Married, widowed, married, divorced - with the same man in Sweden

In Sweden Gunilla Soederholm was married to Martin, a mother of a two year old son and pregnant.
One day she phoned her husband at work and asked if he was coming home for dinner.
He said maybe.
Then he disappeared, into thin air.
Gunilla not only had to face the birth of their second child and raising both children alone, but it turned out her husband Martin had big debts. Debts she had to pay back.
The bank forced her to sell the home and the summer house (for low prices, she says) and for seven years, she had to pay the bank part of her salary, living on a minimal sum of money.

A card she found among her husband’s belongings, sounded like a suicide note.
After ten years the Swedish authorities declared her husband dead.

Three years after being declared a widow, she discovered her husband was alive and kicking. He was back in Sweden. During his absence he had been running a disco in Berlin, Germany and started another family.
He had had no contact for thirteen years, but was furious he had been declared dead!

Gunilla feels his return to Sweden was too easy.
He did not owe any money any more. She had paid his debts.
She had raised their two children. He had not paid any money for his children’s upbringing and daily care.

She wrote a book, with the help of journalist Ulla-Lene Oesterholm, in the hope that a future law will force the person who disappeared and reappeared to take responsibilities for his debts to his family and to the society. The book is called “Gunillas man foersvann” (Gunilla’s husband disappeared) and was published by Ordupplaget.

Life is sometimes stranger than fiction.

(Read in the magazine "kupe" the Swedish Railways have on their trains)