In our experience
In the face of adversity, these women were inspired to give help to others
‘IT’S POSSIBLE TO TURN LOSS INTO SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL’
Author, artist, educator and coach Katie Carr, 45, completed her brother Toby’s book Moderate Becoming Good Later, based on his adventures at sea before he died last year, aged 40. She lives in Barcelona with her partner and two young sons.
Three months before his death, I interviewed my brother for a podcast. ‘If you want to do something, the time is now,’ he said, an attitude that sprang from a lifetime adapting to loss. In 1988, when I was 11, our brother Marcus, nine, and Toby, just six, we lost our mum, Bron, to a viral brain injury from which she never recovered. She woke up one morning confused and was never the same again. Mum’s still alive today, but she wouldn’t recognise me in the street.
A few years later, Marcus and Toby were diagnosed with Fanconi anaemia – arare and life-limiting genetic illness that leads to bone marrow failure and various cancers – and told they’d be lucky to get to 30. We reacted by doing everything we could today in case it wasn’t possible tomorrow. Marcus became a GP and travelled the world, Toby was an architect and keen sea kayaker, and I went to live and work in Spain.
Then our dad died suddenly in 2010. Seven years later, Marcus died of throat cancer. The grief Toby and I shared was terrible, but we each had a counterbalance of joy. My first son had just been born and my brother set off on a sea voyage of discovery. He’d decided to kayak in each of the 31 areas in the BBC Radio 4 Shipping Forecast, the weather for the seas around the British Isles. It was a constant, soothing sound in our home as kids, and we knew what it meant because we had our own boat.
In 2018, I adapted to motherhood as Toby set off on his adventure and the happiest, most exhilarating time of his life. He covered two-thirds of the shipping forecast areas, but by late 2020 he grew exhausted and knew that something was wrong. After months of tests, he was diagnosed with incurable liver cancer in summer 2021. The news hit me like a blow. I was going to lose Toby just like I’d lost Marcus.
That November, Toby landed a book deal to write about his kayak challenge, but knew he wouldn’t live to finish it. By New Year’s Day 2022 he could barely walk and asked for help into his kayak for one last paddle. He died a week later and all I had left was my memories – and Toby’s records of his adventures.
I decided to write Toby’s book for him. Even if it didn’t sell, it would help my kids t
