WHEN Holly White was diagnosed with MS two days before her 23rd birthday in August 2015, she "lost all my confidence".
The assistant chemist, from Edinburgh, said: "I didn't believe I would get a job in science as I no longer felt 'good enough' and in being so ill at the time and relying so heavily on my parents to help me with day to day tasks, I didn't think I'd ever have my independence back."
Less than two years later, however, Holly has bought a flat with her boyfriend and embarked on a career in science, working in an environmental lab in the capital where she analyses sea water samples.
Like many MS sufferers, she experienced her first symptoms of the disease long before it was actually diagnosed.
"In hindsight I now know my first big symptom was in 2012, when my left eye fogged over while I was working security at T in the Park," she said. "At the time I was diagnosed with optic neuritis, but there was no mention of MS."
However, it was in 2015 that Holly began experiencing more troubling symptoms with numbness and tingling in her face, arms and legs, which eventually spread to the rest of her body. Within a few months of visiting her GP she was diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS, and has been taking tysabri - an immunosuppressant drug which reduces MS flare-ups and slows the progression of the disease for the past 18 months.
Holly says the drug "saved" her after a particularly bad attack which left her bed-bound with labyrinthitis.
"My balance was gone and I couldn't see straight. It was like being on a boat in rough seas. All I think now is it could have gotten much worse, had things not happened when they did. I think of tysabri as a magic juice keeping me going."
Since being on the drug, which is administered monthly via an IV drip at hospital, Holly's brain scans show no progression of her MS.
However, like all MS patients, Holly knows there is ultimately no cure and no drugs which can reverse existing nerve damage.
She said: "I worry that one day MS will take my career, my home, my relationships or my freedom so for there to be any cure then this pressure could be lifted from my shoulders. As a scientist I understand and acknowledge the importance and significance of any breakthrough and how massive this would be, so hope that soon the researchers can find an answer and we can beat MS."
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