Describe your worst failure.

I'm familiar with failure. Some people who know me now like to think of me as perfect, I've been accused as such fairly recently actually. I'm the doctor or the hero. When I failed to save Joanna no one thought of it as a failure. I guess no one thought about Joanna.

I've had so many failures in my life that it would be impossible to recount them all and I don't know if there is a worst. Every life I failed to save in my career is a failure; every body that came across my table that I just couldn't fix was a failure. Most people wouldn't call it that, they'd say that I tried and that was all that mattered. I gave those people a fighting chance and the chance was what mattered. Gabriella said something like that to me after her father died on my table. I tried when no one else would. You know what goes through my mind every time someone says something like that to me? Yeah I tried, I tried and I failed.

My father always told me I didn't have what it took because I couldn't separate myself emotionally. I couldn't watch a little girl die on my table and then come home and have dinner and a scotch like nothing had happened. Maybe I shouldn't be a doctor because of that and maybe I'm a better doctor because of that. I don't really know and my father's opinion means so much less than it once did. Even if I always wanted him to be proud of me.

A while ago I probably would have said my marriage was my worst failure because I'd be putting all the deaths in perspective and trying to sort out my failures between personal and professional. My worst personal failure was not being able to keep my marriage together. Marc would argue on fault, Sarah was the one who cheated on me but I made it so easy. I wasn't there for her. The questions I asked myself before we got married were answered; I married her because I saved her life. I couldn't be the kind of husband I wanted to be.

My mother thinks I failed my father by not supporting him, by betraying him and telling the board he'd been under the influence in the surgery that cost a woman and her unborn child their lives. My reluctance to go after him is a failure and how I found him, it's my failure. While I stopped blaming myself for my father's death I know that I filed that instance away as a personal failure.

None of this is even since we've been on the island. I couldn't save Joanna, Boone, Shannon. Claire was kidnapped and I made it easier for that to happen by not listening to her. I failed Charlie. I failed Sayid by not convincing him that we'd help Shannon another way than by torturing Sawyer. I failed Sawyer (though not always feeling guilty about it) by standing by and watching it happen. I've failed everyone.

I failed Kate. I decided that I could protect her from harm and told her to stay put. I should have known better. She wanted to help and instead of letting her, arming her so she'd be safer I blew her off and put her in more danger. It doesn't matter that she was fine, she had a gun pointed at her throat and his finger was itching at the trigger while I was hesitating. Counting didn't help the fear this time; it's a stupid practice anyway.

We failed everyone by letting Sawyer play us. I can't blame one person; we all played into his hands. Locke, Me, Ana, Kate everyone; hysteria blinds people and so does fear. I just have to hope that Sawyer isn't low enough to have actually hurt Sun, that he took the opportunity that was presented to him and didn't have her attacked just to get the power and get back at me. It's not that I don't believe him capable because we are all capable of much more than we think ourselves capable of. As much as I don't like Sawyer I don't believe he's rotten to the core, I don't trust him and I think it was a mistake to ever consider doing so. The thing is, if Sawyer did plan his con from beginning to end it means that someone helped him, that someone else attacked Sun. It means someone is willing to hurt others for a reason that I can't even figure out.

I've always been something of a failure I'm not sure that's ever going to change.