Happy new year, friends! If you’ve been around for awhile, you know that I like to look back at the previous year before moving on to the next one, so today we’re going to briefly revisit the good and the bad of 2025. And, yes, we’re going to talk about the pope—but stick with me, I promise it’ll be fun. 🙂
Content Note: This post talks about chronic illness and medical gaslighting, so please take care.
The Highlights
★ Unraveled released from Fractured Mirror Publishing, and I got to have a release party for it hosted by Grand Gesture Books in conversation with the lovely Jamie Pacton.
★ I got to do several author events, including speaking on a panel for Bookstore Romance Day and being a conversation partner for Megan Bannen. I signed copies of Unraveled for readers I had never met before, which was a major career goal of mine and such a delight.
★ Speaking of Grand Gesture Books…I got to work there as a bookseller for several months! My book bestie Julie and I got to do a shift together, and we could not stop giggling in excitement about getting to work in a bookstore together—serious life goals.
★ I went to two concerts, one for They Might Be Giants with my dad and one for Ethel Cain with my sister. They were both fantastic (with very different vibes). TMBG is my dad’s favorite band and Ethel Cain is one of my sister’s favorite artists, so it was special to see them live with two of my favorite people. Because of chronic illness and just not liking crowds, going to big events is a rare thing for me, so I’m proud that I went (and got sweatshirts from both concerts to commemorate it). I have now been to five concerts total and 40% of those concerts were for TMBG.
★ In health news, I finally got in to see GI after waiting for about a year (love the American healthcare system). Fortunately, I really like this doctor and she has taken my pain seriously rather than dismissing it (let’s put a pin in this for a couple minutes). We found a new medication that completely treats the GERD that has troubled me for over a decade. Hallelujah!
★ I also finally got to see an OBGYN after a similarly long wait. She clinically diagnosed me with endometriosis after years of excruciating menstrual periods, and my new treatment plan has been very helpful thus far. (A clinical diagnosis just means that I didn’t undergo laparoscopic surgery, which is often how endometriosis is diagnosed and is probably in the future for me, but for obvious reasons it’s best to avoid surgery when possible.)
★ I got ICL surgery, which stands for Implantable Collamer Lens and is essentially a permanent contact lens. (It’s similar to LASIK in terms of pain and recovery time.) I have perfect vision for the first time since I started wearing glasses in second grade, and it has been an absolute dream. Glasses are a sensory nightmare for me, but I couldn’t wear contact lenses because of chronic dry eyes due to medication side effects, so I’ve been dreaming of this surgery ever since I learned about it. It’s one of the best choices I’ve ever made, and I can’t wait to tell you more about it in a future blog post.
★ My husband and I celebrated our four-year wedding anniversary and six years since we met. If we’re talking about good choices, then marrying him is by far the best choice I’ve ever made. 11/10 no notes (and if said husband is reading this, YES that is an improper fraction, YES I prefer them to mixed numbers, and YES I am ready to defend my opinion).
★ The biggest highlight by far from 2025 was adopting my kitty Eleanor! I will write about her next month to celebrate her one-year homecoming anniversary, but suffice it to say that she is an absolute delight and my husband and I are both completely smitten. Cat tax below.
★ We also celebrated Persephone’s seventh birthday and four-year homecoming anniversary; I will include a picture of her at the end of this post, as she is a very good kitty and also deserves admiration.
The Lowlights
It was not a good year for health, so most of my lowlights are related to chronic illness.
★ Unfortunately, despite absolutely loving my job at Grand Gesture Books, I had to quit due to my body not being able to keep up with me. Believe it or not, a bookstore job is actually rather strenuous, because you do a lot of book shelving, which essentially boils down to several hours of squatting and weightlifting. It was too much for me and the resulting episodes of Post-Exertional Malaise (the main symptom of ME/CFS) put me in the ER. This was a real blow, and I’m still bummed about it.
★ Both Eleanor and I were in the emergency room twice this year for swallowing a large piece of fabric, attempting to eat a wooden skewer, stomach pain, and throwing up blood. Can you guess which injury belongs to which of us? All parties are fine, but it was not the most fun way to spend a total of 24 hours and way too many dollars, although viewing Disney/Pixar’s Cars in a veterinary waiting room at 3am was definitely a uniquely surreal experience. (Answers: first two were Eleanor, second two were me.)
★ Remember that asterisk in the highlights about my GI doctor not being dismissive of my pain? I wish I could say the same for all doctors. My primary care provider (PCP), whom I’ve been seeing for about 8 years, disagreed with my Long Covid specialist’s diagnosis and treatment plan for me. She believes my illness is psychosomatic and caused by my mental illness and weight gain since the pandemic, despite both my psychiatrist and therapist agreeing that my anxiety/depression are well-managed. She told me I should not be walking with a cane, despite my physical therapist (who sees many Long Covid patients) being the one who suggested it. She told me I do not have hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome even though I received a clinical diagnosis. The solution, in her mind, is for me to get more exercise, because “you’re being told that you are sick and that’s making you believe that you can’t do things.” As you can imagine, this was deeply upsetting to hear from someone I trusted, but fortunately I’d read about medical gaslighting enough to recognize it, and I was able to transfer to a new PCP at the same clinic. It was a horrible experience and I’ll write about it here in the future. I’m very grateful to the folks who have documented their experiences with medical gaslighting because otherwise I wouldn’t have known what to do, and that’s why I share my own experience in hopes of increasing awareness.
The Pope
The biggest bummer of 2025 for me was that Pope Francis died. Now I’ll be the first to criticize the Catholic Church, but I’m also a huge Pope Francis fangirl. You can read my tribute post about him here. I think it’s fitting that he died the day after Easter (the most important day of the liturgical year) and also pretty legendary that he met JD Vance and his response was just to call it quits. Can’t say I blame him. Anyway, it’s cool that we have an American pope now, and that every single person I know texted me the second that white smoke emerged from the Sistine Chapel. Plus, he plays Wordle and calls his brother every day to discuss that day’s puzzle (his starting word is different every day).
Pope Francis was a tough act to follow, but I’ve been impressed by Pope Leo thus far—particularly with his message of treating immigrants with dignity and respect. He’s repeatedly stated that “inequality is ‘the root of all social ills’,” and that we need to defend the most vulnerable members of society. So I’d like to end this post with one of his quotes on the subject, because God knows the people running this country need to hear it: “How did you receive the foreigner, did you receive him and welcome him, or not? I think there is a deep reflection that needs to be made about what is happening.” Here’s an article with a lot more good quotes.
It’s a scary time right now. Every morning I wake up and check the news half-expecting World War III to be underway. People are being shot in broad daylight, taken from their homes and families, detained without reason, and nobody is being held accountable. Sometimes it seems like the people in power can get away with anything and there’s nothing anyone can do about it—certainly not me. I would be out protesting if I weren’t too sick to get out of bed half the time, but I can’t even do that (shoutout to the Portland Frog for making headlines).
But I’m not powerless. Neither are you. Every moment that we don’t give in to despair is a moment of pushing back. Sometimes it almost feels wrong to write about the good parts of life when there are so many horrors taking place around us. But two things can be true at once: even when it feels like the world is ending, there’s still happiness to be found. They want us to feel hopeless and to give up, but I’ve spent too long fighting depression to allow the world to push me back into that pit. Some days everything is scary and bad. But there are pigeons. There are friends to have coffee with. There are new books to read and season finales to watch and that new Hunger Games movie coming out in November. There might even be new books to write.
So thank you for sticking with me, and I hope 2026 is full of only good things for you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to play my daily Wordle—what’s your starting word?
As promised, Persephone in the Raskög cart.