bellabrady

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Sutton in her “gender-neutral” suit  (◡‿◡✿)

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sutton + dancing in 4x09 ↪︎ requested by anonymous

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pilot vs. finale

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Nothing is bigger than us.

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in a hundred lifetimes, in a hundred worlds, in any version of reality

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Why I headcanon Evan Buckley as a character with OCD

(I made a thread about this on twitter and figured why not share it here too lol.)

I wanna preface this by saying that a lot of the things I mention can, of course, also have many reasons other than OCD. If you don't agree with this headcanon, that's perfectly fine, this is just my own analysis of Buck and the potential reasons for some of his behaviors. Anyways, let's get started.

୨⎯ Responsibility OCD ⎯୧

People with Responsibility OCD often feel excessively responsible for preventing harm, controlling situations, etc. It can make you think you have an unrealistic amount of control over outcomes. This can obviously lead to high levels of guilt.

1. Buck very often places blame on himself for things that aren’t his fault. RG mentioned in an interview that Buck seems like kind of a selfish character sometimes, who “makes a lot of issues about himself when they aren’t.” This often comes across as him being self-centered but to me it’s always felt more like him obsessing over his guilt about things because he can’t help but feel that guilt intensely and let it consume him.

A recent example of this is Buck and Eddie’s fight in 8x17: When Eddie says that he wonders if maybe what happened in the lab could’ve gone differently if he’d been there—which is an understandable line of questioning—Buck immediately jumps to assuming that Eddie is implying Buck didn’t do enough. Again, this comes across as self-centered, but to me it seems more like he’s obsessing over his own guilt to the point that he can’t look past it rationally.

Another example of this is Buck blaming himself for Chimney leaving in season 5. He assumes that the team is mad at him for making Chimney leave, even though nobody blames him for it, and even puts in for a transfer due to his guilt. Taylor points out that not everything is about Buck, reinforcing the whole “seeming self-centered” thing. But once again, to me it seems like Buck is so consumed by his own guilt that he can’t think about the situation rationally.

2. He still blames himself for not being able to save Daniel, even though he had no control over it. Even though he was a baby, he tells his parents, “I still wish I could’ve done more.” As mentioned before, this OCD subtype can make people think they have an unrealistic amount of control over outcomes, which is what this definitely feels like.

More examples of this:

-Buck’s guilt about losing Chris in the tsunami—feeling like he should’ve been able to keep him safe the whole time

-After Eddie gets shot, Bobby tells Buck that what happened to Eddie wasn’t Buck’s fault, and Buck responds, “No, I was just the guy standing there when it happened, who couldn’t do anything to protect him.” He’s once again placing unrealistic expectations on himself and feeling guilt over not being able to fulfill them.

3. In season 1, after losing his first patient on a call, he tells his therapist: “I just can’t shake this feeling that this one didn’t need to go down the way it did.” His therapist responds: “So do you think there was something you could’ve done differently?” Buck doesn’t say anything to that, which implies that he does feel like he might’ve been responsible even though he wasn’t.

4. Responsibility OCD can also come with feeling responsible for managing other people’s emotions, which Buck definitely does after Bobby’s death: he (arguably obsessively) checks on everybody’s grief levels and feels like he’s failing because he doesn’t know how to help anyone.

5. In general, we know that Buck always wants to fix things, which also speaks to him feeling a lot of responsibility for things that shouldn’t necessarily fall on him.

୨⎯ Existential OCD ⎯୧

Existential OCD can be focused on obsessing over your purpose or the meaning of life to the point where it becomes debilitating.

In season 6, Buck is extremely focused on his search for happiness, as well as trying to find a general purpose. Obviously this line of questioning is normal to some degree, but it did seem to consume Buck for a while.

I also think it’s interesting that, even though he has of course always wondered about his purpose/place in the world/etc, before season 6, it didn’t feel like it was a constant worry of his, but more something that sometimes got triggered by large events such as finding out about Daniel, being unable to work, etc. In the beginning of season 6, nothing major happens, except for the fact that he just went through  a breakup, but his mind seems to suddenly zero in on the question of the meaning of life/happiness—aka, it feels very obsessive.

୨⎯ False Memory OCD/Real Events OCD ⎯୧

These subtypes are characterized by obsessing over your interpretation of past events/doubting whether you can trust your memory of how those events occurred, and sometimes convincing yourselves certain events were worse than they actually were (among other things, but this is the Buck-relevant part).

1. Buck tackling Gerrard and later being unsure if he meant to save him or hurt him. He clearly struggles with this question even though, realistically, he most likely did only tackle him to save him—it’s just that he was also angry while doing so, which is why he starts to doubt if his anger might’ve been the catalyst for the action. 

2. Buck being unsure whether he meant to hurt Eddie on the basketball court or not. Once again, he most likely didn’t mean to hurt Eddie beyond shoulder-checking him, but once again he was feeling anger, which makes him wonder if spraining Eddie’s ankle might’ve been intentional. His inability to feel certain about his motivations for either of these events is a strong indicator for OCD.

୨⎯ Magical Thinking OCD ⎯୧

Magical Thinking OCD refers to the feeling that you might cause or prevent harm by thinking or doing a specific thing, even though there isn’t a real connection. 

This made me think of the Q-Word. Now, obviously Hen and Chimney are strong believers of this too, but still: Buck firmly believes that through merely saying the word “quiet”, he can jinx the firehouse and cause a lot of weird calls to happen.

୨⎯ Relationship OCD ⎯୧

While usually related to romantic relationships, this can also apply to platonic/familial ones. Among other things, it can include extreme doubts and/or obsessions related to relationships with other people.

Buck constantly obsesses over the possibility of losing people and doubts his place in their lives. For example:

1. Intense jealousy in 2x01 over Eddie potentially replacing him and acting out due to that fear.

2. Obsessing over potentially losing Eddie to Tommy in 7x04 to the point that he checked Eddie’s fridge calendar, tried to get Eddie’s attention in various ways, etc

3. Feeling like he was losing his place in the 118 before filing the lawsuit.

4. Seeing himself in Red and worrying he’ll end up like him: alone (These are just a few of many examples, obviously)

୨⎯ Moral OCD ⎯୧

This subtype can focus on questions about whether you’re adhering to your own moral code and worrying about potentially having done something wrong.

1. In 7x05, Buck is very affected by having lied to Eddie: “So you lied to Eddie?” “Yeah. And, it’s, uh- It’s kinda tearing me up inside.” The lie he told Eddie wasn’t one that affected Eddie’s life in any major way, so being that torn up over the action seems like an overreaction.

2. This one is veeeery very far fetched, but one could argue that the existence of evil Buck in Buck’s coma dream might imply that Buck worries that, deep down, he isn’t a good person

୨⎯ Reassurance Seeking ⎯୧

It’s very common for people with OCD to feel intense anxiety about something and seek out reassurance in an attempt to ease that anxiety.

1. Buck hearing statistics about how many women don’t climax during sex and obsessing over it to the point that he calls his past sexual partners to get reassurance about his performance. Realistically, whether he satisfied his past partners or not doesn’t really matter anymore, since he can’t change the past—if he just wanted to potentially improve, he could’ve just asked his future sexual partners if he satisfied them. But it clearly was a worry that wouldn’t let him go, which is why he sought out reassurance anyway.

2. Buck meeting Red and worrying about ending up alone, leading to him making the 118 reassure him that they won’t grow apart.

(There are more examples of this obviously.)

୨⎯ Obsessive Behaviors ⎯୧

Some of these partially tie into other subtypes and/or reassurance seeking but I wasn’t 100% sure where to put them so I’m making a more general category.

1. Worried that Eddie might’ve had a heart attack and continued to worry about it intensely despite Eddie insisting he’s fine

2. Texting Bobby after his coma dream to make sure he’s not in a coma again—he’s unable to hold onto that belief on his own, without Bobby reassuring him

3. Obsessively checked Bobby for symptoms after he was exposed to toxic chemicals

4. Obsessed over Billy Boils and being cursed by him—thought that him ripping off Billy’s arm led to Buck dislocating his shoulder, etc. He has to make peace with Billy to feel certain bad things won’t keep happening to him

୨⎯ Other ⎯୧

1. He can be very particular about things sometimes, i.e. Clipboard Buck or his planning of Chimney’s bachelor party. Sometimes it seems to genuinely stress him out when things aren't done the way he wants/needs them to be

2. People with OCD often catastrophize, which is something Buck also often does. An example for this (which also kinda ties into Relationship OCD) is Maddie getting her own apartment in season 2 and Buck telling Bobby, “My point is, she just got here, and now she’s leaving again.” It’s a huge leap to assume Maddie is abandoning him again simply because she’s moving apartments.

Aand that's it, thanks for reading!

[bellabrady]

#buck being ocd coded, recovery, 6.12

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sorry for swinging a bat at a hornet's nest here i would normally mind my own business but i've truly never seen shipping overtake media literacy and comprehension to such a degree as with the handmaid's tale. "they character assassinated nick!" he was a soldier who overthrew the government in an attempt to gain power under a new world order that subjugated women. he succeeded in this attempt. this is not a surprise. this has been baked into the narrative from the beginning.

the handmaid's tale is not a romcom! it's a story about standing up to fascism! even when fascism is handsome and says he loves you and will take you to paris! it's still fascism! you can't be falling for this! "i can't believe they called him a nazi" he is! it's that A.R. Moxon quote:

"Historians have a word for Germans who joined the Nazi party, not because they hated Jews, but out of a hope for restored patriotism, or a sense of economic anxiety, or a hope to preserve their religious values, or dislike of their opponents, or raw political opportunism, or convenience, or ignorance, or greed. That word is "Nazi." Nobody cares about their motives anymore."

this is the point of the narrative, that june has been taken in and is finally realizing that now. if you as a viewer were also taken in that's okay, but maybe defending this character to the death is not the move

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THE HANDMAID'S TALE 6.05 "Janine"

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not being funny but if i gave birth without pain relief or a doctor after eating my best friend to stay alive and literally everyone in my life started praying to my dead baby and acting as if they have some ownership over and connection to him that i dont even get to feel because i had to hold his tiny dead body in my arms and accept i'd never get a chance to know him i would also probably become the villian

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I feel like I'm goin' nuts every time I see a post that says "oh they were all supposed to be insane cannibals but now only Shauna is like that and everyone else is just scared of her." No, they literally just condemned Coach Scott to death, tortured him because of a gas-huffing prophecy, ate him, and danced around his severed head like 3 episodes ago. Only Natalie objected to this on any meaningful level, and she was ostracized and punished for it.

The reason they're freaked out about Mari is because she's one of them, instead of an outsider. Literally, in the finale, they make a distinction between killing "enemies" and spilling their own blood- this is the line that some of the girls aren't willing to cross. That doesn't make them not villainous, or violent, or cannibalistic! It's actually not "better" to display some guy's head on a spike just because he's Not One Of Us. Shauna is terrifying because she's unwilling to make that distinction- she literally interrupts Van and Tai's plot to give Hannah the queen! Which they rationalized because she wasn't one of "them." And, in the adult timeline, Taissa decides that Shauna is the problem because Van dies, when approximately 1 day ago she was considering hunting down random people to murder on Van's behalf. It's easy to rationalize violence when it's not happening to people you care about, which is the brutal philosophical bedrock of civilization. The one taboo that most of the Yellowjackets are unwilling to break is killing the people you love, and Shauna has had her ability to love stripped away to nothing.

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It's your job.

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evan belt buckle-y