Hello,
Those of you who either know me or follow me on Twitter may have noticed by now that every second sentence that comes out of my mouth is about my book. I am wary of becoming an insufferable bore about it but then again I wrote a whole damn book so I think I’ve earned the right to wang on about it for at least a while longer. So that’s what I’m about to do.
I have spent this week doing another proofread. At this point I could probably recite it from memory. But having had a break from the text for a few weeks while it was copyedited meant I was able to read it with a teeny tiny bit of analytical distance and, perhaps for the first time, to see it as a whole.
What struck me most was how clearly it came through that I have been on a journey with this disability lark. Things are never exactly easy, but looking back at the things I used to really struggle with and how I pulled myself through them, figuring stuff out often without any guidance, I had to concede that I’m doing ok.
For disabled people, especially those of us who are activists, it often feels like we’re sprinting just to keep up. There’s always another social issue to rail against, and privately there’s often another fire to fight before the embers on the last one have really died away. It’s hard to take a breath and take the long view, hard to feel that any progress has been made.
I’m loathe to overstate the progress made on ableism in society; it can still be breathtakingly bad. But reading the book made me see how much progress I’ve made with banishing the insidious internalised ableism I used to harbour. The older I get the more I understand that while this is an invisible change, it may just be the most important one, partly because it lays the foundations for everything else but actually mostly because it’s what makes individual disabled lives so much better. And really, I think, that’s the whole bloody ballgame.
I wonder how many of us have made huge progress without having realised it. I’m attempting to give myself some credit, I’d recommend doing so too.
After finishing this week’s proofread, I had the pleasure of being interviewed about the book by my friend Brooke, for her new and fabulously-named podcast, Disabled and Proud. Safe to say, we had an absolute blast, but it also made me realise how comfortable I am talking about stuff that used to make me feel anxious or just unable to articulate what was happening. It’s as if, in writing the book, I’ve straightened it all out in my head. I know exactly what the problems are and where they come from now, and I’ve got the beginnings of a strategy for doing something about them.
A pretty good gift to have given myself, I reckon. I hope you’ll join me in the next stage of the fight against ableism.
See you next week,
Lucy
Pre-order my book!
That’s right! My debut book is out on 7 September and it’s now available to pre-order!
It’s a memoir about life as a disabled woman, how ableism and sexism interact in complicated and multifaceted ways, and how we often have to fight to be seen as women at all. Find out more here.
I put my heart and soul into this book and I’d love it to reach as many people as possible. Pre-orders will help it do so, as they encourage media coverage and stock buying by booksellers.
If you enjoy this newsletter, I reckon you’ll love it.
"...reading the book made me see how much progress I’ve made with banishing the insidious internalised ableism I used to harbour."
I love this! This is something I like to do with my own writing. I look back on blogs I wrote as I was beginning to cultivate an anti-racist practice or as I was first beginning to learn about Disability Justice. I also think a lot about the work I've done around internalized queer-shame. It's amazing how what we write can illuminate for us the depth and breadth of work we have done.
" reading the book made me see how much progress I’ve made with banishing the insidious internalised ableism I used to harbour. The older I get the more I understand that while this is an invisible change, it may just be the most important one, partly because it lays the foundations for everything else but actually mostly because it’s what makes individual disabled lives so much better." Yaaas this! I'm bolding the section makes individual disabled lives so much better. I feel this in my cells.