Interesting

Tomorrow, it begins again. I return to Teaching the Youth Of America.

Yesterday, I didn't think it would be possible. Today, I had my weekly acupuncture treatment, and I knew it would be possible. I mentally spun out and hit the wall, this evening, at home, and undid a lot of today's acupuncturing, I'm sure. Oh well. At least, this time, I watched it happen. Hardly a consolation, but usually I don't know when it happens, and this time, I did, and I think (for once) that I understand how it happened, and maybe even why. A step ahead, even though I'm going to have to live in darkness for the entire week, until next Tuesday, when I get it reversed again.

Humanity. Ego. What a pisser.

Anyway, I did have a good discussion with my acupuncturist/neurologist/MD about the MS today. He is sure that I definitely do not have relapsing/remitting, since I don't have attacks that then abate (whether mostly or at all). All of my neurological malfunctions ("inconveniences," let's call them) stick with me. They don't get better. Now, there's no reason that they can't, the nervous system is self-correcting (albeit much more slowly than we like), my herbalist certainly thinks that once we clean out all the nastiness that's causing damage, we can start rebuilding. All this is possible.

In the meantime... I have what I have. Or don't have, depending on how you want to describe it.

Yesterday, I was very dark. I wasn't sure whether I was being prudent in staying at home and not going off to the store or whatever, or whether I had just plain given up. Very hard to tell... probably a little of both.

And yet today, even in darkness, there was light. It was "book day" at school, the kids pick up their books, their locker combinations. I saw some of my students. We laughed. We talked about the cartoons we were going to watch at our Friday-after-school anime club. I told at least one parent that her daughter was very high on my list of people that I don't worry about—and how often does a parent hear that? A lot of smiles, today, even from darkness.

A long ride to the doctor and back, some very interesting points, then a return to darkness this evening.

And tomorrow, I face a room full of 14-year-olds to teach them about using computers. From my wheelchair.

Nobody ever said the MS journey wasn't ... interesting.