Hello all,

I'm hoping this forum will be able to offer me some reassurance regarding a recent pancreatic cancer diagnosis for one of my close family members.

 My family member who is male and in his 70's had been having strange symptoms from about Feb 2020 until his diagnosis in Nov/Dec which the hospital and doctors kept telling him was IBS. He lost a significant amount of weight in a very short period of time (he was around 16/17st and now probably weighs no more than 9/10st) 

He was finally diagnosed with stage 4, metastatic, incurable and inoperable pancreatic cancer and was told that he would be lucky to see a year. Now this is very upsetting for a number of reasons. The biggest being that I am particularly close to this family member and I hate to see him in this position and secondly, he was always such a strong, proud man and to see him lose all of his dignity in his fight is awful.

He has recently started chemotherapy and he just seems to have gone downhill since starting this. He's still losing weight, he is very frail, his voice is hoarse and he has to keep sleeping all the time. He can't eat and when he does he has the worst sickness. His bowel movements are all over the place and he just doesn't look like same and the other day he fainted which is very out of character.

I'm just wondering if this is all normal for chemotherapy? I'm worried that this is the pancreatic cancer completely taking hold of him. I've googled and google states chemo can do this to a person but I don't know if it can to this extent.

I suffer badly with health anxiety myself and the times that I do see him (COVID rules currently allow this as he is 'dying' and vulnerable) I can't bear to look at him but come away thinking I then have cancer symptoms and I end up in another relapsed period of obsessively checking myself and panicking I'm dying of cancer. I saw him recently and I'm currently obsessing that I have lymphoma as I have pain in my throat and near my collarbone!! 

My family think I'm heartless as I always react strangely when they talk about him and it's as if I just don't care even though deep down I care so much it's breaking me apart, but to them it's like I'm 'fed up' of talking about it, and I snap when they discuss him or just tune out of the convo. Is this a normal reac too?! I hope that makes sense? 

Im not sure where I'm going with his post, I think I'm reassurance seeking to ease my worry

Thank you all. 
 

B x