Breakdown of musuko ga taiinsita toki, kazokuzenin ga byouki ga naotte yokatta to omoimasita.
Questions & Answers about musuko ga taiinsita toki, kazokuzenin ga byouki ga naotte yokatta to omoimasita.
You can see the sentence as several smaller pieces nested together:
息子が退院したとき、
“When (my) son was discharged from the hospital,”
→ 息子が = subject of the verb 退院した
→ 退院した = “was discharged (from the hospital)”
→ とき = “when”家族全員が
“the whole family (as subject)”病気が治ってよかった
This is the content of the thought:
→ 病気が治って = “the illness got better / healed (and …)”
→ よかった = “was good” → together Aてよかった = “I’m glad that A happened”と
Quotative particle “that / ‘…’ ”思いました。
“thought” / “felt”
Putting it together:
“When my son was discharged from the hospital, the whole family thought, ‘(It’s) good that the illness got better.’”
→ i.e. “When my son left the hospital, the whole family was glad that his illness had been cured.”
Each が marks the subject of a different clause:
息子が退院したとき
- 息子が = subject of 退院した (“the son was discharged”).
家族全員が … 思いました
- 家族全員が = subject of 思いました (“the whole family thought”).
病気が治ってよかった
- 病気が = subject of 治って (“the illness got better / healed”).
Japanese often has multiple が in one long sentence because you can stack / nest clauses. Each mini-sentence keeps its own subject with が. This looks strange from an English point of view, but is completely natural in Japanese.
Both が and は can follow nouns, but their roles are different:
- が → marks the subject, often introducing new or important information.
- は → marks the topic (“as for X…”, “speaking of X…”).
Here, 病気が治ってよかった is really one tight unit meaning “I’m glad that the illness got better.”
In expressions of feelings like Aがうれしい / かなしい / こわい / ほしい, the thing you feel about is usually marked with が, not は.
- 病気が治ってよかった。
→ Neutral: “(I’m) glad the illness got better.”
If you say:
- 病気は治ってよかった。
it puts more contrastive/topic focus on 病気:
- “As for the illness, (at least) I’m glad it got better.”
Possible implication: maybe other things didn’t go well. That nuance is not intended in the original sentence, so が is more natural here.
The subject of 思いました is 家族全員 (“the whole family”).
- 家族全員が … 思いました。
→ “The whole family thought (that …).”
In practice, this usually includes the speaker. So the idea is:
- “All of us in the family (including me) felt glad that the illness had healed.”
You could express the same idea as:
- 私たちは、息子が退院したとき、病気が治ってよかったと思いました。
“We thought, ‘I’m glad the illness got better,’ when my son was discharged.”
But 家族全員が is a natural way to emphasize that everyone in the family shared that feeling, not just the speaker.
Here と is the quotative particle. It marks the content of a thought or speech, similar to “that” or quotation marks in English.
Structure:
- 「病気が治ってよかった」 (the content)
- と (quotative particle)
- 思いました (“thought”)
So it literally works like:
- 「病気が治ってよかった」と思いました。
→ “(I/we) thought, ‘It’s good that the illness got better.’”
→ more naturally: “(We) were glad that the illness had gotten better.”
This same と is used with other verbs of saying/thinking:
- 〜と言いました “said ‘〜’”
- 〜と言われました “was told ‘〜’”
- 〜と思います “think (that) 〜”
Both are possible but have slightly different nuances.
Aてよかった
→ “I’m glad that A happened / that A was the case.”
→ often carries a sense of relief and “it turned out well”.うれしかった
→ “was happy” (emotion of joy).
In this sentence:
- 病気が治ってよかった
emphasizes that the outcome was good and there is a sense of relief: “It was good that the illness got better.”
You could say:
- 病気が治ってうれしかったと思いました。
That would put more focus on the raw feeling of happiness, rather than on the fact that the outcome turned out well. The original よかった is a very standard, natural choice specifically for “I’m glad that…” after something serious like an illness.
Using past vs non-past before とき changes the timing / viewpoint:
退院するとき
- “when (he) is going to be discharged” / “when he is about to be discharged”
- Focus is before or during the action.
退院したとき
- “when (he) had been discharged” / “when he was discharged (i.e. at that point, after it happened)”
- Focus is at/after the completion of the action.
Here, the family’s feeling of relief comes when the discharge actually happens, i.e. after recovery, so:
- 息子が退院したとき
→ “When my son (had) been discharged / when he was discharged”
is the natural choice.
More examples:
日本へ行くとき、パスポートを作りました。
→ When I was going to go to Japan (before going), I made a passport.日本へ行ったとき、富士山を見ました。
→ When I went to Japan (after arriving / during the stay), I saw Mt. Fuji.
Yes, this is normal and grammatically correct.
Key point:
- Subordinate clauses (like the part before とき, or the part before と with 思う) usually use the plain form, regardless of politeness.
- Politeness is controlled by the final verb of the sentence.
So:
- 息子が退院したとき → clause before とき → plain form 退院した, not 退院しました.
- 病気が治ってよかった → clause inside the quote → plain よかった, not よかったです.
- 思いました → final predicate → polite form, so the whole sentence is polite.
Using something like 退院しましたとき or よかったですと思いました is ungrammatical or at least very unnatural.
The standard pattern is:
- [plain form] とき … [plain form] と 思います／思いました。
Japanese often omits possessors when they are obvious from context:
- 息子がいます。
Literally: “There is a son.”
Naturally: “I have a son.”
If the speaker is talking about events involving a son, listeners will automatically interpret 息子 as “my son” unless another person’s son has been specifically introduced.
If you want to be explicit, you can say:
- 私の息子が退院したとき…
“When my son was discharged…”
But in ordinary conversation and writing, people usually just say 息子, 父, 母, 兄, 姉, etc., and leave out 私の when it’s clearly about themselves or their close family.
Grammatically, it’s:
- 病気が治って
→ 治る in て-form: “the illness got better / healed (and …)” - よかった
→ past of いい (“good”): “was good”
Originally you could think of it as:
- 病気が治って、よかった。
“The illness got better, and (that) was good.”
Over time, Aてよかった has become a fixed pattern meaning:
- “I’m glad that A happened / that A is the case.”
So:
- 病気が治ってよかった。
→ “I’m glad (that) the illness got better.”
Other examples:
日本に来てよかった。
“I’m glad I came to Japan.”あの映画を見なくてよかった。
“I’m glad I didn’t watch that movie.”
In your sentence, this entire feeling:
- 病気が治ってよかった
is what the family is thinking, and that is what’s being quoted by と before 思いました.