it’s too revealing

Today, I was offered a really interesting, amazing opportunity. Amy, a community leader for a health-activist community WEGO Health and also the creator of the blog Una Vita Bella, invited me to be a participant in creating a short video about mental health for WEGO Health’s new venture, WEGO Health TV. Basically, they’re creating a series of conversational web videos led by Health Activists for their online communities, and she wants me to be one of 3-4 panelists who’ll be featured in a video dealing with mental health. I got to see some example videos on their beta site, and the clips were just filled with honest insights from real people, which was refreshing to see. I was told that in addition to spreading word about health issues, the participants will be able to post them on their own sites and build their own brand. With these premises, I thought this would be an exciting chance to try something new. So, I sent Amy a note of acceptance.

While I’m still honored by the invitation, I neglected to think about one little thing before saying yes: the reveal of my true identity (or at least my name). But not just my name, but my identity being tied to this blog/journal. In my blog, I’ve been using the name “Yumers” instead of my real name, and I’ve been careful everywhere else not to tie my actual name to the blog. Most of me would like to link those two things together openly, but there’s a problem that I run into every time I think about doing that. That is, I do not want my parents and sister to know that I write this blog. There’s certainly the issue of my wanting to feel like I can write freely, but a more serious conundrum for me is that my parents do not know about some of the events that happened in my past, like the second suicide attempt—which is something I’ve talked about on the blog. Getting to be in this video would be something that I would love to tell my family, but I won’t be able to tell them about it because that would lead to their knowing that I have a blog that, (gasp), tells the bare truth about myself, instead of about cosmetic products.  I just feel like I’ve reached some sort of a juncture in my own blogosphere where I have to decide whether being my true  self, in name and all, is worth dealing with the fact that my family might find out that I’ve been out in this blogosphere for a while now.

I really, really want to be a part of this new project by WEGO Health and am still committed to being a part of it. But I am torn about having my identity exposed to the public, and quite possibly to my family.