Evansville woman who has disorder unafraid of facing world

EVANSVILLE, Ind. (AP) - Denise Shane-Cheaney decided early that she had two options when life handed her tremors at the age of 6. She could either sit in the corner and cry, or embrace it and make the best of it.

Now, at 51, Denise said the latter choice has made her the persons she is today, one full of positive energy.

"Positivity is my super power," Shane-Cheaney said, her ever-present smile firmly affixed. "If it wasn't for staying positive and my mother staying positive - telling me how smart and beautiful I was, I don't know where I would be. My mom told me I was smart; I told myself, 'Yes, I am smart.' She told me I am positive. 'Yes, I am positive.' She always told me how beautiful I am. 'Oh, yes, I am beautiful.' I became those things. I'm not longer that little homely shaking girl that every one called Shaky Shane."

Her familial essential tremors, symptoms of a genetic disorder, began at a time when kids can be cruel and life can be challenging. Her nickname was just one more challenge. Shane-Cheaney shook off, like the tremoring hands. She grew up dodging the insults, the negativity.

Bob and weave.

The tremors taught her that. She knows they are never going away; she's got to live with them.

"I might as well take a positive swing at life," Shane-Cheaney said. "And there are positives to shaking all the time, even if people don't think so. I am just who I am. I can't be anyone else. It gave me a way to identify myself."

Over the years she's tried a variety of medications and therapies to address the tremors. Medication though made the tremors less noticeable for everyone else but harder for her. She's unmedicated now.

"It's proven that nothing is going to make me steady; I'll always shake," Shane-Cheaney said. "There is no cure; the medicine just subdued them a little. But no matter what I took it slowed me down in some way and kept me from doing something that I wanted to do - my metabolism, my thinking, my energy."

So she turned to alternative medicine - boxing. Instead of taking things away from her it has given back to Shane-Cheaney.

"It helps take away, tone down the tremors and it brings me up more," she said. "I am able to lose weight and keep weight off, build up my metabolism and it lets me get my aggression out. It's my release."

She trains at Rock'em Sock'em Boxing & Kickboxing and it's one of the only places you'll catch her without that cheery smile.

"When I punch that bag I'm looking so mean," Shane-Cheaney said. "It's my chance to let my aggression out, and those shakes. But you know what I always say, 'I'm not shaking; it's everyone else. I'm calm as a judge.'"

Boxing has been shown to help address tremors in conditions such as Parkinson's Disease as well as essential tremors. Although the condition is a neurological one, the strength training as well as intensive boxing regiment that she puts herself through a couple of hours a day, four to six days a week has made an impact - a much bigger one than she ever noticed on medication. It's been an investment in her health, which she knew would have to become a priority as she got older.

She also owns Pink Elephant Celebrations. It's a party business and event planning business that is nearly five years old.

And it came to be in her typical style. She and a friend who were doing the event planning business together were casually talking about the idea of getting a bus, mostly just for the driving billboard aspect and to transport wedding parties they worked with from the wedding to the reception. When checking out bus prices on an online auction site, Shane-Cheaney accidentally bid on one.

"I got a message 15 minutes later that said I'd won," she said, laughing. "My friend just kept telling me to let them know it was a mistake. We flew out to New Jersey and drove the bus back. I'd never driving anything bigger than a regular car before that. That's just me though."

Shane-Cheaney graduated with a degree in liberal arts from the University of Evansville and worked for 12 years at what was then called Casino Aztar, eight of those years as manager and director of special events. The career choice has been a good fit for her high energy and positive personality.

The tremors are hereditary, and two of her three children have noticed some symptoms, although they are minor.

She's never let any of it stop her. They don't impact what she does professionally or personally. She has been helping care for her mom, Tula Belle, 70, but said with a laugh, "Who takes care of who? She takes care of me too."

It all goes back to the power of positive thinking for Denise. She knows there's really no other option.

And that powerful positive thinking is what will help her meet her lofty goals - to help others find their own super powers.

"Keep it real, keep it positive," Shane-Cheaney said. "Live in your own truth. The shakes are my own truth. I might as well make best of it and be as beautiful as I can, inside and out."

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Source: Evansville Courier and Press, http://bit.ly/2fwg8He

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Information from: Evansville Courier & Press, http://www.courierpress.com