Hey guys, this is another RANT rant where some parts may not make sense because I'm essentially going to be doing a brain dump about some things that have been on my mind essentially since Havoc won a Watty last year. It's obvious that my account has grown pretty exponentially in those 4 months. I've gained 2 thousand more followers, had a HUGE influx of new readers, and reached some pretty huge milestones in my stories.

The weird thing is that I haven't changed anything. I haven't published a new fic in over a year, I haven't changed fandoms or hopped on a bandwagon for a popular love interest/fandom, etc. I think most of it comes from the revival of the TMR fandom and TikTok. I'll just sit here and suddenly I'm already at 15.3k when I just reached 15k earlier this month???

It feels like this

I've noticed that so much growth in such a short period of time has shaken things up quite a bit. There was no adjustment period; it's just been very rapid growth with no time for me to really absorb wtf is going on. And I've also noticed that people have started to treat me less and less like a person.

Let me explain. When you see an account on here with a few followers, you tend to see them as more down-to-earth and humble; they're like "one of you". But as an account grows either in reads, follower count, or both, you start to see less and less of a connection between their account/their work and them.

For example, if you see a book that doesn't have a lot of reads, you're more likely to talk to the author directly in your comments, like "You've done a great job with this!" or something of the sort. I can't tell you how many comments I've gotten on Different (my most popular book by far) where people talk about me as if I'm not even there. Someone was like "Ew please don't tell me she likes Teresa." Like ???? I'M RIGHT HERE!! So I responded, "Yes, 'she' does." People look at the read count and assume I won't see what they say, so they're more likely to say things they wouldn't normally say if they knew the author was reading their comments.

Another thing that comes with a large follower account is a new set of expectations. People start to see me as a role model, and while that makes me feel pretty honored that people see me in such a regard, it also is intimidating. I become afraid to be negative, make mistakes, or behave like I normally would because I feel like I have to maintain this image of who people expect me to be. That's why you'll usually see me acting more like myself in this book or my author's notes. My profile is usually where I tend to talk in a certain way because I'm hyperaware of the fact that everyone can see what I'm saying and that's where they go to decide whether they want to follow me or not.

And it's so much easier to say "Be yourself!!!" than to actually do it. I consider myself to be a down-to-earth person and those who know me personally/talk to me outside of Wattpad may be able to attest that I'm chill irl and most of my personality translates into this site (charliehunnamlimhrf nocturnalamp, and other friends, can you attest to this? Not my anxiety acting up rn).

Here's the thing: in real life, if you were to just see me walking down the street, I am very shy. I tend to keep to myself and am quiet, but on this site, I talk to new people every single day. I confront people in my comments when I'm honestly the least confrontational person ever. In some ways, I feel like this is my Hannah Montana life because my friends who have no idea about my account, well, have no idea about my account. I'm like the person you'd least expect to have 15k followers on a social media platform.

These expectations have recently started to extend to social issues. As you guys know, I do my absolute best to use my platform for the better and raise awareness about various issues and post links to places to donate, petitions, articles, etc. But of course I can't talk about every single thing that's happening in the world, because there's a lot, and some people have had problems with this. I've gotten messages saying that since I haven't talked about something, then that must mean I don't care or that I'm performative.

Someone sarcastically told me that "my OCs show SOOOOOOOO much diversity" and they didn't even read my books??? Literally anyone who's cracked open one (1) story of mine knows that I do my absolute best to represent various ethnicities, cultures, religions, sexualities, social issues, etc, in my stories, and I do the work. I put in the research. I listen to the people who belong to these groups and change things accordingly if they offer constructive criticism, I ask them for help, etc. I can't possibly represent every single thing that exists on this earth, but I try my hardest to include as many different things as I can. Idk if they looked at my covers and saw some white (or white-passing) faceclaims or what, but that comment made no sense. I'm not saying I'm the pinnacle of diversity by ANY means, but I know that I try my hardest and do so much research to make my stories diverse.

Just because I do not post an announcement about something doesn't mean that I don't care. Wattpad isn't my only form of social media. I use Tumblr a lot and that's where I find many of the petitions I share; WP has a limit of 3 announcements per day but hitting the post limit (if it even still exists) on Tumblr is very hard, so it's easier to reblog and reblog stuff. I've donated and signed and spoken up, even if you personally don't see that on Wattpad. It doesn't mean it's not happening.

Also, please don't see me as a news outlet. I am not a journalist, news anchor, etc and I shouldn't be your primary source for information. There comes a certain sense of self-responsibility when it comes to staying up-to-date on current events. If you rely on a random girl on Wattpad to keep you aware of what's going on in the world, then you are going to be missing out on a lot of stuff. Yes, I use my platform as best as I can, but again, I can't cover everything.

This post from @/ankle-beez on Tumblr is talking about Twitter but I think it applies to here as well:

"the way twitter culture actively manipulates and warps people's minds into thinking that if you truly stand for something you have to talk about it and retweet posts about it 24/7 with no breaks and if you take a single break to collect yourself and distract yourself with something that makes you happy you're not really in support of whatever the incredibly important thing that's going on at the moment is is an incredibly dangerous thing to propagate and is actively harming how people approach these topics."

Again, I am a person. I'm not an omnipotent figure behind this account who's just pumping out fanfics and all-aware of everything that's happening on this god-forsaken planet. I am a person with feelings and thoughts of my own, and I see your comments and messages. I see when you come on my work and say things like I'm not even there. I am a person just as I was when I joined this orange hellsite, only now I have a fuckton more followers than I ever thought I would.

People have started to see me differently and I wish that wasn't the case. Wattpad is starting to feel more like a job again because I get so many notifications daily that taking a break for, like, a day feels impossible. I'll get 1k notifications and then feel insanely bad because Wattpad won't show me all of them and I hate missing anyone's comments, announcements, or updates. You guys know that I love being connected with my followers and it feels harder to do that.

I also switch from being hyperaware of my follower account to forgetting that people perceive me. Like I forget that there are real people who have read my stories and think about them. Someone tagged me in a TikTok where they mentioned my fics and people in the comments were like "omg I've read all of Kristyn's books" "omg yes Kristyn's books are life" and I sat there, in confusion, for like 5 minutes because sometimes I forget I'm a human being. It's hard to conceptualize just how many people have read my stories/know about me until something like that happens, and it's hella cool but also hella existential-crisis-causing.

So yeah lol. Please don't get me wrong, I'm beyond grateful for everything (my middle school self wouldn't be able to believe it if present-day me told her she'd get this far) but I just wanted to discuss the things I've been feeling. I'll probably update my therapist on these matters cuz she knows about my account and is always interested to hear about the tea on my "secret double life" lmao.

Peace out. I need to study for my Physiology final OOPS.