Unicorns and Rainbows

By Teresa Swartz Roberts

Blog Post 62 copyright 2025

Despite being a little girl at some point, I don’t believe in unicorns and rainbows. I’m not made of sugar and spice and everything nice. 

I am an outlier. I’m a woman with Parkinson’s Disease. 

Men get Parkinson’s nearly twice as often as women do. Some doctors have been trained to believe that it happens only in men. Unless there’s an obvious tremor, they don’t always know what to look for in a woman to diagnose Parkinson’s. Researchers have found differences in how Parkinson’s symptoms present in women and men. If a tell-tale tremor is not present, less experienced doctors don’t know what to look for. My diagnosing neurologist told me so after he had spent only 5 minutes recognizing my Parkinson’s symptoms. 

I am putting this thought out in the universe to possibly help someone suffering from Parkinson’s and not receiving treatment because our medical system doesn’t recognize that yes, indeed, women do get the disease, and sometimes they get their first symptom when they’re 40, like I did. Thirteen years later when we moved from rural Maine to Atlanta, I could barely pick up my feet. And it took me 16 tiny steps to make a U- turn. I blamed it on a  knee with enough arthritis to need a replacement. 

I was also fat. And that complicated the diagnosis process. 

I can’t tell you the number of times that my weight and my gender were blamed for ailments. When I was in my sophomore year of college, I had a serious bladder infection that took away my health.  When I went to see a specialist about it, he did not examine me. Did not take a urine sample. He sat across a desk from me and said that I had a congenital defect. I was born female. 

I am grateful that most medical professionals are not so narrow- minded. Thank God there are researchers who are examining gender as a factor in diagnosing Parkinson’s Disease. I believe in science. Science has given me symptom relief with medications, specifically carbidopa- levodopa, and targeted therapies such as Big and Loud LSVT, which figuratively rewired my brain. And now I’m seeking the miracle of deep brain stimulation (DBS) to literally rewire my brain. 

Rainbows and unicorns are beautiful. Unicorns are not real. Rainbows are. Rainbows are science. They are fact. You have to look for them, yes. And conditions have to be just right to see them. But I do see them. I am hopeful. I do not believe in unicorns. But the rainbows will keep me looking for miracles.