Measuring Indignity on an Entirely Different Scale

Just a little earlier this evening I slid off the toilet and landed with a solid thwack on the floor with my bare bum all exposed and my undies around my ankles. Other than a twisted knee and what will probably be a rather sunset-hued bruise across my mid back, my sense of pride and dignity took the hardest hit. MS uses a rather crude peeler to pare back layer after layer of, "I would never," and "I'd rather be dead than be caught doing x,y, or z."
MS has a way of rubbing my nose in my physical failings like a parent who cruelly spanks their child for wetting the bed. It is as if a series of interlocking steps and processes that were carefully interwoven to create ME as I grew from infant to toddler: feeding & dressing myself, going potty, walking; grade school: exploring the world, meeting new people, riding a bike, playing outside; young adulthood: education, independence, travel, camping; adult: career, gardening, cooking, passion for living are collapsing back into themselves at an accelerated rate. Until I feel like my body is on a completely different journey than the one I expected to to take.
I've learned it is unwise to say I will never do or allow MS to do a certain step in my 'un'development. Although, I still cling to a few. I can't imagine having a total stranger come into the house as a bath aide. I don't think I could live if I were blind. Those are two that can crop up in nightmares. I used to be scared of being trapped somewhere out and about in my wheelchair, but in the twisted way MS works that has never happened because I am no longer able to go out and about alone because I become too fatigued and can get lost easily. Ironic, isn't it. What I feared wasn't anywhere as bad as what I ended up having to live with.
I am not particularly brave or noble or tough. I am, however, a survivor. Today required me to put aside my pride and ask my hubbie to drag my naked bum off the bathroom floor. And, knowing this damnable illness as I do, I am not too certain I want to know what it will ask of me tomorrow.

Under Water

Four months? 16 weeks without posting, where did the time go? It is as if I went wading in a pond, my feet became stuck in the muck and I was slowly drawn under the water. Over time a thick opaque layer of ice built up covering the surface and I can't move or breathe. It isn't necessarily bad in a call the coast guard panic at the disco sort of way. More, just confining and suffocating and compressing and simply put, more than I can push past, through, or over.
Clinically, this is depression topped with a heaping ladle full of chronic pain and a garnish of cognitive loss, life hassles, and other bits and pieces of this and that. Frankly I am tired and warty and grumpy. I am equally tired of putting on a brave face and fighting.
And, in spite of this terrible inertia that grips me, I will. I wasn't sure I had anything left to say on my blog. Then, the other day a friend shared that she had shared my writing with a newly diagnosed friend. If I can let go of the idea that I have to be the poster child for the positive MS patient and share my life, warts and all. Maybe there are words left in me after all. 
I can put on a happy face and act all sweetness and light. But, a little like a roman candle, I quickly fade and collapse. A short visit or a quick trip to the store or a walk around the block can lead to hours or days of increased symptoms. The pain I live with never goes away-it gnaws and eats at me all the time. Somehow, I have to find a way to live. That will be my focus.