Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 25, 1990 TAG: 9004250665
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MIDDLEBURG LENGTH: Medium
The twin daughters long expected the deaths, which came Sunday from an apparent overdose of pills.
Justin DeWitt Bowersock and his wife of 60 years, Betty Bruce Van Antwerp Bowersock, were found in their home alongside two carefully labeled bottles of Darvocet and Seconal. The couple, both 82, had enhanced the drugs' effects with alcohol.
Their daughters and friends said the suicide was not a tragedy. It was instead the successful conclusion of two good lives and one careful plan.
"We're fine," Carol Bowersock told The Washington Post. "One of the reasons we are so fine is that we discussed this openly with them for years. When the time came that the quality of their lives was no longer the same and wasn't going to get better, they were going to, as mother said, call it a day."
According to their daughters, the Bowersocks joined the Hemlock Society 20 years ago, subscribing to its belief in a life and death of one's own choosing. A chosen death, its members say, can be easier on the dying and kinder to the living.
The end began last May when Justin Bowersock, a retired Washington banker, suffered the first of a series of small strokes that impaired his short-term memory, speech and balance.
Then he injured his back in a fall that put him in bed most of the time. In September, his wife's emphysema forced her to give up tennis.
"Mother said she wanted no goodbyes of any sort," said Frances Bowersock.
The daughters saw their parents for the last time Saturday morning. There will be no funeral or a memorial service after the cremation.
Their parents' candor over the years "has made this so easy for us," said Carol Bowersock. "We are left with no guilt," Frances Bowersock said. "Nothing's been left unsaid. Even though we didn't know the exact date, we had plenty of time."
by CNB