MS doesn’t define ME: The Biography of a Polymath

What happens when the life you planned disappears?

I was 23 years old and starting my dream career as a high school Physical Education teacher when I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.

I was devastated.

I felt like I had failed. I thought I had let my parents down. I thought the Patti I knew was going to disappear too.

For a long time, I believed MS had taken away my future and somehow taken away ME.

This book is about what happened after that.

The fear. The anger. The uncertainty. The detours. The times I moved forward and the times I went backward.

And eventually, the realization that changed everything for me:

My life was not over. It was different.

MS doesn’t define ME: The Biography of a Polymath is not about pretending everything is fine. It is about figuring out who you are when life changes the plan you thought you were going to follow.

Because losing the life I thought I was going to have did not mean I had lost ME.