Ardra Shephard: After I was diagnosed, I tried to learn as much as I could about MS. I wanted all the information. I remember going to an MS support group, and that was very, very scary. I remember it being in this kind of dark, low-lit room with, like, really bad snacks, like stale cookies and bad coffee, and everyone just sitting in this circle looking sick and sad. And I just felt like, this is my future. I totally freaked out.

There was one girl there, and it was her first time going to the meeting also. She was about the same age as me. And we exchanged numbers and connected, and that was really important because, I mean, we're still close today. And I can't stress enough how important it is to find people that are going through the same thing that you're going through, but also at the same stage that you're at.

MS manifests in so many different ways, and it changes so much throughout the years. It's important to kind of find your tribe where you're at, when you're at it. So she was like me, in her early 20s, figuring out relationships and career and, like, what -- where your life's going. We needed each other.