I made 1 phone call to my local ABC affiliate & asked them if they had
anyone lined up to tie in w/ MJFox's last show of Spin City. The guy at
the newsroom was ecstatic to have me volunteer to be interviewed. I sent
him an email listing some of my favorite pd web sites
and asked him to please do his homework before he came! Within an hour
received another phone call asking to interview me on the same
day-today!! It's not so hard once you make them aware that you are
indeed newsworthy!
This is a piece I wrote for the PLWP website:
"My newspaper didn't even mention that April was Parkinson's Awareness
month...why not?" I have been asked this question so many times recently
and I always have the same answer: the news media in any area just
reports on things that it considers news. If you think that PD Awareness
is news, then YOU must make it newsworthy. YOU must make the media in
your area "Parkinson-friendly."
This is not something that happens overnight, but if you really want
to see more mention of PD, NOW is the time to start. Think of this as
addressing an audience, trying to educate & help your friends and
neighbors to understand what it is like to have PD. Take advantage of
the inroads that Janet Reno, Michael J. Fox and Muhammad Ali have blazed
across the TV screen-who can forget Ali struggling to light the Olympic
Torch or Janet Reno shaking like crazy but still in charge during a
recent Oprah appearance or Michael J Fox testifying before Arlan
Spector, obviously under-medicated?
I am no way in the ranks of these trailblazers, but I must admit to
being uneasy about the way that I appear on camera. I have gained so
much weight since my 2nd pallidotomy and because of the mirapex that I
hate the sight of myself on camera. My face has no expression anymore,
my voice is gone, I drool on myself and I cry when asked anything
remotely personal. I have taken the TV cameras along with me as a fiber
optic camera was slid up my nose and down my throat and my vocal chords
were displayed for all the 5 o'clock news watchers to see, flapping
aimlessly in an attempt to vibrate together. I was filmed in hospital
gown, shower cap and footies as I walked into have collagen injected
into my vocal chords and then was filmed unconscious with my mouth pried
open & breathing loudly through my nose. Newspaper pictures of me have
included me getting a metal halo screwed into my head on the occasion of
my surgeries and most recently, a fetching picture of me in a wild &
very obnoxious balloon hat at my last Parkinson's Awareness Day
festivities.
The point of all of these true confessions is that it would much easier
and kinder for me to stay at home with my lift chair & the TV remote and
let my disease take it's course. But the truth is: PD is not glamorous
nor is it pretty nor will I allow it to impose its will upon my life any
more than is absolutely necessary. I push myself to be seen in public,
bouncing off walls, falling down on Main Street, or whatever it takes to
make the public notice that what is happening to me, happens to millions
of others and our voices must be heard.
It all starts when you decide that you are no longer willing to
allow your disease to dictate your life. When you reach that point, you
will find the strength & courage deep inside of yourself...you will find
yourself talking to the media and you will allow yourself to be seen in
the unflattering light that PD forces upon us and YOU are the way to
awareness!!
--
Joan E. Snyder 48/10
[log in to unmask]
<http://www.newcountry.nu/pd/members/snyder/page1.htm>
"Hang tough.....no way through it but to do it."
Chris-in-the-Morning (Northern Exposure)
