Terri Schiavo’s Father, Robert Schindler, Never Stopped Fighting to Save Her

This article was originally published at LifeNews.com.

I have written many articles about my sister, Terri Schiavo, her death, and our decaying culture that was in part responsible for the grave injustice that happened to her. Although my parents have been part of many of these articles, I have never written about my father or the profound influence he had on my life.

This Father’s Day, I want to pay tribute to my dad by sharing a few memories of a man whose faith, work ethic, love of family, and principles left an indelible mark on my life.

My father was born in 1937 to Frederick and Catherine Schindler. He and his older brother, Fred Jr., grew up in a hardworking German-American family in North Philadelphia. Raised in a tough, blue-collar neighborhood, he learned early the value of faith, honesty, responsibility, and determination.

His family once owned a Philadelphia brewery named Amreins, which was lost to Prohibition. My dad attended North Catholic High School, then the largest Catholic high school in the United States and went on to study engineering at Temple University for a short time.

At age 15, my father experienced a loss that changed him forever. He found his father on the basement floor after a heart attack and held him as he died, a terribly painful memory that shaped the rest of his life.

My dad enlisted in the Navy and served his country as a young man. He rarely spoke about that time, but he never forgot the dates of his entry and discharge. After leaving the Navy, he worked as a mechanical draftsman and took a job at the Corning Glass Center in Corning, New York. There, he met my mother, Mary Lee Tammaro. They married in 1963, moved back to Philadelphia, and began building their family.

Terri arrived later that year. Thirteen months later, I was born, and three years after that, Suzanne. Those early years were filled with the joys of raising three children in a middle-class Philadelphia suburb.

We attended church every Sunday. We went to Catholic school, played organized sports, and were always outside with neighborhood friends until dark. My family has special and lasting memories of huge family Christmases, holidays, birthdays, communions, confirmations, and graduation parties. Every summer, we vacationed at the Jersey Shore, and Dad made sure we escaped to Florida each winter.

My father was a sports fan and fiercely loyal to his Philadelphia teams, especially the “Fightin' Phils.” He was my first baseball coach, and winning the Little League championship with him when I was seven is one of my fondest childhood memories.

My dad deeply admired John Wayne. The first movie he took me to see was Chisum. It was John Wayne’s display of courage and integrity that always resonated with him. In fact, whenever one of my sisters brought home a young man she was dating, my father’s litmus test was simple: “Does he like John Wayne?”

He enjoyed playing darts, his German beer, and watching his Phillies from our back patio on his little black-and-white TV. Classic shows like The Rockford Files, Hawaii Five-O, Magnum, P.I., The Honeymooners, and The Three Stooges were favorites, of course.

He loved Johnny Carson, Rodney Dangerfield’s comedy, The Pink Panther, and Red Skelton. He listened to the music of Sinatra, Jim Croce, Tom Jones, and Elvis, with Christmas songs being his favorite.

He was a devoted family man and would do anything for my mom and his children. My dad was old-school, had a strong presence, and believed a man’s word meant more than any signed contract. He was honest, loyal to a fault, and humble. He would often remind me, “If you have to say you is, you ain’t.”

Beneath his tough exterior, however, he had a great sense of humor, and there was an emotional side that would always emerge when it came to his family.

When I was a young boy, I remember my father sitting at our kitchen table, overcome with grief after receiving the devastating news that his brother, Fred’s wife, and their daughter had been killed in a tragic railroad crossing accident. He had a similar reaction years later, when he learned that his brother wasn’t expected to recover after he ran his sports car into a tree on the way home late from work.

There are so many memories of my father that I wish I could include. Growing up, I had an incredible fear of thunderstorms, tornadoes in particular. When I saw or knew of an approaching thunderstorm, I would retreat to my bedroom and hide until the storm passed.

So, one day during a severe summer storm, my father came into my bedroom, grabbed me, took me to our back porch, and waited for the storm to pass. I was scared to death, but standing there in my father’s arms, I heard the words he would repeat throughout my life, even well into my adulthood: “I’ll let you know when it’s time to worry.”

I love sharing the story of when Terri got her driver’s license. My sister had an incredible tenderness for animals. One late afternoon, she came flying through the front door, hysterical, convinced she had accidentally run over and killed a cat.

Seeing how upset she was, my father and a visiting friend went to the spot where Terri thought the accident had occurred. After some time, they returned, and my dad said, “Good news, Terri. The cat must be fine. We found no evidence that you hurt a cat.”

Terri’s tears stopped instantly, relieved she didn’t harm an animal. Later, I pulled my dad aside and quietly asked, “What took you so long?” He leaned over and whispered, “We had to bury the cat.”

After co-owning a successful material-handling company, he began to semi-retire in 1986 and moved the family to St. Petersburg, Florida. In the early morning hours of February 25, 1990, Terri sustained a serious brain injury. From then on, my sister required continual care.

It was in 1993, when Michael Schiavo, my sister Terri’s estranged husband, decided he would no longer care for his brain-injured wife and made his first attempt to end her life, that my father’s world changed forever.

What should have been the beginning of a well-earned retirement became years of turmoil and anguish, defined by legal battles, relentless public scrutiny, and a tireless fight to protect his daughter’s life.

For more than a decade, despite the lies from Michael’s attorney and euthanasia activists – not to mention being investigated, maligned, and subjected to nonstop vile attacks – my dad never flinched.

He and my mom endured courtrooms, slanted media storms, and painful setbacks. Yet, he continued defending his daughter and his belief that every human life, especially the most vulnerable, possesses inherent dignity.

Even at the height of Terri’s case, when exhaustion tested everyone's resolve and the nonstop emotional rollercoaster was taking a tremendous toll on his health, he showed remarkable gentleness of spirit. He taught all three of his children to respect life and love unconditionally.

After Terri died in 2005 following an inhumane death by dehydration that lasted nearly two weeks, my father dedicated the rest of his life to protecting the vulnerable. Determined not to let another family experience what our family had experienced, we founded the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network. The organization carries forward our family’s mission: supporting the medically defenseless, opposing euthanasia, and defending food and water as basic human care.

Just as my father’s life reminds us that strength is often quiet and persistent, showing up day after day for those who cannot fight for themselves, we want to remind others that true courage is found in remaining faithful to what is right, even when the cost is great.

Sadly, my dad died on August 29, 2009, at the age of 71 from heart failure. There is no doubt that his passing was a consequence of a broken heart and the unbearable sorrow he carried after Terri’s death.

Just before my father passed away, in a quiet time we had together, he said something to me that I’ll never forget and that to this day breaks my heart: that he could never forgive himself for not being able to protect his daughter from what they did to her. Looking at his eyes, I knew there was nothing I could say to comfort him.

But I also knew the example my dad was to the millions of people following Terri's case, leaving a legacy of sacrificial love that continues to inspire others every day. Most of all, he showed the world what it means to be a father.