Change #3 After the World Parkinson Congress: Deeper Reporting. Case #1: Yuma Bev

I realized at the recent World Parkinson Congress that I should be reading more books and articles about PD, and that my blog posts could dive more deeply when I report on the things that I’ve read.

So going forward, I’m going to try a response format that we use with students at my school, the Bronx Charter School for Better Learning.  We use it with teachers, too, during some of our summer reading and writing workshops for faculty.

Here are the instructions that we ask teachers and students to follow when they’ve finished reading an article or a chapter in a book:

Reader Response Form

When you’ve finished reading, put the book or article away.
Keep the book / article out of your sight for Questions 1, 2 and 3.
Look at the book / article for Questions 4, 5 and 6.

1. Describe in your own words what happened in the pages you just read. What are the main points?  Do not look at the book or story as you do this.
2. What’s your reaction to the story / article?
3. What does the story / article make you think about from your own life?
4. Copy a sentence from the story / article that you find especially interesting or unusual. Use quotation marks and write the page number:
5. What makes this sentence interesting for you?
6. What questions does the story / article raise in you? What questions are you left with?

So the first book that I want to respond to it Parkinson’s Humor, by Beverly Ribaudo, aka Yuma Bev.  Here goes!

1. Describe in your own words what happened in the pages you just read. What are the main points?  Do not look at the book or story as you do this.

The book Parkinson’s Humor is a collection of fun and funny blog posts by Beverly Ribaudo, known online as Yuma Bev, as she lives in Yuma, Arizona, near the border with Mexico.  Bev has Young Onset PD, which she struggled with for years because doctor after doctor misdiagnosed her.  Now she’s on the standard Parkie medicines, although she still deals with many symptoms.  In every post she finds something jolly to say, and her humor often surprised me.  For example, one blog post is titled, “How Do You Explain Parkinson’s to a Cat?”  Ha!

While many of the posts deal with her day-to-day life (e.g., her step daughter, who is about the same age as Bev, visits, and they both get spray tans), Bev also includes some great posts about the disease itself.  In particular, I thought her post explaining in lay terms how the different Parkinson’s medicines work in the brain should be standard reading for anyone who has the slightest interest in PD.

Bev also enjoys rewriting the lyrics to popular songs to make them apply to people with Parkinson’s.  At the back of the book she lists her blogsite address and her YouTube page, so you can follow up with her latest doings and song re-writing, as she’s still active online.

2. What’s your reaction to the story / article?

I laughed a lot, and I was taken in by the way she turns every mishap and minor catastrophe on its head.  She comes out on top of the disease psychologically because she always finds something humorous in her situations.  I kept finishing one post after another, always rushing ahead to see the next funny thing she’d report on or quip about.  If laughter and humor produce extra endorphins in your head, then every doctor should prescribe this book for patients with PD.  It will lessen the anxiety that many Parkies deal with daily.

3. What does the story / article make you think about from your own life?

When I compare her blog posts to many of my own, I realize that I could be more like her if I wrote a daily diary of what’s going on in my life now that I have PD.  She documents what it’s like for her to live with Parkinson’s.  She writes about her sleeping problems, “freezing,” physical movement issues, driving, her lack of interest in exercising, tremors, and her doctor appointments.  On my blog I tend to reach outward, not inward, in that I search online for research articles to report on, or put together slide show stories of my outings with Parky the Raccoon.

4. Copy a sentence from the story / article that you find especially interesting or unusual. Use quotation marks and write the page number:

“Tremors are not always a bad thing.  I do one heck of a job making scrambled eggs and milk shakes.  If I could time my tremors to music, I bet I’d be an excellent tambourine player and if James Bond happens to stop by, I can make him a martini, shaken not stirred.” – page 46

5. What makes this sentence interesting for you?

First, this is funny in its own right.  Second, it’s the final paragraph to one of her posts, showing how she always ends on an upbeat note.

6. What questions does the story / article raise in you? What questions are you left with?

• What’s her blog like now?  (This book is almost four years old.)
• Will she keep up the light-hearted banter if her PD worsens considerably?
• Where does she get her humorous outlook from?

And here, for everyone reading now, are her links:

Her Facebook page:  https://www.facebook.com/parkinsonshumor/

Her website:  http://parkinsonshumor.blogspot.com/

Her YouTube page:  https://www.youtube.com/user/ParkinsonsHumor

If you are reading this now, let me know in the comments section below what you think of this new format of mine for reporting on things I’ve read!