Speaker 1: I was talking about this on the show last week.
Speaker 1: But me and my entire family, the Zamchuri Family, which
Speaker 1: is the little team name we came up for. I
Speaker 1: took part in the MS Walk Run role, which is
Speaker 1: it's kind of like there's many different steps you can do.
Speaker 1: You to a five K, ten K mini marathon, quarter marathon,
Speaker 1: whatever you want to call it, raising money and funds
Speaker 1: for MS research here in Australia. My sister Becky has MS,
Speaker 1: was only diagnosed very recently with in the last six months.
Speaker 2: Also pregnant. A lot going on.
Speaker 1: I just firstly wanted to say thank you to you
Speaker 1: girls end of the pickup listeners. We smashed our goal.
Speaker 1: We like tripled our goal of fundraising and racist under
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: Well, that's amazing.
Speaker 3: You guys should be so proud really honestly because what
Speaker 3: you're doing raising awareness, raising money. I know we're going
Speaker 3: to speak to Becky more about it, but it's yeah,
Speaker 3: you should be really proud, and I'm sure Becky feels
Speaker 3: a lot of love.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's I wanted to get Becky on to
Speaker 1: join us because here I am telling her story about
Speaker 1: it being diagnosed with MS, living with MS walking and
Speaker 1: they run and roll with MS.
Speaker 2: But I wanted to bring out of the show. So
Speaker 2: Becky for the first time pick up debut.
Speaker 4: Welcome show, Hi, Hi, Hello, Hello, how are you guys?
Speaker 2: I can't believe this is your debut. I think maybe
Speaker 2: because I know you. I feel like you've come on
Speaker 2: well literal family and you know. Yeah, Becky, you were
Speaker 2: diagnosed with MS. What was that like for you?
Speaker 5: And I say that because I think there's a lot
Speaker 5: of people that don't know much about it. But like,
Speaker 5: at the time, did you know something was quote unquote wrong?
Speaker 5: What led you to be diagnosed?
Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely, Like I had a three year battle just
Speaker 4: to get diagnosed. So by the time I got diagnosed,
Speaker 4: I think I was actually relieved that someone finally believed
Speaker 4: something was wrong. Initially I had It was around the
Speaker 4: COVID time I got COVID. I got a vaccine and
Speaker 4: then I just like causes some people with immune kind
Speaker 4: of responses to flare up, and I started losing my vision.
Speaker 4: I was at work and saw like we'd stars and
Speaker 4: I went to the neurologist. I had an MRI and
Speaker 4: he was like, look, you just have anxiety, like relaxed, dude,
Speaker 4: some mindfulness come back. So then me and my husband
Speaker 4: pretty much fought for like three years because I was
Speaker 4: having like severe migraines to the point of losing vision
Speaker 4: on the way home from work, like it got really
Speaker 4: bad fatigue, numbness and pins and needles down my arm.
Speaker 4: And then yeah, I pushed and pushed and pushed, and
Speaker 4: eventually they did a lumber punk show which actually came
Speaker 4: back negative, which is like one of the criteria to diagnose.
Speaker 4: But the main thing in the NAY found was I
Speaker 4: had progression of one lesion over a three year period,
Speaker 4: which is very minimal. I'm very lucky a brain. They
Speaker 4: were yes, a brain lesion, so I only have them
Speaker 4: in my brain, but I had had one more lesion
Speaker 4: in my brain. My neurologists was like, look, I think
Speaker 4: it's still anxiety, and I was like, look, I'm getting
Speaker 4: a second opinion. Mitch actually put me onto a really
Speaker 4: great neurologist who had me with an MS specialist the
Speaker 4: next day. Mitchell in his connections, I don't know where fun.
Speaker 2: Everything.
Speaker 1: Well, she kept saying, at the doctors are saying you
Speaker 1: don't have anything. So I called everyone I knew and
Speaker 1: we got her in and that's when she got a diagnosis.
Speaker 6: So this is my question, Becky, you would now have
Speaker 6: spoken to other people who have been diagnosed with MS.
Speaker 6: Is this something like is this experience of being told oh,
Speaker 6: you know, it's not this, or it could be this,
Speaker 6: or kind of it being downplayed? Is that a common
Speaker 6: experience or is that just something that was unique to you.
Speaker 4: Look, I think it's hard because unfortunately, it's such a
Speaker 4: weird disease that presents in so many different ways. Like
Speaker 4: I've met one hundred people with MS, and probably five
Speaker 4: people have the same symptoms, So I think it presents
Speaker 4: so differently. You can either have brain lesions, spine lesions
Speaker 4: both and it really it really depends then on what
Speaker 4: your symptoms are. But I mean, I spoke to a
Speaker 4: lady this morning, just randomly, and then she was telling
Speaker 4: me that like her thirteen year old niece or something
Speaker 4: that were investigating her for MS and she'd been gas
Speaker 4: lit and I told her it was, you know, migraines
Speaker 4: as well, and I was like, keep pushing, like, go
Speaker 4: see this specialist. You need to get to the bottom
Speaker 4: of it, because ultimately, starting any treatment early is the
Speaker 4: key to not well, hopefully if the treatment works for you,
Speaker 4: it's not progressing as sick as you.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, Becky. And I mean for anyone who doesn't
Speaker 6: know what MS looks like, and I think that that
Speaker 6: would be a great deal of people. What does that
Speaker 6: like for you if you were to say, if those
Speaker 6: symptoms were to progress, what does life look like without treatment?
Speaker 4: Well, I think it's really like for me personally, and
Speaker 4: I can only speak to me. Like my everyday symptoms
Speaker 4: is I have really bad static vision in my eyes,
Speaker 4: so when I'm in a room, everything white is static
Speaker 4: and everything black is static. I have problems like the
Speaker 4: lady next to me today at work is wearing a
Speaker 4: multi colored shirt and I can't look it up because
Speaker 4: I'm like, it's making me feel like I'm going to
Speaker 4: pass out, you know, like reading a book. I can't
Speaker 4: read a book because I can't see the letters they
Speaker 4: all move. But for other people, like I know a
Speaker 4: girl that woke up one day and couldn't move for legs.
Speaker 4: So I think the problem is that it's an invisible
Speaker 4: disease and that I can be feeling terrible but still
Speaker 4: turn up to family lunch and put a brave face
Speaker 4: on and smile, you know, whereas other people they can't
Speaker 4: even you know, they need a wheelchair or they need
Speaker 4: a cane to help them out. I just really want
Speaker 4: to spread awareness for it, and they're people out there
Speaker 4: that it is a bit too late and the medication
Speaker 4: doesn't work for them. Like so, I mean, the closer
Speaker 4: we get to research and money for a QR, and
Speaker 4: there's some amazing clinical trials going on at the moment,
Speaker 4: the better.
Speaker 2: Bye guy, Mitch.
Speaker 6: You should be so proud of yourself as well for
Speaker 6: raising awareness. I know how much this has affected you
Speaker 6: in your family, but you guys are the best.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's I mean, I've got a brain condition too,
Speaker 1: and I feel like Becky got MS, which is greater
Speaker 1: than my brain condition.
Speaker 2: I'm like, great, I just have to sit here. I
Speaker 2: just get headaches. And again I'm not even bringing attention
Speaker 2: to my own brain.
Speaker 5: Mitch's brain actually comes out the bottom of his We
Speaker 5: can talk about that.
Speaker 1: Updates my brain Becky's brains.
Speaker 6: All right, Well, look, speaking of brains, I have something
Speaker 6: that I need to admit after this.
Speaker 2: I forgot a really really really.
Speaker 6: Important event, a really important anniversary, and I feel horrible
Speaker 6: about it and I need you guys to make me
Speaker 6: feel little bit better.
Speaker 2: Okay, we can do that, no promise, it's easy. We'll try.
Speaker 2: We might double down.