#where my brain got permanently rewired

[radiosummons]

Y'all ain't gonna believe this ... but Julius Caesar was my favorite Shakespeare play in high school.

And I did get to be Brutus in my English class's mini play/recreation of the stabbing scene.

So ... take from that what you will.

[owlinks]

rebirth

[blindbatalex]

bruins hrpf recs from the server #5

Hello again! The theme for this week was ✨ a fic that broke your heart ✨ Below are our recs:

rec lists so far: || week 4 || week 3 || week 2 || week 1 ||

A (Little) Slice of Heaven by Anonymous || willypasta || 11,541 words || reccer's notes: this fic rewired my brain. I read it months and months and months ago and I have yet to recover. 11/10 I come back to it way more than I probably should

(and i’ve got a plane to catch) you drove me all the way back by @fvcking-damage || mcgryz || 2,862 words || reccer's notes: this is some self-indulgent mcgryz angst i wrote a couple of years ago, idk what i was writing out with this one but. yeah

and turns to dust by adjacently || Jordan Eberle/Taylor Hall || 2,130 words || reccer's notes: i can eat taylor hall angst for breakfast, lunch, and dinner

between your love and mine by @blindbatalex || willypasta || 6,360 words || reccer's notes: This is a story about trying to reconcile two sides of your identity that are at irreconcilable conflict with one another, and what having your wings clipped like that at a young age does to a person.  I certainly broke my own heart while writing it.

dancing by @rasksmoustache || marcheron || 1,111 words || reccer's notes: This fic is so vivid and visceral and sad, it permanently altered my brain chemistry.  Unrequited (but is it really?) marcheron which gets the feeling of loving someone and being just a little too late so so well

Done & Undone by @ghostgeno || marcheron || 14,428 words || reccer's notes: 2023 Game 7, the aftermath. Fair warning: I don’t reread this very often because of how effectively it puts you in Brad’s headspace immediately after the game, in brutal, excruciating detail. And yet. And yet. If you feel like being taken apart and then put back together, if you want to feel all the loss and tenderness and love that remains despite the loss, read this fic.

good at secrets by @fridgefishwrites || prefix boys; mcgryz || 4,017 words || reccer's notes: this fic meant (and means) so much to me because it just gets what trying to live your life and build something beautiful while faced with unrelenting homophobia is like.  I love the non-linear narrative and the prefix boys but it was always Matt who stole the show for me in this story

like a stranger by blindbatalex || marcheron || 13,142 words || reccer's notes: not a fic alex hasn't read before (sorry bud) but i'm Obsessed with fics where the characters talk past each other and the angst compounds and this fic is a perfect example of that, amongst other things!!!

make no apologies by @sphesphe || marcheron || 3,757 words || reccer's notes: Brad gets himself suspended before the Winter Classic and Patrice takes it harder than he thinks he should.  He plays it off as fine, things happen, just be better Marchy but it isn't true. He's angry. After the game, Brad stops by, they have a talk and lo and behold, feelings emerge! (And much more!)

Sixth Borough by bookhousegirl || Jimmy Hayes/Frank Vatrano || 3,067 words || reccer's notes: The third in a trilogy of fics featuring this pairing. This is a very quiet little vignette featuring two former Bruins who were not stars and did not end up experiencing great success in their time here. It exists entirely in the gray of adult complications and disappointments, and refuses any easy catharsis, and is beautiful for those reasons. For those of us who cared about the Bruins in the (relatively) dismal era between 2015-17 it may come across as a tiny time capsule; for everyone else, I hope the delicate way it honors the hopes and dreams of those who don’t become hometown heroes, who don’t get the happily everafter ending, stays with you.

Westward Expansion by bookhousegirl || Jimmy Hayes/Frank Vatrano || 3,625 words || reccer's notes: Jimmy stares out vacantly at the coaster climbing the track. “Just because we’re from the same place doesn’t mean we’re from the same place.” When Frank takes Jimmy to Six Flags, he expects it to be a fun day, showing Jimmy all the rides he used to love growing up. Jimmy is distracted though, melancholy because Frank has so much promise and Jimmy took so long to get to where he is.

Wolverine Feed by @sphesphe || swaymark || 10,659 words || reccer's notes: fic that makes me ill each and every time i think about it

[mtfisakink]

My First Time Breastfeeding My Daughter

Link to the original article is here

Here's my reaction, repurposed from one of my old reddit comments:

The article kicks things off with a real banger:

Imagine the most electric thing a partner has ever done to you, then multiply it by 10. I could feel my brain rewiring, creating pathways that would permanently connect me to my child. (And yeah, I kind of got off on it. Don't judge.)

It always stuck out to me that this.... individual.... IMMEDIATELY thought to compare the experience to "the most electric thing a partner has ever done to you". It was so obvious in the sexual connotations that my jaw was on the ground. Of course two seconds later, the individual admits that they did in fact "get off" to the experience, so there's that. When you start to pay attention, you see that they aren't even trying to hide the fetishistic nature of this behavior even a little bit.

But that's not all! A bit further along in the article:

"Lactating changed how I saw my body. Having breasts was great, but using them to feed another human being? That was magic. Specifically, it was mom magic. I might have been my daughter's sperm donor*, but breastfeeding was how I knew I was going to be a mom.* It validated my womanhood as much as any surgery ever could."

As we all know, the need for that sweet, sweet validations is pretty much never-ending. Breastfeeding is very explicitly NOT a way to nurture a child in this individual's mind, it is a way to "validate" their "womanhood", You'll note that magically, we no longer need to concern ourselves with the endless whataboutisms that they usually throw our way, about the women who don't menstruate, or don't have a uterus, or don't have breasts, or haven't had children, etc. etc. All of a sudden, our biological capabilities can in fact be used to define and validate womanhood, but only when it suits the needs of these individuals. The jokes are in fact writing themselves.

(An aside: note this person's incessant need to alienate themselves from physical reality, in spite of the jabbering on about breastfeeding?? Referring to oneself as a "sperm donor" as opposed to father or dad just comes across as so dehumanizing to me. They really do see their bodies and the whole business of creating another human just like a puzzle where they can just rearrange all the pieces any which way they like.)

How did this disaster end, you may ask? After a series of unfortunate events:

A few weeks later, we both gave up on breastfeeding and switched to formula completely.

But never fear, the individual is still "gushing" about breastfeeding because of the gender feels and validation it provided. Literally at no point did this individual concern themselves with the child here. There was a complete lack of grief or concern over needing to abandon breastfeeding for formula (this is not me judging anyone who uses formula - I'm merely pointing out that in all of my observations of new moms - I don't have any children myself - feeding their children is an arena fraught with anxiety, guilt, and overwhelming love for the child that permeates almost all that these women do. A major decision like stopping breastfeeding does not typically get waved away this casually).

In short, complete and utter narcissism, all the way down. This stuff is hurting innocent children and babies and it can't go on any longer, full stop.

[she-is-27-i-checked]

So we’ve talked ships. What are your favourite tropes? What ao3 tags make you go 👀👀👀?

Yey! I got an ask!! Somebody likes me {{swoons}}....

WELL... ((brain starts whirring because it's like choosing between my many mistresses))

I love a bit of good old friends to lovers, slow burn (checking the word count for LIES), a bit of yearning, a bit of "it's requited but they are idiots". (Warrior Nun fandom is a wealth of this, slow and relatively angst free and just a lovely slide into inevitability). Excellent with a side of "only one bed" or "they were roommates!".

I'm also a big fan of crack fic, particularly smutty crack, which is rare but I love it. Happy Divorced Wife, Happy Divorced Life by birgittesilverbae is a great example. Ooh ooh or Insubordination which is an Anonymous Motherland Fort Salem fic which is just.... ❤️‍🔥

And if we want to get adult about this, anything with sex dreams (yes that scene in The Miseducation of Cameron Post has permanently rewired my brain, what of it), and if I can find a writer willing to overcome their own inevitable praise kink to write a good bit of consensual degradation I will marry them instantly. There's a line in one very good Last Tango in Halifax fic where character B is getting railed by the very condescending and magnificent character A, and character A goes. "touch yourself then, I haven't got all day" and both I and character B just turn into this 🥴. (I should find a link for this maybe I can lure some people into a niche British fandom...)

I am allergic to kid fic and long-term-married-couple fic for obvious reasons...

[nade2308]

Summary: Post SAINW, the brothers pick up the pieces.

Starting the year off with writing a TMNT 2k3 fic in one sitting feels promising about my writing in 2024, and hopefully it means a lot more productivity this year.

Some notes before venturing further:

- The fic takes place post SAINW in the world Donnie from the present was sent to

- The guys were wounded badly, but did not die

- Donnie in that world was taken by the Shredder, but some time before the present Donnie appeared, he managed to escape and he had no idea where he was and where his family was or if they were even alive. Eventually the brothers were reunited

- Mikey's arm was amputated by Leo

- Raph lost his eye due to a Foot ninja shooting an arrow through it.

- Leo has a bad eyesight, but he is not completely blind

- Leo has brief suicidal thoughts (has had them in the past too, but they were fleeting and he's never done anything to act upon those thoughts)

Huge thanks to @thethistlegirl that went over this story and reassured me that I could post this without fretting too much about it and that it worked perfectly as a snapshot.

And of course, SAINW permanently rewired my brain and now I finally got to write something for it.

Hope you like it.

[vampirebeverage]

My burning question for the next Spider-Verse movie is:

“How meta are they gonna go?”

And it’ll be interesting either way, I think! But I suspect they’re gonna get pretty meta and that would be absolutely fascinating. There’s a lot of meta-ness already in Across The Spider-Verse; a reference to “hammerspace” near the beginning of the film got a raised eyebrow from me, and I was very surprised by the naming of “canon events” as such, because canon is a term specific to storytelling. They didn’t call it a “predetermined event”, no, it’s a “canon event”. That is an interesting choice.

I’m really really really curious to see how far they’ll push the boundaries, because it’s already going places past what’s considered “comfortable” for most audiences to follow (especially for an animated film... I have Opinions on this but I won’t get into it, suffice it to say I consider animation just as valid and mature an art-form as live action media and watching Spirited Away at the age of 9 or 10 during a home-sick-from-school fever trip on kid’s cough & cold medication permanently rewired my brain).

Many of the story beats in Across The Spider-Verse were predictable, but certainly not in a boring way. It was in that good storytelling way where nothing feels out of place, and even when you know what’s going to happen, it’s still emotionally impactful when it does. And it can be very satisfying to go “oh, I bet this is going to happen!” and then it does! It’s really cohesive storytelling, you can tell that every beat is planned out, there are still twists and turns but they earn those by carefully setting them up beforehand. It’s not that cheap twist that comes out of nowhere for shock value that a lot of films lean back on these days, making it feel like they just spun a wheel to see what would happen several times while writing the script. Really, really thoroughly enjoyed that.

I have mixed feelings on meta storytelling because when it’s not executed well you back yourself into a corner of not being able to write a satisfying ending? Because everything gets too tangled up in the “characters in a story who know that they are characters in a story” thing that kind of... doesn’t feel like it has anywhere to go? Or at least, there are very few ways to create a satisfying ending with that setup. And I have weird emotions about it that are difficult to process, gives me a weird pit-of-the-stomach feeling when things get very meta?

Anyway these are my incoherent thoughts. If you also have incoherent thoughts about Spider-Verse I recommend you watch some obnoxiously long youtube video essays on metamodernism! I’m certainly not the person to explain it.

[pedulum-chronometry]

First, I need you to understand this post has permanently rewired by brain.

Second, this makes the scene where God gives Job a lecture for asking questions is like 120% funnier now. Like She had a plan. The original one was good, so good, but then well angels pushed back and She had to invent Hell on the fly to deal with things.

So now She moved on to The Plan 2.0 - special brimstone and fire edition and is trying to get on with it - with a diminished workforce no less. But here come Mr. Guilty-by-association, who for the record She really didn’t want to throw out but She draw a line and now has to stick to it, and this brand new demon just gives humanity knowledge as his opening gambit from the other side, like a fucked up wish you were here from a former friend. And God now has to do another Plan revision.

So She throws humans out of Eden and sends the flaming sword to keep it that way. Except, this angel sees the possible harm that could come to the newly pregnant Eve and in a completely loving and caring way just gives the flaming sword away to humanity. Like She didn't have reasons for keeping angel weapons away from humans in the first place. So the principality helped invent war instead of just standing there and looking menacing like he was supposed to!! Plan revision.

Now we move on to 'biblical times', the actual meat of the original plan only for the snake and the sword-giver to just keep showing up and messing with things. Noah's ark? was supposed to be a hard system reset to deal with the rampant war and strife introduced by history's worst guard and Her now favorite demon who She'll admit to Herself ONLY, has some good points, occasionally. Only it doesn't work. Plan revision.

So in comes Job. And he has questions. And really isn't that just the way things have been going from day one of this. And She lets him have it. The stress of having to account for constant changes to what was supposed to be a very straightforward Plan. Like how hard was this guys? I gave you instructions and all you had to do was follow them. Do you know how hard it is to rebalance the laws of the universe every time one of you just decides that it should work different? I made a fiery bush where the fire did not consume bush, I can do extraordinary and exceptional why do you keep drawing me back to the mundane and problematic? I'm trying to craft narrative and meaning here guys please stop messing with the constituent materials.

So people have knowledge and war and free will and God's just like "oh my me Jesus will you please come help me clean up this mess?". And he's just like "yeah mom whatever you need. What's this new draft you're working on? Apocalypse, fun name"

Like God is a frustrated writer who is BEGGING her characters to make different choices and just sitting there dumbfounded when they don’t. By the time we reach The Apocalypse (version 847626848.136-c final-final this time I really mean it!), She has given up on the direct approach. It clearly does not work for beings with free will. So She goes about with a much more light tough. Little bit of misinformation here and a dash of misunderstanding there and suddenly FINALLY She's got the plan going in the right direction.

Oh and those two trouble makers, her favorite snake and that angel he loves, those two deserve some payback. They like the world they way it is, don't want the end of the world? Go forth my children, expend effort only for your wheels to spin fruitlessly as you are thwarted from your plan's inception by other people and their godawful choices. You get to keep the planet but not before I mess with you two the way you messed with me. How do you like them apples? God out!

Awhile ago @ouidamforeman made this post:

This shot through my brain like a chain of firecrackers, so, without derailing the original post, I have some THOUGHTS to add about why this concept is not only hilarious (because it is), but also...

It. It kind of fucks. Severely.

And in a delightfully Pratchett-y way, I'd dare to suggest.

I'll explain:

As inferred above, both Crowley AND Aziraphale have canonical Biblical counterparts. Not by name, no, but by function.

Crowley, of course, is the serpent of Eden.

(note on the serpent of Eden: In Genesis 3:1-15, at least, the serpent is not identified as anything other than a serpent, albeit one that can talk. Later, it will be variously interpreted as a traitorous agent of Hell, as a demon, as a guise of Satan himself, etc. In Good Omens --as a slinky ginger who walks funny)

Lesser known, at least so far as I can tell, is the flaming sword. It, too, appears in Genesis 3, in the very last line:

"So he drove out the man; and placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." --Genesis 3:24, KJV

Thanks to translation ambiguity, there is some debate concerning the nature of the flaming sword --is it a divine weapon given unto one of the Cherubim (if so, why only one)? Or is it an independent entity, which takes the form of a sword (as other angelic beings take the form of wheels and such)? For our purposes, I don't think the distinction matters. The guard at the gate of Eden, whether an angel wielding the sword or an angel who IS the sword, is Aziraphale.

(note on the flaming sword: in some traditions --Eastern Orthodox, for example-- it is held that upon Christ's death and resurrection, the flaming sword gave up it's post and vanished from Eden for good. By these sensibilities, the removal of the sword signifies the redemption and salvation of man.

...Put a pin in that. We're coming back to it.)

So, we have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword, introduced at the beginning and the end (ha) of the very same chapter of Genesis.

But here's the important bit, the bit that's not immediately obvious, the bit that nonetheless encapsulates one of the central themes, if not THE central theme, of Good Omens:

The Sword was never intended to guard Eden while Adam and Eve were still in it.

Do you understand?

The Sword's function was never to protect them. It doesn't even appear until after they've already fallen. No... it was to usher Adam and Eve from the garden, and then keep them out. It was a threat. It was a punishment.

The flaming sword was given to be used against them.

So. Again. We have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword: the inception and the consequence of original sin, personified. They are the one-two punch that launches mankind from paradise, after Hell lures it to destruction and Heaven condemns it for being destroyed. Which is to say that despite being, supposedly, hereditary enemies on two different sides of a celestial cold war, they are actually unified by one purpose, one pivotal role to play in the Divine Plan: completely fucking humanity over.

That's how it's supposed to go. It is written.

...But, in Good Omens, they're not just the Serpent and the Sword.

They're Crowley and Aziraphale.

(author begins to go insane from emotion under the cut)

In Good Omens, humanity is handed it's salvation (pin!) scarcely half an hour after losing it. Instead of looming over God's empty garden, the sword protects a very sad, very scared and very pregnant girl. And no, not because a blameless martyr suffered and died for the privilege, either.

It was just that she'd had such a bad day. And there were vicious animals out there. And Aziraphale worried she would be cold.

...I need to impress upon you how much this is NOT just a matter of being careless with company property. With this one act of kindness, Aziraphale is undermining the whole entire POINT of the expulsion from Eden. God Herself confronts him about it, and he lies. To God.

And the Serpent--

(Crowley, that is, who wonders what's so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil anyway; who thinks that maybe he did a GOOD thing when he tempted Eve with the apple; who objects that God is over-reacting to a first offense; who knows what it is to fall but not what it is to be comforted after the fact...)

--just goes ahead and falls in love with him about it.

As for Crowley --I barely need to explain him, right? People have been making the 'didn't the serpent actually do us a solid?' argument for centuries. But if I'm going to quote one of them, it may as well be the one Neil Gaiman wrote ficlet about:

"If the account given in Genesis is really true, ought we not, after all, to thank this serpent? He was the first schoolmaster, the first advocate of learning, the first enemy of ignorance, the first to whisper in human ears the sacred word liberty, the creator of ambition, the author of modesty, of inquiry, of doubt, of investigation, of progress and of civilization." --Robert G. Ingersoll

The first to ask questions.

Even beyond flattering literary interpretation, we know that Crowley is, so often, discreetly running damage control on the machinations of Heaven and Hell. When he can get away with it. Occasionally, when he can't (1827).

And Aziraphale loves him for it, too. Loves him back.

And so this romance plays out over millennia, where they fall in love with each other but also the world, because of each other and because of the world. But it begins in Eden. Where, instead of acting as the first Earthly example of Divine/Diabolical collusion and callousness--

(other examples --the flood; the bet with Satan; the back channels; the exchange of Holy Water and Hellfire; and on and on...)

--they refuse. Without even necessarily knowing they're doing it, they just refuse. Refuse to trivialize human life, and refuse to hate each other.

To write a story about the Serpent and the Sword falling in love is to write a story about transgression.

Not just in the sense that they are a demon and an angel, and it's ~forbidden. That's part of it, yeah, but the greater part of it is that they are THIS demon and angel, in particular. From The Real Bible's Book of Genesis, in the chapter where man falls.

It's the sort of thing you write and laugh. And then you look at it. And you think. And then you frown, and you sit up a little straighter. And you think.

And then you keep writing.

And what emerges hits you like a goddamn truck.

(...A lot of Pratchett reads that way. I believe Gaiman when he says Pratchett would have been happy with the romance, by the way. I really really do).

It's a story about transgression, about love as transgression. They break the rules by loving each other, by loving creation, and by rejecting the hatred and hypocrisy that would have triangulated them as a unified blow against humanity, before humanity had even really got started. And yeah, hell, it's a queer romance too, just to really drive the point home (oh, that!!! THAT!!!)

...I could spend a long time wildly gesturing at this and never be satisfied. Instead of watching me do that (I'll spare you), please look at this gif:

I love this shot so much.

Look at Eve and Crowley moving, at the same time in the same direction, towards their respective wielders of the flaming sword. Adam reaches out and takes her hand; Aziraphale reaches out and covers him with a wing.

You know what a shot like that establishes? Likeness. Commonality. Kinship.

"Our side" was never just Crowley and Aziraphale. Crowley says as much at the end of season 1 ("--all of us against all of them."). From the beginning, "our side" was Crowley, Aziraphale, and every single human being. Lately that's around 8 billion, but once upon a time it was just two other people. Another couple. The primeval mother and father.

But Adam and Eve die, eventually. Humanity grows without them. It's Crowley and Aziraphale who remain, and who protect it. Who...oversee it's upbringing.

Godfathers. Sort of.

[21tailsofwoe]

aside from arknights ships what are your favorite yuri ships ?

TBH i don't even have arknights ships i go hard for (i haven't had the brainworms strong enough to make content for them i appreciate them from afar) but OOOHHH BOY what a question to ask. you see me venture into a pristine pine forest and ask me to point out my favourite trees?

i have been obsessed with many ships over time but to save everyone and myself the trouble i'll talk about the three that currently plague my mind:

qi yan and nangong jingnu (jwqs): i am not kidding when i say they've permanently rewired my brain. yuri so "toxic" (that's what the new yuri buzzword is now i guess) they needed a million words to give them time to torture and destroy and rebuild each other. my attachment to jwqs mostly came from my carnal desires for qi yan, the main character, but gosh this ship is absolutely bonkers. this novel has permanently changed the way i write my characters and the kind of characters i get attached to. (special shout out to li yanru the masked person gotta be my second fictional favourite lesbian)

2. mary/bloody queen and vera nair/perfumer (identity v): a "rarepair" where the characters have never interacted with each other and have nothing to do with each other i just ship them because i fancy them individually as characters and then i wrote a fic that got the ball rolling and now that ball has gathered so much debris it has come crashing down on my life and ruined everything. after some recent lore happenings though this ship built on nothing but scraps has suffered a devastating blow but at least i have friends to indulge me to row this canoe. no scene of them interacting in the lore anything but have this picture of my maryvera plushies. that joke about ships being two dolls that you mush together to make yourself happy except that shit is literally true for me. I hate it here

3. qi shiyi and tang si (identity v): two idv ships because this game forms 67% of my personality. this time the ship is legit and rich with subtext (or as rich the subtext could get with idv characters). qi shiyi is a playable character while tang si is an npc mentioned in qi shiyi's backstory and is a major motivation for qi shiyi's motives. qi shiyi by herself is a very interesting and layered character (a retired assassin with a tragic story, found peace living a quiet life with tang si, till tang si was taken away from her) so it was about time I would fall for this ship. unlike maryvera this one should've had a greater following but alas, it doesn't. so once again I'm rowing a slightly larger canoe with like three other people. I love it here

[quixoticanarchy]

ok cool that we’ve got media warnings like “contains graphic violence” but where is my warning for “this will permanently rewire your brain”

[g-bgordon]

damn. Wait. so. ports keep u where you need to be, presumably. so. the ai learned about our gamer tomfoolery and... evolved? or something? changed to fit whatever the hell we did in half life 1? im having a hard time putting thoughts into words right now but since ports are a combine implemented thing story-wise i'd say that breen's probably gotten smarter and might be able to dig his meaty little fingers into codestuff. if he's still the administrator.

had something else to say but I can't remember.

anyways, if you know, does removing a port hurt? can they be rewired while attached to someone, or would that fuck said someone up? cause even tho in-game people are (mostly) organic and ports are like. metal and stuff. presumably. everyone's still code. presumably.

“...Well, the best answer I can give is everything eventually realized we’re on a big computer. And from there a lot of corporations scooped it up and figured out how to connect each of our games. That's PORT. But they also produce chips that are vital, both for identity but guaranteeing we stay with our games. If I were to leave and go somewhere corrupted I could get lost permanently without it. But nowadays combine has used it for all sorts of dictator-y things! Tracking citizens and resistance, marking and controlling combine soldiers of any level, I mean they got this damn thing on my brain stem. Alyx is probably the only reason I still have free will...”  “But what about my safety with this thing?”

“Well, you can change out the main chip all you want but taking the entire system out once it's in can kinda mess with you... But not badly from what I’ve seen.” 

[venomade]

OKAY, I think I got to the crux of my issue: I had no issue when Bellum’s device was just perceived as a mind wipe but when Graham says she “programmed him to be some innocent fool” THAT’S where I went ???. The brain and our personalities are incredibly dynamic and while we talk about “re-programming” our brains to do one thing or another, what we’re really talking about is breaking habits or developing skills that make our lives easier. When CS talks about re-programming, they’re talking about the permanent re-wiring of brain chemistry which ??? even WITH memories re-intact wouldn’t change the person’s personality to what it was before??? because the brain chemistry is completely in different areas and even if you learn about what you did before, that wouldn’t change the choices you’ve made and the personality you’ve developed since then (especially when the show has argued it’s choices that define us, not any innate nature or how we were raised)? And I doubt ACME’s device rewires your brain chemistry?? And when Carmen regained her memories her brain chemistry wouldn’t immediately be rewired?? HELLO???

[samtheflamingomain]

25.21%

I've been sober for 3 months today. 92 days. 25.21% of 2021.

I could've posted more updates, more milestones (it took a LOT not to post on Day 69) but I wanted to kind of save it up for a Big Day. It was also a decent way to continue to incentivize my continued sobriety: a full pass to do a shameless, hardcore bragging sesh.

Anyway, this post comes in 2 parts: the TL;DR for those who only want the gist, then more in depth on my ability to stay sober, the lasting effects of rehab, etc.

I tried my damnedest to pare this absolute novel down, but it's long, so feel free to dip out if you just get bored. Onward!

TL;DR: I went to rehab the beginning of July for 3 weeks and haven't had a drop of alcohol since. I've lost weight, I'm more healthy, my daily anxiety level went from 8 to 2, I haven't had an anxiety attack in 3 months, and everything generally just seems... easier. My memory and concentration have improved. I've been productive and I've been meditating every day. I'm saving money, and while I sometimes fantasize about getting drunk, that's usually all it is.

Honestly, it's been much easier than I expected, but I think a lot of that is because for the first 3 weeks, the time in which I would usually break down and start drinking again when trying to get sober myself, was spent behind a locked door. So far I haven't had any days where I was close to giving in. I haven't had many days where I've been depressed about it, missing it or really tempted. Maybe 3-4. I've basically just gotten on with my life as if alcohol doesn't exist.

To wrap up the short version for those ready to peace out, I'll leave it with a bit of advice.

I don't feel qualified to give any specific advice, because my story feels very unique to me, and I honestly don't think what worked for me will work for MOST people. Sometimes people spend a year in rehab and still drive straight to the liquor store on their way home.

That said, there's one thing that I've found pretty universally true: you have to really want it. For a while, I floated about without much of a "reason" to stay sober. I don't have a spouse, kids or a job I've been fired from, so I didn't see the point.

It's taken me a while, but after not being "convinced" by a few superficial "reasons" like weight loss and saving money, I thought I needed something more... permanent? Consequential? I now realize that my "reason" for getting sober at a young age after only a few years of alcoholism is that I don't want it to get to a point where I'm hurting other people, drinking myself into multiple lasting health problems... I don't want it to become permanent or consequential.

Anyway, that's my two cents. If you do have something like kids or trouble keeping a job, definitely use that as your reason. But for anyone who's a pretty "functional" alcoholic like I was, "not letting it go on long enough to become disfunctional" is a good enough reason.

This is going to get stupid long, so feel free to walk away now, just glad you read this much and it really does mean the world when people listen to what I have to say.

Now some more things in depth. I'll go in chronological order: what made me get sober, what I took from rehab (and what I left), and how it's been the past few months.

I started drinking when I got kicked out, manic out of my mind and homeless unable to sleep. It took a while until I was able to sleep without alcohol, but by then the addict brain had taken over. I'd tried a few times to get sober myself, but I never made it more than a week without, and always got back to daily drinking after a few months maximum.

Some people need a "wake up call", a "last straw" or a "rock bottom". Something external to make them realize they can't go on as they are. For me, the catalyst was my health, which is more of an internal reason I suppose. I didn't have a heart attack or liver failure, but my anxiety was getting uncontrollable and I knew it was directly tied to my drinking.

My life had been starting to feel tolerable, and I was more financially secure than ever before. Things were looking up... except for the alcoholism. This is a weird analogy but the only one that makes sense to express why, if I was doing so well on paper, I decided to go to rehab: you have to sweep before you mop. If I hadn't been in the place I was, I don't think I would've been successful at rehab. I had to sweep up the cat turds from the floor of my life before I was able to mop up the shit stains with sobriety. I know, I'm a true wordsmith.

When I finally called the hotline that hooked me up with a bunch of different rehabs, I knew I was in for a wait. It was about 5 months from that call to checking in, which isn't too bad considering I've been on the waitlist for a neuropsychiatrist in ALL OF CANADA for 4 years.

That brings us to July 12th, Rehab Day One. I've gone in depth in multiple other posts but to touch on it briefly, if I had to describe my experience in a sentence I'd say "the place I went to got very lucky with me".

What this means is that, of the 5 people in my group, I think this exact program was only ever going to help me. At the same time, I didn't even know what I would need, but this exact program was 90% of it. I didn't think 3 weeks would be long enough, but for me it was. The hours-long, repetitive, basic-ass CBT groups held 5 times a day 7 days a week was absolute torture for everyone but myself. While it was a drag to spend an hour on defining what a cognitive distortion is, the routine and repetition, something I've never gotten out of any outpatient program, helped me to really absorb the information and let it rewire my brain.

I've always said that I'm someone who should be spending an hour a day with a therapist for the rest of my life, and while that's not even remotely feasible, this was as close as it's ever gotten, and it proved me right, because it worked. I've done biweekly therapy for a short time but even that didn't come close to the way my brain changed in those 3 short weeks.

This program required absolute commitment and open-mindedness. This isn't because it was hard work or difficult concepts, but quite the opposite. While I hate the entire concept of art therapy being used as a cure-all for mental illness, I willingly got out of my bed, went downstairs and tried doing a dot mandala for an hour because I'm willing to try anything to get better. A lot of people might think they are, but really aren't. To use the mandala as an example, one guy was really into it, I wasn't, but we both finished. The other 3 tried, messed up a few times, and then scrolled through their phones. When I say this program necessitates complete engagement, that's not a compliment. It shouldn't be a chore to engage with the program. It shouldn't take me actively saying "I know I've known this basic concept since 4th grade, but maybe hearing it again will help" to get something out of a rehab program. So again, in every way, I got lucky, and so did they.

Before I finish with the rehab section, having had a few months to reflect on the whole thing, I now have an endless list of things wrong with it. I arrived, greeted by the most jaded and disillusioned of staff, and quickly became disturbed and at points concerned with just how negligent the staff are.

Maybe it's because I've been on the psych ward where they won't even let you have shoelaces and shine a flashlight on your face every half hour through the night, but it could've been so incredibly easy to sneak in alcohol. I brought 2 full water bottles, fully expecting to have to dump them out upon arrival, but they said "nah it's fine". Is it though?

Then there were actual counsellors there who were... okay. I recall one, the one I thought was the smartest, reading a handout aloud and coming across the word "delve" as in "let's delve into..." and stumbled, then said she doesn't know that word. The room was silent. As she pulled up Google on the screen I said, "it means to dive into it". She Googled it anyway. Synonyms include "dive in". If that was the only example I wouldn't mention it, but this was the first of at least 10 words she had do Google, none past a 10th grade level, from HER OWN MATERIAL. From that point on it became clear that they had no fucking idea what they were doing.

We had one last one-on-one counselling session before we left and the counsellor just filled in boxes to questions on her computer, rephrasing everything I said to fit into the buzzwords and "lessons" we'd "learned". Example. Me: I do think I'm better able to catch myself thinking 'oh I can just have one drink' and say 'no I can't'." Her: "Okay, so would you say that you can recognize negative cognitive distortions like permission-giving thoughts and counter them with a more rational and less emotional mind?" Like girl, blink twice if your boss is holding your family hostage. She gave me some papers, detailing all the online courses they were signing me up for and options for more treatment they'd be sending me, a phone number to call and a phone appointment for the next Monday. I never got that call, the phone number is a hotline, I never got a single email from them, and given how shitty they really are at their jobs, I didn't feel the inclination to try and get those resources. If they even exist in the first place.

In summation, it was a place where it was physically impossible to get alcohol. That's really all I can say in its favor. Oh, and they let you have your cell phone.

Now on our timeline I'm back home. I want to kind of analyze why it's been easy for me.

I often said that my main goal of going to rehab was to lock me away from alcohol long enough for it to reset my brain. Most people thought that was naïve, but that's exactly what happened. But I'm well aware that my experience of "instantly became sober and literally hasn't had a single hard day in 3 months" is absurdly unusual.

I put this down to a few things. Firstly, I'm on seven different meds for my mental health. Almost all of them have their effects dulled or even eliminated when you drink. So when I noticed my mood, fatigue, memory, concentration etc all getting better at once - right about as I left rehab, I don't think it would be a stretch to say that all those meds started working properly.

Secondly, I've been keeping myself busy, but that's something I've always been good at. Now I specifically choose to undertake projects that will eat up a lot my time and put me in a state of flow. I recently made an entire card game from scratch, and let me tell you, I didn't think of alcohol for a week.

Thirdly, my other goals now get in the way of alcohol. I'm getting old and my body is deteriorating. But I've always wanted to do just one last season of gymnastics. Well, I need to lose weight for that to happen. I've already lost 35 pounds, and after another 20 I'll be ready to go. Also, I used to spend more on alcohol per month than rent. Even though I've done a few shopping sprees lately, I haven't come remotely close to how much I was spending before.

I want it more than anything. I want to be sober more than I want one night of "fun" that will more likely than not lead me back to where I was a year ago. I never want to need anything as much as I needed alcohol.

Lastly, just a few more random thoughts.

A lot of people, myself included, worried about the fact that I work at a bar as a cook, but honestly the entire time I'm there I'm thinking about food, not alcohol. If I'm hanging out with some regulars before/after, I can watch them drink and be perfectly fine with my coffee, because the coffee is $2, and I used to spend $20 after every work shift.

I also decided in rehab to start taking better care of myself as best I could. This started with getting my second vax which I'd been putting off, then an eye appointment, then new glasses, then a dentist appointment where I was informed I need to do $3000 worth of work on my implant that's erroding my bone matter, so that sucks, but I caught it early. I've also been meditating every day. In just 3 months, I've made pretty big improvements to my self-care and my daily routine.

One of my fears about sobriety was "missing out" on "having fun". A few days ago, all my housemates got together to play Mario Party, and it was kind of my first night doing something social while sober. It was a breath of fresh air - I wasn't constantly running to piss, I didn't worry about running out of alcohol, I didn't get sloppy and obnoxious as I can sometimes do. I even came very very close to winning my first game of MP. When I reflected on the night, I realized that, if I'd been getting drunk the whole time, I would've sucked at the minigames, been a hindrance to anyone unfortunate enough to be teamed with me, and likely would've stopped caring about the game itself after the first few turns.

Yesterday I was making my 4th pot of coffee of the day when I realized there was a full glass of wine just sitting on the counter. I had absolutely no idea where the hell it came from - nobody in my house drinks wine. I shrugged and poured that sweet sweet bean juice. It was only when I sat down and took a sip of coffee did I find myself thinking automatically, "this tastes so much better than wine". I only realized then that it had been rose wine, the only kind I've ever been able to tolerate. It was the ultimate moment of possible temptation, and the thought of just chugging that glass - as I may've done in the past - didn't even cross my mind.

I'm so glad to be where I am. I'm about to undergo some serious financial changes - i.e. going absolutely broke - but drinking isn't gonna help that, so I'm cautiously optimistic.

Stay Greater, Flamingos.

[stars-trash-18]

The Adventures of Mando and his chaotic dumbass girlfriend. chp. 1

It had been a long day of running from the mass of bounty hunters after the little green bean your boyfriend decided to adopt, after much begging from you. It didn’t help that the bounty for your head was high enough to reach a Hutt’s BS levels, apparently accidentally blowing up a posh casino after knocking down the entire rack of alcohol warrants enemies, rich ones at that. 

For some unknown reason to you both Mando decided he needed your chaotic energy around and kept you onboard, maybe your knack for bomb making and ship repair helped his decision. Two years later here you were, repairing some wiring after Mando took you threw an asteroid belt to escape said bounty hunters. While your boyfriend snuggled with the little green frog monster, you were stuck with clean up. Typical.

You have been rewiring for over an hour and you could swear you could smell colors with how long you’ve been looking at the blue and green wires. Forgetting which went where. Which is worrisome since one could potentially cause a self-destruct of the entire ship. you finally huffed, threw the wires back into the wall panel, shoved a sticky note on said panel saying “rewire later”, and marched towards the bedroom. Finding your boyfriend snoring under his helmet, and Baby coloring on the sketchpad by the cot. 

You watched for a minute has he colored, finally noticing it was with permanent markers, a wicked a idea slowly forming in the chaotic mass known as your brain. “come here you little womp rat lets color on this,” you said, plucking him from the floor along with a few sharpies. After getting comfy you and baby got to work on a masterpiece.

*Mando’s POV*

There was an annoying beeping sound coming from a distance, at first I assumed it was my dream, then opening my eyes slightly I realized it was real. Slamming my palm onto the alarm clock, only to notice the beeping was from the holo communicator next to it.

Accepting the call after making sure I was fully awake, to the sight of the blacksmith from the covert.

“Is everything alright, did you find a new home for the clan?” I said, trying to keep the panic out of my voice. 

“everything is fine Mando, we relocated, I’m calling for that very reason, until our covert is more secure and so long as you’re being chased I regretfully have to inform you that we can not share our coordinates, rest assured none of this is your fault and you are still our family, but the foundlings are our priority, we can only offer aid in an extreme emergency,” she replied, I can feel the regret of not letting me come home in her voice, how sincere she is in her reassurances.

  I could also feel the smirk in her voice as she continues, “you and your plucky little mechanic, good day Mando, this is the Way,” She then points to her helmet before ending the call.

It isn’t until I pass the mirror on the way to the cockpit that I notice. There are doodles all over my helmet, one side with child like scribbles obviously made by Baby, and the other side with more scribbles, and a certain male appendage. 

“Y/N!” I hollered, climbing into the cockpit to see her cackling in her seat. Baby letting out his usual giggles.

[rationaromanceblog]

Reflections: Hurtles through weight loss

Most of my life my sense of worth was tightly wrapped around how much fat was on my body. When I realized this, detangling them from each other became priority, although it seemed impossible. The work of weight loss revealed everything I was avoiding and hiding from, in addition to giving me a result that I liked. I was forced to face myself head on if I had any desire to change.

Over the years I developed a habit of eating when I felt negative emotions. It’s quite common to do this, eating food feels good and is a wonderful distraction. When I stopped I exposed an entire part of myself I’d refused to acknowledge. There was a part of me I wasn’t aware of that needed attention. It was sad, lonely and neglected.  It told me to be nicer to myself. It asked me to step up. It was unpleasant and I was too distracted to ever hear it. Removing food as a coping mechanism made my emotions important and worth understanding. I learned how to censor out believes that I inherited, from beliefs that were mine and benefited me. I chose belief systems rooted in the idea that I was already worthy, not worthy once I lost the right amount of weight. Permanent weight loss only became available when I did it for reasons that felt good to me. No boy, no dress, no party. 

 For the first time I stopped to question why I was doing this. Why did it matter? I started to see self acceptance as an escape route. It gave me permission to not care when my culture and everyone I grew up with told me I needed to. I knew that there were other things, more worthwhile things, I could be giving my efforts towards. There is an entire community that encourage us to see value in people past their size. It shouts ‘I can be more than what I look like.’ It gave me permission to redefine health as a place of improvement, full of love and peace, instead of a physical aesthetic. I could listen to my body, respect it and never hate it. I dove deep into this world. It was a fundamental key.

The more I explored this idea the more I realized I wasn't ready to give up. I wanted to be thin. As a kid when I pictured myself as an adult I envisioned a leaner woman, I loved the idea of becoming her. Finding this piece of the puzzle allowed me to keep going. I owned it. I changed my motivation from what what ‘they’ wanted to what I wanted and I went to work.  Choosing to accept myself didn’t mean having to give up the process, and choosing to not give up the process didn’t mean not accepting myself. There was a way to love myself throughout, and it was the non negotiable path. 

I would still quit very often, however. I would decide I was done and wanted to feel fine where I was. Inevitably a little voice in my head insisted I give it another go. When the voice nagged at me enough I would start once more. It was that constant quitting and starting that made me realize  I didn’t truly want to quit, I just wanted it to be easier. Instead I decided that I could quit, but first I had to finish. I addressed myself very seriously. The conversation went like this. “Look Maria, I just want to say you are becoming an exceptionally determined person by doing this. I know that it doesn’t actually matter if you’re thin. I do, I swear. I didn’t for a long time, but I do now. You already see yourself as attractive and aren’t doing this for an imaginary level of acceptance. You can stop right now and be super satisfied for the rest of your life. I am aware. You can even gain weight and still shower yourself with constant love. I know. But, that’s not the point anymore. The point is that this is hard, and you will not become the kind of person that quits because it’s hard. I refuse to let you become that. I know you think nobody else has to be as diligent as you in your eating. I know you think it’s unfair. But who cares? This process is teaching you how to achieve. So it’s okay to hate it, and think that other people have it easier. But once that’s over you get up and keep going. You got this” And I begrudgingly agreed. 

 I get to decide If I want to carry around more weight after I show myself that I am in control of how thin I can be. Not for anyone else, but as an exercise in internal management. My physical aesthetic can be at my whim and control, that is empowering. I am not at the mercy of the undefinable forces in my brain. Getting to that place is hard work, and not everyone wants it. But it is worth the freedom of getting there. 

I am so fortunate that I found a sense of control around this issue so early in life. It is common to have this as an impending to-do for decades.  That is because rewiring the way your brain thinks can be arduous consuming work. The process can take a long time and requires a relentless commitment, bravery, patience, and practice. I had to change the way my brain thought about myself, my body, my worth, how strongly it desired food and how much it wanted to avoid emotions. There is a lot of work to be done. But the path is out there and anything worth having is worth working for. 

 My Mantra for Weight loss: 

Approach weight loss from a place of love, never obligation. 

Desire your power and sense of control back, don’t feel at mercy to your inertia.

 Learn to fall madly in love with yourself as or before you lose weight. 

Want it or decide to stop wanting it, but be honest about why. 

Question everything you hear, about beauty and health and why it matters, before assuming that it does.

 Like your reasons you find for doing what you do. 

Be bold enough to face your darkest beliefs and know that they are optional.

[meraki-sunset]

2nd Part of what i think it’s coming on hiveswap (check part 1 <3)

I tried to calculate how old  this guy could be if they were human according to what they described that they knew and to what temporary time on earth he belonged.

I wanted to know if they belonged to the time period of Joey (14) and jude (12) (1994) or to John, Dave, Rose and Jade (13) (2009)

They mentions both memes and blockbusters as something of their everyday life, along with vage claims about going to highscool and katare clases and never anything specific.

In the end with the revelation that reader may not be human and their memories may be false (this timeline is now irrelevant -_-) everything makes sense, all the information they have about the earth comes from the internet.

That's why they can not stop referring to everything with references from famous movies and viral jokes, instead of personal experiences,

They are a dumping ground of human pop culture, all processed and squeezed inside their brain to make them believe that they really came from earth when in reality they are an alien both on alternia and earth. They’ve never been there

(That actually makes them in my opinion the perfect homestuck reader. Homestuck it’s an internet culture dumpster, and for Reader to have their sense of identity surrounding that, seems pretty symbolic)

The reality is that doc sratch needed some points to connect and needed a pawn (pun intended all over) in alternia for that to happen. The reader’s actions on the planet saved the lives of some trolls and connected others with each other. In one way or another, they encouraged a rebellious vein in many of them and helped everyone grow as individuals.

So they can all be ready and motivated when  dammek’s revelion takes place

Dammeks revelion it’s crucial, as we’ll see later.

Doc had to restart several times because reader died many times trying to carry out his plan. Maybe with the help of the handmaid or by his own hand. Like moving the threads from behind, causing disasters that would make it easier for the reader to make friends with the trolls after helping them

Then again the word  PAWN is not just for aesthetics, pawns are sacrificed during the game of chess, trying to get to victory. The pawns can not retreat, just advance, in the same way that peregrine mendicant could not back down in her series of errands and tasks that were assigned to her, no matter what  

no mater how dangerous they are, Reader can not stop making friends and can not retreat no matter what kind of danger they have in front of them, and if they do Doc Scratch just restarts the time line until they move correctly.

Besides, Doc has “rewired” their brain in a way that if they ever try to go against their “befriending order” they begin to feel sick or that something its wrong. And they have to repeat themselves constantly what his life story is, and dismiss any idea that could indicate otherwise.

Also, even if now they are “programed ” to dismiss all signals that something it’s wrong to keep making friends non stop, they still feels like they are following a script made by someone else and that there are patterns in his actions that repeat

and also ignore basic weird stuff regarding their body like not needing to eat or their bones healing way faster that whats normal for a human

And the more time they spends on Alternia, the more they feel that something it’s wrong. They are tired, they are becoming aware and feels they won’t be able to go on for much longer

The only time thay regain control and get’s free from Doc Sratch’s control while being on alternia it’s when they DIE on karako’s bad ending. And then, while doc it’s loosing his grip on their mind, reader questions everything they have been doing, and why the hell are they acting that way, and wonders if it’s all plotted by a higher entity

in the end, their ability to remember multiple timelines due to all the resets and how they began to become aware of being part of something else was something Doc scratch hadn’t planed

Where i’m trying to get with all this it’s that This guy is important. Their mind is way stronger than what it seems. Doc Sratch is an omnicient beeing, and even him was taken back by Reader’s actions and capacity to understand his situation despite the mind control.

Then they had a collapse, after Doc brings them to his lair on the green moon and deactivates their urge to make friends.

their identity is falling apart and they can not feel any appreciation for the memories he made in alternia. they don’t feel that the people they met are their friends. The memories they made with everybody now feel cold. They want to feel again what they felt when they thought of them, they feel uneasy now that they doesn’t have a script to follow, but  they want answers. He wants to understand.

And that's when the important things begin.

they are trapped

but at the same time they are free for the first time

They will now read homestuck and learn about the whole context about doc scratch, alternia and the end of everything.

In fact scratch leaves them alone to read the comic because he has more important issues to attend, because there is someone else who is about to arrive.

Reader makes an “appearance” on homestuck, when the second disc breaks and needs to go to doc scratch to get it fixed. that explains how the reader (that now is considered an actual character) was in doc scratch’s moon in the first place, disc in hand

(now, i don’t remember fully about this, but i’m not sure if doc sratch ever told anybody to call him that? i remember everybody just calling him white text guy. i could be wrong but maybe that’s just how reader refers to him, due to him fixing the disc. i don’t know, i’m probably wrong but would it be cool if that was the case)

And this text I think it’s important 

he doesn’t say “I am an exelent host” he says “I continue to be an exelent host” because he has been hosting reader for a while, they hadn’t just arrived, they arrived a while ago (i don’t know about ya’ll but reading all homestuck took me a couple months) reader was just in a diferent room (that place is hella big. Hussie got lost in there) and had no choice but to go to back scratch’s apartment and ask for help

Also, this text makes a lot more sense to me now, because reader DID influenced the story at some extent

And the somebody that scratch it’s waiting for is spades slick who will attack him, and later Snowball, they will both then make a huge mess fighting, make out and slick will shoot her

Now this is what I believe will follow. From this point on it’s even more speculative but bear with me. There is a lot of plot holes left to fill

Reading the comic and adding 2 plus 2 Reader will discover that they are not human, learn where they come from, and that his friends are going to die permanently when the events of the hivebent happen, the meteors begin to collide with the planet, the 12 trolls enter sburb and the vast glub kills all trolls in the universe

they will also discover at the very end of homestuck, at the Act 7, that there is a safe planet in another dimension, where humans, trolls and Carapacians live together in peace. (yes i know reader is confirmed not a carapace, this theory it’s old) They will have to find a way to get there and take everyone with him there

They will escape and go back to alternia (probably there will be some time shenanigans with the window portal and some time has probably passed since he left) 

and there, eventually at some point, they will encounter Joey

But i’ll explain more of that on the third part of the theory

*Pronouns fixed*

Thanks everybody for all your support and suggestions!

Part 1 - Part 2 (you’re here) - Part 3