Reluctant MS spokesman ready for action
Lynn Rees Lambert
Local News - Friday, May 11, 2007 Updated @ 8:34:14 AM
Bill Hendry, the MS Person of the Year for the Kingston region, gets it off his chest right away: He doesn’t like the idea.
For good reason.
To get the title, you have to have the disease.
“I’d rather not have the disease,” he says candidly.
Hendry is among the 50,000 Canadians — most of them women — who have the neurological disorder for which there is no cure. Canada has a high incidence of the MS, which is more common in temperate climates and among Caucasians.
For Hendry, a retired United Church minister, the disease has been both a blessing and a curse. After a dark period, things are looking up.
He was diagnosed in 1998 with primary progressive degenerative multiple sclerosis. It began with a sudden loss of motion.
“I would be out in the woods and suddenly be unable to move — not being able to get to the tractor — just as if I were nailed to the spot.”
Add to this eye problems, dizziness, and falling. By the time he was diagnosed, he was weak, unsteady and needed a couple of hours of sleep in the afternoon. He got an electric scooter.
Now, 68, he can get around still, using a cane and other aids. The scooter isn’t great on the hill at his Glenburnie home.
He favours his John Deere riding lawn mower and a Massey Ferguson four-wheeler.
But MS doesn’t effect one person. It places a heavy burden on family members. In Hendry’s case, it fell to his wife, Lorna, a retired elementary school teacher.
“My thoughts now are often scattered,” says Hendry. His wife helps keep him on track.
“My life is now her life. It’s like Lorna has MS, too.”
Yet, they cope. They more than cope. They laugh about things, even the not so nice stuff.
“You have to have a sense of humour, otherwise you’re euchred. You have to keep positive. You have to live life as best you can.”
When he has an appointment with his doctor, “she puts a yellow sticky note on me,” he laughs, to help him remember what it was he wanted to say.
The disease has also changed him in other ways. Mainly, he says, it freed him to become who he is — a pagan, a country person who finds God in all life, from trees and animals to people.
“I realized that God is in all of us as we were lead to believe God was in Jesus. And that God is most visible when we are free to be who we are — ourselves. My journey has always been of becoming who I am. MS has been one of those enabling factors. It is now part of who I am.”
The couple truly enjoy the sugar bush on their property, where they produced more than 40 gallons of syrup this year.
“It’s a lovely rite of spring,” says Lorna. “We have a huge connection to the land.”
Making maple syrup has also drawn in some friends and neighbours, including an 80-year-old fellow who still enjoys the bush as well as retired professors.
“We have some amazing discussions,” notes Hendry.
He’s feeling better since Lorna spotted an ad for a seniors program at Queen’s called Fit for Life over five years ago. Since he started going to the program, he’s seen a difference.
“Comparing myself to when I was diagnosed in 1998 to now is like night and day.”
He still needs a nap and his eyes are failing but he says he has regained so much in life. He does the occasional wedding and funeral and is taking up an old hobby — canoe building.
Hendry is on the board of directors of the Frontenac, Lennox and Addington MS chapter.
“I’m not a fundraiser, I never have been, but I like people so they made me social action director.”
He’s working with a group to create age-appropriate housing for people with disabilities and he’s practically bursting with ideas on how to include others — people with other disabilities, whatever the cause — into a network that works together.
“We need to do a lot more bridge-building,” he says. “We’re all disabled in some way. And look at the size of the seniors population in Kingston.”
Some places do a great job in making the world a more accessible place, he notes, including RONA, a major sponsor for MS research and a store that is truly accessible.
Aside from the physical assault, MS is also an alienating disease.
“On behalf of all those MS persons I represent this year, I urge the public not to isolate us, not to feel sorry for us, but invite us in to welcome our gifts and talents, to make the goal of a cure for MS a priority. We are all a part of this community.”
This weekend, when Mother’s Day is celebrated, volunteers with the MS Society will be selling carnations at local shopping malls and major retail outlets.
Funds raised in the 31st Annual Carnation Campaign will support MS research and support.
http://www.kingstonthisweek.com/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentid=525065&catname=Local News&classif=News - Local
Lynn Rees Lambert
Local News - Friday, May 11, 2007 Updated @ 8:34:14 AM
Bill Hendry, the MS Person of the Year for the Kingston region, gets it off his chest right away: He doesn’t like the idea.
For good reason.
To get the title, you have to have the disease.
“I’d rather not have the disease,” he says candidly.
Hendry is among the 50,000 Canadians — most of them women — who have the neurological disorder for which there is no cure. Canada has a high incidence of the MS, which is more common in temperate climates and among Caucasians.
For Hendry, a retired United Church minister, the disease has been both a blessing and a curse. After a dark period, things are looking up.
He was diagnosed in 1998 with primary progressive degenerative multiple sclerosis. It began with a sudden loss of motion.
“I would be out in the woods and suddenly be unable to move — not being able to get to the tractor — just as if I were nailed to the spot.”
Add to this eye problems, dizziness, and falling. By the time he was diagnosed, he was weak, unsteady and needed a couple of hours of sleep in the afternoon. He got an electric scooter.
Now, 68, he can get around still, using a cane and other aids. The scooter isn’t great on the hill at his Glenburnie home.
He favours his John Deere riding lawn mower and a Massey Ferguson four-wheeler.
But MS doesn’t effect one person. It places a heavy burden on family members. In Hendry’s case, it fell to his wife, Lorna, a retired elementary school teacher.
“My thoughts now are often scattered,” says Hendry. His wife helps keep him on track.
“My life is now her life. It’s like Lorna has MS, too.”
Yet, they cope. They more than cope. They laugh about things, even the not so nice stuff.
“You have to have a sense of humour, otherwise you’re euchred. You have to keep positive. You have to live life as best you can.”
When he has an appointment with his doctor, “she puts a yellow sticky note on me,” he laughs, to help him remember what it was he wanted to say.
The disease has also changed him in other ways. Mainly, he says, it freed him to become who he is — a pagan, a country person who finds God in all life, from trees and animals to people.
“I realized that God is in all of us as we were lead to believe God was in Jesus. And that God is most visible when we are free to be who we are — ourselves. My journey has always been of becoming who I am. MS has been one of those enabling factors. It is now part of who I am.”
The couple truly enjoy the sugar bush on their property, where they produced more than 40 gallons of syrup this year.
“It’s a lovely rite of spring,” says Lorna. “We have a huge connection to the land.”
Making maple syrup has also drawn in some friends and neighbours, including an 80-year-old fellow who still enjoys the bush as well as retired professors.
“We have some amazing discussions,” notes Hendry.
He’s feeling better since Lorna spotted an ad for a seniors program at Queen’s called Fit for Life over five years ago. Since he started going to the program, he’s seen a difference.
“Comparing myself to when I was diagnosed in 1998 to now is like night and day.”
He still needs a nap and his eyes are failing but he says he has regained so much in life. He does the occasional wedding and funeral and is taking up an old hobby — canoe building.
Hendry is on the board of directors of the Frontenac, Lennox and Addington MS chapter.
“I’m not a fundraiser, I never have been, but I like people so they made me social action director.”
He’s working with a group to create age-appropriate housing for people with disabilities and he’s practically bursting with ideas on how to include others — people with other disabilities, whatever the cause — into a network that works together.
“We need to do a lot more bridge-building,” he says. “We’re all disabled in some way. And look at the size of the seniors population in Kingston.”
Some places do a great job in making the world a more accessible place, he notes, including RONA, a major sponsor for MS research and a store that is truly accessible.
Aside from the physical assault, MS is also an alienating disease.
“On behalf of all those MS persons I represent this year, I urge the public not to isolate us, not to feel sorry for us, but invite us in to welcome our gifts and talents, to make the goal of a cure for MS a priority. We are all a part of this community.”
This weekend, when Mother’s Day is celebrated, volunteers with the MS Society will be selling carnations at local shopping malls and major retail outlets.
Funds raised in the 31st Annual Carnation Campaign will support MS research and support.
http://www.kingstonthisweek.com/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentid=525065&catname=Local News&classif=News - Local
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