#anyway. a great example of a post by someone with adhd that will probably be prohibitively difficult for other ppl with adhd to read!

[aeide-thea]

very much an off-the-cuff post so there may well be bugs, i'm still workshopping my thinking here, but—

i seem to see posts fairly regularly in which a member of some marginalized group A is objecting to attempts by less marginalized group B to make connections between discrimination against A and harm experienced by B (the main thing i have in mind here is when people attempt to align themselves with visibly-trans people by pointing out the ways that transphobic legislation also impacts gnc cis people, theatrical crossdressing, &c, but there are definitely also examples along other axes)—

and like. the main objection i've seen from A is 'why do they have to connect my experience to their experience in order to care about it? why can't they just agree that i shouldn't be discriminated against as a matter of, like, compassion for fellow humanity?'

and this reaction does honestly always just seem a little, idk, naive to me?? like, i don't know, it's gotten very popular ime to complain about normies' clumsy attempts to Understand Instead of Just Accepting [this feels potentially linked to like. the way many of us now prefer silently clicking 'like' to producing our own original, maybe clumsy, responses? but don't @ me on that point], probably because a lot of the time they aren't genuinely seeking to Understand but just to point out all the ways our queerness &c doesn't fit their received (unexaminedly conservative) understanding of the world, which feels to us (very reasonably!) like renewed pressure from the establishment to make ourselves fit that established framework, and so we resist… but at the same time, idk, maybe i'm just outing myself as lesser-than-thou here, but for every sort of person i was raised to distrust and have since arrived at genuine loving acceptance/appreciation of, it's involved first coming to understand their frame of reference at least a little? not to say that there isn't a place for shutting up and listening while you're still working to understand, because there definitely is! but i do kind of think this idea that's become popular in certain liberal circles of like, 'you don't have to understand my experience, you just have to respect it,' is fine and true for keeping peace with strangers, but really isn't a recipe for winning friends or influencing people—it's a recipe for keeping people at arm's length where they can't hit you. and then people turn around and want to apply that rule to coalition-building, and get all shocked-pikachu-face when others seek to identify more active points of connection.

...

another ~Radical Objection to Liberal Approaches~ i've seen, though often not specifically in this context (of discussing the way attempts to oppress A have knock-on effects for B), is like—'there's no point in deconstructing their logic because it's fundamentally illogical! insert that sartre quote abt anti-semites!' and like. no, there's absolutely no point in debating their logic with them. but fundamentally when people assert a logical resistance to bigoted positions they are not doing it to Own The Bigots, imo, or at any rate shouldn't be; they're (we're) doing it to reaffirm the basis of their/our own camp's position, namely, we see your knee-jerk fears and reject them; we substitute instead a patient allegiance to logic, that reasons its way into compassion.

that said, obviously there's a conversation to be had here about, like, platforming bad positions, and to what extent deconstructing them is implicitly platforming them! but. i do think that complaining that logic won't win over bigots is missing the very fundamental point that the logic isn't for the bigots: it's for us. we're talking to ourselves; we're affirming ourselves. and yeah, we need to understand that this sort of intra-party discussion doesn't, on its own, constitute sufficient activism! messages need to be communicated beyond the bounds of the party! but i do think i disagree that there's no place for it.

[hajihiko]

Ahhh, I'm sorry if this doesn't make sense, but I'm curious to know what changed Hajime/Izuru's mind in the universe your art takes place in? Like, what made him go from not caring about anything because everything was boring and meaningless, to trying to enjoy life?

I don't really remember what it was in the anime, but it was probably hope. And like, that makes sense if you think about it, considering that's the definition of hope, but hope doesn't usually just happen like that, you know? Especially not to someone who probably had never felt it since the whole Ultimate Hope thing (ironically). In my mind, it's hard to imagine what it could have been, considering nothing ever phased him. I know that whatever gave him hope doesn't have to be that deep, because that's how it is sometimes, but I was wondering what you think it could have been (or more importantly, what you consider it to be in your art)!

Also, this is kinda unrelated, but I find it so cool how much your art makes me really think about the characters. It's amazing how you're able to really see how you've fleshed out the characters through you art, and honestly, you are probably one of my favourite artists because of it.

But anyway, sorry about this long and random rant 😭 Idk why I spend my time analyzing the character and point of view of fictional characters, but I guess sometimes the ADHD brain goes brrrrrr.

Thank you for sharing your art; I hope have a great day or night!

depends on the universe! But I'll assume you mean my general post-game stuff.

I've said it somewhere before so if it's old bread to you bear with me, but basically, it was a genuine dedication to face the big horrible awful feelings that come with trauma and life in general, and also the brain boost of getting to skip the slow growing part even for just a while.

My idea is that Izuru and Hajime are not two separate identities, rather, an amnesiac and horribly traumatized boy was given a moniker he didn't care to accept or deny. It's not like he had any other name to go by. That was Izuru Kamukura.

The brain has these neural pathways of how it responds to things, and his all got burnt out so he could respond with an appropriate talent each time. As a very simplified example, someone might respon to threat with the Flight response, because it worked in a dire situation and the brain decided "that saved us, this is how we will respond from now on".

Hajime, in the game, gets a sudden bump out of those pathways, enabling him to feel things properly and be fully present in his life. Thematically, the big Super Sayian moment is him deciding to not fall into old, but true and tried, brain patterns, and instead taking on the horrific experience of being human, with all the messy Emotions and Failures that comes with it.

When he wakes up from the game, he still struggles, but the artificial boost from his old thinking as well as a conscious, strenuous, painful effort to not repress himself anymore but instead face the things that he did and were done to him, make him able to carve himself into a new Him.

Not the same, in the sense that WHO could say they're the same as they were before a simulated murder game that revealed that you were a killing machine terrorist and so were your friends. But the same as in, he's Hajime Hinata and he decides what exactly that means. To want is an emotion, and he wants to become someone who can experience life fully, and chasing that single feeling of Want opens up the doors to everything else. You might've heard this before but "before you change, you have to want to change".

So in short. What enabled him to get Hopeful so to speak was the combination of a brain kick (you could call that a metaphor for outside help), and a concrete decision to try to do the difficult but right thing. Sounds kind of boring maybe, but everything else comes later - like his interest and care for his friends, an enjoyment of philosophy and the arts, a pleasure from being useful and helpful, a serenity from accepting things as they are, and a thrill that comes with strong genuine emotion (from my own life, sometimes a single moment of !!!! can carry you on for months).

Yes the whole thing is a metaphor for getting better with mental health stuff. It's personal to me okay 😂

(also I like the idea from Miggys fic that his human connections override the apathy and distance so as long as he's around the people he loves he can hold onto what keeps him going)

I love thinking about and building on characters too! Spending tons of time inspecting them like a specimen 🤝 people (and therefore characters) are very interesting to me so I just like rolling them around my brain. Thank you for your interest and kind words!

[bluedalahorse]

A highly incomplete introduction to AuDHD for YR fans who want to write more Sara Eriksson

Greetings, friends! In my time in the Young Royals fandom, I’ve seen a few people mention they were interested writing Sara but they didn’t know how to approach her neurodivergence, or that they find it intimidating. I figured it might be worth compiling a post where I share both ADHD and autism resources I’ve found helpful, as well as elements of my personal experience I draw on when writing Sara.

This post is by no means exhaustive, and I could probably say a lot more. But I figured I’d get it out there in case it was helpful to anyone else.

Part One: Resources and Such

Yo Samdy Sam is an AuDHD vlogger who talks about her experiences, and I find her video about how autism and ADHD show up together pretty informative. Since Sara is both it’s good to have a grasp on these nuances! Yo Samdy Sam’s other videos are also ones I’d recommend.

I’m autistic, now what? is also a good channel to check out for someone talking about their day to day experiences of autism. Her videos are a little longer, but she focuses often on how things have changed from her childhood to her adulthood, which can be helpful if you’re thinking about Sara at different ages/writing flashbacks/working on fic set in the future/etc.

Chloe Hayden, who stars in another teen drama called Heartbreak High, is both autistic and ADHD, and very fun and positive. She presents quite differently than Sara does—lots more talking and energy—but I think she’s a good example of every neurodivergent person presenting differently. Also, people should watch Heartbreak High and write me some fic where Sara and Quinni meet because I want it.

How to ADHD is mostly geared toward practical life skills when you’ve got ADHD, but it doesn’t neglect the way those interact with emotional well-being. Sara might try some of these strategies while working on her school work and chores, either because an adult recommended she do so or because it’s part of a system she worked out for herself. Also, the videos are perfectly designed for ADHD brains, and i have acquired many ways to self-accommodate by watching them.

Jessie Gender is autistic and does commentary about lots of nerdy things and trans rights. I really liked her video on The Queen’s Gambit where she talks about autistic girls and sex. If you’re planning to write spicer fic about Sara (which people should write more of imo) then Jessie might be a good resource!

Marieke Nijkamp is a multiply disabled author, and one of her disabilities is autism. I still have to get around to reading her novel length books but her short story “Better For All the World” made me cry and is one of my formative sargust mentor texts. I really recommend it if you can get a hold of the anthology The Radical Element. (Although, heads up, the story deals with the Buck v Bell case of 1927, which is difficult subject matter.)

Disability in Kidlit has some great resources on writing autistic characters from a craft perspective. If you’re going to write specifically from Sara’s point of view, or even if you’re not, it’s worth reading this article about the autistic voice in fiction and this article about humanizing autistic characters. Other articles on the site are also great!

I’m going to talk more about my personal experiences under the cut below…

Part 2: My personal experiences & takeaways

Sooooo if you’ve met one AuDHD person, you’ve met one AuDHD person. I can’t really claim to speak for all AuDHD people, and I’ve only recently gotten my diagnosis anyway. That said, a lot of my own personal experience colors how I write Sara. So in the interest of transparency, I’ve gone ahead and listed some of the things I’ve thought about when I write her.

An important note before I get started—this is not, actually, meta or analysis of the show. I’m not trying to tell you want I “really” think is going on with Sara Eriksson, or what the writers intended, or what the show is saying. You may read her differently, and I’m sure your interpretation is just as informed by your own experiences as mine. So please don’t take this as a criticism if your interpretation is different.

What I am explaining here instead are the ways that my personal experiences as an AuDHD person have influenced my perception of Sara, which in turn translates to how I’ve made sense of her storyline and written her in fanfic. None of these are “excuses,” but they are explorations. You can look at it as me examining my own thinking and writing process. I’m also opening up about some of my experiences and being a little bit vulnerable. If you have questions about any of these things below, or you want to know more for your own fic, you are always welcome to message me. I may not be able to get back to you right away but I can help however I am able. There are also some things I might feel more comfortable discussing in depth one-on-one, so direct messages might be better in that case, too.

Anyway, let’s begin…

Polarized strengths and weaknesses: In my own experience as an AuDHD person there are some pretty dramatic contrasts between what I’m good at and what I suck at. I’m in the 99% percentile in some skills and the 2% percentile in others. This adds up to stuff like, I read the Sherlock Holmes stories for the first time when I was eight and Les Misérables when I was eleven, but I cannot drive a car or learn a choreographed dance no matter how hard I try. This is inexplicable to some people because they’re like, omg but you know all these advanced words! Surely if you can’t drive a car, it’s just because you aren’t trying hard enough! Likewise I think it makes sense to write Sara with a spiky profile of her own, and have characters react to that accordingly.

Perceptions of maturity: AuDHD adults aren’t children. AuDHD teenagers aren’t children either. And yet part of ableism is the infantilization of AuDHD people. I don’t have a lot of huge narrative squicks, but this is one of them, and it’s rooted in frustrations I’ve had over people treating me like I’m still a child. I always write Sara as the age she’s intended to be in the fic. If I see fanfic scenes or headcanon scenarios where someone is treating Sara like she’s five, and that’s spun as positive or never questioned, it can make me really upset and it’s an immediate back button. This is something I would recommend writers be on the lookout for if they’re incorporating Sara into a scene. Maybe this one bullet point is spinning a little far into criticism of other folks, but I think if I could communicate one thing to other people writing Sara, this would be it.

Special interests/hyperfixations: The thing about special interests is that autistic people often turn to them to replenish their energy and get their nervous systems back to a state of equilibrium. (For instance, me writing this post right now about my blorbo Sara Eriksson is me engaging with a special interest to put my nervous system in a state of equilibrium and put energy back in my body.) Sara’s time spent with Rousseau isn’t just wonderful because she loves horses, it’s also something that’s probably helping her recharge after a complicated day of navigating social situations at Hillerska. This is why she panics at the thought of losing Rousseau. Now, there’s still issues here in that Rousseau isn’t actually Sara’s horse. And I do think many teenage and adult autistics with low support needs, like Sara, understand that they can’t engage with their special interests all the time. But in order to write and understand Sara, I have to understand that she’s counting on Rousseau and horses more generally as something that helps her self-regulate and stay grounded. (In Heart and Homeland I also added art as one of her hyperfixations, so she often draws to recharge and make sense of things.)

Alexithymia: Alexithymia is essentially a trait people can have where they struggle to read their own emotions. It’s pretty common in autistic people and other neurodivergent folk; I have a mild version of it. For me, tuning into my emotions is a bit like trying to figure out what song is playing on a staticy radio. I might have to wait and “mess with the dial” a bit before I can fully understand what I’m feeling in a given situation. The question “how are you?” is a bit of a nightmare for me sometimes. Because my alexithymia is mild, I usually can figure out what I’m feeling in time, but I still often need extra effort to discern the nuances. I tend to apply this trait to Sara when I write her, mostly because she seems to need to sit with her feelings to understand how they’re affecting her. This is most evident when she’s trying to figure out if she like-likes August, though it comes out in other ways, too. Sara might just need a lot of time to process her emotions. Even when she’s showing her emotions and in them, they might take a lot of time to leave her system, and she might not catch on to how they’re affecting her right away. In Heart and Homeland, part of the reason Sara keeps a diary in the first place is so she can sort through what she’s feeling.

Heightened empathy: There’s an old stereotype that autistic people don’t have any empathy. This is not true, and some autistics even have an excess of empathy. I would argue that Sara (at least the way I interpret and write her) is one of them. This may seem counterintutive to some, as I have seen people argue that she is insufficiently empathetic to Simon and/or Linda. I see it differently, however. In my own experience, having an excess of empathy doesn’t always mean that I come across as loving and sweet to the people in my life. Sometimes it can make it so you’re so full of feelings toward others that you can’t act. I often function clumsily in conflicts, and feel like I’m caught between different parties, especially if it’s a situation where everyone appears to be hurting. It’s enough to make me shut down and not do anything, or even side with the person who to everyone else is obviously wrong. Especially when I was a teenager, the answer about “who to side with” in a conflict wasn’t always clear to me. For instance, in college, I dated a girl who constantly belittled me and many of my friends, and I let her get away with it because I was sensitive to the ways she was genuinely hurting about life. I am not proud of it now, and I did break up with her eventually and made efforts to patch things up with my friends when I could, but it also took me two and a half years to get there. Thanks to life experience and therapy, I am now better at recognizing red flags and overriding my excess empathy to call people out on their shit when they need it. It took me time, though, and I can’t help reading a lot of that into Sara. In a way, I tend to think her hope that August will own up to his actions is born out of heightened empathy for both August and Simon. She pins her hopes on this solution because, in her mind, it meets Simon’s needs because the person who harmed him has come forward and is willing to be held accountable for his actions and it meets August’s needs because he can find relief in owning up to his shit and stop drowning in regret. Now, yes, Sara is absolutely misleading herself and ignoring crucial details of the situation because she’s in love, and she does misread what Simon actually needs in the situation. This is very typically teenage. At the same time, when I write her in fic, I see this as tied to an excess of empathy, and not a lack of it.

Inertia/Executive Functioning Struggles: Building on what was said above… some AuDHD people (like myself) can really struggle with making a plan and getting started on tasks, and the bigger the task, the bigger the struggle. “Tasks” is a word we usually apply to things like doing laundry, so we tend to think of executive functioning as an unemotional thing, but it can also apply to emotional stuff like, say, having a big conversation that needs to be had or breaking up with someone you know you need to. (Like I said above. Two and a half years with that shitty person in college!) In fact, I would say inertia can even make things harder with social/emotional stuff, because math homework is at least consistently math homework, but social/emotional situations can shift and become more complicated over time. At Hillerska, we see Sara get involved in ever-shifting social politics, and it takes things escalating to the field scene for her to take action at the end of S2. (In a more minor example, Sara taking a while to get ready in the parents’ weekend episode, and Linda rushing her out the door, is a great example of Sara being affected by inertia.)

Menstrual ick: Increasing numbers of studies show that people with uteruses who have ADHD, autism, or both are way more likely to have painful periods and PMDD. This is true for me—one of the biggest signs that my period is coming is that I am absolutely convinced everyone hates me. I don’t know how to apply this to Sara directly, but periods are part of life and if you happen to write about her dealing with menstrual nonsense, this might be something to keep in mind.

Sensory issues: A lot of people are aware of sensory issues for neurodivergents, and every neurodivergent experiences sensory issues differently, and not always in ways that are immediately apparent to neurotypicals. For me, I hate vacuums and car horns and bananas, but for my roommate, she hates any lights on after 7 PM and finds chocolate overwhelming. Sara doesn’t mention any particular sensory issues, but presumably she has some and masks her reactions, so uh… make up the ones that make sense to you, I guess. Or, don’t make them up, but maybe read about a bunch of different people’s experiences of sensory issues and work from there. External stuff like being tired, sick, or being on one’s period can heighten sensory issues, so think about vulnerability factors that might increase them for Sara.

Rejection sensitivity: Many people with ADHD feel rejection or criticism from others with a high level of intensity, even as physical pain. (Fun fact: PMS makes my rejection sensitivity even worse!) I don’t know if we see Sara feeling rejection sensitivity onscreen much in YR, but I can’t help but imagine she’s dealt with it in the past, based on the way she says she sometimes feels like the worst person in the world, when she’s talking to August in 2.3. If Sara’s had therapy (which I assume she’s had in some form because she knows breathing exercises) then maybe this is something she’s worked on coping strategies.

Accommodations in school: I don’t actually know how this works in Sweden specifically or at a school like Hillerska, but I’d love to hear how it works! Someone else should weigh in if they know things. But I would not be surprised if Sara has the legal right to certain accommodations in school such as extended time on tests, guided notes, etc. (Not being Swedish myself, I’m not sure what the equivalent to the Americans With Disabilities Act would be in Sweden.) One thing to note here is that Sara would get to decide herself whether she actually uses her accommodations or not. I would say, based on my observations of teenagers, is that some neurodivergent teenagers tend not to use their accommodations so they can avoid sticking out among their peers. This seems like it might be the case for Sara, since she wants to make friends at Hillerska and not stand out. The other thing she might encounter at Hillerska specifically is teachers who don’t want to meet those accommodations because they’re “old school” and, frankly, ableist. Accommodations are something one should take into account when writing Sara’s academic life, though.

Double empathy problem: This is something that the psych community is talking about more lately, and essentially the idea here is that neurotypicals communicate best with other neurotypicals whereas neurodivergents communicate best with other neurodivergents. That doesn’t mean both groups can’t communicate with one another (and even reducing it to two groups is kind of oversimplifying things, because obviously culture and other things impact communication too) but there are different patterns of communication at work here. In my own life, I vibe well with people whose neurotypes are similar to mine—this is exactly why @coruscantrhapsody and I are such iconic roommates. The Double Empathy Problen is theorized to have played a role in stereotypes about autistic people not having any empathy. (PS: I don’t actually think August has undiagnosed ADHD in canon, at least not according to the writers. Still, I think it would be pretty interesting to write him in fanfiction as someone who has a missed childhood diagnosis given the way he struggles with rejection sensitivity, impulsivity, and emotion regulation, and the way that the adderall addiction could be a form of self-medication that has gone awry. For that reason I think it’d be interesting to see a fic where the sargust relationship is viewed through the lens of the double empathy problem. Obviously not in a way where the ADHD excuses August’s harmful behaviors, but you know. An added layer of delicious nuance. Alternately, I know some folks like to headcanon Wille as autistic. Sara really clicking with autistic!Wille when they finally get a chance to talk is something I’d like to see!)

Neurodivergent community: As far as I can tell, Sara doesn’t really have neurodivergent community. This makes me sad, as someone who strongly benefits from friendships with other neurodivergent people. I would like her to have some in someone’s fic, please! Let me know if you write it.

That’s all for now… maybe I’ll add more in a future post.

For any other AuDHDers, do you have any elements of your personal experience that you incorporate into how you interpret or write Sara’s character? Feel free to reblog and add on, if you feel so inclined. (But also, no pressure.) Like I said, every ND person experiences this stuff differently, so someone else may have completely different experiences than me.

[hotchfiles]

Hi sweets, so only you obv don’t have to answer this if you don‘t want to, I just have a question!

So how do I start being me unapologetically?

Like I mean even online (tumblr, twitter, etc) I‘m so scared of being perceived, especially in a way I don’t want to be perceived but I so badly want to interact with people that I share the same interest with!

I’m so so socially bad that I usually look at other peoples posts to see how it is acceptable to be online, like when I do answer someone’s tweet I literally analyze how they interact with others and try to mirror that so they won‘t think I‘m weird or whatever. And I know that alone is probably weird/creepy? But idk I just always have been bad at any kind of social interaction, I only learned how to mirror behavior and well you get older and understand more lol

You are you, as you should, so freely and I just want this too but what if the people I like think bad about me and don’t want to interact at all and I don’t notice it because I don‘t get social cues? (I don’t think I have to mention I‘m neurodivergent :‘) )

so..any tips haha?

first of all, thank you so much for thinking of me for this, it makes me genuinely happy that my personality does show thru my posts

now, I think maybe an autistic person might give better advice on this, because I might be wrong for assuming this but such an extensive struggle with what you described is very prevalent with autism

as someone with adhd, I did mask for a lot of things, but my impulsiveness makes it pretty impossible to not be me, I just be talkin and posting, really, no thoughts behind these eyes

I've also built my personality online, I got my first PC way too early, and also my first smartphone, I was a chronic twitter user from 2009 to last year, so I've used my space online to be the person my parents wouldn't let me be, always, I guess that helps with being so unapologetically me

I'm sure you're more you than you realize, and that you are more similar to the people you like here then you think. but what really matters is that If anyone thinks bad of you, they are not your people

most people are here to make friends, and you will hit it off great with some, and the conversation won't flow as well with others, but that won't mean they don't want to talk to you, it's just how we are as people, some friendships bloom quick, and some interactions don't flow that great (I post a lot, for example, but I'm a terrible DMer, anyone here can attest)

anyway, I don't know how to help you be more you, but I'm sure letting go of those fears is a big part of it

[bonefall]

two questions:

1. do you have a masterpost of bb? more specifically, do you have a timeline masterpost? i can't remember if i've read it or not

2. was explaining your sol possession thing to a friend who is also into warriors @alphabetbill. she was curious about the whole possession thing in general, specifically with bramble in whatever arc he gets possessed in (i haven't read it so i haven't read your posts on bb for that yet)

anyway love reading ur posts in general, haven't stopped thinking about them for like a month. rereading warriors and doing my own rewrite now bc man, this got me hella excited

My inability to create a proper masterpost is legendary. ADHD culture is saying, "Today I will do X" and then doing both Y and Z as X never happens.

But I DO have THIS, the Better Bones History Lesson. It's a great overview of everything so far! I plan to eventually compile all the little details of each, but start there.

On Possession

The rule of possession is that it's VERY hard to do if you don't let them into your heart. Any ghost can do it in less than one lesson, but they need to be channeled first. It would be possible, for example, for Mapleshade to possess someone... but not until she got someone to channel her.

Ashfur couldn't have done what he did if he didn't have help, and if he didn't know to strike when Bramblestar was already out of his body. Bramble is currently the only example of an unwilling possession.

(and btw this happens in what I call the Reckoning Era, which is TBC. I give time periods a unique name, like for example, the Campaign Era is the time after MV but before Brokenstar's reign)

Other times that cats have been possessed, all of these willingly;

Jay's Wing, Half Moon, and Lion's Roar to channel their gods to oppose Holly Leaves

Fallenleaf, with Sol, back as Hollyleaf and Holly Leaves.

Firestar and Brokenstar, when they were rebuilding SkyClan

Rootspring when he was imprisoned, Hawkfrost used his body to pummel Darkstripe

Applefur, Ratscar, and Redwillow were probably possessed by Dark Forest cats when they were lording over ShadowClan in OotS, after the death of Russetfur, to make them stronger.

When you're possessed, your extra spirit acts like something sharing your body. You are able to fight against it just as much as it can fight against you. Fallenleaf traps Sol within herself, but still has to be careful to not let it take over.

Meanwhile, if Ratscar and Shredtail were possession-buddies in ShadowClan for that time in OotS, they would be fighting with more synchronicity. Like the strength of Shredtail is amplifying Ratscar's blows and reaction time.

[homosexualmorelikehomiesexual]

ok so...we all saw the flurry of Bandom Racism discussion happening. and i have...thoughts.

i know this is late, in theory because i wanted to get my thoughts together, but honestly mainly because i didnt know what to say, so part of me was annoyed that i felt obligated to say anything at all. bc im not nearly as active in bandom as my blog probably makes it look, i didnt learn 90% of the Lore until september and all of that i learned from mcrblr. im new! i dont know about any of this! much less about the racism. so...why am i expected to talk about it? what is there for me to say?

...and over the past few days, its slowly sunk in for me that thats exactly the point.

of COURSE i dont see the racism in the fandom, or know what to say about it. because either none of the other white liberal fans in my circle do, or we just... dont talk about it. and i think when we do know, we dont talk about it, because we feel like its not our place. we dont know what to say, and especially if we feel like we had any hand in it, we're... embarassed? i know i am. and like...i hesitate to list examples, because i dont want to come across as self flagellating. one, because its got to be annoying for people of color, and two, because...i dunno. i dont want to make other white people think thats whats required, to be anti racist? because i think thats one of the assumptions we're laboring under, like...we've created this environment of really aggressive Discourse, so when it comes to racism, and unpacking our own...we talk in really vague terms, we never get past the "UwU!!! Dont Be Racist!!!!" PSAs because naming our own transgressions means admitting to wrongdoing, which is embarassing at the best of times, but in the very spaces we've created, generally being found out as Doing Something Wrong means getting jumped on by other white people for the purpose of their own moral preening so no one will suspect them of the same. so...why willingly subject yourself to that? especially if whatever you have to say, whatever it is in your behaviour you want to discuss, may be triggering to people of color. simply not mentioning it feels like the better - and safer - option.

but...thats what leads to us not knowing enough about all this to feel confident talking about it in the first place.

i dunno. last week, im one of the people who looked right at that piece of art with franks rising sun tattoo, and went... "huh. hey, theres that tattoo he got covered up because it was offensive. i should look into that. ...anyway, cool art!" and hit reblog.

and like...once people started talking about it, (theres one specific post, forget who its by, someone talking about mcrs history with anti asian racism, great post thank you for making it) i felt...bad? but i also felt kinda defensive. in thinking back on it, i was like..."well, im glad to know that now. but dude im not familiar with his tattoos. i kind of assumed what i was looking at was the covered up version where its sort of peeking through. idk it was a watercolor it was kinda garbled. i wont blame myself for not thinking any harder than that."

and then i was like... okay but. if im honest with myself, thats still bad. because it doesnt matter, since i probably wouldve reblogged it anyway, just assuming it was for the sake of photo accuracy or what have you...because i still didnt fucking know or care what the rising sun flag was.

which was the whole point.

because if i HAD. if i HAD done my research when id first heard about it, months ago, i would have recognized that art for what it was and treated it with the wide berth it deserved and avoided it regardless of my knowledge of his stupid fucking tattoo. but i didnt, for a host of reasons. mainly executive dysfunction, general stress in my personal life (nunya bidness) and...if im being honest? i just didnt want to, because...i hate self teaching. i have adhd. i was homeschooled, it was really traumatic, i flunked all of highschool and had to get a GED. my reading comprehension and attention span are piss poor. so i didn't feel like looking into it. i didnt feel like giving myself a whole impromptu history lesson. i opened one wiki page and instantly got overwhelmed.

but thats also the point. because all those reasons for not doing my due diligence and reading up on why asian fans are so pressed about the rising sun tattoo? or why black fans want nothing to do with 21p? the same shit probably applies to them! they don't feel like doing it either, we just give them no choice until eventually they make giant ass posts, comprehensive, easy to digest, step by step posts, for the express purpose of doing what we all refuse to do.

and, again, theres that feeling of guilt. guilt and shame, because im admitting to this, and because i know how reading this is gonna make other white fans feel, because i just went through the exact same set of feelings, and its uncomfortable as hell. so i can only imagine how fans of color have felt.

im not making this to browbeat white fans, or to self flagellate to fans of color. this isnt a soap box or a confession booth. im just.. talking. so lets talk. im gonna be honest, i still havent done real research into the rising sun flag. im literally just now looking at the wikipedia page for imperial japan, which i just now opened, and i still feel just as overwhelmed. (does anyone have good material on learning about this? if i find any, ill post it in reblogs.)

but...yeah. this isnt an UwU!!! Dont Be Racist!!!! PSA. this is uhhhh...We're All A Little Racist, Lets Talk About It So We Wont Be. an open letter, i guess. cause we're doing and saying racist shit, intentionally or unintentionally, whether we realize it or admit it or not, and i think the majority of you who have read this far are, like me, mainly doing so through inaction. and i think the more we ignore that, the worse this feeling will get. so...lets stop ignoring it. i know we all just did exactly that, i saw it happen, i was part of it, i get the reasons why. but its delaying the inevitable, and more importantly, we're hurting other people because of it. so...lets just get it over with, it cant be any more embarassing than burying our heads in the sand.

[jemtokall]

zack for the hcs ask post?

Oh gosh I didn't expect someone to ask me anything from that post LMAO but I can never say no to spewing my thoughts about mister Zack Fair <3

Headcanon A: what I think realistically —

Has ADHD!

Zack's favorite stim is doing squats!

He catches social cues but will ignore them (exhibit A, the girl at front desk who didn't care for his flirty advances until he became 1st class. Zack probably asked her on a date before and got rejected, and he didn't try again) (exhibit B, very often people tell him that Shinra/SOLDIER is in the wrong and

Gets the zoomies (which is a great quality for a SOLDIER operative)

Gets distracted easily! Look at how many side and fetch quests he has piled up...

2. He gives the gentlest of hugs to his friends, but when it comes to Angeal he gives him the bear crushing hugs

3. BISEXUAL KING <333

4. Naturally had brown eyes before he joined SOLDIER and got mako blue eyes

B: what I think is fucking hilarious —

Zack thought of Angeal as his dad. Sephiroth and Genesis were secondary fathers, so the entire events of Crisis Core felt like a huge divorce (I mean, the events of the game are still painful, but it hurts less by thinking of it as a divorce)

He shows to be grossed out by bugs in game, but I believe he ate them as a child. Gongaga was full of them! He outgrew it when he moved to Midgar and there weren't as many bugs everywhere

Zack adopted several pet fish in his lifetime, all of them eventually died due to Zack being gone for long periods at a time for missions. But Angeal didn't have the heart to break the news to Zack, so he replaced them fish with a googly eyed rock. Zack never knew the difference.

Takes a lot of selfies because he knows he'd gorgeous

C: what is heart-crushing and awful but fun to inflict on friends —

After the events of Nibleheim, the only thing Zack had were Cloud and Aerith. One comatose, and another a memory.

Cloud only due to circumstance since they were in the same boat of being science experiments. Normally we see Zack suspicious towards those in Shinra, even if they were friends before (Cissnei and Kunsel are the two prime examples. Cissnei eventually earned his trust, but Kunsel never got the chance to because there's limited things he can do through text.)

Aerith was his only connection outside of Shinra, if anything, he sympathized with her since she was under the Turks watch. The two never talked about it, but they didn't talk about a lot of things. There was always an unspoken escapism that they found within each other. But 4 years is a long time, and the reality of that hit him when he found her 89th letter.

He couldn't even reconnect with his parents, who he hasn't seen since he was 14yrs old. Shinra took that away from him too.

2. After the Wutai War and Angeal disappeared, Zack ate apples more often to feel connected to him. (He couldn't find Dumbapples so he made do with red apples.)

3. After Angeal's death, Zack changed his hairstyle to represent his growth, but it's slicked back to resemble his late mentors hair.

4. He really wanted to see Sephiroth as a friend, but Sephiroth closed himself off too much for them to make a real connection. But that doesn't mean that Sephiroth didn't care, just that he kept Zack at arms length.

D: what would never work with canon but the canon is shit so I believe it anyway —

I would've loved to see him in a team setting! Because I headcanon that he's so used to working as a lone wolf (or in a unit) that he has a hard time working as a part of the team. He's always given or taken orders! He would likely butt heads with whoever else tried to give orders, if he didn't ignore it entirely and run in head first.

I said it before but BISEXUAL KING I would love to see him flirt with a guy in canon :') he came close with Kunsel but it was written off as a joke ("I love you man!" @Kunsel )

I hc him as native american because I'm indigenous and he's just like me fr look at his black hair its practically canon

[lonelinessisadisease]

So, as someone who used to be on ADHD meds and has ADHD, I'll say the most important thing to note is that ADHD meds don't give you energy, they're meant to evenly distribute the energy that's already there.

That is, instead of bursts of passion and then staring at the wall doing nothing or doomscrolling your phone for six hours, the meds lend themselves to a more regulated day.

This includes energy, time, and emotions. This is where people tend to say that it makes you a "Boring Adult," thought for most people this isn't quite how it works.

For some people, yeah, they'll get you working productive and easy all day long, and that's great! But a lot of times your first meds don't work right, and even when they do, you shouldn't go in expecting perfect, expect better. If you don't see a symptom reduction that means they aren't working*.

If it goes well, expect having an easier time coordinating tasks, starting/stopping activities, and regulating emotions, time, and productivity.

With that said, some warning signs that can come along with that are: lightheadedness, brain fog, stomach trouble, increased anxiety, sleep issues, and a few others, but the most damning as a writer was definitely the brain fog.

For most people, these symptoms will clear up shortly on their own, but sometimes the specific meds just aren't right and the symptoms don't go away.

Usually, the first meds you take will be wrong in some way, usually either in type or dosage, and there will be a period of figuring out what's best. Expect to have an adjustment period where things might be even more difficult for a little while, but if it stays that way then the meds probably aren't the right fit. Expect to have to experiment a bit with this.

Additionally, for some people with ADHD, especially if they have other comorbidities like autism, meds just might not be the right step. The way internal processes work when disorders interact can sometimes be more difficult to treat/manage.

*A note: for me personally, meds didn't seem to work at all until I stopped taking them, and realized writing/reading/thinking got harder once I was off them. So for me, the symptom reduction was marginal, but I considered it still better than without. I also did well with non-stimulant ADHD medication, and stimulant ones like Adderall tended to turn me into a walking zombie, although this tends to be different for each person and can change depending on their age.

Now, for the internal processing and the writing process itself, there were some changes. For me personally, it got easier to stick to the story I was writing.

For example, without the medication I tend to get distracted every other line about what's important (you can probably see that in this post, too, rip). With the medication, I found it easier to hold onto the bigger picture as I wrote it, instead of scrambling at the end to try and make it all make sense.

Emotionally, I found it easier to write intense scenes without feeling the negative effects afterward (e.g. wrote sad scene now I feel empty for six hours). I got less frustrated about writing as a whole and most importantly (at least for me), I no longer needed to be "in the zone" to get writing done. I could just do it.

The "zone" that I build when off my ADHD medication tends to be a fake one, barriers that don't do anything but stop me from writing until it feels right or I have enough energy to power through and do it anyway. With the meds, these barriers weren't gone but they were certainly lowered a lot.

Among other things, executive dysfunction probably won't go away entirely, but it should get easier to manage and less severe.

Another cognitive processes that was really helped along by the ADHD meds was my working memory. See, without any medications, I'm always scrambling to remember what I wrote, how I thought it, and where I was going with it. ADHD meds helped my short-term memory improve dramatically, and my writing grew consistency (both in how often I did it and the style of each work).

Long-story short-story, expect an adjustment period and an ease of symptoms, though this might only happen after you find the right med(s) for you or might not happen at all if meds aren't the right fit. Symptoms can appear or get worse when starting a new med, but if this doesn't die down within the time listed (usually by your doctor or the medication brand itself) or the symptoms are severe, it might be time to try a different one. Personally, I found writing easier on medication, and I wish you luck on your journey.

(If you have any specific questions relating to the diagnosing/medication treatment process, feel free to DM me about it.)

Dear ADHD people,

So I've been struggling with undiagnosed / untreated ADHD for a huge chunk of my life, to the point I'm considering getting some diagnosis and eventually some meds.

The thing is - I'm a writer and I'm curious how do the ADHD meds affect the writing process. I guess they can either turn me into an unstoppable writing machine without any procrastination and distractions, OR they'll make me lose my edge and turn me into a Normal Boring Adult™ - sometimes I think it's the utter mess in my head that allows me to commit acts of half-decent writing.

Does anyone have any experience? Is there anything else about treating ADHD I should know?

Thanks a bunch!

[icarusandtalonanimereview]

Hey Tumblr, Talon here to make you learn something completely useless!

I absolutely love music, I play piano and trumpet and sing for fun, and if there’s a second of the day someone isn’t talking to me, you can bet my headphones are on for it (yes, even in school, and yes, they let me get away with it). I figured since I can post whatever anime/manga/otaku thing I want on here that isn’t literal hentai, I’d start off with a music post! So with all that out of the way, let’s talk the music in Girls und Panzer!!

The soundtrack of GuP (by Shirou Hamaguchi, by the way) is made up of a mix of real-world war songs and original compositions, with the original compositions having to match the feeling of the war songs used so they don’t sound out of place. I personally think they do a really good job, but there isn’t much else to say about the originals that I’m not going to mention anyway, so let’s talk about the war songs! Do forgive me if I get a few instruments wrong, though, as I couldn’t find detailed descriptions and had to do all of the comparing and figure out the instrumentation on my own!

Y’all they are absolutely fantastic. The arrangements, just...AH- okay let’s talk specifics, looking at Pravda Girls High School’s Katyusha (the song, not the character) as our example!

⊱ ────── {.⋅ ☭ ⋅.} ────── ⊰

It starts off strong, with wind, brass, and percussion all at once. No slow buildup like in Battle Hymn of the Republic (which starts off with the brass choir) or The British Grenadiers (which starts with just a few flutes and with no harmony, only to be joined by the drums but still no harmony, the brass coming in to fill out the sound 40 seconds after the start of the song), Katyusha just throws you right into it. The horns start with melody, the trumpets joining them a few measures later. Faintly, a flute run can be heard leading into the last line of the verse, where some kind of mallet percussion (maybe a xylophone? I'm so sorry but I know next to nothing about the different kinds) joins the melody as the horns drop off to play their own countermelody. Going into the next verse, the other groups back off, passing the melody back to the horns, but this time, the flutes accompany them with a few notes on the offbeats. Throughout the whole song, by the way, the low brass has been working with the drums to keep us on tempo through their strong notes on each beat. We won’t dig into the specifics of the rest of the song, since we have pretty much everything we need for now, but just know that the song does not at all calm down at the end.

SO, why did I just make you sit through all that? Simple, I want you to suffer as I have. Kidding, kidding, I actually wanted to show you just how DENSE this arrangement of the song is. There aren’t really any points where it feels “empty” like in some other songs (looking at you, Battle Hymn), despite there being plenty of points where certain instruments don’t play, and despite how busy it is, it never feels like it’s too much, as the melody always remains clear and easy to follow along with (although if you’re like me, you probably listen for the other parts anyway). The bassline is relatively simple, but the strength it’s played with really helps drive home that this song is a march, and it has the energy to keep the team going. Remember, the Pravda girls sing this song while riding their tanks in the Japanese dub. They used it as their battle cry! That’s adorable, and it really shows just how energetic and motivating it is, even in universe. It perfectly fits the upbeat, energetic, absolutely insane style of the series as a whole, and I feel this is the case with most of the songs! Even the ones I don’t particularly love fit where they’re used, and there’s something good about every song!

⊱ ────── {.⋅ ☭ ⋅.} ────── ⊰

So yeah! Listen to the GuP soundtrack if you ever want some motivating music (it’s unironically great study music if you’ve got my kind of ADHD), there’s a playlist put together by Alexander Shekhtman on YouTube of the best pieces. Alright, I’m done now. Feels good to put all that music junk out into the void, even if it was a bit incoherent! If you’ve stuck around this long, you deserve some kind of medal for your patience with me. Thanks for reading!

-🖤

[words-writ-in-starlight]

What’s the difference between autism and adhd ? I’m going through you adhd tag and now I’m trying to guess whenever I have adhd or if autism + c-ptsd are wrecking my focus.

Hey anon, I feel you very hard!  With the caveat that I am not a doctor and even self-diagnosis shouldn’t depend on taking the word of a random dude on the internet, here is my broad assessment, as a person with ADHD and C-PTSD but probably not autism:

All three feature a lot of overlap, both between the three and between individual pairs.  For example, PTSD and ADHD can both present with focusing difficulties, memory problems, and hypervigilant behavior.  ADHD and autism are highly comorbid--meaning, they appear together a lot, and one can easily mask the other because diagnostic tests aren’t always designed to separate them. More to the point, they share a lot of traits--hyperfixations and special interests are functionally the same thing, we both tend to stim a lot, we both have that once I start talking I can’t fucking stop thing.  All of them share a big list of symptoms, including rejection sensitivity, difficulty in social situations, difficulty regulating emotions, sleep problems, the works.  This can make it hard to parse the things that are characterized by “shared” symptoms--in this case, difficulty regulating your focus.

The things ADHD has that are not typical of autism or PTSD include:

Hyperactive behavior: this is different from stimming because it’s not attached to an actual sensation.  I just can’t sit the hell down and hold still, at all, ever.  It makes me feel like ants are crawling on my skin, and then it makes me frustrated, and then it makes me panicky, and then it makes me angry, and it pretty much goes downhill from there.  Not everyone with ADHD has this symptom (I recommend looking up the distinction between Hyperactive, Inattentive, and Combined ADHD; I have combined type), but it’s still worth mentioning.

Short attention span: focus is the ability to dedicate your energy to a task; attention is the ability to keep your brain on that task at all.  If I’m having a bad day or I forget my meds, I’ll just wind up staring at a wall or flipping through papers on my desk or something whenever my brain decides it’s done thinking about something.  This is your classic Inattentive ADHD symptom.  It is also why I have a list of every single minute task I need to do every day, because if my attention span ends before I’m expecting it to, I’ll forget everything I’m doing.

Poor sense of danger: not just a lack of impulse control, but your brain genuinely not telling you something is dangerous until you’ve already done it.  One time I submerged my arm almost to the shoulder in 175 F water and the only reason I didn’t have to go to the hospital was because pain reflexes don’t have to report to your brain.  I’m very delicately wired for threat responses, I’ll jump out of my skin if you drop a pencil, but if I had a dollar for every time I had to have my girlfriend bark DON’T TOUCH THAT right before I grabbed a hot pan, I’d be paying our Brooklyn rent.

Time blindness: ADHD means that I live at the mercy of the alarms on my phone.  I have absolutely no sense of how long it’s been since I did anything, nor how long I have until I need to do something else.  Have I been awake for an hour or four?  How long has it been since I ate?  If I have an appointment tomorrow, it basically doesn’t exist, right?  You know how everyone started talking about how it seems like the only time that exists is Right Now since the start of the pandemic?  That’s what ADHD feels like, all the time.

Interest-driven motivation: general executive dysfunction is one thing, but ADHD is characterized by a total lack of motivation for things that aren’t interesting.  I essentially have to have someone physically in the room watching me the entire time if I’m going to clean my room.  This is also because people with ADHD often also have trouble planning, which is such a related problem in my experience that I’m going to put it here.  I can’t parse what parts of “cleaning my room” need to happen in what order, and also, my brain hates it, so if I try to do it alone, I just end up a little puddle of overwhelmed, understimulated despair on the floor.

Understimulation: this is, in my experience, the big one.  ADHD is basically your brain being unable to provide a minimum level of stimulus to keep itself happy.  That means that when people with ADHD get understimulated, we get depressed.  If I sit in a waiting room with nothing to do for an hour before an appointment, I’m going to be on the verge of a meltdown by the time I’m done.  I’ve developed an endless list of “time filling” activities to keep my brain from dropping into the black void of boredom.  I’ve experienced a lot of emotions in my day and Nothing To Do is probably in the top three worst feelings I’ve ever felt.  Personally PTSD tends to manifest as my brain not caring about stimulation anymore, probably because PTSD is plenty of simulation all by itself--if I’m sitting quietly in a dark room, something has gone horribly wrong.

Anyway, that’s what I can think of offhand.  If you’re more of a visual thinker, this Venn diagram is a great TL;DR of this post.  Obviously, plenty of people have atypical presentations of other disorders that might share traits listed here, but these are the things that, in my experience, are more characteristic of ADHD than PTSD or autism.  

As ever, if you’re really struggling and you feel like you need help and you have the option, I recommend a professional opinion over Some Guy Online, but this guy online thinks you’re doing great.  Be gentle with yourself--the slow creep of worldwide trauma created by the pandemic means that a lot of people are struggling to keep their footing, psychologically speaking.  That very frequently manifests as focusing problems, especially for those of us with pre-existing disorders.  Don’t rush to a diagnosis in the middle of a worldwide disaster, but also, take yourself seriously.  The name of the disorder is secondary to the fact that you’re having a hard time, so don’t forget to be kind to yourself and cut yourself some slack.

[miqojak]

🔍 for something you look for on other’s blogs

@eligos-venator @braeden-ooc as well!

Really, I'm looking to find information on their character. It's an RPC, after all, and I'm looking for information on your character(s) so I know whether or not they might be a good fit for my OC to interact with - I have even given thought to revamping the LFRP layout, since it prioritizes things like relationship status and gender preference, when that should really have 0 impact on RP, unless that's someone's only reason for reaching out (I sure don't ask new RL friends their gender preference and if they're single or not when we meet). What I want to know right off the bat is: A) The player's OOC expectations. What's their schedule? Do they prefer in game or out of game? Out of game is almost a deal breaker, really, since I'm ADHD and I'll lose focus REALLY fast in a forum/tumblr style RP that isn't moving at the same pace an in-game RP would be. Are we going to get along OOC? This is important. It's a relationship like any other, and you want to be able to communicate like the mature adults we all are. B) What is the personality of the character, and what kind of interactions/plotting are they looking for? Ultimately, that's the meat of RP - I don't need to know their sexual preference, who their mother was, whether or not they smoke, and what their scars look like; personality is great, but doesn't tell me what kind of RP you're seeking! Tell me what you're looking for for your OC! Are they looking for friendship? Adventure? Crime? Dark RP? Soft RP? Slice of life? Why is that section on the bottom of the current LFRP layout? That's the most important part! The rest is icing on the cake.

C) I guess I'm looking for...aesthetic? Writing? Images? I want to get a feel for the character by scrolling through the first few pages. If a blog is purely devoted to sexual images, I probably know they're not someone I want to RP with. To each their own, but I'm looking for deep plots and long-term stuff...not Playboy. If it seems like the sole focus is sex gifs and playboy gpose spreads and posts lamenting not being in a relationship...I'm gonna nope out. A little spice is nice, but nothing BUT spice? No thanks, too much of a good thing (for me, anyways).

D) This is a spin-off of C I guess - how much OOC is there? A little is okay! I like to meme and shitpost a little, but...for example, someone posted a picture of themselves in lingerie - on their RP blog - and let me tell you, I unfollowed immediately; I'm not on tumblr to see people's RL nudes and the like. Save that for your personal blog, or your tindr or whatever - the RPC is not an RL dating community. Similarly? No drama. No call-outs. I will instantly unfollow and block, because dirty laundry shouldn't be aired out in public - that tells me that that person is deeply immature and will gladly go shout nasty things about ME into the void of tumblr at some point if I do something they decide they don't like (or make something up about me - seen that done far too many times), and you can't trust an immature RP partner. I've had shitty people abuse me, as well, and if I see a friend engage - I'll just politely warn them quietly. (Now and then, now and then - there's someone SO heinous, there needs to be something done, and said publicly. But I see callout posts done for all kinds of little personal vendetta things that don't need to be shouted about publicly. No one wants to see a shouting match in the grocery store, after all - tend to your business at home!)

tl;dr I'm looking for what the other person is looking for in RP! (And I'm looking for OOC maturity! I'm tired of non-communicative RP partners.)

[quinintheclouds]

Hey, I just read your post on ADHD/EFDD and was just wondering if you have read any research articles on this and if you have, could you tell me which ones because it all sounds super interesting and I need to choose a topic for my psych lit review and I’m thinking about doing something to do with all the stigma around and misconceptions about different mental health disorders.. it’s totally okay if not tho, I know it’s a big ask, but thanks anyway

That sounds like such a great topic!!! I would be HONORED to help :D 

The first person I think of when discussing the term EFDD is Dr. Russell Barkley. He’s one of the leading ADHD experts, and has been a spearhead for studying executive dysfunction in people with ADHD for decades. Very much ahead of his time compared to the DSM. I’ve had his book “Taking Charge of Adult ADHD” recommended to me so many times, but have yet to read it.

Here’s some free stuff, though! 

[reblogs appreciated because Tumblr hates posts with links and I wanna make sure this anon sees it!]

I tried to include some short stuff and longer stuff, some articles, images, videos, and comic recs, so you can choose based on your current energy and focus level :) I’ve also bolded links and key points of each source if you like skimming. Let’s go!

...................................

Here’s an interesting article/study on EFDD! They found that “ADHD [is] associated with deficits in inhibition, managing one’s attention, self-directed speech and rule-following, self-motivation, and even self-awareness [...] ADHD therefore involves deficits in self-restraint, [...] selfsensing and imagery, self-control of emotion, and self-directed play for problem-solving.”

Thank you for motivating me to look up some articles, because I learned some new things, too! For instance, they assert that ADHD could also be called SRDD (Self-Regulation Deficit Disorder), but conclude the article by saying either SRDD or EFDD fits better than ADHD, and that the terms could be used interchangeably, because SR (self-regulation) and EF (executive function) are effectively talking about the same things. So his assertion is that even if the name ADHD never changes, it can still be scientifically classified as either of the other terms. I believe in recent years he’s preferred EFDD more and more.

[note that the above article/study is from 2011, back when we were on the DSM-IV, so a lot of research has been done since then]

...................................

If that article’s a bit wordy or you want something more visual and up-to-date, here’s a really detailed PowerPoint presentation used during the 2018 ADHD Symposium! It’s long but well-organized so you can just read the big headers or you can read all the bullet points explaining it. Keep in mind this was a lecture, so some of it probably made more sense in person. I’m glad I read this, because I realize the terminology I’ve used is slightly off: according to the Symposium, there aren’t “subtypes” of ADHD, but the different names (ADHD-PI, ADHD-PH, and ADHD-C) are really just used to show the prevalence of certain symptoms in that individual. So they’re all terms for ADHD, but “subtype” was poor word choice on my part. 

Oh! I just found a video of him giving a lecture in 2012 using many of the same PowerPoint slides! Here ya go! It’s a bit longer than the other videos I’ve linked below (13min), but it might make the slides easier to interpret :)

...................................

If you want a really short and basic overview, here’s a video explaining 5 main ways executive functions affect the brain and how they work differently in people with ADHD. [I put the video below as well if you wanna stay on tumblr] It’s from 2010, but it holds up. It only covers 5 big ones, so remember (if you can) that executive function affects EVERYTHING and the symptoms will affect everyone differently and at different levels. 

This is just the most basic overview and a good place to start:

...................................

Here’s one where he talks about our Time-Blindness! (below) I was going to pick a couple favorite quotes to give you an idea, but that’d wind up being a transcript of the whole video because HE GETS IT. This is from 2014, but I CANNOT recommend it enough!!! He mentions that ADHD doesn’t have a deficit of attention, but rather a deficit of intention. He describes us as having a near-sighted sense of time, and talks about deadlines, “laziness,” etc.

 ALSO he talks about how our brains DON’T CONNECT our knowledge to our performance (back of brain to front) like everyone else’s, so we have the same level of knowledge and intelligence, but can’t access and use it the way others can. This is why teaching skills and organization/memory/time-management tips isn’t helpful -- we can learn them, but our knowledge and action centers are separated, so actually doing them/sticking with them is just as hard as before. 

If you don’t watch the whole thing, at least skip to 3:29 cause that part’s really funny and relatable (ok the whole thing is relatable):

...................................

And of course, I highly recommend the YouTube channel How to ADHD! I have a couple friends who work on it, and they REALLY know their stuff! (They’re the ones who taught me during a game night that RSD isn’t a real term and it should be called “rejection-sensitivity” as part of the emotional dysregulation umbrella) 

I went looking and found this video (below) has the BEST explanation of it that I’ve seen in such a concise, entertaining way. I hadn’t seen this one before, but it even covers some of the things I mentioned in that post your ask is about! Especially the Internal Restlessness that I mentioned as the true “hyperactivity” we all share; even though some of us also express outward hyperactivity, both presentations come from the same restlessness in our brains.

^^^This has some great examples, visuals, animations, and different ways of explaining and thinking about our symptoms! If you want more about this, the description has a bunch of links to their sources! Jessica and everyone else who works on this channel is great at making the videos watchable for people with ADHD (even if we have to rewind sometimes)

Here's Jessica's official Twitter @HowtoADHD! (I was today years old when I found out that she follows me)

...................................

And if you want something REALLY short and simple, here’s a 2 minute animation comparing living with ADHD to trying to film a movie with a director who keeps falling asleep [below]

....................................

If you like comics:

My favorite ADHD comic artists are: ADHD Alien [@ADHD_Alien on Twitter and @adhd-alien on Tumblr]; Dani Donovan [@danidonovan on Twitter and @danidonovan on Tumblr -- we’re somehow twitter mutuals and she is such a sweetheart. She has some really good infographics, too!!]; ADHD Bri [@AdhdBri on Twitter and @adhdbri on Tumblr]; and dreamadept [@yume_dango on Twitter and @yume-dango on Tumblr]

They’re all well-researched, funny, genuine, intelligent, insightful, talented artists who depict ADHD in a very accurate and relatable way. Go check ‘em out and support them! :D

....................................

I’m gonna stop there for now, but PLEASE feel free to add on to this with other sources, questions, videos, thoughts, comic artists, etc.!!! Hope this helps someone out there!

[hazzabeeforlou]

Hi! Can I ask when/how you started writing and how you 'worked' it? I'm re-reading pits, and it's really damn well written, and it makes me feel so many things

Hi dear! You’re so sweet, I’m glad you’re coming back to my ‘story baby’ again, that makes me smile. This will be a bit of a long answer, but I hope it inspires anyone who’s had doubts to FORGOE the doubts and just start writing.

I’ve been making up stories as long as I can remember. I used to write little poems as a five year old, and then little picture books, and then come up with outrageous adventure dress-up games. I dreamed of writing fantasy novels in my pre-teen years, and had multiple journals stuffed with half articulated stories that I just didn’t think were ‘good enough.’ I was always great at coming up with plots and twists and endings, but the actual mechanics of sitting down and writing shit out really scared the hell out of my possible (probable) adhd/executive disfunction. I wrote some really sappy and SHORT Jaina Solo fanfic and some VERY Het but Not Het marauders fan fic in late high school/college, but mostly during those years I wrote tons of songs, and plotted a long-suffering fairy book (that I nagged @metal-eye about just this past week) but I had honestly never completed a full-ass “story” until I started writing for this fandom in 2018!!! Seriously. I MEAN THAT.

I started with a drabble, you can still find it, it’s the first thing I wrote on ao3. And then I was inspired by a tumblr post about a Selkie losing it’s skin and I thought up the plot for Until You Remember and wrote the whole fic out in like TWO DAYS. (Did I mention the probable adhd.) Around this time I was coming to terms with being gay and rehashing the trauma from religion and my family and what not, and I started writing PITS as little vignettes, chapter by chapter, each inspired by a different memory. There was no plot, no organization, just a jumble of scenes from my life. It’s sounds unbelievable, but all of a sudden I had nearly 100,000 words? And I was like WTF Toni. Because that had NOT been the plan. Anywho, I spent a good deal of time editing and stringing it all together, and by some twist of fate or premonition, the pieces all fit like a puzzle, and PITS was born. I honestly thought the subject matter too dark for this fandom, so I expected two or three people to read and comment.

But a little about the ‘working’ of writing, at least for me. I suppose there’s a smidge of natural intuition involved, as I’d always been told I could write well. I read a lot, and I am a VERY visual learner, and an even better copy cat, and I honestly think that’s why I’m so ‘good’ at music/art/writing, because I can mimic the teachers that have taught me. If someone tells me to phrase a phrase musically, I’ll be like, uh, okay ATTEMPT. But if they give me an example? I’ll play it back exactly that way. So it’s the same for writing with me, if I read an author with a certain style, I’ll be writing like that author for several days. My brain is a sponge of sentence structures, and I think that’s a really helpful quirk to have. Now in college, I did a TON of writing, and had some very patient people help me learn to structure essays and shit. At my grad school (which is. Very famous but not for writing.) a professor told me ‘we’ve had Harvard people that couldn’t write as well!’ WHICH I think is more an indictment of their criteria for admission than Harvard’s writing program but anyways my POINT is that I’ve carried a lot of what I learned and observed through 8 years in academia into fan fic writing, which for me is:

-“However” never starts a sentence

-use “was/is” like the HOTTEST pepper in your salsa. Sparingly, and with much debate over if you’ll regret it later

-scan your work for constantly used words (I’ll get in a rut and keep writing “deliberate” three times in the same page) and then THESAURUS THAT SHIT

-your fic is a soup, boil out the excess broth, or it will be all water and no substance. (Seriously, longer is NOT BETTER)

-don’t tell me in each separate paragraph what your character is thinking. Think up a way to SHOW what they’re thinking and let your reader figure it out for themselves. In other words, don’t mansplain to your reader. *(I just finished a fic—not in this fandom—that could have gone from 150k to 100k just by eliminating this RIP MY EYES)

-vary your sentence structure

-read what you’ve written out loud. If your brain stumbles at speaking it, it will be awkward for your reader too

-don’t obsess about your first draft. Just get ideas from your grey matter to your white paper and let it steep for a while, I swear all the silt will settle and you’ll be able to edit clearly

-google is your friend. I don’t remember every grammatical rule from high school either ;)

Okay. I’ve rambled enough. I hope that’s helpful nony, and good luck if you’re writing!! Much love, Toni <3

[adhd-adept]

hi! i like your posts! they're real helpful

anyway a thing i need help with

i want to ask my dad for therapy because i think i might have adhd? and also some other shit

so basically

(this is going to be a long post)

back in summer 2020, i thought i might have adhd because i was reading some comics from adhd alien and the signs of adhd she shared seemed eerily familiar?

and i did some research and more signs came up and i thought i might have them?

and i found a therapist who specialises in adhd and other issues

but when i talked to my dad about it he was all "ADHD is only hyperactive idiots who are useless without meds" and he yelled at me for a while and I'm now basically scared of mentioning the topic up ever again

he brought me to some sessions, but i think once he said it was "so the therapist tells you you don't have adhd"?

anyway after the summer ended i couldn't get therapy again because school and busy

with the 2 week spring vacation coming up i was thinking of maybe asking him again? but I'm really scared and he probably won't take it seriously again...

signed,

an idiot

Hey! Thanks. I’m glad I can be helpful. I wanted to answer this right away, but it took me a little time because this question deserves a thoughtful response. This is going to be a long post.

[If anyone with more experience in situations like this has advice, I would welcome suggestions]

First things first! I don't think you're an idiot. This world can be hard to navigate even in the best of times, and I will never think you're foolish for needing a little help with anything that that entails!

Looking for a therapist is a great start! I’m glad that you are taking yourself seriously and taking steps to get help. That can take a lot of courage, and I’m proud of you for it!

Know that it may continue to take courage, and persistence - it can be really difficult to get an official ADHD diagnosis. I definitely have ADHD, and it actually took two tries when I got diagnosed around age 12, as the first doctor thought I had been perfectly attentive during the meeting and thus could not believe I was struggling with inattention elsewhere. My friend in her early twenties has been attending periodic doctor and therapist sessions for a couple months now, because the first doctor didn’t take her seriously, the second said she clearly had ADHD but sent her elsewhere for prescriptions, and the doctor they sent her to insisted she get a second opinion. She is finally starting to get accommodations, but it’s been an ongoing effort.

And you may simply not get along very well with your first therapist. You can always try reaching out to another. It can be a long process, and I hope saying that does not discourage you because there is a lot of good that comes at the end of that process; specifically, a better understanding of yourself and access to some resources that can help you seek accommodations for the things you struggle with.

It sounds like you’ve done your research on therapy, though. If you want any help with looking for a therapist, I am happy to help, (or at least try to). But it sounds like what you’re asking is how to approach the subject with your dad?

You’ll have to take some of my advice from here with a grain of salt; I’ve never been in the specific situation you’re in now, and of course I don’t know your dad as well as you do. But in my experience, rephrasing a request can do a lot to make it sound more reasonable.

I think the first step is understanding where he is coming from. Again, you have met the man and I haven’t, so this is more suggestion and guesswork than any kind of statement.

It sounds like your dad has a significant bias against neurodivergence. But I think it does matter WHY he feels that way. I can only imagine that it comes from a lifetime of hearing those things about ADHD from the people around him, and it will take time for him to reverse that prejudice. I feel sorry for him to have grown up in that hostile environment, and I am sorry that that hostility is being carried through to you.

But the result is that he thinks there’s something wrong with having ADHD. Of course, that isn’t true, but no parent wants to believe there’s something “wrong” with their child, and he will probably be resistant to the idea for as long as he believes that there is. 

More than that, I think parents don’t want to believe that, if there IS something wrong with their kid, it might have come from them. A child twisting their ankle in PE class or getting bitten by an ant is one thing - it hurts to see the child in pain, but it isn’t their fault. It’s much harder for a parent to see their child suffer because of a hereditary condition, because I think there can be a lot of guilt associated with that.

On top of that, if he’s been told that ADHD is a terrible thing, it might be disagreeable to him because if you have it then maybe he has it too. People don’t want to believe there’s anything wrong with themselves either.

I don’t know if that’s, on some level, why he reacted the way he did - and even if it’s true, I don’t think any of this justifies yelling at you for it. Nothing justifies that. And I want to be clear that it shouldn’t have to be your responsibility to figure out why he feels the way he feels - that should be on him, and it’s unfair to you to have to work through his issues on your way to getting the help you need. This isn’t necessarily the best or only approach. But trying to at least figure out why he feels the way he does might help you figure out how to approach the subject again. 

Maybe even ask him where he got his impression of ADHD, if it does not feel like doing so will start a new argument. (Maybe don’t mention the part where you’re asking because some stranger on the internet is trying to psychoanalyze him.) But I find, personally, that conversations go better when I can approach them with patience, and I have more patience when I make an effort to remember that the other person’s reactions have to come from somewhere, and if I can at least start out believing that they are misinformed rather than actively hostile.

I think a good start would be to try educating him about ADHD and see how that goes. Anything might sound scary because it is unfamiliar; or, worse, it might sound scary because it sounds vaguely familiar even if the only information you know is that you think someone said it’s scary. 

An aside, to give an example: There was a meme a while ago where water would be referred to as “dihydrogen monoxide” and framed as a dangerous thing with vague-but-technically-true statements such as “it’s a common byproduct of chemical reactions,” and “it’s found in our sewer systems”, or “it has the highest pH value of any acid” (you may recall that the strongest acids are those with a low pH value).

I think it’s easy to do the same with neurodiversity. If all you know about water is that it’s a chemical, it may sound scary. If all you know about ADHD is that it’s a mental disorder, it may sound scary.

Talking with him directly may be better than sending him articles - they tend to start with phrases like “mental health disorder” and “chronic condition”, or big (scary) jargon words that you might want to avoid if you want it to sound approachable (I mean, even the “Simple English” version of the Wikipedia article has the word “neurodevelopmental” in the first sentence).

I think it’s important for him to know that everyone’s ADHD experience is different - symptoms can be strong, or they can be very weak, but even people with very weak symptoms may benefit from seeking professional advice. You can be very “high functioning,” and still find certain tasks more difficult than most people do, and thus benefit from help even if you don’t “need” it to achieve your goals or lead a “normal” looking life.

You might tell him that a lot of ADHD treatment is about paying attention to your own behaviors and learning what works best for you - that even if you do not have ADHD, you may have some experiences in common with people who do, and that seeking a therapist who specializes in ADHD may help you find someone with the kind of attitude you are looking for; maybe you want someone who will be especially patient, and who will be prepared to take you seriously with the symptoms or traits you do have.

After all, most people can understand that you don’t have to have clinical depression to benefit from some of the behavioral things often recommended to people who do, such as getting regular exercise and more sunshine. You can do things that improve your mood even if you don’t have diagnosed clinical depression. 

Similarly, if you are seeking help with some things that people with ADHD struggle with - organization, time management, staying focused - a therapist who specializes in ADHD may be a good fit for you for that reason alone, even if you don’t have it.

And yeah, it sounds like he doesn’t want you to have ADHD, so I don’t think there’s anything wrong with saying “even if I don’t have it, talking to a specialist can help me rule that out,” if that’s what helps him feel more comfortable with you getting an appointment. Again, it will take time for him to overcome the negative impression he has now, but at the very least, if he forms a positive impression of ADHD therapists he might not be so hostile about ADHD itself.

Maybe remind him that there can be a lot of overlap between ADHD and other experiences, but that it seems like a good place to start seeking help because it is a relatively common cause of some of the things you’ve experienced.

Know how much you would be willing to compromise before you have this conversation - would you be okay with getting a therapist even if they do not specialize in ADHD? Would you be unlikely to get an appointment if he made it conditional on something like maintaining good grades? Have a clear, tangible goal in mind; while you may leave room for uncertainty in your diagnosis until you speak with a professional, you should try not to leave room for uncertainty in what you are asking for. Know what you want - a session (or a number of sessions) with a therapist - and have your reasoning for that ready, maybe even written down. People tend to take you more seriously when you can demonstrate that you’ve thought something through.

If you say you think you have ADHD, I believe you. But regardless of that, you have recognized that there is something you need help with, and you are taking action in response. I hope that, at the very least, if your dad does not want to take the suggestion of ADHD seriously, he can at least take you seriously when you say that you need help. 

And you will get help. You are moving in the right direction. Don’t lose sight of that.

I hope I’ve answered your question! If this is hard to read I can maybe come back and re-write it as a set of bullet points, maybe suggestions of things to say, but I felt that in the case of more personalized advice it was important to address the context of my advice. If you needed more specific advice, feel free to clarify. And of course, if you have any other questions, I’m always around.

Best of luck!

[into-control]

submission:  

Hi anon. The reason people are unfollowing TTB isn’t just because of the “feud” between her and femmetay. It’s because of her overall behaviour.

          I’m the type of person who always tries to see the best in people, and a week ago, I probably would have defended TTB the same way you are. But it’s kind of a matter of right and wrong at this point.

         Growing up in the society we’re living in, none of us are immune to having subconscious biases. That doesn’t necessarily make us bad people as long as we acknowledge that and put effort into unlearning those biases and doing better. TTB clearly has some of these biases.

         For example, the racial bias. Racism isn’t always conscious. She, a white woman, has been consistently trying to silence people of colour and shame them for their feelings. She’s been dismissing their opinions, speaking over them and acting like her own opinion is more valid, and she’s only been validating the few POC who share her opinion. That is a form of racism. It might be subconscious, but it’s still racism.

       It’s even more clear when you compare her reaction to this situation with the way that: A) She harshly called out Shawn and Ed Sheeran multiple times for not showing enough support for Taylor publicly, and B) The way she herself called out Taylor and even almost unstanned her, just for going on a pap walk with Joe.

        Also, the bias against Jewish people. Calling the Kushners and Scooter “rats” is extremely tone-deaf. There are some words that you just do *not* use against certain racial, ethnic, or religious groups because of the history of hatred and discrimination that is linked to those words. You cannot separate that insult from its dark history when you’re using it against people who are Jewish.

        And the ableism. TTB knows perfectly well that femmetay is bipolar, and she called her “crazy”, “emotional”, and “literally mentally unstable”. The word “literally” really says a lot about how she meant it. That is fucking awful. That is blatant ableism. There isn’t even any room for giving her the benefit of the doubt with this particular example.

        You guys might not see it as being that bad, but it’s disgusting. People don’t talk about ableism enough. Calling people with mental illnesses “crazy” and putting them down is so harmful.

       I have an invisible disability, and I also have OCD and anxiety. The reason I never got *any* support or understanding until I got a diagnosis when I was 18 is because my family were so afraid that people would find out and would think I was “crazy”. So, I never knew what was “wrong” with me, I struggled alone, and I would constantly be told by grown adults (family, teachers, strangers, etc): “Stop acting weird”, “People are going to think you’re crazy”, “They’re going to send you to a mental hospital”, etc. And it was really damaging in so many ways.

       My dad has PTSD and ADHD and went without being diagnosed, without telling a single person, and without any medication until he was in his 40s. Why? Because he was so worried that people would shame him and call him “mental” or “crazy”.

       My uncle’s situation was very similar to femmetay’s. He was bipolar, and he was a teacher. He was great at his job, and the students liked him. But once the parents found out he was bipolar, they gave him hell for it. They would constantly shame him, call him “mentally unstable” (even though he was on meds), tell him they didn’t want “someone like him” teaching their kids, etc. And I strongly believe that if it wasn’t for the stigma about mental health and the constant ableism he had to face, he would still be with us today. (note: as somebody who attended public school up until now, teachers who happen to have a mental illness are really not worrisome at all. there is so much other shit that is actually worth worrying about. like pedophiles.)

      This stuff *can’t* be taken lightly. Comments like the ones that TTB made are a major contributing factor to the reason that my uncle and so many other disabled and people with mental illnesses are no longer with us today.

      It’s literally inexcusable how she strongly implied that femmetay shouldn’t be a teacher. It’s also telling how she deletes so many comments from her posts, but she didn’t delete the ones where some of her followers literally outright *said* that. That isn’t an individual attack. That is an attack against every single teacher in the world with BP, if not every person with BP in general.

       TTB also has harassed so many people in their messages out of the blue. And you can see the difference in tone. On her blog, her tone is a lot more “neutral”. In these messages, her tone is harsh and, in some cases, even kinda aggressive.

       And I’m not saying that TTB’s biases mean she’s a terrible person because, like I said, we’re conditioned to have biases. But the problem is that so many people have respectfully tried to talk to her and have tried to explain why some of the things she says are problematic and hurtful. But instead of hearing them out and apologising and making an effort to be better, TTB always reacts badly and becomes defensive. She then continues the same behaviour.

       It’s at that point, once she’s been informed and still continues, that her actions switch from being *unintentional* to being *deliberate*.

      Anyway, I’m not saying she’s evil or that I hate her or anything. All I’m saying is that I don’t want to support someone like that unless she actually changes. When you have a huge platform, especially as a straight white woman, you have a responsibility to listen to the feedback of POC and other minorities, and if they’re telling you that something you’re doing is hurtful, you should take a look at yourself and examine your behaviour instead of getting defensive and deleting and ignoring the things they’re saying.

        And maybe this whole post was unnecessary, but I’m only writing it because so many of her followers are blindly defending her and acting like she’s not done anything wrong 

[distortingbones]

relistening to a guest for mr spider and i'm really struck by the parallels between jon and martin's upbringings-- martin's mother resented him because he reminded her of his father (who she despised), while jon's grandmother resented him because he reminded her of his parents (who she loved & mourned). both jon and martin carry a similar trauma, but because of that difference (hatred vs mourning) they present in very different ways.

keep reading for a big chunk of analysis of how this has affected them/their relationship throughout the podcast, as well as it what it means for current events in canon. 

more than anything, martin wants to distance himself from his father by becoming someone worthy of love, or, failing that, someone who people overlook. (better to be invisible than to be hated, he figures.) he structures his whole public-facing self around being a trustworthy, kind, caring person. 

he first develops feelings for jon while jon is mistreating him (season 1) because he sees jon as somebody who is in need of love and affection. he can bring jon tea, check in on him throughout the day, and jon gives him very little acknowledgment in return. although it would be a stretch to call jon abusive, this still mirrors martin's parents' relationship, where his mother was the victim and his father the abuser. if martin plays the role of the person offering care and jon doesn't reciprocate, then in their unequal relationship, martin is unequivocally placed into his mother's role. martin gets to be the giver, and he is satisfied that this means he is not acting out the role of his father.

sure, jon still dislikes him, but that's because martin is "annoying and incompetent" (in quotes because it's obviously not true), never because jon thinks martin is a bad or abusive person. to martin, that's what's important. it's part of why he's so horrified when jon accuses martin of lying to him (and committing murder) in season 2. martin suddenly realizes that jon sees him as someone who is manipulative and capable of doing great harm, and that's martin's worst nightmare. up until this point, martin has continued to care for jon, no matter how awful and paranoid jon gets, because to martin it's not about how jon treats him, it's about how he perceives him. (ultimately martin gets better at sticking up for himself, but this is his headspace during season 2.)

this is also part of why martin finds the lonely so compelling. without other people around, he doesn’t have to worry about how he is perceived, because there’s no one there to perceive him. he doesn’t have to worry about being a bad or abusive person, because there’s nobody else around to abuse. nothing hurts in the lonely, because martin’s primary source of anxiety and internal conflict is finally lifted. when jon rescues martin from the lonely, martin says, “i see you,” and comes back to himself. but really, it’s the fact that jon sees martin that saves him. in that moment, martin is sure that jon loves him, that jon sees him as somebody who is worth saving, sees him as somebody who brings goodness into the world. martin feels fully and completely seen by jon, and he is overwhelmed with relief and joy that the person jon sees is good.

okay, what about jon, you ask?

jon is desperate to live up to his parents, who his grandmother mourned. much like martin, he yearns to be “good enough”. however, while for martin “good enough” means "not being abusive”, jon’s goalpost is invisible and constantly out of reach. martin at least had a model of how not to behave (like his father), but jon didn’t. even if he had tried to imitate his parents, it would never have fixed the hole in his grandmother’s heart. it’s impossible for the living to measure up to the dead, because our memory of the dead is both fixed and idealized.

jon internalizes that he needs to be more, better, but he’s never really sure how so he just criticizes every aspect of himself. he’s constantly comparing himself to others, but even when the comparison is favorable he still doesn’t feel good enough.

(big sidenote: i have adhd and headcanon jon as adhd because he displays a number of symptoms, and it’s really common for people with adhd to develop a deep feeling of unworthiness. we grow up with authority figures telling us we’re not “living up to our potential”, as we alternate between hyperfixating and losing focus completely. for example, i was often chastised as a kid because i read YA fantasy novels voraciously, but sometimes struggled in school because i refused to read anything that didn’t hold my immediate interest. guess who else read nonstop but wouldn’t read anything he deemed boring?? jonathan jarchivist sims. i’d be willing to bet he developed a serious unworthiness complex from authority figures asking why he couldn’t apply himself to [x thing] the same way he did to his interests.)

he works himself to the bone trying to be the best archivist that he can, but of course elias really screwed him over by giving him a job that he’s not actually qualified for and doesn’t know how to do which even further degrades his already paltry sense of self-worth. he projects this fear of incompetence onto martin, which is why he criticizes martin so harshly. even if jon’s not great at his job, at least he can say he’s better than martin. for someone who constantly compares himself to others, this is at least a small source of comfort.

when martin shows kindness to jon in season 1, jon brushes it off, because he thinks love is something that has to be earned. at this point jon feels deeply unworthy-- he’s in way over his head with work, and is terrified by the eye watching him give statements-- so he thinks martin doesn’t have any reason to care for him, which means that martin’s affection for him is not valid. in season 2 jon even suspects martin has ulterior motives, because he can’t fathom why anyone would genuinely want to give him love.

this post will expand into even more of a monster if i if get into all the times that jon puts himself down for things he can’t control (it wasn’t stupid to break the table alright, he was doing his best). he also consistently internalizes the criticism of others even when that criticism is unfair/cruel (look at what happened with tim in season 3, or when his coworkers discovered that he was feeding on people, etc etc etc). jon is way too willing to believe that he is a bad, stupid, evil person.

he’s also always going above and beyond to prove himself. again, countless examples, but like the dude literally charged into the buried to save daisy just because he thought it might be possible to rescue her. she’s not really his friend at that point (in fact she tried to kill him), and also he’s not at all responsible for her entrapment. but he thinks it would be the right thing to do, and so he does it, and damn the consequences.

he says if he dies, the world just loses another monster. but also, his parents died and they were the ones his grandmother loved, so maybe if he dies doing what’s right then maybe he’ll finally be good enough too.

anyway, by season 4, martin is effectively gone, and this is when jon’s feelings for him really start to show. (you can probably argue that his love for martin was evident earlier, but i personally think this is when jon becomes actually aware of how he feels.) the primary model of love jon saw growing up was the mournful, longing love his grandmother felt for his dead parents. he wasn’t taught how to love somebody who’s there with you, but he does know what it’s like to love somebody who’s gone. he begins to not just want to be “good enough” in general, but also specifically good enough for martin. (i.e. it’s martin’s reaction to jon feeding on strangers that really makes jon feel ashamed.)

when jon follows martin into the lonely, elias tells him flat-out that he will likely not return. jon doesn’t hesitate-- after all, he’s well-versed in taking enormous risks to save others, and this is for martin, to whom he so desperately wants to prove himself. it’s only once he finds martin that jon finally feel worthy of his love, and allow himself to accept it.

when martin says “i see you” and begins to come back to himself, jon knows he succeeded, that he proved himself, that he is worthy of love. and martin knows that jon loves him and thinks martin’s worth saving. in that moment, they don’t just love each other, they both feel loved, something that seemed almost impossible for these two traumatized men.

and it would be such a beautiful wrap if that was where it ended, right? but instead the eyepocalypse happened and we have to deal with all the messiness that is season 5.

so, jon was manipulated into ending the world as we know it, and the guilt from that undoes the tenuous scrap of self-worth he developed via saving martin.  he’s thrust into a position where he doesn’t think it’s even possible for him to be good again, let alone good enough. the only morally pure thing that he can think of to do is to use his power to protect martin, the man he loves, which is why he’s so emotionally paralyzed at the beginning of season 5. he can be good enough within the confines of their cabin, he can keep martin safe there, but out in the world ruled by fears he knows that there’s no way to be the perfect person he so desperately wants to be.

he ultimately agrees to go try to stop the fearpocalypse because he knows it’s the right thing to do, and jon has never, ever shied away from doing the right thing, no matter how dangerous. but he’s forced to make a lot of messy, difficult decisions out there-- he feeds off people’s fear to keep himself going, he murders not!sasha, he will certainly have to kill even more. as far as jon’s concerned, he’s crossed the line permanently. there is no way he is ever, ever going to be “good enough” again, after the choices he’s made. it doesn’t matter if he’s doing the best he can, or if he makes a net positive impact, or even whether or not events are his fault, he’s proven that he’s not perfect so he will never believe he is good enough.

meanwhile, martin comes into season 5 feeling rather empowered. even after all the effort he spent pushing people away in season 4, jon loves him, and that makes martin feel pretty confident that he’s a good person. he has a solid sense of self-worth, which means it’s easier for him to act and make tough decisions.

he also has a less rigid view of morality than jon does (despite generally being nicer). he sees the entities and their avatars as creatures who abuse others and cause harm, much like his father. if he could have hurt his father to save his mother, you know he would have, and he’s wiling to murder in order to save innocents. also, because he’s secure in his belief that he’s a good person (thanks in large part to jon being such a loving boyfriend), martin is less likely to scrutinize his own actions the way jon does. martin is making choices based on what feels right, what he thinks will have the greatest net positive outcome, while jon just sees every single harmful thing he does as another item in the pile of reasons that he’s not good enough. jon looks at his actions individually, while martin looks at them holistically.

anyway, right now they’re functioning. despite his absolutely annihilated self-worth, jon is still able to find an anchoring purpose in the fact that he can use his eye power to defend martin. martin is able to move forward and act because he has the warmth and confidence of knowing jon loves him.

it wouldn’t take much to break them, though.

if martin died or was lost to a power, jon would absolutely crumble and lose all direction.

if jon stopped loving martin and told martin that he was a bad person, martin would absolutely crumble and lose all self-worth.

that’s what makes annabelle cane’s interest in martin so worrying. right now, martin is confident enough that her call doesn’t really phase him, he just hangs up on her. but if martin were to give in and join the web, it could ruin everything. jon would feel like he’d failed martin, and, knowing jon’s stance on avatars, martin might feel that jon thought he was evil. they would both fall apart completely and lose themselves to the entities they serve.