Has anyone had problems with police stopping you because you look suspicious? This happened to my brother recently. He doesn't dress too well and his walk and talk are very HD type. Police stopped him on his walk home, though he was simply walking! Funny thing is this very thing happened to my father as well when he was alive and walking around town. My brother is dwelling on this incident too much. I wish he could let it go.

My wife has been talked to a couple of times by our local police. The police were very nice, it seems some neighbors saw her and were concerned enough to call the police ,,,but not concerned enough to come out and talk to her themselves.
She was fine about it and the police were very nice.
I got her a nice looking medalert bracelet with a contact number for a cell phone I recently got.

Hey Debbie:
Yes, I have been stopped by the police a couple times, and it was a total
humilitation for me, b-cuz they kept on insisting I was drunk, and I almost never
drink alcohol anymore, and NEVER drive drunk. It was about a year ago from
when they kept on asking me why I talked with a slurred voice and could barely
walk, and they gave me a breathalizer test (negative, of course), and tried to give
me a field sobriety test, which I told them I knew I'd fail, because I had just
discovered a few months earlier that I had a degenerative neurological disease,
that caused my voice to slur, and my body not to have any balance. I had been
taking meds for the balance/muscle problem for a few months, which I also
told them. I told them the name of my neurologist and the name of the med
i'd been taking, and gave them one of my HD info cards from HDSA, but
they clearly didn't respect me. I am sure that all they saw was the outside
of me, and didn't wabt to beleive I had a disease, and was not told by
neurologist NOT to drive, he never told me NOT to drive, even when I told
him the humiliating cop story. Why do I still drive? Because I live in a one horse
rural town, that has no drug store or specialist doctors(my shrink and my gyno,
and my neurologist all work in ITHACA, which is abour 1/2 hour away from here,
and no place to get any testing done, or pick up scripts. My mother, who is my caretaker, never learned to drive, and my family all has jobs during the hrs. I
have to be in ITHACA. They eliminated one of the buses that used to come out
here, so now there is only one bus a day. The handicapped van, the Gadabout,
only goes to ITHACA from 8am til 11:30am two days a week, and my neurologist
only works out of ITHACA a couple days a week, so its always a struggle for me
to arrange my appt. with the gadabout. With my meds, I am NOT a cheery morning
person, and the alarm clock doesn't wake me up. I slee[ very deeply, just as my
HD dad did. It takes a long sustained very loud sound to wake me up, like
someone mowing the lawn for hours!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The sicker I get, the deeper my
sleep becomes.
so there you have it. i am sure that the some folks will berate me for still
driving, but my neuro hasn't told me to stop. of course i feel a sense of
freedom in being able to drive myself, but most of the time i am terrified
of having the cops pull me over and put me thru that awful trauma. I thought
that if I came 100% clean w/them, told them the whole storey, they'd listen
and maybe find it in their hearts toHELP me, or respect me.
I felt no respect from them, and I feel like there is a huge gap in their
understanding of the world and try to imagine, for a moment, that a person
who they loved or themselves could maybe one day find themselves in a
similar situation. They made me drive myself all the way back to Groton
alone, because they were too busy to give me a ride.
it was during a heat wave, my car's air conditioning had died, i wish i
couldave left my car in ithaca, and that they would have had the heart
to drive me home in their wonderful airconditioned cop car. My family
had all just left (it was last year 4rth of july)for Cape May, NJ and I
knew I had NO ONE to call.
sorry, but i had to get that off my chest, debbie.
i know where your brothers comming from.
love,
ruth

Hi, Ruth, you are much better at explaining all the events and feelings of the episode than my brother is, but I can see how upsetting it was for him now. Both he and I still drive, but we both feel nervous about it. I have a husband to drive me long distances, but he doesn't like to go to the library and shopping, etc. that I do, so off I go on my own! Independence is important!

Hi Debbie, I sure do understand this situation. May I suggest contacting HDSA because they have a card that the phd can carry in his wallet. She he be stopped, he can show it to the police officer. I hope this helps. Loretta

Hi Dan, there is a card that your brother can carry with him and show it for incidents like this of like my son does when he just wants someone to understand what is happening. He also used it to get him seated on the plane so he wouldn't have as much trouble. As far as your brother dwelling on this incident, he is the one that will have to handle that. I really think the card could help with this too, as he would feel more in charge, just like we all feel when we pull out our ID's when questioned.

Let me know if I can be of help. Gerleine

thanks for the response. I did order the wallet cards, and both my brother and I have them in our wallets now.