Good early morning Michael, as I am here not awfully far from you in upper Michigan.  I hear you say that your faith has only increased during this affair with MS and I get pleasure in hearing that!  Although I don't have MS I do know that this life comes with various kinds of trials and pains and sufferings that make many of us look up for the greater hope and comfort.  Although I can't speak from your own perspective, I have concluded in my own life experience which has held enough pain that I would never want to repeat it, that all in all it's been worth it in order to have known the awesome Grace of God that meets us according to our need.  A favorite scripture of mine talks about Grace being given where it's needed, so that I have seen that the greatest pain and suffering or need has been met with the greatest measure of Grace from God.

In your own life I imagine you have come to possess some heart and wisdom that some do not know and cannot know because they have not known the pain and suffering you have.  So in this we can find compensation in God and some of those interior eternal treasures which my dear will surely always remain with you. 

I'm an Lpn working in Nursing homes for 11 years and have spent quite a bit of time with a handful of people with MS and did homecare once with a guy who had it.  I hear you describing the various odd ways people can respond to you, and I've seen this plenty from not just strangers but family members who seem to not know how to respond when they visit loved ones who perhaps are aged and dying or perhaps have become terminally ill and such scenarios.  It's been my goal to help these people to understand that their loved ones are no different than they ever were and that they can just relex and talk to them as normally as anyone. 

It's funny how family members will come in and treat their afflicted loved ones as if they are fragile china dolls, and we treat them just like we would anyone, and sometimes family members are shocked!  ha ha.  It's just a lack of understanding; people don't realize that people are just people no matter what is affecting us physically.

Anway Michael, I am sure that God wants to encourage you today, and it's always my heart to try to find just what his word is for you today.  I want to accept you into the human race today, knowing that you are one of us, contrary to the ideas some people have, and face "with you" the reality that this life is not a bed of roses and is not really said to be; atleast God didn't say it would be...but rather it's a time filled with many trials to face, many pains to endure, but ultimately there's reason for it all, and when we do finally see in full and know as we are known on the other side, we will rejoice in the purposes that we can't fully understand today.

If you like or need another person to talk to, feel free; I'm always around and as you can see am an endless talker but also do love to hear from the thoughts and hearts of others.  So write sometime; I will enjoy to hear what you have to say,  Sis Kim

The Big Wish

 I wish I could gently run my fingers through the stars,

and dance in circles in a refreshing, cleansing rain

To take all the people in the world that hurt,

and wash away all their tormenting pain

I wish I could fill the empty stomachs of the children,

and promise to give their little hearts hope

To give them my word of a bountiful future,

so their tiny spirits could cope

I wish I could stop the senseless slayings around the world,

the slow destruction of all mankind

To generate an everlasting peace,

that we soon must all find

I wish that I could take one minute,

to speak with Almighty God

And ask him the one big question "Why"

Only to find I will get my answer,

on the day that I must die!

By Nick Sym