YouTube Channel Michele Dickson: My Artist's Diary

I started my own YouTube channel last year and I am in the very beginning stages of it. It's here. I started off as a "Healing Artist" but I found out that it would've been very difficult to get subscribers and views, so I've changed it to an artist's VLOG. I'm disabled and I have to do everything while lying down, and that can be very difficult most of the time because I have to set up the phone on a microphone stand in order to record my VLOG. You're probably wondering why I have to lie down; well, it's because I'm bedbound and I can't move around because of pain. I also can't walk anymore. I have a severe case of osteoarthritis in all my joints. I also have a whole host of health problems like diabetes, osteoporosis, chronic fatigue syndrome, hypertension, hypoventilation syndrome (which means I cannot take deep breaths), high cholesterol, spastic colon, etc...And I'm on oxygen 24/7. I have mental illness: derealization (I feel like I'm watching a movie of my life unfold before my eyes). depression and anxiety disorder. I have low vision and I'm deaf in one ear. I'm also chronically ill and Anemic. 

But regardless, I love art and I am an artist and have been since I was a young child, as it was always what I wanted to be when I grew up. I draw and paint and I'm a multi-disciplinary visual artist, but I'd like to explore installation art. I love to read and I also love music, and I am also a poet. I write very deep, evocative poetry, and my Mom says it's "too deep" for her! She always makes me laugh! Mom and I are best friends. She says it like it is, and I admire and respect her for that. When I was very little she scared me when she got mad. I guess she still does! Sometimes we fight, but she knows me well, and she always says what I need to know. I love my Mom dearly, and she loves me. She's been my caregiver since I was 21, and from birth, until I was 12. We were separated for 9 years, and they were the most difficult years of my life. I'm writing a fictional account of something that was based in reality. It happened to my Mom and I when I was 12 years old. It's a difficult story to write, and very triggering for me, but it needs to be told, and hopefully, heard. 

It's about when Mom was homeless and I was living with my abusive maternal grandmother and her boyfriend. One day Mom picked me up to stay with her for the weekend, and the police pulled their guns on us then they sent me home and there I was sodomized by my older cousin. I had a nervous breakdown. Mom was homeless because she married a violent drunk who beat her every night and molested me. No wonder I had a breakdown. 

But that is in the past where it belongs. I'm in therapy and it helps me immensely. I also practice positive thinking. I listen to affirmations every day. I write about my pain, and then put it away. I paint and draw what I feel. I'm in the process of starting to make mixed-media art, and I have to save up money for the supplies. I have an exhibit of my artwork in August and I was picked, along with five other artists to collaborate on a group piece of artwork to be displayed in December of 2022. Things are going well for me. My art career is blooming. I'm happy and getting to be at peace. This is what I've worked hard for and what I've always wanted. 

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