Dianne is a retired police officer, and has had MS from early in her career. She managed to work her entire career until retirement age, and achieved the impressive milestone of 40 years of police service. She lived with MS for over 20 of those years, enduring misplaced offers of help, suggestions to quit and the occasional embarrassment of falling at work. She is determined to prove that people with MS can remain a productive member of society.
Dianne proudly breaks stereotypes and demonstrates that a disability does not equate to an inability, including once appearing in uniform as a police officer for an MS television commercial. She sums up by saying “I’ve got MS, but MS doesn’t have me”.
Having lost the majority of his vision, and requiring an electric wheelchair, Tristan is markedly disabled by any definition. Despite this he retains an optimism for life. Tristan says “there is no plan B. I used to have a really big life, but a lot friends have dropped off. Sometimes you don’t feel like getting out of bed, but you just have to. You just have to keep going otherwise you perish.”
As a testament to this fighting spirit, Tristan completed a degree in pharmacy after his original diagnosis, inspired by the dream of finding a cure for MS. He worked for some time in pharmacy, but had a big relapse of his MS and became unable to work due to his symptoms. Still, he maintains an active interest in future therapies to stop MS rather than treat the symptoms. As Multiple Sclerosis results from a loss Myelin (the insulating coating of the nerve cells), he is excited about some new therapies that may be able to replace this Myelin sheath; he describes a case of a woman who was confined to a wheelchair who was able to walk along a beach after receiving the novel treatment. He is disappointed that previous treatment he has received means that he is not eligible for this potential new therapy.
