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    <title>CancerCompass Message Board: Finding it hard to cope</title>
    <description>CancerCompass message board discussion started by leanne2287 on 4/4/2008</description>
    <link>http://www.cancercompass.com/message-board/message/all,22710,0.htm</link>
    <pubDate>Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
    <lastBuildDate>Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:00 GMT</lastBuildDate>
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      <title>Finding it hard to cope</title>
      <description>Hi everyone. It&amp;#39;s been almost 3 months now since my daddy passed away from pancreatic cancer and i&amp;#39;m finding it harder each day. I put on a brave face infront of everyone and carry on with my life as normal but absolutely everytime I&amp;#39;m on my own, I can&amp;#39;t stop crying. Everything is reminding me of him and I can&amp;#39;t bear to even look at photographs of him.I find myself looking out the window, seeing someone, and thinking that it&amp;#39;s him walking towards the house. I answer the phone, it&amp;#39;s my brother, I think it&amp;#39;s my dad and I get so excited. Everytime I think about it, my heart feels so heavy and seems to sink....I can&amp;#39;t explain it properly but I&amp;#39;m sure some of you will understand the feeling. My nephew is 8 and he&amp;#39;s at the stage where he says things that hurts you, without realising. Just the other day he said, &amp;#39;Leanne, you&amp;#39;ll have no daddy to walk you up the aisle if you get married&amp;#39; and &amp;#39;You&amp;#39;re daddy won&amp;#39;t see you graduate from university.&amp;#39; I try to be brave infront of him but I really want to run away and break down. Cancer adverts on the tv&amp;nbsp;are the worst and I can&amp;#39;t help feeling angry when the advert announces &amp;#39;more and more people are beating cancer.&amp;#39; Of course, this is brilliant but I just feel so envious that my dad was one of the one&amp;#39;s that was taken by this disease. Are these feelings normal? </description>
      <author>leanne2287</author>
      <pubDate>Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
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      <title>RE: Finding it hard to cope</title>
      <description>Absolutely!&amp;nbsp; You have every right to feel the way you do and you will continue to feel that way for a long time.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;I can relate to your feelings&amp;nbsp;because I lost my dad almost 20 years ago when I was 16 and just recently&amp;nbsp;my husband was just diagnosed with stage IV stomach cancer.&amp;nbsp; Losing a parent is very, very difficult especially to cancer.&amp;nbsp; It&amp;#39;s frustrating to have to deal with all the effects of treatment, to see them wither away, and worst of all when they are in pain.&amp;nbsp; It sounds like you were close to him, like I was with my dad.&amp;nbsp; Just feel comfort in knowing that time really does heal the heart and if you feel like crying,&amp;nbsp;do so because it&amp;#39;s good for you.&amp;nbsp; People in general understand and are very sympathic/empathic to what you&amp;#39;re going through.&amp;nbsp; You may want to consider volunteering with&amp;nbsp;a&amp;nbsp;non-profit organization.&amp;nbsp; There are so many worthy causes out there.&amp;nbsp; Sometimes that is the best way to release your energy in a positive way and bring happiness to someone else.&amp;nbsp; I will pray for you and your family.</description>
      <author>cal1519</author>
      <pubDate>Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
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      <title>RE: Finding it hard to cope</title>
      <description>&amp;nbsp;On 4/4/2008 leanne2287 wrote:Hi everyone. It&amp;#39;s been almost 3 months now since my daddy passed away from pancreatic cancer and i&amp;#39;m finding it harder each day. I put on a brave face infront of everyone and carry on with my life as normal but absolutely everytime I&amp;#39;m on my own, I can&amp;#39;t stop crying. Everything is reminding me of him and I can&amp;#39;t bear to even look at photographs of him.I find myself looking out the window, seeing someone, and thinking that it&amp;#39;s him walking towards the house. I answer the phone, it&amp;#39;s my brother, I think it&amp;#39;s my dad and I get so excited. Everytime I think about it, my heart feels so heavy and seems to sink....I can&amp;#39;t explain it properly but I&amp;#39;m sure some of you will understand the feeling. My nephew is 8 and he&amp;#39;s at the stage where he says things that hurts you, without realising. Just the other day he said, &amp;#39;Leanne, you&amp;#39;ll have no daddy to walk you up the aisle if you get married&amp;#39; and &amp;#39;You&amp;#39;re daddy won&amp;#39;t see you graduate from university.&amp;#39; I try to be brave infront of him but I really want to run away and break down. Cancer adverts on the tv&amp;nbsp;are the worst and I can&amp;#39;t help feeling angry when the advert announces &amp;#39;more and more people are beating cancer.&amp;#39; Of course, this is brilliant but I just feel so envious that my dad was one of the one&amp;#39;s that was taken by this disease. Are these feelings normal? Absolutely normal. My dad passed away in 94 with&amp;nbsp;recurrant prostate&amp;nbsp; cancer. Because we had him here at our house until his death(it was someone with him 24/7) after he died it was so weird not having that responsibility. Watch for depression, it can come so easily. I still see&amp;nbsp; tings that remind meof him, but cherish the time we had with him the last 6 months.It will get easier as time passes, but there will always be things that remind you of him. Just try to consentrate on the happy times you had witheach other.Jan</description>
      <author>hiswayc</author>
      <pubDate>Sat, 05 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
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      <title>RE: Finding it hard to cope</title>
      <description>Hi Leanne.&amp;nbsp; I know how you feel.&amp;nbsp; I lost my mother on Dec 27 at the age of 68 and I still find it hard to cope.&amp;nbsp; There are days that I just want to stay in bed but fortunately, I have two small children who need me.&amp;nbsp; My siblings and I just can&amp;#39;t seem to move forward and spend a lot of time in anger: anger at the medical system, anger at ourselves for maybe not doing enough, the list goes on.&amp;nbsp; I even find myself angry because I don&amp;#39;t dream about her or feel her in my everyday life.Someone said to me yesterday - Would your mother want to leave a legacy of love or a monument of pain?&amp;nbsp; All I can remember is the love and amazing memories but all I feel is sad.I know in time we will find a new normal but for now, this is normal.Lisa</description>
      <author>LisaS</author>
      <pubDate>Sun, 06 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
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