Which reiterates everything I've read on that very subject in the past few days. Mike also says at his own blog:
...[T]he torture is being perpetrated on both the parents and the husband, and the torture will continue as long as unethical, unqualified, religiously-motivated "experts" (most of whom have never reviewed Terri's medical records, and none of whom have actually examined her) keep giving patently false advice to the parents that someone with no cerebral cortex is a thinking, interactive human being just waiting to snap out of a light coma.
Again, Radley Balko:
What the hell is wrong with us? Why is it that when it get to the point of letting someone go, we force terimally sick people to die in one of the most agaonizing ways possible? Why is starving someone to death by removing a feeding tube considered humane, but injecting a terminal, pain-ridden patient with a solution designed to let them die painlessly forbidden?I know the answer. But it isn't acceptable. The answer is that removing a feeding tube isn't proactive. Whereas injecting someone with lethal, but merciful drugs is. That's asinine
Yes, it is. I wish I could make a living will that says, please do not let me suffer, do not let me linger in some horrible half-living, half-dead state. Shoot me full of some drug that will allow me to die a peaceful, painless death. Just let me go. Would that we could do that for everyone. Have you ever watched someone die? I watched both my grandparents die long, lingering deaths. Painful, dragged out deaths that made me think at many points it would just be so much more humane to give them a nice drug that would put them into a deep sleep from which they would never wake. It would be over. The pain, the suffering, the agony - and yes, those things apply to both the patient and the patient's family - would be over.
I mention this to people and they say, only God has the right to say when a life is over. Let God do his work. So is it God's design that my grandmother was to spend months in a hospital, floating between consciousness and unconsciousness, breathing on her own and then not breathing on her own, unable to recognize her children, her family called to the hospital time and time again to say good-bye, only to have it stretched out again when she was brought back to life, just to spend another couple of weeks dying? What kind of life is that?
Article comments
1 - jadester
i couldn't have put it better myself.
I either want to be cremated when i die, or have my body donated to science. And i'd much rather go into the unknown 15 years early than hang on to "life" in a vegetative state.
2 - Tom Johnson
Imagine being held down, underneath layers of dirt or stone or maybe in a wooden box. You see a pinpoint of light above. Just out of reach. You can hear muted voices above you; there are people out there. Living, breathing people who are going about their daily lives while you are trying to claw your way out of your trap, while you are trying to shout to them. But no one hears you. No one knows you are in there.
Beautifully put. This is exactly my feelings on this - if you're laying there for 15 years, and you happen to actually be somehow able to grasp what's going on, those 15 years are pure torture.
However, in Terry's case, she doesn't even have cerebral cortex - it deteriorated to nothing long ago and its space has been filled up with spinal fluid. All that's left is the most basic of "animal brain" components - the very basic control over some body functions like the heart and lungs. She's experiencing and knowing nothing because she has no ability to do so anymore. There's no coming back for Terry, outside of an absolute, confirmed miracle that somehow not only replaces the majority of her brain, but also brings back all her memories. Let this poor woman die. Or at least let her body die - she, her "self," died long ago.
3 - Joel Caris
Meant to comment on your blog, Michele, but here will work just as well. Just wanted to say that I agree with most everything you say here and thought you did a great job of summing up your thoughts on this case.
Oh, and I really hate it when people take personal thoughts like this and then extrapolate them out to completely unrelated situations and make judgements in regards to those situations. Sometimes people are really stupid.
4 - e
Terri should be allowed to die!
5 - Eric Olsen
do you mean she should be allowed to stay dead?
6 - Mark Saleski
only with her parents' consent.