Get Your Mama A Feeding Tube

[dbt]

Mom was left unable to swallow, the work of a hellish series of small, brain-stem strokes. Sis and I discussed the insertion of a feeding tube at great length with Mom's doctors and nurses.

The good news was that it would keep her alive. The bad news was that "most patients who get the tube get about an extra year before complications take them out," according to the veteran nurse.

We hoped for the best, so the feeding tube was chosen. Sis and I just knew that Mom would get All Better, given the proper care. Maybe she'd even be able to talk again! Three times a day, we watched hopefully as a can of a yellow, cheese-like substance was injected down the tube into the stomach.

Sure enough, the feeding tube kept Mom alive--for just about nine months. During those 180 days, the parade of little strokes had enough time to take Mom away, bit by bit by bit. Every time I returned to her bedside, a little more of her was gone. She finally slipped into a coma, just the way she would have done without the tube. Mom got almost an extra year of life, but what in Hell did she get out of that time? Oh yeah, the answer is Hell. Silly me.

POINT: It's real easy to talk about the Life-Saving Aspects Of The Feeding Tube. If you listen to the radio shows, The Tube is a miracle: it's all you need to get on with your life! The reality of The Tube is a long, sad journey that takes your loved one to the same place that She would have gone without The Tube.

And the Government has any business getting involved?

[Tesla]

1. and with the advances in stem cell research that was put on a halt

by the right-to-lifers, Teri may have a quality of life, or maybe a life to live!!!
Instead, we are fighting in CONGRESS weather to make a decision on this one life, when so many are slipping away!!!

God Bless you Teri, I hope God is holding you in his arms.

[wellst0nev0ter]

2. Better A Tube Than Total Strangers Calling You A Murderer

or so I've heard.

[LiberalinNC]

3. Sorry about your mom

The huge difference between your mom and Terri is you and your sister decided to give mom the feeding tube, whereas in Terri's case the government is trying to over step their boundaries and make this a "right to life" case.

At the time you thought you were doing the right thing for your mom, don't let that get you down.

[Demit]

4. What a sad story. The whole thing must have been so gut-wrenching for

you. I appreciate your telling it, though, because it does illustrate what I think everyone knows instinctively but some people can't bear to acknowledge: that what modern medicine has the ability to do is not automatically a good thing.

The tragedy is that the well relatives feel they must make the choice to keep the person alive or that they are somehow betraying their loved one. If there's any good that comes from this Schiavo thing it will be the open discussions people will have, from which they'll find out that so many others are thinking that maybe prolonging life is not good for anyone. And that it's okay to think that way--it's not a betrayal. At least I hope so.

[shrub chipper]

5. I feel sorry that you went through that.

I lost my Mother last month. She was undergoing Chemo for Cancer and had a stroke. She was in a Nursing home for almost 5 months, not really aware of her surroundings and not really knowing who her family (me, my wife and kids, her sister) was. Like your Mother, we saw her slipping away slightly every day.

It was not a pleasant time and , with the cancer looming, we knew there was only going to be one outcome.

The one thing that bothered me the most was to have people try to trell us what we should do or how often we should be there. Also, when others tried to cheer us up by trying to say she was going to get better somehow, it really had the opposite effect . Her sister and I knew what was going on and knew that there was only one ending for this.

I cannot imagine how Michael Schiavo must feel with the whole country watching and judging him. The Congress getting into his dilemma is really beyond the pale as far as I'm concerned. These private matter need to stay private .

[displacedtexan]

6. Michael Schiavo might as well change his name to Scopes...

and move to Shreveport, where nobody will have any idea who he is.

This poor man is standing up for his (and his wife's) convictions.

I've made the feeding tube decision 3 times in my life. Believe those of us who try to explain to those untouched by this situation (so far): It's one of the hardest things you'll ever do.

Either you trust the team of neurologists, or you don't.

[demnan]

7. I'm sorry about your mother

Chances are she didn't suffer, but I'm sure you did watching her slip away day by day.

Sometimes just accepting the death of a loved one is kinder on all concerned. When my Dad was dying, we called the hospice, not 911. 911 would have resuscitated him.

Have a living will. This case is a lesson for all of us.

[Ripley]

8. I'm sorry yall had to go through that.

The Government has zero business getting involved in these cases. Abortion, euthanasia, medical resuscitation, are all quality of life issues which are extremely personal and to be kept in the private sphere of families and doctors.

I was shocked to my core when I dared to turn on the tube this weekend and saw Frist and Santorum discussing this case as if they were Teri's physicians. And I know for a fact a lot of repukes are shocked too.

Maybe this over-reaching by the thugs who think they are above all laws will finally bring them down.

[dbt]

9. Thank you all!

It didn't start out to be a sob-story, there's just not a pretty way to tell it.

The howling masses will never know about the hell of The Tube; reckon that's just as well.