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Jeremy Browne <[log in to unmask]> wrote: <<<<<<Subject: Re: HELP IN THE UK Hi Sara > My father, who is 75 has just been diagnosed with Parkinsons Disease. > ... a second neurologist has now suggested Parkinsons > disease. The one confusing thing is that he is experiencing > a lot of pain in his legs, and is being told that this is not > normally a symptom of Parkinsons, Well, yes, pain is not normally a symptom of PD. However, one of the major symptoms IS rigidity, and some of us find that can cause pain, because the muscles tighten up so much that it causes aches.>>>>>> I find this doctor and Jeremy and some others saying that pain is not a symptom of PD to not be accurate. My initial visit to the doctors was a "fishing expedition" to ascertain what was cauaing my right arm to ache and become so rigid and uncontrollable when I wrote memos or worked at the computer or keypunch machine (old style way to talk to computer). also, my right leg was painful every time I drove to Los Angeles vicinity or any long trip - if the car had no cruise control. If pain was not a symptom, none of the people of my disposition would ever get dioagnosed for Parkinsonism. I find the data base overall to be unmeasurably more competence in the evolved chemistry that my genes cause in me - relative to knowing how to keep my body functoning - than ALL the expertise of all the shamans, witch doctors, sawbones, and MDs, Nd PHDs that have lived in all history. I certainly have not done everything that was the optimum choice in treating my self well. The environs of my lowest middle class childhood had a few blows that I sustained. Besides beating the odds of living long enough to get almost thru the 5th grade, typhoid fever that I developed then nearly killed me. I have been lucky for many of my 60 years, but not wise enough to be competent to the best in every sphere of knowledge acquiral. I worked hard most of my life - not as much work got done by a skinny, weakling who lost forty pounds and a full summer's growth by being in bed and doing nearly nothing. My intestinal flora were probably gone before I started eating a little mush etc. I am rambling too long but my point was too try to elaborate that pain was not a rarity when working or competing - it became constant and prevented me from doing the least work - before I felt bad enough long enough to get the medical check-up thorough version. The pain is a symptom. The old age gets us too. My father had pain numerous times and so did his father. Grampa Vetter died @ 91 - of Parkinson induced complications - never diagnosed. His brother (1 of 6 or 8? boys born bdfore their father died - 2 daughters to the second husband) had "Shaking Palsy". His was eventually the very whole body variety. My father was taken aback when one of his aunts told him during a visit that she was "not good for anything any more - could not hoe in the garden for more than 8 hours a day" - she was 80 years old then! Not everybody has pain tolerance. Not everyone reports symptoms of pain - some say I cannot do anything like I used to do things. Aches and pains are daily while working if you are not used to hard work. but, when they happen after a short period of work - and the ache is there for a day or a week, this discourages exertion. -- ron 1936, dz PD 1984 Ridgecrest, California Ronald F. Vetter <[log in to unmask]> http://www.ridgecrest.ca.us/~rfvetter