Objective: to understand the experience of rural families who remain in halfway houses during the cancer treatment of an adult family member.
Methods: qualitative research based on Symbolic Interaction and narrative research. Seven rural families participated in the study, 14 people staying in halfway houses in Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. The data obtained through interviews from November 2010 to May 2011 were analyzed with emphasis on content.
Results: the three themes were: halfway houses as a reference for permanence during treatment, everyday life and living together in the halfway house.
Conclusions: the experience was marked by the need to adapt to a context other than the rural one, with specific rules and routines, with discomforts and confrontations with urban culture characteristics and with what is experienced by other families who are also facing disease, which contributed to reframe the experience itself.