August 9, 2019 Columns by John Connor An Open Letter to a Newly Diagnosed Patient I’ve been a co-moderator on the MS News Today Forums for a couple of months now and recently wrote a reply to a newly diagnosed patient, Jono. He’s only had MS for a month. I found myself…
August 2, 2019 Columns by John Connor Hell Week: Record Heat Teams Up with a Sneaky Infection Last Thursday was the hottest day ever recorded in U.K. history at 101.6 degrees F. Heat sensitivity is enough to reduce me to the puddle I described last week. But it doesn’t explain the shaking of my body…
July 26, 2019 Columns by John Connor Beaten by the Heat: Oh, What a Night! It’s 1 p.m. in the U.K., and it’s 90 degrees Fahrenheit. I can hardly move due to the heat. My left hand is typing this. The rest of my body has shut down. Tomorrow is forecast to be the hottest…
July 19, 2019 Columns by John Connor I Survived My ‘Home Alone’ Weekend OK, this was my first test. Accomplish this and Day One should be a breeze. The trick is not to panic. You’ve crossed a continent with your thumb — now all you have to do is get out…
July 12, 2019 Columns by John Connor Eight Days a Week It was such a jam-packed week that the flavor was definitely multi-fruit! It included a meet-cute with a barber inspired by Richard Curtis (rom-com writer of “Notting Hill” and others). As no romance — or indeed,…
June 28, 2019 Columns by John Connor A New Drive for Life: Renovations Let Me Come and Go on My Own It’s taken over a year to conceive, organize, and plan, but yesterday, I was able to leave the house on my own. I even checked that I had my house keys on me as, in theory, I could now…
June 21, 2019 Columns by John Connor Nearly Thwarted by a Step Even in my able-bodied days, I was hardly Channing Tatum — who is? Model, actor, dancer, singer, and he even has the audacity to be funny. There might not be any real comic book heroes in the world,…
June 14, 2019 Columns by John Connor What the Falck Is Going On? Stranded. Not on a desert island but in an empty hospital ward. Earlier, it had been filled with fellow MSers getting their Ocrevus (ocrelizumab) infusions. I write “fellow,” but as ever, we blokes were in the minority —…
June 7, 2019 Columns by John Connor Thank You for Sharing “Thank you for sharing” is a clichéd phrase I never expected to use, or indeed have used toward me! However, it is often bandied at the end of these columns by the select few who like my work, so…
May 31, 2019 Columns by John Connor A Wee Trip — But Not Like in the Past I looked at the road, then west to the horizon. It was the Trans-Canada Highway. I was standing just outside Halifax, Nova Scotia. A 23-year-old intending to hitchhike the length of the Trans-Canadian to Vancouver. I’m English…
May 24, 2019 Columns by John Connor Years of Laughter: It’s Been a Mammoth 40 Years Last Monday night, I was strangely in the audience at London’s Comedy Store. At a rough calculation, I have directed about 1,500 shows there, have been in the audience for maybe 20, and even have been on the…
May 17, 2019 Columns by John Connor Sunday Morning It was a sunny Lower East Side of Manhattan Sunday morning. The bulbous New York Times was shoved, just about, under my arm. I drank a coffee in the sheltered backyard of a diner after surviving the denizens…
May 10, 2019 Columns by John Connor I Survived a Marathon Comedy Festival Exactly one year ago on this day of writing, I was down and out. This year, I’m not exactly fighting fit, but the same set of circumstances has pushed me the distance. But it didn’t floor me. OK,…
May 3, 2019 Columns by John Connor Why I Decided to Join the A-Team (Millennials, Look It Up!) — Part 2 Second in a series. Read part one. I’m actually driving! I really can’t remember the last time I had done so. The car I’d had for years from Motability, a car and scooter program in the U.K. to…
April 26, 2019 Columns by John Connor Why I Decided to Join the A-Team (Millennials, Look It Up!) — Part 1 First in a two-part series. Do I give in or fight? I’d had all the tests, and in the summer of 2009, my fears were confirmed: I had MS. My first question was, “Would I end up in…
April 12, 2019 Columns by John Connor The Drugs Do Work … Better Than My Right Hand Last weekend a mother brought 4,000£ ($5,200 U.S.) of medicinal cannabis from Holland into the U.K. for her daughter with severe epilepsy. It was confiscated by customs. Last year medicinal cannabis was partially legalized in the…
April 5, 2019 Columns by John Connor Going Mobile In February of last year, I stopped. Walking more than a few steps was suddenly impossible. I’d fought, taken every medication and supplement possible, but I’d lost. Maybe positive thinking and mindfulness would have helped, but…
March 29, 2019 Columns by John Connor Always in the Kitchen at Parties My nephew James has taken an interest in this column since having a starring role in it a few weeks ago. We were at his mum’s 60th birthday party. He casually asked, “What are you going to…
March 22, 2019 Columns by John Connor Singing the Bureaucracy Blues You think getting a chronic illness is as bad as it’s going to get, but then you quickly realize that you’ve been catapulted into a netherworld. There’s no stepping through the back of the wardrobe into Narnia —…
March 15, 2019 Columns by John Connor The Antibiotic Time Loop-the-Loop Julian, the doorman at the London Comedy Store, is giving me his biweekly telling off about drinking. It’s biweekly because he and the other regular doorman, Mark, take turns helping me. I’ve known both of them…
November 30, 2023 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister Is multiple sclerosis everywhere, or am I just more aware of it now?
