**#765748** Material Things Don't Matter www.freewebs.com/mtdm/
My husband suffers from a condition known as Degenerative Disc Disease. This is a condition in which the discs in the back dry up and can no longer support the vertabrae like they once did. In 2000 my husband Anthony was diganoised with this condition and his physical health has went down hill from there. At first it limited his movement, then he got to where he couldn't lift anything at all. As time went on he got to where he begin to limp. Everyday became a struggle to deal with the pain. He tried pain management because he didn't want to be on a bunch medicine. So he went through injections, caudal epidurals, and physical therapy. None of these helped it seemed to make him worse, then after they done the injections he had to be rushed back to the hospital for four days. He was allergic to the medicine. When he returned to his family doctor they told him he would have to take medicine because nothing else was helping. Anthony has became much more limited in his physical well being, he has to fight everyday to be able to walk, he can't hardly go to church because he has trouble sitting for long periods of time. He can't go on vacation traveling is just to hard on his body so we do things close to home. You can see the pain on his face when he moves around. The doctors say that he will eventually end up in a wheel chair. It has been five years since he found out about his illness and he has to be admired because so much of his freedom has been taken away, he can hardly enjoy any activities with our teenage daughter, like swimming, bike riding, skating, and hiking. These are the things he once loved to do but now can't because of his disability. But I admire him everyday he gets up and starts his day no matter how bad he hurts. He goes numb in his arms and legs, he has pains that shoot all the ways from his shoulders down to his legs and tries to act like it doesn't bother him. Sometimes you see tears in those beautiful sky blue eyes, but he tries to act like he is okay so our daughter won't worry, he always worries about everybody else before himself. Many of our friends don't understand why he can't come visit them when I am at work and our daughter is at school. They don't realize he can no longer drive, but they don't even offer to go visit him. My number one pet peeve that I hope people will come to understand is don't go patting them on the back real hard and say what's up. Yes treat them as you would anytime but remember one hit on the back to Anthony and he feels like someone has hit him with a brick. When people shake his hand they shake real hard and jerk his shoulder oh how his face reveals the pain and people don't seem to notice. I guess until you live with the person and see that they struggle everyday and see they can't sleep at night because of the pain you don't know what they go through. But please don't pity them, they are to be admired, because he gets up everyday and starts anew even if he feels like it or not. He just wants to be treated normal just like before the illness claimed his body. He wants friends to come and visit and to call just like before. Don't ignore your friends if they become ill they need you more than ever before. If you can only give a call or email that is fine at least they know you are thinking about them. skymac