{"id":334336,"date":"2025-08-10T23:31:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-10T23:31:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/334336\/"},"modified":"2025-08-10T23:31:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-10T23:31:19","slug":"husband-opens-up-on-wifes-tragic-diagnosis-after-she-got-lost-in-primark-for-2-hours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/334336\/","title":{"rendered":"Husband opens up on wife’s tragic diagnosis after she got lost in Primark for 2 hours"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paul Furness said: “She isn\u2019t going to get better, she\u2019s going to get worse. We do things with her like going on holiday so we can make memories – but really, those are memories for me and my daughters.”<\/p>\n

The husband of a woman diagnosed with Young Onset Alzheimer\u2019s<\/a> at just 56 has shared an insight into what life is really like as a carer <\/a>for his spouse.<\/p>\n

Paul Furness thought wife Nicola\u2019s breast cancer <\/a>and a double mastectomy 10 years ago would be their biggest challenge.<\/p>\n

But he now describes Alzheimer\u2019s as \u201cthe battle they\u2019re not going to win\u201d.<\/p>\n

Paul, who lives in Beverly, East Yorkshire, first noticed Nicola\u2019s forgetfulness and confusion in 2019, starting off as little things at first.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cShe\u2019d make a cup of tea but just pour in the hot water then walk away and leave it.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019d repeat questions she had just asked me, and she even drove home with our daughters and went past the top of our street that we\u2019ve lived on for 25 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

She even got lost in Primark for nearly two hours because the layout \u201cwas confusing\u201d.<\/p>\n

The condition has also caused Nicola to be in danger.<\/p>\n

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Paul said: \u201cNicola drove to a friend\u2019s party. She then told friends that I had dropped her off and proceeded to drink alcohol. She was stopped by the police and breathalysed on the way home. She passed but they could see how confused she was and the police drove her home.\u201d<\/p>\n

As well as losing her ability to cook, clean the house and shop, looking after his wife\u2019s hygiene is another grey area that is often overlooked and not spoken about enough. Paul\u2019s keen to change that.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cI have to shower her because she\u2019d walk into the shower with her pants on. I have to tell her what she has to do with the shower gel and the shampoo. It\u2019s exhausting. She won\u2019t remember simple things like flushing the toilet of course, and I need to dress her, brush her teeth and tie her shoe laces.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would think a 58-year-old woman would find it all frustrating, but she\u2019s passed the point of knowing that she has Alzheimer\u2019s. It can be mentioned on TV soaps and we no longer speak over it like we would have two years ago, she\u2019s not aware that she has it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Local council worker Paul says he\u2019s been left \u201cjuggling a lot of balls in the air\u201d over the last difficult few years.<\/p>\n

He has gone from working full-time to a reduced 15.5 hours a week. \u201cI\u2019m only 55, I\u2019m not ready to retire yet. It\u2019s too early.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy youngest daughter is at drama school, it\u2019s costing me a fortune. We\u2019ve had to make cutbacks and sacrifices. I have to be careful about how I\u2019m managing money now.\u201d<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s this reason that made getting a proper diagnosis vital.<\/p>\n

Nicola was allowed to leave work as \u2018ill health retired\u2019\u2019, a status that makes a remarkably bigger financial difference against being dismissed for being off sick for a long period of time.<\/p>\n

Paul told The Mirror<\/a>: \u201cShe hated the whole diagnosis process because it\u2019s so drawn out and protracted – it was so emotionally humiliating for her. To watch her during the cognitive testing where somebody asks what five plus seven is, what the names of her daughters are, her daughters ages. She was getting mixed up and not able to answer. Being given a score described as \u2018abnormal\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was horrendous, followed by CT scans, MRI scans and then she was sent for a mental health check. That was arduous because she\u2019s quite a private person.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe isn\u2019t going to get better, she\u2019s going to get worse. We do things with her like going on holiday so we can make memories – but really, those are memories for me and my daughters. We take lots of pictures and then we put them into books so that she can remember the experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cNikki lives in the moment, but I\u2019m very fortunate to be able to give her these experiences at least. I don\u2019t know how long that\u2019s going to last – it\u2019s becoming increasingly difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

As her primary carer, Paul\u2019s at the stage where he can\u2019t go out alone with her often anymore.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI can\u2019t leave her at all now. I went to the bathroom and she went looking for me while I was away. I lost her for a minute but it was the longest minute of my life. It was an absolute panic.\u201d<\/p>\n

One thing that Paul does rely on is running. It\u2019s the one thing he has held onto from his pre-Alzheimer\u2019s life, running on a Monday to Wednesday as part of a club when he\u2019s working. His mum, 79, stays over to help Nicola while he takes some much needed respite and the chance to get out and chat about anything that\u2019s non-Alzheimer\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a release valve for me. We\u2019ll talk about our kids and what they\u2019ve been up to. It spurs me on and gives me a break and escape.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also takes Nicola along to the park for yoga, Parkruns and gym classes too.<\/p>\n

He laughs: \u201cShe is in completely the wrong position to everyone else in the class but it doesn\u2019t matter \u2013 the instructors are so kind and spend so much time with her.\u201d<\/p>\n

Glimmers of the Nicola he once knew shine through whenever she hears music – especially 80s retro soul – moments Paul calls \u201ca beautiful thing\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cMusic brings her back to life again. It\u2019s like we have her back. This month we\u2019re going to see a Luther Vandross tribute again,\u201d he says, admitting it\u2019s the fourth time they\u2019ve seen the same act perform. \u201cNicola starts singing, dancing, she comes alive. Music is a very powerful thing.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s fascinating as well, she\u2019ll remember the songs word for word whereas normally I can tell her something and three seconds later, it\u2019s gone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite having friends, a supportive mum and two daughters – Isobel, 25 and Lydia, 20 – loneliness can still creep in.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI don\u2019t have anybody on a weekend who can watch her to let me do anything. I\u2019ve tried external help before but she rejects them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can get very lonely because Nicky was an educated, articulate, vibrant, funny, compassionate, caring woman and now she\u2019s just a pale shadow of herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no conversation there, apart from her asking for things, because the conversation gets lost. I terribly miss the woman that I was married to and had children with. I miss conversation with her the most, and seeing her being a mother to the kids. She\u2019s their mum more by name only now. \u201d<\/p>\n

Paul, who has raised around \u00a312,000 for Dementia UK and the Alzheimer\u2019s Society since his wife\u2019s diagnosis, still finds ways to spot the old Nikki deep inside. \u201cIf we go supermarket shopping I try to avoid Tesco because it\u2019s got the clothing section and she\u2019s just obsessed that she\u2019s got nothing to wear. Every time we go in, I end up buying another set of pyjamas!\u201d<\/p>\n

As a father, Paul has one major concern for his grown daughters.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve shown me how incredibly resilient they both are. My eldest has qualified as a chartered accountant and my youngest has moved away for drama school. The one thing that I didn\u2019t want to see is their mum\u2019s health and condition derail their ambitions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI see this as dealing with things 25 years before I thought I might have. We found out just before our 25th wedding anniversary. Instead of going for an Italian meal, we went to Calabria in Italy on holiday. We had a week there and it was still very raw.\u201d<\/p>\n

TV presenter Fiona Phillips, who released a new book Remember When last month, was diagnosed with Alzheimer\u2019s disease in 2022, at 60 years old.<\/p>\n

Her husband Martin Frizell has spoken out about how difficult life as a carer can be saying earlier this year that his wife needs \u201ca lot of help\u201d, with his care extending to showering Fiona, brushing her teeth, dressing her and ultimately \u201cmaking her feel as safe as possible\u201d.<\/p>\n

(Image: shared content unit)<\/p>\n

As another husband in a caring role, Paul reflects on Martin\u2019s situation. \u201cI resonate with Martin a lot. Everything they\u2019re going through is the same as me – we\u2019re living a similar life.\u201d<\/p>\n

In survival mode these days, Paul lives one day at a time.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust keep pressing repeat on the things that make you smile in life. Because you don\u2019t know when life\u2019s going to catch you out.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to wake up and you\u2019ve got to reset and you\u2019ve got to put a smile on your face each day. You can\u2019t drown in self pity. You can\u2019t just concentrate on the negative aspects of life. You\u2019ll just go under.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI miss her, and this is going to get harder. It\u2019s like watching someone fade away in front of you. This isn\u2019t a normal part of the ageing process. She\u2019s now someone I used to know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alzheimer\u2019s Society is there for anyone affected by dementia, through its website alzheimers.org.uk and its Dementia Support Line on 0333 150 3456.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paul Furness said: “She isn\u2019t going to get better, she\u2019s going to get worse. We do things with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":334337,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[231,51,105,224,2070,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-334336","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-alzheimers-disease","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-relationships","12":"tag-supermarkets","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115007080761403182","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334336\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}