The word at the bottom of the letter

The letter from the consultant listed the people who would be in touch: a breathing specialist, and the doctors and nurses. At the bottom of the page was Mary Ann Evans Hospice.

Steve Hyde is 68, a former paratrooper from Hartshill in Nuneaton. Two years ago he was diagnosed with motor neurone disease. He told Ushma Mistry of the BBC this week that he read the word hospice and thought his life was over.

"Well, my interpretation at the time was 'that's where people go to die', and that hit me hard."

He has spent years raising money for other people. The BBC puts it at more than half a million pounds. MND was the lowest he had ever felt. "It's like being hit with a bomb. You just don't know where you are, what to do, you're just totally lost."

Shortly after the diagnosis he walked to a bridge and thought about ending his life. He stopped because of the dog.

The first person he told was Debbie, the hospice's MND support worker. She called him a few names, which, he said, is his mentality. They got on. "She's been a rock for me." Her husband had MND too. "I'm talking to somebody who's been there and can relate to what I'm saying and what I'm feeling." Debbie, he said, has a knack of making him laugh.

Mary Ann Evans sits on Eliot Way, at George Eliot Hospital. It is a community hospice for Nuneaton, Bedworth and North Warwickshire: built after the mayors' appeals of 1987 and 1988, opened by the Princess Royal in January 1991. It started as a day hospice. The work that grew from that is in people's houses. There is a Wellbeing Centre. There is Hospice at Home, eight in the morning until eight at night, seven days a week. Rapid Response, run with South Warwickshire University NHS Foundation Trust, is the 24-hour call-out. A dedicated MND coordinator connects patients into the local specialist team, and into the rest of what the hospice does. Nobody is asked to pay at the point of care.

Just over 24 per cent of the £2.8 million it costs to run comes from the NHS. The rest is charity shops, donations, events, gifts in memory, and gifts in wills. To the BBC this week the hospice put a simpler figure on the work: at least £5,000 a day.

Martin from the hospice visits him at home every month. She is not surprised by the next thing he has set himself. "I've always thought that he's been quite brave...the way that he has dealt with his diagnosis, the way he deals with everyday issues, and I think his military background means that there's bravery there that you don't see unless you talk to him."

On Friday 25 September he jumps again, with his daughter Chez, and with the Army's Red Devils, the Parachute Regiment display team. Coventry Live, which has followed him since the diagnosis, calls him Para. He was 3 PARA. He has already gone back to Aldershot for the old ten-mile march, and walked 150 laps of Hartshill Hayes Park in eight hours. A councillor who used to work the doors with him, Shane Coates-Jarman, started an appeal so the cost of the jump is covered and the rest can go to the hospice.

The Red Devils have been the Army's official parachute display team since 1979. Hyde's jump is a thank you. He is still here. Debbie has been with him since the letter. Martin still comes to the house.

If you have been affected, Samaritans are on 116 123, any time. MND Connect is on 0808 802 6262.