MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS: WHEN WE HURT OURSELVES

Multiple sclerosis is an autoimmune disease (i.e. a disease in which the body attacks itself) that causes loss of myelin sheets (which make up the white matter) in the brain and spinal cord and results in muscle weakness, poor eyesight and slow speech.

A very common feature of this disease is the prominence of several relapses i.e. reoccurrences and these are followed by periods of remissions i.e. breaks from experiencing symptoms of the disease.

Research is still going on as regards the specific pathogenicity of the disease as we speak, but this one thing we know: lots of myelin sheets are affected (that’s why it is called “multiple”).

I believe it would be easier to pin down a cure for this disease if it was not also autoimmune.

In essence, when one progressively harms him/herself e.g. by taking excessive amounts of alcohol or via drug abuse, the damage done is harder to reverse and the processes of inflicting such pain harder to forget. Also, if you have a problem, its far better- and easier I must say, to find solutions when the problems are still minute. This may be harder once the problems become bigger!

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DOKITA

EPISODE 3 ‘Oya sorry now, we’re almost there.’ Felix kept saying as he partially carried his dear friend. She wouldn’t hear the last of this episode once it was over, that much he knew! ‘Awww…you don’t know how painful awww… this is’ ‘Sorry, sorry’ ; he kept saying So they eventually got to the ER and after pulling out her card, used ‘medical student connection’ to see the resident that was on call in Internal Medicine unit. ‘Hello dear’ , Dr. Brown said, looking keenly at the girl that was almost doubled over in pain ‘I think you should lie down on that couch’ ‘What exactly is the problem?’ ‘She just started complaining about her abdomen about half an hour ago’ ‘Oh’. ‘Can you point to where exactly the pain started?’ he asked ‘Here’ . Linda pointed to the area around her umbilicus. ‘Have you had any episode of vomiting?’ ‘No sir’ Felix answered spontaneously. ‘You must be her boyfriend, right?’ Dr.Brown asked, with a mischievious grin ...

DOKITA

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CHRONICLES OF A NIGERIAN PHYSIOTHERAPIST by 'Bola Abioye

EPISODE FIVE ‘Mum, who called you this time again?’ I finally asked. ‘Oh… Charles, that’s what matters to you now right. What matters to you is if it’s Prophet Jabesh or Prophet Judas that called me?’ Then I burst into laughter. I can’t help but wonder why these prophets must bear names as Judas, Jabesh…if you know, you know. Then she changed it for me straight up. ‘Charles, why exactly are you laughing? You know I get scared anytime you get close to that girl and you know that I am at the risk of having stroke with the way my blood pressure rises in little situations.’ There she goes again. My mum gets little information on health precautions and that’s the end. We hear nothing else save what she has learnt in the house for about at least a month. She subscribes to all sorts of health tips on her network and then tries to confirm her newly found information from me. She has several facts on why eating eba, using an onion bulb that has been cut once and use...

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