What? Me, blog???

This month's Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog question comes from me:

Outside of your writing friends, do other people (work, family, friends) know you blog? What do they think of it? Have you ever been hit with a "Hey! I read your blog today!" from someone you never thought would read it?

So this question came from this oozy, uncomfortable place in my life I've been navigating since I started writing fiction and poetry.

One the one hand, I'm a doctor. Serious. Careful. Professional. White-coat clad, stethoscope-wielding. It pays the bills. I get to help people, which is beyond amazing. I get to use my scientific mind. Let's metaphorize this and call my day job BREAD.

Then there's the poetry and writing. It's pretty wow. I love having eyes to another entire world, by way of imagination. So let's call this part of my life, the EYES.

Then there is the blogging. Oh, the fun! The journey! Interacting with people across the globe! Being silly, funny, drawing doodles. Discussing querying, and writing, the joys of loving children's literature and the insanity of trying to get published. Oh my! It's like the YELLOW BRICK ROAD.

What happens when you combine them? Well. You get this:


Or this:


Yeah, they don't seem to go together that well.

Most of my blogging life, I kept these compartments separate. Even much of my writing life was separate from my blogging (until my book deal, I never disclosed the plot lines of my books). But lately, they've been bumping together a lot. My patients have remarked on my book deal. A recent student said they'd read my blog, and wasn't I funny! A colleague told me she lurks on my blog but doesn't comment.

At first, all of this made me SO uncomfortable. I thought I was being judged. And who knows? Maybe I am being judged, the details of which I prefer not to know. But I realized I can't keep hiding pieces of myself from the world. It's not about the separation of facets.

It's about me, just being me.

Nowadays, I'm okay with having facets. I'm not embarrassed about it anymore.

How did it happen? 

I never stopped writing, I never stopped practicing medicine, and I never stopped blogging. I knew the collision was going to happen. It was inevitable. My acceptance came from rather passive-aggressive act of letting the collision happen, instead of avoiding it.

And so, here I am. In one peace. Oops, I meant piece. ;)

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How about you? Has your blogging life collided with your non-blogging life? Please take a moment to visit Laura's blog for last week's answer, and stay tuned for Sarah Fine's and Deb Salisbury's answers in the upcoming weeks!