Happy belated Valentine’s Day to all who choose to participate.
I have been trying all week to think of a topic to cover today but mostly came back to that one topic: love.
Choosing the negative route and ending up in the territory of suicide rates within the MS community, life is too great to make the focus on the negative.
So, let the discussion begin with that topic of telling the story about my bout with Multiple Sclerosis.
The story begins about the time of January 2010, remembering taking a stumble off the elliptical machine and being asked by my best friend “Damn, you drunk?”
I was not, I assured him.
Fast forward to that summer, we were among a big party of people at a sports bar in Long Beach and for some reason, I lost my footing and stumbled on my way down from the platform.
We had a few drinks by then and we went to the bathroom. As we washed up and made our way out, security was right there to tell us “you’ve got to go.”
Never one to take a “no” to the the money burning a hole in the pocket, we went off to a bar down the street and continued the festivities there.
Getting hired a few summers later with a telephone company was seen as a possible career opportunity, which came to an end in March of 2014 as they ended the term early.
April of that same year, the wobbly legs wouldn’t stop, and my mom noticed it more frequently.
A pair of trips to Mexico for Vitamin B12 injections did nothing to improve the condition so one of my aunts told my mother how it might be best if I had just gone to the emergency room.
Going in on a Thursday night and receiving the news that “you have multiple sclerosis“ was one of the toughest times. Having to swallow pride and just let the doctors speak proved to be the best thing I have ever done.
According to everydayhealth.com, “As many as 50 percent of people with MS will experience major depression in their lifetime, compared to less than 20 percent of people without MS, according to the American Academy of Neurology. MS and suicide are also linked.”
But what can make someone make such a decision on taking the one beautiful gift given to us?
MS is a tricky S.O.B and definitely is not to be taken lightly.
Especially when factoring in the change in personality as doing everyday items might not be as easy as they were before being diagnosed with this ugly S.O.B
I would not even think about wishing that on my own worst enemy.
To have the guts to even think of saying “how I wish they had this,” it’s unproductive and it’s certainly not going to making you “better” all of a sudden.
That is the same reason I have chosen to never ask, “why me?“
To ask such a question is like asking “ Why not someone else?” It is stupid to ask and it is not going to get you out of the situation you are at the moment going through.
All is well here. Please don’t think that a story such as this article is never going to happen.
Life is strange that way.