Broadcaster Stephanie Hirst opens up on the death of her parents
She recorded a podcast while her father was gravely ill.
Broadcaster Stephanie Hirst has opened up on losing her parents.
The radio DJ, known for her work on the BBC, lost her mother to pancreatic cancer in 2013. Her father died recently after being diagnosed with bowel cancer.
Appearing on the On The Marie Curie Couch podcast, Hirst praised her mother’s “grit, determination and fight” towards the end of her life.
She said: “Mum turned to me and said, ‘I’m dying, aren’t I?’ And at this point you either say, ‘No, it’s going to be OK, you’re going to be OK,’ or you can just be really honest.
“The doctors had told her it was incurable and all sorts of stuff like that. I think she was just asking me outright. I held her hand and I just said, ‘yes, you are,’ and she said, ‘I know I am. I just needed to hear it from you.’”
Hirst’s father was alive when she recorded the podcast and she discussed grief with bereavement expert Jason Davidson.
“I’m about to go through grief all over again,” she said.
“I’m guessing by the time I hear this podcast and it’s published … he’ll no longer be with us.
“Every time I go and see him it’s like I’m saying goodbye, every single time. I don’t know when it’s going to be. It could be today, it could be tomorrow, who knows? It’s imminent.
“But I feel at peace with having the conversations that I’ve had with him, and I have said to him, ‘Dad, it’s okay. Stop fighting this. It’s okay, you can go.’”
Stephanie Hirst’s On The Marie Curie Couch episode is available now.
