I was diagnosed with MS last Thursday. So far I’m mostly ok, I have minimal defecits and I’ve been diagnosed early. It’s 2023 and treatments have vastly improved.
I’ve joined the gym, hired a personal trainer, begun eating healthier food, accepted help from friends and have signed up with my local MS society.
I have scans booked for this week and bought diaries to track my fitness/nutrition and to take to medical appointments. I will not lay down and succumb to the terror.
All that being said, fuck me this sucks, I’ve just been hit with a wave of terror. Life as i know it has fundamentally changed. We all obviously take risks in everyday life I could be hit by a bus tomorrow but this diagnosis has made me acutely aware that the future isn’t promised. I wonder if my myelin sheaths are being destroyed by my immune system as I type this, is this cunt of a headache that I’ve had for 3 days straight a harbinger of doom?
My dream holiday was going to a resort in fiji to snorkel and drink cocktails. I was going to book that for this year. Fucking MS has made me unable to tolerate the heat.
Im a long time lurker, first time screaming into the void.
If you’ve read this, thanks. If you reply, I’m not ready for worse case scenarios.
What a blow, I’m sorry. My cousin was diagnosed with MS a few years ago and it threw him for a loop. He flew to Mexico for an experimental treatment and came back strong and healthy (immune compromised for a while.) Ever since, there’s been no apparent progression of the illness. He takes good care of himself and is more fit than I am. I don’t know a lot about MS but I know from witnessing it that the right combination of interventions can work wonders.
All of which is not meant to invalidate your understandable feelings of frustration and terror. I just thought a “best case scenario” might help.
This morning I woke up with some nasty allergies. Itchy eyes, sinuses all scratchy. I used a nasal spray, took some non-drowsy allergy medicine, and headed to work.
And now this is a block away from my office, and everything smells like a campfire.
I managed to find a fix. I opened the Chrome browser on my desktop and was able to import my Firefox bookmarks to it, then synced my Chrome account with the Chromebook. It was even able to pick up the login info from my Firefox browser, so I didn’t have to add them. When I get a chance I’m going to edit my Chrome bookmarks to delete all the ones that I don’t want to have on my travel laptop (like the links to my bank and credit card accounts).
Thank you, Spice_Weasel, its nice to read about the best case scenarios. Im a very long time lurker and I’m not surprised to wake up and find that you and Ulf-the-Unwashed have responded. Im feeling pretty special that 2 of the kindest posters on here have responded to me.
Im studying up on the treatments available to ne today. I have 3 options so far and I believe at this stage your brother’s choice of treatment is a last resort where i live (Australia). I need to have a decision made by mid April, so I’ve got some time on my side.
Thanks for your response, it’s a big comfort for me that you’ve acknowledged my rant. My mother is from the "other people have it worse, be glad youre not in their situation " generation and it makes it a bit difficult to have a guilt free whinge.
As an enthusiastic gardener, I sympathize with the situation faced by Icarus & spouse regarding their HOA. I strongly suspect though, that the problem with substitution of plants/shrubs down the line would never come up, because the likelihood of their detailed landscaping plan being approved is so small. The problem is outlined here:
And that’s what the HOA powers that be want. While other homeowners are described as having “made inroads on more attractive planting”, the idea of a comprehensive landscape that differs greatly from and improves on what most of the neighbors have will be perceived as a threat. The boring blob property owners will resent having their yards look bad, and even worse, other people will be inspired to radically upgrade their own landscapes.
Eventually, horticultural anarchy will descend on the area as individuality rears its ugly head. Undesirables could start moving in, causing property values to plummet. Can’t take that risk.
Don’t you see, those are dangerous values that a well-run HOA can’t tolerate in its safe, conforming fiefdom?
*Icarus might be inspired by a fit of serendipity to paint his house aquamarine with multicolored spangles.
My husband wants to buy a house. I also want to buy a house but the thought also terrifies me. The whole idea feels completely foreign. My parents bought one house in my childhood and had to declare bankruptcy and lost it when I was in college. My sister was able to buy a house and has been able to keep houses… But they also got a million dollar settlement when her husband was permanently blinded in one eye in a car accident. I don’t know how any of this works. I don’t know how people save up the cash for down payments or how they have the money for closing costs on top of that or how the process works or how you even find a house. And then how you afford the house after you get it. All I see are $$$$. It’s so scary. Renting feels safer to me.
And my rant is I don’t know how to tell my husband this. I talk to him about everything. But this I just can’t seem to tell him.
You may not be aware that in many situations (not always!) it is actually a bit cheaper to pay a mortgage than rent. It may not appear that way when comparing the monthly check you write, but the savings comes in when you file your taxes with the mortgage interest/property tax deduction (I assume we are talking about the US). Then there is the effect of building wealth by the combination of paying down your mortgage and the property value increasing over time. These are not things that paying rent accomplishes.
A friend’s husband lost the end of a finger years ago in a work related accident. There was a cash settlement. My friend periodically complains that he’s a wuss for not giving up the end of another finger for some easy money.
My sister and I calculated how much I’ve paid in rent living in my apartment all these years. It was a little more than 200,000 total. I have no equity. I have no credit score. I’d have those if I had a house.
Our credit union had a first-time home buyer program. That’s where I learned how to buy our first house. We saved some money, and my mom gifted us money to make up part of our down payment. There are lot of options. If you lose the house through some misfortune, depending on timing, you may not lose more than what you would spend in rent during the same time.
Being a homeowner is not right for everyone, and it’s okay to not want to buy a house. But if the hangup is how to go through the buying process, that’s not as hard as it seems.
I’ll bet there are things your husband doesn’t know much about, so, as you’ve divided up Things That Need To Be Done, you do them.
So… you could certainly tell him (or print out/send him what you said here), and just say “This is way out of my comfort zone. Can you handle this?”
Or, better, ask him “Can you walk me through how we can afford a house, keeping in mind that my adrenaline will be spiking the whole time?”
But you will have to talk to him. For us, absolute worst case would be a spouse rolling their eyes and saying "But it’s simple…" I’d hope yours would be more understanding.
If renting were cheaper on average than buying and maintaining an equivalent house in the long run, all landlords would go out of business. But, there are many many expenses involved in owning a house you may not even think about, and also risks.
Buying vs. renting is a tradeoff. I own a house and personally wouldn’t have it any other way, but I fully recognize that’s not the right choice for everybody.
It sounds like you have some trauma associated with house ownership, and that’s making it difficult to consider the prospect rationally. That is absolutely something you need to discuss with your husband. Hopefully he is understanding enough to work through it with you because even if you all ultimately go ahead and buy, that’s going to be a difficult time for you and he needs to know why.
They deal with the scary transactional aspects for you, and are usually quite nice. For us, that meant we could leap over “OMG how can any one manage this” and straight to “okay, your mortgage payment is $XXXX / month,” meaning eight years later we’re getting a four-bedroom house + yard for what a nice two-bedroom apartment is renting for.
The major downside is that repairs and emergencies are now on us rather than the landlord, but for me it’s been worth pushing through the discomfort.
Seriously, the manager of our teeny tiny bank down on the corner explained every little thing, with both of us asking really basic questions, and acted like a therapist as well.
The fact that he was a dead ringer for Neil Patrick Harris, and just as funny, helped.
You all are really helpful. We are talking to a mortgage broker at a credit union right now. I don’t even know what questions to ask, I’m so dumb to the process. I don’t even know what I don’t know. I’ll ask everything I can think of when we talk tonight.
And I’ll put on my big girl panties and really talk to my husband about my fears. It is time.
I bought a car through the credit union. Easiest purchase I’ve ever made. We knew the make and model we wanted. They asked about colour; I didn’t care. They said “We can have a red one here for you on Saturday.” Literally zero communication with the car people (and their sales tactics). Credit unions are (usually) the best.