The Black Republican

Don't you think it's a bit of a stretch to equate removing a feeding tube and allowing one to die naturally with suicide? If they need to search that hard for medical tests, my guess is she is breathing, but not alive. I just hope nobody ever does that to me. Just let me pass naturally. She would probably want the same.

For those who might just be checking the Recent Comment list, please check the update I've put into the extended entry. It was a bit longish for a comment.

If a judge can rule that due to a csual conversation Terri Shiavo allegedly had with her 'husband' and (I believe 1 or 2 other witnesses) she would wish to die in her present condition, it should then follow that if Terri Shiavo had ever mentioned that she would leave/divorce her husband if she ever caught him cheating on her, she should be granted a divorce from Michael Shiavo. It is the same standard of evidence. Did her parents/attorneys try this already?

Ol' BC

In what way does this not meet the definition of suicide, in this case assisted suicide?

According to her husband: She willfully set out to end her life (if certain condidtions were ever met). She was of sufficient age and mental well-being to understand the implications of this intentional action. How is this not suicide?

As for whether she is alive, nobody is disputing that she is alive, only whether her brain was too damaged as to allow her to be aware of her surroundings, too damaged to allow her to be responsive, and too damaged to ever recover. Those latter two issues are at the crux of the matter, but that she is alive, animated, and breathing on her own is not in question.

Clarification. I don't take issue with a Catholic's interpretation of his or her religious beliefs. My understanding of assisted suicide is that the actual person actively takes his or her own life by means made possible by another(i.e. Dr Jack). I personally am not one who wishes to be kept alive by artificial means be it respirator, feeding tube or some other device. I can see the homocide connection, but being unable to eat is not the same as just starving yourself. Animals in nature die like this and I think God has mercy on them just as he will on the rest of us who have accepted Jesus as our savior.

I need to make a clarification too, there are now two authors on this post. My original post, with the unorthodox contention that the Schiavo's entered into an assisted suicide pact. And, Chris' explanation of how the Catholic religion views suicide; which was, no doubt, spurred by the news that the Shindler family is considering seeking relief based on their daughter's religion (Catholicism) and the Pope's directive toward providing care for those in vegatative states. I hope this makes it clear how we now find ourselves on this dual track discussion, and that the author's are each offering their own views. A bit confusing, perhaps, but confusion is fun; so I, for one, am rolling with it.

Ol' BC, I suspect that we have all, at one time or another, imagined what it would be like to be in some diminished state, and thought, or said, that we wouldn't want to live like that. But, I wonder if the reality of the circumstance is as bad as we project it to be? I don't want to get all metaphysical about this, but can we really expect to know how we will feel at some later time under different circumstances? Can we really know when the life force, or whatever we want to call it, is ready to leave the body? Now being in this state, if Terri would communicate, would she stick with a decision which was based on her imagination of what it is like to be in that state? There are many levels of consciousness, is it not possible that she is happily living in one we don't yet understand?

Enough of that.

If you are correct that in assisted suicide, by definition, the assistant provides the means, but the person causes the means to induce death; then my premise would need to extend the definition of the "actual person actively takes his or her own life" to include oral directions given by said person but physically executed by another constitute "actively" taking one's own life. (as a Captain of a ship actively causes the ship to turn by giving an order which another physically performs)

Btw, there is a fellow named Stephen Hawking who is unable to feed himself. Is he alive? Cheap analogy, I know, but his situation came to mind and I just couldn't think of a brilliant way to introduce it.

I admit I am not a doctor, but wouldn't it be theoretically possible to keep someone alive in perpetuity via artificial support?

Would pulling the plug on a 100 year old be the same? If not, what is the difference? If so, where do we draw the line?

Do you disagree with someone stating in a will they do not wish to be on life support? If not, should the life support go on forever?

After all, it is artificial support. She did not ask her husband to put a bag over her head and suffocate her.

I guess I am so intrigued because I have never heard someone contend that refusing, or wishing to discontinue artificial means of sustaining life, is some form of suicide.

wouldn't it be theoretically possible to keep someone alive in perpetuity via artificial support?

No. I could get really ghoulish in describing why, but suffice to say when a person is brain dead all other artificial support is meaningless. They're gone. You can keep someone hooked up to a battery of machines to replace other organs, but when the brain shuts down, it's over.

Terri Schiavo isn't brain dead. Every organ works without assistance. She lives. But doctors claim she's in "a persistant vegetative state". Because of the technical term, some people confuse this with a coma. That's not the case, and the political correctness of the terminology is to blame. In grade school 20 years ago, you would have described her condition as being "a vegetable" or "retarded" - to the extreme that she may not be self-aware any longer. (Then again, maybe she is, at least on some level. Medical science doesn't fully understand the brain.) The obvious question I have, looking at my dog beside me: she isn't self-aware either, should I starve her to death?

Do you disagree with someone stating in a will they do not wish to be on life support? If not, should the life support go on forever?

I believe that since removal of life support is essentially suicide (or murder, in the case of someone who cannot decide for themselves), I should try never to be removed from a device maintaining my life. (Not to backslide into a sore subject for some, but for the record this is the strict Catholic teaching.) If I were brain dead and on a respirator, my heart could go beating for quite a while, forcing my family to decide they have to violate that principle.

So... if it is reasonable to believe (in consultation with doctors) before I am attached to a machine (like a respirator) that substitutes for one of my organs, that once on such that device I will never be able to be removed from it without my imminent death, AND I will have no means to think OR communicate... in those cases I can choose to refuse the original assistance of the machine. I will (to use that phrase I despise) "die naturally". But there are plenty of people who can still think and communicate while hooked up to machines keeping them alive. How worthwhile they make their life is up to them.

Again, Terri is not hooked up to any machine. She merely needs nutrients (as we all do). Can she think and communicate? Doctors disagree, but her family thinks so. Since we are in doubt, has anyone the right to say otherwise? And if we say, "She wanted to die rather than live like this," she would be suicidal, in conflict with her stated religious beliefs.

NOW, I see that there are two of you. I didn't mean to stir the pot, I just thought suicide was a stretch. Then The Baron chimed in. It appears difference of opinion can truly be discussed without name calling, etc. I often read you guys linking from The Baron until I set up my site. I have a link to you as well. I can agree to disagree on the definition of suicide and still enjoy reading you.

Baron, I wouldn't make this case for every person on life support; the extenuating circumstances are what lead me to state my case for this being assisted suicide. It is not an act of removing life support that makes this assisted suicide, it is her oral wish that she be assisted in ending her life if she ever needed life support that is at the heart of the matter. Her oral will is a suicide wish, need for life support is the term of condition that triggers the execution of her will, (that is, if we believe she actually said that she wanted to be removed from life support).

I am happy to explain my reasoning without feeling the need to convert anyone to my point of view. This, Terri's case as an assisted suicide, was a new idea for me at the time that I wrote about it, and, I find that having come to that conclusion I can't get away from the idea. I am not proposing that all people on life support be kept there, my religious beliefs do not tie me to that proposition (though Terri's religious beliefs may bind her to that position), I would look at each case as unique. In this case, I do believe that starving her to death is the wrong choice, and a choice her husband should not have the power to make.

Being alive but unable to speak or move would be the ultimate horror chamber for me if I were aware of my condition. I would be screaming but no one would hear me. Life, for me, is about independent movement, communication, the ability to enjoy my life. My will states unequivocally I will not be put on any artificial life support in the event of a catastrophic illness. That is, of course, my choice. I am curious, though, to know if any of you would be OK with being in a vegetative state and aware that you were so?

Kathy, by definition (as I understand it) someone in a "persistant vegetative state" is not self-aware. Their brain no longer functions on a high enough level to achieve sentience. So it isn't horrible, because you wouldn't be aware of it.

With that in mind, I would have to answer "Yes" I'd be fine with it. Because, of course, I wouldn't know enough to know what "it" was.

I think what you mean to ask is, if I were fully aware and fully conscious, but totally incapable of using my muscles to communicate in any way, so people thought I was in a "persistant vegetative state", would I be okay with it?

The answer to that (for the moment) is also "Yes", for two reasons. I would hope I would savor the life God leaves for me, and I would try to use the time to myself to pray, and reflect, and however I could manage, to use the faculties left to me to learn all I could for my own self-fulfilment. I grew up keeping very much to myself, and I still find a lot of comfort sometimes in solitude. But more importantly, I think I would be okay with it because I have a family that I know loves me, and they would visit and sit with me, and talk to me, and keep me company on occasion - even if the doctors told them it was useless. They know better. All life has value.

I think MaryEllen should have posted this here instead of in the other thread.

Kathy, be careful what you ask for. Or, should I say, be specific! For, having left that post here, you may now be in danger of having someone (your guardian) pull the plug on you, if, God forbid, you become injured and are incapacitated in a way that causes your guardian inconvienence. Since you have recorded a rather broad definition of the circumstances under which you would wish to be allowed to die; it is possible that you may not reach the actual state at which you imagine that life is no longer worth living when your guardian decides that your care is too much bother for their time and pulls the plug, as it were, on your life.

It is easy to witness someone else's fate and imagine how awful it must be to live that way; but the human will is stronger than we imagine and often pulls us through situations we were not predicted we to survive. So, I suggest that you do some tough work now, and lay out exactly, what conditions you mean to represent as unbearable, who is to decide when you have met those conditions, and precisely what they should be allowed to take away from you under those conditions. And, put it in writing so that if that someday comes, a judge will have your precise words to go by, and not the hearsay of a handful of acquaintances who may have accepted a flippant remark as your last will and testament.

Feeding someone is not unnatural. My infant child could not feed himself. If I had allowed him to starve to death, the issue would have been simple to understand. Why are we pretending that the issue is complicated?

Because judges and lawyers are involved, and they're trying to penumbra her to death.

Obviously you have never been faced with a difficult decision such as this. My father recently refused a feeding tube and chose to leave the hospital and die at home. He had ALS, a horrible, paralyzing disease. He was welcomed into God's kingdom when he died, not condemned because he refused a feeding tube. You are an ignorant, small minded ass.

Obviously, you haven't had to face that difficult decision either. For, as you point out, your father made the decision, not you. My mother, before she was stricken with an Alzheimer-like dementia set out a living will, and one day my sister will have to decide when the terms Mom set out are met. I do not envy her.

But, our personal anecdotes aside, Terri Schiavo never set out a living will, and many who know her well do not believe she would wish to be starved to death. Terri is alive, aware of her surroundings, (not in a vegatative state), and pefectly capable of continuing to live if she receives food and water.

She needs food and water. But, then don't we all. Or, maybe you are able to do without? Or, perhaps you have been doing without, and your electrolyte imbalance is causing you to say stupid things?

Ah, now watch as the Death Merchants come out to sell their wares. And what wonderful manners they display while they do it! Why is it such a wonderful thing to starve someone to death? Why is it so desirous to commit suicide rather than face the pain and anguish that just one more day - one more hour may bring? I'm stressed today - why don't I just put myself out of my misery and stop consuming food and water?

Jean, darling, speak not of what you do not know. My late father suffered a debilitating stroke at the age of 55, and doctors told us he would never walk again. He walked again, albeit with a cane. They told us he'd never use his left arm again. He learned to play golf without it. They said he probably had four or five years left. He lived seventeen more years - exactly half my life to that time.

He was a different man after the stroke, sometimes mean and viciously bitter. Other times he was simplistic to the point of being almost juvenile. We missed the vigorous man I knew as a child, who let the stress of marriage and family too often overcome his happy and adventurous personality. Yet there were times, especially when he could not remember recent events but recalled distant memories of decades ago, that the sparkle in his eye reflected his once-fiesty humor.

Not once did I ever wish him dead. Not once, while I may have imagined the day that would eventually come when the burden of caring for this deteriorating life would be lifted, did I ever wish him dead. In fact, several times he came close. We cried, and prayed, and against the odds he was granted more time. Precious time.

And unlike my siblings who carried on with their own lives, it fell on me - who needed help raising two children alone - to share my home with my parents so I could help my mother care for him. So I was permitted the honor of spending those last seven years of his life in the company of my father, not whoring my way through my 30s with every loose piece of trash I could find, like so many of my generation have done.

At the end, my father was so riddled by osteoporosis that he cracked a rib in his back just getting up from a nap, and his kidneys stopped functioning altogether requiring him to undergo dialysis. Both conditions caused him immeasurable pain, and for two weeks he lay in bed and recited the same phrase over and over again: "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, please help to take the pain away." Not "Let me die," or "I don't have worth anymore," but simply a faithful prayer that soon He who gave him all that extra time would find it the right moment to "Take the pain away."

His last morning, my father woke happier than he had felt for months, was led through exercises by his therapist, ate breakfast and lay down to rest. That's when the Lord took the pain away. I will not shy and fail to tell you Jean, my faith teaches me that people who hasten their deaths, like your father, do not enter into the Kingdom, because through their selfishness and cowardice they take from this world the most precious gift the Lord gave them.

My father was far from a saint, and I doubt he will leave his place in Purgatory any time soon. But Old Scratch didn't take him one second sooner than God wanted him, and I'm certain Dad met his fate free of that particular sin. May the Lord have mercy on your own father if he failed to repent in his last moments, and may He bring you peace from your obvious bitterness and grief.

Most of all, may He forgive me for the awful things I was going to say to you.

Does anyone have a email address for Michael Schiavo or George Felos? I would like to tell them both exactly what I think of them but so far have not been able to find them. My family feels this was the biggest miscarriage of justice since O.J. got off free and clean!! What has this country come to? It's for sure the judical system is corrupt. This country let Terri down big time.

She was not brain dead no matter what anyone says. Michael was scared to death that she might speak and tell of his attempts on her life. We are praying that her autopsy will nail him. He refused to take a lie detector test!! The minute it was known he had fathered two boys by his mistress his guardianship should have been nullified for reasons of conflict of interest. I do have the address to impeach Judge George Greer, it's a petition to sign. If anyone wants it just let me know at christianjohn316@aol.com.

[Edit: John, I edited your comment a little to make it easier to read. Please take the CAPS LOCK off before you comment at someone's blog. - Chris]