Did you know this about me? Well, if you don’t, here is a chance.
This may address a few misconceptions about me.
In 2025, I discovered that I had been diagnosed with cerebral small vessel disease (SVD). Even writing that feels strange sometimes because I am an artist. I write. I record. I perform. I create. I work. I push.
And I keep pushing—sometimes so much that I forget there is something happening inside my own body that I cannot simply outwork.
When the song you know suddenly feels different
There are moments when I am singing something I have performed before and something is not connecting in the way I expect: a lyric, a note, my concentration, or the connection between knowing what I want to do musically and producing it in that moment.
Because I am a musician, my first instinct is often not, You have a medical condition. My instinct is: try again. Work harder. Concentrate. Find the note. Find the key. Remember the lyric. Keep going.
Creativity does not always leave you the time, space or energy to stop in the middle of what you are doing and explain your medical history to everyone in the room.
What people hear—and what they don’t know
Of course, people make judgements: “He’s flat.” “He’s off key.” “He forgot the words.” “He didn’t sound like he did before.”
As an artist, criticism comes with the territory. Some criticism may even be valid. Living with a medical condition does not mean every imperfect note has a medical explanation.
But there is another truth: the person being judged may be dealing with something you cannot see.
Sometimes I hear the criticism, ignore it and carry on. Then later I remember: My God. I am living with Small Vessel Disease. And perhaps I need to extend to myself some of the understanding that strangers may never know to extend to me.
What is cerebral Small Vessel Disease?
Cerebral small vessel disease is a term for changes affecting the brain’s small blood vessels. Its effects are not identical in everybody. Research has associated SVD with difficulties that can include processing speed, attention, executive function and memory, among other neurological effects.
That does not mean everyone with SVD experiences all of these problems, and SVD is not automatically the same thing as dementia. I am also not claiming that SVD explains every difficult note, forgotten lyric or challenging performance. Other factors can matter, and questions about my own symptoms belong with my clinicians.
What I can say is this: I am creating while living with a neurological condition.
Creativity does not happen outside the body
We often talk about artistic performance as though talent exists independently of the human being producing it. It doesn’t.
The voice belongs to a body. Memory belongs to a brain. Timing, concentration, coordination, emotion, breathing, recall and interpretation all meet somewhere inside a human nervous system before an audience ever hears a note.
That does not diminish musicianship. For me, it makes the act of continuing to create even more meaningful.
The testimony behind the performance
There is a video I want to share because, looking at it now, it carries another layer of meaning for me. Testimony leads into performance. Perhaps that is an appropriate way of understanding much of my life and work: the story and the song are not separate; the human being and the artist are not separate; the struggle and the creativity are not separate.
This isn’t a pity party
I do not share this because I want sympathy. And I certainly do not want every performance I give to be viewed through the lens of illness.
I share it because context matters. Invisible conditions are still conditions. Sometimes the person apparently struggling with something “simple” is actually doing something extraordinarily complicated just to remain in the room and continue.
That applies far beyond music. Perhaps this is not only a story about SVD. Perhaps it is a reminder to be slower in our judgement of one another: the person forgetting something, the singer searching for the note, the colleague who needs another moment, the artist whose performance is not identical every night.
You do not always know what somebody’s brain or body is asking them to overcome.
And still, I sing.
I am still writing. Still recording. Still performing. Still learning. Still creating. Still finding new ways to communicate.
And sometimes, yes, still pushing. But perhaps part of this journey is learning that strength is not only about pushing through.
Sometimes strength is understanding what you are pushing through.
So, if you did not know this about me before: now you do.
And if this helps you look at somebody living with an invisible neurological condition with a little more curiosity, patience and humanity, then perhaps telling the story was worth it.
Aremuorin
Artist · Songwriter · Writer
MercyfulGrace™ — music, story and humanity.
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