When death becomes a show: Noelia's last hours on TV sets, with an ode to assisted suicide

Noelia's death is a failure. It is a personal failure, a family failure and, finally and above all, a social failure. Noelia will say goodbye after a very hard life, in which there were faint brushstrokes of happiness left in her childhood, which even in her last moments she remembers fondly. Noelia's story is one of suffering, hard knocks, pain, misunderstanding and loneliness. It is, in short, the ideal argument for the self-proclaimed defenders of so-called "death with dignity" to capitalize on and share with the public to sell the "supreme happiness" of ending it all.

Her last hours have been spent on TV sets, trying to explain why she is leaving like this. The media, once again, have been vultures, feeding on morbidity, on the pain of others to gain views ... and to pave the way (or make the slope steeper, in this case) for the agenda of death.

A made-up Noelia, serene, even cheerful, talking about her life and her decision. A tearful spectacle from which her father, the great fighter to keep his daughter alive, comes off as an alcoholic and a radical who doesn't really care about Noelia.

"I have always felt alone, even before asking for euthanasia I already saw my world as very dark"; "I don't feel like doing anything, not going out, not eating, and sleeping is very difficult for me, apart from the fact that I have back and leg pain"; "I have made it, and let's see if I can finally rest, I can't take it anymore"; "I will put on my makeup and my most beautiful dress." These were some of her final words, spoken on Antena 3, one of the largest mass media channels in Spain.

"I'll put on my makeup and my most beautiful dress."

No one can't judge Noelia. She is a 25-year-old girl with an experience of suffering that would silence anyone. No one would want to go through what she has gone through since her teenage years. Few would be able to cope with it: financial problems at home, a broken family, separation of parents, a traumatic shared custody, guardianship by the authorities, internment in centers for minors under the tutelage of the Catalan government... and finally gang rape.

Noelia suffers from two diagnosed psychological disorders: borderline personality disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder, with paranoid and suicidal thoughts. She also suffers from injuries caused by her suicide attempt in 2022, the most recent one, since she had already attempted it previously on other occasions, after suffering a gang rape. Noelia threw herself from the fifth floor, but did not die. Instead, she suffered severe injuries that further affect her day-to-day life:

"Complete spinal cord injury at L3 level with partial sensory preservation zone L4 due to L1 fracture, sensory alteration below the level of the injury both at tactile and argeal sensitivity, with abolished lower extremity atrokinetics, neuropathic pain requiring pharmacological treatment, neurogenic bowel with fecal incontinence and neurogenic bladder requiring probing every six hours to be able to perform urination."

As a result, Noelia now has a "functional dependence associated with deficits: movement in a wheelchair that she can propel through adapted environments and a precarious walking ability for adapted interiors with a walker and two splints."

A scenario that practically guaranteed a "win-win" for promoters of euthanasia.

This is an extreme situation like all those that have been used to defend the supposed right to death. Abortionists are real experts in making use of truculent and borderline stories in order to extend the assumptions and deadlines for carrying out the procedure.

In fact, they are trying to move the debate to the approval of Noelia's euthanasia for the "unbearable psychological suffering and post-traumatic stress" she suffers instead of for the physical injuries and dependence caused by the suicide attempt. This is not a trivial debate.

"'Psychic suffering' has proven to be the key loophole in abortion law, given the impossibility of objectively quantifying what 'unbearable psychic suffering' is."

Noelia's case also presents the peculiarity that the applicant has reaffirmed with her own words her wish to die, and it has been the family, especially the father, together with the association Christian Lawyers who has raised the judicial battle. The war was raised along with the lost emotional story, and they have tried to make clear a key point that, in the public eye, has not ceased to be a technicality: the death of Noelia is not euthanasia.

This is how Polonia Castellanos, president of the Christian association that has accompanied the family in this two-year process to prevent Noelia's death, has tried to explain it: we are not dealing with "an aid to die for someone who is in a critical situation, but an assisted suicide."

Another of the points they have clung to is Noelia's mental health. She, according to the parents' defense, "has no ability to control her emotions, suffers from loss of emotional control and impulsivity, strong changes in mood, instability of interpersonal relationships and self-image, as well as repetitive thoughts and behaviors that do not make sense."

In other words, she would not meet the requirements of having "full use of her faculties" required by the legislation. The courts did not agree with this assessment. In fact, one of the arguments made by the defense is that no independent professional has psychologically evaluated Noelia, since she has refused.

"No independent professional has psychologically evaluated Noelia."

It should be noted that, according to Christian Lawyers, "upon reaching the Commission of Guarantee and Evaluation of Catalonia in July, the case generated disagreement in the committee between the doctor and the jurist initially commissioned. For this reason, the case had to go to the Plenary of the Commission. This body is made up of members appointed directly by the autonomous government, many of them with clearly pro-euthanasia views, who ultimately ratified the authorization unanimously, scheduling the date for Aug. 2, 2024."

The media routinely leaves out the father's biggest complaint: that his daughter has been granted euthanasia but is not being treated for depression or her psychiatric problems.

The meaning of suffering is one of the great mysteries of human nature. The fear of it conditions us from birth, and the introduction of euthanasia as the ultimate escape from pain is a greedy and poisoned gift to abound in that field.