#to clarify: i'm not at all opposed to talking about my own personal experiences with psychosis but also

[prefrontal-bastard]

About

Corwyn, he/him, adult, part of a traumagenic OSDD system. I'm not the current host, but I have co-hosted before.

This is not a system-blog, per se, but if you have questions about our system, I'm happy to answer them.

Purpose of this Blog

The purpose of this blog is to clarify misconceptions about the mind, the brain, and the nature of thought, and to make available the tools I've used for personal mental discernment.

My first and foremost priority is ethical conduct and mental safety. I don't diagnose people, coerce them, or project my own experiences onto them. What I do is provide resources and offer personal anecdotes. My goal is to make mental discernment more accessible by providing relevant information, and I care about being accurate with what I curate.

My Philosophy on Mental Health Treatment

As someone who's navigated many co-morbid and confounding mental quandaries, I will at times talk about therapy and mental health treatment. As a disclaimer, I don't support any treatment that aims to make anyone "normal." The goal of any ethical health treatment is to relieve distress, restore agency, and improve one's quality of life. That's the only framework I operate in when discussing this topic.

My Stance on Plurality

The therapist I worked with specializes in a humane, cutting-edge model of complex-dissociative trauma-therapy. She's trained to ethically, effectively, and competently work with clients who have OSDD and DID, and give them the means engage fully with themselves and others. Agency is the goal, as opposed to forcing integration.

She and her colleagues strongly advise against endogenic systemhood, because it's an unsafe practice.

I'm not about to argue with the observations made by experts in this field. For this reason, I can't endorse endogenic systems.

However, I'm all in favor of people exploring and engaging with various parts of themselves. Play is a critical part of self-exploration, and it can reveal important things about ourselves we wouldn't know otherwise. Stepping into different personas is one method of doing this.

But ultimately this is not the same as plurality, and shouldn't be characterized as such. Exploring is valid, but experiences need to be understood for what they are, not what we think they are or want them to be. Plurality is not an identity like gender or a form of neurodivergence like autism, but a wound that should never happen to anyone.

I'm happy to engage in good-faith discussions about this topic if anyone wishes for further clarity.

Etiquette

The environments I strive to create are welcoming and nonjudgemental. I invite people to be curious and collaborative with discussions, and I never belittle people for asking questions, no matter what those questions are.

However, I have my boundaries:

I choose which arguments I engage with, if I engage at all.

I'm not a therapist. I might have some pointers, but I can't walk you through emotional process, so please don't ask me to.

I can't help you with time-sensitive issues or immediate crises.

I reply to asks at my leisure.

I do my best to tag common triggers (graphic descriptions, phobias) but I can't guarantee I'll catch every possible thing. Please tell me if you need something tagged! But remember, this is a blog about the mind, and I'll sometimes talk about things like cult dynamics, trauma, and medicine. Please be diligent and unfollow/block if you need. I won't be offended.

I'll update this post as needed.

[albatris]

Sorry in advance for the potentially dumb question, but: do you suffer from psychosis/schizophrenia? I’ve seen you reblog a lot of posts about it, of course, but i was curious. Also, if its not too personal, if you do, how much does it impact your writing/the weirdness glitchiness factor?

Not a dumb question at all, you’re all good!

So this is kinda…….. not something I’ve spoken about in a great amount of detail or specifics on this blog? And talking about it directly is actually kinda weird! I wasn’t expecting this to feel weird, but it totally does! So please excuse how long this answer took me hahahahaha

So I mean YEAH psychosis is a thing that I possess, this is a thing that resides inside my brain and occasionally outside of it………. I’m not schizophrenic, I’m more in the schizotypal realm of things, which is like….. I mean, that’s a label that best encompasses my experiences and so far it’s the only label that’s been vaguely and tentatively applied to me that’s ever really made me go “oh hey yeah that would actually explain a whole fucking lot” but like. Bits of it are still kinda wonky. Mental health is wonky, I think, generally speaking…………….

I was gonna talk a bit here about my specific experiences but, like, I really had no idea where to start with those and I don’t actually know how relevant it’d be to this question aside from being vaguely tangential in terms of psychosis………… so uhhhh I’m gonna jump ahead and talk WRITING which is WAY more in my comfort zone apparently

and oh my god this was so many words, I’m so sorry in advance, I have no idea if any of this is actually like………… super interesting? But I enjoyed the opportunity to talk about it so cheers for that! I think!

(and I’m sorry if you were expecting like………… a really short sharp sweet answer, I don’t really deal in shorts or sharps or sweets, I mostly deal in, uh………. rambling)

Rest of this post, under the cut, which I hope actually works on mobile, for the sake of your dashboards - 

So this message was an adventure for me into how the questions “How does it affect your writing?” and “How does it affect the glitchiness/horror factor?” are actually two entirely separate things. I mean, they’re two separate things because I’m assuming by “glitchiness factor” you’re thinking specifically of the stuff in my recent ATDAO posts about body horror and the unreality? In which case………… let me get to that in a moment

And since this post got super long, I’m going to start with my extremely short summed-up answer, and then elaborate on it………

In terms of how it affects my writing? In lots of direct ways!

In terms of how it affects the glitchiness and horror aspects? In some weird roundabout ways! It’s not where the horror stems from, but it’s where the response to the horror stems from and where a lot of my descriptive choices stem from! It’s not the horror, but it’s kind of the lens through which I explore the horror!

AND NOW HERE WE GO………… WORDS AHOY

So in terms of how it affects my writing, generally speaking

boring straightforward answer first:

It’s something that crops up in a super literal sense, just in that I’ve got a fair few characters who are psychotic to some degree or another, and it’s something that plays into how they relate to the world and their specific character voice and how they respond to the situations they find themselves in. 

somewhat irrelevant, it’s, uhhh….. something that I feel interacts with themes in a different sort of way, too. ‘Cause a lot of times there’s, like….. stories about people going on cool magical sci-fi quests, and there’s Stories About Psychotic People, and there’s not an awful lot of overlap between the two unless it’s in the context of “and the whole magical quest was a delusion all along!” which, ew

and for fucking REAL there is so much interesting ground to cover and opportunities for different perspectives and new avenues through which themes can be explored, like, in that overlap of stories. It’s something I wish I saw a lot more of in fiction! Which is another huge driving force in, like, why I write stuff the way I do

and now slightly more interesting:

Worldbuilding! It’s definitely something that plays into worldbuilding and like…. my love of creating stories that are kinda just……. “reality but a little bit to the left” if that makes sense? 

Whether this is something like Undertow, where there’s a degree of magic woven into the fabric of the universe, where things are connected by invisible threads, where I can give opinions to objects and feelings to the weather and the streetlights, where the earth itself has a voice? Or whether it’s something like ATDAO, where reality is coming undone at the seams and the fact that everything is just a little lopsided and haywire is a Mundane Part Of Everyday Life? That’s something I find super cathartic and quite lovely to play around in! I’ve always experienced the world as Just A Little Bit To The Left, and writing was one of the first avenues I found to kinda…. channel and explore and expand on that and put my feelings of strangeness into words?

It’s kinda, like, I like being able to share that kind of vision with others in some sort of way, and not necessarily in a frightening or horrible way, y’know? 

THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NOT TO SAY that anything I write is, like, 100% a direct mirror or my own life and how I see the world lmao. A lot of my writing takes experiences and feelings and little facets of how I experience the world and works them into something that’s often more literal and concrete, or it’ll start out as My Thing and as I’m writing, it sorta blooms into something totally different. But bits of it are in there, sure, although they change shape a lot! And it’s definitely in there with a lot of the general overarching feelings and concepts! Yeah!

One other thing that kinda leads onto my next topic is, uh…… that a lot of how I interpret events and meanings in the world around me can be kind of frightening and threatening, and that’s not reeeaaaally something I want to delve into too much in my writing from a worldbuilding perspective? So generally the parts of ATDAO’s “reality but a little to the left” that start to twist into horror and unreality are things I’ve constructed specifically to serve that purpose, more so than things I’ve pulled directly from my experiences.

AND NOW IN TERMS OF GLITCHY HORROR STUFF HELL YEAH

so again I’m assuming by “glitchiness factor” that’d be all the unreality and all the body horror stuff and weird horror? Which, fuck yeah! Despite my squeamishness when it comes to horror, this is one odd little corner of ATDAO that I’m extremely fond of hahahaha

And, like, initially when I considered this question I was like…. oh, this is not something that really has any of its roots in psychosis or my experiences of mental illness. And that’s…… kiiiiiind of true? My construction of the unreality and its contents is a lot of me just me sitting at my laptop going “Hahahaha that makes me physically nauseous! That’s the worst thing I’ve ever come up with!! I’m adding it in immediately!!”

But yeah, it definitely does factor in, though! Maybe not in as interesting a way as you’d hoped? 

So first off, my experiences are something that sorta plays into my word choice and the specific way I use language in those scenes. And I’m also gonna go ahead and say that dissociation and specifically derealisation are also things I draw from pretty heavily for those kinda……. more glitchy horror-ish parts? So for me, my experiences factor more into HOW I describe the content more so than any of the horrid glitchy gory content itself. 

‘cause it’s kinda, like, a specific kind of fear, I think, it’s a little bit off-beat and weirdly-worded and disjointed and it hits your senses all wrong, it doesn’t make an awful lot of sense but it’s still extremely real. There’s a lot of weird or unsettling bullshit that goes on in the unreality that there’s no convenient Real World Descriptive Equivalent for. Like, cityscapes made entirely of soundwaves, the aforementioned body horror stuff in earlier posts, places that are a complete and total lack of Anything where there’s not even space or colour or texture or light, senses getting all tangled up into each other, something being simultaneously bigger than the sun and smaller than an ant, voices unravelling like twine? LOTS OF WEIRD, BASICALLY

There’s no nice neat right way to describe that, and if there was, it probably wouldn’t pack the punch it needs to, yeah? But I love that kinda shit, I get to pull from a bunch of really weird sensory experiences and feelings I have no real way to articulate and I get to use language in creative ways to evoke the same feelings, the same experiences, the same sense of fear and wrongness? I get to draw from weird shit to describe a bunch of weird shit that makes NO fucking sense whatsoever and that can’t realistically be tied up with words

Point is, they’re experiences I draw from in order to Get Real Fuckin Weird With Words

and getting weird with words in this specific way is CATHARTIC as FUCK dude it’s so good, it’s one of my favourite things. This is, like, the dark edgy version of what I talked about earlier in regards to worldbuilding and me painting a nice odd vision for people to share in hahahaha

“let me take you on a nice gentle stroll through my imagination” vs me supplexing you to the ground and beating the shit out of you with a bat 

And one other thing is just……. I’m sorry, I’m super tired, this bit is probably gonna be jumbled and wordy and maybe not super relevant but uhhhhhhh

So the unreality is not something I initially drew from any particular place in my psyche, but it IS something I’ve come to construct in a specific way, and a lot of it is something I build with the questions of like…… “How does a psychotic character respond to this input?” and “What does this scenery draw out in my character and how does it challenge them?” in mind, so I guess………… in that sense, there’s definitely still a fairly big impact? But kind of in a sideways way. The unreality is not so much based on psychosis, but it’s something I use to highlight specific elements of it, I guess, but mostly in terms of the skills it draws out

‘cause like. in ATDAO the only characters who kinda get to butt heads with the unreality aside from that one random dead car driver who may or may not be vaguely half alive in a state of horrific limbo are Jacob and Tris, and like

I don’t ever really frame Tris’s psychosis as some horrible terrible thing he’s burdened with that makes life a terrible living hell 24/7 but it is, like………. something he struggles a lot with over the course of the story, both in general terms and in terms of people not taking him seriously about the Extremely Real Fantastical Nonsense that’s going on and in general being hesitant to trust his perceptions of reality. And ALSO I guess in terms of just…….. the way he relates to the fact that he’s been dragged into some Extremely Real Fantastical Nonsense? And him wrestling with how he’s supposed to believe in something like that when no one else can see the evidence and everyone is telling him he’s just crazy, and how “ridiculous interdimensional dumbass sci-fi quest” is something that’s reserved for other people, because he’s already been there like four times already and it has extremely different implications for him

In terms of mental illness, all my protags have patches of the story where they make it through kinda “in spite” of their struggles with mental illness (though that’s a sentence I fuckin hate) and other patches where mental illness is just a thing they deal with alongside whatever plots they have going on…… but their experiences with mental illness are also something that gives them specific skills and perspectives and ways of understanding the world that are invaluable, and some of the most important parts of the story are the parts where they make it through specifically BECAUSE of those skills and perspectives

Which is kind of the Whole Thing With The Unreality, that’s its whole deal

The unreality is a fucking huge turning point for Tris as a character, because it’s specifically because of his experiences with psychosis that he’s able to navigate it so effectively, it’s because of the specific skills he’s developed and the practice he’s had in similar circumstances

not, like, the SAME circumstances, but things from other contexts that kind of, transfer, circumstances where the same skills are applicable

‘cause like, turns out, he’s really good at navigating confusing frightening hellscapes where nothing makes sense and mis-stepping can get you killed, because he’s had a whole lot of practice just like. existing as a person with psychosis in a weird apocalypse world where reality is collapsing in unpredictable ways. He spends a lot of his life trying to make sense of reality and figure out the rules and developing countless systems for navigating the world safely, which he often needs to adjust at a moment’s notice, or completely scrap and reconstruct. He’s had a lot of experience of just sorta waking up and whatever bullshit is going on he’s just gotta be like “ok cool so this is what we’re doing today, I have to deal with this, so how can I deal with this”. He’s used to grounding himself and problem-solving even under intense pressure and when he’s terrified and regardless of whatever objectively horrifying nonsense is happening around him. He’s used to sorting the horrifying things that are not dangerous from the horrifying things that are extremely dangerous.  

He’s basically the one character who can get tossed into the unreality and actually work with it and figure out the rules even though everything is screaming and glitched out and trying to kill him, he’s spent most of his life developing the perfect skill set for it

(and like, this is the first point in the story where he sorta realises that his specific way of viewing the world is going to be a strength rather than a weakness, but like. despite the fact that Tris is basically a walking panic attack he’s actually always been the one of the team who’s been the most adept at navigating daily life with the apocalypse, it’s just not something he’s ever really picked up on)

and uh

that’s kind of a vaguely irrelevant note to end on, actually

HEY THAT WAS SO MANY WORDS I’M SO FUCKING SORRY

I DON’T EVEN HAVE A NEAT WRAP UP TO THIS POST

MY WRAP UP WAS THAT SUMMARY AT THE START

IF YOU READ THIS FAR I HOPE IT WAS AT LEAST SOMEWHAT INTERESTING

[scarlet--wiccan]

Hey y'all, I didn't really think this was something I needed to declare in my bio or tack on to the end of my posts, but as a person of Romani descent with a family history of displacement and trauma related to WWII, I am morally and ethically opposed to all forms of military imperialism, ethnic cleansing, and racism. That means that I consider myself an ally to the displaced and occupied Arab, Muslim, and Domari people of Palestine. I think I've demonstrated that pretty clearly in the past, but I just got some attention from an actively pro-Zionist political blog, so I felt compelled to reiterate it clearly. It might seem silly, since I'm mostly just posting about comics, but I don't think I'd sticking to my principles if I allowed my content to circulated on that sort of blog, and didn't give some kind of statement or caveat.

I understand that this subject is very fraught, and specifically very politically charged at this moment. Like many people, I get really nervous talking about it, because it's hard to be sure that you have all the right information on any given topic. What's more, I know from experience that anything I say on this subject is liable to be twisted and misinterpreted by people who either approach this subject in poor faith, or a have a political agenda to push. To that end, I want to further clarify that I consider myself a lifelong ally of the Jewish people. Our histories are very closely intertwined, and I am opposed to anti-semitism in the same way I am opposed to all forms of racial and religious discrimination. I also hold no judgement towards anyone's personal identity, or nationality. I understand that it's complicated on both sides.

American superhero comics are deeply rooted in the American Jewish experience and the history of World War II. A lot of the characters I post about are particularly tied to that history, and characters such as Magneto and the Maximoffs do so in a manner which also crosses over with my own people's history. My goal with this blog has always been to be an ally to Jewish and Roma people as someone in an art, writing, and fandom space-- and to provide resources and critical analysis to help other folks do the same. I know it's just comics, but I believe that the way we engage with art and media really matters because it reflects, and informs, our politics and actions in other areas. That's why I take this very seriously.

[tlbodine]

Hi, I'm writing a ghost story about a ghost working to not only solve their own murder but the murder/death(s) of their fellow ghosts who haunt the same hotel. The ghosts represent the theme of secrets and how they can come back to haunt you, in this case literally. How would I go about showing this rather than just telling the audience/readers?

Hey, sorry for the delayed response! I opened this up at work, planned to answer when I got a spare minute, and then the world kind of went to hell and I’ve been swept up in the chaotic adjustment, eep! 

That said, I hope you & yours are safe wherever you are, and...let’s talk about ghosts! 

So I presume you’ve read my Ghost Post but I’ll link it again here just in case: https://tlbodine.tumblr.com/post/168621456134/how-to-write-horror-ghost-stories

“The past coming back to haunt you” is really baked in to most ghost story tropes. I think for the most part, that’s what defines ghosts as opposed to other sorts of horror spooks. Ghosts can enact revenge, but ghosts can also lead people to uncover truths that had been hidden. 

In order to make that work, we often need someone with an outsider’s perspective -- a living human character -- to act as the recipient of the ghost’s messages. Because ghosts are usually tied to a specific location, they need a human person out there who can go do their investigative legwork for them. 

Here’s a common framework for the trope: 

Person moves to a new place or otherwise experiences a change in scenery, putting them in path of the ghost. 

They experience a number of creepy events, alerting them first to the existence of the ghost, and then drawing their attention to strange things about the house 

A series of clues lead them to discover that More Is Going On Than It Seems, and they are driven to unearth the mystery 

Quite often, unearthing this mystery means confronting a living person, such as the murderer or a person who is benefiting from the murder of the ghost(s) 

Now that justice is served, the ghost can be at peace and leaves the human alone 

Now, this basic formula can be tweaked in a lot of ways. In your scenario, you’ve got one setting but multiple ghosts. Some questions to ask yourself that might help to clarify the story and themes: 

What is it that connects these ghosts to one another? Do they share a killer? Why are they all in this specific hotel? Does that hotel have a dirty secret? Who stands to benefit from their death?

What would bring justice to these souls? Is there a person who can be punished, a secret that can be revealed, a ritual performed, etc. that would lay them to rest? 

Alternatively, is the ghost stepping in to help a living person instead? Does the ghost recognize patterns of behavior and decide to step in to prevent a murder from happening etc.? 

As long as you’re approaching the story thoughtfully and keeping your themes in mind, you shouldn’t have to do too much work to make the message shine through -- trust in your reader to figure it out. Your theme will emerge organically from the way the story plays out, the way the characters change, etc. 

Here are some reading/viewing recommendations that might help you with ideas and in studying how themes are handled: 

A Taste for Monsters by Matthew J. Kirby - A girl becomes the private nurse for Joseph Merrick (The Elephant Man), and the two are visited frequently by the ghosts of Jack the Ripper’s victims. Solving the murders, and preventing the next one, becomes crucial to both of them. 

The Girl in the Well by Rin Chupeco - Told from the POV of a Japanese yurei (vengeful spirit), the book is about the ghost-girl’s relationship with the boy who can see her, and their attempts to resolve a current murderous haunt as well as uncover some secrets to give peace to the ghost. 

The Shining by Stephen King - The book is better for this than the movie. A family spends an isolated winter as custodians of a haunted hotel. The hotel itself is a malevolent character, and it had a lot of evil influence over the main character -- but before he succumbs, there’s a lot of investigation into the history of the place and all the things that have happened in it. 

The Orphanage (El Orfanato) - One of my favorite ghost movies. A woman moves into the building that was once the orphanage where she was raised. When her son disappears soon after, she starts to see ghosts -- are they leading her to him, or trying to harm her? 

The Devil’s Backbone  - Another of my favorite ghost movies, and one of Guillermo del Toro’s finest. A ghost story set in a boarding school for children orphaned by a war. 

Haunted by R.L. Stine - One of my favorite of the Fear Street novels, this book is about a girl who is visited by a ghost who needs her to help him solve his murder. The twist? He’s not dead yet. 

There are obviously lots and lots more, but you get the idea. Hopefully this helps on your quest! Best of luck writing :)

[scripttorture]

I saw your ask talking about the torture apologia in thriller through assassins and I was wondering cause I have a character who from a very, very young age was taught to be that assassin and was punished with pain/lack of food/isolation for the smallest demeanours, I'm not sure if it counts as torture exactly due to the political aspect of torture as a whole, but would she more likely think this was normal and gradually learn it wasn't or would she need to be exposed to the idea that it wasn't?

(Assassin anon) if she does learn it herself as opposed to being exposed to it, what age is this likely to happen? I also just want to clarify, I don't want her staying with the group doing it cause I know torture doesn't gain loyalty at all, I just want to make sure the way she grows into the knowledge that what's happening to her isn't normal is done correctly and as realistically as I can

Legallyspeaking this would be abuse not torture. But make no mistake whatyou’re describing is child abuse and it is incredibly harmful.

Itwould have a drastic effect on the character, effects which wouldmake the character much less effective as an assassin.

I-know this isn’t exactly what you asked, and I will answer yourquestion. But I get so many story ideas pitched here that assume thiskind of set up is harmless. I don’t think you’re making thatassumption but I feel I wouldn’t be doing my job properly if Ididn’t talk about the damage this kind of abuse would cause.

Asidefrom anything else I think it’s important to be clear on the kindof damage these scenarios would cause. Because as an author it’sreally easy to acknowledge something is harmful but misjudge whatkinds of injuries or long term problems it can cause.

Childabuse, especially the kinds you’ve chosen for this story, causes alot of long term physical and psychological problems. And they’reproblems that would have a knock on effect on the character’sabilities as an assassin.

Starvationat a young age can stunt growth. It can result in weaker bones. Itleads to a lot more illness in childhood. A pattern of regularstarvation at a young age can lead to significant weight gain laterin life (which I’m including because depending on the setting itcould effect an assassin’s ability to blend in).

Italso reduces a child’s ability to learn. It reduces concentrationand motivation, produces depressive symptoms and agitation.

Dependingon how severe the starvation is and how regular the periods ofstarvation are it could lead to a permanent drop in intelligence-brain damage. It can also lead to mental health problems like anxietyand depression.

Starvationis incredibly dangerous for anyone, but it’s particularly dangerousfor children.

Solitaryconfinement, or isolation, is also particularly damaging forchildren.

There’sless research on solitary confinement in children. Most of theresearch is in adults. But everything we do know strongly suggeststhat the effects on children, especiallyyounger children, are much more severe.

It’snot clear exactly what causes the physical symptoms of solitaryconfinement. Some of them could be down to poor cell conditions. Eyeproblems could be down to poor cell conditions. Lack of energy andinsomnia seem to be possible regardless. All of these could causelong term problems for an assassin.

Fora child in particular the chances of long term problems socialisingare particularly high. Solitary causes significant problemssocialising in adults and in children, who are still learning how tosocialise, it can produce life long isolation because they neverlearn to socialise.

Thatin turn has knock on effects making depression, self harm and lowself esteem incredibly likely in the long term.

That’sin addition to the other mental health problems that solitaryconfinement causes. And repeated bouts of solitary confinement wouldexacerbate those previous symptoms. So you’ve got a situation wherethe character’s mental health problems would just keep piling up.Because each of the punishments would cause serious mental healthproblems and solitary would make each of those worse.

AndI think that brings us back to the question, thank you for bearingwith me through that. :)

HonestlyI think this depends on the way you’ve set up the story. Dependingon how much contact the character has with people outside theassassin-organisation she could work out that this isn’t ‘normal’or she might need to be outright told.

Itcould also vary depending on how other children being trained aretreated.

Childrenare very good at spotting unfair treatment even if they’re notalways very good at expressing why it’s unfair. But that doesinvolve being able to see that other people are treated differently.

Ifthe character isable to see what normal life looks like from a young age then shewould probably realise early on that she’s being treated badly.Anecdotally I’ve read a few accounts from people who were abused aschildren recalling that it was when they started going to school,socialising with other children their own age without their parentsaround, that they realised their experience wasn’t ‘normal’.

Fromeverything you’ve said I doubt this character is going to amainstream school. Is there an equivalent, regular opportunity forher to social with people outside the assassin-group at a young age?

Dependingon how you’re picturing the training regime and raising of thesechildren she might be able to reach the same realisation based onother children within the group. If the children are raisedcommunally as a group and are all treated equally badly then I don’tthink that would be possible. But if it’s more akin to them eachbeing put with a particular teacher/parent figure and each child’straining regime is controlled by one or two adults with significantvariations- Then I think you could easily have the character realisethat most of the others aren’t starved, those children aren’tlocked up alone, a few children aren’t even beaten.

Ineither of these scenarios I think it wouldn’t be unreasonable tohave the character realising things are different for her at 4-5years old.

Ifshe’s kept isolated from the outside world and the other childrenare treated just as badly then I think it could take significantlylonger for her the realise her experience isn’t normal.

Theeasiest way to bring about that realisation would probably be as partof any training to ‘blend in’ with larger society. When hertraining gets to a point where she needsto know how to sham ‘correct’ social behaviour or at leastobserve her targets then she’s going to encounter relationshipsthat aren’t abusive.

Itwould probably take a pattern of repeated observation for her torealise that her experience is the aberration. But the exact age thisis likely to take place at would depend on how you’re picturing hertraining regime and the kind of age these assassins are allowed outinto the wider world.

Now,I’m not entirely sure if this has addressed your question, becausethere seems to be an element of spontaneous realisation with nooutside input versus overt exposure. I’m not sure those aremutually exclusive.

Idon’t think she could function as an assassin completely isolatedfrom outside society. Which means that the question isn’t whethershe’s exposed to other ways of living but when.

Idon’t think that someone truly and completely isolated from otherways of living would realise that abuse wasn’t normal. I thinkthey’d know it was wrong and unfair and harmful but those aren’tthe same thing. And that doesn’t seem to be what’s going on here.

SoI think you’ve got some room to decide what age the character comesto this realisation based on what age she’s exposed to- wellnon-abusive relationships. And I think the realisation can be aspontaneous thing that grows in response to that exposure.

Havinga character bluntly tell her that her relationships were all abusive-based on anecdotes and personal experience I’d say this is aterrible way to try and reach someone in that situation. It mostcommonly seems to produce a knee-jerk defence of the relationships.

Itcouldlead to her eventually accepting that these relationships areabusive, years later. But in the short term, most people are morelikely to knuckle down, to get defensive, to deny. Even if sherecognises that the relationship is bad. It’s a sort of ‘it’sbad but it’s not that’.

Tohave a blunt declaration like this reach her I think you’d need todo a lot of groundwork to establish the character is already most ofthe way to reaching that realisation herself.

Dependingon the broader situation and exposure to outside cultures/familyunits you really could pick almost any age. I think the youngest agesyou could reasonably use is 4-5 years old. While she could stillreach the realisation as an adult I think the further into adulthoodshe is, the more entrenched in the assassin-group she is the lesslikely she is to leave.

Becauseleaving these kinds of situations means rejecting her entire socialcircle. It means isolation. It means the rejection of routine andeverything she’s come to rely on. Which is difficult at any age butas an adult in her 30s, 40s etc I think she’s more likely tobelieve she’d be incapable of establishing relationships outside ofher group. That’s not true, but the longer she remains isolatedfrom relationships outside the group the more likely it is thatshe’ll believe she’s incapable of starting over.

Especiallybecause these sorts of isolated groups tend to try and teach membersthat they won’t be accepted elsewhere, it’s part of how they keeppeople in the group.

Youmight also find it useful to look up interviews with people who leftcults. I have a few saved that might help as a starting point. Thisone was an American ‘homeschool’ community.Thisone is a South Korean cult and the interviewee lost contact with herfamily because of the cult.

Beyondthat, you might want to have a look at Scripttraumasurvivors posts onchild abuse.

ReclaimingDreams and the war child site generally could be relevant.There’salso a practical guide to reintegrating child soldiers into societythat could be useful to you here.

Ihope that helps. :)

Availableon Wordpress.

Disclaimer

[nathaniacolver]

The mormon church did not let poc become full members until 1978, endorsed conversation "therapy" and still opposes queer relationships. Why do you have any desire to be a part of it?

hey, fantastic question! sorry for just now getting to this. we do have a sometimes-questionable history, but i mean, which group of people doesn't? which PERSON doesn't? i think for a lot of this stuff, the members at that time just didn't know.

yeah, i actually don't know a whole ton ab the Church's endorsement of conversion therapy, so if you could enlighten me, that'd be awesome! maybe an article or 2? but whatever happened, lol, Jesus never wanted that. it sucks that so many of those members had these hard prejudices against minority/disadvantaged groups, because like, did they not read the New Testament??? did they not literally see Jesus spend all his time with ALL the people who were disadvantaged/shunned/ostracized/disabled??????¿?

and i would hope that members of Jesus Christ's Church wouldn't treat queer people any different anymore. if they do.....................they are NOT living His standards, haha. the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 8) LITERALLY TEACHES US that we have no right to judge each other, because we all have sin. like. i am a sinner. the whole point is if you didn't have ANY sin, you would not still be alive on earth haha. so idk why people judge or oppress. they clearly do NOT know Jesus as well as they profess to. (another note ab the "woman caught in adultery" - everyone assumes she was with a guy, but like - isn't that the heteronormative view of the situation? 😂 point is, she coulda been gay, & we wouldn't know. either way, Jesus literally said He didn't condemn her at all, "go and sin no more." small note from my pov!)

the joseph smith comment as well - again, i don't know a whole lot about this, but the best thing is - my religion, my faith is NOT founded in Joseph Smith. it's founded in Jesus Christ. i've had "spiritual" experiences ("spiritual" might translate into "supernatural" or "inexplicable" situations for you) where it's like........there HAS to be some all-powerful being, non-mortal, that supports me & understands my situation. and that's the number 1 reason I believe in Jesus Christ - because He's shown me that he knows stuff that L I T E R A L L Y no other human could know about me, bc i never shared it with anyone. this is why we're not the Mormon church - our belief is not founded on Mormon. he just happens to be the historian who assembled this book in 410-420 AD, and that's why it's named after him. kinda like pythagoras' theorem, or newton's law of physics. they don't OWN those concepts, they just assembled & condensed them.

point is - i have a spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ, & He's shown me that this Church is His. this Church gives me the resources to learn more about Jesus Christ, to experience His power - that's why i'm a member. i'm a member because i trust Jesus Christ, that He shows me the best way to become the best possible version of myself. There's been way too many times where I just act on a feeling to talk to someone or to shoot them a text or to validate them in some way, and those people have come up to me afterwards & said "i don't know how you knew to say that......i NEEDED to hear that today." and like. my belief in Jesus gives me the power to do so. that's why I believe - i literally feel like I have more power to be a good person if I try to replicate Jesus Christ's life.

sorry for the rant 😅😅 happy to clarify anything if needed!

[momtaku]

What does Flocke know about the inner thoughts and feelings of the 104th or of Levi? He's the newbie to their ranks, and he speaks of difficulty, experience and acheivement while dismissing theirs in the same breath. He's entitled to his opinion but he's not trying to understand or help, he's just being mean and guilt-tripping and I'm sorry but it sounds like you're advocating this vicariously because you're upset. I also disagree with the repeated assertion you make that humanity was [1/2]

[2/2] never the concern of the survivors with the choice they made. I think that is your bias and judgment call and you should own that instead of projecting it as fact. I don’t think caring for Armin or Erwin and caring for humanity are mutually exclusive in these characters heads and that’s part of what makes it so hard for all of them.

Hoo boy, this might get long. First, I appreciate seeing opposing views like yours. I love discussing this series. It’s why I am here. I have plenty of friends who agree with what I say because they share my opinion, and there are others who (I suspect) agree with me because they like me. I’d much rather hear honesty than blind agreement.  So I thank you for sharing your thoughts and opinions. 

I also don’t mind your assessment of me. You’re an outsider looking in, so it’s interesting to hear.

Let me be clear. I love Flocke as a character but he’s not someone I’d invite to my pillow fort for cookies and cocoa. He was tactless and horrible. He’s interesting as a problematic fav. And he certainly isn’t my first. I’ve liked plenty of unpopular characters in this series because they are often the most interesting. 

Now your ask:

What does Flocke know about the inner thoughts and feelings of the 104th or of Levi? He’s the newbie to their ranks, and he speaks of difficulty, experience and achievement while dismissing theirs in the same breath.

Flocke has admitted to knowing nothing about them. He’s an outsider looking in and that’s what makes him so interesting. He doesn’t know anything about Erwin either. He believes, as do the majority, that Erwin was the logical choice at that moment on the battlefield.

he’s not trying to understand or help, he’s just being mean and guilt-tripping 

No. he’s trying to be understood. Armin is the one who started the conversation. Armin wanted to know the truth.  He needed to hear Flocke’s perspective. Look at page 14 on chapter 90. 

I 10000% agree that Flocke could’ve been nicer about it but that’s not been Flocke’s style from the beginning. He drops truth bombs more like nuclear bombs. No consideration!

it sounds like you’re advocating this vicariously because you’re upset

I was a little upset last night because I felt my words were being twisted and my point was being lost.  I’ve advocated for many problematic favs (*cough bert cough*), so I don’t think my interest in Flocke is solely based on my feelings for Erwin. He did call Erwin a devil after all. I’d like to think I’d be drawn to Flocke regardless, but I’ll examine my motives more closely.

I also disagree with the repeated assertion you make that humanity was never the concern of the survivors with the choice they made.

That’s not my assertion. That’s the manga. Levi disregarded humanity because of his personal feelings. He said that. Not me. Eren was very likely the only character on the roof who believed Armin was the “right” choice at that moment. Eren may well have believed it was best for humanity, but it’s obvious emotions were in control. I can’t look at Eren and believe any logical or reasonable thought processes were involved in chapter 83 and 84.

I think that is your bias and judgment call and you should own that instead of projecting it as fact.

Let me be clear here as well: The thoughts and opinions of momtaku are not those of hajime isayama and should not be viewed as fact. Everyone should know this. I write my opinions. 

I don’t think caring for Armin or Erwin and caring for humanity are mutually exclusive in these characters heads and that’s part of what makes it so hard for all of them.

I agree with this. I do think Eren and Levi care about humanity. But at that moment on the roof, humanity was secondary.

Thank you for letting me clarify. You’re welcome to talk to me on the chat to discuss. I don’t bite.