Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
My wife’s dementia is worse but our love will Ex-sex Pistol is full-time carer never die
Devoted ex-sex Pistols’ star Lydon now her full-time carer
PUNK legend John Lydon has told how he is now full-time carer for his wife Nora as she struggles with the debilitating effects of dementia.
Best known as snarling Sex Pistols’ frontman Johnny Rotten, the 64-year-old revealed a softer side as he spoke tenderly about his wife of 35 years.
He said: “Nora has Alzheimer’s... I am her full-time carer and I won’t let anyone mess up with her head.
“For me the real person is still there. That person I love is still there every minute of every day and that is my life. It’s unfortunate that she forgets things, well, don’t we all?”
Lydon and 78-yearold Nora, a German publishing heiress, wed in 1979. He first revealed she had dementia around a year ago. Famed for controversial 1977 punk anthem God Save The Queen, Lydon said: “I suppose her condition is one of like a permanent hangover for her. It gets worse and worse, bits of the brain store less and less memory and then suddenly some bits completely vanish.” He also told how the couple had searched out experts in their quest for the best possible care as Nora’s condition deteriorated.
“It’s quite amazing as the alleged experts we have had to deal with at enormous expense have said that they have been very impressed that she never ever forgets me, we are constantly there with each other [in her mind] and that bit won’t go,” he said. “Why pay for professionals to work on this when I think the message is a bit of love goes a long way.”
And he insists Nora will never go into a care home in Los Angeles where they now live, despite the strain of her illness, which has been magnified by the coronavirus pandemic. “I am under lockdown anyway because I am her full-time carer. I don’t need to go out and socialise with buttholes,” he added.
However the rocker is frustrated that the pandemic has scuppered gigs for his band, Public Image Ltd.
He said: “We would have been playing all the way through this. Doing it next year isn’t good enough. There’s been no income so I am f***ing furious and none of this, let me tell you, I don’t care how communist you believe you are, none of it works without a penny in the bank.”