A Mum’s Love… Dying words For Her Boys
These were Johnathan’s wife’s heartbreaking final words
As she stepped into the ambulance Jolene collapsed
As soon as I saw Jolene, I knew. I was 18, she was 16, and in my sister Louise’s class in college. I spotted her one afternoon when I met Louise for our lift home.
‘Who’s your friend?’ I badgered in the car.
I found Jolene on Facebook and nervously sent her a message.
Hi, I’m Louise’s brother… We got chatting, then we started meeting during lunchbreaks at college.
We had our first kiss in the corridor between lessons.
I was head over heels. Jolene was gorgeous, bubbly and so much fun.
On Christmas Day 2011, I got down on one knee at her mum’s house.
‘You’re the love of my life,’ I told her. ‘Will you be my wife?’
‘Yes!’ she sobbed, putting her hands over her mouth.
Jolene was desperate to be a mummy, so as soon as we moved in together in 2012 we started trying.
The wedding plans went on hold because she wanted a family first.
Such joy
In October 2013, Alfie came along, and a year and a half later we had Theo. ‘Let’s slow down a bit,’ I laughed afterwards. Jolene wanted to try for a third straightaway, but I talked her out of it. ‘Let’s wait until Theo is 2,’ I told her. Immediately after Theo’s second birthday, she asked if we could try for another. ‘OK, I’m a man of my word,’ I laughed to Jolene.
Money was tight, even though I was taking extra shifts as a factory worker, but we’d manage somehow.
A couple of months later, in June 2017, I noticed Jolene was munching ginger biscuits.
She’d craved them when she was expecting the boys.
‘Do you think you could be pregnant?’ I asked.
The next day, we bought a test and she went to the loo while I stayed with the boys.
‘Jay, come here,’ she shouted five minutes later.
I knew what that meant.
‘Are we having a baby?’ I yelled, taking the stairs two at a time.
She’d done three tests and they were all positive.
The next day, she went to the doctor, who said she was about nine weeks gone. Excited, we told our families. ‘Let’s not delay the wedding any longer,’ I told her. ‘Let’s get married before you have this baby.’
‘Perfect,’ she beamed. We discussed a small family ceremony.
But, that week, Jolene wasn’t feeling well.
She was shattered and out of breath even climbing the stairs.
We put it down to normal tiredness.
She’d got terrible morning sickness and Alfie had chickenpox, so that Saturday night, after getting the kids to sleep, we had an early night.
But at 3am, Jolene sat up in bed, struggling to breathe.
Something wrong
‘There, there, love,’ I soothed, rubbing her back.
Jolene could be a panicker, but I knew how to calm her down, and eventually she went back to sleep.
But at 7.30am she was up... ‘Babe,’ she gasped. ‘There’s something really wrong. I need to see a doctor.’
Jolene’s sister Sarah-louise lived just round the corner, so I dropped the boys at her house.
By this time, Jolene was getting worse, so
I dialled 999.
Paramedics arrived
with us within minutes.
‘I can’t breathe,’ Jolene gasped as they checked her. ‘We’d better take you to hospital,’ the medics decided. We supported her out of the house and slowly led her towards the ambulance. But suddenly Jolene turned to me.
‘Tell the boys I love them,’ she gasped.
There was a look in her eyes I’d never seen before. My blood ran cold. She was saying goodbye. ‘Don’t be daft,’ I replied, heart pounding. ‘You’ll be fine.’ But as soon as she stepped into the ambulance, Jolene collapsed.
The paramedics started giving her CPR...
Kiss goodbye
I was pushed out of the way as they used a defibrillator to shock Jolene’s heart.
‘What’s happening?’ I shouted.
They worked on her for 45 minutes outside our house before blue-lighting us to Craig Avon hospital, where doctors continued.
But it was no use.
‘I’m so sorry,’ they told me, surrounded by Jolene’s family. ‘There’s nothing we can do.’
Tears streamed down my face as I went to say goodbye.
Jolene looked so fragile lying there, surrounded by wires and machines.
‘I’ll always love you,’ I told her, kissing her forehead.
Numb, I drove home to break the news to our boys. They needed to hear it from me.
‘Mummy is with the moon and stars now,’ I explained, choking back tears. ‘But she’ll always be watching over you.’
I told them she loved them, just as she’d asked.
Alfie, 3, seemed to take it in but Theo was still 2, too young to understand.
Jolene’s funeral was packed. The boys put teddies and family photos into her coffin and I wrote a poem that was read out in church.
Preliminary reports found that Jolene died of a pulmonary embolism, where a blood clot travels to the lungs.
So Sarah-louise and I began raising money for charity Thrombosis UK.
Jolene was the love of my life, and she gave me two beautiful children.
I keep going for them, and for Jolene.
Her dying words were to tell her boys that she loved them.
It’s my job to make sure they never doubt it for a second.
mummy’s with the moon and stars now...