Fall Down, Get Up Again
— John Connor

Now, I know the phrase “I’m going to do my own research” has become a catch-all for conspiracy theorists who are out to prove spurious nonsense, merely by finding even more spurious websites they can whirl down like Alice…

I only had my glasses for two years, yet reading anything on my phone was now nigh impossible. Still, it did cure my Facebook and Twitter addiction. Yer, yer, I’m old. (I’m 64, you know.) Sure, I’ve written this…

In December 2019, I was stopped in my tracks, or rather wheels, as I was about to have my third infusion of Ocrevus (ocrelizumab), the multiple sclerosis disease-modifying therapy (DMT) that I’d been taking every six months…

No, it wasn’t my good wife, Jane, suddenly insisting we just had to take a break. Spontaneity is no longer a question for me. We can only go somewhere that has both a hoist and a profiling bed.

Monday Unlike Prince, my Monday wasn’t manic. It was barreling along quite sedately until my wife, Jane, casually noted, “Remember, you’ve got a dental appointment on Wednesday morning.” Er, no, I hadn’t remembered. It was somewhat churlish of…

So I’m at my multiple sclerosis (MS) exercise class working out on a sit-down bike. Yes, I know, by their very nature bikes tend to be of the sit-down variety, but for us lot in wheelchairs, these bikes…

Compared with living with multiple sclerosis (MS), the anxiety of what on water (Earth has always struck me as a misnomer as water comprises 71% of our planet’s surface) I’m going to write about next week…

I’ve just received four intramuscular Botox injections in my right arm to relieve the muscle spasticity that comes with multiple sclerosis. (OK, it wasn’t actually Botox, but Dysport, or abobotulinumtoxinA, another medication derived from the botulinum…

There is a more heavyweight subject I could inflict on you lot, but let’s put our feet up this week. Even I can do it with the one leg. My wife, Jane, and I celebrated our 30th wedding…

Today’s youth have to accumulate a range of skills. Everything changes so fast. Parents often have no idea what career their kids even want to follow. Do you know what a UX designer is? Me, neither. This latest social…

In my cooking days, I always had a stock simmering away. Nothing was wasted. What had been frugality spurred on by self-imposed poverty — first as a student, then in the struggling life of a garret writer — later…

This week’s been a relief. I haven’t had to dash to casualty or fallen over in my chair. Nor have I stirred up a ruckus with the health powers that be or bumped into a fellow…

“Well, this an idea for your next column, John,” my wife, Jane, said, a tad sardonically. At least I thought it was probably sardonic, as there was just a wisp of a razor-thin smirk glimmering at the corners…

My column’s handle is “Fall Down, Get Up Again” because the first piece I wrote for Multiple Sclerosis News Today was titled “A Mountain to Climb with MS — in My Living Room.” That column got me this…

For the few of you lot lucky enough not to know about intermittent catheterization, it’s shoving a thin bit of plastic up the old (in my case) urethra so that you can pee. I am well aware of…

It was a moment of clarity. Unfortunately, my attempt at making a bright, clear consommé has for the moment turned into a muddled chowder! Even worse, it was writing this column that started it. I’ve written so often…

Before anyone in the U.S. asks who this Jeremy Clarkson fella is, know that petrol heads in your country know exactly who he is. Indeed, the Brit motoring show “Top Gear,” at its height a few years ago,…

The week started with a bang, albeit with a hint of underlying anxiety. Friends and former work colleagues gathered during the first days of spring to chat in my sun-lathered back garden in South London. COVID-19 lateral flow tests…

The dull throbbing always hits a crescendo “in the wee small hours,” as Mr. Sinatra — or rather his songwriters — so aptly put it. I’m referring to a wound that’s been with me for over a year…

My week is never exactly easy, but it’s much harder for my family. Not only do they have to deal physically with my ever-enlarging lump of flesh, there’s also my verbal diarrhea to contend with. Then last Tuesday, it…