Living with Parkinson's doesn't have to slow you down. In this episode of the Live Parkinson's - Live and Exceptional Life podcast, we'll explore five easy daily habits you can incorporate into your daily routine to maximize your success and well-being.
Join us as we discuss the power of:
Exercise: Regular movement can improve your mood, balance, and coordination. We'll share tips on finding an exercise routine that fits your lifestyle.
Mindfulness: Learn how mindfulness practices like meditation can help manage stress, improve focus, and enhance your overall well-being.
Nutrition: Discover the link between food and your energy levels and mood. We'll provide tips on creating a healthy and delicious diet for Parkinson's.
Positivity/Optimism: Maintaining a positive outlook is key to navigating challenges. We'll share strategies for cultivating optimism and resilience.
Social Interaction/Social Relationships: Strong social connections are essential for emotional and mental well-being. Learn how to stay connected and build a supportive network.
By incorporating these simple yet powerful habits into your daily routine, you can take charge of your day and live a more fulfilling life with Parkinson's.
Get The FREE Parkinson's Symptom Tracker to help you prepare for your next doctor visit. Visit Fanlist.com/liveparkinsonslife to share your success stories on these strategies as well as the strategies that have worked for you. I'd love to hear from you.
Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational purposes only is not intended to treat or diagnose Parkinson's Disease. Please ensure that you are following the treatment plan developed by your doctor. Please ensure before starting anything new you get approval from your doctor. The information being provided is based on my own personal experiences and does not guarantee that it will benefit everyone.
Living with Parkinson's doesn't have to slow you down. In this episode of the Live Parkinson's - Live and Exceptional Life podcast, we'll explore five easy daily habits you can incorporate into your daily routine to maximize your success and well-being.
Join us as we discuss the power of:
Exercise: Regular movement can improve your mood, balance, and coordination. We'll share tips on finding an exercise routine that fits your lifestyle.
Mindfulness: Learn how mindfulness practices like meditation can help manage stress, improve focus, and enhance your overall well-being.
Nutrition: Discover the link between food and your energy levels and mood. We'll provide tips on creating a healthy and delicious diet for Parkinson's.
Positivity/Optimism: Maintaining a positive outlook is key to navigating challenges. We'll share strategies for cultivating optimism and resilience.
Social Interaction/Social Relationships: Strong social connections are essential for emotional and mental well-being. Learn how to stay connected and build a supportive network.
By incorporating these simple yet powerful habits into your daily routine, you can take charge of your day and live a more fulfilling life with Parkinson's.
Get The FREE Parkinson's Symptom Tracker to help you prepare for your next doctor visit. Visit Fanlist.com/liveparkinsonslife to share your success stories on these strategies as well as the strategies that have worked for you. I'd love to hear from you.
Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational purposes only is not intended to treat or diagnose Parkinson's Disease. Please ensure that you are following the treatment plan developed by your doctor. Please ensure before starting anything new you get approval from your doctor. The information being provided is based on my own personal experiences and does not guarantee that it will benefit everyone.
Hello and welcome to Live Parkinson's Live an Exceptional Life. I'm your host, chris Custombotter, and I've been living an exceptional life with Parkinson's for the past 14 years. The mission of this podcast is to help as many people living with Parkinson's live a great quality of life as possible. Today's topic is daily strategies for living a great quality of life with Parkinson's. Fromers got you down? Do you have difficulty getting dressed? We've all been there. Now in this podcast, we're going to explore simple yet effective daily strategies to help you manage your Parkinson's symptoms and reclaim not only your morning, but your day as well. These strategies will keep you moving. Stay with us as we share strategies that keep you engaged and active in all of your social activities and household responsibilities. Now, I know most of us have a lot of different challenges with Parkinson's when we wake up in the morning, and a lot of the challenges that we experience are related to both mobility and flexibility issues. So in this episode, I want to share five specific strategies that I use on a daily basis to help me have a great day and a great quality of life with Parkinson's, and also great weeks and great years. There's simple strategies that you can use in your repertoire at home to help you live a great quality of life as well. These aren't anything expensive. These are things that you can do on your own or with the help of your caregiver, but they're going to provide really great results in the long run for you if you do them on a consistent basis.
Speaker 1:
What are we going to be talking about today? Well, the first thing I want to go over is talk about living well with Parkinson's and some of the core principles that I use to help me do that. Then we'll talk about optimizing our daily activities, and we'll start with our morning routine and some of the things that you can do to help ease some of the challenges that we often face in the morning when we wake up, and then we'll talk a little bit about meal preparation and eating. So, once we've got up and moved around, we're going to look at eating breakfast a great, high quality breakfast to help provide energy for us throughout the day. So we'll talk about some strategies that we can use there, and then we'll talk about the five strategies that I use and hopefully, that you can employ to help you as well, and they are exercise, mindfulness, nutrition, positivity and optimism and social interaction. But I'm going to go into a lot more specifics on each one and provide you some actionable steps for each particular piece that will hopefully give you a great quality of life and help you throughout the day so that you don't become bogged down with fatigue and you're tired and you don't get to do a lot of the activities that you want. And, especially, we want to prevent any type of social isolation by dropping out of different activities that you've enjoyed.
Speaker 1:
So let's start out by living well with Parkinson's. What are some of the core principles that can help us have a great quality of life during the day? Well, one is to start out with a positive attitude. So it's important to have a good mindset and be grateful for some of the things that we have in our lives. Be our caregiver could be spouse, family One of the things I'm grateful for. My son, daughter-in-law, just had our first grandchild, bonnie, and that's been a true blessing in our lives and we're just keeps you in a positive mindset throughout the day and wants to make you do things that are going to keep you healthy and be able to spend more time with your kids and grandkids.
Speaker 1:
The second one is make sure that you collaborate with both your healthcare team for your medication management. It's important to help you make sure that you're taking the right medications on the right dosing schedule to help you control your symptoms, and one of the ways you can do that is a symptom tracker, and I actually did a podcast on preparing for your doctor visit and I talk about a symptom tracker in there. So, if you're interested, that's a great way to be able to sit down with your doctor and talk about ways that you can ensure that you take the appropriate medication on the right timing to help you stay consistent. And then open communication with family and friends is the third one Important that we make sure that we communicate with our family and friends to get the support that we need. Now I'm going to be completely honest with you. I am not the best person for this particular thing, because I hate to bother people and I feel like I'm taking up their time and I don't want to be a nuisance, and therefore a lot of times I don't ask for support when I need support, and that's a shortfall on my part, because family and friends are always there to support you and take advantage of it. When you need it, they're more than willing to give you a hand. So those are the three core principles for living well with Parkinson's that we wanted to start off with.
Speaker 1:
Now let's talk about optimizing our day's activity and then we'll get into the strategies from there. Let's start off with our morning routine. The key is to plan ahead, and one of the ways to do that is to have your medications available and close by, so that you're prepared when you're stiff and your ability to enrich it in the morning and your ability to move is not what it should be. If you're able to locate your medications close by and can take your medications and then wait for them to kick in and then get up and start to be more active, that'll help prevent falls as well. Then, once you've taken your medication, one of the things that I like to do is do some light stretching exercises to help, number one with my mobility, but number two with my flexibility as well. Some of the exercises that I do, I will straighten one leg and keep my foot towards me and I'll bend my other knee to stretch my hamstrings, and then I'll do that on both sides and then I'll lightly bend over and reach for my toes, and then I will do some calf stretches as well by lifting my heels off the ground. So those are some ways that you can do some light stretching exercises to help you feel a little bit more limber and get moving.
Speaker 1:
And then, in addition, you can use assistive devices for dressing. So if you set your clothes out the night before, that makes it a lot easier on you when you're getting ready in the morning, so you don't have to try to figure out what you're going to wear or where things are located. And then, in terms of assistive devices that can help you with your dressing, there's button extenders. There's slip on shoes. Now, I'm big on slip on shoes. I wear a lot of the Skechers shoes because I can just I don't have to worry about tying shoes when my fine motor skills are giving me problems or when I have tremor. I can just simply slip the shoes on and away I go. And then, in addition, there's a long shoehorn. So if you have trouble getting your shoes on, you can use this long shoehorn to help put your heel into the shoe. And then, if you're going to a fancy event, there's also clip on ties. There's some of the things that you can use to help you get ready for the day.
Speaker 1:
But if you set your things out the night before and get ready, then you're all set to go, because I know my wife's always laughing at me because I can't match anything. She'll always say you're not going out in that, or you and I always say, oh, absolutely not, I'm just taking it for a test drive. So if I can set it out the night before, I can ask her does this match and does this go together? And then she'll tell me and then I can. Then I'm all set to start the day off. So if planning ahead is key for your morning routine, all right. So now, once we've taken our medication and once we've done a little bit of stretching and we have our clothes set out, and we're all dressed and ready to go. Now it's time for breakfast.
Speaker 1:
So let's talk a little bit about meal preparation and eating. What you want to make sure you do is you want to choose healthy foods that are going to give you energy throughout the day and that are going to last for a while, so that you're not hungry an hour after you eat, and those would include things like dairy products, like cottage cheese, yogurt and eggs, and then you can also include whole grains, whole grain toast with a little bit of butter, peanut butter or some jam or jelly on there, and or oatmeal is a great source of fiber as well. If you can get yourself some still cut oatmeal or the ones that aren't the quick oats, they're going to give you a larger amount of fiber. And then, when possible, after you've sat down and you've got your meal in front of you, they do make larger utensils with larger handles in larger place that can help you manage your food. So if you have difficulty with fine motor skills or you have a lot of tremors, the large utensils can really be a benefit. For instance, I can be an example. My mom was in a skilled nursing unit after she had a urinary tract infection and they gave her large utensils and she was able to use those effectively and they really helped her in terms of eating and you don't have to worry about being dependent on somebody else.
Speaker 1:
Another key is when you're eating, eat slow, take nice small bites and make sure you chew thoroughly so you don't. That's not a choking hazard. So take your time and enjoy your food and then, once you've eaten your breakfast now you're all set to go and you've got some great quality food in you that's going to give you energy throughout the day. After breakfast we can go on to staying active, and we want to make sure that we exercise. Yeah, that's right. I said the evil word again exercise. And every time I say exercise, I know there's people that dread exercise and think to themselves oh, I don't want to exercise, I hate the exercise. Well, exercise is going to help you manage your Parkinson's symptoms, and the more consistent you are with the exercise, the better off you're going to be in terms of both mobility, flexibility and balance. So exercise is very, very important. I can't stress that enough.
Speaker 1:
Now the key is again with exercise make sure that you select things that you enjoy doing. If you don't like to swim, then don't say I'm going to swim a half a mile every day because you won't do it. You won't do it. But if you like to walk, then find a walking partner, whether it be someone in your family or a friend. Put those walking shoes on, release up your sneakers and away you go. You're all set to walk, and there's a lot of different options for exercise out there, and one of the best ways to find out what's most appropriate for you is to ask your doctor or a physical therapist to say, hey, I want to get into exercise because I know it's going to be beneficial for me. Can you recommend some exercises that would be good for me? And they'll know, based on your symptoms and your treatment plan, which are some good options. You want to include aerobic exercises in there. Those are the ones that get your heart rate up, so that one include walking, jogging, cycling, swimming. But there's also exercises that help to target Parkinson's and help with Parkinson's symptoms. Tai Chi, yoga, walking are all good examples. But they're all involved in helping you with your balance, helping you maintain your strong core and maintain being able to stand up right. But also, you want to make sure that you include in your exercise program flexibility exercises and strength training.
Speaker 1:
A lot of people think oh, strength training, I'm going to have to go to the gym and lift weights with all these big meat heads and I'm going to be embarrassed. I can't go to the gym and try to lift weights, I'm going to embarrass myself. Well, you don't have to go to the gym, you can. Or fitness center. There's a lot of household items that you can use at home. For instance, you can use cans of beans or another type of can good to do bicep curls, tricep extensions, shoulder presses, flies, rows. You can use luggage empty luggage to do squats and then stand up with those. You can use bands to help with different types of flexibility exercises. So there's a lot of different things you can do with just common household items and for strength training, so you don't have to go to the gym and worry about being embarrassed because you have to lift heavy weights in front of other people.
Speaker 1:
And then the other thing you want to make sure that you incorporate is flexibility, and you want, because that's going to help you the more flexible you are. That's going to help you with your balance, it's going to help you with your mobility, and that involves stretching exercises. So, if possible, take a group fitness class that involves a lot of stretching, whether it be yoga or Pilates class, and they can make modifications to suit your particular needs. So don't go in and think, oh, I have to be able to keep up with everybody else because you don't. I'm going to give you several different modifications that you can use to help you along the way to make sure that you're getting the exercise you need, but it's based on your physical capabilities.
Speaker 1:
And then, finally, balance. Make sure you do balance exercises. I try to do balance exercises for five to 10 minutes every day, and the reason I do that is when I have good balance, I have a strong core and it helps me prevent falls. There's been a number of times where I've tripped but was able to catch myself. Or we have two boxer dogs that we rescue from adopt a boxer rescue and a lot of times I'll turn around and want to be standing right behind me and if I'm not careful I can fall. But by working on my balance, I'm able to make sure that I don't fall and hurt myself. So that's exercise. So exercise is very important. Again, it's one of the key pillars that you really need to incorporate. I'm not trying not to preach to the choir, but it's very important that you incorporate exercise into your daily strategies. It's going to help you give you a great day and a great quality of life.
Speaker 1:
Now the next thing is mindfulness. Now, mindfulness is being able to stay in the moment and to help reduce stress and anxiety and depression. There's a lot of data out there that about 50% of people with Parkinson's experience anxiety and depression. So if you're experiencing anxiety and depression. A lot of times it's related to stress or it's related to that you're worrying about symptoms and how you're embarrassed that you're going to have to go out in public. So mindfulness techniques are used to help reduce the stress level and help try to stave off anxiety and depression.
Speaker 1:
Now, mindfulness encompasses a lot of different things. One of them is meditation, and meditation is focusing on it could be a particular word, it could be a particular thought and work be focused on your breathing. There's a lot of great apps out there. I think Calm is one of the ones that I'm familiar with, but there's a lot of other great apps that you can use to help walk you through meditative sessions so that you can reduce your stress and feel good throughout the day and you don't have to worry about. It helps to take some of that anxiety away.
Speaker 1:
Another is deep breathing, and that's focusing on counting in one, two, three, four, holding your breath and then letting out one, two, three, four, and you can do that in an eight count as well. But deep breathing is going to help teach you to slow your breathing down, because what happens a lot of times when we become anxious or we become panicky, the first thing we do is we start to shallow breathe. So we're breathing out of our chest instead of out of our lungs, in our in our abdomen. So deep breathing techniques help you to slow your breathing down and take nice deep breaths, and when you do that it tells your mind, in your brain, that there's no danger here. So it's okay to calm down and relax, because typically what happens is when you start to get anxious or you become very nervous, you start to get into a cycle where you start feeding that anxiousness by saying, well, what if this happens? Or what if that happens? And then it releases more stress hormones and then pretty soon you're into a full blown panic attack. But if you can use deep breathing techniques to slow your breathing down, it tells your brain immediately hey, everything's safe here, there's nothing to worry about, let's, let's calm down.
Speaker 1:
And then, finally, another mindfulness technique is just staying in the what they call the precious present moment, and that is just looking around at things in your environment and noticing them. So what color shirt does that waiter have on, or what is that person doing over there? Because when you're focusing on what's happening in the present moment, you're not thinking about the future, you're not thinking about the past. Your mind's concentrating on whatever's happening in that present moment. So that's another mindfulness technique that you can use as well. So the first two strategies exercise and mindfulness are going to help you progress through the day with a great attitude and being in a sense of calm, because exercise is going to give you those helps release those feel good hormones and you're going to feel good. And then when you do that meditative techniques, that's going to really set you off into a great, great place.
Speaker 1:
The next is nutrition. Now by now, let's say, lunchtime rolls around or you want to snack. In terms of nutrition, we want to make sure that we're eating healthy foods that are good for us. There's actually some studies out there looking at the link between gut health and Parkinson's, and people that tend to eat healthy food tend to have more of the good bacteria in their GI tract than people that eat sugary foods and processed foods. That tends to harbor more of the bad bacteria.
Speaker 1:
So you want to make sure that you're eating good, healthy foods and that they include what they call the three macronutrients, and the three macronutrients are proteins, carbohydrates and fats, and a lot of times people say, well, what's the difference between a protein and a carbohydrate. Well, the way I always remember it and try to tell people is that typically not always, but typically carbohydrates grow on the ground and proteins walk on the ground. So carbohydrates grow on the ground that's typically your fruits, your vegetables, your grains, those type of things and then proteins walk on the ground that would be your beef, chicken, turkey pork, and then, of course, you have fish that swim. So those are all examples of protein. And then, in terms of fats, you want to make sure that you're choosing healthy fats avocados, olive oil, those type of things. So, when you're selecting the macronutrients, make sure that you eat a lot of fruits and vegetables and whole grains, and when you select fruits and vegetables, try to select a wide range of colors so that you're getting a lot of different antioxidants. And then proteins you want to go for more of the lean proteins chicken, fish, turkey, white pork, those type of things and then I already discussed fats. Now the micronutrients they're your vitamins and minerals and they're going to help you give you the energy that you need. So you want to make sure that you're getting foods that have good amounts of vitamins and minerals and antioxidants in them as well. And then you want to eat a balanced diet that's high in fiber, because fiber is important. It helps prevent constipation, but there's also studies out there that show that diets that are high in fiber can help harbor good bacteria in your GI tract, and I'm actually going to be doing a podcast on the gut health and the relationship to Parkinson's. There's some fascinating research out there on that. So make sure that you eat a balanced diet that's going to give you the energy that you need to propel you throughout the day.
Speaker 1:
The next is and maybe I should have put this earlier, but positivity and optimism, and we could put this with our morning routine, because it's one of the things that I do every day. I'm always up at three o'clock in the morning and one of the things I do is I have a gratitude journal. You're saying what's a gratitude journal? Well, gratitude journal. What I do is I write down three things every day that I'm grateful for, because what it does is it has me sit down and think about all the different blessings and that I should be grateful for in my life, because a lot of times we don't think about those, because we're bombarded every day by negative information, whether it's in the media, whether it's from other people, and so by listing three things that I'm grateful for every day in my gratitude journal, I start off the day on a great foot. So that's going to help me develop a positive mindset, and you want to keep that positive mindset and keep that optimism. Now, granted, we're all going to have challenges, and I'm not trying to minimize the challenges that we all have, because there's days where I wake up and my balance is off, or I'm very stiff and rigid, or my tremors are really hard to control. So I understand the challenges that we all have, but if we look at and understand that we're all going to have challenges on a daily basis, it's how we approach the challenge. We can face the challenge in a positive way and say I'm going to overcome this challenge than more taking control of our lives and not letting Parkinson's take control of our lives. So it's important that you start every day out with a positive mindset and a positive attitude. That's going to propel your day in a great direction and give you a great quality of life.
Speaker 1:
Finally, is social connections and social interaction. Now, this isn't very important, because one of the things that people often do when they're diagnosed with Parkinson's is they drop out of all the things that they used to enjoy whether it be hobbies or social activities, family events because they're embarrassed by their symptoms or they feel sorry for themselves or whatever it happens to be. But it's important to maintain those social activities and social interactions. Number one, because you want to prevent social isolation. Social isolation is going to lead to depression and that's going to lead you down a very dark hole that you don't want to go. So it's very important that you stay engaged and active in your activities so that you because once you become socially isolated, it's hard for people to want to break that barrier and get back to working and socializing again. So if I could say one thing is make sure you stay participating in the hobbies and activities that you enjoy or try to learn new things. The other thing social interaction is going to do is it's going to help you with your cognitive health, because when you're interacting with other people or you're working on a hobby, you're always testing your cognitive skills and that's going to help strengthen your cognitive skills, which is very important, because with Parkinson's you can start to have cognitive decline and we want to be able to prevent that by making sure that we're doing activities that are going to ensure that we can maintain our cognitive abilities. One of the ways you can do this as well is look for support group Parkinson's support groups, where there's a lot of different activities after that.
Speaker 1:
Maybe you haven't thought of one of the things I always like to talk about is stepping outside your comfort zone, and there's a lot of different quotes out there, but one of the ones that really struck me is by Mark Twain, and he talks about 20 years from now. I'm not going to be sad about the things that I did, but I'm going to be upset about the things that I didn't do. So if there's things that you like to do that you used to do or that you really want to do, then make sure that you give it a try. Don't be afraid to dip your toes in the water and and take a chance. I'll give you a perfect example.
Speaker 1:
When I was 54, about six or seven years into my Parkinson's diagnosis I always wanted to learn guitar. But I said to myself I can't learn guitar, I'm not that musically inclined and it looks like it's very hard to learn. But I finally said to myself you know what I'm going to do it. And so I decided, I took the step and I decided to learn guitar Now. Again, it took me a long time. I'll be honest with you up front. It took me a while to get the chords down and be able to transition between chords, because of the fine motor skills on my left hand. But with a little persistence, patients, I was able to accomplish learning how to play guitar. So now I can play a lot of the favorite songs that I hear on the radio or at a get together with friends. They'll say, oh, can you play such and such? And I'll say, well, let me listen to it and I can figure it out. And I typically can play it.
Speaker 1:
So there's an example of where I stepped out of my comfort zone. Another example would be having a bucket list. One of the things I always wanted to do since I was a teenager, and I'm 60 now, was to go on a fly fishing trip to Montana to fish some of the great trout rivers in Montana. And I kept putting it off and putting it off. And then finally, last year, I said to my brother I'm going to go on a fly fishing trip to Montana, do you want to go? And he said absolutely so. My brother and I, and a friend and his son, we went and spent nine days in Montana fishing the Galatin, the Madison and Missouri rivers, and it was one of the best experiences of my life.
Speaker 1:
So don't be afraid to step out and learn new things. Take a chance. So, for instance, if you want to learn to paint or you want to learn to dance, do it. The worst that can happen is you can say, well, it wasn't for me, but at least you gave it a try. So take the opportunity to step outside your comfort zone and find your passion and find your joy, because that's one of the things that a lot of times people with Parkinson's loses their passion and your joy for living and they drop out of things and they lose that social connection. So it's important that you find what are you passionate about and join a bowling league or whatever it happens to be. Just make sure that you stay engaged.
Speaker 1:
I have a friend that her and her husband. After she was diagnosed she was going down the wrong path, but then she decided they signed up for dance lessons and they were a little bit apprehensive at first. Now they love it. They love going to dance class and learning new dances, so don't be afraid to try new things. So those are the five daily strategies that I use every day to help me live a great quality life.
Speaker 1:
So let's go back and take a look at those again and review them. The first one is exercise and make sure that you incorporate that on a daily basis and that you don't have to kill yourself, but make sure you do some type of physical activity. It's gonna help you with your movement, your flexibility, your balance and it's gonna make sure that you lead a great quality of life. So, please, if I get out of the five strategies, I think number one, most important, is exercise. And then we talked about mindfulness, and mindfulness helps us reduce our stress and anxiety, and there's different ways to do that, and we talked about meditation and deep breathing techniques. Number three was nutrition, and make sure that you eat a good quality breakfast that have a lot of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean proteins and healthy fats.
Speaker 1:
And then we talked about positivity and optimism, and I talked about the use of a gratitude journal, and it's something that really helps me start off on a positive note, and another way to really look at how you can be positive in your life is to look back at some of your mentors and heroes and if they're still around, a lot of those people help you, form the foundation of who you are today. So go back and check out some of your heroes and when you were growing up, what was it about them that you really admired and that'll make you feel good about yourself. And if you have a mentor, it's great to sit down with a mentor and a mentor is essentially just a loyal, trusted counselor and go over things that are bothering you or things that you wanna do, and they'll give you some good counsel. So make sure that if you don't have one, try to find one, because they really will be a big benefit in your life.
Speaker 1:
Finally, we talked about social connections and social interaction, and the key importance is to make sure that you don't drop out of the things that you enjoy. Continue to do those things and you're gonna find that you're still able to do them in your and even if there's certain things that you can't do anymore, then it's okay. Then you say to yourself it's not what I can't do, it's what can I still do, and then what can I learn? So, for instance, I love fly fishing and I love to tie flies, but there's certain flies that I have difficulty tying anymore because the hooks are small and my hands shake, and that's okay. So I just have to say to myself okay, I can't tie a size 20 fly anymore, so I have to use a bigger hook, that's all. So look at it in the positive, not what I can't do, but it's what I'm still able to do. Or what can I learn or how can I modify?
Speaker 1:
But make sure that you stay engaged with your family, with your activities, join a support group, whatever you need to help you stay active, because social isolation is going to lead you down a real dark hole that you don't want to be in and it ends up becoming a vicious circle and it's very hard to get out of. So there you have it. We talked about a toolbox full of different strategies to empower and to elevate your quality of life. Remember, even small changes can make a big difference. Let me repeat that Even small changes can make a big difference. So a lot of times you think, oh, this doesn't really make sense. Absolutely it does. So make sure you go out and you do wait. Even if it's a small thing, it's going to pay big dividends in the long run.
Speaker 1:
Now, parkinson's may throw us curve balls, but it doesn't define us. You know, we can still live an exceptional life, filled with joy, purpose and connection. Now, when I talk about an exceptional life, one of the things I do want to mention is that what's exceptional to me may not be exceptional to you. So exceptional means different things to different people and it depends on your mindset and how you view things. But I like to say that I've lived an exceptional life with Parkinson's because I continue to try to learn new things and I continue to participate in the activities that I did before. There are certain things I can't do anymore that I used to do, but I don't let that stop me. So I still have the mindset that this is helping me live an exceptional life and you can do the same. So find out what's exceptional for you and what do you view as having a great quality life? What's going to help you maintain your interactions with your friends and family and make you jump out of not jump out of bed, but make you get out of bed with a smile on your face and ready to face the day? So those are some key things to remember.
Speaker 1:
Now it's your turn to take some action, and what I'd like you to do is pick one or two strategies that resonate with you and then try them this week. You know, what I'd like you to do is if you could share your experiences on how they went, and one of the ways you can do that is there's a website called fanlistcom, and I'll put that in the description below. But I would love to hear your success stories and, if you would, I'd love to hear from you and things that worked for you, things that didn't work. And then there's also a chat room. I put a couple chats there. I'm hoping people will go on and start a chat and we can start to build a great community, and by doing that we can share success stories.
Speaker 1:
So if you could go to fanlistcom, slash, live Parkinson's life and share your success stories, that would be great. Now we've only scratched the surface of some of the daily strategies that are out there. These are the ones that I've used and that have helped me. There may be others that you can that help you, and that is wonderful, and if you have other strategies that you can share with us and others, we would greatly appreciate that. So if you have specific challenges that you run into and you want more information on, if you could go to the fanlistcom slash live Parkinson's life page and give me a list of the challenges or things that you want to hear on the podcast to help you live a better quality life, and I'll be happy to do the research and mention your naming but, more importantly, help you overcome some of the challenges and hurdles that you may be encountering.
Speaker 1:
And finally, as we close out today, if you would be kind enough to visit my YouTube channel, live Parkinson's, live an exceptional life tremors to triumph. I have my podcast on there, but I also have several videos Now I have to admit they're not the greatest videos because I'm still learning how to do video editing, but they're hopefully they're getting better as we go, but I would love to have you come and subscribe and be part of the group and help us share success stories. So if you wouldn't mind going to the live Parkinson's YouTube channel and subscribing, I would greatly appreciate it. And if you need additional resources, please visit live Parkinson'scom. And until then, I really appreciate you listening to these podcasts. It really touches my heart to see the number of people that can benefit and hopefully share with others, and I look forward to seeing you on a future podcast and you have a spectacular day, thanks.