Nerve 'recovery'.

As one would presume and hope, the nerves do recover after initial damage, well kind of. In the initial stages of the disease, the damage can be repaired to a near 100% state. Unfortunately, the reality is that once a nerve is damage, under the current understanding and treatments, it never recovers completely again. Hope you've already had the kettle boiling as here we go again!

I will try to explain my makeshift graph below, after the first 'attack' the nerve may be repaired but to about 98%, so an MSers will look 'better' and perhaps feel 'better' too, but as the disease activity continues, the symptoms will remain and almost stagnate to a certain degree. Over time, the repair work will decline in terms of productivity, I like to see it a bit like something like the Atkins diet and many others which are offered to those seeking weight loss, after going through a repetitive  cycle of improvement then a relapse ( back to step 1) psychologically we'd easily give up. The human body kind of does the same, the repair will only ever be done to a certain extent till the more secondary stages of the disease will take over ( secondary progressive multiple sclerosis) which as stated - a very long time ago I know- stereo typically takes the body and its' functions downhill! And with this there are currently no treatments available other than one's that offer 'relief' of symptoms that an MSer may be finding difficult to cope with.

The bars showing an estimate of the recovery after each relapse ( numbered)

I think the generals of MS have been discussed, if anything is misunderstood so far or even in the future, please leave a comment or leave a message. Hopefully We will now be jumping in the deep end with the symptoms, I suggest you keep the kettle, mugs and tea/ coffee nearby for next week! And packet of biscuits! See you then!