Hello, Joan:  Welcome to our group.  (The irony does not escape me here, as
the most common way to join such a privileged society is by an affliction.)
However, I read your message and thought I'd respond.
My name is Barb, 51yrs, diagnosed 2 yrs. ago.  I have a husband and 2 boys
aged 24 and 18.  I am a high school English teacher and plan to keep working
until I retire.  So I have to stay healthy.  The thing that interested me in
your description is that when I was nursing my youngest I,too, felt a
strange tingling sensation.  Not in my arm, actually, but in a particular
muscle in my back.  I asked doctors about it, but it didn't at the time seem
terribly important.  However, it was consistently there, and even today,
from time  to time, the tingling comes back.
To combat the heavy menstrual flow of my pre menopausal years, I've been
taking an estrogen pill called Minestrin.  It has the least amount of
estrogen of all the available comparable medication and therefore, one
expects, it would have the fewest side effects.  So far it has accomplished
the desired tasks and I'm proceeding at least through this changing time
quite easily.
My gynocoligist says that before my next appt. with him next year to get a
blood test on the day before my period is to begin.  Apparently this will
tell him whether or not I've gone through menopause.  (With the estrogen
pill you continue to menstruate and so the actual passage itself is veiled.)
However, my neurologist says that she wants me to continue with estrogen
replacement therapy because of the loss of calcium in the bones after
menopause, and she has cautioned me against the consequences of that with
the potential for falling.
I have also had bouts of depression.  I tried in vain to find a psychiatrist
who could help me accept what was at that time "the unacceptable" in my
life.  I have some funny and sad stories about my ventures in  that field.
But the short story is that I
didn't find one and was chillingly left alone to conclude that I would have
to do this emotional repair myself.  I started delving into "self help"
books.  I used to mistrust these with a passion.  But over time I've
developed a system  of selective reading where there are some ideas and
accounts of success that I accept and are helpful, some I reject totally,
and some I put in a ? box to be evaluated later.  With this method I've been
helped a lot by Bernie Siegel ("Love, Miracles and Medicine") and  Joan
Shimoda Bolen ("Close to the Bone")  Perhaps the ideas of these people will
give your grief a purpose and a direction as they did for my own.
I wish you the very best.  You have a "kickass" attitude as  my students
would say.
Good luck!      Barb

-----Original Message-----
From: Stan Snyder <[log in to unmask]>
To: Multiple recipients of list PARKINSN <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Saturday, June 20, 1998 9:47 PM
Subject: ...to introduce myself


>Hi-my name is Joan. I am 46 yrs. old and have been diagnosed with PD for
>about 8. I am a busy wife and the mother of 2 kids; Ali is 10 & Mitch is
>8. The first inkling that something wasn't quite right happened when I
>was nursing Ali & I noticed that my right arm was "tingley." I
>attritubuted the sensation to laying  on the arm while I nursed but soon
>I was pregnant with Mitch and much too busy to pay attention. 8 months
>after he was born, my husband was activated for Desert Storm. It was
>while a girlfriend was videotaping homemovies to send to dad that
>she noticed that my right arm didn't move when I walked. Anyway-to make
>a long
>story short-I have undergone 2 pallidotomies: the 1st was a smashing
>success, however, during the 2nd operation, the surgeon hit a small
>artary in my brain, causing it to hemorrage. When I came home, I
>couldn't walk or talk, feed myself or bathe. The doctor told me later
>that he had serious doubts that I would ever make it back mentally.
>Altho I suprised him & everyone else-mentally; physically
>has been a different story. We lost all the ground that we had derived
>from the 1st
>operation: my symptoms are very pronounced when I am "off"-I am bone
>weary,
>I tremor on both sides, my jaw tremors and I grind my teeth; I am rigid
>& I get stuck alot or else I am losing my balance and crashing around
>like a pinball! Last
>month, I became very depressed and almost lost heart for the first time,
>but luckily my neurologist and, oddly enough, my gynochologist were able
>to help me
>with my meds. I am now taking Zoloft for my depression and am weaning
>myself off of adivan which was prescribed for anxiety. The suprising
>thing is that after my gynochologist prescribed estrogene, my "off"
>times don't last nearly as long; the symptoms aren't nearly as intense &
>sometimes I even feel like a new person!
>I would like to talk to other pre-menopausal women with PD and, without
>getting
>too graphic, learn about their special problems. This has been a goal of
>mine for a long time & I thank you all for the opportunity to use this
>forum to learn more
>about the disease which is robbing me of my ability to live the life
>that I want, but which has opened plenty of windows while slamming
>doors!  Joan
>