My sister was diagnosed with ovarian cancer a few years ago. It was the type that you don't survive. One thing I learned is that oncologists sometimes know very quickly that you're not gonna make it. Hers didn't respond to any of the treatments. She just started suffering from all the symptoms pretty much immediately: fluid on the lung first, blood clots soon after. Pretty soon the tumors had spread throughout her body, so various other things just stopped working, like her digestive system, which was pretty much blocked off. It's a horrible illness. She was gone within 9 months, and the last 5 of those were a sharp down-hill, with lots of symptom management. There was literally nothing anyone could do. I hate to depress or worry anyone who is going through this, but you already know it sucks. It's cancer.

What I decided, very early in her illness, was "screw work". I told them the situation, and said that I was going to be visiting her 2 days a week (I also had a home life to live, and life has to go on around cancer). Turns out they were extremely flexible and basically said "just let us know when you need to go, and then go". Turned out I was able to work on trains/buses and even from her house, if she dozed off, or was busy with other stuff. One thing I noticed is that, even though 9 months is short when it's the end of someone's life, it's an extremely long time to sit and watch.

To brighten things up a bit: you can't (and shouldn't) be sad all the time even if you or someone close to you has a terminal diagnosis. It benefits nobody. Graveyard humour is sometimes the funniest, because it's so fucking black sometimes that laughter just forces it's way out.

Mostly I just acted like there was nothing different. She thanked me for that many times later in her illness. She was constantly aware of the cancer, and just wanted to be able to think about anything else. My goal was to be there when I could can. Just hang out. We'd talk about pretty much anything except her terminal cancer: my wife, our dogs, her husband and 6 month old baby, what I was cooking for lunch...

She never accepted that she was dying, right to the end. See, she was diagnosed right after giving birth. I wish she did accept it, and try to deal with it, but as someone pointed out (the Chinese reference) perhaps for some people, you cease functioning once you realise it's "game over". But the outcome was that she didn't even leave behind anything for her son, who would never remember her. No recordings, videos, letters. Not a thing. She couldn't bare it.

Anyway, thing is, some cancers are very treatable. Some go away for a few years and come back in a more lethal form. And some just kill you within a few months. In her case, it was really obvious that she had the latter. She wouldn't discuss it with her own oncologist. Her husband had to carry all of that - every decision was left to him. She abdicated. So that brings me to the last part: you need to be there just as much for the satellites that orbit the cancer, as for the person with the cancer. They're all going through the meat grinder. My 94 year old father never thought that he's have to lose a child (he married late, and assumed he'd be the first out of our family to die). My mother was my sister's her best friend, and they saw each other daily. It was extremely tough on her, so I called on her a lot too.

Three years on: life just goes on. Her son is in pre-school. My father is still alive and in relatively great condition for his age. My mother lives for her grandchild. My brother in law has a girlfriend, which is great for him, and everybody is happy for him.