When I was a little girl, I had so many goals, ambitions and dreams. I had a checklist of everything I should achieve by a certain age. I dreamt that after school I would go to college, meet a nice boy, marry by 27, have bought a home and be pregnant or have my first baby by 28-ish. I guess a lot has changed since growing up in the ’90s and ’00s. After school I did go to college for four years to get my arts degree and, well, my goals changed.
Cut to the year 2025 and I'm single and not a parent. In fact up until December I was a woman in her 30s living in a house share. Not exactly the dream I had for myself back when I was a child. In my almost 10 years of being diagnosed with MS, it really has taught me so much; mainly about how life can change overnight, how you learn to adapt, and how resilient we all are.
When you live with a chronic illness your life changes and because MS is so unpredictable I have gotten used to preparing myself for every-case scenario. Your priorities change, well mine did. My goals when I was first diagnosed changed from focusing on my job to not walking funny anymore and getting better. My first major relapse was a movement disorder along with paralysis down my left arm and leg. My priorities have changed. This doesn't mean I don't have ambitions, goals or dreams. I do, but my health comes first.
The last few years have been very difficult, we all experienced Covid. I lost both of my parents before their time and I found myself living in shared accommodation renting a bedroom. We all know Ireland has a housing crisis but I never imagined that I would experience it first hand. I went to so many viewings but the prices of rent would leave you with little to nothing of your salary to survive on. It makes it impossible to save.
I'd look at everyone I knew my age buying houses with their partners and I'd get jealous because I wanted the same thing for myself. I was bursting myself working in a full-time retail job and making my MS worse. It's very difficult to get a mortgage as a single person with a disability unless you're on really good money. Trying to save on a basic wage while paying rent, bills and groceries is not something I could do, like thousands of others around the country.
My MS got bad so I decided to leave that job and get a part-time job instead. It wasn’t something that I wanted to do but I needed to. I can't lie, I did feel depressed comparing myself to everyone because I wanted the good salary with the house and mortgage. I felt like such a failure. Facing grief is inevitable when you have a chronic illness and I guess I had been grieving the Christina who didn’t have MS and who was capable of being energetic and working a full-time job. Instead, I had to accept my reality. Am I able to work? Yes, but part time work is better for me physically. It’s a bitter pill to swallow but my main MS symptoms - chronic nerve pain and fatigue - make full time work impossible for me. I prayed, cried and begged my parents for help. A few days later I got a call from a disability officer in my local council. They had a new build apartment for me if I wanted it. Of course I wanted it. I obviously said yes and by God it is more than I could ever dream of.
It's ground floor and fully accessible. All the doors are wheelchair accessible and the shower too. I even have a small garden. It's perfect and I am so grateful for it all. It takes a lot of stress off my shoulders. Now I don't have to worry about another mortgage refusal, paying massive rent for just a room, or potential future adaptations to suit my disability. Even though I was scared that people would judge me for getting social housing, I realised that I deserve this home. Obviously getting a home this way wasn’t what I had planned on in life, but neither was getting MS. So I’m going to take every little win that helps me and my future. I'm living in a lovely community with lovely neighbours, we even have a WhatsApp group and there's a real sense of genuine community. I'm so lucky and I guess now that I have a home, one of my dreams came true. Not in the way I envisioned but now I appreciate it even more.
Add new comment