A Late "Birthday" Celebration

Happy birthday--to my book.

Just over two years ago, my memoir, "Rough Waters: From Surviving to Thriving with a Progressive Muscular Dystrophy" was finally unleashed upon the world. It's arrival involved some kicking and screaming.

I had written a book back in 2017 that was over 400 pages (115,000 words) that had taken me about 4 months to write and another 4 months to hone into a product I was proud of. It was full of stories where I'd seen God's provision in my life. I handed it over to someone I knew in marketing who I trusted. She sat on the project for about five years, while I paid her piecemeal over $30,000 for printing and promotion, and she told me it would be a best-seller and optioned for movie rights. She would answer emails but refused to take my phone calls. (Beware of those who would blow sunshine up your skirt while skirting real contact.) In early 2022, I worked up the nerve to take my book back and asked for a large sum of my money back. Upon receiving the most gaslighting email ever, I asked again for my book back. It wasn't until I had done the research at the Alliance of Independent Authors and had a group in mind that I was finally sent a PDF that I had to put back into Word formatting myself.

Girl Friday Productions didn't give me the sunshine report. My manuscript needed work. It was way too long and needed more real content. They paired me with my editor, G. Elizabeth Kretchmer who pushed me for "more interiority". I had no idea what she meant. She kept asking what I was feeling during this event or that. I panicked and felt waves of nausea roll in, but went to work. I wasn't planning to write a book about how if felt to have my body betray me, and the twelve years of mishandling by doctors, and the abuse of my childhood and adult life; but I dug in deep to all of those things. (I don't recommend rewriting a memoir while going through trauma therapy, because one of those is tough enough; but I'm not exactly known for doing things the easy way.)

Along the way, Georgie, from the marketing team, showed me their research about who my readers would probably be. We talked about who I'd written the book for, and she guided me as we chose fonts and eventually the cover art. I had wanted my photo on the cover, but since I wasn't a known quantity like Michael J. Fox or Jennifer Grey, we did the next best thing. We used one of my photos for the cover.

This is "Cheeky Waterslide", which has won awards and been hung in the Fotonostrum Gallery in Barcelona, Spain. I am not the woman in the thong bathing suit, but I admire her self-confidence. Georgie said this cover would make her pick up the book just to see what it is about. I didn't hate the idea of having a book cover credit on my creative resume.

The book has been well received, which makes me happy. I wrote it for people like myself who are undiagnosed but know something is not quite right, people who are affected by disability or their friends and family, and the medical professionals who need to hear a patient's perspective. I believe it should be required reading in all Occupational Therapy and Physical Therapy graduate schools, and on the reading list for people understanding the psychosocial aspects of disability.

Happy birthday "Rough Waters", I received this award in the mail just for you.