Oh, yeah, I totally hear you; it's difficult for me to really believe I'm not going backward sometimes (a lot of the time), too.

For a long time after I started writing fiction again (and also, not coincidentally, got divorced) I was totally unable to read books other than fanfic, especially novels. I'm glad that's no longer the case because it felt like a kind of foundational rupture; reading has always been such an important practice for me, in how I relate to myself & the world. And not that fanfic's not "real writing" or whatever, but I did miss reading more widely in the original fiction world. So I'm glad that I've been able to start reintegrating it into my day-to-day life over the past few years. That said, it's possible for the balance to skew in the other direction, and plainly I need to rein it in!