In Love: A Memoir of Love and Loss

Content Warning: The source text deals with issues including terminal illness, assisted suicide, and mental health deterioration, including references to depression and anxiety.

In Love traces Amy Bloom and Brian Ameche’s work with the Swiss nonprofit organization Dignitas in the wake of Brian’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Brian is in his mid-sixties and doesn’t want to end his life prematurely. However, he tells Bloom and his Dignitas representative, “I’d rather end it while I am still myself, rather than become less and less of a person” (24). His statement captures The Struggle for Autonomy and Dignity in the face of an incurable, progressive disease. Respecting his wishes, Bloom begins to research right-to-die laws and assisted suicide options in the US but soon discovers that the process is intentionally obstructive: “Right to die in America is about as meaningful as the right to eat or the right to decent housing; you’ve got the right, but it doesn’t mean you’re going to get the goods” (115). In the US, she explains, nominal legal progress has been made in this arena. States including California, Colorado, Oregon, Vermont, Montana, New Jersey, Maine, Hawaii, and Washington allow physician-assisted dying (51).