Karen Scott

Meet Karen Scott, Living with multiple sclerosis

Karen had a dream: to be able to get to the grocery store on her own whenever she needed groceries. It’s a simple dream — but not so simple for Karen, who has been disabled by multiple sclerosis, a disease that attacks the myelin, the protective covering that wraps around the nerves of the central nervous system.

After losing the strength in her right arm, right leg and left eye, Karen lost her driver’s licence. A mom, she depended on the goodwill of friends to drive her once a week to the store, “but like everyone else, I would run out of food mid-week.” So Karen would ask her 16-year-old daughter to do her errands. Perfect, you would think, except for one small detail. Instead of the requested chicken, her daughter would pick up frozen pizza, along with red licorice or chocolate cake for dessert.

“Pizza is fine once,” says Karen, “but after the second time, I said ‘enough of this.’”

She phoned the local chapter of the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada for help, and help came in the form of a scooter. “Remember the feeling you had when you learned how to drive? You could go wherever and whenever you wanted without having to ask anybody to take you. That’s what I had.”

Thanks to the Society, Karen’s dream was granted.

“Without the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada, I would still be dependent on others to buy my groceries. My dream of freedom came in the form of a scooter. I have my life back.”

karen scott

Now, Karen has a new dream: not to be a paraplegic who may lose her voice, ability to swallow or part of her sight. She dreams of the day she will be able to give back the scooter that the Society loaned her because she won’t need it anymore. She’ll be able to walk to the grocery store.

“I can believe that dream because the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada, one of 17 national health charities working under the HealthPartners umbrella to transform the health of Canadians, is the biggest funder of MS research in Canada,” says Karen. After all, Karen’s first dream came true. “I am living proof that donating to HealthPartners works.”