User blog:Zonerz/Why I left the Sonic Fandom and havent been back until recent

Right so! I've some explainging to do

Im sure most of my DA watchers remember my Sonic phase a couple years back and boy, I was infatuated with it but then, within a year(?), dropped it pretty out of the blue and didnt give much of a reason and I completely abandoned the wiki and my FC's. I suppose I don't NEED to give one either, but this has been on my chest for along while anyways.

So, when I first got into the Sonic series, I was leaving the 5th grade and transitioning into Middle School. Sonic I guess became a special interest I guess (I believe that's the term but am I not sure if I am using it correctly, please correct me if Im wrong haha) and I think I especially focused on it to take off some of the stress I had that came with going into this whole new school with 3x as many kids as Im used to. I was about 11-12 going through all of this I think. But anyways

I remember when I first joined the fandom, and realized how happy being a part of it made me, I said I wasn't going to ever let anything ruin it for me. Even all of the haters and critics of the community I said wouldnt get to me. And low and behold, those didnt, but partially my friends and myself  did.

I used to talk about Sonic a lot in the 6th grade, because I liked it, and thought others might enjoy hearing too because heck, it made me happy right? So why not some others? Well, my little 6th grade-bursting-with-confidence-self, didn't quite understand or catch that idea that it was annoying as all hell. And so, my friend's annoyance with me built up throughout the whole year until Spring Break where my little group f friends that I had had since 1st grade just bluntly told me one day, "Hey man, you're annoying, can you leave us alone?"

And hell I d o no t blame them L M A O but it still hurt even when in later times my closer friends said the same thing.

So with all this, I became frustrated and angry and didn't really know where to project it or how to deal with it so I just latched it onto Sonic. Not just the character, but the fandom, the company, SEGA, my own characters and ideas. It has gotten so bad that every time I would look or glance at any of my old art, whether it's in the little 'also by this user' pop-up you get when Im looking at my other pictures or a little glance at the folder in my gallery labelled 'Sonic', I cringe. My gut twists and ties itself up and I just would get filled with this overwhelming shame and disgust with myself. It didn't help that the summer after, I forced myself to try and continue, which probably made it worse for myself. I couldn't stand it much longer so I dropped it. I didn't say it at the time, or ever really, because I was hopeful that maybe, maybe one day I would be able to sit down, and just enjoy it all again without hating myself or being scared of what my friends would possibly do.

It's been a good 3 years since I dropped it all, and it's been nice, I wont lie. But idk, lately Ive been seeing some stuff pop up every once in awhile and I honestly miss it. I miss the characters and the fanart, the high spirited characters throughout it. And it was nice because for the first time, I was able to miss it without any other negative feelings building up. (Especially excited for the whole Nazo saga continuing, the animation so far is gorgeous, Chakra is outdoing himself!!)

And Im pretty much rambling at this point, but I wanted to get this out. I want to enjoy it again, I dont want to hate myself everytime I draw one of these characters that I absolutely love. And I think I'm gonna start doing that.

Now dont think Im going back to how it was a few years ago where Sonic was the ONLY thing i ever uploaded haha, heck no. Im just gonna be more open with drawing the characters again, because it's fun and I miss it. I miss it a lot.

I wanted to formally apologize to everyone that I just dropped when i left, who I could've had awesome friendships with, you didnt deserve that. Also to my watchers who came just for my Sonic art, Im sorry but I hope you understand.

I'm basically gonna restart. Ive already cleaned out a lot of my gallery of old Sonic art that had a lot of memories attached that I just needed to let go of for the better, Im sorry if any of it was something you enjoyed, but I want to continue and deleting them was one step for me to move forward and past this. To let go.