#and there’s the psychiatrist who is trying to make me go to a residential setting which sounds like a nightmare

[himalayaan-flowers]

reblogging to continue venting in the tags lol

mental health experts are not a thing

[leaving-anorexia-behind]

17/10/24

Part 2

After not managing afternoon snack, I quickly put my converses on, the things I had laid out and put my letters where staff would see me but not necessarily notice if not looking properly. Everything was set up. Not just the matter of getting off a locked ward. So I went to the lounge and out of sight, when 2 minutes later, a patient came out the lift, I watched her walk away and I quickly nipped into the lift and went down.

I walked into the garden initially but there would have been no way I could climb it without being super obvious. So, went back to the main part when a therapist and patient were walking through. I stayed calm and walked with purpose through, thanking them on my way. The therapist walked back with me and went out the side door so I went out the other way via reception. I walked briskly down the steps round the corn and ran as fast as I could and into the woods, nearly skidding down the hill so quickly but managing to catch myself on a tree.

After 10 minutes of waiting, I sneaked over a fence and onto the road I needed for the station. I had planned to take a train, go to the Tesco nearby for vodka and pepsi max and then walk to local wooded park and do what I need. Only, as I walked down the road and the same therapist came round the corner called out to me, I froze, we spoke for a minute, but the look of sheer concern and fear written on her face kicked in the guilt so, I said sorry and ran around her. The next thing I heard was her shouting my consultants name which really confused me, just after I had got to the other side of the road and went into a sprint.

Only what I didn't see happening was my legs giving out completely and I skidded across the pavement. I was mortified, especially having once being a pretty decent runner! My consultant was by my side in a flash, quickly followed by the therapist running behind me where they managed to keep me on the floor, but I didn't make it easy for them! A few minutes later, the cavalry arrived, the ward manager, deputy, and 3 hca came. The ward manager was took my arm first, followed by the deputy where I shoved into the van and then dragged back on the ward, as I started to break down, the reality I was going to die that day sinking in.

Absolutely fucking mortifying really.

The deputy ward manager started saying a load of crap which wasn't true. How she knew I'd run away, how it was because of the weight gain etc. I was like are you fucking serious?! I had seen the weight gain, not liked it, but the reality was, I believed I soon wouldn't be around anyway, and had been planning it all for almost a month! She really has no idea, but the most frustrating part is she thinks she does and uses her power to make others believe the same.

As soon as the we were back the ward manager put me on level 4 arms reach obs again, but after a difficult dinner we sat and talked. I opened up and I explained about the house-share and how I didn't want to go back there, that the only place I ever felt safe in was my own flat and had been so let down by the previous ED residential placement. She told me she wouldn't give up, that she'd find a way to work with me. I asked if I'd be sent to psych (almost hoping they would so I could lose the weight) but she said no, and they could work with suicidal patients. Pity. As hard as some of her decisions can be, I really respect her and wish she could come to my ward rounds instead of the deputy who has no clue. The ward manager knows me so well, listens but also understands, especially from a ptsd point of view.

She also spoke to my Dad who was calm and managed to get his viewpoint across along with his concerns. Between us, the ward manager understood and is going to try and fight for me to have my own flat, she said she would contact everyone involved in my care; my case managers, psychiatrist and care coordinator. I'm scared to know of their reaction. I just hope they don't think I'm doing this to get my own way, for attention or for some other bullshit reason.

[pawjamas]

hey..i’ve been back from my stay at the residential facility for several days now and A lot happened, which i’m putting under a a readmore bc it’s potentially triggering (warning for mentions of s*xual abuse/gasl*ghting/etc) my life is basically being uprooted, so much happened in the month of June and is currently still happening, which i’ll explain below

i was admitted to the residential facility on June 9th, it seemed super promising, there was an abundance of 4-5 star reviews from patients online. my friend who currently is working in the mental health field researched about the facility and also confirmed that it seemed a lot better than most places are. the first day was kind of rough and i knew getting adjusted would be difficult but could never have expected what happened the following several days to happen. i made friends pretty quickly, my roommate on the first day there was very kind to me, she told me if i ever needed someone to talk to that she’d be there for me, we also shared the fact we were both nonbinary/just a lot of things we had in common so it was comforting to know her on the first day there.

i spoke to my psychiatrist the next day who told me i could get off “close observations” which is why i was in the room i was, the label is basically something you get put on if you’re at risk for s*lf h*rm/etc and need a staff member w/ you at all times. so since i was taken off of that i was switched to a different room with a different roommate. she was a 60 yr old woman who was in the other program offered at the facility (mine was mental health related and hers was for substance abuse/addiction) i didn’t feel too comfortable around her the first night, she complained about every single thing, she never participated in the groups offered at the facility, she told me over and over again how much she hated being here. the next few days were a blur and are still very fuzzy, my mind is still keeping all the memories locked away which has happened to me many times before w/ trauma where everything’s vague and not fully there.

basically, over the course i was roommates w/ this woman she groomed me and manipulated me into doing anything she wanted me to do for her, she physically/s*xually assaulted me multiple times, and caused my mental health to plummet even further than i thought was possible. i eventually did get to switch rooms, and i only recalled (again, vaguely) what happened those nights about a week later and reported it to the staff where half of them treated it like a joke. i went to the hospital the night i reported everything to get examined and ended up calling my mom on my friend’s phone (she drove to the hospital and stayed w/ me the whole time) and my mom was probably the worse to take my trauma/situation out of anyone. she told me i should’ve spoken up sooner, asked why i didn’t defend myself from this woman, basically the whole phone call was her blaming me for not doing anything about my assault. when i hung up my friend even told me that what she said wasn’t okay, and was victim-blaming.

i left the hospital and got back to the facility around 1:00 am, and the following days i spent there i was continuously getting worse because being in the environment my trauma had happened was preventing me from healing, plus i literally had to be in the same rooms as the person who had assaulted me and seeing her was extremely triggering. she continuously would call me crazy and delusional and that i made the entire thing up, i had difficulty telling what was real and what was not because of how bad i was treated by her and the staff. i’m thankful i met some really kind patients there that became my friends, they helped me the most out of anyone there. at one point a nurse had pulled me into a room and told me how i should never have spoken up about my abuse, how i should consider how it makes my abuser feel, and stop talking to the friends i made about it. but i’m glad i had people who would actually listen.

i mentioned it once but again, my mom was probably the worst person to talk to when all this was happening, at one point one evening when phones were available i called her and told her i needed to leave, i wanted to come home because this all of this was affecting me so badly, and she screamed over and over that i can’t come home and i have to stay, that it’s too bad that happened but continuing to do the program was more important. at that point i broke down and cried, begging her to let me come home and she screamed repeatedly for me to shut up and then hung up on me.

after that evening i knew that i wouldn’t be taking any shit from her any longer, i called my friend who lived nearby about her the following day or so, asked if i could stay with her at her apartment, which didn’t end up happening because we both worried my mom being as spiteful as she is would take legal action if i did leave w/ my friend instead of my mom. i ended up talking to a couple of the friends i made there that i was having bad intrusive thoughts, and that evening i was baker acted (involuntarily hospitalized) and transferred to another facility, which could’ve been because of the staff or me being reported for the thoughts i was having, but regardless i was away from my abuser and didn’t have to see her again.

the hospital i stayed at was...a lot worse than the other place, i barely got to speak to the psychiatrist/therapist during my entire time there, people would joke about how little time you got w/ them. they ended up keeping me there longer than the required 72 hrs, which i asked multiple people why and never got an answer, at one point my mom wanted to make sure i was sent back to the residential facility of which i had to explain would be detrimental to me and my health, but as usual when she had her mind set on something she won’t listen to reason or anyone who explains other (more beneficial) options.

i ended up calling my friend that lived back in the town i live in, told her the whole story and what’s been going on, and ultimately asked if i could move in with her because her and her family had already offered to let me. she was more than happy to have me move in, so that’s what i ended up planning on doing when i got discharged, was have her pick me up instead of my mom. and i called my mom to tell her that i’d be moving out, all the reasons why it’d be beneficial to us both, she took it horribly and told me if my friend picks me up i can never ever come home again and that i’m kicked out. i told her that’s fine, even though it hurt so badly when she said it.

finally, the following monday i was discharged, my friend from back home picked me up along w/ her husband, and we made sure to get all my things from the residential facility (my clothes/shampoo/makeup/etc) before heading back to her house, which was about an hour and a half drive home.

so now i’m staying w/ her, i still feel out of place and disoriented and uncomfortable but her and her family have been very welcoming. i’m trying to get all my stuff from my mom’s but it’s been a huge struggle to get anything from her because she loves to overcomplicate anything and then make it seem as if it’s all your doing and she’s the biggest, kindest saint ever to grace your life. my friends and i all think she has undiagnosed/untreated bipolar, and i definitely think she at least needs therapy and meds too but she doesn’t believe in either for herself. i just want my stuff back, and i do miss my room a lot and jazzy but there’s no way i’m getting either back, i’m also worried how my mom is treating jazzy because she hates him and i’ve witnessed first-hand what she’s done to him before.

i might post my p*ypal / v*nmo (censoring bc i think tumblr is weird abt posts that have these keywords or smth) because i don’t have any income rn...thank you if you read all this lmao i still didn’t even cover half of the other stuff i went through at the place i was baker acted but essentially my life has been turned upside down and i’m having to figure out how to keep going despite it all

[sometimesiwriteangst]

Soul Mates Are Forever - 1

Summary: Emile gets odd messages, and his boyfriend and brother get concerned quickly, for good reason,

Note: Deceit is called Desmond in this fic. Yes, for once he has a normal name in a human au of partially mine!

Chapter TW: Kidnapping, stalking, u!Virgil, u!Patton.

AO3 Link

Written with @scenecipriano!

Tag List: @samuel-the-gay @alik-gl

-Present Day-

    Emile was getting fed up with the odd messages. Every time he blocked a number, they returned with a new number. They weren’t threatening, or anything that made him believe he should go to the police. Just sporadic “hi”, “why aren’t you replying”, “are you there?”

    Probably a wrong number. Or some guy who was given a fake number. At first Emile had tried telling him this, but over the last couple of weeks he’d given up. If he just kept blocking and ignoring, surely they’d get the message?

    He sighs as he turns his phone off, silencing the constant dinging that came from the unwanted messages. Emile glances in the full body mirror and runs his fingers through his pink fringe, a nervous tic he developed when he was a teenager. 

    “Emi! Your breakfast is getting cold, stop worrying and get down here!” His boyfriend calls from down in the kitchen. 

    “I’m coming, Roman!” 

    Emile looks into the mirror once more and gives his reflection a reassuring smile, ‘Everything was going to be okay.’ 

    The smell of coffee and eggs fills Emile’s nose when he steps into the kitchen, he chuckles when he sees his boyfriend swaying to the melody of a Disney song that was playing from his phone’s speaker. Emile sneaks up behind the distracted redhead and places his arms around Roman’s waist, earning a squeak from the taller man. 

    “You’re the cutest you know that?” 

    “I do! I actually hold the world title of being the cutest man alive, now you need to sit and eat. You’re not going to work on an empty stomach.” Roman replies as he presses a chaste kiss to the corner of Emile’s mouth. 

    Emile chuckles as he sits down at the table, taking a sip of his coffee as he does. “What would I do without you, Ro?” 

    “Starve, considering you can’t cook.” 

    The young therapist in training rolls his eyes as he scoops a bite of eggs into his mouth. 

    “Wrong, Dee would feed me plenty.” 

    “Until the two of you get into an argument, then you’d have to rely on fast food.” Roman teases as he sits next to Emile with his own plate of food. 

    Emile sticks his tongue out and drinks more of his coffee before shoveling the rest of his eggs into his mouth. He quickly chews and wipes his mouth with a napkin before pressing a kiss to Roman’s cheek. 

    “Speaking of arguments, I’m going to have to take the bus this morning. Apparently calling him a ‘reckless’ driver was insulting.” 

    “Desmond Wickham a reckless driver? Please, going eighty through a residential is his default setting, it’s only reckless if he goes ninety!” Sarcasm drips from Roman’s mouth as he bites into a piece of buttered toast. 

    Emile snorts in amusement and shakes his head, “Of course, but I better go. I’ll text you before I go in.” 

    Roman quickly snatches his boyfriend by the waist, causing Emile to bend down slightly allowing Roman to press a gentle kiss to his forehead. 

    “Be careful, my precious rose, I love you.” 

    “I love you too, prince charming.” 

    Emile adores the way Roman still blushes at the nickname. They’d been dating since High School, with only a short break at college before Emile missed Roman too much and begged for a long distance relationship. And yet the man still got flustered over the nicknames Emile found for him.

    In a way, it was ridiculous, and Emile’s brother would happily say that until the cows came home. But Emile knew Desmond liked Roman really, and more than anything it was sweet. It reminded him of when they first started dating, and everything was new and experimental.

    It was hard not to adore the reminder of how Roman would blush every time they held hands, or squeak at every chaste kiss. They may have grown and become more mature about those things, but the small flusteredness over nicknames remained a soft spot.

    “How did I get so lucky?” Emile asks. 

    Roman’s blush deepens as he buries his face against Emile’s side, causing the pink haired boy to laugh. 

    “You’re such a sap, Emi! Get out of here before I decide to keep you to myself for the day.” 

    Emile chuckles and presses a kiss to Roman’s fiery red hair before stepping out of his boyfriend’s relaxed hold. 

    “I’ll be home around eight-thirty, want me to pick up some pizza for dinner?” 

    Roman waves his hand and gently shoos Emile away. 

    “I don’t mind cooking, besides I want to be better than Des at it one day, so I need the practice now go my precious rose.” 

    Emile steals another kiss before rushing to put his shoes and coat on, “I love you, prince charming!” 

    A satisfied smile comes to his face when Roman lets out a flustered squeak, he leaves with a high pitched ‘I love you too’ following him. Emile hums softly to himself as he strolls towards the bus stop, he would try calling Desmond around lunchtime and make amends. 

    “I should really think about getting my license…” 

    Emile huffs as he pulls his phone from his pocket, he turns it back on and is met with constant dings from the same random number that was texting him this morning. One message sent a chill racing down his spine. 

    ‘Pink is definitely your color ;).’ 

    That was the last message that was sent, Emile jumps when the roar of the bus’s engine snaps him out of his shock. He puts his phone back into his pocket and takes a deep breath, ‘They’re not talking about me, it’s okay I’m just overreacting.’ Emile tells himself as he counts out the right amount of money for the bus fare. 

    He flashes the bus driver a small smile as he pays the fee, the driver tips his hat and closes the door as Emile moves to sit in the back. 

    ‘It’s still going to be a good day, it's okay.’ 

    A part of Emile no longer believed that thought. 

    He tries to ignore thoughts of the text as he plugs his earphones in. There was no need for him to worry about odd texts. He’d never had strangely personal texts like that before, why would they start now? It was probably aimed at someone else, like all the other texts.

    You seriously still believe that? Come on, let’s stop kidding ourselves.

    Emile ignores his inner voice, choosing to focus on the song that was playing, it was Stronger Than You from Steven Universe. He tenses when the song is cut off with a new text notification. Emile takes a breath and opens the text, his blood ran cold. 

    ‘I can see you, that’s my favorite cardigan of yours that you’re wearing.’

    Emile looks up and scans the patrons in front of him, no one looks out of the ordinary, everyone minding their own business other than a mother who was struggling to calm her infant down. 

    ‘Who are you? Please leave me alone, my brother is a detective!’ He texts back. Emile watches anxiously as the three text bubbles appear and disappear multiple times. His mouth goes dry when the dreaded reply comes through with a chime. 

    ‘I’m your saviour, my precious bunny.’ 

    He forces himself to breathe upon seeing the message. That was creepy, yes, but it was fine, right? There was no way he could actually see him.

    ‘Is your phone background still that guy dressed as a cartoon character?’

    Emile breathes deeply and looks at his phone background. Roman had taken him to a comic con, and had cosplayed as Prince Zuko from Avatar The Last Airbender. Zuko had never been Emile’s type, but when it was Roman? Hot. Burning hot, one might say.

    He frantically texts back with ‘no, it’s the gay pride flag’. A lie, but that was fine, right? There was no way this stalker - that’s what it must be, right? - could know for sure.

    He gets the next message within a moment.

    ‘Liar.’

    His heart races as he breaks out in a cold sweat.

    ‘I’m not lying, it really is the gay pride flag!’ 

    The reply was almost instant, Emile’s hands were shaking as he read over the text multiple times. 

    ‘Funny, because to me it looks like a pretty red-head with blue eyes, with a shitty white foundation on and a crappy looking attempt at a burn scar. Prince Zuko right? From Avatar The Last Airbender? Gotta say I didn't think he was your type.’ 

    Emile scans the bus again, everything once again seems normal, no one standing out, only the mother with the infant was finally relaxed with the sleeping child resting against her chest. 

    ‘Leave me alone, if you text me again I’m going to my brother.’ 

    Once the reply is sent Emile immediately blocks the number, cutting off all contact with his apparent stalker. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, he could handle this, he didn’t need his brother’s help right now. Surely with the threat of telling his detective brother, ‘You don’t really think Dee would believe you? He’s got better things to do than worry about you.’ 

    Emile winces at his inner voice, ‘That’s not true…’ 

    “Hey, Emile! This still your usual stop or were you planning to go somewhere else today?” The bus driver calls back to him, it wasn’t odd for him to know Emile considering the bus was the young therapist’s most used choice of transportation. 

    “Sorry, Greg! I was just lost in thought!” 

    Emile quickly stuffs his phone back into his coat pocket, he walks briskly down the bus aisle, giving Greg a small wave as he steps off. He takes a deep breath and puts on his serious face. 

    “Time to get this day over,” he mumbles as he makes his way into St. Joseph’s Behavioral Health centre.

    Emile puts on a calm smile as he walks inside, the cool air from the air conditioning fanning his face. Emile was a therapist in training, or well that’s what his boss says. He’s a therapist, only the health centre wasn’t hiring new ones yet, so he landed the job of being the psychiatrist's assistant until a therapeutic job was open. 

    Emile couldn’t wait til that day came, he had so many ideas on how to help his future patients. Most of his ideas involved cartoons but others involved other methods like journal entries! He would let his patients tell their stories in a fictive kind of way, giving them a fun time with therapy and a more comfortable way to talk about their problems! 

    “Emile! Finally, thought you were going to be late, follow me.” A feminine voice beckons from across the lobby. Emile looks up and sees the familiar dark face of his boss, her brown eyes crinkling at the edges as she flashes him a smile, her ebony hair let down for once instead of being held back in a tight bun. 

    Emile nods and walks over to her, struggling to keep up with her long strides as she marches down the hall ahead of him. 

    “You seem in a chipper mood, Caroline, did Marcus finally pop the question?” 

    “Very funny, Picani, but no. I’m in a chipper mood because one of my patients agreed to let you sit in during their session! I’ll be asking your input on things they should be doing to handle their depression, I think you’ll get along with them you two act very similar.” 

    Emile blinks his green eyes in shock, he stares at her for a moment waiting for her to laugh and say ‘gotcha!’ But it never came and Emile couldn’t help the huge grin that stretched across his face. 

    “Really!?” Emile squeals. 

    Caroline chuckles as she stops in front of her office door, she turns to look at him and nods. 

    “Really, I finally get to see just how good you think you are, rookie.” 

    Emile stifles his excitement when Caroline opens the door, he takes a deep breath and lets it out through his nose. ‘I can do this!’ 

    He closes the door behind him once they step in, Caroline’s office was the biggest in the health centre, with a mahogany desk and black leather chairs. Sitting in the chair on the left in front of Caroline’s desk was a man a year or two younger than Emile. He had sandy blonde hair and blue eyes, not as blue as Roman’s they were a paler shade, while Roman’s looked more like sapphires. 

    The man wore glasses with a black square frame, a light dusting of freckles over his tanned face. Now, Emile wasn’t one to judge anyone on their clothes considering his outfits choices consisted of baggy sweaters and cardigans, but this guy looked like one of those commercial fathers with a standard blue polo, khakis, and a cardigan or in this man’s case, a cat hoodie tied around his shoulders. 

    Emile flashes the man a polite smile and offers him his hand, “Hello! I’m Dr. Emile Picani, do you how do?” His smile widens when the man chuckles at the reference he made. 

    “Spongebob ref, nice! I'm peachy, Dr. Picani! My name’s Patton Holter, it’s nice to meet you!” 

    The two shake hands, Emile’s left wondering where he had heard that name before. 

    Within an hour Emile had learned just about all there is to know about Patton Holter. Patton was born on January 19th, 1985 and he has a twin brother, he was adopted by his two father’s when he was five, and he has been struggling with depression since he was sixteen. His methods of dealing with his depression were taking antidepressants along with talk therapy twice a week. 

    “You could try journaling, my boyfriend has depression and keeping a journal usually helps him, only he makes up characters and uses them as a way to vent,” Emile suggests. 

    He notices a change in Patton’s blue eyes, a type of recognition and malice at the mention of Roman.

    “I’ll give that a try! My brother writes songs, he’s got anxiety problems and writing out depressing lyrics always seems to help him, but I’ll try story-telling. It might be fun!” 

    Pride swells up in Emile’s chest, ‘I’m actually helping someone!’ 

    “Well, seeing as you liked Dr. Picani’s idea we’ll give it a try, Patton. I don’t have any blank journals right now, but I should have one by the time you come in this Friday, is that okay?” Caroline asks. 

    “Of course! I can’t wait for the two of you to read what I write!” 

    Another hour passes before Patton’s session is up, Emile stands when Caroline does, offering his hand to Patton giving him a polite smile. A cold chill races down the young therapist’s spine when he notices how cold Patton’s baby blue eyes looked. His smile was sharp and dangerous instead of the playful smile he had on earlier. 

    “See ya soon, Emile,” Patton says as he tightens his grip on Emile’s hand. 

    Before Emile could reply, Patton was out the door leaving him and Caroline alone in the office. 

    “Well, you’re better than I thought, Picani. Good job!” 

    “Thanks… Do I get to sit in on the next one or?” 

    “Fraid not, kid. You can help the nurses give out medicine and get everyone situated, then after that paperwork that needs to be signed. Think ya can handle that?” 

    “Of course!” 

    Emile and Caroline bid their farewells as he closes the door to her office. Emile stops mid-stride down the hallway and turns to look back. He could have sworn he saw a wisp of grey fabric going around the corner. 

    He shakes his head and chuckles softly to himself, ‘I’m just paranoid after those texts.’ 

    He sets off to go find the nurses, which at this time of day would be in the old building. A few years ago the hospital had a donation big enough to make a new building, where they did most of the important procedures now. But the old building was still in use, and Emile hated it.

    The only way to get to it was through the back entrance of the new building, follow the path (which was in an awful state), and then unlock the side entrance of the old building. And with his recent creepy texts, he really didn’t want to be out of sight. Just in case.

    You’re being paranoid, it’s fine.

    With a deep breath he heads out the door, down the path, trying not to catch his foot on the worst of it. He’d heard of nurses breaking things on the path, and whilst they could just be rumours, he didn’t care to turn into a rumour himself.

    He rounds the bend, and pauses, hearing something behind him rustle. What if…? No, ridiculous. He turns to see a cluster of bushes and chides himself. Of course bushes would rustle. Most plants do, if there’s enough of them.

    He turns back, humming softly to himself as he approaches the side door, only to freeze at the buzz of his phone. He tries to ignore it, but it buzzes again, and he hesitantly reaches for it.

    “I swear I turned you off,” he mutters, but sure enough, it was on, and he had two texts.

    ‘Hey Bunny.’

    ‘Behind you.’

    Emile turns quickly, looking around desperately and tensing up. Plants, plants, door, car…

    “...Damn, they really got me there,” he mutters, “...I knew I was being-”

    A cloth is shoved over his mouth as he gasps, and he internally curses himself for not staying aware as he realises someone is now behind him. Emile struggles weakly, trying to tear the hand holding the cloth away from him, with no luck.

    “Just sleep now, bunny.”

    I...no…

    Emile is out before he can fight back any more.

    Desmond sat in his car with his seat lounged completely back, this was how he normally spent his breaks. Just taking naps inside his car, well he had other ways he spent his breaks but Alvin wasn’t there today. Desmond cracks his left eye open when the radio strapped to his side comes to life. 

    ‘I need any available officer to visit St. Joseph’s Health Centre. A nurse called in saying something about a patient escaping again.’ 

    Desmond quickly snatches his radio and presses the PTT switch, “I’ll go, I’ve got nothing better to do.” 

    ‘You could be in here doing your paperwork, Wickham.’ His boss cuts in. 

    “What I can’t hear you, you’re breaking up, captain!” 

    He shuts his radio off and fixes his seat, Desmond knew he was going to get hell for ignoring the captain later but oh well, it wasn’t like that was anything new. Besides, him taking this gives him the chance to apologize to Emile and let him know that he’ll be picking him up later. 

    Desmond sighs when his phone begins to ring, he accepts the call and puts on a fake cheer. “Captain! Ya know it’s dangerous to be on a cellphone while driving sir.” 

    “You’ve done it plenty of times, so I know you’re not worried about it. You can’t keep putting this paperwork off, Desmond.” 

    “Yeah, I know but the assistant I hired will handle it tomorrow. It’ll get done, now let me handle this issue, alright?” 

    The captain sighs. 

    “You and your brother got into another fight, didn’t you?” 

    “Maybe…” 

    “Alright, fine go make up with him but you bring your ass right back here afterwards, got it?” 

    Desmond rolls his eyes, “Yes sir,” he drawls as he hangs up on his boss. 

    Desmond presses his foot the gas, surging down the residential road, funny this was what led to his and Emile’s argument. ‘I really hope he’s okay…’ The last time they got a call about a patient getting loose Emile had gotten hurt. Getting smacked with a bedpan was not a fun experience for his little brother. 

It wouldn’t have been fun for the patient either if Emile had let Desmond have ‘talk’ with them, but Emile said that it would look bad on his record if he assaulted a mentally ill patient. What? He’s got a temper sue him!  

Desmond slows down when the health centre comes into view, he furrows his brows and narrows his blue and brown eyes. 

“Odd… There aren’t any nurses out looking this time around.” 

He pulls up to the curb and puts the car in park, before he even has a chance to step out, a nurse rushes over from inside the old building. Desmond blinks when her face went from fearful to utterly heartbroken. 

Tears gather in the nurse's brown eyes, “I… I’m so sorry… I-I should have gone out when I saw someone behind him. I'm so sorry!” 

“Hey calm down, alright? I’m sure we’ll find Mr. Stevenson, he never goes far.” 

The nurse lets out a sob, Desmond twitches at the sound but forces himself to calm down. 

“I-It wasn’t a patient! I-I told them… I-It was your brother, somebody took Emile and I couldn’t see their face, I am so s-sorry!” 

All the air was knocked out of Desmond, ‘Somebody took Emile…’ 

Roman paces the living room, his phone clutched tightly in his hands waiting for Emile to send him a text message or to at least call him. He checks the time, fifteen past nine, Emile was supposed to have been home almost an hour ago. 

Roman feels his stomach drop when there’s a knock at the door, he quickly walks over to it and swings it open. 

Desmond stood on the stoop with his hand raised, ready to knock again. Bi-coloured eyes meet blue, they’re both silent for several minutes before Desmond speaks up. 

“Emi’s missing.”

[never-not-ever]

So it’s my last night at residential and I can’t believe it’s over. It’s been a good day. One of the residents made chicken teriyaki fried rice for dinner and it was amazing. We got a new resident who I actually had as a roommate when I was inpatient so it was nice seeing her. I had a really good meeting with my doctor today. This was my third time having her and and I’m so grateful I always get her. She’s so validating and kind and is the only provider I’ve ever had who refers to my childhood as traumatic. I always roll my eyes and when she says that though. As much as I hate that this program is only 2 weeks I’m so grateful that my doctor always talks about me coming back if I need to.

I’m seeing my therapist virtually Wed morning and trying to find a time to meet with my group therapist to catch up before I join group again. I hate that everything is going to be residential but I have no choice. I literally just emailed them both a couple hours ago because I was so hesitant at setting up aftercare appointments cause I honestly thought I’d fuck up residential and end up back inpatient. Even now I’m nervous about these appointments and wondering what if I just regress and fuck things up. I’m trying to stay in the present moment and be mindful but it’s hard to shake all these worries.

My doctor here is extending my FMLA til I meet with the new psychiatrist which is May 11th. I’m glad I don’t have to worry about work right away and I think it’s lessened some of my anxiety about going home. 

I need to make a meal plan of sorts and a list of groceries I need. I’ve been so hungry since I got to residential and I’ve been eating so badly and I’ve probably gained so much weight. I’m not looking forward to stepping on the scale tomorrow but it’s probably going to be the first thing I do when I get home. 

[manifestlife]

so i haven’t had a dietitian for several months and it’s starting to really take a toll on my recovery. i had a wonderful one with my university until i withdrew but i can’t see her until i’m re-enrolled and the ones i’ve met with in the interim either i didn’t like at all or they refused to see me until i’d gone to residential, which i want to remain a last resort. so for right now it’s just me treading water with my therapist and psychiatrist, who are both so smart but neither can sit down with me and come up with a thorough meal plan. 

i’m really trying to work on increasing portion sizes and adding in things like sides and dessert and snacks, because i think those will stop me from grazing and then panicking or from getting so hungry that i wake up in the middle of the night. but it’s also like!! i feel like i’m eating too much and i also just don’t remember what the hell normal people eat for sides!! or dessert!! or snacks!! 

i’ve taken a few courses on nutrition and have done my own research, so i’m generally not doing horribly and know how to make sure the bulk of what i’m eating is nutritious, but i just legitimately do not remember what normal people eat. i also am trying to eat at set times and meal prep a bit because a lot of my lapses have happened because i forgot to eat a meal and then skipped the next, and so on and so forth. so i’m making a meal plan tonight and going grocery shopping in the morning and actually committing for once!!

[fallenfurther]

Phantom - Part 4

The final part and I finally fix the Scott I’ve messed up. I hope you’ve enjoyed this whump as much as I enjoyed exploring the topic. It seems fitting that the last part being posted on a tough day, after this whole story coming about after one. Thank you to everyone who has read it.  Part 1 , 2. and 3. 

Many thanks to @photowizard17 for proofreading this for me.

*****

The next day was spent setting up Isla's lab. Most of the things she needed were either available on the island or easy to ship in. Scott placed an order for what they didn't have. It was a small room, but Dad hadn't allowed one of the larger ones to be used. Isla insisted it was fine, so Scott didn't make too much fuss. There was a rescue that day, and Scott watched as Alan flew Thunderbird One. Isla stood beside him as his Thunderbird flew out the pool. They had gone straight to his room afterwards; Scott needed the time to calm down. It hurt so much, not being able to fly. Even maintenance was out of bounds for him. He was so frustrated, but Isla stood by him and helped him calm down. 

The day after that was his first appointment with the psychiatrist. Isla stayed behind, using the time to focus on her project. Grandma flew him out and sat in the waiting room. He told the man about the nightmares. Scott felt better admitting them to the professional. That became the discussion of the hour. Grandma treated him to a coffee and a cake in the local coffee shop before she flew them home. It felt wrong sitting alone in the back, so he sat in the co-pilot's chair, though he had to promise not to touch anything. Just before he got up after landing, Grandma put her hand on his leg and squeezed. She smiled at him. 

"I'm proud of you, Scott."

The words sunk into his heart. He wanted to get better, he had to. He couldn't stay grounded. They walked through the hanger together, before he left her to head to Isla's lab. Scott didn't miss the change in his Grandma as he left her. 

*****

Scott settled into a routine. He'd have breakfast with Isla, before spending the morning in the office doing the Tracy Industries work Dad had given him, before having lunch with Isla. They'd then spend the rest of the day in her laboratory, Scott cleaned beakers and took notes to help her out. He knew so much about her project now; he could advertise it. He'd continued to donate towards her research, although now he donated his time too. It all went through the official routes and some was spent by the others in the Isla’s research group. They were all working towards the same goal, but from slightly different angles, in the hope one would get it to work. Scott just enjoyed Isla's company. They would then have dinner together before relaxing in the evening. 

Twice a week he saw the psychiatrist. Whoever was free would fly him out. Mostly this was Dad or Grandma, with Virgil occasionally volunteering. John was never down, and Scott couldn't remember the last time they had spoken, but it couldn't have been that long ago. Gordon and Alan tended to stay away, apart from the one-time Alan had to take him to his appointment. Alan had changed the topic whenever Isla came up, to the point of asking for silence. Scott had been shocked but could see the way Alan gripped the controls. Scott didn't want to hurt his little brother, so he held his tongue. Those were the tough days, the days his brothers seemed distant. Alan often looked at him like he was a stranger, which hurt. Especially when he and Isla joined in the movie night. Slowly they stopped joining in, preferring to watch films alone in the round house. Scott had to admit, he was spending more and more time up there, away from his family. He would fall asleep with Isla on the couch. He had stocked up the kitchen, so they didn't have to eat with the others. Isla seemed okay with the arrangements. She wasn't bothered that his family never warmed to her. She repeated the same phrases over and over when Scott brought it up. 

"It was always going to be this way, Scott."

"They were never going to welcome me."

"They're just worried, Scott. You're not well."

"You knew this would happen."

Yet Scott didn't understand. He knew his psychiatrist was trying to get him to comprehend something, but Scott just couldn’t see it. Isla wouldn't say it out loud and his family tiptoed around him. So Scott just continued with his routine. Occasionally he'd get angry at the situation, other days he'd watch Thunderbird One leave the island without him and just sit on his balcony until Isla came to fetch him. She looked after him, making sure he ate and slept. The nightmares still came. They were starting to take their toll. Months without sleep and his body and mind were tired. There were days when he just couldn't focus on his work. He knew his productivity had dropped, but he was powerless to help it. He told this to his psychiatrist. He liked talking about Isla, though Scott couldn't always take in what he was saying. There had been multiple mentions of residential treatment, but Scott refused. He wanted to stay on the island. 

*****

Isla wasn't in her laboratory when he looked in having just returned from his latest therapy session. For the first time in a while his heart didn't race at the thought of not knowing where she was. His mind was still focused on something his psychiatrist had said. Something had been awoken in Scott's head. Something he didn't want to think about, something he knew he had to acknowledge before he could get better. It was the cause of the nightmares. Scott headed up through the villa and took one of the paths up to the cliff. He knew Isla would be there, gazing out over the ocean. He'd shown her this spot. This little sanctuary he often retreated to when he needed to think away from distractions. She gave him a sad smile as he sat down beside her. The wind whipped their hair and their eyes met. His hands shook.  

"I can't stay, Scott."

"You don't have to go."

"Yes, I do. Your family needs you."

"But I need you."

"Do you still believe that?"

Scott stared into her sorrowful green eyes.

"Yes."

"You're lying."

"I'm not."

"You're lying to yourself, Scott. Admit it."

Scott's voice caught in his throat. His hands shook and he could feel the tears forming in his eyes. He didn't want to admit it. He didn't want to face the truth. His eyes turned to the sea, rough and expansive below him. Scott had to admit to the truth. That's what Daniel, his psychiatrist, had said. He had to acknowledge the truth. 

"I'm dead, Scott."

Scott shook his head, eyes on the horizon. His heart breaking. 

"No, you're not."

"I am. You know I am."

"I need proof." 

Scott turned to her. Her black hair was flying wildly but her green eyes held steady. 

"Prove to me that you are dead."

"Tomorrow."

Isla got up and left Scott, who continued to stare out to sea. The cold of the wind was seeping through his shirt, but he relished it. It matched the pain he felt. His world was starting to crumble with the tears that slipped down his face. 

*****

Scott sat in Tracy One. Grandma and Virgil were in the cockpit flying him out to the meeting. It was a break in his routine. Isla was sitting in the chair next to him. Scott didn't know what to say. The conversation from last night was still fresh in his mind. The plane shuddered as it hit some turbulence. 

"Why are you here?"

"Because you want me here. If you don't want me here, I could go."

Isla stood up and a familiar panic filled Scott. 

"You don't want me to go."

Scott shook his head. He still wanted her. Isla was real. She was real to him. Was that not enough? Why could no one else see that she was real?

"You know I'm not, Scott."

*****

Daniel met them at the airport, but it was Isla Scott followed to a graveyard. She walked through it confidently, heading straight to one headstone. She stood before it expectantly. Scott came up behind her before kneeling to read the name etched into the black stone. 

Isla Howardson

The date of death is exactly a year ago. The dread fills Scott. His lungs craved air which he pulled in with short sharp breaths. Tears filled his eyes. She's been dead a year! How? Scott fell to the grass. He knew how. 

He thought back to a year ago. The rescue that had gone so horribly wrong. She'd been trapped but was unharmed. Isla had been fine until he'd turned up. She had been lively, joking about the situation like Gordon often did. She hadn't been scared. He'd decided to take her the shortest way out. Flying Thunderbird One remotely, he'd tried to lower the safety grapple in the hopes to raise them up. Not the best, but he'd done it on other occasions before with great success. That time Thunderbird One had lost air, an unexpected wind swinging her to the side as they were on the end. The cable had swung against the wall and Isla's head slammed into the cold hard rock. Scott had grabbed her, kept her from falling, but the wound bled. Her body went limp in his arms. Scott had gotten them out and he had rushed her to the nearest hospital. It had been touch and go, but the staff had sent him away. They had told him to leave her in their hands. The guilt had stayed with him. They had operated on her to try to ease the swelling on her brain. At debrief, John had told him she hadn't made it. Scott had struggled with the guilt, the events replaying in his mind. He re-lived the various occasions when people had died in front of him, or because of him. He had blocked out the trauma. Hidden it away until his family started to see it months and months later. 

Scott looked up. Isla had been replaced with Daniel. More tears fell as the man bent down and placed his hand in Scott's shoulder. 

"Do you remember now? Do you understand what happened?"

Scott nodded. He couldn't speak it yet, but he knew they would discuss it eventually. 

"She was all in your head, Scott." 

Scott nodded and resumed gazing at the name on the stone. 

"I'll give you some time."

Scott just sat there. His head started to run over the past year, trying to see Isla as dead. Closing his eyes against the thoughts of what his family had seen. All those looks started to make sense. Footsteps came up behind him. He wasn't ready to go yet. 

"Did you know her?" A familiar voice asked. 

Scott wanted to ignore her. She wasn't real. He had spent a year relying on someone he had made up. But the question was weird, it didn't make sense. He glanced over his shoulder and there she was. Except instead of jeans and a crop top, she had on a flowery summer's dress. The only time he'd seen Isla in a dress was at the gala. The other strange thing was the glasses. Her green eyes were gazing down at him through thin black frames. There was a sadness in her expression and a warmth in her eyes. In her arms was a bunch of white and purple flowers. 

"Briefly." Scott replied.

"She was a wild one, wasn't she?" A small smile came to the woman's lips. 

"Yes."

Scott was confused. The woman placed the flowers down, before taking a cloth out of her bag. She started cleaning the grave. He glanced over towards the path where Daniel was standing. He nodded. 

"You look like Isla."

The woman stopped. She gave him a curious look. 

"You really did only meet her briefly, didn't you? She normally brags about how different we are. I'm her identical twin, Sophie."

Sophie held out her hand and he took it. She felt real. He suddenly realised he'd never touched Isla. So many times he had stopped himself just before contact was made. Suddenly he had so much to ask. He had a deep need to know Isla, the real Isla, to separate her from the person he'd made up. Sophie finished cleaning the grave and placed the flowers in front of it, before sitting beside him. He was gawking at her. 

"I miss her. Did you know she was rescued by International Rescue? She would have loved that. Bragged about it. She would have told me, and anyone who would listen, every single small detail. Would have gone on about it for years."

"You still think positively about International Rescue?"

Scott had to ask. Did she even know the circumstances? They sometimes received hate mail from grieving loved ones. Was she one of them? He wouldn't blame her. 

"Why would I? They were there when no one else could be. They gave her a chance. I'm glad she wasn't alone. I sent them a thank you letter a few months back, when I finally felt able to. I know it's not enough but it's all I could do."

Scott turned back to the grave. He had made up Isla as a way to cope with the trauma. One trauma too many. He had wanted Isla to live so much that he'd saved her the only way he could. He'd made her alive to him. Yet in doing so he'd forgotten himself and pushed away his family. 

"Thank you."

Sophie smiled at him. "If you ever want to talk about her, just message me."

Scott nodded. He said goodbye and headed to Daniel. He took one last look back. He finally knew he was on the road to recovery. 

*****

Three months of treatment and Scott had slept two weeks without a nightmare. He had consented to residential treatment after visiting the graveyard. Daniel had supported him through it, and it had helped him break the habits he'd developed over the last year. Slowly, Scott felt better. He saw a grief counsellor, who helped him come to terms not just with Isla's death, but the others he'd seen, and prepared him for the ones he was going to see. There had been so much to unravel but seeing the way his brothers reacted when they visited was worth it. He set up a weekly gaming session with Alan and was back to going to every family film night, no matter how awful Dad's film choices were. Daniel had advised against getting in contact with Sophie again, not wanting to trigger a relapse, but he had visited her research team. Scott continued to fund their work, as a way of keeping her legacy alive.

He was now back on the island and setting up a new routine. It would go out the window the minute he was cleared for duty again, but it kept him busy. He had finally taken Virgil up on the offer of a trip in their small plane. Virgil refused to relinquish the controls when Scott complained about it being a big tease. His hands itched for the control, stirred by the sensation of flying, and the adrenaline it released into his system. Virgil just grinned at him and Scott knew he was beaten. Dad had even let Scott sit in when Alan tested Thunderbird One's newly repaired engine. Scott needed to feel his ship again, and was impressed at how Alan's handling had improved. Three more weeks of waiting. In three weeks they were going to reassess him for missions. Scott was counting the days. He was on the road to recovery. Soon he'd be well enough to be a pilot again.

[headcanonsandmore]

Not to drop this on you but why should I stay alive

First of all, it’s no problem. I’m here for you, anon. I’m always here if you want to talk about things. 

Second; while ending it might mean that the possibilities of bad things happening are reduced to zero, it also eliminates any possibility that things will improve.

I’ve been in bad places before, and I understand the feeling of wanting to end things. But please don’t; the world might have some bad things going on, but it’s also got so many good things happening too. 

Your life has value. 

You have your whole life ahead of you. you have so many more years that you can accomplish things in. For example;

having a family.

getting married.

to watch the sun rise.

to watch the sun set.

to save someone else’s life.

finish school.

get your dream job.

to laugh.

to smile.

to go camping.

travel to new places.

to wake up every morning to the person you love.

friends.

family.

to keep that promise you made.

to accomplish a goal.

to meet your idol.

to listen to new music.

theme parks.

video games.

chocolate.

to be able to look back and say “i made it”.

what you’re going through is temporary.

In case you need to hear this:

you are loved.

you are wanted.

you are needed.

you are beautiful.

you are handsome.

you are important.

you are not alone.

you are okay.

you are strong.

you are worth it.

you are smart.

you are not a failure.

you are useful.

you are going to be okay.

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getting a therapist - a brief step-by-step

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50 signs of good therapy

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trans lifeline: 877-565-8860

depression hotline: 1-630-482-9696

suicide hotline: 1-800-784-8433

lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

trevor project: 1-866-488-7386

sexuality support: 1-800-246-7743

eating disorders hotline: 1-847-831-3438

rape and sexual assault: 1-800-656-4673

grief support: 1-650-321-5272

runaway: 1-800-843-5200, 1-800-843-5678, 1-800-621-4000

exhale: after abortion hotline/pro-voice: 1-866-439-4253

Crisis Text Line!

Text HOME to 741-741

Look through my ‘tw: suicide’ tag for more information relating to hotlines, suicide prevention, and reasons why you shouldn’t end it all. 

Below are the numbers for suicide hotlines. Please talk to someone. 

Please stay alive, anon. Things will get better. 

[consumptiontofunction-blog]

I am here.

Hello Tumblr.

My name is Christine, but you can call me CJ. I’m 24 years old, and I am trying, desperately, to save myself from dying. Though I don’t know how desperate I can consider myself to be considering I am only on step one of what I expect to be the longest journey of my life.

I weigh 430 pounds. I have severe asthma, anemia, and a calcium deficiency. I have crippling joint pain. My mobility is severely limited. I’ve always just assumed I’m fat because I’m lazy and I like food. But four months ago, I was diagnosed with binge eating disorder; the definite cause of most of my health problems. I have apparently actually had it for approximately fifteen years of my life... Long enough to not even know that it wasn’t normal. Wasn’t normal to think about food constantly.  Wasn’t normal to plan every aspect of my life around meals. Wasn’t normal to ONLY look forward to when I finally got to binge again. Wasn’t normal that I couldn’t find the heart to get that excited about ANYTHING else. Wasn’t normal to tell stories about fond memories of trips, family gatherings, adventures with friends, only to predominantly focus on the meals I had, because everything else is blurry; because I always remember every meal in precise detail. Wasn’t normal that the only time I felt in touch with myself was when I was eating.

In all honesty, someone should have noticed a lot sooner. Society is so blinded by its genuine hatred of fatness, and in turn fat people, that it never occurred to anyone that it wasn’t normal for a thirteen year old to weigh 300 pounds. That there was no way that there was anything wrong with my weight that wasn’t blatantly my fault. It never occurred to anyone that my constant weight gain might be weird, despite the fact that over the course of the decade I was in mental health treatment of varying types the entire time. Not once was a therapist, psychiatrist, or doctor like “Maybe it’s weird that this human being has gained more than 100 pounds over the course of less than a decade. Maybe there is a mental health component to that.”

I’ll be honest, I’m a little salty.

Being diagnosed was simultaneously the most validated and the most devastated I’ve ever been in my life. I cried the realest tears I’ve ever cried. For the first time, the things I was saying felt true. Not because I had been lying, necessarily. Though I will admit that when it comes to my eating, I have rarely told the full truth to anyone. It can be humiliating to explain it only to have them judge what I’ve said as “Oh this chick is gross”. But no, it was because for the first time I had told the truth to someone who, in turn, looked fucking SHOCKED. Who was floored by how incredibly not normal it was. Who said to me “Of course there is something wrong. You have an eating disorder, and I genuinely cannot believe you haven’t been diagnosed yet. There is no way someone is going to approve you for bariatric surgery. You could literally die.” (Of course, she said this a lot more nicely. She is a dietitian, and an amazing fucking woman. Despite having only met with her a handful of times, she will always be a massively important part of my life. She was step zero of what is the hardest thing I will ever do... If I even can do it.)

The next four months were a mess. The jist of it is that I went into the worst depression of my life. (I made this blog less than a week after my diagnosis, early December, but it took me this long to come back and finally post something.) I went into a partial treatment center two weeks into the new year. A week and a half in, my counselor recommended I go into a residential program.

That was the SECOND simultaneously most validated and devastated I’ve ever been in my life. I said a really hard, firm no to that initially. I didn’t want to leave my dad, or my fiance, or my friends. I would have to go five hours away to this place, and it just was too much. I don’t think I’ve ever seen myself go through the stages of grief so obviously (or so insanely quickly). It took about ten minutes to accept that I was going to go. But it took another seven weeks to accept that I needed to go, and that I actually might be able to fight this.

Literally last night. Literally.

Due to an insurance issue, it took seven weeks to get a set day I would go. Today is Wednesday. I leave on Sunday. But something clicked in my head last night. See, back in November, my life was FINALLY starting to turn around. I was going to start school in January to be a radiology technician. I was starting the process for bariatric surgery. I had an appointment scheduled with a dietitian who would review my case before submitting my application for it. I had my birthday on November 30th being one hundred percent confident that I was finally, FINALLY making some headway. I would finally lose enough weight to not be in pain. I would finally be on the road to a career. I knew my boyfriend was planning to propose soon. 24 is my favorite number; it has been all my life. I just KNEW that all the best things were going to happen to me when I was 24. I knew for so long that it would be a monumental year.

Less than a week later was when I got my diagnosis.

I have never lost so much hope. I’ve always been able to keep at least a little bit of hope in my back pocket. I’ve been fighting all my life to get better, and I’ve always been able to maintain at least a little confidence that someday I would win. But after that, I felt truly, completely, gut-wrenchingly hopeless. I didn’t realize it until then, but something inside of me “knew” that this was the fight I couldn’t win. Since waaaayyyyy before my diagnosis. My mental process when planning for my pre-surgery meal plan was “fake it long enough to get the surgery”. I didn’t quite know what I was faking, but I knew I couldn’t authentically do what they wanted me to. Knowing that I couldn’t get the surgery meant I had no hope for my future, because I truly believed I could never get better, never have control over my eating, and that trying was a moot point. I could have the weight removed by someone else, but I could never have the self control to stop eating the way I was. I went home and broke down to my now-fiance. In my emotional state, I remember wailing “how will I ever be able to be happy without this?”. I genuinely thought that the entirety of my happiness rested on the shoulders of eating compulsively; that nothing could make me as happy as food. That’s how fucked up my brain is. I was truly, completely, utterly hopeless. I was fucking broken. My dream of my 24th year being the amazing turn around story was smashed to smithereens. It was over, and I had given up.

I’ve clawed myself up quite a bit. I accepted that I was leaving, and I began to prepare my life around me to be placed gently on hold. I’ve made an extra effort to enjoy my time with my father, my fiance, my friends. I’ve poured myself into my hobbies while I had the time. I spent a lot of time reading about eating disorders, about the misconceptions around binge eating, about the treatment process, about people who were a lot bigger than me who had succeeded in getting better.

Then, last night, I was having a conversation with my fiance about my planned treatment process for the rest of the year. Residential for one to three months, coming back to go to the same partial program I was at before for several months, going into an intensive outpatient treatment for several months, and eventually taking everything completely into my own hands with outpatient care, at which point I will re-begin the bariatric surgery process. Then completely out of the blue, something hit me. My eating would be completely or almost completely in someone else’s hands for all of residential and partial. Could be up to SIX MONTHS. At my metabolic rate, I could likely lose fifty pounds in that time. I wouldn’t have to follow a meal plan of my own, at home, until IOP, and even then it would only be a few days a week.. That really could be enough time with it out of my hands to develop the right habits to make it the rest of the way on my own, to lose enough weight to give me the drive to keep the ball rolling.

And suddenly, I was sobbing again. Because finally, four months later, it was there again.

Hope.

Maybe this is the thing that I’ve been waiting for. Maybe this is my big 24 turn around story. Maybe I will still look back on this year as the most important of my life. Maybe ten years from now, I will know that this was when my life finally started.

I don’t know for sure yet. What I do know, is that in four days I am driving down to Philadelphia to do something huge, and that is brave as fuck. That I am taking a massive plunge in the name of my own wellness. I will admit, I have always been good at getting better. I’ve always been a fighter. I’m not quite ready to give up yet.

I’m going to post when I can, because I want to track this journey. Most of what I write will come from a place of emotion, and I can’t guarantee I will always be kind to myself or everyone else. But I want a record of this, at least tidbits here and there.

Welcome to my blog.  Maybe I can actually do this.

[realtalk-princeton]

One of the advices I have gotten to overcome my EXTREME social anxiety is to get out of my comfort zone and try things I am scared of (i.e., talking to guys)? But what do I do when EVERY time I take this advice, I am rejected, people avoid me, etc? How to keep going when you have no positive feedback from this world? I have never been on a date bc no guy has ever been interested in me. My entire life is consumed by my anxiety and I am in SO MUCH PAIN every day.

Response from Ocean:

First off, I'm sorry you're in so much pain and that your social anxiety is causing you distress. I'd like to plug CPS and/or an outside provider (therapist and/or psychiatrist) in case you haven't pursued professional help yet. Anxiety is something that many people suffer from, but that doesn't mean you need to just power through it. Keeping your anxiety to yourself can compound or result in other health problems, as it elevates your stress levels to near-constant, which is A Bad Thing. If you'd like more individual help on how to access mental health care on or near campus, you can submit your netid and I'll send you an email, or CPS can provide referrals.

I think you're putting too much pressure on yourself right off the bat, and setting a bit too high of a bar for yourself here. I also think that approaching guys cold and asking them out is probably like the worst possible thing for extreme social anxiety! The social anxiety means they probably don't know you very well, you may be visibly or subconsciously uncomfortable so they might be picking up on this, and people don't typically agree to dates with people they don't know very well and who seem to be uncomfortable asking them out! So I think you've received not very great advice to begin with.

"Getting out of your comfort zone" isn't necessarily bad advice--we all need to get out of our comfort zones to grow--but there's ways to do this that are less painful and less likely to end in rejection. I'd suggest instead to try getting out of your comfort zone in a different way--for example, join a club about something you're passionate about! This way there's automatically a reward (getting to do a thing you enjoy) as well as a bit of a challenge (meeting new people and talking to them) but there's also the structure of the activity and the shared enthusiasm that guarantees that you have something to talk about. Another suggestion would be to attend an event hosted by your residential college or ODUS and make a goal to strike up a friendly conversation with one person. If you're nervous about talking to guys, talk to girls! Ask people questions--this way you have to do less talking. And if someone seems unresponsive or bored, then you can politely excuse yourself and try talking to another person.

I don't know your specific flavor of social anxiety, but another thing that's been good for many people I know is just going out and doing something by themselves--even something as small as going out and getting coffee by themselves, or my personal favorite, going to see a movie by myself. It can be a little bit nerve racking at first (I'm by myself! In public! Am I being weird?) but you get the automatic reward of the coffee/movie/etc and then if someone asks what you did that day/week, you have something slightly more interesting to say besides just "work".

There's a lot of people I know at Princeton and elsewhere who haven't really been on dates or had relationships (even the most well-adjusted of people), so I would encourage you to try and let go of the expectation you have for yourself about your romantic timeline. Honestly, the best way to meet people is to just do the things you like and live life on your own terms, and inevitably you'll come across people who like those same things and think the same way you do. And this goes for both friendships and relationships, by the way.

So, short answer:

-don't put yourself in the hardest social situations right away

-try doing things that you will like regardless of the social aspect (you can't control how people respond to you, but you can control your own responses)

-the romantic stuff will come along in its own time

I hope this helps and next year goes better for you!

[canaryatlaw]

alright. it’s 9 pm here. I’m obviously trying to get to bed early since I have to wake up at 5:30 am and go take the fucking bar exam. Predictably, I’m a ball of nerves right now. But I’ll be fine, I always am. I’m good at tests, it’s easy for me to recall information, and though essays always give me anxiety initially once I get there and start writing them I actually like them, and tomorrow is all essays. 10 of them total. 1 where they give you a whole packet including law in the jurisdiction and write your analysis totally from that, which will probably be the best one for me. Then there are 3 Illinois specific essays and 6 multistate essays. it’s a lot. but anyway, today. I did get up when my alarm went off at 10 because I didn’t want to sleep in too long and not be able to fall asleep tonight. I had decided I would skip showering this morning and shower tonight so I wouldn’t have to shower tomorrow morning, but upon waking up I found I really wanted to shower, so I did, and now it’s night and I really want to shower again lol but I won’t and I’ll do it after I get back tomorrow. So, woke up, showered, made oatmeal which only resulted in one kitchen disaster (I was trying to get the brown sugar to go into the pot a little at a time but then it shifted and all of my brown sugar was now liquified in my pot, so that was fun) and was looking on my computer for stuff when I saw an email from the health insurance company that does our prescriptions, upon which I remembered oh fuck, I need to call my doctors office like today and get this figured out. Basically, I was at the doctor like two weeks ago, and they gave me the prescriptions, which I mailed onto the health insurance company I referenced above, but they haven’t sent me the meds yet, and I’m running out of one of them, and I was set to run out Wednesday afternoon, and I wouldn’t be able to do anything about that until like, Wednesday evening, so I needed to call my doctor’s office and ask them to call in an emergency supply for like two days, and like, I love my psychiatrist so much he’s great and I wouldn’t trade him for the world, but god I have his receptionist staff so much. Whenever I call for anything it turns into such a production, at least this time they didn’t tell me he can’t call in prescriptions to Illinois like he does every time I call, but they had me call the insurance company to find out when the meds would get to me so they could then give me enough of the meds, and the insurance company people said it’s set to come on Wednesday in the mail but like if that didn’t happen I would’ve been screwed so they called in like 2 days emergency supply of it but I don’t actually take it at the dosage he prescribes so I have more than 2 days worth lol but I don’t expect to need to use them, I’m just glad I’m covered. but yeah, I did other things around the house and started getting ready for a bit, then took an uber to target that was somehow like $2 because of some promotion they were running, and grabbed the prescription plus some candy because I needed candy to bring with me here. I have pretzels and potato chips, various candies, granola bars, and these microwave muffin things that has the dry mix in a little cup and you add water and microwave it and it’s like this awesome chocolate muffin, which are super good except you have to be really careful to get all of the mix wet or at the bottom it gets grainy and really gross but otherwise it’s good lol. I also have some of the Starbucks via refresher packs that I’m gonna add to a water bottle tonight and stick it in the fridge so it’ll be good to go in the morning because that’s my method of getting caffeine, which will obviously be much needed. I ubered back from target but it took forever to get to me which was obnoxious, but oh well. I continued getting ready and eventually didn’t have much else to do, so I just kinda hung out for a bit. The school bar people told us not to study today because we wouldn’t remember anything anyway, but like, I know that’s not true for me lol so I did a little. The hotel didn’t have check in till 4 so I was basically just killing time at this point. When we eventually got there I got yet another uber, but I put it on pool and nobody ended up joining so I only paid $10 for the same ride I would’ve had to pay $24 for (#winning). The hotel is kinda small, but it’s nice, the bigger hotel that’s actually at one of the test sites (not the one I got assigned to regardless) but all their rooms were booked because I had to book late since we didn’t know which bar I was taking for like, fucking ever. But yeah, I checked in, easy enough, came upstairs and settled in a bit, figured out how to get the wifi to work and turned on the tv then subsequently broke the tv and had to figure out how to make it work again. I ordered pizza from the same chain place I normally get it from except this was different and I didn’t really like it very much, idk what the difference was but it just wasn’t doing it for me, plus my tongue was being really obnoxiously sensitive so I really couldn’t eat anything other than like, the crust, so that was also irritating. But I sat here on my computer and looked over the mini-outline book (and by mini I mean some of them are like 70 pages). It’s funny to look over the secured transactions material, because at the end of the semester I already had the bar books and used them to study because they had a comprehensive summary of everything I needed to learn, I actually printed one and brought it with me to the test (which was open book, obviously) and it was very helpful and I somehow got an A- in that class that I had no idea what was going on in for a solid 5/6ths of the semester, and when I listened to that lecture yesterday I retained a good amount of it, so I was happy about that. But I went through the ancillary subject outlines that were generally more like 20 pages, so much more manageable, and made sure I had all my mnemonics down, including the one for the hearsay exceptions which is like, 20 letters long lol. I then did go over the Illinois distinction section for the main subjects, because if I get an essay on one of those in the Illinois part I obviously have to answer under Illinois law. I watched the office on comedy central while doing all of this because I couldn’t find the channel guide and the office is always a solid choice. It’s funny to see Ellie Kemper as Erin because she looks so little there as compared to how she is on Kimmy Schmidt now. but those were very entertaining. So I got to the end of the outlines, turned off the tv, took my pills so there would be a little time for the more sleep causing ones to kick in, then started writing this, and now here we are. I have a lot of mixed feelings about everything going on tomorrow. I know I’m smart, that’s never been in question, I’m just worried I didn’t spend enough time preparing and I feel ill-equipped, because it’s just so much information....like you could get a question on the lesson from one day of class, for all of your classes, for three years. it’s a massive amount of information. I’ve also been acutely aware of just how alone I am. My brother never moved out, so he was with my parents every step of the way through this, but I chose to stay out here and do it myself because that’s always been who I am, the independent one who can’t wait to get out into the world. And I’m here, but it gets lonely some times, especially being that I’m super-extroverted so not being around people for this whole studying period was not doing well for me (one of many reasons I was all to eager to get ice cream whenever Jess wanted to). Even now, it’s just me here. I don’t think I’ve ever been in a hotel room completely by myself before, except for that awful night when I got stranded overnight in Philadelphia and had to go to that awful creepy hotel where I didn’t sleep a wink, just stayed up reading, because I did not feel safe at all (and I was only 19) but obviously this is a very different situation. And I mean, I am more or less a proper adult now, I’m 26, which feels like ages older than 25, because now I’m in my late 20s, and I don’t know how I feel about all of that. I mean, these are all choices I made, and they’re not ones I regret, not at this point at least. It would’ve been nice to have someone here with me, but I made the decision to leave those people in New York and come out here and do it myself, and I am doing it. I want my legal career to be about the things I did, the prestige I brought to my name, not following in the shadows of my dad and brother, I want that name to be known for me and what I’ve done, what I will do. And I know I can do it. Got all the way through law school, this is just one more hurdle I gotta jump over before I can actually be a full blown lawyer. I don’t know if my parents are gonna come for the swearing in, it hasn’t come up yet, I mean it would be nice to have them there just because I would feel very, very lonely if I was all by myself surrounded by people who had their families there with them.....because they didn’t move halfway across the country from their families. Sigh, I know I’m rambling at this point. Just a lot on my mind. But tomorrow I’m going to wake up confident and ready to crush this test, because I know I can do it, I KNOW I can, and I will, and I’m going to be a total kickass lawyer who is instrumental in instituting reforms in the child welfare system that will increase adoptions, decrease foster kids getting bounced between homes, better prevent kids from being brought into foster care when it is preventable by providing parents with the right resources, better support to keep foster teens in high school and bridge them into college (the college rate for foster care kids is something dismal like 2%, not even exaggerating), decrease the number of children in residential facilities who do not really need to be there, increase the number of foster homes nationwide, provide resources for the teenage mothers in the system so they don’t end up having their child taken from them and continue perpetuating the cycle, and so many more, I could go on all day about all the things I’m going to change. And I’m going to do it. I know I can, so I will. 

Just you wait. 

Goodnight babes. If you want to send prayers/good vibes/whatever my way for tomorrow, it’d be much appreciated. Thank you. ❤️

[sims4-challenge-bank]

My adaption to the sims4 asylum challenge from 2019

Asylum Challenge

Introduction

Hi there, I’m Shaebae, I got this set of rules from Englishsimmer who got it from her friend Nick and this is The Sims 4 Asylum Challenge! This challenge was originally created by Scout for The Sims 2, then revamped for The Sims 3 by BlakeS5678. So want to apologize if these rules seem scattered or not to make sense. These are modified by myself and I tried to re read a couple times to make sure everything made sense but I’m only human.

If anyone has any modification suggestions email me @ shaebaesimmer@gmail.com or message me on Instagram @shaebaesimmerman

For those who do not know the Asylum Challenge, here is the backstory:

"You have been committed to a run down mental health facility against your will. In order to prove that you are fit to rejoin society and earn your freedom, you must achieve the goals your psychiatrist has set for you – your aspiration. The catch? You need to achieve your goals as quickly as possible, while keeping 7 other patients, who you don't know and are out of your control, alive and as happy as possible. Add to that budget cutbacks leading to a lack of decent furniture and limited supplies, and your task gets harder."

For this challenge there will be an easy mode, medium mode and hard mode, just to spice things up a bit.

Setting Up

***Create your Patients***

Create your main sim in CAS. They must be a young adult. You can choose whatever you want for looks, clothing, voice and walk styles. They must have the erratic trait and the other two traits can be anything except for custom traits. You may choose story mode but you have to make sure they have the erratic trait otherwise you have to cancel the story. They may be any species you wish (except dog or cat)

You can also choose any aspiration except for the following:

-Successful Lineage

-Big Happy Family

-Super Parent

-vampier family

-Fabulously Wealthy

-Mansion Baron

-Any location aspiration

-the pets aspiration (only 8 members to a household so pets won’t fit)

-no famous aspiration (ie master actor/actress, world famous celebrity

-no love aspirations

-no party animal aspiration

After finishing your main sim, create seven other sims. They all must be young adults and they must all have the erratic trait. The other two traits and their aspirations can be whatever you want. (I recommend having a few evil, mean and romantic sims, just to make things interesting). None of the eight sims are allowed to be related. If you want to make things really interesting you can set it so no one has the same trait (except erratic because they all have to be crazy, a really good combo is erratic, paranoid, and evil/mean)

***Building your Asylum***

Next step is to build the asylum on a residential lot. Recommended lots are

- forgotten hollow

- oasis springs..

-strangerville

- Glimmerbrooke

But you aren’t limited to just those places

The size of the lot does not matter. You can build the asylum yourself, download an asylum from the Gallery using the hashtag #AsylumChallenge or modify an existing house in the worlds listed above.

Money cheats are allowed when building or placing your asylum. Depending on your mode of difficulty depends on what objects are allowed in your asylum, but all objects must be the cheapest at the beginning excluding child items and architecture (Cheap counters, cheap beds, cheap couches etc.). You cannot have objects in the asylum which affects sim’s emotions (unless the object was obtained through a career reward) or which prevents fires.

When you have finished building the asylum you cannot modify further except for buying books, unless sims get stuck in a certain area or your asylum saves up enough money for a new skill building item or when you can purchase an upgraded item. Pools are allowed but they are classified as a skill building item (unless one of your sims is a mermaid, you must lock gates for everyone but the mermaid(s) for it to not count as a skill building item unless otherwise stated in your difficulty’s rules)

When you have finished creating your asylum, your family funds must be at the required amount for your difficulty. To change the family funds you must first type into the cheat box “testingcheats true” (without quotations), then type into the cheat box “money (amount required). For example, for easy mode you would put "testingcheats true" followed by "money 1000" followed by "testingcheats false".

Upgrading Objects

When the asylum saves up a bit of money you can start replacing the cheap furniture and appliances with high quality furniture and appliances. You can only replace items, you cannot buy extra items. For example you can replace the fridge but you can’t have two fridges. You cannot upgrade objects in hard mode.

Using the handiness skill to upgrade objects is allowed in all difficulty modes.

Gameplay

- You must only be selected on your main sim, you are not allowed to click on the other sims at all to check their needs. If they die, they die. You can check to see what they are up to but cannot control them to help them. The only time you’re aloud to control them is when you are getting ready to lock the front gate or bedroom gate/doors.

- If you want to, at 12am, you can click on the other sims to check their inventory if they have books, food etc. When doing this your game must be paused.

- Cheats/mods/hacks which boost sim’s needs or skills are not allowed. High free will must be turned on, so the other sims in the asylum will do things by themselves.

- You can not use your inventory to reserve items for yourself. For example, you can't put a book or guitar in your inventory just so no one else can put it in theirs.

- The age settings can either be on normal or long, it’s your choice.

- No rearranging of furniture to reserve or use something for yourself. For example, you can not move the TV into a bedroom and turn it on just to get an uncontrollable sim out of bed so you can sleep in the bed. Nor can you remove a door so others can't gain access to the bathroom so you can use it when you come home from work.

- If a sim dies you must keep the grave on the lot, you must keep the grave on the lot. If their ghost gets too annoying (e.g. they keep breaking objects) you can banish their ghost.

- Putting toilets and showers/baths in separate rooms is OK in all difficulties, as dying from embarrassment tends to occur too much.

- Making your sim “work hard” in their career is ok, you cannot make the other patients “work hard” in their careers.

- You may not wake up other sims to get a bed. If you missed out on sleeping in a bed oh well. Go nap on a couch.

- when leaving you must take everyone with you. If someone would rather not come you must summon them to current lot

- During normal day to day activities you must have your time speed at 1x or 2x. You may only speed up time to 3x if you are fishing or sleeping

- You may have romantic relationships but no trying for baby or getting engaged, you may have a boyfriend.

- -locking sims in a pool is not aloud

- Isolating a patient is permitted for 3 sim hours

-

Game Pack/Expansion Pack Changes

**Outdoor Retreat & jungle adventure**

-Outdoor Enthusiast aspiration is allowed.

-You can only travel to Granite Falls when you need to complete certain goals in the Outdoor Enthusiast aspiration.

-When travelling to Granite Falls you must bring all of your fellow patients with you and choose the campground as your destination.

**Spa Day**

-When completing an aspiration, you can reward your Sim with a trip to the spa.

**Dine Out**

-Your Sim cannot own a restaurant.

-Your household cannot visit a restaurant.

-you may visit a bar IF you have vampires so they can get a plasma drink or drink from someone who doesn’t live in the asylum with you

**Vampires**

-Vampire patients are allowed.

-Vampire aspirations are allowed.

-your vampire is not aloud to feed on other asylum patients, one of the few times you can control vampires sims that aren’t your main sim, to prevent them from drinking the plasma from fellow patients. Also so when you go somewhere you can make them (easy mode: compel for deep drink; medium mode: compel for small drink; hard mode: main sims- ask permission/non main sim- compel for small drink)

-if main sim is a vampire you may get vampire perks and weaknesses

-you are allowed 1-3 plasma fruit tree when building your asylum depending on difficulty level (easy: 3; medium: 2; hard: 1)

**Parenthood**

-Super Parent aspiration is not allowed.

-children are not aloud because they get taken away when neglected

**Get To Work**

- Alien patients are allowed.

- Active careers are not allowed as they require leaving the lot.

- Your Sim cannot own a retail business

- If a member of the Asylum is abducted by aliens and comes back pregnant, when they give birth you have to send the baby back to Sixam.

**Get Together**

-You can create an Asylum club for the patients, you cannot add outside Sims to the club.

-Club perks are allowed for all levels of difficulties.

**City Living**

-Apartments cannot be asylums

**Island living**

- Pools don’t count as skill building if you have a mermaid as a patient as her duration is one of their needs. Must be locked to everyone except the mermaid(s) if not a skill building item. Can be “open to public” for 3 hours of the community time depending on your difficulty level (listed below)

- Pool Must be locked during bedtime hours as it counts as a place to sleep.

- Floaties count as a seat.

- May Travel to beach but asylum can’t be placed in sulani (goes with location aspiration) everyone must go to the beach together

**Get Famous**

Main sim May not have any famous aspirations (previously specified)

**seasons**

Must have one extreme weather set in your game options (ie rain and thunderstorms but just snow or snow & blizzards but just rain)

**cats & dogs**

Can build asylum in brindled bay (or whatever it’s called)

Can have stray animal house traits if desired

May not own an animal as the base of the challenge is to have 8 sims which is a full household

**Strangerville**

May not live here (goes with location aspiration rule)

Can visit but must bring/summon everyone

Difficulty Modes and Rules

There are 3 different modes of difficulty for this challenge.

Easy Mode:

- Starting funds: $1,500

- Complete two aspirations, then you are free!

- Can have the TV and the computer at the same time.

- Two sinks, two toilets and two showers/bathtubs. You may have a duo

- No more than 6-7 ‘bed spots’. Your choice. For example you can have 6 single beds, or 3 double beds, 1 double and 4 single beds etc.

- There can only be total seating for 7. That includes couches, lounges and chairs. If you have a dining table with 5 chairs then you may not use a couch that seats 3. Computer chairs don’t count.

- You may only have a total of 6 Skill Building items in the house, so choose wisely at the start. Computers, stoves, bookcases, mirrors, pools (if you have a mermaid patient) and TVs don't count as skill items. It is highly recommended to have skill items which make money, for example the easel and wood working table.

- Everyone in the asylum is allowed a job, but the non-controllable sims must be in the Criminal Career or an unpaid or part time job that pays under 20$ or less. You are not allowed to level them up in their career. If they lose their job, they have lost it forever. Your main sim can have whatever job they like. (It is recommended that their job is related to their aspiration. For example a sim with the Master Chef aspiration should be in the Culinary Career) you may not have work that you have to travel to, you may have work from home jobs

- Having a maid and ordering pizza is allowed.

- Can leave the lot to go fishing and collecting at anytime. Can only travel to other people’s houses and community lots during the hours of 7am-5pm. (When travelling to another lot you must bring everyone from the asylum along with you)

- If a sim dies, as long as you have one less bed as you do household members, you’re good, seats don’t need to be deleted.

- Beds must be locked from 8am to 8pm, one of the few times you can control other sims and interrupt their sleep is after 8am when the gate needs to be locked

- Pool must be locked from 8pm-8am as it’s a way to sleep

Medium Mode:

- Starting funds: $700

- Complete three aspirations, then you are free!

- You cannot have a TV and a computer at the same time. It is recommended that if your sim has the Computer Whiz aspiration for example, that you should have a computer.

- One sink, one toilet, one shower/bathtub. May be a duo if you wish

- No more than 4-5 ‘bed spots’. Your choice. For example, you can have 5 single beds, or 2 doubles and 1 single bed etc.

- There can only be total seating for 6. That includes couches, lounges and chairs. If you have a dining table with 4 chairs then you may not use a couch that seats 3. Computer chairs don’t count

- You may only have a total of 5 Skill Building items in the house, so choose wisely at the start. Computers, stoves, bookcases, mirrors, and TVs don't count as skill items. It is highly recommended to have skill items which make money, for example the easel. Punching bags are a grey area, you decide if they count because they can also be a type of therapy

- Only 2 non-controllable sims are allowed jobs, both must be in the criminal career. Your main sim can have whatever job they like. (It is recommended that their job is related to their aspiration. For example a sim with the Master Chef aspiration should be in the Culinary Career)

- you may not purchase satisfaction rewards

- No maids and no pizza.

- Can leave the lot to go fishing and collecting between the hours of 9am-3pm. Can only travel to other people’s houses and community lots during the hours of 10:00am-3:00pm. (When travelling to another lot you must bring everyone from the asylum along with you)

- If a sim dies, 1 seat must be deleted until there is 1 seat remaining.

-Beds must be locked from 7am to 8pm, one of the few times you can control other sims and interrupt their sleep is after 8am when the gate needs to be locked

- Pool must be locked from 8pm-7am

Hard Mode:

- Starting funds: $250

- Complete four aspirations, then you are free!

You cannot have a TV and a computer at the same time. It is recommended that if your sim has the Computer Whiz aspiration for example, that you should have a computer

- One sink, one toilet, one shower/bathtub. Not duo

- No more than 3-4 ‘bed spots’. Your choice. For example, you can have 4 single beds, or 2 double beds, 1 double bed and 2 singles

- There can only be total seating for 4. That includes couches, lounges and chairs. If you have a dining table with 2 chairs then you may not use a couch that seats 3. Computer chairs and chess chairs don’t count, unless you want them to.

- You may only have a total of 4 Skill Building items in the house, so choose wisely at the start. Computers, stoves, pools (if you have a mermaid patient), bookcases, mirrors, and TVs don't count as skill items. It is highly recommended to have skill items which make money, for example the easel, etc...

- Non-controllable sims are not allowed jobs. You main sim can only have a job if their aspiration requires it. For example the Master Chef aspiration requires your sim to be in the Culinary Career.

-You cannot purchase satisfaction rewards

- No maids and no pizza.

- Can leave the lot to go fishing and collecting between the hours or 12:00am-5:00am. Travelling to other lots is banned, unless your sim’s aspiration requires them to. In that, you can travel to other lots between 12:00pm-5:00pm. (When travelling to another lot you must bring everyone from the asylum along with you)

- If a sim dies, 1 bed and 1 seat must be deleted until there is only 1 bed and 1 seat remaining.

- Beds must be locked from 6am to 9pm, one of the few times you can control other sims and interrupt their sleep is after 8am when the gate needs to be locked

- Pool must be locked from 9pm-8am

Aspirations

In the difficulties it states that a number of aspirations must be completed. This refers to aspirations such as the Computer Wiz aspiration. It does NOT refer to groups of aspirations such as the all of the aspirations in the Creativity category.

Scoring (Optional)

+50: per aspiration completed.

+1: per skill point any of the 8 Sims have at the end. Only living Sims count.

+1: per 1000 Satisfaction points every Sim has.

+5: per every human turned vampire by your main sim

-20: per Sim that died.

-20: per fire which has occurred.

-20: per day when the power and water is shut off. (E.g. Power and Water shut off for 2 days =-40 points)

-5 points every time you forget to lock a gate/door

-20 points if a vampire patient uncontrollably drinks

-30 points if a vampire patient uncontrollably drinks from fellow patient

[medicalmiracle]

Rotation wrap-up: PSYCHIATRY

Psychiatry was a laid-back, super chill rotation.  My placement was at a Veteran’s Administration (VA) hospital, which is funded by the federal government and treats U.S. veterans and their families. What I did: ~8:00-8:30AM:  I would roll in, coffee in hand.  I would snag a computer (they were in short supply between the residents and medical/PA students), log into the crappy EMR, and read about the current patients or any new patients which may have been admitted overnight.  There was no pre-rounding, just a huddle at 8:30 which students didn’t really participate in.  My team rounded right after huddle, so as long as I was there before 8:30 it was cool. 8:30AM til whenever:  Rounds.  The rounding team consisted of the attending, resident, medical student, PA student (myself), and social worker.  In the beginning, the resident led rounds and the attending would occasionally jump in.  When the students got comfortable enough, they would lead the rounds interviews for the patients they were following.  The social worker would also ask questions and work with the patient on psycho-social issues.  Housing was a big component of this; most of the veterans on the psych ward were homeless and had substance abuse problems which often required close outpatient followup or residential treatment. 12:00PM-1:00PM: Lunch.  Lunch was didactic lectures twice a week, and free time the remaining two days.  If you program offers these, make every effort you can to go, because they are great reviews for end-of-rotation exams.  Topics included: emergency psychiatry, traumatic brain injury, psychopharmacy, geriatric psychopharmacy, PTSD, sleep problems, addiction medicine, involuntary commitment, and legal liability, among others. 1:00PM-4:00ish:  Students were pretty much on their own.  That does not mean you are free to fuck around.  During this time, it was expected that we will complete tasks assigned during rounds.  Things I did included: calling consults for medical issues and coordinating care with the medicine teams, putting in orders for imaging or labs or whatever else, performing focused physical exams for things like MSK pain or neuro assessment, doing psych exams like MoCA and Beck Depression Inventory, and spending time with the patients I was following to get extra history or whatnot. ~4:00ish: Peace out, y’all. Days were pretty short unless there was a late admit, which my team was lucky enough to never catch one. Also, if the resident on your team was post-call and the attending rounded in the morning and didn’t have anything for you to do, students were generally allowed to leave after morning rounds. I was always gone before the words were fully out of their mouths.

ROTATION #: 1 OVERALL GRADE: A+ IMPRESSION: Y’all... I absolutely LOVE psychiatry... I might work in psych after I graduate. Mental health is MORE important than physical health because you can’t MANAGE your physical health if your brain and/or emotions are jacked up. Plus, it’s so challenging to find the right combination of things to help your patients, it’s like the best possible puzzle ever.

ROTATION ADVICE: - Know your pharmacology, because you will be asked. - Study addiction medicine. We only had like two addiction lectures during didactic year and they didn’t really cover treatment, just what is addictive, how to tell when someone is under the influence, and how to treat overdoses. Addiction is a huge part of inpatient psychiatry because so many mentally ill people self-medicate with psychoactive substances. - Learn how to keep a poker face. Psych patients will tell you some jacked-up shit and you can’t wig out or they will shut down. - On the flip side, try not to become overly involved. I struggled with this SO HARD. I just wanted to do all the things for all the people, and it became sort of exhausting. Plus, transference and counter-transference are real things and can lead to trouble. - Relax and have fun. Psychiatrists and people who love psych are usually quirky/odd ducks who see the world a little differently. Come to the dark side, we have SSRIs and comfortable offices. OTHER COOL SHIT: My program offered a lot of really great experiences outside of our regular hospital work.  Some of the things we did... - Observed ECT. Electroshock therapy isn’t at all what is portrayed in popular culture. Patients are under anesthesia and the current isn’t enough to require restraints or cause the body to heave. Only enough current to cause a seizure is given, and tonic and clonic phases are only observed via lower extremity motion. It is very effective for treamtnet resistant bipolar dperession or for people who are so severely depressed that they cannot care for themselves or are catatonic. These people don’t have the time that SSRIs require to be effective. It was really fascinating and the doctor took the time to show me all the cool EEG strips and explain what was going on in each one. - Listened to a recording of “voices” aka auditory hallucinations made by a psychiatrist who struggles with psychosis. We were given small tasks to complete like filling out a job application whilst listening to the recording. It really helped me empathize with what my schizophrenic patients were dealing with. - We attended a Behavioral Court session.  This was a county court-run diversion program for people with mental illness who had landed in legal trouble because of their illness. As long as they followed treatment plans and the other rules set forth by the program, they stayed out of jail. The clients told us their stories and it was really sad but really amazing at the same time. The judge told us that they had been granted money to hire a doctor to better manage the medical end of the program such as better diagnosis and prescribing, but no doctor wanted the job. We immediately raised our hands and asked them to expand the written language to include advanced practice providers like PAs and NPs. Physical physician supervision is not required, only chart review and availability for consult. If there are holes to fill, APPs are glad to fill them! The judge made a written motion to follow our suggestion, and that was pretty fucking cool. - Psych ER. We all got to do shifts at our local Level I trauma center, which is also the safety net hospital for our metropolitan area. It was AMAZING. Involuntary commitments out the wazoo, prisoners from surrounding jails, and people in acute crisis. Very cool, but limited resources made the work challenging. No medical social workers to be found. They supposedly existed, but I never saw one. - PSTAR clinic. This was an outpatient treatment resistant schizophrenia clinic. These people had tried so many medications, and were still struggling with their symptoms. The clinic’s main MOA was to push for early clozapine use, which evidence has shown to lead to improved long-term functionality in persistently psychotic patients if used earlier in treament than it traditionally has been. It was also very cool. One patient who used to be in and out of the psych ER with psychotic breaks and suicidal ideation was so well recovered that she had regained custody of her daughter and was talking prereqs for nursing school. So fulfilling. We also had the option to choose outpatient peds psych or women’s psych, but I picked this because schizophrenia is fucking fascinating. - Attended an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. I can’t say that I got much out of this because it was a bunch of upper class women sitting around a table in a church reading passages from the 12 step book with the occasional vague reflection about something that was read. It was weird and felt awkward.

So far, clinical rotations are pretty fucking rad. I’m enjoying myself immensely and it’s so great to be out of the classroom and actually doing things. Hold on, y’all, it will get better... I promise.

[bluebutterflyofdoom]

I've been so tired

I'm just so exhausted, coffee doesn't seem to help. I don't know if it's the depression, OCD and anxiety, or if it's a physical symptom from my eating disorder. All I know is I'm tired and cold and it's really hard to do things. Maybe it's a combination. I see my psychiatrist -who knows nothing about ED and is very frustrating to deal with, though she means well- next week so I'm going to research what medication changes might help, since her ideas don't help me. In better news, I see a new therapist that specializes in ED and works with LGBT folks at the end of the month. I hope she'll agree to take me on. If she says I need to go into inpatient or residential care, I wanna ask her to help me set that up and be my therapist when I get discharged. If she thinks I can do outpatient, I'll do that. I honestly sometimes wish I would just get into a program where I don't have to make decisions regarding food and stuff because I'm floundering trying to take care of myself and giving up that control helps me to recover.

[mental-health-advice]

i had extreme anxiety my whole life. I'm only 18 but i feel disorientated, sad, hopeless and my memory seems to be bad. I feel like I lost my chilhood/youth - so many opportunities and experiences i will never experience ever again. I feel like I wasted my life and am still wasting my life, i dont do anything, espeically all the things i really want to do because i'm scared. I'm scared of putting myself out there and living and learning. But i'm also scared of death & the passage of time. iceP1

iceP2. I’m a huge perfectionist and this has impacted me negatively since always. I assume i can never achieve anything in the way I want to, so this has stopped me from trying/doing anything. I can’t stand doing something over time, i cant just live and relax. I’m constantly on edge and need to do things quickly, need to be rewarded quickly. My skills need to be good immediately or i drop it. I feel like time is passing and im terrified of losing out on life

Hi darling,

If I didn’t know better, I’d say I’d written this myself! I can relate a lot to what you’re going through and I just want to say that I’m sorry you’re struggling so much. Do know you aren’t alone though!

I’m going to tell you something, and the reason I’m saying it is because I don’t want you to make the same mistakes that I did. You’re 18, which is still really young! I wish I could go back to being 18 with the knowledge I have now, I would have done so many things differently. Okay so here comes a little bit about me. I’ve been struggling with my mental health for 9 years now I think (lost count a little). But it all got progressively worse when I was 17, and even more at 18. I was in therapy, one session a week. But I felt like that wasn’t enough, like it wouldn’t get me there. I felt like I needed a long residential program. I tried to voice this to my therapist at the time, but she dismissed it. It was understandable because I was new at the facility since I’d moved to uni, but before that I’d had years of one session a week therapy already and I hadn’t improved at all, actually gotten worse. When it was dismissed I left it at that. I continued with one session a week, although I went inpatient a couple times, but this was for a short period of time. Flash forward to two years ago and my therapist at the time came to the conclusion that I wasn’t making any progress and that I needed something more intensive. I went to a diagnostic clinical program (similar to residential but only focused on figuring out what’s going on). The goal was to find out what was the reason that one session a week wasn’t helping and to get a recommendation for a treatment program. I was diagnosed with AvPD there and they did indeed recommend a residential program. Due to reasons I won’t get into (irrelevant) I got a new therapist at the same facility I had the diagnostic program with. I didn’t end up going to residential but she thought I could benefit from something that literally translates to ‘parttime’. It was a seven month program where you came three days a week from around 9.30 to 3.30 ish. Flash forward to now. I completed that program a year ago. Last week my therapist had a meeting with the team to discuss my case and my therapist said that it’s most likely gonna be residential (which here often is 6 or 9 months or a year even). So it really feels like the last four years were a complete waste. The reason I told you this is because I don’t want you to make the same mistake that I did. Listen to your instinct and fight for that. If you feel like you need something more intensive, don’t let them dismiss you. You know yourself best! You’re the only one who knows exactly how you’re doing. Please fight for yourself lovely, let your voice be hard. Make sure that you get the treatment that you need and deserve!

Speaking of treatment, are you currently receiving any kind of professional help? You really don’t have to go through this by yourself lovely! There is help available and you deserve to get that help. I know it can be terrifying to reach out, so if it helps, know that when you start therapy you aren’t under the obligation to start doing scary things immediately. You can decide the pace, you’re in control. I hope that is at least a little bit reassuring to hear. It would be easiest to visit your GP / local doctor and explain to them briefly what you’ve been struggling with. They’ll then be able to refer you to a therapist, psychiatrist, or other mental health professional. You can read more about getting help here.

These past 18 years haven’t been easy for you and you feel like you missed out a lot. While you probably had a different youth than what would be seen as regular or normal, I don’t think it necessarily means you missed out. Your struggles don’t define you, but they do teach you certain lessons, which can be positive. I don’t mean this in romanticising way though, as it would have been much much nicer if you didn’t have to struggle so much. But for example, if I hadn’t been struggling I wouldn’t have come across MHA, joined as an admin and met so many of my closest friends through here. I wouldn’t be typing out this reply right now. I wouldn’t be helping other people (at least, I hope that we sometimes help). So of course it would have been preferable if you didn’t struggle so much, but try not to see it as a complete waste of time either. You’re learning a lot from all this and when you’ve recovered those lessons will stick too.

I really hope that this helped a little. Please always feel free to get back to me! You can get out of this, I really believe in you.

Sometimes what seems impossible, is just hard.

Keep fighting beautiful Love Pauline

[cathygeha]

REVIEW

The Final Deception by Heather Graham

New York Confidential #5

Coming into this series on book five shouldn’t have worked but it did. I have enjoyed this author’s work before and was happy to read a new-to-me book by her again.

Craig Frasier is an FBI agent and his fiance sometimes does pysch consultations for the FBI. In this book Craig is still having nightmares about the tough case of THE FIREMAN and Kieran Finnegan, Craig’s fiance, has just interviewed The Fireman a little while before he escapes from prison. About the time he escapes another murder following the same modus operandi takes place and all of New York is soon intently watching the news to find out what will happen next. Is this a copycat murder or did The Fireman do it?

In addition to the catch-him-if-you-can thread there is the ongoing romance between Craig and Kieran and if/when they will get married, the sibling support of the Finnegan family for one another, the police procedural aspects of solving the murder, the suspense of wondering who might be following Kieran and the question of Ruff the dog and where he will end up in the future.

This was an interesting read that might have been more interesting had I come in on book one and read the four books preceding this one because I would have known the main and supporting characters better than I did going into book five. That said, I still knew them well enough to enjoy the story.

What I liked:

* Kieran: Smart, intuitive, puzzle solver, not clingy, a good sister and fiance and very likable

* Craig: Intelligent, driven, keen to solve cases, not too clingy, a good boyfriend, dependable and bit hearted.

* The relationship between Kieran and Craig – they were mature, knew what they wanted and allowed one another the independence and distance needed to accomplish the goals of their profession.

* The Finnegan brothers – I am sure there is more to each and every one of them that I would love to know.

* Ruff – a scrappy fellow that landed in clover

* Following the threads that lead to the WHO and WHY of the murders

* The twist or two at the end

* The good thwarted evil

What I did not like:

* The psychotic puppet master and those he pulled the strings of

Did I enjoy this book? Yes

Would I read more in this series/by this author? Yes

Thank you to NetGalley, Harper Collins and Harlequin-Mira for the ARC – This is my honest review.

4.5 Stars

BOOK SUMMARY

Witness the thrilling conclusion to the beloved New York Confidential series, in THE FINAL DECEPTION (MIRA Books; March 31, 2020; $26.99). Kieran and Craig are about to take on their most chilling case yet as they hunt for a deranged serial killer who has escaped from prison to satisfy his need to kill again.

When criminal psychologist Kieran Finnegan was released from her responsibility of counseling the brutal serial killer known as The Fireman, once he was incarcerated, she was relieved to escape the tendrils of his twisted inner world. The chill she received from her sessions with him has stayed with her despite trying to leave him in the past. However, some demons refuse to remain behind bars. When her FBI agent boyfriend Craig is called to a gruesome crime scene that matches The Fireman’s MO, news begins to spread that he’s escaped from prison.

And he remembers Kieran...

Amid a citywide manhunt, Kieran and Craig need to untangle a web of deceit, privilege, and greed. They suspect that those closest to the killer have been drawn into his evil, or else someone is using another man’s madness and cruelty to disguise their crimes. When their investigation brings the danger right to the doorstep to the once safe haven of Finnegan’s Pub, Kieran and Craig will have to be smarter and bolder than ever before, because this time it’s personal, and they have everything to lose.

THE FINAL DECEPTION

Author: Heather Graham

ISBN: 9780778309437

Publication Date: March 31, 2020

Publisher: MIRA Books

Buy Links:

Harlequin

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Books-A-Million

Powell’s

EXCERPT

PROLOGUE

CRAIG FRASIER BREATHED IT IN BEFORE HE COULD STOP himself; the bloodcurdling scent of burning flesh.

Human flesh.

Flames still skittered over the body—an accelerant had been used. As he stood there in the small dark alley, he heard others rushing in: Mike Dalton, his partner, and patrol officers. He heard the sirens; the fire department was coming.

But there was no saving this victim.

Craig was already tamping the fire out; an extinguisher would make the work of the medical examiner more difficult.

But he knew what the medical examiner would find.

The victim had been strangled, then the tongue had been cut out. And then the eyes had been gouged out. Death had occurred, mercifully, before the fire had been set.

The corpses haunted his dreams. Burned shells, some flesh and soft tissue remaining, charred and clinging to the bones, mummy-like. The mouth in the blackened skull was agape, and those empty, soulless eye sockets seemed to be staring up, as if they could still see, as if they stared at him in reproach…

Why hadn’t they caught the killer sooner?

He heard a rustling sound. Looking across the alley, Craig saw a shadow moving. Leaving the corpse to others, he took off like a bullet. He pursued the moving shadow at a run…running and running for blocks. The city was a blur around him.

He reached apartments on Madison, with a coffee shop and a dress store on the first floor, just as the gate at the street entry to the residential units above was closing. He caught the gate, and he reached the elevator in time to see what floor it stopped on. He followed.

And again, as he arrived, a door was just closing; he didn’t let it close.

And there he was: the Fireman, still smelling faintly of gasoline, ready to sit down to a lovely dinner with his family. About to say a prayer before the meal…just a husband and a father, and a man who looked at Craig and calmly said, “So, my work is over. But I have obeyed the commandments given me, and I will go with you.”

Why did you take so long? The corpse again! In Craig’s dreams, the corpse was back, animated, flying at him like a ghostly banshee, issuing a silent scream.

Craig opened his eyes.

He didn’t awake screaming or startled—he didn’t jerk up. It was almost as if he always knew it was a dream, reliving the day the Fireman had gone down.

He’d had the dream several times before. But, now, it seemed as though it had been a long time. Weeks. He’d thought he’d ceased experiencing it altogether. He’d been doing all the right things: quietly seeing a Bureau shrink a few times, following their advice. He hadn’t told Kieran Finnegan, his fiancée, about his recurring nightmare, and while she was a criminal psychologist working with two of the city’s finest criminal psychiatrists, he’d made a point of not telling her or her bosses.

He’d thought he’d settled it on his own. It was a little strange and sometimes intimidating being in love with someone who studied the human psyche, and he hadn’t wanted Kieran worried about him or trying to analyze him.

Why the hell had the dream come back?

He felt Kieran shift against him. He pulled her into his arms and she rolled, crystal eyes opening wide when she realized that he was awake.

And aroused. Kieran’s tangle of auburn hair was a wild mass around her face, emphasizing her eyes and the quick smile that came to her lips.

“Ah!” she murmured, feeling his arousal against her.

“Your fault,” he accused.

“Well, thankfully. What time is it?” she asked with a soft whisper.

He laughed. “Quickie time, or time for a quickie,” he said.

Her smile deepened, and there was something so sensual about it that it never failed to increase whatever he had begun to feel.

In her arms, in the liquid burn of kisses here and there strategically placed, in the swift—and intense—blaze of arching and writhing and thrusting, all else faded.

After, Craig headed for the shower. He was an FBI agent in the Criminal Division of New York City’s branch of the FBI. He could be satisfied in having brought down several killers. But there would be more; a sad fact of the world and humanity. He was blessed to have his job, his vocation, and it was time to go to work.

He shoved the dream into the back of his mind.

Whatever his day held, he’d already seen the worst that this world could offer.

Little did he know.

AUTHOR BIO:

Heather Graham is The New York Times and USA Today best-selling author sold her first book, When Next We Love, in 1982 and since then, she has written over two hundred novels and novellas with about 60 million books in print in categories of romantic suspense, historical romance, vampire fiction, time travel, occult, and Christmas holiday fare. Graham earned high praise for her New York Confidential series, including a starred review from Library Journal which called it, “Intricate, fast-paced, and intense, this riveting thriller blends romance and suspense in perfect combination and keeps readers guessing and the tension taut until the very end.” For more information, visit her at TheOriginalHeatherGraham.com.

Social Links:

Author Website

Twitter: @HeatherGraham

Instagram: @TheOriginalHeatherGraham

Facebook: @HeatherGrahamAuthor

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