#blogupdate

TW: Mental health; self harm

The Fandom Side

It’s important to note that for the majority of my usage of Tumblr, I was a minor. I turned 18 in 2016, so was only an adult for a year before I left.

The truth of the matter is that Tumblr became an unhealthy environment for me. This site has come so far in so many ways in terms of user behaviour since the day I left, but I think anyone who was on this website during the difficult periods know exactly the type of toxicity that used to run wild here. And I am not totally blameless. I was complicit, and I think that that realisation contributed to my decision to leave.

I was getting involved in fandom discourse and drama on a regular basis. It began in my Hunger Games days and continued into my Shadowhunters era. When it came to the fandom side of Tumblr, there was always a fight to be had. Drama was always just around the corner and if you didn’t word yourself correctly or god forbid shipped something the majority considered wrong, then you were opening yourself up to attack. And I was on both sides of the attacker and the attacked. I think most of us usually are. No one is totally blameless. Whether I was white knighting Claudia Trisac against the Joshifer shippers or being the Anti-CC provocateur in order to big up Shadowhunters, I was always inserting myself into drama in defense of what I thought was the moral and right side.

It got to the point at times where I was constantly checking my blog notifications to make sure no one was reblogging me with a nasty comments or sending me hateful asks. It was interfering with my mental health, and my mental health had already taken a huge hit in 2017.  That’s not to say that genuine debate didn’t take place from time to time. However, this wasn’t common. I advocate for proper debate on my Youtube channel and I think part of the desire to do that was because of how disagreements on this website usually went down. Of course, it also happened on Youtube and across all platforms, such is the nature of social media, but I have lessened my contribution to such behaviour. I’m satisfied with the strides I’ve taken with this. I definitely feel like I’m a lot more responsible with my media consumption.

Mental Health and Autism

A year before I left this site, in the summer of 2017, I had a mental breakdown. A pretty big one, to be honest. I quit college and became a shell of a person due to a severe case of generalised anxiety disorder. Doing anything that went outside of my everyday norm and routine caused extreme distress. My anxiety expressed itself very physically, such as vomiting, trembling and on occasion passing out. This resulted in me being taken into A&E for self harm that Autumn.

I spent the proceeding years pretty much just trying to cope. Trying to survive. Mental health services suck, especially when you’re an adult struggling. The hospital gave me six sessions with a counsellor and a pat on the back. Once those six weeks were up, I was expected just to get on with my new medication and no problems. So I did. Or tried to. I didn’t go back to school, nor did I get a job. It felt like I was just existing, and it still does in many, many ways. There were some benefits, though. I helped my sister raise my nephew and I developed an unmatchable bond with him because of this; a rare connection that I doubt I will ever have with another child (unless I have my own, obviously). That was round about the time I disappeared from this blog. I made my post about my book-which we’ll get to-and then sort of vanished.

In 2019, I put myself in to be put on a waiting list for an Autism Assessment. Being twenty one at the time, many asked why I was doing it. What was the point if I wasn’t a kid anymore? I always say the same thing in return. I needed answers. An anxiety diagnosis did fit me but I always felt like there was something else. Like I had only gotten half an answer instead of a full one. Events and behaviours that traced back to my childhood that couldn’t possibly have been anxiety. I wasn’t anxious when I was five. I was actually incredibly outgoing. So why did I hate fireworks and discos and crowded shops and struggled so much trying to make friends? Why was I so focused on these fandoms in my teenage years? Why was I so obsessed that I couldn’t put the phone down and separate myself from that world? That wasn’t anxiety either.

Last year, on May 31st, I was diagnosed with autism. Hearing those words felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I had an answer. Everything suddenly made so much sense. This anxiety I had been diagnosed with in 2017 was very much still anxiety, but it was an anxiety that stemmed from something much larger. Something much larger that had been a part of me all this time, but had been neglected for twenty three years. 

Co. Down Woman Opens Up about Being Diagnosed with Autism at 23

Now, I’m not using autism as a shield for the fights I used to get into on here. That was all me, whether I was knowingly autistic or not. My neurodivergence doesn’t excuse me from that. In fact, I cringe at the idea of someone excusing my previously argumentative nature just because I’m autistic. It is not a protective blanket; an excuse to throw at people to avoid culpability. All it did, for me, was explain a great deal of stuff such as why I did certain things, or behaved in certain ways. But an excuse? Absolutely not.

The Seven

My final post on this blog before I became Houdini and vanished into the ether was about being published. This did happen. In April 2019, my debut novel The Seven released on Amazon. It’s an LGBTQ+ urban fantasy, and centers around seven characters who have supernatural abilities based on the day of the week they were born on. I never got around to doing an official announcement before I decided to stop posting, which is a shame because there are some congratulations messages in my inbox that I feel terrible for not responding to. I appreciate you, even though the chances of you seeing this are incredibly slim.

Just last year, The Seven became an Amazon Kindle exclusive and can be read for free if you have Kindle Unlimited. Sorry, that feels like a shameless plug but I wanted to let you guys know that the book I last posted about did happen. It wasn’t a pipe dream, or a lie, or bait before I left. 

The Seven ebook

If you’ve been following this blog since my fanfiction days, then this is a really nice achievement to be able to share. A “heh, look, I actually did it!” type of moment. I could have done it earlier. I potentially should have done it earlier. But the time never felt right to come back. Better late than never, I suppose? If you do ever decide to read my word stained pages, drop me a line or an ask and let me know what you thought, yeah?

The Future

I want to come back to this website, but I will be doing so hesitantly. I’m going to take my time and gauge how my psyche behaves. If I sense myself becoming unhealthily obsessed again, or if I feel myself falling back into old actions, I most likely won’t return for good. But at least I will have this post here to fill you guys in on where I went and what happened in the period of time I was away. I’ll probably do a bit of rebranding on here regardless, because I have outgrown hgtmigirlxx and some of her quirks.

Most of all, I want to thank everyone who made my Tumblr experience so enjoyable. Despite everything I said here, I loved this site and my blog and my mutuals. It was fun, and it was silly, and it was good. To the insane fellows who are still following this dumb blog, I see you guys and I love you. You’re all so important to me. 

If you made it to the end of this stupidly long post, you deserve a medal of perseverance. But thank you for bearing with me! Your dedication is admirable and you’re amazing.

Kind regards,

Erin