Muddling Through MS

Those with MS and the people whose lives they touch will find this book helpful in understanding the wide ranging affects with a firsthand look at what it is like to live day after day, year after year with the disease. Written by a woman who is still walking after more than 40 years, the author paints a full and encouraging picture of how it is possible to have a satisfying life despite illness. Kathleen Scully Aquilino experienced the first symptom while in college but was not officially diagnosed until she was 44. Through the growing number of ailments and afflictions her mysterious disease brought, she kept going. Working, Marrying. Making a home. Adopting and raising a daughter. The delay in diagnosis actually did a great deal to help her stay positive and active. There are some lessons here in the power of expectations.

Those with MS and the people whose lives they touch will find this book helpful in understanding the wide ranging affects with a firsthand look at what it is like to live day after day, year after year with the disease. Written by a woman who is still walking after more than 40 years, the author paints a full and encouraging picture of how it is possible to have a satisfying life despite illness. Kathleen Scully Aquilino experienced the first symptom while in college but was not officially diagnosed until she was 44. Through the growing number of ailments and afflictions her mysterious disease brought, she kept going. Working, Marrying. Making a home. Adopting and raising a daughter. The delay in diagnosis actually did a great deal to help her stay positive and active. There are some lessons here in the power of expectations. Hers was the alternative path, relying only when necessary on physicians and pharmaceuticals, depending more on less traditional forms of treatment such as chiropractic, acupuncture, and breast milk. That’s right—milk from nursing mothers! She will share whatever knowledge she's accumulated during four decades of struggle. The decisions she has made may inform others who are faced with crushing losses, pernicious diseases, and disagreeable doctors.

Kathleen Aquilino has lived with Multiple Sclerosis since 1972 (not officially diagnosed until 1994). In Muddling Through MS, she chronicles the episodes that informed her of the disease and the alternative path she has chosen or, rather, was chosen for her by her sensitivities to pharmaceuticals. (She claims she is allergic to the world!) She and her husband Nick live in South Florida. This is her first book.