Alan Alda, the beloved actor known for some iconic roles on "Mash" and "The West Wing," revealed on CBS "This Morning" Tuesday that he has Parkinson's Disease. He's lived with it for more than three years. Why did he go public with it now? Because he hopes to show others that may get the same diagnosis that you can still live a full life with the condition.
"To be immobilized by fear & think the worst thing has happened you -- it hasn't happened to you. You still have things you can do": Alan Alda, who just revealed his Parkinson's diagnosis, hopes sharing his story will help others suffering from the disease https://t.co/ITd4TOq91b pic.twitter.com/sMlR6ZgHJr
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 31, 2018
Alda thought to visit the doctor's office and ask for a scan after reading an article in The New York Times. He read that if you act out your dreams, there's a good chance that might be a very early symptom, where nothing else shows.
Acting out one's dreams, Alda explained, means that they seem very real. He had one dream where someone was attacking him and he "threw a sack of potatoes at them." In reality, he was throwing a pillow at his wife. Besides that, he had no symptoms.
Months after the precautionary scan, Alda started to feel a twitch in his thumb.
"In the very beginning, to be immobilized by fear and think the worst thing has happened to you - it hasn't happened to you," he said. "You still have things you can do."
For Alda, he's taken up boxing, tennis, and he marches to John Philip Sousa music.