Ho'oponopono

I recently signed up for Max just so I could watch The Pitt. It's a medical drama set in a Pittsburgh ER starring Noah Wyle and I think it's far better than ER or Grey's Anatomy. The characters have to juggle personal crises, workplace politics, and the emotional toll of treating critically ill patients. Each episode covers one hour of a single 15-hour emergency department shift, and so far the show has dealt with a patient who was pushed onto a subway track, a mother who has made herself ill in order to get help for her son, a pediatric patient who has ingested one of his father's marijuana gummies, sickle cell disease, a patient who overdosed on Xanax that had been laced with fentanyl, and many other medical crises.

I think it's a great show, but I was struck by something more emotional than medical. An elderly patient is admitted from a nursing home with breathing difficulties but he also has advance directives that say he doesn't want to be be put on a ventilator. His adult children are unsure about the best course of action and they do end up putting him on a ventilator, but it's only helpful for a short time. The patient's daughter especially is not ready for her father to die, but Noah Wyle tells her and her brother about something his mentor taught him concerning how to say goodbye to a loved one. It's a Hawaiian prayer/process called Ho'oponopono that has a difficult to pronounce name but is really simple. It roughly translates to “cause things to move back in balance” or to “make things right.”

 

 

It's simply saying to loved ones, "I love you, thank you, I forgive you, please forgive me." There are variations; sometimes "I'm sorry" is used instead of "I forgive you", and I've seen the phrases used in different orders. But however they are used, these four phrases seem to cover most of the "big things" like love, repentance, forgiveness, and gratitude you might want to express at the end of someone's life. I wish I had been aware of this when my parents were approaching death, but I know I said similar things in my grief. 

 

I enjoy watching entertaining TV and The Pitt certainly does that in terms of medical drama, but it's a big plus when it's more than just a medical soap opera and can provide some real and emotionally honest moments that also teach me something. That's why The Pitt is my current favorite!