Reply to Diagnosed with Terminal Cancer -- Pass my journals onto my children or burn now?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]What's the prognosis, OP?  If you will be well enough over the coming months, please take tons of video (iphone is fine!) of you interacting with your kiddos, and maybe some videos for them to watch on birthdays and special occasions.  Have someone help you go through those digital photos saved on your computer and pick out specific photos for each child and make a photo book with space on the covers for you to write to them.  Hearing a loved one's voice is one of the greatest gifts that is left behind, so record stories and poems and singing.  Prayers of peace to you and your family as you endure what's to come.[/quote]

Do the above now. I do think having some videos they can watch in the coming years, as well as photo books, will be important for them now as youngsters.

And SAVE THOSE JOURNALS!!!!  and gift them to both of your children when they are adults! The Christmas that your youngest child turns 20 years old is when I'd have them be opened by both kids, they'll be 20 and 22....  what a perfect time to read them. And give to both, not just your daughter - both children will love to learn about their mother in her younger years, after you've gone.   Put them in a huge box, wrap in brown paper and a note "to be given to X and Y on Christmas Day, 20XX (I can't do that math).  Speak with your husband, he'll hide the box away in the back of the attic so the box doesn't tempt your children now and the next 10 years of their lives!  (or put in your safety deposit box if it's big enough)

My mother has these - she's kept a journal about just regular normal things since she was in high school. I remember finding them in the attic when i was about 12 years old- opened one at random and it was about how I'd finally slept through the night at a few months of age, both my father and mother woke up in the morning and rushed to my crib to find - a sleeping baby!  I'd just started babysitting and I remember loving to think about my parents as so young, with a baby... me!  And some talk about how she met my father, about their courtship, they are priceless.  Even if there are "scandalous" bits in there, leave them all, don't go to the trouble of removing things - your kids will be adults when they read them, they can handle that their mother smoked pot, believe me!  :)

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Save them to give to your kids, even the bad/negative parts. Both my parents died when I was young and the tendency of both sides of the family was to talk about them as if they were saints. I felt like I needed to hopelessly strive to be a fraction of the people they were when they were alive. And then I met some of their friends from college when I was in college myself. They talked about my parents as if they were regular people. I heard about problems they had, bad choices they made - it was amazing. They became real people to me that weren't perfect. I was able to love and miss them for them, not the fictionalized ideal they had become. A gift of journals written by my parents would be priceless.

I will say - don't give them to the kids at Christmas, or a birthday, or wedding. Holidays can be difficult enough without that emotional landmine. Some people are fine with it, like the PP with the wedding toast, but I would ask that they be given to them at a neutral time. And if you do have a toast, or cards for their birthdays, or leave gifts for Christmas just make sure they're told it's coming. It's not the gesture I don't like, it's being caught off guard with my grief in front of people.

Good luck OP. I miss and love my parents and think of them every day. I smile when I hear something I think they would find funny, and am sad when they miss my kid doing something adorable. My kids know all about my parents. You'll never stop being their mother and you'll never be forgotten. [/quote]

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