Friend's Refusal to Acknowledge an Awful DX

slickwilly said:

friends and cancer
I am so sorry you are dealing with your dad having cancer and being away from home. I hope your able to keep in constant contact with your father and stay on top of what is happening with him. Having had cancer and being a caregiver I can say without a doubt many friends just don't want to deal with it. Sometimes we can't even get our families or spouses to help or understand what is going on. Friends that I spent years helping on home projects or fixing their vehicles just disappeared. I didn't quit helping people but learned there are givers and takers in life. Some I though were friends were only there to use me. An extreme example of this was my sister-in-law. She needed a divorce from an abusive husband and had 3 children. I paid for her divorce, kept her in her house and worked my butt off cleaning up years of garbage. Including a garage full of trash her husband was too lazy to take to the curb for pickup. I told her I wanted nothing back but her friendship. When I had cancer I never even got a phone call. I quickly learned to write these people off in my life as it was not worth the stress it was causing. Yes it hurts but we can't keep beating ourselves up over people that just don't get it or only think of themselves. Find the givers and get rid of the takers. I am sure you will find a friend that really cares about you and your needs. A person that asks how you and your family are doing and does not turn away before you have time to answer. One that always seems to contact you at the right time when your having a bad day. I found a friend at the right time. One that had a tooth pulled and passed out in a store waiting for meds. After the paramedics had finished with her she called me to see how I was doing with my chemo. That is the kind of friend you want. For now I would develope a good relationship with a college counselor that you can talk too. And you always have everyone here when you want to unload. God bless you and your father. Slickwilly

nsquirrely said:

friend's denial
This issue has been a very hard one for me as well. Even after more than a year has passed it continues to hurt me. In my case, I was the one dx with cancer. I don't have a lot of close friends and only have my children and my grandchildren for family that is close. Someone who I had always counted on to be there when I really needed them and that I would have always been there for as well,deserted me when I truly needed that friendship. When I let her know what was happening, she said just let me know if you need me to go with you or anything. Once I finally was told that it was cancer and had time to adjust to the idea, I needed someone I could talk to about it. My children were dealing with their own feelings and were there for me buy I needed someone to share my feelings with that wasn't family. I reached out to my closest friend only to be ignored completely. She said she would come to visit me and never showed up. Through it all there was never a visit, a phone call or even a card to let me know she was thinking about me. At one point, I ran into a mutual friend who told me she had said that she couln't deal with it because of her mother's death due to cancer. I understood how that might make it hard for her but then again I may have been some help to her in dealing with that as well. I didn't know her when she lost her mother.
Anyway, I felt abandoned and that I had lost my closest friend. Even after all this time and my recovery she still has not reached out to me. Recently, I was out at a local restuarant and she was there with her finance. I wanted to go talk to her but was so afraid of rejection that i stayed away out of fear. I hoped that she would make the effort. That didn't happen either. On their way out in passing she said how are you and I said fine to her back as she was walking away from me.
Although, many others that I never realized thought of me as a friend have stepped up to be there for me I still have to deal with the ones who stepped away. There are days when it is still hard to realize that it is just a fact of life. Cancer separates the good friends that will be there for you from the ones who won't be there when you really need them.
I'm sure the my that rambling on tells you that I am still hurt by this and trying to deal with it. In closing, although some step away from you others take the step toward you. I'm grateful for the ones who did and for the new friends I have made here. This site has been a great source of support for me and I would never had been able to deal with my emotions without the support I received from all the wonderful people I've met here.
Hugs and Prayers
Shirley