I’ve had some rough years. It might surprise people to learn that this last year was one of the roughest. It doesn’t make much sense, does it? My first novel came out, I did a ton of comedy, I started new comedy rooms, I traveled. On paper, it sounds like a bang up year. And also on Facebook, always on Facebook, it is a bang up year always. But here on the blog, my friends, we can be real with one another.
Firstly, a note about Facebook. Self-pity sucks and you see a lot of it on FB. Even if I wasn’t a comic and an author, I’d try not to be too self-indulgent with the woe-is-me posts. But I am a comic and an author, and I am constantly selling. Selling books, selling shows, selling myself as a fun go-getter. It’s not hard. I am a fun go-getter. Facebook is a wonderful social tool for keeping in touch with old friends, and it’s a sales tool. It is a sales tool for everyone. They are selling you on their perception of the world, on how they want to be perceived, and if nothing else, on what they think is interesting. This isn’t a criticism, just an observation, but I always find it curious when people find the supposed success of others on Facebook a source of sadness. Facebook walls are like display windows at Pottery Barn – everything you see is for sale. Do not compare your actual living space to the artifice.
In any case, while I am a fun go-getter, I am a lot of other things, too. Like a lot of comedians, the Swamp of Sadness is well known territory for me. It had been creeping in around the edges for awhile, but then it reached Artax-drowning levels last winter. (These are Neverending Story references, in case you’re wondering.) Here was the tipping point. October of 2014, I was hanging out with my ex-husband. Our divorce took a very long time to become final, but the court date was about six weeks out at the time. He had bought a bear-shaped container of honey and mentioned that it made him sad and/or nostalgic to buy it, because I have always loved honey bears.
And that is when I had a very, very terrible thought. Why are we even getting divorced, I thought. If you like me enough to become vagely sort of sad when purchasing a honey bear.
That, my friends, is where my sense of self-worth actually stood in October of 2014. The thought had come along in a lighthearted, joking manner, but when I saw it, and absorbed it, anxiety settled in. Settled in deeply. I realized I had been separated for two years but had failed to improve as a person in some fundamental ways, ways that very much needed fixing. This is when things started to go off the rails. I’d been separated for two years. By all appearances, my life had dramatically improved in that time. I’d sold a novel. I’d created a new life for myself. This was thanks in large part to the massive influx of support that came my way after my ex left. New and wonderful friends taught me a new and wonderful way to live, family and old friends gave me love and support galore. All of it was needed and appreciated and wildly helpful.
But I was also running on adrenaline. And when that adrenaline ran out, I appeared to be doing great. So much so that people didn’t really believe me when I told them otherwise. I told people close to me I was struggling. One replied, “But the great thing about you is, I never have to worry about you.” It was a sincere compliment, but it only served to reinforce a feeling of isolation.
I decided to go to a counselor. He gave me a diagnosis of, “Being a girl got you hurt.” And honestly, that really did work for me. Still does. So I thought, Cool, I’ll work on embracing my femininity. But every time I went there I’d have some happy news to report of what I thought was progress and he’d shoot it down. The message I received was, “Being a girl got you hurt. That’s your attempt at trying to be a girl? You’re not very good at it.” And you know, it really got to the point where I wanted to punch that son of a bitch in the mouth.
Although I was struggling and depressed, I am nothing if not a fun go-getter, so I decided to fix my problem another way and spent six weeks in Charleston, writing. I got a ton of writing done, made several wonderful friends, and did a six week strength training class. And you know what? The strength gains I made in that class were insane. It occurred to me, you can’t gain this much muscle and strength without a lot of testosterone. I am who I am. And thinking those things really made me want to go back and punch that counselor in the mouth.
It was during this time in Charleston that I discovered Conor McGregor, my in-some-ways spirit animal. Conor’s absolute self-belief and joie de vivre were a tonic for my soul when I desperately needed one. Because let us be honest here – I cried a lot when I was in Charleston. Like, a lot. I felt alone and broken and left behind, my current self did not compare favorably with where I felt I should be in life. Now, I was still doing a lot better than I had been back in October of 2014. I was in the process of healing. It’s just that these things take time.
The day after I got back from Charleston I found out that Simon & Schuster had decided to reject the two novels I’d submitted to them. I’d had a decent amount of low lying anxiety about those books, so I wasn’t surprised. I learned this news at an Underwear Comedy Party Show, a show where comics perform in their undies. I got an email from my agent, absorbed the bad news, got on stage, and did really well, actually. Driving home, however, I felt devastated. I remember hearing God tell me, “Your next book must be Ezra.” I didn’t doubt Him, but rejection at that moment in time was just what the doctor ordered – if you wanted a sadness relapse! (And yes, sometimes somebody talks to me. It’s rare but it happens and the voice is never wrong and I believe it’s God, to summarize the experience.)
The next day I was hit with a pretty massive depression, centered on my house. I was still living in the house I’d shared with Evan for ten years. I called my mom and told her what was going on. She told me to move. I told her it wasn’t that easy. She said, “Well, I’ve given you the solution.” In what felt like a genuine miracle, a buyer immediately appeared out of the woodwork. So I moved. It’s three words, “So I moved,” but it was months of work. That house and shed were loaded with ten years of memories and crap. It was hard. But maybe not in the way you’d expect. Evan’s stuff wasn’t emotionally triggering for me at all, which was kind of great. But the older stuff was hard. The things of childhood, especially things from my grandparents, that was hard. The sheer amount of work was hard.
When I finally moved I learned something very important–those golden years of friendship in Clemson were rare and wonderful, and while I treasured them at the time, I didn’t fully appreciate how unique that experience was. I became very isolated in Greenville. However, I’d continued to heal, getting stronger all the time, and I was able to turn that isolation into writing. Ruthless came out, I got a manager, I wrote the screenplay adaptation, I went to LA, thinking all kinds of great things were going to happen, and they totally didn’t.
I left LA feeling that Ezra was the only thing I had in the whole wide world. Finally, I surrendered and did what God had told me to do on Feb 13th of 2015 – work on freaking Ezra. I’d essentially been procrastinating since 2010, only working on it intermittently and halfheartedly. I’d put it off because I dreaded how terrible it would be to truly fix the book, and it was exactly as bad as I expected. For weeks I worked for several hours a day and made no progress. It was brutal.
By the end of December, I’d gotten a handle on Ezra, and started to feel a lot better. January 12th, I sent Ezra to my agent. Even though she said she wouldn’t be able to read it until the end of the week, I received notes from her that same day. It was close to midnight when I got the email. It was several paragraphs long, but it had one message – You did it. It is the best letter I’ve ever received. I cried while I read it. And that is where I stand today, a year to the day after Simon & Schuster rejected those other books, a year to the day that I knew I needed to make Ezra my next book.
I am left with a feeling of tremendous gratitude. Although the last fourteen months have been emotionally and spiritually difficult, they have been necessary. Growth and change can be painful, and I am totally okay with that. Life is so short, I hate to lose any more of it to stagnation. I have a wonderful life and I have been blessed with an incredible amount of freedom. Although my work isn’t always easy, I am passionate about the work that I do. I believe I am doing the things God made me to do, and in that I am remarkably fortunate. All of that said, super hoping the next period of growth and change is marked by happiness–and I believe that it will.
