I'm a bit stuck now with some bad news...

[JustaGirlTrying]

Hi all.

Maybes a bit of a long post, so I do apologise.

I have just been given bad news by my ex boyfriend that he has cancer. He's only late 40s and we spent over a decade together and we're friends first. It was a bit of a turbulent relationship at times, but we had some good times, made memories and just couldn't deal with the world well, but we don't hold that against each other.

We properly spilt a few years ago, but remained friends and he helped me out a lot when I hurt my back and the most supportive person when my grandad died.

I am now in a new relationship, but it's a relationship I wish I had never gotten into and it's seems very hard to get out of. Hes a much older man, controlling, condescending and just basically won't get out of my life and I've asked him many times to. We do have nice days, but he is very teenage like, very argumentative and always has to be right. Sexually coercive and just a bit of a head do. I don't want to get the police involved and my parents are very close to removing him from house..... Anyways..... That will all be sorted out soon...

My ex and I are amicable, I do care for him and he's a nice lad, helps anyone with anything type of person. Now that I have been told this cancer news I am immediately wanting to help him. I see him for the first time in 9 months tomorrow at the hospital. He is going for chemo and whatever the hospital say, which is his choice.

He knows I am more holistic and says he will accept natural help after the chemo. He has a loving mother, he has a daughter I don't know of they are estranged still, and he has a sister he half gets on with. He's well known as a good lad around the area and has nice mates.

In my mind, (maybes it's panic), but I am thinking of asking him when he gets better from chemo if he wants to come and stay with me for a bit (nothing sexual) as I have moved out into the countryside. In my mind I am hoping to help him get his immune system back naturally and show him that it's ok to take time out to heal. He's a massive stickler for working and is constantly employed working hard. I live alone (technically) with our cat we got together 11 years ago.

He never looked after his health and I just feel he deserves a second chance hopefully in life to redeem himself and see a new outlook on life and cherish it. I am no way looking to have a couple relationship with him again, but he is a great friend.

When I found out this morning, I told my current partner (1 year) and he started trying to lecture me about cancer as he thinks I'm thick, and were both holistic so I dont know what he was trying to tell me. I told him I wasn't interested in what he had to say as I know what he was pushing and I shouted at him and he got pissy at me and we haven't spoken since. He's left to take his dog out, not even texted me to see if I'm ok. No emotional support at all.

I'm in bad health myself with my bad back and been in bed depressed all day in tears, having to contact old mutual friends and stuff. I've been helping out with trying to get my ex with pip and stuff like that, get the ball rolling until I see him face to face.

I'm literally sick of my current fella draining me like he does and he has his own place but chooses to live here with all his stuff clogging my house up just being lazy and making excuses.

I feel like my ex deserves my help so much more than this narcissist and maybe he will just leave anyways when he's not getting the attention.

I don't know what I'm writing here, I'm just getting stuff out, but do you think it's unreasonable or weird to ask my ex if he wants to stay on a bed downstairs to try and heal? He's been living with his mam for a year or so and she's getting on mid 70s now and wasn't well herself last year.

Obvs I will wait until I get this current one out of my house first!

Thanks for reading if you did, please go easy on me, I'm not after any negativity.

It's perfectly normal to be floored and upset when you've just learned of somebody you care about having cancer. Especially understandable when you've recently lost two people you are close to, to cancer. And even more understandable given that she's in a depleting abusive relationship, oh, whilst also living with chronic pain!

He contacted me at 7:30 this morning saying he'd been rushed to hospital, had bits cut out of him, told he's got bowel cancer, a bag put in him and it's spread to liver and kidneys.

That's why I tizzied.

@JustaGirlTrying I'm not weighing in on that. Just offering a possible explanation why that person commented about it.

Your replies are very defensive. You might want to step away from the thread. Protect your mental health while you work through this.

I think you should focus on getting some holistic approach to your own life tbh. Your ex will need chemo and follow up meetings, maybe another treatment so don't move him far away from a hospital. Hollistic aporoach is not to cure illnesses, it's to prevent them. And even that can fail so for me it's snake oil.

Thank you, I guarantee the nasty ones wouldn't say anything like this to me in the street.

Guaranteed, but I'm sure they will say it to the wrong person one day and that's on them.

Thank you for you supportive post.

I’d be floored if I had a call like that too. It’s a totally normal response. I think the poster saying it was ‘not normal’ was just trying to be unkind.

She isn't saying she wants to replace chemo and conventional treatment with holistic treatments!! For goodness sake read her actual words!

She is saying she wants to feed him nutritious food and take him for walks in the countryside to support his recovery. IN ADDITION TO THE CHEMO AND OTHER CONVENTIONAL TREATMENTS HE IS HAVING!!! And you're too far bonkers the other way if you don't think that nutrition and time in the countryside can support health. Neither are woo woo, both are supported by quality research studies, and once again...

She's 👏not 👏trying 👏to 👏replace 👏chemo 👏with 👏juice!

I'm sorry I've offended you. You have taken my post and words the wrong way even after I have explained the use of English language.

I'm certainly not setting out to upset anyone, especially who is already ill.

Please don't read anymore into it.

I guarantee I would say every single word I’ve said on this thread to your face.

and probably worse if you told me to redeem myself to my health to be honest.

I have an English literature degree, a law masters and a PhD.

I know what redeem means.

you don’t.

Hi OP. So sorry to hear you’re in an abusive relationship and now you’ve had some bad news.

it’s lovely you want to help him but be careful not to burn out. Coming out of a bad relationship (which you must do), and then into a caring role is ALOT. Especially as you have history. He or you may start to have feelings again - which although very natural, may not be good for either of you.

please look after you first. Then you’ll have energy to help him in whatever way suits you both.

OP, I think you are trying to be very kind to your friend, but please be careful with your phrasing. Lots of people have said things that have been quite upsetting to you, so I'm sure you understand that poor wording can cause upset for others too.

I don't think it's a stretch to say that most of us on this thread will have lost people, possibly many people, to cancer and some of us, like me, have been though it ourselves. Wording really does matter and, I repeat that I feel you are coming from a place of kindness, but some of your phrasing is a little misguided. I really hope your friend makes a full recovery.

So if you KNOW I don't understand the use of the word why are you kicking off so much.

I apologised.

Its lovely that you want to help your ex. Hope the current guy is moved out quickly, he sounds very difficult.

"Hollistic aporoach is not to cure illnesses, it's to prevent them. And even that can fail so for me it's snake oil."

Holistic approaches to health are just ways to try to support somebody's whole body and wellness, whether it's trying to maintain health, return to health, or even to support somebody who is in the process of dying (there are plenty of holistic therapies in hospices). In this case OP has mentioned nutrition, rest, and time outside in the countryside. All three of these are WELL researched and documented.

Of course they can fail. I don't think that's the gotcha that you think it is.

And just in case, it bears repeating....

She's 👏not 👏trying 👏to 👏replace 👏chemo!!

Because you “explained the use of the English language”.

I am sorry for your friend.

I hope he does well.

Yes some.of my wording may have been a bit misguided, but I've been attacked all thread and have also experienced cancer with people in my life, granted not my own cancer, but I have apologised and I dont see anyone apologising to me for insults or anything like that so people just need to chill out.

I haven't come on here to make a post about my dying friend to purposefully offend anyone.

OP then you still need to be calm. It’s a shock, but it’s not a tragedy until there’s no other options. Stage 4 bowel cancer can be treated. I’m perhaps being flippant because my husband died of an incredibly rare cancer which was diagnosed very late and had very few treatment options. Therefore I’m very much of the view that if there’s a treatment plan and evidence of treatments being effective even if the condition isn’t curable it’s not a tragedy until the options have been exhausted. Bowel cancer Spreading to kidneys is exceptionally rare although liver is more common. You’re best making sure you support him that he’s getting the care he needs from a good doctor and getting second opinions if he’s not happy with what he’s told. Hopefully he’ll be ok and honestly bowel cancer is moving fast with treatments and people can live well with it

I think it's really kind of you to want to help him and offer him some good home cooking and fresh air if that's what he would enjoy as he recouperates from the chemo. Encourage him to check with his doctor I guess and keep in touch with the hospital?

you really need some help to get away from your awful man. Ring the police and get him out you deserve better

you sound like a really thoughtful friend. Good luck to your friend with his treatment

TBF, OP said:

"In my mind I am hoping to help him get his immune system back naturally"

"He never looked after his health and I just feel he deserves a second chance hopefully in life to redeem himself"

These comments do sound suggestive of a better approach and also blaming the friend for getting cancer.

OP might not have said that exactly, but it does come across that way. That's why there have been so many replies telling her to stay out of it.

Happy to be corrected but as far as I can see the OP did not say getting cancer is a failure? Was it another poster or was it from your imagination?

Naturall meaning just help his gut flora and fauna and thing so he can hopefully heal with food and nutrients after the chemo and pharmaceuticals as I know myself my mother is on heart medications and stuff but she has to take something for extra now for her guts, but that's after the heart medications ripped her gut biome out.

She has started eating healthily and cut down her gut medication due to this and I was thinking along the same lines of recovering after chemo.

My grandad took the hormone pills for 5 years never had any chemo until a month before and that was just for the pain I think, or radiation.

So I haven't had experience with the chemo first hand, apart from when my friend died after it.

So he’s got stage 4 bowel cancer. Chemo is a bitch to fight and he might not want healthy foods I know I didn’t with mine. Let him come to yours for the fresh air and rest. I guarantee he’ll need the company with such a diagnosis.

Not from my imagination no. From the post where she said that her friend needed to redeem himself from his health, and the definition of “to redeem”.

hth.

Two things are obvious:

Be strong and get out of your highly toxic relationship - pronto!

Do NOT advise your friend on his treatment. Not your business, it's up to the medics.