I keep on mentioning that my grandfather had MS but haven’t really blogged that much about him, and as I have nothing much interesting to tell about myself today I thought I’d let you know a bit about my Farfar (Swedish for grandfather translates to fathers-father). His name was Folke and he was a metalworker spending his day by the lathe. He was the youngest of 5 siblings; they also had one foster brother. His family came from a long line of something called Statare, agricultural laborers that worked without getting paid instead they got to live on the farm. He only spent a few years in school so his profession was really everything, and he was very good at what he did. My mum still has some lovely big candlesticks in brass that he had made. He and my grandmother and my dad lived in a small detached house in a suburb of Stockholm with a huge garden, with lots and lots of fruit bushes and trees. I have many memories running around in that garden. The house was a bungalow but it had a big basement. My grandmother was the stereotypical Swedish grandmother, baked, cooked, knitted, crochet and looked after my granddad.
His MS happened all very sudden. They were on a hill walking holiday in north of Sweden, when Farfar suddenly felt like his right leg got week and he couldn’t move. Doctors got called in and after that he just didn’t seem to use the leg very well anymore, soon after the same thing happened to his right arm. I should guess this happened sometime in the early 60’s as I have been told he got diagnosed when he was around 50 years old.
When I was 14 years old I did a project for school about MS (slightly ironic I guess if you think about it) and did an interview with him, and he told me how fast it had happend, and that the only treatment he had gotten when it first happened, was several Cortisone injections straight into the eyeball ( I think his vision had been effected as well then, but he never had any other issues with it). After that he just got a wheelchair and was more or less told to get on with things. I was born in 77 and he was still walking with a cane off and on then, I even have memories of seeing him walk a few steps here and there. My grandmother died when I was around 5 and my farfar ended up living in an old people’s home. The reason he sold the house was that, the garden was too big and too tricky to get around and the stairs down to the basement. Also my grandmother had been doing all the cooking and such things for him for years; most people thought he wouldn’t be able to cope. I went to the old people’s home once to see him, I don’t remember much from it, but my mum has told me that in those months he was there, he aged something like 10 years, it was awful. So he came to stay with us, while my dad was looking for an apartment for him. He moved around a bit before they found a nice one for him, actually in the same suburb where his house had been. This was in an apartment block build specially for people in wheelchairs, lifts and wide doors with no threshold etc and careers that would come on a daily basis to check in on you and help you with cleaning and cooking etc. Funny enough my dear old granddad that never had even boiled an egg in his life really took to cooking and used to do most of that himself.
He often used to babysit me, and I would come and stay when I was older too, I remember he had this office chair with wheels on it and I used to race with him on that in the hallway. As he couldn’t use his right-hand he had learnt to write with his left one and spent a lot of his days doing crosswords. Many of the careers really liked him and often would save him for last so they could stay a bit longer and end their day with a coffee, cake and a gossip. They sometimes referred to him as the rooster in the henhouse with all the women who sat around there!
So MS didn’t stop him, he lived a good life. He died when he was 80 years old of a heart attack and I think because of him, MS to me or the life in a wheelchair doesn’t scare me as much as it could have done, had I not known him.
When people talk about the Viking gene and the MS in the family I of course worry about the future for my child. My MS has so far been very different from my granddads so far I have had no trouble walking at all (touch wood) but I guess the thing we had in common is that all my issues has been on my right side too. Things are of course very different now from what they were when he was diagnosed, and he died before the DMT’s had made their way on to the market. I don’t know what type of MS he had, but as it went so fast, and I never heard of him suffering from relapses I suspect it might have been progressive.
When I was a child he used to spoil me rotten, he bought me all the toys I ever wanted, and I remember bitterly thinking when I was diagnosed that this was the last thing he gave me. But I don’t view it like that now. With the risk of sounding awfully soppy I look back at him as a role model and a hero really, as he never had a cushy life but he always just got on with it, and he was one of the kindest people I have ever met. So no I don’t want to transfer on the so called Viking gene, but everything else that he brought I’d very happily hope the future generations would inherit!
xoxo
Hellie
Tags: family, farfar, grandfather, MS, viking gene
I really enjoyed reading this – as always! Interesting to know more about your Farfar.