The Writer/Reader

I could have chosen an About Me title for this section of the site, but where’s the fun in that?

If you’ve clicked over to this page then chances are that you’re wanting to learn a little bit more about me. Well. Okay, then. Sit back, get comfortable and I’ll share a little bit more about me.

I was born in 1984, so yes, that makes me 41 years old. I have to remind myself of that some days, because for sure, I don’t feel my age (at least, mentally I don’t. My body may argue somewhat on that point.)

This means that I grew up in the 90s, I was around before the internet was really a thing, and kindles? Reading on a computer? Streaming TV shows and movies? Playing online? It wasn’t really a thing.

I think I was around 10 years old when my family got a second-hand computer off a family member. This computer was our family’s first introduction to electronic gameplay. One of my older brother’s adored playing Prince of Persia and eventually passed all the levels and my mother enjoyed playing Wheel of Fortune – although she wasn’t very good with technology (still isn’t) and had to be reminded constantly of how to turn the computer on and navigate to the game that she wanted to play.

Growing up, my childhood and tween years were spent running amok with friends outdoors from daylight to sundown and when that wasn’t an option I’d be out in the yard playing with the animals.

Did I read when I was younger? When I had to and sometimes begrudgingly. When I was younger I would have much rather have been doing anything else other than reading.

Did I love stories when I was a child? Yes, absolutely. I loved being read to. I loved watching stories unfold on screens (Beauty and The Beast, The Little Mermaid and Robin Hood were amongst my favourites as a child) and I loved making up stories for my toys and also playing Make Believe – pretending that I was a character in a story all my own.

Was I encouraged to read? Yes, I was. Not overtly so. My mother, she’s always been a lover of romantic suspense and mystery books and growing up, there were numerous times that I would see her sitting in the kitchen with a cup of tea and reading and there were countless trips to the library that we took. When I’d complain that I was bored, she’d often tell me to clean my room or read a book.

It wasn’t until I was 12 years old that I developed a love of reading.

It was my first year of high school and as most of my former friend groups had either chosen to attend different schools or were in a year directly below me, I found myself more often than not, alone.

It was during this period of time, when I found myself for the first time truly feeling alone, that the concept of reading was really pushed upon me.

RIBBIT – I still remember the acronym that our English teacher taught us during my first week of high school. It stands for Reading In Bed Because It’s Terrific (or something like that) and it was a part of our English curriculum to read at least a chapter from a book every night and note it down in our reading log.

This was the book that I chose. I’m not going to lie, I think I mostly chose this book because it was shiny and pretty and I loved the colours and sword on the cover.

Once I started reading – I was hooked.

As much as I had avoided reading before, I now wanted to do nothing but read.

From that point on, if you didn’t see me reading at least during some part of the day – then I was either sick or in a terrible book slump.

It wasn’t until I was around the age of 14 or 15 that it occurred to me that I could write my own stories. So I have over the years. Nothing that I’ve ever published. Some of have been completed, some haven’t and some remain unwritten.

It wasn’t until I was in my later teens and early twenties that I began to notice that books weren’t just an avenue for me to feel less alone, they were also a way for me to tap into feelings that I don’t, or rather, can’t tap into in my day to day life.

When I am reading, I feel the gamut of emotions, all the highs and lows that the character does (provided I’m able to emotionally connect with the characters) but in my day to day life it’s hard for me to tap into positive emotions – it’s hard for me to hold onto happiness or contentment.

I know that the brain isn’t wired for happiness, but rather survival, and maybe I’m being too introspective about it, but I have been diagnosed with Avoidant Personality Disorder and also have high levels of depression/anhedonia and withdrawal (meaning I find it difficult to connect with others and derive pleasure from daily activities), combined with significant levels of anxiety, OCD and other factors (I seriously feel like posting my report online some days just because while some parts of the report feel true, other aspects of it make absolutely no sense to me – he also got so many of the stories that I told him wrong that I feel as though he had an AI program complete the report for him instead of writing it out himself.)

Is this enough? Do you still want to know more? Let me know and I’ll add to this page if you want more backstory, but for now, I’ll leave you with a cute image of my dogs, Emory (Emmy/Emmykins) and Bear (Bearykins).