About him

Steve was a Geordie who made his home in London, after moving “down South” to study his beloved environmental science for college. Shortly before leaving the North East to study, his world was rocked the day after his seventeenth birthday, when his dad passed away from a heart attack, aged only 46. Steve lived under the shadow of his dad’s early death in so many ways, one being that he was convinced he would also die young, to which we would jump to reassure him he wouldn’t…

He thought he had lost his accent, but he hadn’t, his Geordie-ness stuck out a mile, with his random words and penchant for stotty cakes and desperate binding to Newcastle United FC.

We met in 2001, just before 9/11, at work. He had come out the other side after his first marriage didn’t have the happy ever after he dreamed of, I was temping having moved home from the States, both broke and not sure where to go next. We clicked. On paper our friendship made no sense, in real life we enjoyed each other’s company, made each other laugh, and grew to love each other.

We married in 2008 and welcomed Nathaniel shortly afterwards.
Finding happiness for a second time and welcoming his first
child opened Steve’s heart in a new way and opened his eyes
to a bigger plan and purpose for his life. Becoming a dad
himself allowed him to heal after losing his own dad.
Being blessed with Abigail and Benjamin brought him even
more joy and he was also thrilled to become an uncle, a role he had always wanted but was never certain he would have.

Steve was a catch as a husband, doing most of the cooking, all of the ironing and making big romantic gestures like extending my 40th birthday celebrations just a few months before he was diagnosed to forty days of presents and treats and surprises with friends that he planned with them behind my back.

But that man loved being a dad more than anything he ever did. He found such joy in putting his children first – he was more than just hands on, he was everything on! He loved to take the children to what they named Daddy Club on a Saturday morning at a local church, he loved to plan day trips and holidays and special treats, and he loved to find one on one time – boys nights away and Daddy daughter dates. He was so invested in the children that he even got excited by the PTA at their school, surrounded by his committee of Sarahs, and attempting to delegate the candy floss stall to the newest unsuspecting recruits.

Another of his unexpected joys was teaching the children
at church, becoming a father figure to more than just his
own kids, deliberately getting their names wrong in order to
start up conversations with them, and remembering the little
things to build their trust. He wasn’t afraid to look silly if it
meant that a little heart might be open to hearing a big truth
about how much they were loved, and despite not becoming a dad until he was in his forties, he maintained a child-like heart, celebrating his last New Year’s Eve losing a dance off with Benjamin and his great friend Nia, for which his daddy dance moves will always be remembered.

That New Year’s Eve 2018 was the day that he received his
cancer diagnosis – hepatocellular carcinoma – which from the outset was inoperable and terminal. He lived his last months making the most of the time that he had left, with a tremendous peace that he was going home, despite the heartbreak that he felt at leaving so many loved ones behind. Despite feeling well for longer than expected – taking a trip to Copenhagen three weeks before he died because he wanted the kids to see a city we had fallen in love with on our 10th anniversary trip the year before – his health did decline rapidly in his final weeks.

He was able to stay home with his us until two days before
he died, and died peacefully in his sleep at St Christopher’s
Hospice shortly after midnight in the very early hours of 9th May, 2019.

It is impossible to describe how diminished the world is without him in it.