Wrod. And it can't be good for our movement to get in bed with Jeb. God, I so hoped she'd be dead before this. And they do too want to run all of our lives. Movement people think it makes a statement about the value of life with a disability not keeping Terri "alive". Personally, I can't see what difference it makes and I would rather die a thousand times than be Necro-Right-wingPoster Child.

I would totally date (or at least laugh at) any of these people:

[link]

Amyliz, by now both sides are fiercely locked into their positions.

But when it all started, the husband faithfully nursed and tended the wife for years; eventually he came to the conclusion that she would never recover. He then went to court and stated that she had told him that she didn't want to live like that.

The court decided (and nobody has ever refuted these facts) that the wife had told the husband that she didn't want to live in a vegetative state.

So that's why he started the whole thing: he was carrying out his wife's last wishes.

AmyLiz, I wonder the same thing. Wasn't he, at some point, offered a billion dollars or something to sign her care over? My assumption is that he knows that Terri wouldn't have wanted all of this mess and is going to try and fulfill what she wanted. OTOH, if it were me in the situation, I'd have to give up and say, "Fine - here you go. I can't do this anymore."

There are cynical people who believe he wants the insurance money when she dies.

There isn't any left. It's run out.

There isn't any left. It's run out.

Oh.

Then...

I don't know.

If they're willing to continue her care, and obviously want to, why does he feel the need to have the last (no horrible pun intended there) word?

The crux of the case is that the husband says that Terry told him she didn't want to be kept alive in case of coma, etc. But there is no written will. He sort of went on with his life while leaving her in a nursing home--he's got a child (or two) with another woman, but never divorced.

Her parents are arguing that he wanted her insurance money, etc. Husband claims it's all gone towards her care.

The legal point should be next of kin gets to make the decision. Her husband is next of kin. If he feels he's following her wishes, it should end there. But her parents insist that she just needs more therapy.

Amy, he says that she expressed very clearly that she would never want to be kept alive like this and that he feels it is cruel to force her to stay alive in a world after she has, for all intents and purposes, been dead for more than a decade.

It's very difficult for me to be rational about this; DH's father died very slowly from ALS and was down to 80 pounds and no means of communication by the time a family member did as he'd requested in earlier years and removed his feeding tube to let him die. If that person had done so publically, s/he could have been tried for murder. It just makes me sick to my stomach to even think about.

That's the thing -- the parents are quite plainly not living on this planet any more.

They claim she's responding to them. She hasn't got any fucking cerebrum to do that. There is no brain there.

Is she in some weird gray area between being totally brain-dead and being... responsive?

eta:

She hasn't got any fucking cerebrum to do that. There is no brain there.

So she's completely brain-dead?

No. She is totally brain dead. MRIs show that her cerebrum has been replaced by fluid.

People who have a working brain stem move, open and shut their eyes, and make noises. She does all the above. That doesn't mean that she's thinking or responding.