#I'm sure Lydia will come around in the third movie she knows now he's not a threat to her

[herefortheships]

Lydia: Doesn't dare to even think about her poltergeist bc she's scared of what he might do to her family if he gets out.

Delia: boards up door to the attic. The attic which, even if Beets still lived there, he was never bound to.

Beutelgeuse: ok so I have a haunting at 10am in Ohio, lunch at 12, got 4 hauntings scheduled in NY from 2pm-6pm, gonna lead a spook workshop in Cali at 7pm followed by a bar crawl, sleep that off till 3am, and then follow up with all the clients from this week who are worried bc they heard talk of tv show people showing up. If it's HER show, I'll need to clear up my schedule for when she shows up. If I make the walls bleed and draw little hearts in the blood, is that coming on too strong?

He is unbothered and delusional sure his charms will get him the girl. Love it 😆

In all seriousness, his attempts at making contact with Lydia and courting her, scaring her instead, is one of my favorite things in the sequel. Lydia terrified, meanwhile Betelgeuse out there swooning and sighing over getting to see her again 😂💚. He is definitely coming on too strong, but he so can't see it and it's hilarious.

I'm sure he did help her with the hauntings for her show, too. I hope that one comes up in movie three. No one can take that headcanon away from me. 😌

[ms-machine]

lmfao

I'm pretty sure she lives with Beetlejuice now. More like he's hovering around while she's in the house.

Imagine the third movie being Lydia getting used to Beetlejuice around the house, doing the chores, ignoring him, while he helps her, and eventually accepting him (more like giving in) and he jokingly says after a couple of years/months (he's sure, but you know how he is):

"Well, after all this play house we should at least get married on paper." Beetlejuice says, playful, trying to get on Lydia's nerves.

Lydia doesn't roll her eyes this time. She just shrugs, taking her eyes out of the book she's reading.

"Maybe we should." She answers casually, then goes back into reading, as if she was commenting on the weather.

Beetlejuice's face is comically surprised. Finally his dreams will come true.

Why was she wearing makeup to bed in that last scene

[fandomenthusiastt]

Writing prompt #6 + Sterek

"I may have tripped him. Just a little."

💛ly

Hi baby I'm sorry this is so late!!! But I hope you like it!!!

Sterek + 6: “I may have tripped him. Just a little.” Established Relationship + Established Sterek + Hale Pack 2.0 + Pack Mom Stiles + Prankster Stiles Stilinski + Mischievous Stiles Stilinski + Stackson Friendship + Almost baby death? Kinda? It’s a really small detail but I thought it’d be important to mention Thanks for the prompt my love! 683 words

Prompt Requests Here

Stiles loved magic.

He loved it.

It was the best thing in the world and he would forever be grateful that his mother’s side of the family has blessed him with the gift of his spark. A spark which burned into a flame as he got older and got more of a handle on it. Nowadays he uses magic without even thinking about it!

Turns out he comes from a long line of Mages? (Mages happen to be the most powerful magic users in the world, sometimes being compared to Gods, so…that was pretty cool!) His grandfather happened to be one, and so were his mom’s brothers and sisters, and Stiles’s cousins.

Stiles later found out his mom was a Mage too, but she had given up her magic to save Stiles’s life after the Nemeton latched onto him and tried to suck his life force into itself, thus almost killing him in her womb. It was a whole thing. She was basically sharing her magic with the ancient tree. Her magic helped stabilize the Nemeton until it was cut down, after which she started to deteriorate as well, and it led to her death. After Stiles found out it was actually Gerard Argent who cut down the tree, he made Derek a huge meal shared between them in thanks for having killed the guy (long story).

And dinner led to a movie, which meant cuddling, that kinda led to a make out session, which led to other things, but that’s a whole other story. (Basically his "Thank You Dinner" = "Start of Relationship”)

But right now, Stiles was once again thanking the world for having blessed him with his magic. Because it gave him the opportunity to safely laugh at the current situation.

Some fae people showed up uninvited, completely violating the truce Stiles and Lydia had written up with the Faery Queen two years back when he was still in his Junior year at University, and the pack had gone to tell them to basically “Fuck off” in polite terms. Neither Stiles nor Lydia went with them, which is probably why this happened in the first place.

One rule about the Fae: they were tricksters, don’t let them trick you into anything! Nowadays, they were pretty chilled with their trickery, so the fae would play harmless pranks. Stiles wasn’t sure if the prank these guys played on the werecreatures was exactly “harmless”, but it sure was hilarious.

The fae had blocked their wolves, making them human again!

Oh, Team Human (consisting of Stiles, Lydia, Allison, Danny, and all adults except Peter) was having a blast with this.

Stiles especially! He was able to whisper things to Lydia, Allison, and Danny without worrying about the wolves overhearing. He pulled his own pranks on them. Hell, being human even meant the wolves had less coordination! Stiles used that to his advantage plenty of times.

After hearing Jackson scream for the third time, Derek sighed.

“Stiles, what did you do?” He asked his boyfriend.

“I may have tripped him. Just a little.” Stiles smiled innocently. Derek raised an eyebrow and Stiles started laughing. It had been years since Derek could truly intimidate Stiles, and now that he’s human, he’s practically a baby in Stiles’s eyes.

“I grabbed some of my dad’s old fishing wire and set up a bunch of strings around the grounds. Jackson just happens to be one to stumble upon them most. I got Ethan and Aiden earlier on two separate occasions.” Stiles shrugged.

Pounding footsteps began to approach and Jackson slammed the door open, glaring at Stiles.

“You. You did this!” He shrieked, pointing at his dirt covered jeans. “Do you know how much these cost?! They’re HERMES!”

“Jackson, you literally have five of those.” Stiles raised an eyebrow. “What is one pair?”

“I’m going to kill you!”

“Is that anyway to treat your Pack Mom?!” Stiles yelled as he ran out of the room, laughing. Derek sighed as he ran past and Jackson screamed as he chased after him.

Yeah, Stiles really loved magic. Especially when he was benefiting off of it.

[modgirlyreposts-revamped]

Millie headcanons!!

- I see her as having more of a gothic lolita/almost Victorian gothic style tbh? Basically she dresses like Lydia Deetz in Beetlejuice. However I love throwing in more mall goth aspects too. Fancy black dress, messy looking makeup, demonia boots, Victorian mourning jewellery, and spiked choker & bracelets kinda thing you get me?

- Bullied kid with comorbid probably undiagnosed ADHD and depression type beat

- I imagine ITP takes place in like, early or maybe mid 2010s. I've seen on this blog once or twice the idea of Millie being around the pizzaplex and i love that idea but I always saw her as like, a closer to classic Freddy Fazbear's kid.

- Her family is pretty well off. That's why she can actually afford to dress the way she does (yeah I'm jealous what of it)

- She likes horror a Lot. It's something of a hyperfixation of hers, but it leaves her grandpa quite concerned because My Granddaughter Has Been Holed Up In Her Room Watching Horror Movies All Day Is She Mentally Stable

- I know in canon she was only going to stay with her grandpa while her parents were away but I got the vibes that her grandpa basically helped raise her. (In my own weird au where millie and sarah like, band together with the other protags to investigate freddy fazbears and specifically the bite of 83 and shit she just full on lives with him lol)

- She's intimidating as Fuck when she gets mad.

- Her hair is not naturally black (not sure what color it Is tho, maybe blonde??), but she dyes it (I also imagine she likes to throw in some purple streaks or a black to purple ombre sometimes)

- She has like 3 piercings on each ear. The second set no one knew she was getting until she came back home from going out to do so. She was banned from getting piercings as a punishment so the third one was also a secret no one in the family noticed for like months.

- She would love FNaF. I feel like she'd make "man behind the slaughter" jokes. Is that old? Me and my sister still do it.

- She is absolutely awful with kids, but they love her. She goes out to the park with a black umbrella to brood dramatically in the shade and from the playground she just hears "Millie!!" And then a small crowd of children runs up asking if she'll play with them. She always gives in and agrees to play in the end. She can never even remember their names or anything but they see the sad girl in all black and immediately know She's Friend. She would die for them.

- Oswald is her surrogate brother and ok now that I'm thinking abt millie in the pizzaplex era Gregory would be too 100%.

- She likes chocolate. She gives me the vibes of someone who just, chocolate everything. Her grandpa buys chocolate chips for baking and Millie eats them all.

- As a kid she cried a lot and didnt know how to/was too afraid to stand up for herself. She has a lot of repressed anger from those years and tends to dramatically overreact as a result (I'm not projecting what do you mean)

[TW for implied abuse for the next three]

- OK BOUNCING OFF THAT ONE HC THAT DYLAN HAS DID AS SOMEONE WHO MAYBE HAS IT MYSELF I LOVE THAT. I have an Idea for how it would've formed which is that his familial situation is Very Not Good. Anyways I think, he has probably abt 10 ish alters, Millie would get along with most of his alters. I think Dylan would have multiple persecutor alters which r alters who formed from trauma who harm the body or other alters to try and protect them. Millie actually gets along surprisingly well with one of them.

- On another note w/ Dylan tho Millie's grandpa meets Dylan, finds out just a little bit abt his family and basically tells him like "my home is your home, if you're not safe there, you're always welcome here" so <3 he likes to spend basically all his time at Millie's grandpa's house and he doesnt say it but he worries hes like is your home really that bad do I need to call CPS?

- Millie's parents come home at the end of the year and are like well what'd we miss? And her grandpa's like look at my new grandson Dylan :) Dylan come out and say hi!! And out comes a teenage boy with bright red hair, a bunch of piercings (also a scar on one ear), wearing spiky platform boots, spiked bracelets and choker like Millie's (but in white w/ black spikes) and patched black jeans, wiping Pop Tart crumbs off a My Chemical Romance shirt and he just looks up at them totally nonchalantly and goes "Heyo" and walks off and they're like MAURICE WHAT THE HELL?!? WHERE DID YOU EVEN GET THIS KID?!?! JUVIE?!!?!??

- Millie's grandpa doesn't Know Dylan has DID 100%- Dylan hasn't told him and doesn't plan to- but he notices major changes in personality from time to time and catches Millie, Sarah or Brooke calling him different names occasionally. That plus his vague knowledge of what goes down at Dylan's house, he's sorta put the dots together on his own, but he hasn't said anything yet.

- Ok so like, I love the idea of Brooke having like a pastel/bubblegum-bitch aesthetic. One time Brooke dressed Millie up in a pastel goth style (and Dylan gave her a scene/emo style) and at the time she was like it's so BRIGHT it's so SOFT WHAT but shes been thinking about that ever since and occasionally while shopping she'll pick out a pair of cutesy/pastel earrings or a neon accented choker or something like that.

- Brooke introduces Millie and Dylan to Marina. Millie introduces Brooke to MCR (or something, idk, for as much of a goth as I am I mostly listen to Penelope Scott). Dylan introduces them both to FaLiLV (a Japanese band). Brooke does not like their taste in music.

- Millie's idea of calming down is laying on her bed and listening to screamo.

This took me an hour and a half I'm sorry

ADHAKFJHSJKJHKDSSJFD I LOVE THESE-

The one about Millie being terrible with children but them loving her anyway, is so accurate to my Millie as well. She can take care of a child about as well as she can take care of herself (not much at all-), but her cousins absolutely love when she babysits them, and Gregory looks up to her as a role model (Millie's just like "thanks, but reconsider!" lol)

And the one with Millie's grandpa practically adopting Dylan, I swear ur trying to kill me with wholesomeness, I love them sm. In my AU if Dylan was having issues with his family and Millie's grandpa found out, he'd just calmly stand up and walk into the garage, coming back with a baseball bat. He'd calmly tell Millie and the others that he's just going to have a "talk" with Dylan's parents, while Millie knowing damn well just what he means by that starts chasing after him telling him not to do this, Dylan not far behind.

Dylan's parents would just hear someone pounding on their door, and when they answer there's just an extremely tired and pissed off 60 something year old man on their doorstep, and two teens attempting to hold him back, all while Millie's grandpa is shouting a load of expletives at them.

The whole time Dylan is just panicking, and is all like "M-Mr. Fitzsimmons, you don't have to do this!", whereas Millie knows that her grandfather will not calm down until someone is at least hospitalized.

[sanchoyo]

danny phantom season 2, episode 17-20 thoughts! finishing up season two! the finale is the THIRD 2-PARTER OF SEASON 2. that's so many! I wonder how many season 3 will have?

see prev episode thoughts in this tag <3

-UERGH WHY DOES VLAD HAVE AN AI WITH MADDIE'S FACE ON IT. SOOO CREEPY. AND MORE 'CREATIONS' waiiiit. vlad is Dr. Frankenstein! (despite his ghost design obviously referencing vampires) HE HAS 'CREATIONS' HE MAKES THEN WONT TAKE REAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR!!! this bitch.

-danny was late and his friends immediately start going off about how hes inconsiderate, and has been treating them like sidekicks??? he just overslept, my god. chill. even if he has, be nicer about talking about it with him?? he really can't help that he sometimes has to chase the ghosts, or has a secret identity to protect...

-'what kind of ghost haunts a miniature golf course' umm. me as a ghost. next question

-imagine going home and theres a tiny child on your bed claiming to be your cousin. with as many cousins I have, I would probably believe her. but the 'ran away from home' BIT....SHES 12?? SHES SO TINY. I hate that they have her belly out in her ghost form, but I like how her colors are asymmetrical. something about her design...maybe the proportions?? are weird to me...anyway danny was good to feed her, but he shouldve taken her to his parents FIRST. or, tbh, probably jazz. (JAZZ DIDNT EVEN GET TO MEET HER!!! NOOO. I mean she said she'll be BACK BUT STILL)

-ANYWAY. shes voiced by AnnaSophia Robb, the girl who was in because of winn dixie, played as violet from charlie and the chocolate factory, and was the girl from bridge to terrabithia. (the movie that made me cry hysterically when I was 12 and I never watched it again because it Broke Me!) thats super cool.

-vlad sucks: the episode, basically. what's new!! I love how he's like, I'm Not A Villain. *immediately cuts to him torturing danny to make him transform, to get mid-transformation DNA, to perfect a Clone.* *immediately shows that he doesnt give a shit about his new daughter Dani and just wants a ''more perfect clone'' and will put her in danger to get that. will let her DIE to get that*

-Dani is danny's clone and is a girl? transgenderism....one of them has to be trans. or they both are.

-dani just. leaving at the end. WHAT? SHES 12. DONT JUST. NO!!! SHE WAS PROBABLY JUST BORN, A MONTH AGO AT MOST, RIGHT?? SHE NEEDS...SOMEWHERE TO LIVE. MONEY? FOOD?? A FAMILY?? AN EDUCATION???! WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHE'S LEAVING!!! OKAY BYE I GUESS!!! D: concern!!!

-the next ep opens with skulker chasing a ghost down. ...does skulker count as a ghost hunter in the way valerie and danny do? I mean, sure, he hunts the good guys too, but he. he hunts ghosts...also, we haven't seen his Real Form since his debut episode! tiny...

-the guys in white are back! ngl, I assumed they were a gag for that one episode. you're telling me they might actually be a threat? ok.

-valerie in her lil nasty burger uniform looks so cute!! glad shes not in that mascot uniform this time. I guess she stopped hiding that she's working there now?

-gregor having white hair, dressed in black and white...and green eyes...sam has a Type, I guess.

-danny being unnecessarily hostile about gregor. danny!!! hes been nice so far. he looks a little...tall to be 14, but. danny doesnt know anything about him! (he does Suspect, but...you cant just spy on people and be rude to them from a hunch.) also, gregor kissed her, and when she freaked out, he was like 'oh no!! sorry, we can take it slow! I understand!' which was NICE. I hate jealousy plots still tho.

-altho. umm. tucker, being concerned about danny spying on them??? SAM AND YOU WERE SPYING ON DANNY AND VALERIE A FEW EPISODES AGO!!!!! im not saying its RIGHT, but dont be a hypocrite!!! AND THEN SAM BEING MAD ABOUT IT, TOO.

-DANNY IS A 7 ON THE SCALE OF ECTOPLASMIC POWER!!! out of 10? so I want to know where the other ghosts rank...I mean it's a list from the guys in white, so, it may not even be accurate, like, they havent seen ALL of his powers, have they?

-Lancer being like 'im not cooperating with the FEDS' until they said they could access his tax records. they already did that joke with jack, but like, its still funny. kings of tax evasion.

-tucker's aggressive third-wheeling. but gregor being super into it. gregor/tucker is the real ship here. then gregor kissing danny on both cheeks after hugging him. bi poly king gregor. (he does turn out to be a liar with a phoney accent. unsurprising, BUT THE CONCEPT OF HIM BEING GENUINE AND THEM ALL DATING IS FUN)

-THE...GUYS IN WHITE THINKING GREGOR IS DANNY PHANTOM. LMAOOO. GET HIS ASS. or,, Elliot. lmfao

-sam saying tucker is part of the package because theyre friends was super sweet <3 but also 'part of the package'...polyships are obviously the solution to these dumb jealousy/love triangle plots.

-danny crashed a whole plane. the collateral damage...

-is he....

-you know....

.... (ITS NOT GAY IF YOU'RE DOING IT TO PRETEND TO BE SOMEONE YOU'RE NOT, AND LIE TO A GIRL. RIGHT? he was getting a little too into pretending to enjoy tucker's company, and the above...c'mon, guy.)

-lmao, freakshow is in actual prison. I didn't expect a follow up, or for him to show back up! in the finale of this season, too!

-THE SICK TATTOO GHOST IS NAMED LYDIA!!! more Lore On her. freakshow seemed genuinely concerned about her. also, is she mute? I don't think she talked the first time we saw her, either. and we didn't know freakshow 'envied' ghosts, either, the first time, we just knew he was controlling them. interesting!

-...they literally stole the infinity gauntlet from marvel and called it the reality gauntlet. is that legal. what the fuck. even with the gems in the lil slots, having different powers...they had freakshow in jail, but didnt check his pockets??! hes just still in his lil outfit??? what kind of ...oh, its in amity park. yeah, all of the adults are idiots, okay, sure.

-'freakshow!' 'in the anemic flesh!' dude take some iron pills then. also, sure, the red eyes could be contacts for his aesthetic, but the whites of his eyes are yellow! does he have jaundice?! he severely needs more...like, every kind of vitamin. (this is what im worried about as freakshow attacks danny with giant robots)

-again, goth circus is a sick theme, and I love his goth train.

-oh FUCK every single person saw danny transform. on a stage. including his parents via TV. oh god. the guys in white and immediately like 'youre coming in for experiments!' SCARY. at least the crowd is willing to help him to escape...perks of now being a local celeb! even the kids at school are accepting :) this is what, the third time his family has found out? its always been an alt timeline tho. and danny fully intending to just rewrite things again instead of...I dunno, trying to roll with it this time? hes really worried his family won't accept him, huh...

-'maybe our son IS THE GHOST BOY, but its not as if our family's ghostly activities have EVER PUT YOUR FAMILIES IN DANGER' maddie. mmmmmmmmmmmm. okay.

-danny 100% prepared to run away from home because of this :( oh :( and saying his parents are 'looking for him, or a scalpel to dissect him with' ouch...

-THE GUYS IN WHITE TRYING TO ARREST A 14 YEAR OLD. fuck da feds.

-side note (another one about voice actors...) freakshow's voice actor, Jon Cryer, was lex luthor in pretty much every DC tv show, which is why I recognized his voice, because my dad loves those shows so I've seen a good bit of them without seeking them out...)

-the old man saying 'hey, i still had minutes left!' and danny saying 'you gotta watch those roaming charges!' about danny destroying the people in the diner's phones so no one could report seeing him...would kids today understand these things. can you even BUY minutes anymore...I remember my first phone being a flip phone, and the fact I always had minutes when my sister ran out super fast, because I didnt have friends calling or texting me like she did...:/

-the fentons being genuinely like 'why didnt danny trust us and tell us this, we love him :(' and JAZZ LAYING INTO THEM WITH THE 'DISSECTION/MOLECULE BY MOLECULE' LINES. LITERALLLLY. they need to apologize

-technically, lydias stronger than you! -jazz lesbianism moments! when did you even learn her name!!! but also get freakshows ass. lydia is also cooler looking. looove her design sm still.

-jazz psychoanalyzing freakshow... (also, her also having ghost envy? au where jazz is a ghost!! id like to see it)

-im glad the kids still got to go to their respective vacation things, even if they cant really stick around and enjoy them much...

-furry: confirmed. (also tucker calling her hot. tucker is a furry confirmed)

-danny being mad someone at the comic con is selling comics of him without permission, lmfao. give him his royalties!

-freakshow > thanos because hes a drama clown and does use his gauntlet to be FLASHY AND DRAMATIC.

-jazz's 'USE PYSCOLOGY' to danny about freakshow LMAOO. AND THEN IT WORKING. but, oh, freakshow's ghost form sucks. I like him as a clown better tbh. good thing danny took away his ghost powers!

-his parents hugging him and saying theyre proud :"( and saying 'of course you lied to us, we never gave you a reason not to!' and saying they were in the wrong basically for always talking about hurting ghosts aaaa :""(

-then he WIPED THEIR MEMORIES AGAIN!!! FUCK. I can understand him wiping the goverments/student bodies' memories, but why his parents?? they were being accepting!! ARGHHH. season 3 couldve been them all trying to adjust to them knowing!

-I know, on a meta level the showrunners probably wanted to just reset things to the status quo of him having a secret identity. But. We've been doing that for (2) seasons, I'd love if season 3 could be like, his parents adjusting to this and trying way harder to learn more and accept it (and the shenanigans that could come from that) and for fun, if he didn't wipe the students memories, it could be him being popular for a while, then everyone slowly realizing, oh, he's still Danny. Like. he might have ghost powers but hes Just The Same Guy instead of putting him on a pedestal (and seeing them all try and help him hide it from the giw/people who don't know!!)

-fuck they didn't even explain WHY he wiped everyone except sam, tucker and jazz's memories. he just Did It right when his parents were saying they loved/accepted him!! and sam and tucker didnt question it at all!!! HELLO??? very annoyed about this turn of events.

-anyway. onto season 3! I know its shorter than the first two seasons, and is the last season... I might just do it in 2 bursts if I can... :3c depends on the episodes' content and how much I want to say about each!

[mrknucklesmcchucklehead-blog]

I was 35 when I discovered I'm on the autism spectrum. Here's how it changed my life. by Zack Smith on January 29, 2016

"Do you hate crowds, especially at supermarkets and restaurants?" I avoided eye contact, which I knew I wasn't supposed to do. "Yes." If Dr. P. noticed, she was too busy looking at the questionnaire to let on. "Do you tend to repeat heard words, parts of words, or TV commercials?" I immediately flashed back to middle school, randomly repeating such phrases from TV as, "I don't think so, Tim," from Home Improvement. I was tempted to respond that way this time. Instead, I just replied with another, "Yes." "Do you have trouble sustaining conversations?" "Yes." "Is your voice often louder than the situation requires?" "Yes." "Do you find yourself resistant to change?" "Yes." "Do you have restricted interests, like watching the same video over and over?" "Yes." "Did you start reading and/or memorizing books at an early age?" Eye contact suddenly became much, much easier. "Wait — isn't that a good thing?" "It is. But did you do that?" I went back to boring a hole in the carpet with my eyes. "Yes." "Have you ever picked up and smelled random objects, like toys when you were younger?" "That's a sign?" "Sometimes. Did you do that?" "...yes." I wanted to puke. After a few more questions, she did some totaling. "Well," she finally said, "it's likely you have ADHD and social anxiety disorder, and you're on the autism spectrum." I slumped back into the overstuffed chair. "Great," I said. "Triple threat." I was 35 years old. There are, according to the Autism Society of America, 3.5 million Americans with autism spectrum disorder, approximately one in every 68 births. Based on reports compiled by the Society, the prevalence of autism has increased 119.4 percent just from 2010 to 2014. Courtesy of Lydia Brown and the Autism Self-Advocacy Network We’ve called autism a disease for decades. We were wrong. The research linking autism to vaccines is even more bogus than you think The errors — and revelations — in two major new books about autism It's not that more autistic people were suddenly being born. It's that doctors knew what to look for. A Danish study published in January 2015 suggests that diagnoses of autism are more frequent because of a broadening of diagnostic criteria over the years, meaning there could be generations of people with autism spectrum disorder who were never diagnosed. I knew, on some level, that I was autistic by the time I was in fifth grade. It wasn't because of Oscar winner and box office sensation Rain Man, which I was too young for; it was, of all things, a Baby-Sitters Club book called Kristy and the Secret of Susan, where one of the babysitters tends to an autistic girl. I don't recall all the details, but I do remember reading the book and asking my mom if I was like this, if it was why I needed "curriculum assistance" classes or why I'd been pulled from preschool and sent to "Project Enlightenment," an ultra-structured children's program downtown. Mom assured me I was not like that. Susan never spoke, and that wasn't me, was it? I moved on. I was already neurotic about reading "girls' books." By the time I reached college in the late 1990s, a new term had become a buzzword: Asperger's syndrome. I wondered if that was what I had. It explained so much — the obsessive memorizing of TV show trivia, the absolute discomfort at bars, clubs, and parties, the way I'd tune out most classes or social situations. Again, I was assured by my parents and friends who knew people with autism — that wasn't me. I had empathy! And I was doing well in school, I just needed to relax a little. In retrospect, they seemed more worried about how worked up I was over this than the possibility of an actual diagnosis. There's a stigma attached to autism that leads many families to avoid a diagnosis. But in attempting to diagnose yourself, it can feel like the things that make you unique are aspects of some sort of affliction, one that is permanent and incurable. A few years later, a good friend of mine was diagnosed with Asperger's. Then he told me he thought I exhibited some symptoms as well. I freaked. I had finally started to feel "normal." I had a job, I was finally comfortable with things like driving and calling up strangers for interviews — I was just a "late bloomer!" I broke down and told him I still cared about him, that I didn't see him differently, but that I didn't have what he had! I was finally growing up, I said. I didn't have some incurable disorder that separated me from everyone else. But I worried. Friends didn't quite know what to say when I brought up the possibility, often in tears and just short of hysterics. "You're just you," they'd say. Mom and Dad were practical: "Well, what if you are? What good does it do you to put a label on yourself?" They weren't being mean. They reminded me, over and over, that I was "doing well." They'd already seen me fall into periods of depression and nonproductivity when I was out of school and out of work, and didn't want me to return to that place. I'd pulled myself out of those spirals before they became too serious. But if a doctor told me I'd never be "normal," that my strangeness was something pathological, would that be the excuse I needed to turn into a complete lump? I was just one of those people who did "better" when I was busy, when I had structure. I just needed motivation. That was all. Eight more years passed. Asperger's became a fear, a phantom, and most of all an excuse. The idea that I might have this "condition" lurked in my mind. It was why I messed up, the nuclear option. If someone got upset with me because I didn't understand something or missed some hints they were trying to give me, I had, "Uh, I might have Asperger's" ready. It broke up at least one relationship. It prevented several more from happening. I was in a strange place. By that time, I'd made good connections — even friendships — with a wide variety of creative people. But other parts of my life felt paralyzed. My creative work was stalling. Setting and keeping any kind of schedule for myself resulted in overstuffed calendars and quick burnout. There were all the times I'd walk away from an encounter with someone new with the overwhelming feeling I'd done something wrong and had no idea what it was. If someone did get mad at me, I'd obsess over it, frozen in a moment of shame and self-hatred long after the other person had let it go. If I could succeed without the pills, that was proof that I'd "won"I considered therapy. But good cognitive therapists were expensive, and it seemed wasteful to potentially drain what little money I'd saved trying to quell what I told myself were such minor neuroses. Surely I could just power through my own problems. In the past, times like these usually ended when I had enough work — school, employment, personal projects — to keep my mind busy, unable to obsess over small things and let myself get "nibbled to death by ducks," as one editor put it. Ultimately, I persuaded my doctor to prescribe me some generic Zoloft. My parents were terrified I was going to have the miscellaneous "suicidal thoughts" the prescription warned about. I didn't, but it was a mixed bag. On the one hand, I felt a bit calmer and had more luck with work and dating. On the other hand, I still faced problems with depression, falling asleep in the middle of the day, keeping an irregular schedule. I'd been dieting for the past year and change, but now I had trouble taking and keeping weight off. Worst of all was that I couldn't feel excited on almost any level — I'd sit through TV shows and movies like a stone. I rarely felt attracted to girls. When I kissed one, it was like kissing my own hand. There was no sensation, just motions. Zoloft, it seemed, could get me a second date but didn't make me a lot of fun on the third. I started skipping pills or going off my prescription for a while entirely, saving a month's refill so I could use it if I knew I had a stressful period coming up. Inside my brain, the relief at not having to face "judgment" was twisted up with self-hatred and fear, along with a perverse sense of defiance. If I could succeed without the pills, that was proof that I'd "won." When I went off the stuff, it felt like second puberty — I'd go from clean-shaven to Wolfman Jack in a week. I felt excited again. I also felt like I was on a toboggan, headed down a snowy hill, accelerating faster and faster toward a brick wall. And I couldn't get off, because I liked the feel of the rush. Cleaning out my email folder, or seeing old social media posts on Timehop, it's amazing how many times I made the same complaint over and over: I needed to get something finished, or I needed a new project. I needed to get out of the house more, to spend more time around people, to stop being so hard on myself. Something needed to change in my life, or I needed to change in some way. I said so over and over, but I didn't know how. 10 things I want to teach my autistic son before he goes to college In January 2015, I started what I knew was going to be a stressful period. I was teaching a volunteer course for retirees once a week, taking a graduate course twice a week, and taking shifts at a used toy shop other days of the week, on top of my freelance writing and creative work. It was a lot, but I knew I could handle it. It took exactly two weeks for it all to collapse. Exactly one year ago today, I showed up for a shift at the used toy shop and was promptly fired. I'd been there two years, I was told, and still had no sense of what to do when they didn't explicitly tell me. I had all these other gigs writing and teaching, they said, and this clearly wasn't a priority. Worst of all, customers had complained: They preferred not to come in when I was behind the counter, ready to chat their heads off. Fridays, when I worked, used to guarantee the company a few hundred dollars of retail at least, and now there were records of multiple Fridays with no sales at all. I was costing my boss money because people didn't want to be around me. I'd failed at what was a fairly easy job because I was me. Because I wasn't fit to be around other people. My parents were due to arrive for a visit in two hours. I went home and felt all the symptoms that had hit me in the past take over: crying jags, nausea, coughing fits. I knew I wasn't sick; these symptoms were all in my head. But I didn't know how to turn them off. When my mom and dad arrived, they were understanding. But I told them I couldn't go on like this. I needed to get therapy and get on medication again, this time prescribed by a mental health professional. Research was done. Dr. P. was recommended as a specialist in the area, good at diagnosing spectrum disorders and helping people organize their lives. A few weeks later, I was answering questions about whether I picked up and smelled toys as a child. Decades after I'd begun diagnosing myself, it was official. But somehow I didn't feel "labeled." That sense that I was "wrong," that I was somehow deficient, wasn't there anymore. Instead, I finally understood the areas where I had problems, and why I had those problems. Now I could work on them. The psychiatrist Dr. P. sent me to said that we could try Strattera, the ADD medication I'd attempted in college, in conjunction with Prozac. Tony Soprano and "Here comes the Pro-Zack" jokes flashed through my head. The insurance company rejected Strattera, but they told the psychiatrist I could do Adderall and see if it worked. "If you have a bad reaction, we can apply for Strattera again!" the psychiatrist said, cheerful. It was a lovely thing to know I was taking a medication with the expectation that I would have a bad reaction to it, but it turned out I didn't. I could listen without feeling an absolute, overwhelming need to blurt something outThe first month was rough. I'd wake up throughout the night, an odd change from wanting to sleep all day. Instead of eating whenever I got stressed or anxious, I wasn't hungry, something I wouldn't realize until early afternoon, when the dizzy spells kicked in. For the first time in who knows how long, I found myself doing things like getting up at the same time every day and eating breakfast. Weird. Other things stuck around. The nervous coughing fits I developed with my firing continued, but a friend noted that they seemed to vanish when something held my attention. When they happened again, I'd find something to focus on, like a song or a TV show or something to read. Eventually they vanished, and when I would cough nervously about something I found I could overcome it right away. Little things became easier, too. Arguments with other people didn't stay in my head months after the issue had been resolved, reminders that I could push other people away. I started dating more, and if it didn't work out, I was able to move on with some new understanding. Errands were done. Garbage got taken out. Annoying forms were filled out, instead of lingering on my desk for months. If I had a weekend with some downtime, I felt an actual compulsion to leave the house or call a friend, instead of simply sitting around. Within a few months, I realized that while I still didn't feel the excitement I could with no medication, I could still enjoy things. I could follow the plots of movies and TV more easily, and when other people spoke, I could listen without feeling an absolute, overwhelming need to blurt something out. I asked Dr. P. what this feeling was. She said I was "content." I kind of liked that. The strangest part of all this has been that being honest about my autism has left other people unfazed. It'd come up, probably because I found some excuse in the conversation to mention it ("Oh, I know what you mean about hating small talk. I'm a little on the spectrum, so..."), and there'd barely be a reaction. I'd watch people's faces. No surprise. No discomfort. And the conversation would go on. Admitting that there were things I didn't understand somehow created a new common ground. No one fully understands everyone else, or the world around them. Many people try to do what I did and "power through" this with false confidence and assertiveness. Sometimes it works. But to know you have a weakness, to acknowledge it, and to treat it as a "what the hell" thing —that's almost more powerful. For most of my life, I'd been afraid discovering I was on the spectrum meant I was cut off from being able to maintain friendships, professional contacts, a romantic connection. It was the wall I was always afraid I was headed toward. But the real wall was my fear, of facing not what I was but who I was. And my parents had been right — I was doing well before. I just needed to find a way to let myself enjoy my successes and build upon them, instead of feeling like defeat was inevitable. In the end, 2015 was perhaps the best year of my life. It wasn't the major stuff — the new job I got teaching, getting accepted full time into the graduate program — it was just that I was able to feel a sense of momentum, of moving forward. Part of me wishes I'd had this happen a decade before. But the experiences I had without therapy and medication helped prepare me for the setbacks I faced, and granted me the maturity to face them. My story isn't typical. The autism spectrum is a broad and constantly redefined place, a frontier of the mind that's still mostly wilderness. The revised definitions of it in the DSM-5just a few years ago are still controversial — it's both easier to diagnose aspects of the spectrum in people and more difficult to determine if a formal diagnosis is necessary, if it's even a "problem." In my experiences I had the benefit of privilege, and of personal choice. No one forced me to get diagnosed or to take medication. I simply reached a point in my life where I felt like I could become a better version of myself if I confronted the areas of my life that seemed to hold me back. I can't say that my life is perfect. I have a great deal I need to accomplish in terms of better dieting, regular exercise, and being more productive in my writing. Some anxieties still hijack my brain, and dating and relationships remain, as they do for most single people, confusing. But I feel like I've learned. And I'm still learning. Learning is all about realizing possibilities in the world around you, and right now those possibilities seem extraordinary. In August 2015, Dr. P explained, slowly and with caution, that she was moving out of state to join a new practice and to be closer to family, so I'd need to change therapists, and that she'd help with the transition. She was relieved when my main reaction was to tell her I understood and congratulate her on the new opportunity. She called me a "success story." "A few months ago, you might have felt ... destroyed by upheaval," she said. "Things change," I replied, and I meant it.