It would bore you if I told you, like my usual activities, I was attempting to do some research for a class paper, and then got horrendously distracted by the research information itself, and then began to think about my silly, silly NaNovel of this year. I finally wrote a last chapter that could conclude the story, if I chose to leave it that way. And oddly enough, with all the cheating (words pre-November, putting in school assignments for word count, etc.) that I did, I only arrived at 49,533 words at 12:15 this morning without the school assignments. So technically, I really lost this year. But I still got my 50,000 in last night, at least on the NaNoWriMo site's word counter.
But here's the point. I was researching for a two-page, ridiculously easy "research" paper for psychology (which is due tomorrow, and I've had way too long to do it), and I found a blog on PsychCentral.com, with a woman who has similar disorders/the exact ones as one of my fictional secondary characters in my story this year.
A note about Sunlight:
It was the most depressing thing I've ever written. I honestly think it would HARM mental health for someone to read it, now that I think about it. It's just an endless cycle of the saddest stuff I could put in a story, with just nothing but that endless cycle. There were some great, wonderfully insightful, interesting parts to it, but most of it... well... just think about those video games where you search through a room to find something creepy to jump out at you. This story was like that--but with depressing events instead of creepy or shocking.
I've spent November writing papers and speeches about mental health and mental disorders and reducing stigma. I spent my summer reading publications about reducing stigma and increasing social model usage for disability. I've spent this whole year learning more and more about these issues, doing my dang best to find this stuff published by people with firsthand experience, not just someone speaking out, and look what I've done.
I believe I've done the absolute opposite of what I intended. I wanted to write something "realistic", but not hopeless. I wanted to portray the dark and difficult sides of a combination of dark and difficult life circumstances, tragedies, trauma, and the like. I understand that, often, these things do lead to worse circumstances.
But people do live. The whole point was to make it about the living, not the dying, and I wrote the entire damn story about dying, pretty much. Sure, I spend my life trying to understand what goes on in people's heads, how a mind works in response to so many different things, and how thoughts are processed when a mind is different than other minds. I want so much to write something of power, of significance, of realism (although some argue that fiction cannot be realistic--I can respect that. I accept that.), of life. And, yes, I suppose, mortality.
But who the heck (look at my language, guys! oooo:) wants to read a story about an already "troubled" young man and his "troubled" family who dies before him, and his "troubled" but fairly well girlfriend doing normal things and him being totally incapable of facing the fact that... well, she's moving on with her life, and he's not? And he feels like he can't? Can I please, please, PLEASE, throw in those magic superhero unicorns and green space donkeys I joked about all month with my friends? The story is totally hopeless. Not because his life is, but just because... I mean, I can't even "save" my characters, let alone people in real life.
It's not about saving him, obviously. Or other people. But... I mean... with the story the way it is (and I can promise, with my whole heart, it will not FREAKING STAY THAT WAY), how on earth is this going to elicit any positive change? It'll be a trigger for those who face similar issues, it will be a horrific story for a "good cry" for the ones who can handle emotional stories and like them, and a testament to me being utterly weird and messed up.
And oddly enough:
http://www.apa.org/research/action/writing.aspx
(So I hardly have any traumatic experiences myself, but apparently it shows I have GOOD mental health, not poor. I always find that odd, because you would think it would be the other way around. But that's not so.)
Anyways, that's just my vent for today. The cool (alright, totally cheesy) title is just because that's my IDEAL self, which is currently in conflict with my REAL self. Carl Rogers, I think. Humanistic psychologist. Took up a month of my Relationships and Family class last year, got a section in my textbook.
Have a good day, everyone. Enjoy December.
But here's the point. I was researching for a two-page, ridiculously easy "research" paper for psychology (which is due tomorrow, and I've had way too long to do it), and I found a blog on PsychCentral.com, with a woman who has similar disorders/the exact ones as one of my fictional secondary characters in my story this year.
A note about Sunlight:
It was the most depressing thing I've ever written. I honestly think it would HARM mental health for someone to read it, now that I think about it. It's just an endless cycle of the saddest stuff I could put in a story, with just nothing but that endless cycle. There were some great, wonderfully insightful, interesting parts to it, but most of it... well... just think about those video games where you search through a room to find something creepy to jump out at you. This story was like that--but with depressing events instead of creepy or shocking.
I've spent November writing papers and speeches about mental health and mental disorders and reducing stigma. I spent my summer reading publications about reducing stigma and increasing social model usage for disability. I've spent this whole year learning more and more about these issues, doing my dang best to find this stuff published by people with firsthand experience, not just someone speaking out, and look what I've done.
I believe I've done the absolute opposite of what I intended. I wanted to write something "realistic", but not hopeless. I wanted to portray the dark and difficult sides of a combination of dark and difficult life circumstances, tragedies, trauma, and the like. I understand that, often, these things do lead to worse circumstances.
But people do live. The whole point was to make it about the living, not the dying, and I wrote the entire damn story about dying, pretty much. Sure, I spend my life trying to understand what goes on in people's heads, how a mind works in response to so many different things, and how thoughts are processed when a mind is different than other minds. I want so much to write something of power, of significance, of realism (although some argue that fiction cannot be realistic--I can respect that. I accept that.), of life. And, yes, I suppose, mortality.
But who the heck (look at my language, guys! oooo:) wants to read a story about an already "troubled" young man and his "troubled" family who dies before him, and his "troubled" but fairly well girlfriend doing normal things and him being totally incapable of facing the fact that... well, she's moving on with her life, and he's not? And he feels like he can't? Can I please, please, PLEASE, throw in those magic superhero unicorns and green space donkeys I joked about all month with my friends? The story is totally hopeless. Not because his life is, but just because... I mean, I can't even "save" my characters, let alone people in real life.
It's not about saving him, obviously. Or other people. But... I mean... with the story the way it is (and I can promise, with my whole heart, it will not FREAKING STAY THAT WAY), how on earth is this going to elicit any positive change? It'll be a trigger for those who face similar issues, it will be a horrific story for a "good cry" for the ones who can handle emotional stories and like them, and a testament to me being utterly weird and messed up.
And oddly enough:
http://www.apa.org/research/action/writing.aspx
(So I hardly have any traumatic experiences myself, but apparently it shows I have GOOD mental health, not poor. I always find that odd, because you would think it would be the other way around. But that's not so.)
Anyways, that's just my vent for today. The cool (alright, totally cheesy) title is just because that's my IDEAL self, which is currently in conflict with my REAL self. Carl Rogers, I think. Humanistic psychologist. Took up a month of my Relationships and Family class last year, got a section in my textbook.
Have a good day, everyone. Enjoy December.
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