#I think also I need more space to expand on the caretaker vs coping mechanism thing but that wasn’t super relevant to the body of this ask

[ongreenergrasses]

while we’re at it can i also say that please can people stop with the idea that finnick is the ONLY thing that can help when annie is having a heavier symptom burden. or that she’s completely unable to cope with her symptoms at all by herself.

you can absolutely say that!!! my inbox is always open for stuff like this and there are many, many things that I would like to say about this as well which would lead to many many paragraphs but the thing that really gets me about this idea where Annie’s completely unable to cope by herself is. it’s not true. we canonically know that is not true. we know almost nothing about Annie, but we do know that.

in all honesty I think this comes down to the conflation of Finnick being a caretaker vs a coping mechanism for her. he absolutely is a caretaker, but i don’t think she’s relying on him super heavily as a coping mechanism.

I think it also has to do with a lack of understanding around mental illness in general…as unfortunate as this is (lord knows I have had periods in my life where I wished this was not the case) if you are living with a severe mental illness, the person that is going to figure out how to cope with that is you. it can only come from you. yes, he helps her. however! he’s not the one that’s doing the hard work to set up those routines, to learn those coping skills, to get through heavier symptom burden days. that’s Annie, and it has to come from her, intrinsically. he can’t just prop her up. she’s a survivor, she’s the one getting herself through it, and his role is to support her but there’s no way that after five years he’s the only thing that helps and we have again! canon proof that she can and does cope without him!