June 28, 2018. Madison, Mississippi. The Clinic End.

The four weeks went by quickly. Today Ken graduated. Now his instructions were for him to perform those same exercises twice a day for the rest of his life. Ken is not inclined to do the same thing day after day so he and I have laughed about whether or not he will be able to follow the therapists instructions. We will see. The exercises are unusual but it is clear that Ken has been helped by using those exercises. The program was developed by a research group at NIH. There are 10 exercises. The instructions have the patient have different things with arms and legs and forcefully have the limbs returned to the side with a slap. They look odd and Ken says he has never been asked to do these exercises in the past. But Regina, the therapist, had Ken walking by himself, with a belt around his waist in case he lost his balance. And he walks better too with big strides most of the time. Ken was intrigues by the exercises. At first he thought them silly but he began to see the wisdom of the program. It is something about programming his brain. He liked it that Regina knew a lot about Parkinson's Disease and understood what Ken was dealing with. And she has been pleased with his progress. But most of all, Ken was pleased. He completed the four week program. Now it is up to him to continue with the program on his own.