Posted by Jeff on 9/16/2006, 2:27 pm, in reply to "How can I help someone with cancer." Oh, and Rick - I replied to your post below...you might want to repost your message up here where people will see it. You posted it as a reply to an old message and it kinda gets lost down there. One last thing for both of you guys - someone gave me this link when I first came here and I remember it was very helpful for me when I was new at this. It's an article written by a woman with cancer, about how she would like to be treated by the people around her. I remember it helped me understand a little better how it feels to be in their shoes. Hopefully it will help you guys too: http://www.bcforum.org/bus.html Jeff
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Warren, sometimes people are reluctant to ask for help, even when it is offered. Especially with the employer/employee relationship that exists, your boss might feel like he would be taking advantage of you by accepting your offers to help. Like Rick said, the best thing is to sit down with him and discuss what you can do, and what he is comfortable with. See how he responds and let that be your guide. His wife will probably be very tired and/or sick during treatment. If she is normally the one who takes care of the children, then he will be taking over many of those responsibilities now...that means he may need help with the other stuff that he won't have time for - yard work and such. Perhaps you could offer to cut their grass, or rake their leaves or whatever. Cooking meals is always good too, especially if his wife is the one who normally does the cooking - she may be too tired to do that, so they might appreciate you stopping over with a meal from time to time (either a ready to eat meal, or something they can pop into the oven or microwave whenever they want it). Anyway, these are just a few ideas - they are the kinds of things that most people will never come out and ask you to do for them, but they will appreciate it if you do them anyway without being asked.
Good luck. I wish you all the best.
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