A WORCESTER daughter is hoping to hit all the right notes with an event in aid of St Richard’s Hospice to thank staff for the ‘amazing’ care shown to her mother.
Gillian Pat Barlow – who was known as Pat – was admitted to St Richard’s in June 2015, after being diagnosed with lung cancer earlier that year.
Mrs Barlow, a former nursing sister and magistrate from Worcester, became so unwell her daughter, Anne Eyre, decided to contact St Richard’s.
Pat settled into the hospice the next day and remained in the care of staff until she passed away at the age of 68 earlier this year.
Mrs Eyre, 42 from St John’s, said: “From the moment she arrived at St. Richard’s, waiting for mum to die stopped being so agonising. She felt safe and secure.
“Mum knew that the hospice would look after and enable her to die with dignity and with her pain well-managed.
“She also knew that it would give us the time and space to make some memories, especially with her two grandsons.
“My mum dying was undoubtedly hard but I believe strongly that it would have been much harder without the support of St. Richard’s,” she added.
An emotional Mrs Eyre revealed her mum told staff how she wished to die on her first day at the Wildwood Drive hospice
“By doing this and being listened to, she was released from some of her fears and was able to find the strength to live again, to enjoy spending time with her family and friends instead of just waiting for the end.
“My then two-year-old Matthew visited her with me every day and still remembers sitting on her bed whilst she read to him.
“William, then six, used to play in the beautiful gardens, popping in and out of his nana’s room with tales of ducks, beautiful flowers and the ‘dingle-dangle tree’.
“And, no longer worried she would die frightened or in pain or trying to work out how I could help her, I was able to sit by my beautiful mum’s bedside every evening being her daughter.
“In the peace of the setting summer sun, I read her favourite book to her, we chatted, we laughed, we held hands and sometimes we cried,” she added.
Following her death, Mrs Eyre and her children have continued to be supported by the hospice with counselling and she still visits the hospice’s Sacred Space to light a candle in her mum’s memory.
Her eldest son, now aged eight, has been helped by the Family Support Team and there will be support for Matthew, as he grows older.
“Perhaps I might have thought that returning to the hospice would be painful after Mum died there but it isn’t; the whole building is suffused with love, respect, positivity, understanding, compassion and comfort,” she said.
“The hospice is like the best friend I can imagine having, always there and always noticing when I need them.”
Mrs Eyre and her friend, the lead singer of local rock and pop covers band Witcher, Jo Hardie, are organising a fund-raising gig for St Richard’s on Friday
The gig will be held at Pitmaston Primary School on Malvern Road and doors open at 7.30pm.
There will be a licenced bar, raffle and auction and tickets are just £5 each.
Tickets can be requested by e-mailing [email protected] or sending a message to the Witcher Facebook page.
Visit www.strichards.org.uk for more information about the hospice.
