9:06am Tuesday 29th June 2010
By Sally Clifford
Ian and Marion Thompson are often told that the romantic tale of how they met could have been taken from the pages of a Mills & Boon romance.
Of course, true love doesn’t always run smoothly, and when the couple’s eyes first met he was sitting on a commode and she was about to give him an injection. “I saw his Sunday face first!” laughs Marion.
She was a staff nurse at Bradford Royal Infirmary where Ian was recovering from his second round of life-saving treatment.
Ian, 79, was first diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphosarcoma when he was in his 20s. “In the early part of my 20s I started getting lumps in the neck,” he recalls.
Ian wasn’t aware of the seriousness of the condition. “I didn’t know what it was. They didn’t tell me. As far as I was concerned, it was a glandular disorder and that was that,” he says.
When the condition recurred in his late 30s, Ian was one of the early patients to receive chemotherapy, then in its infancy. Around the time he was undergoing his second round of treatment, he met Marion.
Ian recognised Marion’s surname after noticing it on the night-time staff rota. “I saw her surname and I said I knew a man with the same surname. It turned out to be her father!” he says.
They started out as friends, writing to each other while Marion spent a year working in Switzerland, and she visited Ian when she came home.
Romance blossomed and Ian and Marion married in 1971 at the parish church in Grassington. They have one son, Andrew, and now live in Rawdon.
With Ian having a life-threatening condition, the couple wondered how long they would have together but, like the Mills & Boon books, this romantic tale does have a happy ending. “We didn’t know how long we would be married, but we’ve been married 39 years now,” says Marion.
Ian recalls that it wasn’t until a few years after his battle with cancer that he realised just how serious his condition was. It was far worse than the glandular problem he believed he had.
Ian says he didn’t realise what a bonus it was to have survived as long as he had until he learned exactly what was wrong with him.
“I had three years of treatment and the doctor said, ‘do you know what you’ve got?’ I said ‘it’s a glandular disorder’,” says Ian. “The consultant told me what was wrong just before we were getting married. I asked him, ‘how long have I got?’ He told me it could be two years or I could try and become a grumpy old man! I decided I’d better become be a grumpy old man!” laughs the semi-retired management accountant.
He heeded warnings not to pursue a stressful job. “So that puts the lid on where you want to go with ambition,” he says.
But now he’s so glad he has managed to survive the fight. “Obviously I am alive and happy to be alive. It’s 40 years since I started treatment and it’s some 37 years since I had my last treatment in 1973, so it does tend to ease off,” he says, referring to the worry he felt for a while.
Ian also acknowledges the fact that if it hadn’t been for his ill-health, he probably wouldn’t have met his wife. “I once said to somebody the best thing I got is Marion,” he says.
Ian and Marion now use their spare time to work as volunteers, Ian with the Yorkshire Air Ambulance.
He became involved with the organisation after responding to an appeal in the Telegraph & Argus and, coming from a family of people who are all ‘medically-minded’ – his father was a GP, Marion is a retired nurse and various other family members are involved in the profession – he says it was the perfect appeal to support.
Ian also helps Marion in her voluntary role with Cuppa Care, a Shipley charity which has been dispensing care over a hot meal and a hot drink for 24 years.
The organisation was recently nominated in the Shipley Community Heroes, an awards ceremony organised by Shipley Area Committee. “It was nice to be acknowledged and nominated,” says Marion.
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