#tfw + therapy

[shallowseeker]

Mia Vallens, shit therapist?

I've really enjoyed the shift in how we view Mia Vallens's therapy session. A re-examination of the 13x04 therapy scenes (by others smarter than me) shows that it is Sam who's boxing everyone into "therapy" on false premises and lies.

He's taking advantage of a case to...get free therapy, but also to control the narrative of that therapy. He does this in order to force and control conversations, and then he runs out wounded when it doesn't go his way.

It's also Sam that is forcing Dean and Jack to work together, pushing them to spend time together, because he wants them to bond as quickly as possible (it's only been 10-11 days. Christ, Sam). Both Dean and Jack have said that they need more time. Initially, Jack doesn't even want to go on the case, and he expresses disappointment that Sam hid the full context of the situation from him, but Sam...works on him.

Now, how the therapy pans out isn't totally Mia's fault, per se. She doesn't have the full scope of the situation. Nevertheless, she acts like a bludgeoning hammer, making assumptions and assigning blame instead of asking leading questions.

////

Then, there's this.

And, well. THIS didn't make it into the episode. Mia is greasing the wheels of her patients...with alcohol?

Wes swallows. Finally nods. WES: What do I--? She motions to a BAR CART in the corner. MIA: Have a drink. Try to relax.

13x04 The Big Empty script

Mia, my girl. You were giving Dean the stink-eye for drinking from his flask, but you have a whole-ass BAR CART in your therapy room? Then your dude is nursing “a lowball” in the next scene???

///

(Text Attributions// Supernatural scripts here via @spnscripthunt. Transcripts are located here via SPNWiki. Visit their Tumblr to donate.)

[pendwelling]

save me from the fires of hell.

[mistrelfox]

[vaguely-concerned]

walking through lucanis' mind prison. the tam lin of it all

[creekfiend]

I feel lately like all my psychological hangups are falling like dominos

[yes-im-a-simple-man]

how many caligari edits do i have? yes

[hanakihan]

lmao the mental image of AB!Jinchul and SM!Jinwoo deciding to have a casual sparring match only for it to turn into that Tohru vs Kanna levels of fight playing session that bystanders are straight up terrified while completely amused and casual Gunhee us like ‘ah I see youths are having fun again’ and someone on background ‘sir that’s not ‘having fun’ that’s a land destruction—‘

[gothamcitycentral]

Am I only who thinks about how Charlie immediately starts blaming herself and thinking she’s a failure the second there isn’t someone there to filter out those thoughts? Just me? Okay

[beneathsilverstars]

my five year old: i had a very rough day at school, i kept forgetting to follow the rules. it's so hard! i just forget and forget and forget like siffrin!

[some-greatreward]

seeing a shrink is overrated tbh

[triggerjelly]

send help, I was sending a GIF to my friend with someone flipping you off and I captioned it ‘this is for your mom’ joking about her mom not following me back . TURNS OUT HER MOM NEARLY FUCKING DIED BEFORE??? EXCUSE ME

[followthemadrabbit]

Matthew McConaughey as ʀᴜꜱᴛ ᴄᴏʜʟᴇ in

⸽⸽T⸽⸽r⸽⸽u⸽⸽e⸽⸽ ⸽⸽D⸽⸽e⸽⸽t⸽⸽e⸽⸽c⸽⸽t⸽⸽i⸽⸽v⸽⸽e⸽⸽

ₛₑₐₛₒₙ ₁

ᴅɪʀ. ᴄᴀʀy ᴊᴏᴊɪ ꜰᴜᴋᴜɴᴀɢᴀ

[ancientdreamkdj]

I Will *Through gritted teeth, cold sweating, trembling like a chihuahua* Do My Therapy Homework

because I want to Feel Better

[shallowseeker]

I don't view Sam's responses as "canned." He's consistently shown to be gentle and empathetic.

And you're welcome to argue that.

In my opinion, it just doesn't come as easily to Sam. That he doesn't instinctually connect doesn't mean he doesn't want to. In fact, he tries really hard to checklist the heart-to-heart stuff and "do it right."

Dean navigates emotional conversations by feel, and oddly enough, so does Cas. But Sam? Sam dissociates. He intellectualizes. He approaches emotional difficulties from a safe distance and treats the situation like a puzzle that either needs solving or simply needs to be moved past.

I think this is actually why Sam communicates differently with Eileen Leahy. He talks in a whisper, and more instinctually with his body. He doesn't therapize and wordify his responses as heavily with her, because he has to slow down, so it comes off as more genuine.

And with Rowena, it's a more of "Rowena skips the bullshit." Plus, Rowena copes by "taking control" in minute ways (Rowena: magic, self-help, lore & Sam: lore, food, exercise, etc.) They're the same kind of soul with a similar kind of coping.

///

Anyway, I think Sam's style of connection to Jack and Claire seems, in my opinion, careful and rehearsed-sounding. He has a distinct "therapy" voice, and sometimes that works well to defuse a situation (like Magda)...and sometimes it doesn't. (Different people respond differently to different approaches in different situations, after all! There is no exact template you can stick to all the time.)

///

Anyway, sometimes even Dean lapses into assuming that because Sam has all the academic words, he's somehow "better" at "the talky stuff," but it is, in fact, Dean that is feeling out Jody Mill's distress in 11x12:

Dean SAYS Sam is better at the "talky" stuff, but in my opinion, it's Dean who is the natural. (He and Cas are both a little...sterner and boundary-driven, but they also acknowledge the reality of a situation and admit when someone is right, as we'll see with Claire below.)

///

Claire n' Sam in 11x12:

Claire does come around to Sam; realizes he knows what he's talking about, but they have to work at it much harder to get there. (And then when Sam flips from psychoanalysis to parental authority in 12x16, she flips her shit on him.)

///

Vs Claire n' Dean in 11x12:

He talks down on her level. He keeps it real. He tells her, "And you were right."

///

And later, it's Dean who Claire checks in with:

x - x - x - x - x - x - x - x

[ofdragonsdeep]

14: Telling

Having a marked effect or impact.

Ar'telan is tasked with investigating the source of recent Dravanian activity.

It had been a gruelling climb. Though the gloom that so often pervaded the air around Mor Dhona had not followed them out onto the lake, the sun beat down upon the rusted hull, no protection in its twisted wreckage. The lower sections of the ship - those that were not sunk into the lake proper, at least - had been crawling with Imperials attempting to scavenge the hull for parts, and they had not taken kindly to the intrusion.

Ar'telan had not wanted to be here at all. It had been Ishgard's envoy, Aymeric, who had requested the foray, using it as a means to test that the alliance being offered had meat. Ar'telan did not claim to understand all of the politics being thrown around. His job was to go where he was pointed and do as he was told. He was not even particularly good at that.

Ishgard had a lot of words for their dealings with dragons, and Ar'telan liked none of them. He especially despised defiling the final resting place of a great wyrm, clambering all about the aether-scorched husk of his body as if it were little more than set dressing. He liked the Imperials being there far less, and had thus far managed to justify the foray with also removing the Imperials, but they had all retreated by now. His companions had stayed behind, on what remained of the airship's hulk, to make sure none crawled back on board to catch them by surprise.

Ar'telan made the climb alone.

Sun-dried hide crunched beneath his boots, his book held above his head to try and ward off the worst of the light. Perfectly preserved despite the lake water, the airship that served as its scaffold groaning with every passing wind. It would not be long before the entire thing collapsed into the water, he hoped. Perhaps then they would leave it be.

His ascent was watched. Dragonflies, not dragons true but close enough, buzzed past him at regular intervals, curiosity in their beady eyes. They did not attack him. Nor did the biasts, sunning themselves in the hollow cavities of the dragon's corpse, though they looked. It was clear from their stances that one wrong step would change that state of affairs, though Ar'telan had no idea why they were only watching. None of the dragons he had seen so far in Ishgard had watched. They had shrieked and cried like creatures possessed, and deigned to speak only when death seemed to beckon. Ar'telan knew that if the alliance with Ishgard was pursued, it was only a matter of time before he was forced to fight to the death.

But he did as he was told. Went where he was bade. All he was good for.

The top of the structure was the nose of the Agrias, the top of the great wyrm's coils still lashing it tight even in death. Carefully, Ar'telan picked his way across the blasted metal, and was confronted with a nightmare.

The area was littered with corpses. Two great dragons lay dead on the metal, and countless others hung from the metal, flash-cremated in the moment the ship itself had died. Over them, like a grisly vision, hung the head of the wyrm himself.

Midgardsormr.

The name was known among his people. Spoken like an oath, the father of dragons the closest thing to sacred they had. Without even thinking, Ar'telan dropped to his knees, head bowed in reverence.

Whatever Ishgard hopes to achieve from this, I…

"How curious, that it is thee who comes upon my place of rest."

Ar'telan started at the sound, jumping to his feet, fingers tightening around his codex protectively. The words spoken were not the ones he had understood, but that was so often the case in Eorzea that it took a moment to register the cause.

Dragonspeak.

Before him, illuminated by the light of the sun, hung a ghost. Blue and aetherial, the head which regarded him still burned with the holy fire of life, despite being suspended from something so devoid of it. Midgardsormr. Father of dragons. Somehow, he had defied death itself.

Ar'telan's first instinct was to remember Bahamut, a corpse with life, hung like a trophy in the fragmented prison of Allag's moon-ship. But he felt no wave of Tempering, no incessant tugging on his soul. Only awe.

"I have seen thee, since thy arrival on our shores," said the shade. "Thou art not of Eorzea, but thou art blessed by Hydaelyn."

"I am… I am Meracydian," Ar'telan signed, wondering if that would mean anything to the wyrm. Surely it had to? Even with Bahamut dead and Tiamat silent, he had to know. Surely?

"And yet thy feet move at the beck and call of Ishgard," Midgardsormr said, disdain rippling through each carefully-chosen syllable. He was so close that Ar'telan thought he could reach out and touch the Song, yet he kept a respectful distance. "Dost thou regret, proud child of Meracydia, to be directed as a hound?"

"I am not-"

"Thou art a coward."

Ar'telan caught the noise of surprise before it left his throat. His fingers tightened around his codex at the slight, his taut muscles longing to disprove it.

"Thy steps falter. Thy course, lost. 'Tis only by the grace of thy Mother that thou art alive to stand before me at all."

The Echo. The Blessing. He was nothing without it. He would have died in the Bowl of Embers with all the others, one more Tempered for Ifrit's army of thralls. What right had he to still be standing when he could not face the outside alone?

Ultima had cracked through Hydaelyn's shield like it was nothing, disintegrating what feeble strength she had to throw at it. She was fading, she had acknowledged as much. Why had he deserved to live when so many others had died at the Praetorium that day?

Why had he deserved to live when a part of him had not wanted to fight Lahabrea at all?

"And yet She doth place Her faith in thee."

His voice was less scathing now. Curious, perhaps. Certainly not pleased.

"Thy coming could have been a gift, mortal. Had thy steps brought thee here before the hooks sunk in deep. But there is no conviction in thy countenance. No strength in thy steps. Thou art unworthy of Her gift."

"I did not ask for it to begin with," Ar'telan replied, though some not insignificant part of him screamed at the blasphemy of talking back to the father of dragons. "I didn't ask for any of it. I didn't want any of this! I am not a fighter, not truly. Yet I…"

"Thy fate demands far more of thee than excuses, mortal." Midgardsormr's spectral head tilted to the side, those burning eyes watching him through the fire. "Full many more have a fate unchosen. Thou must rise to it yet. Wilt thou? Or shall thy coward's feet carry thee away once more?"

"What do you want of me?" Ar'telan asked. Midgardsormr rumbled in response, a sound almost like a laugh.

"Prove thyself," he said, and the aether around him began to ripple. "Stand before me and survive, and there may yet be hope."

The aether gathered into a bright, shining point, and one of the dragons on the floor began to stir with something which might once have been life.

"After all that She hath given thee, 'tis the least that thou canst offer in return."

Ar'telan flipped his codex open, one hand hovering above the pages, feeling the arcane ink laced into them begin to respond. Stand before him? Midgardsormr was a creature so ancient he outlasted every tale Meracydia had, stories that had spanned ages, survived calamities. There had been no time before Midgardsormr, to Meracydia. What was one man supposed to offer against the span of timeless ages?

But he had never turned against a dragon's edict before, and even if it cost them Ishgard, he would not do so now.

As Ar'telan wove protective magic around himself, Midgardsormr made a noise that sounded almost pleased.

[lunarsands]

I think a month-long writer's retreat and soaking in a hot spring regularly might fix me