How to talk to children about Alzheimer’s: ‘Don’t hold everything back – they are resilient’
For Lottie, however, the gradual loss of the grandmother she knew was trickier to manage. “The biggest thing for me was watching nannie lose her smile,” Lottie…
‘I’ve known lots of people who beat cancer and lots who didn’t – you can’t get to my age and not’
On a cold winter’s day, I’m greeted at the door of Maggie’s cancer centre in West London by actress Hermione Norris. It is warm inside, very warm,…
‘Doing the Duke of Edinburgh scheme, I was just Jamie; I wasn’t that ‘care kid’, I wasn’t the ‘bad boy’
By the age of five, Jamie Dalgoutte had lived with 14 foster families. “People just didn’t have the capacity to love a child like me because I…
Janet Ellis: ‘My husband’s cancer wasn’t curable – we knew we wouldn’t be silver-haired together’
There is something a little disconcerting, but terribly moving, about Janet’s ability to talk so openly about her loss. She is, she says, incredibly grateful that she…
‘I felt I had nothing to live for until my dog Rosie came into my life’
“At first she cried and cried,” Sue says. “But as the days went on the crying lessened, and I could see she was settling. After 10 days…
Jonathan Pryce: ‘It’s a scandal my aunt had to sell her home to pay for dementia care’
Back in the Seventies when Pryce, fresh from Rada, was starting his career at Liverpool’s Everyman Theatre, his father, Isaac, was attacked in his grocery shop in…
‘My ex-partner would take his anger out on my dog – I’d rather he hurt me’
‘Sometimes it can be difficult when the dogs go back to their owners. I seem to feel a special attachment to the ones who’ve caused me the…
The lives changed by meeting the real Duke of Edinburgh
When Simpson’s name was called, she walked into the ballroom where an orchestra was playing on the balcony. She curtseyed for the Duke and shook his hand….