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The question of temporality is a real issue for palliative care: When is the right time to introduce palliative care? When is the right time and the right method so that this proposal is not fatal on the psychic level but beneficial to the person and those around them? By trying too hard to anticipate the palliative approach, we run the risk of trivializing its gravity. Palliative care still resonates today as a sign of the fatal nature of an illness. Between too early and too late the real question is really how. Anticipating the worst is benevolent, while predicting the worst is to curse someone. Understanding a poor prognosis is a real psychological journey whose process is not predictable. Humans need to imagine themselves as having a future. We must allow patients to do so by recognizing the probable consequences of their illness while also reminding them that it is impossible to be certain about what their future will be: we can be concerned about it, while also leaving room for hope. It is not a question of lying, but of avoiding speaking ill of one's future.