Blog it!

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Blog it!

From Together Magazine issue 4 - October 2004

Member Gia Milinovich describes how writing a 'web log' - or online diary - helped her through a dark patch, while raising money for other single parents.

Eight months after my son’s father had left, I was unemployed, my savings had dried up and I was left paying for all the mortgage, bills, childcare and food. My son and I were living on economy - dried pasta to get by. I was sinking into debt at the same speed as I was sinking into depression- slowly, but steadily.

In May 2002, I decided to start a ‘blog’, short for ‘web log’, to focus on something else. Every few days in my online journal, I’d write about things I did during the day and about my search for a job. I wanted to portray myself as ‘happy’ and ‘normal’ even if I didn’t feel that way.

My real life situation was a desperate struggle and I became severely depressed - doctors, counselling and anti-depressant prescriptions (I tried St. John’s Wort instead which worked a treat). The tone of my blog posts, however, didn’t change from the upbeat character I had created - I so desperately wanted to be happy that I wrote about this cheery version of myself every time I sat down at my computer.

Sometimes I had nothing to say at all, my mind was empty and numb, but I forced myself to write something, anything. Month after dark and lonely month.

Finally, after two years of single motherhood, five-figure debt and unemployment, at the end of August 2003, I was offered a new job and I was finally able to sort out an agreement about money with my ex. Suddenly, I was in the black and employed. I had made it through the worst.

After that, I started blogging more often and more honestly. I found out that thousands of people read my blog every month.

The Guardian added my blog to their ‘blogs we like’ list. I started getting emails from people who said how much they loved reading it. People started saying I should consider writing for a living. An English teacher in Hungary started using some of my posts to help his students learn English. I was interviewed for a women’s magazine about technology and blogging.

Best of all, I was recently commissioned to do my first professional writing job.

Gia's Blogathon for One Parent Families

Start your own blog

Blogathon 28 July 2007 - Sponsor 'Fembat Unhinged'!

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