After 50 years of career, Parkinson’s disease forced him in 2018 to give up these concerts on his tours. He tells in a rare interview with CBS how he refused his doctor’s diagnosis for a long time before accepting this shift in his life.
He is a huge star in the United States and in the English-speaking world. Neil Diamond, 82, and his 130 million albums sold in fifty years of career is known for his hit Sweet Carolineanthem of football stadiums, or even Girl, you’ll be a woman soon, featured in the movie Pulp Fiction.
“I was in total denial”
The country-folk veteran has always been very active, chaining concerts and tours. And then everything stopped in 2018 when Parkinson’s disease no longer allowed him to go on stage. This week, he who had almost disappeared from the public space for five years has just granted an interview to the American channel CBS to talk about his illness.
Neil Diamond tells how he refused it, how he didn’t want to believe it. “In fact, when the doctor described to me what I had, I wasn’t ready to accept it, I was like, ‘Okay, okay, Parkinson’s, fine, well, you tell me when you want to meet again, but while waiting for me, I have work to do, so goodbye’, remembers the singer. I was in total denial, it lasted for years, and finally, it’s only been a few weeks since I accepted this situation, this calm, this tranquility.. ” After five years of refusing the disease, he accepted to be suffering from an illness that cannot be cured.
Keep singing, “the best therapy”
There is no cure for Parkinson’s, a neurodegenerative disease that slows down movement, creates tremors, clumsiness, gradually reduces autonomy and gives the impression that we no longer belong to ourselves. ” But somewhere, it Neil Diamond, since I have been in acceptance, my life is more peaceful. I am at peace, I am less hard on myself, less hard on others, I tell myself that life goes on and that it will continue after me.
While World Parkinson’s Day will take place in a few days, on April 11, his story speaks for many patients: 8 million people in the world, 200,000 in France, according to France Parkinson, for which the whole challenge is to live with your body and not to struggle. Neil Diamond says that his miracle cure is to continue singing, for his own pleasure, “because it’s the only time my body and my mind work together, in harmony, it’s the best therapy“.
