‘We’re learning to live alongside the grief’
THE widow of a health campaigner who died of cancer says she is “learning to live alongside the grief” almost a year after his death.
Rebecca Williams, from Bangor, supported her husband Irfon throughout his treatment for cancer following his diagnosis in January 2014, but he died in May last year at the age of 46.
He became well known for lobbying the Welsh Government to end the inequality which saw patients living in England benefiting from lifeenhancing drug Cetuximab while patients in Wales could not.
Mrs Williams, a nurse specialising in children’s mental health, told the Daily Post: “I’m feeling better. Things are improving. The grief is still there.
“Things are settling down – I have more good days than bad, and the periods between the grief are longer every hour and every day. It’s learning to live alongside the grief.”
Mrs Williams has been back at work, which takes her all over North Wales, for a month, working three days a week.
“It’s getting back to a routine,” said Mrs Williams.
“It’s being able to have different things to think about.
“I have had to adjust to the situation of being a single parent. It’s never planned, is it?” Mrs Williams said she had been helped by her children’s grandparents, especially with taking Siôn, eight, and Ianto, six, to school. Mr Williams, who worked as a mental health nurse, was also a father to Lois, 23, Owen, 19, and Beca, 16.
Mrs Williams said: “They are doing really well considering the situation. We’re all taking each day as it comes.”
Speaking about the publication next month of Fighting Chance, the English version of Mr Williams’ autobiography, which was published in Welsh last year, she said: “Irfon wanted to reach both Welsh speakers and non-Welsh speakers.
“He wanted it to inspire people and help them through their experience of cancer or other illnesses.”
In the book, Mr Williams tells readers not to accept “what the politicians and doctors tell you”, adding: “After all, everyone has the right to live.”
In the introduction, Mrs Williams wrote: “This is the autobiography of a loving husband, proud father and a Welshman to the core.”
Nia Roberts, who edited the book, said Mr Williams wrote all of it apart from the last three chapters when he was too weak and she typed his words.
She said: “He writes about his childhood and training to be a nurse – which made him stronger and more able to deal with the cancer.
“He was determined to finish the book to show his battle to get the drug Cetuximab available for cancer patients in Wales.
“He wanted people to question decisions made by doctors and in everyday life.”
Fighting Chance is published by Carreg Gwalch on April 15.