#(specifically talking about depression and anxiety here but this applies to other things like psychotic disorders)

[yippie-madness]

the never ending gloom of capitalism, but yeah its prolly just brain chemical imbalances

[albatris]

ik this is probably an inappropriate question to ask but i deal with stpd and just recently discovered this. Previously thought it was just depression/anxiety but ive been on like 7 antidepressants/2 of which were more geared towards anxiety. I was wondering if you take any meds or have any advice you might recommend. Id really appreciate it. Im running out of ideas lol.( Sorry to bother and thank you)

nah you’re all good, I don’t have any problem with questions like this n I’m happy to share any experiences of mine that people might find useful!! though in this case idk how much help I’ll be, sorry D:

mostly about meds but my bad for goin on a whole ramble in the middle about therapy?? I talk a lot and have trouble staying on topic

'cause meds n therapy both have been useful to me but both probably would've been pretty useless without the other

under cut for personal rambles

so I was in the same boat as you for several years, I was in treatment for depression and anxiety and then borderline later on, way way way before anyone landed on schizotypal

as such I’ve been obviously dealing with stpd symptoms for basically my whole life but I only got diagnosed early last year n it’s the first time I’ve been. like. actually in any sort of therapy that addresses it properly and I’m still getting a feel for it

in terms of meds, I’ve been on a whole slew of different antidepressants, didn’t find one that worked until I was maybe 18 or 19? so I’ve been on the highest dose mirtazapine since then....... helps with that kinda baseline anxiety background hum, helps with obsessions and guilt spirals..... I didn’t think it did much for depression until I tried coming off it??

like, it gave me a slight boost in terms of energy and motivation, not a huge one, but definitely noticeable once it was gone

but yeah, it was kinda..... yeah, this med is about as helpful as I’m gonna get, so I decided to stick with it. I recently have considered coming off it ‘cause the sedation was a nightmare, but that’s on hold for the time being

I’ve been on two different antipsychotics, first quetiapine, which did absolutely nothing and was even more sedating on top of the mirtazapine, and currently I’m starting on aripiprazole. still on a super low dose, but working up to something that will hopefully ease some psychotic symptoms. side effects of insomnia and nausea but eased off mostly after the first week

but yeah, I haven’t really had much experience with antipsychotics or how helpful they are yet, atm I’m gonna wait and see whether there’s any real positive effects

but meds are super hard to give advice about, ‘cause different ones work for different folks, what works for me might not for you, what works for you might be something I tried and hated, etc etc etc, y’know

honestly the most helpful thing for me has been therapy, I’ve pretty much been in therapy since I was like 5 and I’ve done a lot of it

meds might be helpful to some people on their own but for me I think they would have been mainly useless without some form of therapy

meds kinda helped with some of the “edges” ie, the resulting depression and anxiety of the personality disorder, hopefully will help with some psychotic symptoms too, therapy has also helped with some of these issues on the edges, and I’m currently addressing some of the more specifically schizotypal core issues, although I will likely have to continue doing the work on those issues for most of my life

if you have a good doctor who listens to you, if you want to continue trying out meds then you might still find one that helps you out! I don’t really have a lot of advice here, because the effects can be so different from person to person. but I’ve found that meds only help on a really small scale, they kind of take a little bit of the weight off but it’s still a whole lot of heavy lifting on my own

so therapy was real good for some of that stuff too, skills for easing some of the load. therapy for me involved Other People, but for others it could involve other resources, such as online workbooks n that kind of thing....... ‘cause I know personally for me I fuckin HATE meeting new people and having to bare my soul for them, so therapy gets. interesting

and I know therapy is not realistic for some folks (and also not what this question was about but I’m just rambling now)

n I know especially that that shit gets fucking HARD when any sort of psychosis and paranoia is involved, in terms of stpd, I flat out refused to speak about certain symptoms with professionals due to paranoia and fear, and had a lot of issues trying to come into a therapy environment and immediately having complete strangers be like “ok tell me about what’s up”

like, no???? fuck off?? I don’t even know you??

n until recently all my therapies where only tangentially useful as a schizotypal, like, I did a bunch of social anxiety stuff which helped with some of the surface level day-to-day social anxiety (not so much the more deep-seated stpd social anxiety, that whole “it gets worse the closer you get to people” type, very fun), I did a lot of work around depression and suicidal urges and goals and meaningful living and whatnot, I did DBT which also encompassed a lot of work on interpersonal skills and handling dissociation and paranoia

n like. some of it was helpful? none of it got to the core of the issue or addressed what I really needed to address

I got super lucky with my current psychiatrist in that she was someone I already knew for around a year and a half beforehand ‘cause she helped out in my DBT group therapy. so I was able to get a feel for what kind of person she was beforehand and got to find my feet in trusting her in a more distanced context before entering one on one therapy. she also specialises in personality disorders and was the one who actually diagnosed me so it wasn’t like she was like “oh you’re definitely schizotypal, I’m gonna just pan you off to someone more experienced now” which was nice

she’s also the one who’s helping me out with meds currently

but ya, therapy can be A Lot, ‘specially for schizotypals who tend to isolate and get uncomfy in those vulnerable scenarios. in order to make the most out of it I have to practice an extremely uncomfortable sort of “radical openness” which is like..... well, I’ve spent most of my life being miserable and unhappy and feeling trapped and stuck in these patterns, and this has gotten me nowhere, in order for something to change I need to be radically open about my experiences

which gets HARD because the knee-jerk reaction to paranoia and delusions is often to pull back and isolate, and often I’ve struggled with the idea that it’s not “safe” to speak about certain things or that something bad will happen if I do

so it’s difficult, but I have to continually commit myself to being open and placing myself in intensely uncomfortable scenarios, getting used to the idea of trust being An Action, and practicing trust even when I don’t necessarily Feel It

that’s been a really helpful outlook for me and the only thing that’s kept me involved with therapy and meds and treatment. idk if it’ll be useful to others. I also know that some therapists and psychiatrists are shit and being radically open with the wrong people can be a nightmare

but it’s something that applies in my other relationships too and with my relationship to myself, so. *shrug emoji*

but yeah. that’s been what’s helpful for me

meds do a little bit of the work, but honestly I still have to pull a fuckload of the weight on my own, I kinda got to the point with meds where I was just like “ok this is obviously as good as it’s gonna get” and just stuck with it......... which is kind of a bummer of an answer

ik that kinda turned into a whole unrelated ramble in the middle there but I hope this kinda answers a bit of your question maybe or maybe not ‘cause I don’t really know what I’m doing

but also

I hope you have a nice day

[mysaldate]

On the topic of BSD mental issues..

Because a lot of people in this fandom just LOVE to bestow their own mental problems on characters and even go so far as to claim not a single BSD character is mentally alright, I went on a little rant to debunk this bulshit of a claim. If you’re one of those who support the “everyone is mentally ill because I said so” theory, don’t even bother reading this, please, and save us both the time.

If you do read, however, please keep in mind those are just my opinions and analysis and why I personally find the claim that everyone is mentally ill bulshit. You’re free to believe what you want but I’ve had multiple people come spurting out insults at me simply for not believing every single character is mentally diasbled.

First, our beloved ADA Atsushi - He's actually doing really well. Sure, he's not 100% ok but we were given no serious childhood trauma impacts (except for flashbacks that don't really... do anything to him mentally except for motivating him to do better which is, you know, not a sign of mental illness), he doesn't have self-destructive tendencies, he doesn't feel like he owes the society anything but he doesn't slip to nihilism either. His motivations are humane and sane and relatable. I mean, if anyone told you your friends would be in mortal danger if you stay with them, wouldn't you try to get away from them too? Dazai - Ok, Dazai is far from stable. He still handles his issues surprisingly well though and his constant suicide attempts are really played off as a joke, which is not the best way to handle them but it takes a lot of seriousness from it and kind of makes it hard to believe it's what he actually wants to do with his life. Especially since there are times where he goes out of his way to make sure he stays alive (Dead Apple being just one example). Kunikida - Arguably one of the most stable characters in the show. Some people claim he has OCD but have you ever seen an actual OCD patient? His love for schedules and hard time when they can't be kept is something that runs in my family and nobody has ever been diagnosed with OCD. People need to realize that having your life planned out is not a mental illness. Yosano - I'm a little more benevolent about Yosano, especially since she has a more psychotic side to her and she seems actually damaged by her childhood but I stiil stand my point that she is doing extremely well for someone who supposedly has a mental illness. It's almost as if the "insane" side of her was purposedly overblown for comedic purposes. Ranpo - I know a lot of people say he's autistic but I don't agree with that hc. Why? Well, I have a classmate who's not autistic and she's exactly like him. She's smart, almost genius, has great deduce skills and brilliant crime-solving abilities (tested multiple times with Black Stories or whatever that game is called in english) but she is unable to live on her own. She knows close to nothing about real life, skills used for everyday functioning and as for public transport, she only learnt how to use it recently and she's almost 19 years old. I also have an autistic friend who specifically said he'd find it insulting to hear that Ranpo is supposedly autistic. Tanizaki - I'm not sure what to say here, Tanizaki is a normal guy. Nothing special about him. He's willing to go great lengths for his little sister but I think anyone with younger siblings can relate to that. At least anyone who cares for their younger siblings. Kenji - Go on and tell me how Kenji of all people has a mental illness, I dare you. And if you pull out his cheeriness, you're obviously just too depressed to fathom that some people might actually enjoy life. Fukuzawa - Again, one of the most stable characters in the series. Say what you will but he's not unstable and his ability to stay calm at almost any situation except for when his kids are in danger is just further proof of this. Kyouka - I'd say she might have issues. My afforementioned autistic classmate pointed out that she feels autistic to him so there's that. Also her childhood visibly screwed her over. However, she's still surprisingly stable and normal despite all of that so while she might have some issues, they are greatly balanced by her strong will and natural personality. Naomi - I wouldn't say Naomi is 100% ok in the head but not to a point where I'd claim an actual mental illness. Sure, I'm not a doctor but nor is anyone who diagnoses her with whatever it is they diagnose her with. Haruno - And exactly what is wrong about Haruno? She's cute, positive, cheery, hard-working and supportive. And she gets scared in situations that invoke this. Literally NOTHING weird.

Next up is our dear Port Mafia Akutagawa - No denying it, Aku has serious issues. Again though, he's doing far better than most people with similar problems but that could just be due to him letting his frustrations out via murder. Chuuya - No issue found here. Sure, he's a little short-tempered but that's about it. A lot of people are short-tempered without being mentally ill. And he could be portrayed with some serious issues due to his origin and past. Gin - Do we even know enough about her to diagnoze her? All we know is that she's silent, a little shy and that she's always on odds with Tachihara. Make me a diagnosis from that. Higuchi - Aside from her massive crush on Aku, there's nothing weird about her. She probably picked the wrong job but she's willing to work hard anyway to earn her place there,, which is not exactly typical for people with mental illnesses. Hirotsu - STABLE PERSON. Just... what else is there to him? He is literally the voice of reason who commands the black lizard solely because he can actually keep them under control. Geez, there is literally nothing linking him to any mental problem! Kajii - This guy's got issues, no denying it. And I won't even say he could do worse because obviously he could but he's fairly close to being the insanest (is that a word?) he can get. Kouyou - Oh look, ANOTHER completely stable person. I mean, come on, she's been an executive since Dazai and Chuuya were 15, that's seven years. Clearly she couldn't hold her position if she weren't stable. Not to mention, we saw her being stable in stressing situations so. many. times. Elise - She's an ability. No comment. Mori - Yes, he has his issues. But he's the hypercompetent Mafia boss who stayed in charge for a very long time already and there's no sign of anyone overthrowing him any time soon, nor planning to because he's just a great leader, something he couldn't be if he was mentally ill. Oda - Do I even need to elaborate on this? Oda is very probably the sanest person we got, one who sees the wrongs of his past and does his best to overcome them and repent, all of which goes without him being depressed or self-loathing in the slightest. Randou - This has been talked about a lot. Randou is sensitive and impulsive and sometimes acts on emotions rather than rationallity. None of that makes him a mentally ill person. It just makes him a person, a human being we can all relate to. Ace - Ace is a selfish human being who thinks too highly of himself and is manipulative and abusive. Is that a problem? Yes, obviously. Is that a mental illness? Not necessarily and more likely no than yes. He does things for his personal gain and everything went his way for far too long for him to expect it to go any other way. And as we all know, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutelly. Q - Does anyone really think Q is sane?

Now for the group that so many people dislike it’s honestly sad, the Guild Francis - Francis is, first and foremost, a very loving husband and father. He goes on this insane mission to Japan to obtain a mystical object he believes is real but never got any deffinite proof of. Is he naive? Perhaps so. And after he loses, he gets depressed and broken because he finds out his wedding ring disappeared, probably because his wife did something. That breaks him. And honestly? He has every right to break down. It's understandable and human and it does not make him mentally ill. Louisa - While yes, she is very shy and some argue she has some sort of anxiety disorder, all of this can be explained by the fact that she's practically a child. She's 18 dammit. Who could leave their home country at 18 only with an organization of older people, who also all seem very sure of themselves, while having no combat ability and nothing to really bring to the table? If she were mentally weak, there's no way she'd go looking for Francis after his fall, it's actually more likely she'd hurry back home, probably with tears and fear of being arrested if she were to stay in Japan for longer. Margaret - Name me one thing that makes you think Margaret of all people would have a mental issue. One thing. Most of her screentime is her being a vegetable. And while that is certainly a health problem, not a mental health one. Nathaniel - Hey, he was completely ok before meeting Fyodor. Being religious is not a mental health problem and f you if you say otherwise. John - Again, nothing unstable about John. He's not even that selfish, doing what he can to support his family and even picking up the remainings of the Guild to keep the people together and give them new hope because, y'know, hope is very important to people. Lovecraft - He's not even human. You can't apply human mental health logic to him. Herman - We've seen him for how much... 2 minutes total? And even from just that, he seemed like a calm and composed guy. No sign of mental problems whatsoever. Mark - He's hyper, that's what people say at least. But is he really? Kind of hard to believe when all we've seen of him is two scenes of adrenalin rush, one scene where he tries to lift the spirits of his coworkers and one scene where he just decides to go back home because this adventure is obviously over. No sign of mental illness here either. Lucy - A little more visible traumatic impact than with Atsushi and some abandonment issues, which are completely understandable and relatable. Not necessarily a mental illness. Poe - Ok so Poe doesn't feel well in company of others and he is a little psychotic when he gets too into his self-assigned role but 1) introverts are not mentally ill and 2) it's completely natural to get carried away when we witness the person we believe wronged us getting some karma back.

The one group that appeared for such a short time, yet everyone seems to love them, the Rats Fyodor - The most obvious god complex, clearly. He's not sane but he's stable so there's that. Nobody says he's ok, he's clearly not. But he's composed and smart enough to not let his issues control him. Ivan - Part of his brain is literally gone. He's not ok. he can't be. And unless part of your brain is missing too, you physically can't relate to him. Pushkin - Actually a stable, understandable character. Weak men are known through all of history to be the causes of major drama simply because their complexes over being weak lead to them finding joy in torturing the strong. It's not a mental illness, it's just bad character. Oguri - Clearly, Ogugu has issues. Call it survivor's guilt or PTSD or whatever you want, he has issues. Nobody is denying that. Still, he's doing fairly well when not desperatelly trying to seem evil.

I do not feel like doing the Hunting Dogs for the sole reason of me not liking them enough to focus on their mental states but they are pretty much lab rats, artificially enhanced humans and that alone should be enough to explain why I don’t believe in applying normal psychology to them. As for the Decay of Angels, there’s still much more to learn about them so I won’t get into that just yet. And when it comes to the governmental agents, I haven’t read the novels so I only know a bit about Ango and I honestly don’t see how anyone could think Ango has a mental illness.

I repeat again, these are my opinions, based on my experiences and what I’ve studied about mental illnesses (because believe it or not, I study about these things quite a lot). It doesn’t fit except for Tumblr romanticised versions of them and even those are iffy. You’re free to agree and disagree with all of this or with just certain parts but please don’t feel required to share your thoughts, I frankly don’t much care.

With that I bid you goodbye, at least until another thing prompts me to make a long-ass analysis almost nobody will read, nor care for.

[ffwriteradvisor]

On mentally ill/neurodivergent characters

I’m going to preface this one by making the point that I myself am mentally ill. I’ve grappled with depression, anxiety, and PTSD for almost all of my life and have done so long enough to get a pretty good grasp on the wide-range of ways the symptoms can present, not just from my own experience but also from researching my various conditions. I also have ADHD, which is a lot less destructive and more manageable than the previous, but also has an impact on them all the same.

Mental illness and neurodivergency are not always represented well in fiction, in part because it’s easy to pick up on the most common or ‘stereotypical’ symptoms and then not go any deeper, but also because a lot of writers don’t understand what it really means to live with those things and pick up a lot of their ‘knowledge’ from pre-existing media created by others who didn’t do their research either.

The word ‘psychotic’ has a lot of connotations in modern English, almost every single one of them negative. To the average person, it means ‘violent’, ‘unpredictable’, ‘criminal’, and/or ‘evil’ and can be applied to anyone who fits those terms in the vaguest sense, such as a difficult ex or a corrupt political figure.

In truth, it means ‘relating to, denoting, or suffering from a psychosis.’ In turn, ‘psychosis’ means ‘a mental disorder where the patient’s emotions and thoughts are detached from their external reality’. Major depression and PTSD can count as psychoses, depending on the symptoms the individual experiences.

In comparison, the difficult ex and terrible representative are merely assholes. That’s a condition of the personality, not the mind. A person with a psychosis might be an asshole, but that’s a separate aspect of their being.

Statistically speaking, mentally ill/neurodivergent people are 11 times more likely to be victims of crime and violence than the ‘average’ person. About 4% of violent offenders have a form of mental illness. On average, mentally ill people are more likely to harm themselves than others.

But they are perceived as dangerous because people have been told through stories and propagated stereotype that they are. Mental illness and neurodivergency are still highly stigmatized, in no small part because so many people ‘explain’ - or rather, excuse - acts of violence and cruelty as the work of a ‘crazy person’ instead of the work of a person who knowingly did harm to others because they wanted to because that’s easier than admitting that some people are like that because they want to be.

The point that I’m trying to make here is that you should be mindful when giving characters these conditions, not only with researching those conditions properly - ideally by looking for information from those that have those conditions themselves, because their first-hand experiences are a lot more helpful than second-hand account from someone who only knows what they see and have been told -, but also making sure that your character is more than just what makes them ‘different’.

They should have a personality outside of their diagnoses and should always be held accountable for their actions by the narrative and the other characters - to what degree and in what ways will, naturally, be affected by the genre, setting, and personalities of those that interact with them.

I will give some more specific guides to mental illness and neurodivergency in characters over time - with the few that I have personal experiences with probably coming first, with more following as I do research and talk with people who have first-hand experience on them.

[jaydier-blog1]

A Guide to Writing PTSD & Psychosis

Something I’ve noticed over my (too many) years on Tumblr is that sometimes, first-hand accounts of mental illness can be hard to come by. It’s totally understandable, and it took me a long time to get to this point, but it can put writers in a bit of a bind who aren’t satisfied with only the DSM-5 and Wikipedia to accurately portray their muse(s)’s MI. That being said, hi, my name is Holo, and I’ve been living with PTSD and comorbid psychosis for almost a decade at this point, and I’d like to share some of my experiences.

This is by no means a complete or exhaustive guide. The thing about brains is that apparently they’re complicated, and that means that everyone develops MI differently. While there are broad strokes that are generally consistent across diagnoses (and said broad strokes are typically what make up the ‘criteria’ of any MI), not everyone will have every single symptom, and not everyone will display the symptoms they do have the same way. I really do recommend using these sorts of guides as guides to writing MI, rather than actual rules.

I’mma start with some basic definitions. PTSD is post-traumatic stress disorder, which is a disorder that develops after witnessing or experiencing a traumatic event. Not everyone who goes through trauma will develop PTSD, and I believe the actual statistic is somewhere between 20-30% (double-check my factcheck before you quote me on that, please). Comorbid mental illnesses (or comorbidities) are MIs that occur with or alongside the ‘primary’ illness, usually because of said ‘primary’ MI. For example, my psychosis is comorbid with my PTSD; it is because of my PTSD that I have psychosis.

Psychosis itself is more of a broad term than a specific diagnosis, and it will generally assume one (or more) of three forms: 1) delusions, 2) hallucinations, and 3) disordered thoughts. I personally struggle mostly with delusions and hallucinations, and I don’t particularly experience disordered thoughts, so that’s what I’ll mostly focus on.

Before I move on, though, I want to share something that an old psychologist of mine told me and that I’ve never really forgotten: it’s possible, and even common, to experience and exhibit occasional symptoms of MI without ever actually having that particular mental illness. A random delusion or general panic attack does not mean your character has psychosis or PTSD. Again, brains are complicated, and what defines a MI diagnosis is the consistent, pervasive presence of multiple symptoms that interfere with the patient’s day-to-day life. You can have obsessive-compulsive tendencies without having OCD. You can be anxious without having anxiety. You can be depressed without having depression.

Another thing is that a lot of MI have symptoms that overlap (which is why comorbid MIs are, again, pretty common). My PTSD comorbidities include depression, anxiety, claustrophobia, and psychosis. In fact, when I first started displaying my PTSD symptoms, I was diagnosed with depression because that was the comorbidity that showed up most prominently at the time, and it took several more years before my doctors and I realized that my depression was a symptom and not the full illness.

Alright! Let’s see if I can break down things into more manageable chunks to talk about.

PTSD

PTSD symptoms are wide, varied, and incredibly subjective from person to person. In my experience, this variance starts with what exactly was the trauma that the PTSD is originating from. Someone who was in a war, for example, will have different triggers and experience different symptoms than someone who was abused (and even then, someone who was verbally abused will once again have a vastly different PTSD experience than someone who was physically abused). Figuring out what your character’s trauma was that caused them to develop PTSD is your vital starting point.

In my experience, PTSD tends to develop slowly. One of the things doctors look for when diagnosing PTSD is that patients are still suffering after six months have passed from the initial trauma. After my initial trauma, I thought I was fine. I was asymptomatic, until months later when symptoms started to creep up on me (and as I mentioned earlier, at first it appeared primarily as depression, and I didn’t even connect it to my trauma at the time).

I experience hypervigilence with my PTSD. I am always aware of where I am, looking for possible exits and escape routes. I get nervous and anxious if I feel trapped in a room or area. (I tried going to a corn maze once. It was a bad time.) I also have an exaggerated startle response. If someone sneaks up on me, accidentally or otherwise, I’m going to react much more dramatically than other people. It’ll frighten me a lot more than it would someone whose startle response isn’t so pronounced. At worst, I’ve had experiences where someone sneaking up on me and startling me as a joke sent me into a full panicked meltdown. (I’d been having a rough time before that, but it was the straw that broke the camel’s back, so to speak.)

To which I’ll segue rather smoothly into things building up! I find it really difficult to ‘destress’ and relax if I have a lot of small triggers and uncomfortable situations pile up on me within a short period of time or without respite, to the point where something rather minor can set off an entire chain reaction and end up with what looks like an extreme overreaction.

Panic attacks can look different from person to person, or even day to day. Sometimes, panic attacks show up for me as in inability to focus, irritation and snapping angrily at every little thing while my hands shake to the point where it’s difficult for me to hold things. Other times, it’ll look like a screaming, crying mess, huddled up in a ball in a corner on the floor. How people express panic attacks varies greatly, and no one way is an ‘incorrect’ portrayal of your character’s panic attacks.

Flashback episodes are an easy, prominent way to showcase PTSD in media, and so it’s something that a lot of people are familiar with, but in a very narrow way. While it’s possible for someone experiencing a flashback to completely lose touch with their current reality and experience an exact repeat of their traumatic incident, that’s rarely the case. More often than not, my flashback episodes feel more like an overlay, where both reality and my flashback are happening at the same time. Innocuous things will suddenly seem much more ominous and dangerous, I’ll mistake the people around me for those who were present during my traumatic incident, and I tend to experience hallucinations (which I will go into more detail about later on). Someone in a flashback episode could even experience age regression, usually back to the age they were during the initial trauma. Flashback episodes and how someone experiences them are extremely personal, and I strongly suggest doing more research on the topic to find more varied accounts, and piece together how your character would respond to these events, if they even experience flashback episodes at all.

I’d like to take this next moment here to mention triggers. Triggers are highly subjective, depending on the person and their trauma, and they can often be obscure and strange. A particular scent or a familiar name could easily be enough to make someone extremely uncomfortable. Sometimes, triggers are only marginally connected to the initial trauma, or not seemingly connected at all. Conversely, something that might seem like an obvious trigger might not be a trigger at all! Brains are fucking weird like that. Also, a very common experience with PTSD (or any MI with triggers) is that day-to-day life is disrupted in favour of specifically avoiding known triggers. Crowded places will trigger my aforementioned claustrophobia, and so I will often avoid social outings, to the detriment of my friendships and familial relationships. (Which is a good example of triggers having nothing to do with trauma, actually. I was alone when my initial trauma happened. Why the hell am I afraid of crowds. @brain explain this) And not only this, but some days a trigger might not affect me at all! Triggers are so, so subjective. They’re a minefield of possibilities and dangers that can shift on what sometimes feels like a daily basis. It can be a real headache to deal with. Taking the time to get into the mind of your character and deciding what triggers them and what doesn’t it another important part of defining how you write their struggle with PTSD.

Psychosis

Since it’s what I have the least experience with, I’ll talk about disordering thinking first. Disordered thinking is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin, and people experiencing disordered thoughts can appear distressed, confused, and have issues articulating their emotions, even to the point of not being able to form full sentences or fully acknowledge questions being asked of them. I strongly suggest doing more research on this topic outside of this post if you think it might apply to your character.

Delusions are, again, fairly self explanatory. Delusions are probably my most prominent version of psychosis that I struggle with on a daily basis. Personally, the most frustrating part of delusions is that I’m well aware that they aren’t real, but I can’t shut them off anyway. In general, my most common delusions is that Person X is out to get me/is trying to sabotage me. Logically, I know that this is ridiculous, but I still have the anxiety and panic that that situation would induce. While I’m sure there are psychotic people out there who cannot distinguish their delusions from reality, and that is absolutely a valid way to portray it, I have personally never met someone like that. It seems to be a lot more common that delusional psychotics are aware that their delusions are not real, and yet we are still forced to change our patterns of behaviour to accommodate for that delusion as if it were real regardless.

Hallucinations are broad and come in way too many forms. Media likes to portray hallucinations as full-bodied apparitions that are indistinguishable from real life, and while that can be correct, I find that I rarely experience those. Most of my hallucinations are tactile hallucinations. These are hallucinations where I feel as though I’m being touched by someone or something, usually in a negative way (these hallucinations can even trigger or be triggered by a flashback episode). There are also auditory hallucinations, visual hallucinations, and even olfactory and gustatory hallucinations, although I’ve never had experiences with the latter two. Often, I find I can fairly quickly differentiate hallucinations from reality, just by doing a quick check around me. If someone is not touching me, the feeling of a hand on my arm is a hallucination. Visual hallucinations (of other people) tend to not interact with the rest of the world the same way a real person would. Auditory hallucinations do not have an obvious source, and those around me won’t react to the noise. And, of course, the usual disclaimer of everyone who experiences hallucinations experience them differently applies here too, this is just my personal experience with hallucinations.

In conclusion

PTSD and psychosis are both broad MIs with a lot of complexity that vary from person to person. I fully encourage you to continue your research into these MIs and discover what is right for your character(s). I’d like to reiterate that this post is non-exhaustive and has focused on my personal experiences with my day-to-day life as someone who has these MIs. This post is absolutely available for you to reblog if you’d like, and my ask box is right here if you have any questions or discussions you’d like to direct to someone willing to be a first-person source on these topics.

I hope I’ve helped! Now go forth and write! :D

[fuck-customers]

idfc anymore

I was tempted to go anonymous but I am far too tired.

I haven't really made a post yet, I've just been following this blog for quite a while as a release as I'm sure is the same for most. But things have changed and I thought for the better, not so sure now.

this does not include the 2nd job I'd gotten WHILE working this one, which put me at 7 days a week, a little around 60 hours a week, for 9 months. That in itself was hell and requires an entirely different submission.

It'll probably get long so just scroll to the tl;dr at the bottom if you want idc.

When I had just graduated HS, I waited the summer out before applying for a job. I already knew I wasn't going to college - a 2.3GPA isn't going to get you anywhere, especially when you're in the working class just brushing the poverty line. Getting loans is not something I wanted to do either, since everyone I'd ever met, seen, or heard who'd gotten them were miserable fcks.

At the suggestion of a relative I dropped off my resume everywhere it interested me. I got hired. Things looked good. I bonded with one of the coworkers, wasn't so bad. But I was inexperienced. And their idea of 'training' was to send 3 different people from 3 different parts of the business to train me on their own time, separately, and then argue about it because either something was miscommunicated i.e I was taught to do something one way but another person said that was wrong so they'd scold me and then "re-teach" me. This went on for a few weeks.

Okay, cool, fine. Whatever. That's stupid, you do you. Shit kind of improves. But because of this miscommunication, I get a write up for talking to one of the co-workers about something I wasn't supposed to because technically they're NOT a coworker and I don't find out exactly what that means until later (paid under the table) nor was I told I couldn't speak to them about the fact that this random ass volunteer was not only getting in the way of my work, but was being a safety hazard for my clients, despite my many warnings and corrections. Because obviously we are a hive mind and I must know that 1. Do not speak to paid-under-the-table "employees" 2. Do not tell mentally unstable child to not crawl into bin and taunt clients 3. Especially do not ban him when he was spraying the hose nozzle directly at clients.

So I get a "strike". Boss lady holds out her fingers and ticks them off once by one, as If I had made a horrible grievance upon the business. I'd only been working there for a few months, I believe. Still early, still new. Still young, fresh out of HS. 

A little back story cause I really feel this is integral to the story and hopefully for those with the same issues will look at this like "ye same" and those who haven't might be able to understand the following actions on the part of myself and others. Either way, here you go:

I've got diagnosed C-PTSD, Anxiety, Depression Bipolar, and ADHD. It has been heavily suggested I also fall along the Autism spectrum (by various doctors and nurses). I am also a victim of emotional, psychological, mental, and physical abuse (with a little stockholm I recently discovered, it's not something you yourself are generally aware of and now that I am it's ... It's worse than if I didn't know.), and I have been suffering with it for as long as I've been consciously aware to the present day. I don't always like to be so forthright with this kind of knowledge because there are quite a few people that either don't believe me, or then don't think I'm reliable enough to function and/or work. So it's usually best I don't.

And during the entire time of my employment there, I underwent a lot of manipulation and emotional abuse. A lot. By a person who believed they were doing a service for others. 

The months go on. I continue to be mistreated but it doesn't get bad until my family decide they want to adopt from the shelter boss lady also happens to run. I'm at work and I am notified of the cutest little puppy who had just gotten surrendered. I immediately asked my parents if they'd like the foster (we'd been looking for a 'family dog'). Said yes but couldn't get down there. I said that's fine, I'll fill the paperwork out. So I go to the other side and I fill everything out, we're set. We go home later on and she fits in perfectly. We decide then we'll adopt her come morning when the shelter opens up again.

Morning comes, I'm about ready to walk out the door to go to work, but I'm sent a message from one of the coworkers. "Bring the puppy in" was essentially the message being sent. Puppy's mom had originally surrendered puppy because she couldn't find a place to live that would accept dogs. So she surrendered her. But then in the morning she found a place. What a moron. Anyway.

Boss lady accepted her to having her dog back. No communication to me other than "Bring the dog in". Well we were about to adopt. Essentially what this scenario was turning into was: You work for me, therefore I 1. Don't have to explain myself 2. You work for me 3. The dog is my property.

So I'm texting the coworker back and forth like "Uh I need a little more info, also my parents want to talk with the ACO". This takes way too long, I eventually get the number, mom and ACO have a chat. I thought it went well. Apparently it didn't. He was giving her the script, paraphrased and a little blase. Moms pissed, understandably. She blows it out of proportion, note she's a psychotic bitxch and does this often with everything involving life but I can see where she's coming from with this. I'm like alright well I have to go to work, good luck barring the doors from the "Police". We go to work and it's kind of fcked.

We open the doors and everyone goes silent and turns towards us, in the kind of way you know they were just talking about you. Cause we got everyone in one room. The Boss Lady, the girl txting me over the phone, the ACO, some unnamed volunteer[s]. It's fcking uncomfortable and idk whats going on. The coworker I'd been txting was known and a little too happy to gossip, run her mouth, and cause problems. I was not surprised this was what was going on, but it didn't make me any less pissed.

Boss Lady confronts relative who'd dropped me off at work. He barely says a word, just stares at her, while she's maybe a couple inches from him. She says things like "Don't stare at me like that, this is how it works" "They are MY property, and as MY property I CAN call the police and they WILL show up on your front door do you want that?" "Peeriet, go with him to get the dog so I know she's coming back." And other really really volatile bullshit. The fact that she called the puppy her PROPERTY, threatened to call the POLICE, like...I was there during all of these interactions. My texts were neutral and just asking questions, my moms convo with the ACO was really calm and easy, and the relative was doing nothing but standing there and staring as she went off her rocker. So. 

I said no, I have to go to work, I'm not going with him to get the dog but he's going to get her. So he goes, I clock in, I leave.

I go to my job and vent to my coworker about the situation because I was still trying to wrap my head around it, when the ACO shows up wanting to have a private "chat."

The fcking conversation went something like this.

"So uh, you really care about your job, right?"

this fcking asshole was alluding, in so many words, probably to get the point across while also saving his ass so if I had gone to anyone saying he THREATENED MY POSITION OVER MY HEAD TO MAKE ME COOPERATE it may have been a problem. Wonder why.

So I said yeah, it's not even an issue also, they're bringing the dog back, etc. They'd even said because I filled out the application under my name that I was liable for anything to happen if it were to happen and that, because it's under my name, well, shucks, this is all your responsibility at the end of the day, we can wipe our hands clean and call it good.

Even though we were following the 'rules' and never once 1. Yelled 2. Caused a scene 3. Refused 4. Or threatened.

So that's settled. I thought. I go home and moms pissed. Que the next few weeks of absolute stupid shit storm via the internet by way of her leaving a trail of bad reviews. Of course this falls on me.

Everything my mom ever did or said, was my fault, as they "alluded" because we can't tell the truth in this business lest we be taken to court for whatever illegal activity we're probably doing behind closed doors.

So that started a whole new thing. They're hatred becomes amplified. Coworkers I'd bonded or befriended just outright stopped talking to me, barely acknowledging my precense and going to my manager for anything, including relaying messages to me. This did not stop for another 2 years.

So eventually things calm down, as calm as it could get. I continue to get harassed a lot, manipulated. I get injured at work fairly frequently, more than most - injuries that required medical treatment. I lied my first visit because it was after work. I was truthful the other time. I'd already been told by a few coworkers but Boss Lady specifically had a few special conversations with me about not telling any of my family I got injured at work, "Because you know how your mom is". They always spoke too sweetly, too nicely and feeding me excuses to cover up the real reasons. And I'd been so used to abuse my whole life that stockholm was bleeding into my work life and if anyone has ever fcking experienced that, it is fcking hell.

So I didn't tell anyone.

Until I'd gotten injured real bad. A dog had clamped full jaws onto my leg and shook. I had an indent for every tooth, including at least 3 deep punctures. I had it disinfected, shot a water missile into the punctures to make sure debris was out, wrapped, and given meds, orally and topically. I limped when I went home. And at the weekend went bye, I continued to get worse emotionally. I couldn't keep this a secret, I was experiencing actual physical pain because of the situation I'd been put under and I, mentally, could not cope. So I blew up in the kitchen. I had a meltdown, I showed my leg, I explained what happened, I said sorry but that I couldn't hide it anymore. 

The next day or days at work I told boss lady I couldn't hide it. I just couldn't. She backpeddled, explained "Oh no no, you shouldn't feel like you have to hide it, I never said that." This was her keyphrase after being called out for every single threat, warning, and manipulation. "I never said that.". Because it was true. She didn't. She said it in a way that couldn't hold her accountable in any true legal situation.

Months go by. I continue with the abuse not just at home but at work now. Abuse most people wouldn't even consider was abuse, but unfortunately I'd been groomed for this sort of thing my entire life, so when it happened at work? I fit in so naturally I didn't even know it was abuse/wrong until I'd left. 

And the real kicker is that she knew of my mental disorders. Because when stockholm had got me good, and I was especially tired, and I'd suffered some real hard shit at home, I'd break and I'd confess to boss lady in hopes of some kind of understanding: See, this is what I deal with, please don't mistreat me.

I wrote letters. I tried talking to her one on one. I tried working so hard at work to show how good I'd gotten.

Each letter was misunderstood. She'd bring me into her office after our oral talk and tell me that, because of what I'd written, I could be misunderstood, taken 'at my word.' "Well it says here that you don't ... want to work with your clients? Well if this is true then I legally can't have you with them. Because you wrote it. And legally I have to put this in your file." So I had to rewrite it, delete everything incriminating so I was left with my personal feelings.

Talking with her wasn't possible. She used tactics my mother does, so I physically couldn't talk, and I did, it was only "Sorrys" and "Thank yous" and accepting I was wrong and she was right and yes, I understand.

Working hard didn't work. I paid for my training personally and attended a school solely to improve. I kept making mistakes though. I wasn't good enough. I was doing some of the work my manager was with none of the pay, none of the acknowledgment or acceptance. I brought her in money, and clients, and good reviews, for nothing more than what I'd already had. Because she knew I wouldn't fight for it. Because she knew I'd continue giving her money and she didn't have to shell out anything more. And legally she didn't have to, because I had no experience, I was out of HS, and no official schooling.

But she'd always give me 'tidbits' of 'rewards'. The kicker for anyone with stockholm and/or abuse is you can basically continue to abuse them without too much issue if they 'reward' you and make it seem like they're doing you a favour. You know what I mean?

So she'd have occasionally 'positive' conversations, or she'd 'comment' something good about me, but I really loved when she'd give me a .50cent raise about twice in 2 years disguising it under her "charity" when it was probably because it was actually required. Cause in her office I was like "Why do I have a .50cent raise?" "Why are you asking, that's not something you normally ask when getting a raise." "???" "It's cause -....Just be thankful" Yeeee you see that? See that? How she almost said something but didn't? Yeah.

When she hired a new person they actually made about the same as me but more than another coworker, who'd been there longer, and when asked, boss lady said she basically didn't want to pay him if he wasn't sticking around (What kind of bullshit is that). He was. He corrected her, and his pay got fixed.

Again, months passed. Sometimes It'd be so good and I truly loved my job. I formed relationships with the clients to this day I can't think about because I get emotional. And every time she would critique me. Make things harder for us, she'd always be watching us on the cameras, and if she didn't see us, she'd assume we weren't working. She'd even come out of office to walk by just to watch us as she passed. 

2 months ago she made some changes. She'd hired someone that was her irl friend. The entire business save 1 or 2 people, were connected either by blood, marriage, or irl friendship. Which wasn't a good thing.

So she hires this new manager. Does ok for maybe a week or two. But then they started making some changes. She redid how we did our payments and filed clients in a really convoluted way. We went back to the old system in a week.

Then she switched everyones schedules. Really inconveniently and without asking anyone for confirmation like she said. She never even spoke to me like she did the others. 

Then she wanted opening crew to take our lunches back to back. Which made the early morning person take their lunch 6-7 hours after they'd already been clocked on, and me take mine only a couple hours after I'd been clocked on. Well, what about the afternoon crew?

Afternoon crew, as Boss lady told our manager and new morning crew person, didn't have to take a lunch now because of the new schedule. Which put him at over 5/5.5 hours anyway, despite the hour cut.

My hours were being cut. She'd just hired new manager and new morning crew, who'd taken over everything of mine previously. She'd also already fired a few people, and the new minimum wage mandatory increase was right around the corner.

I watched my hours. I waited. Few days pass. The next week comes, everyones on edge, I'm a fireball.

She tells us we're not allowed to keep our "belongings" with the rest of the other clients when we're on lunch. We must remove them into an entire separate room, because they would otherwise make our numbers higher (of total clients allowed in a space per person ratio) and thus become "illegal". We'd been seen by a health inspector twice in a year or so by request of a client who wasn't too keen on our 'policies'. Boss Lady was adamantly covering bases, which meant fcking everyone over.

It was kind of the last straw. I applied elsewhere, got accepted, and left. I spent 2 weeks after my last day literally going through a detox/withdrawal. I became physically ill. I had mental breakdowns about once every couple days. It was hell, it was horrible. I hated every minute of it.

Someone else left. A month later another person left. Several people that'd gotten hired have already been fired. And apparently a business too similar to the glory days of the place I'd left, has moved a couple blocks down the road to a second location. 

I've gotten a new job, but It's only partially an improvement, and I am still affected everyday by the abuse I'd suffered at that place, coupled with everything I already go through at home. And I am tired, and I do this alone, and I've been looking for a place to move into for years but minimum wage isn't a livable wage.

I am tired.

tl;dr how tf do you even summarize that?