#Wilson's heart

[nothingisfun]

Wilson's Heart

#house #house md #greg house #james wilson #wilson #amber volakis #art #house art #house fanart #wilson's heart

[brachiocephalics]

So this is the story you made up about who you are. It's a nice one.

Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë / Amber Volakis & Gregory House

#hi selfcesties kiss kiss mwah <3 #this post is brought to you by: my bullshitting #housevolakis #house x amber #house md #amber volakis #gregory house #house s4 #Wilson's heart #house s5 #under my skin #saviours #house divided #ship: i am you & you are me - we will never be alone #disasterpiece.web #housemdedit #hugh laurie #anne dudek

[atomicradiogirl]

Son of a Coma Guy: Unconditional Love is Cutting Your Heart Out

Son of a Coma Guy is leading up to the climax of the Tritter arc of House season 3, only two episodes before Finding Judas, where Wilson betrays House and makes a deal with Tritter, an action that ultimately dissolves their relationship until Season 4. The episode starts with a unique structure, with no patient cold open. Just House having lunch with two patients in comas. Wilson barges in and yells at House for “forcing him to lie to the police” that House didn't steal Wilson’s prescription pad and forge his Vicodin prescriptions. This is all in the first minute of the episode, setting up the intricacies of House and Wilson’s relationship that will soon get pushed in the later events of the season. 

Wilson is characterized as a person who is selfless, giving, loves to be needed, and will do anything in his power to help people he cares about, especially House. House does something that should rightfully break this friendship: put Wilson’s career on the line and possibly send himself to prison. Wilson is mad at House for only thinking about himself and putting himself in jeopardy. Wilson isn’t mad at House for using him and his kindness. House always does this. Wilson likes being used. In reality, Wilson is scared for House, not himself. He lied to Tritter to protect House. House didn't force Wilson to lie for him. Wilson did it anyway. The ultimate act of loyalty and care, the ultimate sacrifice. This is all read between the lines, of course, and this important revelation in the opening of the episode sets up the actions and importance of Son of a Coma Guy. 

We are then introduced to the titular Son of a Coma Guy, Kyle Wozniak, who has a seizure when House induces one. Kyle discusses his medical history and his family history. He says that his dad never liked his mother’s side of the family, and he was raised by a guardian. He only visits his father, who is in a coma. House wakes up his comatose father, Gabriel Wozniak. The last thing he remembers is the fire that killed his wife, something that is revealed to have been caused by Kyle later in the episode. House and Wilson discuss Gabriel. House argues, “Maybe he just doesn’t like his son. The delusion that fathering a child installs a permanent geyser of unconditional love.” Wilson interjects with, “Maybe your father’s feelings were conditional. Not everyone-” House cuts him off, “Yes, of course, that would play into your romantic vision of-” Wilson says, “In terms you would understand, we have an evolutionary incentive to sacrifice for our offspring. Our tribe, our friends. Keep them safe.” To which House replies, “Except for all the people who don’t. Everything is conditional. You just can’t always anticipate the conditions.” Wilson’s argument here mirrors his actions at the start of the episode, sacrificing himself and keeping House safe from the consequences of his actions, even if he deserves them. House says that maybe Gabriel’s relationship with Kyle is conditional, that love and sacrifice can never be unconditional. Referencing his abusive relationship with his father and his perception of love. That it always has to have a catch. This is really important in understand House and Wilson as characters, and especially in their relationship. Wilson views love as being programmed, an innate thing you’re evolutionarily destined to have. House views love as something you earn, something you get, something that has conditions. Wilson might have a romantic vision of love, but his love life is just as unhealthy as House’s. Constantly putting people’s needs in front of his own, sacrificing himself for House, which is left unnoticed and unappreciated by House. Someone who views this sacrifice as conditional when, in reality, it isn’t. This is the dichotomy of House and Wilson. 

House fulfills Gabriel’s last-day request of getting a sandwich and needs Wilson’s car for a road trip to Atlantic City. Wilson of course, lets him have it but decides to come with them. House keeps questioning Gabriel so Gabriel makes a deal with him that for every question House asks, Gabriel asks him one too. Gabriel asks House if he’s ever been in love, House says yes. Says that they met when she shot him in paintball, talking about Stacy. Gabriel asks if House has ever loved anyone else and House deflects saying, “no more questions” but Wilson is of course in the car with them. House doesn’t want to admit that he 1. Either loves Wilson or 2. Is capable of loving Wilson since this would prove his conditional love theory, that he loves Wilson only because he selflessly gives House what he needs. 

In the hotel in Atlantic City, Wilson asks House why he used his pad, not Cameron’s Foreman's or Chase’s. Wilson says that it’s because his association with House is voluntary. That he chooses to be close to him. “Any relationship that involves choice you have to see how far you can push before it breaks. And one day our friendship will break and that’ll just prove your theory that relationships are conditional and you don’t need human connection or deserve it or whatever goes on in that rat maze of your brain.” House deflects this, of course. Incapable of being truly honest about his feelings at this stage. House, throughout the show has a deep insecurity about deserving love, deserving to live, and deserving to be happy. Wilson’s unconditional loyalty to him pushes against this. Yes, there are moments when their relationship wavers but it never truly fully breaks. He always comes back to House and in the end, he relies on House. House is all Wilson has, and Wilson is all House has. Son of a Coma Guy is the first proof that House can bend Wilson and his relationship and Wilson will bend with him. Their social contract of push and pull. Bending but never fully breaking. 

House questions Gabriel about his family history, eventually determining the illness that is inherited throughout their family. Gabriel asks House why he became a doctor, and he decides to be honest with him. Saying that when his father was stationed in Japan he went to one of the hospitals as a kid and he was inspired by a doctor, a buraku, one of Japan’s untouchables. Someone whose ancestors were slaughterers and gravediggers, he wasn’t accepted by his staff, but they needed him because he was right so nothing else mattered. Gabriel is asked about the fire that killed his wife, and he explains that Kyle when he was 12, knocked over the kindling which started the fire. He didn’t blame him because he was just a child and it was an accident. Gabriel isn’t with him because he blames himself for failing to keep his family safe. He couldn’t stop the fire and save his wife. He doesn’t want to see his son die too. This goes into Wilson’s evolutionary love argument. Gabriel loves his family so much that he can’t bear to lose them, to fail to protect them.

Gabriel decides to perform the ultimate sacrifice, to give Kyle his heart to save him. House decides to go along with it, telling Gabriel how to kill himself so that the heart can be saved, by hanging. Before he aids Gabriel, he asks Wilson to leave the room. Wilson says no, but House says, “You’ve lied to the cops enough for me. Maybe I don’t want to push this until it breaks.” To which Wilson leaves, accepting that House appreciates his sacrifice and is willing to put himself on the line for someone else. Something that House rarely does. Gabriel asks House if he could hear one thing from his father what would it be? To which House says “I’d want him to say You were right. You did the right thing.” What this is truly about we don’t know and never really find out but House’s abusive relationship with his father isn’t truly revealed until One Day One Room a few episodes later, which puts new context to this line. House has to kill a father who loves his son so much, even though he accidentally caused the death of his wife, that he is willing to sacrifice his heart for him. Gabriel unconditionally loves his son, but House’s father’s love was conditional. This is what Wilson argued previously. Gabriel is willing to sacrifice his heart, (do I have to mention Wilson’s Heart) also mirrors Wilson’s sacrifice at the beginning of the episode. Both Gabriel and Wilson prove their unconditional love. Wilson wordlessly sets up House’s alibi for him and they wait together for Gabriel to die. When Gabriel’s heart saves Kyle, Kyle asks House for any message from his father, something to give him closure. House tells him what he wishes his father would have told him. “Right about what? What does that mean?” Kyle asks. “How would I know? He’s your dad,” House tells him and leaves.

“You know what I learned about this case?” House asks Wilson at the end of the episode. “That it proved that people can love unconditionally and you can tell yourself it’s not true, but you’ll just end up in a hotel room in Atlantic City asking someone to cut your heart out?” Wilson says. 

Son of a Coma Guy is an episode about unconditional love and sacrifice. Gabriel and Wilson are the givers, those who sacrifice their hearts (literally and not literally) for the people they love. Kyle and House are the takers. Those who don’t think they deserve the love they receive but are forced to take it. Kyle, to live, House for growth. I adore this episode and it is a prime highlight of House and Wilson’s relationship and the peak of House’s writing.

#house md #house md season 3 #tritter arc #hilson #i'm essay posting again #essay post #this is a whole 1600 words long #i wish i was exaggerating #i adore this episode #s3e7 #son of a coma guy #such a goated underrated episode #gregory house #james wilson #wilson's heart #SYMBOLISM!!!!!! #i'm extremely normal about this #my thoughts #nat posting #please don't let this flop #chaining myself to the floor #meta

[purrassicjet]

I will never get over the fact that Wilson had to turn off Amber's bypass himself. There wasn't a nurse to do it, there wasn't another doctor, he had to turn it off himself. He had to turn it all off himself. He was alone. There was nobody there to support him. Amber died in his arms and (probably in his mind) by his hand. That is not something you recover from.

#Making it worse is the fact that I know House would have been there if he could #House would have turned off the machines so that Wilson didn't have to #But House was in a coma #God this show is the worst #wilson's heart #house md #james wilson #amber volakis

[oldmanffucker]

my first instinct upon seeing this was to get angry and want to hit this person with hammers, but actually I want to talk about this.

this post, and I didn't even want to click in the read the rest bc it made me to sad to see, is saying that Wilson and Amber only dated for a maximum of three months, so should he really be this torn up about her loss?

So, as a grief support specialist and house fan, let's talk about it.

First and foremost, it's the depth, not the length, of a relationship that matters. Quality over quantity, all of that. Of course. But also, if we look at Amber and Wilson's relationship itself, this is kind of the first time Wilson is in a relationship that feels really good to him. Amber doesn't just want Wilson bc she needs him and needs to be put first by him, she wants him to take care of himself too. He's being challenged for the first time (in a romantic context) (canonically) to not put himself on the back burner for everyone else, but to think about what Wilson wants. House, of course, does this too, but in different ways. Which is also to say that Amber is a revelation for him because she is like House--House who is his longest and arguably only real friend, the person he trusts the most, is most able to be himself around. And now he's found this person who he can feel all that in a romantic and sexual context too.

Which is all to say that this relationship wasn't like any other three month fling he had, this one had a depth to it from the very beginning that was really important and profound to Wilson, and was changing some parts of himself in a way that was really kind of life altering, even as it was also pretty subtle in many ways to the casual viewer.

This, plus the fact that her death itself was really sudden, very traumatic, and prolonged (a couple days and many really traumatic failed attempts to save her life, including his best friend risking his life for her), really adds up to someone being profoundly affected by this loss.

But beyond this, Wilson did not only experience the loss of Amber with her death. There are losses we grieve beyond simply dying. The whole experience before finding out she was even missing and hurt, of seeing House without memory, of even for a little while thinking they may have had an affair, of watching House kill himself (literally) to bring back his memories - this portion of the situation alone is an experience of a loss of safety. He's realizing that life is random, and terrifying in a whole new way than he may have known it before. His best friend was in a bus accident. Life is random and he could have died. There is no guaranteed safety. His best friend who knows everything suddenly knows nothing. A loss of the status quo, of what he's assumed is the way things are. he's watching his best friend go to extreme lengths in order to capture his memories. he's watching his best friend fucking die on a bus floor as he tries to revive him with his boss. Loss of control, loss of the norm, loss of the future they could have had if none of this happened.

THEN.!! He's made aware that Amber was involved in all of this. And we don't know where she is or how she's doing. He's now been introduced to ambiguous loss (which he has experienced at great length with his brother who went missing, and is now experiencing again). Now they have to find Amber. Okay and now they've found her and she's in a coma and really on the brink of death. And this too is an ambiguous loss of another variety. He's experiencing both sides of ambiguous loss about Amber back to back (1. Physical absence and psychological presence (ex. someone missing/estranged) 2. Physical presence and psychological absence (ex. parent w dementia, someone in a coma))

He then has to skip over the grieving part and jump into problem solving and trying to keep her alive. and then his boy best friend has to risk his life for amber and wilson and almost die. And then Wilson has to realize that now, his kind of technically-alive-but-not girlfriend, he has to let her go. And she's woken up and he has mere moments to say his goodbyes and I love you's.

And ALL OF THAT is just the loss itself.

Then he is "grieving" or "mourning" in the way that is generally understood by the average person. If you ask the average person (esp in the US) what grief is, they'd usually point to this--after someone dies when you're sad--and none of the many paragraphs of grief and loss grappling I wrote about just before that.

The average bereavement leave is 3 days. Grief will invariably last more than three days. The amount of time we see Wilson grieving is frankly, really fucking regular. Even for a death less fraught and traumatic (subjectively) than this one.

Besides all of this, there are a number of different grief styles, and I think that Wilson's grief style is that of the Intuitive, or Heart, Griever (isn't that just perfect? I wonder if the writers knew that when they named the episode Wilson's Heart...).

This type of griever is more overtly emotional than the Intellectual, or Head, Griever (the other 2 styles are the Blended, or Head & Heart Griever, and the Dissonant, or Head vs Heart Griever). But is again, really common! Perhaps the asker of this original Reddit question is a head griever, or a dissonant griever, or perhaps even someone who has never yet had to grieve, and has only been fed the myths about grief, and they're trying to make sense of such a large grief.

There is no right way to grieve, there is no correct length of time that that grieving should last. There's no correct amount of time you are allowed to know someone before you grieve their death or pain. The way you grieve is the way you need to grieve, you simply have to try to honor it.

(I don't have a reddit so I can't respond to this directly, but feel free to link this in the responses to the post itself if you feel so inclined)

#long post #sorry. 2 special interests collide. #house #text post #house md #gregory house #james wilson #my post #wilson #amber #amber volakis #wilsonamber #amberwilson #wilson's heart #danny wilson #grief #loss #media analysis

[malinaa]

SOMEBODY SHOOT ME IN THE FUCKING SKULL .

#shows #house md #house s4 #house 4x16 #wilson's heart #hilson #greg house #photo #tais toi lys #lys lb: house #*

[moxsquanch]

#04x16 #house md #you ascendant - la dispute #gregory house #i miss amber ☹️ #james wilson #malpractice md #wilson's heart #need to post more house original content #amber volakis

[normalenjoyer-png]

house's head/wilson's heart are like such devastating episodes. i know everybody and their dog knows this but i just want to fucking recap cause i'm coping:

- amber dies

- house almost dies like 3 fucking times. this is all to figure out how to save amber. he would die to save amber's life. he would die to make wilson happy.

- what's my necklace made of

- you can't always get what you want fake out only for iron and wine passing afternoon to be played and just fucking spear me through the heart

- thirteen tests positive for huntington's

- house would rather die than have wilson be mad at him

- kutner drops his parents' death bombshell. oh my fucking god

- we're always gonna want just a little longer

- this was never supposed to happen

- i shouldn't have gotten on the bus

- get off the bus

- cuddy was the first person house saw when he woke up. she slept in a chair by his bedside while he recovered. she held his hand. i'm killing myself

the extent to which people just fucking care for each other in this show. it's going to make me sick you people would do anything for each other</3

#house md #house's head #wilson's heart

[castielstiddies]

It's time to play guess which episode of House md I just watched for the first time!

Here's a clue: I cried for the entire episode and after finishing it I'm left with a black hole in my chest where my soul used to be

#guess what episode of house md i just watched #thats right #Wilson's Heart #i could write an entire essay on the layers of house loving wilson and wilson loving amber and wilson loving house and amber being a #mirror for house and wilson loving amber because she's a house that he can actually be with and wilson losing amber who's a mirror for #house so its like hes lost house and than having to deal with the fact that he's not only lost the house that he can be with but hes #constantly plagued by the house he wants to be with but cannot be with and also house is the cause if amber's death and #so glad i watched this show #can't wait for it to go downhill from here and I'll still love it because it's an integral part of my psyche now #house md #hilson

[noclassnowitnosoul]

just finished season 4 and MY GOD this is a whole different kind of show suddenly

#house md #house's head #wilson's heart #i am in shambles #what the fuck #amber what the fuck #my god

[vicku]

I'm sorry did House just WILLINGLY put his own life at real risk for a patient because Wilson asked???????

#house md #hilson #wilson's heart

[buckysoldatbarnes]

house/wilson + early taylor swift

#house md #hilson #housewilson #wilsonhouse #gregory house #greg house #james wilson #taylor swift #fearless #speak now #haunted #haunted taylor swift #you're not sorry #the way i loved you #birthmarks #wilson's heart #literally spiralling into madness and forcing my hyperfixation on all of you sorry #mine

[brachiocephalics]

this scene is so sexually charged! and for what!

#house md #housevolakis #gregory house #amber volakis #house x amber #can someone protect me from what i want right now because... #she ****ed that old man (the she in question? the hallucination) #ship: i am you & you are me - we will never be alone #house s4 #s4 e16 #Wilson's heart #disasterpiece.png #play glory box by portishead fr #the Chemistryyyyyy #unwell #anne dudek #hugh laurie

[swirlsncurlsnmanyturns]

rewatching house md season 4 from th very beginning specifically for the build up it provides into the season finale because i'd like my heart to be broken into smithereens once again

#yes i enjoy it when media tortures the fuck out of my heart strings #house's head #wilson's heart #my beloved

[purrassicjet]

Do you ever think about how Wilson basically lost both the loves of his life in one night

#Because I do #Amber died #He walked away from House #The two people he loves the most #Gone #house md #gregory house #james wilson #hilson #amber volakis #house's head #wilson's heart

[rainycoffeecowboy]

Hi guys, these are my first poems on our favorite #hilson . Hope you like them :).

#house's head #wilson's heart #house md #hilson #gregory house #james wilson #angst