No Brain....No Pain

 I've often heard distance running described as a “brainless activity”.   The kindest interpretation is while running you can turn off your brain and just let your legs go.   Other interpretations are much less polite.    I’ve been delving into the affects on the brain of running/exercise to try to understand the impact it might have on my Parkinson’s.  

My initial hypothesis went something like this….Given Parkinson’s is caused by a lack of dopamine in the brain and dopamine is what causes good feelings (like the high you get from drugs…not that I would know), then the runners high you get when you run long distances should be generating dopamine and therefore alleviate the symptoms of Parkinson’s.   Sounds good in theory but I’m totally wrong (nothing new).     Turns out the brain has multiple chemicals it uses to affect our mood, emotions, body functions and movement (Serotonin, Dopamine, Endorphins and Adrenaline).   Dopamine affects mood, movement, motivation and to some degree, pleasure.  The runners high comes from endorphins that also get released from exercising, eating something sweet, and sex (the latter two being much more enjoyable than a long run).

OK, so running doesn’t have a positive impact on Parkinson’s, does Parkinson’s have a direct effect on running.  I don’t need to know anything about brain chemistry to answer that.  It does, and it sucks.    The best way I can explain it is imagine for a minute that the brain divides the body movement into the left and right sides.   When the brain gives a command to the right side of the body to “run” it responds “yes sir”.   The same command to the left side gets the kind of response you would expect from a typical teenager asked to take out the trash.    “ Do I really have to?” (add the eye roll and heavy sigh here).      To keep from falling on your face the right side has to slow down to match the delay of the left.   My resulting “jog” looks more like a shuffling zombie.     

 That said, I am still preparing for the Marathon Challenge, it just may be a bit more challenging this year.  To assist me I’ve recruited some family members to run along side for part of the distance (more on this in a future blog).   But recognizing I may not be able to do this for another 10 years, I’ve started an annual Virtual Run/Walk (Miles for Smiles) to give more people to get directly involved in helping to raise funds for the children suffering with Pediatric Cancer.     Last year we doubled the number of families we helped and this year we are hoping to reach even more.  If you are interested in participating, or might know someone who would, you/they can find out more and register at the link below. 

https://raceroster.com/events/2023/72063/miles-for-smiles

It’s a win-win, you put a much needed smile on the face of a child while helping yourself get healthier.    

More on how the training is going in the next blog.