St Columba's Hospice appeal: 'I had to tell her daddy wouldn't be coming home'

Published on Thursday 6 May 2010 10:08

AS LINSAY Black sat in the car with her four-year-old daughter Chloe, she could barely believe what she was about to say.

The pair were just outside St Columba's Hospice, where Chloe's dad, Linsay's husband, Douglas, was dying of cancer.

They had just been to visit, and Linsay recalls: "We went and sat outside in the car and I had to tell her that daddy wasn't going to come home. The hospice was fantastic, because they helped me with how to explain things. But I thought 'If I'd known I'd ever have to tell my child something like this . . .'" she breaks off, shaking her head in disbelief.

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That conversation came towards the end of a long, painful journey for the family – and the beginning of another for Linsay and Chloe, as they learned to cope without Douglas. But staff from St Columba's stood alongside them throughout, providing practical, medical and emotional support.

The couple, who married in 2000, were delighted when they found they were expecting Chloe. Douglas already had two sons from his first marriage, Andrew, now 17, and Sandy, 22, and had always wanted a big family. Chloe was Linsay's first child, and she was particularly pleased, because she had always wanted a daughter and knew that, at the age of 42, she was unlikely to have more children.

But within two years of Chloe's birth, Douglas was beginning to feel ill. Both he and his doctors put the 46-year-old lawyer's exhaustion and stomach problems down to stress.

Linsay, 50, who worked in PR and marketing, recalls: "He acted for Tony Singh when he bought Oloroso, and because Tony was working in the restaurant, all the meetings were at midnight and it was quite complicated. He was really unwell at Christmas, very exhausted and had stomach problems, but that's the way stress would manifest with Douglas. Most of the doctors said, 'How old are you? What do you do? It's stress.'"

Eventually, however, they saw a consultant at Murrayfield Hospital. Linsay says: "The doctor said: 'You've got an ulcer' – which as it turned out was the least of our worries – 'and there's a tumour on your bowel, but because you've got a lot of bowel we can remove that.'

"We went home, and because he said you can take that out, we were concerned, but not terrified. Then we went back to see a consultant surgeon. The surgeon said 'There's really no easy way to say this, but it's a lot worse than we had thought because the cancer has spread to your liver, and it's treatable, but not curable.'"

As Linsay wept, Douglas asked how long he had left, but the doctor couldn't say. Linsay says: "You don't really understand 'treatable but not curable'. Does that mean you'll live as long as you would otherwise, but you'll need medical treatment? It was only much later when we were seeing an oncologist and she said the average from diagnosis was 20 months."

That would have given him until February 2007, but in fact Douglas did not have even that long. After diagnosis he had surgery and was very ill, but recovered and moved on to aggressive chemotherapy, which was "just awful", Linsay says.

Although still unwell, he returned to work in the autumn, "I think mainly because he was the kind of person who thought: 'I know I'm going to die and I've got to do whatever I can to provide for my family'," Linsay says.

St Columba's began to help the family, the outreach team visiting them at home in Duddingston with medical support and persuading Douglas to ration his energy carefully. They also helped the couple discuss the illness with Chloe.

"She was aware obviously that her dad was unwell because he was at home a lot more. She was only three-ish, so we said 'Dad's not well', but not ' . . . and he's going to die'," Linsay recalls.

Then came a very difficult decision – to forego a second bout of chemotherapy. Douglas's oncologist warned the couple it would be much tougher than the first, and had only a 20 per cent chance of adding another three months to his life. They decided it was just not worth it, and St Columba's became an even more essential part of life, staff visiting Douglas at home every day as his condition deteriorated.

Remarkably composed as she recounts her husband's failing health, there is one memory which causes Linsay to falter. "At that stage his doctor said to me, 'He's not going to make it until February. He'll probably get the summer but not much more,' and I had to tell him that. He said 'I'm not going to get another Christmas, then?'"

Wiping away a tear, Linsay reflects: "But at least he wasn't in pain." And that was thanks to the hospice staff. With their help, Douglas was able to stay at home until a few days before he died.

Linsay says: "One day Sandy came through to see his dad, and we'd had a nice day but just at tea time he dramatically worsened and lapsed almost into a coma quite suddenly. I phoned the hospice and they called an ambulance. I came in with him and got him into a room and the doctor said 'We'll get him settled, you go home and get some sleep,' which I didn't, of course."

Douglas did not regain consciousness, and it was then that Linsay had to explain to Chloe that her daddy wouldn't return home. Just a few days later Linsay popped away from the hospice to have tea with her parents. As she was leaving to return to her husband's bedside, the hospice called. Douglas had died.

"I just felt so awful that I wasn't with him," she says. "I came back in and they sat with me. I spent some time with him and they were great, they put a little rose on his pillow and things like that."

And so began a whole new life of fresh challenges for Linsay and Chloe, still supported by St Columba's. Linsay received counselling on how to handle unexpected questions from her daughter. "I got random questions coming out of nowhere. I can cope with 'Is daddy in heaven?' that's fine, but 'How did he get to heaven?'"

The support the pair of them received set them in good stead. Chloe, now eight, is thriving, popular and happy, top of her class at school last year.

And now they are helping other youngsters learn about death and dying. When St Columba's decided to produce educational materials for schoolchildren, Linsay and Chloe tested them. Linsay talks to pupils about her family's experiences.

It gives her strength, and, she says, an ongoing link with her husband. "When I said that I would do it," she says, "I felt Douglas on my shoulder saying 'Good for you'."