Finlay family’s perseverance has paid off
Dream of supportive home for former skier Scott Finlay finally coming to fruition
NAPANEE, ONT.— When Hugh Finlay says it’s been a “long, long road,” he’s not exaggerating.
In fact, one wonders why he doesn’t add a few other adjectives to describe the struggle his family and their supporters have been through to make sure his son Scott Finlay gets the supportive home he requires.
Finlay suffered a devastating brain injury in a ski crash at the 1978 Canadian national championships. It left him almost completely paralyzed and unable to speak.
For 33 years, his mother Rosemary has cared for him in the living room of their home just outside Napanee.
And for the last 14 of those years, Hugh Finlay has been bashing on office doors of government and health-care officials in an attempt to get a supportive facility built to accommodate his son and others in the area with acquired brain injuries.
“It’s hard to imagine it took this many years to get it going,” Paul Huras, CEO of the South East local health integration network, said Tuesday as he announced that a new six-bed facility would be ready next year.
As a fun-loving ski racer, Scott was never one to shy away from attention. So when he heard his name called out at Tuesday’s celebratory event his grin widened and he raised his left hand, normally resting on the arm of his wheelchair, and waved.
He was wearing Canadian Olympic track pants — very uniform he was trying to earn that day at Lake Louise when his life changed forever.
On Feb. 24,1978, he was a promising 21-year-old ski racer looking to make his mark at the Canadian championships and jump up to the national team amidst the Crazy Canucks, led by Ken Read and Steve Podborski.
But things went badly at 110 km/h on a set of bumps called Double Trouble.
He came in with too much speed and lost control over the first bump and was out of position as he hit the second one, which threw him into a backward spin. His head snapped back and smashed against the icy slope, knocking him unconscious. Teammates and spectators watched in horror as Finlay cartwheeled like a rag doll down the mountain before finally coming to rest in deep powder.
He was taken by helicopter half an hour later but his life, really, was frozen in time that day. He never spoke again.
“Scott understands everything, he just can’t spit it out,” his father said.
The family’s plight to get that supportive home built was covered in 2011 by the late Randy Starkman, the
“It’ll be the happiest and saddest day in our lives.” HUGH FINLAY ON SON SCOTT’S MOVE NEXT YEAR
Star’s award-winning amateur sports reporter, and videographer Randy Risling in a moving feature headlined “The Skier: When Love Runs Out of Time.”
That story and the donations that flooded in afterward from school bake sales to people in Europe who remembered the Canadian skiers of that era, helped jump-start government action on building this supportive home.
The Finlays never complained about constantly caring for their son but, as with all aging caregivers, they worried about the future. They’re both in the mid-80s now and still in remarkable health, but they’ve always known they couldn’t keep this up forever.
Scott Finlay turns 60 next month and, if all goes according to plan, sometime next summer he’ll finally leave home.
The new home for people with acquired brain injuries is being built in a retrofitted wing of an existing health complex in Napanee, a small town located 40 kilometres west of Kingston.
As Hugh Finlay walked down the hall to see how far along construction was, he excitedly pointed out the doctor and dental clinics, physiotherapy and massage services and the café where families can visit with their loved ones.
It’s everything they ever wanted for their son.
“We’ve never given up,” said Hugh Finlay, who believes his son could still make gains with access to intensive physiotherapy.
Still, when the day does come for Finlay to move into the home that would never have been built without the perseverance of his parents, it won’t be easy for them.
They can’t remember a day that didn’t revolve around their beloved son.
“It’ll be the happiest and saddest day in our lives,” his father said.