Dying to be Thin

In the wake of the Terri Schiavo debacle, many people have urged others to make living wills in order to avoid a similar fate. This is sound advice that I completely agree with.

But there's another lesson to be learned from this case.

Not often mentioned is the fact that Terri had an eating disorder, bulimia, which is what caused her heart to stop briefly, putting her into the state she's now in. Eating disorders can cause heart failure by causing a chemical imbalance in the body, in her case, a potassium deficiency.

In other words, in a cruel twist of fate, Terri was figuratively dying to be thin, and ending up literally doing so.

If Terri had accepted herself as she was and not been willing to adopt drastic measures in a desperate attempt to be thin, she'd not be, ironically, lying severely brain damaged in a hospital bed being starved to death.

Something to think about.