When I was in school, there was a classmate who had a brain tumor and they did surgery and she ended up in a coma (worse than Terri sounds). They brought her home from the hospital, never calling her a vegetable, articles in the paper about her from time to time, and the family lived in a very humble little house.
Her father built her a special bed so they could take care of her more easily (no medical specialty companies here then or they couldn't afford it) and they finally moved to California where she died in Los Angeles in 1957, about six years later. When I think of that family and their devotion, I want to weep.
If anybody would ever have suggested not feeding her and letting her starve and dehydrate to death (somebody fed her somehow, they probably had feeding tubes in the 50's), people would have been shocked beyond belief. Nobody ever expected her to recover, and I don't ever remember any prayers because nobody I knew had any faith that prayer helped people although almost everybody went to church back in those days. She was such a sweet, quiet, pretty girl and had a dignity beyond her years.
Plus, I'm getting older and have mental health issues, my son's wife's whole family has Huntington's so that means my grandson may end up with it and his mother, the grandmother already has serious symptoms and they throw her out of bars because they think she is drunk, and my daughter was in a bad accident and can't keep a job but gets turned down for social security. She has trouble with her memory, and some brain damage along with hardware in her body still. She has to work at minimum wage jobs because the mental health people will not sign off so she can do what she was trained to do, and she has a Masters Degree.
I wonder which one of us will be next if 70 percent of the American people think some people aren't worthy to live now in March 2005. I think her memory and my family is what drives me in this case to fight as best I can for Terri. The best I can do now is have my own little silent vigil like some of the rest of you are doing, resigned to the inevitable.
It may not be inevitable. Rush mentioned he thought there was a turn the other way. I was surprised, I don't see it.
But, we can sure fight it.
save to respond later when more alert.
Good grief. And I bitch about being overweight. God bless you and yours!