“It’s something that, disabled or not, young or old, I’d have never imagined doing in my life.” This is how 41-year-old Anthony Desjardins describes the news that, on Monday 13th May, he’ll be carrying the Paris 2024 Olympic Flame through his home city of Montpellier in France.
It’s been just three years since the father-of-two was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in July 2021, but he could never have predicted that so soon after joining the Parkinson’s community, he’d be chosen to represent them on an worldwide stage at Paris 2024.
He first started experiencing subtle rigidity issues when he was just 34, and to begin with he easily adapted to this symptom, but when the rigidity got worse and was joined by balance issues and bradykinesia (slowness of movement), he decided to consult a doctor. Just a few months later, at the age of 38, he received the news it was Parkinson’s.
“Finding out that I had Parkinson’s was actually a positive announcement for me,” Anthony explained. “Indeed, the months leading to my diagnosis were quite hard as I didn’t know what was going on so learning what I had was paradoxically positive.”
But the news of this diagnosis at such a young age also came as a shock to his close family and friends, who – like Anthony himself – had no previous experience with Parkinson’s beyond seeing famous people like Michael J Fox and Mohammed Ali with the condition, so he “created an Instagram account to show my relatives what living with Parkinson’s looked like.”
Another reason Anthony started documenting his Parkinson’s on social media is because “in France, people often have the assumption that Parkinson’s only affects elderly people and only causes tremor. I was 38 years old and didn’t have tremor so I wanted to show that Parkinson’s wasn’t only that.”
These humble beginnings have grown into an impressive platform: Anthony now has over 10,000 followers across his main social media accounts. He explained how he achieved this following after being put on medical leave at work following his diagnosis:
“I initially thought that I’d be prescribed a few drugs and I’d be back working but when I started to understand that it wasn’t going to be possible, I started online courses on digital marketing to learn how to build a social media presence, and how to manage it. Step-by-step, I managed to acquire my current following.”
More recently, Anthony has used his sporting background (including a previous job at the French Tennis Federation) to focus his message on the benefits of sports and exercise for Parkinson’s:
“Sport has always been part of my life. I had this taken away from me during my initial Parkinson’s symptoms phase, and when I started exercising again it was at the time when exercise was more and more proven to benefit people with Parkinson’s and to slow down its progression. So I told myself that was my silver lining: that loving sports will actually benefit me. I decided that I’d make sports and Parkinson’s my message.”
It was this that led to Anthony’s latest video series, Un Parki Chez Les Pros, in which he visits and plays a variety of sports alongside famous sportspeople.
“One evening at home, I thought to myself that I live near Montpellier which has numerous sports teams in the top division, and that if I wanted to spread my message to a larger audience, people with greater notoriety than me would help a lot. So I started contacting people and clubs.”
There’s now over a dozen Un Parki Chez Les Pros videos on Anthony’s YouTube channel, and he described filming each one as being a varied and overwhelmingly positive experience.
There were some surprises, too: for instance, when Anthony went to record a video with Hugo Gaston (currently ranked in the top 100 tennis players in the world) at the Open Sud de France (Southern French Open) at the Montpellier Arena:
“What was amazing was that at the last minute I learnt that we were playing on the main court which was an incredible feeling. I didn’t play amazing because of the emotions and the stress but it was great!”
Another highlight was an episode with the Montpellier Rugby Club – “They were incredibly welcoming and the team spirit was amazing” – as well as episodes with the French Women’s volleyball team, kickboxer Jimmy Vienot, and three-times Olympic handball champion Michaël Guigou.
Anthony’s achievements with Un Parki Chez Les Pros makes it especially fitting that he has been chosen to represent the Parkinson’s community as an Olympic Torch carrier for Paris 2024, but it wasn’t an easy journey to get there.
After initially being nominated for the role by Jean-Louis Dufloux, President of France Parkinson, Anthony received an email saying that sadly, his application had been rejected.
“I was very disappointed,” he explained, “But in that email, they did say that I had a last opportunity to convince them by submitting a 15-second video explaining why I’d be the right candidate. I recorded that video as soon as I got that email and submitted it, reinforcing my message of promoting exercise as a young person with Parkinson’s.”
With much lower hopes this time, weeks went past with no news, until Anthony finally received a phone call from the Paris 2024 organisers:
“Unfortunately I was driving so I couldn’t take the call. I was so excited I couldn’t wait to know the answer, so I stopped at the first parking spot I could find to call them back – and finally heard the good news!”
As the happy news sunk in that he’d be carrying the Paris 2024 Olympic Torch through his home city of Montpellier, Anthony even received a letter of congratulations from the mayor, but he still can’t quite believe it’s going to happen.
“I probably will when they’ll dress me up with the official uniform and tell me that it’s now but I’m not even that sure as it’ll be such a special moment. I cannot wait!”
Unsurprisingly, Anthony is particularly thrilled about representing Parkinson’s on Paris 2024’s world stage:
“When I announced it on my social media accounts, it was a great honour to hear from people with Parkinson’s about their pride in seeing a person with Parkinson’s participate in such an event. They see me a little bit as their ambassador and it’s a great pleasure, pride and responsibility. I’m as happy to carry the torch for myself as I am to carry it for the entire Parkinson’s community.”
But throughout this life-changing experience, Anthony’s main focus remains helping people with Parkinson’s:
“When I launched Un Parki Chez Les Pros, the idea was not to show that I’m doing better than others with my disease or that everything is a breeze with Parkinson’s, the idea was to spread my message as far as possible by interesting a maximum amount of people to the disease and for me to take pleasure in doing so. The bottom line of the message is really to encourage people to not stay sedentary and to promote exercise. Whether it be standing up and sitting down a few times or playing with a very light ball, I think that anyone can exercise adapting it to their needs. And anyone can benefit from it, especially people with Parkinson’s.”
Keep up with Anthony’s work and updates on being a Paris 2024 torch bearer on his Instagram profile. For more information about staying active with Parkinson’s, explore our Summer of Sport campaign.
