A Little Bit About Me…

For starters, I’m Alex.

I have a very disabling case of chronic migraine along with a few other chronic conditions that fluctuate and impact the way I comfortably live my life. A few years ago I took a step back from the demands of the world to prioritize my health. I left school and work, spent a portion of time completely bedbound, and began to slowly rebuild my health and my life in order to carve out a space where I could thrive, even if medical advancements didn’t allow the thriving to exist without pain.

I’ve wanted to be a weather girl, a detective, a journalist, a psychologist, an architect, an interior designer, an astronaut, and a volcanologist.

I’ve been a waitress, a store manager, a tutor, an executive assistant of sorts, a design assistant, and a professional interior designer.

It’s safe to say that now, I am a writer. A painter. A horror enthusiast. A lunar photographer. A plant mom. A designer. And a chef.

About My Blog:

A picture is worth a thousand words.

That’s how all of this began. It clicked, that in this journey I was destined to be on, I was alone. Alone in the understanding that everyone around me saw this “migraine thing” as black and white. How could it really be more than a headache. I mean just take an Advil, you’ll be fine, right?

There’s so much grey. So many layers in-between the positive and negative. So, I decided to stop voicing what I was going through in half thought out Facebook posts that only demonstrated those extremes.

With the advice of my best friend, the black and white photo montage of my blog was born. Every day, what if you only saw it in black and white? What would be missing from the story you were trying to tell?

Turns out, a lot was missing.

My blog has been a lot of things since it’s inception in the late winter months of 2018 – perhaps the best works were born in the earliest of entries. My writing has always been a therapeutic outlet, one I needed the most in what I consider “Chapter One” of my blog. This period was full of everything I wanted people to know about migraine and my experience. The ups and downs, the interaction between the sick and the surrounding society, and the self-realizations that came from various symptoms and events.

My blog began to transform as I went through the process of applying for, and being approved for SSDI. I wanted to alter my space, allow it to be a place others could come when they needed the resources I hadn’t had.

Throughout this time, I’ve shifted to prioritize my own healing and understanding what that word represents for me. Healing doesn’t come easy, it takes a really long time – maybe even our entire lifetime – and a lot of it is accepting that these conditions I write about, and those that I don’t, are inseparable from me and my life.

The best way to view this blog – if you’re really invested in my story this far – is to navigate to the “Featured Stories” tab where I’ve outlined the highlight reel of pieces published for easy reading.

Alternatively, if you’re looking for resources that can help you on your journey navigate on over to the “Migraine Resources” tab and you can see a carefully curated selection of my writing sorted into pain and symptoms, medications and alternative therapies, educational resources, and a few mental health + caregiver and friends resources.

Where I Go From Here…

My Life My Migraine has become an incredible resource, and I’ll continue to share as my own journey progresses, but much of the story continues elsewhere.

Many of my updates are shared over on twitter, where you can follow along @HemingwayMuse for all the day to day ups and downs of life.

You can also follow along with in depth updates on my personal life and medical updates, along with unlocking access to content previews over on my Patreon! Patreon helps keep this blog ad free while offers readers a way to tangibly support my medical expenses. You can find out more info here.

Patreon helps me work towards some of the personal goals I’ve developed. One of these goals is to get back into design work and work with other disabled people in understanding how my interior design background can serve our diverse disability community in creating real solutions and adapting the spaces around us to meet our needs, rather than forcing our bodies to contort themselves to fit the space. For progress on this goal, check out my design tab to see finished projects!

Beyond that, I hope to take the initiative even further to reimagine design education and improve existing design codes to be more inclusive, while expanding my design offerings to allow free services to other members of the disability community who are looking for adaptive solutions for their spaces.

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“‘O me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless… of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?‘ Answer. That you are here – that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.” ~ Dead Poets Society/Walt Whitman

This is my verse.

A.