Interior battle
Laurence Llewelyn-bowen on his father and leukaemia
It was “a dark, complicated time”, is how Laurence Llewelyn-bowen describes the trauma of his father’s rapid death from blood cancer when he was a child. His mother Patricia, a teacher already battling multiple sclerosis and struggling to walk, subsequently had to fight to keep the family – nineyear-old Laurence and his younger brother and sister – together.
“It sounds as though I was brought up in some Dickensian novel, but it wasn’t like that at all,” insists the flamboyant style guru, now 54.
Today, Llewelyn-bowen – who shot to fame on TV’S Changing Rooms in the Nineties and has forged a hugely successful interior design career – is as confident, open and charming in real life as he is on screen.
But, he admits: “When I was young, I used to dread people asking me about my family and my parents because I would have to say what happened, and I could see people getting really sad.”
He was eight when his father Trevor, an eminent Harley Street orthopaedic surgeon, was diagnosed with leukaemia at Christmas time in 1973. He died seven months later in July, 1974, aged 42.
In his new role as ambassador for the national Make Blood Cancer Visible campaign, Llewelyn-bowen is speaking out about the “huge impact” of his father’s death, to help raise awareness of symptoms and treatment for a cancer which, he points out, claims more lives than breast or prostate cancer.
“I wouldn’t want any other child to go through what me and my family went through,” he says.
He vividly remembers that Christmas 46 years ago, when, unbeknown to him, his father’s cancer had taken a hold.
“My father was very successful and worked incredibly hard to create the ‘perfect life’ for his family, but it meant we didn’t see much of him,” he says. “I’d so looked forward to the holiday to spend time with him, and look back with some guilt now to think how grumpy and sulky I was, and not a very nice son because he wasn’t well. I just felt so disappointed and cheated of rare special time with him.”
He and his siblings only saw their father twice more before he died.
“In those days, there was something almost shameful about being diagnosed with cancer – it was a death sentence and people were expected to shuffle away into a dark corner and that was it,” he explains.
His father spent his time in hospital or a hospice. “His illness wasn’t discussed, so it was a period of such silence and remoteness. Apart from knowing he was very sick, we children didn’t understand what was going on. Not only that, other people around us didn’t understand about blood cancers, nor had they heard of leukaemia.”
When his father did return to the house for a visit at Easter, it was a shock. “The spread of the disease was incredibly quick. My father had to undergo horribly invasive chemotherapy. When he came home for about a week, he had no hair and was wearing a wig.
“I was totally unprepared to see him like that,” Llewelyn-bowen recalls. “He must have felt appalling and couldn’t cope with talking. Really, he just wanted to stay in bed and be left alone.
“It was a complicated period, but when I look back on it, I don’t see it as a tragic time. I don’t think it damaged me. It showed me very early on that there is a fragility to everything we take for granted, but it also showed me how much you have to appreciate what you’ve got.”
He’s driven to make people more aware of blood cancers – “this insidious, evil disease” – so symptoms can be recognised quickly and people can receive early treatment.
“The earlier you catch it, the better are your chances of surviving,” he urges. “If you pick up on symptoms and check it out with a GP, there are hugely improved treatments out there.”
He and his wife Jackie, who’ve been married 30 years, by sad coincidence have a shared experience of maternal illness. Her mother, Diana, also has multiple sclerosis.
“We’re aware that there may be some kind of propensity in the family for MS, but you can’t live your life worrying about something that is probably very unlikely to affect you or your family,” Llewelyn-bowen says philosophically.
Instead, he focuses on relishing his own family life. The couple’s daughters – Cecile, 24, plus her husband and son, Albion, two, and Hermione, 21, along with her partner – all live together.
“Having my family around me is incredible. I know only too well how fortunate I am to have time as a father with my children and my wonderful grandson – time my father was cruelly denied.
“I think you simply have to enjoy and appreciate what you have,” says Llewelyn-bowen. “So often we forget to do that but I know how important that is.” n
Laurence Llewelyn-bowen is celebrity ambassador for the 2019 Make Blood Cancer Visible campaign. Visit makebloodcancervisible.co.uk
“The earlier you catch it, the better are your chances of surviving”