I'm 100% positive that I have a particularly nasty energetic entry/exit block, something five-element acupuncture cures pretty much instantly with four needles. It may sound vaguely "boogah-boogah" and unscientific, but believe me, if you've ever had one (and you probably have, whether you know it or not) and then had it cured, you'd never doubt their existence again. Ever.
If I have the block that I suspect I have... hoo boy, is it gonna hurt, to get it cleared. But trust me, if you've had this as many times as I have, and felt the difference between having it and having it removed, you'd beg to have those nasty points needled, pain or no.
A particularly nasty side effect of these blocks is that the MS symptoms go wild. The unsteadiness of gait, the fatigue (especially the fatigue), the insensitivity/odd sensitivity, they all go completely through the roof. If I hadn't had it happened many times before, I'd be sure that the torrent of MS-symptom intensity promised that the end of independent living, or at the very best, the end of non-wheelchair-assisted living, was coming at me within days, if not hours. And even knowing that it was probably going to be at least a little better within a couple of days, I felt the fear gnawing at me today... "Am I really going to make it to commencement, this weekend? How am I going to be able to perform at all, like this?"
I dropped a cup, yesterday. I had it in my lap, I was really out of it, and I stood up without remembering that it was there, and it fell on the floor and broke. That's the second time that has happened (in the same chair, and I was in the same drained state), and yes it's just a cup and all that, but it was one that my wife and I had received as a wedding present and we'd had it for twenty-four years and now it's gone, and that made me really sad... but also I had been planning on at least trying to drive to the store that afternoon, and I scrapped all those plans because I was afraid--afraid that I'd simply forget something again, or simply not notice something, and Something Bad (who knows what) would happen because of it.
I've always been a homebody, a very stick-at-home homebody... but nowadays, except to go to work, I don't leave home much. At all. Time was when I'd hop in the car and pop down to the Japanese store or some other specialty shop for something fun to make for dinner... not any more. It's a big thing, nowadays, when I even have the energy to make dinner. A lot of time, it's because of fatigue, often it's discomfort (my right, "driving" leg, is the worse of the two), sometimes it's both, sometimes it's fear, that Something Bad will happen. But if there's one thing that the MS has worsened the most, it's my choice to just stay at home and not go on any sort of adventure. Am I honestly too tired to go out? Yeah, very much so, sometimes. Am I in too much discomfort to go out? Also definitely, very much so, sometimes. Is it wise, when I'm not mentally with it, to not put myself in a position of getting even more tired and then driving home? Yeah, definitely, sometimes...
But I still go back and forth on "Should I push myself, or just give up and stay home?" I did get a good answer a few weeks ago ("If you have reserves, it's OK to use them, but if you don't, don't push," my physical therapist suggested), but for so many years I've been able to get myself through anything no matter how bad things were, physically, emotionally, energetically, intellectually, spiritually... and when I don't use the ability to "make it through, no matter what," I feel guilty that I gave up.
And that doesn't help. At all.
Four needles, tomorrow, and things will change. At least, they always have before...
Hope; one of the constituent elements of the universe. Even in this very nasty state... I can still hope.
The gifts of MS, this week, are... an ... interesting ... combination.
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