How MS Is, and Is Not, Like Spring
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Spring is a season of new beginnings. We plant seeds. The world awakens. Bulbs tended before autumn’s end begin to show themselves.
No doubt that springtime offers its challenges. It can also be the hungry months, as stored goods dwindle and the new season foods aren’t yet ready.
Spring: A Time of Defined Beginnings
Spring is also a time with many defined beginnings.
Celtic spring begins with the feast of Imbolc (or Imbolg) on the first day of February, per the National Museum of Ireland.
Funny, now that I think about it, that a day later is Groundhog Day in North America, observed on February 2.
Meteorological spring is based on the calendar and begins on March 1, while astronomical spring, known as the vernal equinox, is based on the position of Earth’s orbit in relation to the Sun and the angle of our planet on its axis, as explained by the National Centers for Environmental Information.
This year, astronomical spring begins on of March 20.
MS: How Do We Define Its Beginning?
So, what does all of this weather talk have to do with living with multiple sclerosis (MS)? Many of us with the disease can relate the confusion over when spring begins to the confusion we may have felt over when our MS began, and how its progression is marked and measured.
“How long have you had MS?” isn’t an uncommon question for those of us who are open in talking to others about our disease — something we talked about in the “Disclosure” episode of The Unspeakable Bits webinar. The answer to that question can be as difficult to answer succinctly as trying to define a spring day.
I was diagnosed April 20, 2001. The physical attack on my body that caused me to head first to my massage therapist and then to my primary care physician started about three days before I sought help. But that wasn’t when my MS started.
My neurological team and I have traced definitive symptoms of multiple sclerosis exacerbations back to at least October of 1989. And there were undefined (read misdiagnosed) episodes back into my days at school.
We have to wonder how long our disease was there before we noticed clinical symptoms.
And don’t get me started about identifying when we transition from relapsing to secondary-progressive MS!
Does It Matter Exactly When It Begins?
But like those of us living in the middle latitudes of the earth know when it comes to defining spring, it can really matter little to how we experience the disease. I have known snow in May and warm, sunny days in February, no matter that it was considered spring.
Since I began with talk of the Celtic spring, it seems fitting that I wrap the conversation with two sayings I have learned to live by here in the far southwest of Ireland.
“We never died a winter yet” (from a Wren day celebration on YouTube) is often how we feel when we are bouncing back from the worst of an MS episode. We’ve bottomed out, and are now beginning to look toward the possibilities and finding our new normal.
MS brings plenty of cold, dark winter days into our lives. It’s up to us to claw back to that new place in life.
And then there’s “a grand stretch in the evening” (from Irish Country Magazine) when, even though the winter still grips the mercury in the bottom third of the glass, and wintry showers of MS can keep us from our appointed rounds, we can see and feel that things are, indeed, getting better.
Those are the hopeful times, and spring is nothing if not a time for hope.
Wishing you and your family the best of health.
Cheers,
Trevis
My new book, Living Well With Multiple Sclerosis, is now available. Follow me on the Life With MS Facebook page, and read more on Life With Multiple Sclerosis.
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