The most difficult decision I ever had to make was to end my first marriage. But the most difficult decision to face and carry out was the decision that it was time for Amelia's suffering to stop. I'm still dealing with the difficulty of that decision three years later.
I was going to say that I can relate to the latter and not the former, but I don't know who Amelia was. I'm assuming a pet (ferret)?
I was initially surprised myself by being surprised to read that the euthanasia decision was more difficult to reach than the decision to divorce. I don't know why that surprised me, other than perhaps the fact that I have no idea how difficult it must be to end a marriage, and that I tend to imagine that everyone is far more capable of doing difficult things than I am.
I think also for the divorce I was able to find a strength I didn't know I had. For Amelia, there was nothing but loss, even as I tried my best to give her every kindness.
Ah, now that makes absolute sense. I can't think of the right word for it, but maybe getting through the difficulty of the divorce (because you knew it was something you had to do to make things better for you) gave you a feeling of "accomplishment" or "satisfaction" (neither of those is right, and only somewhat approximate), but deciding to end Amelia's life leaves you with nothing but a sense of having "done the right thing" and no sense of "satisfaction" or "accomplishment" (or whatever the right word is).
choosing between money and convenience (a job in the finance industry) Vs. a job that theorhetically could be a great learning experience, or utterly awful.
The career decisions are big ones! That's sort of where I am right now. When I took the job I have now, I had to choose between a job that paid $11k less but had subject matter I enjoyed more. Do you find yourself wondering what would have happened had you chosen the other opportunity?
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I was initially surprised myself by being surprised to read that the euthanasia decision was more difficult to reach than the decision to divorce. I don't know why that surprised me, other than perhaps the fact that I have no idea how difficult it must be to end a marriage, and that I tend to imagine that everyone is far more capable of doing difficult things than I am.
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Ah, now that makes absolute sense. I can't think of the right word for it, but maybe getting through the difficulty of the divorce (because you knew it was something you had to do to make things better for you) gave you a feeling of "accomplishment" or "satisfaction" (neither of those is right, and only somewhat approximate), but deciding to end Amelia's life leaves you with nothing but a sense of having "done the right thing" and no sense of "satisfaction" or "accomplishment" (or whatever the right word is).
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;)
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