Suzanne hoped gastric surgery would make her son proud. Here, her grieving sister tells her deeply cautionary story...
Suzanne Murphy loved Christmas shopping for her son, and when she set out to buy the first of Jacob's presents in the last week of October 2006, she was particularly excited. Selecting a toy car, she told her sister Sheila: 'He'll love this - I can't wait to see his face.'
Suzanne's spirits were high because she was about to go into hospital for gastric bypass surgery to help her dramatically lose weight - something she wanted to do for the sake of five-year-old Jacob. It was, she told her family, the start of a whole new life.
And as she shopped with her sister that day, 29-year-old Suzanne cheerfully made her own Christmas wish list. 'She asked me to buy her some size 14 clothes so she could show off her new figure,' Sheila recalls.
But Suzanne never lived to twirl in her size 14 clothes, or to see Jacob tear open his gifts on Christmas morning. Within a week, she was dead - killed by the surgery that had seemed to promise her a whole new life.
Her son - now seven and being raised by his aunt - still cries for the mother he adored.
Sheila says: 'When I first told him that his mother had died, he asked: "Why did she have to have this done? She was beautiful to me. I loved her the way she was." He didn't see her as fat - he just saw her as Mummy.'
Jacob treasures a letter written by Suzanne on the eve of her operation and which she left tucked under his pillow. The single mother wrote: 'To my beautiful baby boy. All you have to know is that Mummy is doing this for you and me.
'Mummy has carried a lot of weight in my head and heart and body for as long as I can remember - I don't want my baggage to become a weight you have to carry, son. You know Mummy is strong and would do anything for you - get the stars from the sky if I could - but with this problem, darling, Mummy can't do it alone. I need a helping hand.
'So when the nice doctors said they could help me with getting the weight off the outside, Mummy thought very long and carefully and finally said: "Yes please." You are my oxygen. I love you so much, and I want you to have the best and happiest life I can give.'
Best of intentions
Suzanne's desperation for her son to be happy and to avoid playground taunts lay firmly with her own unhappy experiences at school.
She was just 11 months old when her father, Stephen Murphy, suffered a fatal heart attack. Her mother Linda married again, to builder Andrew Connor, and Martyn, now 29, and Sheila were born. Three years later, Linda's second husband was killed at work, leaving their mother to raise them alone.
Sheila says: 'Although Suzanne was three years older than me, she was very shy and followed me everywhere. She lacked confidence, and as a teenager she became more and more self- conscious, particularly about her weight.
'The other children at school would point to Suzanne in the playground and scream "Fatty". She was bullied mercilessly, and she hated it."
At the age of 22, in July 2000, Suzanne discovered she was pregnant. Her relationship with her boyfriend ended, and she prepared to raise her child alone.
Sheila says: 'Suzanne had always wanted a large family, and she was thrilled to be pregnant. She said later that her life didn't start until she had Jacob.
'She was a natural mum, and she adored her son. When he first said "Mama" and when he took his first faltering steps, she was so proud. Jacob was her entire life.'
But while Suzanne revelled in motherhood, her weight soared. A thyroid problem, diagnosed after Jacob's birth, left her piling on the pounds. By 2006, despite numerous attempts at slimming, she weighed 19st and was a size 18-20.
By the time Jacob started school, Suzanne, from Lightcliffe, Halifax, was increasingly worried that he - like her - would be bullied and taunted in the playground because she was overweight.
Unknown to her sister, she went for a consultation at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary, West Yorkshire, about having gastric bypass surgery. The surgery would involve sectioning off a portion of the stomach to limit the amount of food that can be eaten.
Stomach surgery has become increasingly popular, and the number of patients having it done on the NHS has risen by over 40 per cent (from 2,500 to 3,500) in the past year; private surgery is also on the increase.
The most common operations are gastric banding and gastric bypass.
Gastric banding is the less drastic of the two. This is a reversible procedure where a hollow tube is inflated with distilled water to tighten its grip around the top of the stomach and so reduce the flow of food to the lower part. This is the surgery that Fern Britton underwent.
With a gastric bypass, the stomach is reduced by stapling off a small pouch. Most of the intestines are then bypassed, leaving only a small section plumbed into the pouch - so not only are patients unable to eat much, they also take in fewer calories because the food is in the intestine for less time.
Neither form of surgery is without its risks. In 2 per cent of cases, gastric bands can slip, which means the patient cannot digest food. Some claim that one in 50 patients dies from the procedure.
Surgery 'not without risks'
Gastric bypasses can lead to bowel obstruction, with food leaking into the abdomen; one in 200 patients dies after the procedure, according to the British Obesity Surgery Patient Association.
Recalls Sheila: 'When I found out my sister was thinking of having a gastric bypass, I was horrified and scared that something might go wrong. I told Suzanne just to be happy as she was, and I said that I would go to WeightWatchers with her.
'But she was adamant. She wanted to ride on fairground rides with Jacob, and she didn't want him to suffer because of her size.'
Suzanne's surgery was booked for October 31, 2006. The weekend before, Suzanne spent hours playing with her son.
Sheila recalls: 'When Jacob asked her "What happens if you die, Mum?", she hugged him and said: "Don't think like that. You've always got your auntie and your Nana." '
Jacob went to the hospital with Suzanne's mother Linda to see her settled before the operation.
Sheila says: 'When it was time for Jacob to go, Suzanne sat on the bed, put her hands either side of his face and gazed at him, as if she was literally drinking in every detail of his face. Then she kissed him and said: "Behave for Nana. I love you."
'He gave her a hug and a kiss - and that was the last time he ever saw his mummy.'
That night, Sheila again tried to talk her sister out of the surgery, ringing the ward just hours before the operation. 'I told her it wasn't too late for me to come and get her, but she said: "You are being silly. See you tomorrow. I love you." '
After the surgery, Suzanne was taken to intensive care, as planned, to recover. Sheila arrived to see her sister four hours later.
'I was shocked by how pale Suzanne looked,' she says, 'and I asked the nurses if she was OK. But they said she'd had major surgery and it was normal to look pale. She told me she was in a bit of pain, but that she was all right. Then she smiled and said she loved me.
'But when I went back to the hospital the next morning, the doctors said something wasn't right, and they were going to check to see if there was a problem with the tubes draining fluid from her stomach.
'Suzanne had an oxygen mask on her face, but she pulled it off and said: "Tell everyone I've sprung a leak, but I love them." She was trying to joke, but I could see in her eyes that she was terrified. I squeezed her hand and she asked the doctor: "Am I going to be all right? I'm a single mother." He reassured her and she was wheeled away.'
Sheila returned home to collect Jacob and her own daughter, Cody, from school, and later a doctor rang and said that Suzanne was doing OK. 'He was quite reassuring, but when I went back that evening, with a card from Jacob for his mummy, Suzanne still looked shockingly pale.
She said: "Tell Jacob I love him" - but she was in too much pain to talk much.'
Painful last words
When Sheila returned to her sister's bedside on Thursday morning, she was shocked to find Suzanne in worse pain.
'She told me not to come too close, that there was a horrible smell, and I noticed it immediately. The nurses actually sprayed deodorant on her.
'By teatime, they moved her to a chair beside the bed and I thought that was a good sign. Suzanne was still in terrible pain, and drifting in and out of sleep. She said: "How's my boy? Tell him I love him."
'I thought she might be improving, but when Mum and I returned to the hospital on Friday morning, we were asked to go and wait in a side room. A doctor came in and explained that something wasn't right: he said they were taking her back down to theatre for an exploratory operation. He said they had no choice.'
'Mum and I went to Suzanne's bedside as they prepared to wheel her into theatre. She looked worse - white and clammy - and she was semi-conscious. We kissed her forehead and held her hand.
'By now I was feeling physically sick. Mum and I sat in the waiting room and for the first time I thought: "We could lose her."
'When Suzanne came back from surgery, the doctors said they had checked her and they couldn't find a problem. It reassured us. But the next morning, Sheila was woken at 5.45 by a phone call from her eldest sister, Linda.
'Linda said the hospital had just rung and wanted Suzanne's next of kin to come straight in because they had put her on a life support machine.
'I couldn't go to the hospital because I had Jacob staying with me. I gave him breakfast and forced myself to smile. I wanted to be with Suzanne, but I knew that she would want me to look after her son.
'I managed to get to the hospital briefly, but at eight o'clock in the evening my sister Linda rang to say that the doctors didn't think Suzanne was going to make it.
'I raced to the hospital. Suzanne was covered in tubes and her eyes were yellow. Mum called for a vicar, and he christened Suzanne, our brother Martin and myself as we stood by the bedside.
'Then Suzanne turned her whole body to face us and looked straight at us. She couldn't speak because of the tube in her mouth, but we just knew that she was pleading with us to look after Jacob.
'We told her: "Don't worry, he's going to be fine." I started to cry, and then Suzanne had a heart attack and the doctors pulled us all from the room. Twenty minutes later, two doctors came in to see us and as soon as I saw them I knew it was bad news. I just screamed "No" and Mum began to sob.'
The stunned family were allowed to see Suzanne. Sheila says: 'I walked in and sat beside her body. They had dressed her in a gown, and there was a single tear in her eye.
I kissed her face, held her hand and said: "Jacob will be fine. Until the day I die, he will be looked after." She was my big sister, and I loved her, and it was the only thing I could do for her now.'
The following morning, Sheila had to tell Jacob that his mummy had died. 'I told him "Mummy's gone to be with the angels" and he looked up at me with his beautiful blue eyes and said: "Why? She was beautiful the way she was. I loved her the way she was." '
'He started to sob, but when I tried to hug him, he pushed me away. For days, he pushed all of us away and refused to let anyone cuddle him.
'Finally, he told us that he was "saving his hugs for Mummy". In her final letter, left under his pillow, Suzanne had asked him to keep some cuddles for her - and he didn't want to let her down.'
The final verdict
A few weeks ago, an inquest into Suzanne's death recorded a verdict of misadventure, saying she had suffered a massive adverse reaction to the surgery. It seems Suzanne was vulnerable to systemic inflammatory response syndrome, a rare condition caused by a reaction to surgery. The whole body becomes inflamed, causing multiple organ failure.
The inquest also heard that Suzanne had contracted MRSA, but the coroner concluded this probably was not responsible for her death.
Sheila says: 'I know that Suzanne would still be here today if she hadn't resorted to major surgery in a bid to sort out her weight.
'It isn't a quick fix - it's a huge risk, which can throw up enormous complications. If I can make just one other woman think twice about this surgery, then I will have done my duty to my big sister.'
Jacob, now seven, lives with Sheila and has recently began to call her 'Mum'. But he still desperately misses Suzanne. Sheila says: 'I just wish she was still here - larger than life and so full of love.'
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