My OCD is ruining my love for writing.

[Deleted member 61829]

I really want to just come up here and vent. I've been diagnosed with a plethora of things. From Bipolar, to Agoraphobia, to Generalized Anxiety Disorder, to--well you get the picture. Anyways, I used to love writing. Everyday I would write shitty fanfiction, and dreamed of becoming a fantasy writer one day, and as I got older and better at writing things just you know spiraled down hill. I developed a set of rules in my head.

1. Work has to be professional. Especially the editing.
2. I have to sound like I'm a professional even researching different synonyms of ordinary words.
3. I have to write exactly 55,000 words or else I'll fail as an author.
4. I have to have the words in a sentence line up or I'll have super anxiety.
5. Sentence structure should be perfect and I should research it more or else I won't be a good writer.
6. I have to outline this way or that way or try to find a way to outline or else I'll never be able to be a good writer.

Rules like that that just make writing impossible. If my structure or writing seems a bit off right now. I'm purposely doing that to combat my OCD because if not I'll be writing the same thing over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over and---well you get the idea. If I have word count on I have to keep track of how many words I have and if I don't meet that goal then I can't stop for the day. I have to continue until I meet that goal. It's gotten to the point that I'm terrified of writing anything because I know I'll be stuck on how a sentence looks, or how many errors are in the document. I really want to enjoy writing again. I miss it.

I also have a horrible time re-reading a certain sentence and then erasing it. If anyone has suggestions on how to continue writing without having an OCD panic attack I'd appreciate it. I'm also in therapy.

 

[autumnveir]

I do not have any of those mentioned before and you'd better ask a professional instead of some random strangers for this, but I have some sort of mental illness that keeps me from focusing.

My method is to write a draft, then edit it after some time. Don't publish it. Just edit it until your feeling of OCD is gone, that your grammar is consistent. You're not alone in this grammar anxiety.
Once you felt that it's gone, don't publish it yet. Try writing a lot of chapters in advance. From what I read, you have OCD in outlining. There will be times when you'll feel deep regret later on. At least you haven't published it yet and still have time to edit it again.
After some time, perhaps 10 chapters back, reread the chapter. If you think it's perfect now, it's fine now.

 

[Topgun1908]

I know nothing about ocd and I am completely unqualified to help, but I'll try to help regardless.

1. Your work will almost always seem professional to at least one person. Everyone has different things they like so while you can focus on getting good grammar, for everything else there will always be people who might prefer it went a different way, or the people who think it is already perfect.
2. Using too many different synonyms that would require the readers to constantly look up definitions is a bad thing. So in this case use whatever synonyms fit with the book or character speaking, intelligent characters may use the more "smart" synonyms while normal people use common synonyms.
3. Don't know if this is exaggeration or if you mean 55,000 words for the entire book rather than the chapter, but long chapters can be annoying to read because readers have no good stopping point. Of course short chapters aren't good either because you actually need something to happen in each chapter, but overall people will consider your chapters good regardless of size if the chapter itself is good.
4. I wouldn't know how to help here.
5. Most readers honestly wouldn't give a crap about proper sentence structure as long as it makes sense. Of course learning proper sentence structure can't hurt. Some authors even intentionally have improper sentence structure in 1st pov to show the character is insane or not thinking straight.
6. Wouldn't know how to help here either.

Again I have no clue what ocd actually is so I might not even be helping but my advice is this: Just write until you think the chapter contains a decent amount of plot or events you're happy with and then you could turn on word count, or just completely ignore word count and just release the chapters regardless of word count. Try to ignore all those mistakes that you think exist until the chapter is done. With the chapter outline done you can go back and make slight changes while keeping in mind that you don't want to rewrite the entire chapter and waste your time. Try to only make grammar changes or only make a small change to how a sentence might be worded. Readers might find your chapters good and then you just have to keep doing the same thing while ignoring whatever you think is wrong with your writing.

Again I want to clarify that I have no idea what ocd is so please don't attack me for anything I said.

 

[K5Rakitan]

I am a professional editor, so I feel you on some of this. That's why I write my drafts in a paper notebook. I edit as I type and then let it sit for a while before giving it a final polish. During the final polish, I have a computer program read aloud to me.

My suggestion is to limit yourself on how many times you edit the story. There will always be something that someone can criticize you on. I've gotten suggestions on writing.com that were either flat-out wrong or I chose to ignore because I prefer the way I wrote it.

Grammar is not an exact science. Different style guides disagree on the rules. If you feel like breaking a rule for emphasis, do it! People don't talk in complete sentences, so don't scrutinize your dialogue too carefully. You might find more freedom writing in first person. That way, the entire story can be shown through the eyes of an imperfect person.

Also, be proud of who you are. This author is dyslexic and clearly didn't hire an editor, but I still enjoyed his book enough to promote it whenever I get the opportunity:

All Saints Hotel and Cocktail Lounge: Monk, Nathan: 9780578955063: Amazon.com: Books

All Saints Hotel and Cocktail Lounge [Monk, Nathan] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. All Saints Hotel and Cocktail Lounge

www.amazon.com

Also, no pitches, please. I'm on maternity leave until my son starts kindergarten, if the Covid situation has resolved itself to my satisfaction by then. As it stands, I'm mentally preparing myself for the possibility of homeschooling.

 

[PancakesWitch]

You look like you're suffering, maybe just stop writing

 

[Marunikyu]

1. ok
2. I do synonyms from time to time
3. 55k words a day? No, you must write EXACTLY 69k words a day or you'll fail.
4. "I have to have the words in a sentence line up or I'll have super anxiety." Tip: change the font size and start all over again.
5. "Sentence structure should be perfect" Good, this makes perfect sense since languages are perfect, the proof is that they never change or evolve throughout history.
6. wut