God and Life Support

[newton3005]

What if a loved one is on life support? What if the person on life support is in a coma? What if they aren’t, and they want you to end their “suffering?” What is your moral obligation to them?

We may have to look back, long before we had the capacity to prolong one’s life, in search of the answer. And we must regard every word in the Bible as a directive on the whole, inasmuch as 2 Timothy 3:16 says that all Scripture is breathed out by God for teaching, reproof, correction and training in righteousness. For even though it is our faith in God that opens the door to Heaven for us, without works it is useless as Janes 2:17 tells us. And although righteousness is part of our faith, it is a function of our works. As Jesus says in Matthew 7:21, ““Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.”

So, Genesis 1: 27-28 says “…God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’” On that basis, it is in God’s interests that we stay alive. In that sense, God is life, and whoever is born has been given that gift of life. And Deuteronomy 28:1…6 says, “…if you faithfully obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today…, Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Blessed shall you be when you come in and blessed shall you be when you go out.”

And these blessings are affirmed for us in the New Testament which declares in Galatians 3:29 “And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.” So God created us to live, and not to die. A reading of the Bible, particularly the Old testament, tells us that God did not command us to kill eachother except in matters of self-defense. In that regard He was, for instance, with David when David did battle against the Philistines. God did command us not to murder, meaning to kill for reasons other than self-defense.

So, are you committing murder if you pull the plug on a lived one? Are the doctors committing murder, and perhaps making you an accomplice if they do it? Or are they your accomplice? What if the person is suffering?

Under God through Christ, there are two paths the suffering loved one can take. Either their earthly suffering will be ended and they will still be alive, or it will end when they stand in judgement before God. Whatever the path is, there is hope for a better existence than the one being endured now. Romans 15:13 says, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” And if the loved one’s path will be to God, 1 Peter 5:10 says, “…after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.”

I tell you that if we take the loved one off of life support so that they will die, then we are committing murder since this is not a killing in self-defense. You may ask, ‘Who is to say that we wouldn’t be speeding up the person’s going to God if God wants them? The problem is, we don’t know what God’s intentions are. What if He determined the person should remain alive for the doctors to relieve them of their suffering? God in Isaiah 55:8-9 says, “…my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways… For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.” And Proverbs 3:5 says to trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding.

As God supports life on earth, we, who are in His image, should do the same. God has a purpose for everything, even though we don’t know what that purpose may be in specific circumstances.

 

[blackribbon]

Discontinuing life support does not kill the patient. It allows their body to die in most instances however some people don't die. Turning off life support is not going to end the life of someone who God is not ready to allow to die. A person can even die on life support. God is the God over life and death.

I had to make that decision for my husband. He had limited brain activity related to a cancer driven series of seizures. The life support was not living for him but just gave him a breath when his body forgot to take a breath. The medications he was being given were no longer controlling his heart rate and his young healthy heart was slowly wearing out from having an extraordinary high heart rate (the seizure had destroyed the part of his brain that controlled the heart rate). The cancer was growing ... yes, you could see it spreading under his skin. Short of a miracle, there was no way that he was going to live for much longer.

I prayed for that miracle but there came a day when I clearly heard from God that it was time to let him go to God. He might have lived a few more days before having a heart attack or had organs stop functioning. He might have suffered from a lot of pain without any way to express that he was suffering. I loved him...loved him enough to want to free him to leave this body that had failed him on such a massive way. Before I discontinued his life support activities, I gave him permission to "let go" and stop living on this earth. We discontinued the interventions. He slowly died peacefully over the next half hour in my arms. I did not kill him or allow him to be "murdered". Cancer killed his body. His soul and spirit were freed.

Just because we have the ability to make a body function does not mean that we are keeping a person alive. If God had intended to heal my husband in this world, He was completely capable of doing just that. However, it was my husband's time to die. And although it breaks my heart to go on without him, my purpose as his wife was to love him within God's plan for his life.

 

[rainingviolets]

Many of us have a life directive already on file directing our loved ones what to do so that decision is off of their shoulders. I personally don't want my children left with that heartbreaking decision when and if the time comes. By having a DNA directive already on file (Do Not Resuscitate) the patient has already decided that in a matter of life or death he/she wants nothing done. It is out of the family's and the doctor's hands. If the DNA directive is on file, the person would never have been put on life support to begin with. The directive is a legal document that has to be notarized and witnessed by two non-family members. It something, at least in our case, that was discussed long ago with our all of children. Since one of our daughters is a doctor and another is an ICU/trauma nurse and both are committed Christians, it's a decision I am very comfortable with.

 

[blackribbon]

There are other levels of advanced directives that aren't as limiting as a DNR. My husband was 41 years old and healthy other than the cancer. I don't think I would have been happy with him if he had signed a DNR at that point. What was important is that we discussed his wishes for when his health status changed (the result of the seizure damage). I am 53 and in good health. If my heart stopped, I would want CPR. If I was in a car accident and there was hope for recovery, I do want life support. However, my kids know that I don't want to live forever in that state and when there is little chance of recovery, my wishes are different. I sat down with my mother and did her advanced directive. She is in her late 70s. He does not have heart disease of any sort. Her directive says that she can receive cardiac meds and shock to restart her heart (like may be needed in a surgical state) but does not want compressions which likely would break her ribs and sternum. She also does not want any long term extraordinary effort to keep her alive.

As a nurse, I don't think staying on life support for a long period of time in the ICU without a means to communicate your wishes as really "living". It is more limbo where the medical world is just not allowing a body to die and let the person go on to be with Jesus.

 

[Brightmoon]

I remember the horror that was the terry schavo case. When W interfered with a family decision to stop life support for an essentially brainless but breathing corpse . I would hate to “live” like that too. Just running up horrendous medical bills for my family.

 

[blackribbon]

I remember the horror that was the terry schavo case. When W interfered with a family decision to stop life support for an essentially brainless but breathing corpse . I would hate to “live” like that too. Just running up horrendous medical bills for my family.

I disagree that starving a person to death is "removing life support". Terri wasn't lifeless corpse. She responded to her family and her eyes would track people and objects. I have cared for people like this and they are very much "in there" if you take time to listen to them. I had to fight to get one patient pain meds before I did a very painful wound cleaning (every 8 hours). And her body language was very evident when I took the time to explain what I was doing each time in the room before I did it. She never spoke to me. She only changed body position when I wasn't looking. But her eyes stopped being so angry and her body relaxed. I'd object to subjecting someone like Terri to anything beyond basic care or comfort care (like cancer treatment), but I believe she was not given proper care. I don't consider food "life support" even in the form of a tube feeding any more than I'd call giving a baby a bottle life support. Terri could suck water off a sponge and swallow...so the same effort a baby makes.

My husband made it clear that he didn't want the "plug pulled" until there was zero chance of him being able to live and watch his children grow up. He would have been okay with Terri's quality of life and I would have been more than happy to have pushed him in a wheel chair to watch all those baseball/softball games I had to go to alone.

 

[Brightmoon]

I disagree that starving a person to death is "removing life support". Terri wasn't lifeless corpse. She responded to her family and her eyes would track people and objects. I have cared for people like this and they are very much "in there" if you take time to listen to them. I had to fight to get one patient pain meds before I did a very painful wound cleaning (every 8 hours). And her body language was very evident when I took the time to explain what I was doing each time in the room before I did it. She never spoke to me. She only changed body position when I wasn't looking. But her eyes stopped being so angry and her body relaxed. I'd object to subjecting someone like Terri to anything beyond basic care or comfort care (like cancer treatment), but I believe she was not given proper care. I don't consider food "life support" even in the form of a tube feeding any more than I'd call giving a baby a bottle life support. Terri could suck water off a sponge and swallow...so the same effort a baby makes.

My husband made it clear that he didn't want the "plug pulled" until there was zero chance of him being able to live and watch his children grow up. He would have been okay with Terri's quality of life and I would have been more than happy to have pushed him in a wheel chair to watch all those baseball/softball games I had to go to alone.

you do realize that the video of her doing these things was taken years earlier. Look up the scan of her brain just before she died . Most of her brain was gone and there was nothing there but liquid . I literally meant brainless that poor woman had almost no brain left . The machines were keeping her body alive. Living corpse was pretty much what she was.

 

[blackribbon]

you do realize that the video of her doing these things was taken years earlier. Look up the scan of her brain just before she died . Most of her brain was gone and there was nothing there but liquid . I literally meant brainless that poor woman had almost no brain left . The machines were keeping her body alive. Living corpse was pretty much what she was.

I find it interesting that there is not a video taken closer to her death that would have shown her in a vegetative state. I don't think that there is ANY video of her in a vegetative state. There were zero machines keeping her alive. The "life support" that was removed was simply a feeding tube and the nurses were prevented from giving her water via the mouth. The fact that it took her 13 days of no water or nutrition for her to die...that is a long time to die of dehydration and shows how healthy she was before they started to starve her.

The brain scans were taken at the same time as the videos (2002) and in those videos, she was tracking with her eyes, responding appropriately to questions with verbal utterances, she did things in response to verbal commands....in otherwards, she was functioning and not vegetative. And I have seen videos of children with less brain who are function and even talking.

I cannot and will NEVER consider food and water "life support". Could we just put a pillow over her face and say we didn't provide life supporting oxygen? Food and water are necessities of human life. They are not extraordinary care. Her body was living just fine and breathing on her own (shows brain activity). She was simply a disabled person that we allowed her husband and the medical world to kill by neglect. Starvation & dehydration is considered too cruel of a way to kill a prisoner, but it was okay to kill her this way because she was disabled with no hopes of recovery. She was not dying like my husband. They simply killed her.

Boy born without a brain turns 6 years old.

 

[Hank77]

I find it interesting that there is not a video taken closer to her death that would have shown her in a vegetative state. I don't think that there is ANY video of her in a vegetative state. There were zero machines keeping her alive. The "life support" that was removed was simply a feeding tube and the nurses were prevented from giving her water via the mouth. The fact that it took her 13 days of no water or nutrition for her to die...that is a long time to die of dehydration and shows how healthy she was before they started to starve her.

The brain scans were taken at the same time as the videos (2002) and in those videos, she was tracking with her eyes, responding appropriately to questions with verbal utterances, she did things in response to verbal commands....in otherwards, she was functioning and not vegetative. And I have seen videos of children with less brain who are function and even talking.

I cannot and will NEVER consider food and water "life support". Could we just put a pillow over her face and say we didn't provide life supporting oxygen? Food and water are necessities of human life. They are not extraordinary care. Her body was living just fine and breathing on her own (shows brain activity). She was simply a disabled person that we allowed her husband and the medical world to kill by neglect. Starvation & dehydration is considered too cruel of a way to kill a prisoner, but it was okay to kill her this way because she was disabled with no hopes of recovery. She was not dying like my husband. They simply killed her.

Boy born without a brain turns 6 years old.

It's amazing that a brain that was 2% at birth could quickly grow to a brain that is 80% of a normal brain.
It's like that once they relieved the pressure caused by the hydrocephalus it just took off growing where it had left off.
I just think it was a miracle.
He can write his name and is learning to read.

 

[blackribbon]

Evidence that who God wants to live, lives. It doesn't matter what any scans or doctors say. I wonder how many other "miracles" were cut up in pieces and just vacuumed into the biological waste trash.

 

[jayem]

I cannot and will NEVER consider food and water "life support". Could we just put a pillow over her face and say we didn't provide life supporting oxygen? Food and water are necessities of human life. They are not extraordinary care. Her body was living just fine and breathing on her own (shows brain activity). She was simply a disabled person that we allowed her husband and the medical world to kill by neglect. Starvation & dehydration is considered too cruel of a way to kill a prisoner, but it was okay to kill her this way because she was disabled with no hopes of recovery. She was not dying like my husband. They simply killed her.

There is another way to look at this. The real issue was what Terri would have decided for herself. She had been in that severely disabled state for nearly 15 years, with no significant change. Terri's husband always contended that she herself would not have wanted to be kept alive by PEG-tube feeding and hydration. And she had expressed that verbally. Terri's parents disputed that claim. Under Florida law, if an impaired patient cannot make medical decisions for him/herself, and has not designated a surrogate in writing, a spouse is considered to have that authority. But Terri's parents went to court to challenge her husband's fitness as the legal surrogate. And after multiple proceedings, in various state courts, there was never any evidence to suggest that Terri's husband was not acting in accordance with Terri's own wishes. So legally, she was not killed by others. She died because she had an incurable neurologic injury, and she herself (through her husband's surrogacy) refused further tube feeding.

The take-home lesson here is that everyone should have a written advance directive.

 

[Brightmoon]

Yes I remember people scrambling to get written directives after this case. Not too many people want to live like that

 

[jayem]

Yes I remember people scrambling to get written directives after this case. Not too many people want to live like that

For maximum assurance that your wishes are carried out, you should have 2 documents. One is the Advance Directive. (Which is informally called a "living will.") Where you specify what type of end-of-life medical care you wish. You can be as detailed as you want. The other, which is more important, is a Durable Power of Attorney for health care decision making. This is where you appoint a surrogate to make medical decisions on your behalf, should you be incapable of making them for yourself. Obviously, it should be someone you trust. Give him/her a copy of your AD. Ideally, your surrogate will then instruct your health care team on exactly what level of treatment you want in accordance with your AD. You don't have to pay an lawyer for these. You can download forms from the internet at nominal cost which are valid in your state. Give copies to your doctor. No matter how young and healthy you are, it's a smart thing to do.

 

[blackribbon]

She was smiling in the various videos. She was choosing to live by how she was acting. You don't see a seriously depressed woman who wants to die. If she wanted to die, she would have withdrawn and not interacted with anyone else...and likely would have died over this many years. But that isn't what was obvious. It may have been legally the right decision but I do not think it was the ethical decision. Her husband could have given guardian ship to her parents and let them pay for it and they would have gladly taken over the responsibility for her life and her care.

It is easy to say you don't want to live in a state like that but when you find yourself disabled, you could very well change her mind. Life is sacred. Just because you become disabled doesn't change that life is sacred. I had always thought my husband would have said he wouldn't have wanted to live if he was physically damaged (he was a very outdoor person)...but as the cancer slowly killed his body, he changed his mind and simply wanted to see his kids grow up and would have okay just sitting in a wheelchair and watching from the sidelines.

Legal or not, as a bedside nurse, I believe she was murdered by neglect. She wasn't given the option to make that decision...even by limiting her nutrition to what she chose to eat or drink orally.

 

[blackribbon]

I have verbally told my kids what I want. They will be my legal decision makers until I am old enough to want to designate my decisions. Without the papers, it is assumed that you want everything done for you and at this point, my kids still need me and I am in good health so I do want everything done. In the rare chance that I'd find myself in a situation where I could not make that decision for myself, I have told them my wishes and then gave them permission to make the decisions that they need to make...and letting me go can be on their timeline and wouldn't have to be made immediately. I have also told them to default to the one who is not ready to let go...and not to feel obligated to visit me if they other child still needs to hang on for a bit longer. I figure, I can stay around for as long as they need me. I will suffer willingly to give them time to say goodbye.

If you have the paper done, make sure they are somewhere easy to find. I have my mom's but I'd have to look for them. What matters is that I have read them and know her wishes. The decision will be mine and I am strong enough to carry out her wishes...taking in account with my brother's needs at that moment. When I stopped my husband's life support, I had his family's support and they were invited to come say good-bye and be there if they wanted. It wasn't easy for my mother-in-law, but she realized it was the best decision after I explained what would likely happen if I didn't do what I did and it would have involved pain and suffering as his organs shut down. That is why I was ready to make that decision. She also got to see him die in peace even after the doctor prepared us to see otherwise. She told me then that when she watched her father die, he was fighting it to the end and it was horrible. He died in my arms.

 

[jayem]

She was smiling in the various videos. She was choosing to live by how she was acting. You don't see a seriously depressed woman who wants to die. If she wanted to die, she would have withdrawn and not interacted with anyone else...and likely would have died over this many years. But that isn't what was obvious.

Terri had been examined by several court-appointed neurologists. Which included hours of video. IIRC, only one physician, who was working with Terri's parents, disagreed with the diagnosis of a persistent vegetative state. And this diagnosis was confirmed at autopsy. Her brain had atrophied to half the mass expected of a healthy, age-matched woman's brain. There were massive neuronal losses in all major regions. All typical findings for PVS.

It may have been legally the right decision but I do not think it was the ethical decision. Her husband could have given guardian ship to her parents and let them pay for it and they would have gladly taken over the responsibility for her life and her care.

You're perfectly entitled to your opinion. But you're projecting your values onto another family. That's not quite proper.

 

[blackribbon]

Terri had been examined by several court-appointed neurologists. Which included hours of video. IIRC, only one physician, who was working with Terri's parents, disagreed with the diagnosis of a persistent vegetative state. And this diagnosis was confirmed at autopsy. Her brain had atrophied to half the mass expected of a healthy, age-matched woman's brain. There were massive neuronal losses in all major regions. All typical findings for PVS.



You're perfectly entitled to your opinion. But you're projecting your values onto another family. That's not quite proper.

I am not projecting my values onto her family...they fought for her to be allowed to continue to live. I back their opinion that she should have been allowed to live. And as in the video I posted before, the brain is an interesting thing and people have lived and function with less than half a brain. How much brain is needed to be considered a human? Should we be allowed to just starve to death every severely disabled person?

 

[blackribbon]

Here is the account of her state the last year of her life. She was not in a vegetative state because she was responsive. Vegetative can't recognize or respond to outside stimulus. The courts allowed her to be killed because she wouldn't get any better than she was at that time. That should not be the criteria. A lot of brain damaged people won't get better but that doesn't mean they should be neglected and allowed to die. This account backs my thoughts on her killing by neglect. If any of us did this to a family member, we would be tried for murder. She wasn't dying until they dehydrated her to death. This comes from the Washington Post with the link at the bottom.

Terri Schiavo's inconvenient life : Remembering when euthanasia prevailed

By Frank Pavone - - Monday, March 30, 2015


I spent the night of March 30, 2005, in a Florida hospice. I was at the bedside of Terri Schiavo during the last 14 hours of her earthly life, right up until five minutes before her death. During that time with Terri, joined by her brother and sister, I told Terri over and over that she had many friends around the country, many people who were praying for her and were on her side. I told her the same thing during my visits to her in the months before her feeding tube was removed. I am convinced she understood.

I’ve known Terri’s family since 1999. They put my name on the short, court-approved list of people who could walk past the police officers stationed outside to visit Terri’s room. Why a court-approved visitor’s list? Because euthanasia advocates didn’t want anyone contradicting their narrative that Terri was an unresponsive person in some kind of vegetative state. The only way to prove she was responsive was to see her for yourself.

I went to see her in September 2004 and again in February 2005. When her mom first introduced her to me, she stared at me intently. She focused her eyes. She would focus her eyes on whoever was talking to her. If somebody spoke to her from another part of the room, she would turn her head and her eyes toward the person speaking.

I told Terri she had many people around the country and around the world who loved her and were praying for her. She looked at me attentively. I said, “Terri now we are going to pray together, I want to give you a blessing, let’s say some prayers.” So I laid my hand on her head. She closed her eyes. I said the prayer. She opened her eyes again at the end of the prayer. Her dad, who had a mustache, leaned over to kiss her and said, “OK Terri, now here comes the tickle.” She smiled and laughed and after he kissed her I saw her return the kiss. Her mom asked her a question at a certain point and I heard her voice. She was trying to respond. She was making sounds in response to her mother’s question, not just at odd times and meaningless moments. I heard her trying to say something, but she was not able to articulate the words owing to her disability. She was certainly responsive.

The night before she died, I was in her room for a total of three to four hours, and then for another hour the next morning — her final hour. To describe the way she looked as “peaceful” is a total distortion of what I saw. She was a person who for 13 days had no food or water. She was, as you would expect, very drawn in her appearance as opposed to when I had seen her before. Her eyes were open but they were moving from one side to the next, constantly darting back and forth. I watched her for hours, and the best way I can describe the look on her face is “terrified sadness.”

Her mouth appeared to be frozen open. She was panting rapidly. It wasn’t peaceful in any sense of the word. Her brother Bobby was sitting on one side of the bed, and I was on the other facing him. Her sister Suzanne was on my left. We had a very intense time of prayer, urging Terri to entrust herself completely to Jesus. I assured her of the love and prayers and concern of so many people.

Who else was in the room with me, Bobby, Suzanne and Terri? Police officers — the whole time. There was always at least one, sometimes two, three, or more — armed police officers in the room. Why were they in the room? They wanted to make sure that we didn’t do anything that we weren’t supposed to do, like give her communion or maybe a glass of water.

There was a little night table in the room. I could put my hand on the table and on Terri’s head all within arm’s reach. On that table was a vase of flowers filled with water. I said to myself, this is absurd, totally absurd. These flowers are being treated better than this woman. She has not had a drop of water for almost two weeks. Had I dipped my hand in that water and put it on her tongue, the officer would have led me out, probably under arrest.

Terri’s husband, Michael Schiavo, and his team were angry with me. They had hoped that they could present Terri’s death as a merciful and gentle act. My words took the veil of euphemism away, calling this a killing and giving eyewitness testimony to the fact that it was anything but gentle.

Another aspect of the Terri Schiavo tragedy is that many people misunderstand its cause and, therefore, its solution. They think the problem was that Terri did not leave any written instructions about whether she wanted to be kept alive. In order to avoid any such problem in their own lives, they are now told that they have to draw up a “living will.” This is both erroneous and dangerous.

Terri’s case is not about the withdrawal of life-saving medical treatment, but rather about the killing of a healthy person whose life some regarded as worthless. Terri was not dying, was not on life support, and did not have any terminal illness. Because some thought she would not want to live with her disability, they insisted on introducing the cause of death, namely, dehydration.

The danger in our culture is not that we will be overtreated, but rather that we will be undertreated. We already have the right to refuse medical treatment. However, we run the risk of losing the right to receive the most basic humane care — like food and water — in the event we have a disability and become inconvenient.

• Father Frank Pavone is the national director of Priests for Life and president of the National Pro-Life Religious Council.

Terri Schiavo’s inconvenient life

 

[jayem]

I am not projecting my values onto her family...they fought for her to be allowed to continue to live. I back their opinion that she should have been allowed to live. And as in the video I posted before, the brain is an interesting thing and people have lived and function with less than half a brain. How much brain is needed to be considered a human? Should we be allowed to just starve to death every severely disabled person?

You’re projecting your values onto Terri and Michael. They’re the family I’m talking about—the central family in this sad story. And the one that matters the most. People should be allowed to make their own decisions regarding their healthcare. When they can’t, then we have to rely on a surrogate. You may have suspicions, but you’re off base to claim categorically that Michael was not acting according to what Terri herself would have wanted. You can’t know that with certainty. No person can. Surrogate decision-making isn’t perfect. If you’re a religious person, you know that we don’t live in a perfect world. We just try to do the best we can.

 

[blackribbon]

You’re projecting your values onto Terri and Michael. They’re the family I’m talking about—the central family in this sad story. And the one that matters the most. People should be allowed to make their own decisions regarding their healthcare. When they can’t, then we have to rely on a surrogate. You may have suspicions, but you’re off base to claim categorically that Michael was not acting according to what Terri herself would have wanted. You can’t know that with certainty. No person can. Surrogate decision-making isn’t perfect. If you’re a religious person, you know that we don’t live in a perfect world. We just try to do the best we can.

Everyone is projecting their own values on Terri. She was not able to express her wishes. It is interesting that he didn't decide to remember that these were her wishes until after he won a million dollar lawsuit that was designated by the judge to be used for her rehab (that she never got) and her long term care. Somehow the money was gone before she she died and she didn't ever receive any rehabilitation. Somehow he had bought himself a nice house and had fathered two kids... but refused to give custody of her and responsibility for her care to her parents. He is the only one who benefited from her death and interesting enough, he was the one who wanted her to die. We really don't know what Terri wanted. We only know what Michael wanted....and what her family wanted. Was it legal? Yes. Was it ethical or morale, I don't think so.

Again, regardless of the details of this case. I do not consider WATER and food to be LIFE SUPPORT, any more than oxygen is. To withhold these without the patient expressly requesting this ON PAPER, is considered NEGLECT and cruelty. Can you imagine if we tried to "withhold this kind of life support" to the animals in the pound or shelters? Or if I said, my granny told me when she was younger that she didn't want to live past the time she could completely take care of herself, so I refused to bring her groceries now that she can't drive to the grocery store anymore.

FOOD AND WATER....really? She died of dehydration.... there is no ethical reason to dehydrate someone to death. This just plain neglect and abuse.