: How to Write About Uncomfortable Subjects? I'm thinking about revisiting an old project of mine that's always given me trouble, thinking that I can finish it this time since I've grown as a

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My normal advise on this would be to gloss over the gory details, the degree depending on the target audience, but that appears to be a non-answer here so:

There is a story I wrote when I was in high school that I don't even like to think about because of the personal... stuff... around it. I get it out occasionally and work on it when I'm not feeling great anyway and because I can't feel that much worse it has a lot less impact than it does when I bump into it looking for something else on a good day. That is one possible if not too healthy approach to working on things that don't sit well with you.

I feel I should ask something here; is the effort you are putting in furthering the goal? If this is a piece for publication and you are as uncomfortable with writing it as you appear to be indicating for the reasons given are you going to be okay with publishing the work when you finally get the process finished? If the work is purely for the benefit of writing it for yourself because you feel you'll benefit from getting this matter on paper it appears to not be working that way for you. If you're benefiting from the piece then I wish you all the luck in the world getting through it but hard won experience tells me there are pieces you have to drop or you go crazy.

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You've already got a pretty good method: put it away again and see if you can write about it later. It took me 10 years or so to finally make a story of a particular upsetting event. It came out pretty well and was published last year.

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