Father in law has cancer and to die any minute?

Question

I can't believe this. My father in law left my husband and the whole family for another women and really didn't care about what her left behind. Only for everyone to suffer. My huband as not seen his father for like 4 years and now a month and 2 weeks ago he was in the hospital with pain. They found colon cancer, removed colon, the one week spreaded to his liver, and then 3 weeks after that it's in his lungs. He now has fluid going to his brain. I just can't belive that in the amount of time he went from walking around normal to know they say he won't make it to the end of the week. I guess I have to face and my husband to that he is just going to die and there is nothing we can change. I ca't belive a man could walk away from his family and not look back. There was not time to heal from this and now we all have to go on from this of what he did.

I guess my question is has anyone gotten to far with death like this and just pulled out of it? Thank you!

Answer 1

During my next to last treatment I became extremly sick, got an infection, became septic, and was in icu for 2.5 weeks. At one time during the icu stint, the docs told my family they needed to start considering my funeral plans and transportation of my body back to my hometown where I am to be buried. These are probably things I should already have worked out, but dont have the money.

Anyways, that was 6 months ago, I am clearly still alive and doing relativly well.

Anything is possible. If it is his time to die, he will die. If it is not, he will not. Try to forgive him his past actions and be there for him.

Answer 2

Ok here goes my opinion:

We don't know why your FIL left his family (as you put it) so we can't form an opinion one way or another. He had his reasons and it was done. Yes I can imagine your husband and the rest of his family suffered from that happening and they probably still hold some kind of hurt and resentment - BUT - considering his condition those feelings need to be either:

1. Confronted Or
2. Put on the back burner

While there is still time your husband needs to find out why and get any questions answered before it is too late. EVEN if he doesn't accept your FIL answer's at least the conversation took place and it was an attempt at being resolved.

OR he has to swallow his feelings, push it aside and be there for his father. I can't imagine desserting family either - but two wrongs don't make a right. You all should still be there for him while he is going through this.

As for him recoverying, there is always HOPE!!! And yes, there have been people diagnosed with Cancer (Stage 4) that has gone into remission.

Your FIL is going through a life or death battle, time to refocus on what's truley important

Answer 3

Colon cancer often has little in the way of symptoms until well advanced. He might have had it for two years,by the time it was detected it would have already been in the liver. It has not spread there recently.
Why he left his family is a separate issue, but if he suspected cancer that can have a powerful effect on your thoughts and emotions.
There is little chance of his recovery now. Your husband should go and see him soon if only to say goodbye.

Answer 4

We've all heard of people who were so sick that they were told that death was imminent, but miraculously survived. Then there are others who appear to be spectacular health and suddenly die. There is no real way to predict. In your condition, I imagine it would be prudent to make your decisions based on the possibility that he will die in the near future. You and your husband want to consider how you want to respond to his dying. For example, do you/does he want to confront him about leaving, do you/does he want to be there to comfort him, etc... This is something you do for yourselves. This is not for your FIL. Just you. Unfortunately, you may not have much time to think about the situation and must make an immediate decision.

I understand the feelings of betrayal and resentment. Even though they often feel like you will keep them forever (and you may not even mind doing so), please believe me when I say that, at some point, they just go away. You just get old enough or tired enough, or something (I don't know what), and you're able to see a larger picture. One where you still may not be pleased with the decisions another person has made and the ramifications you've had to live with, but where you have a wider universe of understanding and you just accept that it happened and you're going to go on from there. And it's crazy, because you realize that you never thought you'd be there. But, you're happy in the sense that you don't feel like you have to carry around the anger and resentment.

All this is a fine part of getting more mature, except if you have to live with the regret of never having the opportunity to speak your true feelings to your FIL. Regret sucks. Maybe you could say "You were a great father, but when you left it made us feel abandoned, etc., etc., and I've been so mad at you at how we felt, etc., etc." You could even say, "I don't even know how to feel now." I think honesty is fine. Just keep in mind he's probably in his own despair now, so some tact would be helpful.

I know it always seems like we ask people who've been hurt to be more magnanimous than the people who hurt them, but this is just a case of you being the human you want to be and making decisions you can live with - not just now, but when you are old and sick.

Best of luck to you.

Answer 5

Your Dad in law is terminal...he will not recover. He may be better some days than others, but his time is limited. Try to encourage your husband to at least try to get some kind of closure with his Dad or at least say some sort of goodbye.

Answer 6

Treat the FIL like you did before. If you didn't have contact with him before, why start?. He made his decisions, do not allow his illness to make your family feel guilty.

Answer 7

Let's see, your father in law dumps his family for something better, and you blame him. Don't you think things might have been different if you hadn't driven him to it? You've probably made him feel guilty for years. Now, he's truly suffering and you're the one complaining. How selfish of you.

To answer your question, yeah he'll die, then you can pretend to be sad..

Answer 8

Make peace with him before it is to late. You will regret it.

Answer 9

a great many people survive such circumstances, if you need help there are counsellors and grief specialists in abundance. You must learn to let go of the past, you cannot change it, and look to the future, while living in the now.