<p>When your child is away at college (long distance), how can you help prepare them for the decline and passing of a grandparent? My husband just found out that his mother has roughly six months left, and we are worried how/when to tell our daughter.</p>
<p>My sympathies to your family. It is so hard having a parent who is ill.</p>
<p>I think that it’s important to do your best to tell the information truthfully while also not telling the info during midterms or finals unless it’s a dire emergency. Since I don’t think that colleges are having midterms or finals now, this would be a good time to tell your child. This also will allow your child the opportunity to see her grandmother again before her grandmother dies.</p>
<p>I came from a family that used to avoid telling me bad news so as not to upset me. What ended up happening was that I was far more upset to learn the information late such as when I learned months later that my mom had been hospitalized for a few days. That lead to my being much more anxious because I constantly wondered what bad things were happening that my family hadn’t told me about.</p>
<p>I’m sorry to hear this. There is no really good time for bad news, but some times are worse than others. Don’t do it just before she has a test, or a paper that is due or some other activity that involves a high degree of focus. If your child is not scheduled to come home soon, choose a weekend to share the bad news so that she has the time discuss it with you at length and to process it on her own as well. She may also decide to use the time to contact her grandmother.</p>
<p>This is a toughie. We have been dealing with this very subject for the past two years as my husband’s parents have been quite ill. His mother died in November 2005 while our oldest son was away at school, and his father has been comatose in a nursing home since May 2006. </p>
<p>Your daughter needs to be told fairly soon that Grandma is sick. Six months is a long time and a lot can happen in that period. If your D will be coming home for a weekend or break, that’s a good time to tell her. </p>
<p>If you have very bad news, I suggest calling the RA or some counselor from the college to be with your daughter when you call her to give her the bad news.</p>
<p>When my MIL passed away, our S was at boarding school. We called the dorm head (tried for his advisor, and his lacrosse coach but they were unavailable) and asked her to go down to his room and be there when we called.</p>
<p>I suggest being very careful with the timing of the initial bad news report – since it’s not urgent news – and not delivering this information during exams or another high stress academic period. Also in our case, we have told his coaches at college that his grandfather is quite ill and not expected to live very long. In our case, I would probably ask the <em>coach</em> to break the news since that’s the “college family” for our son.</p>
<p>I agree with Northstarmom. Tell her, but watch your timing.</p>
<p>You might want to consider a “warming up” to the bad news. Mention in a phone call that grandma is sick and is seeing a specialist. If your child asks what’s wrong, then describe some of the symptoms. This will give her some time to digest the news. When you then tell her the bad news, she will have already started to steel herself.</p>
<p>I highly suggest that you fly her to visit to her grandmother. My parents did this for me when my grandmother was first diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and I’m forever grateful to them. My grandmother got to see me and to tell me stories/things she had never before shared with me. I got to have another memory of her.</p>
<p>Is it feasible to visit your daughter, in order to tell her in person vs. via telephone?</p>
<p>Doctors told my family that my father had no more than 2 weeks to live. I let my son know immediately that Grandpa was dying. I told him to come on the weekend. That meant waiting 5 days to fly to CA and his GP died on Thursday. He missed him by a day. Like me, he should have taken the first flight out. Courses and tests and the like can wait. People can’t. You never know.</p>
<p>My father died suddenly during my son’s first year at college. When I called my son to give him the news, his first impulse was to be concerned about me. After all, I’m the one whose parent died.</p>
<p>You might get the same sort of reaction.</p>
<p>Yeah, that is so true. That was my son’s reaction as well as I now think of it.</p>
<p>Sometimes you have no time to plan breaking the bad news.during D’s first undergrad year,3,000 miles away(NY to Az) 9/11 happened. We lost a neice’s (her 1st cousin) husband, aNYC firefighter.She was stuck there,couldnt fly home.During 2nd year,also September, my sister,her aunt died suddenly,unexpectedly. There was more comfort for her during 9/11 as everyone was in the same boat. The second loss as someone has said above, her main concern was for my wellbeing .Both very tough times that have tested our fortitude at being separated.</p>
<p>{{{{{{{{fireflyscout}}}}}}}}~</p>
<p>I’m so very sorry that your family is having to deal with this very sad and heartwrenching news. My thoughts and prayers go out to your MIL and of course to your husband, her son–and to the rest of your family as well, including your precious daughter.</p>
<p>Will your daughter be coming home to spend spring break with you? If so, I’d suggest that that might be one of the better times to give her this news. That way, she can have you with her for support, and she can have the time with her family to process this before she has to head back to school for the remainder of the semester. Is your D very close with her grandmother? If she is, you might want to tell her as soon as it’s possible to do so without traumatizing her while she’s trying to focus on her schoolwork. </p>
<p>The truth is, there is never a good time to deliver news such as this, but there are times when the effects of it can be minimized. I hope that you are able to find the best time for your daughter.</p>
<p>Again, I’m sorry for this difficult situation which your family is facing. </p>
<p>~berurah</p>
<p>I don’t suggest waiting until spring break. Your MIL’s prognosis is only a guess. I think that you should tell your D as early as possible so that she also can travel to see your MIL while your MIL is still healthy enough to appreciate the visit.</p>
<p>I also fear that if you delay until spring to tell your D, she will be upset that you withheld the information from her so long even though you were doing it to try to be kind. Your MIL also may be too seriously ill for your D to have a real visit with her. The earlier you tell your D, the more opportunity your D would have to see your MIL, call her or write her. This would be supportive for both your D and your MIL.</p>
<p>My mom used to do things like that to me, and her doing this made me anxious about what other important information my mother might not be letting me know about.</p>
<p>Think about how you’d feel if your D had a major illness or another serious problem now, but waited until spring break to let you know.</p>
<p>Has she ever experienced the loss of a close friend or family member before?</p>
<p>The way she reacted to a loss in the pass can tell you a lot more about how you should approach this situation. </p>
<p>For example: </p>
<p>I tend to do better when I’m actually told upfront what is happening. I was heartbroken when I found out a month after my grandmother was experiencing kidney failure that she was going to die. She died on Christmas eve and we had gotten to town less than 12 hours before she passed. It was really hard since she was already unconscious and gasping for breath. The image is seared into my head and I long for the better memories of her and the chance to say a true goodbye. My dad’s brother held onto the secret until the end (she had been in the hospital since that Thanksgiving). I’m unsure how I will react when I see him again for my wedding, as I haven’t seen him since that funeral (over 8 years ago).</p>
<p>However, some people are more emotional and tend to want to be told in person and take the news differently. Some take it defensively, some take it like a sport, some need time for everything to sink in…</p>
<p>Only you know your daughter well enough to be able to anticipate her reaction.</p>
<p>
This about sums it up. Fact is, I wouldn’t even handle each of my OWN kids in the exact same way. For example, my oldest son, not unlike many men, has an amazing ability to “compartmentalize.” My oldest daughter does NOT. I would handle the telling of each of these kids in a completely different way–and they’re both from the same family. </p>
<p>~berurah</p>
<p>I am so sorry to hear of your MIL’s illness and prognosis, fireflyscout. I can certainly understand your concern about informing your daughter. Like Northstarmom, I had a mother who often waited until after the fact to tell me things, including news about a childhood friend’s death months after it had happened. It is always difficult to share bad news, and though I’m sure you’d rather do it in person than by phone, a trip from Texas to Minnesota is a big trip! I agree that timing is important. Perhaps a weekend call versus a weeknight call is in order. That would give your D the opportunity to talk with a friend, if needed, and time to write a letter to her grandmother if she desires, to let her know she is thinking of her and hopefully will see her soon. My thoughts are with you and your family.</p>
<p>I am so sorry for anyone else going through this. We just had two deaths in the family during our oldest S’s first semester of college. The timing was bad on both of them–S’s baby brother was stillborn during midterms, and his grandpa died Dec. 10 at the beginning of finals week. There were many calls and emails about grandpa, who had a slow decline. We all knew he was dying and were mentally prepared. My advice would be to call your D and let her know the facts ASAP,(but maybe on a weekend, as already suggested) keep her updated on medical treatment, etc. If she can’t visit, she could write to grandma.
We thought grandpa might make it until S came home for Xmas break–we’d hoped S could attend the funeral (S is the oldest grandchild and named after his grandpa. He was the only family member not there), but it didn’t happen that way. We did take pictures at the funeral.
About the baby, that was a shock to all of us, and looking back I regret telling S by email. I should have called him, but I was too upset. S emailed back, but avoided talking to me on the phone for a month. During Xmas break he refused to visit his brother’s grave. I took him there anyway (detour from shopping trip), but he wouldn’t get out of the car. I did not express any surprise or disappointment that he acted that way. It was important to me that S see the place, that’s all. We never talked about it. Sigh. S is a guy and pretty unemotional–not one to talk about his feelings. I don’t really know what he’s thinking and didn’t try to pry it out of him, but I know he didn’t experience these deaths (seeing the bodies, seeing grandpa suffering in his last days, etc.) the way the rest of the family did. So in a way, that protected him. I don’t think he was distracted much from his studies because he’s not the kind to dwell on things he can’t change. We didn’t tell anyone at his school (small LAC), and I don’t know if he did, either.</p>
<p>Our family experienced a loss of someone very close and important to us all last year during my d’s first year in college far away from home. She seemed fine and kind of insulated from this all by the distance, as some have already suggested might be the case.</p>
<p>Word of caution, though: even though the student seems fine and “insulated”, later something can happen to trigger a sort of delayed reaction. This occurred with my d when the spouse of the dear one who had passed suddenly announced that he was planning to re-marry. I told my d this on the phone when we heard about it last June…she seemed okay but sort of startled as we all were. She called me back soon after, though…just sobbing. This made the passing of her “aunt” finally a real event. She was devastated.</p>
<p>My grandmother died about 5 years ago, when I was 16. I knew she was ill, but I didn’t know <em>how</em> ill she was - my parents knew, but I was in the middle of important exams at the time she was hospitalized, and they didn’t want to upset me by telling me. As soon as me exams were over, I was planning on going away with friends - we’d been planning it for months. My grandmother died the day I went away. I was away for a month and my parents didn’t tell me until I got back from my trip, a month later.</p>
<p>I understand why my parents did it. But it kills me even now, that I missed my grandmother’s funeral, and that I couldn’t be with my mother while her own mother was dying. I feel guilty, even though it wasn’t my fault - I feel like I should have <em>known</em> what was going on. </p>
<p>Please tell your daughter soon.</p>
<p>atomom, I’m so sorry to hear about your very difficult fall. Losing your family’s grandpa and your baby is more than anyone should have to endure. I lost my dad when one of my Ds was only two weeks old and, sadly, I’ve also suffered the loss of a much wanted baby 3 times. It’s devastating and I’m sure it was made even more terrible by having a child so far from home when it happened. My thoughts are with you, and sending you some <em>hugs</em>.</p>
<p>We’ve only had to deal with the ‘how to tell them’ issue while away at college, once. My H flew to where one of my Ds was and told her in person.</p>
<p>Agree with the postings about breaking the news sooner being better. A couple of years ago in April, H’s father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer halfway around the world. The prognosis was “six months to a year”. Of course, his family heard only the “year” part. H planned a Sept. visit. I encouraged him to go right away. Thank goodness he did, because it turned out that his father died in early June, just ten weeks after diagnosis. Doctors aren’t gods, and sometimes they just don’t know.</p>