TVSquad

Six Feet Under: Hold My Hand is very much about how much the family of Ruth's husband George Sibley has been affected by tragedy over the generations.

As we learn in the opening "death" scene, the darkness begins back in 1953, when a young George is talking to his mother - a deeply depressed and trouble soul who seeks and finds a final solution for the demons inside her. Because this particular death scene does not fast-forward to the memorial service arc most other Six Feet Under episodes do, the interplay between sensitive boy and suicidal mother is meant to provide the background for the mental tortures George will experience throughout his life.

This episode finds George slipping back into the darkness. Flashbacks of his mother's death haunt George at inopportune moments, rendering him unable to perform simple tasks like food-shopping. Ruth recognizes the returning episode by erring on the side of kindness, but we can see that she is really being tortured inside. Maggie, George's daughter, recognizes the onset of another "episode." Verbally and with much reluctance, she agrees to seek another round of electro-convulsive treatments for her troubled Dad.