Why , when i'm at peak dose is my festinating gait and balance at their worst?

[Isthistheone]

Too much L-dopa triggers more sustainable movement

[JohnPepper]

Have you tried using your conscious brain to control your movements?

I am not joking!

Do this test: -

With somebody holding one of your arms to prevent you from falling;

1. Place all your weight on your left leg

2. see how far you can lift your right leg straight up in front of you. Just relax and let that right leg swing backwards and forwards.

3. Place your weight on your right foot and do the same as above with your left leg.

4. With somebody holding your shoulders from behind; see how far you can swing your arms up, and continue to relax and swing them backwards and forwards.

If you managed to do these actions, did you at any time FREEZE?

My guess is you didn't.

What happened was that you were using your conscious brain to do those exercises, but you naturally use your subconscious brain to walk, because you have never had to think about how you walk.

NOW, Pd has changed all that and if you want to immediately walk properly you can get someone to hold your arm and then consciously place your weight on your left leg then lift your right leg up and place it out in front of you and land on the heel of the right foot. Then, without stopping. with your weight now on your right foot, lift the left foot off the ground and move it forward as far as you can and place the heel of that foot onto the ground.

You are now walking consiously.

If you stop concentrating on what you are doing you will immediately slip back to the subconscious walking and FREEZE!

Practice this and try to walk consciously all the time.

[Bundoran in reply to JohnPepper]

I only half-agree with this as there is just so much going on in walking that its impossible to consciously think of it all at any one time. I find it best to concentrate on one aspect of walking at a time, like arm swing or long-stride or hip-extension. There is almost an infinite amount of ways you can go about it.

One very good method is to use a metronome, you can get one on to your phone easy enough. Try either a 3-beat or 4-beat, although 4 beat is better to start. Its amazing how the pulse drives you forward.

[JohnPepper in reply to Bundoran]

I agree with you! I constantly do an all-round check - landing on heels - pushing with toes - posture - swinging arms - back to Heels.

It is amazing how often I have to rectify bad performance.

[LindaP50]

My husband starting both freezing and festinating - hard to watch him walk - then he'd lose balance and either fall or do a slide down fall. No damage to body! Dr adjusted his carbidopa/levodopa from 25/125 to 25/250 (3x daily).

Enrolled in LSVT - big and loud - speech and physical therapy. Teaching him to do big steps. He did read John Pepper's information a couple of years ago but his back hurt him too much to walk/stand any time or distance. (Thank you again John for the info.)

He's near the end of his LSVT sessions and making improvements with voice and taking big steps when walking (instead of a shuffle). Does exercises daily at home. Well worth the time and effort.

LSVT - lsvtglobal.com/