Despite the disturbing scene and my deep concern, Cecilia was never willing to talk about this incident with me or answer my many questions about her health. Not when we were alone, and not in front of her partner Luis, her two kids, or her elderly mother. I knew something was wrong, but she insisted that there was nothing I could do. I never learned the full truth about what happened that day. I will never know if the condition that made her faint also led to her early death. All I saw was her suffering, her embarrassment, and her refusal to be labeled as sick.