#it's that specific tension where you know the roles you're supposed to play but the actual dynamic you have don't fit those roles

[kiseiakhun]

The worst thing about fandom is when you're experiencing a media and you're like "I can't wait to read all the fucked up daddy kink people will write about this" and you open up ao3 only to find fandom has decided they're father and son

[msviolacea]

So yeah, I watched this week's Critical Role. And wow, I have a lot of thoughts and feelings.

To start with, I've also been watching a series on YouTube by supergeekmike where he's gone through the Vox Machina episodes one at at time and talks about what we can learn about GMing and playing TTRPGs from how the CR cast does it. Which is very interesting overall, but the most recent episode has a surprising amount of synergy with this week's CR. He reached the Umbrasyl fight, and talks about how some of the awkward tension in this fight stems from the fact that the players, at this point, tended to keep Matt in the dark about big battle plans they wanted to implement, presumably because they didn't want him to plan a counter for them. This is partly seeing it at least a little as an us vs them, players vs GM sort of game, which can be a valid way of playing if everyone's on board, but doesn't super work for something like CR. But it's also a way players try to exert what little control they have over the situation, especially in very tense situations in which their characters are in serious danger.

Anyway, that sense of control is something I thought about again while watching this most recent episode. Spoilers ahoy!

99% of the time, I'm on team Marisha does nothing wrong fuck you Reddit, but in this one I think that, in her panic and desire to control the situation, she overstepped a couple of times. First with the scryball thing - yes, she mentioned it earlier in the episode, but if you want to assume you have it up and are staring at it 100% of the time you have to say so. Also, knowing Otohan was that close wasn't going to give them any kind of real advantage - there wasn't time or space to create an ambush or do much of anything that would improve their position when she arrived. Looking at the scryball earlier told them that Otohan was there and getting closer - realistically, that was about as much warning as they needed or were going to get. I think the thing to take away here is that sometimes, you can't make plans for everything as a player. Sometimes, the best you're going to do is "big shit's coming, at least you're aware." If you want more than that, especially in a very high-stress situation, you have be specific. "I have the scryball in my hand and will look at it every minute or so." "I am keeping very, very aware as we run so can we just use my passive perception against anything in the area as we move forward?" "I have specifically taken X weapon out of the bag so I don't have to spend an action when we inevitably get ambushed." The more info you can give your GM, the more control you can have, however little it may be. But at the same time, sometimes you're just going to be surprised or get caught in a suboptimal situation, and sometimes that's what the story needs.

As an aside, it did feel like Otohan was a little overtuned - 4 attacks PLUS two action surges PLUS legendary actions? And that's without her crazy shadow backpack? But there's also the fact that the party had used so many of their spells for the infiltration. But still. I wonder if Otohan was meant to be an even later boss fight, and they were meant to flee again, maybe with the teleport back to Exandria. But that wasn't clear, so maybe this really was just supposed to be a brutal deadly fight. It just didn't feel like fun for the players for a good chunk of time.

(I struggle a lot figuring out how to make a fight hard for a large group of fairly overpowered players myself. I haven't figured out how to make it work. But it's a little comforting to realize that Matt might not even quite know how to do it all the time even after all these years.)

But anyway. The second time I started to get irritated with Marisha was when she started trying to bargain/beg after they all realized what Sam/FCG was doing. Thankfully Travis brought out the dad voice to shut her down - I get it, I understand the impulse to want to find something, anything that will change this inevitable outcome, but at the same time, this show is as much a piece of improv theater as it is a D&D game, and there comes a time when you have to just let your fellow actor have their moment. And while Sam will make ridiculous snap decisions to commit to the bit, when it comes to the serious, important stuff, he's clearly a player who knows exactly what he's doing and why he wants to do it.

Ultimately, I think this is why I continue to appreciate CR's no-editing approach to their episodes, even though finding 5 hours to watch one episode can be a pain sometimes. I like seeing these awkward moments, these missteps, the times when it becomes clear that even veteran players and GMs, even professional improv actors don't get it right all the time. It's validating, as a GM and player who feels like she sucks at both things, even after playing for like 7-ish years.

[arcplaysgames]

THE TENSION IS BAD IN HERE. THE VIBES ARE BAD. BOY FUCKING HOWDY like the way the mob mentality grows so quickly over this cowering man.

It JUST SO HAPPENS that the Midnight Channel comes on and... somehow.... Namatame's Shadow? Starts speaking directly to the team, and talking about how he failed and its their fault but the cops won't be able to keep him anyway?

This shit feels off. This makes me wanna scream. What the actual fuck is the Midnight Channel? Like, images aren't supposed to be clear unless the person is in the TV. Namatame is not. And he's denying the shit the Shadow is saying.

Also like, the game is specific enough to say "Other Namatame" and not "Shadow Namatame."

Hang on, I have literally 6000 screencaps, I need to check something.

Yeah, in other instances, the speaker is plainly stated to be "Shadow NAME," unlike here. But the "Other" Namatame tries to make it seem like Namatame was in his full and understanding mind as he did all this shit.

fucking Naoto points out that we can just kill him here and now. Naoto, usually our voice of reason (and, okay, admittedly also voic eof stupid questions), brings up the idea that we should just ensure justice will be done and kill him now before the guards return.

And oh man, the mood feels like you're holding out a hand to try and slow down a runaway train.

Kanji and Yosuke are gonna kill Namatame until the game gives me the option to talk them down and BOY HOWDY. THIS IS WHERE IT BRANCHES HUH.

FIVE dialogue checks, I think? I almost looked them up but then was like "EH FUCK IT I have a safety save" and I think.... I got the right choices. I really get the feeling if you fail any of these checks, you get a bad end like if you killed Ryoji.

maybe I'll go back and watch that later.

NAOTO, BUDDY, YOU WERE THE ONE WHO HANDED EVERYONE A METHOD TO KILL THIS GUY its fine, we were all upset, everyone makes mistakes. But man, Naoto's still waters run deep and angry, and he's good at making his impulses sound like well-reasoned presumptions. Dangerous.

IRL I was like "Ah, Judgement time?"

YEP. JUDGEMENT TIME. Instead of Investigation Team, we are the Seekers of Truth. Which is a stupid name but I'm just glad we didn't murder a guy.

Outside, everyone tries to basically rewind to reopen the topic of the entire case, from the announcer lady up to Nanako.

Adachi is listening in and man. MAN.

WHAT IS KILLING ME is that I don't fucking trust Adachi even remotely, but like. He's a hapless fucking gofer for the most part.

The only things that really make me distrust him are

some of his line reads really really make me stop and squint at him, and this is a game with frankly impeccable voice direction

he's a stealth asshole and doesn't like people, and it veers from "affable everyman joking about his mean boss" into actual simmering contempt a little too often

that FUCKING moment when he stopped swaying, like he forgot to play the role of a harmless dude for a second

i think he lied about the diary. he says that Namatame made "advances" on Konishi but that doesn't track with what we know.

ryoji vibes

But functionally, so far he has been a decent facilitator to the team, both wittingly and accidentally. I would think he's just being a reasonable, good guy if not for the FUCKING swaying moment that haunts me.

Somewhere, Elsewhere, Teddie is alone on a blank, featureless road, walking.

NANAKO FUCKIGN SURVIVES

I feel like I just matrix-dodged a bullet. Or, five bullets, to be exact. In the bad ending, does Nanako just legit die?

I don't understand what happened here, like how would Teddie even get back to the TV World from here? Did he somehow sacrifice his sit-up-conjured body to save Nanako's life?

Where IIIIIIS HEEEEEEEE.

God this game happens so much.

[hoefette]

All the petty things I hate about fate!winx and their shitty universe/world building because

I'd added most if these in tags of other posts but I'm still so mad lmao

The way characters, Aisha and Mrs Dowling specifically make references to explicitly human or American things like instagram and Harry Potter

These people are from a different dimension for ffs why are they concerned with or are even aware of this very earth-specific shit? Do they teach earth classes at school over there?

I understand not wanting to have them be oblivious so Bloom wouldn't have to explain it to them, but it simply could be ✨omitted✨

Why would you go out of your way to date your work like this lmao ew

Ms. Dowling calling Tinkerbell an air fairy.. I cannot breeve with the stupidity why did they keep that in there

Why is Ms. Dowling.. the headmistress.. teaching classes? Where are the other teachers?

We ended up with a trio of antagonists (I guess you could call them that?) by the end of the season anyway so why not give us the trix, why have the characters play double roles as friends of our protagonists and also the villains/bullies? They clearly wanted a delinquent trio, in which case they could've gender bent the trix if they wanted to keep all the unnecessary sexual tension.

It just feels like the production team was lazy, they didn't want to hire more actors, they didn't want to bother with making the world immersive or lived in or believable at best, they just didn't give enough of a fuck

They wanted to make this show and attatch Winx to it for.. what? Like did you even google the main plot points? The abridged version or sparknotes to get details on the very literal, basic characteristics of our main characters or their roles or the world they inhabit????

It lacks wonder and intrigue.. I mean Bloom moves to another dimension, a school for fairies and we don't see her marvel once at anything.. and that's because she might as well have been in Switzerland because she's in exactly the same environment she would've been in over there anyway.

They could've said Alfea was in Europe and I'd believe it because nothing about the setting makes it feel otherworldly. I'm sorry but I'm not impressed.

Why do the teachers and graduated specialists communicate via facetime ?? In the magic dimension. ??? Why do they text each other and those texts then appear on screen like .. oh look, like a bad netflix teen movie ????? HELLO ??? it's the way technology and magic could've blended in so seamless into the world THE WAY IT WAS ALREADY DONE/SHOWN. Missed opportunity. it just takes you out of it imo every time you see the ugly, bland, gray text bar. Some fucking flavour pls I'm begging

How stupid the specialist must feel clonking around with the skinniest shreds of armor, plastic swords on their backs and battery powered flashlights and cellphones in their bags. R we larping?? I know I'd be laughing and asking why we hadn't already come up with something more effective .. idk like guns. I'm surprised I ain't see one gun in there.

In the beginning Ms. Dowling says some nonsense about fairies having lost the ability to transform to explain why there are no wings, which means they could've transformed before. So are we to assume that this supposed to be set in the time proceeding the original then?? Because something is not adding up with where they should be as a magical society technologically if that's the case

How does the production team want to keep the dark academia vibes with torches lining the walls and also want them to be face timing each other, presumably from miles and miles away in the dark forest???

Pls pick an aesthetic and stick to it everything was so unnecessarily dark. Where do they charge their phones since it's the only device we see that is the slightest bit modern and dont fucking tell me they charge it with magic I will punch you in the face

Why is there only one major monarchy that we are shown? Why are Solaria the only ones contributing to the efforts to defend the school and where is this mysterious battalion we never see lmaoo it's all so bad its laughable.

Is this set in the kingdom of Solaria? And why does the queen of an alleged interdimensional superpower monarchy pull up in black SUVs??????????? Why does she pull up with Andreas?? Is he not the king of Erakleon?? Where are his soldiers and his battalion and just?? Huh!? The world just feels empty like nobody lives here fr

Are we supposed to believe that the specialists get paired up with fairies just as a normal occurence and that they have to 'trust each other' and not because the plot demands it suddenly half way through when all we've seen so far are the fairies doing normalish school and homework, and the specialists outside, being physical everyday all day. This was never even implied that they'd have to work together apart from when we see the faculty as youngins with Rosalind. But even then.. it's like well why are they even together lmao? Is this a special team formed from Rosalind’s protégées? Were they formed after graduating from Alfea or what is this?? Are they the ONLY team of specialist/fairies hunting every single burned one?? What?

Are we now supposed to buy that Musa is being switched to 'support' because that's where her strengths lie and not in combat?? Are we supposed to believe that these girls know hand to hand combat?? When was this established? We see Terra wrapping some baby vines around a dude and I'm sorry is that the practical application of her power? Is this what the fairies are supposed to do once they graduate? Or is it just a switch in curriculum because of the threats outside the barrier?? This is never made clear.

Because if not then what's the point of this?? Why do they suddenly have endless classes together when the expectation was never set for the fairies to be like soldiers or out in the field fighting ?

Where exactly are they supposed to be what was the purpose of including Aster Dell and why is it a joy ride away from Alfea lmao?? Where Bloom is from and also not from?? Plot pls make it make sense

Why are fairies from another dimension vaping or smoking weed?? They are not human so why are they engaging in specifically human vices, yol couldn't come up with anything else to characterize 'delinquents'?? Very lazy very como se dices.. no effort. Nothing a little more spicy yol could invent, at least change the name and some properties holy shit did yol even try ??

So its fairies everywhere, having a lil party in the east wing of a phat castle.. and they are playing beer pong and dressed in t shirts and jeans..

Can you hear me screaming? Can you hear me vibrating with rage?

Not one floating decoration or magical anything in sight. Just purple lights and subpar vibes

Stella's costume design: tragic. I won't discuss further because we don't have the space or time but just know that it was absolutely atrocious and I hated it. Giving very debutante vibes

The entire budget going to that lame transformation sequence that was not a transformation sequence and those horrible, barely-there fire wings

Edgelord bloom and all her fucking leather jackets. Why do 30 yo, white cis men think girls exist in a binary? They could keep her earlier characterization and make her a hothead.. Bloom literally screamed herself into a couple power upgrades in the original come ooonnnn

Let girls be feminine without it being a character flaw what is wrong with yol its 2021. They could make her more mature, more angsty or whatever the hell else and not style her like that

The way Aisha's abilities flipflop between episodes and scenes. Very inconsistent. One minute she's struggling with a drop of water and the next she is moving an entire body of water for her bestie Bloom to fake transform because the plot demands it. Why even add in her struggles at all if you're just going to ignore it?

Why was Stella with them in that scene? She didn't do anything literally.. Aisha pulled the water and she did .. nothing.

Who the fuck is Rosalind? Why would they add her in,, to add nothing to story? The company of light was a thing, they could've plucked one of them hoes to be the antagonist. Why did the winx club need their own Delores Umbridge? Valtor was right there if you wanted an evil educator type character.

The camera work was so bland during the down beats, stagnant and fixed during a fairy party and erratic and ugly and disorienting during the fight scenes

I'm not getting over the fairy party because it was a good opportunity for the production and everyone else to show the differences between where Bloom was and where she is now but instead it just looks like a regular teen high school party?? This could have been set in Switzerland fr.

Everyone's just kind of standing?? You mean to tell me these people are from all different places in the magical dimension and their customs are all the same? They all throw parties like this ??

White and flavorless I am very bored

I guess the main question or takeaway I have is just.. who is this for? Because everyone, including the showrunners keep saying that it's for us, the fans of the original. But apart from the characters sharing some names, there are really no other similarities. So again, who was this supposed to appease or placate or satisfy? Because it sure as hell wasn't the winx club fans.

Overall, this feels very much like something I wrote and probably published on ff.net when I was 13 because I thought girls couldn't be taken seriously if they liked pink, and injected angst into everything that didn't need it and had no idea how to structure scenes or dialogue. It's just bad, objectively and N*tflix will keep making shit like this because apparently some people have bad taste??? Idk yol, be easy

[jimmymcgools]

If you're still up for the writing ask meme: the part in chapt 13 where Kim decides to take the phone call in *another* direction (like, WHY does she decide to do that?)

(thank you for letting me ignore this for a full week as i worked on chapter 4 of slip and fall season instead ♥️)

but yes i will do this forever!!! if anyone else has scenes they’d still like to hear my thoughts on 🙏hmu

fic commentary meme and my answers 

the boring doylist answer to your question is: because considering the 1x03 call i figured if i was gonna write mailroom mcwexler i’d be letting myself & everyone else down if i didn’t include a phone sex scene!

and “hold tight to the ropes” really hooked me on the idea of jimmy calling from cicero. so huge credit to that wonderful fic, i mention it in the chapter notes because i stole (and hopefully remixed?) so much of that set up. 

A click. “Hello?” “Hey,” Jimmy says. “Happy Thanksgiving.”  this made me think of mulder and scully when i wrote it and i thought of them reading it over again now. 

“A Thanksgiving classic,” Kim says dryly. “No Way Out.” Jimmy grins. “Nice. Costner at his best.” one of those movie picks where hopefully kim’s joke works just based on the title. jimmy’s dialogue could read ironic, but i do think this is one of costner’s best roles. 

Jimmy chuckles. “We played Monopoly.” mcgill bros monopoly! writing this chapter i learned that you’re supposed to auction off properties if you don’t choose to buy them when you land on them, apparently. #research  💀that’s right i researched monopoly “10 most common arguments people have over a game of Monopoly according to Hasbro” guess i should’ve credited more in my chapter notes huh

A scrap of paper reading That Hamilton Woman rests beneath the plastic but above the original cover for The Boys from Brazil. ruth mcgill playing favourites with laurence olivier movies

“Yeah,” Kim says. “Yeah, sometimes it would snow.” i think i looked this up as well and it only snows like one in 20 thanksgivings but, uh. fanfic.  

Flat white fields dotted with fence posts, like ellipses on a page, drifting into the distance i really like using “this thing looks like writing on a page” type metaphors for kim, but also the idea of endless ellipses seemed pretty perfect for red cloud. 

A little blue dot in the endless fields of white. He exhales. “Kim?” a strange thought process for jimmy here, but he gets to white sands from it somehow. it helps that kim had made the comparison herself, too, while they were at white sands. that it reminded her of winters back home. 

“Can we go back to White Sands?” he asks. i think/hope you can tell from the convo, but jimmy’s not asking for phone sex, he’s more asking for a return to that openness/vulnerability/intimacy. they’ve had a nice conversation so far, but it’s kind of the conversation two friends might have -- “yeah, family. we fought over monopoly. how are you?” -- and he wants more. 

A beat. “What, tonight? That might be pretty tricky.” kimberly #deflection wexler

“But scared of what I might do next. Scared to get too close, maybe.” i wanted there to be this real wariness in the family around jimmy at this point in his life. i didn’t have much to work with for the acb ruth relationship, other than knowing she had nobody by her deathbed but chuck and jimmy, and that she was still up in cicero/berwyn.  i liked the idea that, as much as ruth loves jimmy, in 1992 she’s starting to close herself off from him in that way mothers can do -- she pretends everything is good, she has innocent conversations about movies, she tells him she loves him. to protect/spare him? to protect the purity of the relationship so that she has an outlet where she can pretend nothing’s wrong for a while? i’m not sure. i don’t think it’s good for them. 

It’s like he can hear the connection between them, the long strands of copper wire humming over the country. little reference to chapter 5 when they’re watching born yesterday: “But this is as precious and as fragile to him as crystal, as a string wound to its snapping point, as small human breaths down copper wire.”

“Is there anything you can do?” Kim asks finally. kim the fixer 

staring up at the vine-patterned cornice. oh great jimmy’s looking at a ceiling again 

He counts the leaves, one-two-three, but his brain keeps racing okay whew, at least i only mentioned this one because i brought it up in the white sands chapter -- “His childhood bedroom back in Cicero used to have one, too, carved with vines or flowers or something” -- because he’s staring at the cornice in the motel room while he’s wondering what else he can do with his life. 

he still feels half a step behind something, like there’s something just around the next bend, like the top of a mountain that keeps vanishing into the distance,  two road trip references for the price of one in this paragraph -- them driving up the sandias out of abq, here

And then, as if she can feel the tension and wants to break it, Kim says, “You know, we could do more than just talk.” ayyy we made it, moment of truth!! so why does kim do it, in the fun, watsonian way? 

i think it’s largely what you’ve brought up before -- like she does in breathe, and elsewhere in acb -- i think it’s kim turning to sex when the emotions get too muddy. and you put it better than me! “Kim seems to go physical instead of talking about things”. and when they’re states apart on a phone call? close enough! 

it’s also fixer kim still, right? she can tell that she hasn’t really helped at all with her responses, that jimmy’s still hurting. so here’s take 2. and maybe it’s kim following her own advice she’s just given to jimmy: “is there anything you can do?” 

and there’s that “kim and jimmy giving the other person what they think they need” thing that we’ve all talked about before. and i can’t remember the origin of it now! some interview? 

also she’s definitely hungry for it right now, too. that, like, addictive connection after she’s walled herself off for so long. and after she’s had that “i should call jimmy--oh shit i can’t. huh. hm. this is fine.” moment earlier in the day, too. 

“I’m kidding,” Kim says quietly. “Don’t leave me hanging.” and yeah, with the jimmy pov im always worried about trying to show how much kim wants jimmy, too. i hoped to give the sense that she needed the connection in this scene, too. 

“I mean, I haven’t checked the window, so Gene Hackman might be out there with an audio dish, but—yeah.”  always time for a movie reference. a bit of an ironic one -- he’s referencing the conversation, and i’m pretty sure the chuck stuff in 3x10 is inspired by the scene at the end of that movie when hackman tears up his apartment hopelessly looking for a bug.  (also jeepers, second gene hackman movie of the phone call, he’s also in no way out)

“I miss touching you.” It’s the first time he’s really spoken out loud about that physical intimacy, and something unwinds in his stomach, something that’s been coiled there a long time. oh man, spoilers for safs chapter 4 -- but interesting to reread this part of the conversation in particular when i’ve just written a chapter trying to show a really comfortable physicality between them. aw man. 

He breathes out, tipping his head back against the cold door, eyes tracing over the bare basement ceiling. there he goes there he goes again.mp3

And Kim exhales, and it sounds heavier than it did earlier. “You know, I had bruises there after last time.” starting from jimmy’s “i miss touching you” and then this from kim, i wanted to play with this shift in excitement/energy in the phone sex that comes when they both start actually opening up about the specific emotions/fallout from white sands that’s otherwise mostly gone unsaid. it drifts into more of a pure fantasy scenario after this but i always liked that honesty being a catalyst  kim: “I thought you might notice somehow.” :( 

and then it also seemed very them that they’d end up going with this HHM fantasy with discovery stakes and everything 😂they love their hypotheticals. and also i kinda got to weave in mailroom sex to the fic, almost, sneakily! 

“Thank you yourself,” she says you’re welcome seriously

i hope that wasn’t just me repeating everything we’ve already talked about back at you! 😂

[punkjinshi]

In regards to your oh so we're doing this now reply on that post-I think you're greatly misinterpreting it to be something it's not. I believe it's a comparison of how two (boy)friends are reacting to their other (boy)friend and his predicament, not meant to bash Trent. You're the only person I see making daily posts about how you dislike Chuck/OC, I haven't seen anyone that ships them do the same or say anything remotely negative about Trent or Chuck/Trent. There is no war, dude.

Well that particular person doesn't like the Trent or Chuck pairing in that way and it obviously just comes off that she was comparing them like in a wow look how Trent treats Chuck compared to Orange type of way I don't know how else you're supposed to interpret a 'vs' post

And also daily posts??? I don't post about my dislike for them daily???? I may have posted some recently only cause when I see certain stuff I just type before thinking cause I just get a little ticked off but not daily fam

Plus I've talked with several others who say the same and are annoyed by some people saying things too

Someone literally wrote a murder fic, where Chuck strangled Trent to death because he was getting in the way of him and Orange

I've seen people try to make it seem as if Trent plays so significant role in his team and he's just a third wheel to a two person team

And now people get mad when there's Trent/Oc posts cause it doesn't include shipping Chuck but then it's ok when their ship excludes Trent

I've had people comment their disliking of my edits just because it wasn't Chuck and Oc when they could have just ignored it

Listen me and others have seen people post some stupid stuff and that's why I get annoyed just because you personally haven't seen anything that doesn't mean it doesn't exsists

I know I always jump the gun and post things when I see posts like those and I'm working on it ok, it's like when I got mad over every weird reachy ambrollins posts I seen, they're both a reach and it's just a ship I know I used to like chuck/oc actually but I just seen posts that either didn't make sense or they had that 'my pairing is better' vibe

And it drove me away and I get doing it in a ironic way but when you're being for real then it's just weird

And there's no 'war' yeah I hope not?? Cause I don't want one plus that sounds cringe as hell I just feel like even tho the majority of best friends fans like all of the pairings the ones that have specific pairs have this tension from what I've personally seen and had others tell me

Hope I'm wrong

[fawriel]

First of all, note to self that I need to get better about this because I keep making vague to-do lists and then act like it's surprising that I'm paralyzed by uncertainty when the time comes to actually put them into practice.

Second of all... I just want to vent for a moment about my time at a psychiatric clinic, where they made me come to terms with having a personality disorder with narcissistic aspects. Except, in hindsight, I am becoming less and less sure that said aspect plays as big a role as they seemed to think, and more and more sure that they had already made up their mind about me from the start and viewed everything I did under the lens of narcissism.

Because I was so constantly overwhelmed, I couldn't really see what was happening while it was happening. I should've taken my ADHD into account way more from the very start to demand accomodations. I was eventually kicked out for repeatedly missing regular appointments twice a day to measure my blood pressure (because I wasn't allowed to carry around my phone to remind me). After the first warning, they suggested that I have a problem with authority and ignore those appointments as some kind of subconscious rebellion. Which is a patently ridiculous idea if you know me, but clearly I rejected that so quickly that it read as defensive rather than certain.

There's so many events I could point to for the miscommunication that happened, but the one that this post really brought to mind is the skills training I had to do with a nurse. Which went awry because I had a wrong idea about skills as something you only use in an emergency. It blew my mind when we finally got to the point where he explained that your inner tension is normally supposed to be at a 0/10 and you should use skills to get there even when you're at a 1/10 or 2/10 that you've gotten used to as your Normal. But when we finally got there, he had already decided that I'm being non-compliant, that I don't want to do the work and expect him to just give me all the answers. I'd had a vague feeling that there was miscommunication going on and kept trying to explain my situation to see where the misunderstanding lies. He told me to my face that I'm not listening and that I just keep selfishly circling around myself and that anyone who doesn't know my condition (by which I'm sure he meant narcissism rather than ADHD) would think I'm a complete asshole they wouldn't want anything to do with. So before I could finally do the skills training for real after understanding what it's actually about, they arbitrarily took one of my many missed blood pressure appointments as an opportunity to issue my final warning and kick me out.

That was probably quite a mess to read, but I just had to get it off my chest. It's been bothering me so much for so many months now.

tl;dr:

1. Psychiatric clinics can be a great opportunity to really tackle uncomfortable issues. But when you're getting your diagnoses from a team of people who all just get to see you for very brief moments of time under very specific circumstances, that multitude of perspectives doesn't necessarily translate to a more accurate image of you.

2. If you have ADHD, be very aware of how it affects your interactions with people, and especially with people whose job it is to give you tasks. Even people in the mental health business probably don't know shit about how your brain works, so you've gotta get ahead of them before they draw their own conclusions.

(Source: me on twitter)

*Though, this really only applies to more smaller tasks (such as doing the dishes). Giving very specific instructions for more complicated tasks can confuse and bewilder us more.

** And yes, ADHDers can take things literally too. Its not much of an issue for us as autistic folks though.