Things that might help you, when someone you love is facing a terminal illness

This blog post has been written as part of the special 30 Day Barre Challenge we are running in honour of a wonderful woman, Angie Rosemeyer, who was a huge part of our community. We are raising money throughout the month of October for the Heart of Kent Hospice, a charity close to the heart of Angie’s family.

I wanted to let you know that this blog post will contain mentions of illnesses including cancer, death, grief and other topics that you may find difficult to read about. We are sharing these blog posts with the hope that they can be helpful for anyone going through, or anyone close to someone going through, anything relating to these topics.

This blog post is close to my heart, having lost my lovely Dad to pancreatic cancer last year. After experiencing stomach cramps towards the end of 2022 and into January 2023, my Dad was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and given a prognosis of 8.5 months to live.

When you hear the words “pancreatic cancer”, time suddenly becomes the most precious commodity you could have. Although you don’t want to know a prognosis, you also do because in a world of so many unknowns, you want to know if you’re looking at years, months or days. As a family we count ourselves very lucky that we got longer than the prognosis and were able to spend 14 months with my Dad making as many memories as we possibly could. In that time, he walked me down the aisle, he welcomed two grandsons into the world, he surfed as he always did on his 81st birthday, he travelled to France in a campervan with my mum, we spent long summer evenings reminiscing and cosy winter nights drinking his famous gin and tonics. We knew our time was precious and we squeezed out every ounce of it that we could.

I wanted to use this blog post to share some of things that I did or sought out to try and help me through the grief of my Dad’s diagnosis.

Speak to a therapist.

My family are all very close and we have supported each other every step of the way through this, but I also knew I wanted someone I speak to whenever I needed it. I searched through Self Space for someone I felt would be a good support and started having sessions around 2 months after my Dad’s diagnosis. I was doing the sessions every other week for a while and have picked them up sporadically since he died. Self Space offer virtual therapy sessions meaning you can do these sessions from the privacy of your own home and access support quickly if you need it.

Write it down and clear some mental space

This is one of the best (and free!) tools I have used. I bought a notebook and saved it for all of my overflowing thoughts whenever things felt like they were getting unbearable. Putting pen to paper and writing down whatever comes to mind genuinely feels like it helps clear some mental space.

Connect with others

Around a year after my Dad’s diagnosis, I had an overwhelming want to speak to, listen to and read books from people who knew more about death than I did.

One of the best resources I found was a booked called ‘With the End in Mind’ by Kathryn Mannix. Kathyrn worked as a palliative care consultant in teams in hospices, hospitals and in patients own homes. She shares so many experiences in her book that help the reader to understand the process of dying, to better prepare them to support and care for a loved one. We cared for Dad at home in his last 2 weeks and I would not have had the confidence to face that experience without having read Kathryn’s book. I think absolutely everyone should read this book, whether you are closely experiencing death at this time or not.

Don’t be afraid to talk about it

From what I’ve experienced, some people around you will not have the words to bring up your grief. Death is a huge and heavy conversation and if you haven’t experienced it before then it’s very normal not to have the words to talk about it. But it’s very likely that you will need to talk. If you don’t want to talk to a therapist then choose your most empathetic friend and tell her you need to share how you’re feeling. Tell her you don’t need advice or solutions, you just need to talk. Find the person who can create that safe space for you.

This is by no means an exhaustive list but these are tools that have helped me navigate my experience of illness, death and grief so far. If you have any tools you want to share with our community, I’d love you to leave a comment on this blog post.

Written with love and the hope this might support someone going through a similar situation.

Gen x