Allo. Bit of a crappy post, but here we are. Back in March my best mate was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. Prognosis/outlook is 18 months with an aggressive chemo regime, which he is just over half way through. He's lost a lot of weight, and is of course very tired a lot of the time.
We spend a fair amount of time at his house, the kids even have their own bedroom there. When he first got his prognosis, he was of the opinion of not telling the kids outright, but slowly get them used to seeing him become more ill/poorly with a view to ease them into it/answering their questions as they raised them etc. One of the reasons for this is I lost another mate to lung cancer in Dec 2020 and one of the teachers at the kid's school (actually one of my son's teachers as it happens) died suddenly in Feb, also of cancer, so he didn't want to upset them more. Obviously he's the one who is going to die, so has the most say in how we broach it with the kids.
Kids are 7 and 11, the oldest has just started high school (another reason not to worry them). We were hoping that after our last stay at my friend's over the summer holidays the kids might start asking questions as to why is he looking so thin, why is he tired, what's wrong with him, so we could start the process of explaining to them, but so far they've not asked.
I'm really not sure on how to start/what to do/who to turn to for guidance. Should we now tell them, will they be resentful if we don't tell them? I don't really know the point of this post, but if nothing else it does help to write stuff down. I'm also trying to come to terms with the fact that he's not going to be here much longer. We met over 30 years ago, he was my best man, he's godfather to both the kids, all that stuff.
Sorry, this has gone waffly. I'd appreciate any pointers/help though, as I'm really at a loss atm :/
We spend a fair amount of time at his house, the kids even have their own bedroom there. When he first got his prognosis, he was of the opinion of not telling the kids outright, but slowly get them used to seeing him become more ill/poorly with a view to ease them into it/answering their questions as they raised them etc. One of the reasons for this is I lost another mate to lung cancer in Dec 2020 and one of the teachers at the kid's school (actually one of my son's teachers as it happens) died suddenly in Feb, also of cancer, so he didn't want to upset them more. Obviously he's the one who is going to die, so has the most say in how we broach it with the kids.
Kids are 7 and 11, the oldest has just started high school (another reason not to worry them). We were hoping that after our last stay at my friend's over the summer holidays the kids might start asking questions as to why is he looking so thin, why is he tired, what's wrong with him, so we could start the process of explaining to them, but so far they've not asked.
I'm really not sure on how to start/what to do/who to turn to for guidance. Should we now tell them, will they be resentful if we don't tell them? I don't really know the point of this post, but if nothing else it does help to write stuff down. I'm also trying to come to terms with the fact that he's not going to be here much longer. We met over 30 years ago, he was my best man, he's godfather to both the kids, all that stuff.
Sorry, this has gone waffly. I'd appreciate any pointers/help though, as I'm really at a loss atm :/
