Fiona Phillips’ husband Martin Frizell has shared the story of the moment the TV presenter was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s aged 61.
The GMTV host, now 64, and her husband have been candid about the impact of the early-onset version of the memory disease since going public with her diagnosis in 2023.
In a new interview ahead of the publication of Fiona’s new memoir, Remember When: My life with Alzheimer’s, Martin opened up about the process of writing the book, his wife’s deteriorating health, and the ‘dreadful’ day the doctor delivered the life-changing diagnosis.
‘We went to [the hospital] to get the results of tests, and the consultant said: “I’m sorry, but I believe it’s Alzheimer’s.” And it’s like, oh. Gulp. Then he said, ‘I’ll go and get you a cup of tea, here’s some reading for you.”
‘He pushed a leaflet across the table and on the front cover was an old couple, with a Zimmer frame, basically saying: “How to live well with Alzheimer’s.” It just doesn’t relate to you,’ the former ITV This Morning editor told The Telegraph.
In the book, he adds further details of how the image of Fiona as a 61-year-old wearing ‘skinny jeans and heels’ didn’t match up to the image of a ‘degenerative disease for old people’.
He added: ‘It shouldn’t be happening to someone as young as Fiona. It was utterly gut-wrenching. Sickening. We just looked at each other. S**t! What are we going to do now?’
Martin offered his support in the creation of the memoir, going from writing a ‘few paragraphs’ to ‘24,000 words’ as he moved from ‘writing about what a great woman she is’ to expressing his anger at the lack of support for people with early-onset Alzheimer’s.
Both Fiona’s parents were diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, even so she chalked her ‘brain fog’ down to menopause before she discovered the truth.
The married couple of 28 years, parents to sons Nat, 26, and Mackenzie, 23, underwent genetic testing to confirm that the disease wasn’t hereditary with the blood tests ‘coming back negative’.
What is early-onset Alzheimer’s disease?
Early-onset Alzheimer’s is also known as young-onset dementia or younger-onset Alzheimer’s. It is the label given to anyone who receives a diagnosis before they turn 65.
According to Alzheimer’s Research UK, an estimated 70,800 people with dementia in the UK have young onset, and Alzheimer’s disease accounts for around one in three cases of young onset dementia.
It is thought at least five in every 100 people with Alzheimer’s are under 65, however the figure may be higher.
According to the NHS, the symptoms of Alzheimer’s can begin with usually minor memory problems, but can develop into:
- confusion, disorientation and getting lost in familiar places
- difficulty planning or making decisions
- problems with speech and language
- problems moving around without assistance or performing self-care tasks
- personality changes, such as becoming aggressive, demanding and suspicious of others
- hallucinations (seeing or hearing things that are not there) and delusions (believing things that are untrue)
- low mood or anxiety
Elsewhere in the memoir, Martin explained that he had wished she had been diagnosed with ‘cancer instead’.
‘It’s a shocking thing to say, but at least then she might have had a chance of a cure, and certainly would have had a treatment pathway and an array of support and care packages,’ he said.
Martin now supports Fiona in ‘day-to-day’ activities like cooking, brushing her teeth, showering and dressing her, all with the support of a trained carer.
As for the media personality, she has found discussing her life now ‘agonisingly difficult’.
‘Sometimes I get halfway through a sentence and I can’t remember where I was heading with it or the word I was looking for. It feels awful,’ she said, comparing her condition to ‘trying to chase a £5 note that’s fallen out of your purse on a gusty day’.
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