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Maintaining everyday life in a family with a dying parent: Teenagers' experiences of adapting to responsibility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 March 2015

Ulrica Melcher ,
Rolf Sandell  and
Anette Henriksson
Ulrica Melcher
Affiliation:
Palliative Research Centre, Ersta Sköndal University Collage and Ersta Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden Ersta Hospice Clinic, Stockholm, Sweden
Rolf Sandell
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Lund University, Lund, Sweden
Anette Henriksson*
Affiliation:
Palliative Research Centre, Ersta Sköndal University Collage and Ersta Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden Department of Health Care Sciences, Ersta Sköndal University College, Stockholm, Sweden Capio Geriatrics, Palliative Care Unit, Dalens Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Anette Henriksson, Palliative Research Centre, Ersta Sköndal University Collage and Ersta Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden. E-Mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Objective:

Teenagers are living through a turbulent period in their development, when they are breaking away from the family to form their own identities, and so they are particularly vulnerable to the stressful situation of having a parent affected by a progessive and incurable illness. The current study sought to gain more knowledge about the ways that teenagers themselves describe living in a family with a seriously ill and dying parent. More specifically, the aims were to describe how teenagers are emotionally affected by everyday life in a family with a dying parent and to determine how they attempt to adapt to this situation.

Method:

The study employed a descriptive and interpretive design using qualitative content analysis. A total of 10 teenagers (aged 14–19 years, 7 boys and 3 girls) participated through repeated, individual, informal interviews that were carried out as free-ranging conversations.

Results:

While contending with their own vulnerable developmental period of life, the teenagers were greatly affected by their parent's illness and took on great responsibility for supporting their parents and siblings, and for maintaining family life. Lacking sufficient information and support left them rather unprepared, having to guess and to interpret the vague signs of failing health on their own, with feelings of uncertainty and loneliness as a consequence.

Significance of Results:

Support from healthcare professionals should be designed to help and encourage parents to have open communications about their illness with their teenaged children. Our results add further support to the literature, reinforcing the need for an approach that uses a systemic perspective and considers the family to be the appropriate unit of care and offers a suitable support system.

Keywords

TeenagersDyingParentPalliative careQualitative
Type
Original Articles
Information
Palliative & Supportive Care , Volume 13 , Issue 6 , December 2015 , pp. 1595 - 1601
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

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