Just Can't

For almost two months I have been going to Step Fitness where there are a number of programs for folks with various physical challenges.  Mine is called Rock Steady Boxing where we use many of the exercises designed for boxers to increase agility, flexibility, balance, and to decrease tremors.  It is for people with Parkinson’s disease, and since I have what is called a Parkinson’s Plus illness, there is hope it will slow the progress of my symptoms. 

I have to say that I do think it has helped me in three ways.  First, I have surprised myself by working through some of my stiffness.  I have gone in on some days with short, almost jerky, steps and left with a near normal gait.  I wish I could say I stayed that way the rest of the day, but sitting for perhaps 30 minutes will bring back most of the rigidity in my leg muscles.  There have been times that just the drive home will do that, but I still have to think it is a net gain.  Second, I have to admit that punching the heavy bag is a great way to relieve stress!  It is downright frustrating to me when I think about all of the things I can no longer do, and I get angry at the prospect of losing even more.  A series of hard right crosses allows me to vent that anger.  Third, I have enjoyed being around the rest of the class and the trainers.  My group is usually eight folks who are at various stages of physical decline.  I am not the worst off in the class, but I am the only one to fall in the weeks I have been attending.  Each session we have either three or four trainers working with the group, and ever since my fall I have been shadowed by at least one of these trainers.  It is good to be with people who understand what I am going through.  Many of my friends are concerned about my situation, but these folks at Rock Steady can empathize.

As I mentioned earlier, there are other groups using the same facility.  I am not sure of the name of the group that comes in just as I am typically leaving, but they apparently have more physical challenges than I am currently facing.  There is one man who seems to always have the same tee shirt on.  It features an upside down Nike swoosh and two words in bold print, “Just Can’t.”  This play on Nike’s catch phrase may strike you as cynical, at least it did me the first time I saw it, but on reflection it seems less so.  Someone has said that life is a series of compromises, and a serious neurological disease accelerates those compromises.  For example, even the most avid golfers will play less and less if they live long enough and will typically stop altogether once their stamina is compromised by age.  I just got there a lot earlier than I wanted to.  I have encountered a number of things which I just can’t do anymore.  Things like riding my spin bike (lack of balance), walking long distances or negotiating bleachers (lack of leg strength and pain), even singing the congregational hymns at church (inability to “clear my throat” and weakened throat and mouth muscles).  Believe me when I say this list is suggestive not exhaustive!  Which brings me back to my tee-shirt-clad friend.  I prefer to think that “Just Can’t” isn’t a statement of resignation but of realism.  My reality has been restricted by Corticobasal Degeneration.  To think otherwise would be a self-destructive delusion at best and a one way street to depression and despair at worst.  No, I want to be realistic about what I can’t do, but I also want to always be pushing right to the limits my malfunctioning brain will permit.

Just can’t?  Sure, there is a growing list of things I can’t do, but why not work to maintain what I can rather than bemoan what I can’t?  This is not the intended challenge of Nike’s phrase, “Just Do It.”  I think it is far more than what the people at Nike had in mind.