It spoke more deeply of love and friendship than any words could. The image of former rugby league player Kevin Sinfield carrying Rob Burrow across the finish line of the Leeds Marathon last month.
He had pushed his ex-teammate Rob, suffering from Motor Neurone Disease, for more than 26 miles. This was his final act of dedication.
Yet as moving as that sight was, there is another more powerful still.
That of Rob’s wife Lindsey carrying her husband of 17 years – her teenage sweetheart, the father of their three young children – around their home.
It comes as Lindsey said Kevin should be given a knighthood for his publicity-raising efforts.
Ravaged as 7st Rob, 40, now is, four years after his MND diagnosis in 2019, the task is still Herculean for Lindsey, 40. Yet she persists, lifting and carrying him from bed to chair, chair to car, refusing carers and equipment.
It is only recently she moved Rob’s bed downstairs because she could no longer manage the stairs safely.
“While I’m physically able, I will continue to do that for Rob, and I know he’d do the same for me,” she says, speaking matter-of-factly.
“We haven’t really discussed the option of carers. We don’t want stairlifts, hoists and things, for me it can become quite clinical.
"You just want to do what you can, while you can, for as long as you can. He’s my husband, I want to care for him. You say those vows, in sickness and in health, that’s what you want to do.
“He’ll often say, ‘Thank you for looking after me, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you doing these things’. I know how grateful he is.
“It’s not easy being a carer, but when I look at what Rob has had taken from him I’ve nothing to moan about.”
For the superstar Leeds Rhinos and England player, an intensely private man, it was a courageous call to be so open about the degenerative condition, which affects nerves in the brain and spinal cord.
Thanks to his mission, his and Lindsey’s tireless fundraising, and that of Kevin’s, millions have been raised for MND research and care.
“Rob will always be a hero in our eyes,” says Lindsey, who met the “shy teenager” aged 15
I suggest she is too. She laughs. “Not at all! I’m just a crazy woman who runs around!” she shrugs.
Most will disagree after watching a new ITV documentary, Lindsey and Rob: Living with MND, which airs tomorrow. Although she certainly runs around. While working one day a week as a NHS physiotherapist – Rob’s parents take on his care that day – she spends the rest of her hours as full-time carer and mum to Macy, 11, Maya, seven, and Jackson, three, at their home in Castleford, West Yorks.
She even completed the Leeds Marathon and has entered the Yorkshire Marathon, in October.
“Rob said he couldn’t be more proud,” she smiles.
Rob was initially given two years to live, and today refuses to hear a prognosis. Lindsey explains her husband has now lost all ability to talk, and retains no voluntary movement control, except with his eyes, which he uses to spell messages on a screen.
He struggles to swallow, so she must feed him only liquidised food, and some nights uses a ventilator to help reduce high levels of carbon dioxide in his body. The build-up in MND sufferers whose breathing muscles struggle to function, can lead to death.
“I don’t think he can really get any worse,” Lindsey admits.
She has coaxed him to speak briefly about his end-of-life wishes.
“I know roughly, he knows what type of music he’d like. He’s a big Michael Jackson fan. Rob has said I’m still young, I should find someone else. He just wants us to be happy. But he’s still here, still fighting and I know I upset him when I ask those questions.”
Yet he rarely shows fear or depression. “He doesn’t confide in me about struggling,” admits Lindsey.
She recalls his tears after diagnosis. But a couple of weeks later he visited Doddie Weir, the Scottish rugby union player also diagnosed with MND, who died last year.
“It was a turning point, he instilled so much hope and inspiration,” she says. “Rob came back, saying, ‘Right, we tackle this head on, no more tears.’”
Lindsey doesn’t allow him to see her upset, either. “Crying is not going to change the situation, I’d rather make happy memories and spend time happy with Rob,” she insists.
“I look at the legacy Rob has created, and I hope my children will think, ‘Look what Daddy did’, hopefully it will help us through difficult times.”
Her youngest Jackson, aged one when Rob was diagnosed, struggles to understand. “He will ask, ‘When will Daddy not have MND?’” she reveals. The girls grasp more. In the documentary, Macy speaks of her daddy “taking his last breath”.
“Rob is so determined to fight, they see that fighting spirit, you have to give them hope, so we will continue to fight with him,” she says.
What keeps him happy, Lindsey says, is being with the children. On Father’s Day they will push him around a 1.5km race. Touchingly, they bring him drinks.
Macy will place his arms on cushions for support. And life as a couple? She still talks to Rob nineteen to the dozen. She can hold his hand. On Valentine’s Day he ordered her flowers.
“Rob is still the man I married, he’s just in a body that doesn’t function,” she says. “I married for life, we’d that vision of growing old together. Our time will be cut short but that doesn’t stop us enjoying that time.”
* Tonight - Lindsey and Rob: Living with MND, on Thursday 8:30pm on ITV1 and ITVX
