Posted on 06/28/2007 3:58:52 PM PDT by wagglebee
CHANDLER, Arizona, June 28, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Written off by doctors as a hopeless “vegetable”, an Arizona man would not now be on his way to recovery from an accident caused by a marital quarrel if not for his family’s unrelenting struggle for his life.
The Arizona Republic reports that on Wednesday, Jesse Ramirez, awoke from his nearly month long persistent vegetative state (PVS) and now “can hug and kiss, nod his head, answer yes and no questions, give a thumbs-up sign and sit in a chair.”
If not for the past few weeks’ legal battles that ended Tuesday with a favorable settlement for him and his family, Jesse Ramirez, who depended on feeding tubes for food and water, would certainly have died in circumstances very similar to the tragic 2005 death of Terri Schindler-Schiavo.
On May 30, Jesse Ramirez and his wife Rebecca Ramirez were quarreling in their SUV when he lost control and crashed into a pottery market, ejecting them both from the vehicle. Ramirez suffered a broken neck and major head-trauma, while his wife had only minor injuries.
Just before the accident, Rebecca had attempted to jump from the moving vehicle saying she was afraid of her husband, who accused her of marital infidelity. Police have yet to determine what exactly led Ramirez to lose control of the wheel.
Ten days after the accident and Ramirez’s PVS diagnosis, Rebecca ordered the hospice where he was staying to remove his feeding tubes on June 8. Ramirez family then began pleading with her to let them try and save his life.
“I'm asking you for the biggest favor of my life,” Jesse’s father told her. “Can you give my son another chance?” Jesse Ramirez Sr. told the Arizona Republic she then hung up on him.
In desperation, the family turned to the Scottsdale-based Alliance Defense Fund, which challenged the prudence of allowing Rebecca to arbitrate her husband’s fate, considering their recent marital strife.
“We've got to make sure the decision-maker is the very best and most capable one,” senior counsel Gary McCaleb told the Arizona Republic. “She said she was in fear of her life. Ten days later, she's going to say whether he lives or dies? Frankly, it's too much to ask of the wife.”
Maricopa County Superior Court judge Paul Katz agreed and ordered the tubes reconnected while an independent attorney mediated between Rebecca Ramirez and Jesse’s family and talked to Jesse's doctors. Then Tuesday Katz ruled that a court-appointed guardian would make decisions for Ramirez while the court continued to investigate his health.
“As we have discussed here previously, PVS is often misdiagnosed. More importantly, it can't be done accurately after only a few weeks post trauma. So, why the rush in this case to write the man off?” commented bioethics expert and author Wesley J. Smith on his blog. “This much is sure: But for parents willing to fight for his life, Ramirez would be dead today rather than entering the rehabilitation unit.”
That was a zot worth staying up all night for. It was better than chocolate.
Bug Zapper week was incredible!
As I recall, products were not being transported in a timely fashion, because of the fuel shortage. As retail stores ran low on products, people panicked and cleared the shelves.
Well, he was only in PVS for a month, and his brain hadn’t turned to essentially water, leaving no vestiges of his personality. But other than THAT, this guy was just like Terri Schiavo.
That sounds about right. And with peanut brain in the WH it was a perfectly normal and appropriate response.
What took you so long? We waited and waited for your arrival. Now get busy. There is so much more for you to say.
Jonathon Spectre believed he was doing good.
We have a winner!
You are so right. After all it's absurd to believe that being deprived of court-ordered medical care for over a decade, followed by nearly two weeks without nutrition or hydration could possibly affect brain matter./sarcasm off
Our guest has arrived! See post 44. Looking forward to more commentary.
And it only took 44 posts. Next time, we should call over to that all night troll joint and order take out.
“I wonder how the culture of death FRiberals will try to explain this away.”
“[He] can hug and kiss, nod his head, answer yes and no questions, give a thumbs-up sign and sit in a chair.”
They’ll say: “Well, he can’t tap dance or do long division in his head, so he really doesn’t have much of a life. Snuff him!”
P.S. I can’t do either of those two things. ;)
On a more serious note, we have a situation like this developing in our own family. My Dad’s new wife (they’re both 70; nice Love Story) has a daughter who is 40, has a 9 and five year old son & daughter and is in a vegetative state right now. They don’t know if she tried to kill herself (she does have depression issues, but was taking her meds properly) or if her vindictive Ex-husband did something to her. She left no note. Her boyfriend, who is a Fireman, found her unresponsive when her school called him to report that she hadn’t shown up for her last day of teaching. He revived her, and now she’s in this state. It’ll be two weeks, tomorrow.
Anyway, it’s not looking good. She has no cognitive brain action, though her organs are all fine and she can breath on her own. Her brain is pretty much “dead” from half way up, her brain stem is still OK, which is what’s keeping her body alive.
I really feel for my “step-Mom” who will end up making the decision as to what happens to her daughter. It’s absolutely horrific what she’s going through. (I’ve only met the daughter once so far; we all live far apart.)
But miracles DO happen, as this man has proven.
Water for brains or meat for brains; who really deserves to live? /s
There are a number of threads here (that were all effectively buried by the mainstream media) of miraculous recoveries.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=giannajessen
Praise God.
Trolls and telemarketers, they always show up at dinner time!!!
Don’t forget calcium, because if your bones get too soft and you can’t used utensils to feed yourself you are a “worthless eater” and the “humane” thing will be to let you die.
I’ll keep your step sister in my prayers, as well as the family.
Any idea what the cause of the brain damage was? I hope that the extent of damage will allow for recovery.
((((((((HUGS))))))))
Supposedly, she drank booze and NyQuil, but we don’t have the toxicology reports back yet to see what else was in her. They counted her pills and all that should have been there were there.
It seems very weird, but then, I can hardly get a dose of NyQuil past my lips in the first place.
Thanks for the thoughts & prayers. I didn’t want to do a Vanity on this until I had more facts to go by. Hard to imagine NyQuil and booze would mess her up so badly. You’d think she’d barf it out before then.
Again, it’s a very weird situation. No solid facts of any type at this time.
If she didn’t take her pills for several weeks and took them all at once, that would do it.
We read case after case like this. When will people wake up?
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