Hi All,
I'm looking for support on anything that can help us, our story is below - all this is happening together.
My Mother-in-law is partially disabled and my father-in-law is living with prostate cancer, in December 2020 he was diagnosed with esophagus cancer, since then my husband and I have supported them through appointments for Chemo and whilst he was having 4 rounds of chemo my husband moved back to his parents to help care for them. He has a major operation due in the next month or so to cut it away which will leave him in hospital for weeks and then recovery at home followed by further chemo.
Meantime my Mom has just had surgery on her face for skin cancer and I have found more moles on her back, my son who is 15 has been in hospital for a week and a half suffering anxiety and depression for over 2 years and we have struggled to get help although help is there now after it got that bad with suicidal thoughts, he also needs an ASD assessment as he shows signs of autism this is a long and emotional journey for all of us, whilst in hospital they found he was suffering from high blood pressure and has had some test for that with a follow up in June, he is also being looked in to for a curve in the spine. My daughter has a small operation due soon, suffers social anxiety (which she is getting help for) and have been back and forth to doctors and A&E with bad stomach cramps (which they think is because the doctor gave her the wrong contraceptive pill).
Ended back up A&E on Monday as my Mother-in-law fell over and cut her eye open and sprained her wrist. To top all of this off yesterday we had test results back for the mother-in-law which shows she has cancer of the womb, we don't know any other details yet and are now waiting for the appointment with the relative team to understand grade, next steps etc.
My husband is distraught and no idea how we are going to cope with both having full time jobs and trying to handle all the above, we are already physically and mentally drained and we still have not turned the corner to see the light at the end of the tunnel yet. Between us we are trying to juggle and support everyone.
Any advice would be appreciate as we are a little lost right now.
Hi ,
wow with all that going on I am not surprised you find yourself a little lost. I have a son with ASD so can relate on that front - especially as my wife's cancer was never going to be curable so I did not want to make a fake promise to him.
I know speaking to Maggies in the first instance was something that helped me; I am lucky in that my work has a very supportive sick leave policy and my GP agreed to sign me off with stress - frankly I do not think I was much use in the workplace anyway with everything going on at home.
Later I did a living with less stress course. a key element was living in the here and now, my imagination could create all sorts of weird and wonderful scenarios that were actually much blacker than anything that actually happened. The were some really good breathing exercises that were good too for dealing with the unexpected - life does seem to like throwing curve balls. Transcendental meditation did not really do it for me though.
My current GP is fantastic, he knows how difficult life is and is very keen to support me as if I become ill there is an issue looking after three people.
Waiting for results is challenging - we all recognize that.
A really important point I had to learn was to put some effort in to supporting me - if I break I cannot help anybody. If we look at Looking after someone with cancer we can see hints on coping with being a carer and who can support me that could be very relevant.
It is amazing the power of talking to a complete stranger - if you or your husband ever feel it might help please do consider calling the helpline - I have certainly spent time crying at them in the past and they are remarkable. The old saying of a trouble shared can be very helpful - the helpline 0808 808 00 00 is open 7 days a week from 8am to 8pm
