FIL diagnosed with cancer, DH "not bothered"

[ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts]

Long story, although will keep it short.

Dh and I have been together 5 years married almost for 1 and have 2.9 DD and I am 5 weeks pregnant.

Ever since I have known DH he has not been very close to his parents and the more I got to know him and his family the more I realised they were very toxic parents.

Lots of arguing, violence, affairs when DH and his sister were growing up.

FIL is a constant liar and MIL is a bit of a pushover.

There have been many issues since we've been together where they have stopped talking to us for various reasons ie not getting permission to get engaged, having a baby without being married, saying something to SIL they don't agree with (she is favourite)

They are very sensitive about everything but then will go weeks and weeks without making contact. They get moody if we spend time with y family and they are very two-faced about their own family members.

So the long and short of it is that FIL has just been diagnosed with cancer. MIL told me on the phone. I call DH immediately and tell him and he really didn't sound bothered. I spoke to him when he was home from work and he really didn't seem bothered.

I can't make him care can I?

There have been loads of things I have missed out, I'm sure, as I don't want to waffle on any more. But I'm just worried that DH won't be bothered and then it will be too late. At this moment in time we have no information on the severity of the cancer.

it sounds like it already is too late

ssd please elaborate?

Do you mean it is too late for DH to care?

I realise my post makes my DH sound very cold and callous. But he genuinely says he doesn't like his parents.

FIL may well make a full recovery. I just don't want it to be well advanced and DH not get the chance to put their issues to rest IYSWIM?

All you can do is be supportive to your DH and go with whatever he wants to do (or not). When my abusive and alcoholic father was diagnosed, I didn't care and I never saw him before he died. In a normal family, that would be inexcusable, in a toxic one, it's completely understandable.

No, you can't make him care. Sounds like he has good reason to not care TBH. You might gently suggest that if there's anything he has a burning desire to get answers about from FIL that he needs to do it before the bugger escapes to where he can't be asked any more.

Other than that he probably feels like I did when my Step-Mother died, more concerned for the family left behind. If his mother and sister haven't completely alienated themselves from him that is.

It's quite possible that they will never 'put their issues to rest' regardless of how serious this diagnosis is.

I'd put it another way ? why should your DH care? What he has to mourn is the loss of parents who will never be loving and supportive, and quite possibly he came to terms with that years ago.

Oh how sad for all of you.

my FIL is in the same position except the family are very close and are all 'pulling together' it must be odd - especially if your from a close family.

All you can do is continue to support what your DH wants to do as harsh as that is, some relationships aren't mean to be resolved.

So sorry for you.

I think all you can do OP is suggest to your husband that he makes peace with his father. They don't have to make up, just for your husband to accept the relationship as it was and 'forgive' his parents.

Tell him that it's for his sake, not his father's. His father won't be around but your husband will and the last thing he needs is to carry a burden of 'if only'.

Thanks for your responses :)

I am not remotely upset either. Which I am questioning myself over.

lyingwitch Yes it is the burden of "if only" that I don't want my DH to feel further down the road.

minniebar Yes I think DH realised many years ago that the relationship between him and his parents wasn't a normal one.

kirk "If his mother and sister haven't completely alienated themselves from him that is." Funny thing is that MIL and SIL are very close to FIL. SIL slags them off behind their back and is well aware of all the issues when they were growing up but still thinks the world of him.

The one thing that sticks out to me is when DH and I were together in the early days I questioned the relationship and DH got considerably upset and told me that before he was born his mum and dad had a stillbirth and once in an argument threw it in DH's face that he was born just a replacement for the stillborn baby.

I too am from a toxic family and would be in the same position if it were my father. The difference being that my parents are divorced and I haven't seen hide nor hair of my dad since. DH's parent are still together and see us regularly (as and when it suits them)

Such a difficult situation.

He might never be bothered, I think you need to just let DH deal with it any way he wants. I took the phone call from MIL to tell us that PIL, a rather nasty individual, had just dropped down dead from a heart attach. She wasn't bothered:
"Is Mrpony there? No? Oh OK, I was just ringing to tell him his dad's dead." As matter of fact as that and sounding as perky at if she was ringing up to invite us for dinner. I went to tell DH, who was playing badminton. Got him off the court, having explained to his friends who were suitably subdued. DH "Oh, OK, I'll finish this game then come and get changed and we'll go and see mum".
There was no love between them, nothing at all, and after the cremation we all went to the pub where MIL had a jolly old time catching up with long-lost friends. Sometimes, it's just like that.

Maybe his dad is dead to him already? My mum has bad dementia and has had for just over 5yrs now.
She 'died' years ago, just the body is there.

Let him handle it how he sees fit

If something happened to my father, I would be the same

You can't force those emotions, it may be far too late

ripeberry and pony sorry for your losses.

I expect it's something we'll have to deal with if and when it comes. I don't know how DH will react until it happens.

Thanks for everyone's advice. It is a comfort to know that DH's feelings aren't abnormal in a toxic situation. We should find out today the extent of the cancer.

Cross posts AF, thanks for your input. I'll just tell him what I find out and go with it. I'll be there if he needs me but I expect he'll just carry on as normal.

Thank you Alovely... the sad thing is, I didn't grieve over FIL either. He was a wicked old man and, while not wishing him any ill, I didn't miss him when he was gone.
I think it's true that you can't choose your family, and sometimes there is so much dislike there that there isn't anything left to retrieve of the relationship.
With my dad it was different, he got cancer and for the first time ever we developed a friendship which continues now. So every case is different, but I would just let your DH deal with this as he feels best and be there in the background if you're needed.

The expectation that we will love and care for our parents is so strong, it takes a deal of courage and self-questioning to face facts when a parent is a bad 'un. That in itself is a form of emotional bereavement, and there is a grieving process to be suffered.

My father died suddenly. I was sorry for his pain in dying - but not sorry that he did. I was glad he was gone for definite. I'd already grieved the father I SHOULD have had, but didn't.

Don't feel either of you "must" regret FIL's illness, if you don't. He wasn't a normal father; normal rules don't apply here.

Thanks pony and grace It is reassuring to know we aren't being awfully mean. The only problem is that MIL and FIL have absolutely no idea that they've done anything wrong to DH. They act completely normally, gushing their over exaggerated love every time we see them. So we all put on a pretend act. They have no idea how DH feels. They live in a bubble.

Mmm, that's the thing isn't it? If they really knew what they did was wrong, they wouldn't have done it - that's why therapists say parents "do the best they can". Sometimes their best is just bloody awful. Such warped values were usually passed along by their own carers; in rejecting those values, DH and you have broken a poor generational pattern. That's something to be really proud of!

If they judge you for not being terribly bothered about FIL's illness, you will know their judgement comes from unsound values. So you'll be able to ignore it. (As you both know, you have no duty to uphold their 'bubble' of falsehoods.)

Just wanted to come back and update. After being in hospital for a week they have definitely diagnosed stomach cancer and there is nothing they can do. He has been sent home with a matter of weeks to live.

I think it has started to hit home to DH and we are visiting them tomorrow.

Thanks everyone for your kind words earlier this month.

I wish you all the best, ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts.

ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts... Oh so glad that you've posted an update. I'm really pleased for your DH that he is getting the chance to say goodbye to his father and maybe even make peace with him. Some people never get that chance.

Wishing you well and hoping that FIL's passing is as peaceful and painfree as it can possibly be.

Good luck with it. Be there for your DH if he needs you (you obviously will be anyway) but try not to pre-empt how he'll need you or what he might be feeling.

Grieving is often more difficult when the relationship with the person who has died was not straightforward. Can only talk from my personal experience here, as my Dad died from cancer a few years ago - he was gone about 1 week after diagnosis.

He was a decent man, but his work was his life (he was an academic) and he was very poor at understanding or maintaining relationships with anyone outside of the work context. When he died, I was upset for the loss of my Dad, but realised that I wasn't grieving for our actual relationship - there just wasn't anything to grieve. This basically just left me feeling empty. Every now and again, something comes and bites me on the arse - when we had DC1 for e.g. - and I'll go into myself again. I have grieved my DD's absence of a grandfather (strangely, he loved kids and could have been great with her). I still don't think of him with massive amounts of fondness, just the thought that he was my Dad, he was a good man in most ways, and now he's not there. Its an absence rather than a bereavement. And every now and again it still crops up -DW is great and understanding, but it takes her by surprise at times (just as it does me).

All the best. Hope that these weeks are as positive as they can be for all of you.

For those kind people that answered me, FIL has taken a turn for the worse and after being given a time frame of 8 - 12 weeks he is now in days if not hours time zone. DH had a cry today and we went to see him. Difficult with a 2yo who doesn't understand and no childcare so we had to take her with us.

Marie curie, macmillan and district nurses are all going round every day. He is catheterised and has a syringe drive for morphine. He is awake and lucid but at time very confused asking for people that are no longer alive or that we've never heard of. That'll be the morphine. Breathing is laboured at times and he keeps trying to climb out of bed. MIL has signed the 'do not resuscitate' papers. Hopefully his final days will be pain free, and DH gets the chance to say bye.

SIL said she doesn't understand why DH was crying as he never seemed interested before. Not the time for sarky comments so I just said sometimes it's hard to show emotions when they are not especially close, maybe now is the time to change that. She just said hmm.

I remember your thread, though never posted.
Genuinely sorry to hear this and please ignore your SIL what a horrible thing to say.
DP was very close to his dad when he died and before obviously, there were siblings that weren't but none of us would have dreamed on saying anything to them, each sibling has their own individual relationship with the parent and its not for the others to comment on.

Hi there,

Just wanted to update those who took the time to read, post, and advise.

FIL passed away in the early hours of this morning, peacefully, in his sleep.

Hopefully the next few days and weeks will go by and the family can move forward. We know he is a t peace and no longer in pain.

Thank you all again.