THE POWER TO CARRY OUT YOUR WISHES.
In 1990, Terri Schiavo suffered severe brain damage when she collapsed in her home due to heart failure. For the past 13 years, she has been kept alive through the use of a feeding tube. Her husband and parents have been the center of a lengthy and continuous court battle over whether Terri should be kept alive indefinitely in a persistent vegetative state with this feeding tube, as her parents wish or, if she should be allowed to die, as her husband wishes. Had Terri Schiavo signed a Living Will and a Durable Power of Attorney naming an attorney-in-fact, this long and painful battle could have been avoided.

Living Wills: A Living Will is a legal document that speaks only when you are unable to speak and you are about to die or when the doctor thinks you will never recover from a coma. It tells doctors that you do NOT wish to prolong death. In this document , you may also state whether you want to be kept alive by using tubes to give you food and water and can indicate your wishes to donate (or not) part (or all) of your body after death. Anyone who wants to ensure their wishes to NOT prolong death are carried out should they become incapable of speaking for themselves should have a Living Will.