The only thing I wish was that he could be convinced to get out and spend more time doing things without me. I wish I could get him to understand that it’s okay for him to enjoy doing something that I might not be able to do with him.

Thank you so much for sharing.

I wouldn’t. Not for a second. When I say take care of yourself, to a friend I mean do those things exactly, that you need to do those things in order to be there for the person that you’re caring for. I also mean that if you want to vent at the unfairness, at the anger, the feeling that you can’t take it or that you shouldn’t have or that you want give up, and even that a little bit of you thinks that it would be better if it was over with. And if you said something that shocked me, I’d keep it to myself. As someone who cares about you (and doesn’t necessarily love your mother, who isn’t your sister, or her sister), that’s what I’m there for.

I don’t know Aimee, but if I were her friend, that’s what I’d mean.

Life has been better for my Mom these last few weeks. We made the decision (with her support) to provide her with round-the-clock home care. After months of my aunts, cousins, my mom’s partner, and I taking turns at the hospital, at the house, we realized we were coming to the end of our collective emotional strength. It was best for Mom’s recovery and for our well-being. That said, there still was some guilt in not being there with her all the time. And I’m ok with that. When I need to be with my Mom, I’m there. When I need to be home, then I’m home.

The challenge is in dealing with others who don’t get it, who don’t see that you’ve run yourself into the ground. That you’re hanging on by your fingernails. I’ve definitely seen the best in people through this, and sadly, the worst in others. And I’m becoming okay with that, too.

As for my Mom, this week she told me she’s ready to visit my brother and his family in Florida, including her newest granddaughter. So, there may be light at the end of this tunnel, yet.

I lost my Ma to complications of liver cancer when I was 13. She got sick when I was 5 or 6, so that entire chunk of my childhood was a round of Ma getting chemo weekly, being sick for several days, then having a good day or two before she had to get the chemo again. This was the 70s, so the chemo was no-holds-barred, un-targeted, downright evil stuff. She took it orally until she couldn’t drink down the Coke/Diet Coke and chemo cocktail anymore. It affected my whole childhood.

My dad was diagnosed with cancer when I was in high school. This time, I wasn’t told until I got rebellious. (Long, stupid, adolescent story. Suffice to say, if they had TOLD ME about his cancer, I wouldn’t have argued the point.) The radiation was tough on him, but he survived it. And went on to develop a form of leukemia many years later. When he died, I was 37. And suddenly an orphan. My step-mom is still here, but no one who hasn’t gone through it *gets* it.

I get it. When I say to people “take care of yourself”, I mean it. Take the *1 hour* to take a bath, or have your spouse rub your feet, or eat a real meal or take a nap. If you run yourself into the ground, then who will be there? It is NOT selfish — it’s a necessity so that you don’t break. And when people say that to you, take them up on the implied offer of support. Tell them “I’d love to have an afternoon to just get caught up on things here — could you take the kids?” or “Could I ask you to help me do some advance cooking/bring me some ready to go meals once or twice a week? That would really help.” You know, the stuff people would offer to do if they knew what you needed.

My best wishes go to you and your mom. Cancer is a horrible thing that consumes your life. Hopefully all of the positive vibes your post is generating are worth something.

I wasn’t my mother’s caregiver when she was dying of cancer, so I didn’t have as rough a time as other people here. But I know “Take care of yourself.”

And I know what I meant by it when I wanted to say it to my friend when she was going through the same with her dad. I didn’t say it, I just held her and agreed with the suck and cried with her, but in the moments I wanted to say it — when she would leave me, when she had to get off the phone, when I was going to have to leave her to her own devices for more than a few hours, and I HATED leaving her — I pretty much meant all the stuff people above me have said. I love you, I suck at this but I will be whatever you need to the best of my ability, and when I can’t be there, don’t forget to love yourself and do what you can for yourself because I can’t be there all the time.

Which is stupid. Because that energy, the energy to carve out time for yourself, the energy to take down the walls and then *put them back up* afterward, it sometimes isn’t there. Sometimes what we need most is not something we can have, under the circumstances. People are too hard on themselves, yes, but there are times when it’s more important to put your own needs aside and focus on someone else.

It’s not a failure to tend to your own needs. Neither is it a failure to leave your own needs untended while dealing with someone who desperately needs you. And “Take care of yourself!” can often feel like an accusation or a command: here is this other thing, seems impossible right now, that you have to do. Here’s these other expectations. Take care of yourself so there will still be some of you left for us to interact with. Take care of yourself so that you don’t change too much. Take care of yourself so your problems don’t get so bad they start scaring people around you. Take care of yourself so your grief doesn’t get too unseemly. And while I think some of that selfishness IS inherent in that utterance, simply because people fear having to deal with this sort of thing even secondhand, I don’t think those elements are the most important part of it. It’s just that when you’re in that place, those elements are the ones you tend to hear. Your life is fucked. Being reminded that other people know this and wish it would change is heavy and painful. They can’t possibly want you to be taken care of more than YOU do, you know? There were times I wanted to say “I love you too. Now shut up. Talk about video games for Christ’s sake, or carnivorous deer.”

Something people don’t “get” about this crap is just how draining it is. How the spare change necessary to translate well-intentioned but poorly-aimed words, and to extract the emotional content out of what at the moment seem like truly meaningless phrases, will nickel and dime you with exhaustion. You get tired, so tired it’s hard to react to what people meant and not what they said. Especially when we aren’t, culturally, taught to deal with issues like this with any grace at all. You learn it by force when you go through it, but that doesn’t teach the people you come in contact with every day a damn thing, and they will continue to act like people who don’t get it because they DON’T get it. I didn’t get it until Mom died, and now I *maybe* get a tenth part of what it must be like to lose someone I was really close to (we loved each other but were not friends, and I wasn’t her caretaker).

One of the hardest things to learn, whether the crisis you are dealing with is a sick or dying loved one or your own mental illness, is to ask for what you need. It’s a peculiar variety of . . . shedding shame, I guess. You have to stop caring to some extent about the social niceties that say you shouldn’t ask people for things, you have to stop fearing being in someone’s debt, you have to learn to trust others — a hard lesson, if you aren’t a trusting person by nature. You have to learn to expose your own weaknesses and trust your support network to help you shore them up. And even the best team of emotional contractors can only do so much. This shit wears you down. It ages you. It subtracts from every part of your life. And that toll is something that people who have not experienced it cannot ever really understand.

I don’t know you, Aimee, but I salute you. Sorry I wrote you a novel.