RIP David Foster Wallace, cont.

I've tried a couple of times to write a full post, but keep coming up short. At any rate, I wanted to link to this from the NY Times Obit, which I just can't get past:

James Wallace said that last year his son had begun suffering side effects from the drugs and, at a doctor’s suggestion, had gone off the medication in June 2007. The depression returned, however, and no other treatment was successful. The elder Wallaces had seen their son in August, he said.

“He was being very heavily medicated,” he said. “He’d been in the hospital a couple of times over the summer and had undergone electro-convulsive therapy. Everything had been tried, and he just couldn’t stand it anymore.” |NY Times|

Though I am an immense fan of his work, I never met David Foster Wallace. I did, however, study with Professor Wallace, and T.A. for him in both medical ethics and introduction to ethics. Seeing that quote there I can't help but be reminded of the many times these sorts of cases were discussed in class, and the extraordinary compassion and empathy that Professor Wallace consistently displayed when talking about these sorts of cases.

And that's where I get stuck.