Posted on 04/02/2005 3:04:50 PM PST by Halls
PINELLAS PARK - The room was quiet Friday. The stuffed animals and family pictures were gone. The air mattress that protected her skin from bedsores is neatly covered with a pink and blue blanket.
Only a few clues marked her passing: a bouquet of flowers, still fresh in their vase. An electric candle, ceramic angel and farewell note left by the staff.
Four boxes of facial tissues were strewn on two chairs.
For the first time in five years Friday, life at Hospice House Woodside went on without Terri Schindler Schiavo.
About 50 patients were fed and bathed. An elderly woman with cancer died just before noon. Workers who helped keep Schiavo alive for so long reined in their emotions and plowed through another day.
"It's been very hard watching a circus outside and be there with her while she was dying," said Susan Agines, a senior nursing supervisor. "I think what finally did it was when the juggler came. To me it was ... awful."
Hospice workers are accustomed to death. Their job is to help families through it. But never has the journey exacted such a toll as this one, said Woodside manager Becky McAllister.
For two weeks, nurses, aides and volunteers had to pass through yelling throngs to get to work. Angry voices accused them of murder.
"Today, we are feeling a mixture of relief, exhaustion and satisfaction that we were able to take care of her as well as we did," McAllister said, "and pride in our staff that we were able to continue in spite of having to run this gantlet."
Losing a patient is never easy, McAllister said. Hospice workers deal with patients and families on intimate levels and tend to get attached.
One patient always walked around with a red mark on his cheek, bragging about his daily kiss from the receptionist. An AIDS patient, after several days of extensive wound treatment, told staff that "no one would ever touch him before that," McAllister said. "He felt loved here."
The bonds with Terri Schiavo also were strong. Her five-year stay was two years longer than any other patient. She originally came in 2000 after Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge George W. Greer ordered her feeding tube removed for the first time. People expected her to die soon, but litigation stretched on and on.
The staff took pride that she never developed a bedsore. With twice as many nursing aides per patient than the average nursing home, Woodside workers were able to turn her every two hours.
"She wasn't able to verbalize," said Agines, the nursing supervisor. "But if she was uncomfortable, because the staff had been with her so long, we knew. If she moved, we knew what it meant. We knew when she should settle down with a different piece of music."
For five years, the staff also made connections with Terri's two families - her birth family and marriage family. Some of the staff had moral reservations about removing her feeding tube, others were fine with it, McAllister said. But they were trained to keep those feelings to themselves and try to support everyone equally.
"I said, "This isn't my battle,"' Agines said. "I'm there as a nurse caring for patient. I am caring for the wife of Michael Schiavo, the daughter of Bob and Mary Schindler and the sister to Suzanne and Bobby."
Agines, McAllister and Hospice of the Florida Suncoast president Mary Labyak said their biggest regret was not helping Michael Schiavo and the Schindler family bury their differences, at least long enough for everyone to be present at her death.
Family members have given conflicting versions of what transpired in Schiavo's last few hours Thursday, and the hospice workers declined to elaborate, citing confidentiality.
About 7,000 people die a year under Hospice of the Florida Suncoast care, mostly at home and in nursing homes, Labyak said. Conflict is common as families decide when to treat infections, when to put in feeding tubes, when to disconnect ventilators, when to sign do-not-resuscitate orders.
Mediating disputes "is a way of life for us," Labyak said.
The Schiavo case is the only one she could remember where disagreements kept family members from a bedside at death.
"What saddened us with Terri was all our hoping for reconciliation," Agines said. "To see a family so torn and divided ... I think that was the hardest."
Labyak said it was too early to assess the financial impact of the publicity and furor. She has seen no significant effect on donations.
"Some people wrote letters and said they were not going to donate anymore because they were against" the removal of Schiavo's feeding tube, Labyak said. "Others sent contributions because they said they were proud of what we were doing."
Woodside, with room for 70 patients, is a small part of Hospice's $90-million-a-year operations. Hospice paid about $40,000 for off-duty Pinellas Park police officers to provide security, in addition to officers assigned there by the Police Department, Labyak said. That money came from a "quality of life" reserve fund that usually fulfills last wishes such as helping one patient fly to Peru to visit her mother.
Lasting impact on potential clients is yet to be discerned.
"If anything, I fear that when people need us, they will think of hospice as those signs, those statements, instead of the compassion and dignity and we will not have people dying well in our community because of something they saw on TV," Labyak said. "That would be the ultimate tragedy."
Dr. Theresa Buck, the staff physician, understands the danger. Her own mother and step-mother refused to believe her assessment of Schiavo's condition because of what they saw on television.
"They said she is talking and asking for things," Buck said. "I had dinner with them Wednesday night and couldn't convince them that's not true. And I'm here every day."
Gulfport resident Delys Cavalaro, 82, loves how hospice workers are treating her. "We smile at each other. It's a bond. We don't see many frowns," said Cavalaro, who has breast cancer.
She has a living will and does not want to be kept alive through a feeding tube. "I want to go peacefully. If God chooses to let us live a little longer, I guess that's good fortune."
But she also feels for Mary Schindler. She never met Michael Schiavo, but wished "he would have given her back to her mother. It would have solved a lot of problems."
Jane Burnham knows Michael Schiavo, who lived at Woodside after his wife's feeding tube was removed March 18. His room was next door to the room where Burnham's mother, Betty, 74, lives as she copes with chronic lung disease.
Jane Burnham and Michael Schiavo talked every day.
The day Terri Schiavo died, Burnham's mother was reeling under an infection and was not eating. As they left the hospice, Michael and his brother Brian stopped to say goodbye.
"With all that going on in his life, he knew I was having a rough day," Burnham said. "He came by and gave me a hug and said I was in his thoughts and prayers. He is the nicest man."
Burnham said protesters often yelled at her during her daily visits to her mother. "They have called us murderers," she said. "They say, "Why are you going to go in there where they kill people?' They have no idea what really goes on in here."
McAllister said she expects a new patient to take over Schiavo's room on Monday. It's in the back of the building and looks out over 9 pine-wooded acres. Sometimes, people hold memorial services out there, and weddings, including one between two patients, McAllister said. Afterward the staff welded their hospital beds together.
What you can't see from Schiavo's room is the front of the hospice, where protesters bore witness for two weeks. On Friday, only a few remained.
Thanks, windchime!
I agree with everything you said and could not have expressed it better, or even so well.
I agree, and as you said, Generalizing that all hospice workers are wonderful, caring, nurturing people can make for some very unfortunate surprises at the worst time--
now, replace hospice worker with nurse and imagine having Michael Schiavo as your nurse? Talk about a fate worse than death!
Here's a little more of what they wrote about her (This was a "sidebar" to the article):
"What Does Terry Schiavo Feel?
Absolutely all doctors agree that Terri Schiavo's brain is functioning. It has been determined that she is not comatose. A person in a coma does not react to external stimuli and their eyes are closed. Terry Schiavo cannot speak or move, however she is capable of expressing her mood and main feelings (pleasure, sadness, upset, and joy) via mimicry (sic). ... Doctors do not know if such patients feel pain or suffering, but they assume that they do. According to doctors, the longer a person is in such a condition the less of a chance they have to recover. Nonetheless, there have been cases of recovery in medical history."
(I'm not sure which doctors they are referring to, but I'm assuming they consulted with Russian specialists.)
Just in case Terri ping! If anyone would like to be added to or removed from my Terri ping list, please let me know by FReepmail!
"They said she is talking and asking for things," Buck said. "I had dinner with them Wednesday night and couldn't convince them that's not true. And I'm here every day."
Her own mother and step mother have her pegged as a liar, but we're supposed to believe her, and ignore all the evidence to the contrary.
I know, isn't that something!
I read an article today --- maybe the Telegraph? from the UK I think --- that said Schiavo is in hiding due to death threats, may have to leave FL altogether. Also said he denied the parents even a lock of Terri's hair.
As for the hospice here...I can be as nuanced as the next person but only one word comes to mind.
Accomplices.
Life support is used to help a person RECOVER. Patients with life threatening illnesses and injuries are put a variety of breathing machines to keep them alive while the body heals.
The breathing assistance becomes a problem when, for whatever reason, the patient DOESN'T get better.
She just said that Terri wasn't PVS.
Exactly!!!!!!! That is why when i saw what dear Aigness said I freaked out and was so glad I caught it! I have sent it to Tom Delay and Ohion from Florida is making sure that Terri's family sees it as well. I encourage you and anyone else here to send it on to whomever as well! The Congress, Senatore, DOJ, etc...!This is a big quote and needs to be seen!
Denial over what?
You are responding to an article detailing a trained observer's report and you insist that it has no meaning. You deny its validity because it contradicts your world view rather than accept another scientific datapoint.
The nurses observe responses to different MUSIC, this is not reflexive."
It sure can be.
I studied neuroanatomy in graduate school. I do not recall my studies including a mechanism by which the brainstem could react to different musical patterns. I recall that only the cortex interprets auditory stimuli. http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=20828 The auditory cortex is the temporal lobe, which the lower lobe of the cerebral hemisphere just forward of the occipital lobe.
Perhaps you have more current knowledge than I do. Perhaps you are a neuroanatomist or neurophysiologist. Perhaps you have some specific basal areas that you think could respond to different sonic frequencies? In that case "It sure can be" should be followed by something with a little more gravity.
Ummm..I have. I don't think she deserved to be murdered, but I don't think she was gonna be singing 'God Bless America' anytime soon either.
Umm...You didn't. You failed to respond to the factual statement of a trained nurse. Frankly your flippant response typifies the culture of death that we have been discussing.
What a giant steaming pile of BS this article is. They should have just titled it- CYA.
WOW! Thank you for the information.
So in Pensylvania, without any court order at all, if your husband/wife/mother/sister/brother decide to starve you to death it is ok then.
Just 2 Doctors need to certify pemently unsonscius and then the family does whatever they dar well want.
What is with this country and why didn't I know about this sooner?
Yeah, they've been oh-so-quiet about all this, haven't they been? Curiously very quiet.....why's this not been reported about before Terri? Could it be because Terri's parents had the where-withal to fight this evil, no thanks to a lying media?
Un FREAKING believable /sarcasm
YOU nicmarlo, you are the uncoverer of truth.
A few of these PRO DEATH people have been very busy quietly changing definitions of life, if you are PVS you are a non human, and bringing forced euthaniasia into our country.
Terri Schindler has opened our eyes. Some will say perhaps that was God's purpose, however I will always remember it was man's hand who took her life, not God's.
Yes, because of Terri, we're all learning the truth. And that wasn't God's will that she be murdered...that was Greer's, her adulterous philandering so-called husband, Felos, the ACLU, and numerous others. But I do think it's God's will that we're finding out about all the evil that, up to now, has gone unnoticed and unchecked.
BTW, please note: I posted later, after post #144, MY ERROR: It was not under President George H. W. Bush which that Commission was begun, or to whom they addressed their letter, but was to President Reagan (I say this because if you look in the pdf files, the dates of the letters correspond to when Reagan was President. The name of the President is NOT on the letters, hence my error.)
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