SAMANTHA BRICK: For three years I have been a full-time carer for my husband. I can understand why Ruth Langsford might have grown tired of being 'more carer than wife' By Samantha Brick Published: 20:33 EDT, 29 May 2024 | Updated: 20:33 EDT, 29 May 2024 e-mail View comments People who don’t know me assume my life is glamorous. I live in the Dordogne in France after all, which the British associate with holiday villas and long wine-soaked lunches on pretty terraces.

Yet the truth is, the only time I go out is when I do the supermarket shop. I haven’t been to a party, a concert or even dinner with friends for 14 months, largely because getting out of the house with my husband Pascal — a retired carpenter and, at 63, ten years older than me — is such a palaver. First I reverse my car to the front door of our farmhouse then, after helping him in, I make sure I’ve got his prescribed painkillers, his crutches and bottles of water in the back.

In my handbag, I keep a file containing his various prescriptions and latest blood test results and, just in case, our GP’s mobile number is stored in my phone. This is travelling light. There was a time when I never left home without what I referred to as Pascal’s ‘grab bag’ — an overnight case containing his pyjamas, spare undies, meds, paperwork outlining his medical history and other paraphernalia necessary for a sudden hospital stay.

Samantha Brick, 53, with husband Pascal, 63, in their Dordogne garden. For the past t.