optic nerve. It may get worse as time goes on or better but since it can temporarily blind you or cause your vision to get fuzzy, it’s one of the main reasons why we’re going to have to take your driver’s license away.”
Padraig seizes up like he’s just been shocked. “Are ye serious?”
The doctor peers at him. “Don’t tell me you drove here.”
“I did,” I inform him. “He hasn’t driven since that last episode.”
“Well, sorry Padraig, but that’s the way it’s going to have to be. One of the hardest things for many patients is to learn how to rely on other people. You’re lucky you have a good support system.”
“But if I can’t drive…” he says, utterly fixated on it. I guess I can’t blame him. “That means everything. That takes away my freedom.”
The doctor gives him a placating smile. “It’s going to be a whole new world for you. It’s going to be hard. And, it’s possible that this is going to get worse.”
“So...” Padraig says, swallowing thickly. “Then if I can’t drive, then the game…”
“There will be no game for you. Not anymore. With vision problems and your balance issues, there’s no way you could do it.”
I’ve talked about this with Padraig a bit this last week. About his future in the game. I know that being diagnosed with MS means the end of his career, but I could tell a part of him was holding out hope for a miracle.
“What about every now and then?” Padraig asks eagerly, full of so much hope that it breaks my fucking heart. “What if on days I feel fine, because some days I do feel fine, what if I play then?”
“That would be up to your team to decide.” He pauses. “But I would advise against it. You need to be in optimal shape to play the game the way you do, and while easy consistent exercise is important in the treatment of MS, strenuous exercise will cause your body to heat up, and when you heat up, symptoms can get worse. At some point, you might need a wheelchair.”
While I had been doing my research—and knowing my aunt uses a walker on rough days—I knew that his mobility as he knows it would only slow down as he gets older. But Padraig hasn’t looked into his disease at all. Probably because he didn’t want to know the truth about what would happen to him.
But now he’s hearing it all and fighting against it.
“A fucking wheelchair?” he spits out, violently running his hand through his hair and tugging on it. “I don’t think so. That’s not going to be me. I’m only twenty-nine years old!”
“And it might not be you,” the doctor says patiently. “It might just be a cane on occasions. It might be a scooter or a rollator. A lot of patients never need any mobility aids, even two decades after their diagnosis. But in your case, you’re progressing faster, aggressively I would say, than I thought you would, and looking at those MRI scans, I’m starting to think the scarring is more substantial. From what we’ve talked about, too, I’m beginning to think you’ve had symptoms showing up for years, you just never got a diagnosis.”
“I just thought they were related to stress from playing the game,” he says quietly.
“And that’s common. It usually takes years before someone gets the correct diagnosis. I’m just glad we have one now. In a week we’ll do another scan and see if there are new lesions, and then we’ll figure out if you have the progressive type of the disease or not.”
Padraig just shakes his head and slumps over, putting his face in his hands.
The doctor looks at me. “Have you had any experience in dealing with someone with MS?”
I nod. “My aunt. I don’t see her often and I don’t know all her details but she’s had it for as long as I can remember.”
“Okay. I know you’re engaged to be married and that too is going to put a lot of stress on you, but right now I need you to understand that this is going to be a lot more difficult and a lot more intense than it is with your aunt. It will get very ugly before it gets better, and he’s going to need your help and support every single step of the way. I want you to be ready for that and for everything this disease is going to throw at him.”