#and i feel like ive lost a lot of the passion i had for everything i used to enjoy. i feel like im trapped. stuck in a low paying job

[kuroakikitsune]

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[padfootagain]

Love in Verses (IV)

Chapter 4 : ‘For he gave all his heart and lost’

Hi, everyone!!! Chapter 4 is here! Lots of angst in these first chapters, but we need to get the plot fully plotting!

I hope you like this series! Tell me what you think!

****

Pairing: Hozier x fem!reader (professor!AU)

Warnings: slow burn, angst, hurt, hurt/comfort, tooth-rotting fluff in later chapters, some scenes in later chapters will have heavy sexual themes even if it’s not explicit nsfw description, so minors here

Summary: Your life seems perfect. You're engaged, your career is thriving as you become an assistant professor at Trinity College, and this Andrew Hozier-Byrne you're sharing an office with seems to be a nice guy you hope to call a friend soon. Life seems to be smiling at you... until everything goes sour. When your fiancé breaks up with you, your perfect world shatters. And when your colleague also gets his heart broken soon after, your shared office seems to be a curse rather than a blessing. But Andrew seems determined to mend your broken hearts... Will things finally go according to plan?

Word Count: 2888

Masterlist for the series – Hozier’s masterlist – Main masterlist

Never Give All the Heart

Never give all the heart, for love Will hardly seem worth thinking of To passionate women if it seem Certain, and they never dream That it fades out from kiss to kiss; For everything that’s lovely is But a brief, dreamy, kind delight. O never give the heart outright, For they, for all smooth lips can say, Have given their hearts up to the play. And who could play it well enough If deaf and dumb and blind with love? He that made this knows all the cost, For he gave all his heart and lost.

W.B. Yeats

You decided to meet in a pub. Frank was staying with his brother for now, you were keeping the flat you used to share. It felt empty without him, filled with blank spaces. Clothes missing in the dresser, a shelf unused in the bathroom, empty spaces on the bookshelves. Every time you looked up while you ate, you expected to see his face and found nothing but a wooden chair instead. And it was killing you slowly, how much you missed him, how much you missed your lives tangled together, sharing space and habits and everything in between.

Frank’s brother’s place wasn’t an option to meet up, and the home he left seemed unfitting, you reckoned that it had witnessed enough farewells already. So, a neutral land it was, a pub you knew but had spent few nights at. Laughter had been shared, along with kisses and drinks, but only a few times, nothing worth crying over.

Only, when you stepped into the pub, easily spotted Frank sitting there, on a chair at a small table with one spot left empty for you opposite him, you could feel the tears rising to your eyes…

It had been two weeks, since Frank had left, and you were still in shock. Reality had started sinking in, you were beginning to understand what it truly meant to lose him. You were beginning to realise that he was truly gone. And what a terrifying thought that was…

He smiled when he saw you approaching, welcoming, like he was genuinely happy to see you. Was he though? Then why did he leave?

You had broken up your engagement, you had to announce the news to your family, had broken down on the phone with them as you did so. You had warned all the people you had invited that this was over, that you and Frank were breaking up, that there would be no wedding, after all. The humiliation was almost as painful as seeing him again. Almost as dreadful as the knowledge that you would not hesitate to take him back, you were hoping to make him change his mind still… that was how desperate you were to get your life back on track, to set it how it should be again.

You said your hellos, you smiled to each other, he seemed emotional to see you as well. You sat down and took off your jacket like you were on autopilot. Something happening outside your own mind, your own chest, your own body. You expected him to tell you about his day, to say something about sport and any of his interests, to order some drinks for you both and to ask you what you wanted to eat tonight after you got home together. Instead, he smiled, asked you if you wanted a drink, and then he looked at you in silence for a moment.

“You look well,” he said, and you congratulated yourself for the efforts you had put in earlier that evening to look somewhat presentable.

“Thanks. You too.”

It was true, he looked surprisingly well, considering he had shattered the last six years merely a couple of weeks ago.

“Thank you for meeting me tonight, it means a lot.”

“Sure, I… I’m glad you called to ask for this. I… I miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

There was so much hope within this stupid, lovesick heart of yours after those words…

You gave him a weak smile, imagined him apologising and asking for forgiveness and begging you to take him back after this crazy mistake of his…

Instead, he asked you about work, you asked him about his day, you chatted for a while, dragging the moment along as if you knew already that things weren’t meant to last anyway, that he was about to break your world again, that you were wrong to hope…

… and eventually, you got to the reason behind his call, to what he wanted to get out of this conversation.

“Look, Y/N… you know you’re important to me. So important… I’m sorry about the wedding. And I’m sorry to have ended things the way I did. I reckon that I should have handled this better, ease you through it better so you wouldn’t hurt so much.”

Every word was a slide from hope to pain, a slope that got steeper and steeper, that pushed you towards the edge of a cliff, to a pit you knew you would fall into because you loved him too much not to.

“I really hope you won’t hate me. I… I know that it was sudden, I know that it might have looked like a shocking decision, and it was, even to me. I really meant to marry you when I proposed, but then, I… I just realised that we weren’t meant for each other. We weren’t meant to spend our entire lives together. And I think that’s okay, really. I still have so much love for you, it’s just… it’s just not strong enough for us to go through with this wedding. Do you understand?”

Slowly, you nodded, trying hard not to cry.

He didn’t love you enough…?

“It’s just… Sometimes, it’s a lot to be with you, to take care of you. It’s not that you’re too much to handle, that’s not what I’m saying. You’re grand, Y/N, you really are. But your career takes a lot of space, you’re moving regularly, and you just… I don’t know. I just want something else, I think. I want… I want someone else.”

He heaved a sigh, rubbing at his forehead like he was the one breaking, like he was the tired one, like it was he who suffered when you struggled not to cry, when you felt the pain of rejection and heartbreak wash over you all over again.

“I still care about you, Y/N. It doesn’t mean that all of my love for you is gone, it only means that… I… I can’t be with you romantically anymore. Do you understand? But I… Y/N, I don’t want you out of my life. I care about you too much, you are too important to me. So, would you… What would you say if I asked for us to remain friends?”

Friends… the word echoed in a mixture of horror, pain and disappointment.

Friends… you should have been about to get married, engaged, in love… and instead he wanted friendship?

It was such a blow to your pride, your self-esteem. But then you thought about it, and a glimmer of hope was alit again, foolish and sickeningly in denial.

But if you remained friends, you would keep in touch, you would keep on seeing him.

And if you remained friends, perhaps you could make him see reason, show him that you were the one he belonged with. You wouldn’t be able to do that if you didn’t talk or see each other.

Friends…

He reached for your hand across the table, sneaking his arm between his drink and yours, hand warm against your cold fingers.

“I don’t want to lose you, Y/N. You’re so important to me. I just… don’t think that it would work out for us if we keep on having a romantic relationship, that’s all. It doesn’t change the fact that I care about you. So much, Y/N…”

You stared at his blue eyes, the blond hair you used to run your fingers through. He was making a mistake, and that was all there was to say about it.

“Okay,” you breathed out, the word escaping without you even noticing its passing of your lips.

He raised a surprised eyebrow, and yet he had a relieved expression painted over his features.

“Really?”

“Yeah, okay. We can still be friends.”

“Oh, Y/N! You can’t imagine how happy I am to hear you say that!”

Happy…

You swallowed back the lump in your throat, forced a smile.

You would make him see reason, he was making a mistake, nothing more…

Things would get back to normal, and you would have your life back. You would have your life back…

She wanted to come over, Andrew wanted to refuse at first. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see his partner, of course he longed for her company. Except, tonight, he was busy. Busy sorting out his thoughts, busy worrying about the sadness that surrounded his colleague, busy worrying about his father, whose medication had been slightly changed, busy trying to write and coming with nothing but a blank page.

It used to be easier, to fill up blank spaces. When he was younger, in his late teens to early twenties, he filled notebooks after notebooks with song lyrics and poems. When Sam and Andrew had met, it was so easy for him to write about love. He was awestruck by her all the time, and he still was, in a way. But then they had grown out of the naïve phase of youth, into proper adults; ones that thought about rent, about food, about taxes, about sacrifices, about laundry and grocery lists and the work to be done the next day. She had turned him down when he had offered for them to move in together, had always refused to speak about marriage. And Andrew tried hard to hide how much her reaction saddened him. It turned off a switch in him, the words were harder to find these days. Growing up, or rather, starting to grow older, that was tough work, tricky work. The kind that left all poetry behind.

He still wrote, the two books he had published were proof, as well as the poems he published regularly in journals. But these days, he couldn’t get a word down, and how was he supposed to communicate and let his feelings out when he struggled so much saying them out loud? Speeches had never been his strong suit, it was through the mask of metaphors, the rhythm of rimes, the cadence of alliterations that he managed to express himself. It was therapeutic, in a way.

But in the past few weeks, Andrew had not written a word. He was too worried for that. There was something off with Sam, and he didn’t know what it could be. It made him anxious. He tiptoed around her a lot these days, worried about what would happen if they started fighting over anything, no matter how small the issue. Perhaps that was why he couldn’t write, he wasn’t sure… No matter the reason, his sudden inability to produce anything even vaguely decent made him spiral into doubts and anxiety. He didn’t need that to second-guess his decisions, to doubt his own worth…

He heaved a sigh, closing his laptop, checking the time. Almost 9 p.m, Sam would soon be there. As if on cue, Elwood barked twice when a knock on the door broke the silence of Andrew’s flat.

She was early, as per usual, when he was always late to everything. It annoyed her to no end.

Andrew went to open the door, welcomed Sam with a forced smile, but she seemed not to notice. She merely hummed a hello, let him kiss her cheek, before walking inside the flat. Elwood approached, unhurried, looked up in hope to be petted. Sam granted him a few scratches, before turning away. The dog merely huffed, and walked over to Andrew, rubbing his side against his human’s leg, looking for the attention he craved for. Andrew granted it to him easily.

“How was your day, baby?” he asked Sam in a sweet tone, but she shrugged, waiting for Andrew to move out of the hallway and into the living room.

“Not much. You?”

“I’m fine, yeah.”

He wanted to talk about his research, and how he wanted to start writing a new article, how he was almost done planning out his class for Yeats’s poetry, how sad you looked still, how worried he was for his family these days. Instead, Sam claimed the conversation, and he didn’t try to fight against it so he could speak again.

“I wanted to talk to you, Andy.”

“Sure, what’s up?” he asked back, standing straighter, quitting Elwood’s petting and following Sam to sit on his sofa.

She seemed nervous, in a way she rarely was around him. He was nervous too now, had a bad feeling about all of this.

“I don’t know how to say this,” she spoke in a weak voice, he reached for her hand to reassure her.

“Straightforwardly,” he answered with a smile.

He pushed back a strand of hair behind his ear, tiredly adjusted his glasses. Slowly, she nodded, took a deep breath before speaking.

“Andy… you know how important you are to me. You’re… you’re the first man I ever truly loved, the first person I could see myself with on the long run. And I care about you, about your happiness… I care so much. And this is very hard for me to do this to you, to us, but…”

She took another deep, slow breath, and Andrew could see the tears in her eyes, the way she struggled to hold them back. He knew what was coming, didn’t want to think it true, but it was.

He knew his world was about to get shattered before she spoke the words he dreaded.

“I’ve been happy with you, genuinely happy. But this… I’m so sorry, Andy, but I think we need to break up.”

Andrew blinked at her, his brain refusing to understand her words, refusing to work now. He forced himself back to the present, forced himself to repeat her words.

Break up…

“What… What do you mean? What do you mean ‘break up’? You… you want us to take a break?”

“No, Andy. I want us to break up. For good. I’m so sorry.”

“But, I… I love you. We’re… we’re good together, we… we belong together.”

“I’m sorry, Andy. But I don’t think that’s true anymore.”

“What triggered this? Did I do something wrong? Are you angry at me? I… I can change for you. I can make things better. I can make you happy, do whatever you want me to do…”

“I’m sorry… there’s nothing to do. It’s not… it’s not you. I just feel like… we’re not on the same page, anymore. We were so young when we got together, we’ve grown into different people. I… I’m sorry.”

“Why now? What happened?”

“Nothing…”

“I know you, Sam. I know you better than anyone. I know you’re lying. What happened? What triggered this?”

“Andy…”

“I don’t want you to leave… we can make things work!”

“We can’t…”

“We can make efforts, we can…”

“I don’t want to, Andy. I’m sorry. I just… I love you, but… not enough, anymore.”

These were the words that made him break, that turned his desperate tone into silence, his begging eyes into teary ones. He started crying.

She didn’t love him anymore…

Not enough…

“But I love you…”

“I’m sorry, Andy.”

He let tears overcome him, drown him into silence. Sam was crying as well, but not as violently.

“Why? Why now?”

“I just… nothing, I just…”

But she fell silent, and Andrew wasn’t a fool.

“Is there someone else?”

She looked away, looking guilty.

This couldn’t be happening…

“We met just about two months ago. I just… I think I’m falling in love with him. And if I can love him, it means I don’t love you the way I should anymore…”

He buried his face in his hands.

This could not be happening…

He refused to ask her if she had been having an affair, Andrew knew he didn’t have the strength to hear her answer.

He was falling; falling into an endless pit and he would die once she would have left with the ground in her care.

They fought after that, he tried to hold her back. And perhaps she didn’t deserve it, but Andrew was in love, and he had thought for years that she was the one, that them, their couple, was the constant element in his life. He fought for her, there was nothing he could do. When she said she would only be happy with someone else, he let her go.

He cried all night, called in sick the next day. He answered your worried email, explaining what had happened in a clear, concise way that left out any detail. You said you were sorry. It didn’t make him feel better at all. In the evening he got so drunk he had no memory left of that night in the morning. For a moment he thought none of this had happened, the pain through his skull was too vivid for that. But then reality came back, and when he hurried to the bathroom to throw up, he wasn’t sure whether he was sick because of the remnants of alcohol in his system or because of the pain of losing her.

When she texted a few days later asking if they could still stay in touch, Andrew was too heartbroken to see the red flags. He answered yes, dreamt of having Sam back in his bed, thought about ways to win her over again, and fell asleep that night out of exhaustion and too many tears.

[killjo-q]

life update ig?

internet and doc says id feel better after around 8 weeks , it has been 3 (going 4 i guess) months and i still feel horrible…. There are times where its more manageable but most of the time its like theres a heavy fog in my mind that i cannot shake no matter what i do. i see old classmates and friends living their best lives rn and lots of them seem so happy, chill and put together and I wonder what im missing?? (is it running??? all of them seem to be runners lol). I remember back in internship days and me and friend would always casually say depressing things because it was the usual for us and other co-interns were like “??? omg are u ok dont say stuff like that” and thats when I realized rly that woah not all college students r burntout and fighting depression djdhh

The feeling has never left me since then though, maybe its all the stress from being forced to do well in a path I never rly liked and the lack of proper sleep that had accumulated and im still feeling it to this day? but damn its been 4 years since then

anyway, today has been worse than usual and i did not know what to do with the thoughts tonight so am writing them down as proof of life since I havent rly been active lately. Im still trying to finish everything I have to draw though, cuz my mind wont let me have a moments peace. I cannot rly enjoy hobbies (i thought it would help) or anything either cuz all of them are tainted by …thoughts.

Will definitely take a LONG break after all this (fr this time) because I can’t find joy in art anymore. Its more of a stressor now than a passion and ive lost that urge to learn and improve. I dont even have the energy to open social media that often anymore

[ladymirdan]

I've had such an amazing day today.

I guess there is no secret that my interest in 40k has waned slightly recently.

I feel I get less and less comments on my posts/fics/art, despite getting a lot more followers (and with that, a lot more unhinged hate DMs) Ive started to feel like the hobby had lost that spark for me.

I've been into Warhammer for a loooong time.

I first got into the hobby (WH Fantasy) in 2003 and I was immediately hooked. I was blown away by how cool the worldbuilding was, but more importantly how friendly the community was.

My FLGS let me, a broke-ass student, sit and paint my army in store for literal hours on end. Always so happy to see me, despite me hardly ever buying anything. And let me tell you, I was a shy and awkward kid, and they always remembered my name and made me feel so welcome.

I haven't really engaged with Warhammer online until about a year and a half ago when I created my ao3 account. At first it seemed just as friendly as my offline experiences. But recently? I feel like I'm either ignored whenever I comment or try to interact with the community or worse, get told I suck or should go kill myself.

So I just felt it was time to maybe leave, (but I admit, the sunk cost makes it difficult) The only thing I really looked forward to was the minipainting classes I take once a week.

But today I got that magick feeling back. And remembered how much I love this hobby.

I went to my local GW for the new 10th edition 40k release. I’m a time pessimist as usual and arrived 1,5h early 😅 and found out there was only one other guy in line before me, but rather soon a bunch of other people showed up.

Everyone was sooo excited to be there and I made a bunch of new friends in line.

Then I got in and ordered my box (and I also managed to snag the special edition signed book that is a tie in with the box! That felt so much fun, I have never managed to get one of those before despite really trying).

I also got some of the new Death Guard Space Marine Heroes packs. A kid behind me in the queue also got some because he wanted a specific hero (that he unfortunately didn't get) I suggested I open my packs and see if I got one and then we could trade. I did get that model, and he was so excited and thankful, it really made my day since I didnt care that much for that particular model, but to him it was everything.

Everyone in the store was so hyped, and the mood was so great I didn't want to leave, so when I overheard some of the guys I hung out with in line ask if there was a mini of the month they could build, I tagged along.

The store staff was as amazing as always and brought out not only the mini of the month, but also three other models they still had in stock from previous months.

So I ended up building 4 minis in the store along with a bunch of other people.

I met a really nice couple that was pretty new to the hobby and they asked if I was excited for the new box because half of it was Ultramarines (I told them I love the Ultra boys, big chock 😅) but I explained that there was nothing Ultramarine specific in the box and one could paint them as any chapter they wanted.

And boy, they were amazed! They had no idea that all space marines are generic models and they were so curious about other chapters and I tried to explain that there was a chapter for pretty much anything and any colour.

The girl ended up really liking the Soul Drinkers and the guy was on the fence between Blood Angels and sticking to Ultramarines :D

So my advice to anyone else that feels like the hobby is toxic, or is tired of the “my army is soo much cooler then yours/everyone who likes this sucks”, please join the real world.

This hobby is soo amazing, and it is filled with so many happy, passionate people, all loving this weird little hobby.

Over 20+ years, a dozen or more game stores/clubs; I have never had a bad IRL experience with Warhammer. I really wish I could say the same thing about the online experience.

[moxtoons]

With that said, I've been meaning to make the post to talk about LHT. So this was the Twitter post I put up about it:

I'm sure a lot of you have figured this out already, or simply forgot about this AU, but after everything that happened last year while I was working on the next pages, I ran out of passion for the comic and lately just CH in general, and now I'm lost on where to go next with my art.

I do, however, have a personal project I started about 2 years ago thats original that I've become more focused on and ive actually been having more fun with it. Unfortunately this means this comic and story will most likely not continue.

if anyone has questions about what was going to happen for closure and story sake im happy to share. 💛 sorry guys, I really thought I had more time and energy to give to this project, but I've slowly run out of passion for it.

Feel free to send asks and ill answer and maybe even share the unfinished WIPs💛

[wishful-seeker]

I will soon be the only person in my close family to not finish college because illness forced me to leave, and thats a strange feeling. Im not sure how i feel about it.

I feel a little alienated because of it, but even though i LOVE learning and i enjoyed college classes, i didn't enjoy college itself.

Even in high school i was the "sick kid" and missed a year there, so feeling like i don't belong isn't new.

But i really thought I'd meet people like me in college, but all i found was snobby rich kids that ignored my existence. I genuinely tried making friends but college students are not my type of people.

I don't know if this is because i wore braces on my knees, or because they could tell i was poor, not sure but college kids always gave me bad vibes.

Im sad that the things im truly passionate about isn't taught in college, and i miss the classes i did have, but i don't think a fancy college was ever my scene. Maybe i would've fit better at a community college. But im probably too disabled to ever find out.

Idk i guess it feels strange because i was heavily encouraged to go to college, and now i can't even if i wanted to. Its weird that i could probably guess the view outsiders have of my life, how they'd feel bad for me, or laugh at what I've become.

And i think of that a lot: how outsiders may view my life. "Oh so sad, look how far she's fallen." Ya know

But im happy

I LIKE my life, sure i got all As and Bs in college, sure i won a writing contest in my class, and yes i also completed a triathlon before all this. So many medals saying "look how hard i worked, look what i accomplished" but when i was accomplishing those trival things i was really lost and alone on the inside, those medals were to convince myself i was better than the years before this one, a lie that i was becoming my best self.

But now all that shit is gone, dead, useless to me. Eventually i was left alone, with NO distractions, only my mind and a body i couldn't move in. Only a bed, in a room, no where else to go. Everything i thought that mattered, everything i connected my worth with, suddenly didn't mean anything anymore, because all that was was my chronic pain, and what i did with it. All that mattered now was fighting for a better life, for freedom from a bed, for freedom within my head.

I had to rebuild myself from nothing, i had to literally rewire my brain. I studied neuroplasticity and my only goal was to train my brain to be able to live with this pain. And i had to change a LOT. I can tell you my mind and the internal dialog in my head is completely different from 2 years ago, and also much a much kinder, and safer place.

So no, i won't finish college, im gonna be poor forever, i wont work, but i am much happier.

I finally feel like the best version of myself. The challenges i face in my life are no longer overwhelming, but a cycle ive grown rather fond of. Im so secure with myself that i can say "this next hardship will be good for me." And i don't think many people have the privilege of being that optimistic when faced with stressful situations.

It would have taken me my whole life to get to this point if i was still focusing on things like grades.

Im happy, and im more proud of myself than when i beat a triathlon, or won art contests.

[nahalism]

Did you ever experience some kind of…almost debilitating anxiety? I’m talking of months or + gnawed and exhausted by fear and both mental and physical sensations that come with it. How did/do you move through it

luv

a long one in advance but lol yh bare times. ill answer ur question, but there's two sides to the route i took and i have 2 preface with everything i did and do is based off of what i feel is right for me at the time. it doesnt mean its right though, and im very aware of that, so ill share some parts, but ultimately each person has is their own experience. the first step to moving through something, is looking for answers so like.. deeper than whatever i have to say, the answer is not in my answer, its in the fact u want answers

anyway. throwback to 6 ish years ago, i was having a breakdown breakthru and i started viewing what i called anxiety, as hyper vigilance. i started to see i was using a way of perceiving reality, along with my ability for analysis, to create correlations between my present, based on my perception of the past, to determine/predict the future (both futile and fallible), not cause i wanted to know what was going to happen, but because i thought keeping account of all possible outcomes gave me control and control would keep me safe and stop me experiencing a version of life i didnt want to go back to (more specifically it stopped me feeling helpless & inconsequential). as i understood that, along with the traumas at the root of my hyper vigilance, and the anxiety (social and general cause they r v separate), i recognised that i wanted control because i wasn't confident i could take charge or respond to reality without immense preparation. on top of that, i was resisting the fact that i was anxious because i was calling the symptoms i was experiencing my anxiety, but the real anxiety was the way i thought, and i was actually addicted to thinking in that way, because even though i hated it, and what it did to my body/nervous system, it was protecting my ego by giving me a false sense of control.

so that was my first step. i began to take action from where i was, as i was. that meant listening to what made me anxious. for example, if a place or person made me anxious, i didnt interact or go. i validated myself and what i was feeling. & i dont mean that in an avoidant sense, ill say why in a second. but yeah i validated what i was feeling, and began to see that the more i gave myself permission to be who i was, and do what i wanted unapologetically, the less direct anxiety id experience. and that sounds like an easy decision to have made in hindsight but usually, the change a persons anxious to make is something that in the moment requires a huge leap of faith but seems inevitable in hindsight. anyway, that's when i really realised that i was anxious because i was living an inauthentic life based on premeditation rather than presence. i had/have concurrent ptsd, so there were a lot of emotions i hadn't felt in a long time without realising, like passion or genuine laughter, happiness, joy, peace. id literally forgotten anything but this autopilot need to protect myself, be there for the people that had been there for me and stay alive. in giving myself permission to be different from who i had been, i started to see the world free from what my past dictated it should be and everything started to open up as as a consequence. side note, id been studying metaphysics and philosophy since 6 form, and i can't underestimate how much the principles i learned there helped me transmute my situation. ive recommended all those books in here before, so u can find them, but yeah . it sounds pretty and idyllic and as essy as 'changing my mind' but it was fucking brutal. i transformed in every sense of the word i lost almost everything in the process. there were wins along the way but 90% of them were silver linings of my own deciding. however, nothing i lost needed to stay! and everything i chose to go through or was subjected to led me to understand me and opened options as to how i could cultivate a beautiful and real inner life that eventually began to bleed out into the 'real' world.

the dark side of that, which is how i reached most of those revelations and insights, is the experiential bit that i can't communicate. i literally put myself through hell, and i can type till my fingers fall of and still never convey the full picture of how what why when, but yh. when i said i listened to my anxiety, i meant that literally. as i said before, i didnt allow myself to be avoidant. so if there was a reason i didnt want to do something, i honoured it, but lets say the only obstacle to me doing something was my anxiety, id force myself to do it, to the point of masochism. literally, i was obsessed. day in day out i was reading on self improvement, i studied every religion, researched philosophers, listened to hour long lectures on youtube, i did everything i could do to understand myself, my mind, life, and how to reprogram what i was experiencing. at the same time as this i used to myself in situations that would trigger panic attacks, or dissociative episodes and find ways to 'function' through it. one that worked very well was smoking weed, sometimes alone, sometimes in bad company. weed gave me severe panic attacks at the time, so when i was on my own, id smoke to induce panic attacks so i could meditate, breathe, draw, write, literally do whatever helped to bring myself through the panic attack. then when i felt capable with that, id smoke in bad company and practice with the pressure of being in front of people and there would be times id b having full blown panic attacks in front of people, sometimes with, but usually without them knowing and the whole time was just training myself to understand or pay attention to my mental patterns, training myself to calm myself down, to reach a zone where i could see through what was triggering me, or at the very least just firm it. and the more i did that, the more i understood why i was dissociating, or collapsing, or having chest pains, hyperventilating all that shit. the more i understood, the more i reeeaaally understood, and then i got to a point where even though the trigger is there lol, it still exists, but when it gets pulled i can hold the explosion. because i feel it happening, i see it happening, but it happens to something within me and not to me now? and so i kind of watch it and love and appreciate it for what learning to temper it taught me. its like a familiar old friend has its quirks that i wouldn't change for the world and yh idk im just rambling i need to go to bed. but basically i stopped being debilitated by anxiety by living in complete debilitation of it until it couldn't debilitate me any more. id be lying if i didnt say it drove me to very dark, lonely, appearance of being semi crazy states of being, but it was worth it and still is.

without the period of isolation the second half of what i described put me through, i couldnt have found realignment cause i wouldnt have seen how incorrect my projection of my past onto the future was, or how to correct it. & deep it, if all u know is death misery lack poverty shortage economic & social insecurity, then all u can see for the future is that. once u open ur eyes and see urself and the world for what is u can start playing. it wasnt easy, and im still not over being anxious. but its not debilitating, just an uneasy emotion. & the way i see it at this point, its just my inner system seeing something what my eyes dont & making me aware. when i listen im redirected, and can find alignment. when i dont it gets worse, and the only way out is to be numb. but i wanna live and i cant live numb. hope i answered, love <3

[scourgefrontiers]

HONESTLY..ive been thinking a lil.

so i started down my path to becoming a professional character designer in 2013, when i designed my very first character who was MEANT to be a character design exercise. i cant exactly remember what prompted me wanting to go into character design--it could have just been that i was passionate about designing characters to the point of where i had looked up if that was a job or not--but it had become such a passion of mine that i would go on to study and practice character design for like 10 years afterward.

in 2018 i started to take this career path more seriously by enrolling in stephen silver's schoolism class, the fundamentals of character design. this was significant for me because stephen was at the time a very recent idol of mine and i admired his abilities--plus this would count as my first "formal" character design learning experience. i didnt feel very good after taking the class; it was critiqued, and i kind of got ripped into lol. but after i recovered, i didnt give up and just worked harder, eventually taking his second class a couple years later. that time i did pretty well and i came out feeling like i was finally ready to apply to jobs in the industry!

unfortunately, erm...the job hunting was not only Not a success, but it only served to kind of kill my passion for character design. every time i applied i was rejected and every critique i asked for gave me something new i had to do differently. one critique in particular hurt me a lot and killed my passion for art overall (obviously not completely, i have the art autism so i could never fully fall out of love for it lol). it got to the point where last year (2023) i made the decision to give up on character design as a career and just do commissions full time.

dont get me wrong, i am very happy doing commissions as my full time job!!! i love drawing people's blorbos :]...but also, its a very inconsistent income, and theres been a couple months where i couldnt make rent without help, and that doesnt feel good at all.

so ive been thinking. i dont rly wanna go back to the industry--it still feels bad to me and right now it seems as though the industry is not in a great environmental situation anyway, so i dont wanna even attempt to try getting a job there again. however........i was honestly reconsidering if i had actually lost the passion for character design because it just genuinely wasnt my true passion, or if i had only lost it because the industry killed it. and i think the conclusion i came to was that yeah it was the industry's fault that made me fall out of love with it because it made me feel like i was doing everything wrong and nobody would like my design style.

so now my thought is like...maybe i dont HAVE to work in the industry to be a professional character designer? sure itd be AMAZING for my work to be on like. cartoon network or something. but i dont think i Have to work at a studio to be happy in that career path?? like..idk. maybe i can be a freelancer or something. if an industry opportunity shows itself i dont think i'll decline, but i wont actively seek them out anymore.

its just that i feel like ive put too much work and time and money and effort and passion into character design yknow? i dont feel right anymore just letting the industry kill that passion. i wanna reignite it and use the knowledge and skills ive gained over the 10 years ive been working at it to make a good living for myself. yeah itd be great to get guild pay lol, but if i can just...figure out how to do freelance character design work, then i think it can be just as good and fulfilling

sorry for the long post i just needed to air some thoughts out as usual <33 i guess this does show that character design still is my passion LOL i talked so fucking much about it after all. if u have any thoughts to share feel free i guess

[another-trans-puppygirl]

I have been out for 4 years and never gave myself the space to express myself properly so i am making it for myself today

(first vent post so apologies for messiness lol)

tw// r*pe, transphobia, parental trauma, not sure what else but idk its heavy for me so just heads up

since i came out my life has changed insurmountably and it has all been terribly overwhelming. ive never really been one to use social media aside from horrifically embarrassing teenage shitposting, so ive just sort of let it all mount up and carried it around. i have a couple of transmasc house mates who i am terribly grateful for and consider them to be family but it has ultimately been terribly lonely not being aroud or talking to other transfems.

i will almost definitely talk about it in more detail on here at some point, but to keep things simple for now, i had very little control over how i came out to my family. it just sort of got revealed to my mum who insisted that my dad and brother (who didn't live with me, messy divorce) would never accept me and otherwise she was very unreactive initially. she feigned support whilst keeping it a secret from everyone in our immediate family but told lots of her friends for about 3 months but had expressed very negative views of trans women before so it felt very false to me. in january 2021 she decided she didnt support my "decision", as well as shouting at me for not telling her i had been r*ped and blamed everything on my dad. i didnt feel safe in her house anymore, so even though it was the middle of a covid-19 lockdown in the uk i had to take all of my belongings with me across almost the whole of england to get myself back to my uni campus. it was easily the worst day of my life and the hardest thing i ever had to do and i havent spoken to her since. i broke my collar bone as a young teenager and carrying all my stuff like that has made it hurt all the time, and i find it so hard not to think about it all whenever the pain is really bad. i was at university for animation, something i had always wanted to do my entire life. i could not bring myself to go to classes for the entire year so i deferred to the next. then i still couldnt bring myself to come in for most of the year. for some reason they didnt kick me out despite my attendance so i tried again the second year, and it went better but i was still really disappointed in myself. in my third year, things got complicated. i started to try really hard and believe i might be getting somewhere. i was the only person in my whole course that was doing traditional animation, my course was advertised as supporting traditional animation but i was not given a tutor so i was totally alone to try and fit my assignments to my limited skillset and resources. i had some ideas for projects i was really passionate about and started to develop and then it happened again and i got overwhelmed and decided i really couldnt do it anymore so i stopped going entirely. during this time i have also wrestled with the fact that i knew deep down that i am a lesbian. recently i have given up fighting it and have accepted that i am a lesbian, i think being on estrogen for one month as of today has played a big part in that, as it has rekindled my emotions and i just cannot fight that feeling anymore. but it has also brought on a terrible loneliness that i think i was suppressing beforehand too, and it has just made me feel incredibly lost. i am really happy somewhere in there about it, but it is overshadowed by a terrible sadness that i have let myself hide away this whole time. it has filled my heart to the brim with love and i feel like i have nowhere to put it and i just want to scream. i have been so scared to say any of this anywhere to anyone for fear of burdening people but i cant keep it inside anymore so i want to shout about it here because i have nowhere else to do it. so if youre reading this i am sorry for taking your time, just know it means the world that anyone even knows any of this and that bending your hypothetical ear will hopefully ease the load even if just for a moment.

[uter-us]

So, this is going to be long but I have a couple of questions and you are so eloquent Ive been waiting to find a radblr as level headed to come to abt this. Essentially in the more recent past I engaged with sex and sexual content for for lack of better explanation just sexual issues from childhood and whatnot and I have been trying so incredibly hard to disengage from anything like those bdsm type situations and relationships. I stopped watching porn, even softcore gif type of stuff and I completely stopped shaving a little over a year ago to distance myself entirely from the sort of young girl fetish. But, no matter what I say or how logical I phrase it (or having actually experienced this dynamic with a man) my friends seem to think things like CNC and other bdsm kinks are okay and help people cope. Which I also thought until I acted on it with men and I realized I was dealing with very sick people who got off on my fear and pain and WILL violate trust in small ways until they're too big to ignore. And what can you do but endure what you've been begging for and participating in? I try and negate the blame because I was young (and sidenote: from the age of 11 or so constantly seeing porn and anime hentai and just weird sexual things so easy to find I feel like I almost never had a chance with my predispositions, but still I chose to engage and so many positivity posts for like ddlg and shit like that were EVERYWHERE when I was a teen, most girls I knew saying they are making OFs as soon as they graduate and just no escape of sex in that way) and inexperienced and a heavy alcoholic along with experimenting with drugs for the first time in my life but I'm still sickened by myself. And the worst part was that I did chose it, and sometimes wanted to go farther than I could handle just out of my own intense self destructiveness and trying to awaken memories I had locked away as a sort of control over my mind but all I did was have new memories to lock away and three years of finding myself and fighting so hard to stop drinking about it. I just want to get through to them so they don't go through the same hurt that I did, especially because a friend I'm thinking of specifically went through much more horrific sexual traumas than I and I don't want her to be lost in it a new kind. Do you have any suggestions? Or even articles or reading that I could show her? I try to pepper in screenshots of radfem posts I see acknowledging it but she is very very Barbie movie liberal feminist. Idk. I just don't want her to go through the guilt and the shame and the horror anew after what she's been through after I did and i don't want her to think I'm attacking her because I know I sometimes come across as aggressive when I'm feeling passionate. I'm just so frustrated and I feel like when I make a very valid point trying to be as neutral emotionally as I can it always comes back to "people can cope however they want" and I know this is kinda repetitive lol but like yeah they can. But you're digging your own emotional grave and I know because I've done that already!!! I feel like a crazed hag yelling on top of a soap box on the roadside when I just want these young women to understand that you don't gain power by throwing yours in the toilet!!!

Thank u reading if u take the time I know this is kind of heavy but I would really appreciate feedback if u feel up to it 💛

hey I'm glad you reached out. everything you said sounds and is incredibly distressing. I can empathize with a lot of what you said; I think we've had similar experiences, and also have similar fears for our friends. you're a really kind person to want to look our for your friends, and I'd definitely like to be able to help you as best i can. I want to preface this though by (and I'm sure you've heard this before but I'll never stop saying it!!) you're not to blame, and you should never feel "sickened by yourself" :( these types of things are awful and complicated, but the fault here is never yours. ♡

suggestions on explaining

sometimes it's easier to instead of sending your friends all of the links, to maybe space it out a bit and (in whatever words you'd use,) be like "hey look what I've been reading" and maybe send the link, and (something I've done is) take maybe 1-2 screenshots of the most important parts of the article, and then also use a highlight tool to mark out 1-3 phrases from each screenshot. ideally, they'd just read the full article (and depending on how your friends are they might!) but at least this way you can ensure they won't zone out on really integral parts, and/or this way they can read the integral parts twice yk? this is j a suggestion on how to give the information, but you can give it however is best for your friends to get it!

i also understand that you've had these experiences, and I don't know if it was hard or easy to come to terms w the reality of bdsm/ddlg/cnc/etc, but for some people its especially difficult. i dont know if your friends have engaged in these things (or if youre aware they have), but "sex positivity" and "don't kink shame" is (as I'm sure you're well aware!) such a huge part of libfem ideology :/ it sucks because that makes it very hard to unlearn. and so, if any of these people you're talking to have had these types of experiences, that could make bdsm-related stuff even harder to unlearn only because (I'm referencing the one specific friend u were talking abt), if she's set on it being a "coping mechanism," it might be like that for her (or she's thinking/justifying trying it in the future). (if that doesn't apply to her, then anyone else you discuss this w it might apply to ! at least this is how it goes ime so it depends).

additionally, depending on how libfem they are, it honestly might serve both of yall better to refer to all of this w unisex words/pronouns, only cuz if your number one goal is their safety regarding this type of thing, i think the fact that the dominant/aggressive role or cnc perpetrator is mostly male, and that the submissive/subservient role or cnc victim is generally female, is a seperate conversation. they might be more open to it that way, but use your best judgement! (once they better understand, a follow up topic could be about why the same group of majority rapists irl (aka males) is the same group of majority cnc rapists in fantasies (aka males), but thats typically a seperate conversation)

OF/porn part

okay so first to tackle the OF part. i know it was brief, but here are j some links j incase + some bdsm stuff but specific to porn

OnlyFans Is Not a Safe Platform for ‘Sex Work.’ It’s a Pimp.

OnlyFans is an experiment in mass grooming

OnlyFans is sex work and pornography — stop calling it ‘empowering’

OnlyFans is just another pimp-led pyramid scheme

"ethical" porn / trafficking personal experience (the "Consider Before Consuming" series is very informative, but a lot is graphic so be prepared)

Ex-Porn Performer Describes What BDSM and Abuse Porn Is Really Like

How Porn Played a Role In My Childhood Sexual Abuse || Barbi’s Story

Jessica's Story: My Life As A Porn Star

What Led Me Into the Mainstream Porn Industry || Alia’s Story

bdsm - suggestions for explaining

now for the bdsm stuff. so for starters, something i hear 24/7 abt ddlg/cnc/etc related stuff is "its just a fantasy!" and i think an easy work around for that is j conceding that its a fantasy, and referring to them as "fantasies." i see a lot of feminists focus (imo) too much time trying to prove they arent just fantasies (and i get that in some scenarios which i will get to in a minute), but generally its just irrelevant. if someone was fantasizing about killing people, we would ofc be concerned. EVEN if that person never went on to kill anyone, it should STILL be of concern (including if they were getting aroused by the violence!). similarly to if someone was fantasizing about having sex w a daughter/kid figure or raping someone, we should be concerned. like if im against people pretending to rape others, and someone says "its just a fantasy," that is a worthless statement because i am literally against that too. i am anti rape fantasy too yk?

also if calling them "fantasies" doesn't feel right, you could also call them "situations they enact" or "situations they pretend to do," and you can even tag on at the end a "that they get aroused from." Depending on the context though, "fantasies" might actually do a disservice in that the term usually implies its just in the persons head, as opposed to something they are actively pretending to do to/with someone.

choking / strangulation

so for example, this work around goes out the window when the "fantasies" arent roles being played, and are instead actions like (the unfortunately common) "choking" or "breathplay" aka strangulation. it would be ridiculous to call this a fantasy or pretend when someone is legitimately blocking your airway and blood to your brain. "we cant consent to this" is a UK based group that (i believe?) started in opposition to the rough sex defense. i like this website because they have ample anecdotes (which the personal aspect can be more convincing for some), as well as actual information and statistics which shows the patterns of abuse. (theres more pages worth reading than j those 2 fyi!!)

this is actually another suggestion for explaining, but (especially for choking) its SO normalized that one of your friends might have even tried it on someone else, or (whats more likely still) one of their partners (specifcally bfs) could have done it to them. im saying this because its important that however you say it, its probably in yalls best interest to make it less of a moral judgement, and more like a "some people dont know this -- even the ones doing it -- but choking is actually dangerous!". if shes had a previous bf who she loved or even just liked, i imagine it would feel so hurtful so hear that what he's done is misogynistic or sadistic. i think something important ive had to learn and apply in my own life is gauging when to be more heavy on the feminist part, and when to be more heavy on the safety part, yk? like i remind myself when i have these conversations irl that some if not most of the time, my goal is to make sure the woman/girl understands why its unsafe and not necessarily why its sexist. (obviously use your best judgement on your friends because for some it IS best to talk abt the misogyny too! it just depends ofc)

CNC and DDLG

okay next. the way this woman explains cnc is well done. i think for cnc, ddlg, or other bdsm related stuff, it makes it easier for some to understand when they focus less on the person playing the victim or child, and shine the light instead on the person playing the rapist or pedo/adult or aggressor. its a real dillema that i think is best explained by this quote that ive been trying SO hard to find but i will paraphrase (and if anyone can lemme know if they know it that would be amazing), but its something like "What pro-BDSM activists require is the idea that there are thousands of men who care deeply about the issues of rape, sexual assault, pedophilia, and physical abuse, and also at the same time are aroused by it." Again i dont remember the quote exactly, but its that same sentiment. and its very true! it also forces you to ask, "why does my boyfriend get hard when i pretend to cry?" or "why does he get turned on when I say 'no'?" i think that even if you are pro- "people can cope how they want," you're still left with the scary realization that the life-long traumatic experiences of victims of DV/SA/CSA could just as easily be fantasies for others, and not just fantasies, but fantasies AS THE ABUSER.

things abusers say to intimidate, or things generally violent people say can and are the exact things people say in BDSM spaces. things victims say to escape (or don't say, like w kinks related to passing out or drugged women), or the actions both abusers and victims do, are also used in those BDSM spaces. its worth noting too that like, where are the these ideas coming from? where are they getting their material for fantasies? its sadly a collection of real experiences. sometimes w "twists," but rooted in real violence nonetheless. what came first, a rape kink or rape? the kink came from the arousal to rape. so what does it say about those two groups (cnc perpetrators and rapists) that they both do similar things, say similar things, and get off to similar things? it says something really scary and concerning, ill tell ya that. (plus they don't even have to say its the SAME thing, but the fact that its so similar isn't enough?)

additionally, where do DDLG ppl get the material/words/phrasing/etc for their fantasies? it comes from imitating children and parent conversation, and then pedo dynamics. they are aroused by pretending to talk to and then have sex w a child. the fantasy isnt something that could never happen; they are getting their fantasies from real people's experiences whether they realize it or not.

for example, i got this anonymous message like 2 weeks ago:

someone could have read that to me and told me it was someone into cnc and degredation or something, and how could i not believe it? if i had to determine if this was either a threat, or a line in someones "healthy" sex life, how would I know? despite the fact that one example of these exact words is used for aggression/malice, its scary that it could just as easily be used for arousal! both people are gaining something (power, control, arousal, pleasure) from the statement, so why would i not question ANYONE who is gaining something from that statement, EVEN when consensual.

i also think, kind of going back to the part about where cnc/ddlg/bdsm people's material is sourced (aka rooted in real rape fantasies, sometimes with "twists" or whatever but the root of it is arousal to rape), something really upsetting and sad is the fact that (for example) if someone is aroused by their gf pretending to cry and fight back in bed, if/when the bf is out and about, chances are at least at SOME POINT in his life, he will encounter a woman who was raped. and so this woman, vulnerable and retelling a moment of distress and trauma, describing her rape (or CSA or DV or torture or other experience) could and has described probably thousands of fantasies, some of which he could have participated in. people forget what a strong conditioning tool an orgasm is. do you think kinky sex with his gf wont even cross his mind, like it wont even occur to him that theyve played through this same event? sadly, of course it will. his brain has been conditioned to associate those descriptions/images/etc with sexual pleasure. thats another reason i can never get behind pro-bdsm stuff (like deny the facts now that im aware of them) cuz the stuff the abuser is imagining/pretending/etc has happened, is currently happening, and will continue to actually happen to hundreds of millions of people.

i also want to talk about your friend saying "people can cope how they want to." i think that response is misguided. id love to know where this originated because it seems so contradicting to the types of people who do say this (ime). cuz like ive seen a lot of libfems talk about mental health problems and addiction, and they are great at recognizing that sometimes things that make you feel good temporarily (like substance abuse, self harm, eating disorders), hurt you in the long run. and notice how the things i listed are also coping mechanisms? like yes people CAN cope how they want to, but we shouldnt encourage or even normalize self-destructive behavior (like the compromising and vulnerable and violent and painful scenes and roles in BDSM). imagine if someone was previously an alcoholic and is now sharing why that was so harmful for them. if someone replied "people can cope how they want to," yea thats a true statement, but that doesnt mean anything to what the person is expressing. they are saying they DID choose to cope how they wanted to, and now they are sharing how harmful that was in order to prevent others from making that same mistake

futhermore, my second point to that "let people cope how they want to" statement, would be the implication that statement suggests. the basis of the statement says that yes, there are people who engage in bdsm-related sex in order to cope with that trauma. but that implies there is also a group of people who take advantage of that in order to get aroused!

(this MIGHT be a time when its worth recognizing the sexist patterns. since female ppl make up the majority of victims of SA, and also the majority of submissive roles in bdsm, and additionally that males make up the majority of perpetrators of SA, and also the majority of dominant roles in bdsm, this could help solidify your case that patterns show what group is most likely to want that dominance/control, and who to get it from. although w this, im sure your friend might bring up "femdom" or dominatrix stuff, and you can look to this short post but if you want further explanation feel free to dm or send another ask, but regardless, thats the minority when it comes to d/s dynamics (hence why its specified its FEMdom, because the standard "dom" doesnt need to tell us its for males, but femdom needs to specify its a woman this time.))

lastly, the WDI is a generally great resource (videos like this one and this one) however I don't suggest at all sharing it w libfem friends cuz (like in both those videos) they include gender critical statements

anyway, hopefully this explanation is helpful, and i hope it goes well with your friend. i appreciate your patience as this took me a few days to get to and finish. i know i didnt cover every base, and theres a lot to be said about this topic, but i hope i sent you in the right direction.

i genuinly am hoping the best for you and your friends. you're a kind person, and I'm glad you were able to reach out. and I'm glad you're cultivating a porn and bdsm -free life! ♡ feel free to dm me anytime.

take sm care and be so safe

[carmenpeach]

ive said it lots before but i feel its good to talk about on my little blog but its just so weird to me how badly antipsychotics affected me and how long it lasted even after i quit them. on one hand i thought "well i can try it and if i dont like it i can quit and go back to how i was" but i didnt know it would take almost a year to be myself again, and not just in the terms of being insane. i felt like i lost my passion, drawing had little interest in me and it was so hard to draw, i struggled to get out doodles, so much of my sketchbook is half of a simplified face or just odd proportions or weird lines. like back until november 2022 and prior i felt top of my game, i was filling sketchbooks and happy with almost all my drawings and i feel i was as skilled as i needed/ wanted to be, but it was a hard downhill and im still working on getting to that level again. but moreso i lost my passion for everything else too, like i felt detached from my special interests, i hardly played any video games too.

like sure i wasnt paranoid or filled with dread every time it was silent or i was alone for more than 30 seconds and i wasnt hallucinating and my nightmares and insomnia calmed down and i wasnt having panic attacks every day and wasnt constantly angry, but what did it matter if i felt detached from it all. i always thought i didnt want to live like that but i didnt know what it was like to live without it and its weird and i hated it. i remember the exact moment too when it hit too. i think i was just changing my clothes and suddenly this clarity washed over me, and it was so weird and confusing. one way ive always somewhat described my schizophrenia was this feeling, like another me inside of me, right in my spine and the base of my head, right behind me and always there, and i could never figure out the emotion that came from her (not sure why but i/ we used she/ it for her) but it felt something akin to malicious, like in a way it hated me in a way and wanted to be the front center one, like sometimes i could feel it dragging at me like it would win. and so recently a lot of my symptoms have returned but that one still isnt back yet but since ive been slowly regaining my other symptoms im sure itll follow suit. and so this last year ive been in this panic over this, since that was always a part of me as long as i can remember, this other me. and to have that ripped away i feel like an empty person. she was literally half of me and its lonely now. like i know this is a silly way to say it and i sound like a cartoon character, but its kinda quiet up there. but i hate it. so ive spent this last year feeling like my identitiy as a person was just washed away and suddenly i was a new person in a way, and just being so scared ill never be who i was again. i even spent a good chunk of time trying to trigger psychotic episodes but to no avail. all that to say is, im almost myself again and i dont feel so miserible being different now that im getting back to how i was, and im not worried this other half wont return since now i know it will

[turbulentscrawl]

Hello there! I hope you’re doing well! I love your writing your are literally sustaining the entire idv fandom rn skcbsnsnd. I would like to request a match-up!

My name is Nico and I am a 21 year old female (she/her maybe they if i’m feeling spunky) bisexy (bisexual). ehmmmm. Idk what to say already LOL. uh I believe i am infp and 4w5 I am a scorpio rising and sun and capricorn moon. I personally think that my duality is silly, weird, kinda naive tbh, cute, chill, friendly, maybe a bit talkative? but im also very introspective, melancholic, wise, quiet, perceptive, thoughtful. i can be quiet insecure/self-deprecating/self-critical, i have a hard time being vulnurable and usually help others without allowing myself to be helped. i’m stubborn in that way and like to be independent and tough even though i crave being cared for lol. i am very passionate and empathetic and i have very strong intuition although i tend to ignore it in favor of “logic” and my attempts to feel in control. i am ambitious and always come up with grand ideas in my head and hyperfixate on them and ultimately become disappointed when i can’t bring it to fruition because it’s too ambitious. however that has also made me resourceful because i will find work arounds to make my ideas possible, even if it’s not how i originally planned.

i am a sort of solitary creature, and i know how to be my own best friend and to enjoy my own company, not having grown up with lots of friends. i didn’t used to go out much and i used to think i was very quiet and unsociable but after going out a bit more i have discovered that i can actually be a bit of a social butterfly, and it comes more naturally than i previously thought, although it makes sense considering i could talk to anyone and was a great leader/public speaker as a child. (and then anxiety/depression hit and i retreated into a shell as a teen.)

I used to say my favourite colour was green because I really like it, but then I thought it was grey because that is the colour i perceive myself as. but lately i have began thinking it might be red as that is what i have always been drawn to, regardless of what i think. idk why but it felt important to mention that.

anywhoo. my hobbies are playing any and all video games, watching horror movies, playing board games/card games, doing puzzles/puzzle books (crosswords, sudoku, word search), playing piano, singing. i love antiques and i love buying them because they are practical and beautiful and often much sturdier and long lasting than more modern things (they just ain’t built to last anymore) and i believe that they have so much character and soul and it’s tragic that there is a lost art in craftsmanship of furniture and clothing and like. shoes! and pens and clocks and everything! so i like to give those old beauties a new home where i can actually USE them as well as admire them.

i also love singing i have been told im good at singing but honestly i think im only mediocre. i sing in choir and i would honestly love to be an opera singer haha even though that might seem silly. i would love to be in a band too and i genuinely have been attempting to pursue that. oh i also study biochemistry in university i am suffering but it is interesting and i have always had an innate curiosity about things. i was a very dark but bright and curious child. i was fascinated by death and other things as a kid, but i never found it morbid it was just interesting to me.

i love science and random fun facts but i also love tarot and astrology (even though i barely know anything about it) and i am interested occultism and metaphysics and would love to know more about it because i don’t believe science and “magic” kind of stuff is mutually exclusive.

i feel like i am writing too much but you said write a lot so 😭 i enjoy talking abt myself as im sure most people do but i always feel bad for it lol. uhmm i do like writing and i used to do it a lot but ive been struggling with it lately. i also love lots of different types of “aesthetics” i suppose, such as dark academia/victoria /gothic/antique but also cottage core/witchy/nature/kinda hippy forest lady but also grunge/punk/garage rock/seattle in the 90s but also 70s and 80s style but also 2000s but i also sometimes enjoy modern fashion. idk im a real mixed bag but i love it i mean there are just so many things to love in the world. i am a very sleepy gal too i mean some people wake up early to be a hater but i wake up early so i can have time to go back to sleep.

i cant really think of much else. it’s hard to perceive yourself ya know, but hopefully there is enough information there for you and i sincerely apologise if it is too much!! thank you very much for your consideration and i hope you truly have a wonderful day. sending you good vibes full of love mwuah <333333 :3

oh i also really love sharks and foxes and bears and bats and squids. and cats. and silly little shrimps and trilobytes. and pterodactyls. OK WNOUGH-

-------

Yes I love lots and lots of info 👀

I ship you with Fiona Gilman!

-From how you write and what you’ve described, I’m getting a sense that you strive for a strong identity, but both struggle with and respect the complexity of trying to achieve that. Due to the nature of her worship, Fiona finds it attractive when people accept the intricacies of life. Things are rarely easy to pin down, life is fluid, people included, and she thinks it takes great wisdom to understand that.

-She shares your curiosity for life and the universe, and since your expertise seem to be so different, teaching one another is a great excuse to spend time together. ;) Unfortunately, there are some things in relation to the occult and her worship that she simply cannot share. It’s for your safety, as much as she trusts your ability to comprehend things that would break others…better safe than sorry.

-Fiona is an ambivert. She’s good with socializing, but she also likes equal time to have quiet time. Since you’re still getting the feel for these things, she’s fine letting you take the lead on going out or staying in. If you need space away from her? That’s fine too, there’s plenty of things she can busy herself with in the meantime.

-She’s both persuasive and a little sneaky, and will take steps to assist you in getting better at accepting help. If she has to, and if your workload is too big, she will go behind your back to help with a few things. Nothing major, partially because she feels bad and partially because she hopes you won’t notice, but she can’t just do nothing when she feels like you’re sinking.

-She’s not much of a nap-taker, but as long as she’s not busy with something she does like to offer you her lap as a pillow.

Runner Up: Grace

[saltyr3mix]

No longer a void

Poem by Me! written in less than 30 minutes because i was sad. i thought tumblr might appreciate it so here!!!!

I say i love you

And at some point i think i did

I cherished your smile

Memorized your intrests

Laughed at your jokes

Teased your brain

Echoed your dreams

And held you close with a passion 

There was a point where you meant the world to me

The center of my solar system

Thats a good metaphor, let me expand it

My entire life ive been warped into diffrent galaxies 

And grown to find joy and beatuy in all of them

Which is why it hurts

You see id speand years and years 

appraciteing and gathering stars

Finding peace and comfort in these systems

And then ill blink and out of my control im somewhere entirely new

And i’ll enjoy it

But always find myself comparing it to the others

Their differences and similarities were intriguing

From the day i first saw you i could tell you were diffrent than the other stars

No you were barly a star at all

You were a sun

The first thing you did was scare of stars that were close enough to harm me

I thanked you

Your warmth was something i never felt before

It was nice compared to the slight chilli had grown used to

I didnt explore much else of that galxy after that

You were far more interesting than whatever it could possibly offer me

It felt you understtood me

And that you were the only things that did

I thought you were another form of life

You protected me and gave me things

I loved you

And then like the 4 times its happend in the past

I blink and awake to a whole new galaxy

Only its diffrent than the others

It’s made of nothing

Just a dark endless cold void that swallows me whole

Not knowing what to do i call out 

I shout and scream hoping someone would hear me

Pleading for someone to realize how lost and afraid i was

No one came

Until i softly muttered your name

And nearly blinding me you flashed before my eyes

Lighting up the void with a fiery spark

And filling my bones with your comforting heat

You were there for me in my darkest moments

Im still not sure how but you were

I felt so small and alone and terrified of everything

But you were there

I clung to you because i didn't want to lose you again

I didn't want to lose anything again

And it was like that

For a long time

Just you and me against the world

We used to say that a lot back then didnt we?

I think

I think you were in a void of sorts too

I think at this time too, us?

We were the only things in the world

Years went by all in a blur

Our relationship grew and grew

It felt like you mattered to me more than myself most days

I think we both shared that thought

And it was just us

But the world is never that small is it?

Things are happening and changing all the time

And so other small stars started to twinkle in the disstance

It was hard to notice them at first but they were there

And then more started to appear

It wasn't fast 

It still took months and years

But they bloomed

And they didnt stop ethier 

More and more kept coming

It felt like the more that showed up the more that followed

Including other suns

Suns that lighted up the area around them

Suns that produced warmth that stuck my core

I no longer feel cold

I can barely see the void

And so i stooped clinging to you

Im not sure if i regret that or not

I got lost in the new array of stars

Appaciting them diffrently than i used to

It took some time but i started going back to my old habits

But the time i got back to you

Next to all the stars and suns i had just seen you looked so dim

It hurts becuase i know you arent

I know that there was a time that in my eyes 

you shone brighter than whatever this system thinks it is

But thats because you were in-front of a void backdrop

I loved you because you saved me

I loved the warmth that you brought

I loved you becasue at the time i couldnt find anywhere else to put my love

But now?

I have a whole healthy support system behind me

I have hobbies and interests and clubs and fandoms

And writeing!  

And so so so many wonderful family and friends

And i have so much love to give to all of them

That i cant love you like i used to

I’ll write you poems and songs

But wont send you the videos of me recording them

I’ll listen to your stories 

but never check out the source material like you ask

I’ll love you

But i cant cling to you anymore

And i kind of hate that

I want so badly to pay you back for all you for me

I want to love and cherish you like you the only thing in the world

But your not anymore

[bisexualcacti]

hi ! i was a huge fan of your robin and eddie fic when it was coming out. like waiting for each upload kinda fan lmao. and yk life got crazy n i dont think i ever ended up reading chapters 9 n 10! but ive thought abt this fic literally multiple times since then and ive even tried to search for it but i could NOT find it for the life of me. and so i scrolled allll the way down through my liked posts just so i could find it and your acc again! lucky me i had forgotten almost everything so i got to reread the whole fic and it was just as amazing as the first time. im a proud woman lover and robins route truly did deliver in every way. i know its been a while since season 4 came out. and i was just wondering if you think another chapter or even an epilogue would ever be in the works? or is it something you feel you kind of lost passion for? which is totally fine! either way im a huge fan of your work and im glad i finally found you again! best wishes :)

this is so sweet omg than you 😭😭😭 the thought of someone remembering my fic and looking for it just so they could reread it again makes me so happy i swear you just made my entire week

i could totally see myself finishing what i started. i thought about this fic and going back to it multiple times. i still remember what i intended for the last chapter to be and everything. i’m just a very lazy person and that combined with the fact that last year i went through some personal issues, dropped my career and just lost some interest in st, it just made me never finish the story. i’m still very fond of it tho, and i think eventually i’ll come back to finish it :) but thank a lot, it’s really nice to know that even if i wrote it mainly for myself, there’s someone out there who loves it just as much as i do 😭💖

[garoumylove]

hi! would you tell about your drawing and writing journeys? how you started, what inspires you, if there were any obstacles etc - everything that you'd like to share! ive seen some of your old arts and can say that you've made a great progress, also some color scemes that you choose for your arts, like red/pink/white are very beautiful ヽ(*・ω・)ﾉ

Ah thank you so much for such a kind ask!! (I'm writing this on my PC so I can't use emojis but just imagine a lot of hearts inserted here!! ^.^)

I'll try to keep this as brief as I can as I don't want to go through my life story and sound self important!

But basically I've been writing since I was pretty young, like middle school. I was lucky to have some amazing English teachers who always encouraged me and praised me! I wrote for English class and just for myself since I was like 12. At first they were just fantasy stories and then as I got into high school it became romance stories and fanfiction (that I never published). I have hundreds of pages worth of writing from my high school years omg! I'd stay up late instead of sleeping writing this stuff haha!

I also wrote some crack LOTR fanfic with a friend in high school and we published it but it got taken down eventually and has been lost to time.

I stopped writing for a while because I got older and life got in the way. Then in 2017 I got very sick with some mysterious neurological thing (and i'm sick again now unfortunately) and to cope I got into anime and manga because it was the only thing that held my attention enough to distract me from a pretty horrible health crisis.

I watched OPM as one of my first animes and then read the manga. I ended up just falling in love with Garou's character. As someone who was bullied by other kids and adults in my life pretty constantly I saw A LOT of myself in him and understood his anger and secret insecurity. I felt so much for him that it pushed me to start writing little romantic drabbles again in my diary. Eventually, someone showed me AO3 and I saw people writing xReader fanfiction which I had not heard of before but I was instantly hooked and decided to try write a silly little smut just for fun, just to try it out. I posted it on AO3 in 2019 and got an overnight very positive response and a couple of people asking me to write more. I was very pleasantly surprised, so I did! And then after a couple of fun smutty xReaders I started to write things that were more emotional, a bit deeper and I became very passionate about it.

We get so little of Garou's life and thoughts and feelings about things outside of his hero hatred and his bullying and insecurity that I wanted to fill in those blanks. I wanted to explore the depths of his mind and character beyond the desire to be a monster. Because of course he is very human and very insecure inside just like many of us. I also wanted to explore that romantic/sexual side of him and his thoughts and feelings about that since that's also a basic and huge human need for most people. So that's where my writing inspiration comes from! I feel very lucky and honoured that so many people have read my fanfics and enjoy this characterisation of Garou I have created.

As for the drawing, well I really loved drawing as a kid but I wasn't very good and it's not something I took too seriously even though I loved doing it. It wasn't until I got into One Punch Man and Garou that I became really passionate about learning how to draw. I wanted to dive into the OPM universe and create, create, create. I wanted to make Garou and other characters come to life through my art (and writing).

The ship I draw (Garou and Eiko) is based on my xReader fanfic "Love/Hate". I just fell in love with my own story so much that I wanted to draw it as well as write! So the two things have come together nicely in that way :)

For my colour schemes...I just really love warm colours, that's all I can say really haha! No matter what I draw I always end up gravitating towards the warm reds. It's like a habit/addiction I guess lol!

My ideas for drawings are a mix of completely my own original ideas and using memes or photos etc as reference when I'm feeling the art block. But I do love drawing Garou, light of my life, my love. I've probably done it over 500 times now =^.^=

I hope I managed to answer your questions! Please let me know if there's anything else and thank you again for your kind words!

[thewolfwarriors]

HTTYD Art Wrap 2022!

tl;dr: I found my passion for drawing again and have been doing a lot of self healing by not only working on my old fan fictions but also posting them. I've fulfilled childhood dreams by doing art I wish I had done 15 years ago when I first started reading HTTYD. Life's too short, dudes, make that wolf fan fiction come true! Here's the art I did in 2022!

ALSO!

YOU GUYS HAVE BEEN SO AWESOME! Ive been in happy tears at least 3 times because y'all are so cool and nice to me. Not just nice but like, playful and funny and cool! I'm so grateful for the attention y'all have been giving my work!

LONG POST OF ART ahoy!

In June, I found my full passion for drawing again! It started off with many small doodles that I've yet to post, because I haven't scanned and colored them in! I have a giant stack of paper of just HTTYD stuff! Fan fiction, head canons, comic strips, tons of stuff!

From the bottom of my heart, thank you everyone who has been liking, reblogging and interacting with me! You've all really helped me gain confidence I didn't realize I needed when it came to posting my work! I'm having so much fun here on tumblr!

My biggest happiness has been bringing these two back together. Snotface Snotlout and Mewgull! Literally one of the first plot devices I made when I first read the books in '07 *joints crack in glee*

I got to draw them as youngin's and adults! This was a huge step for me! Just seeing them like this ALKJFLAJKWER I don't know how to describe the happiness and satisfaction I feel to actually work on their story and to actually VISUALLY SEE THEM!

(Mewgull and Snotlout becoming friends / Snotlout and Mewgull Post War [How/Why He's Alive] )

I got to draw them as youngin's and adults! This was a huge step for me! Just seeing them like this ALKJFLAJKWER I don't know how to describe the happiness and satisfaction I feel to actually work on their story and to actually VISUALLY SEE THEM! I'm certain I had art of them back in the day but I lost nearly everything in 2012! (I was also too shy to post a lot of my fan fic work...as I am today)

Honestly, Gumboil was a huge help in finding my sea legs. He's a simple design and easily adaptable to my style!

I even got an animation out of him!

It didn't start out with Gumboil though! I naturally wanted to start drawing my wolf characters first! It's what I knew how to draw and something was bothering me....MADGUTS WAS A WOLF WARRIOR AND I NEVER DREW HIM YET I HAD HIS DESIGN IN MY HEAD FOR A DECADE! There maybe a 2.0 but this def rocks my socks for now.

LOOK AT EM! LOOK AT THE BIG BOYYY

This is probably one of my favorite pictures I did. I love how it turned out! Sure the story behind the picture is kind of sad [Hint: takes place around Book 10] but it was my first real (in my heart) success at combining traditional and digital mediums! It's when I decided to give everything a "storybook" feel to it.

Anyway, I have tons of sketches and other things I could add to this post but I thought I'd keep it short n sweet, so I stuck to what I only posted on Tumblr! I've only been here since December so it ain't much.

Thanks for all y'alls support <3