“They say that what you do for yourself is gone when you are gone,” Dan Diaz tells PEOPLE. “But what you do for other people, that is what lives on”
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Brittany Maynard galvanized a national discussion about the “right to die with dignity” movement when she ended her life while dying of terminal cancer
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A decade later, her widower, Dan Diaz, talks to PEOPLE about Maynard’s impact on the world and how he has continued to advocate like she would have wanted
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“I miss her every day,” he says
It’s been 10 years since Dan Diaz’s wife, Brittany Maynard, ended her life after being diagnosed with terminal cancer, galvanizing a national debate about the “right to die with dignity” movement.
In that decade, Diaz, 53, has been moving forward with their work together — now looking back, he sounds surprised at how fast the time has passed.
“How has 10 years flown by so quickly?” he tells PEOPLE in an interview from the San Francisco Bay Area. “I mean, there are just moments from our lives together. This is the house that Brittany and I bought together, or our wedding day, and I think it’s like, ‘No, that just happened,’ I remember very vividly.”
Maynard died at the age of 29 on Nov. 1, 2014, after sharing her story with the world: Diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, she elected not to move forward with treatment as she believed that would decrease her quality of life in her remaining months alive.
“My [cancer] is going to kill me, and it’s a terrible, terrible way to die. So to be able to die with my family with me, to have control of my own mind, which I would stand to lose — to go with dignity is less terrifying,” Maynard told PEOPLE at the time.
She and Diaz, however, had to first move from their Bay Area home to Oregon, one of the few states at the time providing legal access to medically-assisted suicide in certain cases.
Related: Brittany Maynard’s Husband Imagines Holidays with the Kids They Wanted to Have Before Her Death
Diaz can still easily recall his late wife’s myriad doctor appointments and the day she had brain surgery, “navigating the chaos that cancer brings into your world,” he says.
And he is also choosing to remember the victories, small and large, he’s had on the legislative front, helping others to attain what he calls their own “autonomy” while sick with terminal illness.
“We passed California just a year after the following year after Brittany died,” Diaz says, referring to the state’s End of Life Option Act. “Gov. Jerry Brown signed our legislation in California in October of 2015. And then after that, introducing our bill, we got to pass in Colorado and then D.C. and New Jersey — and Maine and New Mexico, Hawaii.”
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“When I reflect on it, when I think about all the time, energy, and effort that obviously not just me, but Compassion & Choices [the Colorado nonprofit Diaz works alongside] and all the volunteers and all the terminally ill individuals that show up, it’s like, ‘Yeah, of course it’s been 10 years,’ “ Diaz says. “I mean, look at all the stuff that we’ve worked on and accomplished.”
Even when he comes across people who live in states where the legislation will likely never pass, Diaz has forged a connection through Maynard.
“There’s one guy from Texas and he remembers Brittany’s story, and he’s like, ‘Oh my god, I’m so supportive of this, and what do you think? When can we pass this in Texas?’ And I’m like, ‘Buddy, that’s not happening. I’m sorry, but that’s not happening,’ ” Diaz says.
He continues, recalling the man’s reality — not so dissimilar from the one he and Maynard faced in 2014.
“He says, ‘I’m going to have to move to Oregon or California or some other state. I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s probably your reality.’ And he’s just upset at that,” Diaz says.
Medically assisted dying for terminal patients remains controversial, with critics arguing it could be abused, although research has also shown it is supported by a majority of Americans.
Since Maynard died, her widower and other advocates have worked to expand access to what they call end of life options: California, Colorado, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont and Washington now all allow it under certain circumstances.
Ten years on, Diaz pushes on.
“I miss her every day and I continue doing what I’m doing because this is the promise that I made to her, and for me, that is very important,” he says.
“They say that what you do for yourself is gone when you are gone. But what you do for other people, that is what lives on in your legacy. And so Brittany’s legacy is precisely that.”
