#LISTEN TO ME. NOT EVERY ANECDOTE ABOUT AN AUTISTIC PERSON IS A MEAN ONE.

[scorndotexe]

also sorry but if a conversation is about what something means it doesn't feel like the place to talk about how rude or tactless it is. we're having an autistic conversation can we move past "people will be hurt by that." well at least in this situation the person who could have been hurt by it wasn't. people might be hurt by that but you know what that's a separate discussion

[bookwyrminspiration]

Hi Quil!

It was awesome to hear from you! I had a few add-ons/clarifications to my last note to you:

By “autistic theatre kid” I actually meant myself! I’ve been wanting to kind of “come out” to you as autistic for a while, but I was overthinking my words and I think my language was a little confusing. But yeah! I’m also autistic!

I’ve actually been listening to some of EPIC: The Musical recently, partially thanks to you! I found it at first a while ago because I had to read The Odyssey for school (it was a fun read, so if you haven’t read it I’d recommend) and I was looking at musical animatics and it came up. And then I was hanging around your blog a few weeks ago and you reblogged a post talking about how the Circe Saga would be coming out for Valentine’s Day, so you actually got me back into it! Some of my favorite songs from it are “The Horse and The Infant”, “Warrior of the Mind”, and “Done For” – what are your favorites?

Also, I love the description of a “hearth”! I had to stop and look that word up but it fits really well. It also reminds me of a book that I’m reading right now that I want to tell you about, but that’s a longer story so I’ll try to remember to tell you later.

Also I had one extra question: Do you know if submissions get sent differently than asks? Every time I send one there’s this message that it’s “awaiting moderator approval”, but I don’t actually know what that’s about so if you know anything about how submissions work vs. asks that would be helpful. 

But yeah! Also I’d love to hear about your day if you’d like to share. I personally had a lower-key day today with a lot of studying because I have a really hard test coming up soon, but it was actually a pretty good day! I also finished this book called Belle of the Ball that has an all-girls love triangle going on and it’s really sweet and pretty!

Enjoy your day!

- Amethyst

~

Hello again, Amethyst!! I’ll go through your points one by one for clarity :)

1. Ah, it’s me who wasn’t clear enough here--I understood what you were saying. Me saying “I also love musicals--though my partner’s the theater kid, not me” was me making a connection to you! You said you were an autistic theater kid who loved musicals, so I went oh! I also love musicals--but am not a theater kid. my partner is though! establishing similarities and distinctions, that kind of thing. but I can 100% see how my wording made that confusing. and woo! autism buddies!

2. HELL YEAH!! I love Epic, it’s like 70% of my current music. I haven’t read the Odyssey myself yet, but I’ve always wanted to get around to it--same with the Iliad. There’s a bunch of famous classics I want to check out, some for genuine interest and some just so I can have context (like the Divine Comedy).

I think my top three songs--at least of what’s released are: Ruthlessness, My Goodbye, and Open Arms. Though I love so many more than that--Wouldn’t You Like, Done For, Warrior of the Mind. Teagan Early just has such a lovely voice.

3. Yeah!! A thing I’ll do, especially when I’m talking to other autistic people, is use atypical words to describe feelings. Feeling like fireworks, or a rusty pipe, or an aching hourglass. Because they’re such specific feelings sometimes, and I can generalize, but it’s not quite right--and I’ve found, at least w/ anecdotal evidence, it’s something other autistic people also do or understand. Also curious to hear more about this book :)

And yes, submissions are a bit different than asks. When you submit a post, it’s submitted to be posted as if I had made it. I add text to respond to you, but usually submissions are posted as they’re received. You’re using it like the askbox--which is totally fine, but a typical submission can be posted without other people knowing it wasn’t me. There is a label in the tags that marks it as a submission, but if people don’t see that (they don’t look, it gets reblogged and people don’t check the og tags), it looks like any other post I’ve made. Which means that I need to approve it for publication, as it’ll look more like it’s coming from my mouth, and I don’t want people putting words in my mouth. 

Asks clearly separate the asker from the answerer, but submissions don’t, so whoever you submit something to (me in this case) is the moderator who has to approve having it on their blog (there are a few blogs whose whole gimmicks are submissions--like one-time-I-dreamt where we know different people are submitting their different dreams, but that’s generally an outlier)

And my day! Right now it’s still fairly early (about 7:30), so I haven’t done much--I’ll have to review a few of my classmates’ short fiction pieces for tomorrow and finalize mine to turn in. But otherwise I’m going to try and take it very slow and easy, since tomorrow is my long day and I haven’t had the most restful weekend. My nana was in town with my 7yo cousin, and they were with my cousin’s friend and her grandma. And we don’t see extended family often so they wanted to visit.

However, my family is...not great with guests. We’re not rude, it’s just really hard on us. It’s a big disruption to our routines, and we’re a very routine oriented family just naturally (sans my dad). And we’re a VERY quiet household, which is interrupted by having even one person over. especially since my dog is very anxious and doesn’t even trust my dad, who he lives with. So four people in our house--especially since this side of my extended family is horrible at giving heads up--two of whom are very energetic children? woof. they came over twice so I. need to recharge a little before tomorrow.

but thank you for the well wishes! i return them back upon you :)

[freddiekluger]

Do you think that if the ghosts sees period dramas set in their time, it will reignite memories of their life?

i think it definitely depends on the accuracy and style of the drama- if they're too poorly researched, any attempts at reverie would be totally disrupted by the historical and visual inaccuracies (think: thomas yelling about the 'roccoco legs' during the byron shoot). of course the other big thing is setting: it's all well and good to watch to a movie set in your time period, but if it's based in a country you've never been to (especially for the older/less privileged ghosts like mary and robin, who probably didn't have much knowledge of the world outside of their continent when they were alive), it's not going to feel particularly familiar.

working on the assumption that we have at least partial historical and geographical accuracy, here's how i think each of the ghosts would respond to

robin: considering how little we actually know about early human history, i don't think robin would be that fussed by any attempt to put that on film- he'd still appreciate a good caveman joke, although he's not a big fan of how stupid every movie assumes they would have been (it's not like they had omega-3 tablets back then!). robin's unspeakably old, and for the most part he seems to have processed through all the parts of his past that he possibly can, and is now committed to enjoying his time at button house as much as he can (a big part of this is his prankster spirit and frankly underrated friendliness), so it would have to take a lot more than a stone age movie to rake up serious conflict.

mary: given her incredibly traumatic death, mary avoids virtually anything that hints of fire or witchcraft which is where things become difficult. i think mary could really enjoy a film set in her time if it follows a working family not dissimilar to her own- it could help her remember some of the positive things from her life, and probably help her feel a lot more seen as she often ends up misunderstood or ignored by the other ghosts (pat initially dismissing mary's advice about the camera work because he didn't think she properly understood what was happening; the ghosts focusing on correcting her speech more than what she actually says). the problem is, almost all movies set in mary's time that follow people from her class end up focusing on the witch trials, which is a BIG no no for her.

humphrey: i think humphrey could really enjoy watching some tudor set films. like mary, he often gets ignored (and straight up left behind), so watching a period film absolutely gives him the opportunity to feel a bit more seen and stew on those long forgotten memories like post-meal games of cards with friends, or the occasional hunting trip when the king came to visit (the trips themselves were more stressful than anything, but mouthing off about them with the king's entourage after he went to bed was always a highlight). humphrey would definitely have a keen eye for inaccuracies, but i don't think they'd bother him. it's just nice to have things be about him for a change (if by him, we mean having all the ghosts watching something that is vaguely related to his alive-period and actually looking to him with questions instead of just using his head as their personal football/security camera/magic 8ball).

kitty: kitty is one of the ghosts who accesses her memories pretty easily- she has no problem with thinking about her life, even when the anecdotes are screamingly sad to anyone listening. so a period film would naturally bring some memories, but i don't know if they'd be anything radical or new- kitty's real growth and drama would come from her leaving behind the rationalisations of what clearly was severe neglect. actually on that note, while not quite kitty's environment, i think she might get a lot out of Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette. something about the themes of the loneliness that comes with growing up in high society and only being valued for what your status and your biology can give to your family and your husband (who you likely didn't choose), along with feeling like an outsider and being visibly othered, even by those you outrank, no matter how friendly and approachable and like them you make yourself (while not necessarily linked to the broader themes of familial neglect kitty's character touches on, i think her experiences as a georgian noblewoman of colour would have to have impacted her growing up and also socially- i'd love to hear any thoughts on this from fans of colour, as i'm white and so any theories i could come up with would likely be a poor approximation). and she'd definitely like the pretty dresses and stunning rooms of versailles, and for that i can't blame her.

thomas: most of thomas we sort of got to see in Free Pass- the detail nitpicking, the excitement until a specific trigger from his life (in this case, lord byron, the man thomas considers his greatest enemy, although i’d be curious to know whether byron acually had any idea of thomas thorne’s existence) causes him to go into a full thomas hissy-fit. sure, the emotion is real to him, but he absolutely plays it up, even trying to get humphrey’s body to fetch alison so she can see how ‘upset’ he is (thomas reminds me of a child in this respect).  there’d probably be less of the tantruming for a movie that had already been made, although i’m not so sure about the memory point. The Thomas Thorne Affair sort of brought out thomas’s big Unresolved Life Mystery, and now i think all that’s left for him to work through has got to be a lot more internal. sure, he’d be reminded of a few good old parties, and maybe any romance scenes might trigger some of the sad isabelle/general lost love emotions, but i don’t think they’d be anything particularly spectacular. 

fanny: now fanny would be a real stickler for accuracy. she would be calling out every makeup, decorative, hair, wardrobe, architectural, and lingual failure with the classic lady button judgement in her voice. this is probably half because she can't help herself, but half a measure to distract herself from actually having to pay proper attention and relive her life. i think fanny struggles a lot with no longer running her own household (along with the shifting morals, and fashions, of the modern world), and so to be reminded of everything she can no longer have would be tough. i'm not saying she would long for a time when women didn't have a lot of rights, but she went from a wealthy society woman who held a lot of power in her own sphere to a ghost, unable to touch anything or even be seen by the living (save for the photo glitch), and stuck spending her days with a motley crew of equally frustrating ghosts whom she doesn't always feel respected by (noting that 'respect' to fanny is much the same as deference). she could have it a lot worse, but i think fanny would much prefer to not have to think about her old life.

the captain: the captain is an interesting one. he's one of the few ghosts who actively seeks out media related to his time, although that's within the impersonal war documentary which focuses on facts and mechanics as opposed to day to day realities and feelings. on the one hand, any war film for the captain would be sure to rake up memories of wartime (even if he never made the front- that remains unconfirmed), and the immense grief that comes with watching the people around you slowly stop returning home. the captain is a war fanatic, and has no problem talking about the great battles, victories, and tactics, so i think the heightened emotional states that a film presents would be the key to unlocking the captain's inevitable wartime trauma and going beyond the surface level facts. for that reason, i'd really like the captain to see Peter Weir's Gallipoli. i know it's the wrong war and the wrong country (although the australian's were technically part of the British forces), but i think the overarching themes of the idolisation of the military, the deconstruction of the glory of war, and the intense (bordering on the homoerotic) although never quite realised relationship between Archy and Frank (which, spoiler alert, ends in tragedy), could give the captain a lot in terms of food for thought and unlocking some of those deeper experiences. on the other hand, the captain watching a period film set in the years before his war could be equally interesting- i think they'd play on some his is insecurities and general issues surrounding the difficulty he may have had fitting in with day-to-day life (not just due to his homosexuel répression, but due to his broader issues with fitting in socially which we see through his interactions with both the ghosts and his own forces- some particularly valid fans have used these to headcanon cap as autistic). in short, films would unlock a fair few memories for cap, but even more EMOTIONS.

pat: with pat and julian it gets interesting because while yes, technically any movie set in a non-current time period is a ‘period piece’, you also have to deal with the fact that they’re going to have less impact on their respective ghosts because you also have actual movies from those periods floating around. for this reason, my answers for pat and julian are relatively similar: they wouldnt have any more memories appear than for any film coming from while they were alive. for pat, this means he’d get pretty excited about ones that came from his childhood (pat would be a giant sci fi fan don’t @ me he loves technology), but i think anything that came with too strong a family attachmet, or that he watched in the weeks/months/year leading up to his death might bring out the angry pat we saw in Happy Death Day and Perfect Day. anger is how his inherent death trauma (and the additional loss that comes from the world moving on without you) manifests, so i definitely think that would come out here, even if he isn’t quite able to put his finger on why specific movies make him so angry/irritated. for pat, childhood memories would abound, but the closer we get to his death, there’s less memories but definitely more unresolved emotion.

julian: see my point above about the whole period-film-vs-regular-film thing. julian doesn’t really strike me as a movie person, and i definitely think he wouldn’t give much care to the influx of 80s/90s set british political media (think The Iron Lady etc). in his words, “i don’t really care for politics, and they’re all too busy trying to push their labor propaganda”. he just makes a captain-inspired noise when alison reminds him that he WAS a politician. julian is another character who accesses his memories pretty easily (although they’re usually either horny or at least slightly morally bankrupt), and i honestly find it hard to give a tory emotions so i’m very excited to see how the christmas special manages. julian is a self-centred bloke though, so i think only things that are directly about him could have the power to rake up buried memories and feelings. now i really want to see julian watching a documentary on himself and just getting outraged.

thanks for this one, sorry for the delay!!

[thesaltyace]

big rant/ramble below, you can safely ignore and move on to the next post in your feed.

Urgh

I shared the results of that autism screener with a quasi-friend who I thought would be "safe" (we used to work together and we connected over his being gay and me being visibly queer) but his response was blergh

Everyone has hints of autism.

okay yeah but this isn't just *hints* of autism. I'm answered yes to symptoms I've had since I was a kid that I've learned to mask or work around as an adult. But I still struggle with them.

He pointed out that he sees me as more ADHD than ASD.

Yeah, fair, and I'd need to see a professional to try to distinguish if my symptoms are ADHD, ASD, or both.

You don't hit the three prongs needed for a diagnosis.

But.... but I do. And the stuff I dealt with as a kid is still stuff I deal with today. I just mask it better. A short and not exhaustive list:

As I kid I had trouble interacting with peers. I didn't have friends, really. I didn't know how to make friends and I didn't try terribly hard to. I acquire friends when someone else "adopts" me and decides that we are friends. And once I became an adult, I have almost never had friends of my own - I share a friend group with my spouse who we're primary connected to through him. I'm okay with that. Maintaining a friendship entirely on my own power sounds impossible and exhausting.

I was okay with not having friends, I liked being alone, but my mom insisted on me being social. She made me join things so that I would have a list of people to invite to parties. I'd honestly have preferred a day of doing stuff I like or just a couple friends. As an adult, I want to be alone on my birthday. I will celebrate with certain friends, separately, usually over a quiet meal. That's it.

I had trouble understanding sarcasm and figurative speech. Like, I understand it now but I still think most figurative speech is annoying. I've been told the way I deliver sarcasm is weird, too.

I liked memorizing movies and quoting them start to finish, I thought it was fun but everyone else thought it was weird. I continued to do this into adulthood but I only quote aloud when I'm alone. Alamo Drafthouse quote-alongs are the BEST. I don't do this with every movie, either, just ones I really like.

Okay actually I also liked to listen to the same album or, in some cases, the same song over and over until I was sick of it (and sometimes even after that point). I mean, just endlessly looping on repeat. Not interspersed with other songs. I do this as an adult a LOT because it's easier with headphones to do this without annoying everyone else around you. Like, often it's fine for me to just put a playlist on shuffle, but I get into Moods where I just want the one album/song over and over. Yesterday I listened to Wellerman about 50 times in a row and only stopped because I had to get up and do something else and that song wasn't "good" for whatever I got up to do.

My special interest as a kid was cats. Literally everything cats, all the time - I sought out obscure facts and could tell you the difference between similar species, and wanted cats involved in literally everything I did. Adults laughed it off as childhood obsession. I was also pretty obsessed with the solar system. I thought asking my peers, as a trivia question, which of Jupiter's moons had its own asteroid (Io, in case you were wondering) was appropriate and interesting and was confused that they didn't know that. That was in fifth grade.

I watched the weather channel for fun. I would watch it for hours and absorb the weekly forecast info just... for fun? I never used it, could never tell you if you should dress a certain way or bring an umbrella or whatever. Everyone thought it was weird.

I was a know-it-all and literally could not stop myself from bluntly correcting people who were wrong. Didn't know or care that it was "rude". I'm still that way but I've learned how to sometimes swallow the urge long enough to find a more tactful way to point it out (but often fail).

I could read on my own before kindergarten, used vocabulary beyond what one would expect for my age, and had a special interest in spelling and grammar throughout my school years. I did not understand how other people weren't interested in learning about it and getting it right. I read at an undergrad level by 4th grade.

I hated loud noises and often covered my ears to block out irritating sounds. I could also hear high pitched noises that even other kids didn't seem to hear (or at least weren't bothered by them). Too much noise sent me into an internal meltdown, I'd just kinda shut down because I couldn't deal with it.

Textures and pressure on my skin bothered the absolute fuck out of me - sock seams, certain fabric materials, socks that weren't equally elastic, one shoe tighter than the other, tags.... all of that. (Also, fun anecdote I just unlocked - when I was 4 or 5 my grandmother started letting me use the soft silk sleep shirt she had as a young woman because I preferred it to anything else. Soft, smooth, no irritating qualities. Bliss. I wanted to wear it all the time.)

Don't get me started on food. Until I was in COLLEGE I mostly subsisted on pasta with either butter or alfredo sauce and chicken. I would eat other things, but pasta and/or chicken was (and still is) my biggest safe/comfort food. I'd eat other stuff mostly if I could control the balance of ingredients, get it made plain, or could confirm the texture wouldn't be offensive (so, like... plain burgers, plain cheese pizza, grilled cheese, mashed potatoes, etc.) I cannot stress this enough - from childhood through COLLEGE I did this. As a kid my mom had to make me a completely separate dish most nights to get me to eat something. My spouse was horrified at what little variety I ate. The only reason I eat so much variety now is that he knows what I do/don't like and tells me in advance if I'll find a texture or taste offensive. Of course, rather than wanting consistent texture like I did when I was younger, I now seek as much texture as possible (so long as they aren't Bad textures) so.... that's fun. But yeah most of my objections to Yucky foods is due to T E X T U R E. Even if I like the taste, the texture overrides it all.

I prefer animals to people. I will seek out animals and interact with them instead of people in the same room. And will pointedly focus on the animal to avoid interacting with people.

I'm perfectly happy with only myself for company. Being with just my spouse counts as me being "alone" though. Always has. I just realized last night that it's because I do minimal to no masking around him because he's a safe person to unmask with and always has been. Never batted an eye at the weird shit I do beyond asking questions about what I was doing or why. And then just "Okay."

Okay honestly just the fact that I want to vent into the void of tumblr instead of actually discussing this with a person - even my spouse! - pretty effectively shows how little it occurs to me to interact with other people directly. o_0

And there are so many more things that I won't list here because I could just go on and on. And like, sure, some of this may certainly overlap with ADHD but my point is that I have enough to point to ASD that it doesn't feel like having a "hint" of autism. And who knows - maybe it is mostly just ADHD and CPTSD stuff interacting in weird ways. Could be!

But just because I can make small talk and make eye contact and do the "normal" shit and I can interact "normally" doesn't mean I LIKE it. I had to LEARN to do those things to avoid having bad social interactions. When I'm by myself or with my spouse, I behave very differently than I do around anyone else. ANYONE. It's not just slightly changing my behavior depending on who I'm with - it's completely suppressing how I naturally would do things if left to my own devices.

Like, the things we recommended to our autistic students who wanted to know how to interact in ways that would help them blend in/be accepted by others ARE THE EXACT THINGS I ALREADY DO. Like, it did not occur to me at the time that neurotypicals literally do not have to think about doing those things. I thought, ah, these students just need to be told what the tricks are. Other people figure these tricks out on their own. It did not occur to me that other people, in fact, do not learn these tricks because they naturally do that behavior. They do not have to actively think about learning the trick, period. I literally thought other people also have to think as hard as I do about interactions. Evidently not.

So yeah, I'm feeling a little upset about the reaction I got from him because I'm like.... honestly, a diagnosis of ASD wouldn't change a lot about how I do things or think of things. But it would make me feel better about interacting with and participating in autism-related stuff if I am actually autistic. I realize I can use the resources and supports meant for ASD regardless, and for formal supports anything I can access due to my ADHD diagnosis likely covers anything I'd need for ASD. But having a diagnosis opens up more community. Right now I'm like yeah I'm ADHD but I totally relate to this ASD content. But I'm not going to interact much because I feel like I don't have the right to join in since idk if I do have ASD.

idk I have a lot of feelings. I had a bad email about the trans insurance coverage thing yesterday and I'm not in a great headspace, but finding out me and my spouse both scored very high on the autism screening stuff was honestly a high point because we ended up sharing a lot of how we view and interact with the world that was very eye-opening about why we interact the way we do, how we relate to others (and how other people think we're weird for how we relate to others), and just...everything. And having someone be skeptical after I've spent a lot of time trying to convince myself that I DON'T have ASD only to conclude that at the very least, I should probably be evaluated because I can't reasonably rule it out. Like, most people do not wonder if they have autism. The fact that I am spending this much time looking into it and trying to find examples to disprove it only to find I overwhelmingly can't in virtually every single diagnostic category.... just..... dismissing it outright is kinda hurtful.

Like, I recognize that ADHD symptoms overlap a fair bit, but seriously. My spouse (who definitively does not have ADHD) scored almost identically to me and we vibed on almost everything when we compared answers. We see most things similarly. We have similar areas of confusion about other people and for fundamentally similar reasons. I can't imagine all of the stuff that points to ASD for me is just ADHD in disguise, not when I vibe THAT HARD with someone else. Spouse does not vibe with me on ADHD content. At all. He can appreciate it since he does live with me, after all, and observes whatever's being discussed. But he doesn't vibe with it. He vibes with autism content, though. And I vibe with both.

idk this rant ended in rambling and I'm just going to go listen to Inside on repeat for a couple hours while I try to calm down a bit. o_0

[thaliatimsh]

So I saw your meme about the eucharist monologue, which I loved, but the possibility of George Hodgson being autistic has lived in my head rent free ever since I saw it. It fits his behaviors so well, and to this date has been one of the most galaxy brain takes I have ever seen. I was wondering, if you don't mind of course, explaining your take on it some. I would really appreciate it!

of course! I have to say it is.... mostly just a gut instinct based on my own experiences as an autistic person with variously autistic family members (but all falling under the bracket in ASD that used to be called Asperger’s so my view is coloured by that.) and... UH, I just... feel like I recognise.

(opens UnfinishedHodgsonEssayThree.doc)

okay I am once again REALLY BAD at explaining myself, but I guess what I mean is that I can see where every mental leap Hodgson makes comes from - that he is, at his core, a man who is extroverted and friendly, wants more to be *liked* than admired - but for whom social skills don’t come naturally, and other outcomes aren’t imagined.

We catch him time and again exposition/info dumping -

+’the xing mission came aboard’ from the alternate wardroom cut - an event he was PRESENT FOR but still tells like a rote fact

+’they say she talked up a storm until her father died’

+’the word diet -’

+intro to the Comanches Bit= ‘my mother’s cousin had a relation who married Texas man, moved to a territory town there called Victoria in ‘38′... ALL OF THIS UNNECESSARY PREAMBLE

making poorly-timed/not relateable/barely-relevant/professionally inappropriate jokes

+’now she’s ~~all silence~~” @ random AB

+’they must we waltzing with that bear after all’ re: a crisis

+’[frostbite is worse because] I play the clavier back home’ @ random Marine/ship’s boy/AB re: ‘sir there is a monster out here’

+’hear hear’ about the pudding that used up their fruit

+’when the ship sets sail, make sure you’re aboard’ @ a rando caulker’s mate

+’would that be rocks here, then?’ re: caribou tastes of what it eats

+’[the beard] can’t hurt where we’re going’ @ rando caulker’s mate (??) who’s just shown aSTONISHING disrespect

+’dis-moi ce que tu manges’ @ rando NOT-caulker’s mate-turned-Godkin re: man-eating monster

PLUS a few barely-relevant personal anecdotes told more to himself than anyone else (Comanches bit/American Ham/Eucharist Monologue) - and yeah, Ep8 and The Comanches Bit in particular are what cements my opinion, which, I mean, from the top:

Little & Hodgson charge into the tent and give this absolutely confident rundown of what happened, and then we watch the surety in Hodgson’s entire bearing leave as crozier, fitzjames & blanky take him off-script. He'd known what he was doing, because he'd taken the situation at face value -

'those dastardly natives committed unspeakable acts on lt irving and mr farr! I know so because mr hickey saw it! we retaliated!'

and crozier & fitzjames would finally go 'well done george, quick thinking.'

but they don't! There are other questions! questions he's not prepared for - questions that take processing time, questions he doesn't even seem to understand why they're being asked - he hadn't previously asked them because Mr Hickey Saw Dastardly Natives Cut Lt Irving's Cock And Balls Off - when Crozier says 'I want to see the bodies' and leaves Hodgson behind in the tent, he looks utterly baffled. He's missed something, clearly, but he has no clue what it is.

We know what he's asking Little, and we know it's unfair to even pose the question to another officer - I'm getting the sinking feeling that I've fucked up - did I do the right thing? would YOU have done what I did?

and he'd take ANY ANSWER to ANY of those questions, - you've done something terrible, you're going to hell - you were right, those dastardly natives had it coming - I don't know, but I'd probably have done the same thing - but instead gets Edward Little 'If that's what you thought at the time, then that's what you thought!' it's fucking MEANINGLESS and VAGUE, Edward, listen, do you even understand why I thought what I thought? I know all about Dastardly Natives, they'll kill women and children and they'll kill us too, do you understand, do you understand, are you understanding -

And then he understands, from one bit of seal meat, barely digested - you can almost see it happen in his mind’s eye, moving the little markers of the characters around, slotting the real story back together - he must have been alone with Mr Farr - but no-one’s interested in that. all they want to know is if he’ll confirm it, and of course he will. it’s the truth.

I know it’s very funny to say Hodgson’s bad at his job but until that entire debacle... he really wasn’t. Yes, he let EC in, but the fact that he had even the SLIGHTEST inkling that EC and Hickey weren’t the same, after a single meeting of a few minutes with the first, during which time he spent most of his time writing, a month apart from the previous - I???? All that scene does is show that Hodgson has a near-preternatural memory for faces (he greets Morfin by name before getting his papers) and a non-confrontational manner.

I’ve written at length about how I think Hodgson models the social standings between the men as something like school; Crozier’s Headmaster, and Fitzjames is his teacher, and Edward’s Head Boy, and he is a prefect who is going to keep the separation between student body and staff quiet. He isn’t a Captain - he’s a Lieutenant, a prefect, a fellow student who thinks he’s better than a fellow student because the Headmaster gave him power, and when he ends up with the Rowdy Boys Mutiny Crew there’s this explicit Othering that’s... let’s be real, fully schoolyard Weird-Kid Bullying - you sit on a barrel, you get a nice china plate, you get threatened by Des Voeux because Goodsir won’t cut up the dead guy -

I don’t know. I’m totally aware that this whole thing might sound insane and the problem with Readings of Media is that they're subjective... BUT

The show was careful about how it used the names (& therefore lasting immortal images) of the men on the ship’s roster - they were real people, with loved ones and lives, and they were victims of a disaster. The entire message of the show is that W. H. Auden line: We Must Love Each Other And Die. The only character who did Unforgivably Bad Things was swapped out for an OC out of respect for that, so building some bizarro conspiracy of Personal Evil around a character who seems to just be doing their best, though weirdly - is just plain rude, and insulting to the writing, frankly.

SO, as with every character in this show, it behooves you to give the benefit of the doubt - and the benefit of the doubt leads me to “Hodgson is autistic”

[badaxefamily]

A year ago today, I got news that was devastating to me, but entirely expected. I should elaborate a bit on exactly what WildStar means to me.

Being autistic, my brain latches onto things seemingly at random, and won't let go. They're called special interests, and technically are different from hyperfixations though there are similarities. Though whether the individual is hyperfixated on them or not varies over time, special interests tend to stick around at least in the background all the time and often last one's entire lifetime. I personally have a few special interests, including dragons, Pokemon, and as of the beginning of 2012, WildStar.

Somewhere around there, the last MMO I had played, Phantasy Star Universe, had closed or was about to close (I don't remember exactly) and I was actively searching for a new one for my brother and I to play together. My requirements were strict: No medieval fantasy settings, sci-fi of some variety was required, just like Phantasy Star. Lots of character and style, no excessive violence or sex, just fun. I actually found a site that lists ever sci-fi MMO that exists. Most didn't even make the short list for me, being too close to medieval fantasy, too serious, or too violent. Only one really stood out: a game still in development, the only information available being a cinematic trailer from 2011 and a few early "interviews" with the characters in the trailer. I was absolutely fascinated right from the start. The art style, the story of a ragtag bunch of exiles stumbling across something of galactic historical significance sure to lead to untold adventure, the undertone of a space Western! It was all perfect.

I eagerly sought out ever scrap of info I could. I listened to music tracks that were put on YouTube. The first song I ever heard was "The Rescue Mission", which originally played during a cutscene in the Northern Wilds, when the escaping Exile ship is destroyed. I didn't know that was its purpose at the time though, I just heard the masterful note-slinging of Jeff Kurtenacker. The song still gives me goosebumps to this day. I remember hearing that song for the first time and thinking "this is the one." I even got to play - sort of - in the stress tests. I say "sort of" because the point of those early tests was just to hammer the servers with too many people, which caused pretty much everything to break. I remember in Stress Test 1, only Dominion characters could be made, and some of them weren't finished yet (Chua for example), so I made a male Draken named Jedidiah because there wasn't a name randomizer yet and I was in a silly mood. I wandered around Crimson Isle, unable to really do anything because the lag prevented combat from working, but I was getting to explore! The world was coming alive. In early 2014 I was in the Winter Beta, and loved every moment. I also took my testing job seriously, diligently documenting anything that seemed off. I wanted to help make this work.

I could go on and on. The first time I saw Celestion (another "this is the one" moment), the time the Lolilopp challenge bugged and the hallucinations got stuck visible, the inside jokes, the strange creative processes my characters went through. But then my wrists would be tired from the typing. I have to stop somewhere.

Last summer, after months of no new content being added and uncharacteristic silence on the part of the devs, I and the other "oldbies" were suspecting closure was imminent. The publisher was NCSoft after all, notorious for never keeping a published title around unless it could go independent. I held out hope a bit longer than many, ever the optimist. But eventually I recognized what was happening. I started playing FFXIV, I could barely even log in to WildStar, knowing its fate. After the announcement, and the final farewell in November, even I was surprised by how distraught I was. Hadn't I known this was coming, for months? That was when I really realized that WildStar was a special interest. And that's important for many reasons. Special interests really have to be indulged in. Refraining, or worse, taking one away, is psychologically damaging. And unforgivable sin, a personal attack. And that is why I have such unending vitriol for NCSoft. They took away a special interest, something that has never happened to me in my entire life. No amount of logical thought can shake the instinct-level feeling that I personally was attacked, my joy stripped away by greedy and uncaring strangers. The best I can do is the Thumper rule: if you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all. There are still a few Carbine folks working for NCSoft, and I can't bring myself to say anything positive about what they're doing. The best I can do is remain silent. Other times - when in like company - I can be a bottomless mine of salt.

I don't want to end this post on such a sour note, so I'll relate an anecdote from Winter Beta: In Whitevale there's a quest where you're supposed to help the Pell with a ritual, and one of the things you have to do is interact with an Eldan machine. At one point during testing though, the machine couldn't be activated from the ground. The game would think you were too far away. The temporary solution to this was to climb on top of the machine and activate it from the top! At the time, the two factions couldn't communicate at all, so helping each other required getting creative. At least once or twice, I informed opposite faction players of how to get around this bug by /pointing at the machine, then jumping to the top of the machine and jumping up and down on it. Pantomiming and emoting were frequently used this way, but that instance is the only one I really remember. I just think player ingenuity is interesting like that.

I made friends in WildStar that I still like to pal around with. We’re still sending each other videos and memes on Discord with “Is this (character)?” or “This is H4H”. WildStar will never really be gone to me.

[thoughtsafter8]

Mental Health Awareness

Isn’t May Mental Health Awareness month? I think it is. I’m too lazy to google it. Unfortunately for me, mental health month is every month because *surprise* I suffer from several mental illnesses. I don’t really like to talk about the true depths of these illnesses, however, it’s becoming increasingly more difficult to hide the grittiest details of my poor brain. Just a couple weeks ago I had to leave work because I began to suffer a panic attack induced by exhaustion, dehydration, and a med imbalance that had happened because I did that fun depression thing where I feel good for a minute, so I think I don’t need to follow up with my doctor. Anyway, I thought maybe it would help if I just, you know, put it all out there. Maybe some of you guys feel this way. Maybe I truly am the hot mess I think I am and should be snapped into the looney bin. Either way, I think it may take a load off.

So, again, a little about me (the abridged and most current version). I am a 34 (how in the hell?) year old infant teacher’s assistant, student of early childhood education and intervention, mom, and wife. My son has autism and adhd, my husband has had 3 heart attacks in three years, and my daughter is currently treading the waters of gender/sexuality while coming to terms with her own autistic tendencies and the fact that she is a teenager. I decided at the age of 32 to go to college on a wing and a prayer directly after my husband’s first heart attack and suffering the trauma of losing the home we had lived and raised our family in for 10 years. We were, for a short time, homeless. We currently live in public housing and I couldn’t be more grateful in that regard.

Fortunately, our financial situation began to line out earlier this year as my husband’s long-awaited disability hearing was approved. Nearly 3 years of counting pennies, skipping meals, and taking hand outs later I could go to bed without worrying whether I could stretch those 3 chicken breasts in the fridge across 4 days and dreading the summers because I could not fathom how we were going to feed the kids without the help of their school meals. This was a grand old time for my depression because on top of all the worry and the guilt I had the aforementioned responsibility of working my very first job and pinning down 5 classes each through those first few semesters. And that sort of sets the stage for where we are now.

Below I will discuss my diagnoses individually. Yes, they are separate and yes, they are all interwoven. It’s all complicated to discuss and explain, but I’ll do my best.

Clinical Depression: While I only got this diagnosis about 8 years ago, I am certain that I have suffered from depression my entire life. I’ve had life long self esteem and inferiority issues and difficulty with concentration, focus, and relationships, specifically friendships. I’ve maintained thoughts of unworthiness, worthlessness, and guilt, as if I am a burden on those around me. That I cry too much or am too sensitive. I am quite sensitive. A close friend once told me that I am an empath, but that wasn’t a bad thing. Sometimes I do think it’s a bad thing. I’m hard on myself and will judge myself worse and before anyone else.  This is specifically hard to deal with within my family as I have had to take the mantle of advocate for everyone. I’ve spoken at length of the struggles I face getting help for my kids and my husband, trudging through IEP meetings, and calling out people who use words like “retard” and “fag”. I have been forced so far out of my comfort zone that if I allow the depression even the slightest crack it will flood in. I’ve gotten better at this fight, but I still lose sometimes.

Anxiety: This one hasn’t been with me as long as the depression but started once we began to realize something was up with Gunner. Instead of fully recovering from trauma and moving on I love to internalize it. I think I put on a good face most of the time, but it has gotten so bad that even now, with everything that we have gotten through and managed to come out the other side, I do not trust it. I wake every day, not with a smile, but with a suspicion that today will be the day that everything I’ve worked for will come crashing down. My husband will fall sick again, something will happen to one of the kids at school, I’ll lose my job, have a car wreck on the way there, get a phone call that a loved one died or is sick. This sometimes manifests in OCD type behaviors. For example, I wake several times a night to make sure each member of my family is breathing. I have to see their chests rise and fall at least 5 times. I never let my kids wake Jeremy or come in to the house first after outings because I don’t want them to be the ones who find Jeremy dead. I worry. I worry so, so much. Sometimes I spiral and bite my nails until they bleed. For many years I suffered from dermatilomania, a body focused repetitive behavior aligned with self-harm where you basically pick at your skin or scabs to relieve internal tensions. This should be in a category of its own, but as I currently am not suffering from derma, I’ll let it go.

Imposter Syndrome: This is the newest one. And while it is not an actual diagnosis, I had no clue that there was even a word for the feelings that I began having once I started achieving personal successes. I am killing it at school and will graduate soon with an associate degree and 3 state certifications in early childcare and direction. Soon after I’ll begin pursuing a bachelor’s and managed to score a job in my desired field after just one semester in the program at a highly sought-after day care in my area. These are all good things! Amazing accomplishments some one like me should be proud of and own. It’s not that easy though. I’ve touched on this in a previous post, I think. It’s just so hard to see myself as a productive, professional type person. I bounce between feeling as if I don’t deserve my success and feeling crushing guilt at pursuing something that takes so much of my time away from my family, who still very much need me around. I am aware that a lot of people feel this way but combined with everything else I have going on upstairs, it makes it particularly difficult to overcome.

General Fear: Another not-actual-diagnosis, but something that goes hand in hand with the anxiety section of our tour is fear. Soul draining, insomnia inducing, heart breaking fear. Death is a biggy in this department. I fear for Jeremy, my mom, my grandma. Jeremy’s bad heart, my mom because, well, I don’t know what I would do without my mom, and my grandma because she is dealing with so many health issues. These three are the gates and cornerstone holding up my feeble mental fortress and if one of them is removed, everything will come down with them. I don’t really have any friends, so my family is supremely important and dear to me and I am constantly afraid of losing one of them. I also fear for my kids. The unending questions that come along with a kid/kids with special needs or circumstances. Will either of them ever be truly independent? Will Gunner be able to live alone, get a job, hold relationships, drive a car, get married? Will Daphne discover her truth? And in carrying that truth, will the world treat her with kindness? With her friends accept her decision? Am I prepared to deal with all this, god forbid, alone? The fear of doing *all this* by myself is maddening. I’ve never just been Brittany in my entire adult life. I’ve always been one half of a team. Surviving under different circumstances is something that, for over a decade, I never even contemplated. Now it’s every day life and that is terrifying.

With all this being said, and for those of you who don’t know me very well, this doesn’t mean that I’m sitting here hanging by a thread. I am still productive and love my school and work and family. This is all inside and as things have gotten harder to deal with I have come to the realization that I need the help of a professional. For several years I have relied on the help of different medications (currently I take Wellbutrin, Zoloft, and Vistaril. You can research these if you want) but I think it’s the right time for me to seek additional help. As of today, the referral has been submitted and now we wait. I hope to keep things documented through this blog both as documentation and anecdotes to share and as a means of measuring progress (or lack there of) and I hope some of you might share the journey with me. Thanks for listening/reading 😊