Writing with ME

If you’ve read my previous blog posts, you will know that I often get annoyed at myself for not blogging enough. Okay, I’m quite busy, but having a more regular blogging presence and readership is useful to show publishers. I’m fairly sure when that when I query agents they will look for me online, and it doesn’t look great when my last post on here is a couple of months old.

However, I don’t talk about it much because I don’t want to be ‘that guy’, but I suffer from a condition called CFS/ME. (Here’s an interesting link on the symptoms). As Friday was ME/CFS awareness day, I wanted to talk about how it affects my writing and explain why my blog isn’t as active as I would like.

One of the main ways of coping with ME is pacing. It’s something that I’ve done quite naturally since I was diagnosed with ME in 1999. I usually know my limits and when I can do something cognitive, or when I just need to sit and think. Since I referred myself to the local clinic last year after having a relapse, this has become even more important.

I think this is one of the reasons I naturally turned to writing. I’ve always loved stories, and I enjoy telling stories. A writer (I think it was Gav Thorpe) once said to me that a writer is always writing, whether they are putting pen to paper or not.

Even if I’m having a bad day, health wise, I can sit and think about my plot, character or setting. A lot of the planning gets done on these days, and it’s always good to plan out as much of your novel as possible before writing the actual prose. This allows me to feel quite productive, even if the physical novel or short story isn’t actually increasing in word count.

I would love one day to write a book about ME itself, but we’ll see.

Of course having mentioned this, you can perhaps understand why I don’t blog as much as I, or maybe you, would like. If I feel up to putting figurative pen to paper then I would much rather be writing the actual stories themselves.

However, I have a plan. Rather than writing one post on the day that it needs to be posted, I’m going to try and plan ahead and schedule posts. Here’s hoping I can actual fulfil this.

What I’d love to know is what kind of stuff you would like to read?

Feel free to ask me writing questions, and I will answer them as soon as possible.

Thanks for reading.