What do you do when your body gives up on you?
You build something it
can’t destroy.
How to Start a Design Brand While Your Nervous System Is on Fire
(A not-so-serious guide for anyone with a broken body and a working brain)
STEP 1 : GET A RARE NERVE DISORDER
Go for something exotic. Bonus points if it sound like a tennis tournament. Mine is called Parsonage-Turner Syndrome. Sounds elegant, feels like electric fire from the inside.
In my case:• Radial, ulnar and the boss of them all: the brachial plexus
• Two herniated discs
• I still hear the doctors voice : “Impressive, your neck is 85 years old”
I am 46.
Step 2: Work Create and deal with ART
Pain became my reality.
So I found a way to shift it.
Not with therapy. Not with hope.
But with form and with color.
I began working with anything I could still shape: resin, pigment, creative concrete.
No precision, no control…just resistance.
Material that pushed back.
Material with tension.
In my right arm, I held the grinding tool.
The fine work, ironically, was done left-handed.
Just start doing …
• Resin, pigments, and creative concrete
• Fine motor skills? Gone.
• Straight lines? Not a chance.
• Goal: Get color out. Get feeling out.
Step 3 : Accept the pain
Nothing healed.
Nothing erased.
I don’t work against the pain.
I work with it.
Monopops was born from that.
Not from recovery.
But from friction. From refusal.
From redesigning myself—through shape, color, contrast.
What do you do when your body gives up on you?
You build something it can’t destroy.
Something that takes your inner scream and answers it:
with color. With weight. With shape.
And it saved me.
But my comeback is on the 2026 bucket list.
2025 taught me a lot.
I lost some people.
Gained others.
Some stayed.
This year will be fantastic.
I have the best physio team, supportive doctors,
a roof over my head, food on the table, and healthy kids.
AND A WORLD FILLED WITH COLOR.
That’s more than enough.
Thank you, Tina Turner Syndrome.
Thank you, Monopops.
Let’s roll.
BONUS LEVEL : MEDICAL FUN
*
BONUS LEVEL : MEDICAL FUN *
Emergency Clinic #1:
They gave me Valium.
Diagnosis?
“Your nerves are fine. You’re just a stressed-out mom and teacher who doesn’t relax enough.”
Emergency Clinic #2:
“You again?”
“Yes. My hand is hanging like a dead raccoon.”
Diagnosis: “You probably just slept funny.”
Like a drunk guy on a park bench.
Then came the MRI.
Boom. In your face.
Then MRI 2. Then 3. You get the idea.
But I have the good ones.
The doctors who look you in the eye and say:
“I believe you.”
And I have my physiotherapists.
Who show up with tricks, care and hope.
They help rebuild what pain keeps tearing down.
