#that in my own lived experience as a PTSD person - my more ''understandable'' traumas hold the same weight as my less ''understandable'' | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

babyspacebatclone · 1 year ago

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Ouff, Number 1….

Personal story below cut. I don’t blame the Autism for this, but it was definitely a factor in that being the reaction I gave.

There’s this one mother at the daycare where I work. To be fair, three years on she has pretty much complete faith in us staff and completely understands when we calmly relay all the ways her two kids have been, as I say, “independent.” She’s a single mom, we understand things, although we also know the kids’ behaviors have causes (that is, the youngest suffers from only getting attention when “naughty,” and the eldest mimics mom’s more “Karen” traits…).

But it took work getting there, and while we understand a lot of her own issues came from places of legitimate trauma I seriously don’t know how as a center we survived the first year.

Very early in that year, I happened to be helping the mobile infant room during breakfast. Not my usual room, but I pitch-hit a lot. It was just me and the lead teacher and four babies, two getting baby oatmeal mixed with puréed fruit and two getting cherrios and chopped fruit. The lead was cutting up the food, her preferred task, and I was sitting spoon feeding the younger babies.

The Lead was already stressed, as one for the older babies had been very proudly “independent” since being dropped off an hour and a half earlier.

It’s at this scene that the mother in question shows up with her youngest.

No problems with drop off, the youngest gets settled in with the table food babies, we’re assuming we have everything handled.

Mr. “Independent” has taken to knocking all his food onto the floor, and it was well and truly time to get him cleaned up and into a jumper so the Lead could have about five minutes not having to worry about him.

Even with not working much with this particular child, it didn’t surprise me a bit that cleaning up involved basically holding him down to rub all the food off his face while he screamed; some babies are like that.

I glanced over my shoulder and winced - in my opinion, the Lead really was being a bit too rough with the task. Not in anything that actually concerned me, just enough where her frustration and older-school experience led her to being more focused on finishing the task fast and not on the kid’s comfort.

I assume, if I’d had a moment, I would have offered to switch quickly, let her know I’d handle him since she’d been vocal about her frustration and I could spin it as giving her a break.

Maybe, maybe not, I don’t always think of those things in time.

But I never had the chance - next thing I know the room gate flies open and a tornado of yelling enters our room.

I was shocked; the mother had been watching us through the room window, which we’s been too distracted to notice. Please remember, this isn’t even her kid getting cleaned; her baby was calmly eating the first bits of her cherrios.

And it wasn’t even the roughness I’d noticed that hd set her off - she was furious at a teacher holding a baby’s head (at the base of the neck) to clean them.

The lead is almost instantly reduced to tears. She tries to defend herself, but there really wasn’t anything she could have said in her defense as the mom unstrapped her child from the high chair.

I was not nearly as far into my C-PTSD recovery as I am now, so I was just sitting in a chair with my back to the pair, trying not to cry myself, feeding the two babies who didn’t seem to care about anything but food, praise everything noble and good.

And then the mom drops this line:

“I know how much you [staff] make!”

(Translation: You guys are making so much money, you should have better standards than this! How do you live with yourselves taking so much money from parents and then abusing children??? Nevermind that any moment of logic lets you realize that the staff physically can’t get all the money directly a parent pays, there are things like food and cleaning supplies and electricity that are required to keep a daycare center open…)

It was a single bark of a laugh. There was literally no way I could have helped it.

Let’s just say, I currently earn about $15 an hour, which is where a contingent of people suggest raising the USA minimum wage to.

There isn’t a teacher I work with who has young children who hasn’t needed county assistance to keep their own kids in daycare, which is gross but a rant for another time.

She didn’t really react to me, at least not that I remember and as said with me focused entirely on the dual tasks of spoon feeding babies and not having a panic attack because my coworker was now running into the bathroom and I was responsible for four babies for the conceivable future.

Fortunately for our sanity, mom ran into my center’s director while trying to gather her second kid, still complaining.

My saint of a boss was able to calm her down enough to listen to her, at the very least, and then somehow convinced her to let the children stay while the director would deal with this.

I cannot imagine how, at all, but it happened.

My laugh had been brought up when the director talked with me, but in a very factual “She mentioned this, she thought it was rude, I tried to explain how much we as staff actually make…” that was complete sympathetic to me.

Anyway…

Yeah. Not a great situation for anyone.

As an Autistic person, I really don’t know how I’ve survived these kinds of parents….

Number 2 reason I refuse to work Lead.

(Number 1 is just finite spoons to responsibility ratio…)

Autistic Traits which are interpreted Rude...

Neurodivergent_lou

#actually autistic #tales from the daycare #autism and being seen as rude #autistic traits #actually traumatized

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shammah8 · 1 year ago

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SPIRITUAL ABUSE There are various types of abuse, including physical, verbal, mental, financial, and others. Each of these types of abuse can cause trauma and soul wounds. However, for the purpose of this chapter, I am focusing on spiritual and emotional abuse. Why?

Because the two most important parts of a person’s being are their spirit and their soul.

I have prayed for and counseled thousands of people over the years who have been victims of someone who has abused their spiritual authority. In my book Unmasking the Accuser, I deal with a condition that I call PTSD (pastoral traumatic stress disorder). Just as many people have experienced post-traumatic stress disorder through exposure to severe trauma (including war, the tragic death of a loved one, or a natural disaster), there are countless people in the body of Christ who have experienced the devastation of spiritual and emotional abuse, often at the hands of an individual in spiritual leadership. Satan is the accuser of the brethren, but many leaders under demonic influence function as “abusers of the brethren.”

The reason why emotional and spiritual abuse are so devastating is that people in spiritual authority represent God, and when these leaders abuse their authority, it is often very difficult for their victims to distinguish between the pain of the abuse and their personal relationship with the Lord. If you have suffered from spiritual abuse, I want you to truly understand this: God did not abuse you, although those representing Him did.

People who are the victims of spiritual abuse can experience soul wounds that are very difficult to overcome. Thankfully, the power of God is greater than the pain of abuse. Our heavenly Father is more than able to heal and restore us when we call upon Him with a heart of sincerity and humility. We may also need to seek help from a trusted Christian counselor.

I remember speaking to someone who had been the victim of extreme spiritual abuse. They had received false prophetic words from their pastor that convinced them to marry a person who happened to be a witch. They were constantly criticized, judged, and controlled by this pastor. They were even told that if they left the fellowship, they would become sick and die. Friends, this type of controlling behavior is demonic! If you find yourself under this kind of abusive leadership, I recommend that you leave immediately and seek counsel from a licensed counselor or other minister who is qualified to give insight in this area.

Another form of spiritual and emotional abuse is when those in church leadership use their influence and power to draw people to themselves rather than to God. This is a form of witchcraft. When people become more committed to their pastor than to Jesus Himself, this is a serious problem. Please do not get me wrong:believe in honoring those in authority over us. However, when honor becomes worship, there is another spirit at work besides the Holy Spirit. We should all love our spiritual leaders and hold them in high esteem. We should even do our best to bless them as much as possible. But again, these things should be done as unto the Lord, according to Scripture; and doing so should draw us closer to God, not create dissonance and chaos in our spiritual lives.

Spiritual abuse can also be wielded in the form of mind games.

Many Christians are literally losing their minds while sitting under certain leaders in the church who “gaslight” them (manipulate them psychologically) but then deny their words and behavior in a way that makes the people under them question their own sanity.

Here are some signs that you are under spiritual abuse:

Decreased ability to hear God’s voice Unproductive spiritual and emotional life Fear of man Constant spiritual and physical infirmity Isolation from family members and friends No longer able to make rational decisions Constant strife and confusion in one’s spiritual life Regression in one’s spiritual life Calamity and devastation in one’s life Extreme financial lack and poverty☕️Kynan Bridges

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system-of-a-feather · 3 years ago

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hi, I think I might have DID, but I also don’t know if I’m for some reason faking it for attention, though I haven’t even told anyone of my suspicions? and i’m a minor so i can’t really get myself screened and i don’t trust my parents enough to tell them. if you could provide any guidance or anything, i would appreciate it so much <3

I strongly do not recommend doing much digging into DID or potentially having a system as a minor unless symptoms are overtly getting intrusive because processing and working through DID is a lot for someone who is still living in an unsafe environment and limited tools to help their own situation out. If you do some personally digging into your experiences, I VERY strongly do not recommend doing trauma work without a professional as a minor living in an unsafe environment.

I know that sounds possibly like me saying "don't try to heal". That is not what I mean, I would recommend focusing on learning and establishing fundamental coping skills - grounding techniques, trying to learn what makes you feel safe, trying to find safe ways to handles increased emotions and symptomology, trying to establish healthy and safe friendships and peers, looking into less-trauma centered symptoms that might not be related to DID but play a role into how you are experiencing things.

Personally, I was aware of having a system around age of 14 and that led to a lot of compounding issues and unfortunate situations because I was 1) incapable of doing much about my situation and 2) overloaded with my age-appropriate identity issues and the stressors of middle school and highschool and 3) had little room to actually have people to support. I didn't really know much of DID until I was like 16 (beyond that I totally couldn't have it I just have people in my head), and didn't actually really think I had it until I was diagnosed.

With that being said, I am very very thankful I was able to get two years of foundational therapy before I even really addressed the DID too directly to get some understanding on how to cope with OCD, PTSD, and to just have someone who could help me navigate surviving highschool and living at home.

I'm very very much of the personal opinion that minors who think they might have DID should probably hold off before jumping into the DID community or digging into it too much, because going through being a mentally ill teenager in an unsafe environment is already a lot to process and deal with and I think its much more important for those teenagers and minors to focus on being a teenager and trying to get through that hard period rather than focusing on the intense complexities that comes with DID.

Additionally, if you do have DID, the first stage in most professional treatment is stabilization which involves learning and gaining a lot of coping tools and self awareness as well as communication with parts. Trauma work and intensely trying to understand every part and all the trauma all parts hold is something we - having been in treatment for 6 years and DID focused treatment for 4 - are only just starting to actually open up.

Having recently cleared "stabilization" for the most part, I very very very very firmly support that it is a very very very important stage in recovering with DID and its very very very important to not skip that stage. Obtaining the coping skills, internal trust, and secure base within yourself is very very important to being able to handle the brunt of the trauma that comes with DID.

So with that said, my best advice would be to probably try to not think too much about having DID or not having DID, but to just look at what things are distressing you and focusing on self care, coping, and how to better care and help yourself because regardless of if you have DID or not, it is something you will likely need to do and at your current age and place in life, that is probably a much more effective, healthier, and safer form of healing to focus on with the resources you have.

I know it isn't easy or always possible, because I too was a mentally ill minor with parents that I could not trust, but if there is a way to get to see any professional for any mental health condition, I would really suggest giving it ago. I was talking to some friends about this, and some therapists suck, so if you do get one bad one, I am sorry and please don't write treatment off, but having a therapist is often better than none.

If you aren't comfortable saying "I think I have trauma" which is completely understandable for many reasons, a little "I was a minor who had abusive parents" trick that worked for me was to pick the LEAST offensive LEAST image breaking (for them) and most beneficial (for them) disorder / mental health issue and pushing that very very hard to just see someone.

We got into therapy first by leveraging a situation that made them more prone to being concerned for once, honestly intentionally played up our distress massively, and insisted that we were really severely distressed about our Trichotillomania (compulsive hair pulling) and that I really couldn't cope with it on my own and I really really needed a professional's help because "it is causing permanent damage to my skin / hair follicles and I might never be able to grow them back and if I never do that then I can't get a job because I look mentally ill" and the "can't get a job" sold my parents enough that they put me into "temporary therapy for 13 weeks"

I'll just tell you that I've been in therapy since.

Anyways, I hope that helped and I hope you can get the help you need sooner than later. Being a minor is hard. Being mentally ill is hard. High school is very hard. You are in a really really difficult place at the moment and I'm proud you are keeping strong. Take care of yourself, you deserve it. ^^

-Riku (Host)

#alter: riku #ask #asks #actuallydid #dissociative identity disorder #minors #minor #minors tw #abuse tw

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avelera · 2 years ago

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Speaking of Behind the Scenes stuff for my dreamling fic Giving Sanctuary, I've got the last two arcs pretty firmly plotted but there were a few scenes along the way that got cut and a few ideas for scenes that just never found a place. At the risk of them showing up later, which at this point I doubt, I thought I'd discuss a few that never made it in and some reasons why:

(Cut for spoilers)

1 ) More stuff about Eleanor. Specifically, to have one of Hob's nightmares (aka, PTSD episodes) tied to holding Eleanor's hand as she died in childbirth.

This is my biggest regret for a plotline that did not make it into the story but that I really, truly, don't see a place for given what is left. Most likely, if it occurs at all, it would be off-screen and mentioned at some later point as one of the nightmares Dream eventually dispatched for Hob.

There's a few reasons why more about Eleanor and her death did not make it into the story. I think the primary one is that it felt somewhat repetitive with the Robyn nightmare of losing a loved one and unlike the loss of Robyn, Eleanor's death isn't something Hob could bond with Dream over to quite the same extent.

All it would really do in practice is reiterate some stuff we already more or less know about Hob's trauma: that he lost his wife in childbirth. Nothing really new is learned there and, if anything, it would more likely distance Dream from him rather than draw them together as Robyn's death memory did because Dream would be shown in great detail someone else Hob loved, even if he lost them. It's not equivalent to Hob meeting Calliope at all, since Hob was eventually shown that Calliope really is done with Dream (and has been for millennia) but Dream would understand and perhaps in his fatalistic way attach to the idea that Hob is still mourning and therefore in love with Eleanor (unlikely to move on) if he was exposed to that memory of Hob's.

Also, I don't want to belittle Eleanor's role in Hob's life or the impact of her loss on his trauma (as a married person and a woman, the last thing I want to do is imply Hob's chosen wife was somehow lesser in his life!), but it was categorically less traumatic for him than Robyn's death, for a variety of reasons. One being: Hob has had many lovers die at this point. It's awful and tragic but it wouldn't have been an entirely new experience for him.

Second, he had someone there for him after and someone he had a responsibility to look after in return after he lost Eleanor, which was Robyn as a ten year old child. Hob didn't have the luxury of wallowing in Eleanor's lost, he had a young son to care for.

Third, just based on my own anecdotal observations over the years, widowers don't necessarily bounce back from losing a spouse, (indeed many many people are utterly destroyed by losing a partner) but losing a child tends to hit parents much, much harder than even losing their spouse. And Hob doesn't strike me as someone who would fall into the spiral we see in the 1600s just from the loss of a lover. He's lost lovers and partners before. He was resigned to the fact he would one day lose Eleanor, if not so soon. He lived in a world with an average 20% chance of a woman dying in childbirth, he would know many people who had lost a spouse that way.

But losing a child who had successfully reached adulthood, Robyn at age 20, an accomplishment that can't be overlooked for the time. As the person that Hob had rebuilt his entire life around with Eleanor gone, it was Robyn's death that really knocked him down into the spiral that lasted 80 years. Hob didn't take serious lovers after Eleanor in GS, specifically so there'd be no challenge to Robyn's birthright, no question of dividing up Hob's fortune. He really had his entire life focused on Robyn at that point. Losing Robyn left Hob completely unmoored in the world.

So, anyway, there's multiple writerly and plot reasons not to show the impact of Eleanor's death on Hob. It was plotted to be there at the beginning indeed, at one point I thought the structure of the entire story would be based around Dream finding and dispatching Hob's points of trauma with flashbacks. But then the Robyn one was so powerful, at least for me, that backtracking to show Eleanor after seemed repetitive and a distraction from the plot by that point, which was Dream and Hob falling in love. The Naxos arc really spelled the end of that, given how long it got, and how it really refocused the story specifically on their loss of their sons and Dream and Hob's love story that emerges from that.

(At the risk of this post already being too long:)

2 ) Another plotline was going to focus on Hob leaving the manor house to walk around London with Dream and having some panic attacks around that. This was another casualty of the Naxos arc, where obviously Hob left the house and had a different sort of panic attack about being left alone in the world by Dream, such that one that takes place in London would be redundant and while based more deeply on his recent PTSD triggers, a panic attack around his own ability to survive alone would be less realistic given he's already been shown to be able to survive in London and would eventually pull himself back together if abandoned there (as we know from 1789 in canon). At least in London, Hob would have more resources at his disposal (like knowing his way around surviving there and speaking the same language) than he does when he has the full on panic attack in Naxos at the prospect of just how entirely screwed he would be, short of getting lucky enough to happen upon an English merchant ship of some sort of hitching a ride back to England as a crew member.

But originally, going back into the city of London was going to be a PTSD episode of its own for Hob. Some elements of this still might happen later in the fic, but it made more sense when the story was focused on finding and dispatching his PTSD triggers specifically, rather than the more back-and-forth of care between him and Dream established by the Naxos arc. Among the things Hob might have encountered in London that set him off were loud, intrusive crowds, people staring at him, a public execution/bodies of executed young men (ie, reminders of Robyn), and the sight of blood in stockyards (reminders of Eleanor's death in childbirth).

Short of it just being a misery tour and a history lecture on life in the 1600s, there were only a few fleeting moments in it that I was particularly attached to and again, I prefer how the Robyn memory worked out, as it was originally going to be much bloodier when triggered by a walk through London, showing Hob seeing his son's body as the point of trauma, but the fact it ended up being the lack of closure and saying goodbye to his son that really kicked off Hob's spiral of misery and agoraphobia felt less overdone and more poignant.

tl;dr Those really are the two biggest ones that don't really have a place with where the story is going. I feel some loss at them not making it in, mostly for how it leaves a bit of a bait-and-switch in the structure where it seems like Dream's focus is just going to be pinpointing and eliminating Hob's PTSD triggers via magical hypnosis therapy, but IMO the way the story has evolved since Naxos is richer and more interesting than that structure, and what Hob actually needs, more than magical hypnosis therapy, is someone he loves to be there for him in his life, and the same applies to Dream, and that theme is the one we'll be exploring in greater depth, over and above the specific traumatic episodes of their past, except where those intertwine and have a mirror in one another.

#1689 fic #giving sanctuary bts #giving sanctuary

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rainbow-fairylandsystem · 2 years ago

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Hi! I'm not officially diagnosed with DID so feel free to not use this in your study, but I have been in DID specific treatment for a year. I decided I don't want DID in my medical records, so I never went through the official diagnostic process.

I'm also not someone who understands my illness as well as other people on here, so I'm just going to try to talk about my own genuine experience.

[1] I would say, for me, I would describe DID as a coping mechanism that I developed as an extremely young child, and now could not live my life without. I have a hard time describing it because its all very confusing to me still. I'm still trying to accept that I even have it.

[2] I find that living with DID has its ups and downs. It makes me very confused a lot of the time, and it actually causes me a lot of physical disability due to repressed trauma having no real outlet besides physical pain. It's really hard to deal with emotions when you're not sure if the emotions are coming from you or from someone else in your system, especially when the emotions are tied to a trigger that you're not aware of. It's also really scary to find out that there are gaps in your memory when you previously weren't aware of it.

That being said, I wouldn't know how to function without DID. My entire adult life has been built by assigning specific responsibilities to specific parts, and I know that I could never do it on my own. Even though I'm the host, I'm still just another part in the system. I'm not built to do everything by myself.

(I honestly find that I struggle more with my PTSD symptoms than I do with my DID symptoms most days.)

[3] The first thing that comes to mind is that not every system part is going to be as complex as a lot of people think. In systems like mine, some parts are built to hold a single emotion, or to hold 5 seconds of a certain memory. Those ones tend not to have names, and don't have a wide range of emotions/interests.

I think its also important to note that it's not always going to be obvious who is 'fronting'. Yes, sometimes its very clear that a defined part is out. Sometimes, though, the lines get blurred. Sometimes multiple parts will be out at once, or sometimes dissociation gets so bad that it feels like no one person is in the front at all. Like I said before, it can be a very confusing disorder (especially for the person experiencing it).

That's all I have to say on it! Feel free to message me if I can be of any more help

-Nimm

Hi!

So im doing a research project on DID in class and wanted to get some opinions and personal opinions from people who actually have DID, rather than exclusively relying on medical info. So, if you'd like to pass this on to your followers, I have some questions.

(Specifically only for people with DID in this case, just since that's what I'm researching, I know there are plenty of other ways to be plural)

-what is, in your opinion, the best way to summarize DID? like, describe it in 1-2 sentences briefly.

-what is it like living with DID? Any details are appreciated

-what is something that is unlikely to be found on medical websites that is good to know and add to my project?

-anything else you want to add

Answer as many as you want

I hope this is okay to send here

Hello! We’re diagnosed with DID, so we’ll gladly answer these questions and encourage our followers with DID to do the same!

[1] As we’d define it, DID (dissociative identity disorder) is a mental disorder characterized by dissociation and two or more separate self-states or personalities in individuals with a history of repeated childhood trauma.

[2] Living with DID is certainly challenging. We deal with lots of memory issues and daily amnesia, trauma flashbacks, a lack of a sense of self and identity, and lots of depersonalization/derealization. Our DID has in some part caused us to develop other mental disorders like depression and anxiety, and we have trauma-induced psychosis as a result of our trauma history which caused us to develop DID.

There’s also been lots of good moments that have come from our disorder. Being a system means we’re able to support, uplift, and be there for one another inside. We’re working on developing a sense of inner-community and showing each other compassion and respect. It’s a work in progress, and we rely on therapy, meds, and our spouse to help us progress and improve!

We made a post on what a typical day looks like for us as a system if you’d like more info - you can check it out here!

[3] That DID systems are people, not merely patients, test subjects, or statistics. We’re not problems to be solved and we’re more of a danger to ourselves than to society at large. DID is widely misunderstood and heavily stigmatized in society, and media often frames us as violent, evil, or incapable of taking care of ourselves - all of which could not be further from the truth. It’s up to us as individuals (singlets included!) to educate ourselves on plurality and dissociative disorders so we can break down negative social stigma and push towards awareness and equality for systems of all sorts!

[4] Nothing else to add, but good luck on your research project! We hope some of this info is useful for you - keep in mind that what we’ve shared are our opinions and perspectives as just one DID system. Other systems may have differing experiences and worldviews!

Thanks so much! And to our followers with DID, please feel welcome to answer these questions to help this asker collect more information for their project!

🌸 Margo and 💫 Parker

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informationsorter · 3 years ago

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Let's talk about self diagnosing.

(This is purely a personal opinion piece.)

CW: Descriptions of hypothetical physical injury.

So I'm going to start off by immediately settling your minds - I believe self diagnosis can be both good and bad. I’m not here to judge, gatekeep, or vilify. *************************************************************

A quick overview of the sections: 3 problems/examples. 5 questions/opinions.

*************************************************************

Determining that you have an issue, does not mean that it is the only issue.

Lets start with a hypothetical example where the self diagnosis is obviously correct:

- You've fallen down the stairs. - You can see a bone sticking out of your leg. - You deduce that you have broken your leg.

This is almost certainly accurate, as there is no healthy explanation for the visible evidence.

However, this may not be the whole story.

What we’re really doing in this situation is identifying symptoms and possible/probably causes.

The symptoms are: - Pain. - Visible evidence of a broken bone. - Visible evidence of wounded skin. - Probably experiencing shock - Pale, cold, clammy skin. Shallow, rapid breathing. Anxiety. Rapid heartbeat. Etc.

The probable diagnosis: A broken leg bone.

When you arrive at the hospital, they will do an x-ray. They may discover additional injuries, for instance the bone may be broken in several places, a tendon may have been severed.

Their treatment of your issues relies on the full knowledge that they are able to learn via their tests. If they (somehow) were to treat only your broken bone and the flesh wound, you would likely end up with further health problems as the extra broken bones were not set properly, and the severed tendon would not heal on it's own.

This is a rather ridiculous example of course, but that's why I started with it.

You may believe that you know what the issue is, but if you do not have the right equipment/training, you may not be able to identify the full extent of the issue.

Even if you know what the issue is, you may not be able to determine the full impact of it.

For example: - You notice that whenever you eat citrus, your mouth and tongue start tingling/going numb. There may be also be symptoms such as sweating, feeling faint, swelling of lips/tongue. You conclude that you are allergic to citrus. You act on this by avoiding citrus. That’s all fine and reasonable. However, with this information you only know that you have a reaction to citrus. You don’t know the full extent. Are you mildly allergic? Are you at risk of anaphylactic shock? Sometimes you do not need to know the full extent (in this example you can simply avoid lemon). But sometimes you DO need to learn everything you can about it, in order to live the best life possible.

Especially when the issue is not something easily avoided such as a minor food allergy.

You might group all of your symptoms together, leading to you accidentally obscuring one issue by presenting it as another.

(An example using some of my own symptoms & past trauma experiences.)

You have diagnosed yourself with autism based on the following symptoms:

- Difficulty forcing eye contact with others.

- Inability to read the invisible social cues that neurotypical’s can see/read.

- Discomfort/anxiety in social settings / large groups.

- An extreme feeling of mental shutdown in response to loud noises/music.

These could indeed be symptoms of autism, however they can also be symptoms of other issues in play.

For instance, discomfort or anxiety in social settings could be due to an anxiety disorder.

The loud noises/music may mimic sounds from traumatic events - initiating flashbacks or fight/flight/freeze instincts.

You go to a therapist.

Your therapist listens to your concerns and symptoms, and looks for other explanations for these symptoms.

This is to ensure that the diagnosis they give you will be accurate, and thus the treatment you receive will be the most effective treatment possible for you.

If you did not go to the therapist with this, you may have been able to deal with the autism symptoms fairly well, but the anxiety and PTSD would go untreated. Your problems would not go away, because you weren’t treating ALL of your issues.

When do I believe it is acceptable to self diagnose without seeking professional verification of your self diagnosis?

- When the issue/symptoms do not affect your life in any substantial way;

- When the issue is self evident;

- When there is no indication that there is an unseen element;

- When the issue does not require urgent or extensive treatment.

Eg: Mild allergy to citrus, which can easily be avoided in your daily life.

In this sort of case, I believe it is important to stay aware of the symptoms and immediately seek a professional opinion if there is a change in severity, frequency, or perceived cause, of these symptoms.

Eg: One day you have a drink that had a lemon wedge on the rim, and the symptoms are far stronger, or appear far sooner, than they used to.

Or:

One day you have the same reaction, but you did not consume any citrus.

When do I believe that it is helpful to ask a professional to confirm/refute your self assessment?

Always.

There may be situations where the professional can’t offer any treatment (eg: a mild food allergy, where avoiding it is all that can be done). But if you feel anxiety over the uncertainty of it, and you want a professional assessment, diagnosis, or testing, you are of course entitled to it.

Whether it pinpoints a cause, or rules out a cause, finding out for sure will increase the chances of you receiving appropriate treatment.

Additionally, professional tests and assessments can identify previously unnoticed symptoms and/or issues.

(Such as additional injuries in example 1, or separate disorders in example 3.)

Do I believe that you should tell your health professional that you have self-diagnosed / self-assessed your symptoms?

Yes.

Especially with mental health issues, where your therapist’s assessment of you may be affected erroneously by them noticing that you are holding something back.

They may believe you are uncomfortable with them, or have some trust issues which you may not have.

If you simply tell your therapist that you have recorded your symptoms and searched for answers on your own, the therapist will be able to make a more accurate assessment of you.

It also gives them a good starting point, as they immediately know that the issue is concerning to you, and that you are ready to seek help for it.

Any health professional worth their training should be able to understand that you seeking explanations for your symptoms is natural, and should be willing to look into something that you are concerned about.

Eg: I told my GP (physical health doctor) that I was concerned about a specific lung condition which seemed to fit symptoms that I had been experiencing for over a decade. He listened, he asked further questions, he performed tests for the condition I had brought up, and he performed tests for other possible explanations.

In the end he determined that I did not have that condition, and we went from there.

Why do health professionals dislike self-diagnosis?

The issue with self diagnosis is that a patient can become convinced that they have something that they do not actually have.

This can lead to the patient: - Misinterpreting symptoms - Ignoring symptoms which do not fit their self-diagnosis - Unintentionally manifesting somatic symptoms which fit the self-diagnosis (this refers to a patient believing they have a condition, and their body beginning to show those symptoms. This is not the same as purposefully faking.) - Refusing testing for something other than their self-diagnosed issue - Refusing to accept that there may be a different issue - Refusing to accept that there may be additional issues - Resorting to self-help remedies which may be ineffective or actively dangerous to the patient

They aren’t just being difficult or elitist - they are concerned that your self-diagnosis may impact their ability to accurately diagnose and help you.

This is a particular concern when the health professional doesn’t know you well enough to be able to determine how much your belief will impact your symptoms, or whether you will be open to treatment if they determine a diagnosis which conflicts with your self-diagnosis.

Your health professional has YOUR health and safety in mind.

(If you believe this isn’t true, you should seek a second opinion.)

Should your health professional just accept your self-diagnosis?

It is your therapist’s duty to independently assess your symptoms, and possible causes for those symptoms.

It is not an attack on you, it is not a sign of distrust.

Think of it like scientists - they don’t just say “oh well that guy’s experiment showed these results, so they must be correct.” They go out and duplicate the experiment to check their results against the original results.

Yes, it’s not a perfect metaphor. No two people’s life experiences are the same. No two people’s brains will react identically to the same thing.

But the spirit is the same - in both cases, doing the extra work is to ensure that the stated result is accurate, NOT to discredit or demean the person who originally stated it.

What if you are certain you have a certain issue, and will not be persuaded otherwise?

I urge you to rethink this, and open your mind.

You want to heal from whatever it is that is interfering with your best life.

You want answers.

You want validation that such-and-such issue isn’t a personal failing but a neuro-divergency.

Those are great goals, but the best way to find the truth is to be open to explanations that you may not like.

And the only way to know it’s the truth, is to be honest and objective about yourself.

#CW: Descriptions of hypothetical physical injury.#did #osdd #self diagnosis #therapy #actuallydid #actuallyosdd #actually neurodiverse #actually autistic #actually multiple #long post

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ask-the-chaos-creation-crew · 2 years ago

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The entire CCC(a) plot summarized to the best of my ability under the cut.

Act 1:

Alex ventures to the CCC(a) building to investigate the disappearance of their timeline's Henry Stickmin. They end up trapped inside with the AUs, and the goal shifts to learning how everybody got there (and these strange "moderators" that seem to be behind it) so they can escape. Their experiences are live-streamed, and the outside world believes it to be a strange ARG, with the exception of Alex's roommate, Asa. They pair up with one Henry (who seems to be nicknamed "Vision") to accomplish this, traversing the building and questioning different AUs. With the help of another Henry who calls himself "Android", they realize that there are in fact multiple timelines/worlds, and a lot of the residents are the same person, brought together for the sake of entertaining the moderators. They also learn that the building itself is alive, nicknamed "Cici." They also develop a bond with a child version of Henry and his mother (Kid and Mom V).

Act 2:

Horror Henry, who has been passively mentioned once or twice, and has a door labelled "DO NOT OPEN", escapes from his room, causing every Henry in his path (Vision, SR, Tyrant, and possibly Author and Kid) to become melted monsters. This also has a detrimental effect on Cici, who becomes more unstable and aggressive. One of the monsters is hesitantly killed, and they realize that this almost cures their horror-fication. The rest of them are killed and return to normal, but with a few physical features changed, and the ability to speak a strange, garbled language.

Through this language, they're able to communicate with Cici, and learn that it was the missing Henry that Alex had been searching for. But, with no way to kill a monster of that scale (and fear of the consequences of destroying an underground building), they can't do anything to help.

Act 3:

Android, who had been working for the CCC(b) to try and destroy the CCC(a) from the inside, launches a raid on the CCC(a), taking the AUs, but the mods escape. Alex questions him, asking why he did nothing to help when he had every chance, why he's being violent when he knew that the AUs would probably listen to him, etc. This causes an argument that culminates in him killing them outside of the CCC(a) boundaries, leaving them actually dead.

The AUs are kept in holding cells in less-than ideal conditions while the CCC(b) tries to figure out how to get them back to their timelines, but contemplating killing them because that would be just as effective at containing the chaos. However, they have their cybernetics team revive Alex because they technically had nothing to do with this with the intent of sending them back home (after all, they found out where the missing Henry had gone at their request). Jimmy, a simple janitor who had no knowledge of any of this, lets the AUs out on account of having morals, but is also killed by his best friend Android (and revived, but with trauma this time). The CCC(b) decides Android is more trouble than he's worth and deactivates him, chucking him off a cliff or something I forgot.

Act 4:

Their troubling fates averted but the problem unsolved, the AUs are taken back by the mods. They decide they need to work together to escape, but are all too shaken up to really think properly. Enter Asa, Alex's perfect roommate who also happens to be an extremely skilled psychologist and therapist. She comes to the CCC(a) and is trapped inside as well, given the job to fix the AUs' mental problems. She takes the time to say "I told you so" to Alex, though. Alex declines Asa's therapy, dealing with their newfound body dysmorphia and PTSD on their own.

Asa is startlingly good at his job, reading the AUs like a book and giving them excellent advice and coping mechanisms for their various issues. He understands them perfectly, is empathetic, and always knows what to say.

Now more equipped to work as a team, the AUs make a plan to attack the mods and kill Cici, destroying everything that's keeping them trapped. Cici approves of this plan, being pretty sick of being a building. Asa's perfect image begins to crack as they attempt to take the lead, but so does Tyrant, who is just as skilled at mind games as they are. Asa grits their teeth and agrees to work together to lead, and they're surprisingly good at working together. It's because, everyone realizes, neither of them see the AUs as people, but as puzzles that need solving and pieces on a chessboard. Unhappy with that revelation, but realizing these are the best people to handle their revolt, everyone grins and bears it.

They split into teams, taking the moderators one-by-one and putting them out of commission in one way or another. Abstract, who really only cares about restoring his powers, agrees to kill Cici. He does, and everything begins to crumble. They take shelter in the now-open room that contains the machine the mods had used to take the AUs in the first place, and hurriedly rush to it. The ones who want to leave go back to their own timelines, and the rest, Vision, Mom V, and Kid, stay in this timeline.

Alex, Mom V, Vision, and Kid move somewhere new (Asa had actually begun living with someone else during the time between act 1 and 5), and all is well except for all of the trauma.

I probably got some stuff wrong, I wrote this in about 70 minutes with cold hands, but that's the gist.

#I'm gonna pin this once the ask box closes so if you're reading this in the future the blog is discontinued! sorry!

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gogglor · 3 years ago

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Cap-Ironman RecWeek: Tropey Tuesday

Over the past year my pandemic brain decided it would produce happy chemicals exclusively by reading and writing Stony fanfiction. On the advice of counsel, I decided to take my happy chemicals where I could get’em. And the result is that I’ve had the tremendous pleasure of reading some absolutely incredible works of art by some immensely talented people. And since it’s @cap-ironman RecWeek, I figured this is as good of an excuse as any to make some posts recommending my favs (and try to keep self-recs to a minimum, but I’m only human).

I skipped Multiverse Monday since I’m still not well-versed enough in the multiverse to talk about it with any kind of recommendational authority, but today is Tropey Tuesday, and so I would like to share some fics from my all-time-favorite, major-reason-I-bother-with-the-MCU, gets-me-every-time trope:

Found Family

And so, without further ado, here are some Found Family Stony fics that I simply adore.

Avengers Family Ficlets

Author: elwenyere

Word Count: 8,548

Summary: “You built a neural network that analyzes squash,” Bruce said flatly, “and you attached it to a laser.” A collection of short stories set in the extended Domestic Avengers Universe.

Why You Should Read It:

Thing number one that you should understand about me is that I would be perfectly happy with a story about body-less entities making funny quips at each other in a featureless void, and anything else is just a bonus. Elwenyere’s stories consistently get the banter down so unbelievably, ridiculously well that when you find out they also have heart, creativity, well-developed characters, and so much damn feeling in them, it feels like an embarrassment of riches.

Go read all of their stuff, please, but this one’s a great place to start. It’s got everything you could possibly want in a fic: over-competitive pumpkin carving, emotional hospital confessions, Christmas decorations that come to life and attack people, crab dip, Steve Rogers accidentally ruining Thanksgiving through the sheer power of his own snark, and most importantly, a bunch of human disasters that somehow make a beautiful family together.

Executive Party

Author: copperbadge

Word Count: 3,228

Summary: Tony's terrible December is suddenly looking up.

Why You Should Read It:

Copperbadge is another author where you should read everything they’ve put out there. They’ve got this phenomenally creative mind that manages to consistently draw out deeply human stories that can kinda catch you off-guard in the places they find touching moments. You might’ve heard of their very popular Foodieverse, which is an incredibly creative AU with the Avengers in the food service industry, but this is the one I come to whenever I’m looking to indulge in my favorite trope.

Tony’s looking forward to spending the night before SI breaks for Christmas doing paperwork. Steve gets the Avengers to have an impromptu video game Christmas Party in his office instead. Cb’s also got a gift for banter (I have a type when it comes to writers, ok?), and the little details like Steve’s carnage record on GTA, Natasha’s Russian appreciation for country music, and Steve’s SHIELD break-up mixtape make it just a goddamn delight to read.

patchwork people

Author: itsAllAvengers

Word Count: 28,247

Summary: It was a pretty well-known fact that Tony Stark had control issues.It was far less well-known why, though.

CW: Past abuse and non-con (not by main pairing)

Why You Should Read It:

If you’re the kind of person who regularly thinks to themself “You know what Tony Stark needs? More trauma,” then this is the fic for you.

Tony’s got some serious trust issues and PTSD thanks to some shitty, shitty exes. This is the story about how Tony learns to trust again, Avenger by Avenger, in his new Found Family. Come for the Whump, stay for the found family insomnia infomercial parties and Steve Rogers getting arrested for enacting some sweet, sweet karmic justice.

And now we get into a sub-genre of Found Family that is also a huge weakness of mine: Tony thinks he’s only tolerated instead of wanted, and his found family convinces him otherwise.

Some Things Shouldn’t Be a Chore

Author: scifigrl47

Word Count: 22,187

Summary: Steve takes things like personal responsibility and respect seriously. Tony's got people he pays to take care of that kind of thing, and anyway, he's pretty sure that he's going to die of some exotic disease in his workshop, because Dummy's still a little spotty about what is 'clean' enough to put on an open wound. The rest of the Avengers are in this for personal gain, except for Clint, he just enjoys being a dick. And some things shouldn't be a chore.

Why You Should Read It:

Honestly it feels a bit like cheating to recommend the first work in scifigrl47′s tremendously popular Toasterverse, since I’m pretty sure a lot of people who don’t even like or regularly read fanfiction have liked this one, even indirectly. Sci is so ludicrously good at building an engaging, creative, character-driven universe that this series is responsible for most of the fanon you know and love about MCU fanfics. Tony’s bot Butterfingers? Sci made him up for this story. Thor’s love of Pop Tarts? Clint the vent goblin? All sci. They’re just that damn good at world-building.

In this fic, the Avengers try out a chore chart. Hilarity and feels ensue. I don’t want to say anymore and risk spoiling it because if you’ve managed to get far enough in Stony fanfiction to read this post and haven’t yet read the Toasterverse, I want to keep the experience pristine for you to enjoy. Please read this. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll reserve a hypothetical genie wish to make this series the actually canon MCU (God knows I have).

Hold the Things You Wanna Say

Author: SailorChibi

Word Count: 6,316

Summary: Tony is still a consultant, and between SI, the team and SHIELD he's overworked and exhausted. That's okay. He and Steve have been having sex for weeks but that's all it is, just sex, and Tony wants more but he'll never get it and that's okay. Really. What's not okay is the fact that Howard Stark has somehow appeared in the future and is the same as always. This is definitely going to fuck up his schedule.

CW: Abuse, Howard Stark’s A+ Parenting

Why You Should Read It:

SailorChibi’s one of those authors I’ve been meaning to get around to reading all their stuff for, but it’s tricky when you have a short attention span and an author that is just so damn prolific. They’re a multi-fandom maven consistently putting out some really great stuff, and they’re absolutely worth checking out.

This story’s a real yank on the heartstrings, and as someone who can really identify with Tony’s fear of failing the people he cares about, the point in the story where he reaches his low is just unbelievably poignant. But the warmth and the wholesomeness of the end made my heart grow three sizes the day I read it. And the love that all these idiots have for each other is just so damn palpable in this story, it damn near made me cry.

Irreplaceable

Author: Orphan Account :(

Word Count: 4,952

Summary: There are obvious downsides to being the only member of the Avengers who is not a super soldier, a god, or a super assassin, and does not Hulk out when aggravated. The most obvious one is that when villains want bait, they've got a go-to guy. Tony already knew Mondays sucked. He did not need his opinion reinforced this way.

Why You Should Read It:

It’s such a bummer I can’t plunder this author’s other works because I love this one so much!

Tony gets kidnapped and says a lot of self-deprecating things that, unbeknownst to him, are projected on a live feed to the Avengers. They rescue him and have some opinions about how easily he could be replaced. This story’s got Tony hiding from feelings like an idiot, Steve manually carrying Tony somewhere the Avengers can say nice things about him, and a lot of feels.

That’s it for today! Tune in tomorrow for some AU recs!

#capimrecweek #stony #fanfiction #MCU #Tony Stark #Steve Rogers #the avengers

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pinnithin-writes · 2 years ago

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June 22

Mom and Dad visited last week so I haven’t had much time to write. They drove up from Anaheim on Monday, and even though they’ve been to San Francisco before, they insisted there’s always something new to see and dragged me all through the city with them. At least we got to eat at some pretty cool places - places I didn’t even know existed, but Dad knew from his culinary school connections.

Mom got to go antiquing. And do that weird thing she does where she people watches in public and makes assumptions about their trauma based on the conversations she overhears, or how they walk or dress, or their body language in different situations. Like, that woman over there is wearing long sleeves in the summer, and she walks while holding one wrist with her other hand, keeping her purse tucked snugly under her arm. She keeps her back to the wall and often looks around her instead of browsing the aisles.

“I bet she was mugged recently,” Mom said. Out loud. Where people could hear her. I guess she sees so much stuff like spousal abuse and PTSD and personality disorders in her day-to-day she kind of has to make a game of it. But come on.

Anyway, we also visited Land’s End and the Cliff House, which was pretty cool. I’ve never been. It’s kind of sad that I’m the one who lives here and Mom and Dad are the ones who ended up showing me around. It was like this on previous visits too, but I think it was more pronounced this time because I have my own place. At least in the dorms it was like, okay, we get that you have a limited capacity to live when everyone’s on top of each other and thirty people share a kitchen. Poor hygiene can be forgiven when you have to put up with community showers. You’re just getting oriented to adulthood, it’s okay that you haven’t had a chance to get out and sightsee.

Now I have my own bathroom and only share a kitchen with one person, and that one person is a competent and self-sufficient adult already at age twenty one. So by comparison it’s really obvious I’m just barely managing the independence thing over here. I have a car and the freedom to see what the Bay area has to offer and I’m still calling it a win when all I did was sit outside my apartment in the sun.

On the bright side, Dad cooked for everyone. I missed his cooking. He made pan seared ahi tuna with honey wasabi vegetable slaw, which was a huge step up from my go-to microwave ramen. I told him it was weird seeing him frying fish on our one burner cooktop, knowing he’s probably used to a full utility kitchen, but he just laughed and said it made him nostalgic. Apparently he used to cook in a shit apartment in a shit kitchen back when he was my age, making New York strip and tarragon crab for himself while he neglected paying for his car repairs.

We shared some with Gina, and it was nice to see her reaction (Holy shit, your dad just made this? This is like, restaurant grade). And I got to be like, well he’s a professional chef, and she thought that was really cool. I guess I forget sometimes that it’s unusual to grow up around good food all the time. Probably because I ate everything with a side helping of guilt. But this guilt isn’t there anymore - not since the worm.

Sharing that food with the worm felt really nice, too. It was like finally getting to introduce a significant other to your family after they’ve heard about them for several months. My relationship with Will was short lived enough that he never got to meet my parents or try my dad’s cooking, but I imagine this feeling is what it would have been like. Like, yes, I knew you’d like them, I knew you’d enjoy this, and feeling the gleeful undulations in my digestive tract was like seeing a smile of understanding on a partner’s face.

Honestly, it was a really good week overall. The worm and I got to see and experience new things, spend time with family, and eat delicious food together. I don’t know if it was pleased with the offerings in my stomach and its good mood was contagious, or if it worked the other way around and the worm fed off my happiness. In a brief moment of elation, a brief lapse of judgment, I almost told my parents about it, and only the news of Audrey’s recent hospitalization stopped me in my tracks.

Of course I can’t excitedly tell my parents how a tapeworm has made my life better. That’s insane. And it’s especially insane news to drop right after learning your older sister had to stay overnight in the hospital while she metabolized life threatening levels of alcohol. Wow, that sucks, glad she’s better now, is she looking into long term treatment? (she isn’t) - by the way, I have a worm in my stomach I’m a little in love with. We’re very happy together.

My parents wouldn’t be excited for me; they’d be vaguely disgusted and upset, and I don’t need to put them through more of that when they’re dealing with Audrey.

A Helminthic Romance

Short story about a girl who falls in love with her intestinal parasite, told through entries in the narrator's journal.

[Posting these in short installments in conjunction with the the dates of the journal entries.]

Read on Ao3

<- May//June//

June 1

Will messaged me again. I should just block his number at this point. He seriously asked me if I wanted to hang out, after everything that happened. I don’t know what he doesn’t get about “don’t speak to me again.”

I’m looking back at my entries from spring break and realizing I never actually talked about the aftermath. There’s like, a two week gap where I didn’t even write anything. I guess it was too raw then. Now that it’s been a couple months it’s kind of scabbed over, so I can poke at it a little.

After he cheated he tried to go back to how things were before. I don’t know if he was counting on me not finding out or was just planning on lying about it or what, but when I tried to confront him about it he just acted like it hadn’t happened. I had to show him the screenshots to make him actually acknowledge it.

“You can’t just act like spring break doesn’t count,” I told him, and he was like, what does it matter? I’ll never see her again. And then he added a passive aggressive comment about how he couldn’t expect me to give him everything he needed, so he filled in the gaps where he could.

I hate to say it but that was my breaking point, not the cheating. I was almost willing to forgive him and let him have another chance after that. I mean, it’s not like anyone has ever shown any romantic interest in me before him, and it’s unlikely I’ll get another shot at love anytime soon. And I did like him. I still do, really.

But then he went and said that? I gave him everything. I carved out hours of my life to hang out with him. I listened to his stories about how his parents hit him and how all his exes used and discarded him and I hugged him while he cried and I held his hand while he learned to heal.

We could have been something. He was my broken doll and I was his starving dog. The only two people fucked up enough to understand each other.

I should have known establishing a boundary would have been taken as an attack. He’s been hurt too many times to assume good intentions. But he didn’t have to turn around and cheat on me.

Just because I can’t figure out what I want doesn’t mean I’m not able to tell what I don’t want. I knew I didn’t want to move in with him after only dating for six months. It didn't matter that I was aging out of the dorms. I didn’t want to live with him because that would give him a front row seat to all the weird shit I do behind closed doors and I knew I wasn’t ready for that.

I think he took me signing the lease with Gina as a sign that I was going to leave him just like the rest of his exes. The first in a series of steps to distance myself after he showed me all the undesirable parts of him, and I’d decided I couldn’t handle it. If he knew all my undesirable parts he’d have known it would take quite a lot for me to draw the line. Maybe he tried to find where the line was early so he could save himself some heartbreak. Or something.

This is so fucking stupid that I just inherently psychoanalyze people. Thanks, Mom. He’s already wasted so much of my time, but here I am wasting more of it figuring out why he thought that was okay.

God. Whatever. The worm’s doing fine. The one inside my body, that is, not the other one. I’ve sort of gotten used to the indigestion, and it’s nice I can eat whatever I want now. It seems to perk up when I feed it chocolate covered pretzels, which is great because I love eating those.

I really thought for a second about naming the tapeworm Will, just as a funny joke to myself about how Will is a parasite, but this feels like kind of an insult to the worm. It hasn’t led me on for months only to decide I wasn’t worth the emotional effort of waiting on me. All the worm ever does is wait on me, really. It just sits there in a dark little part inside of me I’ll never get to see, waiting patiently for whatever I decide to give it. It doesn’t complain, and it never leaves because it can’t.

I think I want to be kind to it. It didn’t choose these circumstances, much like a child doesn’t choose to be born. The least I can do is treat it well while it’s forced to exist in my digestive tract.

I don’t know. I shouldn’t name it Will, but I should probably name it something, now that I think about it. We’re past the point of avoiding missing it when it’s gone - I’ll miss it. We’ve already spent so much time together and it’s always there with me. But what does one name a worm that’s attached to your intestines, eating when you eat, sleeping when you sleep, fully dependent on you?

And if we’re being honest I’m a little dependent on it, not only for getting my weight down, but for keeping me on a schedule. I’d probably be in bed all day long if the worm didn’t stir every once in a while, reminding me to go about the daily maintenance of being alive. I actually showered today because my stomach hurt so bad I couldn’t stay curled up in bed any longer. It’s like it’s reminding me to keep being a person.

Hard to pick a name for someone that important.

#tapeworm story #parasitism #body horror #disordered eating #self harm

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furiousgoldfish · 4 years ago

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I haven't been writing a lot lately because my recovery has been taking a wild turn and in lack of anyone to talk to or therapy, I'll be writing about it here! I'll put it under a cut. There are some descriptions of recovery going very wrong, and also explanations of things I was wrong about.

So since the pandemic started I've been deteriorating badly, first I've been processing trauma extensively, having intense breakdowns and gradually it turned into depression from lack of stimulation, I've been completely alone for months without speaking to, or seeing anyone. I thought it was the isolation getting to me, and decided I just need to endure that, indulge in whatever coping I could and wait for it to end. And then things got worse.

Even as normally I was seeing some very slow progress in recovery; now it was going backwards; I was having less and less ability to get anything done, I wasn't able to force myself to do my job for months, I kept getting stuck in bed for weeks, chronic pain got so bad I couldn't move on most days. And, it only kept going worse.

My breakdowns stared to be about the present instead of the past; I couldn't handle being in pain all the time. As in before I would recover from a breakdown within a day or two, now it took 4 days to a week, and the trauma episodes would last for hours, so intense I'd find myself hoping I would die during it.

And then, I started losing all mobility and this seriously freaked me out. Everything above I've already experienced before, without long term consequences, but now my body was losing function in a way that felt permanent; I could no longer move for more than few minutes, and without extensive pain. Sometimes I would try to get up and end up collapsing and screaming from how much it hurt, I would move my arm and my whole body would experience a shock of intense pain. I was scared, I no longer knew what was going on, I was suspecting something more than ptsd was wrong. I've forced myself into physical activity, trying to fight this, I tried stretching, exercising, running, punching, and every single one of these activities made it incredibly worse. I thought I had broken my body by laying down too much. I no longer felt anything but terror and dread, and kept spiralling into scenarios of my own death; it felt inevitable, I wasn't going to survive without ability to move, nobody would take care of me.

I tried out medicine that helps relaxing, it had minimal effect. Then, in desperation to check if this was all ptsd, I attempted self harm, to see if it erases the pain. It did. It lowered the pain significantly It was a big relief, even though I wasn't happy with resorting to that, at least I could move around for a while, and I was grateful for that. Times couldn't be more desperate, and the measure felt fitting. I was still in a very bad shape, and the pain was only somewhat lessened.

It was about that time someone sent me the Complex PTSD book; I had wanted it for a while and immediately went to read it. I felt some relief reading it, and I was struck with the realization that I have not felt any relief in more than a year. It also surprised me with some of the exact descriptions of my behaviour, that I didn't realize was a symptom. I thought it was necessary and smart of me to live in hiding, to avoid interaction and never connect to anyone; it kept me safe. It turns out it's a regular freeze response to trauma; I got very called out for it. It also explains that a freeze response is what people use when anything else doesn't work, and it's true! I had been fighting, fawning and perfecting myself desperately prior to realizing that absolutely nothing helps, and froze to survive. It also described that freeze types are capable of surviving prolonged isolation because their brains produce hormones that relax the body as if they're going thru a moment before death; also true for me, I've been aware my brain does that, only I get that way too often, and it only helps me marginally because I'm too used to it.

Another thing I was very wrong about was my concept of my inner critic; I thought I had already won that battle, because I did not allow any voice in my head to criticize me (my alters can drag me affectionately), and I generally didn't experience a lot of shame or guilt for what I was going thru. The book describes inner catastrophizer, which is an extention of the critic, and it causes you to spral into extremely negative scenarios of your own demise. Now that.. was happening to me every single day, I saw myself dead around every corner. But I always thought my fears about that were perfectly reasonable. I had been tortured into suicidal state as a kid and nobody cared, I barely escaped with my life from there, I was living illegally, in hiding, without a normal job or regular income, without close friends or any family, with ptsd i couldn't get diagnosed for, without ability to work due to ptsd, in a capitalistic society where being able to work is only thing between you and dying. I had, by that point, gained many skills of survival, but it still felt very reasonable to fear that I would die if I don't get better soon.

The book described people who had families, jobs, social circles, friends and community, who spiraled into deep fear of becoming homeless and dying on the street; somehow their spiraling was exactly the same as mine, and it made me realize that it was, in fact, a symptom, and not reflection of reality. Because I was spiraling even when laying in my bed or eating or sleeping, knowing I could still afford rent for months because I arranged my life to allow myself to lay down a lot. I kept fearing my parents were coming to end my life, even when I arranged my entire existence specifically to prevent this from happening. And even if I was sick and without a real job, I had in fact, survived for 5 years after running away, I wasn't getting worse at it. My spiraling into death scenarios was a symptom of being trapped within a flashback.

The book guided me to try to challenge these fears, I immediately went for it, had a breakdown, screamed "I can't" for like an hour, had additional few breakdowns afterwards, and miraculously, recovered from them in only few hours. And then, I woke up from my flashback.

I won't describe what the flashback was, because it's too gruesome and horiffic, but it was in fact, bad enough to warrant every single bit of that pain I was experiencing, and a very convoluted, complex trauma. I was waiting to be killed in that flashback. Whats concerning is, I've been trapped in that same flashbacks for more than a year. After I broke my way out of it, it felt like I woke up to being alive for the first time in years. I got out being frozen in bed.

For 5 amazing days, I was able to do whatever I wanted. Chronic pain? I didn't know her. It was absoluely exhilirating to get to move again, I was not getting tired either, I was out there making up for months of doing nothing and I was not collapsing at any point. I felt actual joy again, and hope, and being free from pain was so extremely good, that alone made me ecstatic. I was able to create, to be organized, to take care of myself, to follow a checklist, to focus, I was a Normal Person for those 5 days.

And then, predictably, I was getting back stuck in that flashbacks and my levels of terror and dread spiked again. I went to re-read the book, and it took me a few days to really figure it out again, I don't know exactly how the book works on me, I feel like it says just the right keywords to trigger me into realizations and causes breakdowns that set me free. I found myself able to stop some spiraling, but sometimes I can't, that flashback holds immense power over me and is actually mixed with 10 other near-death scenarios that are too extreme for me to process, so this will keep happening. I did break free again, and got to experience additional few days of movement and happiness; I also started working extensively with my child alter, who was until recently extremely suicidal and dangerous to work with.

I am still kinda lost in all of this, and unsure whats going on, but I do believe I wont get trapped in a flashback again for a whole year. I became so anxious and helpless due to isolation, I forgot how to fight trauma, I forgot I actually had to do it. I used to do it constantly in the beginning, but it had made me suicidal back then to face all this, so I tried to just let it heal naturally, which I believed would eventually happen; but it didn't, I got trapped and suffered without knowing how to get out. I also believed my own spiraling was a reflection of reality and not trauma, and that fueled it a lot.

It explains very eloqently in the book how inner catastrophizing comes from being massively neglected; children who are not looked after start to realize just how unprotected they are, so their own sense of danger becomes hypersensitive and starts to lock on possible dangers everywhere. This is then further aided by media that points out every possible bad thing that could happen to a person, and the child who isn't guided by adult who could actually make a reasonable distinction between real and unlikely danger, will clock it all as absolute possibilities and be on alert. It's also fueled by the line of disasters and dangers that happen to them in the context of their own home, and for me, the strongest factor was my parents constantly convincing me that I would die without them. Even though I proved this wrong, and understand they did it precisely because they knew there was a lot of survival ability in me and that's why they worked so hard to destroy it, the fact that it was brainwashed into me under circumstances of torture still makes it impossible for me to fight it.

Maybe one day I will be able to.

I'm writing this because writing things down helps to make sense of it all, and I need to find my way thru this. I also hope someone else will see themselves in what I'm describing and it will help them find a way forward. Complex ptsd is the only book I found that speaks from the point of view of a person who survived cptsd, healed from it, and had so much experience with other traumatized people they're able to draw parallels and create patterns and statistics out if it, it was that more than anything that convinced me of their words, and gave me hope. The book also warns many times of how essential it is to reduce inner critic and catastrophizer before getting other recovery work done, other therapy might only do further harm before this work is done. It was true for me.

If you wanna read this book, here's a post with the links!

#cptsd #complex ptsd #ptsd recovery #tw self harm #story of recovery #trauma #abuse recovery #trauma symptoms #chronic pain #chronic exhaustion #freeze response

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aiyexayen · 4 years ago

Note

re: that "I'll live for you post" - WHERE'S THE ESSAY

this post? [innocent face]

alright, alright, JUST TWIST MY ARM WHY DON'T YOU, just force me to talk more about my boys!

4.9k word essay under the cut

Wei Wuxian

Let us take a look at Wei Wuxian first. Wei Wuxian has no problems throwing himself in-between the people he loves and danger, or even certain death. Hell, sometimes he just throws himself into it for fun and profit!

To some extent, putting yourself in danger to help others and being willing to die is something of a cultivator thing in general, a hero thing in general, right? And Wei Wuxian is a prodigy, exceptionally strong and clever, so he has more reason than most to be a little cavalier. But most of the point of training so hard as a cultivator and getting strong and aligning yourself with a sect is kind of so you can be in real danger of dying as little as possible, one would presume.

So we're going to set aside the danger-as-a-profession thing for now, because I think it's only tangentially related.

The real point is, Wei Wuxian is sacrificial to a fault. If there is a problem, he decides he's the one who needs to fix it. And his first go-to solution is to throw himself at it, to give up anything of himself if it's viable. As clever as he is, if he finds a workable solution that involves his own sacrifice, he doesn't stop to look for anything else.

Some of it is pride--not wanting to admit he needs help from anyone else, and the shame of being seen as weak.

Some of it is arrogance--a very natural kind given his competence, the presumption that he knows best in a given situation (neurodivergent arrogance walking hand-in-hand with self-esteem issues is always a fun time).

Some of it is appropriate--ranging from his own moral imperative to protect the weak and do what's right to his understanding of his place in culture and in his own sect and relationships.

Some of it is a natural bent toward caretaking, "fixing," and heroics--someone has to do it, so it's going to be Wei Wuxian. He won't hesitate to take initiative in any other area of life, and this is no exception.

And some of it, yes, is a lack of value placed in his own life--between a more youthful, dramatic perspective on 'I would die for you/for this cause' taking priority in his worldview, and some genuine self-esteem issues. Issues largely stemming from his uncertain place in the world growing up and his uncertain relationship with parental/guardian/master and other familial figures, all stewing under the surface and brought to light sharply when the world went to shit and choices were made and he lost or seemed to have lost everything from his reputation to his home to his extant support structures. The paranoia and voices in his head (the ptsd and resentful-energy-as-ptsd-metaphor both) only drove that home.

Basically, Wei Wuxian was already trending in some unfortunate directions but his circumstances and the people surrounding him kept him grounded, and the events of the story as it unfolded really pushed him all in. No one thing or one person--even Wei Wuxian himself--is really to blame for that, which is the beauty of the story really.

I also think Wei Wuxian started to buy into some of his own stories at his lowest points--the things he said or came up with, lies he told publicly, justifications he made for his choices once the heat of the moment and the panic was over. Justifications he made to himself and to others. He purposefully led people to believe much that was incorrect about him and his character and his status, to which the response was distaste and horror, and even though he planned it that way in order to push everyone away I really think he started to believe it himself. Depression and trauma are just really fun times.

I'm getting a bit off-topic.

The point remains, Wei Wuxian is extremely sacrificial. He comes by much of it naturally, and not nearly all of it is bad or melodrama or angst or even unhealthy or problematic. It's one of his good qualities, too, and it's one of the ways he knows how to love.

All of the threads weaving together to make Wei Wuxian and the situations he finds himself sacrificing things in are all true, but it also really comes down to love. He loved Jiang Cheng enough to sacrifice his everything and risk his life doing so. He loved his sect enough he was willing to sacrifice his right hand. He loved his sect enough to sacrifice his very ties to it. He loved Lan Zhan enough to sacrifice their friendship. He loved Jin Ling enough to sacrifice himself to the curse he got in the Nie tombs. (And more!)

Wei Wuxian loved, and so he sacrificed. Thus, the initial post.

Jiang Cheng

Let's switch gears for a moment and talk about my darling Jiang Wanyin.

Ah, Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng. Taking the initiative and sacrificing at the drop of a hat and so forth are not really characteristics of Jiang Cheng's the same way they are for Wei Wuxian.

And yet, is he not also a disciple of Yunmeng Jiang; is he not also a young hero? Has he not pride, and the incentive to do good?

Does he not also see love as sacrifice?

Zi Zhizhu was his mother. The woman who sacrificed to get Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian to safety. The woman who killed herself and crawled across the ground to hold her husband's hand in death.

You think she wasn't Like That the whole time? You think Jiang Cheng picked up nothing of such behaviours from her, even before that day?

Hah.

Besides which, there's absolutely an underlying theme of Jiang Cheng trying to be like Wei Wuxian for much of their lives.

Partially just...Wei Wuxian, strong and clever and popular shige, always manages to get credit and glory and good stories and good favour, exemplary of the Jiang motto--the one Jiang Cheng's own name is tied to. They were supposed to be shuangjie, besides. How could he not want to be like him at least a bit? If nothing else, it's a little brother's curse.

And partially this is also due to Jiang Cheng's parents and that whole Situation.

It was complicated for so many reasons, and absolutely left Jiang Cheng feeling inferior to Wei Wuxian. As though he needed to be more like Wei Wuxian, to emulate him, in order to be worthy of his title and station and inheritance, something that turned out to be categorically untrue in the end. There are many kinds of leaders, and many kinds of strengths.

As an aside, I personally think that's something Jiang Fengmian and Yu Ziyuan knew, themselves, as adults and leaders and political figures in their own rights. Adults often don't realise or think about how the things they say can influence children's entire worldviews and senses of self (why, no, I don't speak from experience, why would you ask such a thing ahaha).

Jiang-zongzhu and Zi Zhizhu got a lot of their own relationship difficulties and misunderstandings and conflicts and conflicting attempts to want the best for their children (and ward) tangled up in everything. I think if they'd ever been able to speak plainly, if they could manifest into the Ancestral Hall and speak to Jiang Cheng, they would say so.

Just as Jiang Cheng would have cause to be horrified by much of what Wei Wuxian believed about himself, I think Jiang Cheng's parents would have cause to be horrified by much of what Jiang Cheng believed. (I mean, and Wei Wuxian, probably.)

Anyway.

Jiang Cheng has plenty of reasons to aspire to those same ideals of sacrifice. And it's not just aspirations, either--we see him follow through.

He walked outside from that inn, saw Wei Wuxian in danger, and made a decision in the space of a single breath--a decision with full understanding, too. He knew he was giving up his entire life for Wei Wuxian's. He said goodbye in his head.

I would argue (and I'm sure I've said this before somewhere too) that his sacrifice was the purest example of this in the entire story.

Perhaps some of it is that many of Wei Wuxian's sacrifices are premeditated and just about all of them have alternative solutions that don't involve him just diving in and giving pieces of himself up.

That isn't to say that Wei Wuxian wouldn't see a sword aimed at Jiang Cheng and take the blow himself. But we never see him do that, exactly. As much as Jiang Cheng has internalised this ideal of Wei Wuxian's, he both encounters fewer of these situations and has other problem-solving tactics in his repertoire.

The way Jiang Cheng hates himself doesn't lead him to think of himself as disposable. I could get into a (very amateur) discussion of negative schemas formed in childhood and their various similarities and differences, and the different ways Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian's brains appear to work (Jiang Cheng sees himself as inferior, while Wei Wuxian willfully dehumanises himself in other ways), but basically, it's simply a different set of psychological issues.

But! When he is faced with the choice, Jiang Cheng absolutely dies for the ones he loves.

He loves his sect and his family, and he internalises love as sacrifice, and when it comes down to an extreme moment he chooses to die for them.

And then he doesn't die.

And then the war happens.

Jiang Cheng's Growth

There are a lot of reasons for Jiang Cheng to grow in this area, and I think it starts with inheriting the sect.

(This leads to excellent thoughts about What If Wei Wuxian Had Somehow Become Sect Leader but that's an au for another day.)

If sect heir was a position full of responsibility and reputation management, how much more so is zongzhu? Jiang Cheng is suddenly responsible for all these people. Whether he's good enough or not doesn't even matter. The job is there and it's inescapable and he's the only one there to do it.

I'm absolutely sure he still has all kinds of inferiority shit he's dealing with by post-timeskip and he only just gets to touch on some pieces of resolution by the end of the story, with the one person still in the world who would even know anything about the life that gave it to him.

Jiang Cheng has been responsible for people before, in small ways--night hunts and such, I'm sure, and he was certainly in charge of the Yunmeng Jiang disciples who went to Cloud Recesses. But being at the top of that hierarchy entirely is such a different matter, and he did so at a very young age and in a very fraught time.

The fact that he had to deal with all this new responsibility and duty to people more than his family and to causes greater than the first people in need he encounters is a huge perspective shift. Especially as a sect with nothing to give and no wiggle room where it comes not only to basic resources post-war, but to things like reputation and political standing. This is, of course, a huge facet to the conflict between him and Wei Wuxian (and the Wen remnants) at that point in the story.

But on a personal level it also speaks to the sacrifice thing. If Jiang Cheng sacrifices his life, he is not just sacrificing his own life anymore.

When he gave up his life for Wei Wuxian, he had not yet inherited. His parents were only barely gone. There was nothing to inherit. There was no surety of there ever being something to inherit ever again. Everything else was already gone. It was only the three of them, barely surviving, running for their lives. It was only him and Wei Wuxian in a street, and one of them had to die.

But once he inherits? He's a commander. He's a leader. He has all the knowledge and all the networking connections. He has the reputation. He has the social standing. He might still have a long way to go in developing his skills, but he has a natural leadership ability and he does have training appropriate to his station.

What happens if he personally sacrifices his life? What happens to all of that? What happens to everyone depending on him?

That's not very satisfying, very epic-worthy. That's not very dramatic or romantic. It's gradual, and messy, that kind of change and realisation. Becoming that kind of person. Making choices based in that reality. Deciding that you do not belong to yourself.

And I think it really comes to a head when his siblings die.

I think it comes to a head personally. Not just in his role as Jiang-zongzhu. We don't see Jiang Cheng choose not to die, in as many words. But we certainly see him choose to live.

Or, perhaps, we see the evidence of that choice.

Jiang Cheng could have faded away. He could have started delegating all his responsibilities, gotten help from other sects, trained up a replacement. He could have made such things necessary by getting more and more reclusive. He could have pulled a Qingheng-Jun.

Hell, with a-jie gone already, he could have just said fuck this and followed Wei Wuxian off that cliff, and if you don't think he wonders about that sometimes--at least at first--then we have very different interpretations of Jiang Cheng as a person.

And no, none of those are sacrifice. But at some point, he still chose to do the opposite.

He chose every day to live for his sect, to keep growing it into something powerful and secure. He took that vow that he made and he fucking stuck to it.

And he chose to live for Jin Ling.

I don't half wonder if that was a bigger driving force at first than anything else.

Jiang Cheng could absolutely have left Jin Ling to be raised by his Jin family in the absence of his parents and fucked off to hide away in Yunmeng and had nothing to do with him. He could have done a lot of things, let himself develop in a lot of ways, unhealthy ways.

But he so very clearly did not.

Jin Ling and Jiang Cheng have a close relationship. Jin Ling defers to Jiang Cheng, is answerable to him on night hunts and beyond them. It's never questioned why he's basically just in the Yunmeng Jiang party by himself. Yunmeng Jiang disciples answer to Jin Ling in turn, follow his orders without question in the absence of their zongzhu. It's a Yunmeng Jiang disciple who hands Xianzi off to Jin Ling outside the Guanyin Temple in Yunping, and Jiang Cheng is intimately familiar with Xianzi's commands and is apparently a trusted person to give them (which, we find out, Jin Guangyao is not.)

As much as Jiang Cheng is not good at saying what he means, and especially after everything he's been through his softer bits have grown harder and harder carapace around them, Jin Ling never seems to misunderstand what Jiang Cheng means. They snipe at each other and snark and bitch and roll their eyes and so clearly love each other.

Jiang Cheng's love for Jin Ling shines brightly the second you know how to interpret Jiang Cheng, and Jin Ling absolutely does. Jin Ling's trust in Jiang Cheng is incredible.

Jin Ling is practically Yunmeng Jiang's heir, and practically Jiang Cheng's son.

That sort of thing doesn't just happen, because you're related or whatever. In fact, the story goes out of its way to present blood relations not being close, especially father figures.

Which means from a young age, Jin Ling knew Jiang Cheng's love. Jiang Cheng, struggling young zongzhu of a struggling newly-rebuilt sect, who just lost everything, barely more than a kid himself, figured out he needed to not only stay alive, but needed to live for Jin Ling.

He needed to teach him everything, needed to figure out how to be the best of his own father and mother, and the best of Jin Ling's father and mother, and live up to every lost bit of love Jin Ling should have had, and try, and try, no matter how unworthy or unfit or inferior he felt. No matter how much he fucked up and didn't know. No matter how much grief he was dealing with. No matter how many people hated him and how few friends he had. No matter how much there was to do. No matter how overwhelming the endless tide of days, of forever in front of him felt, horrible and empty of everyone that had come before. Jiang Cheng still chose to live.

He carved out that new life because of love. He didn't die for anyone, and he didn't die for anyone's memory. He lived.

"I never thought I'd be worth the work it would take to piece myself together," but he did, for his sect, his disciples, his family's legacy, his siblings' memories, and Jin Ling.

And, as a bonus knife, the things we see him chide Jin Ling the most for? Are specifically things Wei Wuxian would have done, and even things he would have done in following him. Grandstanding, not asking for help when needed, wandering off alone, making unnecessary sacrifices.

Wei Wuxian's Growth

That brings us to Wei Wuxian coming back. And, well, the boy still has a long way to go. He goes through a lot of kinds of growth post-timeskip. And I think this is one of them.

For one, he's already fucking died once.

Honestly, almost ironically, that death wasn't even fully a sacrifice. Perhaps in some ways it was, in some ways he internalised that it was. But regardless, after all his sacrificing, he finally died. And, much like Jiang Cheng's sacrifice, it didn't stick. He woke back up. Albeit 16 years later.

Now, he wasn't keen on dying, or he maybe would have just gone back. But that doesn't mean he'd suddenly decided to live for anyone rather than die for them.

And, indeed, we still see that side of him come back with him in full force. He starts off by deciding he will just live this new life without Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan altogether.

I think, for Wei Wuxian, this matter of sacrifice ends up being tied into a lot of other pieces of his growth--none of it happens independently of each other.

First, he is shown and told that he is wanted. That's the first thing. He cannot simply go on without inconveniencing/endangering/roping anyone else into his shit because his ties to other people don't work in only one direction. He is wanted.

Lan Zhan wants to be at his side, has not forgotten him, and loves him unwaveringly. That is a huge first step, right there at the beginning, when Lan Zhan grabs his hand, and they make eye contact, and by the time Lan Zhan turns to look away Wei Wuxian is grabbing his hand back desperately and that pretty much says everything it needs to right there.

The idea that Wei Wuxian can act at all without having any negative affect on anyone tied to him is something we see even outside the concept of sacrifice--how many times before his death, even before his defection, do we see him say things like "you can insult me, but don't involve the Yunmeng Jiang sect" like. Like. Wei Wuxian please. That's not how this works. That's not how any of this works.

So I think him realising that other people will willingly be tied to him and there's nothing he can do about it, that his actions affect the people who care about him all the time, is something he still has to learn/relearn even after everything that happened leading up to his death. I think, in particular, Wei Wuxian realising that it's not just his mistakes and fuckups that affect people, but his intentional actions, too. Like sacrifices. Even if they're at his own expense. Because people care and that's okay and good.

Lan Zhan drives that home with things like noticing that Wei Wuxian has transferred Jin Ling's curse to his own leg, and then insisting on carrying him.

Lan Zhan notices. Lan Zhan cares. This act of sacrifice does not end with Wei Wuxian suffering. It has cascading effects, even something this small. It is, perhaps, more effective a lesson on a small scale with fewer complexities woven in, than it would be on the larger scale issues he dealt with before his death.

This idea that his sacrifices affect people beyond him is carried through the rest of the story, too, from the way everyone seems to fret about him after the Burial Mounds and Lan Sizhui runs to hold him, down to the fact that he has to answer for how his sacrifice of his golden core to Jiang Cheng affects Jiang Cheng. Both the absence of his own golden core being a catalyst for a lot of other shit, and finding out about the core transfer actually fucking Jiang Cheng up. Which, it turns out, Wei Wuxian kind of knew would happen, he just thought he could get away with not dealing with it if he kept the secret better.

Wei Wuxian can't escape his sacrifices and his actions having an effect on those around him, the ones who care and the ones he cares about, or even the object of his sacrifice, and he really does have to have that hammered home.

He also deals with growth related to his pride and arrogance. He learns how to be weak, he learns how to have alternate forms of strength, he learns how to let others in, and let others stand with him.

Most of this is related to Lan Zhan, and I've already covered it at least somewhat in another meta, but it relates back to this, because those are two driving forces behind his sacrificial nature.

If Wei Wuxian is allowed to be weak, is allowed to hesitate, is allowed to go to others for help, is allowed to look for alternative solutions, that sets a better precedent for cutting down on the habitual self-sacrifice tendencies.

Additionally, he learns that others can and will stand with him in his sacrifices, when they are necessary.

Look at the way he pushes Lan Zhan away on the steps of Jinlintai, but Lan Zhan steps back toward him, and draws his sword, and declares his love before heaven and earth, saying in as many words that Wei Wuxian need not walk his path alone, and they fight together.

And the next time Wei Wuxian goes to sacrifice? In the Burial Mounds? He doesn't even think twice before volunteering Lan Zhan to stand with him. His entire plan revolves around the idea that Lan Zhan will stand with him--without even consulting Lan Zhan--and in doing so, they may be able to prevent Wei Wuxian from actually sacrificing his life.

Already we see him internalising a lot of that growth. He doesn't need to grandstand or prove himself; he doesn't care what everyone there thinks of him, and for the ones he does care about he is secure in their regard for him. He doesn't first attempt to sacrifice himself and be bait to draw the fierce corpses away while everyone including Lan Zhan runs off. He doesn't have to be convinced to accept Lan Zhan as part of his plan. He doesn't have to have Lan Zhan simply stay behind and then deal with the addition of him later.

Compare, if you will, the Xuanwu cave. Wei Wuxian absolutely expected everyone else to leave while he drew its attention, and Lan Zhan staying was not part of his original plan. Yes, later on they attacked the Xuanwu together, but that was different entirely. At first, he was just being bait to get everyone else to safety.

In the Burial Mounds? He's already worked Lan Zhan having his back into his plans.

It's still a sacrifice, but he's come a really long way about it.

So now that we've mitigated some of the sacrificial tendencies, modulated their effects on his choices, we come down to the "live for you instead of die for you" issue.

My positing that Wei Wuxian has reached this point by the end of the story has a lot more to do with having seen the patterns of his growth, watching the way he interacted with Jiang Cheng regarding the issue of the golden core transfer being revealed, watching the way he interacted with Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan in general evolve, and watching him allow himself to have more and more attachments by the end of the story. And getting the overall vibe that living is now important, and there are things to live for in this world now that he's back in it.

However, if I had to narrow it down to one moment to exemplify this, I would point to the moment where he's caught around the neck by Jin Guangyao.

Wei Wuxian absolutely knows that if Lan Zhan sheathes Bichen, they're all fucked. Lan Zhan could easily take everyone here who would fight him, but not if he sheathes his sword and seals his spiritual power. And at this point it's increasingly likely that if they let themselves be captured they're simply not going to make it out alive. None of them. No matter what Jin Guangyao says.

Lan Zhan's best chance for survival and Jin Guangyao's best chance at being brought to justice/captured are one and the same in this moment--Lan Zhan keeping his sword, and either taking Jin Guangyao down himself or escaping to go fetch the assembled sect leaders and such at Lotus Pier.

Wei Wuxian knows this. It's why he begs Lan Zhan to be okay with his death and to do this Right Thing anyway.

Lan Zhan is not, and does not.

I don't think Wei Wuxian is surprised by this, to be fair.

But he could have ensured it would happen. He could have ensured that Jin Guangyao would go down. He could have ensured, more importantly, that Lan Zhan lived. He could have prevented Lan Zhan from sheathing Bichen to begin with.

He could have sacrificed himself.

It would have been incredibly easy at that point. All he had to do was fight back instead of hold still. Jin Guangyao was not bluffing, probably, though he just as surely knew if Wei Wuxian died then he was next, he counted on everyone wanting Wei Wuxian alive more than they wanted him dead. So if Wei Wuxian had tried to fight back or escape, he would have died.

Jin Guangyao would have been shocked, very very briefly. The resulting chaos would have seen everyone in custody who needed to be. Perfect.

And, you know, Lan Zhan would have been once more Wei-Ying-less.

Wei Wuxian very notably does not make this sacrifice. Even if it means they get captured. Even if it means they likely die together instead of only one of them dying. Even if that math is terrible on the surface of it.

He doesn't make Lan Zhan watch him die again. He doesn't presume that his loss means nothing. He doesn't presume that his life is not worth it, that his sacrifice is worth it.

Wei Wuxian actively chooses to live. He chooses to live for Lan Zhan. For the chance that they will both find a way out, and if they don't, then they are together in this and that matters more.

And he keeps making that choice. At no point in the confrontation with Jin Guangyao, for all those hours and hours and hours of back and forth and monologuing in that damned temple, does Wei Wuxian try to grandstand or throw himself sacrificially into the mix in any way. He is always working with everyone there to whatever extent possible, to the ends that everyone (including people he cedes the political superiority to) decides upon. He releases ownership of the situation, of needing to fix the situation, of needing to fix the situation by giving himself up.

I've been writing this so long I'm starting to lose the threads of my own thoughts, but yeah.

By the end, I think Wei Wuxian learns a lot and grows a lot and finally hits the point that Jiang Cheng hit years and years prior.

"I never thought I'd be worth the work it would take to piece myself together," but he was confronted with the idea of it again and again until it had to stick, and so he did. For Lan Zhan, for Lan Sizhui, for Jin Ling, for the other juniors.

I do think there will always be some element of self-sacrifice to Wei Wuxian's character that remain unchanged. He is a caretaker and a fixer at the heart of him. He is a big brother and I think maturity has only expanded that trait. He's also notably not a leader, and to some extent he does belong to himself both more and less than he ever could before his death.

But that doesn't have to be a bad thing. And it doesn't negate him embracing the idea of living for the ones he loves, getting better for the ones he loves, and letting them keep him in their lives.

I'd like to think that this piece of character growth is another significant thing in favour of Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng being able to forge not just a healthy relationship but a healthier relationship post-canon than they may have ever had before, or at least in a very long time.

#you would not believe how long this took to write out #why am i like this #my meta #unedited #the untamed #the untamed meta #jiang cheng #jiang wanyin #wei ying #wei wuxian #sacrifice #i may or may not be accepting constructive criticism at this time #this whole thing was probably terribly redundant but i'm too lazy to reread it and edit

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intheshadowofsignificance · 4 years ago

Note

I think the point is June and Serena becoming the same person in the end so there’s not any room for better or worse.

I completely understand your interpretation and there’s so much it makes me want to touch on and dissect.

Ultimately, June and Serena are different people with different experiences. Trauma and pain were a huge part of Gilead’s narrative even before it existed, and seeing that trauma manifest in similar ways between June and Serena is so, so interesting to me.

Ultimately, to me, Serena is a more compelling character. I personally like her more than June. That doesn’t make her more likable overall though, and it certainly doesn’t mean the two were created equal.

June has more room to grow and evolve than Serena, because despite what she’s been through and the anger it’s bred in her, she’s empathetic. She cried holding Esther. Regardless of it potentially dismantling their escape, she didn’t leave her. She felt deeply for Janine’s struggle too, and mourned her when she thought they were separating. She has complex PTSD and I think the flashback of Alma is a nod to her survivor’s guilt. The question of what she deserves is another nod to that. We don’t get that kind of reflection and introspection from Serena.

When she’s praying in the church, it’s not because she’s truly sorry, or truly grasps the horror of what she facilitated and forced upon thousands of women, it’s because she wants something. She wants a healthy baby. When Serena mourns Nicole, she’s moreso mourning the chance she lost to be a mother. She doesn’t feel compassion for Nicole’s separation anxiety, she immediately tells her, “it’s mommy.” Because what she really wants from Nicole is someone to love her. Serena never mentioning Nicole again during her pregnancy is very telling. It was never about a little girl she loved and bonded with, but the idea of having that love and bond in the first place. Motherhood is about completing herself, not bringing another soul into the world and helping them find completion.

June tells Hannah it’s okay to be angry with her. Can you imagine Serena telling preteen Nicole the same in that context? Can you imagine Serena being okay with a daughter who rebelled, and showing her compassion instead of spiteful, Bible verse scorn in the face of that rebellion? Serena’s own mother masqueraded her grief around for attention and sympathy. Serena is intoxicated by that same attention as long as she’s not the subject of it, and I could see her turning into Pam without much effort.

One thing June got right in the last scene that I don’t think is remotely shared between them is this: Serena is a sociopath. Not one who was made, like June, for the sake of survival, but one who was born. She doesn’t genuinely know how to feel anything for anyone else, she’s able to leech people’s emotions when she needs to, but she very seldom feels anything for herself towards other people.

When she got shot, was recovering, and called Fred weak, that wasn’t compassion. That wasn’t love. The Waterford’s had a marriage when Fred was useful to Serena and vice versa. When Eden died and she saw what very well could’ve been a younger version of herself drown in that pool, she grieved. Not for Eden, but for the person she made her out to be in her own head. For the person her daughter could have grown up to be. When we find out Eden had written in the Bible and Serena condemns her for it, we get confirmation of this. Eden isn’t who Serena thought she was, and Serena’s grief is strictly for the idealized version of her.

I firmly believe she could only let Nicole go because she saw herself in Eden. When Eden died for love while everyone around watched her drown, just like Serena was drowning grasping for the pieces of her failing marriage and the illusion of her superiority in Gilead, she realized she wanted more for Nicole. And the second the smoke cleared and she started to feel empty, she took it all back.

Right now, June and Serena are the same. They’re drunk on power and in a desperate battle to be in control of their own life. The difference is, June has the capacity for empathy and love, and will eventually use those things to see the wrong she’s done, whereas Serena is, in my opinion, incapable of meaningful grief, reflection, and growth.

She lived her entire life as a fanatic in a faith that requires surrender, not because she’s committed to it, but because she practices a version that absolves herself of responsibility for what she’s done. If she gives it to God, God will forgive her. If she says she’s making amends, she doesn’t have to actually do it. Some people use God, even in Gilead, to find meaning in heinous things. Serena uses God to take the meaning out of them.

It was his plan. I am his vessel.

Gilead made June into this person too, she didn’t care who died for her, she just needed to get to Hannah. Start a movement. Keep moving, keep being useful.

June has been cold and callous and she has committed atrocity just like Serena Joy, the difference is she has the capacity to recognize it eventually, and change. Whether she will or not is up in the air.

But anyway, all this is to say that June and Serena are both products of their environment, but June was very on the nose when she told Serena she didn’t know how to love. I genuinely don’t think she does. I don’t think she feels much other than smugness unless she’s sapping it from people around her.

Neither of them is perfect, and I think saying June is better or worse than Serena would convey the wrong message. What I will end on, though, is the notion that June is more human than she is calculating, while Serena feels more calculating than she does human.

#the handmaid’s tale season 4 #the handmaid's tale #tht #june osborne #serena joy #serena waterford #character study

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