Lost and Found

by Lynda Bellingham

  Then I would be taken back to my room and offered the lunch menu. The first week I ordered a large lunch only to discover that I couldn’t eat a thing because I was so nervous!

  I will never forget the first show. Back in my dressing room, I kept leaping up and going through the dance steps every five minutes, while my phone kept bleeping texts at me. So many dear friends were sending me wishes of good luck but every time I read ‘Knock ’em dead’ or ‘You’ll be great!’ it made me feel even worse. In the end I had to stop reading them.

  By four in the afternoon my lovely dresser, Lena, arrived to sew me into my dress. Because we had to wear microphones they were in a material pack sewn into the back of the dress. This meant that going to the toilet could be a nightmare. God knows how many microphones went down the toilet.

  Once Lena had finished, I would be in my dressing room at 4.30, sewn into the frock and all dressed up and ready to go, but still with three hours to wait. I would go upstairs and join the other celebrities pacing the corridors and doing their steps over and over again. The trouble was that as the nerves set in, I would go completely blank. It was terrifying because unlike forgetting lines in a play, when I could always fill in with something, I had no ‘muscle memory’ to fill in with steps in a dance.

  Finally we were called to the Star Bar, a kind of holding room (definitely not a drinking establishment). It was extraordinary to feel the tension: each person would be going through their steps or stretching tight muscles or adjusting a curl. We would all give each other a hug or a squeeze of encouragement, then it was into the studio to line up on the stairs to make our entrances at the top of the staircase going down to the ballroom floor. Then the familiar Strictly music would start and my stomach would crash to the floor, but I would be buoyed along by everyone else laughing and jostling for positions and it was out into the bright lights and roar of the audience and we were off!

  The evening would pass in a flash. The actual moment one goes and performs is a nano-second in the great scheme of things, but the build-up is just unbelievable. That moment when you wait in the wings to go on, and the camera is there for a close-up of your face, is something I never want to experience again in my life. I couldn’t breathe. In fact I never really did breathe throughout the whole dance! Nor did I hear the judges’ comments because I was usually in another world – it was like being underwater: voices seemed very far away. When I was finally voted off I could hardly respond, except to follow Darren down to the red mark on the floor to do our last dance. Then, suddenly, it was as though I had come up and broken through the surface of the water into air. The noise of the audience hit me and I woke up and was in the daylight again. I was so relieved it was over!

  As far as my husband was concerned he appreciated having me back inside my comfort zone because I was hell to live with for those two months. However, he loved the dance practice in the bedroom at night. Especially the time I had forgotten to go through the steps of the group number and jumped out of bed, naked, to go through it once before I went to sleep. All was going so well until I reached the bit where I had to jump up and down…

  Strictly was an amazing experience and I’m pleased I did it. Nothing can be as nerve-racking again, surely? I conquered my body issues and proved to myself I do not crack under pressure. Best of all, the public have been so kind and supportive. I have had such positive feedback that I really feel I have a place in their hearts, and that means everything to me.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  ‘I AM NOT AFRAID OF TOMORROW, FOR I HAVE SEEN YESTERDAY AND I LOVE TODAY’

  (WILLIAM ALLEN WHITE)

  SADLY I HAVE one other, far more poignant, last chapter to tell, before I close my story.

  In January 2009, Michael and I were to be found sitting in the lounge of Edmonton Airport. Outside it was 30 degrees below zero, as we looked out on to a snow-covered runway and, beyond that, a flat, ice-covered prairie. Inside the airport lounge it was hot, sanitised and very Canadian.

  We were both in shock after a week spent with three people over ninety. Impending death had seemed to hover constantly. Quality of life, positive thinking and a healthy lifestyle describe another planet; they are words that belong to another language, another time. They are not words that describe the life of a senior citizen.

  I had looked into a deeply disturbing place, a place that is unavoidable to all of us. Old age.

  Since my divorce from Nunzio in 1996, I had only managed to visit Marjorie a couple of times. She and Shirley lived in a block of apartments close to Milton’s home. They each had their own flat. Marjorie would visit Milton every evening. He was still just about compos mentis but it was no life for either of them. When Marjorie talked about Milton, she gave the impression he was right on top of things but the reality was a long way from that.

  The first time I took Michael, in November 2005, to meet my birth mother, things were already going downhill. Marjorie had stood in her kitchen, chatting away to us, when Michael noticed the microwave was on.

  ‘What’s in the microwave, Marjorie?’ he had asked.

  ‘Oh, nothing, dear, I’m just warming it up before I put our dinner in!’

  Michael and I were both still drinking at this time and thanked God for the oblivion, because it was utterly bizarre being with these two old birds. They had to shout at the top of their voices to converse and, in Shirley’s case, repeat the same conversation several times, because Marjorie had forgotten it five minutes later.

  We spent a lovely week with Marjorie and Shirley on that occasion, nevertheless, and I cooked up a month’s worth of food and left it all labelled in the freezer. But alarm bells were starting to ring even then. I had thought that Marjorie was forgetful and put it down to old age (she was, and is, very good at disguising the seriousness of her condition).

  When I got a call from Marjorie in October 2008 telling me she had Alzheimer’s, I was not completely surprised. It just seemed very harsh, though, as I knew what things would be like for her as I had been through all this with my mum only four years before.

  Michael and I discussed the situation and we both agreed that if I did not go and see Marjorie as soon as possible, I would regret it. The only week I had free was the week after Christmas, before we started back on tour with Calendar Girls.

  So Michael and I had to travel to Canada in the middle of winter. Actually, Michael quite liked seeing the snow! We stayed in the same hotel as before, The Macdonald, which was like being in an old-fashioned station hotel in Britain in the 1950s. It just all added to my general feeling of sadness throughout the trip.

  Marjorie tried so hard to hide the effects of the dementia but I could see the change in her. The apartment was no longer spick and span. Poor Shirley, who was ninety-four, seemed to walk around with a bill permanently glued to her fingers, trying to sort out Marjorie’s finances.

  Michael was so good and went through everything with them. Shirley had gas and electricity bills going back years. It was very apparent that they needed proper help. Milton’s daughter, Sylvia, lived a thousand miles away, in Ottawa. She rarely came to visit, and it seemed that she had not done very much to try and sort out her aunts. Marjorie was still talking about Milton as though he actually knew what was going on, but when we visited him in the home we realised just how bad the situation was. He had no idea who I was, at all, and yet we all played Marjorie’s game that everything was all right and nodded along with her in agreement.

  So, here was Marjorie at ninety years old trying to come to terms with the finality of Alzheimer’s, and the inevitability of her mind deteriorating, while visiting her husband who was lying in a bed in a home for the aged. He was ninety-eight and lay hour after hour in a dementia ward, staring into an abyss.

  When we went to see him, Marjorie led the way through the ward dismissing the other lost souls as they crowded in on us. She rushed to Milton’s bedside and kissed him passionately on the lips, caressing him like a young lover. He lay inert, his eyes star
ing off to another place. She held his hand and kept up a constant flow of chitchat. She tried to coax him into some kind of response to her, to me or Michael. She told him over and over again that she loved him. His lips moved but he wasn’t looking at her. Marjorie seemed more and more desperate. It was as though she could see him fading, and was scared he was trying to take her with him.

  But her sense of survival kept her clinging on to her few remaining shreds of reality. She was not ready to go yet, no matter how much she cared about him. She had told me that morning that she had terrible dreams now. She had a sense of her dementia and described it as like having constant déjà vu. She found it hard to distinguish between what was real, what was dreamed and what was remembered. I used to see this helplessness in my mother as she turned to me sometimes. Looking into her eyes, I could see the Alzheimer’s forcing its way into her sanity. It is a disgusting disease. Poor Michael just couldn’t cope. He had to leave the room. But I found him later trying to ask the way to the toilet from a nurse who did not speak a word of English. His anguish and frustration was getting the better of him and he was shouting at her, ‘Where’s the bloody toilet?’

  When we got back to the hotel he sat on the edge of the bed and wept. He was just so bowed down by the whole situation. The other person involved in all this was dear Shirley. What about her life? Here she was at ninety-four and profoundly deaf. She sported a constantly whistling hearing aid, which must have done exactly the opposite from aiding her, as it filled her head with noise. She weighed eighty-seven pounds and was like a tiny bird. Arthritis had bent her fingers round each other and the only shoes she could wear were children’s trainers because her feet were so narrow. Her little sparrow’s ankles peeked out over the tops of the trainers like sticks, holding up her waif’s body. But her eyes were bright. Dark brown, warm and intelligent. Shirley did not miss a trick, God bless her. Without her, the other two would not have coped.

  We spent the rest of the week trying to set things up to visit various nursing homes. Michael was amazing and just took over. When we spoke to Social Services they explained that Marjorie was being less than co-operative and they would have to take over very soon if the two old ladies remained on their own. So Michael returned a few weeks later and managed to persuade them both to go with him to look at places, and eventually he found them a lovely place to which they have now moved.

  That week for me was about saying goodbye. I knew from the experience with my mother that the Alzheimer’s would slowly remove all memory of me from Marjorie’s brain. How ironic that I had found her, only to lose her again.

  I have had plenty of time to reflect on my brief time with Marjorie over the twenty years I have known her, and the one powerful thought that keeps coming back to me is that my dear parents, the Bellinghams, truly changed my life. I would never have survived without them. Literally. I may have lost them too, but their love and advice has been the driving force that kept me going throughout my life, and still does today.

  Looking back, perhaps the single biggest problem was fear. Fear of failure, fear of other people – but mostly fear of myself. It has taken sixty years to discover who I really am. It’s never too late to find yourself, however lost you may be.

  NEW AFTERWORD

  SINCE CHRISTMAS 2009 life has become very full. The ridiculous thing is that here I am longing to spend time with my new husband and travel the world, and I find myself busier than ever with work. When the book came out in March 2010 I was just finishing the first leg of a national tour of Calendar Girls. There are very few plays I would ever go back to again but Calendar Girls is special. Not only did I create the character of Chris on stage, but the whole concept of the play, and the wonderful ladies of the WI, especially Angela and Tricia Stuart and the gang, have made such an impression on me. The play has raised over £3 million for the Leukaemia Trust.

  While on tour I had been able to go to so many different towns, and using my book and my life story I started to give talks. Some were for charity. Coming out about being adopted has meant I can do so much more for charities like Barnardo’s. Because my husband Michael was fostered we have also been able to really talk to families and couples about the pros and cons of adoption and fostering. I have also visited several care homes and I am now an ambassador for the Alzheimer’s Society. Slowly, slowly the issues of dementia and research into Alzheimer’s are coming to the fore. It is so difficult because it is not a sexy charity. The public associate dementia with dotty old ladies who have lost their marbles. Alzheimer’s is so much more serious than that. It is an illness and should be treated with respect, especially as in twenty years the number of sufferers will have doubled. Anyway, enough of my preaching.

  I thoroughly enjoyed the touring aspect of Calendar Girls, particularly as Michael came with me. It was like a road trip. The Hilton Hotel group were very generous and gave me a great deal, so I had fantastic digs everywhere we went.

  Even more wonderful was that my eldest son Michael played the role of the photographer. He unfortunately saw a good deal more of me than he would have liked – we keep joking that he should go into therapy now to adjust to the shock! But I think his reward for putting up with his mother in the nude was to work with the gorgeous Gemma Atkinson. When he first started rehearsing the calendar scene he didn’t know where to look, but as the tour went on he relaxed, and it became second nature to see her beautiful boobs. Familiarity breeds contempt they say!

  I used to stand in the wings every night and look across the stage and watch my son preparing to go on. In a way, it was like watching me when I was young. He would hop from foot to foot adjusting his hair, saying his lines to himself and gearing up to go on stage. His excitement made me remember how much I loved acting. Still do. It is in my blood.

  I tried to give him advice about certain things, like making sure he booked his digs well in advance. He never did take any notice though, so some weeks he would be homeless when we arrived in a town. At first he thought I would pay for him to join us in a hotel, but Michael, husband that is, was adamant that he find his own way, as this was the only way he would learn. I knew it was right in my heart of hearts, but it was hard sometimes seeing my baby suffering! He made all the usual mistakes like spending all his wages too soon and then having no money to eat. I threatened him with the sack if he ever got too drunk to perform. It must have been such a pain for him sometimes to have me watching his every move. Still, he survived and loved every minute.

  But Michael has had one big change in his life that has touched us all. He is now a father. Sacha was born in January 2010. Sadly, my son is no longer in a relationship with Kate, the mother. It is never easy in these situations but I hope that the two of them can work through any differences for Sacha’s sake. He is a delightful baby and Michael adores him. When Michael brings him to visit it is lovely to watch him with his son. He does exactly what you would expect. Fusses over him and tells me I know nothing about babies. It was ever thus, was it not?

  On first publication, Lost and Found did really well – it stayed in the top ten best sellers for ten weeks. I was so proud, and just wished my parents were still alive to see my success.

  Talking of parents, I have had some strange times with my birth mother, Marjorie. I wrote about my sadness at seeing her so frail when I went over to Canada in 2008, and how Alzheimer’s was taking her to another place. We realised it was dangerous for my mother to drive herself to visit her husband Milton, who was in a dementia ward in a care home a few miles away. Over there everything is geared to cars. Without being able to drive, Marjorie had to depend on taxis and they were often a long time coming. My aunt, Shirley, had the flat below Marjorie, and although she was profoundly deaf, she was very independent. However, when Michael went to see social services about the two old ladies, they told him that things were getting very difficult and to make matters worse Marjorie was not co-operating. When social services tried to call she would not let them in. She is very strong willed and it w
as going to take great diplomacy to persuade her to leave her home.

  I had been worried about the financial state of the two ladies but we discovered that Milton had more than covered their needs, so basically they could afford to go into a private home. My dear husband was so upset when he saw the state of Milton in his ward, he was determined to go back and help my mother get settled. We agreed with Marjorie that Michael would return in a couple of weeks and they would visit various homes. It was impossible for me to join them as I was still doing Calendar Girls every night.

  When Michael arrived back in Canada he spent a long week taking the old girls round different homes. He used all his charm and diplomacy on them, and even his estate agent talents came into play, because in order to get them into the home he had chosen, he took them to all the horrible ones first. He explained to them that if they did not co-operate the state would automatically place them in a care home chosen by social services, and that would not be fun. By the end of the week he was exhausted! He would ring me at night from his hotel room completely worn out. The added problem was they were both deaf, which meant every conversation was shouted and repeated a hundred times. Anyway, finally they agreed to this particularly nice home my hubbie had found and they had signed a cheque for the deposit.

  Social services decided that Michael had better have a conversation with Marjorie’s step daughter, Sylvia, who lived in Ontario. Sylvia had never met me and did not even know I had existed until recently. Poor Michael was put in a room with several people from social services, with a phone on the table in the middle, and was patched into a conference call with Sylvia, ringing from Ontario. Not a comfortable situation for any of them. He returned to the UK thinking he had achieved major success. The girls were ready to go into a beautiful care home and all that remained was for Michael to return, as soon as possible, to help to pack up and move. Everyone was very impressed it would appear. Oh, how wrong could we be?