ideas please - long distance support for a sick friend

[tatt]

he is really ill and getting to the stage where no further treatment is available, one child is doing A levels, mother struggling with a life turned upside down. They had to cancel their holiday and money is going to be a problem.

I'm hoping to arrange a visit to see them in school holidays, staying nearby not with them. Suggestions please for ways to be supportive.

Whilst you're visiting try and do as much housework/shopping as you can without being bossy and interfering! Offer to drive DCs about and if you can sit with ill friend to give the rest of the family some downtime, that would be fantastic. They may not want to leave him though, in which case, don't push it. Cook and buy take-aways.

And practical paperwork - pay bills, does the car need MOT?, does house insurance need updating? etc. And they may need a stack of birthday cards and stamps for the next couple of months - it sounds a bit odd but these things do get forgotten when you have a serious illness in the house and then you feel guilty for forgetting all your friends and relations.

When you're not there, keep in regular contact, even if it's by text, email or a variety of post cards rather than by phone, which is time consuming and can often be inconvenient.

Send some vouchers for a frozen ready meals company - we have Cook! in the South East, it will save her having to make dinner.

Good for you for going

bumping for others

Thank you, the cards would not have occurred to me. I think at the moment they are desperately clinging to the hope that treatment will be successful. Not sure if this is denial or because they don't want to upset the one doing exams.

I'm suffering from the usual problem of not knowing what to say because they are either in denial or keeping it from the child doing exams. Feel so useless being so far away, you can't get someone drunk and let them cry it out.

Yes that is rather difficult. My father was in denial so we didn't discuss his impending death with him, but the rest of the family all knew and talked about it to each other.

Perhaps when you are there in person, and you have some quiet time without children around, you can ask what the prognosis is, how the consultant thinks the treatment has gone etc. It will give them a chance to be honest and if they don't take the opportunity, then I think you'll just have to accept it and be ready to pick the pieces up in a few weeks/months/years.

Hope it goes OK xx

I had a friend in not the same but similar circumstances. Once he told me that life was becming so serious and all about his illness that he had forgotten what real life was like.

I sent him stuff - any stuff - sometimes a coupe of things a day - silly postcards, notes about things we'd done, anything that made me laugh or think or him - even used to send really odd stuff like packets of sugar from starbucks or free toys from cereal.

He told me it really helped and made him smile on days when nothing much did.

Is a bit of a nuts one and only works if you know the person really well.

I am relly glad I did it even though I felt like a bit of a twat at times.

the consultant told his wife the prognosis was poor several months ago but at first it looked like the treatment was going to work and his wife was talking of him returning to work. That always seemed optimistic but then there were complications and now his doctors say there is just one more treatment to try.

I like the idea of sending odd things, I'll try to get hold of the book - thanks for those ideas.

We haven't seen each other much with distance in the way but this is the friend I've know for longest. He also married someone I would have chosen as a friend anyway.

can you send random reminders of past good times you or they have had ? Maybe pictures you have of when the kids were small - or when you first met.

we met so long ago I don't think I have any pictures But I will look for any of when the children were small or from previous visits. I'm also going to earch mumsnet for the best of the jokes posted here

my friend died yesterday. We had told the family we would visit next weekend as he sounded so ill. Now we will be waiting until we know the date of the funeral.

Oh no - how sad for you all.