Posted on 04/15/2005 1:49:57 PM PDT by FR_addict
In a house on Chicago’s southeast side, a Mexican family is going through a heartbreak like the tragedy that befell the American Terri Schiavo’s family and deeply affected both those who defend the right to life and partisans of euthanasia. But no voices had been raised so far in this case because very few knew about the situation concerning the 39-year-old Latin woman whose husband decided to disconnect the tube that had been feeding her during her three and a half years in a vegetative state.
As of the close of this edition, Clara Martinez, 39 years old and mother of two children aged five and seven years – had been almost 30 days without food and was still alive, taking only water. For the last year she has been cared for in her home, with special medical equipment installed in the living room, while the rest of the family try to go on with their lives.
This woman has remained in this condition since suffering a stroke. She was cared for in the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Medical Center, later at an intermediate care facility, then at the hospital again, and finally she was taken to her home. At that time the physicians had judged her condition to be irreversible.
Under these conditions her husband Salvador Martinez, 35 years old and also Mexican, resolved that his wife should not live artificially. He signed a “Do Not Resuscitate” order to keep her from being revived artificially and disconnected the feeding machine. Under these conditions the woman should have died by withdrawal of feeding and the case would have gone unnoticed, had it not been for the intervention of a pastor of the Hispanic Evangelical Church at 4340 W. 87th St.
The wife’s mother, Gregoria Ruano, who has lived 33 years in the US after coming from the state of Durango in Mexico, attends this church. She disagrees with her son-in-law’s decision and spoke about the situation with Pastor Guillermo Espinoza.
Indeed, family and members of this church seem to be against euthanasia, which has led the husband to refuse an interview with La Raza, saying he doesn’t want to go public with my troubles. “My problems are mine, I will take care of them, and when I need you, I will call you,” was his reply.
According to Pastor Espinoza, who is from Bolivia, “The husband made a decision and will not change it, even though the family does not agree.”
Just as in the much-discussed case of Terri Schiavo, in which even the Vatican has called death by withholding feeding “an offense against life,” the Evangelical pastor feels that withholding feeding is “a form of hastening a death that definitely was not occurring.”
In the interview he said that when he was with the wife, “she moved, opened her eyes, and when we prayed and sang together by her bedside, she blinked as though she was listening.” He said it was also significant that, in spite of her condition, the woman was still “able to take water.”
Espinoza said that his was not a personal opinion on the right to life but from the Bible, which establishes that “God is the one who gives life and takes it away at such times as He sees fit.” According to Espinoza, “We conceptualize life in the context of a perfection, and when perfection is lacking, we feel it is incomplete.”
And so, “The husband’s ideal is the sublimated ideal of life. He wants to see his wife healthy like always and can’t conceive of seeing her like this.”
Court battle
Schiavo was disconnected per court order on March 18 from the apparatus that was keeping her alive. The so-called “Schiavo case” took a seven-year court battle between the husband, Michael Schiavo, who argued that she did not want to live artificially, and her parents, who maintained the opposite, and carried it into political terrain.
Even the President of the US, George W. Bush, took part in the dispute, taking the side of the conservative and religious groups opposed to euthanasia. He declared that “Those who live by the mercy of others deserve special concern.”
The tragedy involving Terri Schiavo began in 1990 when she was 26 years old. She has been in a persistent vegetative state after suffering a hear attack caused by a sudden drop in her body’s potassium levels, brought on by a strict weight-loss diet.
She was fed artificially for eight years until 1998 when her husband, who exercised legal guardianship, became convinced that there was no hope for her to live normally and asked for her feeding tube to be withdrawn. He claimed that his wife never wanted to live that way, although there was no legal document expressing such a wish.
That was the year the long and drawn-out court battle between Terri’s husband and parents began, during which the woman’s feeding tube was disconnected and reconnected on three occasions.
After the second disconnection in October of 2003, Terri’s parents appealed to the Governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, who presented a special bill to the state legislature which passed the so-called “Terri’s Law” which allowed the governor to order the feeding tube to be reconnected again.
Michael Schiavo brought suit claiming that law to be unconstitutional, and in September of 2004, Florida’s Supreme Court struck down the law. The feeding tube was disconnected anew.
Terri’s parents appealed for intervention by the US Congress and President Bush, who promulgated a bill in Congress with majority Republican support for “relief for the parents of Teresa Marie Schiavo.”
And so the case went to the US Supreme Court, which finally denied the claim and decided in favor of disconnection. The woman died fourteen days later.
At that time, L’Osservatore Romano (the official publication of the Holy See) published an editorial expressing fear at the wave of devastation that will, as a result of this case, erase established values and wildly distort people’s beliefs. It lamented the quality of life being judged inadequately when under guardianship, when a patient is in no condition to relate and comprehend. It also rejected the woman’s vegetative state as being synonymous with brain death or incapacity to feel the “slow agony” of being without food and water.
Living will
Comparing Terri Schiavo’s case with that of the Mexican family, Pastor Espinoza told La Raza he is worried about laws that could be passed. “If we allow a law to determine who will or will not live, it will be an offense against God’s principles of ethics.” In his opinion, nobody should be allowed to determine that “this person is not a living human being, so I decide when I give life or take away life. It’s a sophisticated way of murdering somebody.”
The “Schiavo Case” points to the need for people to make arrangements for having a “living will” in which they set forth their wishes for not being resuscitated or kept alive by artificial means, although opinions have been expressed that feeding and hydration – with or without tubes – are not considered artificial. As for the Catholic Church, its followers cannot request in a living will that denied water and nutrition be withheld, “as that is starvation, a deliberate mutilation of the body.”
Good job, FR_addict!
Call the local police and the Department of Social Services.
The family wants MEDIA ATTENTION. Please read this excerpt from blogs for Terri:
"Martinez suffered a debilitating stroke a year ago and her husband signed a "Do Not Resuscitate" order that led to the disconnection of her feeding tube. She is able to consume liquids through her mouth and, so far, has survived for thirty days without food.
Under "normal" circumstances her situation would have gone unnoticed had it not been for the intervention of a pastor of the Hispanic Evangelical Church. Her family also opposes the husband's decision.
====> I spoke to the article's author, Jorge Mederos. He said the family feels "powerless" and has called the media without response. "No one is paying attention," he said. "The family is planning a protest tomorrow or over the weekend."
http://www.blogsforterri.com/archives/2005/04/another_terri_s.php#more
These congresspersons are very pro-life and here's their contact info:
http://www.house.gov/paul/
http://tancredo.house.gov/
The family wants media attention, so here are some contacts. If you don't have much time, please at least make one contact.
Sean Hannity's e-mail: James.Grisham@abc.com
Special Note
Nationwide local media contact database - one of the best all-purpose links.
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/media
For contact info for all media in a local area, enter your zipcode.
For contact info for all media in a state, click that state on the map.
For national media, check the "show national media" box.
When it returns your list of media outlets, you can click on the name to go to the website.
If you want to send email to any or all of them, click the box next to the name. Then, click "compose message". When the next screen comes up, enter the requested information, type in your message, and click "send message".
==>Added bonus: on the left hand side of the search page are links to the same kind of contact info for national, state and local officials; and state agencies.
To Call FOX News Channel:
1-888-369-4762
FOX News Channel Comments
Comments@foxnews.com
cbs phone # is 212-975-3247; e-mail is audsvcs@cbs.com
If you call you can either leave a message on their answering machine, or if you wish to talk with a "real person," call between 10 - 11:30 a.m. or 2 - 3:30 p.m.
netaudr@abc.com
nbcshows@nbc.com
If she can "take water" why not milk or Metrecal or whatever?
Bottom line, I agree with you.
Excellent post!
Sent e-mails to Chicago papers, WSJ, New york Post and Drudge.
I don't care if she's from Mexico, the north pole or the Moon. It's still wrong.
I reread the article after I read your remarks - am I missing something?
I know it says they are Mexican but I didn't see where they said they were illegals?
If not, then following your reasoning, unless you are full blood Native American - you're not in your "homeland" either...
Since the story apparently checks out, I'll post the talk show list in a minute. I've got the usual suspects queued up to be faxed again, as soon as more details become available. That's what I'll be mostly doing this time.
I'm going to FReepmail several who I seem to remember being able to speak Spanish, in case they're needed.
Thanks for sending the alert.
How did he do it? With a comatose mom in the living room and all the care that would involve for one person - who, presumably, would also have to work - how much help did he have?
What adverse effects would it have on the little children to see their mom in this condition and the things that have to be done to her to care for her? And if, presumably, the poor woman could go like this for decades, what would that daily situation do to their lives?
How much help was friends, family, church giving?
I'm not agreeing with not feeding her - I just wonder if we should think of the strain this must've put on the husband - who has to be father and mother and breadwinner and caretaker of a patient that usually has several professional caretakers - plus the heartbreak of it being someone he loves?
Also - this newspaper article got so much information wrong about Terri - for ex: "She has been in a persistent vegetative state after suffering a hear attack caused by a sudden drop in her body’s potassium levels, brought on by a strict weight-loss diet." - I can't help but wonder if everything else is factual...or perhaps a reporter jumping the gun for a by-line with a 'topical' story.
I would first like to know all the particulars of the case - just how much daily help was the husband getting - and just why she hasn't been in a care facility for the past year? Should she not be in one?
Does anyone know if the pastor = or any pastor - and how many, if any, family members and friends and church people have been daily helping the family?
Here's a link that lists a number of Chicago newspapers for folks in a hurry:
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/media/?command=state_search&state=il
WorldNetDaily put the link up on their website.
http://www.laraza.com/news.php?nid=21715
Maybe later they will write their own story.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.