Identity Crisis

Having a bit of a crisis of conscience at the moment, after some really weird - and pretty darn creepy - comments.  Basically, I've been thinking about how a lot of people use the Internet to hide behind, like these so called 'trolls' that abuse others on twitter, because they feel they have the right to say anything, and it won't get traced back to them.  The whole point of my blog was to be as honest with my readers as possible, yet, I don't use my real name… And therein lies the problem.

When I first started writing, I figured it would be much easier to be myself if I wasn't myself; i.e. I used a false name. That way, I felt I could be honest about my life, without worrying about having any fallback, or offending anyone I know – not that I would deliberately. It's like, when you have counselling; it's much easier to talk to someone who's not part of your life, who won't judge you, because they don't know you. That's what this blog is to me, kinda like my therapy. I've already explained at great length why I chose the pseudonym of 'Bad Wolf', and I still stand by what I said back then. I like the anonymity, and I like being able to keep this identity separate from the persona I portray in the real world. Otherwise, I am 100% honest in what I write here, and my twitter account – also under 'The Bad Wolf' - is an extension of that.

Yesterday, I got it into my head to screw what anyone else thinks of me, and connect all my accounts. So I went about connecting my twitter back to my Facebook, and allowing NetworkedBlogs to post on my Wall/Timeline. But then I thought about it a bit more, and talked to The Wife, and today I've gone back and reversed all those decisions; except one, which I'll reveal in a minute. Maybe I'm a coward, and shouldn't be bothered about what anyone thinks of what I write, but I am – bothered, I mean. It's like I said in 'I'm Fine'; there are certain people I can be honest with, and tell how I'm really feeling, but for the other 99%, I give the default 'I'm fine', and it's those that I don't feel comfortable in letting read my blog. Stupid, right? My blog is public, for the whole world to read, yet I don't want [certain] people I know reading it. I think, if I always had that worry at the back of my mind, that friends and family may be reading this, then it would hinder my honesty, and ruin the whole point.

It also helps that, after a lot of thought, I've kind of pinned down what I want out of this blog, which maybe I hadn't really thought about before. I want it to be a platform for me to express how I'm feeling, how I'm coping with my day-to-day life as a spoonie, and any worries or changes that may occur, and I hope that, in turn, I'm providing a bit of support or insight to those of you reading this. I find it really difficult to talk to people, apart from a select handful, so this blog has proved useful to me, on a selfish level, for understanding myself, and working a few things out. I welcome comments, and criticism, and would love to hear from other spoonies, or friends/family of spoonies, just to know someone is on the same wavelength would be brilliant. On that note, in future posts I'm going to try even harder to talk about my life as a spoonie, and how my condition - Brittle Bone Disease - affects me, in the hope that anyone else with a similar condition, or spoonies in general, will at least feel that they're not alone. I'm also going to make sure to write more about film too; it's not all about me, and I need to make the effort to write something a bit academic, after four years of studying the subject.

But, while I want to remain anonymous, I feel that I should give you all a bit of myself, a smidgen of my true identity, in order to keep that balance between the completely honest 'Bad Wolf,' yet be an identifiable and empathetic personality. So, from now on, call me Katie.

KT xxx