#(yeah i know the adhd is also a reason but like. i'm already medicated for that and still not functioning)

[icarus-hasfallen]

Y'all I figured out somethin big about my health recently and like. Suddenly I can't feasibly assume I'm just not motivated enough to do the things. What on earth do I do with this why does the way I operate make Sense now what the fu

[milf-murdock]

Unsteady (Simon x Johnny x Reader)

Request: Simon and Johnny taking care of F!Reader

Summary: Simon and Johnny take care of you after you almost pass out at the pub.

TW: heavily implied disordered eating, almost passing out, mental health concerns, medication mentions (nothing specific but could be read as ADHD medication side effects).

A/N: Hi anon! Thank you so much for your request and your kind words! I'm choosing not to publish the ask because I think there are some triggering words that I won't be able to hide under a "read more" line, but I hope that you enjoy this and find some comfort in it.

As someone who has also struggled with EDs in the past, please, please, please do not be afraid to ask for help. There is nothing glamorous about eating disorders. They absolutely need to be taken seriously.

Instead of going the full ED route with this one shot, I took it down a slightly softer path and based it off of my experience with ADHD and how it has led to me accidentally missing meals.

The din of the pub faded into the background as you sat in the corner booth of your favorite pub. You were pressed up against Simon’s bulky frame, one of his strong arms wrapped around your body, keeping you tucked in close. Johnny sat across the booth, taking in his favorite view: you wrapped up in Simon—his two loves, his whole world sat right across the table from him. 

Your empty glass clinked against the others as your set it on the table. “Looks like we’re ready for another round,” you said, smiling up at Johnny. 

“Mm, that it does,” Johnny smiled back at you, and you felt like you could absolutely drown in those ocean eyes. 

“You tryna get us drunk or something, love?” Simon teased, lips pressing against your collarbone. 

“Something like that,” you laughed, turning your head meet his lips for a quick kiss. “Here, I’ll go, order them” you reasoned, being on the outside of the seat and closest to the bar. “Be right back.” You pushed yourself from the booth to your feet, and instantly the entire room started spinning.  Damn, you thought to yourself. That beer is hitting fast. You went to take one tentative step, and then the room started to tilt, the floor coming up at you fast. 

Johnny was out of his seat in an instant, having picked up immediately something was wrong from the moment you stood up. His two large hands reached out to steady you, catching you in his arms. “Easy now,” he grunted,  bracing you both. “I’ve got ye.” He gently lowered you back into the booth, letting your weak form lean up against Simon. Simon’s hands instantly held you against him, supporting you. At the edge of the booth, Johnny got down on one knee so he could be eye level with you. 

“Look at me, hen,” he coaxed. “What’re you feeling?” Johnny grabbed one of the ice waters from the table and gingerly helped bring it to your lips. 

You blinked, trying to get your bearings. The room finally stopped spinning. “M’fine,” you mumble before taking a sip of the water Johnny offered you. The icy cold liquid helped clear your mind. “Just got a bit dizzy.”

Johnny and Simon exchanged knowing glances. 

“What’ve ye had to eat today, lass?” Johnny’s voice was gentle, prodding, but his eyes were a dead giveaway to the concern and hurt he was feeling, already knowing the answer. 

“Umm, I’m not really sure,” you stepped around the question, your voice hesitant. “I think I had a banana this morning?” 

Simon let out a resigned sigh. “I’m assuming that would be half of a banana,” he corrected. “Considering I found the remaining half still in the peel on top of the dresser.”   

You eyelids fluttered shut, cheeks flushing with embarrassment. “Oh.” You let out. “Yeah, I went in there to grab one of your jumpers and I must have forgotten it.” 

It happened all the time, you getting distracted mid task. It had gotten even worse since one of the side effects of your medication was a suppressed appetite. You never did have quite a good relationship with food to begin with though. 

“And what about lunch?” Johnny continued his prodding. 

You bit your bottom lip, a nervous habit of yours. Wincing, you reply with a mumbled “forgot.” Your voice was barely above a whisper as shame flooded through you. 

At this, both men let out a sigh, completely in synch when it comes to their concern for you. 

“Love, we’ve been over this,” Simon started before being cut off. 

“M’sorry.” Despite your best efforts, a couple tears started to slide down your face. 

Johnny pulls you into his arms. “S’okay, Bonnie,” he soothed, running a hand up and down your back. 

“S’not okay, Johnny,” Simon snapped from the other side of you. “She needs to be eating.” 

Johnny shot Simon a glare. “I know that, Si.” He took a deep breath before pressing a kiss to your temple, your head buried against his chest. “He’s right though, bonnie. Ye need to be eating.” 

His hand slid up to grip your chin, forcing you to look up at him. 

“I know,” you whined, fidgeting under his piercing gaze. 

Simon scooted closer across the booth, a strong hand coming to rest against your back. 

“We just need to know you’re taken care of, love,” Simon began to rub his hand in a soothing circle. “Specially knowing we can’t always be here to take care of you ourselves.” 

“I know,” you sighed, feeling yourself shutting down. 

Simon and Johnny exchange another glance, Simon giving a short nod of approval signaling to back off for now. 

“Just promise us you’ll try,” Johnny pleaded. “For us. Please?”

You nod, sniffling. 

“I promise,” you sighed softly. “I’ll try harder.”

Johnny gave you a crooked smile, a favorite of yours. “Atta girl.” 

Simon pressed a kiss to the back of your head. “Now let’s go get some dinner, love. How’s that sound?” 

“It sounds…” you trailed off.  “Well, I don’t really feel that well.” 

Simon nodded his head knowingly. “Well that’s cause you’ve hardly eaten today.”

You shrugged your shoulders. “Probably.” 

“Something easy then,” Johnny stated matter of factly. “Perfect weather for soup. Think you can manage that, dove?” 

You gave a small nod and let Johnny transfer you over to Simon’s strong arms. 

“Aye, good lass,” he gave you a quick peck. “Si, get our girl home and I’l go pick it up.” 

“Affirmative,” Simon agreed, giving your hip a quick tap to encourage you to try to get on your feet again. 

Johnny stood up and offered you a hand to help you up, Simon’s hands never leaving your hips until they were both certain you weren’t in danger of passing out on them.  

“I’ll see you both at home,” Johnny quipped, giving both you and Simon a quick kiss on the cheek before going to pay the tab. 

Simon helped you shrug into your coat and the two of you made your way out to the brisk Manchester air. 

An hour later, empty takeaway containers littered the coffee table in the living room as you laid on the couch with your loves. You were pressed up against Simon, leaning up against him, tucked under his arm. Your legs were sprawled out across Johnny’s lap, his calloused hands giving you the most delightful foot massage. 

“Y’know we love you, right?” Johnny’s voice broke the silence that had settled over the three of you. 

“I know,” your voice was low. 

“We just worry about you, love,” Simon urged, pressing a kiss to the back of your head. 

“I promise I’ll try to be better.” You sighed softly. “I love you both so much.” 

“We love you too, lass.” Johnny leaned forward to give you a kiss. 

“So much,” Simon finished, pressing another kiss to your exposed neck. 

[copperbadge]

In the nicest way possible, you just got diagnosed? I have been a fan of yours for longer than you would prefer I tell you. I always assumed that my undiagnosed self found your fic through mutual neurodivergent energy and that's why I was so obsessed. I hope you find some peace and acceptance in yourself that you may not have had before. Also, though, you have always been my favorite writer and it's partially because your thoughts are so complex. You have always been wonderful ♡

Well, first, thank you, I'm glad you've been enjoying my work and my presence! (I hope it's ok to post this publicly, it's a very sweet comment and a lovely compliment.)

The diagnosis is not entirely new at this point, but I didn't even consider the idea prior to about 2018 and didn't get a diagnosis until April of 2022. The only reason I even thought about it was I made an offhanded joke about having ADHD and a bunch of people responded "Well yeah, were you not aware?"

I've always had a lot of friends who were somewhere in the neurodivergence buffet, but I assumed that was because I had two neurodivergent siblings I helped raise, so I was more comfortable around neurodivergence than a lot of neurotypicals tend to be who haven't had much exposure. Turns out as I said in another post recently, game recognize game.

On the plus, I don't really tend to...I mean I think we all judge ourselves, but I don't do it as much or as negatively as a lot of people I know, regardless of who they are or where they're at in life. There are certainly things about me and my life that dissatisfy me but I tend to think of them as systematic rather than personal failings, and I'm perhaps unhealthily self-sufficient but that does mean that I don't tend to look outwards for validation so don't suffer if I don't get it. Not having a diagnosis didn't make me blame myself for stuff outside my control, is what I'm trying to vocalize.

Having a diagnosis has been a much bigger help than I anticipated, as has medication, but I'm fortunate that while I have moments of anger and sadness about it, they're fairly passing, so I had already accepted myself in ways that it seems like many people find difficult. So you know, I guess all of that is to say I was doing okay and now am doing okayer :D And so I hope the same for you! (Both you specifically and you in the "y'all" sense of the word.)

[alertarchitect]

I... Think I'm experiencing one of those moments of wistful nostalgia that leads to the road of constantly missing and wishing for "the good ol' days," even though I know that line of thinking is what leads to a lot of the "look at how great the US was before black people could vote! Hell, before women could vote!!" nonsense conservative reactionaries spout, but... There's just something weird about feeling something and not realizing what it is until you've almost gone through it completely. Especially since there's this weird sense of mourning tied to it, which you'll understand in a bit if you choose to read on. I'll put a full explanation of what I mean below the cut so my nonsense rambling won't fuck with your tumblr scrolling. CW, I'm going to be talking about Rooster Teeth, which involves some of the controversies that came up towards the end of its lifespan, so if that stuff (including discussions of homophobia, grooming, and abuses of power for sexual favors) triggers your trauma response and/or you were a victim of certain parties who were fired from the company for good reason in the last few years of RT (if you know, you know, and if you don't, well I'll get into it under the cut), feel free to skip this for your own safety.

So, I was a Rooster Teeth fan in one way or another for a very long time. I first watched Red vs. Blue when I was, admittedly, far too young to do so (I was born in 2000, and I was watching it on YouTube on the first iPod touch I owned that had the YouTube app back when the icon for YouTube was still meant to look like an old CRT TV... Yeah, far too young for that show lmao), around 2010-ish got into Achievement Hunter thanks to the Halo Reach Fails of the Weak series, which lead to their Minecraft series, then I had a massive hyperfixation on RWBY (though I didn't realize it was a hyperfixation due to being very uneducated on the ADHD I knew I had because I was a kid, was scared out of agreeing to get medicated by my mother when I was diagnosed at around 6-7 years old if I'm remembering the time frame correctly, and was taught the idea that you "grow out of" being neurodivergent) for the first 4-5 seasons or so. I was even a Rooster Teeth FIRST member for years when I started working.

Now, obviously, I took a bit of a step back from watching them around 2020 or so when the controversy around Ryan Haywood being a grooming creep who allegedly succeeded at having physical relations with minors (while married with kids btw) using the power dynamic of them being AH fans as an entry point to conversation and a way to coerce them came to light - and I ended up staying with watching RT in general, though I was far more into Achievement Hunter in particular at the time, because I felt they had shown that the people around Ryan didn't know he was a piece of shit and genuinely felt disgusted, betrayed, and overall appalled at what they learned about him. I also ended up maintaining my FIRST subscription, which was yearly anyway so I couldn't have really paused it at the time since they already had my money, but I decided to stay with supporting them because I liked the content and getting the early videos, exclusive series, and other stuff through the app and website.

Fast forward to late 2022. Now, at this time, I was dealing with the massively first-world problem of liking the content RT was producing, though not as much as I used to because things had changed a lot and I missed a lot of the "IRL fucking around in our offices" stuff that seemed to have gone completely by the wayside by that point, but I was also up-to-date on all of the stuff on their site that I cared about watching and so I started watching more stuff on YouTube again since, once I had started paying for FIRST, I had basically made RT into my primary content source to get my money's worth out of it. I listened to a lot of the podcasts that were kinda branched out from the AH space, such as Off Topic, Face Jam, and F**kFace (no, I'm not self-censoring, that is how the name of that podcast was stylized), the exclusive stuff related to those shows offered through the subscription, basically all AH content, and more.

I was basically current with all of it, because earlier in 2020 I was kinda in friend-group-limbo, where I was finally trying to find groups of friends away from just being in groups that I was introduced to by my sister where everyone just knew me as her younger sibling, and it was only around early 2022 that I actually started getting into the consistent friend groups I have now that I would consider some of the people I'm closest to in my life, including the group that I met my boyfriend in - partially thanks to a somewhat-depression-fuelled obsession with Destiny 2 that started shortly after the release of the expansion The Witch Queen. Due to my mostly-friendless life before then, not really knowing anyone IRL outside of family, the one friend group I thought I'd be able to stay in (a FFXIV FC I stumbled my way into) turning out to be fairly transphobic leading to me just straight-up ghosting them and quitting that game, and all of this being around the time that I finally quit League of Legends - which was both a toxic presence in my life that I was no longer enjoying but was also the main avenue I had for meeting and hanging out with friends - I ended up spending most of my free time thanks to the pandemic on a few, specific things. Those being 1) Zelda BotW on the Switch I purchased with my first-ever tax return since I had only started working in 2019, 2) my mostly fruitless-at-the-time pursuit of finding people who actually liked and knew me for me, not just my association with my sister, and 3) watching lots, and I mean LOTS, of videos on Rooster Teeth.

Seriously, through both of my failed attempts to go to college, the COVID-19 lockdowns, multiple personal events that led to me being pushed out of former friend groups not-so-subtly by my sister as I was trying to be a part of her groups a lot thanks to me not really knowing how to find people to interact with IRL or online for a variety of reasons, losing multiple good jobs that paid me much more than I get at this shitty retail job thanks to my own inability to handle having a full-time job without being constantly late to shifts and shit (seriously, working full-time hours makes me feel like absolute shit and I don't know if I'd ever be able to actually handle going back to a full-time job, which is why I really want to try and set things up to start streaming and turn that into something to supplement my part-time work enough to be able to live off of it and get away from my mother who is... not great), and multiple short-lived relationships that I still mourned over fairly heavily (to be fair, I had figured out I was pansexual, but I only realized in the past couple of months thanks to my BF that I'm demiromantic... plus I just didn't find any potential partners who understood my troubles with not being able to constantly message back and forth 24/7)... Watching a bunch of Rooster Teeth content was my comfort space, even when I didn't actually have my own space due to cramped living conditions for about a year at one point. It was what greeted me at the end of a long day of work, what got a chuckle or two out of me at my most depressed, what really defined (to me) some of the humor I love to this day of just friends fucking around and doing bits, I could forget some of the serious shit in the world that was going on for just a short time with the nonsensical stuff that just went into straight-up weird territory that really started rearing its head with the Morning Show Show (but was very visible with stuff like Last Laugh), and more. So I watched it all, voraciously, insatiably. I was caught up on everything until early 2022, when I started getting into Destiny 2 and actually, y'know, having friends again, so I missed a video here or there I'd catch up on later, usually as something to listen to as I went to sleep.

Then Kdin Jenzen made her post detailing all of the horrifically homophobic and transphobic bullshit she dealt with during her time working there, none of which I knew about because it had happened during times I was either too young to fully remember or during times I wasn't really watching RT. A "nickname" used for years (during which time people knew she was queer, btw, though she hadn't come out as trans yet and idk if even she realized that specific detail at the time) that was born from the f-slur. Horrific crunch that basically everyone in the company was subject to, constantly, which didn't change even after she was hospitalized with fucking pneumonia. She wasn't getting credited for videos she worked on. Then, she came out as trans, and the treatment got worse, where she'd deal with the same levels of overwork and crunch time while getting isolated off in a corner to do her work because "people had no idea how to deal with a trans woman," only there to do far too much work while simultaneously getting pulled out like a trophy as if to say "See? We're inclusive!!!" despite her horrible treatment and isolation.

In short, even though there were "a handful of good people" as she put it (with who being apparent by who she gave positive responses to at the time when they publicly apologized for their past behavior - some noting they had done so privately in the past and felt a public apology was still in order - with others being given rather harsh ones, including Geoff Ramsey, a founder whom she called out for never using the power he had as a founder of the company and as someone very high up in the company to do anything to stop the bullshit she and so many others dealt with at RT over the years), the company itself was absolute dogshit. So, I did what anyone should do in that situation - I felt absolutely sick to my stomach because I felt as if I, a queer person, had been duped for years on end by an inclusive PR image, set my FIRST subscription to never renew again, couldn't even stomach watching what they released during the time I could still watch ad-free until my subscription expired, pulled all of my RT merch out of my closet (all of which I ended up donating to a local Goodwill except for one shirt, though there's another one I regret getting rid of now), and proceeded to unfollow a lot of the RT people I had been following for years at that point en masse, with the exceptions of those Kdin personally responded well to.

Fast forward to now. I'm going to assume we all know that Rooster Teeth started the process of being fully shut down by Warner Media earlier this year, partially due to low revenue, partially because I don't think Warner could stomach having anything media-related they own have content anywhere that wasn't on HBO Max. As of now, the website is basically fully non-functioning, with just a farewell video and a simple goodbye message iirc. The only way to get many videos that were FIRST-member exclusive over the years is via the Internet Archive, and with recent rulings, that may very well be in jeopardy if the people who end up with the various RT IPs decide to have them pulled for one reason or another. Yet, because of a tangent in a conversation I had with my boyfriend after playing some Warframe, I started wondering what had happened to the various people and channels I used to follow...

So I went down a bit of a rabbit hole. I'm even following some of the ones that were decent people at a bad company that have gone independent, sometimes buying the old RT IPs they were associated with, now... but something just feels off. I felt empty. And now... I realize what's going on. I'm feeling this sense of nostalgia for a specific period of time in the history of Rooster Teeth's content production, during which I may have been at one of the lowest points of my life, but those videos were a massive source of solace during. I'm also grieving over the loss of a fucking company that I didn't even really care about anymore, but in some part of my mind I kind of did because of how formative some of the videos it produced were to me. I'm watching the post-mortem of a company that helped define so much of what we know as the modern internet thanks to its start as one of the last vestiges of the old internet before everything became overly monetized and corporate, for better or for worse - months after everyone else that still cared has already processed it.

I'm grieving over the final, 100% irreversible end of one of the last things that - again, for better or for worse - was a constant source of being able to see something new that fit within formats I was used to seeing since I was a kid.

If I wanted to see an actual let's play that had more than the bare minimum of editing done for a VoD that isn't just constant, over-the-top bullshit, had actual interaction between the people in it that showed they were at least work friends, that had all of the POVs in one video instead of needing to hop to 17 different VoD channels to see everything... Those videos were what I would turn to, more often than not. Like I said, new videos but in formats I loved. Now... even though I haven't watched anything like the old AH videos in almost 2 years since Kdin's post, I'm feeling this... Gap. A void. If I want to watch gameplay, chances are it'll be a VoD of someone I like watching, yes, but something like that lightning-in-a-bottle of the old AH stuff where everyone was in a room together and you didn't have to watch multiple VoDs to see everything you wanted to see... I genuinely don't know if that really exists anywhere anymore.

And thus, I grieve a part of my childhood and young adulthood that is gone forever. Sure, I can buy an external SSD and put copies of all of the old videos I liked on there for me to watch whenever I want, such as RvB or a bunch of the old AH stuff (I could probably even find the FIRST stuff that was never on YouTube if I really tried), it doesn't change the fact that, though some vestiges of what once was will live on through different podcasts and channels made by the few decent people that were left in the ashes of the dumpster fire that was Rooster Teeth, new stuff made like that is, quite possibly, gone forever unless someone were to get enough money scraped together to be able to try and do something like it again - and it's unlikely it'd make enough back to be around for long in the modern age of content creation and consumption. Hell, to my (fairly limited, admittedly) knowledge, even before RT was shut down, the main channel they owned that I'm nostalgic for now was essentially shut down - Achievement Hunter was retired and the people that remained made something called DogBark.

It's a part of the unending march of time - things come and go, no matter how much of a constant they may seem in the background of your life, even if you aren't engaging with them how you used to. But even knowing that... This one's hurting a bit as I finally process it. Especially as I take the time to write a post about it to be able to get these thoughts out of my head and off of my chest without directly weighing down those around me with my glum rambling about a shit company I didn't even watch anymore going under. It just feels... wrong, in some way. Hell, I'm anticapitalist as shit, but because of how formative those videos were to me for so long, I'm mourning the shutdown of a shitty fucking company that was a WARNER MEDIA SUBSIDIARY!!!

The human mind is a hell of a thing to have to deal with sometimes, huh...

[futchmemes]

whining and rambling about my self sabotage don't mind me

i've been at home for months now and i'm supposed to be like buckling down on getting a job now that my internship is finished but for some reason i'm just fucking paralyzed. like i don't know what's wrong with me, i had to do the exact same thing last fall and i applied for over 30 jobs in less than 2 months. i'm so fucking embarrassed and i keep lying that i've been working on it this whole time but i haven't done shit. like genuinely i don't know why it's so much worse this time and i feel awful all the time and i don't know what to do about it

that's a fucking lie i know exactly what to do about it, i need to go outside more and get literally any exercise and fucking APPLY FOR JOBS so i can stop feeling so fucking bad about myself but i'm just.... not. like i'm just sitting here day after day pretending to work at my laptop and i'm not. i suspect this is a "when the disability is disabling" moment but it hasn't been this bad since before i got medicated more than 5 years ago and i don't fucking understand why it's happening so suddenly???

i have an appointment with my psych in december just for maintenance reasons but idk what to even say to her about this or if i should say anything. like idk if this is me needing to up my ssri or try a different adhd med or what, and the idea of fucking with my meds is exhausting just to think about and might make things worse so like why even bother? i have an appointment with a sleep specialist a couple weeks before that and i've been having sleep issues for so long i have to hope i can finally figure that out and that'll do something, but i can't wait for fucking december, i need to do something Now

i probably just have to force myself to have any fucking discipline whatsoever and once i start it'll be fine, but getting over the block feels so stupidly difficult. it shouldn't feel so difficult! it shouldn't be! i already have a resume i just need to do my portfolio, i've literally written a fuckign masters dissertation why is this so bad! AND my mom keeps being like "you should try to get a temporary retail job in the meantime" and like yeah maybe! but also the idea of doing that makes me want to fucking die!

someone needs to come threaten to beat me with a hammer i think that might be for the best. maybe actually beat me with a hammer. maybe then my family would feel sympathy for me instead of being frustrated and angry. bitch I'M frustrated and angry you don't need to do it for me!!!!!

god!!!!!!! someone come throw my brain in a hypersonic jewelry cleaner maybe that would fix it

[necromancelena]

I think you might have adhd, as some who also has adhd, and even if you don’t what your describing is executive dysfunction. I also struggle to motivate myself and I sometimes also try to shame myself into forcing myself to do things/learn things.

I know it might seem like the best way to motivate yourself but please don’t, all your doing is using shame to trigger anxiety and using that to overcome executive dysfunction, and it’s not healthy nor sustainable. (Because lower self esteem can make executive dysfunction even worse, since you now associate learning with shame and anxiety, and that kindof stuff makes it harder for the learning to actually stick)

From experience somewhat healthier way would be to try to motivate yourself by encouraging yourself to work on it by how useful the skill is, and than making it seem less stressful by breaking it down into small steps. Rather than just shaming yourself into doing it. Look up videos about the skill, learn about it and cool things you can do with it. Stuff like that, basically find ways to motivate yourself and make the skill seem like less of a mountain and that should help at least a little. (And if you can, research about adhd, and if it rings true you should see a doctor about it, maybe you can get some medication for it and it will probably help a ton. I unfortunately can’t get meds for personal reasons, but they might help you /gen)

also none of those things you say to motivate yourself are true (or at least aren’t true about any person who is worth being around you or being your friend) their is no age where you “should” have a skill or your behind on something, everyone is learning and going about life on their own pace and you shouldn’t feel shame about not knowing how to do something at any age and wanting to learn about it is already amazing.

(I really hope this helps, as someone who has the same thing and is trying to work on it.)

Yeah, I got diagnosed with ADHD as a kid, I haven't been able to afford my medication for it for years though. And you're right, being filled with overwhelming shame is probably not a very healthy coping strategy, which is why I was venting about how it's the only way I can ever get things done. I am cognisant that it's not a good mental state but pretty much every piece of reassurance about how it doesn't matter where I'm at in life and how good I am at the things I care about has only ever made me far more upset about it, it's legitimately the last thing I need to hear. And at the end of the day I would much rather be anxious and miserable all the time but still accomplishing the things I want to.

[weathernerdmando]

I told my dad recently that I was looking to get evaluated for ehlers danlos because it would explain a lot and his reaction at first wasn't the best (it's honestly a little fucked up what he said but i saw where he got it and he did basically apologize for implying it) but once I actually got to explain why he seemed to get it. At first he was like "why do you want to get all these labels and to stand out and like I sort of get the perspective but now that I am actually chronically ill I just want to be healthy" and like I get it, I do, but I think what he didn't understand is I don't want to "stand out".

The problem lies in that I already do. The autism and ADHD alone already make me "unique" or whatever enough. It's not that I want. Its not that I want to be sick, I dont.

I just...i already am, or at least, have things wrong with me that haven't had answers so far for my entire life.

It's that I don't want to be alone. It's that I want to find other people who share similar issues who I can finally say "there's an answer to these random, seemingly unconnected, pain in the ass issues and other people understand it finally".

It's knowing I've always been medically complex and that apparently just kinda got forgotten/ignored because I thought most of it was normal because I didn't really know much else and once things were initially "dealt with" we kinda just moved on and if we needed to make accomodations we did but we just slid them between everything else and it was like they were always there before.

I know I've always been medically complex, but I didn't know that I wasn't the only one dealing with these issues and maybe some of it *is* fetal alcohol related but I don't see those things in me much at all, and even if it is a factor it doesn't explain the things I'm looking for answers for.

I'm not looking for a diagnosis for the hell of it. It's not for another label to slap on, it's not another "fun little trivia piece" or whatever you want to call it.

It's getting answers and ways to deal so things cause me less pain and I can stop being exhausted 90% of the time and maybe only be tired to exhausted 70% (50% is optimistic I think, lol). It's maybe maybe maybe finding out why no matter what I do, how much more I eat, how much I try to remember to eat, why i cant gain weight, why I can't get the body signals that signify hunger like I should be, it's maybe getting a path forward to a healthy weight for the first time in my life. I've never hit 3 digits and I *should* be and it's not intentional at all, I try and try and try but I simply can't and getting some reasoning as to why?? And maybe finding ways to get there?? That's what I want.

It's finding another person who's ribs move like mine in a way they really shouldn't and the relief in knowing "this person has an Official this is something wrong diagnosis and they share this trait with me and I finally have confirmation that this *should* concern me a little" but that there is also an explanation for it too.

I just want to be able to do things, accomodations or otherwise, somewhat normally for once. I'm used to accomodations, they've already been present in some way throughout my entire life. I wanted to be normal for a long, long time and I'm never going to be. I know I'm not like most people. I know that.

I don't want to be normal. I'm not ever going to be. What I want is to find other not normal people like me who I can say "this is happening and it hurts" and get a "yeah, same, you're not alone" response from or maybe "Here's things that have helped me, maybe talk to your doctor about them" and "Yeah, no, you're not overreacting to that being painful or weird or whatever, that's not something you should be able to do".

I'm not looking to stand out but to some extent, blend in and have a chance to finally just rest for a second or two.

I told him some of this, summarized really, and he kinda sat for a second, and I think understood what I was saying. And he said "I'm sorry you've been dealing with all this and I didn't realize."

So I think he understood why, in the end, but still. It's nice to lay it all out in the end anyways.

[creations-by-chaosfay]

Some folks have been questioning whether or not i'm epileptic, or if my seizures are as severe as I say they are. Here's a video of me participating in a seizure study. This is what happens when I miss a single dose of my medication and sleep deprived. For this study, I went over 24 hours without sleep.

My seizure threshold is extremely low, meaning it takes very little to trigger a seizure. We learned why so many medications have failed me. We learned why meds will never completely control my seizures. We learned that my seizures begin deep in my brain and spread to both frontal lobes, which disqualifies me from every known brain implant available for seizure control.

Before commenting here or asking questions, read the comments and my replies in the link. I will direct you to the comments if it's something I've answered already.

In my most recent EEG, back in I think...2017? During the strobe light test, the EEG was showing massive seizure activity. There were no outward signs though, which had the doctor confused and concerned, so he talked to me. That's when he discovered something disturbing. How? I was conversational. No confusion, very chatty, and when the strobes stopped, the seizure activity diminished. I finished the test with a headache and exhausted. Some apple juice and a protein bar fixed the worst of it. That's when we learned I'm likely having several seizures a day, and may be why I'm hypoglycemic. Seizures burn through glucose, and my blood sugar tanks after I have seizures. It doesn't help that I have ADHD and forget to eat, which then lowers my blood sugar and outs me at risk for more seizures.

Yeah, epilepsy is complicated. It's also terminal if left untreated or poorly controlled. I'm high risk for SUDEP, but the risk is lower if my stress and anxiety are lower. It's one of the reasons I use edibles. The combination of THC and CBD have successfully helped me get more control over my seizures.

I hope this provides you with some information and gives you a better understanding of what it is I live with. The video is a tonic-clonic seizure, which is in the gran mal family. These occur twice a month for me, when my period begins and ends. I have a variety of other less violet seizures everyday.

Low blood sugar, too much stimulation (namely noise, and i'm autistic), stress, anxiety, lack of sleep, consuming gluten (I have celiac disease), illness, fever, being too hot (i have poor heat tolerance), these are just a few things that can and will trigger seizures.

I don't know how to drive, and have no desire to learn, seeing as I must go a year seizure-free. That will never happen. I cannot work because if the many things on the list that can and will trigger seizures.

Again, read the comments and replies. You'll find the answers to your questions there. I will direct you to read these before I answer any questions regarding my seizures.

[viscerasmoothie]

NOTICE: THIS IS BEING UNPINNED AS OF 2024/10/8 BECAUSE IM QUITTING TUMBLR

\\ Pinned Post 2: Electric Boogaloo //

\\ Names/Nicknames/Whatever: Viscera, Viscera Smoothie, Chris //

\\ Date of Womb Evacuation: 2010/09/17 //

\\ Main Interests: TF2, FNaF (My shitty au specifically), psychology, human biology, other shit related to the previous two //

\\ Side interests and Former Interests: Ace Attorney (Former ~2021-2023), MLP Creepypasta (Former, ~2017-2018?), Yandere Sim (Former, ~2017-2019?), Gravity Falls (Side), analog horror (Side), tech restoration (I blame Wade from Dankpods and Bringus Studios for this, Side), religions and cults (Side) //

\\ YouTubers I Watch Frequently/Consistently: Dankpods/Garbage Time/The Drum Thing, Emkay, Bringus Studios, Kwite, planet clue, RTGame, ManlyBadassHero, The Click //

\\ I don't even know what to title this so uhhh here's some shit I believe:

People with personality disorders (Specifically Cluster B) aren't all complete garbage (Narc Abuse isn't real)

People faking disorders and shit shouldn't be harassed because there's absolutely something below the surface (Pro endo, pro recovery(is that fitting?))

Also harassment is bad in general (Anti-harassment, self explanatory)

The human brain is a pile of electric meat that we don't really understand shit about (Pro endo, pro good faith identities, shit like that y'know)

Glorifying abuse and shit is bad (NOT antiship OR proship, there's a shit ton of nuance here)

People hating children for no fucking reason is bad (I hate to break it to ya but turning 18 doesn't make someone automatically not annoying so uhhh yeah)

Trans people aren't inherently bad (Also I'm literally trans myself so)

\\ TW for shit under the cut: medical shit, mental health shit, drugs, suicide, etc //

\\ Shit I suffer from:

Depression (Dx, taking Zoloft for it)

Anxiety (Dx, not taking meds specifically for it but the previous probably covers this as well)

ADHD (Dx, used to take Adderall but the hyperactivity part fucking died so no more meds)

Autism (Dx, probably need a lobotomy /s)

Anhedonia (Symptom of depression, this shit is eating me alive because there's spurts of joy from shit but mostly I just feel numb all the time)

Something related to sleep maybe (Idk my circadian rhythm is fucked, I can sleep for 12 hours and still feel like I've been put through seven different steamrollers and the only thing keeping me from going right back to my pseudo coma is my eyes refusing to stay shut)

Walking and gait/posture shit (Literally the only way I could walk for like 9 years was through toe walking, and it got so fucking bad that when I tried to put my feet flat on the floor I'd start falling backwards, got surgery to lengthen my Achilles tendon, and now I have lower back pain, foot pain and my knees feel like they're locking up after a while even though I can still bend them, and there's probably more lol)

Chronic pain (Again, lower back and foot pain, pain in my limbs that feels like it's in the bone, headaches almost everyday and I know my reports say otherwise but it's still a daily thing I'm just stupid and forget to go the school nurse for my meds, also I chug liquid Tylenol like it's from the fountain of youth and I get finger joint paint and the bone and joint pain I try to relieve by cracking my joints but it either doesn't do shit or makes it worse)

Fatigue (Sleep issues already mentioned, my limbs sometimes feel tired and it's only the limbs, I'm in my bed like 90% of the time and idk how voluntary it is anymore)

\\ Family situation and friends:

Live with my 71 yr old grandma who's been my primary caretaker since shortly after I was born

Grandpa is alright (was a neglectful shithead towards his own kids though) but him and his current wife (Not my grandma) are transphobic but unknowingly affirm my name change because my grandma masked it as wanting to distance myself from my mom

Oldest uncle likely had bipolar 1 disorder (undiagnosed because neglectful dad and mental health stigma shit) who committed suicide on my mom's birthday/about a month after I was born

Currently living uncle is kinda anti-vax (he said that a coin stuck to his skin because COVID vax made him magnetic or something and if that were true people who work with screws would get a shit load of boosters) and not the best but there's absolutely worse so yeah

Mom likely has ASPD (also undiagnosed but idk my grandma reading the opening section of the Wikipedia article for ASPD and says it's literally her then I think that's pretty damn close but idk I'm dumb, also I don't hate people with ASPD I hate people who are garbage regardless of reason) and had (also likely still has) a drug addiction (heroin specifically). She found out she was pregnant because she got caught in a sting and purposefully swallowed 10 balloons of heroin and when they did an ultrasound to see if any were in her stomach/intestines/whatever there was a stupid dumb baby (me), and she did not stop doing heroin throughout the pregnancy. This led to me being born addicted to heroin and went through a withdrawal that notably consisted of a seizure minutes after being born, and when I was taken back to her room like right after being born and before the seizure she literally said "I don't want her*, give her* to mom." So uhhh yeah, also unsurprisingly she gave 0 shits about me and pawned off a Barbie airplane I got for Christmas 2017 for drug money (though being 7 fucking years old, I thought it was cigarette money because the place she was staying at had ash imbedded into the carpet)

My relationship with my cousin is weird, but the things of note are that he used to watch wrestling and would try to perform moves he saw on TV on me (he's 3 years older than me so he wasn't going to kill me or anything, but probably wasn't super pleasant), when I was 9 he was playing bitlife and wanted to act out the shit his character was doing and his character got someone pregnant and he wanted me to lie in his bed in front of him and I said no (he asked me a couple times and tried reassuring me that he wouldn't dry hump me but I was super uncomfy and at least he didn't actually force me to do it so that's good maybe), I'm pretty sure he either put a pillow on my ass and slapped the pillow repeatedly or he slapped my ass with the pillow repeatedly (either way I was laying on the floor), he flashed me at least once after he took a shower because he covered the trampoline in soap and asked me if I saw his dick and I refused to answer because I just wanted to play with his Mario chess set (did not use that shit for chess, I was a dumb kid rping with chess pieces lol), and he showed me his dick on the trampoline. I'm probably slandering him by only saying that kinda shit about him but idk we don't talk much anymore so yeah

No clue who my dad is and it's not the guy I got my last name from (if you know me irl you'd know that my grandma's last name and mine are different and it's not because she's married), I have a hunch though

Rex was the guy who I thought was my dad for a while, he was roped into drug addiction by my mom but he did infact give a shit about me (though he was better suited as the fun uncle than a dad but I'll take what I can get), he would take me with my mom to "the corner store" which was probably a dollar tree/general/family and but me mike and ikes and now n laters while my mom would buy cigarettes for both of them

Susan, Rex's mom, used to try and spoil me because she actually had money (I love being poor /s) and she bought me the Barbie airplane from earlier and an entire Barbie dream house but she let my mom (and maybe Rex idk) mooch off of her and she got evicted from her apartment (the one with the ruined carpet, that shit would stain my feet when I walked on it), so she moved in with her dad and had to offload her old cat Spazzy to us because cats weren't allowed there I think so that happened but before she got evicted she would let me stay up when I stayed the night at her house and I'd watch adult swim and robot chicken gave me nightmares I think and I wanna watch that one show that was probably written by someone with 10 bongs in their mouth (which probably doesn't narrow the list down at all)

My best friend I met at a preschool that was also a church and I literally just went up to them and asked "wanna be friends" and they said yes and their life has probably changed for the worse because of me so yeah, their brother has autism so they probably do too but their parents haven't gotten them tested soo but they used to take my shopkins beanie from me (it was playful, id run after them and I'd get it back) and so I did that with their pink beanie back for a while and there was this thing where they'd act like my robot and I could command them to do shit and they'd give me stupid error messages (god recalling this shit makes me miss being a stupid idiot child) and it was super fun I think and gay and then in 6th grade I had like no classes with them until I got the surgery then I had 2 including ela and then in 7th grade we had a couple of classes and this year we literally have 0 other than lunch and if I have a dollar for everytime the school I was going to had a different principal come in because the last one was upgrading their position in the school district in the last year that I was going there and made me have no classes with my friends id have 2 bucks and 5th grade sucked kinda because of that

Sailor (who I'm name dropping because istg if you don't use Tumblr by now then what are you doing with your life) was someone who I shared classes with for a little while, we went separate ways in like 3rd and 4th grade and then in 5th grade the school therapist mentioned them to me bjt they changed their name so I was confused and then she invited us to lunch in her room and there was this "YOURE TRANS TOO???" moment we both had and then we reconnected and then 6th grade was kinda a disaster but we still had each other then they got accepted into an alternative school so we lost contact in 7th grade and then we reconnected at pride this year and we played ponytown together for like 5 minutes (which lead to me finding a really cool lavender infection rp and I ended up adding the person who started it on discord) and we went to the gay youth center thing together this year as well and I've sent them stupid TF2 shit and I think they're a system now which is cool I think idk I'm a singlet lol

There's this other friend who I know I had history prior to 6th grade but we really only reconnected in 6th grade because we had a tech class together and during a 7th grade field trip to the zoo I got their phone number and also sent them stupid TF2 shit and I see them sometimes in the hallway because both of us use the elevator at school so uhh yeah also they're a little hard to understand but I'm also stupid so that might be why (I'm not trying to be a dick my brain just needs a minute to process what they say I'm sorry)

Yeah there's probably more but I'm lazy and need to go to sleep also can you tell that I got lazy here anyways uhh gay gay homosexual gay you stupid gay bitch /pos /lh

[auroras-void]

Hmnn if you ever feel bad about not sleeping well, and you've really tried hard but nothing sticks. My personal story is I've had terrible insomnia starting in like middle school at least all the way until I was 19. I had internalized so much about how it was my own fault. I knew I was guilty of "revenge insomnia" and several other bullshit reasons. And I was told all the standard interventions and I tried them again and again, and I could tell it wasn't making much difference, but I also had and still do have horrendous executive dysfunction. So it felt inconclusive because I could never stick to it for more than like a week. And so I blamed myself for it, I told myself I was a failure.

Then one year I had a stretch of time where I had no responsibilities to anyone or anything, I was kinda miserable about it, and it wasn't helping anything. But I just stopped giving a shit about day and night. And I found that after a while it always seemed to stabilize at around 4 or 5 am when I would always feel sleepy. So I just went to bed at 5 am. And I suddenly felt more well rested than ever before. My sleep felt consistent. I didn't have the grogginess, honestly if I had tried to force myself to conform to the standard 9-5 schedule then it would have destroyed me. The only thing wrong was that, I was a little, out of sync with the rest of the world. Or, to me really, the world was out of sync with me. And I was mad about it, because I knew I couldn't fix it.

Then I got some medication, almost begrudgingly prescribed to me from my psychiatrist. Primarily for the anxiety but it had the side effect of causing drowsiness. First one was hydroxyzine and it helped a lot I could actually get myself to sleep when I wanted to. It hurt the quality of my sleep by a lot if I actually took a dose strong enough to be effective, and I could power through it if I didn't. Second one though, 2.5 mg mirtazipine, actually still the same dose I take right now, that one took, and it was pretty gradual, it took a while for my body to adjust to it properly. But today, I notice, taking that on time is the only reliable method to actually get to bed on time. I still stay up late sometimes, but it's always because I got distracted from taking my meds, not from going to bed. If I take my meds, the latest I go to sleep is 1 hour immediately after that. If I'm really determined, I can still keep myself awake, but my brain starts to slow down, it actually makes me feel like it's 5 am.

And suddenly I understand why normal people tell me I'm doing it wrong. If this is what it's like for them then yeah, it seems crazy and disruptive to do insomnia.

But it's not for me. I'm just being punished for having a different brain.

And now I've just kinda, naturally fallen into a mostly healthy sleep schedule without really trying too hard or thinking about it, and, life moves on.

Cause the other thing is this has only fixed exactly 1 (one) of my problems.

I do not feel better. I do not feel happier. I do not have more motivation. I do not have more focus. My ADHD my depression my anxiety, they're all still wreaking havoc on my life, completely independently of this.

I just feel slightly less tired.

That's it.

It does make fighting the rest a little easier I *guess*. But I'm not cured. I'm not suddenly normal. I don't just need another 3 hour lecture about shit I already know. I know how to take care of myself. I just *can't*. I'm just, out of sync with the world. And I lack the autonomy and power to bring it to me. So I need a hammer to strike myself with to bend into shape. How I don't know. No one wants to give me a hammer without lots of back and forth energy I simply don't have. So I just wait. In Limbo, a little longer. Waiting for the next appointment. Praying my memory of it doesn't get corrupted by the constant shower of cosmic rays bouncing around inside my head.

It's been two decades, and my life still hasn't felt like it's begun.

[copperbadge]

hi, i had a medium to big question. in your post about the adhd self-help book you mentioned people with adhd being conditioned to be nonconfrontational, but i've never once in my entire life connected the two? can you break down the connection for me so that i can once again (this week, even) have my understanding of my own condition blown wide open?

So, you are not the only person to ask about this, but that's on me for being unclear -- I wasn't trying to assert that kids with ADHD are automatically conditioned to be nonconfrontational, I was more trying to be like "Hey not everyone needs lessons in medical self-advocacy but a lot of nonconfrontational people do." And I think there is a higher population of people with neurodivergence who are deeply confrontation-averse, but I don't have like, numbers for that, it's just an assumption based on other knowledge.

It gets complicated; ADHD is a disease based heavily in acting impulsively against your best interests. But yeah I do think people with ADHD are often conditioned to avoid confrontation because of two main factors: rejection-sensitive dysphoria and executive dysfunction.

RSD, which I hate perhaps more than any other symptom or behavior associated with ADHD, automatically kicks our nervous system into high gear in social situations and encodes embarrassing moments in our memory with high-def clarity. Because RSD naturally causes a level of anxiety around socialization, it tends to make us nonconfrontational simply because a) we don't want to be yelled at, b) we don't want to embarrass ourselves by getting emotional about something that may not warrant it, and c) by the time we realize what's happening our body is already on high alert which means we are likely to go into fight-flight-freeze mode.

Me, I freeze, usually, but none of those three options are great for fast thinking during an argument. I used to lose arguments a lot simply because I couldn't think or react as fast as the neurotypical person I was fighting with, so I simply stopped having fights. Notably, I did not have this problem when fighting with my brother, who is also neurodivergent and has many of the same freeze reactions I do.

If people disagree with me, even when I know I'm right I also know I probably won't be able to vocalize it properly, so I back down. Usually it's trivial so it doesn't matter, and I've gotten strategic about how and when I argue about things that do matter; it's also a lot easier to do with strangers or professionals (like doctors) where I don't have to worry about long-term social repercussions. But yeah, our own nervous system tells us "hey maybe don't pick this fight" about every single fight and if we do pick that fight, it treats our opponent as a dangerous predator.

Executive dysfunction's interaction with nonconfrontation is something I have less problem with because while I do have poor executive function, I've spent a lot of time and energy training myself to cover the Important Stuff. I have mild ADHD so I'm capable of this; I'm not trying to say everyone with ADHD is, because lord knows it's exhausting for me and I've been doing it for roughly thirty years. But essentially, I cover where it counts: if someone needs me to do something I do it, I meet deadlines, I pay bills.

So with that disclaimer in place, a very common issue especially for children with undiagnosed ADHD is that they'll be told or asked to do something and simply be unable to begin or complete it, then when they're asked why they didn't do it they can't explain. Even if they try to explain that they simply couldn't, like they were incapable of doing it for reasons they don't understand, that usually doesn't hold water with a lot of parents and teachers.

"I couldn't bring myself to write this essay," is actually something I told myself a few times in college, but it's not something I'd bother trying to tell someone else, because if you think you're neurotypical that sounds very insane. So I'd lie and say I forgot, or I'd take the fail, or I'd simply drop out of the class. Crucially I would not fight with the authority figure who was questioning me about it, because I knew I wouldn't be able to explain myself, and I'd just end up getting in more trouble for longer.

Our culture is structured for neurotypicals, and it's not even structured for all neurotypicals. Behavior that deviates from Approved Neurotypical even when you think you are Approved Neurotypical is highly punishable. So if your options are passivity, even when passivity leads to pain, or confrontation, most people who aren't Approved Neurotypical will opt for passivity once they've had a taste of where confrontation leads. I know I do.

And the thing is, there's nothing actually wrong with that. It's a strategy calculated to minimize pain. Even when I'm firing on all cylinders on a fresh dose of Adderall, I still generally let fights go unless there will be actual real consequences, because it's just not worth it. But knowing we have ADHD and knowing we fall into this pattern, I think it is good to be aware that sometimes letting a fight go is really going to fuck you, and at that point even being bad at it is better than not engaging.

I'm pretty good at calculating those, but it's a lifelong process, knowing which hills to die on when you assume you will automatically die if you ever get above sea level.

[panic-switch]

NT PEOPLE PLEASE DON'T SAY THIS SHIT TO ME!! (SOMEONE W ADHD)

Okay so this is just for my brain so i can like,, get it out and in writing bc I tend to word things better when i write so uhhhhh yeah here (under the cut)

(I have ADHD and I've lived with it my whole life, i've gone on a ton of different meds and seen a lot of doctors and therapists and all that jazz and i've heard a LOT of neurotypical bullshit that just irks me all the time.)

1. "why do you need attention right now?" this is usually said to me when I'm stimming (one way I do that is by dancing in place when I'm standing around) I am not doing it for attention. I am doing it to keep myself grounded. .I actually would prefer it if you didn't bring attention to it bc that makes me wildly uncomfortable!!!

2. "I wouldn't have even guessed that you had adhd!! You do a great job at not showing it haha" THIS IS NOT A COMPLIMENT!!!!!! I understand that it's not meant to be ill-intentioned but HOLY FUCK IT'S NOT NICE. there is no "look" to adhd, there isn't any giveaway to it. Half the time I'm medicated so of course i'm not gonna be all over the place. Comments like that just feel insensitive and ignorant. Please think before you say something like that to me.

3. "I'm sorry." (yes, someone seriously said this to me). Fucking what???? why do you feel the need to apologize? adhd isn't a bad thing and you have no reason to feel sorry. Again, PLEASE think before saying this stuff bc it comes across as really ignorant and kinda mean :(

4. "well have you tried-" yes. chances are if you're asking i've already tried it. again, I know these aren't done maliciously and I appreciate the sentiment behind it, but unless you are my doctor or therapist or professionally inclined to suggest things to me, please do not offer up suggestions unless i ask you first. Unsolicited comments like this feel backhanded to me and make me feel incompetent. I am an adult please don't talk to me like a child.

5. (insert comment about my eating habits/weight here) DON'T. JUST FUCKING DON'T. My meds can suppress my appetite and that can cause sporadic changes in my weight, as well as causing disordered eating, it's also none of your business. You shouldn't be making comments like this to anyone.

6. "you didn't forget you just chose not to." do you think I like having executive dysfunction and short term memory problems? you think I just wake up every morning and go 'today I will do absolutely fucking nothing just to piss people off :)' ? NO. I am constantly dealing with an internal battle about getting shit done but everything is so fucking overwhelming to me that half the time i can't even make myself stand up. I've been trying to hype myself up to pack up dishes for 5 hours now. I hate it.

7. "Why do you want to disrespect Me?" STOP MAKING MY DISABILITY ABOUT YOU. IT IS NOT ABOUT YOU. NONE OF THIS IS ABOUT YOU. STOP TRYING TO MAKE ME OUT TO BE A SHIT PERSON WHEN I'M STRUGGLING TO EVEN DO BASIC TASKS. I don't like feeling like a bad person. I am not a bad person. I'm not bad. please stop. you need to do some self reflecting and figure out why you take my own personal difficulties as an attack on your person. It is never about you.

8. "you haven't done (basic hygiene thing)? gross" shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up. shut the fuck up. I am TRYING okay? I'm trying. Please be patient and understand that. I've been freaking out because I keep forgetting to shower.

9. "why are you upset/overwhelmed? you have no reason to be!" oh my fucking god please be quiet please i don't even have the energy to explain this one to you. I will cry if you make me try to talk about it.

Anyways feel free to add to this list if you feel so inclined.

[lostsomewhereinthegarden]

I can’t believe that a rant is gonna be my first post-

Anygays, welcome to me ranting about Tokyo Revengers:

I swear, all of those children should just go to fucking therapy, like the others need decent amounts of therapy cause yk, seeing their friends die or almost die, and fighting everyday and shit can traumatize you

But Mikey needs to be put in a mental asylum or get some fucking medication because as we all know he is not fucking ok, like oh my gosh, and why is the Takemichi the only one actively doing something to help Manjiro? Like bro, even Shinchiro didn't do shit and Takeomi was doing most of the work of making sure the little shit didn't become worse, Mikey needs to get treated and/or get some fucking medication. Screw it he does need medication, that’s probs why Sanzu takes drugs to encourage Mikey to take something to help him and then got addicted, cause there is no other reason for him to take drugs despite being in the business.

Next topic, oh my gosh, Takemichi needs a vacation and some therapy, like I feel so sorry for this man. Kazutora is right, Mikey is the cause of all of this. speaking about Kazutora, my guy needs legitmate therapy and mental help, and I'm concerned on why they didn't try to get him some help as he just killed a person accident or not, cause for a kid to kill a person something is either wrong in their head or that incident fucks up their head. This is different as this is not stealing or a fight, this was legit murder, and this murder incident is what causes Kazutora to just fucking drop to the bottom with his already declining mental health due to the abuse he was already reciving, doesn’t help that his friend won't hear him out (Mikey once again being a problem though it's reasonable this time cause Kazu legit killed his brother and thats hard to forgive) so yeah mental spiral and should've gotten therapy including after he was caught a second time with a dead fucking body soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. Plus the dead body is the person he was caught with last time and also, the positinoning of the last stab wound was legit suicide so that fucks up Kazu's head more. God bless he's somewhat alright in the future, God bless Chifuyu's soul.

But on that note of Kazu's partner in crime-

Baji should have gotten some help, cause he sucks so bad in school, and other things he might have ADHD or something of the sort, my guy can't even write properly, for all we know he could be dyslexic and shit with other issues.

But does he get help?

No.

Does he get therapy for watching his friend kill someone, get harshly punished and other shit?

No.

And it's not like they're refusing the help either, it's just not given to them, and if they themselves seek it out it'll cause a bigger problem. Ik Mitsuya and Draken would force all of them to go and probs not go themselves, but at least the ones that do go are the ones who need it the most.

ALSO-

FUCK TAKEOMI AND WAKA

THEY'RE GROWN ASS ADULTS FIGHTING A GANG WAR WITH YOUNG ADULTS AND TEENAGERS

I'M PRETTY SURE THE OLDEST AFTER THEM IS LIKE 21 OR 20 YEARS OLD

IDC IF THEY'RE LOOKING OUT FOR THEIR LOVED ONES OR SOME SHIT

SEND THEM TO THERAPY AND KEEP THEM LOCKED IN THE DAMN HOUSE OR SOMETHING

REPORT SOME SHIT

HAVE THEM SOMEHOW GET MENTAL HELP THAT'LL HELP THEM INSTEAD OF HAVING THEM BECOME CRAZY AND FIGHT GANG WARS

TAKEMICHI CAN'T DO SHIT AT THAT AGE CAUSE THEN HE'LL ALSO GET IN BIG TROUBLE AS HE'S STILL A KID TOO

PRETTY SURE Y'ALL IN Y'ALL THIRTIES

SO GET THESE CHILDREN HELP INSTEAD OF ENCOURAGING THEIR BAD HABITS AND BEHAVIORS YOU SHIT BAGS

[tfw-adhd]

the one thing that is kinda making me hesitate from going to my doctor about ADHD and trying to get medicated is like. how hard is working Supposed to be? cause sometimes (all of the time at home) making myself do something I don't want to do is like. absolutely hell. it feels beyond frustrating, almost physically painful, and the only way I can do it is outside force, or it takes the entire day and even then might not get done. I have one task I need to do today and it's going to take about an hour and there's nothing stopping me, and it feels like I Should be able to do it, but it's just. it's so so hard for no reason, and I'm honestly thinking I'm going to have to drop out of school because doing homework or studying is always like this, and I want to go to university but I just. I just can't do things sometimes, and I can't go to uni or even finish high school like this. I have autism for sure (tho my patterns of interests are way more like hyperfixations than like special interests) and I've already been diagnosed with that and I know that might make an ADHD diagnosis harder especially since I've never had trouble at school before now (I've always had this sort of executive function difficulty but it's never been so bad and also the tasks have never been this important), but basically just. I'm not sure how hard things are for people who don't have ADHD? Does trying to do things you don't want to do always feel this bad, to the point where it's almost physically painful, and its possibly but it's just so so so so hard and awful? Is this something that ADHD medication might help? thank you so much for reading this rly long ask, and I hope you have a nice day <3

First of all - I’m really sorry you’re struggling!

Second - people with autism experience hyperfixations as well as special interests! Hyperfixations are a part of the ADHD-Autism overlap.

Third - yeah, that’s what it feels like for people with ADHD. Neurotypicals procrastinate, but... they have a choice in procrastinating. They can choose to stop. But we can feel guilty and anxious about not doing our work, and really want to do it so that it’s out of the way, and just.... still not do it. And yeah, ADHD medication is supposed to help with that.

[megaman-r]

I am definitely going engine-first, generally speaking; a lot of those assets are UI bits and pieces. I'd say the majority even. I do have a fair amount of other sprites/tiles at least roughed out, but that's because I'm a visual artist so that's the fun part for me, and it all needs to happen at some point anyway, so I haven't tried to stop myself from working on the parts that sound fun at the moment. Especially since getting a cohesive 'look' across the whole game is a massive task, and having a really long time to think it over and refine things is only going to be of benefit.

A whole lot of what you've listed is just not possible to implement easily, if at all, in the engine I'm using. Total playtime per file, items used, enemies killed, the basics that make the game work at all (Robot Masters defeated and the like)—sure, that's all doable and largely done even, but lifelong stats across multiple files aren't supported in any reasonable way because save files simply don't interact with each other. If I load one to reference a variable, I have nowhere to store said variable to add it to another from a different save, because referencing that save will lose the first variable entirely no matter what I do with it or where I put it. Cumulative totals simply cannot be a thing with this engine, essentially, which isn't the end of the world. After all I'm basically doing an NES-like with a few modern bells and whistles, so being somewhat less detailed in save data than other modern games isn't going to make or break it.

I have no idea what is actually in each save file as far as data. They're all in JSON and they're not particularly human-readable, because everything is obfuscated. If this were actually something I was coding from scratch in a real language, yeah, I could worry about individual bits and bytes, but I picked an oddball engine off the strength of its being easy to learn (...and having already been in my Steam library from a sale...)—I know exactly zero programming languages, unless you count Pixel Game Maker MV's visual scripting system. So that hampers a lot of things; it's state-based, not object-oriented, and things like menus and UI absolutely suffer for it. The degree of tedium it takes to set up a basic foundation is...yeeegh. I do understand the concepts better, and I will probably switch to Godot or something with a lot more fine control if I do another project, but as it stands... the bit/byte count is all very interesting but I have no access to the save file structure beyond, "Keep these switches and variables, allow these others to reset to default." (Also I don't know how to do math in hex much beyond being able to generally count from 0 to 15, which is all I need to use Famitracker effectively, lol.)

I kinda just started on a whim to see if I could do it, so the order of operations has been whatever I'm confident will actually allow me to keep making progress. Things like doing the music first happened because I didn't want to get years deep into making a game only to discover that I have no ability to compose, so I completed a fair amount of it first to make sure it happened at all. (It turns out I'm okay at it, fortunately.)

But yeah, I'm sure there's a lot of nontraditional stuff happening, because I have no idea what a traditional workflow even would be. I'm emphatically not a programmer, even if I do seem to be programming. My entire background is making dumb things in RPG Maker 2000 back in high school. The fact that I've organized myself enough to get this far is a testament to the combined power of ADHD medication and sheer stubbornness.

But believe me when I say that I am painfully aware the save system should be X, Y, and Z things. It just is what it is, though, and what it is is extremely limited and very, very prone to producing errors if things aren't laid out just so. Even trying to save two files too quickly will cause at least one of them, if not both, to simply not output at all. So for even just this basic functionality I feel pretty accomplished and while I do want to add some more miscellaneous stats plus some way to view them, which is a whole other UI setup that I'll need to do, there is no way to add much beyond that.

But again, I think that won't horribly impact anyone's enjoyment, in the end. People still have plenty of fun with much less. I almost didn't even include saves, but my dev Discord voted down a classic NES style password grid system. Would have been relatively very easy to implement, but alas. The people have spoken.

I should add that there is one way that would technically work for multiple save files with lifetime play stats and you could support any sort of cumulative save data you could imagine with it, but I'm not doing it, because it would involve emulating multiple save files within one save file...meaning that for every single time a saved variable or switch is changed, I would need a bunch of branching logic to disambiguate exactly which "save file" I'm changing, and I would rather eat my own teeth than deal with the bugs that would invariably produce if anything at all in the entire game was set up even slightly wrong.

@megaman-r, @afniel

I should probably clarify what I meant.

When I say "backward", I mean that when work actually begins on a game, there's typically kind of an… order… to how things should logically go: make the game engine and all the conceptualized bits and bobs, test to satisfaction, and then make all the assets. A lot of people do it the other way, though. I used to, back when I dabbled. Realistically, though, making the entire engine first with all it entails just makes more sense to me, these days.

As for the save system? Here's what I expect from a Mega Man save:

Save Game Slot

Stages beaten and/or weapons collected (2 to 4 bits?*)

Lives, Tanks, collectable inventory (1 byte** each)

Permanent inventory (Energy Balancer, et cetera) (1 bit)

Score, if enabled (4 bytes)

Game difficulty, if enabled (1 byte)

Character, if applicable (1 byte)

New game or replay, if applicable (1 byte) - These three can probably be combined into one bit

Time played in hh:mm:ss format (3 or 4 bytes)

Deaths, if applicable (1 byte)

Other stats (E-Tanks chugged, enemies destroyed, and so on) (1 byte each)

Overall Save Stats

Games played, beaten, et cetera (1 byte each)

Features unlocked (1 or 2 bits, number of unlocks depending)

Overall time played in dd:hh:mm:ss format (1 and 4 bytes?)

(* Bits in "hex format" 8 possible "hard values" per bit: $01, $02, $04, $08, $10, $20, $40, $80 Use bit math for combinations.

Examples: - Stage 1 and Stage 3 beaten = $05 - Stages 2, 5, and 8 beaten = $92 - Stages 1 through 8 beaten = $FF

** Bytes are just standard hex bytes: $00 - $FF 10 = $0A, 99 = $63, et cetera. Multi-byte values stored in reverse order.) —

... I've put a lot of thought into this. (,:

[rejectedanimexp]

Hello people of the internet. Does anyone know how to properly ask their doctor to see if they have autism? Like, my social skills are like nonexistent and I have no idea how to talk to my doctor without coming across as rude or dumb or impatient. I don't get social norms. They don't exist for me. I have ADHD but my mom seems to be the only one that accepts I might have Autism. Everyone else says I'm not broken or there's nothing wrong with me as if having Autism makes one stupid- WHICH IT DOESNT, LIKE OMG PEOPLE STOP BEING SO RUDE AND IGNORANT. They already say I shouldn't use my ADHD like a crutch and that I can't have Autism because I have good grades- yeah, well, Autism doesn't mean you can't get good grades. Most people with Autism are actually really smart. Why are people so afraid to admit that I can have it? Like, sorry I'm not perfect!!! Funny enough, I think said family members might have it as well but don't want to admit it because they see it as a disability that hinders their individuality or whatever. IM SICK OF IT. I'm sick of being seen as weird for not wanting to go outside or socialize. For not being able to function with others. For coming across as rude when I'm trying to be polite. For having the worst attention span and hyperfocused on doing one thing at actime- even when it comes to eating food. Like, no, let me finish my rice before I try to greenbeans. I'm wired differently. I just want some proof that I'm not some "vampire freak" but that there's an actually scientific and medical reason I'm this way. Also, I am so off track from where I started. So yeah. How do I approach my doctor about this as an adult? I can't really talk to anyone about this and I just wish someone would hear me out. Also, sorry for this mini rant.