Bucket list and feeling blessed

[miwealia]

My "Bucket List"

Jules A, your original post really got me thinking, so a couple nights ago I started listing all the things that I've been able to experience before I got MS, and by the time I was finished, almost four hours later, I had almost 5 single-spaced pages of things I've been able to experience! That blew me away and made me realize that in my short 55 years I've lived a very full life and have a LOT to be thankful for! Here's a "short" excerpt:

• Marry a woman who makes me feel blessed every day to be married to her (30 years this coming July!)
• Honeymoon in a cabin in the woods
• Have a son and a daughter who I’m extremely proud of
• Have a son-in-law that I love and fully trust with my daughter
• Live in Oregon, Florida, Indiana, and California
• Live in the Cayman Islands, Kenya, and nine different cities in China
• Visit Vietnam, India (Taj Mahal), Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Germany (when it was still West Germany!), Scotland (my clan's ancestral home in the Highlands), England, Jamaica, and Honduras
• Visit about 30 states in the U.S., including Alaska
• Visit the Mojave Desert, Mt. Rushmore, the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, the Badlands of South Dakota, Crater Lake, Lincoln and Washington monuments, Smoky Mountains
• Swim in the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, the Caribbean Sea, and the South China Sea
• Take a cruise on a cruise ship - to Alaska
• See Queen Elizabeth in person
• Earn a bachelor’s degree
• Earn a master’s degree – twice
• Conduct an elementary, junior high, high school and university choir
• Conduct a junior high and high school band
• Study a foreign language - Spanish, Mandarin, and Uyghur
• Learn how to play a musical instrument - guitar and dutar (Uyghur stringed instrument)
• Learn how to sing a song in a foreign language – Spanish, French, Chinese, Uyghur, Gaelic
• Learn how to shoot a pistol, rifle, and bow
• Earn a black belt in Taekwondo
• Play on a championship college soccer team
• Play the part of the sheriff in a community theater stage production of “Oklahoma”
• See a play on Broadway – "Fiddler On The Roof"
• Write a song for my daughter’s wedding and then sing it at her wedding
• Ride across America on a Greyhound bus – three times!
• Hike the Pacific Crest trail
• Climb Mt. Kenya
• Go canoeing on the Suwanee River in Florida
• Scuba dive to 200’ in the Caribbean Sea at the Cayman Trench
• Swim with stingrays at Stingray City in Grand Cayman
• Go camping in a tent
• Go frog gigging on the Sacramento River
• Build a treehouse from old timber
• Help tear down an old house then build a new one in the same location

Yes, I'm truly blessed! If someday this MS causes me to live with greatly clipped wings, it can NEVER take these - and many more - experiences away from me!

[Jules A]

Jules A, your original post really got me thinking, so a couple nights ago I started listing all the things that I've been able to experience before I got MS, and by the time I was finished, almost four hours later, I had almost 5 single-spaced pages of things I've been able to experience! That blew me away and made me realize that in my short 55 years I've lived a very full life and have a LOT to be thankful for!

Yes, I'm truly blessed! If someday this MS causes me to live with greatly clipped wings, it can NEVER take these - and many more - experiences away from me!

Wow! It sounds as if you have lived 3 lifetimes in 55 years, definitely a a LOT to be thankful for no matter how things end up.

I have always been grateful that I was diagnosed at 40yo because I was fairly stable both emotionally and financially but after reading your experiences I'm feeling like an underachiever, lol. You have inspired me to get cracking on my present bucket list.

Thank you for sharing your most impressive list of experiences!! I hope you are able to continue adding to it for many years to come.

[egadsdonna]

BL

It's been a blue Monday. Thank you for the postings regarding a Bucket List. I was finally diagnosed Oct 28 after a 17 year struggle for answers. After the first episode in 1995, I have done so much on my bucket list. I realize I have so much to be thankful for and I, now, plan to add to that list, too!

[just1yogi]

Sunday morning is the day I sit at my computer and get caught up on the most recent MS research. I always finish this update a little depressed, unhappy, and feeling a bit more hopeless.

BUT THIS MORNING I STUMBLED UPON THE "BUCKET LIST"!!!!!
I have laughed. I have cried. And I feel better than I have all week. Thank you all for a delightful morning. It did not occur to me until this morning that I should be happy about the many things that I have been able to do instead of lamenting the fact that I will never be able to many of them again. I actual have tears of joy as I think about my own list of precious memories that can never be taken away.

Before MS
1) Fly fishing with my son.
2) Rode trips on my motorcycle.
3) Rock climbing in Colorado.
4) Cross county skiing around the rim of Crater Lake in
Oregon
5) Working on a commercial fishing boat.

After MS
1) Meeting an amazing group of people who refuse to allow,
a "disability" limit what they can do. Oddly enough I feel a
bit of pride that I can be counted among such a group.

The Bucket List should be a permanent category at MS World.
A place where we could share victories past and present. And a place to share our plans for future adventures, those adventures that friends and family are always telling us we should not try.

[Echo2099]

WOW! Thanks everyone!

Sheesh! Did I ever need this post!

I've been feeling pretty down lately, and concentrating on the things I can't do anymore, rather than on the things I have done or still can do!

So many of you have mentioned things that I have done and forgotten about, and I appreciate all of you for helping me to remember.

When I was younger and healthier, I didn't have a bucket list, but I did have hopes and dreams. And most of them seemed pretty wild and crazy to me. I never imagined they would come true.

But seeing all your lists have helped me to remember how many things have come true in my life, even the totally wild and crazy ones.

You have helped me realize I need some new hopes and dreams for the rest of my life, especially some wild and crazy ones! Who knows, they may come true too!

Thanks everyone for the "leg up"! I really needed it!