Michael Palin issues heartbreaking statement as wife dies just weeks after 57th anniversary
Actor Michael Palin has announced that his wife of 57 years, Helen
PA
Actor Michael Palin announced that his wife Helen died peacefully in the early hours of this morning.
The Monty Python legend confirmed the heartbreaking news in a post shared on his official website today.
The 79-year-old said that his wife passed away after suffering with chronic pain and kidney failure.
He wrote: “My dearest wife Helen died peacefully in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
Michael Palin with his wife Helen who passed away following 'chronic pain and kidney failure'
themichaelpalin.com
“She had been suffering with chronic pain for several years, which was compounded a few years ago by a diagnosis of kidney failure.
“We first met on a summer holiday on the Suffolk coast when we were both sixteen and we married in our early twenties."
“Two and a half weeks ago we celebrated our 57th wedding anniversary,” he added.
“Her death is an indescribable loss for myself, our three children and four grandchildren.
“Helen was the bedrock of my life. Her quietly wise judgment informed all my decisions and her humour and practical good sense was was at the heart of our life together.
“The family ask that their privacy be respected at this time.”
The couple met as teenagers before getting married in 1966 when they were in their early 20s.
In 2015, Palin spoke about why he believed their relationship had been so strong for so many years.
“What is the really important thing in a relationship, what is the main thing?”, he told the Telegraph.
“Sex, or going to the theatre, or having lots of friends, or whatever? None of that matters.
"There’s something underneath that works, that you’re happy to be with somebody for an awful lot of the time.”
Michael Palin has describe his heartbreak following the death of his wife
PA
He added: “The more time you spend together, the more things you have to share, the less likely it is that you want to throw all that away.”
The duo met on a family trip to Southwold in Suffolk in 1959 when they were 15-years-old.
He and Helen, who had been staying with her family in the cottage next door, began exchanging letters following the holiday, before drifting apart.
Years later, the pair rekindled at Oxford University through mutual friends.
“You can see fate was actually tightening the screws on us very hard at that time," Palin said.
Helen is survived by her husband and their three children - Thomas, 54, William, 52, and Rachel, 48.
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