Multiple Sclerosis is the best Thing that ever Happened to Me

"Multiple Sclerosis is probably the best thing that ever happened to me. I appreciate life more, laugh when it might be inappropriate, cry when I want. I watch sunrises and sunsets that in the past I might have ignored. I love more. I share more. I own my disease, but ms will not define me. I will define ms."


-Rebecca Graziano (posted on an online ms patients' forum when asked to complete the sentence "Multiple sclerosis is...") (used with permission)




The vision in my left eye comes and goes throughout the day. In a good moment, I see well enough that I forget I have any issue with it at all. On a bad moment, it's like a have a cloud of fog directly in front of it. My left leg has been in constant pain for the last 17 days, and for seven of the nine weeks prior to that. My left hand often drops things, and yesterday I fell down the stairs at my office. I can't eat dairy, saturated fat, or most forms of protein. For me, this is what MS looks like even now, when it's in remission.


But please do me a favor: don't feel sorry for me. I've never felt this much joy in my life.
Sometimes when I run--and thank God I can still run--I start out with little energy. I go through the motions for three miles that are mostly level, until I hit a gigantic hill on the trail that forces my adrenaline to kick in. It become harder to go forward, but it also shakes me out of complacency, forcing me to push harder. The last time I ran it, I actually ran that uphill mile faster--better--than I had run the previous three. And even when the path leveled out a mile later, the adrenaline shot lasted to push me to a better pace than I'd run the first half of my run. The challenge shook me out of my doldrums into a better a run.
MS, for me, has been kind of like that hill.


Multiple Sclerosis has taught me so many things in the first 78 days. For one, I've learned that when you were born with a slight lisp, it's really hard to say the word "sclerosis." It seems a cruel trick that God couldn't at least bail me out of one issue or the other.
But that's not quite all.
I appreciate sunshine and beauty so much more than I used to, especially on the days I feel good enough to go out and enjoy it. I don't take those days for granted anymore. I couldn't tell you the last time I woke up thankful for the strength to get out of bed prior to my diagnosis. I get to do that often now.


My doctor thinks I have the "better" version of MS, the kind that goes into remission and doesn't outwardly show signs of progression beyond my current symptoms for months at a time, maybe even years. For a few weeks, it looked like I might have the other type, where the progression never stops. When I heard this good news last week, I burst into uncontrollable tears for the first time since my diagnosis. I get to live something like a normal life, and I get to appreciate every moment of it so much more, because I know all too well that it wasn't guaranteed.  It's almost as if every moment I get to run, walk, travel, or work is a blessing I might not have had if life had worked out just a little bit differently.


Actually, it's exactly just that.


Last week I got to speak to a group of a couple hundred people about what MS has taught me. About how it's made me thankful for every good moment, and even more thankful for the bigger things that even the bad moments can't take away. No one would have listened to that message three months ago, and I wouldn't have even been in a place to give it.


For the past several years, I'd been a prisoner stuck in my own head, unable to forgive my personal failures, that I buckled under the pressure of my last high-profile job, and that neither my new job or life in general immediately fell neatly into place once we moved to California. It was a funk I couldn't quite break out of, no matter how hard I tried, as I couldn't find my way to make a difference in the world in my new life.


But when you're in a constant struggle for your continued existence, you don't have time for these internal debates any more. You forgive yourself for your past mistakes, and don't waste energy holding grudges against the people who let you down along the way. You stop taking your own strength for granted, and ask God, and loved ones, for more help along the way, deepening your relationships with both. In a weird way, the chains of your newfound limitations set you free.

Quick: assuming you still can: when's the last time you were thankful for the fact that you had vision in both your eyes? Or that you could walk to the bathroom? Or get out of bed at all, at least on a good day? Or that even on a bad day, that you aren't all alone?


Well, as long as there are still good days, and as long as there is still love, we all have something to be thankful for. I see that so much better now, even with only one working eye.


In my desperate moments, I still hope that someday I'll hit the peak of this hill I'm climbing and get to start running downhill. That I'll get to eat pizza again, see clearly out of my left eye, and move around without limitations. Medical science hasn't gotten there yet.


But when I pray, I don't often ask that God takes away my disease. I'm a better person for having had it. It's given me the freedom to define my life in such a better way than I ever would have without it.