A dying mother has admitted killing her terminally-ill seven-year-old son by using a large dose of morphine to ‘quietly end his life’. 

Antonya Cooper, from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, said her child Hamish had stage 4 cancer and was ‘facing the most horrendous suffering’ before his death in 1981. 

She said Hamish was ‘telling me he was in pain and asking me if I could remove his pain’ and that as a mother, she was ‘not going to let him suffer’. 

The brave youngster had been battling neuroblastoma –  a rare cancer that affects children – since the age of five and had been given just three months to live. 

And despite 16 months of ‘beastly’ cancer treatment at London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital, Hamish’s incurable illness had left him in constant agony.

Speaking of her decision to give her little boy a large dose of morphine, Mrs Cooper said: ‘It was the right thing to do. My son was facing the most horrendous suffering and intense pain, I was not going to allow him to go through that.’

Now facing her own battle against terminal cancer, Mrs Cooper has described in heartbreaking detail how she helped her son die after he begged her to ease his pain. 

Antonya Cooper, from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, said her lad Hamish had stage 4 cancer and was in ‘a lot of pain’ before his death in 1981

Now facing her own incurable cancer, Mrs Cooper has spoken out about how she gave her son a ‘large dose’ of morphine to ‘quietly end his life’

‘On Hamish’s last night, when he said he was in a lot of pain, I said: ‘Would you like me to remove the pain?’ and he said: ‘Yes please, mama’,’ Mrs Cooper told BBC Radio Oxford. 

‘And through his Hickman Catheter, external, I gave him a large dose of morphine that did quietly end his life.’ 

The dying 77-year-old was asked by BBC Radio Oxford if she believed her son knew she was intending to take his life. 

‘I feel very strongly that at the point of Hamish telling me he was in pain, and asking me if I could remove his pain, he knew, he knew somewhere what was going to happen,’ she replied. 

‘But I cannot obviously tell you why or how, but I was his mother, he loved his mother, and I totally loved him, and I was not going to let him suffer, and I feel he really knew where he was going.’

Mrs Cooper’s admission comes as she fights to change the law on assisted dying. 

Assisted suicide – the act of intentionally helping someone to end their life –  and euthanasia – the deliberate ending of a person’s life – are both illegal in the UK. 

Mrs Cooper’s admission to the BBC could now open her up to a potential police investigation. 

Quizzed over whether she understood she had potentially admitted to manslaughter or murder, she told the radio station: ‘Yes’. 

Patriotic Hamish, with a Union flag on his hospital bed. spent 16 months undergoing ‘beastly’ cancer treatment at Great Ormond Street hospital after being diagnosed, aged five

‘If they come 43 years after I have allowed Hamish to die peacefully, then I would have to face the consequences. But they would have to be quick, because I’m dying too,’ Mrs Cooper added.

Hamish died at home on December 1, 1981. 

Antonya said the death of her beloved little lad was like an ‘amputation’ and that she will ‘never get over it’.

Mrs Cooper has now been diagnosed with incurable pancreatic cancer and is undergoing chemotherapy, which she said makes her feel ‘rotten’.

She now wants to campaign for the laws on assisted dying in the UK to change, joining the likes of Dame Esther Rantzen. 

Dame Esther, best known for presenting and producing the hit BBC show That’s Life! from, is one of the nation’s most well-known advocates for assisted suicide, after being diagnosed with stage four lung cancer last January.

Last December, she revealed that she has signed up for Dignitas, the most well-known assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland, and said that she ‘might buzz off to Zurich’ if her complex cancer treatment doesn’t work. 

In England and Wales, assisted suicide can be prosecuted with a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

But despite the enormous personal risk, her daughter, Rebecca Wilcox, hinted that she would help her mother attend a Dignitas clinic.

Wilcox, herself a TV presenter, wrote in Saga magazine: ‘If she goes – at the moment it would be her only option for an assisted death – she will have to go alone. It is against the law to accompany her. I would face ­prosecution for manslaughter and could receive up to 14 years in prison.

Despite the enormous personal risk Dame Esther Rantzen’s (pictured, right) daughter, Rebecca Wilcox (pictured, left), hinted that she would help her mother attend a Dignitas clinic

‘Even if it doesn’t go to trial, many people face a two-year investigation. I have a young family with two children, a busy home and a complex job. I shouldn’t have to risk going to prison just to keep mum company, but I’m not sure I could let her go alone.

‘It’s an impossible decision to have to make: either risk possible prosecution at the worst time of my life, when I have just lost my adored mum, or do the unthinkable and let her die alone in a foreign country with no one she knows or loves to hold her hand.’

Wilcox added: ‘The thought of her actually dying is abominable, but the thought of her dying in pain is unthinkable.

‘Her health is not great and her illness has no cure. The ­prognosis may lead to a painful death that might not be eased with palliative care and opioid painkillers.’

Mrs Cooper is now coming to terms with her own incurable cancer four decades after her son’s death. 

She added: ‘I am not a religious person, but there is a tiny voice inside me that believes it would be wonderful if I could cuddle Hamish again.’