Nothing works anymore, drugs don’t work (escaping reality) medication doesn’t work (happy pills/sedation pills/sleep pills, therapy/venting/ranting/talking about it doesn’t help, doing happy stuff doesn’t work, no matter what I do nothing changes or feels any different.
man I wish people understood how much it sucks ass to be neurodivergent and trying to find the middle ground where people like/tolerate you. like, I'm either "boring" (trying to wait my turn in conversations, holding space for other people, taking a back seat to let others get some spotlight) or "too much" (too loud/talking too much, getting excited to share, trying to participate in group conversations/activities). No one really talks about how much of being neurodivergent is just sort of trying to make yourself palatable.
I feel like so much of my life has been spent trying to find this effortless sort of middle ground everyone else seems to automatically already know, and I'm always swinging too far one way or the other. I'm lucky to have neurodivergent friends who grok me, but goddamn I wish that I could just like, exist without the constant background script in my brain that's like "you're being too loud. You're not talking enough. you're being self-centered. you're being boring. you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong." I feel like I'm back in high school trying to make friends but stuck as the eternal "weird kid"
dear god please just give the pirates their quiet seaside inn and the angel and demon their little cottage in the south downs before I lose my mind completely
✨first time trying to draw camp pioneers and soho's resident queer cryptids bc I've been obsessed with them lately 😌✨
based on that classic photoshoot of david tennant and michael sheen from season 1! probably done before (and better!!) but I wanted to figure out how to draw their faces and outfits (ngl harder than I thought, still not perfect 🫠)
Percy was conscious (but suffocating to death) while Annabeth was trying to save him
So, from the first watch, I thought Percy's reaction to being released from the chair was odd. If he had been frozen in time in there, wouldn't he wake up asking, "is the quest over? Did we succeed? Where's my mom?" I mean, he had time to before Hephaestus started talking.
But look how devastatingly calm he is as he's engulfed. He is controlling his breathing and forcing himself to say and appear that he's ok
NOW, take a look at how he acts when he's freed
he's taking quick gulps of air. Note: that's not what hyperventilating looks like. And when he goes to stand, he's in pain and grasps Annabeth for support
You know what these symptoms look like? Someone who held their breath too long and can finally breathe again.
Percy was in that chair for almost exactly four minutes, which is generally the threshold for how long the human body can go without oxygen before suffering permanent damage. Note: there will still be damage (like initially feeling weak or sore after regaining air.)
Percy, being the son of Poseidon and a demigod could probably survive longer than the normal human without oxygen. But eventually (probably within the hour) he would have died. And also, he would be awake for a chunk of that time, unable to breathe, unable to move, with the certainty that he was going to die.
So anyway, he lived four minutes of that hell and was genuinely in shock that he was alive