Survival Mode Stole my Love of Writing (Here’s How I Stole it Back)

Living in survival mode meant I didn’t have time or energy for my muse.

Playing with my words used to feel as easy as breathing. Writing was in my blood and I lived for the deadline, any deadline.

That was a long time ago.

Before surviving became all I could handle.

Surviving

When you only focus on survival, everything else is unimportant. Most people survive events — one time happenings which are at least ‘done’ at some point. Most parents like me, though, survive a consistent barrage of ongoing craziness that comes with multiple kids with multiple diagnoses. We survive seeing our child turn blue, giving them CPR, and then doing it all over again another day.

For years, I focused on raising three boys and being a wife. Specialists diagnosed our sons and my husband with the same rare genetic disorder, epilepsy, and then autism. My life was about survival and writing just didn’t fit in with that.

Years of advocating, struggling, and desperate praying took its toll. Our guys have always been exceptional in their ability to prove every single expert wrong.

But, and yes there is always a ‘but’, I spent years helping my husband and three guys with new diagnoses, regular eye exams under anesthesia, seizures, meltdowns, and sometimes even CPR.

And I was tired.

In the interests of survival, I stopped writing. Not on purpose, but over time I lost the joy of writing, and then, eventually, I couldn’t write. In all honesty, I stopped doing a lot of other stuff too. But writing was the one thing I missed, time and time again.

During quiet mornings and long, late nights, it was writing I yearned for.

I spent so long in survival mode that it was hard for me to do anything but survive.

Even today I’m interrupted by imposter syndrome. I’ll be writing and then the words are stopped up again and it’s like I don’t know how to write anymore.

I think I Murdered my Muse

Stephen King spoke about his muse as though he were a dude with a cigar (and not fairy-dust).

“There is a muse, but he’s not going to come fluttering down into your writing room and scatter creative fairy-dust all over your typewriter or computer station. He lives in the ground. He’s a basement guy. You have to descend to his level, and once you get down there you have to furnish an apartment for him to live in. You have to do all the grunt labor, in other words, while the muse sits and smokes cigars and admires his bowling trophies and pretends to ignore you. Do you think it’s fair? I think it’s fair. He may not be much to look at, that muse-guy, and he may not be much of a conversationalist (what I get out of mine is mostly surly grunts, unless he’s on duty), but he’s got the inspiration. It’s right that you should do all the work and burn all the midnight oil, because the guy with the cigar and little wings got a bag of magic. There’s stuff in there that can change your life.”

- Stephen King, On Writing

My muse? I murdered mine. Callous disregard and abusive neglect. That’ll do it, right?

Muses, like most imaginary friends, disappear if you don’t use and appreciate them. They disappear if they don’t find you writing regularly.

When I focused on survival, I didn’t write. When I didn’t write, my muse didn’t know where to go. And when my muse didn’t know where to go, she disappeared. Inattention killed my muse.

So maybe I didn’t actually murder mine, but she was neglected horribly (I’m so ashamed).

Coming Back to Myself

About a year ago, after another round of therapy and some massive lifestyle changes, I started waking up. I was still depressed, but I realized I needed (and wanted) more for myself than simply surviving.

I lost years of my life to depression and survival. And while surviving is the name of the game, when you focus on it for too long, everything else ceases to be important. I didn’t suddenly feel better one day. I spent months (and years) doing the hard work of fighting my way back, and I still have a long way to go.

A huge part of my healing was done through the pages of my journals, one I keep for writing ‘morning pages’ and one I keep just as a Bullet Journal.

I had given up on being able to write for other people. And in fact, I hadn’t written anything publicly for over 5 years. But a month or two ago I started playing with my words in a meaningful way again, first in my journal and then through some free writing.

The first time I wrote something I thought I might want to share with other people I felt like part of my soul came to life again. I remember telling my therapist that I felt like I could breathe again, that I could help people again.

In many ways, coming back to myself was always about coming back to writing.

I just needed time and the ability to heal to see that.

Feeding my Muse

Now that I am writing again, I feel like I need to woo my Muse back again. Whisper sweet nothings in her ear and tell her how pretty she is. Something.

I’m hoping my muse is made of solid stuff, though, because all those things I spent my last twenty years living through? Those things are still a part of me and I still am a mom and a wife (and a coffee addict).

I picture my muse as a punk rock kinda fairy godmother. She might be head-banging one minute and the next minute her head will be angled to the side while she’s sounding out a word.

“That’s misspelled, dear.”

For some reason, I hear her in my head with a British accent. Her crown is askew and she wears knee-high pink-and-white striped stockings. Just because.

I like to think of her cheering me on, tapping me on the shoulder when I think about checking out Twitter or Facebook instead of finishing the next draft of another article.

And I know what she likes to see: Me, sitting in my chair, writing, come hell or high water.

Survival Mode Didn’t Kill my Muse

But staying in survival mode for so long (years) wasn’t good for me and it certainly wasn’t good for my punk rock granny of a muse.

I’m learning to do better.

Hopefully, my muse will come along for the ride.