Rebecca King Crews Has Hope in Parkinson's Battle

Rebecca King Crews says her handwriting tells the story: She can clearly sign her name with her right hand for the first time in around three years. The 60-year-old singer and wife of actor Terry Crews revealed on NBC's Today that she has Parkinson's disease and recently underwent a new, noninvasive brain procedure to ease her symptoms. Crews said her health issues began around 2012 with foot numbness, a limp, and a tremor she recognized from her grandmother. For years, she says, doctors blamed anxiety or over-exercising, and a neurologist was unsure—until a Parkinson's specialist finally diagnosed her in 2015.

Her most disruptive symptom has been tremors that complicated basic tasks like brushing her teeth. In March, she had a bilateral focused ultrasound, a recently expanded FDA-approved treatment that uses MRI-guided sound waves to target brain areas tied to movement problems. The procedure isn't a cure and doesn't replace medication, but she says the tremor on her right side is gone and her balance is better; she plans to treat the other side in September. Crews, who still drives, plays piano, and takes acting classes, says she went public to raise awareness of the costly, not-yet-widely-covered procedure and to "give hope to people with Parkinson's, because I believe that we're going to find the cure."

The therapy is "very cutting edge," says Dr. Vivek Buch, an assistant professor of neurosurgery at Stanford University, per People. "And I think she did it for others as much as she did it for herself. Not for publicity, but to be part of moving the field forward so others can also benefit from this new therapy."

Terry Crews says his wife, who underwent a double mastectomy after being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020, is a "superhero" and "the rock of our lives." He says he "got choked up just thinking" about her being able to write her name for the first time in years. "When they say sickness and health, this is the battle that we were designed to fight together," the America's Got Talent host says. "Where she's weak, I'm strong. Where I'm weak, she's strong. And we built each other up like that for almost 37 years and all the way to forever."