Summary

Chapter 4 is titled “Our Condolences to the Shastri-Persson Family.” It opens with a statement from the Dava Shastri Foundation's social media account. Dava is frustrated by the need to decide if she should justify her actions to her children. She thinks back to the day of the diagnosis. She realized she was going to become helpless, leaving the children to argue over what to do. She was not afraid of death but feared that slow decline she had witnessed Arvid endure. She decided on an end-of-life plan instead of treatment. She set out to “schedule her death as if it were just another important appointment” (42). She had been a philanthropist but also lived a full life. She wondered how the media would react to news of her death. That prompted her to come up with a plan for assisted suicide. She tries to...