Grocery Shopping with Parkinson's

A funny thing happened in the grocery store the other day. I was in the toothpaste aisle and I was kneeling. No, I wasn’t worshiping the toothpaste. I was kneeling so that I could read the prices on the bottom shelf. While I was kneeling, I suddenly had the sensation of going from ON to OFF. For those of you not familiar with ON and OFF, ON is when the Parkinson’s meds have kicked in and are working; OFF is when the meds have stopped working. Generally, the longer you have Parkinson’s, the faster you go from ON to OFF.

It takes a while to go from OFF back to ON – it takes me 45 minutes to an hour on an empty stomach, and sometimes over two hours – or not at all – on a non-empty stomach.

You need to time the medications so that the next dose kicks in before the previous dose turns off, but that’s tricky too because when too much medication has kicked in, you get dyskinesia, the involuntary jerking, twitching, rocking that you sometimes see.

Anyway, there I was on aisle # 8, kneeling at the toothpaste, and my meds kicked OFF. I realized I didn’t have any meds with me – they were out in the car. I also knew that I still had to go to aisle #12 to get deodorant.

I stood up and was light-headed. I put one hand on the toothpaste shelf to hold myself up so I wouldn’t fall over. I waited a few moments and then started walking to aisle #12. The problem was, my feet didn’t want to move.

When I’m ON, I walk almost normally. When I’m OFF, I shuffle in a manner that reminds me of Tim Conway’s old man from the Carol Burnett show.

My shoes felt like they had lead weights in them, magnets fastening them to the floor.

I tried again. I lifted my foot and tried to take a big step forward. My foot traversed maybe 4, maybe 6 inches. I moved the other foot. Same thing. I closed my eyes and tried to think “big step big step big step big step.” That works sometimes, but not usually.

I made it to the end of the aisle and had to let go of the shelf so that I could step into the main aisle on my way to aisle #12. I stepped out and started. Before I knew it, I passed aisle #9. I paused, not intentionally, but because my body told me to pause. See, visual noise gets in the way. It interferes with movement. Lines on the floor, objects on the floor, doorways, hallways, people with carts, signs advertising chocolate for sale…..

Chocolate! I couldn’t pass that up. I grabbed a couple of Hershey chocolate bars on my way past aisle #10. Then my feet froze again but my upper body did not. I started leaning forward, and then my feet scurried to try to catch up with my upper body. Unfortunately, my feet didn’t catch up in time and I started falling. Fortunately, I’m tall, and I was able to catch myself on the aisle #11 shelf before I went all the way down.

A store clerk came by at that moment and asked if I needed any assistance.

“No sir,” I replied, “I’m just admiring your AA batteries. They’re really nice. Almost as nice as the AAA batteries.”

He stared at me, not knowing whether I was kidding.

I get stared at a lot when I’m OFF. I understand it. It’s unusual to see someone my age shuffling around like someone twice my age.

AA batteries. Yep, I decided I needed some of those too. I put a package or two of Energizers into my little hand basket and continued on to aisle #12. I reached the aisle and turned. The deodorant was at the other end, way down there.

I shuffled along past the shampoo, the conditioner, and then a series of diaper products. It was at that point that a cart came around the corner on the far end of the aisle, causing me to freeze and lose my balance.

I grabbed hold of the shelf right there at the diaper products. I tried to act nonchalant. Let’s see. This one looks good. But oh, this other one is deluxe at only 25% higher price. As the person passed me, I put two packages of Huggies diapers into my little hand basket. You have to understand that my youngest child is a teen-ager. Anyway, I turned, let go of the shelf, and shuffled along until I made it to the deodorant.

“Attention shoppers!” I heard someone say over the store intercom. “Come to our cheese corner and sample some of our cheeses! We have Gouda, Gruyere, Goat, Havarti, Cheddar, Swiss, Edom, Brie, Camembert, Mozarella, smoked cheddar, smoked gouda, a nice baby swiss, bleu, Monterey jack, pepper jack, Colby, parmesan, romano, and a nice velveeta.” That all sounded tasty, but the cheese corner was back behind aisle #8, and I knew it would take me several minutes to get over there. Besides, the meds were turning more and more OFF. I had to get out of the store, and fast.

I headed back to the self-checkout. I paid for my items and headed out to my car, leaning on everything I could discreetly lean on without setting off any car alarms. I leaned against the newspaper counter; I leaned against the door; and I leaned against an old man who had fallen asleep on a bench outside the store.

I made it to my car, got in, took my medicine, and waited a while for it to kick in.

It was then that I realized I had forgotten to get a gallon of milk. I guess that would have to wait until next time.