if you were going to die, would you want to know or not?

[onlyjoking9329]

why?
what would be good about knowing?
what would be bad about knowing?

I would want to know so I could see all the people I wanted to and arrange things so as to ease the distress on my loved ones when I died. And so I could make arrangements for dd.

Yes -- to say goodbye to people. To leave all relationships on a good note. To hopefully leave my kids with the belief that death of a loved one wasn't end of the world.

Bad: being afraid of it happening.

Yes
Being able to plan
Leave stuff for your children when they were older.
videos , letters etc.
Being able to say goodbye properly is important.
My brother died suddenly a few months back and it is sad that none of us could say the stuff we wanted to say.
Lots of support to you and your DH by the way.
Have been reading your threads

I would want to know, for the same reasons as Carmenere.

Also I would want to arrange my own funeral, especially the hymns.

ditto what everyone else says.

Yes definitely organising your own funeral.
We had to organise my brother's not having a clue what he would have wanted,and it felt like he would have wanted to have been involved.
Hope he would have approved

Same as Carmenere.

Its good because we have been able to plan things.

It is mind blowingly horrible to live in the knowlage for an unknown period of time, and that is rather emotionally wearing.

Probably yes but only a short time before so that I could say goodbye to my children, collect some things for them to remember me by, take video footage etc.
Wouldn't because I'm not sure if I could get past the anger at the unfairness of dying early.
So sorry you are even asking this question OJ

Yes i would want to know.

Means I could sort out whatever needed to be sorted.

If I was the last one, I could transfer all assests to the children to stop them paying inheritance tax.

I could arrange my own funeral, and see family and friends to say my goodbyes.

I would never ever like to go the way my mum did, so sudden we never said goodbye. I want my children to know that death is a natural process, and although heart breaking, it cannot stop them living their lives.

The only advice that I can really give you OJ, is to quickly find out those people who are supportive of you, and those people who expect you to cheer them up!!!

Ditch the latter.

JARM - not sure whether you would be able to avoid inheritance tax very easily. There certainly used to be a 7 year rule with transfer of assets - i.e. lower tax/no tax only if you survive the gift by 7 years.

But that's beside the point.

I think I would like to know, so I could say goodbye and put plans in place for the children.

At the same time, not sure I could bear to know because would be desperately sad (words cannot describe how sad) to be leaving them behind so young. To not see so many things. To miss them.

Thanks for all of your replies. i would want to know too.
very difficult here today, steve had forgotten what the oncologist had said, i had thought it was denial but it seems he just can't remember, so today he has been really sobbing, thing is if it is his memory i will have forgotten again by now.
so do i remind him or not?

No, no and thrice no.

I understand all the reasons that people here are saying they would want to know, but its not for me.

Why? because that is all that would be on my mind and I wouldn't be able to function.

Hope this isn't too insensitve but what do MrMB and Steve think? I suppose it's a bit difficult to answer because they do know but wouldn't it be better to have hope?

Oh God, OJ, how amazingly horrible for you.

Can you arrange for him to have the support he needs without him needing to be constantly reminded?

The worst time for dh and me was in the very early stages, and now we have had the ability to come to terms with it. But if Steve is constantly going to forget the dx, and need reminding all the time, he will be trapped in those first awful weeks of understanding, he will be constantly reliving the worst time.

God, I don't know what to say to you sweetheart. Its bad for us, but this is just so much worse.

For me the answer depends entirely on what would be wrong with me, ie. what the illness was.

Hmm. In that case I am not sure that I would remind him. Oh crikey, I really really don't know what I'd do in our situation.

So so sorry that you're going through this. Words fail.

sorry oj posted before your last post

well he told me yesterday that he didn't understand why people were visting him or making such a big fuss when there is nothing wrong with him
i assumed denial but maybe it is his memory.

Oh god OJ. That's awful for you all.

I wouldn't remind him if I were you.

If he's going to repeat the pain of finding out again and again, that's a different situation from the original Qs.

Honestly, I think I'd just say for now "It's very bad, so we have to take one day at a time", and then think about what to do overnight.

How much of the good things (planning, etc.) has he already done, made his preferences clear?

I would, but that's partly because I know too much about diseases to be easily reassured. I do understand nb's point, and to be honest I would leave well alone. It just seems amazingly harsh on top of everything else if Steve has to get the news over and over again I'm so sorry.

Mb, was the scan last Friday or next?