Our plan for retirement was to travel. I envisioned cruises, group tours, road trips and exotic destinations. I did not expect that we would have a third partner called Parkinson’s along on the trips. Needless to say, this additional party has meant that we must plan more carefully and be ready to adapt to challenges that pop up along the way. It has definitely limited what we do, where and how we go.

My husband no longer drives so the long road trips we discussed mean that I get to spend hours behind the wheel and he is the passenger. Getting in and out of the car can be challenging and then we add the fact that he is sitting for extended period of time and it gets worse. As a matter of fact, sitting too long in a car, on a plane, train, bus or boat is difficult for both of us, we need to be able to get up and move around. Otherwise, we need to add a day to either end of trips to allow for recovery from the travel ordeal itself.

We can still go places as long as we understand that things can change and do our best to be prepared. If we talk about the challenges we might face, we can be ready for them if they happen. We do our best to plan shorter fights with layovers that force us to get up and move. We don’t try to drive straight through to long destinations, instead planning shorter legs to the trip with carefully thought about how many stops to make. We accept that life is not what we expected it to be, but also that it can still be what we want it to be as long as we are willing to adapt and keep on trying. Who knows what wonderful and exotic things we may find as we modify our travel to be closer to home?