Word Doulas: Writing Beyond Illness and Trauma 8-Week Zoom Workshop with Hillary Leftwich starts on Tuesday, May 5th, 2026

Class Starts on Tuesday, May 5th, 2026 The class will meet weekly via Zoom on Tuesdays from 6:00PM MST - 8:00PM MST. Any questions about this class? Use the Chat Button (lower left) to talk with us. Instructor Hillary Leftwich is a neurodivergent, multi-media writer and the author of Ghosts Are Just Strangers Who Know How to Knock (Agape Editions, 2023), Aura (Future Tense Books, 2022), and Saint Dymphna’s Playbook (Limit Zero/University of Hell Press 2025). She teaches creative writing, business writing, environmental writing, and environmental storytelling at several universities, writing organizations, and nonprofits for adults, previously incarcerated and hospitalized youth, and unhoused populations. She centers her writing around themes of class struggle, the impact of disease, ritual, and the supernatural. On the outskirts of the writing world, she is a professional Tarot reader and death worker.  Who is this class for? This workshop is for writers who want to explore the intersections of body, memory, and voice, whether working through illness, grief, trauma, or the ongoing work of resilience. Open to all levels, with no prior experience writing about personal or vulnerable material required. What to expect: This workshop explores writing as a form of care, healing, and resistance. Using personal narrative, lyric modes, and hybrid experiments, students will practice translating embodied experiences of illness, trauma, and recovery into art. Each week focuses on a different way writing can witness, soothe, or resist erasure. Participants will leave with a portfolio of pieces and a sustainable practice of writing as both self-expression and survival. What are the writing goals for this class? Students will generate 8 new pieces (essays, poems, or hybrid works), practice craft strategies for transforming lived experience into narrative, and develop revision tools that honor both the writer’s voice and their boundaries. The course includes in-class feedback from Hillary.  COURSE TAKEAWAYS: Generate 8 new short works rooted in embodiment and care. Learn strategies for writing difficult or vulnerable material with intention. Explore lyric and hybrid forms as containers for complex experiences. Build a practice of writing as both witness and resistance. Leave with a small portfolio and resources for next steps (revision, submission, or personal continuation). SELECTED COURSE TEXTS: Text will be provided via the instructor in handout form. COURSE OUTLINE: Week 1: Writing as Witness How writing names and acknowledges experience. First generative pieces.  Week 2: Writing the Body Exploring embodiment through sensory detail and metaphor.  Week 3: Voice & Fragmentation How fractured forms reflect fractured experiences.  Week 4: Silence, Boundaries, & Consent What we choose not to say, and why. Practicing omission with care.  Week 5: Anger & Resistance Transforming rage into art. Writing as survival strategy.  Week 6: Memory & Forgetting Exploring memory’s gaps and distortions as craft.  Week 7: Building Toward Wholeness Sequencing fragments into narratives of care and resilience.  Week 8: Integration & Release Sharing work, reflecting on process, and envisioning writing’s role beyond the workshop. TESTIMONIALS: "Thank you for a wonderful class. It pushed me to write in a way I never have. I loved the passion and knowledge you brought. I hope to take another class with you soon. I just adored this class—it was so awesome and really something I have loved and looked forward to each week." —former student "I want to thank you for your wonderful encouragement and for giving me the permission to break the rules of writing." —former student "It has been great to grow and build creatively with such a wonderful group under your guidance. You engendered trust and confidence in everyone from day one. This course has given me some pretty concrete ideas around a much bigger project. I'm looking forward to seeing where that takes me." —former student "Thanks again for your wonderful class. I really enjoyed! Found so generative especially with embracing a style of writing that I hadn't realized I was experimenting with but knew nothing about!" —former student "Thank you for such a wonderful class. I've generated the beginnings of a couple of essays, one using some collages I created in my somewhat daily art journal. I look forward to taking another class with you in the future and really appreciate how giving you are with your students." —former student "Hillary offered us an amazing course, and we ended on such a high reading and responding to each other's work and of course, Hillary's leadership." —former student "Hillary Leftwich is your best writing instructor here. She gives the best feedback in the world, helping you become the best writer you can in the course's stated genre within a compact time frame. She helps you find your voice, your 'you' that makes your voice uniquely yours and what a gift that truly is in every instructor. I'm not just talking about the feedback she gives on papers, but even in discussions. She helps you push your critical thinking skills and expand them, helping you stretch your mind in new creative directions and to consider the big points you might be missing in your own story, and helps you not be too hard on yourself in all the right places." —former student "Hillary did a wonderful job of providing helpful critiques WITH encouragement. She is great!" —former student "Hillary utilized a variety of methods to ensure that the content was not only clear but also engaging and enjoyable. Her thoughtful approach to course structure greatly supported student learning and retention. In terms of her teaching practice, Hillary demonstrated deep expertise in the subject matter. Her feedback was consistently constructive and focused on promoting student growth, reflecting her commitment to not just delivering information but also actively supporting each student's development. Furthermore, she fostered an inclusive learning environment that embraced diverse perspectives, creating a classroom atmosphere where all students felt respected and valued." —former student "Hillary is one of the best instructors I had in this program. She was very kind, flexible, attentive, and understanding about students' varying needs. Her feedback on discussion posts and individual assignments was clearly thoughtful and demonstrated an expertise in the craft. I really loved this course." —former student "Hillary's deeply detailed written feedback with suggestions unique to my writings, the variety of essay genres and encouragement to be creative, and the practical schedule for workshopping the writing assignments were all strengths of her workshop. Hillary's comments on my writing were well thought out and helpful. I enjoyed learning about the different types of essays." —former student "Hillary is wonderful! Her empathy and open-mindedness helped to foster a collaborative and safe environment for the students. The course covered a broad range of creative writing-related topics, and the level of work was appropriate for an online graduate course." —former student "The variety of readings was incredibly helpful to broaden my understanding of each genre of writing. Hillary was punctual in feedback and discussion engagement, leading the energy of the class." —former student "Hillary was clear and encouraging, every step of the way. Those two characteristics helped me to know what was expected of me, and that she believed in my/our ability to meet the objectives outlined. It made it easy to participate in constructive ways." —former student "This course was very useful to my manuscript project, and I appreciate the resources that Hillary used and shared about this memoir methodology." —former student "The writing prompts helped to silence my inner critic. The number of different types of prompts helped to get different types of writing. I also loved the encouragement to share without judgment." —former student "The in-class writing prompts were great." —former student "Hillary was warm and gracious, the creative flash prompts were fantastic, and the sample pieces were great." —former student "Loved the teacher, Hillary, and the class!" —former student "The reading lists Hillary shared were most helpful. I got a wealth of information from the research she has done into this form." —former student "I thought Hillary's feedback was great, and she provided a supportive space for all participants. Her homework questions, in particular, always seemed to be spot on, and this was a seminar where I feel my writing actually advanced." —former student ONLINE COURSE STRUCTURE: This class meets weekly via Zoom. Come prepared for a super fun class with live interaction on Zoom each week and plenty of writing, reading, and talking! PAYMENT OPTIONS: You can pay for the course in full or use Affirm to pay over time with equal Monthly Payments. Both options are available at checkout. Instructor: Hillary Leftwich Class Starts on Tuesday, May 5th, 2026 The class will meet weekly via Zoom on Tuesdays from 6:00PM MST - 8:00PM MST.