Hi there. You’re new here. You and maybe one hundred forty-one million, five hundred thousand others. That’s a guess. An imperfect one, because the data is young and ever-changing and because lots of folks lived in this house before a brand-new Goldilocks broke in and started judging our food and lodgings. Too metaphorical? Probably. Let … Continue reading
Tag Archives: disability
Paddling, with a belt on
Hey, nice to meet you. I’m Michelle. I’m a novelist, a radio professional, and a disabled person. I have ankylosing spondylitis, an immune-mediated auto-inflammatory disease that’s trying to destroy my hips, seize my rib cage, and turn my spine into one lone bone — oh, and chew on the rest of my joints for snacks. … Continue reading
Managing Spoons One Year Later: Christina Robins
Editor’s note: The last twelve months (and counting) of living during a global pandemic has had an affect on us Spoonies, so I thought I would do a six-week series, asking some of our contributing authors the same questions about how they are managing spoons, one year later. This week’s featured author: Christina Robins SpAN … Continue reading
The Power of Creativity and the Disabled Writing Community
I spent 2014 in an acute state of fear. Yeah, I know that seems hyperbolic, but I was quite terrified. The chronic pain I had been experiencing from the neuropathy of fibromyalgia had levelled up to a state where it felt like someone had injected several areas of my body with burning hot, vibrating curling … Continue reading
Internalized Ableism: A New SpAN Series
I am delighted to announce that we’ll have a new series starting on February 9, 2020 called internalized abelism. Several of our past contributors (and some new ones) will share with us how they’ve wrestled with their own ableism—which they might have also used against themselves—and how these attitudes have affected their lives. It’s really … Continue reading
Welcome to 2020!
SpAN Editor Cait Gordon has a few words to share about the upcoming year. Closed captioning is available for this video. Happy new year! Continue reading
Charity™ and Disabled Futurity
Editor’s note: I invited Derek Newman-Stille to share with us their own experience with writing fiction, as some people might only know them as a champion in elevating speculative fiction authors and/or disabled voices. Their short story, Charity™, is the grand finale of the Nothing Without Us anthology. Most of my writing about disability has … Continue reading
Writing from Within
A few years ago, someone asked me if I would ever write a novel with a character who had MS. I told him no. My reasons for this at the time seemed simple. I already wrote a blog about living with multiple sclerosis and cerebral palsy. That seemed like enough for me. My thought at … Continue reading
Even friendly-neighbourhood Spoonie editors experience burnout.
I love the Spoonie Authors Network. It’s been a blessing since its inception and continues to inspire (in a healthy way) wonderful things. The SpAN allowed me to gather up people who experience disability and chronic conditions in various ways. Sometimes it allowed the creatives to come to terms with the fact that they are … Continue reading