I’m Not Ignoring You

Medium just makes it seem like I do

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash

Hello lovelies! I hope you are all enjoying a lovely holiday season!

I haven’t posted in a while, and though I was avoiding writing yet another post about Medium (because it can feel like there are too many post about the platform already), it feels like Medium is forcing my hand.

You see, For the past few months I have been having problems with this platform for a number of reasons which has made it very difficult to interact with you lovely lot as much as I would like to.

I wanted to write about it here for a few reasons.

1. I don’t want you to think I am rude or ignoring you.
2. I always like to share writing experiences so we writers feel less alone. At least, it always helps me to know I am not the only one.
3. To see if I others are having similar problems.
4. To update where I am at in my writing journey.
5. To write again.

I am not ignoring you I promise

A long time ago when my very first blog took form I learned an important lesson. To interact with your readers.

Many people will talk about how this boosts your platform, improve your stats, increases financial flow, helps to improve chances of getting writing gigs, and all of that good technical business type stuff. And it can. If you want to have writing be your main profession you do need to treat it like any other business, put in the hours, network, advertise, grow.

But there is another aspect to reader participation that, to me, is the most important. Sharing stories and growing with each other. I learn so much from fellow writers that have enabled me to be a better writer. I have gone on such a self search journey and learned so much about being human, how to self help and look after myself, all from reading and speaking with other people. To me, my writing is about being in a community, supporting each other’s growth and sharing experiences and new ways of seeing things.

But Medium has other ideas

One of the things that attracted me to Medium was the community. I love reading people’s posts and retrieving comments, sharing thoughts and connecting with people from around the world.

However, lately this is becoming harder and harder because Medium seems to be malfunctioning for me (and possibly others, do let me know).

I see that I have notifications and I can opening them to see what is happening. I love to read the works of those who read mine, so if you clap and comment I will always return the favor. Well, I have been trying to.

For some reason Medium seems to be hit and miss as to whether it will allow me to do this. Some days it’s behaving fine and I can comment and clap back with no problems at all. But increasingly it’s becoming harder.

Sometimes I can read a post but when I try to comment it just flicks on and off the comments section making it difficult to read the comments let alone add to them. I refresh and try again to no avail.

The same seems to be happening with claps. I will usually leave 50 claps on your post, but sometimes it’s not letting me clap at all, or it will start and then stop at a random number before 50. I don’t know why this is happening.

But your thoughts and opinions matter

Which is why I have felt driven to write this post. Because I do see your lovely words, and I am reading your interesting perspectives, but I am at times unable to return the favor. It’s very frustrating and impacting on what I love to do the most. Connect with people.

I will endeavor to try to get this fixed, and any updates from others as to whether this is happening to you too would be really helpful.

I have also been suffering with depression

It is something I hadn’t realised until I was made aware of it due to some of my behaviors and things going on for me. But it is what it is and I am working on things. It takes time of course, and some days with physical health and mental health, it just has to take priority. I am trying to remind myself that this is only temporary and at some point (soon hopefully) I will be back to my full self, along with my full writing capabilities.

Until then though, it might take me a little longer to reply or read your amazing works. Again, please know that it is not because I don’t think your words are important. They really are, and I look forward to catching up with everyone very soon.

It’s Christmas!

Okay, so, of course this isn’t Medium’s fault, but it’s another reason why some of us might be a little quiet on here for a while.

For me, I have been out of the country visiting for Christmas, and of course, with all of the festivities I’ve had little time to get on with writing. It’s felt a little rude to be in somebody else’s home celebrating to then slink off to write. So things have been put on hold for a bit, but it will be all systems go when I return to the UK…….and got over the jet lag.

It’s not been fully quiet on the writing front for me though. I have now printed off the manuscript for my novel, so I have been working on that and adding some scribbles.

Keep writing lovelies

Your words are heard and they can and do make a difference.

Enjoy the rest of the holiday period, and I look forward to reconnecting with you all in the New Year. x