When it comes to issues that deal with human lives, it's never black-or-white, and never easy. These subjects are always complicated, and can be hurtful for those involved.
We are seeing this again with two different situations going on in two different states. One involves a 13-year-old California teen who went in to get her tonsils removed and ended up being declared brain dead three days later. They say it's entirely unclear what happened, but the issue is that since brain death has been declared and verified, the hospital wants to have her taken off life support, which the family objects to. The second situation takes place in Texas, where a pregnant female paramedic is being held on life support, against her wishes (according to the husband, who is also a paramedic), due to a Texas state law that puts the rights of the fetus over the wishes of the mother.
Both very, very interesting situations, if you ask me. These cover the questions of Life vs. Death and Faith vs. Science.
I find the one with the California girl to be extremely heart-wrenching. To think that one going in for a simple procedure could come out with a death certificate....And the circumstances are really hard too. Although she has been declared "brain dead", her heart is still beating, and the mother says that she moves her eyes and hands sometimes.
The sad truth is, with the hospital, it comes down to money. I suspect that the family's insurance coverage ran out, and the hospital obviously isn't going to work for free, so that indicated their time to cut her off. Which, obviously, is wrong. But then there's the other side of the spectrum: if the family does take her to another hospital (which, even if they got permission to move her, I suspect that it'd be extremely hard to find another hospital who would take her in), how long will they keep her on life support? I know that they say they have hope, and are expecting a miracle, but it's hard to argue with the science that she has no brain activity, which, in theory, is a form of death..
Then there's the Texas couple. People say awful things about the husband for his desire to take her of life support, but it's completely understandable, because they had had the conversation dozens of times (which makes sense, since they are both paramedics). He even says that they were going to sign DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) forms to make it official, but this incident occurred before they had a chance to. But at the same time, I doubt that they ever talked about DNR procedures in the situation in which she was pregnant. The state's statute makes sense, and usually, I would think that family members would back it 100%, since the case is usually that they feel that the mother would want to save her child, even if she is going to pass away (kind of as a mother's "dying wish"). I'm actually rather surprised that the husband doesn't feel the way that I just described, especially with him not being a first-time parent.
These two cases have raised a lot of talk in the United States, and for good reason, too. To me, its relieving to hear the people of this country talking about something that's actually relevant to society, rather than worrying about the newest couples of Hollywood, or the Royal Family in England.
I'm interested to know what people think about this, especially the younger generation. Leave a comment stating your opinions on these topics!
Hey, I was just passing through and I saw this.
ReplyDeleteI think that, while the Texas situation is a rather hard situation to take a standpoint on, the husband has a point. While they didn't talk about keeping the woman on life support while she had a child, she did confirm that she did not want to be kept in a coma. Further, you can't assume that she would want to keep the child alive even though she's brain dead, and you can't be surprised that the father is having a hard time disrespecting his wife's wishes. You should especially not assume what you said, "I would think that family members would back it 100%, since the case is usually that they feel that the mother would want to save her child, even if she is going to pass away (kind of as a mother's "dying wish")," because there is no way to know for sure, and the husband has already said that he wishes to respect the mother's wishes to not be kept on life support.
This is, in fact, very similar to the argument for or against abortion. A child with only one parent is going to have a harder time growing up, and the family may not even have the resources to support that child if it is born. It's already very expensive to keep someone alive on just life support, and since the woman is not functioning, it is impossible to tell ahead of time how that will affect the fetus.
If you are pro-life, then it is obvious that you would like the mother's wishes to be disrespected for the child. However, as a pro-choice individual, I agree with pro-choice laws that allow the woman to decide whether or not she wants the baby to be born. Since she cannot make that decision in person, the custody of her body belongs to her husband. Between the fact that she has previously stated that she does not want to be kept on life support and the fact that the husband does not support it, I think his decision is fully justified and he should have the choice to take her off of life support as a brain-dead coma patient.
Thanks for listening, feel free to reply with your thoughts.
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Hey, I really appreciate you posting a comment on how you feel!!
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Usually, I input my own opinion in my posts heavily, but I didn't so much in this one. Not for any particular reason, I guess I just tried to focus more on the facts, as far as the public knows of them.
The portion that you quoted wasn't in any way me assuming anything, nor anything else I wrote. I was just simply stating that circumstances that I have heard of, and even been personally involved with, that includes a situation between a mother and a child's life, I've seen the family take all actions needed to at least preserve the child's life. In these scenarios that I've seen, the husband usually refers to the baby as "the last piece of her" he has--that's the only reason I said I was surprised about him wanting to immediately take her off life support. My apologies if it came out sounding differently. (I am also actually curious to hear some other family members weigh in on this--of course, the choice is still up to the husband, but I just wonder about how they feel about the situation.)
I wouldn't necessarily say that I'm pro-life, because I actually am, 8 times out of 10, considered to be pro-choice by others. In this post, I never really stated my personal opinion, and that's because this topic is so difficult. I really couldn't bring myself to take a stance on this, and that why it really interested me. And although it is similar to abortion, the fact that she's incapable of making her own decision always leaves the question, "What would the individual really want in this situation.?"
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If you had an opinion about the California young lady, I'd love to hear that too! Thanks so much for commenting!!