Confessions of an Internet addict

In the months following my diagnosis, I became addicted to the Internet. Hour after hour I sat in front of my computer reading everything I could find about Parkinson’s disease — some of it true, some of it not; some of it more than I wanted or needed to know at that moment. I was drawn to the Internet like a moth to a flame.

“The best prescription is knowledge,” said a former U.S. Surgeon General. If a little knowledge is good, a lot has to be better, I thought. He forgot to warn of possible side effects, including depression and insomnia.

My husband would awake in the middle of the night to find me sobbing in the glow of my computer monitor. He would hold me tight in the darkness, trying to scare away my demons, but there was no consoling me. I had skipped ahead and read the last page of the book. The ending was not pretty.

My husband and my neurologist tried to win my agreement to limit my time on line and restrict my access to certain Internet sites, but this just made me mad. I was especially angry that my husband “tattled on me,” though I knew he was trying to preserve my sanity.

I learned the hard way that the Internet can be a blessing or a curse depending on how you use it and your personality. Too much of anything is not good.

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