Is this normal for some writers? AM I OKAY IN THAT REGARD?!

To make a long story short: I just got finished writing chapter twelve for Red Reign and that was an emotional chapter for me.

It was so emotional that I was tearing up about to cry and shaky from it.
In all my years of writing, I HAVE NEVER WRITTEN ANYTHING THAT EMOTIONAL BEFORE!!!

I am still shaking and wanting to cry because of it!
Has anybody ever got like that? Is that normal? Am I okay?

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I am really still over shaky over it.
Like I really want to cry right now because of it.

What the heck? That has never happened to me before!

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@Akje
@AMMeyers
@J.L.O

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ā€œNo tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.ā€

ā€• Robert Frost

Thatā€™s never happened to me that I can recall, but itā€™s great that itā€™s happened to you! Good work! (*ļ¼¾-ā€˜) 乃

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It is the weirdest thing.
When I wrote the House of Naivin, I donā€™t EVER remember getting shaky and wanting to cry and the same applies to Into the Chaos.

Actually, Iā€™ve NEVER got that way!
I am scared because in the next chapters are going to be even more emotionally heavy too.

I hope I donā€™t get that way for all the rest of them.
:sweat_smile:

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Look, Iā€™m about as coldhearted as they come and yeah, I get some hellish lows from writing something that is emotionally draining. They say creating something is a lot like having your own childā€“thatā€™s highs, lows, mourning, celebration, despair, the whole lot.

Thereā€™s a couple reasons it happens:

Emotionally invested leaves you with heartache. Many of us canā€™t write the end of story without feeling loss. I hate ending stories because it feels a bit like Iā€™ve ended this world.

Personally invested means our own trauma winds up in our writing. Itā€™s why I take To Make a Kinder Childrenā€™s Tale so hard. Itā€™s heavily tied up in my motherā€™s death. I didnā€™t do a lot of outward mourningā€“its in that book.

So, when someone who is fighting against a personal breakdown writes something that is either directly tied to themselves, or is their baby in the midst of their fighting their own demons, I really expect moments where it should be FAR worse than my own experiences. As bad as my momā€™s death was, Iā€™m tough as hell and Iā€™m way older than most. Thatā€™s not to downplay thingsā€“itā€™s just to put things in perspective.

Now, as far as what kind of impact it has on youā€“thatā€™s probably a therapy session.

Now, aside from all this, a general thing I find lacking in this idea of self-care:

Too many times in the effort to declare things ā€œnormalā€, we fight to prevent ā€œtherapyā€ because we believe that things going right means that things should be healthy. Or that things that are healthy arenā€™t things that should need work. That ideology is killing our society and is again, my disgust with labels. People need to be able to accept that something is right but can still be better, needs help, and still hasnā€™t integrated for you. This all or nothing society drives me nuts.

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I suppose so.
But Red Reign isnā€™t even suppose to be all that emotional. Yet that was an experience and eye-opener for me.

Red Reign is suppose to be a fun adventure with epic lore and interesting twists, turns, and more.

Yet I took a dive into Jorildynā€™s character and something about it slapped me in the face.

I had my own issues, but it doesnā€™t really mingle into my stories.

This whole thing seems so weird and interesting.

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Itā€™s still your baby, and youā€™re allowed to be empathetic.

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Thank you so much.
I honestly wasnā€™t planning on making Jorildyn an emotional character who has a lot of empathy towards people yet she also happens to try to be the hero and save people.

I donā€™t think Iā€™ve ever written a character like her.
:sweat_smile:

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The last time a book made me cry it was Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. When the last plane lands and they canā€™t open the doors because someone came on board with the plague and now everyone on board is infected, it was so sad! I hope I can write like that someday and wring emotion from the reader, but all we can do is keep reading and writing until we improve. ĀÆ\_(ļ­¢)_/ĀÆ

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The longer I am into Red Reign, the better my writing feels than before.
I mean yeah it needs so much work and it is a zero/first draft, but something about the later chapters feel like I am improving a different way.

I wonā€™t say I am getting better, but I am improving in such an odd way.
Chapter twelve is an interesting example of that.

Now, that seems weird to me!

@J.L.O and @Akje

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I like bittersweet more than devestating, which is the ending of The Kingā€™s Three Sons. Finality can be so overdone that it ruins it, sometimes.

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So true! ( Ė†ā—”Ė†)Ū¶ Ł©(Ė˜ā—”Ė˜ )

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And to think I did no plotting and planning for Red Reign and still got hit by a truck carrying emotional baggage.

Yeesh! LOL!

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Next time, I get that emotional I better have tissue nearby, as I continued writing this novel.

:sweat_smile:

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Writing can be a very cathartic practice.

Iā€™ve always kept a level of distance when writing fiction. But today I learned about doing emotional work through writing fiction. Which could prove extremely helpful for me as a researcher working with very heavy topics.

The last time I cried about my writing was when I did a piece of auto/biography for a class. It felt good to get it off my chest. The tears came when I received feedback from my lecturer who sat me down and discussed it with me. I felt so seen.

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Are you saying that getting emotionally invested is good?

Iā€™ve heard of many writers crying and getting emotional over their stories, so it is common or normal. Personally, itā€™s never happened to me but thatā€™s also because itā€™s hard for me to cry or become emotional with stories, even with my own. xD

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Well there are two schools of thought with that.

One says yes, absolutely. Because it builds passion and motivation for writing.

And the other says no. You need to let go of emotion, and acknowledge it is a fantasy youā€™re creating. You wonā€™t be able to use what youā€™ve learnt through the writing process in your real life.

I suppose I tread the middle path.

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I didnā€™t put much stark in it with other writers and thought it was weird.
Now, that Iā€™ve done it, it seems so foreign to me.

@JojoDahlia: This story is the only novel that I actually felt such a weird emotion and improved a bit better than most.

I am just stunned that I allowed myself to get like that.
I didnā€™t even plan for that to happen or allowed it to happen.

IT JUST HAPPENED AND THAT IS JUST STRANGE TO ME!!!

lol!

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