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hi all At 19:34 1999/06/03 -0500, wendy wrote, in part: >... I am a new member who was diagnosed with Parkinson's in January >and confirmed in April. I am a 37 year old female. I had severe >tremors back in October and saw a local neurologist. I had 2 MRI's, >2 Cats Scans, Spinal Tap and he found nothing said it was stress >and sent me to a psychiatrist. Which I went, but also made an >appointment with another Dr. who is a Movement Disorder Specialist. >I met with him for about 1 hour and he diagnosed Parkinson's. for any newly-diagnosed person with parkinsons my unsolicited advice is - learn all you can! fear stems from ignorance knowledge is power aside from subscribing to this list, i recommend reading three items in particular: follow the trail on my site from "pienet" to "words" to "nuggets" to "pd for newbies" ... oh heck, here's the direct URL: pd basics 101 for newbies <http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Village/6263/pienet/words/np990213.html> bravo to you for your persistence a lot of us 'get the runaround' when it comes to diagnosis because 'we are too young' i had 'a bad case of nerves' 'too much stress' 'not enough exercise' and finally a 'pinched disk in my neck' before finally being diagnosed all those scans don't actually diagnose pd [yet]: they just rule out other possibilities >I started Mirapex at .25 3x's a day and worked up to .50 and met >with Dr. again. After taking the Mirapex he said he saw a good >improvement in movements etc. Increased the Mirapex to 1.0 3x's >a day which was to much, became confused and lost my car at lunch >time, came home and slept for 2 to 3 hours. Backed the 11:00 a.m. >dose down to .75 this helped me get through the day.... you've learned one of the critical lessons early part a. titration part b. low and part c. slow "messing" with our brain chemistry can produce amazing responses physical, mental, emotional, cognitive, you name it >The tremor for the most part has stopped I still have a hard >time moving first thing in the morning after about 1/2 hour >after med's I am good to go... it's good that you are getting a reasonable response without sinemet the longer you can function well without it, the better [but the operative word here is 'well'] you appear to have the 'tremor' type while i have the 'rigidity' type the main symptoms are now considered to be: 1. rigidity 2. slowness of movement 3. tremor 4. balance problems 5. fatigue we may manifest one or two or all of them to varying degrees [i rarely, if ever, manifest tremors, but rigidity, oy!] >If I do get stressed out about >something the tremor comes right back... yep yep yep! we are more vulnerable to stress and any other emotional situation [positive or negative] >It is interesting many of you have been writing about sweating. >I have been complaining about this for the last 2 years, and >headaches and balance. Again Dr's said it was just stress.... nope nope nope! the thermo-regulation difficulties are a definite proven [not anecdotal] secondary symptom i don't know about the headaches that could possibly be due to worry about your [undiagnosed] condition and also maybe to muscle tension associated with pd >It is great to hear all your experiences... it's great to hear from you too welcome to the cyber-family! your input has only reinforced [for me] what i posted to annie earlier: a competent up-to-date parkinson-specializing movement-disorder-oriented neurologist is just the ticket! but why can't we ever find one when we need one??!! janet janet paterson 52 now: 41 dx: 37 onset Mail address: PO Box 171 Almonte Ontario K0A 1A0 Canada Web-site: http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Village/6263/ E-mail: [log in to unmask]