 The film is partially autobiographical. When Miyazaki and his  brothers were children, his mother suffered from spinal tuberculosis  for nine years, and spent much of her time hospitalized. It is  implied, yet never revealed in the film, that Satsuki and Meis  mother also suffers from tuberculosis. He once said the film would  have been too painful for him to make if the two protagonists were  boys instead of girls.