A new start after 60: I became my husband’s carer

When Sarah Geeson-Brown retired in 2022 she and her husband, Michael, planned to travel. Six months later Michael had a stroke, then another, and a third after a fall and a broken hip left him in a wheelchair; by the time he left hospital Geeson-Brown was his full-time carer.

They had meant to be Interrailing, but the end of the garden felt far-flung and even upstairs was out of bounds, so she endlessly looped the ground floor of their home in Oxfordshire. Waking hours were governed by pill-taking – 19 a day – hoists, washing, dressing, trying to eat and medical appointments.

Even with professional care workers the days were relentless and the nights interrupted. She notes the old English root of the word "care" – caru – meaning sorrow, anxiety, grief and trouble, and found the emotional fallout harder than the physical tasks.

sarah geeson-brown, michael, stroke, wheelchair, oxfordshire, retirement, full-time carer, 19 pills, hoist, interrailing