Rachel is a writer, artist, and part-time student studying sociology and creative writing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She identifies as a queer, physically disabled survivor of childhood sexual abuse and lives with Ehlers Danlos Syndrome and resultant dysautonomia. In 2017, she participated in The Voices and Faces Project “The Stories We Tell” workshop which led her to speak and write publicly about her experiences with sexual abuse in a psychiatric facility as a child. This experience, as well as the trauma of repeated institutionalization and forced medical treatment throughout her adolescence continue to shape her advocacy for the rights of disabled people.
She can be found on disabled writers and on twitter @wordcalculus. Recent op-eds have appeared in Rooted in Rights and poetry and creative nonfiction have appeared in The Journal, Colorado Review, New South, and Anomaly. In November of 2018, her multi-media narrative in the form of rocks about her experiences with child sexual abuse went on display at The Awakenings Foundation in the exhibit “Our Bodies Remember.” She is currently working on a project relating trauma and narrative to math, particularly calculus.
Word Calculus 