#i had to kill a rabies plotline i was working on because uh

[delcat177]

I know you don't check tumblr often anymore, but I don't have a pillowfort and I'm finally feeling a bit of courage so: Your fanfiction has helped me so much. Your sharing of trauma has helped me so much. It's helped me realize what I went through was real, and that it hurt me, and that no matter how messy it is I'm still allowed to be hurt. You writing helped me stop hesitating about writing from my trauma. Thank you.

hekk if that ain’t what I needed today

thank you so much, so so much

I hope you didn’t wait too long on this one.  One of the big reasons I stepped away from Tumblr for awhile was because I desperately needed to spend time on exploring my trauma–it seems like radio silence over here, but I’ve spent the past year tangling with it, with the help of a few close friends and my therapist. It’s only been within the past two months that I’ve gone back and re-read some of the logs of my abuse (because it was in the form of one-on-one RP with an ongoing plot, I was in charge of keeping a meticulous archive, something I wonder if the other party remembers), and it’s only been within the past two weeks that my therapist has seen it (the only other person in 18 years!) and confirm that with the power dynamic going, despite our matched ages, it was molestation–consent is only consent if it’s informed, and I was not.  Rather, I was so anxious to please and to write with someone that the grooming was invisible to me then and horrendously visible now.  There’s been a lot of validation, but also a lot of grief, and a lot of wondering what to do considering I know where my abuser is but not knowing if I should do anything with that information.  I still don’t know, honestly!

I was called out in 2015 for being a rape apologist because of TSWU, and that fucked with me, a lot.  I believed it at the time, that I was hurting people, especially kids, and, on the callout’s insistence, Woundson himself.  I became incredibly paranoid about writing, afraid that I was, as stated, glorifying abuse.  I second-guessed myself at every turn, trying to understand why I couldn’t just edit Trust Fall out of existence, and when I finally realized it was my This Is What It Felt Like expression piece and said as much, I was further accused of making up my own experience as an excuse to write rapefic.  I struggled to keep publishing, but I had no joy left and every reason to doubt myself, and it stagnated, turned sour beneath my fingertips.  There’s a line about how to write a book, you have to get up every day and decide to write a book, and that’s been the case with the fic for years now–consciously deciding, day in and day out, to continue.

I don’t think I would have, if it hadn’t been for messages like this.  Because I keep getting messages like this, and at first, I responded positively but dismissed them out of hand as misinformed, blamed myself for drawing people astray, but…I keep getting them.  And I go “My God, I’m not alone, I wish I was alone because fuck anyone ever having to go through this but my fucking idiots and their not a dog maybe possibly mean something, and maybe that something isn’t that I’m a monster”, and that is a powerful, powerful thing, because it is so, so hard to believe I’m worthy of that.  It is easier to be silenced than to break it.  But here you are, doing just that, doing this immensely brave, powerful, kind thing, blowing all my hesitations out of the water, living your reality, claiming your hurt, walking the gale–

You are a hero.

You are real, you are valid, you deserve comfort for your hurt, justice for it, for all who would put you back or put you down to be tossed from the mountaintop you stand on.  You are a hero, and you are my hero.  I’m talking gingerly today, maybe not using my best words, but this much I can state in absolute certainty.  I am honored, beyond what I can ever express, that anyone would say to me what you’re saying now.

Thank you.

So much.

As for the fic…

…it’s an absolute goddamed organizational clownshoes, but I will never, ever give these guys up again, and at this point, it’s a matter of carving in rather than building out.

I…really, honestly cannot thank you, any of you enough.

But good goddamn, I’m gonna try.