Helen Keller

Six months ago I was diagnosed with a degenerative condition that will progressively limit my mobility. I'm 34. The doctors say I have maybe ten good years before I'll need a wheelchair, and the decline after that is uncertain. I've always been athletic—running, hiking, rock climbing. My identity is wrapped up in what my body can do. My friends are my adventure buddies. My career involves fieldwork. Some people tell me to fight—adapt equipment, find new sports, refuse to let this define me. "You can still live fully," they say. "Don't give up on anything until you absolutely have to." Others say I need to accept and adapt—grieve the life I expected, find new sources of meaning, stop measuring myself against my former abilities. "Fighting reality is exhausting," my therapist says. "Acceptance isn't giving up." But acceptance feels like surrender. And fighting feels like denial. How do I live fully in a body that's betraying me? Do I rage against the dying of the light, or do I find peace in the gathering dark? — The Diagnosis That Changed Everything in Denver

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