The one agonising battle even she could not win: How the cruel dimming of her awesome mental powers tested the great love between her and Denis to the limit

At Harrods, the queue wound around the tableware department, entirely obstructing ordinary business. At Hatchards bookshop, it stretched down Piccadilly.


Everywhere that Margaret Thatcher arrived to sign copies of her memoirs — at enormous speed, yet without a smudge of her large signature — crowds arrived and waited for hours.

It was a typically high-octane performance, and the reception was rapturous. This was 1993, and the public already knew — even if most of the political world as yet did not — that they were in the presence of a great historic figure.



Frail: Margaret Thatcher is helped by an aide after leaving hospital following treatment for flu in November 2010, where it also had been discovered she had undiagnosed rheumatism

But there was at about this time also the first evidence in private of a dimming of her very acute mental faculties. All her life she had enjoyed exceptionally good health and huge stamina — physical as well as mental. As Prime Minister she took remarkably little exercise, but she made up for that with a healthy diet. She’d left office in remarkably good shape.

Now her concentration was inclined to flag and she found it more difficult to master complicated data — though Mrs Thatcher at half-throttle was still more impressive than most of her political contemporaries at full power.

Age and infirmity were catching up on her, however. De Gaulle remarked that ‘old age is a shipwreck’, and at times she seemed to be drowning. Every ageing politician discovers sorrow and humiliation as his or her mental faculties decay, but it is worse when those faculties have been outstanding. Relating the details is upsetting, but no true portrait of her can be drawn that omits the dark reality.

This mental deterioration was neither continuous nor fatal to her public performance. Nor was it easy to distinguish its effect from other problems. For example, in 1996 she also became much deafer. She initially tried to wear hearing aids, but could not get on with them. As with other people who are hard of hearing, people began to shout at her, or ignore her, or treat her as a fool.

The effect of her growing deafness and her mental deterioration was to render her conversation repetitive, and on occasion barely comprehensible. People assumed the bottle was to blame, and those who had it in for her — and sadly there were many — sneered openly in order to damage her reputation and belittle her opinions.



Endless love: Margaret and Denis Thatcher, pictured at his birthday party in 1985, were married for 52 years



Marital woes: After Thatcher's retirement Denis grew unhappy with her refusal to quit for good, and in their last time together she, in turn, obsessed that he was unfaithful, which drew a wedge between them

Increasingly, there was the tragedy of contemporaries dying: Nick Ridley in 1993, Keith Joseph in 1994, Willie Whitelaw in 1999. Denis, ten years older than Margaret, greatly disliked such intimations of mortality and did something practical about it. From about 1998, he ensured that the two of them went to church every Sunday.

Initially, they chose a church near home, but it was very evangelical and no one was less happy-clappy than the Thatchers. They tried out the Chapel Royal and the Guards’ Chapel before alighting on the chapel at the Royal Hospital in Chelsea — an institution that appealed because it was authentically British and patriotic, and embodied a traditional concept of service.

In 2001 she began writing a book about foreign affairs based on her experiences, and it became clear part-way through that her memory was seriously starting to fail.

By the time it was complete, her short-term memory had all but disappeared. She would pick up a page of the draft, reach the bottom and then start to read from the top again, desperately trying to recall the argument, and failing.

But she had not altogether lost her political instincts. At the time, the invasion of Iraq was in the offing and she lent public support to the Bush–Blair strategy. In private, she was more critical: ‘I don’t like it,’ she used to say. She often complained that ‘We just don’t have enough information about Iraq’ — which turned out to be all too true.

The decision to go to war was based on a lack of intelligence about the country to be invaded. But when she said it, it was difficult to work out what she meant. Was it wise prophecy? Or amnesia?

Certainly, she would never have accepted at face value the flimsy evidence that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. And for all her faith in the Americans, she would have probed Washington’s plans for the operation more deeply than did Tony Blair.



On Iraq: Although Lady Thatcher publicly backed her admirer Tony Blair, pictured shaking hands at a 2007 Falklands War commemoration, in his decision to go to war on Iraq, she did not behind closed doors

She was now being repeatedly sent to her doctor for check-ups. But she was a bad patient. She regarded doctor’s appointments as opportunities to prove that she was indestructible.

When she entered the consulting room, she would summon up all her power of domination to demonstrate that nothing was wrong. She diverted attention from herself onto Denis, though he seemed to defy his years. He had given up his non-executive directorships, but kept up with his rugby and his lunches. He spent much of his time reading history and biographies, or carefully adding up the totals in his bank statements, in search of an elusive, beneficial error.

Yet appearances were deceptive. Denis put on a good show for outsiders, but he was not in reality so happy. Ever since she left Downing Street, he had pressed his wife repeatedly to retire for good, and — he fondly hoped — to stay at home and look after him.

When she did not, he insisted on joining her on foreign tours, where his physical inability to keep up constantly threatened schedules. She worried about him. ‘Where is my husband? Is he all right?’ was her constant cry.

But she worried about him at home as well, concerned that he would not take taxis because they were too expensive, trying to have him use her official car, which she knew was not allowed unless they were travelling together.

Her concern was justified. On one occasion, he tried to jump onto a bus in Piccadilly after lunch, fell off, hurt himself and smashed his gold watch. She was furious.

But, in the event, Margaret was the one to succumb to illness. They were on holiday in Madeira over Christmas 2001, and drinking coffee outside a café up in the mountains, when suddenly she could not string her words together. The symptoms bore every sign of a stroke — though she claimed she was suffering from altitude sickness. Denis was in an even more defiant state of denial.

Back home in London, she was examined seriously for the first time by a specialist, and more extensive neurological tests were performed. These showed that she was suffering the effects of a series of minor strokes, which had already irrevocably affected her brain and would continue to do so. Moreover, the risk of a major stroke was high if she continued her current stressful life.



On work: Lady Thatcher, pictured announcing her retirement in 1991, was long in denial about her mental state and struggled to accept that she was incapable of continuing at the same speed

Her doctors summoned up the courage to tell her that she must cancel all her speaking engagements.

She fought against the advice, and would try — on occasions successfully — to escape the ban. But in effect she had been silenced.

Was it in her best interests? Yes. The painful circumstances of the next few years would amply testify to that.

There had been fears that she was suffering from Alzheimer’s, but, though the symptoms were similar, this was not diagnosed. The ‘small’ strokes continued, and some were not that small. She would suddenly feel unwell at home and would then arrive in the office able to articulate only with difficulty. Her face would have the ravaged, lop-sided look that strokes leave behind.

Her memory continued to worsen and she was often seriously confused. If she stayed with friends, care had to be taken that she did not get disorientated and leave her bedroom during the night. A police officer always sat in the corridor. At home, full-time nursing staff and a housekeeper were hired.

HAUNTED BY MONEY WORRIES



Lady Thatcher’s last years were, to some extent, overshadowed by worries about money.


She and Denis — and, indeed, their children — had always been preoccupied with the topic.
At the time she retired, it looked as if she would always be comfortably off — and, indeed, she was never by any definition poor. But her outgoings were much larger than foreseen.

The nursing staff were expensive, and (as she had forecast in quite another context) she went ‘on and on’.


There was also a problem about her house in Belgravia. The sub-lease to her from the family trust on 73 Chester Square expired in 2010, and Mark would have liked her to move out so that the property could be sold.


But this was regarded by everyone else as out of the question, given her age and health. So she stayed, but the argument aroused tensions.

There were also difficulties created about Lady Thatcher’s appearances in public, and even whom she should see at home.


On this matter, Carol was the most concerned. There were practical arguments for some restrictions; but the end result was that Lady Thatcher finished up more isolated than ever. Quite what she felt about it all is hard to tell, because she was no longer articulate.

With her workload drastically cut, she and Denis were now spending much more time in each other’s company. But, as is often the case with elderly couples, the more they were together, the more spiky relations between them became.

Her forgetfulness and repetitiveness irritated Denis terribly. He had always had limited patience, but now he showed none. He shouted at her, and she became angry and felt humiliated. Resentments grew.

She also developed a strange obsession that he was unfaithful, based perhaps upon some old memory or past suspicion but obviously now a cruel delusion resulting from her illness or from the medication. By the time Denis’s own health suddenly collapsed, their marriage was going through a difficult patch.

They spent their last Christmas together in Tenerife in 2002, and on his return he had a heart by-pass operation, which he had not told her was coming up. She was still resentful and suspicious, but at the same time frantically anxious about his health and guilty that she might have neglected him. It was a bad combination, and it made her badger him when he most needed rest.

For recuperation, he was dispatched first to a luxurious hotel in Devon, far enough away to make visits more difficult and rows less frequent, and then to South Africa, where he spent April with Mark. Margaret later flew to join them, and, for some reason, the clouds suddenly lifted and the three of them enjoyed a wonderful holiday.

Denis was in good spirits and the prognosis was encouraging. Then, suddenly, he became listless and his physical strength ebbed. Tests showed his heart was sound, but he had terminal pancreatic cancer. He died in hospital in June, 2003, with Margaret holding his hand.

Some of those who had seen the reality of their relationship in the last few months thought that she would take the loss in her stride. They were wrong. If love amounts in the end to mutual need, she and Denis had loved each other more than they ever conveyed, and more perhaps than they ever knew.

She was devastated with grief. What was worse, she kept thinking that he was still with her. Her hold on reality weakened. For seven months she was in a trough of unrelieved despair. She could not work, sleep or function, and in her disorientating misery she made life impossible for everyone around her.



Distraught: Margaret Thatcher leaves a remembrance service for Sir Denis, whose death in 2003 devastated her and saw her mental state severely deteriorate

Finally, in January 2004, her medication was reassessed, and life became bearable again. But the improvement was slow, and it was two years before she emerged from the interior darkness that descended with DT’s death. Eventually she did — partly because somewhere inside her the old resilience still lurked, and partly through the bitter-sweet blessing of a forgetfulness that dulled the pain.

She smiled more. She slept properly. Despite going for regular walks in London’s parks, she put on weight, even becoming quite tubby with all the chocolates she was given — and not, of course, being able to remember how many she had consumed.

She still had no short-term — and not much long-term — memory, but she had ceased to be confused and was often unnervingly shrewd in her observations. It was no longer necessary to shout in order to be understood, because she had become highly proficient in lip-reading.

She also entertained, and was the model of a charming hostess. Indeed, she was somewhat better company than in the past because she did not dominate every conversation, and nowadays never drank excessively.

She felt lonely and would have liked a dog, but Denis, and then Mark, hated the animals, so it was never possible. But she acquired a rescued tomcat called Marvin, which she had to be prevented from overfeeding.

The cat followed her around and people became worried it would trip her up. When she was in hospital, it was spirited away ‘on holiday’ (so the line was spun to her) — in fact to the care of a good owner. Soon she had no recollection that Marvin had ever existed.

In 2005, her 80th birthday was celebrated with a dinner that included the Queen and Tony Blair. She gave a faultlessly delivered speech replying to the congratulations heaped on her. Only those who knew her best perceived that she was not quite clear what the event was about.

The final years of her life were particularly sad. Physically, she was fitter than outsiders assumed, but mentally she was a good deal worse.






Taking its toll: Several small strokes over the years left their mark on Baroness Thatcher's face as well as her mental state, pictured in 1986 and 2004


Of the physical mishaps — passing out in the House of Lords in March 2008, breaking her arm in a fall at home in June 2009, and contracting what was described as flu in October 2010 — only the last was dangerous.

And this was because, on investigation, it turned out that she had been suffering great pain from a serious, weakening rheumatic condition (‘polymyalgia’) which had gone undiagnosed. The ensuing steroid treatment cleared it up, but also caused her to put on a lot of weight.

The mental decay was linked to the continuing strokes. She had a quite serious one on the morning of her (last) Christmas party in 2009. She should never have attended, but she did — though she sat down throughout and left early.

The effects, and perhaps those of other new strokes, became very noticeable in her speech the following year. She could no longer string a sentence together. This only partly righted itself, and not for long. Often, it was difficult to know what she was talking about. By 2011, meetings with her had become heartwrenching.

She would earnestly seek to make some point (even now, she had no taste for small talk), but then trail off and look hard at you. Then she would try again, with the same intent, but to no more avail. The quandary about whether to reply cheerfully, without any comprehension, or to hesitate and try to make sense was ultimately unresolvable. It was hard to know which she preferred.

People easily assumed the first. But they may have been wrong. Nothing is worse for someone like Margaret Thatcher than to feel patronised. Was there sometimes a gleam of contempt in her eye, as she saw one slithering? Or was that just memory and imagination playing tricks?

Whatever her difficulties, she contrived to read the newspapers. In early 2012, she noticed a large picture of Meryl Streep, playing Margaret Thatcher, in the highly successful film, The Iron Lady. ‘How elegant!’ was the delighted response — though whether this was a tribute to the actress or to the Prime Ministerial original was unclear.


SHE WAS ECSTATIC AT CAROL'S TRIUMPH ON I'M A CELEBRITY



After Denis Thatcher’s death, the only regular source of worry for his widow was her son.


For three days, her staff kept from her the news of Mark’s arrest in South Africa in 2004 on suspicion of involvement in an attempted coup in Equatorial Guinea. When she was eventually told, she felt a deep sense of shame. She told friends she was glad that DT had not been alive to see it.


On his release, Mark was denied entry to the U.S. to join his wife and family, and he spent the next 18 months in and out of his mother’s house. She never knew where he was or when he would return. She was concerned that he would be unable to earn a living.




Proud: Mother and daughter at Sir David Frost's summer party in July 2004

She was dismayed when his marriage broke down and Mark formed a liaison with a married woman (who eventually became his second wife).


Although married to a divorcé herself, Lady Thatcher had always taken a very stern view of adultery. Her son’s departure to Spain in 2006 was, in these circumstances, a blessing for all concerned.


By contrast, Mrs Thatcher was extremely proud of her daughter Carol’s success in the TV reality show I’m a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here! in 2005. She did not watch every episode, and friends ensured she avoided some of the less tasteful bits, but she was glued to the screen for the final and was ecstatic at Carol’s triumph.


Those who did not know Margaret Thatcher well would have been surprised by this. But she respected courage, and she saw it in her daughter’s performance.


Despite Lady Thatcher’s image, she was not averse to vulgarity if it went with success and rewards — as in this case it did. For the first time, she found it easier to respect — and just to be with — Carol.


In the summer of 2008, a Sunday newspaper published extracts from a book by Carol which revealed intimate details of her mother’s mental condition. The headlines describing the symptoms of Lady Thatcher’s ‘dementia’ (Carol’s word) aroused public sympathy, at least for the mother.


But it was now wrongly assumed that the former Prime Minister was in an advanced state of Alzheimer’s. People thought that she could not even be invited to attend private functions, which she still enjoyed.


There were even rumblings about whether someone apparently mentally incompetent should be allowed to vote in the House of Lords.


Confusion and embarrassment descended. For a few days Lady Thatcher’s staff kept the piece from her, but in the end she had to know.


When she read it, she was shocked at seeing in print facts about her condition which she only half-acknowledged, but above all wounded by the thought that her own daughter could behave in such a fashion.

She remained unaware of the distasteful elements of the film — focusing on her dementia — which she would certainly have found humiliating and distressing. Others carefully kept them from her.

The rhythm of Mrs Thatcher’s days was by now well established. She seemed, indeed, in reasonably good physical health.

Then suddenly, just before Christmas, she began suffering abdominal pains. The operation to remove a growth in her bladder was not difficult, and after some days she was allowed out.

But she could not manage the stairs at home, so she was provided with a suite at The Ritz, through the generosity of Sir David and Sir Frederick Barclay, the hotel’s owners. Here she enjoyed a period of luxurious recuperation.

But it was not for long. The end, when it came, was mercifully quick: a massive stroke — the last of so many smaller ones that had remorselessly destroyed her faculties, though never her self-respect.

In the eyes of her admirers, her status as the only great Prime Minister of modern times was unassailable. In one of her last public engagements, in 2007, at a ‘Heroes’ Dinner’ for decorated veterans of the Falklands War in the Painted Hall at Greenwich, she turned as she left to wave from the top of the great staircase, and more than a thousand male voices roared their approval. The thunderous bellows must have reminded her of her party conference triumphs; but if they did, the impression quickly faded.

Sadly, the following morning she had no recollection of what had occurred. But if she had forgotten, the country, paradoxically, was now increasingly remembering her.

Her semi-retirement from public life in 2002, for reasons of health, had prompted a flood of quasi-obituaries, mainly favourable and already bearing traces of nostalgia. A general reassessment of her role was under way, and the inescapable conclusion was that Britain’s history was now impossible to write — impossible even to imagine — without her.

Without knowing it, Margaret Thatcher had become a national institution: not a universally beloved one, perhaps, but an institution all the same.