A WOMAN who lost her husband when he fell into a diabetic coma after a Christmas night out has said she wants the tragedy to be a lesson to others.

Ellen van der Kroon described her husband Gerard as “being in denial” after being diagnosed with insulin-dependent diabetes six years ago.

Ellen, 30, of Market Weighton, is now left to run the couple’s business, Crowne Tyre Services, and raise their four-year-old son, Alister.

She said: “Diabetes ran in Gerard’s family. The only reason for his diagnoses is that I booked an appointment and said it was for me, because he had a fear of needles.

“After he was diagnosed he wasn’t too bad, but it didn’t last too long. He was stubborn, but he was happy-go-lucky and he didn’t take too kindly to me or the doctors saying he should look after himself.”

Mrs van der Kroon said Gerard, 44, would often try to control low blood sugar levels during a working day by having a pint of beer. When he did inject himself with insulin, he would do so without making essential checks on his blood glucose levels first.

In November last year, Gerard was found by his wife, at home, choking on his own tongue after falling in to a diabetic coma. He was saved by paramedics and recovered.

However, on Christmas Eve last year, he attended an arranged works night out and failed to turn up the next day for dinner with his wife and child at his mother-in-law’s home.

Ellen said: “I couldn’t get in touch and I thought he was asleep because he would sometimes sleep till 3pm. But at 3pm I thought “this is just too long – there’s something wrong here”.”

She then phoned family friends in Market Weighton who broke in to the house and found her husband.

He was taken to hospital in York and placed in intensive care. However, after seven days, doctors found evidence of brain damage and they made the decision to turn off the ventilator keeping him alive. He died shortly before midnight on January 2 with his wife at his bedside.

She said: “He didn’t realise the implications of not taking on-board the medical advice.”

To others struggling to cope with their diabetes, she said “doctors are not there to punish you”. She said: “You have to be honest with them and they can help.”