Sigh.
I don't even know where to start.
So, I guess I can start at the very beginning. One of the things about Wattpad is that it totally changed my life. Dramatic, I know, but let me explain.
Now, I'm sure there are plenty of you who feel the same, or maybe I'm just weird, but I get the feeling that a lot of my life has been consumed by this app/website.
This isn't to say that Wattpad is the spawn of the devil or anything. In fact, I think it's a blessing that so many amazing stories can be accessed for free.
The thing is, I feel like I lost my old self after I started using Wattpad. Like, there are so many occasions when I think, "this year would have been so much better if I never knew Wattpad," or "I wish I could go back to before I found out about Wattpad."
Before this gets any more depressing, I'll get down to the point of why I feel this way. Or at least why I think I feel this way. I believe that it took four simple steps for me to lose myself:
● Obsession
● Consumption
● Corruption
● Drainage
Now, before you go on thinking those are titles for a series of dark romance books, let me explain, starting with the first bullet point.
OBSESSION
When I first started Wattpad, it was like I was a puppy freshly released into a wide meadow. There was so much to explore, so many flowers to sniff at, so much land to cover. I could read books, make new friends, and most of all, I could finally share the fantastic story I was stashing away in an old Word document with the world.
(This was when I had an older account)
It was love at first sight, or download, so to speak. The first few weeks, possibly months, after I got Wattpad, I was completely hooked. Every waking moment, I spent thinking about how many reads I got or how many I could get in the future.
It was great. I met my first online friends, I got my first taste of what it's like to be an author, and I got to enjoy some great content from fellow writers. So far, so good.
But, my obsession with the app got to the point when I stayed up till 2 in the morning on a school night just to read or write. It was such an easy way to procrastinate, too.
CONSUMPTION
When I say consumption, I'm talking about consumption of content, consumption of my time, consumption of storage in my phone, and a bunch of other things that were consumed by both myself and the app.
Seriously. This stupid app literally made me lose like two to three hours of sleep every night. School was hell. I was a freaking zombie. It didn't help that I was just starting high school when I got the app.
Even in the current day, when I'm in freaking college, I can't seem to stay away from here. No matter how hard I try. :'(
And not to mention how much space it takes on my phone. It's over 200 (or is it 400?) MB! I'm not sure if that means anything to any of you, but when phones start warning you that you're running out of storage space, you know it's almost time to change your phone before it starts acting crazy.
Anyway, I soon got to meet the darker side of Wattpad.
When I say "darker" side of Wattpad, I don't mean the horror genre. I love horror and darkness. Heck, my username is freaking dark_affinity!
No. I'm talking about the thing that robbed the innocence of my mind:
.
.
.
Hotdogs.
Lol, no.
I'm talking about smut or erotica or word porn or whatever the heck you call these things.
CORRUPTION
Now, I know that there's a whole profile dedicated to these kinds of stories, and I'm not saying that no one can write them, but I swear, I was completely and utterly shocked when I read about what people do in the bedroom.
No, I was not twelve or under when I started Wattpad. No, I did not actively search for erotic stories. Most of the exposure came from stories that people requested me to read. Yes, I knew what sex was and how it operated. It's basic biology.
It was just...
Look, if you're gonna put the great details of coitus in your story, can you please say so?
I'm sure most of you already do this. Way back in 2014-2015, though, I rarely saw stories marked as mature.
Anyway, I ended up reading way more than I needed to about what it feels like to have sexual intercourse. Way more than I would've liked.
And so, my life was ruined.
Joking, but seriously. I was never the same after learning that. And boy, did I wish I never knew some of those things at many points of my post-wattpad life.
DRAINAGE
This, I think, is the worst one. After frolicking through the field of Wattpad books and chucking a few of my own bones in the meadow, I began to get tired.
To continue using the puppy analogy, it's like the meadow only looked great, but was actually there to trap unsuspecting puppies in order to drain their life energy, bit by bit. Kinda like the floating island in Life of Pi.
Maybe, that's a bit harsh, but when the momentum of my stories began to slow down and when things began to get repetitive, it felt like my life was draining away.
Wattpad had consumed so much of my time and life that when I wasn't on the app, I had no idea what to do. I couldn't remember what I used to do to have fun before Wattpad came into my life.
I began to isolate myself from friends and family. I didn't get depressed, per se, but it was like all my ideas and all my creativity just died. I just couldn't do anything anymore. All I could do was do my regular check on Wattpad. Maybe post an update or two here, read a chapter of a book there. And that's it. Nothing else came out. My productivity just up and left.
To this day, I still feel like Wattpad is taking too much space in my brain and draining any bright idea I get there. There are a few reasons for that, but this is getting way longer than I suspected, so I guess I'll file it away for another time.
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Whew! That was even more depressing than I thought. :/
Honestly, I didn't want the beginning to be so heavy. This seems more like a journal than a rant. Oh well. There will be plenty of room for salt, so no need to worry. :3
Anyone else part of the Salt-shaker family? If you know what I'm talking about, then we can be saltE (see what I did there?) together!
In the words of my old school principal,
"See ya!"