One of the first things I searched when I found out I had ms was running and ms. I was sorely disappointed, I hardly found anything. There was one story of a woman who was going to run a marathon with ms but it never pulled up anything about how she did. I hope she made it. The other story was about a man who ran for years and finally had to give it up. He was able to relive his running days through his wife who he helped train for a marathon.
I wasn’t looking for inspirational stories, I just wanted to know how to do it. So that is my goal, to share with you all how I do it. Even though I am sure your ms is different than mine, maybe you can get something out of this. I also hope all of you out there with ms who are running can share your thoughts, successes, frustrations, prs, etc.
You can run with ms.
Hello! I was very happy to find your blog. I too, have MS and was diagnosed (August 2007 at the age of 38).I haven’t had a relapse (that I know of-does extreme fatigue or spontaneous mild electric rubberband sensations count?) I love to run and have wanted to find some positive connections between MS and running, but have not seen much to inspire me. My first “attack” (I hate that word) was loss of use of my right hand (the one I write with-go figure!) I had numbness on that forearm and a band around my triceps. Remarkably, I regained full use of my hand and the numbness and band feeling has disappeared. Sometimes I get a little neuropathic pain in the triceps area, but it is usually transient. I am a dialysis nurse and am fully able to insert large needles into my patients! I still run, but was almost afraid to continue because it seems like unchartered territory. I told my neurologist that I would continue to run and honestly felt like I was being defiant by the way he looked at me! I figure that I will keep running/jogging/walking until I can absolutely, no longer do so (and I don’t think that will happen!)I figure that keeping my leg muscles strong with running is important. I have chosen to be positive about this new “situation” in my life. My husband is my best support of all and runs with me. I have actually had some days where I could outrun him! I feel I am kicking MS in the butt on those days! Of course, I have some less than stellar days where I just don’t feel like my old self. But I continue to run. It makes me feel in control of my life and my MS and I am so happy to see that someone else feels the same way. Keep on running!
RunningNurseWithMS