Hello, Natalie and welcome to NeuroTalk.

Dontcha just love the tacked and diplomacy some doctors have

You will hear some people refer to their brain as "swiss cheese" but it can be those same people who live normal lives - normal for MS

This is a strange disease - you can have a lot of lesion with little if no disability and a few lesions with a higher level of disability.

Black holes indicate permanent axon damage but, the brain has the ability to re-route around the damage to form new pathways....to a point.

I wuld guess in time with knowledge of this disease you probably will find connections to this disease way before you were diagnosed. I have been diagnosed for 22 years. I have been able to trace some symptoms back to childhood and a few months ago I just had another symptom validated from childhood. Needless to say I was shocked when the validation/connection was made after all of these years with a symptom that I had never even considered a symptom but just strange and annoying when I was a kid.

Give yourself time adjust to your diagnosis. All of us go through the grieving process when diagnosed (dx'd).