When Molly Burke thought of the term “memoir”, she was under the impression that her life story had to be told at the end of her life. Being in her early thirties felt way too young to have enough of a story to write a book, yet her accomplishments in the last decade were too big to ignore.

Unseen: How I Lost My Vision And Found My Voice shares her journey of being diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa and how that journey gave her a platform to advocate for herself and others. She began documenting her life on social media at 20 years old, sharing her story in between sharing her interests. The more of a following she acquired, the more she realized she was able to be a voice for her community.

“I was really proud to feel like I’d been one small part of carving a path for disability representation on social media,” she said during her author event at the Chicago Humanities Festival.

Proud wasn’t always an emotion that she felt as her world changed. Throughout the book, she details the unglamorous moments of losing her sight. She credits some of her writing style to fellow memoir authors Jeanette McCurdy and Julia Fox, whose books Burke read despite not knowing either of their back stories. She was struck that they did not write books with the intention of making themselves look good. She left those books not judging them but feeling more connected to them, and she wanted to write something that showcased the same level of humanity.

She had been told for years that she needed to write a book but didn’t always agree with that statement. She thought that every little thing that ever happened on her journey thus far needed to be documented and truthfully there were many things she was not ready to be open about.

“It was hard [for] me to feel like I could write my story and leave things out because that didn’t feel truthful,” she said. “It didn’t feel like me.”

Finding a team that could help her navigate through writing a memoir was important, and Burke credits Courtney Paganelli at Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary Agency for being the reason Unseen exists. Burke explained that Paganelli was the first person to tell her that the book could be whatever it was meant to be, and that this memoir did not have to be her only one. She encouraged Burke to write whatever came to her, and if it felt like it did not belong or was not the right time to be shared, it could be saved for later.

Burke found those difficult topics easier to share than she initially thought. Recognizing that this book could be a talking point for anyone in the disabled community, for anyone who has ever felt unseen, became just as important as being unapologetically herself.

“It’s for anyone that’s ever felt unseen in their life to know that that experience is not isolated [and] that you are not alone in those feelings,” she said.

She wanted it to be clear that this book was not a struggle-to-success story. The good and the bad co-exist, and that success, money or followers did not change her disability. The ending of Unseen is not a stereotypical happy ending wrapped in a bow. There is no bragging, no complaining; just living.

“This book is for the people who need to see themselves in a story,” she said. “That’s something that I grew up not feeling like I had, and I know other minorities don’t feel like they had, and I hope that this can be that for them.”

Inclusivity and representation of the disabled community is a systemic society issue. It is not a new problem that they face oppression on a daily basis. In chapter 30 of her book, she writes, “Society has yet to hit the pivot point where accessibility and inclusivity are the expectation and not the exception.” Yet, with the help of people like Molly Burke, the conversations have gotten louder. Education has spread wider. And as she learned, her memoir doesn’t stop here. She found her voice, and she knows how to use it.