A dad made a poignant promise to his "beautiful" wife who tragically died a week after she caught flu.
Ian Wileman begged his primary school teacher wife Michelle Wileman to stay off work after she became ill, but dedicated to her job, she ploughed on.
But a combination of the influenza virus and scarlet fever led to her contracting sepsis in March, 2016.
Ian was forced to make the heart-breaking decision to end life support for his "best friend" Michelle, 37, Liverpool Echo reports.
He said he promised Michelle, who he met in 2002 when they were both at Liverpool Hope University training to be teachers, that he would raise their then eight-year-old son Billy to be a man with good morals and ethics.
Ian, who jokingly told Michelle he would marry her on their first date, said: "She was a beautiful, lovely, caring woman. She was everything to me, we were best friends."
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Using money from her teacher's pension, Ian, from Dovecot, Liverpool, began donating small amounts to charity or community causes each month, both to create a legacy for his wife and to teach Billy the value of charity.
However his efforts have gone viral after he posted about a donation to a local food-bank in a Facebook group.
Ian, 51, who works at Greenbank Primary School, told the ECHO Michelle began to feel unwell on a Monday morning, but decided to go to work.
He said: "She really wasn't well, but us teachers can be stupid, we go into work all the time when we don't feel well because we feel guilty about the kids.
"By Wednesday morning I was literally begging her; 'you're sick, don't be in work', but she said 'no I can't."
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The following day Michelle was sent home from her school, Our Lady of Good Hope Catholic Primary in Wavertree, after she began to get nosebleeds, and told Ian she would book an appointment with the GP.
The tragedy began to unfold on Sunday morning, after Ian had spent the night in a bunk bed in Billy's room to help Michelle sleep.
Ian said: "I asked Billy to go and check on mum while I jumped in the shower. He came running back in, full of terror, saying mum can't breathe properly."
He rushed into their bedroom and found Michelle "panting like she had run a marathon," prompting him to immediately call 999.
The severely ill mum was rushed to Whiston Hospital after paramedics arrived and suspected sepsis.
Ian followed on in his car, and was asked to wait while Michelle was intubated to help her breathe.
He said: "After about two or three minutes a nurse said should be done by now, and took me back in. When I went in the room they were doing CPR on her, she had had a massive cardiac arrest.
"I was on the floor screaming, it was a terrible thing to witness."
Despite Michelle's dire condition, the medical staff managed to restart her heart and transferred her to Wythenshawe Hospital, where she clung to life in a medically induced coma.
Ian said over the next seven days, he had to stop Billy from seeing his mum due to the startling image of her in a bed hooked up to machines and tubes.
However he got his son to record himself reading a bed-time story his mum would often read to him, so Ian could place his phone by Michelle's ear and play it for her.
Despite antibiotics appearing to clear the infection and Michelle's heart appearing to recover, on Saturday March 26 doctors pulled Ian aside and gave him the devastating news – a scan had revealed complete, irreversible brain damage.
Ian said: "I made a few phone calls to my brother, and got him to bring Billy to me. I told him that his mum was going to die."
The following day, Easter Sunday, Billy was able to say goodbye to his mum and used her palm to make a handprint in blue, her favourite colour.
Ian says he and Billy, now a 12-year-old pupil at Childwall Sports & Science Academy, both underwent counselling after Michelle's death, and he wanted to create a legacy for Billy to remember his mum.
After a bout of illness last week left him unable to go shopping, Ian says he began to think about people stuck in poverty who had nothing in the cupboard.
He said: "It's ridiculous that we're the fifth richest economy on the planet and there are people who cannot buy a tin of vegetables. It has been allowed to happen, there are 150 billionaires in this country and we have people on the streets."
Ian asked some friends to help him raise money for St Andrew's Foodbank in Clubmoor, and donated a large amount of food, nappies and women's sanitary products.
After posting about his idea in a group called #Corbyn'sChristmasChallenge, his story was shared hundreds of times and he was advised to set up a GoFundMe page – which raised £2,300 in three days.
Ian is also asking for advice or help in the best way to use the money and ensure it goes as far as possible to help local foodbanks.
Anyone with advice or willing to help can email [email protected]
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