Dispatches from the Anxiety Den: Aphrodite, Emotional Whiplash, and Learning to Let My Work Exist

I have a strange, emotional relationship with my Aphrodite books.

Some days I look at them and think,
I should unpublish this. I’ve grown so much. I know better now.

Other days, often within the same hour, I think: actually… this isn’t a bad book.

This week tipped me back toward that second feeling.

I’ve been pulling quotes from Aphrodite’s books for TikTok, not rewritten lines, not polished excerpts, just moments lifted straight from the page. And every time one landed, every time someone reacted or commented or said this made me feel something, I felt that familiar, disorienting whiplash.

How can something I’m so ready to disown still sound like me?

The truth is, Aphrodite was written during a time when I didn’t fully trust myself — or the reader. I cared deeply about the emotions on the page, and I doubled down on them. Not because they weren’t there, but because I was afraid they wouldn’t be felt the way I felt them.

That wasn’t a technical flaw.
It was emotional fear.

I wanted the reader to understand.
I wanted the feeling to land.
I didn’t yet believe I could leave space and trust someone else to step into it.

Now, looking back, I can see the seams more clearly — but I can also see the honesty. The intent. The heart. And that’s where my emotions start to swing again.

Because growth doesn’t erase what came before it.
It just makes it easier to see it.

I don’t think my urge to unpublish Aphrodite comes from thinking it’s bad. I think it comes from discomfort, from seeing a version of myself who was still learning, still afraid, still trying very hard to be understood.

And maybe that version of me deserves more grace than I give her.

I even have two different covers for this book. I love both of them. And depending on the day, one feels like the “right” one… until the next day comes and my feelings change again.

That’s the thing I’m learning to sit with:
my emotions about my work are not stable.
They swing.
They contradict each other.
They don’t mean something is broken.

Sometimes they just mean I care.

For now, I’m letting Aphrodite exist — not as a perfect book, not as an embarrassing one — but as a real step in my journey. Proof that even when I didn’t fully trust myself or the reader, I was still writing something honest.

And maybe that’s enough.