I sit here in my dusty office in Prudhoe Bay Alaska, winding down for the day, I look at the date on my computer and I realize I am a little over a week away from my anniversary. Nope, not my wedding anniversary, that’s later this month. The anniversary I am speaking of is the date that changed the trajectory or my career, my personal life, everything that I knew about myself at the time. The date was June 1, 2000.
This is a tough one to write. While a few of my closest family and friends know “what’s wrong with me,” it’s something I have kept to myself for many reasons. This blog is a coming out of sorts. Shining a light on the MonSter I have kept carefully contained in the closet. I think I am also about to find out, just how many of my “Friends” really do read my blog posts. I realized after I started blogging, this disease and disability is so intertwined in my life, who I am and my writing, that it needs a voice of its own. This blog will probably become a category all unto its own as I write about all the things I pertaining to the MonSter, but I figure this is a good start.
I knew something was wrong. I had known for a long time. The strange medical symptoms had finally reached a tipping point when my right arm, and right side of my face went numb, along with the blurriness in my right eye becoming larger and larger. The military doctor I had been seeing could no longer blow me off as just being a hypochondriac or his other favorite, “You’re fat, you just need to lose weight.” I was thinner than I am now, but I digress.
I remember walking into the neurologist’s office on that sunny day with mixed feelings. I had completed the MRI’s and other blood tests they had asked for. I had spent three weeks on my back, trying to recover from a lumbar puncture test that wouldn’t heal properly. The neurologist had warned me ahead of time that I should probably have someone come with me to the appointment, anticipating bad news. Since my family lived 3000 miles away in California, I had no one close who could come with me to the appointment. A fellow sailor on my crew in the Navy volunteered to drive me. Part of me was hoping they were wrong. It would be something they could easily fix. They could just give me a pill or I could just lose 10 pounds and all the problems would go away. Though it would be great to have a definitive answer; I didn’t want it to be what they suspected: Multiple Sclerosis.
I don’t remember much about that appointment itself. It’s strange how I held it together just fine in the doctor’s office while he delivered the news, gave me pamphlets on the medications he was starting me on, and resources for information on the disease. What I do remember is crouching down in the elevator as Paul and I rode down, eyes finally blurring with tears as the information sunk into my brain.
I had Multiple Sclerosis. My Naval career was over
I couldn’t see much past that at that moment. My world was crumbling around me. It would take another 6 months for the military machine to process all the paperwork, but by December I was “retired,” and a civilian again.
In the book Anne of Green Gables, by Louisa Maude Montgomery, she refers to “the bend in the road.” This was definitely a bend in the road I didn’t see coming. For better or worse, it shaped my life in a way that can never be taken back. I will do my best to explain the path I took, in the hopes that it helps others, no matter what you’re dealing with.
Hope you enjoy the ride as much as I did. Fasten your seat belt, and hold on to the “oh—” bar, it’s going to get bumpy.
