January 22, 2024 Columns by BioNews Staff Celebrating the legacy of MS columnist Beth Shorthouse-Ullah My name is Dave and I’m Beth Shorthouse-Ullah’s husband. We had spoken about the possibility of writing a column that looks at the experiences of partners of people who have multiple sclerosis (MS). But instead of sharing a thought-provoking piece from another perspective, today I sadly announce that Beth…
March 8, 2023 Columns by Beth Ullah Living with MS involves ‘invisible’ symptoms that are hard to explain The “invisible” symptoms that are common with relapsing-remitting MS and many other chronic illnesses can be the bane of our lives. It’s difficult enough to manage them, as they’re constantly fluctuating like a changing tide. But in some ways, it’s even more difficult to explain them to…
January 25, 2023 Columns by Beth Ullah MS cognitive fog is the hardest symptom for me to accept “You only begin to grasp the import of an event – and its larger implications vis-à-vis your life – long after it has entered into that realm marked ‘memory.’” — Douglas Kennedy, “The Moment“ I am reading my first book since multiple sclerosis (MS) fatigue reared its…
January 11, 2023 Columns by Beth Ullah With an Epilepsy Diagnosis, I Face Another Battle With Chronic Illness “The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” — Dan Millman I’m now living with multiple chronic illnesses. Lately, time has been rushing past like a ravenous flood, or standing still like a lonesome statue. In…
December 7, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah How I Plan to Have a Cracking Christmas With MS As an adult, it hasn’t been easy for me to get into the Christmas spirit. Planning festivities and buying gifts don’t come naturally to me. Perhaps it’s because adult life never ends, whereas as a student, I had holiday breaks that signified the beginning of the season, allowing me to…
November 2, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Making the Difficult Decision to Step Away From Fertility Treatment Ten years ago, my husband and I lost our twin girls during my 18th week of pregnancy. In some ways, it feels as though this decade has flown by in the blink of an eye, but in others, it feels as though an eternity has passed. Several years before I…
October 12, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah How I’m Managing the Challenges of Study With MS Fatigue Just like a surgeon’s prize hand or a ballerina’s plié, my mind has been my most valued asset. That’s been true all my life, through realizing my passion for science, achieving my undergraduate degree in biomedical science, and even keeping myself sane during the dark days of paralysis following…
September 14, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah My Wedding Anniversary Reminds Me to Find Strength in Silver Linings It’s in my nature to get a little reflective around significant dates, such as New Year’s and the changing of the seasons. I love that these occasions represent change and starting fresh. So celebrating my seventh wedding anniversary on Aug. 29 has made me rather contemplative, more so than in…
August 17, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Overcoming MS Setbacks to Find Abundant Love on a Special Day Last week, we welcomed a wonderful person into our family. My not-so-little brother got married! The wedding was beautiful — so beautiful that I couldn’t let myself feel it all in the moment. Who wants to hear the loud, ugly crier?! (I did my happy crying loudly in the ladies’…
August 10, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah How Paw-fect Pets Improve Life With Chronic Illness Having grown up in the countryside, I’ve been around animals my entire life. We always had dogs and cats, and I learned how to ride horses. It was tranquil and storybook. When I left home to take a trip or attend university, I experienced a void only the animals in…
August 3, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Sometimes Pushing Boundaries With My MS Management Pays Off My brother is getting married in two weeks, so last weekend, I attended my future sister-in-law’s bridal shower in London. When it came to managing my relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS) on the trip, I pretty much broke every rule I live by. Surprisingly, taking risks paid off for me, which…
July 20, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah A Big Step Forward: Using Public Transportation With MS As anyone with chronic illness knows, leaving the house requires planning. There’s much more to think about than what’s visible, especially if you’re relying on public transport. In the days preceding last week’s appointment with my multiple sclerosis (MS) nurse, I was contemplating just how long it’d been since…
July 13, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Fighting Fire With Fire: The War Between Lemtrada and My MS “So can you lift me up/ And turn these ashes into flames/ ‘Cause I have overcome/ More than words will ever say.” — Kate Voegele My relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) diagnosis stole my life from me. The reverberations of this unwelcome thunderbolt were astounding. Coming to terms with a…
July 6, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah While Living With MS, Good Planning Is Key to Avoiding Chaos “Without leaps of imagination, or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning.” ― Gloria Steinem For as long as I can remember, my father has always had a saying: “Perfect planning prevents piss-poor performance.” Much to my husband’s frustration, though, I’m still…
June 29, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Managing Fatigue and Other Vacation Tips for People With MS “A holiday is an opportunity to journey within.” — Prabhas Last week was only my second weeklong holiday since my relapsing-remitting MS diagnosis in 2017. My husband and I have had weekend getaways here and there, mainly to visit family. Of course, COVID-19 has placed a huge restriction…
June 22, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Grappling With the Sensory Overload That Can Come With MS Imagine this scene: There’s a rowdy crowd of nearly 40,000 people in a rugby stadium with music blaring over the Tannoy speakers. Newfound numbness spreads throughout the majority of your body, and on top of that, you can hardly see. That was the perfect myriad of factors to elicit my…
June 15, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Just Because We Aren’t Relapsing Doesn’t Mean We Are Symptom-free In relapsing-remitting MS, relapses and exacerbations involve a worsening of symptoms or the appearance of new ones for 24 hours or more. My disease baseline has changed many times over the years, but has never returned to how it was before my symptoms began. I’m intrigued by how…
June 1, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Tipping the Scale: When Today’s Choices Become Tomorrow’s Consequences Like watching a scale tip up and down, I’m constantly assessing how any choices I make could affect how I feel tomorrow, or even later today. Although my multiple sclerosis was as aggressive and unstable as a hurricane in my first few years with it, I’ve found a baseline…
May 25, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah It’s Time to Start Thinking About Seasonal Adjustments and MS The thought of summer approaching both worries and excites me. I’ve always preferred the changing of seasons and fair weather to the height of a season, even before my MS diagnosis. I prefer change and the idea of starting anew, as if it might be a remedy to the…
May 18, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah After Standing Still, Finding My Next Step “The carousel never stops turning.” – the TV drama “Grey’s Anatomy” At the 2019 European Patients’ Forum Congress in Brussels, which focused on patient involvement in healthcare, attendees were invited to write down a list of goals they wished to achieve in the next 12 months. After rolling my…
May 4, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Recovering My Self-esteem After Adapting to MS-related Incontinence Without hesitation, I would say that my bladder and bowel issues have been the hardest symptoms to manage and overcome following my MS diagnosis. It comes down to one thing: the fear of having an accident in public.
April 20, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah MS and Emotions: Pessimism vs. Realism in Life With Chronic Illness There is an ongoing difference of opinion between my husband and me regarding my general outlook on life. I consider myself to be a realist, whereas he thinks I tend to err on the side of pessimism. I’m an overthinker. I’ve always felt things incredibly intensely. Interestingly, when I read…
April 13, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Pain and Positivity: My Experience With Plasmapheresis “‘Cause I would never break your heart/ I would only rearrange/ All the other working parts will stay in place.” — Biffy Clyro, a Scottish rock band If you’ve spent any time in a hospital, you know that it never gets completely dark. There’s always a light flickering somewhere, a…
April 6, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Building Blocks of Becoming a Busy Bee “Serendipity. Look for something, find something else, and realize that what you’ve found is more suited to your needs than what you thought you were looking for.” — Lawrence Block When the world was thrown into lockdown at the dawn of COVID-19, I was already an old hand at functioning…
March 16, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Visible and Invisible Reflections of MS “Mirrors don’t lie. They only show a part of truth.” — Lara Biyuts I’ve written about how my reality feels jagged compared with actual reality. I wrote, “The woman looking back at me isn’t whom I perceive myself to be.” I’ve been pondering this recently. The realism of reality With…
March 9, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Lyrics and Loving Myself: Rediscovering My Lost Voice “Most of the time, the greatest rewards come from doing the things that scare you the most. Maybe you’ll get everything you wish for. Maybe you’ll get more than you ever could have imagined. Who knows where life will take you? The road is long, and in the end, the…
March 2, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Double-edged Sword of Fatigue Medications “I close my eyes/ Only for a moment then the moment’s gone/ All my dreams pass before my eyes, a curiosity.” — Kansas, “Dust in the Wind” The dark cloud of fatigue first swept through my mind toward the end of 2018. I was no stranger to physical fatigue,…
February 23, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Furious Fire of Heat Sensitivity “In order to rise from its own ashes, a phoenix must first burn.” — Octavia E. Butler You know that feeling of waking up in a strange place, and it takes a second to remember where you are? Imagine that coupled with not being able to move from the neck…
February 9, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Jagged Edges of My Altered Reality “You know that place between sleep and awake, that place where you still remember dreaming?” — James Matthew Barrie Being diagnosed with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis significantly changed my perception of myself and the surrounding world. This drastic shift has been overwhelming and difficult to accept in many ways. The…
January 26, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah The Trials and Tribulations of MS Medications “Hey, man, I’m alive. I’m taking each day and night at a time/ I’m feeling like a Monday but someday I’ll be Saturday night.” — Bon Jovi Multiple sclerosis (MS) medications can generally be separated into two categories: disease-modifying therapies (DMTs) and those that help to manage symptoms. While…