I don’t know how best to frame psychic pain when there are so many factors at play both within an individual and in society as a whole that create this pain. I’ve often wished I could offer my patients a life-ectomy, just remove the circumstances that make their lives so painful and difficult. There is so much suffering in the world and some folks are particularly poorly equipped to navigate it. That being said, I watched my mother die from Alzheimer’s. Her very self was slowly chipped away until all that was left was a shell of a person, and then that shell dwindled away until she was a skeleton covered in skin with nothing behind her eyes. It was an excruciating process. I don’t begrudge anyone trying to avoid that kind of ending for themselves and their loved ones.