How hard to push someone to get help and support

rjshunt

I have a friend diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer a little over a year ago. She has no living family and just a few friends. When first diagnosed they had to break into her house as no one had been able to get in touch with her for a few days. It took a while to get her stabilized enough to actually diagnose and then strong enough to treat.

We (wife and I) live 6 hours away. Luckily we are retired and spent 1st 3 weeks helping her out as best we could. This was all while she was in the hospital. She has since gone through I believe 13 chemo treatments and supposedly her numbers looked really good. But they have not done any surgery. Since we are not related, we have no standing with the doctors or hospital and rely on her for info which she is reluctant to go into any detail, though we know she is not happy or confident with the doctors or hospital. But she also seems unwilling to get 2nd opinions or press for more detailed answers. Basically she is afraid to advocate for herself.

Initially she was very strong and upbeat, she was determined to not let this beat her or drag her down. We come over to visit as often as we can. And each time she seems more knocked down and evidently they are looking to start her up on more treatments.

I've mentioned this site and other resources which she says sounds like a "good idea" but doesn't follow thru and when pushed, gets very defensive and "has so much going on" she doesn't have time to get other help or support.

Honestly, I'm frustrated with both the lack of treatment, lack of a treatment plan and her unwillingness to seek any other outside help or support which I think this site and forums could give her. It is hard to know what to do and harder to help her with any of this when we only get over here about once a month for 3-5 days at a time.

Please give me some advice, suggestions. Should I back off? Push harder?