When parents are ill, their children have many new duties and worries. If you have a friend in this situation you know she’s stressed and you want to help. What can you do for a friend whose parent is ill?
1. Listen. Just listen. When my parents had health problems, I often drove home from the hospital on the phone with a friend just telling her everything that happened. I didn’t want advice, medical or otherwise. I just wanted someone to listen. Hearing myself talk helped me to process the whole thing and often, if there was an answer needed, it came to me as I talked through the situation.
2. Don’t offer unsolicited advice. Unless you are specifically asked, do not offer advice. Your friend knows you’re there and willing to offer advice. She knows she can ask you. Let her make that decision. When you offer advice, it’s one more thing for your friend to respond to and you become one more person whose feelings she has to try not to hurt. Your attempt to help actually adds to the burden. Don’t be that friend.
3. Tell her she’s a good daughter. Your friend feels helpless. Her parents are in pain and there’s not much she can do about it. She needs your assurance that she is doing a good job.
4. Don’t badmouth the siblings. Sure, we all know that your friend is going above and beyond the call of duty while her little sister phones in from her vacation to make sure everything is ok. If your friend wants to complain about her sister, that’s fine, but you shouldn’t add to it. When you complain about her sister, no matter how justified, she will feel guilty about complaining and come to her sister’s defense. Remember tip number one—just listen.
5. Don’t say “Call me if you need anything.” When people are under extreme stress, the idea of making one more call, or one more decision, can be overwhelming. Instead of waiting for her to call, think about what would be helpful and go ahead and do it. Instead of saying “Let’s have lunch sometime,” set a date and call to see if she’s available. There’s a fine line between taking care of the arrangements so she doesn’t have to make any decisions and bossing her around, so be careful not to cross it.