Posted by Morgan Carey on Saturday, August 9th, 2025 1:51pm.
“Leave it to my autistic father to use math to explain compassion.”
~ Ariyah Carey, with a loving smile.
I have rarely been able to make my words match my feelings. I know what I want to convey in my mind and from my heart, but when I try to share it with others, it often doesn’t land.
My language only seems to make sense to me, and I often cannot make sense of the language of others—especially when it comes to feelings. I can’t teach people to understand how I think, nor can I seem to learn how their minds work. It’s frustrating.
“Math is the language of the universe.”
~ Neil DeGrasse Tyson
There is one language, however, that can be taught. That can make sense. Neil would say it is a language that is true whether you know it is true or not—a language that is not invented but discovered. (And yes, I’m aware that many folks feel about math as I feel about words and feelings.)
Bear with me. I promise this math is easy.
My wife is sick. Very sick. And she is the love of my life.
Eight months ago, she was diagnosed with stage 4 mantle cell lymphoma. A few months later, while awaiting clinical trials, another devastating blow—she was also diagnosed with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia. (We don’t even really talk about the constant skin cancer from the radiation treatments from her past bout of Hodgkin's Lymphoma.)
She’s a 10/10 sick every day of the week and twice on Sunday. (Sunday is a metaphor. Any day can be a Sunday.)
My wife is a good person. Those who know her think of her as kind, caring, compassionate, giving, thoughtful, patient, and considerate. (This list could go on forever, but hopefully I’m painting the picture. )
Lately, she’s been struggling with what I can only describe as a crisis of identity, and I want to help her, but I don’t have the words. So I’m turning to the language I understand best instead.
Perhaps I should ramblesplain a bit more (that’s not even remotely a word, but I feel I need to explain, and I do tend to ramble on).
She’s not herself (her healthy self) when she’s sick.
Here are some examples she struggles with:
She wants to make plans, but she feels really bad when she makes commitments in a moment of higher energy, only to have to cancel them the day of because she can’t even get out of bed.
She gets overwhelmed by outreach. So many people love her and want to reach out (texts, calls, emails, DM's). Oftentimes, it can be way too much for her to keep up with, and she feels really bad when she does not reply. But she literally can't. Sometimes she can't even see. (I feel this way too, which is why I often make posts instead, so that people have one single spot to share love/comments, and we can engage with our amazing community and friends when we're strong enough to do so. (Note, we love your support. We love your love. Please just understand we rarely have the energy to engage these days.)
She has massive anxiety during treatment due to the side effects and risks that come with R-CHOP, Ibrutinib, and DHAP. She’s afraid her hair won’t grow back, and that she will lose her hearing and her eyesight. Her anxiety manifests as impatience with the nurses and hospital staff (sometimes even anger).
She’s worried I won’t love her when she’s done with treatment. We see the nurses for a few hours per day for a few days every three weeks. I’m by her side every day and night. I’m the one she loves and trusts the most. Oftentimes, that means I’m also the receiver of her panic, pain, and anger.
She’s afraid to die. Of course she is! Who wouldn’t be? She’s 46 years old and she loves life (more than most, I’d say). She has so much more she wants to do—places to see, people to meet, wine to drink. She wants to see our youngest graduate. She wants to hold our future grandchildren (who she insists must call her a ridiculous name like “Bon Bon” or some such thing—Grandma is too basic for this lady!).
Whether it’s the nurses, doctors, her mom, or me—friends, kids, or extended family—whenever she is struggling and being hard on herself because she is not 100% the person she knows she can be when she’s well, the answer is always the same: You don’t need to apologize.
But no matter how many times we say it, she’s still so hard on herself. She worries that deep down, she’s done irreparable harm. And I think I know why.
She’s thinking that we see her as a healthy person—her old self, the person she remembers herself to be, who she identifies with. She wants to see herself that way. The reality is she is sick, and that changes everything.
I’m “almost there” (just need to ramblesplain just a bit more).
Here is what I’ve learned about myself and observed in others through this process.
Whenever anyone I love has been sick—be it my wife, my kids, my friends—it is not “tolerance” that I feel or that I see in others. It is true compassion.
As I reflect on my life, I’m somewhat surprised. I don’t see myself as a particularly compassionate person. Hell, I’m barely a tolerant person at times. I expect a lot from those around me, and I don’t tolerate abuse of any kind. But when someone I love is sick, it’s like I’m able to access a completely different modality. None of my rules or my boundaries apply.
And so I’ve come up with this equation to make sense of this phenomenon. It’s helped me to reconcile what seemed at first to be a dichotomy, but as I’ve thought through it, is a lot simpler than I realized.
Here is the equation: C = 1 - (1 / S / L)
Where:
Expressed as a %.
Carly is at a 10/10 level of sick.
Morgan loves Carly 10/10.
Plug it into the compassion equation: C = 1 - (1 / 10 / 10) = .99%
What this says is simple: Because of how sick Carly is and how much Morgan loves her, Morgan is capable of 99% compassion. Put another way, there is quite literally nothing Carly can do or say that won’t be met with compassion.
How are we so capable of putting up with SO MUCH SHIT from them on a daily basis, you might ask?
Well, let’s use the compassion equation.
Baseline compassion for our kids:
Our kids aren’t sick at all: 1.
We love our kids unconditionally: 10.
Plug it into the compassion formula: C = 1 - (1 / S / L)
Compassion for our kids: 1 - (1 / 1 / 10) = 90%
Thus, no matter what these little stinkers do, we somehow put up with them. We have no choice (though my kids have definitely tested my last 10%—how about you?).
These are extreme examples (wife and kids), but this works in understanding other interactions in the world too.
I like to think that human beings, on average, have some baseline of love within their hearts. Let’s say it averages a 5. But what made a nurse become a nurse? It’s likely because they want to help people, which means they likely have more than average love in their hearts.
So we’ll call nurses a 6 on the love scale (assuming you’re a stranger).
Taking my wife's case, they for sure know her level of sickness is a 10, and thus we get this equation:
Compassion for my wife (no matter what she does) = 1 - (1 / 10 / 6) = 83%
What does this suggest? You would have to do something pretty darn awful to cross the line of compassion with these nurses. They understand where you’re at, how you feel, and they have love in their hearts. You don’t need to worry that they can’t handle you being impatient or snappy for 5 minutes of a terrifying 3-hour chemo appointment.
So when Rachel (or Rachel) or Jennifer or any one of those amazing, loving people say, “Don’t worry about it, we understand, and we’re here for you,” you can believe them. :)
(Is it possible that you get a nurse who isn’t compassionate?) Sure, you can! Let’s do the math.
Someone comes in all the time faking sickness, and you’re really not sick (they know it), so you’re a 1 on the sick scale, if that. And they have been dealing with folks like this all day (rude, aggressive, inappropriate)—maybe their love meter for these folks is worn down to a 2. What happens then?
C = 1 - (1 / 1 / 2) = 50%
They half want to help you and probably half want to punch you in the face. :) (Any of my nurses out there relate? (You don't need to say anything, I got you!)
And finally, let’s test the most extreme opposite: the hateful people in this world.
To them, everyone is 1/10 sick (they don’t care to know).
And they are 1/10 in terms of love in their heart.
For them: C = 1 - (1 / 1 / 1) = 0
People like this, while rare, exist (the “Donald” or “Vladimirs” of this world). If it’s not about them, they don’t care. They have zero compassion or capacity for compassion for others.
So that’s the math—for me it works. It helps me understand why, in some circumstances, I am less tolerant and compassionate than others. I don’t love everyone the same, and I expect more from someone who is otherwise of sound mind and body.
But when it comes to those who are sick, I truly believe that we are wired for compassion.
Will this article help my wife understand just how “okay” it is for her to be whatever she needs to be right now (and that we will love her just the same, no matter what)? I sure hope so.
In this equation, compassion can be 0% but it can never be 100%. We’re all human—but that’s what makes human equations so beautiful.