Paramedics help fulfill grandmother’s dying wish to see an ocean sunset with her beloved husband – a tradition the couple carried out every day without fail since migrating to Australia in 1995
- A grandmother stricken with bowel cancer has been granted her dying wish
- Carmen Leon de la Barra and husband walked along the beach daily since 1995
- Two months ago, their daily tradition stopped when she was admitted to hospital
- With cancer progressing, her family reached out to charity to help her see sunset
A grandmother has been granted her dying wish to take in the sunset with her husband one last time.
Carmen Leon de la Barra and her husband Antonio had walked along the beach Brighton-Le-Sands, south of Sydney, every day since 1995.
But for the past three months, the grandmother had been too ill for their daily wander of the foreshore, battling bowel cancer in a palliative care unit.
With her days dwindling down, Mrs Leon de la Barra’s family combined with NSW Ambulance paramedics and charity Dreams2Live4 to get their loved one to the sunset one last time.
Stricken with cancer, grandmother Carmen Leon de la Barra fulfilled her dying wish with her husband Antonio (together)
Wrapped in a blanket and with a Thermos full of tea in hand, the Chilean-born woman sat in the sun last Wednesday.
Flanking her on either side was her husband, their three children and their partners, and her grandchildren.
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Mrs Leon de la Barra’s daughter Tatiana Salloum said her mother knew where they were, managed to open her eyes and was ‘so happy.’
She said she reached out to the charity after doctors told her the cancer had progressed to its final stages.
Mrs Leon de la Barra and her husband had walked along a beach every day for nearly 20 years
‘When I told them Mum only had a few hours or days to live it became their mission to make it happen’, she told The Daily Telegraph.
She made the application at 1pm last Tuesday and within a day, the plans were in full swing.
‘Myself, my father, my two brothers, partners and seven of the nine grandchildren all headed to the beach from Mt Druitt.’
She had been unable to get to the beach for the past three months as bowel cancer progressed into its final stages
The near hour-long commute from the hospital had stopped Antonio from taking his wife to the beach as he had done every day since they moved to Australia in 1995.
Mount Druitt Palliative Care, Blacktown Hospital, the charity and Ambulance NSW worked together to pick Mrs Leon de la Barra and get her to the beach by sunset.
Paramedic Jeff Gadd was on duty at Hawkesbury Hospital when he and his partner received the call asking for their help.
Paramedics helped the grandmother make the strenuous commute to the beach, one calling the job one of the most rewarding he’d ever done
He called the job one of the nicest he’d ever done, saying it was ‘such a simple job but very rewarding’.
The trip turned out to be the final time Mrs Leon de la Barra would leave palliative care, as she died from cancer two days later.
She spent her final days with her loving husband, their three children and nine grandchildren.
NSW Ambulance, Bankstown Hospital and Dreams2Live4 charity combined to help her large family make the hour-long commute from palliative care to the shorefront
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