Questions

To be human is to have lots of questions. If a teacher tries to answer questions the students are not asking, not much learning will take place.
However, when people are hurting, we need to be really careful with the questions we ask. Here timing is everything. For hurting people, questions can be unwelcome and intrusive.
Perhaps you don't need to know everything about what is going on.
Possibly you can ask the questions later.
Perhaps the person we are visiting is a very private person.
Here is an example of timing--
You come home from work to see that your wife has had a rough day. One of the kids has just vomited and the other is being mighty cantankerous. Now is the time to pitch in to see if you can help, but if you ask instead why your best shirt is not yet ironed, it will be a cold evening in your household. You might even just iron your own shirt.
Give some thought to how you might visit someone in a hospital without asking even one question. Let the person you visited decide what to tell you, and when.
You might be surprised to find that you will find out more when you ask less.
Allan.