ABSTRACT
Families with a member who has terminal cancer are in transition: the transition from living with cancer to experiencing a death from cancer. During this experience, some families describe the patient as “fading away.” The transition of fading away involves several components including redefining, burdening, struggling with paradox, contending with change, searching for meaning, living day-to-day, and preparing for death. The components accumulate, overlap, and recur but must begin with the patient’s redefinition of self and the family’s redefinition of the patient. The trigger for the fading away process comes when the family members recognize, separately or together, the decline in the patient’s condition. The patient’s condition worsens in such a way that the inevitable can no longer be denied. A change in the patient’s physical appearance signals a decline in the patient’s condition. The patient may lose weight, become weaker, less mobile or less mentally able.
