The symptoms of Parkinson’s disease start slowly, and at first, you might be tempted to neglect the condition and say to yourself that there’s nothing too dangerous. One of the most common symptoms of Parkinson’s disease is represented by tremors, while patients may also experience stiffness and slowing in their movement.
In other words, Parkinson’s disease can surely affect your health pretty much if you develop the condition. Patients may even go through an embarrassing situation when their heads start to tremble involuntarily, but thanks to Nathan, a therapist, we can now check out a set of simple exercises that anybody can do at home to try to get away from those tremors.
However, it’s important to keep in mind that the exercises mentioned here will not replace your doctor’s recommendations for managing Parkinson’s disease.
The first seven exercises are about the head, while the remaining three ones will only focus on the jaw. Therefore, follow these steps every day and see if there’s an improvement in your head tremors related to Parkinson’s:
Step 1: Look up and down
Look up until the point you “touch” the ceiling with your chin, bend your neck as far as possible, and then look down so that the chin touches your chest. Do this step ten times, then head over to the next step.
Step 2: Look left and right
Look left as much as you can as you look over the shoulder. Look side to side. After bringing your head all the way to the left, do it all the way to the right. Do this step ten times as well.
Step 3: Look in diagonal (two ways)
Diagonal head movement is the next exercise to do. This means that you need to look left towards the left and then look right towards your right shoulder. Do this ten times, then switch the side, meaning that you must start by looking right towards the right and then look towards the left shoulder.
Step 4: Head rotations
Head or neck rotations (aka circles) represent the next exercise. Therefore, do ten of them clockwise and another ten counterclockwise.
However, you must do the exercise slowly, as otherwise you might hurt your neck.
Step 5: Ear to shoulder
For this exercise, you must bring your ear as close to your shoulder as possible. However, you must not cheat, meaning that you must not lift the shoulder at all. You have to do ten, as in the case of the other exercises.
Step 6: Neck retractions
Pull the head back as far as you can and then relax. You need to sit down straight and keep your back straight. Pull and relax ten times.
Step 7: Opening and closing the mouth
It’s time to dive into the jaw exercises! The first one consists of simply opening and closing the mouth. You can do it wide, but not force it, as the jaw might get dislocated. Open and close the mouth ten times.
Step 8: Moving the jaw from left to right
For this exercise, you have to slightly open the mouth and move the jaw from left to right and vice versa. Do ten of these.
Step 9: Bring the jaw out as far as possible
For the last and final exercise, you need to bring your jaw out as far as you can ten times.
Parkinson’s disease is known to occur in 50% more men than women, and the gents are even more prone to develop the condition earlier in life than women. Although Parkinson’s disease is not fatal, both the symptoms and effects can often contribute to the patient’s death.
