To blog or not to blog – that is the question …
I tend to post a fair bit on Facebook and when I remember I throw out a Tweet every now and then, however the concept of blogging I thought was beyond me due the effects of a head injury that rules my life.
In regards to my writing in years gone by I was fortunate to do some trips to various events around the world and report back in as a journalist & photographer. Sadly that way of life came to a standstill as my head injury worsened – I couldn’t remember what I had written from one sentence to the next which made it very difficult to write an article. That was a shame because the photography started off as a tactic on coping out in public. Instead of freaking out talking to people (memory and speech problems) I could whip out my camera saying had to go take some photos.
My photos were published in various equestrian magazines and not before too long the requests came in to supply articles to go with the photographs. In my opinion doing these things were good for me by way of a form of therapy for me. I’ve had a lot of upsets with the medical treatments I have received (or lack thereof) so my writing and photography were my therapy with trying to read and write and get my brain working.
I loved writing. The thrill of a deadline looming was a thrill quite like no other (it’s a mix of awesome and stress) and the reward of seeing a finished article in print in a magazine warmed the soul when I wasn’t well as I felt that I was achieving something in my life. So to have that outlet come to an end was disappointing. But I have come to learn to live with disappointment as my head injury tightened its grip on my life and would present me with new boundaries every week, month and year.
On one occasion I was in a room with several Dr’s who marvelled at the articles I had written. One of the Dr’s who was reading through some of the magazines looked at me and asked “How can you write this? You can barely talk let alone string a sentence together so how can you write these articles?”
No doubt I will use my blog in the future to talk more about my head injury and the awareness work that I do, but I’ve been told that my first blog should be an introductory piece to let people know the “Who, Where, How and Why” about me…
My name is Elizabeth Charleston. I grew up on a farm in the Waikato region of New Zealand and rode my ponies at events and shows in the various disciplines like showing, show jumping, eventing and dressage and did well in school until I hit the age of 15. Here’s a picture of me and “Edward” ( Native Flight) on the cover of the show catalogue.
At 15 years of age I entered a modelling competition called the ‘Revlon Look of the Year’ which was an international model search that Elite Models (New York) started. Famed modelling agent Maysie Bestal-Cohen held the New Zealand competition and because I wasn’t brave enough to walk into a modelling agency to declare ‘I want to be a model’ so this was a great way for me to test the waters as all I had to do was send in some photographs of me along with the entry form. I figured if I didn’t hear back from M.B.C it wasn’t meant to be, but a few weeks later a letter arrived in the mail to advise me that I was to be a finalist in the New Zealand competition.
Modelling jobs came in thick and fast which resulted in your typical weekly magazine articles on the horse riding farmer’s daughter that was giving the international modelling scene a crack. I proudly represented New Zealand in the Ford Models ‘Supermodel of the World’ contest in 1992 that was held in LA and went on to live in New York, Milan, London etc. I’ve got some funny stories from ‘back in the day’ that I still remember but perhaps those tales can be left for another blog. Here I am with Eileen Ford and Maysie Bestal-Cohen
I ended up living permanently in Cape Town in 1998 when I married a lovely South African chap who I shared a mutual love of horses with amongst other things. I had some of the best experiences of my life living in South Africa and some of the worst. It is still a country I hold very close to my heart because of the people I met and the things I got to experience in life over there with the modelling industry, the equestrian community and day to day life.
Following my divorce I returned to New Zealand to live as I didn’t quite know what to do. Unfortunately one year later a horse fell on top of me during January 2005 bringing my life to a screaming halt with suffering a head injury from the accident amongst other injuries.
The head injury has been a life changing problem but dam it I still try to give life a crack and I’m fortunate to have some close friends around me that support and help me when the chips are down. I call these friends my ‘babysitters’ but it’s been suggested I refer to them as my ‘minders’ as it sounds a bit more important … yeah so these ‘babysitters’ of mine help me with my outings. I don’t get out much but when I do I have to rest so I can charge up enough to survive an outing which might be something to do with a charity event or function of some kind and sometimes its as basic as taking me to a Dr’s appointment.
One thing that kept me alive during some very dark days has been my head injury awareness work. Knowing that I was helping other people in effect basically helped me. Unfortunately I ended up with a lot of things to do with equestrian roles that I didn’t volunteer to do and the stress was literally killing me to the point that I ended up weighing just on 110kgs. Things had to change and I had to learn to say ‘no’ to people that wanted me to do things for them.
I was very fortunate to be invited to stay with a friend in 2012 (July/August) who was travelling back to Canada to spend some summer months up there with her family. Long story short – I rested up, saw the light and came home to New Zealand and turned my life around because of the time I spent in Kelowna. I lost 30kgs in about six months and cut out a lot of things from my life, all in an attempt to have the best health I possibly can. I can’t control the problems I have associated with my head injury but I can to a degree control how I now react to it.
Because of the various things I get involved in my future blogs could be about fashion, head injury awareness, equestrian and yes even sheep. I’ve already been told off that this is getting a bit long for an ‘intro blog’ so I only have myself to blame if no one bothered to finish reading this.
Have soap box, will travel …
elizabethcharleston 