How the heck did this happen? The Bearton Bears Story

How did I end up with The Bearton Bears?

I never intended to write a book about bears. Had I realised that writing this Epic Bear Story for Adults would become such an occupation I probably would have sort some therapy and turned away from the project in haste. I'm glad things didn't pan out that way and that The Bearton Bears have found their way into the world through me. Good old Eddie, You have a lot to answer for, mate! 

 Eddie Edgely, the main character of The Bearton Bears has his origins in a bear skilfully crafted for me by an ex-partner as a birthday present some 15 years ago. So it isn't just Eddie who has a lot to answer for. 

 I have to admit I was charmed by Eddie from the start, though he went away in a drawer for some time after his mum and I parted company. It wasn't all that long though before he climbed out and back into a place of prominence in my home and my life.

 Accountability Partner

 It was a time of great change for me. I was focussing a lot on personal development and looking to build more self-discipline. Surprisingly, Eddie found a real purpose for me. For some time I had tried to find someone to act as a reliable accountability partner to keep me on track. Finding someone who will commit can be difficult. Partners may start with the greatest intention but hey! They have their own lives and unless you are lucky enough to have someone on board who is equally committed to the path you are on for their own self-improvement, things can soon begin to fail.

 Therapy Bear

 I was working as a therapist in drug and alcohol rehabilitation at the time. We had bears in the therapy rooms which were often used to good effect. Amazing to see how some otherwise quite hardened characters were able to get benefit from holding onto a bear whilst getting in touch with parts of themselves that had been buried for too long. Also amazing to see how many of them willingly worked this way.

 I decided that Eddie would be my accountability bear. Thanks, Eddie. I started to pledge my goals to him and quickly it began to matter to me. I soon develop a strange but strong sense of not wanting to let him down. This seemed bizarre to me at first but it was working so I kept at it and it soon became quite natural. Even now if I'm struggling with procrastination  I can usually get through it by making PTE's (Promises to Eddie) If you have a soft spot for bears as I now do and a habit of procrastination as I have always had, give it a go, it works wonders for me. 

 So that's the original Eddie. He came to be the central character in a 5 novel serial purely by accident. Well, I guess nothing like this ever really happens by accident but it was certainly never intended by me from the outset. 

 The Bearton Bears are born

 I was at another of those moments of great change in my life. I was moving house. I had been writing a lot of very serious material about addiction and needed a break while I settled. I had for a year or so been in the happy and productive habit of getting up at 5:00am every morning to write and I feared breaking my routine in the middle of my move. I needed something relaxing to write about. Everything was far too hectic in life for me to concentrate on writing upon the subject of addiction recovery. 

 I found myself sitting with a tablet in my new place. I'd not yet moved the laptop and had long since given up on the telly. The shifting and sorting had been done for the day and I had a moment of peace.

I'd been wanting to play around with the idea of exploring addiction with a bear story since re-reading the great book "Counselling for Toads" by Robert de Board.

I was particularly interested in behavioural addictions at the time; gambling, workaholism, gym addiction, all that kind of thing. 

 After Dinner Tales

 I began to write a tale about Ted on my tablet; the same Ted who eventually became Ted Fudgely-Walmington.  The short story I was writing to get me warmed up was meant to lead to poor Ted becoming addicted to fishing but another tale grew from the mustard seed I planted that night instead. I wrote "Ted and the trout as long as his arm," as featured in Episode 4 The Bearton Bears After Dinner Tales currently under editing instead. From here I swiftly moved on to other ideas for short bear stories - not necessarily intended for therapeutic benefit though I have to admit that writing The Bearton Bears proved to be a very therapeutic journey for me.

 Soon Rufus and The Hacklebacks were born. Though the club name was different to start, the original one later turned out to belong to a human motorcycle club who may not have been best pleased to find that I had used it in a story about bears, so it became the Hacklebacks. Hopefully, there isn't a Hacklebacks Motorcycle Club out there yet? Mainly because when I get the time I might well start one myself. Any takers?

 This is addictive

 Before long my serious writing had been sidelined and I was all out writing short stories about bears and decided that they would make a good anthology. I thought it would be good to have a larger story in which I could set the parts. The concept of the after-dinner stories was born. I loved the idea of the society of bear friends getting together to have a special dinner with after-dinner tales and the whole thing got quite a bit out of hand; from a short story to an anthology to a novel to a 5 part serial and some spin-offs on the way. 

Anyhow, that's how it happened. There's probably a lot more to it than that of course, but I'm glad to say that though I'm still writing The Bearton Bears and intend to continue doing so for some time. I'm still a fully functioning therapist with two other businesses and recovering well!

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