Todd Hiestand

On the inside…its Techicolor… (on being related to Terri Schaivo)

March 18, 2005

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The past few days (and months for that matter) have been quite a challenge for our family. I have been silent on my blog about this whole thing, but my wife’s cousin is Terri Schiavo (Melanie’s dad is Terri’s mom’s brother). I probably don’t need to say more as to why its been a long few months. I am not going to take your time and try and convince you as to why we believe this whole situation is screwed up. Watch the news, there is already enough mud slinging going on and frankly i am getting a little sick of everyone putting their “two cents” in.

One thing that I have learned through all of this is that when you stand outside an issue or situation from an “objective” position, its really easy to think you see the whole story and be sure of your “informed” decision. But, when you know the people involves, things become VERY different. All the sudden you are not talking about something that is “out there” but you are talking about someone in your own home, family, heart. I had a woman come into my other place of employment a while back and she started going off on how “those crazy, selfish parents should just let her die” (of course I disagree with but it is her opinion which she has all the right to hold). Of course, she had no clue that these “crazy parents” are family….I calmly told her that since she was my wife’s cousin, it was much more complicated than that and i disagreed with her. Man, you should have seen her face turn white. She felt like such a moron.

When you stand outside of something like this, things can seem very black and white for you. But, when you step inside, things turn Technicolor and are much, much different.

A few things:
- If you pray, please be in prayer for Terri and my family. This is a hard time for us all, especially my in laws.

- The facts in this case are so misrepresented on the news. You can have your opinion and that is fine. Just make sure its well informed.

- Don’t make my blog a forum to debate this issue. Go do that somewhere else.

- This situation has been interesting for me because I obviously support my family in this issue. (And not just because they are family, but because when I look at the case, I really do support Terri’s life). But, I’m someone who sometimes gets more than a little irked with the tactics of ultra conservatives, the religious right and the actions/tactics that the right-to-lifers sometime take. Their hearts are probably good, but sometimes i think they do more harm that good. I’m glad they are fighting for Terri, but man, its weird!

Please be careful about making harsh judgments about things situations when you are standing outside of something. It’s not as black and white as it seems. Maybe you can’t get inside like in this situation, but at least try, or just stay out of it.

Update: Yes, I have edited this post since I first posted it. I wish I would have not linked to the site i did in the first post becuause all it did was take away from and overshadow the intent of the post, which was to share a little bit of our experience and feelings about this terrible situation, not make a statement about someone else’s view about church. Sorry for that.