I haven’t been diagnosed with parkinsons, but today my neurologist diagnosed me with RBD and mentioned the connection with parkinsons. I wondered if anyone here had RBD before they were diagnosed with parkinsons and how long it was before the parkinsons symptoms started.
Thanks
Hello @Toffee, welcome to our forum, and thank you for posting your first message. We hope our community can share their insights and experience with RBD to help.
We have information on our website on Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep behaviour disorder, which you might find helpful, including symptoms, reaching out for help, and things you can do to help reduce the risk of hurting yourself at night: Sleep problems | Parkinson's UK
These include tips such as removing potentially dangerous items from your bedroom, adding protective padding to the corners of bedside tables, and moving furniture away from your bed.
Take care 
Parkinson’s UK Moderation Team
Hi Toffee. I was diagnosed with RDB in 2018 and Parkinson’s two years later in 2020. I have very few Parkinson’s motor symptoms - a bit of a tremor, poor gait but no real problems with pain etc. On the other hand my non motor symptoms including sleep disruption, constipation, loss of sense of smell, thinking problems all started several years before either diagnosis. In fact if I hadnt been dx with RBD I would probably not been dx with PD. Its only because of the link that they monitored me so closely. I knoiw its scary, I was terrified at first, but here’s the upside - Early diagnosis is a very good thing. It means you can do things like exercise and medication to slow the thing down. Some people live like this for decades. Welcome the news as a cue to get into a healthy mind and body regime and enjoy life.
Thank you for getting back to me. It is scary.
Hi Toffee, I sometimes think there are so many symptoms of PD that almost anything can be linked to it! You’re doing the right thing by getting symptoms looked into for reasons Angus has outlined. My early symptoms were what I thought were minor muscle spasms and tremors in my right leg and arm. I’d no other symptoms until I watched an episode of Loose Women where a celeb with Parkinsons mentioned his sleeping problems - and I struggled to sleep well from literally that night! Things aren’t always what they seem.
Hope things go okay for you going forward.