Category: Parkinson’s Disease

New PD Travel Tip

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This post is a bit late as it involves something I learned on the last day of my road trip to Kentucky. Which was two and a half months ago.

As you all know, Parkinson’s Disease (PD) can cause a person to slowly hunch forward. For this reason, physical therapists and Rock Steady Boxing coaches continuously try to get us to constantly pay attention to our posture. But staying focused on posture is not always easy.

As I drove all over Kentucky, I occasionally noticed that my posture had completely abandoned me while I was behind the wheel. I wasn’t slouching straight forward, but forward and to the right – towards the radio. Usually, I wasn’t aware of this posture problem until it started hurting my back. So I was definitely not looking forward to the long drive back to Charlotte.

Thus, in preparation for the long drive home, I adjusted the driver’s seat so that the seat back was straight up. I hoped this would decrease the slouching a little, since there was no room for my spine to recline. This worked far better than I had imaged it would.

Y’see, with both the seat back and my own back being perpendicular to gravity, the back of my head very lightly rested against the head restraint. So lightly, that every single little bump in the road caused my head to bounce just a little. So there was a constant (and kinda fun) jostling as long as I maintained my posture. Every time my head stopped bouncin’ around, I immediately noticed the change and corrected my posture.

The results? I completed the five-hour drive home with zero back pain! And this was no fluke. I still keep the seat back as vertical as vertical can be, and the ol’ driving fatigue and back pain haven’t been happening. So, it looks like we have ourselves another PD Travel Tip!

PD Travel Tip: When travelling by car, keep your seat back as upright as possible to improve posture and to prevent fatigue and back pain.

Up ENDing Parkinsons

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The number of exercise programs / options targeting Parkinson’s continues to grow. Recently, “Up ENDing Parkinsons” made its Charlotte debut. This is rock climbing for people with Parkinson’s Disease (PD). You read that right! Well, I assume you read it right. I really have no way of actually knowing what you thought you read.

But, yes! Rock climbing for Parkies! This seemed like the perfect fit for me. I spent a lot of time during my twenties and very late teen years wandering northern Colorado, looking for rock formations to scale. So, about three months ago, I decided to try Up ENDing Parkinson’s.

Charlotte is not exactly known for cliffs, so this is actually an indoor, human-made climbing wall. Several such walls, even. And this is REAL climbing. With ropes and harnesses. I never bothered with such equipment when scrambling up remote rock formations in my foolhardy days of yore. On some of the climbing ‘routes’ they connect your rope to a machine that prevents you from plummeting if/when you lose your grip. On the rest, they connect your rope to a human “belayer” who stays on the ground while you climb. I imagine that if you fall, the belayer would be catapulted into the ceiling, though I haven’t seen that happen (yet).

I was amazed at my lack of energy and my overall weakness. However, I was assured by several people that it’s normal for folks to feel that way in the first session, and that most folks get past that quite quickly. I went back a week later, but actually felt weaker during that second session. I had planned to go again the following week, but decided I needed to use that time to finish plotting my Maryland trip. Then I was in Maryland for about two weeks ago. Then I started having, ummm, issues with the Vyalev pump. I’ll address that in my next post. For now, I continue to believe in Up ENDing Parkinsons, and intend to go back soon.