My twin explains myasthenia gravis and heat intolerance
When I was a toddler, I tripped and fell into a wall. The impact caused a small wound on my forehead, and I cried out in pain. My twin brother, Aaron, who was napping…
Me, My Brother, and MG — Allen Francis
Allen Francis is a New York City native, graduate from Marymount Manhattan College, and a former college advisor. He writes from his experience of having a twin brother, Aaron, who has been afflicted with myasthenia gravis (MG) since 1999. From his perspective of a loving sibling, Allen wants to learn more about MG and advocate for more awareness about the rare and medically unknown condition. Allen is also a lifelong comic book fan dedicated to launching his own company writing comic books with his twin.
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Being a homebody suits my twin who’s living with MG
I started traveling as a backpacker when I was 19 years old, back in the 1990s. I spent a semester studying in London in 1997. As a naive kid from the South Bronx in…
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With my twin’s continuing double vision, I don’t know what to say
Do you ever use a phrase often without fully appreciating its meaning, especially its meaning to others? I’ve been thinking about the phrase “seeing double” for some time. My twin brother, Aaron, was…
MG is not the end of the world, but more people should be aware of it
“To acknowledge another is to paint strokes of kindness on the canvas of existence.” I was unsuccessful in trying to find the source of this quote, but I like it a lot. As human…
Sifting through regret over things left unsaid
“It’s the things that are left unsaid that take up the most space in our hearts.” I don’t know who wrote that, but it reminded me about how much has been left unsaid between…
My twin had thymectomy surgery 26 years ago, but I didn’t know
In the Irish writer Oscar Wilde’s play “The Importance of Being Earnest” (1895), he writes that memory “is the diary that we all carry about with us.” Still, our memories can’t always be trusted;…
A lesson I learned about eye misalignment and popular media
You’ve probably heard of the saying, “The eyes are the window to your soul.” Yet how do we judge people when their eyes are misaligned through no fault of their own? Do we still…
My twin needs his MG medicines forever, which I didn’t understand
This column describes the experiences of the author’s brother with side effects to several MG medications. Not everyone will have the same response to treatment. Consult your doctor before starting or stopping a…
My brother knew something was wrong long before his diagnosis
Dr. Seuss once said, “Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.” That’s another way of saying you never know what you have until it’s gone, whether…
MG has limited my brother’s career options, but not his identity
Identity is how we define ourselves, and it can be established through nature or nurture, voluntarily or not. Part of our identity may even be shaped by the person we imagine ourselves to be…
The muscle weakness from my twin’s MG is worse than I realized
Author Tom Clancy once wrote, “Surviving is much more painful than death.” Realizing how much my twin brother, Aaron, has been surviving with myasthenia gravis (MG) since his…
In wearing sunglasses, my twin was hiding MG, not trying to look cool
Sometimes we say so much about unimportant things that we leave the important things unsaid. Or, we talk about important things using codes or euphemisms. After all, some studies suggest that more than…
