Just let her go, damn.

A couple weeks ago my wife and I went to an attorney to set up a will. Part of what we did was to put in writing that we do not want to be kept alive on machines. Who would? Damn.

Make sure you notify your parents and any other meddling relatives of your decision.

I hate to break it to her folks, who seem like nice people but just can't handle it - and are pulling some of the sickest tricks out that I've ever seen - your daughter is gone. She's never coming back. She probably should have died 15 years ago.

Time to pull the plug and let her husband get on with his life.

I have mixed feelings about this.

I also don't know how badly her brain is damaged.

If her brain is so badly damaged that it's an impossibility for her to wake up, you guys are right and she should've been dead 15 years ago.

If there is a chance that she could come back, i'd keep her alive.

I understand her poor husband wants to move on, but her poor parents don't want to lose their daughter, even if she is a vegetable.

Oh and so it's in writing, i would like to be kept alive by machine, because I believe I could have a chance to come back. That or I'll be stuck in between life and death forever. Woo Hoo!

That's a fine headline right there.

They should leave it in the hands of a Kung Foo poll.

I tried to look at it from what i would do. I KNOW i'd have a conversation with my boyfriend about this and i'd tell him "15 years feeding tube + vegetative state = let me go". But i seriously doubt that i'd have told my parents. I think, regardless as to whether he's looking to move on or not, she would have had this conversation with her husband @ some point and she told him don't keep me alive like that. I understand where her parents are coming from but i think that they should let her go. What kind of life is she "living" right now? This is more about the battle and less about Terry.

AND, i am totally against bringing this all the way to Congress. What a waste. It's between her (ex) husband and her parents. And "Over the years, courts have sided with her husband in more than a dozen cases." Her parents should LET HER GO...

Worst part about this is her husband being made out to be the bad guy. He's getting it bad from the government and the Catholic church and Terry's family. There's absolutely NO reason he'd want to let her go unless he was just keeping her wishes.,

People are trying to make this out to be an issue where he is just trying to collect the lawsuit money they won, but last week some billionare offered him 1 million dollars to just walk away and he didn't, so I feel pretty confident he really is looking out for her interests.

He did try for years (I believe he also took nursing courses) but after no improvement he finally realized it was a lost cause. I don't blame him for starting a new life, he'd basically be ending his life if he didn't move on and now we'd have two dead people. If I was in a coma / vegitative state for 10 years, I'd expect my spouse to move on as well.

First of all, Terri is Roman Catholic -- that pretty well establishes her belief on being kept alive. She must believe that there is value to EVERY human life.

Secondly, Michael Schiavo is her husband only in legal terms. He is now in a common law marriage with another woman, and they have two children. He has moved on with his life, and should have absolutely NO say in his "wife's" medical treatment. Michael and Terri are married on paper only, but he is CERTAINLY not her "husband".

Terri is not DEAD -- she is DYING. She is being slowly and inhumanely starved to death. Being "dead" and "dying a slow death" are two very different things. I find it to be unfortunate that we, as a society, can site idly by as we starve someone to death -- a fate more cruel and inhumane than any murderer on death row will EVER face.

It's pretty sad to see that society puts so little value on human life. If Terri's parents believe that she has even a SMIDGE of hope of improving, and are willing to take the emotional and financial responsibility of caring for her -- then why not allow that?? Michael Schiavo put Terri in a hospice YEARS ago and stopped allowing therapy or necessary medical testing. At this point, who can say -- with any certainty -- that she has no chance of improving if given the appropriate therapy?

Michael should divorce Terri and return the responsibility of her care to her parents.

She's mentally dead. The scans of her brain show there is no activity in the areas where thought and consciousness exist. The only part of the brain that still functions is the lower part that controls bodily functions. She is as alive as a plant is... There is only 1 doctor that was willing to put his reputation on the line out of hundreds to say she was still conscious, and mysteriously he makes a living out of trying therapies on such people, although there is no real documented case of a true recovery. Can someone say conflict of interest?

And just because she is catholic doesn't mean thats what she would want. I'd safely say 99 percent of all religious people have different views than their religion on one matter or another. I know many Jews who don't keep kosher, many catholics who use birth control and are pro-abortion, etc. I feel the reason he is still trying to do this is because he truley believes that this would be her wish.

I find it funny... in a sad, pathetic way that people refer to Terri as "alive as a plant is alive". So, it is perfectly alright and acceptable to not water a plant and let them die, so what the hell... why not treat a human in the same manner. That is a completely RIDICULOUS argument!!!

While I agree that there are PLENTY of people who don't follow all the doctrine associated with their religion, I don't believe this is as much a "religious" issue as it is a "humanity" issue. When do we, as a people, decide that enough is enough? This is a HUMAN LIFE we are talking about... not a plant... a friend, a daughter, a child of God.

i don't think lettin her go is the problem. i think having an shady husband with one hand on the plug and the other on a multi million dollar check with an adultered family as a backdrop is the issue. i believe the polls would tilt in the favor of unplugging her if the parents were allowed to make this decision. the not allowing any kind of treatment is odd too. the law giving him the power is outdated. it was from a time when people married for love and committment. today people marry for good sex,beauty, and immediate financial gain with the idea of try it and if you don't like it or something comes along with two less pounds on their ass or 1/2" more poker...they're gone.. today how many spouses would sell out the other for a multi million dollar check . americans today have no concept of love.

Although that is a completely DIFFERENT argument, I absolutely agree with you. People in general, not just Americans, no longer marry for love, and no one looks at marriage as the covenant in which it is meant to be regarded.

If Michael was acting in the "best interest" of his wife, I think that would be WAY more obvious. We have all watched someone make the ultimate sacrifice for someone they love -- and I think we can easily recognize the sacrifice that is being made. In this case, it appears as if only Terri's parents are truly willing to sacrifice themselves for Terri. Isn't THAT what LOVE is? What Michael is doing is selfish and completely self serving.

This has become an ugly, ugly fight... what has this world come to when we are ARRESTING people for attempting to provide water to someone who is suffering dehydration? [LINK] Mother Teresa became a saint doing similar things -- now we arrest people for acts of humanity.

1) Terri Schiavo's parents are Roman Catholic, and I will assume she was baptized at birth but her activity in the church and agreement with Roman Catholic beliefs during her adult life has never been firmly established. It is entirely possible that she no longer believes in the Catholic Church nor wishes to follow its teachings. Unless evidence can be provided that she (not her parents) had an overwhelming religious belief due to her hitherto unproven status as a devote Catholic, this point is null and void.

2) Michael Schiavo is her legal husband, and therefore has the right to decide regarding her treatment. He waited five years after she fell into a coma to begin dating and, frankly, that's OK. He had to move on with his life. Like it or not, that's his right, and Terri gave him that right when she married him. Claims of spousal abuse, etc. are unimportant and, at this point, impossible to prove. Other claims are simple heresay.

3) Terri has been diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state and, as such, is incapable of anything other than reflex actions to stimuli. I understand that the idea of allowing someone to die in that matter is unsettling, and sympathize with you on that, but the fact is she's gone. She won't feel it because, other than as a pure reflex to stimuli, she no longer feels.

Terri has been diagnosed repeatedly as being in this state, undergone several tests and even experimental procedures to improve her situation. There is nothing there to bring back, she's gone. Her husband wants to see to it that her wishes are carried out, and her parents have no right to interfere with that.

This looks like one of those issues where we will never see eye to eye. It is my opinion that unless you have consciousness, you as a human are not alive. It is your opinion as long as the body is functioning (heart, lungs, etc) you are alive. There really isn't a correct answer (besides the I'm right argument), so people who agree with me will all say pull the tube with no second thought or remorse and people who agree with you will do anything possible to keep the feeding tube inserted until the body finally gives out.

One thing I learned from my years here on foo. There are some things that there will never be a correct answer to so you may as well agree to disagree (damn, I'm starting to feel old!)

Ok, lets say for 1 second against all medical proof that Terri is in fact conscious and aware of her surroundings.

How do you know that she is not in extreme agony and has been for the last 15 years? Can you be certain that by keeping her alive you are not actually torturing her? I know if I was conscious for 15 years and unable to move, speak or communicate in any other way I would go crazy. It'd be like a nightmare. When they put people in sensory deprivation chambers for a couple of days to do psych tests people go crazy, imagine the same for all of those years. How can you be so certain that she would in fact want to stay alive? And if you are truly religious, wouldn't killing her send her to heaven? Wouldn't you rather her live with god instead of waiting on earth in agony?

You have no idea what you're even talking about.

It's a legal document, there's nothing anyone could do to stop it.

Why hasn't the mental health and subsequent validity of the parents request been questioned instead? The medical experts have spoken on how braindead Terry is. The parents don't want to believe them and hold out hope she will be rehabilitated and restored. Now its understandable that parents can hold irrational hope for awhile, but for how long is it acceptable? 15 years is crazy. If you were holding onto your wife's dead body in your house, and the doctors told you she was dead but you insisted no she's just sleeping, not only would they take the body away from you but you would be put in a mental institution. I can see a lot of parents making the same decision as Terry's parents, at least initially but only for a few years at the most. At this point its kinda sick what they are doing.

Why are her parents arguing for Terri to get a divorce?

Her parents are arguing that Terri would want to stay alive under any circumstance due to her devout Catholic belief, which of course has not been proven in court to be the belief of anyone involved other than her parents, who are not her legal guardians.

Well, that's fine, maybe she is devout catholic, we may never know. However, if s he was such a devout Catholic that she would go to such ends to preserve her life, then why would she be willing to accept divorce, an action that is not well looked upon at all in the traditional Catholic church? If she did recover, and had divorced, would this not lead to her being prevented from taking Holy Communion (at least in many traditional, "by the book" churches)?

I understand that there can be a question of priorities here - death over still living, but why should her parents encourage divorce if it's the exact opposite of what a truly devout Catholic would want?

if a Catholic wants to correct me on this, and if I'm wrong, please do so, as I don't claim to know everything about Catholicism, nor do I want to misrepresent your beliefs. I apologize for any mistake in advance.

I'm not a Catholic, but I do have a close friend who is Catholic and he married a woman who was married to a Catholic, divorced him and then married my friend. Since the first marriage hasn't been anulled they're considered adulterers.

Therefore, I'd assume that she'd have to have the marriage anulled for it to make a difference and I also assume that having it anulled would require a testimony. Something she cannot, under the circumstances, give.

Why wait for someone to die of dehydration - if you're going to let some one die just use a nice quick painless overdose. Seams to me better than making the family wait in this state of limbo till they finally drop. Free the hospital bed as well.

I faced the similar situation whereas my mothers feeding tube had to be pulled after she was vegatative for a year. I felt then as now that there should be a way to allow a person a quicker way to end their lives than dehydration. Mrs. Schiavo's parents and the religious zealots that support them should think a little deeper than "every life is sacred". Let her die and be at peace!

This is where the assisted suicide argument comes in.

I am of the belife that yes every life is sacred. But I know very well not everybody shares this view. But I also don't think that a person should be taken off life support because a spouse says they would want it that way. No one knows what Terry really wanted because she didn't put it in writing. People seem to forget that people can lie and decieve. I don't think a person should be taken off life support unless they have it in writing that they wish to do so.

Whether I have it in writing or not (and eventually I will), I do expect my wife to carry through with my wishes to not be plugged in for the rest of my life. Furthermore, when I married her, I gave her the right to make that sort of decision.

The attempts to paint Michael Schiavo as an abusive or otherwise neglectful husband have come so late in the game and been backed up with so little evidence that it's disturbing. Terri is his wife for goodness sake, let him carry out her wishes. It's his right.

I am just saying that this sort of thing should not be a right of a husband or wife. On a completely unrelated topic, people keep saying marrige is being destroyed and that poligamy well fallow gey marriage. What happens if polyagamy becomes legal. Think of the mass wave of marriages for US citizenship. One person could marry as many immigrants as they wanted to grant them citizenship. What would happen then? Man I feel sorry for who ever has to ratify some of these marriage laws to fit poligamists. For the record I have becomw apathetic and think the government should no longer have anyhold on marrige.

PS It's three am and I have been up since 615 am please feel free to bash the inchorrence and crappy spelling of this stuff which me wrote.

Actully, this decision should be the right of the husband or wife even more so than that of the vegetative person. Terry is braindead and only kept alive by machines. She is the one person involved who really has no opinion on what is going on whatsoever. Her feelings died when her brain died and there's nothing left. A lot of people ask, how would you feel if you were in the same position? Would you want the plugs pulled or not? Honestly I'd be the one person who wouldn't have any wants or wishes either way, because I'm already dead essentially. But I do know ahead of time I would want somebody else to prevent my parents or other hysterical loved ones from holding on to irrational hope for me and never moving on. But I can't have any wishes for my 'life' after I go braindead, its not possible.

So put it in writing that you don't want to be kept alive on machienes then. The problem I have is that all of her family says one thing that she would want and only her husband is saying she would want to die. Now how the laws stand now he has the right to pull the plug. I don't think anyone should be able to make that decsion but the person who well be killed. Obviously put in writing before they need the life support.

The husband knows what his wife's wishes were and also, for a country that is the "Leader of the Free World", we sure have those fuckers in congress making an awful lot of laws.

This entire matter has nothing to do with what anyone thinks is correct (including those cocksuckers on capitol hill), rather, what Terry would have wanted.

No-one knows more about me than my wife... not even my mother. I think Michael full knew the intentions of his wife.

If you want to see VERY HOT pics of Terry go to www.freshfloridaveggies(link)

Polygamy isn't going to increase immigration to the US, trust me.

Ever have a friend of yours marry a foreigner, or a foreign friend of yours marry someone from outside of the US? Do you have any idea how many interviews, how much paperwork, etc. they have to go through to prove it's not the kind of marriage you're talking about? It's a pain in the neck to say the least, even if your spouse is from the UK. I've had a lot of co-workers go through it, and trust me that's the last thing I'd want to do, let alone three or four times.

The fact is most people will never put it in writing which way they would want it. Especially if they collapse at an early age. This is a struggle about who has the authority to say what should be done with her now that she's braindead and never put it in writing what she wanted. You say if people don't want to be kept alive on machines then put it in writing. I say if you want to be kept alive on machines, that's what should require a living will made a priori. The de facto assumptions as they currently stand are backward.

That's how I feel.

1/3 of her entire brain is gone, replaced by CSB. The part of her brain that contians "her" is completely destroyed.

The courts have sided with him for the past 5 years (when he started the move to have the tube removed, after 8 years of her being like this).

1) It's been 15 years
2) Yes, he did try. He even took her to CA for experimental treatment that didn't work
3) He's demanded the best care that the award money can buy
4) The break with the parents came when he refused to give them any of the award money

For more, see link]">this PDF document (the transcript of the judges decision and what he based it on) back in Febuary of 2000.

[link]
The above is the document I tried to link to, damnit.

Doesn't matter. She has stated to her husband and brother (who supported this in testimony) that if she were to ever get to the same state that Karen Anne Quinllan was in, to pull the tube. He tried 8 years of therapies and treatments before accepting there was no bringing her back and that he should carry out her wishes. A court sided with him in February 2000, and they have sided with him ever since.

[link]

1/3 of her brain is completely missing, replaced by cerberal spinal fluid. There is no need for an MRI because the CAT scan is clear enough in showing the GAPING-FUCKING-HOLE where her brain would normally be.
She entered this state due to a potassium imbalance that went undiagnosed (hence the money that everyone says Michael is supposedly after).
Her parents /encouraged/ him to move on. He may be in common law marriage (with kids) with another woman, but he was and still is the only one who visits his wife. He was the only one to demand the best care for her, the best nursers, the best in everything in the hopes it would help.

I don't have little value on human life, but I do have value on dignity. Terri is not being dignified. She hasn't been for the past 15 years. There is, and never was, a smidge of hope of her improving. He put her in a hospice because 8 years of therapy and medical testing turned up NOTHING.

For those interested in the truth, and not speculation, lets see what the court has to say.

[link]

Thank you.

Shady husband? Multi-million dollar check? WTF are you talking about?

Certainly not this case:
[link]

oh yeah, because agreeing with someone who doesn't know what they are talking about really reinforces the rightness and validity of your position. /sarcasm

what I find funny is that they are insisting on the divorce now after they've already told him to move on with his life. Sounds as if they want the money. Or are just completely sick in the head, which is possible.

As do I. I just wish her parents would go see greif counselors or a psychiatrist (both, preferably).

I agree with you. First of all statistics show that being married at the young age they were the odds of them being divorced outweigh the odds of them still being married. It is over a 65% chance they would have been divorced by now. Trudy a care provider for Terri stated Michael had told her on several occassions he wished he knew Terri's wishes,but he didn't. Trudy submitted a legal affidavit stating Michael had disclossed to her he did not know Terri's wishes. Micheal is kinda like a bigamist he wants his cake and eat it too! How can he claim to be this devoted husband and living with another woman at the same time. This is a sick situation! It is a shame Terri couldn't have been granted a divorce based on Adultry.

well letting her go is one thing. Have you ever woke up dying of thirst? Just imagine laying with no help. What a inhumane way to go. Even people on death row get lethal injection.

If by inhumane you mean "natural for someone in her situation." Then yeah. You're right.

Well she finally died this morning...

I am so glad it's over. I am so sick of hearing about it.

how long was the marriage between terri and michael when terri had her health crisis?