An interesting thing I've noticed in my years of being a chronically ill writer is that there are very few resources that specifically give advice to this group. And that could be because of the language barrier.
Often, those of us with chronic illnesses will say, "I don't have time for X" because it's an easy concept abled people can understand. "Not having time" is something everyone runs up against, as time continues no matter what. It's simple to see how we might "run out" of time.
Unfortunately, this often leads to unhelpful advice. Abled writers will say things like, " then cut out Y" or "wake up earlier" which, yes, does generally answer the Time problem.
But we're not really using time as meaning of "finite minutes and seconds". In this context, "time" is quick shorthand for any or all of the following:
Energy
The intro and outro stages of tasks
Task switching
Settling into tasks and spaces
Pain levels
Functioning levels
Because, for the majority of abled people, they do not have to think about these things. When you don't live with a chronic illness, you don't realize how taxing every step of every process is.
To write in the way that is most productive for me, I physically need:
To be seated in my chair at my desk
To have my computer on
To have my keyboard on the desk and in my hands
But on top of that, I also need:
Steady chunk of time
Low levels of pain
High levels of focus, concentration, and functioning
If any one of these is missing, writing becomes that much harder to do.
Now imagine two of those missing.
Now most of them.
"I don't have time" becomes a quick explanation for "the Venn diagram of Time, Energy, and Pain is not correctly overlapping and I can no longer think clearly enough to create".
Which, yeah, the second is more accurate, but it's longer to say and invites the abled to offer more unwanted advice.












