Start Your Crooked Path Here
One day I found myself calculating how far I was from the nearest hospital while driving home from work.
My throat was swelling. Again. Hives were spreading across my skin. I took a Benadryl and chugged some water. Hopefully I could stay awake until I got to the hospital. Three months and seven doctors later, I was diagnosed with MCAS. Six months after that came my Sarcoidosis diagnosis.
Like many people with chronic illness, I spent a lot of time and emotional energy trying to make sense of symptoms, grief, and uncertainty. I felt isolated and wasn’t sure who I was anymore. Life no longer looked the way I had planned.
Finding My Way
I had always made things—modern quilts had been the latest, steady practice. But predictable, perfect patterns weren’t part of my landscape anymore. So, I ditched the quilt patterns and began making improv quilts—no patterns, no rulers. Just cut the fabric and design your own quilt top. Then a friend introduced me to Gelli plates, and I returned to my experimental printmaking and mixed media practice. I don’t even remember why I stopped doing that in my 30s. Probably the usual suspects: work, career, and all those other excuses.
What surprised me was that art became more than a creative distraction. It became a way to regulate my nervous system, process difficult emotions, reconnect with myself, and find moments of joy even when my body and life felt unpredictable.
It became a wayfinding tool.
That’s why I created Crooked Path Studios: a place where creativity, chronic illness, and evidence-based arts practices meet.
Why Art for Chronic Illness
How can a ten-minute watercolor practice possibly help when you’re dealing with fatigue, pain, brain fog, anxiety, or uncertainty?
It’s a fair question.
Research continues to show that creative activities support well-being, emotional regulation, stress reduction, social connection, and resilience. Just to name a few things. These are reasons healthcare systems around the world are increasingly exploring arts in health programs like social prescribing.
But most arts in health programs weren’t created for people navigating the unpredictability of chronic illness and many are still in-person.
Crooked Path Studios exists to bridge that gap and give us the well-being benefits of a creative practice.
Here you’ll find creative practices grounded in emerging arts and health research and adapted for the realities of chronic illness. And no, you don’t need to be an artist to benefit. You just need to be curious, willing to play and trust the process.
Your Crooked Path
If you’re looking for community, social connection, and ready to sculpt a new sense of self, join our Wayfinding community. The community includes:
Monthly Wayfinding Circles on Zoom where we connect with and hold space for each other while going deeper with a creative practice. Pajamas and creating from bed welcome.
Workshops and multi-session practices designed for the unpredictability of chronic illness.
Access to the workshop archive
A private chat group to share your creative practice and your crooked path in life.
Community only posts, like low histamine recipes, and creative prompts.
Access to the Histamine Food Compass
Everyone has access to the Unfolding Path:
Free monthly creative practices with videos, written instructions, and supply lists
Life Lesson essays, including my illness self-story series and updates on arts in health research
Notes on Substack where I share and translate arts in health research into chronic illness real life
Free guides and resources, like the Safe Art Supplies guide.
Where to Begin
New to Chronic Illness?
Reset your nervous system, process emotions and find a sense of calm with these practices:
Playful Animals for Nervous System Regulation
Bilateral Drawing to Process Emotions
Color Walk for Regulating Your Nervous System
Repetitive Art Reset for Nervous System Regulation
Think You’re Not Creative?
Poppycock! Everyone is born creative. Start with these practices to reconnect with your creative side.
Rebuilding Your Sense of Self?
Here are some creative practices and essays.
Connecting Two Novembers and Slow Looking Guide
Pushing Boundaries with Collage
Bridging the Distance: Collaged Postcards for Social Connection
Need Help Navigating the Low Histamine Diet?
Download my Low Histamine Compass
A Few Helpful Links
What’s the Difference Between Art Therapy and Therapeutic Arts?
Work With Me
I offer 1:1 therapeutic arts programs if group space is too much and you need slower pacing and a practice shaped around your nervous system.
You can purchase original art and digital prints of my work, and original improv quilts, and other handmade textiles on my website.
I take commissions on the following types of art:
Mixed media on paper and textiles
Modern quilts, including improv quilts
My Days With Sage collection of utilitarian textiles (zip pouches, folios, Kawandi placemats, Lux Cuddle scarves, slow stitched drawstring and other bags)
Chronic illness rarely takes us where we planned to go.
But a crooked path isn’t a wrong path.
If you’re looking for creative companionship, practical tools, research-based insights and a different way to navigate life with chronic illness, you’re in the right place.
—Kelly