#diagnosis || answered

[heart-of-gotham]

🍽: Our characters’ orders are mixed up at a restaurant and they’re given each other’s meals by mistake.

[ First meeting starter prompts! - ACCEPTING ]

Oh, well, this wasn't exactly what she would have ordered. In fact, it wasn't. Oh no.

"Miss, I—"

The waitress had already hurried away as fast as she could, her arms laden with about two other tables worth of orders and another three up and ready in the window. She heaved a sigh.

Well, that was not going to do her any good then, was it? Not like she could help it, the poor girl was already in a state-and-half rushing back and forth during lunch rush. She'd been there. She was already dearly tired from her own big rush of patients back at the clinic, the cold wet weather lingering around had left too many people victim to catching (and ignoring) bad colds. So she did the next best thing: cut out the middleman and look around for any similarly confused patrons staring at a very incorrect order of her carrot ginger soup. Hopefully untouched.

Thankfully, she saw only one other person who had said soup placed in front of them. With a weary sigh— she really did just want to have lunch, and she was not wanting to barge into a strangers', but it was what it was— she carefully slipped her hand under the plate as to not touch the food, just on the off-chance they were willing to make an easy trade.

"Pardon me, you didn't happen to order this, did you?"

[canisalbus]

I've been curious about this for a while, and after finding your Tumblr and reading up on Machete lore I'd love to know; Is Machete autistic? I myself am autistic and I see myself in him quite a lot at times while reading your posts... If not, are there anything other disabilities or ailments he has? What about Vasco?

I'm hesitant to assign either them a lot of labels, but I think it's justified to say he has enough autistic traits to place him somewhere on the spectrum. Of course they hadn't figured out neurodiversity in the 1500's, if you knew him well enough you might call him a little eccentric. Even then he's reasonably proficient at masking and trying to appear normal to others. Having impressive self-restraint and an unhealthy degree of self-awareness helps with that. His surroundings are formal, rigid and impersonal and he has learned to navigate that specific social climate reasonably well. In addition to difficulty in socializing his main issues are sensory related, he's sensitive to textures, loud sounds and environmental overstimulation and has a low pain threshold, but can tolerate a surprising amount of discomfort in order to keep his face and not appear weak or unprofessional.

I'd say most of his physical health issues are related to anemia in a way or another, a condition that hasn't been discovered yet and thus can't be treated effectively. In their terms he simply has a weak constitution and is susceptible to mystery pains and illnesses. Unfortunately the catch-all medical care at the time is bloodletting, which, as you can imagine, only worsens his symptoms. Albinism affects the development of your eyes so his sight isn't the best and he's very sensitive to bright lights, to the point he prefers to stay indoors on sunny days.

Vasco, in comparison, has always been healthy as a horse, apart from recurring childhood ear infections. He exhibits some traits that could align with inattentive adhd, but probably not enough to justify a diagnosis. He can be a little disorganized, forgetful and has trouble starting and completing tasks, and has hard time forcing himself to stay invested in things he doesn't care about all that much.

[mjrtaurus]

Cw: Body horror

One of Crocodile's favorite pastimes is to cause his flesh to melt into sand in a way that shows his facial muscles and skull while he's talking to captive marines to gaslight them into thinking they're losing their minds. He knows how to do the Uzumaki eye spiral too. Buggy thought he was just bullshitting everyone and then puked into a wastebasket when Crocodile showed him.

Unsurprisingly, Mihawk thinks it's hot.

Very surprisingly, so does Dragon. He said it looked like a grape going down a toilet.

Dragon and his way with words 🤣

Crocodile has so, so much fun breaking marines like this. Making them think they’re losing their minds. Filling their silly little heads with nightmares.

He’s taken his face off like a porcelain mask. He’s had deadly scorpions crawl out of his skin. He’s cloaked himself in heat mirages. He’s let the tiniest flicker of candlelight reduce him to a pair of gleaming eyes in the dark. He’s been a corpse in their cell that’s got up and walked. He’s every fear. He’s every nightmare. And he LOVES it.

He’s a twisted man. A truly twisted man.

[rivenantiqnerd]

If this gets 1,000 notes, I’ll try bringing up the topic of an autism diagnosis with my mom

[say-hi-intrepid-heroes]

having anxiety but also frequently dissociating is wild cause i'll be anxious about Events or Emotions or Relationships or Things That Are Happening Imminently but then my brain just goes "no no, none of that. there's no reason to be anxious. instead we're going to forget the next two hours."

but hey i'm not anxious anymore!

[fella-lovin-fella]

guess who got diagnosed with ocd a couple weeks ago

[pretentiouswreckingball]

you don’t feel like dying after you overshare? no? just me, then? 🫠

[ragnarokhound]

hey i saw ur tag on the executive dysfunction post where u said ur meds allow u to punch a hole in the wall and access the internal well of motivation or some such. can i ask how that works as in can you just do things after that?? you like have a task you gotta do and you up and do it? sorry to break into ur askbox like this i was just very curious because my executives do not function

Hi! Sure, I don't mind :)

Short answer: yes. :') I take my meds in the morning, and over the course of the day, it is much easier for me to add tasks to my mental list and then knock them down like the most dutiful Sim in the world. I forget to do things sometimes still - but those are usually due to other barriers like 'I would like to schedule this appointment, but I'm at work right now so I can't do that yet.' and then hours later I will have forgotten that I needed to do that. WHOOPSIES. Not necessarily an ADHD problem, just an average human one.

Also, the meds make it easier to access the well. That doesn't mean I always CHOOSE to use the well, haha. Sometimes I am just sooo comfy in bed and think 'i should get up. But I bet I could get away with another 25 minutes of dozing UwU' and then after my alarm goes off because my 25 minutes are up, I'm cursing my past self for being a hedonistic sloth because I really do have to get up now or I'll be late. I CAN choose correctly. That doesn't mean I do.

Long answer getting into the nitty gritty of my ADHD med journey below the cut:

So just remember that I'm not a doctor, I'm a stranger on the internet, so I don't know quite how it works, and not all medication will work the same for everyone. Executive function is huge for folks with ADHD, but it might be something else! ADHD often shakes hands with other conditions.

BUT - in my experience, I was diagnosed with combined ADHD (both the hyperactive bouncy kind and the laser focus, sit still for 12 hours doing one thing kind). A lot of my own executive function problems stemmed from not being able to choose what I hyper focused on, for how long, or if I even could. :')

There's a few different medications available to choose from once you get a diagnosis, including a fast-acting stimulant and a slow-release stimulant. The one that helps me is a slow-release - I take it in the morning, and it'll start to kick in after an hour and gives me a steady stream over the course of the day, wearing off about 8 hours later.

People with ADHD don't make as much dopamine on their own, and stimulants help your brain produce more of it. If you find yourself feeling calm and more able to focus or task-switch after drinking coffee, or soda, or other uppers, you might be self-medicating, and a diagnosis and meds may be helpful (but definitely talk that out with a doctor).

It took a while for my "storage" of dopamine to build up, and it wasn't pretty the whole journey there. There were multiple days in a row that I had to force myself to eat because the meds suppress appetite, so it was easy to skip meals I shouldn't have. (I embraced snacking over the whole day as a solution until my humors were balanced and I'd built up the habit of prepping a lunch hours beforehand lol)

But the benefits were immediate. Some things are normal, and habits are something every human has to figure out how to build regardless of whether you make enough dopamine - but I was immediately calmer. I would think 'i need to take out the garbage. I will do that now' and I would, in fact, take out the garbage? I'd just get up? And do it??? It was that easy. I find it much easier to stop in the middle of what I'm doing without getting annoyed, and to task switch without it completely breaking my flow. I'm CAPABLE of task switching at all. It's easier to remember that mug I left in the microwave. I can sit or work in silence and it's fine, I don't need music to be playing in the background to focus.

I still have to convince myself sometimes to do things when my executives don't want to function - a big coping skill I like is giving myself a crossroads moment. If I'm reading, the crossroads moment is at the end of a chapter, or a scene break. If I'm playing a game the crossroads moment is when I lost or won a round, or when I completed the task I was in the middle of, or reached a safe area.

At a crossroads moment, you can either choose to keep doing whatever you're doing, or do something else. It's why being on Tumblr and other social media is difficult to get away from, because there is no natural stopping point if you haven't turned off infinite scrolling. If that's hard for you, see if you can change your dash settings to only load a page/set number of posts at a time. You'll get a crossroads moment every time you reach the bottom of that page.

This is all my own experience with ADHD and stimulants, so again, I encourage you to think about whether this sounds like you and bring it up to a doctor if it's having a really big impact on your life.

I hope this helps! I also suggest this video from Jaiden Animations - she talks about her own experience getting an ADHD diagnosis, and funnily enough, this video dropped within the same week as I got mine, haha.

[taamlok]

every time someone calls taash "basically a teenager" i lose a year off my lifespan

[pseudophan]

what is it with doctors/psychologists and being like yeah you have this thing but it’s not harming you so i won’t diagnose you?? 😭 literally what my doctor said to me about autism like cool it didn’t effect me when i was 16 but it sure as hell does now in 26 ???

it's literally so stupid lmao like they're so afraid of setting a wrong diagnosis they just won't diagnose people at all unless they deem it absolutely debilitating

i've had the same thing happen with autism several times but i'm not too fussed about that one cause like whatever who cares i can't do much about that anyway, whereas with adhd i need a diagnosis if i want to try any meds. i did the raads-r again recently and my psych was like yeah you're probably autistic but lets ignore that and focus on the adhd because i don't think they're gonna let you get diagnosed with both lol

[heart-of-gotham]

👜: My character drops their bag and yours approaches them to return it.

[ First meeting starter prompts! - ACCEPTING ]

A lost bag in Gotham did not stay lost long. Then again, it wasn't always the person who lost it who found it.

Thankfully, a more honest soul had found it first. "Excuse me, are you looking for this?" The older woman, wearing her doctor's coat still, held out the bag carefully towards the young man. She'd seen the poor thing drop it in the sea of comers and goers wading around the area this time of day, most on their way home from day jobs and on their way out to night ones. A rough hour for anyone in-between, really.

But Leslie just gave a warm and understanding smile. It's not like she didn't learn the lesson the hard way back in her college days, no shame in it. Keep the loops of your bags and clutches wrapped around your wrist, straps cross-body, put your money in the inside pockets, keep your purse in front of you, always get a bag with a zipper. "I saw you from across the street, dear, you looked to be in an awful rush. I almost didn't catch you in time."

[canisalbus]

Counterpoint to the possession ask: you've been possessed by one dog for a very long time, but then a another dog who's broken edges fit wonderfully into the first dog's found you and they shuffled around to both fit possessing you because now they can't let go of each other. They're two halves of a single star and you're their galaxy :)

.

[bittsandpieces]

Pls stfu u r not autistic, if u haven’t been diagnosed by a real doctor shut up. U keep saying that shit for attention it’s annoying tbh disrespectful to all the people who REALLY have autism

Hey. if you'd like to go speak to my psychiatrist(s) about my formal diagnosis, you're welcome to do that, but in my personal opinion? You should keep your nose out of other people's FUCKING business.

EVERY. MOMENT. OF MY LIFE has been influenced and affected by my autism. I can barely make friends. I had to be taught to make eye contact as a child. I've had screaming breakdowns where I ripped the backs of my hands open with my nails because I got overwhelmed. Every real life social interaction I have feels like a performance where I'm missing the goddamn script but somehow everyone else knows exactly what their line is

You. Don't. Know. Me.

Oh, just because I'm hot and kinky and funny online I can't be autistic? Just because you see this one small element of my life, you think you know me and my medical history and diagnoses? What a fucking joke.

[brittlebutch]

i kind of hate to say it because i feel like i'll get pushback for it,,, but i kind of feel like if you're going to be making informational posts about autism online you do need to be reading actual autism research and literature. at least some of the times. like you can't just make things up and then present them as fact.

[thatswhatsushesaid]

In addition to it being useful, disabled people also have a moral obligation to learn certain social and communications skills. Test statements, backhanded compliments, reading a room, knowing what is appropriate to say in front of children vs coworkers vs friends. Anything related to sexual harassment is high priority: where and how intensely you are staring, conversation appropriateness, appropriate places to touch people at different levels of familiarity (as a rule:ask if unsure).

It is extremely frustrating watching disabled people on this website call anything and everything ableism when, even by their own account, they behaved in a way that is inappropriate and discourteous. Humility is the first step towards self-improvement.

I'm disabled, I've worked with disabled people and I read the news.

i dunno if i’m comfortable calling it a moral obligation exactly (gotta sit with that one for a while to figure out why that wording specifically is giving me pause), but i agree with the spirit of what you’re saying, anon. like… my having adhd and a probable mathematical and spatial reasoning disability* doesn’t mean that i’m just off the hook from ever having to reason spatially or do math. wouldn’t it be great if i never had to do those things!! alas, we live in a society, etc.

[editing this to add: i should hope it is clear from my tone that everything here is relative; there are no universals when it comes to disabilities because all of our disabilities are different, and manifest differently. and sometimes they are going to come into conflict with each other in a way that has no easy resolution, does not result in anyone feeling seen or heard or adequately helped, and no one is the bad guy. i wish i had something more helpful to say on this subject, but my perspective is influenced by my own experiences trying and failing to get the help i've needed. ok, back to the rest of the post.]

the skillsets i’ve have to develop to deal with these challenges are different from what my abled pals have had to develop, because dealing with numbers doesn’t cause them the same problems that it does for me. but at the end of the day, i need to be able to navigate enough to get to where i need to go; i need to be able to file my taxes every year; i need to be able to remember complex chains of numbers; i need to be able to do basic arithmetic for my job. i need to be able to follow instructions and take the correct dosage of my medications. and likewise, if i am in a position where i need to provide help to someone else (either as part of my job or in an emergency), i have to be able to do these things, or i risk letting someone else down.

tl;dr being disabled means that doing all of these things is that much more challenging for us because of how our brains work. but we still have to do them, no matter how unfair it is that it is harder for us than it is for our able-bodied friends, because no one else is going to put our needs first but ourselves.

[alfredosauce50]

Alfredosauce I have a confession…

I’ve read some of your stuff to the boyf (he lets me gush about what I like) BUT I HAVEN’T TOLD HIM IT’S HETALIA FANFICTION WE’VE BEEN READING THIS ENTIRE TIME 💀

Me asf 🙏

I took out the cringe of Hetalia and replaced it with my own cringe. You’re welcome