#outside of the fucking DSM

[buntress]

[ID in alt text by @horrgores ]

『 ✿ ⋆｡˚ 』 Old Queer

[PT :: Old Queer]

✿ Overview ✿

A blankqueer label // stance for queers who are too old for this shit. It believes that queer // mogai discourse and infighting is stupid and harmful to the community at large and that as long as you aren't harming anyone do whatever the hell you want. One doesn't have to be a specific age to ID with this term, just share the general sentiment. The emoji code is 『 🪻💚 』

✿ Stances ✿

What Old Queer Is ::

Pro MOGAI // Xenogender // Microlabels

Pro Mspec // Contradictory labels

Pro Endogenic // Non-Traumagenic systems and Anti-Syscourse

Pro Queer Education and Research

Pro going outside and becoming active in your irl community

Pro Recovery Paraphilia // Anti-Contact harmful paraphilia

Pro Kink at Pride

Pro Reclamation of slurs

Against the idea of Cluster Abuse ( NPD abuse, BPD abuse, etc)

Anti-Harassment, live and let live.

Pro fucking with bigots for fun

Pro harm reduction

Pro Therian // Otherkin // Alterhuman // Transspecies

What Old Queer isn't ::

Pro Radqueer

Pro TransID

Pro Xenosatanist

TERFs // TIRFs // Gender Crit // Gatekeeping

Exclusionary

Minors in kink // NSFW spaces

Tagging :: @radiomogai @io-archival @redacted-coiner @genderdenied @mimiscoiningcafe @discrophy @dsm--v @kiruliom Simplified flag + color meanings below the cut!

[ID in alt text]

✿ Design Meanings ✿

Shades of purple and blue-green because the colors purple and green are some of the oldest colors to represent the queer community

Yellow lines to represent queer joy

White to represent unity

Violets because, once more, it is one of the oldest queer symbols we have. While violets originally held a meaning for sapphic love, here it is to represent educating yourself further on queer history to understand your community better.

The lacy top and bottom lines to give it kind of a "grandmas lace" feel, making it feel older!

[olderthannetfic]

Oh great, everyone is all in on the ~all the kids who think they have DID are wrroooong~ thing.

Im sorry but none of you saying that are helping the community or plural folks as a whole. Even if you are also a system or have a CDD.

For DID *alone* the barrier to diagnosis is very high- arguably as high as Autism and according to one study it takes an average of 10 years in therapy to be diagnosed because so many doctors are ill-informed or refuse to diagnose it/believe it exists despite all the evidence due to the shadow of the satanic panic. The goddamn REASON people are diagnosed in their 30s and 40s isnt because you *need* to wait that long its because they look for horses before zebras and refuse to do anything else most of the time and fuck us over!!! Many of us report symptoms -the same fucking symptoms- since teen&young adult age or earlier!!!

The diagnosis has many of the same drawbacks of any other major diagnosis like autism and schizospec stuff where you can lose custody of children or the ability to adopt, face unofficial discrimination from doctors or employers or people you try to get accommodations from with it, and could even have your drivers license taken away or have to jump through hoops to keep it- and more issues!

Pursuing a paper diagnosis is not for everyone and the plural community for decades has been built on this- even before the exclusion criteria were added to the DSM and ICD that kicked a huge chunk of us of us off even getting one despite being systems (which is a good thing to be clear! If its not impairing or distressing it shouldnt be pathologized!). We have folk therapy and dyi resources and we have a lot of them for a reason.

And thats not even getting into how therapy has historically severely abused our community and how the only accepted treatment path is pursuing the fusion into one person (which has a hilariously low success rate that for anything else wouldnt be accepted as a vaild treatment) and not everyone wants that or is helped by that.

Most of us are never going to be ABLE see useful therapy or a paper dx, so we use the community to find resources and community and it FUCKING WORKS. We built our community with our own blood, sweat, and tears because no one else could or would fucking help us. And it WORKS.

Attacking these people who self-dx ONLY ever causes splash damage on the very people this kind of behavior claims to protect.

And like. If someone reports an autonomous entity that talks in their mind and takes over their body sometimes its... rather obvious they belong in the 'having an autonomous entity that talks in your mind and takes over your body sometimes' community regardless of anything else. NB4 people say psychosis; Schneiderian First-Rank symptoms are actually more indicative of DID than schizophrenia in this manner according to studies- but schizospec people with persistent personlike voices are known to benefit from the same exercises you'd do if they were ''''real'''' alters and are included in the plural community anyway (which btw doesnt require a dx- calling yourself plural or a system is not self diagnosing its an identity label the community created OUTSIDE of diagnosis criteria FOR this very purpose of self-ID).

While yes, we would agree many people say DID For Sure when they might want to hesitate there- we do NOT doubt they are plural. We just wonder if they were told the ONLY way they could be plural/a system is through DID and that is why they are saying they have it. Which... yeah thats not so great. HOWEVER informed self-dx is fine provided they havent been fed that kind of misinformation.

The solution there though is to just spread the real information about the breadth of plural experiences and people will feel less pressured. Simple as that.

Never EVER telling them its really just something else, you dont know yourself- you cant know something that extreme when something that extreme is EASIER to tell tbh because its such a unique and intense experience.

--

[peachesofteal]

oh we’re going DARK dark 😈 poor Darling can’t catch a break. How does Simon expect to keep her under control, or is Johnny willing to help him so they don’t lose Darling or the baby? How far are they willing to go beyond drugging her to keep her with them, safe and healthy for the rest of the pregnancy?

It’s a team sport for sure. This is referencing tranquilizer.

18+ MDNI / baby trap au / dark and twisty themes

They’re in this together. They made this decision, together. They’re fully aware of the consequences, the possible outcomes.

Some, they're willing to accept. They're willing to accept that you might be very, very pissed off for a while, that you might be devastated, feel betrayed. They're willing to be patient. They're willing to work against you, wear you down. You've always been emotionally vulnerable. Considered mentally ill, by some, a diagnosis that exists in the DSM-5. Would it be difficult to gaslight you into thinking that this is what's for the best? Probably not. Would it be hard for Simon and Johnny to numb your anger with their love and affection? Again, probably not. They are the loves of you life, after all. The people you trust more than anyone. And what are you going to do? Where are you going to go? You would be alone, and pregnant. You're not exactly the most self sufficient person as is sometimes, to add a baby into the mix? It would be a disaster.

So one of them probably takes indefinite leave immediately, so you're never alone. You're under watch 24/7. Your health is a major priority, so there's always bountiful meals and your favorite things, peanut butter smoothies that Simon manages to sneak vitamin powders into, pancakes, pasta dinners, your favorite fruit always cut up and ready. Johnny makes sure you get outside for sunshine, fresh air, exercise. Once you become agreeable enough, you go back to work. They spoil you, ridiculously. It's a two part goal for them. One, to sweeten you back to their side and two, to ensure you and baby are getting everything that's needed, rest, relaxation, nutrition, proper care, love. You've always been stubborn, so it takes time, takes a lot of work, but eventually you begin to soften, begin to let them sleep with you again, let them touch your belly, cuddle you and rub your feet. It's fucked, certainly. They use love to disarm you, to make your worries drift farther and farther away, but it's better than using force, which is a definite last resort.

[nevermindtheblood]

I rlly despise how pro-psychiatry the system community is. So much fucking misinformation and needless infighting and division because ppl think getting academic with it makes more sense of the very weird and infinitely fractured and nuanced way human brains survive unfathomable trauma (with ininifte possibilities of how said trauma occurred). Cannot think of a more virture signaling phenomenon than trying to feel guilty for using simply plural because theyre "pro endo." Yeah i know what the dsm says and it's great that DID is a defined diagnosis. But for having such expansive identities and thoughtspaces very little of you think outside of the box. The way i see it the only thing this "anti endo" shit does is seep itself into traumatized brains that further isolate and fracture themselves by thinking shit like "well, i dont remember any instances of 'real' amnesia, i must have osdd or udd or cdd or abcdefg instead" .. my hot take is that every fucking dissociative identity disorder is Dissociative Identity Disorder. And that it's fundamentally a NEUROTYPE, not a disorder, because Disorder means fitting Every Diagnostic Critera according to The Mental Illness Bible. Schizophrenia is a neurotype. Tourrettes is a neurotype. On and on and on. We're going to get fucking nowhere if we're forever categorizing different "types" of DID instead of actually accepting ourselves and systems and getting to know actual phenomenon within these neurotypes. Wishing you weren't a system isn't going to undo your trauma or what it did to your brain. Taking out your internalized pain on people you dont think are Real Systems Like You only shuts down your capacity to explore how other people who arent like you moght experience the world. Same beef i have with singlet sensationalist media about systems.. if we weren't so goddamn bent on debating what exists and whst doesnt we could actually start creating research on why systems do what they do beyond one fucking theory. Same concept of when ppl do not connect the dots of why psych inpatient stays are traumatic.. ITS BECAYSE THE MEDICAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX IS JUST AN ARM OF THE PRISON INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. And when you dont realize that youre both centering yourself as More Sick and ignoring how you are a victim of the state at the same time.

None of yall have nuanced or abolitionist takes and your refusal to deconstruct your bias regarding psychiatry as actual Godly Canon, maybe the system community everywhere wouldnt be such a gdamn cesspool. No solidarity anywhere.

[devotioncrater]

ed/stede + edizzy + edward's bipolar

oh man the first three episodes of season 2 are. wow. okay. much to unpack. more fuel for my Edward Has Bipolar Theory.

DISCLAIMER: i am not a clinician, nor do i hold any degree in the psychology field. this meta is purely drawn from my own experience with diagnosed bipolar i, alongside what i've learnt in years of therapy as well as reading bipolar books/articles and peer-reviewed research papers. above all, this meta is for fun; please do not use this as a self-diagnostic.

this meta is broken up into sections:

the intro section

the bipolar section

the codependency section

the season 2 speculation section

The Intro Section

right away, the admittance of edward hating himself & feeling unloveable recontextualizes everything. his dynamic with stede & the crew, his dynamic with his own crew, his dynamic with izzy.

because like. hi hello?? when izzy says "you know me better than anyone else, and i daresay the same is true for me to you" it's just. a nail in the coffin. one of many nails. here's why.

it took an insane amount of vulnerability for edward to open himself up to stede in season 1. it took a lot out of him to even accept stede's love, and then believe it to be real. he believed that just for one moment in his scarred life, he was someone worth loving, baggage and all. as he himself was. for who he was. stede saw him and loved him and accepted him. if edward had been there to hear when lucius said to stede that the time edward spent with stede was the best it'll ever be for him, edward probably would've agreed.

which is. oh man. it would be a bit of a thin ice situation, wouldn't it? that's fucking bleak.

before we get into that, we need to dissect the dysfunction in the edizzy dynamic. i mean it's all tragic, all toxicated, especially with the downward spiral edward's on. so why examine it? what is there to examine?

the downward spiral began in season 1, became abated by stede & the crew, only to jumpstart at the end thanks in part to izzy. so we need to examine why, because edizzy's dysfunction plays a role in all of this mess.

it's undeniable izzy triggered edward, yes, but look a little further. edward's irritability, his emptiness, his substance abuse, the sudden shift in gears between his erratic moods. the crew walk on eggshells around him, because his behavior in season 2 so far is reckless, dangerous, and suicidal. there's pressurized speech patterns and racing thoughts present and they intermingle alongside low-energetic periods when he isolates. above all, he feels hopeless. overwhelmed by a sea of loneliness. fang starts the season off being unable to recognize him.

on the flipside, in season 1, he's on the tail-end of a low when we meet him. listless, bored, passively suicidal before he swings the other way. with stede & the crew he's up in the clouds. he's affable, he's happy, he's social. there's hope for change. he tries new things, laughs, even falls in love. he imagines a life for himself outside of piracy. there's impulsive actions such as the act of grace and impulsive thoughts like sailing to china. even when stede leaves him, edward grieves at a healthy-looking level. in episode 5, when edward's mood first shifts, fang doesn't recognize him in the elevated state.

the point is, edward feels things in the extreme. he lacks emotional regulation. "uncharacteristic" high highs and low lows.

how he reacted to izzy's trigger — "this is blackbeard" — is disproportionate until you piece together two puzzle pieces:

edward likely has bipolar + his core beliefs (self-loathing/feeling unloveable) throw oxygen into the flame of his relationships.

The Bipolar Section

to get on the same page here, let me provide a few Basic Oversimplified Definitions (here is a pdf of the DSM-5 for a scientific understanding, scroll to page 168. please do not use this PDF or meta as a self-diagnostic. contact a clinician/psychiatrist if you have questions or feel you need an evaluation):

bipolar disorder: a chronic, lifelong mood disorder characterized by manic highs and depressive lows. fluctuations in moods are extreme and, depending on subtype, can inhibit functionality. it can be managed today with medication and psychotherapy.

manic episode: lasting one week or more, this is the high highs. the mood is elevated or irritable. if severe, it can include psychosis/psychotic features such as hallucinations, paranoia, and/or delusions. mania belongs to subtype Bipolar I.

hypomanic episode: lasting at minimum four days straight, this is a lesser high than manic. it does not include psychosis/psychotic features, nor does it inhibit functionality. hypomania belongs to subtypes Bipolar I and Bipolar II.

depressive episode: lasting two weeks or more, this is the low lows. anhedonia and major depression are hallmarks of a depressive episode. depression belongs to all three subtypes of bipolar (the third subtype being cyclothymia).

mixed episode: best of both worlds. a person experiencing one may possess high levels of energy — such as pressurized speech — while simultaneously feeling overwhelmingly low and suicidal. a mood may flip from elated to hopeless on a dime.

euthymia: a mood state that is stable, without (hypo)mania or depression. it is a neutral baseline which occurs between episodes.

IMPORTANT NOTE: bipolar disorder is more complex than "just a mood swing". mood swings are situational, while bipolar presents even without situational factors. think about how, in season 2, edward has got his hair in a messy updo, cleans his cabin, swears off drinking & drugs, and is smiling. he explains to frenchie that he's decided to change after a rough night. then it cuts to a flashback of him the night before lying on the floor bawling his eyes out. the scene is played for laughs, however that is a textbook bipolar mood fluctuation. you go to bed hopeless and you wake up on top of the world, or vice versa. edward's situation hadn't changed in the hours between him crying and his conversation with frenchie.

(it can be argued that he thought izzy had died, but i don't think he believed frenchie had truly finished the job. why else had he grilled frenchie? he was sweating frenchie out, testing frenchie's loyalty. "you don't think i know the smell of my rotting former first mate?" edward knew izzy was alive the entire time).

like with almost every disorder, bipolar disorder presents itself differently in different people. in my experience, when i am in either a depressive or manic episode, two different outlooks may occur:

it becomes hard to remember what life was like on the other emotional end. (i.e. when manic, i tend to downplay my prior depressive episode).

i become hyperaware of the other emotional end, so i try to either get it to happen or prevent it from happening. (i.e. not wanting to become depressed, so i'll do XYZ).

i mention these outlooks because they're common. when you're in it, you're in it; when you're out, you're out. the first outlook is something edward's actions point to him experiencing, too, as evidenced in season 2 with his extreme suicidal behavior. he's in it in it.

the ups and downs in bipolar are difficult for the person struggling with the disorder. often, it feels uncontrollable. the symptoms — especially the ones which risk becoming severe like hopelessness or distractibility — are a challenge to cope with. during the high highs, your brain feels like it's frying. during the low lows, your brain feels like dense fog. therefore it's common for people to turn to substances to help alleviate what they're experiencing, and/or they partake on an impulsive whim. drastic life changes also may occur in an attempt to "fix" or "control" the disorder. severe episodes, when left untreated, may ruin or end people's lives. people with bipolar disorder are 15x more likely to commit suicide than the general population.

people who do not have bipolar themselves yet are close to someone with bipolar may also experience related difficulty. it may feel overwhelming to witness episodes occur with little to no understanding or tools on how to help. it may also feel stressful to try and gauge what state the other person is in. "walking on eggshells" is a common descriptor for the experience when the bipolar is unmanaged. that does not mean the person with bipolar disorder is automatically bad/abusive/harmful, it just means the disorder is a disorder. it interferes with daily functioning, causes distress, and impacts interpersonal relationships.

at the end of season 1, izzy hit edward where it hurts (edward's self-loathing, intertwined with the role of blackbeard) while edward was in what i believe to be a euthymic state (calm). now with their recontextualized relationship, we also see the underlying message of: "i serve blackbeard, he is my captain." -> "edward isn't good enough for my love".

izzy loves edward, but he's made it clear in season 1 it was for edward's blackbeard persona. or was it? you see, i don't believe that claim to be entirely true anymore, not after the first three episodes of season 2.

i believe a more accurate reading would be that in season 1, izzy was concerned, jealous, and vindictive. all in that order. the above underlying message weaponizes edward's separation of Edward and Blackbeard against edward. more on this later.

in season 2, izzy is just plain concerned ("we're worried for you"). he tries a different approach at managing edward's unstable mood. he goes for a softer attempt ("i have...love for you") because maybe, maybe it could work. it worked with stede. when it backfires, he ditches it and goes right back to bluntness ("the atmosphere's fucked!"). he also refuses to kill edward despite everything edward's put him through.

both seasons' motives were not for blackbeard, but for edward.

when we meet them in season 1, their relationship is dysfunctional at best. their baseline dynamic before stede is best depicted during episode 4.

in the model ship scene, edward's excited about stede's stuff, restlessly moving, unable to focus, appearing happy even though he's a hair-trigger away from irritability. he purposefully avoids or dismisses izzy's concerns about dying. he feels bored and trapped ("is this all there is?"), then feels frustration over feeling trapped, citing that he's blackbeard and blackbeard shouldn't feel trapped.

later in the episode, izzy frustratingly points out that edward's moods are "increasingly erratic" and something that izzy himself has had to manage. izzy also states that he's followed edward's every whim for years, and smoothed over their crew for him. edward, again dismissive, says "sounds stressful, izzy". izzy says it is but he felt honored to do it all for blackbeard, who is the greatest sailor he's ever known. this ties into their codependency, which i'll go over later on.

at this point in time, "edward" and "blackbeard" are synonymous, the names are just different titles reserved for different settings. edward himself doesn't see a distinction until stede — a person he respects — consistently treats him like Edward and not like Blackbeard. edward's identity to Blackbeard separates because he opens himself up to the possibility that Edward is someone worth knowing. Blackbeard, once a healthy coping mechanism created to survive in the pirating world, had soured somewhere along the way into an unhealthy coping mechanism. it became more of a cage than a home.

but to izzy, "blackbeard" is a good thing to be because it's an accomplishment of edward's. they built their whole careers and lives around it. when izzy says he's honored to sail with blackbeard, the greatest sailor out there, he says it to try and bring edward back to himself. it's his botched attempt at grounding/helping edward. if edward can be reminded of how great he is, reinforced by his accomplishments under the name blackbeard, maybe he'll snap out of his funk. if edward values izzy, loves izzy how izzy thinks edward does, he'd see the weight behind the compliment. izzy doesn't sail for just anybody.

it's botched entirely because any time edward tries to voice how "blackbeard" really makes him feel, izzy dismisses/minimizes/mocks it. he isn't supportive to edward because he feels threatened in two parts: that edward finds stede fascinating, and that edward is making a drastic life change for both of them based on yet another mood whim.

to izzy, edward becoming Edward and ditching Blackbeard would mean izzy's lost control of the situation, which means izzy's lost control of edward, which means no one will have control of edward. not even edward himself. this is yet another facet of izzy's codependency.

side note: speaking of names, in the calico jack episode, we know "ed" is a nickname edward doesn't allow people to call him. the only two people who call him "ed" are stede and izzy.

so that begs the question: why did izzy call edward "eddy" in season 2? where the hell does that nickname come from? why does edward use it on himself when he was struggling in purgatory?

based on these two conversations in episode 4, we can glean both sides of the situation. on one side is edward, who is struggling mentally and whose work is deteriorating because of it. on the other side is izzy, who is equal parts concerned about edward and frustrated at him because he isn't functioning as well as he used to, leaving izzy to clean up his messes. since this has been a years-long tension point, they are both at the end of their ropes. about to snap.

that is how we meet them.

from then on, edward begins falling for stede, and his mood shifts. he begins functioning better. stede is genuinely good for him. stede, with his different view on life, provides emotional balance and radical acceptance and a general softness that edward's been missing. he is supportive, he is kind, and he treats edward like edward isn't broken.

but stede is not accustomed to pirate life or its reality. he's naive to the point of foolish. foolish to the point of fatality. and izzy sees those flaw points right away. it's a red flag to him because how can edward — passively suicidal edward — be trusted to not take advantage of stede's naivety and steer them all into a doomed situation?

edward's relationship with stede is also where izzy's jealousy kicks into gear, clouds his judgement.

i mean, shit, wouldn't anyone feel slighted? if you devote your life to a man, stick with him through thick & thin, feel responsible for both of your lives, go above and beyond, worry over his wellbeing, put him before yourself....just for him to run off with a wannabe pirate.

a wannabe pirate who has only known your man for a fraction of the time you and your man have been together. his weeks compared to your years. yet somehow he gets your man's good side, gets the love you desperately want.

of course izzy's seething. wouldn't anyone?

it makes sense for izzy to sell edward and stede out to the british navy. he's spiteful, vindictive. bet there's a bit of hurt pride to it, too. it's fucked! it's a terrible thing to do!

his motive here boils down to, once again, keeping edward alive. cleaning up what he perceives to be another mess. sell stede out, keep edward where he can see him. izzy hates spanish jackie's, he hates the navy, he doesn't enjoy any of it. this is his hail mary, his last ditch effort.

of course it backfires. royally. no one expected edward to call for an act of grace. to sign away his life. izzy tries to stop him, but edward goes where stede goes. and soon after that, edward returns without stede.

and soon after that, the situation deteriorates. edward's launched into a severe mixed episode, triggered by the compounded stress of stede leaving and izzy's rejection of Edward. pressurized speech, emptiness, irritability, suicidal behavior, increased goal-directed activity...he ping-pongs between mania and severe depression. this is more than a break-up.

edward struggles with emotional impermanence. when stede's right in front of him, kissing him, edward feels secure that stede loves him. but when stede doesn't meet him at the dock? Stede Never Loved Me.

another example: izzy. when izzy obeys edward's orders, edward feels secure that izzy loves him. but when izzy speaks up or disagrees? Izzy Never Loved Me.

"he was your friend," jim tells edward, in reference to edward's awful treatment of izzy. but edward, at this intersection of a severe mixed episode + emotional impermanence, can't see that.

he burns his bridges left and right. destroys everything because he's lashing out in pain and he doesn't think he deserves anything good. Blackbeard? sure, he'll be Blackbeard. Blackbeard is all he'll ever be anyways. a killer, a pirate, a crazy captain who does too much rhino horn.

edward hates himself so fiercely that he only finds relief during the storm, right before he believes he's going to die. "finally."

The Codependency Section

edward's relationship with izzy was always going to end in destruction.

they both love each other, we have canon confirmation of this. "i have...love for you" and "i loved you best i could".

edward's confession is critical here, because he did love izzy as best as he could. there exist moments between them that shine light into possible happier times. the way edward talks to izzy to placate him in season 1 when izzy packs a dinghy, even if manipulative at the time, requires intimate knowledge on what izzy would be receptive to. david jenkins mentioned that it was izzy who helped doll edward up for the season 1 ball, an offscreen act of intimacy. edward tries unsuccessfully to connect with izzy over stede's model ship and the clouds. the casual way edward says "i had a dream about you last night."

"best i could." if edward hated himself less, he could have loved izzy more. if he believed he was deserving of love, he could have accepted the fact izzy loves him.

so they both love each other, but love is not enough to combat self-hate. it just isn't. the only opponent to self-hate is self-compassion.

self-compassion is a process you have to choose for yourself. you must work on it yourself, hopefully with the aid of an external support system. self-compassion is separate from self-love and other forms of love because, oftentimes, people who operate under the core belief of Being Unloveable also operate under an assumption that love is conditional. "i'm not enough" / "i'll never be enough" / "i don't deserve love" / "i'm too much". it's unrealistic for someone to jump headfirst into healing when that healing is programmed with restrictions. we are our own worst critic. so to practice self-compassion is to soothe that inner, hater critic until we heal ourselves enough to get to a place where we can practice unconditional love on the neglected self.

the conditional love aspect is one that is modeled. edward grew up in an abusive household. abusers hold their victims out on a string of conditions. furthermore, his mother rejected his interest in fine things by saying that it's not "for people like us". it makes sense for edward to internalize an "i'm not [rich/nice/good/etc] enough" message, thereby shutting himself out.

he continues to shut himself out in the aftermath of killing his alcoholic father. he doesn't tell anyone about the traumatic event — an oscillation into "i'm too much" — until he opens up to stede.

so here you have an unloveable boy, the victim of domestic violence and the killer of his own father, going into the chaotic world of pirating. a world — put so eloquently by calico jack in season 1 — where everyone fucks each other over. where trust is a prized, rare currency.

and somewhere along the way, he and izzy find each other. and they stick together for years.

both edward and izzy bottle their emotions up and then blow up on each other. it's so completely different to how stede & the revenge crew operate. it's years of miscommunication and mutual resentment between them, caused in part due to their pirate enviornment. their pattern is hot and cold. reactive.

izzy smooths over things with the crew -> edward is dismissive of izzy -> izzy blows up on edward and resigns -> edward convinces izzy to stay -> edward begins falling for stede -> izzy and stede fight over edward's heart -> izzy gets exiled for losing, edward says nothing -> izzy goes vindictive mode and sells edward/stede out to the navy -> edward hates izzy's guts -> edward comes back without stede, depressed -> izzy smooths over things with the crew -> edward is dismissive of izzy -> izzy blows up on edward and triggers him -> edward convinces izzy to stay through violence

it's that one friend who keeps returning to their shitty partner — on again/off again —, only here they both are the shitty partner.

the thing about unhealthy relationships is that they provide a layer of comfort. it's known territory. which is why, when an unhealthy relationship morphs into a codependent one, it is incredibly difficult to break out of them.

codependency definition: excessive emotional or psychological reliance on a partner, typically one who requires support on account of an illness or addiction.

like conditional love, codependency is learned/modeled inside of a dysfunctional family setting.

it works a bit like an ouroboros in that it's an infinite loop. the codependent partner compulsively takes care of their struggling partner in the hopes they get better. this role of "caretaker" makes them feel needed/wanted, ergo filling their own low self-esteem void. however, all the rescuing does is enable the struggling partner further into self-destruction.

sound familiar?

izzy is edward's caretaker. izzy is codependent.

important note: no one feels good inside of a codependent relationship. there may be positive periods, yes, but codependency is primarily stressful for both parties involved.

in order to blossom, codependency relies on low self-esteem.

we know edward oscillates with his self-esteem, but we don't talk about how low izzy's self-esteem is.

izzy doesn't have an identity outside of edward, with the exception of being one of the best swordsmen in the pirating world. of course, this exception is taken from him when edward cuts his toes off.

izzy is high-strung with a compulsive need for control. things must be done when he orders them to, to the high standards he creates. do not question his authority. this compulsion is exasperated by edward's uncontrollable mood shifts.

izzy rolls with the punches, metaphorically and literally. he shuts down attempts at comfort, evidenced by his knee jerk reaction when fang hugs him in season 2. "i'm fine. unhand me. unhand me!" he doesn't allow himself to fully break down and cry. the tears only appear in this scene, and when edward attempts to get izzy to kill him.

loyal to a fault, izzy threatens to leave, goes to leave, but never leaves. he gets casted out, so he devises a plan to return instead of, i don't know, creating a new life for himself. even when edward maims him, he stays.

so is this loyalty? or is this a belief that this is what he deserves? or maybe it's loyalty born from the belief that this is all he's deserving of.

a hit dog will holler, and boy does izzy holler when questioned. about his role, about himself, about who he is to edward.

so who is izzy without edward?

"you know me better than anyone else and i daresay the same applies with me to you." is an insane thing to say because izzy does know edward, but only the version of edward he stitched his skin to. the unstable, erratic version that needs help, and who he subconsciously sabotages with enablement.

and edward does know izzy better than anyone else because izzy's consumed by him.

if edward could not accept izzy's love in a direct form, then the roles izzy inhabits are his only outlet. Caretaker, Punching Bag, First Mate. 50 ways to say I Love You and none of them are healthy.

they both are violent with each other, drag each other down, but can't quit even when they know that they function better separated. codependency is an addiction, and like an addiction, the only way for this to end was in rockbottom or death.

The S2 Speculation Section

going back to the very top, here's why i say this thing with ed/stede is on thin ice right now: without edward working on his self-compassion, their relationship runs the risk of devolving into yet another unhealthy dynamic.

stede has decent self-esteem, an identity outside of edward, so i don't think they'll ever become codependent. stede also doesn't try to fix or enable edward. again, stede is genuinely good for edward.

i think the Mer!Stede scene was amazing, vital in balancing the heavy topic of suicide/death with the overarching comedy genre of the show. love saves lives, without love the world is bleak. who are we as humans without connection?

that being said, i personally want to see edward heal before jumping into a full-blown romantic/sexual relationship with stede. he deserves to choose himself, nurture Edward, and figure out how to manage his moods. especially since his last relationship with izzy was so tumultuous.

speaking of izzy, i also want to see izzy find himself and heal, too. he needs to learn how to let go. i'm hoping he'll build up his self-esteem in his own way, doing something he's good at (maybe as a sword-fighting instructor?).

either way, i trust the direction this show will go in. they've done well so far in their depictions of mental health and the impact of mental health. it'll be interesting to see the rest unfold.

[saturnaftertaste]

who wins the psychological problems olympics, betty or cheryl?

oooh tough one! cousin v. cousin battle

to me it really depends on what you consider as their psychological problems. are we talking about how much they suffered and what psychological problems they hypothetically would end up with? or are we talking about the way the given traumas present themselves through the characters in the show?

interestingly enough despite the show running from the late 2010s to the early 2020s, we don’t get an actual mention of any dsm-certified mental illness until archie starts seeing dead soldiers post-The War and gets diagnosed with ptsd. (i don’t even remember if that was said outright but i do remember in s6 they use armchair psych terms in reference to archie’s sexual abuse from s1).

anyway a case could be made for either; our introduction to betty is of her being reminded by her mother to Take Her Pills without any later reference to what those pills might be or why she was taking them; i think it was a 50s-housewife-valium habit she was trying to pre-install in betty just to make sure she didn’t end up like polly. that being said, however, i do think that betty has, AT LEAST, some garden-variety anxiety disorder/some other mild form of clinically diagnosable mental illness - what with the pills and physical manifestation of unconscious self-harm. on the trauma end, factor in hal’s grooming of her to carry on their serial-killer legacy and the memories she repressed of her childhood, plus the fact that she was a victim of every major riverdale event (black hood, gng + THE FARM, stonewall prep death fakeout, polly’s disappearance, TBK, percival and rivervale) not to mention alice’s ways and behaviors that she was subject to. still, nothing about betty changes. the black hood and then TBK become representative of her “darkness” and what she could do if she “gave in”, but that’s always been like betty’s narrative thread, that if she ever Let Herself Go you would see Terrible Things Happen. so really, post-all this trauma, what’s really changed about betty? the answer is nothing! despite having endured ALL of this, betty remains the girl-next-door, albeit with a different job (but still an extension of her childhood interests!) whatever you want to call it - shoddy CW character work, jughead’s fucked up narrative keeping her in the girl-next-door role, or even meta commentary and the implication of Cycles in this Town, betty doesn’t change. she still wants to investigate, she still wants to date archie, she’s still the only “sane” one left. she has all this trauma, all these things that happen to her, and yet they exist outside of Betty as a being.

cheryl on the other hand has her traumas stacking like jenga. obviously her family was very much steeped in gothic horror from the jump, because even though riverdale is set in 2017, they did not bother modernizing the kind of strange context provided for the blossoms, and mind you, this is before the ghosts and the transgender twin-dolls and witches were all apparent. like from the very start there is this weird anachronism of the blossoms, who are like holding onto wealth from early colonial times and have like a house built like a crypt but also a teenage daughter who is the head cheerleader at the local public highschool (speaking of, why did cheryl and jason not attend stonewall prep?). not to say that maple syrup barons (?) don’t exist in today’s day and age, moreso that cheryl and her family contain weird multitudes. like what i’m trying to say is that cheryl’s original characterization as the mean rich girl struck by tragedy is the combination of two tropes at once - both regina george and jane eyre at once, but they exist like, separately from each other. unlike betty, however, over time the two become intertwined - cheryl hosts highschool parties at her gothic mansion. she crushes on a girl and sends her a pig’s heart . and as for the things she’s suffered. well. the weird insular nature of the blossom family makes it that her best friend and only confidante is her twin, who dies a violent death at the hands of her father, who then commits suicide, leaving her with her mother who hates her. this, then followed by the discovery of her own repressed homosexuality, plus her mother’s rejection of it, attempted murder of her and her subsequent conversion therapy at the soqm — the stakes for cheryl just keep stacking. this is also only around season 2 - we aren’t even talking about her extended family that come to visit, her stint with THE FARM, jason’s taxidermied body in the living room, the insanity that is nana rose. abigail blossom, julian blossom, the Haunting of Thistlehouse…

cheryl literally attempts suicide at the end of season one. like actively, you know what i mean? I think the key difference between cheryl and betty is that despite them literally having the same hereditary emotional abuse issues in their respective families (family?), betty is given a “normal” to return to. if her house is insane at any given moment, she can run to one of the other core four, and they help each other cope through other various insane behaviors (ie. investigating murders and leaving to cabins in the woods and whatever) and you know what they say! a problem shared among a sexually-charged almost-polycule is a burden halved! even that time penelope and hal trapped them in the woods, they had each other to go through the trials with. veronica drank poison for her. “as friends”!

on the flip side, every day of cheryl’s life is quite almost like that time the corefour polycule was trapped in the woods in that penelope tormented cheryl for the entire time they lived together. no friends, no one who knows her reality EXCEPT jason, who gets murdered by their father. cheryl never really had a normal or even an IDEA of normal to return to, because once she lost jason, realistically she had nothing left to live for. of COURSE people thought she was fucking her brother, the toxic codependency is intrinsic to cheryl’s personality and up until jason dies, i doubt she was known as anything but the girl obsessed with her brother. jason is replaced by ronnie is replaced by archie is replaced by josie is finally replaced by toni, who then is subject to all of cheryl’s insanity. cheryl, who doesn’t actually recognize that keeping her dead brother’s body taxidermied in a wheel chair is not “normal” behaviour, because she has no idea what normal is thanks to her parents’ wealth shielding them from both CPS and her peers, meaning she doesn’t have a baseline for “normal”. if alice cooper did one thing right as a mother, it’s that she was so bent on suburban normalcy for her family that it helped betty realise she was facing emotional abuse and that she needed to get out/confront alice, which is what she does several times. the blossoms’ wealth made it easier for them to isolate cheryl entirely meaning that she, now, is learning how to function thanks to toni and occasionally betty and veronica. betty can re-set every time something bad happens. cheryl just keeps stacking her stuff.

tldr: cheryl wins. by a long shot. the girl was born to be mentally ill, unfortunately. suits her though!

[frisbee-equine]

not hatemail but fucking THANK YOU for that reply on olderthannetfics post, the amount of people that go around claiming DID and then say "yeah it's komaeda from dangan ronpa" in the same breath are mindboggling

Look, I am the first one to admit that the institution of medicine and psychology/psychiatry have deep flaws. I'm not denying that. The APA in particular needs to be fucking reformed and I want to talk with the people who did the last edition of the DSM because those changes to autism disorders were not fucking it.

That being said, self-diagnosis has always been a very dangerous path to go down (due to things like comorbidities and outside factors - i.e., do you have hallucinations and need to go on medications that could have serious side effects, or do you just have a fucking gas leak in your house?), but it is ESPECIALLY dangerous to go down with a condition that is as rare and difficult to understand let alone treat as DID.

I remember a professor of mine in college said that DID (or MPD as it was also known as at the time) was so rare, a psych might see 10 real cases of it in their entire, multi-decades spanning career. There is no shitting way that it's suddenly exploded to the degree that it has - and certainly not in the ways that I'm seeing it manifesting. A lot of these so-called cases are mirroring symptoms that were debunked years ago as fraud (like the different art styles thing, for example) and using terminology that is not actually used in psychological parlance. There is no current, peer-reviewed psychological source that is using fictive or factive or singlet or any of these other twee little words that sound like roleplay language.

And the worst part is that all this roleplay fakery for DID is, that much like the over-diagnosis of ADD/ADHD and autism were for certain regular child behaviors was back in the day, it is only going to cause an over-correction/backlash and hurt those who actually and verifiably have the conditions. I've seen it happen before and I am dreading seeing it happen again.

[sysmedsaresexist]

Hi, so this doesn't seem like your main focus, but you also seem to know a fair amount about it and I could really use an outside perspective ... I hope that's okay, so sorry to bother you if it's not.

Today I was evaluated for cptsd, and, well, one thing is that I wasn't really asked about symptoms like triggers, self perception, stuff like that. Was asked about anxiety and lack of feeling safe, but it might have been after I brought it up.

The main thing I would really appreciate an outside perspective on is that, at the end, I was told I probably wouldn't get the diagnosis, because I didn't have an experience that would have qualified me for ptsd (like assault, SA, DV), and that all my trauma was relational. And I just - I thought that wasn't a requirement? And it's not like she mentioned symptoms not being right for that diagnosis.

My country isn't actually ready to officially diagnose cptsd, it's still being entered, and she acknowledged that, but ... Is that a requirement? Is it something that's being discussed in the psych world?

Again, so sorry if this isn't an okay ask, really hope it's not too bothersome a question ...

That is some bullshit, anon

I am so upset on your behalf, if you can, get a second opinion, because that's ridiculous

Okay, so... normally, in countries where CPTSD from the ICD isn't being used, PTSD is given to those with CPTSD and PTSD.

The DSM even made a couple tweaks to PTSD knowing CPTSD would now be included under it.

CPTSD is specifically about relational trauma-- that's specifically what it's for and what it includes.

That's like saying, "You have so much PTSD that I can't give you a PTSD diagnosis."

That's INSANE

Like, the Dissociative PTSD subtype (what encompasses most CPTSD symptoms in the DSM 5), DESNOS (disorders of extreme stress not otherwise specified), OSTSRD (other specified trauma- and stressor-related disorder) and USTRD (unspecified trauma- and stressor-related disorder) are right fucking there if your doctor wants to split hairs.

What the fuck

Anon, I'm so sorry.

Please, if possible, see another clinician.

[oopsallfictives]

I feel like sysmedicalism gets boiled down to just being anti-endo, and that's not really even the core of their beliefs. That's definitely a big part of it, but it's more of a side effect of their core beliefs. Those beliefs are:

Plurality only exists in the context of DID and similar disorders

Those disorders only ever happen as the result of trauma

Both the above points have been scientifically proven

Psychiatrists who study/treat DID, as well as the ISSTD, are more trustworthy than anyone claiming their personal experiences fall outside of what they believe "real DID" looks like

The only one of those that even might be true is the second, but I have no idea if it is or not, and it would be irresponsible to make the claim that it is without proof (correlation isn't proof, that's literally the first lesson in statistics). But what I want to focus on is the last point, because I think it explains everything else

People with DID/OSDD/etc have pretty much always been fighting an uphill battle against the general public's disbelief. This worsened significantly in the 90s. DID (then called MPD) got swept up into the Satanic Panic, and when aspects of that were disproven, everything else that got lumped in with it was assumed to be equally false. On top of that, there was a high-profile lawsuit against Bennett Braun (psychiatrist and founding member of the ISSTD) that alleged some pretty horrific abuse against a woman who claimed she was misdiagnosed and never had MPD/DID in the first place

This split the discourse. Some people condemned Braun and his associates for their treatment of their patients, and claimed that MPD/DID was made up. This is why the name was changed to DID, btw. The chair of the DSM-IV task force didn't believe it was real. On the other side of things, there were people who believed it was real, and therefore assumed everything being said about Braun and others was made up. There were some people, like those who were abused as "treatment" for MPD/DID, who believed that both plurality and the abuse were real, but they were largely ignored or silenced

Nowadays the issue is mostly simplified into "is DID real or not?". However, the idea that criticizing the ISSTD/psychiatrists who treat DID is the same as siding with the people who don't believe in it lingers. For many people newly diagnosed or discovering the online community and their place in it for the first time, these clinicians seem to be the only ones who believe their experiences are real. On top of that, there's a societal belief that being a doctor gives someone the authority to speak on medical issues in a way that being a patient doesn't. This goes doubly for anything mental health related. So these systems latch onto the ISSTD/psychiatrists and uncritically buy into everything they say (or what a game of twitter discourse telephone claims they say), even if it doesn't make sense, or if the proof just isn't there

So when they lash out at endogenic systems, or systems who claim to be people instead of parts, or any system that doesn't fit their idea of "real DID', it's because they see us as threats to their legitimacy. They think we can only be taken seriously if we go along with what the ISSTD claims. But this community has decades worth of very real reasons not to trust the psychiatrists making those claims

If you're a system whose beliefs align with the bullet points above, and you're starting to doubt the ISSTD (or even just some individual psychiatrists) because of the McLean video, take some time to look a little deeper. Look up what Bennett Braun got sued for malpractice for at least 11 times over (but be prepared, it will be triggering, it's some fucked up shit). Look up other prominent psychiatrists in this area, see how many of them have had accusations of abuse leveled against them. Try this video on Onno van der Hart, the primary contributer to the ToSD as it applies to DID (TW psychiatric abuse). And if you're starting to realize that perhaps they can't be trusted to be correct about everything, maybe it's time to consider what else they've said that's wrong

-Oliver (he/him)

P.S. If you're a dick on this post you'll be blocked on sight

[atticollateral]

Pin! Feat. I can't stop talking

Updated 02/11/2024 (dd/mm/yyyy)

Hi! Welcome to my blog; My most used name is Atticus, or Atti for short. I go by mostly it/its in English, as well as other neopronouns. I prefer gender neutral & masculine honorifics (Sir, Mr, Mx, Lord, etc.)

I go by masculine pronouns with a heavy preference for masculine honourifics in other languages. EX; If you were speaking French with me, you'd use he/him pronouns. [FR: Si vous parlez français avec moi, vous utiliserez des pronoms il/lui.]

More about me & my blog beneath the cut!

I am a Maritime Canadian! Seafood & acres & acres of farmland and vineyards be upon ye

Languages i'm currently Learning: [French/Français, Spanish/Español, Latin, Mi'kmaq, Chinese (Mandarin) [中文], Japanese [日本語], Korean [한국어], Ukrainian [українець], Hindi [हिन्दी भाषा], العربية (Arabic)]

Fluent Languages; English

Strongest Languages Currently; French, Spanish & Latin.

Weakest Languages Currently; Japanese, Korean, Hindi, Arabic, Ukrainian, Chinese, Mi'kmaq.

Languages Currently Progressing: FR, ES, JP, KOR, CH.

If you speak any of these languages, I am sorry if you try to communicate with me, I am slow.

PERSONAL TAGS:

#atti speaks - txt posts

#atti rambles - rambles

#atti won't shut the fuck up - posts where I figure I talked too long

#atti journals - personal life posts / inspirational posts / quotes

#atti smiled fondly at this. - posts that make me smile.

#atti queue is this? - queue tag.

#atti pics - me!!!

#atti went outside - photography / adventure pictures!

#atti cooks - food / recipes

#atti screams at the top of his lungs in painful anguish because he can't take it - things that made atti sad or angry (overexaggerating... usually.)

#atti draws - ART

#atti OOTD - Fashion

Music Sideblog: @therealstarboy

Makeup and Writing Blog: flamboyant-and-powerful

Art Sideblog/Archive: @collateraldamage-dot-wav

Crowley Character Sideblog: @starrmkrr

Other Sideblog: @ohgoodgoditsmothman

Fandoms (Shows/Games I like):

Good Omens / Overwatch 2 / Animal Crossing (New Horizons, New Leaf) / Stardew Valley / Terraria / Guilty Gear / Street Fighter / Blazblue / Minecraft (PC & Console) / Sanrio / Baldur's Gate 3 / D&D [GM & Player] / Legend of Zelda (BOTW + TOTK, Twilight Princess, Ocarina of Time, Windwaker, Majora's Mask.) / Palia MMO

Interests:

Entomology, Human Biology, Anthrozoology, Bio Mechanics & Bio Engineering. The DSM-5 & DSM-5-TR; Neurodiversity. Neurology / Neuroscience, Psychology, Sociology. Weaponry. Technology; Computers / Compsci, Coding. Fashion Design & History, Art History. Fungi.

Hobbies:

Fashion Design, Interior Design, Character Design, Digital Design, Sparring (Swords, H2H), Painting (Watercolour / Gouache & Acrylics), Calligraphy, Theatre/Drama (Singing & Dancing, Improv & Script Writing), Choreography, Storyboarding, Ice Skating, Rollerblading, Writing (Fics, Music and Edu. Papers), Cooking & Baking, Photography & Videography.

[poppyandzena]

re: pepper wanting NF to be her mom. i'm not a system and i don't know what it's like to be a system, but speaking from that outside viewpoint, isn't it a little fucked to push that dynamic onto someone who has a sexual relationship with someone else in the system? how would that feel for the partner? i'm talking about a hypothetical IRL relationship as opposed to mostly online, but personally i could not act as a parent to someone who shares a body with my romantic and sexual partner. that would just feel wrong in a way i couldn't handle. it doesn't feel right to ask that of someone who hasn't explicitly and forwardly said they would be okay with it

Edit: Poppy claims to have Other Specified Dissociative Disorder, which is under the same umbrella as DID. A typical feature of OSDD is infrequent or a lack of amnesia barriers between alters. All of my points below still stand, and the lack of amnesia points to even more culpability on Poppy's part to manage her alters' harmful behaviors. Poppy is not exempt from system responsibility no matter what excuse she tries to use. Refusing to partake in system responsibility is a willful act of bad faith that I do not tolerate. Thank you for the replies in this post.

It's going to depend on the comforts of both parties. Hypothetically a person with DID having a child alter would find a lot of security and support if their partner or spouse took on a caretaker role for that alter. Age regression is not inherently sexual.

For Poppy, I can't lend that same benefit of the doubt because Poppy latched onto NF within a month and was already making plans to set her up with surgeons and have her move in. Pepper arrived while Poppy couldn't handle that NF and Amy were having the most normal of romantic interactions. Pepper's public appearance is very convenient and I absolutely do not condone a child alter like her speaking on NSFW accounts.

Pepper, much like Penny, is often used as a weapon to put people in a tight position to excuse Poppy's behavior. She got mad because someone (presumably NF) wouldn't say "I love you" to Pepper after being rightfully pissed at Poppy. I frankly don't care for manipulation and theatrics like this. I know quite a few systems, and none of them have behaved like this. I've dived into the DID Community since I was a teenager, and this is not typical behavior, and please don't think Poppy represents them as a whole. Systems aren't perfect, but being emotionally manipulative is not part of the DID diagnostic criteria.

Poppy, as a 42 year old adult with a masters in psychology, knows better than to weaponize her illnesses against her loved ones. She knows, and she does it anyway because it gets her results. She has people enable her night and day. BPD, DID, ADHD--she can have every illness in the DSM V and it will never excuse her abuse of others. I wouldn't tolerate it from a rando and I sure as hell do not tolerate it from her.

[neurodecadence]

Girlthing yapping about brain being odd + what neurodecadence means.

Vis-a-vis last post. I don't really know what is going on with my brain situation.

There's three of me in here. Sometimes we see and hear shit that ain't real. Sometimes we feel things that aren't real.

Sometimes we believe in things that make no sense even when we present logically present proof against it or it simply makes no sense.

I don't know if it's a bunch of quantitifiable dsm-v shit, or bunch of effects from an upsetting upbringing, or I'm just fucking odd. At this point I don't think I care.

I'm gonna choose to believe in some of the unreal because it's comforting, and some because it's a way to get through the days.

I mean, if we're being real, it's right there in my url isn't it.

We understand that by therapeutic and psychological standards I'm probably deeply unwell, but isn't harming me. Why should I get more labels, more meds, and condemned to existing as a perpetual outsider, just becaude I was too honest with a psychiatrist.

This neuro decadent existence suits us well enough.

[ziggysgender]

Me searching sam beckett autism in AO3 and Tumblr pulls a frightening zero amount of content talk to me here

its genuinely upsetting Yes............. ik one of my mutuals is working on a sam autism fic im not too sure when thats dropping. BUT. in the meantime,, lets discuss

long post beware 👇👇👇

extracted from the DSM-5 autistic criteria.

> Persistent deficits in social communication and social interaction across multiple contexts, as manifested by the following, currently or by history

1. Deficits in social-emotional reciprocity, ranging, for example, from abnormal social approach and failure of normal back-and-forth conversation; to reduced sharing of interests, emotions, or affect; to failure to initiate or respond to social interactions. 

2. Deficits in nonverbal communicative behaviors used for social interaction, ranging, for example, from poorly integrated verbal and nonverbal communication; to abnormalities in eye contact and body language or deficits in understanding and use of gestures; to a total lack of facial expressions and nonverbal communication.

3. Deficits in developing, maintaining, and understand relationships, ranging, for example, from difficulties adjusting behavior to suit various social contexts; to difficulties in sharing imaginative play or in making friends; to absence of interest in peers.

sam does indeed struggle with social cues and communication. he does blend in, but not entirely well. his constant attempting to adapt to different people and personalities, both in his leaping, and also in his canon backstory, is noticeably lacking. that being said, he is VERY empathetic. people are very drawn to him. more often than not either in a "what the fuck is wrong with you" way. or a "hey lets have sex" (he does not want to have sex) way. he is also frequently fixated on learning languages outside of english. not that he plans to communicate in these languages, he simply wants a base connection to other people and this is how he does it. learning is his love language.

> Restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities, as manifested by at least two of the following, currently or by history.

1. Stereotyped or repetitive motor movements, use of objects, or speech (e.g., simple motor stereotypes, lining up toys or flipping objects, echolalia, idiosyncratic phrases).

2. Insistence on sameness, inflexible adherence to routines, or ritualized patterns of verbal or nonverbal behavior (e.g., extreme distress at small changes, difficulties with transitions, rigid thinking patterns, greeting rituals, need to take same route or eat same food every day).

3. Highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or focus (e.g., strong attachment to or preoccupation with unusual objects, excessively circumscribed or perseverative interests).

4. Hyper- or hyporeactivity to sensory input or unusual interest in sensory aspects of the environment (e.g. apparent indifference to pain/temperature, adverse response to specific sounds or textures, excessive smelling or touching of objects, visual fascination with lights or movement).

i mean. any episode can show you easily sam stims OFTEN. usually due to negative input, he will make certain gestures with his hands or entire body. you've got al frequently reminding sam to calm down. sam's reaction to being overwhelmed is usually either to become angry and lash out (emotionally or physically) or to shut down completely. he has had entire meltdowns such as going quiet and running away to cry. this didnt make al bat an eye, then knew exactly how to correct it. if you wanna talk about fixated interests, man has 7phd's...

ALSO. JIMMY.

jimmy is the one leapee sam has encountered the MOST. he leaped into him twice (not encludinb shock theater), met his older brother three times. he connected the MOST deeply to him. he even made an appearance in the last episode. and every time he has encountered jimmy, he instantly became ecstatic; running to wordlessly hug anyone he knew he could trust with his disabilities.

in the actual episode "jimmy" sam has a meltdown over how he is treated. he cries to al about how different he's acting in this body. to which al responds he is actually acting exactly the same as normal. sam doesnt understand completely, but the conversation progresses to al's sister.

sam is also embodying jimmy in "shock theater", yknow, when his mind is slipping away and his most important past leaps take over. yeah that one.

jump to "runaway". sam has a longwinded conversation with his leap's mother about how he feels like a "non-person". how he doesnt feel real or connected to anyone.

now jumping to the NOVELS. theres several examples here but specifically Prelude. where we get this insane page of text:

um. anyways. sam beckett is autistic ;P

[mikelogan]

apologies in advance for the following rant that you really don't have to read if you don't want to.

my parents have been raising my nephew since he was just over a year old and he'll be 7 in march. i had to move back in with them in early 2023 bc of my medical and financial issues. as he gets older, the more violent, disobedient, mean he gets, and his outbursts and tantrums are nightmarish at home and at school.

a couple weeks ago, they were finally able to meet with a doctor (he already has a good pcp and has recently established with a psychiatrist) and he had a full day of testing. he's already been diagnosed with ADHD. they got the results today, which confirmed that. in addition, he's also on the autism spectrum, though i don't really know to what degree yet. but he also has dmdd and after checking it out on nimh, it fits him to a t. but jesus christ, don't read the treatment section unless you want to feel hopeless.

it's a newer disorder, first in the dsm in 2013, and listed is cbt or medications, none of which are specifically for dmdd. i looked at a few reddit posts from parents of children with the disorder and it's exactly what we're dealing with and the outlook feels so bleak. his frontal lobe is underdeveloped, so he's unable to regulate emotions the same way other kids of his age are.

and the real kicker? my sister tricked her boyfriend of 3 months at the time into getting her pregnant, telling him she was taking her birth control when she wasn't. she has borderline personality disorder but won't seek treatment for it and every direct result of her actions is always someone else's fault in her eyes, so she refuses to take accountability for anything. and she smoked pot for the entire duration of her pregnancy, claiming that it HELPS brain development 🙃

in summary, if i 1) wasn't dealing with multiple chronic illnesses, 2) wasn't so close with my parents and grandparents, and 3) didn't have severe anxiety, i would pick up and move so far away from all of this. i'm sure a lot of this sounds insensitive from the outside, but i don't mean it to. i know none of this is his fault, but the fact of the matter is that his behavior takes a massive toll on my own mental health because it's quite literally constant. loud, violent outbursts, one right after another over the most miniscule triggers. yelling, screaming, swearing, hitting, throwing, kicking, etc. if he doesn't get precisely his way. and my parents are trying and they love him dearly, but they're also not very consistent, which makes me fucking nuts.

i just. i don't know what to do and it doesn't look like there's a ton that can be done. he's tried so many meds already and the one that seemed to help for a while is starting not to and he's gotten even worse. i dread him coming home from school each day and literally count down the hours until bed time. and even then, he'll get up multiple times after they put him to bed for no reason and then throws a tantrum when they tell him to go back to bed.

however bad you think it might be, i can guarantee you it's worse living with it. i'm not being dramatic. he's a nightmare to be around and he's hurt teachers and other students, not to mention how rough he is with my parents. he has an iep and hopefully this testing and results will open more doors for help at school, but apart from math, he couldn't be less interested. all he wants to do is play on the playground and then disrupts the classroom when he doesn't get his way. he's thrown chairs, hit other children, made them bleed, etc. and again, i feel like i have to state that i know this isn't his fault, that he's not doing these things on purpose, but something's gotta give, right? i'm exhausted and miserable and i can only spend so much time holed up in my bedroom, and even then, my door has to stay open enough for my cats to get in and out, and you can hear everything downstairs even at a normal volume, let alone screaming. we only have one vehicle because mine got repo-ed after i lost my job and before my long-term disability got approved, so i can't just leave the house any time i want, plus that'll be even less of an option once winter comes.

i hate it here, basically.

[greenbileba5tard]

I went through the DSM-5 with my buddy the other day and looked at what applied to Dennis Reynolds. I can confidently say that he checks off every box for borderline personality disorder/BPD (which he is diagnosed with in the show),, has most symptoms of PTSD (I believe he has C-PTSD based on further academic articles supporting it as a valid diagnosis),, checks every box off for narcissistic personality disorder/NPD,, and (surprisingly enough) checks every box off for dissociative identity disorder/DID. I’m not surprised by that last one because I personally am diagnosed with DID and C-PTSD,, but that was after the 218 question questionnaire and PTSD packet so I might have to get ahold of that and apply them to our knowledge of him from the show. Either way,, his dissociative symptoms line up pretty damn well,, and his arc in “Charlie Rules The World” is fucking DAMNING. Dennis would be horrible DID representation and stigmatize the disorder further if this was confirmed,, but the diagnosis looks like it applies to him when viewing the show from an outside lens.

[trans-femme-fag-dyke]

Privilege, Virtue Signaling & The Long Game

When thinking about the election, I need to take a step back and remember the privilege of living in Los Angeles as a transfemmefagdyke.

Like any privilege, QT (queer/trans) geographic privilege is a dangerous game.

I live in a city where I walk past billboards featuring queer couples and gender fuckery, and cannot walk a mile without bumping into my darlings.

It's very easy to succumb to the idea that I might be OK in a Trump-led world.

It's very easy for me to inject my estrogen and boof my progesterone and not worry too much about the continuation of my trans journey.

When MY identity is seemingly not as much at stake, it can make me lazy and it can erode my empathy. When my biggest dysphoria trigger happens with a barista misgendering me and not criminalization of my presence in a bathroom, I am subject to different realities.

My extra security and additional time can lead me down rabbit holes.

It can lead me to a place where I consider abandoning my vote or voting for a third party to make a stand about Palestine.

Here's the deal:

I am firmly pro-Palestine, pro-ceasefire, pro-two state solution. I am pro-boycott and anti-governmental silence or platitudinal rhetoric.

I donate to vetted Palestine causes, I write to my elected officials, I read more than social posts and CNN, and I have dug deeper than headlines since 2005. I know the dates, the history, the theology.

What I am not is someone whose commitment to those causes begins and ends with social media post shares and photo opps at marches and whose identity is almost entirely comprised of virtue signals and DSM diagnostic obsessions and contains barely any actual values or attributes.

What I am not is someone who thinks that Palestinian civil society is going to happen overnight such that we don't remain locked in the negative feedback loop that haunts any chance of hope and which likely any US administration won't be able to do shit about.

What I am not is someone who thinks that, if a Trump administration comes into play and my trans identity is threatened, I will still be thinking about Palestine.

When Trump will 100% continue to attack my female/trans/queer friends outside my geographic privilege, I am not someone who can even rest on the laurels of thinking that in California I will be OK.

Prop 8 language is still on the books and if Prop 3 fails, California's homophobic Constitution will be the fallback in the event of a fundamental legal backslide.

Anti-trans efforts have already led to trans refugees fleeing to states where they get stuck in the cycle of homelessness and addiction.

This November please don't get stuck in some romantic revolutionary delusion that makes your Feeld profile more edgy.

Praxis over theory, long game over impetuous virtue signaling, research over reaction, commitment over shares/clicks/views.

Would you rather engage with and fight Kamala for your rights, or Trump? It really is that simple.

Then you can go back to hopping on the wagon of whatever genocide most burnishes your self-image.

And, while you're at it, reblog the fuck out of @estrogenesis-evangelion who frames at least some of this argument in succinct and passionate terms: https://www.tumblr.com/estrogenesis-evangelion/755322350213513216/a-single-one-more-of-you-gormless-childish-fucks?source=share