Author: Aya DeAniege

May Starter

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Work took away my day off and I don’t know why. No explanation, I haven’t been back in. I know another manager is on a two week vacation, but I was managing my days off when we didn’t have her. This is a stress on me. I felt like I was finally starting to feel almost stable again.

Getting things cleaned up and organized, ticking tasks off my list, buying plants.

I never really buy plants while depressed. I don’t understand why that is.

I’ve got some seeds coming my way. From online so I can only say they’re supposed to be Desert Rose, Dragon Tree, and an Aeonium mix.

Yes, I could buy Desert Rose or Dragon Trees but I’m having terrible luck buying plants. They look fine in the greenhouse/store, I get them home and put them in quarantine and mites appear.

It’s not an all over the house thing, just a me thing.

Or they’re planted in the wrong soil and have root rot when I receive them but it’s so new I can’t see it.

Saw a house with a small orchard within my price range and desperately wished I could afford it now. A small orchard, a shed for small animals which housed goats and birds, zoned for small animals and it looked nice on the inside but in an ‘ish’ fashion which means I’d renovate and really make it mine.

I need to get on Sims and design an approximation of a house I want. Then I will have a bit of an idea and know what to look for or what sort of a blueprint I need made to build a house.

I know I’m going to get distracted and add a pool or some such. Then it’ll be a hundred hours later and I’ll have altered the entire neighbourhood, but that’s okay. As long as I get that first house done.

I’m going to refinish a couple of chairs.

I know what you’re thinking: but Aya, you don’t have time.

See, I’ve also altered my pain management. After hitting the edge of my tolerance Friday and still having to work then, a full shift on Saturday, and a half-shift on Sunday, I was beyond what I can tolerate.

So, I decided to take it upon myself to alter my management. Two of the pain killer / anti-inflammatory pills try to kill me from the inside out, from the feel of it. The one was like magic when I first took it buy my delicate little system decided to shove two middle fingers into the air.

Between the intestinal pain and all over body pain, I’d actually rather the all over body pain because I’m so used to it that I don’t feel it as pain any more.

So far it’s been good, of course, it’s only been a couple of days. All of a sudden I sleep, I eat (but not in the mornings because that’s madness), I clean and have interests in hobbies and activities again. Yesterday the pain came back at 1 p.m. but after two days without it was actual pain. I felt it like pain.

It started in my back and spread to my arms and shoulders. By the time my class ended I was basically laying on my desk, it hurt so much.

Each morning I wake up, I feel stuffy still. Like there’s cotton stuffed into my joints. So I take to ibuprofen because despite what the internet tells me, that stuff never causes any problems for me. By the time I’m done my coffee, usually, it’s all fine and done.

Today my back is still aching, or aching again, but I think that’s being exasperated by the couch I’ve decided to use again. I need to re-stuff the cushions and, I think, add ties to the corners to keep them from sliding about the couch. I never had this much issue before, surely.

Today for school we’re doing a volunteer day. Me and almost half my class are going to a place together. Rumour is I will be doing administrative work with one other person, while others do another equally important but unknown task. I signed up for the task and then heard someone else mention an instructor.

Yeah, signed up without reading beyond “may involve administrative work” and what group we were going to work with. Turns out, I signed up to work with a teacher we had back in Fall and who I really missed.

I’ve come to like… most… of the instructors, but she could very well be my favourite.

I finally managed to get confirmation from the one that she understands the only place I want to go is the hospital, but she said nothing about having me on the list. She didn’t even recognize that I was sitting at the table until that exact moment. She’s taken to doing that and it’s exclusion which by her own words is a form of bullying.

I had something to share the other day which I found interesting and brought it up because the topic was brought up and she barely let me talk before she started talking over me. A nurse ahead of me turned around and wanted to discuss the subject so the instructor called her attention over as if we hadn’t been talking and asked what she thought on the topic.

She doesn’t do that if anyone else starts talking about… anything. Could be school based, could not be school based, could be inappropriate. She lets them finish. Me? I want to talk about how you can’t get the Hepatitis B vaccine at the moment because there are none, but new babies are supposed to be vaccinated at birth against Hep B and suddenly the conversation has to end.

I get that I have attention problems and most people see that as being disrespectful, but the fastest way to get anyone involved in a class is to hear them out about topics which pertain to the class and which they are also showing interest in. Quickest way to make them stop paying attention?

Cut them off and make them feel invisible.

Instead of paying any attention in her class I’ve started reading the book on my own, or doing online research into health news and current research. She makes me feel like she doesn’t want me in the class and I don’t need or want that kind of negativity right now, as I’m trying to build myself back up.

It’s not really my fault that as I rebuild myself I can split my attention between two things and take both in just the same. It’s also not my fault that I can’t focus on one thing anymore. There’s no panic about the whole thing. I’m just taking information in passively.

I used to do it all the time, before I got run down, depressed, and just blah.

I missed the old me, I’m glad she’s back without as much baggage or anxiety.

April Updates

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I’ve barely started the last edit for Grim Port, moved into Wattpad with a story called The Arcane, been dabbling with cover design and digital painting, and am super manic right now.

Grim Port may be slow because of a couple of reasons. The first being that last in the list: I’m super manic right now. Getting me to focus on words is like trying to feed a child brussel sprouts. It’s not that I have an aversion to words even, it’s that I have an aversion to editing. Normally I’d just hop on over to a story and get it out of my system but this is due in less than a month.

More like… about two weeks.

The move into Wattpad was done because of the manic thrum. I was down and out for almost a month from writing and world creation. Kind of exploded all over all the things. Serialized stories is how I started out and I love them to bits. It’s been years since I did one. Posting to Wattpad lets me get the stories I want to get out, out, while also allowing readers to get something from me that isn’t vampires.

Besides working on Kaz on the side, I’m going to shelve the vampires for a little bit. The three trilogies sort of round out the vampires and they do leave room for creation in the world. I do, at some point, want to write about Mungo and Daisy, and the witch war, and the Ba Re family.

But I also need a bit of a break from them.

Also, readers online prefer the romance. Readers in person like the vampire books better so, you know, if I could figure out how to get them into a book store in a major city, I could get books into the hands of readers that way.

If only, right?

Anyhow, Wattpad will update once a week. I think it was a Sunday I posted? Monday? One of the two, I’ll figure it out on Sunday.

For the cover design, well, it’s not words and it’s basically arts and crafts. I did a quick slap together cover for The Arcane and then did another cover, this one with purpose and attempt to make it look nice for an author named R. J. Price over on Wattpad.

At some point I need to do five fantasy books for the same author, but thankfully it’s not a commission so I’m not pressed to do them now.

I’ve been thinking about redoing the Contracted covers. I love the current covers, but they aren’t what readers are looking for, apparently. I also (still) need to redo the Wraith’s Rebellion covers. Lots of arts and crafts.

There’s also still school and work involved. I didn’t get either the specialized work program for the summer or employment for the summer from the hospital. It almost sounds like they only hired one position for the summer and it’s a friend of mine which is great for her.

So, from the sound of it, I’m stuck at my current job over the summer. Did some more math, can’t afford to quit and just spend the summer focused on my work and publishing like crazy. It’s sad, but that’s the fact of life.

Unless one of you has the winning lottery numbers?

Any job opportunity we hear about, I apply for. Getting into a job next year will be easier if I have experience in my field.

But I’m trying to prattle on to avoid edits, and if I get them done I can move on to another story sooner rather than later.

New Plan!

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

This is how I know I’m in the middle of some kind of meltdown.

I keep making plans and adjusting plans and figuring out plans and just… just just, you know?

If I could find a job with a steady income I could buy a house. Or at least get pre-qualified to buy a house. This is part of my long term plan. I understand repairs would be on me, but there’s this deep need of mine to own the land I live on. I’d have a garden and almost never mow the lawn because anyone who bitches can do it themselves.

So it has to be in the country, obviously.

I’d probably mow the lawn, but later on.

So, buy a house, have a child, pay off my mortgage and then “retire” on the writing.

See. Plan.

Shhhhhhh, don’t talk numbers to me. Don’t tell me how the writing isn’t guaranteed to pay for me and a child. Just take that little urge to talk and smother it.

I talked with someone else who told me a credit score her bank gave her for her steady income job in a different but also necessary field. I consulted an app in my bank because when I reached out for a specialist nothing happened. The app takes the information my bank has on me, which is a lot, let’s face it, and spits out an estimated credit score.

Okay, I’m within the range for a mortgage.

My brain just has to obsessively check all these things off.

Down payment, check.

House in the country that needs some work, check.

Don’t worry, not trying to buy a house now.

Then, after seeing my credit score I started backwheeling. Or, back tracking or… whatever. Pay off that debt, that also needs to get gone to get into that situation of living mortgage free and off the books.

Having sat down with a financial advisor before, I know how a bank looks at you. Your money plus your debt equals your worth plus how many “good” debts you have divided by the number of missed payments in the last twenty-four months plus one.

Math.

So I did that and realized there’s a whole different thing going on.

My brain immediately told me I had to work through the summer to maintain income to pay down the debt more. Then I did the math and realized that I would pay off an approximate $300 extra if that happens.

Whereas if I stepped out of work and focused on writing I could get the Nate’s trilogy done, Kaz done, Awakened done and who knows what else (I’m looking at you D.o.t.A, it’s time). So now I’m trying to talk myself out of talking myself out of taking the summer off.

Except this is one of many plans, that particular plan involves not having a summer job at all. I’m still looking and I’d still love to have a summer job in my new field. Luffle it to bits and pieces.

And if I’m there for the summer, working in my field, then there are two possibilities. One is that I got into a specialized program and I’m earning barely above minimum wage but getting full-time hours and that spectacular bonus of having experience in my field.

The other is that I get in at the hospital like I really, really want and I might earn what I’m earning now but from the sound of it they may work summer students (even in my position) full time sort of like an office job. As in 8-4 five days a week. The added bonus being that I’d be in the freaking hospital. Getting experience I want at the same-ish price as my current work is offering me and I’d probably squee through the first three weeks.

The only problem being the possibility of either of those is about… the same as winning the lottery.

Which puts my mind in this spiral of trying to plan finances and making it through. Which is the same as above. It’s like I’m searching for magical money except I’ve kind of found magical money because I had forgotten about the equation my bank uses to determine my worth.

And knowing my worth, having grown up in what my bank classifies as poor, I’m trying very hard to sit on my hands and not spend money. It’s not magic money, just keep doing what you’re doing.

Except what I’m doing gets me so far into it that I can’t see the forest for the fences people have built between me and it.

I think at this point I’ve now decided to find magic money, to find that amount which will drop my worth back to $0.

But that interferes with the house and child.

And if I had kept in the running for the position I withdrew from, it’s possible I’d already be back at $0 or close to and then I’d already be on track for all the things.

Which makes my mind start to spiral again even though I should be freaking happy because my worth practically freaking doubled so why in the hell is this such a freaking problem?

Anytime I sit down to write or edit that’s what starts going through my head. It just refuses to stop. Even Kaz has only gotten a few words in edgewise and he’s super loud and annoying most of the time.

And I know the best thing for me, the best way I can help myself right now, is to finish the edit for Grim Travels and get that up, then take the week to write Kaz for my sanity, then get on with editing Nate’s Story, then edit Kaz, then… then…

See? I need the summer off to get all these things done to realize my dream but I can’t look at my manuscripts without that spiral starting and me getting distracted and sinking into numbers and all the rest.

Writing keeps me sane during all this insanity, it helps give me something to keep going for yet I can’t even manage that right now and it’s frustrating. I don’t want to think about how it could take four years for me to be able to buy a place if I change my plan now. I don’t want to spend so much time focused on the financial status that can’t change without action, time, and patience.

I want to do something that makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something.

So… in the meantime, I’m knitting two more blankets and trying not to beat myself up about not editing just yet. I’m trying not to think about how disappointed I’ll be when I don’t get into the hospital/summer job even though I’ve already realized I’m not getting in there.

No matter what happens this summer, I have a plan to keep going and get things done. This should not be woe-is-me. I should be excited and moving and ticking things off the list and getting a little further into my plan to get a little further ahead before the summer hits.

I just need… to refocus, except I can’t focus. Not even on my favourite instructors. Instead I’m twirling a pen in class and staring off at nothing.

Yeah, you read that right, I’m not even daydreaming in class. I’m not plotting, I’m not planning, I’m not running scripts in the back of my mind during lectures. I’m in class and not only am I checked out of the class, I’m just not functioning.

This isn’t like me, and I don’t like it one bit.

Plan Changes (Again)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

So, a few weeks back I had a discussion where I stated what I needed to succeed and I was reassured that it was possible. Yesterday I was told it wasn’t possible and I would have to accept the original agreement made at a time when things were lacking and I was trying to be a helpful little bunny or I would need to step down.

Stepping down means dropping to minimum wage. If I work at minimum wage I would have to work my current hours in order to make what I would make on the modifications at the reduced hours.

So… it’s step down for the sake of my mental health.

Or keep going and keep my head above water while not gaining the volunteer experience or peer experience I want to get from my schooling. Not getting back on track with my writing which… I mean, come on, it’s the only thing I’ve got that I still do for me anymore.

But if I step down I won’t have enough money which means I can’t afford anything which means…

Which means I am in full blown meltdown mode.

And I should probably say, my modification request was made after considering what I’m supposed to do. I didn’t ask for less that what is expected of a body filling my position. And I wanted the reduction because I’m getting more and more overwhelmed and stressed out and it’s started this spiral of destruction which affects my ability to work.

Know who’s lippy when tired and stressed out?

This person.

I was in pain yesterday so I took two pills for that and still had sharp, sudden pains in my back. Not in my rib cage or I would have gone straight to a hospital. A coworker commented that I was motioning to about my kidneys. She thinks kidney stones.

I’d go to my doctor except I don’t have one. And I can’t go to emergency because the wait for a bleed or broken bone is six hours. Also, I just don’t have the time, I mean, I physically do not have the time. Between work and school and sleep I think I figured I had something like 45 hours a week that isn’t dedicated to something. And two and a half or those hours are the first half-hour of weekdays when I’m making coffee and breakfast and getting everything situated for the day. Almost five of them are showering and dinner at the end of the day.

It might sound like I have a lot of time, but I’m actually pretty certain I messed up in my addition somewhere because… because I have an hour Monday and maybe two hours Tuesday where I have nothing to do. So where in the heck are the other 32 hours? Because I can’t find them.

I should be editing right now. I was so close to getting into the edit of Grim Travels and then the second discussion happened and my mind just completely shut down.

It didn’t help that my “career advisor” or whatever they want to call them at school, told me to go hand out resumes at doctors’ offices for my on the job training… directly after I told her I am interested in the hospital.

She said to go to her if we wanted to get in somewhere and she would tell us what we needed to make it happen, make phone calls, help us out. It reflects well on her if we get jobs, especially if we get the jobs we want and we are then happy alumni to pass on that bit of information for her.

And then… that.

I need people to stop telling me one thing and then doing another.

It’s not hard. “Everyone in the class except Aya can come to me and tell me where they want to go and I will do my best to get you in there.”

Bam. Done.

I’d be like, “Okay, lady, that’s kind of mean but I’m usually on my own so let’s do this.” and off I’d go getting all the job offers to show her.

Yeah, I’m a spitefully successful type of person.

Even if the conversation went:

“I’m interested in the hospital.”

“Okay, few people get in there. I’ll put you on the list and as soon as they approach us about next year, I’ll pass on your name to them. In the meantime, I’d suggest you also hand resumes out to doctors’ offices, just in case a lot of people want to go to the hospital and they don’t choose you.”

“Okay, I’ll do that, I was planning on doing that anyway, as I know not everyone gets in to the hospital.”

Even though last year’s class, everyone who applied and passed the application process got in from what I heard. Then they all got hired.

So… ya’know…

People I know who have worked for the hospital keep telling me I’ll get in but it’s not a magic job land where I can throw resumes at them and eventually they’ll let me in. If it worked like that I’d already have a job there and most of my stress from this past month would be solved and I wouldn’t be upset with an instructor who I’m pretty certain likes me the least out of all my instructors and just so happens to be our career advisor person… thingy.

I want to be happier at school but work has me in meltdown mode constantly because for almost the last year work has been in constant meltdown mode. Which is why I asked for a modification, so I could go to school like I have for the past two weeks and not felt like I’d be crushed under the weight of my schedule.

First it was no pay raise for the higher position last year. Then it was need to lean on you because this person is leaving and you used to do her job and we need that extra help. Then it was work these extra hours to make this work. Then it was pick up the pace to make this work. Then it was work six weeks in a row without a single day off or time to yourself because it’s our busy season. Then work through Christmas. Then it was you can’t make those changes. Then it was why aren’t these people succeeding? Then it was well… maybe we can work in a regular day off. Then it was this other person left and that person left and the whole place is on fire so lean on you some more!

And now it’s: if you can’t work the previously given schedule at the same rate you were earning without the higher position, you need to step down, revert to minimum wage and we will go without or struggle until a replacement is found and trained.

I feel they would rather not have my position filled than make accommodations for my mental health, of which I was told what I asked for were just to be reduced to the hours that my position is allowed/expected to work.

It’s kind of like saying, “Hey, I drove you crazy (pretty near literally) but you’re being a bitch, so fuck off. No, I don’t want to problem solve. Go away.”

Which I’ve also heard in the past.

I suppose I also feel betrayed and used and that likely is spinning into my seriously downed mood. Someone asked me how my day was and I started crying. That is not the answer to “how’s your day?”

I know when I get stressed out without a break, I go off the rails. I flight right off of them and land in crazy down, then light that bitch on fire and go cackling through the streets. Normally with a bottle of wine in one hand and a cat tucked under my other arm. I know this about myself.

I’m also pretty certain I’ve been saying right along that I need a break, that I need this over here as a break. That I need this week off without being called in and with pay, for my sanity. I need this. I need a day off. I need people to support what’s being done or I need to not be doing it anymore.

I never expect people to look at me and know, “Oh, if she doesn’t eat, she gets cranky.”

I tell them.

Then they laugh and are like, “Oh, you get hangry.”

No, I have snapped at a store manager that I needed food, he snapped back at me and my response made my customer tell me to go eat something while she looked at the wall for five minutes. Hangry is a cutesy term.

I turn into a crazy lady and I tell people that.

Basically it all boils down to: I am stressed.

I need a break and/or a new job that pays above minimum wage and doesn’t want full time hours unless it’s over the summer, then please, yes, throw the hours at me, I will roll around in them like they’re a bed of money, with as much delight as if you made me a bed of money because there’s something about working that just gets everything else working.

Eighty days to Mexico.

This is going to hurt and be bloody.

Grim Updates

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Grim Haven is about halfway through the second edit. There are definitely fewer issues to fix. The book was written when I was about halfway through the first semester of my course.

The course which involves writing and formatting classes. Thanks to the formatting classes I’m having fewer issues with double checking things or flipping about the book while also saving time at the end for formatting.

This mildly played into my choice to stay in the course. The fact that the idea of working in an office hasn’t lost its appeal after six and a half months of work and school and all the rest was a larger factor, along with the fact that it’s in medical which, don’t ask me why, is very interesting to me.

So today is my re-dedication to school, except I am a lot more aware of my attention problem so I need to figure out how to handle that. In a normal work environment I’d find something to do. In a classroom environment it’s a lot harder.

I might have ADHD, but would need a doctor to talk to, to go over my symptoms and figure it out. What brought that thought to my head was sitting across from someone who does have it and is relatively… controlled, I guess? She knows she’s like that and she never stops. I’ve seen those same symptoms and movements in myself.

Sometimes mental health problems can be used to your advantage.

Would also explain the weird tangents I get off on.

At work yesterday I went to do something and nothing was where it was supposed to be. Every time I reached, what I needed wasn’t just in the wrong place, most of it was full on missing. So I’d slip into a very specific mode and get ganked out of it, then I’d think it was settled and slip back in and get ganked back out.

I got mad.

Which is apparently a sign of ADHD, when something’s supposed to be there and isn’t. I did not know that, I thought I was just very particular in an eccentric way.

My frustrated reached the point where I had a hypergraphic episode on the job and wrote it out before the words began hurting inside my head. I was going to get rid of the evidence like I do any of my episodes because they rarely make sense and they’re impulsive explosions of messy writing with no point.

Except someone walked in and rather than speak to me (like everyone else has in the history of my episodes at work) she read the note. So I had to leave it there even though I didn’t want to.

Because my hypergraphic episodes are not how we deal with things at work. My manic episodes aren’t how we deal with things at work, but, hey, I get stuff done.

Today I feel tired and defeated, but the hypergraphic is still there. That causes and groan and curse from me because it was caused off the side, a boom and me getting hit by a train which means I can’t redirect that energy toward a story. It’s not…

I hate when I get like this.

In… words something of that… I think I’m going to make myself a journal the way I did my writing journal and then just journal my days away. Well, probably not all of them. But then when I get like this I can just let the ink bleed all over the page and get all the words out instead of having them continue to swirl around in my mind, picking away at pieces of me, ripping my being apart.

The short of this is: had a hypergraphic episode, my attention problems are flaring up into the manic spectrum of what they get, and all I have to focus on is Grim Haven but even focusing on that is difficult.

Oh… right, and once I’m done with editing these books on my list I’m going to refocus on the romantic side of my worlds for a while. I love vampires, but have to write to market. I’m sure I can manage to write to market while still staying true to me, considering I did it before, but I just need to figure out the how.

Etcetera Part Three

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I was going to Instagram when I finished chapters yesterday but I realized I couldn’t take a picture of anything without giving away spoilers. Just a couple chapters left on this edit.

I also talked with my boss. My hours will be reduced. I will complete my course and once the new schedule kicks off I will apply to the hospital for volunteering while figuring out how to apply to clinics for summer jobs.

My Mexico trip might interfere with finding summer work. My aunt pointed that out last night, but as I booked the trip before I decided to seek summer work in my field (I mean, I had a job, why go looking for another?)

In the meantime I feel godawful. Running on too little sleep and mys tress has finally been alleviated a little. Need sleep, but I can do that tonight after I get home from this shift.

Etcetera Part Two

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I didn’t get much work done yesterday as I joined Instagram and decided to do a day in the life of me which makes me tired just thinking about it.

I guess the time I took to upload to Instagram was the time I would usually slip into edit mode. By the time I got off school and went to sit at work I couldn’t really focus on anything. I did a few pages of edits, but yesterday was definitely less edit work than I normally get done, especially with getting off school early.

I also spent quite a bit of time going over options with people. Figuring out my options. I knew I wasn’t thinking straight, so I reached out.

The day in my life doesn’t encompass the mornings. Up at 6 a.m. half an hour to prepare for foodstuffs for the day. About half an hour for my first coffee then about half an hour to get dressed and drive to school where I almost always lose half an hour now to … something.

First semester I’d arrive about 7:30, just like this semester, and I’d edit from 7:36 to 8:30 when my first class started.

Suppose, first semester, I wrote, not edited.

Now, by the time I get settled, it’s 8:06 or 8:15 and I can’t really account for that time besides I set up and get music going.

Mondays I’m upright and by Friday I’m forcing myself through, trying to get something done. And when I say something, I mean school work. I’ve been doing my job so long I can do it even while sick.

That’s not bragging, that’s just a fact of my life.

Fridays, especially on weeks when I start work on Tuesday instead of Wednesday, I am burnt out and look like I haven’t slept. I can do a lot of things during daylight hours. A lot but the balance point is that I need sleep eight to ten hours a night to feel normal. Wednesday to Friday, if I fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow, I get about seven.

Sleep is important to my mental health.

Yesterday I made it through without yelling at anyone, thank goodness because no one deserved it. I did end up crying though, when someone told me to call in sick. It’s not something I can exactly do when physically ill, let alone when needing a mental health day.

With me scrambling for a plan, I as much money as I can too, and I don’t get sick days.

Or selling more books. Or covers. Basically, I need to arrange for income in some way.

Etcetera

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Writing first.

Hera launches next week.

Grim Port is with my beta. I keep forgetting to check in over the past week. Grim Haven is halfway through the first edit and I’m not sure how effective I have been this time around but I’ve got stuff going on.

I’m shifting my plan there to produce a box set of the Reaping in April, then (hopefully) I’ll have Grim ready to go for May to July. That’s how months work, right?

Given recent events, I’ve been trying to dial back on writing but it’s my go to for everything. The only reason I tried dialing back on it was because that’s all I can dial back on.

I had a week off of work then it was canceled, then I was promised as many days as my boss could manage off. She delivered, which I have to say is surprising for my company. It took three days for me to start to unwind but it was only a sart.

My oldest cat passed away on Saturday, which leaves me obviously upset.

It and how much I’m struggling daily leads me to believe I’m mentally unstable. Not in a hurt someone or myself type of way. At least, not physically. No, this is the kind of unstable that takes a strip off someone for taking the last brownie in the cafeteria at school even though I’m back on my diet and am determined to stick to it.

The vindictive little bitch, I think I’ve heard people call it.

Not too many people realize that the ‘moodiness’ people see that appears to be for no reason is really for no reason. The person dolling it out is probably having a freaking breakdown, they’re struggling to hold onto whatever ground they have and can feel it slipping through their fingers.

I need time and to take a step back but as I said, stepping back from the writing didn’t work. I did try, really, I casually world built as I went along and now am writing again. Whole different project there, an entire story to go along with it.

So I’ve sat down and looked at my options for what I can do and it really comes down to to.

Quit school or quit work.

I am halfway through my program and, when done, can get an office job the likes of which sound mildly entertaining but also a lot less stressful. My program is for medical based offices and getting into a medical office is super exciting for me. Why? I don’t know.

At work I am still part-time and feel like the others are pulling away. They don’t want to know what I have to say on a topic and would rather do it their way or do things which doesn’t sound like how the company wants things done but is a grey area so I’m certainly not going to fight them on it.

I don’t have the energy for it.

I’m tired of that fight with difficult team members. I don’t have the energy. All I really want to do is whip out my mother’s special tone of voice and say, “look, we’ve been over this, you need to do your job.”

But I’m still sane enough to know that’s not right.

Two opportunities have presented themselves. When the first appeared I was like yes that’s me, pick me, pick me, pick me.

Now I’m not so sure. Am I ready for the change? Yes. Can I handle the change? Yes. Am I afraid of the change?

Yes, but I’m afraid I’ll be chosen, take it, and regret it later.

The other opportunity, is almost the same. I’m not quite ready for the change. I can handle the change, considering I can handle almost anything. And I’m petrified of the change because I worry I’ll get out there and not be perfect.

Whoopdeefreakingdo, you aren’t perfect.

Welcome to being human.

So while I’m off in my corner, having a bit of a meltdown and waiting for a few things to slide into place or work out or… whatever… I have no idea what’s going on, which way is up, or the time.

Ah fuck, I’m late for school.

Stressed Out

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I may have broken my brain.

That’s what occurred to me when I got home last night, sat in front of my computer after I ate dinner and opened the valentines from work to retrieve a chocolate kiss. I wanted chocolate, popped it in my mouth, turned to look at the pet rock someone had given everyone for valentines day…

And started crying.

No specific reason for it, which makes it scarier, I suppose. It means I’m overwhelmed and stressed out. I’m at the end of my rope.

Stuff’s going on and I don’t know exactly how to take all the information I’m hearing. I’m missing job opportunities because I can’t speak French but I don’t have the time in my schedule to sit down and really learn. I can’t learn a language on my breaks while at school, while working. It winds up being too much.

The editing and writing I’ve done so long that it hardly phases my stress level somehow.

I have two weeks (14 days) to my week and a bit off, but now I’m worried because eating chocolate somehow made me cry.

Hi, brain, we need to talk.

Annnd the writing teacher just walked in and mentioned my books because someone told her they were here. In an excited, supportive way.

Excuse me while I melt into the floor and try not to bawl my eyes out.

I seriously need time off.

Plan Changes

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I need to change my publishing plan.

I have the books written, I’m trying to edit them, but it’s not going so well. Hera will be done in time, but the Grim trilogy is barely started and I don’t want to rush on through it. So. That’s got to change so I can relax a little.

Work, school, writing, cover design.

I’ve got a lot on my plate.

The plan was ambitious, it was meant to give me a lofty goal and it was something I desperately wanted. But it’s not something I can do right now.

So I’m going to finish the edit of Hera. I think on the side as a breather, I will take chapters of The Others and rewrite them. If I don’t go exclusive, I can publish on Amazon and all the rest. There will, of course, be additions to the book. I’m hoping to do about double the word count. It’ll include expanding on the smut, of course, and possibly adding a few chapters.

It’s just something I’ve been thinking about for a while, and doing this is kind of like a me thing I can do.

This means the publication dates of all books have been pushed forward except Hera.

In the real world something came up. It was the thing that, going into school I said if it ever happened I would quit school and do that instead. So, when it came up, I ventured forward.

Only to be told it was never going to be an option. Not because I wouldn’t qualify or could be trained for this opportunity but because that, while, yes, this thing had happened, the opportunity no longer exists.

Changes happen everywhere, all the time. Supposedly it’s a sign of progress. My guy… suppose I should name him. Uh, let’s call him Flynn. Obviously not his real name, anyhow. When the opportunity came up, I needed someone… or four… to talk to. It’s kind of a big deal, even if I had made the decision back before school started.

When it fell through Flynn said something like, “okay, so, your plans just stay the same.”

I went through my day, got home, and started crying in the shower.

Okay, so I guess I wanted to go through that opportunity more than I had expressed. It would mean leaving school, which would mean a significantly shorter week for me. More time for editing, art, doing what I want to do. I wouldn’t be stretched so thin.

I wouldn’t be tired all the time.

All.

The.

Time.

And the thing is, yeah, I considered not writing because it’s extra work. But the writing is filling in gaps. A break here, two hours between work and school there. It gives me something to strive for and something that is a me thing. It’s a reminder that I’m doing all this for something just like the opportunity.

Something that, once I’m in it and there, I can focus less on editing, formatting, cover design, because I could finally afford to hire out. Then instead of being all stressed out about getting a cover done, or getting it positioned just right, I can relax more.

Quality would improve, time would be found. I could do so much more.

That’s why I’m doing all this.

Checking sales each morning and keeping track of them helps keep me sane. It’s a regular structure that never changes.

Unless I have no sales.

Editing over coffee gives me something besides the next year of exhaustion to focus on.

New fountain pens is weirdly getting me through this heart wrenching time. Heart wrenching isn’t a term a normal person would use, but I’m super not normal. So, there’s that.

There is a slight possibility that I will be obtaining a fountain pen that was a special edition a couple of years ago and is Mr. Wrightworth purple.

I’m going to be getting two more fountain pens so I can have three colours on the go. Then I can take my notes and do world creation and start the writing journal I want to make. The pens/markers I have now are very narrow and it’s hurting my hand to do writing.

When I got the fountain pen it was like a freaking revelation. Suddenly I enjoyed writing things out by hand. I haven’t enjoyed that in years. I’ve looked at it with distaste because of the ache.

The co-worker who gave me the pen suggested those little triangular foam bits that children use as grips on their pens and pencils to teach them to grip it properly. It’s a fantastic idea and I’ll look into it but I don’t want to attach them to the markers I use at school because they won’t fit into my binder cover. The other option is to swap them out from marker to marker and suddenly I’m tugging on markers constantly when I’m already getting looks because whenever I have to open a marker I look like a crazy person who has never seen a pen before.

Basically, I have to wrap my hands around the cap and then the end but not while making a fist with my right hand, just kind of using half my hand and then tug and wiggle until it comes off.

Except I’ve got this thing about sudden changes and such so when it pops off I always look super surprised. Like I just discovered that these stick things open and there’s stuff inside them.

So, to go along with the Mr. Wrightworth purple, I’m going to be getting an apple green pen. It’s an odd choice for me, but of all the colours offered that’s the one I like best. Which is weird. You’d think I’d go for black or blue. Maybe even a nice white to pair with the black one I already have.

Mr. Wrightworth purple and witchy green.

See, that cheers me up and there’s no way to explain the why.

For inks I’m getting a sample of true turquoise, which is just luscious, Moss Green, and … I don’t recall the exact name, but I think it’s Dragon Rage orange.

There’s also a chance the purple pen will come with a Mr. Wrightworth purple ink.

Little things.

I’m already trying to buy all the inks. When the co-worker talked to me about inks and we reached three he said, “and…”

And I said, “No, that’s it. I do not need to hoard ink. I want all the ink, but I don’t need the ink so three will work for now.”