... but in dealing with PD, it counts for a whole lot. I loved the MJF quote you closed with, Carolyn! It eloquently stated what I was trying to say in a post I recently made on Braintalk. The quote Carolyn used was:

"One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, but cannot be taken away unless it is surrendered. ~~ Michael J. Fox, in "Saving Milly" by Morton Kondrake"

In a topic about "Mental Capabilities" posted on BrainTalk, I responded with my experiences with the reduction in short term memory and frequently struggling to remember the word I want to say. In that post I wrote: "Nothing I know of helps with the word search though. Stressful situations tend to make this worse. ... I often struggle to find a familiar word like "fortunate", instead describing the word I want like "Oh yes, we've been very...very...you know, like lucky?" It is frustating and can be embarrassing, but if you're a nice, likable person, people tend to overlook your struggle or chime in with the word (ala the Jeopardy game show!). Either way, they don't think less of you.

I didn't word it very well in my original post, but what the underlined section really means is people tend to follow our lead when we're having PD problems. If I don't get upset and make a big deal out of forgetting a few words, others don't see it as a big issue either. It's our own attitudes that are reflected in how others perceive us.