Posted on 03/26/2005 4:40:38 AM PST by tessalu
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (AP) -- Jennifer Johnson, barefoot and in her pajamas, ran to her grandfather's bedside once a hospice worker said his death was moments away.
She got there - one minute too late.
Johnson said the chaos outside the hospice where Terri Schiavo is dying kept her from saying goodbye. When Johnson arrived, a police officer demanded identification; she had none. And after a hospice employee cleared her, another officer halted her for a search with a metal detector.
The delays lasted three to four minutes - the last of her grandfather's life.
"It's a terrible, extra obstacle to put in front of a family. ... Everything is about Schiavo," Johnson said. "It's all about her and in my family's case, it cost us dearly."
Woodside Hospice has 70 patients besides Schiavo, whose parents are desperately trying to have her feeding tube reconnected. Dozens of protesters have arrived from across the nation since the tube was removed March 18, and at least 15 have been arrested, prompting a police barricade around the facility and unprecedented security.
Family members visiting patients must pass through a police checkpoint to park, then show identification outside the door before another security screening inside. They also must walk by scores of signs decrying Schiavo's "crucifixion," "torture," and "starvation," plus navigate around hordes of media who have been camped outside.
"To have to maneuver through all of this and have a hostile environment outside when all they want is peace and quiet and to enjoy those few days they have left with a loved one is a horror," said Dr. Morton Getz, executive director of Douglas Gardens Hospice in Miami.
Getz said many people with a family member in a hospice have to make the same excruciating decision that courts have made for Schiavo.
"It's causing a lot of grief and questions in their own mind on whether they did the right thing," he said. "It's unconscionable to have a family member to be near the end stages of life and to get there, you have to walk through signs that say, 'Murderer.'"
Most protesters direct their signs and their chants against the courts and Michael Schiavo, Terri's husband, who insists she would not want to be kept alive artificially.
But walking through a hostile environment can only add stress to what's already an emotionally draining situation.
"It probably has the same psychological effect on the residents' families as it does on someone who is walking into an abortion clinic and facing signs and aggressive behavior," said Elizabeth Foley, a Florida International University law professor who specializes in bioethics.
Over the past few days, as Schiavo's parents' attempts to have their daughter's feeding tube reinserted repeatedly failed, signs outside the hospice have grown more desperate. Doctors have said Schiavo would probably die within a week or two of the feeding tube being removed.
Messages compare Michael Schiavo to Scott Peterson, convicted of killing his wife and unborn child in California, and John Evander Couey, who allegedly murdered a 9-year-old girl in Homosassa.
One woman in a wheelchair regularly moves up and down sidewalks in front of the hospice yelling in a megaphone, "We're disabled, not disposable!" and "Terri is a person, not a vegetable!"
Relatives of hospice residents say the clamor - intended to rattle Michael Schiavo - rattles their patience.
"It's a real pain in the neck," said Bill Douglass, whose mother-in-law is a resident. He said the only consolation is that she is "oblivious" to the outside scene.
Police and hospice officials say they are trying to minimize the intrusion on hospice residents and their families, and that the security measures are meant to protect the privacy and safety of all residents, not just Schiavo.
But Johnson, 24, said her 73-year-old grandfather, Thomas Bone, was restricted from moving freely around the hospice grounds during his final days. He died just hours after Terri Schiavo's feeding tube was removed and protests intensified.
"They've taken away hospice's greatest quality, that it is peaceful and serene and quiet and calming - and it's not fair," Johnson said
Look, the article quoted above says EXPLICITLY there's someone using a MEGAPHONE. What do you think megaphones sound like?
You can't seriously be insinuating NONE of the 70 other patients or their families have been BOTHERED or DISTURBED by the circus outside when the article EXPLICITLY says they have.
Who between us is living in la-la land here?
Thank you for saying quite eloquently what I have been saying to myself for a long time.
You're right - as long as the party I fought for shows no signs of wanting to save this poor woman I will never vote for either of the two main parties agian - THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE. The GOP politicians who are putting on a show of compassion (Jeb Bush) are calculating the exact moment when they can rush in and remove Terri so that she will have no chance for recovery. That way they can show their base that they took action and the death crowd can have their their wishes satisfied.
Call me synical, but that's the way I see it.
All it takes for evil to succeed is for good people to stand by and do nothing.
"If the protesters want to yell and scream, they can certainly do so - just NOT at a place where people DESERVE some peace before they die."
I understand what you said quite well. Let's be quiet while a woman is starved to death. And let's mock those who do stand for justice. The protesters aim to deliver a woman from unjust condemnation. The noise is necessary.
A great and accurate description.
You hit the nail right on the head.
The idiotic intolerant, hostile and irrational behavior has gone on for far too long.
Depriving someone of ARTIFICIALLY-SUSTAINED sustenance (i.e. a feeding tube directly implanted into a person's stomach) is not the same as killing the person. One is passive - letting nature takes its course (since there is NO way she could've survived without the aid of modern medicine and there is NO hope of recovery) and the other is actively killing her.
It's sheer idiocy to claim Terri is being killed or murdered just because an *artificial* means of keeping her alive is discontinued.
People turn off life support equipment everyday when the chances of recovery is nil. Are people murderers for doing so?
Not once in 15 years has Terri ever given any hint she will recover. Not once has she conversed with anyone. Not once has she shown any cognitive ability whatsoever (despite the highly deceptive video snippets her family's put out to the public).
There's a reason why Michael Schiavo has one every single court case and why Terri's parents have lost every single one. Because the evidence support's her husband. All the courts agreed with the husband that Terri wouldn't want to live like this.
Would everyone respect Terri's wishes and let her die in peace.
Yesterday I heard the protests characterized as "well organized." Now they're "chaotic." Whatever fits the story the press is trying to tell.
You may want to direct that question to the management and stockholders of this particular hospice. Terri has been there five years, although in no imminent danger of death (except through court order) and through much of that time she has been in the national spotlight.
Exactly how much compassion has the management shown to the other families by allowing this?
Baloney. You are incredibly selfish and self-righteous. Who the he** are you to demand the right to disrupt the peace of those on the verge of death? What business is it of theirs of what the courts say about another?
Don't you have any respect for those dying and their need for some peace?
1992? Get your facts straight. Michael was doing his best trying to make Terri recover years after this 'magic' date you quoted.
Mrs. don-o please don't think that I disagree with you. Your reference was very enlightening. In fact, it revolts me that this place is called hospice, which is a group that I previously held in great respect.
Did you watch c-spann today with a national rep from hospice? He was showered with hosannas of the wonderful hospice nurses who care for terminal patients in their final days....but at one point he did admit that the natl organization is affiliated with the Fl. hospice too.
Hey wait! I thought they were pro-life?
I'm sick tired of radical clerics and religiously insane wingnuts like you representing the public face of the Republican party. In the Schiavo case, you have behaved EXACTLY like liberals when they don't get their way. This includes throwing childish temper tantrums amd claiming those who have a different opinion on this difficult matter are reincarnations of Hitler etc.
You're absolutely right, Ms. Johnson, but neither is it fair to murder a person by dehydration and starvation.
Non sequitur. Terri's situation is very different than a baby because:
1. Terri didn't want to be kept alive if she was ever placed in such a situation - babies can't make that choice.
2. Terri has NO chance of recovering and regaining cognitive abilities and hasn't shown any hint of doing so in 15 years. Babies show such abilities from the moment of birth.
3. Terri is ARTIFICIALLY kept alive by having a tube directly inserted into her stomach. Babies are fed NATURALLY through the mouths.
Get your facts straight before pointing fingers.
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