Hi! I'm new! What brought me here is that I have been having trouble coping with my dad having cancer. He was diagnosed with oral cancer back in November 2019 he immediately had to have surgery that lasted 14 hours and then was in the ICU followed by another 2 weeks in the hospital. He then started his chemo/radiation treatment and he finished in march. They did another CT scan and found out that the cancer has spread to the lungs and has also come back to the spot that he previously had the tumor removed from. He has to undergo another 4 months of treatment then 2 years of immunotherapy, that too he has a feeding tube and hasn’t had real food in over 3 months. I have been feeling a lot emotions and I feel like I haven’t been able to fully cope I feel like this has been quite traumatic not only for me but for my mom and brother. I want to be optimistic but the other part of me just feels very depressed and hopeless and I feel like I’ve been trying to mentally prepare incase something does happen to him. It’s been really hard, I try to keep it together for my mom and dad and try to not show how worried or depressed I am because I don’t want my dad to see me like that. I feel like I have to be strong around him but sometimes it’s difficult. I know I’m not alone but I just want some guidance on how others have been able to cope in similar situations.
Hi and welcome to the community.
I have to agree with you it is easy to recognise we are all in at least a similar situation but somehow that does not always help us.
For me perhaps the thing that worked best was I did a living with less stress course with Maggies and came to realise I was spending so much time worrying about what might happen in the future that I was not taking time to appreciate what I had at the moment. There is a skill that people can learn and often it is referred to as mindfulness. Another part of the course was around conscious breathing and that can be helpful in dealing with the inevitable "emergencies" but also as a way of relaxing. The more transcendental bits did not really work for me though.
When my dad was ill some years ago people might have thought we were prepared for him to die, still hurt like no tomorrow when he did though tinged with a feeling of relief that it was all over then tinged with guilt over feeling relief.
You might find some helpful advice in our pages on Looking after someone with cancer especially the emotional bits and looking after your own health - perhaps the best advice is to remember to be kind to yourself too.
<<hugs>>
Steve
