How Smut books destroyed my dreams

For a long time, writing was my most vivid dream.

I started when I was 13, like many others: after falling in love with YA books — stories with real characters, facing real dilemmas.Paula Pimenta, Meg Cabot, Nicholas Sparks, Thalita Rebouças... those names lived on my bookshelf and in my heart.

It was around that time that Reino Silencioso ( Silent Kingdom) was born.

But it died two years later.

When I was 12 years old, I met Paula Pimenta — one of the best days of my life.

When the cute cover says nothing about the content

It was at 15 that, in the midst of heartbreak and insecurities about my body, I stepped onto a quiet (and dangerous) path.I started reading fanfics on Nyah!, and suddenly, the stories became more about explicit scenes than about emotions.

I started to think that what had always made me uncomfortable deep down… was “normal.”

I realized I didn’t need to open an adult website to access pornography. (Though I eventually did, once I discovered that world.) It had already invaded the books — even the ones with colorful covers and cute characters.

Little by little, reading stopped being a safe place for me. And writing did too. It felt wrong to write something pure while I was reading the opposite. So I stopped writing.

I became someone else.

I grew quieter, more needy, more dishonest. I couldn’t open my notebook anymore. I waited for nightfall to do what I hated — but also thought I needed. I hid. I felt ashamed. And it felt like God had stopped speaking to me. But the truth is… I was the one who had stopped listening.

I became addicted to stories that spoke of nothing but bodies. To videos. To conversations. To touches. And the worst part? I hated it. And still, I couldn’t stop.

And most of all: I wasn’t writing anymore.

Because something inside me said that writing what I was reading was wrong. And writing what I was feeling... I no longer knew how.

The Bible in the Dark and the Most Genuine Cry

At 18, I was "allowed" to date and accepted the first person who came along. It lasted two months. It ended, and the emptiness remained.

That’s when I realized something was broken.

Then I remembered a book called The Sheep and the Dragon by Renata Martins. I remember buying it at Lagoinha, in Belo Horizonte, on a family trip. I never read the second volume — but that first one stayed with me. It scared me. It warned me.

That’s when I opened the Bible. And for the first time, I truly met Christ.

I had always been in church. I was a cell group leader, I sang, I preached. But only inside my room, in the middle of the night, with the Bible open and tears in my closed eyes, did I understand who He was. And who I was. There, I repented. And there, I was reborn.

I decided to get baptized again (that’s another long story) and even cut my hair in the meantime. After that, I discovered the Christian side of Wattpad (though I avoid the site as much as I can). Pure, sweet books that talked about sin and redemption. Maina Mattos, Kell Carvalho, Dulci Veríssimo, Aline Morertho. The whole Corte Queens squad! (My first was Orei Por Você— I tell everyone about it!)

And I remembered the girl I wanted to write about when I was 13. I started reimagining Silent Kingdom. Planned it for the first time.

And with Him, I began to write again.

But it still took me a while to understand that writing could be ministry. That purity was possible. That there were beautiful, well-written Christian books waiting for me on Wattpad (a place I had always thought was a trigger for sin). And that God could use me just as I was.

Yes, I still deal with the consequences of that phase.

Yes, I still try to avoid cute covers with immoral content.

I still struggle with the aftermath of that time.

I have difficulty talking to single men.

I fight distorted thoughts.

I have triggers with silence, with darkness, with mirrors.

But God has been restoring me.

Little by little, I have begun to see myself as someone worthy of love — and called to love with words that heal. Today, I know what to do with my heart: to surrender it.

And with my words: to consecrate them.

Why do I tell you all this?

Because pornography doesn’t come with a warning sign. It sneaks in quietly, disguised as romance. And maybe no one has told you this, so let me be the one to say it:

"And so, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation; the old has passed away; behold, the new has come." 1 Corinthians 5:17

This is my story (or at least a part of it). And it’s why I write the way I write.

That’s why I write romances (and fantasies too, why not?) that don’t romanticize sin. Books without sexual immorality.

Stories that show hope doesn’t come after the mistake — it is born in the middle of it.

Because it was in the midst of my mistake that Hope found me.

If this story touched you, please share it.

Leave in the comments what this struggle has been like for you.

And together, let’s build a new chapter: purer, stronger, redeemed.