I have been very
honest with my kids about cancer from the very beginning. They have asked numerous questions and I have
tried to do my best to answer them all.
There was one question and subject that hadn’t come up yet and I hoped
it wouldn’t, but it did. I figured it
would at some point. I’m not sure how or
when they figured it out and I probably didn’t give them enough credit in
hoping they wouldn’t put two and two together.
They began to ask about death.
They began to associate cancer with death. It was the one thing I had hoped to
avoid. They asked me what it meant to be
a “survivor”, and what happens if the cancer comes back, and if I could die
from cancer. Now my heart feels heavy in
my chest and I have to remind myself to breathe.
It is as if my body and brain are frozen. I want desperately to go back in time, to a
time before cancer interrupted our wonderfully healthy and simple lives, to a
time when they never would have had to ask me this. I gave
them the best answer I could. My
attempts to be truthful in a way that wouldn’t frighten them proved to be
effective, for now. They both seemed
content with my answer but I could tell by their seriousness that they
understood. Despite my telling them they
don’t have to worry about it, I knew that it would be inevitable to some degree.
I didn’t get a
true sense of their understanding until the next day when Brinley was playing
Barbies and I heard her say “my mom died, she had cancer” and another say “yeah
my mom has cancer too, she lost all her hair.”
Brinley continues to play like this and her Polly Pockets, Lego Friends,
Little Pet Shops, etc., all seem to have at least one mother who died from
cancer. It breaks my heart to hear, but
I know that this is her way of processing the concept of death and cancer. Coen brings it up occasionally too. He went from saying things like “I hope you
get rid of cancer forever” to “I hope you don’t die from cancer.” Jeff can’t stand to hear the kids say things
like that and wants to stop them, but I think it is okay for them to play out
the scenario and talk about it in their own way. I don’t want to make them feel like they are
doing something wrong. I want them to be
comfortable dealing with it in a way that makes sense to them. My hope is that Brinley will eventually be
overheard playing with her toys and having one Barbie (or whatever)
saying to another “yeah my mom used to have cancer. She is a cancer survivor and she kicked
cancers ass!” Maybe not in those exact
words but you get the point.
Looking
on the Bright Side…the Lego Friends have removable hair so if you ever want to
truly play cancer or chemo as my kids did while I was going through hair loss,
they are the way to go!
Bald Barbie - not sold in stores...yet
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