February 2012 – Yvonne Watterson Writing

More about Yvonne

Yvonne Watterson is a Northern Irish-born writer and educator, now based near Guadalajara, Mexico. Her career in public education spans 30 years, during which she led school reform initiatives featured in national outlets including The New York Times and Education Week. Her work as a high school principal in Arizona focused on equity, inclusion, and student advocacy, earning both local and national attention. Yvonne's writing life began in November 2011, after an invasive breast cancer diagnosis sent her searching for answers online. What began as survival grew into a practice of storytelling, with her work appearing beyond this blog in The Irish Times, Irish Central, Reading Ireland, and other outlets. Yvonne's essays and reflections explore themes ranging from The Troubles in Northern Ireland and the poetry of Seamus Heaney to personal experiences of illness, loss, and resilience after being widowed in 2013. She compiled and edited Documented Dreams, a bilingual collection of letters documenting her advocacy with young immigrant students, and she contributed to Bravados: An Anthology, featuring 21 personal narratives by expats living in the Lake Chapala region. Most recently, she collaborated with Stephen Travers on The Bass Player – Surviving the Miami Showband Massacre. Yvonne’s social justice advocacy has earned her numerous honors, including the City of Phoenix Martin Luther King “Living the Dream” Award and the YWCA Tribute to Women Social Justice Leader Award. She is also a musician, performing with her partner, Scott Henrich, in The Old Souls Band, a six-piece Americana ensemble based in Ajijic, Mexico and she plays violin in the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra. Her daughter, Sophie, also a writer, lives in Arizona. “If you have the words, there's always a chance that you'll find the way.” ― Seamus Heaney

About Yvonne

From there to here . . . Yvonne Watterson is a Northern Irish-born writer and educator, now based near Guadalajara, Mexico. Her career in public education spans nearly 30 years, during which she led school reform initiatives featured in national outlets including The New York Times and Education Week. Her work as a high school principal in Arizona focused on equity, inclusion, and student advocacy, earning both local and national attention. Her writing life began in 2011, after an invasive breast cancer diagnosis sent her searching for answers online. What began as survival grew into a practice of storytelling, with her work appearing in The Irish Times, Irish Central, Reading Ireland, and other outlets. Her essays and reflections explore themes ranging from The Troubles in Northern Ireland and the poetry of Seamus Heaney to personal experiences of illness, loss, and resilience after being widowed in 2013. She compiled and edited Documented Dreams, a bilingual collection of letters documenting her advocacy with young immigrant students, and she contributed to Bravados: An Anthology, featuring 21 personal narratives by expats living in the Lake Chapala region. Most recently, she collaborated with Stephen Travers on The Bass Player – Surviving the Miami Showband Massacre. Yvonne’s social justice advocacy has earned her numerous honors, including the City of Phoenix Martin Luther King “Living the Dream” Award and the YWCA Tribute to Women Social Justice Leader Award. She is also a musician, performing with her partner, Scott Henrich, in The Old Souls Band, an Americana ensemble based in Ajijic, Mexico and she plays violin in the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra. Her daughter, Sophie, is also a writer, living in Arizona.

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small steps are not enough

February 27, 2012 / 4 Comments

Not to dismiss in any way the science behind it or the work of those who compiled it, but my pathology report might as well have been required reading in my high school English Literature class. I can visualize my teenage self, poring over its language, structure, and form, trying to discern “what it’s really saying,” because I know there…

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scary stuff

February 26, 2012 / No Comments

On November 4th, 2011, I remembered first to post a happy birthday message on my brother’s facebook wall and then made my way to SMIL, ironically pronounced SMILE, for my mammogram. On the doctor’s handwritten order, I noted “12 0’clock” and “ultrasound.” The other words were indecipherable, but I wasn’t concerned. Initially. I’d had mammograms before and lived to tell…

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‘racing’ thoughts

February 20, 2012 / 2 Comments

My post-surgical lap around the hospital ward, was at best, tentative and unsteady, but that was more to do with all the things still attached to me, the urinary catheter and the JP drains, as well as the stunning realization that standing up straight is just not possible three days after a DIEP flap reconstruction. Magically, just two weeks later,…

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lucky 21: saying no to chemo

February 17, 2012 / 23 Comments

Decision made. At 9:45PM I took my first 20mg of Tamoxifen, having spent the better part of the weekend prowling every corner of the Internet in hopes of finding someone to validate my decision, to tell me unequivocally that having weighed the relative merits of treatment with or without adjuvant chemotherapy, Tamoxifen would be enough. Enough for me not to…

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