An NHS worker has said 'time will never heal the guilt' after her mum died alone in hospital at the peak of the coronavirus pandemic.
An hour after leaving her mum Ethel in hospital, PA Sarah Candlish received a message from a fellow colleague to say that visiting had been suspended due to coronavirus.
Sarah,47, who was on leave from work to care for her terminally ill husband, had left her mum so that she could gather some items for her stay in Sunderland Royal Hospital, Chronicle Live reports.
Believing that she would return to the hospital in an hour, she was unaware that their time in A&E would be the last time that she had a face-to-face conversation with her mum.
Sarah said: "People say 'time's a healer', but I know that time will never heal the guilt I feel knowing that my mum died alone. We were so close."
She added: "I left her in A&E and told her I was going to get her a bag of clothes and I would see her soon. But in that time we went into lockdown and I couldn't go back and see her."
Ethel died from Covid-19 on April 5, 2020 - the same day Sarah had made plans with hospital staff to bring Ethel home with oxygen to help her breathe.
Following her death, Sarah says she has been left feeling like she failed her mum, who was planning to move in with Sarah at the time of her passing.
At home Sarah was also coping with caring for her husband Simon, who had been placed on end of life care with stage three bladder cancer.
She said: "My mum dying and knowing I still had to carry on and look after Simon was the worst possible scenario of the lockdown.
"I remember being at my mum's funeral and thinking what if Simon dies and I'm not there."
Simon died in the weeks following Ethel's death on May 8, 2020 following a two-year battle with cancer.
But with the help of Marie Curie end of life care, Sarah believes she was able to give Simon the best passing possible.
She added: "One of the biggest things when somebody dies is the 'what if I'd done this?' and 'what if I'd done that?'.
"I couldn't have had a more perfect passing for Simon and you can't put money on that when you're left with doubts like I am with my mum.
"With Simon, yes it was awful and horrendous, but at least I know I did the best I possibly could for him.
"Being able to give Simon what he needed helped me to deal with his death."
In the two weeks leading up to Simon's death, Marie Curie supported Sarah with a night sitting service, allowing her to get some much-needed rest while knowing her husband had the support he needed.
Sarah said: "It's not until you need to reach out to end of life services that you realise what's out there.
"Marie Curie's support was invaluable. It allowed me to have some normality in what was a really highly emotive time."
She added: "You should have the right to live as well as you possibly can until you die.
"I struggle with the guilt of my mother being alone at the end but was able to plan the funeral I knew she wanted which is some comfort.
"It would have been Simon's worst nightmare to die in a hospital and because I work in the NHS, I knew what support was available to us at home and knew how to ask for it.
"Patient care means just that, a patient should be cared for equally no matter at what stage of life we are at and palliative services should be funded equally as any other service, to ensure we all have an equal right to high quality personalised care and support."
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