#i really love ascended astarion tbh and i find his path really cathartic and validating when it comes to trauma responses

[vorestarr]

thoughts on vampirism as a symbol of trauma

i've been thinking about this in relation to Astarion's story arc for a while and started writing this post a couple times, only to have it become much longer than expected, so for now this post is just going to be about the different paths of ascension vs spawn from the end of his personal quest. (i think there are multiple ways to read his story, and this is just the way i've been reading and thinking about it.)

the basic idea of this post is that Astarion's vampirism is a physical manifestation or symbol of his trauma, and therefore the two different ending paths for him are distinguished by how he addresses his vampirism (and therefore trauma).

it's pretty clear that the vampirism itself is a traumatic experience for Astarion, from how he describes almost dying, then actually dying, and then everything that comes afterwards at Cazador's hands. but i think of this a step further, in that the actual symptoms of vampirism are also part of this. there's an idea that there are physical manifestations of traumatic experiences held in the body, even if the trauma itself was psychological in nature (i.e., the body keeps the score). this is how i read vampirism for Astarion, specifically.

to start, he's turned into a vampire after a traumatic experience (almost being killed by a group of people one night). he's "saved" from this by Cazador turning him into a vampire, but still his body literally dies when he turns into a vampire, which is another separate traumatic event where he feels himself die and then has to climb out of his own grave. (also noted, i believe it's hinted that Cazador orchestrated the attack on Astarion that almost killed him in the first place, so Cazador is the cause of all of this trauma in one event that is Astarion becoming a vampire.)

his body is physically changed by the experience. he loses things because of it, maybe things that were not particularly important to him but now seem incredibly important once they're gone (like walking in the sun) or things that were previously important to him and now he can no longer enjoy (living indulgences and pleasures like food, or his own reflection). also critically, he cannot get those things back. his life is changed (literally ended) and there's no fixing it.

he learns coping strategies during the subsequent 200 years, which i will not get into in this post, but suffice to say that he learned things that he believed would protect him in the moment.

after the tadpole when he experiences freedom from Cazador's influence for the first time, there are some critical shifts that happen to start him on a path to address these things, or not. the recent interview where the devs mention that the ascended path is one of fear, i really agreed with and have said similar things in previous posts, because to me, i think the main difference between how Astarion acts in those paths is that for ascension, he relies on the methods he learned in those 200 years to survive in the moment, while in the spawn path, he learns new ways to cope.

to elaborate on that, i think the ascension path specifically is about avoidance.

in trauma, avoidance is what it sounds like: avoiding any triggers or negative emotions related to the traumatic experience. the avoidance can manifest in different ways, but a key idea is that by avoiding those negative feelings, they are never actually addressed.

i think there are two big ways this manifests in Astarion's story, related to vampirism:

ascended Astarion is avoiding those negative feelings of fear of Cazador (or someone else doing what Cazador did) by focusing on seizing power and control. if he's more powerful, in control of a situation, then nothing bad can happen to him again. the way this ties back to vampirism as a symbol of trauma is that this is literally described to us in the game as the natural course of life for vampires: they live in fear of other vampires, fear of their own spawn seizing their power, etc. this is the story of Vellioth and Cazador, and then later Cazador and Astarion (regardless of the choice he makes to ascend or not). we even get a list of vampires where ALL their life spans/eras of power are timed so that we can infer that each subsequent vampire has killed the previous vampire to dethrone them. so, vampirism itself is trauma and the known course of vampirism is this same cycle we see repeated with multiple vampires and histories in game. by taking a different path and not becoming a full vampire, spawn Astarion has started to learn a new way of dealing with his vampirism/trauma, rather than avoiding it.

the OTHER major way i see this manifest in the game is how ascension and spawn paths deal with the literal symptoms of vampirism: walking in the sun, Astarion's reflection, food versus drinking blood, the vampiric state of undeath, etc. these are all things that changed about Astarion when he became a vampire, and things that (in the normal course of events) cannot be changed back. he died, he's dead, there's no curing his vampirism. in other words, there's no going back to who he was before the traumatic experiences. that by itself is a neutral statement, the same way that there's no going back to who a person is before any major event (be it meeting someone important, choosing to take a certain job, etc etc), because we are all constantly changing and growing. HOWEVER, i think the places with Astarion where this stops being neutral is how he addresses that fact: with acceptance or avoidance.

to elaborate on the second point, which is my main reason for making this post:

on the spawn path, Astarion learns new ways to be and to live with his vampirism. in his epilogue, he can mention that he's not bothered by losing the sun again, he can describe finding a sense of belonging with others who share his vampirism, and he can define himself in new ways that he's picked for himself rather than stay in the definition of vampire that Cazador held.

in the ascension path, Astarion avoids all of those difficult realizations and choices. he falls back on the same strategies that helped him survive in the moment for those 200 years, but which can and do hurt him after escaping that environment. he's working hard to keep from addressing those negative feelings -- and on the surface, this works! he can walk in the sun without the tadpole! he has new vampire powers and he can do all the things he lost when he died! he can see his own reflection again! but, he's still a vampire, still has his fangs, still has his red eyes.

this is why i think the route is characterized by fear and why i found that interview with the devs interesting: by focusing on all those avoidance behaviors, Astarion ends up being stuck in a state of mind that's all about fear because it's all about avoiding that feeling. he feels great in the moment because he has been able to claim back some of what was taken from him, but this is not a solution because he's still a vampire.

personally, i do not read the ascension path as continuing a cycle of abuse, but as the continuation of avoiding the painful process of healing from trauma.

ascended Astarion is elated after killing Cazador because he feels the power flowing through him and it makes him feel safe in the moment, and because he is avoiding addressing any lingering feelings of pain or negativity, including avoiding addressing that he just killed 7000 people.

spawn Astarion meanwhile looks absolutely miserable immediately after killing Cazador when he cries and breaks down, and then he feels numb later because he's so overwhelmed. this i think resembles something that can happen in trauma therapy, where a person feels worse when they initially start addressing and working through their trauma, because it means actually feeling all of those negative emotions they've been avoiding.

in the end, ascended Astarion has not changed how he addresses his trauma or vampirism, and the ascension has actually given him more tools to continue avoidance. spawn Astarion meanwhile is exploring other ways of living with his vampirism, and can be experiencing success with that by the time the epilogue rolls around (even if there are some bumps and regressions along the way, like losing his ability to walk in the sun again).

because this is my main reading, i also don't think this makes ascended Astarion evil or irredeemable -- i think he shows that he does still have all the emotions that he's displayed through the game and therefore he still has the potential to follow the same path that spawn Astarion did in healing. but, the critical thing with the ascension path is that he does not have the clear motivation or triggering event to start him down that path. he's further away from that, and it will take more work to get there. everything he did after all comes back to the ways he learned to survive under Cazador, so those behaviors helped him at one point. the issue is that he's past the point of those things helping him, but he can't let them go.

tl;dr: i like looking at vampirism itself as a physical symbol of trauma and as a way to read Astarion's potential storylines, because it provides a context for me to view how the ascension and spawn paths treat his vampiric symptoms -- avoiding them in the ascension path by giving him an "out" of sorts to avoid addressing how those symptoms impact his life because of the extra abilities granted to him by the ritual, versus being forced to grapple with them and figure out a way to life with them and even enjoy them on his own terms in the spawn ending.

if you read this whole post, thanks for sticking with me and feel free to share your thoughts too. :)