Many writers of fanfiction create because of a deep love for the material, characters, or themes expressed in canon, but that creation often comes from a place of personal hardship and unspoken challenges others are unaware of.

Original fiction and fanfiction alike can be a source of encouragement when life gets complicated. There’s something about sitting down with characters you love and working through their difficulties that helps unravel the complicated knot of our own problems or helps us realize there is hope of coming through the other side of the storm.

When I started writing my first snippets of fanfiction, I was in the middle of a series of events that would impact the rest of my life. Every day brought new uncertainty. What few friends I had were distant, unwilling to step into the hurricane I was walking through.

Instead of bemoaning my lack of companionship, I turned to other sources of courage: my faith in God, and the stories I loved.

Faith guided and shaped my journey into fanfiction and manifested in the themes and topics I chose to explore. Nearly twenty years later, that’s still true. Every piece I write reflects pieces of who I am—who I became—because of the things I endured.

Whenever I face seemingly impossible challenges, or just run out of energy, I go back to fanfiction—to the people and places I fell in love with so long ago. There, I remember the faith that supported me through every struggle, and I know there is a way ahead.