Grabbing life by the horns: Wildlife photographer reveals how he is coping with Parkinson’s

June 13, 2016

One of the stunning images captures by wildlife photographer David Plummer (Photo: David Plummer)

For seven years, the photographer David Plummer kept his Parkinson’s diagnosis secret, still travelling around the world taking beautiful images of exotic wildlife.

Far from slowing him down, the disease has inspired him to achieve some of his greatest work, he tells Amanda Riley-Jones

“When I started feeling tired in 2009, I put it down to over-working and getting older,” says David Plummer. “Then I started getting a little twitch in my left arm maybe once a week. I thought it would go but when it got more frequent over a couple of months, I googled it and Parkinson’s was the first thing that came up.”

Unfortunately for the wildlife photographer, his internet search proved accurate. He was just 40 at the time. “Hearing the diagnosis was like an axe coming down,” he says. “Travelling round the world photographing wildlife is my passion. I live and breathe it every day. I thought I was going to lose everything.”

David Plummer with his hi-tech photography gear (Photo: David Plummer)

Anyone reading further on the details of Parkinson’s disease will learn that the progressive neurological condition involves the death of some of the brain’s nerve cells. This causes a deficiency in a chemical called dopamine.

The symptoms and speed at which the condition develops differ from person to person; but as the world has been reminded by the decline of Muhammad Ali, the main symptoms are the tremors, becoming more rigid and slowing down in movement. Other complications can include pain, depression, insomnia and digestive and speech problems.

It affects 127,000 people in Britain – that’s one person in every 500. Around a third of people with Parkinson’s develop symptoms before the age of 65, and one in 100 before the age of 40. The condition is chronic and progressive, although not fatal. Despite intensive research, scientists still don’t know why most people get the condition and there’s currently no cure.

Many experts think it’s caused by a combination of environmental toxins – such as some pesticides and chemicals in cleaning products – as well as lifestyle and genetic factors, which only have a small effect individually. According to Parkinson’s UK, severe repeated head injury could also be a factor.

“I briefly thought ‘Why me?’ – which I subsequently think is ridiculous. I’m an ecologist, I’m just another organism like that robin out there that is going to get killed by a sparrowhawk,” he says, gesturing to his West Sussex woodland garden, which backs on to farmland and the South Downs National Park.

“In nature, nothing stays the same. A birch tree grows fast, reaches senescence at 60 to 90 years, falls over, pulls a hole in the canopy and other plants come to life in the clearing. I feel lucky to be here and pinch myself every day that I do this for a living. I just happen to have a sod of a disease but I don’t think I’ve ever felt happier.”

A lion cub nestled inside a carcass (Photo: David Plummer)

Parkinson’s is notoriously difficult to diagnose. After David’s GP referred him to a neurologist at London’s UCL Hospital, he had six months of appointments and brain scans before getting the diagnosis in November 2009.

“I had a fleeting moment of liberation from the uncertainty. Then the neurologist commented that I looked a bit shocked. When I asked what I could do, she replied: ‘There’s nothing you can do’. Afterwards, I walked around a London square in a daze.

“The next day, I researched Parkinson’s on the internet and remember one photograph of a nurse holding a very wrinkled, elderly hand. The message I received was ‘Parkinson’s? Game over.’ I had days of pure panic. For five days, I was walking around day and night. I couldn’t stay in a room if the door was closed.”

Apart from close family and friends, David kept his diagnosis to himself. “I’m a man, I want to be seen as a good specimen. It’s natural that I wanted to hide it,” he says.

His GP prescribed tranquillisers but David didn’t hear back from his neurologist. “I wanted information, I didn’t know what to do. When I contacted Parkinson’s UK, they sent a volunteer to my flat. It was such a relief to talk to Paul and he told me to go back to my GP and insist on an appointment with a Parkinson’s nurse.”

Over the months, David managed to rebuild his equilibrium. “We have no control of what happens to us, but we can choose how we react. All my life I’ve been strong-willed and chosen positivity. It has become a habit. Disability is a hindrance and I know I will lose function in time. But Parkinson’s galvanised me to be more alive and to achieve more in what could be less time. I made the choice to grab life by the horns,” he says.

A spoonbill photographed in Hungary (Photo: David Plummer)

Although drugs are the main treatment for symptoms, David managed without them for several years. He explains: “The drugs aren’t effective for more than about 15 years. So I had a fear that once I started, I’d be setting myself a timescale.” Despite progressive fatigue, muscle stiffness and tremors (“some days I had none, other days they could last for hours and it was a struggle to pull keys out of my pocket”), he doggedly carried on as usual. “If people asked what was wrong, I’d explain I had a nerve condition.”

He continued – and still continues – leading his wildlife tours to biodiversity hotspots including the Galapagos islands, Kenya’s Maasai Mara and the wetlands of Brazil’s Pantanal. The other eight months of the year, he runs trips and courses in the UK, manages his private woodland and works in bird and badger conservation.

But whether he’s photographing gorillas in Rwanda or teaching a course in macro photography in his garden, his mind is completely focused on work. “I am obsessed with images. I don’t think about the disability while I’m working. I don’t care if I’m stiff and aching, I’ll do whatever it takes to get the shot,” he says.

“There is nothing serendipitous about the perfect wildlife photo. Photography is only 15 per cent of the task: 85 per cent is researching the animal’s behaviour so you can get inside its fear circle, setting up and waiting. To get the image of the spoonbill in Kiskunsag National Park in Hungary, I was in a floating hide for two hours with my back and arms covered in leeches. Bloody big things they were too!”

Three years ago, David started taking levodopa – a drug used to increases levels of dopamine in the brain. “There was no choice. I’m on it throughout the day. When it starts to wear off, I have less energy, my muscles feel heavy and stiff and I move more slowly,” he explains.

Like many users, he has a side effect called dyskinesia [involuntary muscle movements]. “It’s like a weaving motion of the whole body. Of course people notice and it’s quite embarrassing,” he says. “And although I’m on a cocktail of drugs, some days they don’t work. I did a course last week and I was completely ‘off’ – tremoring severely and walking slowly.”

Despite this, David’s only concessions to Parkinson’s are using faster shutter speeds to counteract camera shake and, with long-haul trips, he flies one day ahead of the group so he can have a night in a hotel before the tour starts.

At home, he uses voice dictation software on his computer and uses the services of a cleaner, bookkeeper, accountant and PA (a retired man who’s equally passionate about wildlife) to help shoulder the load. “I can’t let my business slip. I want to stay here and I have a mortgage to pay,” he says, sitting at a desk in his conservatory from where he can watch birds, foxes and badgers coming to his pond.

Plummer works in badger conservation and the animals are visitors to his garden (Photo: David Plummer)

Until very recently, David was keeping his health condition private. There are two reasons why he’s decided to break his silence now. “The symptoms are getting harder to hide,” he smiles. To restrict unwanted movement in his left arm, he’s got into the habit of putting his left hand in his pocket or holding his wrists behind his back. “My friends say I stand like a major!” he laughs.

But the main reason for going public is that he wants to promote his soon-to-be-published Seven Years of Camera Shake. The book contains over 200 wildlife photographs he’s taken since the diagnosis, along with his descriptions and anecdotes. “Parkinson’s UK do such good work and I’m giving them 50 per cent of the proceeds,” he adds.

In April, he set up a crowdfunding appeal on unbound.co.uk to raise £18,000 to secure a publishing deal. “I reached the target within three weeks and I’ve been very moved and grateful for all the messages of support,” he says.

David wants his book to dispel any remaining preconceptions that Parkinson’s is only a disease of the elderly and that a diagnosis represents the end of hope. “This book is not about what Parkinson’s has done to me. It’s a book about what Parkinson’s has not done to me,” says David who’s now a volunteer supporting others with Parkinson’s.

“It’s a showcase of what I hope is world-class work and I just happen to have Parkinson’s disease. I want to tell people with any disability not to limit their ambitions. I have a challenge but it’s not stopping me. I’m seven years down the line and still loving my life.”

‘Seven Years of Camera Shake’ by David Plummer will be published next year. For information on his book, courses and tours, see davidplummerimages.co.uk

https://inews.co.uk/essentials/lifestyle/people/wilidlife-photographer-david-plummer-parkinsons-disease/?