Her parents tell stories of Terri's devotion to family pets and to animals of every sort. Her sister and brother label Terri a lover of music - especially piano. She even wrote to musician John Denver to request he play at her wedding.
Terri had a knack for art and her sketches are something of a treasure to her family.
Terri came to Florida in the early 1980s and worked in an administrative capacity for a local insurance agency. She attended Catholic Mass with her sister and kept a close relationship with her immediate family.
In 1990, Terri Schindler-Schiavo collapsed in the home she shared with her husband, Michael Schiavo. The cause of her collapse is unknown to this day.
Terri fell into a coma but awakened from her comatose state weeks later. She was left in what some medical professionals
call a "locked in state" with limited abilities to communicate or move.
During the first months that followed Terri's mysterious collapse, she made progress. Medical practitioners noted her efforts to speak and her responsiveness.
Throughout the following years, Terri remained significantly disabled. Though she was responsive to stimuli, interacted with her environment and her loved ones and was capable of communicating in limited ways, she was a disabled and vulnerable adult - requiring protection, therapy and the route to recovery.
Terri received food and water by way of a gastric feeding tube. There are many amongst us and in all walks of life who receive assisted nutrition and hydration.
Terri did not receive meaningful therapy since 1991 on the orders of her estranged husband.
In 1998, Terri's estranged husband petitioned the circuit courts of Pinellas County, Florida to end her life by removing her feeding tube. From March 18, 2005 through March 31, 2005, Terri was denied enteral nourishment and food and
water by mouth. Even though there are laws in place to protect her from such things, the courts decided that her wish would be a death from dehydration and starvation as opposed to therapy and rehabilitation.
On March 31, 2005 at approximately 9:05am, Terri Schindler-Schiavo lost her nearly 14 day struggle against starvation and dehydration and died at the Hospice Woodside in Pinellas Park, Florida. Her family was not permitted to be with her as she passed.
Terri's family and the volunteers of the Terri Schindler-Schiavo
Foundation have vowed to focus the Foundation, named for her, on assisting other desperate families in their efforts to protect vulnerable loved ones.
