Brain Soup

I’ve been waiting to write about a book once I’m done with it, but it hit me this morning [yeah, my brain is slow like that!] that those moments of inspiration to write about what I’m reading don’t appear later.  So, here I am, 90% through “Awkward Bitch: My Life with MS” by Marlo Donato Parmelee, and I’m getting inspired to write something.    

My inner dictator is saying, “No, just finish the book, then you can write about it.”

I make up stupid rules for myself, follow them for a while, then realize later that there’s not much logic behind the rule other than, “What if I don’t like the book in the end, but I’ve already given it a rave review?  Or I don’t like it, have suffered through it, then the end redeems all that suffering?” 

So, here I am being a rebel and breaking my own strange rule.  It’s a good book so far.  There….okay, caveat in place….now I can write out the inspiration that was sparked from it.  [Jennie sticks her own tongue out at the reflection in the mirror and says, “So there.”]

This book is about the author's life with MS.  Hey, she said that in the title.  I’m observant like that.  This quirky, honest, humble autobiography is very thorough, taking you through each step of her journey through the maddening first years of having MS. 

Our author and her hubby started out in America as singers/songwriters, but decided to try living in the UK to make their dreams happen.  That’s where MS came steamrolling over her.

Reading about her experiences with socialized medicine there as compared to what happens here in the US is interesting.  There are a few advantages to it, but I’d take America’s current way of doing things over that.  I’m not here to write about this, though.  You can read the book and come to your own conclusions.

I do want to write about some other thoughts that came along, though.  As I research and read, it strikes me how much more the medical and science communities know about MS now than they did twenty years ago.  Yet, there’s still so much unknown about it.  As patients, we’d like to think there are experts who have all the answers.  If we could only stumble across them [yeah, probably literally, too], we’d suddenly be a break-through case of permanent reversal of the nastiness.  We’d scream it through all the media waves, “Hey, do this!  I’m cured!  Come try it!”

Admittedly, there’s quite a bit of that already.  Maybe we try it.  Then, when a relapse comes, we wonder if the next idea will work or we’re fooling ourselves.  Personally, I don’t like the term, “incurable.”  To me, “we’re still looking for a cure,” is more desirable and actually more accurate.  Yet, I want to be level-headed in what I try on my body, not rushing to the latest "fad cure.”

When I’m reading, my medical-science obsessed brain is constantly going down tangential, unconventional paths.  When there’s a yet-to-be-cured disease I know about, my thoughts go into treasure-hunt mode.  Thinking unconventionally is part of the adventure.  So, keep this in mind as you are reading this.  I’m not saying, “Hey, here’s a cure over here.”  I’m merely thinking aloud on a cyber page while dragging you along.

This book sparked the idea, but the author was writing about something else when my brain went frolicking on its treasure hunt.  She’d just gotten intravenous steroids to alleviate symptoms from a relapse, and she was feeling so much better.  Her hubby told her she should be resting, but she said she couldn’t because she was feeling “jumpy!” 

This statement has nothing to do with bipolar disorder, and I’m not saying the author has bipolar disorder.  However, the sparked thought is this:  I know several people with bipolar disorder.  One also has MS.  She is in her early 60s.  She has a very slow-moving, fairly mild version of MS.

I’ve wondered a lot about why my version of MS has been around so long yet seems so slow-moving and mild compared to the experiences of others.  Perhaps I have something else, but my regular doctors and I have no idea what that something else could possibly be.  MS is the only thing that makes sense. 

The light-bulb-over-my-head effect happened when I thought about how my mom seems to get “jumpy” when she’s in her manic stage.  She has bipolar disorder, or “manic depression,” as it was called when the doctor diagnosed her from afar.  She’d refused to go in to see him, but my descriptions and my Dad’s to him made him realize that was the problem.

"Plato" by Raphael

When I was first researching bipolar a couple decades ago, it was thought that it was a chemical imbalance in the brain.  MS is the body’s immune system attacking its own central nervous system, often including the brain.  The bipolar woman I know who also has MS is still going strong.  I don’t have bipolar, but my mom does.  Genetics do strange things.  You see where my treasure-hunting brain is going with this. 

I thought:  Is there a trick the chemical imbalance is doing in the brain of a bipolar patient that also combats MS more effectively than the chemical make-up in the brains of those without bipolar?  How many people out there with milder, slower MS also have bipolar?  Is their body trying to self-treat the MS by throwing chemicals into the brain that aren’t normally there?  Since they have milder MS, does that mean this chemical cocktail on the brain is working?

Then, I got to wondering if the old definition for bipolar is still accurate, and I found an article about “chemical imbalance,” written by Ronald Pies, M.D.  This is from the article: “But neuroscience research has moved beyond any simple notion of a ‘chemical imbalance’ as the cause of psychiatric illnesses. The most sophisticated, modern theories posit that psychiatric illness is caused by a complex, often cyclical interaction of genetics, biology, psychology, environment, and social factors.  Neuroscience has also moved beyond the notion that psychiatric medications work simply by ‘revving up’ or toning down a couple of brain chemicals. For example, we have evidence that several antidepressants foster the growth of connections between brain cells, and we believe this is related to the beneficial effects of these medications. Lithium—a naturally occurring element, not really a ‘drug’ -- may help in bipolar disorder by protecting damaged brain cells and promoting their ability to communicate with each other.” [For readability, I’ve removed footnote references.  Go to the article to learn his sources.]

Well, your brain likely leaped where mine did when I read that.  Would lithium or whatever is in antidepressants as the active ingredient help brain cells communicate enough that it can treat MS and other diseases targeting brain cells?  Are any of these elements/chemicals in MS disease-modifying drugs already?  That part I can look up.  The rest remain as hovering questions. 

So, anyway, it’s a good book so far.  I’ll likely write more on it later.  I’m not done pondering previous books, so will likely write more about them, too.  Lucky you for wandering into the Pub and deciding to stay for the meanderings of the MS mind.