The team treats Delaney, a sixteen-year-old girl who has legally emancipated herself from her parents and works as a manager at a processing plant. She is admitted after collapsing with a swollen heart and lungs.
Thirteen and Chase provide a sounding board, highlighting Foreman’s desire to prove he can lead a team without House’s cynical influence. EmancipationHouse M.D. : Season 5 Episode 8
Wilson decides he needs to stop being House’s "enabler" and moves out of their shared arrangement to find his own apartment. The team treats Delaney, a sixteen-year-old girl who
House, feeling abandoned, tries to sabotage Wilson’s new sense of independence by mocking his new "boring" life. Wilson decides he needs to stop being House’s
By the end of the episode, Wilson realizes that while he needs space, he can't fully "emancipate" himself from House because their dysfunction is a core part of their friendship.
House is skeptical of her independence, believing no teenager can truly be an adult. He spends much of the episode trying to prove she is lying about her age or her lifestyle to justify her "adulthood."
He eventually realizes that to save his patient, he has to "bend" the rules of the trial—a very House-like move that troubles his conscience. The Personal Story: House vs. Wilson