Anne Beaudoin

Why was I resuscitated? Anne Beaudoin

Eduardo, a very healthy child, was only six years old when he suddenly died at school while returning to his classroom after morning recess. He was resuscitated. Two weeks later he came out of the Intensive Care Unit in a vegetative state. How can you live when you've been stripped of everything you had? Nobody can imagine the life of Eduardo since that fateful day when he was resuscitated, and all he has suffered during the long and difficult rehabilitation process he has gone through. Cared for and helped by his mother, he has lived moments of horrible torment, and he had to face innumerable and immense obstacles, many of which were insurmountable. In spite of all his efforts, he lives today in a broken body that doesn't allow him to enjoy neither freedom nor autonomy. Nevertheless, his story is one of true achievement and the book tells it through fragments from the past and from the present, enabling the reader to discover Eduardo's endless struggle to find himself. On the other hand, the testimony of his life, destroyed by cardiopulmonary resuscitation, gives way to an honnest reflection on the matter and leads to a questioning of the ethical basis of this supposedly lifesaving medical procedure. Neither the author nor the story's protagonist think it is a good thing to keep glorifying medical technology to the detriment of human dignity.