The Longest Farewell

A heart-breaking story of living with dementia, but with a truly joyous ending – proof that dementia is not always the winner. That ‘bastard dementia’, as Nula Suchet calls the intruder that robbed her of her husband James at such a young age, crept into their lives insidiously and unannounced. But in a remarkable turn of fate, she found that her husband was in the same care home, just a door away, as Bonnie, a woman also slowly descending into dementia. She met Bonnie’s husband – television and radio broadcaster John Suchet – and an extraordinary relationship began. Twists and turns, unexpected emotions, partings and reconciliations all happened over a period in which James and Bonnie were taken further and further away. A unique story of friendship and love, distress, pain and ultimate joy, Nula has chronicled her journey in the hope that anyone whose life is blighted with dementia can know that the tunnel they feel enclosed by need never be totally closed. There is always a chink of light at the end, and sometimes that light can be gloriously bright.