Archie Battersbee - Thread 3

[BongoJim]

Follow on from previous full thread

www.mumsnet.com/talk/in_the_news/4596573-archie-battersebee-case-thread-2?page=1

Wouldn't you think she'd Google some of these things, the information will be out there. Non medical people won't know what she's talking about so might well be believing her, but she's just making herself look silly to people who do know. Someone is giving her this misinformation I don't think she has medical knowledge.

I believed it when I saw the video of the hand gripping, but I have no clue about these things, my dad had a brain bleed and swelling on his brain, they were "cautiously optimistic" after his op. His arms stretched when I spoke to him so I thought he knew I was there. He didn't though his brain had or was swelling again and we lost him. Gutted to think I was mistaken but nonetheless I'd have accepted if I'd been told it was a reflex or wherever because like most of us I have that respect for the experts.

I am trying to imagine how other parents feel who have made the decision to end life support on the advice of the medics and out of love for the dignity of their child.

@Eeksteek I think you're right.

I don’t to think she’s got any real understanding that her son is very close to taking his last breathes, and that then he’ll be gone. She says the words ‘where he’ll take his last breathes’ but there is zero emotion there so I worry that she doesn’t really believe it’s going to happen, that she thinks in the end they won’t do it, that he’ll keep on breathing.

She’s going to be torn apart at that moment when reality hits her - it was always going to be a horrendous moment, to have to say goodbye to her child, but she hasn’t even begun to even try and mentally prepare for that it seems - but instead is just almost lying to herself that it won’t. I suppose it’s a sort of protection - but it will come crashing down in the most traumatic and horrifying way, it will be like relieving the moment she originally found him.

Precaution I would imagine.

It will be for safety of staff and other patients and families.

Probably all the negative rhetoric they've been whipping up on social media asking the army for support.

Absolutely agree with you, @Eeksteek

Why is she allowed to throw the execution word around unchallenged?

Because the hospital are being kind.

This sounds horribly callous but I don't think there are any more advantages now to the hospital giving them more time now when all they do with it is spend time with their lawyers. They need to put Archie first now. And I'm very angry that even with all this talk about Archie's best interests, it feels as though Hollie's have been and still are priority.

It’s very possible that Hollie’s animosity is directed at ‘hands-off’ staff (who she perceives as making the decisions and not knowing Archie) and not the ‘on the ground’ staff. This is often the case, ime.

There’s no way hospice staff could care for him. He needs senior specialist ICU staff, and lots of them. There’s no way he could be moved. He wouldn’t make it out of the room, sadly.

I wonder if she just can’t face going home. That would be completely understandable. And I wonder if being with Archie is too hard to bear, too. For all her self-deception, it must be hard to see him as he is and keep going. Maybe all the media stuff is a way of helping him without having to confront it so much. After all, there must only be so much you can say, or do, with a person who is so clearly no longer there. If she was with him more she might not be able to go on convincing herself he’ll wake up.

Because she is a distraught grieving mother of a beautiful boy. He is not being executed or murdered by the hospital staff, the people who are really responsible for this awful situation should be the focus of the police, Courts and media now.

Helpful update from Joshua Rozenberg at the bottom of this article with today's latest legal proceedings.

It's clear everyone is bending over backwards to be as considerate as possible.

rozenberg.substack.com/p/archies-life-support-may-end-today

@Eeksteek Think you could be right. ADHD is a funny one in that it can mean a person has ultra focus as well as paying attention to everything. Having a child with SEN can mean you are gearing up for fights with 'authority' (NHS/school/LA) so perhaps she was always a bit primed for that before the awful thing happened to her son. I don't agree with things she says but that doesn't stop me from feeling a lot of compassion. It's a situation no-one would ever want to be in. I feel deeply sad for Archie, Hollie and the rest of their family and friends.

I do think she has been exploited mercilessly by CLC.

Targeting a woman at her lowest ebb is immoral, unforgivable.

I hope and pray she can find some peace with Archie's death, if not now then sometime in the future.

It's being reported life support will be removed at 11am tomorrow. I hope it's as peaceful as possible

Lets hope he has a peaceful night and that he will be with his loving family when he dies.

Re the hospice request, I think even if it were possible to move him safely I think (any legal minds able to comment?) that given the current legal situation, the fact that this could not be done quickly (you need to find a hospice, carefully plan the move etc which could take days) would mean that if the hospital agreed to this then that would be in breech of the order.

Sadly (or perhaps mercifully) Archie will not be aware of where he is when treatment is withdrawn, so any move cannot be in his. best interest if causes delay. The move to a hospice is what his family want, what they believe are their best interests, but that can't override what's best for Archie.

I hope it goes ahead tomorrow finally and he is soon at rest.

my thoughts are with those who love Archie and those caring for him.

I really hope so. This entire circus needs to end, and Hollie needs to accept that. She doesn’t have to like it, but she needs to know her son will not come back to her.

Because she's a mother who's son is dying and she's going through the stages of grief and raging against the world. Some people grieve more quietly and with more dignity than others.

I’m a hospital consultant who has been in the position of trying to reason with a family who were irrational, anti-authority and full of internet crackpot theories. They accused me of neglecting and starving their family member to death, when the reality was she died of end-stage dementia. The stress was indescribable, and it wasn’t one-millionth as awful as this situation is, plus didn’t have the media scrutiny or the army nonsense. I cannot begin to imagine what the staff are going through, my heart goes out to them.

I think this is where most people look at the evidence and can see he isn't dying. He died months ago. This was more just not wanting to let go I think. Because she still believes he is alive and sadly he isn't.

I hope it goes ahead, and Archie is finally laid to rest.

Sadly, I think we will see another 11th hour appeal, and another stay that will be a cycle that is repeated until Archie's body gives up by itself.