This is an incredibly old ask and I’m relatively sure you’re into other fandoms and things now. First, thank you for the love and the kind words. However, I wanted to answer this because of something specific in this message: “Please think about continuing it for you fans.”
I’ve been thinking about some things that I need to get off my chest here, the reason why I’ve been away from Tumblr and, honestly, why I will continue to be pretty minimal in my activity on the site.
First and foremost, there’s something I should state - almost everyone in my family, including myself, is in a service career. Nurses, teaching, the clergy…those professions are very normal to go into in our family. And it’s also very much the norm in our family to put others before ourselves, to help whenever we can. I’m not saying this to brag, it’s a fact. And it’s also a fact that we are so ingrained to perform services for others above anything else that we often neglect our own personal needs and health and self care.
One of my biggest struggles is being a people pleaser and needing validation from others. Unfortunately both of these traits have led me down some very detrimental paths, and I turned to very unhealthy coping mechanisms to deal with it. I’ve grown enough and have learned enough to understand that self care is just as important as service, that setting boundaries isn’t selfish, and that one can be compassionate without letting themselves be consumed in the process.
How does this relate to this ask, to me not being on Tumblr?
Tumblr was where I got almost all of my social interactions, the one place I could cut loose with other people. I had genuine friendships on here, very close relationships. The Strange Magic Fandom experience was a heady, loving and beautiful one, and it was a huge part of my life, as were the people I met through it. It was my everything, even through the longest, darkest depressive period I’ve ever had.
Time went on, as it does, and people came in and out of the fandom, but I had my close friends and all was good. Until I noticed after a few weeks that they weren’t interacting with my personal posts like they used to. They weren’t as constant as they had been.
I felt left behind, rejected, overlooked. I was asking myself, what I had done? Did I fail them in some way? What way? Was it the fact I wasn’t creating content? Did they finally realize I wasn’t worth their time?
I was deep in an anxiety spiral, and my self loathing was in full force. Each time I went on Tumblr and saw these people interacting and posting with others but not me, it hissed at me that was reminded how I was no longer important, how I would always be left behind unless I was putting others first, “you can only use the depression period as an excuse for so long…”
For my mental and emotional health, I stepped away from Tumblr. I spent the next few months reading and working out and drawing and hiking and working and living my life. Those months turned into years. And I didn’t feel the need to come back, dive in as deeply as I had. The hurt had caused the departure, but now I recognized something else.
I was making Tumblr my haven of validation. My whole self worth was tied to it. And when I didn’t create fanfics or update them, I thought I was failing my friends, exposing myself as a subpar artist, a bad person.
When I wasn’t. And I’m not.
My stories are deeply personal, and I pour myself into them. And that takes time. And I have a life to lead along with all that.
The saying “write for yourself” is an odd one - I believe it and I don’t. Creators need feedback, interactions with what they create. It helps their process and inspires them. When I read a book or go see a movie, I’m inspired by it. Creativity fuels creativity.
Fanfiction has a blessing and the bane of being able to directly communicate with the author. The comments of those who read my fanfics are deeply deeply deeply treasured by me. I can’t even begin to say how much they mean to me.
My stories are personal but I share them because I want to. People see themselves echoed in stories, and that’s why they matter. I want to share my stories because I want to give others the same experiences I’ve had reading stories.
So I do write for people in that I share my stories. But I also write for myself. I write because the words won’t leave me, because the scenes keep playing in my head, because I want to chase after all the questions. I write to get the damn thing out of my head and onto the page so I finally have space in my skull. I write to satisfy my soul, hungry hungry hungry thing that it is.
But I have learned a hard lesson, and I know myself better now then I did when I started posting fanfiction. And while I’m absolutely certain it was not intended in such a way, “continuing it for you fans” is something I will not set store in because I’ve been down that path. I don’t like what it did to me, what I did to myself.
I plan to continue my stories. But I will no longer apologize for taking my time with them because it is just that: mine.
