INSPIRATION
I wasn’t inspired to write. I was sitting on my sofa while rain brushed hard against the windows, and I was in excruciating CRPS pain. My mind couldn’t focus on anything except what my body was doing to me. Tears started to form, but I refused to cry another day. I tried to think of something—anything—that felt good. A place. A memory. A moment.
I went back to my trip to Paris and relived every day of it. Slowly, other thoughts began breaking through the pain. I can’t fully describe it; it felt like imagining a different life. There was a notepad on the coffee table, and I started writing down whatever came to me. Every time a thought appeared, I wrote it. That thought became a few sentences, then a paragraph, then a chapter.
PROCESS
In the beginning, I didn’t have a process. I didn’t have an outline, a plan, or even a direction — I wrote in fragments, letting each idea land wherever it landed. When characters began to appear, I explored their heritage, their vibe, and who they might be if I stepped into their lives. I researched French names, pulled from my sightseeing in Paris, and slowly built their families, friends, and world.
I wrote for hours at a time — entire days passing while I sat at my desk in front of my laptop. The pain was still there, but the writing kept going. Ideas, twists, and plot turns came faster than I could process them, so I captured everything as it arrived. I didn’t organize first; I wrote first. The structure came later. My character choices came from instinct and based on pieces of myself and pieces of people I love — my own demeanor shaped one character, and the personality of my best friend shaped another. I decided on names, settings, and relationships by following what felt true rather than what fit a formula.
I kept anything that carried emotional weight and removed anything that didn’t. When the story expanded, I didn’t force it into a smaller shape. I let it grow, because the characters still had more to say. And it naturally became a second book. Then a third.
DECISIONS
Honestly, I didn’t want to peddle my books, hoping someone would take a chance on me. And even if someone actually did, I didn’t want my words, my feelings, or that frowned‑upon “conceptual phrasing” stripped away. So I made the decision to go the indie author route and start my own publishing company.
That was the easy part.
The cover designs, the editing and re‑editing, the POD systems, the marketing, the endless learning curve — that was the real work. The experience was so intense and so full of lessons that I began writing a book about that journey as well
NON FICTION
INSPIRATION
The inspiration for this book was because I was pissed off. I was fed up with being misdiagnosed, dismissed, and stuck in endless hospital stays with medications that didn’t touch the pain. I was tired of hearing “we don’t know” from doctors who barely understood CRPS.
I was angry — angry at the system, angry at the ignorance, angry at the silence surrounding a condition that destroys lives. That anger is what pushed me to tell the truth exactly as it is.
That same anger led me to find a place that, without question, understands CRPS. So I’m grateful — grateful for my anger, for my writing, for my advocacy, and for still having a part of myself that CRPS will never take.
PROCESS
II wrote this book in sections. I already knew what I wanted to name the chapters, so I wrote directly into each one. I researched relentlessly — medical journals, case studies, patient accounts, anything I could find — and documented that information with endnotes. This book is real, unfiltered truth. I wrote the reality of CRPS exactly as I lived it: the confusion, the frustration, the moments that changed me, and the ones that nearly broke me. Every part of this book comes from firsthand experience and the work I put into understanding a condition most people barely recognize.
DECISIONS
I made the decision to be direct and unapologetic. I didn’t hide behind medical jargon or polite explanations. I chose to include the hardest parts on purpose because leaving them out would have been dishonest — because this condition is brutal, and pretending otherwise helps no one. This book would confront the realities people avoid, name the failures people excuse, and say what patients are never allowed to say out loud. I chose to write for anyone who needs the truth — patients, families, and anyone who thinks they understand CRPS but doesn’t. Nothing would be the watered‑down version the medical system gives them. Nothing rewritten to make others comfortable. The only goal was clarity: say what needs to be said, exactly as it needs to be said.