Yvonne Rogalski

I'm new to the Aphantasia Network community and am looking to make connections with authors who have aphantasia. I found this discussion from three years ago, but better late than never, eh? I realize the initial post is for writers of fiction, but I resonate with some of what the fiction writers here are saying. I write creative nonfiction and have just finished a memoir. I rely heavily on emotions and feeling to describe what I'm going through. Oddly, people who have read parts of it describe it as visually evocative. I often start writing from a sense memory. My writing style is rhythmic and sometimes rhymey, which seems to help carry over the feelings/memories into language. Once the words are on the page, I can see what I'm creating and I can build on it. For basic descriptions of objects, I too search Google for images. I struggle with finding the precise words to describe something and rely on Google for that too (but make up plenty of my own words as well). I've also needed to pantomime doing something to more accurately write a scene (put my body through the motions then translate that into words). To remember what I've written in previous sections, I have an excel spreadsheet with summaries and details, otherwise I'd never be able to keep track of everything. I haven't heard of the Scrivener app cork board, but it does sound useful. Ideas for what and how to write often come when I'm walking (maybe that's why my creative writing is so rhythmic?). What I lack in a visual mind's eye, I make up for in motion, sense, and emotion.