The Schiavo Reloaded

The Mad Alchemist leave the following comment, which I feel bears answering. Since my comment was getting long, and it's my blog, I decided to turn it into a post. His comment follows:

I'll certainly not disagree that there was some undeserved demonization of Michael Schiavo, but I just can not see him as an upstanding human being. The whole "I all of a sudden remembered after all these years that my wife actually wanted to die. Silly me for forgetting about that!" thing just doesn't sit well with me. Plus, I understand he wouldn't let the Schindler's have so much as a lock of Terri's hair, or any of the ashes from her cremation. I can understand him having a grudge with them, but even so that is still not too much to ask from him by any means. I have tried to picture myself in his situation, and I just can not imagine ordering the death of a spouse without making a sincere appeal to her parents that it would be her wishes. In fact, personally, I can't imagine going through with it at all without her parent's blessing. I don't think I could ever find it in me to completely and permanently take a woman away from her loving parents like that, even assuming they were in fact in the wrong. If Terri was not conscious of her state to begin with(and even Lee made this same point), I don't see how it would have hurt Michael Schiavo any to simply turn her over to her parent's custody if it was that important to them, and it obviously was.

I'm not saying that Michael Schiavo is some sort of saint, but put yourself in his shoes. You spend years trying to pursue treatment for your wife's ailments, at one point you even move in with her parents so that you can team up on taking care of her.

Eventually, you come to accept that in spite of the treatments, in spite of the therapy, your wife just plain isn't going to get better. At the same time, you're forced to accept that your wife wouldn't have wanted to be kept alive in that kind of state if there was no hope for recovery.

You approach her parents about the issue, and try to convince them, but they'll have none of it. Instead of accepting after eight or nine years that their daughter isn't coming back, and letting go, they file lawsuit after lawsuit against you. They accuse you of having been the cause of her medical condition. They even go on to accuse you of murdering her. You try for years to convince them, but it's no use - they absolutely refuse to listen to reason, or medical advice.

What would you do? I can't say that I'd do exactly what Michael Schiavo did; I'd like to think that I'd have been a bit more compassionate about things. Even so, if I'd sought treatments for my wife for years and years, and shifted my entire life to get credentials as a nurse, and finally decided to let my wife go with some dignity, and her parents accused me and brought lawsuits against me and painted me as a murderous monster, I can't say for a fact that I wouldn't get so bitter that I'd seek to deny them any possible consolation, be it a lock of hair or bits of her cremated remains.

When it comes down to it, Michael Schiavo did make sincere appeals to the Schindlers. He tried to take care of their daughter and allow her life to end with some dignity, and they responded by doing everything in their power to make his life an absolute nightmare.

You say that you couldn't fathom taking a woman away from her parents forever without their blessing, but the bottom line is that you aren't Michael Schiavo. I'm not trying to attack you; far from it. I just think it's sort of out of line to pass judgment on him because he did, after fifteen years, what you, who have never been in his situation, claim that you wouldn't do. I don't think that's a fair statement to make.

Evne so, I can agree to disagree. I appreciate the comment, Alchemist.