A slightly more disturbed night. I awoke at 2.30am, 3.15am, 5am and 6.30am. It was okay though, because I wasn’t lying there awake – I went straight back to sleep. I certainly seem to have been waking up more frequently during the night since the operation. I had thought it was due to the neurostimulator being switched on while I was asleep, but I’ve been turning it off at night for some time now and my sleep pattern remains very erratic. I got up and switched on just before 8am.
Downstairs, cup of tea, Nutriblast, check email. I notice dyskinesia in my right arm once more, but at about the same level as yesterday and definitely manageable, if a little annoying. I become aware that I’m moving my head a little more than usual, and it’s quite uncomfortable because my neck is still stiff following the surgery. It becomes apparent that I also have some mild dyskinesia in my neck. It certainly wasn’t apparent yesterday, so may be a consequence of raising the voltage on my left hand side. To be monitored!
As the day progresses, my dyskinesia remains fairly stable. Still twitching my right arm and head, but not any worse than first thing this morning. Tremor in my right arm has been quite strong today, and it is hard to resist the temptation to increase the current on my right side. It’s just after 5pm now, and having put up with it all day I am now going to mildly self-medicate with cannabis to calm the tremor a little.
Cannabis definitely helps me. My GP says he can’t prescribe medical cannabis for me because (1) it isn’t licensed for use for Parkinson’s Disease, and (2) it isn’t proven to have a beneficial effect on Parkinson’s Disease. Yet he is prepared to prescribe drugs which are far more powerful, which he knows don’t work for me, and which make me really unwell. How can that be right?
I turn up the voltage on my left side to 1.7v, switch my device off and go to bed. My tremor returns very quickly tonight, and I lie awake shaking for what seems like an eternity (but in reality is only about 30 minutes) until I drop off to sleep.