There is an online resource called “Parkinson’s News Today” that hosts forums for People with Parkinson’s as well as for those of us who love them. They recently posed the question in their forum for Caregivers “what is your greatest challenge?” and were surprised when most responded that watching their Person with Parkinson’s decline as symptoms progress was the worst thing ever. I wasn’t surprised at all, I live it every day.

When my husband was first diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease, I was heartbroken. I had seen my father go through this and wasn’t ready to face it again. As my husband’s symptoms progressed, I saw that our journey was going to be different. Things moved more slowly but the tremors and stiffness eventually took away his ability to work, his ability to drive, even challenged his ability to dress and feed himself. Life became hard for both of us. His philosophy has always been to look at what he can do, not what he can’t. Unfortunately, I am not as good at seeing the glass half full, I see the challenges and grieve for our loss.

We have been given somewhat of a reprieve thanks to Deep Brain Stimulation. It took 10 years for him to decide to give it a try and it has been life changing. Once again, I see things that I had been missing, most notably his smiles. Yes, we are still facing challenges, but they are more manageable and I am starting to feel a little more optimistic as we are able to resume some of our activities. Yet I do wonder what life could have been like as I continue to work through the heartache of PD.