Hello ,

My eyes feel like I've spent spent nine hours swimming in the ocean—without goggles.

My heart feels like it's four sizes too big for my chest cavity and that it would rather be pumping blood inside a hibernating black bear. It doesn't want to be working so darned hard right now.

My body is limp, like my arms are too heavy to even lift a soothing cup of chamomile tea to my still quivering lips. (Which is actually okay since I despise chamomile tea).

I've sighed at least nineteen thousand times since Sunday morning, when I put my phone down after an emotional three hours.

As I gathered up all the tear- and snot-filled tissues that I'd dropped on the floor, darling Mr. Bloom shook his head and asked,

"Why did you do this to yourself?"

But I couldn't answer, since I had no voice. And I feared if I tried to speak about it, I'd start crying again...

Today I can type about it ... just two words ...

Regretting You.

Another two words:

Colleen Hoover.

The two words my writing buddy used to describe her novels, after I told her the story wrecked me:

Trauma porn.

I intended to write to you yesterday, but I took an afternoon nap instead. I never nap. And today, I still feel like my emotional world has been upturned.

This was my first Colleen Hoover experience. I don't regret reading Regretting You... but holy mother of pearl, I will not wade so cavalierly into her story pool again.

Do you read Colleen Hoover's stories?

And if you do, what emotional self-care routine do you use before, during and/or after delving into her world?

Thankfully, the next titles on my e-reader are rom-coms ... I need a good romantic laugh. Or a thousand.

Here are a few of my recent recommendations, books I read before I stepped outside of my normal fare.

You can see my short reviews and get links to the books on BookBub.

If you do check them out, I'd love for you to follow me, if you don't already! I'll have a new release coming out very soon and that's the best way to hear about it since I've been pretty loosey-goosey with email this summer ... 😞

Danika's rom-com reads

I trust you're keeping well. Hope you're managing to stay comfortable in whatever crazy weather the skies might be dropping on you this summer.

love&devastatedstuff,

Danika

xo

PS — I'm not kidding —how do you handle reading a Colleen Hoover story? I can't take 24 hours off work to recover, the next time I pick up one of her books... and still, I feel a strong pull to put myself through the emotional wringer again... we are strange creatures, aren't we?