Back to normal

After treatment finishes, there is usually a long period when things are still very different from normal life as it was before your parent had cancer.

Then, as time goes by and all the changes in your lives are over and all the uncertainties about whether your parent would recover - people talk about life gradually getting 'back to normal'.

Although it is usually impossible to know that a cancer will never come back, the treatment, the daily changes in your routines and most uncertainties are now behind you. Things are looking good - and as time goes by - it becomes easier to think about the future and people stop thinking so much about their cancer and whether or not it may come back. You are all eager to move on with life now and try to get back to how things were before.

However, you may discover that life will probably never return to exactly the way it was before. The experience will have changed all of you in different ways. Your parent may have physical changes, like scars on their body, less energy or be less mobile. The experience will certainly have also affected them emotionally as well as physically. You will also feel that this experience has done something to you and you feel a bit different from the person you used to be.

This might affect your relationship with your friends and they will have difficulties understanding how you feel. Often people feel that although it has been a very tough time, the experience has changed them in a positive way and they appreciate many things they took for granted before. Many families see this time as a chance to begin again, to start enjoying life and do all those things that they have always wanted to do.

Talking about how you feel right now and getting information to help you understand the situation is probably one of the best ways you can help yourself and your family look forward to the future.