SPEAKER_02 0:00

Something that I see because of my own experience. If I go, oh my god, I'd be by the side of the road now and just sleeping, you know? So just that is kind of the bias that you have as an able person. So it's very tricky sometimes to be in that headspace or what exactly is the life of someone who is ill.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Welcome to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacy Fraser, a formerly repressed creative soul, turned fiction writer, story editor, and author accelerator certified fiction book coach. At Write It Scared, we tell the truth about why writing a novel is so hard by acknowledging that most writers grapple with two stories: the one they want to put on the page to the best of their ability, and the often subconscious internal story that prevents them from doing it. This show is designed to help you identify and rewrite the internal narrative holding you back while you discover and write the story you want to tell and learn all the tools to help you do that successfully. Join me each week for a new episode where we'll talk about writing to deepen our understanding of the craft and of ourselves as writers. Writing a novel is an inside job that we do not do alone. Welcome to Write It Scared. I'm glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hi, writer. Welcome back to another episode of the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacy, and I'm so happy to have you here. Today I'm in conversation with my friend Sandra Postma, who is also an author accelerator certified fiction book coach. And we are going to talk about how to write when you are a writer who struggles with a chronic illness, as well as how to write characters who struggle with a disability or have a different lived experience than you do, and how to do that with integrity. I hope you enjoy this episode. It's actually quite vulnerable. And I want to say once again thank you to Sandra for her courage and her authenticity and for just always showing up and being the beautiful human that she is. But before we jump in, I wanted to remind you that another cohort of my small group book coaching for fiction writers will begin in January of 2025. This program is for any commercial fiction writer who wants to start developing their story idea and write their novel in the coming year. So join a small but mighty, welcoming group of writers who are working through the same story struggles as you, get professional editorial guidance with one-on-one support with individual book coaching calls for every writer from me each month. The space is limited to six writers, but you can secure a spot on the enrollment list right now. If you are interested, just go to writeitscared.co forward slash group coaching to learn more and apply. All right, now let me introduce you to Sandra and then we will jump into her interview. Sandra Postma is a former journalist who switched from fact to fiction after discovering her own writing held the power for change. Founding Your Story Mentor in 2021, Sandra is now a writer of fiction and nonfiction and a certified book coach. In her work as a book coach, Sandra helps writers with a chronic illness, disability, or mental struggles. She helps writers embrace their unique voice and develop their story ideas into novels. As a woman with multiple chronic illnesses herself, amongst them MECSF, Graves disease, chronic migraines, and anxiety disorder, and being a HSP or highly sensitive person and by, she knows what it's like to feel invisible to society and misunderstood by many. Making her writers feel seen and making them realize how important their individual voices and stories are has become the main goal in her work. She helps people find their voice, write, and thrive. Oh, hello, Sandra. Thank you so much for coming on the show today. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_02 3:50

Hi, Basie. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, I'm doing great. I'm just so lovely to be here.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

So I gave you a bit of a bio, but would you please share more about your journey to becoming a writer and a book coach with our listeners?

SPEAKER_02 4:02

Yeah, it's it's been a while for me. Or basically been writing since I could hold a pen. And I'm not even exaggerating. It was literally me at my desk at like seven years old. I was even just copying the phone book. That's what I did in my free time. That was me happy me. It's only that I didn't handle pen in my hand. I was I was fine. I was happy. And I got an actual typewriter later, which I used to uh write stories and write some lyrics on. I did all the kind of all kinds of writing that you can imagine. But then my team hit and school hits and all the mandatory reading hit that wasn't really what I would read myself. And it just kind of set me for my entire creativity, it was just zapped away from that. And then I also got political. And so my creative soul was just drained. And it took me about 10 years after that to finally get my way back to writing. I graduated with journalism and English from uni. And after a period of really bad illness after that, I just kind of came back up and was like, I want to write again. I need to write again. But I haven't stopped since. And at first writing really was an escape from my own shitty life. And then over time, as I'd got slightly better, it was still an escape, but it was also healing that I had something to say. And then one day, as I really just wanted even more out of Five of Life, because I couldn't work nine to five Monday, Friday, because of my illnesses, I ran into the Jenny Nash's author accelerator program. And it was just like one of those moments in life that you look back on and kind of go, how did that happen? Because it kind of brought all brought all my skills and loves and passions together. And so yeah, here I am, three years later, um, still writing and also book printing.

SPEAKER_01 6:01

Thank you for sharing that. And so tell us more about what you do as a book coach. Where's the guests and who do you help and why do you help them?

SPEAKER_02 6:11

Yeah, having the experiences that I've had with writing as someone who deals with um limitations every single day. It's both a very low battery, also pain every day, brain fog every day, and and you know, other kind of sort of symptoms that that that go with all those chronic illnesses. I know the challenge that it is to write to write at all. I can't just sit at a desk and write because that's just not how chronic illness works. And having that experience, I've just been able to counter so many other writers who are secretly dealing with that as well. They often don't talk about it because they're you know, writing is I need to sit at your desk every day. I need to write a certain amount of time every day to be a writer. And they can't do that, and and it just affects your whole sense of self and your whole identity as a writer. And I just, you know, having gone through that same journey myself, I really saw the struggle in so many writers around me that dealt with the same things. And the more I spoke about my own struggles and experiences with it and how I dealt with all of that, the more writers came to me saying, Can you help me? Because this is something I deal with too. And so throughout the months, really, since becoming certified, I just started to on helping those types of writers because yeah, it's my own lived experience. And it's just really, really nice to be able to help people and see them find their voice and kind of go, I but those writing rules actually don't make any sense. I write when I can, and that makes me a writer. And just to be able to see them finally embrace their writer identity and the fact that they can actually write really good books. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

Do you find from your own experience and from the writers that you've worked with that there's a level of shame or guilt around not being able to write like we think the dominant paradigm typically writes?

SPEAKER_02 8:30

Yeah, absolutely. And I know that from my own experience, I was really ashamed. When I read Stephen King's own writing book, it's it's an incredible book, but some passages were so hurtful. And I didn't even realize it when I was reading it. It was just reading this really good book, and then there were certain passages like, oh, this doesn't actually this is not me, you know? And so I remember putting it away, just finishing it and kind of going, Oh, so it's probably not for me. Because I can't write every day, because I can't sit at that desk every day. I can't do it for a second, I can't get up at 5 a.m. and write. Can't stay up till 3 p.m. and write 3 a.m. And that as being shit that was incredibly hurtful and it makes you ashamed in the sense that there's just something that you really want to do, and then this huge author I mean he doesn't literally say that I can't be writer, obviously, but that's how I, in my own self-doubting mindset, interpreted it, and that took a long time to get out of. And to kind of even just recognizing it that that is what is happening, and and to kind of go and stop and think, oh, but it's actually kind of strange that that is a rule that I have to write every day. Because I think about writing all the time, every day. Think about my characters all the time. And that does not make me any less of a writer. And so this has not been an overnight thing. It really has taken me years to go from the shame of not being an actual, you know, writer, author, to kind of seeing myself as, oh god, I am a writer because it's just who I am. And it takes time and it takes a lot of work, but it's so worth it.

SPEAKER_01 10:25

And that's why I absolutely love to hear you speak and talk about this because I have you heard the Brene Brown, I think it's Brene Brown, the quote that it's like empathy and compassion are the antidotes to shame, and shame keeps us in the dark, and shame keeps us small, and shame keeps us from pursuing the things that we love, right? Yeah, and so when people are willing to step up and be vulnerable and say, Hey, I struggle with this too. This is my experience. We don't feel so alone, right? When we find our people, then we don't feel so alone, and then then we can rise together, which I think is really cool. And I appreciate that you're out in the world and willing to share on that level. Because it really connects, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 11:11

And it's it's all about that, it's all about connection because when you're clinically ill, your life is very small. Often your home is often just as far as you go. And so being able to kind of go online and share experiences with people and and and getting messages from people going, I don't actually share this with anyone, but thank you. Because this is exactly my life as well and and and what I deal with. And you know, sometimes it's really hard to be dishonest, but then when you get messages like that, it's like because you know, being vulnerable means being open to criticism and and judgment and feedback. But when people come to you and they actually say, You make me feel less alone because I thought I was alone in this because I live a very lonely life, and you've just made me see that I'm not alone in this. And that's why I love you know, I went into this book coaching career thinking I was just going to help people write books. But it's it's just turned out, and and I know that you know this to you. It it turns out to be so much more than that. It's it's it's just about the people and about the connections that you make, and about seeing people and about helping them value their own voices and overcoming self-doubt. And it's not just about writing a book, it's just about how you hold yourself in the world. And that's it. And it's front of the mirror. Oh gosh, yes. Yes, so hard. So what are you doing? And I'm like, what do I do? I do lots of you know, from the answer, I'm like, I have people write books and then they're like, oh yeah, but actually it's quite transformative what I do. It's just so meaningful to be able to make those connections and and again, because we live this really small life because our illness keeps us at home and often without a big social life. It's so it's so what's the word? Valuable but also vital to make those connections online and to have people come to you and go, thank you for I you see me, it's just it's the best. This sounds really cheesy, but it's true.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

No, I I don't make sure you just get it. I totally get it.

SPEAKER_02 13:37

I mean, let's be honest, you're also vulnerable because you feel alone and you want people to kind of go, regret to me too. So that in turn I also don't feel so alone.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

It's kind of a reverse out altruism to be but to be completely right if that if that's a thing or a term. But I I totally understand what you mean. And you know, this is how we fight the dark. We we let the light in with exposure, whatever that dark may be for the individual, for the writer. And allowing ourselves to be seen takes risk. Yeah. Putting our words on the page, allowing other people to read them. There is a certain amount of risk involved with that. Um, so with that, what would you say, in your experience working with writers, are some common, unhelpful internal narratives that keep them from doing the work they want to do?

SPEAKER_02 14:33

It's kind of like an ongoing story in the sense that with chronic illness often comes fatigue, and with fatigue comes brave fog. And when you combine those two and you want to write, there's an immediate block all of I can't write now. Because I'm too tired because my brain can't actually form a sentence right now. And these symptoms are continuous, and so you kind of go in the moment when you go, I can't write now, but I probably won't be able tomorrow either. Probably next week I'm still gonna be tired too, and the week after that, and so you don't start because you're like, why would I even bother? I might want you, but I won't be able to finish this story anyway. I might be able to finish it in 20 years. That's not what I want. So I'm like just not start, I'll just think about it and that's it. And that in a narrative of and why is one not bother? Because who wants to hear my voice anyway? Who's interested in my story? It'll take too long anyway. I wouldn't be able to do a book tour anyway, I'm gonna get rejected anyway. These are obviously all narratives that many of us feel. But for us, that time span of writing itself is such a block. And what I always say, and that is something that I find for myself to have been most successful in getting me writing, literally just do it one minute a day. Even if it's just coming up with a name for a character, even if it's just in your mind walking through your world, it doesn't have to be that you write a whole chapter every day. That is not what writing is. I mean, we know the the the phrase where we stare out the window, the writer is writing. Because it's true. See how much of writing is thinking. Not always the act of writing is writing and just thinking about your story, about your themes, about your characters, what they want. All of that adds to what what a what a writer is. And so that when you do get to that moment where you're like, you know what, I should have a good day. I'm gonna write a paragraph that you know exactly what you want to write, where you need to write, what you want to do. Because the story has become part of you. And I I think this is something that I had to work at myself again for years. That realization that writing is not just the act of writing, it's thinking about your story, it's doing the research. It's all that. And you don't have battery every day when you're ill to do all these things. I definitely have weeks where I can't do anything. That's just that's just a reality of having chronic illness. There will always come a time when you do feel better, and that's the moment where you latch onto that writing desire and do it. Because this is so key. You cannot chastise yourself for something that is not your fault. Becoming ill is not your fault. And so you can't blame yourself for something you had no say in. Again, this is not something that happens overnight. You're not like waking up tomorrow and going, Yes, now I believe that I can actually, you know, do it and I'm gonna write this book. But as long as you make that commitment to the writing life and to your writer identity, you will get there.

SPEAKER_01 17:56

It sounds like there's a lot of acceptance, yeah. Letting go of expectation, letting go of comparison, none of which we do overnight. It sounds a lot like recovery, which I happen to be in. You know, where it's it's one day at a time, it's one moment at a time, it's you know.

SPEAKER_02 18:18

That is exactly it. And the but the trouble with being chronically ill, and it is funny, I I you know, I can relate to you in that sense, is that it is every day and even sometimes every minute, kind of going, how do I feel right now? Every hour, kind of going, okay, I feel really bad right now. My mind is going in really bad directions because I feel so bad and I can't do anything. It's a continuous struggle with acceptance. And I I always say I don't like the word accepting, I only like the word acknowledging. I don't accept that something. Exactly. Which is why I use acknowledgement, like trade. Exactly. Exactly. It's like I acknowledge that this is my reality right now, but uh I do not accept the heart that it is like I don't approve of this. They're saying managing chronic illness is uh is more than a full-time job, and it's true, and I'm sure it's the same for recovery.

SPEAKER_01 19:15

So, do you have any tips of wisdom to impart to a listener out there who may have a chronic illness and be struggling to write?

SPEAKER_02 19:24

Well, there's two. The one is that your voice does matter. The problem with chronic illness is that our society is based on at least Western society is based on capitalism and values, income and money, and what you contribute to society economically. When you're chronically ill, that is often a big, huge fucking problem. Because you can't work. And so your voice is taken from you, is diminished, you are seen as a burden to society because you require healthcare, etc. etc. So that inner voice, just as a human being, is already diminished, let alone when you actually want to tell your story. Because that is not a fact, it's not the reality of who you are. You have such deep value. Every single writer has deep value, every single human being does. And you really have to do the work to see that yourself. Because if you don't, you'll never value the the story that you're writing. And attached to that is I don't think people with illness realize how unique their voice actually is. Because when you deal with illness, you because we feel that because we live at shown that we actually have no life experience. And is that right what you know? I had I hear that so often. But San, I can't, I you have to write what you know, and I know nothing. And we always kind of go, and again, Stephen King, I say, Do you think that Stephen King knows about clowns in series? I don't think he has personal experience with that. But what he has experienced it with is fear, human fear. And he knows exactly how to use human fear in his stories. And the same goes for us. And what we know is life and death, illness and health, being scared out of our minds for our own health, for our own lives, grieving our own futures, the life that we could never lead because we got ill. We have so much experience with such deep emotion, and that's what writing is. It's about emotion, it's about feeling, it's about change and learning, and that is something that people with illness know so much about. And always when I say this to people, you can just kind of see their eyes kind of going, Oh, I never thought of it that way. Because again, that write what you know, always think about it in terms of external stuff.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

You know, like I don't go on roller coasters, so I don't know what it's like to go on a roller coaster, so I can't write about it. That's not what that is about. It's a so much about worry, you know. what you you know, the the the experiences that you had in your life, how did they make you feel and that is that is what writing is. It's about emotion and about feeling and again connection. And that's something that we know deeply.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

How important is finding a community to belong to to a writer's journey who's struggling with chronic illness?

SPEAKER_02 22:25

If I spin from experience it has been a lifesaver. I remember I I was so alone when I you know it almost makes you so so lonely. I mean think of it when you have the flu you feel really really shit and you pity yourself you know you're like and what about a person?

SPEAKER_00 22:46

I'm a terrible terrible flu person.

SPEAKER_02 22:49

We all get mad flu. We always think that math flu is a male thing. We all do it. Uh we all feel you know so ourselves but imagine having the flu all your life and you know be having that you're the only one who has that experience and you can't share your pain with someone else. You just can't the pain is in your body and and there's you can't share it and it's so lonely because it it's painful on an emotional and on a physical level and especially when you're surrounded by to put it you know as we do abled people who are not ill and you see them go off to concerts you see them go off to like something laugh it's painful every single day. And when that is all you know and it was all I knew. It keeps raining really lonely and I remember the moment where I found the community online and I didn't even interact with them. I was just crumbling you know but I saw what they wrote and it changed everything. I went from someone who felt like the weakest person in the world like the worst person in the world because illness happened to me I felt like the biggest burden to everyone around me. I felt like the worst friend ever you know continue the list and felt it and here I was looking at people who were like I'm not a burden my illness is my burden I was like oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Yeah which gives them a sense of there's a sense of empowerment and ownership there. You can't do anything about a problem that you don't have any ownership in. So in some way shape shape or form I relate that to drinking problems right yeah I mean from my lens I you know I'm I'm terrible and worthless I can't do this I'm a drained my friends and family and everyone around me and the truth is no I'm a person with a problem. Yeah and and I can you know I need to find the box of tools. I totally get where you're coming from so do you have any resources you could recommend?

SPEAKER_02 24:58

I just created a workshop called How to Create an Authentic Disabled character and it's for various people with illness and those who are not ill but want to write about a disabled character and want to do it with integrity and want to tell the truth about what it's like and also just you know what it's like to write about something that is outside your own lived experience. And that will soon uh go on my website so keep an eye on that. And yeah talking about community I'm actually creating what I'm in the final stages of creating a uh virtual online community for people with chronic illness. It's exactly the community that I encountered that helped me I really hope to be able to help others feel less alone and not just it's again it's the empowerment also because our inner narrative when you're ill is devastating and dangerous at times and if I could offer just a few people a place where they can go and kind of go I I'm having a really bad day. I need help right now and just be there. You know I'm not a therapist I'm not a licensed therapist. I'm I just have lived experience and I have tools now to cope with certain things. I'm I'm not I'm not healed I'm not cured still very very ill but I have so many more tools in my belt that I can use to help others as well so that's coming as well and I still you know I also offer one-on-one book coaching to anyone who wants to write a book feels limited by the daily limitations.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

So so to to recap, we've talked about what are some of the unhelpful internal narratives that writers who are struggling with chronic illness may hold and one is the belief that their voice doesn't matter and and two is the belief that they are utterly alone. And a couple of the suggestions that you have offered is to embrace that piece of the lived experience if I'm hearing you correctly and that it almost it allows you to go into a deeper emotional level with your characters in your writing because you're writing from that piece of your lived experience and then the other was to find ways to be a part of a community of people who can you know share experiences similar to yours. And I always think that that that is the bright spot I think of most writers' lives is finding people that that resonate with us. Let's turn it over to the craft piece and talk about because you mentioned your workshop that is going to come up about writing characters who have disability or chronic illness and how to do it when that is outside of your lived experience and how to do it with integrity and leaving the stereotypical aside and the generalization aside. So talk to us about how a writer can approach writing a character that does struggle with disability or that struggles with a chronic illness and be mindful of their own bias. What would you suggest?

SPEAKER_02 28:16

It's a great question. Yeah I think it's it's it's actually very simple talk to people it would be just that simple talk to people and obviously it depends on what your genre is what kind of story you are writing and take that with you and always know that you know for for one person with that illness you talk to someone else will have just a slightly different experience so yes talk to people read you know go to themighty.com which is a great resource for all kinds of chronic illnesses with with personal stories of people living with those illnesses and it's did you say that was the Mighty dot com yes yeah okay I'll put it in the show notes yeah it's a great it's a great resource for that's the community that I found with it's basically a community of storytellers telling their story about illness it's really quite powerful. I've been published on there quite a number of times as well and just be mindful that you know we we are quite a very vulnerable group in a sense that in storytelling we've always either been used as a comedic yeah and or as inspiration to the healthy people to live their best lives and so keep away from that please and yeah just talk to us just come talk to us we love to be featured in your stories but also you know I've talked a lot about characters with disabilities but at the same time we're everywhere you know it's just like when you talk about queer characters are everywhere I think people often forget that illness is everywhere in our lives and we're so absent from storytelling it's kind of crazy when you think about it. You know when when we go on a road trip no one ever gets really tired. Yeah but we always have like third batteries to go on these trips. It's something that I see because of my own experience going oh my god I'd be by the side of the road now and just sleeping you know so just that is kind of the bias that you have as an able person. So it's very tricky sometimes to be in that head space or what exactly is the life of someone who is ill.

SPEAKER_01 30:30

So yes absolutely talk to people and that's just the best you could do really have you ever heard of writing the other it's a reference that I found by Nyssa Shaw and Cynthia Ward and it was written quite a few years ago and I've been reading it and it's definitely eye-opening about how to write a character that isn't like you and I found it to be so far a really helpful resource. I'm sure a lot of the listeners will will know it but it's writing the other a practical approach by Nissa Shaw and Cynthia Ward. And it's got a bunch of stories in the back of it that are written from different cultural perspectives and it has a ton of exercises. One of the things it talks about is you know there is a dominant paradigm. Wherever you live in the world there will be kind of a dominant paradigm for your society. And it's like kind of trying to find your way to shift from that perspective and step into another character's lived experience.

SPEAKER_02 31:39

And part of it comes from identifying your own bias is that you don't even know that you have because Ryan it's interesting because even my own bias when it comes to you know I've been really ill but before that I was mildly ill and so when I became severely ill that also kind of changed my perspective and kind of went oh I'm I was privileged you know in the sense that I was not that ill and now I'm privileged again. So it you know that shifts all the time as well and that's also very good to be mindful of as writers like it shifts all the time and just be okay with that you know that everyone will have a just a slightly different lived experience but as long as you're doing it with integrity I applaud you.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Yeah privilege is such an interesting word to me but it's really like it's the ability to practice a behavior without risk or adversity.

SPEAKER_02 32:37

Yeah and also you know with we've become so aware of it in certain situations that it almost becomes you know it kind of shifts on itself in the sense that once you're aware of it it kind of melts away because you're you start to act accordingly to realizing like right now I know that I'm sitting here talking to you like I couldn't have done that with all the is and so I immediately shift my I re I know that you know if I could write about this conversation I would immediately go but I realized that a couple of years ago I wouldn't be able to do this so if you're not in that place yet either don't forect in a couple of years you might be able to sit behind a laptop and talk to people again as well. And you know so it's it's good to be aware of it but it can also be tolerant.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

Yeah yeah and that's the other piece is like I think everybody kind of discounts how big of an emotional load writing is I mean it's it's emotional it's intellectual it requires a lot of creative energy isn't a a simple thing to generate or regenerate and and for some that's more difficult than others. So I don't think we give ourselves enough credit for you know how difficult this really is.

SPEAKER_02 33:57

Yeah and it also seems because we're just you know you could do it sitting down. Yeah it's trying to it's again that whole idea of oh well you're sitting down so it's not actually you know tiring. No my brain just did like a brain oh my gosh it's going like you know this is also why you like something about brain folk is absolutely terrific when you're a writer because you need this thing and it's just full of mist and yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

And then you're asking it to do like 50 push-ups. Exactly okay that's a great place to wrap up I have just two more quick questions for you well maybe three. One, do you have any authors that you particularly admire because of the way that they write about characters with disability or that they themselves have a disability and they and they write about it.

SPEAKER_02 34:49

Well it's really interesting to me that I like is just my own interest in this I've been doing a lot of research and finding out a lot of like legendary writers having chronic illnesses or mental health issues and having no idea when I read them like I had no idea but in hindsight I'm like oh yeah I should have seen it you know Alice Hemingway the gender wolf with severe depression flannel conlan actually had loopers which I didn't know when I used to read her at EM and there's one Dutch author who said to pass away she has my illness M E CFS and she was so open about it during a time that I felt that I was ill and I was gasped by doctors and doctors wouldn't acknowledge my illness because it wasn't Knorris officially in the Netherlands at that time. And she was just a beacon of light to me because she was sharing about it. She was writing about it her name is Renata Dorstein and we remembered her like she has my illness and she's a writer she was like this beacon for me you know even in dark days it was like if she did it I can do this. And again that kind of shows you why that is so important. And they don't even need to be writing about it to just be important you know I love that.

SPEAKER_01 36:05

Thank you for sharing that I I feel the same when I read writers that struggle with similar you know issues that I do whether they're in recovery or you know have a learning disability or those kind of things. Totally. Yeah so what wish would you like to impart to your fellow writers? If you could breathe a wish out into the world what would it be?

SPEAKER_02 36:28

My wish is that everyone could see their own writing well that everyone could could feel how much their voice matters and how valued it is because can you imagine the stories that would be written if if every writer kind of felt their own value? Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 36:47

Yes I could imagine that for other people sometimes I struggle to imagine it for myself but my my wish is your wish Theodore Betty Yeah no. And where can listeners find you?

SPEAKER_02 37:02

Yeah they can find me on your story.com and so yeah so you can sign up to my weekly newsletter there where I write about personal stories about life and writing when you have an illness and I'm on Instagram a lot your story mentor. So that's where you can find me. Can you tell me again what the workshop's name is that's coming up the workshop's called how to create an authentic disabled character.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

Beautiful that's coming up soon yeah all right and I will make sure that I pop a link into that because I definitely want to take it as well. Okay so a quick recap I will make sure that I put in the Mighty.com into the show notes. I'll also put a link into the book that I mentioned writing the other please day yeah and then all the links to find Sandra and her workshop thank you so much for spending time with me today. It is always a pleasure the backstory here is Sandra and I have been friends for a while and it's just we don't get to talk enough and I absolutely love you. Okay. I will see you next time. Thank you for listening to the Write It Scared podcast. If you enjoyed today's show please make sure to hit the follow button so you never miss an episode and please leave a review. Reviews help other writers like you find the voices and messages they need to hear to continue to write their stories. Let's lift each other up remember you can be scared and still be unstoppable. I'll see you next week