Writing While Ill
By Casey Douglass
At various times, I
have searched the internet for any articles that might feature tips
on how you can feel like grim death but still write as much as you
want to. If such an article exists, I’ve yet to find it. In lieu of
this, I thought I might just have a stab at one myself, knowing that
it could easily turn into a case of the blind leading the blind, or
at best, a show of solidarity with no real answers. If nothing else,
I am hoping it might get me past some of my own frustration at the
least.
This piece will focus
more on people with long term health issues. If you have the flu or a
cold or something like that, do what you want and be thankful you
will recover. If you are the type to force yourself to sit at the
laptop trying to catch your snotty sneezes in a wet tissue while your
fingers struggle for purchase on the keys, knock yourself out. If you
have to take yourself off to bed to tremble under the covers and
curse life, do that too.
I have been chronically
ill for more than a decade, and while I don’t want to get into the
details, it’s a real fucker. My prospects for recovery are now
pretty much as close to zero as they can be, and I am gaining a
collection of other health issues like some strange macabre set of
Pokemon. This means that even if I really feel like writing
something, my health can very much get in the way, be it struggling
to sit upright or just feeling so exhausted that my eyes struggle to
focus and my hand to write. This bugs me, it really does. I can
usually tell the difference between this kind of obstacle and the
“writers block” kind which seems to be equal doses of
procrastination and lack of ideas, which is a different beast
altogether. I have worked through a lot of my own issues in that
area: the anxiety that writing can cause, the mental tension that
comes with trying to suss things out and the lure of quick feel-good
pastimes like firing up the Xbox for a quick game of something. If
you do suffer from that kind of issue, there are certainly some good
books on creativity, procrastination and writers block out there, and
it is well worth investigating those.
As far as the illness
side of things, yes you can power through and force it, trying to
shoehorn yourself into some routine where you write everyday without
fail, but what happens when day after day you have to reduce your
word counts, lose other things that you enjoy being able to do or
just feel so shit in yourself that you lose all interest in life in
general? The last thing you will be worried about then will be your
writing. On the other side of the coin, what if you just wait until
you feel like writing? Days can drag on to weeks and maybe months,
waiting waiting waiting. Not a very attractive prospect either.
Like many things in
life, it seems to be that the middle ground holds the most promise. I
find that I can sometimes write when I feel very bad, and other times
I just have to concede defeat and see how I will be the next day. If
the next day is no better, there’s always the day after. This
creates its own kind of stress of course, which is why you need to
have some kind of basic self awareness and enough drive to actually
stay the course, or you might end up floundering in a sea of apathy
which takes even longer to get out of. Every time the thought enters
your mind “Can I write something?” you need to realistically
judge if it’s feasible, not just procrastination, and won’t make
you feel too ill.
I sometimes have the
fantasy of wondering what it would be like to wake up at my
laptop/notepad one morning having written and worked so hard that I
just had nothing left to give. Then it occurs to me what that would
do to me and the health consequences I would likely have to live with
for the next weeks and months. I guess that that is at the heart of
so many writing issues and doubts. Any writer wants to feel that they
have done their very best, not held back or compromised and achieved
something worthwhile, overcoming all the obstacles that that may
entail. This is very much the game, whether you are ill or healthy.
This balancing act is
all that I have found mildly useful since trying to increase my
writing output and quality while struggling with my illness. I don’t
doubt my motivation, and as far as my ability, past evidence does
indicate that I have some. Of course there are always doubts about
how far you can take something: do you have what it takes to turn
pro, build your readership and become the name on at least one
person’s lips when asked which writer they recommend?
Like any skill, the
most important thing is just to write. It’s the only way to improve
your craft. Any obstacles that get in the way of that need to be
assessed on an individual basis, and the decision taken on how best
to deal with them. Don’t become a writer who needs everything to be
perfect before you start something, and don’t waste money on
writing aids or too many books that teach you about writing. Write
and put your creations out there and you are a good way towards
winning the battle.
This article has come
to an end without much in the way of answers, which I thought might
happen. With this in mind, I will share a few general writing tips
that I have found particularly helpful below.
Keep a notebook to
write down ideas as they come to you. I find that if I do this, my
mind sends me more ideas, as I am showing that I am interested in
what it has to say. On a day where I feel too ill to write, the ideas
often flow like this, and can lay the foundations for some good
writing when I have a better day.
When you have finished
a first draft, leave it for a few days and work on other things
before coming back to it. We get too close to our own writing, and
just a few days focussing elsewhere will help you in a big way when
you come back to begin your editing process. It’s the mental
equivalent of trying to see an elephant from an inch away or moving
back a few metres and seeing the whole thing.
Acknowledge that some
days, you will be in a media consumption mode rather than a creation
mode. I might write for a few days and then find myself wanting to
read/watch films/play games more than actually write. In my own
experience, I find it is best to just allow this. I don’t know if
it refills the wellspring or just gives my mind a break or outlet for
other pressures, but I find it broadly helpful. Just take care that
it doesn’t become your default mode. I find that too much of this
makes my mind feel more sluggish and leaves me more prone to
procrastination.
These are the tips that
I consistently put into use and that I have seen work time and again.
There are lots of other things you can do of course, but like
anything, that becomes a personal choice for the writer and it’s
their own personal task to see what works for them and what doesn’t.
