Likes and Dislikes
By Mike Taylor | May 17, 2010
Laughing etc. I got told a joke recently what do you call a deer with one eye? No idea! What do you call a deer with one eye and no dick? No f-ing idea! It’s ironic sitting here with multiple sclerosis that one of my first likes is laughing and smiling I love comedians that can make me laugh out loud I include Billy Connoly and Chris Rock in this category and being English which I am I enjoy programs like Weeds. And I enjoy surrounding myself with positive people. But I in my dislikes I would have to put negative people these people bring me down, like Republicans, when someone comes up with an idea they just say no it will never work. Think about it, look for something. Look for the possibility in the idea and work together to make it work. I don’t like when the sun is not shining and I say that because today is one of those days I feel cheated I moved over from England to sunny California. I like going to the movies now and again and I say that because on Friday I saw Robin Hood with Russell Crowe. It was okay but I reminded me of Gladiator which I thought was a brilliant movie I can only assume that Robin Hood was similar to Gladiator because they had the same director Ridley Scott. My favorite movie last year was of course Avatar…brilliant what a visionary James Cameron is. I also loved Inglorious Bastards. I love Quentin Tarantino’s movies I also enjoyed Sherlock Holmes. And I have to say as an Englishmen Robert Downey Jr. played a jolly good English chap.
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The Truth
By Mike Taylor | May 13, 2010
Just to let you know although I have MS, and I can no longer swim or indeed walk I do exercise daily. Which involves standing in my solid frame getting stretched alot, which involves lying on the bed and my care taker stretching me. He doesn’t say it but I think he thinks I’m mad. But honestly I just want to stay as fit and healthy as I can, eat healthy too. And I always have since I was diagnosed with MS and having seen a homeopath for the first time and I think it a rude awakening by being poured some food in tolerances. Which includes sadly cutting back on the alcohol not that I’m an alcoholic but I do enjoy a drink on the weekends. Look I’m English I’m good at drinking, it’s taking me nearly ten years actually I’m lying I still drink now and again but sadly not as much.
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Mobility
By Mike Taylor | April 5, 2010
I’m going through the “Be very patient Mike”, stage, while my agent is looking for publishers. I am now using this time to look for an electric wheel chair. They are bloody expensive and although I have health insurance, clearly, it’s not good enough. I’ve been speaking to the MS society who have been a great help so hopefully, we can sort something out as it would be brilliant to have some mobility back. I’ll keep you posted on the progres.
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Further developments
By Mike Taylor | March 23, 2010
Once I took Todd on, which involved a fee, one we were both happy with, the way it proceeded with Todd was he came around several times and we talked about the book. He interviewed me and recorded it as well. The reason for this was for him to get my voice so when he wrote it was my words, in my language, and not his. We had a goal. Rather than writing the whole book, we proceeded with a book proposal and three chapters. Once we were happy with this, and we were, (I especially was, and excited about it) it was then up to me to tote it around to publishers and literary agents. Me being naive about the book world, I didn’t even know what a literary agent was. I sent out the book proposal to many publishers and literary agents, with them all saying, “This is great, Mike.” A couple of minutes later they would say, “This is great, but not for us.” It happened again and again, which is incredibly frustrating. To cut a long story short, and I mean long, I now have a well-respected literary agent. Now I’m in the world of, “Be patient, Mike,” which I’m not. Oh well, I’ll keep you updated on the progress.
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I’m back!
By Mike Taylor | March 21, 2010
I apologize its been over a year now since I’ve updated this blog. There is a reason for that. I’ve been out there doing motivational speaking, which has been fun, but not easy. I don’t know whether I’m doing this the right way, but I really need to get my name out there as a speaker. Just having a website is not enough. I honestly feel I need to do more marketing to get myself out there. In the way I choose to do this (and I don’t know if it’s the right way) is something I thought about doing years ago, and that is write a book, great idea! So I thought, and its really funny every time I come up with an idea like this, suddenly I come across naysayers. ”Are you mad?” some would say. ”In this market do you know how hard it is to get a book published?” others would say. Well, in all honesty, no I didn’t. Seems to me it would make my life a lot easier if I was a celebrity or a well-known person, of which I am neither. Not deterred by this, as I firmly believe I have a great story in me that people can learn from. So, off I went, but I hit my first big roadblock and that is, with my Multiple Sclerosis, my hands don’t work so well now, so typing is a problem for me. So rather than giving up, I saw this as an opportunity to move forward. I needed a ghostwriter. Great idea. I put an ad on Craigslist and thought I would get one or two responses. I would use one of those to help me out. That was the idea, but I didn’t expect the responses, although, I should have known because of the state of the economy. Instead of one or two applications for ghostwriters, I got nearly one hundred (as my wife smugly told me I would get). I got responses ranging from the ridiculous, people with good intent, people who had just left university saying they were the person for the job. With responses like this, I just deleted and moved on. There were also published authors in there with great credibility who were also flippin’ expensive. So I couldn’t use those, as honestly, I don’t have deep pockets. Going down the list it was important for me to have a ghostwriter who lives relatively close to me so I could work together with them. Having interviewed four who were good, but not right for me, the last person I interviewed was a young guy called Todd Klick. He lived relatively close. He’s a bit younger than me, which is okay. He’s got a ton of energy and a positive attitude which is a good fit with me. He gets my english humor, which is bloody brilliant. He was the man for the job!
In my next blog I will tell you how it progressed.
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It’s Me, Mike Taylor
By Mike Taylor | August 20, 2008
Hi, I’m Mike Taylor, and yes that’s me on the video. An English guy with MS (Multiple Sclerosis) who is now married to Helen, a beautiful California girl and living in Los Angeles.
I’ m the youngest of 3 kids and I have a great mom and dad. if you enjoy hearing from people with a positive attitude, a sense of humor and a brilliant set of friends (which I will introduce you to as my blog goes on) stay posted. Yes there have been highs and lows in my 15 years of MS, and yes again, I will share those with you and be honest about them.
But seriously, having a positive attitude helps me focus on what I can do and will do rather than what I can’t. It’s quite a story I have to share with you as I go forward, one I hope you will enjoy and one I hope you will learn from.
I’m just an ordinary guy who’s hungry for life and loves staying fit and healthy. As an English kid I participated in rugby, criket,and athletics.
Later on I rode, skied, wind surfed and mountainbiked, oh did I mention girls, girls, girls? Loved them too. At sports I was good but not great.
I was also quite good at art and persued that as my career. I obtained a degree in graphic designand headed to London to start my career. At the age of 26, I was given the opportunity to travel the world, I packed my rucksac, got a cheap around the world flight ticket and off I went. On my trip I was scuba diving, skiing, bungee jumping, sky diving and basically having a lot of fun, laughter and meeting a lot of new people.
I returned a year later with a mild limp in my left leg.
One I assumed was an old sports injury . When I checked it out, I was diagnosed with M.S. I was diagnosed at the age of 27, I’m 43 now. This is really where my blog begins. Talk to you soon!
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Mike Taylor’s M.S. Story - Part 2
By Mike Taylor | August 19, 2008
Being a stubborn and determined individual, and yes, looking back at that time, very naive, I was in denial about my M.S.. Even though I was hobbling around (which was a problem I was soon to discover, I was cross when a London cab driver wouldn’t give me a lift because he thought I was drunk).
I rode a motorbike but my left foot could not change the gears up. Hey, “not a problem” I thought. So I got a piece of string and tied it to the gear stick and over my gas tank and when the gears needd to change up I would pull the string. This worked for about 4 months until the bike stalled on me. What I needed to do and couldn’t do was push the bike to start it. I couldn’t do it and this was an incredibly sad point because I knew my biking days were over. Bye -bye bike…
It was around this time I bought my first flat (condo). It had one bedroom and a balcony at the back. And wait for this, did I say I was in denial about my M.S.? That flat was on the 2nd floor! No problem because my M.S. wasn’t going to get any worse was it? Getting to work was now a problem for me because of the stairs on the London underground transport system. So instead of giving up work, I worked at home as a freelance graphic designer. I had total beleif in my ability as a designer and why wouldn’t I. I had previously creatively directed many multi-national design projects. how hard could this be?
As it turned out, very hard at first. I went from a pretty good salary to little money over night and now I had the mortgage. Oh, isn’t life fun. See what happened on my next post.
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Mike Taylor’s M.S. Story Part 3 - One Big Learning Curve!
By Mike Taylor | August 17, 2008
So there I am in my 2nd floor apartment working on getting work.
I had met a girl previously who I got on well with. Even though my disability was very visible, I was still in denial. When it came to sex which I love, and just like most guys reading this I prided myself on my performance between the sheets. Having little use of my legs had a big effect on that. Without going into details, swinging off the chandeliers was a problem. Isn’t it amazing how much we take for granted?
But hey Mike, focus on what you can do, and do it well, not on what you can’t do. Before long, she had moved in so clearly she was enjoying what I can do.
Still in denial of my situation and determined to get my design work going, I kept looking forward. Slowly, very slowly work started coming. Each little bit gave me the confidence and motivation to look for the next one. Life with my girlfriend was pretty good. despite not being able to go to places with me that she would have liked to have gone to. London not being disabled-friendly there were many places we couldn’t go to. Even though she didn’t mention it, I knew it.
I was about to discover that M.S. was and has continued to be one big learning curve. The first big one that came to me was when sunbathing on my small terrace outside with my girlfriend and getting bloody hot. Yes, it gets like that sometimes in England. You know if you’re hot when salty sweat drips into your eyes. I needed to be submerged in cold water to bring down my temperature.
Trust me, a bath full of cold water did just that. It was miraculous! This cold bath changed my life in more ways than one. I will tell you in my next blog how this cold bath led to me swimming the English channel.
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Mike Taylor & M.S. - Learning to Swim
By Mike Taylor | August 15, 2008
I told you I had the desire for staying fit despite having M.S.
As jogging was clearly out of the question, and remembering the benefit I got from cold water and
knowing that I could swim quite well, I found a pool not to far from me, it was out doors and unheated. I say pool, in England and Europe they are called lydos, why, I don’t know, but they do. I say a pool but this place was huge; 100 yards by 40 yards.Honestly this was the sort of pool you could land a sea plane on.
Despite hobbling in there on my walking sticks and wearing my speedo’s (I am English you know and that’s what we wear to swim in), I was like a kid in a candy store. Daunted by the size of the lydo but excited by the opportunity in front of me, I gracefully flopped into that pool. Even though I thought the bath water was cold, this was a new level of coldness, testicle shrinking cold. Off I went doing the front crawl (that was my stroke) after about 15 strokes, I suddenly encountered a big road block. It was that because my legs didn’t work, they started to sink .Leaving me in a standing up position, not a great position to be in if you want to swim from point A to B. I was f—ing furious! This was another thing I couldn’t do. A life guard had seen my frustration and came over with a small pool float. He suggested I put it between my legsand it would put my legs in the position they needed to be in.
Easy, not so easy.
It lifted my legs alright and forced my head down under water. To cut a long story short, it wasn’t easy but I was determined to make that one length. Eventually, after a lot of effort and determination, I made it red-faced and out of breath - I made that first length.
That was it, I loved, loved, loved it! I was exercising and I was outdoors.
All the effort to make that one length was all I needed to excite and motivate me to keep going back again and again. Throughout that summer, me and that pool float had turned that one length into a mile. Work was picking up for me. Work, swimming and my girlfriend; I was having a great time.
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By Jove I think I’ve Got it…Swim the English Channel!
By Mike Taylor | August 13, 2008
I’ve got to be honest, swimming in a straight line was OK, but doing many lengths was a problem.
At the end of each length I had to stop of course, turn myself around and start again without the benefit of being able to push off with my legs. This was a big problem as long as I allowed it to remain a problem.
I didn’t.
My attitude being sky-high and knowing that turning at the end of each length was my problem, I needed a distance in the water, where I didn’t need to turn around. Hence the English channel!!
Being a determined and driven individual, I’m also a realist. That twenty one miles is the distance between England and France, cold Atlantic water and rough conditions for me (at face value was) was an insurmountable distance. That would have been impossible for my to attempt, but when I found out that insurmountable distance could be broken up as a relay swim, 5 able-bodied people and me…bingo!
Each doing an hour at a time, resting for five hours on the sports boat which was beside us; suddenly that insurmountable distance seemed possible.
A lot of hard work went into making this a reality including persuading 5 able-bodied people to join me on the swim. (Shit! I must have been persuasive).
The team came together. We worked hard together, not only in training in the pool, we trained in the ocean, we got sponsors for the swim (which was easier than I thought) because instead of people trying to raise money for M.S. trying to do the swim, here was a person with M.S. actually doing it.
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