Welcome to 2026!
New Year—New beginnings. In Michigan it also means winter, with all the white (and grey) that comes during the season. The best part of winter…it’s Gala planning! On February 28, we will be on the dance floor celebrating another year of supporting young adults navigating a cancer diagnosis. We like to call this evening a party with a purpose! I’m guessing you’ve heard tickets are on sale LINK HERE.
For me January always causes me to pause. Winter in general is a chilling reminder of our time in hospice with Cassie. Several years back I wrote a three part hospice series for another cancer support network about our time with Cassie from December 2011 to March 2012. I recently stumbled on the folder that had my early drafts — I can still picture the shadow of myself trying so hard to write without fully re-living that time.
I will repost the hospice series on our Shoe Prints blog. You can link to them at the bottom of this post but I wanted to share some reflections first.
In Part 1, I reflect on how Cassie’s social worker, Kathleen, first brought up the option of hospice. A couple months after the blog was published I met Kathleen for lunch. She mentioned she had read the hospice series and really enjoyed it. She also told me there was more to the story…
“You mentioned in the article that you were shocked by my mentioning hospice to Cassie. I guess she never told you, that was the purpose of my coming over. Not to tell her about hospice, but to bring it up to you and Chris.”
WHAT?!?!
Apparently, Cassie knew she was out of treatment options soon and wanted to prepare us for the inevitability of hospice. It’s really so strange for me to look back on that conversation with a different lens. It’s no wonder she locked eyes on Kathleen when she mentioned hospice, she likely didn’t want to see our reactions. She knew we’d be shocked. What a deep love and understanding she had for us—even in her scariest time, she was preparing us. Later in the article, I talk about what hearing those words “There’s nothing more that we can do” did to all of us. Now in reflection, she wasn’t surprised at all to hear those words, she had been preparing herself and us for what was to come. In my naivety, I thought she was hearing them for the first time, and maybe she was, but no doubt she was expecting to hear them.
I share all this because I have been asked “Do you think it’s ok to talk about death when someone has cancer? Did you talk about death with Cassie?”
I still don’t really know how to answer that question, mostly because there’s not a right answer. I think it depends. Certainly, the conversation about death is tricky and not meant for just anyone to have. If the person wants to talk about it, they likely will if they feel safe to do so. I’m sure Cassie assumed she’d scare us if she brought it up (for the record, she probably would have). It was more comfortable for her to have a middle person broach the topic. Hospice wasn’t the first time we talked about dying, it was just the first time dying was on the horizon.
When someone is diagnosed with a life threatening illness, it’s quite common for them to at least entertain the idea that death could be an outcome. That doesn’t mean you can(or should) broach the topic and give all your worldly insights—there are dumb questions. I think the most important piece is to know where you are in that person’s life. Are you the person they would be vulnerable with? Do you have a gift for listening? Can you resist making the conversation about you?
There’s no question Cassie knew she was dying and she was always more interested in living. She definitely made plans for her life, even as she prepared for death. I can only speak to our experience around who Cassie was comfortable talking to as death became eminent…it wasn’t Chris and I. We talked through a lot of things. In retrospect, she didn’t wanted to scare us with all her thoughts, so didn’t share them all. My best advice is to support your loved one. If it’s finding a professional to talk through the tough stuff with, encourage that (that goes for you too). Love them, support them but you don’t have to be their everything. To quote Mel Robbins “Let them”. There is a lot of stress around uncertainty but that doesn’t mean you should try to control the uncertainty—let them.
If you’d like to read the original hospice reflections, I’ve reposted them as they were originally written, links below. Please feel free to read one, all, or none at all.
Peace Love and Kayak,
KH
Hines Family Christmas Eve 2011~