My Grandad, Alan, was always really active. My Dad says he was the perfect advert for retirement, he cycled, went shooting, looked after cars, and was a brilliant father, grandfather and friend to many people. If you needed your gas boiler looking at or couldn't switch off your burglar alarm you could just give my Grandad a call and he'd be right round with a load of tools, ready to fix things. He liked solving technical problems, and he liked to make things. He made a little bird table for me when I was 5 so I could put bread crumbs out for the birds in my garden, he made a toy fort for my brother, and a doll's bed for my sisters.
But he started to notice that he couldn't move as well as he used to. So he went to a doctor who said it was osteoporosis, very common in guys his age, and he was given some calcium tablets and sent to a physiotherapist. But it didn't work. At first the doctor tried to fob him off and said he wasn't doing the exercise he had been told to do, but my Grandad knew it was something more, so he went to his GP who referred him to the local hospital.
It took about 2 months of tests to work out what was wrong, MRI, CAT scan, blood tests, you name it my Grandad probably had it. In the end he was told they were 98% certain it was Motor Neurone Disease, with the other 2% being myscular dystrophy. We had already been told that it was a distinct possibility, but I still remember how shocked I was when my Dad phoned to tell me. I remember it was a Saturday, I was in my second year of university, sitting in the room of my student house when I got the call. And after I hung up I just burst in to tears. I had really, really been hoping it would be something else, anything else.
My Grandad sold his guns to the shooting club he was a member of, as it was the safest way to get rid of them. He continued driving for as long as possible but he had trouble getting in and out of the car so half the time he would just sit in it while my Nan did the shopping. Eventually he was told he couldn't drive any more so he had to sell one of his cars, a lovely BMW, to my uncle (my Dad didn't want it).
We also started to visit more often. I was younger we saw them every other month, my Grandparents were members of lots of clubs and it was a 3 hour drive down to see them so before it wasn't practical. But knowing that he was now on "borrowed time" spurred us in to action. He was put on some drug that slowed the symptoms but damages your liver at the same time, I clearly remember my Dad saying that he hoped my Grandad would die of something else in the mean time, anything to stop him being killed by MND.
My Nan was really amazing. She became a full time carer and I don't think I ever heard her complain once. She gave up so much to look after him, she used to do loads of volunteer work and attend lots of clubs, bowls, Women's Institute, helping out at the local school. Luckily the Motor Neurone Diease association found some volunteer carers, they came and helped my Grandad for an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening, and for two hours twice a week so my Nan could do the food shopping and still help down at the school. A year later my Dad and aunt took over caring for my Grandad for a week so my Nan could have a well-deserved holiday in Italy.
Each time we went to visit, something had changed, a stair lift, a wheelchair, special cushions in my Grandad’s favourite chair because he back muscles couldn’t support him properly. He was told to have a feeding tube inserted in to his stomach and he told the doctor to go to hell, instead he had a nutritionist and my Dad dug out our blender and gave it to my Grandparents so my Nan could make smoothies for him. He really liked food, ham, egg and chips, sticky toffee pudding, chocolate, if you could have put any of those things in a blender for him we would have done. He also had a breathing apparatus but it was more for when he went to bed as he couldn’t breathe properly lying down, when he was sitting up he was better. He also looked different every time, weaker, thinner, older, he was 78 going on 98. He could still speak but it was with some difficulty, and some times I had trouble understanding what he was saying.
The last time I saw him was in October 2006. As we left I wondered if it would be the last time I would see him, but I persuaded myself that we would visit before Christmas. I turned 21 on 13th November, we had a family party in London, but my Grandparent’s couldn’t go, my Grandad was too weak to make the trip and my Nan didn’t want to put him in a care home for the weekend. I called them from the restaurant to thank them for my birthday present, they and my parents had given me a not insubstantial amount of money, and I was really touched. The plan was for me to buy a car with it so I told my Grandad over the phone that I would be needing his advice on what sporty little number to buy. But on the way home from London I calculated it in my head and realised I actually had enough to pay the tuition fees for a Master’s degree, so thought “sod the car” and decided to do that instead.
I never got to tell my Grandad that though. On Friday 24th November 2006 my Dad called to say he was down at my Grandparent’s place and would I like a lift home for the weekend? I jumped at the chance, even though my boyfriend was visiting. And when he got there my Dad said my Grandad had been taken in to hospital on Tuesday, he had been very delirious and wasn’t making any sense when talking to my Nan so the doctor had him moved to the hospital. On Thursday night one of the nurses was doing the rounds and asked if he wanted anything, he said “no thanks, I’m fine”. She went around the rest of the ward and when she got back to him, he had gone. Just like that. I’m glad those were his last words, I’d have hated for him to die while waiting for a cup of tea.
I think he was holding on just long enough to see me turn 21, and know that the family was okay. And once he knew, he was ready to go. I never got to tell him I was going to do a Master’s, and he never saw me graduate from my BA either. I think about him nearly every day, and miss him very much. I have a car that another uncle gave me, and there are several problems with it, and every time something goes wrong I want to pick up the phone and call him and ask him about it. I really want to sell it and have him help me find one that’s more reliable. And I can’t. My Nan was diagnosed with breast cancer less than a year afterwards and I cried because I wanted my Grandad to be there to support her, drive her to the hospital and yell at the doctors if he felt they weren’t looking after her enough. She’s okay now, they caught it in time, but I still wish he had been there.
It was just such a waste of his life, he really was a perfect advert for retirement, but he was also a perfect advert for exactly what MND does to you. His Mum managed to live well in to her 90’s, I think if he had been given that chance he could have made that quite easily.
RIP Grandad Alan.
xxxxxx
