To cope or not to cope?

By inability to switch off and get a good nights sleep is wearing me down, as soon as lie down and get ready to sleep there is nothing to keep me occupied and then the worst thing happens......I START TO THINK!!!! Was is, what will be, the journey and its end, life without dad...... a bit of panic sets in an i'm away. For the fifth time this week im sat on the sofa, husband is in bed and im crying alone. Im finding it so difficult to talk to my husband about things and i can see him becoming frustrated that i wont open up to him, the problem is as soon as you verbalise the situation its reality sets in and i still dont want to accept that its real...... As soon as it is real im breaking down again and so on and so on........ Im sure i will be able to talk about it eventually but what i need is time to accept the reality, im just not strong enough to talk about it to those closest to me, just for now its easier for me to suffer alone.

dear fatcat

i know just how you feel about being unable to talk. when i was where you are now, i too literally could not speak about it, to anyone. i sent messages to all my friends saying do not contact me, do not call me because i cannot talk, and i will call you when i can. this was most unlike me, i'd never done that ever before, but then i'd never lost a parent before. they were all still there when i did eventually call them weeks and weeks (and some of them, months)later. i didnt speak to my husband much about it either, because like you, basically it was just too damn painful. so i think you should just let yourself handle this stage as best you can, any way that you feel you can manage. we are all here to talk to , so you need never feel alone or not understood. and yes, you will talk about it eventually - but go easy on yourself, it takes time.

with love, Claire xx

I am the same with my husband at the moment, i keep breaking down and he keeps asking me to talk to him about it. I know he means well but i just want to say what is there to talk about, my father is dying. Talking about it makes you have to face the reality and i can't talk for crying. I have let work know whats going on but have expressed that i do not want anyone discussing the events there with me.. it will just be too hard, as soon as someone asks you if you are ok it becomes very obvious that you are not...

We will have more answers tomorrow, we are off to see the oncologist to discuss treatment... up until now no one has discussed with dad the implications of chemo, side effects.. quality of life issues...how much time we have left. I'm not sure if chemo will be the right way for dad to go as i do not think he has long and the posssibility of the rest of his life potentially spent going in and out of hospital and dealing with the chemo side effects would be awful for him. He has a lifelong aversion to hospitals and doctors and has never spent a single night in hospital it would be awful for him. I will suppot him with what ever decision he makes, i just want that decision to be an informed one. Im angry the docs didnt explain treatment to him but not suprised... as a nursing sister myself a lot of my time is spent giving patients and their families information that should have been explained by doctors. I know some of these conversations must be immensley diffficult for doctors however long they have been qualified but surely the least we can do is be honest and empower the patient with the information they need to make the right choice for them.  All the doctors said to him is that they wanted to start chemo as soon as possible...thats it... nothing else, poor dad agreed before he was aware that there are other options or that chemo itself would have implications.

Fingers crossed that tomorrow dad will make an informed decision about how he wishes to proceed once he has the information he needs.

Gail xx