#mind of a mentally ill nd teenager

[nariz-teatime]

Holy fuck nari posts his art again? And its another stupid fucking thang i spent 6 hours on this and its all because of these lesbians get em out of my phone i hate em

Template under cut

[tairaawhiti]

hine intro post ..

hello strangers and mutuals alike i have not introduced myself

tw for this blog, i reblog stuff like medgore/pathology stuff, will be tagged w #notsafe for your blocking pleasure

hine! woc (polynasian + wahine Māori) . australia's fav living corpse, full of hate and cheap beer. i like indie horror games, brokeback mountain, BOY i love boy, forensic pathology, indigenous cultures, and anything thats repulsive in a sexual way. he/she final boss ,dsc is tupacalyps for cool mutuals that use the grooming app

bisexual aromantic fuckboy in a teenage girls body. lds christian, speaker of 2ish languages (eng + reo māori plus a litle bit of ukrainian nd german) . free palestine, drc, ukraine, sudan, haiti, and all other countries suffering under genocide and war

no dni all you little freaks are free to interact ,very mentally ill there are many things wrong with me and im v autistic so #Keep that in mind.

letterboxd is @ eeltrash

[mr-magoriums-im-sorry-emporium]

Here's the quote about how "clinical narcissists" are "evil.""Oh Simon. Simon is a clinical narcissist. He absolutely can’t stand to be wrong, so he rewrites everything in his mind. “I’m always right, therefore everyone who disagrees with me is wrong. And if I’m always right, literally all my actions are justified.” But clinical narcissists are also very caring, provided you live by their rules. If physically abusive, they’re the type who say, “Why do you make me hit you?” Like in "The Origami Car," [Alex Horab] has him saying, “You made me do this. I liked what we had.” Or in "The New Apex" by [Justin Michael], he says, “Why would I want to change when I’m always right?” It’s just the saddest thing. If you don’t think you need help and you’re always right, how can you ever get better? That’s why Simon dies. Needing to be right is a cancer.Simon is a teenage villain in Infinity Train for reference.

WH?MMQHAT?????MWHAT?????

> DIES

> TEENAGE??????

DIES??? DEAD BOY. LITTLE DEAD MENTSLLYILL BOY. WITH QUPTES THAT SWIMG BACK ND FORTH BETWEEN "HES EVIL" AND "OOOO POOR PITYFUL THING MARCSISCCM IS A CURST"

and ifu wanted a tragic npd villain yea fifffffineeeeeeeeee but why HE has to die? why is he evil? my fiance is sad and he says "how can someone say that someone suffering like that is evil?" the way simon seems to b written is like hes doing this on purpose. hes a mentally ill TEENAGER A. CHILD!!! A CHILD!!! LEFT TO DIE???? BECAUSE HES BEYOND HELP TM

also "im always right so i need to justify whagever" is a part of npd but its not even like. the main part. u probanly found me from the cluster b culture post so i bet u hsve npd and im.preaching to the chroiir but like. me nd everyone i know with npd suffers so mucjb from this shit ass disorder (a friend of mine nd i were talling abt hpw pwnpd are like. stupid easy ti abuse bc our need for Attentiom and Validation cam verrrry easily be used against us loopllololol) npd at its core is lkke. we were ignored and shat on so we need to be gassed up constsntly or we will fall into a hell pit of despair that can MAKE US WANT TO KILLOURSELVES whoch is where the justification comws from. sword od damocles ass disorser. i hate demonization od npd i nees to write my two serieses with npd protagonists (one of them teenahe!!!) so it wont be as shit out there

[milfygerard]

(Tw Ableism, sanism, death threats, suicide baiting, addiction) The ableism and sanism in swiftidom has no limit, between the mocking Joe Alwyn for maybe having severe deprsesion and alienating the love of his life and mocking him day in and day out for things he can't control, and like personality traits or Taylor and her depression and ND (and addiction)-coded things being constantly denied or even Travis mispelling a word on his twitter back in the day or being disguesting about Matty and pretending he doesn't exist, like he's an awful man but he's a part of the story now, even if he's weird and has lots of problems (You know its' bad when even I are ilke, just aknowledge him and I know he's an awful person but he was a part of the story for awhile). I saw someone being weird about someone, Travis? needing speech therapy. There is no limit to the disguesting things people in swiftiedom do and especially to people who may have had medical issues, depression, addictions and otherwise being a flawed human being. One or two Swifties are a bit fond of death-theating and suicide baiting Taylor's exes who have the most obvious mental health issues (IE Matty and Joe) It's awful out there and I stay in my lane and bubble as much as possible.

yeah i also try to avoid all outer bubble swiftie discourse if i can help it unless i find something particularly interesting. Swifties, in the end, are just too massive of a community for me to ever feel comfortable integrating myself into. I don't really do that for any fandom anymore because I would get really overly obsessive to the point of it being unhealthy when i was a teenager. Not that I don't participate or get super into stuff, but the way I used to function is pretty much impossible for me because of just how burnt out it made me as a teenager. People can and will be so incredibly cruel towards things they don't understand or respect, and being embedded in a community that disrespects you or people you care about 24/7 gives that sort of addictive hit of anger, but will do nothing positive. This is especially true for mental health and illness, which is a discussion thats somehow only gotten worse since taylor has tried to discuss it more and bring more nuance to her experiences, as it gets misconstrued or ignored or mocked by a fanbase that refuses to change and adjust their image of taylor no matter how hard she tries.

I am happy to stick with my small circle of mutuals (though some of my posts have been slightly breaking containment which is both cool and validating AND kind of terrifying) where I feel like not only do people understand me but are also willing to read and respond to my thoughts in good faith, and won't argue just to argue or because they just don't like me for whatever reasons. Sometimes it can be worth it to interact with the fandom on a broader basis, but make sure you aren't falling down any rabbit holes of arguing with people who have no intentions of changing their minds or hate-reading posts to the point of distress! Always put your health first!

[tvmblrsillyman]

might fuck around and make either a lemon demon nightcore remix or a midi vid

[high-caliber-bitch]

Self diagnosis really needs to stop being demonized. People get angry about how some people are self diagnosing based on TikTok, but seriously, how many of us self diagnosed or started down the path of diagnosis because of Tumblr?

So many people posting relatable content about what their life was like with autism or ADHD and their personal fixes for it. So many of us going, wow same, we're not so different, this must be a universal thing. Until you interact with people outside your little internet bubble and go "oh shit" it's not everyone, maybe I actually do have ADHD or ASD?

I'd been saving posts about ADHD and ASD for years like "yah same gurl" without it clicking that I shouldn't find nearly every post about these ND issues relatable if I'm NT. Turns out I'm not. I still didn't come to the conclusion myself. My psych major husband, who's almost every flavor of ND was the one who suggested I may have ADHD or ASD or BOTH.

So when we get mad at people who are like "damn this content about this disorder is relatable" even if they don't have said disorder, it's just harmful all around. Humans crave connection with others and sometimes we'll behave in extreme ways it make some leaps to get there. But also, it's really telling about the breakdown of society when more and more people are experiences what are typically seen as symptoms of mental illness.

There's been a spike in anxiety and depression, and a lot of people with ADHD and ASD have one or both as comorbidities. So when someone sees a post where either a diagnosed or self diagnosed person is listing some of their symptoms and someone finds that relatable. Even if that person may come to the wrong conclusion, nothing truly bad has happened. And hopefully, that person will see at least a therapist and have whatever "symptoms" they're experiencing taken care of.

ND people are better at recognizing and diagnosing ND disorders in our own. My husband has personally gotten at least three people to seek mental health help by recognizing symptoms in them that they failed to see themselves. Two major depressive disorders and one ADHD. So it makes sense that within certain communities we diagnose each other before some of us can get formal diagnosis.

That communal diagnosis is also important, because a lot of resources are simply non-existent for adults. If you Google nearly anything about ASD most of the search results are heated towards parents of autistic children and children with autism. Nothing on teenagers or adults. You can hardly find any resources on specific symptoms, only really the ones that overlap with ADHD usually and even then it's always clinical and impersonal and not humanistic.

You can find all sorts of personal blogs on how people have dealt with their depression, how they understand and that it's hard, but this approach worked for them, so maybe it'll work for you. No one ever questions these sorts of things. No one ever questions depression or anxiety. But once you get into ADHD or ASD or even personality disorders, people question everything you say. Saying you have to be an expert.

Like, I'm sorry but if someone with or without ADHD finds my way of doing something helpful, I don't care what their diagnosis is. In a world full of people who can't get diagnosed, who get misdiagnosed, or get late diagnosis, sharing our stories is important. This fight we have to be heard is the same as the fight for pedestrian and green spaces in cities. It's a bunch of new young people with mental health in mind against decades of mistakes and misinformation.

[fairycosmos]

TW: self harm

The way onision hated people who were self harming? He literally made vids about it where he made fun of people for doing that. Kinda fucked me up like i was 13 watching that and i was also actively self harming and idk watchinf that really hurt me. I even remember i was watching it in my bed and cried after watching it LOL i felt so pathetic that there is something wrong with me (i mean there was but u get what i mean). I didnt think "what a weird adult loser that makes fun of teenagers for hurting themself instead of providing help" but now that im 20 im just thinking...wow what an asshole

god he is such a fucking cunt. im so sorry he made you feel like that nd at such a young age too :/ words can not express how much damage he's done like i bet every kid in his audience felt the same at one point or another. set us all back 5 years in our personal growth lmfao. and his content was the most violent and predatory shit ever - his whole channel was just fuel for his narcissism and incessant need to shit on people and to look down on them. even literal children who were mentally ill. i was the same esp with his body image videos - took me years to think to myself why is this grown man behaving like this in the first place? before that it was so normalized in my mind, just having a parasocial relationship with youtubers in general was, that they always felt like friends rather than adults who had a responsibility to influence their audience in a positive way + to safeguard a secure community. i didn't see it like that at all when i was 10, 11 yrs old and creators like onision knew his kid audience didn't have the capacity to see what he was doing. it was a gross situation all around

[seven-oomen]

If You Are Going Through Hell, Keep Going

These are the words that Marin Morrell – Druid, Emissary, Guidance Counselor – says to Stiles Stilinski in “Battlefield” (02x11) And I think they suit his character just perfectly, because Stiles has been going through Hell all his life.

The Teen Wolf Fandom don’t talk nearly enough about Stiles’ traumas, so I’ll try my best to do it myself *I won’t even remotely touch on the Void Stiles, Dark Stiles, Donovan and the Nogitsune trauma though, because it’s extremely complex and deserves its own Meta*

It’s Canon that Noah was an alcoholic (as Rafael pointed out to Stiles in 03x11 Alpha Pact), that he neglected and lashed out at his own child (Stiles’ memory in 02x09 Party Guessed), and that Stiles was verbally, emotionally, and physically abused by his mentally ill mother, Claudia, throughout his childhood (there’s a whole magnificently acted, heart wrenching scene about it with flashbacks and all in 05x06 Required Reading.) It’s Canon that Stiles had to take care of himself and of his father before AND after Claudia’s death. And it’s Canon that Stiles – who was only an eight years old child at the time – was at the hospital with his mother when she died, nobody else:

[Teen Wolf Season 3 Episode 11, Alpha Pact]

CHRIS: You knew… I remember meeting you once, before you were Sheriff. You questioned me about a body. You knew something was up. You just weren’t ready to believe it.

NOAH: You’re right. There was a night eight years ago… the night my wife died. I was at the end of a shift, and a call came in. There had been a pile-up, and a young woman… she was a teenager, actually. She was trapped under an overturned car. We had to wait for the paramedics. We were never getting her out, but I was able to hold her hand. She knew she was gonna die. But I just kept telling her “No, no, listen. The paramedics are on their way.” And then I remember her hand suddenly gripped mine so tightly that I literally thought she was gonna break the bones. And she looked me in the eyes, and she said “If you wanna be with her, go now.” And I knew she was talking about my wife… But then that other part of my brain — the part that looks for clues, for fingerprints, for logical connections… that part told me that there is no way that this girl could possibly know about Claudia. And so I stayed. I stayed until the paramedics pulled her out. Until her heart stopped beating and they declared her dead.

NOAH: When I finally got to the hospital, I saw Stiles sitting in the waiting room with his head in his hands… He was with Claudia when she died.

NOAH: But I wasn’t. I wasn’t with her because I didn’t believe… I just did not believe.

It’s also Canon that Derek Hale is a rape victim and that the hunters slaughtered Derek, Cora and Peter’s entire pack/family (including humans and children.) And it’s Canon that Stiles immediately sides with the Hales and openly confronts Chris about what Kate had done to the Hales in 01x12, Code Breaker:

CHRIS: Let me ask you a question, Stiles. Have you ever seen a rabid dog?

STILES: No. I could put it on my to-do list, if you just let me go.

CHRIS: Well, I have. And the only thing I’ve ever been able to compare it to is seeing a friend of mine turn on a full moon. Do you wanna know what happened?

STILES: Not really. No offense to your storytelling skills.

CHRIS: He tried to kill me, and I was forced to put a bullet in his head. The whole while that he lay there dying, he was still trying to claw his way toward me, still trying to kill me, like it was the most important thing he could do with his last breath. Can you imagine that?

STILES: No. And it sounds like you need to be a little bit more select—

CHRIS: Did Scott try to kill you on the full moon? Did you have to lock him up?

STILES: Yeah, I did. I had to handcuff him to a radiator. Why? Would you prefer I locked him in the basement and burned the whole house down around him?

CHRIS: I hate to dispel a popular rumor, Stiles, but we never did that.

STILES: Oh, right. Derek said you guys had a code. I guess no one ever breaks it.

CHRIS: Never!

STILES: What if someone does?

CHRIS: Someone like who?

STILES: Your sister.

Unlike self-proclaimed hero and ruler of Beacon Hills Scott McCall, who immediately sides with the Argents and tells Derek Hale that his family deserved to be burnt alive by the hunters in front of his comatose uncle………..

-----

I feel like there is a lot to unpack on Stiles’s trauma. And I will go over these moments one by one, why they’re damaging, what I think the context of the scene is supposed to represent ft how people might take it. And what my personal thoughts are regarding Stiles’s trauma.

First of, I would like to say that the following words are my take on this. I am a 29 year old trans man of caucasian descend who is an domestic violence and abuse survivor. I am diagnosed with ADHD since 12 and diagnosed with CPTSD since this year. I understand trauma and I understand what it does to people. But I am not a professional. I am a fan, who’s responding to the submission of another, anonymous, fan.

You are completely free to have your own takes on this matter and your own headcanons. That’s what fandom is for.

That said, I would love to have a discussion if you can have it peacefully.

Stiles is a character who was (Unwillingly) neglected, emotionally traumatized and both emotionally and verbally abused by both of his parents. There is even evidence of physical abuse by his mother.

I think it does need to be said, that neither of his parents intended for this to happen. What happened in the Stilinski family was by and large a very traumatic event for everyone involved.

Noah is an alcoholic, as Stiles also confirms in the episode that Noah never really stopped drinking. His alcoholism is a result of his own traumas and possible ND mind and an unhealthy coping mechanism.

As a result of this, Noah most likely was verbally and emotionally abusive during his drunken tirades.

I personally think that before Claudia was diagnosed and got sick Stiles had a good childhood. His parents tried their best to be good parents for him and laid a good foundation for him. This is evidenced in the bond Stiles seems to have with his father in general. He’s not afraid of his father, he’s nervous about consequences. But he never gives off a vibe to me that truly says; I fear this man and I have to stay in line to stay alive.

Unlike Isaac and his father.

This also tells me, that unlike Elias Stilinski, Noah never lashed out physically at Stiles. He was trying to break a cycle of abuse but more than likely still fell victim to it himself when he could no longer cope with trauma and his neurodivergency and started drinking.

That doesn’t mean that he’s not guilty of abusing his own son. We know Noah can be neglectful and dismissive towards Stiles (even though he tries his best not to be) and has a tendency to low key insult Stiles from time to time. Whether or not he truly means to or not is up for debate, I personally think he doesn’t mean to do it, but Stiles is clearly heartbroken every time Noah accidentally lashes out. 

As evidenced by sentences: “I’ve never believed a word he said since he was born.” “Thank you, son I should have had.” (To Scott)

Stiles already has a deep founded fear that he’s not enough, that he killed his own mother, that he’s not believed by the people around him, and that people don’t want to take him seriously.

This is clear in every interaction he has with the people around him.

Which also brings me to what happened in 2x09. Now based on the context clues of that scene, I actually don’t believe Stiles saw a play-by-play memory. But rather, Stiles saw his greatest fear play out in a hallucination. 

Why do I believe that?

Because in the same scene, Allison has a hallucination about becoming her own worst nightmare (a huntress like Kate) and Scott sees a hallucination of Allison and Jackson making out. (Aka, losing Allison.) 

I think the scene both has fabrications and truths in it. The truth is that more than likely, Stiles saw his father getting drunk at his mother’s funeral and lashing out at people around him in his drunken stupor. (Which on one hand, one can understand if you take the pain and trauma into account, but it’s not a healthy or an okay thing to do, obviously. This is definitely where Noah fell apart.)

I also like to think one of the other adults put a stop to Noah’s behavior before he could get out of hand. But we never really see her funeral play out, so that is speculation.

The fabrication is the scene that follows. We know that Claudia was the one that actually said the words to Stiles. “You’re killing me, he’s killing me.” 

And that Noah was the voice of reason in that scene. “No, he’s not. You’re sick, let’s go back inside.” (Or something along those lines. I can’t remember the exact words.)

What I think is more than likely is that Stiles’s greatest fear is that his father actually believes he killed his mother. As that is what his mother said to him before she died.  And so that’s what he hallucinated under the influence of the wolfsbane.

Stiles’s greatest fear is losing both of his parents, no matter in what way that is. He also fears that he failed as a son, and failed to take care of his father. All of this is fueled by losing his mother and watching her die at a very young age.

And that is where Stiles’s trauma truly lies. He watched his mother die (at the age of 10) slowly while she lost her mind to a terrible illness. 

His father couldn’t handle losing his wife and not being able to help her and the previous traumas he endured in his own childhood. And Stiles had to step up to take care of him. That changes a child and leaves a mark. A mark that Stiles can’t shake.

We know Noah neglected Stiles by not being able to care for him as he should have, we know Noah tends to think Stiles has wild conspiracy theories and tends not to believe him.

Which traumatized Stiles even though Noah didn’t intend for that to happen. That doesn’t mean that Stiles’s trauma isn’t real though. It’s very real. This is also the reason why he immediately chooses Derek’s side in 1x12.

For Stiles, not being believed is a daily reality and he doesn’t want anyone else to go through that as well. Which is why he chooses Derek’s side. Because Stiles, due to his own trauma, is hard-wired to believe the victim and tends to defend them.

Now I think a lot of people take a lot of Stiles’s scenes literal because they identify with what’s happening on screen. Because Stiles isn’t being believed by the other characters, the audience tends to take his perspective at face value. Even in situations where it’s made clear that Stiles, like other characters, is hallucinating at the time.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but I do think it’s something to consider.

Tagging a few people who might want to add a thought or two to this.

@mostly-vo1d @artemisa97 @msmischief101

[livefromtheelephantsfoot]

I am one month into college and I want to tell those of you struggling with high school that it's going to be okay. Those four years were the worst of my life and I was worried college would be harder, more stressful, that I wouldn't be smart enough or driven enough and would end up dropping out.

I can't speak for all college students-- hell, I can't even speak for my future self. But I can say that right here, right now, I am... happy? I don't even know what that word means anymore, but I have friends and like my classes and don't feel sad and empty all the time.

My whole life, I just wanted to get to this point. 1. Get good grades 2. Get into a good school 3. Get scholarships 4. ??? 5. Profit. I've never been ambitious beyond what I had to be, and I was scared that without that motivation, which was really a fear of debt and poverty and unfulfilled needs, I would lose the will to try.

But I didn't. I am relearning what it means to do things because I like them. To study because I want to know things. I don't see the financial aid I got as a ticket to success but the freedom to fail. If I graduate with a "useless" degree and work minimum wage it will be ok because I know how to scrimp and save, and I know how to scratch my creative itch without it taking up most of my income.

My situation is unique to myself, but if I divide myself by my identities I can perhaps give limited advice.

To LGBTQIA teens: if the people around you are cruel, I am sorry and I want you to know that this is not normal. There will come a time and place where you will expect decency from people.

To ADHD teens: school is hell, amiright? Here's the thing: a subject you enjoy taught by a teacher who cares is the most incredible thing in the world. If you're not an academic you'll find this experience in skills classes and trade learning, but if you are an academic I cannot recommend college highly enough. Even if high school was godawful and you never want to see a textbook again, just try a community college class that looks cool. Once school becomes fun, there is no turning back. (Also, I'd bet good money that a large portion of college professors are ND.)

To Jewish teens: not a lot of specific advice to offer, but oh boy will you meet a lot of other Jewish people at college. If you're worried about antisemitism, there is TONS of info online about campus culture, and even ranking lists for which places are most welcoming (same goes for lgbtq teens!).

To teens with mental illnesses: this one's hard, because experiences and struggles vary a whole lot. But focus on what makes you curious. No matter how swamped you are in apathy or despair or stress, there's gotta be something that makes you want to hang on and see what comes next. Make "fuck around and find out" your new life motto. Can you find something curious in a tv show? A class? A friendship? What do you want to find out badly enough to wait and see?

To otherwise nerdy, isolated, or awkward teens: as you get older, people will be more accommodating. You will have access to new sources of like-minded people. You will have more resources to dive into your interests or work through social problems.

And to every teenager struggling with school, parents, relationships, mental health: the control over your life that comes with independence is incredible. Just wait and see.

[beautifullymeh]

1: self-dxed

2: feb 17 this year and last week, ig

3: pinterest, tumblr, and this video on yt

4: tumblr ig

5: ig reading about psychology stuff, getting to know me, looking for proofs and convincing myself that i am an nd dammit lol

6: meh?

7: id say inattentive

8: that's cool. i love words. i just find it hard to finish reading a book. also, the spacing, grammar, font and font size, even margins, yeah that matters a lot

9: they seem fun, id say im fond of them, its like someone's talking to me and i like that. although i dont do listen to podcasts and/or lectures as much as i do wiggle my hands around if that makes sense at all

10: def not

11: line of 8 and 9

12: sometimes, i spend the whole day doing just one activity from a whole homework. or a week.

13: vocal; moving around

14: internal ?

15: i write it down. and i try to stick to one notebook. or i send a message to myself. but since i dont br that much so i write on sticky notes. or mnemonics, yeah.

16: i was basically mute in elementary. then i became talkative in high school. but i dont have a permanent circle.

17: i tried. volleyball. but im scared of balls. and insecure of my height (wc as they said is pretty much above average for such a sport).

18: no. :/

19: movie character? the first one that came to mind was jake gyllenhaal of nightcrawler. but no, that's creepy. but yeah, ig i do act like that when im alone... with my thoughts... and im arguing with my mind lol idk. i love daisy from mickey mouse clubhouse tho hehe

20: idrk. i just sing song sentences. or randomly sing? or

21: uhh humming?

22: am i understanding this question right? but uh i recently wished i was just deaf :/ imma take that back tho cause i feel like the universe would take every word that i say seriously

23: ive never been properly diagnosed but i believe i have multiple mental illnesses. then again, overlapping.

24: idts, but maybe.

25: teenager.

26: im an infp, and it is said that infps are creative. and recently a teacher of mine made us make a collage and i think my creative side was brought up (because i dealt with glue wc i dont usually do bc ew glue). but no i dont think im creative. maybe im just not yet- or maybe that part of me died down- idk

27: meh

28: they don't really say anything. but i have good grades :/

29: uuuuhh tumblr ?

30: ye

31: nop

32: on-off. no.

33: ive never been drunk

34: yessssss

35: i guess i dont. i just try not to get pissed while writing down literally everything that is on my mind at the moment, as much as i can, and if i do succeed on trying not to get pissed then i slowly get to calm my thoughts down, read what i have written, and then see what i can do abt it. maybe add more sentences, if i do have more, or start rewriting to make it look good and make it understandable :> but if i fail, and do get pissed, then i either angrily scribble on the paper, draw a straight line applying pressure to it so you can see the line mark still after 5 pages or so ig. then i get teary-eyed and angry at myself. and maybe throw it. or no bc throwing it may or may not make me more pissed idkk

36: YES. THANK GOD HE EXISTS I LOVE HIM SO MUCH tho we're not close and dont really talk but ye bless him :>

37: nooo wish i was

38: uh. no? yes? some?

39: idt i can put it to words. the first thing that came to mind tho is anger. and then thinking that i suck and should jump off a cliff but instead of ending up dead, i be chilling on the ocean staring at the moon yes

40: CONGRATULATIONS. WELCOME TO THE GANG (even tho i am not officially diagnosed BUT YES). Tumblr NDs are here for u, darling. They were to me, so will they be to you for sure. Don't feel bad, now. Or do so, do you. Anyway, go touch grass and have milk and cookies (hope ure not allergic or anything to that). LYYY!

ADHD Ask Meme

1: Are you diagnosed? 2: When were you diagnosed? 3: How did you find out that you had ADHD? 4: What’s your current hyperfixation? 5: What has been your most intense hyperfixation? 6: How well do you sleep? 7: What subtype (inattentive, hyperactive, combined) are you? 8: How do you feel about reading? 9: How do you feel about podcasts and lectures? 10: Were/are you popular in school? 11: What were/are your grades like in school? 12: How long did/do you spend on homework? 13: What’s your favorite way to stim? 14: Is your hyperactivity internal or external? 15: What’s your favorite memory strategy? 16: Were/are you talkative in class? 17: Did/do you play a sport? 18: Have you ever tried ADHD medication? 19: What characters do you most identify with? 20: How do you most often fidget? 21: What sensory things do you love? 22: What sensory things do you hate? 23: Do you have any comorbid diagnoses? 24: Do others in your family have ADHD? 25: Did you find out you had ADHD as a child, teenager, or adult? 26: Are you creative? 27: Do you have high, low, or normal self-esteem? 28: What did/do your report card comments usually say? 29: What piece of media makes you blissfully happy? 30: Do you doodle in class/meetings? 31: Do you self-medicate with caffeine? 32: Do you exercise often? 33: What are you like when you are drunk? 34: Do you like writing? 35: How do you process your thoughts and emotions: internally, verbally, in writing? 36: Do you have any friends with ADHD? 37: Have you ever been to therapy? 38: Did/do teachers like you? 39: What is your experience with RSD (Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria)? 40: What would you like to say to any person who has just been diagnosed with ADHD?

[eeee-lye]

So I’ve finished Tempests and Slaughter and ... look, I write long, rambling works more about character development than plot, so when I say there’s not enough plot in this book, the context from where I say it matters.

Pierce has never been a tight plotter. She’s better at it in the Circle universe books, where the structures of events in a single book gives a sense of plot that leads to a more definite conclusion (like Sandry’s destroying the murderers at the end of Magic Steps). Many of her Tortall books, though, involve a sequence of events that occur over a period of time, event after event, finally reaching a conclusion at the end of the series, but often stopping mid-series because it seems like a good spot to wrap up (with some character development to make it stick, with varying degrees of success). We’re just not reading Pierce for plot, and I don’t have a problem with this most of the time.

Tempests and Slaughter has no plot and only a very quick “oh this is a romantic relationship” revelation emotional tie-up at the end (not instigated by Arram). It is solely establishing set up for everything that happens before and during The Immortals. Yes, things happen, but there’s no real conclusion, just a tour through many, many scenes that are depictions of magic and growing up and learning with a lot of foreshadowing but not a lot of things actually happening.

(Some of the foreshadowing is utterly enjoyable for old Pierce fans. It’s fun to see Ozorne and Varice interact with each other and Arram, and Pierce’s showing us Tristan, Gissa and their relationship with the three is really cool.)

The major problem here is that Arram Draper is a character to whom things happen, and, honestly? This never a good protagonist makes. There’s gods talking about how he’s destined for great things (he has a sunbird called Preet, which is basically the equivalent of Alanna/Beka’s Faithful/Pounce) but Arram Draper does almost nothing himself. Gods find him. Teachers make decisions for him. His friends find him. He ends up in situations of tempests and slaughter from the actions and decisions of others. I’m honestly racking my brain for more than one or two instances where Arram decided to do anything without someone else deciding for him or pushing him towards it. He doesn’t instigate adventures, he doesn’t try to investigate a certain mystery himself (most of Pierce’s other characters would have tried to solve it instead of leaving it for the next book). Arram does nothing but let the universe push him around, and since the book tells me so unsubtly that he’s destined for great things, it undermines this message--the telling and the showing don’t match up.

That Arram does little of his own will is why there’s no plot. A proactive character who makes decisions, good and bad, generates their own plot. A character who has his decisions made by others and handed to him does not; you just get a character coasting from scene to scene. There’s not even a great sense of character development--you see Arram learn about magic and observe things about Carthak and Ozorne, but very little about himself. One of the two character arc moments that formed the conclusion was handed to us in the first chapter!

I suspect this is meant to contrast the massive changes that Arram makes to become Numair in the next books, but it leaves Tempests and Slaughter lacking in emotional punch. It’s dull. I was reading just for the foreshadowing, for mentions of Lindhall. I wasn’t reading for the character of Arram Draper, and when compared to every single one of Pierce’s other protagonists, that’s not something I want to say.

I didn’t love Battle Magic, but it’s a much stronger story with an antagonist, a threat, something at stake, and characters who deal with magic and awfulness but don’t walk away unchanged by it. (Plus there’s delightfully polyam and bi Rosethorn.) Tempests and Slaughter doesn’t have a clear antagonist whose actions impact Arram and doesn’t have anything at stake for Arram despite the murder and political doings. It’s the Star Wars prequel trilogy of the Tortall verse.

Under the cut, I’m going to talk in slightly spoilerish fashion about mental illness and the Tasikhe family:

Mental illness has a stronger presence here than in most of Pierce’s books, excepting perhaps The Will of the Empress / Battle Magic / Melting Stones. There’s potions made that seem to be the functional equivalent of antidepressants and antipsychotics, purposefully for mood-lifting and calming. I think this is awesome, generally--I’d love to see more fantasy novels with fantastic treatments for mental illnesses. I’d love to see a fantasy protagonist take a potion every night or morning to manage their symptoms, just like I do.

But. When the only characters seen using these potions are from the Tasikhe family (Ozorne and his mother) and are generally depicted as unstable, racist and violent, and when Ozorne is a damn series antagonist, I have one hell of a problem.

(There’s also the fact that one of the characters giving Ozorne’s potion is Very Clearly Up To No Good, which leaves me wondering if the potion is meant to damage or harm Ozorne long term. That connotation, as it maps to psychiatric meds, is troubling to say the least.)

There are no other characters written as mentally ill in the same way. Arram is clearly ND-coded, written as distractible, narrowly-focused, shy, anxious, awkward--a healer character makes a comment about his mind being a singular place that reads, to me, straight from the autism playbook. Arram, though, isn’t written as unstable in the way Ozorne is, and at no point is Arram’s neurodiversity ever named; at no point is he shown getting support for it. It isn’t treated in the same way as seeing Ozorne being given a potion that settles his depression symptoms enough that he can return to more normal functioning.

Ozorne has some degree of PTSD from his father’s death and depression, specifically seasonal affective disorder, although it’s forgotten about in the later stages of the book. He is a reasonably good depiction of depression earlier on, but also prone to rage and violence towards anyone remotely connected to the ethnicity of the people who killed his father. I’m far too white to speak properly on this, but I’m not liking the approach of giving a racist character a “you people killed my father” backstory justifying his racism. What I can speak on is the fact that we’ve got a mentally ill character who is racist, violent and hateful, and while mental illness never stops one from being racist (and we white mentally-ill folks need to not use mental illness as an excuse) it is dangerous to associate mental illness with violence the way it is in Ozorne and his mother.

People with mental illnesses are more like to be the victims of violence than its perpetrators, yet here we are getting characters who are visibly mentally ill, to the point of needing treatment--one of whom will become an antagonist who does some horrifically terrible things during The Immortals. We’re getting another character, treated similarly to Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequels, who is written as even more obviously and unambiguously mentally ill because it is inconceivable that anyone without mental illness can be a violent, lethal series antagonist, and as a mentally ill person, I am so not okay with this.

This is a carryover from The Immortals, but it is so damn unnecessary. Ozorne did not need to be mentally ill. He didn’t need to be written as a mentally ill character, undergoing the treatment of a mentally ill character. He could have been written as a racist would-be conqueror without any suggestion of mental illness; I don’t believe it would have changed his character arc at all.

Given that Pierce writes YA, and given that she’s written suggestions in the Circle universe of mental illness and its treatment being more normalised (at least with regards to trauma/PTSD), I think she’s done mentally ill teenagers a massive injustice here. Teens with depression and SAD do not need to see a character who has their symptoms and experiences being built up to be a series antagonist who wrecks destruction and violence.

It’s ableism, and given that this is the set up and where Ozorne’s character must go, I’m doubtful it’ll get any less ableist.

[spamtonology]

@dumthicc​ (Please do not harass this person.)​ I am going to assume you meant this in good faith and want a serious answer. You won’t get “hatecrimed” for having an opinion, that’s not what this place is for. Fire is right on his part, and in his original tags alludes to the fandom phenomenon of Flanderization, which is exactly what is happening here with Spamton.

Wikipedia’s definition:

Flanderization is the process through which a single element of a character's personality, often an originally mild element, is inflated in importance over the course of a work until it becomes their primary defining characteristic

Yes, Spamton is all of the three: Creepy, mysterious and odd. That’s one facet of his character and it’s good to keep in mind that is how he is in the game. Flanderization of this trait would be focusing exclusively on the creepy aspect and not the other aspects of his character (manipulative, sleazy, even friendly if you go to his shop).

It can be easy to dismiss homeless discrimination because for the most part, people have an unconscious bias against homeless people propagated by media and news sources. It’s easy to “otherize” them and forget that they too, are people. They are therefore reduced to the “hobo” carciature: filthy, mean-spirited, animalistic drug addicts who must be avoided at all costs. It does not help that Spamton fits this carciature a little (probably unconsciously on Toby Fox’s part). But again, he is not just this trait. Again, Flanderization of this trait would be reducing him purely into this stereotype without taking into account his other traits: he is actually charismatic, looks well-kept by all accounts, and if “fried pipis” is anything to go by, he seems to make his own food just fine.

Ableism is not when neurodivergent and mentally ill people project onto/headcanon a character as mentally ill, it is the act of deliberate mocking and discrimination of mental illness, reducing it to offensive stereotypes. People who are ND and mentally ill recognize these stereotypes and generally try to avoid them, and want to destigmatize mental illness above all.

Are there some people who don’t realize this and display unconscious ableism when headcanoning him? Certainly; just like with homelessness, mental illness is often stigmatized and “otherized”, so bias is easy to fall into. In that case, it’s wise to let that person know and to correct them on their stereotyping. A headcanon becomes Flanderization when you focus solely on his, say, delusions and make that his only defining trait to the point it displays offensive stereotypes of mental illness, such as having murderous intent (I have seen this as an actual example of a headcanon, yes).

Spamton technically does have avian traits, this is something that is factual to the game, but again, Flanderization is when these traits are so exaggerated that it’s all he is, a literal animal rather than a humanoid who has bird-like symbolism (namely, a caged bird seeks freedom). This then leads to the (unconscious or not) relation of mental illness and homelessness to being akin to animal behavior, contributing to dehumanization of these stigmatized groups.

Lastly, the infantilization of his character is a real issue and extends far beyond “small and cute”. The traits of being small and cute are not bad in itself, and it’s one reason Spamton is an appealing character: he’s about the size of a short teenager and resembles Pinocchio. “Small and cute” old characters are also something you see in cartoons, too. Flanderization is when these physical traits become exaggerated to the point that he is depicted as needing a stroller, needing to be pacified, and, rather egregiously, needing a rubber ducky to calm down during a bath.

Just as Fire said, it’s not weird or “blowing it out of proportion” to criticize how the fandom has come to treat Spamton’s character, especially when certain forms of Flanderization and treatment like these reveal what the person thinks mentally ill, homeless, short people must be like instead of who they are. These, at the surface “harmless” thoughts and ideas about Spamton’s character really do contribute to and show how stigmatized people are still reduced to stereotypes and dehumanized, that their existence is purely there for jokes in this case.

Toby Fox’s characters have a lot of nuance, and there is a common phenomenon in the fandom to Flanderize characters, reducing them to one or two traits and then exaggerating those. It’s been seen with Sans and Papyrus, and it’s a repeat with Spamton.

I have faith that most fans understand this and want to avoid falling into these (admittedly easy to fall into) traps, that’s partially why I created this blog. For those who don’t, I hope they can learn from this blog. For those who don’t and subsequently don’t care, I don’t know what to do with those people except criticize their actions from afar.

I hope you understand.

Why are the two fanon Spamtons just “super suave 6’5” sexyman” or “literal toddler”

[fahrminbrahmin]

ED Questions: nobody asked for this but im bored lmao

1. which eating disorder(s) do you have? 

tbh nobody has said a specific name to me drs just say either ‘eating issues’ or ‘eating disorder’ so ednos?


2. when did you develop your eating disorder?

this is hard to answer bc looking back ive shown signs since ~early teenage years but ive been fully aware of it for about 2-2.5 years


3. are you currently in recovery?

im in therapy, its bought up every other session but i tend to avoid mentioning it so yes and no


4. honestly, do you want to recover?

again, yes and no. I often h a t e feeling like this but?? the pros out way the cons at this point


5. how are you doing today?

unhealthily? great! lol i hit my next gw this week and p much all my cals have been from alcohol lmao healthily? p bad ive only eaten a cruskit and some lettuce & im kinda depressed these past days but hey! idc


6. 5 safe foods?

lettuce! so much lettuce i can easily go through a head a day. honestly, its the only thing i can eat without feeling any semblance of guilt.


7. 5 fear foods?

tbqh, its such a long list everything p much. at the height of my fear of food i saw the word protein and freaked the F out so protein


8. do you count calories?

yeah but im really good at lying to myself about how many calories ive actually eaten lmao


9. what is your max calorie limit?

i say 550, but anything over 250 makes me feel like utter shit but then again, anything makes me feel shit lol


10. what is your height?

5′3″ / 161cm 


11. what is your ultimate goal weight?

it was 49.5kg! but i hit that so its 48.7kg atm itll go down again tho


12. are you trying to lose weight?

absolutely yes


13. have you ever been called “fat”?

honestly i cant even remember if i have or not


14. have you ever been called “too thin”?

ive been called ‘small’ but not too thin. the dream tbh


15. what is your current goal weight?

48.7kgs


16. what was your highest weight?

when i first started weighing myself regularly, 61kgs


17. what was your lowest weight?

49.1kgs


18. do you wish you were back at your lowest weight?

im there rn 


19. does your family know about your eating disorder?

yes, i dont talk to a lot of ppl and p much everyone knows


20. do your friends know about your eating disorder?

yeah, one of my best friends was actually the first person i told


21. do you wish you didn’t have an eating disorder?

yes and no, i hate feeling like this toward myself and food. but ive always hated myself so this is an improvement so its a really happy side effect


22. have any “free foods”?

lettuce!! lettuce lettuce lettuce. and tea


23. how often do you weigh yourself?

every day when i wake up. id say morning but i have a shit sleep schedule lol


24. thinspo or bonespo?

neither tbh im more of a i-have-an-ed-more-to-harm-myself-less-to-be-thin kinda gal


25. biggest problem area on your body?

my chubby chubby cheeks. the great irony is that my ed gave me chipmunk cheeks which hasnt helped any but  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 


26. favourite part of your body?

tbqh i like my waist. its not tiny but its p good imo


27. what kind of results do you want to see?

booooooones!!


28. do you purge?

:/ yeah


29. do you take laxatives?

yes but i have bowel problems anyway so its the constant struggle of do i take the reccomended amount or do i overdose lmao its always overdose


30. how often do you purge?

it goes in cycles, some weeks i purge every day, other weeks its could be 1-2 times a week.


31. do you binge?

by definition, no, but often times ill eat and say to myself its a binge


32. how long have you fasted for?

im SHIT at fasting, probably like 18-19 hours


33. who’s your biggest thinspiration?

hands around thighs really get me. also protruding rib cages thats the dream.


34. favourite eating disorder movie/show/documentary?

none! ive only seen maybe half an ed doc i cant get through one. But! I have a book of stories of girls w/ eds and there was one story about a white/polynesian girl with an ed with identity issues and she was l i t e r a l l y me i still have that book


35. favourite thinspo picture?

again, any pic of fingers touching around thighs. LUV it


36. can you post a photo of yourself/your body?

ive only posted 2 body checks lol, u can see them here


37. how does your eating disorder affect your life?

Im literally obsessed with food nd my body ive isolated myself from everyone/thing in my life and everything i do is a number i h8 it


38. what is your BMI?

currently, 19.1 
39. do you follow a diet?

yeah, as little calories as possible lmao


40. least favourite part about your eating disorder?

most if not all of it? its all i think about


41. has your eating disorder ruined any relationships?

yes? if we group my ed with all my other mental health problems, i isolate myself from everyone i havent seen one of my best friends in over a year so YA


42. do you have a “guilty pleasure” food? what is it?

c h o c o l a t e. it is very much a guilty pleasure lool


43. meanspo or sweetspo?

not about the whole concept tbqh


44. does anyone else in your life have an eating disorder?

the saddest part, most women i know have expressed r admitted to doing some really shitty stuff to themselves in order to be thin


45. ever been inpatient? 
/ 46. ever been outpatient? / 47. ever been in residential care? / 48. ever been in a psych ward?

nah but ive been threatened with it


49. are you currently in therapy?

yeah, individual therapy and DBT


50. what did you eat today?

a cruskit, 1 gummy lolly, ~4 leaves of lettuce and 3 glasses of wine lmao


51. are you scared about the holidays?

yes bc ill make a pavlova and ofc im gonna eat it rip :/


52. are your family/friends supportive?

kind of, if im in a healthy mind set i know they care but dont really know how to go about it. but they let me do a lot of shitty things to myself


53. have any other mental illnesses?

’severe social anxiety’, emotional disregulation, depression, maybe avpd and/or bpd?


54. looking for ana buddies?

nopenopenope ill never encourage this


55. what is your current weight?

as of this morning: 49.1kgs

[evehasplans]

Anxiety and Safe Spaces

The other day, The New York times did this long form piece (paywall) on the rise of anxiety for teenagers.

Instead of really talking about why,1 they spent roughly half the time talking about a teenager who had several breakdowns due to his anxiety and the other half of the time talking to psychologists. Some of whom are involved in running a rehab camp for teenagers with mental illnesses, specifically focusing on anxiety.2

1. One low-context quote blaming social media as the cause. They don't examine this in sufficient detail but if they're going for an anti-bullying message, they undermine it with their “toughen up” stance in the rest of the article. Also lots of shade thrown at safe spaces and other “be considerate of others” efforts. Remarkably little empathy for the fact that some of the teenagers they talked to ended up in the rehab facility because of being bullied thanks to places without safe spaces. 2. But lumping in OCD and a few other things the DSM no longer considers a part of anxiety. The camp is a bit behind. NYT noted this but not so blatantly.

The “default” position in our society should be able to justify itself without trying to make its detractors look weak.

If you go out and talk to adults3 about how to be considerate to neurodiverse people, you'll quickly discover there are a lot of people who think making accommodations for neurodiversity is just going to make people soft. The unstated assumption is that people should “toughen up.”4

3. Defined here as people who have reached the age where they've decided they don't need to grow with society anymore. Never been happier not to be a “functioning” adult. 4. I think I've talked about this before but I haven't been on Tumblr for awhile so just in case … the number of accommodations ND people make for NT people is startling once you start listing them out. NT people seriously need to stop acting like it's such a chore for them to do even the smallest things to be considerate.

Half of the things the main psychologist said were word for word what I've heard from adults arguing against using even the most basic consideration for ND people.5

5. By their reckoning, I should be too soft and weak to make it all the way through their article. I've read it twice. 💅

They spent a lot of time taling about Exposure Therapy (ET). In ET, you're exposed (in a small, controlled environment, a bit at a time) to one of the things that makes you anxious in order to help you overcome your anxiety. I could spend a lot of time talking about my frustrations with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). The core concept (of CBT) feels like it's blaming people with mental illness for not having the coping skills our society (and CBT) didn't bother giving us. ET isn't itself the problem. Even though I dislike CBT, it's not in itself a problem.

If you have the wrong motives and mindset, your results are going to be less than ideal but ET and CBT to blame. We are.

Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons will undermine compassion every time.

The thing about anxiety is that, yes, some of it is “irrational.” You're probably not going to be laughed off stage if you speak in front of an audience. Not all anxiety is irrational though.

A reasonable person would say my anxiety about cars is rationally founded. I've had my cars break down dozens of times. I've had a person hop out of his car and try to beat my window in with his fist because I made a driving mistake6 on unfamiliar roads. I've had 18-wheelers try to merge on top of me.7 I've had my transmission die in the middle of nowhere and paid thousands of dollars out of my savings to repair it. I only managed to keep my job bcause a friend had a spare car they didn't mind lending me for a whole month. Every time I get in my car, I have the very rational and very painful fear that the car isn't going to start or I'm going to have a life-alteringly bad experience on my trip.

I didn't start out this way. I used to love driving. I'd go out driving in the middle of the night on back roads to relax. Exposure to driving gave me my anxiety. You can't cure my anxiety about cars through exposing me to more of them. A compassionate psychologist isn't going to try to expose me to more cars.

6. No vehicles or people damaged by my mistake. 7. Repeatedly, when I'd been in the same lane running cruise control for miles and miles.

From the perspective of the folks in the article, I don't have a problem because I still make the long drive to and from work every work day. Over 300 miles a week. Mission accomplished! If this was judged on pain management instead, they'd recognize the problem because I don't drive any other time. I only drive when I have to. I'm using cars as an example because I've lived with it but there are plenty of other rational anxieties.

ET is one tool in the toolbox. It can be a great tool when it's the right tool and it's used with compassion. Meaningful coping strategies are another. Teaching people how to apply self-care, when to give themselves a break, and how to ask for compassionate behavior from others (aka “safe spaces”)? Those things don't undermine a compassionate CBT.

Without a core of compassion, you don't have tools. You have weapons.

I hope to Eris there's one day a meaningful treatment for rational anxieties.

More than that, I hope for a world where our experts don't reach for the uncompassionate, patient-blaming answer first. Where we don't carry water for the vicious and cruel impulses of our culture in the search for the easy answer. Where we give up the search for the easy answer and instead dedicate ourselves to the compassionate answer no matter how hard it is. Because there really can be value in ET when it's applied correctly, from the right mindset, and in the right situations.

When it's not, it makes us and our world crueller and less caring.

I don't want to live in a crueller world. This one is bad enough as it is.

[rottenbutrecovering]

No! anyone who hurts someone on purpose is not 'neurotypical'- they may not have a diagnosis but they are not 'neurotypical'. Tbh, i hate that word anyway, it suggests that people without mental illness all think the same way, but pretty much everyone experiences a bout of depression in life-even without realising it.i feel the same with diagnosis sometimes,its strange how we put people in boxes and ignore the fact everyones mind works differently!(i understand its sometimes needed in treatment)

idk like i completely disagree

violence doesn’t mean the person is mentally ill- cause anyone who isn’t ND is mentally ill/disordered, by definition.

like people can hurt people for many reasons? teenagers bitching about over teenagers and casting them out is done by p much all teenagers, it doens’t make them ND, but thats hurting people

people get angry and punch people, doesn’t make them ND

people murder people, doesnt make them ND. it could be because the other did something wrong and they want revenge, doesn’t make them ND

It’s not just mentally ill people that hurt people, NTs do it to, even if you don’t like the word.

[completeworksofsigmundfreud]

Studies on Hysteria (1895) - Part II - Case Histories -  Case 2 -  Emmy von V., 40 year, from Livonia (Freud) - English summary

The second case of Studies on Hysteria is a woman performing under the alias Emmy Von V., who Freud took care of from May 1889. According to his observations, it was very easy to get her into the state of somnambulism and so he decided to use Breuer’s method since his friend described it to him in detail, although he was inexperienced in it and it was his first try. When he saw Mrs. Emmy for the first time, she lay on the sofa and her still youthful appearance was giving her enough charm despite her age. Her face was distorted by a painful grimace, though, her forehead was wrinkled, the tone of her voice too low and she often alternated between states of stammering. Her hands were tightly clasped, her facial muscles kept moving, just as the muscles on her neck. She kept disturbing her speech by a clacking sound coming out of her mouth. When she started to tell Freud about her illness, she spoke intelligibly and she showed a high level of education and intelligence. In the middle of the conversation, she fell into hallucinatory state, though, her face twisted in disgust and contempt, reaching out her hands to Freud with bend fingers and yelled at him not to come any closer to her and not to touch her (Freud later discovered that it was her defensive mechanism). At a slap, she became normal again and resumed the conversation without being aware of her hallucination. Freud got to know everything essential about her origin – her family descended from central Germany, but lived in Baltic provinces in Russia for the last two generations and owned vast estates there. Emmy was thirteenth of fourteen children from which only four children survived under the supervision of their strict mother. In her age of 23 years, she married to rich, significantly older man, who died of stroke soon after the wedding. She was forced to bring up two daughters completely alone (now in the age of 16 and 14 years) who were often ill and suffered from various neurotic problems. Emmy herself attributed her illness to these events as she withered away year by year despite several treatments and procedure she had been through all over the world. Freud advised her to disconnect herself from her daughter who had her own governess by that time, and to move to a nursing home where he could pay his entire attention to her. Emmy agreed without objections.

On 2nd May 1889 Freud visited her in the nursing home and noticed that Emmy always startled whenever anyone entered her room. He ordered to everyone to knock loudly and wait for her invitation before entering. In the following days, Emmy felt better thanks to Freud’s practice – he ordered hot baths for her and massages of her whole body twice a day. Before she went to sleep, he always lightly hypnotised her and tried to convince her that she should sleep well and her symptoms should improve. Emmy reacted more than positively and she never asked him about her hypnoid states, slept well and spent most of her days by peaceful rest in the bed. Her daughters could visit her, or Emmy could read and deal with her correspondence.

On 8th May 1889 she piqued his interest by a story she read in newspapers that made her tremble with fear – about a boy who was tied up by an apprentice and who gave him a white mouse into his mouth. The boy died of fear. When Freud hypnotised her, he found that the article in the newspapers really tells a story about a boy who was tormented to death but there was no mention about mice or rats. He came to the conclusion that Emmy had to create the association by herself in some sort of delirium after one of the doctors told her that he sent a crate of mice to Tbilisi. In the evening, she couldn’t remember anything about it, she just mentioned that she suffered from cramps in her neck in the afternoon. Freud tried to convince her in the hypnosis to talk more about her past experiences so he could find out why she associated the tormented boy with mice and rats. Although she mediated before every single answer, she was able to give him the answers during which she kept twitching and the expressions on her faces kept changing from the one of horror to the one of fear. She started talking about how her siblings threw dead animals at her which caused her first fits of fainting and cramps. Her aunt considered it as unacceptable so these demonstrations of her mental state stopped. Another traumatic experiences were dead bodies of her sister and aunt, and her brother who scared her dressed as a ghost. On a question why she kept throwing herself so much, she explained that when she was talking about all the traumatic experiences, she could see them in front of her quite lively and colourfully. Freud swore to himself to help her to free herself from these lively notions by therapy and induced this suggestion to her by stroking her eyes for a couple of times.

9th May 1889 – Emmy slept well but she started to have digestive problems after she spent too much time with her daughters in the garden. Freud advised to her to limit the visit of her daughter to two and half hours at maximum. There were also other symptoms that had origin in a shock she suffered after she leafed through an ethnological atlas and she saw American Indians dressed as animals. Freud tried to convince her in the hypnosis not to fear of the pictures but quite the contrary, to laugh at them which she did after she woke up. She kept giving out the clacking sound, though (she brought it about when she took care of her sick daughter and was forced to be completely quiet and now the tic showed when she was nervous or anxious), and especially after Breuer’s visit (she didn’t mind him) and a doctor from the nursing home (the reason of her anxiety). By the evening, she was cheerful and showed very surprising humour sense considering her social status that was directed mainly on her previous therapy which she tried to get rid of, but never found the courage to do so. That happened after a remark from Doctor Breuer but then she was horrified that she was too indiscrete. Freud calmed her down that it wasn’t like that and hypnotised her so she could tell him more about her fears. Emmy started to talk about her teenager years where she started to suffer from fear of insanity because her female cousin and her mother spent some time in an asylum, and from one of the maids who was also in the asylum, she hear horrific stories about how the patients were treated. Freud tried to fix her impressions about the asylums. Then Emmy talked about her concerns for her mother because she once found her after a stroke which mother survived but few years later, she died anyway and Emmy found her. Freud succeeded in suggesting that she should perceive these facts but shouldn’t associate them with any emotions.

10th May 1889 – Emmy went through a bran bath for the first time and she didn’t like it, claiming that it caused her a lot of pain. During the massage, she relaxed and while she was afraid that Doctor Breuer could get insulted by her yesterday’s behaviour, she also started to talk about her queer male cousin whose parents got all his teeth pull out at one sitting. She got into hysterics during these moments and kept repeating her defensive mechanism, then she calmed won again. Freud focused on her defensive mechanism during the hypnosis and found out that the phrases she used had an origin in her past – “Keep still” was connected to a period when she was attacked by her animal hallucinations. “Don’t touch me” reflected in a past experience where her brother grabbed her strongly in a fit caused my morphine overdoes, or when her daughter was sick that one time and almost strangled her to death. During the evening hypnosis, the focused on her stammering problem and it came into light that she got into a situation in the past when she forced herself to keep quiet so the frightened horses wouldn’t be frightened even more. After another suggestion therapy that Freud practiced in her case, she got rid of the problem. Then they talked about other cases during which Emmy got scared and they came to the understanding as to why Emmy always startled when someone entered her room. All her shocks and past traumas usually came suddenly and unexpectedly.

11th May 1889 – gynaecological examination of her daughter made Emmy very nervous and Freud had to hypnotise her. It came out that she was afraid of telling him something that could insult him the other day, but Freud explained to her that nothing like that happened. After the examination they talked about her greatest shocks and fears – especially the death of her husband and the following illness of her daughter who was a bit retarded during her childhood. Freud argued that her daughter was now an adult and she was in a very good condition by which he helped Emmy to get rid of the inner fear what would happen with the child. Then they returned to her fear from asylums and Freud once again tried to convince her that the patients were treated well. He realized, during these hypnoses, that it wasn’t good to interrupt Emmy because she was angry with him for that in her hypnoid state.

12th May 1889 – despite Freud’s expectations, Emmy didn’t sleep well and didn’t want to talk about the bad dream she had had. During the massage, she rather talked about the times she spent at the Baltic and people from the neighbouring town she entertained etc. During the hypnosis, she uncovered that her nightmares from the last night concerned her fear from animals. Freud tried to force her to the root of the problem, but she informed that they would get there when she wanted and he should let her to narrate the story. When he did so, she started to talk about her husband again, how she couldn’t believe he had been dead and how she hated her child for three years because of that, because she believed that her husband could have still been alive if she could have taken care of him, instead of lying in the bed because of this child. These events were also connected to drear of foreign people after the family of her deceased husband started a campaign against her, slandering her, printing defaming articles in the newspapers about her, and keeping accusing her that she poisoned her husband because they couldn’t stand their marriage and their happiness. Emmy relaxed after Freud told her a couple of soothing words.

13th May 1889 – Emmy slept badly again and although she was in relatively good mood, her tics returned. She spoke about her fear of animals in the hypnosis that appeared after she had been on one theatre performance and had gotten scared by a character of giant lizard. She also spoke about her digestive problems they connected with depression after her husband’s death when she ate out of duty. She also confessed that although she hated her child, no one could ever notice it and she reproached herself until this day that she had been fonder of the elder child more.

14th May 1889  - Emmy slept well finally but she complained about pains in her right leg. During the hypnosis, they returned to her fear of foreign people when she listed all the other cases of this fear. Freud saw the main problem in what had happened after her husband died, though. When he came to see her in the evening, she was anxious again. Breuer had visited her and she had startled when he came in. She considered it as inappropriate because she disparaged Freud in front of Breuer according to her opinion. Freud had noticed so far, though, that she always tried to be obliging and dutiful to comply with Freud’s wishes and when it wasn’t like that, she reproached herself. He assured her during the hypnosis that nothing happened and she shouldn’t be so hard towards herself.

15th May 1889 – Emmy slept well again, but she started to be anxious immediately. She explained that she had advised her daughters to used a lift in the pension both for a ride up and down. But because she didn’t trust lifts, she reproached herself for causing a threat to her daughters’ lives. Freud, who knew the pension and its owner, explained to her that the lift is safe and the owner wouldn’t make such an advertisement out of it if it wasn’t. Emmy was able to laugh at her unwarranted fears, but Freud suspected that her today’s anxiety had different roots. He started with the massage of her body, but Emmy spoke mostly about her social life in German Russia and North Germany and entertained him with many stories. During the hypnosis, they returned to her morning anxiety and it came out that she was afraid that her period was about to start and it would prevent her from having massages, but in attempt to avoid this fear, she attached to something entirely different – thus to the lift in the pension. Freud added in the footnotes that this hadn’t occurred for the first time – for example she once claimed that she didn’t want to take cold bath because they caused her a depression and when Freud convinced her through hypnosis that she wanted cold bath, she really started to take them. However, she fell into depression anyway, but later admitted that she read in newspapers reports about riots in San Domingo and her brother, who hadn’t sent any message about himself, was there. Freud came to the conclusion that during the splitting of consciousness, there is also a transfer of psychosis onto different object, most of the time seemingly irrational. Then they focused on her pains in the various parts of her body, when Emmy talked about the events when she had felt them the most. In the evening, they also focused on her fears about the family members – illness of her children, life of her newlywed brother. They talked them through in detail and Freud also gave her a couple of advises considering her pains.

16th May 1889  - Emmy slept well and she complained again about some pains, but the hypnosis didn’t reveal a thing. When Freud came to her in the evening, she was nervous and her thoughts kept running without any kind of order. She wasn’t able to answer on any of the questions he had asked her, and so he hypnotised her and started to take her words one by one to let her talk about it.

17th May 1889 – Emmy had a very good night, but the pains and anxiety lasted, she was overly cheerfully and didn’t want to talk about why she was so excited. In the hypnosis, Freud focused on animals because she saw worms in her bran bath. She began stammering again and when he asked why, she answered that it did so every time she felt frightened. She was afraid that because of the return of some of her symptoms, Freud would lose patience with her and stop his treatment, and she also worried about not thanking him for coming to visit her. Freud assured her that she was getting better, and that she was more resilient and opened to people she was close with and that was the important thing. By the evening, she was very content and hypnosis didn’t bring anything. Freud focused on the pains in her right leg then which he managed to get rid of in her hypnoid state but after she woke up, the pain partly returned.

18th May 1889 – allegedly, she hadn’t slept so well for many years. The pains still last, though.

By that, Freud completed his notes about Emmy. Because he always waited for various symptoms to appear and let the things flow, the notes were often repetitive and didn’t bring anything new. Existing notes considered as sufficient. After 7 weeks of treatment Emmy’s state improved enough that Freud allowed her to return home with that both he and Breuer would stay in contact with her in correspondence to know how she was doing. She relapsed 7 months later because her daughter started to have some uterus problems. Freud advised her to visit his gynaecologist friend who managed to help her daughter for a couple of months. After the return home, the daughter got worse and Emmy chose a different gynaecologist. She started to reproach herself because of what happened to her daughter, and she also accused Freud’d gynaecologist friend, as well as Freud himself, by which she completely destroyed the results of his treatment. The situation improved fter Breuer’s intervention, but the aversion towards Freud still lasted. She let them persuade her, though, to transfer her to a sanatorium where the main doctor was in contact with Freud and received recommendations from him how to treat Emmmy.

Sanatorium proved to be a failure, though, because Emmy refused any kind of treatment. She improved after her family relative “kidnapped” her from sanatorium and took care of her in her home. Soon after, Emmy decided to leave for Vienna and ask Freud for his help again. He found that her state wasn’t that bad as he had heard. The anxiety was replaced by confusion, moments of sadness in a particular hour and various tics. He had problems to hypnotise her because of her unpleasant experiences in the sanatorium, but he succeeded in the end. During the hypnosis he came to the conclusion that to reach the therapeutic effect, the described event must be retold fully and completely truthfully. He started to pay attention if Emmy wasn’t holding back anything or distorting the facts. He “abused” the hypnosis to make her forget on unpleasant sanatorium. He had bigger problems with “storms in her head” as she called them that were connected to the illness of her daughter, but he managed to get over them, as well. At the end of her treatment, he found out that Emmy ate a little and she couldn’t drink anything else but thick fluids, according to her words. Freud ordered to increase the food portions and drink alkaline water. Emmy agreed with that she was doing it because he said so and warned him beforehand that it was going to end up badly, because her digestive system wasn’t adapted the way to eat normally. Freud dismissed that because he didn’t consider likely that someone could be able to cause digestive problems to himself by this way. However, he found her in depression after the food and she complained about digestive problems and he came to the conclusion that the problems were caused by psychical problems.  He tried to hypnotise her but Emmy rebelled and accused him of causing her these problem, and mainly that he threw away all the progress just because he wanted to learn her eat how he wanted. Freud told her that he would leave her for 24 hours alone to think it over and consider whether the digestive problems were really caused physically or if it was a psychical problem. If she would insist on a physical problem, he would ask her to leave because he couldn’t help her anymore. After 24 hours, he found her submissive and complaint. She admitted that she thought that the digestive problems were caused by her psychical problems but just because Freud thought so, as well. Under the hypnosis, she then talked about a series of experiences that produced disgust and distaste in her (inappropriate behaviour of other at the table, her mother forcing her to eat cold meat etc.), as well as her disgust towards water (caused by experience in the childhood when her whole family suffered from digestive problems because of bad drinking water). The therapeutic effect of hypnosis showed immediately the second day.

After she was released from the treatment, Freud remained in contact with Emmy as she wrote him how well she ate and drank, and how she gained some weight. She had problems with her daughter, though, who became disobedient with unreachable ambitions and even became violent. Freud came to the conclusion that it was a case of hereditary psychosis and said that to Emmy who accepted with understanding. In spring, he met with her in her home and was glad for her new and healthy life when she lived full social life with a couple of occasional, trivial problems, such as problems with travelling by train and gaps in her memories. She was also afraid that she would be less obedient to hypnosis but Freud managed to convince her otherwise by a little trick. After this visit, their communication was limited, Freud only heard that her daughter started to worsen and in 1893, Emmy sent him a letter if he agreed to hypnosis from a different doctor. Freud agreed because Emmy fell ill again.