Grey's Anatomy Season 15, Episode 23 Recap: "What I Did For Love"

This is the big Grey's Anatomy-Station 19 crossover event of May sweeps, so you might think that Chief Ripley (Brett Tucker) passing out due to aortic stenosis would be the big storyline of the episode. But you would be wrong. That's actually only the third most interesting thing going on this week, though it is a good lead-in to the Station 19 half of the crossover.

The two big storylines revolve around two children. The first is with Gus (Christian Ganiere), the anemic boy with autism who has been waiting for weeks for a blood donor who matches his ultra-rare blood type so that the doctors can perform surgery on him. Jo (Camilla Luddington) comes back to work and is put on Gus duty, which seems like just the thing to help pull her out of her spiral. Finally, it looks like they found a match for Gus in Canada.

Unfortunately, after Jo tells Gus' mom and Alex (Justin Chambers) the good news, she speaks with the Canadian hospital and finds out that they were mistakenly thinking Gus was the donor for their accident victim with the rare blood type. Now no one is getting the blood they need, and Jo crashes hard from her feelings of guilt. She actually starts crying and can't stop when she has to tell Gus' mom about the mistake.

However, the one nice thing about Jo's breakdown is that more people notice there is something seriously wrong with her. Teddy (Kim Raver), Bailey (Chandra Wilson), and Ben (Jason George) are now noticing Jo's struggles, and we are hopefully one step closer to Jo getting the help she so desperately needs.

While all this is going on with the first Dr. Karev, the second Dr. Karev is busy treating a migrant girl whose father came to the U.S. on a visa. Her mother and brother are still back in the deplorable holding facilities that have been set up near the southern border. But the more immediate problem is that the girl has a bowel obstruction that requires surgery. Her father makes too much money to qualify for state insurance for her, but he doesn't make nearly enough to pay for the surgery on his own. So Meredith (Ellen Pompeo) steps in and puts her daughter's information on the surgery forms. Chief Webber (James Pickens Jr.) is rightly furious, because they could get in huge trouble for that.

And it becomes a helluva lot more complicated when the girl's bowel obstruction turns out to be non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma that will require years of treatment. So now the Chief knows about Meredith's insurance fraud, which cannot continue for years, and he is supposed to report her, which could land her in jail. He doesn't like lying because not only is it wrong, but it puts his sobriety in jeopardy. But he also doesn't have the heart to get this man and his daughter deported, nor do we think he would ever actually turn Meredith in. Instead, the Chief comes up with a solution — keep the girl in the hospital for 30 days, and a new state insurance policy will kick in regardless of her father's income.

This arc is a compelling way to address both the migrant family separation crisis and also how broken the country's healthcare system is. Plus, Meredith's save-the-day-at-all-costs attitude is so touching to DeLuca (Giacomo Gianniotti) that he blurts out that he loves her. At this, Meredith's eyes get super wide, she basically says "okey-dokey," and she walks out of the room, visibly freaking out.

Speaking of freaking out over declarations of love, Chief Ripley bonds with Maggie (Kelly McCreary) over the fact that Victoria (Barrett Doss) just proposed to him, and he didn't say yes, and Avery (Jesse Williams) just asked Maggie to move in with him, and she didn't say yes either. This prompts Maggie to tell Avery that she needs time to weigh the pros and cons, which he adorably agrees to. It also prompts Chief Ripley to leave the hospital to go find Vic. Except his condition is much more serious than they initially thought, and now it's a Seattle FD manhunt to locate the chief.

There's a small Owen (Kevin McKidd) storyline this week that should prove very interesting in the last couple episodes this season. He realizes he's in love with someone and tells his therapist that he's going to pursue her no matter what it costs him. It feels like the show is setting this up to be Teddy, but there's juuuust enough interaction between Owen and Amelia (Caterina Scorsone) this week to make you think it might be about Amelia.

Honestly, it really should be about Amelia. She should have to face her feelings for both Owen and Link (Chris Carmack) and make a decision. But the drama with Owen, Teddy, and Tom (Greg Germann) is probably where this is headed, considering Tom just found Teddy her dream apartment and the baby is due any day now.

Finally, Nico (Alex Landi) is really struggling with his mistake costing that young man his life. Schmitt (Jake Borelli) desperately wants to "be there" for Nico, but he's being a bit selfish in wanting to help Nico, but only his own terms. Link finally points this out to Schmitt and tells him to back the hell off Nico right now. Nico has to come to terms with this his own way and hopefully, Schmitt can respect that.