#the only person who actually listens to me is my psychiatrist. shes the only professional I've told about my trauma lol

[graveyarrdshift]

hate it when people say how much they love daydreaming. as if I feel safe enough in my mind to daydream

[meraki-yao]

This is gonna be really personal, and really venty and probably really selfish, and I’m most likely gonna delete it in the morning, but I feel like this is the only place I can talk about it, so I’m just gonna shout this into the void. If you’re not in a good space either, please stop reading and keep scrolling.

I’m not in a good place in my life right now. Truth be told my mental health has been shit since I was 7, but this is the worst I’ve ever been. Long story short, I was pressured into a college major that I didn’t want by family, and I thought I could pull through the four years of school, but it’s the first semester of the second year and I can’t handle it. I do not suit this major, nor do I find any purpose or joy in trying to deal with it. I hate it, I struggle with, yet it consumes all the time in my life. It’s been like this since the start of college, and it’s just getting worse. It doesn’t help that adults around me keep telling me how good this major is as a career and how I need to start looking for internships. It’s gotten to the point where I’m mentally and physically unhealthy, and I skipped school for the entirety of October without anyone but my sister knowing because classes gave me panic attacks. My parents aren’t people I can talk to about this because 1, they invalidate mental health issues as my fault for not trying hard enough because engineering and science came easy to them 2, they’re the ones who put me in this position in the first place. My sister listens but I help her more than she knows how to help me, and my friends are all busy with their own stuff.

I am seeking professional help on my own, I have bimonthly counselling which helps, and I recently started taking prescribed antidepressants. But for me to find a psychiatrist for a diagnosis on my life long issues and more meds, or for me to start looking into switching a major (which is a fucking arduous process where I am, fuck), I need to wait till I’m done with my exams which will be the last two weeks of December

So for the following month, I’m stuck, and fucked.

RWRB saved me in a way. I accidentally stumbled upon the trailer when it came out and suddenly I had a source of joy, a reason to keep going and keep looking forward to the next day. RWRB made me the happiest I’ve been since January of 2022. I can’t explain why, maybe it’s how I relate to Henry, maybe it’s how firstprince’s relationship is so beautiful, maybe it’s how it’s a rom com, I don’t know. But I have a couple of movies/shows that make a huge impact on my life, and RWRB is one of them. Waking up to something new, waking up happy with something to look forward to felt so good after so long of wanting time to just pass by me. I’ve haven’t watched a movie on repeat since I was 6 and repeating the original Lion King. I started this account because I had so many thoughts about the movie and I wanted to share them.

And I know it’s not the healthiest to hook all of my sanity onto a fandom/movie. But I’m not in a space where I can deal with my actual problems directly right now. And I do have other things in my real life that make me feel a bit better, but RWRB really has been the most effective/impactful one right now.

This is also the first time since Infinity War in 2019 were I followed a movie’s promo and release rather than discover it when all is said and done. And it happened to coincide with the strikes. Which again I’m supportive of and proud of the agreements they achieved, but the timing of everything just makes me so upset.

I thought that Prime would keep it going for a bit, especially after the strike resolved. And right now I’m not saying they’re definitively not doing anything. We don’t know that.

But I thought they would release a new deleted scene on 18th since that’s the date the last two deleted scenes were released, and it was the 100th day since release. When that didn’t happen, I thought they would release it on Thanksgiving. I lost sleep over waiting for it. But that didn’t happen either.

I got an anon ask who kindly but objectively explained the situation on the business side. And after reading and answering those asks…

I felt really fucking bad.

I kinda just lied down, panting and trembling.

It kinda felt like drug addiction withdrawal. Which is a morbid thing to compare it to, because if it weren’t for my myriad of problems this would just be a hyperfixation, but withdrawal is genuinely the only way I can explain my reaction (but to clarify I never actually did drugs)

And the following days I just had this ache and weight in my chest.

I think the reason my reaction is visceral is because RWRB is really my only, singular source of unbridled happiness right now. It’s literally the only thing I’m trying to hold on and stay afloat for, the reason I wake up in the morning. I thought Prime would keep going for a while with a relatively fixed monthly schedule of something new, but that broke off.

And that’s not to say that the fandom isn’t included in my RWRB happiness. I still fucking love the fanart and fanfics I come across.

But the jump from August and September to now, and my worsening issues because of school, it just hits harder.

I’m kind of at a lost right now. I’m getting worse in my own life with exams that I’ll definitely straight up fail (and I used to be a star student: I’ve needed academic validation my whole life) on the horizon, and I feel like I’m losing the only thing I held on to for the past couple of months.

I’m fucked and I don’t know what to do.  

[autismvampyre]

ok so audhd rant/asking for advice

we had a psychologicist come to the class to explain autism and adhd today. the reason why is bc i have faced a lot of discrimination, ableism and bullying from my peers bc of my disorders. my teachers felt we should all learn what the words mean and why they should never be used as insults, and how that can affect someone, which is a nice sentiment.

the person they picked was recommended by my mother, which should've been my first warning sign, bc try as she might my mother does not understand the autistic community. she trusts the professionals which is good bc im not a doctor and they're qualified, i get it; but also i dont fucking trust professionals to understand me because not once did my doctors help me understand when i was diagnosed. i asked to meet her before she came to the school, but my mom insisted she was great so i held back and tried to be hopeful, because even if a lot of my experience with professionals has been negative doesn't mean they're all bad and ignorant

anyways, she was exactly like every other psychologist ever and explained everything in the most basic way ive even seen. she literally sounded like the people who explained my diagnoses to me when i got them at age 11 and those mf's were literally useless. it took me years to actually understand what my disorder meant and i only figured it out by talking to other people with autism and adhd instead of reading shit by professionals and autism moms. the way we are portrayed by psychiatrists is not my experience at all and they often use outdated language and speak in very broad terms and don't bring up any of the things that i find important. i know not everyone with adhd and autism is the same but i genuinely cannot relate to the way they talk about us at all. like, this psychiatrist didn't even mention executive dysfunction and kept talking about how it "isn't an excuse" and fucking everyone agreed.

i feel like almost an anti-vaxxer, claiming i know better than doctors, so i genuinely do try to understand and accept doctors but i just cant fucking stand it. am i wrong for thinking she's wrong? like she has a degree, but she also doesn't seem to understand me and idk if im just a weird outlier even in my neurodivergence or if im right and she doesn't truly understand. like im not a doctor, im just a person who has these disorders but i genuinely feel misrepresented and like all these explanations are for other people to understand that they have to put up with me. i feel infantilised and really fucking bummed. like, i knew she wasn't gonna be perfect bc she isn't actually in the community but the level of generalization and misinformation was so disappointing

i feel fucking crazy. cause who am i to disagree with her when she's the professional, yk?? im no one. they won't listen to me. my classmates can't empathize with me like they do each other, and so many of them think they get it bc they're white teenage boys with adhd that are low support(and im happy for them that they feel good about it!! genuinely! and not saying they aren't valid, but in my experience many of them tend to unknowingly invalidate other people with the disorder who are different than them/have higher support needs) and can't seem to understand that other people have different experiences and struggles with the same disorder. i also live in a very conservative city, and even if the school is more liberal, we are still very high in MUF(the moderate party's youth) and you can tell because everyone i know is either apolitical or conservative, except me and the three leftists. it's a hostile environment, and i feel like im rambling but whatever. i needed to get it off my chest

[featherymainffins]

No but since we're on the topic of eating disorders anyway, I'm really grateful for the doctor who's gonna lead my individual therapy as well as the group DBT therapy, because she's the first person who takes my issues with food and body image seriously and doesn't shame me for them.

Like I genuinely wasn't expecting that. Because I'm so used to professionals just kinda shrugging it off or mocking me. When I was a pre-teen and then a teen, they always asked the wrong questions and didn't pry more, and I genuinely didn't understand what they were asking. They always asked if I thought I was fat. But until two years ago, my perception of myself was not actually warped in this way - I was cognitively aware that I was not fat, because I could look around myself and see that most people were bigger than me, and logically I understood that I wore XS and S clothes. So I always said no. It was the truth. I didn't think so. But I felt fat. An emotional component of me was telling me that I was fat, while my visual perception was telling me that I wasn't. But they never asked me about how I felt, only what I thought. And they never pried more.

I had one psychiatrist who did, but she was aggressive and made me feel ashamed about everything. She kept threatening me, saying that if I had an eating disorder she'd call a psychiatric hospital and they'd lock me up. It was a threat, so I avoided talking about it. She also tried to weigh me several times despite me getting a panic attack every time. I tried to explain to her that it makes me feel intense fear and that I would rather die than step on a scale, and I was willing to weigh myself at home if she needed to know that bad, I just needed to do it on my own time with enough mental preparation, but she'd never listen.

When I started transitioning, I had to clam up about my body and food issues completely. Another psychiatrist told me that I had to choose - I could either be a man, or I could have an eating disorder. She would treat me as a girl if I decided that I have problems with my body image and food.

Most other professionals have just shrugged it off. They always ask how much I eat during anamnesis. I don't lie about it, though I try to make it sound light-hearted. It's supposed to be funny. I'm supposed to be funny. "Oh...well...not much. You know how it is, no time for things like food haha." They don't ask if there's a reason besides time, so I don't say anything. I'm not sure if I'm secretly hoping they'll pry, I'm not sure if I'm hoping that they notice something nervous behind my chuckle. Either way, they don't.

But when I was at one of the DBT interviews they do before the group therapy begins, the doctor was doing my anamnesis and talking about BPD and DBT etc etc. It was partly boring and I felt like she thought I was an idiot. Logically, I think she found it as awkward as I did, and I wonder if she was hoping I would stop her. You see, I told her that I'm studying psychology during the anamnesis. I was aware and very familiar with about 90 % of everything she was telling me about psychology, the brain, BPD and DBT. I couldn't decide if it was weirder to let her go on about things I know like the back of my hand or to stop her and tell her that she doesn't have to say all that. I decided to just nod through it. At one point during my anamnesis, she asked about how much I eat.

"Eeeeh, well, could be better, you know how it is."

She asked what that meant, if I could put the amount of food into a number. I assumed the anamnesis needed a number. She asked me if once a day would be correct. I said yes, which was a lie. I wasn't about to tell her that these days I go without food more often than not. Way more often than not.

"You must be really tired," she offered.

Nobody has ever said that to me before. I was tired. Most of these days I'm tired, fatigued, exhausted. So I told her that I was tired. And that the worst part was that I was well aware it was because of me not eating, but that I couldn't stop. And how I was aware of all the other effects it was having on my body, how annoying it is that all wounds take forever to heal because my body doesn't have enough protein and how I need to wear bandages because otherwise I keep scratching and opening the wounds again and then they take forever to heal again, rinse and repeat. I didn't have to say anything, she herself said that that's probably something we'll want to work on, and jotted it down.

I felt really elated because I was fully expecting her to ask the dreaded question "How can you be a man and have symptoms of an eating disorder?" or to say "Hmmm, so in my opinion you may have deluded yourself into thinking you are trans, but you actually just have an eating disorder." but she didn't do either of that. So um yeah.

[insipid-drivel]

There are a ton of notes on this post but I'd like to speak up for those of us with "scary" mental conditions that cause doctors to try to speedrun through every interaction and ultimately leave us to die.

I personally have DID, or specifically, OSDD-1B (kinda makes me feel like an SCP). Basically, I have a system of alter personalities, but unlike "classical" DID, they're fully aware of each other and of me, and rarely interfere with my memory now that we've gotten good at switching. We work together as a team and my alters have literally saved my life on multiple occasions.

The sheer lack of ANY knowledge regarding even the bare-bones "DID" is among medical professionals - psychologists and psychiatrists included - is terrifying. I often wind up burning through appointment times with doctors who get caught up needing me to teach them what my condition even is or how it works.

I have to seriously explain no, I am not a serial killer, because most DOCTORS assume that DID patients are inherently violent and enjoy hurting people. They never understand that DID and its associated conditions are entirely borne of severe psychological trauma sustained during early childhood out of a desperate need for survival and comfort.

I also have to explain that, in fact, if Alex is the one talking to the doctor, they're actually 90% more likely to have a good, cooperative, successful appointment with me than if I were fronting. However, if they refuse that basic concession that's little different than "If an elder with dementia is having an episode, just go with it or else you'll only scare and traumatize them," with regards to elder-care, then they'll only get a quivering, panic-muted mess with me, or - even worse - they'll wind up meeting Cassandra.

Cassandra puts people in the hospital when she has to. She has taken down men twice my size trying to back me in a corner and physically harm me. In high school, she once beat a violent bully attacking me and my best friend so badly it took 4 17-year-old football jocks to pull her off the bully before she was done making her point about keeping your hands off me without asking permission to touch me first.

If I'm being threatened or harmed directly and intentionally, Cassandra will get aggressive, and if the threat isn't removed immediately or she isn't able to take me out of the situation, she will respond like a cornered animal and attack, and it's 100% the doctor's fault for not listening to my warnings and guidelines on how to handle and approach me. Cassandra's job and entire reason she exists is because doctors have hurt and traumatized me too many times and are officially on her shit list.

The thing is, now that I'm vocally out about my OSDD... doctors now shut the fuck up when I talk. I can never get away from the bigotry and the unwarranted fear from people who don't even really know us, but I can at least use it to force a self-important doctor into a reality check consisting of, "Hey, you're not the expert here, and if you don't listen exactly to what I say, you're putting yourself and everyone in this room in danger."

That's when I see misogynistic faces (and I'm fucking trans and agendered gdi) turn into frightened first-day-of-residency students again. I know they're thinking of shows like Criminal Minds and Law & Order and how scawy DID is on TV. They're thinking of all the psych rounds and classes they bullshitted through because "I'll never have one of them for a patient." I know they're judging me based on characters that weren't even written by writers that bothered to do any research into what DID can actually be like. And honestly, I've grown to anticipate it.

So I let them freeze and let the "Oh shit, it's one of them," wash over them. I'm more afraid of them than they are of me, but if their fear and apprehension forces them to sit down, shut up, and listen? Then that's where we are. I didn't make them neglect their studies, and I shouldn't have to scare them for them to treat and diagnose me humanely and gently, but since doctors on average only truly listen to their patients' complaints for an average of 11 seconds before they start interrupting the patient and stop listening to them, I will use every tool trauma and nature gave me to force my doctors to give me their fucking attention.

This ABSOLUTELY works.

I have used this for many years. Definitely b do it.

[atd-everything-girl]

Demigod of my own

ch-2 Manhattan's youngest surfer.

Hey! Umm so because of well examinations Almost everyday I couldn't quite Post part 2 due to academic reasons but Hey at least this came a bit earlier than Planned! Oh whatever anyway here's Ariel's POV!

A large  Wave was oncomings many people on the beach turned their attention towards it. A couple of surfers some professionals and some plain youth tiled to see catch the wave to surf but were  washed away as their talents betrayed them. As they returned grumbling, they the heard the loud Joyful screan of a young girl. Many shock on their face  and some showed wonder for the only person who had managed to catch and ride the wave was a red-headed 8 year old girl Ariel malician, who had tactfully slipped out of her mother's sight just is time to ride the wave. she Swinged her surfboard around skillfully between her feet. The water moving as if following her will and command. she surfed tell she the wave till it died down and  just as she came to the shore, she felt Very satisfied with the attention she was getting as all eyes  were on her. she smiled, the wind flew into her hair which was tied back Into a low ponytail. As someone was approaching her ( perhaps to ask questions) A Woman wearing a lifeguard's uniform cut her and gave Ariel a cross look who in turn gave her an apologetic smile, 'Sorry mom.. felt like surfing.' Her half-bluffed excuse didn't exactly help pacify Sofia, who ended up silently taking her back to the apartment that afternoon. 'Ariel, there's nothing wrong with surfing but NEVER disappear out of my sight again, especially without telling me.' Ariel pouted on the couch as her mother rambled on about safety. Oh what did she know? the water always moved to her mind's will besides even If she did fall in, there's no way she couldn't grab her surfboard in time. Her mom would often credit Ariel's dad for her surfing abilities though she had actually never meant the man, sofia claimed that her surfing tricks and stunts were identical to his, from when they were together. She never quite understood why her father had promised to meet her specifically when she turned 15 and why her mom still believed it and simply refuse to marry anyone else (much to her grandpa's annoyance)Sofia had raised her alone with 2 Jobs as a part-time lifeguard and part-time grocery store cashier. As sofia finally stopped rambling Ariel headed to her bedroom. Today was a sunday which meant school on monday. she groaned, for all her teachers often found her irksome and loud, upon their insistence she had been diagnosed with A.D.H.D by the psychiatrist (only after complete and through procedures of course). The only person she looked forward to Seeing Was mitszy monica her best friend A sandy-brown haired highly energetic fellow 8 year old with elfish ears and black eyes. She thought about how for she had also been diagnosed with ADHD though mitszy often had a lot more energy then her so maybe their diagnoses had some faults.                          ~~~~~

School was largely uneventful. Except for when mitszy Jumpscared her at lunch by hiding under the table and then laughing for the rest of the lunch period as Ariel grumbled about how she could have possibly fallen for such a lame trick. Thought as they were In English class an announcement came and everyone Were to gather outside for an firefighter had been called to give a speech on fire safety. Ariel became became annoyed, These kinds of people never gave any  useful information  even when she'd listened. Her eyes spun towards mitszy who had a mischievous smile on her face.she raised her hand and said,' mrs. Johnson. I have to go to the bathroom its an emergency. please?' The teacher absently mindly nodded yes so she grabbed Ariel and sped out the classroom as the teacher was trying to get everyone In line. They reached the grounds and went behind the trees as mitszy pulled out a bunch of  candy  hidden in her pockets. 'where did you get that?' Ariel asked and was met with the same response 'stole it off cassy's stash.'  'you mean her bag?' 'eh! she won't even realise it till we've  already had our feast.' she Shrugged and popped gum in her mouth. Ariel was about to pick up a kit-kat when a large  strange orange fox ran by them. Jumping into school property by the fence. If that wasn't strange enough, they suddenly saw a bunch of girls with black outfits, silver crowns and freaking - Weapons! bows and arrows and daggers even! First these weird girls  trespassed into the School grounds and second, no-one payed any heed to them! Even the Janitor who was Swepping the ground just looked up and around shrugged at the noise   and then went back to work as if  weird foxes and gangs  normal! Mitszy and Ariel as the girls Shot the fox but there arrows missed and seem to try everything in their power to catch It though the fox jumped out leaving girls Very angry, a few of  them cursing loudly. Though one Hispanic looking girl with an elegant braid noticed the fact that Mitszy and Artel could not only see them, but were also horrified and Wanted to potentially report them  she walked to them. Smiling at their candy stash and the then gesturing towards the auditorium as of to say, "you girls are suppose to be there aren't you? Ariel looked at her silently though mitszy broke the Silence,'who are you ? A gang or something'  Insted of answering her, the girl pulled out a dagger and asked, 'can you tell me what this looks like to you?' Ariel answered sheepishly, 'A very sharp object you can kill us with.'  The girl took a step back maybe Wondering how & Second-grader knew about about death or maybe - thinking that killing them will be the Wise to thing to do. Instead she Smiled and asked, "Do you know anything about greek or roman mythology?'  They both stared. Though Mitszy replied,' my mom reads me stories about the gods  sometimes and I think I read a couple of greek myths here and there.'  'what about you?' The girl asked Ariel who replied, 'we have downloaded audio books about myths that I sometimes listen to.' 'Well then I think you girls  might think may be demigods! She said and then hastliy Introduced herself ' I'm Reyna by the way.' Another girl came and stood beside Reyna, she looked like a punk girl with short black short and strange light Blue eyes... she stared into Ariel's eyes and was met back with a cold cautious one. The punk h huffed and looked at Reyna,' who are these little ones? ya plan on recruiting them?' Reyna Shrugged and turned to them asking , ' have you ever had an absent parent?'  'None of your business.' Ariel reliped though mitszy once again went, 'our dads I guess.'  The punk looked at her and Said, 'you look like those kids from cabin 11.'  'what?' Before anymore questions were answered. All the girls suddenly glowed silver and then disappeared leaving behind the most baffled 8 year olds in existence.

     ~~~~~~

It had been a couple days since the Incident. Ariel's mom had taken her and mitszy this time to the beach. As she sat at the shore staring at her surfboard (mermaid themed) mitszy asked her, ' Remember those weird gang girls?' Ariel nodded. mitszy continued, ' I have kinda looked into it and demigods are children of greek or Roman gods With mortal parents. They supposedly have abonormal abilities sometimes.'  Ariel looked at have her and asked, 'sure those girls weren't just our imaginations?'  'so you're saying that both of us imagined the same thing and talked to them?' Ariel didn't give an answer. She laid back on the sand and simply said, 'I'm going to ask mom.' 'About what?'......... Ariel closed her eyes and  said, ' About the mere existence of gods and whether or not one's my father.'

[aduncanrant]

I'm somehow upset. I just want to take this thought from my mind. Again and again, I'm told that this is just part of my OCD. But the funny thing is my neuropsychologist told me it isn't. She went just as I needed to: step by step, from one diagnostic criteria. My psychiatrist just puts the ASD diagnostic along with the other ones. I have that ASD tag on my medical history for maybe a year. But it isn't enough (It never is), for it all to click I need that ASD assessment to happen, to be there (I beg my mom to be there with me) and to take a look at my full life at listen to this story that I have tried so long to make sense off. I'm not stupid, I know there's a big chance that it is all in my head and the answer is "NO", but I'm ready for it. God! I have the biggest list of reasons why I'm not, but being as I am, I have these ideas that stuck deep into my brain and I cannot take off. What I am asking, as an OCD girl, is for someone to take this idea from my head from the roots, not just a side eye, not a professional opinion (my sister makes the most of the "Stop with the autism" club).

So there I was. My psychiatrist sent me to be checked by neurology. My neuropsychologist said my neurology appointment was "urgent". I had been fighting to get the appointment because "there was no agenda". But I'm finally there. The neurologist is a man who teaches at my university (we haven't met before) and when I say that my mom might be helpful and ask if I can call her he says that he "believes me". I didn't feel so bad because well... I can speak for myself.

But then he starts asking again and again about my schooling and my grades. And... well my grades are garbage at this point. But it doesn't matter (?) I answered all his questions, all about my problems with reading and logical thinking. But again... I have those problems due to a period of depression. For me, that was super confusing because I'm not there for cognitive issues, actually part of what makes me think of myself as an ASD person is the fact that I always had a better understanding of school than human interactions. I did well academically in school till my social problems reached me. But I could make it through. So I was confused... It was like we both looked at totally different diagnostics.

Next was the most uncomfortable part. First, we talk about my friends (I only have one). But then... He asked me if I was attracted to people, if I had a partner and some things that made me feel out of place. I can guess it's about relationships and getting close to people, but the comments about my attraction... I don't know. Asexuality is not in the diagnostic criteria, or is it?

He intended to leave the appointment as it was, so I talked about my interests. That is a thing that affects me a lot, I get caught up in them for months and can talk about anything else (it's difficult to manage uni that way too). And he comes and says to me "Everyone has interests" and "Most people just think about soccer and pop music". Like.... man.... that is literally in the diagnostic criteria.

"Highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or focus." (DSM-5 50)

(I'm not saying mine is automatically that, but it felt so wrong to be dismissed like that)

Then he said that the fact that I didn´t understand child play as a kid, or that I said things against things that weren't purely practical. That all of that reminded him of himself and that it was normal.

I wish I had my mom by my side in that moment just to say how strange growing up with me was. That it wasn't just normal. But he didn't let her in, so I was alone.

I don't know if I'm just making a fuss out of nowhere. But I want something real, something that goes deep....

[awakefor48hours]

Hi same anon who was asked what I should do abt my psychiatrist telling me I might be autistic. I live in the uk, so if I’m diagnosed with autism or I get out on the spectrum I’m at a risk of being bullied and possibly killed so yeah, and also I don’t believe I’m autistic, it would ruin my image and I’m on tumblr for those weird memes so I can post them on TikTok. 🕎

Anon, I'm a neurodivergent yank, I'm not gonna be much help to you. To this day, I'm still learning things about neurotypical people/the neurotypical experience that shocks me (the biggest one lately being that "eye contact" doesn't mean looking directly into someone's pupils). But you really should listen to the person who studied for years in this area. If you do get diagnosed, you don't have change anything.

I'm not going to be one of those people that's going to say "kids will bully for anything" because that's not entirely true. Kids do actively find things to bully people for (be it race, gender, weight, neurodiversity, etc) but even if you are professionally diagnosed, you don't have to tell anyone. If what you're doing right now is fine, then just keep doing that.

Also, once again, I'm in the US so I don't know things work in the UK but psychiatrists don't just go around giving people autism diagnoses all willy-nilly. My sister was actually professionally diagnosed with autism (twice now, I think) but because they "function just fine" it's not on any of their official medical documents. The sad truth of it all is, being neurodivergent isn't treated with respect in the medical field. So when someone in the medical field says "you have autism" you probably have autism.

But if you really want to avoid being professionally diagnosed (and keep in mind, I only read about this in another tumblr post once about a year ago) you can get diagnosed for symptoms of being neurodivergent without being actually diagnosed for being neurodivergent (to take me for an example, instead of being diagnosed with ADHD, I could just be diagnosed with RSD).

I understand that being bullied and being at risk of killed sucks (I have ADHD and I'm black so trust me when I say I completely understand your predicament of not wanting to be bullied/killed) but this is the best advice I got.

I'm an adult with ADHD on tumblr dot com with Zuko as my pfp and cry watching cartoons for children, I'm not going to be much help in the name of avoiding an autism diagnosis. All I can really leave this off with is that you really might be autistic but just not know it. Autism is a spectrum and takes on many shapes and sizes. I didn't think I had ADHD until my psychiatrist listed off the symptoms and I felt like she was explaining my live story to me.

[ihatebiden]

my therapist realised how traumatized i am and now she doesnt want to see me anymore 😀😀😀😀

[dreamwritesimagines]

Twisted 17 - Mind Games [Spencer Reid x Reader]

A.N.: Thank you so much for your wonderful support my loves! Here’s the next chapter, I hope you will like it as well, and please let me know what you think of it! ❤❤ Ily, kisses! ❤❤❤

Series Masterlist

Warnings: Murder, serial killers, violence, manipulation, mentions of sex, drinking, smoking, angst.

Word Count: 4700

Summary: Love demands sacrifices.

Not even once in your life had you ever imagined yourself in handcuffs, in an interrogation room on the wrong side of the table.

You weren’t even at the FBI headquarters though. The police had taken you to the station after the hospital, taking a blood sample and your fingerprints, then they had handcuffed you and left you there with a glass of water.

Of course they suspected you. Of course they thought you had murdered him.

Murder was your father’s legacy, after all.

You traced the handcuffs over your wrists, already feeling the bruises forming there. The shock still hadn’t worn off but you were starting to think it was a good thing. It felt as if you were watching all of this from behind some kind of glass window, perfectly aware of every single emotion but unable to actually feel them.

Spencer had said when you felt threatened, your body produced nervous energy, some sort of a fight or flight reaction but for once you weren’t trying to do any of that.

You just sat there, completely frozen.

“You look calm,” the police officer spoke, making you look up, trying to ignore the faint yelling coming from outside, possibly from the end of the hall.  

“I’m sorry?”

“Most people would be traumatized if this happened to them, they’d be crying, shaking…” he motioned at you, “But look at you. Still as a statue. You look pretty calm.”

“Would you rather if I were crying?”

“I’d rather if you were acting like a human being,” he said, “Why are you so calm?”

Why were you so calm?

Because your mother had taught you this much. Showing emotion when you were afraid meant weakness.

“My father was a serial killer,” you stated, looking him dead in the eye, “I’ve had a complicated childhood.”

“Yeah, I’d say…” he leaned in slightly, “You know, I’ve watched that documentary about your father. His interviews too.”

You raised your brows as he sniffled, trying to look like he was nonchalant about this whole situation.

“And I’ve spent sixteen years on this job,” he said, “After a while, you don’t even need anyone to speak for you to know what they’ve done. It’s all in their eyes and little girl,” he clicked his tongue, “There’s nothing behind your eyes but ice and death.”

You couldn’t cry. You wouldn’t cry. Not in front of people, not even if they tried to kill you. No matter how much they tried to hurt you-

No emotions.

“Impressive,” you managed to say, “Very poetic. Have you ever considered changing your career?”

“You know what I think?”

“I’m sure you’re about to enlighten me.”

“I think you wanted to follow your father’s footsteps,” he said, “I think you killed Anthony, and all those other people. It’s not even your fault, is it? Some people are just born broken.”

That was more than enough to make your eyes snap up to his and you could feel the lump in your throat but you bit your tongue so hard that you swallowed blood, making sure to keep your expression still.

“Nothing to say?”

“You’ve already decided what to think of me,” you said, “And I already told you what happened. What more do you want to hear?”

“Right,” he scoffed, taking a look at the file in front of him, “You went to bed around 12, didn’t wake up whole night, when you woke up you found him like that. Lying in a pool of his own blood, in your kitchen.”

“You don’t look like a whiskey girl.” an unfamiliar voice made you turn your head and you lowered your glass, tilting your head. The guy smiled at you, and stole a look at the whiskey glass you had put on the bar.

“Yeah?” you asked, “What girl am I then? If you’re such an expert?”

He thought for a moment, “Hmm, wine?”

“Depends on the occasion.”

“What kind of an occasion does whiskey call for?”

“Apparently an occasion for meeting guys with bad pick-up lines.”

He let out a chuckle, “Yeah, I swear I’m normally smoother than this.”

“I would hope so,” you grinned, and offered your hand, “Y/N.”

“Anthony.”

“But you failed to mention the part you texted him to come to your apartment.”

“I didn’t text anyone.”

“We have your phone Y/N.”

“I didn’t text anyone,” you repeated, “Someone must’ve drugged me and taken my phone, the same person who killed him, the same person who obviously broke into my apartment.”

“How convenient.”

You clenched your jaw.

“I always wake up during night,” you said, your voice completely calm and controlled. “Always. I never woke up last night, there has to be a reason for that.”

“If you’ve been drugged, it will come up on the blood tests.”

“Good.”

“While we wait for that,” he said, “Why don’t we go over what you did last night?”

You took a deep breath, “I woke up,” you said “Went to work. I left work at 7 to go to my sister’s place. I left there around eleven, came home and went to bed.”

“Nothing else happened.”

“Nothing else happened,” you repeated and he sat up straighter.

“Okay. Well just so you know, Dr. Spencer Reid—” he started and your head shot up, your heart slamming against your chest, “He is giving us his professional opinion at the moment, about this case and what might have really happened this morning. Do you have anything you want to change in your story before he’s finished?”

You gawked at him, blinking a couple of times before you turned your head to look at the one-way mirror on the wall.

The BAU was there, behind the mirror.

“….They came back?”

“We’ve sent them the report, yes. They landed an hour ago.”

It was as if somebody was trying to claw your stomach out of your body as you stared at your reflection in the mirror, trying to ignore the burning behind your eyes before you turned to the officer.

“I don’t have anything to change,” you managed to keep your voice stable, “It was a terrible thing, it definitely was but I didn’t do it.”

Someone knocked on the mirror, making you and the officer look that way before he pushed his chair back and left the interrogation room. You closed your eyes for a moment, focusing on your breathing through the blinding headache but opened your eyes when the door opened again.

Luke.

He offered you a small smile and pulled himself a chair.

“Hi.”

“Hello,” you swallowed the lump in your throat, sitting up with your back straight, your hands clasped.

“You okay?”

“I’m fine,” you stole a look at the one-way mirror, “Is he there?”

“Reid?” Luke asked and shook his head, “I had to basically wrestle him out of the hall, he’s…he’s not allowed here. Conflict of interest. He’s giving his statement at the end of the hall as we speak.”

You nodded, digging your fingernails into your palms. “Okay.”

“He also called your sister on our way here. Couldn’t reach her, but left a message. Listen, he can’t request it on your behalf, but you need to ask for a lawyer.”

“I didn’t kill Anthony.”

“I didn’t ask if you killed him, I’m saying you need to ask for a lawyer.”

“Does he think I did it?” you asked and Luke shook his head again.

“No,” he said, “But it doesn’t matter what anyone else believes at this point, Y/N. Ask for a lawyer.”

You kept your back straight, rolling your shoulders. “If Spencer left a message to Mina, she’s coming.”

“Is she a defense lawyer?”

“No but she knows a lot of them.”

He took a deep breath and put the bottle of your pills on the desk, “The officers also found this.”

You tried your hardest to focus, moving your wrists to help with the soreness of the handcuffs. “They’re prescribed.”

“I can see that. The side effects say confusion?”

You arched a brow, “I’m sorry, do I sound confused to you right now?”

“No, you sound way too controlled right now, I may as well have been talking to a robot.”

You gritted your teeth, trying to control the panic bubbling at the pit of your stomach, sending anger through your veins.

“I’m not confused,” you stated, “Besides, I haven’t been taking them lately.”

He threw his head back, pressing his lips together, “God, Y/N, you can’t say that. A psychiatrist prescribed you something and you—“

“They’re just for nightmares, they don’t make you…” you took a deep breath, commanding yourself to stay calm, “I didn’t kill him. I found him like that. It was terrible, but I didn’t do it.”

Someone opened the door again and Emily Prentiss cleared her throat.

“Luke,” she murmured, “Spencer.”

You could feel your heart skip a beat upon hearing his name but kept completely still as Luke left the room and Emily and JJ walked into the room.

“You’re taking turns now?” you asked and Emily cleared her throat,

“Me and JJ are the only people in our team who haven’t spent as much time with you, so we figured it would be better if we interrogated you.”

“I didn’t do it.”

Emily pulled herself a chair as JJ crossed her arms, standing by the wall.

“Can you walk me through what happened this morning?”

You took a deep breath, “I woke up,” you said, “With a headache. I knew something was wrong, I felt it. My window was open, the front door was half open and my phone wasn’t where I left it. I stepped outside my room, saw the blood, went to the kitchen and saw—“ you gritted your teeth and clenched your fists, “Saw my ex-boyfriend there. Dead. Lying in a pool of his blood.”

“But you heard nothing.”

“I never sleep for the whole night,” you said slowly, “Check my blood test. Something happened last night.”

“We don’t have your blood test results yet, but there was no sign of any sexual—“

“That’s not what I’m talking about.” You cut her off, a shiver running down your spine, “That’s not it. Whoever it was, they didn’t touch me, they wanted…”

“What did they want?”

You shrugged slightly, “I don’t know. They wanted me to see it I think. My…my father’s crime scenes.”

JJ took a deep breath and pushed herself off the wall.

“And you don’t think it’s a little too convenient?”

You pulled your brows together, looking at her and she stepped closer to the table, her eyes fixed on you.

“Two victims so far,” she said, “The ones that we knew that were in the same place as you, they had some connection to you. That woman who was killed at the charity ball, you didn’t get along when you were kids, you turned her down as a client before she was killed, and now your ex-boyfriend ends up dead, in your apartment because you sent him a—“ she scoffed, “I’m sorry, someone sent him a late night text, inviting him to your apartment.”

“JJ,” Emily started but JJ held up a hand while you tried to wrap your head around it.

She had a point. Two victims so far had some connection to you and that was not a coincidence, it couldn’t have been.

“You think I did it,” you rasped out and she scoffed.

“I think you had something to do with all of this,” she said, “I think you’ve been trying to manipulate Spencer for something. The best case scenario, you were cheating, that’s why Anthony was there and something went bad, the worst case….” She shook her head, “You’re behind every single murder we’ve been looking into, and Spencer was just a tool for you. He’s my best friend, and if I find one single proof that you put him in harm’s way, I swear to God I will destroy you.”

Two people had ended up dead, and that was your fault. The copycat was going after people who had some kind of connection to you, and apparently no one except you and your family was safe.

The idea was way too painful to even exist inside your head, but it was clear as day. JJ was right, you were putting Spencer in harm’s way just by being with him, and if it were him, if you had seen him lying in a pool of his blood, his eyes wide open—

You dug your fingernails into your palms until it hurt before you managed to lift your head, that invisible wall which kept you safe from anyone and everyone who could possibly see anything you felt going up again.

“You…” you trailed off, your throat burning, “You don’t have to worry about that anymore.”

“What does that mean?” Emily asked but before you could say anything, someone slammed the door open, making you and the agents turn.

Mina.

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” she asked no one in particular and stepped aside so that 4 lawyers could walk inside before the police officer rushed to you to remove the handcuffs off your wrists.

“You’re not saying another word,” she snapped her fingers, “Come on, we’re leaving.”

“We’re going to need her to sign some papers,” the officer said as Mina grabbed your wrist to pull you out of the room, making you hiss in a breath and she froze, lowering her glances to check your sore wrists for any bruises.

“What did they do to you?”

You shook your head silently, and something in Mina’s gaze shifted. You had seen it only a couple of times, including that time you were getting stitches after some girls in your classroom had ambushed you in the bathroom, and more importantly, you had seen that look on her face when Lily had fever that one time and you all had to rush to the hospital and the doctors said she couldn’t see her.

It was fire, similar to yours, ready to burn everything in its path.

“Don’t say anything to anyone. You two,” she motioned at the two lawyers, “Read whatever she’s supposed to sign.”

The lawyers approached the desk by the door as Mina put her coat over your shoulders, rubbing at your arms as you swayed slightly on your feet, trying to focus.

“We’re leaving, okay sweetheart?”

“Miss—“

“No,” When Mina turned to the police officers and the BAU team, any trace of softness in her voice disappeared, “You don’t talk. If you don’t want to get into even more trouble, you’re going to listen to me right now.”

The officer that had been with you at the interrogation room just blinked a couple of times, obviously taken aback.

“Do you have any idea what you just did to yourself?” she asked, “What you did to this whole precinct? Because allow me to explain, my sister was a victim in this scenario, and you tried to pin this shit on her to make her a scapegoat,” she shook her head, “We will be suing you for defamation of character—“

“Mina, your sister—” JJ started but she snapped her fingers at her.

“I haven’t even started with you yet, wait for your turn.”

“Mina…” you murmured but she didn’t even look like she could hear you,

“Where was I? Defamation of character because press will be all over this, intentional infliction of emotional stress and wrongful arrest and hey, to make things fun we will also be requesting the security footage in the interrogation room and if I see one very small slip of anything that wasn’t supposed to be said and done in that room…” Mina tilted her head, “Well, let’s just say that by the time I’m done with you guys and this whole precinct, the only thing you will be able to afford is going to be a typewriter and a desk.”

One of the lawyers came to tell you the document was alright to sign and as soon as you approached the desk, a door by the hall opened and Spencer stepped out.

It was almost excruciating not to be able to run to him. He looked as shocked as he was and he took a step towards you but JJ stepped in front of him as you grabbed the pen, ignoring the way your name spilled from his lips in a whisper.

“Oh, hi genius.” Mina called out, “Were you getting a glass of water while your team was hounding my sister or something?”

Spencer looked almost confused only for a moment before he turned to look at JJ who deliberately averted her glances from him.

“Mina, this is not necessary,” you croaked out as you signed the papers and she shook her head.

“No, this is very necessary, trust me. You need to show these people what you’re capable of or they will try to fuck you up, case and point.” She turned to Emily, “You’re the one in charge, I suppose?”

“I am.”

“Good. Consider this your warning, because the next time anyone in your team, including the puppy dog eyes over there gets any closer to my sister, we will be getting a restraining order for each and every one of you.”

You closed your eyes for a moment, still swaying on your feet and you hugged the coat around you tighter.

Not that you could do anything other than watching this.

“Your sister is an active part of this investigation, your father specifically asked for—“

“My sister is a civilian,” Mina growled, “She has no responsibility for this case, you do. How about you surprise me and do your fucking jobs?”

You took a breath to say it wasn’t fair, that it wasn’t their fault but Mina turned to look at you.

“Get in the elevator, we’re leaving.”

You were way too tired to fight her, way too tired to even stand there so you followed the army of lawyers to the elevator, while Mina shot the officers and the BAU members a fake smile.

“Pleasure, let’s never do this again,” she said, and got in the elevator with you, and you tried to keep your expression still, Spencer staring at you until the doors slid close.

“4 lawyers?” you managed to say, “I don’t think even Bundy had four lawyers.”

“Tell that to mom,” she said, “She was on the phone with a congressman the last I checked.”

You couldn’t even smile at that, but Mina let out a breath before pulling you into a bone crushing hug, making the tears rush to your eyes as you wrapped your arms around her.

“Never do that to me again, you hear me?” her voice cracked for the first time and you nodded slowly.

“I won’t,” you said, “I promise.”

                                                   ***

It was as if someone had pulled all your energy out of your body. You were exhausted, you could barely understand what anyone was saying but you knew there was no way you could sleep anytime soon.

The blood test, as the lawyers had informed you, finally came back and just like you suspected, they had found traces of chloroform in your system. That and your team of lawyers combined were more than enough to get rid of any kind of accusations against you, so at least you had that.

On the other hand, the fear, the guilt, the sadness were still there inside of you, even if you felt way too numb to reach it.

You wondered if Spencer would have a scientific explanation for that.

Your mother had insisted you would never step a foot into your apartment again, she was already looking for a new apartment for you, one with multiple security systems and until that happened she had told you you would be staying at her house.

The damn thing was way too big anyway and you and Mina had grown up there so you figured it would serve as some sort of shelter.

If it even existed for you.

“Here you go sweetheart,” your mother pushed the tea cup towards you, “Drink it, it’ll make you feel better.”

“I’m fine.”

Kenzie heaved a sigh, “It’s okay if you’re not,” she said, “No one expects you to, anyone would be traumatized.”

“The real estate agent already sent me three apartments,” your mother said, “Huge windows, you love a bright apartment.”

“Mom,” Mina said silently and she heaved a sigh.

“It could help her distract herself,” her head shot up, “Y/N, you should go on a vacation! Somewhere far away from here.”

“Somewhere peaceful could be nice?” Kenzie added, “I think that’s a good idea.”

You and Mina exchanged glances.

“I heard Fiji is lovely this time of the year,” your mother said and you let out a breath.

“Mom, two people died because of me,” you croaked out, “I’m not going to Fiji for vacation.”

“Honey, you could use some peace,” she held your chin carefully and lifted it so that she could look at you better, “You look so…”

“I look like how I feel,” you said and turned your head when the doorbell rang, making Mina sit up straighter.

“Who’s that?” she asked when the maid walked in.

“Spencer Reid?”

“What?” you and Kenzie asked at the same time, your heartbeat getting faster and Mina jumped on her feet but you stopped her, shaking your head.

“It’s okay,” you sniffled, nodding to yourself, “It’s….it’s fine. There’s no point in dragging it out.”

“Dragging what out?” Mina asked you but you walked out of the living room and reached the front door, trying to ignore the warmth filling your system as soon as your eyes caught the sight of him. You stepped out of the house and he pulled you into a tight hug, burying his nose into your hair and inhaling deeply as if it helped him calm down while you just stood there, desperately trying to keep the tears at bay.

You had to do it. No matter how much it hurt you, no matter how much you didn’t want to.

No matter how badly it would rip your heart out.

“You okay?” he asked you, his fingers pushing your hair behind your ear, “I tried your apartment but I figured…”

“Yeah, I’m not going back there,” you shrugged your shoulders, “I’ll move out, it’s fine.”

“Do you want to stay at my place?” he asked quickly and you closed your eyes for a moment, every cell in your body begging you to change your mind.

You couldn’t though. You’d rather die than see him lying in a pool of his blood, all because of you.

“Don’t say that,” you whispered and opened your eyes again, “Please don’t say that.”

He looked almost confused, tilting his head to the side like a puppy before it dawned on him.

“Is this about the file on me?”

You shook your head and he took a deep breath.

“About today?”

“I didn’t send that message,” you said, “To Anthony, I mean. I wouldn’t…. I wouldn’t cheat on you.”

“I know that.”

“And I didn’t kill him. I don’t know if you heard, but the blood tests came back positive for—”

“I never doubted that, not even for one second,” he insisted, “With or without blood test.”

“You might be the only one,” you murmured and he paused for a moment.

“What did JJ say to you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Because we had an argument on the jet on our way back here and whatever she said…”

You shook your head again, trying to smile.

“I get it,” you murmured, “She’s your best friend, she’s protective of you. That’s normal.”

“Yeah but if she thinks that you’re capable of—”

“I want to break up.”

You could swear the words burned your mouth, some invisible hand clutching your heart tighter and tighter as you willed yourself to keep your eyes on the street, because you were sure that every wall you built to keep your emotions under control would crash down the moment you looked at him. Out of the corner of your eye you could see that he froze and he blinked a couple of times, as if he was lost.

“What?” he asked silently and you tried to swallow the lump growing bigger and bigger in your throat.

“Y/N, wait—no,” he said quickly, breathing hard, “Listen, whatever they said to you today during the interrogation, if that’s what this is about—”

“It has nothing to do with that,” you forced yourself to say, crossing your arms and he took a step closer to you.

“Whatever the problem is,” he rasped out, “We can solve it, okay? Don’t do this.”

That was when it dawned on you.

It wasn’t enough to push him away. You had to make sure to burn that bridge so that neither of you could ever find your way back to each other.

“It’s not one of your cases Spencer, you can’t solve this one,” you muttered and finally turned your head to look up at him, your stomach churning at the sight of betrayal on his face.

“I don’t understand.”

“You—it’s—“ you stammered, trying to find the words, “It’s going way too fast, alright? It’s going way too fast and it’s going to fucking crash, and I can’t—“ you cleared your throat when your voice cracked, “I’m not going to crash with this, I can’t.”

Your father had taught you this way too long ago, when you were too young to even question it.

Stab the prey, twist the knife, pull it back and watch them bleed.

Stab the prey.

“I mean come on Spencer, we’re not in love or anything,” you shrugged your shoulders, “Should be easy enough.”

He stared at you for a couple of seconds, his mouth slightly agape and his brows furrowed, shock written all over his face.

“We’re not in love?” he repeated, “You…you don’t love me?”

Twist the knife.

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

His eyes searched your face, as if looking for any kind of clue that could tell him you were lying, or that it was a trick but for once, it was in vain.

You’d had spent years learning how to control your emotions and your expression when it came to heartbreak.

Pull it back.

“It’s not my fault if you’re in love,” you said, each word making you hate yourself more and more, “I can’t be held responsible for that.”

Stabbing yourself would’ve been less painful, you were sure of that but you knew you had to keep going. One last step, one last sentence and you would be done.

Watch them bleed.

“I never told you to love me.”

Then, silence.

You had to give it to him though, it took him faster than it would’ve taken you to pull yourself together if you were the one on the receiving end of this. He blinked back the tears, clenched his jaw and in a second, his gaze turned cold, exactly like yours.

“Yeah,” he said slowly, nodding, “You didn’t.”

But you had forgotten one small detail. 

Spencer knew how to withdraw that knife and stab back.

You cleared your throat and turned around to get inside the house but before you could step in, you heard his voice.

“I was wrong.”

You looked over your shoulder, clutching at the straws to keep it together, “I’m sorry?”

“I was wrong,” he stated, his voice was distant and held no trace of its usual warmth, “Before, I mean. In terms of behavior and psychology, you’re exactly your father’s daughter.”

With that, he walked away from the house, and you just stood there for a moment before stepping into the house and closing the door behind you, that comfortable haze of shock slowly withdrawing from your mind like mist. That hand squeezing your heart twisted it in your chest and you tried to breathe, pressing a hand on your chest.

“Sweetheart?” your mother called out as she stepped into the hallway, then slowly approached you, “You okay?”

It was impossible to stop the tears rushing to your eyes now and a gasp escaped from your lips as you shook your head.

“Mom,” you whimpered, “Please, my—my heart hurts...”

She rushed to you and shushed you gently, pulling you into a tight hug and caressing your hair as you slipped to the ground and you buried your face to her shoulder.

Then the sobs came.

Chapter 18

[angria]

About this Blog

*Do not reblog personal posts tagged #angriadm*

Hi all, I’m Angria, not my real name (it comes from my love of the Brontë's…it’s the name of their childhood paracosm).  I live on the east coast of the US, both my home-state and the city in which I currently live.  I’m 34 and a gay/queer, cis-woman with she/her pronouns. Was a teacher, now a social work grad student.  I’ve been on here for over 10 years.  This is my outlet and safe space to express things I cannot talk about outside of therapy.  I post what I like or things that resonate with me. I'm weird and pay attention to how my tumblr looks (like how the colors, quotes, pics go together), so I usually blast 20+ posts in a row and then silence...that probably will annoy some people. Also...I curse. A lot (probably too much, but eh). And I do not tag it, so no TWs with regard to swearing.

Speaking of, I have a very specific tag system that serves me and not necessarily others in the sense of trigger warnings.  Just be aware of that and if you do need to unfollow me, I fully understand.

1) I mainly struggle with CPTSD, BPD, and severe depression from childhood abuse and neglect.  I also struggle with self harm and will mention it, usually as SH (no graphic details).  I am still in contact with my parents, for financial/practical reasons amongst others.  So please do not recommend I go no-contact.  It is a very complex situation and I actively discuss it with T.

2) I am very private when it comes to locations and people, mainly because I’m afraid of people I know finding my tumblr.  So my privacy settings are very strict and I do not allow anons.  I’ve never had a good experience during the two times I allowed it years ago.  This is my personal, private safe space and I do not need some random person’s cowardice and ignorant judgments invading it.

3) As a heads up, I do talk about religion and my faith, specifically Christianity.  I’m Episcopalian, was Atheist for a time, and recovering from my religious trauma inflicted by the Catholic Church (born and raised in a dogmatic household and school). I am a firm supporter of inclusive, affirming, and accepting theology. Religion should never be weaponized to control and manipulate others with threatening, bigoted, hate-filled doctrine or beliefs.  If it makes you feel shame, fear, or worthlessness, it does not come from God.  It comes from twisted and false human ideology cowardly hiding behind the guise of “religion.”

I did study and teach Theology for many years; however, no, I do not wish to argue or debate theological or religious discourse.  That is not the point of my blog.  It’s completely fine if you disagree with me or have different beliefs/faiths. But, I am not inviting people to challenge me purely because I have a faith.  I respect other’s faith or non-belief (as long as it doesn’t harm others), so please respect mine.  I am open to genuine questions that you may have; however, I am by no means an authority nor consider myself an expert.  I may know more than the average person, but I will always be in a state of learning.

I do write about things regarding religion that may trigger people, so please take care of yourself and unfollow, if need be. I try my best to notify people with TW/CWs and Read More’s.

Some main people/things I mention…

T is my therapist of 12 years.  He is an incredible person who has supported me and helped me throughout our time together, never giving up on me .  I probably would not be here if it wasn’t for our work.  I vent about him occasionally if I’m upset with him (which we do talk about eventually).  This is not an invitation to judge him or my therapy. My blog is only a snapshot of our years together.  You do not know him, his experience and professionalism, our boundaries, nor fully understand the context of what we discuss and process.

Dr W is my psychiatrist of 11 years.  She also is a huge advocate and actually listens to me when it comes to my symptoms, medication, and their side-effects, which is a rarity when it comes to psychs.   

Her is a child-part, for lack of better term.  The Voice is a fight(?) part.  I do not have DID, but I have been told I fit criteria of OSDD.  While I agree, I am still hesitant to say I have it.  I just know Her and The Voice are more fragmented/dissociated than how “parts” are described in IFS (Internal Family Systems).

Smshellhole was the Catholic school I attended for 11 years, from preschool to 8th grade (I always call it hellhole; the school's name is a trigger).  I was severely bullied and abused throughout that time, both from kids and teachers.  As well as the priest who worked there.  The time between 3rd and 7th grade were the worst years when I was so dissociated I can’t remember much…just small pieces. Along with the abuse and neglect at home. Main abuser is a person from hellhole during the worst years.

E and J are the priests at my Episcopal church St. P’s and have been life-changing for me and immense supporters as I untangle and process my religious trauma (a couple years ago, J left to assume a different role in a diocese that is in another state. Which completely devastated me). W is our new priest and so far seems to be kind, gentle, and welcoming.

And if you are feeling up to it, check out my positivity/recovery blog spegaudentes (Latin for rejoicing in hope). Mostly stuff that makes me happy with a smattering of coping skills and memes.

[the-chaos-crew]

okay, so FYI I made that post like super pissed and exhausted so I might contradict myself here. easier to give an opinionated argument when not running on fumes yk

so, you seem to be hyper focusing on the bit of my psychiatrist not listening to me. and yeah she definitely doesn't seem competent in her job, but for this post I just wanted to highlight how fakers and "endo" systems are kiinda ruining chances for help for those who actually need it.

but can you at least acknowledge that my therapist is hesitant on addressing my blackout type dissociation because of the track record people, especially those of my generation (gen z),have of faking disorders and seeking out professionals to confirm their delusions or to get extra attention in some way.

also I frankly don't think there's any such thing as a "non-disordered" system. logically, what reason would a person's brain have to develop different identity states or to dissociate often from their reality if not for something like trauma. it's fairly well known that those who have suffered a traumatic event, or several traumatic events, will dissociate themselves from that event. from as little as having a disconnection to what had happened to them, to so much as blocking out the memory entirely so the brain doesn't have to suffer those emotions again.

as far as I have been taught by my therapist on understanding things like my dissociation, you cannot have dissociation without some level of stress to cause it.

sadly with the influx of people claiming to have this or that disorder, minus the actual disorder part (for example; autistics but only the silly quirkiness, BPD minus the extreme emotional distress and strained relationships and destructive behavior, DID or OSDD but without the dissociation and without the trauma to cause such a disorder in the first place) a lot of professionals are hesitant on believing people when they genuinely express concerns about their mental health pertaining to these disorders people love to fake.

(also before you say anything about the disorders I used as examples - my mother had BPD, I know what someone with it acts like. I have family members who knew her much longer than I and know what someone with BPD acts like. my little brother is on the spectrum, I have known peers and friends on the spectrum, my dad is on the spectrum, I know what autism looks like for various different people and circumstances)

my therapist had made several nudges and suggestions about my dissociation and what I described as "alternate personality states" or "dissociated identities" but she avoided completely suggesting anything more than it just being a slightly more extreme coping mechanism related to my C-PTSD.

I'm trying to keep this calm and trying to explain why I feel offended by people claiming to have similar issues to my own, just without the issues, but man I'm getting frustrated again so I'm just gonna say,

people like you, who claim to have a disorder but without the actual disorder part, feel like a spit in the face to me and probably many others who actually deal with these issues. every single time I have tried addressing this problem and endos take notice, I'm immediately talked down to and "you don't know what you're talking about, being non-disordered is totally valid!!" and it's insulting! it's basically telling me that what I suffer through can be used as a cute little accessory for others who don't suffer. which kind of undermines the shit actually disordered and disabled people deal with!

I have no idea if I'm even making sense I'm just so frustrated.

if you really do believe you are a system, maybe without any idea of any trauma, then please see a therapist. I can at least attest that my therapist has helped me discover a lot more trauma hidden deep inside my brain that I completely blocked out, and processing those things has really helped me. I'm of course no where near out of the woodworks, hell having old stuff dug up to reprocess them is probably what's been causing me to dissociate much more, but man is it helpful.

also, you're in your 30s dude. you probably have a job, probably have some /decent/ income, I'm sure you can get at least one session with a professional about your "non-disordered" disorder

okay this is gonna be SUPER different than most of my posts but god ding diddly dang it I'm frustrated so hear me out

I had a bad childhood, like a really bad one, as far as I know since I was 6 but my dad and older brother think I probably was affected by the insane shit since 4yrs old. which if you don't know is pretty fucking young. and that traumatic childhood lasted until I was about 11. that's a pretty long fucking time for trauma to build up over time.

now because of this shit childhood, I developed the coping mechanism known as dissociation. I often feel like I'm in a dream or I'm watching someone else live my life and it's really really weird. now sometimes though, that dissociation is taken to an extreme. and extreme where I just suddenly BLIP lose several hours or more of time and I have no memory of it.

my IRL friends have told me that during these periods of time where I just black out, I act completely differently or my behavior shifts suddenly

I've tried denying that this is a thing and at one point I did consider Dissociative Identity Disorder. I snapped out of it of course cause I'm too young for that to start disrupting my life, right? yes my abuser is gone, she'll never return, I mean how could she when she is in an urn sitting on a shelf now. but, I'm a teen now, and in therapy, I should be fine and healthy now right?

I told my therapist about how these black outs in my memory freak me out and I just cannot keep ignoring it anymore, and my therapist told me to talk to my psychiatrist cause she might know a bit more and be able to help me

you wanna know. what my psychiatrist said? what she said about this very worrying and distressing thing that affects my life and relationships?

"you're fine, it isn't affecting you that significantly" (while I was there crying cause I am honestly scared about whatever is going on) "it sounds totally normal to me, everyone gets a bit more extreme in their emotions"

LIKE WHAT. LADY. AUGHHHFHFFHH

she completely waved off my concerns.

I don't try to get into discourse in stuff I'm not even a part of, but fuck man. this is what mental illness fakers are really doing. "erm endos aren't taking resources away erm uh" BRO. MY THERAPIST KNOWS OF DID, SHE KNOWS THE ABSOLUTE SHIT I WENT THROUGH AS A KID. and yet she isn't too sure about going anywhere in that realm of possibility other than me dealing with dissociation above the average for C-PTSD sufferers. why? because my therapist has dealt with one too many fakers trying to be fucking debilitated like I am, without the actual debilitation part!

my psychiatrist is waving my concerns and problems away because she knows that a lot of kids of my generation are just saying this shit for attention or clout or to validate their delusions

mental illness fakers are making it so no one believes the people who are actually struggling and it's making me pissed off. I DONT WANT TO LOSE HOURS OF MY LIFE TO SOME OTHER FACET IN MY BRAIN. I WANT TO GET HELP FOR THIS SHIT. BUT NO ONE WILL FUCKING BELIEVE OR LISTEN TO ME.

I WONDER. FUCKING. WHY.

okay. rant over. sorry. I'm just super fucking pissed and I just want help for whatever the fuck is going on with me dude

[witchthewriter]

Hi! I'm Cherry and I was hoping to get three level four ships for DC, Marvel and Stranger Things? I did all the things listed on your info post and I'm super excited!

I'm a pansexual female who uses all pronouns. I really like to dye my hair, my favourite colour at the moment is red (I think its sick lol) and my hair is pretty long. I'm also super pale but I have very red cheeks 24/7. I have a sort of gothic fashion sense, nothing super over the top but I mostly wear black and anything dramatic with lace is something I am guaranteed to love haha. I'm super into music and its basically my main form of expression. My music taste is super diverse. I can go from listening to Taylor Swift to Black Sabbath, then to Metallica and then Baby Queen so quickly that it might just give you whiplash lol. I struggle a lot with mental health issues and eds but I'm doing pretty well at the moment so that's really nice. Most of the time I'm pretty witty, sarcastic, flirty and (jokingly) mean to people I'm super close with but I'm also incredibly loyal, protective and caring for those I love. I give pretty good advice and I'm good at helping people out with their issues or if they just need someone to talk to. I'm also a professionally trained singer (I'm pretty out of practice at the moment though) and I'm learning guitar at the moment. I love horror and drama movies and TV shows, especially classics from the eighties and nineties and I really don't like many comedie movies or shows. I'm also a huge comic book nerd and I make a shit ton of pop culture references all the time. I love action movies and romcoms bore me and I also love the bands Lovejoy, Kiss, Metallica, Motley Crue and The Backseat Lovers.

I'm sorry if this is way too much information, I'm just super excited haha. I can't wait to see what you do <3333

Want to be shipped? Here be the instructions 🦋

Thank you so much for participating my love! Thank you for the information it actually makes it so much easier!!! You sound like such a cool person xx

What each ship has in common:

⋆ Know what they want ⋆ Realistic ⋆ Unique  ⋆ Tough on the outside, soft on the inside ⋆ Stubborn

𝐃𝐂

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Dinah Drake/Black Canary. I think she has a lot of amazing qualities; loyal, perceptive, intuitive, that would match your own. I think you two would definitely start as friends - initially talking about each other’s fashion sense/outward image. 

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・Going to get piercings together and maybe even a tattoo or two

・Sharing make up and clothes

・When she kisses you, she puts both hands on your cheeks and kisses you softly

・Lazy weekend mornings where all you want to do is sleep and lay around. She loves it; will make you a tea or coffee and some toast and lay in bed beside you

・Spoiling each other with gifts

・Inside jokes that only make sense to the two of you

・Smacking each other on the ass 

・She calls you love

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

How much fun you guys have together. And it’s not even chaotic or criminal fun; she likes it when it’s just the two of you, dancing or singing or watching a movie. She literally finds anything fun when you’re around. 

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

I think your best friend would totally be Harley Quinn!!! She would definitely -get- you, because she is a psychologist, or is it psychiatrist? Any which way, she would surprise you with how well she understands your language. You two would definitely get up to no good; and Canary would be there to bail you out. But only you, and Harley is like “Huh?? Hey! What about me?” 

  And Canary would reply, “I don’t fold your socks Quinn, why would I bail you out?” 

𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐥

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Druig - I really think he would connect with you as he isn’t afraid of the darkness that people have. He’s stubborn, but honest and wants to do what is right. You would bond over your exploration of deeper feelings and their meaning. 

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・Piggy back rides, can you imagine? He’s one of THE oldest beings to exist and you’re riding him like a fricken toy. It’s absolutely hilarious

・You would learn about things in history that no one else (other then the other Eternals) would know. Like he would fact check history books and you’re like ??? But they teach this in schools and he would respond with a shrug. 

・Leaning your head against his shoulder and he would kiss the top of your head

・He would totally hide your things and act as if he didn’t; you catch on and start doing it to him. Then each item that’s taken is more and more important to the point where Druig is walking around the ship like, “WHERE DID YOU PUT MY JACKET?? MY FAVOURITE LEATHER JACKET Y/N!!!!!” 

・Listening to all the stories he has, and your mind is absolutely blown. Sometimes you start to cry because how can this be real? How can a person; who is living and breathing, live for so many centuries and live to tell these tales? 

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

Your understanding. He loves that you can actually pick up what he’s putting down. A lot of people don’t understand Druig - either they dont want to, they don’t feel the need to or their ability to isn’t there. Yours is though. It’s like you’re both magnets, or (stereotypical I know-) puzzle pieces that fit together. 

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

I think your best friend would be Yelena Belova; you guys would have a similar friendship like she has with Kate, except you don’t try to stop her from doing what she wants to do. She likes to hang out with you - and it’s crazy because she’s never experienced that before; a friend. 

𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Eddie Munson! (What a beautiful gorgeous perfect man. i love him.) I think you guys are tHE PERFECT COUPLE. You’re true, genuine and don’t partake in fakery (I mean fake relationships, friendships etc. Not like ... make up or fake tan ... doing those things are absolutely fine.)

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・You would be his WORLD; literally he would want to be around you all the time. He would never get sick of you, seriously. 

・You guys would go crazy together once finding out that you like the same bands; he’d probably ask you to join his band as well??

・Loves hug-tackling you; where he’ll creep up behind you and grab you. 

・Attack kisses

・Likes talking to you about his DnD campaigns and would go absolutely BALLISTIC if you showed interest and wanted to learn

・He will sneak into your room randomly and at times he’s scared the absolute shit out of you and you’ve nearly attacked him thinking it was an intruder. 

・Picking you up in his van and resting his hand on your thigh

・He likes to always have a part of his body touching yours; hand holding, hand on your back, arm around your shoulder, kissing, legs entwined etc

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

Would be your authenticity. Eddie HATES fake people, he despises those who don’t stay true to themselves and when he met you, he was astonished. You were honest and open, and he values that. 

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

Would be Jonathan, yeah I definitely think so. I thought maybe Robin or Nancy, but I feel like they wouldn’t grasp your emotions and menta health in the way Jonathan would. He would definitely be able to bond with you over your opinions and experiences. 

[tinydancer-busyday]

ADHD and girls

My friend got me into TikTok about a year ago, which in hindsight was excellent timing because the last year has required every single dopamine boost that time-eating app can give me. In the last few months I found myself on ADHD TikTok and thinking, wow, I identify with a lot of this stuff, like, with all of this stuff. Interesting...

So I stayed on ADHD TikTok and learned enough that I started Googling and going through symptom lists and taking self-report questionnaires and thinking about my childhood... It seemed increasingly obvious to me that I was one of those girls in young adult life realizing it really isn’t this hard to keep up for everyone. Just because we weren’t outwardly hyper and disruptive didn’t mean our minds were also calm and undistracted.

I love knowing why’s, how things work, and what motivates what, and so I wanted to look into getting a diagnosis. If so many of the things I struggled to change were ADHD symptoms, maybe tackling ADHD as the root cause would help change things. Better to tackle the source rather than the product, right?

But I’d seen the videos and read the articles from women telling how hard they had to fight for their diagnosis, how they had to convince doctor after doctor, and were misdiagnosed or ignored. I was worried. I’m non-confrontational by nature, fighting an authority figure to see things my way is terrifying.

So I prepared. I created a five page document of symptoms from lists I’d found and that I experienced. I found the most legitimate, professional self reports I’d found, the kind that say to give them to your doctor when you’ve filled them out, and I put them all in a cloud folder so I could immediately pull them up on my phone or email them to doctors if they asked. And then I waited for my doctor’s appointment.

My doctor is great. A younger woman, who sometimes wears WonderWoman graphic tees, she almost unquestioningly gave me a referral to a psychiatrist, even referencing the now known fact that ADHD is under-diagnosed in girls and women. As the first hurdle, this was so reassuring.

Shockingly quickly, only a couple weeks later, I heard from the psychiatrist’s office to book an appointment, only two weeks away. They had me fill out a 40 minute online questionnaire. It’s a good thing I like personality tests and questionnaires!

This past week the day of the appointment arrived. I reread my curated symptom list and questionnaires, hoping I wouldn’t have to argue my case, but hoping to be prepared if I did. For an hour two doctors asked me question after question. They were both very friendly, thankfully, but it still felt like a very personal intense job interview.

At the end the psychiatrist simply said, so it looks like you fit the criteria for Generalized Anxiety Disorder and ADHD, to which the other doctor agreed.

I was a bit taken aback. I would've been shocked not to get a diagnosis in the end, but I didn't expect to get it on the first appointment! Also, GAD? Not a surprise in the slightest, but having got the referral for ADHD in particular I wasn't even aware that was on the table! Can’t slip anything by a psychiatrist, I suppose!

So now I have my root cause. Two in fact! I can tackle them with the many tips and tricks from therapists, psychiatrists, and fellow ADHDers and GADers, or I can go the medical route, or I can chose both. It’s a bit of an anti-climactic relief to finally have some answers. My brain is actually wired different and going at it in a neurotypical way won’t help, as evidenced by the last twenty-odd years of my life. Hopefully now I can find a way to go at it that feels more natural, and works with it instead of fighting it.

So many of the stories I found were people having to fight for diagnosis and of doctors refusing to listen. While those experiences do happen way more often than they should, maybe this can comfort a future undiagnosed ADHDer getting ready to pursue a diagnosis, it’s not always like that. Sometimes it’s downright easy.

[alwaysthinkingoutloud]

Hannibal Episode-by-Episode Meta/Analysis: Episode 3, Season 1 (Potage)

The first scene of the episode takes us back to Abigail���s memories of hunting with her dad. That whole memory provides us with a brand-new aspect to who Abigail is what Hannibal might see in her.  Suddenly, it makes us question if Hannibal saw her as something more than a tool to draw Will in. Afterall, Hannibal’s philosophy would not sound too strange or bizarre to Abigail than what she already is accustomed to. She grew up being taught to normalize killing and eating what she kills with maybe different reasons than Hannibal, but obviously she still is the most fitting instrument to whatever he is planning.

Alana comes to Will’s house to talk about Abigail’s waking up from the coma and when Will expresses his concerns for Abigail’s being left alone, she says “Dogs keep a promise a person can’t”. And Will replies it with “I am not collecting another stray”. While she is trying to warn Will before he makes a huge commitment he probably cannot keep, because of guilt; she compares Will to a dog and Will compares Abigail to one. In the previous episode’s article I had already expressed my thoughts about Will’s relationship with dogs and how I think it represents his animalistic, urge-full side. So I find this set of metaphors to be a touch-on to Abigail’s yet-hidden killer side and Will’s subconscious recognition and acceptance of that, along with his own.

The conversation of Alana and Abigail is pretty informing about who Abigail is. When Alana walks into room and says that she is a psychiatrist, Abigail’s curious, if not tactical, question of what kind? and Alana’s saying family trauma (and not, for example, criminal something), ends up Abigail’s facial expressions to suddenly change into one that looks victimized. I do not believe it was an emotional transaction, I think it was one on purpose. As Alana later will say, Abigail shows enough-to-be-considered-healthy emotion about her parents’ deaths but also enough detachment from what happened to falsely suggest a lack of connection on her behalf. Her jumping from the topic of her parents’ being dead and her dad being a serial killer to making plans about college is not a mere denial caused by being traumatized but also a strategical move that someone of guilt would do. Her lying to nurses and trying to analyze Dr. Bloom is not a very victim-like behavior, she manipulates and tries to establish a position of dominance. I am this close to almost suggesting that this is something Hannibal would do. Hannibal made a fantastic move, bringing Abigail into the equation. (Abigail’s yet-to-come talk with Freddie is another example to what this paragraph is telling too.)

When Jack, Alana and Hannibal come into the same room together; everybody’s priority is different. Jack wants the case to resolve at all costs (at the cost of Will’s or Abigail’s stability), Alana wants the best for Abigail and Will, protecting their mental health and Hannibal wants neither. He wants the case to stay unresolved or resolved in a way he is pleased, and he wants both Will and Abigail in a position that is furthest from being stable. Actually in his thinking, he does want the best for them. Afterall, that is how Hannibal operates. He wants people pushed to their darkest potential, to unleash their beast, in whatever form it may come. He does that by increasing chaos around him and he feeds on that chaos. He sets things into motion to ends that even he sometimes does not know what of. So of course, he will agree with anything that stirs up the pot, which is right now Will and Abigail coming together.

Hannibal and Jack walks into classroom when Will is giving a lecture about the Copycat Killer. While doing so, he describes the killer in detail and to our knowledge, quite accurately so too. Hannibal seems to be listening to him intrigued and almost fascinated at Will’s deductions about the killer since they are so right and his smile reaches its max (well… max at Hannibal standards) when Will points out that the unidentified caller is in fact, the Copycat Killer. He is not just enjoying the thrill to be discussed as a killer in the same classroom he is standing in, without a soul knowing; what he enjoys the most is Will’s closing in. His spot-on deductions on what kind of person the killer is. Maybe this is the first time Hannibal hears someone speaking about the real version of him who is not wearing a person suit and doing that quite accurately too. Will is getting to know him, real him, and Hannibal enjoys it.

Will and Hannibal take Abigail for a walk in the greenhouse, Will supporting Abigail’s arm with his own. There is a one-second scene where Hannibal also touches Abigail’s arm (but that is all it is, a very no purpose-serving touch) to try and help her sit just like Will does and looks at Will, almost hoping to find appreciation or approval, which makes me smile.

During the conversation of Will and Abigail, the camera focuses on Hannibal only right after Abigail says, “That’s not all I brought out in him”. Up until then, Hannibal seems almost bored with their conversation about her mom. But that sentence makes something in him move, suggesting that he may be hoping Abigail to bring out something in Will too. Maybe that something being protective feelings against her which can be manipulated to familiarize Will with normalization of crime. Abigail continues to express her concerns about being messed up and having nightmares. But Hannibal only says “We will help with the nightmares.”, so they will not with her being messed up part? Well, why on earth would he? That is exactly how Hannibal wants her, messed up as others would say, or perfect as Hannibal would. Then, Abigail finally asks a question to Will that intrigues Hannibal the most, “Does killing somebody…feel that bad?”. Hannibal almost holds his breath waiting for Will’s reply. In return, Will gives a very interesting answer. He does not say yes it does, he does not confirm. He says, instead, that it is the ugliest thing in the world. He maybe right, but ugliness is not equal to badness, is it?  Ugliness is a measure of visual taste, not a measure of morality. He almost suggests, killing may be an ugly act, but does not necessarily feel bad.

“It is not very smart to piss off a guy who thinks of killing people for a living.”

says Will to Freddie, in response to her threats about badmouthing him to Abigail. Obviously, Abigail already became family for Will. He protects her and shows a very different face of his when his relationship with Abigail is threatened to get compromised. A face that Hannibal loves seeing Will with. So when Jack asks Hannibal why he let Will say those words, Hannibal gives some Hannibalistic answer while smirking in a very non-subtle way. Of course, he would not stop Will in one of those rare times that he reveals his inner demons, Hannibal counts on it, even.

The second time Alana and Hannibal have different opinions (the first time was about Will going to see Abigail) is about if it is right for Abigail to visit her home where all the crime happened. While Alana disagrees with the idea on an attempt of saving Abigail from possible trauma, Jack chooses to go with Hannibal’s idea which is that confronting everything that happened in her home could be healing for Abigail. Jack is so blinded by his professional ambition to figure out everything hastily that he does not even realize how much damage he is causing unknowingly by each time not taking Alana’s professional opinion over Hannibal’s, whose motive actually is the opposite of Jack’s.

I think right about here is a good place to express my thoughts about Hannibal’s effect vs Jack’s effect on Will/Abigail. Although Hannibal is supposed to be the so-called ‘villian’ in this show, the serial killer, the cannibal, the person who drives people’s minds off the edge, the person standing opposite of law enforcement; he has a moral code. A code that is very different from the consensus but nevertheless, a code. And all the mind games he plays with Will and Abigail are meant to serve a purpose of helping them achieving their highest selves. Not forcefully making them into someone they are not, not harming them of out nowhere, but watering the seed of whatever it is inside them. To his thinking, he is elevating them. Helping them. On the contrary, Jack being one of the good guys in the show, the FBI director, the voice of justice; he manipulates and uses Will and Abigail never having their best interest in his mind. The only thing he cares about is the crimes and criminals; and everyone else’s stability and sanity, if lost on the way, is considered collateral damage. Unlike Hannibal, he does what he does to Will and Abigail knowing that it might end up harming them. So it is open to discussion, if Jack’s morality is any better than Hannibal’s. Or if his even is half consistent as Hannibal’s. I will come back to that in the coming episodes.

While still in the office and the four are talking, we learn that Jack’s motivation to take Abigail home is about gaining information about the Copycat. That is probably when the wheels started turning in Hannibal’s head about diverting FBI. Hannibal’s acts are never well-planned or calculated until the moment of actually killing someone. Although he is spotless on his murders, he rolls the dice and works with the material he is given on the events that lead up to those murders. Yes, he has one great big plan that consists of bloodshed, severed limps and a few people on specific positions; but he does not have one definite way to reach that. He goes with the flow placing the pieces into their places, which is what makes him that exciting: His unpredictability. 

The short conversation happening between Will and Abigail about Will’s empathizing and his putting himself in her father’s shoes are seemingly pleasing for Hannibal. Afterall, more bonded they become, greater the chance of Will protecting her on all costs and consequently that cost being slipping away from the light side into Hannibal’s lap (sigh). When the topic of why they came there (to find out about the man who called the house that morning) comes up and Will asks her about the caller, she throws a very quick glance at Hannibal while saying that she did not recognize the caller’s voice, which suggests that it is a lie. Hannibal looks a little surprised, either for the fact that she remembered his voice, or that she did and did not blurt it out. Considering Hannibal’s thick accent, it is unlikely that someone would not recognize it after hearing it. So the second option weighs more heavily, just as her suggesting Hannibal being the man on the phone on a reenactment proves it so.

“One cannot be delusional if the belief in question is accepted as ordinary by others in that person’s culture or subculture. Or family.” 

says Hannibal and it says a lot. Is not this the very thing Hannibal is trying to do? Putting together a family where his beliefs will be accepted as ordinary? Providing the same freedom to other members of his family as well? Making a family to set them all free, along with himself?

When Marissa shows up and somewhere in between the events calls her mom a bitch, considering the look Hannibal gave her (a very similar look he had given to Franklyn after he blew his nose and placed the dirty napkin on the table), her death was expected. The combination of that and finding the stone stained with Nicholas Boyle’s blood would be an obvious one-stone-two-bird solution to Hannibal’s diverting FBI from the Copycat Killer plan.

The second time Will dreams about the stag is at least as illuminating as the first one. He dreams about the stag right after the Copycat Killer kills someone. The first time, he saw it after Hannibal killed Cassie Boyle. And this time, we will learn that he sees it after Marissa was killed. I do not think that is a coincidence. This time though, as a difference, Will sees himself as the stag getting into a defensive position against Abigail’s throat being cut, again by himself. So he has no way out, either he is the guy killing Abigail or he is the stag who we already know is a killer, although is in defense right now. This almost suggests that deep down he knows regardless of the path chosen, there is no escape from blood. There is only a lesser evil, maybe, and that is killing to save. And the stag is the representative of this lesser evil in the dream, which is interesting because well, we know the stag will turn into Hannibal. Almost to suggest that, Hannibal’s true evil self without the person suit and Will’s maybe acceptable lesser evil sides will be one, to complete one another. (I may be reaching with that one…)

When Alana, Abigail, Will and Hannibal reach to cabin; the look on Hannibal’s face when Will asks Abigail if there is anyone else beside her and her dad who has been to the cabin and she says no, suggests that it is not true, although she is not aware of it and it also suggests that the plan of Hannibal is put into motion. In a little while, he also loudly accuses of Nicholas to kill his sister and Marissa, suggesting he is the Copycat Killer. 

While Hannibal is making remarks about this killer not being Garret Jacob Hobbs because of leaving a body behind and not eating all of it, Will gives him a little disturbed look. Either because Hannibal looks too certain speaking, or because deep down, Will is smelling something suspicious. He actually gave a very similar look to Hannibal when he came into his classroom in between his lecture about the Copycat Killer. I do not think it is a coincidence, but it is very arguable to what degree Will’s awareness was at that point, even on a subconscious level. (There is another possibility that Will’s looks at Hannibal are just/also because he finds Hannibal glamorous with the way he thinks and everything ;)) )

Hannibal, hearing Freddie talk about someone else lurking around the house, asks her if she saw Nicholas. So we conclude that by putting the blame on Nicholas, what Hannibal hopes to achieve is to draw him out to the house to talk to Abigail to clear his name and… Well, there is no “and”. That is probably as far as his plan went and Hannibal did not know that Abigail would kill Nicholas but we can say he hoped she would. Creating a bond (preferably) and/or leverage (that can be used if Abigail did not turn out to be compliant) between them perfectly.

After Abigail escapes from the hospital and comes to Hannibal’s office, in between the conversation Hannibal says, you climbed over the wall, which means, apart from its literal meaning, that after she killed Nicholas, she is now free. By killing him, she broke her restraints and now in new territory. Then, he tells her to come down from there, suggesting after climbing over the wall, what you do is to come down, where Hannibal is also standing. Meaning, Hannibal also had climbed over the wall and now they are at the same side, so she can relax. This is the family where the belief is accepted as ordinary.

While Hannibal convinced her that if she did not hide the body, nobody would believe her innocence right after she killed Nicholas, insinuating she had no choice but to ask for Hannibal’s help; now that it is all over, he tells her that most people actually would believe that she was innocent. Abigail who understands that she has been manipulated, puts the pieces together and reveals that she did know Hannibal was the one who called the house. Not trusting her enough yet, Hannibal does not deny what she is saying so that she would feel let in, but not so much to let her in all the way either, creating a balanced relationship dynamic (of course, in the eyes of Abigail) between them. Then, by saying “No more climbing walls, Abigail, he makes sure she understands they are in the same side now, as equals (he lets she thinks) and there is no going back.

[adhdandelion]

A rambly post about ADHD and my BPD diagnosis

I was evalued for Borderline Personality Disorder twice, despite being pretty sure I didn’t have it myself. The first time I was actually diagnosed with BPD. I didn’t know that much about it, so I just accepted it. Then I started looking a bit more into it, reading about other people’s experience with BPD and started to relate less and less to them. Sure, I had some of the symptoms that former the diagnostic criteria, but my experience of life was so much different than that of people who had BPD.

About a year later, I was - once again - hospitalized for severe depression and suicidal ideation. I told the psychiatrist at the hospital that I was officialy diagnosed with Borderline, but that I didn’t think I actually had it. She thought I probably had it anyways, so she ordered another diagnostic evaluation. This time, I was diagnosed with a Borderline Personality Accentuation, which isn’t a proper diagnosis, but it means that you have symptoms similar to a person with BPD, just less severe. I could live with that - I knew I met some of the critera, and I did relate to people with BPD a little bit after all. But it didn’t feel like “the truth”. 

The main reason doctors so often insisted that I had Borderline was that I self harm(ed) quite severely. And it seems like BPD can be the only explanation for SH in adults. At least that’s where their minds jump to usually. It seems like when young women come to them with depression, self harm and some emotional regulation difficulties and they don’t really know what’s going on, they diagnose them with BPD just to diagnose them with something.

Even before I was misdiagnosed with BPD, I had a different disorder on my mind, a disorder that made much more sense to me. But I didn’t want to bring it up with my psychiatrist or even my therapist, I didn’t want to just diagnose myself, I didn’t want to seem like a hypochondriac. So I never mentioned that I suspected I could have ADHD to anyone. And for several years, no one suspected I could have it. And must that not mean that I can’t have ADHD? Wouldn’t someone figure it out over the years of therapy, three hospitalizations, and multiple psychiatrists? I did some reading on the topic, but I stopped myself from researching the disorder in too much depth, after all, if I wasn’t affected by it, why should I?

Finally, a new therapist mentioned ADHD after I described my struggles to her. She recommended I should get evaluated. And finally - I had the permission to do so. I got diagnosed with ADD, or ADHD-PI according to the DSM-5.  I started researching ADHD more, and discovered something that I didn’t expect: A distinct overlap in the experiences of people with ADHD and people with BPD. Let’s look at some of the symptoms of the two disorders: 

Additionally, ADHD and BPD share many common comorbidities, such as depression, anxiety disorders, sleep disorders and substance abuse disorders.

Note that these aren’t the official diagnostic critera, but rather symptoms that many people with these disorders experience. These aren’t all possible symptoms, and not everyone with ADHD or BPD experiences all these symptoms.

As you can see, there is a significant overlap. After looking at the diagram, is it really so surprising I was first diagnosed with BPD? Especially since I don’t exhibit overtly hyperactive symptoms, it was relatively easy for the doctors and psychologists to focus on my emotional instability self harm issues rather than my inattention and executive dysfunction. 

I just wish that they had listened to me when I told them I didn’t identify with the experiences of people with BPD. Unfortunately, not even mental health professionals always listen to their patients. 

If I was diagnosed correctly earlier, I could have been spared from much suffering. Primarily inattentive ADHD is criminally underdiagnosed, and often misdiagnosed. Untreated ADHD can lead to severe mental health imparements. In my case, it lead to problems with my education, which in turn lead to many depressive episodes, severe self harm and even suicide attempts. If anyone of the dozens of people who were in charge of taking care of my mental health had considered even for just a moment a differend disorder than BPD, maybe they could have diagnosed me with ADHD much sooner.

The health care system in my country is not that bad, compared to others, but it’s still lacking in the mental health area. How many others are just like me? Misdiagnosed and suffering. I don’t wish that on anyone. 

ADHD is a disorder with many faces, not at all just a “little boy who screams and can’t sit still” disorder. Unfortunately, it’s not taken very seriously and mental health professionals who really know enough about it are few and hard to come by. But if you think you might be affected by ADHD, don’t be discouraged just because you haven’t been diagnosed yet. It took me many years from first suspection it to actually getting diagnosed with it. You don’t need to wait for anyone’s permission, if you think you have it, make an appointment for a diagosis. Knowing is worth it, I promise. And when you know, you can start working on it.

I still have a long way in front of me, I haven’t found the right medication for myself yet, but I have hope. Now I know it’s not my fault that I struggle more with studying than others. I can work on not blaming myself for it so much. And learing to forgive yourself for being a bit scatterbrained is the most important part about having ADHD.