First, why do I write? 6-21-10

Happy Summer Solstice!

My little brother Mikey is celebrating in the land of the midnight sun - Alaska, with his girlfriend Kara. Can't wait to hear stories and see footage!

Some have asked, "Why do you write, Kate?" Or "Why do you share so much publicly and openly?"

This entry is designed to answer those questions once and for all. The number one reason that I write, is selfish. When I write, I feel better. When I write, I can sometimes work through my emotions on my own just through the act of writing.

Not too far behind, though, is the reason that I write publicly.....When I blog, I don't always know that people are reading or care.....So I can write more in blog format, and it will help me with the book I will write one day, but I don't really get much feedback on my blog posts. I only started keeping a blog on the suggestion of an Aunt who thought that I was putting too much information into email form. So the blog was designed with the reader in mind - if people choose to read it, then wonderful. However, if all I do is keep a blog, I usually have no way of knowing if anyone is paying any attention.

So when I need feedback, immediately, when I need support, when I need a lifeline to keep going, when times get really tough, I skip the blog and go straight for the email. And if the email doesn't elicit a response, then I go to Facebook.

I'm not a very private person - that's why I do what I do. I believe that the stress of dealing with illness comes in large part from a culture of stigmatizing the ill. When I was diagnosed with depression at the age of 10, no one that I had ever spoken to ever admitted to dealing with depression. That realization can be a very isolating and stigmatizing moment. It makes a person with that diagnosis feel very alone and abnormal, among other things. And it doesn't help to add stigma to depression.

When I was diagnosed with MS, again, I didn't know what to do with everything that was going on inside me. I started out writing lengthy emails to anyone who would listen, because I needed a support network. When someone suggested that the emails were too long, I put them in blog format.

But then I realized that the main reason I write is to find hope, support, friendship, and a network. I have done a piss-poor job in my life of making new friends, especially in Chicago. I don't know how to make friends, and I especially don't know how to determine that I have made a friend who is close enough that I can call upon in a crisis. So when a crisis arises, as unfortunately the entry to follow this one will be about, I have no one to turn to in geographic proximity to me.

I love Chicago, I love living here, it is good for me in so many ways, but when Steve is gone, I have very few people in my life. And because of this I have no other choice but to write. But in a crisis, I need feedback - I need support - I need a lifeline.

And that lifeline in the last week has been Facebook and email - yes, sometimes my posts are so desperate and desolate on Facebook, but they reflect exactly what I am going through. And more importantly, they get people to communicate with me. My friends are all over the country and all over the world. I am not able to be with them physically - so I post messages to them - by writing open messages on Facebook. Those positive responses that I receive from people - those caring, loving, inspiring messages SAVE MY LIFE.

So yes, maybe posting on Facebook seems like a strange thing to do - but it helps me by pulling a network of support and inspiration and love at least virtually, which is the next best option when I am too sick to travel to see my out-of-town friends or afraid of thinking that I can open up to a local friend where maybe we're not at that point where I can open up. So I open up in writing - and if some people find it uncomfortable, that's okay. I don't write for them.

Obviously I write for myself - to help me feel better - and the way that happens is because it is very easy when you feel like your world is falling apart and no one is there with you and you are so alone and so scared, you feel like it might just be better to get out. And so by writing, and writing publicly, it keeps from getting to that point where I act on those thoughts. Some day I would like to live a life where circumstances stop being the way they are and I never feel those things ever again....but until then, I write, and I cherish every response I get.

I may not do things the traditional way - but I have never in a million years ever been mistaken for traditional! And most importantly, if people are uncomfortable, they don't have to pay attention. And I am not uncomfortable. I make the choice because the feedback and support and love I get in response brings me over these chasms of dark emptiness.....

That's why I write....