Pensioner invited onto radio show after revealing his loneliness during phone-in
Bill Palmer, 95, explained how he has felt since his wife moved to a care home: 'Every day is hell. I feel so alone'
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Sometimes it can help to get things off your chest, as pensioner Bill Palmer learnt this week. Mr Palmer, 95, has become an unexpected internet hit after calling up a radio phone-in show and revealing how “alone” he has felt since his wife had to move into a care home.
What prompted him to pick up the phone?
Mr Palmer, from Southampton, Hampshire, called the Alex Dyke show on BBC Radio Solent to participate in a phone in about love in later life. He described how his wife, Sheila - who has dementia and colitis - had fallen and was taken to hospital before the 85-year-old was moved to a nursing home where she now lives. “Every day is hell. I feel so alone,” the pensioner said. The couple married last year after 30 years of friendship.
What a sad situation.
Listeners agreed – and so did the radio host. Mr Dyke arranged for a taxi to bring Mr Palmer into the studio where he sat in on the rest of the show. A recording of Mr Palmer’s call had been accessed 41,000 times on the station’s Facebook page this afternoon and the pensioner has been inundated with offers ranging from Sunday lunch to a private concert by a ukulele orchestra.
I hope that put a smile on his face.
A shocked Mr Palmer said: “I can’t believe it. I just sit and listen to the radio and watch TV and have lots of friends, but unfortunately when you get old people don’t visit - that’s life.” Mr Dyke said his guest had “touched the hearts of thousands of listeners” and it was his “nicest moment in 30 years of broadcasting”.
It marks a turnaround in fortune for the DJ too…
Indeed. Earlier this year the radio host was suspended and then reinstated after he said on-air that women should not breastfeed in public as it was a “throwback to the stone age”.
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