A Multiple Sclerosis Update from Jack Osbourne

In 2012, English media personality, Jack Osbourne, was diagnosed with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS), after going to the doctor for optic neuritis (a type of inflammation that damages the optic nerve). Before his eye symptoms occurred, Jack had been experiencing pinching and numbness in his leg for over 12 weeks. “I ignored the pinching in my leg because I thought I just pinched a nerve. Even when I got diagnosed, I thought, 'Aren't I too young to get this?' Now, I know the average age of diagnosis is between 20 and 40,” he said. Today, Jack stresses that he wished he knew more about MS being before diagnosed. “When the doctors told me, ‘I think you have MS’, I kind of freaked out and thought: ‘The game is over.' But that may have been the case 20 years ago. It's just not the case anymore,” he said.

After learning that he had MS, Jack reached out to a close friend of the family by the name of Nancy Davis. Nancy founded Race to Erase MS and Montel Williams. “It's one thing to read [about MS] online, but another to reach out and hear it from someone who's been living with the disease for a while to get a good understanding of what the day-to-day looks like. That's been the most helpful,” said Jack. He also researched MS to learn first-hand, personal recollections on living with the condition. “I’ve always been a proactive person, and I’ve taken on a lot of challenges in my life, from climbing mountains to dancing on national TV. I was shocked and scared when I was first diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS, but then my type-A personality kicked in and I started learning everything I could about the disease, and the more I learned, the more I realized that maybe my diagnosis wasn’t so terrifying after all,” he said.

Jack’s recent endeavors

Most recently, Jack teamed up with an escape room in Los Angeles to create his latest webisode for his “You Don’t Know Jack About MS” campaign. He and his sister, Kelly Osbourne, had to use their knowledge on MS in order to make it out of the escape room in time. They had to answer questions such as ‘How many people in the world have MS?’ and ‘It’s easy to tell if someone has MS – true or false?’ “We wanted to make the campaign educational and fun and lighthearted. Not doom-and-gloom, the-end-is-near kind of stuff. We keep the vibe positive and uplifting and we sprinkle in education through entertainment,” said Jack.

Read on to learn more about what Jack Osbourne is up to more than five years after his diagnosis.

Photo: NY Daily News