I used to be healthy, like, seven, years ago. And then I had my second baby. I came out of the C section, and the feeling in my legs never came back. I ignored it for like, five months thinking it was just a side effect of the C-section. And then I fell carrying my baby. My mom told me to get to the hospital something's wrong. They diagnosed me with M.S. When you have kids, you would do anything that will keep you around for longer. I researched all the miracle treatments in

I spent years, almost a decade, knowing it was probably M.S. After watching my mom and aunt both be diagnosed with M.S. over 15 years, I knew the symptoms. But seeing the lesion on the MRI with my own eyes, and hearing the words Multiple Sclerosis, still felt like a gut punch. The next few years were full of many ups and downs. Not only because of the debilitating M.S. flares, lack of education around my diagnosis, and understanding just how life-changing this disease was, fe

My MS story is simple. I came from being a child whose mom had M.S. To being her caregiver. To having M.S. myself. I was eight years old when my father told me my mother had M.S and needed my help. He had me take over all the household chores and her care. It was a lot for a young girl, and I always worried my mom would fall when I wasn’t around. We had a pup at the time. Casey. He was the love of my mom's life and always stayed right by her side. So I taught him to fetch the

It was July 4, 2002. I woke up and my foot was asleep. By the next day, it had moved into both my legs. By the third day the numbness was to the top of my ribs. It took seven months and several doctors to get the official diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. College, marriage, family. I was so nervous about whether I could do any of it and still have this disease. But I also wasn’t going to use my disability as an excuse. I wanted to live my life to the fullest. One of my goals i

When I was diagnosed 32 years ago, the first thing my neurologist said was I might want to get a desk job. But UPS was the first job I had ever had with benefits, and I did not want to give that up. So, I worked for UPS for 30 years while treating my MS. Sometimes I struggled to get through the day. I had foot drop and would often fall. I fought with them to stop the forced overtime. And even though the last three years were pretty tough. I had to do it. I had to provide for

I was only 12 when the doctor told me I was “faking it." But I knew my arm numbness was real. And it was moving up towards my shoulders. Luckily, my mom believed me. She took me to another doctor and then even more specialists. At the age of 13, I was diagnosed with pediatric multiple sclerosis. Between sixth and ninth grade, I was not stable at all. New lesions kept popping up even on the different medications. I was homeschooled because I was in the hospital and at doctor's

My story isn’t that dramatic or anything. It started with knee pain, which the doctor passed off as a pinched nerve. It took eighteen months and two episodes before they would say it was MS. At first I was really afraid of the future. People had told me that the first 10 years you do pretty good and then it goes downhill from there. That scared me. I learned I couldn’t think about it. I couldn’t think to the future. I don’t want to say I’m more positive than I was before, But

I was a professional dancer my whole life. A former Radio City Rockette. A dance instructor. You know, MS symptoms mimic a lot of other things. So when I had numbing, and tingling in my hands, I thought it was a pinched nerve or a pulled muscle from dancing, not a big deal. When I noticed I had a blurry left eye, I thought it had something to do with my glass prescription. The eye doctor sent me for an MRI. When I got the call and the doctor told me they found lesions on my b

In the back of my mind, I would say, “It’s not fair.” I was only 23 years old and had a two-year-old when I was diagnosed. I had watched my uncle become paralyzed and die from progressive MS and thought I would be the same way. But it didn’t happen like that for me. I didn’t have any big issues for the first 9 years. Then I reacted to my DMT. Coming off the drug, my MS progressed very rapidly. I started having seizures and had to be hospitalized. Honestly, I didn't even know

It's been a crazy twenty-two years. I went to sleep one night-- you know as a semi-normal person-- and then woke up that next morning with no feeling from the chest down. It was scary because I didn't know what was going on. I spent three weeks in the hospital then left with the multiple sclerosis diagnosis. The first 15 years were rough. I was on and off of different DMT’s. At one point I was on 26 different medications just for the side effects. The last seven or eight year