I watched a re-run of "House" tonite. It's the one about the 9 year-old girl with cancer and hallucinations. Apparently, no matter what they do, she will die in about a year. I've seen parts of the episode before, but not the whole thing until tonight. What strikes me most about this episode is the girl's mother. Thru the whole show she is alone in the hospital waiting for her daughter. And I think, does this woman have nobody? No husband, no sister, no best friend to be there with her?
It makes me think about the future. That a lot of my friends are going to have kids, and some of those kids may get sick...hopefully not cancer, but there's no way of knowing of course. And my gut instinct is that I would NEVER let one of my friends sit in one of those waiting rooms alone...that I would drop everything to go and be with them, so they didn't have to cry alone. I think that I will love my friends' kids like my own, and that I won't be able to stay away in a time of such trauma.
But my next thought is, would I really? Anyone who knows me knows that I am terrible when it comes to sympathy & illness. I'm just so afraid of sick people, and of getting sick myself, that I find it impossible to help sick people and it always seems that I am cold toward them. Even when I truly am sorry for them or sad about their illness, I am just incapable of showing it in a genuine and meaningful way. Plus, I'm going to be a lawyer. I will have a high stress job with long hours and I will be living off my income alone. Will I really be able to drop everything for any reason I choose? Would I have the guts to walk away from my job in such a situation? I've never been in a situation like that and I am afraid that if it came down to it, I wouldn't be brave, I would be selfish and fearful.
I am afraid that, deep down, I'm really not as good of a person as I think I am. Even worse, I won't really know until it's too late. And it scares me to think that my friends are wasting their time on me, that I will end up being nothing for them at all.
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You're not a bad person if you don't sacrifice yourself for another. Total selflessness is dangerous, because you cannot be everything to everyone, and invariably you will feel like you are letting down someone along the road by your complete devotion to another - friend, parent, sibling, boss, whatever. Don't fall into a vicious circle of perpetual sacrifice and disappointment.
As for "House", well, can you say plot hole? :) These shows hardly ever bother to show supporting characters like an extended family.
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