I've explained on the earlier thread why I feel so strongly about respecting Terri's wishes, but let me do so again.
18 months and 12 days ago, my dear wife of 39 years passed away after a 3 1/2 month battle with primary peritoneal cancer. About 10 days prior to her passing, I had to make the decision to stop chemotherapy and continue only hospice care. It was the most difficult decision of a lifetime spent making decisions for myself and for others professionally.
Yet in another sense, it was easy because my wife and I had discussed it many times over the years. She wanted me to protect her -- as I had for 39 years. Now, she didn't discuss her wishes with supermarket clerks or even, to my knowledge, with her relatives. That is not surprising to me because of the nature of the discussion; it is just not the sort of thing you discuss casually.
I'm fairly sure it came up in some of her Bible studies, but I would have been hard put to locate the people who were there and who remembered what she had said.
Moreover, while we both had durable powers of attorney expressing our desire not to be maintained by extraordinary maintenance, our durable powers did not mention the words 'chemotherapy' or 'hospice.' Fortunately, all of her physicians concurred and there was no fine, upstanding member of the plaintiff's bar standing by to drag me before a federal judge to prove that God could not perform a miracle cure.
So, I made the decision (because my wife could no longer do so) and 10 days later, my wife went Home.
Now, do I feel strongly that my superintending that decision was as important as any other protection I provided to my dear wife over 39 years? You bet. Would I have been frantic if some collection of well-intentioned but misguided folks had decided to override her wishes so clearly expressed to me? Beyond words. My obligation to her trumped social convention and civil law (although I am a lawyer) because I promised before God and man 39 years ago to 'honor and protect' her.
So that is why my blood boils to see Terri so misused. The reason for my insistence is that I was so recently there.
This has become an exercise in futility. Terri has yet to receive proper medical care. She's never had a cat scan, she's in a hospice, etc...It's a complete and total difference.
But since we're comparing. Same thing happened with my father-n-law a year and a half ago. His decision was a conscious decision made between he and his wife. He received the best in medical care and in the end it wouldn't have mattered.
And that is the difference. But like I said, "An exercise in futility."