I feel overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed by Mom’s MS.  Overwhelmed by my thoughts about Mom’s MS.  Overwhelmed with my inability to focus on one particular thought and come up with a way to fix it.  So I think I am going to rattle.  Rattle my thoughts off and see if I can come to some sort of plan for myself.  A plan to mentally deal with this because it’s becoming a lot. 

I wish there were a more direct path with solutions to fighting MS.  I feel like everyone has tried something different.  You could try this but this worked for me.  Maybe you should try this.  Lately Dad is talking a lot about considering stem cell research for Mom.  He is researching it, talking to people about it but Mom doesn’t want to talk about it.  I understand both points of view.  But I think we will try anything because we all feel helpless.  I feel helpless as I live my life and watch Mom get worse.  I think the MS is not only impacting her physically but it’s changing who she is, how she sees the world, how she lives her life.  It’s changing all of our lives.  It is putting an added stress on our family and on each of us.  What is the best treatment, how do we continue living our daily lives trying to keep them as normal as possible, how do we encourage her, how do we live with a disease where we take 1 step forward as a family and shortly after are forced 2 steps back.  And we continue this dance as we continue our lives. 

I guess I need need to start taking things day by day.  Everyone says to just live life day by day, take it one day at a time, and I agree with them but I never believe it in my heart.  That’s where the life of a planner comes into play.  I like plans.  I like to make them.  I struggle with taking things one day at a time.  But what if I didn’t.  What if I could just not think too far into the future but just into my day’s future.  What if Mom’s good days and bad days were just that…a good day was reason to smile and a bad day was not a reason to panic that things are getting worse.  They were simply just a good day and a bad day.  Because I tend to not enjoy the good days as much as I wish I could could because I am focused on the bad day that recently passed or worried for the next bad day to come.   

So how do I do it? How do I train myself to take things one day at a time? To not jump to the worst conclusion in a bad moment and to celebrate the good moments more.