6 week update

I am officially 6 weeks post-treatment.  I am still making remarkable improvements in my legs and core strength in PT, thanks to my wonderfully unforgiving therapist.  She works me hard, and I love it!

My balance is still a little unpredictable.  My therapist and I discussed that strengthening my muscles will do great things to improve my balance.  However, any permanent damage that has been done to my vestibular system over these years may prevent total recovery of balance.  I’m going to do everything I can do to work on the muscle stuff, and just hope that great strength can compensate for deficits in other departments.  We’ll see!  For now I am fine without a cane in the house.  I take one with me when I go out, but try not to touch it to the ground as much as possible.  It is a fun little game I play with myself, although uneven surfaces are still too risky to attempt to navigate without my third leg! 

For anyone new to my story, I should warn you of my gift for devising explanations for phenomena where there really are none.  I do not like uncertainty.  In its presence I will concoct what I believe are reasonable explanations to fill in the blanks.  It helps me manage my world, and has worked for me for decades.  Until I find or develop a better system, I’m sticking with it! 

My physical stamina is still good, and improving daily.  On Monday I was able to go straight from a vigorous PT session to the grocery store for a full shop.  I was pooped when I was done, and luckily my wonderful husband was home to unload when I arrived.  To put this in perspective, pre-treatment I would have had to go straight home to the sofa to recover from a mild PT session, and stay there for at least an hour.  Being able to do two strenuous activities in one day, and to do them consecutively is incredible!

I am still cold most of the time, although my feet are not purple and are actually warm as I sit here typing.  I overanalyze every symptom, and was concerned about my cold intolerance.  Then yesterday I had lunch with two friends who also spend the whole winter shivering.  They don’t have MS, they just have "delicate constitutions."  So that's what I have, too!  Not every problem has to be defined by my illness.  My New England born husband would probably call us wimps, but I think “delicate” is a much nicer description.  And since this is MY blog, what I say goes!  

As I noted above it has been 6 weeks since my procedure.  I am still feeling great.  However, a little voice in the back of my head can’t help thinking about the fact that I began restenosing 8 weeks post-procedure last time.  Will restenosis happen again?  I am very realistic, and the answer is: probably.  But hopefully not for many, many more months, maybe years!

The longer I can delay another treatment, the more the doctors will learn while I enjoy my good health.  Already the focus is broadening in many doctor’s opinions to include valves as an important focus in this puzzle that is CCSVI.  Who knows what else will be discovered while I am busy feeling so well?

Ladies and gentlemen we really are making history here.  It is a rare gift to be able to benefit from, and contribute to, a paradigm-shifting discovery in medical science.  I still pinch myself everyday.  (But now that I have regained so much sensation, I have to be more careful where I pinch!) ;o)