Bloggers' Best for Terri Schiavo: Anniversary Edition, pt. 2
Bloggers are invited to submit links to their best writing on Terri Schiavo's case and related issues. Part I of this series is here. Part III with be posted next Friday, March 31st, one year after Terri Schiavo died after being deprived of food and water for 13 days. If you wish to submit a link, please try to get it in by noon Friday, though late entries are accepted.
From prolifeblogs we have the second part of Tim's interview with Terri's brother. In Bobby Schindler - Part II - Terri Schiavo and the Culture of Death Movement, Bobby Schindler discusses changes in our society and government that enabled the legalized murder of his sister. "The health care industry, working together with many pro-euthanasia groups, have been flying under the radar, endlessly working together to change state laws to make it a relatively straightforward process to kill persons with disabilities."
Chronicle of a Meandering Traveller shares Remembering Terri Schiavo. Georgette says, "I never would have dreamed such a thing could have happened in America if you had told me this ten years ago!" The “right” to die; the “right” to abortion. How can things so wrong be “rights”?
The Judge Report sends us Death by Justice. "I've known teenage suicides. I've known murderers and murder victims (at least one of whom, I am confident, was both). Yet none of these terrible violent deaths can compare to the horror of the judicial murder of Terri Schiavo, who began dying one year ago."
From SecretAgentMan's Dossier, we have Belated Blogburst for Terri, in which he links to previous posts on Terri's plight.
In Caught in Confusion, Leslie Carbone argues that America's moral confusion caused Terri Schiavo's death to be especially horrific.
I Heard the Death-Watch Beating comes to us from Christianity and Middle-Earth.
Wittenberg Gate directs us to two survivors of "hopeless" situations: Kate Adamson and Curtis Neeley.
See Also
A Life That Matters, a book by Mary and Robert Schindler.
SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT MOM’S CARE ON TERRI’S ANNIVERSARY
My Mother enjoys very good health approaching her 90th birthday; but she is frail and requires total care, 24/7. Within that context, I often communicate with others, also caring for aging parents, at or nearing end of life stages.
This is a highly charged, emotional time for families -- comments by loving sons and daughters are often poignant and not easily forgotten -- “I can’t bear to see Mother like that,” or “Dad’s last week of life was more than I could stand,” or “That’s not really living – it’s better to end it before they suffer,” or “She was in so much pain -- if I had the option, I would pull the plug.” Maybe too often, it is we – healthy family members – who too quickly interpret what those at end of life stages are feeling and thinking, rushing judgment on what’s best for failing loved ones, based almost wholly on our frayed emotions – not theirs.
While I cannot relate knowingly of others’ parents, I can tell you about my Mom – proud and independent, working long hours with her hands until retired by her doctor, she often said, “I want to die with my boots on,” and “I don’t want to be a burden on my kids – I want to go quickly.” The truth now is – although unable to care for herself (with a leg amputation, arthritis, dementia, and feeding tube) – she doesn’t want to die, certainly not soon nor before her time is due. Still courageous and defiant, a born again Christian – from traditional Buddhist / Shinto roots -- who anchored the Sunday school, she is uncertain about death, as it closes to a finite distance.
Defining my caregiving task is simple – God has entrusted me with Mom’s life, not her death. I gratefully serve to maintain her good health and happiness -- confident that day-to-day medical attention and personal care received at home is unavailable at best institutional facilities. As a mother she would do -- and has done -- the same for me (or my wife) if roles were reversed. And at some time, hopefully in the distant future, only God – whose love and wisdom we embrace -- will decide when Mom is to make the one-way journey to her final home.
Posted by: shokenjii | March 27, 2006 at 10:54 PM