1. Multiple Sclerosis: Disease that Affects an Entire Family
By Matt Marcinick
It’s 3 a.m. and I woke up to large “thud.” It sounded almost as if someone had kicked in our
front door, but it came from the back of the house. I spring out of bed and dart for my parent’s
bedroom. Darkness covered the entire room so I flipped the switch to discover that my mom had fallen
out of bed again. I help her back up and into bed and return to my room to sleep. To some, this scenario
may seem like an unfortunate event, but to me it’s life as usual.
Multiple Sclerosis, or MS for short, is a nervous system disease that affects the nerve cell axons.
The cell stem is covered in a type of insulation, much like power lines are today. The insulation is called
myelin. This myelin sheathing coats the axon and allows for safe passage of nerve impulses to pass from
the brain to the muscles and vital organs.
Once this sheathing is deteriorated by the disease it cannot regenerate and impulses become
interrupted. As the disease spreads to disable more cells, entire portions of the body can become
completely immobilized. In my mom’s case, her right leg is paralyzed and her left leg is nearly there. For
most of the day she is confined to a wheel chair.
My mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis at the age of 22. It just so happens that I am
22 myself and could not imagine getting such life-altering news at my age. She has lived with the disease
for the last 26 years. Luckily for my mom the disease stayed dormant and did not progress for 16 of
those years. At the age of 40, she began to see the signs.
At 40 she seemed depressed. She was always full of aches and pains. Unfortunately, mom put
most of the pain aside, thinking it was arthritis. Then she began to feel numbness in her limbs from time
to time. A routine visit to our family doctor revealed that her MS had become progressive.
In the years that followed, mom began to drop dishes. We must have gone through an entire set
of glass cups. The depression got worse as she began getting down on herself and thinking that this

2. disease was somehow her fault. The doctor put her on antidepressants when she began her treatment.
To this day mom gets a shot of medication every other night. It is supposed to slow the progression of
the disease and decrease the probability of an attack.
A Multiple Sclerosis attack happens when the disease attacks a nerve in the brain. This causes
the entire body to become completely paralyzed for a short time, and then the person slowly regains
feeling in their extremities.
As a young man who is looking forward to leaving home after college and starting his life, I find
it difficult to know for sure if my parents will be all right. My father is getting older and is finding it
harder to take care of my mother. While I live at home it makes things much easier on my family
because, should my mom fall, I am able to pick her straight off the ground. I am also there to do more
heavy lifting around the house and help keep it clean.
Questions race through my head on a daily basis; “Will Mom be okay if I leave?” “Will Dad be
able to fully take care of Mom along with working?” and “Will my little sister stick around long enough
to help out?”
On the flip side I realize that I need to take responsibility for my own life. Let’s be honest, no
woman out there wants to date a college grad that still lives with Mom and Dad. If I am ever going to
live the life that my parents intended to give me, I must move on to bigger and better things. My parents
seem to think that my eventual move from home will be no problem at all. In my head, I know better.
Multiple sclerosis has treatments, but no cure. Scientists have been working on stem-cell
research to see if it can be used to treat MS. Until then, my family must live with the ups and downs of
everyday life. Some days are better than others. My mom is a very tough cookie, so if there is anyone
who can show that life with MS is livable, it would be her and my family, and I am there to help her
through it all.