Remembering Lynda Bluestein

Lynda Bluestein died this morning, in Vermont.

The longtime active member of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Westport won a lawsuit last year that allowed her — despite being a non-resident — to use the state’s medical aid in dying statute.

Lynda suffered from ovarian and fallopian tube cancer. Her condition worsened this week. Yesterday, her husband Paul drove her to a hospice in Vermont, where she had made arrangements for her death.

Lynda’s legacy will live on in many ways. She was a dedicated voice against gun violence. She has advocated for a Connecticut medical aid in dying law.

Lynda Bluestein yesterday, before traveling to Vermont. (Photo courtesy of News12 Connecticut)

Last year she helped place wind phones — disconnected telephones that allow loved ones and friends to “call” people who have died — throughout the area.

A ceremony at the Westport Library — the first such indoor space for a wind phone in the world — drew dozens of friends and admirers.

Here is the “06880” report of that event:

=================================================

Lynda Shannon Bluestein’s fight against fallopian tube cancer — and her battle to end her life on her own terms — has inspired many people.

Earlier this year, the longtime member of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Westport reached a settlement with the state of Vermont. She will be the first non-resident to take advantage of a law that allows people with terminal illnesses to end their own lives.

At 76, she is now in hospice care. Time is short. But Lynda continues to inspire friends and strangers, in many ways.

And — as she has done for decades — she continues to give back to Westport.

In a brief ceremony this Wednesday (December 13, 10 a.m.), the Westport Library will accept Lynda’s donation of 2 wind phones.

One will be housed in the Children’s Library. The other will be available through the Library of Things.

Lynda Bluestein’s wind phone at the Library of Things …

Wind phones are physical objects, but also very spiritual. Originally from Japan, they are disconnected phones — a way to stay connected to loved ones who have died.

Garden designer Itaru Sasaki created the first wind phone in 2010, to help cope with his cousin’s death. “Because my thoughts could not be relayed over a regular phone line, I wanted them to be carried on the wind,” he explained.

It was opened to the public the following year, after an earthquake and tsunami killed over 15,000 people. It has received over 30,000 visitors.

Since then, wind phones have been created in several US states, from parks to front lawns.

Lynda donated a wind phone in Ridgefield. Its plaque says:

This phone will never ring. It is connected by love to nowhere and everywhere. It is for those who have an empty place in the heart left by a loved one. Say hello, say goodbye. Talk of the past, the present, the future. The wind phone will carry your message.

Though wind phones are often located in nature, those donated by Lynda and her family to the Library are different: Both will be available to all to use, and check out.

The first ones to be placed in a library, they will be available early next year.

… and in the Children’s Library.

Lynda chose the Westport Library because “it feels like the heart of a community my husband and I have been part of for 30 years. When we moved to Connecticut from California, we gravitated here.

“But mostly, I was interested in doing something that has never been tried before anywhere in the world: a wind phone to check out from the Library.”

The solitude and accessibility of the library setting were also draws.

“So many wind phones in the US are in parks or on hiking trails in remote and often inaccessible areas,” she says.

“When people lose someone they love and have loved for decades, it feels strange to go out alone — except to a library, where that feels completely normal.”

The Library’s wind phones will be accompanied by recommended reading for both children and adults, plus a dedicated resource guide.

“It’s important that these wind phones be available and accessible to the community,” says Agata Slattery, the Library’s development director who worked with Lynda on the donation.

“We want these to be a source of comfort and solace, and of course a lasting testament to Lynda’s generosity and bravery.”

==================================================

In February 2022, Lynda wrote an opinion piece in CT Mirror, urging Connecticut’s General Assembly to approve a Medical Aid in Dying law. She said:

My medical records declare that I am a cancer survivor – twice over no less. I got through treatment for breast cancer and malignant melanoma feeling confident and grateful. But in March 2021, I was diagnosed with late-stage Fallopian tube cancer. It is very rare. It is also the most lethal type of gynecologic cancer.

With my diagnosis has come a resolve to put in place a plan for living what I now think of as my ‘short shelf life.’

I am using what time I have left to do the things I’ve always wanted to do—and one of them is to advocate for medical aid in dying, aka MAID. I simply want the right to have a say in the timing and manner of my death when I reach the point where my disease or the pain and suffering it causes robs me of the quality of life that is essential to me.

I have witnessed bad deaths – my mom’s and my dad’s. My mother, who also had cancer, died in my arms, in a too-large hospital bed, suffering and frightened. Five years after mom passed, I sat at the bedside of my father as he gasped for air and went in and out of consciousness. Neither of my parents wanted their precious final hours to turn out the way they did. I don’t want that for me either.

It has taken me getting sick to realize that having agency over the circumstances surrounding my own death is going to require me to get busy. Really busy, because I live in Connecticut, a state whose lawmakers have turned their backs on this issue for two decades and I am running out of time.

Lynda Bluestein and her husband Paul. (Photo courtesy of NBC Connecticut)

Without passage of enabling legislation, I will have two choices when my life is near its end – stay in Connecticut and have no say in my own dying, or pack my bags and head to Vermont, establish residency, find new doctors, and arrange for hospice care and then complete the paperwork required to invoke Act 39, Vermont’s medical aid in dying law.

Recently, on February 1, my state representative and co-chair of the Judiciary Committee, Steve Stafstrom, held a 2022 Legislative Session Preview on ZOOM. I, of course, registered to attend since I know that for the 27th consecutive year there will be another attempt at getting a Medical Aid in Dying (MAID) bill to the floor of the Connecticut General Assembly for a vote.

One constituent ahead of me asked about this MAID bill. Steve responded by saying that yes, the bill would again be raised in the Public Health Committee. I then added a comment in the ZOOM chat regarding how the 2021 version of this bill had finally gotten out of the Public Health Committee for the first time in 26 years, but when it was sent to the Judiciary Committee that Steve co-chairs, it died, full stop.

Steve read my comment, then launched into an argument that opponents of medical aid in dying legislation use as a scare tactic that has no basis in fact – words to the effect that ‘peoples’ life insurance policies could be put in jeopardy if they die by suicide.’.

This is just a politically convenient way of “having concerns” about the proposed legislation which most people in Connecticut support. The truth is not complicated.

Fact 1: If there is a clear case of MAID (medical assistance in dying) where both health preconditions (terminal disease/palliative condition) AND legal requirements are met, life insurance companies will pay claims in full – it does not matter how long the policy was in place.

Fact 2: If a suicide (by any method or means) happens more than two years after getting a life insurance policy, the life insurance policy will pay out death benefit to the policy’s beneficiaries. State Representative Steve Stafstrom is either ill-informed about standard life insurance exclusionary clauses or is passing along information he knows to be inaccurate.

Representative Stafstrom is not only my state rep, but he’s also a neighbor. He has acknowledged his Catholic faith as part of his reluctance to support MAID legislation in Connecticut. But a lot of his constituents, me included, don’t share those concerns about end-of-life decision making.

I want the same choices that adults in 10 states and Washington, D.C. – 20% of the U.S. population – have now. This is about my life and my death — not his. Shouldn’t this also be my choice?