#i mean that its my autism that makes me not just have my characters be my special interest but also feel so intensely about them

[cripplecharacters]

Writing a Schizophrenic Character: Everything But Hallucinations

Plain text: Writing a Schizophrenic character: Everything But Hallucinations

Hey! Mod Bert here. 

So: you’ve decided to write a character with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder (there are other disorders on the schizophrenia spectrum but I will be focusing on these for today)

You’ve done it, you have their hallucinations and maybe even delusions picked out. Maybe they are one of many who experience auditory hallucinations or maybe they also have visual hallucinations or a combination. Maybe they have olfactory hallucinations as well. They may have persecutory delusions or delusions of reference or something like Cotard’s delusion or clinical lycanthropy. Awesome, you’ve done it!

What, I hear you say? What do you mean that’s only 2 of the 5 components needed to be diagnosed with schizophrenia? What do you mean, you don’t need to hallucinate at all to be schizophrenic?

What Goes Into a Diagnosis of Schizophrenia

Plain Text: What goes into a diagnosis of schizophrenia

Not a lot of people realize there’s more to schizophrenia and schizoaffective than just hallucinations or delusions. There are 5 diagnostic criterias that are needed for schizophrenia, and only 2 of the 5 are needed for a month, with larger symptoms happening for six months or more. Let’s get into it.

Delusions

Hallucinations

Disorganized speech or thinking*

Disorganized or unusual motor behavior (catatonia)*

Negative symptoms (avolition, anhedonia, flat affect)*

I’m going to focus on disorganized speech/thinking, catatonia, and negative symptoms.

Disorganized Speech/Thinking

Plain Text: Disorganized Speech/Thinking

Schizophrenia and related disorders are often called “thought disorders” for a reason. Speech and thinking can be extremely affected, and for people like me this can be one of the first and most striking examples of an episode coming. Some people will always have disorganized symptoms that will flare during episodes. A myth is that schizophrenia can be indistinguishable with medicine: most people will have some level of symptoms even during moments of peace or “remission”. More on remission later. 

So, disorganized speech. Some examples are: word salad (schizoaphasia), thought blocking, poverty of speech (alogia), pressurized speech, clanging, and echolalia.

Word salad: a combination of words that do not make sense together. Often called schizoaphasia for its similarity to jargon in Wernicke’s aphasia, this is instead a disconnection with the brain and not due to damage to the language part of the brain.

(Example: the salad would be yellow in the fat cow).

Thought blocking: A severe loss of thought, often paired with connecting two trains of thought that are not connected

(Example: I went to the………Do you like grapes?)

Poverty of speech: A lack of organic responses to speech or organically speaking, it can be severe enough that a person only responds to questions or in one word responses. Can also happen in severe depression.

(Example: Person A: Did you do anything fun today?

Person B: Yes.

Person A: Oh, what did you do?

Person B: Store

Person A: How was it?

Person B: Fun)

Pressurized speech: A sort of frenzied way of speaking associated with psychosis or mania.

Clanging: Connecting phrases together because of what they sound like instead of meaning

(Example: I went bent tent rent).

Echolalia: Repeating word’s and phrases. Commonly also associated with Autism Spectrum Disorder. 

(Example: Person A: I went to the store.

Person B: To the store.)

These are not the only examples but they are some ones I thought I'd highlight, either because they’re well known or I have experience with them, or because they’re famously thought of with other disorders as well and I wanted to point out how things overlap.

Personal experience: I had severe alogia for the duration of my last and worst episode. People thought I was mad at them because of the clipped way I spoke and the lack of really speaking. It got me in a lot of trouble. I didn’t realize what I was saying was different or weird (I have the least insight when it comes to my speaking patterns affected by my schizoaffective, meaning I can’t hear any difference and all of this is from repeated conversations with my mom, who was my caretaker for a bit and knows the most about my speech and what it means). The best solution was talking with people and being honest and educating myself and others. I don’t know about others, but I couldn’t have used AAC at that time.

Catatonia

Plain text: Catatonia

Fun fact: catatonia means unusual motor behaviors! Any unusual motor behaviors mean catatonia. This includes what we think of when we think of catatonia in schizophrenia (inability to move) as well as the opposite (being unable to stop moving) as well as strange movements and ways of holding and moving the body! Catatonia in the DSM-5 includes 3 or more of these 12 behaviors:

-Agitation unrelated to external stimuli

-Catalepsy

-Echolalia

-Echopraxia

-Grimacing

-Mannerism

-Mutism

-Negativism

-Posturing

-Stereotypy

-Stupor

-waxy flexibility

I have some experiences with catatonia-like symptoms but since they were never identified as such I’ll skip those for now. I will say that catatonia is a symptom that can happen in many disorders besides schizophrenia as well.

Negative Symptoms! Yay!

Plain text: negative symptoms! Yay!

So a positive symptom (Hallucinations or delusions) are symptoms that add something to reality or a person. Negative symptoms are symptoms that take away. There are 5 A’s:

-Alogia (Again, poverty of speech, our favorite)

-Avolition (Lack of energy and motivation)

-Affect (Blunted affect, or a flat way of speaking)

-Anhedonia (Lack of pleasure in things that used to bring you pleasure, often thought of with depression)

-Asociality (Lack of interest in social events and relationships)

There are also often cognitive changes including thinking and memory, information recall, understanding, and acquisition, and so forth. 

Schizophrenia and schizoaffective often (but not always) happen with what’s called a prodromal period. This period can be months to years (mine was a little less than a year) and mainly consists of negative symptoms. Slowly, positive symptoms are added. There are thought to be stages to schizophrenia including prodrome, active phases, and remission.

I’ll talk about that a little for a second because I’m currently in remission and no one knows what that means. I was diagnosed with schizoaffective depressive type in January 2021. As of February 2024, I no longer qualified to be rediagnosed because my symptoms were strongly under control and no longer severe enough to qualify for a diagnosis. They also didn’t distress me or impact my daily life severely. Day to day now I still have mild symptoms and take my antipsychotics (trying to go off them have made it clear that I still have some symptoms I choose to keep medicating) but I haven’t had a delusion in 2 years and been hospitalized in 3. There’s always a possibility of another episode but I work with my team to keep myself one step ahead if that happens.

What I want from a character with schizophrenia

Plain Text: What I want from a character with schizophrenia

Alright the writing advice part. What do I want from a character with schizophrenia or schizoaffective (which is schizophrenia plus either depression or bipolar). 

-Characters with caregivers.

-Characters using coping strategies (recording hallucinations to tell if theyre hallucinations, taking medication, having service animals that greet people so they know if they’re a hallucination, using aids for the cognitive symptoms like sticky notes and organizational tools)

-Characters who know other characters with their disorder, either online or in support group or through running in similar circles

-Characters having autonomy

-Characters who aren’t the killer or horror victim. I know it’s cool to have the schizophrenic protagonist in horror, and I love horror, but I don’t want to read about the horror being symptoms the whole time

-Characters who are in magical scenarios, who are in fantasy and sci-fi. The schizophrenic princess and the schizoaffective robot technician aboard the spaceship.

-Medication and hospitalization treated casually. Sometimes we need higher care. That’s morally neutral

-Characters with negative symptoms and speech symptoms.

-Characters with catatonia! 

-Characters with other disorders as well

-characters with side effects from medicine treated casually

-Characters with cognitive symptoms

Thank you for reading this incredibly long thing! Happy writing!

[wisecrackingeric-2]

Can I be mega autistic here and vent for a second and ask if anyone else is lowkey scared for whatever the next RE game is HSBWHDNDJ

[milo-igidk]

yo keefe is FUCKED UP like i thought i was projecting most stuff but NO, rereading the books oh my god he needs therapy wtf

like you ever just remember that hes been implied suicidal since book 4

[puppppppppy]

who up seeing their disorder in a fictional character but feel like its not their place to put a name on it

[cherrysnax]

i see so many people starting their own projects and it makes me so happy but so angry at myself at the same time

[weafurry]

YAYY YIPPEE HII/silly

(Sorry I didn't get to this till now it was late when I saw the ask and I didn't wanna answer it while I was half asleep. Also apparently tumblr doesn't let you edit asks anymore?? )

Leaving this under a cut tho cuz I know this shit will get LONG

ANYWAYS. The. Big one related to that™ post came from a combination of me wondering how the FUCK Cedric got the yellow phosphor needed to rebuild proto + consequences of the revival of characters my beloved

And uh. Yea any yellow phosphor he does end up getting his hands on I. DOUBT WOULD BE ENOUGH.

So uh. Proto being rebuilt with less yellow phosphor then is probably even remotely adviseable and that causing a whole ton of issues™ . And Cedric not even knowing cuz of the whole just. Scanning the blueprints in.

Also this is proto we're talking about here. There's no fucking way he'd tell anyone until shit got BAD.

LEMME JUST. Screenshots from when I was brainrotting over this in my first OneShot fixation

And yea. The author probably would have had yellow phosphor stored in the lab somewhere just incase. (Esp with the head canon that. Proto predicted his own death a long time ago cuz. Prophet moment. And. Told the author and the prophet but never cedric and rue cuz everytime he went to he would get another vision of them trying to intervene and things only going worse)

BUT. since I want my angst goddammit. That part of the lab collapsed first and while Cedric was abled to salvage some yellow phosphor it ends up not being enough.

BUT LIKE. YEA. the way I always imagined Cedric and Rue actually finding out is. One of those moments where a bunch of errors and shit happens . Happens when him Cedric and Rue are walking in the refuge. And this one's bad enough that he can't just metaphorically grit his teeth through it like the other times this has happened in public. Once it's over Cedric and Rue are reasonably extremely concerned and. Fuckin rush him to the lab to try and see if there something they can do to fix this.

AND UH. That segways into another little detail of this headcanon. BECAUSE. he let this go on for so long with the damage all the errors and malfunctions overtime have caused. It probably would just be better to rebuild him and reuse the yellow phosphor they already have. BUT UH. since the situation around him being rebuilt made it so stressful the first time around, he. REALLY doesn't wanna do that again. I have. Such a vivid idea of a scene in my head for that. They're like. Talking with kip. And shes like halfway through saying the word rebuild and. She doesn't even get to finish he just cuts her off.

So what they end up doing is, in the meantime, using red phosphor to prevent any further damage until they can go to the barrens to get blue phosphor so said phosphor won't have to be replaced as often.

I ACTUALLY. made a dumb little chart of how. I imagined them looking different a few days ago

I imagine that. Actually having a normal level of phosphor would. Definitely HELP. But. There would still be some issues partially because it's not one uniform type of phosphor and partially because of the damage the issues caused. And you couldnt pry this headcanon out of my cold dead hands. Consequences of the revival of characters go brrrrrrr

AND THEN UH. Don't get me started on the night terrors as a result of the whole squares thing headcanons.

that whole thing. Came from me going. "do robots still need sleep?" and ultimately deciding yes when i came up with the other headcanon that. only tamed robots dream.

When I made this headcanon I actually hadnt played solstice in a while, and for some reason I always remembered it as, him handing Niko the disk while the lower half of his body was already in the squares. which. no he actually hands it to them while the squares are directly behind him BUT. I still choose to remember it that way HSHSH. anyways uh. Important and related to this headcanon. He remembers what that feels likeeee. and hes probably the only oneee because in the solstice ending everyone only sayss they remember the squares surrounding themm not actually touching themmm and even robots who have gotten caught in them and liveed probably dont rememberrr especially since most of them arent tameddd and uhh even if he only remembers the beginning of ittt hes probably really good at filling in the gapss with the whole prophet thingg (thanks @malwarechips for that last idea/silly)

ANYWAYS UHm. so the whole. tamed robots dreaming thing right. HIM. having night terrors about the fucking squares.

I always imagined it as like. about a week after solstice, once things are starting to calm down and return to normal, one night cedric and rue wake up to proto just fuckin screaming at the top of his (metaphorical) lungs. And. they fuckin burst into his room to him tossing and turning in his sleep and then fucking jolting awake. and like.this keeps happening like. practically every other night. he's losing sleep over this shit. Which probably isn't helping all the other issues from the whole phosphor ordeal which he still hasn't told Cedric or Rue about at this point. And I mean. I doubt the nightmares would be restricted to just. in the mines. cuz dreams are weird like that esp when traumas involved AND UH. With the whole prophet thing. That. PROBABLY WOULDNT MIX WELL. (once again thanks eve for that last part/silly)

(On a lighter note I did have the thought of Cedric and Rue sleeping in his room one night and him actually finally getting a good nights sleep and thus that just. Becoming routine for them. The thing about my angsty headcanons is 99% of the time there's hurt/comfort potential in there)

I DO HAVE. some more lighthearted not angsty headcanons, but i wanna save most of those for their own posts cuz theyre small enough that i can actually draw them and finish them.

I will say one more though. this one is 100% projection but *points at proto* chronic migraines

[dallonwrites]

my autistic ass when i would try to explain to my non-autistic writer friends how my ocs don’t just feel like characters/plot devices/narrative tools, they feel like fully fledged people that just live inside my brain who i just have access to for some reason and the stories i write are merely a snapshot into their fully fledged personhood/lives. and that that these feelings don’t mean i’m unaware of my role/agency/responsibility as the writer who has the final say in these characters and how they are written it just means that my writing process feels very intuitive and i can only describe it as “listening” and “getting to know” these people that just live inside my brain in a way that i don’t feel like i can completely elaborate on. and because of this i would actually consider these characters “real” in their own way because the impact and influence they have had on me as a person beyond just my writing is so real and not having them would feel like i’m missing a part of myself 

[pentaghast]

hey you just spent 60 to 70 hours getting to know these characters and possibly romancing them? well lets throw in a suicide mission for them where at LEAST one of them dies! teehee this is goooood gaming folks love a shock value death

[arolesbianism]

I'm still not over h2woah they're so funny to me. Especially the octoling, they rly managed to make the whitest ass character in the entire splatoon universe, I hope they explode <3

[lunarflare64]

I think once the batch of showdowns and competitions I'm following are done I should probably block the tags. Any feeling in excess can be bad, and for me the one feeling that can never come in moderation is competitiveness, I don't know how to back down and it makes me a kinda shit person, I've been holding back as much as I can, I don't think I've done anything mean, but I've gotten close and its not a mindset I'm fond of, it feels really unpleasant. So yeah, checking out of that stuff hopefully soon

[lesbianraskolnikov]

I will never be normal about him this book eewired and impacted my brain BIG TIME!

[cyzi4]

𝐉𝐉𝐊 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐱 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜! 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

How jjk characters would be with an autistic partner

Warnings: none. Just fluff.

Parings: Yuji Itadori, Megumi Fushiguro, Toge Inumaki, Maki Zenin, Satoru Gojo, Choso Kamo, Suguru Geto.

~ 𝐘𝐮𝐣𝐢 𝐈𝐭𝐚𝐝𝐨𝐫𝐢, Hyperfixates with you

Yuji is always happy to hear about your newest hyper fixation and listen to you tell him every little detail. He loves listening to your rants and will probably try and get into whatever your new interest is.

“Yuji! This game is so good. The plot is so simple but its also really well crafted and the characters are amazing and theres one that I’d really think you’d like. You have to play it with me!” You beamed about your new obsession. Yuji listened to every little detail attentively. Your extensive knowledge on your favorite topics reminds him of how he obsesses over the human earthworm series. “That sounds so fun! We can play after training!”

He likes listening to all the random facts about your interests and he even gets into some of them himself so that you two can be even closer. He makes sure to do his own research on your interests so that you two can talk about them together.

~ 𝐌𝐞𝐠𝐮𝐦𝐢 𝐅𝐮𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐮𝐫𝐨, both lack social skills

You and Megumi both lack social skills, although for very different reasons. You tend to not understand social cues while Megumi understands them, he just doesn’t care about them. However he’ll try to help you understand.

“Wait so I can’t say gn?” Megumi nods. “Some people think it means you don’t care enough to spell out the whole word” “but its more convenient?” “I know, but some people care about stuff like that” “oh..”

Megumi also makes sure to clarify what other people mean if you’re not getting it so you aren’t confused.

~ 𝐓𝐨𝐠𝐞 𝐈𝐧𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐢, mute buddies

If you’re non-verbal, you two kinda have an understanding of each other. You two talk all the time through sign language and you always understand what he’s saying when he’s speaking in onigri ingredients.

“Tuna?” ‘I know. How is gojo even a teacher? Is he even certified?’ “Bonito flakes.” The others stared at you two. “I think they’re talking about gojo. I know a little sign language and they signed “gojo” “ Nobara stated matter of factly. “They’re saying Gojo’s an idiot.” Maki stated with a bland expression.

Sometimes, you do speak, however you speak just like inumkai with rice ball ingredients. He even tries to teach you how to speak onigiri.

“Bonito flakes?” ‘No, no’ “mustard leaf” ‘ohhhh. Tuna mayo.’ ‘Exactly.’

~ 𝐌𝐚𝐤𝐢 𝐙𝐞𝐧𝐢𝐧, always stands up for you

Another one for if you’re non verbal. She is not afraid to get confrontational for you when someone’s bothering you. If someone even breathes in a slightly disrespectful manner Maki is staring them down with the most piercing gaze.

If it seems like someone’s invading your space, Maki will come over and physically push them out of your space. “You’re making them uncomfortable. Move.”

Someone messed up your order? Maki’s making sure they understood what you asked for. “They asked for no pickles.”

Someone speaking to you with an even slightly aggressive tone? “Speak to them like that again, asshole, and Ill make sure you never speak again.”

Maki will go to great lengths just to insure that you’re comfortable and happy.

~ 𝐒𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐮 𝐆𝐨𝐣𝐨, comforts you during meltdowns + feeds your hyperfixations

Gojo always treated you with extra care, even before learning you had autism. He’s always been comforting towards you and does his best to help with your meltdowns.

“Shh shh. It’s okay my love. Come on, wheres that smile?”

Anytime you mention even the slightest thing about any of your hyoerfixations, Gojo will have a new gift centered around it in a heartbeat. You might end up running out of places to put these gifts so gojo keeps some as little reminders of you

~ 𝐂𝐡𝐨𝐬𝐨 𝐊𝐚𝐦𝐨, steals your stims

As a cursed spirit, he doesn’t even really know what autism is. He just knows that your cute little movements mean you’re excited with something, and he thinks its a good way to show when he’s excited with something.

You squealed in excitement when you saw that your favorite tv show was on and flailed your hands in excitement. Choso saw and copied your movements when he saw the tv. “Baby look, our shows on!” “I know!!”

You once asked him about it. “well when you’re happy, you do them, and seeing you happy makes me happy, so I do them too.”

~ 𝐒𝐮𝐠𝐮𝐫𝐮 𝐆𝐞𝐭𝐨, appreciates your bluntness

Geto often doesn’t trust others initial inputs. He values your unfiltered nature and likes your blunt and truly honest opinion.

While you, Geto, and Gojo were making your way to the school, you started to take notice of Gojo’s posture. Geto noticed as well but didn’t think it was something to be brought up. However you did. “Gojo, you really need to fix your posture.” Geto slightly chuckled to himself as he watched Gojo straighten up his posture begrudgingly, slightly offended by your remark.

Another time, you and Geto were about to go on a mission when you started to take note of Geto’s appearance.“Geto your hair is getting extremely greasy. You should really wash your hair more frequently.” Geto was a bit taken aback but he was also quick to wash his hair.

…Geto also thinks that sometimes you can be overly blunt. But he loves you all the same.

[lovewireds]

been meaning to post my designs for these little guys forever. insane splatoon rambling under cut to explain design choices and lore related things ... read my autism boy

btw this is a repost from our art side blog this was written and drawn like months ago <- minorly rewrote some things tho

thx splatoon users drfreeman & drcoolatta for fueling my splatvrai autism brainrot ... i hate u /J

GORDON

idk how to explain this but Theoretical Physicist is inkling coded . maybe its cuz splatoon species social hierarchy

Native ink color is Orange, but he has Dark Brown tentacle roots.

Uses custom weapons to attach in place of his prosthetic; It works best with Splatlings but can be adjusted to attach other weapons.

If the thing above didn't make it obvious, he's a Splatling main. He switches out depending on his mood though.

sighhhhh technically an Agent... stares at the ceiling...Main character...

His arm loss is like pretty much the same as in-canon but it's with the octarian army shrugs. don't ask me why he doesn't just regenerate it cuz hes a squid thats for me to know and you to find out. (get partially sanitized loser)

Born & Raised in Inkopolis pre-splashtags; He wasn't informed of the switch to Splashtags being expected when participating in most activities around Inkadia.

TOMMY

I forgot why i made him an inkling why did i do that. I think it was bc i didnt wanna make them all octolings but i was wrong srry we all make mistakes /hj I ALREADY REDREW HIM ONCE IM NTO DOING IT AGAINNN

Native ink color is orange-brown.

His hat has an eye guard for sensory reasons; He covers up as much of his skin as possible because he doesn't like the feeling of foreign ink on him.

He isn't a specific weapon main, he just uses any long-range weapon to minimize the possibility of getting ink on himself. If he has enough guarding, he prefers to use N-ZAP '89.

Makes his own gear for sensory reasons as well :) It's legal when ur dad's the G-Man.

Exclusively plays in Turf Wars, Anarchy Battles, etc with friends. He hates playing with people he doesn't know.

Born in Splatsville !! He feels like a Splatsville resident. His occupation is resident I cannot imagine him doing Anything

His dad is that creepy curtain in one of flounder heights windows /j

BENR(E)Y

Octoling bc I wanted him to be sanitized :) Other than the visual part of being sanitized, I thought him being clinically dead fits /hj also lore reasons below

Pre-sanitization, his native ink color was blue.

Great Turf War veteran; He didn't do anything in the war itself, he was just enlisted lol. He was primarily security for the Octarian Domes in the years after the war. Yes, that also means he is over 100 years old.

"Raised" (debatably) in Octo Canyon.

E-liter main (4-star Base + 5-star Scope) and avid squidbagger. He also uses any heavyweight weapons (dynamo, tenta, etc)

Absolutely hates working at Grizzco, he only does Turf Wars and Anarchy Battles. He only works at Grizzco during Big Runs. The type of guy that does X battles.

Professional Anarchy / Ranked / X Battler btw. That's literally 90% of what he does.

Got on Gordon's azz over him not having a Splashtag; i wonder what that parallels.

BUBBY

Genuinely don't have a lot to say about his design. He gives off Splatoon 2 Octoling vibes (showoff /hj) also i wanted to make his hair wispy like it should be.

Native ink color is a light blue-gray gradient.

The drawing doesn't give it credit but I swear those are glasses not goggles .. they're opaque-colored slanted oval glasses !! ^_^ u can interpret them as spiked or just eyelashes, both are right.

oh also the text under bubby says "Is Best" in some splatoon font we downloaded awhile ago . i think it was ripped from splatnet

Blaster main. I don't know how to explain this one but it feels right.

helps with the practical Map props (ie ink rails) and with some weapon gear manufacturing ^_^ tech guy

COOMER

Was going to make him an Octoling for the convenience of making his hair curly but i didn't want to make all of them octolings + i think his personality generally fits Inklings more.

Native ink color is an off white gradient.

Slosher main cuz he likes moving his arms. this makes sense to me. Also is a fan of Splatlings and other Shooters.

i felt ill trying to design coomer without making his eyes two lines with eyelids

War Veteran...Stole some octarian tech and got fucked up super limbs. Cyber Inkling stealing from octos !! [inkadia crowd goes wild] /j

anyways outside of the war™ he's a data researcher. just generally. he does shit with splatfests and eggstra work.

If you splashed him with ink he would stand unmoving. He would not shake it off.

DARNOLD

Ok i'll be honest the Octoling choice is primarily bc Octolings have the afro style & inklings have no textured hair styles (i didnt have the energy to design smth that could work) . His personality fits octoling too though :3

Native ink color is red-orange.

The fucked up guy that makes those drink effects people never use ( i use them ... )

He doesn't participate in Turf Wars or Anarchy Battles, but he works some gigs at Grizzco for extra cash every once in awhile !

the type of guy that goes after flyfish cuz no one else will . god bles !!!

not a lot to say about his design & his place in inkadia , it kinda speak for itself . he just wants to get by and make his drinks in peace . #autism ... he is pretty much exactly the same as his canon self

[cripplecharacters]

Writing Intellectually Disabled Characters

[large text: Writing Intellectually Disabled Characters]

Something that very rarely comes up in disability media representation are intellectually disabled characters. There is very little positive representation in media in general (and basically none in media meant specifically for adults or in YA). I hope this post can maybe help someone interested in writing disabled characters understand the topic better and create something nice. This is just a collection of thoughts of only one person with mild ID (me) and I don't claim to speak for the whole community as its just my view. This post is meant to explain how some parts of ID work and make people aware of what ID is.

This post is absolutely not meant for self diagnosis (I promise you would realize before seeing a Tumblr post about it. it's a major disorder that gets most people thrown into special education).

Before: What is (and isn't) intellectual disability?

ID is a single, lifelong neurodevelopmental condition that affects IQ and causes problems with reasoning, problem‑solving, remembering and planning things, abstract thinking and learning. There is often delay or absence of development milestones like walking (and other kinds of movement), language and self care skills (eating, going to the bathroom, washing, getting dressed etc). Different people will struggle with different things to different degrees. I am, for example, still fully unable to do certain movements and had a lot of delay in self-care, but I had significantly less language-related delay than most of people with ID I know. Usually the more severe a person's ID is the more delay they will have.

Intellectual disability is one single condition and it doesn't make sense to call it "intellectual disabilities" (plural) or "an intellectual disability". It would be like saying "they have a Down Syndrome" or "he has autisms". The correct way would be "she has intellectual disability" or "ze is intellectually disabled".

Around 1-3% of people in the world have intellectual disability and most have mild ID (as opposed to moderate, severe, or profound). It can exist on its own without any identifiable condition or it can be a part of syndrome. There is over a thousand (ranging from very common to extremely rare) conditions that can cause ID but some of the most common are;

Down Syndrome,

Fragile X Syndrome,

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome,

autism,

Edwards Syndrome,

DiGeorge Syndrome,

microcephaly.

Not every condition always causes ID and you can have one of the above conditions without having ID as long as it's not necessary diagnostic criteria to be met. For example, around 30% of autistic people have ID, meaning that the remaining 70% doesn't. It just means that it's comorbid often enough to be counted as a major cause but still, autistic ≠ intellectually disabled most of the time.

A lot of things that cause intellectual disability also come with facial differences, epilepsy, mobility-related disabilities, sensory disabilities, and limb differences. A lot of, but not all, intellectually disabled people go to special education schools.

Intellectual disability isn't the same as brain damage. Brain damage can occur at any point of a person's life while ID always starts in or before childhood.

"Can My Character Be [Blank]?"

[large text: "Can my character be [blank]?"]

The difficulty with writing characters with intellectual disability is that unlike some other things you can give your character, ID will very directly impacts how your character thinks and behaves - you can't make the whole character and then just slap the ID label on them.

Intellectually disabled people are extremely diverse in terms of personality, ability, verbality, mobility... And you need to consider those things early because deciding that your character is nonverbal and unable to use AAC might be an issue if you're already in the middle of writing a dialogue scene.

For broader context, a person with ID might be fully verbal - though they could still struggle with grammar, what some words mean, or with general understanding of spoken/written language to some degree. Or they could also be non-verbal. While some non-verbal ID people use AAC, it's not something that works for everyone and some people rely on completely language-less communication only. There is also the middle ground of people who are able to speak, but only in short sentences, or in a way that's not fully understandable to people who don't know them. Some might speak in second or third person.

Depending on the severity of your character's disability they will need help with different tasks. For example, I'm mildly affected and only need help with "complex" tasks like shopping or taxes or appointments, but someone who is profoundly affected will probably need 24/7 care.

It's not infantilization to have your character receive the help that they need. Disabled people who get help with bathing or eating aren't "being treated like children", they just have higher support needs than me or you. In the same vein, your character isn't "mentally two years old" or "essentially a toddler", they are a twenty-, or sixteen-, or fourty five-year old who has intellectual disability. Mental age isn't real. Intellectually disabled people can drink, have sex, smoke, swear, and a bunch of other things. A thirty year old person is an adult, regardless of disability.

An important thing is that a person with ID has generally bad understanding of cause-and-effect and might not make connections between things that people without ID just instinctively understand. For example, someone could see that their coat is in a different place than they left it, but wouldn't be able to deduce that then it means that someone else moved it or it wouldn’t even occur to them as a thing that was caused by something. I think every (or at least most) ID person struggles with this to some extent. The more severe someone's disability is the less they will be able to connect usually (for example someone with profound ID might not be able to understand the connection between the light switch and the light turning off and on).

People with mild intellectual disability have the least severe problems in functioning and a lot are able to live independently, have a job, have kids, stuff like that.

What Tropes Should You Avoid?

[large text: What Tropes Should You Avoid?]

The comic relief/punching bag;

The predator/stalker;

The "you could change this character into a sick dog and there wouldn't be much difference";

...and a lot more, but these are the most prevalent in my experience.

Most ID characters are either grossly villainized (more often if they have also physical disabilities or facial differences) or extremely dehumanized or ridiculed, or all of the above. It's rarely actually mentioned for a character to be intellectually disabled, but negative "representation" usually is very clear that this who they're attempting to portray. The portrayal of a whole group of people as primarily either violent predators, pitiful tragedies, or nothing more than a joke is damaging and you probably shouldn't do that. It's been done before and it hasn't been good once.

When those tropes aren't used the ID character is still usually at the very most a side character to the main (usually abled) character. They don't have hobbies, favorite foods, movies or music they like, love interests, friends or pets of their own, and are very lucky if the author bothered to give them a last name. Of course it's not a requirement to have all of these but when there is no characterization in majority of disabled characters, it shows. They also usually die in some tragic way, often sacrificing themselves for the main character or just disappear in some off-the-screen circumstances. Either way, they aren't really characters, they're more like cardboard cutouts of what a character should be - the audience has no way to care for them because the author has put no care into making the character interesting or likable at all. Usually their whole and only personality and character trait is that they have intellectual disability and it's often based on what the author thinks ID is without actually doing any research.

What Terms to Use and Not Use

[large text: What Terms to Use and Not Use]

Words like: "intellectually disabled" or "with/have intellectual disability" are terms used by people with ID and are generally OK to use. I believe more people use the latter (person first language) for themselves, but i know people who use both. I use the first more often but I don't mind the second. Some people have strong preference with one over the other and that needs to be respected.

Terms like:

"cursed with intellectual disability"

"mentally [R-slur]"

"moron"

"idiot"

"feeble-minded"

"imbecile"

"cretin"

are considered at least derogatory by most people and I don't recommend using it in your writing. The last 6 terms directly come from outdated medical terminology specifically regarding ID and aren't just "rude", they're ableist and historically connected to eugenics in the most direct way they could be. To me personally they're highly offensive and I wouldn't want to read something that referred to its character with ID with those terms, period-accurate historical fiction aside.

(Note: there are, in real life, people with ID that refer to themselves with the above... but this is still just a writing guide. Unless you belong to the group i just mentioned I would advise against writing that, especially if this post is your entire research so far.)

Things I Want to See More of in Characters with Intellectual Disability

[large text: Things I Want to See More of in Characters with Intellectual Disability]

[format borrowed from WWC]

I want to see more characters with intellectual disability that...

aren't white.

aren't men.

are adults (and not just 18-25 either, middle-aged people and seniors with ID exist).

get to have a different role in the story than just "annoying little brother".

are allowed to be angry without being demonized, and sad without being infantilized.

are not described as "mentally X years old".

are respected by others.

aren't "secretly smart" or “emotionally smart”.

are able to live independently with some help.

aren't able to live independently at all, and aren't mocked for that.

are in romantic relationships, have crushes, or are someone else's crush (interabled... or not).

are non-verbal or semi-verbal.

use mobility aids and/or AAC.

have hobbies they enjoy.

have friends and family who actually like and support them.

go on cool adventures.

are in different genres: fantasy, romComs, action, slice of life... all of them.

have their own storylines.

aren't treated as disposable.

aren't there just to be a mascot/motivation for an able-bodied character.

don't die or disappear at the first possible opportunity.

...and I want to see stories that have multiple intellectually disabled characters.

I hope that this list will give someone inspiration to go and make their first OC with intellectual disability. This is just a basic overview to motivate writers to do their own research rather than an “all-knowing post explaining everything regarding ID”. I definitely don't know everything especially about the parts of ID that I just don't experience (or not as much as others). This is only meant to be an introduction for people who don't really know what ID is or where to even start.

Talk to people with intellectual disability (you can send ask here but there are also a lot of other people on Tumblr who have ID and I know at least some have previously answered asks as well if you want someone else's opinion), watch/read interviews with people who have ID (to start - link1, link2, both have captions) and try to rethink what you think about intellectual disability. Because it's really not that rare like a lot of people seem to think. Please listen to us when we speak.

Good luck writing and thank you for reading,

mod Sasza

[l-amplights]

MY HUGE TPOT 15 THEORIES AND OBSERVATIONS AND JUST RENERAL RANTS AND AUTISM POST. SPOILERS AHEAD

i NEED TO TALK ABOUT EAN AND VERPT(? NO SUBTITLES YET) RIGHT NOW

I NEED PEOPLE TO REALISE THEY CALLED THEMSELVES A LETTER. NOT A VARIABLE. A LETTER. ALSO CALLS VERPT A LETTER.... also awesome 1 legged algebralien and no limbed. we love to see variations :> excited for eventuall floater algebralien

PLEASE CORRECT ME IF IM WRONG BUT ASSUMING THIS IS WHERE THE ALGEBRALIENS COME FROM I THINK THIS IS THE FIRST TIME WEVE SEEN THIS???

HUGE WIN FOR NUMBER AUTISM

SOMETHING I JUST REALISED WHILE GOING FRAME BY FRAME FOR LAST IMAGE, MARKER. IS PURPLE HERE BUT THEN

YOU CAN SEE THE EFFECTS TAKING PLACE!!!!!

THATS AWESOME!!!!

these little shits are remind me of goo man from TPOT 11 (out of the blue)

looking back at goo man im not sure why

IM SO HAPPY THE VR HEADSET HOST FINALLY GOT USED

according to the awesome wiki

"The character was shown during the production of BFB. They may have been the original host of BFB, given the tweet description, but was replaced by Four and X.

Sometime after the VR Headset post was posted in jacknjellify's Twitter, Satomi clarified VR Headset was never meant to be a host or any sort of character, and was drawn simply because Michael thought they would be cool to draw."

HIIII PROFILEY... AWESOME TO SEE THEM BACK. REALLY COOL PARALELL HERE METHINKS BC THEYRE VOICED BY THE SAME GUY AS TWO :>

jumping around a bit. this was shown earlier and not expanded on untill the end. this. this drives me insane

thats ones equivilent of the fourest, it has a link to the equation playground I WAS RIGHT

very interesting its also plant based.

I CANNOT FIND . WHEN I WAS BLABBERING ABOUT THIS SO IT MUSTVE BEEN IN A VC. BUT I CALLED THIS. also barf bag literally my face when i saw this lollll

okkkk back to like the usual time

HI EVIL LEAFY HIIII IM SOOOO HAPPY SHE APPEARED. THIS DOESNT MEAN SHE ISNT LIKE DEAD AFTER IDFB BUT IM GLAD WE GOT TO SEE HER IN TPOT .. AND AS A HOST NO LESS!!

ID ALSO LIKE TO POINT OUT not sure if this is just startled or pin here being AFRAID for a second of EL

ABSOLUTELY HEARTBROKEN RF AND BB GOT OUT SAME TIME. HORRIBLE also neat they used the ending of the bfb intro here

X host.... imagine. life could be a dream

ok let me go over all the style stuff we see here also in order

(starting at the start of cake at stake (or cake at skate))

for the entire first half its just the usual TPOT style so i wont make a huge deal of that

Ean's part is also in TPOT

Pan Flute here's part is in the style of BFDIA specifically the newer episodes, figures, thats what hes from

EL's part is also in BFDIA style (with some very old assets behind), however id like to go over something else here

RIGHT BEFORE SHE APPEARS PIN GOES THROUGH SOME OF HER BFDIA ARC CHANGES. NEAT

also the music in the background here is "The Fiber" (thats what its called in the bfb ost release at least) WHICH IS ALSO THE SONG THAT PLAYS ENTIRELY THROUGHOUT BFDIA 5B!!!! AWESOME!!!!

GONNA BE HONEST NO IDEA WHAT STYLE THIS IS SUPPOSE TO BE... THE ANIMATION IS SUPER WEIRD AND DIFFERENT. it actually reminds me of how sacri animates her shows!!

hold on i need to make a new post i cant upload any more images

[stump-not-found]

A03 wrapped 2024

tagged by @tempusedax-rerum >:DDDDD

1.) Biggest surprise while writing this year?

how much people responded to bill cipher saying daddy . how people have interpreted ford's relationship to mabel in theseus' guide; i've really tried to write him as really caring for her so seeing that interpreted as him disliking her is so interesting haha

most of all tho i'm just surprised and very grateful that theseus has received any attention, it's been so so wonderful reading everyone's thoughts and seeing them engage with the fic . it really makes the entire process so gratifying, and i hope folks continue to enjoy where the story goes next :D

2.) How many WIPs do you have in your docs for next year?

i've got my erotic billford rom com Can of Snakes that's over 20k right now . it has banger titles such as "sad handjob" and "penicular sounding", so someday i'll be posting that . i think they can make it work

i also just started Weirdmageddon 2: Electric Boogaloo: Lost In New York, an AU where ford gets stan to help him finish the portal after kicking fidd's to the curb . stan and bill become besties, ford hates it, and bill isn't allowed to destroy new york until he tries a slice of 'za .

this is not accounting for the mountain of comic WIP's i have but that shit aint goin on ao3

3.) Favourite character to write this year?

ford for sure . you give me a character who's autistic in a way that isn't cute and it just means the world to me . i get to give him evil autism . the autism where we acknowledge growing up autistic is traumatizing and makes you not a nice person all the time . fuck i love him . i get to dump so much of my own shit on him its so funnnnnnn yay lalalala

there was a whole paragraph i wrote that was just describing the perfect eye angle to maintain when walking through a farmers market to avoid social scenario's, which i had to remove because it was just me rambling about my own social survival strategies . farmers markets are dangerous places

i also love writing him in the context of bill . what a fucking mess they are i hope they never get better . but together <3

4.) The character that gave you the most trouble this year?

honestly stanley pines . i feel like i soften him too much, and lean in to his more positive traits than his more negative ones . it's hard because i feel like folks don't talk about the fact he was homeless for like 10 years & also had a breaking bad style adventure in columbia

the other problem is that he IS a big softy so idk . but he should be bitchier god damn it . he should be talking about his cataracts

6.) Did you receive any gifts this year?

I DID YOU INSANE PEOPLE thank you all it make a me smile:

@stemmmm @ancharan @kronehaze @sillyhyperfixator @ezrathean0n

7.) Did you do any collaborative works this year?

i feel like all my writing is collaborative!! i spend hours talking fic stuff with my wife & brother and my stuff is all the better for it . would love to do more of that w/ other folks i love it talking and thinking and playing is so fun

8.) What do you listen to while writing?

i don't like listening to music when i write lol ...... i sit in the cold silence and type in a frantic spiral .

i listen to a lotta different things while i think of things to write tho . atm all i want in the world is to make a theseus animation to this song it's very hammercore :

9.) Favorite line/passage you wrote this year?

oogh that's hard to choose . i'm just gonna share a bunch that make me laugh

from theseus' guide step six:

Dipper, clearly, doesn’t get it, and Ford acknowledges he is too young to understand a professional working relationship.

also from step six:

“Oh, sure, I can move on,” Stan grins, “To the other items on my list. A, the shack’s toilets all suck, and the seats keep raisin’ automatically. B, your handwriting sucks. C–”

from theseus' guide step three:

“You think you’re coming back anytime soon?” “No, 8-Ball, I don’t think I’m ‘ coming back ’ anytime soon.” Ford snides, though 8-Ball either doesn’t register that, or doesn’t care; hard to tell with the guy, “I’m sure you’re aware, but your boss wants to kill my family. And destroy my universe. ” 8-Ball sniffs. “Cool. Mind if I eat your leftovers then? Teeth keeps eyeing them.” Ford frowns, “You couldn’t have just brought them with you?” “Nah, man, I want to eat them.”

lots of lines from step eight but we ain't there yet

uuuuhhghhg who to send this chain mail along to uuuhgghgh

@beccadrawsstuff if u wannaaaa . anyone else feel free to pick this up as well i'm bad at this lol