#Bc the duscussions are all like this!

[silouvertongues]

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[eternally-tired-cryptid]

Anna from Frozen is my comfort character, specifically Feozen 2 Anna. Do I get a little prickly and even defensive when I see someone criticize her or discuss her actions in a light I don’t agree with? Yes.

However! People can have different opinions than me and it’s okay for them to honestly discuss a characters role or lack of role or whatever else. If it upsets me, I avoid the conversation. Please do the same.

If it’s on tumblr ask the person to tag it so you can filter it out! Most people are totally up for tagging stuff. That way you can coexist. 😊

[tngrace]

I feel like in the whole "TK should have let Carlos in more" discourse, people are missing the fact that Carlos wasn't letting TK in either. He had plenty of opportunities to express his feelings and he didn't. He could have just told TK that he was feeling left out or that Cooper was making him feel insecure. But he kept pretending that everything was fine until TK came home to a passive aggressive solo dinner, which made TK (!) start the conversation. TK had spent the last however long it's been since the drugging going through withdrawal, the trauma of being drugged against his will, AA meetings every single day, grief over his mother, grief over his lost sobriety, and a multitude of twisted up emotions that he was only just beginning to understand, and he STILL found the strength to open up a dialogue when Carlos wasn't willing to do it. He should get a little credit.

I've sat on this the majority of the day so I could come up with a response that made sense bc honestly I've been waiting on an ask similar to this since the discussions started. It really got away from me too so all my points after 1 can be found under the cut.

1st: I never took TKs credit away. I've said I know more than once that he was trying. He actually had a conversation instead of running away, he heard what Carlos said, he came home instead of going to a meeting etc. They were in some ways communicating. So to imply that I haven't given him that is not fair.

2nd: was the dinner passive aggressive? Sure. But let me just say, I would've done the same thing and have done the same thing to my husband more than once. After so long of cooking for 2 and cooking for 2 on a regular basis, when the other party (a) quits eating with you and (b) blatantly disregards your cooking even tho they KNOW you cook every night and don't bother to tell you they're not going to be eating with you, you get tired of it. Does it always get expressed clearly? No we're human and sometimes we want them to feel like we feel. So no I'm not going to find fault in Carlos for doing this when I've done the same. Plus it made TK really see him for the 1st time in who knows how long which I'll address in a later point.

3rd: I disagree that Carlos wasn't willing. He asked about Cooper. He tried to have that conversation with TK about his meetings about not knowing things. Had TK been paying attention he would've picked up on the nuances of his expressions and tones, he would've known Carlos was feeling things that needed to be duscussed. Did Carlos explicitly express his discomfort? no. But Carlos strikes me as the type that he's not going to say anything bc he knows TK is going thru a lot and he's not going to add to his burden. He's going to deal with his feelings on his own. And when TK blew him off about going to meetings (and yes that's how I saw it. Carlos was offering all this support and TK blew him off as if he didn't want it or need it bc he had other people that understood better) that's going to cause Carlos to shut down too. He's going to internalize even more bc TK is coming off as uncaring. Carlos is seeing the love of his life struggling and he wants to help in any way possible. He wants all of TK. But he also sees he's not getting it. He sees TK coming home late, he sees TK not eating with him, he sees TK being happy and lighter after meetings and spending time with Cooper and he doesn't know how to handle it without making TK feel bad about it so he internalizes and tries to handle it himself.

4th: TK isn't the only one going thru all these messy complicated tangled feelings. Let me remind you what all Carlos is going thru too:

Idk that Carlos was close with Gwyn, but he called her Gwyn when he still couldn't call Owen anything other than Capt. Strand. So I'm gonna say they had a connection deeper than what we saw on the show. He lost her too. But he's going to push that aside for TK bc its TK's mom. But I can guarantee Carlos feels her loss too. (I'm thinking about my dad and my aunts in this scenario when my grandfather passed away 4 months ago. Their feelings werent any less than ours just bc they're the in-laws in the scenario. And Carlos's feelings shouldn't be any less than TK's) Carlos's feelings surrounding Gwyn’s death shouldn't be just pushed aside either but the show/writers are really good at doing that.

Carlos was put on leave for a death on the job. Was it ultimately his fault? no. But I can guarantee he's still carrying that with him bc even tho we got to see him work thru some of that with Grace it wasn't a magic fix it all.

Carlos was also drugged and we have YET to see how Mr. Control Freak handled that. Sure it's worse for TK bc he's an addict that's having to go back thru and work for his sobriety and I feel for him. So much. But that doesn't excuse him shutting Carlos out. They both were victims in their own home once again and they should be dealing with the consequences together.

Carlos is dealing with all of this and feeling guilty that TK was put back at day one. Bc if you remember how he was after the house fire, he's going to be blaming himself for not figuring Sadie out sooner and for not protecting TK from her.

So you wanna talk emotions and feelings in the relationship? TKs not the only one going thru things.

5th: I've rewatched the "fight" scene and I'm sorry but I didn't like how TK handled it. No communication isn't their strong suit, they've proved that multiple times. And I HAVE and will continue to give TK credit for sitting there trying to talk about it instead of running. But my main problem with the dialogue of it is (a) TK just assumes Carlos is upset bc he thinks he's cheating. But he should know Carlos better than that. (B) he should know how Carlos is a fixer and how he takes on everything and how he finds fault within himself for everything. So (c) him telling Carlos point blank he wouldn't be enough isn't fair. Yes TK knows what he's like as an addict and he knows what he needs and that's fine. But it's not fair to not give Carlos a chance to understand. He's clearly been shutting Carlos out of the whole process and this conversation or "fight" feels like he's going to continue to do that without understanding where Carlos is coming from. He might say Carlos has all of him. But I don't see it or believe it anymore than Carlos did.

6th: I think you're discounting Carlos’s strength as well. Yes it took a lot for TK to say what he kinda said. But also had TK been paying attention to begin with, he would've picked up on Carlos’s feelings sooner. He would've seen Carlos was struggling just as much and it could've been addressed long before the passive aggressive dinner fight. But I'm going to venture out to say, TKs not been at home a lot. And when he does come home it's probably just to sleep bc he's obviously not eating with Carlos. I'm going to even pose the thought that he hasn't even bothered checking in to see how Carlos is handling everything bc he's worried about hanging on to his own sobriety and I'm sorry but that's slightly selfish when you're in a relationship. So Carlos even broaching the subject after TK brought it up and sharing his feelings knowing he's going to upset TK when it's the last thing he wants to do took a lot of strength as well. Bc he told TK exactly what he was feeling and how he was questioning his place.

Lastly: TK made the effort to come home instead of going to a meeting at the end, so why not just take that extra step and let Carlos be there for him? That was related more to his grief than his addiction in my opinion and there's no reason he couldn't have turned to Carlos in that moment. I've expressed my feelings on everyone grieving differently and needing that time to yourself but at the same time if he didn't want Carlos’s comfort why even come home? Yes he was making the effort to let Carlos know he heard him the other night, but besides coming home what did he really do? Make Carlos feel even worse that he made TK feel like he had to come home when he so obviously didn't want to. The writers handled that whole scene wrong in my opinion but it was nice to see what Carlos learned about TK and how he handled and applied it and was able to take that step back and give TK what he needed.

If you made it this far than kudos. I've tried to express myself over the last 2 days without bashing or hating on either TK or Carlos bc really I fault the writers for a lot of things and choices made with these 2 characters. But this one felt like it needed a lot of explaining on my part and I'm not meaning to bash TK or come across that way, I'm just countering your points with things I found wrong in the episode and things TK could've handled better.