r/pediatriccancer • u/HarmonicHues • 19d ago
I hate platitudes.
My loved one just received a terminal diagnosis. He is only 12 years old, and someone had the audacity to tell me, “Isn’t a short life filled with love better than a long one that isn’t?”
I wanted to scream.
I told them what I actually want: both. A long life and a love-filled one. The two are not mutually exclusive, and the fact that I cannot have both does not make me grateful for only one.
How do you all cope with the platitudes? Every time someone reaches for a tidy phrase instead of sitting with the discomfort— instead of just saying “that sucks, I’m so sorry” — I feel the anger rise a little more. There is something deeply isolating about watching people protect themselves from your pain by repackaging it as a lesson.
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u/ExpatRosie 18d ago
I’m so sorry for what you are going through. It’s absolutely devastating.
Unfortunately I don’t think there’s anything you can do about the platitudes. People feel sorry, but they don’t know what to say, so they try to say something to make it a little bit less terrible. The truth is they can’t do that, but they try anyway.
In the end what a lot of them are really saying is “this sucks, I’m so sorry” but they think that’s not a helpful thing to say so they come up with something else.
I’d say if it’s someone close to you, tell them you just want the truth not the sugar coating. And if it’s someone you aren’t close to, don’t expend your energy trying to fight it. Just say thanks, walk away, and try to treat it like a stupid person’s way of saying “this sucks, I’m so sorry.”
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u/mablesyrup 18d ago
I am blunt with people. I just say, "that's not helpful. I just want my kid to not have cancer." and it changes depending on what they say. So for example I would have answered what you were told with, "That's not helpful. A life without cancer is better than any life with it." or something along those lines.
I haven't thought of a good answer, though for when people ask how my kid is doing on. Sure she isn't in the thick of it - buit still lives with scanxiety for her scans every 6 months and the lasting effects of always being tired and meds/side effects etc. So when someone asks there is always a long pause from me and then I just end up saying, "she is doing ok. thanks for asking." People just won't ever understand the weight and lasting impacts of cancer on a child and their families.
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u/rst012345 17d ago
I low key HATE when asked how my kids is doing, because its usually a poorly veiled attempt at asking if she is still on treatment, if we are preparing for her death, or cancer free (trust me, I'll shout it from the rooftops the first time we get a negative for circulating tumor dna even). I usually say something along the lines of She is running, playing and having meltdowns just like most kids her age
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u/polymathtechie 18d ago
Unfortunately the platitudes don’t end after they pass. When my toddler died at 3.5 from brain cancer, I heard many very well-meaning attempts at making sense of it. That’s where a lot of it comes from.
I will say that the platitudes are better than the people who blame you for your kid getting cancer in the first place from breastfeeding/not breastfeeding/an organic diet/a non-organic diet/household chemicals/not enough praying… etc etc.
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u/ExpatRosie 18d ago
Anyone that blames you is a piece of shit who shouldn’t be in your life anyway. I cannot believe you have to deal with that.
I’m so sorry for your loss and for all you’ve been through. If I knew you, I’d ask you to tell me a story about your child, something other than the cancer everyone focuses on. But this is the internet, so feel free to just think of something and I hope it brings you some small amount of happiness.
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u/Eggnogallyearlong 18d ago
I'm truly sorry for the loss you've experienced. I have rage towards the people who blamed you. I hope you were able to protect yourself from even entertaining that thought as best you can.
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u/Naive-Concern4720 16d ago
I used to get ‘I don’t know how your doing it’ when Bub was going through treatment, I got sick of it I would just reply with ‘well I don’t really have a choice she would die if I didn’t do anything’
Just make them feel uncomfortable and they will soon learn not to say those types of things
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u/Wakeful-dreamer 15d ago
Honestly I think we've all maybe said a platitude or something close to it. Maybe just tell them, "I know you mean that kindly, but platitudes aren't helpful. Most people in my situation would rather just hear 'I'm sorry, and I care about you and your family.' Telling me that a child benefits from a shortened life is cruel."
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u/nothin_special_here 13d ago
Firstly, I’m so sorry your loved one has found themselves in this club. It’s not fair and these kids just deserve so much more.
Secondly, These kind of phrases have made me so jaded to talking about things to others. I just push forward in the conversation nowadays and generally ignore those kind of comments bec I think mostly people just don’t know what to fucking say. They don’t want to hear how real it is either to face the thoughts, emotions and choices we face as parents and families to kids with cancer.
I worked in surgery and on the floor as a nurse aide before that in the ten years before my kiddo was diagnosed at 4m old. Navigating the medical understanding of what was going on vs how I felt as a parent already had me in a bad way towards everything for a long time. I was (and still happily will be) a thorn in the side of every doctor we worked with for my kid, which incidentally were often docs I worked with professionally.
Interesting development in this type of thing is that when people find that our son has a brain tumor they talk about how resilient kids are, yada yada… then I jump immediately into our methods with health and cannabis therapy and how well he’s doing and then and nearly every time the stigma takes over and people no longer want to discuss the absolute treachery that is cancer.
I guess I’m just saying here that people will never know what it is to cope with this emotionally when your child/loved one gets this diagnosis. They’ll never do the digging, the fighting and soul searching you’ll do to find answers and straighten it all out in your own brain. I’ve gotten mean in a lot of ways, sometimes just in private, over how insipid people are until they feel the weight of a life cut short. But at the end of the day it’s things like this that just come with experience, and you know that if someone does respond kindly and intentionally, that person has likely also experienced platitudes of this nature or similar as well.
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u/CarolynDesign 19d ago
"I would prefer you just say sorry. What you've just said actually upsets me, and it's not helpful." I'm all for giving a blunt answer.
My son is still mid-treatment, and we don't expect him to become terminal, which I appreciate as the gift it is. But I still get platitudes that are just infuriating sometimes.
"God doesn't give you more than you can handle" is one that really sets me off, because this is, 1000%, more than I can handle. I fall apart at least once a week. It's like a constant nightmare I can't fully wake up from. I need therapy, but where am I supposed to find the time between all of his doctor's appointments and everything else I need to do?