Trishna Bharadia
The nation's MS poster girl, Trishna Bharadia, has become a symbol for resistance to the illness. After her turn on People's Strictly, last year culminated in her being recognised as a Woman of the Year. Emily Horton hears her tale
There is no blueprint for trauma. Emotional, mental, physical: its forms are many and varied, its baleful effects unique to the sufferer concerned.
Of course, it’s how one deals with it that ‘oft proclaims the man’. Or, in this case, the woman: multiple sclerosis (MS) sufferer Trishna Bharadia who, at the age of 28, was diagnosed with a bewildering neurological condition that would change her life for good.
Or evil. For in MS – which affects some 100,000 people in the UK – the immune system mysteriously attacks the nervous system, causing lesions on the brain and spinal cord that prompt the body to degenerate. Each day, Trishna faces an angry army of debilitating symptoms that sometimes leave her exhausted, incapacitated and in pain. And that’s before reckoning with work and the boss.
Sitting around in self-pity, however, simply isn’t Trishna’s style. Since her diagnosis in 2008, the Marlow resident has thrown herself into charity work to raise awareness of the illness, with the result that she has gradually become the nation’s MS poster girl.
Last year she was not only chosen from 11,000 applicants to appear on People’s Strictly for Comic Relief, but was also recognised as a Woman of the Year at the event of the same name, hosted by Sandi Toksvig, in October.
BBC Pictures
Trishna with her Strictly partner, Aljaž Škorjanec
“I feel incredibly honoured,” she tells me. “It has all helped put MS on the map, which is really welcome.
As a result, Trishna is in high demand as a speaker. Today she has just returned from a charity parliamentary launch.
“After Strictly, I didn’t think my life could become any busier,” she chuckles. “But it has! On the programme it wasn’t made clear that I actually have a full-time job, so I get asked to do a lot of charity projects that I have to try to fit in around work.”
Fortunately, Trishna is able to carry out her work – as a translator for a company based in Reading – at the home she shares with her parents and younger sister. But despite defying the MS stereotype of a sufferer bound in misery and a wheelchair, Trishna is still compelled to manage her active life with care.
“It’s all about planning,” she says. “If I try to pack in too much, I will end up completely exhausted. I have to be mindful of my limits.”
Trishna was 27 when she suddenly lost feeling down one side of her body, all the way from her shoulder to her toes. It was her first big relapse – the technical term for a period of deterioration in a sufferer’s body.
“I was otherwise very healthy. I‘d always been very active and played a lot of sport, so there was no reason to fear the worst,” she says.
Yet the relapse followed another episode, three years previously, when she lost the strength in her hands. At the time, this was put down to repetitive strain injury.
“I’d experienced RSI before and, looking back, this did feel completely different. But you don’t think of questioning the doctors. It’s actually quite common for those eventually diagnosed with MS to have had the symptoms for some time, and to have had them wrongly attributed to more common ailments.”
In 2007, however, when the big relapse occurred, Trishna told her doctor that a cousin had been diagnosed with MS the previous year. She was immediately whisked off for further examination.
An MRI scan showed lesions on her spinal cord, but there then followed an excruciating three-month wait for a second MRI to indicate the likely prognosis. In the meantime, Trishna had begun to experience tingling sensations.
“I started having what is known as Lhermitte’s sign,” she explains. “When I flex my neck, I can experience an electric shock going through my body.”
Following the second MRI, Trishna underwent a lumbar puncture in her spinal fluid to test for the presence of a certain protein associated with the illness. It was positive and, in May 2008, Trishna was diagnosed with relapsing, remitting MS – the most common form of the disease.
Sufferers are attacked for a length of time, but then enter a period of remission when the symptoms abate. This can last for up to 15 years. Sadly, however, there are those who constantly relapse.
“I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t worry,” admits Trishna. “I still have full movement of my limbs, but MS creates a lot of hidden disabilities. You can’t see the pain and fatigue that sufferers go through, or their bladder and bowel complaints.
“Even if you do everything that you can to stay healthy and keep stress levels down, you can still relapse. When you hear that you might wake up tomorrow and be unable to move your legs, it does change your attitude to life. I have definitely stopped putting things off!”
So how did she manage for Strictly?
“I really don’t know,” she laughs. “Adrenalin, I suppose, plus the thought of seeing Aljaž. He made me believe that anything was possible.”
‘Aljaž’ is Slovenian professional dancer Aljaž Škorjanec, who won the 2013 series with celebrity partner Abbey Clancy. During rehearsals with Trishna at Bisham Abbey, he carefully adjusted their jive routine to accommodate his new partner’s limitations.
“He wanted me to do an unsupported spin at the end, but I kept falling over. My muscles were so fatigued that I couldn’t keep my balance. So Aljaž held my hand for the spin and then, when I came back round, my other hand went straight down onto his shoulder so I could rebalance myself before continuing.”
Trishna also has her parents to thank for getting her through the dream experience.
“I couldn’t have managed Strictly without them. It’s so important for an MS sufferer to have a strong support network; to surround yourself with people who have your best interests at heart.”
What are her other tips?
“Keep going,” she responds quickly, “and always look for a positive from every challenge.”
Jesse Toksvig-Stewart
Trishna with chef Thomasina Miers
At Woman of the Year, Sandi Toksvig expressed the wish that every primary school girl in Britain could come and sit with the 400 or so ladies recognised at the event, as it would show them what women can achieve.
Trishna agrees.
“I have to live with knowing that I might have a relapse at any moment, but whatever the future may hold, at least I’m ready to face it,” she reflects. “I have done as much as I can for whatever eventuality may arise.”
Hurrah for a very brave lady.
WINDSOR JAN 2016
Read the full article in our January issue of The Windsor, Ascot and Maidenhead Magazine going out across the area and also Virginia Water, Sunningdale and Chobham
