“The very first thing that they had to say was definitely wrong…‘First of all, I am beautiful and have beautiful soul.’ ” writes the late Yuri Hayashi, ALS patient

By Barrier Free Japan

August 17 2020

It was reported on Thursday 24 July 2020, that two doctors were arrested by the Kyoto Prefectural Police for allegedly murdering a woman who had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, at the patient’s request. 

The deceased, a woman aged 51 named Yuri Hayashi, ran a blog and a Twitter account.

On September 23 2018, Hayashi posted a blog titled “Beautiful soul”. In it Hayashi relays a story about emailing someone about a shared love of sumo, during which the email correspondent describes Hayashi as a ‘beautiful soul’ and Hayashi wonders what that might mean:

“I can’t quite meet friends living far away, but I love watching sports, so I always e-mail each other about the athletes I care about.

A friend of mine talked to me, a beginner of sumo, about the strengths of their favorite wrestler.

While writing the email, I also wanted to write about my good points, and the next day the email was sent.

What they wrote overestimated a lot about me, but the very first thing that they had to say was definitely wrong, even though they were smart:

“First of all, I am beautiful and have beautiful soul.”

I wondered if I was far away, “What is a beautiful soul…?”

If you have such a disease “What are humans? What is life? What is life?”

I always think about such things. I used to be a better person when I was fine, but I was able to do anything better…

I have an inconvenient body, and I’m becoming more and more annoying because of the stress. So what is a beautiful soul? I thought.

The image suddenly came to my mind.

Thanks to the patients I met through this blog and Twitter.

A beautiful soul is a soul that wants to live! I think that a pure soul is the power that wants to live when people and other things are scraped off. I felt it was a beautiful soul.

Unfortunately I can’t say I’m beautiful.

Various desires and dissatisfactions are filming.

They said that a body that cannot do anything by itself is not human life. They say that they don’t like being alive.

However, such a weak person seems to be human.

I wonder if that’s me.“