migraine fragment 0: why i can’t write “the migraine essay”
Note: I am in the process of archiving my writings disperced across social media platforms on my own website here. This is a mirror post of “migraine fragment 0“ on my Substack page (cringe) processing.
Man being sick from bed, 1987, Migraine Art Competition. Source: Wellcome Collection. © Wellcome Collection
July is Disability Pride Month. July is also my birth month. It felt like the right time to finally write about the migraines that have accompanied me since the year 2008.
For almost a month, I wanted to start but felt overwhelmed. It truly is the first writing block or dread I felt since the launch of cringe processing, the blog you are currently reading.
It is ironic that I was greeted with the onset of a migraine a few days ago as I was about to finally sit down and jot down some thoughts. So I wrote down one sentence about the irony and left the document open, hoping to return shortly after I took care of myself with sumatriptan, ice packs, rubbing essential oils everywhere, and rest.
That was wishful thinking.
I didn’t return to the table until two days later, trying to pick back up my thoughts. Part of the delay was due to the migraine attack itself. Part of it was related to this sense of dread I’ve been feeling when thinking about this piece and how I must start the act of writing.
It doesn’t help that I have already procrastinated for such a long time. It is less that I am forcing myself to write and produce on an unrealistic schedule. It is more the state of being paralyzed by all the experiences, or horrifyingly mundane stories I could choose to write about that come with living with a chronic debilitating illness. I just turned 31 and I have had migraines since I was 13, if not earlier. That’s more than half of my short living years.
Perhaps a less stressful way to try writing this piece is, when my body-mind allows, quickly free write in my journal about a specific flashback, be it an image, sound, or sensation, that comes first into my mind. I will write out this memory with as much details as possible and fill in any interpretations that organically come my way. Then I will stop there, letting my nervous system rest before transcribing this memory on my laptop another day and elaborating further on relevant insights and thoughts. If I have the capacity, I can quickly jot down a different flashback and then repeat the whole process again. The iterative nature of the process appeals to me.
Or perhaps, I don’t have to write a cohesive piece on my relationships with migraine. It doesn’t need to be a personal essay that clarifies everything for me. It won’t be my equivalent of Didion’s “In Bed.” Maybe the mistake is thinking there is a single story to tell. Maybe migraine resists coherence. Maybe the only honest way to write about my experiences is in fragments.
As such, I have arrived to the idea of writing “migraine fragments,” a continuous series on my life long journey with migraines. As opposed to the false reality of processing everything, writing THE migraine essay, and be done with it, episodic writing can not only liberate me from the pressure of telling one story, one truth but also keep me returning to processing the complex reality of living with migraines.
I cannot wait to discover what these fragments become. Will they be part personal essay, part scrapbook, part pattern art, part diary, part poetry, part soundscape, part pottery, part woodcarving, part meditation? Maybe they’ll reflect the full range of my creative practice. Maybe they’ll resist every genre I know.
Regardless, I plan to have as much fun as possible in the writing, creating, and assembling process. I commit to experiment with honoring and expressing myself through a multitude of fragments.