A gift to medical science

One of my new year’s resolutions (made in April or thereabouts) was to keep in touch with people more; become a little bit less of a hermit, and generally be more sociable. Those of you who know me well, might think that a bit of a tall order, but I figured the COVID lockdown hadn’t

The eyes of the monster – part 2

Well, I went to see the eye surgeon. The upshot of my meeting was that I’m not going to have an operation to correct my doublevision. I decided that it wasn’t worth it because I have what he termed a “complex squint” and any correction to my doublevision to the left would be offset by

“Sorry, there’s nothing we can do”

There is a stand up routine by Sean Lock where he recounts being told off for swearing by belligerent airport staff. His exasperated reply finishes with “This is exactly the sort of occasion swearing was f***ing invented for!” Excuse me a moment… a$%e!… &u$%&!!… (%d%*!!! %^&*!!… f&*^:~!!… ~*()&*&^$%$”!!!!!! There – out of my system… No,

MS Explained

Just a note to say that the MS Trust (UK) have updated their marvellous booklet MS Explained. This is a little bit more involved than some of the literature out there. While not for everyone, it explains the neurology and immunology aspects of MS very well in layman’s terms. I would heartily recommend this publication

One year on …

Today is the first anniversary of my diagnosis (see MS History – part two). Health professional bodycount so far. Starting with the first GP visit last year, the bodycount is as follows GPs 4 Practice Nurses 2 MS nurse 1 Ward nurse 1 Occupational Health nurse 1 Phlebotomists 6 (estimate) Physiotherapists 1 Neurologists 5 Neuro-psychologists

Yearly neurologist meeting – 2009

Yesterday, I saw my neurologist’s registrar – Dr Somebodyorother plus one student. I had to recap my entire MS history from Day 1 again. I always find it difficult to remember the relapses prior to diagnosis as I didn’t recognise them for what they were at the time. I did my usual set of tests.

My MS History – Part Six

After one more session of double-checking with the consultant where he had yet another student in tow – it seemed I was becoming a textbook example of nystagmus – it became apparent that the steroids really hadn’t done their job. So to suppress my existing symptoms I was prescribed Gabapentin. I had been given details

Reading and MS

I used to read a book a week. Every lunchtime, I’d grab some fresh air and sit by the canal with the latest piece of weirdness that I’d picked up at Waterstones. Every evening I’d lounge with my face buried between the pages while my wife sat next to me watching telly. That all disintegrated

Life with MS – Part One – Symptoms

I don’t want to come over all “woe is me” because there are plenty of people out there on the internet trying to out-do each other with their bad symptoms and there are many others with MS who have it much worse than I do (my old neighbour who also has MS, doesn’t recognise me