How Cosplay Helped Me Heal
For a while, I more or less quit cosplay. Obviously, I didn’t permanently leave one of my favorite hobbies behind, but there was a period of time during which I just wasn’t cosplaying. I wasn’t active in the cosplay community, I wasn’t making new things, and I wasn’t sure if I ever would again. Some factors that contributed to this are relatively normal and reasonable life happenings: I’m a mom, raising a super cool kid. I was also working on internships to finish earning my Bachelor’s degree in Communications & Media. I got a new job as a writer that soaked up nearly all of my free time, and so I just didn’t have time to commit to cosplay.
Putting Down the Glue Gun…
Another contributing factor was that the community — at least as far as my involvement in it at the time — had changed so much from when I first began cosplaying in 2014. It felt like I couldn’t do anything right because I was constantly being misunderstood by my peers, and I didn’t like a lot of what I was seeing with what felt like old, resolved issues rearing their ugly heads again — like the “bought vs made” cosplay debate, which is silly because as long as there’s a costume involved, it’s cosplay! Doesn’t matter if you made it yourself, bought it from Party City, or commissioned it from the world’s most expensive craftsman – it’s all cosplay! Things like that, coupled with a few too many people trying to live out their Mean Girls fantasies through the cosplay community, just left a bad taste in my mouth. I didn’t really have much spare time to commit to cosplay anyway, and after a few too many negative interactions with people — some of whom I once admired and respected — I no longer had the passion.
…And Picking Up the Pen
As a result, I threw myself fully into my then-job as an entertainment news writer. It was great for a while, but it slowly began to wear on my mental and emotional well being for a number of reasons that I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about. On top of this, I was accused of writing personal articles on company time (a big no-no), and it took me a while to recover from the sting that comes with being unfairly suspected of dishonesty and underhandedness. It’s not something I did or would ever do, and so it hurt to be regarded with suspicion while being simultaneously urged to move faster and do more with little regard for the reality of what that can do to a person — especially a person who has the added bonus of being on the autism spectrum and contending with ADHD.
Ultimately, I came to realize that I’m just not wired in a way that best served the bottom line. I was expected to quickly pump out as many SEO articles as possible about topics I may not actually know or care about, with little regard for the actual art of writing or journalism. Producing truly good writing seemed secondary to churning out merely adequate content. In fact, it was not uncommon to be tasked with rehashing an old story or story from another website in lieu of focusing on thoughtful media analysis and original takes. While I still did my best to bring something new and interesting to everything I did, and I wrote a lot of things I am very proud of, it still took a toll on me because I was being pushed further and further away from writing with passion. Eventually, the company that owned the site I wrote for also began to crack down on keeping people in their “lanes,” meaning I was told I could no longer write features or reviews (the things I actually cared about), but that I must focus solely on SEO. Not because I wasn’t a good enough writer to tackle more substantial content, but because that’s what made money.
Due to all of these factors and then some, I had to talk away. I was heartbroken, but I knew I was making the right choice. This isn’t to make excuses or claim it’s impossible for everyone else to meet the demands that I struggled with; it’s just an acknowledgement of personal incompatibility, and a meaningful catharsis for something that had been fucking with my self esteem and my ability to truly move forward for months.
Who am I?
Feeling lost and in need of another job, I eventually decided to work as a barista for a bit. After a month of slinging lattes, I once again found myself without a job. Without getting into too much detail, suffice it to say that I had to walk away again…literally and figuratively, but that’s another story for another post, maybe. This left me feeling even worse and more lost than before, knowing I had the skills and capability to do multiple jobs well if I only I could figure out who I was and what I wanted — and if only there was a place that would be understanding of me in a way that was mutually beneficial. I knew I was still a writer, but writing for entertainment news sites led to burnout because most have simply become churn-and-burn content mills that focus more on Google search rankings and clickbait headlines than they do on the actual quality of the articles they publish or the wellbeing of their writers. This isn’t to say that good writing, good writers, and good people don’t exist within those outlets, but to say that while I’m thankful for the experience and the people I met, it’s just not something that I can do in that capacity without hurting myself in the process. With all that in mind, entertainment journalism was out of the question as far as jobs went. I began to think carefully about what I really wanted to do, what made me happy, and what could potentially become a career for me.
Hello, Cosplay, My Old Friend…
In the meantime, I came back to the world of cosplay. I missed being creative with makeup and craft supplies. I missed transforming myself into different characters and otherworldly entities with the flick of a makeup brush and pair of colored contact lenses. I missed the positive aspects of the community, like going to conventions and bonding over shared interests in games, movies, and books with other cosplayers and unapologetically nerdy adults. This isn’t to say that I was specifically hoping to turn cosplay into a career, though I have used it as a relatively successful side hustle in the past; I was just looking for some joy and a creative outlet while applying for jobs and figuring myself out.
And then things began to fall into place. I applied to be a vendor at two local cons/arts markets so that I could sell my cosplay and nerd inspired art and goods, and was accepted into both. I finally cosplayed the mischievous looking devil guy on Eddie’s “Hellfire Club” shirt from season 4 of Stranger Things, something I’d wanted to do ever since I watched it…and people actually liked it. Nobody was waiting with snarky remarks, contrived drama, or any negativity. On top of that, I started to receive paid content creation opportunities thanks to my cosplay endeavors. Feeling good and eager to keep going, I entered a cosplay contest hosted by Peacock TV on a whim…and I won.
I didn’t expect to win. In fact, I didn’t even know about the contest until 3 days before the deadline, and I didn’t finish or submit my entry until 3 hours before the last minute. I just wanted to share my love of Chucky. Part of why I got my writing job was love for movies and media, which is also part of why I got into cosplay. The Child’s Play franchise is one of my favorites, and the Chucky TV series was on the list of approved shows to cosplay from for the contest. Obviously, I had to become Chucky. I modified some corduroy overalls, did my makeup, put on the fluffiest orange wig I owned, and I became everyone’s favorite homicidal doll. I submitted my photo and felt happy about what I did regardless of the outcome. And then, I was validated with an email. Not only was I one of the selected winners, but my cosplay was among the favorites. Yeah, I know we shouldn’t rely solely on external praise and validation from others, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel really fucking good to have my work appreciated. I felt confident. I felt like myself again. The $2000 prize was also a pretty nice bonus.
I’m Good and Good Enough
Before I rediscovered myself through my love of cosplay, it had been months since I truly felt good about anything I wrote or created because I was still trying to heal from not being the ideal SEO slave entertainment journalist, cosplay clique mean girl, perky coffee cadet. The hurt I felt was seeping into my personal life. I knew I was still a good mom, daughter, girlfriend, and person, yet still I struggled with feeling like I was failing not only myself, but everyone around me simply because I wasn’t “fast” enough, fake enough, or fanatic enough to unequivocally worship at the throne of the green siren. Even without the contest win, just cosplaying again — doing something that made me happy and allowed me to be creative without restraint or the pressures of lining corporate pockets — was healing and nourishing in a way that I’m not even sure how to put into words. Sure, it may sound silly. I’m a 30 year old mom and college graduate who took the loss of a job pretty hard and found my spark again through playing dress up, but I’m ok with that. We shouldn’t take ourselves so seriously that we can’t find joy in the harmless things others might find childish or hard to understand. I know who I am again, and I don’t have to choose between this or that, or chop my identity up into little pieces to fit in anywhere. I can just be me, all parts of me, and move accordingly.
Through cosplay, I was able to regain my confidence, heal from some upsetting situations, and remember what I love most about my creative nature: expressing myself, putting a piece of my identity and perspective into my creations, and taking my time to craft something interesting and original…be it through words or glue guns
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DeLa Doll is a culture writer, cosplayer, and artist based in Florida. She has been writing professionally since 2016, with some of her work being featured on sites like HuffPo and /Film. She is an advocate for meaningful diversity and representation in media, a gamer, a mom, and an avid user of DIY hair dye.
