Currently seeking literary representation for my debut memoir, The Weight Of Gravity
Gravity is constant—but life rarely is.
In this memoir, Megan Ploch reflects on a life shaped by Friedreich’s ataxia, beginning with her diagnosis at age thirteen, becoming a wheelchair user in high school, and gradually navigating the loss of physical abilities over time. As balance becomes both a literal and metaphorical challenge, independence is constantly being redefined—never disappearing, but continually changing form.
Through medical shifts, changing mobility, and the evolving need for support, she learns that strength doesn’t always look like control. What follows is an honest look at growing up disabled in a world built for able bodies marked by fear, grief, resilience, and constant adaptation.
As uncertainty becomes a constant, she navigates friendship, education, advocacy, and the everyday logistics of accessibility, slowly redefining what a full and meaningful life can look like. Along the way, she discovers that stability isn’t about standing still. It’s about learning how to keep moving forward when the ground beneath you shifts.
The Weight of Gravity is a memoir about adjustment without surrender, independence without perfection, and finding contentment in a life that doesn’t follow a straight line.
The Weight Of Gravity Excerpt:
CH. 1 - “Off Beat”
“And ba ba BANG BANG BA!”
My dance teacher’s voice cut through the music as we finished the jazz routine for our upcoming competition. The studio speakers crackled as the song ended, the bass still vibrating faintly through the floor beneath my feet.
“Nice work, ladies. Go get some water,” Miss Whitney told us.
We broke formation, the tension dissolving into chatter and laughter as everyone scattered toward their dance bags along the mirrored wall. The dance studio became my second home, where every day was measured in eight-counts instead of hours. Hairspray, sweat, and the rubber scent of marley flooring filled the studio, becoming the scent I would forever associate with belonging.
"Hey, Megan?" Miss Whitney called as everyone headed for their water bottles. "Great job. One thing, though—you've got to get up faster after the floor work."
I froze and heat rushed to my face. I forced a smile, but my stomach dropped. I'd practiced that exact transition over and over all week, and apparently, I still wasn't fast enough.
Out of breath, I nodded. “Yeah, okay.” I watched the other girls pop effortlessly to their feet, chatting with one another, while I replayed the correction over and over in my head.
The problem wasn’t that I didn’t understand the moves. I knew the combination like the back of my hand. I’d mastered the routine in my head, but my legs clearly hadn’t gotten the memo. My body refused to move how I wanted it to when I told it to. Standing up took too long. Transitions felt awkward. My body wouldn’t move at the speed the music demanded, no matter how hard I tried. It felt as though there was a delay between my brain and my body. Like someone had quietly turned my speed down while everyone else kept dancing at full tempo.
None of my peers seemed to have this problem. My friend Téa was already taking pointe classes. Other girls turned effortlessly, leaped higher, moved faster. Meanwhile, I couldn’t even do a fouetté turn yet. I felt like I was falling behind, and not just in dance class. Gym class wasn’t any better. The week before, we ran the mile. I hated running the mile. What did we even have to do that for? We were in fifth grade, not training for the Olympics.
Taking a spelling test? Yeah, not to brag or anything, but I was always the first one done. (I got a 100 every time too, but that’s beside the point.) Running the mile? Or doing anything in gym class, for that matter? Dead last. Every single time. By the time I huffed and puffed my way across the finish line, everyone else was already lounging on the grass, talking and laughing like it had been nothing. Meanwhile, my lungs burned, my legs felt like cement, and my face turned a shade of red so intense that the boys nicknamed me “tomato face.”
Even climbing inside the wooden pirate ship on the playground made me flushed and breathless. My heart would pound like I’d sprinted a marathon instead of simply walked up a small set of steps. And my ankles or shins or knees would get this weird, uncomfortable feeling in them. Not exactly pain. Just… wrong. Like my legs didn’t belong to me. One day, I swung across the monkey bars, determined not to look weak, and not even halfway through, my arms simply gave out. I landed on my butt with a hard thud. Kids nearby pointed and giggled as I tried to play it cool, hiding the sting in my pride and the fact that something in my body just didn’t feel right. A question lingered in the back of my mind: Why did everything physical seem so much harder for me?
So I lost my balance easily and tripped over blades of grass and was bone-tired after a day of fifth grade. My parents and I chalked it all up to one thing: I was a chunky kid. I still had my baby fat. (At least, that’s what we told ourselves.) If it was just baby fat, I could wait it out. I could push through.
But my body had other plans. Small, seemingly effortless things tended to remind me that somehow, I wasn’t like everyone else. Balancing on a curb felt harder than it should’ve. My ankle would stiffen mid-step, making me wobble. Jumping rope? Forget it.
Looking back now, the warning signs seem impossible to miss. The way my legs betrayed me in dance, in gym, on the playground. The way my mind raced ahead while my body lagged. Every stumble, every slow transition, every fall was my body trying to tell us something. We just didn't know how to listen. We blamed baby fat because it was easier than imagining there could be another explanation. But my body already knew the truth—even if none of us did.