Cancer used to be a big, scary word that people in polite society dared not speak, especially around children. Dreadful as a diagnosis can be, telling the kids the unvarnished truth seemed too horrible to fathom.
But here's how comfortable we've become in familial communication between a parent newly diagnosed with cancer and children:
Dina Howard, a 41-year-old Carmichael mother of two, allowed her young kids to draw all over her bald head with erasable markers after she lost her hair to radiation and chemotherapy for breast cancer. Howard's husband, Ed, jokingly chided pen-wielding Noah and Maya, then 6 and 2, "No, kids not the Sharpie!"
Mom laughed heartily, a nice change from the weeks of tears that preceded it.
Nearly three years after Howard's diagnosis and double mastectomy, cancer is the new normal around the house. From the start, Dina and Ed never fell back on euphemism and always told the truth to their children – though leavened, when at one point the diagnosis looked bleak, with a positive spin.
Until recently, Maya would routinely "play chemotherapy" with a mane-shorn doll. And even now, the kids pop in a "Charlie Brown" cartoon DVD with a cancer storyline.
"It was weird how not weird it was," recalls Dina Howard, who produced an award- winning radio documentary about her breast-cancer battle. "It would freak me out, but for (Maya) it was just, you know, 'Mommy goes to the grocery store, or, Mommy loses her hair and goes to chemotherapy.' No big deal."
The Howard family is hardly an anomaly. These days, child psychologists and oncology experts urge newly diagnosed cancer patients to be straight with children about the severity of the illness and keep communication open throughout the ordeal.
Do not be lulled into thinking kids are too young to deal with stark realities. They are tougher than you think, says Lynn Newman, a pediatric social worker who deals with children of cancer patients at Kaiser Permanente, South Sacramento.
"Be as honest as you can, without devastating your child," he says. "Admittedly, that's a fine line to walk."
New cancer patients don't have to make this walk alone anymore. The Sutter Cancer Center in Roseville, for instance, offers a series of support groups specifically for children of diagnosed parents to trade stories among themselves and realize they are not alone.
But the big challenge remains at home, where a parental cancer diagnosis changes the daily dynamic in ways parents can barely imagine. Having to explain the situation to the kids and deal with the emotional upheaval comes at precisely the time when the parent needs comforting the most.
"You need to remember that children need reassurance, extra hugs, a listening ear," says C.J. Doran, an oncology social worker at Sutter and a three-time cancer survivor herself. "And they need you to be honest."
Gone are the days when the C-word was spoken only in whispers, if at all. If a parent doesn't share the facts with even the youngest child, they still might find out without a proper parental filter.
"I usually tell people to use the word 'cancer' because invariably the kids will hear that somewhere along the line," Doran says. "It's better to be able to speak to them openly, then proceed to describe it differently for different age levels."
Telling toddlers
Newman and Doran say that a lengthy dissertation on cancer and its manifestations is neither needed nor appropriate for preschool-age children."For the very young, you say, 'Mommy or Daddy is sick with cancer, and they have to take medication. And they may not feel so good while they're going through this,' " Doran says. "They'll also feed off of how you are doing with things. If you're not totally stressed out when you're telling them something, then they won't be as stressed out listening to it. Granted, that can be very challenging."
Because toddlers, as Newman says, cannot understand abstract concepts, "the best way is to model for the child, to show them that Mommy or Daddy is sick but will be OK."
Call The Bee's Sam McManis, (916) 321-1145.
