Fear of Failure
Seconds To Snap was written for various reasons - mainly to end stigma associated with these conditions to allow people to be free from the prisons of judgements.
Also as a huge thank you to everyone who took care of me in the hospitals over the years. I am so grateful each day. I owe them my life.
The patients I met along the way also taught me so much about life and how you should never take anything for granted as you don't know what's around the corner. I learned very quickly to never judge a book by its cover within a few weeks of being in an adult psychiatric unit.
However even though I was so motivated to write the book for all of those reasons I was terrified of failing.
Failing to make a difference, let everyone down, not talk loud enough on behalf of all those people I know are in their mind prison each day and are desperate to escape. But worst of all let myself down.
I was terrified of self-failure. We are all intrinsically very self-critical - so this was hard to shake.
This then led me to question my reasons even more so I asked various people lots of questions, tested the market, watched people's reactions in certain situations. All to allow me to know I had to write it no matter what and not doubt the need I knew was there.
Some members of society through no fault of their own have a preconceived idea that all mentally ill people are scary, zombie like, psychopaths, lank hair, bad skin, unstable, dirty etc and some of those descriptions came from a class I spoke to of psychology students who should have known better about pre conceived ideas - I can assure you they did within seconds of meeting me. It was an incredible experience for all of us. I had on purpose sent them a horrifying chapter of the book before it was published as they would have no way of finding me online. When I walked in the class their faces said a millions stories. They reluctantly told me what they expected me to look like - and yes some of the words I've used above.
Needless to say after the talk they had a very different view of the issues around mind health.
We all learned something that day.
It also backed up the huge need for the story to help those people dispel the myths and stereotypes.
So I knew I had to publish no matter what. I had to have belief in myself and what I could bring to the world alongside the book.
When I was a teenager I stood in a grotty hospital toilet one day about to end my life as I felt there was no reason to live. In that moment I wondered if all teenagers had shit lives and felt as worthless as I did. My attempt was interrupted thankfully.
A day or so later I vowed to myself if I lived through all I was going through then one day I would tell my story so no other young person ever had to find themselves about to end their own life in a dingy toilet and hoped it would not all be in vain.
So I went ahead and published Seconds To Snap with huge anxiety, but also huge drive and passion to really use it to create change within society on many levels.
It's now been 18 months and I feel immensely proud of all I have achieved since publication. I don't feel I have let myself down in anyway. I just wish I had done it sooner.
So if you're thinking of writing a book - do it!!! There is no time like the present and if you put your heart and soul into it you will never let yourself down -so don't be scared of failing as you won't!
If you want to tell the truth with pure intent - just do it... I promise the hope it can offer others is worth it all.
Tina x
