Wow . . . two years since my last blog post. Time sure does fly. No excuses actually, I was just pretty well wrapped up in my career and other personal adventures.
Needless to say, a tremendous amount of ‘stuff’ has obviously
happened since 2018 – from a lying, narcissistic, incompetent idiot in the White
House (who fortunately was told to GTFO during the November election) to the devastation wrought by the coronavirus pandemic, a disease that has
brought the world to its collective knees. Like the events of September 11th, I’m sure and I fear that life as we
knew it will be dramatically changed. Hopefully, in time we will be able to recover
and return to some semblance of normalcy.
And then there are the personal
changes that have had a major impact on my life. I spent most of the summer on
2018 fighting massive western wildfires and then assisting in the recovery
effort. 2019 was, for the most part, routine and basically uneventful. 2020 however
was personally, another story.
We are currently witnessing the
terrible effects of the COVID 19 pandemic and the horrible impact it has had on
so many people. As of this writing over 500 thousand Americans have died. I
have been fortunate in that in my position, I was considered ‘essential’ so thankfully,
I remained fully employed. I’ve also practiced the necessary safeguards of mask
wearing, social distancing and staying sequestered from the rest of the world which
has, so far, kept me virus free.
But my health still took a major
hit this year. In February of 2020, I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease . . . and
not just PD, an ADVANCED stage of Parkinson’s! How could this have happened? In
my entire adult life, other than the occasional cold here and there, I had
always been the picture of health. I was incredulous . . . until I looked back
at those subtle, missed signs.
The muscle stiffness, the
microscopic penmanship, and the lack of arm swing were overlooked warning signs
which are also early tell-tale symptoms of PD.
The twitching finger on my left hand was probably the big one which should have raised a red flag. I ignored it but so did the many doctors who, when asked during routine physicals, wrote the issue off to ‘essential tremors’ . . . which are not uncommon.
So there it is . . . my disability: a progressive, incurable neurodegenerative disease that affects millions worldwide. I can deal with the tremors and the other stuff but it is the 'freezing of gait' that is my biggest challenge.
What exactly is Freezing of Gait (aka FOG)? Well, plain and simple it is when my brain tells my feet to go forward but my feet say "nope . . . not gonna do it" and I'm left with the sensation of my feet being glued to the floor. The problem, actually the danger, is that while my feet may not move, the rest of my body didn't get the memo and actually tries to move forward, expecting to take a step which doesn't come. This can result in a fall . . . which I have done more times than I'd like to say.
The most common forms of freezing are seen with initiating gait (start hesitation) and during turning. Freezing may also be caused by the presence of a visible obstacle in the path, a change in the pattern of design on the floor, walking in narrow spaces or crowds, or being rushed or startled
TO BE CONTINUED . . . .
