How It Started
Eyewitness Newsletter began privately, and went out to 30 or so friends and family. It was September 2022, and I was searching for a better way to update everyone in my life on what was going on besides the casual, “Going into surgery” Instagram story with no explanation.
That year, I had been in and out of the hospital. I had uveitis, an autoimmune condition that was making me lose my vision. So, I started this newsletter to let people know what was happening, and something really amazing happened. I didn’t need to send the same text over and over again, but also, I started feeling way less alone. This newsletter let a lot of people understand my rare condition in a way they couldn’t before, and made me want to open up more about everything I had been too afraid to share.
A few months later, I decided to open up this newsletter publicly. I had kept my disease to myself for most of my life, until I realized how important it was to share this side of me. I began traveling nomadically in January 2023, and found that this travel was inextricably linked to this newfound feeling of liberation.
I continue to write this newsletter to share and document my experiences, but also to make my journey public in the hopes that it may make someone else feel less alone. In December 2023, I started treatment for a second autoimmune condition, multiple sclerosis. And this time, I don’t want to keep any of it a secret. I would love for this newsletter to be a space of authentic community, for those with chronic illness or otherwise.
Why subscribe? You’ll get access to:
Tiny Joys posts, on small moments of gratitude and joy we can find in the every day.
Interviews with talented writers, travelers and artists.
Access to ecstatic dance and journaling events.
A supportive community.
Photos of my dog, Oreo!
This will be a space where I write about travel, movement, give medical updates, share thoughts on chronic illness, and any other dumb musings that I unfortunately feel like sharing. Welcome! Thank you for being here.
About Julia Edelman
Julia is a writer, creator and workshop facilitator. She has been contributing for The New Yorker since 2015, and she is the author of “Love Voltaire Us Apart: A Philosophers' Guide to Relationships." She has written for animated TV for shows such as Ben 10 and Power Players, and she facilitates Embodied Writing Workshops that combine ecstatic dance and guided journaling.
