<h1>Do not go gently into that dark night</h1>

I got bad news today. An acquaintance of mine died from complications due to PD and Parkinson's Dementia. He was hit hard, right from the beginning several years ago. Every man's death diminishes me, but especially the loss of the active, athletic man I knew in our younger days.

Reliable reports I have read state that 20% of PWP will suffer from dementia. Not bad odds. I have decided I will be among the 80% who don't have, and won't get, dementia.

There is Parkinson's dementia and then there is Lewy body dementia which is related to PD. Lewy bodies! That is PD on steroids. Avoid at all costs.

Parkinson's with Lewy bodies (probably the cause of Robin William's losing battle) differ from Parkinson's dementia. Lewy body dementia is usually diagnosed when the victim is first defined as a PWP, while Parkinson's dementia will be the diagnosis after the PWP has suffered from Parkinson's for several years (although it can show itself in as little as a year after PD symptoms arise.) To put it more succinctly, with Lewy body Parkinson's, the PD symptoms arise after dementia shows up, while with Parkinson's dementia, the PD symptoms arise before the dementia is diagnosed.

Personally, I don't deal with the future much, except to acknowledge the possibility that I might go into the blackness of dementia sometime down the road.

But my brain immediately rules out any talk of dementia. Don't be ridiculous! I tell myself. It will never happen. I mean, after 7 years, nobody notices I have PD, especially if I don't talk. The only other way PD has hit me is that it has made life more difficult. I can live with that. It is true that I move at glacial speed but my mind, well I think I am still quite _______ (you fill in the adjective).

Maybe I am delusional