Victory Summit Dec 8, 2018 - Seattle
Jillian Carson, chair of Parkinson Wellness project and Manager of Operations Krista Lavoie are fresh back from an inspiring weekend at the David Phinney Foundation Victory Summit held in Seattle December 8, 2018.
Just under 600 people attended the event. There were PWP, care partners and family. A great community event. As always Davis Phinney started the day off with an inspirational talk. He has had a tough year due to problems with his DBS device and had time on his plate. We learned he was admittedly suffering from apathy. How did he manage this? Well he didn’t his wife Connie put him to work! He had every excuse in the book as to why he couldn’t vacuum, sure sounds familiar to me! Connie says #nevergiveup and Davis did the vacuuming. Immediately he belted out with a big PWRFIT UP! #everyvictory counts ! Yes and he also admitted he felt better after he completed his chore for the day, no matter how long it took him. Another story he shared was how he continues to have problems with his speech, something we all know about. Davis recently joined a choir near him called the Tremble Clefs. He then suddenly belted out ‘Eight Days a Week” a Beatles toon and wow Davis is a great singer. He admitted he could now sing better than he could speak. We all joined in to finish the song. Great voice practice. We need karaoke!
This Summit focused on supportive care, pain in PD, anxiety and depression and how to navigate these. It wrapped up with building resilience for wellbeing, all very informative talks.
Krista and I attended the break- out sessions on Mindfulness and meditation done by Dr Benzi Kluger, a physician from University of Colorado. We learned how to breath in the good air through our nostrils, focusing on the air inside our nose and all the way to the bottom of our lungs and then feel the bad stress go out of our bodies though the weight on our chair and feet on the floor. This technique really works to ground ourselves. We also attended a session on nutrition. Dr Laurie Mischley, a naturopath from Seattle Integrative medicine. She talked about how food has a major impact on health and well- being. Watch Here
Krista was able to meet many people in our extended Parkinson’s family including a few from Victoria. Big Thank you to the Davis Phinney Foundation for putting on such an inspirational day. Just remember everyone that every victory does count, no matter how big or small it is.