I promised you a joke a day for the remaining days of August, so here’s one I wrote about Myasthenia Gravis.
An older man with Myasthenia Gravis was sitting in a chair. On his lap was his 5-year-old grandson, Jack. Jack looked up at his grandfather and said, “Pappy, why are your eyes half closed?” Jack had called his grandfather “Pappy” since the time he learned to talk. “My eyes are tired today,” his grandfather replied.
Jack was an inquisitive boy, so the questions continued. “Why does your voice sound funny, Pappy?”, the boy questioned his grandfather. “I guess my throat is tired today, too,” said his grandfather. Jack went on, “My Mom says you have OMG.” The grandfather chuckled and replied, “It’s MG. That stands for Myasthenia Gravis, but that’s a hard word to say, so we’ll just stick with MG. Yes, Jack, your Mom is right. I have MG.”
“What does MG mean?”, Jack asked. “Myasthenia Gravis means grave weakness,” his grandfather responded. “How can a grave be weak?”, Jack asked. His grandfather chuckled again and said, “No, grave in this case stands for severe, so when I have a bad day, I have severe weakness.”
“Are you having a bad day today, Pappy?”, the boy asked. “I guess I am, Jack,” his grandfather responded. Jack looked at his Pappy again and said, “When I’m having a bad day, I whistle. That makes me feel better.” Pappy responded, “Well, Jack, when I’m having a bad day, I can’t whistle.” To which Jack replied, “Then maybe you should learn.”
Okay, maybe it’s not the best joke, but it’s a cute story.
I’m attempting to send a couple of messages with this joke. The first is that Myasthenia Gravis may look different through someone else’s eyes; especially a child. They probably don’t understand what a person is going through with MG. They certainly don’t understand how symptoms can come and go so quickly. They also may not recognize when you’re having a good day or a bad day, but you do. You know when you’re having a bad day and hopefully you’ve learned to just take it easy on those days. If you’re having more bad days than good days, then maybe it’s time to see your doctor. If your medication is working like it should, bad days should be infrequent.
The other message I’m trying to send is Jack has learned that whistling is all he needs to get him through a bad day. What he’s really experiencing is the fact that his whistling takes his mind off whatever is making his day bad. It redirects him. It works to distract him.
While some of us are unable to whistle on bad days because the muscles in our mouth are being affected by MG, we could find other ways to get distracted. Maybe it’s reading a book, or watching tv, or telling a good joke.
Distraction takes our minds out of the present and that’s exactly what we need to do on bad days. If we spend too much time dwelling on how we feel or what we’re unable to do, our day is only going to get worse. Redirecting our thoughts to something else, even if it’s as mindless as watching tv, may help us take the focus off our troubles. A good distraction can work wonders.
Jack’s pretty smart for a 5-year-old. I think I’m going to go practice my whistling.