Whenever I am moved to comment about painful or negative subjects to do with MS I think twice about the wisdom of doing this. I know it can be upsetting for suffers and family, and in a way it is because of this that I am posting today. This is such a sensitive subject that I find it hard to talk about it face to face with friends and family; but talking to others can make a difference and this is why I am writing today.

A couple of years ago I sat and listened to my daughter telling me the most appalling decision she had made. She told me that if it came to the point when she could no longer have a meaningful life: go to work, have a boyfriend, drive, live on her own, have a social life she would not want to live anymore. She has made a living will, she had made a public and most rational statement on national television that if she loses her means of independence (social security payments) and self worth (she works as a disabled employment adviser) she will commit suicice.

We all know that one of the symptoms of MS can be 'depression', and most psychologists/psychiatrists would say that suicide happens as a result of it, but most pwMS are in a depressive situation and suffer from distress through constant grieving for losses of their quality of life rather than from a clinical depression. Although depression is part of my daughter's profile her decision to take the final step to end her life is not because of this but because for her there is no joy in living without involvement in the world outside her four walls.

Recently I have read a couple of stories about people who were at the end of their tolerance levels:

• The woman who wheeled herself for two hours on two occasions before finally achieving her goal of drowning herself.


• The elderly man who shot his MS wife and then himself.

There are obviously many reasons why people with MS symptoms might want to end their life, some like my daughter because she is a lively person who wants to be part of the world, some because of the pain, some because of the hopelessness of their situation, some because they have lost everything, some because people do not understand what MS does to them, some because of abject poverty. In short they do not like what they have become emotionally, physically or socially. 

It may be that in some cases pwMS are committing suicide because they are no longer able to think  rationally (they are not in possession of their faculties) but on the whole from my limited experience of this subject it would seem to me that most people who do commit suicide actually to it for very valid reasons.

As a mother I am appalled at the thought of losing my daughter whatever her condition but respect her right to choose. One doctor I read about gave 6 reasons why people commit suicide, the one that applies to my daughter and possibly to other people with MS who have contemplated it is number 5. In the meantime I will work tirelessly to find a solution to the conundrum that is MS, so that my daughter and other people like her do not have to take this final step. Although CCSVI is a real and important part of the solution I will not stop looking for other possibilities.