#tw questioning reality

[starleska]

just saw Heretic (2024) and am delighted. without spoiling anything, regardless of your religious conviction or lack thereof you'll be challenged on your faith, morals, and the question of whether or not belief constitutes reality, and whether the answer to that matters at all. please go and see it!!!!

[five-thousand-loaves-of-bread]

feel like. more n more because cognitive stuff get worse. becoming “unreliable narrator” of own life. if have heard of that literary term.

can’t tell you what am want even if give choices. can type make noise make gesture that mean yes automatically before even process question but actually answer is no. can borrow other people words say thing that thought is true about self only turn out very wrong. don’t know if want something. don’t know if like something. cannot answer those questions.

can’t tell you whether symptom getting worse or stay same or be better. don’t know if regression slowed or stopped or just past point where regression took even that awareness from me. ask me what symptom experience, if am experiencing this symptom. say yes, think do, but am i? actually understand what symptom is, actually understand n aware of self? for example. say have body weakness. genuinely think that do experience word that say “weakness��. but do actually experience the experience that is weakness? do actually understand definition of word “weakness”? not on purpose lie but, is what say n genuinely believe about self actually reliable.

really is perfect gaslighter, be perpetually gaslit by own cognitive symptoms, cannot escape, because it inside me. but not even know if it gaslighting because what if it not gaslighting what if it actually true. even facts that have nothing do with personal experience. did make it up, did i make reality up. is reality real. “are we live in simulation” except not meme joke. but actually. feel nothing different than made up shows that watch, while can’t shake belief that made up shows real just different world or actually part of this world we just just not aware (similar to how people like us cannot begin imagine what be ultra rich like).

feel as if float in space majority of time. not have self awareness. be in own world all time but not have self awareness of actual things actual self. not have awareness of surrounding.

[please don’t tell me you relate unless am know you / we friends / mutuals & you also have disability that really affect cognitive]

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

this whole fear of repressed memories regarding sexual abuse has been following me around for years, probably since I became aware of memory loss/repressed trauma in the first place, but idk why it's been so intense this summer and it's really really frustrating how every time I think I've worked through it and gotten over it, I see a picture or someone says something and I'm all "I'M SCARED THAT THIS FAMILY MEMBER RAPED ME AS A KID AND I JUST CAN'T REMEMBER IT" and like. it's so frustrating because it's literally a symptom of OCD or whatever that I can't stop going over and over and over this, and it's driving me nuts that I can't seem to trust my own mind

[smilingmxsk]

So Bad End Marg stuff... WARNING FOR DRUGS AND SUBSTANCES-

So Margaret in this verse starts off at the bottom of the cathedral basement in restraints with nothing else to really look forward to but whoever is bound to eventually let her out.

In the eventuality that she does, tearing into whoever unleashed her because it's the first drop of blood she's had in ages, she's basically due to be mentally torn apart because of how different the world is and how much it left her behind. And after that comes the spiralling thoughts as to whether or not she tries to find her friends again. If she ever does, it'll just devastate her. Bad End takes place 5 or so years later (depending on the muses that interact with her. If it's her friends, we can say min 5 years or even later if they're ageless muses :) ). Witnessing them not only alive, but aged will send the weight of reality slamming into her. Maybe so much so that she just drops to her knees on the spot. If they ever have eye contact, she would just disappear that first time.

Her friends are older, likely living better lives, moving on without her as the world did? It doesn't bring the kind of thoughts that someone wants to entertain or otherwise suffer with. So what do you do when you want to forget it all? You turn to the "happy stuff". Margaret in her lower moods would probably dabble into cannabis, meth, and occasionally ecstacy for the sake of a high. It just depends on if she wants it to be a numb high, or something to make her happy where she can dance around in her brain for a while. Or maybe she wants to mix the effects, just to see what happens. She's crossed the threshold of caring about what happens to her body at this point, so mixing the effects doesn't matter to her. Even if it makes her disorientated for a while. Sometimes she wakes up somewhere she doesn't remember lying down. Sometimes she's wrists deep in someone's guts or just caked in blood. Sometimes she wakes up with vomit next to her. The after effects always leave behind a bitter skull shattering headache... but for the moment she was happy, it's worth it. She can just go kill someone afterwards.

If she's looking for a high, she'll find a dealer through word of mouth. Her payment is either cash out of a wallet she stole, or taking a job to have someone killed. And that's if the dealer has enough will to not turn her down just because she's unnerving and looking them up and down like a t-bone steak. If he absolutely cheated her out of what was owed, they're more than likely not waking up. And that's IF they don't skip town first.

Meanwhile, while she's trying almost everything on earth to either feel or erase her feelings, her body with reverse the damage done after a while, if she takes either of them enough to actually start doing damage to her brain or otherwise. Her regeneration will treat it as if she got a bruise or a cut, which also means that if the high lasts for hours, it'll probably get cut short at some point once she hits the 'regeneration threshold'. Thus starts the cycle of constantly finding something to fill the void in her heart-

[demonidoodles]

Oc concept doodles but over time they get too crowded for my liking

Textless ver under read more

[insipid-drivel]

"Biz, what would you like for your birthday this year?"

"For nobody to misgender me for a day."

Turned out too much to ask (:

[vampiricbisexuality]

I’m failing at the diet that I made smh

[thinkin-bout-milgram]

I believe Mahiru has Schizophrenia

(Go to third paragraph if you want to skip my prefaces and meandering. I also put a fairly simple to understand DSM-5 criteria screenshot from one of my textbooks for schizophrenia near the bottom)

Admin Saturn here post Mahiru drop, I’m sure others will have either similar or very contrasting thoughts on this but I thought I’d offer my own perspective on it as a psych major and a person with a family member who has schizophrenia. She definitely shows a lot of symptoms of schizophrenia which of course doesn’t necessarily mean this is what they’re intending to portray with her, nor a good portrayal, but I want to put my thoughts out here.

I also want to say that I’m most familiar with schizophrenia and this could very easily fall into a different psychotic disorder I’m less familiar with so I’ll be doing some research into those to either rule out other possibilities or hone in more on a potential schizophrenia portrayal.

Starting with the most basic, she’s near the typical age of onset for schizophrenia in women which is mid 20s to early 30s. (although of course theres a very broad range)

Going on to criteria A. To start there are three ‘main criteria’ that are often the most telling for people with schizophrenia. These include 1. delusions, 2. hallucinations, and 3. disorganized speech. I would say mahiru definitely meets delusions and hallucinations based on this MV. 

While auditory hallucinations are the most common, and having fully formed and incredibly all encompassing visual hallucinations like the ones depicted in her MV are very uncommon, milgram depicts very specific and intriguing cases. The fact that all the prisoners hear our voices also makes it difficult to be able to tell if she might experience auditory hallucinations as well, but it’s something I’ll be looking out for. 

To say more on delusions (and keep in mind I’m reporting all this in a very simplified version sans context because theres a lot about delusions within psychotic disorders. And also this is just with just a quick refresher from a previous textbook) there are a few kinds. Mahiru would be expressing erotomanic type where you believe a person is madly in love with you and you two were meant to be together. This is most often experienced in relation to celebrities but again, milgram tries to take looks at the most ‘intriguing’ cases.

The other criteria are 4. grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior and 5. negative symptoms. Schizophrenia can be thought of as having negative and positive symptoms. Positive symptoms are things like hallucinations and delusions that add a nonreal experience where negative symptoms reduce a typical experience/self expression. (again, simplified) So some negative symptoms a person could experience would be reduced affect or a lack of pleasure from everyday activities. I don’t see her having any reduced affect but I could definitely see her having grossly disorganized behavior.

Grossly disorganized behavior includes not understanding you have a problem (specifically in a lacking insight way), another thing is cognitive slippage where a person will jump from topic to topic or talk illogically. While we haven’t seen her have these symptoms recently, the deterioration of her notebook entries could be an attempt to show the audience this.

A person must have at least 2 of these 5 symptoms.

She also def meets criteria B (worsened hygiene at the very least which doesn’t even bring in how much these actions likely impacted the other aspects of her life)

I can’t say for sure with C, D, or E, however F I can say has been met.

Something important to note is that it’s hard to tell if Mahiru would meet the criteria of experiencing this for the past 6 months. We don’t know how long she was holding him captive (although I think from the wear it looks like he experienced it was longer than the few days expressed in her journal) but it’s still difficult to know. If she hasn’t, it would be important to look into schizophreniform which is a shorter version of it and brief psychotic disorder which is an even shorter version. These can have a better long term prognosis.

In regards to outcomes that people with schizophrenia can experience long term with treatment vary. Unfortunately, many people never make a full recovery and continue to experience symptoms, especially those who never receive treatment. Schizophrenia is typically considered a chronic disorder. They typically benefit most from a structured inpatient facility with good care and this is a disorder where med compliance is one of the number 1 things that can impact recovery. However, that definitely doesn’t mean they can’t. With med compliance, a good support system as well as coping skills and frequent checkups symptoms can severely lessen to almost disappear. Especially with schizophreniform and brief psychotic disorder, there are a lot of cases where a person can experience one case of it and never have these symptoms again (although it is also a very big risk factor for a later schizophrenia diagnosis)

Another thing to consider going forward in regards to being able to ask her questions would be asking about childhood and family history. Schizophrenia is highly hereditary and there are also some early flags in childhood that include atypical beliefs or some of the negative symptoms.

From a personal standpoint, I would also say that my family member expresses a lot of floaty whimsical type ideas. Not quite in the Mahiru love way but it has similar vibes? I don’t quite know how to describe it because it’s such a specific mannerism but it’s just another coincidence I thought I would add.

Theres always the availability heuristic and I know a lot about schizophrenia and it’s something I think about a lot more than the average person. However, I do feel that she meets a lot of criteria and I’ll definitely be looking for more signs.

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

I was just thinking the other day that after my psychiatrist takes me off the antipsychotic I'm on I could float the idea of getting off the antidepressant too

[musical-chick-13]

The worst feeling is seeing women are my favourite ghy posted everywhere but none of those users who post it even care or support female characters.

You are not wrong!

I don't have a problem with people quoting "women are my favorite guy." I really don't think it's meant to be malicious, it's a joking meme phrase that's meant to elicit a smile due to the unexpected way it's worded. And I don't have a problem with people liking male characters (hell, I myself have had three emotional breakdowns over one of them in the past two days!). What I don't like is that a lot of people I've come across seem to be saying this phrase as some sort of "proof" that they Really Care about women. And many of them. Do not actually seem be making an effort to back up that claim. (And this isn't even just in the context of refusing to engage with female characters-it's avoiding media created by or for women, it's harassing actresses for playing characters they don't like or who "get in the way" of a desired story outcome, and most egregiously, it's the way so many people treat female victims of domestic abuse or other similar kinds of trauma or mistreatment.)

It's not the fact that this meme phrase exists, it's the fact that too many people are hiding behind it as a show of "support" without actually doing anything. And, honestly, it's the specific way that people use it to suggest that we don't still have a rampant misogyny problem, both in and outside of fandom. If women were your "favorite guy," you'd treat them better. (At the very least, you would spend some time actually thinking or talking about them.)

[convictedsodomist]

Sometimes, I like to frolic outside of my flowery little classic lit meadow and explore other, mildly more cursed sides of tumblr

Today I discovered: Al Pacino tumblr

Just blogs upon blogs dedicated to Al Pacino

Is Al Pacino even still alive?

What is Al Pacino?

What

[starleska]

What food do you think salad fingers would like... miscellaneous scavenged corpses aren't his favorite probably lol and nothing spicy, he's much too British for that.

ohoho, what an interesting question!!! as a Brit myself, i can weigh in a little on his English-specific delicacies, although i imagine they're all some form of curdled, rotten, or detrimental to the senses 💀 up here in the North we love our pies and pasties, and in spite of Salad Fingers' skinny frame, i reckon he's partial to a good pastry or two!! with miscellaneous meat replacing your classic beef, chicken or sausage, of course, including with a Sunday dinner, when the whole thing is drenched in oil-black 'gravy'. i can imagine him quoting the importance of eating your greens: a mildewed mess of off-broccoli, poisonous peas and crusty cauliflower!! 🤢 desserts come in the form of 'scrumptious' (in his opinion) crumbles and tarts: fruity concoctions which leave your mouth puckering, and sticky toffee pudding (though don't ask Salad what the 'sticky' is) to finish as well. i think Salad Fingers has quite the affinity for hard-candied fruits, and makes the most fascinating (if visually nauseating) sweets from his scavenging. have you ever seen Atomic Shrimp, that lovely British guy who does challenges where he forages for his food and lives off £1 a day? i'm thinking something like that, but 50x more horrifying 😂

[jupiter--dream]

So we have lots of books in my house, and my dad sorts them by theme. And there's the "religion section" which only has two books: a bible he bought to read, not because he believes, but because of culture and wanting to know what Christianity is about;

And a book titled "erotic Christmas stories"

[queerstudiesnatural]

guess who had yet another dream about a friend dying

[selenoplexia]

logging back in just bc this is my only private diary

[astridcookie]

help what

CLADISTICS ruined my life