Hi Everyone..Ive been taking it easy this week, probably too easy..Ive gotten very symptomatic over the last month, mostly my legs..I go through this every winter..This winter my legs are like jello, and when I was actively fishing my legs were strong, and I walk normal most of the time..So I have to get busy walking, or do something to keep my legs working..Chasmo suggested one of them stationary exercise bikes..I also dont move well once I get in bed..I am very stubborn about taking more medication than Im already taking, but some nights I took an extra Sinemet rather than go through the crap of not being able to move and being uncomfortable..I take generic CR 50/200, and I often wonder how much levodopa the damned things actually deliver

Laura flew back to Washington on Monday to tie up some lose ends, take care of some business. get some of her stuff out of there, and over here and visit family..I was busy this afternoon making space in the cellar for her computer/music room..Its amazing how much junk you accumulate without even trying..So I trying to figure out where Im going to put this stuff that I'll probably never use, and I came up with a novel idea..Throw it in the back of the truck and take it to the dump!....So thats exactly what Im gonna do..We've been moving stuff around here since we got back from Ohio, so Ive now realized how much space my junk has been occupying..And the house looks so different now..Its got a "woman's" touch..How about that?....It was good for my legs to get busy this afternoon, climbing up and down the cellar stairs, and moving stuff around..Exercise..Use it, or lose it

So thats my story and Im stickin' to it

How was your week?

Hi, Steve, glad you're settling in okay. I talked to Laura yesterday. She sounded good--very much on top of things and glad to be feeling better.

Managing this array of symptoms is sure a challenge at times, isn't it? But I saw three of my doctors this week, all of them very happy with where I am, especially that I'm getting a little more exercise on my exercise bike. For me, when I have a little trouble getting "on," a few minutes on the bike will give the drugs the boost they need. Of course it'll take me most of the day to get around to hopping on the thing.

I just signed up for a yoga class that starts this week at the local senior center, which is only about a half mile from my house. A church contact of mine will be in the class, too, as will her mother, so at least it will be a pleasant social contact, even if I fail Pretzel 101. I'm in it for the breathing, anyway.

I live not far from Washington DC and have been reading a lot in the paper about the arrangements for the Inauguration next week, and believe me, I have no intention of even going out for a bottle of milk that day. My daughter and son-in-law, though, have managed to get tickets and will be flying in for a short visit, to include braving the masses to get a glimpse of history on the big day. Better them than me, and I'll worry about them all day, but I admire them for it and certainly do welcome the visit.

We're having cold rain and freezing temperatures in Maryland. It must be winter. Have a good week anyway, everyone!

Jaye

Yes..She is doing so much better, and she has been doing her best to stay on top of things..She is determined to get well and stay as well as possible with both pd and anxiety..It has really been absolutely wonderful to watch her transformation from where she was, to where she is now

Went to a high school friend's birthday party tonight..we both ended up in the same town and state here in Florida after growing up outside of Pittsburgh PA. Our kids [all adults now] went to school together and they and their friends also attend gatherings at this friend's house.

This home is one of the few places where I feel comfortable socializing these days. That is probably because my friend's wife had a brain anyeurism [sp?] and had to learn everything over [ after just barely surviving it] - also lost her mother young to one. I lost my mother to cancer at a young age; I'm older than my mother now. She learned the motor skills but was left with no short term memory....a very serious loss.
So instant bonding that blocks out everything else. He was a friend in high school, not just an acquaintance....we did things socially then.

I'm going into detail because i have parameters now on what I will do socially. And this family and mine have so many parallels.

That's the bond.

What did we actually do at the birthday party? Well it was a 50's theme, which no one had anything for which to wear except the wife and their daughter and son....what a striking, good looking group in this house in Florida. My daughter dropped by very late because she fell asleep.

Before she got there, I discovered I could still do a mean hula hoop. What great exercise! You have to use the big one. It gathers more momentum.

I'm very serious.....don't do it in front of anybody until you see if you can do it [go outside or something] That's the key to not giving up too soon. It will fall straight down at first. Then you move franctically, like a bird first trying its wings. This needs to be refined...lol. Of course the first thing that happens is you have a little success and then notice that you are completely breathless and even dizzy.

Well there was music playing and I stuck with it. It's just as much about rhythm .....multiple rhythms....which - if you apply along with all the forces available to you, you can keep the hula hoop going indefinitely without even moving much. i considered trying to use my cell phone, but realized how strange that must have sounded and hushed up. I mostly slur and stumble softly by this time; had taken more sinemets than usual to stay on....and here it is....after 1 a.m. home and still wide awake.

Once the hula hoop is mastered and you feel the force around you and how it takes less and less movement to control it for a long time....there is an overwhelming feeling of calm and relaxing from the grip of PD.

Now I know that some of the readers could possibly have minds that might take this in the direction of something sexual in nature.

I'm sorry to disappoint you, I'm talking hula hoop and am going to Toys R Us and buy one tomorrow ..........for PD symptom relief and exercise.

If you couldn't do it when young, chances are you may not get it now...mostly because you won't be interested in it, thinking you can't.

OK I'll stop .....sinemet.....what to do next? This post was fun and where safer than in Steve's thread?

nite,
paula

Well I'm back on the medication after the stomach bug passed around the new year. This took a long time to leave, but it wasn't only me. My parents were still sicker afterwards, and then it started around the house again with the younger ones.

I actually ended up back on January 1st. What a way to start the year. I definitely need them and I felt much better on them. So folks I'll be around here more often. You think you can beat the PD monster but it gets you in the end anyway.

Today I had a scheduled neurology appointment. Overall mechancially things are doing well when I am on the medication. She noticed my movement as good, but slow on the right side. This was the usual walk in the hall, toe-to-heal test, fiinger exercise thing, and the other usual stuff. She noticed tham I am slowing down, which I've noticed as well particuarly when using my computer mouse where I've actually slowed down the mouse clicks for double-clicking. She asked me about my piano playing which has been deteriorating to say the least. I no longer have the speed in my right hand, which is required for certain passages in Chopin and Liszt, so I lose the momentum of the music.

Any how, the conversation went from the mechanics to cognitive function, which has become an issue for me lately. I'll go into this in a seperate post, but she sent me for some blood tests and she's scheduling me for an appointment with a neuro-psychologist to check my executive function.

So this is how I started my week. Other than that, I've started my next class. If I can last until July I'll graduate with my BS in Information Technology. I only have 5 more classes to go.

John

Hey Paula, they have hoola hoops that make noise and ones that have their own music.

I can see you on youtube now.

Paula,

Thanks for the insight into the hoola hoop. I, too, will try to get one later this week. We're suppose to get a blizzard tonight so it might be toward the end of the week, but be assured that I will hunt one down!

Another actvity that I like, and which helps with the dexterity of my legs/feet is Dance Dance Revolution, a dancing game for the X-Box. Somedays I'm right on the money, other days so stiff that I don't do well at all. Either way, though, I have fun and that's what counts.

Hope all are doing well. I'm hanging in there ... the best any of us can do.

I had mentioned that I was having some trouble with my ovary the last time I posted. I had another bout of pain so my doctor was able to move my ultrasound date up to January 8th. I got up early that morning and had the ultrasound done. I didn't have a good feeling about it. Shortly after I got home from the ultrasound on Thursday, I got a call from my doctors office. They wanted me to come in as soon as possible and they asked me when I had last had anything to eat. I had a feeling that I would be having surgery later that day.

My husband came home from work and took me to the doctors office. It turned out that the ultrasound showed that there was no longer any blood flow to my left ovary. My ovary had twisted and cut off it's own blood flow and my ovary had died. This is called ovarian torsion. My doctor believes that my the torsion occurred around December 20th or 21st when I had the terrible pains that sent me to the ER. It must not have completely cut off the blood flow until a later time though because there was still blood flow to my ovary on the 20th when they did the ultrasound. Now, knowing that my ovary had died, my doctor knew that he needed to do surgery and get that dead ovary out right away. So, I went straight to the hospital after the appointment and my surgery began around 4:00 p.m. My doctor had said that surgery would probably take about an hour. When my doctor got in there he was surprised at how bad things were. My ovary was twisted twice and was dead. My colon had wrapped itself around the ovary and two masses and was adhered to the big mess. All of this was sitting right on top of my bladder. I had a lot of adhesions everywhere and my intestines were all twisted up and adhered to eachother all the way up to underneath my ribcage. My doctor disected all of the adhesions, removed my dead left ovary with the masses on it, and tacked up my right ovary to help prevent it from torsing in the future, bored out my cervix to see if my mini periods will stop, and he filled my abdomen with some kind of special fluid that is supposed to prevent adhesions from developing. I have had two previous abdominal surgeries, so some of the adhesions were probably from those surgeries. But, the majority of them were caused by my body's response to having a dead ovary inside of me.

All in all, the surgery took a little over two hours and my doctor managed to do the whole thing laparascopically. I have four one inch incisions in my abdomen. I am very sore because of all of moving around of things inside of my belly and I am very bloated. The initial tissue samples that my doctor sent to the lab did not indicate any cancer. I am VERY grateful for that! My doctor did not find any signs of endometriosis either...that was a relief. My right ovary looked great and so it was left in to prevent me from going into menopause. I am still a little concerned about having problems with my ovary in the future, but after a lot of talking with my doctor, I decided that the benefits of keeping my ovary was worth the risk of problems in the future. I came home from the hospital yesterday at around 4:00 p.m. January 9th actually marked the two year anniversary of my partial hysterectomy. Kind of ironic. Glad it is over. I am praying for a speedy recovery.

One final note, I am so glad that I listened to my body. I knew that there was something wrong and I am so glad that I had that ultrasound date moved up. I just knew that the type of pain I was experiencing wasn't normal. I am blesssed that I didn't wind up with a horrible infection from having that dead ovary inside of me. So...listen to your body and what it is telling you.

Hello, I am a lurker since 8/07 when I was diagnosed, but this is my first posting. I felt somehow connected to this thread because, as Paula, I grew up near Pittsburgh, and when I read Evonne's gyn story I related to it. But as the surgeon! I am a gyn surgeon, which makes having PD very depressing, as my career is based on having meticulous fine motor skills. Ha ha. But for now I am doing pretty well on Sinemet, Amantadine, and Selegeline. My doctor is wonderful, he is a movement disorder specialist at a great university medical center. It helps that I have always liked to exercise or walk every day. That was the first inkling that something was really wrong, when my left arm stopped swinging while I walked, and my left toes curled and cramped if I tried to walk fast (I have not had a tremor yet). I was 57 at the time, raising two teenagers alone (dad died of Agent Orange-related lymphoma) and PD never occurred to me. What a bolt of lightning that was!

Also two weeks after I received that news I was called by the FBI and informed that my long-time stockbroker had disappeared and put all my savings including IRA and college funds into a scam investment. He's been indicted and I received a decent settlement from his brokerage co. but needless to say not nearly what I lost. So it has been a challenge to deal with loss of health and wealth in one fell swoop. I have been determined to be graceful and private about my problems, deciding that some inner grace would have to prevail as I became outwardly more clumsy! I also have always been a knitter and find that very meditative, especially since I don't know how long I'll be able to do it, realistically.

I was reluctant to post here for a long time as there seemed to be quite a few "anti-physician" writers and that turned me off for a while. But today felt like a good time to "un"-lurk!

Hi Hiptothat,
Welcome to the Forum and I am glad you decided to un-lurk! Great to have a physician participating in here!

Girija \