When I worked out I was gay and decided to leave the church at 29.

When I now think of how the uncertainty about my own future, and the proximity of death, threw me into torment, careering wildly between hope and despair, I look back in wonder at how little I thought about the effect I had on my own patients after I had spoken to them. I did worry that if my tone of voice was too pessimistic the poor patient might spend what little time they had left feeling deeply depressed, simply waiting to die. So I tried to find a balance between telling them the truth and not depriving them of hope. After a patient died, I only occasionally heard back from the family, so I had little way of knowing whether the way I had spoken to them was appropriate or not.

July 2018, when I married my third husband, Roger, after two years of proclaiming that marriage at 76 was stupid.

When I decided that Mavis Staples was right – I don’t need to despise myself.

I spent about five years living in Paris thinking I would become Kristin Scott Thomas, and it didn’t happen.

I think we go back into the earth.

My failed driving test a few months ago. I got three majors and by the end of it the examiner couldn’t wait to get out of the car.

You can only do one thing at a time.

Someone said that I had a laugh like Jimmy Carr.

A receding hairline.