Terri Schiavo

[Cayo Hueso]

I don't know if anyone has been following this, but its really getting out of hand.  This poor girl has been a vegetable for about 15 years now.  Every time there's hope that she'll be allowed to go, Jeb and his cronies step in and try and create a new law to keep the tube from being removed.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/03/18/schia ... index.html

Last-ditch bid in right-to-die case
House committee to issue subpoena to stop removal of feeding tube
Friday, March 18, 2005 Posted: 9:19 AM EST (1419 GMT)

 
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Employing an "extraordinary congressional" maneuver, House Republican leadership early Friday made a last-ditch effort to keep doctors from removing Terri Schiavo's feeding tube.

Schiavo is scheduled to have her feeding tube removed at 1 p.m. today, under court order.

"Later this morning, we will issue a subpoena, which will require hospice administrators and attending physicians to preserve nutrition and hydration for Terri Schiavo to allow Congress to fully understand the procedures and practices that are currently keeping her alive," a statement from the House Republican leadership said.

That statement was released by House Speaker Dennis Hastert, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Government Reform Committee Chairman Tom Davis. Details of the subpoena were not immediately clear and it was not revealed whom it actually targeted.

"The Committee on Government Reform has initiated an inquiry into the long- term care of incapacitated adults, an issue of growing importance to the federal government and federal healthcare policy," the statement said.

"This inquiry should give hope to Terri, her parents and friends, and the millions of people throughout the world who are praying for her safety. This fight is not over."

The statement also said there will be a Senate investigation as well.

In 1990, when she was 26, Terri Schiavo collapsed in her home and suffered severe brain damage when oxygen to her brain was interrupted for five minutes. Lower courts have ruled that she is in a "persistent vegetative" state.

Since then, she has been at the heart of a legal tug-of-war between her parents and her husband, who have have been fighting over whether to keep her on life support. Her husband, Michael Schivao, wants her feeding tube removed.

Subpoena tried before
Regarding the subpoena, Ron Bonjean, a spokesman for Hastert, said: "We're on very comfortable ground that we have a federal interest in long-term care."

Five years ago, the same House committee issued a subpoena for 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez with the goal of preventing federal immigration officials from returning the refugee to Cuba.

Rep. Dan Burton, R-Indiana, who was then chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, said the subpoena would "provide a measure of legal protection while the court is considering this case." While the tactic was never tested because court action delayed Elian's deportation for months, it remained a potential delaying device.

In Schiavo's case, the U.S. Supreme Court late Thursday rejected an emergency appeal by her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, to stop the removal of her feeding tube, while legislation that would keep her alive appeared to stall in Florida's legislature and in Congress.

"The family's attorney will be in the hospice this morning with the subpoenas," Randall Terry, a lobbyist for Schiavo's parents and president of the anti-abortion group Society for Truth and Justice, told CNN Radio.

"And if anyone tries to remove Terri's feeding tube, he's going to say, 'Look, I've got a subpoena here from the federal government, and if you do that, you'll be in for a big lawsuit and you might be in the criminal case as well.' "

Friday morning, protesters were beginning to gather outside the Clearwater, Florida, hospice where Schiavo lives.

Other legal moves
On another front, the Florida Supreme Court rejected a request for a stay by the state's Department of Children and Family Services, citing a lack of jurisdiction. The agency had argued that it needed time to investigate allegations of abuse by Schiavo's guardian, her husband Michael.

In Washington, the U.S. Senate passed a narrower version of a House bill that would give federal courts jurisdiction in Schiavo's case. The House on Wednesday passed a broader bill that would give federal courts jurisdiction, not only for the Schiavo case, but for disabled people in similar conditions.

With the House already recessed for Easter, it appeared that a compromise bill would not make its way to President Bush's desk, because there was not enough time to reconcile the differences.

Schiavo's husband, Michael, contends his wife would not want to be kept alive artificially. But her parents argue she had no such death wish and believe she can get better with rehabilitation.

Both sides have been embroiled in a legal wrangle over whether Schiavo should live or die. Schiavo did not leave anything in writing about what she would want if she ever became incapacitated.

Over the years, courts have sided with her husband in more than a dozen cases.

Her feeding tube has been removed twice before, most recently in 2003. That year, Gov. Jeb Bush pushed a law through the Florida Legislature that authorized him to resume the woman's feedings six days after a court stopped them. The law was later ruled unconstitutional by the Florida Supreme Court.

I cannot believe in the immortality of the soul.... No, all this talk of an existence for us, as individuals, beyond the grave is wrong. It is born of our tenacity of life -- our desire to go on living -- our dread of coming to an end.
--Thomas Edison, American inventor

[Anonymous]

http://northlouisiana.cox.net/cci/newsn ... =D88UDCJ00

Bush Changing Schedule to Return to Washington to Sign Emergency Legislation on Schiavo Case  
 
 
President Bush arrives in Waco, Texas at the Texas State Technical College airport at the end of a day of selling his Social Security reform proposals in Florida, Friday, March 18, 2005. Bush travels on to his ranch in Waco, Texas, for the remainder of the weekend. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
03-19-2005 7:47 PM
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer

CRAWFORD, Texas --  President Bush is changing his schedule to return to the White House on Sunday to be in place to sign emergency legislation that would shift the case of a brain-damaged Florida woman to federal courts, the White House said Saturday.

"Everyone recognizes that time is important here," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said. "This is about defending life."

After Terri Schiavo's feeding tube was removed on Friday, members of Congress worked out a deal to pass legislation to allow federal courts to decide the 41-year-old woman's fate and _ in the hopes of supporters of the woman's parents _ restore the tube that was keeping her alive.

The House and Senate hoped to act on the legislation Sunday, so Bush decided he needed to be in Washington so he could immediately sign the bill, McClellan said.

"The president intends to sign legislation as quickly as possible once it is passed," McClellan said.

During previous travels, Bush has had legislation flown to him overnight by military plane for his signature. But in this case, McClellan said that the fact that a woman's life is at stake made it necessary for him to travel to the bill.

"Terri Schiavo's feeding tube has been removed and we stand with ... all those who are working to defend her life," he said.

Bush was spending the weekend at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, arriving there Friday night after a day traveling in Florida to pitch his plans to overhaul Social Security.

On Monday, he was to leave from Texas for a two-day trip in the West to continue pitching his Social Security proposals. Now, McClellan said, he would likely keep his Social Security appearances but depart for them from Washington instead.

On Wednesday, Bush is due to host Mexican President Vicente Fox and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin at his ranch, and there was no indication that would change.

He was then to spend the rest of the Easter week before returning to Washington March 28.

McClellan said that Bush had not talked with any members of Congress Saturday about the case, but was kept apprised by his staff. He dismissed any suggestion that there were any political considerations at work, either in the quick and aggressive congressional action or the president's hurried return to the White House.

The Senate convened briefly Saturday evening to give formal permission for the House to meet Sunday, when it otherwise would be adjourned for the Easter recess.

The plan is for the House to act on the two-page bill Sunday or just after midnight Monday morning. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said the Senate then would act on the House legislation, assuming it passes the House as envisioned.


Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[Anonymous]

This situation is SO pissing me off.
  Her life (and death) is between HER and her HUSBAND!   EVERYONE ELSE (including her parents, the courts, government, etc.) need to BUTT OUT!
  (By the way, I am a Christian.  It's people like those protesters shown on the News at her Hospice location that give Christians a bad rap)

[Anonymous]

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/03/22/Colum ... tten.shtml

With all laws flattened, where will we hide?

By HOWARD TROXLER, Times Columnist
Published March 22, 2005

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The end justifies the means.

When you have enough power, you can tell the courts to get lost, you can overrule the self-government of an entire state, you can obliterate the rule of law.

It does not matter that Florida's courts ruled that Terri Schiavo expressed the wish not to be kept alive artificially. We are entitled to ignore court rulings.

Neither does it matter that the doctors say that her brain has largely turned to fluid. We may dismiss these facts with a wave of the hand, or a sound bite on CNN.

Congress knows all. The federal government knows all. The strutting Tom DeLay and the unctuous Bill Frist know more than all the judges and doctors combined.

They are cynically armed with their internal memo about how many votes they are going to get out of the Christians. Some members of Congress speechified without knowing how to pronounce Terri Schiavo's name, or the most basic facts.

Tom DeLay's conduct is odious. He represents everything bad about Congress. His principal pastime is raising large amounts of money from wicked people in return for hurting the public good.

The notion that Tom DeLay of Texas is entitled to usurp Florida's rule of law with the claim of being morally superior is akin to Bill Clinton coming down to lecture us on marital fidelity.

On top of that, anyone in the way of these half-witted bombasts is a devil. It is not possible that Michael Schiavo might actually believe he is doing what Terri wanted - no. He is a murderer. It is not possible Judge George Greer actually made what he thought was the correct legal decision - he is "merciless."

If you are cheering because Congress acted in the midnight hour to "save" Terri, be sure of what you are cheering for.

You are applauding a Congress for throwing out the rulings of the courts, throwing out the due process of the states, and substituting its own will.

The difference between me and so-called "conservatives" is that when I say the power of government is a dangerous beast to be feared, I actually mean it.

Let me ask you a question.

Let's say that the next president is ... Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I know, I know. But just say.

Do you also believe that ol' Hil should have the power to wipe out the rulings of the courts and the states, with the wave of her magic wand?

No?

Then maybe you are clinging to a very foolish belief. Maybe you believe that the government will trample over the courts only when you agree. Well, good luck.

There was an Englishman named Thomas More. He is most famous for refusing to approve Henry VIII's divorce, and paying for his principles with his head.

In the play about More's life titled A Man for All Seasons , More debates a character named Roper, who wants to ignore the law to fight evil:

Roper: So now you'd give the devil the benefit of law?

More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the devil?

Roper: Yes, I'd cut down every tree in England to do that.

More: Oh, and when the last law was down and the devil turned 'round on you where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws from coast to coast, man's laws not God's, and if you cut them down - and you're just the man to do it - do you really think that you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the devil the benefit of the law, for my own safety's sake.


For the sake of headlines and self-righteousness, the U.S. Congress waited until the final seconds of a yearslong, agonizing legal process to say that our law does not count. Many well-meaning people are cheering. And so one more tree falls.

* * *

My e-mail address is troxler@sptimes.com My telephone number is 727 893-8505. I will be delighted to hear and read anything intelligent you have to say about this case. Helpful hint: Personal insults or calling me "liberal" for opposing the power of government don't count.

[Anonymous]

Florida officials move again to intervene in Schiavo case
Wednesday, March 23, 2005 Posted: 5:01 PM EST (2201 GMT)


 
Florida Gov. Jeb Bush announces a new legal filing in the Terri Schiavo case.
     
http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/03/ ... index.html
 
TALLAHASSEE, Florida (CNN) -- Florida authorities have filed a new request to intervene in the case of brain-damaged Florida woman Terri Schiavo, arguing that new information suggests her condition may have been misdiagnosed, Gov. Jeb Bush said Wednesday.

A neurologist who reviewed Schiavo's medical records for the state Department of Children and Families indicated that she is "most likely in a state of minimal consciousness," rather than the persistent vegetative state previous doctors have diagnosed, Bush said.

The doctor reviewed Schiavo's medical records, watched videotapes and observed her at the hospice, but was not able to personally examine her, state officials said.

"This new information raises serious concerns and warrants immediate action," Bush said.

The request comes amid last-ditch efforts to restore a feeding tube for Schiavo, who suffered severe brain damage in 1990 after heart failure linked to an eating disorder. Schiavo, now 41, has been at the center of a legal and moral tug-of-war between her husband, Michael, and her parents for years.

The governor's announcement came as federal appeals court in Atlanta rejected her parents' latest attempt to obtain a federal court order restoring the feeding tube.

Earlier Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit in Atlanta denied the Schindlers' emergency request to restore the tube in a 2-1 vote.

On Monday, President Bush, explaining his signing of a bill moving the case from state courts to federal courts, said, "This is an extra sad case, and I believe in a case such as this, the legislative branch, the executive branch ought to err on the side of life, which we have. And now we'll watch the courts make their decisions."

Florida courts, which also reviewed medical records and videotapes, previously have rejected arguments put forth by doctors retained by Schiavo's parents that she is not in a persistent vegetative state.

Michael Schiavo insists that his wife would never want to continue to live in her condition -- what Florida courts have deemed a persistent vegetative state.

People in such a condition cannot think, speak or respond to commands and are not aware of their surroundings.

Terri Schiavo collapsed in her home in 1990, suffering from heart failure that led to severe brain damage. Michael Schiavo said his wife suffered from bulimia that resulted in a potassium deficiency, triggering the heart failure.

The Schindlers said because of the absence of a living will, or written document, clearly spelling out her wishes, their daughter's due process rights have been violated. They said her Roman Catholic faith would prevent her from wanting to die this way.

They also contend that their daughter's condition could improve with treatment.

Court rulings have held that Michael Schiavo is his wife's legal guardian and has the right to make decisions regarding her care.

Terri Schiavo's feeding tube was removed Friday.

[Cynthia]

Even though I agree with her husband, her parents had her for so many more years. I wonder why he didn't give them power of attorney? I wish they would change the laws.
I think it is sick to have her die from lack of food. We should be allowed to have an injection like our dying pets do.
Jack Kovorkeon is a hero. He helped dying people end their suffering, quickly.

Did Terri Schiavo die yet? This whole ordeal is so upsetting. I feel for both sides.

[Anonymous]

On 2005-03-25 19:14:00, Llahsram wrote:

"Even though I agree with her husband, her parents had her for so many more years. I wonder why he didn't give them power of attorney?

Because he maintains that Terri would not have wanted to be kept alive like this.

[equestrienne]

how ironic that there is all this rumpus about keeping a feeding tube in a woman who is likely in this condition because of bulimia.

[Deborah]

Heather Boushey is an economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research  in Washington, DC.

On Friday, a woman in Florida went hungry. Hundreds protested and sent letters to Congress. Congressional leaders became so enraged that they have called a special vote to ensure that this woman is provided with food. Congressional intervention is necessary, they argue, because access to food is her ?constitutional right.?

On Friday, a woman in Florida went hungry. No one protested. The Senate was so indifferent to her and her family?s hunger that they voted down a measure that would have prevented $2.8 billion in cuts to the Food Stamp program over the next five years.

While Congress has spent the past few days making heroic efforts to restore the feeding tubes to Terri Schiavo, a Florida woman who has been in a vegetative state for 15 years, they have also been debating the federal budget. While Terri Schiavo?s case has sparked passion about her right to live ­and her right to health care and food­, there is no passion for the millions of Americans who go hungry every day or the millions more who lack access to basic health care.

President Bush cut his vacation short to return to Washington so he could sign into law legislation that would restore Terri Schiavo?s feeding tubes. Last month, President Bush proposed a budget to Congress that would cut the Food Stamp program by $500 million over the next five years, leaving more than 300,000 low-income people without food assistance every month.
*******

She didn't mention that recently it was decided that the minimum wage would not be increased either. What will those millions do?

[Anonymous]

She's gone.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/03/31/schiavo/index.html

Terri Schiavo has died
Thursday, March 31, 2005 Posted: 10:07 AM EST (1507 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Terri Schiavo, the 41-year-old brain-damaged woman who became the centerpiece of a national right-to-die battle, died Thursday morning, nearly two weeks after doctors removed the feeding tube that had sustained her for more than a decade.

Brother Paul O'Donnell, a spokesman for Bob and Mary Schindler, Schiavo's parents, said the couple was with their daughter's body and praying.

Wednesday, the Schindlers lost what their lawyer described as their "last meaningful legal appeal" in their desperate battle to have their brain-damaged daughter's feeding tube reinserted.

The U.S. Supreme Court late Wednesday refused once again to hear an emergency appeal from the Schindlers.

Their lawyer, David Gibbs, heard the high court had rejected the appeal during a news conference outside the Pinellas Park, Florida, hospice where Schiavo was receiving care.

"It appears that that will be the last meaningful legal appeal unless something comes up," Gibbs had said. "Fundamentally, the decision of the Florida courts will remain unchanged and the federal courts have declined to get involved."

Thursday morning, O' Donnell said that Schiavo was in her final hours of life, and police have prohibited her blood relatives from spending time with her.

O'Donnell, one of the family's spiritual advisers, said that her parents and siblings were "begging to be at her bedside...but are being denied."

Michael Schiavo was Terri's guardian and controlled who may visit her and when.

Pasco-Pinellas Circuit Judge George Greer in Clearwater, Florida, ordered the feeding tube removed March 18 at Michael Schiavo's request. He has said that his wife wouldn't have wanted to live in her condition -- what Florida courts have deemed a "persistent vegetative state."

The parents felt otherwise and had sought to take guardianship of their daughter from her husband. Their bitter court battles began in 1998.

"I don't understand why Michael Schiavo at some point didn't walk away," Gibbs said.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, who has jurisdiction over Florida, Georgia and Alabama, and could have ruled on the petition on his own, referred the appeal to the entire Supreme Court at 10:40 p.m. Wednesday.

There was no breakdown of the vote, and the high court issued no explanation for its decision. The petition had been filed earlier in the night.

It was the second time in a week the high court refused to hear the case, and the sixth time since 2001.

The Schindlers "can know they have done everything possible under the law in letting government know that they wanted to fight for the life of their daughter," Gibbs said.

In his Supreme Court filing, Gibbs and other lawyers for the parents wrote that removing the tube represented "an unconstitutional deprivation of Terri Schiavo's constitutional right to life."

The Supreme Court's rejection came hours after the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, rejected the parents' petition 9-2. That court denied three similar requests from the parents last week.

In a concurring opinion of the Atlanta court's latest ruling, Judge Stanley Birch said Congress "chose to overstep constitutional boundaries" by passing a law to force the Schiavo case into federal courts.

Judges Gerald Tjoflat and Charles Wilson dissented, with Tjoflat writing that the Schindlers deserved a hearing on the merits of their argument.

On March 21, three days after Schiavo's feeding tube was removed, Congress passed a bill transferring jurisdiction of the case from Florida state court to a U.S. District Court, for a federal judge to review. President Bush signed it into law the next day. But federal courts refused to overturn the state courts' decision.

2002 videotapes released
The Pinellas County Probate Court has released nine of 11 videotapes of Terri Schiavo recorded in the summer of 2002 and shown in a Florida appeals court hearing on her medical condition.

The videos show several doctors talking to and examining Schiavo to get ready for their court testimony. The tapes were recorded from July to September 2002.

Family members, including her mother and husband, also appear in the video.

Two of the 11 tapes remain sealed by the court, but it was unclear why.

In October 2002, Florida's 2nd District Court of Appeal heard a week of testimony from five doctors who examined her, including two picked by Michael Schiavo, two by her parents and one picked by the court.

Three doctors, including one appointed by the court, testified that Terri Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state with no hope of recovery. The two doctors selected by the Schindlers testified they thought she could recover.

The appellate court concurred with a lower court decision that Schiavo had no hope of recovery and that her feeding tube could be removed.

Terri Schiavo collapsed in her home in 1990, suffering from heart failure that led to severe brain damage because of lack of oxygen.

Her husband has said she suffered from bulimia, an eating disorder, that resulted in a potassium deficiency that triggered the heart failure.

CNN's Ninette Sosa, Bob Franken, Rich Phillips and Susan Candiotti contributed to this report.

[Anonymous]

There never was any right thing to do.  Letting her starve was obscene.  Keeping her alive was obscene.  Euthanizing her would have been obscene and illegal.

[Deborah]

What is obscene about euthanasia?
This country doesn't even starve to death its murders on death row. They die fairly quickly (most of the time) from lethal injection. Why make her family watch her slowly dehydrate to the point her tongue splits open? I think we have some sadists making policies in this country, confusing and contradictory policies to boot.

[Anonymous]

First and foremost my sincerest condolences go out to the Schindler family for the final loss of their legal battle to save their daughter Terri Schiavo. Your grunting and drooling meat-shell suffered kidney failure followed by heart failure and finally her bone-dry husk stopped functioning completely. I understand your loss, all the more profound because Terri's immortal soul is simply a shallow conceit of hokey spiritualism. Her soul was nothing more than a crackling nest of nerve impulses that largely stopped existing when her own brand of starvation resulted in a heart attack 15 years ago. Even her emaciated flesh will soon be gone as the grim kiln of the crematorium bubbles and melts and sears her flesh until she is nothing but ash.

I really hope that your daughter's ultimate sacrifice - becoming a humiliating public spectacle for your financial and political gain and a tool for the character assassination of her husband - will pay dividends down the road and allow the Republican dominated legislative and executive branch to erode the checks and balances imposed by the tyranny of the judicial branch. Just like Terri always wanted. Perhaps her memory will live on amid the creeping buboes of Culture of Life groups and their shadowy revenue streams. Adieu Terri Schaivo, may you become the Horst Wessel of our time. Your death was not in vain. Millions, full of hope, look up at the stars and stripes.

Hehe

[Deborah]

Subject: Florida - Living Will

I, _________________________ (fill in the blank), being of sound mind and body, unequivocally declare that in the event of a catastrophic
injury, I do not wish to be kept alive indefinitely by artificial means.

I hereby instruct my loved ones and relatives to remove all life-support systems, once it has been determined that my brain is no longer functioning in a cognizant realm. However, that judgment should be made only after thorough consultation with medical experts; i.e., individuals who actually have been trained, educated and certified as doctors.

Under no circumstances -- and I can't state this too strongly -- should my fate be put in the hands of peckerwood politicians who couldn't pass
ninth-grade biology if their lives depended on it. Furthermore, it is my firm hope that, when the time comes, any discussion about terminating my medical treatment should remain private and confidential.

Living in Florida, however, I am acutely aware that the legislative and executive branches of state government are fond of meddling in family
matters, and have little concern for the privacy and dignity of individuals.

Therefore, I wish to make my views on this subject as clear and unambiguous as possible. Recognizing that some politicians seem
cerebrally challenged themselves (and with no medical excuse), I'll try to keep this simple and to the point:

1. While remaining sensitive to the feelings of loved ones who might cling to hope for my recovery, let me state that if a reasonable amount
of time passes -- say, ____ (fill in the blank) months -- and I fail to sit sit up and ask for a cold beer, it should be presumed that I won't
ever get better. When such a determination is reached, I hereby instruct my spouse, children and attending physicians to pull the plug, reel in the tubes and call it a day.

2. Under no circumstances shall the members of the Legislature enact a special law to keep me on life-support machinery. It is my wish that these boneheads mind their own damn business, and pay attention instead to the health, education and future of the millions of Floridians who aren't in a permanent coma.

3. Under no circumstances shall the governor of Florida butt into this case and order my doctors to put a feeding tube down my throat or through a hole into my abdomen to keep me alive. I don't care how many votes he's trying to scrounge for his run for the presidency in 2008, it is my wish that he plays politics with someone else's life and leaves me to die in peace.

4. I couldn't care less if a hundred  zealots send e-mails to legislators in which they pretend to care about me. I don't know these people, and I certainly haven't authorized them to preach and crusade on my behalf. They should mind their own business, too.

5. It is my heartfelt wish to expire quietly and without a public spectacle.  

This is obviously impossible once elected officials become involved. So, while recognizing the wrenching emotions that attend the prolonged death of a loved one, I hereby instruct my relatives to settle all disagreements about my care in private or in the courts, as provided by
law. If any of my family goes against my wishes and turns my case into a political cause, I hereby promise to come back from the grave and make his or her existence a living hell.

[Carmel]

Has anyone read about how her parents have now sold off the list of fund donors?  Sold it off to several different groups, including right-to-lifers and Christian convervatives?

Sold it off so that these whack-os so they can spam everyone who sent support to the Schiavo cause.  Talk about sick.

I'll tell you what....as I am sure some people on this board do as well, I know a thing or two about losing a child.  I lost my 5 year old daughter in a car accident not two years ago.  

Now, she didnt starve to death, peacefully, in her sleep....no, there were no loving arms to hold my baby when she passed on, in fact there was nothing but the sandy ground and the hot sun.  She was thrown from the vehicle, and it was at least 30 minutes before she was found.  Still not dead, but unable to communicate...she was taken in an ambulance and pronounced dead on arrival.

It makes me FURIOUS. Positively FURIOUS, that Terri's parents drug this out and out in order to avoid the grief process.  Its sick.  It ceased to be about Terri's survival, and more about their fear of loss.  NO ONE in this world is truly entitled to ANYTHING.  Bad things happen to good people every day, and all there is to do is go on being the best that you can be.  

I applaud her husbands strength, and  despise her parents weakness.  I feel that when those we love are gone from this earth, it is imperative that we maintain  an honorable, strong path forward without them...so that we may make them proud in ALL our endevours, wherever they may be.  I feel not one ounce of sympathy for those people who fear death as if it were not part of life.  

Just my thoughts.[ This Message was edited by: Carmel on 2005-04-05 07:33 ]