The Butterfly Hours Memoir Project: ILLNESS

For 2019 I'm running a year-long series on my blog in which I share my responses to the writing assignment prompts found in THE BUTTERLY HOURS by Patty Dann.

I welcome you to join me, if you like! I've divided the prompts by month, and the plan is to respond to 3 (or so) a week. For some of these I may write poems, for others prose. The important thing is to mine my memory. Who knows where this exploration will lead?

For links to the prompts I've written on so far this year, please click on The Butterfly Hours tab above. This month's prompts include: hospital, hotel, humming, ice-skating, illness, kitchen table, knife, laundry, library, lunch.

ILLNESS

My childhood was greatly affected by the family disease of addiction and its faithful companion, depression.

I could fill reams with stories related to this topic. But that would mean telling potentially hurtful stories about my family members, and I'm not willing to do that at this time.

Also, it's simply too BIG a thing for me to address in a blog post – someday, perhaps, I'll write a book with these themes. But for now it is not a place I choose to dwell.

However, should anyone reading this have similar experiences and want to talk, you can reach me by email: irene (at) irenelatham (dot) com.

And, here are a couple of great/honest books on the topic:

Sunny Side Up by Jennifer Holm

Hey, Kiddo by Jarret Krosoczka