#I also like that they both have irregular emotions - they are men of extremes

[bumblingbabooshka]

Gallery Piece of Montreal is how I think of Suder/Tuvok

[girlmeetsliv3]

Lilies of the Valley X

A/B/O!BTS x Reader

Flowers can have different meanings depending on the flower shape, color, and method in which they are presented. Lilies are my favorite for such a simple flower can have so many distinct meanings.

 “Flower essences encourage gentleness and nurturing. And can also calm an overly aggressive person. However, some have the opposite effects.”

Release Date: 06/19/20 @  7 pm

previously ~ next

           YN couldn’t remember the last time she had a check-up. It must’ve been right before she presented when her physician had explained to her, that everything pointed to her sub-gender being an Omega and not a beta. Granted there had been little time for her to dwell on it with her parents outside the door, but it didn’t make for a favorable experience. Her suppressants hadn’t been handled by a doctor, but rather a nurse in a quick drive-thru clinic for which she had to pay $15 every month. Considering how reckless YN had been she went through the suppressants a lot quicker than she should, but no one ever asked any questions.

           The place she was at now was a lot nicer and even had some omegas as nurses which YN hadn’t seen much of. The nurse had asked Hoseok and Namjoon to stay outside for privacy reasons and the alphas had encouraged YN to contact them if she needed anything. Now all YN could do was wait. For what she wasn’t too sure, but a health check-up couldn’t hurt. Her phone served as a distractor, as did Rosé:

           Rosé: Long time no see…

           YN: Sorry I’ve been mia lately. I’ve missed you.

           Rosé: I’ve missed you too. Also, you’ve missed so much

           Rosé: I met someone!

           YN: Who??

           Rosé: He’s a beta. A nice beta. I just kinda ran into him one day and we started talking. Isn’t it amazing?!

           YN: Yeah, that’s great.

           YN locked her phone screen and glanced around the room. On the door, there were the typical pamphlets one would expect all ranging from various topics: sub-genders, presenting, mating, and starting a family. Maybe she should’ve felt something when she looked at them, but YN didn’t feel anything. Not anger or disgust. Not happiness or excitement. It was still far too early in their relationship to consider any of those things. Can it even be considered a relationship? The men were much more invested in it than she was, but then again that was to be expected. They shared a pack bond and YN had only recently started warming herself up to the idea of being with them. It wasn’t like she had much of a choice in the matter, but at least she was thankful the seven of them weren’t pressuring her into anything. Even if they were rushing a bit.

           The door opened to a nice-looking woman wearing a lab coat, on the pocket was embroidered: Dr. Jun. “Hello, nice to meet you. I’m Dr. Hyoseong Jun.” YN felt herself relax at the warm aura that seemed to surround the woman. “I’m YN. It’s nice to meet you too.” The doctor outstretched her hand and YN shook it. Jun motioned for YN to lay on the exam table and went through the procedural check-up before motioning YN to sit back up. Once YN was comfortable, the doctor took a seat in her chair, attention fully on YN.

           “So, what’s the reason for today’s visit?”

           Oh. YN didn’t exactly know, but she took her best guess. “I had a bad heat and wanted to see if I could change my suppressants.”

           Dr. Jun nodded, focusing her attention on the computer. “Have you ever had a bad heat before this?”

           YN swallowed, unsure of how to proceed. Rosé had warned her not to hide these things anymore, but YN was afraid of how people would react. Then, again this was a doctor and confidentiality did exist. “I haven’t had a heat since I presented.”

           “Oh?” This caught the doctor’s attention. “Is it something biological? Are you irregular in your heats?”

           ��Um, no.” YN shook her head, taking a deep breath before speaking again. “I just took my suppressants so I wouldn’t have a heat.”

           If anything, the doctor seemed even more perplexed at YN’s explanation. “Does your mate know about this?”

           “No, I wasn’t with them. My mates have a pack bond and one of the alphas bit me during our first heat so-”

           “The lead alpha, correct?”

           YN felt time stop, her words dying on her tongue. “No. It was the youngest. We both presented at the same time and he accidentally bit me.”

           Dr. Jun nodded, “Yes, but did you share the heat with the other members?”

           YN scratched her head, the memories of her first heat were kind of muddled. YN did remember the other’s being there, but not participating in it. “They were there, but Jungkook is the one that bit me.” Seeing the doctor’s confused expression caused panic to swirl in the pit of YN’s stomach. “I was told that the bite of an alpha doesn’t heal.” Dr. Jun shook her head. “That’s only true if the mating bond is completed. Did you complete yours?” Dr. Jun had stood up at this point and was walking towards YN. Noticing her panicked expression and the slight shaking of her hands. “N-no.” A million thoughts were bouncing around in YN’s head as she tried to comprehend what exactly the doctor was implying.

           “Only a lead alpha’s bite can’t be healed. If that applied to regular alphas there would be a bunch of mated teenagers running around. I’m sorry, YN but I have no reason to lie to you.”

           No, that can’t be true. It couldn’t possibly be. If it were true then that would mean Namjoon bit her. It would mean Jungkook was innocent. It would mean…

           “It wasn’t an accident.”

           Kim Namjoon was an anomaly. Born to two alphas his birth had been a challenging one: his mother barely surviving it and Namjoon being born two weeks premature. It was a miracle his mother had even conceived, but with the help of hormonal treatments, they had just barely managed. Still, he was a strong child and exceptionally bright. The pros of having two parents of the dominant sub-gender or so he’d been told growing up. None of those things mattered to him though because Namjoon always felt incomplete. Like a part of him was missing and it haunted him. Nothing ever satisfied him because he had no one to share it with.

           His parents encouraged him to make friends and even develop crushes, but it was useless. No one was ever up to par with his expectations - no one felt genuine. Eventually, Namjoon learned the hard way that self-isolation at a young age could have devastating consequences and made him an easy target. Not just among his peers but family members as well. Many found Namjoon to be unnatural - alphas should not be together, much like omegas shouldn’t - his family looked for every reason to pick him apart and by extension his parents. Namjoon felt that was a ridiculous stance in general: sub-genders shouldn’t determine who you’re allowed to be with. However, these were unpopular opinions and not ones he could voice as a child without extreme repercussions.

           Namjoon kept his head down and avoided people, having few friends, and closing himself off until his eleventh birthday. That was the day Namjoon presented. Alphas didn’t typically present at such a young age, but he’d always been peculiar that day. It wasn’t until he was taken to the doctor and given suppressants that Namjoon finally understood why he was the way he was.

           "He must be a lead alpha. Only lead alphas present at such a young age." The doctor had spoken to his parents outside, unaware that Namjoon had his ear pressed to the door. "It means your son likely carries the pack bond. He'll have multiple mates and will be able to sense them." Namjoon had been so shocked at that statement, he merely fell when the door opened. The second he got home he researched everything he could on pack bonds and how they worked. It might not be the case, as it was extremely rare, but it didn't hurt to hope. That was the one prevalent emotion that filled Namjoon: hope. He didn't know why, but it just made sense to him. He wouldn't simply find a mate like everyone else - no they were destined.

          Being so rare there was limited information about it. Most of it is pure speculation as most individuals with a pack bond weren't open to sharing their experiences online or those that did claim provided little proof. It didn't really matter as it would be just two weeks later on the first day of school that Namjoon would feel it: the smell, pull, tug that innate feeling that drove him away from his parents and towards the center of the large crowd. Standing there with an old grey hoodie and scruffed converse was Min Yoongi. Namjoon's nose immediately picked up on the light scent of myrrh coming from him and a thought popped into his head. Beta? Though that was impossible as it looked like Yoongi hadn't presented yet, still, something inside Namjoon knew.

           It seemed Yoongi was on edge, but the second their eyes met the elder rushed towards Namjoon embracing him in a hug. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.” It left both their lips simultaneously and both seemed shocked until Yoongi laughed it off. “I’m Min Yoongi. Nice to meet you, mate.” Namjoon had never felt happier.

           There was still an ache there, a craving, but Namjoon ignored it for the most part. Then, he felt it again. The pull. The need. Namjoon had stayed late after school working on a project when the soft thumps coming from the dance room caught his attention. Now had he been thinking logically, he might have noticed Namjoon was too far away from the dance room to possibly be able to hear music. But he did and so Namjoon followed the sound towards the room and towards Jung Hoseok. Who froze mid-step the second Namjoon threw the door open, there meeting was a bit different: instead of rushing to meet him Hoseok simply stood shocked. As seconds turned into minutes, the only words that escaped Hoseok where “the fuck.” Before rushing to meet Namjoon and nearly causing him to fall.

           The second they embraced Namjoon’s nose rubbed against Hoseok’s neck and he felt a strong citrus scent. Alpha. Was his immediate thought, but he didn’t share it with Hoseok too caught up in the moment.

            Slowly Namjoon began to meet his mates: Seokjin, Jimin, Taehyung, and Jungkook. All of them experiencing the same reaction upon meeting him and once they meet each other the connection only strengthened. The group stayed together for seven years and it was easy too considering the school they attended housed an elementary, middle, and high. Despite them knowing what they were to each other they simply remained close friends. Best friends. At least until Jungkook entered High school. By then most of them had presented and Namjoon's hunches had been correct. Still, something unnerved him and the others, though they would never directly mention it, they weren't complete.

           It was as if they had all spent years building an elaborate puzzle only for the final piece to be missing. It became increasingly frustrating and Namjoon felt the most guilty as no matter how hard he searched, nothing provided him with answers. It was two years of searching by him and the others, yet there had been nothing. No instantaneous connection. No pull or need. They were beyond content with each other but never satisfied. By then news had already spread that the group were mates and shared a pack bond, which didn't make their search any easier. It's a bit ironic how fate strikes. Or maybe it's cruel. Namjoon would argue it's both. For when the group stopped searching is when they found their missing piece.

          Namjoon was in his senior year, Seokjin and Yoongi had already graduated but since they all lived together it impacted their relationship very little.

          “Don’t overexert yourself.” Jimin stood in front of Jungkook, scolding him after the latter had practically collapsed once the relay was over.

          “But hyung we won. That’s what’s important.” The youngest pouted adorably and Namjoon had to resist every urge to tease him about it. It didn’t really matter because someone would always do it for him.

         “Aw. Jungkookie you’re so cute.” Taehyung spoke, ruffling Jungkooks hair. Soon enough the three of them began bickering between themselves.

         Namjoon looked over the crowd trying to find Hoseok, who had left to bring them all snacks before their next game. It was sports day and in Yeong-gwang that meant another way to prove their superiority among other schools. Namjoon, despite his build, was never the athletic type but most of his mates were so they were drafted by the school to compete. He wasn’t going to complain since it meant he got to skip the dreaded clean up since Namjoon was technically a volunteer. By technically, it meant he got special perks because 4/6 of his mates competed and their families were the school’s biggest beneficiaries.

        “Namjoon.” Taehyung stood in front of him, brows scrunched up. “I’ve been calling you for like ten minutes.”

        Namjoon shrugged apologetically. “Sorry, I was distracted.” He ignored the fact that Taehyung hadn’t used honorifics figuring he’d punish him for it later.

       “Please go find Hobi-hyung. We’re about to start soon.”

           Hoseok was likely in the refreshments section were there currently stood a large crowd of people from his school and those visiting. However, Namjoon didn't head over there preferring instead to take a long way and pass through the lily garden. It was the school's pride and joy, one of the largest privately-owned collections in the country. Most of the students didn't really care for it, but all of them respected it. Sometimes kids from other schools tried to sneak in and vandalize it, but it was only accessible through a key card or a code: one every student had. Namjoon didn't know what led him to the garden only that he had a strong urge to see it.  

           It was when he saw the gate unlocked and the door opened that he panicked a bit. Rushing inside to make sure no one had sneaked in - then he saw her. She wore the school’s uniform with a denim jacket on top. A red sash with the words ‘volunteer’ draped across her body. Namjoon’s heart began to race as his eyes began to water. Finally, he’d found her. The missing piece. His last mate. Slowly, she turned around facing Namjoon with a confused expression. There was a hint of recognition in her eyes and Namjoon expected that any moment now she would run and embrace him. Tell him how she had longed for him and the others the way they had for her.

           “Excuse me. Why did you lock the gate?”

           Namjoon was taken aback, struggling to get any words out. “What?” She marched towards him, but instead of running into his arms she sidestepped and went around him. Opening the gates back up and leaving. Namjoon stood still for a moment or two before he gave chase. He tried to be inconspicuous but knew it likely didn’t seem that way from an outside perspective.

           “YN! There you are.” A group of girls reached her before Namjoon could, embracing her and pulling her away. The slight action caused a hint of her scent to reach him, lilies consuming his senses as another thought prevailed. Omega.

           “Are you certain?”

           “I saw her, hyung.”

           “And she didn’t react?!”

           “No. She just walked past me.”

           “Did you at least get her name, hyungie.”

           “YN. She must be around Jungkook’s age.”

           Silence surrounded all of them back in their small apartment. Namjoon ran his hands through his hair, feeling frustrated. Seokjin felt conflicted at everything that was happening. Namjoon had never been wrong, but YN’s lack of reaction would imply that he was. Maybe she simply knew their mate or spent a long time around them and that is why Namjoon picked up the scent. Then again that seemed like too much of a stretch. Yoongi thought about everything, what were the odds that their mate would be right there in front of them the entire time. Then again, they had all been in the same place and it hadn’t been until Namjoon presented that they’d felt it. Still, Yoongi had felt the bond long before he presented.

           “What is she?”

           Namjoon turned to face Yoongi, “What do you mean?” He knew exactly what Yoongi meant, but wasn’t sure if he should share that kind of information.

           “What is her sub-gender?” Yoongi persisted, trying to grasp if that played a role in it. Maybe she was an alpha and just didn’t pick up Namjoon’s scent. Perhaps she’d recently presented -

           “She’s an omega,” Namjoon muttered seeing the way their expression shifted. No one they knew was an omega or at the very least no one in the school had yet to present as one. Given the difficulties, omegas often faced it would be difficult for someone from an omega family to be able to enter their school. Not to mention how difficult pure omegas were to come by. “She hasn’t presented yet.”

           Hoseok who had remained quiet thus far spoke out, fully aware that his words might only worsen the situation. “I’ve never heard of an omega in a pack bond.” At this Namjoon became frustrated, “Do you think I’m lying?!” Jimin rushed to comfort him. “No. That’s not it. We’re all just confused, maybe there’s someone who could provide us with answers.” Namjoon had someone in mind but wasn’t sure if they would help at all. Seokjin cleared his throat drawing all their attention, “That’s all fine and well but we should meet her first, no?”

           “Excuse me, YN!” YN turned around to see a much taller boy running to her at full speed. Once he reached her, he stopped and smiled. “Sorry. You’re YN, right? Kevin sent me to get you because you forgot to put your student id in the volunteer form so they can’t give you the hours.” YN’s weight shifted on her feet, “Oh. Um, how did you find me then?” The boy kept smiling, but there was a bit of an edge to it now. “You wrote down your fifth period and Kevin described you to me.” YN was still hesitant to give a random stranger her student id, even if he did look harmless enough and had an office pass.

           “Look, I know this looks sketchy and normally we’d just contact the teacher but Professor Wei isn’t answering his phone and their inputting the hours today.” YN sighed, that did sound like something Wei would do. “Alright, do you have somewhere for me to write it down?” The boy grinned and for a brief moment, YN thought about how adorable the smile was. Almost bunny-like.

           “It’s her.”

           “I told you so.”

           “I can’t believe we actually found her.”

           “We can finally be complete now.”

           “...but why didn’t she react with Kookie either?”

           “Maybe it has something to do with her being an omega? Maybe she’ll feel the bond once she presents.”

           “So we wait, then? That doesn’t feel right.”

           “No, we can still get close to her we just don’t announce our intentions outright.”

           Namjoon agreed, “Eventually she’ll feel the bond. She’ll come to us and everything will be made right.”

           Dr. Kang looked down at the seven men who had all crowded into his study. Kang had become a sort of confidant for Namjoon ever since he presented. Being a professor in sub-gender studies and specializing in mythology caused Namjoon’s parents to seek him out in an effort to aid their son. Though the nature of their relationship was meant to be purely transactional, Kang did eventually develop a soft spot for the boy. One not born out of mere scientific interest. Kang had been there when Namjoon had met all the others and though never directly meeting them, he knew of them. Knew enough. Enough to know that the pack bond couldn’t be completed as they had yet to find their last mate. Unfortunately, it seems it would never be completed.

           “I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but omegas can’t have a pack bond.” The look in all seven of their eyes, made Kang feel as if he had just plunged a spear through their heart. “But I felt it. We all did.” Namjoon insisted and Kang had to agree. “That may very well be true, but it is impossible for an omega to feel the bond. It isn’t biologically possible, at least not in any text that I’ve seen.” They all remained silent, letting the information sink in. Kang felt pity for them all, he truly did. Pack bonds were a rarity and beauty. To be left without a mate all the while knowing who they are must damage one’s soul. Not to mention psyche.

           “What do you mean it’s not biologically possible,” Jungkook questioned, his hands fisting the dark material of his jeans.

           “Well,” Kang cast a look around his office searching for the specific book he had in mind. “All omegas are pack omegas. Legends tell us this is from a time before alphas could breed with each other and beta pregnancies were risky. Male omegas were also high in abundance, so all omegas were forced to mate in order to ensure the survival of the pack.” In Kang’s opinion, it was little more than a glorified abuse tale, but it did help to explain the situation. “Due to this omegas didn’t typically mate. So, the pack bond didn’t truly apply to them.” Kang sighed, “Obviously, omegas can mate. It affects them the way it would any other sub-gender, but since there is no historical evidence of omegas experiencing the pack bond it’s best to assume it is impossible.”

           “So what then?” Taehyung asked, clearly agitated. “She won’t recognize us?! She won’t want to be with us?!”

           Dr. Kang shook his head, “Not unless it’s of her own merit. If you can convince her to be with you, then you all can mate and the pack bond will be complete.”

           “And if not?” Namjoon raised his head out of his hands. His voice deep and eyes hollowed. Kang was aware it wasn’t directed at him, but it was terrifying nonetheless.

           “Then she will present, meet, and mate with someone else. There’s nothing you can do about it. The law will only allow the breaking of a mating bond if it is consensual.”

           Dr. Jun reached over hesitantly and touched YN’s shaking hands. “Are you alright?” YN was unable to answer. Instead, she shook her head hoping the doctor would understand. “I see. Do you want me to go get your mates?” No! YN’s hands latched onto Jun’s not letting her go any farther. “I’m sorry if anything I said scared you, YN. That was not my intent. There are a few questions, I would like to ask you, however.” There was a knock on the door, an urgent one, and YN froze in fear. Tentatively June excused herself, heading towards the door. It was the omega nurse looking visibly anxious.

           “I’m sorry to bother, but your next patient is here and it’s an emergency. Something wrong with the baby.”

           Dr. Jun gasped, “Oh dear. Alright, I will be there soon.” The door closed and Jun turned to face YN. “I’m so sorry dear. I’m afraid I have to cut this a bit short.”

           “I understand. Thank you for your time.” The response just slipped out, YN not having put too much thought into it.

           “I’ll get you off suppressants and ask for your alphas to be put on rutters. Be sure to schedule an appointment if your heat is off again.”

           YN nodded, slipping off the exam table and walking towards the door. Her phone in her back pocket vibrated and YN slipped it out typing the message fast without thinking of the possible consequences. Then as she neared the exit, she deleted the message and turned her phone off. YN pushed open the door to see both Namjoon and Hoseok still sitting in the waiting room, smiles on both their faces.

           “Ready to go?”

           “Yup.”

           YN: Come to my place tomorrow at noon. Say it’s an emergency don’t give up until they let you in. If they refuse, call the cops and show them this message but don’t show the guys.

Hope you enjoyed ~~~

Tag List:

@hxsxxk-180294​ @saxpam24​ @trixsterbi @mel-gonzalez07​ @cstobitk​ @dionysus-png​ @taekimxx​ @moonlitehunter @joonie-grim​ @wonderlace19​ @sugashaye​ @rosey-roseu​ @mintaemark​ @ciderxi @soloikeadates​ @alex--awesome--22​ @ruth619​ @tinger-k​ @thenyousaidhello​ @missseoulite​ @justdidabadthing​ @ireallylikefoodandyoutube​ @letmebeyour-sun​ @lyoongx​ @kpopfictrash​ @purpuravm​ @unsureofwhathappens​ @blank-et-noir @thatchampagnebitch​ @nooooooooona​

[thesoobfiles]

she was a queen, ani – a. skywalker

Request: anon, one where jedi! reader is in a relationship w/ anakin but she’s insecure about herself and compares herself to padmé but anakin reassures her?

Words: 1.6k

Summary: Reader and Anakin are both Jedi Padawans; however, this doesn’t stop them from pursuing the other and this leads up to their current situation. They’re in a relationship and they love each other very much; but, the Reader can’t help but constantly feel inferior to Anakin’s extremely beautiful and intelligent friend, Senator Padmé Amidala.

A/N: I know the summary is essentially in the request, but I just thought I’d give my summary vs. the requester’s summary; whichever one explains the story better. They’re both there for the same purpose. Also, I’m so sorry this took so long but my writer’s block paired with my lack of time is not a good combo…

-

My first meeting with Padmé Amidala went a little something like this:

- 1 year ago -

Master Windu’s voice boomed in the small meeting room of the Jedi Council, “Padawan (L/N) and Padawan Skywalker, you’ve both been assigned to Senator Amidala.”

“Those who support the new bill, in danger they are.” Master Yoda confirms.

“Your mission starts right away.” Master Mundi added.

“You’ll find her in the hanger; she is waiting for your arrival.” Master Kenobi finishes off.

“Yes, Master.” Anakin said as he bowed before the Council, a slight smile beginning to form at the corners of his lips.

“Thank you for entrusting us with such as important task.” I bow as well before I leave the chamber with Anakin trailing behind me.

“You’re familiar with her, right?” I ask, to clear the air on the way to the hangar, “She’s the one you’ve known since you were nine?”

“Mhm.” Anakin confirms, the smile from before coming back full swing; completely oblivious to the feelings of insecurity beginning to radiate from my form.

“I see…” I reply, eyebrows furrowed in thought as we continue navigating the labyrinth that is the Jedi Temple.

I’ve never seen Senator Amidala before; only ever heard hearsay. I’ve either heard Anakin recall their memories together or happen to catch the occasional story from other Jedi. Other than that, I’m going in blind; however, if I remember correctly, Anakin mistook her for an angel upon their first meeting. She must be beautiful was my last thought before I actually saw her and wow, she is gorgeous.

During my thinking, it turned out my feet carried me all the way to our destination.

My eyes followed Anakin as he ‘casually’ walked up to what I assumed was Senator Amidala, as there were plenty of other Senators awaiting their Jedi escorts. I follow Anakin to the Senator and bow before her, as does he.

“Senator Amidala.” Anakin addresses her as he returns to a standing position.

“Padawan Skywalker.” She replies with a pearly white smile. I assume they’re trying to keep it professional for any prying eyes.

“And you must be Padawan (L/N). It’s nice to meet you.” She says, her focus and smile now on me.

“Likewise, Senator.” I respond, really taking in her features. She has flawless, fair skin and her chestnut brown hair is styled in a sophisticated up-do, adorned with a headpiece of some sort. She wears a rose tinted lipstick and light blush. Her chocolate brown eyes stare at me and my (E/C) ones stare right back. She really is beautiful, I’m screwed…

“Shall we get going, ladies?” Anakin’s voice snaps me out of our staring contest.

“Of course.” I say a little too quickly, “Senator.” I extend my arm in the direction of her ship. She smiles at me, then at Anakin as she boards the ship.

After she boards, Anakin slips his hand into mine. I look around and see everyone minding their own business. I give his hand a squeeze as we walk into our new mission, together.

That was our first meeting. In the span of a standard year, we’ve managed to meet 10 more times; getting assigned or passing by one another almost every month. I’m sure this is quite irregular for any pair of Jedi’s and a Senator.

By now, Anakin and I have been knighted.

I’ve brought up my insecurities to Anakin once before and he quickly shot them down; kissing them away. However, the more time we spend around the Senator, the more it seems to eat at my soul; the fact that this woman has been a Queen and a Senator in her life so far and she’s still so young, older than us, but still young.

“Goodbye, Padmé!” Anakin calls out to the Senator as she heads for her ship.

“Goodbye, Ani! (N/N)!” She calls out to Anakin and myself. I wave goodbye as she retreats into her ship and it leaves Coruscant for Naboo.

Anakin and I return to the Jedi Temple. We’re standing in front of my door and we casually scan our surroundings. Once we’ve determined no one is watching, I open the door and we rush inside.

Immediately, Anakin’s arms are around my figure and he buries his nose into my neck.

I giggle at the attention I’m suddenly receiving, “You’re so touch starved, Ani.” I say as I put my hands on top of his arms.

“You don’t know how hard it is to keep my hands away when we’re in the presence of others.” He says, muffled by my robes.

“I do actually.” I retort, turning to face him and whisper in his ear, “I suffer the same problem.”

“Then it must be fixed!” He sweeps me off my feet, “Ani!” I shout in surprise. He hurriedly carries me to my bed and plops me on it.

“Anakin!” I say as I swat his shoulder, “You should have let me take off my robes first! Do you know how dirty it is? Sitting on unknown ships and prancing about on the battlefield…” I trail off, beginning to take my robes off. He only chuckles at my little reprimanding rant.

“Sorry, your highness. I wasn’t aware you were afraid of a little dirt.” He replies good-naturedly as he too takes off his robes.

Your highness… Royalty… Queen… Queen Amidala…. Padmé Amidala… my mind hovers over the subject of Padmé Amidala, Senator and Anakin’s childhood friend.

I fold my robes with less energy and lie in bed, thinking about Padmé…

We’ve known each other for a year, shedding formalities and acknowledging each other either by nicknames or first name. She calls me (N/N) and I call her Padmé. I once considered ‘Addy’ but thought it was too similar to ‘Ani’, so I dropped it… She may be 5 years older than us; but she looks our age. It’s amazing how she manages to keep up appearances. I mean, she was a queen so it isn’t such a marvelous feat… She’s just so pretty. And regal, even in our presence. I suppose she wouldn’t just drop her regality when she’s with us… I don’t know what’s going on with me; whenever she’s around, I just feel so… inferior. She’s a great person and has a lovely personality, don’t get me wrong. She’s amazing in every way and I’m just-

“Don’t finish that sentence.” Anakin said authoritatively. I was so caught up in my thoughts, I completely forgot Anakin was with me. I turn to my right to see Anakin has settled in bed and has taken a hold of my hand.

He sits up and I mirror his actions. He turns towards me and grabs both of my hands. His cerulean orbs stare right into my soul. I forget, he has a knack for being able to read me like a book.

“You are amazing too.” He reassures me.

“She was a queen, Ani and I’m-“

“You’re a Jedi! Do you know how amazing you really are?” He asks with genuine curiousity.

“You wake up every day – risk your life every day – to go fight for the Republic! You command the 343rd Battalion; entire platoons of men look to you every day for guidance. Your skills with a lightsaber are nearly unmatched AND you’re one of the most beautiful Jedi to have every roamed these halls.” He exasperates while flinging his arm to the door that leads to the halls.

“Padmé is a great person and I love her.” He says and my heart drops to the pit of my stomach. “As a friend.” He continues.

“But, do you know who I love as a lover? Who I love with all my heart and who I wish to spend the rest of my life with?”

I look at him with innocent doe eyes, soaking in his words like a sponge.

“You, (Y/N). You are my best friend and the love of my life. Do you know how many times I’ve stared your way as a Padawan? Countless times. Or how happy I was whenever we got paired for a mission? I was exhilarated. It’s the joy you get when your feelings for someone are so strong, you feel like you’ll explode. You’ve always had my heart and never known it.” He finishes, or so I thought.

“I love you, (Y/N).” He says, letting go of my hands to grab both sides of my face, “With all of my heart.” The tears that have been collecting at the corners of my eyes finally begin to fall; being told you are the love of someone’s life and that they love you with all their heart makes you emotional.

His hands make quick work of wiping away the tears that cascade down my face.

Once he’s done and the waterworks stop, he says, “You are NOT inferior to Padmé and you never will be. Understand?” with emphasis on ‘not’ and looks at me. I nod my head in comprehension.

“Good.” Anakin lays back and pulls me into his side; rubbing my arm with the calloused fingers of his left hand. I steady my breathing from the crying I just did and relax into him, sliding my right arm around his back to take residence on his waist. The room is settled in a comfortable silence; the only noises being the sound of our breathing.

“I love you too, by the way.” I say in a small voice, keeping my eyes down as my thumb strokes the skin on his waist. He turns is head and looks down at me with a smile and responds with two words:

“I know…”

[incorrecttowerofgodquotes]

Tower Of God Anime Episode 1 Breakdown

Spoilers so Anime only’s beware.

-The two hot boys have shown up. Interesting they’re both under honor and pride, since the two hate each other’s guts. Hatz strives to bring honor as swordsman and places a lot of his pride into that. Meanwhile, Khun strives to regain his honor taken away from him after his exile, and his overwhelming pride causes problems for him.

-In this small scene, there’s so much symbolism about Endorsi’s character. First, we focus on her shoes, which links to the idea of how Jahad’s Princesses are called the shoes in the king’s showcase. Right now, she is a shoe, walking towards her destiny of entering the tower. Then we get a shot of her face, a mix of adorable and pretty. These two shots indicate what everyone sees when they first meet Endorsi, a princess and then just a pretty face. Until it finally pulls back and shows the many other shoes in the showcase, to which Endorsi is compared to and what people hope she becomes. However, she stands outside the case because she wants freedom from her duties as a princess.

-Another interesting thing about the showcase shot is that while Endorsi is at first front and center, she’s ultimately dwarfed by the many other shoes that come into frame, showing that even if she’s a princess, she’s just one of many and can easily be made (replaced) again.

-The power and influence line shows Endorsi wants. She wanted power to become stronger than the other girls at her home, and eventually she gained it. Now she wants power to become a popular princess, which will give her influence. With her influence she might be able to change something about the princess system, just like what Yuri wants.

-Shibisu is under the money and wealth, replacing Narae. Now, we don’t actually know Shibisu’s backstory. We’ve gotten hints of it such as someone taking something from him, but we don’t know the full story. Might this give a clue into his past?

-Anaak is probably the most easiest to explain. She wants revenge on the Jahad family for her mother and father’s deaths. However she eventually mellows out with this, preferring to keep her teammates safe then strive for revenge (like in the Name Hunt Station Arc)

-Rak wants to transcend all. Basically become stronger than anyone, and he’ll gain this power by hunting down strong prey and proving he’s stronger.

-I can’t really do an analysis of the op cause most of it is just Bam walking and stuff, so here are my fav shots (Though the yellow one scares me). Interesting that we get a shot of the Jahad symbol in the op, though it makes sense with just how important it is. Though I don’t know what was up with the bird. I guess it’s meant to represent freedom, but ToG is more full of water metaphors than sky. (Also the only time birds are relevant in ToG is when they appear and then die)

-I love Rachel’s little smile after Bam tells her he doesn’t want her to go up the tower. It seems like she’s smiling to calm him down and explain the situation, however you can also see the fakeness in it. She isn’t smiling because she feels bad for Bam, she’s smiling because she feels like she has to.

-This shot still confuses me. It’s like the tower itself is vibe checking Bam.

-Subarashi

-Bam subscribes to the “No Waifu, No Laifu” train of thought. And just as I predicted, people are already calling him a simp. I guess I can let it pass for now, but’s gonna get annoying if people keep calling him that, even after S1.

-Thus, the meeting that forever changed the tower’s fate has occurred. And it all started with a kick to the face.

-Seeing Yuri and Evan together makes me happy. They’re such a great duo that feel better together than split. Also I’m interested in the language they’re using. Is it a real world language, fake, or a mix of a few languages? Either way, it seems that Yuri and Evan might be able to understand each other without a Pocket (maybe because Evan’s guide abilities allow him to know every language in the tower?)

-Gotta say, the CGI looks very crappy, especially in mix with the extremely cartoony style of ToG. Hope we don’t get to much of it.

-Why are they saying Non-Regular. It’s supposed to be Irregular. The trailers got it right, so why is this different?

-Love how Bam’s the only one who reacts to the threat of execution. Evan and Yuri probably hear that on a daily basis so it doesn’t matter as much.

-Yuri went from shitting on him to wanting to fuck him in a second. Normally I’d criticize such a thing but since Yuri has a different agenda, and the circumstances between princesses and men, I can’t blame her for wanting a handsome man to go up. (Seriously all the princesses must be sexually frustrated)

-Anaak’s my favorite girl in S1, but I think Yuri’s gonna convert me if she has more of these great faces.

-Another translation error, but one also translated wrongly in Japanese. It’s supposed to be needle, but they say katana (sword in japanese). If I’m remembering correctly, only one 13 Month Weapon is actually a sword.

-Poor Evan. Then again, even if it seems he has a weak hold on her, he’s probably the best one for the job. Since he’s one of the highest ranking guides, he’s probably stuck taking care of either hard to handle or strong princesses.

-Their relationship is adorable. I have a thing for tall girl x short boy and this fulfills it all the way. Also, Yuri saying she hates being bored is really telling of just how much of an adventurous spirit she has. Even in the tower where things are hectic all the time and she works under Jahad and Wingtree, she still desires a world outside of the norm. I wonder if meeting Phantaminum really broadened her horizons that much?

-Love seeing all the buildup just to get to Bam being eaten. It’s a great way to subvert expectations from him just cutting it normally. Also in the manwha, Yuri says the needle is for stabs and pierces, probably giving Bam the idea of entering the eel.

-Also Yuri for best big sister in anime pls.

-”Welp, let’s go home”

-Yuri was about to try and punt an administrator. How can she walk in such dense shinsu with balls as heavy as hers

-Can we talk about the amount of trust in Yuri and Evan’s relationship. Sure, Yuri protested when grabbed by Evan, but when she heard that Bam had taken the right path she immediately stopped fighting or rushing to break in there. Even if she couldn’t figure out what the path was supposed to be, she believed in Evan’s words that Bam had done it right and stopped fighting.

-Bam’s gonna need a bath

-I love these two shots. Just the raw determination Bam has is inspiring. We should all be like Bam, except maybe focus that determination into a hobby or work instead of stalking a girl.

-Yuri about to punt Headon part 2

-This scene had me tearing up. No matter how horribly the two’s relationship progresses in the future, this scene will always be sweet because it’s the two’s raw, positive emotion. Bam was stuck down there for weeks, months, maybe even years, and finally someone comes along and says they’ll be there with him. Even if he didn’t leave the cave, his world got brighter just by having Rachel there. I’m glad they included this scene because it shows why Bam is so desperate to get Rachel back, to get his light back.

-This is precious

-I can’t believe I’m actually saying this but Rachel looks adorable

-These shots are so simple yet so powerful. If only they could have stayed like this

-Bam is smooth. This dude spent years in a dark hole with no one to talk to and yet he can still pick up girls. Also I think this scene shows that Bam and Rachel have more of a sibling relationship. Ruffling his hair is more of a big sister type of thing.

-Based on Yuri’s reaction, this is probably the most determined she’s seen Evan

-Black March is top tier waifu material even though she’s just a needle. I like that the animators made her look more mature. It shows that she’s an old weapon without needing to say it.

-BEGONE THOT

-I love how Black March’s preference in men was a superstition. Also can we talk about Evan’s face in the last panel? It’s beautiful.

-Honestly, it’s hard to tell who’s in charge of who

-That feeling when a sexy, needle lady will never hold you in her arms, why even live?

-I love how Bam’s first reaction to entering a new place was to eat it’s grass. Bless this precious child

-And finally, it ends off with the RaKhunBam trio. I’m so happy to see all three of them together.

This episode had it’s good points and it’s bad points but either way I’m excited for the rest of this journey, especially seeing the anime onlys reactions.

[tallat-of-thralls]

Mesquite: The Tree of Life of the South West

"I could ask for no better monument over my grave than a good mesquite tree, its roots down deep like those of peace who belong to the soil, its hardy branches, leaves, and fruit holding memories of the soil..." J. Frank Dobie, Texas Writer

Overview

The name mesquite derives from the Hispansized word 'mizquitl'.

There are more than 40 species of mesquite trees found worldwide, at least 90 percent of which grow in Latin America, principally Argentina and Chile. Although mesquite also thrives in other arid regions such as those in Southwest North America, Africa, the Middle East, Tunisia, Algeria, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Burma, Hawaii, West Indies, Russia, Puerto Rico, and Australia.

The tree itself comes in a variety of sizes depending on rain fall. Locations with higher rain fall note mesquite trees ranging from 40-50ft in height with a spread of nearly 40 feet or more. The branches are sparsely covered in thin feathery leaves with 2inch thorns growing at the base of the leaf joints.

This blog will mostly focus on Latin America; specifically in the Southwest Us and Texas.

There are seven varieties that cover one-third of the state of Texas or 56 million of the 167.5 million acres of land from the Rio Grande to the Panhandle, across central and north Texas and into much of west texas. Of all the US states 76 percent of mesquite wood grows in Texas. Mesquite grows in all regions of the state except the deep East Piney Woods.

Out of the seven varieties, the post will mostly reference Prosopis glandulosa var. glandulosa a.k.a "Honey Mesquite".

Map of the American South West and Latin america showing the range of Mesquite tree growth.

Native Tribes: Resource and Myth

Description reads: Salt River Reservation, Pima Agency Arizona, two Maricopa men(sitting) and Mojave Man in full aboriginal dress. 1880

Mesquite was such an omnipresent and nutritious resource and a central part of life itself that many tribes such as the Walapai, Apache, Papago, and Maricopa honored mesquite within their language and mythology.

Mesquite beans were the food staples for many of the South West Native American tribes. Through out the United states they gathered millions of pounds annually. In cases of food shortages, mesquite beans were often the only food source.

Much of the plant material such as fiber, thorns, sap, and roots were used in the making of many goods. The fibers were used for making of textiles and baskets. The

The creation myth of the Maricopa states that the Maricopa, Pima, and Yavapai -after death of their maker- scattered over the land and gathered mesquite beans. An Apache myth recounts how the sun and moon consulted with one another and formed the mesquite tree then hung beans upon its branches. The death of the Coyote myth of the Pima tells of Mesquite surviving the Great Flood and of how the coyote ate so many beans that they swelled in his stomach.

The Mesquite was an extremely important resource and was used frequently as an amenity of trade between the Apache tribe and the Pima tribe. When food plants failed during time of drought the Pima would travel long expeditions to trade goods with the Apache for beans and bean flour. With it, the Pima made dough and cooked it as round cakes. Certain tribes such as Pima and Opata also fermented bean flour water creating a bean beer called Atole and has a mildly intoxicating quality.

The gum, or sap, of the tree was used as adhesive to mend broken pottery as well as dye clay before the heating process. The gum when mixed with mud was used in several tribes spiritual and courtship rituals.

Both leaves and gum of the Mesquite is known by the tribes to carry healing powers and medicinal properties.

The Yaqui community in particular honor mesquite as one of two plants to have supernatural powers beyond most other plants. However of the two, only Mesquite grows in the sacred territory of the Yaqui and is said to have powers to detect and vanquish witchcraft especially if the wood is cut into a shape of a cross. One Yaqui myth tells of a "talking stick" made from mesquite wood which foretold death to all people baptized as christian.

Anglo-Texan History

Image of Mesquite Texas, 1890 showing piles of mesquite branches and horse drawn wagons containing grain or beans.

Historians believed that the mesquite was orginally limited to extreme South Texas and spread north only after the Civil War when cattle drives became frequent. Cattle would eat mesquite beans when grass was not plentiful.

Early Texas settlers facored the mesquite wood because not only was it plentiful but it also resisted rotting. Before commercial barbed wire came to texas in the 1870s, ranchers built sturdy corrals from mesquite-log picket fences. Travelers also fashioned hubs for wagons, wagon spokes, and small boat ribs from mesquite.

During the civil war, when coffee was scarce, Texans made ersatz coffee from roasted and ground mesquite beans. Honey made from mesquite flowers was especially prized. In the absence of pins, settlers substituted mesquite thorns.

In the 1869 Dr. John E. Park of Sequin patented under the no. 51,407 on December 5 for the use of mesquite bark in tanning leather. In the article from 1870 Texas Almanac, he included information on the superiority of the use of Mesquite in tanning leather. For, mesquite was found to be richest in Tannic Acid (a substance used for tanning) and worked exceptionally faster than previous methods because the acid penetrated the hide faster. Fast enough to seldom lose hide to decomposition. This allowed for tanning to be done in summer months, a process usually done in winter.

Medicinal Uses

*Note: not a replacement for modern day regulated medications and treatments.*

Aztecs made a lotion from ground mesquite leaves to treat sore eyes.

The Yuma tribe treated venereal diseases with an infusion of leaves and sap.

Comanches chewed on leaves to relieve toothaches.

The Yaqui Tribe treated headaches with a poultice made from mashing leaves to a pulp, mixing with water, and binding the mixture to the forehead.

The light-amber gum or sap that oozed from mesauite bark was mixed with water and gargled to treat sore throats, or swallowed to treat diarrhea, aid in digestion, and help wounds heal.

The Yavapai rubbed a mixture of mud and mesquite gum into their hair to simultaneously dye it and treat lice.

Modern Uses

Although ranchers still try to annihilate mesquite due to injury of livestock and cowhands, a dedicated group of texans cant get enough of it. They are mostly artisans who value mesquite for its beauty, the ease with which it can be worked, and the high sheen of finished pieces. Some even prize its irregularities.

Mesquite has a swirling grain, radial cracks, mineral deposits in the bark, and often many insect holes. Mesquite is dimensionally stable: as most hardwoods dry they shrink more in one direction than they do the other while mesquite shrinks the same percentage in both directions. It has a surface hardness of 2,336 pounds per squared inch, equal to that of hickory and almost twice that of oak and maple; and a density of 45 pounds per foot greater than oak, maple, pecan, and hickory.

Modern Spiritual interpertations:

Harmonizing qualities

Accessing the willingness to cross the wasteland of "dark night of the soul" to find deep spiritual richness within yourself and others

Comfortably connecting with others from a place of compassion and warmth

Standing inside a circle of love

Self blessing

Forgiveness

Possible use for Mesquite in imbalances

Emotional remoteness

Aloofness

Allowing others to see a coolness that actually covers an inner warmth

Feeling as is there is a barren wasteland or spiritual desolation within self.

Feeling separated and remote from others or self.

Personal Suggestion on craft Use*

*Disclaimer: subject to error and not a replacement for actual medications; allergy notice: mesquite is part of the legume family. Research trees and plants in area before ingesting random plants. Watch out for use of pesticides in public places. I do Not recommend diy fermentation. I do not support appropriating native tribes' traditions and rites unless explicitly permitted to by said tribe, do NOT trespass on Sacred Lands for resources it may be possible to purchase sacred mesquite from the tribes. Do Not vandalize sacred grounds or public trees. BE RESPECTFUL.*

Mesquite is tasty. Use wood for rich Smokey flavor on barbequed meats and vegtables.

Make tea from leaves

The beans are said to taste sweet and contain 30 percent sugar trace. Eat beans raw, roasted, dried, or ground into a flour.

Use water diluted sap to treat rashes. (Unless allergic.)

Use diluted sap in hair as you would oils.

Burn leaves and wood to smoke cleanse.

Hang mesquite cross to avert hexes or harmful craft.

I recommend buying from South Western Tribes and other mesquite artisans for bobbles and other wooden figures. Otherwise, source your mesquite in an earth friendly manner by sustainable means and only take what you need.

Information Sources:

"The Magnificent Mesquite" book by Ken E. Rogers

Texasalmanac.com

Desert-alchemy.com

Local Texans

Picture Sources: Google and pinterest

[intanelya-blog]

Assignment Week 1

Data Management and Visualization

 WEEK 1

ASSIGNMENT: Developing a Research Question and Creating Your Personal Code Book

STEP 1: Choose a data set that you would like to work with.

After reviewing the code books for the data sets made available for this assignment, I choose code books for the data set of National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health.

STEP 2: Identify a specific topic of interest.

After run through the codebook for the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, I have decided that I am particularly interested in the factors that influence the adolescents’ health in the United States. From the data given in the codebook, I would like to analyze more on the one factor; does daily activities influence the general health of the adolescents.

STEP 3: Prepare a codebook of your own (i.e., print individual pages or copy screen and paste into a new document) from the larger codebook that includes the questions/items/variables that measure your selected topics.)

Factors influence Adolescents General Health Codebook

a)    Topic of interest: Adolescents General Health

b)    Variables : Daily activities

STEP 4: Identify a second topic that you would like to explore in terms of its association with your original topic.

The second topic that I intend to explore that associate with the original topic is the correlation between uses of social media with adolescents’ general health.

STEP 5: Add questions/items/variables documenting this second topic to your personal codebook.

Some questions/items/variables that can be ask during survey:

1.       Do you use social media?

2.       How many hours a day do you use social media?

3.       Which social media platform do you use most often?

4.       How influential is social media in your life?

5.       Do you using any social media platform to promote a healthy lifestyle?

STEP 6: Perform a literature review to see what research has been previously done on this topic.

               Social media play an important role in the daily lives of young people and have become important contexts for development among adolescents and young adults 1. Early adolescence represents a period of vast developmental changes that span across the physical, psychological, and social dimensions of an individual 2. Extant developmental research suggests that adolescents and young adults use social media for self-presentation and self-disclosure, and these behaviors are linked to their identity and intimacy development and well-being 3.

               Undeniably, engaging in various forms of social media is a routine activity that research has shown to benefit adolescents by enhancing communication, social connection, and even technical skills 4. According to research conducted on 2011, 22% of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 times a day, and more than half of adolescents log on to a social media site more than once a day. Seventy-five percent of teenagers now own cell phones, and 25% use them for social media, 54% use them for texting, and 24% use them for instant messaging 4. However, these days a large part of this generation’s social and emotional development is occurring while on the Internet and on cell phones. Because of their limited capacity for self-regulation and susceptibility to peer pressure, adolescents are at some risk as they navigate and experiment with social media. Recent research indicates that there are frequent online expressions of offline behaviors, such as bullying, clique-forming, and sexual experimentation, that have introduced problems such as cyberbullying, privacy issues, and sexting. Other problems that merit awareness include declining health, internet addiction and concurrent sleep deprivation.

               Evidence is increasingly supporting a link between social media use and various aspects of adolescent wellbeing, especially general health including sleep quality and mental wellness 5. Poor sleep quality is prevalent in adolescents and is known to contribute to depression, anxiety and low self-esteem. Besides that, sleep deprivation also could lead to other major health issues such as heart disease, irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, stroke, and diabetes. Furthermore, an association between poor sleep quality and overall social media use would support the role of a less physically active lifestyle. Excessive time spend on social media among adolescence lead to sedentary lifestyle which contribute to much more health issues. Previous findings on Internet use in general are certainly relevant when considering social media use specifically, as young people spend 54% of their time online using social media 6.

               Adolescents’ use of social media, which has increased considerably in the past decade, has both positive and negative influences on adolescents’ health. As social media is the most prominent communication tool of choice for adolescents, it is important to understand the relationship between the frequency of social media use and health behaviors among this population 7. Regular social media use every day was associated with a reinforcement of health behaviors at both extremes of health behaviors, whereas a medium intensity of social media use was associated with the highest levels of physical activity and lowest sleep adequacy among those with moderate health behaviors 7. Hence, finding an optimal level of social media use that is beneficial to a variety of health behaviors would be most beneficial to adolescents who are in the middle of the health behavior spectrum.

References:

1.       Michikyan, M., & Suárez-Orozco, C. (2016). Adolescent media and social media use: implications for development.

2.       Salomon, I., & Brown, C. S. (2019). The selfie generation: Examining the relationship between social media use and early adolescent body image. The Journal of Early Adolescence, 39(4), 539-560.

3.       Bartsch, M., & Subrahmanyam, K. (2015). Technology and self-presentation. In L. D. Rosen, N. A. Cheever, & L. M. Carrier (Eds.), The Wiley handbook of psychology, technology, and society (pp. 339-357). Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

4.       Fernández, A. (2011). Clinical Report: The impact of social media on children, adolescents and families. Archivos de Pediatría del Uruguay, 82(1), 31-32.

5.       Woods, H. C., & Scott, H. (2016). # Sleepyteens: Social media use in adolescence is associated with poor sleep quality, anxiety, depression and low self-esteem. Journal of adolescence, 51, 41-49.

6.       Thompson, S. H., & Lougheed, E. (2012). Frazzled by Facebook? An exploratory study of gender differences in social network communication among undergraduate men and women. College Student Journal, 46(1), 88e98.

7.       Shimoga, S. V., Erlyana, E., & Rebello, V. (2019). Associations of social media use with physical activity and sleep adequacy among adolescents: Cross-sectional survey. Journal of medical Internet research, 21(6), e14290.

STEP 7: Based on your literature review, develop a hypothesis about what you believe the association might be between these topics. Be sure to integrate the specific variables you selected into the hypothesis.

Based on the literature review, we can suggest a hypothesis that greater overall social media use will be associated with poorer general health among adolescents.

[kiruuuuu]

Thatcher/Lesion oneshot in which Lesion has a tattoo and Thatcher hates it. (Rating T, fierce denial and fluff I suppose, ~2.5k words) - dedicated to @glazkov-smile​ who put this ship into my brain where it now festers and grows shakes fist

.

The first time Thatcher catches a glimpse of it, all he feels – curiously enough – is betrayal.

No part of it makes sense, it’s neither his body nor his decision and yet it’s as if he’s been deceived in some way, left in the dark about a topic concerning him personally. It’s irrelevant how nonsensical his emotions are because they’re there regardless and no amount of logical arguing with himself is able to make them vanish. He can’t rationalise it even if he tries, and he tries desperately. He’s merely being a judgemental old fart, probably, something he’s been called before in differing contexts. But he doesn’t know how to deal with it.

It was no longer than a second: Bandit pulled on the back of Lesion’s collar to drop an ice cube into his shirt, and Thatcher just happened to look over at the commotion and saw colour lick at the back of Lesion’s neck, usually hidden by whatever garish shirt the man inexplicably chose to wear that day but now revealed in a flash of ink. And it’s enough to conjure up a profound disappointment in Thatcher.

They’ve known each other for years now, stayed in contact where Smoke exchanged irregular messages which taper off now and then, only to rekindle once in a blue moon. No, Thatcher and Lesion wrote and called almost every week, given their work permitted it, left messages on a variety of media depending on their current location and sent each other postcards even, both of them carefully and happily maintaining an unlikely friendship. They differ in many regards though not the most important ones, and thus remained pointed towards each other like magnets. Friendships like this one are rare, Thatcher has come to understand this all too keenly.

And he can’t stand tattoos.

To him, they’re much worse than gaudy jewellery, flamboyant clothes and unnaturally dyed hair together – not only are they alarmingly permanent but also usually horribly tacky. Who cares if someone managed to father a child? Congratulations, they fulfilled their purpose the way nature intended, no need to plaster their kid’s heartbeat or birth date or entire bloody face all over their arms and legs and basically rub it under everyone’s nose. He doesn’t care to know the names of people’s partners nor is he interested in cringy quotes or supposedly deep and symbolic bullshit which allegedly holds so much meaning for its bearer. They’re ugly. They mar skin instead of decorating it.

He much prefers freckles, scars, stretch marks, hair, natural discolouration, any sort of blemish which tells him this person is alive and breathing and not airbrushed or genetically engineered to look this way. He doesn’t care tattoos have been around forever, to him they’re a disgrace and can erase all his interest in someone. Can, and have.

Thinking back, he’s fairly sure he ranted about this to Lesion’s face before, was met with the usual calm patience tinged with amusement whenever he complains about something at length, earned no more than a half-reply implying his position was at best a bit too extreme and at worst complete and utter dogshite in Lesion’s opinion. He’s never dismissive about it, merely pokes fun but ultimately chooses to respect Thatcher’s views which is probably one of the reasons why they’re still friends.

So when he catches sight of precise strokes lining Lesion’s back, Thatcher is appalled. Indignant. Offended, even.

He needs to see it.

Just like he demands details about all the unnecessary so-called ‘apps’ most people around him use so he can judge them accordingly, curiosity grips him in its iron hold and compels him to view the entire disaster Lesion immortalised on his body for reasons unknown. Maybe it’s linked to a previous partner, a family member, a time in Lesion’s life about which Thatcher knows nothing yet, something deeply personal – in which case he’ll still disapprove of the ink but possibly gain more insight into his friend’s past. In that case, it’d be a worthwhile endeavour despite the knowledge of what exactly is tainting Lesion’s skin. He won’t be able to unsee it afterwards.

.

“Do you want to fight?”, he interrupts Lesion’s current conversation and gets a good-natured laugh from his friend and a concerned look from Ying in return.

“I thought we agreed not to argue politics in the workplace anymore”, Lesion replies cheerfully and moves his toothpick from one corner of his mouth to the other, Thatcher’s gaze following its journey momentarily.

“You said you were a little rusty in whatever fancy martial arts style you always torture the recruits with, so I thought you could use a refresher.”

“It’s much too warm to fight”, Ying points out and Thatcher barely bites back a response along the lines of that’s the point.

Lesion ignores her statement and leans back in his lawn chair, one of Rainbow’s most sought after commodity in summer – ants are prevalent and therefore sitting in the grass ill-advised. “Even if I did, I’d go to Yumiko and not you – no offence.”

“I bet you’ve been doing it for longer than she has.”

“Possibly, but she’s still lengths better.” The younger man raises an amused eyebrow. “Mike, are you bored?”

Oh. It’s the perfect excuse, his entire team is known for their eccentric solutions to boredom as well as striking fear into everyone’s heart as soon as it looks like they’ve got nothing to do. “Yes”, he lies smoothly, “so you can either join me willingly or spend the rest of the day anticipating a non-consensual fight. I’ll know when you least expect it, Tze Long.”

“Sounds like you don’t have a choice at all”, Ying sighs, shaking her head. “Men.”

“Don’t pretend you wouldn’t jump on the opportunity to roll through the mud with Elena, my dear”, Lesion comments casually after which neither of the two stick around for long enough to watch her turn crimson and splutter at the accusation. “So, tell me. Was this a misguided rescue mission or do you need my help with anything embarrassing?”

Thatcher blinks at the unexpected question until he realises his excuse sounds so terribly flimsy Lesion didn’t buy it for a second, correctly assuming an ulterior motive. Even if he’s nowhere near guessing it. “Oh, neither. I really just – it was a genuine suggestion and I…” He trails off when crinkles appear around dark eyes.

“Aren’t we a little too old to kill time by beating each other up? Let’s go drink some green tea to cool down instead, shall we?”

His objection dies on his tongue as his friend turns away, wearing a small smile. “I don’t even like green tea”, Thatcher protests quietly yet trails after Lesion nonetheless.

.

“Let’s go swimming.”

Lesion pauses visibly, marks his spot on the page he’s currently on and then glances up sceptically. “Now?”

Yes, Thatcher almost blurts out but catches himself just in time, checks his watch and pretends like he didn’t completely lose track of the hours ticking by purely because of Lesion’s presence. It’s a common occurrence, oddly enough. “Of course not”, he scoffs, “but what about tomorrow?”

“Where is this coming from? We’ve never gone for a swim together, you prefer going alone.” Fortunately, there’s no suspicion in his voice, only curiosity.

“I just thought you might want to join me. When’s the last time you went swimming?”

“Yesterday. Meghan invited me.”

Ah. Thatcher squints before he can help himself – they probably spent the time showing off their respective tattoos, and for some reason this thought makes it worse than as if Lesion had gone with anyone else. Even Blackbeard. “Well. If you don’t want to, that’s fine”, he concludes curtly and directs his attention back to the book in his own lap, fighting down another wave of dismay. So others are allowed to see it, apparently, where he’d not even been aware of it at all.

“What? Of course we can go, I was just surprised -”

“Nah. Nevermind.”

“Mike.” There’s gentle exasperation in Lesion’s voice now and he leans forward in the armchair which has become basically his over the course of several months – it bears his imprint and smells of him. Not that Thatcher would know. “I didn’t say no.”

“I’m busy tomorrow anyway”, he lies through his teeth and wonders whether he sounds cranky.

Lesion silently examines him for a few seconds longer, expression unreadable, and finally shrugs. “Alright. If you do want to go, just let me know.”

.

The doors of his wardrobe have mirrors. It’s the perfect plan. Thatcher buys the Dutch beer Lesion likes so much, and while Maestro is in the middle of listing all the exotic animals he’s eaten in his life with Smoke listening intently (and probably adding quite a few to his bucket list), while Mute snitches on Bandit’s newest plan to Sledge, while Sledge pointedly ignores Maestro’s hand slowly creeping up his thigh – while all of them are gathered in Thatcher’s living room, he makes sure to spill some of it down Lesion’s back.

“Whoops”, he says after his friend has jumped up with an undignified noise of surprise and hopes dearly that either none of the others watched him very deliberately tip his bottle or that they at least know to keep their mouths shut. “Come on, let’s get you something else to wear.”

“Why did we even stay in if I end up smelling like pub anyway”, Lesion complains weakly on the way to the bedroom, lamenting the wasted drink and accepting the fresh t-shirt Thatcher presses into his hands. “Thanks. You can go ahead.”

Thatcher pauses, hovering uncertainly. This – isn’t how it’s supposed to go. The last time, Lesion undressed in front of him without any qualms and he hoped it would be the same now, positioned his friend between himself and the mirrors so he’d get a good look no matter what. “I, uh -”

“Do you want to watch me change?”, Lesion asks, audibly entertained.

“No, I just – you probably need a towel, right? To get rid of the beer.”

“Sure”, the younger man agrees easily and Thatcher nods more to himself than for his benefit, leaves the room and dashes as soon as he’s out of eyesight. He’s never fetched a wet towel faster in his life, hoping to at least see part of it if Lesion’s in the middle of undressing, yet when he returns, Lesion is still wearing his soaked shirt. As well as a meaningful smirk. “Thank you, Mike. I’ve got it from here.”

No, he’s not going to let this opportunity pass. “Are you sure you don’t need help with your back?”

“Do you want to see it that badly?”

Oh.

“I have no idea what you mean.”

“Your personal vendetta against my shirts. It took me a few days to realise why so many of them ended up ruined, stained, ripped or threatened. You’ve not seen it before, have you?”

He hasn’t been that obvious. Has he? Thatcher considers denying everything but his curiosity prevails, triumphs over the prospect of never living this down. Defeated, he shakes his head, prepares for the inevitable ribbing yet is merely awarded with Lesion’s fingers reaching up to unbutton his soiled shirt, a gesture so hypnotising all speech evades him.

“I didn’t know you were that interested”, Lesion comments nonchalantly as if the temperature in the room hadn’t just jumped up a few degrees – or maybe Thatcher is experiencing a heatwave, yet whatever it is, his face is burning.

“I’m not”, he replies petulantly and is in the middle of justifying all his actions to himself in his head when the piece of fabric drops, carelessly gets discarded, and then Lesion turns.

It’s -

Well, it’s large, first of all, covering the entirety of his back and seemingly continuing even below the waistband of his trousers, just shy of curling all the way around his ribs. The ink is vibrant and mesmerising, no part of Lesion’s natural skin colour visible between all the vivid colours crassly at odds with everything Thatcher considers desirable. To him, it looks more like a yakuza tattoo than anything else, the motif of a roaring tiger familiar yet kept in a more tasteful style, no cartoonish bulging eyes or exaggerated features. Part of it is shiny with moisture, making it look even more recent and amplifying the otherworldly feel of it.

And it’s still a tattoo, even if the fact that it’s Lesion’s back changes something about it; even if the outline of his shoulder blades, the dip of his lower back, the gently curved spine do something to Thatcher, its nature remains intact. He doesn’t know why anyone would choose to deface their natural beauty like this, would spend a horrendous amount of money on something this hideous, would endure a million needle pricks only to look like this.

He also has no idea why he can’t stop staring.

A detail catches his attention and, without thinking, he lifts his hand and brushes over the tiger’s face with a thumb, the skin warm and slightly sticky. “He’s got a scar below his eye”, Thatcher murmurs and fights hard to keep this odd, uncalled-for reverent tone out of his voice.

“Do you want to watch him dance?”, Lesion asks him quietly and his brain is too occupied to process his words, discern the meaning behind them because – surely, he’s not -

The air is thick around them and it’s not only a byproduct of the season; it’s not stuffy yet heavy nonetheless, struggles against Thatcher’s deep inhale. His other fingers join his thumb in resting on intricate swirls, scared to move in case they smudge the ornate ink. “What do you mean?”, he hears himself mumble, possibly hoping for a repetition only, not even a clarification.

“Oh. Nevermind.” Lesion’s reply is soft and it sounds like he’s grinning. “I’m glad you seem to like it though.”

“I don’t”, Thatcher protests immediately and withdraws his hand, suddenly light-headed with the rush of oxygen, air flooding his lungs, returned to normal from one second to the next.

His friend throws him a look over his shoulder and he really looks like the Cheshire cat for some reason, as if he’s having the time of his life and Thatcher feels like he missed something somewhere along the way. “Alright”, Lesion agrees readily.

They get him cleaned up and into Thatcher’s shirt without any more interruptions, but when he turns to leave, the Brit holds him back yet falters at the expectant, amused and open smile with which the gesture is met.

“How about”, he begins, suddenly sheepish, “we go swimming this weekend?”

And to his relief, Lesion nods immediately, grinning and extremely pleased with the suggestion. “Of course. I’d love to.”

[mindfulness-movement]

The Doctor Told How Much Sex A Week Is Needed For Health

Doctor-sexologist Yevgeniy Kravchuk said that two or three times of intimate contact a week is enough to maintain health, Sputnik radio reports. Check out here for more details about sex.

The expert noted that in modern culture, sexual motives are extremely common, so a person begins to think that something is going wrong in his life. To get rid of such anxiety permanently, it is better to see a doctor. If such a desire does not arise, then Kravchuk advises to follow the "sexual norm".

The doctor explained that the concept of UVR is important for sexology - a conditionally physical rhythm. This indicator is not strict. But it is generally accepted that, according to the UFR, a person needs two or three intercourses a week. Kravchuk stressed that this is an average indicator, but one cannot ignore the temperament and needs of each person. If a person does not get his norm, then his quality of life is worse and his health is worse, ”added the sexologist.

Exceeding the norm of sexual activity also negatively affects the general condition of a person and his health, including mental. Intimate contact can get bored if it is much more than necessary. In addition, there are specific cases when it should be abandoned. For example, on the eve of important events, it is better to abstain from sex at least a day before. The doctor explained that after intimacy, the nervous system needs rest - it goes into a "protective" mode. If the event requires high results, then they will definitely be lower. Therefore, you should refrain from sex before the event, but make up for everything after, emphasizes Kravchuk.

Work also affects sex , experts say. An accomplished person who has found himself in his business, seeks to be realized in the intimate sphere. Representatives of creative professions, as a rule, also have high life potential, including sexual potential.

Female sex hormones have a stronger effect on the immune system than male ones. Therefore, women are more likely to suffer from immunodeficiency than men, especially if they have menstrual irregularities. But the hormone of happiness serotonin, which is produced after sex and not only, acts equally well on the immunity of both sexes, explains obstetrician-gynecologist Evgenia Pekareva.

If the need for intimate relationships is naturally great, then the lack of sexual life will negatively affect the emotional state, thus reducing the quality of a woman's life. However, an orgasm experienced with a partner is not very different from an orgasm experienced on its own, so masturbation is a good way out of the situation, says obstetrician-gynecologist Evgenia Pekareva.

More often it is more like "but I heard." Ask any doctor about the causes of any of the diseases, he will list them for you a dozen or two. Perhaps the absence of sexual intercourse will also be listed among them, but it is impossible to establish that this was the decisive factor. Take the same problems in the genitourinary sphere in men and women, which have become quite common in our time. And at the same time, a more significant factor for maintaining health in this area is the issues of maintaining a healthy lifestyle, regular exercise, absence of bad habits, adherence to the rules of intimate hygiene and sexual safety, periodic visits to the doctor and passing all the necessary tests for STDs, the expert believes.

[soapboxsocrates]

What I Tell Older Parents

Streams of “Living Waters” … it’s why I am writing; it’s what I have been trying to share as I work my way through Frances Jensen’s, “The Teenage Brain: a Neuroscientist’s Survival Guide (yada yada yada). Jensen makes the observation that there is an overabundance of myths regarding the brain and how it functions within our popular society and even in medicine -- e.g. that teenager behavior is reducible to “raging hormones,” or that “multi-tasking” is even a valid notion (hint, it’s entirely not, we just task-switch really fast, but with great limits). There is great freedom which I am finding through the rigorous application of science, allowing science to inform my faith and my understanding of these years enough to lay down burdensome and wrongheaded expectations on myself (as a parent) -- expectations which don’t align with the reality of this developmental period.

As I have written in other posts, the teenage brain is only about 80 percent developed, and still wiring in the area (the Frontal Lobe) which is responsible for judgement, insight, abstraction, planning, and impulse control. Thus it is that the wild responses, the outbursts and emotional mood swings are understandable in light of this ongoing development, and are something for which the teenagers themselves have very little control over (and why parents have all the nore reason and all the more excuse to be patient and compassionate with thier teens). It is also a time, this period of adolescence, when experiences are imprinted upon and learning is supercharged, and thusly why their being exposed to new experiences repeatedly is so important (and also not only why the teenage years are the years in which to be investing more fully in mere schooling-unto-career alone, but the years in which the parent can join and participate in the wonder and excitement of it all). These years are to me as good and as wondrous and as adventurous (for these and other reasons) as were the infant years. It goes without saying (though I said it) these years and the development within them behooves the parent to mercifully stay the course (especially the course of patience and compassion, not “frustrating” their children, that is, not throwing up unrealistic expectations which essentially are developmentally inappropriate).

Maybe the most quickening, the most “attention-grabbing” insight (for me) is that the imprinted upon experiences during the adolescent period plays a role later on in life, and in how the brain works later in life. To get straight to the nut of this tree, these adolescent years arguably are our most effective years as parents, but are also extremely vulnerable years for our children. Now, a personal aside, I vaguely remember two quotes (one from Mark Twain, and one from a disgraced comedian not to be named but who worked on an advanced degree in child development), both of which went generally along the lines that, as children they thought their fathers superheroes, as teenagers thought their fathers idiots, and as mature men thought their fathers geniuses. I talk to a lot of older, Christian parents, many of whom bemoan the difficulty of the teenage years and remark how their children seemed after high school to have gone off the rails. I simply tell them that they loved on their children with the love of God, and that love is the Word of God which does not go forth and return void but accomplishes the purposes for which it was sent. Some actually seem to receive that, go figure. The bottomline is that in these teen and adolescent years we are affecting how they will be and think in the future (regardless of the present moments’ incongruous irregularities with then and now).

The more I read in Jensen’s book the more I think I might just be right in what I have told them on a whole other level. And, like I said, the quickening thing is how important and how vulnerable these years are. The teenage brain is just different, absolutely different, in how it functions, and if we want to parent well we have to parent according to how that teenage brain functions -- the importance and the vulnerability of these years demand we do no less. And this means learning the science of the brain. Critically, and Jensen specifically makes this point, no two brains (and no two teenage brains) are wired the same way at all. One I think should surmise that you not only have to deal with them, teenagers, as unique and seperate individuals (just as you had to when they were young), but that you have to deal them as they neurologically function as teenagers.

To illustrate this point: in discussing how the vulnerability of the adolescent brain continues well into the college years, Jensen relates the story of a college kid who had gone out drinking with friends, and the friends subsequently decided to climb a fence to get into a secured tennis club’s pool for a late night swim. When the friends got home they realized they were missing the young man from their number, returned to the club only to find the friend dead, accidentally drowned due to “acute alcohol intoxication.” Jensen emphatically states that how parents deal with these tragic stories and talk about them with their own children is critical:

“You have to stuff their minds with real stories, real consequences, and then you have to do it again…” {She goes on to list a litany of times to take the opportunity to do so.}

Later Jensen explains that one of the frontal lobes executive functions includes “prospective memory” ( “the ability to hold in your mind the intention to perform a certain action at a future time”), but during the teenage years this part of the brain simply isn’t keeping up with the rest of teenage development. For this reason, even though they have heard it a 100 times before, teenagers need to hear it again. Of course just harping on things (things not to do) is not the way, is not the right methodology for “stuffing their minds.” To be sure, this “methodology” has been the subject of so many articles I’ve read of late, and all seem to amount to how to (and how not to) engage through dialogue, and dialogue (as we well know from our own lives) takes work and time and effort.

I really REALLY WANT TO UNDERSCORE the above quote that we are stuffing the mind with “real stories of real consequences” if only because that gives me what i need to latch on to what I am talking to my teenagers about. I can talk about stories, about consequences, WITHOUT READING A CHRISTIAN BOOK on how to moralize these things to my children -- that latter effort is the onerous, burdensome “have to figure out” thing that sort of misses the point: what I am supposed to be doing is equipping my teenager with the ability to remember, the bolstering of their prospective memory ability (and doing so maybe, IMHO, to the expense of moralizing). Said slightly differently, telling my kid 100 times that premarital sex is wrong is less effective than dialoguing about how to identify those moments and heightened emotional states when decisions are made which lead to real consequences. The only thing moralizing does is effectively breed guilt and condemnation when that child, unequippedly, faces the situation I wrongly expected them to be neurologically be capable of handling like the adult they aren’t. HINT HINT: I might bear as much “fault” or more than my teenager in that moment.

Like I said, this is a time for effective parenting, but it’s essentially a parenting predicated on learning and responding to the teenage brain for where it is at.

[themangaguide]

They socialize in later

Senior high school trainee falls under a fantasy globe!

I am rather bad tester and viewers, however I truly feel that I need to talk about this manga. I need to protect my manga because this mangabat is among my most favorite mangas. As well as I hope you enjoy it as I did. This publication is about a mean high-schooler who's above? Common in archery. 1 day he's thrown into a location utilizing Moon-Bro, has actually been carried from the Bug in the price that she would certainly take among his children and where stated MoonGod-Bro makes clear that his parents are from one more world. Our major personality requires to be carried additionally requires the duty in place, leaving letters to obtain his family. After he arrives him tosses into the boundary of the planet for not being 'relatively'. MoonGod-Bro saves him and also defines him that individuals possess extremely power within this world and provides him a few of his very own abilities in the area of the Bug's "true blessing". Providing so we won't see him once again.

That's essentially it, the remainder follows his journeys in this new universe. It is till these crap phases as well as in which he gets involved with politics. Let us accessibility to some problems I've seen men and women whine around. This is the thing concerning people, they're trying to press on romance. Why will it not go away? Girls, back to the topic? THAT !?!? Both buddies in the world that admitted were reasonably declined because he wanted to take it slow down as well as love them prior to heading out. He wasn't being simple, he turned them down, LIKE A NORMAL PERSON as well as did not enjoy them. The pal in the border town's sis that appeared much like one? Why could he have feelings for this male that 'appeared like'? She did not think of him and why could she? He is simply some random guy. She enjoyed him as a couple of crowded out savior, which she would certainly make every effort to accomplish his overpowered capability after he rescued her as well as her sis. They haven't fulfilled since as well as were divided. The collection her host sibling as well as girl? Alright, that librarian has some emotional issues (first idea, do not take me seriously) as well as can be going through great deals of things right now. I believe she's thinking of some teacher that saved her of her kingdom as opposed to love. Her sis is also discussed. The only ones are his 2 fans, and there's absolutely no love!

How typically does the main personality of mangabat need to claim it! They don't appear to be in love, although I will certainly recognize, the women are throwing themselves at him. They have established a bond and spent a long time together, which suggests that they like as well as secure one another, nonetheless they aren't crazy happy negative marriage. Yes, they 'd leap at the idea of doing it with him, however if they socialize in later chapters that they look extra like a silly household than a hareem (particularly with Shiki). There is no chance a connection can originate from it since he does not require to, and also he makes it clear. I truly like how that they socialize as is, it's easy as well as simple. Individuals state he's spineless leading them on yet is exactly how a person would handle these folks that are goofy, bush off it or just laugh. And some individuals today are inclined to neglect, he's A NORMAL PERSON!! Not some super spy, not some planner thinking about the film he enjoys. He deals which makes him look simple and foolish yet it's natural considering that he's NORMAL.

And you know what? He's subdued however does not use it. Just exactly how could he use it? He is a person, naive and young. He doesn't need to utilize his power, he does not need to kill people. Enable him to remain his self that is calm, it's a small change in the regular 'kill, eliminate, eliminate' powerful individuals do. And of course, in those irregular events he combats, it's remarkable! That's not every little thing I wan na state to protect my favorite manga, however I assume it's enough. If you're seeking a [light manga online] as well as do not understand where to start. Offer this manga a flight and also you'll love it. To know more, check out: https://jocelynhonore.doodlekit.com/blog/entry/14783111/this-matter-ended-up-being-among

[rekindlingintimacyinmarriagepdf]

How To Restore Intimacy And Romance In Marriage - Men’s Edition

Relationship elements, a concise preliminary; the inceptions of outrage and closeness Marriage mentoring, treatment for melancholy, or relationship/life instructing is an interest in yourself or potentially your marriage. It appears to be that nobody shows us how to be a genuinely solid individual, or how to have a sound marriage. A few of us search out a mentor, or a coach, and when we do, we find that we have found something that we never knew existed. We find that being a sincerely solid individual or having a sound marriage is definitely not a strange or tricky thing that individuals just discussion about. It's genuine, and inside your grip. The time and energy you spend on yourself and your marriage is rarely squandered! Put resources into yourself and your marriage!

Connections can be fulfilling, and rather vexing and befuddling on occasion. Through our conversations you will learn numerous apparatuses, and to create and use these abilities to accomplish your objectives throughout everyday life, work and love. This article manages one focal dynamic seeing someone, with an accentuation on close connections. That dynamic is the connection between private emotions and irate sentiments. It is an antiquity of our very closeness that makes us have the option to all the while feel nearer then any other individual we know, and to battle like nobody else we know. This dazzling inconsistency appropriately made do with getting, regard, and responsibility, can and ought to be the wellspring of interminable satisfaction and a happy life as a couple. There is an extremely cozy connection between warm, close, adoring emotions ( Intimacy ), which is our objective, and cool, furious, inaccessible sentiments ( all the more frequently then we might want, the issue ). Those two sentiments may appear to be, and are, from numerous points of view perfect inverses. Nonetheless, they originate from nearly, precisely, a similar spot.

Those total inverse sentiments make them thing in like manner, passionate weakness. To incredibly shifting degrees it penetrates each connection we have altogether of our connections. It is generally predominant and applicable to our close connection, and subsequently key to our conversation of relationship elements. That weakness is obvious in both our caring private connections and our furious harmful minutes, it is the actual establishment of every one of our connections. Without some degree of weakness there is no relationship by any stretch of the imagination.

We as a whole have weaknesses. We are altogether powerless in light of the fact that not a solitary one of us is awesome. It is our decision to share or make ourselves powerless against someone else that brings session a relationship. How those weakness are overseen, is the thing that decides how close a relationship will be. Since not a one of us is great, we as a whole have beneficial things about us, that we are glad for and appreciate offering to other people. These weaknesses are ones that we have a sense of security to impart to a wide scope of individuals and we do only that when we meet another person and we are putting that best foot forward. Also, we as a whole have things about us that we are not so glad for, that we would prefer not recollect not to mention share with anybody. These things, are our greatest weaknesses and hence what causes us to feel genuinely passionate powerless. We are ordinarily exceptionally cautious about whom we endow this most delicate data with. It is just those individuals whom we believe the most that we will impart our greatest weaknesses to. We share these weaknesses, just with those individuals whom we wish to be nearest to. We convey them verbally and actually, in return for closeness, and in the long run, trust and love.

Notwithstanding passionate weakness, there are different sorts of weakness that are partaken seeing someone, there is scholarly weakness, where I share my considerations, abilities, thoughts, and arrangements. There is additionally actual weakness where I portion of my actual self, we like that one.... Passionate weakness, anyway is the key "flavor" of weakness that we need to concentrate on. This is on the grounds that it is the fundamental segment of each relationship. Throughout the course of time, as we share increasingly more about ourselves, it is additionally one of the essential things that dynamically brings us closer, and closer together. Appropriately regarded and oversaw, in time it bonds us together, as a sound and upbeat couple. In our personal connections our closeness/closeness develops through the sharing of weaknesses.

Passionate weakness is just 50% of what draws us together. Notwithstanding weakness to feel close, we should likewise feel great, or protected in sharing those weaknesses. In the event that we are not happy, or don't have a sense of security with another we won't share our weaknesses. In any case, when we do have a sense of security we appreciate sharing this data. At the point when we share weaknesses and we feel tuned in to, regarded, and really focused on, we start to feel close. These warm close sentiments feel so great that we are attracted to that individual genuinely and in time truly as well. The more we share with one another and the more secure we feel, the nearer we become. As we keep on dating one and other, there normally comes when we find that we can talk for quite a long time. We miss one another and long to be together once more. At the point when we are having these long distance race discussions we start to share things about ourselves that we are not so pleased with, in short our weaknesses. As I share this advantaged data about myself, and you tune in and support me, and offer to help me in managing these things, I feel regarded, heard, really focused on, and on schedule, cherished. Through correspondence and actual touch, we develop personal sentiments and eventually fall head over heels in love for one and other. Our inevitable objective is to impart all of ourselves to one another and in the end feel adored for all of what our identity is, blemishes what not. In this way, warm, close, adoring, personal sentiments originate from the capacity to feel genuinely powerless and protected simultaneously.

Closeness develops, as I depicted, thus does .... outrage.

Outrage starts at a point on schedule after some proportion of significant closeness has been developed. This is on the grounds that before any significant annoyance will show between us there should be some proportion of shared weakness. Like closeness, outrage originates from feeling sincerely powerless, however this time hazardous simultaneously. It begins with miscommunication, and resulting errors, at that point as examples create, correspondence diminishes, and feelings of disdain start to aggregate. These feelings of hatred will arrive at a sort of minimum amount and ruinous resentment arises.

Outrage is an individual, guarded, and on occasion dangerous dynamic, that runs its course by harming the ones I love. My displeasure shields me from you by making distance between us. The reasoning is moderately straightforward, in the event that I can make sufficient distance among us, you will not have the option to hurt me and I will be protected once more. Outrage makes distance in one of two different ways, possibly I drive you away or I eliminate my self from the circumstance, whichever way I reestablish my very own security, regularly to the detriment of our common or relationship's closeness.

Outrage shows itself as disappointment when I am attempting to control what I see to be a wild circumstance. Or on the other hand when a circumstance is considerably more constant in nature, by verbally and sincerely harming the ones I love, making at that point pull back from me. This is typically refined through the abuse of cozy, favored information I have about you. Weaknesses that were divided among us to encourage and look after closeness. Which out of resentment I currently decide to abuse, to hurt you or to control you. The enduring harm outrage causes comes from the disintegration of trust between us. The harm originates from the way that the weaknesses I shared were to make closeness, and out of frustration are currently being utilized against me, to hurt me and control me. A relationship with ongoing dissatisfaction, outrage, and the essential abuse of weaknesses, will in the end dissolve the actual texture of that personal connection, our capacity to feel sincerely powerless and protected simultaneously. This article managed just one, yet a focal dynamic in personal connections, the roots of outrage and closeness. That amazing agreement is only the start of a total image of close connections. This appropriately dealt with getting, regard, and responsibility, our relationship can and ought to be the wellspring of perpetual satisfaction and that cheerfully ever after we as a whole joined for.......

Since we are for the most part people, and our relationships are one of a kind to us, no two are by and large something very similar. Accordingly we are all needing varying degrees of care and intercession. In view of my long periods of involvement as an expert mentor, I have created four distinctive marriage mentoring programs, custom fitted to meet the varying necessities that my customers face. First I have the Marriage Counseling multi week program, which is ideal for moderate degrees of stress a contention, couples battling with correspondence and irregular critical battles. Next I have built up the Marriage Counseling multi week mentoring program which is ideal for couples who are encountering impressive degrees of stress and struggle, helpless correspondence, successive battling and dangers of separation. For couples encountering persevering clash, and stress the Marriage Counseling multi week mentoring program is an excellent decision to reestablish agreement to your marriage/relationship. The Marriage Counseling multi week world class marriage mentoring program is ideal for relationships encountering basic degrees of stress and struggle, one in which the both of you are extremely dedicated to working things out however the consistent clash is unendurable. The correct program for you and your marriage, can reestablish the agreement, regard and love the both of you once shared. Robert Whitman LPC, MA, CACIII For additional data and contact data kindly visit my site Marriage mentoring Colorado

Article Source: https://www.amazon.com/Rekindle-Intimacy-Marriage-Proven-Tips-ebook/dp/B08MZN881W/

Related Websites

https://sites.google.com/view/rekindleintimacyinmarriagemen/

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-PilErmpxEJXXQrDeboLde_QOeQ3Kxl8m0Fi-tBLEzA/edit?usp=sharing

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Al0Uo0CPVJe1-0V8SXCA_bW-dXsuFu6XGuTbndev-tU/edit?usp=sharing

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/141dFxAvEi-5T_LtjKd1HWV-9qjnyM6PHTuXL0aNibQU/edit?usp=sharing

https://restoreintimacyinmarriagerekindlepdf.blogspot.com/

https://restoreintimacyinmarriagerekindlepdf.blogspot.com/2021/03/revive-romance-in-your-marriage.html

https://rekindlingintimacyinmarriagepdf.tumblr.com/

https://rekindlingintimacyinmarriagepdf.tumblr.com/post/646871413378121728/how-to-restore-intimacy-romance-in-marriage

https://rekindlingemotionalandsexualintimacyinmarriagerestorerevive.weebly.com/

https://rekindlingemotionalandsexualintimacyinmarriagerestorerevive.weebly.com/restore-emotional-and-sexual-intimacy-in-your-marriage.html

https://rekindlingemotionalandsexualintimacyinmarriagerestorerevive.weebly.com/rekindling-emotional-and-sexual-intimacy-in-marriage-romance-love-pdf-book-reviews.html

https://rekindleemotionalandsexualintimacyinmarriagerestoreromance.wordpress.com/

[ladypepperofdavenshire-archives]

“I hope you realize that I’m still against everything about this.  I’m only here because you asked me to come.”

Mr. Haddock sat on the opposite side of the carriage, thrumming his fingers on the windowsill.  He looked at Isolde with those piercing amber eyes, returned his gaze to the bouncing landscape outside.

“Just be grateful I didn’t spoil your plans and tell your mother,” Isolde muttered.  Mr. Haddock huffed a sigh, causing a momentary foggy circle to appear on the pane.  They had come to something of a truce after Isolde went off to think the day Mr. Haddock told her his motives behind accepting Sir Drexel’s challenge.  Isolde dropped the subject and restrained from interfering on her end, and Mr. Haddock avoided anything having to do with the duel in conversation around her.  Evans had been brought into the secret, and had himself requested that he be Mr. Haddock’s Second in the fight.  He rode on the box with the driver, who had also been sworn to secrecy.  Isolde grew fidgety as the carriage turned into the woods. They were three towns away from Broadburn, headed in the direction of the Haddock’s hunting lodge, which lent some half-truth to Haddock’s lie to his mother. 

This was where Sir Drexel and Mr. Haddock had agreed upon as the staging grounds for their duel.   The wheels grated against dead leaves that littered the forest floor, shafts of golden autumnal sunlight peeking through the trees’ canopy.  Isolde’s nervousness intensified.  Mr. Haddock, on the other hand, seemed as calm as could be.  She didn’t really think he could be so cool about this whole ordeal.  Not when Sir Drexel was involved.  Her fear of Sir Drexel had turned to cold hate as events played out; only part of her reason for coming was because Mr. Haddock asked if she would be there.  The other reason was in hopes that he’d shoot Sir Drexel dead. Isolde heard echoing voices from outside of the carriage.  She espied the sandy head of Sir Drexel glinting in the light amidst a crowd of well-dressed men.  She made an angry noise, of which Mr. Haddock took notice.  Before he could say anything, the carriage lurched to a stop and Evans was at the door.

“We’re here, Sir.” Mr. Haddock jumped down from the carriage and barred Isolde’s way with his arm.             

“I’d prefer it if you remain inside the carriage.  This isn’t something a woman should see.”

Isolde frowned down at him.  After all the trust the two of them had built up, this was how he treated her!

“Why?  Do you think I’ll faint at the smallest hint of blood?” she shot back. “You do realize I’ve seen worse; you get used to that sort of thing when your father is a tanner.”             

“Yes, you’ve told me that a dozen times over, but I would prefer it if you stayed here,” Mr. Haddock replied, a tone of finality in his voice.  Isolde returned his glare with her own.

“If you insist,” she muttered, sinking back into her seat.             

“Thank you, Miss Marlowe,” Mr. Haddock said, and shut the door.   

                                                           *

Haddock straightened his jacket and together with Evans, strode over to the area where Sir Drexel and his followers were mingling. Sir Drexel wore the same smug look he had after slapping Haddock in the face with his glove.  He raised a thin eyebrow.             

“I was beginning to think you wouldn’t come, Haddock.”

“And I thought you might swiftly leave town again, Drexel,” Haddock returned in the same tone.  Sir Drexel’s false smile widened as he narrowed his eyes.

“Where’s Miss Marlowe?  Did that doxy leave you for another man too?” Haddock held his fists in check.  You’ll get a chance to shoot him in a few minutes anyways.

“Where’s the pistols?” he asked instead. Sir Drexel snapped his fingers and a meek little man in indigo livery scuttled over with a wooden box.  The man opened the lid, revealing twin flintlock pistols resting on a velvet cushion.  Haddock eyed them suspiciously.  Sir Drexel barked a laugh.

“If you’re that mistrusting, why don’t you choose your weapon first, eh?”

“Fair enough,” Haddock said, and lifted the pistol on Sir Drexel’s side, all the while watching Sir Drexel’s face to see if he would betray any of his schemes.  Sir Drexel’s sneer didn’t waver.  He fished the other pistol out of the box and the liveried man snapped the lid shut and retreated from whence he came.  Haddock handed his pistol over to Evans, who looked at it all over.  He handed it back with a curt nod.  Nothing irregular.  When Haddock looked back up, another man had appeared at Sir Drexel’s side.  He was dark-haired and rail-thin with deeply-pitted eyes that made Haddock think “criminal.”             

“This is my Second, Vespa.  He and your butler will decide how this duel should end.”

Haddock already discussed with Evans that he didn’t plan on holding back with Sir Drexel, so there was no need for this duel to be settled with first blood.  Vespa held his hands folded in front of him, rubbing a large ring on his finger while studying Evans.             

“How do you wish this fight to proceed, Signore?” the man asked.  His voice was low and smooth.  “Do the combatants cease after drawing first blood, when one falls, or to the death?”

Evans hesitated, seeming as if he was mulling the options over.  He looked at Haddock with a slight questioning expression in his eyes, but Haddock kept his eyes fixed on Sir Drexel.             

“To the death,” Evans said.

“So be it,” Vespa said.  He said something in Italian to Sir Drexel, who laughed.  Sir Drexel shed his coat and handed it to the thin man, who left to join the rest of the entourage.  Haddock removed his coat as well and handed it to an expectant Evans. Evans took the coat, face void of emotion.  He turned to leave, and with his back at Sir Drexel, gripped Haddock’s shoulder.             

“Good luck, Sir,” he said and walked off to the side.  Haddock held the gun with both hands, feeling its weight. He couldn’t tell if anything was off about it either.              “Why the audience?”

“I promised my friends something exciting when I was last in London.  I thought this would be more than satisfactory for them.”             

Haddock’s extremities went cold.  So this had been planned. Sir Drexel drew a few steps closer so that they were face to face.  He pitched his voice low.

“I’ve been looking forward to this, Haddock.  You better hope that your aim is as good as your handiness with your claws.”             

He traced a long, crooked scar over the bridge of his nose.  Haddock forced down the thing inside of him that wanted to fight Sir Drexel then and there with fists and nails.

“Ten paces,” he barked.  Sir Drexel shrugged nonchalantly. “You’re only prolonging the inevitable.”

They both turned back to back.

“When this is over, I’m reclaiming what you stole from me,” the leering devil said under his breath.             

“One,” Haddock said, taking a step.  Sir Drexel followed suit. “…Two…three…four…five…six…seven…eight…nine…ten!”

Two shots split the serenity of the forest.  Sir Drexel reeled backwards as blood sprayed from his shoulder and spattered over the dead leaves on the ground and his Second, a terrific howl erupting from his mouth.  Haddock also jerked backwards.  Something hot and burning had sunk itself into his chest.  He exhaled deeply as the pain increased tenfold and let the pistol drop from his fingers.  He felt warm, wetness blossoming from his chest.  Haddock coughed and crumpled backwards like a ragdoll.  The wound didn’t hurt so much as the bullet, which felt like a hot poker had been rammed through his ribcage.  He stared up at the autumn canopy as he heard Evans running up to him, trampling dry leaves and sticks.

Haddock grit his teeth, knowing he shouldn’t have left the duty of bringing the dueling pistols to Sir Drexel. It had been a silver bullet loaded in the other’s gun.  Haddock had only experienced this kind of pain before, when a savvy huntsman who had heard rumors of a werewolf in Broadurn’s parts had shot him in the arm while Haddock had been galloping across the moors during a full moon.  He coughed and tasted metallic blood.  Evans skidded to a halt on his left while Miss Marlowe sank down beside him on his right.  Hadn’t he told her to stay in the carriage?  She never listened.  He tried to reprimand her but choked on blood.  Evans was methodical as he assessed Haddock’s injury, ripping open his master’s vest and shirt, jaw tight.  Miss Marlowe’s face was blanched as she watched Evans at work.

“Will he be all righ—?”

“Yes, if I can stop the bleeding and get that piece of metal out of him,” Evans replied coolly.  He applied pressure to the wound.

“Call the carriage over, Miss Marlowe. We need to get Master Haddock to the hunting lodge where I can work.”             

Miss Marlowe left Haddock’s field of vision, swift crunching footsteps headed in the carriage’s direction.               

“If you don’t mind me speaking candidly, Sir,” Evans said quietly, “You were damn fool naïve to trust Sir Drexel.  This bullet is silver.”

“So was his,” Haddock coughed. Evans’ eyebrows jumped up and he looked up.  Raised voices and crackling underbrush were coming from Sir Drexel’s side as the wounded man continued to groan.  Haddock stiffly twisted his head to see how the other combatant was faring.  Sir Drexel was kneeling on the ground, face contorted in pain as he clutched a blood-soaked arm while Vespa and another man from his entourage gathered him up and deposited him in one of the party’s carriages.  Vespa directed his face at Haddock and Evans, blinked his dark eyes, and mounted the carriage.  The party began to leave in droves.              “Cowards!” Evans hissed.  The rumble of Haddock’s carriage sounded even louder with his ear mashed against the ground.             

“Evans.”

“Yes, Sir?”             

“Take Miss Marlowe back to her home after—”

Bloody saliva filled the back of his throat and he had to spit.             

“Take her home after—”

“Yes, Sir.” The worry on Evans’s face was mingled with understanding.  Haddock closed his eyes as his body gave a convulsive shudder.  The driver leapt to the ground and helped Evans carry Haddock into the carriage.

Haddock’s impressions of the carriage ride to the lodge were fragmentary.  Evans’s face cast in deep shadows while the vehicle bounded through the woods, the man’s white sleeves rolled up as his master’s fresh blood stained his hands and arms.  Horses’ labored breathing.  Speckled sunlight dancing across the windowpane.  Thundering of the wheels.  Miss Marlowe’s pale hands holding his head in her lap as she whispered a repeated prayer.  Blackness.

[juniperpublishers-fashion-b-blog]

Fashion and Death Ethnographic Explorations on Ubiquitous Styles - Juniper Publishers

Abstract

My anthropological glance will focus one a fashion shows in Rio de Janeiro and a “passista” carioca in the carnival 2011; a Karl Lagerfeld’s fetish design (body-corpse); a bizarre mannequin I met in Belem (Brazil). I’ll try to demonstrate the deep connection between living body and death corpse in a meta-fetishist perspective and - by the meta-morphic dialogue written by Giacomo Leopardi - on fashion and death (Figure 1).

Fashion Rio

The model is stationary, as a doll-like, in the sense of “dollifyng” her body: an empty gaze directed towards nothing, both arms inert by her side, her legs in a hopelessly waiting. The trained eroptic (8) eye targets her without hesitation, not so much the bikini, but what is tattooed just above her pubis: a vida não é assim, nunca, para nem para sempre (‘life is not like this, never and even less for ever’). A philosophical statement presented by fashion as a reflective affirmation of itself. A meta-communication of the profound meaning of ‘what’ is actually fashion. Rio’s designer is a philosopher as much as Zaha Hadid. Philosopher in both, the show composition and the public / pubic text tattooed for the observer’s sexualized eyes. From this ‘eroptic’ dimension, I offer two reflections based on dialogues with two poets-essayists, Horace and Leopardi [1].

Horace

The Roman poet known for his proposition on time that, in the unsurpassed simplicity of the Latin language, offers an oblique perspective through which time can be observed. Indeed, a time that is not only Kronos, as the Greek masters taught, but also Kairos: a nonlinear time, less mathematic and relentless time in its orderly flow, but also casual, random, sudden as his god. Indeed, Kairos’ hair is just in front, placed forward whilst his back is bald. When he presents himself, a unique, unrepeatable, irregular opportunity faces the subject and, if missed, taking it back will be impossible as his hair is just in front of his head. Carpe diem ... this famous ‘carpe’ refers to Kairos’ hair, passing quickly, before our undecided eyes. For this uncertain reason, life is not what the “usual” pubis seems to offer: Eros’ pleasure is ephemeral and it does not exist forever in this carnal temporality. So, the carioca designer is a kind of philosopher who addresses every glance from the model body to the bikini style and finally to her tattoo. My emotive reflection about the style is crossing through the three contiguous but not identical panoramas. And the last one, the tattoo, is offered as a novel (or a myth) that threatens the model’s beauty: in every moment, the doll-like body may become a skeleton, a pile of dismembered bones without any connection. In my fantasy, this reflexive fashion designer updates the famous sentence of Horace in an original composition: he reinvents and accentuates the seduction of the unrepeatable and unstoppable caducity [2].

Leopardi

The poet of Recanati was also an essayist. In his “Operette Morali”, Leopardi plays a philosophical dialogue between Fashion and Death, with a capital D because both are living beings. Fashion is what defies Death: she says they are sisters, claiming a deep consanguineous affinity between them; she explains to the hasty Death that they are both daughters of transience.

Fashion: I am Fashion, your sister.

Death: My sister?

Fashion: Yes, don’t you remember that were both born from transience?

Death: What I remember is that memory is my capital enemy.

She, the Fashion herself, cannot tolerate the life of a present dress, that’s why she imagines how to eliminate it with the next trend. The fashion, better saying, Fashion, as a person without the article, cannot stand what is alive and present. She-Fashion looks at the impeccable design of a transience dress that is quiet obsolete when it is worn even for the first time: in the wrinkles of cloth, folds of flesh have already traced what makes it old, oldfashioned not in the sense of antiquate but in the sense of a recent one. Only the revival of vintage retains the buried items (hidden in attics, drawers and warehouses) and makes it rise again with a sense of chic. This Leopardi’s affinity between Fashion and Death sparks reflections and phantasmagoria. Buying new clothes is not just a quirk of the consumption more or less encouraged by news agencies or advertising: it is a challenge to feel alive, to become life, to challenge through the new style the heaviness of the older one. What was just worn, is already assimilated as dead. There is something of theology in Fashion that challenges eternity with its creatures. One talks about Fashion creation, but in effect, they seem more like creatures: a concept, as some may remember, that challenges the only possible creativity, at least according to Christianity - the divine one... A Fashion show has something about agrarian archaic rituals that, at the end of winter, not only celebrated but favoured (‘caused’) spring’s arrival and with it the rebirth of the floral nature, frozen by wintry season.

I say that our nature and common custom is to continually renew the world”, Fashion explains. This generative cult is what makes Fashion and Death sisters: both make life reborn because both cut off what is alive; Leopardi clearly expressed the reason for this decisive act: “As if I were not immortal”, Fashion proudly replies when Death threats to fetch her; and then Death, intrigued by this bold statement, questions more information to her unexpected sister. And Fashion’s answer is brilliant [3].

Well, although it is not good manners to speak plainly, and though in France nobody speaks so as to be heard, yet, since we are sisters and need not stand on ceremony with each other, I’ll speak as you wish. I say, then, that the tendency and operation common to us both is to be continually renewing the world. But whereas you have from the beginning aimed your efforts directly against the bodily constitutions and the lives of men, I am content to limit my operations to such things as their beards, their hair, their clothing, their furniture, their dwellings, and the like. Nevertheless, it is a fact that I have not failed at times to play men certain tricks not altogether unworthy to be compared to your own work; as, for example, boring men’s ears, or lips, or noses, and lacerating them with the trinkets which I place therein; or scorching their bodies with hot irons, which I persuade them to apply to their persons by way of improving their beauty. Then again, I sometimes squeeze the heads of their children with ligatures and other appliances, rendering it obligatory that all the inhabitants of a country should have heads of the same shape, as I have ere now accomplished in America and Asia. I also cripple mankind with shoes too small for their feet, and stifle their respiration, and make their eyes nearly start out of their heads with tightly laced corsets, and many more follies of this kind. In short, I contrive to persuade the more ambitious of mortals daily to endure countless inconveniences, sometimes torture and mutilation, aye, and even death itself, for the love they bear toward me. I say nothing of the headaches, and colds, and catarrhs, and fevers of all sorts, quotidian, tertian, and quartan, which men contract through their worship of me, inasmuch as they are willing to shiver with cold or stifle with heat at my command, adopting the most preposterous kinds of clothing to please me, and perpetrating a thousand follies in my name, regardless of the consequences to themselves.

In short, all the previous practices and also the current ones (from tattooing to piercing, from the brand of fire and cranial or bone deformation) are anticipated and offered to Death’s listening, and to all of us, who - still alive - are listening this Leopardi’s lesson. At the beginning of XIX century (1824), for the poet fashionquestion is much more complex than contemporary common sense or simplistic sociology have been imagined: fashion as as conspicuous consumption, manipulated homologation or a caprice to be ‘up-to-date’. Fashion emerging in the Western culture is not a simply dressing up, she first affirms herself globally, then is reworked locally and finally she presents glocal fragments, in which styles of different cultures are coexisting in a body assemblage made of fabrics, stitching, accessories, makeup, folds that the designer draws and each subject adapts or reworks to his/her own figure. Fashion incorporates the anxiety of changing an identity as one, a fixed and packaged identity, an ambivalent anxiety that characterizes a currently cultural dynamics toward continuous inventions under the sign of extreme diversities. Presenting Fashion as a whole is almost impossible: she has a multiverse that does not coincide with cool designers, pret-a-porter productions, discounts department stores, fake imitations, outlets with delayed brands, immortal vintage, individual recycling and etc. Fashion is immortal and metamorphic. Her destiny is to delete or to melt all that is solid because its immanent fate is mutation - where life pulses. She is immortal and polytheistic: there is no fashion god, but a brotherhood and competitive different deities who, each in their specificities, marks the future as philosophers were used to imagine few decades ago. If now philosophers are silent and rethinking only about their past history, with no desire or ability to interpret nor to change the present, it is because philosophy migrated to visual artists or street artists, fashion or sound designers. Zaha Hadid, Pan Sonic, Gaetano Pesce or Cindy Sherman emanate philosophy with their liberationist speeches, dissonant architectures, compulsive music, eccentric design, and mutant photos. They use a different alphabet from the one based on words: sensorial concepts that can conquer each person and anticipate what will be an innovative way of thinking about public/private body’s aesthetics. This dichotomy is perhaps even questioned by a few daring designers. Some of these, Armani, Prada, Yves Saint Laurent, Dior, Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen are to be placed on the same level of Zaha Hadid. They have their own philosophy [4].

So, in addition to the words written above the pubis, what does the model, or Fashion, says? The words are ambiguous and can be read in a traditional, almost obvious sense, and then in a more complex one. “Life based on the desire for sex, insolently shown in this catwalk, not only will never be forever like this, ever, but even now it is not so. In fact, what I show is the bright object of desire, a mix of bikini and vagina, but none will ever be yours, not now or never. So, please surrender, you male and female spectators to a vision at a distance that represses you to the same extent that excites. This object of desire is not to be given to you, not in the past, much less in your future. And then I, my own self, will never be like this to you nor to anybody else, even if I wear or show it. Never. That’s why I assimilated myself to an amorphous doll, a half-living thing and a half death body. My seductive bodycorpse is dedicated to Madame Death, my inspiring aunt, because I know that, even incorporating at least for now a carnal Fashion, soon I will be rotting flesh and my caducity will be the triumph of my relentless sister. I am only a temporary appearance. I am here to affirm The Triumph of Fashion and Death. Buying a piece of fashion is booking death in advance. I said ...”.

And that is what whispers the model, a caducous still life, a sublime beauty that is undoing the triumphant exposition of her body and writing in front of immobile spectators. Following my synchretic and fetish perspective, I find a “caducity” affinity with a Samuel Cirnansck’s fashion show in Rio de Janeiro. Some models parade with their body covered with very traditional veils and fabrics. One of these stops with her hands on her hips as if challenging the viewers, showing bizarre fingers ringed with black cylinders that anticipate her menacing nails just as black. Has long been that accessories are no longer marginal, but they became as essential as the rest of the performance. At large, everything is an essential accessory in a catwalk. But here, a special accessory emerges: the mordaça de ferro (scold’s bride). What impressed me most is to see that this parade takes place in Rio, probably near the church Nossa Senhora do Rosario dedicated to the Escrava Anastasia‘s (‘Slave Anastasia’) cult: every models wear a mordaça as an accessory, without expressing a single tribute nor even mentioning the tragic and symbolic story concerning the whole Afro-Brazilian movement or the Anastasia’s liberationist role against slavery. Perhaps such a bizarre staging needs an interpretation. Of course, the key is the culture of fetishism that relentlessly expands in the different genres of contemporary sexualized communication. What was once a torture instrument, the gag, became now an accessory. This instrument owes its invention to the need of taming animals making them thus docile. Domesticated, in fact. The Western culture transferred this instrument from animals to human beings, especially heretics, a few centuries or perhaps a millennium later. These heretics were considered by the Catholic Inquisition not worth using the ultimate expression of humanity: the language (Figure 2).

Language is what differs animals from humans; hence, an heretic is not a human, being diminished to an animal state, having to be tamed and subordinated to a dominant ‘specific’ power that removes the right of the word whilst waiting for the final punishment. Giordano Bruno, philosopher and humanist, was burned alive in Campo de’ Fiori in Rome with a muzzle on. In the same period – around XVI century - another phenomenon changes Western political and cultural geography: the conquest (or the so called “descobrimento”) of America with its consequent imperative of imported slaves, whilst the native populations preferred to die than to work in such conditions. In this way, the rebel slaves coming from Africa have their mouth gagged, to show publicly that any slave was an animal, that s/he had to work in a domesticated way, eventually copulate and eat to survive. Toni Morrison - the great African-American writer - recreates in her novel Beloved what a person with a piece of iron in his teeth for 12-15 hours a day would feel. A madness withheld and violated by the capillaries of one’s reddened eyes, from the slow drool clotted on one’s lips, the heavy breathing and an explosive and diverted anger.

He wants me to ask him about what it is like for him – about how offended the tongue is, held down by iron, how the need to spit is so deep you cry for it. She already knew about it, had seen it time after time in the place before Sweet Home. Men, boys, little girls, women. The wildness that shot up into the eye the moment the lips were yanked back. Days after it was taken out, goose fat was rubbed on the corners of the mouth but nothing to soothe the tongue or take the wildness out of the eye” (Morrison, 2004). And then, what does it means a fashion parade with this accessory inside the model mouth, in a country that last abolished slavery and in a city where Anastasia is venerated as a saint? (Figure 3).

The symbolic power of the slaver or heretic iron bit is decaying, it evaporates into a simple code through a de-symbolized process, an exciting sign is ambiguously parading between political amnesia and liberationist pleasure. A kind of s/m performance offers an apparent feminine submission playing with symbols and signs as gadget to be offered as a dark desire to the audience that may imagine some quiet private games. So, this model, as a Fashion’s amnestic body, fractures the historical link with the slavery past, cancels the force of the oppressive symbols, displays a seductive excess that dominates by showing herself as submissive ruling woman. And it is precisely this apparent submission that proclaims, in contrast, the triumph of fetishism. I’m sure that the visual proliferation of fetish current meanings expresses the subtle connection between Fashion and Death (Canevacci, 2015). In Leopardi determinant dialogue, visual fetishism is the missing link that manifests the deep sisterhood between these two restless Ladies through the impudent mordaça de ferro. Perhaps, Anastasia will not be scandalized by this tampering, maybe she perceives that - through the symbolic emptying of what was her instrument of torture - justice is finally served. Perhaps now Anastasia can finally smile and show those magnificent white teeth and her carnal lips that made very jealous the wife of the slave master, a wife in turn slave of a jealousy based on her classist privilege (Figure 4).

Karl Lagerfeld is a famous fashion designer. The obvious decision to add him to a research project on syncretism comes from this photo and a more general hypothesis: new visual fetishisms have in cultural syncretisms one of the potential applications in the field between the unstable and mutant zone of fashion and art. Visual fetishisms and cultural syncretisms develop the potentialiality of wandering arts. These are the ones oscillating among different genres and with the tendency to suppress boundaries. Lagerfeld designs clothes for humans; designers dress things, objects and goods. Coca-Cola has in its body, that is, in the body of the bottle and in its written vintage, its brand and style, perhaps even its taste. Coca-Cola’s feminine design form has been long discussed. Why is a sophisticated and dandy stylist as Lagerfeld entrusted to create the new look of the brand?

The first reflexion is simple: the body of the bottle is a bodycorpse, meaning that it transits between a living body and a dead corpse. This tendency of visual fetishisms distorts and amplifies the traditional analysis on the “nature” of fetish objects. Accordingly, this ambiguous drinkable body is always in need for new clothing and has to find temporary solutions between tradition and innovation. Examples are indeed endless on this subject. The interesting point here is that most classic products of mass culture do intersect an equally classic elite’s designer. The super fetish Karl. The mentioned dissolution of boundaries between genres is a gray area (or a brilliant one) where oscillating syncretism flows. To achieve a fit-for-purpose result, syncretisms hybridizes with fetishisms [5].

Whilst observing the picture with some sort of careful obsession, a few obvious points came up: the bottles are actually two, perhaps a male and a female version. Both are Coca Cola Light written with the traditional font but with different colour, so conscious and faithful consumers can even compute the calories swallowed from a glass of a coke. Above the drinkable brand, there is the designer brand: KARL in bold letters and LAGERFELD in thin ones. Below, the year of production is shown, like a vintage wine: 2011 - 1/3; 2/3. Looking with more attention, it is possible to discover on one side a black silhouette observing the result. Widening the perspective on methodological fetishism, my glance understands that the bottles are three: he, Lagerfeld, is the third bottle, a good between the goods, his value added is the fetish art he manages in order to incorporate himself into the two bottles. His dark identity transits between the polka dot and the sinusoidal striped dress on the bottles. It is well-known that Lagerfeld always dresses in the same way. Paradoxically, his diversified styles occurs whilst he wears always the same dress. A man in black with an eternal dandy collar, sacred accessories, impenetrable glasses as much as his face-mask is. Clearly, Karl Lagerfeld is also the hyphen ‘-‘ where syncretic fetishisms flows. He is the body-corpse creator. He objectifies himself as the third bottle, as much as he enlivens the other two with their glamorous clothes. The Coca-Cola bottles come to life and can be dressed like any human being, only because he assimilates himself to a living commodities. Observing a little bit closer, and even better, being a little bit naughty, one may notice that his body rests on one foot, in this way his silhouette creates a slight curve that accompanies both bottles’ sensual curve (the sexiest coke hips). Finally, Lagerfeld’s crossed arms assimilate even more him to the two ‘persons’ on his side. Everybody lack of arms.

These three beings are perhaps trans-gender. The final result of this fetishism/syncretism crossing reaches the sex-game: visual goods, with their hyper-sexed design that spreads and mixes organic and inorganic, nature and culture, mass consumption and elite’s art, are alive because they transit between identities, styles and beings (Figure 5). Belém is a city on the source of the Amazon River. As all of Brazil, Belém is changing fast, the co-presence of different codes is even more enlarged than the ‘normal’. The city’s markets are an excess of colours and flavours, as its craftsmanship and, off the coast, the large island of Marajó where traces of pottery and other products of great beauty were left by a refined ancient culture. Whilst casually visiting a popular market on a large, beautiful and messy square, I was drawn to a mannequin. Clearly, this was a mannequin of Chinese origin, as nearly all popular ones everywhere, not only in Brazil. I believe the production of these beings have really invaded the world. Yet, here I am, blocked by astonishment looking at her. I reckon it is a spontaneous work of art in which, once again, the ‘objective’ fetishism built into each mannequin is crossed and augmented by some sort of Sino-Brazilian syncretism. Colour is the first thing: a well-defined orange I have never ever seen on any another mannequin or person for the matter, Chinese or Brazilian. A mutant being for sure, I reckon. Then, a missing arm, the left one, leaving an emptiness that looks like a round eye-mouth hollow yawning its surroundings [6].

The most disturbing ‘thing’ is her head: clearly detached, perhaps lacking internal support, like the cervical one, properly connecting it to the torso. Right there in the usual spot, slightly tilted though, looking like a guillotined head that has been put back into place simply to enhance the show. A baldhead with such a smooth skull looking like no wig would remain seated there. Finally, the eyes: the mannequin’s eyes and even the eyebrows expressed infinite sadness, something I have never seen in other mannequins, usually displaying a dull face, rather expressionless. Here, however, the pain is obvious, something terrible must have happened to this mannequin; of course, the arm is missing; the head, detached; all hair is long gone; but it is not only that. Mannequins are used to such misfortunes. This one, however, must have suffered a recent experience that printed in her physiognomy a sense of anguish, anxiety, perhaps even horror due an encounter or even a terrible fate. Eyebrows and lips are bent down, its eyes troubled and plain sad.

Go to

Dismembered Body

Maybe this mannequin feels it might be a work of art, living art, jetting globally around galleries and museums; perhaps it feels its destiny, created by an artist or artisan, is unique. Maybe it is not like the other mannequins, always a bit vulgar and yet, ever so identical. This one is unique. It is the only one expressing these unusual colours and a dismembered body. Certainly, the mannequin cannot exactly recall how it happens to land there, in that beautiful square, but surely, not worthy of her status. Her memory is confused. Clearly, a princess she is. Her extreme nobility is expressed by her behaviour, which continues to be dignifying even in such disastrous and inadequate situation.

I understand very well what disturbs her more than anything: it is the bra she wears. Really ugly, she knows, the mannequin feels it. How is that possible that her person is forced to expose herself with such an … awful object. Yes, the bra is handmade, but is not gracious, it is too wide, with three strings attaching behind. Who would buy a similar object? And how long was she forced to wear that cover, thankfully other garments cover her bottoms, also not appropriate but eventually bearable. No, not the bra, though. If the mannequin had both arms and a less stiff neck, she might have been able to take it off and proudly show her beautiful orange breasts. But she cannot. And her dismay increases, becoming rather uncontrollable, reaching out and making even me worried. would have loved to buy that orange woman-mannequin. I thought about it for a long time whilst going around her in circles. Truth is, this was an encounter with a well-lived work of art, one that has travelled and suffered, that resists despite or because of her semiabandoned condition. She should really be displayed again, as in her recent past, in a wandering art gallery.

Her beauty is vague. Vague is the only appropriate adjective to her bodily condition. The madam of that outdoor stall, seen in the background, was an elegant woman, mastering her movements, organizer of her goods. What kept me from asking her about the price of the orange mannequin, was the idea of travelling by plane with her. I was embarrassed with the idea of having she sat next to me, whilst departing to São Paulo and the other travellers giggling. I was an incompetent or a coward. I abandoned setting she free from her current fate, saddened as the expression on her face, only because of my timid hypocrisy. And the mannequin, so shiny and sweaty, dismembered and erected, so sad and resolute, royal, would lie abandoned who knows where. She is a spontaneous work of art, mixing and exposing all the syncretic fetishism of its body-corpse. A mannequin, travelled from different continents and cultures, incorporating the ambiguous desire of a being that is still alive even in most disastrous situations. For me, it / she is more attractive and desirable than the other three hyper-fetish human bottles previously observed. She is alive and vague.

My final cut on fashion: Madame Fashion is and even more will be ubiquitous, syncretic, plyphonic, meta-fetishit and metamorphic

To know more about Journal of Fashion Technology-https://juniperpublishers.com/ctftte/index.php

To know more about open access journals Publishers click on Juniper Publishers

[harcoxrt]

In this verse, Joanne has become a grim reaper after ending his own life. Due to the backstory I’ve developed that explains what drove him to suicide, this verse is set at any point in time after the current events of the manga.

Joanne is now aware of the supernatural happenings that once went on right under his nose without him noticing, and also has all the basic abilities that come with his new existence. He is only moderately stronger than he was as a human, but he has a far greater level of endurance and is extremely agile and light on his feet. He is and immortal reaper, and as such, can only die (again) by the blade of a death scythe.

His eyes are now the distinctive chartreuse phosphorescent that all reapers possess. The glasses he chose for himself upon completing his training are black, oversized frames with rounded edges, with temple pieces that start wide and gradually taper into a thinner width at the earpiece. At the start of each temple piece are two painted, stylized roses; one a metallic gold and the other a bright crimson. I will still use icons for this verse, so please know that even though Joanne won’t be wearing glasses in my icons, he will still have them for any thread set in this verse. As an additional reference, he chose to have his death scythe modified into the form of a folding pruning saw because he finds it easy to handle and likes that its blade can be folded away.

At the end of his human life, he kept heavily to himself and avoided interacting with others whenever possible, and he is slowly relearning how to be more social. He trusts his new coworkers, but only moderately, and if he feels like questioning them about something, he won’t hesitate to do it. He is still the curious type, always eager to learn and practice his newfound skills and abilities. As such, he has adjusted reasonably well to his new life, given the circumstances that led up to it. 

However, he isn’t too fond of working in the field to judge and collect souls, and would prefer a position in the Dispatch’s forensics department. His preference will be taken into consideration due to his high marks during training, he’s been told, but for now, he has been sent to collect souls and assist in the investigation of the “irregulars” (bizarre dolls) that have been appearing in London as of late. He has consoled himself on the matter by thinking of it as a trial run for a forensics position since he gets to take part in an investigation, and, truth be told, he also hopes to use his assignment as a chance to overcome his lingering fear of those very same creatures.

Below the cut is the backstory I’ve developed that explains why Joanne would take his own life. It also adds further detail to the process of him becoming a reaper. Trigger warnings for mentions of depression, violence/gore, drug overdose, and suicide apply. Another, less serious warning: this is long. 

The moment the story hit the papers, there was chaos:

“Horrible Murder by Sphere Music Hall!”

A range of emotions struck him the first time Joanne held a copy of the paper in his hands—first, sadness for the woman shown in the photograph; pictured lifeless in the dirt. Then came the shock, disgust, and utter horror towards the rival music hall that he and his bandmates had been working so hard to defeat. The people of Sphere Music Hall were far worse than competition; they were murderers!

Could Redmond and the others have known? Were they part of some kind of awful scheme by the music hall?

It was indeed an awful thought fit to match the deed itself, and Joanne would have rejected the idea if not for the secret he knew about his former upperclassmen. It deeply saddened him to think that they might have yet again soiled their hands with more blood, but in truth, it would not have surprised him. They had paid for it once with expulsion, and surely they would pay again.

The blond sighed, lowering the paper down onto his desk. Something had seemed unusual about the photo for the cover story the first time he’d glanced at it, and now that he looked at it again, he saw what it was. Strangely, there was a piece of cutlery sticking out of the gun held by one of the men in the picture.

Confusion came next. The story gave no discernible reason for the cutlery in the photograph, only mentioning that the photo had been provided by a freelance photographer. The knife in question—for he was almost positive that the piece of cutlery was a knife because of how it fit in the gun—appeared to be quite ornate, but beyond that, there was no visible indication of who it belonged to or where it had come from. The style of the knife alone narrowed down the owner to one associated with nobility, and aside from his own family, the first noble to come to mind was—

No; It couldn’t be! But…if it was, then why the knife, and why Funtom Music Hall? He’d never gotten a straight answer as to why Funtom Music Hall and the Phantom Five even existed. All he knew was that Sphere Music Hall held a certain allure that put the citizens of London in danger, and the goal of Funtom Music Hall was to draw people over to somewhere safe. But with another woman dead…it hadn’t worked.

…Or had it?

The thought chilled him to the bone, and his body became rigid in his chair, a whirling ball of nausea forming in the pit of his stomach. Phantomhive simply didn’t fail. He’d seen that first hand at Weston while the two of them had been fellow students. Not only that, but both Phantomhive and his butler had praised the group of five for their excellent work.

What if Phantomhive had known this death would happen?

The article itself gave the cause of death as blood loss, yet there were no serious wounds visible on the the body of the woman in the photograph, nor any signs of wounds that might have been hidden underneath her clothes. That most likely meant she was dead because her blood had been drained from her body—a horrifying death, to be sure, but why? And assuming that was the true cause of death as the article said, why would one of the guilty men be brandishing a gun? The man must have tried to shoot someone, or else there wouldn’t have been a reason for him to have it out, but he couldn’t have shot at the victim.

Perhaps at the photographer? No; there was no way a freelance photographer would be able to defend themselves with cutlery in such a manner, and if only the photographer had been there to apprehend the men, Joanne personally doubted that the photographer would have lived to help publish the photo. Scotland Yard certainly wouldn’t be throwing around dinner knives either…which led him back to his original assumption of nobility. Phantomhive was the only noble who made sense, given the circumstances, but the blond just couldn’t picture Ciel throwing a knife directly into the barrel of a gun. It would have taken a great deal of precision and force, and although Weston had seen another “Blue Miracle” with the help of Phantomhive, Joanne knew from a very personal experience that it was because the Earl played dirty—not because of strength or skill.

Another name in connection with Phantomhive rose to the forefront of his mind, and he longed to reject the possibility, but logically…he could not.

…Mister Michaelis. Phantomhive’s butler. It would, in an odd way, make sense—a butler wielding cutlery as a weapon. If he accepted that as fact, the rest of the puzzle pieces fell into place quite neatly—Ciel had known this would happen, and Michaelis had been there to help the photographer. Sphere Music Hall was indeed responsible for the murder, for he could plainly see a bracelet associated with the hall adorning the wrist of one of the men in the photo, but Phantomhive had known—maybe even wanted this to happen.

And the Phantom Five had helped, including him.

Joanne felt physically sick to the point that it made his stomach ache, and he shakily slumped forward, cradling his head against his arms on his desk. How could he have been so stupid?! He had thought he was helping; doing something good. Instead, if his deductions were correct, he had been an indirect accessory to murder—all because he had been so blinded by an immoral love. Hot tears stung his eyes before spilling over, running down his cheeks and dripping onto the newspaper. He cried himself to sleep that night, still sitting at his desk until the next morning when the first sound of the school bell stirred him from a fitful, restless slumber.

He became a recluse again, keeping to himself and largely ignoring anyone who tried to cheer him up. At first, he still tried to focus on his studies and perform his fag duties, but eventually those too began to fade into the background. He couldn’t concentrate; couldn’t bring himself to care, and with each step he took to force himself to go about his daily routine, he felt as if he were simultaneously slogging through thick, wet mud and sinking into quicksand.

He lost his position as the fag of the Red House prefect, and the occasional nightmares he’d been having became more and more frequent. He often woke up screaming, or with his cheeks stained with tears, or both. Nearly every night, he would dream of undead corpses chasing after him, dragging him down to sink their teeth into his flesh. Sometimes he was lucky enough to wake up before they caught him, and other times—more often than not—he would not wake until after one or more of the monsters had begun to devour him, biting and tearing away at his limbs.

He never told anyone, though. They would have thought he was crazy, especially if he mentioned that some of the dreams also featured the Phantomhive butler crushing the skull of one of the monsters just before Joanne himself met his doom.

His reputation was ruined, with many of the Weston students whispering that he’d gone mad, and he simply let them talk. The loneliness he felt was soul-crushing, but at the same time, he couldn’t bear the thought of trying to be around others and pretending that everything was still normal. He couldn’t trust that they actually cared; he barely even trusted himself. How could he, knowing that he had been duped in such an awful way?

He no longer yearned to see his former professor—or so he told himself, anyway. He should hate the man, by all accounts, and yet a small part of his heart still ached at the thought of the kindness Michaelis had shown him. He had no way of knowing how much of that kindness had been genuine, and he was terrified to think that it might have all been nothing but another ruse.

The ongoing tears and nightmares didn’t ever stop for more than a couple days at a time—until the day he finally decided to end it all.

He didn’t want it to hurt, as he’d been hurting too much to bear already, so he did the only thing he could think of that might work without causing him too much additional misery or pain. Weary from a lack of sleep and miserable indeed, he decided to visit the campus infirmary. It took very little effort for him to convince the nurse there that he was feeling unwell, and he soon found himself resting in one of many beds housed in the infirmary. After he listed his supposed “symptoms,” the nurse brought a large bottle of chlorodyne tablets to his bedside, along with a glass of water for him to drink. He took the recommended dose, even attempting a small smile afterward to show his thanks, and the bottle was left behind in case he felt he needed more later to ease his ills.

Within the hour, another student came in with a few scrapes and large bruises from a rather rough cricket practice, and as soon as the nurse turned their back, Joanne grabbed up the bottle of “medicine” and dumped several more tablets into his hand, shoving them into his mouth and swallowing them right away with another sip of water from his glass. He did this again and again until the bottle was empty, hurriedly sneaking extra doses each time he was sure the nurse wasn’t looking his way. With such a high dose of the drugs in his system, the fate he wished for came swiftly, and his eyes soon drifted closed. The last thing he remembered was the odd sensation of floating even though he knew he was laying down on a bed, and then it was over—or so he’d thought.

After his suicide, Joanne was in for a rather rude awakening. He was thrust into the world of being a grim reaper, placed in the Dispatch’s training academy with little mercy. His eyes, once a bright pale maroon, were now a starkly bright duotone green that gave off an almost phosphorescent glow in dim lighting. His human self was no more, he’d been told, and his existence was now that of a death god—immortal, but bound to serve the Dispatch and aid in the judgement and collection of mortal souls.

He was given a pair of standard-issue spectacles to compensate for the fact that his human death had cursed him to become incredibly nearsighted, and as was suggested, he threw himself into his new studies, taking it upon himself to learn everything that the educators at the academy endeavored to teach him. It had been incredibly strange to learn that a whole different world existed outside of the human one he’d known, especially with all the additional, more modern luxuries and technologies he now had access to, but he drank it all in nonetheless. The novelty of it all, as well as his newfound immortality and abilities, were a wonderful and welcome distraction from the utter despair he’d felt at the end of his life as a human.

Weeks and weeks passed, going by in a blur, and by the end of the training term, Joanne had earned himself both impressive and solid scores for each course of study. For both the written and ethics portions of his training, he scored triple-A marks, and in practical skills, a solid B. At the end of his training, he was assigned a partner to work with for his final exam, and his re-entry into the human world was jarring. He’d become so immersed in his new life that he’d actually managed to forget how awful humans could be, and it was with a heavy heart that he assisted his partner with their collection assignment. After their success, he and his partner returned to hand in the collection report and were subsequently granted permission to go choose their own personal spectacles. Joanne was officially a full-fledged reaper.

[a-woman-apart]

Advocating for Myself as a Patient

A/N: This post will contain statements about medication and dosages as well as diagnoses and diagnostic criteria. This post is not meant to serve as medical advice. If you are having any issues with your medication, it is important to consult your medical professionals for advice. If you are experiencing an emergency, scroll to the bottom for emergency information.

Okay, it’s story time.

For a little background, I will mention the different tools I use for tracking my symptoms. The most recent tool I picked up was recording voice diaries on my phone; I record these and listen to them back, and it gives me a sense of how my mood changes through the day. Another tool I utilize is journaling in a private written journal, and to a lesser extent writing these Tumblr posts. I also record cravings, mood shifts, and physical symptoms in my Clue App, which is a free app I use for tracking my menstrual cycle.

My diagnosis is schizoaffective disorder bipolar type, but my original diagnosis was bipolar I with psychotic features. There is a lot of overlap between the disorders, but I feel like the schizoaffective diagnosis encourages a more liberal and centralized use of antipsychotics as a part of the treatment plan. I am willing to accept, though, that I may not be fully correct on this, because antipsychotics/neuroleptics may be utilized in bipolar I with psychotic features as well (this was confirmed by my psychiatrist). Here is a list of all the antipsychotics that I’ve been prescribed—that I can remember.

Seroquel

Risperidone

Invega

Abilify

Seroquel and risperidone both caused appetite changes, fine tremors, and extreme lethargy. When I expressed a desire to be removed from them, I was placed on the Invega injection. Invega was quite effective—for years actually— but it had the unfortunate side effect of causing an irregular menstrual cycle. This is because most antipsychotic medications simulate a hormone known as prolactin, and this is a hormone involved with pregnancy in women (and can cause breast development in men). Over time, my prolactin levels became elevated and it all came to a head when I bled for 40/50 days during a 2-month period. This was the opposite of the usual period scarcity that occurred with it before. I was removed from the Invega. I went to my PCP (Primary Care Physician) and was placed on birth control to re-regulate my cycle.

To replace the Invega, I was placed on an atypical antipsychotic known as Abilify. Abilify is associated with less severe elevation of prolactin levels. I was placed on an extremely small dose of 2mg, to be taken at night. I noticed favorable results for a few weeks, with my sleep cycle regulating. I would wake up early and feel rested.

However, this underlying anxiety started to creep in. I felt ill at ease at even familiar situations, such as at work and with regards to school. Even though I can no longer remember—and don’t have exact records of how much this coincided with the discontinuation of Invega and the introduction of Abilify—my Clue app says that I marked “stressed” for my mood every day except once since May 13th, 2019. I am incredibly grateful to have that evidence. This tells me that my symptoms began to be bad about a month ago.

It is important to note that during this time, I was also on two other medications: 900mg of lithium each night for mood-stablization and 37.5mg of Effexor (Venlafaxine) every afternoon for depression relief. I had been using the Effexor to improve my depression symptoms, and while I had noticed a slight uptake in anxiety around when I started it, it leveled off (or so I thought) as the time went on. This will be important later.

My anxiety first started as a kind of discomfort and general irritability and impatient feeling. I was seeing my main psychiatrist regularly, but I ended up seeing a different one when I went for a follow up. The new psychiatrist was pretty understanding, and she also warned me that if I started to experience anger or anything out of character that I should come back in and increase the Abilify. What psychiatrist B told me was in line with what psychiatrist A had said before, and I was skeptical, but I agreed to follow her instructions.

The reason I was skeptical was because even though the Abilify was helping me with sleep, I did feel more on edge since taking it. I agreed, though, because I was not sure if it was the addition of Abilify or just the withdrawal from Invega that was causing my symptoms. Having been on birth control for a month at that point and knowing that that could also affect mood, I was open to just trying what the doctors recommended.

I tried to be patient, but I noticed myself getting a lot worse, starting about 2-3 weeks ago. I felt more emotional and less stable. I began to feel like crawling out of my skin. I would have to consciously control my breathing. Looking back, I can see that I was beginning to have anxiety attacks, but I did not understand what they were.

I tried everything within my power to control my symptoms. I had previously starting exercising regularly, being more conscious about my diet, and getting more sunlight and fresh air. I walked literally miles every week, and sometimes I would walk just to try to control the anxiety. I went back to doctor A and he increased my Abilify. Now in addition to the 2mg I took at night, I was to take 2mg in the morning.

The first day(s) after the medicine was increased, I had horrendous migraines/tension headaches. I could feel literal knots in my neck, and I remember having to massage them out when I came home from work that day. I believe that it was around that time that I also began to have some gastrointestinal symptoms that would only continue to worsen as time went on. Some mornings I would wake up feeling like a gremlin was trying to knife its way out of my abdomen and I would have to rush to the bathroom. I felt nauseous all the time, and sometimes I could only have toast and tea in the morning or a smoothie because I couldn’t stomach anything else.

Meanwhile, the mood lability worsened. I literally went from laughing to crying within the space of thirty minutes. I would have mood diaries where I was rambling at top speed, and then others—within the same day— where I spoke painfully slow. I felt anxious, energetic, and optimistic all at once, while at the same time feeling tired, irritated, despondent, and feeling as though I wanted to jump out of my skin. I had racing thoughts and flight of ideas. I felt like I wanted to escape myself, while at the same time feeling derealized and outside my body. It was the most uncomfortable, disconcerting, and dysphoric sensation I had felt in a long time—if ever.

While this was happening, I knew something was very, very wrong. I kept telling my boyfriend that I didn’t feel right. I kept trying to explain that I was having intrusive suicidal thoughts, while at the same time wanting more desperately than anything to live. I told him that I wanted to go to inpatient because I felt like I wasn’t safe with myself. He was able to calm me down enough to stop me from checking myself into the hospital. He was convincing, alright, but a big part of why I didn’t go was because my clothes weren’t clean, and it was almost too late to go to the laundry mat. I was planning to pack a bag so that I could wear what I wanted at inpatient.  

Before you criticize his decision to stop me, please note two things;

A)     The hospitals in my area are all trash

B)     Even if I went as a voluntary patient, if they decided I was a danger to myself, they could keep me indefinitely, and that might’ve caused me to lose my job

I think my boyfriend had assessed the situation—including realizing that it was Sunday and I could go to my clinic as a walk-in on Monday— and just had more faith in me that I had in myself. I felt like I was completely losing control of my faculties, and he saw that I was speaking coherently. Let me tell you, it is an awful feeling to feel like you’re going crazy and everyone is just like, “You’re fine.”, because even if you know they are right, you still have this pervasive feeling that you cannot be trusted. Even though my health and safety are much more important than any job or anything, I think my boyfriend knew I was having an anxiety attack and didn’t want me to behave rashly.

We will call what happened the next day, “visit one”. At this point, I am sleeping less and less, which is the #1 indicator that I am going to have a manic episode. I am now starting to panic even more because I know that once I’m fully manic, I’ll be totally delusional, and it will be too late to dial it back. I am at the clinic within minutes of it opening, so I can speak to psychiatrist #3 quickly, even though I am coming in as a walk-in. She is warm and welcoming, and I liked her instantly. I am talking to her as fast as I can, trying to explain my symptoms—especially the anxiety—she is furiously taking notes and nodding, and she goes, “Don’t worry, I’m going to prescribe you something.”

She ended up prescribing me Hydroxyzine, which is an antihistamine (think Benadryl) at 10mg to be taken up 3 times daily. I took the medicine once I got home, and then I called in to work because I still felt incredibly sick to my stomach, and I wanted to be sure this medicine wouldn’t make me too drowsy to function (it pretty much did).

I continued taking the medicine for a few days. It did not fully help with the anxiety and mood instability; it just made me too sleepy to fully respond to them. The “edge” was still there. The sleeplessness was getting worse. The nausea was getting worse, despite psychiatrist #3 saying that the Hydroxyzine would help with that.

At this point, I was so desperate, I felt justified in going to my PCP on Thursday. This was “visit two.” I wanted to see if the birth control could have been causing some of my symptoms, and I felt like if I got more information, I could have something more concrete to give to my psychiatrist.

It is important to note that I now always take detailed notes to all my doctor appointments. I detail my symptoms and the questions I need to ask. Doctors do have a tendency to interrupt and not fully hear what I am saying, but the notes at least help us to stay on track and provide some foundation to the visit. It is much more helpful to be able to proactively tell them exactly what is going on, than it is to just wait for them to ask from a generic list of questions that may not cover everything I am experiencing. So yes, I am “that patient”, but my health anxiety is so intense that I want to cover not just what is wrong but also phantom other things that could even possibly be wrong just so that I get everything I can from the visit. I do not want to go away saying “I wish I had asked about X.” I would rather ask too many questions than not enough.

My doctor—who is awesome, by the way— consulted with her superior and then told me that they did not believe that it was the birth control. It was then that I remembered that I had already been on the birth control for over a month before these symptoms started, and symptoms would not approach out of nowhere. The birth control was doing its job of regulating my periods, and it was even possible that the hormones were helping—rather than hurting— my mood. My doctor then recommended a probiotic to deal with my gastrointestinal issues and told me to talk to my psychiatrist about the Abilify.

Fast forward today—Friday— and I am back at my psych clinic before it even opens. I have already decided that I want to see either psychiatrist #1, #2, or #3 and I do not want to see anybody new. Psychiatrist #2, who usually does Friday walk-ins is out on vacation and my heart sinks a little. So, I ask if, even if I have to wait longer, can I please see #1 or #3 and the front desk girl tells me that she will try her best, even though it isn’t their policy.

I once again only wait a few minutes before being called back, and who Is it but #3! She was like, “You’re back!” but she seems genuinely excited to see me. I update her on how the Hydroxyzine has been working and tell her that I’m still anxious. I explain the mood lability and wanting to jump out of my skin. I told her that my sleep patterns were worsening. She tells me that Abilify is a good drug and it is a small dose, but it isn’t for everyone. She had begun to recommend an anti-anxiety medication but hesitated.

Then my dramatic ass decides to read the “statement” I had prepared for her (or whoever would’ve seen me that day).

Here is that statement:

“Please help me. I know I come to you seeming very together, but my symptoms are overwhelming, and I need help. I plan to start attending groups here at ___________. I am doing everything I can. I do not want to take another antipsychotic. I believe I have been misdiagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, because my psychotic symptoms have always been accompanied by mood disturbances. I believe my previous diagnosis of bipolar I with psychotic features is the correct diagnosis. I also believe I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder.”

That was when she went on to tell me that they still used antipsychotics for bipolar I with psychotic features, but that we could reduce the Abilify back to just 2mg nightly if that would make me feel better. She inquired a little about how I came to be diagnosed schizoaffective, but she did not address the possible GAD yet (I will definitely bring it up again if anxiety persists). Then she said she would discontinue the Effexor, because she made the connection between how antidepressants could cause mania. She said, “You’ll feel much better- trust me.”

As I had said, the Effexor would be important later. In all my calculations, I had never made that connection. I said, “Even though I was taking it all this time?” and she said, “Yes.” She also told me that I could discontinue it without tapering off because I was still at such a small dosage. She did not use the term “mixed mania” but when I mentioned the sleep disturbances was when she finally determined, “this is mania.”  

Finally—and this is the climax— she increased my lithium from 900mg to 1200mg. I would take one 600mg pill capsule in the morning and one at night (rather than taking both at night). It was still morning, so she told me I could begin taking the drug immediately.

Y’all, let me tell you, I feel a little drowsy/out of it, but just from that one pill I feel so much better. Yet it took literally 2 weeks of advocating for myself and 4 doctor visits to get to right now. I made it. I have always said that lithium is the only medication that I feel really works for me, and it also has the lowest side effects for me. The only thing that I can point to is excessive thirst, and that just means I carry water with me everywhere daily. That is a small price to pay for mental health.

I did end up calling in to work today—because of my stomach, but also because of being exhausted and trying to adjust to the lithium— and I’m just trying to take it easy. Honestly my stomach feels much better now that I am not a living ball of anxiety. It can be extremely frustrating to lose so much time and to jump through so many hoops, but I am fighting for my life here. My job might really need me today, but ultimately if I am hospitalized, they will find someone else for the position. I must learn to value myself, because to everyone else, I’m replaceable.

Here is the tl;dr:

·        Always advocate for yourself

If you don’t like what a doctor has to say to you, then find another one. Keep looking until you find the one that listens to you/hears what you are trying to say.

 ·        Trust your body

If you don’t feel right, trust that shit. Only you know you. I know some of us have hypochondria/health anxiety, but if you feel that something is wrong you should seek out an answer that will give you piece of mind.

 ·        Keep a list of questions to ask your doctor

It is so incredibly easy to get off track once you get to your doctor appointment or to allow them to dominate the conversation. Listen to their answers, but get a second opinion if it doesn’t feel right.

 ·        If you are in crisis, call emergency services

I really don’t recommend doing what I did and trying to just white knuckle it until the next morning. It worked for me because I’ve been managing my symptoms for years. That, or I just got lucky. Either way, if you have a desperate urge to harm yourself/someone else, or if your symptoms are otherwise overwhelming you should definitely either check yourself into treatment or call emergency services. Your clinic usually also has a support hotline you can call.

 Suicide prevention hotline:

1-800-273-8255

Suicide Prevention Hotline Chat

Crisis Text Line

[bandbacktogether]

Eating Disorders Resources

New Post has been published on https://www.bandbacktogether.com/master-resource-links-2/mental-illness-resources/eating-disorders-resources/

Eating Disorders Resources

What Are Eating Disorders?

Eating disorders are illnesses in which the people experience severe disturbances in their eating behaviors and related thoughts and emotions. People with eating disorders typically become pre-occupied with food and their body weight.

There is a commonly held misconception that eating disorders are a lifestyle choice. Eating disorders are actually serious and often fatal illnesses that are associated with severe disturbances in people’s eating behaviors and related thoughts and emotions. Preoccupation with food, body weight, and shape may also signal an eating disorder. Common eating disorders include anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge-eating disorder

Eating disorders affect several million people at any given time, most often women between the ages of 12 and 35; however there is burgeoning research that indicates more and more men are developing eating disorders as well.

There are three main types of eating disorders: anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder.

People with anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa tend to be perfectionists with low self-esteem and are extremely critical of themselves and their bodies. They usually “feel fat” and see themselves as overweight, sometimes even despite life-threatening semi-starvation (or malnutrition). An intense fear of gaining weight and of being fat may become all-pervasive. In early stages of these disorders, patients often deny that they have a problem.

In many cases, eating disorders occur together with other psychiatric disorders like anxiety disorders, panic disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, and alcohol and drug abuse problems. New evidence suggests that heredity may play a part in why certain people develop eating disorders, but these disorders also afflict many people who have no prior family history. Without treatment of both the emotional and physical symptoms of these disorders, malnutrition, heart problems and other potentially fatal conditions can result. However, with proper medical care, those with eating disorders can resume suitable eating habits, and return to better emotional and psychological health.

While eating disorders may seem to be about beauty, weight, and image, they’re actually about control or avoidance of stress and emotional issues. Eating disorders may be a result of being unable to express strong feelings and emotions.

Those who suffer from eating disorders generally try to hide the problem, but there are signs of a problem if you know what to look for. Early detection and treatment of eating disorders makes for an easier recovery. It’s important to note that, while you may confront someone whom you suspect has an eating disorder, you cannot force someone with an eating disorder into treatment. Making an effort to be a caring, compassionate support system is often the best thing that can be done when a loved one suffers from an eating disorder.

Eating disorders involve extreme disturbances in eating behaviors, such as gorging, following rigid diets, throwing up after meals, and counting calories obsessively; they are more than just an unhealthy eating habit. The core of eating disorders involves self-critical, distorted attitudes about weight, body image, and food, all of which lead to the damaging eating behaviors.

Food, for those with eating disorders, is used to deal with painful emotions. Restricting food (as is the case with anorexia nervosa) is used to feel in control. Overeating soothes sadness, anger, and loneliness. Purging combats feelings of self-loathing and helplessness. Over time, food and weight obsessions dominate the life of someone with an eating disorder.

What Are Some Common Warning Signs of Eating Disorders?

In the early stages of an eating disorder, it may be really hard to ascertain the difference between an eating disorder and normal weight concerns and dieting. As an eating disorder progresses, the red flags and warning signs become more apparent. Those who suffer eating disorders are particularly good at hiding their disorders, so knowing the common warning signs may help to spot an eating disorder.

Hoarding high-calorie food

Constant dieting – even when thin

Rapid unexplained weight gain or loss

Preoccupation with body or weight

Binging – usually performed in secret

Purging – disappearing after every meal or frequent trips to the bathroom

Obsession with food, calories or nutrition

Usage of laxatives, diuretics, or diet pills

Compulsive exercising

Making excuses to get out of eating

Eating tiny portions or refusing to eat

Intense fear of being fat

Distorted body image

Strenuous exercising (for more than an hour)

Hoarding and hiding food

Eating in secret

Disappearing after eating—often to the bathroom

Large changes in weight, both up and down

Social withdrawal

Depression

Irritability

Hiding weight loss by wearing bulky clothes

Little concern over extreme weight loss

Stomach cramps

Menstrual irregularities—missing periods

Dizziness

Feeling cold all the time\

Sleep problems

Cuts and calluses across the top of finger joints (from sticking finger down throat to cause vomiting)

Dry skin

Puffy face

Fine hair on body

Thinning of hair on head, dry and brittle hair

Cavities, or discoloration of teeth, from vomiting

Muscle weakness

Yellow skin

Cold, mottled hands and feet or swelling of feet

What Are Some Common Myths About Eating Disorders?

There are many myths about the causes eating disorders, how serious they are, and who develops an eating disorder. Let’s dispel them now:

Are eating disorders a choice?

Eating disorders are not a choice. They are complex medical and psychiatric illnesses that people don’t opt to have. Eating disorders are bio-psycho-social diseases, which means that genetic, biological, environmental, and social elements all play a role.

Several decades of genetic research show that biological factors are an important influence in who develops an eating disorder. A societal factor (like the media-driven thin body ideal) is an example of an environmental trigger that has been linked to increased risk of developing an eating disorder.

Environmental factors also include physical illnesses, childhood teasing and bullying, and other life stressors.

Eating disorders commonly co-occur with other mental health conditions like major depression, anxiety, social phobia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Additionally, they may run in families, as there are biological predispositions that make people more vulnerable to developing an eating disorder.

Are eating disorders really that serious?

Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric illness. Besides medical complications from binge eating, purging, starvation, and over-exercise, suicide is also common among individuals with eating disorders. Potential health consequences include heart attack, kidney failure, osteoporosis, and electrolyte imbalance. People who struggle with eating disorders also have intense emotional distress and a severely impacted quality of life.

The consequences of eating disorders can be life-threatening, and many individuals find that stigma against mental illness (and eating disorders in particular) can obstruct a timely diagnosis and adequate treatment.

Doesn’t everyone have an eating disorder?

Although our current culture is highly obsessed with food and weight, and disordered patterns of eating are very common, clinical eating disorders are less so.

About 20 million women and 10 million men will struggle with an eating disorder at some point during their lives. A study in 2007 found that:

0.9% of women and 0.3% of men had anorexia during their life

1.5% of women and 0.5% of men had bulimia during their life,

and 3.5% of women and 2.0% of men had binge eating disorder during their life

If eating disorders are linked to my genetic makeup, how do I recover?

Biology isn’t destiny. There is always hope for recovery.

While biological factors do play a large role in the onset of eating disorders, they are not the only factors.

The predisposition towards disordered eating may reappear during times of stress, but there are many good techniques people who have eating disorders can learn that will help manage their emotions and keep behaviors from returning.

Early intervention is a key part of eating disorder prevention, and helps reduce serious psychological and health consequences. Recovery from an eating disorder can be a long process and requires a qualified team of professionals and the love and support of family and friends.

Aren’t eating disorders a ‘girl thing’?

Eating disorders can affect anyone, regardless of their gender or sex.

While eating disorders are more common in females, researchers and clinicians are becoming aware of a growing number of males and non-binary individuals who now are seeking help for eating disorders. A 2007 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that up to one-third of all eating disorder sufferers are male, and a 2015 study of US undergraduates found that transgender students were the group most likely to have been diagnosed with an eating disorder in the past year (Diemer, 2015).Eating disorders most often affect girls and women, but boys and men can also have an eating disorder.

One out of every four pre-teen kids with anorexia is a boy.  Binge eating disorder affects females and males about equally.

It’s currently unclear whether eating disorders are actually increasing in males and transgender populations or if more of those people who are suffering are seeking treatment or being diagnosed. As some physicians may have preconceptions about who eating disorders affect, their disorders have generally become more severe and entrenched at the point of an actual diagnosis.

Don’t you have to be underweight to have an eating disorder?

People who have eating disorders come in all shapes and sizes – many of those people happen to be normal or overweight.The two best-known types of eating disorders are anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa and can occur separately or in the same person, additionally, binge-eating is another type of eating disorder.

Aren’t people with eating disorders super vain?

It’s not actually vanity that drives people with eating disorders to obsess about their food. Eating disorders are a product of feelings of shame, poor body image, anxiety, and powerlessness.

Do parents cause eating disorders?

Organizations from around the world, including the Academy for Eating Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association, and NEDA, have published materials that indicate that parents don’t cause eating disorders.

Parents, especially mothers, were frequently blamed for their child’s eating disorder, but recent research discovered that eating disorders have a firmer biological root. Eating disorders develop differently for each person, and there is no single set of rules that parents can follow to guarantee prevention of an eating disorder, however there are things everyone in the family system can do to play a role in creating a recovery-promoting environment. such as including parents and other family members in the treatment process.

Can someone be too young or too old to develop an eating disorder?

Eating disorders can develop or re-emerge at any age. Eating disorder specialists are reporting an increase in the diagnosis of children, some as young as five or six. Many eating disorder sufferers report that their thoughts and behaviors started much earlier than anyone realized, sometimes even in early childhood. Although most people report the onset of their eating disorder in their teens and young adulthood, there is some evidence emerging that people are being diagnosed at younger ages.

It’s not clear whether people are actually developing eating disorders at younger ages or if an increased awareness of eating disorders in young children has led to improved recognition and diagnosis.

Men and women at midlife and beyond are being treated for eating disorders, either due to a relapse, ongoing illness from adolescence or young adulthood, or due to the new onset of an eating disorder.

Doesn’t recovery from an eating disorder take a long time?

Recovery time from any mental illness varies from person to person. Some people get better relatively quickly, while others take longer to improve. While not everyone who has an eating disorder will recover fully, many people do improve with treatment. Even with full recovery, many people with eating disorders find that they have to take steps to make sure they stay well. This can include:

planning meals

regular check-ins with a therapist, dietitian, or doctor

medication

proper support

proper education

stress management

What Are The Types of Eating Disorders?

Currently, doctors have discovered that there are 6 types of eating disorders.

Anorexia Nervosa is an eating disorder characterized by weight loss (or lack of appropriate weight gain in growing children); difficulties maintaining an appropriate body weight for height, age, and stature; and, in many people, a  distorted body image.Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID), once referred to as “selective eating disorder,” involves limitations in the amount and/or types of food consumed without any distress about body shape or size, or fears of being overweight.

Bulimia Nervosa is characterized by a cycle of binge eating and compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting designed to undo or compensate for the effects of binge eating.

Binge eating disorder is the most common eating disorder in the United States and is characterized by episodes of eating large quantities of food; a feeling of a loss of control during the binge; experiencing shame, distress or guilt afterwards; and not regularly using unhealthy compensatory measures to counter the binge eating.

Orthorexia was coined in 1998 to describe an obsession with proper or ‘healthful’ eating.

Pica is an eating disorder that involves eating items that are not typically thought of as food and that do not contain significant nutritional value, such as hair, dirt, and/or paint chips.

Rumination disorder involves the regular regurgitation of food that occurs for at least one month. Regurgitated food may be re-chewed, re-swallowed, or spit out.

Unspecified feeding or eating disorder (UFED) applies to presentations where symptoms characteristic of a feeding and eating disorder that cause clinically significant distress or impairment predominate but do not meet the full criteria for any of the disorders in the feeding and eating disorders diagnostic class.

What Is Anorexia?

Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder characterized by weight loss (or lack of appropriate weight gain in growing children); difficulties maintaining an appropriate body weight for height, age, and stature; and, in many people, a distorted body image. People who have anorexia generally restrict the number of calories and the types of food they eat. Some people with the disorder also exercise compulsively, purge via vomiting and laxatives, and/or binge eat.

Anorexia can affect people of all ages, genders, sexual orientations, races, and ethnicities. Historians and psychologists have found evidence of people displaying symptoms of anorexia for hundreds or thousands of years.

Although the disorder most frequently begins during adolescence, an increasing number of children and older adults are also being diagnosed with anorexia. You cannot tell if a person is struggling with anorexia by looking at them. A person does not need to be emaciated or underweight to be struggling. Studies have found that larger-bodied individuals can also have anorexia, although they may be less likely to be diagnosed due to cultural prejudice against fat and obesity.

Most turn to this obsession as a sense of control in a reality where they feel they have none.

People with anorexia nervosa may see themselves as overweight, even when they are dangerously underweight. People with anorexia nervosa typically weigh themselves repeatedly, severely restrict the amount of food they eat, often exercise excessively, and/or may force themselves to vomit or use laxatives to lose weight. Anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder.

Anorexia, with severity in relation to length of time, is a potentially life-threatening disorder marked by extreme fasting or restriction of food intake, often eating as little as 200 calories a day. Anorexics have an intense fear of weight-gain; even while underweight, they see themselves as fat. Females with anorexia develop amenorrhea, or the absence of menstruation.

While many people with this disorder die from complications associated with starvation, others die by suicide.

If you or someone you know is in crisis and needs immediate help, call the toll-free National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (NSPL) at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

This eating disorder can affect males, females, and non-binary people, however, 90-95% of those diagnosed are girls and women and of these, it’s estimated that 5-20% of people affected by this eating disorder will die,

Do I Have Anorexia?

If you think you may have anorexia, please make an appoint to see your doctor as soon as possible. Delaying treatment can make recovery a bit more challenging. Your doctor will probably ask you if you have experienced any of the below questions:

Have you recently noticed a drastic decrease in weight?

Do you struggle with maintaining a healthy self-esteem?

Are you overly concerned about gaining weight?

Do you find yourself refusing or making excuses not to eat?

Are you self-conscious about your body image?

Do you exercise excessively?

Do you obsess over dieting?

Have you been distancing yourself from friends and family?

Are you often depressed?

Have you noticed dry or yellow tinted skin?

How Is Anorexia Diagnosed?

To be diagnosed with anorexia nervosa according to the DSM-5, the following criteria must be met:

Restriction of energy intake relative to requirements leading to a significantly low body weight in the context of age, sex, developmental trajectory, and physical health.

Intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, even though underweight.

Disturbance in the way in which one’s body weight or shape is experienced, undue influence of body weight or shape on self-evaluation, or denial of the seriousness of the current low body weight.

Even if all the DSM-5 criteria for anorexia are not met, a serious eating disorder can still be present. Atypical anorexia includes those individuals who meet the criteria for anorexia but who are not underweight despite significant weight loss. Research studies have not found a difference in the medical and psychological impacts of anorexia and atypical anorexia.

Other diagnostic criteria can include:

A person 15% below their ideal weight

Person with an intense fear of being fat, even though they are underweight

He/She/They may have a distorted view of their body or deny that their low weight is a problem

(among women) missing at least 3 periods in a row

People who have anorexia may or may not also binge and purge, use laxatives, or other means of losing weight

 If left untreated anorexia can have devastating effects.

When the body is starved of proper nourishment, the system slows down to conserve energy and can lead to injury of the organs, and even death.

What Are The Dangers Of Anorexia?

Systemic Symptoms: 

Heart rates drop to an abnormally slow rate

Blood pressure drops

Blood count becomes abnormal

Risk of heart failure increases

Risk of osteoporosis and reduction in bone density

Muscles deteriorate

Body suffers from dehydration, leading to kidney failure

Physical Symptoms

Extreme thinness

Irregular periods in women

Lower testosterone in men

Feeling weak, fatigued, or dizzy, or experiencing fainting spells

Dry skin that may also take on yellowish tint

Bluish color on the tips of the fingers

Dry hair and hair loss

Downy hair that grows over the skin in order to keep warm

Anorexia affects all of the organs in the body. If left untreated, the body becomes severely malnourished. This can result in damage that is not treatable, even if the disease is taken under control.

Emotional Symptoms

Lying about whether or not you have eaten

Irritability

Withdrawing from social activities

Emotionally flat affect

Obsessing over weight gain

Feeling insecure about the way you look

Decreased interest in sex

Feeling depressed

Thoughts of suicide

If the above resonates with anything you’re experiencing, it’s time to see a doctor.

Medical attention doesn’t have to be scary. Think of it as a moment of clarity that’s bringing you closer to your desired result of being a healthy, happy human being.

Mortality and Binge Eating Disorders:

It is well known that anorexia nervosa is a deadly disorder, but death rate varies considerably between studies. This variation may be due to length of follow-up, or ability to find people years later, or other reasons. In addition, it has not been certain whether other subtypes of eating disorders also have high mortality. Several recent papers have shed new light on these questions by using large samples followed up over many years. Most importantly, they get around the problem of tracking people over time by using national registries which report when people die.Overall people with anorexia nervosa had a six fold increase in mortality compared to the general population. Reasons for death include starvation, substance abuse, and suicide.

In summary, these findings underscore the severity and public health significance of all types of eating disorders.

What Is Bulimia?

Bulimia nervosa is a serious, potentially life-threatening eating disorder characterized by a cycle of bingeing and compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting designed to undo or compensate for the effects of binge eating.

How is Bulimia Diagnosed?

According to the DSM-5, the official diagnostic criteria for bulimia nervosa include:

Recurrent episodes of binge eating. An episode of binge eating is characterized by both of the following:

Eating, in a discrete period of time (such as within any 2-hour period), an amount of food that is definitely larger than most people would eat during a similar period of time and under similar circumstances.

A feeling of lack of control over eating during the episode (such as a feeling that one cannot stop eating or control what or how much they are eating).

Recurrent inappropriate compensatory behavior in order to prevent weight gain, such as self-induced vomiting, misuse of laxatives, diuretics, or other medications, fasting, or excessive exercise.

The binge eating and inappropriate compensatory behaviors both occur, on average, at least once a week for three months.

Self-evaluation is unduly influenced by body shape and weight.

The disturbance does not occur exclusively during episodes of anorexia nervosa

It’s really important to remember that people with bulimia may be anywhere from underweight, to normal weight, to overweight.

Common Warning Signs That Of Bulimia: 

Emotional and behavioral 

Generally speaking, new behaviors and attitudes indicate that weight loss, dieting, and control of food are becoming primary concerns

Evidence of binge eating, such as disappearance of large amounts of food in short periods of time or lots of empty wrappers and containers indicating consumption of large amounts of food

Evidence of purging behaviors, including frequent trips to the bathroom after meals, signs and/or smells of vomiting, presence of wrappers or packages of laxatives or diuretics

Appears uncomfortable eating around others

Develops food rituals (including eating only a particular food or food group [e.g. condiments], excessive chewing, doesn’t allow foods to touch)

Skips meals or takes small portions of food at regular meals

Fears of eating in public or with other people

Steals or hoards food in strange places

Drinks excessive amounts of water or non-caloric beverages

Uses excessive amounts of mouthwash, mints, and gum

Hides body with baggy clothes

Maintains excessive, rigid exercise regimen – despite weather, fatigue, illness, or injury—due to the need to “burn off ” calories

Creates lifestyle schedules or rituals to make time for binge-and-purge sessions

Withdraws from friends and activities

Shows extreme concern with body weight and shape

Frequent checking the mirror for feared flaws in appearance

Secret recurring episodes of binge eating (eating in a discrete period of time an amount of food that is much larger than most people would eat under similar circumstances); feels lack of control over ability to stop eating

Purges after a binge (such as self-induced vomiting, abuse of laxatives, diet pills and/or diuretics, excessive exercise, fasting)

Extreme mood swings

Physical Symptoms of Bulimia:

Unusual swelling of the cheeks or jaw area

Calluses on the back of the hands and knuckles from self- induced vomiting

Teeth are discolored, stained from vomiting

Noticeable fluctuations in weight, both up and down

Body weight is typically within the normal weight range; may be overweight

Stomach cramps, other non-specific gastrointestinal complaints (constipation, acid reflux)

Difficulties concentrating

Abnormal laboratory findings (anemia, low thyroid and hormone levels, low potassium, low blood cell counts, slow heart rate)

Dizziness

Bloating from fluid retention

Fainting/syncope

Feeling cold all the time

Sleep problems

Cuts and calluses across the top of finger joints (a result of inducing vomiting)

Dry skin

Dry and brittle nails

Swelling around area of salivary glands

Fine hair on body

Thinning of hair on head, dry and brittle hair

Muscle weakness

Cold, mottled hands and feet or swelling of feet

Menstrual irregularities — missing periods or only having a period while on hormonal contraceptives (this is not considered a “true” period)

Poor wound healing

Increased infections due to poor immune response

Many people with bulimia nervosa also struggle with co-occurring conditions, such as:

Self-injury (cutting and other forms of self-harm without suicidal intention)

Substance use and abuse

Impulsivity (risky sexual behaviors, shoplifting, drugs)

Diabulimia (intentional misuse of insulin for type 1 diabetes)

What Is Binge Eating Disorder?

Binge eating disorder (BED) is a severe, life-threatening, and treatable eating disorder that is characterized by recurrent episodes of eating large quantities of food (often very quickly and to the point of discomfort); a feeling of a loss of control during the binge; experiencing shame, distress, or guilt afterwards; and not regularly using unhealthy compensatory measures (e.g., purging) to counter the binge eating. It is the most common eating disorder in the United States.

BED is one of the newest eating disorders formally recognized in the DSM-5. Before the most recent revision in 2013, BED was listed as a subtype of EDNOS (now referred to as OSFED). The change is important because some insurance companies will not cover eating disorder treatment without a DSM diagnosis.

What Are The Diagnostic Criteria for Binge Eating Disorder?

According to the DSM-5, the official diagnostic criteria for bulimia nervosa include:

Recurrent episodes of binge eating. An episode of binge eating is characterized by both of the following:

Eating, in a discrete period of time (e.g., within any 2-hour period), an amount of food that is definitely larger than what most people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances.

A sense of lack of control over eating during the episode (e.g., a feeling that one cannot stop eating or control what or how much one is eating).

The binge eating episodes are associated with three (or more) of the following:

Eating much more rapidly than normal.

Eating until feeling uncomfortably full.

Eating large amounts of food when not feeling physically hungry.

Eating alone because of feeling embarrassed by how much one is eating.

Feeling disgusted with oneself, depressed, or very guilty afterward.

Marked distress regarding binge eating is present.

The binge eating occurs, on average, at least once a week for 3 months.

The binge eating is not associated with the recurrent use of inappropriate compensatory behaviors (e.g., purging) as in bulimia nervosa and does not occur exclusively during the course of bulimia nervosa or anorexia nervosa.

What Are The Warning Signs for Binge Eating Disorder?

Emotional and Behavioral Signs and Symptoms

Evidence of binge eating, including disappearance of large amounts of food in short periods of time or lots of empty wrappers and containers indicating consumption of large amounts of food.

Appears uncomfortable eating around others

Any new practice with food or fad diets, including cutting out entire food groups (no sugar, no carbs, no dairy, vegetarianism/veganism)

Fear of eating in public or with others

Steals or hoards food in strange places

Creates lifestyle schedules or rituals to make time for binge sessions

Withdraws from usual friends and activities

Frequently diets

Shows extreme concern with body weight and shape

Frequent checking in the mirror for perceived flaws in appearance

Has secret recurring episodes of binge eating (eating in a discrete period of time an amount of food that is much larger than most individuals would eat under similar circumstances); feels lack of control over ability to stop eating

Disruption in normal eating behaviors, including eating throughout the day with no planned mealtimes; skipping meals or taking small portions of food at regular meals; engaging in sporadic fasting or repetitive dieting

Developing food rituals (e.g., eating only a particular food or food group [e.g., condiments], excessive chewing, and not allowing foods to touch).

Eating alone out of embarrassment at the quantity of food being eaten

Feelings of disgust, depression, or guilt after overeating

Fluctuations in weight

Feelings of low self-esteem

Physical Symptoms of Binge Eating Disorder

Noticeable fluctuations in weight, both up and down

Stomach cramps, other non-specific gastrointestinal complaints (constipation, acid reflux, etc.)

Difficulties concentrating

What Are The Health Risks of Binge Eating Disorder?

The health risks of BED are most commonly those associated with clinical obesity, weight stigma, and weight cycling (aka, yo-yo dieting). Most people who are labeled clinically obese do not have binge eating disorder. However, of individuals with BED, up to two-thirds are labelled clinically obese; people who struggle with binge eating disorder tend to be of normal or higher-than-average weight, though BED can be diagnosed at any weight.

What Is Orthorexia? 

While not formally recognized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, awareness about orthorexia is on the rise. The term ‘orthorexia’ was coined in 1998 and means an obsession with proper or ‘healthful’ eating. Although being aware of and concerned with the nutritional quality of the food you eat isn’t a problem in and of itself, people with orthorexia become so fixated on so-called ‘healthy eating’ that they actually damage their own well-being.

Without formal diagnostic criteria, it’s difficult to get an estimate on precisely how many people have orthorexia. We still don’t know whether orthorexia if is a stand-alone eating disorder, a type of existing eating disorders like anorexia, or a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Studies have shown that many people with orthorexia also have been diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

What Are Some Of The Symptoms of Orthorexia?

Compulsive checking of ingredient lists and nutritional labels

An increase in concern about the health of ingredients

Cutting out an increasing number of food groups (all sugar, all carbs, all dairy, all meat, all animal products)

An inability to eat anything but a narrow group of foods that are deemed ‘healthy’ or ‘pure’

Unusual interest in the health of what others are eating

Spending hours per day thinking about what food might be served at upcoming events

Showing high levels of distress when ‘safe’ or ‘healthy’ foods aren’t available

Obsessive following of food and ‘healthy lifestyle’ blogs on social media

Body image concerns may or may not be present

What Are The Health Consequences of Orthorexia?

Like anorexia, orthorexia involves restriction of the amount and variety of foods eaten, making malnutrition likely. Therefore, the two disorders share many of the same physical consequences.

How Is Orthorexia Treated?

There are currently no clinical treatments developed specifically for orthorexia, but many eating disorder experts treat orthorexia as a variety of anorexia and/or obsessive-compulsive disorder. Thus, treatment usually involves psychotherapy to increase the variety of foods eaten and exposure to anxiety-provoking or feared foods, as well as weight restoration as needed.

What is Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder?

Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) is a new diagnosis in the DSM-5, and was previously called “Selective Eating Disorder.” ARFID is similar to anorexia in that both disorders involve limitations in the amount and/or types of food consumed, but unlike anorexia, ARFID does not involve any distress about body shape or size, or fears of being overweight.

While many children go through phases of picky or selective eating, a person with ARFID does not consume enough calories to grow and develop properly and, in adults, to maintain basic body function. In children, this results in stalled weight gain and vertical growth; in adults, this results in weight loss. ARFID can also result in problems at school or work, due to difficulties eating with others and extended times needed to eat.

How is ARFID Diagnosed?

According to the DSM-5, ARFID is diagnosed when:

An eating or feeding disturbance (such as, apparent lack of interest in eating or food; avoidance based on the sensory characteristics of food; concern about aversive consequences of eating) as manifested by persistent failure to meet appropriate nutritional and/or energy needs associated with one (or more) of the following:

Significant weight loss (or failure to achieve expected weight gain or faltering growth in children).

Significant nutritional deficiency.

Dependence on enteral feeding or oral nutritional supplements.

Marked interference with psychosocial functioning.

The disturbance is not better explained by lack of available food or by an associated culturally sanctioned practice.

The eating disturbance does not occur exclusively during the course of anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa, and there is no evidence of a disturbance in the way in which one’s body weight or shape is experienced.

The eating disturbance is not attributable to a concurrent medical condition or not better explained by another mental disorder. When the eating disturbance occurs in the context of another condition or disorder, the severity of the eating disturbance exceeds that routinely associated with the condition or disorder and warrants additional clinical attention.

What Are The Risk Factors for Developing ARFID?

As with all eating disorders, the risk factors for ARFID involve a range of biological, psychological, and sociocultural issues. These factors will interact differently in different people, which means two people with the same eating disorder can have very diverse perspectives, experiences, and symptoms. Researchers know much less about what puts someone at risk of developing ARFID, but here’s what they do know:

People with autism spectrum conditions are much more likely to develop ARFID, as are those with ADHD and intellectual disabilities.

Children who don’t outgrow normal picky eating, or in whom picky eating is severe, appear to be more likely to develop ARFID.

Many children with ARFID also have a co-occurring anxiety disorder; these children are also at high risk for other psychiatric disorders.

What Are The Warning Signs of ARFID?

Behavioral and psychological 

Dramatic weight loss

Dresses in layers to hide weight loss or stay warm

Reports constipation, abdominal pain, cold intolerance, lethargy, and/or excess energy

Reports consistent, vague gastrointestinal issues (“upset stomach”, feels full, etc.) around mealtimes that have no known cause

Dramatic restriction in types or amount of food eaten

Will only eat certain textures of food

Fears of choking or vomiting

Lack of appetite or interest in food

Limited range of preferred foods that becomes narrower over time (i.e., picky eating that progressively worsens).

No body image disturbance or fear of weight gain

Physical

Because both anorexia and ARFID involve an inability to meet nutritional needs, both disorders have similar physical signs and medical consequences.

Stomach cramps, other non-specific gastrointestinal complaints (constipation, acid reflux, etc.)

Menstrual irregularities—missing periods or only having a period while on hormonal contraceptives (this is not considered a “true” period)

Difficulties concentrating

Abnormal laboratory findings (anemia, low thyroid and hormone levels, low potassium, low blood cell counts, slow heart rate)

Female after puberty loses menstrual period

Dizziness

Fainting/syncope

Feeling cold all the time

Sleep problems

Dry skin

Dry and brittle nails

Fine hair on body (lanugo)

Thinning of hair on head, dry and brittle hair

Muscle weakness

Cold, mottled hands and feet or swelling of feet

Poor wound healing

Impaired immune functioning

What Are The Health Consequences of ARFID?

In ARFID, the body is denied the essential nutrients it needs to function normally.  Thus, the body is forced to slow down all of its processes to conserve energy, resulting in serious medical consequences. The body is generally resilient at coping with the stress of eating disordered behaviors, and laboratory tests can generally appear perfect even as someone is at high risk of death.

Electrolyte imbalances can kill without warning; so can cardiac arrest. Therefore, it’s incredibly important to understand the many ways that eating disorders affect the body

What is Pica?

Pica is an eating disorder that involves eating items that are not typically thought of as food and that do not contain significant nutritional value, such as hair, dirt, and paint chips.

It is unclear how many people are affected by pica. It most likely is more prevalent in developing countries.

Pica can affect children, adolescents, and adults of any genders.

Those who are pregnant and craving nonfood items should only be diagnosed with pica when their cravings lead to ingesting nonfood items, and the ingestion of those items poses a potential medical risk (either due to the quantity or type of item being ingested).

Pica can be associated with intellectual disability, trichotillomania (hair-pulling disorder), and excoriation (skin picking) disorder

There are no laboratory tests for pica. Instead, the diagnosis is made from a clinical history of the patient.

Diagnosing pica should be accompanied by tests for anemia, potential intestinal blockages, and toxic side effects of substances consumed (i.e., lead in paint, bacteria or parasites from dirt).

What Are The Warning Signs of Pica?

The persistent eating, over a period of at least one month, of substances that are not food and do not provide nutritional value.

The ingestion of the substance(s) is not a part of culturally supported or socially normative practice (e.g., some cultures promote eating clay as part of a medicinal practice).

Typical substances ingested tend to vary with age and availability. They may include paper, soap, cloth, hair, string, wool, soil, chalk, talcum powder, paint, gum, metal, pebbles, charcoal, ash, clay, starch, or ice.

The eating of these substances must be developmentally inappropriate. In children under two years of age, mouthing objects—or putting small objects in their mouth—is a normal part of development, allowing the child to explore their senses. Mouthing may sometimes result in ingestion. In order to exclude developmentally normal mouthing, children under two years of age should not be diagnosed with pica.

Generally, those with pica are not averse to ingesting food.

What Are The Risk Factors for Pica?

Pica often occurs with other mental health disorders associated with impaired functioning (e.g., intellectual disability, autism spectrum disorder, schizophrenia).

Iron-deficiency anemia and malnutrition are two of the most common causes of pica, followed by pregnancy. In these individuals, pica is a sign that the body is trying to correct a significant nutrient deficiency. Treating this deficiency with medication or vitamins often resolves the problems.

A medical professional should assess if the behavior is sufficiently severe to warrant independent clinical attention (e.g., some people may eat nonfood items during pregnancy, but their doctor may determine that their actions do not indicate the need for separate clinical care).

How is Pica Treated?

The first-line treatment for pica involves testing for mineral or nutrient deficiencies and correcting those. In many cases, problematic eating behaviors disappear as deficiencies are corrected. If the behaviors aren’t caused by malnutrition or don’t stop after nutritional treatment, a variety of behavioral interventions are available.

Scientists in the autism community have developed several different effective interventions, including redirecting the person’s attention away from the desired object and rewarding them for discarding or setting down the non-food item.

What Is Rumination Disorder?

Rumination disorder involves the regular regurgitation of food that occurs for at least one month. Regurgitated food may be re-chewed, re-swallowed, or spit out. Typically, when someone regurgitates their food, they do not appear to be making an effort, nor do they appear to be stressed, upset, or disgusted.

How is Rumination Disorder Diagnosed?

The DSM-5 criteria for rumination disorder are:

Repeated regurgitation of food for a period of at least one month. Regurgitated food may be re-chewed, re-swallowed, or spit out.

The repeated regurgitation is not due to a medication condition (e.g., gastrointestinal condition).

The behavior does not occur exclusively in the course of anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, BED, or avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder.

If occurring in the presence of another mental disorder (e.g., intellectual developmental disorder), it is severe enough to warrant independent clinical attention.

What Is The Treatment for Rumination Disorder?

Once a physical cause for rumination disorder has been ruled out, the most common way rumination disorder is treated involves a combination of breathing exercises and habit reversal. A child with rumination disorder is taught to recognize the signs and situations when rumination is likely, and then they learn diaphragmatic breathing techniques to use after eating that prevent them from regurgitating their food. They eventually learn to prevent the rumination habit by replacing it with deep breathing techniques.

Seeking Treatment for Eating Disorders:

Recovery from an eating disorder can be a long process that requires not only a qualified team of professionals, but also the love and support of family and friends. It is not uncommon for someone who suffers with an eating disorder to feel uncertain about their progress or for their loved-ones to feel disengaged from the treatment process. These potential roadblocks may lead to feelings of ambivalence, limited progress, and treatment drop out. Therefore, knowing about the Stages of Change Model, as defined by Prochaska and DiClemente, will help everyone involved better negotiate the road to recovery.

The Stages of Change in the process of recovery from an eating disorder are a cycle rather than a linear progression. The person may go through this cycle more than one time or may need to revisit a particular stage before moving on to the next. They may also go through the stages for each individual eating disorder symptom. In other words, if they are recovering from anorexia, they could be in the Action Stage for restrictive eating (e.g., eating three meals a day along with snacks, engaging in social eating, and utilizing support system) while, at the same time, they could be going through the Contemplation Stage for body image and weight concerns (e.g., becoming aware of how body image is tied to self-esteem and self-worth, defining oneself as a body or number, and identifying the negatives of striving for the “perfect body”). This is precisely why recovery from an eating disorder is complex and individualized.

If you are a parent or friend of someone struggling, you no doubt suffer right along with them, so it is crucial for you to pay attention to your own needs as well as be present for your child or friend during her recovery process.

What Are The Stages of Change?

There are five Stages of Change that occur in the recovery process: Pre-Contemplation, Contemplation, Preparation, Action, and Maintenance. Let’s examine them further.

1) The Pre-Contemplation Stage is evident when a person does not believe they have a problem. Close family and friends are bound to pick up on symptoms such as restrictive eating, the binge/purge cycle, or a preoccupation with weight, shape, and appearance even before the person admits to it. They may refuse to discuss the topic and deny they need help. At this stage, it is necessary to gently educate the person about the devastating effects the disorder will have on their health and life, and the positive aspects of change.

Do not be in denial of your child or friend’s eating disorder.

Be aware of the signs and symptoms.

Avoid rationalizing their eating disordered behaviors.

Openly share your thoughts and concerns with your child or loved one.

2) The Contemplation Stage occurs when an person is willing to admit that they have a problem and are now open to receiving help. The fear of change may be very strong, and it is during this phase that a psychotherapist should assist the person in discovering the reason they have an eating disorder so they can understand why it is in their life and how it no longer serves them. This, in turn, helps the person move closer toward the next stage of change.

If your child is under the age of 18, insist that they receive professional help from a qualified eating disorder specialist.

Educate yourself about the disorder.

Be a good listener.

Do not try to “fix” the problem yourself.

Seek your own encouragement from a local eating disorder support group for family and friends.

3)The Preparation Stage the person transitions into the Preparation Stage when they are ready to change, but aren’t sure how to do it. Time is spent establishing specific coping skills such as appropriate boundary setting and assertiveness, effective ways of dealing with negative eating disorder thoughts and emotions, and ways to tend to their personal needs. Potential barriers to change are identified. This is usually when a plan of action is developed by the treatment team, (i.e. psychotherapist, nutritionist, and physician) as well as the person and designated family members. This generally includes a list of people to call during times of crisis.

If supporting a loved one in their recovery, identify what your role is in the recovery process.

Explore your own thoughts and beliefs about food, weight, shape, and appearance.

Ask your child/loved one and the treatment team how you can be best involved in the recovery process and what you can do to be supportive.

ACTION STAGE

4) The Action Stage begins when the person is ready to start their strategy and confront the eating disorder behavior head on. By now, they are open to trying new ideas, behaviors, and are willing to face fears in order for change to occur. Trusting the treatment team and their support network is essential to making the Action Stage successful.

Follow the treatment team’s recommendations.

Remove triggers from your environment: no diet foods, no scales, and no stress.

Be warm and caring, yet appropriate and determined with boundaries, rules, and guidelines.

Reinforce positive changes without focusing on weight, shape, or appearance.

5) The Maintenance Stage evolves when the person has sustained the Action Stage for approximately six months or longer. During this period, they actively practice new behaviors and new ways of thinking as well as consistently use both healthy self-care and coping skills. Part of this stage also includes revisiting potential triggers in order to prevent relapse, establishing new areas of interests, and beginning to live their life in a meaningful way.

Applaud your loved one’s efforts and successes.

Continue to adjust to new developments.

Redefine the boundaries at home as necessary.

Maintain positive communications.

Be aware of the possibility of recovery backsliding and relapse to prior distorted eating.

6) The Termination Stage & Relapse Prevention. Relapse is sometimes grouped with the maintenance stage since recovery doesn’t occur all at once, and it’s normal for some relapsing behaviors.

So, how do you know when it is time to discontinue treatment? With the understanding that this decision is best made in consultation with your treatment team, ask yourself the following questions:

Have I mastered the Stages of Change in the major areas of my eating disorder?

Do I have the coping skills necessary to maintain these changes?

Do I have a relapse prevention plan in place?

Am I willing to resume treatment in the future if necessary?

To prevent relapsing ask for help, communicate your thoughts and feelings, address and resolve problems as they arise, live a healthful and balanced life, and remember that you would not have made it this far if it were not for your strong determination and dedication toward recovery.

How Do I Help a Loved One With An Eating Disorder?

If you’ve spotted the warning signs of an eating disorder in someone you care about, it’s hard to know what you should do about it. You don’t want to hurt their feelings, falsely accuse them, or say the wrong thing.

Do it anyway.

People who suffer eating disorders can be very afraid to ask for help, and eating disorders get worse over time. Say something to them when you first suspect there is a problem.

How to Talk to Someone About an Eating Disorder:

Avoid accusatory, critical or harsh statements as it may make your loved one defensive. Instead, talk about what worries you.

Focus upon feelings and relationships rather than weight or food. Use specific examples of times that you noticed a particular behavior.

Don’t mention their looks – the person with the eating disorder is already too aware of their body. Comments about weight and/or appearance will reinforce their obsession.

Avoid power struggles over food.

Don’t demand that they change.

Don’t criticize their eating habits.

Respect their privacy but tell them you’re concerned about their health. Knowing that you’re concerned will help the person with the eating disorder feel more comfortable.

Avoid casting blame, shame, or guilt-trips. Don’t accuse them. Instead of saying, “You just need to eat,” say, “I’m concerned because you didn’t eat breakfast.”

Avoid simple solutions. They’re notoriously unhelpful and may minimize the problem.

Help! My Child Has An Eating Disorder!

Having a child with an eating disorder is one of the hardest things a parent may have to handle. Alongside professional treatment, here are some tips:

Avoid threats, scare-tactics, angry outbursts, and insults. Negative communication will only make it worse.

Look at your OWN attitudes about food, weight, body image, and body size. Discuss the way you’re affected by body image pressures with your child.

Set caring, consistent limits.

Stay firm. Eating disorders are very serious and require constant supervision.

Promote their self-esteem in any way possible.

Encourage your child to find better, healthier ways to manage unpleasant feelings like stress, depression, loneliness and self-hatred.

Remember, above all else, IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT.

My Best Friend Is Starving Herself. What Do I Do?

If you know that your friend is not eating or is eating and purging, tell someone.

Tell his or her parents, a teacher, or even your parents. Your friend may listen to an adult before she listens to you.

If you are an adult, gently express your concern to them. Perhaps you can talk to their spouse or partner. Be supportive, especially if inpatient treatment or long-term outpatient treatment is needed. Recovery isn’t instantaneous.

Treatment for Eating Disorders:

There are many different treatment options for eating disorders, but an individualized care plan will be developed for the individual suffering an eating disorder. Effective treatment must address both psychological and physical aspects of the disorder, with the end goal of treating medical and nutritional needs, promoting a positive relationship with food, and teaching constructive ways to deal with food.

Eating disorder treatment can be delivered in a variety of settings. Understanding the different levels of care and methodologies can be helpful when selecting a provider.  It’s also good to understand types of treatment as insurance benefits are tied both to diagnosis and the type of treatment setting.

Levels of Care:

Inpatient Hospitalization

Patient is medically unstable as determined by:

Unstable or weak vital signs

Laboratory findings presenting acute health risk

Complications due to coexisting medical problems such as diabetes

Patient is psychiatrically unstable as determined by:

Rapidly worsening symptoms

Suicidal and unable to contract for safety

Residential Treatment Program:

Person is medically stable and requires no major medical intervention

Person is psychiatrically impaired and unable to respond to partial hospital or outpatient treatment

Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP)

Person is medically stable but:

Eating disorder does impair functioning without immediate risk

Needs daily assessment of physiologic and mental status

Person is psychiatrically stable but:

Unable to function in normal social, educational, or vocational situations

Engages in daily binge eating, purging, fasting or very limited food intake, or other pathogenic weight control techniques

Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP)

Person is medically stable and does not need daily medical monitoring

Person is psychiatrically stable and has symptoms under enough control to be able to function in normal social, educational, or vocational situations while continuing to make progress in recovery

Types of Psychological Therapy:

One of the most important considerations when selecting a psychotherapist is the type of therapy they provide. Different therapies work differently for different people, and some may be more helpful than others, depending on the person and their stage of recovery, while others may not be as helpful. It’s important to remember that if you don’t click with one therapist, there are many others available. Reducing eating disorder behaviors is generally considered the first goal of treatment, and the following therapies currently have the most evidence for effectiveness.

Psychodynamic Psychotherapy 

The psychodynamic approach to treatment of eating disorders focuses upon trying to understand the root cause of the disorder. Psychodynamic psychotherapists see eating disorder behaviors as the result of internal conflicts, motives, and unconscious forces; if these behaviors are discontinued without addressing the underlying motives that are driving them, then relapse will occur. Symptoms are viewed as expressions of the person’s underlying needs and issues, and are believed to be resolved by working through these issues.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) 

A relatively short-term, symptom-oriented therapy focusing on the beliefs, values, and cognitive processes that maintain the eating disorder behavior. CHT modifies distorted beliefs and attitudes about weight, shape, and appearance; these are heavily related to the development and maintenance of an eating disorder(s).

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

The goal of ACT is focusing on changing your behavior instead of focusing upon your thoughts and feelings. People in ACT are taught to identify core values and commit to creating goals to fulfill these values. ACT also encourages patients to detach themselves from emotions and learn that pain and anxiety are a normal part of life. The goal isn’t to feel good, but to live an authentic, good life. After people begin to live a good life, they often find they do start to feel better.

Dialectical Behavioral Therapy

DBT is behavioral treatment that has been proven to be effective for treatment of binge eating disorder, bulimia nervosa, and anorexia nervosa. DBT operates under the notion that the first course of treatment should focus upon changing one’s behaviors. DBT treatment focuses on learning skills to replace maladaptive eating disorder behaviors. These skills focus upon building mindfulness, learning how to better build interpersonal relationships, how to regulate emotions, and the tolerance for distress. While DBT was first developed to treat borderline personality disorder, it is currently being used to treat eating disorders as well as substance abuse.

Evidence-Based Treatment

While all of these therapies are frequently used to treat people with eating disorders, they have varying levels of efficacy and research supporting their use. Many therapists now recommend the use of evidence-based treatment, which is “the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual people.” In eating disorder therapies, evidence-based treatment usually means that the therapy has been used in a research study and found to be effective in reducing eating disorder symptoms, encouraging weight restoration in underweight patients, and decreasing eating disorder thoughts.

Calling a therapy “evidence-based” doesn’t mean that it works for everyone; just that it works for many people. Research and evaluate which types of treatments would best target your symptoms and psychological concerns. Also, not all therapists who say they utilize a type of treatment actually use it in all of their sessions. Some CBT therapists might have a primarily psychodynamic approach and only occasionally use CBT principles. Ask about how strictly the therapist adheres to treatment guidelines, what a typical session might consist of, how much training the therapist has received in this particular treatment modality, the rough percentage of patients who they treat using this form of psychotherapy, and how current their ED knowledge base is.

Interpersonal Psychotherapy Therapy

Interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT) is an evidence-based treatment for people who have bulimia nervosa and/or binge eating disorder. IPT contextualizes eating disorder symptoms as occurring and being maintained in a social and interpersonal context. IPT is associated with specific tasks and strategies linked to the resolution of a specified interpersonal problem area.

The four problem areas include grief, interpersonal role disputes, role transitions, and interpersonal issues. IPT helps clients improve relationships, communication, and resolve interpersonal issues in the identified problem area(s), which leads to a reduction of eating disorder symptoms. Just as interpersonal dysfunction is linked to the onset and maintenance of eating disorder behaviors, healthy relationships and improvements in interpersonal functioning are linked with symptom reduction.

Cognitive Remediation Therapy (CRT)

CRT works to develop the person’s ability to focus on more than one thing. CRT works to target rigid thinking processes that make up a core component of anorexia nervosa through simple exercises, reflection, and guided supervision. As of 2017, CRT is being studied to test effectiveness in improving treatment adherence in adults with anorexia. However, CRT has not been tested in other eating disorders.

Family-Based Treatment

Family-Based Treatment, also known as the Maudsley Method, is a home-based treatment approach that has been shown to be effective for some teens with anorexia and bulimia. FBT doesn’t focus on the cause of the eating disorder but does place focus upon eating and full weight restoration to promote recovery. All family members are considered an essential part of treatment, which consists of re-establishing healthy eating, restoring weight and interrupting compensatory behaviors; returning control of eating back to the adolescent; and focusing on remaining issues.

Eating Disorder Hotlines:

The ANAD (National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders) Helpline – 630-577-1330

National Eating Disorders Association’s Toll-Free Information and Referral HelpLine at 1-800-931-2237

Additional Eating Disorders Resources:.

The National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders (ANAD) has an international network of support groups, offers referrals to health care professionals, publishes a newsletter, and will mail information packets customized to individual needs upon request. They work to educate the public, promote research projects, and fight insurance discrimination and dangerous advertising. Their national hotline (847-831-3438) can give you a listing of support groups and referrals in your area.

Maudsley Parents is a site for parents of eating disordered children. The site offers information on eating disorders and family-based treatment, family stories of recovery, supportive parent-to-parent advice, and treatment information for families that opt for family-based Maudsley treatment.

The Something Fishy Website on Eating Disorders has lots of resources of all kinds, including information and online support. (Scales are for Fish!)

The Academy for Eating Disorders is a global organization for professionals from all fields who are committed to leadership in eating disorders research, education, treatment and prevention.  Phone (US) 703-556-9222.

Overeaters Anonymous is a twelve-step program offering support for recovering from compulsive overeating. Phone (US) 505-891-2664.

About-Face focuses on the impact mass media have on the physical, mental and emotional well being of women and girls. They challenge our culture’s overemphasis on physical appearance and encourage critical thinking about the media.  Phone (US) 1-415-436-0212.

The American Dietetic Association has information on good nutrition, sensible eating habits.

The Weight-control Information Network provides the general public, health professionals, the media, and Congress with up-to-date, science-based information on weight control, obesity, physical activity, and related nutritional issues. Phone (US): (202) 828-1025 or 1-877-946-4627.

The Council on Size and Weight Discrimination, Inc. provides information on eating disorders, “sizism,” the non-dieting movement, and size discrimination. Phone (US): (914) 679-1209.