Announcement

I’ve been trying to figure out how to write this for a while, and there’s honestly no perfect way to say it, so I’m just going to be real:

I’m going to be stepping away from making bots for a while.

Not because I don’t care about it anymore—but because I care about it enough to recognize that something isn’t right for me right now.

A lot of what I’ve written over the past months hasn’t just been “ideas.” It’s been coming from a very real place. The themes I keep coming back to—loss, regret, longing, wanting things to go back, wishing you could make a different choice, people being gone/dead—they’re not random.

They’re things I’ve been dealing with in my own life.

Not exactly as they appear in the stories, but close enough.

Most of what I’ve written has been shaped by my own experiences—past and present. I tried to put a creative spin on it, and for a while, it was cathartic.

For a while.

But somewhere along the way, what started as a way to process things turned into something heavier than I realized.

Lately, I’ve noticed that every time I finish a bot—especially when it does well—I don’t feel relief or pride. I feel anxious. Like I have to live up to it. Like I have to do it again, but better. Especially if it is about a character I write based on a person I knew IRL or my own experiences. Doubly so if I lost that person.

And instead of being something I enjoy, it’s started to feel like pressure I can’t turn off.

At the same time, I’ve been dealing with a lot personally. More than I’ve really talked about here.

It’s been a hard year. That’s an understatement.

And I don’t think I’ve actually given myself the space to process any of it properly. I’ve just been… moving through it. Using writing as an outlet, but also as a way to avoid sitting with some of it.

And that’s caught up with me.

I’ve realized I’m tired in a way that isn’t just “I need sleep.” It’s deeper than that. And I don’t want to keep pushing through that feeling until something I care about becomes something that drains me completely.

I’ve also had to face something difficult:

I can’t replace the people I’ve lost with writing. I can’t fill that space by creating stories that try to hold onto something that’s already gone. I have to stop saying things like, "If I just did this, my friend/family/step brother would be here. If I just did this, this wouldn't have happened."

And I can’t keep hiding from real life because I’m afraid of getting hurt again by connecting with people.

As hard as it is, I need to start showing up for my own life again. Because this past year, I have just been watching life pass me by; as stupid as that sounds as I am in graduate school and have things that I am doing but ask me if I am thriving? I don't know. I just know that it feels like I am falling.

Because this past year has been one of the hardest of my life.

So I’m stepping back.

Not as a dramatic “goodbye forever,” but as a real pause. A step back so I can focus on myself, my mental health, and actually deal with the things I’ve been carrying—instead of constantly trying to write through them.

I think, without realizing it, I was burning myself to make these bots.

I don’t know how long this break will be. Probably a couple of weeks. Or maybe a month.

And I’m trying not to put pressure on myself to figure that out right now.

I just know I need the space.

I also want to say thank you.

Genuinely.

The support, the messages, the way people have connected with these stories—it’s meant more to me than I’ve been able to put into words. Knowing something I wrote resonated with people, or made them feel something, or helped them in some small way… that matters to me more than numbers ever could.

And that’s part of why this is so hard to write.

But I think stepping away now