I Discovered The Joy of Writing Again
I’ve always loved to write, but I didn’t like who I was becoming
I have loved writing since I was a child. I wrote my first short story, “Plastic Oranges” at age ten. It told the sci-fi tale of a futuristic vending machine that falls in love with a little girl. It was pretty good for a kid.
Writing online started with a friend on Facebook who created a blog called New Progressive Muckraker. I had no idea about anything related to writing for the internet. I remember getting 800 views on an article about Glenn Beck, and being so excited that 800 people read something I wrote. Writing brought me joy.
After New Progressive Muckraker folded, I kept writing. I was having so much fun, I created my own Google blog, Poking At Snakes. My dad bought me books on writing, I learned how to embed video, and I learned how to craft sentences. The joy was still there. I didn’t care about clicks or views or money, I just wanted to write.
At some point during this period, I began writing for a big website, Forward Progressives. This is where the joy started to die. Suddenly, I had to worry about Adsense, I had to attain the perfect SEO score, I had to submit my articles to an editor, only to wait days for them to go live, and when they did, I saw changes. Sometimes it was the title, turned into clickbait for the masses. Sometimes the changes were to the actual piece, subtle and not-so-subtle tweaks, to make the article more appealing and “easier to read.”
Forward Progressives is also where I learned what can happen when you go viral. I began receiving death threats, rape threats, and threats against my family. A group of neo-Nazis tried to dox me. I was making money, I was gaining internet attention, but the price I was paying was horrific. The joy was gone, replaced by fear and anxiety. Instead of skipping to my keyboard in the morning, I would stare at my computer, hands trembling, wondering what nightmare this article would bring into my life.
Eventually, Forward Progressives died, the owner’s ego devouring his creation. I took a break. I thought if I stopped and regrouped, I could reclaim the joy of writing. I could find my way back to wanting to write. I interviewed amazing people-Anne Rice, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, John Fugelsang. Slowly, the joy returned.
Two former Forward Progressives writers started their own website, Modern Liberals. I was invited to come write with them, showered with promises that this would be different. It was, for a while. I kept gaining internet notoriety, I had more freedom to write what I wanted, and I continued going viral. I also continued receiving threats to my life and the lives of my family, including my son.
It was too much. The price I was paying for “internet fame” was destroying me. I wasn’t sleeping, I was always angry, and I was obsessed with views and clicks and Adsense. My husband began to worry about my mental health. So, I did the only thing I could do. I lied.
I told my husband the problem was writing for big websites. I’d be fine if I just found somewhere small, if I focused on my own blog, I could find that joy again. He believed me to a point, because he loves me, and he knew how much I’d enjoyed writing in the past.
I found sites with less traffic. I kept meeting male editors who were, to put it kindly, egotistical assholes. I worked for a guy who told me I was “too good” to write clickbait, then turned around and demanded I write clickbait. He also let other men bully and harass me in the comments of my articles because engagement is profitable.
I’d had enough. Enough of men who couldn’t write as well as I could telling me how to write. Enough of the threats. Enough of the stress. Enough of the bullshit. Writing online had ruined writing for me.
Six years later, I posted an article on Medium. And for the first time in what seemed like forever, I felt a spark of joy. I love it here. Medium is a safe space for my words, Medium gives me the freedom to write the way I want to write. I can write about politics, mental health, or my dog, and no one will send me an email telling me my article or essay isn’t commercial enough.
On Medium, I am discovering other writers, writers who make me laugh out loud, writers whose prose and emotional essays bring me to tears. I’m creating my own writing space, one where I can write with my heart.
I discovered the joy of writing again.
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