Introducing Author Anna Storm: Greetings! It's lovely to meet you.

Hello, and welcome to our first fireside chat. I'm thrilled that you're here. I hope that you are comfortable and cozy, feet tucked up under your bum or positioned in a way that allows your shoulders to relax, a deep breath to find space, and a large helping of calm to take hold.

Whenever you pause to read my blog, One of the Good Girls, I hope that you can imagine yourself sitting beside a crackling fire in a well-used cushy chair, hands hugging a warm mug of your favourite beverage, an emotional support pillow, blanket, or animal (stuffed or real) within arms' reach, free of all distractions. I'm right here with you, all ears and heart, mirroring your readiness to be seen and heard. You and I are strangers but we already have an intimate knowledge of each other's vulnerabilities, frustrations, and battle wounds.

Thank you for taking a few precious moments out of your day to sit by the fire with me.

I'm going to assume that you've landed on this page so that you can learn a little bit more about me. How wonderful -- I'm happy to oblige! It feels somewhat surreal to introduce myself as an author -- I've long known that this is what I'm meant to do, but I have skillfully avoided doing it for over fifty years. Ugh. I took a long, winding path to finally settle on solid ground, but here I am -- thrilled and goose-pimply -- writing the words: "Introducing Author Anna Storm...". Forgive me while I pause to pinch myself and allow a quick self-congratulatory high-five. I did it!

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The first thing I want you to know about me is my why Why am I introducing myself and sharing personal details with a daunting, big, (sometimes unkind) world of strangers? I'm choosing to lift the curtain and expose raw and vulnerable parts of myself firmly in support of my hope that by getting to know me and my story, you might get to know yourself a little bit better as well. I believe that we all have a similar story to tell; the details are different, of course, but we all have hurt and sadness in our past, disappointments and questions about life's decisions, and wounds and feelings that aren't fully known by others (and, sometimes, by ourselves). True vulnerability is some scary shit, but it can lead to such beauty - I'd love to show you how leaning into truth and vulnerability brought clarity, love, and beauty to me.

If you've read my debut book, Good Girl, you already know the basics, but let's review:

• I was born in 1972 and grew up in a small town in Southern Ontario, Canada

• I'm an only child and my parents separated and divorced when I was a teenager

• I was the victim of a predatory high school teacher - one who liked to groom "the pretty girls"

• I was in a twenty year relationship (ten as a girlfriend and ten as a wife) with an individual who has Narcissistic Personality Disorder (unofficially diagnosed by me)

• The narcissistic abuse I suffered was emotional, physical, and sexual, and I have been grappling with the resultant PTSD for over a decade

• My father passed away after a short but brutal battle with multiple cancers in 2011

• I am now in a healthy, loving relationship, and I have two amazing step-children, and a meant-to-be-mine biological daughter

• I am well along a path to healing and embracing self-love (which was pretty foreign to me for most of my life)

• I love to write and read, and I've dreamed of becoming an author for as long as I can remember

• I love to dance

• I love to preserve memories and create nostalgic photobooks for my family

• I have a law degree, but I detested the practice of law; I worked in a related field (legal publishing) for fifteen years

• I became a certified Pilates instructor in 2023
  

Them's the basics, folks! 😊

I will take a deep dive into many of these topics in other posts, but for now, I hope this summary gives you a sense of where I've been and where I'm going. In a way it feels like I've been to hell and back -- but because I weathered the trip quietly, proficiently, and productively (all with a public-facing smile plastered on my face), there are only a handful of people who know the true depths of my past despair and desperation. I felt hopeless and weak for so many years. Help seemed out of reach, falling completely out of sight at several points along the way.

I write about "good girl" programming in my memoir, Good Girl. Maybe you've landed here because you, too, are a recovering good girl and/or a recovering perfectionist. What I learned by taking a long, hard look at my childhood and my own tendency to embody the "good girl" directive at all costs (even when fulfilling the good girl shoes was clearly harming me), is that none of us need to do a damn thing to be good. We are good. Full stop. Our "goodness" is inherent; it doesn't exist in context. Understanding this has allowed me to show up here with you and for you, shoulders relaxed, jaw unclenched, offering understanding and strength to face the next hard thing. Better yet, all this work allows me to show up hopeful and happy, ready for the next joyful, easy thing!