Let’s explore how to support your loved ones with cancer or other medical challenge. According to the two criteria of Healthy Survivorship, the best way to help is by supporting their efforts to (1) get good care and (2) live as fully as possible. In general, it helps to…
#1 Listen with compassion, not judgment. More than anything, patients need to feel heard. Try to understand where they are physically and emotionally, especially since they may not know themselves. Use body language and words that say, “I hear you.”
#2 Focus on helping now. Patients’ needs evolve as they experience changes in their condition, circumstances, outlook, and coping skills. When offering to help, try to be specific, focusing on the short term: “What do you need now? What can I do for you this week?”
#3 Talk about hope. Understanding what patients are hoping for helps you appreciate what matters to them and what they might need now.
Those suggestions can be challenging to carry out. It might help if you think in terms of helping them maintain as much control as possible, such as by…
Offering—not demanding—to assist when doing so enables them to continue doing things they want to do.
Believing what they are feeling and thinking, even if you don’t undestand it or wish they were feeling and thinking something else.
Repecting their right to choose what they hope for.
When you say or do the wrong thing (and you will sometimes), apologize to your loved one…forgive yourself, learn from it…and move on with love and hope.
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