Rebuilding the Walls MS Tears Down

All around Ireland there are stone walls and hedgerows — strips of densely planted trees and shrubs marking a border. Many (if not most) of the hedgerows have a solid stone wall a few inches or feet inside the shrubbery.

Just about everyone who visits the country notes how many walls there are. Let’s just say that the original quality of much of the ground made for decades of clearing stones from potential fields in order to make something useful.

A Strong Wind Can Blow Down Even a Sturdy Wall

We had a good few strong storms this past winter, and even the well-built old stone walls were not immune to wind damage. In many places, there are now gaps in walls that have stood for hundreds of years. As spring approaches and in anticipation of livestock soon being put back on the grass, there are many repairs commencing all around the place.

As these things often do, it got me thinking about an MS metaphor.

You see, even though one can grow used to expecting aspects of life (such as strong stone walls) to remain in place when adversity comes, it’s not always the case. Even a relatively benign course of MS can flare from time to time, and we all know the bulldozer of relapse and progression that comes for the rest of us.

MS Is the Storm That Blows Down Our Walls

Because of MS, our personal “walls” fall down, taking with them things we used to do and the way we used to do them.

But as we look ahead to the life we hope to live, we need to find a way to rebuild those walls and continue on, sometimes until the next MS storm knocks them over once again.

I’ve noted, as I watch farmers and their helpers rebuild the stone walls, that they often have to tear down some of the structure that’s still standing to make proper repairs. If you just restack the stones as they were (and most of these are dry-stacked walls, not mortared into place), they would be even more susceptible to the next bit of wind that came their way.

Like the farmers, we have to see what damage has been done beyond the visible stones lying about our lives.

And when it comes to MS, the damage can be more than just physical. The emotional foundations upon which our lives’ walls are built can get damaged as much as our physical selves when the MS winds come a-blowin’.

So we need to do more than just rehabilitate our drop foot or rest after steroid infusions. We need to evaluate whether or not putting a wall in the same place is a good idea, whether or not it’s appropriate, and whether that wall really served us any purpose other than just always being there.

Then, like the farmers, we fit our families, our activities, our jobs — our “stones” — back into place. We might reshape this stone or that. We might go looking for something that would fit better than the old stones.

We ask for help because sometimes (and often more than I know I’d like) we just can’t see the best way to rebuild the fallen wall of one aspect of life or another at which MS has had its latest go.

The New Wall Isn’t Exactly the Same as the Old

The reworked walls seldom look like the old sections. New stones get added; some old stones get discarded and lie about the field unused. It’s not the same, but that doesn’t mean it’s worse.

Where the walls of our lives were, and how they were built originally, may no longer suit our abilities, our aspirations, or the needs of ourselves and our families.

Perhaps when we think of rebuilding parts of our lives’ stone walls, we should consider doing a bit of knocking out ourselves. Taking out stones or whole sections that no longer help and guide but rather obstruct and hinder.

Perhaps it’s time to act a bit like a storm ourselves — in advance of the next MS blow — and tear down some of our old lives’ walls so we can live a better life within them, MS or not.

Wishing you and your family the best of health.

Cheers,

Trevis