Meredith Grey quotes from Grey's Anatomy

Meredith

[voice over] They say ignorance is bliss because once you know about the tumor or the prognosis, you can’t go back. Will you be strong or will you fall apart? It’s hard to predict so don’t worry about it. Enjoy the time you have before the news comes. Yep, ignorance is bliss.

Meredith

[voice over] Patients who undergo an amputation often feel a sensation where the missing limb was as if it’s still there. The syndrome is called phantom limb. It’s as if the body can’t accept that a terrible trauma has occurred. The mind is trying to make the body complete again. Patients who experience phantom limb report many different sensations but by far the most common is pain.

Meredith

[voice over] The body can be stubborn when it comes to accepting change. The mind holds out hope that the body can be whole again and the mind will always fight for hope, tooth and nail. Until it finds a way of understanding its new reality and accepts that what is gone is gone forever.

Meredith

[voice over] We’ve all heard the buzz words, streamline, optimize integrate, adapt. Every day someone comes up with a new strategy or tool or technology to increase our efficiency. The idea is to make our lives easier but the question is, does it?

Meredith

[voice over] To really be efficient, you have to eliminate what doesn’t work. You have to figure out what is important and hold on tight to the things that matter most.

Meredith

[voice over] They say there's one sure sign of a successful negotiation. It's that when the parties leave the table, they both feel like they've been screwed. The goal is a compromise. A situation where everybody wins.

Meredith

[voice over] They say that negotiation is an art form. Yet, when we negotiate, we have a strategy, we use tactics. Strategies and tactics aren't words we use for seeking a compromise. These are words for going to war.

Meredith

[voice over] There is a procedure to treat epilepsy that involves surgically severing the connection between the left and right brain. The goal is to block signals that cause seizures. The problem is this also cuts off the brain's ability to communicate with itself. The left side has no idea what the right side is up to. A patient may experience problems with coordination, memory, speech. It's a drastic solution that's only considered when all other options have failed because once a surgeon makes that cut, there's no going back.

Meredith

[voice over] There's a reason surgeons are willing to roll the dice on a risky, go-for-broke, point-of-no-return surgery with potentially devastating consequences. Sometimes, it works.

Meredith

[voice over] To a critically ill patients, an organ transplant means a new start, a second chance. But the body is designed to fight off any outside invader, even the one that is trying to save it. Because the transplant doesn’t guarantee that’s an easier life, there’s the threat that the body will reject the organ outright.

Meredith

[voice over] The transplant process is very scary. The patient goes from worrying about getting an organ, to worrying if the organ will be rejected. The anxiety continues, until they can finally open their eyes after surgery, and see that their gift has been accepted.

Meredith

[voice over] Work keeps our minds active, it keeps us out of trouble. When we're not working, our hands are idle and the devil will find work for idle hands to do. And when you have an idle mind, well, that's the devil's playground too.

Meredith

[voice over] At first, idleness can seem like a welcome distraction. The troublemaking and the fun. Everyone needs some idle time to focus on something other than work, even if it means focusing on something that's a little bit scary. Stepping back from work is the only way to change perspective. And it's only after we had everything in perspective that we remember where our hands truly belong.

Meredith

[voice over] Let's say you're standing in an OR, staring at an aneurysm that's embedded deep into a patient's frontal lobe. There are three things you'll need to remove it. You'll need confidence, you'll need an eleven blade and some really good instincts.

Meredith

[voice over] There are some feelings that refuse to go away, they're little distractions whispering in your ear. Some things just get under your skin. Try as you might, you can't ignore your instincts. It's like they say, always follow your intuitions.