How Can I Help a Family Dealing with Cancer?
Many families are not used to needing help nor accepting it from others.
Since one out of every 300 children in the United States will experience a diagnosis of cancer, you probably have a family in your neighborhood or community who has a child in treatment. Here are some suggestions to lend a "helping hand."
First of all, keep in mind that many families are not used to needing help nor accepting it from others. The best way to offer assistance is to name a specific task or service that you would like to do for them and to remember that if the family refuses at first, you may want to offer again a week or two later. It’s also important to remember that the road to recovery can take years and that many families will need long-term assistance.
What can I do to help?
Here are a few ways you can make a difference:
- Offer to clean their house when they come home from the hospital.
- Buy CDs, an MP3 player, puzzles, reading or activity books for the child undergoing therapy... and his or her siblings.
- If you’re welcome to visit the hospital, offer to wait with the parents on those long days when they may be scared, bored and exhausted all at the same time.
- Bring a favorite food or a new magazine, and lots of news and stories so the parents feel less left out of their regular life.
- Spend time with the child so Mom or Dad can take a shower, get something to eat, or merely unwind with some quiet down time.
- Enlist friends to send cards and silly, fun things to the child and any siblings.
- Help the child start a collection of favorite things – stickers, pins, toys, scrapbooking – to provide something fun to focus on, and give family and friends gift-giving ideas.
- Offer to baby-sit the other children or commit yourself to be the friend of one of the siblings so he or she can call you if the need to talk arises.
- Be the “fun” friend who shows up at the hospital room or at home with bubbles, silly string, joke books, rub-on tattoos, whatever.
- Help set up a voice mail system, an answer machine, or a web log (blog) that provides updates of the child’s progress and records well-wishes in order not to bombard the family with daily calls.
Most importantly, work with the family to help them solve any problems that may arise. In particular, don’t ever decide on your own to sponsor a large project (like a fund-raiser or major house repair) without talking with the family first. As well-meaning as many of these efforts can be, they may not always serve the family’s most urgent needs. Any supportive undertaking needs to be done in a way that respects the family’s wishes and honors their privacy.
