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Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Cure Or Curse?

Lets say that they come up with a fix for MS. Lets say that they shoot you full of the newest poison and suddenly your autoimmune system is rebooted, and suddenly you don’t have MS anymore. Moreover, lets say that this magic potion goes even further and actually reverses damage that has already been done, restoring all the roads, repairing the washed out bridges, slapping on a new coat of paint to boot!

How then will I excuse myself in the future? How to explain the low level dementia that creeps affably about in my everyday life? What convenient, *regrettable* condition can thereafter *sadly* exempt me from employment in hard labor and other distasteful tasks that I would really deep down rather not do?

Would I have to give up my extended leave of absence from work, which has taken so much time and paperwork to obtain? As it is, I have wrangled out for myself the permission to work a short day every Thursday, and the right to use special time for illnesses or doctor visits (EIT) instead of my own coveted vacation time (PTO).

Are you saying that I would have to work a full eight hours again? Every day?

God forbid.

Let us be careful, therefore, lest we fail to appreciate the good fortune bequeathed upon us by disease—received through none of our own doing, but by grace. So to speak.

2 comments:

Natalie Ford said...

I am similarly conflicted. Whilst I hated my 'career' as a programmer, that may have been because I was always so fatigued and befuddled and did not know why. However, I would love to have the energy to apply myself to the projects and self-employment that I would love to enjoy. I am hoping to manage these latter in a productive manner despite the MonSter but I can only imagine how much I would be able to achieve/earn without the MonSter hanging round my neck and dragging me down.

(P.S. Blogger gives me a "Bad Request" error when I try to use my livejournal identity to reply to this post and so I am using my Google login instead.)

R.W. Boughton said...

Yes, the desire to achieve never goes away. In ones mind, or imagination, one remains able. Then you set about the actual project and immediately find yourself struggling against these ridiculous limitations imposed by MS. It's frustrating.