It's a moody Manitoba morning

I compare PD to a game of Snakes and Ladders, the snakes being the symptoms that can be very rude and the ladders are the recovery from those symptoms. My encounter with PD has been a series of suffering and recovering, down the snakes and up the ladders. Fortunately, so far at least, for every snake, there has been a ladder but, unfortunately for every ladder, I have slipped down a snake. Let me count the ways:

1. Trouble swallowing (snake). Lasted about 3 weeks, disappeared and has not returned (ladder)
2. Exhaustion to the nth degree (SN) Yes, but an hour's nap revives me until around bedtime (LA)
3. excessive saliva making me slur and spit out my words (SN) Now excessively dry mouth is my constant companion (due to medication). Thank goodness for Biotene spray / toothpaste, that relieve dry mouth (LA)
4. Inability to find words when speaking (SN)has led me to write out my thoughts wherein I have no inability (LA)
5. Right hand shaking (SN)drugs keep it quiet,

Now for the ladders

1. Amantadine is a great drug for me - works wonders!(LA) The manufacturer has slowed production, making it difficult to obtain(SN)
2. No sense of smell - makes it easier to be around my granddaughter when her diaper needs changing (LA) I can't smell food, flowers, gas, etc. (SN)
3. constipation - yes, believe it or not - I used to suffer from the other end of the "poop" spectrum. Now I can exercise without having to have a bathroom nearby (LA)By the 3rd day, voiding becomes unpleasant to say the least.(SN)

These symptoms come and go and are unpredictable. This appears to be a good thing. I suffered greatly at first, but now, right at this moment, I am feeling quite normal and to boost my normality I have reasoned the following:

• hallucinations outside, early morning, are either caused by darkness and shadows in the moonlight or an overactive imagination.
  
• Hallucinations inside are always out of my right eye and are early in the morning when I am concentrating on the daily crossword. The right eye that was subjected to laser surgery, left many "floaters" -ie - lines and shapes that float around somewhere in the eyeball. I have decided that these floaters fool my mind into seeing microsecond apparitions and they are not hallucinations.

Of course, I can't explain nonexistent barking dogs, or someone walking on my bed, or an astronaut floating beside me, except to conclude I was dreaming.

The best thing about dreams is in that special moment, when you are between asleep and awake; when you don't know the difference between reality and fantasy; when, for just that fleeting second, you believe, without a doubt, that the dream was reality, and it really happened.

That about sums up my preference for dreaming, for unreality that you hope will become real.

In fact, I am thinking about going for my nap, right now, to dream about snakes turning into ladders.

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