At about this time every single day, I become a very poor verbal communicator. Taking l-dopa every two hours, leaves me very miswired mentally and physically by the dinner hour.

My mouth takes on a somewhat pointed, puckered up shape as I constantly fight the urge to let my lower lip and chin collapse in; my tongue just doesn't follow directions.

Thoughts are like mental festination. I am so distractable that my thought can change to something else after just one word being expressed about the first thought. It can result in speech hesitations and jumble my verbal expression all up so that I don't make any sense. This easily passes for weirdness or drunkenness.

It's difficult to carry on a conversation with me like this. I end up apologizing for much of what comes out of my mouth, not understanding it myself. IT makes me look like I am not being truthful - I hate it.

So after dinner, for which I have no appetite and usually do not eat, [another pound lighter] I have to chemically begin my journey "down", without going off. And so it goes, each and every day. My personality is controlled by drugs. The alternative is DBS, which they just publicized can cause cognitive problems.

I have to accept that I am headed for stupidity - not so much in intelligence but in verbal and physical expression. As someone told me seriously, without intending to insult, "you aren't stupid, you just look stupid."

I am still in PA, truly enjoying my family and hometown reminiscing. I have a cohort here - a cousin who almost died of Toxic shock syndrome in the late seventies from the tampons. She has talked about her brain short circuiting ever since. We make a great team...she understands and short circuits all day. So I have a shot at being more with it than she is in the early day, well early afternoon, after about 3 or 4 doses, before the craziness of too much sets in, and the lips pucker, etc etc. I relish those few hours, when I am calm.

My formula for coming down is also fine tuned. I am CHEMICAL....sing it Helen Reddy.

let's get to that cure,
paula