Hi… I’m Back?? (A Recap on Everything that Happened While I Was Hiding From Everyone)

Hi… I guess I’m back??

I thought I was going to be back when I posted my review for The Fever King but apparently life had other plans and loves to hold me captive!

A Lot of things have happened since I last posted a monthly wrap-up (for… January??), so I decided to just write a neat little recap of everything that happened while I was gone as an update post, since there are a lot of things I want to talk about!

Unfortunately, I did not do the blog-hopping and comment-replying I really hoped to get done during my hiatus (you’ll see why), but I feel a lot more refreshed from this break and hopefully you’ll see more of that for the rest of this month!!

   

   

In February, I read 6 books: Lore Olympus, The Weight of Our Sky, King of Scars, Heir’s Game, Mage & Demon Queen, and The Weight of the Stars.

3 of these were actual novels and 3 were webcomics, so I guess it was better than January with 4 books (novels)??? Most were 4 to 4.5 stars, except for Mage & Demon Queen, which was just… a very wild experience let me say.

I want to point out King of Scars, though, since I have STRONG feelings about it: It was super enjoyable for me and I really loved reading it… but it would’ve been 5 stars if not for that ending!!! It’s only a half star off, but the ending annoys me to no end and I hate it, and while I know Leigh will do something amazing with it, just… WHY.

   

    

So far in March, I’ve read 6 books, and they’ve all been rereads and full-length novels: Aristotle and Dante, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, The Song of Achilles, The Foxhole Court, The Raven King, and The King’s Men. These are all huge, heartbreaking gay favorites of mine and it has hurt so much to reread them (but it’s worth it!!).

All of these are 5 stars, of course, besides the All for the Game trilogy (4, 4.25, and 4.5, respectively). I honestly made a huge mistake rereading the AFTG series, since I knew that it would put me in a hangover and I’m already currently in a slump, but it’s okay!! I’ve dealt with this before!!! It can’t kill me!!!!

I don’t know what other books I’ll read before the end of the month, but it might include some Heroes of Olympus books that I’m rereading with this recycling sign. I don’t know how I’ll handle rereading these knowing what happens in The Burning Maze, but it’s fine!! I’m forcing Prag to be my emotional support friend!!!

(I’m secretly hoping to read 9 or 10 books by the end of March but now that I’ve said it out loud I’ve probably jinxed it.)

Okay, I’m going to be very very honest with all of you: multiple times during my break, I was dreading returning to blogging, dreading replying to comments, dreading commenting on blog posts. It was my fear come to life, the paranoia that once I took a break from blogging I would never return, which my mind fought with because how could I possibly not keep doing something I loved?

Luckily, that dread has strangely disappeared for now, and I’m really excited to be back! I don’t know if it’s just because I love writing wrap-ups and that’s what’s currently keeping me motivated, or if it’s just a one day thing before I go back to dreading everything, but I’m taking it one day at a time.

And I’m making myself a promise from now on: Whenever I see comments pop up in my notifications and I read them, I’ll reply to them. It’s so weird that I’ve come to this point, but an anxious part of me keeps telling me that replying immediately makes you all judge me. Which is just dumb and my anxiety speaking, but I’ve been struggling with it for a year now and it’s something I want to work to overcome!!

Anyways, pretty much nothing happened blogging-wise (I never opened WordPress once while on my ski trip), but I’m determined to make something happen for the rest of this month. I’m going back to school today, which means limited time again, but I really do promise to try!

…I don’t want to talk about it.

So many life things have happened recently, and I don’t particularly remember them in chronological order, so here’s just a list of things that have happened while I was gone!

• First off, I got the flu (or a very severe cold, we’re not sure which) that had me bedridden for like four days, and I missed a lot of school and schoolwork because of that!! This was at the beginning of March, when I was hoping to come back from my blogging break, but that + all the work I had to make up for school kept me super busy.
• I also went skiing over spring break (which was this past week for me), and it was a lot of fun! Memorable events include me faceplanting into the snow on only my second run, losing my ski while getting on the ski lift, and having to abandon the car and take shelter under an overpass on our ride back because of an extreme tornado warning!!

 

• And on to the whole reason I took this break: mental health, which did Not get better during my hiatus, because of course, my brain loves to be uncooperative! Breakdown-wise, I had a breakdown at school over one (1) math quiz question I couldn’t do, and I had a Very Big Breakdown in front of my mom at home. In general, I think my depression is getting worse!
• [TW: suicide] || A few weeks ago, I also received the news that one of my old teachers had died by suicide, which messed with my mental health even more and pushed back my return to blogging. (I’m doing okay now for those wondering!)
• Luckily, after my ski trip, I’m feeling a lot better and more relaxed and less breakdown-y. It probably won’t last when I go back to school tomorrow, but I’m hoping that my horrible past quarter will motivate me to actually Change My Habits for the last quarter of school!!

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how have you all been? any good heartbreaking gay books you’ve read recently to add to my streak?? link me to any blog posts of yours that I missed and you want me to read!