14 May 2023 started as a normal day for Peter, 74, and Patricia (pictured), who live in Middlesex. Peter is a retired civil servant and Patricia is a freelance tutor. At 6 pm, Peter wished one of Patricia’s students “Good luck” for an exam the following day. Half an hour later Peter had a haemorrhagic stroke and his life changed dramatically forever.
Peter’s health had been deteriorating since 1991 when he developed epilepsy, followed by arthritis and hearing loss. “But the stroke was a huge shock”, says Patricia. “I rang my daughter who was on her way over with my grandson. She phoned for an ambulance and Peter was in Charing Cross Hospital in central London for the next three weeks. Complications arose and several times we were informed that we might be near the end.”
Touch and go
Peter was then transferred to West Middlesex Hospital. “Fortunately Peter was entrusted to a professor whose approach is to give stroke patients time, rather than assuming they will not make it”, says Patricia. “For many weeks it was touch and go, but this approach proved right. Peter came home on 14 August.”
“We are blessed to have Peter at home but every day is very challenging and looking after his needs is time-consuming”, says Patricia. Peter is completely bed and chairbound, being paralysed on his right side. At night he is on a catheter, and he has to use incontinence pads day and night. Carers come four times a day to wash and change him and to administer medication.
The value of every life
Peter and Patricia have always believed in the value of every human life. Their two daughters were adopted from China. Eloise is a highly skilled children’s nurse and Christina is a talented young designer.
“A turning point in Peter’s recovery came last June”, Patricia recalls. “I told Peter that Christina was being invited to prestigious interviews following her graduate show. As I said, ‘Our little girl!’, he squeezed my hand and smiled, and we remembered the one-year-old we adopted in Guangzhou and how her artistic talent had emerged at an early age.”
Both Peter and Patricia are opposed to assisted suicide. “The time for people to die is when it is the right time for them to go, not when they or anyone else decides,” says Patricia. “What terrifies me about assisted suicide is that no human being is omniscient, and doctors should never believe that they are, no matter their skill and experience. We just don’t know how long someone has to live.
“Today, Peter is very much living, excited about the arrival of a new grandchild. He is still very interested in current affairs. I read him articles from The Spectator. His speech is clearer every day and, ironically, his hearing, which was becoming a real problem before the stroke, seems improved, possibly because he is aware he has to concentrate more.”
Shock and confrontation
Patricia is candid about the huge impact of an event like her husband’s stroke which puts both the patients and their loved ones in an extremely vulnerable situation: “There is the shock and there is the confrontation with medical staff who all seem to talk a different language.”
“Several doctors seemed genuinely surprised that we did not immediately say that Peter would prefer not to live a disabled life”, Patricia remembers. “Peter was fragile, but so were we. We were so fortunate that Eloise understood all the technical terms and jargon, questioned and challenged staff and was then able to explain to us what was happening. But how many families have that privilege?”
Patricia is also concerned that if the law is changed, remarks made by a patient could be interpreted as a wish for assisted suicide. “In the early days of Peter being at home, one afternoon he said to me, ‘This isn’t living’, as he sat waiting to be changed, unable to do anything for himself. But I knew that he was thinking about how he could carry on, and not should he carry on. I told him that he had come so far since the stroke and that we loved him very much.”
If assisted suicide was legal and inevitably became part of the system, Patricia worries that other families facing a similar situation would be at risk. How many very sick people and their families will properly understand what is being said, if assisted suicide is suggested, and what the implications are? Less articulate people could well end up saying something they do not fully mean. If their first language is not English, no matter how fluent the speaker, the strain of caring for a sick relative could cause incomprehension.
Small precious moments
Peter is part of a loving family. His three-year-old grandson insists on being “the doctor” when he comes to visit, helping Patricia fill syringes for supplementary liquid. Peter loves to hear his grandson talking about visits to the park. Small, precious family moments such as these make Peter’s life positive.
There have been many times in the 42 years of their marriage when Patricia has lived through the vows she and Peter made to each other – “for better, for worse, in sickness and in health.”
“When Peter became epileptic aged 41, I hadn’t thought I could love him more tenderly but found that I could”, says Patricia. “Last year, when we thought he was about to die, for weeks I was saying a line from a poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning: ‘I shall but love thee better after death’”.
“Peter is fantastic”, says Patricia. “He has surprised us all.” Peter and Patricia show us why assisted suicide is so wrong. It will kill the most vulnerable people and it will kill real love at the time it is most needed.
