The "No Barriers" Special: Get lifetime access and PAY WHAT YOU CAN $297 (regularly $497) 🚀

For Writers With a Hard Story To Tell

Finally Release the Story You've Been Carrying

This 90-day course helps you finally tell the story that's been weighing you down. Writing Your Pain as Fiction is for writers who have a heavy story they've been carrying. It's time to get it out using a tool you already know and love: fiction. In 90 days, you'll have a complete first draft using fiction as your protective container. And because I don't want money to be a barrier it's now...

Pay What You Can

Watch the video. Still have questions? Scroll. Ready to start? Click.

I tried to write about my dad for 20 years.

But the harder I tried to tell the truth, the more difficult the story became.

And then I gave myself permission to lie…and finally told the truth.

Here's what I know about writers like us. We might write fiction, but we have another story inside us. A real one.

Something heavy we've been carrying — a loss, a complicated relationship, an experience that shaped who we are. And we've always known we would write about it.

Someday.

We want to write about it because we know it could help others. We need to write about it because it will help us heal.

But every time we try, something stops us. We don't know where to start. We don't remember enough to tell a "real" story. It's too big, too close. Too overwhelming.

So we don't write. Or we start and stop. Or we journal pages that feel more like therapy exercises than a story anyone would want to read.

I did that for 20 years, on and off. My dad died from alcoholism when I was 15. For most of my adult life, I wanted to write about him — about us. I knew there was a story there, I just didn't know how to tell it.

Memoir wasn't going to work. Journaling wasn't right. Non-fiction felt like a lie. I couldn't remember details, my own feelings were muddled and confusing, and the truth felt out of reach. Until I realized I already knew how to tell it.

The Solution

I Didn't Have to Write Memoir.

I Could Write Fiction.

Fiction gave me the distance I needed.

Not to hide from the truth — but to protect myself while I told it.

I changed some details. I wrote about a different time period. I gave my character something I never got: time with her father's ghost.

The story was mostly invented, but the emotion was very real.

And that book — The Things We Cannot Change: A Story About the Ghosts Created by Addiction — is now published. Readers have connected with it and therapists have called it "life-changing."

The tools I used? They're teachable. And that's what this course is about.

Writing Your Pain as Fiction is a 90-day program that takes you from blank page to finished first draft — using fiction as your protective container.

THE THREE PHASES

GENERATE RAW MATERIAL

You're not outlining a novel. You're not forcing yourself through memoir.

You're writing short pieces about moments from your life. The ones that haunt you. The ones you miss. The ones that keep coming back.

Every day, you get a prompt. You set a timer. You write. You stop.

No staring at blank pages wondering where to start. No pressure to write more than you're ready for.

By the end of Phase 1, you'll have 20 to 30 short pieces of raw material.

FIND THE SHAPE OF THE STORY

Then we look at story structure — the beats that make a story… well, a story.

And here's where it gets interesting: you look at what you've already written and see which piece fits where. The novel starts to emerge from what you've already created.

You're not forcing something out of nothing.

You're finding the story that's already there.

FILL THE GAPS & FINISH

Now you write what's missing. Same process — prompts, timers, contained pieces.

You connect. You expand. You finish your draft.

Your story is already inside you — buried in fragments, memories, feelings.

We're not creating something from nothing. We're carving until we set it free.

Ready to get started?

In 90 Days, You'll Have:

A finished manuscript that finally makes sense of your pain

The confidence that comes from finishing what you started

A story relateable enough to share (if you want to)

20–30 flash fiction pieces proving you CAN write about this

Tools that will keep you writing (no matter what story you're telling)

Freedom from carrying this alone

In 90 days, you'll go from "I've been trying to write this for years" to holding a complete first draft in your hands.

What Makes This Different?

YOU DON'T NEED PERFECT MEMORY
We're writing fiction, not memoir. You just need seeds — small anchors to reality. One line of dialogue. One image. One feeling. Everything else, you get to imagine.

THE PIECES ARE SMALL
300 to 500 words at a time. You're never drowning in a massive chapter you can't finish. You write one piece, you stop, you come back tomorrow. It's sustainable, even when the material is heavy.

EMOTIONAL SAFETY IS BUILT IN
I've included a module with a licensed counselor on how to enter and exit your writing safely — grounding techniques, what to do if something unexpected comes up, how to take care of yourself while you do this work.
Most writing courses don't even think about this. But this isn't most writing. This is your hardest story. You deserve support that acknowledges that.

COMMUNITY SUPPORT
You automatically get access to a growing community of writers who are also trying to tell their hard story. Check in during each step of the course, or when you need to. Give support to people like you and get it when you need it. You're not doing this alone.

this is for you if:

You have a painful story you've been carrying for years
You've started and stopped writing more times than you can count
You want to write something others can read, not just journal entries
You're ready to commit 20-30 minutes a day to your writing
You're open to using fiction as a way to tell you're truth
You want to do more than just "sprinkle" bits of your life into a different story

this is not for you if:

You're looking for therapy (this is a writing course, not treatment)
You're not ready to actually sit down and write
You want someone to write your story for you
You're hoping it will just come together on its own someday
You're not willing to invest in your story or your growth as a writer

MEET your instructor

Hi, I'm Allison!

I'm an award-winning author and writing coach based in Michigan. My novel, "The Things We Cannot Change: A Story about the Ghosts Created by Fiction," is a fictionalized version of my own story of losing my father to alcoholism. It took me 20 years to figure out how to tell that story. Fiction was my way in — and now I teach other writers to do the same. My work has been called "brilliant, disturbing, and thought-provoking," and "The Lost Girl: A Neverland Story," won the 2024 PenCraft Seasonal Book Award.

What's Included:

The COMPLETE COURSE: 13 MODULES: $497 VALUE

Step by step, from blank page to finished draft. The same process I used. The same tools. All of it laid out for you.