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The year I lost Mr. Pickles, my beloved cat of twelve years, was one of the hardest of my life.

We were giving him fluids daily at the end to provide quality of life, and watching him just get older, knowing his kidneys were failing, was rough. There were other complicating factors in my life, making it one of the toughest of my life.

The grief sat heavy on my chest. Some mornings, just opening my laptop felt impossible. I had a battle within myself--can I? Should I? Do I want to?

I had a previously-learned lesson on my side--I didn't have writer's block, I was stressed and sad. They aren't the same thing.

As an aside, and hopefully this hits someone right when they need it the most: on the other side of a different and very stressful time, I realized I wasn't "out of words," as I had thought.

People would ask about my "next book," and I'd say, "I think I'm done. I don't have any new ideas." I was making it, one day at a time, through stress and grief and just life. When the sun came out again, the words reappeared, and after some retrospection, gave me insight and a different perspective.

The following year, I wrote and published ten books.

Writing is one of my happy places, so instead of giving in to the grief (not ignoring the feelings I needed to feel, of course), the minute I could, I used it as a place of refuge. As I felt better and better, I wrote more and more.

Hopefully this helps: Stress isn't writer's block, and life challenges aren't writer's block.

They're just ... life.

During that time, I realized I had a choice:

1. Wait for life to be "perfect" and to feel better before doing some (any) writing (spoiler: it never is)
2. Write anyway, even if just 200 words some days

I chose option 2.

Some days, writing was the one thing I could control when everything else felt awful. Other days, I gave myself grace and wrote nothing.

The key? I didn't quit. I didn't tell myself I had "writer's block" because the truth was, I didn't.

In There Is No Such Thing as Writer's Block, I share the full framework for writing through life's challenges:

✅ How to write when you're exhausted

✅ The self-care strategies that keep your creative well full

✅ When to push through vs. when to rest (yes, rest is productive!)

✅ Managing stress so it doesn't shut down your creativity

​Grab Your Copy &
Start Writing Through (almost) Anything​

I wish I'd known during my first really terrible year that I could find a way to write, I know it would've helped me. I hope it helps you. 🩵

Tomorrow I'll share the secret weapon that helps me write 1,000 words a day even (especially!) with a packed schedule.

Yours in resilience,

P.S. I've been working on something and I'll be back in your inbox in a few hours -- which I know is highly irregular, but I can't wait to share!

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