Finding the Answer to the Problem

Before I start this story I want to mention that I’ve never sat down and spoken about this particular topic before; not with my husband or my parents, or anyone else close to me. People may have caught glimpses of the issue here and there, every now and then, but I’ve never taken the initiative to grab someone important to me and just talk about what I was feeling. Honestly, that’s just the kind of person I am. I like to keep my baggage to myself. But today, inpsired by a fellow blogger who recently had a very helpful doctor’s appointment, I’m going to tell you a little about what I dealt with internally for several years.

Some time before I was married, I found myself in my doctor’s office with a laundry list of complaints. I wasn’t sure if they were connected in any way, but I was hoping that there was some simple answer for why I was tired all the time (regardless of how much sleep I got), was often very lethargic, and had a lot of difficulty losing weight, amongst other annoyances. I’d done a bit of research and thought that perhaps I had a thyroid problem. Communicating this idea to my doctor was a bit tricky because he’s a difficult man to talk to sometimes; he tends to quickly make up his mind about what he thinks the problem is, and then he’s like a dog with a bone, refusing to let go even when new information is presented. For comparison, when my daughter was an infant and was constipated for over a week, I had three separate appointements with this doctor during which all he kept telling me was to give her fruit juice…despite the fact that I’d explained several times that she flat-out refused to swallow it.

So here I am, talking to my one-track-mind doctor, trying to convince him that I think I have a thyroid problem and that I’d like to be tested, and he comes out with this gem: “I think you’re depressed. I’m going to prescribe you an antidepressant.”

I was flabbergasted. I honestly couldn’t see how the complaints I had added up to a mental problem. I was certain that it had to be a physical issue – something that was off about my body, not my brain. “And besides,” I thought, “I’m not sad.” I knew that depression could come in many forms and that being depressed doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re sobbing all the time, but I genuinely didn’t feel like I was anything resembling depressed.

Somehow that day I managed to convince dog-with-a-bone to send me for the thyroid test before pushing pills on me, and I left that appointment satisfied that I was going to get some blood drawn, return to my doc, and get a prescription for thyroid meds that would make me feel loads better. But then my tests came back perfectly normal – on the low end of normal, perhaps, but still normal. I was honestly quite surprised, and the dog took his opportunity to start gnawing at that old bone again. I left the second appointment with a prescription for antidepressants and a gut feeling that they weren’t going to do a thing for me.

Now here’s the thing: I’m sure that there are lots of depressed people out there who truly don’t believe that they are depressed, or know that they are but don’t believe that medication will help, or are so concerned with all the stigmas that are associated with mental health problems that they refuse to admit that they might have one. But I wasn’t one of those people. I knew that depression wasn’t my problem. I couldn’t tell you how I knew, but I knew. And I was right. After over a year of taking the antidepressants as prescribed, I felt absolutely no different.

I officially stopped taking the pills after my wedding, when my husband and I decided that I was going to go off my birth control. I figured that since I was getting nothing out of them anyway, there was no point in risking that the medication might have an affect on a possible pregnancy. I stopped taking both the antidepressants and my birth control pills at the beginning of November 2009. In March of 2010 I took a positive pregnancy test, and in early December of 2010 I gave birth to my beautiful baby girl.

Fast forward to about two months after my daughter’s first birthday. Though I hadn’t thought about them in a while, I started to notice that some of my old symptoms were bothering me again, with an added joy: I started to have some pretty awful mood swings. I didn’t often express them out loud, but I would find myself getting extremely over-emotional about stupid, pointless things. If my husband left his clothes on the floor I would get enraged and want to put my fist through a wall. If I couldn’t get the baby to eat I would have to struggle to fight back the tears. At first I attributed it all to stress, since at this point my husband and I had both been unemployed for about five months and were just starting to seek employment out West. But the mood swings continued in full force even after I was back to work. I would be perfectly fine one moment, and then with the slightest provocation I would find my face growing hot and my throat choking up as I fought to keep myself from either bursting into tears or punching someone right in the nose. For the most part I managed to keep this inner turmoil stuffed firmly down in the bottom of my stomach, but every now and then I would say or do something that would have people looking at me like I’d suddenly lost my mind. It was all terribly frustrating and I wondered on several occasions if Iwas losing my mind. I almost went back to my doctor to ask for another antidepressant prescription. I was still confident that it wouldn’t help, but I hated feeling this way and couldn’t think of anything else to do.

It wasn’t until early 2013 that I started to realize some things. First, I’d had a truly excellent pregnancy. Though I would up with some pretty bad back pain in the last trimester, I’d been quite happy and issue-free throughout the pregnancy. Second, although I’d had to deal with the lack of sleep and mountain of emotions that come with having a young baby, the first year of my daughter’s life had ultimately been quite normal as well. My various complaints, along with the descent into Mood Swing Hell, had only cropped back up a little while after my daughter’s first birthday. So, I thought to myself, what was the common thread between the time before I’d gotten pregnant and the time after my daughter’s first birthday?

It didn’t take me very long to come up with the answer: my birth control pills. I’d gone off the pill in order to get pregnant, and had gotten pregnant only a few months later. After my daughter was born I’d opted for an IUD for birth control because I’d read that the hormones from the pill can leech into breastmilk. But then, when I officially decided that I was finished with breastmilk, I’d gone back to the pill because I’d had issues with the IUD – and that was right around the time of my daughter’s first birthday. My symptoms had disappeared a few months after I stopped taking my birth control pill, and had returned (with friends) a few months after I started taking them again.

Luckily, only a few weeks after my revelation, I had an appointment with my OB-GYN, who is a much easier doctor to communicate with. So, determined to prove to myself that I wasn’t simply insane, I took a deep breath and asked the doc, “Could my birth control pills be giving me mood swings?” You can’t imagine the relief I felt when she looked back at me and replied, “Oh, absolutely.”

I left that appointment with a prescription for a different brand of birth control pills – one that is known for being less likely to cause mood problems. And though the changeover to the new pill caused a couple of issues with my cycle for the first few months, I’ve felt a hundred times better ever since. My moods are back to normal (or as normal as the moods of the mother of a toddler can ever be), I’ve been sleeping better and subsequently feeling more awake and alert, and I’ve found that I’ve been gaining a rekindled interest in things that I had once been too lazy and lethargic to bother with for a long time. I’m still having a hard time losing weight, but there are a host of other reasons for that.

The reasons I’m choosing to share this story now are threefold:

One, as a reminder that it’s okay to complain if you aren’t feeling well. Even if you think that your complaints are trifling or that no one will take you seriously, you should still see someone if you think that there might be something wrong. Follow your gut.

Two, if you think that your doc isn’t taking you seriously, or that they are taking you in the wrong direction on something, insist on a second opinion. Find another practitioner or ask to see a specialist. Just don’t settle for the first opinion if it doesn’t feel right. Medical diagnostics is not an exact science; doctor’s make mistakes.

Third, sometimes it’s just nice to talk about these things – or in my case, write about these things. It can be embarassing, it can make you feel weak and pathetic, but it can also feel great. We all keep our crap buried down deep inside where it sits and festers, but if you’re brave enough to turn over that soil and plant some seeds, maybe – just maybe – something beautiful will grow.

The Princess Defence

For what seems like ages now, I’ve been reading about the bashing of Disney Princesses. The common thread, for the most part, seems to be the poor example that these princesses set for our daughters by teaching them that love is everything, that your man is the most important thing in your life, and that you need a prince to come and rescue you. People have praised the most recent princess, Merida from the Disney-Pixar film, Brave, for being the first and only princess to not give a damn about men and to stand true to herself, her dreams, and her desire to live her own life.

That’s great. Honestly and truly. I thought Brave was a great movie and I loved that Merida was such a headstrong girl with an “I don’t want to be a damn princess!” attitude.

However, as a woman who grew up with Disney movies, who has always loved all of the Disney Princesses, I feel a strong need to defend the others who have been so often picked upon.

Let’s go down the list, shall we?

They’re pretty and they like men! BAD ROLE MODELS GRR RAWR!!!!

Snow White
To say that Snow White was a useless woman just waiting for her prince to save her is completely false. When this film starts out, love is the furthest thing from Snow White’s mind. At the start of the film she is simply a sweet girl who happens to be hated by a crazy evil queen. She is chased from her home and finds herself living deep in the woods with the seven dwarfs. She takes care of the dwarfs, teaches them common courtesies and how to clean up after themselves. She is then tricked by the evil queen in disguise into putting herself into a coma-state, which she awakens from by the good prince’s kiss. Okay, yes, in the end it was the prince who saved her. But it could have been anyone, really. Snow White wasn’t a useless woman sitting around and waiting for a handsome man to save her; she just happened to land in trouble because a crazy, evil, witch queen had it in for her, and as a result she wound up in a position where she needed saving. Guess what? Everyone on this planet needs a little saving once in a while. Not a horrible lesson for little girls, in my opinion.

Cinderella
Again, we have here a sweet young lady who has seen a lot of hardship…her father passed away and left her to the evils of her truly despicable mother-in-law and spoiled rotten sisters-in-law. She is forced to do all the housework, live in a tiny room in the attic, and never have any kind of life of her own at all. Is it any wonder that the poor girl dreams of a better life, of a loving family built with a loving man? Sure she could have dreamed of other things, but if you’d lost your father at a young age and been saddled with the worst surrogate family imaginable, wouldn’t you dream of real love? So she works her butt off in order to get to the ball (remember, she did a million and one chores all while trying to build her own dress from scratch, before the fairy godmother came along), and when she gets there she falls in love with a man who she doesn’t even realize is the prince. Cinderalla didn’t go chasing after the chance to be royalty…she stumbled into it because she just happened to fall for that particular guy.

Aurora (Sleeping Beauty)
Here we have another Snow White, for all intents and purposes. Aurora is chased from her home before she is even a few days old, by a crazed witch who puts an evil curse on her. As a result she grows up in isolation with three fairies pretending to be spinsters. She grows up with no one her age, or even remotely close to her age, and doesn’t even meet a boy until she’s sixteen years old. Is it so surprising that she falls for him? She’s lived her entire life up to this point without even the prospect of romance available to her, and then this handsome man just shows up in her backyard one day. She’s a teenager, for cripes sake. The hormones must have been through the roof!

Ariel (the Little Mermaid)
Ariel is one of the princesses who is often talked down about for caring only about her handsome prince. Absolutely not true. When this story begins the last thing on Ariel’s mind is love. She’s a headstrong girl who dares to dream of something bigger for herself. She’s strong and adventurous and dreams of the world above. It just so happens that in her pursuit of that she comes across a man and falls in love with him. Yes, she risks everything for the chance to be with him, and she does some truly stupid things, but remember that this isn’t all about a man. Ariel has been dreaming of the surface world her whole life. Eric was just the straw that broke the camel’s back. And hey, for the record, Ariel fought back in the end. Sure, Eric saved her from Ursula, but not before she saved him from Ursula. That’s teamwork right there, ladies and gentlemen.

Belle (Beauty and the Beast)
Okay, I’ll admit it…I’ve seen the comparisons between Belle and a sufferer of Stockholm Syndrome and I couldn’t help but go, “Huh.” But that’s not all there is to this particular Disney Princess. For one thing, she’s smart. She’s the first Disney Princess who is portrayed as a bit of a scholar, always reading and helping her father with his inventions. Second of all, she has convictions about the concept of love and marriage. She turns Gaston down flat out because he’s an ass and she’s not about to get married just because everyone expects it of her. Third, she’s brave. When her father goes missing she rushes off to find him, and selflessly gives herself over to the Beast in order to rescue her dear dad. Okay, the rest of the story may seem a little unlikely, with her falling in love with the person who has been keeping her prisoner, but the whole point of this particular story is that if you look for the good in people you just might find it. Is that really such a terrible lesson?

Jasmine (Aladdin)
Like Ariel, here we have a princess who dreams of something more. Come on, one of the first things that we learn about her is that she is rebelling against the traditions that say that she has to marry a prince. She doesn’t believe in marrying for money or power…she believes in marrying for love. How can you complain about that viewpoint? Sure lots of people insist that she never would have fallen for Aladdin if it hadn’t been for the power he possessed (the Genie), but personally I think that that’s just stretching for an argument. The first time we see Jasmine show interest in Aladdin is when he’s a beggar on the streets, sharing his stolen food with a couple of young street urchins. She sees the goodness in him long before he shows up pretending to be a prince.

Pocahontas
I’ve never actually heard anyone complain about this particular princess, but for the sake of argument I’ll say this. Pocahontas was a strong warrior with strong convictions. She happened to fall in love with a man during an extremely tumultuous time in her life, and in the end she gave up that love for her convictions and her people. Not exactly a damsel in distress here.

Mulan
And the exact opposite of a damsel in distress is Mulan. She’s a young Chinese woman who breaks all the rules about tradition. She doesn’t care about looking pretty, being delicate, or finding a groom. She is a tomboy of the highest order who would rather fight than be rescued. She bravely takes her father’s place in the Chinese army to keep him from getting hurt. She pretends to be a man to enter the army and goes through all the same training and hardships that the men go through. In the end she  saves everyone  – including the Chinese Emperor himself – from the Hun army. Oh, but she happens to fall in love while she’s handling all of that, so yeah, shame on her I guess.

Tiana (The Princess and the Frog)
Yet again we have a young lady for whom love is the absolute last thing on her mind. She has dreamed all her life of opening a restaurant of her very own, a noble, independent kind of dream. She works her ass off to make this dream come true, despite being blocked at every turn by corruption and good old fashioned human indecency. When she’s at her last straw, about to have all of her hard work and dreams ripped away from her, she takes a chance on a talking frog who claims to be a prince. What a horrible person right? For taking a chance when no options were left? For shame. And in the process of righting the wrongs and trying to get back to her true self she, like Mulan, happens to fall in love. Oh the horror.

Rapunzel (Tangled)
And, my friends, before Merida ever landed on the scene we had little Rapunzel, who apparently was completely forgotten about. This girl was locked in a tower for her entire childhood, never knowing the outside world, never knowing any human contact aside from her “mother”. And yet she has the strength, bravery, and cleverness to coerce Flynn into helping her achieve her dream of seeing the “floating lights” in person. She goes on a great adventure, during which she is often the one doing the saving (Flynn would have been arrested several if not for Rapunzel and her frying pan), and in the end she is willing to give up her life and her freedom to save the life of a good man that she believes, at this point, she will never even see again.

And then we have Merida, who apparently is the only Disney Princess worth idolizing because she’s the only one who didn’t fall in love.

Let me just get this last bit straight: I’m not saying that each and every one of the Disney Princess was a perfect, flawless, shining role model for our little girls. What I’m saying (or rather, wondering, I guess) is when did it become such a horrifying thing to fall in love? Most of these princesses weren’t fawning around, waiting for a big strong man to come and whisk them away…they were lovely young women who went through hell and back, followed their dreams and beliefs, and oh, geez, sorry for being human, but I happened to fall in love somewhere along the line, and if I happened to have been rescued at one point or another, sue me, have you never needed help from anyone ever?

I just think that in this day and age we put far too much emphasis on teaching little girls that they need to be strong and independent instead of just letting them be what they want to be. When I was a young girl watching these movies over and over again I can honestly tell you that the romance aspect was not what I was enjoying. I loved Ariel’s adventurous spirit, Belle’s intelligence, and Jasmine’s plucky attitude. I felt sad for Snow White, Cinderella, and Aurora for having their lives snatched away from them by the evil people in their lives. I was amazed that Pocahontas and Mulan were strong enough to fight for their people and what they believed was right. Never once did I watch a Disney Princess movie and think, “Yeah, I totally want to be a princess, so I’m going to go and get a bunch of pretty clothes and make-up and sit around and wait for a hot guy to come sweep me off my feet”.

In this, as with many things, I truly believe that we underestimate our little girls. We try to rescue them from dangers that we fabricate in our own minds. And in this, aren’t we ourselves being the “handsome prince” who swoops in, all cocky and self-absorbed, and tries to save the day even if it doesn’t need saving? Ladies and gentlemen, our little girls are not damsels in distress. If we let them be, they can be strong and brave and intelligent and adventurous. They can make their own decisions about the world and what is important to them.

And oh, by the way, if it does happen that “true love” is what’s important to a particular little girl? Deal with it. There are a hell of a lot worse things that they could be focusing their time and energy on, and many much worse role models they could be idolizing.

Laugh, Cry, and Scream

Recently I’ve been doing a lot of jumping between stories. Within my own work I’ve been moving between zombie apocalypses and werewolf romances, between epic fantasies and personal journeys. At the same time I’ve been reading books, watching movies and TV shows, and playing video games. All this going back and forth between different stories with different characters has gotten me thinking about what makes a truly memorable character. What is it that makes a particular person in a book, tv show, movie, or game become this amazing character whom you can’t get enough of? What makes a character great?

I’ve given it a lot of thought, and I’ve come up with three answers, three things that make a character great, in my opinion.

Great characters make you laugh.

Humor is almost a given, isn’t it? Laughter is like a drug, one for which the only side effects are happiness and maybe some pleasantly sore muscles. Mentally and physically, our bodies get high on humor, which is why we love comedies so much, why we appreciate friends and loved ones who can make us chuckle, and why we tend to gravitate toward peers who share our appreciation for what is or isn’t funny. Sense of humor is not universal, of course, but almost everyone will find themselves drawn toward a character who can make them laugh, especially if that laughter is of the deep-down, belly-rumbling, gasping-for-air variety.

Characters who give me the giggles:

Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory – He’s just so absurd and stoic in everything he says and does that it’s absolutely hysterical. I genuinely don’t know how the actors of this show make it through their lines sometimes.

Tyrion Lanister from the A Song of Ice and Fire series (G.R.R. Martin) – I’ve rarely read a character so damn witty. His humor is rude and crude one minute, and exceptionally intellegent the next. Every second line out of his mouth makes me go “HA!”

Great characters make you cry.

Sadness is a little less obvious, but whether you might believe it or not sometimes we crave a good sob-fest. Why else would movies like The Notebook be so popular? The thing is, crying is cathartic; even if you didn’t realize you were stressed out or upset, crying gets all the pent-up bad mojo out, and while no one wants to be sad for real-life reasons, being sad for a character allows you to experience that release of emotions. Being able to feel for a character, to be truly empathetic toward them and experience their pain, releases a host of hormones and chemicals that leaves you feeling somehow refreshed and rejuvinated.

Characters who give me the sniffles:

Dean Winchester from Supernatural – It’s one part great writing and one part awesome acting on behalf of Jensen Ackles, and the combination is a character who has made me exceptionally weepy on more than one occasion (but don’t tell my husband…I always turn to my side so he doesn’t see).

Simba from The Lion King – There is one scene in particular that I’m talking about, and if you don’t automatically know which one I’m talking about you can’t possibly have ever seen The Lion King, so GO WATCH THE LION KING RIGHT NOW, YOU FREAK.

Great characters make you scream.

Fear is another thing entirely. Though there are always going to be some people who run in the other direction when faced with fear, quite a lot of us love it. Fear gives a person a unique rush of adrenaline and “fight or flight” hormones that can be obtained in no other way, and how better to experience such a thing than from the comfort of your own home while reading a scary book or watching a horror movie? When a character makes your heart beat faster, the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, and gives you a nervous twtich because of the incredible tension, that is something real and visceral that you won’t soon forget. If the eventual result is actual nightmares, the character has really done their job.

Characters who give me the wiggins:

The creepy ghost girl from Shutter (original Thai version) – There is one thing I will give to the Asians…they know how to do ghosts, and this chick in particular had me literally watching the movie from between my fingers. Bonus points for totally freaking out my husband and father-in-law.

The Joker from The Dark Knight – He may not be scary in the “I’m going to have nightmares forever!” sense, but Heath Ledger’s maniacal version of The Joker creeped me out more than I can tell. He was truly, entirely mad, and that is a frightening concept.

There are, of course, lots of other factors that go into making a good character. The protagonist should be likable but also have real flaws, the antagonist should be hateful but have relatable qualities as well… You’ve heard it all before, I’m sure, or if you haven’t I’m sure you know most of the rules without even realizing it; that’s how you as the consumer recognize the characters you like. But in my opinion, the three things I’ve mentioned above are what take a character from simply enjoyable, to positively incredible. And if you can somehow incorporate all three of these types of characters into one story…wow. Just wow.

Character (groups) that have made me giggle, sniffle, and wig out:

The cast of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV) – Fear doesn’t necessarily apply anymore, but I watched this show when I was young and significantly more innocent, so hear me out. Back in the day the monsters creeped me the hell out, the banter between characters (good and bad) constantly had me laughing, and the misery that several of the characters went through made me (on more than one occasion) bawl like a little girl. To me, that is seriously a winning combination, and that is why this show is one of my all-time favorites to this day.

The characters from Invitation to the Game (Monica Hughes) – The characters in this book were witty and amusing, went through a tense, frightening situation that threatened their lives, and experienced a plethora of negative emotions and miseries. I’ve read this book dozens of times and I still experience an emotional rollercoaster whenever I read it.

As a writer I now find myself in the position of trying to incorporate these factors into my characters, which is a much more difficult endevour than simply pointing them out in the books I read and the movies and shows I watch. Humor isn’t my strong point, although I’ve been told by readers of my fanfiction that I’ve made them chuckle a time or two. I strive to incorporate fear into my horror and fantasy pieces, and I hope it comes across, but I haven’t been in the position yet to have anyone tell me one way or the other. Misery seems to be my “thing” (what does that say about me…?), as I love to torture my characters and I’ve had a number of people inform me that I was successful in drawing out those tears. It’s a very difficult thing striking all three, but as other writers will attest, writing is rarely easy and creating excellent characters can often feel like an exercise in futility. Regardless, now that I’ve beaten down exactly what it is that creates characters I’ve come to love, you can be damn sure that I’ll be keeping these three factors in mind whenever I put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard.

What about you? What characters have made you laugh until your belly hurt? Sob like a baby? Cower under a blanket? Are there other factors that make a character great for you? Please share!

A Little Push

A reminder: This post courtesy of Julie Jarnagin’s 101 Blog Post Ideas for Writers.

29. Encourage other writers to keep going

I suspect that it is an inevitable truth that at some point (and possibly multiple, regularly occurring points) every writer feels like giving up. Whether you’re an amateur working on your first real manuscript or a published professional having issues in editing, writers are a naturally self-depreciating breed. As my rage comic indicated, we have a tendency to flow through repeating stages of “I’m so awesome!” and “I’m such a hack!” It is a tendency we share with artists, musicians, and other creative peoples who put a little piece of their own selves into their work.

Some of this constant shift in attitude can be attributed to physiology (moods, hormones, emotional state due to outside forces, etc), but much of it is likely due to the lifestyle of a writer and the inability of people in general to fairly, and without bias, judge themselves.

The lifestyle may break may would-be writers because they simply can’t (or feel that they can’t) handle it. The life of a writer may seem simple and carefree to many, but in reality it can be very stressful and difficult. Deadlines may lead to anxiety and burnout. Disagreements with editors and agents can cause frustration and a feeling of losing creative control. Rejections from published and poor critiques/reviews can create doubt, depression, and the belief that you’ll never be successful. It’s a mentally and emotionally exhausting situation to volunteer for.

And then there’s that bit about being unable to judge ourselves. As humans, we are notorious for this, not just involving creative processes, but in every aspect of our lives. One only needs to observe drivers on the highway to understand the concept. Everyone on the road believes that they are an excellent driver, while everyone else is a dangerous SOB who needs to be arrested. It’s the same with writers, except that in our case it works at both ends of the spectrum. Either you think you rock (even if you don’t) while everyone else is a hack, or else everyone else is amazing while you’re a miserable failure (even if you aren’t).

So, in conclusion, being a writer is wrought with emotional distress, time management impossibilities, peer-to-peer conflict, pain of rejection, and psychological issues, and on top of all that you might never become successful enough to make a living out of it.

And here I am, supposedly about to tell you to keep going. Hmm…

Here’s the thing…have you ever heard the phrase that nothing worth doing is easy? While it may not be a logical descriptor for every person in every situation, it still rings true a good deal of the time. Do you think the athletes who go to the Olympics just breeze through the events without any training? Do you think young army recruits just walk through the door and all of a sudden they’re a high-ranking officer? Hell, do you think pregnant women just have a squat and a grunt and a beautiful, perfectly healthy baby just pops out?

If you really care about something – genuinely want it with all your heart, then you’ll do what you have to do and endure what you have to endure to make that dream a reality. Olympians know that they’re going to have to push their bodies to the limit, but they crave that gold, so they move through it. Privates-in-training know they’re going to be trained hard and disparaged at every turn, but they want to serve, so they deal with it. And women know damn well that childbirth is like to be a painful, miserable event that makes them feel like they’re going to die, but they want to bring a life into the world so they damn well manage it.

So if you really want to be a writer, write. Put your heart and soul into it and deal with whatever you have to deal with as a result, because in the end that’s the only true way to get what you want. You have to be willing to do whatever is necessary, end of discussion. If you aren’t willing, well…I guess you didn’t really want it very much in the first place, did you?