Look at that image. Just look at it: thirteen published books, most within the past 2 years, with four more on the horizon for this year!
As a graphic, it almost looks impressive.
Almost.
What would be more impressive? How about if I could do this for a living!?
Oh, wait. I can’t.
Yeah. I have bills to pay and stuff to get done. I can’t just write. And normally, I’m okay with the author half-life that I’ve managed to eke out for myself.
The past couple of days, however, I’m less and less okay with that.
You may have noticed the stilted lines. The fractured paragraphs. That’s a stylistic choice, representative of how my fucking mind is operating right now.
I was doing okay, I guess. I mean, I was more or less emotionally stable until a day or two ago, thanks to the wonders of modern medicine. Problem was, one of those medicines–the one primarily responsible for my stability–also had a side effect that I just couldn’t take anymore. A little over one week before my next psychiatrist appointment, I stopped it. Not quite cold turkey; I tried tapering it down, going every other day instead of daily, but that pesky side effect just wouldn’t go away.
Last time I took this med was 2-3 days ago. Side effect is now gone, but so is my stability.
I spent about half of yesterday crying. Crying because I’m nowhere near a point in my life where I can write as a job and not squeezing it in as a “hobby.” Crying because, while my day job isn’t necessarily a bad one, it’s not one I enjoy. Crying because my primary care doctor just about ignored me when I went to him with a different (physical) problem. Crying because the pharmacy wasn’t open yet when I got out of the doctor’s. Crying because I was frustrated. Crying because I just couldn’t stop.
Bipolar disorder sucks.
I don’t exactly enjoy crying all the damn time. I don’t enjoy feeling like I’m on the edge of insanity. But for the next week, I guess that’s just going to be my life.
My problem is, besides writing, I honestly don’t know what I want to do with my life. Forty-two years old, and my dream job is, for the time being, a pipe dream. I know that I don’t want to make healthcare my career. I don’t want to spend the rest of my existence doing this. But what do I want to do, then? Maybe I can break it down.
- WFH. I would kill to be able to ditch the commute and the dressing up. If I could plop down at my computer and go to town on X project, even if X isn’t writing, that would be great.
- Creativity. I want a job where I’m doing something on the creative spectrum. I don’t want to work with numbers.
- And number three … I don’t fucking know. I guess one and two are all I’ve got so far.
So … Anyone hiring someone to stay at home and be creative??
The ultimate irony in all this is that for these last two days, I haven’t gotten a single word of progress on my WIPs. I’ve been so busy organizing and thinking about logistics and what have you that I haven’t actually written anything. Oh, I’ve been working, but it’s all been essentially admin stuff.
One week. In one week, I’ll hopefully get a new med that doesn’t give me that side effect but still manages to keep the tears in check.