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2023 May Writing Prompts for People with Chronic Illness & Disabilities

2023 May Writing Prompts for People with Chronic Illness & Disabilities

It’s time for the 2023 May Writing Prompts! I’ve been up to my neck with school assignments, and am now dealing with the aftermath of severe pain and fatigue. I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. I’ve eaten way too deep into my energy budget, and now am paying the price plus a nasty interest rate for it. Anyway, I’d love to hear what YOU have been up to since the last linkup in March. Take a peek at the writing prompts below, and join us if you can!

What The 2023 May Writing Prompts are About

The linkups are a monthly writing support group for anyone with a chronic illness, mental illness or disability. An opportunity to share, support and learn from one another through shared writing prompts.

It’s also a great way to provide insight into life with chronic pain, from many different points of view. Many participants have also found it useful to get out of a writing rut, or use it to share about stuff that they don’t normally write about on their blog.

They’re pretty much open to interpretation, so you can use them to craft an evergreen blog post, share freely about what you’ve been up to in your chronic illness life, or even write a poem or comic strip!

How to Participate in the May 2023 Writing Prompts

  • There are 5 writing prompts every month. You just need to pick 3 to write about (although 5 is best!).
  • Publish the post to your own blog, or use a free writing platform like Medium if you don’t have one.
  • Only one link submission per person to avoid spam.
  • Don’t forget to click on the blue ‘Add Link’ button at the bottom to add your post to this page, so that others can read, share and comment on your post.
  • Do comment on at least two other blog posts in this linkup if you participate. Helping to spread the word on your social media is always appreciated as well.
  • Failure to follow these rules might get you blacklisted from future linkups. Let’s keep it fair for all 🙂

Get the May 2023 Writing Prompts!

  1. Telling

    Is there something that you’ve been telling yourself or someone else on repeat? Or maybe you told off a nasty person on the street, or a rude doctor. You could also be telling a story, joke, truth, lie, or expressing your feelings to someone (or trying to!). Perhaps you haven’t been telling yourself anything, but depression has been whispering lies in your head. Or perhaps someone told you an interesting fact, tip or shared some knowledge that got you thinking.

  2. Speaking

    You could be speaking up and advocating for yourself or for someone else. You could also be speaking the truth, speaking in public, or speaking to someone. Perhaps you had to speak to a parent, teacher, mentor, therapist or someone else for advice or comfort. You could easily weave ‘speak’ and ‘tell’ into one sharing as well (two writing prompts down in one fell swoop!).

  3. Worrying

    Is there something that has been troubling you of late in relation to yourself or someone else? Perhaps a potential or new diagnosis, a traumatic incident, or disturbing behaviours. You could also be worrying about your child, about school, bills, work, chronic pain and life in general. I know I worry about the future quite a bit as a person with chronic illness who’s unable to work full-time to support myself fully.

  4. Progressing

    The journey truly matters more than the destination. After all, the ultimate destination for us all is death. I’m not trying to sound morbid or negative here; It’s simply a fact of being human. But I find that perspective encouraging as it gives me the freedom to take my time on this journey, and to try and enjoy it along the way. Every step in the right direction is progress in that sense.

    What else have you been making progress in? Perhaps you’ve been working on a course, school, career, hobby, skill, blog, book, etc. Remember that the small wins all add up, and that mistakes are part of the journey of progression.

  5. Fantasising

    Well, I’m sure as someone who’s chronically ill or disabled you’ve had some fantasies about not being so sick, or about your former ‘real’ self. What are some of your fantasies or seemingly impossible dreams in life? You could also fantasise about winning the lottery, living in a mansion, travelling around the world, or something else that’s grand, bold, creative or idealistic. You could also fantasise about being in a certain line of work, or even world peace. This writing prompt is free for you to imagine and be creative!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

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