Hey everyone,
I’m going to stop announcing things. I feel like every time I do, I’m tempting fate. Hey, I’m undertaking this challenge. How many ways do you think you could ruin it, life?
So, 10k Friday didn’t go quite as planned.
I’m ghostwriting someone’s memoir. It’s an incredible story that we both believe needs to be out in the world. But every time we talk, she goes into a spiral of anxiety and depression and can’t get out of bed for days. Hmm, remind you of someone who went through exactly this a few years ago? (If you’re new to my work, that would be me.)
I’ve been sharing my experience of working through this and offering all the support I can. It’s taking time. We’re not getting much written.
This is such a common problem among writers, especially novelists and memoirists, and so few writers talk about it. Writing a story, especially if it revolves around unhealed or unacknowledged trauma, provides a constant trigger that will send your mental health careening, especially if you haven’t yet processed it.
I’ve watched writers break down during a coaching session for no reason they could explain. With one woman, the moment she started telling me about her book, her leg began shaking violently and she couldn’t get it to stop. It wasn’t the idea of writing the book that was daunting; it was the idea of people reading it. The idea of a community that she’d worked so hard to be accepted in rejecting her all over again.
When I point out that it would be unnatural if unhealed trauma didn’t manifest itself in this way, it suddenly starts to make sense. I say that it’s not entirely outrageous to be afraid of the repercussions of what you write. I tell them about the backlash that followed when I wrote about being raped, that I never really recovered from. With the exception of my parents, I’m estranged from my entire family. These fears aren’t always exaggerated. Not every book, not every story, is worth losing your entire life over. A life you’ve already had to rebuild stone by stone.
I know why I attract clients like this. I am a mirror to them; they are a mirror to me. It’s a blessing. It’s a curse. It’s an honor.
But, man, wouldn’t it be nice to write a book for once that doesn’t involve acute levels of psychological pain. (Maybe that’s what my freelancing books are for.)
Anyway, so that was Friday. Which means 10k Friday was a bust. You know what wasn’t a bust?
10k Saturday!
(What idiot declared it could only be Friday? Oh, that’s right. Me. Doh.)
So, on Saturday, I thought right, enough mucking about. I need to do this. And I did!
10,169 words!
I’ll tell you more about how it went tomorrow.
See you then!
Cheers,
Natasha