Welcome, A-Z Blogging Challenge friends. This year, my theme is Prompt-a-day, with fun or thought-provoking writing prompts to use as a story start, warm up, or creativity stretching exercise.Mourning
How it would feel to suddenly or gradually lose one’s abilities due to injury or illness.
Writing prompts can be a helpful tool, no matter where you are in your writing journey. Here's how: 5 Reasons to Write with Prompts.
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Q4U: How might you spin this prompt in an unexpected direction? How about as suspense, middle grade fiction, or romance?
To suddenly or gradually lose one’s abilities due to injury or illness? A scary thought...but a reality that many people face.
ReplyDeleteAn unexpected twist could be - the gradual decline in the body of an athlete in excellent health, due to unforeseen medical complications during an operation undertaken as an organ donor.
Writer In Transit
Sounds like an interesting twist. A kidney donor, I'm imagining. To suddenly need dialysis to live after being in top shape would radically change a person's perspective.
Delete"You'll suddenly lose your ability to see," the doctor said.
ReplyDelete"And then?"
"And then... Isn't that enough? You'll be suffering without the ability to see, why not think about the alternative?"
"Look, just do what you gotta do."
Great prompt! I see a story coming out of this one. I'll have to check out your book.
Theglobaldig.blogspot.com
@trincarl
I knew someone with brain cancer who went through this. She had a little preparation ahead of time to braille tag her clothing and household items. The surgery gave her another five years.
DeleteOh really.. Did she even enough time to learn braille before she lost sight? I know weird question but you never know.
DeleteNot proficiently, no. but it is apparently better to learn it when you can't "cheat" by looking at the bumps and have to do all the reading by feel.
DeleteHi Laurel - I'd hate that ... watching my stroked mother spend her last year's in a bed being nursed, though able to talk ... I needed to be with her as much as possible ... and I've recently watched someone deteriorate and die from Motor Neurone Disease ... I couldn't think about it - you do .. because you have to deal with it. People are amazing at what they can cope with ... if they pull through ... reading about Helen Keller recently I think here in a blogpost ... brilliant people - but who want to live ... just not sure how I'd cope - I'm sure I'd live though ... cheers Hilary
ReplyDeletehttp://positiveletters.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/m-is-for-melton-mowbray-market-national.html
Watching another struggle can bring a kind of grief with it too. To lose one's abilities, I expect one would go through the usual stages of grief, as with a death--a death of a certain kind of future in which one is fully mobile and independent.
DeleteI imagine I'd be pretty angry about it. It would depend on the type of abilities... I'd probably be more okay with losing my physical faculties than mental ones! If I was to use this as a prompt, there'd probably be a sinister reason behind it.
ReplyDeleteAnger would surely be part of the grieving process too. I think I'd be the opposite--it would be far harder to be fully aware and trapped in a body that can't respond than to be a bit blissfully dimwitted and wandering through remaining days able to get around and communicate. But then, I've seen a mean grandparent become nice when her mind went, so that looked pretty appealing.
DeleteFor sure, the weakness could be caused by some grand conspiracy.
I've written this one. One of my characters loses the ability to teleport herself and access information like everyone else. She's pretty darn angry about it and it takes years to come to terms with the loss.
ReplyDeleteDiscarded Darlings - Jean Davis, Speculative Fiction Writer, A to Z: Editing Fiction
I imagine one would go through all of the kubler-Ross phases of grief when going though a loss like this, including bargaining and anger.
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