MOVE for Parkinson's

MOVE for Parkinson's We believe everyone deserves access to skilled multidisciplinary care

A program dedicated to improving access and reducing barriers for people with Parkinson's via a comprehensive "brain to toes" approach led by speech, OT & PT experts.

04/25/2026

The research is clear: exercise matters enormously for people living with Parkinson's. But showing up is hard to do alone.

That's what m.o.v.e. is built for, a structured, evidence-informed program where every session is designed with your nervous system in mind, and every room is full of people who get it.

June registration is open. We'd love to have you.

📋 Register at movefound.org.

04/24/2026

In Parkinson's disease, the automatic systems that once ran movement in the background begin to fade. The swing of an arm. The length of a stride. The lift of a foot. Things that used to happen without thinking now require thinking, every single time, and sometimes worse than others.

That's not a failure. That's the biology. And it's exactly why cueing matters.

Visual cues. Tactile cues. Verbal cues. Delivered in the moment, tied to real movement, repeated until the body starts to trust them and participants start to remember them. Research tells us that external cues can bypass the damaged basal ganglia circuitry and recruit alternative motor pathways, giving the brain a workaround it can actually use.

Here's what the research can't fully capture: what it feels like when a cue lands in the middle of a room full of people working just as hard as you are. The correction meant for one person ripples outward. Everyone adjusts. Everyone improves. Nobody is alone in the effort.

That's the quiet power of group-based exercise for Parkinson's done well. The cue finds you. The group carries you.

And it doesn't stop when class ends. We teach care partners, family members, and friends the same principles, because the most powerful cue of all might be the one that comes from someone who loves you, at home, in the middle of an ordinary moment. Understanding this biology isn't just for clinicians. It's for everyone who shows up for someone with Parkinson's.

This is why we show up.

🧠☀️

04/23/2026

Every time an activator pole makes contact with the ground, something important happens — your body gets information.

Where am I in space? Is my arm swinging? Is my rhythm holding?

This is biofeedback. And it's not a clinical concept, it's physics meeting intention. That grounded contact travels up through your hands and into your nervous system as real-time confirmation of what your body is doing.

For people with Parkinson's, this matters in a specific way. PD can quietly change the way we perceive our own movement, like how big a step feels versus how big it actually is, how much we're rotating, whether our pace is as steady as it seems. This is called reduced proprioceptive acuity. This perceptual mismatch it's one of the less-talked-about ways PD shapes daily life.

One of the patterns most affected is contralateral swing, the natural coordination of opposite arm and leg moving together. Right foot forward, left arm forward. Arm swing is something most of us do without thinking, but PD can reduce or dampen that motion over time. When arm swing decreases on one side, it doesn't just affect the arms, it changes the whole rhythm of walking.

Tools that provide external sensory feedback (sound, rhythm, tactile input, resistance) can help bridge that gap. Not by compensating for what's harder, but by sharpening the signal that's already there.

Activator poles are one of those tools. When used intentionally, they prompt each arm to participate actively with each stride, reinforcing that opposite arm-leg pattern, encouraging upright posture, and giving each step a point of reference your nervous system can actually use.

You're not leaning on them. You're listening to them.

We're grateful to partner with friends Just Right at Home
https://justright-athome.com/

Reach out to Julee if you'd like to learn more about incorporating poles into your practice.

04/22/2026

Meet Coach Nicole. Physical therapist. Principal researcher at m.o.v.e. The person on our team who digs deepest into the science of why everything we do works.

And as you can see, a mom who will move mountains for those two boys.

Nicole doesn't just study volition. She lives it. Every intentional choice, every early morning, every sacrifice that doesn't feel like a sacrifice because the reason behind it is clear. That is volition in its most human form. The science has a name for it. Most people just call it love.

This is the lens we want you to try on today: find your why.

Not the abstract version. The specific, face-you-can-picture, reason-that-gets-you-out-of-bed version. Research tells us that a strong sense of purpose is one of the most powerful protective factors we have against cognitive decline. But purpose isn't a concept. It's a person. A practice. A passion. Something that makes the hard work feel like the only logical thing to do.

For people living with Parkinson's disease, finding and holding onto that why is not just emotionally important, it is clinically significant. It changes how you move. How consistently you show up. How hard you push when pushing is hard. Purpose doesn't cure anything. But it changes everything about how you fight.

Our coaches bring their whole lives to this work. Their research. Their expertise. Their families. Their reasons.

What's yours?

💛

Your muscles and your brain are in constant conversation. Exercise is what keeps that conversation going.When you move, ...
04/21/2026

Your muscles and your brain are in constant conversation. Exercise is what keeps that conversation going.
When you move, your body releases BDNF (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor) a protein that feeds, protects, and supports the very neurons most vulnerable in Parkinson's disease. The dopamine-producing cells in the substantia nigra that Parkinson's works hardest to erode are the ones BDNF works hardest to protect.

A 2024 systematic review confirmed that exercise therapy significantly raises BDNF levels in people with Parkinson's disease, and those increases were linked to real improvements in motor function, balance, and mobility.

This is why exercise isn't just good for your body in PD. It is a biological intervention. It reaches inside the nervous system and does something for which there is no substitute.

You don't need a laboratory to access this. You need to show up and move, consistently, intentionally, with amplitude and purpose.

The message your body sends your brain every single time? Resilience, right down to the cell.

🧠 📖 Kaagman et al., Brain Sciences, 2024 — link in bio.

04/20/2026

There are places that just get it, and is one of them.

The principles that drive results at OTF are some of the same principles that sit at the heart of what we teach at m.o.v.e. Large movement. Intentional effort. The kind of consistency that compounds over time. It is no accident that this community has been such a meaningful part of my own personal movement journey. What happens in that room matters — not just for fitness, but for long-term health, neurological resilience, balanced mood, and the kind of aging we all want.

Coach Mickey (an absolute queen) put it perfectly: less really is more. Forty-five seconds of your absolute all. That's it. That's the ask.

Here's what we want you to sit with: your all is not a fixed number. It shifts. Day to day. Hour to hour. Some days your all looks like a sprint. Some days it looks like showing up and doing the work when every part of you would rather stay home. Both count. Both matter.

Max out. Get out. And then come back and do it again. That is living with volition.

The effort is the practice. Practice is the point. Keep showing up to the spaces that support you, because every time you do, you are choosing your future self.

🧡 So here's your challenge: find 45 seconds today and give it everything you've got. That's all. Just 45 seconds. You can do this. With volition. 🧡

04/18/2026

This is what we show up for.

Every week, our m.o.v.e. community walks, not timidly, not apologetically, but with intention, amplitude, and power. That's not an accident. It's design.

Research tells us that community, movement, and purpose are three of the most powerful tools we have against cognitive decline and disease progression in Parkinson's. Our participants aren't just exercising. They're protecting their brains. They're protecting each other.

This is April. This is Parkinson's Awareness Month. And this is what we want the world to know: people with Parkinson's are not waiting. They are moving.

☀️

04/17/2026

There's a term researchers use to evaluate whether a training program actually works in real life: ecological validity.

It means: does what happens in the gym transfer to what happens at the kitchen table? On the sidewalk? In the middle of a conversation?

This question sits at the heart of everything we build at m.o.v.e.

From the beginning, our program was designed around the movements of your actual day — not exercises performed in isolation, but skills practiced in context. Reaching, turning, speaking with volume and intention. Rising from a chair with full deliberate effort. These aren't arbitrary choices. They're volitional when it counts.

That commitment to real-life relevance is also what drives our ongoing research partnership with North Central College. Our Principal Researcher, Dr. Nicole Bettin, PT, DPT, is working to measure not just what participants can do inside our program, but how those gains show up in daily life. Peer-reviewed, rigorous, and grounded in the question of what actually transfers.

There's a term researchers use to evaluate whether a training program actually works in real life: ecological validity.I...
04/17/2026

There's a term researchers use to evaluate whether a training program actually works in real life: ecological validity.

It means: does what happens in the gym transfer to what happens at the kitchen table? On the sidewalk? In the middle of a conversation?

This question sits at the heart of everything we build at m.o.v.e.

From the beginning, our program was designed around the movements of your actual day — not exercises performed in isolation, but skills practiced in context. Reaching, turning, speaking with volume and intention. Rising from a chair with full deliberate effort. These aren't arbitrary choices. They're volitional when it counts.

That commitment to real-life relevance is also what drives our ongoing research partnership with North Central College. Our Principal Researcher, Dr. Nicole Bettin, PT, DPT, is working to measure not just what participants can do inside our program, but how those gains show up in daily life. Peer-reviewed, rigorous, and grounded in the question of what actually transfers.

The fork. The pen. The phone. The morning routine.OT sees exactly where Parkinson's shows up in daily life — and knows w...
04/16/2026

The fork. The pen. The phone. The morning routine.

OT sees exactly where Parkinson's shows up in daily life — and knows what to do about it.

m.o.v.e. thanks all the incredible OTs out there. You are the special sauce of the therapy world. And a special thank you to our own Sharon Seitzinger who is worth her weight in gold and makes the world a better place every single day. 🧡

Happy .

04/15/2026

Meet Coach Sharon. Occupational therapist. m.o.v.e. coach. And as you can see, violinist.

Sharon didn't pick up the violin because it was easy. She plays because it matters to her. And that distinction — doing something because it is meaningful to you — is at the heart of what occupational therapy is really about.

Here's what a violin actually demands from your brain and body: fine motor precision. Bilateral coordination. Finger independence. Postural control. Breath regulation. Sustained attention. And all of it woven together in real time, in service of something beautiful. That is not a casual ask. That is your nervous system working at a very high level.

For people living with Parkinson's disease, the activities that once felt automatic — playing an instrument, cooking a meal, buttoning a shirt, handwriting a note — begin to require more deliberate effort. More intention. More volition. And the temptation, completely understandably, is to quietly stop doing them.
We want to push back on that. Gently but firmly.

The research on meaningful occupation is clear — staying engaged in the activities that give your life texture and joy is not indulgent. It is neurologically protective. Purposeful, skilled movement reinforces the very pathways that Parkinson's works to erode. The hobby isn't separate from the therapy. In many ways, it is the therapy.

Our coaches practice what they preach. Sharon plays. Megan skis. We move — loudly, intentionally, and with as much joy as we can bring to it — because that is exactly what we ask of every person who walks through our doors.

Find your violin. Keep playing it.

🎻🧠

04/14/2026

We teach it in the room. He took it everywhere.

This is what we work toward. Not just better movement during class, but a person who walks out the door and carries volition into every single part of their life. Into the kitchen. Onto the water. Onto the bike. Into their voice, their face, their presence in the world.

Volition isn't a technique you just perform during exercise. It's a way of moving through life with intention; choosing to be loud when Parkinson's says quiet, large when it says small, strong when it says slow. It takes practice. It takes repetition. It takes showing up for yourself again and again.

That's the goal. That has always been the goal. Not that our participants need us to move well, but that they carry what they've learned far beyond any class, any session, any room. Into their rowing. Their biking. Their cooking. The expressions on their faces when they greet someone they love.

This is what it looks like when it works.

We are so proud of you. And we are so grateful you shared this with us and with the world.

🚣🚴🧠

Address

500 E. Wilson Ave.
Lombard, IL
60148

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