Horns247 Board

MS 150 becomes personal for former UT football player

Dallas Griffin's love affair with the bicycle began last summer with a sudden numbness in his feet. [...] Griffin, then 26, had been through four knee surgeries - including anterior cruciate ligament repairs on both joints - trying to stay on the field for the Texas Longhorns. [...] it's a character trait that's going to serve him well as he battles multiple sclerosis. At first, Griffin had concluded residual damage from those operations was somehow related to the problem with his feet, and he'd suffered concussions in the past, too. MS not tied to football While sitting at the computer a few weeks after the strange sensation in his feet began, Griffin felt the same numbness overtaking his calves and hamstrings. The hospital kept Griffin for three days, doing an MRI and a spinal tap among other procedures. [...] the tests showed clear evidence of the telltale scarring of the sheath on the nerves in his brain. [...] doctors and researchers can eventually figure it out, then find a cure. The first question Griffin asked after he received the bad news was, Doctors assured him there's no direct link. Save for all those knee injuries - the last of them ended his football career during the 10th game of his senior season - Griffin's world couldn't have been much tidier up until the moment he found out what was wrong. By the end of that week, two of them had decided to start an MS 150 team and get the company to back it.