Life update, and a little goodbye
Hi friends ❤
I've been gone from fandom and pretty much the internet for nearly a year.
How's everyone holding up?
What's been giving you sustenance this past bit-over-a-year?
Also feel free to just rant if things have been sucky.
I thought I'd just do a bit of an update on where I've been.
Last summer, things got a bit too overwhelming for me with the covid life, burnout from work and other things. It's taken ten months and counting to recover (still can't say I'm at my best, but we're slowly getting there!). Mental health -wise, I'd rate this past year a solid 2/5.
I needed a break from anything that wasn't strictly necessary, including fandom. I've spent that time trying not to overdo it, trying to learn how to rest, all that basic yet impossible stuff.
Around the same time that I was struggling to keep together RL last year, came another round of JK Rowling's infamous transphobic stuff. That pretty much felt like the last straw. I just felt like I couldn't handle dealing with HP content for a while.
And almost a year later, I still sort of feel the same. I miss a lot about fandom. I miss all the wonderful people, particularly the HP femslash writers and readers. I hope I'll find myself back on Discord and chatting to all the great peeps someday in the near future again. I want to keep occasionally checking in on works of my friends and authors I enjoy. (Who, unarguably make HP better and actually give non-male characters the fleshed out existence they deserve.)
But strangely, I haven't missed HP and related things very much. Considering how it's been a massive part of my life, pretty much my one consistent hobby throughout the years for 16 years (!!!), that's pretty weird. Maybe I'm still in some sort of denial phase. Or maybe I just really needed change.
So, I guess this is a fandom goodbye of sorts. At least to HP fandom. As difficult as it is to say goodbye to something that's given me so much over the years, it feels like the right thing to do at this time.
I don't know if it'll be forever. Probably not. Time will tell.
So, what next?
There's other things, like offline forms of creativity. While I've been recovering from burnout, I've been doing the important work of Creating Things Just For The Heck Of It, just for my own eyes to see. It's pretty life-giving, I gotta say. At some point, I think I'd like to get back into making games, but I'll still have to rest a bit longer before I can bring my brain around to difficult stuff like that.
I've been on the lookout for other fandoms to explore, and would maybe even like to start writing and drawing again, but I'm not in a rush.
I did just finish Star Trek TOS season 1 plus the first episode of season 2 (which has mad chemistry and potential!), and started peeking into Kirk/Spock fics. I feel like I'm a hormonal pre-teen discovering fanfic again, especially after such a long time without it. I've enjoyed what read so far.
Anyway, that's it about me. I wanted to let anyone who might have been wondering how I'm doing that I'm ok.
Lots of love ❤
I've been gone from fandom and pretty much the internet for nearly a year.
How's everyone holding up?
What's been giving you sustenance this past bit-over-a-year?
Also feel free to just rant if things have been sucky.
I thought I'd just do a bit of an update on where I've been.
Last summer, things got a bit too overwhelming for me with the covid life, burnout from work and other things. It's taken ten months and counting to recover (still can't say I'm at my best, but we're slowly getting there!). Mental health -wise, I'd rate this past year a solid 2/5.
I needed a break from anything that wasn't strictly necessary, including fandom. I've spent that time trying not to overdo it, trying to learn how to rest, all that basic yet impossible stuff.
Around the same time that I was struggling to keep together RL last year, came another round of JK Rowling's infamous transphobic stuff. That pretty much felt like the last straw. I just felt like I couldn't handle dealing with HP content for a while.
And almost a year later, I still sort of feel the same. I miss a lot about fandom. I miss all the wonderful people, particularly the HP femslash writers and readers. I hope I'll find myself back on Discord and chatting to all the great peeps someday in the near future again. I want to keep occasionally checking in on works of my friends and authors I enjoy. (Who, unarguably make HP better and actually give non-male characters the fleshed out existence they deserve.)
But strangely, I haven't missed HP and related things very much. Considering how it's been a massive part of my life, pretty much my one consistent hobby throughout the years for 16 years (!!!), that's pretty weird. Maybe I'm still in some sort of denial phase. Or maybe I just really needed change.
So, I guess this is a fandom goodbye of sorts. At least to HP fandom. As difficult as it is to say goodbye to something that's given me so much over the years, it feels like the right thing to do at this time.
I don't know if it'll be forever. Probably not. Time will tell.
So, what next?
There's other things, like offline forms of creativity. While I've been recovering from burnout, I've been doing the important work of Creating Things Just For The Heck Of It, just for my own eyes to see. It's pretty life-giving, I gotta say. At some point, I think I'd like to get back into making games, but I'll still have to rest a bit longer before I can bring my brain around to difficult stuff like that.
I've been on the lookout for other fandoms to explore, and would maybe even like to start writing and drawing again, but I'm not in a rush.
I did just finish Star Trek TOS season 1 plus the first episode of season 2 (which has mad chemistry and potential!), and started peeking into Kirk/Spock fics. I feel like I'm a hormonal pre-teen discovering fanfic again, especially after such a long time without it. I've enjoyed what read so far.
Anyway, that's it about me. I wanted to let anyone who might have been wondering how I'm doing that I'm ok.
Lots of love ❤