May 1, 2000 (Berkeley, Calif.) -- When physician Wendy Schlessel Harpham wen
May 1, 2000 (Berkeley, Calif.) -- When physician Wendy Schlessel Harpham went to the hospital with severe back and leg pain in the fall of 1990, she faced a devastating diagnosis: non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer of the lymph system.
A few hours later when Harpham's husband Ted returned home from the hospital, he, too, faced a difficult situation: what to tell the couple's three young children, who were then 6, 4, and not yet 2 years old, about their mother's illness, sudden hospitalization, and absence.
When parents fall ill -- if only with a bad cold, the flu, or a strained back -- caring for young children becomes challenging. A serious illness, however, presents not only the practical dilemma of how to keep the day-to-day logistics going, but a host of psychological challenges, as well. What should you tell the children? When do you tell them, and how much?
The Harphams told their children the truth right from the beginning. In the book she subsequently wrote, When a Parent Has Cancer: A Guide to Caring for Your Children (HarperCollins, 1997), Harpham emphasizes that telling the truth is necessary "to establish and maintain a bond of trust."
"Your sons and daughters need to be able to believe you, their parents, in order to grow up into adults who, in turn, can trust others," she says. "With the added stress and uncertainty of your illness, being unfailingly honest gives your children assurance in a sea of uncertainty." Her book comes with a companion volume for children and provides resources along with detailed information and an inspiring message.
Telling the Truth
Those who work closely with children agree that telling them the truth as soon as possible is crucial. Marlene Wilson is program coordinator for Kids Can Cope, a Kaiser Permanente-sponsored program designed to support children through the "life stress" of a parent's serious illness. Children from 3-1/2 to 19 meet weekly in groups of about 10, often for periods up to six months or a year. Through activities and play, a therapist helps children open up about their feelings. And when one child does, it often stimulates the others to share similar thoughts or feelings. But Wilson does not allow children to participate in the program unless they have been told the truth about their parent's illness.
"Sometimes parents are fearful of telling the child because they think the child will be overwhelmed. But when there's a delay, or if it's a family secret, the child builds up resentment. So on top of the shock or dismay, you also have anger. The child says, 'Why was I left out? Don't you trust me enough with this information? I have a right to know.' " If they are not told, children as young as 4 and 5 will pick up on the tension in the household and have these reactions, says Wilson.
Joan Hermann, LSW, a social worker at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, has supplied advice on the subject to the American Cancer Society's web site (http://www.cancer.org). She says that children who suspect parents of concealing something often imagine that the problem is even worse than it is because it's "too awful to be talked about." In addition, when a child is left out, she adds, he or she will feel isolated from his parents at a time of tremendous stress.
But how to begin? The approach depends partly on the child's age (see How to Talk to Children When a Parent is Ill) but should always be couched in terms of "love and hopefulness," says Harpham. She told her own children that "everything possible was being done to make her better and they had good reason to hope that she would be fine."
Despite several recurrences of her disease, Harpham has most recently been in remission for almost two years, and her children are now 15, 13, and 11.
