![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/4815750_4_articleinline_Twitch_by_Annemarie_O_E2_80_99Connor.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
<\/p>\n\u00a0\u201cMom, I have Parkinson\u2019s. I don\u2019t know what to do.\u201d <\/p>\n
So writes Annemarie O\u2019Connor, the Irish Examiner fashion editor, podcaster, and author in her honest, interesting, and darkly humorous memoir about learning how to cope with a devastating diagnosis.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor was 47 when, in December 2021, she was diagnosed with early-onset Parkinson\u2019s disease \u2014 a progressive, degenerative brain disorder with no cure. It affects movement and mental health.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor\u2019s mother, on receiving the bad news when she phoned her daughter for a chat, said: \u201cDear, you\u2019ll carry on and you\u2019ll do it because you have to. That\u2019s all you can do.\u201d<\/p>\n
A strong woman, O\u2019Connor\u2019s mother was widowed at 35 with five children.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She coped admirably and her \u201cquiet certainty\u201d, as O\u2019Connor describes it, regarding her youngest daughter\u2019s ability to keep going was well placed.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor, a regular columnist with the Irish Examiner, an advocate for people with Parkinson\u2019s, as well as Irish Tatler Woman of the Year (in the Catalyst category) for 2023, is a remarkable woman who possibly didn\u2019t know she had such reserves to pull on when life threw her a cruel blow.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n She describes herself as outwardly independent but a loner at heart who is afraid of being a burden to anyone.\u00a0\n <\/p>\n
But as Catherine, one of her four sisters, said to her: \u201cYou need your people. Don\u2019t forget that.\u201d It was, O\u2019Connor reflects, the best advice she has ever received.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor went through a battery of tests before she got her diagnosis at Cork University Hospital.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Brought up in the US, O\u2019Connor was 12 when she moved to the west of Ireland with her mother and siblings.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She attended NUI Galway and alludes to an eating disorder that she had while a student. This is in the context of O\u2019Connor\u2019s depleted appetite and weight loss on her Parkinson\u2019s journey.<\/p>\n
The memoir is full of ups and downs when it comes to medication. It seems that for nearly every drug that works, there are often prohibitive side effects such as impulse control disorder.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor navigates the medicine, sometimes with humour, a great tool in her armour.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She writes: \u201cOn occasion, the vibrations and body-popping make it look like I\u2019m auditioning for a break dance crew \u2014 the girl who doesn\u2019t dance.\u201d<\/p>\n
But as well as the humour, there are niggling worries about financial insecurity and O\u2019Connor\u2019s future.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Being a single freelancer makes her vulnerable. She had to give up her role as a stylist as trying to handle pins and zips with a tremor made her a liability.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Towards the end of the memoir, O\u2019Connor\u2019s typing ability is back on track allowing her to work at a good pace.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A sister had suggested she try speech-to-text software but O\u2019Connor resisted, feeling she had enough on her plate without having to learn the art of dictating her columns.<\/p>\n
When Vickie Maye, features editor of the Irish Examiner, commissioned O\u2019Connor to write a piece, opening up about her diagnosis and what it\u2019s like to live with Parkinson\u2019s, it was an opportunity to \u2018come out.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
The article was the cover story of Weekend magazine on August 27, 2022. O\u2019Connor says the piece was \u201cdeeply personal, but I didn\u2019t feel exposed. Instead, I feel grounded, like I finally own my story.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
There was a huge reaction to the piece which resulted in O\u2019Connor accepting invitations to come on the Brendan O\u2019Connor Show as well as Tommy Tiernan\u2019s chat show.<\/p>\n
In the introduction, O\u2019Connor writes that she had a choice to make. \u201cI could play it small and stoic and \u2018manage\u2019 my condition, or I could share my medical coming-out story and, in doing so, help others who might feel similarly broken.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
O\u2019Connor made the right choice. Her book is a must-read for anyone affected by Parkinson\u2019s. It\u2019s also a compelling read for anyone who appreciates memoir writing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a0\u201cMom, I have Parkinson\u2019s. I don\u2019t know what to do.\u201d So writes Annemarie O\u2019Connor, the Irish Examiner fashion…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":204444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[127004,64,63,457,134,127103],"class_list":["post-204443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-books","tag-books-non-fiction","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-books","tag-entertainment","tag-person-annemarie-oconnor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/204444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}