𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

My mum’s name was Kate Bilderbeck and her 59th birthday wish was to die. As she struggled to blow out the candle on her cupcake in August, she prayed to God she wouldn’t survive another day. In fact she lived another agonising six. She had been a nurse for more than 20 years, working everywhere from Romanian orphanages to Great Ormond Street Hospital and, later, with Alzheimer’s patients.

She was also a single mum, raising her only child, me. And Kate Bilderbeck was one hell of a stubbornly positive woman. Having been diagnosed in 2022 with terminal pancreatic cancer, where many would’ve, quite justifiably, retreated, my mum wore her diagnosis as a superhero would a cape. She raised awareness about pancreatic cancer at every opportunity and vowed to embody the late Deborah James’ mantra of “rebellious hope”.

My mum was determined not only to survive but to thrive, living with purpose and joy for as long as she could. I dropped my life, moved home, and my mum’s rebellious hope gave us not just “one year, if lucky”, but an incredible three. We embarked on a bucket list, fitting it around more than 60 gruelling rounds of chemotherapy.

My mum didn’t do chemo like anyone else; she wore bright outfits each time – one Easter, even sporting a straw hat dangling with yellow chicks. She jokingly nicknamed her tumours “Colin” and “Carlos” and christened her catheter bag “Kevin,” swinging it along as we made memories I will treasure.

But her final week threatens to overshadow those memories, because it will haunt me forever. My mum moved into a hospice in June 2025 and held fast on to all the rebellious hope she could. When she was unable to walk and confined to a wheelchair, she insisted I push her to the last things on her bucket list.

When her body became too weak to be moved, she invited friends to her bedside for an early birthday celebration. But even for her, rebellious hope eventually slipped away; when she could no longer manage a mouthful of food without vomiting; when an incident report had to be filed because of the pain of moving her even an inch leaving her skin horrifically bruised. If my mum had been given the choice, she would’ve died peacefully after saying goodbye at that early birthday gathering.

As the Daily Express Give Us Our Last Rights campaign highlights, choice in death isn’t giving up – it’s taking control to ensure as pain-free and dignified-a-death as possible. Instead, my mum’s body clung on for another torturous week. A week may sound brief, but the trauma still plagues my sleep. Despite outstanding palliative care, no legal dose of morphine could fully suppress her pain.

I was forced to watch my only parent lie barely conscious, waking only to cry out in agony, at one point unable to see and even forgetting my name. Dignity In Dying reports that 17 people with a terminal illness die in pain every day, even with the best palliative care – my mum was one of them.

The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life Bill) passed its Third Reading in the House of Commons in June but it is far from secure. Despite overwhelming public support, a small group of peers opposed to assisted dying have tabled some 1,000 amendments. One even suggests requiring a dying person to show a negative pregnancy test – absurdly including a 90-year old man with terminal prostate cancer.

While scrutiny is legitimate, amendments such as these neither protect nor empower dying people. If the bill is not passed before the parliamentary session ends next spring, more people risk suffering unnecessarily like my mum.

The public must be heard, and the democratic will of the Commons respected. Emailing members of the House of Lords and urging them to not block this bill over the coming months could change lives – as well as deaths. You may not currently know anyone with a terminal illness, but that could change. What would you want for your parents, your partner, your child – for yourself? Our current laws fail to respect terminally ill patients and fail those who love them and are forced to watch – one day, I even picked up the phone to Samaritans.

Denying people autonomy at the end of life benefits no one. My mum’s birthday wish was to die. This year, many others will wish the same. The cycle doesn’t have to continue. You can help ensure someone else gets to die without agony, without leaving traumatised loved ones behind – and, above all, with dignity.