In 2015 Matt Vickers supported his wife, Lecretia Seales, in her campaign to gain the right to choose how she died. In his first book, Lecretia’s Choice: A Story of Love, Death and the Law, Matt tells the story of their life together, and how it changed when his proud, fiercely independent wife was diagnosed with a brain tumour and forced to confront her own mortality. The death she faced—slow, painful, dependent—was completely at odds with how she had lived her life. Lecretia wanted to die with dignity, to be able to say goodbye well, and not to suffer unnecessarily—but the law denied her that choice. With her characteristic spirit, Lecretia decided to mount a challenge in New Zealand’s High Court, but as the battle raged, her strength faded.
Lecretia’s Choice: A Story of Love, Death and the Law is not only a moving love story but compulsory reading for everyone who cares about the dignity we afford terminally ill people who want to die on their own terms. It is published by Text Publishing.