The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of When My Article Went Viral

Sharing what I went through when my article reached thousands of readers

*Note, this is going to be about my experience only. I will not be diving deeper into the original articles.*

Most writers would love for their work to go viral. They would likely take advantage of the opportunities it presented for them. The extra money they’d rake in from views would be nice too.

In my case, the money couldn’t have come at a better time. I live paycheck to paycheck, and I had been having costly car trouble. I worried about money and was trying to get a second job. I had even signed up to work for Instacart right before my article went viral. Despite my struggles, I wasn’t writing with the sole intention of making money.

For me, writing for medium was more about making connections. I felt I had found a little corner of the website that I loved. There were a handful of writers that I loved reading and interacting with. Medium had even named me a top writer in gaming. I had my own (struggling) publication and was making new modifications to it to improve it. I was also writing about writing, connecting with others, and sharing my Kindle Vella experience. I felt like I was on the right path, and that I just had to keep interacting and growing with my audience. I felt many of the interactions I was receiving were genuine, and I loved them.

At least, I loved interacting until something I wrote went viral. With all the fresh eyes on my work, there were bound to be people who didn’t like it, but I hadn’t expected them to be so vocal. There was one woman who went through each of my articles and told me how stupid she thought I was until I blocked her. A man told me I should have fought the elderly ladies who I’d written about. Recently, a woman using a stock photo as her profile picture called me a rage blogger.

Someone posted the link to my article on an anti-transgender forum. That puzzled me because I’m not transgender, and the article had nothing to do with gender issues. Someone else copied and pasted my writing onto another forum. People were tweeting my article and tweeting at me at a rate that made me uncomfortable. I had always been happy to have my work shared in the past, but this time it left a knot in my stomach. Most of the people who shared my article did so because they felt connected to it, but there were a few people who shared it to insult me.

I thought about deleting the article, and even my entire medium account. I stripped away every bit of personality from my profile. I also stopped interacting with others as much. I hid the link to the chapters I’d published on Kindle Vella and added nothing else to my story. I didn’t even log into medium as much. When I did it was to see what horrifying things people were saying about me and my writing. I still haven’t been able to interact with people in the same way that I used to, but I want to.

I had good intentions when I sat down to write the article. I wanted to spend positivity and interact with new people. I became the center of negativity instead. I deserved some of it since I hadn’t done enough research before writing my article. I had seen a few TikTok videos that featured girls using a word they’d taken from another culture and misusing it. I misused the term in my article and for that I am sorry. I never intended to write anything that would cause anyone else to hurt or face discomfort.

The interactions weren’t all negative. Several women politely educated me on the topic. I learned and grew from my experience while connecting with new people. I gained many new followers. I also encountered some people who will never read my writing again.

Some women shared their experiences with me. A lot of their experiences were like mine. People wrongfully assumed they were into their hobbies to impress men. Some of their experiences brought me to tears, and I was grateful that these women had shared them with me.

I was also offered a chance to pitch my writing to an online magazine, and I did once only to have the article rejected. The rejection made me wonder if my writing was good enough to be featured in a magazine. I thought I’d only received the offer because so many people had read my original article. I decided that magazine wasn’t for me, but the rejection kept getting to me. Was my writing good enough?

To this day, I still doubt myself, but I’ve always wanted to be a writer and refuse to give up my dream. I plan to finish (and publish) my novel, submit articles to magazines, and continue my medium journey.

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