My feet had been bothering me for several months. The pain was different than last year. I wasn't sure what was wrong with my feet, but I thought I had better find out. I called to make an appointment with a Podiatrist and hoped I could get in before October. The receptionist asked if I could come in the next day. I said YES. Apparently someone had cancelled right before I called. Lucky me.
I stopped by later that day and picked up the forms so my Wonderful Husband could fill them out for me. The next morning I went in for my appointment. I explained to the Doctor that my feet hurt intermittently; some days were bad, other days I had no pain at all. He asked if they hurt when I first got out of bed (plantar fasciitis) and I said no. He had me walk, stand and manipulated my feet. He said my Achilles tendons were very tight and my one leg was shorter than the other. He grimaced when I told him I had Parkinson's and a DBS neuro-stimulator. He said having Parkinson's complicates things. Duh!
He put a lift in the heel of my one shoe and gave me some stretching exercises to do and said come back to see me in a month if you don't have any improvement.
I went home and did the stretching exercises. Since this looked like something I would have to figure out on my own, I started paying very close attention to how my feet were affected by my Parkinson's medication cycle and DBS settings.
I noticed that when my Parkie meds kicked in, two things happened. My feet would stretch and twist themselves awkwardly and I would walk on my tip toes, but only for about 10 minutes. If I was sitting down during these twice daily episodes, my feet were fine. If I was standing or walking when it happened, then my feet would hurt the rest of the day. This explained the intermittent foot pain.
Since I was only taking half of a carbi/levodopa pill twice a day for my speech issues, cutting back wasn't an option, unless I wanted to be mute. (No snide comments from the boys out there!)
I lowered my DBS settings a bit, but the stiffness and slowness returned. I tried adding another half a pill with the lower settings and finally found a good combination. I lowered my DBS settings by 2 tenths on each side and increased the carbi/levodopa to four halves a day and actually improved my speech!
Within a few days of figuring all this out, my feet stopped hurting. I am still doing the stretches the doctor ordered. This Happy Parkie now has Happy Feet.
Exercise is a necessity if you have Parkinson's disease and walking is a great way to keep moving. One of the realities of living with Parkinson's disease is that your gait will change. These changes happen so slowly, you may not even notice that your arm no longer swings or that you walk like you have a ten pound weight attached to one ankle.
Medications can reduce the rigidity, but if you've been walking this way for a long time, it can be difficult for your brain to learn a more normal gait.
Prior to diagnosis, I had a very distinctive gait. I lurched. Neighbors could tell it was me from four blocks away.
My right leg was very rigid, my right hand was always clenched into a fist, my right arm didn't swing and my right foot seemed to thud down as I walked. People, including medical folks, thought for sure I had a stroke.
After diagnosis and medications, my gait slowly changed, and I lurched only when my meds wore off. One of these times, made for a humorous story involving a dance contest.
As the disease progressed and I began to take more and more medications, my gait changed again. My movements became slower and my left foot would cramp. Gait changes can cause pain in your knees, hips, feet, back, neck and even shoulders due to postural misalignment and in my case, I had left hip pain that woke me every morning along with occasional charlie horses. Not fun.
Fortunately, the last foot cramp I had was the morning of my DBS surgery and as the settings got optimized and I reduced the amount of medications I was taking, my gait slowly changed again. The charlie horses disappeared but I now added left knee pain in the mornings. I would get out of bed and within ten minutes, I'd be out walking. It seemed the only way to relieve the hip and knee pain.
Sometime in the last year or so, I realized that my left knee and hip had stopped hurting and therefore, I was sleeping longer. Yippee! Hooray!
However, I began to notice something new a few months back. When I would first get out of bed, the bottom of both feet would hurt for the first three or four steps I'd take. Since walking seemed to relieve the pain, I began walking even longer distances. But each morning, the pain was worse and then, throughout the day, if I sat for more than 15 minutes, the first few steps I took were very painful.
I considered going to a foot doctor, but decided to ask others with Parkinson's first. They came up with a possible answer: Plantar Fasciitis. It seems my gait had changed again and my feet were slapping the ground as I walked instead of rolling normally from heel to toe. The more I walked, the more I aggravated my feet.
I had my DBS settings adjusted, bought brand new walking shoes, reduced the amount of time I walked and paid close attention to exactly how I took each step. If I get distracted, I begin slapping my feet again, especially my right foot. It's been a few months now, and my feet are slowly getting better, but I am still walking.
Here I am, at age 55, trying to learn how to Walk This Way.
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