In early September 2023, I came down with a bad stomach bug. I spent all of Labor Day weekend going between the bedroom and the bathroom drinking a lot of water and hardly eating anything. By the following Friday, I finally felt recovered enough to go back to the gym. But during my warmup my whole body felt “off.” When I tried to squat, my legs felt wobbly, like they were asleep. When I tried to bench press, I struggled to do five reps of a weight I could normally easily do for 30 reps. As the day progressed, I tried to ignore the fact that simply walking felt hard and that I was limping. It was more difficult to ignore the fact that I was unable to bend the fingers of my left hand when I tried to scratch my ear.
My MS Story
by Thom Szymanski
Later that day after my wife and I put our nine-month-old daughter to bed I told her what was going on and asked, “Do you think I’m having a stroke?” We agreed that I had probably just pushed myself in the gym harder than my body was ready for, and that I should take it easy the next few days.
The next morning it felt hard to get out of bed. But I kissed my wife as she went off to work and made a cup of coffee for myself and a bottle of milk for our daughter. After giving her the bottle, I decided to do some stretches for my legs as our daughter crawled around her playroom. It wasn’t until I tried to stand up from a half kneeling position and didn’t budge that I thought something serious was going on. “I’m going to die today” I thought as I pulled myself up onto the couch and used all my strength to rock forward to a standing position. I called my brother to come watch his niece while I took myself to urgent care. They told me to go to the ER. After parking in the lot and pulling myself out of the car, my legs started buckling as I approached the entrance to the ER. I had to brace myself against the building so as not to fall. They admitted me immediately and I spent the next two weeks in the hospital. However, it wasn’t until six months later after multiple MRIs, ultrasounds, CAT scans, blood tests, and spinal taps that I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
The six months between being discharged from the hospital and finally receiving a diagnosis was very difficult. A few days after coming home I fell while holding my daughter and struggled to get myself up to put her in her crib. I also lost my balance and dropped her twice during that period. I fell while opening the fridge. I fell while walking down stairs. I fell for no apparent reason at all. In the moment all these experiences felt devastating. They cast doubt on my ability to be the husband, father, and person I had seen myself as. Each one of these falls came as a surprise. Getting MS came as a surprise. But the biggest surprise yet has been the power of my mind to turn events that feel like devastating blows to my sense of identity into motivation to push beyond what I thought was possible.
I couldn’t have discovered this internal fortitude without support from family, friends, and two MS4MS Ambassadors who I had never met but decided to reach out to on social media – Adam and Alyssa. When I was recovering from my first MS flare up I didn’t know anyone who had multiple sclerosis and I felt pretty isolated. Well-meaning friends and colleagues shared anecdotes about people they knew with MS, but none of their stories were all that encouraging. However, when I reached out to Adam and Alyssa they “got it.” Not only did they understand the emotions I was experiencing, but they also understood my desire to continue to be physically active in spite of my MS. They embodied the saying, “you can’t change what happened, but you get to choose what happens next.” As an MS4MS Ambassador my goal is to proactively raise awareness about multiple sclerosis, and be part of the community of support for others living with the disease.
Learn more about Thom’s journey with MS by listening to his interview on episode 61 of the Jason Khalipa podcast:
In early September 2023, I came down with a bad stomach bug. I spent all of Labor Day weekend going between the bedroom and the bathroom drinking a lot of water and hardly eating anything. By the following Friday, I finally felt recovered enough to go back to the gym. But during my warmup my whole body felt “off.” When I tried to squat, my legs felt wobbly, like they were asleep. When I tried to bench press, I struggled to do five reps of a weight I could normally easily do for 30 reps. As the day progressed, I tried to ignore the fact that simply walking felt hard and that I was limping. It was more difficult to ignore the fact that I was unable to bend the fingers of my left hand when I tried to scratch my ear.
Later that day after my wife and I put our nine-month-old daughter to bed I told her what was going on and asked, “Do you think I’m having a stroke?” We agreed that I had probably just pushed myself in the gym harder than my body was ready for, and that I should take it easy the next few days.
The next morning it felt hard to get out of bed. But I kissed my wife as she went off to work and made a cup of coffee for myself and a bottle of milk for our daughter. After giving her the bottle, I decided to do some stretches for my legs as our daughter crawled around her playroom. It wasn’t until I tried to stand up from a half kneeling position and didn’t budge that I thought something serious was going on. “I’m going to die today” I thought as I pulled myself up onto the couch and used all my strength to rock forward to a standing position. I called my brother to come watch his niece while I took myself to urgent care. They told me to go to the ER. After parking in the lot and pulling myself out of the car, my legs started buckling as I approached the entrance to the ER. I had to brace myself against the building so as not to fall. They admitted me immediately and I spent the next two weeks in the hospital. However, it wasn’t until six months later after multiple MRIs, ultrasounds, CAT scans, blood tests, and spinal taps that I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
The six months between being discharged from the hospital and finally receiving a diagnosis was very difficult. A few days after coming home I fell while holding my daughter and struggled to get myself up to put her in her crib. I also lost my balance and dropped her twice during that period. I fell while opening the fridge. I fell while walking down stairs. I fell for no apparent reason at all. In the moment all these experiences felt devastating. They cast doubt on my ability to be the husband, father, and person I had seen myself as. Each one of these falls came as a surprise. Getting MS came as a surprise. But the biggest surprise yet has been the power of my mind to turn events that feel like devastating blows to my sense of identity into motivation to push beyond what I thought was possible.
I couldn’t have discovered this internal fortitude without support from family, friends, and two MS4MS Ambassadors who I had never met but decided to reach out to on social media – Adam and Alyssa. When I was recovering from my first MS flare up I didn’t know anyone who had multiple sclerosis and I felt pretty isolated. Well-meaning friends and colleagues shared anecdotes about people they knew with MS, but none of their stories were all that encouraging. However, when I reached out to Adam and Alyssa they “got it.” Not only did they understand the emotions I was experiencing, but they also understood my desire to continue to be physically active in spite of my MS. They embodied the saying, “you can’t change what happened, but you get to choose what happens next.” As an MS4MS Ambassador my goal is to proactively raise awareness about multiple sclerosis, and be part of the community of support for others living with the disease.
Learn more about Thom’s journey with MS by listening to his interview on episode 61 of the Jason Khalipa podcast:
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