I'm curious for people's opinions on this scenario - I've NC'd because I'd like an answer without the additional context and where people don't know which person I am in the scenario.
A person is sick - long-term but not chronic or disabled. The sickness is likely to last about a year. It's a recognised, debilitating illness but is very unlikely to be life threatening. The illness is diagnosed and can be cured but it will take months for the person to feel better. They're frequently in and out of hospital, completely unable to work or socialise, they visit the hospital multiple times each week for ambulatory care or appointments, and receive a lot of treatments. If they didn't receive this care then they would almost certainly die from the illness - but the care is very good. Whilst the long-term outlook is very good, in the mean time, the illness means that they are in a lot of pain and very unwell. It's a genetic illness so some members of the family have also had it before, but not as severely as the person who has it now.
In this scenario, would you expect:
a) the person's family (parents and adult siblings) to reach out and ask the person if they're ok and how things are going.
b) the person to contact their family to update them, without being asked, whenever anything changes or they have to be admitted to hospital?
Either way, how often or when do you think they should reach out to update/check-in?
The family speak via messages around 3 times each week and video call around once each week. The frequency that family members see each other in person varies a lot because of distance. They consider themselves a close family who get on well.