About a year ago a local woman with MS started a badly needed support group for this area. There were several attempts at getting groups started in this area, but the leaders never hung around long enough to make it work. They would do two or three groups and then quit. This got folks discouraged, and many simply stopped coming. Several times you would show up, only to find a cancelled sign on the door and no further instructions till the new leader took over.

A new woman took control of the group about a year ago, and well...she is ...pushy. I cant blame her one tiny bit, but it bugs me. I say I cant blame her because the locals here need encouragement to get anything done. There are more than 100 names on the list, and yet frequently she is sitting with one or two folks. She takes alot of time out of her own busy schedule to find speakers, and arrange meeting places, and be supportive only to find herself abandoned on meeting day.

the few meetings that I have gone to were dominated by the newly diagnosed. Which rightly so, they have many questions, and many fears, but we never seemed to get off the "how do I do this" topic. or the "how to be a new patient" at least 50% of this crowd is no longer new, and many of them are PPMS or SPMS and dont wish to hear over, and over and over about DMDs. for example, one month was a copaxone speaker, and the next was a betaseron speaker, and the next was a LDN woman, and then it was a cancelled speaker to talk about DMD side effects. If you have a computer, or a town library you can easily look up the basics yourself. I think support group meetings should be about support!

so, recently this woman has found herself ALONE on meeting day, and is now starting to get aggressive with her campaign to get folks in the door. I feel bullied into going, and yet I feel badly for leaving her sitting there alone. yep, I have MS and Yep, I feel like I can contribute to a meeting, but its hard to get there, and its hard to stay there. I dont want to hear about being newly dx for the 20th time.

I have spoken to her after her last email blast about "how could all of you leave me sitting here alone!" she wanted input and suggestions on how to pick a better day/time for the meeting, but didnt seem receptive to to what info to have at the meeting. She said she works very hard to get speakers of ANY kind, and its too hard to be picky. I suggested maybe NOT having a speaker, but allowing those who attend to share their stories, and be supportive of each other, instead of having to sit for a 45 minute speach about stuff we dont want to know. It upset her, and she called me ungrateful and told me that if I thought I could do a better job, to bring it on! it really did make me sound ungrateful.

I could use some advice here. If I stop going, the group will die. If I keep going I feel like I am wasting my time, efforts and energy hearing over and over and over about stuff I dont need or want to know. Should I keep going so the group stays afloat? Should I take care of me and just stay home?