You have all my sympathy. I don’t know cancer stages but, as someone who was diagnosed to not have much more than a fe months at most a year to live many, many years ago, I know it can be worth double or even triple-checking. Seeing another specialist was a revelation for me as the new doctor she, well, she did not contradict the first doctor diagnosis but instead she suggested me a new experimental treatment the other doctor (a very nice but also a much older lady) was apparently not even aware existed.

How to talk about it with your family depends entirely of your relationship with each of your family member. There is no such thing as one right way to tell them all.

I would only tell people I trust, that’s for sure. And there aren’t that many. Then, I would decide to which of those people I love I can tell, and how much I can tell, and how. Some, no matter how close we can be, I would not tell them anything.

I mean, when I was persuaded my time was coming, we talked openly about it with my spouse. We discussed absolutely every single aspect of what was to happen like the two (back then young) adults we were supposed to be, two persons caring one for the other. We talked openly because that is how we had always done it when faced with any serious issue, like we still do today. But I would not have talked like that with anyone else. Certainly not with my parents.

No matter how much we love them, many people simply aren’t wired for 100% honest talk, and can’t stand those kind of hard truth without being overwhelmed by denial and emotions (some of which can become very problematic when heartbreaking decisions and choices must be made), the kind emotions you may yourself not want to deal with at that time (I certainly did not want to).