Tag: writing

More thoughts on looking at my refelction

You may or may not know that I’ve been attending creative writing classes for the last few weeks. Last week’s homework (the topic I chose to do anyway), was to write about an event in the first person but to use the word ‘I’ only twice. After the vlog that I posted last week about how I see myself in my head and how I look when I see myself in a my reflection, I decided to write about looking in the mirror.

I’d like to share what I wrote with you.

 

Looking in the mirror is a very strange experience for me. It forces me to confront the impact that Cerebral Palsy has on my body, and that is not always an easy thing to deal with.

Although I would not swap my disability for the world and consider it to only be a side-note in my life, it means that the person who stares back at me in my reflection is not the woman my mind’s eye expects to see.

While my imagination likes to pretend the girl others meet stands and sits up straight with half-decent posture and a left arm that doesn’t naturally sit in a curled up position that is not the case. Staying away from reflective surfaces means my brain can keep pushing my disability to the back of my mind and focus on living my life to the full and gloss over the fact it might come up against limitations from to time. It that dominated my thoughts, what would be the point in trying anything?

Dancing is a favorite pass time of mine, during which my eyes often stay closed and my sub conscious conjures up images of the moves my body would love to make, if only my Cerebral Palsy would allow it. Alas, it does not, but that’s a moot point, if you ask me. Seeing myself as others see me does not upset me, but instead it makes me angry that my CP plays a far bigger role in my life than I would like to admit. You can call me disillusioned if you’d like, but my word of choice is indifferent, both towards my disability and the limitations it tries to impose on me.

No matter how hard it fights against me, it will never win. This girl will keep on dancing, not matter how it looks. She will use her body with pride because she loves it. As far as my self-image is concerned, there is no CP most of the time, just a girl who likes to throw herself into, and considers herself to be just as good (or bad) at dancing as everyone else.

Fun Fact Friday [6]

Hello and welcome to Fun Fact Friday, a place where I share facts about myself that aren’t linked to my Cerebral Palsy.

I’m really excited to share this week’s fun fact with you all. It’s been really hard not to already post it all over the Facebook page and my Twitter account, but now I can finally tell you all.

For the last 10 months or so I have been working away on a novel; a superntural detective story, and I am no really pleased to say that the first draft is complete and I’ve now started on the editing process. I’m finding it both scary and fun!

I’d love to publish it one day but I know that it’s not ready for that yet.

Change is in the air

Well, today I’m feeling really quite positive and motivated, which is nice. I think that it could have something to do the think fact that my room has been recently redecorated, and sometimes I think a change like this can do us all some good.

I’m quite excited because I’ve got a new wardrobe which  is lower down that my old one was so that it’s easier for me to get my clothes on and off the rails without almost falling over with the effort, or simply giving up and throwing everything into a pile at the bottom. The latter is what happened far too often.

There’s also a nice, new comfy bed. It’s much bigger than my last one, which will give me even more room to practice being a starfish at night, oh and it will make it easier for my mum to do my physio on it, but I’m far more excited about having more room to sprawl out in if I’m honest. I’m half in love with it already because I went to sleep with a very achy back last night and when I woke up it was as good as gone!

In my spare time,  (AKA when I’m not frantically job hunting),I do a lot of fiction writing as well as working on my blog. Usually as I do it I always hope that one day other people will read it and enjoy it, but I never expect that to happen. Today though, as I sit here in the writing cocoon that I have constructed for myself, tapping away and the keyboard and listening to Paramore, I’m starting to feel like maybe at some point they will. Not just yet, but it feels possible. We’ll see.

The extra effort that I’m supposed to be making with physio has actually got off to a pretty good start. I know it’s only been two days since I wrote the post declaring that I was going to try really hard so I shouldn’t get too excited, but it all helps, right? So far I’ve only made a few small changes, but hopefully they will all combine together to have a big impact on me for the better.