#not specifically aimed at neurodivergent kids

[reasonsforhope]

By the way, you can improve your executive function. You can literally build it like a muscle.

Yes, even if you're neurodivergent. I don't have ADHD, but it is allegedly a thing with ADHD as well. And I am autistic, and after a bunch of nerve damage (severe enough that I was basically housebound for 6 months), I had to completely rebuild my ability to get my brain to Do Things from what felt like nearly scratch.

This is specifically from ADDitude magazine, so written specifically for ADHD (and while focused in large part on kids, also definitely includes adults and adult activities):

Here's a link on this for autism (though as an editor wow did that title need an editor lol):

Resources on this aren't great because they're mainly aimed at neurotypical therapists or parents of neurdivergent children. There's worksheets you can do that help a lot too or thought work you can do to sort of build the neuro-infrastructure for tasks.

But a lot of the stuff is just like. fun. Pulling from both the first article and my own experience:

Play games or video games where you have to make a lot of decisions. Literally go make a ton of picrews or do online dress-up dolls if you like. It helped me.

Art, especially forms of art that require patience, planning ahead, or in contrast improvisation

Listening to longform storytelling without visuals, e.g. just listening regularly to audiobooks or narrative podcasts, etc.

Meditation

Martial arts

Sports in general

Board games like chess or Catan (I actually found a big list of what board games are good for building what executive functioning skills here)

Woodworking

Cooking

If you're bad at time management play games or video games with a bunch of timers

Things can be easier. You might always have a disability around this (I certainly always will), but it can be easier. You do not have to be this stuck forever.

[septembersung]

@citadelofthestars You are in luck because I just overhauled our entire chore system for the new school year so this is all fresh on my mind.

Context: this was from the post about making chores fair for kids and not requiring more domestic labor of girls than boys or having sisters clean up after brothers but never vice versa.

The following sounds complicated but it’s not? It evolved organically based on what our house needs and fits into how I organize the rest of my life. And, ymmv based on kids’ ages, temperament, and varieties of neurodivergence. My kids are all under 11 and we homeschool and half of us are probably adhd, so we’re still learning skills and also in our space making messes a lot. I would also like to emphasize that I am so bad about chores. Hence the system. When we follow through… it’s amazing. And then we don’t and we start over again (distant screaming.)

We do chores 2-3 times a day on school weekdays (or… sometimes once… but that’s a rough day for cleanliness) and everybody helps at mealtimes. Everybody gives me an hour or a set number of chores on Saturday. We aim to have the house “Sunday ready” by dinnertime Saturday.

Morning chores: this is their chance to take care of their personal space: bed, desk, laundry tidy, that sort of thing. It’s part of general getting ready. After this, the big 3-4 kids help with animal chores (and gardens when applicable) except when they’ve fractured a bone like kid 4 currently has. In some seasons the big 3 will each have an easy first thing kitchen chore like “empty the dishwasher” but not usually during the first part of school year. Mornings are hard for us so we have to get into school routine fir a whole first.

Afternoon chores: By age and ability. Mostly, one-off jobs like change out laundry, put away your laundry, take out trash, entertain a little for 20 minutes so I can have free hands for a separate task, help make the afternoon snack, etc. (Our lives run in 20 minute increments it feels like. I have a timer for everything. It’s what keeps me on task.) I expect big kids (7+) to do 2-4 tasks in this time depending on what the tasks are and under 7s to do one or two things tops, with me. Laundry is a coveted job but the rule is you have to be able to read the label on the knob and reach the bottom of the washer. We’re always behind so I decide as we go what the next load is, and if it’s your basket you’ll be called to help me load even if you’re not big enough to do it independently. Everybody folds (except the 1yo. Because she thinks it’s a keepaway game.)

We have a basic laminated grid on the wall with a column for each kid and little chore stickers with Velcro buttons on the back. (Well, we will when I print and hang the updated version.) Stuff no one likes doing I assign in 2 month increments or more (for habit and technique building) like scrubbing the bathroom; things everyone wants to do, like dust mop, they trade off each week or so. My oldest is so possessive of his sweeping job it’s possible no one else will ever sweep that bit of floor again. But there’s so much else to sweep I’m not too worried tbh.

I try to reset the chart for changeable chores every weekend. In my new and improved version there’s a section for each chore time, and separate for meals, instead of one long column under your name, and you have two columns!, so you move your little chore sticker from “undone” to “done.” Also contemplating have a little sack of random chores to draw from, like a scrabble tile bag, because “contribute positively to the family” is our go to consequence for misbehavior.

Evening chores: This is when we “get in the zone”. Your zone is one specific area of the house you are responsible for. You can do it on your own as you like to stay on top of it or wait til during the fast zone tidy which comes right before or after dinner. And it is fast, like maximum 20 minutes and 10 is better. Big 3 kids rotate between dining room, living room, and main bathroom. Little kids share the playroom. Everybody helps in their own bedroom at the end for 5-10 minutes. I cycle through and help everybody as needed unless something urgent calls me.

Meal time jobs include: table, chairs, floor, dishes (load up or wash by hand.) We’re working up to include kitchen floor and counters as the big kids take on more responsibility for cooking. Again the big 3 kids rotate among the more skilled jobs, while the little 3 trade out what they help scrub and sweep and carry.

Saturdays the kids will do a more irregular job, like “clean out the van” (which is all hands on deck together) or a periodic job like “mop or vacuum your zone” or “scrub cabinets.” We mostly discuss these jobs each week depending on what seems most needed instead of having a specific thing on the chart. (In my improved version the Velcro buttons say “Saturday chore time” in the little Saturday section at the bottom.)

This is probably way more detail than you ever needed in your life, but here we are. Happy planning!

[clearlightwired]

people are always saying so and so media is "about being neurodivergent" due to the presence of a "silly little guy" in it

untrue invader zim is actually about being autistic though. the horrors of finding out the human world is gross and evil and the only person who understands you is a kid who hates you and wants to dissect you and harvest your organs homoerotically

i think the JV body of work actually captures being weird much better than most things explicitly aimed at doing so (at least in a ~representation~ light). i mean, read jthm. the original NEET. transition couldn't have saved her but it could've made her worse. Real Schizo Moments. etc

JV has a characteristic way of capturing little parts of the world and magnifying them textually and artistically, which wouldn't be quite as unique if he didn't hit so perfectly on the stuff that's actually real -- like, the bizarre and totally completely unfair nature of "skool" in IZ, that none of the kids actually get that mad at because it's normal to them? the creeping horror of realizing you are an alien and the world is covered in germs and is hostile to you on a cellular level, but like, specifically the way that episode is drawn and paced and then the antidote ending up being something that appears much grosser to other people

it just deals with a bunch of issues in a sort of subconscious way, there's no explicit or implicit pointing out of the conclusions the artist wants you to make. all the best art about real problems is this way i think, partly because people who aren't trying to highlight some or the other issue don't feel the need to try and smash the audience's face up to it and in doing this, somehow tap into the Real Shit frequency with ease. not to say this is foolproof though. i am sure there are many readers of this post who have watched some amount of IZ and didn't feel it was "that deep" but i kind of think that's part of it too. Subconscious Implantation. the best stuff is stuff that's funny or enjoyable on a "shallow" level too

i really wish JV was still actively making work that was like this but i can't blame him for mostly just being weird online at this point i guess

[mitzvahmelting]

assuming that will's glasses aren't for correcting his eyesight, where do you think he got them from and when did he start wearing them?

Assuming that the glasses aren't for correcting his vision, then we have to consider why he's wearing them. One reason that's generally accepted in fandom is that he wears them like a shield between himself and others, to give himself some distance from their gazes. That's a vaild reason, but I would argue that it doesn't explain why he started wearing the glasses. Because it would be pretty strange to make the leap directly from "i'm uncomfortable looking into people's eyes" to "i should wear glasses!" Maybe he started wearing sunglasses to help with avoiding people's gazes and then, though the sunglasses weren't appropriate for a professional environment, he found that clear glasses served the same purpose?

But honestly, a more natural origin for the glasses would be that he was trying to lean into tropes about glasses-wearing people. In particular, he was aiming to look 1. more intelligent, and 2. less proximate to violence. (This is particularly relevant to him as a cis man. I don't think people would make the same unconscious judgement about a cis woman in the same situation. There's something about putting a man in glasses, and the stereotypes associated with glasses, that would subconsciously distance Will from the concept of violence in the minds of the people around him. It makes him seem less dangerous.) If changing the way people perceive him was the original purpose of the glasses, then the question becomes: when in the timeline did he start using them? Two major options come to mind.

One: he started wearing glasses when he went back to school. So after he got fired from the police force in New Orleans, he went back to school to study criminology, presumably getting a Master's degree in forensic entomology (which, after a quick google search, is a real thing that you can actually get a master's degree in! neat!) Either that, or he started wearing the glasses after he was out of school and had already been rejected from the FBI as a field agent. Like, once he knew that he would be teaching at Quantico, maybe he started wearing glasses (and neckties) to make him seem older and more specifically bookish, so that people wouldn't confuse him for a trainee. Two, and the option which appeals the most to me, is the possibility that he's been wearing non-prescription glasses on-and-off since grade school. Because picture this: you're Beau Graham (for the purposes of this tumblr post we will be going with the name Beau for Will's father.) It's the 80s. You're a single father and you're working crazy hours in the boatyard and you're barely putting food on the table. You travel seasonally to various lakes in the eastern US for work, and your poor kid is shuffled from public school to public school, all underpaid guidance counselors and administrative staff working to get Will situated in his new class in the middle of the school year. Meanwhile, Will isn't a perfect student. And with the amount of instability he's experiencing at home, it's no surprise that he's got some behavior issues. But you're Beau Graham, and you know how smart your son is, and you know that this brilliant, sensitive, unusual kid (who you already suspect is probably going to turn out gay, neurodivergent, feminine, or some combination of the three) will be torn apart by the world if a subpar school transcript keeps him out of college and stuck in the boatyards.

If these teachers look at Will, and they only see his secondhand clothes, his attention issues, his behavioral issues, his attitude issues.... they're gonna write him off. They're not going to be willing to put in the work to help him, and they're going to bring their preconceived notions about him when they grade his schoolwork. So Beau Graham puts his son in glasses. And that alone would make the comments on the report cards change: "Will still struggles with paying attention in class and showing respect to adults, but I can tell he's a bright kid and, when he's engaged in learning, he's a pleasure to have in class." or shit like that. Anything, anything to give him a boost. Those teachers would see that Will was a brilliant kid if they only gave him a chance, Beau thought, so he used the glasses to make sure they actually gave him that chance.

[hael987]

My dear friend Allie Mason has authored her first published book ‘The Autistic Guide to Adventure’ - Illustrated by Ella Willis, so I just want to take a minute to talk about it here.

It’s a fantastic book targeted towards autistic tweens and teens featuring a full of a variety of activities to do. Though targeted towards an 8+ younger audience, I’m sure adults could benefit from and enjoy the activity recommendations as well.

It’s exactly what it says it is — a helpful guide on how to get involved in these activities and how you can navigate them as an autistic person.

Each activity has its own section and features content like:

‘Sensory Expectations’ [e.g sounds, visuals, textures, movements etc. — things you may encounter and want to be aware of before starting].

tips on ‘How To Get Started’, so you get a clear plan of action on how you can begin your new activity and navigate the adventures!

‘Support Recommendations’ — tips and suggestions for accommodations or preparations that might make the activity safe, more accessible, or more suited to your needs.

It also features some really cool sections such as interesting facts or interviews/ profiles/ anecdotal experiences around the activities from people who are actually autistic. It’s a great way for autistic young people to be able to read about other people just like them who are doing and enjoying these activities and know how they can do it too.

The activities cover a really wide range, so even with varying mobility levels, support levels, other disabilities, or specific sensitivities I think there’ll be an adventure right for everyone [or one that can be adapted].

I think this would also be a great resource for allistic parents with autistic children, you could even read it together. Sometimes it’s hard for parents to know what activities to do together with their neurodivergent kids, or even know where to start to broaden their kids’ interests/horizons (in activities), so I think this book could also be a great starting point for parents. It’s full of ideas that parents can suggest to their kids and details what to expect (sensory experiences) so relevant plans, accommodations, and/or sensory aids can be planned beforehand.

All children deserve the chance to have fun, experience new things, and enjoy the benefits of the outdoors if they can — this book aims to make that possible, making outdoor activities more accessible.

It would have been great to have had something like this during my youth too. Wanting to take part in these activities but not being able to simply because of not having enough information, knowing how to, or knowing what to expect can be really disheartening. So to see what this guide aims to do — making activities more accessible by giving all that information as well as encouraging interest — really brings a smile to my face.

You can hear more from (and about) Allie and also where to buy her book on her Blog > Everything Page | Instagram | TikTok

It’s a project full of love from both Allie and Ella, so I’d encourage you to please check it out. You’d also be helping to support autistic creators.

If you don’t want to click the links above but still want to purchase the books you can do so here: [UK] [International]. As far as I’m aware the book is currently (21.03.23) only available in English.

I saw just how much effort Allie put into this book and just how much she wanted to create something that could benefit and help autistic youths. While I do not know Ella personally, it’s very clear they put equally as much effort into their lovely illustrations for this book.

[thisisntapainting]

How the Cogs of Toontown Online Are An Anti Capitalist Metaphor

autism be upon ye

foreword: this was written as a "fuck it, we ball, pick whatever topic you so desire" research paper for a creative writing class, with a pre-determined format to follow. as a result, my writing style may seem off here. hope you enjoy.

READ ON MY WEBSITE HERE

What I Knew and What I Want to Know

While I was both too young and didn’t have the money to fully play the game while it was still under a subscription service, Toontown Online has always been one of my more intense interests, mostly due to the charity that is several private servers that keep the game running, sticking to the original, or branching out into a modernized experience, but for now, sticking to the original game. Toontown Online was a kids’ aimed MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) started by Disney in 2003 and shutting down a decade later, with a pretty lively presence in the genre during this time. The plot was basically that you played as, well, a cartoon anthropomorphic animal, and kept the world cheery and fun against the ongoing invasion of “Cogs”, which are these businessmen robots, heavy emphasis on businessmen, with all the boredom and drab that comes with such. You fight against them using stereotyped cartoon gags, because, well, Cogs can’t take a joke. Rinse and repeat this basic basis with variations of the fighting format all throughout the game as you progress, as well as other stuff to do (grinding gets boring, and Toontown Online was notorious for grinding), and you have what remained successful until it was pushed off to the side for Club Penguin.

I’ve always been much more interested in the Cogs than the toons when it came to this game. Their origins, which elaborated on with a simple flash animation within older installers for the game, are mostly unexplained. And, of course, the unified designs of just average, uncanny office workers with little variation except for head design and suit color dependent on department, are a specific, stylized sort of cool. There’s also probably something to say about my own personal experiences with work and neurodivergency and the want to be one, but that’s not the point.

The point now will turn political – despite the game being aimed at kids who could afford ten dollars a month to play, there are some specifics parts that addle to my now an adult brain, that make it think of the further lore implications, and what it means in the greater scheme of things. What do the Cogs represent? What does the war between the Toons and them mean? Of course, it’s also very easy to compare such a thing to the workforce in our own daily lives, and how big corporations play a role, reaching in, making evil decisions, and yet, giving us no choice but to consume their product. And what would I use any of this information for, to look into the implications of Cogs as a symbolism for real-life capitalism and its evils? Probably just rewording this entire paper into an essay to be posted on my website, but also, for my own fan-writings for the game, because, well, making fan content is fun.

My Search Process

The main treasure chest of information when it comes to Toontown Online nowadays is the Toontown Preservation Project, a website hosting game design documents, concept art, and much more, donated from the developers of Toontown Online while it was still active, such as Bruce Woodside. There’s also, of course, the many still-standing videos and posts on old forums about Toontown Online, as well as the gameplay that remains in private servers (mostly relevant to Toontown Rewritten, which is actually the group that runs the Toontown Preservation Project as well). The documentation is vast, encompassing things never implemented into the game, removed early or in beta testing, but for almost all of the conception, there is no use of the word Cogs to describe the Cogs. Instead, they are called Suits, and no discussion into the robotics parts, either.

However, these are not decisions that made it into the final game, and thus, could mean nothing at all in the long run. What was in the game, however, was Unites, a reward for completing a certain boss that replenished either your gags or your Laff (the toon equivilent of health), which were considered the most useful of boss rewards for obvious reasons. When a Unite was used, your Toon also shouts “Toons of the World,” and then a slightly varied prose based on the type of Unite. In addition, if you went a little bit out of your way, you could get a Speedchat (pre-picked) phrase of just “Toons of the world, Unite!”.

While if you had any clue of the book or the man behind it, you probably could’ve seen this coming, but there is something to be said of Toontown Online’s central themes and including a rip from “Workers of the world, unite” (Marx), which is straight from The Communist Manifesto. While it has never been confirmed, nor probably ever will, if the recycling from such a fundamental source of socialist theory was on purpose or merely a coincidence, it sure does work for my point here.

In addition, take into account the setting of the game, and how Toontown’s economy seems to hinge upon a plethora of small businesses, there is the obvious comparison one could make to themes of anti-monopolization. Toontown is defending itself against what the fate of plenty of smaller towns has become, which is depending on one or two companies to carry the entire area in terms of business, and while the Toon’s shops all serve all sorts of purposes (but being boiled down in gameplay to just throwing quests at you), the Cogs only have one overbearing one, so at least there’s one major reason to keep them out of sticking their stick into the ground.

What I Have Learned

What I can gather from all of this is actually pretty interesting into the accidental symbolism the Cogs have become over the years, as, in my own eyes, the unavoidable evils of a society that hinges on capitalism and the selfishness of product become more obvious. They are a stereotype, sure, but also a stripped-down truth to the place of most workers in the eyes of company – in the truest form of the word – just another cog in the machine. The robotism of Cogs can also be taken as a symbol of automation, as more of the bottom-line, repetitive work becomes shelved out by machinery and AI to replace humans, at the cost of jobs for those who do not have a specialization in anything at all, or who’s specialization has become the menial labor needed for these, such as factory work.

There’s little variation compared to the colorful forms of toonery you play as, having to fit into these molds, and perhaps, business stereotypes as the Cog types are most often named after. There is no deviation. You serve a purpose, serve it well, and that’s all there is to it. That’s your life purpose. Have fun doing that until you die.

I’m also not the only one who’s attempted to co-relate their own life to the satire situation of Cogs. During the research part, I was stumbling over some less than reliable sources of social media, and plenty of older Toontown Online players had ended up in office positions themselves, and mentioned how, in a way, they had become what they once fought against. Sometimes, this was more obviously aligned with the office positions shown in-game, with one user stating “When I was having an early 20s life crisis when the song Suit and Jacket by Judah and the Lion came out and I have a vivid memory of standing in the shower hating working at a bank and being pushed to ‘sell’ checking accounts and that’s when I had the sleeper memory of toontown cogs awaken in me” (goddessbotanic). In the system of modern life, where one has to almost kill themselves, emotionally or otherwise, just to be able to keep up with the frivalities of modern life, to keep a roof on their head, the best you can do is try and keep your tooniness alive, though only at the side.

What This Means to Me, and How I’ll Use It

I’ve always cared about little silly niche topics to try and explore like this. Though there is probably no true intention to any of the evidence brought upon the table except for really in-line coincidences, it all seems to add up to a more mature way of seeing a game I’ve cared about since my first years using a computer. I’m all too big on nostalgia – most of my best memories of technology were with the early 2010s net, which encompasses the later years of Toontown Online, as well as the earlier years of some of my other favorite games, as well as an era of content that wasn’t as dopamine-trapping and headache-causing as the modern internet feeds. Something like this is a bright, fresh light, and makes it all too easy to keep caring about Toontown Online.

Fortunately, I am not trying to embrace a grave. The spirit of Toontown Online still lives on in the form of private servers that keep the game running and available to play, and, in both spite of what made Toontown Online shut down in the first place and to avoid copyright troubles, entirely for free. The two most popular are Toontown Rewritten, which keeps to the base game for the most part for nostalgia reasons, and Toontown Corporate Clash, which adds new content and quality of life changes to change Toontown and modernize it into an all-new, exciting experience. I’ve invested a lot more hours than I would like to admit on a few renditions of these servers, but time having fun is not time wasted, despite what the Cogs think.

Works Cited

Marx, Karl, 1818-1883. The Communist Manifesto. London ; Chicago, Ill. :Pluto Press, 1996.

“r/Toontown - Ever Realise We Grew up to Be the Cogs?” Reddit, Dec. 2022, https://www.reddit.com/r/Toontown/comments/zmwjtm/ever_realise_we_grew_up_to_be_the_cogs/.

Luthin, Stefanie. “The Unique Anti-Capitalist Journey of Toontown Online.” VGA Gallery, VGA Gallery, 24 Mar. 2022, https://vgagallery.org/vga-zine/toontown-anti-capitalism.

Woodside, Bruce. “Toontown Preservation Project.” Finalized Suit Turnaround -- Toontown Preservation Project, Toontown Rewritten, 28 Aug. 2022, https://toontown.online/Finalized- Suit-Turnaround-4393ef3db89341638e8a55242b79ee0a

Toontown Preservation Project, Toontown Rewritten, https://toontown.online/

[shihalyfie]

do you see any of the digimon characters as neurodivergent? i've always seen taichi, takeru, and astra as having adhd while a bunch seem pretty autistic coded in different ways

I'm hesitant to go too much into detail due to the delicate nature of the topic (and the fact there are some things related to my own personal stake in it that I really don't want to disclose), but I can definitely at least say that there are some headcanons back here, and I also encourage others if they have their own!

In a sort-of-related topic, while there's no evidence (that I know of) that the writing team for any Digimon series was necessarily consciously aiming to portray any of their characters as such, I also don't know if I would say it's "accident" that some of the characters seem to go in that direction. To be more specific, the Digimon staff -- especially for Adventure, 02, and Appmon, which is where the characters you mentioned come from -- were very insistent on having their characters be ones that real children could identify themselves with. And many, many, many real children are neurodivergent, regardless of whether they're formally diagnosed or recognized as such.

So if you're making a creative work, and you also happen to be really good at observing people and learning about things from their perspective (and especially treating said perspective with sympathy and kindness), you are going to hit on many things even when they're not necessarily formalized in clinical diagnoses -- an example I was given once was that Jane Austen's work from the 19th century had unnervingly accurate depictions of emotional trauma and other severe mental health problems centuries before they were given names. Just because they didn't have names back then doesn't mean they didn't exist, and people who understand people would have picked up on those things. I think that kind of thing applies here too, so if the Digimon staff was observing real children and wanted the Digimon characters to reflect those real children, some of those real children they were based on were probably neurodivergent, and the staff probably still wanted neurodivergent kids to personally identify with the characters from Digimon, regardless of whether words related to neurodivergence were ever brought up in the writing room.

Basically, to summarize: regardless of whether or not "this character is neurodivergent” was brought up in the writing room, or in-series, or even in-universe, as long as Digimon is a series meant to reflect real children and real human beings, it's still extremely possible for said character to be neurodivergent, and if you happen to be neurodivergent and identify deeply with a given character, you can't necessarily say that's an accident. Of course, I'm no psychiatrist or medical professional, so I'm a bit nervous about the idea of doing armchair diagnosis myself or anything, but that's how I see it.

[emersonfreepress]

I don't think something like this was answered, but can we make the MC be disabled in some way in the game? I'm assuming something like having a wheelchair is already a no, but is there an option at some point to give them a chronical illness for example, or make them neurodivergent in some way? (If not straight into the text, do we have your blessing to hcs them as such?)

I think I mentioned in passing or in tags (same thing p much) that I should be able to include mobility aid options for Book 2, but because that's sequel talk I won't claim to have any specific ideas or plans yet. There's currently no plans to write the MC as having a specific neurodivergence. The only way I'd want to do that is if it's something that I'm personally familiar with like depression or PTSD. (like, i'm sure that's going to come across in some playthroughs anyway, but I'm not purposely aiming for it lol)

Please please please headcanon your MCs as disabled and/or neurodivergent! Do what you want! I have to set limits for customization as a writer and (especially) developer, but there's no reason you have to stay within the constraints of my code. Not with your MC anyway, that's your New Kid 😊

[postmodernmulticoloredcloak]

ironworked replied to your post “especially since all my classmates could tell i...”

diagnostic criteria and tests are bad enough on their own, but when on top of that professionals fail to take into account things like masking and context...

yeah. in my case it’s more like the test was aimed at a completely different flavor of symptoms/features that i have. the questions on the diagnostic test were all about struggling at school, but i was the best kid in class. i was also bullied and ostracized by my peers in elementary school for being weird. i had special interests... which included school stuff, so obviously i focused on that. i missed so many social cues. i did weird things in class (like writing my letters and numbers in strange ways) to avoid understimulation. there are so many little things that the test didn’t take into account. it only considered valid symptoms getting bad grades, being scolded by teachers for not paying attention... but the way school works (routine, specific instructions, precise deadlines...) just clicked well with my flavor of neurodivergence. coincidentally i crashed after getting out of that structure...

[krillest1]

Week 6: Feeling Bad Feels Good

HEWWO It has been another strange week. I'm slipping away from normal interaction more quickly than I thought. This week, on a related note, I got anxious a few times just being around people. This is an ill omen, and usually precedes quite a bit of dysfunction in my life. There is, however, much to be grateful for. I have the first glimmerings of an out from my current job (which I hate). I also finished the bible this week, and consumed all sorts of fun media. I am a prolific consumer, which I'm sure will come up more fully in a future post (if this continues...). Feeling uncomfortable provides a good chance to step back and let go of those deeply-rooted-ego-things, to orient myself towards the interesting, and be taken up in a righteous anger. Just kidding about the righteous anger part. A couple of weeks ago, while talking to someone I don't know very well, I brought up the point that most structures/things in society bottom out at feeling good. They were not terribly interested in this point, so I thought I'd interrogate it a little further here

FEELING GOOD Being an (often wrong) observer of people, I've noticed that they often feel good doing 'natural' things. Socialization is a pretty good example here. We talk about interacting with people as natural, but the reason people engage with others (I think) is that it feels good. No man is an island, because islands are sad. Going to church, for example, provides a chance to interact with others, to feel part of a larger narrative, blah blah blah, doesn't matter, the point is that they feel good. In a similar vein, people feel good being touched, or touching, or laughing, or drinking, or doing whatever. A related point: the idea of being neurodivergent here is pretty interesting. There's a certain population for whom the 'natural' things do not feel good, and are not opened up to them in the same way. I think (more on this later) that without these good feelings, the things we do start to feel arbitrary. Should we chalk this up to the atypical being 'unnatural,' or should we object to the 'natural' as a category? I'm not sure, but I like the framing. To return, and maybe be a bit more consistent in the approach: do our actions 'bottom out' at feeling good? Aristotle comes to mind here. In Nicomachean Ethics, he talks about the role pleasure plays in the good (and remember that the good in this context is a mean (actually it's only a mean for stupid people, but whatever) that ultimately aims at our happiness). While I can't speak to the specifics (I need the mean, not contemplation), Aristotle defends the idea that pleasure accompanies 'the good.' Pleasure actually emerges as something which... not quite interrupts, but completes an action. It's the end of a process, not the process itself, or something along those lines. I hate to say it, but this is the framework we're running with. Forget the 'aiming at a mean' stuff, and focus more on the idea of pleasure accompanying the good, and pleasure as interruptionish. I do not want to imply here that pleasure is the good (neither, I think, does Aristotle); instead, I'd like to gesture towards the fact that the things we talk about as being good (as being happy, as being natural (is our natural state happy? I think these two get conflated)) are accompanied by pleasure... most of the time

FEELING BAD My body is not structured for pleasure in this way. Aristotle would probably diagnose me with akrasia, but as a committed materialist the idea of a 'will' feels too vague. Before the analysis, though, an explanation. My body is an uncomfortable thing to be in. Why start with the body? Because I take it that pleasure and the body are interrelated in some important way. My body, on the other hand, does not get pleasure from things like touch. My hands, for example, are so sweaty that touching another fills me and them with a sort of repulsion. I'm sure mine is learned, but the disgust in the other is not. Touch, in other words, is not a source of pleasure for me. Even if it's not using hands, a hug, a headpat (anime coded, what the hell), and even 'bones' (the bumping-of-fists-as-greeting-or-celebration) feel wrong to me. A similar thing happens with socialization. Being alone feels bad, but so does being around other people. I am not neurodivergent, but that population came up above and I think bolsters this point. For some people, in short, the natural is not pleasurable. The good/the right is also not pleasurable, or at least not available in a similar way. Sometimes, though, feeling bad can feel good. I'm not talking about anything as explicitly sexual as masochism (though there's something quite interesting going on there, sweeten your mouth with some Deleuze). Instead, I'm talking about the secondary feeling-good that comes from my feeling bad. Sometimes, for example, I notice that I'm making someone I'm talking to feel bad/weird. This, in turn, makes me feel bad. I then, however, feel good that I notice this feeling bad, and I feel good that I cannot fit. It forces me outside, and things seem strange and exciting from the outside. This is, after reading what I've read, too romantic. I am a strange and disturbing thing. This does not feel good. What does feel good is being thrust into the unknown, and being forced to evaluate things all the time. If things bottomed out at feeling good for me, I don't think I'd be as interested in the world/my unknowing as I am. Maybe there's some weakness of will here, and maybe I'm doing a disservice to those who are well adjusted and evaluate the world. Who knows. I should also note that even though I find unknowing interesting and exciting, I am an idiot. This feels bad. I'm currently working on a strategy, however, to make this bad feel good. Nice.

TYING TOGETHER I've been throwing terms around willy-nilly today. I've also done some tricky things with the idea of the 'natural' and the 'good.' I'm hoping to trace the relationship between those two concepts a bit more closely here, before an undoubtedly fascinating close. The reason I tied the natural, the good, and the pleasurable together is that I think people often talk (no language discussion here, much too much) about the three as being related. To return to the church example (sorry, I just read the bible), people feel good at church because they are doing a 'good' thing and feeling this type of good is natural. I should not here the distinction between the natural and the pastoral that Christianity emphasizes, and maybe push back against the idea of natural pleasure being embraced by Christianity. Still, we can make an appeal to a meta-approach, and say that man is a social animal rewarded (with delicious chemicals and receptors) when (s)he interacts with others. Ok, not super clear, lets try again right Here. Wanting pleasure seems, to me, to be natural. Happiness (to do Aristotle a disservice) is the aim of our actions, we get some pleasure related to happiness. So far so good. When, however, we are poorly designed (not quite unnatural, but not capable of extracting pleasure) things get a bit more complicated. We can appeal to reason to care for others in some way, but even this is complicated. This is another post, but the way we care for others maybe should not make us feel good. Comforting others maybe ought to be uncomfortable, and maybe is a process that consistently falls apart. We mourn with those that mourn, we don't get them to stop mourning. Not sure, I've lost the thread again.

DENOUMENT I am ashamed of this post. I spent a lot of time trying to understand Aristotle, but I'm way off here. Even though I claim not to care, I want to appear as something smart and capable. I'm working, however, on gratitude in my unknowing (this is the trick to feel good about feeling bad about being an idiot referenced above). More generally, things are going alright. There are times when I feel very scared about the future and my failures. This assumes some way things ought to be though, and I'm working on not thinking of things in those terms. Rent Strike released an album a week or two ago, go listen to that it's pretty good. I feel that this week was particularly rambling. I'm also, relatedly, working on seeing the unknown in its clarity; I ought to be more careful with what I write and say. I (unsurprisingly) need to feel the weight of language more often. I am going to quit my job, I think, which hopefully means I'll be unemployed for Halloween. I'm hoping to keep reading, keep being grateful in my unknowing, and keep seeing people in their strangeness. Love ya.

[noisycowboyglitter]

Autism Gifts for Kids: Sensory Toys & Educational Activities

"I Have Autism" gifts for kids are thoughtfully designed items that help young individuals on the autism spectrum embrace their neurodiversity and communicate their needs to others. These gifts serve multiple purposes: they can boost self-esteem, facilitate understanding, and provide practical support in various social situations.

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Common items in this category include:

T-shirts, bracelets, or backpack tags with autism-positive messages

Customized ID cards explaining autism and the child's specific needs

Picture books about autism written for young readers

Sensory-friendly fidget toys that discreetly indicate the child's status

Noise-canceling headphones with autism awareness designs

Communication cards or keychain prompts for non-verbal children

Autism-themed puzzles or games that celebrate neurodiversity

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These gifts can help autistic children feel more comfortable expressing their identity and needs in school, social gatherings, or public spaces. They can also serve as conversation starters, allowing the child to educate peers and adults about autism in a positive, empowering way.

For parents and caregivers, these gifts offer a means to advocate for their child's needs without constantly having to explain. They can help create a more inclusive environment by increasing awareness and understanding among teachers, classmates, and community members.

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Ultimately, "I Have Autism" gifts for kids aim to foster acceptance, self-advocacy, and pride in neurodiversity, helping autistic children navigate the world with greater confidence and support.

Autism gifts for adults cater to the unique needs and interests of neurodivergent individuals, focusing on comfort, self-expression, and practical support. These gifts often include:

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Sensory items like weighted blankets or compression vests

High-quality noise-canceling headphones

Fidget toys designed for adult hands and preferences

Specialized planners or digital organizers

Books on autism by autistic authors

Customizable jewelry or accessories with autism-related symbols

Sensory-friendly clothing made from soft, tag-free fabrics

Art supplies or craft kits aligned with special interests

Tech gadgets to assist with daily tasks or communication

Subscription boxes curated for autistic adults

Sensory items like weighted blankets or compression vests

High-quality noise-canceling headphones

Fidget toys designed for adult hands and preferences

Specialized planners or digital organizers

Books on autism by autistic authors

Customizable jewelry or accessories with autism-related symbols

Sensory-friendly clothing made from soft, tag-free fabrics

Art supplies or craft kits aligned with special interests

Tech gadgets to assist with daily tasks or communication

Subscription boxes curated for autistic adults

The best gifts consider the individual's specific needs, sensitivities, and interests. They aim to enhance comfort, support self-advocacy, and celebrate neurodiversity while respecting the recipient's adult status and preferences.

[christian-homeschools-alaska]

Top Ways to Conduct Anchorage Homeschool Programs for Neurodivergent Kids

Anchorage homeschool programs for the neurodivergent need to be structured and flexible. You must ensure that it fulfills the learning needs of the kid. However, with the structure, you need to provide the much required flexibility. It can help them stay regulated and handle their meltdowns effectively.

There are specific strategies you must introduce in your homeschool programs if you want to enable success for the neurodivergent kids.

When we are talking about neurodivergent, you need to imagine safety and structure together. It helps if your child knows what to expect, including the proper schedule. However, being too strict can lead to major meltdowns. You need to ensure you are equally flexible.

This would help them focus on the tasks and get things done easily. While homeschooling, you must strike the right balance between strict structure and flexibility.

When incorporating a structure into your child’s routine, you must consider several aspects. We have defined the tips that can help implement the structure.

1. You must start Anchorage homeschool by creating the perfect daily routine you can for the child. Make sure the routine is flexible enough to incorporate the meal breaks and different activities. You must always implement the activities keeping the child’s energy levels and attention span in mind.

2. You can use visual calendards and timers to help them identify with the structure. You must ensure that the child is able to anticipate the everyday activities. They should be able to expect the activities within the hour so that they are not stressed.

3. When you are building the structure for your child’s Anchorage homeschool programs, you must ensure clear communication of the expectations. There should be complete understanding of how you aim to accomplish the tasks. You might want to offer positive reinforcements to your kid for every progress they make at the tasks.

4. When you want to implement structure, the best way to do that would be via dedicated learning space. You might want to offer a quiet corner where you can place the table chair for them to learn. You must ensure that there are minimum distractions around this space. This would help you manage their needs better

5. You should also take up adaptive tools and technology to meet the unique learning style. There are several interactive tools and apps that can help you get the job done.

While implementing structure is great, you might also want to define flexibility in your schedule.

1. Flexibility is best introduced when you follow your child’s interests and strengths. You can check their struggle that makes it difficult for them to adapt to the environment. You can use these insights to make the schedule easy and flexible for them.

2. When you are dealing with a neurodivergent child, you must implement strategies that can help them with their sensory needs. you can use different learning methods to help them learn better.

3. The child cannot learn in a single go. That’s why you must make way for regular breaks and physical activity while ensuring they learn. You can offer them breaks for movement, which can help them learn.

4. You should also be open to the unconventional learning opportunities. This is a good idea too. It can help you overcome the difficulties posed by the traditional learning in your Anchorage homeschool.

[vashtijoy]

It also bears pointing out that all of this right-wing questioning, trying to destroy Labour by (shock!) making them commit to trans rights, is coming in the wake of this story on the 21st (link to the BBC because fuck The Times):

Like... if you don't understand that this is a thunderbolt aimed at the heart of Labour's campaign, then you don't understand British politics, or JKR's unholy influence on it. The whole point of this intervention from the Death Eater Queen was because Labour were not shitting on trans people enough for her liking. And the reason the right are hammering Labour on this is because they know they're "weak" on it—that they do consider trans rights as important.

tl;dr: Labour are pursuing what's being called a "Ming vase" strategy; they are trying to get across the line in an incredibly conservative country—with, specifically, an incredibly terfy public discourse. (Note, that's not an incredibly terfy public, as polling has repeatedly shown—but in elections, small numbers of votes can be incredibly important.)

I'll say that again: in an election, small numbers of votes can be incredibly important. And I'll also say this: I truly believe that the best thing we can all do for trans people in the UK, right now at this election, is to vote tactically against the Tories in whatever way that looks like.

This is where I'm coming from: I'm an old lady (lol). I remember Margaret Thatcher's pearl-clutching speech in the 80s about how children were "being taught that they have an inalienable right to be gay". I was in school under Section 28, in a system where you could be beaten up for being queer but your teachers could not tell you it was okay to be gay. I, personally, saw one of my teachers panic when, as a bullied, depressed and neurodivergent-before-it-was-cool kid, I told her I was worried I might be a lesbian—because it was illegal for her to counsel me.

I recognise transphobic rhetoric as hateful, because I saw the same exact arguments and logical fallacies trotted out against lesbians and gays in the 80s and 90s. And so I recognise that Labour's messaging on this is profoundly different in nature to that of the Tories.

To be clear: Labour's cowardice on trans rights is profoundly disappointing. It is shameful. But Labour at least talk about trans people like they're people. The Tories talk about them as if they're the beast.

Labour are not going to give us what we want on trans rights, because that isn't where our national politics is—but they are at least legislating with the idea that trans people are human. Can you look at the Tories and sincerely say that? Can you look at Sunak laughing about Starmer "not knowing what a woman is" in front of the mother of murdered trans girl Brianna Ghey, and sincerely say that about them? Can you look at Kemi Badenoch sticking "male" and "female" signs on unisex toilets and say that about them?

As far as wider progressive issues go: I'm also a disabled woman, dependent on state benefits. I am terrified of another Tory government. They have no interest in people like me; they will continue to cut the support I need, including the NHS, to the bone. Their contempt for me and those like me makes me fear for my life.

Are Labour any better? Well, I'd be remiss not to point out that it was Labour who introduced the notorious WCA (Work Capability Assessment), back in the mid-00s. But at the end of the day, Labour depend on the votes of people like me. The Tories don't care if I live or die. In fact, their voter base would largely prefer that I die, if it means they can have another tax cut. I believe things will still be bad under Labour, but they won't be as bad.

I could get into other things, like Labour's manifesto offering the vote to 16/17 year olds while Sunak wants to take away their right to a driving licence or finance if they don't do mandatory national service. But that's really a side issue. Just another of the glaring, very real differences between the two parties.

A vote for Labour isn't a vote that Keir Starmer is perfect and everything he does is perfect forever and ever; it's a vote for whether you want him or Rishi "he doesn't know what a woman is! lol!" Sunak in number 10. We're not voting to change the world. We're only voting for how we want the world we have to be managed. God, voting should never be all of your activism—because we can't change the world at the ballot box; that's just not the system we have.

But we can stem the bleeding. We can slow the damage. We can make a choice to do that—to bring in a more centrist, thoughtful government (which yes, is better, compared to Sunak's cackling bats' nest of hateful culture warriors) that we can then pressure to be better. We can have five or ten years to silence the right wing, to drive the Overton window to the left, to change discourse in this country in a more human direction.

That's worth voting for. It's worth fighting for.

Whoever you vote for, please vote on July 4th—and vote well.

The Labour Party are going to introduce a new Section 28.

Seriously, ask yourself before you go into that voting booth on July 4th. What is the point of voting Labour if they are just going to enact Tory policy.

[dearkei]

You better believe I’m pissed about the underutilization of the topic of “Gifted Kid Burnout” that inspired me to write this. I keep seeing surface level shit about how people had the potential as children then the cherry on top for their punchline is about how they’re are deemed failures to society. Then the conversation fucking stops there. 

I don’t believe we need this title and to be frank, it’s fairly condescending. The term feels like it is reinforcing that toxic idea that got them that position in the first place. However, I won’t condemn those who use it since it may resonate with their experiences. Personally, my case was a bit more complex that this feels inaccurate. Keep in mind, these are my personal feelings. I don’t think I can even give myself the title “burnout” since I was doomed from the beginning. Maybe I am too mean about this- but I’ve always had the feeling I was never good enough my entire life and now people think their life is over because they’re reduced to feeling the way I did as a toddler? Fuck. Circumstances may change, but people are still capable of growth and it’s a good thing if you aim to keep growing as an adult. Like how many of these people had to learn how to take notes and ask for help later on in life.

Instead of having a special title, why can’t we agree that the education system screwed the majority of us by accommodating a specific type of learning? From what I’ve seen, it’s the general expectations teachers have on students that can give a skewed impression on how all kids work. Working with mentally ill kids aren’t what most teachers were equipped to deal with. Even then- neurodivergent people can be so different from general textbook definitions. Their behaviour listed in the easy read generic material can be different than what’s going on in real life. 

Along with the term “masking” was something I had to do and now I’ve burnt out from it. A lot of people do this regardless of having mental illness, but to a less degree than what masking really is. People can try to pretend who they aren’t and do their best to ensure that their life seems good on the outside. But people have different levels of proficiency to keep that up. Since there are subsections this conversation can go to such as child abuse or setting high expectations that are detrimental to the majority. 

In my conclusion, not only is it the education system, but for parents who encourage a system they can microwave their kids by setting it on high in order to present their well done child to the world. Which can be incredibly damaging. Even more when it comes to the debate of completely pulling your kid out of school and isolating them from other kids at such an impressionable time. It’s just depressing to see how a lot of us are too tired to advocate for that sort of change. In the meantime, I really do commend those doing their best to change that. This may seem performative or whatever, but I really do think it’d be great if we evolved these conversations to be more radical than continue to blame ourselves for something that was inevitable in a society structured in a way that will typically fail to those who don’t conform to it. 

[philoskylax]

probably the cutest and best dog/kid interaction video I’ve seen yet

[sparklyeevee]

Okay, so in Crown of Swords (beginning of Chapter 27), Perrin thinks about how "a long while had passed since anyone had been able to pick him up and throw him". The wording here strongly suggests to me that this isn't hypothetical - at some point, someone did pick him up and throw him. Now in and of itself that doesn't necessarily mean anything, because picking up and throwing small children is pretty normal and helps them develop proprioception and vestibular awareness, you just have to be gentle and aim for a soft surface. Except, first of all, he's specifically comparing this implied event to Rand using the One Power to throw him into a column hard enough to crack his ribs. And second, Perrin's proprioception is pretty bad, and was worse when he was a child (adults with working body awareness do not need to move with the kind of conscious caution Perrin does, even if they're bigger and stronger than most people), suggesting that, if anything, he was not tossed into appropriate soft surfaces enough as a child. So when Perrin was small, someone picked him up and threw him in like, the bad way. Like very possibly into a wall. (I want to note also here that "For one moment there, he had been sure Rand was going to kill him.", and while that's obviously partly meant to illustrate how unstable Rand's mental health is at this point, the entire fight they had was staged, and that Perrin was, however briefly, sure, not just afraid but sure that Rand was going to kill him seems to support that this interaction maybe set off a little bit of a trauma response). We could also talk about the dissociation and the staggering alexithymia (seriously, the only other character who comes close to Perrin's level of obliviousness to his own physical and emotional condition is Lan), but that could just be the neurodivergence - it's not terribly compelling evidence on its own.

Now, Perrin, prior to moving in with the Luhans, did not only live with his parents. I think we can rule out any of his siblings having thrown him, since he's the oldest by like five years (we'll come back to that) and the middle two Aybara kids are girls, but his uncle, Eward, Eward's wife Magde, and their three children also lived on the Aybara farm, so that's at least one other adult who was at one point probably able to pick Perrin up and throw him, and three cousins whose ages (and therefore possible relative sizes) we don't know. If the only thing in play were "Perrin was apparently physically abused as a young child" we wouldn't necessarily have an obvious culprit.

However, parental abuse is actually pretty rare in Wheel of Time. I mean, lots of parents do things that we here on Tumblr, as mostly youngish adults with a 21st century perspective, would recognize as abusive, like spanking. I'm almost sure there's reference somewhere to children being sent to bed without supper, too, and Siuan having her mouth washed out with soap for swearing as a Novice isn't remarked as particularly egregious, so that might be something parents do. But like, product of its time and all that. Parents in WoT largely don't hit their children, outside of spanking and similar. They don't throw them into walls. Hell, if I remember rightly, even Moghedian, one of the actualfacts Forsaken, didn't hurt those two boys she stole - as best the Wondergirls were able to determine, their trauma was almost entirely from watching their parents die. Except, now we gotta talk about Gawyn Trakand. Direct textual evidence for how Taringail treated Gawyn is pretty thin on the ground. We know he "had never been much of a father" to Gawyn, but that could mean almost anything. But the head trauma. The fucking head trauma. We know Elayne gave him at least two concussions for which he didn't receive Healing(TDR ch. 24), but then we have to ask, where did she get the idea that it was normal and okay to hit him in the head that hard? One can hardly imagine Morgase or Lini doing such a thing. (I'll refrain from going on a tangent about the evidence that Gawyn's vision was permanently impaired by at least one precanonical head injury, as it's not directly relevant here). What we know about what the Damodreds, in general, are like also reinforces the idea that Taringail abused Gawyn. I'm going somewhere with this, I promise.

See, Gawyn doesn't look like Taringail. I mean, at all. In point of fact, he looks like an X-23 style "change one sex chromosome and nothing else" clone of Elayne. Red hair is rare outside of the Aiel, and rarer in Cairhien than most places. Available textual evidence does not support the idea that there are any light-eyed Damodreds aside from Elayne and Gawyn, who look a lot like each other and Morgase and not a damn thing like Taringail. No one from the third age knows about genetics, as such, but basic inheritance patterns are hard to miss. But you know who does have blue eyes? House Trakand's bard, who did at least half the work of getting Morgase on the throne, and who's been close to her since she was a teenager - Thom Merrilin. To be clear, I don't think Thom is actually Gawyn's father. I think Taringail is, because Morgase confirms it in her own internal monologue, where she has no reason to lie, and I trust her to know who she slept with. I think that in the early Age of Legends, before the ban on human and animal genetic engineering was put into place, they created a dominant blue eyed gene, to help keep the Aiel visually recognizable, maybe a dominant red haired gene as well, and that the Trakands have an Aiel ancestor somewhere way back up the tree. But Taringail doesn't know that. Taringail just knows that the first child of his loveless marriage of state to a very young woman looks nothing like him and enough like Thom Merrilin to be more than a little suspicious. And there's decent, if not unambiguous, evidence that he abused Gawyn.

So we've got two characters, Perrin and Gawyn, with evidence of parental abuse, in a context where that's rare enough to be noteworthy, and we know that Gawyn's father had good reason to suspect that Gawyn wasn't his. Well okay, what about Perrin? He doesn't particularly look like his dad, is what I can say with certainty. The only physical description Con Aybara gets is "slim", which is uh, not among the words I'd use to describe Perrin. Certainly just, y'know, looking at him at any point after infancy, there'd be some visual evidence that's Perrin wasn't actually related to Con. (Maybe during infancy too, but that gets into the "Rand is at least a year younger than he ought to be" thing which is a whole different theory). So, physical abuse when the only other case we really see of that involved the perpetrator suspecting the kid wasn't his, and he looks sufficiently unlike his father that Con would have been justified in similar suspicion.

But I have more. Paetram Aybara's existence is, in itself, evidence that either he or Perrin is the product of either infidelity or covert polyamory. It's pretty rare in this setting for men to have brothers who are full siblings, and rarer still in Rand's generation. Among the older generations, we don't have enough of a family tree to really say. We don't know whether Laman's brothers were his half or full siblings, or whether Con and Eward Aybara were, or whether any of Siuan's uncles were full siblings to each other. Leane Sharif had brothers, plural, I believe, although we don't have details. But we do know that for like, the kids, it's virtually unheard of. The Basheres apparently had three boys, and I can hardly imagine either of them having kids with anyone other than each other (although since Faile's older brothers are never named and died off screen before she enters the story, they don't feel entirely, y'know, real), but other than that it's just Perrin and Paetram. And then with the largest age gap of any two siblings, half, full, or otherwise, in the series. By and large, there seems to be a limit of one boy per pairing, although whether this is accomplished through The Pattern, reliable and undescribed methods of selecting a child's sex during conception, sex-selective abortion, or a truly distressing amount of infanticide, I really wouldn't venture to guess. I had initially thought that Paetram's existence might be attributable to the Aybaras going for a second boy during or shortly after the breakbone fever outbreak in 989ish, out of fear that they'd lose the one they already had, since the timing just about lines up, but it would make at least as much sense if Perrin and Paetram, y'know, weren't full siblings.

Okay, so that's the evidence that Perrin isn't, biologically, Con Aybara's son, but why Haral Luhhan? Since part of our basis for this is that he doesn't look like Con, on account of he's Huge, we're looking for a pretty big guy. Among men in the Two Rivers who get a physical description, there are two reasonable candidates: Haral Luhhan and Bran al'Vere. But I don't think it's Bran, because of the show. I trust Rafe not to have missed anything I caught, and he decided to throw in possible romantic feelings between Perrin and Egwene. I shan't say "Rafe would never write a near miss with accidental half-sibling incest." but I will say that I don't think he would have done it casually. Which means that Rafe does not think Perrin and Egwene are related, and that's good enough for me. My only actual uncertainty is whether Perrin's biological father is someone from the Two Rivers at all - Eye of the World is at some fucking pains to avoid telling us whether Mat or Perrin were born outside the Two Rivers, so the possibility cannot be discounted.

One of the problems with Wheel of Time is that there's just, so much going on, sometimes you catch a new implication casually thrown into an offhand sentence in the middle of a scene about something else, and you work it through with other textual evidence until you've got a pretty good idea what it means, and you move on with your life, but now you know this new thing, and it becomes part of your basis for further analysis, and you try to talk about a theory that's partly based on it and people go "Wait, what do you mean Haral Luhhan is Perrin's biological father?"