Thanks for your comment. Poorly managed symptoms can be very frustrating and painful. We hope you can find a treatment regimen with your doctor that improves your ON time. Let us know at blog@dpf.org if we can help.
Hey Janis, thanks for sharing. Happy to hear you can still drive an automatic. It's important to notice the subtle changes in everyday tasks like driving to keep safety as the first priority.
Kevin, I have been trying to figure out the dystonia for a long time, (fifteen years) turning over several hypotheses. Trying to rule out red herrings. It's still a mystery but green potatoes still is partly stuck in my mind, not completely ruled out, however another think unrelated to potassium, potatoes, copper overload, but a latency in acetylcholinesterase. Something not bridging the gap between my "points & plugs." So instead of the steady release chaser following acetylcholine, something blocks the acetylcholinesterase. Several hours later, its like it releases several blocked hits of it all in rapid succession which creates uncontrollable sleep, with an electrical sensation in my tongue and back and extremities, while all the rigid muscles and recent dystonic muscles at last relax, and I cannot maintain consciousness. I can wake up sooner from it if I don't try to fight it, and put myself in a safe area. If I fight the losing battle to stay awake, it can take hours to wake up sufficiently enough to safely navigate out. If I don't fight it, I only end up being knocked out for 15-30 minutes but it seems like it has been longer than it was. I have also considered fluoride and manganese overload, from the tap water. I try to keep in mind that correlation is not automatically cause. The idea of longstanding Parkinson's just kicking up its progression never entered my mind. As a child it did, when I recognized elderly people who shook like I did, sometimes, and they explained it was Parkinson's. Tremors would come and go with no way to explain. It's the dystonia I find most debilitating and the wrecked sleep.
