#especially from friends like even if this was related to my psychosis you could just let it be

[cyb3r-mutt]

Okay so I’m originally from the uk and over there it’s a thing to always greet/wave at/salute magpies and whatever it’s something I’ve done forever and I’ll admit it turned into like a big thing for me and I will absolutely interrupt a conversation to say hello to a magpie and get super distressed if I can’t but whatever it’s fine. The thing is I live in Canada right now and people think I’m weird when I say hello to magpies and don’t believe me that it’s not just me and it’s very annoying me saying hi to birds isn’t hurting you??

[spaceumbredoggos]

However fucked up Alex reveals Bill and Ford’s relationship is revealed to be in The Book Of Bill, Kenz and Bill’s is a hundred times worse.

Disclaimer: I am not glorifying abuse in any way shape or form. I myself have had nightmares similar to this despite never being sexually abused, both Bill related and otherwise. Some of these are based on personal experience (such as the nightmares), whilst others are a device used to show how fucked up shipping Bill with pretty much anyone is. Not even the Axolotl is safe in my opinion. If Bill was real, I’d guarantee he’d probably be a massive creep and with how thirsty his fankids are (and I’m calling myself out here) he’d probably use his magic to g*oom those kids like a church pastor. The thing that scares me the most about Bill being canonically real is not that he could catastrophically end the world, it’s his oversexualization in the fandom that got so bad, Alex himself had to make him unattractive. This will be along the lines of a Yandere Bill Cipher x Reader headcanons. With that being said, here’s a few content warnings:

G*ooming, Pedoph*lia, s*xual abuse and assault, physical and psychological abuse, mind control, cult-like things, psychosis, and general paranoia. I’m not saying these things actually happened, but knowing Bill’s character and his powers and history, if he was real, I’d generally be afraid for anyone in the Gravity Falls fandom. Especially minors.

This could be my most controversial post yet, and it could jeopardize any potential of getting into some colleges. This may sound like paranoid rambling, but I know that Bill is just a cartoon character. That being said, Alex like the blur the line between our world and the world of gravity falls with Bill’s character, dicing around the fact that he’s influenced history and wrote all religion on the basis of a lie. I’m not scapegoating him as “controlling global politics on a massive scale” because that would be stupid and I’ll sound like those tin foil hat rednecks that snort moonshine and burn pride flags. My heart goes out to all those who have been impacted by all forms of abuse as an abuse survivor myself. Alex, if you see this post (or any other of my posts/ read my fanfics), just know that it’s a critique on the fandom and the canon lore, and a cautionary warning to avoid lawsuits in case The Book of Bill Cipher causes mass psychosis.

As a kid (ages 7-9) I would watch Gravity Falls casually. At that age, the only thing I consumed online content wise was Skylanders and Minecraft content (Skylanders until age nine, then it was pretty much a lot of Team Crafted, Popularmmos, DanTDM, and other Minecraft YouTubers.) I didn’t invest in the Gravity Falls fandom until I was eleven (that’s when I first started writing my fanfics. The drafts are long gone because they were on school computers that were crammed with viruses due to kids installing Minecraft mods (this was just before chromebooks became mainstream. I went to a special ed middle school specifically for autistic individuals (it was pretty ableist, gonna make a post on that.) so the rules on what was allowed in school were pretty loose content wise. It didn’t have to be educational, as long as it didn’t have blood or guns. There were no safe search filters or Go Guardian (I remember one of my friends accidentally finding Iris from Pokemon black and white vore. I also found Pacifica vore.)) Before that, the February before my tenth birthday, my dad took my TV out of my room due to behavioral issues (undiagnosed autism go brrr). Around that time, there was talk in my town that the Disney channel was “rotting kids minds” with bad attitudes and crude humor (this could be said about any child’s television network (I mean, look at Nickelodeon.) but I lived in a pretty conservative area of Southern California and had a pretty conservative dad. So naturally, Disney was the scapegoat (this was way before the “woke” era of Disney.)) All of this talk of Brainrot made me stop watching the Disney channel during the peak era of gravity falls (2015 as a whole) and I didn’t watch gravity falls again until summer of 2016 when my tv was put back in my room (with intense parental controls so that I couldn’t watch my vet shows.) That’s when I had my first gravity falls dream about Bill cipher. It had to do with getting unicorn hair to protect my house from Bill Cipher. I had an interest in dreams previously due to warrior cats. It was at that moment when Gravity Falls was added to the obsession list.

As a neurodivergent eleven year old surrounded by other neurodivergent preteens and teens, we found common ground talking about Gravity Falls at school. I also would, whenever I didn’t feel the prying eyes of the grown ups or my peers would go off outside and act out my gravity falls x pokemon x warrior cats fanfiction (I’m not sure if those are signs of maladaptive daydreaming disorder or I simply had an intense imagination that would consume my body and make me want to just act out my fanfictions outside. I don’t do this anymore, mostly because of my own embarrassment and I can just write it out.) Yes, there were times where the discussion or action played out Bill Cipher being real. A lot of my “play” as I called it back then was me being kidnapped or possessed by Bill. I even wrote some really cringey fanfics involving my friends and Bill Cipher. To this day, I still involve my family in my fanfiction, but more final drafts will have their names changed. Weirdmaggeddon was a common topic, as well as Bill Cipher possession.

As time went on, I had more dreams about Bill Cipher, fueling the obsession and the fact that Bill could be real. During my middle school years, I never had a crush on Bill Cipher, despite what my friends seem to think. My parents just took it as whatever and as long as I was happy and just working towards going to a neurotypical non-sped school. My crush on Bill Cipher didn’t start until I was in high school. I remember it specifically being Valentine’s Day 2020 when I learned that I have a crush on the triangle. My dreams of Bill would only get more frequent and worse from here (involving the typical horny teenage dream that I don’t want to elaborate because I feel weird doing so (you’ll see why later on.))

Now there’s typically nothing wrong with having a cartoon crush. Given any other cartoon character that doesn’t have a canon history of influencing this world (Bill’s history of influence is vague but it still counts) I would excuse this as another silly cartoon crush like PurpleCliffe simping for Cynthia and the like. However, given that it’s in the show’s canon that Bill could be real and he crossed over to our world, do you understand what implications this could have? Bill is trillions of years old, he’s likely seen every timeline to ever exist. Meanwhile, there are whole armies of fankids who are down bad for him (including me.)

Notice how when I first started getting into Gravity Falls that I didn’t have a crush on him. How many other fankids felt the same way? It wasn’t until years of obsessing over Gravity Falls did I develop feelings for him. And of Alex says in the Book of Bill Cipher what I think he’s going to say (that Bill probably ab*sed Ford sexually with possible g*ooming involved), notice the pattern that is being presented here? Alex, if you blur the lines between fiction and reality with a villain who may or may not have canonically g*oomed and abused someone, possibly using mind control given his powers and his role as a dream demon, could it really be so far fetched that… (I’m not going to say it because it’s leaving a sour taste in my mouth, but use your imagination.)

If we take Alex’s word that Bill has crossed over to our world, then we can only assume that there are vulnerable kids and adults being… You get the picture. I’m not explicitly saying that it is happening right now, but this is problematic because revealing that Bill ab*sed Ford in that way means that Alex would probably imply that Bill is doing the same to MINORS. I may sound paranoid and this may just be a ramble, but considering the show’s canon and how mythology is filled with cases of degenerative acts from deities, this is a really fucked up situation.

It may be funny to say “haha, evil triangle man is sexy” but at the end of the day, Alex stated that Bill has crossed over into our world. For all we know, he could be taking advantage of the fact that people thirst for him, probably not in pleasant ways.

[schizosupport]

this is going to be very long and rambly, i apologize. you can answer any, all, or no parts of it, i guess i just really need to blurt it all out to *someone*

for the past 3 or 4 years, ive been having mild (?) transient stress related psychotic symptoms. i suspect i have a cluster b pd which could possibly cover that

at first it was mostly paranoia i think ? usually the standard "theyre out to get me" type thoughts, both with people i knew and nebulous entities i couldnt define. it doesnt happen too frequently, but it seems to have gotten worse with time. this past fall / winter was especially bad bc i was already doing poorly mental health wise and was very isolated. a lot of the thoughts are still paranoia based, but some lean more towards delusions now (e.g. being afraid of the music i left to play from my phone speakers bc i felt it was hunting me down) as well as some that are fully bizarre (e.g. believing that ive been an angel stuck inside a human body my whole life, thinking theres a force field around my apartment thats keeping me stuck inside). for a while there was also this... pervasive sense of unreality almost ? like i would get frustrated that things werent operating on dream logic, or have difficulty differentiating dreams and reality in general. for the past couple months since then, ive had pretty much no issues

i always retain Some grasp on reality, whether its full on double booking or a vague sense of "something is wrong with me right now", which is enough for me to hide away from people and try to calm myself down and ground myself back to reality (... can you even do that with "real" delusions ? talk yourself out of them ?). the symptoms only last a few hours "at their peak", though the unsteady / unreality feeling may stick around for days or weeks surrounding that. im still able to be mostly functional for that part though. as such, nobody knows about any of this.

i just. i dont know. i dont have a therapist (i need one). im too afraid telling my friends will change their views on me irreparably even though they too struggle with (other) deeply stigmatized mental health issues. ive spent a lot of my childhood being called insane and incapable and i dont want it to happen again after ive finally found people that respect me. im worried ill have a full on psychotic break at some point (what the hell counts as "a break" ? can i call what ive been through "episodes" ?), or lose my ability to double book, or display symptoms in front of people i know. i just dont know what to do so im. spilling it out all here. so someone at all besides me knows

-- elias

Hey there,

Sorry it took me a while to get back to you.

It definitely sounds to me like you are experiencing some level of psychotic symtoms, and it sounds like it's causing you significant distress. You asked whether you can "talk yourself out of" a "real delusion" - and well, not as such, until the delusion passes, but they can be more or less long-lived and come with more or less insight.

The types of episode that only last a couple hours at full intensity are sometimes referred to as micropsychoses. When people talk about "a psychotic episode" it usually refers to a prolonged loss of reality that may last days, weeks or even months. But plenty of people on the schizo- and psychosis spectrum don't experience full-blown psychotic episodes. That doesn't make their psychosis un-serious, and it also isn't a given that these people will go on to develop worse psychotic symptoms.

I think one of the reasons the diagnosis of schizotypal exists, is because we needed to acknowledge that not every person's endpoint on the schizo-spectrum is schizophrenia, but that doesn't mean that their experience doesn't come with distress or disability.

I think you could try to do a vibe check with your friends to see how they react to the concept of psychosis and psychotic disorders. If they seem cool, then you could try to bring up your own experiences. It might be nice to be able to talk about those things, and get to experience that it doesn't have to be the end of the world, and not everyone will judge you for it.

I hope you all the best, anon!!

[higuchisora]

"Mom says it's MY turn with the hallucinations!"

Lmao on one hand, plenty of illnesses (physical and mental) are genetic, including various psychosis-related/adjacent illnesses. On the other, they didn't have to take Jinx's so Vi could have some. They can share symptoms! They arguably already do, since some scenes (seeing baby Powder when she was bleeding from the stab, Vander encouraging her in the fight with Sevika, etc.) could be interpreted as being hallucinations of their own. If anything, it'd be interesting to consider how Vi would handle showing similar symptoms to Jinx, and how her view of the (unidentified) mental illness, Jinx, and herself would all be affected by this connection.

But I also think it would've been just as if not MORE interesting for her to have her own entirely different symptoms of mental illness, because even if two people from the same family suffer all of the same exact traumas (not possible but hypothetically), they'd still be impacted differently and react differently, so it would be more realistic if these things manifested in their own unique way in Vi. I'd also have loved to see how (depending on what these trauma and mental illness symptoms are) Vi and the people around her handle them. She comes across as the "suppress and don't acknowledge it" kinda gal, but if they were the kinds of symptoms you couldn't just "put in a box to deal with never" (like PTSD flasbacks/physically reacting on instinct, intrusive thoughts, etc.), and ESPECIALLY if others noticed and were constantly bringing it up/putting pressure on her to face these issues, I'd be curious to see the outcome of that. Obviously there'd be a lot of self-blame in there regardless, maybe even some internalized ableism (calling herself weak or pathetic, etc). But I'm mainly curious about how this could affect her coping mechanisms, as well as her POV on the situations and people around her, and vice versa.

Would she think herself too "broken" to be of help, of use to others? Would she push them away, would she become distrustful of them, or would she become MORE fixated on the ones she loves, perhaps turning them into makeshift anchors for her mental stability? Would she become similar to or more different from Jinx, and would that help or hinder their understanding of each other? Perhaps where Jinx indulges in and embraces violence, Vi would begin to shy away? Where Jinx staples her wounds and tries to murder-suicide her and her childhood friend, would Vi turn to substance abuse, chasing things that promise to make her feel good- or even feel nothing at all? Where Jinx pushes to become stronger, louder, more dangerous, further and further away from the version of herself she viewed as weak and easy to leave behind- would Vi instead stop pushing at all? Would her skin be unable to bear the sensation of her bandages scratching against her? Would she try to become smaller, harder to see, easier to ignore, to leave behind, as she believes she deserves? Could her hands continue to form fists without trembling? Could she continue to stomach the sight of blood, the sound of bones breaking under her touch?

I'm doing too much but now I can't stop thinking about it. Regardless of how "obvious" her traumas and mental illness(es) are, it's obvious she's got them, but considering the absolute refusal by Overton and Linke to acknowledge this and do anything with it, it's as if she has no problems at all and just walked out of season 1 completely fine. So I'm left to do nothing but speculate and imagine and wish upon stars.

"Hallucinating her loved ones screaming at her"

Jinx handing her psychosis over to Vi like:

[miishta]

freezer bride your sweet devine

you devour like smoked bovine hide

how funny , i never concidered myself tough

𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹

☥ about me :

my name is misha , i’m a goth and metalhead (black metal) high femme lesbian who actually really loves pink and cute stuff ,,, even though i’m goth ,, but i’m goth ,,

i’m a goth high femme , i’m trad goth but i sometimes i do more romantic goth / vampiric gothic styles sometimes as a refresher . i also do corpse paint a lot too because i’m just the same amount a metalhead (black metal + sometimes death metal and doom metal) than i am a goth . also sometimes different subcultures of vkei , but rarer . very kinky pillow princess

my main interests are jojos , ethel cain , extreme metal (i mainly like black metal but i also like a lot of death metal and doom metal too , other than that i like learning about other extreme metal , and listening to a few hybrid metal bands [i love blackened death metal and drone doom metal] ) , goth politics and helping baby bats get into the subculture , garfield ,,,, homestuck ,, horror movies , vkei , arcane , online mysteries , online abnormal kink and nsfw stories , kink and bdsm , medical mysteries , lost media , how deep the internet can go , creepy content , animals (especially snakes , tarantulas , cockroaches and centipedes) , vet nursing (i’m a training vet nurse) and body peircings , tattoos and mods

i’m spiritual and an aphrodite devotee and have grown up in a spiritual family where i have been taught authentic spiritual practices . tho i do have religious trauma from when my christian friend took me to church for a day . ONE DAY . ohmy god , nonetheless

i love my gf

leo sun ♌︎☉ , aries moon (dom) ♈︎ ☾ , leo rising ♌︎ asc , leo venus ♌︎ ♁ , scorpio lilith ♏︎ ⚸

𓂀

- serious stuff :

mental health and neurodivergency : i have adhd , bpd and psychosis , i am on the schizospec , seriously . psychosis isn’t psychopathy , it is a lot more similar , and includes schizophrenia and similar symptoms . schizospec disorders can also be worsened by bpd , which i have , which i developed from severe trauma that i have in many forms . adhd i was born with . i just wanted to clarify this for my proof i’m not a faker like most people on the internet . i’m VERY against it . also my first diagnosis’s were separation anxiety and sensory issues at 4 years old after my first experience with grief . idk if separation anxiety is an outdated diagnosis now ? but i have it apparently, but the incident at 4 was the start of why i have bpd so if that helps??? 4 IS a horrible number

do not mention : cancer , it’s the only aspect of my wide range of trauma i can’t talk about .

𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹

☥ jojos :

but i’m a gw (and mista) dickrider

fav character : MISTA !! (obviously) and fugo (i relate to him more than any other character ever in trauma , personality and goals , literally a mirror of me , apart from he’s smart)

fav part : golden wind ! i’m the biggest gw dickrider it’s literally the best part of jojos i could rewatch it nonstop

fav jojo : giorno and jolyne , if you hate jolyne ur 1. a misogynist 2. mad jotaro busted a nut in jolyne’s mom and not you

fav jobro : i’d say mista but some ppl don’t class mista as a jobro ,,, so gyro !

fav side villian : doppio !! i love him so much and i get him as a borderline who had to do chair work where the therapist thought there were two of me instead of realizing my personality issues were bc of my literal cluster b personality disorder, like ???

fav main villian : pucci , he’s so interesting and i always question his morals as he was manipulated by dio

fav stand : purple haze , i love how it portrays fugo , as a fugo relater i cried HARD when i figured out purple haze

fav spinoff : purple haze feedback , obviously , but also i love how it made fugo haters change their minds

most relatable : fugo . ,,, then narancia , then trish

also honorable mentions for relatability are lucy steel , yukako , jolyne , abbachio , kakyoin,, doppio,,,

𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹

☥ overall interests and my hyperfixations : (neurodivergent ranting)

everything listed above . as well as this i love art and analysing it as well as analysing media in general , like movies , shows , music and writing . i’m not very good at analysing writing as i’m not very intelligent (genuinely) , i try really hard but i struggle a lot as i struggled a LOT mentally in high school , BUT i am a lot happier now and i tried to improve my education post high school . now im getting distinctions in my vet nursing courses !! so ofc my education is a lot better now but some issues are still there because of my bad education in the past . but i adhd there so back on track : i love analysing music especially since ethel cain is my favorite solo artist and hayden’s songs and character for ethel cain are so deep and interesting to analyse . i also love analysing movies and shows , i HATE when shows don’t have analytical deapth . an example of this is the tangi virus analog horror , it was AMAZING until the woman died and everything was way too fast and on the nose , it was better when you had creative freedom to think for yourself

music i like : ethel cain , christian death , twin tribes , the cure , diva destruction , cocteau twins , paralysed age , bat nouveau , horror vacui , the naked and the dead , corpus delicti , siouxsie and the banshees , past self , strawberry switchblade , candlemass , type o negative , mayhem , nattefrost , nargaroth , emit , darkthrone , emperor, gorgoroth , immortal , blashemy , bathory, carpathian forest , mare cognitum , dark fortress , marduk , burzum , celtic frost , aura noir , aeternus , satryricon , obituary , cannibal corpse , angelmaker , autopsy , armagedda , king crimson (ha jojo ref) , dio (ha jojo ref) , dorian electra , jiluka , malice mizer , femme fatale , girugamesh , mejibray , the gazette , versailles

i used to produce dubstep and edm w my cousin when i was 8 , we had to stop because of money and copyright . but since then i have been playing electric guitar on and off for years and i really want to produce again . also after one of my cousins deaths in my teen years i started trying to learn how to rap for his honor , i’ve been rapping for years and i’m actually really good now !!

i also love to create art , i draw , write , play guitar and i also dance but i’ve only just started writing , only just got the confidence to , as i said , i wasn’t educated well so i had to teach myself how to write . i’ve drawn since i was a kid , i’ve always loved it . i also paint abstract pieces , whether it’s my emotions or how i portray songs , i’ll paint it and i only like it if it’s so inherent that no one understands it but me - that’s what makes art so special . i’ve been playing guitar since i was 8 , had a huge break twice for multiple reasons but i love guitar , i’m an electric guitarist and i like to use pedals as well as my amp . i really want to learn how to play the drums too because i feel like it would be a good way to get my pent up anger with and i’ve always been interested , my cousins got me into making music and my older cousin out of the two was a drummer as well as a guitarist (me and my other cousin were just guitarists) but i always wanted to learn the drums like him . he said he was going to teach me but it never happened ,,

𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹

☥ random stuff i love ?! :

fav movies : TERRIFIER TRILOGY , saw franchise , ghost , flashdance , pretty woman , high and low franchise , pearl , x , maxxxine , tscm , pulp fiction , reservoir dogs , kill bill

fav shows : JOJOS BIZARRE ADVENTURE , all of us are dead , alice in borderland , south park ,,, hunter x hunter , breaking bad

fav artists : araki , louis wain

fav animals : BATS , cornsnakes , rinkhals , all snakes tbf especially elapids , tarantulas (especially arizona blondes) , cockroaches (especially madagascan hissing cockroaches) , centipedes , leopard geckos , rats , raccoons , opossums , cats , ferrets , pigeons , moths

𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹𓆣𓋹

interact !! :

- jojo fans

- goths

- metalheads

- vkei fans

- ethel cain lovers

- anyone chill really

dni :

- basic dni criteria like racists , homophobes , sexists , transphobes , ableists ect.

- ppl who infantilise adhd or any neurodivergency

- ppl who sexualise and or villianise bpd or any cluster b personality disorder

- ppl who are afraid of or think people with schizophrenia/psychosis are insane

- ppl who sexualise goths

- conservatives and conservative “goths” (you’re not goth)

- “goths” who don’t follow the politics in general

- cunts

schizopost account : @doppiorelater

blog i talk about lesbian stuff on : @femmefataleii

[dragynkeep]

Everyone's problematic fave is Josh and look I get he's mentally ill and went through such a tragedy but his prank on his friends was so much worse than what they did to Hannah. Maybe more people see him as sympathetic or relatable or want to have their own revenge fantasy but none of the kids deserved being terrorized and feel like they would die. Especially Sam and Chris who would had nothing to do with the prank.

I do feel bad for Josh but he's not a uwu soft bean not when he meticulously planned out how he would traumatize mostly 3 of his friends and 2 of them has zero involvement and the 3rd just stood by and laughed. Still shitty and mean but Ash had the least involvement of them all.

I also just remembered while watching some play through but Mike does apologize to Hannah when he sees it went too far. I mean too little too late but he was remorseful.

i never got the idea of josh being a soft uwu bean that’s so heavily perpetuated in the fandom because while the events of the game are happening while he’s having a pretty intense psychotic break like ... he wasn’t even that nice or friendly before the game by the other characters retellings of him. even in the opening he’s passed out drunk & beth responds in frustration, telling how this is a common occurrence for him which is understandable because it’s a form of self medication mixed with just being a regular teen who wants to get drunk with his friend.

i know it’s a trend for mentally ill characters to either be in the wholly demonized evil psycho catagory or the uwu soft mentally ill baby bean & while i’m glad that josh isn’t in the former despite his psychosis in the game like ... that doesn’t make him being wholly put into latter any better! he did a lot of terrible things & while his motives were understandable, they were nowhere near justified & he had the mens rea to make him culpable for guilt for a fair portion of the “pranks.” he was literally able to make all these intense, intricate plans on how best to terrorize his friends from what he knows personally terrifies them.

& when you bring into it that sam & chris had absolutely nothing to do with the prank yet really seem to almost suffer the worst from josh’s pranks, it not only speaks to just how cruel josh can be but how much his logical center of thinking in his brain has warped from the psychosis, from the lack of medication, from the mismanaging of his mental illness. i really wish we could find a middle ground between “josh is a deranged psycho & deserved the ending he got” or “josh is a poor sad traumatized bean & that makes his actions justifiable” because no. neither of these are right, they’re both the same forms of ableism just in different coatings & neither help people who relate to josh through their own mental illness.

people with psychosis, with psychotic disorders & those who’ve suffered psychotic breaks, like i have with my own disorder, we don’t need to be babied or demonized. we need to realize when we’ve taken a step too far & when our own center of logic is so warped & deformed that we need time to reset that because we’re hurting the wrong people, we’re hurting people.

revenge fantasies are carthartic in fiction but that doesn’t mean they should be emulated or congratulated, especially for the mentally ill because often times, you might end up going for the wrong person. josh did in the game & still somehow gets catagorized as a poor bean. it’s so weird.

[h-didanart]

It is. It has for a while.

I do agree that the benefit of doubt should be given, but in the opposite direction, we cannot expect the show runners to know the exact intricacies of mental disorders and all their characters’ psyches, tho taking that as the characters themselves having wrong assumptions about things is a very valid take. I do believe Sun’s issues are portrayed well enough, at least his depression, ocd, and ideation since those are the ones I can recognize the most, but it sounds like you understand the character a lot more than me so I will take your word. You’d be surprised how often writers can accidentally write something as complex and intricate as that, so I could see some of those being in accident, but at some point it does seem very purposeful, perhaps the show runners realized this aspect and decided to lean on it? You could also be right on it all being purposeful however, I’m just putting my thoughts out.

Uh, yeah, generally speaking media isn’t very good at portraying this kind of things, especially Hollywood, and especially when it comes to highly stigmatized disorders and symptoms such as bpd and psychosis respectively.

That’s a very good observation, it did seem like an alternate dimension for a while, what with its own story and events.

I actually didn’t know that, huh. I suppose it makes sense for a break to center around a delusion when triggered by external events and stressors rather than from a psychotic disorder itself, good to know. (And agreed, neither of them has it)

I read about that symptom, and I immediately thought of how Moon’s reaction to the nightmare makes sense with his personality. It all matches up. He would act like that, maybe the aggressiveness in the end was slightly out of character but the guy was having a really bad time so I can’t blame him for getting like that.

Tho I do want to mention a point a friend raised when we were discussing this episode before we switch to Sun. Moon still couldn’t differentiate between reality and dream when he woke up but every time any other character had a nightmare they could tell it was a nightmare when they woke up. From this my friend believes this episode marks the start of a psychotic breakdown for Moon, and I too feel like this might lead to a breakdown, even if Moon already kinda had one less than a month ago (?)

But enough about Moon, onto your points on Sun.

Yes, he was very different, ruthless, determined, apathetic, from what I remember. 

The point you raise about Eclipse and later mention about his manipulation make me link the two events actually, perhaps Sun took those words to heart and it bled through during his breakdown, various things of the ‘Running from the government’ arc stuck around after all.

Agitation and restlessness, also saw those symptoms, and also saw Sun very much being like that, running all day from bunker to bunker with only one goal in mind. (This kinda gave me the thought that maybe Sun is also bipolar since the symptoms also line up with a manic episode, but I forgot the other symptoms so I really can’t tell (and psychosis is also common in bipolar) anyways—)

Huh, didn’t think about that one. Most of my knowledge of hallucinations is that they can affect any sense and can be triggered by a lot of stress. 

Ooh, yeah, I too noticed that but didn’t immediately connect it to today’s episode and Moon. Both Sun’s Bloodmoon hallucination and Earth’s (sorry for mentioning them) Bloodmoon nightmare knew exactly what the two were feeling, and exactly what would terrify them. They were personifications of their fears in the shape of their trauma. So yeah, comparing those guys and the Solar and Ruin Moon interacted with really brings the difference to light.

Okay now that’s standing out to me a lot. I know Sun has a bad self esteem and terrible view of himself, so I usually thought of it as just a core view of himself he held, with the guilt being another core thing of his because of his and Old Moon’s relationship. But if it’s a delusion… that would fit as well, and would make this a lot sadder, the guy really truly believes himself to be at fault for so much…

Oh it was fine, you did a good job! I understood. 

Yeah, the paranoia also points to a possible breakdown methinks. Overall, Moon is extremely stressed, extremely anxious, and probably sleep deprived, a terrible combination that can only get worse if//when Creator comes around to mess it all up. 

That’s a valid line of reasoning, and you know what? You have my full support, that is a logical development and fits well with the character’s actions and feelings.

Also I strongly doubt that Moon is hallucinating/has delusions..

And I doubt he had psychotic break..

Probably Frank/Forkface was messing with him probably to show him what could've been.. This weird nightmare had a lot of Moon's fear included so I think that's that..

Nothing indicated Moon having psychotic break so it would be completely out of nowhere..

I'm slightly annoyed with people saying that Moon has psychotic break because they somehow didn't see Sun having it when Sun had shown signs of development of psychotic episode before having it unlike Moon..

[msookyspooky]

maybe later on we could have a better look into billy's psychosis?

i would never survive this cause my psychosis makes me so paranoid sometimes i cannot leave my house. if someone so much as hinted anyone as the killer it would be game over, i can't sleep, i think everything is poisoned and im convinced im always being followed. i can recognise when it's a delusion normally but that doesn't make it any less real. if you tell someone with psychosis that there hallucinations/delusions are not real it's very bad, it's like if someone told you that the sky doesn't exist.

a thing with my psychosis that i would like to think billy experiences is forgetting. i don't want him to be in distress but i would quite like some representation because i want to relate to him more. if someone has hurt me or made me upset sometimes i will just forget. i will associate them with pain but i won't remember what they have done, it really sucks. i most likely remember after a while though. it just feels invalidating and i think that i did something. sometimes i have an episode or really bad anger and my coping is pretty self destructive.

if you don't think it's right for his character or this didn't make sense then ignore me. i hope you are doing well, i love your writing. <3

Sorry, I've had such a busy week! Grandpa in the hospital with pneumonia, driving 30 min away twice a day everyday to take care of his pets, family friend has uterine cancer and my mom is driving her to her surgery and were both helping her out at home this week and weirdly enough my great uncle had been battling cancer for 5 years (Terminal. He's on his death bed basically. He only weighs 95 lbs now.) and has medical psychosis now.

His body has been through so much that one day his mind just snapped for lack of a better word. He walked in the hospital fine and completely his regular self before a surgery and then within an hour of waiting he started screaming and thrashing that he was in a bus and kids were going to get ran over. It scared my aunt to death bc he wasn't my uncle in that moment and none of us have ever seen him like that before. He's home and doing much better. He knows who you are has complete clarity but he is absolutely terrified now of my aunt leaving his side 💔 He got so angry and scared when she left and one of us watched him in her place (He can't hardly walk) but yet that day he made all these appointments and paid bills before my aunt even got up and made a ton of phone calls he just doesn't want her to ever leave...Ik I shouldn't laugh but I gotta find something to laugh about in this situation and he was talking to us calm as can be on the phone and just casually mentioned. "Yeah, ya know she has me in a box underground, right? These fucking abortion nurses are stealing fetuses and they got me locked in a god damn box bc they couldn't steal mine."

...We just rolled with it but omfg I'm glad we know he has psychosis rn bc I can't imagine a stranger calling me and telling me that 🥴☠️ I just have to laugh and so did my aunt bc she's so defeated and tired seeing him like that and taking care of him that we have to find some humor in this especially since he's not scared about it just not connecting certain dots and he only gets scared when she leaves for groceries or anything like that bc that's when the paranoia sets in. And it's just disheartening to see him in this mental state sometimes

I know that psychosis is different in everyone and medical psychosis might not be the same as the psychosis you're dealing with and that there's varying levels and that most psychosis especially medical or stress can go away within time and on proper medication. Now, idk much about psychosis brought on by having other psychological disorders or if there are forms of psychosis that never goes away?? I'm more than eager to learn from your perspective bc I definitely hc Billy is my story as having psychosis similar to his future daughter Sam but he just won't admit it and that maybe it's lessened since his Mom's death or gotten worse; either way. Maybe both? Bc now I could see his paranoia heightening from cops, betrayal, etc.

Sadly tho, this story is from YN POV

I fully understand wanting to relate to him but I feel like that can be hard to do bc from not only who I've known irl with psychosis and what I'm trying to educate myself on is everyone's symptoms and degrees of the symptoms are different. Plus, it's hard to do with YN being the POV and the only canon mental issues she has is PTSD, Anxiety and probably High Functioning Depression from what she's went through (Of course anyone is free to add in their own to personalize the experience while reading) and people thought she had psychosis from Billy and Stu purposely trying to make her doubt herself as well as others doubt her in Windsor. So, that makes it hard to show Billy's POV in detail.

I'm sure tho later on a short story will come along the way and I really appreciate you taking the time to tell me your experience with psychosis so I can add it into Billy's character. 🖤🖤🖤

[traumasurvivorshelpingsurvivors]

hello, i'm trying to seek advice and validation for these stuff

tw : destructive hallucinations, death

i've been having these flashes of "thoughts", they appeared at random times and obviously i couldn't control them. i know they weren't real but....they FELT real

i've seen my parents having a car crash and died, this happened when i was waiting for them to come home from work. then one day i saw myself having a crash while driving my motorcycle, the worst one was when i woke up and the world's ending (meteors crashing to earth, volcanoes erupting, earthquakes)

it didn't last long because it's just flashes but still it appears a lot of times, it feels like watching a movie and then it paused when i snapped back to reality, when the stress got too overwhelming it continues and i just had a breakdown from that

and then there are these "voices" too, i've tried to made some peace with them but they always refused. they're annoying as hell cause what they're told me were very harmful and self destructive, like i don't deserve to live when i had a decent normal day, or everything i did is wrong, or my happiness is a burden to my family, that i just ruining everything. heck even my headspace friends (not alters tho, more like imaginary friends) got pissed off too because of them!

i've been searching on google (i'm pretty much banned from going to my psychologist cause my parents knew and they just told me to pray much more, typical sea parents smh) on what these stuff are and i'm still not sure, i feel like it's only ptsd but with hearing voices? is it psychosis?

btw prob those voices would be mad at me after i send this ask lol, dw i can handle them even tho yeah it's exhausting. i feel like maybe if i'm able to understand what this is i'll feel much better

thank you for reading 💖

Hey anon,

First of all I'm sorry to hear you're dealing with these things. That sounds unnecessarily challenging and frustrating.

The first thing you mentioned about "flashes" actually strongly resonates with another ask I answered. I will reiterate that "Intrusive thoughts in and of themselves can be considered a type of OCD, and harmful intrusive thoughts can be further classified as Harm OCD. This type of OCD is very common in those with PTSD, depression, and anxiety." But of course this experience is comorbid with other disorders, such as schizophrenia, OSDD, or other disorders that involve voices.

Also I just want to say that, like you may discover in the hyperlink to the other anon, you're not alone and I can especially relate to those apocalyptic flashes around bedtime. Those are the worst, they get you right when your defenses are down, and I'm sorry you experience that too. I've found that it's comforting to consider the extremely rare odds of something like that happening.

As we are volunteers and not professionals we unfortunately can't give you a diagnosis of any kind, but your experiences are valid no matter what condition may be causing them.

Hope I could help point you in a clearer direction, and we're here for you if you need anything.

-Bun

[absentmotive]

SCREAM 5 REVIEW

deep breath i’ll do my best to keep from posting about spoilers but if i feel like i can’t avoid, i’ll put it under a read more and THAT will be your ONLY WARNING not to read to avoid spoilers.

alright so i’ve been pumped and excited for scream 5 since they announced it was happening. over all impression of the movie was...it was good. it def’ kept you on the edge of your seat, constantly revising your “who done it” suspect list, but it just, it lacked something. maybe it’s because i got my hopes up for SOMEONE to come back because it would have made much more sense than what actually happened. and since i know myself, the rest is going under a read more ‘cause i need to talk about it lol

normally i don’t vibe with canon characters getting random kids, but given how billy was very much sex / touched starved, it did not surprise me that sam was his kid. so i wasn’t too concerned with it and i do love that they showed how psychosis can be hereditary but can be treated.

my biggest gripe is richie and amber ( amber annoyed the fuck outta me to begin with like...i was waiting for her to get sliced and diced. ) i had somewhat high hopes in that they wouldn’t recycle the whole “it’s the boyfriend” or “best friend” trope, but they did. and the biggest thing that rips my nips is the motive these two dumbshits had to revive ghostface after a decade even though it does show that fans / fandoms can be fuckin’ weird and people can take things too far.

but the whole “we’re making our own movie ‘cause the last one sucked” thing is just...c’mon. scream 4 was barely hanging on by a thread ( if you know me, you know i don’t like emma roberts and her being in the film killed it for me to begin with, but the jealous cousin / family member wanting fame was boring. ) but the whole stab 8 being shit...okay who the fuck cares about a fake movie within the actual film?! like i don’t care if they kept making stab films as time went on. we already know hollywood likes to recycle *stares at camera* plots, characters, themes, etc. we didn’t need a half hour to listen to two wannabes explain their weak ass motive.

you know what would have been better and made way more sense? FUCKIN’ STU MACHER COMING BACK because the biggest horror movie thing didn’t happen; we didn’t get a confirmed kill nor saw the body. there is SO MUCH they could have done with stu coming back and being the killer.

it’s no secret that billy was popular while alive and he certainly gained more interest when he died. but what about stu? stu is hardly ever mentioned other than “billy and his friend” whenever someone speaks about the murders so it would have made perfect fuckin’ sense if precious stu came back, went after everyone ( don’t ask me why he’d go after his own nephew other than the fact of not knowing who vince was / could have been ) that was related to an original victim / survivor to get sidney’s attention and remind her that she didn’t shoot him in the head like she did with billy as she should have done ‘cause come on...that tv had a 50/50 chance of doing the job.

also, going back to amber freeman, yOU’RE GONNA LOOK ME IN THE EYE AND TELL ME A LITERAL CHILD KILLED A GROWN ASS FUCKIN’ MAN?! it was some fuckin’ horseshit in how dewey died and i just don’t fuckin’ accept it. not one goddamn bit. she literally double fisted stabbed this man and somehow managed to fillet him. like our man died in vain and fOR WHAT?! JACKSHIT THAT’S WHAT.

so in closing, the only upside to this whole thing was that i got to see my boy billy / skeet once more on the big screen. even if he was a hallucination for his daughter sam. and sidney has aged like fine wine and we stan a queen. also randy would have been very proud of his niece and nephew, Mindy and Chad, especially Mindy as she’s basically randy’s mini me.

[slugtranslation-hypmic]

same anon as the headcanons one! maybe some “this is something I think would be nice but has nothing to do with canon” and “this has absolutely no relation to canon and doesn’t make sense within the Hypmic universe but I have fun thinking about it anyway" ones? 👀👀

I swear, I have tons of them, but the moment someone asks... Poof, they’re all gone.

Put under a cut because I suddenly got embarrassed and also wrote way too much again.

This is something I think would be nice but has nothing to do with canon

I feel like Hifumi and Doppo enjoy gossiping with one another. Doppo probably denies it, but he’s actually really invested when it includes someone he knows. Considering how persistent Hifumi is in asking Jakurai about Ramuda, I have a feeling they spend a lot of time speculating about what went down with TDD. Hifumi probably suggests really wild ideas like, “Ramuda is secretly an alien!” and consequently has probably hit upon the truth at this point.

I think Hitoya wants his team to be better than Matenrou so he can show Jakurai who’s boss. Juushi, being Juushi, supports Hitoya in this 100% and tries his hardest. Kuukou, being Kuukou, just wants an excuse to throw down at the slightest provocation, so he’s really enthusiastic about it too.

This is so far out of left-field, but for some reason, I imagine Sasara’s apartment smells like cigarette smoke.

I am convinced - and will be unless canon says otherwise - that Hitoya was Jakurai’s gay awakening circa eighth grade or thereabouts. There is nothing anyone can do to change my mind. The only way Evil Line Records can possibly invalidate this if they explicitly say, “No, Jakurai’s gay awakening was [insert a different scenario here]” but will they ever do so? Nah. (Note the “explicitly” because a few of the mangakas appear to have much to implicitly say on this subject.)

I think Hifumi probably didn’t do very well in school.

I think Saburou is probably a little bit jealous of how easily Jirou gets along with people.

I think Gentarou’s editors must actually all hate him because he handwrites his manuscripts.

This has absolutely no relation to canon and doesn’t make sense within the Hypmic universe but I have fun thinking about it anyway

Okay, I was really thinking of one thing when I wrote this, and I guess it’s a little bit personal but oh well. I have an AU where everything is the same but everyone in Fling Posse has psychosis of some kind.

This is probably not going to make sense to most people, but there’s a special feeling you find in a psychotic community you don’t find anywhere else. A lot of people with psychosis who are aware that they have psychosis feel a need to hide it for lots and lots of reasons - shame, concern of being judged, fear of losing their job or loved ones if their illness is discovered, etc. Psychosis is also really embarrassing. You don’t want to be doing what you’re doing, you’re often aware that what you’re doing or what you’re thinking is irrational, but you have no control over it anyway. Even around very close non-psychotic friends, I feel ashamed whenever I exhibit too irrational behavior. They’re all used to it, and I know they don’t particularly care (outside of concern for my well-being), but I resent the fact that I can’t act the way they do at all times.

However, when you’re within a psychotic community, there’s none of that. Everyone in the group has the understanding that at some point, everyone’s going to be off the shits, and that’s okay. We’ve literally all been there. Even though psychosis manifests differently in different people, large enough groups make it so that everyone can find someone else who understands them and has been through a similar experience. This is everything. I cannot stress enough how important this is. Psychosis is by nature alienating because it gives you a different reality than everyone else around you. Having someone else say, “My reality is similar to your reality” and offer genuine understanding and empathy means the world. Psychotic communities also tend to be more understanding of trauma (because psychosis itself is traumatic and can manifest in absolutely horrifying ways that the average person will fortunately never experience. Additionally, psychosis can manifest because of trauma, and people with psychosis tend to be preyed on more because we’re often more emotionally vulnerable. So we’ve all been there) and can have free discussions about it without feeling the need to shelter others from it. You can also discuss very real problems that are utterly foreign to the rest of the world, like the issue of falling in love with a hallucination and dealing with the grief of its passing. It’s freeing. It’s freeing and accepting on an unreal level. I’m a member of a community for people with schizophrenia which is somehow the kindest, most well-behaved community of people I’ve ever met. The rest of the Internet could learn a thing or two from that.

I think Fling Posse has that same general feeling, especially post-DRB Fling Posse. They all have the understanding that they have shit going on, really serious shit, and they’re accepting of one another even though their serious shit may not be the same as anyone else’s. They have all seen each other blow up and act weirdly, but their concern is less about “Whoah, you’re being weird” and more “Hey, you’re not feeling well. Let’s get you away from other people and take care of you.” (I’m thinking in particular of the Gentarou and Dice bit in Chapter 10 of FP/M, although there are other examples of this elsewhere.)

I’d like to write a fanfic about this someday, although it’s probably just going to devolve into shameful amounts of projecting. Oh well. I think it’s important to talk about these things anyway, even if they do necessitate shameful amounts of projection. There needs to be a lot less “shame” in the statement of, “My life is different than yours, and I want you to be able to understand it.”

If anyone out there reading this has psychosis or one of the many disorders that manifests with this particular symptom, know that you are important and that I love you.

[scarlet--wiccan]

(1/?) The MCU is going on a specific direction and might touch Wanda's history of mental illness. Maybe talk about that when you have the time? Wanda was going on a nice direction before all that happened.

Whew! Sorry it’s taken me so long to answer this— I have several super-long message chains like this one in my inbox and they’re hard to parse through and harder still to write a real answer for. I’m gonna try through a couple of these today.

Well, I think you hit all the important points here-- the optics of a mixed-raced family of first- and second- gen Holocaust survivors committing mass acts of terrorism, becoming rulers of a fascist, supremacist regime, and then, finally, committing pseudo-genocide, are, you know, not great. These are complicated characters whose representation can easily swing in either really positive or really, really negative directions, but this goes beyond the pale for me, especially given the proximity to 9/11.

The portrayal of Wanda's mental illness during this time, while not wholly unsympathetic, is wildly inaccurate and generally played as a horror motif. I'm not an expert on schizophrenia, but I think we can all agree that it's high time we moved past exploiting sick and disabled people's experiences for cheap scares. It's especially frustrating because Wanda, as a character, does have ground for poignant stories about mental illness-- she's had numerous traumatic experiences, starting with generational trauma and a lifetime of violent discrimination, and ending, at that point, with the deaths of her young children and the abrupt dissolution of her marriage. Her mental health should be addressed, but not in a way that demonizes illness or characterizes sick people as villains. One thing I appreciate about Robinson's Scarlet Witch is that it represents her mental illness in a very human, matter of fact manner and gives her the power to take control of her own wellness. She has realistic symptoms and pursues realistic treatments, instead of, you know, making hallucination constructs and getting mind-probed by Charles fucking Xavier.

Wanda is simultaneously infantilized and vilified in these stories-- she's denied agency at every turn, and yet, Wolverine and the other "heroes" of this saga view her with unbridled contempt, and most of them are immediately ready to murder her in the name of justice, even before the "no more mutants" spell was cast. You wondered how Bendis was able to inspire such a long lasting hatred of Wanda, and I think the simple answer is that almost every character in House of M hates Wanda. The characters you root for, the characters whose perspectives dictate the tone of the story, direct palpable fury towards her, and even those who aren't out for her blood don't extend any actual empathy towards her-- most are ambivalent to her wellbeing, while Xavier and Strange are incredibly paternalistic.

The final spell, "no more mutants", has baffled me for years. You're spot-on in saying that Wanda here represents a self-hating minority, but it's really hard for me to understand how she could have reached that point. It's not consistent with her previous characterization, nor is it thematically connected to the factors which led to her breakdown. Bendis places the onus of her condition on Erik, alleging that he abandoned and abused his children in his fanatic commitment to the mutant cause, which, besides being a willful misinterpretation of canon, has nothing to do with Wanda's current circumstance-- she's like this because Agatha Harkness altered her memories, because the Avengers continuously gaslit her, and becaue Mephisto killed her kids in the first place. It has nothing to do with Magneto, and Wanda's breakdown has nothing to do with mutant politics. She and Pietro were raised in a loving family until their adoptive parents were killed by racists. Erik didn't knowingly abandon them, and while he did mistreat them during the Brotherhood days, it wasn't parental abuse because he wasn't a father figure to them-- neither party had any idea they were related. Bendis is evoking specific forms of trauma that never actually happened, while ignoring the ones that did, and the effects of the spell itself are vague and seemingly random.

~~~~~

Young Avengers does call back to Wanda's circumstances in Disassembled and HoM, but it doesn't execute the concept of reality-warping in the same way. The driving force in YA is the spell which Billy casts, and Loki tampers with, in the first issue. It is a spell which distorts reality, but it has specific parameters, and neither party is characterized as "crazy" the way Wanda was. The spell was intended to bend space and time so that Billy could pull Teddy's mom from the past, before she was killed, into the present-- it's not dissimilar from how Wanda "retroactively reincarnated" her kids. Due to Loki's interference, however, the spell was hijacked by an interdimensional parasite called Mother. The Mother virus appears primarily as a construct of Teddy's mom, but as her influence over the Earth-616 dimension grows, she's able to create constructs of other dead parents, and even mind-control living adults. All of the ways in which reality is being warped hinge on the specific conditions under which Mother was summoned, and while it is Billy's magic that's fueling these constructs and distortions, they aren't symptoms of psychosis-- Billy doesn't lose control of his magic because he's losing his mind, he loses control because he's too young and inexperienced to protect himself from predatory forces. Those forces do take advantage of his depression and anxiety, but his condition is never the cause.

Loki's magic is wrapped up in the spell, too, but rather than conjuring dead parents, it emerges as a construct of their former best friend, Leah. Loki, in Young Avengers, is a mashup of two personae-- the reincarnated child Loki, and Ikol, a phantom of their past life who is carrying out the previous Loki's evil will even though their heart isn't in it. Ikol has mostly overshadowed Loki, who has been reduced to a ghost that torments Ikol by acting as a constant reminder of their guilt. Ikol is haunted by their past, but it's important that this haunting is a nuanced metaphor and not literal hallucination, as Wanda's condition was in HoM. Because Loki's power is part of the spell, Kid Loki's ghost is able to hijack the reality distortions to summon the construct of Leah, who, in turn, is able to summon the Young Avengers' other exes, the same way that Mother, in the form of Teddy's dead mom, can summon other dead parents.

Loki does raise the question of whether or not Billy might be subconsciously influencing Teddy with his powers, but this is clearly illustrated as a manipulation tactic and disproven several times. Loki's original goal in summoning Mother was to draw out Billy's full magical potential so that they could steal his power for themselves. Driving a wedge between Billy and Teddy, and causing Billy to question his own sanity, were devices to make Billy more susceptible to having his power stolen, and they worked-- Billy is not able to divest his magic from the spell and banish Mother from Earth-616 until he overcomes his self-doubt and start exercising mindfulness. Loki, in turn, is not able to divest their power from the spell and banish Leah and the other exes until they own up to their guilt and admit everything they've done. Both characters are experiencing symptoms of exacerbated mental illness-- Billy's depression and suicidal ideation, Loki's disassociation-- but their mental illness is not the source of their magic, but a challenge which makes it harder for them to live as their fully realized selves... just as it would be for any normal person.

I know that was a long-winded explanation, but I wanted to illustrate what sets Gillen's take on "reality warping" apart from Bendis's. It's based on clearly though-out ideas of how magic works and what defines "reality" in a world populated by parallel universes and living myth-forms. Gillen affords Loki and Billy a degree of sympathy without denying them agency, and Loki is held accountable for their decisions without being painted as a total monster. Bendis, meanwhile, characterizes Wanda's magic as delusion made real, and completely vilifies her for her illness in spite of the fact that she's given no control over her actions.

[crimeronan]

that last post i reblogged made me reminisce about the times i actually Have become the subject of ppls ire and it’s kind of. amazing. putting under a read more so as not to subject people to Wank but. if u wanna know what 8 years of blogging has wrought on “i enjoy things in non-mainstream ways” Maximum Aggro and “i’ve had several posts about autism and psychosis go viral” Extreme Difficulty

here are things ive gotten several anon hate and the occasional dedicated ongoing hateblogging campaign over

“diagnosing” characters with autism

a whole bunch of other autism-related stuff that is Unfortunately not fun so i will not detail it

shipping the raven cycle ot6

“wanting ronan and blue to have sex,” notable especially because the blogger who mounted the campaign somehow didnt notice id written at least 5 posts about ronan and blue as platonic metamours & talked at length about how ronans gay & specifically stated, repeatedly, that its important to me that their relationship is platonic and nonsexual

posting a humorous contextless snippet of an RP btwn me n my partner where ronan asserted that being monogamous would be miserable

(because it was part of my malicious campaign to oppress monogamous people and invalidate their relationships)

saying adam and ronan aren’t inherently made for each other and had to work for their relationship

saying gansey is actually capable of having healthy relationships and that i even think he has some in the actual canon text

saying gansey is a good friend

(you will think this is facetious but this was honest to god an intense point of controversy and hatemail. the context is people were already mad about [pick anything on this list] and padded their manifestos with my gansey positivity)

(but it’s So funny to imagine a horde of people just blacking out in red-misted rage upon seeing the words “gansey good”..... a concept that causes enough wrath to fuel death threats violence bait and graphic content submissions...... let’s please imagine that’s what happened)

having polyamorous homestuck ships

especially ones where m/m couples were still together and just as committed and passionate and in love..... but also dating a woman too

saying zuko can be interpreted as autistic

problematic because it’s impossible for autism and trauma-related emotional issues to exist in one person

(the joke is i was writing abt him bein me. an autistic person with trauma feelings)

(this isn’t even the autism stuff that was Unfun this is amazing autism stuff)

writing about psychotic characters who have a fairly adjusted humorous grip on reality

bc it delegitimized the Seriousness of Psychosis

and could Reinforce The Delusions Of Actual Psychotic People

especially notable due to me tagging the posts in question with “i’m psychotic”

because. they were humorous posts about how i’d like to see my day-to-day life represented. because i’m an actual psychotic people

im sure other things have happened im forgetting but these are the biggest highlights that come to mind

(not included: things that only got me sent one hate message from a clear troll. too many of those to try to remember)

then the things i EXPECT to be attacked for (enjoying fictional violence, writing messy unhealthy relationships, prioritizing platonic mlm/wlw relationships over canon gays, wanting my faves to commit murder, etc) have like..... yet to cause an issue for me

(this is not an invitation to cause an issue for me.)

[shes-fast-like-me]

pleaseee share ur bpd hcs thanks

!!!! aaaaaaa okay!!!

(i mixed in Some adhd hcs becus i feel like for him those two are a lil connected becus of the symptoms overlapping. also tw for self harm, substance abuse, suicide, etc.)

octavio was diagnosed with adhd as a kid and y'kno, rejection sensitive dysphoria is one of the things that comes with it so when he started noticing his emotions being Really disregulated and his reactions being different from other people's he just kinda blamed it on that. he didn't get a bpd diagnosis until he was 21 when he went to rehab and that was the first time he had ever even heard of the disorder

he did start to go to dialectical behavioural therapy at 24 after he joined the games though because ajay urged him to

he's definitely impulsive type and self-destructive type. has zero impulse control and gets bored really easily do he just Does things to pass the time, anything that pops into his head. with the self-destructive type, he also has no self preservation at all. his stunts are absolutely a result of his bpd. he needs the attention and thrives off the adrenaline but he honestly doesn't care how injured he gets which worries a lot of people, especially ajay

chronic boredom is HELL for him and probably his biggest symptom overall. he cannot handle it at all and he needs to keep himself entertained. he'd set himself on fire and record it just to give himself something to do tbh

substance abuse is common to come along with bpd and yep. stim is kinda addictive. he's used other drugs before and he's gone to rehab for it but he hasn't gotten much better esp since using stim on live tv is now his fulltime job

he is so stubborn and he sees things in such black and white, the voicelines where he calls enemies the "bad guys" comes to mind. everything is either good or bad no in betweens and trying to change his mind is sometimes near impossible. he's the good guy and everyone else in his way is bad

he's got a bit of a god complex but ykno surviving impossible stunts and being insanely rich does that to you.

ajay has been his favourite person pretty much his whole life as she has also been his only real friend growing up. veryyy clingy to her but can go weeks just ignoring her and being distant for no reason other than to avoid feeling as hurt when she finally abandons him which she never really does becus she's scared of how he would react

him getting blocked by her hurt a LOT and he had a whole breakdown over it. he hated himself more than anything n defs did something stupid to try to take his mind off of it but she forgave him in the end and he completely forgot abt being upset becus zero emotional permanence

speaking of emotional permanence unless you actively talk to him and reassure him you don't hate him he Will think you hate him

sooo sensitive you could make the smallest joke at his expense and he will run off and get himself hurt. think of that quest dialouge where ajay made fun of his pants and he almost got himself eaten by prowlers

with that sensitivity come intense mood swings. anger and sadness are probably the worst for him but he usually turns it inwards rather than express it outwards

i genuinely hc that the gauntlet stunt was a suicide attempt i just can't shake that thought out of my head like he is definitely suicidal

he cries a lot but not in front of people. he got made fun of it as a kid so he tries his best to hide it. good thing abt the mask is that when he gets teary eyed people can't see it

the only time that he is quiet is when he's dissociating the fuck out. ajay's caught onto it by now and she sometimes tries to help out. usually he gets triggered by overstimulation like the room being too bright or if something reminds him of a traumatic event or his father

this is canon actually and probably mostly due to the adhd but this comes along with bpd sometimes as well; he stims All The Time. tapping his feet was a big one but now that he doesnt actually feel them anymore he's started doing other things like shaking, rocking or swaying in place, flapping his hands and snapping his fingers, etc.

he gets fixtated on things a lot like his favourite animals or music or cars and motorcycles but he can just as easily drop it all and start hating it for no reason because random splits just Happen sometimes. he has a Bunch of useless facts about things like sharks and bunnies from when he was a kid and if you need anyone to help u with ur car or motorbike he's ur guy

he's actually good friends with wraith because they relate to each other a lot mental health wise since wraith has ptsd and psychosis and those all share some similarities. sometimes they stay up together talking after a stressful day becus they just Get each other.

his abandonment issues are probably largely because of his father and 3+ step moms and nothing ever being a constant in his life

this all just off the top of my head but yep! thank you for asking 💖💖

[heeres-suffering]

Be More Alluring: a Personality Swap AU

[pic description and source will be at the bottom of this post, under the read more]

Start of summary:

“You need to be more alluring.”

"... don’t you mean attractive?”

“I do not. Your attractiveness is adequate, Brooke; if you want to mask your apparently latent queerness, you have to make them want you straight. Isn’t that why your step-father defended you?” 

Brooke Lohst is a loser.

But you know what? That was okay.

She always knew she was a weird one. The intensity of her affection for puppies, picture books, and near-constant daydreaming has lasted well-past a normalcy she can’t seem to grasp; when coupled with her inability to befriend anyone (besides the similarly self-identified loser Michael Mell), it’s not a surprise the rest of her peers have left her behind.

However, there were... ah, worse things in her life to worry about then some mild bullying. She liked her passion well enough, and all of her true insecurities went largely unnoticed, so any insults or weird looks rarely lingered in her mind. It’s not like she was a constant target either, which helped a lot. All in all, she just planned to hunker down, wait out the awkwardness of High School like everyone else, and move on to the rest of her life... 

Except.

When Brooke develops a crush on a girl she’s never talked to, after years of avoiding fairy tale romance and trying not to think about the inevitability of marriage (or how finicky her attraction to boys is in the first place), it feels like her whole world is about to cave in. She’d do anything to make sure her parents, especially daddy, never find out... including buying an edible super computer from the loudest, tiniest guy in school.

End of summary.

Alright!

Hi, hello, it’s Mod Seb, and here’s an AU I’ve been rolling around for a few days! You are free to do with this concept whatever you want, but I wanted to introduce it with a good chunk of the info I’ve already worked out in my head.

So. As the CWs are... too numerous, I’m going to go with a blanket “Dead Dove: Do Not Eat” label and encourage you not to read the rest of this if you have any big darkfic triggers that could be upset by mere mention; this isn’t a fic tho, so descriptions of anything awful won’t last long. 

Although, I will mention upfront that Brooke isn’t a binary lesbian. I know the description might read like I’m setting her up to be 100% homosexual; she’s bi with a strong preference for girls, and anyone who presents soft enough in gender or appearance. If it wasn’t for the end-game pairings, her unfamiliarity with smaller details/history of the LGBTQ+ community, and general “gay newb” status, she’d likely ID as a bi lesbian!

(ships and everything else under the Read More)

Okay. That out of the way, there’s quite a number of pairings; I’m pretty sure it’s a super polyamorous and sexual AU, though you’re free to change this list as much as you’d like:

[bolded are end-game ships. italics physically hook up at least once. strike-through means they were in a relationship but break-up in some way before the ending. (H) stands for healthy, while (T) is toxic and/or noncon. underlined characters are pining for the other and may never confess their true feelings]

Brooke/Christine (H), Brooke/Rich (H), Brooke/Jenna (H), Brooke/Michael (H), Brooke/Chloe (T), Brooke/her Daddy (T), Brooke/Squip (H), Brooke/Jeremy (soft T at first bc of mirrored canon-compliant manipulation, H later on), Brooke/Squip/Jeremy (H), Brooke/Squip/Jeremy/Rich (H), Rich/Moses (H), [insert every form of Rich/Mo/Squip/Jeremy here] (H), Jeremy/Chloe (T), Jeremy/Michael (H), Michael/Christine (H), Michael/Christine/Mr. Heere (H; no, seriously), Madeline/Brooke (H)

This is, of course, a role swap AU where Brooke and Jeremy trade places based on my personal lore for their home lives. I always have some pretty fucked ideas as I don’t imagine MB is a great place with great adults, and I pick and choose which parts of canons I use and which I don’t. 

There is no definite ending planned in mind as this isn’t an outline; it’s meta (or an imagine or w/e) for an AU that you’re free to do whatever with. 

So,

The big difference is that Brooke was picked by Michael, while Jeremy was picked by Chloe. Jeremy is trans and hadn’t come out yet; if Chloe had known he was a boy, she wouldn’t have grabbed him. In contrast, Michael’s never gave a shit about potential friends genders.

Jer and B’s personalities... are altered some. Not ALL the way, but kiiinda fusing into their roles, kinda tweaked (I'll get back to that).

The main point of this for me was Brooke/Squip/Jeremy, with B/Jer having a MUCH stronger focus than in canon, and a really bad Chloe acting as one of the major villains.

Michael gets roped into Chloe’s shit, even tho he's still generally a good guy here, bc he's worried about B and thinks she can't properly take care of herself.

While B DOES have a strong crush on Christine, she’s the opposite of the Squip’s “goal”; that’s (obvs) masking, or making passably digestible, her queerness.

Her Mom and step-’Daddy’ have reacted to her friendship w/ ‘openly gay moms, also very flamboyant and GNC’ Michael... poorly.

Michael thinks the solution has to be “act as aggressively yourself as you can, and if they reject you, you know me and the mom’s have a space for you”. This works for him bc he’s permanently hyper-visible, what with all of his own marginalized identities. But, not only has she flied under the radar in comparison to him for years, he doesn’t know everything about her life.

In fact, he doesn’t know most of it. She’s very good at hiding things.

Meanwhile, Jeremy, one of the more popular ‘boy... ish’ (we’ll get to this, too) people in school, is mid-psychosis and self-destruction. He actually has schizo-affective disorder--as is the case with all of my versions of Jeremy--which he needs medication for. Combined that with so many bad influences and trauma, he can no longer fully control himself or his life.

The way he handles this (badly) is to ‘whore around’--which, besides being Chloe’s pet, is kinda why he’s so popular. Nobody respects him, but he’s viewed some form of favorably.

Jeremy is in a relationship with Rich, but he won't let him get as close/protective as Rich wants; Mo and Rich were doing their own man-whoring (but healthy, just droppin’ panties and making dudes and chicks swoon--yeah, Rich is out as bisexual, this is a very ‘the Squips are a good thing’ AU) to gain their standard reputation, but in the course of that, they got together with Jeremy and it became... complicated. Both of them are very "nnn" about how bad his life is for Jer.

The way that their personalities are altered is... okay. To explain this, I have to talk about my characterization of canon-Brooke and Jeremy in relation to this, starting with Brooke:

I imagine B as just a liiittle below the line of "all the way there" for sorta-similar reasons to Jeremy here: trauma, and Chloe (which is why that’s what Jeremy gets in this, it’s just WAY worse when compounded by everything else). She’s also--like me, and like almost every character I write as a result--autistic, in a near-permanent state of “not enough accommodations” and over-stimulation. This leads to a lot of dissociation and a very wandering mind, as well as being perceived as a bimbo or dumb blonde or w/e misogynistic bullshit is projected onto her by the boys she dates (she’s also much more down the middle bi outside this AU).

So, going back to how she is for this AU: she's actually not super nerdy, despite the close connection she and Michael have. Honestly, it’s their general neurodivergent weirdness that bring them together, and so she’s mostly adopted her nerdy interests through him, whether directly a thing he likes, or finding a whimsical variant that fits her tastes.

Obviously, unlike Jeremy, she doesn’t mind being called a loser. She does any insinuation she might be queer. This including anyone who calls her gay or a dyke.

She has too much Cis Male Trauma (unlike canon, where it comes from both cis angles) to really entertain the idea of a Traditionally Male Partner. This means she skews HEAVILY towards hard GNC guys at the very least, and generally finds herself most interested in the idea of enbies and women. she's also not super into butches tho, bc her trauma mixing with her sexuality has latched on to Strong Masc People Are A Threat. 

An expansion on her interests, in canon and otherwise: animals, ASMR/sensual service work (including massages and stuff), spending hours just sorta sitting by herself and letting her imagination wander, fairy tales, and YA-and-under fantasy books.

(Here, she tries to avoid het or f/f romance... except that, this past year or two, she’s started really like m/m stuff--esp after getting REALLY into drag shows, which she could enjoy safely since girls like Chloe have gotten into them too; in canon, she’s a romance fanatic)

Now... this is one of the really darkfic element; she's fucking her step-dad. 

She does this so that he doesn't walk out on her, her mom, and her little sister*. Her mom has a good-enough job as a standard office woman, but he makes enough to pay the rent on their nice townhouse and all the bills she can’t. So, after he expressed interest in Brooke and then casually mentioned he could always just leave if she wasn’t comfortable, she reluctantly entered a relationship with him

(* = her sister is currently know as her brother; he’s like 12 or 13, and started showing signs of trans/queerness which have been Heavily Discouraged. Brooke worries about him a lot)

((I didn’t use she/her pronouns bc I’m not entirely sure he would change them? This is an OC Oli created at the beginning of our interest in BMC, and we haven’t worked on him at all since, so how his characterization will be is up in the air))

Canonically, Brooke's "in love" with her daddy, which is a self-imposed delusion; if she actually addressed it, she’d says she’s well aware that’s not true, but it's so much easier to pretend when you’re cornered like that. Brooke’s life blows.

She’s a lot more honest to herself about hating him here; still, she tries to be as polite and generally-friendly as she can, doing what he says whenever he wants.

OKAY, THAT’S BROOKE. If any of that is badly described or potentially-offensive, it’s just bc I glossed over SO MUCH DETAIL, even in that amount of it!

So. Jeremy.

I don’t have to go over him much and we’re all mostly aware of how I feel about him and also I don’t have the energy to do this again--

(just... read my fics The Devil at your Door or hello yesterday or something... eyyy actually do that, my ao3 username is Sedusa, blah blah blah ANYWAY)

--but basically: He's still very nerdy, like, he’s super into film as well as video games (which is another constant for me), but after being largely ignored in elementary, he's been trailing behind Chloe at her orders since they were in 6th grade. As a result he isn't very open about... any of his interests.

In 7th grade, he came out as trans to everyone. Chloe was furious, but at the same time, intrigued; this was around the time Chloe gets her own... ah shit I gotta go into that too--

--yet another hc of mine is that Chloe gets a Squip on accident around this time at a party (there was one in a “”candy bowl””), and from there, she claws her way up the ladder. I... will not go into that much, but her Squip was crippled by the drugs and alcohol in her system, and therefore largely at her mercy. She’s used his power to manipulate certain things about herself and to sharpen her focus on popularity to the point she’s full-blown Alpha Bitch.

Man, I’ve had to go on so many tangents, I apologize.

Anyway, she drags Jeremy around as a punching bag. She constantly mocks Jeremy's transness, even though she usually calls him by his correct name and pronouns.

This has made the rest of the school follow her lead, hence why I said “boy-ish”; he’s popular, he’s technically ‘well liked’, but nobody really takes him seriously. This is compounded by Chloe’s refusal to let him dress in 'dorky' casual clothes, and, as he’s both too poor to afford designer clothes and also generally hates popular guy fashion, he has to wear the hyper femme clothing Chloe specifically tells him too/

As such, people call him a boy but largely see him as either an idiot, a slut, an attention seeker, or all of the above.

So of course, in Brooke's place, his neurodivergence is more prominent than ever; every day he slips further into this psychosis and self-infantilization haze, as his his mom leaving, his dad severely depressed, Chloe's sexual violence, and other repressed trauma (see: my fic hello yesterday on ao3) all weighing on him. This makes him INCREDIBLY regressed, like, all the time by Junior year.

And then Brooke's Squip (IE: canon Squip) falls in love with Jeremy extremely fucking hard. He pushes her to date him as a way to compromise on her queer desires, since Jeremy is technically a boy, and certainly a few other straight-ish girls have hooked up with him in the past.

WHEW. That is a fucking lot. To wrap this up, lemme go over the interpersonal relationships not already mentioned, and what directions I think it takes.

First off, Madeline has a more prominent role, as I quite like her tbh; she’s a sex worker, she has her own Squip, she’s one of Chloe’s most hated enemies, and she gravitates towards both Brooke and Jeremy. She’s also Actually French, Chloe’s just weird.

(Anyway she prolly sees through Brooke’s straight act and asks her why she’s pretending to be a good little cishet. It rattles Brooke.)

Chloe is scum. This bears repeating. She DEFINITELY rapes Brooke at the Halloween party, and becomes obsessed with her, along with already being obsessed with Jeremy and Jake. 

Jake, by the way, has a lot of regressive behavior and impulsiveness bc he’s been in an abusive relationship off and on with Chloe for years now.

Speaking of Jake, moving on to his best bro: Rich doesn’t set himself on fire. He’s having a good time with his Squip.

But.

He IS set on fire at the Halloween party.

Instead of the Smartphone Hour being about Rich's instability, it's actually about the mystery of Someone Did It To Him But No One Saw Who It Was, They Were Disguised.

The answer relates to the fact that Rich and Brooke are ALSO hooking up, after she’s already with Jeremy, bc he Properly introduces her to him and the three of them hit it off really well.

(She initially wasn’t interested, but while Rich is loud and still kinda abrasive, his Squip doesn’t drive him to act like a bully--and in private, his nerdiness is really obvious and he’s extremely gentle with her and Jeremy. Add to that that he’s bi and trans*, when Brooke connects best w/ queer men over cishet one, and it off-sets his masc-ness enough to make him an Exception.

* = I always imagine him as trans. See: all of Vanceypants fics.)

Sooo... the culprit is actually Brooke's daddy, who sees her with this obvious heartthrob and Cannot let that be.

Chloe convinces Michael that the Squips are Very Very Bad and has him team up with her to force Brooke into drinking Red, with the intention to convince him to kill himself after to get him out of the way, bc she’s really going nuts at this point.

Eventually, he snaps out of it when he and Christine get together (he’s thought he was Full Homo all of his life, but Christine’s prolly genderqueer-ness makes him realize “oh shit, I’m bisexual”) and she starts to question why he’s acting the way he is towards Christine.

He also definitely has a crush on Jeremy and during his time with Chloe he kinda tried to flirt a little but couldn’t really... he’s not up for dating someone as sexually active and a push-over as Jeremy is in this.

However, when he snaps out of Chloe’s manipulation, he and Christine approach Mr. Heere to convince him to straighten up and help Jeremy and also bc they really need an adult to successfully fight Chloe.

This requires a month+ of Christine getting him to see her psychiatrist (the one who prescribes her ADHD meds). Jeremy spends the majority of his time staying with Chloe, and very rarely comes home to gather things or to make sure his dad is eating/still alive, as much as he can remember to in his own haze of mental illness. Anyway, point is, he doesn’t know Christine and Michael are there often... not that, in the course of growing close to Mr. H, they both fall for him hard and it becomes one of my stranger OT3s.

(God, Jeremy goes through a lot of shit in this, tho.)

Pre-Squip, Jenna was kinda-sorta Brooke’s friend--or, well, friendly. However, she’s actually full blown “oh my God she’s wonderful” in love with Brooke.

Brooke isn't aware of that, esp since Jenna tries her not to be around her a lot. She's also trying to hide her own queerness, bc she’s a trans woman and she knows Chloe finding that out would be extremely dangerous.

Eventually, Chloe succeeds in making Brooke take the Red months after canon usually ends, w/o Michael’s help. If you’re curious, Red doesn’t affect her normal Squip bc she’s had him too long and a lot of his receptors and stuff are damaged, so it’s the second one she gets in canon that turns off.

This plan backfires, however, as Brooke’s Squip comes back with a physical body w/ help from Rich and also-bodied-now Moses.

With a body, and shenanigans, Mo and Squip take out Brooke’s daddy too. His life insurance more than makes up for the loss of his income, as it’s a sizable amount. Now that Brooke feels more empowered and strong, she overrides her mother’s neglectfulness and takes control of the household w/ her boyfriends*, comes out as queer, helps her sister transition, and begin to heal from all of this trauma.

(* = Rich and Mo move in, as does Jeremy eventually, after graduation; Jeremy gets a psychiatrist and a therapist and prolly has to go through some intense outpatient care and possibly a stay in the hospital, before finally making major breakthroughs and looking like himself again. The five of them are now happy and in love.)

Chloe, after her arm gets twisted by the Squip’s protective presence so thoroughly, gives up on Jeremy and Brooke to focus on Jake. This too gets abandoned when Rich and Mo help him cut her off, and so she stays in her own popularity bubble, bitter, until graduating and going to a community college in a different state.

All in all, things work out well in the end, but getting there is a long, difficult process. This AU fascinates me immensely and feels like a great way to examine some of my really dark headcanons about MB, as I think it’s a town similar to Derry in Stephen King’s IT--as in, just chronically The Worst Place Ever, with this, like, miasma of low-key despair around it. People adjust and don’t question it, which is why so much of BMC is this flippant dark humor in the face of some highly questionable shit.

I’m so sorry this post is so long (I’ll be uploading it to AU under my usual Sedusa account, as metas like this are more than allowed), but I really adore these characters and the way they can be twisted around, so I had a lot to say!

Thank you for reading <3

-mod Seb

image description: virtual-like stairs pointed forward and bathed in neon yellow and blue to represent Brook and Jeremy, which I’ve modified from the original blue-only design.

source: x (link description: a free Wallpaper Flare image that I found off Google Image’s “filtered by ‘labeled and reuse with modification” feature) 

[back-in-wyoming]

Hey guys. Been a while. Hope you’re all doing ok. ***Trigger warnings under the keep reading line.

I want to update all of you, especially in regards to what plans I have for this blog which is that I’m deleting it and everything related to it. If any of you want some of the names I have set aside, message me and we’ll make it work. 

If you want to keep in contact, we can talk. 

This post will be taken down in 24hrs. After that, blog deleted with everything else. 

TW: Sexual assault, mental illness, abuse

I don’t use this space much anymore because around five years ago, I started having flashbacks to traumatic instances I experienced young. And once that started to unravel it was hard to function.

I distracted myself with things I thought were important because I couldn’t handle seeing anything else in focus. It wasn’t until recently that I could put some sort of timeline together. I do have flashbacks, not enough to call it a chronic issue or anything but they happen. I was almost fired from my job at the time a few times for being late as my nights and days slowly reversed and I couldn’t physically get up in the morning. Around that time, I don’t believe I really knew how to communicate kindly with others or truly consider the consequences of my actions. I distanced myself from myself, not assuming real responsibility. I was clingy. Overly sensitive. Always fearful. Angry. I couldn’t see myself in focus. I can sit here and say I never learned how to take responsibility, that I grew up with parents who had unchecked mood disorders, addictions, and unhealthy behavior and coping mechanisms and it would be true but that alone can’t unburn bridges or close a gap of five years silence.

I thought I understood myself then. I thought I knew emotions, especially my own. I didn’t. And I didn’t realize how risky I had become, throwing myself away, stacking to try and loose weight quick, drinking to the point of blacking out and doing it again as soon as I had the chance.

Four years ago, Dec. 2016, I was sexually assaulted in my home. I shut down entirely for a month or two. Went through the motions. I was taking writing prompts knowing they were never going to be written. I thought I could restart somehow, like I’d snap out of it, that I’d feel something again. My partner was instrumental in helping me survive the winter and spring.

The following year, we lost the house. 

My mother wound up in the hospital and has been in and out. Her addiction to narcotics nearly cost her her life twice since moving. We went through a long process to get all of her care localized finally after her latest stint in the hospital mom for overdose and encephalophy and dad for some kind of obstruction in his intestines (second time having that). During that time, I had one car, two jobs to get to, and all of the medical paperwork and doctor visits for both parents. 

I had a nervous breakdown a week or two before COVID-19 really kicked up which is when all of the above happened. I checked myself into a partial hospitalization program, left for being accused of lying, and found a better therapist whom I adore. 

It was after that I was diagnosed with bipolar I a.k.a. manic depression. For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, it’s a mood disorder marked by intense highs and lows with the highs potentially triggering psychosis depending on the severity of the episode (unfortunately, I do suffer from mild paranoia which does tend to be triggered by Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria). People with bipolar I are distant, very in their head, unpredictable mood wise sometimes. It’s also been discussed that I may have PMDD as well. Basically, my brain is just trying to outright off me at this point. All of that said, the second reason I’m making this post is because I wanted to apologize to anyone I hurt during that very weird, confusing, and anger filled time in my life only to be followed by years silence. 

I didn’t forget you.

You did nothing wrong.

You didn’t deserve that. No one does. I don’t expect for this to make anyone forgive me. I’ve been trying to figure out how to get a message across but never considered that I don’t know how to make that right. I don’t think I can. 

Even if I had the chance, I’m not entirely sure I’d know what to do with it. I see old friends and they’re good. Like, they’re really really good and happy and I just... didn’t quite get there. And I dragged people down and I’m terrified of responding to messages. Terrified of fucking up, terrified of writing even the smallest responses because I just can’t... handle things. The what if’s. The fear. It’s embarrassing. Shameful. For me. I feel slower than everyone else. Learning things too late, things that I personally feel I should’ve known and remember by now.

It’s just really... hard. To not apologize. To feel sorry for existing. Looking back, it is hard to not feel those things. To just want to erase it from existence because you miss it and it hurts and you put the space there, not anyone else. Because you didn’t really say anything of worth when you had the chance because right when you needed someone, they were already driven away by all the shit you put them through.

you can’t blame them. 

and i guess this blog is really one of the last remaining archives, for me, of that person who just pushed and pushed and pushed and didn’t know when to stop. 

i want to be a better person. i’m doing my best. and i apologize for all those years of silence. i hope you’re all taking care of yourselves. be safe.