Michael J Fox on accepting Parkinson’s disease

It took a while for Michael J. Fox to come to terms with his illness, says Emma Brockes in the Guardian. In 1991, when he was just 30, the actor was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease.

For seven years, he was in denial. He continued to film his sitcom, Spin City, in front of a live audience, disguising his twitches by sitting on his hands, anchoring himself to pieces of furniture, or turning each tic into a conventional mannerism (a hand flying through the air would land on his hair and smooth it down).

Even so, he hated the way the disease made him look. "Peculiar," he says. "Funnylooking. It makes me squirm and it makes my pants ride up so my socks are showing and my shoes fall off, and I can't get the food up to my mouth when I want to."

It was only after he finally 'came out', and began a new career campaigning and raising funds for research into Parkinson's, that he began to feel more optimistic. "It has a lot to do with accepting [the condition]. That doesn't mean being resigned or not looking for a cure. But if you're trying to get away from it or change it, you're going to wear yourself out."

Now, he says, he doesn't care about looking strange. "If I don't get the food into my mouth, I'm still happy. If my pants are round my ankles, as long as I don't get arrested for indecent exposure, I'm happy." ·