Tamsin Pearce
Jo's Jolly Box
Fundraising for Marie Curie
Story
In the ten years that our mum Jo Pearce (Darke) had cancer, she chose to
live.
Trips to Japan, China, India and numerous other exciting places were annoyingly interrupted with trips to the Royal Free chemo ward. Celebration meals were tempered by a decreasing appetite and interest in food, but never cancelled. Frequent stays in the Royal Free Hospital presented opportunities to make new friends with an endless stream of roommates and their visitors, and provided the most spectacular views of Hampstead Heath, Mum's London home turf.
Plans were never abandoned, just amended and revised. The care and attention of the NHS and the Royal Free Hospital was second to none, and without doubt enabled Mum to reach her 70s, in pretty good shape. But when Mum's choice to live was no longer an option, the love and support provided by the Marie Curie Hospice in Hampstead was breathtakingly generous.
Asked in her final week how she felt about being in the hospice, mum replied, with a huge smile, 'pampered'. And that applies to all of us, her family, too. The Marie Curie hospice is staffed by actual angels. Nothing is too much for them and no words can really do justice to the services provided for us all. The hospice pampered my mum, for free, for her ten final days on this planet and for that we will be eternally grateful.
So if, like a dear friend of ours said, you think Jo Pearce was 'a top bird', and you happen to find some spare coppers down the back of your sofa, I invite you to put them in this pot. The hospice exists on NHS funding and donations. It provides 5* care to a standard matched only by the very best hotels in London. Anything we can give will make a difference, as it did for us and Mum.
Thank you, from the Pearce/Darke/Lawson rabble x
Trips to Japan, China, India and numerous other exciting places were annoyingly interrupted with trips to the Royal Free chemo ward. Celebration meals were tempered by a decreasing appetite and interest in food, but never cancelled. Frequent stays in the Royal Free Hospital presented opportunities to make new friends with an endless stream of roommates and their visitors, and provided the most spectacular views of Hampstead Heath, Mum's London home turf.
Plans were never abandoned, just amended and revised. The care and attention of the NHS and the Royal Free Hospital was second to none, and without doubt enabled Mum to reach her 70s, in pretty good shape. But when Mum's choice to live was no longer an option, the love and support provided by the Marie Curie Hospice in Hampstead was breathtakingly generous.
Asked in her final week how she felt about being in the hospice, mum replied, with a huge smile, 'pampered'. And that applies to all of us, her family, too. The Marie Curie hospice is staffed by actual angels. Nothing is too much for them and no words can really do justice to the services provided for us all. The hospice pampered my mum, for free, for her ten final days on this planet and for that we will be eternally grateful.
So if, like a dear friend of ours said, you think Jo Pearce was 'a top bird', and you happen to find some spare coppers down the back of your sofa, I invite you to put them in this pot. The hospice exists on NHS funding and donations. It provides 5* care to a standard matched only by the very best hotels in London. Anything we can give will make a difference, as it did for us and Mum.
Thank you, from the Pearce/Darke/Lawson rabble x