Columns

It’s taken me three months to have enough distance and perspective to tell you about my once-in-a-lifetime trip that didn’t happen. I was all set to visit a favorite relative in Rome, with plans to stay in the dormitory of a 17th-century church with nuns. It was my first trip…

I am attending the annual meeting of the Consortium of Multiple Sclerosis Centers (CMSC) this week, my second time here. Like my first time, in 2024, I’m going as a member of the multiple sclerosis (MS) committee of the Paralyzed Veterans of America. Back then, I thought all…

During my sophomore year of high school, my class schedule was changed against my wishes, resulting in me having to enroll in a theater class for the semester. Although I had dabbled in choir during middle school, band was where my heart resided. I had no interest in pursuing other…

The first night after my husband, Rhead, moved into an assisted living facility, I stood in our kitchen and listened to how quiet the house was. Our six kids were asleep, the dog was asleep, and I was alone with a silence I hadn’t heard in years and didn’t know…

In a column I wrote a couple years ago, I noted that, despite my fascination with the subject of psychology, I have only an amateur understanding of it. We can add artificial intelligence (AI) to the long list of things I’m not an expert on. I know what it is…

Dear family and friends, Over the years, I have wondered how my diagnosis of relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis has impacted your worlds, as well. Just as I am unable to convey the impact of its collision with the life as I once knew, I imagine those words don’t necessarily come…

By now, I’ve spent at least 70 hours inside an MRI machine. That’s three days of my life spent lying perfectly still while magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) searched my brain, spine, and joints for answers related to my multiple sclerosis (MS). At 16, the experience felt terrifying.

For years after my husband, Rhead, was diagnosed with progressive multiple sclerosis in 2019, I was working two full-time jobs, raising our six children, and caregiving for him around the clock. I kept telling myself I was managing, because the alternative was unthinkable. I had to be managing. Someone…

I have a bad habit. OK, several, but I’m only going to address one of them today. I tend to have a lot of imaginary debates or arguments in my head where I anticipate another person’s points, counterpoints, and questions to craft a perfect response. It isn’t an entirely bad…

Between my tours with the Army, a new course was added to the curriculum for me to teach — a two-week basic combat skills course for support personnel. The logic was that if a mechanic or cook attached to a special forces team overseas ever had to do something outside…

Every year, warmer weather arrives with a collective exhale as people spend more time outdoors, enjoying sunlight that stretches into the evening and patio dinners. But for me, living with multiple sclerosis (MS), the arrival of summer lands more like a quiet tightening in my chest. I find myself…

I was supposed to have my first colonoscopy this week. I’m at that age when it’s recommended that you have one regularly, so it wasn’t like I didn’t know it was coming. Prepared doesn’t mean excited, though, so I can’t say that I was too upset when it was…

Living with multiple sclerosis has taught me that some of the hardest symptoms to explain are the ones no one else can see. For me, one of those is itchiness. Not the kind that comes from dry skin or a mosquito bite, but something deeper, more unsettling. It…

I don’t remember much about the support group meeting that changed everything. I don’t remember the facilitator’s name, the other people’s faces, how long we sat there, or what anyone actually said. What I remember is the moment, somewhere in the middle of someone else’s story, when I looked around…

When I began this column about living with multiple sclerosis (MS) nearly four years ago, I worried about sharing good things in my life and about comparing my situation with that of others. It made me feel guilty. After writing about it, though, the feedback I received from…

If I sit for over three minutes, it takes almost that long to regain movement in my legs when I stand. Even then, my limbs must fight the relentless pressure of immobility. Focused therapies, such as the Portable Neuromodulation Stimulator, have given me back years of lost function.

I have written about how much I enjoyed helping my grandma tend to her garden as a child, in the years before I was diagnosed with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis. She instilled in me a great love for plants and for being outdoors. But with multiple sclerosis (MS)…

I had never known anyone personally who had been admitted to a psychiatric hospital. Walking my husband, Rhead, through those doors was one of the strangest moments of my life — not strange in a dramatic way, but strange in the quiet, disorienting way of realizing your life has become…

I would say that no one grows up telling themselves that they can’t wait to get their first minivan, but that’s probably just my opinion. I will allow for the possibility that some people have thought that exact thing, but I never did. As I imagine is the case for…

As I write this, the April showers that bring May flowers have brought forth a string of gloomy days here in central Texas. During days like these, I cannot help but be reminded of my grandma, who passed away about a year ago after a battle with dementia. I remember…

I was outside with my youngest child, who was only a few months old, strapped to my back while doing yard work, housework, and everything else, while my husband, Rhead, lay on the couch inside. This had been going on for a couple of years by then. Slowly, without a…

I had the recent honor of attending our nephew’s graduation from Marine Corps basic training. The ceremony on the parade field, along with the events of the previous day, were as stirring as one might imagine, but I think what struck me most was the changes I saw in my…

Until my relapse last summer, multiple sclerosis (MS) hadn’t really affected my daily life in nine years, so the recent MS Awareness Month made me pause. Living with the disease sometimes at the forefront and sometimes in the background has shown me how much the meaning of “awareness”…

Not long ago, while the family was all together in the car, a squirrel ran into the road in front of us. It froze for a couple seconds, then darted one way, and then another, before finally choosing a direction. Fortunately, it turned out to be the right direction. Watching…

There’s a bin of laundry in my car. It’s been there for days, but I keep putting off carrying it upstairs. My dryer is broken. It’s not a crisis, but it’s certainly inconvenient. It means I have to make a weekly trip to do laundry instead of running a load…

It’s definitely dark and maybe even disturbing, but a book I have always enjoyed is Thomas Harris’ “The Silence of the Lambs.” If you’re unfamiliar with either the book or the movie, you’ve either been living a sheltered life or you need to find someone whose birth year starts with…

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic neurological condition wherein the immune system attacks the protective covering of nerves. This clinical definition accurately portrays the medical reality, but it doesn’t encapsulate the lived reality. It doesn’t account for the ways in which fatigue can feel like gravity doubling overnight…

In the not-too-distant past, when my hands were still deft enough to use tools, I really enjoyed working on vehicles. The fact that they weren’t vehicles I depended on every day helped make it a hobby I enjoyed, rather than a chore. Like any hobby, it had its dull moments,…

Dealing with multiple sclerosis (MS) — including the numerous symptoms that manifest differently for each person, the grief, and the uncertainty — is grueling. On top of all that, there’s the added challenge of navigating the American healthcare system. As I have written before, I’ve dealt with migraines…

It’s been a few years since I’ve traveled in an airplane. Flying commercially when you depend on a wheelchair for locomotion is apparently quite the nightmare. Between that and all the accessories I travel with, as long as the distance is reasonable, I’d rather just drive. The fact that…