Dear Reader: I dashed this piece off last night at about 3:30 a,.m. Reading it to my friend Lana today, I discovered it needed editing which has been made below. Please excuse the less than perfect proofreading. There may be more that needs to be grammar correected. My vision issues are kicking in again for this evening.
Sorry!
Constance
We have a neighborhood Bible study that was organized a few months ago by our next door neighbor. During the pandemic, this group has been a comfort to us as churches have been made largely inaccessible. We are going through the Bible, book by book. My disabled husband always gives me his blessings and sends me off to it, cautioning me to be on time. We open and close with prayer. I pretty much know my Bible cold, but as our study leader (a community college teacher) gives weekly reading assignments, I find re-reading the Bible makes it much more familiar. We just finished the book of 2nd Samuel and will be reading and discussing 1 Kings next week, God willing. We end with refreshments that all participants bring. Good study and good fellowship!
I returned home from it Sunday afternoon and my husband was in his adjustable large lazy-boy type chair. Usually when I return, we begin a lively discussion of who was present and what was gleaned from this week's readings. I started talking before entering the family room. Barry was uncharacteristically quiet. I was startled to find him in his chair, clutching a pole lamp that appeared to be falling and unresponsive. I made a quick decision to call 911 and our Fire Department came thankfully, very very quickly. A shot was administered and then we gave him a glass of orange juice. His blood sugar was dangerously low. He was transported by ambulance to the hospital where his cardiologist practices. Because of my wet type macular degeneration, night driving is now out of the question for me. The Fire Department ambulance personnel suggested I wait to hear from the hospital rather than follow them there.
I then called one of my very loyal friends, Lana Mangiapane, who is also an elected Oakland Township Trustee. She came immediately and drove me to the hospital. Because of the Covid-19 rules, only one could enter. I was taken by a speedy wheel chair pusher attendant to my husband's room in the Emergency section. Tests were being run and he was given food. As you may recall, Barry, my husband for the past 46 years is a bilateral above the knee amputee from an October 15, 1979 accident, occurring only five years past our marriage. With the grace of God, we have lived through that situation since. Barry has been a real trouper since that accident. He, a former teacher, took a second MSW degree and took a new post- accident career as a substance abuse therapist/social worker. He retired a few years ago. He recently turned 82 -- making his post-accident recovery accomplishments even more remarkable. Over the years, he drove a car with hand controls and we even managed a few trips together in earlier years.
Time marches on. The times have clearly turned very strange. Very few people now saying things such as "lo, all continues as since Creation." The world is being prepared for a global reset. Covid-19 is the claimed excuse. We are, as they like to say "in a time of transition."
I wrote about "our coming age of Barbarism." That was brought home to me by last night's events. I was forced to fight for my husband's needed treatment. Barry's body is weakening. Transitioning from wheel chair to bed and showering and bathroom are becoming increasingly difficult for him. He has had continual pain from the accident and has learned to live with it over the years. Heart trouble set in for him in the early 21st century years, but a defibrillator and pace maker have been successfully employed.
As Lana was driving home on the Freeway, I received a type of "robocall" on my mobile phone. It was from the hospital. This was the same hospital system for which in earlier years I received a restraining order from a local court. The order which I sought and obtained on an emergency basis prevented them "pulling the plug" against family wishes on a gentleman whose life they had written off as unworthy of living. Family members employed me to fight after that hospital told them they were going to pull the plug on his ventilator. The gentleman had been weakened for many days by the hospital giving him only a drug called Ativan and depriving him of nutrients.
Preparing for the emergency hearing scheduled by the Court to take place soon after the restraining order was issued, I discovered that hospital attorneys were giving seminars on how to persuade families to make end of life decisions for family members against their wishes. That hospital's medical and administrative staff were making triage type "quality of life" decisions. They were giving that gentleman only Ativan. and depriving him of necessary life sustaining nutrients. He had lost the ability to speak because of a bad intubation received from a feeder hospital. Family members approached me after the hospital made demands that they designate a guardian who could authorize the life support ending.
As I was to learn when I got into that case on an emergency basis, interesting dynamics developed. As I was to learn when we got into hospital records discovery, the hospital had assigned staff Social Workers to work with family members twice a week with sessions to explore "why won't they let go of Dad." Then they successfully pressured the family member appointed to the guardianship to support "pulling the plug."
Other family members then rushed in and said that dad was clearly not brain dead and was clearly responding to signs shown him. Concerned honest hospital employees were tipping the family that the man was obviously not brain dead nor "vegetative". That was what the hospital unsuccessfully attempted to portray in our subsequent court proceedings. I didn't have to start a new law suit. I was able to seek the restraining order using the the very same guardianship the hospital had tricked the family into obtaining.
After obtaining the emergency restraining order preventing a next day removal of life supports, I served it on the hospital. We served it after business hours and upon the medical staff where the patient was housed. Hospital personnel protested that only their legal department could receive the court order. I said, "you are served, you are on notice." The plug was not pulled and we had an emergency hearing. At that hearing the Judge ordered that the man receive intravenous (IV) nutrients of which he had been deprived and a subsequent hearing was scheduled. The hospital tried to prevent evidence collection. Hospital attorneys sent both myself and the family warning letters telling them not to photograph nor videotape. Of course, they did, securing evidence that he was responsive. We then had a subsequent hearing and then the feeding tube was ordered.
The day of the ordered operation on the feeding tube, and while the Judge on the case would have gone to lunch, I received a telephone call from the hospital that the operation had been held, the patient put on an ambulance and transported to a facility in Sylvania, Ohio. Clearly, moving him for the time being out of Michigan jurisdiction. I was stunned at the audacity of that move. That was the BAD NEWS. The good news was that the hospital had moved him only 15 minutes from my medical expert, Dr. Paul Byrne of Sylvania, Ohio, then head of the Catholic Medical Association. Dr. Byrne had done previous radio interviews with me on "passive euthanasia" issues. On our next scheduled Court proceeding, that good Ohio doctor came as both an expert and fact witness. Even more admirably, he came at his own expense from Ohio. The hospital's staff attorney came confidently strutting into the Courtroom. I made a motion that the hospital be dismissed from the case. The patient was no longer a "guest in their facilities," I argued. The judge asked the attorney why he should stay in the case. "Because our medical records are involved," said the hospital's lawyer.
The Judge roared: "Medical records are involved in every case. Out!" She too was obviously disturbed by the hospital's tactics. During discovery, the hospital had long stalled on giving me access to the medical records of the patient. Another lawyer, also a doctor, told me which medical records to ask for. We asked for the EEG records. The medical records people told me the EEG records were not there. "And just where they?", I asked. "They are stored in cardiology, the medical records person said. "That's really interesting," I replied. "Here are the EKG records. This was the same night I took the deposition of the doctor determined to pull the plug. The doctor pointed to alleged brain scan pictures and said "he hears nothing, he sees nothing, he knows nothing."
I had cross-examination fun on that one. I repeated that statement to the doctor and asked if he really believed it to be true. I then asked, "he is receiving Ativan (an anti-anxiety drug), is he not." "Yes," the doctor said. That is an anti-anxiety drug, is it not, I asked. He cleared his throat and said, "yes, it's a tranquilizer." Well, doctor, if he sees nothing, hears nothing, knows nothing, why would he need a tranquilizer?" He cleared his throat and in his British accent, harrumphed, "well, I personally believe he needs nothing, but some of my colleagues are of a different mind." He sat stony faced as we showed him the videos we obtained of this allegedly "brain dead" and/or "persistent vegetative state gentleman responding to family written messages.
Well, how does this relate. I would have preferred my husband to to a separate hospital, but this hospital is highly regarded and promotes heavily in our area. It now has a medical school attached. It does have some excellent doctors. It also had doctors such as the English doctor then on that case who I learned were attached to the British Eugenics movements.
All that was brought to me last night. As we were driving home from the hospital, a call on my mobile phone told me my husband was discharged and we should pick him up and take him home. I was astounded because my husband's condition was severe and something had caused his blood sugar to suddenly tank. I told the caller that the situation smacked of medical malpractice. Then, I trotted out in a heated discussion my attorney credentials and my long time knowledge that the hospital made "quality of life / triage type decisions." A frail looking 82 year old bilateral amputee did not look like some body with a good quality of life. Knowing my husband, his active and sharp mind and remarkable exploits in managing his disability, he has a life worthy of living as long as the Lord decides to keep him here. I said many heated things and then the caller said, he would talk to the doctor and make a decision, but I should try to get him home that night.
Thank God, I didn't and couldn't. During the night the same medical condition repeated despite food and nutrients being given. I know I scared the hospital by threatening malpractice and raising my knowledge of the practice, but I know my husband is getting better care because of it. I would not be at all surprised to receiving calls from hospital social workers asking me to sessions to explore "why we can't let go." This lady is prepared for it.
Welcome to the New Age of Covid-Resets as are currently being promulgated by World Economic Forum and its leader Klaus Schwab. A form of global trauma was deemed necessary for a reset and global governance launch. At this time, I cannot definitively say that this is a "planned virus." However, they are certainly not letting a good crisis go to waste. The old New Age slogan as chortled by New Age author Marilyn Ferguson in her book AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY of "crisis = opportunity is happening. A drastic lowering of the world's population, biodiversity, and thinning of the elderly were deemed welcome developments.
You are probably seeing things like this in your own medical institutions. Sometimes, one just has to fight. The nurse taking care of my husband seems conscientious. But, I know there are institutional policies for less profitable patients and the inclination to dump a patient prematurely is happening.
Anyway, that's one of the reasons you haven't heard too much from me lately. I didn't name the facility in this story to "protect the guilty." If my husband had been sent home last night, he would have died from the later developments in the night. I have been given several horror stories of families where people were sent home from emergency and the need treatment not given. We are grateful for good neighbors and that same facility's differing medical people who intercepted the decision to prematurely discharge. Pray for us as we go through this difficult stage of our senior years.
Constance
