To feel upset by this good news

[NotMyCircusNotMyProblem]

First of all, I know IABU but, I just wanted to write it down and get it out there so please be kind.

My DB passed away earlier this year. It was cancer. He battled it for 18 months but he just didn't respond to treatment, nothing seemed to work and every scan showed the disease to have progressed further. He was only 58.

In March of this year my FIL was diagnosed with a similar cancer. Scans showed it to be widespread but his consultant agreed to try him with some chemotherapy although even with this, they believed he would only have 3-4 months. He responded really well to the chemo. His final scan showed no trace of cancer, his consultant described it as miraculous. FIL is 79.

I AM really, really over the moon at his recovery, he's a lovely man and I'm pleased that my DH won't have to go through the loss that I've experienced. I've expressed my delight to everyone concerned and said all the right things but... inside I'm just devastated.

Devastated that my DB couldn't have the same outcome. Devastated that every treatment my DB went through just didn't work. Worse still, I find myself thinking how unfair this is - DB died so young yet FIL is 79. I feel disgusted at myself for thinking like this but, I can't help it.

I know I'm still grieving my brothers loss and I will get over it but, why is it so unfair?

I know exactly how you feel OP. My dad died of a heart attack aged 46. On the 6th anniversary of my dad’s death my FIL also had a heart attack. He survived, and I’m genuinely glad he did as he’s a lovely man, but I had some very dark thoughts about it for a while. I still find the anniversary quite difficult as DH’s family see it as a day to be celebrated and I obviously don’t.

You are still grieving. Be kind to yourself. Your feelings are completely understandable. Xx

I do understand what you’re saying @NotMyCircusNotMyProblem, all you need to remember is, life isn’t fair and nobody promised it would be.
Life is full of injustice.

Sorry, I posted too soon.
Be grateful for the good news, ignore the shit life throws at you.

Truely sorry you lost your brother so young.

Totally understandable it is bitter sweet.

So sorry about your brother OP - and that 'good news' triggered it further. (Of course it is reasonable to feel this way - life is given out so randomly.)

I get it. I lost a child and I have sometimes felt so angry at people and their good outcomes. I can be angry with people who walking around with their healthy kids or complaining how hard it is to work from home with them. I can be angry or resentful at someone grieving the loss of a 90+ year old grandparent. Not because I want anything bad to happen to anyone else or because I don't sympathise with any loss and we all face difficulties but because I'm sometimes still so angry that we lost our child. I think anger is part of grief.

Your entitled to feel like this. I’ve been there, it hurts. You want to be happy for others but at the same time it hurts that the person you have lost has gone and can’t enjoy the things others can. I went to a number of family events where I just couldn’t be as happy as I wanted to be because it wasn’t right without my loved one. I know people always say it well get better, it dose, just don’t be too hard on yourself if it takes a while x

of course this is really difficult for you. when this shitty disease has affected your life it is impossible to think logically and it is inevitable you will feel this way. When my lovely father died at the age of 63 of cancer I had to attend s few retirement dos for people I worked alongside. On each and every occasion I felt really evil towards them and resented the fact they had lived to retire. horrible and totally unreasonable but this is what it does to you. I can only say that after a period of time these feelings do begin to subside, but I had a difficult time when I reached the age m father had been when he died, I felt it was so unfair he had not lived that long.

Totally understandable OP. Cancer is a genetic disease at the end of the day, and even the same “type” of cancer can affect people very differently because of this. There is sadly no rhyme or reason to it.

I suspect it wasn't the same cancer -- I mean, it could be called the same name, but actually there are lots of subtypes for breast, brain, liver, etc. That's why one person benefited from treatment & the other one didn't.

Sorry for your loss, OP.

I'm so sorry

You are NOT being unreasonable.

It's so hard when it seems so random like this. Cancer just doesn't follow rules. It's horrible and I'm so sorry.

YANBU
In fact I'd say those are pretty normal thoughts.
My dm died at 54 from an aggressive brain cancer. Treatment prolonged her life by a few months. Others with the same had a few more years and some even longer.
I felt like you do now and also felt awful for it. Some 5 years later I don't, not anymore.
Don't be too hard on yourself x

Aw bless you. Sometimes life doesn't seem fair but that is just the way it goes. Cancer actually grows much slower in the elderly too, in fact old people often have some type of cancer and don't know, it is only when they die of something like a stroke or coronary that it is discovered on post mortem.

I'm so sorry about your brother, that was tragic.

I hope you come to terms with this soon and that your father in law makes the very most of his 'second chance'.

Thank you for sharing this with us. Your mental health is just as important as physical health. I desperately hope you are ok, darling. We're here for you xxx

It would be unreasonable to voice your thoughts to his family, but you're not being unreasonable to recognise that it is hugely unfair. Not unfair that FIL survived - it's not a case of it had to be one or the other after all - but just unfair that your brother didn't.

My mum's best friend lost her son when he was 17 to cancer, and at the time of diagnosis, her husband was going through tests for lung cancer (which it turned out it didn't have). My mum's friend said to my mum at the time she wished it was her husband who'd had cancer, not their son .. and I think that's understandable, even though it didn't mean her son had to get it just because her husband didn't .. again, it didn't have to be one or the other. It could have been neither - or even both!

I remember chatting to a woman at my gym...she was in her seventies and was talking about how she was going to visit her mum. A lady I knew had recently died leaving behind her baby who wasn't even a year old. I remember smiling at the woman who was talking about her mum whilst thinking why is it fair your mother is still alive when a baby doesn't have it's mum any more.

Thankyou to everyone, for your kind comments and for being gentle with me.

I read through all the comments last night and cried my heart out (DH was at work, I was alone so the ideal time for it). It was a very cathartic experience and I do feel a little calmer this morning. The internet is indeed a very useful place to rant, anonymously!

Moving forward, I do have a good friend I can talk to about my feelings, unfortunately we are in tier 3 and soon to be locked down further so we can't meet up atm and this is something I would only want to discuss face to face, online would not cut it. If the weather improves, we could probably meet in an open space, I'll see if we can sort it - A good talk will be nice and I know she won't judge me.

A bit about my DB. He was my big brother. He was a lovely man, kind, generous and loved by everyone who knew him. He leaves a wife and 3 kids. My heart is with them and everyone else who is going through a similar scenario.

@EatPrayYoga

I get it. I lost a child and I have sometimes felt so angry at people and their good outcomes. I can be angry with people who walking around with their healthy kids or complaining how hard it is to work from home with them. I can be angry or resentful at someone grieving the loss of a 90+ year old grandparent. Not because I want anything bad to happen to anyone else or because I don't sympathise with any loss and we all face difficulties but because I'm sometimes still so angry that we lost our child. I think anger is part of grief.

That’s so sad. I’m so sorry for your loss. I often think to myself when I moan about work or just general etc... that nothing else matters other than the health of my children.

I know that there couldn’t possibly be anything harder to deal with than losing a child. I know 3 people that have lost their DC and my heat goes out to them. I think how hard it must be especially when hearing people moan about insignificant things. I imagine if that was me I would just be numb and not care about anything else. I would struggle to find sympathy for anything else as the loss of a child, imo would be that worst thing ever ever ever to happen.

Again, I’m so sorry for you xxxxxx

I also wanted to say that it's OK to feel the way you feel.

My mum died recently at a fairly young age of cancer.

My dad and I were driving back from the hospice right after she died and we saw an elderly man walking along with his Zimmer frame. We turned to one another and realised we both had the same
shameful thought 'why does that guy get to live and DMum has to die so young.'
Totally random guy who we both had this stupid thought about but decided not to beat ourselves up. Grief is irrational.

More problematically I often secretly wish it was my MIL who died and not my mum (they are the same age). This thought is to the extent that I find it hard to be around MIL in case I somehow blurt it out. I never found her the easiest lady but by no means did I ever wish her dead before. It's stupid and irrational but it is how I feel and I try to just acknowledge the thought, not feel guilty about it and let it go.

You know that FIL's better luck was not at the expense of DB's bad luck

That.

My husband died of colon cancer, which was already at Stage 4 when he was diagnosed. We were lucky that treatment bought him 18 months before he died.

6 months after he died, my neighbour was diagnosed with the same. And she was at stage 4 too. I assumed that she would have the same outcome as my husband, but amazingly she's still here and now only having six monthly check ups. But basically she seems to be in full remission.

I'm no saint and I can be as selfish and irrational as the next person. But hand on heart, I'm absolutely delighted for her and her family. I don't want anyone else to have to go through what I and my daughters went through. There is no connection between her illness and treatment and my husband's apart from the same diagnosis. They were different people. She's not taken anything away from me. It makes me smile to see her doing so well.

I'm not discounting your feelings OP, and I totally understand them. But you have to stop thinking that there's any link between the different outcomes. There isn't.

I did actually tell DH about my awful thought about MIL

He is a really good guy and he understood that I don't really hate her or wish her dead. It's just part of my grief about my mum. It helped me to have told him so it's not my bottled up secret and I felt I had to explain why I was avoiding her.

Of course she is in perfect health and didn't have cancer herself and DH is a very good tolerant man so I'm not suggesting you necessarily do tell DH what you are thinking as you know best how he'd react. I just wanted to say that it might be OK to tell him and talk to him about how you are feeling if you think he'd understand and it would probably help you because you wouldn't have to pretend to him so much.

I lost my DB to cancer 8 years ago, he was 64. I also lost my mum and dad when they were in their 70s.
I've felt all sorts of emotions over the years, especially when you get the creaking gates, droning on about some very minor health complaint or other. How you're feeling at the moment is understandable and normal

I also found it hard when someone has the same thing and lives. I lost a relative young, and I think what it was, was that it was easier to accept his death if it was somehow inevitable, if that makes sense? it did make me so angry-sad when people I knew survived what he had. If people could be saved from the thing he died of, why not him? It made it seem even more unlucky, one to get it and two, to die of it. People surviving other things didn’t affect me the same way.
I’m sorry for your loss, you would normally expect to have a longer relationship with a sibling than any other person, and your brother sounds lovely. It’s a huge loss.