"Life is suffering." Gautama Siddharta (Buddha)

Okay, we all walk a similar path. I don't care how different we are.

We will age, get sick and die. Some of us will die violent deaths - car accidents, murders - while others will die quickly - massive heart attacks, aneurysms. It doesn't matter how many marathons you run, how many vitamins you take, how many visualizations you peform. A majority of us will simply suffer the simple indignities of aging, our bodies breaking down and eventual death. It is not a great plan, not even a good plan. But nobody asked us for input.

In first world countries like the U.S. we benefit from first class drugs and the ability to afford them and take them. Most people in the 3rd world will suffer without relief, sometimes not even the simple relief of an aspirin or morphine. Prescription drugs also can work against us, killing us before our time with their toxicity, or accidental overdose. It's a fine line we walk. A lot is out of our control. Okay. Most everything is.

M.S. is one of those illnesses that has no known cause and no cure. The drugs offered for M.S. cannot be proven to help. So when you dutifully take the latest drug, with the most years on the market, you will never know if it is helping you, hurting you or is simply a placebo.

Never know. If you have a violent relapse you don't know if the drug caused it, made it less severe or had no effect on it at all.

Our recent go around with M.S. is typical. Trigeminal neuralgia [excrutiating face pain due to the myelin disappearing from the nerve] outbreak. We try to chase the pain with the drugs we have but they're not working. The fear is that the patient will become tolerant to the drug and it loses its effectiveness. If that happens, what then? No known substitutes will work.

We go to Neurolgist #1. She is understanding and brilliant as most neurologists are. My husband asks for xanax. He knows now what works for his body. Adding xanax to his prescription cocktail calms him from head to toe, allows him to ride the wave of pain for as long as it lasts. She refuses. She won't prescribe xanax for anybody, not even her best friend who has M.S. She won't back down. She tells us "get it from somebody else". Later my husband and I confess to each other we both flashed on buying it black market in Chinatown. I would have. He said the price there would have stopped him.

We call neurologist #2 the next day: the pain is not being suppressed. We tell him what's happening, my husband wants to come in and see him. He can't eat, drink water to wash down his pills - it's day 3 and he's becoming incapacitated. The Dr. at first says: "Take him to the E.R." But what can they do? My husband asks to come in and see him. "No," the Dr. said. "Don't bring him in. I can't help him." But he did prescribe him the xanax. One small battle won. But those 4 words echo in our small room.

Creatures of habit, we'd all like to live forever. To feel no pain, only hope and courage. To have our bodies feel like they did when we were 25 and our minds that of a 55 year old: wiser, more temperate, less chaotic. When we are sick, it is a solitary journey. It doesn't matter how many friends you have or family members. The most they can do is bring you a glass of water or pat the pillows. Pain is solitary confinement. You can look through your eyes at the passing world, unacknowledged for your heroism in the face of agony.

"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars." Kahlil Gibran.