The Road Less Taken

Since being diagnosed with MS, I have been intentional about what information I look for online regarding MS. There are two schools of thought when it comes to healing/managing MS. The first is the western medicine path that focuses on immune suppression therapy and mentions/suggests stress mitigation, exercise, and nutrition. The second is the other side that focuses on stress mitigation, exercise, and nutrition not suggesting immune suppression therapy.

I believe that it is wise to look at both areas weighing cost and benefit for both. In Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Descartes a 15th-century philosopher argues that all problems should be broken up into their simplest parts.

At some point in this MS journey, I had to make a choice. Once making a choice the information and research went down a specific path. The information that crosses my eyes and ears have the lens of the second path of mindful living, nutrition, and exercise. This choice is not easy, but it leads me down a path of unexpected opportunities.

I HAD TO MAKE A CHOICE

I started my MS journey with a mission and goal to heal MS. What I did not intend or expect was how my perspective on life would change. When we decide on a path whether to have kids or not, who we marry or not, or the million other choices that are presented to us daily, we often don't think about the changes it will make for ourselves at a deeper level. On every path that we choose, we meet new people, see new things or read new books. A path chosen does not just mean the larger picture of this or that, it is the little steps, people we meet, new insight or information, failures, tears, and sweat that define us to be the new us.

During my journey, I met a wonderful woman in her 80's that has had MS for the past 25 years. I asked her if she ever wondered "why her?" She proceeded to look me straight in the eye and said with a smile, "because I am strong enough."

I do not believe in coincidences and every moment of our lives is for a reason. I was diagnosed with MS for a reason; I choose my path to heal for a reason. This path lead me to make a difference in the lives of others, and I am grateful for this opportunity.

I DO NOT BELIEVE IN COINCIDENCES

Robert Frost said it best in his poem "The Road Not Taken":

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

I am confident about the choice I made no matter what. During this journey, I am becoming a better man, father, husband and that will make all the difference.