“Don’t buy me anything for Christmas” dad said.  He didn’t like us to “waste our money on him when he probably wouldn’t be around long enough to enjoy it”.  My dad had been diagnosed with prostate cancer five years before and after a couple of painful and unsuccessful operations, plus radiation treatment and chemotherapy,  the doctors had finally told us there was nothing more they could do.  For the last three years my dad had been slowly dying.  Watching him painfully fighting this thing had taken its toll on the rest of the family, especially my mum, who had been his main carer throughout. 

It’s hard enough watching someone you love die but I felt as though I was also watching my mum die with him.  She wouldn’t admit she wasn’t coping but I knew.  She became frail but her pride wouldn’t let her ask for help.  In the end I asked for help.  The nurses were fantastic.  Respite care was organised immediately.  Someone was there listening to my mum, and they were still there for her right up to the end.  Through our grief, I don’t think we ever properly thanked those nurses for what they did.  They’re amazing. 

Macmillan Cancer Support provides those nurses and many other kinds of support to people with cancer and to the families of people with cancer.  They are funded by the generosity of the public without which they could not continue to provide this valuable support.  Please help me to say a big thank you to them by supporting me in my challenge to climb Kilimanjaro to raise funds to help more people.  I pray you never need their support but it would be nice to know that if someone you knew ever needed them, they would be there.

I did buy my dad a Christmas present that year.  A Ken Dodd DVD.  When I told dad it only lasted 1 hour and 20 minutes he laughed.  And he did enjoy it.

My dad died eight months later.