#because as an autistic kid who back then still thought i would BE a librarian my brain was ideal for it

[foldingfittedsheets]

I’ve always been a pretty good liar. As an adult I’ve come to a moral place in which I don’t use that skill set unless it will explicitly benefit someone. But when I was a kid all bets were off.

I think tiny child me was doing their little autistic best but recognized that some situations would be best navigated by lying as telling the truth never netted positive results. Whether it was because my needs often went unmet or ignored, or because I didn’t see any reason not to lie if it would be more favorable, I’m not sure.

This is the story of my proudest lie. The best lie I ever did. A lie that looking back I still go, damn, I was eight.

Our story begins in second grade. I was eight. My school was having a book fair and I spent my small stipend on Gulliver’s Travels. No idea why. Lacking further funds I wandered the fair and came upon the greatest sight known to man. Frog erasers. They were so cute and I was extremely into animals of all kinds.

The whimsy. Who could have known they made erasers in such wonderful shapes? I mourned that I’d spent my money already, and played quietly with the little frogs in their bin. That’s when I was approached by a few other kids from my class.

I didn’t know most of them very well, but enough that it was civil when they asked me, “Are you going to buy those frogs?”

“I’d like to,” I admitted, “but I spent all my money.”

“Why don’t you steal them?”

“I thought about that, but I don’t have pockets.” Indeed, stealing had crossed my mind but it had been a brief temptation. I wasn’t even scandalized that the other girls suggested it.

“Caitlin has pockets,” the leader of the pack said. And indeed, Caitlin in her purple overalls did have pocket space for two frogs. So Caitlin and I became partners. My role in the escapade was just... wanting frogs and walking out with her. We stole two frogs, a yellow and a purple, and united by the misdeed we played together with them at recess despite not really being friendly prior.

After lunch I was called from class to the library. The principal herself was there waiting for me. She had a somber air, almost mournful that she needed to punish me. It was self evident to me that I was here for frog crimes. Caitlin had cracked and taken the fastest route to forgiveness- snitching on an accomplice. Despite the fact that my role was just: wanted frogs, I knew I was going to be in trouble.

Now, I could have told the truth. Pulled a Caitlin and ratted on the girl who told us to steal them. But clearly I’d still be in trouble for having gone along with the morally bereft plan. I was mad at Caitlin for telling but not enough to foist the onus back into her.

“Do you know why you’re here?” The principal asked kindly.

“Is it about the frogs?”

“Yes, Caitlin told us you stole the frogs.”

I quivered my lip and drew myself up indignantly. “I didn’t steal them!”

She blinked at my vehemence but since I looked near tears she carefully asked, “What happened?”

“I really wanted the frogs, but I didn’t have any money. So I asked the librarian if I could take them and bring the money tomorrow! But she was really busy and lots of people were talking to her, and she said yes! But maybe she was saying yes to someone else? And I thought it was to me but Caitlin didn’t, but I was going to bring money tomorrow!”

The principal. Was flummoxed. This was a situation in which I clearly thought I’d done no wrong, in which she couldn’t prove I had done anything wrong, and which the librarian would almost certainly not be able to weigh in. She regarded me not with suspicion but rather vaguely confused as to how to handle me.

I got off with a slight warning that I should pay for things before taking them, despite not having been the one to take things in the first place, and the frogs were confiscated.

I was vaguely worried they’d call my parents but years later when I admitted the story to my mom as an adult she laughed herself sick and said she’d never gotten a call.

[actuallylorelaigilmore]

if one of your proudest accomplishments growing up was being deemed ‘the youngest to ever do x' then congratulations! you’re now a burned out adult with mental health issues and low self-esteem

[cureicy]

BSD neurodivergent headcanons

not sure if i’ve already done this but uhhhhhh here goes

kunikida give me high functioning anxiety vibes. man has not let himself stim in years because he deems it unacceptable behavior (internalized ableism is a bitch) but occasionally lets himself do the pen click thing when he’s alone. Also when i say high functioning i mean he’s repressed enough to function well in society and presents as the braincell of the group, but at the cost of not understanding his own emotions and stunting his empathy. sometimes he permits himself to go to the office store and touch everything, as a treat.

atsushi tends to stim in more self soothing ways, like curling up and rocking when he’s had a bad day. due to his upbringing, he isn’t the most physically expressive person in terms of movement, but when he’s reading, his entire demeanor shifts to match the tone of his book. He flaps his hands when he’s really excited and open, which only the yokohama librarian has seen up close. probably has a blanket collection for pressure stim purposes and sleeps in a tank top no matter the season

kenji has ADHD and seasonal affective disorder, he just never knew because his parents handled it well enough without a diagnosis. He gardens in order to use up his excess energy, and talks with his hands a lot, to the point where his mom taught him “inside voice, inside hands” to teach him not to knock things over. his solutions to emotional problems go something like: if lonely, pet large animal or hug, if manic, go chop some firewood. if sad, sit in sunlight and talk about feelings. He’s still figuring out how to comfort someone with trauma, but he’s doing his best and we stan!

kyouka doesn’t externally stim, but has a very active internal world, which manifests in anything from maladaptive daydreaming to the dolphin brain (aka there’s a perfectly logical train of thought but most of it is hidden from outsiders, and it appears that she’s just saying random things in conversation.)

ranpo self medicates like hell, and has a legitimate sugar addiction that has mellowed out over the years but would cause a lot of medical problems if it weren’t for yosano. his executive dysfunction is an absolute bitch and he doesn’t always have the vocabulary to express how he feels. (for example: “no i don’t wanna save atsushi, gimme some good mysteries” translates to something along the lines of “i don’t have the energy to spare on an uncertain investment; currently seeking short term forms of serotonin that are proven to work, but validation will also give me the dopamine in order to help solve this problem”) there are multiple people who can match him intellectually, but because poe is the only autistic one with the same special interest, ranpo immediately latched on. when he was seven, he read a sherlock holmes novel, saw a lonely man with a cocaine problem and an extraordinary mind, and decided to be a detective. never looked back.

tachihara gives me big ADHD vibes. he was the sort of kid who watches tv shows for the fight scenes and the found family and nothing else, and never knew that emotional dysregulation and rejection sensitive dysphoria existed even though they impacted him heavily. he got a diagnosis, but the doctor was “ah yes you are a small boy with Not Sitting Still Disorder, this is normal for males and you will endure skepticism from adults”. he stims with his weaponry, because guns make such satisfying clicking noises.

gin is in the same category of high functioning anxiety as kunikida, but slightly to the left. She’s got selective mutism, which made it hard to be taken seriously as an assassin until she decided she was gonna be the strong, silent type at work. outside of her mafia duties, she makes meticulous shopping lists and falls asleep to relaxing nature sounds.

fukuzawa comes off as this intimidating strategic leader, but honestly look at him. man loves cats, gets flustered easily, and understands ranpo. he is in no way neurotypical.

anyways. feel free to give opinions and add on!

[ladyautie]

get to know me more!

@funyasm​ tagged me and I’m bored after writing my chapter, so here it is!

✨ what do you prefer to be called name wise?

My name’s Sophie. My friends call me Spencou or Spence. We met on a Role-Playing game forum where I played a character named Spencer. We’re used to call each other by our characters’ names and nicknames, most of the time. My brother calls me Sis’.

✨ when is your birthday?

15th november 1993.

✨ where do you live?

Paris, France.

✨ three things you are doing right now?

I’m watching an episode of AT4W on youtube, scrolling on Tumblr and I’m drinking a coffee.

✨ four fandoms that have piqued your interest right now?

Definitely It and especially Eddie Kaspbrak and the ship Reddie. I’m kinda obsessed right now, writing fanfic, reading fanfic, daydreaming about it and all.

I just played the Last of Us 2 and I’m currently watching a let’s play from my favorite youtubers, Mari and Stacy from Geek Remix. I’ll probably read a few fics as well.

The tv show Barry (HBO) is a definite special interest for me. I’m probably going to watch it all once again real soon and I’m planning on writing a fanfic or two in the future. I’m dying for the third season to come.

Finally, I’m probably going to be super into The Umbrella Academy once again, when the second season will be released. I’m just really into Vanya, Klaus and Allison and I can’t wait to see more of them.

✨ how is the pandemic treating you?

None of the people I know have been contaminated, so I’m lucky about that. I’m not quarantined anymore, back to work, and the transition is not easy. 

I feel like I’m more openly autistic than I used to be and that I can’t stand the rest of the world for a long period of time. I’ve experienced multiple meltdowns and shutdowns and I have real difficulties to socialize with most people or to focus on my work.

I feel incredibly naked and vulnerable whenever I’m leaving my flat without my mask on, so I think that’s definitely something I’m gonna have to work on in the future.

Leaving Paris and meeting my folks for my mother’s wedding, I found myself surrounded by people who mostly didn’t care about the virus, kissing each other on the cheek in true french fashion to say hello, hugging, not wearing a mask, not respecting any kind of social distance. 

I was quickly overwhelmed by all of that, plus the noise, and I had to isolate myself in my parents’ car, sobbing hysterically and willing to suffer in a overheated car if it meant having a bit of peace.

There are definitely going to be long-term consequences. I can only hope that my physical health will remain okay, though.

✨ song you can’t stop listening right now?

Keep On by Sasha Sloan. I just really love the lyrics and the message.

✨ recommend a movie.

Whenever I have to think of a movie to recommend, Frank by Lenny Abrahamson is the first one that comes to my mind. This movie is an obsession for me since the first time I watched it and I often find myself watching it again and again. Despite its heavy subjects, it’s definitely a comfort movie for me.

Too often, movies featuring mentally ill characters will aim for the characters to “get better”, which doesn’t mean for them to find healthy ways to cope with their issues, but usually for them to look more “neurotypical-like”, if you know what I mean. Frank  doesn’t go that way at all. On the contrary, it pushes the viewer to empathize with the main characters and to understand their point of view, their way of being.

It’s so incredibly comforting to watch a movie featuring mental illness realistic and not romanticized and to have the movie say “you’re different and you have issues, but you’ll find your tribe someday and be able to find your own happiness, even if it’s unconventional by society’s standards”.

I don’t know, I just have so much feelings about this movie. Plus the music slaps, the humor is hilarious (kudos to the random French guy who can perfectly understand English but refuses to utter a single word if it’s not in French) and the actors are truly on point (I can only salute Domnhall Gleeson, among everyone else who is also worthy of praise, because he definitely managed to make me hate his character in a way I almost never hated a character before).

Watch it!

✨ how old are you?

I’m 26 years old.

✨ school, university, occupation, other?

I used to be a librarian, but I couldn’t find a stable job in this field, so I passed an entrance examination and I’m now working in the tax administration. Yeah, not really glamorous, but it pays the bills and I’m accommodated for my disability, so it helps. 

✨ do you prefer hot or cold?

Definitely cold. When I was a kid, I used to swim in mountain lakes, at temperatures close to 13° celsius, and I still take my showers mostly cold. I can’t stand heat, I get headaches very easily when it’s sunny and I’m getting confused easily whenever it’s too hot. I recently had a nosebleed at work so intense that I found myself spitting blood (it went better once I got a fan, making the temperature bearable).

✨ name one fact others may not know about you.

I used to be allergic to my own sweat when I was around 18, until my early twenties. Whenever I was doing a mild physical effort or getting stressed out, I would get hives and itchy skin rash all over my whole freaking body, which was so exhausting that I would fall asleep immediately as soon as the rash was gone. 

It disappeared as suddenly as it appeared, without me ever doing something about it. I still don’t know why I experienced that and if I’m going to experience that ever again. I hope not.

✨ are you shy?

My autism makes social interactions complicated, but I’d say I’m mostly impaired by my social anxiety and the various traumas I’m dealing with daily.

Traumas I got after having been bullied pretty badly by kids and teachers during my school years, my stepfather being borderline abusive and different traumatic experiences, including my childhood crush dying from a ski accident when I was 15 or so (and me never being able to tell him that I loved him) and people betraying me so many times that I can’t even recall every little thing.

As a result, I find myself doubting constantly that I’m worthy of love, affection and respect and I often wonder when I’ll do or say the “wrong” thing that will cause me to lose everyone I care about. I also have a hard time knowing who I am and, as a result, allowing everyone to know who I am as well. 

I often don’t know what to say and will find myself keeping my mouth shut, even on topics I’m knowledgeable about, because I’m scared of people shutting me down, among other things. My friends make it easier for me to talk about things I like and all, but I’m still heavily doubting myself.

I try to challenge myself regularly. I’ll force myself to take part in events that are taxing or that are forcing me to perform in front of people. That’s how I found myself taking part in the casting part of the french equivalent of “American Idol” (I merely met the pre-judges, but I did manage to sing my whole song in front of them). I needed to prove to myself that I could do it.

✨ do you have any preferred pronouns?

I’m using she/her, but I don’t mind people using they/them to talk about me if they don’t want to be gender-specific.

✨ any pet peeves?

I hate how people can freely and openly be homophobic, racist, ableist, transphobic, sexist and so on, but as soon as I open my mouth to let them know that what they said/did wasn’t appropriate, I’m labelled as one of those “hysterical feminists” or a “party pooper”. s/ Sorry if your antisemitic joke isn’t making me laugh, my “dear” colleague... /s I hate whenever people infantilize me, especially my mom. She’s still keeping an eye on my bank account, despite me telling her that I didn’t want her to do so again and again. I don’t dare to block her out, because I’m scared of her emotional reaction.  I hate the ugliest parts of fandom, notably the obsession with “who’s topping / who’s bottoming” whenever there’s a gay pairing or the racism / ableism / transphobia / homophobia I’ve witnessed again and again.

I don’t dare to engage in the Last of Us 2 fandom because of that and the way some people describe the character of Abby (a very muscular woman), focusing on her physical appearance and calling her awful names (being downright transphobic when they thought that she was the transgender character that Naughty Dog announced there would be in their game). 

✨ what’s your favorite “dere” type?

I had to google it, because aside from Yandere and Tsundere, I didn’t know a thing about it. I guess you could say I’m a Dandere (someone who is quiet and asocial. They are afraid to talk, fearing that what they say will get them in trouble.). 

My favorite type is Kuudere though, when it comes to anime in particular (someone who is calm and collected on the outside, and never panics. They show little emotion, and in extreme cases are completely emotionless, but may be hiding their true emotions. They tend to be leaders who are always in charge of a situation.). 

My favorite anime character, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji from the anime Classroom of the elite, is the most extreme case I can think about. He’s completely expressionless for most of the anime, talks with a very dull voice and it’s impossible to know what he’s thinking about at all times or what’s his overall plan. His hidden depth makes him all the more fascinating. He managed to keep me interested in a mostly meh anime.

✨ rate your life 1-10. 1 being really crappy and 10 being the best you could ever be.

It’s a bit hard, but somewhere around 5 or 6? I went through tons of crap in my life but I’m still here and able to live on my own, even if my quality of life isn’t all that good. I live with nearly daily suicidal thoughts since I was a teenager and have to compose with my meltdowns and anxiety attacks as well. I feel “other” most of the time and I can’t relate to most people I’m meeting and interacting with, which can sometimes feel very lonely.

On the other hand, I have wonderful friends who are willing to put up with my trauma crap and are overall amazing to talk to and be around. I have a cat I love dearly. They’re the reason why I’m still alive to this day, giving me a reason to say fuck off to my suicidal thoughts. 

✨ what’s your main blog?

My main blog is Ladyautie and is about autism. I have another blog, reddie-4-more, focusing on the It movies and Eddie Kaspbrak and Richie Tozier.

✨ is there anything you think people need to know about you before becoming friends with you?

So, uh, don’t be weirded out by the kind of things I can tell you about my past. Even if it seems a lot, all of it is definitely true. 

For example, I was almost kidnapped when I was around 8 or 9 by a random guy, while I was camping with my father. 

My father and my paternal grandmother actually kidnapped me and my brother when I was around two and I stayed with him until the social workers determined that my mother had to raise us again because our well-being and overall life were threatened. 

Lots of events of my life seem far-fetched or out of a movie / a book or something and I had people telling me that I must be lying or that I’m over-exaggerating, something that always hurts deeply.

I’m terribly awkward and more or less openly autistic, so you’re definitely going to notice something different about me. I can’t change for you and I’m not willing to hide my traits only to make you feel more comfortable about frequenting me, so if you can’t handle my socially anxious and disabled ass, then just leave.

I need people to actually tell me what they think or feel. I’m very “first degree” and I’m pretty bad at guessing what people are thinking about. Don’t be afraid to be frank.

Finally, never, and I mean never, infantilize me. I’m a 26 years old woman. I’m not a kid.I’m fine with my friends offering to help or making sure that I’m okay or so, but never assume that I don’t understand something and don’t force your help on me if I say that I’m okay.

That’s it, those who want to take part in this exercise, don’t hesitate!

[notquiteaghost]

there isn't enough nonbinary jon sims content, here is... well i started writing this as headcanons but this is really a not!fic about nonbinary jon sims. it’s 3′300 words

it contains: nonbinary trans masc autistic jon, jongeorgie, lesbian georgie, trans guy martin & tim, trans woman sasha, team archives trans solidarity, and not-insignificant amount of internalised transphobia and references to misgendering & general cis people bullshit

(also ftr i am heavily basing jon's experiences here as a nonbinary autistic person on my own experiences as a nonbinary autistic person) (this is like 80% projection) (what else is fandom for!)

also on AO3 if you prefer your 3k of bullet points to have better spacing

tiny baby [jon] who knows she isn't very good at being a girl but doesn't have the words to articulate why

her grandmother thinks kids clothes should be durable and practical so even tho jon is not a kid who climbs trees or plays football, her wardrobe is exclusively straight jeans & 'boys' t-shirts & large jumpers

she keeps her hair roughly shoulder length because that's the length it's always been but strangers still 'mistake' her for a boy a lot. this makes her feel a way she again hasn't got the words for

when she starts secondary school she continues to dress 'masc', never starts wearing makeup, never gets any interest in dating, generally fills out the checklist for everyone else assuming she's a lesbian

she knows she's definitely not a straight girl, so she shrugs and decides sure, she's a lesbian. it's a moot point, mostly, seeing as even if she did have any interest in dating she's the only gay person her age she knows

but she does get involved in some community support stuff – she spends a lot of time in the library as a teenager, and one of the librarians is a lesbian who takes jon under her wing a bit

coffee mornings and book clubs and things like that. sixteen year old jon and a dozen queer women all in their late twenties at the youngest. they joke a lot how often they forget jon isn't also a thirty-something

(this is that autism feel of having no interest in your peers but getting on great with adults)

and then she goes to uni, and then she meets georgie

georgie is a Very Out lesbian. she goes to clubs, she's heavily involved in the lgbt society, she has a rainbow flag hanging in her bedroom window. yknow.

jon likes her a lot, and still isn't really sure if it's romantic or not, but assumes that's more due to being gay than anything else

(no one has told jon about asexuality yet)

so when, one night when they're meant to be studying in georgie's room but instead are mostly drinking shit cheap wine and complaining about their professors, georgie looks at jon with this soft look on her face and asks to kiss her, jon says yes

and then they date

they're both living in one of those massive student houses with a thousand bedrooms crammed everywhere and only a kitchen for a communal space. georgie has lived there since coming back to finish first year, and jon moved in halfway through second year after a somewhat disastrous flatmate situation

so after they graduate, moving in together seems like the natural progression of things even tho they’ve only been dating for two months

jon is still, when asked, identifying as a lesbian and using she/her, but is also still dressing what other people now call butch. she always feels kind of weird about that term, but again, just chalks it up to the mess of complicated feelings being a gnc lesbian does genuinely involve

and then, finally, jon meets some actual trans people

jon has, circumstantially, known trans people. thanks to georgie, jon goes to a lot of lgbt soc things, and is passingly familiar with most of the lgbt people on their campus

but there’s a big difference between nodding at someone when you see them in the library and having an actual, proper conversation about gender

so, jon goes to a lot of social events because georgie does. without georgie, jon would probably not leave the house except to go to work and to the library (jon is not doing postgrad. jon’s library habits do not particularly reflect this)

mostly at these events, jon sits in the corner and reads, and only talks to other quiet antisocial people, while georgie circles back periodically to report on her social butterfly escapades

and at one, one of the other quiet antisocial people is a trans guy

he’s called harry, and he asks about the book jon is reading, and after they’ve been talking a while he says, “sorry, you probably get this a lot, but what pronouns do you use?”

jon just blinks at him and says “what”

“well, i’m trans, so i’m always really cautious about assuming,” harry says, easily, and this does not answer the question jon was asking

jon.exe has crashed

she(?) eventually says, “uh. she? i’ve never– she”

and harry, who has spent the last forty minutes discussing dante with jon and is already sure they’re going to be friends, says “want the trans 101? you’re making a face like you need it”

three hours later georgie finally reappears with the intent to actually interrupt (she’s drifted past periodically, but jon was always deep in conversation with harry, so she left them alone) and get going, and jon gets harry’s email address and is then very quiet as they walk arm-in-arm back to their house

just as they turn onto their street, jon says, “i, ah. i think i might be trans?”

georgie, who has for the past couple months been having something of a crisis after realising she definitely loves jon but she isn’t in love and she can’t figure out why, says “oh thank god”

jon, very bemused, “that wasn’t the reaction i was expecting”

“i think we should break up,” georgie replies, and jon stops walking. they’re four feet from their front door, but it’s late, no one’s about, so georgie decides sure, they can have this conversation in the street

“you– because i’m trans?”

“i love you, i really do,” georgie steps closer, takes jon’s hands in hers, “but i’m not in love with you. and it was driving me crazy trying to figure out why, but if you’re not a girl–”

“i can’t tell if i should be offended by this or not,” jon says, somewhat dazed, “i’ve been trans for an hour, georgie, i don’t know if this is transphobic yet”

georgie laughs, and presses a kiss to jon’s cheek, and says “it’s nearly midnight, we both have work tomorrow, let’s table this for later. we can look up names and what word i should use when i complain to other people how you always leave your shoes in the middle of the floor when we aren’t both on the verge of passing out”

and that sounds reasonable, so jon nods, and kisses georgie on the mouth, and then they go inside

the next day jon stops by the library on the way home from work and checks out almost every baby names book they have. georgie comes home and he’s sat at the kitchen table making a spreadsheet

“you don’t have to make it this complicated, you know,” she says, hooking her chin over his shoulder to read what he’s already got. the spreadsheet has a lot of columns.

“it’s my name,” he retorts, and she hums agreeably, then points to ‘jonathan’, which has relatively few ticks in any pro columns (god, this nerd), and says, “isn’t that your grandfather’s name?”

it is. he doesn’t talk about his grandfather a lot – doesn’t talk about his family a lot full stop, but she knows, even though he died when jon was still a toddler, the stories his grandmother told had a significant impact

“my parents didn’t name me after anyone,” jon says, quietly

georgie nods. she doesn’t say they’re not here now to offer an opinion, because that’s far harsher than jon deserves to hear, and it’s not like she ever needs to remind him of it either. he’s definitely already beating himself up for taking so long to come to this realisation there’s no one left around to tell him how they’d have reacted

“i think it suits you,” she says instead, and jon nods, and then she moves away to make a pot of tea and some pasta (it’s technically jon’s night to cook, but she was anticipating coming home to find him already hyperfocused beyond the point of no return)

a week later, jon looks up from the spreadsheet to where georgie is curled up on the sofa reading and says “ugh, fine, you win, you were right”

(georgie hadn’t pressed her point any further, jon is just like that)

“jon?” she asks, and he makes an exasperated noise and nods, then closes his laptop dramatically and stands. most of his spine pops when he stretches

“this calls for celebration” georgie says, also standing, “franco’s or monsoon?”

“franco’s. i’m going to eat a pizza the size of a car”

so then jon is actually going by jon, and using he/him, and isn’t dating georgie anymore but is still living with her and spending most of his time with her and factoring her into all his major decisions

he talks to harry, and other (binary) trans people, and reads a lot of blogs, and after a few months gets a referral to charing cross gic

by the time he starts at the magnus institute, he’s had top surgery and has been on T for years, and passes as cis completely, and he doesn’t know how to articulate it but this is. bothering him.

he’s not exactly… he likes being stealth, he doesn’t need to flaunt his personal life. he can understand the impulse, but he doesn’t share it. his feelings about gender and romance are no one’s business but his own

but. everyone assuming he was a girl itched – being miss simms, georgie’s girlfriend, she, it felt like wearing a coarse knitted jumper. it was exhausting

and, for a while, everyone assuming he was a man was a relief. it didn’t make his skin crawl, it didn’t make him want to scream, it was nice. it felt good.

it didn’t feel right. but it didn’t feel bad, either, and jon has never been gendered in a way that felt right. he thought that was just part of being trans

except. he moves to london, and he starts at the magnus institute, and he wears shirts and slacks, and the long skirts and patterned dresses some of his colleagues wear keep catching his eye the way men in three-piece suits used to, and that terrifies him

he was lucky, in a way, having no family left to care when he transitioned – if anyone reacted negatively, he could just cut them out of his life, and his social circle was already queer enough that was hardly necessary

but that doesn’t mean he escaped internalising a whole swathe of shit about what being trans should mean and how he should act and what he should want and if he wants to wear skirts then is he even a man? was he making it up all along after all?

naturally, he deals with this by ignoring it. he’s a man, men don’t wear skirts, he doesn’t wear skirts, that’s that.

he manages to keep that up until he’s made head archivist, and he’s given three assistants who are all also trans

(he doesn’t know if elias did it on purpose. elias knows he’s trans, of course, because he’s never bothered to get the name on his diploma changed, but the way elias reacted lead jon to assume elias may also be trans. and if that’s true, then selecting only trans people for the archives staff feels like a kindness more than anything)

and, the thing about them all being trans, is even if jon and martin are both rather fond of being stealth, and sasha and tim aren’t used to being out at work, and none of them are exactly friends, they’re the only people who ever come in the archives, so the archives very quickly becomes the Safe Trans Zone

they all vent a lot about cis people. sasha will walk in and the first words out her mouth will be “the next person to ask me if i’d had the surgery is getting their own surgery when i cut their tongues out”, and tim will make a commiserating noise and offer her the pack of donuts martin brought in

so when, on one of the rare afternoons when jon leaves his office to lean against tim’s desk and brainstorm organisational system ideas, martin walks back from the break room upstairs with a scowl and says, bitterly, as he sits back down, “oh so when cis guys wear nail polish it’s inspiring and breaking down gender roles but when i wear nail polish, jenny from HR gets to side eye me and ask if that means i changed my mind, because surely i’m the one who’ll do that and not all the men who didn’t have to do hours of therapy to establish they are definitely, one hundred percent for sure a guy!”

tim and sasha both make the standard commiseration noises, and sasha says something about the supervisor at her last job trying to say it wasn’t appropriate for her to wear trousers, and jon stops listening and runs away moves back to his office

he hadn’t noticed martin is wearing nail polish, is the thing. or, he had noticed it, but he hadn’t thought about it, and now he’s thinking about it. he’s thinking about it a lot

martin had– martin is a guy. martin is definitely a guy, if something of a feminine-leaning gay guy, the kind of feminine-leaning no one ever questions in cis guys, and it hadn’t occurred to jon to question martin, either, even though he’s trans, and. and.

he’s still circling round a revelation he can’t quite make himself have an hour or so later, when martin sticks his head round the door

“you, uh. you alright?” martin asks, incredibly tentatively. it says a lot, jon thinks, about how nice martin is, that he’s asking even though there’s a 90% chance jon will tell him to fuck off “you kind of disappeared abruptly, earlier. i didn’t upset you, did i?”

jon stares at him for a long moment, then says, “can i see your nail polish?”

“oh!” martin’s cheeks flush, just slightly, as he steps inside the office and lets the door shut behind him “uh, yeah, of course. it’s a little chipped, now, but, yeah”

martin’s nail polish is a light, pastel blue. it’s neat, and even, though his nails aren’t that long, and jon thinks he remembers martin saying something about mostly painting his nails to try and get himself to stop biting them. jon’s never really gone for nail polish, but it’s. nice.

“it’s, uh. it’s a good colour, on you,” he says awkwardly. martin flushes even more

“oh, um, thanks? did– are you alright?”

if jon was a different kind of person, this is where he’d open up to martin, and this would be the beginning of them becoming actual friends

jon is jon, though, so he just shoves all his emotions back in the box they escaped from, nods, and says “i didn’t sleep that well, is all. not really up to socialising”

(an aside about s1 jonmartin dynamic: jon is very good at shittalking martin when martin isn’t around, but in the face of martin’s genuine care and concern, he defaults back to a far more friendlier tone than he’s aiming for. he knows, on a level, that he and martin could be good friends if he ever got his shit together, but that is something else he’s currently repressing. he doesn’t need friends! he isn’t desperate for social contact at all! what’s loneliness!)

martin says “ah, okay, i’ll just– i’ll leave you alone, then”, and then jon makes himself focus on work, and then when he gets home he opens the group chat he’s still, thankfully, in with the trans people who got him through his first gender crisis and sends ‘help i don’t know if i’m a guy after all’

three people immediately send back a link to nonbinary.org

and that’s the rest of jon’s evening

he reads through every article. he reads several articles multiple times. he opens several new tabs, and gets a notepad to make a list of books, and eventually remembers to reply in the group chat

a week later, he bites the bullet and writes an email to georgie

nothing long, just, they still tell each other about big life events

and then, another couple weeks after that, when martin brings him tea, he says, “ah, martin, could i– do you have a moment?”

“of course,” martin says, and lets the door swing closed again, “what do you need?”

“i, ah. this isn’t very professional, so, you don’t– you are perfectly welcome to say no, of course, but i. um. would you– come clothes shopping with me?”

(ideally, jon would have asked georgie, but as much as he loves her (still), they haven’t talked properly in years, and she is cis. the best cis person he knows, but still a cis person. and he’d just, rather have a trans person, for emotional support, and no one in the group chat lives particularly nearby anymore) (or, well, some of them are, but when he asked they all told him to get over himself and ask one of his ‘lovely’ coworkers)

(why does he ask martin and not sasha?) (well, dear reader, he is nursing the beginnings of a crush) (not that he knows it. but that’s absolutely what’s happening here. martin is sweet and lovely and jon definitely finds him annoying and overbearing. yes. nothing else. no other emotions.) (his chest feels all weird when martin smiles because he doesn’t like him. that always happens around people he dislikes.)

“oh!” martin says, surprised. “uh, yes, of course, is– is there an event or something…?”

jon takes a moment to stare at the wall above martin’s head before he makes himself say, “i. am non-binary, and i need– different clothes.”

“oh, god, have we been–”

“no, no, this is a, a very recent development. he is still fine,” jon says, quickly, then pauses, then adds, more haltingly, “i think. i might, if – they, as well, maybe? just, to see”

“of course. d’you want me to tell tim and sasha?”

martin, jon thinks, is maybe not all that bad “yes, please”

“cool,” martin smiles, “i’m free this weekend? for shopping?”

“this saturday would be good, yes”

and then jon and martin go shopping! it’s probably not that successful of a shopping trip, because it takes jon like four shops before they admit what exactly it is they’re looking for, but they go to several charity shops and have fun trying to one-up each other with the most ridiculous/inexplicable item of clothing, and at the end of the day jon has three skirts (a knee-length black a-line skirt, a full-length black skirt, and a full-length black skirt patterned with red flowers), two necklaces, and a skater dress they probably can’t get away with wearing to work, but they really liked the way the skirt moved when they spun

other things that happen include lunch at a cafe where the staff definitely think they’re on a date and only martin notices and also martin is dying, both of them only managing to walk past a secondhand bookshop twice before they cave and go inside, and then emerge half an hour later both holding three books (two poetry anthologies and a sci fi novel; a psychology book and two history books), and martin somehow talking jon into trying on skinny jeans and then, again, leaving this mortal coil

jon doesn’t buy the skinny jeans, which is for the best really

the first time jon wears one of the skirts to work, sasha does a victory lap around the archives because “hell yes skirts are so much more comfortable, and now you swish! tim you should get a skirt. skirts for archives uniform”

and jon is still a prickly antisocial bastard but now he’s an outly nonbinary prickly antisocial bastard, and sometimes they walk into the archives at 2PM smelling of tobacco and holding a bottle of vodka, and then the archives staff all do shots and dramatic readings of the most ridiculous fake statements, because sometimes that’s how you cope with cis people, and that’s! valid!

[boazpriestly]

I feel like talking about the AquaHart Babies as adults because I think about them a lot and I need to write this shit down. 

If you don’t know who/what AquaHart is it’s an OC ship in the Hawaii Five-0 universe made up of Pete Hart, Freddie Hart’s younger brother, created by @hollandvalleybaptist and @pterawaters, and Nahuel Hart who was created by @hollandvalleybaptist. Pete’s portrayed by Travis Van Winkle and Nahuel is portrayed by Jason Momoa. You can find out more about them in these tags here, here, and here. (We reblog a lot from each other so there’s bound to be repeats in the tags.) 

The AquaHart Babies are Pete and Nahuel’s three sons, Freddie and Alika,  who are from a surrogate, and Kai, who they adopted. 

I have basically stolen these children and run away with them because I love them a lot. 

So like here are my thoughts on them as adults...

Freddie Hart

Freddie is aro/ace. He has absolutely zero interest in being with someone or having sex or having children. He prefers his alone time and finds dealing with others, besides his family, tedious and boring. He enjoys being alone and living in his house all by himself with his three dogs, two cats, and a parrot that quotes TV show lines at random times. 

He is also a librarian (his main section is the children’s books) and a tutor for middle schoolers. He is very patient and very soft-spoken, and working with children reminds him of all the times he spend helping his brothers with school when they growing up. He is a favorite at his library. 

He takes immense pride in being an uncle. His nieces and nephews are the highlights of his life and he will drop everything to be there for them if they need him to. He is on all their emergency contact lists and it is well known in their schools that if the parents can’t be reached for some reason (usually work), Freddie is who you call. He is also known as the baby/kid whisperer because not a single one of his four nieces and nephews have ever been held by him and continued crying. He has a very calming spirit and often times, especially now that his nieces and nephews are getting older, all it takes for them to calm down is holding Freddie’s hand or hugging his leg. But more often than not they want full on cuddles and Freddie is more than happy to oblige. 

Also, Freddie is a bad cook. Like he knows, in theory, how to cook because Nahuel is amazing at cooking and he taught all his sons, but Freddie is just bad at it. He doesn’t know why, because he can follow a recipe to the letter, but it will not turn out good. Ever. Luckily he has lots of family who can cook and are more than willing to stock his freezer with homemade meals. 

Alika “Ali” Hart

Ali has really bad ADHD and Dyslexia. He’s had it since he was a kid and Freddie was the first to notice and took it upon himself to help his brother to learn differently (Freddie would read Ali’s text book passages to him and also make recording so Ali could listen to them over and over again.) These difficulties mean that Ali does not have just one single job, it’s impossible for him to stick to one single thing. He has like five part time jobs that he splits his time with. He is a boxing instructor, a surf instructor, a line cook at his dad’s restaurant, an ASL interpreter, and sometimes he a personal fitness trainer (but he only does it in the summer and if he’s in the mood for it. He is not by any means the breadwinner in his family, but his wife Kalea makes more than enough money in her job that he can just do a bunch of jobs to keep himself occupied. 

Mostly though, Ali likes to be a stay at home dad to his daughter Ari. She is autistic and the love of his damn life. Ali and Kalea taught her sign language early because a) it’s her mother’s native language since Kalea is deaf and b) Ari is mostly non-verbal. And because Ali is very fluent in sign language, he and Ari are able to communicate very well together and Ali just things Ari is the best person he knows next to his wife. And he is a really great dad who encourages all of Ari’s interests and actively participates in them. Like one time Ari wanted to dress up to go to a movie, but she wanted to go as the prince and wanted Ali to go with her as the princess, so Ali was like, “Alright, let’s do this!” and went to the movie with Ari in her cute little tux and him in a beautiful poofy dress. It was magical and Kalea hung a picture of them at the theater in their costumes in a frame on their living room wall. 

When it comes to his wife, Ali is an absolute romantic and one of those husbands who loves his wife so much and just misses her when she’s gone and will leave an event early if it means he can go home and spend time with Kalea. She is his best friend (they are childhood sweethearts and Ali learned sign language just so he could speak to her) and he will talk to anyone who’ll listen about how much he adores his wife and is in awe of her. Their house is full of random items all over the place because Ali has a habit of buying stuff impulsively because it reminded him of Kalea. Like the brown wooden frog that sits on their lanai that Ali bought because it made him think of this one field trip they went on when they were like twelve and this tiny frog jumped out of a guide’s hand and landed on Kalea’s head and she just walked around for like 20 minutes that way before someone realized the frog was missing and Kalea just plucked it from her hair and handed it back to the guide and moved on to the next exhibit. Little things like that stick with Ali and when he remembers them he often buys whatever item made him think of it. 

There are three things that will quiet Ali’s mind so he is not bouncing around constantly: boxing, surfing, and cooking. Those three things are the only things where he will just relax, be calm, and focus completely. He can often be found doing at least one of these things late at night when he can’t sleep, or on the days when he’s just having a bad brain day. The only other thing that calms him down like that is being held by Kalea. 

Kai Hart

Kai is polyamorous and has three partners, two men (one cis and one trans), and a woman. The four of them have three kids together; his trans partner gave birth to one of their children. Neither Kai or his cis male partner, Adam, know which of them fathered which child and they plan on keeping it that way. They are a closed quad, meaning that neither of the four of them have partners outside of each other. They tried to but it just didn’t work, and through lots of communication they all decided that it would be best or all of them if it was exclusively just the four of them. They’ve been doing well that way for like six or seven years now. (The names of his three partners are Adam, Cymon, and Sierra, and the name of their children are Tayvin (boy), Erynne (girl), and Eden (girl).)

Kai works in his dad’s restaurant, and plans to take over when Nahuel retires. He fell in love with cooking at a very young age and was like Nahuel’s shadow whenever his dad was in the kitchen (his love of cooking is very different to Ali’s love of cooking. Ali loves it because it keeps his mind quiet, Kai loves it because he gets to create something from nothing and share his love of it with others through the dishes he makes). When he isn’t creating new things, he is perfecting his family’s recipes passed down through generations. He hopes to one day be able to not have to look at any of the recipes and just make them perfectly by memory. 

Kai’s favorite people to spend time with besides his fathers, his brothers, and his partners and kids, are his grandmothers (Nahuel’s mother and Pete’s mother). He loves hearing listening to his grandmas tell him stories about his fathers or about their lives when they were kids. They fascinate him so much and he has such a deep respect for both of them. But the one thing he loves the most is that they still love to do his long hair whenever he comes around. He’s like 6′2 with hair down to the middle of his back and they still act like he’s this six year old little boy and have him sit at their feet so they can brush and braid his hair and make it look awesome. 

Kai loves to sing. He’s inherited his musical abilities from Nahuel and he loves to sing. He’s been in several different bands growing up, but currently he just does solo stuff and sings at venues whenever he feels he’s got a song worth sharing. He has no dreams of becoming some big artist or anything. He just likes writing and singing his own songs which are usually about his family. He sings in English and Hawaiian, and like Nahuel, Kai has written and recorded a special, individual song for each of his children and partners. 

I have more about them, but as this is already really long I’ll stop here. 

[luckjustkissedyouhello]

No joke, I often wonder what my life would’ve looked like if I wasn’t born in 82. If I wouldn’t be struggling to find a diagnosis at thirty-fucking-eight to explain why my brain, my life is like this.

long post is long

All through elementary school I had 1 friend, the other outcast. This happened in two separate elementary schools in the district. Two separate groups of kids decided there was something ‘wrong’ about me that they didn’t like, and that was that. In my first school, I was put in group therapy (and didn’t even fucking realize it, I was the kind of kid that just went with what they were told - always desperate to please). I don’t remember much about it other than the leader - the school psych split between 4 elm schools who would come in once a year to say ‘hey I’m here if you need me’ - and a kid talking about being hit in the face with a waffle maker (I remember being fascinated by his black eye, it was so black and puffy and it took sooo many meetings to heal properly). That’s all I remember. That’s all the school ‘did’ to help me.

One time my mom was giving me a bath, and she was like ‘why are you covered in bruises?’ (Ironic b/c she was a hitter) and I just said ‘oh the kids on the playground’ like it was normal for me to get my ass beat. She went to the principal. This was probably like 90/91. He had me write an essay about the other things I could do to stay away from the mean kids - I think he’d been told I followed the bullies around. Idk, man. I didn’t get social cues, I thought we were playing, etc. (for the record, my mom did tell me to leave the office and then told the principal she wouldn’t contradict him to me, but she thought that was an awful way to handle me getting bullied - again it was the 90s, I don’t fault my parents much for not realizing something was *seriously* different about me. That’s the point. Autistic was just for nonverbal kids. ADHD was for those so active they couldn’t sit in the classroom. Neuro-typical or Neuro-Divergent were not terms anyone know about. They didn’t discuss or know much about the spectrum of neurodiversity. They sure as fuck didn’t see it in AFAB kids like myself. I was just ‘weird’ and I have the mental scars to prove it (typing about elem school right now? Making me sweaty and nauseated- that’s how I feel when I look back at most of my childhood in school. Actually. My eyes are sweating too)

I struggled academically. When I tell people now that I was in the lowest reading groups from K-6th grade, people are surprised: I’m a librarian. But there is some kind of diagnosed learning disability in me that made it impossible for me to pass a spelling test - and I still fucking can’t - and since school tied writing with reading, they decided I needed the lowest group. They knew something was up because my compression was good but I failed the spelling tests. They tested me for dyslexia in 15 minutes one day in third grade. I sat at a machine, looked in, and pointed my finger in the direction the letters were facing. I remember it clearly. From that test, they were like ‘nope you just slow’ and put me in the remedial reading groups. Now, a large difference between comprehension and spelling would be a flag that would’ve been investigated. I know this because 2 of my sisters kids have dysgraphia. Something that wasn’t tested for in the 90s, or if it was not in a school nurse’s office.

Do you know what my grades looked like, even in college? Cs in most everything but my major classes. Grad school, I got a 3.7 - almost as if, and this is a shocker to you neurodiverse folks, I know, almost as if I could only really excel in the things my brain was interested in...wow. Shock.

I often say you couldn’t pay me to go back to high school. But then I wonder. What if I was a student now. Would they have found out about the probable ADHD/Autisim? (I’m not sure which I am but I do know I’m not neurotypical!) Would I have been given resources to help fit into the world I still clearly struggle with? Would I have so much trouble in my carrier as I have now, because people make assumptions about me being lazy or weird or not ‘right’ and dislike my mannerisms and speak and dissect everything I say? Like, no joke, I forgot how to explain the summer reading club in front of an audience once, and the librarian that went with me told the director I was awful. Shit, would that have happened if I was properly medicated? If I knew how to handle my brain forgetting shit, or how distracted the crowd of kids made me (funny thing, I can do standup just fine if the stage lights blinding me from looking out, but the second I see the crowd I get distracted and start mumbling things at people rather than the prepared jokes).

There are positives. I see *everything* happening in my story time. So i see when I’m losing the kids, I see when a sibling is beating the crap out of another. I see those kids in the audience when I talk about the summer reading club that are harassing another student, etc. I think I keep my library safer because I see every-fucking-thing going on.

But I think I’d do so much better in life if I was helped younger. I know I’d feel better about myself. I’m working through my shit self esteem but the truth is I’ve hated myself for not making it work, for not fitting in, my whole life. And the people that say ‘embrace your differences’ don’t know what it’s like for your stomach to drop out when the teacher says ‘find a partner’ because you know nobody will be yours (once, my teacher called my mom in tears because we were planning for a zoo trip and everyone else had a group, and when she asked who would take me, two groups raised their hands and she said ‘I’ve never seen her face light up like that’ - this was the exception to the norm)

Soooo.. yeah. I’m crying now. I’m not sure why I even wrote all this. This is tumblr. Nobody reads and responds much. I guess that might be why. I just...everyone neurotypical is born with a manual I just never had. And I can’t reconcile that with the idea that if I was born 20/30 years later, maybe I would’ve been at least allowed to glimpse the manual from time to time.

ETA: Talking about being undiagnosed with a learning disability and spell ‘because’ wrong every single time....i didn’t do that on purpose.