Thank you for this area.  I too lost my sister, she was my only sibling and 8yrs younger.  At 18, she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma.  After multiple relapses treated with chemo, radiation, her stem cells and then my stem cells... her body was too weak to fight.  Rachel died 2 weeks after her 23rd birthday.  She left behind 1 niece and 4 nephews that miss her very much.  And while I can not imagine the pain of losing a child, I sometimes feel as though I've fallen through the cracks.  No one called me to ask how I was, there were no sibling loss groups in my area, no books to read.  It has been  4yrs now and I am in pre-nursing to become a nurse oncologist to help other cancer patients and their families.

Thank you again for this area.  I hope that other siblings find this place and are able to find a place of peace.

I hate to hear when anyone has lost someone in their life due to cancer.  Especially someone so close to them.  I can not blame you for taking the semester off.  I found that keeping any train of thought for an extended time was hard.

I started volunteering for the LLS here in Lexington.  Rachel passed in July and Light the Night was in September.  It was a great way to talk to other people who could understand what I was going through.  Megan Reilly is over the Lexington branch and is also a Hodgkin's survivor.  It was a great experience.  This was my first year I didn't work LTN because school and my kids.

So I would say volunteering, alot of tears, alot of writing poetry has helped me.  Some days are better than others.  When I'm sick or my kids are sick I often think about what really being sick is.  She is horribly ill for most of the last 2-3yrs of her life.  At the end, it was so difficult to see her that way.  I noticed most of her friends one by one fell off the face of the earth.  A couple she hadn't spoken to in years, showed up out of no where.  I had a cousin that was able to come in and see her more than me.  i felt very bad about that but thank god that I asked my sister before she died if she felt bad towards me because of it.  She told me that I was the only one who came in and sat beside her and didn't ask how she was, or if she felt better.  I just sat quietly until she asked me if she needed anything.  And that meant more to me than anything.

I don't believe that you ever get over losing a sibling but if you don't try to go on with life, you end up with some serious health or mental problems.  I think helping other people, helped me...

I lost my youngest brother in August to Hodgkin's Lymphoma. He was 22. It is really hard for me still, and there isn't a day where I don't cry at least once. You are both right that there doesn't really seem to be too many resources for this kind of loss. Though I am sad to read both of your stories, it is nice as well because I don't feel so alone.

I lost my brother in August 16th 2009.  He died at 44 years of age and was born with Down Syndrome.

It has been hard for because I was hoping that he would stay alive for two years, but he was only able to live about a year after being diagnosed with

early B-acute lymphocytic leukemia.  I was upset when my parents decide to put my brother on hospice basically I felt like we were giving up on my brother.