Yearly Wrap-Up: 2025

Hello, dear readers! ICYMI, welcome to the series of newsletters for December, as part of my end-of-the-year wrap-up. I know not everyone is into looking at the past year and reflecting upon it, but I eat that shit up. It’s one of my favorite rituals, spending part of December reflecting on my past year and then preparing my intentions for the year to come. So, the months of Deecmber and January will be more newsletter-heavy than usual (3-4 posts each, over the usual 1-2). I appreciate everyone giving me that space to reflect on the year in a way I love.

For this year, the wrap-ups you can expect are:

• Freelancing Wrap-Up: first one!

• Video Game Wrap-up: second one!

• Reading Wrap-Up: previous one!

• Yearly Wrap-Up: last one!

So, let’s dive into reflections, sap and more in the final newsletter of the month: just how was 2025 for me?

Highlights

2025 was truly an incredible year but also one of the hardest years I’ve experienced. I did not anticipate how much stress it would be changing careers, even when this change was 110% instigated by me. Figuring out healthcare, insurance and taxes as someone who is self-employed is not something I’d wish on anyone—the system is fucked and we truly deserve something so, so much better.

At the same time, after being my own employer for almost a year, the idea of going back to corrupt America academia/corporate is literally almost panic attack inducing (and I’d like to keep those under control). So I’m going to continue doing my damnedest to allow myself to live—and one day, thrive—as a freelance editor.

So, that was my greatest highlight of the year: taking a risk and betting on myself and moving my freelance editorial business, which I opened part-time in August 2019, into a full-time adventure. I left academia the last week of January, took the month of Feb off to recoup and then hit the ground running in March. It’s so surreal that it’s almost been a year since that happened. It’s been a huge year of adjustments and there is still a lot I want to learn and adapt to or even change.

(For example, guilt continues to plague me and I’m constantly in a deadline-driven state of stress that I realized only recently that just…never goes away, because there is always—thankfully!—a new book with a new deadline to work on after the last was completed. I want to work on managing my stress and figuring out how to work and live while honoring that my needs as someone who is AuDHD and disabled, since they look different from what my brain continues to compare to, thanks to all that neurotypical hardwiring from being in academia for a decade.)

On top of that big life change, there were other highlights, as well. Things like:

• Making greater connections with fellow editors (including a local friend who quit her job the same time as I did to also dive into editing full-time, plus another group of disabled or chronically ill editors who meet monthly virtually).

• I got to go to a talk and meet CL Clark, one of my favorite authors!!!

• Attended an orcestra concert with friends from college featuring How to Train Your Dragon, one of my favorite movies.

• Got back into hockey (even if our team regularly plays like ass, I still love them; Go Blues! lolsob)

• Was able to get two rounds of COVID vaccines and my flu shot, despite attempts against keeping them accessible by our government.

• So many writing partner dates with the lovely EA Bard, who also, PUBLISHED HER DEBUT!

• Celebrated my dog’s 6th birthday!

• Every single favorite band I had released a new album last year. Every single one. And they were all bangers.

• Multiple hangs with my DnD group, including a birthday bash (since four out of the six of us have our birthdays within three months of each other) in late December.

• Borderlands 4 virtual hangs with my friend Olivia.

• So much quality time with my partner. I feel so loved by him. 🥰

• My partner won first place for his Warhammer 40K Armies on Parade entry!

• Getting to explore the wetlands with my doggo during every season this year.

• Got to cat sit my favorite cat who isn’t mine, Feather, twice. 😍

• Attended a virtual launch party for my friend Val’s new book, Witch You Would!

• Redyed my hair for the first time in over a year.

• Played so many video games and read some good books.

• Celebrated my debut turning one and selling 200 copies!

• Turned 33, better known as my Hobbit Gommage Birthday!

The other biggest highlight, aside from these, was the fact that I am literal chapters away from finishing my first new book since writing Blood Price in 2014!!!!!!!! But I do a lot of sappy gushing over on my Patreon, which is my spot for all things writing related, so be sure to go check that out if you’re interested!

Lowlights

On top of an incredible year of growth, there were also a lot of struggles, particularly financially and mentally.

While I am SO proud of earning almost $20,000 this year after taxes, that was still a roughly $10K paycut to what I earned previously in academia. That, on top of being paid more sporadically than the regular every two weeks, made this year a challenge financially. This challenge only felt more exasperbated by the healthcare costs rising for 2026 (mine personally rising 200% per month) and the fact that I need roughly $2K in dental work next year, which came as a shock to me. So, despite already being booked out for almost half of 2026 (!!!!!), my financial goals of becoming debt free and being able to one day experience a life where I can spend money that isn’t just on bills still feels pretty unattenable. Especially since I’m also paying to publishing a book next year.

But, I’m stubborn as fuck, so I’m not giving up.

Mentally, it was also hard. Living in a country that hates you, as a queer, disabled fat woman, is really fucking challenging and heartbreaking (and that’s with also being incredibly privileged). Trying to stay creative while your country chooses to fall further into fascism is a mindfuck I wish we didn’t have to experience. Seeing the rise of AI and how many people are willing to play the cost of our fucking PLANET is sickening. Going into six years of a pandemic most choose to continue to ignore and being one of the few you know to still be taking precautions is isolating. Learning my book was stolen to feed AI and that I’m not eligible to be paid at all from any of the ongoing lawsuits is aggravating. Palestine still not being free is heartbreaking. Living in the US feels like the darkest timeline imaginable, currently.

Yet I have to hold onto hope that it’ll get better. It must, because we will make it so.

On top of the hellscape of American politics and global horrors, there were also some hard things to go through personally. Things like:

• Cat’s dental surgery where she losts all but three teeth (and we just paid it off this month, after her surgery in JANUARY)

• Edward’s kidney losing function and resulting in one emergency surgery and then another removal surgery was certaintly not on my bingo card this year. The last few months (since this has been something we’ve been dealing with sinec Labor Day) have been hard, but I’m just so glad he’s okay.

• Feeling like a fraud and consistently battling imposter syndrome as both an editor and a writer.

• Depression worsening around my period and cycles becoming generally more painful/emotionally devastating in the past year has been unexpected; excited to finally talk to my OGBYN in January.

• Extended family health issues that have impacted immediate family and raised some tough times.

• Not being able to afford therapy every month (god I can’t wait to see my therapist again in Jan).

I don’t share the lowlights to be a downer or to elicit sympathy. But I think it’s important to recognize and talk about the clouds along with rainbows (an ironic analogy, in this case, since I’d choose a cloudy sky over sunny any day), especially since social media can be so highlight-reel-focused—to the point that it’s almost unrealistic, at times. Showing both the highs and lows allows me to give a bit more of a reality check in my corner of the internet. That transparency is important to me.

I am very grateful for my life, even with these hardships. And while I dream of the day our timeline isn’t one of a capitalistic hellscape, I hold onto the things that give me joy, and will be striving to hold them even closer in 2026, on top of continuing to fight back so that I’m doing my part to make a better world not just possible, but a reality we actually get to experience in our lifetimes.

January Newsletters Sneakpeak

If this month was all about wrapping up the year, next month is going to be all about setting the intentions for 2026. Again, I eat this shit up, so next month will be newsletter heavy, too. We’ll get back to our regularly scheduled once-a-month newsletter in Feb! Thanks again for giving me this space. It means a lot. 🖤

• Intentions for 2026

• Reading Goals

• Freelance Business Goals

Whew, that was a lot of wrap-up newsletters in a single month. I did have a lot of fun writing them. I hope you enjoyed reading them, too! Thank you so much for being here. It means so, so much to me.

Here’s to 2026. May it be kinder.

Until next,
Nicole 🖤

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