How to cope with terminally ill relation?

[countrygirl]

I know this is not strictly health anxiety related but just wanted some other peoples opinions.

My cousin has terminal ovarian and womb cancer, she is 54 and was diagnosed 2 years ago and has undergone 2 big operations and loads of chemo and now there is no treatment left.

In past 2 years she has been in alot of contact with me asking all the questions that she didn't understand from her Dr's as she knows I know about medical things!!! suddenly a few months ago she stopped contacting me as did her sister ( they are very close). I assumed things were bad and that neither wanted to talk about it as my cousin has always been in denial about the cancer.

I have finally spoken to her sisters husband who has confirmed my suspicians that the lack of contact has been because neither of them can face being asked anything as they get very upset. I have assured the sisters husband that I will not ask any questions if either of them contact me. I will wait and see what happens.

I feel in an awful situation - I do not want to ring either of them becasue how on earth to I have a conversation that totally ignores this horrific situation but don't want them to think I don't care. I am hopeful that now I have spoken to the sisters husband things will become easier.

I know this isn't about me and I shouldn't be upset at the lack of contact but in such an impossible position and just wondered what anyone else would do??

[williamsemciw]

Wow. This is a tough one.

Personaly, I've been dealing with my own mortality, very prematurely, but no less real for it. However, pretty much everyone else thinks I'm fine, so I'm not sure what kind of advice I can give for that.

I think it might depend a lot from person to person. Some could do better with blunt talk. Others might hate being reminded. I wish I could help, but I don't think I Can.

I hope you figure it out though.

[countrygirl]

Thanks for your reply. I have now spoken to the sister and it was hard and upsetting. It appears that they don't want to speak to anyone who might be in slightest bit negative and with my extensive medical knowledge they feel I might say something that will upset them. At least the air is clear and I now know what is what although it was hurtful to know that is what they are thinking, I now realise that I was in no win situation - I was being asked intensive medical questions and giving honest replies but this was not necessarily what they wanted to hear, but of course I am not a mind reader and only now do I realise that I should have pleaded complete medical ignorance - sometimes you can try too hard to help someone!!


I feel the air is clear with the sister now but I will not contact my cousin who is ill - I will leave it up to her to contact me if she wants to as she has enough to cope with.

I wonder if anyone else has this problem - their health anxiety means they have extensive medical knowledge which people seem happy to take advantage of when they want to know things but it them makes us seem insenstive because we can discuss medical things?????????????

[williamsemciw]

While I can't say I've ever had any spesific exsperince with medical advice, I think it's established that Ignorence is bliss. Telling people the truth will often hurt more then help. I've done that a lot.

[Emira7]

Hey Hun

I think all of us should be very careful. Yes we all have extensive medical knowledge from our bouts of googling etc.., I work for the NHS where my primary role is training doctors (i deal with curriculum and different methods of training - from a project point of view)
It takes 12 years to train from the point of medical school right up to the end to become a consultant/gp.
How I think about things, is its impossible without the in depth knowledge of medical training to reach the right conclusion every time when I think about how long it takes to put a doctor out there. Thats why I always bite my tongue when giving advice about stuff to relations etc(i find medical stuff fascinating/scary at the same time!).... And that is how I am trying to deal with my Health Anxiety as well (does not always work mind LOL!)

I sit in meetings with some senior doctors and its like listening to a different language sometimes which proves I don't know as much as I had thought.

I don't mean this to be insensitive, and I think you have absolutely done the right thing. And you have been put in an awkward position where by you were asked questions etc..

I am not sure if this makes sense, or I have rambled. And also that I have not caused any offence.

Hugs
Emira
xxx

[countrygirl]

Emira no offence taken I know exactly what you mean.

I think i may have given the wrong impression in last post about the type of questions I was asked by my cousin ( I wrote it while still upset!) at no point did I ever pass comment on her treatment or prognosis but she would ring me and ask things like when she developed diabetes as a result of steriod treament if I had ever heard of this happening and I said yes I had. What I was guilty of was probably asking too many questions which seems to be one of the main problems of health anxiety.

while she was undergoing treatment she was eager to discuss things with me as I understood what she was saying but of course now there is no treatment she doesn't want to talk about it to anyone, understandably.

Back to the problem of asking too many questions - I may be wrong bu I am sure I am not the only one on here who when told of an illness by someone has a bad habit of asking questions - this is born of fear- no different from the cross questioning of our poor Dr's!! Most of the time I can bring myself up short quite quickly and stop asking questions because I realise that its intrusive but I recently did this with my cousins sister on her diagnosis of non serious condition and this is where the prolbem has arisen, the sister is worried I will questions her ill sister.

Hope all this makes sense. So I have apologised to the sister for being insensitive in asking her questions about her newly diagnosed problem and am hopeful that all will settle down. I appreciate that they are both in a highly emotional state so the slightest thing will upset them.

But I also appreciate that my health anxiety problem is the cause of this misunderstanding but of course they don't know I have a health anxiety problem!!!!!!

[Emira7]

I know what you mean, if someone tells me that someone died from a condition, I ask all about it and then scare myself for the next week or so.

And can you imagine having Health Anxiety in a place where I work, sometimes I think my work feeds the Health Anxiety a bit.

I think you have dealt with it really well. Its always hard in these situations to know how to deal with it. Do you ask, and seem like your asking to much. Or do you not ask and seem ignorant.

I really hope it all settles.

Hugs to you countrygirl

xxxx