It was recommended to me by multiple professionals to write and publish a full autobiography. I'm 50 pages deep and I'm questioning if I should leave out my sexual experiences. If put my whole truth into it then should I really leave it out? Some of it gets pretty erotic in description. And even though it's all with the same man I've been married to for 20 years it starts in high school. ( under age). Could there be legal ramifications if I publish? I feel these details are relevant to understanding the depth of the relationship and the type of person I am and he is. It's primarily about living with Cumulative PTSD and ADHD. In hopes for readers to understand how deep and far back different trauma can effect relationships and healing. What are your thoughts?
I see that you have just joined the forum, so welcome. If I understand your post correctly, you are concerned about the potential legal ramifications of publishing - include in your autobiography - your sexual experiences whilst underage at school? If so, then all I can suggest is that you consult a lawyer / attorney as to the laws regarding this in your country. Secondly, as this is your autobiography it is up to you as to what, and how much of your life you want to divulge to the public.
Friendly mod warning that this is a writing forum - we don't discuss legal or medical issues of individuals. I am going to leave it open for now because I think some interesting discussion could come out surrounding the whole truth and nothing but the truth in autobiography, but nothing legal or medical please. And to that end; I think all autobiographies will represent a truth that the author wants the world to read. Without wanting to dive down a philosophical rabbit hole, I don't think there is any such thing as absolute truth anyway - my perception of an event will be entirely different from your perception of the same event. To each of us our perception will be a "truth" but my truth will not the same as your truth. So for my ha'penneth I would say that, as the author, you have the privilege of deciding what goes in and what doesn't. Nobody* wants to read an autobiography that details every bowel movement you have had since you were a toddler, so we're filtering from the get go. Of course if some of your readers who know you can see that you have "accidentally" omitted, say, four years in the army, or a two year prison sentence for shoplifting, they may feel a little cheated, but, generally, the choice is yours. *at least nobody I want to meet at a party...
That is excellent insight. Honestly that's the perspective I think I needed to hear. Now im thinking why share such personal intimacies when the readers in the end will still read it as two characters in a non fiction story more or less. They will take different facts and information from my autobiography and find different truth and meaning from how I experienced it. Is that what your getting at? Thank you for the warning. I'm new and still trying to figure out the format of this platform.
Partly - but I think what I was trying to say was that, even if we were at the same event, our perceptions would differ (there have been many studies on false memories etc. they can even be implanted by a clever narrator). However, yes, as you say, people will read your work in a way that you could never imagine, and they will go away thinking things you never thought you meant... Sometimes this is good, sometimes it is bad, but always it is. Yes - welcome by the way! It's a great community we all have writing in common, and every one of us has something to gain and something to offer. Get involved.
The OP seems to have a clear idea of why what's included is included. It might be useful to put an extract in the Workshop's erotica/nsfw section (with a short explanation like the above) and get some views on whether or not it's too-much-information. Consider keeping the descriptions bunched up so they can be edited back out easily without leaving loose-ends in the rest of the work. If it's at first draft, leave enough time before starting the second draft. If the content seems wrong after an interval of a few months then that might be readers' perception too.
I would think about writing about your life in a memoir format rather than an autobiography. Memoirs are more popular and easier to sell if you're not super famous from already doing something else. And a memoir will let you really hone in on the story you are trying to tell. When it comes to writing about sex it's all in the delivery. Just because you're writing about great sex doesn't mean you have to switch to writing erotica. You don't need all the graphic details to get your point across. And I would try to keep in mind your point including such scenes and information as you're writing them. Sometimes saying less is more and can be quite powerful. I've only written one piece of creative nonfiction (person essay/short memoir) that involved a sex scene. There were a lot of details that could have really amped it up, but I chose a more understated approach and played with some subtext. My sex scene came down to one or two lines. More than that would have had a bigger effect on the rest of the writing or pulled it in another direction than I wanted. I wanted to include the sex scene because it did add to the piece. Sure, the piece still probably would have sold and been published without any sex, but I was inviting readers into my world in an intimate way throughout the writing already and I decided including it amplified that level of intimacy I was sharing with the reader. So, it can be a good thing. Just remember you're not writing porn. Even if you're having sex like a porn star just watch how you say such things and keep it short. As a reader, I've often found that literary sex is often ugly and not really that sexy at all. Not saying you have to write it like that, but it might help you to read some literary sex scenes to get more of a feel about how these encounters are covered when you're not writing erotica.
When I wrote my memoir, I left out a lot of the kinky stuff and used innuendos and double entendres to depict most of it. I felt it was veiled enough to not melt a snowflake. I had to pull it back (self published) because the complaints were about listing my jobs, of which there were over a hundred.
