Both Michael Schiavo & the Schindlers have books out this week (it will be a year tomorrow). I read A Life That Matters : The Legacy of Terri Schiavo — A Lesson for Us All last night and was struck by how gracious it is. It’s written by Terri’s mom, dad, sister, and brother. The siblings make clear they were never huge fans of their brother in law but her mother retains a remarkable respect for him (remarkable inasmuch as I wouldn’t have been surprised if she simply hated him).
She writes about how in the early years after Terri’s accident Michael “fought hard for his wife and was tireless in her care.” That changed of course—he would go from fighting for her life to fighting for her death–but even in writing of the later years, Mrs. Schindler doesn’t demonize Michael Schiavo, suggesting that he was a bit of a Felos tool (see previous post for some evidence of that from Michael himself). Mrs. Schindler writes: “[w]e believe that it was Felos’s strategy, not Michael’s, that dictated the course that led to the death of my daughter.”