Case 3: X's dying nephew.

Feb 01, 2007 00:29

The story: A woman called X had a 16 year old nephew who had cancer. He'd been seriously ill and received a present from the Make A Wish Foundation, then the cancer had gone into remission for a few years, then it had returned. She was angry and upset with the unfairness of the world that he was dying so young and wanted a little support from her friends.

Status: TRUE

More details: I'm telling this story here so you can compare and contrast it with J's dying baby. Unfortunately, X fell victim to the effect whereby a community, having had one faker, gets all twitchy about anyone else who's asking for help.

Rule 15: People with genuine dying relatives don't want huge amounts of attention, just a little support.

I happened to know that the dying nephew was genuine because I'd been chatting to X around Christmas time, December 2005, and she'd mentioned going to the hospital to see him. She was a little upset to have seen how ill he was compared to how healthy he'd been a few months earlier.

X was never very outspoken about her nephew, she didn't go on and on about him for attention the way J did with her fake pregnancy. She barely mentioned him, except one or two times after she'd been to see him and was having trouble handling it. There were no dramatic details - no over-dramatised medical facts, no sudden miraculous recoveries and equally-sudden traumatic relapses. Mostly, like the rest of us, she talked about the Sims and stories and trivia of everyday life - and when she did mention him, it was brief and to the point.

Rule 16: People in genuine difficult situations want thoughts and prayers for the situation or for their relative, not for themselves.

X was adamant that thoughts and prayers should be for him and his parents and friends foremost, and for her only to have the strength to support all of them.

When the nephew was really ill with the cancer and obviously pretty unlikely to make it, X wanted some support. Because of J, she didn't feel able to post about him openly. So she sent a private message to the web forum's owner, A, asking her to post it anonymously. I didn't see the original post, so I wasn't able to say at that time "I know this is real". A few days later the nephew died, and X posted to thank people for their comments. At that point, a few people started to express doubts about the story. Oddly enough (!), X got very upset, and posted the full name of her nephew, the hospital he was being treated at, the room number and the doctor in charge - details she shouldn't have had to post at all.

It was a horrible farce of a misunderstanding which arose because the original post was anonymous. X made the original post anonymous by posting it through A because she was afraid of people thinking it was another J thing - but in doing that, it actually made the situation look more likely to be fake to some people! Because "if it was a real situation, someone would sign their name to it, wouldn't they?". Yet X didn't want attention for herself, she wanted the prayers to be for her nephew.

dying relative, real situations not fakes

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