“Tonny, I’ve always loved you.” With those words, Annie Leenders (71) wanted to honor her sister-in-law during her lifetime. Not until a cremation, “because then you’re just talking to a coffin.” But Tonny van Gastel (72) from Etten-Leur died earlier than expected. “She never got to read this story again.”
Annie and Tonny had known each other for almost half a century. She still remembers the first meeting with her sister-in-law. “We were in our late twenties when I first met her. She was sitting at the window waiting for us and looked exactly like my husband Ad’s mother. We clicked immediately.”
Annie could always count on her. “If something was bothering me, she immediately said, ‘Just call and I’ll be there.'” They went on vacation together with their families. “Then we drove through Barcelona with the caravan and we saw a car behind us that was blue with smoke. That was Tonny who was smoking,” says Annie, laughing.
According to her, Tonny was a real bon vivant. “She liked a good time and a beer. And when we were having drinks somewhere, she was the one who said: ‘Another one together?’ Before we knew it we had had five and it was really time to go to bed.” Annie remembers how Tonny often had a nightcap at home with her brother.
The bond between them never changed. Not even after Annie’s husband Ad died of corona in 2020. “Officially you are no longer family, but it didn’t feel that way at all. Tonny really felt like my own sister.”
She describes Tonny as a real family person. “She did everything for her children and grandchildren. And she had something that made people naturally start talking to her.”
In September 2025, Tonny receives bad news. What started with back pain turned out to be metastatic cancer in her lungs and meninges. “She called me after the hospital visit and said, ‘It’s all wrong.’ I thought so.”
In the period that followed, Tonny became increasingly confused by the metastases in her meninges. Her health quickly deteriorated and she soon ended up in a hospice, where she spent the last three weeks of her life.
Tonny’s illness was extra confronting for Annie. She was told in 2021 that she was terminally ill: lung cancer that had spread to her liver, kidneys, lymphatics and brain. Yet, thanks to chemo, radiation and immunotherapy, she is still doing reasonably well.
“I’m sick, but I’m not pathetic,” she says matter-of-factly. “Some days it feels like I’m not sick.” That is precisely why it felt painful for her to see Tonny deteriorate so quickly. “Sometimes I felt guilty. It affected me so much that I sometimes did not dare to say that I was doing so well. Then I thought: there is such a sweet woman who will soon be gone, while I am still hopping around here.”
She visits Tonny for the last time in the hospice. “I saw her eyes light up when I walked in. We went to the restaurant together and toasted with a non-alcoholic beer and a Bossche bol.”
What Annie found most difficult was that Tonny did not want to let go of life yet. “I saw her fighting against sleep. She was not afraid of death, but she felt bad about leaving her children and grandchildren behind. She kept saying: ‘I don’t want to leave you.'” She died in her sleep on the night of March 25 to 26.
What Annie will miss most about her dear sister-in-law? “I will never forget the love and attention she always had for me.”
Would you like to pay tribute?
Do you want to pay tribute to a loved one and share your memories? Do you perhaps have a story that can touch, comfort or inspire others? Then send an email to [email protected] and tell us about the person you will forever carry in your heart.
View all articles in the Forever in our hearts series here.
