- Dance gives people the ability to respond.

And there's nothing really more personal than getting to respond with your own body.

(bright music) - I had a shake in my hand, and I wasn't sure what it was, and made an appointment to check it out.

I had never heard of Parkinson's disease.

I mean, I had heard of it, but didn't know anyone who suffered from it, until the end of my doctor's appointment.

When he said, "You have Parkinson's disease."

And I said, "when am I gonna die?"

(somber music) That was 11 years ago.

Dr. Google became my friend, and I spent all my time finding what organizations existed?

What I could do?

And actually that was the best thing I ever did.

(somber music) And when I finally got the nerve up to go to activity, I started to meet people who also had Parkinson's.

I realized it's like this club that I could join, and it would be okay.

And it was fun actually.

And I turned around.

I had a big turnaround.

And that's when I really started to fight, fight back.

(dance music) I loved to dance.

I went to an old girl school and we didn't have gym.

We had ballet.

By the time I was in sixth grade, you know, I wanted to be the star.

And as an adult, I have been known to dance up storm.

(dance music) - I first started dancing when I was seven years old.

Whenever music would turn on when I was little, I would just instantly start moving around the room.

And so my parents thought they needed to enroll me quickly so I could get started.

When I was able to teach, I saw that I could actually share this with other people, and be able to pour out in a way that I had not before, and being able to connect with others and see that they could benefit from dance in the same way that I had.

(piano playing) The partnership between Neuro Challenge and Sarasota Ballet started just over two years ago.

The joyful movement through Parkinson's class, really is basically what the title says.

It's a way for participants to be able to move in a really freeing and joyful way to music together.

And so we're using ballet as the main structure for the class.

We always wanna make sure that the students can feel comfortable doing movement, either sitting down, or holding onto a chair or something stable.

(piano playing) From here, we're gonna do a low Swan arm.

Now, each time you do a lift, I want you to actually breathe in.

So that way, when you're breathing in the chest will lift, and the arms will lift with the chest and then breathe out.

Good.

I can hear it.

So if you see a joyful movement class, and you see professional dancers, you'll actually see a lot of similarities in the movement.

And that is because with ballet there's a very simple core to the technique.

It's really neat that, you know we can take what the company is doing, which are really inspiring and interesting works of art.

And we can actually use the fun movement within that choreography to have the Parkinson's community doing those really simple movements.

(piano playing) - The reason I like it so much is because it's all about the body, and the mind.

One of the things that happens with Parkinson, is you can no longer multitask the way you used to.

It's very hard.

When you're in a dance class and you're moving your feet, and your arms at the same time, it's hard.

And you have to think too, and that's hard and they challenge you.

It's not just introduce yourself.

It's introduce yourself with a upper body movement.

There are a lot of moving parts.

It works to improve your balance.

And the more confident you feel about your balance, the more likely you are to stand up and walk, and more likely you are to stand and walk.

Then you'll be doing some exercise before you know it.

It's uplifting.

It makes you feel good.

(piano playing) - As a dancer and as a teacher, for most of my career, the focus of dance has been so much on mastering the technique, and pushing oneself and teaching the Parkinson's community.

It's really opened my eyes to see that dance is so much more than that.

Obviously honing a skill is important, and it's amazing that we have very talented professionals that we are able to go to watch, but dance should be more than that.

Dance should also be so something that's incredibly healing and that is accessible to everyone.

When we experience different kinds of physical limitations, it's so easy to put labels on ourselves, based off of our condition or our stage of life.

And what our class does is, it takes away these labels.

And it shows our students, that they have a different identity, that they are human beings, who have a story to share.

They can be artists and they can also be really loved and valued members of a community.

(bright music) - People who don't understand the disease sometimes, you know, tiptoe around, cuz they don't wanna offend you.

They don't wanna say anything.

They don't wanna do the wrong thing.

I mean, I get that.

That's very nice.

But the people who love you and know you, they know I'm just an everyday normal person.

I mean, we coexist that's, that's the beauty of Sarasota.

(upbeat music)