Losing Ground

(This isn't my greatest writing. This is MS drug induced...I'll edit it later)

It is now June 17, 2013.
I am not the same person I was when I began 2013.
Okay, I guess I am.

I'm just more aware of the defects that lie within me.

January began as usual. Cold, uneventful and never-ending.
Except for the pain. This sharp ripping pain that began in my shoulder and progressed down my arm into my bicep.This pain was followed by a cold feeling in my right arm and hand.

It was always there and yet there was no explanation. I tried to ignore it and chalk it up to being out of shape.

Once the cold sensations became more intense in my arm I couldn't take it anymore so I decided to see a doctor.  The doc suggested that I may have a joint injury or something simple like that and sent me for a cervical spine MRI to rule out a pinched nerve in my neck.

I had the procedure done and the following day I received a call from the doctor's office. They wanted to see me in their office as soon as I could find the time. No appointment necessary.

Now, I already had an appointment set for three days later, but they wanted me in there right then.  So, I took a break from work and stopped in. I sat in the waiting area thinking that they have finally discovered the cause of the shoulder pain. My days of pain were soon to be a thing of the past.

The nurse called me in to the exam rooms and took my vitals like always. She left the room and told me the doctor would be in soon to discuss everything with me. Once he came into the room I could tell that something was off. I wasn't here for some simple fix.

The doctor pulled up my MRI results and handed me a copy of the radiologist's report. He proceeded to tell me that they have found a few large lesions on my cervical spinal cord and that I needed to have another MRI with contrast to make sure that I don't have cancer or some sort of demyelinating disease.  This is the reason they called me in today. He didn't want me to wait for the results.

 I have always been a daydreamer whose focus gets lost sometimes. I stray during conversations and  sometimes lose track of what people are saying. Not this time. I was stunned and scared to death and couldn't help but wonder what the hell was going on?!

The doctor told me they were going to schedule another MRI with contrast for a few days later and they'd be in touch. The contrast MRI would let them see if there was a mass in my spinal cord or if there were active lesions attacking my body.  In the meantime, he told me to research demyelinating diseases and Multiple Sclerosis.  I left the appointment and went out to my car. I sat there for a moment registering what had just been said to me. I decided to call my husband to let him know what they had said. He was quiet. I cried a little and told him they were going to schedule the test for this week and I let him know I was going to go back to work. No use dwelling at this point.

Yeah, right. No use dwelling. I sat at work in a state of shock. At that point in time I had no idea what was going on. I had just been told that life as I knew it was about to be completely thrown in the air. Cancer?! There's no way!  I had no idea what demyelinating disease was, but I began to research it.

The more I researched it that day, the more frightened I became.  I decided to call it a day and headed home. I spent that fifteen minutes of quiet commute time crying to myself and trying to figure out a way to cope with knowing that something wasn't right.

When I got home I couldn't stop myself from researching things a little more. It's what I do. If you know me, then you know my nickname is Noogle due to my excessive use of Google for research. My husband and I talked about it all and he reassured me that they have no idea what it is and that I shouldn't worry too much right now. I could see the worry in his face even though he thought I couldn't. We've been together since 1999, there's not much we don't know about each other at this point. He likes to think he's good at hiding his emotions from me, but I know better. He was just as afraid as I was.

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I went for the follow-up MRI of my cervical spine a week later. They injected the gadolinium into my system and proceeded to look at me from the inside.  I spent about forty-five minutes in that MRI tube hoping that what they found the first time was just some sort of freak occurrence. After the procedure they told me the results would be at my docs office in a few days.

So, for the next few days I was on edge. I just needed to hear everything was okay and that it was all just some weird explainable MRI result.

I went in for my appointment and sat there waiting for the doctor to come in. When he finally did he sat down with me and started to explain how there was no mass (no cancer, yay), but that my lesions were old. He then said I needed to have another MRI done, but this time of my brain. He said that Multiple Sclerosis was something that really needed to be looked into at this point.

I have no medical insurance, because student loan payments took front row. I'd rather pay my student loans than have the government hounding me for money.  So, I went to the free clinic in my area and met with one of their doctors. He was going to order the brain MRI (because you can't just walk up into a hospital and order yourself a brain MRI, you have to have a prescription for it).

A few weeks later, on April 10, I went in for the MRI.  I was nervous but had come to the conclusion that those lesions they had discovered in my spinal cord were probably something I was born with. Hey, it happens!

They injected me with the Gad, scanned my glorious piece of thinking meat, and then sent me on my way.  I really was at peace with it all. I had finally rested myself into that little boat of denial and knew that nothing was wrong with me so I continued about my day afterwards.

The cool thing about MRI's at my hospital (and I'm sure many more) is that you can get a CD of the results for your own records. So, on April 11, the day after the scan, I went to the hospital and got a copy of my CD with the radiologists results on it.

I put the CD into my computer, ran the program that you need in order to see the images, and began to explore my magnificent brain.  I began to see little green arrows pointing to areas of my brain in different slides. So, I decided to pull up the radiologists findings to see what they had to say. 

After reading the doctor's report I thought I was going to vomit. There are findings of "9+ lesions"  and some of the lesions were "black hole type" lesions.  "Consistent with Multiple Sclerosis". There was more, but I couldn't see straight at this point. I didn't want to see it. I had been reassuring myself so fiercely that nothing was wrong with me that this moment took the life right out of me. I needed to talk to my doctor, so I put in a call to see if he had just a moment to direct me.

He called back later that day and told me that I needed to find a neurologist. Again, no insurance. I got in touch with the health clinic again and told them my situation. For some amazing reason the director of the clinic, Dr. H, called in a favor for me to a local well known neurologist and there would be no charge. Things like this do not happen for me, but they did.

I got an appointment with the neurologist and he told me that he was 95% certain that MS is what I was dealing with and that I'd be fine. He also mentioned that I've more than likely had this for ten years or so. He wanted me to have a lumbar puncture (spinal tap) to rule out anything rare. So, I set that up and went in.

I couldn't stop wondering how I could have something like this for ten years and not know it?!  How does something like this slide by?  I guess there were signs, but I ignored them and went about my may.  When you're a parent you tend to shake off the aches and pains. 

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A spinal tap is not necessarily painful, just incredibly the most uncomfortable feeling in the world. They remove a little of the liquid padding around your brain, so recovery is important.

My spinal tap induced an MS relapse. Pains like I have never known began to take over my body. I started having intense pins and needles like bursts in different areas of my body, but mostly along my right side. My foot would feel like it was falling asleep while I was walking. Muscle spasms began to kick my butt. I was in my first full-blown relapse and it sucked.

Then my right side started to lose feeling. I was sitting at work on Myles birthday and I noticed things didn't feel right. I could put a thumbtack into my arm and I couldn't feel any pain. I called my doc and they said it was time for the ER. 

The ER loaded me up with Solumedrol and sent me on my way. They said it was parasthesias due to MS.  I had to have three days of Solumedrol infusions at the Cancer care center at my hospital following the ER visit and I haven't been right since. My arms are bruised everywhere and my body feels like it got hit by a truck.  I'm hoping this turns around soon.

This is when it all became real. This is when I knew that MS was now a part of my life. There was no explaining it away as something else. No, the doctors aren't wrong. I have to accept this now and work with what I have. It's not going to beat me.  There are hundreds of strong men, women, and children out there kicking MS's ass as we speak.

Now I'm one of them.