The instructor talked long and well about the specific and difficult consequences to the patient and of the impact on the family as an integral part of the process.

When illness strikes, life as it was is altered, sometimes forever. Helping to empower the patient in the face of fear is one clear task, but supporting the family system and the caretakers is an equal challenge.

Serious illness is life-changing in a number of ways. At the deepest level, we are compelled to consciously acknowledge our attitude toward illness and our beliefs about life and death. The experience of daily life changes in color and tone, shifting our awareness.

Some of us harbor a sense that somehow the patient has invited or caused the illness and silent blame may blanket the accompanying discomfort and inconvenience we experience.

It's hard to admit annoyance and irritation at a sick person, and natural anger becomes alternately disguised by guilt and resentment. Often, the situation is exacerbated by all too frequent and unwelcome contact with family members who do not get along.

The question becomes how to feel good about ourselves, do our best for the patient, feel like loving people, and still retain some personal boundaries and a life separate from the situation.

We're concerned with how we relate to the patient, how much time given is enough; and what kind of care one is able and willing to deliver. Not everybody is cut out for sitting long hours in a hospital, but there are other tasks that may feel less onerous that can be as helpful. Listening is sometimes the greatest gift.

Illness is isolating; no one consciously chooses to go there. Like aging, it's part of the human condition. And compassion for another is compassion for ourselves.

So listening with an open heart is much better than advice. Offering a specific contribution (like dinner once a week) is better than asking, " What can I do?" Useful support is what it's all about.

Serious illness appears more frequently as we age and we need to re- examine both our obsession with youth and our fear of aging and death.

It is as though we choose to forget, that if we stay alive, we all walk the same road. As we live those years between youth and age, vulnerability tempers us.

Seeing death as a part of life is the ultimate perspective, and getting to know how to cope with ourselves in the circumstance of illness is a journey in itself.

No-one volunteers to enter this dimension of experience, but life has a way of bringing us to the brink, as though who we are as humans is finally forged in the hardest of times.

Elaine Z Mosher PhD

The cases in point which appear in this column do not represent any particular individual or couple, but are a composite representation of people with relevant life issues. Similarities with actual people are coincidental.

©1999 Elaine Mosher

Cases in Point: Archive