#HAWMC Day 1: Why Do I Write?

About a month ago I had a moment of insanity and signed up for another month of 30 blogs in 30 days for Wegohealth's Health Activist Writer's Month Challenge (HAWMC). Somehow I forgot that last year I exhausted myself as my anal, "You can't beat me!" side came to the fore. I'm starting to think that it's a little like the blogging version of childbirth, where despite the pain, being coated in your own bodily fluids and having the whole class of trainee midwives come in to watch your lady bits be sewn up (okay that last bit may have just been my experience) you still go back for a second child thanks to the meth/hormones that is the new baby high. Or in this case, the satisfaction that I did manage to complete so many blog posts in the last challenge despite a rather rough health patch. It would seem that a dissociative fugue is not always my friend.

So hear I am again, ready to embrace my crazy and my tendency towards masochism, only a couple of days and brain cells, late. Luckily Wegohealth have added that you can pop in some old blogs if you've done it before and some Wordless Wednesday's which do give some breathing room this time around.

So first up (and because I am running late) I'm going to link you up to the post I wrote last year that explains why I write this blog and share my experiences both here and on my Facebook page.

".......Blogging about my health in those early days was about rediscovering and taking ownership, of my voice and my experience. When it comes down to it, if you don't write your story no one else will. And there is no one who knows your story as well as you. Being a patient and being ill can be very disempowering. A paternalistic medical system and a body that seems out of control can rob you of your sense of self. Sometimes, it can be down right scary. But every word I wrote in those early days was another step back on the road to reclaiming me. The very act of sharing my voice with the world was equal parts empowering and pee-in-your-pants scary. Some of those thoughts that go through your mind when you are alone in the dark at 3 am, make you feel like a crazy person. But when you share them you suddenly find that there are others out there having the exact same thoughts and they become far less scary. It's then that you realise that you are in fact a rather normal person living a rather abnormal life........." (1st Novemeber 2012)

Full link can be found at: National Health Blog Post Month: It Begins. Why I write About my health.

I do recommend blogging or at least writing as a means of working through so much of what we go through. It helps to clarify what you are thinking and feeling. And it gives you a chance to share your voice whilst reclaiming your experience. Too often others speak for us. Sometimes this is because we are physically or emotionally unable to advocate for ourselves and sometimes because there is still a paternalistic element in society that infantilises the ill, and speaks for, instead of with, us. You don't have to show anyone what you write. But writing can be an amazing cathartic experience and I can't recommend it highly enough.

Cheers
Michelle :)