First person with MS to play in the NBA shares his inspiring message: 'Make the most of it'

Chris Wright, the first person with MS to play on an NBA team, discusses how his multiple sclerosis diagnosis impacted his career — and how he maintains a positive outlook.

Multiple sclerosis is a life-changing diagnosis for one million people who are affected in the U.S. — but for a professional athlete, its physical limitations can seem particularly challenging.

Chris Wright, 34, the first person with MS to play in the National Basketball Association (NBA), has been living with the disorder since his 2012 diagnosis.

Ahead of World MS Day on May 30, Wright and his neurologist, Dr. Heidi Crayton, joined Fox News Digital in an on-camera interview from Washington, D.C., to discuss how he has come to terms with his MS and to share words of wisdom for others facing the diagnosis. (See the video at the top of this article.)

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Wright first experienced symptoms in 2012, he said, when he noticed tingling in his right foot while warming up for an overseas basketball game in Turkey.

"As I was shooting, I felt a tingling sensation in my right hand that eventually spread throughout my entire body within a matter of a minute," he told Fox News Digital.

Chris Wright, 34, the first person with MS to play in the NBA, has been living with the disorder since his 2012 diagnosis. (Getty Images/Chris Wright)

His coaches sent him to a doctor, who told him to take the day off.

"The next morning I woke up, and I couldn't walk. I couldn't stand up. I couldn't really use my limbs," he recalled.

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Wright returned to the doctor, this time in a wheelchair.

"They