That Samuel-O’Brien Chick!

Indulge me…I going and toot my own horn a lil bit.

it still amazes me after all these years that I have such a positive attitude about having MS. It’s so not like me; I’m usually so pessimistic about things. Maybe deep down somewhere I knew that my outlook will make it easier for everyone around me to cope? I know they feed off my energy/feelings/outlook. I was reminded of that last week Saturday while I was talking to one of my aunts and she was talking about getting old (in fact, for years she been telling us young’uns not to get old because it is in fact a bitch) and she said, “u are amazing…how u deal with everything. It’s because of ur attitude that we can be positive about so many things.” It eh easy trust me, but it is what it is, wha ah go do.

from the moment I was diagnosed my doctor always encouraged me to exercise…that’ll help things he said – years ago it was thought that exercise was not a good thing for MS patients – of course that train of thought is no more. Back then I hated the gym, sweating, exercising, weights…all those gym things. Slowly but surely over the years that has changed and now I actually like working out. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d ever get to that point but here I am. Now I certainly eh no gym rat and there are days when I can do without it but I like working out. Problem is, I can’t go by myself- well I could but why tempt fate; u know that I’ll be moving from one machine to the next and will end up on the floor! Enter Spree – my personal trainer. we’ve been together for the past year and a half and she’s talked about how nervous she was in the early days. We talked on the phone and I told her that I can walk but I’m in the scooter…I have MS…blahblahblah. She was cool and said yes no problem but was a bag of nerves because she didn’t know what to expect/couldn’t figure out how we’d be working out etc.

i think from day one I put her mind at ease though. I told her from then that working out was no problem for me. In fact, I’m willing to try any exercise or machine. If while doing it, I take extra long or we realise that maybe this isn’t a good idea then we know that maybe we shouldn’t do it again. (In fact, a dream I have is to start doing pull ups but not sure how we going to get me in position – but I know that one day we will try to make it work; that may be a story for another day. who knows!). Her biggest fear of course was that I’d fall “on her watch” and so the day it happened and I kinda dragged her down too (as strong as she is, she was no match for me!), she was mortified…me? Not so much – all in a day’s work…in fact allyuh know I started laughing especially when I realised that yes I pulled her down but we were both just fine. She also feeds off of me…she knows that she can throw anything at me and I’ll figure it out as we go.

i don’t need reinforcement but it’s always nice when anyone, including those who don’t know me, say encouraging things to me. I’ve had strangers in every gym at which I’ve worked out tell me that I inspire them and give them the strength to come out because if I can come workout, then they have no excuse whatsoever.  It tells me that “hey! it’s not all bad right?” and clearly I must be doing something right.

Hopefully, I will be able to maintain my positivity/upbeat outlook and my wretched disease won’t throw me a curveball that I can’t (or don’t want to) handle – time surely will tell.

P.S. I’ll be out of pocket next week so I sure won’t be posting anything.