S1E13 Preventing MS in family members with Lorna Wilson

Geoff Allix  00:00 

Support for the Living Well with MS podcast is provided by Overcoming MS, a global charity registered in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia, whose mission is to educate, support and empower people with MS in evidence-based lifestyle and medication choices that can improve their health outcomes. Please visit our website at www.overcomingms.org to learn more about our work and hear directly from people around the world, about the positive impact Overcoming MS has made on their lives. Now on to today’s episode. In today’s episode, we’re going to discuss family members of people with MS, how we can reduce the risks for these family members and tips for bringing up children to lead a healthy lifestyle. Today’s guest is Lorna Wilson, a mother of three daughters who has made MS prevention a part of her family’s regimen. So Lorna, welcome to the OMS podcast and to start off with, could you tell us a bit about yourself, your experience with MS and a bit about your family? 

  

Lorna Wilson  01:06 

Okay, well, I’m Lorna Wilson, I was diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS. I’ve been married to my husband, Jonathan 25 years and we have three daughters, one of whom is a young adult. I’ve recently established an OMS circle here in the West Midlands, and I would encourage listeners to visit the website and find their nearest OMS circle if they’re interested in it. Prior to diagnosis, I had our children on vitamin D protocol as I have relatives with MS and we have a strong family history of autoimmune conditions. You know, unfortunately, after four or five years of supplementation, I did what I think many mothers do when life gets busy or tough. I ensured my kids had strong vitamin D levels, and I neglected my own. And you know, I’ve been really transparent with this with my children. And I’ve shared my regret in doing so, in part because I want them to learn the import of preventative measures. And I want them to value their own well being and health as women when they’re older. I’ve also learned from it, so I build this into our family’s meal routines. And as I have family members with MS, I wasn’t particularly surprised at my diagnosis. I had two distinct episodes of optic neuritis in the past, and I had been under considerable stress for three years before any reoccurrence of activity. But I displayed all the MS-typical activities: the MS hug, tingling, spasms, etc. By the time I saw my neurologist or national health system, for which I’m very grateful, I wasn’t experiencing any symptoms or weakness. It was only upon exam that I realized I had weakness on my left side, but it didn’t come as a total shock to me. 

  

Geoff Allix  03:12 

What I wanted to say about MS of family members, is that research has found that family members are 20 to 40 times more likely to have MS. So that’s direct family members (children, siblings, etc.). But we should consider that that only raises their risk level to a few percent. So in this sort of region 2/3/4 percent chance. So I think it’s important to consider that it isn’t likely that they will get MS and certainly when we’re talking to children, I say to my children, the chances are that you won’t have MS. Yes, you’re more likely than the general population, the general population are very, very unlikely and you’re still very unlikely. So in the region of 95/96/97 percent chance of you not having MS. So it’s not, by any means, a certainty. It’s very unlikely. And what we want to talk about here, is what we can do to reduce that risk even further for our children because obviously they’re our next of kin. So what I wanted to ask now, is how did you break the news of your diagnosis to your children? 

  

Lorna Wilson  04:24 

Okay, so my children are older, and they were aware that I was having MS-like activity. So, I did let them know that I was seeing a neurologist. We have family members with MS, o they weren’t totally ignorant about what might be happening. They could see some of the activity and I was just very open with it. I went to the neurologists and they knew that I was investigating that. In terms of how I shared my diagnosis, I took time to process it myself, even though it wasn’t a total shock, I didn’t go home and tell them right away. Because I had to process that. I got in my car and I cried, and I wasn’t happy. Nobody gets an MS diagnosis and says ‘Oh, yippee!’ right? But a couple of days later, I just waited until my husband gets back home, he was away, and we just shared my diagnosis in a very open and relaxed manner. Family meetings aren’t unusual for us, around the dinner table, or talking, hanging out isn’t unusual for us, so that was a natural venue. And I guess, you know, having grown up with a father, who was chronically unwell all my life, my perspective of MS was perhaps different to some people initially. So, my perspective was, it was integral from the very beginning of this process, and I viewed MS as part of my life and an element of my health that I needed to engage with and manage, rather than react to or fight. Because I think that’s really an exhausting idea for what is a lifelong condition, at least at this point, it’s lifelong. So yeah, I kind of entered with that perspective, and told them my diagnosis, we left room for comments and questions. And I shared that we were going to look at lifestyle and medical approaches, in line with my neurologist, to lessen the impact of MS on me. But I also said, you know, from the very beginning, I said to them, I want to explore the way we can limit the impact potentially of this for you, and we had that conversation about ‘I have MS. It doesn’t mean you’re going to get MS. But let’s look at what we can start doing now to give you a healthier future, really, to give you the power to limit this potential.’ And I guess my kids were already aware of this, because they were already taking vitamin D. We already had them on the vitamin D protocol. Even though I wasn’t particularly concerned about developing MS myself at that point. So, it wasn’t a new concept to them that that you’re going to actively take measures to improve your overall wellbeing now and for your future self. I also let them know that I was very hopeful for my outcome, that we know others with MS who are living life very well. And then finally, you know, I would say we are followers of Christ, we have a very deep faith, and we know that God can heal. And we also pray as a family, particularly about the effects of MS. And, of course, we’re still asking God for healing as well. And I don’t think this is at odds with our overall approach. So we really included the whole of the family in a whole person model. We pursue health and wellbeing spiritually, which I think, meditation we can talk about later, has a lot of impact there and benefits. We opened up all the avenues of communication and we keep those communication avenues open today, right? We make regular space where they can talk and ask questions. Because I was only diagnosed, what, six months ago, probably? June 2019 I was diagnosed, a little bit more than six months, I guess. And we’re just very open and transparent with it. So we don’t have to have the questions come in only a question time, we seize those moments and there’s opportunities to try and pursue them. So, I guess as a couple of we’re very open to just talking about MS and wellbeing. And as a family, we’re very transparent in this as well. And finally, personally, as our family we we really see the humor of MS too, because sometimes there are some funny moments that arise from it. And we’re able to engage with that and laugh at that and take it on as part of who I am and who we are as a family. 

 
 Geoff Allix  09:54 

And do your children follow all of the OMS protocols or somewhat adapted? 

  

Lorna Wilson  10:02 

No, it’s adapted. And I think that’s right, for our family. I think it’s really important to remember my children don’t have MS. I have MS, but they don’t. So we follow different pillars. Do you want me to go through them individually or as a whole? 

 Geoff Allix  10:21 

We can go through them. I mean, I can tell you about my experience as well. I have two teenage children (a 15 year old boy and a 13 year old girl) and they’re slightly different, the two of them actually, as well. So, in terms of diet, the way my children are, is they have less processed food, we try and avoid too much processed food, and they don’t have red meat. They’re largely following OMS, but they do also have chicken breasts. So they’ll have a low saturated fat, low processed food diet, essentially. And that’s the way we’ve done it. One of the things was the swank study that OMS was based upon. He had 3,500 people in his study. And he put all the family members on the same diet of low saturated fat, and not a single child got MS. So statistically, I think out of 3,500 people, none of them having MS was statistically significant. Actually, neither of them have dairy. They don’t have dairy, the low saturated fat, but they do have poultry, they have fish with me as well. So they have a sort of modified version. Is that similar to you? 

  

Lorna Wilson  11:51 

I think we’re probably following it a little bit more closely. Just because, one, we’re a family foodies. We didn’t really have a lot of processed foods before my diagnosis. I’ve always enjoyed cooking, and my children enjoy cooking. But we have changed our diet, because for my whole family perspective, it’s just easier to cook one meal, right? So, our kids have a low fat, OMS-friendly diet with little processed food. They had a low fat, little processed food diet before that wasn’t OMS compliant. Prior to my diagnosis, eggs and dairy were featured heavily in our diet. And they do so less now. Now, I don’t have eggs, I have egg whites, and I have plant-based milk. But my children still have eggs and they occasionally still have dairy, we use mostly plant-based milks. But you know, they don’t have MS, so if they want to have treats or have milk, I’m not going to create a barrier that does not need to be there. They’re equipped with the knowledge and they have a healthy diet, they have a heart smart, OMS friendly diet. So, I’m happy with that. And I said earlier, I think it’s important to remember that my children don’t have MS and what I see ourselves doing as parents and as a family is I’m equipping them to take an active role in their health and wellbeing. That’s what I’m doing. And I’m not teaching them to fear MS is a foregone conclusion. I’m teaching them to eat well, to eat healthily, to enjoy life. And part of this is an OMS approach, but also, isn’t it just a really healthy approach too. We also talk about the impact on the environment from our OMS protocol or OMS lifestyle. And, you know, I think younger people are more aware and concerned about their impacts to the environment. And there’s a lot of really great environmental impacts of basically vegan plus fish. And they’re happy with that, they can celebrate that too. 

 
 Geoff Allix  14:30 

Yeah. One thing that doesn’t often get mentioned in OMS, but it is in the Overcoming MS book in the family section, is smoking. I think this is almost a given but we should point out that children smoking is a bad idea. Anyone smoking is a bad idea, but particularly that was one of the key things that came out. So presumably, you’ve encouraged your children not smoke. I kind of take this as a given but we should mention it.  

  

Lorna Wilson  15:05 

I have. I’m older, you know, I’m approaching 50 and my children have grown up with a different perspective to smoking than I did. And that was central before any thought of MS ever came into our our family history even. However, what I will say is I’ve made them more aware of the association. They knew about the health risks associated with smoking. And I’m happy to say that neither seem drawn toward it, nor their peer group. I think smoking, at least in the UK, has almost a generational gap now. You don’t see a lot of younger people smoking. I will go on to say that I’ve had those same conversations about vaping. Because I think vaping is new. And really, I don’t think we know long term effects of that yet. So, we’ve had conversations about what if we don’t know if vaping is safe and I think you should consider not engaging in that. I have 13,15,21 (the age of our daughters), none of them seem particularly drawn toward that as an activity. 

  

Geoff Allix  16:28 

I’m the same. I think, a way that I put it is we just don’t know. And also if you’re looking at food, you can be a very unhealthy vegan. You can get heavily processed food now in the supermarkets – because there’s a lot more vegans and there is a lot more food for vegans – but some of those are heavily processed foods. And so in the way that I would sort of discourage them from, you know, unless it’s sort of emergency food, then grab something to eat. But planning to eat a whole food diet is a good thing. And equally, if you’re not going to smoke, well, vaping is basically going through something which was once natural (tobacco leaves) is unhealthy, but then taking that and heavily processing it, to try and remove the toxins from it. It’s then still heavily processed. So we just don’t know what it’s going to do. I would not be surprised if in 20 years time you find out that there’s a terrible thing with vaping and they just didn’t know. 

 

Lorna Wilson  17:30 

Yeah, totally. And we started having those conversations before recent news reports coming out of the US about respiratory syndromes associated with vaping. Those are coming out now. I don’t want to go off into a tangent of vaping. But I think, because we are proactive, parents who seek to embed life skills, and I think OMS, low fat, whole food eating is a life skill. We haven’t just left it at smoking, we extended that and said, ‘well, I think there are lessons to be learned here for vaping and we would prefer for you not to engage in it.’ And we’re equipping them for that and I think it will stick. I will also say that – and I didn’t do this when my children were younger, because I think there are appropriate levels that you share information with children – we’re very transparent, open family. But what I share with my then eight year old would be different to what I shared my 15 year old, what I share with my 21 year old is different to what I share with my 13 year old, on certain levels. So, when I was younger, before I was married, I did smoke and I think it was pretty common. We all smoked at the time. And when I knew that we wanted to start trying for a family, I quit because I knew that that was not recommended. And even before my MS diagnosis, and I have only recently become aware, I thought it was pretty well informed pre-diagnosis because we have friends and family with MS. I was only made aware of that correlation when I went on an OMS retreat and actually when I spoke to my friends and family stateside who have MS, they weren’t particularly aware of that correlation either. So I think it’s great that OMS has highlighted that. But I had already shared with my children my regret at smoking when I was younger. And I guess, you know, I just I think it’s important to empower your children through your knowledge and through your skill. But also, I want our children to be able to learn from my mistakes, I don’t want them to make those same mistakes. And so at an appropriate age, and in an appropriate way, I shared my regret of having done that. And now, it may or may not have contributed to my MS. I don’t take it as a burden. But I certainly have highlighted the association with them. 

 
 

Geoff Allix  20:28 

To go through the other pillars, then. What about exercise? 

 
 Lorna Wilson  20:32 

Yeah, so I’m getting more active. I used to be more active, but no, I’m getting more active again. And we certainly always encouraged our children to be active. So, I think exercise is an important element and I think it’s an element that you can make it really fun. So, you know, our younger two daughters used to swim competitively three times a week when we lived in the Middle East, which is great now I’m like, wow, they were out in the sunshine, they were moving, that’s awesome. I encourage them, my 15 year old, I’m sure you’re aware GCSEs – which our national exams here in the United Kingdom, for listeners outside of Britain – can be all consuming. And so her engagement in sports has lessened a bit. But I’ve encouraged them all to keep going in sport or to take it back up. And as a family, we’re active as well. So even though I’m not super sporty, it’s not unusual for our family, maybe to run a 5K. I might not run the whole way but my husband certainly can with my children. And we regularly go out and walk in the countryside for a couple hours. It’s not uncommon. We have a dog and we live in a beautiful part of the world. So, why not? So yeah, my children engage in activity and we view it as just a healthy thing to do both for just emotional wellbeing – it’s good to get out and get your spirits moving – and health. 

  

Geoff Allix  22:17 

The most problematic one, on a personal level, and I think probably for most people would be encouraging children to do some form of mindfulness. I personally think it would be good for them anyway, because I think there’s a whole load of hormones going on with teenage children, which I understand with my son, because I went through it. With my daughter, I had no understanding because I went to an all boys school had a brother, I had no experience of what girls were until I was at school. So but there’s obviously hormones going left, right and centre. So, I think that just generally would be quite good for them to do mindfulness. But I found that one a very difficult one. Do you worry about that? Do you try and encourage them to do any sort of mindful practices? 

  

Lorna Wilson  23:14 

Yes, our family does do mindfulness and meditation together. And it wasn’t a totally new concept to us before my diagnosis. But we’ve certainly engaged with it more. We already had Headspace and we’d already done mindfulness with our children when they were younger. I have a background in special educational needs and so I would incorporate that in often when working with children. Just because it’s a good life skill, and it’s a good stress management skill. And it’s a good physiological calm down when a child on the spectrum is melting down. And so, our family already had a basis in mindfulness and meditation, but we’re encouraging them to do it more. And so, it’s not unusual in our family, sometimes a family life people are just keyed up as a group, and I’ll just say, ‘hey, let’s take 10 minutes and do a family meditation.’ And I put on a guided meditation, and we all do it. We participated as a family and I’ve said them, this could be a really good life skill for you. My kids are kind of science geeks. It just so happened when I came home from the OMS retreat, one of my daughters, my 15 year old, subscribes to a journal called Scientific American. And she came, very excited, and started saying to me, ‘Oh, I’ve been reading about meditation’ – I’m probably going to get this term wrong because they do not get the love of science from me – ‘did you know that you can actually grow your nerve ends through meditation? Did you know that it actually elongates’, and started telling me all this great stuff, some of which I’ve learned at the OMS retreat, and I was coming to him excitedly to tell her, but she beat me to the punch. So, yeah, we do a whole family meditation, some of my family are more apt to explore meditation than others. My eldest daughter, she’ll do it at a point in need, like, if she’s feeling stressed, she will then use some of the techniques we’ve given her. Whereas my younger two, particularly my 15 year old, are more apt to hone in earlier to the need to meditate. And perhaps it’s because we started it when they were younger, I don’t know. But it is something that we certainly do. And it’s something that we seek to develop as a family. In fact, I’ve just talked to all three of my children who have happily agreed, I didn’t have to twist any arms, about going on an eight week mindfulness course, where we meet once a week. There was a course designed just for teens in a nearby city, and there was a course kind of designed for adults in our town. And I contacted that course coordinator and said, ‘listen, I’ve got 13 and 15 year olds, is suitable to come along?’ Because I just don’t want to drive more than I need to. We’re a very active family. And we have a lot of different commitments, individually and as a family. And so that meditation coach agreed to take us on as a family, he’s had it done in the past. And we look forward to doing that. But we can’t do it until next year, because we’re traveling once a month until January. 

 
 Geoff Allix  27:16 

Okay. And just for some tips for other people: teenagers – I’m going through this – because I think they are moving from being children to being adults, and they want to be independent, they want to do their own thing, and not necessarily do what they’re told the whole time. It’s quite straightforward when they’re younger, because they do what they’re told. But then as they move through those sort of teenage years, adolescent years, what are some tips you’d have to encourage adolescent children to make the right lifestyle choices? 

  

Lorna Wilson  28:01 

Okay. Well, I can only speak to our experience and I think it depends on the family, but because transparency and communication are one of the bedrocks of our family before I ever had any indicators of MS. So we already had a solid communication platform as a foundation, and we already had good relationships and mutual respect. So part of that was sharing my diagnosis and why it was important to me, and part of that was sharing why it was important to me to equip them with the best skills that I could. And part of it is about engaging them with it. All my children cook, and they all cook well, but I have one daughter, who just really loves to cook, which is a great blessing for me because I work as well. And it’s really nice to be able to come home and know someone else sometimes is going to cook a really nice meal. In fact, there is an OMS recipe that we submitted on the website for a vegan stuffed lentil cabbage. She did that, that picture she did. So, one of the things is we let them engage where they want and where they’re talented, and we really grow those. We make it fun. Now that we’re adapting a lot of our other dishes that we love to the OMS lifestyle and making up new recipes and adapting others. We kind of make a family game of it almost where you know, one night we might come out – there’s a show here, I don’t know if they have it in other parts of the world called, I think it’s called Masterchef and they always have a very sedate voice on – so sometimes we’ll come out with a new dish that I’ve made, or one of the girls have made, and we’ll say, ‘and tonight we are presenting it,’ you know, and we seek it out. And we vote on a family, you know, and I think it’s uncommon, we don’t like have a system of secret voting. But if we have a new OMS-friendly meal, if we like it, we remember it, and we say, ‘okay, we’re gonna make that one again.’ And if we don’t like it, we go, ‘ew, no, we’re not going to do that’, or ‘I don’t like this element of it, please take off the mushrooms’, or whatever. So that’s how we engage in there food wise. And I guess for food and the other pillars, for them, it’s more about creating an empowering life skill. That’s what I’m trying to pass on to them. And they’ve just received it as such. 

 
 Geoff Allix  30:57 

Okay, I think we’ve been through all of the OMS pillars, or the ones that would apply to children. And it sounds like you’ve got a really good handle on your children following most of the important steps for themselves. So how do you feel about the future, about their future? Are you optimistic that the parts of OMS that you’ve implemented will actually give them a good future? 

 
 Lorna Wilson  31:36 

Yeah, I am optimistic. I actually had this conversation with our girls earlier in the week, as well. So I asked them, ‘how does our lifestyle and what we’re doing make you feel?’ and because you know, I had a flare when we were traveling recently, and I needed assistance to the airport, and they’re still dealing with some of the effects of MS. And I check in on them on that and I check in on them on our lifestyle, too. And my 13-year-old said to me, ‘well, it makes me feel safe because I know I’m taking measures to prevent it. I’m taking measures to prevent me getting MS.’ That’s a total win for me. I don’t want my kids to grow up with fear. My 15-year-old at another conversation another time, said she’s ‘happy that I’m active and pursuing my health’. She basically said to me, ‘I’m really happy you’re doing this because I really hope you don’t end up in a wheelchair.’ And I really hope that too. The word she used to describe how she felt was ‘secure’ that our whole family was taking this approach and it makes her feel secure. My 13-year-old was talking about her feelings, I feel safe because I’m taking measures to help me ensure that I have a have a healthy life. Right? And my 15-year-old was saying I feel secure because you’re engaging in your health, and it’s creating a secure environment for our family. Those are two great effects that I gladly receive. Personally, for myself, I feel quite positive about my future. I have relapsing-remitting. I don’t have a high level of disability. My neurologist kind of laughed and said, ‘wow, for someone with MS, you have a really good brain.’ And so, I’m hopeful. My neurologist has recommended disease modifying drugs, which I don’t have a problem with. I’m waiting for the panel of our local health board to approve that decision. And OMS is not at odds with medication. So I just feel like I can fully engage with both those realms to ensure that I have the best future that I can have. Right? So from a personal perspective, I would say, since cutting out milk, which I really loved, and going over to the OMS protocol, my sugar cravings have really dropped and I feel very good. I feel great in myself. I really like eating the OMS way. I don’t think I would go back to meat. I think it would just not sit well with me at this point. I was raised with a father with chronic heart disease, amongst other conditions, I had a much more restrictive diet growing up. I was raised with an even more restrictive diet than OMS. It wasn’t a hard bridge to make. And, yeah, I’m enjoying it. 

  

Geoff Allix  35:13 

I think one of the things that I say to my children, is there’s a very low chance of them getting MS, even though they’re the child of someone with MS. Having said that, there is a quite high chance of them getting cancer, something like 50% chance of them getting cancer in their life. And actually, we have friends who have done modification or sort of dietary and interventions for cancer risk, because they were recommended – so someone who’s in remission from cancer – they were encouraged to have a Mediterranean diet, but without dairy, so they’ve cut out dairy, they’ve cut out red meat. And they’re encouraged to supplement vitamin D, which we haven’t mentioned, but supplementing vitamin D is another important one I’ll come back to in a second. And they were encouraged to do a very, very similar thing. It was really interesting actually, there’s huge amounts of similarities. And so I’m actually saying to my children, the chance of you getting MS is very low, the chance of you getting cancer and heart disease are much higher, and actually following the OMS protocols reduces your risk of getting cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and these things which are actually much more common. 

  

Lorna Wilson  36:39 

Yes, we’ve had that conversation as well, because we have a history of autoimmune, we have a history of MS, we have a history of breast cancer, close family member with bilateral breast cancer, five years apart. And now I have MS. So really, I haven’t identified all those conditions for my kids. But I have said actually, this is a healthy lifestyle, and one of the things that I think, is perhaps a bit of a shame when people are considering the OMS lifestyle for MS is we actually no longer have these conversations about heart disease. It’s a given, right? We no longer have these conversations about diabetes. I think for MS it will come to a point in understanding where it is accepted, and I would say it’s largely accepted in certainly the United States, that diet matters and that vitamin D matters. And I would love to go on and talk about vitamin D because we do have some experience with that, both medically and in terms of prevention before diagnosis. 

  

Geoff Allix  37:50 

So we hadn’t brought up vitamin D actually. So firstly, how important is it? I mean, I encourage my children to supplement vitamin D. And is that something that you encourage? 

  

Lorna Wilson  38:04 

Oh, yeah. My children were on vitamin D, I guess six or seven years before my diagnosis because I do have a family member who very much advocated that for me and our children after diagnosis. And I would say my first episode of optic neuritis was in the Middle East. I had two episodes in Middle East less than a year and a half apart. I wasn’t diagnosed with MS at that time. But the doctors, certainly the second time, were so intent on vitamin D, they tested our whole family. They supplemented our whole family. They gave my eldest daughter and myself vitamin D injections directly into our hip because we were very low. And they just drove that home, that it was an important thing to supplement, generally, they didn’t they didn’t say for MS, although I had that background, and they didn’t diagnose me with MS, but they said really we consider vitamin D an important aspect to overall health and most people are deficient. So, we had that knowledge already and my kids were already on vitamin D. One of the things that I found easier to supplement. My 13-year-old and my 15-year-old grew up with it, took it willingly and didn’t have a problem with it. I tried to introduce vitamin D to my 21-year-old when she was 16 or 15 and she was really not into it. She really fought me on that and I would say, she would take it sporadically, but fought me on it pretty much up until the point of my diagnosis. So I decided not to make an issue of it, I said to her, ‘this is better for your wellbeing and health, I can’t make you take this’, particularly as a young adult, I mean, when she was younger, she took it. And I didn’t want it to become a barrier, right? I didn’t want it to become the thing she didn’t want to do as a teen. So, we now use a mint flavoured spray. It’s affordable, they don’t have to take a pill, they can carry it in their bags, they can take it with a meal. And they like the taste. And I think that’s what made it for my 16-year-old is finding a method that was deliverable, accessible, and she liked. And I think her biggest shift with taking vitamin D and engaging in her health came after my diagnosis. And she was still a little bit, I think she didn’t want to engage with it. And so I sat her down separately from my other children. And I was able to share more deeply my concerns because actually, out of all my children, I’m most concerned for her, in terms of her background. So my eldest daughter, I was vitamin D deficient  when I carried her, she was born in the spring, she spent the first 11 years of her life in a far north region without sunlight, particularly, and in a cold environment in which she was always covered. She has other autoimmune issues that are identified and diagnosed, she had Epstein-Barr as a young adult, very pronounced. And so I said to her, ‘I have concerns, particularly for you and this is why I want you to supplement vitamin D and not just for MS.’  Then I gave her – she has a science background through university – the literature and I said, ‘I just want you to read on this. You’re grown, I can’t make you do this, but why would you not engage in it?’ And ever since my diagnosis and reading those studies, she’s been much more proactive in managing her own health, and she’s on board with vitamin D. And, and mainly with with the diet, although we’re going to Greece this month, and I can guarantee she’s going to have some lovely Greek yoghurt, and that’s okay, she doesn’t have MS. 

  

Geoff Allix  42:37 

Okay, so I think we’ve covered all the pillars now. So to wrap up, are there any tips or any anything that you haven’t brought up so far that you wanted to finish with? 

 
 Lorna Wilson  42:51 

Um, well, I think that I would say I don’t live in fear of my children getting MS. I don’t fear my own MS. But I do seek to manage it and limit it and engage with it and engage with my health, as a whole. And right now, our family is very, I guess, unified in our approach, and we’re all living together. Okay? So my young daughter’s returned from university, my young adult, and she probably won’t be with me next year even, right? So, I think that from a parent’s perspective, I’m doing the best thing I can do in laying a strong foundation of health and wellbeing for my children through staying active and fit, through eating in an overall healthy way, from being aware of the dangers of smoking and vaping (related to our health condition), in the same way as we talk about drugs, and we talk about other elements that aren’t particularly part of OMS, but they are part of health and wellbeing. We try to instill all those things in our children, that’s our job as parents, but when my now young adult, and my emerging young adults, it’ll be their responsibility to engage with their health, when they’re older and their wellbeing and it’s my job to equip them to do that. And so I think that’s the strength of a family-based approach to OMS. I think it can be empowering and it can alleviate fear. 

  

Geoff Allix  44:48 

Okay, thank you very much for that. And thank you for joining us for this episode of the OMS podcast. 

  

Lorna Wilson  44:55 

Thanks very much. 

 
 Geoff Allix  44:59 

With that I’d like to thank you all for listening to this episode of Living Well with MS. Remember that there is a wealth of information at overcomingms.org, including show notes, and an archive of all Living Well with MS episodes. Once again, that’s overcomingms.org. There you can also find OMS friendly recipes and exercise tips, connect with other OMSers in your local area through our OMS circles programme, and learn about the latest research going on in the MS world generally, and related to OMS specifically. I encourage you to register on the site and stay informed about the latest news and updates. I also encourage you to subscribe to this podcast, so you never miss an episode. And please feel free to share it with others who might find it of value. Let us know what you think about the podcast by leaving a review, and if you have ideas for future episodes, we’d love to hear from you. So please contact us via our website overcomingms.org. Thanks again for listening, and for joining me on this journey to Overcoming MS and Living Well with Multiple Sclerosis. I’m Geoff Allix and I’ll see you next time.