Falls are part of life with multiple sclerosis (MS). We strive to prevent falls. We learn how to fall when they are inevitable. We take note of our well-being once we’ve reached the ground. We teach ourselves how to get back up after falls happen.
But falls aren’t the reason I’ve been spending so much time on floors, pavements, drives, and lawns of late.
I seem to be dropping everything, all the time.
But let’s take a step back — no pun intended — and let me tell you why this concerns me so.
The Importance of Hand and Arm Function
I was diagnosed with MS in 2001, when I was 35, but my team and I believe I was experiencing MS symptoms for at least 15 years before that.
It’s not surprising, then, that it wasn’t long after my diagnosis that my relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS) was determined to have transitioned into the secondary-progressive (SPMS) phase.
For many of us with SPMS, the disease begins to affect not only our gross motor skills, which enable activities like walking, but our fine motor function as well. That includes the tasks we do with our hands and fingers.
It’s one of the reasons Professor Gavin Giovannoni and his team at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry began the #ThinkHand campaign. For people with advanced and advancing MS, our hands become more important, as we may lose abilities in our legs.
In my case, I’m also losing abilities in my hands.
Dropping Things and Picking Them Up
So here I am on the floor again, as I drop something yet again, thanks to the effects the MS is having on the dexterity, coordination, control, and strength of my hands and fingers. Add in my newly diagnosed Dupuytren’s contracture, and I’m down here a lot.
One moment I’ve got a hold of something and then the next, I just don’t.
Because of my other limitations, getting down onto the floor and then back up again after collecting whatever errant object has escaped takes more time and effort than I care to admit.
Funny how fast an MS fall can bring me down, but when I’m trying to get low with some control, it takes a good bit longer.
Time for Retraining Both Brain and Hands
I am now aware that I have slipped beyond the “prevent and retain” phase of my MS hand issues. I now must jump to “maintain and improve” mode.
This will mean reengaging with my occasional therapy team, planning more time to complete tasks that already take me multiples of the time they once did, and focusing on each moment as it happens, rather than being two or three steps ahead of myself in my brain.
It’s another adaptation from the old new normal to the new new normal. It’s not something I saw coming, so I frankly didn’t prepare for it. But, as so many other times before, I’ll adapt, I’ll change, I’ll curse a little bit (or a lot), and I’ll move forward with my ever-progressing multiple sclerosis in tow.
Hopefully, that moving forward will be less interrupted by trips to the ground to fetch the next thing my MS hands can’t hold.
It also seems like I should plan for extra training for our next puppy, whenever it is that she presents her happy self to the world.
Wishing you and your family the best of health.
Cheers,
Trevis
