My mother was diagnosed with an acute form of breast cancer in 2021 and has been undergoing chemo in hopes of shrinking her tumor to have surgery to have the tumor removed in the next month or so. She has one more chemo appointment left!!! Upon my mom's wishes we have withheld the information from my 6yo and have just explained that "grandma is on a medication making her lose her hair but it will come back" and they have been content with that explanation.

Today they overhead my mom in a conversation tell someone she had cancer and asked me at bedtime if it was true my mom had cancer. So I called my mom and we explained together that she's fighting cancer and that her team of doctors is amazing and will be removing the cancer. Talked about how it's already shrunk through treatment and the conversation seemed to ease my 6yo's mind. Once off the phone, my 6yo tells me they learned about cancer in school and that people die.

My heart is so raw right now! I had a feeling they would eventually find out but I wasn't ready for it. Stupidly, I was actually starting to think we might have been able to shield them from one traumatic thing in life and now I just feel like a failure. My mom is a big part in my 6yo's life so far and I hate everypart of this.