Happy day! The verdict is in. Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is not caused by stress.
The NIH (National Institutes of Health) has been following two enormous groups of nurses over two massive spans of time, and they have found no link whatsoever between traumatic life events and the onset of multiple sclerosis.
Zero, nada.
I know I sound a bit overblown. But that doesn’t mean that I am exaggerating. I’m not even over-exaggerating (a distinction we often make in my larger-than-life family-of-origin.)
The two groups studied really were enormous: 121,700 nurses in Study One, and 16,671 nurses in Study 2.
The two time spans really were massive, maybe not massive in geologic time, but certainly massive in biologic time. The first group has been followed since 1976 (Number 1 song of ’75: Silly Love Songs by Paul McCartney and Wings.) The second group has been followed since 1989. (Number 1 song of ’89: Look Away, by Chicago. Was I asleep that year?)
The nurses in both enormous groups were asked to complete a questionairre about their personal history of stressful events. After they handed in their questionnaires, they went about their normal lives. A minority of the nurses who completed this questionnaire would later find that their normal lives would be disrupted by MS.
When investigators compared the answers from the group of nurses who were destined to develop MS with the answers from the nurses who were destined to remain healthy, they found no significant difference in self-reported levels of stress and/or stressful events.
I feel so vindicated.
There are so many subtle and not-so-subtle ways of blaming of victim. With my MS diagnosis came the injunction to avoid stress. I don’t necessarily think that was an entirely bad piece of advice, although, under the circumstances, it wasn’t particularly easy advice to follow. No one ever outright accussed me of creating my disease state because I’d been under too much stress. That was entirely my own inference. I’ve been blaming myself ever since.
Since my diagnosis, I have made it a priority to avoid stress. I’ve done plenty of yoga. Not enough meditation. When I’ve gotten pissed off, I have, on occasion, actually slowed down long enough to count to ten. I am, without a doubt, a happier, more even-tempered person than I was before my diagnosis. I might not have made such an effort had I not believed it would contribute to my health.
So I can’t say I have a quarrel with avoiding stress. I have a quarrel with the notion that a person with MS has a stronger obligation to finesse stress than a person without MS.
I would like to propose that there is something intrinsically wrong with the assumption that multiple sclerosis is a flawed emotional response, rather than a flawed immune response.
I’ve had MS since at least 1988 (Faith, George Michael). I am a study of one. I am lacking a control group. As both investigator and subject of my own disease, I have had a “massive” amount of time to explore the complex interplay between multipe sclerosis and stress. For what it’s worth, this is what I have observed. Stress is not the only response that can trigger MS symptoms. Any old emotion will do. Joy, for instance. I will never forget the excruciating pain that shot through my legs when I learned that a family friend would be lending us his apartment in Paris.
If I want to eliminate pain from my life, does that mean I ought to eliminate joy?
I don’t think so.
I’d like to propose a paradigm shift.
Let’s stop fussing over eliminating stress. Let’s focus, instead, on eliminating MS.