It all started when I started to notice that there was a cellphone stuck in my abdomen. I remember clearly I was driving to an job interview on one of the days where I had 6 interviews in 2 days and I suddenly had a distinct vibrating sensation, right below my bellybutton. My husband was a med student at the time, so I immediately reported it to him and asked him what he thought it could possibly be.
“It’s probably gas.”
Now, I’m not bragging or anything, but I’m pretty well acquainted with gas, and I knew that this was definitely not gas, it was a cellphone in my belly. This continued for a few weeks. I kept trying to feel my stomach when the sensations came to see if I could feel my insides actually vibrating like a GameBoy Motion Pack to no avail. There was even one scary moment where I thought the feeling had moved to my butt as well, but then I realized I had inadvertently sat on my nephew’s Playstation controller.
After a few months I became so used to the vibrating feeling that it no longer freaked me out. I think humans can get used to pretty much anything as long as long as it doesn’t interfere with the things they want to do every day. This has become the story of my life.
Then, one day, the day we were preparing for our fourth move in a week of being nomads, I noticed something strange. The left side of my torso was gone. If I looked down it was still there — but when I tried to ‘feel’ it with my mind I couldn’t place it. Similarly when I touched it with my hands I could feel my torso with my hands but I couldn’t feel my hands with my torso. That was when Brent told me to go to the doctor.
I went to my internal medicine doctor who told me it might be gas but referred me to a neurologist. The neurologist ordered some MRI’s but he didn’t seem to think there would be anything serious going on and told me that it might gas. So, like an idiot, I decided to not get the MRI’s done.
Fast-forward to a few months later, I suddenly started having another odd sensation. Every time I bent my head down (ok, I’ll admit it, i noticed it while texting and driving at the same time), there was a weird feeling that went down my back and my hands and feet went numb. Now I was definitely freaking out. I called Brent again, and he told me I had to go to the neurologist again since my symptoms had changed.
Three days before the day that I had my second neurology appointment, my feet went numb. As the day progressed the numbness spread upwards and by the time I went to the doctor I was numb up to my ribcage. When I reported these symptoms to my doctor he said that these were classic signs of MS and that he definitely wanted me to get some scans of my back done.
I got the scans done and sure enough there were lesions on my neck and in my torso. The one on my torso was leaning to the left, explaining why I had lost my left side for some time. After these results the doctor told me that he was 90% sure that I had MS but he wanted to get a spinal tap and some brain scans to be certain.
This entire time my symptoms had been getting worse. By the time that I got my spinal tap, I hadn’t been able to feel my fingers for a few weeks. I still can’t right now, which makes typing somewhat problematic sometimes since I can’t feel the indicator nubs on the keyboard. I’ve gotten used to it, though.
The spinal tap came back positive for MS markers. The brain scan showed many lesions — they looked like little flames lighting up my brain. I couldn’t believe how many there were… How long had my body been trying to kill my brain, I wondered.
The next step for me is medication to try to stop the progress. I start tomorrow. Let’s hope that it works because I’m tired of being tired and numb and sick all the time. All I can do is be positive and believe in the doctors and Brent when they say things will get better with time.
) I felt like I had to do it, but instead of just having the toe prints, I decided to take it a little further and make my own version of the book for Rand’s wall. Then, we made prints of his feet in purple/blue/green hues on the yellow paper and put them together to make the butterfly. This was a long project, but so worth it in the end!
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