Happy Anti-versary

Today I am celebrating my 10 year anniversary with MS. On this day, almost to the exact hour as I write this, we were joined in ever so slightly reluctant life-long matrimony, officiated by a soon to be retired doctor man of very high standing. Perhaps it is no surprise that after 10 years things have grown rather stale.

And so, to spice things up a bit I decided to treat my MS to a romantic trip down memory lane, to visit all the places that mean something to us and our life together. Unfortunately, we no longer have access to the inside of some of the places where we’ve been and other places, after a decade, are almost unrecognisable. Take, for example, the site of my most dramatic ‘swoon’ during our courtship – an event that we fondly refer to now as Flip-Flop Gate. What was once the dingy backend of the city library where the bins were kept is now a spruced up zone complete with plants and pebbles and swanky new paving – not a wheelie bin in sight!

We spent some time awkwardly lingering, or rather lurking, outside key places. We started, appropriately, where it started – our old apartment building, location of our first meeting and the very place where we had our first tingle. I should have liked to have gone inside, and did consider waiting for someone to open the main door before sneaking in and ‘running’ up the staircase for old times’ sake, but thought better of it.

Next on the agenda was the scene of our first Trip, which resulted in my first grazed knee since primary school.

Just down the road from here is ‘our bench’ – a saviour on many a torturous trek down the never-ending road between our house and the city.

I couldn’t pass through our old neighbourhood without swinging by our old house. There’s nowhere to discreetly stop and stare, and so we simply stopped and stared and reminisced about the times we’d spent in the house we were living in when we finally entered ‘wedlock’ and where we spent much of the honeymoon period, by which I mean the denial phase!

Top of the list of places to visit was, of course, the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, one of our most frequented places to go and where our union became official all those years ago. It also happens to be where 2 of my 3 children were born, which is a bit of a sore point with my MS, who thinks that having children has put a strain on our ‘marriage’ and constantly plays up because if it.

Other than our visit to all these places, I’m not too sure how else we should be celebrating our decade together. Usually, in a normal relationship, you might expect a special anniversary gift from your other half. The trouble is, I’m not terribly fond of the kind of gifts my MS usually gives me. I also don’t particularly want to be wined and dined by my MS, whose idea of romance is to spend a whole weekend together in bed!

I’ve had a quick look online to see what sort of gift is appropriate for 10 years of wedded bliss. It appears that tin and aluminium are traditionally given on such an anniversary to represent the “durability and flexibility needed to sustain a loving union”. Bah! Well, MS sure is durable!

Ultimately, I have decided to simply chill out, crack open some wine and reflect on what has truly been a remarkable 10 years, regardless of my MS!