The one lesson I’ve learned from life

Andrew Strauss is one of the most successful cricket captains of all time and guided the English team to Ashes victories in 2009 and 2011. He lives with his children, Sam, 14, and Luca, 11. MY WIFE’S CANCER TAUGHT ME HOW TO LIVE

WITHOUT a doubt, it’s my late wife Ruth who’s been the single biggest influence on my life. When we met in Sydney in 1998, I was blown away by her incredible love of life.

She also had empathy for people less fortunate than herself. Ruth forced me to realise my family’s way had been about achievement and being successful, while Ruth’s was about fulfilment and making a difference.

Her cancer diagnosis, at the end of 2017, came right out of the blue. We were thrust into a whole new world and, together with our boys, we had to find a way to navigate it. She was a big believer in having difficult conversations about death.

‘I need to feel prepared for what’s to come and then I can get on with living,’ she would say. We made the most of every day — going to see the Northern Lights in Sweden and taking day trips.

After she died in December 2018, I set up the Ruth Strauss Foundation, to fund research into non-smoking lung cancer — which is what she died of — and also to provide emotional support for families facing the loss of a parent.

I know what a difference it makes when you are grieving to have friends who are willing to go there with you and let you talk and cry.

I came out of it all thinking I wasn’t going to sweat the small stuff or worry about what people thought of me. I feel comfortable just being myself.

Lockdown’s brought that home, too. When you’re not rushing around, it makes you ask yourself: ‘How much of that rushing around was important?’

What we’ve been through has made me realise how important our families are. Everything else is secondary.

Now my motivation for doing things is different and my focus has switched from achievement to fulfilment. I’m running the London Marathon in October to raise funds for the Foundation in Ruth’s memory. It feels like I’m doing the right thing by her. She was a very special woman.