Living Will

While I don't like to be too predictable...I gotta keep you on your toes!...most anyone who knows me probably already knows how I feel about all the nastiness going on in Washington DC these last couple of days. There is already enough being written about the destroyers of freedom so I'm not going to add to the hurly burly.

However, I am going to comment on a little side bar that seems to get lost in the minutae of everything else...why Terri Schievo's heart stopped in the first place. In 1990 her heart stopped, most likely due to a potassium imbalance caused by an eating disorder. A potassium imbalance is one of the many life threatening side effects of years of bulimia and anorexia. Few people realize that people who suffer from eating disorders, of all psychological disorders, have the highest mortality rate...higher than people who suffer from depression. Think about this for a second. All the media attention of late has focused on her post-heart failure life. However, if you consider that Terri Schievo was likely a victim of bulimia or anorexia...her life pre-heart failure wasn't all glowing and lovely. The life of a bulimic/anorexic is not a happy one...I know from personal experience. It's a desperate existance...you feel as though your life is spiraling out of control. Desperate to control something, you turn to your most precious belonging...your body...and you slowly destroy it. You hate what you see every time you look in the mirror...nothing is good enough. You are constantly tired, constantly hunger, constantly neurotic, never at peace, never at rest. Your thoughts are solely focused on food, exercise, and your own imperfections. I know a great many people who have/currently suffer from eating disorders and several have suffered irrepairable damage to their hearts, livers, and kidneys due to their constant starvation. In order to reach a physical state where a chemical imbalance would actually cause a heart failure, someone must be actively bulimic for years, or actively anorexic for months - possibly years. The human body is exceptionally intelligent and will do almost anything to preserve itself. What psychological hell was Terri Schievo living prior to her heart failure? No one but her husband really knows. This whole case is a very sad ending to what was likely a very sad existance.