A Thorn in My Rose Garden
A Woman’s Journal Living With Parkinson’s
C. Claire Lucka
Copyright © 2012 Corinne C. Lucka
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2012-05-15
Dedication
This book is dedicated to my husband Tom for all of his love and support and for giving me a comfortable quiet place so I could write my story. Thank you.
And
To my best friend Pam for always standing by me all these years no matter what; for your friendship, love and encouragement.
and for both of you for having faith in me.
My Diagnosis
My husband and I were in our mid forties and were beginning to dream about retirement and slowing down. We were looking forward to that life together just the two of us. He was working for a rather large company as a field service person and I was a Corporate Paralegal.
My job at that time was constant stress and anxiety. I was in the center of a corporate office nightmare with SEC investigations, power plays and takeover attempts between officers and directors. I would walk down the hallway at work bumping into the walls as if I was intoxicated and trip every time I walked into my boss’s office. He could not figure out what was up with me and questioned me about it a couple of times.
The year was 2002. I was working for a rather fast-paced public company during the time of corporate takeovers, inappropriate stock trading, misappropriation of funds, creative financial reporting and other SEC reporting issues. My work became very intense, stressful and extremely demanding. I would describe my working conditions at times to be a “hostile working environment”.
It was during this period of time that I began to notice a general feeling of malaise. I frequently felt fatigued and a slowing down of both my energy and concentration levels at home and at work. I also developed allergy symptoms that I had not had before. All these symptoms noticeably increased in the number of times and length. I felt that something was not quite right, as if my immune system and general stamina had weakened. Commuting and working full-time became too much. There seemed to be never enough time or energy left at the end of the week to get housework and laundry done before it was time to go back to work again. I could not catch up. I became less able to manage my days and complete the tasks I had been able to do before. Because of my age then, we attributed this to getting older and menopause. It appeared that I needed to make some life changes. We still had both children living at home, the youngest in college; I was working full-time plus some overtime and commuting three hours a day, keeping house, etc.
It had been a nice relaxing July 4th weekend just Tom and I. We were sitting outside on the deck with the newspaper and a couple of drinks. I had been down in the yard trimming the rose bushes for about a half hour. Tom had said years before that he never promised me a rose garden but I got one. Thirteen beautiful rose bushes, a baker’s dozen. I could see them from the family room and the bay window in the master bedroom. The colors were gorgeous when they were in bloom. Anyway, Tom had shown me how to cut them so that they would grow long strong stalks for cuttings and keep them nice and showy. I sat down took my garden gloves off when at the same time we both noticed that my right index finger was “pill rolling” (what we learned later was the term they used to describe it) and I could not stop it from doing it. That is when my husband insisted that I see a doctor and find out what was going on with me.
I made an appointment with my doctor the following week. He checked me out, did a couple of what I know now to be Parkinson’s (“PD”) tests and scheduled me as soon as possible for a brain scan. Immediately thereafter, I was to take the results to a neurologist in the area he recommended.
I spent the entire week before this appointment trying to diagnosis my symptoms. My doctor had not said a word about what he thought my problem might be. It drove me crazy. Although I feared finding out, I knew I needed to know. I had come to the realization that there was something serious going on and I was scared.
My MRI took two hours. A long time when your head is in a lock down and you are not able to move. All while the sound of the tick, tick, tick, ticks of the machine continued. The technician apologized several times for having me so long, which he indicated was a bit unusual but that the doctor wanted several tests performed.
This just made me more nervous I thought to myself. ”What was happening to me?”
I finished the tests with no side effects and instructed the receptionist to make certain that the neurologist received the results before my appointment that afternoon. I had taken the day off for these tests. Now I had a few hours to think and wonder until I met with Dr. Williams.
Dr. Williams’ had a small office on the second floor of a medical building near where we lived. I walked in, filled the customary new patient forms, and sat. I was alone. Tom was out of town on business and would not be home until Friday. Dr. Williams made me feel very comfortable and proceeded to perform some of the same tests Dr. Jacobs had done plus a few more. Then he told me that he thought I had Parkinson’s. He explained that the brain scan did not indicate MS and that was a good thing. A million things ran through my head and I began to panic. All I knew about Parkinson’s was that old people had it and I did not think it was good.
Dr. Williams tried to calm me and said. “We don’t know for sure yet. Wait until we are certain. The only way to know for sure is for you to start taking a drug called Sinemet. If you notice a difference, that means it is working and you have Parkinson’s. If it does not work, well….”
He was sure that is what I had. … “And anyway Parkinson’s was better than having MS”, he offered, “because Michael J. Fox had Parkinson’s and that meant that he would be spending money towards finding a cure.”
I left his office in complete shock. When I got downstairs to my car, I started crying uncontrollably. I wanted to call Tom but he was working and I did not want to tell him until he got home face-to-face. I called Cathy, a good friend from work. She could barely understand what I was saying when I called. I was so upset. She managed to calm me down a little and I told her what the doctor had said. Then I drove home. I knew I could not share the news with anyone else until Tom got home on Friday. Therefore, I kept it to myself and tried to hide the feelings of panic and fear within me. I spent my 46th birthday on our front porch with a glass of Chardonnay tears pouring down my face. I could not stop crying.
I took my first Sinemet on Thursday morning and went to work as usual. It was hard to focus on working or to concentrate on anything other than what was happening. I could not wait for the day to end. Tom came home that night. Thank God. I told him what had happened at the doctor’s office and what Dr. Williams had said. He was supportive and calming. However, I knew he was scared for me too.
We went out to dinner that night to celebrate my birthday. Our daughter went with us. We had a wonderful dinner. For some reason we decided to tell her about my probable condition at the restaurant. Maybe it was because we were in a public place and could keep things lighter for all of us. She was visibly upset about it and was even angrier that we had shared the news with her at the restaurant. Since then, she hardly brings it up or asks me about it as if she has tried very hard not to think about it and go on as normally as possible.
On Friday morning, I took my second pill and went to work. By that afternoon, I felt like I had more energy. My friend Cathy also