Glamour writing Archives - So About What I Said

Tuesday, May 7, 2019

My Essay on Glamour: “To Cope with My Father’s Suicide, I Had to Learn to Love My Grief”

Please forgive me, friends!! I’ve been remiss in sharing my new bylines on the blog, but as we get closer to the slow-down of summer, I’m planning on sharing ALL THE BYLINES. Translation: Get ready for a heavy dose of relationships, disability and pop culture — you know, my classic wheelhouse! First up: My November piece on Glamour about losing a parent and grief.

Survivors of Suicide Loss Day was in mid-November and my piece was timed perfectly. As I remember my father, I’m glad I was able to write about grief for one of my favorite publications. I wanted to look at what it’s like to lose a parent to suicide in your early 20s, which is something that isn’t talked about very much. There aren’t books about it like there are for widows or children, and there’s really no label for losing a parent at that age. I felt like I was in limbo — no longer a child, but at the same time, not a full-fledged adult.

So I tried to give voice to that — to be the resource and reassurance for someone today that I didn’t have back then. This one was one of the toughest to write (I started writing it in March 2018), and I hope it helps someone.

Anyway, here’s an excerpt of the piece, which, even after 16 years, was still incredibly therapeutic to write. It helped me continue to heal, process and, of course, honor the relationship I had with my father…

No grief book could tell me what it would feel like to see reminders of my father: birthdays, holidays, little girls holding their dad’s hand. Even worse, there was no way to prepare myself for what it would feel like to graduate from college and not pick out my dad’s smiling face from the crowd as I accepted my diploma. When a loved one commits suicide, they’re both everywhere and nowhere.
The most distressing and concerning thing about being left in the aftermath of a loved one’s suicide, I came to realize, is that it decimates your sense of identity. I was no stranger to feeling different—growing up with a physical disability, I was used to feeling different from my peers—but my father’s death brought with it an entirely new sense of isolation. I suddenly felt like a stranger in my own life, isolated from the person I used to be.

You can read the full piece here and I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to email me anytime at mellow1422@aol.com and let’s chat! And of course, feel free to share my essay on Facebook, Twitter or even your local refrigerator. If you share on Twitter, be sure to tag me @melissablake so we can connect! I can’t wait to hear from you! And here’s to us going home for the holidays, wherever that may be! Love you all… xoxo

Tuesday, March 19, 2019

My Essay on Glamour: “No, My Disability Doesn’t Make Me Undateable”

YAYYY!!! It’s finally here!! I’ve been so excited for my newest Glamour essay to come out because it’s all about my two favorite topics: Dating and my disability!!! And, SPOILER ALERT, there’s a shout-out to the haters!!

*Cue waving emoji*

Seriously, though, this piece has been a long time coming! For years, I’ve written about how my disability has impacted my dating life — or, let’s be real, lack thereof — and to finally be able to write about it for a place like Glamour? It’s incredibly gratifying. And, well, a bit scary to be this vulnerable in a publication that is read by so many people.

But, thankfully, the response has been overwhelmingly positive! I just really want to shout THANK YOU from the rooftops!! The response has been overwhelming in the best way possible. Someone even said that reading the essay made them want to see an independent woman with a disability in a rom-com!! This is exactly why I write!! I think that’s why so many writers write in the first place — to be seen, to be understood, to make an impact on the world. Plus, writing this piece made me want to write another MEMO TO MEN since it’s been ages since I’ve written one! I’d say we’re due for another, wouldn’t you, friends?

Since this piece came out last month, I’ve been talking about it A LOT on social media, but that’s actually the whole point. The fact that we’re talking so openly and honestly about dating and disabilities?? That’s HUGE. Seeing disability advocates share my piece on social media means that we’re not afraid to have these types of conversations. It makes me feel like what I want isn’t some unrealistic, daydream-y fantasy that is reserved for other people. In the end, I’ve never felt more vulnerable, but I’ve also never felt more seen. OK, I’m done with the Hallmark movie monologue!

Anyway, here’s an excerpt of the piece, where I spell out EXACTLY what I’m looking for in a relationship, which is pretty much what every woman is looking for. Really, I may be disabled, but I’m not that special…

“It’s time to set the record straight: I am disabled, desirable, and not looking for a nurse.
Sometimes I feel like I need to put those words on a neon sign in Times Square. I know there are many ways my disability does make me different—like the fact that I use a wheelchair to get around—but it’s 2019, for goodness’ sake. Don’t we deserve all the same things in a relationship as able-bodied women? My wheelchair doesn’t make me something other than a woman.
There are so many things I do want, and brace yourself, because this might come as a shock: I want the same things you want in a relationship. I want a guy who makes me laugh, who is kind and gentle and sensitive, who is family-oriented, who is as obsessed with pop culture as I am. I want to be myself, to be seen, to be loved—disability and all.”

Someone said “May you find love in 2019” after reading this essay, and I’m choosing to take that as a crystal-ball level prediction. Come at me, 2019…I’m more than ready for you!!

Monday, November 20, 2017

My Essay on Glamour: “My Disability Made Me Dread Going to Weddings Alone”

If you’re a longtime reader of So About What I Said, then you probably remember seeing Jessi featured in several posts. She and I go way back (we initially bonded over our mutual love of writing and blogging!!), so I was honored when she invited me to her wedding a couple years ago. I was excited, of course, but there was a nagging thought in the back of my mind: I’m not used to going to weddings alone. This will certainly be a first.

And what a first experience it turned out to be — in the BEST way possible! I’m so glad I ended up writing about my wedding experience in my latest essay for Glamour! The essay “My Disability Made Me Dread Going to Weddings Alone. It Shouldn’t Have” explored what this new experience was like, even though most people my age had flown solo at weddings long before my maiden voyage. My editor was incredibly kind and wonderful to work with; she really got me to dig deeper and explore my feelings about my disability and not just recount the details of the wedding.

Here’s an excerpt of the essay, which I’m happy to say got Jessi’s stamp of approval (I’m *so* glad she liked it!)…

As I got older, it didn’t help that my physical disability made me feel as though I was on display; I felt incredibly self-conscious of my surgical scars, wheelchair, and deformities, and was about ready to say goodbye to any sense of hope. I was born with Freeman-Sheldon syndrome, a rare genetic bone and muscular disorder. And in my wheelchair, well, I tend to make an entrance wherever I go. I’ve realized that it’s impossible for me to go under the radar, no matter how much I might want to. People notice me. That’s just how it is.
So when I found myself sitting in a small banquet hall one rainy October evening in 2015, attending my first wedding as a solo guest, I felt especially seen—and not in a good way. Everything should have been perfect—I’d been friends with the bride for six years, and her now husband almost as long, and I couldn’t have been happier for them. Plus, at 34, I knew most people my age had probably been attending weddings alone for nearly a decade, and it’s really not that unusual. But here I was, drinking my Coca-Cola in a dimly lit ballroom and feeling anxious. It would be one thing if I could just easily blend in with the crowd—I craved that kind of anonymity—but instead, I carried that self-consciousness with me that night. Insecurity was my plus-one.

You can read the full essay here and I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to email me anytime at mellow1422@aol.com and let’s chat! And of course, feel free to share my essay on Facebook, Twitter or even your local refrigerator. If you share on Twitter, be sure to tag me @melissablake so we can connect! I can’t wait to hear from you! Love you all… xoxo

Wednesday, February 22, 2017

My Essay on Glamour: “I’m Tired of Not Seeing Women With Disabilities on TV”

It’s been quite the busy month for my disability writing, apparently! In fact, I’m thinking of just declaring 2017 The Year of Fearless Writing — it’s got a nice ring to it, don’t you think? Last month, I took reality TV to task (Hi, Bachelor/Bachelorette!) for not casting women with disabilities, which, let’s just be real, shouldn’t even be an issue in the 21st Century. And now, in my essay on Glamour, I’m challenging ALL the networks to feature MORE women TV characters with disabilities in our favorite shows.

My essay I’m a Woman in a Wheelchair—and I’m Tired of Not Seeing Anyone Like Me on TV is something I’ve been wanting to write for awhile now. Growing up, I never saw women with disabilities on my favorite shows and if I did, they were typically portrayed in either some sickly way or merely in the plot to teach us some sort of lesson. Nothing about their appearance on the screen was flattering! Instead, it was just downright insulting because I knew that wasn’t how the disability community was living. That most certainly wasn’t how I was living. I needed to see other people like me, you know?

Here’s an excerpt of the essay, in which I give my *true* feelings on a certain book-turned-movie from last year…

But in the real world? Women with disabilities exist beyond mere props used to teach some worldly lesson. Having someone who looks like you and faces the same issues you do is so important. We need to be represented, not just as an object meant to be inspiration porn, which is something that’s always made me cringe. Truthfully, the whole phenomenon has always made me feel like an “other,” an outsider who will never belong…
Take the film Me Before You, for example. The main character is a paraplegic who falls in love with an able-bodied woman. How many times has it been the other way around on TV or in movies, where a woman in a wheelchair falls in love with an able-bodied male and it’s not some unrequited-love situation? Why is it so hard to believe that women with disabilities could be in a relationship with an able-bodied person? I’ve often wondered why those examples are few and far between.