Who Knew Writer’s Trauma Was a Thing?
How I discovered I had it and my process of recovery
Did you know that writer’s trauma is a thing?
Of course, we all know about post war trauma, an abusive relationship, or addictions that can leave their indelible marks, and understandably so — but writer’s trauma? Who knew?
Ann Handley, apparently.
If you haven’t read Ann Handley’s book, Everybody Writes; Your Go-To Guide to Writing Ridiculously Good Content, it’s a must read!
Finding Ann’s book wasn’t difficult, but it was an accident.
While reading an online listicle of resources about writing great content, I began right clicking links the author embedded. With the skill of a chain smoker lighting their next cigarette from the one still burning, I had a daisy chain of open tabs, when my gnat-sized attention span left the listicle, and leapt to the mention of Ann’s book.
Once on her website, in roughly the time it takes to choose between chocolate or vanilla, I had signed-up for Ann’s newsletter, Total Annarchy, and clicked the “buy the book today” button. About five seconds later the book arrived a-la Amazon Prime. I tore open the package, brewed a cup of tea and started reading that instant.
I was eleven pages in when I read the following: Part 1: How To Write Better (and How to Hate Writing Less) the latter for the recovering or traumatized writers.
Wait. What? Hold on. Traumatized writer…recovering? What gives?
Laid-back as the Big Lebowski, Ann tossed this cherry bomb into her introduction as an afterthought. I could almost see The Dude himself peering over the rim of his sunglasses at me, saying, You can’t be worried about that shit. Life goes on, man! Or as if Ann had said, Why, everyone knows about writers trauma… let’s move on.
Everyone but me.
The Trauma Discovery
Her use of the phrase “the traumatized writer” stopped me cold. I put the book down and left it on the coffee table for two days.
Meanwhile, the comment poked and prodded me, until it shook me from the denial I’d evidently been in — that I’d had writer’s trauma, and been in recovery — for nearly three years.
But wait. I’ve gotten ahead of myself.
Sometime before Ann’s off-the-cuff remark, there was an email I’d written to a friend, to catch up on our lives. Quicker than a three-minute egg, my friend shot back a reply, “Holy crap! This was a great email, Tarini. You should be a writer!”
My first thought was, Clearly, she hasn’t read my book.
The second was: If I hear that one more time, “You should be a writer, Tarini!” I’m gonna — well — I don’t know what I’m gonna do, but I’m fixin’ to do somethin’!
The truth is, I wrote a book and published it. On this score alone, I am a writer. The fact that said book only sold 100 copies (to my closest family and friends), is beside the point.
I’ve written for obscure publications, various online publications (like here), gazillions of business emails — and gobs of killer personal ones, too — “about” stories, blogs, ghostwritten blogs, web copy, and cover letters galore.
My biorhythms were clearly off that day because my friend’s innocent and lovely response to my well-written email hit me like a bowling ball hits the pins and topples them in a perfect strike.
I closed my computer and went for a walk.
To passers-by, I’m sure I had a homeless woman’s vibe. You know the kind: wandering aimless, and having a full-blown conversation with the air.
I say this with all respect to homeless women, because although I wasn’t precisely homeless I was damn near. And I was aimless, and having a Come to Jesus Meeting with myself.
That email brought on something of a perfect storm, arriving when it did. A cush job had just come to an end. I now had time to figure out how I was going to make my living doing more of the stuff I love and less stuff I, or others, think I should.
The Post Publishing Blues
If you ask me, writing a book is a lot like pregnancy. Editing is like delivering a baby, and the publishing part — for me — was traumatizing, and left me with a bad case of post publishing blues.
Like pregnancy, the writing part comes with something like the expected weight gain, awkward cankles, and painful hemorrhoids. In my own case, it was that interminable period where I imagined I was writing something coherent — with all its fingers and toes — but as it went on… and on… the work got bloated, awkward and cranky. At some point it took over my life, the way my son did during late-term pregnancy, kicking and elbowing me in the gut to signal he was ready to come out and was making his way to the exit.
Then came the editing. The moment where my editor kindly worked like hell to decipher my meaning, and insisted I bear-down, take deep, cleansing breaths and kill my “darlings” (as Stephen King said), in order to deliver something remotely worth reading.
Unlike childbirth — which was the most remarkable event of my life — once the challenging though exhaustively rewarding work of editing was done, publishing was a colossal disappointment and an embarrassment. Having agonized over every word of that book, mining both unusual and painful life experiences to extract their meaning, I felt an awkward mix of pride and disillusionment when the book was published. Neither Ann Handley, or anyone else could have warned me that writing a book can be traumatizing, or that publishing can be a big fat “meh” moment. But after the book came out and the rush of pre-publishing euphoria wore off, I was so not going to get dressed-up to parade around in public with my new book.
Short of taking a vow of silence, shaving my head and retreating to a cave, I all but divorced myself from writing — and that book.
It wasn’t until I had gone silent on the writing front, deprived myself of its gifts, and then read Ann’s choice words, did I gain some insight into my condition, and began sobering-up to the reality of being a writer.
The Not-a-News-Flash Epiphany
Life is a series of small and large disappointments that leave their marks. It is normal to retreat after a traumatizing event, to tend to our wounds so we can find new footing and the courage to rise again.
In time we must bravely reenter our life, do the things we loved — be it writing, horseback riding, or____ (fill in the blank).
To be a writer isn’t only about getting published, it’s about doing the work of writing. It’s about writing a lot of crappy stuff, writing good stuff and maybe some great stuff, but come what may, continuing to write.
My Post-Traumatized Writer’s Recovery Program
Writing is its own reward. I had to discover this the only way I could — by doing it again.
Anne Lamott posted a Tweet recently, saying this same thing, but as only Anne Lamott can.
“You are going to have to give and give and give, or there is no reason to be writing. You have to give from the deepest part of yourself, and you are going to have gone on giving, and the giving is going to have to be its own reward. There is no cosmic importance to getting something published, but there is in learning to be a giver.” –Anne Lamott, Twitter
Oddly enough, it was Anne Lamott’s work that inspired me to write my first book — she and David Sedaris that is. Now Ann Handley joins them. They are like my secret writing sponsors, not as-in they take my calls when I’m on the writing wall, but they inspire me. And I remind myself that to write is a gift I give myself, and by writing one word at a time, in time I may learn to be a better giver and a better writer.
Edited by Clelia Lewis
