A Perfect day, Life & Sport with MS

dfc4

Hi everyone,
My name is Steve, i am an englishman living in Germany i used to be a sportsman and have always been in pretty good shape.
Last year in october i became ill and after a long time in hospital & Rehab i was diagnosed with MS (monophase)
I have lost my sense of balance, felling in my arms and have severe koordination problems
I have begun to write about what has happened to me, to help me understand and hopefully to motivate others.

I would like to share this with you, maybe i can help motivate you to reach your goals.
Hope you like it.


April 2004
It was a rainy Tuesday morning in late April 2004.
I remember it quite well, the sun was coming up and the sky was slowly but surely getting lighter.
The birds were beginning to sing and the odd “klunk” of car doors shutting as people headed off for work were the only sounds from outside.
After putting on my cycling gear I iwent down into the kitchen and like every morning drunk a glass of warm water with fresh lemon juice….god knows why…I must have read it in a training magazine and decided that it was a good idea.
Whilst stuffing my cycling jersey pockets full of self-made energy bars & bananas i made my way to the front door where my bike & cycling shoes had been waiting patiently for me since the evening before, and went outside.
It was raining and quite cold for this time of year so I decided to put on my thin waterproof over my jersey and looked up into the grey sky, drops of cold fine rain came down onto my face washing away the last bit of sleep that was still clinging onto my eyes, trying to talk me into getting back into my warm comfortable bed.
“Well anyone can cycle when the weather is good” I thought to myself and swung myself onto my bike, klicked my shoes into the pedals and rode off for my 100 Kilometers hill training session.
I remember one of my teammates asking me back then, what motivates me to train so hard and be so disciplined with my nutrition.
I’m not really sure exactly what I answered, deep inside I didn’t really know what to say.
I just knew that you have to work hard when you are trying to reach your goals, I never really wondered why or looked for another way of getting where I wanted to be in life, I just accepted the fact that it wasn’t going to be easy.
I also didn’t know at the time, that in years to come, I would need that self-discipline and fighting spirit just to get through daily life.




1 A Perfect day
Although this mid - October day in 2017 was the beginning of the worst time I had ever had in my life, I decided to call this first chapter “a perfect day”
That is more or less what it started off as.
It was a Saturday morning and like that spring day in 2004 I was awoken by the sound of birds singing and the sound car doors shutting outside.
The window shutters of our bedroom were closed so it was quite dark in the room, but I could see on the digital alarm clock that it was something past eight.
After slowly getting out of bed trying not to wake Angie, i pulled the shutter up a few inches to see what the weather was like outside.
“Blue Sky, Sun coming up…perfect weather for a run in the woods” I thought to myself.
I looked across at Angie and watched her sleeping for a few minutes until Happy, our cat, interrupted me with a long meeauuuww.
That meant more or less that she wanted to go outside to get on with her daily business.
I took another glance at Angie and saw she was still sleeping soundly, I smiled and went downstairs to let the cat out.
The air outside was and crisp and cool and I stood at the door for a few seconds to enjoy a few lung-fulls of fresh oxygen then went into the kitchen to make a coffee or us before going back back up to bed.
This was one of our weekend rituals, have a nice coffee in bed before getting on with the day.
Sometimes we would talk for a while and as long as it wasn’t raining I would then go out for a run.
If the weather was bad we would just have another hour relaxing in bed before getting up.
On this October morning we didn’t talk much, Angie was still half asleep and sometimes it is better just to enjoy the moment without saying anything.
I finished my coffee and decided to go for my run, Angie had fallen back to sleep and still had half a cupfull of coffee.
My training on this special day was almost perfect.
For more than a year I had been working on cross country running using Ski Poles, a bit like cross country skiing without the snow, sometimes I would get my breathing just right but my legs felt heavy, on other days I had the strength in my legs but had problems breathing or with coordination.
But on this day, just like the weather, everything was perfect and I enjoyed every minute.
After having a good stretch I went in for a shower.
The warm shower felt good and I showered a bit longer than usual, I thought about what we would do that day.
Probably do some gardening, cook dinner together and the weather would be nice enough to sit outside for an hour in the afternoon…..perfect.
As I was getting out of the shower I noticed that the floor wet in a few places and decided to lay a towel down before I stepped out.
I took two steps and made sure my feet were firmly on the ground.
The next thing I knew I was on the floor in pain.
I couldn’t understand what had happened, although my feet were firmly on the floor and I was totally concentrated I had still fallen.
I didn’t feel dizzy or weak but had a strange feeling like someone had just pulled my legs from under my body.





I had fallen on my back and shoulder which had felt like it had come out of the socket and gone back in again when I was trying to get back up.
Angie, who was now awake, came running out of the kitchen to help me up.
Sitting on the toilet trying to get my breath back, watching bright stars flying around the room, I was still trying to realise why I had fallen.
Angie thought I was having problems staying conscious.
“I think we should go to hospital and get you checked over” she said.
“No it will be ok, I’m ok now” I replied.
Still Staring at the Towel on the floor and wondering Why…or better said What! Had made me fall.
The answer to that would come three months later.
The three months between question and answer were to be the worse I had ever had and would change my life forever.


The following days were very painful and I was having problems moving my arm, I still went to work although driving was difficult I was capable of doing my work in the office as long as there were enough pain killers in my system.
I should have really taken a few days off sick but with new projects at work, every day off work would cause further delays.
That was the type of person I was, always in the fast lane, setting personal Training bests, constantly doing the house and garden up and working much too hard.
After setting new goals I would spend every waking hour trying to reach them without even thinking of taking a rest.
I managed to get through the week and actually tried to do some light strength training but my arm was still too painful and decided to go out for a light jog when the weekend came round..
That weekend however I still wasn’t feeling strong enough to train and spent most of the Saturday lying on the couch watching telly.

Later on that day I started feeling down and felt as if I was getting a bout of flu so I went to bed early.
The rest of the weekend in bed feeling rotten but by the time Sunday evening came round I was feeling better and decided again not to go on the sick, I promised Angie…and myself, to take it easy at work.
By mid - week my shoulder was starting to get better but I had a light neck pain that seemed to be getting worse and worse all the time and by Friday evening was so bad I could hardly hold my head up to watch tv. I took a hot bath and went to bed at about nine.
I must have been sleeping y when Angie came to bed because I can’t even remember her coming up to the bedroom.
At about four in the morning I needed to go to the toilet but the pain in my head and neck were now so severe I was having problems sitting up straight.
I decided to go downstairs to try and stretch my back and neck a bit.
I was only when I got into the Dining room and tried to switch the light on that I realized there was something wrong with my arms.
For some reason I had the feeling that I couldn’t move them.
I tried the light switch again but couldn’t seem to get my arms up high enough.

I remember thinking to myself that this was one of those bad nightmares..but if it was..it was very, very real.
I tried again to raise my hands and it felt as though they were in front of my face but I couldn’t see them as the room was too dark, I pushed the light switch with one of my shoulders
The light caused more pain in my head and neck and my back tightened up even more.
I remember that i had started to shiver…it wasn’t cold in the room..it was the scared kind of shiver that was going through my body.
Then I realized that I wasn’t just scared……I was petrified…… although my arms felt as though I was holding my hands in front of my face they were actually still down by my sides.
I looked down at my hands and tried again to raise my arms, the next thing I felt was panic, fear and disbelief all rolled into one.
I couldn’t move my arms at all.


to be continued.....