May Kandiah and her family have attended the hospice’s Tree of Memories services at the Tendring Centre in memory of her husband Peter, each year since 2012.
May explains: “We love to come and remember Gramps here, light our candle and all be together.
“Peter used to come here [Tendring Centre] on a Thursday for all the complementary therapies, relaxation and generally the opportunity to chat to people. My grandsons used to come too when they were on their holidays. They would call the garden ‘the enchanted garden’. In the summer it’s beautiful.
“We’d drop Peter off, have a quick chat, maybe an orange juice and a biscuit, and then we’d go out for the day. He loved it there. They had a wonderful chef and Peter was a great cook too and would always have lovely chats with him. He did lovely lunches.”
During summer 2012, Peter stayed at The Hospice for 11 weeks. He went home in the September and died at home in December, where he wanted to be.
“His time there was lovely. It’s so lovely there; the boys had the garden and the play room and we used to meet up for Sunday lunch in the canteen there all together. I used to spend the day there, it was nice. A wonderful summer, weather-wise. The gardens were beautiful, and the pond.
While he was there, he bought his grandson Dominic a hospice branded baseball cap. The treasured cap has been worn at every year at the Tree of Memories service in Clacton since, when Dominic and his older brothers Harry and Liam come along with their Nana May to light a candle and remember Peter.