I’m really grateful to this blog community for following me through this year. Every time someone reads a blog post of mine, I am grateful, because I know it takes time, and time is in short supply. So – thank you!
These were my most popular blog posts. I’ve done two lists – the first is according to number of retweets, and therefore includes pieces I’ve done elsewhere; the second is the most popular blog posts according to number of reads on this site.

What I discovered doing this:

• My most popular posts are those which coincide with current news. No surprise there – this is the nature of the blogosphere.
• My posts on vulnerability are popular. That makes me think that perhaps I should finally get reading all the Brene Brown I meant to read, and do some proper thinking on vulnerability.
• My campaigning/awareness posts (e.g. on disability or M.E.) are popular. This is a double-edged sword; I find campaigning emotionally draining, and prefer the more creative and theological writing. But I think it is possibly the most important writing I do, and I desperately want to see change. Some posts I write because I want to, and I take pleasure in them. These campaigning posts I write because I must; I can’t not.

My 5 most Retweeted Posts: 

(written by me, published elsewhere)

1. 1. “Disabled people have been affected by the austerity cuts nine times more than the average person, and severely disabled people nineteen times more. Austerity should mean that everyone tightens their belts, and yet the sharp edge of the cuts has fallen repeatedly and disproportionately onto the most vulnerable. Disabled people have been cut so deep they are collectively bleeding.” An Open Letter from a Disabled Christian to Conservative Voters (at Archbishop Cranmer’s blog)

1. 1. “Imagine you’re diagnosed with epilepsy: what would you think if you weren’t referred to a specialist but taken to a psychiatrist to treat you for your ‘false illness beliefs’? This is what happens to Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) patients in the UK. They are told to ignore their symptoms, view themselves as healthy, and increase their exercise.” ME isn’t just ‘exercise phobia’ – it’s a physical illness (for The Spectator)

1. 1. “We need not fear our emotion, our sorrow, our frustration. Sometimes the most dangerous, subversive, revolutionary thing we can do is be authentically ourselves, emotions laid bare. Even if society disapproves of it. Even if a room full of other people don’t know what to do with it.” I am Tanya Marlow, Armed with Tears (for She Loves Magazine)

1. 1. “Which would you find more vulnerable – turning up to church dressed in nothing but swimwear, or admitting to your home group that you have a problem with alcohol? It’s my theory that being honest about yourself at church is the equivalent of turning up in a bikini (or swimming trunks): it’s a trifle vulnerable.” – Can You Wear a Bikini to Church? (for Premier Christianity Magazine)

1. “We would rather be those who hold, and not need to be held ourselves. We want to focus on our achievements rather than our powerlessness. But this is not the way of the kingdom, and the cloud of witnesses tell us we are not alone.”  All the Things I Cannot Speak (for She Loves Magazine)

The 5 most popular posts on this blog:

1. 1. “But I have another story to tell: the lesser-told story, the ongoing story, the one that we wouldn’t tell in a big Christian conference because we wouldn’t know whether we were supposed to applaud at the end. I have a story about being miraculously healed, but I also have one about not being healed.” – When God Doesn’t Heal

1. 1. “A recent study by Dr Snell, Van Ness et al, using VO2 Max testing, demonstrated that in a 2 day test, ME patients were shown to be able to exercise less the following day than they were the day before. This is the opposite of what happens to patients who are deconditioned – they can do more the following day. Because it measures chemical changes in the body, there is no way of ‘faking’ this physiological exhaustion.” Can Exercise and Positivity overcome M.E./CFS? – A look at the evidence

1. 1. “We want holidays to be heaven, but that is still to come. Sometimes it is good to be reminded that we are homesick for paradise, and that heaven is not to be found by jumping on a plane.” When Your Holiday Is Not Heaven

1. 1. “Today I am very aware of ME – it’s in my brain, as I feel the window of concentration rapidly closing, my brain swelling and my mind as slow as porridge; it’s in my back and shoulders, a long slow burn of acid pain; it’s in my ears, flinching and cringing at the shrill bird song which sounds painfully loud today.” ME Awareness Day 2015

1. 1. “So far, so good – there are bus friends and covenant friends, and we need both kinds. But – and here’s the rub – how do you know which is which? We don’t have proposals or marriages in platonic relationships; we lack the language and ritual to define the nature of the relationship.” The Two Types of Friends 

Also popular: When the Journey is Too Much for You (1 Kings 19); Potential Biomarker for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis; Memory Keeper; The Beauty of Being Average.

Thanks, friends for accompanying me on this journey.

Over to you: 

• Which was your favourite blog post of mine this year? I’d love to know!