Health & Self-Care

A week ago today, I was lying in bed in the emergency room of Swedish Hospital in Ballard, Seattle, with an IV dripping fluids into my veins.

You see, I had contracted some virus that gave me the shakes, hot flashes, and a fever for two days. On the third day, all those things went away but I was still weak. My hope rose like a freshly inflated helium balloon. I was getting better! Then it came crashing down on the fourth day when I got Montezuma’s revenge (aka. diarrhea) seven times. I had been down this road before and knew I was headed toward dehydration. So, I asked Marcus to take me to the ER, and even though I’m a needle-phobe, I willingly asked for an IV for fluids. The ER doctor praised me for coming in. An hour later, I felt better.

That night, I went six more times. That makes it 13 bouts of diarrhea in one day. Yep, lucky number 13.

But the IV fluids from before helped me from getting dehydrated, and the next morning, my mouth was drier than the Mojave, but I felt better.

While I was sick, I couldn’t sit up, couldn’t read, couldn’t even watch TV. All I did was lie on my bed, sleep, listen to podcasts, and think. I thought many thoughts. Many I didn’t want to think–racing, crazy-ass thoughts–but some made me think even more.

Thoughts like, when I get better, what do I want to do with my life?

Thoughts like, when I get better, what do I want my legacy to be?

Thoughts like, when I get better and can eat solid food, what’s the first thing I’m going to eat?

The answer to #3 was homemade chicken and vegetable soup. Good stuff. Highly recommend it.

The answer to #1 was I want to keep writing and keep building my writing business.

The answer to #2 was a little bit harder and took me a while to figure out.

By the seventh day of this illness, when I felt much better, I realized that what I wanted for my legacy was what I’ve been doing for much of my career: help people achieve their dreams.

Specifically, help people achieve their writing dreams. And even more specifically, help people in the beginning stage, when fear and doubt are loud and raging, and keeping you from venturing even a few paces down the path of being a writer.

I know that place. Intimately.

While I delight in talking shop with other writers, I don’t necessarily want to help people with the craft of writing. Don’t get me wrong, I love discussing story, armature, theme, character arcs, setting, and more, but what really lights me up is helping people break through their mental and emotional barriers to expressing themselves in a creative way.

I realized once again that this is what I had been doing for 12 years as a prelaw adviser when I helped students write their personal statements for law school. Writing the personal statement was the most scary and daunting of anything on the law school application–even more than the dreaded and terrible LSAT (Law School Admissions Test)–and it was the most rewarding for me to coach students through it, and help them get their stories out.

Many of my prelaw students told me the process of writing their personal statement was cathartic. It changed them, for the better. For many, writing a story about their life gave them courage to move forward. It also gave them a touchstone that they could read in coming years when they felt fear and doubt creeping in, or when they’d lost their way and needed to remember why they were on this path.

I didn’t realize when I closed my Prelaw Guru consulting company that I’d still want to do what I did with prelaw students, but with writers.

But when I opened my writing coaching business in January and started doing one-to-one writing coaching, the work focused more on the nitty gritty of the craft of writing. I realized that while I was good at it, and enjoyed working with my clients, it didn’t feel quite right. It felt too technical. It felt too much like homework. It made me realize that I may need to close my writing coaching practice. But to do what? I can’t just write, I need to do something that is of service to people. That’s important to me.

Because of this, I’ve felt at sea through all of August. I wasn’t sure where I was headed and it filled me with anxiety. Then, September came crashing in with that dang virus and tossed me out of the boat and into the waves. I swam and swam, and now I’m back in the boat and the shore is in sight.

I feel better. Tons better.

I have more hope now than I did before I got sick.

Being sick forced me to slow down and face my anxiety.

Change is coming.

I will hit land soon.

I’m no longer afraid.

I’m excited.

Stay tuned, friends.

Peg Cheng is the author of The Contenders, a middle-grade novel centered on the question, can enemies become friends? She is currently writing another novel that is a re-imagining of the Snow White fairy tale set in 1980s Seattle. Peg is also a writing coach giving help, encouragement, and feedback to writers from all walks of life.

Art by Julia Cejas.

2017 got off to a rocky start with my pop-in-law, Mr. Mark, getting very sick in January, and then dying in March. You never truly know how the death of someone is going to effect you until it happens. And even when it does happen, the effects can continue to change over time.

While Mr. Mark was sick, and after he died, I ate a lot of Mr. Mark foods. I ate more ice cream, burgers, fries, cheese, mayo, and cookies than I have in years, since I was a child. I did this because, let’s face it, those foods are comforting, and because I felt like I was honoring his memory by eating his favorite foods.

Another reason I ate all these foods is because I thought if Mr. Mark can eat these foods all the time and live to 84, why can’t I? ‘Course he had all sorts of health issues, and I have a host of them myself, different ones than the ones he had, but why can’t I enjoy myself by eating whatever I want? Life’s too short. Or life is long and why not enjoy yourself while you can?

But after four months of eating like this, my health started to falter. You see, my body has a hard time digesting dairy, wheat, and sugar. I visited Mr. Mark’s grave on Memorial Day and told him I was going to take better care of myself. And, over time, I finally stopped eating those foods. For about a month, I felt better. Then I went back on them after attending another memorial for him in his hometown of Chico, California. Now, I’m back to trying to get off of them again. It’s hard. But I’m trying.

What I realize more and more is that life is one big experiment. You try one thing, it works. You try it again, it doesn’t work. You try something different and it’s a grand success. You try something else and it’s an epic fail. So, you go back to the drawing board and you try again. And again. And again. I don’t mind the trying. But I do get upset when I stop trying or when it takes me too long to stop doing something that isn’t working. I’m trying to look at my mistakes as a learning opportunity, not a failure, and I’m trying to be more forgiving of myself.

Speaking of trying, here I am in the last half of 2017, and I’m looking ahead and feeling way more optimistic about trying some new things and starting up again some old things. The grieving for Mr. Mark hasn’t ended, but it’s reached a point where it’s not on me like a low-grade fever or like carrying a 5-pound bag of sugar with me everywhere I go.

When I look ahead, the number one thing I see myself doing is getting out in the world more. I know Mr. Mark would have supported that. I straddle the line between being an Extrovert and an Introvert (if you’re wondering, I’m ENFJ) but my pop-in-law was an Extra-Extrovert. Keeping that in mind, here are some goals that I’d like to go for during the last five months of 2017.

Goal #1: Keep teaching workshops and retreats for writers and creatives.
So far, I’ve taught a Writers Wellness Retreat in March, and co-taught a Poetry Makerspace Workshop with Marcus in May. In September, I’m thrilled to be teaching a workshop on Fear and Writing for the Seattle Public Library’s Seattle Writes Program. In October, I plan on teaching a workshop on Creating a Sustainable Writing Practice. If that goes well, I might teach it again in November. Lastly, I want to teach another Poetry Makerspace Workshop with Marcus in December. If you live in the Seattle area, I hope to see you at some of these events.

Goal #2: Start blogging once a week again.
This time last year, I had written 24 blog posts. This year, this post included, I’ve written just 12. I want to start blogging once a week again. It’s not a quantity thing, but more of a quality of life thing. I stopped blogging weekly because I wanted to have more time to work on my novel. But what I discovered after seven months of not blogging weekly is that I miss it. While I have worked more on my novel, I’m not sure I wouldn’t still have done that even if I had kept blogging every week. You see, I blog for myself as much as I blog for other people. Blogging gives me a regular way to reflect on what I’ve learned, or what I want to learn. It helps me, and it’s valuable to my self-care. So, whether it takes away time from my novel writing or not, I want to keep doing it. Every week. Hope you enjoy the more regular blogging that will be coming your way.

Goal #3: Start using videos in my blog.
Some people call this vlogging. I want to start creating blog entries with videos instead of writing them all. I was inspired when I discovered the videos of awesome illustrator Fran Meneses (aka. Frannerd). Frannerd seems to have so much fun with her videos, while also giving people helpful information about illustrating, and it reminded me of when I ran my law school consulting business, Prelaw Guru, and made quite a few videos and then found that prelaw students loved them. I like sharing my learning in a verbal and visual way instead of just in written form so I’m looking forward to creating videos on writing and the writing life. Thankfully, Marcus has volunteered to help me with my videos (he helped me film and edit the ones I did for Prelaw Guru) and I have a feeling we’re going to have a lot of fun making them. So, stay tuned for some videos coming your way.

Goal #4: Find other ways to make money.
It’s taken me 18 months of full-time writing to realize that depending or expecting my novel writing to make me money not only fills me with massive amounts of guilt (what if I can’t do it and Marcus has to keep supporting me for years and years?) and fear (what if I can’t do it no matter how hard I try?), but it also limits my creativity. I want to create works that I love. I hope that other people love them too but I can’t count on that. All I can do is create the best work I can possibly create, and then work on getting it out there. I’m not an artist that gets mad when other people don’t “understand” my work. My goal is to create stories that are understood so much that people can’t help but tell their family and friends about them. Still, I’m not writing stories that I think will sell. I’m writing stories that I most want to tell. Because I find writing both glorious and hard, I need to write stories that appeal to me, otherwise it’s not worth the thousands of hours of unpaid work I put into it. So, while I do hope my books sell well enough someday to support me, I’m researching some options right now that will help me make money while I get better at my craft. I’m not going to reveal them right now but I will someday.

I wasn’t planning on it–I was trying to make today a day of relatively “clean eating”–but I ate an orange-chocolate-chip cookie this afternoon that was so good, I cried out with glee. I think Mr. Mark would have loved it. I was given this cookie (it was the last one) at a document-shredding event at my bank (thanks WSECU), I have no idea where they got it, and I’m not sure if I want to know because then I’d be there all the time. As I move forward, I realize I don’t have to cut out every single Mr. Mark food from my diet, I just have to savor the ones that I do have, the few times that I have them. I can remember him in other ways that have nothing to do with food but can be just as satisfying. I know he’d support that. For the rest of 2017, my work is cut out for me: remember Mr. Mark in healthy ways, take good care of myself, get out in the world more, and keep on trying.

Peg Cheng is the author of The Contenders, a middle-grade novel centered on the question, can enemies become friends? She is currently writing another novel that is a re-imagining of the Snow White fairy tale set in 1980s Seattle. Peg is also a writing coach giving help, encouragement, and feedback to writers from all walks of life.

I still remember what Phyllis Wise, former Provost, Vice President of Academic Affairs, and first Asian-American President of the University of Washington (UW), said to me and a roomful of Asian-American women staff and faculty members at a reception we hosted for her in 2008 or 2009. The UW was going through a tough round of budget cuts and she told us, “You can’t do more with less. You can only do less with less.”

That was the smartest thing I’d ever heard a leader at the UW say. In fact, it’s one of the smartest things I’ve heard any leader say.

Every business or organizational leader I’ve ever met or read has said, “Do more with less!” I’ve heard that motto for years. And for a long time, I believed it. I worked for years at organizations and departments that gave me less money, time, and resources to do the work that needed to be done and yet always expected me to do more. More. MORE.

Even when I started my Prelaw Guru business back in 2010 and became my own boss, I found myself still pushing to “do more with less.” But who am I kidding? I never did more with less. I did more at the sacrifice of my body, my mind, and my relationships. I was doing more by using the resources I had at my disposal: ME.

This year, I’m putting a stop to this.

Even last year, when I thought I had achieved my dream of being a full-time writer, I was incredibly hard on myself and forced myself to be an introverted writer when I really needed a combination of introverted and extroverted work and activities to feel balanced. I kept making myself do more when I had less and less to give.

Last year’s isolation and depression, and this year’s recent death in my family, have helped me come to this decision. As you may have read in an earlier post, my pop-in-law Mr. Mark died last month. His health took an extreme downturn at the end of January. So, for the last 9 weeks, I’ve been either thinking about death, seeing death, or experiencing his death and its aftermath.

During the last 9 weeks, I stopped planning, I stopped writing daily agendas (for years, I’ve written my daily to-do’s on the back of an old business card and then crossed them off–actually, completely blacked them out–as I complete them), and I stopped caring about the future.

To witness a loved one die was sad and stressful in so many ways, but strangely, it didn’t completely depress me. It didn’t because Mr. Mark lived his last years on earth the way he wanted to live them. While I may not live my years the way he lived his, his dedication to his every day, to making this day–not yesterday and not tomorrow–what he wanted it to be, was inspiring to me.

It’s crazy. I’ve never been like this before. But life changes you, and so does death.

I have less cares about the future.

I have less cares about reaching goals.

I have less tolerance for people who bring me down.

I have less ability to make myself do things I don’t want to do.

I have less energy to deal with bullshit.

This year, I’m taking Phyllis Wise’s advice, and putting it into motion in this way: if something feels right, I will do it. If it doesn’t feel right, I won’t do it. I’m not going to judge it either way.

This includes my writing. No more beating myself up for not writing enough words or not writing good enough. What I write is what I write. How much or how little or how good is the past. Whatever comes out, comes out. I accept it.

I’m living every day the best way that I can. I simply don’t have the energy or capacity for anything else. Finally, thankfully, I’m okay with doing less with less.

Peg Cheng is the author of The Contenders, a middle-grade novel centered on the question, can enemies become friends? She is currently writing another novel that is a re-imagining of the Snow White fairy tale set in 1980s Seattle. Peg is also a writing coach giving help, encouragement, and feedback to writers from all walks of life.