Well, you've already done that, you've already compromised yourself and diminished yourself for me. I feel that, your pissiness, and your resentment, Derek.
You know why? You know why I resent you? Because you've never had my back on this! Not since the day I told you I would stay. I told you that you and the kids were more important. You have been determined to prove me wrong, that this is the wrong choice.
Deborah, it's Dr. Shepherd. Glad I could catch you. It was great that you came by today. Please tell the President that I would be thrilled to accept the post. Yes, absolutely, we can talk more then. I look forward to it. I will see you soon. (He hangs up the phone.)
[ending voice over] Nobody's memory is perfect or complete. We jumble things up. We lose track of time. We are in one place... then another and it all feels like one long, inescapable moment. So, what does it mean? What do we take away? Which pieces will haunt us? Hurt us? End us? Inspire us? It's just like my mother used to say, the carousel never stops turning. You can't get off.
[opening voice over] When exposed to trauma, the body deploys its own defence system. From the first second the brain receives the signal that a catastrophe has happened, the blood rushes to the organs that need help the most. Blood floods into the muscles, the lungs, the heart, the brain. The brain makes a decision for the rest of the body. Either face the danger or run away. It's a mechanism designed to protect the body from harm. From knowing that what has happened might be irreparable, we call it 'shock'.
You have a shot! You have a chance! And it may be small and it may be risky, but it's a chance. A chance that my friends would give anything to have, and you're ignoring it. You're wasting it.
[ending voice over] When shock wears off, when the body can accept that a trauma has happened, when it can let down its defenses, it's a scary moment. It's vulnerable. The shock response had protected us, and it just might have saved us.
[opening voice over] They found this guy in Maine who had been living completely alone in the woods for 30 years, they called him the last true hermit. 30 years without the warmth of human touch, without conversation. The hermit felt more lonely when he was out in the world than he ever felt in the woods by himself. Surrounded by people but drowning in solitude.
(to Jackson and her mother Karen) You are not helping, neither of you. I am standing here, listening to you tell me that God only gives me one choice, and you telling me that I should forgo God's choice. And the truth is, I don't know anything expect that I am scared and sad and I'm alone. You're both just standing there, yelling at each other and talking at me, but I am alone, and it is terrifying! And the louder you get, the more terrified I become, so I just need you both to just shut up! Can you do that? Can you please... Can you please both just shut up?!
You don't. I mean, before three months ago, any time I called your house or came over or skyped or whatever, Cristina was there. There's no way you ever slept alone. I mean, you had Derek. And if you didn't have Derek, you had Cristina. I'm guessing if it came down to it, you were, like, the middle spoon in the middle of a very weird spooning situation. I've never met a less alone person than you u...
Ben snores. And he sometimes talks in his sleep. And he's hot. Like a furnace. Like flames shootin' out of him. He's lucky I love him. And he's a resident and hardly home at night. Or he'd be dead.
I miss sleeping with a man in my bed. You know, facing away from each other, barely touching expect for just the arm thrown over your waist. When I'd wake up at night, terrified of... me, I liked knowing he was there and I wasn't by myself.
I cannot sleep with someone lying next to me. Literally cannot. My one serious guy? Dean. Dean just loved to spoon and snuggle, and I would just lie there, staring up silently, counting the seconds until he would fall asleep and I could sneak off to sleep on the sofa. And then I'd sneak back into bed before he woke up in the morning. Yeah, people think that's a cute story. It's not a cute story. That sofa was hard as a rock. I was exhausted. Dean is a really sweet guy. He's tall and kind. Civil rights lawyer. He's funny. So when he proposed, I explained to him about the sleeping. I said, "you know, maybe you could sleep in a room down the hall." I wanted to sleep alone.
You know, I can't even imagine it. It's sex. Sure, you know, I've gone out and had one-night stands before. But... I don't know. I can't... Something real? I pulled that icicle out of her chest. Hell, I bathed her when she couldn't bathe herself. I can't imagine belonging to anyone like that again.
Have we used up all our happy? You ever afraid of that, that this is all there is now? It's like I had a certain amount of happy that was supposed to last my whole life, and I've used it all up. Do you think that's true?
[ending voice over] The last true hermit was found and dragged out of hiding and into the world. Most might find his existence sad but the hermit knew something we didn't. He knew that when it comes down to it, even when you’re with someone or in the noisy rush of people, it’s just you. The one you can count on and lean on and depend on. It has to be you and once you figure that out, being alone becomes a choice.
[opening voice over] There's a thing we say when someone dies. We say it to the patients's family. We say, 'I'm sorry for your loss.' It's a pat little phrase and an empty one. It doesn't begin to cover what's actually happening to them. It lets us empathize without forcing us to feel their devastation ourselves. It protects us from feeling that pain, that dark, sinking, relentless pain. The kind that can eat you alive. And every day, I thank God for that.
I wished horrible things for them, Jo. Jackson left me for her, and I wished them misery and fights and breakups. I mean, I'd see them sitting together in the cafeteria, and I'd wish them food poisoning. Then I found this.
You would never have wished them this. You know that. If you hadn't have found it, somebody else would have. It wouldn't have changed anything. It's not on you. If anything, it just means that you're a good doctor.
