Tag: writing

NEW EYES AND A NEW LOOK AT LIFE

Published on by Aimee EddyLeave a comment

I had my second cataract surgery on my right eye on Monday, December 8. The surgery went well without any complications. It was strange; I could hear the doctor and nurses talking and I felt pressure on my eye, but no pain. I wasn’t awake, but I wasn’t completely asleep either. The doctor put a patch on my right eye, and when the nurse took it off the next day the world around me changed.

I got my first pair of glasses in fourth grade. I tried not to wear them as much as possible, but that made seeing difficult. As the years went by, the lenses got thicker. They grew heavier and I had to constantly push them up. I tried to get thin frames, hoping it would make the glasses less heavy, but it didn’t help much. I became accustomed to my bulky glasses. They became a part of me. Every morning, I put them on, all day long I pushed them up, and every night I took them off. It was a routine.

Mental illness is like wearing glasses. We don’t want to admit we have it, so we avoid it as much as possible. Then the racing thoughts, negative thinking, hopelessness, and loss of self esteem grow thicker and thicker. We become accustomed to it and begin to live our lives in darkness. We believe the mental illness has become a part of us. We wake up to it, we drown in it all day long, and we go to bed with it.

With my eyes, cataracts made seeing extremely difficlt. I used a bright light and a magnifying glass to see better. When I went through cataract surgery on my left eye, things started to look brighter. Then I went through cataract surgery on my right eye and when they took the patch off, I could see everything better. I could see a brighter and better world. I was amazed at what I could see without glasses. It was like I got new eyes.

 Some things remain hard to see like words in a book and the guide on the TV. I got a pair of readers but will eventually need prescription glasses to see words on the TV and signs in the distance while driving.

Similar to cataracts, mental illness makes life look like a never-ending road of sadness. You use a therapist, medication, coping techniques, and a psychiatrist to help you find your way to the light. You fight a battle with your illness and in time life begins to look brighter. You take medication to balance the chemicals in your brain, and you change the way you think. Then you climb out of the dark hole and see a brighter and better life. But you still need medication and coping techniques to continue in the light of recovery.

Getting surgery for cataracts gave me a new look at the world, like reaching recovery gave me a new look at life. Since my vision was bad, cataract surgery couldn’t repair my vision completely. Recovery from mental illness doesn’t cure a person completely. There is nothing wrong with having extra aid to get through. I can’t see without glasses to read, and I can’t stay in recovery without coping techniques and medication. Cataract surgery wasn’t a complete cure for my vision, and recovery doesn’t mean I’m cured of mental illness.

There may not be a cure for mental illness, and you will need coping techniques to get through bad days, but your world will look brighter. Just like my world looks brighter after my cataract surgeries. You can live a happy life and find joy. So, I encourage you to fight for recovery and learn to see your life differently.

I not only see the world differently because of cataract surgery, but I see life differently because I stand in the light of recovery.

USING YOUR CREATIVITY TO EXPRESS FEELINGS

Published on by Aimee EddyLeave a comment

Most people are creative. They find joy in art, music, writing, dance, and crafts. Many people use their creative skills to relax and escape from the stressors of life. For people struggling with mental illness, using the creative side of your brain can be a way to express pent up feelings or to tell others how you are is feeling. It’s an excellent coping mechanism.

When I was in high school, I turned to writing to cope with the feelings built up inside me. Feelings of loneliness, sadness, anger, and much more. I poured my feelings out in folders of college ruled paper. I created worlds I could escape to; I filled my characters with the feelings I felt and then I created happy endings. With my stories I felt like I was in control while in real life I felt like I was out of control.

In high school many of my stories were dark and depressing, because that’s how I felt. My mom even suggested that I try adding positivity in my writing. When I was caught in an abusive friendship, I wrote poems about how I felt about the friend. Some of my feelings were distorted and confusing, but I worked them out in my writing. I filled a folder full of poems trying to deal with my feelings about the friend and to understand what she was doing to me.

When my uncle was killed, I wrote about him and what he meant to me and how his loss affected me. I still write about the loved ones I lost in my life. It helps me deal with my grief. It helps me release my feelings and commemorate my loved one’s memory.

I joined a support group for mental illness. One of the strugglers in the group posts a drawing of how she feels each day. Others post drawings and paintings of things that express their feelings. There are also art therapy groups that focus on using art to help people express themselves, explore emotions, and improve mental health.

I use woodburning to express my emotions. I pick out patterns that show my feelings and help me explore my emotions in an imaginative and creative way. Sometimes I combine patterns to make a picture that expresses my feelings the best. The weight of my emotions pours out in the careful twist of my woodburning pen. The smell of burning wood eases my anxiety. As I create my woodburnings, my bad feelings are set free, and excitement and joy replace them.

Other arts that help express emotions are:

  • Painting uses colors and brush strokes to express emotions.
  • Music lets individuals express emotions in a way that is accessible and less inhibiting than words.
  • Dance can help an individual channel emotion in a way that is both expressive and freeing.
  • Collage and craft help an individual express emotion in an imaginative and creative way.

How can you express your feelings creatively through forms of art? You might not be very creative, and your drawings might be stick figures, but it doesn’t matter. You can doodle, you can just dance around your living room, you can scribble, you can knit a sweater with uneven arms, and you can journal random thoughts to express yourself. It doesn’t matter how good your art is. All that matters is that you express your feelings.

Writing my book, Escape from the Garage: Family Love Overcomes Bullying, helped me express my feelings about the bullying I faced as a child. By expressing my feelings, I was able to heal myself and find peace with my past. Writing is my creative outlet for my emotions, and it helps me stand in the light of recovery.

MY NEXT MEMOIR

Published on by Aimee Eddy3 Comments

It’s been a little while since I worked on my next memoir, The Years After the Garage. With all the hard times going on in my life, I haven’t been in the right mind set to relive my past. Plus, I’m learning a new role at One Life Project and that has been exciting, scary, and a bit overwhelming. Today, Saturday the twenty-eighth, I had the day off from work and it happened to be when Pennwriters meet in person. I haven’t been to an in person meeting in months. So, I printed out chapter one of my memoir and took it to the group.

I arrived there a little before one o’clock. There were some people I knew and some people who were new to me. I have reworked chapter one a couple of times, trying to make sure this book could keep the readers interest if they had not read the first one. That involved giving some details about things that happened in the first book. Details like coffee break was a break that the guys at E.L. Eddy and Sons Garage took. The new people who never read the first book said the memoir worked well as a stand-alone book. Even those who read the first book agreed.

One woman asked if I should add my perspective from me as an adult looking back. I explained that would take my readers out of the story. A good memoir brings the readers into the story and allows them to live each part with the author. I want my readers to cry, to get mad, to feel sad, to laugh, and to rejoice with the teenage me. This shows the readers what it’s like to go through bullying and to slide into mental illness. If I put the adult me into it, then I take the readers out of the story.

Minor grammar errors were found in my chapter. It was suggested to cut the chapter into two chapters, but that would make one eight pages long and the other one four pages long. I’m not sure if I can have chapters in such different lengths. I may have to add to the four pages chapter. When I got home, I talked with another memoir writer and posted on We Love Memoirs Authors group on Facebook to ask about the chapter lengths. Once I figure out what to do, I will know if I need to add, and then I will work on that. By splitting chapters I went from six chapters to eight, putting me further along in my memoir.

My first book was about bullying and finding acceptance from family. The second book focuses on mental illness and the accomplishments I make despite being sick. It shows the pressure I put on myself to succeed. What helps me deal with the mental illness is my writing and woodburning. The bullying I face in this book is a little different than what I faced in grade school. Bullying comes in many forms such as gossip, physical abuse, destruction of personal objects, and being ignored. I’m not going to tell you which one of these I face in the next book.

One theme I want to make clear in this book is that even though a person has mental illness, he or she can still accomplish a lot in his or her life. Mental illness doesn’t mean you cannot fulfill your dreams or succeed at your goals. I achieved a lot while struggling with my illness. It did make things harder, and I put myself through hell to reach my goals, but I did it. This book will show that.

The good news is after this meeting I am inspired to keep working on my next memoir. I came home and split a couple chapters up and reworked some scenes. I wanted to get this book done in two years, but it’s already been a year since I started it. I can’t write every day like many authors do. I write when I’m emotionally strong enough and inspired. I do hope it won’t take me four years to write it like it did the first one.

If you want to keep updated monthly on what is going on with my writing and One Life Project, sign up for my newsletter at http://eepurl.com/iuzWqw and get a gift for signing up.

Writing is my way of healing from the past and dealing with my emotions. When I’m not working on a book, I’m journaling. Releasing my feelings and past in words helps me stay in the light of recovery.

SAINT DAVIDS CHRISTIAN WRITERS CONFERENCE

Published on by Aimee Eddy4 Comments

Writers may be born with the ability to write, but they are not born knowing how to make their writing great, how to market it, how to obtain followers, how to format their writing to be sent out to editors, and so on. To learn about the writing field, we writers must read books and go to workshops and conferences.

June 21 through 25, I attended Saint Davids Christian Writers’ Conference at Allegany college in Meadville, PA. We stayed in the college apartments and went to workshops most of the days. We also had fun things like the literary coffee house, where authors had three minutes to read a piece from their recently published works. There was the Great Saint Davids Auction, where attendees brought new and used stuff to be auctioned off. The money goes into the scholarship fund to benefit next year’s conferees. There was also an awards banquet where we got fancied up, ate a nice meal, and saw who won the different categories of the conference’s writing contest.

I got to reconnect with old friends and make new friends. Conferences are a great place to network with established authors, other authors, publishers, and editors. I did lots of networking with fellow authors and have lots of new support in my writing career.

I met one on one with a woman who taught a workshop on talking to groups in schools. I got lots of advice from her. Now I have an idea on how to take my talk about bullying to schools, and I also have lots of work to get there.

I learned I can get paid to talk at schools and that schools have grants to have speakers. I need to find ways to engage the children in my talks and have them participate. I also learned I need to put together a printable pamphlet about my experiences as a speaker, what I will talk about, a blurb about me, quotes from places I have already talked to, a book order sheet and some other things. I need to get the book, Sell Books and Get Paid Doing Author School Visits by Kim Norman. Over the summer I have lots of work to do.

One thing that I learned at the conference is I must have an email newsletter to gain followers and an email list. Followers will buy my book, tell others about me, and bring more subscribers to my newsletter. Building an email list is important because those are people you can send links to upcoming books or announce books that you may have coming out. The email list you build from your newsletter are fans of your writing and they can help build your following and help with your sales.

I thought maybe I could just get away with writing about my book in this blog, but it’s not enough. I do have a fear of writing a newsletter. I’m not very good at editing. That is part of my learning disability. All writers must have someone edit their writing, but I have a hard time even editing a letter. I don’t know grammar very well. I get confused with nouns, pronouns, verbs, and adverbs. I have tried over the years to learn more about grammar, but I still struggle. I have an author friend edit these blog posts before I post them.

When I came home from the conference, I spent hours trying to figure out how to use Mailchimp (a free program to build newsletters). I just got frustrated and confused. Today I will attend a zoom meeting on how to use Mailchimp, so hopefully I’ll make progress. It takes me time to learn new things. I must be shown several times. Luckily the workshop will be recorded, and I can refer to it.

Keep your eyes open for a place on this site to subscribe to my newsletter and receive a gift. Even though I have risen above the bullying I faced in school, I still fear failure and I worry what people will think of me. So be patient with me as I figure out this newsletter.

I also learned about building platforms. An author’s platform is a way to target audiences by making the author visible to the readers. This means becoming part of online groups, networking, becoming part of organizations that pertain to the subject you are writing about and building a website. I have a website, I’m a director for One Life Project, and I’m part of groups on social media. I learned how to improve my platform and how to become more noticed.

I learned so much that when I got home, I felt like my brain was overloaded and steam was coming out of my ears. I have been going through my notes a little bit at a time. I have lots of homework from the conference to do to improve my marketing of my book and myself as an author.

The best part about a Christian conference is the kindness and caring. I had an asthma attack walking to workshops. Several ladies came to check up on me, one lady drove me back to the apartments, my roommate brought me dinner, and the lady who took me back to the apartments drove me each day to the workshops and the buildings where we used. They prayed over me and showered me with kindness. I could see God working within each person to make the conference a wonderful experience.

The conference lifted me up and gave me a gentle push forward in my writing career. It will help me succeed with my goals and grow as a writer. It has helped me stand in the light of recovery with bigger goals and dreams.

NEW STARTS AND WHAT’S HAPPENING

Published on by Aimee Eddy2 Comments

I thought it was time to let you know what is going on with my book and my writing. They’re at a slow point, but they’re about to pick up. I put aside setting up talks and book signings for a bit as I struggled with my asthma. My asthma has been out of control, and I have a pulmonary function test and I see a specialist at the end of the month to hopefully get answers. Even though I have been struggling I haven’t given up. I have been busy planning and writing. Here is what I have been up to and what is to come. 

Last week I couldn’t write my blog post because of computer problems. I usually write on my couch, using a lap desk with the sound of the TV playing in the background. I sat down to work on a chapter about the years after we sold the garage when my dog, Esther, needed to go out. I sat my lap desk with the computer on it on the couch beside me. My computer slipped off and landed on the floor. The screen went black and refused to turn back on. My screen had blown. I put my frustrations about the loss of my computer on Facebook and a co-worker and friend messaged me she had a laptop for me. I got the new computer last Saturday, so instead of writing a blog post I was setting up all my programs. 

When I asked my friend if I could give her something for the computer she said, “You don’t need to give me anything. I know how important your writing is.” 

I got a partial scholarship to attend Saint Davids Christian Writers conference. I needed to come up with another $225. Finances have been hard this year. I was ready to decline the scholarship, thinking my husband and I couldn’t come up with the extra amount when my cousin suggested I start a GoFundMe. The next day I started the GoFundMe, and in one day I raised enough money to go to the conference. June 21 to the 25 I will be attending Saint Davids Christian Writers Conference at Allegheny College in Meadville, PA. I am excited to learn new techniques and information about writing. Conferences help us make connections with other writers and with publishers and agents. It also helps us improve our writing careers. 

I have been toying with two new ideas for books. My plan for my next book was to write a book compiling my blog posts. My friend Roberta has agreed to organize them for me, but she has been busy. I’m not quite sure where to start that book. So, I decide to wait for Roberta and see what posts she picks out for my book. Last week I decided to start chapter one on the years after the garage. I have nine pages written. I don’t know yet how to end the chapter. In Escape to the Garage: Family Love Overcomes Bullying, the chapters ended with coffee break and adventures at the garage. Now the garage is gone; in the next book I must search my memory for a new ending to my chapters.  I plan to get a start on my book using my blogs once I decide how to start it and see what posts Roberta chooses for it.  

Wednesday I am talking in the children’s section of Patterson Library in Westfield, NY. It’s about a forty-five drive from my home. I’m excited. My English teacher who helped me enter contests and edited my writing in high school volunteers at that library. I’m hoping she will attend my talk and I will get a chance to thank her for all she did for me. I haven’t seen her since I graduated from high school. I’m also looking forward to talking to children and their parents about bullying. If you live in the area, come see me. It starts at 4 P.M. 

I work for a grocery store as a cashier. While girl scouts were selling their cookies at the store, I told the leaders about my book and my advocacy against bullying and handed them a business card. Last month a girl scout leader messaged me on messenger and asked me to speak to her troop. The troop will be  girls from first to fifth grade. I also asked the leader to invite the parents. The leader said she’ll pay me twenty-five dollars to speak. I believe it’s very important to tell children of all ages how hurtful bullying is. I will be talking to the troop and their parents on May 24 at 6 P.M. 

There will also be some new things happening with the One Life Project where I am director of Education and Research. The leader of the organization has big plans for me. I will let you know soon about what is to come.  

I have a lot going on in my life and I’m excited. Following my dreams, advocating against bullying, and starting new adventures keeps me pushing forward in the light of recovery.