iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by LaDonna Witmer

The Turning Leaf Journal @turningleafjournal.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

Excerpts from @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social's essay, "A Tender End," published in Volume 3, Issue 1. We paired this piece with artwork by Kate Efimochkina. Read the piece here: turningleafjournal.com/2026/06/15/l...

011

Reposted by LaDonna Witmer

Identity Theory @identitytheory.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

"This is how the disease progresses. We lose her first by inches, then by miles." This week's essay by @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social

identitytheory.com

Monkey Business by LaDonna Witmer - Identity Theory

Her bony embrace was a fiction.

031

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 24/02/2026

“There’s always five minutes to write... Because five minutes can lead to ten. Because a month of five minutes adds up to a few new pages... Because those five minutes might be the best part of your day. Because those five minutes could feel like saving your life.” - @jamiattenberg.bsky.social

100

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

I'm teaching a writing workshop about shame: wordsbyladonna.com/workshops

Because I think shame is something most of us carry around like a shadow. Like a stone.

Shame silences us. It suffocates. Smothers our creativity, our confidence, our joy.

When we feel a profound sense of shame, it changes the story we tell about ourselves. We believe that the shameful thing is not simply a thing that happened: a mistake we made, or something someone else did to us, or a facet of ourselves that others tell us is less than. We believe that the shameful thing is actually Who We Are.

My writing workshop examines the ways in which we can write ourselves free of shame. Together, we'll examine what shame actually is and interrogate the ways in which shame has harmed us. Most of all, we'll write our stories. Because putting truth on the page is a great way to de-fang our shame.

020

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

"American history needs more names, not fewer. It needs the names of the famous and the names of those who... have remained unidentified in personal and institutional archives. Take that shoe box out of your closet and label your family photos. Everyone’s story matters."

smithsonianmag.com

When a Historian Saw This Haunting Photograph of a Nameless Native Girl, She Decided She Had to Identify Her

In 1868, Sophie Mousseau was photographed at Fort Laramie alongside six white Army officers. But her identity—and her life story—remained unknown for more than a century

010

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 14/09/2025

Teaching two writing workshops via Zoom rn, seats still available for a 1-session class called "Write Your Life" and four sessions of a generative/germinating class called "How to De-Fang Shame"... wordsbyladonna.com/workshops

wordsbyladonna.com

Workshops — LaDonna Witmer

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 14/09/2025

“There is a Gaza—an unwanted and dominated population—behind most stories of democractic rule, which is why the truth that Gaza embodies has the potential to dismantle our world order." —Tareq Baconi in “Confronting the Abject”

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

The amount of awful in the world is overwhelming. But there is always something we can do to help. Here is a small thing you can do right now if you have extra cash in your pocket and believe writing is essential: Click below to help my friend Nicole. gofund.me/6c4724ad

gofund.me

Donate to Help Nicole Continue Her Writing Journey in Ireland, organized by Nicole Morris

Two years into my midlife pivot, living out my wildest dream as a wr… Nicole Morris needs your support for Help Nicole Continue Her Writing Journey in Ireland

000

Reposted by LaDonna Witmer

Literary Mama @literarymama.bsky.social · 09/08/2025

"Would I have come all this way if my mother weren’t disappearing?" - from "Like a Deer in the Dark," @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social's essay about visiting aging parents in rural Illinois in our July/August issue:

literarymama.com

Like a Deer in the Dark

Rural Illinois, March 13, 9:36 p.m. I do not want to be here. The flight from Lisbon to Chicago was 10 hours, then the chaos of passport control and luggage retrieval. The line at the Budget car re...

043

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 12/08/2025

"Not all immigrants are created equal. Not in circumstance, not in reception, not in opportunity, and certainly not in the English language. We define the terms that create hierarchies within our societies: Who matters and who doesn’t. Who gets welcomed and who gets cast out."

wordsbyladonna.substack.com

Migration Semantics

The white supremacy of it all

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 13/05/2025

My lit wife Nicole Morris tells it how it is in her latest essay: "You have to have money to be a real writer... It’s just like anything else in these systems of dominance and power. Some of us get in; most of us are locked out."

nikkidmorris.substack.com

It Costs Too Much to Be a Writer || A Working Class Rant

To be a writer who has a chance at making it, you gotta pay to play.

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 02/03/2025

One thing I love is that sometimes I forget about this poem, and then I cross paths with it again and fall in love once more like the first time I met it:

The poem "Meditations in an Emergency" by Cameron Awkward-Rich

120

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

This Friday, DON'T BUY ANYTHING! <illustration by Martha Rich>

An illustration of a red rabbit on a teal background that reads: Economic Boycott! Don't buy stuff Friday Feb 28. We have power! No Amazon, Walmart, Target, fast food, gas. Ok to buy from small businesses, but use cash!

030

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Thursday, February 13, 2025 at 12:52pm Lisbon time: I finished the first draft of my book. 294 pages, 78,777 words. Time to celebrate and then go back to the beginning with a red ink pen.

A proud writer stands holding a giant stack of paper up to the camera: her first draft of her book.

030

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 03/02/2025

My mom has Alzheimer's and doesn't know who I am anymore. Sometimes I imagine what it would be like if she hadn't lost herself.

open.substack.com

In a Different Version of This Story

(There are things that will never be)

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 24/01/2025

My friend Nicole has a brilliant piece out in Blood Orange Review. Here's the first sentence: "The biopsy revealed the start of tooth and bone material, keratin and hair, the beginning and ending of what would have been my twin at conception." The rest is here: bloodorangereview.com/take-care/

bloodorangereview.com

Take Care.

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 23/01/2025

Loving this gorgeous poem, "Willingly" by Barbara Sabol... @swwim.bsky.social www.swwim.org/swwimeveryda...

swwim.org

SWWIM Every Day — SWWIM

by Barbara Sabol

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

They say that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, but that is exactly how book publishing works, right? On using rejection as a signpost. Not so much "No" as "Next!" open.substack.com/pub/wordsbyl...

open.substack.com

The Hard Nos

Nowhere to go but around

000

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

A gorgeous piece of writing from Jessica Petrow-Cohen in The Common. "It’s happening now, in June, not then, in June, time is collapsing, June is June is June. I’m sticky in June’s web, tangled, caught, strangled." www.thecommononline.org/the-laws-of-...

thecommononline.org

The Laws of Time and Physics

JESSICA PETROW-COHEN <br> My necklace has a thin silver chain and a pendant made of sapphires. My mommy says she knew that my mama was ready to die when she gave away her jewelry. I can see it all so ...

010

Reposted by LaDonna Witmer

Electric Literature @electricliterature.com · 10/01/2025

Rejection is something every writer faces. But how do you press on when those rejections begin to feel overwhelming? Benjamin Schaefer has advice we all need to hear from time to time. electricliterature.com/all-of-my-accepted-stories-started-with-rejections

electricliterature.com

All of My Accepted Stories Started with Rejections - Electric Literature

I can't sacrifice my writing for the business of advancing my career

1275

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

Early January is brutal for writing rejections. It's like all these editors were sitting on their reading queues for months but now they're finally wading through submissions and damn. My inbox is like a firehose of No.

230

LaDonna Witmer @wordsbyladonna.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Ready or not, the New Year is upon us. I am riding out to meet it with every intention to at the very least not make it worse and at the very best make it better, bog witch style. wordsbyladonna.substack.com/p/dont-make-...

wordsbyladonna.substack.com

Don't Make It Worse

Beginning as I mean to go on

020