My official diagnosis and becoming a parent happened at about the same time. I had my daughter Makenzie in September of 2010 and by October I was starting to have issues using my arms on top of the issues that I've had with my legs for the past 6 years. I initially complained to my regular doctor, unfortunately he didn't seem to be interested in figuring out what was actually wrong...instead he wanted to make excuses and tell me to come back if it kept up. This went on for two months before I realized that he wasn't going to help me and so I took matters into my own hands and found a neurologist. I'm not sure how many of you out there have tried to make an appointment with a neurologist but the wait can be quite lengthy. I got very lucky and was able to get my first appointment with him in December of 2010 which was only a month wait.
The process started with reflex testing and some other simple things at my first appointment. It was followed by MRI's, evoked potential testing, and a spinal tap. FYI when they tell you that you may get a spinal headache...what they actually mean is if you get a spinal headache you will wish death upon yourself. I have never been so miserable in my life and after 5 days I was lucky enough to have to go to the ER for a blood patch to make it go away. All this excitement lead to my next visit with my neuro and the two nastiest words I've ever heard...Multiple Sclerosis.
Multiple Sclerosis...initial reaction was tears, lots and lots of tears. If we are being honest this is my initial reaction to anything bad so it probably wasn't overly surprising that I cried. Then my mind started racing with questions. Some about the disease because I've seen people with Multiple Sclerosis and all of them were in wheel chairs. However, most of my questions were not ones that I have ever expressed out loud...except to maybe my Mom. First was...What about my daughter? Am I going to get to enjoy her growing up? Did I potentially doom her with this disease too?? Second was..How can I possibly ask Brian to stay with me?? How can I expect him to take care of me if I do end up in a wheel chair?? And third was...WHY ME!?!?!?! What did I do wrong?? Why doesn't anyone else in my family have this??
And so that brings us to now...I now have two beautiful children under the age of 2, these will be my only 2 because I had my tubes tied after my son's csection because of my health issues. I am in the process of being discharged from the military because of my diagnosis and getting put on VA disability...which has been in the works for over a year so I won't hold my breath because if I did, I'd probably already be dead. And I am starting a blog...mostly for theraputic reasons because anyone out there with any sort of disease knows talking about it can help, and maybe just maybe because someone out there who is also a mother with MS or even just another person with MS will feel less alone by hearing my stories. Here goes nothing...
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