‘We love to make a difference’
Meet a couple who fell in love over their passion for nursing and are now both life-changers for Marie Curie
‘It’s our job to respond to urgent calls from district nurses, GPs or the patient’s family’
As husband and wife Richard and Jean Gamlin are obviously devoted to each other. But an even bigger passion in their lives is working together for Marie Curie to bring comfort and care for those facing a terminal illness. The husband and wife are both part of Marie Curie’s Rapid Response Team in County Durham, providing palliative and end of life care to patients and their families in their homes who are dealing with a variety of terminal conditions from cancer to motor neurone disease.
Richard has been involved with Marie Curie for most of his life, having started as a volunteer with the charity when he read as a teenager about a little boy who’d died from cancer. There and then he decided that he wanted to help make a difference by volunteering at his local hospice.
From there he trained as a nurse and has worked in palliative care for most of his career. As soon as he met Jean on an online dating site, he could tell she was a kindred spirit who could do something similar. “Jean is a very caring person and I could see she was made for palliative and end of life care,” says Richard. Before long, he persuaded Jean to move from her nursing practice to join Marie Curie.
“Our job as Rapid Response nurses is to respond to urgent calls from district nurses, GPs or the patient’s family and help the patient deal with their symptoms, whether that’s pain or nausea or agitation. We also support families at the end of a patient’s life, which requires a great deal of sensitivity,” says Richard. “We see families who are in pain and grieving, and we do everything in our power to relieve that pain and distress.”
While the couple, who were married in September 2017, often work different shifts, they regularly bump into one another while they’re working, typically when one takes over the care of a patient as the other’s shift is coming to an end. “Our
jobs do sometimes cross over, but we’re always total professionals who happen to be working in the same office,” says Jean.
But doing the same job means they understand each other’s emotional challenges in their day-to-day work. Last December they sacrificed their Christmas Day together to spend it helping others. Jean says: “It brought us both a sense of peace knowing we were able to help another family get through the day as that’s the true meaning of Christmas after all, helping others. “Even though we cannot cure the people we come into contact with, we can make their last days on earth peaceful and that’s the biggest motivation for both of us.
“The relatives who are left behind are in our thoughts too and we’re there to support them when they feel the need to contact us. I’m so proud that this is something we do together.”
■ If you, or someone you know, has been affected by a terminal illness and need support contact Marie Curie call 0800 0902309 or visit www.mariecurie.org.uk