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1dffexchange · 6 years

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Warm Blood

To: Eriza @booksncoffee

From: Natasha @wokeuptired

Summary: This is ridiculous, and Carver knows it.

She doesn’t even know his name, and he’s all she can think about. One kiss at an office Christmas party—an office where she doesn’t even work most of the time—and she can’t get him off her mind.

It doesn’t help that she’s spending a week working in said office, sitting at a neat freak’s desk and trying not to leave fingerprints behind while looking over her shoulder every five minutes to see if he—Mistletoe Boy—is at the coffee pot.

She’s beginning to think she dreamed him up.

ONE.

Carver Cantrell is not somebody who makes stupid decisions.

That is the first thing she would want you to know about her: this is not her modus operandus. She is not the kind of girl who buys a plane ticket and jets off to Paris on a whim. She doesn’t purchase expensive articles of clothing without stalking them online for a few weeks first. The wildest evening she has is when she orders something different from the Chinese place on the corner. Nobody would ever call her a wild child.

And she certainly doesn’t kiss boys she’s never met under the mistletoe at the office holiday party just because she feels like it.

Except she just did.

“Wow.”

Carver pulls back, unsure of which of them said that, her or the guy she’s just been locking lips with. Her heart is beating so loud she can hear it in her ears, and she can feel her blood hot in her cheeks. His eyes are bright blue, so blue she can feel them in her toes.

Which is a feeling she’s never felt before. Crazy, because Carver thought, right before this second, that she’d felt them all.

Her emotions have tended towards the severe ever since she was a kid. Imagine six year-old Carver, throwing a fit at the supermarket because her favorite cereal was out of stock, and her helpless mother, standing three feet away with her hands up so that other shoppers wouldn’t assume she was the cause of the tantrum. Skip to middle school, when Carver didn’t eat for two days after she and her best friend—the same Jess whom she roomed with in college, walked beside at graduation, and is currently accompanying to this party—had a fight. Just last month, she watched a Hallmark movie where a woman reunited with her teenage love after twenty-five years, and she sobbed for an hour.

Anger, sadness, happiness—Carver has always felt them all in extremes. She’s learned over the years to take deep breaths until the emotions calm down so she can figure out which ones to listen to before she acts, but they’re still there, nonetheless.

Like two minutes ago, when she turned a corner on her way to the restroom and walked right into the sturdy chest of the guy who currently has his arms wrapped around her. He sparked something in her right away, and the inches they’ve just put between them have done nothing to dampen that flame.

“Sorry,” he says. He tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, his fingertips warm. “I probably shouldn’t have done that.”

This is where she should say something like, “Fuck that, do it again!” but her mind draws a blank. Her brain is too busy considering his accent, which is decidedly not California surfer boy like every boy she’s dated since she moved here a year ago, to come up with something witty to fire back at him.

“Hey, Car—”

She looks over my shoulder to see Jess coming around the corner. She has a plate in her hand piled high with Carver’s weakness: angel food cake, the literal food of angels.

“I found this,” she says, holding it out. “And you. And, you’re busy, apparently—who’s this?”

Carver follows her gaze back to the boy in question, who’s pushing a hand through his hair and grinning. His hair looks like it’s straight out of a shampoo commercial. She should’ve touched it during their kiss. What a missed opportunity.

“Sorry, I—I was actually on my way out,” he says. His eyes return to her as he brushes a fingertip across her cheek before stepping back. “It was nice to meet you.”

“You too,” she manages before he turns away and disappears around the corner.

Jess grabs her elbow. “What was that? Who was that?”

Carver lets her tug her back into the party. “I have no idea.”

Five minutes later, Carver’s shoveling angel food cake into her mouth and recounting the last hour as Jess rambles on with the office manager, Kayla. Michael Buble’s Christmas album plays in the background, stockings hang on the wall, and a small Christmas tree sits in the corner, but nothing can disguise the fact that this is an office. A well-designed office, but an office nonetheless.

Jess has worked for West & Up for a year, and Carver’s going on month three. West & Up is one of those newer companies that’s popped up as interior design has become accessible to anybody with internet access. It’s part online home goods retailer (think Wayfair but a bit less fashionable), part interior design firm. Jess does web design, and Carver crunch numbers.

They both work in the Century City office, where a bunch of nerds in glasses occupy cubicles in a decidedly less fashionable building right next to the freeway. Carver had never been to the Santa Monica office before tonight, and she’s definitely been missing out, because not only can you smell the ocean from the balcony, cute boys also work here.

One cute boy in particular.

Carver has never felt such an instant connection with someone before, and she can already tell it’s going to consume me. This is how her mind works: it can only focus on one thing at a time, and that one thing nearly always becomes an obsession. That’s why she’s so good at math. Her OCD keeps her doing problems over and over again until she’s sure they’re perfect. And her OCD will no doubt have her going over that kiss incessantly.

“Carver, it’s going to be so great to have you here in January,” Kayla says. “I’m so happy you said yes.”

Carver swallows a bite of angel food cake and fakes a smile. Truth be told, she’s not looking forward to her temporary reassignment to the Santa Monica office. She hates changes to her routine, and she hates things that aren’t her choice. Kayla says she agreed, but when her supervisor presented it to her, it didn’t really seem like saying no was an option.

“I’m really excited to see how things work around here,” she says, which is about the best answer she can manage without the unrelenting guilt she always feels when she lies. She doesn’t tell Kayla she doesn’t understand why she can’t continue her internal audit of the company from her own cubicle.

She has a slight suspicion that she’s going to arrive for her first day in January and be instructed to count the pens in the copy room.

TWO.

Kayla Warner is not the kind of person who takes no for an answer.

This is typically something that works in Niall’s favor, because Kayla is the office manager and when she’s on your side, she gets shit done. Niall befriended her on his first day at West & Up, and ever since, she’s been going to war for him. She got him the best cubicle (aka the one furthest from the break room), always makes sure he leaves promptly at five, even if she has to drag him out herself, and never fails to order his favorite brand of pens. Usually Kayla Warner is his hero.

But now that she’s decided to be his matchmaker, he’s moving her decidedly into the “villain” column. Once Kayla has an idea in her head, there’s absolutely no talking her out of it. Which doesn’t mean Niall isn’t going to try.

THIS IS A BAD IDEA.

Niall watches as three little dots appear on his phone, showing that Kayla is responding to his all-caps message. He never should’ve told her about Mistletoe Girl in the first place, but Kayla could tell that something was up when he suddenly appeared way more interested in Kayla’s incessant stream of office gossip than he used to be. Kayla practically sniffed it on him.

“You kissed somebody at the Christmas party, didn’t you?” she demanded, the question mark only there out of politeness. Kayla’s like a bloodhound when it comes to secrets, especially secrets related to the affairs of the heart.

Not that Niall’s heart is involved here. He really doesn’t want it to be, because it shouldn’t be, not after one kiss. Even if it was the most perfect kiss he’s ever experienced in all his years of kissing–barely a decade, so he wouldn’t exactly call himself an expert, but he knows a good kiss when he sees it.

Kayla’s still typing, so Niall navigates away from the text message thread and opens Instagram. He’d scoured the employee profiles a zillion times over the past few weeks searching for Mistletoe Girl, looking at all the Carters and Carolyns and Carlas that work for the company, and he couldn’t find her. But now, thanks to Kayla, he knows her name, her actual name, so he can stalk her on social media.

Carver Cantrell. Her profile is private, so Niall can’t see much beyond her bio and her profile picture (her smiling face pressed up against a puppy’s much smaller one), but it’s gratifying to know that she’s real. It’s a relief to know that he didn’t imagine the whole thing. And it’s nice to know that she loves dogs. Loving dogs is a good sign.

Niall doesn’t blame himself for questioning his sanity. It was like something out of a romance film, wasn’t it? Kayla’s obsessed with those things, “Love Actually” and “27 Dresses” and all that. It’s not every day that you’re on the way back from the bathroom at the dreaded office Christmas party when a cute girl crashes into you right under the mistletoe. And it’s certainly not every day that a kiss with a stranger makes you reexamine the way you look at the world.

Kayla’s reply rolls in, distracting Niall from reading Carver’s bio for the hundredth time.

THIS IS A GREAT IDEA

YOU CAN LEAVE HER CHOCOLATE AND FLIRTY NOTES ON YOUR DESK

I’M A FUCKING GENIUS

The messages arrive one after the other in rapid succession. Kayla texts like she talks: without breathing. It overwhelmed Niall when they first met, the speed at which Kayla thinks and talks and moves, but he’s slightly less intimidated by her now. Slightly.

Sighing, Niall clicks through to the text thread and hits the call button. It only rings once before Kayla picks up.

“You’re not going to be able to talk me out of this,” she says. Something clangs in the background; she’s probably making cookies again.

“It’s a terrible idea in every way,” Niall says. He stands from the couch and goes into the kitchen. Speaking with Kayla always makes him feel like he’s not doing enough. Like he ought to be doing at least 6 things simultaneously while talking to her. “You know I hate people in my workspace. It’s like you’re making us move in together, and we’ve barely even spoken.”

Kayla laughs. “Exactly. This is a great trial run. I’m pretty sure she’s just as much of a neat freak as you are, but if she’s not, you’ll be able to tell, and then you can abort the mission.”

“I want to abort the mission already.” Niall opens the fridge and starts unloading it of containers full of leftovers that should’ve been thrown out weeks ago. “You’re the one who’s not letting me.”

“That’s because I am your best friend and I care about your well-being.”

“But—”

“I’m not hearing it, Niall Horan,” Kayla says. “Now stop pretending to clean your kitchen, hang up the phone, and figure out a plan for tomorrow, will you? I can’t do everything for you.”

“Are you sure you can’t?” Niall asks. “Because you’ve done the rest of this for me. So I think you could just—”

“Don’t be facetious, Niall, it doesn’t suit you,” Kayla says before hanging up.

Sometimes Kayla reminds Niall of his mother, and since she’s far away across the Atlantic Ocean, he doesn’t really mind that.

Except right now. Right now, it’s driving him crazy.

THREE.

On Monday, January 7th, Carver parks her car in the lot outside West & Up’s Santa Monica office. She’s ten minutes early, and she fully intends to use all ten of those minutes to have a panic attack in her car.

There’s a post-it on her dashboard that, at her therapist’s suggestion, reads, “EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE,” and she repeats that aloud to herself a few times, but it doesn’t help. She makes a list in her mind of all the things that could go wrong. Maybe her cubicle neighbor will smell like baloney sandwiches. Maybe she will embarrass herself in front of the CEO. Or, maybe, worst of all, she might run into Mistletoe Boy.

She’s done her best over the past couple of weeks to forget about him, but she hasn’t gotten very far. And Jess’s constant mentioning of the kiss hasn’t helped things. She’s scoured the employee profiles on the company website for the guy with the soft lips and the foreign accent that Carver kissed at the Christmas party, and she’s come up empty.

“He must be one of the ones with no photo,” Jess has insisted multiple times.

“Or maybe he doesn’t work at West & Up anymore,” Carver told Jess last night as she was waxing on about how her chances of running into him again were about to increase exponentially. “Or maybe he never did, and he was crashing the party and that’s why he ducked away so fast. Or maybe he’s engaged to one of the girls from HR, or—”

“Or maybe you’re looking for excuses,” Jess said, jabbing an elbow into Carver’s side. They were watching “Set It Up” on Netflix for the zillionth time, and Jess had paused in speaking all the lines along with the actors to remind Carver that she may have watched her chance at one true love walk out the door a few weeks back. “Do not hide in your cubicle for the next week, okay? You need to, like, make yourself visible.”

“How do you suppose I do that?”

“Go to the coffee machine, like, all the time. Introduce yourself to everyone you can.” Jess turned to Carver, her eyes wide, her tone serious. “And, for the love of God, make a fucking move if you see him again.”

Carver tries not to think about that right now, as she squints into the sunlight and curse herself, again, for leaving the house without her sunglasses this morning, as that’s basically a death sentence in Los Angeles.

She reads her post-it again: “EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE.”

Then she takes a deep breath and opens the car door.

Kayla practically pounces on her when the elevator doors open on the third floor. She checks Carver in and shows her where the restroom is and babbles the entire time about how great her New Year’s was and how she hopes Carver’s was great too and did she watch the ball drop this year?

“You can use Horan’s desk,” she says, leading Carver through the office. It’s an open plan, desks everywhere, most of them totally cluttered. Paper everywhere, knicknacks, dusty computer screens. But the desk Kayla guides Carver to is wiped clean. “He’s one of our architects. He’s on site all week.”

“You’re sure he won’t mind?” Carver runs her eyes over the spotless desktop. There’s a pothos plant in a terra cotta pot next to a black mug holding six identical black pens, and that’s it. The only bit of personalization she can spot is a dinosaur sticker on the corner of the computer monitor. Horan, whoever he is, clearly values cleanliness over, well, pretty much everything else.

It actually reminds Carver a little bit of her workspace, but at least she’s got more than one plant.

“Oh, yeah,” Kayla says. “He won’t care. He might come by in the evenings, though, so you should be out of here by five if you can, and don’t leave anything lying around. He’s a bit of a neat freak.”

“Right.” Carver pushes the keyboard out of the way and puts her laptop on the desk. “I’ll be out of here by five.”

“You know where I am if you need anything. See you at lunch!” Kayla calls as she disappears around the corner

Carver opens her laptop and clicks through her email to the spreadsheets the company wants her to look through. Luckily she hasn’t been asked to count any pencils yet, but the day is still young.

By lunch time, her fingers hurt and her eyes are dry. Kayla takes her to a salad place across the street, and Carver forces myself to choke down kale topped with assorted vegetables. When she was younger, she believed that she’d magically develop a taste for salad once she reached her twenties, since it’s what twenty-something professionals always ate for lunch on tv shows, but it hasn’t happened yet.

Then she returns to Horan’s immaculate cubicle, puts her earbuds in, and zones into the work. She used to think that she’d have to hate her job in her twenties, just as she’d have to love salads, but the truth is, she loves it. She loves columns of numbers and when there’s a knot in the data she has to untangle. She loves losing herself in it, because in the numbers there is always an answer.

In life, there often aren’t answers, and she’s not a fan of ambiguity.

Before she leaves, she can’t resist opening the top drawer to see if that’s where the owner of this desk hides his mess. But, no, it’s just as organized as the surface. Plastic bins hold pens, paperclips, pencils, and post-its, all in separate sections. There isn’t a thing out of place. She wonders if he uses dinner plates with dividers, too.

Carver snags a bright pink post-it out of the drawer and scrawls a quick note on it before sticking it to the monitor.

Thanks for letting me use your desk. I tried not to leave too many fingerprints. Sorry for snooping through your drawer, but I wanted to find your organizational weakness. Apparently you don’t have any. Congratulations. - Carver

FOUR.

Niall chickened out.

After all that berating last night and a pep talk via text from Kayla this morning, he chickened out. He didn’t leave anything at his desk for Carver, and, to top it off, he hasn’t been able to stop thinking about it.

Every day at the Wilson project is a busy day, and today was no exception. This morning, two of the guys ripped out the old range and found faulty wiring, which is a remodel nightmare second only to flooding. That should’ve been enough to distract Niall, but it wasn’t. He pulled out a pen to make some notes and wondered what kind of pens Carver likes. He looked at granite samples with the Wilsons and wondered if Carver would think the black countertop would darken the room.

And then he thought about how fucked up it was that he was thinking about what Carver would think, considering he doesn’t even know her. Fucked up and creepy.

But here he is anyway, driving to the office in 5 o’clock traffic to see if Carver’s left any mark on his cuble. A very small, slightly creepy part of him is hoping he’ll be able to catch a trace of her perfume lingering in the air. He doesn’t have the vocabulary to describe scents, but he smelled it on her the night they kissed, and he knows he’ll recognize it instantly if he smells it again.

Kayla’s already left, which means he doesn’t have to face an interrogation when he passes her desk. The entire office is pretty much cleared out, which is how he likes it. Honestly,if he could work from home, he would. Other people are exhausting.

Which is part of the reason he’s afraid, he thinks, of meeting Carver. He’s idealized her so much in his head, but what if when he meets her, really meets her, she’s boring? Or annoying or just plain exhausting? What if spending time with her makes him wish he were spending time alone? The disappointment could crush him.

Which is why it’s easier to pretend he doesn’t care.

As he rounds the corner towards his cubicle, his heartbeat quickens, which is a total betrayal of his attempts to be nonchalant about this whole thing. He takes a deep breath, but it doesn’t help. Then his desk comes to view.

Nothing appears to be amiss. His chair is tucked in just the way he likes it, all of his black pens are still in their black mug, and his dinosaur sticker hasn’t moved. But—

Wait, what is that?

Niall grabs the post-it off the monitor and brings it up to his face. Is this Carver’s handwriting? It’s much neater than he’d expected based on the way her hair was slightly askew at the party. One’s general upkeep, he’s noticed, tends to belay their handwriting, and their handwriting reflects their level of organizational mastery.

Niall’s own hair is always flawless.

He reads the note to himself a couple of times, smiling at the mention of fingerprints. Apparently Carver has a sense of humor. And she might like post-its just as much as he does.

Hmm. Niall takes a seat at his desk, opens the drawer for another post-it, and grabs a pen. Time to come up with something clever to say in response.

FIVE.

In the morning, there’s a new post-it note on the monitor. Carver grins when she first sees it, because she’s always loved the idea of penpals, letters exchanged between strangers. She’s never had one herself, but novels always made it seem like you could tell your friend who lived worlds away things you couldn’t tell your BFF who lived next door.

Carver doesn’t have any such expectations of Niall Horan, of course, but it still makes her a bit giddy to see that he’s written her back.

But that feeling disappears as soon as she reads the note.

Thanks for your note, and thanks for keeping my desk clean. I don’t know what you’ve heard about me, but I don’t really mind fingerprints. As long as there aren’t too many. And you keep them off the computer screen. You have neat handwriting, though, so I think I can live with you using my desk for the week. - Niall

Carver turns the post-it face-down on the desk. Maybe she was slightly rude in my post-it, but his message is ruder. “I can live with you using my desk for a week”—who talks to a stranger like that? It might be sarcasm, but he should know better than to be sarcastic in a note. There’s no room for nuance in a post-it note, they’re much too small.

What Carver wants to say in response is also much too long for a post-it note, so she yanks open the top drawer in search of notepaper. Her desk back in her cubicle hosts a variety of cute notepads and post-its, but all she can find in Niall’s desk is a small yellow legal pad. Despite its unattractiveness, it’ll have to do.

She does decorate the corner with a giant flower, though, courtesy of one of Niall’s five identical black pens.

Dear Niall,

Thanks for your note. I appreciate that you can live with me using your desk for a week, although I’d like you to know that I’d gladly vacate for another workspace if given the chance, since you seem like an asshole. Is that your weakness? You don’t know how to be nice to strangers on post-it notes? Good luck with that. I hope you enjoy being alone.

Note written—or at least started; Carver thinks she might have more to say later—she shoves it under Niall’s keyboard and opens her laptop. She’ll leave it there for the day, keeping it in the back of her mind, and right before she leaves, she’ll decided whether or not to leave it.

No impulsive decisions, even in anger.

Except maybe she should be impulsive. Maybe she should stand up for herself, even though there may be negative consequences, like an even ruder reply tomorrow, or a chastising by Kayla or even a meeting with HR for inter-office harassment.

Carver goes back and forth about it all morning. She spends a bit of mental energy regretting leaving a note at all yesterday, and then a bit more energy wishing she’d asked Kayla more questions about the owner of the desk. Like, is he a nutcase? Is he obsessed with fingerprints? Because he catalogues them? Because he’s a crazy, stalking, murdering, psychopath?

By lunch time, Carver feels like she’s bursting at the seams. Kayla shows up for lunch, and Carver practically leaps out of her seat. They barely make it out of the building before Carver brings it up.

“Hey, so this Horan guy? What’s he like?”

Kayla looks over her shoulder as she pushes out the front door of the building and into the sunlight. “Why do you ask?”

Carver wrinkles her nose at Kayla’s smile. “He left me a super rude note.”

The smile drops instantly. “What?”

Carver squints into the sunlight and stops to fish her sunglasses out of her purse. “Yeah,” she says to Kayla. “I left him a note last night, thanking him for letting me use his desk and whatnot, and I come in this morning to a note that’s like, don’t leave too many fingerprints and I won’t kill you.”

“What? There’s no way Niall wrote that,” Kayla says.

Carver follows her into the same salad place as yesterday. “I mean, I may’ve exaggerated a little. But that was the gist of it.”

The conversation pauses as Carver orders her food—the same salad as yesterday—but Kayla brings it up again as soon as the two of them are seated. The restaurant isn’t exactly quiet, but Kayla is not the kind of person, Carver’s beginning to realize, who lets a loud space hinder her conversation.

“Niall is not an asshole, I promise,” Kayla says. She extracts a metal straw out of her bag and sticks it in her drink. “He’s just not that good at people.”

“What?”

Kayla shrugs. “Listen, I’ve been friends with him for three years. He doesn’t always make the best first impression. Like, he tries, but it’s hard for him.”

What? Carver thinks the question this time instead of voicing it. She understands being socially awkward, but the best thing about written correspondence is that you can revise it a thousand times before sending it off (or, as it were, leaving it taped to a monitor).

“Like, okay,” Kayla continues. “He probably thought he was being funny. But he’s such a dingbat he doesn’t realize that sarcasm doesn’t translate when it’s written down, or he thought he was making a joke and he didn’t realize that he’s not funny. Like, he’s really not funny.”

Carver tries to think of something to say in response, but she finds herself coming up empty. Kayla’s trying to apologize for Niall, but Carver’s realizing that she really doesn’t want to hear it. Luckily her salad arrives, saving her. She shoves a forkful of lettuce into her mouth and chews as Kayla rambles on.

Finally, Kayla pauses, so Carver asks what she really wants to know. “So, do you think I should write back?”

Kayla’s fork hovers in the air on its way to her mouth. “Do you want to write back?”

Carver blinks. “I don’t know what I want to do.”

“Well, I’m a firm believer that you should do whatever feels right to you,” Kayla says, setting her fork down. “So maybe what you need to do is figure out what it is you want to do.”

Carver nods, repeating that over and over in her head until it starts to make sense.

At least, the words make sense. She still has no idea whether or not she should leave the note.

SIX.

“I wrote her a note.”

“Yeah, I know, you idiot,” Kayla says sharply. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

Niall nearly drops his phone. That would be especially bad considering he’s currently squatting over a puddle of water in the middle of the Wilson construction site. He’s downgrading it from kitchen to construction site, since every 10 minutes a new problem arises that requires something else to be ripped out or torn up. The drywall is gone, revealing rotting studs, and when they pulled up the tile this morning, they found mold in the floorboards.

This house isn’t even old. Niall doesn’t understand it.

But he has to deal with it nonetheless.

“What are you talking about?” he asks.

“She asked me about you,” Kayla says. She’s whispering, like maybe she’s sitting at her desk right now and doesn’t want to be overheard. “Hold on, let me go outside.”

Niall stands up and turns his back on the other guys staring hopelessly into the puddle. He walks into the Wilsons’ backyard, which borders a strip of land known for being a mountain lion hotspot. When he first moved to LA, Niall was fascinated with them, with P-22 and his brave freeway crossings (both the 405 and the 101) and his adventures around Griffith Park. Experts say that P-22 will probably never leave Griffith Park’s 8 square miles, which is only half a victory. He’ll be safe because he’s the only male mountain lion living there, but he’ll never mate. His line will end with him.

Niall isn’t nearly as pessimistic about his own future, but he does have a few things in common with P-22. In a city surrounded by people, sometimes he feels like he’s living on an island. Anyone who wants to get to him will have to cross treacherous territory.

“Okay, I’m back,” Kayla says in Niall’s ear. “Now tell me what the fuck you were thinking, please.”

“I still don’t know what you’re talking about,” Niall says.

“Your note! You were a total asshole. At lunch today Carver was like, who is this guy and what the heck is his problem? And she’s totally right. What the heck is your problem?”

Right now Niall’s problem is that Kayla doesn’t seem to be planning on letting him get a word in. “Well—”

“Stop talking. I’ll tell you what’s wrong with you. You don’t know how to be nice to people because you are afraid of making authentic connections because then someone might get close enough to see that you’re as perfect as you pretend to be.”

“Hey—”

“It’s not your turn, idiot. You need to fix this now, because you haven’t completely ruined your chances, but you’re close, I can tell you that. I tried to tell Carver that you’re just bad at first impressions, but she wasn’t hearing it. Like, she literally zoned out and stopped listening to me.”

Niall feels like doing that right now. He also feels like jumping headfirst into the Wilsons’ pool, or throwing his phone in so the water can drown out Kayla’s voice. Or maybe he should leave his phone here and walk off into the forest and make a new home with P-22. The mountain lion won’t judge him. It might attack him, but it certainly won’t do so while calling him an idiot.

No, Niall can do that himself. He definitely feels stupid right now. He thought he was being witty and maybe even flirty, but clearly none of that came across. Instead he made himself look like an asshole, and he’s probably completely ruined his chances with Carver, who—he can admit this to himself, even if he hasn’t said it out loud—might be the one girl who could save him from a P-22 fate.

“So figure out a plan, Niall, because Carver is probably sitting at your desk right now writing a note to you about how much of a dickhead you’re being, and your deserve it!” Final words voiced, Kayla hangs up.

Niall sighs, allows himself a moment of self-pity, and opens the notes app on his phone to make a list.

Before end of work day:

- Call plumber

- Figure out how to explain further delay to Wilsons

- Call Wilsons, explain, apologize

- File report with office

By tomorrow AM:

- Fix Carver problem

- Refill gas tank

- Sleep?

It’s shaping up to be a busy afternoon.

SEVEN.

Carver wakes up the next morning feeling perfectly normal, and then she remembers what she decided. Before she left the office, she pulled her note out from underneath Niall’s keyboard, signed her name to it with a flourish, and taped it to his monitor.

She sits up in bed, overcome with a wave of nausea. Assuming Niall went to the office last night, which he most likely did because he seems like the kind of person who follows his routines religiously, without exception, there is going to be a note waiting for her, and it’s probably not going to be a nice one.

But when she gets to Niall’s desk, there’s nothing there. Her note is gone, but there isn’t a new one.

Fuck. There are so many things this could mean. Maybe he read her note and was so annoyed by it that he decided she wasn’t worth responding to. Maybe he laughed and crumbled it up into a ball and tossed it over his shoulder as he walked through the parking lot to his car. Or maybe a janitor threw it away and he never even saw it.

Carver pushes it out of her mind, though, because she has work to do. There are numbers to be crunched and data to be sorted and there is plenty to distract her anxious mind.

But she can’t get the note out of her head. How did he react to her note? Why didn’t he respond? Is she a terrible person for leaving it in the first place?

Just before 11 AM, Kayla pops her head over the edge of the cubicle, a mug of coffee in her hands. “Morning,” she says. “Can you do me a favor?”

Carver minimizes my spreadsheet and grins. “Of course. I need a break anyway.” That isn’t an overstatement. With all the circles her brain has been going in, Carver wonders how she managed to get anything done this morning.

“Great.” Kayla holds out a manila envelope. “Can you take an early lunch and drop this off for Horan at the Wilson house?”

Drop this off for Horan. Oh, shit.

“Of course,” Carver says, but meanwhile her brain is having a heart attack. She hates spur of the moment plans, she hates going to places she’s never been before, and mostly she hates that she might be about to confront Niall in a place she’s never been before, where she can’t control anything.

She can’t say any of that out loud, though, so she takes the envelope from Kayla and puts the address Kayla gives her into Google maps on her phone. She blasts the “Mamma Mia” soundtrack on the drive, but it doesn’t help calm her nerves.

Even though the house isn’t geographically that far away, it takes nearly half an hour to get there, which must be why Kayla told Carver she wouldn’t expect her back before two. Los Angeles traffic is no exaggeration.

She parks her car at the end of a long driveway and pushes her sunglasses onto her head. She remembered them this morning, but she doesn’t think they’re going to save her from whatever is going to happen at the top of the drive.

The house is the first thing that shocks her. It’s beautiful, and that’s not a term she typically uses to describe architecture. She may work for West & Co., but she’s a math geek. She’s a human computer. She doesn’t have a natural taste for beautiful construction, but this she recognizes. It’s two stories and massive but not obviously so, because the facade has varying heights and it doesn’t look like an imposing box. She can tell, though, that the people who live here are loaded. There are mediterranean stones and slightly tinted window panes and she can just bet that the back of the house is entirely glass to give the residents the best possible view of the hills behind.

She walks through a beautifully manicured front yard to find that the front door is open, so she goes inside without knocking. The front hall is two stories high, and a living room with mid-century modern furniture is on the right. It looks like it belongs in an Architectural Digest celebrity home tour on youtube. There is no clutter anywhere, like maybe no one lives in this house and it’s actually just used for filming and photoshoots.

Carver follows the sound of hammers through to the kitchen at the back of the house. There are floor to ceiling windows, just like she expected, and even though the kitchen is entirely deconstructed—it looks like custom cabinets are currently being installed—she can already tell it’s going to be beautiful.

“Hey, Horan!”

Shit. Carver follows the direction of the shout and steps further into the kitchen, and that’s when she sees him.

He’s outside, so they’re separated by a massive kitchen and a sliding glass door, but it’s definitely him.

It’s Mistletoe Boy.

It can’t be, though, right? He can’t be Niall. Niall can’t be him. They can’t be the same person.

But then somebody shouts, “Horan!” again and Mistletoe Boy turns and, oh shit, he’s coming this way, and Carver definitely cannot deal with this right now. She backtracks out of the house and grabs a construction worker who’s just coming in.

“Can you give this to Horan?” she asks, holding out the envelope. The guy wrinkles his brow, but he shrugs and takes the envelope. “Thanks,” Carver says, and then she practically runs to her car.

Carver starts the engine as she’s buckling her seatbelt (even though her mother taught her never to do that), and she drives out of the neighborhood with her heart attempting to beat its way out of her chest. She pulls into the first parking lot she sees, shuts off her car, and leans her head on the dashboard.

Of all the things to happen today, it had to be this. She had to find out that Mistletoe Boy and desk asshole Niall Horan are the same person, and that had to happen at his construction sight and it had to be a total surprise, and now she’s sitting in her car in a parking lot outside of a Whole Foods and this is fucking Beverly Hills or something (Carver really doesn’t know where the fuck she is right now) and she’s probably going to get arrested for having a panic attack in her car.

Deep breaths, Carver, her voice of reason tells her, and she leans her head back and tries to listen. Her dashboard post-it tells her that “EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE” but that doesn’t seem realistic right now.

Nonetheless, Carver says it out loud.

“Everything will be fine,” she tells the steering wheel.

“Everything will be fine,” she tells her bitten-down fingernails.

“Everything will be fine,” she tells her purse, haphazardly thrown on the floor on the passenger’s side as she rushed away from the Wilson house.

“Everything will be fine,” she tells herself.

Then someone knocks on her window, causing her to shriek.

Everything is not going to be fine.

EIGHT.

Carver looks up, eyes wide, and Niall regrets this immediately. When he saw Carver rushing to her car looking as though she’d seen a ghost, he knew instantly that she saw him, realized who he was, and panicked. His brain told him that if he let her go now, he might never see her again.

So he followed her out. He jumped in his truck and trailed her car out of the Wilsons’ fancy neighborhood and into the parking lot of a Whole Foods. Whole Foods is a store that he generally tries to avoid because the prices are ridiculous and all of the Prius drivers in the parking lot give him dirty looks when he parks his truck, but none of that matters right now.

What does matter is Carver, and she looks like she would rather cry than talk to him.

Too bad, because for the first time in a long time, Niall doesn’t want to walk away from this problem.

He meets Carver’s eyes and waves. She grimaces, so he tries to smile. Carver closes her eyes, takes a visible deep breath, and reaches for the door handle.

“Shit.” Niall takes a step back, out of her way, and tries not to panic. He didn’t really think this part through. What the hell is he going to say to this girl? This girl of his dreams? The girl who is now standing in front of him, leaning against her closed car door, looking up at him like he’s already broken her heart.

Damn, what a mess. Niall hates messes.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hi,” Carver says. She looks exactly as he remembered her: green eyes, blond wavy hair, oversize glasses. Just as cute as she was before Christmas.

He said hi, then she said hi, so it’s his turn again. Unfortunately, his mind is blank.

This was much easier in December, when they were standing in the dark under the mistletoe and Niall didn’t yet know that the kiss they were about to share would haunt him for several weeks following.

“Sorry about the note I left you,” Carver says, saving his ass. “I shouldn’t have written any of that.”

Niall shakes his head. “No, I deserved it. I’m a terrible note writer.”

Carver bites her lip; she’s either holding back a smile or a frown. “You could definitely use some practice.” It’s definitely a smile.

Niall smiles back. “Will you let me try again tomorrow?”

Carver nods.

NINE.

Dear Carver,

This is what I should’ve written in the first note: I knew that you were using my desk, and by that I mean that I remember you from the Christmas party. I’m glad that you’re using my desk, but what I’d like better is if you’d go out on a date with me. I think you’re kind and funny and sweet, and I want to learn more about you.

Best,

Niall

TEN.

Dear Niall,

Yes.

- Carver

#1dff #exchanges

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jaydier-blog1 · 6 years

Text

A Guide to Writing PTSD & Psychosis

Something I’ve noticed over my (too many) years on Tumblr is that sometimes, first-hand accounts of mental illness can be hard to come by. It’s totally understandable, and it took me a long time to get to this point, but it can put writers in a bit of a bind who aren’t satisfied with only the DSM-5 and Wikipedia to accurately portray their muse(s)’s MI. That being said, hi, my name is Holo, and I’ve been living with PTSD and comorbid psychosis for almost a decade at this point, and I’d like to share some of my experiences.

This is by no means a complete or exhaustive guide. The thing about brains is that apparently they’re complicated, and that means that everyone develops MI differently. While there are broad strokes that are generally consistent across diagnoses (and said broad strokes are typically what make up the ‘criteria’ of any MI), not everyone will have every single symptom, and not everyone will display the symptoms they do have the same way. I really do recommend using these sorts of guides as guides to writing MI, rather than actual rules.

I’mma start with some basic definitions. PTSD is post-traumatic stress disorder, which is a disorder that develops after witnessing or experiencing a traumatic event. Not everyone who goes through trauma will develop PTSD, and I believe the actual statistic is somewhere between 20-30% (double-check my factcheck before you quote me on that, please). Comorbid mental illnesses (or comorbidities) are MIs that occur with or alongside the ‘primary’ illness, usually because of said ‘primary’ MI. For example, my psychosis is comorbid with my PTSD; it is because of my PTSD that I have psychosis.

Psychosis itself is more of a broad term than a specific diagnosis, and it will generally assume one (or more) of three forms: 1) delusions, 2) hallucinations, and 3) disordered thoughts. I personally struggle mostly with delusions and hallucinations, and I don’t particularly experience disordered thoughts, so that’s what I’ll mostly focus on.

Before I move on, though, I want to share something that an old psychologist of mine told me and that I’ve never really forgotten: it’s possible, and even common, to experience and exhibit occasional symptoms of MI without ever actually having that particular mental illness. A random delusion or general panic attack does not mean your character has psychosis or PTSD. Again, brains are complicated, and what defines a MI diagnosis is the consistent, pervasive presence of multiple symptoms that interfere with the patient’s day-to-day life. You can have obsessive-compulsive tendencies without having OCD. You can be anxious without having anxiety. You can be depressed without having depression.

Another thing is that a lot of MI have symptoms that overlap (which is why comorbid MIs are, again, pretty common). My PTSD comorbidities include depression, anxiety, claustrophobia, and psychosis. In fact, when I first started displaying my PTSD symptoms, I was diagnosed with depression because that was the comorbidity that showed up most prominently at the time, and it took several more years before my doctors and I realized that my depression was a symptom and not the full illness.

Alright! Let’s see if I can break down things into more manageable chunks to talk about.

PTSD

PTSD symptoms are wide, varied, and incredibly subjective from person to person. In my experience, this variance starts with what exactly was the trauma that the PTSD is originating from. Someone who was in a war, for example, will have different triggers and experience different symptoms than someone who was abused (and even then, someone who was verbally abused will once again have a vastly different PTSD experience than someone who was physically abused). Figuring out what your character’s trauma was that caused them to develop PTSD is your vital starting point.

In my experience, PTSD tends to develop slowly. One of the things doctors look for when diagnosing PTSD is that patients are still suffering after six months have passed from the initial trauma. After my initial trauma, I thought I was fine. I was asymptomatic, until months later when symptoms started to creep up on me (and as I mentioned earlier, at first it appeared primarily as depression, and I didn’t even connect it to my trauma at the time).

I experience hypervigilence with my PTSD. I am always aware of where I am, looking for possible exits and escape routes. I get nervous and anxious if I feel trapped in a room or area. (I tried going to a corn maze once. It was a bad time.) I also have an exaggerated startle response. If someone sneaks up on me, accidentally or otherwise, I’m going to react much more dramatically than other people. It’ll frighten me a lot more than it would someone whose startle response isn’t so pronounced. At worst, I’ve had experiences where someone sneaking up on me and startling me as a joke sent me into a full panicked meltdown. (I’d been having a rough time before that, but it was the straw that broke the camel’s back, so to speak.)

To which I’ll segue rather smoothly into things building up! I find it really difficult to ‘destress’ and relax if I have a lot of small triggers and uncomfortable situations pile up on me within a short period of time or without respite, to the point where something rather minor can set off an entire chain reaction and end up with what looks like an extreme overreaction.

Panic attacks can look different from person to person, or even day to day. Sometimes, panic attacks show up for me as in inability to focus, irritation and snapping angrily at every little thing while my hands shake to the point where it’s difficult for me to hold things. Other times, it’ll look like a screaming, crying mess, huddled up in a ball in a corner on the floor. How people express panic attacks varies greatly, and no one way is an ‘incorrect’ portrayal of your character’s panic attacks.

Flashback episodes are an easy, prominent way to showcase PTSD in media, and so it’s something that a lot of people are familiar with, but in a very narrow way. While it’s possible for someone experiencing a flashback to completely lose touch with their current reality and experience an exact repeat of their traumatic incident, that’s rarely the case. More often than not, my flashback episodes feel more like an overlay, where both reality and my flashback are happening at the same time. Innocuous things will suddenly seem much more ominous and dangerous, I’ll mistake the people around me for those who were present during my traumatic incident, and I tend to experience hallucinations (which I will go into more detail about later on). Someone in a flashback episode could even experience age regression, usually back to the age they were during the initial trauma. Flashback episodes and how someone experiences them are extremely personal, and I strongly suggest doing more research on the topic to find more varied accounts, and piece together how your character would respond to these events, if they even experience flashback episodes at all.

I’d like to take this next moment here to mention triggers. Triggers are highly subjective, depending on the person and their trauma, and they can often be obscure and strange. A particular scent or a familiar name could easily be enough to make someone extremely uncomfortable. Sometimes, triggers are only marginally connected to the initial trauma, or not seemingly connected at all. Conversely, something that might seem like an obvious trigger might not be a trigger at all! Brains are fucking weird like that. Also, a very common experience with PTSD (or any MI with triggers) is that day-to-day life is disrupted in favour of specifically avoiding known triggers. Crowded places will trigger my aforementioned claustrophobia, and so I will often avoid social outings, to the detriment of my friendships and familial relationships. (Which is a good example of triggers having nothing to do with trauma, actually. I was alone when my initial trauma happened. Why the hell am I afraid of crowds. @brain explain this) And not only this, but some days a trigger might not affect me at all! Triggers are so, so subjective. They’re a minefield of possibilities and dangers that can shift on what sometimes feels like a daily basis. It can be a real headache to deal with. Taking the time to get into the mind of your character and deciding what triggers them and what doesn’t it another important part of defining how you write their struggle with PTSD.

Psychosis

Since it’s what I have the least experience with, I’ll talk about disordering thinking first. Disordered thinking is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin, and people experiencing disordered thoughts can appear distressed, confused, and have issues articulating their emotions, even to the point of not being able to form full sentences or fully acknowledge questions being asked of them. I strongly suggest doing more research on this topic outside of this post if you think it might apply to your character.

Delusions are, again, fairly self explanatory. Delusions are probably my most prominent version of psychosis that I struggle with on a daily basis. Personally, the most frustrating part of delusions is that I’m well aware that they aren’t real, but I can’t shut them off anyway. In general, my most common delusions is that Person X is out to get me/is trying to sabotage me. Logically, I know that this is ridiculous, but I still have the anxiety and panic that that situation would induce. While I’m sure there are psychotic people out there who cannot distinguish their delusions from reality, and that is absolutely a valid way to portray it, I have personally never met someone like that. It seems to be a lot more common that delusional psychotics are aware that their delusions are not real, and yet we are still forced to change our patterns of behaviour to accommodate for that delusion as if it were real regardless.

Hallucinations are broad and come in way too many forms. Media likes to portray hallucinations as full-bodied apparitions that are indistinguishable from real life, and while that can be correct, I find that I rarely experience those. Most of my hallucinations are tactile hallucinations. These are hallucinations where I feel as though I’m being touched by someone or something, usually in a negative way (these hallucinations can even trigger or be triggered by a flashback episode). There are also auditory hallucinations, visual hallucinations, and even olfactory and gustatory hallucinations, although I’ve never had experiences with the latter two. Often, I find I can fairly quickly differentiate hallucinations from reality, just by doing a quick check around me. If someone is not touching me, the feeling of a hand on my arm is a hallucination. Visual hallucinations (of other people) tend to not interact with the rest of the world the same way a real person would. Auditory hallucinations do not have an obvious source, and those around me won’t react to the noise. And, of course, the usual disclaimer of everyone who experiences hallucinations experience them differently applies here too, this is just my personal experience with hallucinations.

In conclusion

PTSD and psychosis are both broad MIs with a lot of complexity that vary from person to person. I fully encourage you to continue your research into these MIs and discover what is right for your character(s). I’d like to reiterate that this post is non-exhaustive and has focused on my personal experiences with my day-to-day life as someone who has these MIs. This post is absolutely available for you to reblog if you’d like, and my ask box is right here if you have any questions or discussions you’d like to direct to someone willing to be a first-person source on these topics.

I hope I’ve helped! Now go forth and write! :D

#pstd writing guide #ooc;; the universe is a hologram #psychosis writing guide #writing guide

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ghostmartyr · 7 years

Text

Obsession and Fandom

2018 being a year of doing better, apparently I’ve decided that being overly honest about fandom and my interactions with it is an A+ idea.

I think most people on the internet these days have no idea what OCD is. Even the people who know enough to understand that it’s a serious problem don’t often examine it past that. Something to do with washing hands and perfectionism, only damaging and crazy.

OCD is built on doubt.

Pick a thing, any thing, that you believe to be true. You turned off the lights. You didn’t run anyone over on your way home. You would never hurt a child. Your God is real. You love your significant other. Your house is not currently on fire. You don’t live on a fault line. Your hands are clean.

Where OCD starts is in the anxiety of uncertainty. In panic loudly suggesting in your own voice, “what if?” You can’t just remember that you turned off the lights. What if you were wrong? Human memories are so fallible. What if your electricity bill spikes and you can’t pay it and you get kicked out and you don’t have enough money left to eat?

Go check.

Twenty times at four in the morning.

Then one more time, to be certain.

Always one more time.

The cycle itself is very simple. Something makes you anxious. You react with compulsions to wave off the anxiety. The compulsions upgrade the importance of whatever made you anxious. The next time the source of anxiety hits, it’s worse, and the compulsions just keep digging into the rut.

Part of what makes that cycle so hard to shake is the obsession aspect.

The general rule of treating OCD is that you need to cut out compulsive behavior. That’s the component that’s keeping everything running. Understandably, this is harder than it sounds.

OCD is a broken coping mechanism. The compulsions put distance between you and the anxiety. Every time you check, and it’s all okay, your brain rewards you with relief sweet enough that you don’t draw the link between that compulsive behavior and the terror that spawned it. The compulsions are how you’re fighting the anxiety, and not fighting means that this great threat will certainly kill you.

Enter the importance of the obsession.

Someone once made a chart about tumblr, and how it treated emotional response. I don’t remember the specifics, and can’t find it, so I’m kind of just hoping I’m not grossly misrepresenting the example, but it was a simple bar chart, illustrating how tumblr did away with a balanced range of highs and lows. Every bar went through the roof.

Obsession is a time-honored way of describing passionate interests. You don’t just like a movie; you’re obsessed with it. It makes your heart beat faster and consumes all your waking thoughts, because that’s just how much it means to you. It is The Thing for you.

In fan circles, this is perfectly normal. We all show up because we love a thing (or hate how we should have loved a thing), and are willing to devote hours and hours of our loves luxuriating in it. This thing, which is just a movie or a comic book or a band, has intense value to us. It matters. Fiction matters to our reality.

What happens with obsession is that you lose the ability to correctly perceive something’s importance. Because whatever it is you’re obsessed with is The Most Important.

Fannish obsessions are, ideally, about enriching your life. They add joy, or some other sense of fulfillment. OCD obsessions impede life. Things that may or may not be inconsequential become so Important that it’s impossible to think that chilling out about them is even advisable.

It matters that you know the lights aren’t on. How could your brain think otherwise? Worse, it’s dangerous to think otherwise. A clear threat to your livelihood is presented in knowing whether the lights are on or not. Are you really going to be so careless as to disregard that?

It matters.

No, you can’t just shut up about this and go about your life, because it matters.

One of the fascinating things about psychological disorders is how quite a few orderly humans have usually brushed against symptoms. Most people don’t have depression. Many people understand feeling depressed. Most people don’t have anxiety. Pretty much everyone has felt anxious.

Plenty of people have superstitions and rituals.

Plenty of people get obsessed with things.

Unfortunately, that can make it hard to communicate the problem. People relate to other people through their own experiences. If you tell them something that sounds like something they’re familiar with, they’re going to assume that it’s that thing they’re familiar with, not something different. Going with depression, since I think that narrative’s the most common to hear nowadays, many people have had terrible days, and felt really broken, and sad, and like the world is ending.

Then a good night’s sleep happened, or the next day, or the next week, and the trauma was over, so it passed, and it was all good.

So don’t let a few bad days get you down! :) :)

It’s well-meaning, but frustrating. Sounding the same does not equal being the same.

I'm trying to be extra careful about that here, because OCD is misunderstood frequently enough without my help. Discussing behaviors I’m more aware of thanks to an anxiety disorder is not the same as saying those behaviors only ever belong to that thing.

Not every rectangle is a square.

So. Let’s talk why I’m bringing all of this up.

Humans like labeling things. That means that nearly everyone with OCD who has gone and investigated themselves on the internet is familiar with very specific ways to denote how their OCD presents.

Disaster OCD. POCD. ROCD. Harm OCD. Pure O.

To be as clear as I possibly can, all of those extra unique titles are just a fancy way of saying, “I obsess about X.” It is all OCD. They are useful categories when it comes to explaining your personal experience, but the diagnosis remains OCD. The extra fluff of other letters or words is just shorthand.

What I have would be called Pure O. It stands for “pure obsessional.” Like several bits of naming vernacular OCD communities adopt, that’s a misnomer. It gets the name because with Pure O, the compulsion is obsession. All of the compulsions are relatively invisible because they happen internally.

To be even more specific, one of my themes is moral scrupulosity.

An obsession with being moral.

If I’m angry over something, my mind wants five hours of pacing and detailed thought analysis explaining why, in order for it to judge if it is acceptable to have those feelings.

If something hurts me, my mind wants five hours of pacing and detailed thought analysis explaining why, in order for it to judge if it is acceptable to have those feelings.

If I like something untoward, my mind wants five hours of pacing and detailed thought analysis explaining why, in order for it to judge if it is acceptable to have those feelings.

It isn’t enough to have feelings. Those feelings have to be Right. They have to be justified. If I can’t justify them, they shouldn’t be there, because I need to be right. I can’t just dislike something. I can’t just be angry. I definitely can’t like things.

There have to be Reasons.

Before I went to therapy, that was my entire life. Not letting any of my emotional responses go, because the most Important thing in the world was being a good person, and the only way to know that I’m being a good person is to have a solid copy of every argument that I can come up with that’s even slightly to related to whatever it was I was thinking about.

Usually, the end result (using ‘end’ loosely) was a bunch of exhausted, dizzy thoughts, and deep emotional unrest. Along with hours of my life that I’d spent entirely inside my own head, contributing nothing to the outside world.

Fandom right now is such a trip for me, because it’s full of people validating my worst moments. They dance with the rhetoric that the hell inside my head invented for me, and that’s considered right and proper.

Everyone gets so worked up over whether or not something is problematic. Everyone gets so worked up over whether or not it’s okay to ship a thing. Everyone gets so worked up over there only ever being five ways to ethically enjoy a problematic thing. Everyone gets so worked up disagreeing.

Everyone gets so worked up over proving their point.

Because it’s all so important.

When I was first seeking treatment specifically for my OCD troubles, I talked to my therapist about its qualification as an anxiety disorder. Yes, I told her, I spend hours and hours and hours turning things over in my head, it makes me miserable, and it is a problem, but... I don’t feel, like, anxious about it.

She asks me what happens if I stop. I stare at her blankly. ...Stop? ??? What do you mean... stop? There wasn’t any answer to that. Not following through on my compulsions was such an impossibility that I couldn’t even figure out why it was so important to do them.

The compulsions are a broken coping mechanism to keep the anxiety at a distance.

Put in the terms of standard human interaction, it’s a layer of crap meant to distract from the real issue.

The real issue is the feelings, and the refusal to let yourself have them.

You treat OCD by cutting out the compulsions and letting the anxiety happen. Instead of prolonging it, you let all of the torment wash over you. You don’t engage. You just allow it to exist.

Slowly, you ease out of the rut the compulsions dug. Are the feelings fun? No. Does every part of your soul want to kick and scream and defend yourself? Yes.

Will that ultimately make the pain worse?

Hell yes.

There are so many different ways to look at my mental history, look at fandom, and start going off about how damaging certain things can be. I honestly wouldn’t know where to start if I wanted to get through them all. I began this post without a clue where I’d end up.

The thing about making stuff Important is that then you can borrow from other Important things to illustrate your point. After all, it’s all on the same level of importance. This creates a loop of intensity, where the Importance keeps growing, and growing, and any threat to the Important thing is worthy of unholy wrath for the sake of all that is good in the world.

Very, very quickly, rival ships aren’t just an unpleasant thing. They’re dangerous. They caused you discomfort, pain even, and here’s ten thousand reasons that make an ironclad case for destroying every trace of the evil.

Borrowing rhetoric feels good. It turns your uneasy feelings into something bigger than yourself; something righteous. You aren’t just a tired human who wishes fandom liked what you like more, you’re a crusader against injustice.

We’re all tired humans.

Whatever you’re feeling, however awful or good it is, one of the most destructive things you can do to yourself (or others) is demand a reason for it. Humans are emotional idiots capable of feeling more for people who don’t exist than for each other.

It’s okay to have feelings just because you have feelings. They don’t need to be right or wrong. You are allowed to exist without reason. You can read a book or listen to a song and take it however you want.

The people around you can, too.

Obsession steals away perception. It makes small things feel more important than anything else. Shouting at other people for doing things wrong becomes more obviously meaningful than building up what you find to be right.

The most important thing in your fandom experience should be yourself. It is not supposed to hurt you. Pain is the universal sign that something is wrong. Experiencing it during something that should be enriching your life is a problem, and just because other people can set it off doesn’t mean that they’re the cause.

Whenever someone brings up fandom and its purity kick, I remember what it’s like to be trapped in that type of thinking. It’s still something I struggle with. Daily. People diving into it blindly because the train tracks are all set up and ready to go is distressing.

I don’t really know what I’m trying to get at with all of this, so I can’t wrap it up very neatly. I just wanted to share, on the off chance that someone might find something valuable in it.

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theboykingofhell · 6 years

Note

3, 13, 17, 25?

whispers that i love you sensually in your ear

3) An OC I’ve never used for anything

ooch ouch the reject pile... this one’s a little hard to answer because i honestly repurpose my ocs all the time cuz i rly hate giving ideas up but there’s been a few characters in an rp i’ve done that i made but they just... didn’t go anywhere...

or, like, there’s plenty of ocs that last like two seconds because i want a character for so-and-so fandom but then i don’t do shit with them besides think about them a lil... s’why i wish i could draw cuz at least i’d be making them exist in SOME way

OH OH and one time me and britt made vampire brothers together and they were cute as hell and then we forgot about them forever r.i.p.. they were cute

edit: I JUST REMEMBERED. there was this subplot in the original high school version of cc where there was this kind of android/cyborg race that i had shoehorned in there because i was watching a lot of existensial robot anime at the time and i was just so in love with that parents-make-android-clone-of-their-dead-kid trope that i wanted one with rachel’s sister. i don’t feel like making that a thing in the current version of cc though because that’s too much effort and robot media is just making me tired rn but. that was a thing.

13) An OC inspired by something completely unexpected

interesting question... i think, especially because i’ve just been writing a lot in RP communities for so long, it’s kind of new to me to create an OC to serve a purpose in the plot, rather than because i just felt like making an OC and then i later figured that they’d be good to do this-and-this

so when i decided to make adcl i kind of realized ‘oh shit i need a character so that this can happen’ and had to make one appear, which is pretty backwards for how i usually do things

it was also interesting knowing that i needed to have a character that 1) had to embody a concept that didn’t belong to me, and had to do that in an interesting and creative way that was unique to me, and 2) had to have this concept be reflected IN both their superpower, their personality, and their motives as a villain

which eventually led to me having ayameko, and a lot about her character has been really fun beCAUSE a lot about her is very familiar in the usual tropes that surround this concept (the concept being hanahaki disease). i also just absolutely adore writing villains, and her motives especially (that she did everything she did because she was obsessed with the need for people to love her. and NOT to love her in like a pure, true love kind of way, but that she was addicted to manipulating people into situations where they had to die for her) was just? fun and new when i compare her to characters like red or hydra or nathaniel. i have a lot a LOT of characters obsessed with revenge and getting back at people for something, or, like, becoming a certain way in retaliation to something that happened to them. ayameko is fun because something bad happened to her but she came out of it unscated and she was like ‘oh? that was cool? but what if i make that bad thing happen to someone else? noice’

.... so i guess the REAL surprise in this character is that her entire character is inspired around love, unrequited or not, and how it could be used against people in a chaotic manner? i don’t see that shit a lot outside of yanderes (and i dont consider her to be one) so it was fun YEAh

i did not mean to talk about her so much but i love her so :’(

17) The easiest OC for me to write (and why!)

probably red because i’ve been writing for him for over a decade now so at this point it’s like a second skin... especially his dialogue, i can’t stress how effortlessly writing the way he talks is now, when that was something i used to have trouble with a lot back when i first pooped him out

25) An OC I’ve changed a LOT

tsg in general changed a LOT from what it used to be. nora is pretty similar to her original incarnation but nisha is COMPLETELY different. she started out pretty much like the protag of my immortal because i made her, like, last year of middle school i think? so she was just this pale white bitchy too-cool-for-you emo girl in high school named rachael who hated everyone but her far-too-hyper friends that she would put up with day by day, and who kind of stumbled into this big dramatic mess of a plot...

... which is so funny to think about. anyway now she’s this shy indian girl with ocd who is kind of stuck in that halfway point between college and the real world, and the reason she gets into the mess she’s in is partially because of her insistence to butt into her adopted father’s cases (he’s a cop and she’s a wannabe for all the wrong reasons) and partially because she and her bestie is getting stalked, so there’s a way more fun dynamic of her kinda-not-really getting herself into trouble that she likely wouldn’t have been able to avoid anyway. she became one of my absolutely favorite characters to write so quickly because of that (like, when it comes to all my narrator characters, she’s definitely my favorite one) and it’s WILD thinking about how. outright goddamn boring she used to be

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wxldchxld · 7 years

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So I feel the need to elaborate on my earlier post because after scrolling tumblr I see that somehow the age old argument of “you can’t write this/I can write whatever I want” is exploding at the moment.

While I would prefer you tag this as drama or whatever, that’s not what I’m annoyed about. I got mad because I saw three consecutive posts about school shootings and none of them were tagged.

I agree that this is a terrible tragedy and that America’s gun control policies are ridiculous at best, but all in all I have to protect me first. I have OCD and GAD and I’m currently on a medication that is largely ineffective for both. This leaves me prone to major panic attacks. Not because I just see your content and get immediately triggered into an attack but because I work at a high school.

The more content I see about see about a subject like that, the harder it is for me to keep from obsessing about it, which leaves my anxiety high, which means that tomorrow I could already be on edge and risk having a panic attack that would be detrimental to my career.

So I’m asking nicely, one final time, for you to block it with something like current events or something super common.

STOP PUTTING YOUR FUCKING AESTHETIC INTO YOUR TRIGGER WARNING TAGS. I fucking... I’m really losing my patience. I will NOT go through each blog to see all the weird tiny text and capital letters and brackets and dashes and tiny poop emojis you want to put in a tag that is meant to be helpful to other people’s state of mind. Have those if you want to, but have them after real fucking tags that I can block without adding 20 different variations to my blacklist.

This goes for all this drama that is going on here too guys. I deal with so much fucking drama IRL. I get it if, on either side of this argument, you’re offended and hurt by what is going on, but I’m not a part of it. I don’t want to be. Stop bringing me into it because you think everyone should HAVE to hear your side of something. Do you know what I did today? I talked to a kid who knows his dad’s going to whip him over the weekend so no one at school can see the marks, to a young man who just got released from the psychiatric wing about how he wants to die, and heard about another that was hospitalized and one that was taken into DCS custody.

I fucking love my job. I wouldn’t trade it for the world, but pile all those REAL issues on top of boy/girl drama and “I hate this teacher” and then my own personal life, I am up to my eyeballs in drama. I’m allowed to say that I don’t want any more of it. I don’t feel bad about that because I feel like what I do at work is more important than anything on the computer and I just don’t have the energy for both.

So like I said, in both of these issues, I understand you’re upset and I’m very sorry. I hate to see people being hurt, it’s not that I don’t care. I just can’t see it. I would do it for you guys, and I expect for you to have that same measure of respect for me.

Once more and finally: please tag your material with tags I can easily block, from current events to fandom discourse to nsfw or I will unfollow you without notification. This is not vague blogging. It’s not at anyone. It’s at EVERYONE that has been doing this. And I’m not angry, I’m not calling people out, I’m not saying I dislike anyone, but I’m just super super done with asking grown ass people to do the same thing over and over again.

#psa #ooc

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valkerymillenia · 7 years

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I ask all 50!!! Fill us with fun facts about you!

Holy shit, again?! I’m not that interesting, you know?But ok, I’ll try, I’ve already answered some though.

1: What color are your socks?

Answered.

2: Have you ever lied about your age? Why?

Answered already!

3: What is something you regret in the past month?

So much wasted time…

4: Do you believe in love at first sight?

I’ve answered this before- no, I believe in attraction at first sight; love, however, needs to be earned, grown and nourished.

5: When was the last time you wrote someone a letter on paper?

Do notes to translate conversations into paper for my deaf dad count? If so, then today.If you mean real letters… I honestly don’t remember.

6: How old were you when you first learned how to ride a bike? Who taught you?

Answered!

7: Do you get along with your parents? Why or why not?

Oh my gods, this is such a loaded question…Ok, I’ll try to keep it simple. Who am I kidding? That’s not possible.

Mom- ok so my mom is denial of any form of mental illness but she clearly has manic depression and war PTSD since forever. So as a result my mom has always been a bit aloof, irresponsible, neglectful, super permissive, a sneaky opportunist and a slightly childish and impulsive. Never thinks ahead, just goes nuts on the moment or spends too much time asleep (no in between).So my mom wasn’t the best mother in the world, she was a great caregiving and spoiling mother when we were babies but as soon as we gained minimal independence (aka around 5 years old) she just slacked off on the motherhood department. She’s not very bad, she’s just irresponsible and opportunistic and won’t interfere if we need help which doesn’t suit a mother but she’s a great person so she makes a very good friend (as long as you set boundaries and basic duties), she’s funny and sweet and a bit geeky, she’s also beautiful and used to be a model before I was born so she’s that fashion and beauty oriented friend (if fact she’s a certified beautician and taught me all she knows).So… Complicated relationship, lots of love but not the best mom (can’t blame her, grandma was a bitch).

Dad- I love him, he raised me, but I was also his main caregiver since I was 10 since he’s deaf and crippled. He’s a funny and permissive dad (except when he had explosive bouts of rage but that was a phase…a traumatic and slightly violent phase around the divorce time but short), he tried to be a provider and friend with shared interests with me. BUT he was also quite neglectful, being deaf made him very introverted, paranoid and isolated so he just let me run wild (I didn’t, I was taking care of the house and school instead) while he was cooped up playing pc games. We have that friendly daddy’s girl relationship but we both lack trust, we keep our more important thoughts to ourselves and I’m always afraid that as a deaf person he’ll misunderstand important things or judge me for whatever (and he’s always also feeling judged) so our relationship often feels shallow, he’s also the type in denial about people’s mental illness.

Biological father- Fucking complicated. As a little child he babysat me and was our neighbor so I was always hanging out and getting candy, he was also the person that cherished me the most to take hundreds of photos of me. I moved at age 5 so after that we only communicated through my grandma when she traveled between countries, he’d send me presents and worry about me. I only found out he was my progenitor when I was 10 and it took me years to accept it. Saw him again when I was 18, in fact it was like shock therapy- I spent a whole month living with him as I visited my hometown again. He likes to spoil me as much as he can and he’s very kind but also naive and stubborn and not the type that likes to talk about feelings or important things so talks between us are extremely awkward chitchat.

Stepdad- Terrible relationship. He’s the kind of person that is a caregiver for us all out of duty but then uses that to emotionally manipulate everyone. He’s small minded, old fashioned and selfish and blames everyone for his problems, he also seems to have a personal thing against me- pretty sure he doesn’t hate me but I’m his natural verbal punching bag, anything I say or do in front of him, no matter how innocent, even standing still for a moment or asking to pass the juice at dinner, he twists everything into insults and psychological abuse. Luckily my sister is his baby so she escapes his judgement but he wasn’t that much of a present parent to her either and let her run wild a lot (I’m so glad I could turn that around and teach her to be way more responsible than her parents). The only reason I don’t totally hate him is because he gave me sister, who I love most in the world.

8: What’s your favorite season?

Answered!

9: Do you currently like someone?

Yup, also answered before.

10: Have you ever used an Ouija board?

I know how but I never used it, as a Wiccan my preferred specialty for spiritual communing was pendulum scrying.

11: What’s the last song you sang?

“Havanna” by Camilla Cabello has been stuck in my head for weeks.

12: What’s your favorite scent?

Telling me to choose just one fav of anything is hard af… But here are some favs.

Fresh peppermint, lavender, petrichor, burnt eucalyptus, baby powder, sea water, freshly baked bread, and oddly enough- gasoline.

13: What’s your favorite urban legend?

Can’t choose favs but off the top of my head… La Llorona.

14: What’s a bad habit that you have?

Procrastinating.

15: What’s a strange habit that you have?

All my odd stims and ocd rituals.

16: What’s the first instrument that you learned to play?

Answered.

17: How would you describe your ‘type?’

Already answered in the previous ask meme.

18: Would you rather stay in or go out?

Both, when I go out I make it special and try to make the most of it because it’s rare… But I guess I do prefer the safety and routine of staying home.

19: What was the last thing you said to your mom?

“Never going to see what you borrowed from dad again, am I? This is why people don’t trust you, you never keep your promises…

Well, whatever! How are the stitches? You’re better, right?

Ok, put my sister on. Kisses, bye.”

20: Do you want to get married someday?

Already answered in the previous asked meme.

21: Have you ever snuck out?

Not that I needed to with my kind of parents but yeah, a couple of times.

22: Can you sing well?

I love to sing but whether I’m good or not is up to the listener, I can post a song sample if anyone wants.

23: What’s an embarrassing thing that happened this week?

Other than grovelling desperatly for help?

24: When was the last time you went sledding?

Never?

25: Have you ever/do you liked someone you know you can never be with?

Yeah.

26: Do people often mispronounce your name?

Yes! If you’re not a Portuguese speaker, I DARE you to pronounce my surname. Go ahead- Coelho.

27: Would you like to live in another country?

I do miss my home country, South Africa holds my heart… and I’ve dreamed of a stint in Japan. But all in all, I like this country, it’s…interesting, safe.

28: Do you like to watch ghost-hunting shows?

Not really, they tend to be too over the top and stereotypical.

29: Who was the last person you said you loved to?

Boyfriend.

30: What’s something you’d like to be better at?

Follow through.

31: Have you ever stayed up to talk to someone who was sad?

Very often, Some right here on tumblr.

32: What was the last thing you cooked?

Chili con carne. Been eating leftovers of it for a whole week now.

33: Do you think you would make a good parent?

Answered already.

34: Do you have trouble sleeping at night?

Answered!

35: Where is your best friend right now?

Given the day and time, my sister is probably at dance practice now.

36: How long does it take you to get ready in the morning?

Depends if I’m making an effort (an hour) or if I’m just being casual (20min).

37: How late do you usually stay up at night?

Answered.

38: When was the last time you cried and why?

I don’t know…

39: Have you ever won a contest?

Yes, started this year by winning a Justice League pop contest. But that was more of a giveaway... Actual contest? I won a couple b of art contests before but nothing big.

40: Can you draw well?

I have art posted here so you tell me.

41: Would you ever date someone you met on Tumblr/the internet?

Sure. I already do.

42: What was the last thing you ate?

….Bread.

43: Do you think you’re/you’d make a good boyfriend/girlfriend?

I sure hope so, I try my best… But to be honest I don’t think I’m a very good partner.

44: Have you ever had a near-death experience?

About 6 actually.

45: What do you think people think of you?

I don’t know… I’ve been told I make people feel comfortable and I’m easy to open up to? But to be honest I don’t really know.

46: What is your middle name and do you like it?

Augusto. My mom’s maiden name, because that’s how it works here (Name+ maybe 2nd name + mom’s surname + dad’s surname).

Yes, I like it, it’s latin. But people sometimes mix it up with my paternal grandma’s first name.

47: Are you close with either of your parents?

In my own way, yes. Both mom and dad.

48: Do you like yourself?

Some days…

49: State five facts about your appearance –

-I get a lot of comments on my boobs and I really don’t mind

-I look pale because I stay inside a lot but I tan very easily, probably because my mom is dark

-I love my tattoos, I’m proud of them

-I wear glasses or contacts in important occasions

-I have the worst time looking people in the eye

50: State five facts about your personality –

-I’m patient but full of anxiety

-I don’t have just one personality

-I try to be as unbiased and non-judgmental as possible

-I’m obsessive about random things

-I like solitude but I also like interacting (though the more non-physical the better)

#ask meme #rach rambles #personal

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radioactive-tiefling · 7 years

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Ask meme: Lux

My good good buddy @captain-atlantic asked me to answer all 30 questions for one of my characters, so here’s lux! My newest dnd character, a fallen aasimar raven queen Warlock.

1: What’s your OC’s biggest insecurity and how would they react if someone pointed it out to them?

Lux is insecure about her motives for what she does sometimes, but feels it is wrong to doubt it. If someone else doubts it, it gives her a chance to explain at length exactly why she’s doing what’s best, and convince herself as well as the person who doubted her.

2: If your OC wants to buy a firearm, what it might be for?

In a modern au where guns exist, I think it would have been to kill her abusive guardian/ break herself and her friend out of the church where they grew up.

3: Does your OC behave differently around different people, if so with whom and how?

yes, she always had masks for different people. It used to be she seemed either incredibly pious or incredibly rebellious to everyone except her friend lyra, but after they’ve been separated for a year she puts on a more secretive face with her, like she’s trying to hide something. With the other members of the party she purposely goes out of her comfort zone to try and make connections.

4: Would your OC want to involve themselves in humanitarian work ? If yes, then for what? If not, then why not?

She kind of thinks of what she’s doing already as humanitarian, even if it involves helping police death. However, she has some issues with many churches and other organizations that claim to be humanitarian, since she thinks they’re all too easily corrupted.

5: How would your OC generally react to someone being verbally abusive towards them for no apparent reason?

she would ignore it at first, and try to appear sarcastic and jaded about the comments. If she responds at all, it would be with joking agreement or by making fun of the abuser. If she ever actually looks angry, you should run.

6: Does your OC have a realistic image of their own intelligence?

she knows she’s pretty smart, but she constantly beats herself up about her slow (in her mind) progress. She trusts what she already knows, but works hard to learn more because she believes it’s the only way to move ahead.

7: Does your OC have any irrational phobias?

Anything/ anyone being in her mind. Her angel spoke mind to mind with her for her whole life, and now even the message cantrip can cause her to panic, especially if she isn’t expecting it. Possession and gaslighting are a real fear of hers and any time anyone is in her mind, for any reason, her first thought is that the angel is back.

8: How is/was your OC’s relationship with their parents?

she never knew her parents. They were farmers and gave her up as an infant. They were devastated about it, but poor enough that they couldn’t afford to raise a blind child who couldn’t help make money on the farm. They chose not to visit her or know her because they didn’t want her to miss them.

9: Does your OC feel a pressure to achieve or are they content and calm with doing what they can at the moment?

she feels incredible pressure to achieve. Despite only just getting her powers, she is desperate to impress the raven queen and advance in her forces, and feels that nothing she does is enough to progress the way she needs to.

10: Does your OC guard their emotions by being tough? If not how would they?

she mostly guards her emotions with humor and dry, sarcastic comments about herself. Either that or by ignoring emotions as much as possible.

11: How would your OC react to hearing they’re adopted?

She already knows, and did since she was a child, that her parents gave her up for adoption.

12: What is one of the most primary thing your OC feels that is missing from their life?

friends, and the ability to get close to people without hurting them or them hurting you.

13: What kind of situations does your OC avoid the most?

Anything involving organized religion

14: If your OC gets into a fight with their best friend, would they wait for their friend to make up with them, or would they try to make up with their friend?

most of the time she would try to make up first. However, she sometimes gets into fights because of something she’s hiding, and in that case she continues to hide it rather than make up.

15: Does your OC consider themselves a good person?

no, not really. She works for death and is obsessed with killing a creature most people would see as “purely good.” She pretty much decided to leave the idea of goodness behind her, because people will never accept goodness from someone they think is bad.

16: Is your OC good at giving others validation of their feelings and making them feel understood?

She thinks she’s not great at it, but she really tries if it’s someone she cares about or wants to grow closer to. She’s naturally charismatic, so even if she doesn’t know how people feel they tend to listen to her anyway.

17: Does your OC suffer from any mental health issues?

she probably has PTSD, and minor OCD.

18: What kind of intrapersonal values does your OC have? (values about their self, what makes them feel like a valid person)

she feels valid as long as she’s working towards a goal. Whether that’s making friends or impressing the raven queen, progress and new discoveries fuel her and make her even more motivated to keep going.

19: What boosts your OC’s confidence the most?

the biggest confidence boost is when she gains more power, or when someone actively chooses to do something nice for her.

20: Does your OC hurt others often unintentionally? If yes, how?

yes, often by shutting them out of things or appearing to brush them off.

21: Does your OC hurt others often intentionally? If yes, how?

yes, for her job or for a goal. She uses magic to control or hurt people most of the time.

22: How does your OC usually show affection? Are they openly romantic or more restricted with their affectionate emotions?

she used to be much more affectionate, with her best friend. If she’s close to someone, she’s generally a very tactile person since with lyra they had to be touching to even communicate (she’s blind, lyra’s mute, so they used a form of physical sign language.)

23: Does your OC tend to hide something about their personality/essence when meeting new people? If yes, what?

yes, she mostly hides the fact that she’s not really a “good” person. She also tends to hide insecurity and reactions to anything that might hurt her.

24: How would your OC react if they got humiliated by someone in a group of people?

probably laugh about it. If it was really bad, she’d cause a scene with magic to scare them out of messing with her again.

25: How would your OC process the grief caused by the death of a loved one?

she wouldn’t do it very well. She’s new to working with the raven queen, but currently sees it as a solution to everything if she can just get strong enough. She would probably remain in denial/bargaining, insisting that if she works harder and becomes stronger she can fix it.

26: What is the most intense thing your OC has been battling with?

PTSD from her childhood with an abusive angel whispering in her head night and day. She’s still trying to get past it over a year after falling.

27: Does your OC practise any kind of escapism? If yes, what kind?

her main form of escaping is her dry humor and self deprecation.

28: How would your OC react if a bully stole their lunch money in high school?

probably with a quick command spell to get it back, then walk off leaving them wondering what she did to them.

29: How do they behave on the face of a conflict?

almost scary casual, trying to look the part of a warlock of the raven queen to prove her worth.

30: What makes your OC defensive quickest?

Slights on people she cares about, and people questioning her motives.

#asks #my ocs #lux

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jameelajamilfan · 6 years

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Press/Video: Jameela Jamil Is Shutting Up and Making Space in 2019

New Post has been published on https://jameelajamil.org/2019/02/01/press-video-jameela-jamil-is-shutting-up-and-making-space-in-2019/

Press/Video: Jameela Jamil Is Shutting Up and Making Space in 2019

youtube

The ‘Good Place’ actress and body positivity activist joins the #AerieREAL role model family.

If you’re familiar with Jameela Jamil’s, work you may know her for a few things: her role as the narcissistic but always well-intentioned Tahani Al-Jamil on NBC’s The Good Place; her fiercely vocal stance against photoshopping and airbrushing in advertisements and magazine covers; her news-making tweet in which she hoped certain celebrities “shit their pants in public” for hawking “detox teas” that promise to help with weight loss and bloating. In her 32 years on earth, the British actress has battled an eating disorder, hearing loss, and a car accident that broke her back. Yet she’s come out on the other side, starting a beloved life positive moment called “I, Weigh” and as of today, Jamil is one of the newest members of the #AerieREAL Role Model family for spring 2019. Ahead of the reveal, I phoned Jamil to discuss how the body positivity movement can change moving forward, why she wished Aerie existed when she was a teen, and why in 2019 she’s making space, not taking it.

When Aerie revealed you were going to join their campaign, it seemed like a match made in heaven. Why did you want to work with them?

I wanted to work with Aerie because they’re one of the only brands I’ve ever seen actually take inclusion seriously, and it’s not performative. It runs throughout the entire brand: their desire to reflect, on their website and in their stores, what we see outside in everyday life, which just never happens. Seeing people from all walks of life and all ages modeling underwear and modeling clothes was just such a breath of fresh air. When I walked into their store I realized how much I could’ve benefited from having a store like that and a company like that when I was younger, so I was very excited to be a part of it. Your body’s been through a lot, between an eating disorder and a serious car accident. How has that affected the way you treat your body now?

I treat my body with great respect now and I make sure to check in with it and thank it every so often. Because I’m aware of what it’s like to not be able to go to the toilet by myself, or to be able to breathe because I had asthma, or be able to hear, because I was deaf as a child. I also stopped menstruating when I had an eating disorder, so my body has been in jeopardy so many times that I’ve, frankly, by the age of thirty, a little bit late but better late than never, learned to treat it with lots of kindness and respect. I don’t talk shit to myself anymore. Every time it crops up I stick up for myself the way that I would for a friend or for a stranger even. The things that women say to themselves in their head, they would never tolerate being said to someone that they love. So I’ve decided to be my own best friend.

I’ve become the loudest voice that’s been allowed in body positivity and I think that has given some people the wrong idea.

How does being your best friend manifest itself?

I did EMDR therapy, which is a specific kind of therapy that removes the conditioning of irrational thought. So it goes right to the core of the problem. It’s very good for PTSD, anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and OCD—all of which I had. Within a matter of months, it just sort of extracted the root of the problem, which meant that I didn’t have to deal with the symptoms anymore. So that was a big thing that I did. I also made the decision three years ago that most of my money that I would spend on corrective or beauty items I’d save up for therapy. I started doing that when I was 29, and that was probably the biggest act of self love I’ve ever done. So no cellulite cream, no stretch mark cream, nothing anti-aging, I just put all of my money into a piggy bank that I would’ve spent on must have products. I just did therapy and then bought myself some self love.

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Body image and body positivity can be super personal. How do you discuss these topics without alienating people?

I link body positivity with mental health, which makes it a much bigger and broader conversation. I think that we don’t do that enough I think I’ve kind of moved it more into a life positive movement and more into mental health discussion, and I think we can all relate to that. Body positivity is something that we have to be very conscious of not leaving women who are of minorities out of. We need to include everyone, so I just make sure to be inclusive with my language and make sure that I’m involving activists from different minorities in my work and giving them a platform in order to make sure that everyone knows it’s a conversation for all of us to have.

For example, the MeToo movement got kind of taken over by a lot of very famous, slender, predominantly white, straight women actresses. I think it’s important not to let that happen with body positivity, which it does happen. Often, in the last year I’ve become the loudest voice that’s been allowed in body positivity and I think that has given some people the wrong idea: that I think that I speak for all people, which I don’t. It’s just that I have a platform and a privilege that allows me to be listened to and heard, when other people who are actually struggling with these things are being ignored. I’m not afraid of being annoying, I’m just afraid of being complicit in a problem that is systemically destroying the mental health of most of the women around the world.

So how do you deal with the criticism?

I don’t take it personally anymore, and I think I used to get defensive and when I would be called out for not being intersectional enough or just feel frustrated that people were expecting too much of me, but now I just shut up and I listen and I realize that there are people who are going through a lot and I would like to help those people, so I just focus on the good. I also don’t receive a lot of negativity or backlash. Most people support me and my profile growing in the way that it has, has been a sign of mass support of so many people who were just done, they feel the same way as me. I’m not on the wrong side here, I’m on the right side, the feminist side of mental health of young people and their well being internally and externally, of women and people everywhere.

The hashtag is #AerieReal. When do you feel you’re most real?

I feel I’m most real when I’m cuddling my boyfriend, I do [laughs]. I feel most real when I’m spooning. There are so many great role models. Who are some of your own role models in this space?

I mean, Samira Wiley is one of them, so I was super starstruck to meet her and to be photographed alongside her. That was a big seal of approval. Janet Mock is someone that I’m very, very obsessed with, and think that what she has done for our culture is just so extraordinary and she’ll be remembered forever and go down in history as such a game changer for the trans community. Roxanne Gay, I think she’s a real hero of mine, and her books have taught me so much and called me out so brilliantly. As in, in reading them I’ve been able to find my own mistakes and learn, via her, how to do better and be better.

I think we bring a lot of ego into activism and wokeness these days.

What did you learn from her books?

I’ve learned from her books about white feminism and how much we could leave people out of the conversation and what makes you a bad feminist and how you can call yourself out, and that that can be okay to make mistakes. You know, she calls herself out on her own blind spots, and I think that’s a really important thing to do. I think we bring a lot of ego into activism these days and ego into wokeness. I think that that can sometimes make you afraid of admitting when you don’t know something, and therefore you don’t ask, and therefore you don’t learn. Even someone as brilliant and accomplished and educated as Roxanne Gay, to sometimes owning up to her weaknesses or her blind spots, has been so inspiring so many people that I know, because it makes you feel like it’s okay to just keep learning and if you’re a bad feminist now, it doesn’t mean you’ll always be a bad feminist.

We’re having a lot of conversations in the office about the kind of energy that we’re bringing into 2019. How would you describe the energy you’re bringing into this year?

It’s make space, don’t take space. That’s the thing that I’m gonna bring into 2019, is making sure that I create space for other women. I create space for people from minorities, and people who are living in experiences that I have not myself had to live through. Recently I turned down a role of a deaf woman, because even though I used to be deaf as a child, I’m no longer completely deaf. And so that role should go to someone who still currently cannot hear because there’s a brilliant deaf actress out there somewhere who we don’t know her name, but she can’t get the role. I do think it’s really important to start to make sure that we stop being greedy and we just step aside for one another, and don’t fear each other. We’ve been taught to fear each other by men, and feel like there’s only space for one, and that’s a lie. That’s so that we don’t all join together and take up loads of space and become equal. So supporting other women, making sure that I put my money where my mouth is, and pass the mic.

Source: Elle

#aerie #aeriereal #jameela jamil #the good place #tahani al jamil #tahani al-jamil

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leo-dale19 · 7 years

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Where dreams lead

The Serotonin God has led me down many a winding road - I have followed him to the point of exhaustion, he cannot escape me, he is by no means out of sight but he repeatedly disappears and reappears from behind the trees that are the various obstacles of unlucky fate that separate me from permanent reunion with him. Unless I get permanent brain damage, we will meet again and be united with the present moment anew. This lesson goes to show you should never let go of your loved ones, because you have no idea where you’ll end up without them and there are no guarantees. Well, there are, but merely on a divine level.

I would be highly intrigued to know what is currently happening on a subconscious level, what canals of my birth trauma am I currently unconsciously passing through again amidst the current everyday chaos. On saturday night I had the interesting return of 2001: A Space Odyssey into my conscious space. More precisely, I suddenly remembered Peter Hyam’s sequel to Kubrick’s masterpiece, the tight associations it holds with January/February 2012, the longest, grayest, winter I could remember, literally a pale shadow of its 2011 predecessor (although that comparison mainly refers to March and its 2011 analogue). I was convinced that 2001 world of eternal ectasy was truly eternal, I didn’t see how it was subject to physical laws of what chemicals I may or may not have ingested into my body. But God works in strange ways. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V68pnTJwjQU

For the first time in a very long time, I took advantage of a sudden moment of mental lucidity to take pictures of myself looking more or less presentable. This is a rare occurence, as although I do not consider myself unattractive, I have one of the main distinguishing features of a paranoid schizophrenic - I am very, very bad at regularly taking care of myself. One can deifnitely argue that self-absorbedness is more frequent in moments of mental insecurity, which I agree with, but my paranoias go to such extents that I get states where I am totally unaware of myself as “really being there”. Like I am so absorbed in my ego that all I feel is merely my mental image of myself, rather than what I actually look like to other people. So on Saturday I actually had the luck to experience a brief moment of mental lucidity where I was somewhat in limbo between two states - being paranoically anxious and being self-aware enough to realise what I seem like to the outside world. And so I decided a little cam-whoring was necessary, as I could indulge in some potentially constructive self-loving. That is, undeniably still a state of mental insecurity, but not as detached from reality.

Vkontakte has become a bizarre obsession. I plan on keeping my russian interest going for as long as possible, but the group of people I have come to know on Vkontakte know nothing of who I really am and I shamelessly take liberties in the image I create of myself to them. I am aware it is an escape. I often wondered whether they could realise that too, but people aren’t stupid - I know they do, although they obviously can’t complete the rest of the picture as they lack the facts and can only guess at what my true essence is. I think they are strangely tolerant or just bizarrely intrigued - or perhaps quite simply both - by this foreigner who speaks perfect russian, which, if they are to believe him, he learned all by himself. I also suspect life in russia is quite drab so there is no real time to reproach other people for not getting on with their life (although there probably is but more within the social-status confines of their own everyday society) or quite simply to be picky about fantastically weird occurences that you come across: my mum mentioned the USSR made you appreciate the simple things a lot more, and a an anglo-german russian-speaker who lives in france is more bizarre and interesting than it is worthy of cynically questioning. Although those russians are not a rarity either, I can feel a lot of what I was convinced for many years was unique to the English - a merciless contempt for those more talented than one’s self (although the english, as far as I can tell, are still worse and generally obnoxious about it, since it isn’t merely a petty character trait but a whole institutionalised social class mentality). I’ve already come across a few people on my adventures who I plan to never trust or have any serious dealings with, as, I kid you not, it would not surprise me that if we were to meet, they would give me away to the secret police or some shit because of their immature teenage jealousy, making up some pretext to have me taken away for good, away from the world where I may potentially humble them. Russia, I feel, is one of those countries where truth is a very, very bizarre phenomenon and it is very hard to establish what it is in a country so vast and so varied, the accounts I get of life in Russia differ so much among themselves that it’s impossible to know what really goes on, although inevitably I have been able to attribute certain views to certain precise character types, for example a common archetype is that of the Denial russian: these are generally reasonable looking types, not necessarily extreme-oriented, however they have no interest in a free society, justify the authoritarian regimes they’ve lived through, blatantly deny the existence of certain horrors of russian society to the point where talking to them feels more like reading a history book on Soviet Propaganda than it does like getting an objective view on what’s going on in the country. I accentuate “reasonable-looking” as I feel in the western world we immediately imagine anybody who supports anything totalitarian as a raving fanatic, but we’ve become quite desensitised and we must remember that evil in the vast majority of cases is criminally banal; and if one gives it some serious thought, it could never be any other way, since evil can only be committed by superficial people for superficial motivations. It is destructive and intentionally illusory, whereas love allows life to grow. It is therefore intriguing to see very ordinary people supporting such great evil in such a petty manner; would they maybe be more worthy of respect if they at least had some finesse to their wrong-doing? These people generally have a very strong vanity streak and there are more pictures of them on their pages than ther are of anything else. One could say I am the last person to judge, but I’ve realised my narcissism is quite often merely a by product of my unstable state of mind, an energy that stabilises me so as not to go fully psychotic, but then again, it is possible I am more truly vain than I think. And even then, or rather, especially then, it is a sort of pseudo-narcissism, i.e a hypersensorial daydream, not an actual philosophy to life that I put into action and impose on people around me, I have gained too much self-awareness for that. It is merely an energy that takes hold of my present moment awareness. But on top of that, in the depths of universal love something tells me that I cannot really be a narcissist. Dave Bowman powering through the red Stargate, the light reaching 6 year old me on the grass next to lake Divonne tells me that my mind is blessed with forces too great and beautiful to truly have narcissism at the core of its inner essence. It is a symptom of my illness, and Universal Love is with me. The Consciousness Network knows of me and I have experience in accessing it. It just blows my mind that I have managed to lose touch with it, as this seems unthinkable every time I come in conatct with it. Sand, trickle not through my fingers but shape into an empire!

I am having a sudden OCD panic attack so will have to take a break from writing this (there is still more). The sudden lucidity that allowed me to write everything above is dissipating. It will return. I must believe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR98qq9iHmw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pi9buHnx9rU

Underworld are a recent revelation; not a discovery, as I have known of them for several years. It is just that something has grasped me in their music of late, something very homely, friendly to Karl Hyde’s voice combined with their sound textures. Songs like Bird One are moments where, much like I had at times in the past about russians, I catch glimpses (of a man, moving uphill) of hope for english and anglosaxons, that is in a Eugenics sort of way, namely that, despite their general contempt for all things rational, their anarchic spirit gives them a raw spirituality that I find mainland europeans can tend to lack once taken over by their abstract concepts. There is a certain finesse to the constant crescendo that is Bird One that I feel could only come from the souls of a couple of english blokes, a certain friendly naivety that gets lost when for example their mainland european counterparts try to emulate it; although I generally tend to prefer the French to the English, I know from personal experience that the latter have more of a natural feel for making music. I have started to take racial theories seriously recently - not in the sense that I feel they are truly grounded in reality or are necessarily of any value, but in the sense that I believe that people don’t just make these things up, and in our distinct social groups prevalent energy trends can be mutually communicated in a deeply profound way, creating a mystical sense of unity, for better or for worse. I am admittedly highly untypical for an englishman, for various reasons, but even though I have never lived there I feel a sort of strange sentimental attachment to certain things english, things that speak very directly to my immediate behaviour and personality, more so than many french things, although I do still have a special connection with various of the latter having grown up with them and all. I found that for a long time the way I thought in Russian was more cloesly linked to the english part of my brain than to the french part.

Underworld give me hope for the english. That the english are more than the friday night pub-drunkards, or the social-status obsessed sociopaths that populate the country, that they really have a Weltanschauung within their character that is worth sharing. The english generally seem like uncivilised barbarians compared to their european neighbours, and there have been points where I may have considered the possibility that they were quite simply an inferior nation with lower capacities. They have no real sense of culture, any idea of what it is to be human, what it is to be. I feel they are liberal in a way that other european countries aren’t - whereas in France people, I feel, are truly concerned about democracy and freedom, in England liberal mentality seems nothing more than a social trend that shifts according to the tide, for example english people are traditionally the worst homophobes I have ever met, back in the 60′s they effectively condemned one of the world’s greatest minds, Alan Turing, to death for his sexual orientation, and suddenly as of a few years ago it became socially accepted that sexual equality was a thing and now everyone goes along with it likes it’s totally normal. The english have no real values. They are an entertainment culture like the americans. I even find the russians are sometimes more respectable in their fierce respect for their culture, (although I do find them very superficial themselves of late and appreciate the english’s basic niceness which I think is more profound than the paranoid frown russians greet everyone with). But they produce wonders of art that make me think twice. There is something godly in that fuck-off anarchy. Yes, I am a hopeless romantic. But by God does the world need us. It is hopeless without us.

A maintes reprises over the past days I have been convinced that my brain is gone for good and that my Odyssey will have no stargate ending, i.e a banal end in which the computer actually manages to kill me because I forgot my space helmet. This is all because this time last week, I ate about 12 entire packets of ham within the space of 3/4 days, since I realised it had a great capacity for digesting serotonin, i.e to end my current mental drought. I went a bit too full retard on this one though and have been feeling what I believe are the effects of excess serotonin: headache, confusion, trouble with memory, slight depressin etc. I pray to god and have not lost hope that my mind will gradually stabilise, but I will say one thing - there is no worse fate in this world than being boring and superficial. I have felt states of mind so dull these past days I became terrified at the prospect I may never rediscover my former psychotic Eden, but also horrified at the idea that people actually live in such limited states of consciousness. No fucking wonder there is so much evil in our world, I certainly don’t blame anyone for resorting to it. I would literally rather die than live in those states for the rest of my life and so keep going merely in the hope that this is all purely temporary, which I tend to truly believe. Moral of the story is, kids, don’t eat 9 packets of ham within the space of two days, cus y’all might fuck up yo brains in doing so. A worthy death is worth far more than a meaningless existence.

To elaborate on 2001 - Kubrick’s 2001 is more than just a film for me, for many many years, until the wonders of modern psychiatry altered Universal Love’s playing fields, that world was a crucial part of my general life perception. It was an energy that flowed like a river underneath all occurences of the physical world, reminding me of the divine and greater good in this life. It is something supernatural, on a heightened sensory level, where my inner world mixes ecstatically with the ouer. It is when I lost those sensations that I inherently started to become a disgustingly superficial person. Religious faith in such things is crucial, as life may take them away.

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supernovawriting · 8 years

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Matchup Request :)

KnB matchup please :) I’m 5'3, a bit skinny, with black hair and eyes and wearing eyeglasses ‘cause of my poor eyesight. I’m pretty simple, always likes to wear shirts/blouses and jeans to go out. I’m Aquarius, INFJ, with a hypersensitive personality and mild social anxiety, I also have some symptoms of OCD. I’m kinda weird - not in an emo or gothic kind of weird (no offense meant) - but I actively try not to conform or be the same as other people. I don’t like being mainstream. For my positive traits, I’m very considerate and thoughtful to other people, like I always filter what I say depending on the mood and situation, and I always look out for others. I’m the youngest in the family, so it makes me really happy when I can also take care of other people, especially when I’m treated like an older sister and depended on by those younger than me. I’m a generally sweet person, on my own will I tend to do little things for other people so they would be spared from the burden. I’m very passionate when it comes to the one thing I love and am very loyal to it. I have a childlike personality, like I’m literally a kid when it comes to speaking and acting (although I’m way too old). But deep inside I’m actually a deep person, and a mature thinker and feeler. For my negative traits, I’m too perceptive about things to the point of being somewhat cynical and, sometimes, untrusting. I always think behind the motivation of a person in doing something, whether they do it out of pure kindness or they’re just trying to show-off - although it’s not always a malicious thought, sometimes it’s just a casual passing thought. Due to my hypersensitive personality, I’m too sensitive about the littlest of things, being hurt or bothered at the least even if nothing thrown at me is meant to be in the negative. I have a bad temper, I’m very irritable and moody, and often gives the cold shoulder and silent treatment when things don’t go my way, I get cold and distant when I’m angry. I’m pretty stubborn, too. When it comes to dealing with people, I’m too shy and have low self-esteem. I am socially awkward, I’m lacking with regards to the communication department (I always worry whether people get bored with the things I talk about so it’s hard for me to maintain a conversation other than the basic greetings). That’s why I avoid being around people a little too much. I’m a loner, and I enjoy my time alone. I like having my personal space, without being disturbed or demanded of my time and attention. I keep to myself, just reading or surfing the net. I’m a quiet person (although I can also be talkative when the mood is festive or when I’m talking about my interests with someone I’m completely comfortable with). I’m too cowardly, never wanting to step out of my comfort zone, so I often avoid fears and confrontations as much as possible by escaping reality (I drown myself in my interests). I’m dramatic and a worrier. There’s a part of me that wants to please other people and have them accept me. Sometimes I even tend to act out of character because I think people would find the real me uninteresting, though it doesn’t mean I’m doing drastic measures just for that, I only try to be more agreeable, I guess. I fear rejection, and as a defense mechanism I tend to reject others before they can reject me. It makes me distant from the people I love. I mentioned that I’m passionate about the ONE THING I love, which means I can only like one thing at a time - I’m single-minded to the point of obsession. The positive side of that is loyalty, the downside is I can’t be bothered to care for anything else when my sole focus is the current thing I’m interested in. However, I have a short attention span so I also get swayed easily and switch interest, which means loyalty changes as well. My attitude depends on the attitudes of people around me - when they’re nice to me, I tend to be nicer. But if they do something I see as inappropriate towards me or people/things I care about, I abandon all nice thoughts and act coldly. I also have too much pride, I don’t want people to see me hurt or cry. I don’t apologize first (if I even). I hold grudges, although I don’t tell those people what my problem with them is. They know I’m mad, but they don’t know why. Since I’m a loner and barely talk when I’m not in the mood, I appear to be absorbed in my own world and have an I-don’t-care attitude, but deep inside I care a lot. I just very seldom act on those feelings. When I make up my mind about something, nobody can sway me into thinking otherwise. I don’t like being told what to do (if I’m going to do something for other people as what I mentioned above, it has to be of my own will. I’m not good in taking orders or requests from people). I don’t listen to advice of other people; I like to take credit and responsibility for every good and bad things that happen in my life. If I fail, it’s my fault. If I succeed, it’s because of my own doing. // I’m comfortable with a person who shares my interest, or someone who I feel won’t judge me no matter what silly things I say. I like to be understood - that’s kinda impossible though for someone who doesn’t talk; but when I find someone who’d make me really open up my heart, I’d love to tell them everything about me and have them deeply understand me). I have great dislike for judgmental, unfair, and arrogant show-off people. Watching violence makes me uncomfortable (one time I watched a play on political dirt and violence and it made me so scared that I cried all throughout). My hobbies are watching anime and horror movies, reading manga and novels, daydreaming, writing, surfing the net, collecting stuff like action figures and manga of my favorite anime, listening to music, and sleeping. I grew up being a ‘child’ all the time so it’s already my nature (like I can literally roll or lay sprawled on the ground or jump around the house and it’s an everyday normal thing for me. I speak babyishly, too – except when I’m outside or with people I don’t know), but everyone in the family and relatives know I’m a baby. I’m very simple, conservative, and reserved. I’m pretty formal when I talk, I’m like an old school type of girl. And I like old school stuff too. I don’t have interests in girly things like make-up, dresses, fashion, bags, shoes. I’m an otaku through and through.

Sorry if I got overboard! ^^ SFW is okay, thank you! :)

match up: Kiyoshi Teppei

He’d make a good match for balance. Whenever you get in a different mood, Kiyoshi will be there to comfort you. Sad or angry, he’ll offer an ear and a shoulder. He’ll be patient when it comes to getting you to show how you feel. Don’t feel rushed, you just being with him is enough.

For your date, he’ll let you sleep in. He’ll probably be over anyways, just chilling next to you. Once you are up, Kiyoshi will take you to the park and get ice cream. He’ll take you to lunch at a casual place you frequent. You’ll have good laughs as the staff swoon over how cute you both are. In the afternoon, you’ll go window shopping and splurge on some things you were putting off. At night, you’ll go to the movies and have a good time stealing popcorn from the bucket you make him hold.

Runner ups: Kise Ryouta, Mibuchi Reo, Akashi Seijuurou

#valentines day special #submission

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tolvoofovlot · 6 years

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OCD,Symptoms, Resources, Treatments(Reposted)

This is a repost of something I wrote on a forum for a thread on OCD.

OCD, or Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. You may have heard of it, but do you know what it is? Do you have it and want to talk about it or what methods help you or haven’t worked for you? Do you want to learn more about OCD? This is a thread about OCD, the disorder of the brain that effects many people worldwide.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnzz-eFmKaw[

There is a lot of misinformation out there about OCD, especially due to media portrayals of it. Things like the above can contribute to this. And while they said the video was supposed to poke fun at people who don’t have OCD, when you go through comments or many reactions people thought it was an accurate portrayal. Things like Monk, and other portrayals and stories even when the intentions are good can cause problems. On top of the fact that often studios find accurate portrayals not marketable or too frightening so they require changes to happen to characters and stories.

https://iocdf.org/blog/2017/11/02/how-the-media-gets-ocd-all-wrong-uk-based-podcast-helps-ocd-sufferers-find-recovery/

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/neverending-nightmares-how-ocd-inspired-a-psychological-horror-breakthrough/1100-6414083/

Some things whether intentional or not can give people an idea of what it is like. Neverending Nightmares is a game inspired by OCD, the creator has it and it helps to portray it as the horror it can be. Silent Hill is often my go to example, while that’s not the intent, of what OCD is like for me. So there are also things that don’t directly depict characters with OCD but are inspired by it or are supposed to evoke similar feelings.

So what is OCD then? It is an anxiety disorder, it is a way your brain functions, or how it dysfunctions. Technically you can have symptoms of OCD but not be diagnosed with it. Unless it is negatively impacting your life it is not considered OCD typically. There is also OCPD, or Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder, which is a separate thing that shares similarities but is seen as not as negative and more useful. The distinction between the two can be difficult, with the most basic being that those with OCPD typically see it as mostly positive while those with OCD typically see it as wholly negative.

https://www.ocduk.org/ocd/types/

There are also multiple types of OCD. It can manifest in many forms, and it is possible to have one or some forms and not others. What are the main ones is often debated, and lots of people have broad categories they fit under but have more specific obsessions and thoughts. Some common things are Contamination, Intrusive Thoughts, Hoarding, Symmetry. Hoarding is often associated with OCD and many who have it Hoard but it can also be a symptom seen in a lot of other disorders. Symmetry, or Order, is about making sure things are exactly perfect. This is one people do commonly think of, such as ensuring that things are symmetrical, that things are categorized. Contamination is somewhat commonly known about, in regards to physical contamination or a fear of being contaminated by touching things and needing to be clean. This is a part of why hand washing rituals are so common, but Contamination can be mental. Like thinking about a contaminated thing contaminating your very mind. And then there are Intrusive Thoughts. Intrusive Thoughts can be hard to explain to those who don’t have them. It is like having a second brain, or a separation from your self and your brain. Your brain can feed you thoughts that you don’t believe or think yourself, or it can be obsessed thinking that others can more easily stop thinking about. Intrusive Thoughts can almost be compared to hallucinations, except instead of seeing/hearing/feeling things in your environment, it is like having thoughts projected into your head.

There are other symptoms, such as body picking(Skin picking, hair plucking, nail biting, ), tics, checking(Checking things to make sure they are in the right order, doors closed, doors lock, stove off, etc). Many behaviors due to OCD are not considered rational, and even those with OCD can recognize what they are doing as irrational yet do it anyway. It is a sort of cognitive dissonance that is common in those with OCD, they recognize what they are doing and why it is wrong but do it anyway. Though it should be mentioned OCD is usually not something that will result in harming others, but instead just the self. Those with OCD have lower rates of aggression towards others as it is mostly self-destructive. Thoughts about harming others won’t likely cause someone with OCD to hurt others, but rather hurt themselves to stop the possibility of hurting others.

What needs to be understood too is how obsessive thoughts lead into rituals. Often it is not that you need to do a ritual just to feel calm, that can be a way it works, but is usually the safest way to explain it. Rather than that if you don’t perform a ritual you’ll die, or someone you love will die, or the universe will explode killing all life. Often those with OCD feel immense pressure to do these things because they’re worried nebulous or specific bad things will happen if they don’t. And if you address it, it doesn’t make sense. I know that I’m not Thanos and I don’t have the infinity gauntlet, but also if I don’t wash my hands three times my dogs will explode before my eyes and I can now hear the whimpers from their heads attached to bloody torsos as they look at me asking why I didn’t just wash my hands three times. Which if I mess up doesn’t really happen because it is irrational, but deep down I believe that will happen every time.

Something to keep in mind is OCD is also tailor made to each individual’s brain. A common obsession is one that is a fear of secretly being a pedophile. It’s not because our brains are wired to think that, it’s because OCD often tries to convince you that you are a worthless monster that deserves to die. Since pedophiles are commonly considered the worst type of people, those with OCD often have that fear. If you thought people who put pineapple on pizza genuinely deserve to be executed, and have OCD, you might be afraid of the possibility that you secretly like pineapple on pizza. It is a kind of horrifying concept but it is genuinely your own brain trying to hurt, and even kill you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dR8xVqSfXc

OCD is both less common than people think, but actually very common. Not every person who is anal about things has OCD, though it can also be dangerous to gate-keep people just because they don’t have explicitly observable symptoms since many might not be open about it or have outward rituals. Over 1% of people have it in one form or another. In the above clip is Leonardo DiCaprio, who famously had OCD playing Howard Hughes depicting real symptoms of OCD he had such as hoarding jars of his own urine(Though the nudity thing is actually related more to a nerve disorder from crashing planes). It can be tricky with historical figures because unless we have explicit detailed recordings of every thought they had and thing they did, we can’t actually know. Howard Hughes was far more explicit so we do know he had it.

https://iocdf.org/

There are quite a few organizations around the world for OCD since it is actually very common. You can usually google for local resources and support groups. A thing about OCD is while it is incurable, it is manageable. While it isn’t entirely understand where it comes from, there is medicine that can really help people and therapy is very useful in treating OCD. CBT(Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) is considered by many to be the most successful way to manage OCD. People with OCD will live their lives with it, and suicide rates are high for those with OCD, but for those with treatment it is much lower. Try to ask your doctors or therapists about it if you think you have it based on some of what you can read above, it can’t hurt to check though if you don’t have explicit symptoms don’t worry about it most people still don’t have it, roughly between 1–2% of the population do.

http://beyondocd.org/

Now I want to stress that if you can, please do try to seek help. OCD has claimed many lives when left untreated. And while you can learn CBT yourself it is better done with professional assistance. Certain forms of meditation that are good for anxiety can help, but therapy and medication can be very important. Electroconvulsive therapy can help in extreme cases, but is typically a last case scenario. I have used Clomipramine and it has helped, though I’m off it currently due to insurance. It is cheap depending on where you are, and effective, but it does have some strong side effects like body temperature control being lost and sexual arousal becoming incredibly difficult. OCD can also develop in children and manifest early, but early symptoms are rare and it can be very hard to diagnose children with OCD.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/cognitive-behavioral-therapy/about/pac-20384610

CBT being the most effective treatment for OCD does not mean it will work for everyone, but it can be very helpful. It is about altering how you think and recognizing what kind of thoughts you are having and how to diffuse them, how to dismantle negative thinking, and more constructively think. It is best done with the aid of a therapist. Please seek professional help, especially when doing Exposure Therapy. Exposure is in bits forcing yourself to deal with things that are upsetting. Whether it is physical, emotional, mental. If you can’t touch things, being slowly made to touch things, maybe at first it is a door knob, maybe later it is a toilet seat. For emotional, maybe it is talking a bit about a trauma, then later being more detailed. Again it is gradual, and is to make it not so drastic when you have to confront these issues. But it should be done with a therapist, you need someone to teach you and you need someone who can recognize when you’re being pushed too far and might have a severe episode or are being harmed.

For much of my life growing up I thought I was the only person with these thoughts and feelings in the world. So I hid them, worried everyone would think I’m a freak, crazy, that I need to be in an asylum. But I want everyone to know you are not alone out there, if you have OCD in some form there are others like you going through similar experiences, and people out there you can talk to, and ways to get help. For me therapy was the biggest gain I ever had on my OCD, whether it was in group sessions or private ones.

https://lilywilliamsart.com/portfolio/ocdcomics/

Some comics by Lily Williams on OCD.

Broodhollow is a webcomic by Kris Straub about a man with OCD. It is a cosmic horror and mystery series both about real symptoms of OCD as well as the cosmic horrors that effect the town of Broodhollow. You might notice horror is the main way to convey what living with OCD is like, there is a good reason for this because of how it catastrophizes situations and how it can warp your understanding of the world around you.

http://broodhollow.chainsawsuit.com/comic/2012/10/06/book-1-curious-little-thing/

I wanted to pepper this a bit with both media about OCD people can check out as well as resources that can aid people. As well as facilitate people sharing their own experiences and asking questions that can help them understand things.

https://www.nami.org/Learn-More/Mental-Health-Conditions/Obsessive-compulsive-Disorder/Support

https://www.ocdaction.org.uk/

https://thesecretillness.com/

And I know suicidal thoughts are a common part of OCD. I am chronically suicidal myself. But if you believe you are at risk and are considering suicide please seek help, if you can contact professionals for help, contact your doctors/therapists if you can, or use the below link for the suicide hotline in the USA. As well as other sites for helping you find local hotlines.

https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/

http://suicidehotlines.com/

http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suicide_crisis_lines

#ocd #ocd tw #actually ocd #OCD Problems

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