#I always really like period things

[seagull-scribbles]

Howdy! I'm your Sonic Santa - I've got some concepts, but I gotta ask: any particular aesthetics you're really into right now? Looking forward to it!

Hello 👋

erm? Honestly can't think of anything, all aesthetics have there own charm xx I think you should do the one that would be the most fun for you and whatever that will be I'm sure I'll love cause you've had fun making it

also dude thank you for being my Santa I'm very grateful you did a change for me so I wouldn't have been excluded

[giantkillerjack]

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

[plain-text version of this post can be found under the cut]

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

Plain-text version:

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

P.S. Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

[jomeimei421]

Felt a bit nostalgic watching RT shut down…Here are the og faves again for old times sake 💙

[batsplat]

this is how i think the valentino/casey rivalry plays out in their minds

[wonder-worker]

Wild how we know that Elizabeth Woodville was officially appointed to royal councils in her own right during her husband’s reign and fortified the Tower of London in preparation of a siege while 8-months pregnant and had forces gathering at Westminster “in the queen’s name” in 1483 – only for NONE of these things to be even included, let alone explored, in the vast majority of scholarship and historical novels involving her.

[napping-sapphic]

hehe~~ i am soooooo sleepy and tired right now :3 i’m all cuddled up in all my blankets🥰 so warm and comfy hehe…..oh and also my past is haunting me😐

[puppyeared]

Jitterbug

[someobscurereference]

ive been rereading your ffxv fic "im trying hard to take it back" for literally four years now. please end my suffering and tell me how gladio feels. please. PLEASE. (but only if u want ofc)

(fic) Short answer: Gladio feels insane guilt and spends a lot of his life trying to make this up to Prompto. In the process, they deepen their connection as friends and do begin a relationship probably around the one-year mark of endless darkness. <3

Longer answer: (implications of abuse/violence tw but no worse than in the fic itself; just what others assume to be true even if it's not in the context of this specific fic)

Gladio is a secret romantic at heart who has always envisioned meeting his soulmate, but he's also duty-bound and duty comes first. So even though he reads romance books (amongst other types of books too) and indulges in his head a bit as many people do, he's often put his duty to the crown first and foremost in his mind. He also didn't imagine his soulmate was anyone on this trip and thought perhaps the person he may have been fated to meet died in the assault of Insomnia. Even if they were a refugee, they can't be a priority to him at this moment. His priority has to be Noctis.

Prompto has obviously grown on him over the course of their road trip, but there are aspects of them that don't 100% mesh (as is true with every realistic relationship). That said, Gladio never in a hundred years would want this moment of (understandable but out of line) frustration and anger in the wake of Luna and Altissa to be a permanent mark on Prompto's face. He's genuinely horrified and disgusted with himself for a long time after this and spends most of his life trying to make it up. He feels like a dirtbag about it.

That said, Prompto runs away from him in this moment and they need time to calm down, just as the fic shows. Noctis goes after Prompto, just like in canon. Prompto falls off the train and has his Despair Arc just like in the DLC, now with the added despair of "well, in addition to being a clone, my soulmate hates me. And in addition to the mark of inhumanity on my wrist (barcode), I have a giant hand print of him literally Shoving Me Away on my face. Forever."

Aranea: Well, do you want to die about it. Or do you want to live.

Prompto, eventually like in canon: Live, I guess. But it will be excruciating.

Aranea: That's what living is. We do it anyway. Your friends love you. Get off the floor.

He fights his way through his issues and gets rescued like in canon. Gladio probably tries to talk to him when they all catch up again, trying to apologize, and Prompto tells him to hold off on that for later.

Then, of course, Noctis is eaten by the crystal and "later" becomes much, much later as they evacuate and try to survive in eternal darkness. (Though they also can't Not think about it because it's a giant hand print. On Prompto's face. And every person they meet has Something To Say about it, for better or worse, whether they knew Prompto before or not. Prompto cannot escape it, and when Gladio is not doing Crown Duties he feels he must do in Noct's absence, he's with Prompto, so he also Cannot Escape It either. Even when the person speaking is unaware that Gladio left that mark. It's almost worse when they don't know, but when they see it's Gladio, who is such a big guy who seemingly hit Prompto and left that permanent mark there, some of them get nasty to him and some back off out of fear. Both are horrible. The guilt is eating him alive.)

Eventually, enough time passes as the dust settles that they do Talk About It. Gladio apologizes sincerely, for the 500th time. Prompto's like, "Well. It's not like you could have known that this would be The One Time it happened." And then cracks a joke about their soulmate mark being a Prompto's hand print on Gladio's ass from a butt slap in another life, which does help the tension somewhat. (The more Gladio tries to apologize, the more Prompto grows sick of hearing it, so they just have to move on and keep going, as he's learned to do.)

They grow closer over time, especially because there's not a lot of people who have survived to this point and even less later on. They do get together romantically, both because they do like the idea of soulmates (for different reasons) and also because they're living out of each others pockets for years, so there's an affection and dependency that develops there. Also, teenage Prompto always thought Gladio was really handsome and teen Gladio thought Prompto was cute and sincere for a pipsqueak.

When they are out together on dates in normal settings surrounded by strangers after the light returns, Gladio will receive dirty looks for the rest of his life from strangers who see the hand print on Prompto's face and immediately (correctly) assumes it was out of anger rather than a funny accident or something. (Edit: Some people will assume there is a funny story attached. Gladio will not know what to say to this. Prompto will play along.) He will learn to live with this. Prompto is really grateful Gladio is with him despite everything.

[icewindandboringhorror]

... why he sit like this

[sadaveniren]

.

[hella1975]

my dramatic ass pacing circles in the kitchen like im never writing anything ever again bc nothing feels great anymore it just feels good and apparently i will not apply myself even to my most longterm and beloved passion if i can't feel prodigious at it. fym ur gonna stop trying altogether ur also gonna get ur period in the next few days but im sure there's no correlation

[wonder-worker]

“Studies of Elizabeth Woodville […] have been hampered by the continuing fascination with her brother-in-law, Richard III. The Ricardian [and Yorkist] apologetic is now largely dependent upon the argument that the Woodville family posed such a threat to Richard of Gloucester, and the kingdom as a whole, that Gloucester had little option but to take the throne from his Woodville-dominated nephew. Although this argument has [irregularly] been contested, a reassessment of the queen's role in 1483 has not yet been attempted. Michael Bennett, in his 1987 account [...] still dismissed her as `an inveterate intriguer, capable in her vanity and fecklessness of some remarkable shifts and turns'. But more often she is scarcely mentioned in general histories of the period.”

-J.L. Laynesmith, “English Queenship 1445-1503” (thesis for the degree of DPhil in Medieval Studies, University of York, Centre for Medieval Studies, April 1999)

[phagodyke]

the masculine urge to take a saucepan off thr draining board and bash myself repeatedly over the head with it until I pass out and no longer have to experience feeling Bad 😍

[muirmarie]

.

[valewritessss]

In honor of my period coming two fucking days early, here’s a menstruation based pjo question.

Who do we think has the worst cramps vs who do we think is one of those lucky ducks who have minimal bleeding and little to no cramps?

[reliquiaen]

Okay, a few years back I made this graphic to explain the Great Cycle. Now that I've mulled over DD2 for a few days, I'm updating it. Some of the same assumptions as before remain: The Dragonforged fought the dragon, his weapon broke, he tried punching it (lmao), but he did survive without killing the dragon, possibly there was a second Bargain offered in the face of his determination. So you don't have to kill your dragon to survive it. Also still assuming that different classes become different types of drakes because I just like that detail, even though we see nothing to confirm it in DD2 (except maybe for the wyrms in the post-game, I hope that's what those are, just a bit redesigned).

But this time, I'm making some NEW assumptions: A Great Dragon can be manifested directly by the Seneschal's will (I'm guessing this is why our DD2 dragon doesn't have a name, I suspect this dragon was created after Rothais defeated his - he didn't become a dragon OR Seneschal so it had to come from somewhere). The challenge a Seneschal poses to the Arisen can be anything; Savan gave us the opening of the Everfall and unleashed a ton of powerful monsters upon the world; but Pathfinder gave us what the world would look like without a Seneschal to oversee things. My assumption is that the Colossal Dragon that appears out of that final red pillar of light IS the Pathfinder (possibly using his will to force order back upon the world) and when we kill it, our Arisen becomes Seneschal (because Pathfinder says he won't be there to see the new world that's forming). So the challenge can be anything, not just the Everfall. I'm curious what happens to our pawn after that fight, though. And it's a much better Seneschal fight than the one against Savan, sorry Savan.

I'm also assuming that (given we see the Pathfinder rewind time and rewrite the world) the Seneschal can simply will the world into a state of being that suits them. This includes wiping memories of events. Though I like to imagine that our Arisen-turned-Seneschal didn't wipe memories of themselves or of the apocalypse-world. There was an entire plotline going through this game with Rothais and Phaesus where mortals are trying to get rid of the Seneschal and so it makes sense that they need to remember what would happen without the Seneschal's presence.

Anyway, thanks. I'll probably have more thoughts later, but this is the part that gets me most. I like to know how things work so I wanted to sort the Cycle out.