European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - May 9, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse Yearning to die Appow i said yes i know and hey looked at me Ike i was Kookie she says Kubier Ross is passionate As she talks about these children who Are at the Point of death. Something happens she Are almost always pain Lino and very much Al peace. Some come out of a coma fight before they die. I look them straight in their eyes and ask can you share with me what you re experiencing they Looft through you not of you. They know what Nati Vates you to ask these questions. It your motivation is not Good they will turn t heir Back on you. They say everything is Okay now. Mommy and Peter Are waiting for me like it s the most Norma thing Tike my vacation is Over and i have to go Back Home now. There is no excitement or panic or anything like she also prayed to find a Way to research the possibility of being made whole just before death she was intrigued by Vietnam veterans or other amputees v xhosa descriptions of their wholeness were so similar � ind so was with a Blind woman who was dying and she t old me she could see again she says. She had been t Lind for Over Tsy ears. Asked her what i was wearing sad she was Able to describe it in g Eal detail.1 my colleagues wanted to give it every psychiatric Label in he Book and Many called it oxygen deprivation. 4 said my loot. Ii this is oxygen deprivation Hen we be fit a curs Lor blindness. Why Don t we do this for Blind f people who have never been Able to see their c children?1 " she then Sot out to ind Blind people who were dying ii. Of course was t easy and i had rigid criteria to says. I insisted they mus have been Blind for at k 335 10 years a id they must not even be Able to see Light. I demanded Complete but she says she did find others and witnessed the 3 Arris thing White she s come Drable explaining such happenings the has no desire to Force her views upon others. I have a very Strong conviction that our Job is not of r or convert people she says. If you re ready to fear it you re ready to hear it. In 10 or 20 years this will no Fonger be news. Ii will be very Normal. I used o be quite to ajl hered by the arrogance of people who thought they Ujj Wisd an he answers and refused so accept this a 9,1987 United press International slanted Diamond of afternoon sunlight skims the Hospital Blanc Els highlighting the Birdlike form of Elizabetn Bouvia. She is pondering her 29 years of life saying she Slid yearns for death. Lying almost motionless this is a delicate woman who Drew gasps from around the world in 1983 when she announced she would rather starve than go on living in a body twisted and made helpless by cerebral palsy. And yet a year after she won a landmark appellate court ruling in los Angeles affirming and expanding the right of every patient to refuse medical treatment including nourishment she lives. The desire is still thers to die. I just need it to be right Bouvia said in a rare interview last week. She did not allow pictures. She voluntarily eats a liquid High protein food and says she has delayed acting on her wish because she tears her slow starvation in a Large Hospital would spark hostility toward her and bring too much grief and guilt to the Slaff. With no race Elsa to go and in need of round the clock physical care Bouvia lies in bed in a private room at county us medical Center. Between pulls of a Figarelle held to her lips by a visitor she Speaks clearly of her wishes i Don t want to die but if it Means living like this in this body i Don t want to live she said. If i was up to me. I d go somewhere private More comfortable and carry out my wishes with people who text it was of in 1983, the wheelchair bound Bouvia fought in court for the right to starve at a Hospital in River Sido about 60 Miles East of los Angeles. And y moral speeches peppered the trial and tense Mical debates filled the hallways Al recess. Some noting Bouvia s failed marriage miscarriage and unsuccessful Effort to Lind a Job despite her degree in social work said she should to counselled until she regained the will to live. Others insisted she had the right to be left alone. Ultimately the judge decided Bouvia had no right to ask a Hospital staff to provide painkillers while Sha starved and she left Riverside general Hospital. Receding from the Public Eye Bouvia stayed with friends Lor a while and went briefly to Mexico whore she considered experimental treatment. Her physical condition worsened and she is now bedridden. She again surfaced at the Center of the right to die debate in january 1986, when she sued to Force doctors at High desert Hospital in suburban Lancaster to withdraw a nasal feeding tube inserted against her will. California s 2nd District court of appeals on april 16, 1986. Ordered removal of the tube saying Bouvia had the absolute right to refuse medical treatment regardless of her motive even it it trough i Toboul her death. Bouvia acknowledged the value of the precedent she set by said she feels bad and Kinc Fol bitter thai it took so Long. When aha first sued in Riverside in 1933, she was mentally ready to die she said but now it is More difficult because she senses that her reputation makes the hos Pilaf staff even now if i decided to Stop eating although legally Hoy could do nothing morally the Hospital might Leei still not right she said. You still feel that pressure. I always wanted the people around me to Teel of about ii. People might say now she has the right to starve Why does t she do it " Boutta said but it s easier said than done when you re so Avert you a nov everyone around you is waiting and thinking. Of god so i m afraid to say of it s time " Douvia s cerebral palsy slurs her speech and renders her limbs useless. But she is still articulate talking almost offhandedly about her unusual bid Lor death. Her Sun streaked room is hardly the picture of gloom plants and stuffed Teddy bears line her Bright yellow window Sill and cheerful posters of Flowers and san Francisco Cable cars paper the Walls. Finches and sparrows alight in the Bird feeder outside her window. Dying should t be. A morbid thing she said it s an alternative 1 feel i should have and that everyone should Bouvia s Days Are punctuated by Baths occasional movies on the television by her bed and visits from friends and a favorite social worker who reads to her her father and two Sisters visit but infrequently because o the expense of travelling from Northern California Oregon and Washington. She said family members Don t try id talk me out of it anymore but they Don t want to see me she said she would never move in with her family because she would Noi want to subject them to watching her Dalri. Society has made it starving so complicated thai it s prohibitive until things Calm Down Bouvia said. Time will self. Sooner or later i la decide it s Lime but i want to do it quietly when it s Light Lor me and for others for those around cerebral Patty sufferer Elizabeth Bouvia the desire is still Here to die. Juat need it lobe right the stars and stripes Page 15
