The Kettles were an average family.Mary was the homemaker, Joe had a regular job driving for Stagecoach. They’d been together for 13 years and had a daughter aged 7 and a daughter aged 8 and a lived in a detached house in Bramhall South Cheshire. They were planning to go on holiday to Javer on the Costa Blanca at Christmas.
So life was steady and they were very content. They had a lot of friends, chiefly through the school that their children went to and a great social life.
All of a sudden things changed. Neil had been having mild headaches for the past two months but didn’t think much about it – certainly not to have time off work to see the Doctor. Susan had given him a packet of Aspirin to take to work just in case it became much worse.
It was a Monday and the day started just like any other. gemma was in her dressing gown in the kitchen making sandwiches for Joe to take to work. The little ones were at loggerheads as usual. Peter was in the bathroom shaving.
Then there was a tremendous bang. It wasn’t like a vase falling on the floor. It was somehow ominous, like a big bag of spuds falling. And it came from the bedroom.
Sophie’s heart fell. In some way instinct told her something wasreally wrong, very very wrong. In a jiffy she was up the stairs and pressed to the bedroom door. It moved open a fraction and stopped. She pushed and pushed but something was obstructing the door from opening any more. She poked her head around the door and the blood seeped from her face. There was Simon lying on the floor, curled up face down.
For a few seconds she tensed. Then she just screamed and screamed
It took 16 minutes for the ambulance to appear and approximately six more minutes for the ambulance crew to confirm that Joe had just had a stroke. Would he live? To be truthfull he was seriously ill. The Doctors would be able to tell her more at the hospital.
Richard did did get well again. He had three lengthy months in the hospital followed by five more months at a expert rehabilitation centre. At the beginning he was wheelchair bound but soon he began to walk some steps with the aid of a walking frame.
But at the age of 35 he would never be able to work again.
Could this be your worst nightmare?
Information shows that men and 2 out of ten women go through a critical illness before retirement age. James was very young to have had a stroke but life is full of risks.
Neil’s stoke came out of the blue but a large proportion of families do have insurance cover to impart financial help should something like this transpire. It’s called Critical Illness Insurance. This kindof insurance gives out a tax free lump sum if the insured person is diagnosed with a critical illness. A typical insured sum would be in the 120,000 pounds to £200,000 – it’s for the insured to decide. (What signifies as a “critical illness” is made plain within the insurance documents but they nearly always cover heart attack, cancer and stroke and normally loads of other conditions and illnesses as well.)
Life assurancecan’t help heal the stroke but it certainly could mean that financially, things were satisfactory.
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