What do you do when heat exhaustion and the MonSter don’t mix? It's that time of year. You know what I mean. The sun is shining, bikinis are on sale, coolers are loaded, and summer invitations are distributed. Unfortunately, a majority of MS Warriors face the disappointing reality of being inside looking out. According to a May 2022 study by the National Library of Medicine, between 60% to 80% of patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) exhibit Uhthoff’s phenomenon with heat exposure. Uhthoff’s Phenomenon (also known as Uhthoff sign or Uhthoff syndrome) is described as a transient worsening of neurological symptoms related to a demyelinating disorder such as multiple sclerosis when the body becomes overheated in hot weather, exercise, fever, saunas, or hot tubs. I know. That’s a mouth full and likely not to resonate with, well, just about anyone. Severe intolerance to heat is one more reason MS Warriors are misunderstood. We're not whining. Our world is just so difficult to expla
In my Daily Life with MS, the more we learn, the more we know https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgIsUiT2dug According to legend, if you say the name Beetlejuice three times fast, the magical trickster himself will appear before you. Let’s reverse that. Wouldn’t it be great if we could say MS three times fast to erase the existence of this ridiculous disease? I'm pretty tired of my personal trickster. Since the Monster refuses to be exorcised, the best thing we can do for ourselves is to learn more about it. Pushing aside the negativity of multiple sclerosis, its history is kind of fascinating. As recently as the 1950s (in the realm of history, that really is recent; or I’m really old), they subjected people exhibiting inexplicable neurological symptoms to inhumane “cures”. Photo by Gabriella Clare Marino on Unsplash The MonSter was first detected as early as 1300, but not assigned a label until the 1800s when the medical field recognized the mysterious symptoms of MS a nervous d