What do you say when an acquaintance tells you they have stage 4 cancer and less than a year to live?

I was friends with a gal for a while in jr. high. I haven’t seen her since, but we reconnected on Facebook a year or so ago. It took me a while to remember who she was.

Today she sent me an IM that said that she won’t be going to the HS reunion next month because she’s starting her second round of chemo.

I racked my brain, and went back through our messages, to remember if she’d said something about having cancer before, and I callously forgot. I found nothing. So, holding my breath I asked if she had cancer. The answer is Yes, stage 4 bladder cancer.

Plus I have another acquaintance from high school, who I was actually closer to, suffering from breast cancer. I’ve been to see her since then, but yesterday, via public post, she said it has metastasized to “some bones.”

And there are various and sundry other FB acquaintances who are suffering from serious ailments, or cancer, or whose parents are, and I just don’t know what to say or do.

Not to mention my own daughter who is just reeling from her debilitation back problems.

I want to cry because I don’t know what to say….