#stave off the stagnant depression

[disconnected-dragon]

gonna be trying to do sicktember this year, even if it might not be daily. i think trying to get back into the groove would be good for me.

[yeahcurrahhe-e]

𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐒𝐄𝐄 𝐑𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓

𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇 𝐌𝐄

( 𝐂𝐀𝐍 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐒𝐄𝐄 𝐑𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓

𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇 𝐌𝐄?)

〚 𝐉. 𝐋𝐈𝐄𝐁𝐆𝐎𝐓𝐓 〛

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 ➛ mentions of blood/death, self-esteem issues

𝐑𝐄𝐐𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐓 ➛ anonymous: I was wondering if I could make a request for Liebgott comforting a sweetheart who struggles with depression and self-esteem, -confidence issues, please? Maybe with Nrs 1 and 19 from the angst list and Nrs 17 and 16 from the happy list? — prompts used: “who did this to you ?" , “you look awful”, you're not alone. you never were” ,"i trust you, it's okay”

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐀𝐍𝐊 𝐁𝐀𝐒𝐄𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓 was reamed with an overbearing tense silence.

The gargled breaths and pleas of Eugene Jackson had been its cruel predecessor, before he asphyxiated on his own bloodied implores beneath her hands as Roe and her scrambled to alleviate his airway.

In the oppressing construct of silence, she had no choice but to be privy to the tide of stares pooling around her whilst she discarded blood-spoiled rags into a bucket. They mocked her abilities. Her presence in the room, in the company, in the Airborne.

They could have started screaming at her, a deluge of acrimony not too unlike the German artillery that had dealt destruction to most of the town. They didn't have to, her crippled esteem was already aware of what they would say. Because she knew she was supposed to be better. And tonight, and too many times throughout their European campaign, she hadn't been.

"We'll bury him beside the others." Eugene passively muttered to Martin, accepting the grey blanket into his war-toiled hands, and draping the thin cloth over the young man's stagnant body.

The pair of downcast men glanced over to the female medic that knelt at Jackson's uncannily angled feet, tides of guilt, regret, and anger wading across her muddied face. Could they see right through me? was her acknowledgment of their stares, even as she remained deathly still and silent as the boy before her.

"I'll help you, Doc, Martin patted the dark-haired medic on his staunchly drawn shoulder, the gesture similarly wrenched with stiffness, then stepped with discretion towards Y/N.

The abrupt pressure from his grasp encompassing her forearm, jolted her from the isolation of mind-numbing anguish, her stature ricocheting with a sharp startle.

"Why don't you go take a rest? We'll get a medic from reserve duty to relieve 'ya, kid," his hands shifted as to pluck her upper arms to persuade her away, scrub herself of the ghastly disaster on her skin and OD’s.

"But, Jackson-" she blurted with a forlorn, uncharacteristic hush, haywire mind mainstreamed to the thought of the young boy's body finding its permanent tomb in this ravaged basement.

"Roe and I got him," Martin pursed his lips, a hair away from being a frown, "Go sleep, YIN."

Sleep? her sorrowful stare slanted over to him, a pinned gaze of bewilderment dealt forward. Sleep after a boy just suffocated on his own blood as he tearfully implored for me to not let him die?

Eugene Roe is now knelt on compact floor in front of her; as a fellow medic, he knew the anchoring feeling of defeat when a soldier couldn't be saved by them despite all the training they were equipped with, and how foolish it is to play God. How sleep, when it came, was fitful at best; it was only another landscape where those that had been laid to rest would find them, scream at them from beneath torn flesh and bullet holes.

"Go and get cleaned up. Heard they actually brought in some showers from battalion this mornin" his whisper was so gentle, regarding that now she was a disaster of tears and convoluted emotions; her headstrong mental barriers futile amidst a grieving mind.

"Okay;" the passive agreement was again uncharacteristic, an indication of a surrender to a grief she had staved off for months…years.

It was a typical tendency of Y/N Y/L/N to take anv part of her that was decaying, and cast it off as a ghost, something she'd never take a moment to mourn. She had the grace of moving on with certainty, standing tall and leading with steady nurture. She wasn't without her psychological cracks, he knew that, perhaps she was just better at subduing the surges of temptations that frisked about with each traumatic scar. And it was cruel to be one of the few who could iostle aside those feelings like a broom would a collecting of dust. Perhaps if you have blood on your hands often enough, your skin a canvas for the grot of the dead daily, and your hand tender from the many who have grasped it as if it would save them, you merely learn to dim the feelings like any anesthetic would.

After Eugene Jackson, the anesthetic now throbbed with dullness against a painful billowing of despair and anger in her nerves, draining through her rather than just skate over her skin.

And, as she traipsed numbly out of the basement, nostrils throbbing with death, she wondered with dread if this had been her breaking point - the final shard of her old self being ground into the Earth by Death himself as she had fought to save Jackson.

She may as well have been a dead girl walking as she trudged down the dirt path towards the depot of portable showers.

—

THE EMBLEM of first sergeant felt burdensome on her frayed uniform, as her grimy finger traced over the sewn patch, gaze fixated on an echo of herself in the shower's timeworn mirror.

The traces of a bygone, golden girl from Toccoa, lingered beneath the grime of the day, seeking to emerge with a tightness in her chest; bound around freely and not within the shackles of misery. Back when the world exhilarated her. Before a life at war rotted her soul.

Maybe she could have saved Eugene Jackson.

The reflection of a young woman with her hair gathered haphazardly beneath her helmet, eyes weaved with the whispers of unshed tears - was wholly and utterly a far cry from someone that could have. Jackson's glassy, lifeless eyes would forever remind her of such. Remind her that she was no good; just a killer. He saw right through her.

Hastily, as if to wrench herself away from mourning the girl and Jackson, she liberated her hair from the notorious ponytail she fixed it in, it now a soft glide down to her mid-back.

When she had enlisted, it was with an absence of peer pressure on her shoulders, it being an internal pressure to show everyone that a woman could do anything a damn man could. The repercussions of it all, had been gliding ghosts in her head when she filled out each line on the enlistment form, a stamp of approval from superiors ultimately separating her from a mainstream pathway to the Army. They had all commended her abilities, her response times, her grace and humility - everything a wounded soldier could pray for.

Somewhere amidst the ripped flesh, the blood as bright as any field-born poppy, and the shrieks for God's sparing, she lost all of it. She failed. And she didn't even know who to begin with in her solitary trek through remorse. Hoobler? Julian? Jackson?

The mirror shifted into a blur as she moved herself hastily around to discard her reflection, suppressing a hideous sob with a hurtful bite of her bottom lip. I failed him, and him, and him too.

Y/N hastened across the slimy floor of the washroom with an ache in her feet formally settling with each step, seeping right through to her bones.

She shed her filthy gear to the damp crevices of the tile, it being a heap of grot that couldn't possibly become more spoiled by any tendril of organic scum. The taunting melody of blame traipsed through her head like a rabbit of mockery, with each extraction of the blood-spoiled fabric from her skin. You failed. You failed. You killed those men - those boys!

Hastily, she wrenched the handle to permit a deluge of lukewarm water to pour over her tear-beaten face, the trickles of water alluring out goosebumps beneath scrapes and splotches of earth. The water ran over her skin like an earnest caress, tainting with the colors of the earth and innocent blood spilled, her teeth clenched with a hiss at what scrapes it was unearthing. Anything to dispel the tingle in her nose of an impending cry.

Despite the misery accompanying her in the lonely showers, she begrudgingly lowered her head to allow the water to beat on her neck in steamy rivulets. The subtle heat soaked into her skin, her muscles miles away from being merely cramped as the water felt like sparks and flickers on them.

The wilily snake of rebuke wined around her anguished mind, despite her longing for a ceasefire of the misery beneath the running water. They didn't want to die and you had promised they wouldn't. Their blood will always be on your hands. And here you are in your warm shower, while they're somewhere in the dirt, wishing they could feel anything else that wasn't absolute anguish. They all thought you were supposed to be the best. Look where that got 'em.

Harshly, she then yanked off the shower, the now chilled water barely exuding through the stampede of frenzy that homed itself in her brain.

Almost too belligerently and ruthlessly, did she then scrub the oval droplets of water from her skin with a flimsy towel. I know I failed. Scrub. I know I failed. Scrub. I know I failed. Scrub. I know I wasn't good enough. Scrub. I wasn't. Scrub.

And, perhaps, she never had been.

—

WAR'S SIGNATURE SYMPHONY accompanies the stark black night as her feet instinctively trace the path to the medic's billet. There's the crescendo of machine gun fire, the crooner of a mortar round, and then the subtle alto notes of a man screaming for his life.

She hated how it greeted her internal torment like an old friend, her footfalls anchored to the Earth as if her body was a magnet for misery that evening. It was an entirely new symphony, curated with the orchestra of those boys' screams, a percussion of the weapons that stole their youths, and a choir of her wounded esteem.

It had casted her so far from reality that she never heard the footsteps that curtly approached her, only surfacing in awareness when something heaved her abruptly backward.

She cast a hand down to pluck her utility knife from her belt before the individual seized her wrist, damn near twisting it to the extent of breaking. Her face scrunched, twisting around furiously so she could push them away despite her wrist's confinement.

"Nuh-uh, you don't get to save yourself," the soldier grunted against her resistance; he is evidently inebriated from some poached German alcohol, the stench of its mediocre quality on his breath and uniform. It's the amber liquid aflame in his nerves that now stokes his anger and resent towards her.

The soldier is a replacement; no more than eighteen. An eighteen-year-old who found himself in Death's watching gallery as his friend - Eugene Jackson - spasmed around from blood loss on the floor of a French basement.

And he's pissed at the world. At the war. At the superiors. At her.

Her chest was filled with this tightening feeling of misery as she whispers, "I did what I could, with what I had." Liar.

He knew it as well, bubbling frustrated with alcohol's poison driving her down to the gravel. She struck hard against it, chin skidding across its stony shards, abrading harshly against the sensitive skin. A careful hand came beneath it and she could sense the blood seeping down from the scrape. Don't feel sorry for yourself.

"Did 'ya now? Is that what you're gonna tell yourself - make your pathetic ass feel better about it?" he essentially snarled in her face, bowing over her pinned body with a complex only alcohol and despair could construct.

"I did my job, I did all I could!" her chest heaved like a woman possessed, a distant explosion rattling the ground beneath them. Bullshit! You killed that boy, beckoned an offending serpent from some corner of her subconscious - one that could see right through the words she pushed through gritted teeth.

"You can tell Winters that all 'ya want," he commenced with a flurry of smoky breath through his own gritted teeth, leaning down a hair closer to her now, "But we both know that Eugene Jackson died because of you - no bullshit about a lack of supplies or hands. It’s on you.”

Her limbs exerted no effort to shove him away, to mount an endeavor to flee. Because, she knew he was right.

She remained there, back constrained against the ground's muck, a macabre comparison to those boys that preyed upon her lame remnants of sanity. She let the soldier scream himself raw beneath the whistle of a mortar across the river, allow him to despise her in that seemingly eternal moment. Because, no matter how good of a medic - a soldier - she was drawn to be by superiors who would never fire a shot in this war, no matter how good the medicine, no matter the strategy, boys died. Died in flashes of a sniper, an ambush, red. She didn't want to move, gaze burning towards the young man, conversating wordlessly to extinguish her misery however his vengeance deemed fit. Do it. Before another boy dies because of me- before another mother loses her son because I wasn't good enough.

Dirt-powdered fingers clenched her cheeks, her frown molded into a restrained gasp at the blinding pressure exuding into her flesh,

"You ain't even worth a fucking bullet," he indifferently stated, words slicing rather than tumbling through the dry air.

He snatched away his unforgiving clasp from where it confined her flushed face, indents of his fingernails on the crimson-beaten skin.

There's the essence of a scowl on his face as it's glorified in the moonlight when he drew up his posture, a drunken influence in his stature.

"You shoulda just stayed home, with all the other broads. Woulda saved a lot of men," he snapped down at her through the evening briskness; his inebriated mind not dulling his talent to pluck at her confidence's last surviving shard, do away with it in a predictable mockery of her gender.

He then staggered away, seemingly satisfied, his silhouette vacating its obscurement of the moon's milky glow. The beams pirouette across her bloodied chin, the odd spasm of her limbs as her haywire mind can't quite comprehend the overwhelm that has it hostage.

All she knows, as the moonbeams sketched runways across her body cradled on the road, is that he was right.

—

BY SOME GRACE OF PITY, perhaps by God Himself, she hauled her body begrudgingly from the stone and with languid footfalls found her way through the doorway of a nearby billet.

She has the presumption that all the soldiers serving as its temporary inhabitants, would be in their bunks - buried about in their olive-colored Army blankets, hair tousled by flaccid pillows, mouths agape to occupy with smoky air. All none-the-wiser to her pitiful presence as she waded in the darkness of the ramshackle vestibule, minuscules of gravel on a bloodied chin and humiliated tears supple in her eyes.

One soldier wasn't. He had discarded his blanket twenty minutes prior, departing the upstairs barracks and not stirring even the lightest of Easy's sleepers, all too content to be in a bed that wasn't an icy foxhole.

And he watched her as she had lumbered through the front door, gravity awkwardly placed in her heels, for it seemed cumbersome to even take a step.

In the platinum betrayal of moonlight, he observed how it grazed over the dirt on the highs of her cheekbones, the laceration on her chin, and how she pinned her wrist to her chest in a lame cradle.

"You look awful,” the pipeline between thought and verbalization is nonexistent in Joe Liebgott's brain, as the observation stumbled out into the stale air nonchalantly.

The poor girl's hunched body emits a jolt, suggesting there was a erroneous assumption of solitude for her one-person pity party, and she turned towards him, almost as pale as the sky's nightly ornament.

"Jesus Christ, Joe," she exhaled hotly, squinting at her boyfriend as he held himself up in the doorway in a slump, face alight with splotches of blemish from burrowing it in the pillow overnight, chestnut hair tousled, and faintly resembling the coiffured up-do of the bygone day.

She felt horridly conscious of her disheveled appearance beneath his inquiring gaze. Can he see right through her? Does he know about Jackson - her failure?

"What happened?" he bowed his head in an indication towards her wounds on display in the moon's spotlight.

"Oh, this," she feigned nonchalance, it extending simultaneously to her tone and to the gesture she funneled forcefully through her bruised wrist. The corners of her eyes fleetingly crinkle at the soreness that twinged through the limb as she continued, "Just tripped while carrying some new supplies towards the medic CP.”

He eyed her now with an unconvinced squint, having noted how the lack of fabric around her wrist betrayed the canvas of violets and yellows around it - how the hues were cast in the outlines of finger marks.

Before her chaotic mind could spare a second for reality and thus a reaction, he is in front of her with a fluid stride, fingers to the discolored body part.

"Who did this to you?" his frustration tensed with a clench of his jaw, as he welcomed the offending serpent of anger to the atmosphere.

When it came to her, Joe Liebgott was even more easy to set off, almost like flicking the top off a grenade to allow it to not be girded in a container no more. If a man dared to hassle her, belittle her, or merely make her upset, Joe would shoot them before their heart could strike one last time.

Her nervous chuckle seemed to cower beneath the serpent as she flexed her wrist from him, "I told you what happened." And if I told you the truth, I would tell you I deserved it.

"There's finger marks on your wrist, Y/N." he scoffed incredulously. His mind wanted to throttle her with more agitated questions: why aren't you more mad? Why didn't you fight back?

The sense of the girl with a firecracker smile and a disposition to match, had been snatched from reality and replaced with the aura of a girl who is barely a cinder - a ghost.

His fingers shifted with intention for the swollen laceration on her chin, gaze simultaneous in movement as if to reassure that his touch would be tolerable. Her instinct conquered over a waned scream of objection in her mind, the instinct set forth in her eyes; it's okay, I trust you.

Discreet fingers amble beneath her chin, mindful of the debris and sorely raw abrasion beneath them. His radiating dismay and frustration could be felt through his touch, as if he was burning it off like a furnace.

Her head then bowed, nearly wilting, as her chin came to lean against her chest, fretting restlessly with the hem of her jacket. Failure. Failure. Failure. You got what you deserved.

"Hey, don't go quiet on me now," he exhaled, voice far more labored than he anticipated it to be as he decisively dropped his hand from her wound, grasp now favoring her forearm instead.

To his bewilderment, her body then jolted out with a meager quiver, her withstanding fortifications set alight by the overwhelming misery and humility devouring her soul. She wept, hot tears soaked into the lines of exhaustion on her young face, leaving damp evidence upon her cheeks.

Y/N's hand clasped around his wrist that reposed against her arm, throat feeling dry and exhaustion rattling her bones.

"I want to be left alone," she had never sounded so mournful as she now spoke; her plea for solitude was foreboding, an off handed indication towards a wish for death. She sucked in her cheeks, teary glint in her subtly bloodshot eyes relentlessly betraying her on every front, "... I also deserved it all. I failed. I failed each of those boys."

He warily raised his thumbs to brush away the lukewarm tears trickling down the arch of her cheeks. Her face was warm between the clasp of his callus palms.

"You're not alone, 'ya never were," he murmured with a flush exhale, “And you’d be the last to fail anyone. You save our asses everyday without question; some of these dimwits wouldn't even consider running into the crossfire for someone. You? Major Winters could ask ‘ya to jump and you'd say ‘how high?’ You didn't fail anyone, 'ya hear?"

Her toilworn eyes flicked up to him, pupils nearly blown wide as if to refute: I did! I failed Jackson. I failed Hoobler. I failed Julian. I failed them as they screamed at me to save them - my sworn duty to them! And I failed each fucking time, Joe!

Her chest now heaved with mouthfuls of the brisk night air, the electrical storm that crumbled her will, beneath the gloss of her eyes.

"You know that they were beyond saving, and you still gave your best damn effort with what shit supplies 'ya had. You did all 'ya could," Joe clasped at her wrists to drive whatever thread of attention she had in that second towards him.

"Tell me 'ya know that," he murmured, his shuddering breath fanning over the flush of her cheeks. That you believe it.

"I know," her chest deflated with waning misery, her response a whimper amidst the alleviation as the olive fabric of her OD's was dampened by a few lithe tears. I know but I still hate myself. Allow me to hate how I couldn't save Jackson.

"Let's get 'ya cleaned up, doll," he lightly exuded a tauter squeeze on her forearm, as if aware that all he could do was be there for her, and that cornering her into agreement was an unfair tactic.

Y/N nodded her head dimly, relenting to his guidance towards the desolate powder room to have her superficial wounds patched, and knowing he was maybe the closest she'd ever get to mending the mental ones.

[althaeaofficinalis]

okay update while I'm still in agot: I was right, pycelle is just the equivalent of a 1980s us doctor prescribing opiates for everything while going, "there's no way this could possibly go wrong!" and I'll tell you how I know this.

mirri maz duur.

so as we open on the khalasar in the lands of the lhazareen (dany notably chooses not to call them by their endonym, but by a derogatory exonym from the dothraki, but that's not what this is about), we find out that drogo has been wounded. specifically, his chest wound is what our attention is drawn to:

now I can't exactly interrogate too much about the tissue state, but we don't mention any notable inflammation of the wound to indicate heat/excitation (think when a wound is very red and swollen, oxidation, that kind of thing). in fact, from off the top of my head, those wounds can trap pus inside - specifically I'm thinking of henry viii's leg wound here, which would be more torpor than anything else, and cause cold/depression of the tissue shown by an inactivity to function properly.

this, I have to admit, is mostly backed up by how the wound is described after drogo falls off of his horse and jorah picks it clean:

AHA, I think. blood and pus have been collecting under the skin that's knitted itself back together, and it's starting to rot because it can't actually get out the way it needs to. the wound is unclean as a result. definitely hypoactive function indicated in cold/depression and fluid buildup of damp/stagnation. (even the descriptors added to the tissue states help you connect the dots here!) small side note: in our astrological correspondences, both those tissue states indicate excess earth, damp/stagnation indicates excess water (natch), and cold/depression notes "deficient fire".

and how did it get this way?

the herbwomen gave him cooling mud for his chest. MUD. which certainly can be a remedy, but not for a wound that is sluggish, cold, damp, full of excess fluid, and hypoactive function!!

meanwhile, mirri maz duur gave drogo a poultice to apply directly to the wound with herbs that sound hot (firepod) and stimulating (sting-me-not, which also sounds like it has an urtification effect) - generally the opposite of cold and damp. which is PRECISELY what's indicated here! something to get the blood circulating to the skin that had been severed, the fluids moving out of that area (although perhaps checking on it daily for cleanliness would also help), and staving off the rot that comes with stagnant hypoactivity. and for good measure, she manages to slide in a little sniff at milk of the poppy, which would dull pain, yes, but would prevent anyone from seeing what's actually wrong and what type of pain you're in.

so okay, I eat my own words, george, you're doing a fine job (so far! I've got four more books to reread), and I will more than likely keep a running commentary on the medical interventions in this, lmao

the problem with studying the greco-arabic model of herbalism and medicine while reading asoiaf is that I'm constantly thinking, "do... do you not have any other herbs that counteract pain than milk of the poppy, an opiate?? no meadowsweet? no other antispasmodics? y'all don't utilize willow bark??"

like... I know there's two obvious answers to this, and the watsonian one is that pycelle is untrustworthy and deliberately unhelpful while also being of questionable knowledge, and the doylist one is that grrm simply didn't learn much about the medical models of the medieval time he was striving to emulate, but neither of those alleviate my constant ¿¿¿¿¿¿ feeling

[hiriajuu-suffering]

Dude, are you okay??

Is anyone really okay on here? For real though, a warped perception of gender relations doesn't make someone less "okay", facing the realities of what the world is to you when your youth is behind you. I'm just coping with become a bitter, jaded old man and that's all I'm really doing. Implying I'm mentally unwell because my perception is the opposite gender is entirely selfish which would be "okay" if I was female, so why should I be asked this given I'm just an ugly dude with no status a girl finds desirable to poach off of and ultimately try to possess me over? The pandemic has us all fucked, and I didn't think my life would be an entire school year of withholding regular income to protect my family just so I could substitute teach the following year while going graduate school. The problem is my life has very little promise before 2023 because a bunch of my idiot countrymen wanted to stop believing in science and my federal government won't even share the vaccines my fellow Americans won't take with other countries so maybe I'd have opportunity to be looked at like more than an object of labor there. The problem is I have a desire to be happy but no external factors want that for me at all. Maybe, after 13 years of self-identifying as a classically liberal minarchist, I finally see why I need a leg up because I am disadvantaged in a public sector field and reproductively speaking as a South Asian Muslim man. Maybe I see the pattern in how unfairly the world treats me: from the lack of second chances I got from people, from all the friends I lost, from the things other people stopped me from seeing through to the end so I could move on with my life, from all the times I was called a good child/person but not worthy of being a son-in-law.

Don't ask if someone is okay if you aren't willing to mitigate the answer. I'm a 3-time suicide attempt survivor who has had battles with depression twice in his life (both of which all of his best friends abandoned him) and can confidently say he staved off a third during this pandemic. There is no empathy for the way I have suffered, it's not extreme enough to be real but significant enough to just be a nuisance to others, and I have too much pride in what I am to take pity from anyone. I believe the world can and will get better, which is why I believe in teaching still; but as long as these fucked ass systems of patriarchy and ethnic segregration where human methods of attraction remain racist, it's not going to happen anytime while our social norms remain stagnant. I used to always try to make the best of the shitty social and physiological hands I was dealt in life, but I see clearly people generally are too superficial to evaluate effort and intention well enough to be truly empathetic, that's why I come off as pissed off and angry at the world and when I don't, just sad.

I won't forgive you if you just feel sorry for me and don't make a concerted effort to reach out, though. Either we start a conversation anon or you’re not actually trying to stop me from going on a potentially harmful path in your view, the “grey area” of this question is just a nothing to me.

[santos-emilia]

An exploration with Emilia’s relationship with struggles and addiction Word Count: ~ 2,400 TW: drug use & addiction, miscarriage, self-harm More for me than y’all

Pain is powerful. Everything in life comes from pain - yours or someone else’s. Even, the first breath one takes only comes after hours, sometimes days, of pain from the one who had birthed them. Pain fueled anger. Pain fueled revenge. The thing is, there is always relief from pain. There is always something better to come, something to take pain away. Pain fueled life and with it the pleasure of joy. Pain fueled happiness. Pain fueled relief. 

But there is one thing that is even more powerful than pain. Numbness. A loss of sensation of feeling. 

When the decision was made to give the daughter she had so dearly wanted up, to make a promise never to interfere in her life and all to keep her safe, Emilia had felt pain. She and Tony had dearly wanted that tiny bundle of joy, had a name picked out and even a nursery made. But time had made her realize that being her daughter would put a target on her back. If President Snow would kill a victor to get his way, what would he be doing to an innocent child to get the cooperation of the child’s parents? It wouldn’t be safe for the child. And so the child was given up, given to someone who could hopefully provide a safer home, one without the constant attention, one without the threat of retaliation if her parents stepped a foot out of line. 

Emilia had only had two weeks with the child, two weeks before being forced on a train to tour the nation. She had cried and grieved for the life lost, for the lie that she tried to pretend was a reality - that her child had died. But in her fragile state she could only take so much, so much poking and prodding, so many touchy hands, so many sponsors she was forced to entertain before she just let go. It was easier to be numb than to feel everything else, pain and shame and worthlessness. It was easy to feel nothing at all - a stagnant, harrowing nothing. 

Numb : deprived of the power of sensation or responsiveness

Being numb took you away from everything. It took away your pain and with the absence of pain came an absence of happiness and joy, pleasure and satisfaction. You would do anything to regain some semblance of normalcy, to break through the fog of numbness. But numbness has no adversary in the way pain does. Numbness lingers. Numbness spawns tendrils that work into every fiber of your being. Numbness’s only adversary is you, and if you refuse to face what invited numbness in, numbness will make your world go black. 

But nothing is not pleasant and trauma, unfaceable. So when a sponsor offered a hit, a line of cocaine, an assurance that it’d make the evening more interesting, Emilia had given in. If for no other reason than to feel something without dealing with her issues. And the euphoria offered by the fine white powder became a problem, a problem that she would seek out in droves. It wasn’t her first run in with drugs (a morphling addiction fueled by a want to escape her post-games pain, but she’d stopped cold turkey at the barest suggestion that it might harm her growing pregnancy), and it wouldn’t be her last. No, the cocaine and the euphoria it offered quickly became an addiction. 

Something was better than nothing even if that something was artificial. 

It would be an addiction she would struggle with on and off for several years, even after the void of numbness abated. A positive pregnancy test would come back and she’d force herself to stop. A miscarriage, or the absence of Tony, or the worry that he might end up dead if caught by peacekeepers while in his search for rebellion would send her spiraling again. Rinse, wash, repeat, the cycle would continue for seven years until an overdose nearly ended her life. 

Chemical euphoria was better than numbness, but numbness was better than death. And numbness was broken by fear so strong it made her blood run cold. She’d almost died, almost killed herself. Tony would forever be physically scarred, his back a grisly mess of blood and muscle (the retribution of the head peacekeeper for activities relating to rebellion) as he fought to keep her alive. And she would be forever emotionally scarred by the fact she’d nearly died, nearly died trying to keep the love of her life alive, that he had nearly died. 

And so, Emilia would wake for the first time in seven years. Emilia would fight off withdrawal, vomiting, shaking and exhaustion. Pain would resurface. And with pain, would eventually come happiness and joy, relief - right? That’s how things were supposed to happen. 

Emotions would be felt again, life would be lived again. She would go about her daily activities and actually take note of them. Emilia would take up the things that had provided her with happiness and excitement and joy before. She would begin cooking again, reading from the small library she'd brought from her childhood home, dancing and listening to the music left behind by her father. 

Pain would make its presence know again and again. Another baby so dearly loved, lost - heartbeat gone at week eleven; a set of twins suffering from twin to twin transfusion, the 'healthy' one with a large gap in its skull; a lack of movement. Each time the numbness would try to resurface, try to creep in, but Emilia knew how to stave it off. Remember that night, the night spent tirelessly tending to her husband's tender back, the night spent covered in his blood, the next morning with her heart racing, the morning spent on the shower floor in the frigid water, Benadryl forced to be taken, her husband's pleading voice begging her to stay with him. If that didn't work, she'd disappear to the Academy for hours with the girl she'd taken on as a mentee, practice and focus, the ache of muscles worked until they could no longer,  would drive off the numbness. Tony would always be there to hold her close and provide the relief she'd need from the self-inflicted pain. Pain to drive away the numbness, relief to drive away the pain. 

But when her husband joined the rebellion again, something Emilia was not against for any reason other than her husband's safety, and his arms were not always there to provide comfort the pain was harder to get rid of and with the pain harder to get rid of, numbness crept in a little more successfully. So a dog was brought home, Metztli named for the Aztec Goddess of the moon and night for the black fur that covered the animal. A dog that was trained to recognize the signs of Emilia's depressive states or when she was on the verge of an anxiety attack. A dog that offered her the comfort her husband could not when he was not home. 

And things would be okay again. Okay and even enjoyable sometimes. She'd garden. She'd cook. She'd spend time with Alejo, the father-in-law who'd become like a second father, a man who'd teach her to shoot a gun just for the relief it offered, nothing more than blanks or paintballs. It was a relief from pent up emotions. But life was okay and she was coping. 

But when Emilia lost that little girl who'd become her mentee. When the little girl became a teenager and volunteered and died, Emilia would feel the pain. She would mourn that little girl who'd been as near as a daughter to her as seemed possible. She would cry in the privacy of her own home, blame herself and wonder if there had been something she could have done different. And in those months nothing seemed to be able to relieve the pain stuffed in her chest, but she had learned pain was better than numbness and so she clung to it. Clung to the pain for fear of the deadening of sensation that she knew came when she hid from the pain. 

Months passed in this way, clinging to the pain. She was tired and nauseous and that too she blamed on the nightmares, or rather refused to believe what else they might lead to. Her husband was away more. Rebellion thick on his skin when he returned. And he would be the one to mention she looked different, though by this point after loss after loss he knew better than to point out what seemed different. That could lead to tears and anxiety, it was easier to Emilia to just pretend she wasn't.  It when clothes begin to fit differently and still nausea clings worse than ever before, she was forced face the reality. And at eighteen weeks she was confirmed pregnant, a miracle, the furthest she'd ever made it since the very first. And at twenty-two weeks she was told she was having twins. 

Everything was great, everything grand. Emilia had finally set up a nursery, her husband was keeping home more, and for the first time in seventeen years Emilia felt well and truly happy despite the still present morning sickness. But as with everything it seemed, life was intent to tear her down and at twenty-six weeks pregnant she stood for another reaping. A reaping that would throw her daughter, the one she had birthed a mere six months after her own victory, at the arena with no hope and Emilia's world would come tearing down around her again within a couple of weeks. 

But Emilia was good at acting. So good that she almost convinced herself she was okay. Her beloved died, but two and a half months later she gave birth to two more children. And though numbness had seeked her out again, dragged her under, she was great at smiling for the cameras. Happy mom happy life despite the warning obviously dolled out by the Capitol. Everything looked and seemed fine. But under it all lulled a sense of dread and failure. Post partum depression danced in hellish circles with the depression and anxiety she was acquainted with. 

And when a year after the death of her beloved first child, the Capitol threw a wicked curve ball - resurrected tributes; the mentee, the beloved, and the father all in the arena again, Emilia could no longer ward off the cold clutches of numbness. Desperation sang out, and one by one she watched as her loved ones died in screen again, Tony gone when one right after the other Diana and Amada died within half an hour. She fell into the only relief she knew in the absence of her husband. Even with Metztli and her children with her, she fell, succumbed to the icy tendrils of nothing and gave in. 

Addiction : the fact or condition of being addicted to a particular substance, thing, or activity

Addictions are tricky things. The vast majority of people deal with an addiction in some form; caffeine, tobacco, alcohol. But for some addiction runs deeper than those accepted by society. For some, addiction comes in the form of cocaine or morphling or heroine. For some addiction comes in the form of harming oneself. Whatever it is, from socially acceptable, to those often hidden, there is one universal truth. Addiction is hard to kick, addiction with fight you with headaches and convulsions, paranoia and exhaustion. Addiction is not willing to let you go easily.  

Addiction is a hard thing to fight off and nearly ten years after making the choice to be sober, Emilia gave in again. She sought out the only solace she knew, the only thing that was sure to make feeling something possible again. Cocaine was an old friend, and easy to come by, especially when she knew where her old stashes were kept. But when stashes ran out and the itch grew stronger, contacts were made and old acquaintances pulled in. 

And for a while, the old friend worked well. A line or two here or there, kept secret and behind closed doors and she could at least pretend. She could pretend behind her suits of white and her hair pulled back that she was once again that picture perfect victor. But that perfect picture was always a lie, had always been so. The poised and polished exterior hid her darkest of secrets just as it had in her early years of victory. She could stand tall (as tall as she could at 5’2”) when the nothingness was dulled by the euphoria of drugs. She could smile and wave, give advice and live. But is it really living when you're a slave to something else? 

For Emilia it was as good as, at least while her life still maintained some semblance of normal. But when shit hit the fan and the world around her seemed to crumble, fires spread and houses broken into, lives lost and bombs set, and Tony... Tony in the thick of it. When Emilia didn't even know where her husband was, left at home with the kids and her in laws, in laws that took more care of the kids at that point that she did, well not even the comfort of her drug of choice could bring her back from the deep seeded, vast emptiness she felt. Emptiness to stave off the constant worry, emptiness to stave off the anxiety, emptiness to stave off days spent in bed... But when her days were spent aimlessly, wandering and without any emotion to give purpose, when the emptiness could no longer be staved off Emilia found another vice that made her feel something, anything but numb.

It started as half-moon indentations, nails dug into her palm or into the fleshy underside as her arm as she watched news reports of the ongoing rebellion efforts; of bombs set in various districts including her own, of boats set adrift and sank, of factories destroyed and animals let loose, of reported deaths, rebels caught and imprisoned. And it worked for a small while but quickly delved into deeper lacerations. As things got worse so did the numbness and her need to feel anything but, nails in skin no loner could drag her out of the reveries that would suck her in, the what-ifs; what if Tony got caught, what if he was killed, what if they came after her or the kids. 

Half-moon indentations gave way to thin lines of red, to the cool press of metal against skin, one of Tony’s straight razors taken to the thick of her thighs or the tender skin of her belly. And not long after the rebellion would fall quiet, Tony would return home, injured but safe. But the thing with addiction, a fact Emilia knew entirely too well, was that addictions were not easy to kick, no matter what the addiction was. But she could feel something now, even if that feeling was a sharp pain, even if she often chased the pain with a line of euphoria, even if her husband was home to hold and comfort. 

At least again she could pretend, a facade falling back into place and just in time for her to be thrown back into the public face for the Victor’s Ball.

[veridium]

You Want Writing Tips? You Got Writing Tips

Hello, lovelies. So, in light of my Q&A last night and receiving some asks about writing fanfic/in general, I wanted to make a text post paired with what I said -- mostly for accessibility reasons. I want to restate the fact that I am in no way an exceptional/professional-level/goddess of writing, I am simply someone who wants to encourage and provide some helpful advice to anyone who may be struggling or starting. My opinions and perspective are not sacrosanct by any means.

That being said my advice is mostly about existing as a writer, authoring fanfic, and building confidence as a creative. I am not interested in conscripting people to my personal style focus at all. This is meant to be an encouraging primer more than anything. Some of these will echo my Q&A as well.

1). Writing is first and foremost a practice to enjoy and be fulfilled by for your own creative needs and tastes. 

Yes, we post and promote our fanfictions on multiple platforms, clamor for likes and comments, the whole nine yards. That means it’s easy for all of us regardless of how long we’ve been at it to forget that writing fic is primarily for our own enjoyment and gratification. As creatives we can be told our work is frivolous unless it gathers some sort of outside aplomb, and that our labor is useless without attention. This is not true, and is a pernicious form of suppression. 

If you get a lot of feedback and reader response on your work, fabulous! I’m so happy for you. But I am also happy for you if you manage to finish and post a chapter or a ficlet in the first place. That is hard work, and it’s not something everyone does everyday. Be proud of yourself knowing you’re practicing an art form that not only brings you joy but provides an opportunity to connect with others. 

2). Tumblr is not the Gauntlet of Talent. 

I know it’s also easy to assume that Tumblr is the ultimate bastion of affirmation given the prolific presence of fandom and fanfic. But, let’s be real: we all know this site is a garbage fire. It has been, it is now, and it will be in the future. The way it hinders creative content and its creators is appalling. With that in mind, getting less-than-jubilant responses from the Tumblr-verse is not a sign that you lack talent, capability, or original ideas by default. Once again I wish to point out that writing should be something we all do for our own sakes, for our outlets and desires. Having Tumblr fandom attention is nice, and it feels supportive in my experience more often than not, but it’s also fraught and can get lost in the trivialities of popularity.

Fandom should be community, rather than fame oriented. We should be looking to each other for encouragement, helpful critique, and new, fresh perspectives. We should also respect those among us who do not wish to engage or attend to the attentions of others -- introverted creators matter too, and their points of view are valid. 

Tumblr fame does absolutely infer talent, and vice-versa. 

3. Writing is a Wonderful Opportunity to Build Good Habits. 

The culture of writing until you drop, of staving off your priorities and needs in order to dedicate “fully,” is toxic. It is also unfortunate that idea of “success” is so pervasive because writing can be a neat chance to instill some helpful habits into your routine. From my personal experience, writing is a wonderful thing to do to wind down at the end of my day: I settle in after a shower and dinner wearing my comfy pajamas and I write for a couple hours, water bottle nearby. I listen to music, watch movies if I need muse/inspiration, and enjoy my introvert time. 

Writing as a routine activity can be a conduit for good habits, like hydrating, exercise, other forms of art, and reading books. It can inspire you to change up some old regimens and think in new ways. Writing isn’t just the physical act of writing or typing words, it’s a process. Your productivity and balance is entangled with the rest of your goings-on, your responsibilities, and environment. You can use that to your advantage! 

Because of my writing I have had an excuse to hike/walk more, something I have not always had the time or ability to do whether it be for my chronic illness or demanding schedule. Now I find I am much more relaxed, my anxiety episodes are fewer and far in between, and I enjoy where I live more. Writing has helped me not only as a creative endeavor but as a life habit, and in return my stories have benefited. 

4). Care, Genuinely Care, About Your Non-CisHet White Characters. 

Please. Please care. I’m not just saying like them or craft them, I mean interrogate why and how you’re making them the way you are. If you’re letting them fall into a disempowering trope, ask yourself what the purpose of having a one-dimensional or stereotypical character is for you. If you’re constructing a cis woman character for example who is struggling with internalized standards for femininity or gender roles, that’s one thing and that can be a really interesting character development. 

But if your character is stagnant within that point of view, and their adversities/experiences are not engaging with them, you should ask yourself why. If you’re writing a perspective you do not personally have -- queerness, non-cisness, ability, etc. -- you REALLY need to be critical about what you’re writing. It may not intimately impact you, but it does impact readers who have those identities. If you’re white and you’re writing non-white characters it does not matter whether your universe is fantasy or not, you are and will be writing from a white gaze imbued with racism. You have to constantly monitor and check in with that.

As a Femslash writer one of the things that saddens me the most is when I read a cis woman character that feels one-dimensional, dependent on how other characters look at her rather than someone with their own sense of self, and like they can’t manage for themselves on some level. It’s one thing to grow from those traits and become confident or independent over time -- OR EVEN MORE DEPENDENT AND LESS CONFIDENT BECAUSE SHIT HAPPENS LIKE THAT TOO! -- but the heart of the matter is that there should be changes, fluxes, and impressions in a character’s sense of self. 

Try to think about how your own social conditioning has influenced the way you see these kinds of people in your every day. Think about how you could be infusing biases and unnecessary shortcomings into your characters based off of those misunderstandings. Female characters can be detestable, evil, malignant. They can be modest, or promiscuous, or both! They can be quick to anger, or struggle with depression. There are an infinite number of possibilities, so much so that writing a flat, meek caricature to be a waste of time. 

--

These are my main tips I would give to anyone wishing for my perspective. As I stated before, I am no sage expert on the craft of writing. Truly, I don’t think anyone is. The point is to have conversation, to engage thoughtfully for the betterment of our writing and each other’s. We’re a community and that is what we do. 

I hope this is helpful and constructively encouraging, because that is what we deserve from ourselves and each other. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to inbox me or message me directly. Sending love and light to you all!

-Veri

[jojoingjoseph]

A breath, a breeze lifting from his lungs, it was the foundation for Hamon..

As much as it was a pain to get up, it was far better to be busying himself with something or other just to stop himself from doing nothing but lay in a depressive funk all damn day. It wasn’t in his nature to be so apathetic towards just about everything, the slow inhales and exhales filling and exiting out through his nostrils.

Inhale for ten minutes, 

                                           Exhale for Ten minutes....

Just as Machina and Logs had ruthlessly ground into his and Caesar’s heads back then. Perhaps a swim would do him well as opposed to going on a jog, it was easier on the limbs and joints but still held the challenge for how long he could hold his breath. Truly, anything just to break the drone of a stagnant mind and empty heart.

Mediation wasn’t much of his thing anyway... That was more of Caesar’s thing whenever the brunet caught him during such times of serene peace. How the Idiot could stand to be in one place for so long was beyond him, though the Notion of attaining a certain Peace was not lost on the Joestar.

Hard work... God how he Hated it but doing this was necessary in the grand scheme of things. He knew it very well within the inner workings of his mind to keep up on his training instead of letting it slip through his hands like Sand. Perhaps as a memory, perhaps just to stave off a downward turn of emotions that can’t be helped, perhaps... just to pass the time.

It was no doubt people’d call him Crazy for what he had come to know and take to heart, for all of it had yet to happen ‘in a sense’. An older version of himself, the stories heard; Slacking off on his strengths wasn’t an option anymore than it was truly more of a simple survival against the unseen obstacles that now strewn perilously over his chosen path. 

[honeygrip]

Untitled...

I haven’t written anything in a LONG time.

As cathartic as writing has always been for me, I grew fatigued by writing about bleak subject matter.

I staved off writing for as long as I could.

Today however, I felt this immense craving, it was time for me to say something.

I’ve been grappling with how to admit this, finding the right words to convey to the right “audience” of people who would be compassionate and nonjudgmental enough to understand, trying to come to terms with how in depth I wanted to go here with this subject matter altogether, because it is so personal to me. Because it is something, I’ve worked so hard to not have to acknowledge, and because I find most people really don’t “understand”.

Depression is not for everyone.

The Depression discussion isn’t for your casual acquaintances. Its not for your Facebook statuses. It’s not a conversation you want to have with your co-workers or your boss or your family or even your “closest” friends. It’s not an ice breaker. And It’s not how you reveal yourself charmingly in the early phases of a budding new relationship.

It’s not a dialogue you want to start when you’re unsure of how others are going to react. It’s not an exchange you want to engage in when you are anxiously terrified about what is happening to you but still polite enough to not want to worry anyone else around you.

I didn’t want to be babied. I didn’t want to be hospitalized. I didn’t want people to be afraid of me or worse- abandon me completely. There were times when I was scared for my life because I felt so hopeless. But in the next second, I would know, that I didn’t want to acknowledge that idea in any real way because once I did, I would be labeled and stigmatized.

ESPECIALLY WITHIN THE BLACK COMMUNITY.

And So, I isolated myself. It was time for me to put together a plan of action to save my own life. I reached out to my FB community very vaguely asking for help with finding a good (and affordable) therapist.

That was the easiest part of the last few months of my life. The QUEST that began to find a quality, licensed therapist inside of my network of shitty insurance who was taking new patients and wasn’t demanding all sorts of other large exorbitant payments from me on top of my copay was exhausting.

You’d think with all these health and mental wellness experts abound, that it would be easier-but it wasn’t. I am fortunate enough to have a decent paying job, and since I don’t directly benefit from any magical government subsidies, it seemed like it was harder to find adequate resources.

I was... NO, I am mentally ill. But since I haven’t had a complete mental breakdown, or done something so drastically dangerous to myself or someone else, I was... and am NOT considered- a high priority case.

I am a perfectly functioning adult, dying inside, right here in plain sight.

Truth is, I couldn’t afford a “mental breakdown” even if I tried. Although, a full on “mental breakdown” does sound glorious...

A few days locked up in a hospital, resting, highly medicated and regularly monitored actually sounds fucking delightful!

But I had life here, my beautiful 10 year old daughter, my bills and my commitment to my daily obligations to consider. If I stopped working, EVERYTHING in my life would stop working. That desperate realization alone was enough to keep going.

My pride and my misanthropic attitude made it difficult for me to find people “close” enough to talk to. It’s hard for me (personally) to ask for help. I understand everyone is busy, EVERYONE IS COPING. I’m an empath, so I already know this about other people and understand it well. I never want to be a burden to anyone. When you’re in the depths of a depression, like I was (I’m slowly coming out of it now) I wasn’t sure if I was really hitting bottom enough that I needed help. I just knew I was exhausted all the time, that my heart is completely broken and that I felt so stagnant that I just couldn’t figure out a good reason to go on.

I was so desperate. Something had to change, something had to stop, and it needed to happen quickly.

I couldn’t be fake about it anymore.

Couldn’t be preoccupied by a social life because I wasn’t living. I didn’t (still don’t) want to go out. I don’t want to be seen or social. And I didn’t want to let anyone in.

People say they are “always there” if you need them but they’re not. Especially when “there” is a dank, dark place that’s not particularly positive a majority of the time. So naturally, “Friendships” imploded.

Relationshits (not a typo) never existed to begin with.

I would get text messages occasionally that I couldn’t answer. I literally just could not (be bothered to) answer.

Some check-ins weren’t personal enough to tell them the truth.

Some were too personal to go into depth with.

If I tell you, I’m not doing too well and you press further (as a good friend would) how could I dance my way around delving deeper without offending you?

What about when I tell you and your response is as vague and generally unsupportive as some that I received...

I was at a complete standstill.

I didn’t and still don’t want prayers or positive mantras, suggestions on books to read, meditations to try. And Thank you!

But NO.

I needed definitive plans of action and new strategies to attack this and NO ONE could give me that but me.

Isolation is NOT good but I needed to be truly alone with myself. Not distracting myself with nonsense or nonsense people and not self medicating.

I thank God that I wasn’t truly suicidal, although some days, I wasn’t sure. For as hopeless as I felt, I was able to keep my wits about me for the most part, I was resilient enough to focus on getting into some sort of therapy and committing myself whole soul and heartedly to getting well.

My first few sessions with my therapist felt a bit pointless. I’d just sit here and talk and talk and talk. She’d say something wise, I’d cry like a blubbering lunatic and then she’d send me on my way.

My therapist was also adamant about me going to a psychiatrist and getting on medication. I was resisting because I didn’t want to admit that I needed antidepressants to be well and I also didn’t want to have to go back out on another QUEST to find another doctor in my network of shitty insurance who was taking on new patients and wasn’t going to charge me violent rates of $250-$350 an hour for a consultation.

Finding a psychiatrist in my network of shitty insurance took me another month and a half, which had me going to therapy wondering if it was ever going to work because I needed the 2 for 1 service to begin to feel relief.

I was suffering through insomnia every night. That tremendous pressure on my chest of wanting to cry but not being able to. Of wanting to breathe but not being able to, of wanting to STOP crying but not being able to.

Because I wasn’t sleeping, I’d be a zombie most of the day. So, I sleep whenever I can, and sometimes sleep comes when I should be the most present.

I’m checked out emotionally, mentally, physically and I hate everyone. Exhausted by frustration. When I tell my therapist I’m so tired, she always chastises me.

“You’re not “tired”- YOU’RE DEPRESSED.”

She tells me, I have to own it, not hide it.

And therefore, I am...

Although, I’m still not ready to “talk” about it. It’s become evident to me that I have to honor myself and my gift of writing by actually WRITING about it.

Writing and journaling is actually a part of my prescribed homework, even though I had sworn off writing about anything until I had found something happy or positive to talk about. Here I am—writing.

Writing from the deep beyond, the depths of heartbreak, in the midst of a self imposed Cold War. Little to no communication with the outside world. Rarely engaging with ANYONE, and releasing any guilt or shame I felt about not being social.

I hardly go on social media anymore, because it’s wildly triggering for me. I’ve blocked any relatively toxic person who could contact me. I live in an innocuous bubble of my personal daily routine.

What’s most peculiar is the randomness of the people who do reach out to me. Folks I don’t actually know, who DM’d me- “to check on me”. Those who still check in, no matter how sporadically I respond. Those truly understanding few who have left me alone completely and those who don’t AT ALL.

The longing in my heart for those I wish cared, the amount of time it’s taking me to sync the intellectual realities with my emotional fantasies or is it my intellectual fantasies with my emotional realities- at any rate- it fucking hurts knowing I’ve chosen- against my best self interest to care for people who do not care about me. And every so often, I get mad at myself for still even thinking about that fact.

There are things about myself and how I love and how I cope- that I am learning for the first time. There are new ways that I am learning how to love myself and understand myself for the first time as well. I’ve been on the precipice of all this before- but each time I discover how childhood traumas relate to present day wounds- and how they show up in my behaviors and I’m astounded in a new way.

I am reluctantly sharing all this because our people don’t talk about depression in the present tense. Most talk about it as if it’s something they’ve miraculously conquered but never as something they miraculously endure.

Depression may come to some in phases but it isn’t just a phase, and it’s okay to be depressed as long as you don’t give up completely. As long as you are seeking to find a way to conquer it, and not pretending your Cold War is over.

♥️

[thefoldedbird]

I just really don’t have motivation at my job anymore. Got it’s so repetitive and boring. Which, duh, it’s labworks but like…

I have genuinely considered quitting and taking up food service again. Pay cut and shitty people. The whole package.

The only thing stopping me is the pay. But with this sell they’ve done that might not even stick around.

…long story short I feel very stagnant these days.

Which I feel is very valid even without the fact that for the next 5-12 (possibly 18) months I am no longer allowed any upward momentum at my company due to the sell.

Shift work sucks. I have no time for studying or hobbies. It’s go home, sleep, take care of the house, try to squeeze in something I enjoy to stave off this looming depression and then back to work I go…

I need a new job with stable hours like yesterday.

[revpauljbern]

They Say There’s an Economic Crash Coming, But Will It Really Happen?

The Coming Economic Reset and the Bible

by Minister Paul J. Bern

For a website view, click here :-)

The profligate $22 trillion dollar deficit currently being foisted on the backs of scores of millions of hardworking Americans by their federal government is, based on observation, one of the greatest rip-offs in the history of humanity. The Federal Reserve, which everybody knows by now to be neither, is the primary player in this scam, and certain elements of the US government are its enablers. The root cause of this problem is the way our capitalist economic system operates, which is that it is based on debt as a way to create money. For hundreds of years our economic system has worked just fine just as it is, and many have benefited from its existence, including myself.

But more recently capitalism has become problematic due to one thing – population increase. Once the earth's population eclipsed 5 billion in 1987, there were too many people that wanted their fair share of capitalism's profits, and so all our fair shares have been dwindling ever since in the form of stagnant wages. Since then, humanity has passed the 7 billion mark back in 1999, and we will leap over the 8 billion mark sometime in the early 2020's. The end result, from capitalism's standpoint, is that too many people are competing for their chunk of the profits, while too few already have far more than their fair share. Our modern term for this is 'economic inequality', and the US in particular has a huge problem with this. Continental Europe (including Great Britain) is also experiencing increasing issues with inequality, as the “yellow vest” protests in France, as well as the civil unrest in Greece, Italy, Spain and elsewhere attest to.

So to come full circle, capitalism is a debt-based economic system, but debt is slavery because those who are repaying their debts are legally bound and obligated to them until they are repaid. So logic would then dictate this: Capitalism is a debt-based economic system; debt is slavery; therefore, capitalism is slavery, or more accurately has devolved into slavery in the 21st century. Realities change and paradigms change, and both by the force of human progress. Now, before any of my prosperity-loving readers become upset with me, I am certainly no Communist or Socialist – I will admit to being a bit of a hippie, but I say that with pride and enthusiasm. Both of those economic systems and/or ideologies have already been tried, and they have all ultimately failed miserably, such as Soviet Russia, Castro's Cuba, North Korea and Venezuela, to name a few.

But all of those who are capitalism's proponents are overlooking an important set of facts, and that is what the Bible says about indebtedness, debt repayment and debt forgiveness. That last one concerning the forgiveness of debt is what the die-hard capitalists have the biggest problem with. Yet strangely enough, nearly all of them self-identify as Christians. They seem to have forgotten the part of the Lord's prayer that says, “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us”. Don't expect to be forgiven if you yourself refuse to forgive the wrongs of others, whether real or imagined. Based on that alone, it would be good if I could interject some relevant Scriptures over the next page or so, together with some background and explanation of how these ancient Scriptures still apply to modern life. All these truths come from the writing of Moses, so let me start with Leviticus.

“8) “Count off seven sabbath years – seven times seven years – so that the seven sabbath years amount to a period of forty-nine years. 9) Then have the trumpet sounded everywhere on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement sound the trumpet throughout your land. 10) Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you; each of you is to return to your family property and to your own clan. 11) The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; do not sow and do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the untended vines. 12) For it is a jubilee and is to be holy for you; eat only what is taken directly from the fields. 13) In this Year of Jubilee everyone is to return to their own property.” (Leviticus 25, verses 8-13)

Now, just to set the record straight, a “sabbath year” is defined earlier in this passage, in verses 3 through 5: “For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops. But in the seventh year the land is to have a year of sabbath rest, a sabbath to the Lord. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest.” At first glance, this would not seem to apply to modern life. After all, we no longer live in an agrarian-based society. But this way of life could still be applicable to the times in which we live. Overpopulation has been a concern for the last generation or so, probably more. Yet one fourth of the world's population still does not have access to clean running water. So what if everybody took a whole year off and hooked up the entire world with clean water and sanitation? The world sure would be a lot better place, inhabited by a lot better caliber of people, than it is now. That could be one version of a modern Sabbath year.

“Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you; each of you is to return to your family property and to your own clan. The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; do not sow and do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the untended vines.” In modern times, instead of crops in the field, we should be tending to one another since there are so many of us. Imagine having an entire year of paid family leave! That's just one way that these commandments of old can be renewed and their relevance refreshed, I'm sure you can think of some more. “For it is a jubilee and is to be holy for you; eat only what is taken directly from the fields. In this Year of Jubilee everyone is to return to their own property.” Remember that slavery was still legal back in those days. Anyone who had sold themselves into slavery to repay a debt, which was common, was free to return home to their families. The same thing applied to mortgages, as we see in verse 13. It still does – which is why 30 year mortgages are sinful for both borrower and lender. Let that one sink in for a minute.

Now let me quote from a second example before tying this all together. “1) At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts. 2) This is how it is to be done: Every creditor shall cancel any loan they have made to a fellow Israelite. They shall not require payment from anyone among their own people, because the Lord’s time for canceling debts has been proclaimed. 3) You may require payment from a foreigner, but you must cancel any debt your fellow Israelite owes you. 4) However, there need be no poor people among you, for in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess as your inheritance, he will richly bless you, 5) if only you fully obey the Lord your God and are careful to follow all these commands I am giving you today.” (Deuteronomy 15, verses 1-5)

By now all of you have noticed that our economic system, together with the mortgage and payday and vehicle title loan businesses, are not even in the ball park compared to God's instructions to Moses, which have been handed down to the rest of us. Some of you will be surprised to learn that any loan lasting longer than seven years runs contrary to the instructions contained in the Scriptures. Also, notice in verse 3, where the Lord Almighty says it's OK to lend to foreigners, which means 'non-Jews' in this context, but extends to everyone in modern times simply because there are so many of us. If this is starting to sound like it includes those who are applying to cross America's southern border, you are absolutely right.

“However, there need be no poor people among you,...” If, says the Lord Almighty, we obey these commands, everyone will have enough, and there will be no one needy among us. But modern capitalism has devolved into a contest of “whoever takes the most wins”, which is exactly the opposite of what the above passages of Scripture tell us to do. Consequently, the western capitalist-based economies are in real danger of collapse for the first time in living memory for all but the oldest of Americans, who still remember the Great Depression. Debt has now reached unprecedented levels, and the interest on the deficits of the world's governments are accruing faster than the principals can be repaid. A financial implosion is on the horizon – not just America's, but the entire world's economies will soon crash. Once the federal reserve runs out of debt from which to create money (see fractional reserve lending), there will be no one left to lend to, and the world's finances will run dry. This will included the world's banking systems as well as the economies of entire countries. And all this will be occurring because some insanely selfish people can never get enough money, wealth and prestige, all of which are illusions.

So ultimately, the world's economies are going to have to be rebooted sooner or later. It will be the only way to stave off disaster. If anyone has money in the stock market, better get your money out of there before you lose it, and I'm not kidding. Anywhere is better than Wall Street's gambling casino. And, when the day finally comes when all the world's economies have to be reset, instead of gold and silver, I would invest in ammunition, nonperishable food, tools and barter items as a way to survive what's coming. A ton of gold will do you no good if there's no way to sell it. Our money could become worthless, or close to it. One dollar in 1913 is worth 4 cents today, which is why I say that hyperinflation isn't on the horizon. It's already here, and we've got it in spades. Four stinking cents? Just think about that and let it sink in for a minute, and you'll see how far we've fallen. And we're going to have to pick ourselves up, because the government will no longer be able to help us. Let that one sink in too.

[nosfaruto]

My goal is to stop hating myself so much and to stop being chained to what I think I should be doing. And to not be so damn down and stagnant. Up til 5am, hoping for a way to stave off the next day which ironically results in me getting less sunlight leading to worsened depression. I envy people that can just get going like it's nothing. I probably need to fucking sleep

[socialoligarchy-blog]

Activity 2: Introverted Extrovert

Growing up, I was effectively socialized to be introverted, but in my adult life I find myself needing the comforts of extroversion in order to stave off depressive feelings.

I never had an easy time fitting in with people. Growing up, I was with my parents and their friends a lot; multiple times a year, at least every two months, we would go to a science fiction convention, either in Detroit or Chicago. This sparked an innate love of the genre, and of fantasy, as well as a desire to talk about those things.

However, due to the other children in my town not being into as many weird, more grown up subjects, and my emotional instability at the time, I did not have all that many friends who lived near by who had many overlapping interests. The friends I did have often lived in far-flung locations, most only seen at conventions.

This lack of close friends, both geographically and socially, led me to never really learn how to interact with people properly once I did overcome my emotional failings. I have trouble engaging with people, especially when I have to initiate, and I often find it hard to keep a conversation moving forward. This, to my understanding, is exemplary to an introvert, and would normally be fine.

The issue runs into how I feel when I am by myself. I often need and crave social interaction in order to feel happy and to get work done. Without interaction, I can become stagnant and unfocused, with work falling to the side of my attention in favor of creature comforts and distractions.

The biggest issue this mismatched socialization poses is the fact that I don’t have the skills needed to meet and maintain people who function similarly to me; everyone I hang out with regularly need introversion in order to be happy, which means that I have minimal access to people.

I fit into a weird place, socially. I’m not really able to be alone with myself very easily, but I also lack the social group needed to be with other people. Often times, I feel like a wanderer, drifting at the fringes of various other tribes, unable to actually find one and be happy with them. A jack of all tribes, but a member of none, so to speak. Functionally, it’s difficult to pin down how I aid social institutions. I don’t fully understand just where I fit, so knowing what gears turn around and because of me is even more difficult.

In a conflict sense, I understand exactly how I function; my desire for social interaction leads me to give up my own power to other people, hoping that they engage with me. This can be off-putting or annoying, even a little scary, to people, especially when the person in question is someone who needs to be alone more often than not.

[cryptic-baby-blog]

The Advice Everyone Needs To Know About Depression

Depression is a condition that needs to be taken seriously. It can cause some pretty serious side effects. There is a plethora of information available when it comes to depression. Following is an article on depression in which you some helpful tips:

When you have a negative thought about yourself, consider whether you are being more harsh with yourself than you would be with others. If the answer is no, then you're being unfair to yourself. Try to retrain your thinking into statements that suggest solutions to the problem.

Take up a new hobby, an instrument or join a class that teaches and provides fun interaction with others.No matter what you decide, the key is to remember that new interests can help you treat your depression.

Dealing with personal issues in your life can help you manage depression better. Take baby steps to avoid becoming overwhelmed and take on tasks one or two at a time. You can work on your depression and lessen its effects by making smaller goals.

For instance, if you feel that you aren't in the best shape and is makes you feel blue, do something to change it. Get on a treadmill as soon as possible and take the bull by the horns.

As the saying goes, if one has hope, one can have a reason to keep going and looking for a better future.

You may not exactly be depressed if you feeling blue. https://creepellex.tumblr.com/

Music can be great for dealing with depression, but be cautious about the kids of music you choose to listen to. Don't focus on music that require a lot of thought. This music will make you dwell on your own feelings.

This is true for just about every type of art, because getting involved with them could be a good way for you to learn to deal with any hard times.

Consider investing in a journal if you are depressed. Putting your feelings and thoughts on paper can really help you feel better. The journal can also be useful for determining if there are any particular items that trigger your depression.

Take your prescription anti-depressant medication at a set time each day; the morning is preferred.

When experiencing depression, you can retreat further into yourself and avoid social activities, but the truth is, these activities can help you feel better. Being around others can help make your depressed feelings retreat, even if only for a bit of time. You won't be as depressed if you have a full calender.

You can resist depression by staying positive.

Take little steps at first and progressively move forward as you gradually pass through depression. Taking steps in a much slower manner helps you deal with your feelings.

If depression is something you are at risk for, try keeping a daily journal. This helps you spot triggers and keep depression because you'll be able to see what your moods are like.

One way to cope with depression is to understand those things that trigger your depressive feelings.

This is easy to say than to do since our minds can easily default to the negative thoughts before positive ones. Try to keep track of your thoughts and actions into specific words.

Getting enough sleep you need can lessen your depression.Both physical and mental health suffer if you don't get enough sleep. If insomnia is a problem, meditate before bed or discuss your problem with your doctor, or speak with your physician with regard to medications that may help.

Exercise has been scientifically proven method for combating depression. Exercise elevates the levels of endorphins in your body which lead to pleasant feelings. If you are feeling down, exercise can put you in a better mood. It can be simple like spending an hour each day to jogging.

Cognitive behavioral therapy or interpersonal therapy can both help with the symptoms of depression. Interpersonal therapy helps you explore your interactions with other people. Cognitive behavior therapy deals with changing your negative thoughts into positive ones.

Avoid the use of "crutches" in your depression that ultimately only lead to other problems. Some people are prone to turning to alcohol in order to relieve their depression.

This will not help you or you. If you're starting to realize this and keep yourself from becoming carried away, be aware of it and immediately switch into talking about something more positive to help you from falling further into that depressed state.

Depression and stress should also focus on dealing with together. Getting a good night's sleep each night is vital to managing stress and body to deal with this stress.

Develop some interests to stave off depression. A lack of depression is boredom or idleness. Even if your daily schedule is packed, you can still become bored. There are a number of interests that will assist you can pursue in order to help fight depression.

Make changes in your life if you are suffering from depression. Even small change can make a big difference since remaining stagnant often puts you in a rut. Try changing your daily routine, change up one routine in your daily life, or adding a new hobby. Your mind and physical being will benefit from these changes.

If you are looking for relief from feelings of depression, then try reading a novel you enjoy. A book provides a place to escape to a fictional land with made-up characters and exciting places.

Try a variety of mood improving techniques to battle your depression symptoms. Choose the tips that work well and stick with them. You can be happier if you are determined to try.