Last year, I burned out on journalism massively. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that I was on the floor sobbing a day before a deadline for a major international newspaper having done all the research and interviews because I just could not write.
I know now that many career journalists go through this (sometimes frequently) and the more successful you are, the harder you’re likely to crash because there’s this pressure to be someone and do something that you no longer feel you can. I know this now because I’ve talked to people who’ve experienced it, but because that’s who you are—our work tends to define us in this industry—you feel like if you can’t do what you’ve done all this while, then who are you?
I felt lost, and worse, I felt alone. Because no one talks about it. No one wants to talk about it. Everyone thinks they’re the only ones who have ever gone through something like this so it’s not really worth dedicating words to.
I used to understand it when more experienced writers said, “There’s no such thing as writer’s block. You just write. Plumbers don’t get plumber’s block. They just do the work.” And as someone who writes at least 10,000 words a week, often more, can I just tell you, a plumber goes in, does the work, pulls up his pants (hopefully!) and is done. His entire identity and self worth isn’t wrapped up in a leaky pipe. Mine is.
I care about the issues I write about, the people whose stories I’m telling. When I write a novel, there are real issues I’m exploring, often those that I’ve experienced in one form or the other myself or through the people in my life. The leaky pipes I fix are very personal to me and so when they stop being personal, there’s an identity crisis bubbling over somewhere that will impact my work and my life.
I’m telling you this because many of you are on the path I’m on, some just a step behind me, and I want you to know that if you get here—and it’s likely, trust me—there is someone who has been there, who has experienced what you are experiencing, and who will talk about it with you if you need to. Help is just an email away, but you have to be willing to take that first step. I wasn’t and I really really wish I had been because I experienced one of the worst depressions of my life last year and as someone who has suffered on and off from depression for 20+ years, that’s saying something.
What I did was simple: I stepped back entirely. I stopped pitching, I stopped writing, I stopped being a journalist for a while. It had financial consequences for my family (I was the sole wage earner when I crashed) and it’s been really hard for us. It’s meant that we’ve depleted our savings and gone into debt and that my (incredible, amazing, wonderful) husband has had to pick up the slack. It’s meant that we’ve had to work as a team, as a family, to consider what we want out of life and how we’re most likely to get it. None of the decisions have been easy, but they’ve been necessary.
It’s funny because in the four months we’ve been here in London, whenever someone has asked me what I do, I’ve almost always stopped short. I say I’m a journalist and hope they won’t ask more about it, but they obviously do (because they’re nice people) and I’ve frequently floundered. My entire identity seems to be wrapped up in that question and I’m learning how to separate the two.
I’ve given a few interviews now since I set up The International Freelancer and people look at my website or my work and tell me how impressed they are by me and all that I’ve achieved. All I’ve felt like in the last few months, however, is a big fat failure and I feel like such a fraud when people say these things. I’m learning to deal with that, too. I’ve done some good work and I will do good work again.
Stepping back, however, despite the price we’ve paid, was much needed. You can’t go at breakneck speed for 12+ years, putting yourself in dangerous situations and telling difficult stories, and expect it not to have any impact on your mental health.
But last week, the clouds parted, the birds sang, and just like that, I felt ready to pitch and write again.
Okay, no, that’s not true. Two weeks ago, an editor emailed to ask me if I’d take on a $1-a-word assignment and very reluctantly I agreed because it was money that we needed, and I begrudgingly set to work on it only to find that I enjoyed it. I loved the work, the writing, the interviewing. There was joy in my days again. That thrill of finding just the right quote, that right angle, that right source—it was all back.
The crazy, obsessive, ranting, sending-25-queries-a-week part of me had resurfaced!
Now I feel like I’m ready to jump back in.
I’m still continuing to focus on the other areas of my career (fiction, nonfiction books, and The International Freelancer) but I’m super thrilled to have the journo part of me back as well. I’ve missed her crazy antics.