Out in the Mountains

Karen Thompson:

Still Fighting to Bring Sharon Kowalski Home

Sage Russell

Karen Thompson made her first visit to
Vermont on November 15, as the guest of
the Vermont Lesbian and Gay Pride Com-
mittee, speaking at Christ Church in Mont-
pelier on “Protecting Your Relationships.”
To drive her point home, she told in vivid
and powerful detail the story of her own
long and so far unsuccessful fight to ob-
tain guardianship of and proper medical
care for her partner Sharon Kowalski, who

    
  

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was seriously injured in an automobile ac-
cident on November 3, 1983. Thompson
spoke with passion and urgency, using the
force of her own experience to try to help
others avoid a nightmare like the one she
has lived through since then.

The outlines of this story are well known.
The guardianship petition pitted Thornp—
son against Sharon's parents in a pro-
tracted legal battle. Guardianship was
awarded to Donald Kowalski in July
1985, whereupon he immediately moved
Sharon from St. Cloud, Minnesota, where
she had lived with Karen, to a nursing
home in the northern part of the state, and
obtained a legal order preventing Karen
from seeing Sharon.

Three and a half years passed before
Thompson was able to see Sharon again.
During this time she traveled and spoke
out on the case extensively, and wrote a
book about it called Why Can't Sharon
Kowalski Come Home?

Karen Thompson knows why Sharon
Kowalski can't come home. In her talk
she explained clearly and convincingly
how sexism, ableism and homophobia
have worked together to keep Sharon in-
stitutionalized. Thompson feels that these
three factors, particularly homophobia,
have obscured the ftmdamental fact: that
this is a human rights issue. Sharon Kow-
alski has been denied her basic civil
rights, especially her right to recover to
her fullest potential. She has not received
appropriate medical and rehabilitative care
and has been unable to participate in de-
cisions affecting her own lif -- decisions
she is well able to make.

The case finally caught the attention of the
mainstream media, and this publicity in
turn attracted some support from local and
national politicians. Disability rights

groups began to see it as a disability rights
case and not solely as a gay rights issue,
and they finally began to get involved too.
Thompson believes the combination of
these factors broke the case open, and led
to the limited progress that has been made
since then.

In September 1988, Sharon was tested for
competency for the first time, even though
under Minnesota law she should have
been tested every year since the accident.
The testing demonstrated clearly that she
was able to understand, communicate and
express her own wishes. Sharon was
moved to a nursing home near St. Cloud
where she could receive rehabilitative
care. Karen finally saw her again in Feb-
ruary 1989. Since then, Sharon has been
able to spend two weekends a month at
home with Karen. The other two week-
ends she remains at the nursing home in
case her parents want to visit her. In a
three year period they have seen her five
or six times.

The latest round in the legal battle began
in August 1990 when Thompson once
again petitioned for guardianship. Hear-
ings were held in December, and for the
first time Sharon was present in a court-
room where her future was being decided.
The decision was announced in April.
The judge denied Thompson's petition,
primarily because Karen intended to bring
Sharon home, and he awarded guardian-
ship to a “neutral” third party who had not
even filed a petition as required by law.
This decision went against the unanimous
opinion of 16 court-appointed experts --
doctors, nurses, psychologists, social
workers and the like -- that it was in Shar-
on's best interest to go home, “home” de-
fined as being with Karen, and that there
was no medical reason why she could not
be cared for there.

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