Terri Shiavo's Gift To Humanity
Written on Thursday March 31 2005
Terri Sciavo died this morning. Or rather her body was allowed to complete the death process it had started nearly 15 years ago.
I understand her parents anguish. No matter what the circumstances, losing a child has to be the worst pain anyone can experience.
But the majority of people who wanted this poor woman's body to go on living for their own reasons (religious, emotional, misguided beliefs) and proclaimed she had a "right to life" are generally misinformed. I talked to people who saw the video clips the parents released and the media misrepresented for the most part. They nearly always interpreted the video as "proof" Terri was responsive and mentally present if only on a minimal level.
The problem is the videos were edited. And shot in the early 1990's.
Those few who viewed the complete 4 hours of video report that Terri was not consistently responsive. For example, her father taped her eyes following the movement of a ballon. But he could not get Terri to repeat this response.
And the scientific and medical evidence shows Terri's brain was no longer capable of thought or response. Her brain damage was devastatingly massive. Since the original damage occurred her brain suffered serious atrophy. One specialist who examined her stated her brain had liquified and she had few or no viable synapses. This rules out the electrical activity necessary to think.
This leaves us with the arguement that a body no longer capable of thought in a vegetative state has a right to life.
The problem is, her body was trying to terminate.
Terri Schiavo's body has been kept alive for years by the placement of a feeding tube because she lost the ability to swallow and take in nutrition orally.
People who do not swallow well aspirate bits of food or liquid into their lungs. Aspiration leads to a form of pneumonia. Pneumonia is one of the most common causes of death.
Feeding tubes are placed in patients who would quite literally die as a result of trying to eat or drink. In some cases, a feeding tube is medically appropriate. If the person can recuperate and regain the ability to swallow and eat normally again, this measure is only a stop gap.
In people with permanent brain damage as massive as Terri's, the patient does not regain the ability to swallow. The feeding tube is an artificial means for nutrition and hydration that interupts the body's ability to shut down naturally.
This is the natural way human bodies begin the dying process. Our bodies stop taking in food and water, body systems begin to shut down, the body slips into a coma and the person dies peacefully.
Removing the feeding tube is simply stopping a medical treatment. The emotional and often uninformed outrage expressed over this issue clouds everyone's opinions. "They're starving her, she's dying of thirst," are emotionally loaded and also incorrect. Her body had tried to proceed down this natural path to death before.
Before I decided to do some indepth research on this, my husband and I had a few thoughtful dicussions. We both agreed keeping her body alive served little purpose. But we had issues with pulling the feeding tube. Why is it that a monster and murderer like Scott Peterson, if he exhausts all his appeals, will have his life ended easily and nearly instantaneously by lethal injection. Yet in our supposedly enlightened times, this option was not available to Terri Sciavo.
But the bottom line, the heart of this issue is defining life. What does it mean to be alive.
I imagine you'd get a thousand different definitions if you surveyed a thousand people. Emotions, religion, personal issues and views on health would surely come into play.
For example, I have had brain damage since birth. Due to prematurity and low birth weight and other complications, I was born not breathing. (My brother always loved the dramatic, "You were born dead!") I ended up with mild cerebral palsy. This has certainly had an affect on my life, but not as much as most people would imagine. I function on such a high level, I run a business and a busy household, have a happy marriage, drive, ride horses, lift weights.
CP didn't affect my intellect, my IQ has tested between 129 and 140 depending on the method. I was on the high end when tested by a psychologist when I was 8. The low score was from an online test that was timed. (My toddler was screaming at me and the cat walked accross my keyboard, so who knows how valid that one was.) Maybe the gin n tonics knocked out too many usuable brain cells? Ha.
I digress. The point I wanted to make, I have a liberal definition of what constitutes a viable life. Partly due to my personal challenges and experiences. I have friends in wheel chairs who've never walked, spoken or been able to navigate a spoon or cup to their mouth. The can chew, swallow, digest, but someone must navigate for them, maneuver the food or drink to their mouths. Yes, they suffer from severe brain damage chiefly affecting their body. But they are average, even bright, enjoyable people. Their physical disabilities, though severe, do not define their worth.
I known a few mentally challenged people with varying levels of functioning. I hold the same opinion in here. Mental retardation, Down's Syndrome, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, yes they're terrible, sometimes devastating. But these people have the capacity for emotions and expression even when their IQs are very low. They're valuable humans, inspirational to many who meets them.
The bottom line, when the brain is no longer capable of electrical activity or thought on even the most basic level, life is no longer present. Thoughts, emotions, the ability to respond to the world around you, defines a living organism. The ability to force a body to sustain life when the human mind that inhabited it is absent smacks of arrogance to me. God, nature, the order of the universe has designed the human body to cease when the human mind and/or soul exits. Who are we to out-judge, out-think and out-guess God?
Terri Sciavo's time to die should have been a private matter.
Her husband, as her legal guardian, should have been allowed to apply their personal definitions of what is a viable life in deciding her fate. No one else, even her parents, should have had the right to force their own definitions of life upon Terri and her husband.
There's one good thing that might come of Terri Sciavo's death and the media circus surrounding it. People will have discussions about how they define life. Meanings and parameters will hopefully be put to paper. Future victims of catastrophic medical disasters will not be subjected to years of family anomosity and court battles.
Terri Sciavo might be a hero despite her tragically short time on earth.