News, info and tips for living with multiple sclerosis
I slept through the night last night. Recently, I’ve managed to do that on most nights. No 4 a.m. bathroom trips for me! That’s a big deal. There was a time when I’d get up two or even three times during the night for a bladder run. Sleeping seven or eight hours straight is huge. I’ve been troubled by bladder frequency and urgency for many years during the four decades…Continue Reading
I’m drinking again, more than I have in years. It’s not the hard stuff, though; not even beer or wine. It’s just plain water. That may sound crazy for someone like me who has bladder problems due to multiple sclerosis. For many of us with MS, we think that water is something to avoid — mostly so we can reduce those gotta-go, gotta-go moments that have us sprinting for a…Continue Reading
I’m back in Maryland. After two days — 16 hours of it spent on the road — and 1,104 miles, not a single accident. My bladder control meds must’ve worked. The semiannual trip my wife and I take between Florida’s southwest coast and the suburbs of Washington, D.C. is never easy, particularly because we travel with a cat and a dog. Getting in and out of hotels with two pets,…Continue Reading
I thought I finally had this bladder thing licked. After years of urinary urgency and frequency, I’d been doing much better. I was sleeping at least seven hours a night without having to go to the bathroom, and bathroom trips were less frequent in the daytime, too. When traveling by car, the once common question “How long to the next rest area?” became less of a concern. During our annual…Continue Reading
I’ve had pee problems for as long as I’ve had multiple sclerosis. Many folks with MS have these issues, including urinary urgency, frequency, or both, bladders that don’t empty completely, or streams that don’t start when you need to go. There are medications to treat these problems. The best known is probably Ditropan (oxybutynin), which has been around for quite a while. I’ve been taking the generic oxybutynin once a…Continue Reading
My wife and I joined our son and his family on a tour of a Southwest Florida nature preserve a couple of weeks ago. It required riding on an old school bus turned swamp buggy for a little over an hour and a half. There were plenty of gators, wild hogs, egrets, and storks in the swamp — but no restrooms. So, the bumpy buggy ride really put my bladder…Continue Reading