Kelly Osbourne and the rest of her family initially feared that Ozzy Osbourne “would never walk again” following his Parkinson’s disease diagnosis last February. Diagnosed with PRKN 2, the disease is a neurodegenerative disorder that has no cure and can cause tremors, bradykinesia, limb rigidity, and gait and balance problems, according to the Parkinson’s Foundation.
“This time one year ago, we didn’t know if Dad was ever gonna walk again,” Osbourne said during a Tuesday interview with Robin Roberts that aired on Good Morning America.
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Ozzy, who described the past year as “terribly challenging,” suffered a fall around this time last year that required surgery on his neck that “screwed all my nerves.” At the same time, he was also diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, but did not publicly disclose that diagnosis until Tuesday.
Despite their initial concerns, Osbourne is on the mend and is “a lot better now than I was last February,” a time during which he said he was in a “shocking state.”
Although diagnosed with the disease just a year ago, the Black Sabbath rocker was diagnosed with Parkin syndrome, a nervous system disorder that affects movement, in the early 2000s. According to ContactMusic.com, Ozzy had received the diagnoses, which is unrelated to Parkinson’s disease, after he complained that his tremors were “practically destroying (his) life.”
“I’d always assumed it was the booze and stuff,” he said at the time. “Now I’ve found it all stems from the family. It’s called Parkin but it’s not Parkinson’s. Anything to do with the central nervous system has the word Parkin in it.”
While there is no cure for Parkinson’s disease, there are numerous treatments to manage it. According to Ozzy’s wife, Sharon Osbourne, the rocker will be traveling to Switzerland in April to seek further medical help from a professional who “deals with – getting your immune system at its peak,” as “we’ve kind of reached a point here in this country where we can’t go any further because we’ve got all the answers we can get here.”
For now, however, Osbourne is continuing to adjust to life and is receiving plenty of love and support from his family.
“It’s kind of become a bit of – I think a role reversal for us, where we have to be like, ‘Snap out of it. Come on we – we have to all admit what’s happening here,’ so that we can get over this. And it took a while for everyone to be on the same page,” Kelly explained. “We’ve all learned so much about each other again – and it’s reaffirmed how strong we are.”
