13 May 2025
Until Gary Dance experienced Harbour Hospice care, he had thought hospice was “just a place where you go to die”.
Gary and Margaret Dance had enjoyed doing lots of things together. And one of the things the couple of 38 years enjoyed doing most was cooking for one another and sharing delicious meals.
“We ate the most glorious meals – gourmet meals – and we planned our meals all the time,” says Margaret. “One would say, ‘What are we going to have for lunch?’ And the other one would say, ‘We’ve got that casserole, maybe we could turn that into little individual pies. Ok, what are we going to have for dinner?’ We did this all our lives.”
But in 2018, at the age of 69, Gary was diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) – a chronic lung condition that causes difficulty breathing. As his condition worsened and hospital visits to regulate his breathing became more frequent, meal planning began to take a back seat. Gary had to return to hospital seven times in just 18 months and then refused to go at all, so Margaret suggested a referral to Harbour Hospice.
At first Gary was reluctant “because he thought that hospice was only a place where you go to die”, Margaret says. But eventually he agreed, and from that day on the couple’s lives changed for the better.
“The difference with Hospice was that it was always there,” Margaret says. “Hospice made us feel safe and they made our lives easier. They would phone us all the time and send their nurses round, who would suggest things that made our lives more comfortable.
“It was Hospice that applied for a Disabled Parking Permit for us. We hadn’t even thought of that. It was Hospice that convinced Gary he needed to get a wound that was not healing looked at. Hospice took him in to sort his breathing, and when things got too much for me, they would take him for a couple of days for respite care.
“I don't know whether I would have been able to cope for too much longer if they hadn't stepped in. Gary never, ever complained but people don’t realise how exhausting it is to look after a loved one. You’re always ensuring they’re okay, that they’re not in pain.
“I didn’t really like leaving him with anyone except his sister. But I trusted Hospice implicitly – we both did. And, whenever Gary went in, I would feel this relief that they could just take over for a few days. Gary enjoyed his stays, too, because he was so well looked after. He thought everybody at Hospice was marvellous.”
Gary was under hospice care for about six months until he died on 6 July 2024. Margaret is grieving and has started attending a hospice bereavement support group to work through her feelings. She says mealtimes are the worst time of day because they’d always been such an enjoyable part of their daily routine.
“We’d been together 38 years so I do find it difficult to eat alone now. Even though he’s gone I always have a meal that I know Gary and I would have eaten. It will be the type of meal where he would say, ‘That was very nice, what did you put in that?’, and I’d say, ‘I put such in such in’ and he’d say ‘oh, I wouldn’t have put that in’. Or if it was the other way round, he could never remember what he’d put in because he never used a recipe.
“Gary and I had a marvellous life together, because of the deep respect we had for one another and the love and trust. He was a good, good man and I’m just so thankful that the last few months of his life, we were both so well cared for by Hospice.”
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