#(it's cloud autism strife.)

[rocketbirdie]

we got a lot in common...

[wowa-bublord]

Do either Zack or Cloud have their traumas manifest in a fear of physical touch? Or a fear of anything that the other may trigger by accident? Sorry My Whump Is Kicking In Today

NO NEED 2 APOLOGIZE FOR ANY ASKS i am eating them all the time

Zack and cloud I think are both very touchy and clingy, it's definitely one of Zacks main love languages. He bites he wrestles he messes up everyones hair. if you have talked 2 him for 4 seconds he will give you a hug and explode all of your bones

But their fears definitely do pop up from time to time. Cloud has days where he doesn't want contact from anyone, I imagine him as already pretty touch averse (he has autism 2 me) so when things get tough and he can't deal with it that day, I imagine him as pretty good at shutting it down. Cloud in general I imagine as really good at setting boundaries, and doesn't usually think about how the way he expresses his dislike for things might bother the other person. It doesn't even cross his mind. Like in this comic!!

zack is. not as good on that front.

the strugglers

[blueseraphim]

I just saw the FF7 Rebirth demo with Cloud and Sephiroth fighting together, and I cannot believe that the entire sequence is actually real. LIKE WE HAD CLOUD STRAIGHT UP PINING OVER SEPHIROTH.

I have to say that the whole entire flashback with Cloud and Sephiroth fighting was the most queerest thing I've ever seen.

We all know that Cloud has part of Zacks' memories and that it was actually Zack fighting with Sephiroth, but I can easily say that Zack DID NOT look at Sephiroth like that from what I've seen in the games.

Cloud is modifying his false memories to cater to him cause Cloud idolized Sephiroth, and Zack didn't.

[rocktis]

fanon my beloved vs. fanon my beloathed

beloved - zack's nicknames for cloud (spikey, sunshine, cloudy, etc) - kunsel has hacked into shinra's database and could cause massive damage to the company on a whim by tapping a few keys beloathed - "zack's so stupid lol he's such a himbo" - "cloud's just a cocky asshole who doesn't care about anything but money and himself"

[soggy-fishsticks]

i drew cloud as utena tenjou from revolutionary girl utena! :D

[strayheartless]

so does zack, seph and gen are all aware that they are neurodivergent?

Errr not officially aware as in they have been to a doctor who has formally tested them. But aware in the sense of they experience all these different things that are hard to ignore.

I kind of write a lot of these things with a duel idea of “they don’t know, but if they were formally diagnosed they’d recognise that it’s because of their diagnosis.”

The reality is that Zack, Seph, Gen and probably Cloud would not be able to be diagnosed unless they were willing to give up their jobs as members of a military force. Most armed forces (or at least in my country) don’t allow formally diagnosed autistic and ADHD people in the military.

Whether Shinra cares is up for debate, but I’d imagine they wouldn’t put much effort into accommodating neurodivergent peoples needs.

Also there’s the question of if it’s an available diagnosis within the world of FFvii. Assuming it is then how readily available is it?

I generally see it like this:

Genesis: seen as “gifted kid” because he was so intelligent, never got diagnosed because his parents didn’t believe autism and ADHD were a real thing. Gen was simply seen as bossy and opinionated. He he could be brutally honest but he wasn’t a bad kid. Gillian was very good with him, and Angeal never seemed to have an issue with how much Genesis could be.

Sephiroth: Hojo ignored all his signs on purpose, has read very bad and harmful science on “curing” autism and has traumatised sephiroth to the point of deep rooted masking. It’s hard to tell what’s trauma and what’s Autism with Sephiroth these days.

Zack: His parents were told he probably was ADHD in fact his teachers were almost positive he was. The problem was there’s not a lot of funding in country reactor town education, so mr and mrs Fair would have had to pay a lot of money to get him diagnosed and that would mean taking him all the way to Midgar or Kalm to find a doctor to diagnose him formally. In the end they went to the library and read up on what they could do to help him.

Cloud: Cloud doesn’t know what Autism is. He doesn’t know he has it. He doesn’t know that his mother desperately tried to get him diagnosed when he was little because she thought it might ease how people treated him. And Cloud certainly doesn’t know that his main problem with communication and sustaining friendship has to do with said autism. Claudia tried so hard to find a way. She’d suspected since he was little because he didn’t like eye contact and he was slow to speak, but she never had the money.

[computerram]

sorry to report I have a new brain disease

[mobblespsycho100]

i think we should put cloud strife and laios touden in a room together. idk what would happen there but they would be . there . autism

[bluegumballmf]

Dog i watched this analysis over cloud strife's mental illness and perception and lowkey it got me thinking about naz

Like

i know at first glance he's perceived like this edgy emo aloof mf type, but like He's really not he's just extremely socially awkward and even a little stunted

And it relates back to the video in the sense that cloud has this false persona that he takes up to make himself seem stronger and as a coping mechanism And ngl that reminds me of naz too because in the stasis arc he has to toughen up and ascend past mortality so he can unstigmatize stasis, even if he didn't want to

So like Cloud pretends to be a genetically modified state of the art SOLDIER and Naz pretends to be a natural deity and it becomes a coping mechanism for both of them, to the point where they lose their sense of self

And both have ptsd, that presents itself in really similar ways

Like

aloof usually

struggles with social cues

typically pushes loved ones away if hurt

reverts to masking if perceived to be in harm

and then like both of them have to work to be able to let their facades fall down and both of them are kind of a deconstruction of the "cool strong aloof protagonist" because while they can be strong and they can be aloof, in the end they're both country boys who grew up with mental illnesses and never recovered while gaining more trauma and mental illnesses

And also like they have to work to even trust people that deem themselves as their friends because their sense of trust is so damaged that it's hard to take people like that at face value

Add in the fact that Naz can't save myn no matter what he does and Cloud can't save aerith no matter what he does, and we have ourselves another parallel

also the fact that in advent children/ in Naz’s canon,

cloud struggles with geostigmatism, which i tend to perceive as a chronic pain problem.

Naz also has a sort of chronic pain problem, in the form of stasis chains, as well as tremors.

The way they both deal with these issues is similar too, with cloud isolating himself from his family, and Naz isolating himself from everyone else. They both don’t feel worthy enough to rely on anyone else for help with their struggle, as some people with mental illness are known to do, myself included. Moving away from this and back to my other point about masking, they are shown to occasionally let their own personality shown through the cracks of their mask and it’s entirely different then the one they’ve built up.

for instance; cloud is a little dorky and sarcastic, and honestly seems a little shy at times.

meanwhile naz is more playful and gentle, extremely caring and affectionate when in a space where he can’t keep up the mask.

idk they just. Remind me so much of eachother.

[tobyista]

Turns crisis core characters into monsters high

[sebritz]

cloud strife & his bisexual predicaments

[rocketbirdie]

do you trust him to give you cpr. yes or no

look at him. pathetic

[wowa-bublord]

I love your art it always puts a smile on my face when I see you post! I also like seeing people make Cloud take more of an initiative in zakkura~

thank u!!! ehehe, 2 me they r like this

[autisticcharactershowdown]

BRACKET 3, ROUND 11

[hecho-a-mano]

when cloud does a spinny spin with his sword after winning a fight? stimming. cloud would love fidget spinners

[rolaplayor101]

Baybeybel (however it's spelled) red

YES YES YES YES LETS GO OUTSIDE LETS FEEL THE WIND FLOW THROUGH OUR HAIR LETS GO LETS GO LETS GO FBGRGEDBSH!!!!!

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