Member-only story
Celebrating One Year of Writing on Medium
I didn’t have high expectations or much knowledge about Medium when I started. I figured I’d be lucky if I made a couple of dollars a month, and made 10% of that total during my first earning month, as I initially didn’t even know how to get started with the Medium Partner Program.
Needless to say, definitely did not anticipate receiving thousands of views on this piece. (Was not surprised by the slew of angry men in the comments section, however).
Because I didn’t expect much to come of this account, I told all my family and friends about my blog, believing that if I didn’t have their views, I wouldn’t have any at all.
As I gained a modest following and became more vulnerable and honest in my writing however, I began to wonder if I should have used a pseudonym, or at least have kept my account to myself and not used my last name, one that is so rare I couldn’t attribute it to another Kayla Vokolek.
I thought this as friends and family read stories of mine discussing loneliness and mental health.
I thought about how open I make myself online when a girl I was just in the talking stages with read my article about the difficult experiences of coming to terms with my bisexuality. We never ended up meeting, I forget her name, and yet she still knows important details about me…
