The biggest challenge is managing the pain when you get out of bed to face the day. He says that the disease is not the end and proof of this is that he started painting and has already exhibited his works in Samora Correia. MIRANTE was in conversation with Dulce Possante as part of World Parkinson’s Disease Day, which takes place this Thursday, April 11th.
In a joke, Dulce Possante, 60 years old, realized that she didn’t move the fingers on her left hand like she did on her right. She consulted a rheumatologist and was referred to a physiotherapist. As she had had pain in her left foot for three years, the first diagnosis suggested that she had paralysis on the left side of her body. Referred to a neurologist, she was immediately diagnosed with Parkinson’s. The disease is not detected through exams but through movements that are requested from patients.
When he received the news in 2018, at the age of 54, he had no idea what the disease was. She began to receive medication and is still being followed in this specialty at Santa Maria Hospital. “The disease had been with me for many years so it wasn’t a shock. There was a name for the suffering that had accompanied me since I was 15 years old. Generalized pain, tiredness, pain in the foot, throat, spine, depressive tendency and always with a black shadow over it for no apparent reason,” she says.
The first five years of the disease are called “honeymoon” because the physical symptoms are not as pronounced. But in 2020 Dulce Possante fractured her leg and had to undergo four surgeries. In 2021 she broke her ankle and spent more than a month in a cast. Throughout the process, doctors diagnosed fibromyalgia.
With two chronic illnesses, what’s most difficult for him is getting up in the morning because of joint pain. He takes ten tablets a day, including Levodopa, which is used to prevent slow movements, plus an anti-depressant, a stomach protector and a pain pill. “Still I don’t stop. I have a big house, with two floors, plus two children, I take care of everything. I was an insurance intermediary but I didn’t like contact with the public and I left the client portfolio in 2005”, she reveals.
“When I paint I have no pain”
Unexpectedly, the painting appeared after the diagnosis of Parkinson’s, in April 2019. The youngest son went to study in Poland and with free time he bought a canvas and paints. Without knowing anything about painting, paints, brushes and without any type of training Dulce Possante began painting day and night. First on paper blocks and cardboard. She would get up at three and four in the morning, go to the outbuilding in the backyard and start painting.
“When I started painting it gave me extraordinary joy. When I paint I’m not in pain, I’m not cold or hungry. I spend a lot of time there. I only leave when I finish a painting. I always paint with lots of color and express feelings.” Her family didn’t comment because they didn’t know her painting skills, but two friends encouraged her. Then having a painting exhibition under my own name was a leap forward. She exhibited at the Palácio do Infantado gallery, in Samora Correia, in March, and was praised. The paintings, signed with the pseudonym Maria Miguel, were sold at symbolic prices after the exhibition “Parkieart – Parkinson and Eu”. Color predominates on the canvases, giving space for everyone’s imagination.
Dulce Possante drives and insists on going on vacation and sightseeing. The biggest challenge is controlling the pain. She doesn’t shake much but involuntarily she always has one hand moving. She only realizes it when she looks in the mirror. One of the most important aspects of living with Parkinson’s is exercising. That’s why he started following the American group Power for Parkinson, which gives daily live online classes aimed at mobility. She confesses that she is lazy but sometimes gets up at dawn to stretch.
