Did I flop again?

Here we are, week one of Stacey trying to figure out who the heck she is. I’ve tried to go back to the Madness and Blood manuscript countless times over the past five years.

Did I fail this time too?

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Well, the fact that I’m actually writing a summary and not just avoiding the world should be a good clue. I’ll tell you a secret . . . Monday night I felt like a person again. I realized that my identity had been drifting away like the fog in Thunder and Blood over the last year. It’s gotten even worse over the last few months as my hands have pretty much shut me down functionally.

I went from being an over-busy publisher to a stay at home mom in the blink of an eye. It’s can be a big job, but my kids are in school or grown. I’ve just been trying to manage the house.

I’ve had problems with pain in my hands since my early 20s. I’d always know if I’d overdone it because they’d yell at me. This summer, though, they never really got back to being quiet. Things around the house were getting more and more difficult. My awesome doctor ran a bunch of tests and sent me for a few referrals and we discovered that I had osteoarthritis in the end joints of my fingers and in both my big and baby toes. The only issue with that diagnosis was that I didn’t have pain in that part of my fingers. I was diagnosed with carpal tunnel and was so excited that the surgery might free me from hand problems.

The tingling is gone. The pain is worse and has been joined by its friend, Swelling. Turns out I likely have another kind of arthritis in my hands (either rheumatoid or psoriatic) which is autoimmune and the immune system response to my surgery caused a flare up.

I spent a good 2 to 3 months sitting around only reading ebooks and managing to feed myself. There’s lots of things I couldn’t do but I won’t bore you with the list.

Essentially, my self-identity as a functional human being was gone.

So, I’ve been struggling.  Maybe all of this was what I needed to get moving again. All I know is this– I finally feel like I’m a human being with a purpose. And it’s not just a purpose–it’s a purpose for me. I have my own identity back. I’m not just a mom (although I’m still rocking motherhood as the best job ever), and I’m not just someone who helps other writers get their books out to the world. I’ll never stop helping writers but I never want to do it full time again.

I am Stacey Voss, author. It’s what I wanted to be since I was 5 years old.

I have to really thank the people who came up to me at the December Dreams show last month to talk to me about how much they enjoyed Thunder and Blood. You reminded me how it felt to have my own work thrust out into the world again. you reminded me that, although not everyone will love what I write, some people love it. And that’s the second best feeling in the world … maybe 3rd. First of course is when my kids give me humongous kid hugs and the second is when my husband looks at me with that… look that tells me he loves me.

So yes, Madness and Blood is well on its way to completion. And I can’t wait to see my name on the cover.