In August, Terri had advanced enough that we were able to continue rehabilitation and therapy for her at home. We had rented a three-bedroom house in Vina del Mar so that Michael could live comfortably with us.
What joy it gave us to have her with us! To be able to hold her and kiss her in a room that smelled like home instead of a hospital, uninterrupted by nurses and loudspeakers blaring for a doctor’s attention. To bathe her, to clothe her, to take her outdoors. Now there was no question of PVS. This was an injured girl, not a comatose one. Terri was responsive to everything around her. She would laugh at our jokes, smile when we sang to her. She was a presence in our lives, interacting with us as best she could.
She loved going to the mall. The county paid for wheelchair transport; all we had to do was put her in the chair, and they would pick us up and take us back. When she was tired, she’d start fidgeting, and her groans would tell us it was time to sleep. Through the use of a Hoyer lift, we were able to get her in and out of the hospital bed donated by one of our friends. When she lay in it, she was connected to a G-tube in her stomach through which we fed her formula, a lot like Ensure, which kept her robust; it was the only tube to which she was attached. (A feeding tube through the nose was judged too dangerous because it could so easily become infected.) The nurses at Bayfront had told us how to care for her but hadn’t warned us that the G-tube would sometimes come out and have to be replaced at the hospital. Frantic calls to the EMTs were the result.
Bob worked as a mechanical systems designer for Raytheon Engineers during the day, so Michael and I divided the custodial duties. We had to be careful that Terri didn’t choke on her own phlegm. Michael, who was taking nurses’ training courses, insisted it was his “job” to use the suctioning device provided by Bayfront, and he became expert at it, as well as using the G-tube. Terri was up most of the day and often slept through the night, but Michael and I took turns staying with her at night just to make sure she was okay. It made us feel better, knowing she was never unattended.
Michael and I became very close during this period, treating each other as partner and friend. Michael never talked about his feelings or about his childhood, but he fought hard for his wife and was tireless in her care. A bond grew between us, which was not the case between Michael and Bob. In fact, Michael said in a deposition years later something to the effect that Bob “didn’t want to participate in helping Terri,” an accusation that stung because it was so obviously untrue.
Still, by October, Michael and I decided we could care for Terri no longer. There had been too many trips to the hospital to have the G-tube reinserted, too many calls to the paramedics when Terri had coughing fits we did not know how to stop. All the goodwill in the world couldn’t substitute for the sheer physical burden placed on us both. In retrospect, we had probably moved Terri home too early.
It was always our intention to bring her home permanently at some point, to make her part of our family again—that was essentially what our battle with Michael was about—but this was not the time. Much of the hope that had washed over me when she was at Vina del Mar was replaced by blackness. I held firm to our conviction that Terri would live with us again; still, there seemed a long journey ahead, and there were nights when, exhausted, I came close to despair, only to revive in the morning.
In the fall of 1990, Michael’s sister-in-law, a nurse living in Philadelphia, called with exciting news. Two doctors, Yoshio Hosobuchi and Charles Yingling at the University of California at San Francisco, were experimenting with a new kind of brain surgery aimed at curing people with Parkinson’s disease or traumatic brain injuries, people who had suffered lack of oxygen to the brain. (The medical term is anoxia.) We were electrified. Was there a chance that Terri . . . ?
At our urging, Michael contacted the university hospital to enlist Terri in the program. The procedure involved putting a stimulator in the brain, very much as doctors routinely put a pacemaker in the heart. Technically, Terri didn’t qualify for the program, since her doctors didn’t know the cause of her injury—she may or may not have suffered physical trauma, and she certainly didn’t have Parkinson’s. But in December, they agreed to accept her, and our spirits were lifted higher than they’d been at any time since her collapse. The doctors would speed her recovery. Perhaps she’d even learn to talk again, walk again—even live on her own, just like Bob’s brother.
I didn’t go with Michael and Terri because by then I had to take care of my mother at the nursing home. Michael was angry; he didn’t want to go alone. Still, Michael reported the results. They were mixed. The operation didn’t work as well as expected, but there was still noticeable improvement. Further rehabilitation was prescribed.
In January 1991, as a major part of Dr. Hosobuchi’s prescribed follow-up program, Terri was admitted to MediPlex rehabilitation center in Bradenton, Florida. There, her admittance chart notes that she was saying “No” and “Stop” and “Mommy” because of the pain of her physical therapy.
Later, people said that Terri was in a persistent vegetative state from the moment she collapsed. The MediPlex notes are objective evidence that this isn’t true. More, they gave us ample reason to believe that with rehabilitation, including speech therapy, she would have been able to say more, interact more. Tell us she loved us.
Because Terri was so obviously in pain during her therapy, MediPlex ordered a total bone scan on March 5, 1991, to determine its cause. The scan, which we only found out about some ten years later, revealed Terri had once broken her right femur, had suffered an “unusual” amount of rib injuries, and had sustained multiple other abnormalities to her skeleton. To the best of our knowledge, MediPlex did not investigate the radiologist’s conclusion of trauma. We’ll never know why they didn’t report any of these findings of abuse to law enforcement authorities. As a guess, maybe they were afraid they’d be blamed for the injuries.
Why didn’t Michael report the scan? He had to know about it, because on each of his visits he’d scrutinize Terri’s medical charts. If he believed MediPlex was at fault, we believe he’d have sued them. But to do that would have meant making Terri’s bone scan public. If we’d known about the scan when it was taken, we’d no doubt have been less trusting of Michael.
Another major element of Dr. Hosobuchi’s follow-up program was for his associate, Dr. Yingling, to come to Florida to examine Terri. He determined Terri was improving and prescribed advanced rehabilitation. He recommended to Michael the Shands facility in Gainesville. We were ecstatic at Yingling’s evaluation. I barely noticed the one-year anniversary of Terri’s collapse. My spirits were good. Our Terri was going to get better.
Money remained a problem, especially during the fall of 1990. Michael was living on Terri’s Social Security disability payments, and Bob was working, though not at the same financial level as in Pennsylvania, so it was a precarious existence. We were living from paycheck to paycheck and dared not think of what would happen if Terri suffered another cataclysmic event.
We might not have been able to care for Terri financially if the St. Petersburg community hadn’t come to our rescue. Fund-raisers were held on Terri’s behalf, not only by our neighbors but also by Terri’s co-workers at Prudential. There were bake sales, a Valentine’s Day dance in her honor, a Terri Schiavo Day. Over Christmas, a mile-long line of candles placed on sandbags was set up along the seawall, and people could buy the bags as well as pray for Terri. Beyond the formal events, individual donations arrived from dozens of citizens, many of them strangers.
And here, publicly, we are finally able to thank everyone for their generosity, financial and spiritual. They sustained our efforts for Terri in a difficult time.
Altogether, some $50,000 was raised, money we used to pay for the plane trip to California, nurses, and other medical expenses. In the spring of 1991, we discovered that Michael had acquired a safe-deposit box at a First Union bank in St. Petersburg, in which he placed $10,000 in cash. We figured it probably came from the money raised i
n St. Petersburg, but Michael never said anything about it. From then on, we never got an accurate accounting of what he spent either on himself or on Terri.
According to Humana Northside’s medical records, the doctors were mystified about the cause of Terri’s collapse that horrible February 25, 1990. Like the paramedics, their first thought was a drug overdose, but the toxicology tests were negative. A congenital heart anomaly was ruled out by an echocardiogram, which registered normal. A heart attack was considered, but no, Terri’s enzymes weren’t elevated. The only thing out of the ordinary was a low level of potassium in her blood.
Based on Dan Grieco’s suggestion, Michael decided to investigate the possibility of suing Terri’s ob-gyn, Dr. Stephen Igel, and her GP, Dr. Joel Prawer, for not having detected that Terri was in danger. Michael and I went together to the law firm of Woodworth and Dugan for the first of many conferences on the feasibility of a suit.
Glenn Woodworth hesitated, particularly since Michael’s lawsuit against Prudential had failed (the suit was brought by a different lawyer in Woodworth’s office). “There’s no malpractice suit. There’s nothing,” he concluded. “Well, somethinghappened to Terri,” Bob said when we reported back. “Somebody did something wrong.”
Woodworth called Gary Fox, a malpractice lawyer in Florida, and the two men came up with a strategy based on the presumption that Terri was bulimic. In November 1990, nine months after Terri’s collapse, Woodworth filed a $20-million lawsuit against the two doctors on Terri and Michael’s behalf. The sum was based on actuarial figures, which Woodworth later presented to the jury, that estimated the cost of Terri’s medical and neurological treatment for the rest of her life, along with her rehabilitation.
Prawer and Igel had never tested Terri properly, Woodworth claimed. They’d been negligent. Neither Michael nor us nor any of Terri’s friends had ever seen any sign of bulimia in Terri. Yet, as Bob said, something happened. Somebody was responsible.
What was to ensue broke my heart. The time I spent working with Michael to help Terri improve would soon seem a facade. What Michael wanted was to favorably influence the malpractice jury that he was a dedicated husband. When I realized this, I cried so much I can still taste the tears.
The case went to trial in November 1992. Its outcome signaled a 180-degree turn in our relationship with Terri’s husband. From being the closest of allies, united in our love for Terri and our desire to give her every chance at the best life possible, we became sudden enemies, bitter opponents in “The Schiavo Case” that divided the country as it divided Michael and us.
CHAPTER 6
Medical Malpractice
Q (Glenn Woodworth): Why did you learn to become a nurse?
A (Michael Schiavo): Because I enjoy it and want to learn more how to take care of Terri.
Q: You’re a young man. Your life is ahead of you. When you look up the road, what do you see for yourself?
A: I see myself hopefully finishing school and taking care of my wife.
Q: Where do you want to take care of your wife?
A: I want to bring her home.
Q: If you had the resources available to you, if you had the equipment and the people, would you do that?
A: Yes, I would, in a heartbeat.
Q: How do you feel about being married to Terri now?
A: I feel wonderful. She’s my life and I wouldn’t trade her for the world. I believe in my wedding vows.
Q: You believe in your wedding vows. What do you mean by that?
A: I believe in the vows I took with my wife, through sickness, in health, for richer or poor. I married my wife because I love her and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I’m going to do that.
Moving testimony from the 1992 trial, told with passion and conviction, accompanied by Michael’s sobs and tears. Bobby and I were in the courtroom as Michael testified, and were deeply moved. I imagined then that our son-in-law was feeling as much pain as I was. Michael said nothing about Terri’s wish to die in case of a traumatic injury.
Michael had repeatedly told us that any money he won, and Terri won, from the lawsuits would go toward her rehabilitation. When Terri came back from California and was living at MediPlex, Dr. Yingling urged us to move Terri to the Shands Hospital rehabilitation center in Gainesville.1 Michael and we agreed that when and if Michael received an award, this would be our plan. Michael promised that Shands would be her next stop, for it was her best hope.2
We believed him, even though all through 1991–92, there were indications that Michael was neither the good husband nor the diligent caretaker he portrayed himself as being during the trial.
In the summer of 1991, he transferred Terri from the MediPlex rehab center to the Sabal Palms nursing home in Largo, Florida. Michael told us MediPlex had recommended we discontinue rehab, that it made no sense to keep her there. This was the beginning of the end. From that point forward, Terri was denied any chance of improving. Tragically, she was never to receive any rehabilitation or therapy again. We were legally unable to stop him—we had, remember, given up our right to have a say in any medical decisions regarding our daughter—but he told us he was doing it for her good, that he had investigated the nursing home and was convinced she would be well cared for until the medical malpractice money came through.
• It was in this period (September 1991) that he had the terrible fight with Suzanne.
• It was in this period that he began a relationship with a nurse named Cindi Shook.
• In May 1992, Michael moved out of our Vina del Mar house to live with his new girlfriend, Cindi Shook. Good, we thought. This would leave us free to take care of Terri.
• To our horror, he had Terri’s two cats euthanized because Cindi had a dog and didn’t want cats.
• In August 1992, Terri’s GP, Dr. Prawer,3 on the advice of his insurance company, settled Michael’s suit out of court for $250,000. Despite these assurances, we have no idea where the money went because he never informed us. The money was to go to Terri. Michael promised to add it to the malpractice lawsuit award—there would be that much more to spend on Terri’s rehabilitation, he told us. But the money went elsewhere, and he never told us where.
All this should have made us more suspicious of our son-in-law. Yet so great were our dreams, and so persuasive Michael’s assurances, that we simply waited for the trial to begin and focused on the victory we assumed would soon be ours. Our hope was that we’d get enough financing to take care of Terri at Shands—and then, when she was better, to bring her home for the rest of her life.
The verdict came quickly. Woodworth had asked for $20 million. The jury, evidently buying the argument that Terri was bulimic but figuring that she herself was 70 percent at fault for her condition, awarded her $1.56 million and Michael $686,700 for loss of consortium. We were elated. Terri’s financial problems had ended. We would be able to take care of her for as long as necessary. We could devote ourselves to her without worrying about the cost. As Michael said to me, “Mom, you and Dad [meaning Bob] and my mother and father will never have to worry again a day in your lives.” If he said it once, he said it a thousand times.
A few weeks later, Bob went to Michael. “You made a commitment,” he said. “If we got the money, you were going to give Terri the therapy you promised. When is that going to be?”
“We’ll talk about it later,” Michael said.
Bob went to see him again a few days later with the same result.
On February 14, 1993, St. Valentine’s Day, Bob and I went to the nursing home. Michael was in Terri’s room, doing his homework for the nursing course he was taking. What happened next produced such deep emotional scars that even as I write this, twelve years later, I can feel our anger, relive the depths of our pain.
Bob started with his by-now-familiar plea. “Michael, your commitment. The promises you made to give Terri rehabilitation. When are you going to do that?”
“There’s no money,” Michael said coldly.4
Michael was silent for a moment. Then, face contorted, eyes flashing disgust, he hurled his books across the room. “Look,” he screamed. “I’m her husband. I’ll make all the decisions. You have nothing to say.”
He came after Bob physically, fists raised, wild with rage. “I thought we were going to tangle, and I was prepared to defend myself,” Bob remembers.
Terrified, I had to jump in between the two of them to stop them from hurting each other.
“You’re a liar,” Bob said.
Panting, his face bright red, the cords on his neck bulging, Michael glared at us. “This has nothing to do with you,” he said. “This is about my wife, and as far as I’m concerned, you will never see your daughter again—that is, if I have anything to do with it.” He turned around and stormed down the hall. “I’m calling my lawyer,” he shouted.
And that was it.
The words “you will never see your daughter again” hung in the room like poison gas. Then, too upset to see Terri, we drove home and told Bobby what happened. He put his hand through the wall.
“It was almost like I knew that was going to happen,” Bobby says. “In fact, I had suggested even before the malpractice suit that we should sit down and get Michael to put everything in writing.” (It was still a time when we trusted Michael, and Bob and I didn’t think it was necessary.)
“Anyway, I ran out to the car. I was going to confront him. I was going to drive to his house, and I don’t know what I would have done. And Mom came running after me, crying and begging me not to go, not to go. I was out of my mind, beyond reason, I was that mad. But I didn’t go, which might have saved his life—or mine.
A Life That Matters Page 5