Science just pulled off a double miracle

Today’s post may mark a new era for me, and an end of an old one. I can’t say it will cure me of my mood swings or my bitchy phases, but I think I’ve found the keys to defeating my depressions because I’ve been given my hope back.

Earlier this month the news brought the announcements that 3D printing was able to make organs, cartilage, or even stem cells, and I started to feel a tingle of hope in my future. Last night researchers at Lund University announced that they could encourage the brain to build new nerves and cells without surgery.

You cannot fully appreciate this without understanding that my MS plaque scares are all in my head. I have holes in my brain that make me act weird randomly. Even as people showed me stories of potential MS cures, all those article made it clear there was no way to repair damaged or dead nerves. So no promise of a future cure could give me hope. But this does. If this were put into practice, it could patch the whole in my head, and I could be freed of my MS relapses.

That’s one thing I had to give up on after being diagnosed. I was told I wouldn’t live to see 55. I couldn’t hope to be an old lady. I couldn’t even pretend I had the potential for a long happy life like healthy people. I had a countdown clock put over my head, a definite date for when I would die, and it counted down faster and faster with every birthday. It was one of my two main sources of depression, and now, it looks like I might be able to drop-kick the clock and get back to the happy delusion that I can live to be 100, just like everyone else.

The other source of my depression is, I was born sterile. Even if I hadn’t transitioned, I’ve always had to come to terms with not being a parent. And yet, the years go by, and it still hurts me. My friends online celebrate having new kids, and without meaning to, they remind me of what I could never have. I couldn’t get pregnant, nor get someone pregnant. I could never know the joys or the stresses of raising my own kid. And the thing is, having MS and brain problems, I couldn’t adopt, or even be a foster parent. I’m not rich enough to pull a Michael Jackson and hire someone to have kids for me, and after 9 months of work, I don’t see any mother going, “Nah, I changed my mind…hey, Zoe, didn’t you want a kid?” For all intents and purposes, I was locked out of the mysterious and scary world of parenting. And unlike some folks who don’t want kids and find the little rugrats irritating, I still wanted the chance to have a kid and maybe do a better job of loving my kids than my parents did with me.

It certainly didn’t help that my little brother had kids, nor did it help that my dad gave me monthly reports that his parenting style is…toxic. The most recent report is, my brother is mad at my dad because he won’t hit his granddaughter over wetting her pants. They’re not my kids, so I can’t swoop in to rescue them, and with my brother considering me the whore of Satan, there’s no way I can tell him to treat his kids like the miracles they are. I can’t even parent vicariously through him, because dear lord, he’s just as mean as mom was, and he has about as much empathy for his kids. But he gets to be the parent, I only got to be the crazy sex-change aunt that nobody talks about in polite company.

BUT, if doctors can 3d print any organ to custom fit a patient without rejections, even stem cells, then they can print a uterus. I’d have to opt for a donated egg and test-tube fertilization. I’d have to be willing to accept a C-section birth because I’m not made to accommodate a normal delivery. But that’s one scar I’d be willing to take. It’s a fair exchange for what I’d get out of it.

I learned about the 3D printing early this month and got really excited, and I thought, “If they can do this before I’m 42, I could still raise a kid before MS erased my brains.” But now, that sword hanging over my head just got removed too. Women are having babies much later in life, and if I were cured of MS, I could raise my own kid without needing help for those fatigue attack days, or for the joints swelling or relapses. So even waiting until 48 for the technology to mature wouldn’t be a problem. I don’t need to rush, but when the technology is ready for human trials, I could have a kid. A miracle baby. A gift from God, and from science at the same time.

I got so excited last night, I went woozy and weepy. When that high started to wear off after dinner, I drew a sign to put on my desk. It says THE CURES ARE COMING! It doesn’t need to say anything else. It is now my inspiration, and it is my hope. It will serve as the life raft I cling to when depressions hit, and it will be my anchor when mood swings are tossing my brain about like a raft in a choppy sea.

I don’t know if y’all grasp how huge this is for me, but I gave up hope at a young age, and these things have haunted me for years. In ONE MONTH, science just came along and said, “But Zoe, maybe we can fix this stuff for you.” They gave me back my hope, y’all. I can be cured of MS. I can have the holes in my head repaired. And I can have a kid. No might, no maybe. I BELIEVE this can be reality very soon. I can have hope. And that one thing makes all the difference in the world.

I don’t know if this will completely end my angry “you people” rants or not, but I wanted to mark this occasion and make you a future deal. If it turns out I can be cured, and that I can have a kid, I will forfeit my rights to bitch about “you people.” (Not you people as in you personally, just you people in general.) Because if I can have these two miracles, then the world and people can’t be so bad after all. I told hubby this last night, and he laughed. But I’m serious. If I can have this, I think I’d give up being unhappy with other people because I’d be too grateful for having been given the impossible, twice.

Mark this day down. Remember it. This is the day that hope returned to my heart.