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I see this all the time, and it drives me crazy! People walking around with their hands in their pockets regardless of whether it’s cold out or not. What’s so bad about walking with your hands in your pockets? Two of my friends have fallen while their hands were in their pockets. One lady was hiking, one hand in her pocket, and fell and broke her nose. The other was walking in the dark after a basketball game, didn’t see the curb, and fell and broke his jaw and teeth. Both individuals were in their 20’s and did not have Parkinson’s disease.

If you are standing or sitting it’s not terrible to have a hand in your pocket, but once you start moving you should pull your hands out and swing them by your sides. 

People with Parkinson’s are more likely to put a hand or two in their pockets because of a tremor. They feel like it either conceals the tremor or quiets it down. I understand the temptation, but it’s dangerous. 

My fighters and dancers often comment on how good they feel after our classes, and their family members notice that their mood is so much better on the days they attend. This isn’t true just for people with Parkinson’s, but with all of our group classes! It’s a fact, people who work out together are getting more bang for their buck.

Why? Because they are getting the physical benefit of the exercise for their bodies AND a psychological boost for their brain!

It breaks my heart to hear someone with PD say, “I’m getting plenty of exercise. I lift weights, ride my indoor/outdoor bike, and I walk every day.”

Do you hear what I hear?? “I have PD. I am choosing to go it alone, and hope what I am doing is right”.  

If you are working out in your home gym or just walking because those options are cheaper than going to a Parkinson’s group exercise class, you are choosing an expensive, high-risk way to exercise. Those are good options when you are traveling or on your days off from class (we’ll call it homework), but we highly recommend joining a class with professional instruction as your primary routine.

At one of our recent happy hours some of the fighters and I were discussing the benefits of nutritional aromatics (spices) and Parkinson’s disease. For example, there is scientific data to suggest that cinnamon seems to stop the progression of PD in mice. Unfortunately, the research showed no evidence that it slowed down PD in humans, but cinnamon is still a great antioxidant to add to food. For now, just keep the cinnamon on your spice rack instead of in your medicine cabinet. 

Toward the end of our happy hour discussion we were commenting on how good cinnamon rolls smell. It wasn’t long before we were talking about the Scottish woman who can smell Parkinson’s disease. This retired nurse, Joy Milne from Scotland, smelled a strong musky smell on her husband 10 years before his Parkinson’s diagnosis.

As an exercise physiologist and corrective movement specialist, I specialize in assisting people over 40, and my focus is (as you already know) Parkinson’s disease. I have many orthopedic clients that don’t have PD, but I see similar issues with postural malalignment. I love my personal clients because I can really get into the issues with their tissue.

Today we will address forward rounding and poor posture. I’m going to focus on PD because it is like accelerating aging. Stooped posture can cause serious stress on the joints resulting in neck, back, and jaw pain. It also creates a huge risk for falling as the body tries to “catch up” with the momentum of the forward flexing of the spine.