Daily living

The tinkling laughter of tiny children filters through the windows of my bedroom. It’s a sunny Sunday afternoon. In years past, I would be sitting in the garden watching my grandnieces play. Undoubtedly with a large jug of Pimm’s that I would have concocted for the assembled adults. We’re…

It’s 3:15 p.m. U.K. time on Wednesday, May 9, 2018. My deadline for this column is actually 3 p.m. Gone are the days of blaming the dog for eating my homework; it’s only in the last few minutes that I’ve actually been able to move a bit. From 8:30…

A little over a year ago, in this column, I asked if it was safe for someone with MS to handle a gun. I wondered whether there would be safety issues due to problems with grip strength, balance, eyesight, and all the other various difficulties people with MS have…

Really big things are going on in the world. WW3 is again flagged as a possibility. My world is considerably smaller. It’s mostly my bedroom. I can get out of it, but it takes a considerable effort. In the last seven days, I only exited it once. Last night, I…

My morning ritual of showering for a fresh start to my day has progressed to a once-a-week occurrence. Like everything else that my multiple sclerosis (MS) affects, less shower time is not by choice. I take sponge baths daily of course, but actual showers are reserved for when I…

The MS Focus: Multiple Sclerosis Foundation will be accepting applications through June for its Cooling Program, which provides cooling garments to multiple sclerosis patients whose condition has left them heat-sensitive. Although 60 to 80 percent of patients are heat-sensitive, there were no MS-specific cooling garments on the U.S. market until…

It is noon on Wednesday, and I am sitting in a chair in our living room. My wife holds two books against my hips, one on either side, while Stefani, my occupational therapist, measures the width — measuring me for a wheelchair. Like a lot…

My column last week was a recap of my journey to a primary progressive multiple sclerosis (PPMS) diagnosis. This week’s column continues that theme by showing a glimpse of what it is like to live with PPMS on a daily basis. To say that having a disability like…

It was late May 2014, and my wife and I were on our first trip to the Cleveland Clinic. We’d been to Cleveland for a wedding a few years earlier but had been too busy to explore. We booked a room at the…

I was throwing the ball for my golden retriever when it bounced onto an unreachable ledge. I watched her become antsy for a ball she could see but not reach and wondered what she would do. Her frustration gave way to a solution as she jumped from…

In March 2003, I found myself suddenly unable to drive or even walk a straight line through the house. MS had arrived with several active lesions in my brain, including one in the brainstem, which affected my balance and speech and created significant limitations in my usual activities. One…

So many of us are affected by disabilities, and day-to-day we strive to live our lives the best we can. The struggles due to these disabilities can consume a lot of our precious and sparse energy. Anything that can be modified in the home, at businesses, or anywhere we choose…

Gait and balance issues and MS go together like peanut butter and chocolate. At least they do to me. In one way or another, they’ve been in the foreground of my life since I was diagnosed in 2013.

I was carded while at Costco with my son just before Christmas. Normally, I’m flattered when asked for ID, but this time was different. The request wasn’t from the cashier as my vodka rolled by, snug between the peppermint cocoa and persimmons. No, the request came from a police…

It was Burns Night last week, which is always a joy. I love whisky and am very partial to haggis (tricky to source, as we only buy the outdoor roving haggis!). A few years before MS hit, I went to a Burns Night supper where the only thing…

Nothing resets your thinking like bouncing your head off a hardwood floor. At least, for me. It was about 10 p.m. on a Saturday night, and we were shutting down the house. That routine consists of turning lights off, locking doors, and plugging in phones and…

The TV was on as background noise the other day, but the words of the commercial cut right through my noise filter. With a little drum beat in the background, a woman’s voice was saying, “The doctor called me and she was, like, ‘You have multiple sclerosis.'” “Another drug…

It was late. I dropped the TV remote on the bedroom floor. No biggie. I was sitting on my commode (don’t worry, it was in its chair configuration!) and was reasonably close to the ground. No thinking involved, I leaned over to pick it up as I’ve done many,…

I have always loved the start of New Year’s; tabula rasa, clean slate. Much like a snake shedding its skin, we leave behind the old and embrace the new, or at least accept such. While Dec. 31 is ripe with well-intentioned resolutions, I avoid promising myself anything simply because…

There ‘s a top 10 list of New Year’s resolutions that are most commonly made and then most commonly broken. Lose weight, get fit, stop smoking (well, never touch hard drugs like tobacco), and spend more time with the family (they have no choice unless they leave…

I was just monkeying around while on vacation a few weeks ago, amazed that the animals jumping between my wife and myself were actually listening to the commands of their owner. I knew that chimps and apes were smart, but seeing monkeys respond to commands was new to me.

It’s 4 a.m. and, unsurprisingly, I’m laying flat on my back. Yesterday, I had a whale of a time and now I feel like a beached one. I’m not in my own bed because I’m staying in a tres jolie bed-and-breakfast in Northern France. The trouble is the bed…

Whenever I turn the pages of my wall calendar to December, I look at the word itself ― DECEMBER ― and my heart fills with joy. And admittedly a little dread. Joy, because my husband and son have birthdays a week apart, it’s…

Though I don’t always use it, I take my cane with me every time we go shopping. I can still shuffle to the cart pickup and drop-off without it and the cart doubles as my walker. Canes can be clunky, aren’t easily stored, and I simply…

Well, 460.75 miles (741.5 km), to be exact. When I wrote about April Hester in late September, the headline on my column was “She Has MS and She’s Planning to Hike 500 Miles.” Well, she did it, hiking the Palmetto Trail from Walhalla, in the South…

Are you ready for a disaster? Wildfires in the wine country of Northern California exploded so quickly that survivors say they didn’t know they were threatened until flames were nearly at their doors. Hurricane Harvey forced more than 9,000 people into Houston’s main evacuation shelter. It…

Some days are easier than others, and some days are just not easy at all. Today I find myself in the latter of the two. It’s Monday morning, and my Sunday was insane: insanely busy, insanely fun, and insanely difficult. While…

For those of us in the workforce, our MS can sometimes make a workday challenging. The Americans with Disabilities Act allows for an employee to request reasonable accommodations from their employer. Included in the act are three broad accommodation categories. One focuses on the hiring process, and…

It looks like a dog’s leash, but it isn’t. I put in “dog’s lead” and “disabled apparatus” into my first Google search and fittingly was taken down into a rabbit’s warren of equipment for psychically challenged dogs. Who knew? It’s a nifty bit of kit for moving your leg…

I am an avid dog lover and very involved in volunteering with the golden retriever rescue here in Southern California. On any given day, you will find my 8-year-old rescue, Abby, here along with two to three other happy golden retrievers. I may have  rescued Abby physically, but there…