Living Well: Climbing beyond our limits

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

By Teresa Griswold

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-She woke up one morning and half her body was numb. That was scary enough for Lori Schneider, but the diagnosis was even scarier. At the age of 43, Schneider was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

“I was so fearful of what I would not be able to do or what I would look like,” she said. “I had to get over the image of myself as a purely physical being. You are more than your body and more than your legs. I had to move beyond that and become the person I wanted to be inside.”

She did not tell anyone except her parents and ran as far as she could in hopes of outrunning the disease. Schneider says she now feels like she lost a year of her life, because she was in such a state of panic at first. She left her two decades-long marriage and teaching career in search of who she was to become.

“I couldn’t believe it was happening to me,” she said. “That was the hardest year of my life, because I was in fear mode.”

She built up her mental and physical strength by training to summit the highest peak in South America, but she kept her MS a secret. Almost a year to the day she was diagnosed, she stood on top of Aconcagua (23,000 feet). That was her turning point, 10 years ago.

“I thought, ‘If you are strong enough to get to the top of Aconcagua, then you are strong enough to tell the world you have MS without fear and shame,” she said.
She came clean.

Aconcagua was the second of the “Seven Summits” – the highest peak on each of the seven continents – that she would eventually conquer, having initiated her bid six years earlier with a Kilimanjaro ascent.

Last May, Schneider ascended Mt. Everest securing a place in history as the first person in the world with MS to stand atop Mt. Everest and all seven summits.
Schneider has the type of MS called “relapsing, remitting” which means that her symptoms come and go unpredictably. Those who have progressive MS struggle with mobility every day, but she gets a respite.

When she does, Schneider strives to stay healthy and do what her body can do now. Her balance is sometimes off, and she does a lot of core strengthening to overcome the vertigo. The worst of her symptoms have been body numbness from head to toe and almost total vision loss in one eye, both of which have subsided.

Schneider makes the most of every day. “ [MS] has been life altering in a very positive way and has gotten me to look at possibilities that would not have existed,” Schneider said. “I am more driven to quest, because I am freer.”
Like climbing a mountain, the way to overcome challenges is to put one foot in front of the other, Schneider said. She loves talking with youth and inspiring others. She speaks from her own experience when she tells people to not be afraid to try and to believe in themselves.

“You don’t have to be the strongest or the best, you just have to get out and do it,” she said.

Schneider’s next big adventure is leading a group of people with MS to Africa’s highest peak, Mt. Kilimanjaro, in 2011. Learn more at www.etadventure.com. JHW

Schneider presents her story of the Seven Summits, Tuesday, 7 p.m., Center for the Arts. Free. 733-9355.

Courtesy etadventure.com
Lori Schneider on approach to Everest.

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