C - Creativity

🚫Concentration. 😵‍💫Cognition. 🥴Constipation. 💩Confusion. 🤔Choking. 😵🚫

I don't feel like talking about any of these words. 🙅🏻‍♀️

Did you know that there is a potential link between Parkinson’s and creativity? 🧠🎨This is quite well known in the Parkinson’s community as a lot of patients suddenly or gradually release their inner artist post-diagnosis. Several studies are backing it up too. It seems a subgroup of patients experience an urge to draw, paint, write, etc, after their diagnosis. This happened to me too. I have had a creative side for as long as I can remember, however I never really knew how to use it. And after I finished school I lost the interest for many years completely. I really like the idea, but I also know that this link is associated with the parkinson’s medication, which makes it a bit less fun. 💊

But could it be, that the disease robs you of your creativity, makes you depressed and apathetic, and then the medication helps you get it back? I like that thought, but either way, it doesn’t really matter what causes it, it’s just a really cool concept and a bonus you can get along with this horrible illness. It was the reason why I started this account in the first place, and why I called it _thesideeffect_. Side effect of the disease or the meds, I don’t really care, but I really love what it made me do. Instead of scrolling endlessly through my phone every night I started being productive and creative. Learning to do new things is a great way to promote a healthy brain and drawing, painting, knitting and sewing also trains fine motor skills. Many artistic parkies find it gives them a sense of freedom and a break from their debilitating symptoms.

To me, this burst in creativity really helped me cope with recieving this life-changing diagnosis, and gave me a new perspective, new hobbies and let me explore art in a whole new way. Some of the friends I have made in the parkinsons community have the exact same experience and it is so inspiring to follow them. So forget all the other C-words today. Creativity is one of the positive “symptoms” this disease has given me. It’s not all bad! 🥰