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Dick has asked me to toss this question out to the list members:  Has anyone
had trouble with what he describes as "mental freezing"?  Based on his
description of this mental freezing, I'd say it's exactly the same as when
someone says, "My mind's a blank."

Dick is experiencing more actual physical freezing, more bradykinesia, and
more brady-
phrenia (slow thinking), and associates the "mental freezing" with these
symptoms.  It tends to occur when he's under stress.  For example, today he
was asked to speak at another support group about his surgery.  He had
difficulty forming his thoughts, and also had difficulty hanging onto the
thread of the conversation.  Then at least a couple of times he experienced
the mental freezing.

Another example of when this has occurred was on the phone with a
particularly pushy salesperson who wouldn't take no for an answer.  He found
the call so stressful that he suddenly froze and couldn't say a thing.  The
woman finally conculded he had hung up on her - as it turned out, a pretty
effective way to get rid of her!

Can anyone tell us whether this could be a normal reaction to stress, i.e.,
unrelated to PD, or whether this is indeed related to bradyphrenia or some
other facet of PD?

Thanks for any info you can give us.  Margie Swindler  (cg for Dick, 52/15)
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