Drug Dependence and Multiple Sclerosis

The day they told me I had Multiple Sclerosis was perhaps one of the worst days I've ever had. Having a chronic autoimmune disease changed my life forever. Not only did I have to give up on a dream, but I also had to compromise with every aspect of life just to survive. Let's be honest, living with a disease that alters your capabilities will change your life forever.

One is the need to take so many pills and tablets. Day and night, in pain or not, I have to. The constant syringe being inserted each and every time, to draw blood, or inject the medicine that will stop me from relapsing—and in some moments, dying.

Having an autoimmune disease will cause the simplest of colds to become something more. A simple infection can kill you, because your immune system won't fight the virus, it will attack your body. In my case, it causes the myelin sheath of my neurons to die.

So I have to drink medicines all the time. I need their benefits even if I have to live with their side effects. To tolerate the side effects, I have to take another tablet or two.

In order to live, I must take all of it, even if it means I feel like dying whenever I do it.

Many people claim I depend on the drugs. It's true. Diet won't solve any of my problems. Pseudoscience never did, not the ceremonies where they killed a chicken, and made me carry a live bullet to scare off the demon in me. That later escalated to me being the demon, by the way. It's not demons or evilness, it is Multiple Sclerosis. I need the drugs for it.

Even when people likened me to a drug addict, I had to take a deep breath and just laugh at them. Laugh because they'll never know the difficulty of my life until they themselves experience it. Let's face it, most of them won't.

I don't love taking all of these pills, or being prodded by many needles. I love its benefits. I don't feel as crappy as I used to. I don't vomit that often, I have fewer tremors, I can walk a little. Though my balance is off, and my working capacity is less, I'm alive.

Sometimes, you just have to take what's there, or else you die from the consequences.

I loathe the side effects. The weight gain, water retention, the dizziness, there's so much more. However, the benefits outweigh the side effects. Can you really blame me for trying to live?

An invisible illness made me do what I had to do, not because I want to torture myself swallowing so many things at every hour of the day. I want to have a fair shot in life, and live to the best of my capabilities, which isn't that much. If taking those drugs is my only way to live, even if you call me a drug addict for depending on it, I still will.

I don't want to be that girl who reaches her dreams, and dies shortly after. Must I die for the sake of achieving my goals? If it's short-lived, then everything I've done is a waste. Maybe that's the reason why I try to live long and lightly. That is the only dream that I can do and achieve.

One of the reasons I chose this life, to live, and continue to breathe despite the difficulties, is because I don't know what happens when I die. Where do I go? Is there an afterlife? Reincarnation? Do heaven and hell exist? Or is it like a permanent sleep?

I don't want to know the answer so soon. So here I am, battling every day, armed with the drugs people hate. To live, to love, and take whatever freedom I can still reach.