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It's already 2 weeks into 2023. I'm not one to make New Year's Resolutions. I'm always a work-in-progress with short-term and longer-term projects to keep me busy. I haven't blogged on here for a while as I have mainly focused on vlogging but I want to move away from that. In this blog post, I will sum up some of the past year and also where I feel I'm headed. I don't make super long goals, as things are pretty unknown for me. I switch from one activity to another, all headed in the same general direction.  Softie, the hedgehog represents vulnerability
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I am diagnosed with the shutdown presentation of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), bipolar 1 disorder and mild social anxiety disorder, which multiple strangers online confuse with autism. I have had a lot of abuse online because I no longer call myself autistic, after assessment for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). I have difficulty with communicating with words. Below is an extract of transcript from a recent video, when I was trying to speak, while dissociating (PTSD):   Ataahua, acrylics on canvas by Xanthe Wyse In just over an hour, it will be 2022 in New Zealand. I have been jotting down some notes and preparing some photos over the past 4 hours with the aim to write a final blog post for the year (all improvised really).
I will upload a few pics I took today and write some text around them. It is very challenging for me to organise words into sentences, paragraphs etc. I have impairments with bipolar 1 disorder and post-traumatic disorder (PTSD), which affect my cognition and communication. I originally wrote this blog post in January 2019. Moved to here after deciding not to renew the domain name. In 2021, I published my first novel, Pet Purpose: Your Unspoken Voice.  Pawn Queen by Xanthe Wyse I am diagnosed with rapid cycling bipolar 1 disorder (which has mania, hypomania, mixed features, depression and mood crashes) with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I have been in treatment for PTSD for 2 years. I self-advocate as a vulnerable person and survivor and also for the vulnerable. I have trust issues after betrayal from friends and my ex-husband. I have recently found out what some of the lies are against me in a pile of abuse.
to sell books, need to promote themI have self-published two books as e-book and print-on-demand formats, distributed by Amazon. One was a memoir under a pen name. The more recent one, my debut novel, was under my legal name. I didn't promote the memoir. Only a handful of people read it, whom I told it existed. It never was found under millions of books on Amazon. Let's face it, if no one knows about it, no one's going to buy it, are they? I 'unpublished it' and thought I had deleted the files, then recently recovered it. I am going to edit it, rename it Bipolar Cringe and republish it under my name with more context. 
Well, since my last blog post, I saw my novel Pet Purpose: Your Unspoken Voice hit #1 in top free best sellers in Biographical Fiction on Amazon US. If I had been paid for those downloads, I would have made more in royalties in a few days than well over a month of my part-time minimum wage job. I did some calculations, and if I were to sell at the rate of what was downloaded with the promotion, I would make nearly six figures annual in NZ dollars in royalties. Whereas, I made a few hundred bucks from actual sales, prior to the giveaway, which I invested into testing out marketing and promotion options. Potential is there.
It was a ridiculous goal to be an internationally bestselling author when I was struggling so much with bipolar 1 disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, that I was unable to cook a scrambled egg with a scrambled brain, or remember how to take my meds on my own. It took 7 years to complete Pet Purpose. I wrote and edited it in short bursts every few months. 
No idea why there are a couple of paid books in the top 100 free promo books
I recently self-published my debut novel, Pet Purpose: Your Unspoken Voice, about a character with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) navigating love and loss. I am currently running a free promotion of the e-book on Amazon. Today, it is currently #2 in biographical fiction and #19-20 in romantic erotica categories, listed in both in Top 100 Free Best Sellers. If it ever made it to #1, I didn't check, as rankings are updated every hour.
I have had a diabolical week with massive mood crash, the most distressed I have been since 2017. Quit a job. In the process of moving after my parents disapproved of me publishing my book. Attacked by trolls. The first reviews are starting to come in for my debut novel, Pet Purpose: Your Unspoken Voice. Available as an e-book and print-on-demand (which was better quality than I expected).   |
Xanthe WyseXanthe finds creative expression including writing and painting to be therapeutic and helps her to manage her diagnoses of bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Archives
January 2023
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