By Steven Shapiro 
 
 “She said, ‘I’m ready. I’m already only living for others, this is a fact, Mom. I’m only living for other people now. Let me go.’” 
 
 In an exclusive interview with Yahoo Global News Anchor Katie Couric, Deborah Ziegler, author of the new book “Wild and Precious Life,” recounts her personal and profound journey after learning her only child, 29-year-old Brittany Maynard, was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. 
 
 “I just thought, I just want to go with her,” Ziegler says. 
 
 On New Years Eve 2013, Brittany was rushed to the hospital with a debilitating headache. A CT scan showed a large shadow on her brain. 
 
 Ziegler writes that when she approached Brittany in the hospital, her daughter’s first words were numbing. “I’m sorry, Momma,” she said. “I’m not going to be able to take care of you the way you’re taking care of grandpa, I’m not going to live that long.” 
 
 Brittany had her whole future in front of her. She was a Berkeley graduate and had married her husband, Dan Diaz, just a year earlier. 
 
 Following her terminal diagnosis and a surgery that removed less than half of her rapidly growing tumor, Brittany made a decision that would catapult her to the forefront of the death with dignity debate. She chose to move from her home state of California to Oregon where physician-assisted death for terminally ill patients is legal. At the time, it was against the law in California. 
 
 She chose Nov. 1, 2014, as her final day. 
 
 “She woke up and said, ‘Let’s go for a walk,” Ziegler said. “It was just a beautiful day and I couldn’t help myself. I asked, ‘Are you sure today is the day?’ A mom always has to do that. And she said, ‘Yeah, Mom, today is the day.” 
 
 Asked by Couric if the ability to take a walk in the woods indicated it might not be Maynard’s time, Ziegler offered a sobering response. 
 
 “When you’re talking about a terminally ill patient, you have to realize that each death takes its own journey. Brittany was having some very difficult symptoms.” 
 
 She had terrible neck pain. The seizures were terrifying. They were coming closer together. They were more severe. Each seizure was worse than the one before.Sometimes she would just talk gibberish when she came out of the seizure, and we would wonder, ‘Oh my gosh, is she going be able to speak again?’” 
 
 Ziegler says her daughter returned home to her bedroom, where she was joined by family in what she described as the “circle of love.” 
 
 She took her medicine and her last breath as Ziegler read her favorite poem, “The Summer Day,” by Mary Oliver. 
 
 Ziegler has become an advocate for the death with dignity movement. 
 
 “She said, ‘Mom, instead of grandkids, this is what I’m giving you. I can’t give you grandbabies, but I can give you this, to champion the cause of the terminally ill,” Ziegler says. 
 
 Ziegler found an ally in Christy O’Donnell, a terminally ill single mother from California, who was also fighting to die on her own terms. 
 
 Related: California Mom Christy O’Donnell Fights to Die on Her Own Terms 
 
 On Oct. 5, 2015, a day Ziegler describes as bittersweet, Gov. Jerry Brown signed the End of Life Option Act for California,. 
 
 “The law was there and many people were jubilant and happy, including me. But that didn’t bring my daughter back, and so there was that feeling of loss magnified in a way.” 
 
 O’Donnell died four months before the law went into effect. 
 
 A year after her daughter’s death, Ziegler told Couric she honored a request her daughter made months earlier for her to visit Machu Picchu in Peru. 
 
 “I felt her presence,” Ziegler said. “It felt like cleansing. Like washing away everything that was inside of me that was angry and anxious and sad — it was washed away. And I felt like “I’m going to honor my child in the biggest way possible. I’m going live a bigger life because of her. I’m going live a larger life. I’m going be a better person. I’m going to honor her with the rest of my life.” 
 
 In the days preceding publication of Ziegler’s book, Brittany Maynard’s widower, Dan Diaz, who did not participate in the writing of the book, posted a statement on Facebook, which reads, in part: “The book that her mother, Deborah Ziegler, decided to write against Brittany’s instructions, Wild and Precious Life, does not appropriately tell the story of Brittany Maynard.” Diaz, who along with Ziegler, has helped champion the right to die movement, went on to say, “The purpose of this post is simply to convey Brittany’s instructions; it is not to create angst or division. Kindness and Love are what we need more of in this world.” 
 
 Read More ||||| For Dan Diaz, the two years since his wife Brittany Maynard died have been about keeping the promises he made to her — large and small. 
 
 This week he kept a big one. On Monday, word leaked out that Good Universe had optioned the rights to Maynard’s story as well as Diaz’s, who will also be an executive producer on the film. 
 
 Diaz, who has been working full time to get right-to-die legislation passed in several states, had not wanted the news to come out until after the Nov. 8 election but says it’s all part of the same goal-protecting his wife’s legacy and carrying on the work she’d just started doing before she died. 
 
 “It’s a way that I can share the true story of Brittany so that the audience gets the true picture of who she was,” Diaz, 44, tells PEOPLE. “Most importantly, it will help move [aid in dying] legislation forward by sharing the reality of what Brittany was going through and the logic of the decisions she was making, that being her true legacy.” 
 
 Nathan Kahane, co-founder of Good Universe, said: “We are incredibly honored that Dan has entrusted us with helping to tell Brittany’s incredibly courageous and heroic story through film. Dan’s work in honoring his wife’s legacy is truly inspirational and we hope a film brings more awareness to the issue. ” 
 
 Maynard, 29, who had terminal brain cancer, ended her own life on Nov. 1, 2014 with medication prescribed to her by her doctor in Portland, Oregon. She and her husband had moved to the state from California so Maynard could access its Death with Dignity law. 
 
 On Oct. 6, 2014, she launched an online video campaign with Compassion & Choices, an end-of-life choice advocacy group, calling for the laws to be expanded nationwide. She simultaneously gave an exclusive interview to PEOPLE. 
 
 She quickly became the face of the controversial right-to-die movement – and the subject of countless news stories. 
 
 So concerned was Maynard about her story being told the way she wanted it to be told, she sat down with an attorney the week before she died and signed over the rights to her life story to Dan. 
 
 “No one else can tell my story, Dan, except for you,” she told her husband, according to a new statement released by Diaz Friday. “You are the only one that has been here for me the entire time and you are the only one that can share the meaningful private moments that I would want shared.” 
 
 She also told him, “My mother might be the biggest problem regarding protecting my story,” according to the statement. 
 
 Because of her concerns, she made sure to tell her mother, Deborah Ziegler, that she did not want her to write a book about her life, Diaz says. She then prepared a statement for Diaz to release should her mother write a book, anyway. 
 
 Courtesy Compassion & Choices Courtesy Compassion & Choices 
 
 On Oct. 14, Good Housekeeping ran an excerpt of Ziegler’s new book, “Wild and Precious Life,” in which she shares the “mostly untold story” of her daughter’s last year of life, according to Simon & Schuster’s description of the book. 
 
 So Diaz released his late wife’s statement. 
 
 “I love my mother very much, but I don’t want her to be a storyteller about me,” Maynard said. “She’s been a great mom and I wouldn’t be here without her but I don’t want her to write about me. It is not her place to do so.” 
 
 Diaz believes Maynard would not be happy with the way she’s portrayed in the book. 
 
 “Brittany was very specific about how her story should be told and she went to great lengths to prevent her story from being misrepresented,” says Diaz, who says he was not approached for factchecking for Ziegler’s book. 
 
 “I was at Brittany’s side during our time at the rental house in Portland,” he says. “There are dozens of important scenes that were not even included and those are the moments Brittany’s parents weren’t around for because they were absent from the Portland house for weeks at a time. They weren’t there for most of the last week of her life.” 
 
 Ziegler declined to comment to PEOPLE but told the Today Show Monday she was not aware of her daughter’s wishes. 
 
 “When she talked about me working for the cause, she said, ‘Use your strength,’ ” Ziegler told the show. “She never said anything to me about that so I don’t know what to think of this statement except that Brittany said many, many things in those last days, and I again go back to honoring the Brittany who I knew, not the brain tumor Brittany.” 
 
 Paul Olsewski, vice President and director of publicity for Atria Books (which is owned by Simon & Schuster), Ziegler’s publisher, defended the book and its contents in a statement provided to PEOPLE. 
 
 “As we approach the second anniversary of Brittany’s death, WILD AND PRECIOUS is a beautiful tribute to her life and honors Deb’s promise to her to carry forward her legacy and the discussion of death with dignity,” the statement said. “The book recounts a lifetime of experiences, and unless you’ve lived life as Deb has – a mother enduring the loss of her only child – it seems unlikely anyone would be able to know what she experienced.” 
 
 Posting the response to Ziegler’s book is something Diaz did with “a heavy heart,” he says in the statement. 
 
 But with this, as with his work as a consultant for Compassion & Choices, he’s simply making sure he keeps the promises he made to his wife. 
 
 “Brittany shared her story so that terminally ill individuals in her predicament could have the option of applying for medical aid in dying in order to have a gentle dying process without needing to leave their home for another state as we did,” he wrote. “I continue to advocate for this end-of-life option to honor Brittany’s legacy and because I firmly believe in this basic human right.” ||||| Facebook 
 
 Brittany Maynard chose to end her life in November 2014 after fighting terminal brain cancer. The 29-year-old was public with her decision to pursue "death with dignity," and advocated for it for herself and others. Maynard’s mother, Deborah Ziegler wrote a memoir about her daughter’s life and death, Wild and Precious Life, and shared some of it with Cosmopolitan.com recently. 
 
 However, Maynard’s husband, Dan Diaz, took to Facebook to share that Maynard did not want her mom to be the one to tell her story. 
 
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 "No one else can tell my story Dan, except for you," Diaz says Maynard told him. "You are the only one that has been here for me the entire time and you are the only one that can share the meaningful private moments that I would want shared." 
 
 About her mom, Diaz wrote that Maynard said, "I love my mother very much, but I don’t want her to be a storyteller about me. She’s been a great mom and I wouldn’t be here without her, but I don’t want her to write about me. It is not her place to do so." 
 
 He also shared that Maynard told him her mom might be his "biggest problem" when it came to protecting her story, and so gave him sole ownership of her "name, likeness, image, description, voice and life story" in her Will. 
 
 He continued: 
 
 
 
 The book that her mother, Deborah Ziegler, decided to write against Brittany’s instructions, Wild and Precious Life, does not appropriately tell the story of Brittany Maynard. In particular, the scenes from the last 10 months of Brittany’s life obviously reflect Deborah’s own opinions, concerns, and thoughts. Deborah’s book does not speak for Brittany and there are numerous passages that are inaccurate. 
 
 Brittany was very clear about her instructions to me when she communicated the following:“…if she releases ANY kind of statement about me, Dan will release mine. Even after I am gone.” 
 
 The purpose of this post is simply to convey Brittany’s instructions; it is not to create angst or division. Kindness and Love are what we need more of in this world. So please save the harsh or mean-spirited comments. The purpose of this post is to relay the information that Brittany required of me; that she did not support her mother writing a book and feared the contents would be inaccurate. 
 
 I will continue to keep my promise to Brittany of ensuring that her story will be told truthfully and preventing it from being misrepresented by sharing an authentic account of her love of life and determination through the medium of film. By conveying the reality of what Brittany was enduring and providing insight into the decisions that she was making the audience will come to know the real story of Brittany Maynard. 
 
 A film will go a long way of honoring Brittany’s legacy and helping my continued efforts of passing legislation so that terminally ill individuals in her predicament will have the option of a gentle passing in their own state. 
 
 Diaz, who currently works full time to get right-to-die legislation passed in several states, didn’t want to share the info about the film until after the November 8th election, but felt it was necessary to speak out. 
 
 “It’s a way that I can share the true story of Brittany so that the audience gets the true picture of who she was,” he told People. “Most importantly, it will help move [aid in dying] legislation forward by sharing the reality of what Brittany was going through and the logic of the decisions she was making, that being her true legacy.” 
 
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– When 29-year-old Brittany Maynard took her own life in a physician-assisted suicide in 2014, it brought an end to her own role in a national debate about the right of terminally ill patients to choose the terms of their own death. Now, Maynard's mother is continuing her daughter's quest for right-to-die legislation with a new book about her daughter's journey, Wild and Precious Life. The book, however, is making headlines for another reason as well—Maynard's widower doesn't think Deborah Ziegler should have written it, Cosmopolitan reports. In a post shared on Facebook, Dan Diaz writes that Maynard told him, "No one else can tell my story Dan, except for you." He has criticized the book as inaccurate and colored by Ziegler's own "opinions, concerns, and thoughts." Diaz says his wife told him that while she loved her mother dearly, she did not want Ziegler to tell her story. He is working to share his wife's story in a film, a medium he believes is more suited to the story. Publisher Atria Books defends the book, saying it honors Ziegler's promise to her daughter to push for right-to-die progress, reports People. Ziegler herself, meanwhile, talks about Maynard in an interview with Katie Couric at Yahoo News. “She said, ‘Mom, instead of grandkids, this is what I’m giving you. I can’t give you grandbabies, but I can give you this, to champion the cause of the terminally ill.'" (This teen decided to end her treatment after a special "last dance.")