#if anyone has any of the earlier posts I've done drop a comment in them so I see the post and can tag it

[copperbadge]

Hey Sam! Since it's currently AO3 donation time, I'm wondering what your thoughts are on it? I'm asking because you've written RPF and it's one of many "anti-AO3/anti-AO3 donations" people's favourite things to bring up when they're complaining about AO3 getting so many donations that it continuously obtains an excess of its donation goal whenever donation time rolls around? (Wow, how many times can I say "donation" in an ask?) Sorry if this question bothers you! I don't mean to offend or annoy.

Hey anon! Sorry it took a while to get to this, I don't even know if the drive is still going on, but the question came in while I was traveling and I didn't really have the time for stuff that wasn't travel-related. In any case, let's dig in! (I am not offended, no worries.)

So really there are two issues here and as much as some people who are critical of AO3 want to conflate them, they are different. While some criticism of AO3 may be valid, rhetoric against AO3 tends to misinterpret both in separate ways.

First there's the issue of what AO3 hosts -- RPF, yes, but more broadly, varied content that some people find distasteful or think should be illegal, which is a misunderstanding of the purpose of the archive and more broadly a dangerous attitude towards the concept of freedom of expression.

Second, there's the issue of AO3 generally outpacing its fundraising goals while not allowing monetization, which is a misunderstanding of the legal status of AO3 and to an extent a misunderstanding of philanthropy as a whole.

The longer I watch debates about content go on, the more I come to the conclusion that I was fortunate to have a teacher who really wanted to instill in us an understanding of free speech not as a policy but as an ongoing dialogue. It's not only that freedom of expression "protects you from the government, not the Justin" as the meme goes, but also that freedom of expression is not a static thing. It's an ongoing process of identifying what we find harmful in society and what we want to do about it.

Should the freedom to shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater be restricted? Should the freedom to yell slurs at drag performers? Should the freedom to teach prepubescent kids about gender, sexuality, and/or safe sex? Should the freedom to wear a leather puppy hood at Pride? Who gets to say, and why?

I was nine when my teacher did a unit on freedom of speech and the intersection of "harm prevention" and "censorship", which is (and should be) a discussion, not a set of ironclad rules. This ambiguity has thus been with me for over thirty years, and I'm comfortable with the ambiguity, with the process; I'm not sure a lot of people critical of AO3's content truly are. Perhaps some can't be, especially those affected by hate speech, but RPF is not hate speech. It's just fiction. Or is fiction "just fiction"? This is a question society as a whole is grappling with, although fandom seems to be a little out ahead of society in terms of how explicitly we discuss it.

The idea that prose can incite violence or cause harm is both valid to examine (witness the rise of fascism on the radio in the 20s, on Facebook and Twitter in the past ten years; they're very similar processes) and a very slippery slope. Because again: who decides what harm is, and what causes it, and what we do about it? Our values align us with certain beliefs, but those are only our values, not universal truths. So AO3 is part of the ongoing question of harm and benefit both to society and individuals.

AO3 itself, however, has a fairly defined policy that it is not meant to police content; it is an archive, not a bookstore or a school board. AO3 refines its TOS and policies as necessary, but the goal is always open access and as much freedom of expression as possible, and if that's uncomfortable for some people then that's a discussion we have to have; ignoring it won't make it go away. But it has to be a discussion, it can't be a unilateral change to the archive's TOS or a series of snaps and clapbacks, and I don't see a lot of people ready to move beyond flinging insults. Perhaps because they were taught a much more binary view of freedom of expression than I was.

So, self-evidently, I support AO3 and I don't have a problem with RPF. Whether other people do is something we're going to have to get to grips with, and that's likely to be a process that is still going on when most of us are dust. I'd rather have a century of ambiguity than a wrong answer tomorrow, anyway.

But whether AO3 hosts RPF is truly a separate issue from its donation drives, because it's a criticism some people level at the site which exists whether it's fundraising or not. So people can criticize AO3's open policy and they can give it as a reason not to support the site, but it's just one aspect of the archive and the fundraising as a whole should be examined separately.

I think AO3's fundraisers are deeply misunderstood (sometimes on purpose) because even people who are anticapitalist get a little crazy when money gets involved, and this is, to fandom, a lot of money -- a few hundred thousand, reliably, every fundraiser. To me, a fundraiser that pulls in three hundred grand is almost quaint; my current nonprofit pulls in better than ten million a year and my previous employer had an endowment of several billion dollars. At my old job I didn't even bother researching people who couldn't give us a hundred grand.

On the other hand, AO3 is an extreme and astounding outlier in the nonprofit world, because basically it's the only one of its kind to work the way it does. It is entirely volunteer-run on the operational side (ie: tag wranglers, coders, lawyers, etc) and has no fundraising staff (gift officers, researchers, outreach officers) as far as I'm aware. To pull in three hundred grand from individual one-time donations, without any paid staff and without even a volunteer fundraising officer? That's insane. That doesn't happen. Except at AO3.

What people misunderstand, however, is the basic status of a nonprofit, which is a legal status, not simply a social one. (I'm adding in some corrections here since it gets complicated and the terminology can be important!) The Organization for Transformative Works, the parent of AO3, is a nonprofit, which indicates how it was incorporated as an organization; additionally it is registered federally as tax-exempt, which carries certain perks, like not paying sales tax, and certain duties, like making their financials transparent to a certain extent. (Religious nonprofits are exempt from the transparency requirement.) If you're interested in more about nonprofits and tax-exempt status a reader dropped a great article here.

Nonprofits, unlike for-profit companies, cannot pay a share of their income to stakeholders. Nonprofits don't have financial stakeholders, only donors. They can have employees and pay them a salary -- that's me, for example -- but if a nonprofit pulls in $10M in donations, my salary is paid from that, I don't get a percentage and nobody else does either. That's what it means to be a nonprofit -- the money above operational costs goes back into the organization. The donations we (and AO3) receive must be plowed under and used for outreach, server maintenance, further fundraising, services expansion, et cetera. You can see this in the 990 forms on Guidestar or ProPublica, or in their more accessible breakdowns on Charity Navigator. Nonprofits that do not put the majority of their income towards service provision tend to get audited and lose their nonprofit status. So nobody's getting paid from all that money, and the overage that isn't spent goes into what is basically a savings account in the name of the nonprofit. (I'm vastly simplifying but that's the gist.) Using that money for personal purposes is illegal. It's called "private inurement" and there's a good article here about it. The money belongs to the OTW as a concept, not to anyone in or of the OTW.

So the biggest misunderstanding that I see in people who are mad at AO3 fundraisers is that "they" are getting all this money (who "they" are is never clearly stated but I'm pretty sure people think @astolat has a special wifi router that runs on burning hundred dollar bills) while "we" can't monetize our fanfic. But "they" get nothing -- nobody even earns a salary from AO3 -- and you can easily prove that by looking at the 990 forms they file with the government, which are required to be made public. You can see the most recently available 990, from 2020, here at Guidestar. Page seven will show you the "highest compensated" employees, all of whom are earning zero dollars or nonmonetary perks (that's the three columns on the right).

Either AO3 is entirely volunteer-run or someone's Doing A Real Fraud. The money the OTW spends is documented (that's page 10 and 11 primarily) and while they may pay for, say, the travel and lodging expenses of a lawyer going to DC to defend a freedom-of-expression case, they don't pay the lawyer for their time, or give them a cut of the income.

Despite what you've read, the reason "we" can't monetize our fanfics on AO3 has nothing to do with the site being the product of volunteer handiwork or AO3 having it in their terms of service or it being considered gauche by some to do so; it's because

IT'S ILLEGAL.

I cannot say this loudly enough: It is against the law for a nonprofit to be used by its staff, volunteers, or beneficiaries to earn direct profit from the services provided by the nonprofit.

You can be paid to work at one, but you cannot side-hustle by selling your handmade friendship bracelets for personal gain on the nonprofit's website. If the nonprofit knowingly allows monetization of its services, it can lose nonprofit status, be fined, be hit with back taxes, and a lot of other unpleasant bullshit can go down, including prosecution of those involved for fraud. If you put a ko-fi link on your fanfic, you are breaking the law, and if AO3 allows it, they are too.

Okay, that was a sidebar, but in some ways not, because it gets to the heart of the real complaints about AO3 fundraising, which is that people in fandom are sick or unhoused or in some form of need and other people in fandom are giving to AO3, a fan site that is financially stable, instead of giving to peoples' gofundmes or dropping money in their Ko-Fi or Paypal. And while it is a legitimate grievance that there are people who are in such desperate need while we live in an era of unprecedented abundance, that's not AO3's fault. AO3 doesn't solicit actively, there's no unasked-for mailings or calls from a gift officer. They just put a banner up on their website, and people give. (Again, this is incredibly outlier behavior in the nonprofit world, I'd do a case study on it but the conclusion would just be "shit's real, yo.") You might as well be mad that people give to their local food bank instead of someone's ko-fi.

You cannot lay at AO3's feet the fact that people want to give to AO3 instead of to your fundraiser. That's a choice individuals have made, and while you can engage with them in terms of why they made the philanthropic choices they did, to blame an organization they supported rather than the person who made the choice to give is not only incorrect but futile, and unlikely to win anyone over to supporting you. We know from research that guilt is not a tremendous motivator of philanthropy.

It is also not necessarily a binary choice; just because AO3 gets a hundred grand in $5 donations doesn't mean most of the people giving don't also give $5 elsewhere. I support the OTW on occasion, and I also fundraise for UNICEF and the Chicago Parks Foundation and BAGLY and others, in addition to giving monthly to several nonprofits that I have longterm relationships with -- my alma mater, the animal rescue where I got the Cryptids, my shul. And I give, occasionally and anonymously, to fundraisers that pass through Radio Free Monday, which are mainly individuals in need, because I was once in need and now I pay it forward. These are the choices I have made. Nobody twisted my arm. I respond poorly to someone making the attempt to do so by attacking places I've given.

I think the upshot is, after all of this that I've written, that we cannot begin to come to grips with questions of institutional inequality in philanthropy, or freedom of expression and censorship, until people actually understand what's going on, and too few do. So all I can do is try and explain, and hopefully create a forum for people to learn and grow when it comes to charitable giving.

Archive Of Our Own and the Organization for Transformative Works are products of our community and as that community changes, we will necessarily continue to re-evaluate what aspects of it mean and how AO3/OTW express the community sentiment. I hope that the ongoing discussion of support for AO3 also leads to people learning more about their philanthropic options. But criticizing AO3 for fundraising by attacking it for fulfilling one of its stated purposes is silly, and attempting to guilt people into giving in the ways one thinks they should give rather than how they do give is just going to make one extremely unlikable.

As members of this community, we have to be a part of the push and pull, but it's difficult to do that competently in ignorance. So, I do my best to be knowledgeable and to educate my readers, and I hope others will do the same.

[chrysalis-the-butterfly]

Schnee's video "The Deeper Meaning of Loser Baby" is by far the BEST Hazbin Hotel analysis I've ever seen. Literally. Perfectly pointed, edited and EXTREMELY empathetic. Like. For real. It clearly shows how media literate and sympathetic the author is. He analysed Angel's behaviour, his trauma, how realistic it is, how well written Angel and his whole arc is, analysed why and how Husk was able to help Angel when Charlie wasn't... omg, it's so much better than any anti bullshit trying to explain why "Angel is a bad victim actually, hypersexual and unperfect? Nhaaa you're unvalid actually yeah sorry" to validate their own hate boner against Viv. Seriously, what a fucking perfect video. I recommend anyone of watching it, even haters, so they can see how blind and ignorant they truly are.

Thanks for sharing!

I did really like how non-judgmental Schnee's video was. I do occasionally watch videos made by Hazbin haters - because I want to give the other side a fair hearing, and expose myself to different views so I'm not just in an echo chamber - and one of the things I'm struck by is how many of them drift away from talking about the cartoon to pass judgement on the fans. "I don't understand how anyone can like these characters!" "Y'all have been gaslit into thinking this is good writing!" "Everyone has such bad takes, as evidenced by this single comment that only one person said which I'm now going to rant about!" That sort of thing.

Schnee's video was different. It didn't poke fun at the fans of the cartoon (probably because it was made by a fan). It instead kept its focus on the story - what Angel goes through, and how impactful that is, and how Angel's arc fits into the wider themes of Hazbin Hotel. And the whole thing was really well-scripted and well-edited.

Another thing I liked about Schnee's video was the fact that it wasn't laser-focused on Angel's character flaws, which it seems a lot of anti-Angel videos are. They focus too much on how he was harassing Husk in the earlier episodes, and don't acknowledge the fact that he changed and stopped doing that in the later episodes.

I even saw one video that was criticising the Huskerdust ship saying, "Be mad at me for saying this all you want, but I'm sorry, does Angel even really deserve Husk at this point?" When I heard that, my jaw dropped. What do you mean, Angel doesn't deserve Husk? Yes, he has a bad coping mechanism that hurts others, but does that really make him totally unworthy of love? Can he not be loved as he is and then helped to change?

And what does that say about Husk? That quote makes it sound like Husk is better than Angel and that Angel would drag him down, like Husk is some perfect precious uwu smol bean who needs to be protected from the big bad spider demon. My fellow human being, Husk is a former Overlord. He owned souls and gambled with them and didn't care until his own power was threatened. But I don't see anyone arguing that Husk doesn't deserve Angel because of that!

Why is Angel getting all this ire? Why is he the launcher of a thousand discourse posts and not, I don't know, Valentino, his abuser? That very same video also mentioned Staticmoth, and all it said about that ship was, "I just don't feel comfortable shipping a sex abuser with someone" - and that was it! Valentino has done so much worse than Angel, but he was quickly dismissed in that one comment, whereas Angel got three minutes in this video (plus multiple other videos by the same person) trashing him in an angry tone of voice with F-bombs aplenty! It's disproportionate!

(deep breath)

Wow, that was a doozy of a tangent!

That's the trouble with watching videos by Hazbin haters: you run the risk of hearing something that boils your blood. So it's really refreshing to find videos that aren't just criticising Angel endlessly, but treat his story with the respect such topics deserve.

I feel that not enough people recognise Angel's positive traits either. Such as his willingness to assist people even if they've hurt him in the past. Or his bravery in standing up for others. Angel's got a good heart deep down! It just takes a bit of work to help him show it.

[kachuusha]

implied mutual feelings of love between levi and hanji—an analysis based on chapters 126 and 132.

note: this is a more in-depth version of what I have posted earlier.

This post is an attempt to make sense out of Levi’s nuanced dialogue in chapter 132. But before proceeding please read this tweet first to understand the context of this post: link to original tweet 

Please also read this analysis done by shunkani, explaining the nuance present in the original Japanese text. 

it is important that you read the posts I’ve linked above because what I am about to say here is not gonna make sense if you don’t.

Like always, note that what I am about to say is only my own interpretation of the events and should not be taken as absolute canon confirmation.

In chapter 132, Levi has a line that lost its nuance in the English translation. As explained in the linked posts above, Levi comments on Hanji’s unrequited love for titans but there is an implication that a mutual love shared with someone else.

What if that someone is Levi? When you think about it, it is not farfetched to assume that it was him considering how close he is to Hanji.

Other than that, there is an incident in the chapters prior to 132 that presents a strong case on why Levi could be referring to himself. Yes that's right—Hanji asking Levi to live with him.

Now I've seen people try to dismiss what Hanji said to Levi in the forest and insist that there is nothing possibly romantic with it and that Hanji was simply expressing their want to run away because they are tired so here is my take on it:

After tending to Levi's wounds, Hanji says,

"Maybe we should just live here together. Right Levi?"

If Isayama only intends to have Hanji express their exhaustion and desire to run away from everything, why didn't he just make Hanji say something like 《"I want to run away Levi. I am tired."》 ?

Why did it have to be Hanji expressing their want to live together with Levi? It was like Isayama tried to hit two birds with one stone. He had Hanji say their desire to run away and also to be with Levi.

Another factor in this is Hanji blushing after realizing that Levi heard what they said. Again, some fans have tried to refute this by saying that Hanji blushes all the time.

Yes Hanji blushes a lot but also consider the context of the scene. For second let us pretend tha these two characters are not Levi and Hanji—let's pretend that they are Character A and B.

Character A is with Character B, and the former thinks the the latter is asleep. Character A then takes this as a chance to voice out their feelings for Character B.

A few moments later, Character B brings up what Character A said. Character A realizes Character B heard their confession and so they blush.

I mean look at it, you could easily pretend that what happened in the forest was something that came out straight from a romance novel or a shoujo manga.

And come on are we going to pretend that the run away and live with someone to start anew isn't a common trope in romance?

Another argument I've seen is that maybe Hanji was just embarrassed that Levi heard them expressing their want to abandon their duties. This one is very easy to debunk.

Remember the beginning of Uprising Arc? Hanji shows their hesitation to Levi in continuing the titan experiments with Eren because they are afraid that the MPs might go after the SC just like what they did to Pastor Nick.

In both situations, Hanji was trying to run away and evade something and Levi was present in both situations. But did Hanji blush after showing their want to run here? No they did not.

Then what else could possibly the reason for Hanji's blush other than a hint for romantic feelings?

Next let's talk about Levi's response to Hanji.

Levi subtly implies to Hanji that he heard what they said by asking,

"If we keep...running and hiding...what will that get us...?"

Some say that this was Levi rejecting Hanji but I disgaree. To me what Levi said sounds more like a We can't run away yet if we still have things to do.

Levi also said that because he is aware of Hanji's strong sense of responsibility.

"I know you...you're not able to stay out of the action..."

He knows Hanji would't be satisfied in being a bystander.

Another thing to note here is that Hanji is the one who arrives at the conclusion that they can't.

Levi himself did not really gave a direct answer—and that is expected from someone like Levi who seems to be awkward and inexperienced in romance. It is understandable if he was caught off guard with what Hanji said and thus couldn't give a proper response.

Now getting back to chapter 132.

After seeing Hanji's exchange with Pieck, Levi says:

"...So, four eyes. yet another love for a titan gone unrequited, I see."

So like what had been explained in the posts above, Levi comments on Hanji's unrequited love for titans but implies that there is mutual love shared with someone.

With what happened in 126 in mind, who would be the most reasonable choice for that someone if not Levi? What if this was Levi's response or way of acknowledging Hanji's words back in the forest?

Just think about it. Hanji gives Levi something like a confession and then a few chapters later Levi suddenly implies that Hanji shares a mutual love with someone. The connection between the two events is not really difficult to make.

Like I said earlier, Levi not being able to form a direct answer is expected considering he seems to be the type who would be extremely awkward at love. Maybe he just needed time to sort his feelings first. Another thing to consider is they are both soldiers in duty.

Also can we talk about how Levi suddenly decided to call Hanji "four-eyes" again? It was like Levi is making an effort to go back to those days of normalcy.

An ambiguous and vague confession is also something that is so in character of Levi because of his awkwardness with words. Another is because he doesn't have to be direct with his words because Hanji and him share a deep understanding of one another.

Before anyone tries to brush this line off as nothing, I would like to point out that Isayama changed the kanji used in the dialogue in the volume release. This was pointed out in the tweet by @/kasumi_kasa as shown above.

The point I am trying to make here is that if this line is something we should just simply brush off, then why would Isayama bother making changes to it in the volume release?

The kanji in the original chapter release was 片思い but was changed into 片想い in the volume release. Both are read the same way (kataomoi) but just like what @/kasumi_kasa had explained, the kanji used in the volume release which is 想い, is indicative of a deeper form of love.

Also take note that the latter is an unusual way of writing unrequited love in Japanese.

Taking that into consideration and the implication of a mutual feeling with someone, does that mean Levi and Hanji share a deep form of love?

See the lengths Isayama is going through just for this one line? It really feels like the is trying to push something here.

Now onto Hanji's side. If by any chance we are correct that Levi was indeed confessing his feelings to Hanji, then did the latter caught what Levi was trying to say?

In my observation, it is very likely that Hanji had caught on to it because of their seemingly flustered and hesitant reply towards Levi. The hesistance is present in the pause (the three dots) before Hanji's dialogue.

"...We"ll be friendly in no time."

Another thing I would like to point out is how Hanji suddenly diverted the subject.

This is actually kind of ironic if you think about it. In 126 Hanji was the one who is seemingly confessing and Levi was the one who brought up their duties. Here in 132, it was Levi's turn to confess but Hanji was the one who brought up their duties.

My honest take on here is that it feels like Hanji was on the process of moving on and abadoning whatever feelings they had laid down in the forest so they could focus solely on their cause but then Levi suddenly drops something like this on them.

Hanji would be understandably flustered just like how Levi was in 126. Honestly in the end, both of them are just so awkward at romance.

So this is where I am gonna end this attempt at analyzing what was said in 126 and 132. I hope I was able to convey my thoughts properly. If you have made it this far then thank you.

If ever I am mistaken with my assumptions in here, it still doesn't diminish the beautiful bond that Levi and Hanji share.

[bluephoenixdruidicprincess]

Vox Machina/Critical Role Rambles

You all may have noticed, I've been going a little crazy with the Vox Machina posts. What can I say? I started watching The Legend of Vox Machina earlier this week and I kind of got hooked.

Now, I didn't know much about this show before going into it. Really the only thing I knew about it was that it was an "adaptation (I guess?)" from the first campaign Critical Role did. And I knew about Critical Role very loosely, knew it was a D&D tabletop stream done by voice actors but beyond that, I'd never really checked them out before. I had wanted to but then I kept on hearing things like "they're overrated" "or they've become over-serialized and too commercial" and whatever. But then I realized, you know, I haven't watched a D&D stream since the Natural Oneders from TFS at the Table and maybe it was time to get into another D&D campaign. And since I have so little experience with streamed D&D campaigns, how am I going to be able to tell "who's too commercial" or "who's overrated"? And really, these kind of comments will typically always pop up whenever something becomes successful -- we humans are jealous creatures and sometimes we let our envy get the better of us, so maybe I shouldn't listen to judgements on something I've never seen before. Now if anyone thinks they're overrated or too commercial, I'm not dissing you in any way, not saying you're not entitled to your opinion or anything or that you're jealous or envious of them, I'm sure you have your reasons. But just in my experience when people use phrases like overrated or overserialized and stuff like that, I've learned to take a grain of salt with that.

But anyway, whilst watching the show, I also started watching the campaign 1 on Youtube while iIm at work. Mainly because while watching the show, I found out Vax is voiced by Liam O'Brien, whom I have a HUGE vocal crush on (ever since listneing to him in GunxSword) and if you're telling me that there's a stream that goes on for hundreds of episodes with him in it and I can listen to his voice for hundreds of hours, then yes, I'M ALL IN. Listening to Liam O'Brien is like constantly being in the throes of vocal passion and pleasure to me and I'm not sorry. I kind of forgot how quickly sometimes the day can go by while at work and you're just listening to a D&D campaign. It's been fun and its fun to go back to the show after watching a few installments of the campaigns and finally understanding some of the inside jokes they put in the show.

Now the actual show, The Legend of Vox Machina, particularly in the beginning feels pretty clunky. You just don't know that much about the characters when you're first introduced to them and then them having these character moments a few episodes in, you just don't know how to feel because you don't really understand the characters that well. But perhaps this was done on purpose as a call out to the beginnings of Critical Role. I mean, when Critical Role first starts, we're essentially all dropped into a campaign that they've already been running for 2 1/2 years prior so there is a bit of a period when you're still trying to get used to and understand the characters, there's all these inside jokes and character dynamics you don't have context for). Plus D&D in general is also not super great when it comes to story telling in general, it definitely has its own flavor of story telling but you know, when you're bound to some dice rolls, and characters, their decisions, and where they go are dictated by several people, the story can go places that don't always make sense and don't always have a semblance of a cohesive story. So in that respect, you can definitely see the D&D flaws within the show. BUT give it a few more episodes, and you'll find you don't really care, you've fallen in love with the characters at this point so you kind of forgive early show.

Obviously my favorite ship is Vaxleth (Vax and Keylethe). They're both my favorite characters and they are so awesome and so awkward all at the same time, I mean come on, I have a weak spot in my heart for rogues and awkward characters, there was no way in hell I was not going to ship them. Now, whenever I listen to music, I keep imagining them in my head, might create a playlist in Spotify for them. And I seriously CANNOT wait until I get further in the campaign to see Liam and Marisha roleplaying this dynamic I saw in the show. I don't necessarily like how at the end of the show, Vax just says "I'm going to walk away now" after Keylethe rejected him especially since I've seen snippets of what Liam actually says in the campaign stream and it is just the most romantic, intimate, understanding, wonderful speech to being rejected that I've ever heard, like Liam O'Brien is just a total romantic sap and I AM HERE FOR IT. It's like why would you not use that speech! It is such an integral soft vulnerable part of Vax. But at the end of the day, maybe they'll use it at a different point in time (also, maybe I don't know what I'm talking about because I don't have context but whatever). And I get it, the "walk away" line is probably a call back to the campaign stream where everytime Vax talks to Keylethe, at the end, Liam will say, "and I walk away".

I also love Vax and Gilmore too. I think those two together are really fun. And who knows? Maybe with a little more confidence from Keylethe, we could end up with an Ot3 on our hands.

But anyway, I just had thoughts that I needed to get out and here they are. Thanks for reading and putting up with my fangasms.

[lizzybeth1986]

I don't think you play TRR/TRH anymore but you should see what they did to Kiara in the newest chapter. It's so dumb and makes me so angry, especially considering the current climate of events. I've already seen people on Reddit be like "but we helped her overcome her trauma" (we didn't lol) and someone called her the c-word, very classy. Honestly PB's been low key racist in the past but all the stuff right now makes it high key...

(Apologies for the long post and not being able to place this under a cut)

I'm pretty glad I got these anons because truth be told I wasn't sure how many people - besides the few that I already knew were constantly speaking about Kiara's treatment in the books - would care enough to ask any questions about this. Most of the posts I saw expressed a disturbing eagerness to throw her under the bus, without exploring nuance or asking questions, and at this point I'm not very surprised.

I've always maintained that the treatment for Kiara is what happens when both the writers and the fandom are heartless, and these past few weeks have only been proof of that.

There are questions you could raise about this finale re: Kiara - questions almost no one seems to bother asking. I have three:

1. In this Coventus Nobilis...how is it that I see four Heads of House, and only one heir? 

2. If Kiara - who is not head of house - is supposed to represent Castelserraillian instead of her father Hakim (who presides over that estate), why do I not see Madeleine? Why do I not see Penelope? 

3. Why are we suddenly seeing Adeleide  popping up out of practically nowhere to rep Krona/Fydelia, and Landon conveniently rep-ping Portavira?  

Some of the answers to these questions lie in the questions themselves. Why else would Madeleine and Penelope not be present in this meeting - if it weren't to purposely distance them from this awful moment? After all, both of them have inbuilt subplots ready for the next book that would require interactions with the core group. How else do you think the writers could ensure we kept coddling them and pandering to them in Book 3, except by distancing them from this "betrayal"?

Why else would the narrative choose to pit Kiara - the lone woman of colour we'd been shitting on for most of this series - against Olivia - the white woman who has been given innumerable individual PoV scenes and her own mini-book (and whose reputation we had to help rebuild in said mini book whether we cared about her stupid duchy or not). 

Why else would they force Kiara to alert us mere minutes before the meeting begin, if not to distract us with crumbs ("See? At least we wrote her as warning you. Of course we don't hate her!"). 

Why else would you have Olivia and Kiara pitted against each other like this - if not to show these two women side by side, on opposing ends -  and compel us to believe that the white woman we spent 4.5 books propping up and pampering, is the most loyal one.  When in fact we have done absolutely nothing to deserve any fucking loyalty from Kiara or her family to begin with! (Ezekiel and his white bride notwithstanding).

What we finally got as a result, was a narrative that (as @queen-of-effing-everything summed it up when I discussed this with her) in one full sweep "glorifies Olivia, shields Madeleine and Penelope and sets up Kiara". Very few of us even noticed. And even if we did notice, is there any guarantee that we would care??

Remember how I mentioned in my last ask that I wished we expanded the same energy that we did with Aurora, to speak up against the ill-treatment of other black characters? Kiara was undoubtedly one of those.

After this, we as a fandom will speak very easily now of her "betrayal". We will call her the b-word and the c-word. We will boast of how we will "take her down" along with Adeleide and Landon and Bartie Sr. We'll boast about how we "never liked her" to begin with, as if doing so required some...idk exemplary foresight. We will make memes about how Olivia was "the only bitch we ever respected". We will make huge, sweeping claims about how Kiara was our "friend" and how (as you've mentioned, anon) we "helped her overcome her trauma" (!!!!) and claim by that token that  we were entitled to good treatment from her. I'm pretty sure when TRH3 finally comes out, her every word and action will be screenshot, put up on blogs, mocked and torn down just so we can write essays on how awful she is. 

Yet I saw very little of this energy in Book 3, where the MC could first emotionally manipulate her into supporting the Unity Tour, and where we actively suspected her  at a time when she was traumatized. At most there was some lukewarm acknowledgement of how she "deserves better", all while people still continued to write fanfic that positioned her as creepy and obsessed and villainous.  Almost no one had a problem with Savannah not acknowledging Kiara's earlier support of her, and in fact I'd seen posts that clubbed her with the other ladies of the court who likely "treated Savannah badly". Her father Hakim was made to join the tour alongside her by default, without the expectations that Landon/Emmeline and Godfrey/Adeleide were allowed to have, and the fandom was mysteriously silent about Hakim being made to "bow to his knees" in a way the others did not have to. Very few people even bothered to  notice or talk about how often Penelope was allowed to hold the MC's baby, or how Kiara was never really allowed to hold her even once. Which "friend" treats someone like this??

When I finally published this essay on the treatment meted out to Kiara especially in Book 3, what I got was a lot of neat, but ultimately hollow, little platitudes about how Kiara "deserved better" (How and in what way? Who knows, who cares). Out of those many many people who reblogged and responded, only a handful held the MC and Drake in particular (and Maxwell, who thought it appropriate to joke about "one suspect down") accountable for choosing to suspect and interrogate just her, and for showing ZERO remorse in forcing her to reopen those wounds. How is it that we can judge Kiara for this latest "betrayal", yet pretend that the MC and Drake had nothing to do with the pain THEY caused to her? How is it that this fandom was so fired up over her comments, yet would have such a weak, muted, carefully-generalized response to the screenshots where Drake was openly suspecting her and optionally  minimizing her trauma? 

Following that, why should we be entitled to good treatment from Kiara when we never really gave her even half as much?? Why is it so easy to divorce characters from their words and actions in Drake/MC/Maxwell's case, but so hard for a character like Kiara? (One may claim this is because Drake and Maxwell are potential co-protagonists, but the aforementioned essay already proves that you as a main character can get punished for not treating a mere side character with kindness).

Another thing that fascinates and repulses me even further is how the fandom has created myths around this one character, and how PB has constantly leaned into these "characteristics" even though the text itself tells an altogether different story:

1. Kiara is a snob. This is especially hilarious considering that she is established in Book 2 as being the only person who befriended Savannah before her departure and cared about what happened to her when she left. Never once in the books has she looked down on us for class-related issues, or outright mocked people for not knowing the languages she knew. In fact, she was the first person to acknowledge our skills if we showed any before Lythikos in Book 1. On the other hand, Penelope can be uppity and look down on us in Book 1 (there is even a dialogue option in Chapter 10 that leads to her calling us a "commoner wench") if we don't do well, and yet she's a cinnamon roll.  Olivia can engage in snobbish , entitled behaviour without the fandom having a problem just because she's their favourite. Madeleine can look down on us and pretend for 3/4ths of the social season that we're not worth her time yet somehow Kiara is the snob. Okay. Okay. 😐

2. Kiara is "obsessed with" Drake and constantly comes on to him. This is said by the same group of people who saw Olivia fucking Nevrakis plant a WHOLE FUCKING SMACKER on Liam's mouth, and said..nothing. Kiara on the other hand, has admired Drake's abs once, mentioned she'd always liked Drake once, spoken normally to him about his sister once, flirted with him once (Paris tea party), and ordered a wine from him when he was bartending. In the next book she either looks at him wistfully or admires his suit. Yet somehow she's the creepy, annoying, stalkerish. Okay. Ooookay. 😑

(This one was particularly damaging, because post the TRR3 hiatus, all efforts from PB were focused on reversing Kiara's position as an alternative LI. This included "confirming" on livestream that her affections were one-sided, at a time when Olivia was finally allowed to have some romantic moments with a single Liam, pushing forward a buildup scene to Drake's eventual secret wedding that had him acting extremely rude and confrontational to Kiara mere minutes after suspecting her (while she was expressing joy at his upcoming wedding in his playthrough!!!), and involving a subplot where he openly and by default suspected her. Sure, he spends a minute to be nice to her and chat about trauma if the MC chooses. But that's like a drop of sewage water floating in an ocean of shit).

3. Kiara Pretended to Be Our Friend And Then Dropped Us: This is false. Kiara only ever promised to put in a good word for us to the rest of the court, no more, no less. And she fulfilled that promise. Otherwise she never pretended to be friends with us nor made friendly overtures either way. In fact if you're going to accuse anyone of duplicity, you have Penelope and Madeleine. Yet somehow Kiara is the dishonest one. Okay. Okay. 🙃

4. Kiara Was Insensitive To Penelope and Didn't Understand Her. I'm not sure how Kiara is supposed to magically understand something that her friend isn't telling her. Plus this argument deliberately leaves out the fact that she stood up for Penelope when people chose to be mean to her, and even explained to the MC that she employs "tough love" because she can't always be around to protect Penelope. It also leaves out how one-sided this friendship is and how Kiara is made to do most of the heavy work in this friendship. Meanwhile, at Kiara's most difficult time period, in Castelserraillian, Penelope says absolutely nothing as the MC forces Kiara to join the Unity Tour, while making bedroom eyes at Kiara's brother. In fact the only reason Kiara's brother even exists is to give Penelope a love interest. The Kiara-Penelope friendship practically revolves around Penelope. I have never really seen Penelope look out for Kiara or attempt to actually support her in any way, and Kiara was the one who got the knife wounds. Yet somehow I'm supposed to believe that Penelope's the better friend of the two. Suuuuure. 😡

And this steaming pile of crap doesn't just make its way into shitposts and short opinion posts. It creeps into fanfic and fandom opinions. It finds its way in the tags and in other social media. It eventually even finds its way into the books, even though nothing in the earlier narrative ever really supported these extremely stale takes. 

Because PB didn't care for Kiara the way they cared for their white characters, they had no problem framing her narrative the way this fandom so desparately wanted it. Book 3 has the MC claim behind her back that Kiara is stuck-up and acts like knowing ten languages makes her better than everybody else, even though this is not backed up by the text, and in fact you will never see any acknowledgement of how Madeleine forced Kiara to make herself sound "exotic" in Book 2, or of how Madeleine and the MC (optionally) could downplay or question her skills unless they wanted to use her. Also, Penelope is never allowed to be talked about like that no matter what she's done. PB even had a scene (in the Hana playthrough) where they aggressively retconned the events of Madeleine's bachelorette party, where Kiara supposedly shouted at Penelope until the latter cried, and Madeleine was the one "having fun". Kiara was literally being thrown under the bus to make Madeleine look better. Madeleine. Imagine that. Madeleine.

Given how desparate the fandom was to nitpick and overdramatize everything Kiara said and did, is it any wonder that the team got away with the writing they gave her in Book 3? Considering that all the false arguments I stated above have made a resurgence in the past few weeks or days...is it any wonder that the only "support" this fandom is capable of re: Kiara, is lukewarm platitudes, cold takes and rank hypocrisy??

Yes, we can hold PB solely/largely  accountable for the treatment meted out to Kiara now. They made these choices over and over, and continue to do so, while tossing us occasional crumbs of faux-sweet behaviour from the MC. And they did this in insidious ways, which were so hard to catch that even a Kiara stan like me had to observe multiple playthroughs just to unravel even half of what they'd done.

But let's not pretend a huge chunk of the fandom was just as responsible for this - with their unfounded opinions, their disgusting bias, their favouritism of white characters, their refusal to observe anything besides their favourites, and their godawful fanfiction where Kiara is a creep or evil or killing the virtuous main character. Out of the huge body of fanwork that I've seen for TRR that features Kiara - at least 90% of it features her stalking Drake, or harming the MC (particularly the Drake MC), or in cahoots with the villains, or generally being referred to as a creep (why Olivia, who kissed Liam without his consent in Book 1 and was entitled enough to be angry about him not returning her feelings in TRH1, never got this sort of writing - I fail to understand). There is a tremendous gap between the vitriol dumped on her when she does something the MC doesn't like, and the milquetoast response when harm is done to her. There have been times when I've had to comb through pages and pages of hate just to read even one positive post on Kiara in her own goddamn tag.

When the next book arrives, I know you folks will continue to gas up the white women in this book every chance you get, and mask your racist vitriol for characters like Kiara (and Hana, let's not forget the way y'all treat Hana) behind the same self-righteous judgements and the same tired, stale takes. I know that PB - despite what I will still believe is their hollow promises today - will write every single one of those stale takes into existence. All because it will be "justified", because Kiara is a "bad person" or "untrustworthy" or "fake". Whatever. Y'all can stick to Olivia The Black Hole and babysit Madeleine and Penelope, I guess. Kiara always deserved better than these writers and most of this fandom anyway.

[buddha-in-disguise]

Nothing is as it seems.

I've talked about this away from social media at length, but wanted to just put the thoughts down properly about the overall Supergirl Season 5 plot - not about cast or characters per se, since I have covered this a few times in numerous posts.

Supergirl was touted as being a Black Mirror season, where nothing is as it seems, and the dangers of technology and certain social media platforms.

I was excited for this. As my husband can attest, I love these kind of puzzles or plots in TV or film (hello, Interstellar anyone? Or 12 Monkeys. Or from books, the likes of Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder, or Shutter Island - I've not seen the film so, no idea if it follows the book closely. Or TV, Black Mirror).

So much to my husband's annoyance I often will catch onto clues long before he does when watching things (I do try to keep quiet when I watch things with him so as not to spoil it, but I slip up and suddenly say 'did you see that?' As he gives me a bemused look and the 'no.' falling from his lips with practiced ease). I might not always know the full relevance to certain things, but I see cohesion that I can then map towards a conclusion, or it helps me understand if an ending is more open to interpretation.

Supergirl this season has left me struggling to catch any clues or their relevance. Sure they're there. Hope offering to kill Kara even though her prime directive was to do no harm in episode one for goodness sake, as an immediate red flag went up for me, plus Lillian and the Earth they controlled comment to Lex suggesting she wasn't Earth 38 Lillian, particularly with Lex's reaction, Leviathan leader is female - not a surprise if they're following the comics, but it feels far more weighted as a clue than that. Lena decidedly working against Lex (including appearing to press the button on the cube as he walked away, facial expressions as he leaves or has left etc). These are the most immediate things just off the top of my head.

So I know if I'm struggling to bring things into any cohesive threads, then I can only imagine some are struggling to do even that and can't get anything of the whole season plot from the episodes thus far.

I think this would be fine over a short run, but the problem seems to have become 2 fold.

The first is, Black Mirror or most films of a similar ilk only last around 60 to 90 minutes on average. Perhaps a little longer, sometimes less.

That's all well and good, but to then try and bring that over to around 20 hours of television?

Think of this another way. Black mirror has had 5 seasons. The same as Supergirl. However, it has only had 22 episodes in all that time, so only one seasons worth of episodes compared to Supergirl. Each Black mirror episode was self contained. Plus any Easter eggs or themes they brought into later episodes were done in such a way, that knowing earlier episodes wasn't essential for understanding any new episode.

While the premise was sound for Supergirl, I think now the execution has suffered because it is over too many episodes.

Add in the Crisis episodes and then 2 hiatus' coming in almost on top of one another, and that has been compounded. It has made it far harder to remember nuances that might have been given in the early episodes, that would now make more sense. Because they haven't been outright smacks over our heads with a piece of 2x4 in terms of how clues have been given, or even which scenes might actually be relevant and others have no real meaning to the later plotline.

Behind the scenes, they know how this is going to play out (or at least, they have a broad arc outline), but the viewer doesn't have that. It is one thing to watch back once all pieces are in place, to understand it. It is entirely another when you expect an audience to understand what you are trying to achieve when there is so much that is confounding people.

This is leading to frustration. Add in other issues being raised, and it can only compound the situation.

Truly I want nothing more than to be able to get the full season screened, to look back and finally understand what it all entailed, and hopefully say: Shit okay, so that was how it was. Well done. It frustrated me all to hell, but damn you pulled it off. *applause*

But honestly, to have it over a full season feels excessive. I think it would've been far better served to have more of Crisis in the lead up into those episodes, and allow the 2nd half of the season deal with everything else. Just compact it up a bit more. It feels far too complicated for far too long.

Plus I'm also just not sure how they're going to be able to bring it together with the number of episodes left, especially if it is a shortened season number as being suggested.

Remember I am saying this is as someone who loves this kind of thing!

We are now at the stage of the season where we need more than subtly on how this is going, but good solid moments of momentum that we know are part of the ending somehow, even if we still don't have full context. Otherwise I sense the discomfort for viewers in not understanding what is trying to be shown to them will become even more discord.

Right now it feels messy. I've not felt this adrift on the overall plot in previous seasons of Supergirl as I have in this one. Sure we know, nothing is as it seems. We have some puzzle pieces outlining certain things. We know Leviathan are involved. We know Lex has a part to play. We even know Lena has a part to play (you can tell she is looking to take Lex and Lillian down, let alone the other problems with Kara that are nowhere being addressed either). We know Brainy has a part to play. We know the broader strokes. But the middle is still a jumbled mess of pieces that have nothing that looks even remotely like the picture on the box.

I want nothing more than the season to succeed. The earlier half of the season had overall solid views. Since Crisis it has suffered (and let me tell you, if you think SuperCorp can reach across a 200k to 300k drop in viewership *after* the last episode began airing, you are completely blinded by your desire to blame them for everything. It might be a big fandom, but it is nowhere that large. Step back and at least acknowledge that is not logical or feasible).

So. I think they had a great idea, I really do. I think though the length of time to try and make it come to fruition has been detrimental overall.

I truly hope the rest of the season pulls back what it did earlier, and it solidifies the whole season as it reaches its conclusion.

[oumakokichi]

Hi! Just wanted to say, I've noticed that you described Saihara as suicidal and depressed in several of you meta posts, including the most recent one. I'm not having anything against it, I can see where it's coming from, but could you maybe elaborate a bit more on how it manifests in the game?

No problem! The fact that Saihara is depressed (that all the ndrv3characters are depressed to some degree) is established fairly early on, but I’dsay it first comes to light in Chapter 2. Following Kaede’s death, Saihara isinclined to stay holed up in his room without really eating or talking toanyone the next day. If Momota hadn’t come to fetch him in person, it’s quitelikely he wouldn’t have come out for some time.

This kind of behavior isn’t abnormal considering how muchtrauma all of them just experienced the day before, but it’s fairly notablethat Saihara is the only one in thegroup who didn’t really want to come out and meet up with everyone forbreakfast. As far as I can remember, it’s not something Naegi or Hinata everexhibited, even when they were both at their most upset. Meeting with the groupand trying to figure out what they would do next or how they would tackle thesituation always sort of won out on the list of priorities.

This trend of Saihara staying holed up in his room andfeeling too lethargic or upset to go anywhere or talk to anyone continuesseveral times throughout the game, culminating in Chapter 5 with the reveal of “thetruth of the outside world,” but I’ll touch on that in a bit.

As for Chapter 2, the remember light they use is perhaps thefirst really big tip-off as to how depressed Saihara and the others actuallyare, as well as a fairly good clue as to the potential real state of theoutside world. One of the first things Saihara recalls as a result of usingthat remember light is thinking a very strong, prevalent thought: “I want todie together with everyone.”

At the time, Saihara and the others can only assume thisline of thinking was related to the SHSL Hunt and erasing their memories inorder to live as talentless students. Knowing what we know about the reveals inChapter 6 however, there’s a strong implication that the decision to enter thekilling game willingly was itself a method of “throwing away one’s life.”

Tsumugi strongly emphasizes again and again in Chapter 6 that“the world of Danganronpa” is the only world in which “people like them” canlive. This is, of course, no doubt partially due to her desire to break theirspirits and have them never be able to open up the catbox or visit the outsideworld themselves. But I think there’s at least some degree of truth to it too,as there is with many of Tsumugi’s comments. She wouldn’t be able to weave sucha convincing story about the survivors, and about Saihara in particular, ifthere weren’t some underlying truth to it too, in my opinion.

In ndrv3, regardless of what the state of the outside worldmight be, one thing that seems pretty consistent is—bad. There are tons ofhints that the virus in particular seems to be real. Even if it didn’t wipe outall of humanity, the fact that Tsumugi was clearly sweating bullets when sherealized Momota was sick in Chapter 5 and the fact that the virus wasforeshadowed by Ouma long before the Hope’s Peak remember light, as early asChapter 3, all suggest that some kindof disaster happened in the outside world.

There’s also what we hear from “Makoto” in Chapter 6. Thescene with Makoto isn’t shown via any remember lights or scenes with Tsumugi;rather, it’s a scene entirely for the player’s eyes, and it highlightsincredibly well the sort of pressure placed on “normal, talentless” people tokeep up with societal pressure in a school meant only for the “elite.” Makotopretty much flat-out confirms that he would just up and kill himself without throwinghimself headlong into fiction and into DR in particular in order to cope—to anunhealthy degree even.

This scene sets the tone for the rest of Chapter 6 and forthe reveals we discover about the rest of the characters. This is exactly whatleads me to believe that pre-game Saihara did, to some extent, rely on the DRfranchise in the same way; his audition tape suggests as much. The ndrv3universe seems to hinge heavily on convincing children, particularly teenagers,that their lives don’t particularly mean much if they can’t “keep up” with theelite and talented members of society. And so, joining “the world ofDanganronpa” is a definite way to escape from that frustrating, painful realitywhich puts so much pressure and misery onto these kids.

Going back to what I mentioned about Chapter 5 earlier aswell, in-game Saihara is notablydepressed and suicidal after Ouma drops “the truth of the outside world” on allof them. The whole group is, really, except for Tsumugi as the ringleader andMaki because she’s used to dismissing her own personal feelings in order tokeep going as any good soldier or assassin would.

Saihara literally lies in his bedroom for at least two orthree days literally thinking to himself “there’s no reason to live, there’s noreason to live, there’s no reason to live” on loop, unable to eat, shower, orgo out and talk to anyone. Maki even agrees to kill all the rest of the groupas per Himiko’s request if they still want to die after using the rememberlight she found—and none of them have any problems with this, because realizingthat all the people they ever loved are dead and gone and the earth is acomplete wasteland is just that painful a truth.

This tendency to want to just give up and die is somethingthat carries over even into Chapter 6, when Tsumugi hits them with one “reveal”after another about the fragile state of their existences as fictional beings.As she claims credit for every single thing they’ve ever thought or done, downto their experiences, their memories, even their emotions, the initialexpectation from most players I think is to assume that Saihara’s going to bereally shocked and upset at first, only to bounce back with the usual “you’vegot that wrong” speech full of hope and inspiration.

But that doesn’t happen. Saihara quite literally gives up.It’s a very emotional scene full of heavy impact because Saihara makes someextremely valid points on why there’s not even any point in going on. If she saysall that, then it is true they have no way to deny it. And he’s tired. He’s tired and he’s in pain andhe’s miserable and they’ve already lost so many of their classmates, and nowthey don’t even have anything about themselves that they can trust, not eventheir own feelings or the memories of the people they love.

It’s at that point that Kiibo has to take the stage as themore traditional “hope-giving” protagonist figure—and it’s this hopeful andinspirational speech which actually incites Saihara to action again. Ratherthan hooking him into the usual “hope vs. despair” conflict though, it’s angerthat drives him. Anger and a willingness to quite literally discard his life ifthat’s what it takes to end the whole killing game. It’s the same sort ofsuicidal but determined drive which allowed Ouma to make the same decision inChapter 5.

Even at the very end of Chapter 6, Saihara never reallyexpected to make it out of the game alive. Every truth he exposed, he did so inthe hopes of keeping himself and the other survivors alive, but by the game’send, he was fully convinced that the DR franchise and the killing game showcould only be brought to a stop if he and the other survivors sacrificed theirlives for it. He was willing and ready to die, and only Kiibo’s self-sacrifice offeredthem a third option they hadn’t considered before.

In other words, Saihara is pretty clearly depressed,anxious, and suicidal for almost the entirety of ndrv3. He’s capable ofcheering up and gaining confidence in himself, of course, but often he needs torely on others and has a much more dependent streak than either Naegi or Hinatabefore him. His hesitation and insecurities about his own abilities, aboutfinding the truth, and about whether or not he even wants to live on, are allextremely relatable in my opinion, and part of what make him such a greatprotagonist in the most unconventional way.

I hope this cleared matters up a little! There’s probablymore examples than what I’ve listed too, but these are just the big points Icould remember in terms of how depressed and willing to die Saihara gets. Thankyou for asking!

[mybumpbirthandbeyond]

Sticks and Stones

To all the women who comment on how feed my baby, or ask whether I'm due another, or pass judgment when my baby is put down in the changing rooms and can’t keep their comments to themselves, this one is for you. After all, why seek advice from those close to you or those you trust, when you can be offered unsolicited and unwanted advice from a perfect stranger?!

I never used to care what people think. Yes I would get annoyed or pissed when someone said something and probably have a rant, but I was brought up to be polite so most of the time was so shocked if someone was rude, I was stunned into silence. Since becoming a mum, I hate this part because now I constantly seem to wonder what people think. He screams when I burp him ‘I promise I'm doing this to help him.’ I give him a dummy - ‘that will cause problems with his teeth and speech;’ I put him in on his own early and I started weaning him earlier - ‘that’s not what the guidelines say.’ Why do I care?! I’m Cailean’s mum, I know what’s best for him and it’s up to me. 

Most of the people I refer to in the introduction are, sadly for them, old boots as I like to call them. In their 60′s plus who believe they have a right to comment or judge. They don’t actually do anything to help or support, they would prefer to give their opinion or even criticise. Take for example an instance at Waterbabies. There are around (or were) about 8 of us in the class. All mummies who have babies no younger than 12 weeks. Whether it’s our first, second etc doesn’t really matter. Now I have been extremely lucky to have Alex there 6/7 classes so there’s someone in the water with Cailean, and then the other person dries him. I’ve only been in the changing room dripping wet and trying to get Cailean dried and dressed on my own once. Most of the mums in my class have done that every single class and I take my hat off to them - you’re wet and freezing but you don’t even look at a towel until the baby is dried and dressed. The changing room was practically empty and I decided to try and put the swimwear in the drying machine. Cailean was in the middle of this central part of the changing room which was circular and we used to change all the babies. I was 1, maybe 2 feet from him watching him the whole time.This old lady then raised her eyebrow at me quizzed me on ‘is he not rolling yet? I wouldn’t be leaving him like that.’ As my mum pointed out, why couldn’t she have offered to watch him to help me?! Knowing I was on my own?! I was quite blunt: “No he’s not and I’ll worry about that when he can.” My polite way of saying sod off you stupid old woman!! In the same changing room a week later, another old cow reported my friend to the manager for putting the nappy in the wrong bin. I mean really?!?! Give us a bloody break!!! 

There is a lot more about social media now about ‘bump shaming.’ People commenting on the size, shape etc of a pregnant woman’s bump. “You’re tiny;” “You’re huge;” “Are you sure it’s not twins?!” “You’re going to go early.” I always got the latter three but I wasn’t particularly bothered as I knew I was big for my frame. The irony is, I was on track to have a 7lb 10oz baby on the 7th of April, and that's exactly what happened. An average size baby (though quite long) born on his due date. However, as much as I liked my midwife, I think I've previously mentioned that she described my bump as weird. I was certainly a bit uneasy with this description, given my midwife is close to retirement. She suggested that this might be the way I carry all my children. When she saw me after Cailean was born, she said she couldn’t understand where he was hiding, as it wasn’t as if he was particularly small. It didn’t really occur to me that the ‘big/weird’ bump would actually cause me any real problems.

If I was described as ‘star’ in labour, then I can only be described as an epic failure in postpartum recovery.  Everything had gone so well, there had to be something to bite me on the ass.

I think I previously mentioned I was seen by two community midwives the day after I came home from hospital. One was clearly more experienced than the other. While she saw to Cailean, her colleague checked me. When she felt my stomach, she frowned and went to get her colleague. Her colleague felt my stomach and gave a nod - “yes you can feel all the way down to the intestine and bowel. Were you told about muscle separation?” I explained yes but only at  36 weeks. “I'll drop in a tubi grip for you to wear during the day until your 6 week check.” I asked do I have to see physio? “No this should be fine until you see your GP but if you do, they’ll refer you.” Okay then.

I had been experiencing back pain which is no doubt caused by the lack of abdominal muscles to support my lower back. As I have described, I have a diastasis recti which is where the abdominal muscles have separated due to pregnancy. The abs are the only muscles designed specifically to separate, in order to accommodate a baby and the uterus during pregnancy, The human body is amazing and I don’t think you fully appreciate how amazing until you’ve been pregnant and given birth. However, sometimes the muscles don’t return to normal after pregnancy and leave a gap. The gap is measured in fingers - how many fingers are there between the left and right side post birth. It’s also measured in depth.

As you can probably guess, mine is massive. It wasn’t measured accurately until I saw physio and did a 121 Pilates session. I could tell it wasn’t great when I was in the bath - I could put my hand on my tummy and it just keep going and going down as I pressed. It seemed to have a life of its own in the water but hearing from the midwife that it was all the way to my intestine was rather shocking. I knew I couldn’t do anything until I saw my doctor at my 6 week check and hoped they could tell me more.

Just for anyone who has high expectations for the 6 week GP check - being the only check you get specifically for you and not your baby - don’t. My GP didn’t have a clue why I was there. I was allocated the standard 10 minute appointment everyone gets, and I had to tell her what I wanted checked. When I said I wanted referred to a pelvic health physio, she seemed to not know how to do this. She said ‘I suppose I'll just write a letter?’ You really do experience the best care during pregnancy and labour and immediately after birth. After that it’s all downhill from there!! 

I didn’t want to any exercise at all until I had seen a physio. Lots of people offered advice and exercises they did to reduce the gap etc, but I wasn’t prepared to do anything until I was seen by a professional, as I wanted to exercise safely. I had hoped to see my physio in July (3 months after I gave birth), but had to wait until the end of the month. I had booked a 121 Pilates session and was told some things that were safe to do. It’s all relative, but that instructor assessed me at 5 fingers, telling me it was likely to be 6-9 months minimum to get back to normal. It would be a long process but I would probably benefit from joining a class with the owner who was post-natally trained. 

I saw my physio shortly after. Her assessment was even more grim. My gap was 7.5 FINGERS WIDE and not just that, very deep. She could get her hand pressing down past her knuckles into my stomach. She measured it from the top to the bottom where my uterus would have been. She even brought another issue to my attention - I had an umbilical hernia and my belly button would now stick out until I had it fixed. I felt like I could cry. Yet another issue that was rearing it’s ugly head now I had given birth. Oh and the likelihood would be I would need surgery, but a General Surgeon would probably only agree to do it after I had finished having children. It might go down as my stomach did, but might not. Fabulous!

She said given how bad it was, this recovery would be at least 9 months - 1 year to try and get the gap closed as much as possible, as there was no guarantee it would go back completely. She asked was I not seen on the postnatal ward, and why was I not referred by my midwives. I explained it wasn’t even really picked up until weeks before I gave birth and then I was given a tubi grip. She was disgusted. It sounded like I had been royally shafted, judging by her comments. I should have been seen at the hospital, and at the very least, I should have been referred by my community midwives and not had to wait until my GP check. A tubi grip (unsurprisingly) had done very little if nothing at all for me and she was appalled. I told her how I thought I had a strong core, considered myself a fit person and had no idea why this had happened. She told me that despite how bad the separation was, she could tell I had strong obliques (the muscles on the side of your abdomen) and despite how strong I felt my core was, it could happen anyway. She asked me what I did at the gym and what I wanted to get back to. I explained I regularly did HIIT and cardiovascular classes and exercises. I think given the way I had fallen through the net, and my clear fitness prior to my diastasis, she immediately told me she would see me the following week but would give me exercises to do in the meantime. It was almost like she wanted to get me started as quickly as she could to get me back to recovering. I was to do the exercises 4 times a week, then also go to my Pilates class.

She also measured my stomach. 90 cm circumference, even 3 months after giving birth. That hurt. I always had in my head that I would be one of the people who sprung back to my original size post-pregnancy. I hadn’t put on any weight other than my bump and although it was massive, I genuinely was all bump and nothing else. People I saw who put on loads of weight were literally in their jeans pre-pregnancy a couple of weeks later. I have no idea if this is coincidence or not, or whether this plays any part in it, but I've found anyone I know that has a C-section seems to be back to their pre-pregnancy size quicker. It may be pure coincidence of the people I've met, but that’s just my experience. As they say though, every pregnancy is different, so even with the same mum, two pregnancies might be entirely different. 

The following week when I saw my physio, she measured me again and I had already gone down 2 cm in tummy size to 88 cm. She said the gap was still as bad, but that wasn’t unusual given it had just been 1 week. She said the tension even from standing appeared better. She gave me a few more exercises and I was up to 6 exercises within a week. When I saw her next, I measured 86.5cm and the gap was slowly starting to close. It’s still massive across the middle, but dropped to 3.5 fingers at the top, 3 at the bottom, and was still measuring 4.5 in the middle. This is just going to be it now for the foreseeable future - physio every few weeks and exercises and Pilates every week. 

Sometimes it’s too much to do physio and Pilates in the same day but that’s unfortunately when all my appointments fall due to my physio’s hours, coupled with the only Pilates class that had any space. Pilates has been great. The instructor is so knowledgeable, and has taken the time to really know my treatment from the physio so she can modify my exercises in class accordingly. It is frustrating however. I did boxing training, body combat, functional, circuits etc previously at the gym. I could do full press-ups, planks, sit ups, the lot. Now in Pilates, any time I hear the word ‘plank’ or ‘engage your core’ I sit still until I get my own exercise. Don’t get me wrong, I have to engage my core, but I can’t overdo it because essentially there is no core there.

I’ve been asked if it hurts. Generally, it doesn’t. However, there are times, like with any muscle worked, I can be easily fatigued, or I can get cramps after working hard. I can’t lift anything too heavy. (Try telling that to my growing baby!!) When I engage my core, I have to draw in as much as I can but cannot do anything to the point where I lose the connection. I once tried to do table top into toe taps. Basically I was lying on my back with my legs above me. I was to drop one leg so it was almost 90 degrees and stop. I misunderstood and did alternate toe taps. I’ve never seen so much panic in my usually very chilled Pilates instructor. I clearly wasn't meant to do that!! That’s how frustrating it is. I can’t even do alternate toe taps!!!! When older women (well into their 60s) are doing planks, and I'm told to do hand hovering, I struggle mentally with that. I hope it’s not forever, but I'm impatient to get back to it.

I have just had my most recent physio appointment and I'll be honest, I've been in a bit of dark cloud. This was the biggest gap between appointments since I'd started physio - 4 weeks. I was determined to break the 1.5cm deadlock. I hadn’t managed to make any of the Pilates classes but to make up for it, I had done my exercises 5 times each week. For some reason before my appointment, I felt nervous. I had to take a few minutes in the car before I went in to tell myself to chill the hell out. When I went in, my physio did her usual measurements of my actual stomach. 0.5 cm. WHAT?!?! I couldn’t understand it. She then got me on the bed to measure the gap. No change. WTF?!?!? I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach. I was gobsmacked and said I didn't understand how this could happen. This just didn’t make sense. I asked her the question that has been weighing heavy on my mind since I started. Would l ever get better, or was there a chance I could stay like this? When she confirmed my worst fear I felt like I'd been hit by a sledgehammer. That wasn’t what I wanted, nor hoped to hear. She looked at me and told me to blurt out what I was thinking. I just sat with my head in my hands refusing to believe that this could be happening. I asked if there is any chance that the delay in being seen had contributed - she thought it probably had. I swore inwardly. I had been royally screwed over by the very people who I couldn’t praise highly enough during my labour and birth (not those specific midwives - this is completely nothing to do with them). She asked me to go through again who checked me the following day. I told her bitterly how it had all been about breastfeeding and then I was seen by student midwife (!) who only checked to see that my uterus had contracted before I was discharged. I asked (though I already knew the answer) - could I see a PT who was postnatally trained? She shook her head. Could I use a stronger theraband with more resistance? She shook her head. Could I do anything other than the exercises? She shook her head. I could have cried. She asked me if I planned to continue with Pilates and I said yes. She agreed it would be beneficial, but at this point, how beneficial we don’t know.

My physio is now trying to get me an ultrasound to accurately measure the gap. During the appointment she said it might be the case there is significant herniation preventing the muscles from coming back together. I certainly have an umbilical hernia, but she now considers there might be even worse underlying issues. She also thinks I might need to consider surgery to fix the gap. That is major abdominal surgery which has a longer recovery time than a Cesarean section (12 weeks I believe). The key thing is I can’t have it done until I ‘finish’ having children. We haven’t confided in many people when we want to have more kids but she is one person I've told based on the fact it could impact her treatment. She is adamant this won’t happen again, because she will see me antenatally, and I'll likely be in a tuba-grip from 12 weeks of pregnancy onwards. I will continue doing exercises, antenatal pilates, and likely be taped. Postnatally, immediately after birth, I'd be seen at the hospital by her or her colleague and then treated again. However, despite all of that, there is chance the gap could be even bigger this time, depending on how much we can reduce it now.

She told me there is a band I could wear but it may not do anything at this late stage. I’ll be honest I'm still in shock. This all just happened yesterday. I didn’t cry in the appointment but got back to the car and just sobbed. How could my beautiful baby boy have caused such a major physical problem? He wasn’t massive, he wasn’t ever really in a bad enough position, there was only one of him. My physio thinks being slim, I have narrow hips so Cailean being 7lbs 10oz was big for me. I told her I don’t want to look pregnant when I'm not pregnant. Short of making a sign to hang around my neck, I'm sick of the comments, I'm sick of the looks people don’t think I see them give me when I walk past, as their eyes flick to my stomach. She too has been in my position but she doesn’t look pregnant. She pointed out it’s clear I've always been slim so it looks more obvious on me.

She basically told me, she has no idea if the treatment I get will work, and if it does, progress will be very slow, but we’re going to carry on. I’m just finding it very hard to feel positive or even have the motivation if it stops working. My appointment yesterday turned out to be more therapy than physical therapy. Due to the comments recently, I've had quite a bad few weeks. She suggested apart from the referral, she thinks I should see someone about it. I told her I knew there was a team for birth trauma. Basically, if you have a traumatic birth, you can speak to the consultants/midwives that looked after you to get clarification, closure and to talk through what happened to try and process things. I asked my physio if there was such a team that might be able to help me. My birth couldn't have gone better if I had planned it - but the physical impact that has since been missed is without doubt starting to impact on my mental and physical well-being. She pointed me in the direction of Patient Relations initially. I don’t particularly want to complain about the midwifery team but at the same time, I don’t want it to happen again, and I don’t want it to happen to anyone else. I’ve already had a confirmation email to say this has been passed to a Patient Relations Officer. I’m hoping to discuss my postnatal care with this person and find out what can be done so I don’t go through this again next time.

Separately, I've been having issues with my episiotomy scar. I think there is scar tissue causing me sharp pain and have been referred to Gynaecology. I have been told, they may laser it off or even fashion me another episiotomy and then stitch me again. Fantastic!

I don’t want anyone to think I'm ungrateful. Cailean is 100% worth everything that has happened to me. I know there are worse things than what I'm going through - I've been through worse things in my life. It’s just that this is soul destroying for me at the minute and after everything I've already been through, I don’t think anyone would blame me for feeling the way I do. At this point in time, I cannot be gracious to those women who just jump back to their previous size. People complain about stretch marks, or excess skin or their new body shape. I’m sorry but I would kill for that right now. I look pregnant AND I’M NOT!!!

This has all happened within the last 48 hours. If my ‘recovery’ has shown me anything - when it rains, it definitely pours...