PD Drugs “On” vs. PD Drugs “Off”

On three occasions recently I had to go for long, seemingly interminable stretches of time without taking my PD drugs.  It’s shocking how quickly I became miserable and lame.

In two instances I was volunteering for clinical research on Parkinson’s disease at Columbia University.  The research required that I stop taking all my Parkie medications the afternoon before my appointments at the lab.  I showed up at Columbia the next morning, limping with a cane and totally stressed out.  The researchers put me through a few hours of cognitive tests, including many short- and long-term memory games.  I resumed taking my medicines after the experiments finished, in the early afternoon.

Then this past weekend, my pharmacy (CVS) miscalculated how many pills they had given me for one of my medicines, Ropinerole.  I went 48 hours without it until CVS finally fessed up to its error.

Q:  What’s the difference between being “on” Parkinson meds and being “off”?

A:  Let’s watch two video clips.

In the first clip, Daniel Craig does a superb job of showing what I’m like when the medicines are “on”:

• He sits at the gambling table, cool, calm, collected.
• His arms don’t tremble, even at rest.  No problem picking up the poker chips!
• He speaks fluently and cogently, and easily utters what he is thinking.
• At the end of the clip, he stands rock solid at the bar and smoothly, skillfully lifts the full martini glass to his lips.  There’s no tremor in his hand.  He doesn’t spill a drop.

(Side question:  Is Daniel Craig/James Bond gay?  He doesn’t seem the least bit interested in the woman slinking up to him at the bar, but he does seem to be cruising the guy across from him at the poker table.)

(Just asking.  I didn’t see the movie.)

In the second clip, the butler is me when my medications are “off”:

• He nearly falls over when the other man hands him his coat.
• He wobble-hobbles when he tries to walk.
• In general, he appears demented.

The difference for me is stark.

Gosh, I sure do love my Parkie meds!

And gosh, I sure do hate the way YouTube slips ads into these embedded snippets!