What is your first author photo?

My first author photo is....

Yep, the same one I use today.  My hairdresser took it at the end of one of my visits, which is pretty much the only time my hair looks this good.  LOL

However, when I first joined Wattpad back in 2012, I used a different picture for my avatar, and people who knew me back in those early years might remember it.

I chose to post my first story on Wattpad because I could be anonymous.  I didn't have the guts to show my writing to anyone I knew because I was afraid they'd judge me.  I didn't even tell people I was writing until after I'd already joined Wattpad, many months after I'd completed Stolen Hearts.  My husband didn't even know I was writing until more than a month after I'd started.  Using my own picture wasn't something I considered doing, so I had to find one.  I chose the picture above because I thought it would 'sell' me as a romance author.  (I was thinking about marketing even at the very beginning.) 

The funny thing is, after I'd been on Wattpad for a while, and developed very close friendships with people, I started to feel like a fraud.  I felt like I wasn't letting people know who I 'really' was by not showing the real me, and I didn't like that feeling. 

Ditching the ballerina and posting my own picture was still really, really hard.  I was depressed for about a week, no lie.  But it wasn't bad enough to make me go back.  I had to be my real self on Wattpad, just like I am in my real life.  Now I really like my author picture and I think I look pretty cute in it.  If only I could make time stop so I stay looking like that forever.  LOL