The sufferer conundrum.

I recently came across a blog written by a fellow MSer that could have easily been written about me. It was the condemnation of using the terms “MS sufferer.” I use these two terms together, at the frown of my fellow blogger, because I have my own reasons for using them. I consider myself a sufferer because, at this time, it's something I do suffer with, just like I have to suffer with annoying in-laws or noisy upstairs neighbors. It's the annoying pest that whistles in my ear while I go about my daily business and I suffer with it, because it's the hand I was dealt. One man's journey is another man's suffering.
It almost seems petty to attack something so silly as a term, or as it's put elsewhere, a label. It reminds me of those days in high school where we protested the labels we were given by society while others embraced it. Who cares? If I choose to consider myself a sufferer, that's my choice just as it's your choice to use a different phrase. Heck, I even call myself a PCOs sufferer, because, you would too if you've ever spent a half hour in front of the bathroom mirror plucking chin hairs with tweezers you can't even see.
Quite honestly, I picked the phrase up from a medical professional and it was just something that stuck. Instead of attacking the phrase, offer some other coined term we can use instead. Instead of picking apart labels, wouldn't it make more sense to present a united front? Remember, we're the source of available, real life information for the newly diagnosed.