To Protect My Relationship, I Had To Stand Up In Court and Defend Myself

“If you wish to be a good writer then write as if nobody will ever read your stories”.

Stupidly I followed the advice that led me straight into a courtroom and cost me all my savings. But most importantly, it nearly cost me my relationship with my stepson.

You see, I am an "aspiring" writer who hoped to get my stories out into the world and receive recognition. But instead, I got a front-row seat in the witness box, where I had to defend my stories. Sounds, unbelievable?

It is.

It all happened last year when I started writing online articles on various trending topics such as mental health. I did all that a writer is advised to do to reach reader engagement and generate the most income. To enhance revenue, I signed up for writing programs: I learnt, studied and researched the topics I chose to write about and to joined and engaged with online communities where these topics were discussed.

I went so far that I have studied a course on Psychology to write more accurately about certain mental health conditions. I’ve done that for over a year, investing over $3,000 into my writing!

I never expected anything in return, I just did what I love the most — writing.

You see, I am a graduated screenwriter: I wrote a movie script, I published several short stories and wrote a few TV screenplays. But somehow I ended up working full-time in the video games industry as a marketing manager.

I wasn't confident enough to continue doing what I love the most. So I choose another career path, more stable. Working in the video games industry has given me financial security but it has never made me fully happy.

Writing online and writing articles about various topics was a completely new field for me, so I believed that in order to succeed I had to invest first and learn more about this new trendy craft.

Ironically writing online articles cost me over $30,000 and my relationship with my stepson.

I told myself: “To succeed online I should write personal stories: open up, spill my guts out, let the reader experience my agony — make them cry, laugh and most importantly drag them to hell with me. I won't ever let them doubt my writing, I will make them blindly believe that my story is the only truth. I will make it so good, that no one would ever consider it to be made up.”

I decided to write all of my stories in the first person and make them as believable as I could. My goal was simple: to provoke, entrap and enchant my readers. After a few stories, my writing was picked up by various popular publications and my reader engagement improved. I was awarded the accolade of being a top writer in a few categories on various websites.

I’ve gained a humble amount of followers, made modest pocket money but was still far from getting that Mustang that I’ve always dreamed of.

During the day, I kept to my usual work — video games marketing, in the afternoon I’ve researched the most provocative topics to write about and in the evening I wrote online, splattering all my thoughts on a paper and sharing it with millions of readers, unaware that I had one avid fan, who was savouring every word I wrote, awaiting an opportunity to misuse it against me.

Out of nowhere, my stepson's mother decided to drag me into her own drama, making defamatory statements about me, portraying me as dangerous, psychotic and even going as far as stating that my alleged behaviours could have endangered a child. Her evidence?

My fictional online stories!

There are no words to describe how I felt when I was accused of the above: it was surreal. I could not grasp my head around it because of multiple reasons, I will name just a few.

First, she has never brought up any issues with me directly, she has always been very friendly to me and has encouraged my presence in my stepson’s life. I've done so much for the child who I choose to love unconditionally. I've always helped his mother when she needed me. It was a shock to realize that for over 5 years she was actually despising me. Let me get one thing straight, I never "stole" her husband. They were never married and they separated before the baby was even born. "Was the real reason, that perhaps her son loved me too much as well?"

I will never know.

Secondly, she has known of my online stories since I have shared them on social media: she has liked them, re-shared them and commented on them, knowing too well, that I am a professional writer!

Thirdly, who is in the right state of mind would surely realize after reading my stories that they are exaggerated and do not define me as a person or anyone else.

I’ve written stories where I depict myself as suffering from countless mental health conditions: OCD, bipolar disorder, borderline, anxiety, depression, agoraphobia, bulimia, anorexia, “spoiled brat syndrome”, anger intermittent disorder, ADHD, ASD, dementia, social phobia — I had it all.

I know a lot of people (many of them are my closest friends) who suffer from these conditions and I just wanted to get it "right" - depict what are these souls going through and always respectfully. All I wished to do, was raise awareness. And I did, but the spotlight was on me.

She accused me that because of these stories it is certain that I am suffering from all of these conditions and therefore I am dangerous.

"Wow. So much for raising awareness and trying to break prejudices!"

I ignored the accusations as they were absurd and honestly, they were undermining. She wasn't only putting me down as a writer and someone who wished to help others, but she was putting down all the actual people who do suffer from these illnesses. Does that mean that someone who has OCD is dangerous to be a parent?!

I knew it to be waste of time to even deal with them. I realized that I have been “targeted” by a scorned person, who perhaps is either unwell or is just plain miserable and wishes to hurt me because of their own insecurities. So I stepped back and focused on my family: my partner and stepchild.

I didn’t react, knowing that reaction would only feed her anger and desperation. I hoped she would just go away. But my most avid fan got creative: she used words from my own stories to come up with situations that have never happened to portray me as “unsafe”!

My relationship with my beloved stepson was jeopardized because of these ludicrous accusations. Social services got involved and to my despair, they were “unsure” if my stories were fictional and whether I could potentially pose a risk to a child.

I could not believe it: how more ridiculous could this situation get?

So I stopped writing, not just online but offline too. All I had left now was my daytime marketing job which didn’t seem appealing like before. I even stopped spending time with my stepson and he felt it. He knew something was going on. One day he told me:

"I don't know why, but my Mummy hates you..."

I felt as if had nothing to look forward to anymore. Was I suddenly experiencing depression myself? We used to play video games together every afternoon, we even came up with awesome comics. He was drawing characters while I was writing the dialogues and plotlines. It was our thing. The thing that was taken from us.

My writing routine was gone. I was angered, and I regretted writing online stories. I even considered deleting all of my stories, writing profiles and burning all of my manuscripts.

“Damn you all, I never should have fallen in love with a pen!”

You see, I love writing. It is my escape. By writing, I can explore outer worlds, smell various scents, become somebody else, re-live lives and fall in love over and over again.

Writing lets me live without fear, feel unconditional love, mourn and laugh at the same time. It lets me create and meet people that I will never truly meet and delve inside their souls searching for their true purpose.

The day I stopped writing I realized that if I am not writing, I am not living either.

In the last two years, I thought of leaving my safe and stable career in video games: I’ve felt as if I gave it my all and it was time to move on. Somehow I never took that step, because I wasn’t prepared to depend on one thing that I love the most — writing.

I took cowardly baby steps instead: I kept my daytime job, occasionally I wrote video game characters and I wrote articles, hoping that one day one of my stories will go viral and then perhaps I would be able to write full-time. I also had savings which I planned to invest into property and to take that next courageous step and live from writing.

I was supposed to take that step last year, instead, I ended up in court.

To save my relationship with my stepson and clean my name I submitted all the evidence to disprove the lies. I gave all of my medical records, even though Judge has never asked for them. It was her, she wanted to know everything about me. I obliged.

I didn’t write for 6 months as I lived in fear that If I write, every world would be again used against me. At times, when I tried writing my stories were under censorship.

Writing suddenly became torturous: my hands very cuffed, my lips shut while my mind was broken.

Social services considered that it would be best if I attend the court to provide evidence about my writing in person! Even though their decision puzzled me, it awakened my inner writer who craved the once in a lifetime experience of being in court.

I had a choice to make, either I stand by my written statements and don’t show up or I show up and protect my relationship with my stepchild, defend my stories and stand up for myself.

Somehow, the decision to go to court has awakened me. As if along with the decision to go to court, another unconscious decision was made — to be who I always wanted to be, a writer.

In court, I was questioned for two hours: I was confident, concise and I knew what I wanted from the future. I stood there and spoke about my stories, the motivation behind writing, the relationship with my stepchild, I spoke of myself a lot. I opened up. It felt as if I was bare naked there but at the same time, I felt bulletproof. I had nothing to hide: I have so much to say and to be proud of.

The prosecution kept on pressing unsuccessfully, they were impatient, frustrated, they wished to break me but they could not.

I could not stop talking. I was silent too long. I didn’t want to leave the witness box anymore: I wished to be heard.

I wasn’t protecting my writing anymore, I was there to stand up for myself.

You see, many people enjoy putting others down. These people live in denial about their true circumstances in life, they are prisoners of their own minds, they are truly unhappy. I’ve been put down a lot in the past for being different and challenging the norms.

Choosing whether a person should stand up to hatred comes down to what you can or cannot live with.

I can’t live without writing. I can’t live without speaking my mind. I can’t live without being my true self. I can't live without my family.

On that day in court, my true story was heard, and I was free to parent my stepson, free to write, and free to be myself.

On that day in court, I made my own judgement.

I quit my daytime job and parted ways with the video games industry. I decided to become a full-time writer. Perhaps the time isn’t right for such a step as I have no savings, no backup plan.

But then again, there is never a right time. What matters is to always do what is right by myself. In order to find my purpose, I had to lose my freedom and learn how to stand up to myself.

And I will always be grateful to my most avid reader.

"Thank you for helping me realize how strong I am."