I feel like writing helps me accept my illness as well. Or at least live with it... easier.
Making this series of peer videos was a meaningful experience for me, and it was rewarding in many ways. Through other people, I had to face the difficult things that illness brings. At the same time, my interviewees gave me an awful lot of excitement and hope, as well as practical examples of how to approach or act with – or despite – an illness.
The visual world of the videos, created by Tekla Vály, relays the incredible dimension that when it comes to the rest of your life, everything’s certainly not the way you thought it would be! Life with an incurable illness – or with death – is not an ugly, clear-cut thing; it’s life in full colour, until the final breath. I hope that both peers and people close to those with an incurable illness can reach the many layers of honesty, pain, and hope in these videos.
- Astrid Swan