Fame and fortune

[ailbhe]

I was asked to do an interview about traumatic birth for a freelance magazine-not-newspaper journalist, and I agreed on condition she questioned me in email not over the phone, and she did, and that's fine. Now I've been asked to do an interview for a company that are making a documentary for Channel 4.

I can't do it. I hate phonecalls. I have no desire to be on television. I don't want my name on television. I want to be my own editor, dammit, and I don't want to do it in an oral / aural medium. I can't put myself across like that - it doesn't work.

But undoubtedly my birth would have been easier to live with had I know that traumatic birth leading to PTSD was one of the possibilities. So if I did the interview, other people's lives might be easier.

But I have surgery on Tuesday. I haven't had a single appointment with a psychologist yet. I am squishing tears out of my eyes so that I can see to type this, because I feel so guilty about it - but it's much too early. I need to be a lot closer to well, physically and psychologically, before I can undertake anything as stressful as actual publicity.

And for this, I really do need to be my own editor.

Perhaps they could interview someone to speak on my behalf. Would that fill the same moral purpose?

I don't know. I've told them that I can't make any decisions until at least the week beginning 20 December. It's all too fragile now.

What should I do? (in the spirit of tossing a coin to see whether I'm disappointed when it lands).

Comments

[d-h.livejournal.com]

I would, to stake my colours to the mast, say don't go there.
Television as a storytelling medium tends to express itself through the 'personal story'. Moreover this is as an external observer when compared to media such as print. Given the multiple editing after the interview it would be very difficult to avoid it turning into "your struggle with PTSD" rather than "one person's experience of PTSD".

If it was a year from now my advice would probably be different, but in the midst of things I recommend against it.

Concerning the moral purpose question. Is suspect that having someone talking for you will not be suited to the style of story one can tell on television. As has been said by others you have strengths in making your point in a written form, so perhaps a desire to help could be fulfilled in that way.

Anyway, there's an opinion to like or dislike as you see fit.