#visible

Featured Author- @11tay99

This months Featured Author is the Wattpad author 11tay99 talking about her popular book 'Anxiety Attack', and her inspiration behind the story.

Welcome to the #visible campaign book! To start things off, why don't you tell us a little about yourself?

Thanks for having me! Well, my name is Taylor, I'm going to be sixteen in November and I've been writing since forever and playing soccer since I was six . I'm hoping to make the varsity team at my school. I like listening to music, which mostly consists of 5sos, All Time Low and Ed Sheeran, who is ginger like me. I'm a triplet, but not identical, and we're all girls! I both love and hate my sisters at the same time.

Lovely to meet you Taylor! Can you explain to us a little bit about your book 'Anxiety Attack'?

Well, I came up with the idea because of Luke Hemmings and how he had a lip ring but was a total goofball, and I liked the idea that a guy with a piercing was a nice guy, not a bad boy like a lot of stories present. The anxiety came later, after I pictured the "bad boy" comforting the girl after she cried.

When I posted it, a lot of people related to it. I personally don't know what anxiety feels like, because I don't have it had some people told me what it was like, which really helped. StarCrossedThoughts was one.

I also have noticed in stories that the girls issues go away as soon as the boy and the girl date, so I kept anxiety as a common theme throughout

How did you feel once people started to relate to the anxiety you were now portraying? Did how you approach the writing process change?

I don't want to say amazing, because it's actually really sad that many people suffer from anxiety, but I was glad that I was writing something that directly affected tonnes of people in their daily lives. I hope that people found comfort in knowing that they weren't alone and that there were a lot of other people they could talk to. Once I realized this, I just wanted to keep it real. I wanted to make sure that the anxiety attacks my character was suffering from were like the ones my readers were getting, so that it sounded real and not fake. I did focus more on making sure that the anxiety didn't go away completely, because I don't believe a guy can just make it go away. A lot of people messaged me saying they appreciated that.

It's really great you took the time to find out about how anxiety effects real people and projected that into your work. In the story you also deal with topics such as depression and anorexia- how did you go about portraying these conditions while also giving the characters a sense of personal identity?

Well, I figured that having depression or anorexia doesn't define who you are, any more than having anxiety or a piercing does. I made them real people with real problems. Personally, I'm not diagnosed with depression, but after my parents' divorce, I felt sad at times. I still laughed and did all the things I regularly do, even though I was sad, which furthers my belief that it doesn't matter if you don't act any different, you can still have a disorder. Disorders that people have don't define who they are- they shouldn't be discriminated against from having them. I wanted my characters to still be real, and yet have problems like real teenagers. I drew on my own experiences for that.

That is definitely the message this campaign is striving to get across! Do you have any advice for writers out there looking for a way to add a disorder into their story?

My advice is, if you don't know what it is, don't do it. If you can't make it realistic for people who do have it, don't put it in. Ask some people on Wattpad for their experiences. Do research. Don't forget to make your characters real; give them traits beside their disorder. Maybe give them one of their own. And don't forget to keep it realistic, if they have anxiety they aren't going to be able to talk to anyone whenever they please. Make your character have a disorder, but make them love something else. Like music or writing or sports. Let them do things that make them happy, but don't go too far to get rid of the disorder. Especially that. Disorders don't just go away when you meet a boy. If someone has anxiety, their anxiety isn't going to go away just because they have a boyfriend. They're still going to get nervous around things that made them before. I think that's the most important part.

Really excellent advice! So, Taylor. Where do you hope to be in five years? Will you still be writing?

Well, like I said, I'm only just going to be sixteen, so I'll hopefully be in college, in my third year. I want to be a writer when I grow up, so yeah, I'll still be writing. I don't think I can give it up. I might be playing soccer, I'm not sure. I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do in college, but I have two years to figure it out!

I'm sure your fans will be glad to know there is more writing in your future! What are you working on at the moment?

I'm currently writing an Anxiety Attack, spin off, its Luke and Allie's story. Its not focused on mental disorders, but toxic relationships. I'm playing around with a couple of ideas, like people live life in a game where good actions get them points and bad actions loose them. Like Ross City- if you're read Legend, but with a focus on actions the main character thinks are good, but loose points for that. I'm not too sure about that because then I would kind of go dystopian- I'm more of a teen fiction writer.

Sounds like a very interesting topic! Wishing you good luck, I'm sure it will turn out to be an interesting read.

So finally, a question asked to everyone- What does 'diversity' mean to you?

Diversity to me, is everyone being unapologetic, completely who they are. It doesn't matter what colour your hair is, or your eyes, or your skin. You are you and you are beautiful

Great answer- Thanks!