Four Years, Many Miles, One Reason to Keep Riding

For the fourth year in a row, I’m getting back on my bike for the annual Bike MS ride. At this point, my legs know what’s coming and are begging me to celebrate my birthday with cake like a normal person.

The tradition began while I was working at Barclays and looking for a more meaningful way to celebrate my birthday. When I discovered that Bike MS took place just one or two days beforehand, the timing felt almost serendipitous. Instead of buying me a gift, I asked friends and family to donate to the National MS Society, while I agreed to do the pedaling. It seemed like a fair arrangement, at least until the first hill...⠀⠀⠀

MS had not directly touched my own family when I first signed up. I joined because I have always believed that we should not need to be personally affected by a cause before choosing to support it. But that first ride made the cause feel personal in a way I had not expected. I saw partners riding for spouses, children riding for parents, and entire families cycling together for someone they loved.

As the day went on, one pattern kept standing out: so many people were riding in support of women in their lives, especially their moms. I wondered why.

When I looked into it after the ride, the answer was striking: MS is three times more common among women than men. I also learned just how differently the disease can affect each person. MS is sometimes called the “snowflake disease” because no two cases are alike. Symptoms and progression can vary entirely from one person to the next. MS may be one disease, but the nearly one million people living with it in the United States experience it in nearly one million different ways.

That complexity is exactly why fundraising matters. Although treatments have advanced, MS still has no cure, and a disease that affects every person differently requires continued research. Funds raised through Bike MS support that work, along with advocacy, resources, and services for people living with the disease.

So what was intended to be a one-time birthday fundraiser instead became a tradition I felt compelled to continue. I return for the moms and families I saw on my first ride, for the people navigating the uncertainty of MS every day, and because I still believe that caring about a cause should not depend on whether it has touched our own lives.

Four rides have also taught me a few practical lessons: hills always look smaller on the route map, padded shorts are non-negotiable, and asking for donations is considerably easier than asking people to choose a birthday gift.

If you would like to support my fourth ride, you can donate to the National MS Society below. Every contribution, of any size, helps move us closer to a world free of MS.