Hi Mignon,
Some people just want to cut to the chase, they say - "so, are you going to die". They just ask this straight out. I got the feeling that I was more of a spectacle; my life a spectator's sport. There was no relating going on at all, people distancing them selves emotionally, and I was on show. As it is always said - just when we need people the most too.
I understand that they don't know what to do or say, i get that but, I cannot help but perceive that it stems back to the values we have constructed as a society, eg, so much on materialism, about survival and sort of "running" and winning the race, at the expense of taking time to consider our lives, our relationships, and our journey, and share our experiences.
I bet there's a heap of things you want to say and share about your experience still, not to mention receive genuine emotional support for such an extreme situation as well.
It's not over, it never really is I don't think (although it get's easier), this stuff effects a person for the rest of their lives as it changes one's whole perceptions on what life is - maybe it undoes the programing that we have been in about the material race? Maybe that's part of the trauma? We change, and we are never the same. I call it "Eyes Wide Open".