Sometimes working on maps makes me crazy

Usually when I have to redo something big.

For an alternate history map, I couldn't find a good reference for the western hemisphere in the right topographic style. I tried different ones, but they were too warped, too small, too simplistic, or far too detailed and fancy to be useful.

And for my fantasy map, I have had to redo the coastlines and mountains when I switched to a higher resolution to eliminate the annoying blurriness. Then I had to redo the trees a couple times to get the right type of look. Then I spent a long time drawing tons of tiny trees. Then I drew the cities and found that I needed a smaller scale, and redid the cities. Then the trees were too big, so I needed to break up the tree layer, shrink them and draw in a lot more trees.

I think I am torturing myself a bit with the totally hand-drawn aspect, but I really prefer the look. I'm a bit picky, and I dislike seeing the exact same symbols all over a map that is supposed to be hand-drawn. On the bright side, the craziness made me take breaks, during which I developed the world quite a bit. I have many more ideas for cultures, religion, institutions, militaries, architecture, and magic.

I have now grown attached to it, especially the cults, and intend on making it my definitive fantasy world.

I'm usually the other way...I start out making everything too small and that makes things take forever so after a few hours I scrap it all and go bigger. Lather, rinse, and repeat a few times. I usually do about 6 or 7 different mtn styles before I'm happy. So, yes, hand-drawn style maps can take a real long time if you're picky like us...and makes me insane and burns me out.