As many of you know, my husband and true love, Steve, died a year ago, on the day we would have started driving home from Portugal. My journey since then is a tale I’ll share soon enough, but first – my Steve. I can’t leave his story hanging where I left it, and I’ve finally grown accustomed enough to the heartbreak to tell it. So, for those who loved him too, here are his last few weeks.

To recap –

You remember at the beginning of February he had some stomach pains that necessitated an early morning trip to the hospital? And that – after hitting a bump in the road – something shifted and the pain went, leaving us to conclude that maybe it was a hernia? 

When he first said he was in pain I’d immediately thought of his heart, of course. But he said it was his stomach, and I could feel and see a definite swelling starting to appear there, which is why I took him to the hospital in the first place.

He’d had his heart thoroughly checked out and a stent put in before we started travelling. But one artery had started to bleed as they tried to stent it (causing a heart attack) and so they’d left it as it was. We knew he wasn’t as good as new any more, but the drugs were working, they’d done all they could, and we’d been assurred he had plenty of years left.

So the story continues –

We get back from the hospital, relieved that the pain and the lump have disappeared, and get some sleep. He takes a couple of days to recover from the tenderness. He gets very tired and sleeps more than usual, but within a week he’s back to normal and raring to go. Even so, I’m not sorry that we’ll be home soon and I can get him properly checked out by our doctor.

Unfortunately, his sleeping position has changed to lesson the tenderness of his stomach, so he’s developed an ache in his hip. Not one to suffer any pain with stoicism, he immediately starts taking Ibuprofen and worrying that he’s going to need a new hip, probably this week, if not sooner.

At this point our plans are to drive up through Portugal, seeing the sights we missed on our first fling down, two years ago. But it is nearly carnival time and the one in Loule, nearby, is supposed to be a cracker. We decide to hang on for a couple of weeks to catch that, and to allow time for Steve’s hip to recover before he has to sit and drive all the way to Lisbon.

We do all the usual things: go for gentle walks, sit in cafes watching the world go by, check out Chinese shops and hardware stores for things that Georgie might need. We hold hands, cuddle lots, tell each other how much we love each other, say, ‘I can’t believe this is our life – we are so lucky.’

Steve downloads films for us to watch in the evening, curled up on the bed with the laptop, holding hands. Sometimes we search Youtube for music to play each other that describes how we feel. He plays me You’re the best person I know and I play him I’ll love you for a thousand years. We decide that Better, by Boyzone, might be our song.

We bask in knowing that, although we have hardly any money and none of the things that most people consider necessary, we are perfectly happy and totally in love. We have had a lovely time here, with our friends, in Moncarapacho, but are both itching to set off into the unknown again as soon as the carnivals are over.

The local do in Moncarapacho is on the same weekend as the one in Loule, but is a more low key affair: less political and more knob jokes, to be precise. Nonetheless, it is a lot of fun, and we sit outside Ana’s in the town square (where we’ve all just had lunch and plenty of wine) and watch as it circles around the town five times, getting more raucous with each lap.

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In the evening Steve’s ‘hernia’ plays up again, but not so painfully, and, to be honest, I’m not sure if his excessive use of Ibuprofen isn’t affecting him as well. I tell him to stop taking it so much, and rest up instead. I ask if he wants to go to the hospital again, but he says it’s not that bad. As a lifelong hypochondriac, I know he errs on the side of panic rather than patience when he’s ill, so if he says it’s ok then it probably is.

We’ve had many chats about his attitude to illness over the years, as I’d never previously encountered someone so prone to imagining themselves about to go down with something terrible and life threatening. My job is usually to try and calm him down, and then get him to describe his symptoms rationally. ‘I think I’ve got throat cancer,’ he’ll say. ‘Why?’ ‘Because it hurts.’ ‘So you have a sore throat?’ ‘Er, yes.’ You get the picture. 

He once conceded that I might have a point about his hypochondria, after he’d listened to a medical phone-in radio program on his drive home from work. ‘I honestly think I’ve got everything they described,’ he said, ‘including ectopic pregnancy.’

So, over the years, I’ve learnt to read between the lines a bit. Still, I’m keeping a close eye on him and am determined to make him see a doctor who isn’t Google the minute we get home. The thought of something serious happening to him or, worse, of him not being here, is so unbearable, so impossible to comprehend that I push it away.

He feels fine again the next day, which is a massive relief to me, so off we go to the Loule carnival. This is an eye-opener: apart from the many, brilliant, political, floats, there are troupes and troupes of scantily clad, shimmying, feathered and sequinned dancing girls. Some are completely naked apart from a tiny g-string, some body paint and stripper heels. And it isn’t even a particularly warm day.

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We both have our pictures taken with them. Steve, bashful, refuses to choose which girl to pose with, so I find a rather gorgeous lady with enormous … feathers for him to stand with.

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That night he has more stomach pain, and now I insist that he stop taking Ibuprofen. I am concerned, but also finding it hard to gauge exactly how much pain we’re talking about, considering his habit of exaggeration. He says it’s not bad enough to see a doctor, so I stop nagging about it and decide to wait and see. 

The next day we have a wine-tasting afternoon led by the Intrepids. Each person is to bring a bottle that costs no more than €2.50, and we’ll choose the best by a process of elimination. In the end, nine couples join in, so that’s nine bottles of wine to taste, and naturally the one we drink last is deemed the nicest, on account of no one can remember their own name let alone the taste of the first bottle.

There are some hangovers the next day, but Steve seems to be recovering well.

The day after, however, he wakes me at 7.30 in the morning, saying he thinks he’s broken a rib. Broken a rib? How? What have you been doing? Nothing, apparently, just sitting there hurting, but it hurts a lot now, so his rib must be broken, he says, pointing at a ribby/stomachey part of his body. You see what I’m dealing with? I bundle him straight into the car and take him to the hospital. I stay very calm and reassuring, mostly for his sake but also, partly, for my own.

At Faro they give him an ECG to check his heart, take blood to check his liver, an X-ray to look at his innards and them hook him up to an IV for a replenishing drip. The doctor who sees us afterwards has limited English but has the test results. The blood work is fine, the ECG is fine, but the X-ray has shown a swelling of the stomach. ‘Stomach big,’ he keeps saying, and draws a picture that looks like a bad raincloud. They give Steve €73 of drugs to help calm down the stomach acid and make his digestion easier, and to take away the pain while it heals.

I am so relieved that it isn’t his heart, and I realise just how scared I’ve been. He is confused that it isn’t a broken rib. But later in the day, when we look over the photos from the carnival, we can plainly see the distension in his stomach. Poor babe. Luckily, we don’t have to be back in the UK for a few weeks yet, so we can take our time letting him recover before we even think of setting off.

For the next few days Steve hardly eats, and sleeps a lot of the time. He is still cheerful, funny, sweet and engaging. We watch films together and play Carcassonne. At night it is too painful for him to lie down so I wrap him in blankets on the reclining chair, kiss him goodnight, and sleep with the door open so I can hear if he needs me. Without the Ibuprofen numbing everything out, he is in a lot of discomfort, but is still in good spirits. I’m worried, naturally, but keep reassuring myself by remembering that the ECG said his heart was good.

Each day he is a little better. By day five he is up and about, going to the Chinese shop with me, and enjoying a music quiz and happy hour over at Naomi and Pete’s. It looks like he’s finally getting back to himself again, although he’s lost a lot of weight from not eating. I joke fondly with the Intrepids about Steve’s hypochondria, and start to worry a bit less.

On day seven Brenda and John, of the Intrepids, have their farewell party. It is sixties themed and Steve gets all dressed up in his favourite ‘Jesus as a hippy’ T-shirt, and makes badges for himself. He lasts for an hour at the party, then, as he is still easily tired, goes off to bed. I stay, get legless, and discover that Leslie has a weird onesie that three people can fit inside.

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On day nine he declares himself to be out of pain at last and, although still tired, he’s feeling much more himself. He wants to pack up the van ready to leave in the morning. I agree on the condition that if he’s not up to it, we just stay a bit longer, and that we only go as far as he’s comfortable with and then stop.

He has a lovely, pain-free day, checking the engine, getting Georgie started (first time), making sure the generator is working properly etc. All the guys from the campsite cluster around as Steve lifts off the engine cover, and they all talk the kind of happy, vehicle related rubbish that I don’t understand and can’t join in. I sit drinking wine with Brenda and Sue, watching him having a brilliant time showing off his precious Georgie.

Then we go out for a final dinner at Antonio’s. We hold hands across the table and say romantic things. I am ridiculously pleased to see him have such a perfect day. That night – back in the same bed and no longer camped out on the chair – we say I love you, give each other a kiss, and curl up to sleep.

And I stupidly feel content again, and relieved, and I go to sleep instead of holding him as tightly as it’s possible to do, for as long as I can. And I should have, oh I should have; I should held him, held him, and held him. Because I wake, at six, to a deep, unfamiliar and intermittent coughing sound coming from the other room, and Steve saying, ‘Bev, I think I need your help.’

By the time I’ve jumped out of bed and got to him, his eyes are glazed and he won’t focus on me, won’t talk to me. I beg him to tell me what hurts, what’s happened, what’s wrong, can you get to the car or shall I call an ambulance? 

He doesn’t answer and I’m starting to panic now. He’s not clutching his heart or any of the things you see on movies, but something is obviously wrong. I don’t know if he’s exaggerating again or really, really ill, so I go and grab my phone to call the emergency services.

And then the coughing stops. 

And he’s gone. 

Just like that. 

And I pump his chest and call his name, dialling for an ambulance, and I’m pumping, blowing, calling. 

And my own hearts turns suddenly to ice and my world dies with him.

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Next time – I’ve told this wonderful man’s story as best I can, and words are inadequate to describe the vastness of the loss. But now my journey is a solo one, beginning with the problems of arranging a funeral in Portugal, within the specified 72 hours.

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