#ninalitediting

Disclaimer: I am not an expert on this nor do I have personal experience with it. This research is not extensive. If writing an amputee character, I suggest you do more research than what I have here. Always focus on personal experience from actual amputees. I would advise you to look out for ‘inspiration porn’ written by non-amputees. 

There is nothing inherently wrong with this in general. It’s okay for people without a given identity to represent such identities. I would consider keeping this part of their character development as not being a Main Storyline if you haven’t been through it, but I don’t think representing it at all is a problem. I would recommend a sensitivity reader to go over the relevant scenes, though, but I think that’s widely applicable advice to pretty much everyone representing groups they aren’t necessarily part of.

I’m no expert, but I wanted to share a few tips that have helped me in the past. Some of these I’ve gotten from others and some I’ve discovered on my own. I hope it helps and happy writing!

1. Changing the Font

I’ve seen quite a few posts saying that changing the font to Comic Sans increases your writing productivity. I found this to be true, but I’ve had the same effect with changing to any different font. So every once in a while, I recommend going in and changing to a different font you find appealing (for me, it doesn’t work as well if I don’t actually like the font) and writing in that font for a while. Using the same font over and over can get boring and make you lose interest. Changing the font has certainly helped me crank out an essay or two!

2. Writing Prompts

I don’t know about y’all, but I used to try to use writing prompts and it never helped me to actually write. The problem wasn’t that I couldn’t write, but it was because the prompts weren’t what I wanted to write. There is a lot of different types of prompts you can use. Find the ones that actually get your writing juices pumping. Personally, I can’t use long and/or specific prompts (i.e prompts that range from a sentence to a paragraph with too many details). Instead, I work better with one-word prompts or prompts that have to do with craft (for example, a prompt that says “Write something for five minutes using a long sentence with no periods”). I try to find a good prompt and set a timer for five minutes. Try to keep writing for the entire five minutes. Don’t backtrack or erase and certainly don’t stop. If you find yourself stopping too much, I recommend working with a different prompt. 

3. The 25/5 Minute Rule (or whatever it’s called)

This one is pretty popular and can be useful for pretty much anything. The gist is this: you work for 25 minutes, you take a 5 minute break, and then you work for another 25 minutes. Some people have different guidelines with it, but that’s the basic rule. I switched it up a little bit. I work for 25 minutes, take a 10 minute break, and then work for another 25. I just do that because I like it all to add up to an hour instead of 55 minutes. You can play with this a bit. You can add rewards for every hour; some people have charts that they put stickers. o whatever works for you. But it’s really important that during the time for work, you are working without distractions. You have to be working. If you’re not getting anywhere with one project, switch to another project. Just keep going. 

4. Looking at Other Writers

Now I know this won’t work for everybody, but it really helps me. Scrolling through writing accounts on Instagram, Tumblr, Twitter, what-have-you, always makes me want to write. But this one is tricky. You have to make sure you actually start writing when you feel this way; you can’t just scroll mindlessly through social media for hours. It’s also hard because the feeling isn’t going to last. You’ll lose the motivation you got pretty quickly. You can’t rely on motivation to get you through writing; you just gotta keep writing. 

5. Changing Mediums

This is a hit or miss with me, but something that helps occasionally is switching what I’m writing with. Sometimes, typing on a laptop works better for me. Other times, writing by hand works better. You just have to find the medium that works the best for you and run with it. If you find yourself struggling, maybe switch to something else for a bit. It can’t really hurt to switch things up. 

6. Take Care of Yourself

Trigger Warning: Mentions of PTSD, PTSD symptoms, triggers, flashbacks, and trauma

Disclaimer: I am not an expert on PTSD nor do I have personal experiences with it. This research is not extensive. If writing a character with PTSD, I suggest you do more research than what I have here.