Monthly Archives: April 2013

Apr 20 2013
8 Comments
Symptoms and Treatment

Getting On My Nerves…

special offerIt’s been a stressful week and stress plus MS equals a spike in symptoms.

I have tried everything to stay serene and in control – deep breathing, chocolate, mindfulness, two episodes of Mad Men.

The deep breathing made me feel a bit silly, the chocolate nudged the scales up,  The ‘Power of Now’ was the ‘Power of Not-Right-Now’ and as for Mad Men, well, two episodes are never enough.

For me, it’s mostly an increase in nerve pain. Ever tried describing nerve pain to the uninitiated? Burning, tingling, numbness, crawling, aching doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Tingling sounds delightful, numbness sounds painless, crawling sounds weird and we all ache, don’t we? Just like we all get tired.

It’s been driving me round the twist all week and as always with MS, it doesn’t come alone. It’s the great MS special offer – ‘get one symptom, get three free’. So, as well as the nerve pain, there’s the fatigue, the wonkier walking, the hands that’d be better suited to a Greek taverna. Smashed plates? Yup, as well as my last proper grown up wine glass and yet another chip in yet another bowl.

I lay awake most of last night listening to Izzy miaow loudly. For a tiny cat, she’s got a huge set of lungs. The Teenager got up and shut his door and I was left to ponder the cobwebs on the ceiling and listen to a group of drunk woman sing ‘Simply The Best’ outside my window at 1.30 am. The pain was excruciating and made even more unbearable as my legs started to jerk and twitch.

I wasn’t sure if it was like being possessed by a malevolent spirit (The Exorcist sprang to mind in the wee small hours) or being stretched on a rack. Only problem was, I couldn’t get up and go downstairs as new cat Izzy would think it was perfectly normal to sit in the kitchen listening to the shipping forecast before sunrise. I was trapped and the women outside moved on to a Tom Jones medley, a tortuous backdrop to insane pain.

Action plan for the weekend – rescue ‘The Power of Now’ book from the corner I flung it in to, lie on the sofa with a huge bag of crisps and a relaxing face-pack on and chant, ‘this too shall pass’ over and over and over again…

Tagged , , , , , , ,
Apr 18 2013
9 Comments
Daily Life

Adorable Dora

Dora the bonkers catThe Teenager and I had a very long chat the other night and we decided to adopt another cat as soon as possible, so I went to Cats Protection yesterday.

He wanted to call the new cat ‘Dog’ or ‘Jam’. At a push, ‘Enchilada’. Hmm. This is the same kid who named my mum’s cat Yoda eight years ago.

Anyway, at the centre there were four long rows of the cutest, saddest cats. Heartbreaking. Half of them were clambering behind the glass, the other half hiding or sitting with their backs turned.

Some of them had sad histories. One had been kicked so badly in the stomach that she had to have an operation. One had lost an eye. Many had been abandoned and some were handed over by owners who could no longer afford to keep them, due to the recession.

I looked around. So many cats, but one stood out. Dora. A dinky little all-black female. Five years old, with a bonkers glint in her eye and I took to her straight away.

Back at reception I handed over my ID, my bank card and my details. I filled in numerous forms, read the small print, promised to take her for her second injection and swore allegiance to Cats Protection. I joked that there was less paperwork when I took my son home from hospital after he was born but that didn’t go down so well.

Dora came through in her basket and we whisked her off to the car. Back home, she has settled in incredibly quickly. When The Teenager came home from school, she jumped straight onto his lap. It feels as if she has been her forever.

Dora could never replace Bubble. She’s her own little character. She seems slightly crazy, but I like that. Having a crazy cat in a crazy world is no bad thing.

p.s. Dora just would not stay still for a second to let me take a proper photo – think she was high on catnip. And we’re going to call her Isadora…

Tagged , , ,
Apr 14 2013
14 Comments
Symptoms and Treatment

‘D’ Is For Cog Fog…

D Is For Cog FogI am a dunce. No two ways about it, MS has seriously fogged up my brain.

I first noticed it before I was diagnosed – simple recipes became infuriating Mensa-like tests, I got lost driving to the shops and reading a book was an exercise in tedious endurance.

I’m in my final year of my part-time degree and the last five years have been pretty good.

I’m an unabashed girly swot and enjoy cracking open a new packet of Sharpies, drawing intricate mind maps, carefully crafting my essays, ferreting out incisive references. Then my brain went on holiday with a one-way ticket.

After an agonising couple of weeks last month, I finally submitted my first essay of my final year. The mind maps never moved beyond a bunch of circles with nothing in them and my Sharpies lay dormant. I got my result yesterday. It was 65%. Sigh. Such a sad, sad little number.

I normally get higher marks, so this was upsetting but not totally unexpected. I often struggle to add up simple numbers or find the right word, so writing a 2,500 essay is akin to scaling Mount Everest in flip-flops. In the middle of recounting a funny anecdote to friends over coffee, my mind can go completely blank, the punchline withering and dying as my friends look at me with pity.

I read recently that memory loss is the most commonly reported cognitive difficulty in MS. Last year, when I was revising for my exam, I had written up a set of comprehensive study notes. They were a thing of beauty. I read them over and over and over again, but nothing, not one tiny thing, would stick inside my brain. I barely scraped through the three hour exam but luckily my fabulous MS nurse wrote a letter to the university explaining that I was not stupid, it was the MS.

My next essay is due at the end of May and I am hoping for some divine inspiration. In the meantime, I’m furiously highlighting points in my books, jotting down what I hope will be valid arguments and crossing my fingers for luck. And no, the Sharpies haven’t been used yet, but they’re on my desk, raring to go. How do I draw a mind map again?

Tagged , , , , , ,
Apr 12 2013
8 Comments
The Teenager

Basket Case

never take a teenager shoppingI’m not a fan of supermarket shopping and I should have been suspicious when The Teenager jumped at the chance to accompany me the other day.

I haven’t given up online shopping, but my mum mentioned she had seen some artificial grass in a supermarket nearby and it was selling out fast.

It was one of those cut-price supermarkets – no frills, no helpful staff, prison-style strip lighting and pushy customers shoving their trolleys into any legs that had the audacity to get in their way of grabbing the last bottle of Lambrusco or tin of discounted baked beans.

‘Muuuuuuuuuuuuum, can I have a bag of donuts?’

‘No.’

‘Two donuts?’

‘No.’

One?’ (sad face)

‘Just let me find the blinking grass and we’re out of here. What? Oh, alright then. ONE.’

I found the grass and tried to juggle four rolls of the stuff in my arms when The Teenager came back with a basket, one donut lying forlornly in the middle.

‘Why do you need a basket for your donut?’

‘Er. Um. Pepsi’s cheap, only 25 pence a can and I never have pop and everyone else in school has pop in the house and it’s not fair that everyone else in school gets to have pop and I don’t and I really think it’s so cheap that it would be really nice if for once I could have some pop in the house so I’m just like all my friends and won’t feel so different from everyone else. See?’

‘Oh really?’

‘Yeah. Pleeeeeeaaaaaassssssse? Just say ‘stop’ at the number of cans I can have? Tennineeightsevensixfivefourthree…’

‘THREE. You can have three. One a day for the next three days as a treat. Then it’s checkout.’

We queue up, offload the grass, Pepsi and solitary donut.

‘Muuuuuuuum’.

‘No.’

‘You don’t even know what I was going to say.’

‘Yes. I. Do.’

‘Awwwwww. Can I just get one tiny packet of chewing gum? Everyone else in school gets to have chewing gum and….’

‘STOP. Don’t go any further. I know exactly what you’re going to say. I’m your mum. I’m a mind-reader.’

‘Meanie.’

‘Right, put the donut and the Pepsi back then.’

And so on and so on. And that is yet another good reason for never, ever going supermarket shopping…

Tagged , , , ,
Apr 10 2013
10 Comments
Emotions

Feeling Blue? Think Yellow…

feeling blue - think yellowThe miserable Arctic weather and lack of sunshine is making me feel, well, miserable. Thankfully I recently bought Albert Espinosa’s fabulous book, The Yellow World and life suddenly looks a whole lot brighter.

Espinosa wrote the book after surviving cancer, and many of his inspiring points can apply to anyone, not just people living with a serious illness:

Ask 5 good questions each day – silly ones, practical ones, emotional ones. No matter what the question is, having answers will empower you.

Keep a life record – keeping things that are important to you at the time can help you look back and realise how unimportant they are now. The embodiment of the ‘but will it matter in a years time?’ rule. Also keep things that remind you of good times – the heart-shaped stone you found on a beach, the drawing your nephew made just for you.

Find the positives – life doesn’t go to plan, but your reactions to it can. Even if it’s only small, try to find something positive in everything.

Take 20 minutes out every day – Espinosa learned this from having to stay still during scans. Shutting out life for just 20 minutes can free the mind.

Look at things – so often we rush through life not noticing our surroundings. Try to make a conscious effort to see the details we often miss.

Finally, collect Yellows. You know who they are – the people with that certain energy, that goodness about them that just makes you want to be in their orbit. MS has taught me to turn away from the negative people I used to know, the energy-sappers, the fair-weather friends, the doom-and-gloom merchants. I just don’t have the space or time for them in my life any more. Their ‘void’ has been filled by people I can’t wait to spend time with. If anyone else has read this book, let me know what you think?

Tagged , , , ,
← Older posts
Newer posts →