Weekly Update: Ugh...

So when we last left off, I had posted about my experience with Nick Gibson. Life has been interesting since then. I've had people question why I kept talking to him when he couldn't further my career (implying that if he could further my career, I should have put up with it) and I even saw one person calling it a revenge post and possible cyber-bullying. All I can do is shake my head. I wrote the post as a warning to others and since then, I sleep with my doors locked. Yes, I'm afraid of retaliation. After all, he called the police on a friend of mine who vocally criticized him and his actions.

But, I want to move past that. It's just one piece of my life and I don't want to live within it. I said my piece and I'll "happily" talk about it if asked, but my life is continuing onward and I need to move with it. Tomorrow, my book is officially released and I'm full of nerves and excitement. I love this book and I really hope that others do too. I really want for it to do well.

On top of that, the Kickstarter is still running. We need about $1200 to fund and there's 11 days left. I know that it's possible, but it gets nerve wracking. With all of this, I'm amazed that I sleep at night. I do though...even if it takes me a while to fall asleep. I think the cats know because over the past week or so, one of more of them will come to bed with me and curl up where I can reach them to pet them. They can be royal pains, but I love them.

Let's see...what else...I'm busy with work which is good. I'm behind on a client's book which isn't good but I'm hopeful that I can catch up and have it back to him tomorrow. Yep, tomorrow...in the middle of the book launch...Ahh well, you have to do what you have to do sometimes.

I guess that's it. I had a million thoughts before I sat down and then they scattered. I think there's just so much going on this week that I'm having trouble keeping up with myself. I'll get through this though and come out the other side. I may be sweating and clutching desperately at a pen but I'll make it through.

Weekly Update: Monday again?

For whatever reason, I lost track of what day it was and could have sworn that today was Sunday. Turns out that I was wrong...ahh well...I guess that's what happens when your daily routine is so...routine.

I don't really have any grand updates for today. Work is going well. I have 4 books on my desk right now. I'll finish one of them tomorrow. I'm really glad that people are coming to me with their work. I love what I do, even when it's hard for my brain to do it. It's also allowed for me to have a bit more financial freedom. I've been able to keep gas in my car and even splurge by going out for breakfast once in a while. This past weekend it allowed me to buy 9 books from a series that I love and have wanted to own since I was a child. When the owner offered to sell them to me at below what she could get, I wanted to hug her.

Next week, my book comes out and I have to admit that I'm nervous. What if nobody buys it? I so hope that people buy it. I put so much of myself into it. It means so much to me as a writer and as a mom. I've already said I'll have the next book out by December, but it's going to drag me down if this one doesn't sell. I'm not expecting best seller, but I have a dream of selling 100 copies. The ebook is available on pre-order now. I need to remember to order the author copies that I want to give to my illustrator and a few other people. I wish I could give one to Rob, but he's still not talking to me. It still hurts, a year later, that I lost my best friend. I think of him constantly. All I can do though is keep moving forward the best that I can.

Speaking of moving forward, the kickstarter is edging closer to funded. It still has a long ways to go and I'm nervous that it won't fund. Nick takes it so personally when they don't. I need to come up with some creative ways to spread the word and hopefully get some more eyes on it. I'm not really good at that sort of thing, but I do need to try. Tristan and the gang are like my own characters. I've been with them so long and their story deserves to be told. I already pledged so I hope others do too.

All of this promoting, combined with the weather, and who knows what else still has me totally exhausted. I sleep for at least 12 hours and then often take a 3 hour nap. It's frustrating and I wish I knew why I was bone tired all the dang time. I have no energy for anything. There's lots to do but I'm just not doing it. I'm forcing myself to do a podcast here in a bit to try to promote some more. Did I mention that I'm not good at promoting? I do it because Nick doesn't do podcasts and neither does Veronica so far as I can tell. I somehow became the mouthpiece for the group. Plus, nobody else is promoting my book so someone has to do it.

I guess that's it for this week. I did notice that the number of folks reading here has dropped and that makes me the tiniest bit sad but I'm so thankful to those of you who come back week after week to check in with me and see what's up. Please feel free to reach out to me at any time and take care of yourselves.

Weekly Update: So Tired

I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't know if it's depression or what.  All I do is sleep. Like last night I went to bed around midnight and finally dragged myself out of bed at 1:30pm. I'm writing this 45 minutes later and all I want to do is lay down and go back to sleep. I don't feel particularly down but this is where I am.

I guess I am a little bit overwhelmed. I've reached another stage of everything is breaking. My kitchen floor has dangerous soft spots that we've blocked off with boxes so people don't step there. My couch has developed a hole that sucks the cushion right in. If that's not enough, yesterday, at some point, the front fell off of the air conditioner in my bedroom and snapped off one of the knobs. Now, don't get me wrong, none of these are to the dire stage and they can be handled. It's just a lot to happen all at once, I guess.

Have I mentioned that I'm tired? Ugh. It's actually really annoying. There are things that need doing and I just don't have the energy to even attempt them. Starting today, I'm going to make sure that I'm in bed by midnight. Maybe having a set bedtime will help me regulate things. I honestly don't know.

Being this tired is affecting everything, like writing this post. I have no idea really what to write because all I can think is how I want to just lay down and nap. It's crazy. I know that my body does not require this much sleep. I can only guess that it's some kind of depression because when Roger was here I didn't have this much trouble staying awake. Sure, I was tired, but not to the point of being zombie like.

I guess I'm going to give up on writing this post. Nothing major has happened within the last week except us launching our Kickstarter for the last part of Awakenings. That for sure has added to my feeling of being overwhelmed. My own book comes out in about two weeks and I'm not promoting it at all because I'm promoting the KS. I wish Nick hadn't chosen to overlap them. A small part of me is upset with him because he knew my release date and went ahead. No use dwelling on it though. It is what it is and hopefully we'll fund soon so I can stop thinking about both at the same time.

For now though...I'm going to go post about the Kickstarter and how awesome of a book it is. (It really is.) Take care of you and each other.

Weekly Update: The Evening Edition

Well, it's Monday again. They seem to come so fast. I swear it was just Monday a day or so ago and here it is again. Things are better. I wouldn't say 100% but it only feels half weird to smile now. That's progress. I'm doing well enough that I can work again which is a relief. It was terrible to look at a manuscript and suddenly feel as if I had no idea what I was doing. I ended up going over one book twice and was horrified by the number of things I'd missed when things were at their worst. Now, I'm back on top with that and I've been blessed to have a number of projects come in. I'm currently booked until the end of the month which is super exciting.

My house, on the other hand, is not top of the world. When things were bad, I let things slide. It's amazing how far things can slide in as short of a time as just a couple of weeks. Roger will be here on Wednesday so I'm going to have him take out some trash that I've put together and get the can out to the road for Thursday's pick up. That should help some. I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks so it will be nice to have him here. Plus, the weather isn't supposed to be atrocious so he won't melt in his bedroom. If it gets bad, I'll give him my room with the a/c unit and sleep on the couch.

As for his brother, he's still working a lot of hours. He also just registered for his first college class. I'm nervous about it, but I know he'll work hard. Today he also started physical therapy. For those that don't know, he has cerebral palsy and it affects his muscles and tendons quite a bit. He's gotten really tight and has weakness in certain areas. Since today was his first appointment, he asked me to go with him to fill out/explain the paperwork for him. He wanted to make sure they'd be able to read it. The appointment was mostly an assessment and he was sent home with stretches to do each day. I really hope that it helps him. I want him to have things as easy as he possibly can. Starting the first week of July, he'll be going twice a week.

I guess that just leaves me. I have a few books that I want to get started on this week. I'd also like to get at least one room whipped back into shape. I'm co-hosting a show on YouTube tomorrow night. I also need to grocery shop and there's been a request for me to do a "State of the Walmart" address after. My book comes out in a few weeks so I need to promote that. Nick is launching a new kickstarter for Awakenings this week so I'll be promoting that too. And my favorite thing? My new drawers for Lego sorting should be here tomorrow so I can finish sorting out the Lego that I bought over the weekend at a garage sale.

Other than that? A shower would be nice....and trying to forget that my uncle's funeral is tomorrow.

Depression is Sneaky

It's been a month since I wrote here and I suppose that's a good thing and a bad thing. After Laura's funeral, I was thrown for a while but then life caught up with me and I had to just keep going. My youngest had final high school concerts and then honors night and then graduation. I kept waiting for the tears to come but instead, I felt almost numb. Please don't misunderstand. I am insanely proud of him and I know he's going to great things, but I'm finding it hard to feel those emotions right now.

I don't think I realized just how down I'd gotten until today. All of the usual signs were there, but because the depression wasn't this intense feeling, I hadn't recognized them. I'm guessing I can thank my medication for that which is good...I mean, it means it's doing something, right?

June seems to be kicking my ass though. Instead of the excitement over the kid graduating and life changes, I feel stuck. I feel trapped in a never ending loop of what ifs. What if my food stamps get cut back again and I can't afford to eat? What if I never finish this book? What if I do and Nick hates it? What if I can't ever get it together enough to get this house clean? What if no more jobs come in and I can't afford to do anything? What if...What if....What if...

Depression sucks, y'all. I know that I'm a super intelligent person and yet I feel stupid. I feel like a failure, like someone who will never, ever succeed at anything in life. I know that I have a lot of setbacks now, but when I'm depressed, those don't feel like setbacks, they feel like huge walls or quicksand, things that I can't get past.

Right now, I'm part of an incredibly great Kickstarter and I so badly want to have the excitement and the enthusiasm for this project so that I can help encourage people to help us fund it. Instead, I find myself not wanting to even be online because online means people and people means pretending I'm not stuck in the bottom of a well. They say fake it til ya make it, but depression is exhausting on its own and faking enthusiasm and happiness just makes it all the more tiring.

I don't know, y'all. I don't want to be like this. Who would? I want to enjoy writing, enjoy storytelling, enjoy my bullet journal again. I want to tell the world how amazing Awakenings Act 3 is without feeling like crying. Because it truly is an amazing project. Nick is an incredible storyteller and Veronica is an amazing artist. Their work deserves to be seen. I don't want to sleep 12 hours a day. I don't want to be this person right now and just typing this paragraph has made me want to go back to sleep. I hate that.

For now though, this is where I'm at...and I'm glad some of you read because feeling totally alone would just make it worse.

What Tristan Means To Me

Tristan

Every week I tell myself that I need to come and write and every week, it gets pushed to the side. Not today though. Today, I need to write. I need to tell you things, even if nobody is listening. I just need to.

Most of you will have no idea who the character to the left is. His name is Tristan and he's the lead character in a series of comic books that I've been blessed enough to work on over the past few years. His main job is to protect his boy from the monsters under the bed. Nobody really knows just how much being able to work on his books means to me, not even his creator, Nick Davis.

Today, while his current project is stuck in Kickstarter limbo, I need to tell that story...not because I'm hoping it will push people to go and fund it, though if it does, I will be grateful for each and every penny, but because it's time. I need to share this piece of my life with you.

You see, most would see my childhood as typical. Sure, I was raised by my grandparents, but that's not terribly unusual. It happens. From the outside, everything looked great and it was, as long as you never looked at the time that I spent with my mother.

Times at my mother's were like that book that opens, "It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.". You never quite knew which one it was going to be. It could be a grand time of playing games and hanging out or it could be one of the nights when her and her friends would smoke pot and wake you up to come out and entertain them. It could be gardening in the backyard or being screamed at, cursed at, and told that she wishes you had never been born. You just never knew. The only thing I did know was that my teddy bear was always there for me. He'd soak up my tears and he never complained about how tightly I held him. Not even once. He was my stability in a very rocky world.

Fast forward a lot of years, a lot of traumas, a lot of changes, and the one thing that never changed was that some sort of teddy bear has always been there for me. It's still a constant in my life. The collection has expanded and sometimes who has caught those tears has changed, but when I'm alone, on the worst of days, there's one by my side to remind me that I'm not alone and that I'm not fighting alone.

Somehow, I found Nick in the chaos that is the internet and we became friends. I reviewed his early books for Life With Katie and then, I think, for Geek-o-Rama. Then, a few years ago, he started letting me edit/proofread on his books and it was a bit like finding home. I felt as if I fit. Nick not only let me play in his universe, but he gave me a chance when there weren't a lot of chances coming my way. I will be forever grateful for that. He believed in me when I didn't believe in myself.

He let me work on a series of books that were all about protecting children, about giving them a safe space, and about watching over them. This touched a part of me that I thought I'd buried. Now, that same series is at risk of not being funded and that's breaking my heart a bit. I've realized that I need to see this project funded not just because it's an amazing book with amazing talent, but because I need for other children to see that they aren't alone in whatever it may be that they're battling. This project is personal to me and I don't think that people realize just how much.

For two weeks, I've been on social media asking for pledges and asking for people to share it and I don't feel as if I've been all that successful. People don't see my name as the project runner and don't bother to read the page to see that I'm editing this book if it gets funded. If it doesn't, I don't get this job. I don't get to hang out with Tristan and Wilma as they fight off the no-names and children, perhaps children who really need to see this story, won't have it available to them.

This project means so much to me that I've pledged to it myself. I've pledged more than I will ever be paid for it, but that doesn't matter to me. It matters far more to me that this project get made and that this book be made. If I could, I'd back the entire thing myself and then donate the rewards to the local children's hospital that my oldest has spent time at. Heck, if people wanted to back, but didn't want the rewards, I'd have them tell Nick to have them sent to me and I would still do that. For now though, all I can do is continue sharing this project on social media and to try to keep hope alive as each day ticks by.

For those of you who have taken the time to read this, thank you for letting me share my story with you. I've found that sharing can lead to healing and each post here is a tiny step towards that.