<p>Does anyone have any tips on how to handle this? Our news involves parental surgery, radiation and most probably a good outcome at the end. But I don’t know what to say that won’t freak the kids out. Also, I feel very bad about not being able to see their reaction. </p>
<p>Plus, I need the hug.</p>
<p>I was always taught in nursing school to ask if the person was alone. You don’t want to deliver bad news to someone who is alone. In really bad news cases, you can try to contact an official - even an RA - to tip them off in advance. I did that when I had to notify my S that my father had died. (Called the dean.)</p>
<p>However, in your case, you can keep it from being devastating simply by changing your approach. I would emphasize the positive aspects - He/she will take their cue from you. If you can keep your voice light, in a “by the way” kind of conversation, your s/d can absorb the news in a slower, more thoughtful fashion.</p>
<p>Hope everything turns out okay. Here’s a [hug] - not as good as one from your s/d, but something!</p>
<p>Is it at all possible to wait until Thanksgiving break to “tell?” I know, not the best policy keeping something, but sometimes waiting until you can do it in person when it comes to kids and this kind of news… They will be scared, and not so sure of the outcome even when you are being positive. Sometimes if they can see your face, they will see that its not so bad.</p>
<p>i would then follow up with an email with some particulars to answer any questions forgotten in the conversation</p>
<p>"Hey, I know that call freaked you out, but really, its going to be okay…the treatments are …and "</p>
<p>The unknown and unasked often can make the stress worse, and the young person may not know how to approach such questions…and tell them the best thing they can do is to enjoy school, work hard and not worry about rushing home, you will see them when it works</p>
<p>That way they won’t feel bad, if they just can’t come home for awhile</p>
<p>Take Care</p>
<p>I got some kind of birthday/xmas card in college from my auntie saying she was so sorry about my father; what a horrible thing to happen etc…so I called my siblings (also not at home) and they had no idea what she was talking about. Apparently the 'rents had decided not to tell any of their kids that my father had cancer. The part that really “freaked out” me and my sibs was that they had decided not to tell their kids. So definitely make sure your kids are the first to know!</p>
<p>Thanks, this is all good info, and gives me some good thoughts to formulate.
I would love to wait until son comes home at Christmas (he’s way too far away to come for Thanksgiving), but that isn’t possible. </p>
<p>Especially not possible as we’ll be telling his high school sibling today or tomorrow, if she ever has a moment when she is at home without her entourage of friends.</p>
<p>Arranging for an RA or trusted friend to be around for the call sounds like a great plan.</p>
<p>During my freshman year, my best friend/hallmate got a call that her mother had breast cancer and it was in the lymph nodes. Company really helps. (Btw, that was over 11 years ago and her mom’s been cancer free since her surgery.)</p>
<p>My situation was not as serious, but last winter I broke my wrist very badly. I had to have surgery. I didn’t tell my son away at college until after the surgery. He’s a complete worry wart.</p>
<p>My mother would say stuff like, “Your father’s home again.”
Me: “Oh? Where was he?”
Mom: “He was in the hospital for [. . .] but he’s OK now.”
Me: “Why didn’t you tell me when he went in?”
Mom: “What could you have done?”</p>
<p>She did that through my entire adulthood, until my father passed away about 8 years ago! Boy, I hated that!</p>
<p>So my vote is to tell him - maybe if you have the cell phone of a friend of his, you could call that friend, tell him or her first, and make sure that he or she’s there when you tell your son?</p>
<p>And my prayers and wishes for a complete recovery are with you.</p>
<p>KarenC: Sending a hug, strength, and prayers your way. </p>
<p>Agree with above posters. Call on the weekend and follow up with an email. Just keep him in the info. loop and he should be okay. If he’s like most guys he will want to know the plan of events and basic info and will be okay with that. I’d follow up with positive emails and hold off on the more serious discussions for xmas break. </p>
<p>Be well.</p>
<p>We’ve had this situation a couple of times. With my husband’s lymphoma, the kids are now used to the situation, and we don’t tell them about tests until we get the results (we don’t tell H’s father either). In the early days, we did keep them posted and told them when we’d know things and how things were going. They are wonderfully supportive, and their support makes a difference.</p>
<p>With my chondrosarcoma last spring, though, I got the diagnosis the week before a) my son’s finals and b) my daughter’s graduation. I wasn’t having surgery for a few more weeks, so we decided not to tell until AFTER both events. We couldn’t tell one without telling the other, so we waited. Both children were grumpy about the delay… but not that grumpy. My surgery took place the day before son’s graduation (he wasn’t going, neither were we), and we called immediately after the surgery with good news: “oh good, now I can go to the parties without worrying.”</p>
<p>I would find out your kids’ schedule, then call tomorrow, Saturday, with “good news, the outcome looks excellent. We’ve been so worried, I have X, but we’ve found a great oncologist, radiation should work very well, we’ve got it all scheduled, I’ll be done by (date).”</p>
<p>dmd77 has a lot of experience with this , so I defer to her judgement, but I might leave out the “we were so worried” part. When I did this recently, I did it kinda matter-of-fact-ly. My situation isnt a big deal, in my mind (it was a skin cancer that had to be removed) but I felt I needed to be sure S#1 knew, because I didnt want him to hear it from s#2 (who is home and knew I had this appointment). So in the course of a conversation, I presented it as “oh, by the way, I wanted you to know…blah blah blah… but everything should be just fine”. I think if we are comfortable with it, we can make them comfortable with it. I invited questions, as I believe knowledge is power (look at what latetoschool has learned from her ordeal, and she seems to be comforted by all the knowledge she’s acquired) and I wanted him to feel free to ask. I think, in all honesty, he has forgotten, which is fine by me. But I am not going through at all what you are going though, Karen Colleges, and I wish you all the best. I am sure everything will be fine. We are all here for you!!</p>
<p>What a difficult situation. I totally agree that you must not keep it from him. I had to have a biopsy for suspected breast cancer a few years ago and waited till close to the date to tell my kids as I did not want them worrying. My daughter was really upset to have been ‘kept out of the loop’ especially when she found out a couple of my close friends knew.</p>
<p>I agree with all the comments about trying to make sure there is someone with him. Binx’s advice in particular seems very good. </p>
<p>Big cyber hugs to you.</p>
<p>oops, I missed binx’s comments above! Sorry binx. We both agree that the positive, and “by the way” approach is a good one. Serious question- how can you be sure someone isn’t alone and not get their suspicions up by asking them or trying to arrange it? I can’t figure out one would set that up without raising concern? Suggestions?</p>
<p>We had a situation happen with one college kid where her health was threatened, but we did not know exactly what was going on and it probably took us 2-4 weeks to really get a handle on things, luckily it was not as bad as we had feared, it was much more easily dealt with than the worst imaginings which passed through my mind. </p>
<p>Since we were not sure what was going on we did not call our other college kid and have her ride the roller coaster of “what if” with us, mainly because we were busy just dealing with the situation. The D left out of the loop was quite miffed not to be kept informed, so I have made sure to keep her in the loop on other of life’s silly issues, things I did not think would be that important to her seem to be.</p>
<p>"My mother would say stuff like, “Your father’s home again.”
Me: “Oh? Where was he?”
Mom: “He was in the hospital for [. . .] but he’s OK now.”
Me: “Why didn’t you tell me when he went in?”
Mom: “What could you have done?”</p>
<p>She did that through my entire adulthood, until my father passed away about 8 years ago! Boy, I hated that!</p>
<p>So my vote is to tell him -"</p>
<p>My mother did exactly the same thing with my dad and her hospitalizations.</p>
<p>I agree with the person who posted the story. Do not do that. It is far better to get bad news over the phone even if one is alone than to find out later that bad things happened behind your back.</p>
<p>My mother was trying not to worry me, but she ended up worrying me even more than she would have by giving me the info when it happened. I ended up being constantly worried that horrible things were going on at home, but no one was telling me.</p>
<p>This is not exactly the same situation, but last year we did not tell our daughter (who was a sophomore away at college) that an acquaintance of hers, who was also the son of my husband’s colleague, was killed in an auto accident. The boy who died did not go to her high school, but they took music lessons from the same teacher and played together in county-level bands for several years. Our reasoning was that she was in the middle of exams and was not close enough with this boy to come home for the funeral (which was attended by hundreds and hundreds of people), so we would wait until her semester ended to tell her. When we did tell her, she was very upset that we did not tell her at the time that it had happened. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, when she was overseas this summer, her music teacher, whom she was very close to, passed away after a long battle with cancer. This time we did tell her when it happened. I know she communicated with her college band director, who knew the music teacher from years back but was not aware of her illness and death. She also emailed with the family of the deceased music teacher and requested that I attend the memorial service and make a donation to the charity that the family had selected. She told us she was sad for a few days, which is normal, but it was definitely better for her that she knew about the death when it happened instead of finding out weeks or months later when she returned home.</p>
<p>Most posters here are in agreement that they wish they had been told the bad news prior to the surgery, chemo, etc. In retrospect, it’s easy to say that you wish you had known. But what about the kid that’s at college thousands of miles away from home and can’t get there to offer comfort or whatever? For my kids, it would be a horrible sense of worry that would interfere with their school work and their daily life at school.</p>
<p>You know your kids and how they would take the news. The advice most posters have given wouldn’t necessarily be appropriate for all families – including mine.</p>
<p>jym - good question. When I, as a nurse, had to call a family member with bad news, I would ask up front for another person by name or relationship. “Is your husband home?” (Which could translate into: is your roommate there?) This was before I stated the reason for the call. If not, I was prepared to say, “We’d like to talk to both of you at the same time.” Sometimes the chart had other contact info, such as clergy, and we could ask them to be present. We did not like to give very devastating news over the phone, but rather asked them to come to the hospital because we needed to discuss something with them.</p>
<p>There have been situations where a person might faint or something if alone. And we didn’t want people driving when they were especially distraught.</p>
<p>I did exactly this when my father died. I was alone with him at the hospital. Had just returned from Germany the night before, and was at the hospital in the wee hours of the morning. I had to call my sisters and my mom. I just explained that I was with Dad, and I thought they should get there as soon as possible. Of course, they all knew he was very ill, and assumed bad news, but they did not know he was already gone until they got there. Interestingly, when I called, they were all cheerful, and said they were on their way! No questions asked. I think they all didn’t want to know. </p>
<p>When my sister died, the doctor did the same thing to my parents. Asked them to return to the hospital. Didn’t tell them she’d died already.</p>
<p>Another approach (brainstorming here) would be to open the conversation with a request for the RA’s phone number, or the roommate’s, or whatever. Then, after delivering bad news, call the other person. Or just tell them you had some sad news (as opposed to bad news) that you didn’t want to tell them when they were alone, and to go be with a friend (with cell phones, it’s not like you’re tied to one spot.) </p>
<p>Or, just call the RA, tell him to go to S or D’s room and have S or D call home. </p>
<p>This has got me to thinking, though. Our kids (or at least mine did) had to give all sorts of emergency contacts to the school. Maybe we should ask our kids for the same. Close friends’ cell numbers, RA’s cell, etc.</p>
<p>Regarding what some posters have stated about trying to reveal the news when your child is not alone - I (college freshman) would actually prefer to be alone when receiving bad news, because having someone else there, no matter how close I am to him/her, may inhibit me from truly reacting to the news and asking questions that come to mind. Of course, your child may feel differently.</p>
<p>Also, even if I know I would not be able to do anything and I would worry a lot, it is still better to find out when it happens than after a period of time. I would be even more upset that something so important was kept from me. No matter how much of a kid your child will always be to you, it is okay to relay news to him/her in an adult-to-adult way. I’m sure a “things are under control” tone will be very much appreciated, but please do not leave out major details.</p>
<p>That said, I’m not sure if my mom would give me bad news over the phone like that… since I’ve started this quarter, she was involved in a car accident (very, very minor) and got a traffic infraction (separate case) during the week while I was at school, and for some reason she didn’t tell me about either. This isn’t that odd, considering how neither was a big deal, but it’s just that she calls me every night. I find it strange for her to keep that from me, and then my just casually finding out about them during the weekend when I’m at home. I think she thinks that even small things like those would worry me and distract me from my school work.</p>
<p>Edit: Oh, I didn’t even think about the possibility of someone fainting when told bad news, sorry about that.</p>