We lost Eric to pneumococcal meningitis on 22nd December 2008. He was 58.
He was such a quiet and gentle man, but this devastating disease took him and left a huge hole in our lives. He was a wonderful husband, dad to our three children and granddad to his six grandchildren.
Eric was active, fit and well. He never learned to drive - said he couldn't be doing with all hem idiots on the road - so he used to commute on the train to Wallasey where he worked as a plasterer. Things like colds never used to bother him, but a few days before the meningitis manifested itself he had complained that he had the flu; he never laid in bed, but this 'flu' was taking it out of him.
On the Saturday he got up out of bed, said he had a banging headache and that no matter what he did he couldn't get his feet warm, and that he was just going to sit on the couch for a while. I kissed him goodbye, but when I returned around two hours later he was unconscious, one side of his face had fallen and he had blood coming from his mouth.