Hello!
I’ve been away for quite a while online, as I wanted to focus on trying to get more books written.
I’ve got many more books decided, which is great, but I have to admit I’ve been having trouble writing them.
If you’ve been following my progress for a while, you’ll know that the most part of the last decade has been a bit rough. I would probably say the first four years of my thirties were pretty great: I published my first book, I moved home, I started a new job role where I worked that meant I didn’t have to be on the shop floor anymore. Things were really looking up. And then my mother got sick and passed away. My job role started changing and the managers started making it harder, even moving me from a big office to a smaller one and giving me less and less support and more pressure to do the same amount of work but without extra time or assistance. I stopped taking care of myself and ended up with a panic disorder (leading to time off work. I thought I was having a heart attack!), depression (that saw me se days not even realising I hadn’t moved around in hours) and extremely low self esteem and low self worth.
I tried to get myself out of it, and finally I feel like I have.
The final part of my problems has been resolved. I quit my job role after eleven years. It was a long time coming, as I’d tried to step down a number of times but was talked out of it by managers - as I’m the only one who could and would do the job - but this time, after putting myself first for once, I told them I would no longer do the job and wanted to return to the shop floor. There, I will have less responsibility, less stress, less work…and I get paid the same! I know, why didn’t I do this earlier?
My last shift was at the end of the week. It felt strange leaving my office, sad to sign out for the last time, unnerving that I won’t be doing what I’ve been doing for eleven years… When I made the decision originally, I instantly started fretting I’d made the wrong decision and I had to convince myself I hadn’t. I noticed I was thinking about the job like it was the same one I’d taken up several years ago, when it wasn’t bad. Luckily, for the three weeks it took to get my replacement, all matter of shit stuff happened to keep me in check that it most certainly was the right thing to do.
And I started to feel a huge weight physically lift from my neck and shoulders. When I got to my last proper week, and it was the point of no return and I couldn’t change my mind, my imagination almost instantly gave me story ideas and I wrote over 2’500 words of a book I had been having trouble with for a number of months.
Turns out I didn’t need to rest, I didn’t need to take a break from online or my books. I needed to change my life in a more significant way that would benefit me.
Now, from next week - my first shifts starting in the new role and a couple of life stuff to deal with - I will be putting my focus back to where it was nearly a decade ago; trying to build a life for myself with my man, aiming for a career in storytelling and being who I’m supposed to be.
The real work starts now.
See you here and on socials!💖
Ama.x