Derek figures out a way to get to Izzie's tumor. He wants to remove
part of her hippocampus, a common surgery for seizure patients, but one
that could affect her memory and her speech. Given the severe possible
side effects, Izzie is reluctant to go that route. Dr. Swender wants to
try her on IL2 medicine, which has kept her "miracle" patient alive and
tumor-free for two years.
To see how Izzie's memory might be affected by the surgery, they do a
test where they show her flashcards and then ask her to say what was on
them, repeating it with the right half of her brain has been put to
sleep. She's unable to speak or even nod when Meredith asks her to tell
her who Alex is. Dr. Swender and Meredith are adamantly opposed to the
surgery and after talking to the IL2 patient, Izzie decides to try the
less radical approach.
Alex wants to know what Derek would do: "What if it was Meredith?" he
asks. Derek tells him, "I would ask her to have the surgery."
Owen tells Cristina he's had a good session with his shrink, but she
wants to know when he's going to tell his mother he's back from Iraq.
George works with Owen on a patient, an ex-soldier with constant,
excruciating pain in his leg. The doctors can't find anything wrong,
but the soldier wants them to cut if off so he can get back to Iraq.
George asks the soldier why he wants to go back so badly and he
explains that he has nothing in common with his relatives and that the
guys in Iraq are his "real family."
Arizona wants Miranda to scrub in with her on a pediatric case, but
Richard lures her back to general surgery with his newest acquisition:
A high-tech robotic operating system. She absolutely loves it and
eagerly jumps at the chance to do a second surgery with the hospital's
new toy. Arizona vows to fight the Chief for Miranda's time.
Alex can't believe Izzie has decided against the surgery. "It's not
just your life at stake anymore," he shouts at her. "You're having the
surgery!" Derek is furious with Cristina for talking Izzie out of the
surgery, until Meredith tells him she's the one who talked to Izzie.
Meredith tells Derek how her mother wasn't her mother anymore once she
got Alzheimer's, how she lost her dignity, her memory. Derek insists
it's not the same thing, and that Izzie's condition is treatable. He
orders Meredith, as his resident, to go back and talk Izzie into the
surgery.
Izzie is talking over her decision with the IL2 patient when the woman
collapses. Surgery doesn't go well and Izzie looks on as Swender tells
the woman's family that there is no hope she'll ever be off a
ventilator.
Izzie pages George to ask him what to do. "You know what to do," he
says. "You've already made the decision." Izzie tells Derek he can
operate, but she doesn't want to end up on a ventilator. She signs a
DNR but Alex wants her to tear it up. "I can't live like this," she
says. "And I can't live if something goes wrong. It's not what I want."
She says she "went crazy" when Denny signed his DNR but begs Alex not
to do the same thing. "If it comes down to it, just let me go," she
pleads.
Owen tells Cristina he's decided to go back to Iraq, and that his
nightmares are the result of "unfinished business." She tells him she
doesn't want him to die. He asks her, "Come with me," and they end up
on his mother's doorstep.
It's a different doctor who knocks on the army recruiter's door:
George, who's inspired by the soldier's passion.
The soldier talks Callie into amputating his leg but she freezes when
it comes time to cut. "We're not doing harm. We're saving him," Owen
tells her.
After seeing Izzie wheeled off to surgery, Meredith says to Derek,
"Let's go to City Hall tomorrow. I don't want to spend another day not
being married to you."
After the surgery, Izzie wakes and is told she's fine, apart from
"sluggish" kidneys. She is jubilant when Derek tells her he got the
whole tumor out. But then she asks again about how the surgery went.
And again. "Did you screw up her brain?" demands Alex, but Derek asks
him to stay calm, that this could just be a temporary post-op condition.
Since Derek and Meredith are getting married, and won't want housemates
anymore, Mark asks Lexie to move in with him. When she says she wants
to wait several years, at least, he takes a patient's advice and tells
her that he's "moving on" and that he's going to buy a house on his own.
After the visit to his mother, Owen tells Cristina he slept without any
nightmares for the first night since he's been home. "I'm getting
better," he tells her, and asks her to think about taking him back.
