Living with Parkinsons

This project was very personal to me as it was based around my family and something we have all been dealing with for years now. It started 5 years ago when we found out my beloved grandad was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. Ever since, it has been a battle every day, especially for my amazing Nan. She really is my hero whom I look up to so much for what she has to deal with on a day to day basis with my grandad. I wanted my final project for my final year at University to be something very personal to me. I chose to base it around my grandad’s disease. I created a hypothetical charity that solely focuses on supporting carers of people with Parkinson called ‘Living with Parkinson’s UK’. A charity that is there for them, to comfort and support them, to be a shoulder to cry on when things are getting tough. This charity would work alongside the well-known Parkinson’s charity, Parkinson’s UK. I created a series of posters to raise awareness for carers of the disease and to show that each person deals with it differently. It affects everyone emotionally in a lot of different ways, may that be anger, frustration or even sadness. However, there is always someone there to be your support system, someone to turn to when you just want to scream and cry when you’re having a bad day. That is what ‘Living with Parkinson’s UK’ charity is here to do. I wanted my posters to have a personal feel to them, so I involved my family. I asked each member of my family to write down exactly how they feel about Parkinson’s disease. I went through and chose the key elements of their letters that sum up exactly how they feel about it, then later I turned them into posters to raise awareness that you’re not alone. A lot of people are in the same situation and feel exactly the same sometimes. There were a lot of mixed emotions when doing this project. I really got an idea of how my family are feeling as we don’t speak about his condition very much. We are a “bury your heads in the sand” kind of family, it is just easier that way. I think even my grandad definitely has a better understanding of how we all feel. It has brought my grandparents a lot closer as my grandad now appreciates and acknowledges it is of course hard on him, however, it’s even harder on my nan, his wife who loves him dearly and sees him every day, now struggle with day to day things he could once do very easily. He is and always will be our lovely grandad, a loving husband and an amazing dad.