I remember it like it was yesterday. It was the spring of 2005, and I was laying in my hospital bed wondering if I was ever going to walk again. A month after my hospital discharge, I was devastated to find out at the follow-up appointment with my neurologist that I had a chronic illness, Multiple Sclerosis.
I would like to say that I handled it better, but I didn’t. I went into a deep depression. Fear and anxiety overwhelmed me to the point that I believed that my friends and family would treat me differently and that my dreams of a successful career were over. As a result, I started pushing people out of my life. I even told my wife that she was young and could go out and find someone else who wasn’t damaged, like me. At 28 years old your life should be just beginning. However, I feared that the hopes I had prior to my MS diagnosis were gone forever.
Over the next month, I stayed trapped in my shell of depression. Physical therapy helped me learn how to walk again, but I was still unsteady on my feet. I was afraid to go back to work and rarely went out in public. My wife and my family started to worry about me. They wondered how they could break through and find the person they knew and loved before the MS diagnosis. Watch the video below to see how Matt turned his situation positive.
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