I have several purposes for this site, though I’ll admit straight off that it began as an accountability device to keep up with my treatments. I’m putting my life, my health, and the related aspects of my relationship with Beautiful out there for everyone to see. In addition to that, I want to educate, build a community, and entertain. I plan to entertain with my writing, which I’ve honed over the last 5 years of blogging and 3 years of intense English courses, culminating in getting my B.A. in English this coming May. Thank you all so far for the tweets to @cffatboy and e-mails I’ve received noting my writing. I truly do appreciate it.
I wanted to have an open-door policy on my writing today because I’m planning on posting my next CF-related essay that I’m doing for school. I’ve got an incredible professor for my last, and highest-level English course: Advanced Composition. To put it in perspective of my other courses, everyone in college starts with Comp. 1 & 2. That’s where most people end, unless their major requires some literature. For me, as a Professional and Technical Writing major, I continued on to take Modern Short Novel, 3 British Lit courses, 3 American Lit courses, Professional Writing, Technical Writing, Advanced Technical Writing, Expository Writing (non-fiction writing), an instructor-level grammar course, and now my Advanced Composition. Dang, I feel like an expert at this point!
My first essay for the course is getting a few tweaks before I submit it to Newsweek for publication as a “My Turn” essay. Part of the agreement is that it has to not be previously published, which includes personal sites/blogs and that sort of online publishing. Once I submit it, I have to wait up to two months to know if they are interested because they receive over 600 entries per month and only contact you if they are interested. After that, I may publish it elsewhere, probably choosing my local daily paper called tbt*, which has published all of my letters to the editor thus far.
This essay will be for all, and will be ready by the end of the month. We are using the Toulmin model to map out our plan for the essay (900-1,200 words). It’s a pretty difficult model to grasp, and the professor doesn’t fault students for not fully “getting it” in such a cursory exploration of it, so she sort of filled in some blanks in my model for us to come up with this plan, which I hope you all will enjoy seeing the planning that can go into some of my writing before seeing the final result in a couple of weeks.
Preliminary title
To Transplant or Not to Transplant? That Is the Question.
Claim
Everyone in the later stages of the cystic fibrosis life cycle should receive a lung transplant to prolong life.
Qualifier
Almost everyone.
Rebuttal
[unless] One does not have the support system in place to go through such a life-changing and initially traumatic procedure.
Data
[therefore] Lung transplantation is currently the best treatment available to prolong the life of end-stage CFers.
Warrant
[since] No other treatment offers CFers a better prognosis and no treatment at all means certain death for persons at end-stage CF.
Backing
[because] The median survival rate for lung transplant patients with CF is 5 years, though 10-year survivors are becoming more and more common – precious years with one’s loved ones, especially those with young children who need their parents for as long as possible.
I am looking forward to reading it!