The first time I was diagnosed with cancer, around our trip to London in June 2016, I really didn’t know what to do. I was struggling to process the news myself, let alone discuss it with the people around me. There was so much else going on around the family any case, that in some bizarre sense, focussing on my cancer seemed almost like a selfish indulgence and that I should just get on with life as normal.
And as a fairly private person, I didn’t want or need to broadcast the news with others. In fact, once I had accepted what was happening to me, and what was going to happen to me, I didn’t particularly want to discuss it at all.
Living in Australia, and being so far from my family in London only exacerbated this situation. My poor parents, receiving the news through a Facetime call from one side of the planet to the other, obviously wanted all the information, which I duly supplied. But I found it hard to talk about it.
I didn’t want to worry others and most of all, I didn’t want to worry my children. My two boys, who at the time of my first cancer in November 2016, were aged ten and twelve, had already experienced many other dramatic familial life events, and I didn’t want to overload them with yet another one.
I wanted to get into the hospital as quickly as possible, get the job done, get out and get on with my life.
As with everything in life, there’s no fixed rulebook to follow when you’re diagnosed with something as serious as cancer. And there’s so much to take in and process for yourself, that it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and pretend it’s not happening. With a hidden cancer like Prostate Cancer, of course, it is easier to do that. Others are not so “fortunate”, and have to face these things head on.
So that’s what I did – I swept it under the carpet. I agreed with my partner that we’d tell the boys I was having an operation to have a hernia removed, as the procedure for robotic prostatectomy is very similar.
The children were of course very matter of fact about it all as a lot of children are.
The operation came and went. The recovery process began.
During that recovery process, something changed in me. For some reason, I felt an overwhelming desire to discuss it with the children. That in some way, by hiding it, I had been dishonest and they had a right to know. I really wanted to ‘fess up.
I discussed with my partner at the time, and it was concluded that in doing so I’d be possibly doing it for my own benefit and not theirs. Why worry them now? I thought she had a point. So I left it.
But as time marched on, I felt increasingly that was the wrong thing to do.
I certainly had nothing personally to gain from talking to them about it (other than clearance of conscience perhaps) but I wanted them to know what had happened to their old man – they had a right to know, that it was important for them to know. I felt like by keeping it from them I was somehow being dishonest with them.
Had the outcome of my operation been different – then, of course, I would have sat them down and discussed it with them. But I didn’t need to.
I left it. But it didn’t feel right.
So when cancer number two (my leg sarcoma, misdiagnosed earlier as a DVT) was diagnosed towards the end of February / early March, I wanted to do things differently. They were a year or so older. And by this point, I was separated from my partner. The landscape was very different.
But before I did anything I wanted to get some professional advice about how to approach the issue.
I asked my surgeon for a referral and he put me in touch with a psychologist, Sam.
We discussed a variety of issues surrounding my situation but my main concern was how to broach the issue with the children.
My instinct was to delay telling the children as I processed the information myself.
Sam felt this was wrong.
She indicated that it was likely that the children would start to get an idea that something was wrong.
That they might overhear things as adults around them discussed the situation.
There might be a danger they would draw their own conclusions from what they heard and it may worry them more than it should.
That they might hear it from someone else.
That children are not easily fooled – they will suspect something is wrong.
Sam told me I needed to take control of the situation as quickly as possible, and manage the dialogue myself.
That in doing so, this would give the children the best opportunity to process and cope with the realisation that someone very close to them has cancer.
That in doing so, the children will not feel excluded. That they won’t feel as though they’ve been left out.
She also indicated to me that I was right to have wanted to tell the children about my previous cancer, even in retrospect.
That children have a right to know.
Discussing your diagnosis with children and opening that channel of communication gives children the opportunity to process the information. To ask questions. Discussion. To let them know it’s OK to be emotional about it. It’s OK to be angry. Sad. Indifferent.
That it’s not their fault.
We sometimes don’t give kids the credit they deserve – they often can cope. And with a caring, informed approach, they will get through it. And learn from it, and grow as human beings.
So, with all that in mind, I set about talking to them.
What you say to a child about cancer is really going to depend on a variety of factors.
Age, maturity and their general understanding of what cancer means.
In my next post, I am going to discuss some of the approaches that I was advised, and what worked for me and my boys.