Last November, my husband James celebrated his 65th birthday. For many, this is the age you can stop working and finally start living your dreams, the long retirement years stretching ahead of you.
Certainly, for a long time, that’s what James and I thought this milestone birthday would mark for us.
Instead, he spent the day having palliative chemotherapy after being diagnosed with stage 4 bowel cancer eight months earlier. He died three weeks ago – exactly a year after being diagnosed.
After a 41-year marriage, it doesn’t feel real that James will never again stand by my side. But in the depths of my grief, there is one thing I’m thankful for.
Because, 11 years ago, James and I faced a monumental dilemma. Both 54, with a severe case of empty-nest syndrome and a desire to travel the world, we asked ourselves if we should postpone our dreams for another decade until the mortgage was paid off and we could retire with financial security – or take the gamble of our lives, sell everything we owned and indulge our wanderlust right away?
We agonised over the decision, wondering if we’d be fools to take such a risk, knowing it would mean we’d probably never own a home again and would end up renting in our old age.
But eventually we decided to take the gamble and retire early. It means we spent the ten years before James’s diagnosis travelling the world and living our dreams.
The reality if we hadn’t taken that path, and instead hung fire for the security of a pension? Well, James would have died before he could retire.
With the state pension age ever rising, more and more people are putting off leaving the workplace. Last month troubling statistics found more women than ever are working past 65.
But to anyone wrestling with the decision over whether to retire now or stick it out a few more years, let our story be a warning.
Retiring early means we spent the ten years before James’s diagnosis travelling the world and living our dreams
James and I met in 1981 when we were both 21, marrying two years later. We moved from Cheshire to Scotland and our three sons – Ben, James and Iain, now in their 30s – were born in quick succession. James built an engineering business, while I was a full-time mum and helped with the business admin.
Travel was a cornerstone of our family life. We’d take the boys away once a year, always saving up for the next trip.
James and I fantasised about a time when we could give up work, sell the business and travel the world. But we had resigned ourselves to this being decades away.
That is until we found ourselves suddenly bereft after the boys all flew the nest. Without the happy chaos of family life, our rural cottage no longer felt like home. Their three empty bedrooms filled me with sadness and the huge garden that once gave us such joy felt like a burden to maintain. I lacked purpose.
We began to question what was next for us, now we were no longer just Mum and Dad.
That’s when the idea of giving it all up to go travelling began to take hold. If we sold everything, paying off our mortgage, we’d have the funds to do it.
We didn’t know anyone else who’d retired early – let alone in such dramatic fashion. But once we’d made up our minds, there was no going back.
By autumn 2012 we’d decided to liquidate all our assets: the cottage, the business, both cars and all our possessions. After a year on the market, the house finally sold in October 2013.
We had one last magical Christmas there with the boys before we moved out in January 2014.
Life felt incredibly exciting; meeting interesting people, trying new foods, staying in remote locations where even the power supply was unreliable
We wanted to leave room for spontaneity, to experience real freedom, so we didn’t have a concrete plan of where we’d go or even exactly how long we might travel. We just wanted to do it while we were young enough to still enjoy it, and were confident we could finance our travels with money raised from selling our assets and careful budgeting. In fact, life abroad is often cheaper than in the UK.
We’d planned that James would take a small percentage of his private pensions when he turned 60. And we aimed to continue earning while we travelled by fulfilling our personal ambitions – me to start writing the novel I’d long dreamed of, James to pursue his love of scuba diving.
Our sons were fully supportive, as were friends – though when they threw a goodbye party for us, many joked we must be having a mid-life crisis to make such a mad, if brave, move.
Still, when James and I boarded that first flight to Barbados in February 2014, I was full of trepidation. Had we done the right thing? What if it didn’t work out? We didn’t even have a home to return to if it all went wrong.
But any nerves were quickly soothed as we hopped around the Caribbean islands. Life felt incredibly exciting; meeting interesting people, trying new foods, staying in remote locations where even the power supply was unreliable. It was a world away from the daily grind our friends were living back home. We eventually settled on the tiny island Utila, just off the coast of Honduras, for six months, where James gained his scuba-diving instructor qualifications.
Our next stop was Asia, where I penned a draft of my first novel, The Backpacking Housewife. To my deep joy, I landed a three-book deal and James suggested we could look into house-sitting so I had a comfortable base to write. That’s how we ended up in a magnificent chateau in the Dordogne for six months.
What followed was another nine years of pinch-me moments.
Circumnavigating the world twice over, we visited 65 countries. We saw the Grand Canyon, wild orangutans in Borneo and had a picnic at the top of Mount Misen in Japan, where an eternal flame has been burning for 1,200 years, to name a few. We even renewed our vows in Vegas with Elvis just for the fun of it. James used his new diving skills to take part in dream experiences such as working on a major archaeological dive on a 17th-century shipwreck in the Caribbean, while I worked on my travel website. Occasionally we’d return to the UK to visit family and friends, including a forced return for the lockdowns in 2020 and 2021, when we rented until restrictions were lifted.
Whenever challenges arose, we’d pull together to solve them. We were naturally frugal, but never to the point we went without. In fact, we felt incredibly rich, so deliriously happy in our transient lifestyle that we didn’t ever want it to end.
In February last year, we paused our travels and temporarily rented a house in Shropshire to be close to my elderly mum after she was recovering from a stroke.
We hoped to resume our adventures later in the year. But not long after we arrived back in the UK, James started complaining of a niggling discomfort, which he thought may be haemorrhoids.
During James’s final months, we reflected on how incredibly grateful we were that we had taken that big risk and realised so many of our dreams
If only it had been something so routine.
After a visit to the GP, he was immediately sent for a scan, then a colonoscopy. Days later, in March 2024, we received the news he had terminal bowel cancer that had spread to his liver and lungs. It was heartbreaking.
James had surgery and began palliative chemotherapy. Designed to extend his life, the treatment was gruelling and relentless. But he maintained a positive attitude and his body responded well.
We were able to enjoy sitting in our small garden at the Shropshire house and occasionally manage short walks. But as the summer drew to a close, I could see he was getting weaker.
It was like living in a nightmare. I was going to lose my lovely, kind and adventurous husband and I couldn’t bear to think of a future without him.
During his final months, we reflected on how incredibly grateful we were that we had taken that big risk and realised so many of our dreams.
Now, rather than knowing we spent the last decade of James’s life with him working all hours and me holed up at home doing admin and missing our boys, I have 11 years of wonderful memories to look back on. And though I’m currently too numb to contemplate the future and need the comfort of family around me, I made him a promise that, in time, I’ll have more adventures as a solo traveller.
So, to anyone conflicted over whether it’s time to leave their working life behind, I say, just do it. You don’t have to sell your home and go off like vagabonds as we did.
You could take a sabbatical and rent your property while you travel, inquire about housesitting or simply increase the number of short breaks you take.
But whether it’s a holiday, yoga retreat or just the prospect of being able to call your time your own again that’s calling you, scrutinise your finances and lifestyle and find a way to make it happen. Don’t spend your life putting it off until ‘someday’.
As I know only too well, tomorrow isn’t promised.
As told to Sadie Nicholas.
