#need to look into my almost pathological avoidant behavior

[finex09]

It’s 3am and I’ve yet to do anything for my essay which is due at 2pm sharp today. I’m failing so hard this semester!!

[belong2human-kind]

Hey guys! Clara, echoflower, here! :')

This going to be a really long post and it contains my view of my disorder OCD and it can be triggering to some, so I already apologize for the length and also for possible triggers :(

I've been offline from tumblr because there's too many things happening in my life, and although I'm not really depressed again, I don't think I can engage in the things I love the most on here, which is my fandoms like Rebels, SW, deltarune, undertale, Avatar and so many more you know? As much as I want to be active here because these things bring me so much joy, I don't think I have the energy to do it for now :(

I know I've mentioned quite sometimes here, but I have OCD and GAD since my whole life, and many of my behaviors are still influenced by them because although I'm in treatment and I do see many positive results, I only discovered OCD too late in life, in my 19s during covid when I almost got through a psychotic episode. OCD makes you question reality in such a sick way that, if you don't have support and don't have the diagnosis, you can experience a disconnection from reality since you question your whole self and the world around you. It's much more deep than just checking the doorknob 3 times to make sure it's locked, because it is never only 3 times. Maybe 4, maybe 6, maybe 7 or you skip to 12, but never really only 3. You engage in compulsions and you know that they do not make any sense, you see the door locked in front of you, but it's like a feeling. It doesn't feel like it's locked. And these types of questioning can suddenly change to other topics because this is one of OCD specialties, right? To infiltrate in everything you know and believe and twist that against you, making you doubt yourself and your reality around, making you feel confused and guilty. I have pretty bad themes on my ocd like "What if I hurt someone I love while I'm holding a knife or scissor??" And I have this one, followed by horrifying intrusive realistic thoughts that show me performing the action I despise the most, and to avoid the thought or relieve the stress of it, I need to do something. Sometimes, screaming "no, I won't do it" out loud, sometimes avoidance. I stopped using any really pointed and sharp scissors and knives at age of 7 to 8 years. And the thing about engaging in compulsions is that, it helps, momentarily, but it gets worst as time passes by. And the thoughts can turn into more monstrous things, like "Imagine if you kissed your parent romantically??" "Oh this person that passed through me was good looking... Did I just cheat on my boyfriend? I think I did..." and other what ifs and pathological doubts that never ends and can apply to anything, specially the things you care the most about. If you value honesty, then OCD makes you feel a liar. If you're certain you are someone good, ocd doubts that until you question your own actions, all of them, even the smallest ones like touching your nose. If you are afraid of being sick or catching microorganisms (thankfully I don't have this type because I could probably never engage in biology and microbiology, my passions) you become hyper aware of any normal thing in your body, they become signals of something that isn't there, but you can't believe it because it feels like it is. It's like experiencing your worst nightmares repeating on an endless spiral in your mind, daily.

And as time passes with you being in the dark and not understanding why you do this although you know it's illogical and you don't really want to do, the more you spend your life without the knowledge that you have this disorder and consequently without the properly treatment, the more time it takes to heal all the damage. And sadly, I'm 21 now. I've been just "weird Clara with weird superstitions and rituals" for 19 years but I've been "Clara, who has OCD diagnosed and treated" for almost 3 years now. The process is slow, it's full of ups and downs, and I had very meaningful losses in my life during the pandemic years, which impacted negatively on my healing :(

I lost my dad, my dog and the other closest person in my house (which I already mentioned in private to some but won't say publicly because of my mystical OCD and the belief that if I mention her name I'll deem her bc of my fault) is fighting cancer rn, metastic one, and her treatment is having ups and downs that makes me feel so so bad... some days I'm just hopless, you know?

I was recently also confirmed to my old suspecting of ADHD. I had it all my life, but my OCD and generalized anxiety made it difficult to notice. Now that they are much more controlled, adhd is so so loud and I was in the dark, not knowing why I was so lazy, why I would forget to drink and eat, forget to go to the bathroom and take baths, brush my teeth, forget to feed my so beloved pets... now I know, but some relatives like aunts and uncles still don't have the patience to deal with it. I'm trying to get better, but because of OCD and GAD, I cannot treat ADHD, since they are opposite medications 🥲 so I guess I'll just have to find ways to compensate my chronically lateness, lack of time understanding and lack of energy to exist someday too, to simply get out of bed even though you want to do so many things.

Anyways, this post is already super long, but I just want to update you all and thank for all the amazing friends I've got here, and all the prayers and support as well. I used to be (still am a little) super shy to post my things, but the Rebels fan community received me so lovingly that I got confident to post my arts 🥺 I really adore you all guys 🌻

I intend to be back as soon as possible, I just really need to get my life together, that by now is a chaos 🥲 but I'm sure I'll be around when Ahsoka goes on air bc my hyperfixation on Bine and Ezra will be back!! Lol 🥲

I hope you all are doing great! Miss you all guys 🌻

[weepingwillowwhipers]

This is an incredibly important point. 20 or more years ago no one was talking about Pathological Demand Avoidance, a type of autistic spectrum behavior that looks a lot like "just being defiant". It isn't because it is rooted in dysregulation and poor executive function. There is a big difference between a child refusing to do something (ie "defiance" or ODD) and a child being unable to do something because they lack developmental maturity or have some other obstacle (like ADHD, autism, or sensory processing disorders) that prevents them from doing that task. It's critically important to determine if a child can't do something instead of assuming they "won't" and are being defiant. If you look closely, there is almost always a reason for a specific behavior. Many years ago I worked with children in foster care. Many were POC, many lived in poverty, and nearly all had a massive amount of trauma. Unless they have had a chance to observe it close up, most people may not realize that responses to trauma and extreme emotional stress can look like other psychological disorders. Emotional stress can look a lot like ADHD with symptoms like poor concentration and disorganization. Both people with ASD disorders or those under extreme stress will sometimes get so overwhelmed they shut down and if pushed will have a meltdown, sometimes lashing out violently. A person who is too dysregulated to function needs undisturbed time and space to "reset". It is more similar to a toddler temper tantrum. And BTW, under emotional stress, almost all children regress and act younger than their chronological age. Another reason children might get labeled "defiant" is because they distrust adults in authority (often for good reason if they came out of abuse or neglect situations) and are anxious. Children don't have much control of their own lives and do far better with consistency. Having predictable routines and explaining to them what is going to happen next goes a long way toward seeing more cooperative behavior. So does giving children a few minutes of warning before changing activities. It helps all children but especially younger ones and ones with neurodiversity issues. This substantially cuts down on defiant behavior and meltdowns. It worked well on my own kids--one of whom is neurodivergent and the other is very strong-willed. It also worked well with foster children who had a lot of trauma and trust issues. It just requires more time and patience on the part of the adult. Psychological diagnoses are somewhat subjective depending on the experience of the clinician making the diagnosis. Race and class can definitely be factors that influence that diagnosis. So can many other things, like if the person is in a stable environment. I have seen case files where different clinicians gave the same person a different diagnosis because they saw them at different times or they had different specialties. It takes time to gather enough detailed information to make an accurate diagnosis--you need a good history and solid observations of a person's behavior. Particularly when some behaviors are common to several disorders and you have to choose the one that is the best fit. I don't want to minimize the main point from the OP. Systemic racism is very present in the medical field. (So is classism, sexism, ableism, etc.) If you are trying to make an accurate diagnosis it is important to look at the big picture and consider the person's social context, lived experiences, and how that could be impacting their behavior.

[silenthillmutual]

[ID: Anonymous said: this isnt like, a demand or request, just an expression of interest - you mentioned in your daniil-is-autistic post that you also think artemy is neurodivergent, and i would really enjoy seeing a similar post on that topic. thank you, have a nice day.]

(anon is referring to this post!)

i do have some thoughts that i would like to share about that topic! however comma, it probably will not be as in-depth as my post about daniil, as i am myself autistic and have had a couple years since being diagnosed to ruminate on places where that has affected my life, and so it’s easier to write about coming from a place of personal experience. i can do the same with depression, for the same reason.

i have a couple of ideas about what artemy could have:

adhd

ptsd

ocd

i won’t really be going into ptsd or ocd on this post because i feel like it’s more difficult to point the ptsd out (artemy doesn’t talk much about or flashback at all to being on the front) and because i think ocd should have its own post. it is severely misunderstood, even by other neurodivergent people. plus i think all four of the healers have it (or aspects of it), and this post is about artemy.

i feel like… something about the dsmv diagnostic criteria for adhd feels condescending to me, like it feels the way it’s worded places a lot of the blame on the person who has it? and some of the criteria like “fails to follow through on instructions”, “does not seem to listen when spoken to directly”, “has trouble holding attention on tasks” can depend greatly on the player. not as much of that is baked into artemy’s character and dialogue in the same way that social ineptitude, which is a core feature of autism, is baked into daniil’s character and dialogue.

with that being said: while i will include a few things from the diagnostic dsmv diagnositic criteria as listed on the cdc website, i am going to primarily be thinking about accounts from people with adhd. i have several friends with adhd (and i suspect that i may have it, though i’ve only come to suspect this recently and have had less time to think on it) whose experiences i will be taking into account.

other links to sources i am referring to: [adhd/autism venn diagram by tfw-adhd]  [what those symptoms look like in adults, by chadd]  [ptsd criteria on brainline]  [ocd criteria on beyondocd]

vague spoilers for pathologic classic & pathologic 2

very briefly & quickly: ptsd & ocd

the problem with going into it is this game is already a very difficult and anxiety-inducing world because of the plague and i’d argue that any of the healers could have one or both of these either before the outbreak or after it, so here are some things that stick out to me for

ptsd - overly negative thoughts or assumptions about oneself or the world (can overlap with adhd; artemy has the option to repeatedly blame himself for his father’s death), negative affect, feeling isolated, irritability or aggression, risky or destructive behavior, hypervigilance (any game that dabbles in horror aspects will expect this from you), difficulty sleeping (overlaps with adhd), depersonalization (this is a core aspect of the theatre theme of the game)

ocd - without going through the entire ybocs, i’ll just say that i think all three healers struggle with hoarding (understandably and by necessity) and hypermorality (all three protagonists believe they are the one and only person who is right, rubin is awfully judgmental of people who don’t abide by his personal standards). compulsions would be easier to point out in the game than the obsessions they are linked to, as we’re not exactly privvy to intrusive thoughts outside of the dreams. you could, however, say that artemy struggles with intrusive thoughts of causing harm even inadvertantly and argue that he takes measures to ensure that he doesn’t, won’t, and hasn’t. in classic, this is highly dependent on playstyle.

[this is my standard disclaimer that i have an official diagnosis of ptsd so i’m not just pulling this out of nowhere and am about 98% sure i have obsessive-compulsive disorder, and have researched it thoroughly.]

what’s built into the game: making careless mistakes, poor planning skills, time blindness / anxiety, executive dysfunction

pathologic is a game that sometimes feels like you’re being set up for failure. something that i missed talking about in my previous post is that it often feels like an autism/adhd simulator because it is, in classic, so very easy to screw yourself over and get locked out of an objective by picking the wrong dialogue option. while some of the correct dialogue options are obvious, others feel like a guessing game and you have to just hope you’re picking the right thing and have made a save file at the right place to go back and pick different options in the case that you’ve bungled something. hence, “making careless mistakes”. it’s a little bit easier in 2, as dialogue options that end a conversation are indicated with a diamond (thank you to whomever decided on that!), but it makes up for this by being unforgiving in other aspects. i believe the difficulty settings for imago state that the game is intended to be “almost unbearable” - and lots of people have difficulty completing it on the intended difficulty without cheats. (do not discourse about this on my post.) the game invites you to make careless mistakes and either live with or learn from them.

keeping this in mind, you’re kind of expected to have “poor planning skills” on at least your first time playing it. part of the game’s point is that you can’t do everything, and you can’t save everyone. not paying close enough attention or interpreting the instructions of the game just right in classic can cost you the lives of several of your bound.

that also feeds into time blindness & time anxiety. classic & 2 do these in different ways. in classic, you can’t run, so you have to hope you’re not busy doing something else or else hope that all of your letters come in at a time where you can hit up all the places you need to go, or you’re going to be cutting it short on time for the day. in 2, you can run, but there are far more sidequests to be completed than in classic.

i’d also argue that executive dysfunction is a core aspect of the game. you are very busy and very poor and items are very expensive, meaning that unless you know what you’re in for, either you or the town is low on resources or funds or time to do things like eat, sleep, and take care of your aches, immunity, and infection. all of which can be avoided if you don’t make careless mistakes, have good planning skills, and can manage your time wisely.

“interrupts or intrudes on others”

i don’t appear to have a screenshot of him doing this in 2, but he and daniil do have at least one conversation in which they keep interrupting each other. peak autism/adhd solidarity.

i do, however, have a screenshot example of him doing this to clara in pathologic classic

Haruspex: …Wait a second. If there was nothing but the great Bull, where did the stars and light come from? Changeling: Oh, don’t interrupt!

and as for intruding - khan feels that he does this frequently: intruding on him and capella at the station, intruding on him and notkin at the broken heart, and here he is intruding on kids at the nutshell:

We have so few places of our own - only a couple. And yet you feel the urge to impose yourself even here. Do you know what childhood is? It’s slavery. Herders treat their cattle better than parents treat their children. They lock us up like objects, mold us like statues, and still never take us remotely seriously.

he also intrudes on clara talking with block on day 11, either completely oblivious to the fact that he’s doing it or outright ignoring that he is.

“is often ‘on the go’“

i could say that this is one that is built into the way the game is organized, and it’s true! but his time spent with lara comes to mind. she’s not the only one to mention his restlessness, but i don’t keep screenshots of big vlad on hand so their day 1 dialogue is lost to the wind.

Aren’t you supposed to be terribly busy? I don’t understand why you keep coming. Or do you need my help again? I’ll wash your clothes. You’re filthy, like a chimney sweep. Revolting. While they dry, have some sleep.

“often fidgets […] or squirms in seat”

like with daniil’s body language, i don’t have any gifs to show to prove this. i’m really looking forward to seeing what idle animations he gets in the other two routes. for now i know that in the lucid dream, if you use flycam you can see him idling by swaying and rubbing his chin & that in other pantomimes he can be found constantly turning his head and looking around.

sleep problems

i don’t have the screen shot so just pretend that i do - he mentions this to the fellow traveler on, i think, day one when you go to the dead item shop. in either game, you can also only sleep for a maximum of six hours at a time, which is like..two hours less than the recommended amount, unless that’s changed.

little sense of danger & impulsivity

As usual, I act first and think later. I’ve made a panacea. But from what? What blood was that? Whose blood was that? To cure the Town, I’ll need to figure that out.

there’s actually no dialogue i can think of that addresses the danger of the situation he’s in - which is sort of the reason why i included it! though i am absolutely obsessed with classic artemy threatening grief, kingpin of the villains in town:

Bad Grief: That ain’t good! Got too soft a heart or something? Soft, eh… Well, can’t blame you. Haruspex: Got too hard of a bone structure? You watch it. I’ll break them in no time.

artemy has little to no problem offering to help daniil get ahold of organs and blood:

Bachelor: Exactly. I need tissues of a person who died of the Sand Plague. I need them today, right now! I’ve tried to get them at the cemetary, but failed miserably. The patrolmen are vigilantly watching over the dead. Haruspex: Would you like me to get you some? Bachelor: I’d reward you generously for that. Haruspex: Deal. I’ll do what I can, even though I still don’t have the right to.

‘even though i still don’t have the right to’ - he knows it’s illegal and could easily lose him reputation, but he jumps at the chance to do so. part of his route requires you being in constant danger, but later on there are options to tell daniil you won’t help him. this isn’t one of them.

in pathologic 2, you can also instigate fights with people by, to name a few: refusing to leave the house in the atrium where they have a person bound and gagged upstairs, not leaving barley the barber in grief’s lair, and picking the wrong dialogue option with the guys in the broken heart on day 11.

as referenced above, his impulsivity sometimes shows in the dialogue options you can choose. you can say things that clearly haven’t been thought through all the way. for example, this is what he says to clara bout her parents:

I wonder what you did to your old ones. There was someone gullible enough to adopt you?

and this is how she replies:

Clara: What? Why would you say that? I never even knew them. I’ve been an orphan for as long as I can remember. Artemy: I didn’t know. Right, that’s what I figured.

it’s not all that different from the sort of tactless comment a person with autism might make.

no motivation for tasks you are not interested in & hyperfixations

in pathologic 2, on day 3, daniil asks artemy to be his aide in developing a vaccine. artemy’s responses are all something dismissive and frequently quite rude. here’s the end of that conversation:

Bachelor: I will make the vaccine, but I can’t do it without you. All you need to do is be at hand and do as I say. I will take full responsibility for the situation. Haruspex: Perhaps I’ll drop by… if I have the time.

guess what never happens?

it’s understandable that the panacea is artemy’s main goal. what makes it stick out to me as a hyperfixation specifically is that, while a vaccine is daniil’s main goal, daniil manages to ask artemy about his progress with the panacea.

Bachelor: Anyway, how’s it going? Any progress?

the interest is never reciprocated.

emotional dysregulation & rejection sensitivity dysphoria

i personally think this is the most striking piece of evidence. every single perceived sleight can invoke a drastic reaction in artemy. just take day 3 for example - the perceived sleight here is the belief (based on no evidence) that daniil was snubbing him or trying to exclude him from the meeting:

Bachelor: Burakh. The situation is regretful. I just didn’t have time to warn you. Haruspex: This was ugly of you.

and then he proceeds to get into an argument with him. he can, in fact, get into snits with not just daniil, but with rubin and lara as well. i will not be taking sides in this, because who is right / who is wrong is not really the point, the point is how artemy responds to perceived sleights with increased emotional agitation.

when capella upsets him by telling him she’s taking the kids from under his care for their own protection, he can respond by comparing her to her horrible capitalist pig of a father:

You truly are your father’s daughter. Children always succeed their parents…

i can’t even remember what was said to him to get him to reply this, only that it was said to him by a teenager:

I’m a surgeon. Ever considered having your tongue removed?

he also holds onto murky’s repetitious “what is there about you to love? nothing. so i don’t.” and brings it up to her when she is infected with the sand plague on day 10. though it does bring the rather heartwarming line about murky having loved him from the start, my point remains that he has not been able to stop thinking about something murky has said that she has obviously already changed her mind about by this point in time in the game.

difficulties making & keeping friends

remember what i said about the interest in daniil’s vaccine not being reciprocated? yeah. friends, acquaintances, colleagues - they all kind of expect you to take an interest in their lives. this is where autism & adhd overlap, from my understanding - both can come with an inability to recognize social cues. in fact, i’m going to use the same example now that i used in my post about daniil (it is, after all, what inspired this ask):

Bachelor: From you? Oh, nothing. I was just sharing.

daniil thinks they’ve been having a normal conversation, but artemy hasn’t picked up on whatever social cues he’s been using. this could easily be on either one of them. though i will say, some of my easiest friendships as a person with autism have been with people who have adhd. which is why i’d suggest that daniil saying he’ll tell artemy about thanatica “the way i’d tell a close, intimate friend” is autism/adhd solidarity. despite initially not getting along, they are clearly able to communicate with each other.

i think the rest of this is really self-explanatory. despite being from the town in classic, artemy doesn’t actually appear to have any friends in it. could be a symptom of him having left much ealier (ten years ago as opposed to the five in pathologic 2), but in pathologic 2 his friendships are constantly under threat of spontaneous combustion. this day three conversation with lara sums it up nicely:

Lara: Ugh, whatever. Like it’s any of my business… Do whatever you want. Did you make peace with stakh? Artemy: Doesn’t look like it… Forget Stakh. I see now that I’m one step away from falling out with you. Why?

there’s a variety of reasons why his friendships are falling apart. but it occurs to me that there’s no mention of artemy communicating with his friends at all while he was gone, and maybe that’s contributing to it. this is not an attempt to pick sides (i think everybody’s wrong), i am just pointing this out.

adhd in adults: history of academic or career underachievement, relationship problems due to not completing tasks, chronic stress and worry over failure to accomplish goals, chronic and intense feelings of frustration / guilt / blame

artemy did not finish med school. classic has him described as a “vagrant scholar” traveling from town to town to learn instead of staying in the capital where he was sent (”always ‘on the go’” indeed). in pathologic 2 he simply states that he doesn’t have a degree and that he sucked at latin.

relationship problems mentioned under “making and keeping friendships”, but it should be noted that you can repair your friendships by completing a sidequest on day 3 to gather everyone together. 

“chronic stress and worry over failure to accomplish goals” is sort of the entirety of pathologic 2. you could say it’s built into the game, but artemy does express a lot of stress over not knowing where to turn for answers, has bizarre prophetic dreams, and is plagued by… well, the plague taunting him for not being to save his bound. both when notkin gets sick on day 4 and when all of the children get sick on day 10, he can express an extreme amount of guilt for not having the ability to cure them.

i mentioned under ptsd that artemy has a tendency to be able to blame himself for his father’s death, and i think that fits under here as well. there’s also this:

I get anxious thinking about my kids… Are they faring all right in the Lair without me?

conclusion

i do not know if i have adhd myself and i am sure there are things i am missing, especially as i have not completed artemy’s route in classic yet or started clara’s. feel free to contribute to this, i would love to see others’ input!

[funkymbtifiction]

 I wanted to ask two things to you as a fellow ENFP: how do you think your inferior Si manifests in you and how do you deal with Ne sometimes being overwhelming with so many ideas, only to end up not following any, for the very reason of feeling overwhelmed and kind of stuck?

My inferior Si manifests as having absolutely no idea how to get ahead in the real world in the terms of “… do what other people have done.” I feel powerless and like I must reinvent the wheel or do something unique and creative instead of the “boring slow route.” It means finishing something and moving quickly on rather than taking the time to establish it in any tangible way. I have a hard time keeping track of detailed information; I can learn bits and pieces of random info that interested me at the time and hold onto the vague essentials of it, but I cannot quote text books about it like a lot of STJ friends can. Probably the most fun, I have no tangible way to track myself or how I used to be or measure how far I have come or produce evidence for certain things, so I wandered around forever looking for my MBTI type and my Enneagram fixes because my Ne believed whatever it stuck to and can be easily influenced.

Ne-wise, I just go with the flow most of the time. Ideas come, they go. I keep and act on the good ones, or I act on one I think will be good, feel out whether it will hold my interest, and abandon it if it does not. If I’m overwhelmed with ideas for a book, say, I will write them down to see if any of them are good enough to keep the plot going or in some way bring in my Te to organize them, narrow them down, see how they fit together, and then proceed with the better ones, but it’s mostly “going with the flow.” Usually if I’m stuck it means I have too much going on in my head – getting it out on paper or talking out loud usually helps.

Back in high school, I may have been one of the “mean girls”, but I would always make sure to feel unique in comparison to my so-called friends. I would put up with sustaining fake friendships in order to appear on top of the school social hierarchy because I wanted to feel powerful (at least in my bored with life, sixteen-year-old-self head), but my best friend would never put aside her own principles and fake a friendship with somebody she doesn’t like only for convenience sake.

In regards to my enneagram, I came to the conclusion I am, yes, a 4w3. I really thought about all of what you told me and started reading all about the type 3 I could, but 4 feels much more the true, ugly me, while 3 sounds more like my social persona. You know, when I first discovered the Enneagram, I instantly though of myself as 3w4-7w8-8w7. Pretty cool, I thought. But you are right, Enneagram is there to make us see the ugly truth about our personalities, and soon I found out, deep down, I am much more a 4 than a 3 (which is how I desperately wanted to present myself, akin to the ESTJ facade) and that I have a (very counter-phobic) 6 fix, not 7. However, after what you told me, I started reading about the type 9 for my last fix, as you once said the last one is some kind of last resort, and I am much more, let’s say, catatonic, when things start to crumble inside of me. Which maybe be just my 3 wing disintegrating, I don’t know. But I did feel really dragged reading about the ugly aspects of being a 9, and now I am almost sure it is my last fix. Therefore, I think my tritype may be 4w3-6w7-9w8. What do you think?

TBH, neither would I fake anything, ever. I literally cannot do it. I cannot stand fakers / being inauthentic and my fix isn’t even 4. (I’m either a 693 due to my lack of sense of self / The Bermuda Triangle, or a 692 goody-goody, although the nickname Stockholm Syndrome makes me laugh and cringe.) (Tho you could be soc-first. I’m sp-first so appearing powerful doesn’t matter to me as much. Wanting social acceptance is very soc-dom.)

If interested in learning and self-torturing, you can listen to the podcast that discusses the negative aspects of the tritypes here. (They haven’t gotten to the 1 fixers yet, but have done the 9s and 8s.) The 469 is Whiny Tears. ;)

I can tell you how my own 9 manifests, because I have seen it in constant use the last two weeks. I had several things I needed to do but no clear deadline, and I did not really want to do them because it was tedious and might not be pleasant, so you would be amazed at how many menial tasks I suddenly found far more important to do than those three tasks. I cleaned the entire house, I re-organized my CD collection, etc., all to avoid doing things that, in the end, took me 5 hours total to finish doing. I spent two weeks avoiding them, and I could have been done with it in a few hours and moved on with my life. This is an example of the slothful behavior of the 9 fix – avoiding of doing anything that seems unpleasant through self-distracting behaviors but that make the 9 feel safe and peaceful. But doing this only exacerbates the anxiety, because not only is the thing you are dreading still not done (and will have to be), you are wasting time avoiding it.

This has been a pattern my whole life – an inert inner laziness when it comes to tackling things that are hard, boring, or unpleasant, of avoidance, distraction, and mounting anxiety as a result. It effing sucks to have a 9 fix, just like the pathological need for perfection makes it suck to have a 1 fix, and the militant need to control everyone all the time makes it suck to have an 8 fix.

You still don’t seem to understand the Enneagram in context with your actual behavior nor do you grasp what it means to be a 4. A 4 doesn’t present a facade to get accepted or make people like them; a 4 finds all facades unbearably fake and is constantly thwarted by, obsessed with, and makes a big deal out of, their perceived brokenness and separateness. A 4-core I know says it’s like rejecting every single thing you encounter as “not me” and then having to pull something out of yourself, devoid of anybody else, that “is you.” Essentially, painting yourself into a corner and removing all your options. The 4 is eaten up with misery inside at how easily other people seem to do things, and have things, and be pleased with themselves and life and make friends, all the while ensuring they do not and cannot ever get those things, out of their militant need to be true and ugly to themselves. Their sin is covetousness – being simultaneously envious about how others are so easily pleased and carefully constructing an image of “Oh well, they are Lowbrow and Boring and Less Cultured than me” that is pure snob. It isn’t glamorous, and it IS fake, but the 4 would have a panic attack / meltdown at the idea that they are BEING fake by constructing an elitist attitude of what is and what is not “me.”

To find your tritype, first you need to cope with the ugly aspects of your core and admit to and find evidence of how they have sabotaged your life in crucial ways (1s - trying to be perfect drives everyone else and themselves insane FOR NO REASON; 2s - constantly thinking they need to meet everyone else’s needs means they are out of touch with their own wants; 3s - constantly thinking ‘I must achieve or be what others admire’ means they are afraid that without success, they are inwardly empty; 4s - sabotage their relationships by pushing everyone and everything out of their life / being self-absorbed; 5s - constantly standing on the sidelines means they have accomplished nothing much; 6s - all the unnecessary self-doubt and questioning holds them back from doing things; 7s - all the avoidance of boredom and stagnation has made them shallow and unable to face hard things; 8s - the militant defensive posture and aggression has made them out of touch with their sensitive feelings; 9s - being unable and unwilling to rock the boat has made them a doormat). There’s the brutal truth of each type. 

If you are a 4, you should have ample evidence of how you self-sabotage and how it has ruined your relationships in some way. But if you are an inferior Si, you won’t remember these as much so - keep a journal, track your thoughts, write down how you are fake or presenting yourself in a way that isn’t true to yourself, what you are worried about over the course of the day, etc., and after a month or so, compare them to the coping mechanisms for each type. You may find out you are a different type (... 6 with a 3 fix, IMO).

- ENFP Mod

[itsmyfandomandilikeit]

I'm 26 arcs into Worm: The Stick Up Brian's Butt

So I'm listening to the We've Got Worm podcast and they keep talking about KingBob, the guy on reddit who really related to Alec and ended up understanding him (and by extension Aisha) far better than most of the other readers.

I haven't really gone into this on this blog, I've been reading Worm for like six months now and I don't update that often, but throughout this read I've been the KingBob to Brian. It's gotten to the point where I actually took a few mental health breaks from reading Worm. I know a lot of people thought Brian was boring and dumb. I'm almost done with Worm now and I feel like the inclusion of Brian this story elevated it, for me, from a fun superhero story to something intensely personal, something that was almost a struggle to read. I know from spoilers that Brian's part in this story is almost over. He isn't my favorite character (Dragon) or even my favorite Undersider (Aisha) but I felt like I should write something before this is over. It wouldn't be an honest blog otherwise, as infrequently as I post.

But Kuno, you say. You're a 22-year-old white female engineering student. Why the hell is this the character you relate to?

For a collection of dumb reasons that add up to a large part of who I am. From the time I was eleven to the time I was about twenty-one, I had night terrors. Seven times a night sometimes, I dreamt vividly of the people I loved getting hurt, hurting me, getting killed, killing me. My students and pets melting in my hands. My mom and I clutching each other on the freeway as we're stopped in traffic, a terrorist approaching our vehicle with a shotgun. We don't make it. The dreams made life almost impossible. Seeing people during the day and being absolutely certain they would die before I saw them again. It didn't matter how many times I saw them come back okay. They never would.

I'm afraid of everything. Every missed phone call is a sudden death. Every text message brings terrible news. Every possible situation brings danger, but if my friends go, I can't let them go without me. Something could happen. They'd be safe as long as I could see them. If I was looking at them, everything would be okay. Some child psychologist I spoke to at a young age noted I was a "natural leader". To this day, I lead because I am a control freak. I am afraid of what would happen if I let someone else be in control.

Interlude 15 fucked me up.

My fatal flaw extends from this. I'm terrified that people will see me as weak. I dated a boy on my robotics team when I was in high school. I treated him like shit in public because I didn't want anyone to think I cared about him, even though he was my boyfriend. What would they think of me if they saw there was a person I treated as an equal? Horrible things. I became a better girlfriend to another boy, years later, because someone mentioned to me they thought I could be a good girlfriend, and that it was rough, calloused girls who were the weak ones. It was the perfect two sentences to convince me that for people to see me as strong, I had to be a good girlfriend.

In the We've Got Worm podcast, Scott and Matt always mention that each of the Undersiders brings the team down somehow, their inputs to every situation silly or stupid. I was confused. I always thought Grue's avoidance of conflict, always taking the slow, deliberate path, was the right way to go. Then I realized that, to many, this behavior indicates brokenness. Maybe they're right.

Yeah so I said I'd talk about the stick up Brian's butt in arcs 25 and 26. I don't think he has much to say for the rest of Worm so here we go. I'm building off a lot of what the WGW guys say, but I think I can take it a little farther.

So in arc 10 the WGW guys point out that Brian resists letting Taylor back on the team until the precise moment when it becomes apparent that everyone else wants her back, when he suddenly changes tactics to talking about how they "need her for offense". They make the imo correct deduction that this is because he's afraid of looking weak. Everyone knows Taylor likes him, so, logically, to be Stoic Leader Man he should want her to go away. He needs permission to want her back on the team. Once he has that permission, he is all for it.

I know that sounds convoluted but trust me as a person with exactly these issues this makes perfect sense.

Arc 11, Brian has still not decided to be Taylor's friend again. This is because she's on the team to be offense. Their friendship doesn't help nobody's offense. When Lisa calls him and tells him he needs to lay up on her, that to be her friend would be good, he goes directly to Taylor's house and declares them... best friends. Because Lisa has given him permission to do so.

I hope you're following because I'm aware this is stupid.

In arc 12, I'm gonna veer a little to the side. Let's talk about Brian's second trigger, just so that I can educate the public on exactly how this came around. Keep in mind that trigger events happen from a long period of a specific type of stress coming to a head. And that Brian's previous trigger happened from feeling like he maybe couldn't help Aisha for a long time, and then suddenly being hit with the fact that he definitely couldn't help her.

Arc 1: The Undersiders save Taylor who was saving them from Lung Arc 2: Brian punches Rachel for attacking Taylor Arc 4: Taylor gets blown up by Bakuda, Brian sits in her hospital room and stares at this for presumably a while Arc 5: Taylor looks like she's been hanged, having fought Lung again Arc 7: Taylor and Rachel are attacked by the ABB, Brian shows up late. Taylor is attacked later the same day by Sophia, Brian shows up pretty late. Taylor propositions the boy, he tells her he thinks of her like he thinks of his sister. I am 100% certain at this point, looking back, that this was an early indication that the second trigger process was starting towards a lack of ability to keep up with Taylor. He wasn't just saying he thought of her like he would think of her if they were related, he thinks of her like Aisha specifically, the one his power is attached to. His little brain is drawing the equivalences already. Arc 8: Broken spine, betrayal, yadda yadda Arc 9: Sophia attempts murder because it's Tuesday Arc 10: Brian pretends to not want Taylor to come back Arc 11: Brian does his now-classic "walks into room/why is Taylor injured/maybe she should not be doing this" routine Arc 12: Repeat of arc 11, except now he starts stumbling over her name. He tells her she should have let her people die. If there's a point onscreen when he realizes there might be something going on, this is it.

Point is, this has been stewing in the background since as early as arc 1 and as late as arc 7 but probably actually started in arc 4. It wasn't out of the blue, it was the logical culmination of the entire story's events thus far from Brian's perspective.

Arc 13: Yeah, you know what happens here. In the final chapter, he tells her he thinks about her too much, but even though he received a new set of superpowers and a vision from aliens telling him that he probably loves her, the vision is definitely wrong and he just feels like he can't keep up with her.

She's been attacked by everyone. Lung, Rachel, Bakuda, Sophia, Armsmaster, Leviathan, the Merchants, Mannequin. He doesn't want her to keep fighting, he feels he needs to be the one to do it. At the same time, he knows he's not powerful enough. No one power is enough to deal with all of these threats.

No single power.

But he doesn't love her. That would mean he was weak.

He doesn't even agree to have dinner with her in 15. He allows it to happen because Aisha set it up. She knows what's going on, and she has given him permission to have this.

Aisha had to be the one to give him permission because his previous powerset was for her, and now it doesn't work with her, either. At the same time as his second trigger was stewing under the surface for Taylor, he was losing his power's connection to Aisha because their powers didn't work together and he kept being forced to forget she exists. He had lived for her before, and being Super Big Brother was exactly what Brian wanted to be. Now, Aisha doesn't want to be lived for. She wants to be her own person.

Brian spends the next several arcs simply living for Taylor.

I strongly suspect that the side effect of Brian's power is that it makes him pathologically need to be 100% responsible for others. No matter how dumb everyone's plans are, he always has to be there. No matter how stupid it is, Coil told him being a villain will allow him to get his sister back. No matter how dumb it is, he tells Taylor she has to sit out running from the Nine in arc 13 because she might be tired. He pays for it.

Brian's powers will probably never actually allow him to get over Taylor Hebert. It's like Taylor and bullies. No amount of therapy or time will get Brian's shard to let the fuck go.

So when the girl whom you are physically incapable of not thinking about leaves and goes to prison and tells every single person on the planet exactly how weak you are, who goes to an even more dangerous situation where you cannot follow her, what can you do?

The only possible thing. Try your absolute damnedest to pretend you never knew her.

You walk out of that meeting with the most powerful people in the world because she is there. You go find yourself somebody else. Another girl. Taylor hated her little boobs? This girl has big boobs. Taylor can't stay away from violence? Cozen seriously appears to have never even seen a corpse.

When Taylor comes back, Brian greets her with the new girl on his arm. He tries to shake her hand. Time has passed. There's nothing between them any more.

The next day, Grue is presented with the choice of pushing back against Taylor and standing with the new girl, whoever she is, or supporting Taylor. He chooses Taylor.

Of course he does. The situation calls for it. The situation has given him permission.

[gonnabewell]

when i think about the roots of my perfectionism... part of it is paying intense attention to detail as a way of avoiding the mistakes that come with inattention (this is most obvious in the way i take tests, or do math problems, basically the areas i used to make frequent “lazy” mistakes as a kid. i’d go over every math problem 3x before turning a test in, checking for not dropping signs, writing out every step fully to make it clear and easy to check and re-check, etc.) this is how i see it most often explained as to why adhd leads to perfectionism. other parts of my perfectionism, when it comes to things like music and art... i’d say are the usual amounts of perfectionism you’d see in an artist, nothing to pathologize.

but the most debilitating way my perfectionism manifests is when i pour way too much into assignments and projects that should be easy/that everyone tells me to “bullshit.” usually things in the humanities, like writing assignments, film assignments, outlining/other facilitated reading assignments, worksheets with short answer questions, presentations or projects with art components that are meant to be easy and boost your grade/look good... and i realized that the motivation behind it isn’t necessarily achieving perfection, but achieving a level of depth that makes the assignment/project actually worth doing to me—essentially, triggering hyperfocus by making it something genuinely intellectually engaging. for example, in gov last year, i couldn’t make myself do the short daily assignments where you’d simply read an article and write a surface level, short, informal response. i just couldn’t make myself. it was intended to be busy/easy work, and in class i just...wouldn’t do it. it was only when i went home, and took a good hour to actually engage with the article and write an in-depth response that i could even make myself begin the task. otherwise, it was impossible. (and then of course id fall behind and it would pile up, etc.)

and this was how i approached nearly every assignment. i physically could not do it if it didn’t interest me, so i had to go to extremes on my own to shift the goal posts and make it into a task that would spark that genuine interest, and then i would have fewer problems sustaining the effort unless it was just, unavoidably repetitive or something like that. in fact, i’d often get super super into it, to the point of totall overkill. and it worked for a while!

in middle school, when i had literally no homework, i could spend hours outlining my entire science textbook in-depth and following whatever tangents of interest would arise until i’d learned the material to the point of overkill (which id then be bullied for lmao). but in high school, the more work that piled up the less sustainable this approach became. and as i started missing more and more deadlines and giving up on timeliness entirely, eventually deadlines couldn’t trigger hyperfocus either. it’s really interesting to me when i analyze these behaviors through a lens of what i now believe to be adhd, because it explains so much why my efforts in school were always so inconsistent. why i could dedicate sooo much time to things that genuinely interested me to the point of being labeled an overachiever (even though that didn’t feel accurate to my motivations), but i never was able to just sit down and memorize my times tables. (like, literally, i memorized my multiplication tables by accident eventually. i didnt know my 7 times tables until like sophomore year.)

and the reason why my struggles with attention were never obvious at all? because for the longest time (until high school broke me entirely lol), i was just genuinely interested in most things, and most (not all) teachers would let me draw or read to stay focused because i was a good student. god i just think about how different pre-calculus and physics were in junior year. i loved physics and it was intellectually rigorous and my teacher loved me, and didn’t mind my zoning out or doodling (or even straight up sleeping) in class because i was smart and got good grades. but my precalc teacher hated me, because everything in that class was rote memorization and repetition, and i just couldn’t do it. not for lack of trying! i told her: “point me to the proofs, and i’ll go home and be able to learn it! i just can’t memorize it, i can’t stay focused”...but then it turned out we were learning things that, although super easy and boring to execute, the proofs for were incredibly complex and would often require calculus to comrehend. and here i was, frustrated, because WHY THE FUCK THEN ARE WE LEARNING ALL THIS BEFORE TAKING CALCULUS IF YOU NEED CALCULUS TO ACTUALLY FUCKIN UNDERSTAND IT?? anyways, that was the first class i ever got a b in because i just couldn’t. and my teacher ended up thinking my inattention was contempt when really i just could barely keep it together. i’d never before had a class, believe it or not, where i couldn’t use my normal “perfectionistic” coping mechanisms to trigger hyperfocus. ever. at all. the class wasn’t demanding and it was an “easy a” and i felt so stupid for not being able to just do what everyone else was doing! and, to make matters worse, almost every day for months she’d call me out for drawing or not having homework in front of the whole class (rsd hell), until eventually she gave up on me.

i could probably go on and on about how these behaviors made school impossible for me by my senior year. but what matters is that now i understand it differently through an adhd lense... and i think it makes much more sense? the way i would explain it concisely would be: in school i relied on raising my personal standards to make boring assignments more intellectually rigorous and trigger hyperfocus. of course this method eventually failed and then i was left paralyzed unable to do anything, yet still with the same perfectionistic mindset. my standards are all or nothing at all, because my attention is all or nothing. at least, that’s my current theory lmao. this might all sound like deranged ramblings to anyone else... originally this post was not supposed to be long but it’s mostly just a way for me to document myself so? yeahh lol

[yobaba30]

Brace yourself, dear reader, for today’s topic is rage. Not just any garden-variety rage, but its narcissistic kind, one of the darkest and most destructive manifestations of our Shadow.

A narcissist’s rage is always there, sometimes barely under the surface, sometimes hovering above it in the form of sadistic cruelties dispensed casually without specific reason, just because (that stupid dog was in my way, you are so fat and ugly, only idiots park their cars in this spot, and no one talks to me like that — any or no reason would do). There are, however, solid enough explanations of its existence.

You may have heard of Donald Trump’s very bad day the other Tuesday — or rather what would have been a very bad day for any normal person / presidential candidate confronted with his inaccuracies and lies. For Donald, however, it was just Tuesday as usual, complete with playing the Perpetual Victim™ of the Cruel and Unforgiving Press, and humiliating people who dared to question him about these pesky things known as facts.

The sordid as usual spectacle was instructive, as is everything else coming from the man, in the dynamics of narcissistic pathology.

First, the bombast. His over-the-top pronouncements about his huuuge charitable efforts are meant to shock and awe the audience into unquestioning submission.

Second, should any audience member retain his or her bearings and still manage to persist in their questioning, next comes the unloading of the massive victimhood complex designed to cow them into silence filled, presumably, with commiseration and appreciation for the Put Upon Donny and His Unique Suffering (and, oh, how he suffers! only a narcissist can suffer so — you mere mortals / losers cannot possibly comprehend it).

Third — since, remarkably enough, the first two options did not quite work, a sign perhaps that some of the press members are growing spines — there followed a predictable, but still shocking, dose of sadism in the form of insults, direct and less so, meant to shut everyone up for good.

It is instructive to watch The Donald, who epitomizes dishonesty and sleaze, rage at the reporters for being “dishonest” and call them sleazy — for trying to extract some honesty and truth from him. He shames them — or futilely attempts to, given that his moral standing is non-existent and reality is decidedly not on his side — with the ease and force that indicates the extent of his own fear of shame.

This sequelae, seen above, in response to shame is classic for any narcissist, especially one of this extreme caliber, for very obvious reasons:

The narcissist tends to be very sensitive to shame, which he perceives as humiliation: a blow to his ego (sense of self) and/or a threat to what he sees as his important status compared to others. This sensitivity is the reason why he tends to lash out at those who shame or appear to shame him in any way. His reactions to shame are grossly disproportionate to the “offense;” he will hold grudges and seek revenge sometimes till death, his own or his “offender’s,” whichever comes first. Hell hath no fury like a narcissist scorned.

Shame is so difficult for a narcissist to tolerate because it arises from an exposure of some flaw of his to others. He has many serious shortcomings; but in his own eyes he is perfect and surpasses everyone else, as he will let you know time and again, directly and not. He must retain this grandiose delusion of superiority and perfection at all costs because this is all he has. His bigger than life persona hides an empty inner core, devoid of meaningful values and attachments. A prick of shame exposing any flaws in the narcissist’s façade has a potential of deflating it and effectively destroying him since there is nothing of substance to fall back on within his inner world.

The rage with which a narcissist reacts to shame or humiliation thus deflects attention from his inner emptiness. That rage is often a predominant emotion, particularly in a narcissist who feels chronically deprived of the admiration and perks he believes he deserves (and as his need for admiration and perks is bottomless, so then is his sense of deprivation). It does not take much to provoke it: a simple, neutral observation or a request can suddenly unleash it on an unsuspecting victim.

The vehement defense against shame is also another reason why a narcissist never takes responsibility for his behavior. Why should he anyway, when he’s perfect and does no wrong? Nothing is ever his fault, no matter how great a mess he creates. Responsibility is always projected outwards, onto others, as blame. Admitting his culpability in anything could lead to shame and cracks in the false façade that defines his character — and his ego won’t allow that. It is a matter of life and death, ‘psychically’ speaking.

The flip side of his shame intolerance is his desire to humiliate others. It comes as naturally to him as breathing. He derives pleasure from inflicting on others the kind of pain he himself wants to avoid at all costs. Humiliating other people is almost as satisfying as winning. It helps that the two often go together in the narcissist’s life. In fact, humiliating others is itself a win. And he likes to win.

What we have seen in Donald’s behavior was a relatively mild version of narcissistic aggression in response to shame, but it gives us a glimpse of what’s beneath it. We are still in the wooing phase, and Donald is, believe it or not, on his best behavior.

He is still The Charming Donald (or what passes for charming in Trumpland), trying to curry our favor and votes. If he makes it into the White House, then we will get to know his true self, unhampered by all these frivolous niceties.

We must appreciate the often sadistic and always revealing quality of insults dished out by The Donald at the people who try to confront him with reality, because, in the Freudian-slippage way, they expose his shadow — take this one, directed at ABC’s Tom Llamas on Tuesday:

You’re a sleaze because you know the facts and you know the facts well.

In this breathtaking attack, The Donald conveyed more than he wished. While his intent was to imply that he was being unfairly (but of course) criticized by the reporter who should know better, he let us know, Freudian-slippage style, what we have observed time and again: that reality as we know it with its pesky facts is optional — and threatening — for him, because he lives in his own version of it, where we all should join him (if we knew what’s good for us).

This again ties in with his pathological defense against shame. A narcissist’s facts and facts as most of us know them are distinctly incompatible, and you bring it up at your own risk.

Should the truth — those inconvenient realities of his life and his character as the rest of us see them — be revealed, he would be emotionally annihilated, so he cannot allow that. Yes, a narcissist would kill, easily, to protect his fragile ego from this unforgivable, to him, insult of the truth.

That narcissistic rage attacks can be deadly we see in, for example, the tragic and seemingly incomprehensible instances of lethal domestic violence where a narcissistically injured spouse, usually a husband, lashes out at his wife who may have offended him “for the last time” by confronting him with some imperfection of his (as in, Would you take your shoes off the table, please?). We can also see it, brazenly displayed, in the lives of genocidal tyrants. Saddam Hussein, for instance, was known to invite his advisers to give him honest feedback, and then execute those who took the honest part seriously. Ditto Stalin.

The epidemic of gun violence in the US, particularly mass shootings — a persistent clamoring of our Shadow to pay attention to its presence, something we equally persistently refuse to do — is also driven largely by narcissistic rage. During a news conference several days ago about the UCLA shooter, the chief of LAPD said the following:

Everybody tries to look for a good reason for this. There is no good reason for this. This is a mental issue, mental derangement.

He was correct that there is no good reason for this and that “mental derangement” is the cause — but we should learn to identify and name this specific mental derangement, called aggrieved entitlement, which is a form of narcissistic rage, already. Our failure to do so, repeatedly and with the kind of stubbornness that suggests willful blindness, is deadly. Whatever other difficulties the UCLA shooter may have experienced, we can assume with a fair degree of certainty that narcissistic entitlement and rage were among them, as it is nearly always the case. For it takes a grand dose of faith in one’s specialness to believe that one has a right to take another’s life — or many — in revenge for whatever slights, real or imagined, one may have experienced.

Tom Llamas’ offense, like those unlucky honest Hussein’s advisers, was, in addition to confronting Trump with cold facts about his charitable inactivities, ignoring those central facts that comprise the narcissist’s reality:

It is not, however, as though his understanding of himself and the world is entirely fact-free. There are three major facts around which his whole reality is organized:

1. I am great.

2. People unfairly malign me.

3. I will show them (they will pay).

Those are not just beliefs — they are facts etched deep in his psyche, and they evoke corresponding emotional states of 1. grandiose pride, 2. sense of victimhood and resentment, 3. desire for revenge, all of which form the core of his sense of self and motivate his actions.

“You’re a sleaze because you know the facts and you know the facts well” — the real facts, about the narcissist’s unsurpassed and unquestioned greatness — and you choose to ignore them. You will pay.

Trump’s gratuitous putdowns hint at the reservoir of narcissistic rage within. If physical violence (or a lawsuit) is not an option, sadistic insults will do. We all remember his gleeful mockery of a disabled reporter; yesterday, he gave us another example when talking about John Kerry’s accident in France last year:

He goes into a bicycle race, and he breaks his leg, and he’s incapacitated. And you know what they’re saying to each other? ‘How dumb is this guy? How dumb?’

The crowd laughed, as WaPo reports.

Narcissistic rage is easily evoked by the weakness of others, which the narcissist finds contemptible and deserving punishment, sometimes giving us hints at his own early traumas he may have experienced as a weak and helpless child at mercy of his harsh and/or cruel caretakers.

It also gives us a close look at other aspects of his shadow. Here is what Trump said about Hillary Clinton this week:

She’s a total mess, she’s unstable, and she can’t be president.

And how he responded when asked why he engaged in Twitter wars with Elizabeth Warren:

Because she is a nasty person, a terrible senator, and it drives her crazy.

These grade-school level barbs, which, like everything else that comes from the man’s mouth, are based on projection, tell us most about his shadow, facts which he does not want to — cannot, at a risk of grave injury — acknowledge of himself: that he is a nasty person, a total mess, unstable, terrible at his job (whatever it really is), and easily driven crazy by petty insults and criticisms. Oh, and that he can’t be president. If only Donald listened to his shadow…

Narcissistic rage is one of the darkest and deadliest forces known to mankind. Before it erupts, it usually simmers and percolates for a long time, fueled by resentment, envy and entitlement, the latter always aggrieved as the narcissist’s need for adulation and glory is insatiable and he can see the world populated by the undeserving, inferior people who nevertheless dare to be happier and/or more successful than he is. It thus creates enemies out of the innocent and often weak who become vessels for the narcissist’s hateful and envious projections.

These sustained projections form a basis of an attitude called the narcissism of minor differences, first described by Freud, where we exaggerate small differences in people who are our neighbors — their dress, the shape of their noses, etc. — in order to feel superior to them and exclude them from our group. This attitude, like anything else based on fear and hatred, easily infects others, already narcissistically predisposed; and the sharing makes the hateful projections grow and spread. The co-existent phenomenon of collective narcissism, which intensifies the in-group ties (and which is unsurprisingly associated with authoritarianism) at the expense of excluding and demonizing those who do not belong to our group, strengthens this pathological, but common and predictable enough process.

Once established as a more or less legitimate shared worldview, the narcissism of minor differences leads to an easy dehumanization of The Other, entrenched in racism and other forms of prejudice. It culminates in mob actions, gang violence, terrorism, and endless internal conflicts and wars, which — because of their grand scale and the magnitude of destruction — are the ultimate expressions of narcissistic rage and the deadliest manifestations of our Shadow.

And we allow this to happen.

Much cyberink has been spilled on analyzing Trump’s enduring appeal to American voters, and lauding his purported political mastery. This predictable but misguided adulation that stems from widespread narcissistic collusion and denial it creates (and the other way around) is exactly what the narcissist desires and aims at extracting from others.

It is unforgivable that our media not only legitimize this destructive individual, but imbue him with all kinds of special skills, attributing to him, with admiration and awe, political genius and media savvy.

Not coincidentally, the same happened with other leaders in human history who shared this character defect: while they were ridiculed by some, they were lauded by the press, domestic and foreign, for their “eloquence” and “brilliant political skills” as they peddled their grandiose dreams of glory alongside contempt and hatred for their “enemies,” The Others.

“This is a marvelous demagogue who can really inspire loyalty.”

“This guy is a clown. He’s like a caricature of himself.”

That’s how the media both idealized and devalued another similar character from the past who set out to show the world how great he was and how much adulation he deserved, Adolf Hitler.

This happens every time with an extreme (psychopathic) narcissistic leader / public character, because his pathology evokes just that very kind of response in people, media people included: it makes us either laugh in disbelief and contempt, or idolize his hyped-up “skills” — which are really nothing more than expressions of his pathology — often both at the same time. And while the public is both amused and mesmerized by the future tyrant’s larger-than-life persona, he ever so persistently marches toward his ultimate goal unimpeded — because the number of those who fall for his narcissistic manipulations is always too large.

The predictable and co-occurring idealization and devaluation are two emotional states that generally define a narcissist’s attitude toward himself (idealization) and others (devaluation; see the insults discussed above). He projects them, primitively — i.e., without any self-reflection or inhibitions, as there is no functioning conscience to impose such “obstacles” on his mental processes and behavior — onto the world and constructs an entire ideology from them.

When dressed up in grandiose and empty sloganeering on patriotism, faith, national purity, and other perverted “ideals,” this pathological process is mistaken for “political brilliance” and other such dangerous nonsense, as it inspires too many people to follow the leader, even if straight into an abyss. His irresistible pull lies not in any specific policies he may be promising (and being blissfully unacquainted with reality, he is always short and/or vague on those), but in the feelings his words engender in his followers, specifically a narcissistic identification with the strongman, which compensates for his followers’ inadequacies; and narcissistic rage, which the strongman embodies and already unleashes on the nation through inciting chaos and violence. The only promises that matter are those which bring in a possibility of revenge for the real and imagined hurts of his followers. That, too, is our Shadow at work.

This phenomenon, part of narcissistic collusion that develops between narcissistic leaders and their followers in any human group and organization, is as common as it is dangerous. It should be obvious that any promises and “serious” pronouncements such a leader makes are not worth the air he wastes uttering them. The only “skills” that he possesses come from his emotional primitivism combined with his grandiosity and lack of conscience, which allow him to unleash the disordered contents of his psyche on the world without any inhibition or compunction.

This appeals to and “awes” people who are psychologically similar, but frightens and repulses, correctly, the rest who are not as primitive and/or disordered and who see where this dangerous process leads. Unfortunately, too many journalists, not to mention Trump’s admirers and supporters, apparently belong in the former camp, as their shadow dangerously colludes with his.

[doodlebuggity]

Testimony of a surgeon working in Bergamo, in the heart of Italy's coronavirus outbreak.

“There are no more surgeons, urologists, orthopedists, we are only doctors who suddenly become part of a single team to face this tsunami that has overwhelmed us.”

Daniele Macchini works in Humanitas Gavazzeni Hospital, Bergamo in Italy. This is a directly translated account of his experience there. It was written on March 7th, 2020. Italy has since gone into lockdown.

“In one of the non-stop e-mails that I receive from my hospital administration on a more than daily basis, there was a paragraph on "how to be responsible on social media", with some recommendations that we all can agree on. After thinking for a long time if and what to write about what's happening here, I felt that silence was not responsible. I will therefore try to convey to lay-people, those who are more distant from our reality, what we are experiencing in Bergamo during these Covid-19 pandemic days. I understand the need not to panic, but when the message of the danger of what is happening is not out, and I still see people ignoring the recommendations and people who gather together complaining that they cannot go to the gym or play soccer tournaments, I shiver. I also understand the economic damage and I am also worried about that. After this epidemic, it will be hard to start over.

Still, beside the fact that we are also devastating our national health system from an economic point of view, I want to point out that the public health damage that is going to invest the country is more important and I find it nothing short of "chilling" that new quarantine areas requested by the Region has not yet been established for the municipalities of Alzano Lombardo and Nembro (I would like to clarify that this is purely personal opinion). I myself looked with some amazement at the reorganization of the entire hospital in the previous week, when our current enemy was still in the shadows: the wards slowly "emptied", elective activities interrupted, intensive care unit freed to create as many beds as possible. Containers arriving in front of the emergency room to create diversified routes and avoid infections. All this rapid transformation brought in the hallways of the hospital an atmosphere of surreal silence and emptiness that we did not understand, waiting for a war that had yet to begin and that many (including me) were not so sure would never come with such ferocity (I open a parenthesis: all this was done in the shadows, and without publicity, while several newspapers had the courage to say that private health care was not doing anything).

I still remember my night shift a week ago spent without any rest, waiting for a call from the microbiology department. I was waiting for the results of a swab taken from the first suspect case in our hospital, thinking about what consequences it would have for us and the hospital. If I think about it, my agitation for one possible case seems almost ridiculous and unjustified, now that I have seen what is happening. Well, the situation is now nothing short of dramatic. No other words come to mind. The war has literally exploded and battles are uninterrupted day and night. One after the other, these unfortunate people come to the emergency room. They have far from the complications of a flu.

Let's stop saying it's a bad flu. In my two years working in Bergamo, I have learned that the people here do not come to the emergency room for no reason. They did well this time too. They followed all the recommendations given: a week or ten days at home with a fever without going out to prevent contagion, but now they can't take it anymore. They don't breathe enough, they need oxygen. Drug therapies for this virus are few.

The course mainly depends on our organism. We can only support it when it can't take it anymore. It is mainly hoped that our body will eradicate the virus on its own, let's face it. Antiviral therapies are experimental on this virus and we learn its behavior day after day. Staying at home until the symptoms worsen does not change the prognosis of the disease. Now, however, that need for beds in all its drama has arrived. One after another, the departments that had been emptied are filling up at an impressive rate. The display boards with the names of the sicks, of different colors depending on the department they belong to, are now all red and instead of the surgical procedure, there is the diagnosis, which is always the same: bilateral interstitial pneumonia.

Now, tell me which flu virus causes such a rapid tragedy?

Because that's the difference (now I get a little technical): in classical flu, besides that it infects much less population over several months, cases are complicated less frequently: only when the virus has destroyed the protective barriers of our airways and as such it allows bacteria (which normally resident in the upper airways) to invade the bronchi and lungs, causing a more serious disease. Covid 19 causes a banal flu in many young people, but in many elderly people (and not only) a real SARS because it invades the alveoli of the lungs directly, and it infects them making them unable to perform their function. The resulting respiratory failure is often serious and after a few days of hospitalization, the simple oxygen that can be administered in a ward may not be enough. Sorry, but to me, as a doctor, it's not reassuring that the most serious are mainly elderly people with other pathologies. The elderly population is the most represented in our country and it is difficult to find someone who, above 65 years of age, does not take at least a pill for high blood pressure or diabetes.

I can also assure you that when you see young people who end up intubated in the ICU, pronated or worse, in ECMO (a machine for the worst cases, which extracts the blood, re-oxygenates it and returns it to the body, waiting for the lungs to hopefully heal), all this confidence for your young age goes away.

And while there are still people on social media who boast of not being afraid by ignoring the recommendations, protesting that their normal lifestyle habits have "temporarily" halted, an epidemiological disaster is taking place. And there are no more surgeons, urologists, orthopedists, we are only doctors who suddenly become part of a single team to face this tsunami that has overwhelmed us.

The cases multiply, up to a rate of 15-20 hospitalizations a day all for the same reason. The results of the swabs now come one after the other: positive, positive, positive. Suddenly the emergency room is collapsing. Emergency provisions are issued: help is needed in the emergency room. A quick meeting to learn how the to use to emergency room EHR and a few minutes later I'm already downstairs, next to the warriors on the war front. The screen of the PC with the chief complaint is always the same: fever and respiratory difficulty, fever and cough, respiratory insufficiency etc ... Exams, radiology always with the same sentence: bilateral interstitial pneumonia. All need to be hospitalized. Some already need to be intubated, and go to the ICU. For others, however, it is too late. ICU is full.

And when ICUs are full, more are created. Each ventilator is like gold: those in the operating rooms that have now suspended their non-urgent activity are used and the OR become a an ICU that did not exist before. I found it amazing, or at least I can speak for Humanitas Gavazzeni (where I work), how it was possible to put in place in such a short time a deployment and a reorganization of resources so finely designed to prepare for a disaster of this magnitude. And every reorganization of beds, wards, staff, work shifts and tasks is constantly reviewed day after day to try to give everything and even more. Those wards that previously looked like ghosts are now saturated, ready to try to give their best for the sick, but exhausted. The staff is exhausted. I saw fatigue on faces that didn't know what it was despite the already grueling workloads they had. I have seen people still stop beyond the times they used to stop already, for overtime that was now habitual. I saw solidarity from all of us, who never failed to go to our internist colleagues to ask "what can I do for you now?" or "leave that admission to me, i will take care of it." Doctors who move beds and transfer patients, who administer therapies instead of nurses. Nurses with tears in their eyes because we are unable to save everyone and the vital signs of several patients at the same time reveal an already marked destiny.

There are no more shifts, no more schedules.

Social life is suspended for us. I have been separated for a few months, and I assure you that I have always done my best to constantly see my son even on the day after a night shift, without sleeping and postponing sleep until when I am without him, but for almost 2 weeks I have voluntarily not seen neither my son nor my family members for fear of infecting them and in turn infecting an elderly grandmother or relatives with other health problems. I'm happy with some photos of my son that I look at between tears and a few video calls. So you should be patient too, you can't go to the theater, museums or gym. Try to have mercy on that myriad of older people you could exterminate. It is not your fault, I know, but of those who put it in your head that you are exaggerating and even this testimony may seem just an exaggeration for those who are far from the epidemic, but please, listen to us, try to leave the house only to indispensable things. Do not go en masse to make stocks in supermarkets: it is the worst thing because you concentrate and the risk of contacts with infected people who do not know they are infected. You can go there without a rush. Maybe if you have a normal mask (even those that are used to do certain manual work), put it on. Don't look for ffp2 or ffp3. Those should serve us and we are beginning to struggle to find them. By now we have had to optimize their use only in certain circumstances, as the WHO recently recommended in view of their almost ubiquitous running low. Oh yes, thanks to the shortage of certain protection devices, many colleagues and I are certainly exposed despite all the other means of protection we have. Some of us have already become infected despite the protocols. Some infected colleagues also have infected relatives and some of their family members are already struggling between life and death. We are where your fears could make you stay away. Try to make sure you stay away.

Tell your family members who are elderly or with other illnesses to stay indoors. Bring him the groceries please. We have no alternative. It's our job. Indeed what I do these days is not really the job I'm used to, but I do it anyway and I will like it as long as it responds to the same principles: try to make some sick people feel better and heal, or even just alleviate the suffering and the pain to those who unfortunately cannot heal. I don't spend a lot of words about the people who define us heroes these days and who until yesterday were ready to insult and report us. Both will return to insult and report as soon as everything is over. People forget everything quickly. And we're not even heroes these days. It's our job. We risked something bad every day before: when we put our hands in a belly full of someone's blood we don't even know if they have HIV or hepatitis C; when we do it even though we know they have HIV or hepatitis C; when we stick ourselves during an operation on a patient with HIV and take the drugs that make us vomit all day long for a month. When we read with anguish the results of the blood tests after an accidental needlestick, hoping not to be infected. We simply earn our living with something that gives us emotions. It doesn't matter if they are beautiful or ugly, we just take them home. In the end we only try to make ourselves useful for everyone. Now try to do it too, though: with our actions we influence the life and death of a few dozen people. You with yours, many more. Please share and share the message. We need to spread the word to prevent what is happening here from happening all over Italy.”

His original Facebook post.

Italian newspaper (Corriere della Sera, edizione di Bergamo) transcript.

[eyes-on-me-please]

The Interrogation

As Alice sat in the police department’s waiting room, adjusting her skirt every few minutes in an attempt to avoid the fact that everything seemed dirty, her mind lingered on three things. The first was how she looked. To Alice, image was everything. So she had put extra effort into an outfit that would make the officers take her seriously-she chose a gray sweater instead of a pink one and heels that were only three inches, tied her hair back into a bun, and decided to forego her usual lipgloss for a more demure lip balm. It was only as she was sitting there, eyes flitting about as she watched the officers go about their day, that Alice considered that her usual appearance could’ve played to her advantage. People underestimate you when you’re wearing pink. But she couldn’t help it, she always had to dress to match the occasion. And if she answered the police’s questions honestly, their opinion of her wouldn’t matter. Right? The second thing she couldn’t stop thinking about was Daisey. But that was the norm now. She was being haunted by the memory of her dead ex-best friend. When she was alone, Daisey was there, whispering in her ears. They’re going to blame you for everything, she would say. Just feel how disgustingly clammy your hands are. It screams guilty. Oh, and that hairdo is extremely unflattering. The third, and most disturbing, thought that Alice couldn’t get out of her head was the image of a package with no return address and a public mailbox on a quiet street.

Finally, someone came to get her, walking her down a long hallway. For once Alice felt self-conscious about the sound of her heels clicking on the linoleum floor. As she walked, a feeling of dread began to fill her stomach. But Alice had always been good at pushing that down and hiding all of her emotions with a convincing smile. Once in the interrogation room, Alice looked around. It was the kind of place she had always hoped to be, though in her daydreams she was there as an actress on a movie set, not as a potential murder suspect. As Officer Grant explained what was about to happen, she just smiled and nodded. Both her parents were lawyers-she knew the drill and she knew her rights. Alice had even considered bringing her mom or dad with her. But she didn’t need to. Innocent people didn’t need lawyers. She clasped her hands together in her lap, and crossed and uncrossed her legs. She checked her hair in the two-way mirror. Now that she had made herself comfortable, or as comfortable as she possibly could be, Alice was ready and willing to cooperate.

( mentioned: @divineangcl @the-great-and-wonderful-oz @ofcelesticls @mvgicians @atdelilah @ofrutherford @ofxcxdemics )

Part One ( You. )

Do you have any criminal history? Anything big or small that you want to make us aware of?

Alice smiled. She had never been arrested, not even reprimanded or given a warning. “No, I don’t.” It wasn’t like she’d never done anything illegal. She drank before she turned 21. She smoked weed, which had yet to be legalized in Connecticut. Daisey had encouraged her to try acid once, and molly, and coke. She always hated it, and refused to do anything for a second time. And there was the time she shoplifted in the seventh grade. But if the Macy’s beauty counter’s security camera didn’t notice, the police never would. She had done things that were illegal, but nothing that police genuinely cared about. And there was a beauty in their question. They didn’t really ask her if she’d ever broken the law-they asked if she’d ever gotten caught.

How have you spent the few weeks back at college? What have they been like?

Her smile faltered. Alice had spent the last few weeks being terrorized by a murderer, having her nudes leaked along with her dirtiest secret, and crying in bed. She had spent them as a shell of her former self. And even though she wanted to scream at Officer Grant that someone was taking credit for Daisey’s murder and she had a list of the 29 people it could be, she didn’t. She couldn’t. What would happen if she did was unclear, but Alice knew it would be more awful than she could imagine. “The past few weeks have been hard. I miss Daisey. I mean, we didn’t really talk anymore. But not having her around is just…” Alice sighed. She didn’t know how to finish that sentence. “It just feels wrong. And the way it happened?” Alice grimaced. “Well it’s just all very disturbing. And then the blood outside the art gallery. It’s hard to focus on my classes, or cheer, or the play I’m doing when terrible things are happening around me.” 

Part Two ( Daisey. )

How did you know Miss. Rutherford? What was the nature of your relationship? 

“Daisey has been my best friend since we were fourteen.” Alice paused. “Had been. Last spring-well it seems so stupid now, but she said something that hurt my feelings, and I decided I didn’t want to be friends with her any more. Or maybe she decided. I guess I’m not quite sure.” Alice frowned. Perhaps she was being too truthful. “But before that, things were wonderful. In high school, Daisey, Angel-Angelica Flores, I mean-and I, we were practically inseparable. We were all on the cheer squad, and we had sleepovers practically every weekend. A couple of times Daisey even took me on family trips.” Alice smiled, memories playing in the back of her head. But that had been only a small snippet of their relationship. In truth, at the beginning of their friendship, Alice was practically obsessed with being like Daisey, convinced that that amount of popularity and attention would mean people truly cared about her. Her need for attention was almost pathological and no one had more attention on them than Daisey Rutherford. Being around Daisey meant some of that attention would land on you. But being around her also meant letting her do whatever she wanted, and it meant playing along with her games. It meant learning to love gossip and how to extract it from people. It didn’t take long for Alice’s friendship with Daisey to change her into a completely different person. “Our relationship was pretty normal for best friends.” What a joke.

Do you remember where you were the night Daisey went missing? If so, where were you? What were you doing? Who were you with?

“Uh, yeah, I was at the party at Oz’s house.” She paused for a minute, thinking. “The homecoming party. I was just doing normal party things, I guess. Drinking, dancing and hanging out. I mean, I had a few drinks so I don’t remember it all. But I remember I spent a lot of the night with Angel. We danced for awhile, and then she went off to do her own thing. Then I played beer pong, can’t remember who with.” She stopped to think again. The whole night had been a blur. “Well I saw my sister, Kiera Kibler. I can’t remember what time, but I remember saying hi to her. I hung out with Vitória Da Silva. Oh, and Delilah Jordan. I think we did a couple of shots and danced, And then I went home by myself, around 3:30.”

Did you notice anything strange about Daisey’s behavior the night she went missing? Did you notice anything suspicious about anyone else you ran into that night? 

Alice looked at Officer Grant. She didn’t know how to properly answer the question, because all of her interactions with Daisey had become strange. She frowned for a moment before smiling uncomfortably and shrugging. “I don’t know. Daisey was acting like her usual self at the game,” which meant belittling Alice’s cheering and whispering about her to their teammates, just loud enough so that she could hear. “And I only saw her for a few seconds at the party. I don’t know if I would say she was behaving strangely. I just saw her from across the room, and then we made eye contact. And she smiled at me. I guess that part was a little weird. But not weirder than things had been between us” Alice smiled. At the time she had thought nothing of it. She was mad at Daisey, so she didn’t smile back. Now she wished she had.

Where were you the night Daisey’s body was recovered?

“The night they announced she was dead? I was at rehearsal for one of the shows I’m doing this semester. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. I’m playing Maggie.” Alice smiled with pride, before remembering that she was being interrogated by the police and now really wasn’t the time. “We were taking fifteen. I was just looking at my phone, and I got the news bulletin. I had to go outside. I…” she frowned. “I don’t know. I couldn’t stop crying. I ended up coming back to rehearsal like ten minutes late. The director was not happy.” 

How familiar are you with the Ashmont woods? Have you been there often? Have you recently ventured out here? If so, why?

Alice looked at Officer Grant, and then at Officer Forrester. She didn’t understand. Daisey was found in the junkyard. Why were they asking about Ashmont woods? “Pretty familiar. I grew up here, so I used to play in them. As a teenager I would go for walks there when I needed to be alone, before I had a car. I guess I still do that, sometimes. If I just need quiet.” Alice neglected to mention the fact that she also frequently went there to smoke with Oz. She stopped to think for a moment. “And I walk my dog in the woods. I think we went for a walk there like a week ago.”

Part Three ( the Investigation. )

Do you have feelings towards the investigation? Any comments?

Alice thought back to earlier that morning. She had held the package in her hands, turning it over and over again as she looked around to see if she’d been followed. It was small, hardly more than an envelope. Just large enough to hold a necklace. A gold chain, flecked with dirt from outside the Lamar’s home. But more importantly, something had formed a slight crust on it, deep red and crumbling. Dried blood. Alice had seen it, moonlight reflected off of it’s surface as she left Oz’s party. She was like a magpie-attracted to shiny things. And in her drunken stupor, she had picked it up off the ground and pocketed it. Alice figured that in the morning, once her hangover had died down, she’d send out a mass text to see if anyone had lost something. But she had put it in her jewelry box where it was quickly forgotten. It wasn’t until after Daisey was declared missing that Alice went looking for a bracelet Daisey had once given her. She didn’t find the bracelet, but there lay the chain, dried blood on it as clear as day. She had wanted to take it to the police immediately, but the killer’s message had warned her against it. So it sat in her room, hidden for weeks. After Alice got the notice that she was being summoned to the police station, she decided she couldn’t hold onto it anymore. But so much time had gone by, there was no way the cops wouldn’t be suspicious. There was even the possibility of being charged with evidence tampering or obstruction. Alice had done enough research to know that the charges wouldn’t stick-they wouldn’t have proof of knowledge or intent. But if she was charged, the killer would know. So it all had to be anonymous. She put the chain in a plastic bag, and the plastic bag inside the small parcel. She wrote the Ashmont Police Department’s address on the front. And then she drove to the edge of town where there happened to be a mailbox. Alice stood there for ten minutes, debating whether or not to send it. On one hand, it was DNA evidence. It had the potential to solve the case of Daisey’s murder with one trip to a lab. On the other, the killer had said people would pay if they talked to the cops. What if someone had seen her pick the necklace up at the party? What if the killer was watching her now, waiting for her to put it in the mailbox? She couldn’t bear to have more pictures of herself leaked, or, god forbid, a video. She couldn’t risk her life, or jeopardize the lives of the people she loved. Alice was too afraid. So she put the package back into her purse, got in her car, and drove away. 

It was still burning a hole in her purse. She couldn’t think about it without feeling her heart beat faster. Bringing evidence into a police station and not turning it over was stupid, even for her. Especially evidence that she put her fingerprints on before she ever realized what it was. But there was no safer place for it than where she could see it. She was already planning on ordering a lockbox off of Amazon once she got home. Alice swallowed, turning her attention back to Officer Grant. She would have to keep most of her comments on the investigation to herself, it seemed. But she could say how she felt about it… almost. “I just hope things are going well. It’s really important to me that this is solved.”

Do you have any people you feel the police should look into? Please, let us know who and why.

Of course there were people Alice thought the police should look into. Twenty nine of them. Some of them she truly believed couldn’t have done it. But it wasn’t her place to decide. However, as Alice tried to ignore the chain hidden in her bag, one horrible thought made its way into her head. That she had absolutely no idea who that necklace belonged to. It could have been Daisey’s. It could be the killer’s. Or it could belong to some not-so-innocent bystander.  And none of that told her who was responsible for all of this. Her brow furrowed as she sat in thought. “I really don’t know. I guess the person who seems the most suspicious to me is The Figurehead. Everyone knew he and Daisey didn’t want to get married. It was all fake. And now his brother is missing? I don’t know, maybe that’s a terrible thing to say. I don’t know what his relationship with Nathaniel is like. But it just feels strange.”

Part Four ( Weekly Events. ) 

Did you attend the illegal bonfire? Do you know who organized this event?

Alice nodded. “Yeah, I was there. Even beforehand it seemed like a bad idea, but I wanted to go anyway for some dumb reason. I heard Daniel Rutherford helped organize it. But I have no idea if that’s true. Wouldn’t surprise me, though. Danny loves parties and I’m pretty sure he hates rules.”

Did you notice any suspicious activity if you attended the event? 

“No. Honestly?” Yes, Alice, they want you to speak honestly, she thought, nearly rolling her eyes at herself. “I was pretty drunk. My only concrete memory from the bonfire is the reaction I got when I told a bunch of people who were making s’mores what gelatin is really made out of.”

Do you know Nathaniel Ballantyne? If so, what do you know of him? 

Alice shrugged. “I wouldn’t say I know him. I more know of him. He dated my sister, a long time ago. Near the beginning of high school, I think. But maybe it was middle school? I don’t know, I’d have to ask Kiki.” The next question was trickier. “I know he loves the stars. A hobby he totally got from my sister. Hmm, what else… Well, he’s a TA at St. Etienne’s. I am, too, so I see him at staff meetings every once in a while. He’s obviously really smart. It gets kind of annoying.” 

Do you know anything about his connection to Daisey Rutherford? 

“Other than his brother? I don’t think they had one.”

.

Finally done with her questions, Officer Grant told Alice she was free to leave. She grabbed her purse, hugging it and it’s contents close to her chest she quickly walked out of the police station. Alice didn’t look back once.

[gaynorexic-posts]

VENT and TW

Dear L.,

I'm really sorry for what happened (or didn't) yesterday. I know i'm sending mixed signals, tell you i want to but not act like i do. I don't look for excuses because of my misbehavior, but i have a huge urge to explain why i am being so weird. It might be hard for you to understand, i know that, i know that you struggle handling people with pathological manners of behavior, people like me, but listen, please listen. I want you to understand. Whether you do or not, that's up to you, but i really need to get this off my heart, at least one of the reasons - the other one, the things that happened 4 years ago, things that will haunt me for my lifetime, i won't discuss them with you. Not now, not here. This is supposed to to give you another point of view over... us, basically, or whatever that thing is that we have, that thing that i like, that i long for, but yet feel like I'm not capable of handling. I think about it probably more than you do, to be honest i am OBSESSED with the image i'm constantly forming in my head, how perfect it could be. But when the moment comes as we get closer, then i can feel your warmth but there is this inner voice that screams at me, tells me to run, pushes me away or maybe us apart, i don't know. And that voice, accompanied by other hostile demons that join the choir, is called AvPD. I hate "excusing" me with my diagnosed sicknesses, but they have impact on every little branch of my life, which is why i need to tell you this, or at least this one part of this miserable cancer that seems to feast on my soul, my heart, my whole damn life.

It sucks so bad. Avoiding confrontation. Taking steps. Change. All those things that are part of a daily routine, many of them can't be avoided and leave me scared, permanently. Scared of the cashier, the bus driver, actually of almost every person passing, strangers and even my therapist. But wouldn't that be enough? No, for god's sake. Friends, friends like you, family, every social interaction is covered with a layer of insecurity, expecting people to leave immediately after i show them my true self, fear of boundaries and still being so. Fucking. Codependent. Every look, every word, maybe just one unanswered message, it's freaking me out, i just don't seem to get used to humans and their behavior. As i try so bad to control everything i do, every step, every word and even all my thoughts, it is so hard to bear other people not doing the same. And i feel bad about that, feel bad about them, blame myself for the things i cannot control. And then comes the moment where i can actually show you my desire and my loyalty, but that inner barrier is too high to overcome so i keep fucking things up, especially those i desire the most, our thing, like i said. And sooner or later, should i be ready till then, I've already missed my chance. I can't expect people, can't expect you to have the patience to wait for me, i know that. I don't mean to confuse you by sending those mixed and kind of contradicting messages, when i tell you i want it, i do want it, i think i am actually so far to guarantee that because sharing my desire with you only by words is not as easy for me. It requires a ridiculous amount of courage and inner stability that i don't have. It sounds so stupid and childish, but i wanna be honest with you, i don't want to hide, especially not as we came closer to each other than i ever thought we would. And i enjoy this little fucked up honeymoon thing, playful and secret and arousing, like teenagers making out for the first time. But enough of that. I hope i could explain myself. Please don't let this go just because i'm acting weird, contradicting. I wouldn't have done the things i did when i only tried to please you - that has to come to an end, but i'll shut up now, this is getting too close to the events of 2018, i might save them in a locked document on my computer. And should i get too tired of this world once again, should i decide that it is my time to leave, then you will have the option to read all about it, only if you want to, of course. I don't want to force anyone into the things i had to go through back then.

Should we ever go different ways, don't forget about everything we shared. Please remember me. I will do so.

Forgive me.

Lovingly,

M.

[pessimisticshape]

How would Starscream fit into your Tf: Universe?

Prompt by : @Transformersmr-hq

((The starscream in building on is TFP Starscream, which is also WFC starscream.

I'm not one for romantizising toxic behavior in people and I pull no punches when it comes to analyzing villains and their motivations. Some people have a tragic backstory that explains, but not excuses, why they are the way they are. You have people who were raised a certin way and don't know any better because no one is born evil. And finally you have people who are just bad, nothing happened to them to cause them to go down a bad route and they were raised fairly well but we're allowed to get away with too much. Permissive parenting show be a federal crime, imo.))

I feel that most Starscreams would fit in military and scientific factions. Most starscreams' colors match this as well.

• Red(w/ a dull unassuming paint job of dark shades of greys)- military

(G1, Prime, armada, IDW, MTMTE, RID, WFC)

• White- scientific

(G1, Armada, RID, WFC,)

• Blue- artisan

(G1, RID, WFC,)

Starscreams are very sure in their abilities, so sure of them that it's causes them to bite off more than they can chew. Star would have excelled at a merit based society, he is very skilled, but he thinks he's to good learn how to be better. He dosent take criticisms well and can be brash and pigheaded when faced with what he wants.

Star is very charismatic but he's a terrible leader. Yes, in prime he did lead the Decepticons for those three year Megatron was taking a space nap, but across most Starscreams' this seems to be a constant. He is too self absorbed and selfish to consider what it takes to be a great leader that in inspires their followers to do their bidding. He's an incredible commander and tactician but an awful leader. (He's the Pearl to Megatrons Sugilite, lol.)

Ambition is good, it makes you want to do more and be more. Stars are incredibly ambitious and that's ok. The problems arise when he steps on others to reach his goals. He makes way, way too many enemies for him to maintain his goal for long. IDW Starscream had to flee vos because he embezzled tax dollars and was caught. And he never considers what to do if and when he reaches his goal. Starscreams are very calculating so for them to not think about these things is frustrating for me.

I think before the war, and before his canoodling with Megatron, Starscream would have been an aspiring officer or scientist. He would have been very good at what he did, so much so that most would overlook his more negative traits. This would contribute to star never improving his crappy personality. Give or take a few tutors and classmates. Why change if everybot already accepts you.

The Primary military faction was a very toxic place that brought out the worse in most mechs that enter there. The high protector believed that the pressure would make better soldiers. He was discredited and relieved of duty but not till after star had graduated. It's a much better place now but it was already too late for Star.

Starscream wouldn't have many friends, outside of bots he works closely with, like jetfire, skywarp and thundercracker. He would have made himself notorious for the misfortune that seems to befall mechs that get close to him, which he may or may not have had something to do with.

He was never a good person to begin with and his Training only exacerbated these qualities in him. It almost as if he had a pathological need to betray and backstab, even when it was his fault or his responsibility and everyone knows it, he still lies and blames others. Like when the incident with the zombicon outbreak on the nemesis. Even if both he and knockout were the cause, Starscream outranks knockout so he would be held accountable.

((When writing interactions between Starscream and other seekers, I jokingly make them uncomfortable and unnerved by his presence. Like if there was a wasp getting to close to you. His mannerisms and reputation put average fliers on edge. He's The Air Commander and SIC of the Decepticon Army. Not someone who's attention, good or bad, that you want on you. ))

Starscreams will not hesitate to throw anybot under an airbus. Anybot. He just doesn't care. This comes back to haunt him severely. All enemies and no allies.

Also from what I've read, Starscream has a silver tougue and able to talk himself out of and into trouble. He is painfully insecure and seeks validation from any source friend or enemy. This would stem from his antisocial nature and isolation caused by his varies misdeeds.

The worse thing about starscream, besides everthing about him, is that he doesn't know how to hold on to what he achieves. He works so hard to get things but he can't keep them cause he's a selfish, greedy dumbass. He wants power, he wants control but he doesn't want the responsibility of what getting those things would entail. You have to be composed, you have to be a source of motivation and maybe not be a known underhanded, morally bankrupt coward. Just a thought.

((Like he shoots himself in the pede on so many occasions that I'm starting to think it's intentional. I love this cranky bird man but sometimes I wanna just shake the hell out him screaming STAHP BEING MEAN! STAHP BACKSTABBING! JUST BE NICE! Breakdown's a Decepticon and he's not a pompous asshat!))

Back on topic, in my universe Star would probably be a scientifically inclined cross faction military cadet. His primary aspiration would be becoming the next sky monarch or in their high guard in Vos. But as he learned more about Cybertron and the legacy of the primes he would have wanted to become the next Prime.Cadets have a lot of privilege which would foster Starscreams narcissistic tendencies. He's handsome to behold from afar until he opens his mouth. He'd have many admirers but he wouldn't able to hold a mate for more than an orn.

Based of Stars appreciation and attachment to his frame id say that at the time of his creation his frame type was the first of that kind off the assembly line. But this pretty normal behaviour for fliers.

When vosian newbuilds are old enough they are sent off to be sorted and placed in boarding schools. Higher placements just mean that the new build will start at a more advanced level. Star would have been placed pretty high at a young age as he has an overactive mind.

I've been digging and I've come to the conclusion that most Starscreams' have a Cluster B personality disorder. Or all of them if you observe their actions. There is no concrete cause but there is a correlation between children that were verbally abused and developing personality disorders. Maybe Star was too young to be placed in such advanced courses with older seekerlings. They might have bullied him. :'(

Starscreams' lust for power and influence, or maybe just power. With the way things were going on cybertron during Starscreams hayday anybot would have done anything to come out on top, in Vos and in the other city-states. That might have lead star to affiliating with the factionless and Megatron's up-and-coming Decepticons. Him looking for any way to get ahead of the rest and Megatron looking to get a foothold in Vos and access to an aerial Armada.

I feel like starscream thinks he's so in control that he doesn't believe he is susceptible to manipulation which is why he is able to be used by Megatron.

Depending on the starscream, because of course, Stars motivation for usurping Megatron is sketchy at best. Most reasons are personal vendettas and others are to simply take his place. TFP Starscream is completely fine being a Decepticon but has noticed over the past millenia Megatrons sanity is slipping or has slipped. He does things that are incredibly detrimental to the Decepticon chances of winning the war.

Decepticons have all but won the war, they have an arsenal of weapons, they have a motherfricken BATTLESHIP! If they'd decided to spend most of their resources actually training their clone soldiers and looking for ways to restore cybertron and NOT actively antagonizing the Autobots they could've avoided all that extra nonsense with the predacons, and the dark energon, and UNICRON the god of flippin death and unlife! Megatron, is an egotistical Jackass, and any, any mech that worships him is dumber than the altmode they flew in on. Soundwave? Dumbass. Shockwave? Dumbass. Dreadwing and Skyquake? Double dumbasses.

It's ironic that their fanatical loyalty to him and the Decepticon cause, still Megatron, was there undoing.

[alyjojo]

Singles: Potential 😍 in January - Capricorn

How will you meet them: 8 Pentacles

How will they treat you: 7 Swords

Long-term potential?: The Devil

Overall energy: The Empress

This connection almost seems karmic, there are a lot of different signs covering a lot of areas, this could be something you can’t avoid in some cases. You’re in The Empress energy, which is beautiful, you’re artistic, creative, loving and nurturing, what you touch turns to gold when you meet this person, and it looks like it’s going to happen either at work or through something you do creatively, maybe a side project or an art event, whatever you’re involved in related to work. Now how they treat you is very strategic, clever, underhanded and a bit sneaky. It could seem exciting at first, they have a way about them that’s mysterious...they could also be a pathological liar so look out for that.

The Devil as a potential is not very comforting. The intimacy is probably going to be off the charts, there’s a level of lustful attraction that could easily lead to obsession. That’s not the worst thing, by itself. This person could also be bad news considering we have 7 Swords next to it. They could be a cheater, addicted to substances or a number of unhealthy things, have toxic behaviors or be looking to “trap” you in some way. At worst this person could be a full on predator looking for something sweet and easy and you need to be very careful of this. To a Devil, an Empress looks like sweet & easy prey. At the very best, this is an extremely intense, obsessive, and very sexual connection. Just be careful they are who they say they are...I really don’t like the vibe I get from this one. If your intuition red flags you down, walk the other way.

Possible signs:

Sun: Capricorn is here twice, Libra, Taurus & Pisces.

Mercury: Taurus, Leo, Virgo

Venus: Gemini, Libra, Taurus, Aquarius & Pisces

Pluto: Capricorn

Messages:

You are the YIN to my YANG ☯️

I’ve never felt this with ANYONE else.

[haptureratch]

My case is done the the mid-level has not replied, so.... LET’S DO SOME MORE RAMBLINGS ON LIFE LOL

Yesterday.

Yesterday’s bright sun lit up the crisp morning like it did in my childhood. Before setting out to return my trauma call pager, I had resolved to be strong. I was so lost in the thick of my anxieties related to Jordan that I wasn’t eating or sleeping right, and I had turned to self-medication a few times. It was time to make my way out the other end, back into the light.

I reflected on the guidance Alexis had given me during the terrible day that Scott died and I just could not do anything right as I was so off-kilter. An outside but still genuine component of my support system-- I had given so much medical advice during his hospitalization some time ago. I filled in the gaps of their knowledge and expectations and empowered them to advocate for the right care. He had been so kind and thankful to me and said I was a doctor in his eyes already. I knew I’d see him again either right after match or before graduation, whenever I’d finally be able to visit Rilley. And then suddenly he was not there and would never be there again. And my poor love was thrust into one of the biggest nightmares of her and her mother’s lives. I did not know how to process anything. And I still had to scrub in and deal with those asshole gunner MS3s. I was so hesitant with everything. I could not avoid comparing myself to the younger student. I faltered too many times and the attending’s understandable frustration peaked. “WHERE did you say you had your clerkship training?!” I backed away and failed to keep my eyes dry. That was a low day. Very, very low.

I struggled with jealousy, fear, doubt... I did not know how I was going to get anywhere in the life I chose to pursue. Surely I did not belong in this space and it was my clawing and gouging against nature that gave me any kind of place to stand. I saw everyone else around me as worthy and learning and acceptable. I felt so other...

[[[ oh shit i ran into amanda’s crush and had a great conversation - okay actually he came up to me and i’ve seen him in passing a couple other times on this rotation as he does pathology stuffs ]]]

* many hourz later *

I don’t even remember where I was but essentially all that shit was going on and then Jordan started to pull away from me too. I lost my entire shit. I wasn’t eating much. You know that’s when it’s bad.

But I resolved to shift myself. To live by Alexis’s guidance given to me no this A/I. I said, “Thank you for this opportunity to test myself and grow. Thank you for this difficult period with Jordan. I need the chance to continue to cement my forward strides. If I do not learn to work through this I will stagnate.” And so I found the comfort inside of me; I found the beauty outside. I marveled at it as I walked through campus yesterday morning. I looked over at the Rebirth installation between the library and Levin-- all at once I was hit by gratitude and swept up in powerful waves of realization. So much growth and perseverance in this place that I thought was hell.

I truly started from scratch here. I used to loathe the idea of starting from square One. But this is what was needed. Maybe not needed. I could have stayed just where I was as a nurse. But this was...something...I cannot call it good or bad because I see now that this is only the beginning. I am about to be re-written again. I’m a little disappointed to have the realization just now that this is just like college Jess transforming into SLICU Jess. Wait... I don’t actually know if I am SLICU Jess. I became an expert after 4-ish years there. What am I now, after almost 4 years of med school?

This will take more analyzing.

----

Welp. This got away from me lololol

Anyway.

----

Saloni and Angeli are not liking Jordan’s behavior. I don’t want to believe Angeli when she says I should break up with him. I think I still need to do work on myself before that’s a valid option. Yes, I agree that a relationship should not make one feel doubtful. But like....I need constant reassurance everywhere in life.

That boy DOES need to work on his god damn empathy and communication though. I’m still bothered by “I’m sorry you’re dealing with those feelings. I’ve had experience with that most of my life” THEN WHY THE FUCK DON’T YOU KNOW HOW TO REASSURE ME????????/ LMAO XD

Motherfuck.

Saloni is right about one thing, though. You can’t change a person. When I saw him in his unit yesterday after all the walking and calming, he was wearing all his damn jewelry. After I tooooooollllllld him and proved to him that it’s an infection control issue and just not sanitary.

b i n c h  y a   n a s t y

Antyway. I will never get to have the long nails that I would love to click at him because I actually understand that shit lmao. Please tell me he’ll finally learn when he does his RN-to-BSN. And please tell me he does go through that program some day for his own professional benefit. Henny you wanna work at a magnet facility TRUUUUUUUUUUST ME

----

gOT away from me again god dammit

, 

Look the whole thing is I started out being independent as hell in this relationship. And I need the reminder that I am woman, I am fearless, I am sexy, I’m divine (god I love that Emmy Melli song more and more ugh) - holy shit. I just realized this is the first time that I am accepting the unknown. I have no idea how he feels about me deep down. And, though I REALLY wanted to for a few days, I am not going to keep pestering him until I feel like I understand completely where I stand and how every little thing of mine is perceived by him. I’m just gonna enjoy what I can get out of it. I want kisses and footrubs and someone to lay down in my bed with. As long as he is amenable to continuing to see me, I don’t need perfect connection right now. My future is in limbo. I’m not building anything right now. I have no idea how I will be able to date and grow something in residency if he doesn’t follow me, but like...... yeah, fuck it, we yolo on.

I want sex. I want to feel good. I’m not gonna be able to build anything on this island with a huge move looming nearer. That would be even less time to see if the next partner would follow me. Not to mention there isn’t really much else out there as far as potential partners go lol.........Jordan was someone I had matched with before as we know. So yeah. I don’t want to try looking. There’s not really going to be much around. He already knows about my trauma--oh god I didn’t even think about unpacking that shit to another person--and the med school experience / residency roulette.

Sure, Angeli and Aaron loved each other two months in. And Saloni and Kapil established their relationship would lead to marriage on like the first date (or so she jokes). Yeah it would be super nice to have that. I was almost going to say that I don’t deserve it, but that’s wrong. I do deserve it. But I also cannot make it materialize out of no where. I have no idea where to get it. So I guess I’ll stay here and keep experimenting. Keep working on myself so that I’m even better for whoever the One is going to be.

I don’t mean this with malice, but I don’t think Jordan is the One. Wouldn’t the One work harder than he has? Be open to me? Not shut me out? Prioritize me? Again, no malice. Just trying to put facts together into a cohesive picture so that I can adjust my expectations. Like the god damn doctor I am going to be *siren noises*

I think it’s fine to keep spending time with Jordan at this point in the med/res process. Match is so close. 3 months. I couldn’t possibly find someone new in this area before then. And until I match it is completely unknown where I will end up. I think I want to tell Dr.T my #1 spot is LR. I think I do want the move. I still just have a rough time in this place. The residents are great and so is the program. But like..... so tired of this town. This area. This region. This climate. LR is a tad closer to where I would feel much more at home.

----

Maybe I should give myself more credit on the college/SLICU Jess front. I have had to work in I don’t know how many different settings and try to become an expert in like 3-6 weeks. 4.5 YEARS IN THE SLICU OF COURSE I WAS AN EXPERT. Okay. Alright.

And it’s so freaking funny how I keep settling in this relationships that do not knock my socks off. Somehow I feel that this is the right way. Make my way from trash up to better and better until I’m there lol. But genuinely I have NO IDEA how to find the right people. I think I’m doing the best I can. I have this attractive person who is nice most of the time and in healthcare. Generates a considerable amount of good feelings most of the time (definitely all of the time outside of this blip, assuming it is a blip and not the start of a descent). I’m learning in it. I’m using it for growth. That’s not wrong, right?

[robbiemeadow]

Spending Time Naked With Strangers—In a Safe Space—Can Improve Body Image

Nudism (also known as naturism) is a practice—and sometimes a lifestyle—that centers around non-sexual public nudity. As someone who grew up in the United States, I learned very early on in my life that this was taboo. I mean, whenever nudism was discussed or portrayed in the media, it was always the butt of the joke (pun intended). The impression I got was that no “normal” person would ever do this and that just being naked in front of other people is wrong, pathological, and perverted. 

However, research tells us that getting naked with strangers in a safe setting probably isn’t harmful. In fact, contrary to all of the negative assumptions and stereotypes about nudism, there just might be some benefits to it.

In a recent article published in the Journal of Sex Research, researchers sought to understand how nude socialization is linked to people’s body image. Could spending time naked improve how people feel about their appearance or help them to appreciate their bodies more?

This paper presents the results of the first-ever randomized controlled trial of communal nudity. Specifically, 27 men and 24 women were recruited in London for an experiment in which they would “hang out” with others and, if desired, drink wine.  

Participants were randomly divided into two groups. In the control condition, participants were told that “all you have to do is enjoy yourself in the company of the other participants.” In the naked (experimental) condition, participants were told to “(1) enjoy yourself in the company of the other participants and (2) do so naked. All participants are expected to disrobe for this part of the experiment.” 

Note that this study was approved by a university ethics committee, the possibility of nudity was mentioned on the informed consent document, and participants were repeatedly told that they had the option of withdrawing at any time. In other words, people freely chose to take part in this study and they didn’t have to do anything they weren’t comfortable doing.

Participants in both conditions were further instructed to create a safe space by treating everyone else with “dignity and respect at all times” and they were told that offensive, inappropriate, and harassing behavior would not be tolerated. 

After the study, participants completed a survey that included a measure of body appreciation (note that participants also completed a body appreciation survey before the socialization activity so that researchers could compare responses).

What they found was that, for participants in the naked condition, body image was significantly more positive at the end of the study than it was in the beginning. For those in the control condition, there was no significant change in body image.  

Further, they found that “social physique anxiety” (anxious feelings about the way others look at your body) was lower for those in the naked condition, and that this accounted for the increase in body image reported by these participants.  

In other words, communal nudity seemed to make people feel less anxious about how others viewed their bodies which, in turn, made them appreciate their own appearance even more. 

Please note that this was a small study conducted in the UK with an almost all White sample, so we need to be mindful of the limitations. Thus, we shouldn’t assume that these results would necessarily generalize to other persons and cultures. Also, it’s possible that this study selected for those who had more experience with public nudity, or more willingness to try it in general, so they might not be representative of the broader population.

That said, these findings suggest that communal nudity—when it occurs in a safe space—has the potential to improve body image. This is an important finding because we know that negative body image is related to a number of problematic outcomes, including several mental health issues (e.g., depression, eating disorders), as well as sexual and relationship difficulties (e.g., avoidance of sex with one’s partner). Interventions that improve body image therefore have the potential to offer a number of positive downstream effects, although we clearly need more research to demonstrate this definitively.

Of course, this isn’t to suggest that communal nudity is the only way to improve body image or that nudity is necessarily the best approach for everyone. However, for those who are open to trying it, spending more time naked just might offer some psychological benefits.

Want to learn more about Sex and Psychology? Click here for previous articles or follow the blog on Facebook (facebook.com/psychologyofsex), Twitter (@JustinLehmiller), or Reddit (reddit.com/r/psychologyofsex) to receive updates. You can also follow Dr. Lehmiller on YouTube and Instagram.

To learn more about this research, see: West, K. (2020). I Feel Better Naked: Communal Naked Activity Increases Body Appreciation by Reducing Social Physique Anxiety. The Journal of Sex Research.

Image Source: 123RF/Oleksii Zabusik

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from Meet Positives SM Feed 5 https://ift.tt/2Hz2Ds3 via IFTTT

[brittanyyoungblog]

Spending Time Naked With Strangers—In a Safe Space—Can Improve Body Image

Nudism (also known as naturism) is a practice—and sometimes a lifestyle—that centers around non-sexual public nudity. As someone who grew up in the United States, I learned very early on in my life that this was taboo. I mean, whenever nudism was discussed or portrayed in the media, it was always the butt of the joke (pun intended). The impression I got was that no “normal” person would ever do this and that just being naked in front of other people is wrong, pathological, and perverted. 

However, research tells us that getting naked with strangers in a safe setting probably isn’t harmful. In fact, contrary to all of the negative assumptions and stereotypes about nudism, there just might be some benefits to it.

In a recent article published in the Journal of Sex Research, researchers sought to understand how nude socialization is linked to people’s body image. Could spending time naked improve how people feel about their appearance or help them to appreciate their bodies more?

This paper presents the results of the first-ever randomized controlled trial of communal nudity. Specifically, 27 men and 24 women were recruited in London for an experiment in which they would “hang out” with others and, if desired, drink wine.  

Participants were randomly divided into two groups. In the control condition, participants were told that “all you have to do is enjoy yourself in the company of the other participants.” In the naked (experimental) condition, participants were told to “(1) enjoy yourself in the company of the other participants and (2) do so naked. All participants are expected to disrobe for this part of the experiment.” 

Note that this study was approved by a university ethics committee, the possibility of nudity was mentioned on the informed consent document, and participants were repeatedly told that they had the option of withdrawing at any time. In other words, people freely chose to take part in this study and they didn’t have to do anything they weren’t comfortable doing.

Participants in both conditions were further instructed to create a safe space by treating everyone else with “dignity and respect at all times” and they were told that offensive, inappropriate, and harassing behavior would not be tolerated. 

After the study, participants completed a survey that included a measure of body appreciation (note that participants also completed a body appreciation survey before the socialization activity so that researchers could compare responses).

What they found was that, for participants in the naked condition, body image was significantly more positive at the end of the study than it was in the beginning. For those in the control condition, there was no significant change in body image.  

Further, they found that “social physique anxiety” (anxious feelings about the way others look at your body) was lower for those in the naked condition, and that this accounted for the increase in body image reported by these participants.  

In other words, communal nudity seemed to make people feel less anxious about how others viewed their bodies which, in turn, made them appreciate their own appearance even more. 

Please note that this was a small study conducted in the UK with an almost all White sample, so we need to be mindful of the limitations. Thus, we shouldn’t assume that these results would necessarily generalize to other persons and cultures. Also, it’s possible that this study selected for those who had more experience with public nudity, or more willingness to try it in general, so they might not be representative of the broader population.

That said, these findings suggest that communal nudity—when it occurs in a safe space—has the potential to improve body image. This is an important finding because we know that negative body image is related to a number of problematic outcomes, including several mental health issues (e.g., depression, eating disorders), as well as sexual and relationship difficulties (e.g., avoidance of sex with one’s partner). Interventions that improve body image therefore have the potential to offer a number of positive downstream effects, although we clearly need more research to demonstrate this definitively.

Of course, this isn’t to suggest that communal nudity is the only way to improve body image or that nudity is necessarily the best approach for everyone. However, for those who are open to trying it, spending more time naked just might offer some psychological benefits.

Want to learn more about Sex and Psychology? Click here for previous articles or follow the blog on Facebook (facebook.com/psychologyofsex), Twitter (@JustinLehmiller), or Reddit (reddit.com/r/psychologyofsex) to receive updates. You can also follow Dr. Lehmiller on YouTube and Instagram.

To learn more about this research, see: West, K. (2020). I Feel Better Naked: Communal Naked Activity Increases Body Appreciation by Reducing Social Physique Anxiety. The Journal of Sex Research.

Image Source: 123RF/Oleksii Zabusik

You Might Also Like:

Believe It or Not, Nude Psychotherapy Used To Be A Thing—And Even The APA President Supported It

Three Observations About Sex And Culture In Europe

from Meet Positives SMFeed 8 https://ift.tt/2Hz2Ds3 via IFTTT