Hi everyone.
My mum has stage 4 ovarian cancer. Its been a rollercoaster as weve gone from her having 4 to 6 weeks to live, to her managing to be well enough for chemo and have an operation to remove as much cancer as possible
She recently had the operation which was major. She had a lot of organs removed as well as a huge chunk of bowel leaving her with a stoma. She is staying with me while she's recovering. I am more than happy to look after her and want her to get better of course.
What I am struggling with is that there are things she needs help with which I know she doesn't want to ask for help for. She is too young to need help in some areas and sometimes it's embarrassing for her. I will help her in what ever way she needs me to but I hate that she needs it but also, some of the things she needs help with are not things I'd want to share for fear of embarrassing her but also because it isn't always a nice thing for people to hear. As standard, I am an oversharer and I think it's important for us to share what medical things are happening to hs to make them more normal and not embarrassing but these aren't my things to share and I don't want people to think anything negative about my mum. As a result I feel really alone as I cannot tell anyone whats going on - even my partner.
I thunk a bit of me feels sorry for myself that I have to do this and have become the parent of my parent way too early. She's strong and independent and it feels 20 years too soon for her to need this help which makes me really sad. This isn't about me having to help or do these things, I'll do anything she need, but about it being too soon when she's still young.
It's hard to get these things out as you want to do it while saying you'll do anything for your family and love them but it's that still hhard and considering what she's been through, it sounds selfish. And actually, that's half the issue - you can't talk about it because it sounds selfish when they've been through so much.
I'm sure other people must feel the same? And I hope you're all OK if you do feel that way.
