There's a lot of reasons to come clean about this - and one of the main reasons is the support I've received up until this point. It was the comments that came early on that pushed me to further my passions, and what I owe you all now is honesty. No one actually has to read this post, but I figured it would help me come to terms with what's happening in my life at the moment, and hopefully help me move forward in a more healthy way than I have in the past.
With everything that was going on, I considered my lack of wanting to write as the downside to my newer, far busier, lifestyle; but I can only use that excuse for so long before delving deeper and wondering why, after a nearly 7 month hiatus from writing, I'd suddenly stopped writing at all. Even sitting here I can come up with a list of ten things that only helped me in hindering myself. Though now it's gotten to the point where I can't count on myself to be the driving factor in getting what I want.
Ever since I can remember, I've suffered from anxiety. It's left me utterly breathless as I struggled against the ever-growing weight on my chest. At one time, I had a really good handle on it. But as my life went on, my troubles in school, at home, and with just about anything else, it only got worse. Writing was an amazing escape through my time in high school, and honestly, it's what got me through it. The only particularly bad time I had writing in high school was during the tale-end of my fanfiction days. It felt like there was no way to live up to the image I had created for myself; like somehow, whatever I wrote or did would never be better than what I had done the day before.
That's when I ran away from it.
It seemed like when I ditched the whole 'Smilie254' persona, I had a chance to start over again. I've always done better without the spotlight on me, and that's part of the reason I hid who I was for so long. Though my small movement of getting out of fanfiction got quite a few of my fans out of their writing-ruts as well, it was more a way for me to escape myself. I took this in stride and started working on my real fiction books. Because no one was really looking forward to them, it was easier to just write. I can write for me when I'm not trying to live up to anything. When my work is still private, it feels like it's mine. I don't have to worry about what anyone thinks.
So I was doing really well from the middle of 2016 until last summer. I had four books out, I was writing like I had when I had first gotten online in 2014, and I felt like myself again. It came as one of the biggest surprises to find out that Something Real was suddenly topping the charts in Chick-lit. It was what I had always wanted and when I finally had it, I felt like hiding in my room again. I tried to ignore the feeling; I pushed through it and finished off The Buddies Rule/SR in a little under a year. But suddenly the sequel of Something Real was one of the most anticipated books I'd ever written/worked on. The pressure I put on myself to make it just as great, if not better, than the first book was one of the worst feelings in the world. It was right around that time that I found out about my carpal tunnel (now found out to be a cyst that's sitting on top of my tendon and stopping me from doing the things I was able to before), and my endometriosis (which, as it turns out, I will be needing to have surgery within the next year).
I used any excuse, medical included, that I could not to write. I felt like it would be better to simply slide off everyone's radars than to fail at writing a sequel to two of my most popular works. Days turned into weeks which quickly turned into months, and all I had written was one chapter for either sequel in January before I basically gave up. I was able to ignore the world without having internet between February and April, and for a while after that as well. There will quite literally never be a time that I'm caught up on inbox message/general notifications, and I can't apologize enough for that.
What I do, and what I've always done, is push my feelings and insecurities deeper and deeper until I can't think about them anymore. I hide under a blanket in my room and instead of writing, I watch whatever show I can find on Netflix. Soon enough, the world that I still care so much about has no meaning and has forgotten about me. Wattpad is just a memory half the time, and it's all because I try so hard to not succeed that I made myself fail.
I tried so many times over just the last four months to come back - to write and to forget that any of this ever happened; but every single time I go through this weird, prolonged anxiety/depression, I change. I'm not the same person I was before. I've got a whole new set of responsibilities under my belt and i can't just push those aside. But one thing I need to remind myself of is that writing IS one of those responsibilities. Having friendships and talking with people IS a responsibility. I can't just ignore all the things and people that have been there for me over these last few years.
My procrastination needs to stop, and this is the only thing that I haven't done - shared my fear with anyone who will listen. I know that I'm usually a safe person to turn to for most when they're going through a rough time, and as half the time it seems I'm only comfortable talking with myself about it (I'm a writer and thus I'm stuck in my head forever anyways, now apparently I'm able to talk things out with myself), I'm just going to write about it. Anyone else who's going through a rough time, feel free to drop a comment or send in a message to my website.
This post is Left Unwritten for all the books I've tossed aside; for all the messages I've never sent and for all the comments I've not replied to; for every single word I've wanted to type but I couldn't out of my own fear. Succeeding, no matter how small, is not something I should shy away from. Even failing - I need to f-ing face it head on. Who says every single thing I do is going to end up at the top? Half my fanfics suck but that never stopped me before, am I right? :P
I'd like to thank everyone for reading.
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