Asking for support

• Talk about day-to-day things if and when you want to Having cancer doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to talk about anything else! Most people find it normal to talk about other aspects of everyday life as well as the major issues that they face, so you don’t need to feel limited.
• Try to decide which issues are most important to you and the things that you really want to talk about Quite often you’ll find that it’s only two or three things that you really want to discuss, and that’s fine.
• Tell the person that you want to discuss issues related to your cancer You could say something like, ‘I want to talk about things that are quite difficult.’ This lets your listener know that what follows is something that’s important to you.
• Try to be specific when talking about the things that worry you You may find it easier to take things in stages. You can start talking about awkward subjects by saying something general, such as, ‘I’m worried about how things are at the moment’ and then it’s easier to go into particular areas, for example, ‘I’m not sure how long I’m going to be in hospital this time.’
• Say if you’ve been worrying about something a lot For example, you could say, ‘For the last few days, I’ve really been worrying about ...’. This lets the person listening to you know how important the issue is to you and they can focus on that.
• Check every now and then that the other person understands what you are saying You can use any phrase you like to do this, such as, ‘Do you see what I mean?’, ‘Does that make sense to you?’ or, ‘Do you understand?’
• Try to make sure that what you’ve said has been heard At the end of the conversation, if you’ve asked for some things to be done, it’s worth summarising - for example, ‘So you’ll come with me to the appointment on Tuesday to discuss the treatment, and you’ll ask Dorothy to collect the children ...’.
• After you’ve covered the main topics, don’t feel embarrassed to go back to small talk You don’t have to discuss serious issues all the time and just chatting about everyday things can also help you feel that normal life still goes on.

Humour

A lot of people ask if it’s a good thing to use humour when talking about difficult subjects. But humour can be a useful way of coping as it can help make situations less frightening. If joking about things has been part of the way you’ve coped with challenging things in the past, it might help you now. If, on the other hand, you haven’t used humour in this way in the past, it may not be helpful.

Humour can be helpful in some situations, but it has to be used carefully so that it doesn’t seem as though you don’t understand the seriousness of the situation.