#but Too Many Noise is the most likely to push me into meltdown mode

[echo-bleu]

no one ever said it would be this hard

For @moonlight-breeze-44 Happy birthday Em!! I hope you like this. I made it all angsty and painful for you 💙

I've been wanting to write Alec breaking down after breaking up with Magnus for a good while, and this was a great opportunity. This is part of my map out a world series (though there's no need to read the other parts first as it's mostly canon compliant), but it can reasonably be read as a prequel to take me back to the start, too. Hence the Coldplay title.

Huge thanks to my amazing beta @jeanboulet who edited this super fast and helped me figure out a title.

[self-harm, self-injurious stims, meltdown, blood, dissociation]

Read on AO3.

It should be raining, or something. There should be some kind of external sign that the world has just turned on its axis. The night shouldn’t be this… normal.

Alec runs back to the Institute on autopilot. He doesn’t even realize that he’s forgotten to activate his speed rune until he arrives, panting, at the front doors. He runs fast enough to make his lungs burn, because it prevents him from crying all the tears in his body. He shouldn’t cry. He chose this.

It doesn’t make it hurt any less. It doesn’t make it feel any less like his whole world just ended.

Maybe because it did.

“Alec!”

He’s assaulted by Izzy as soon as he steps inside. He doesn’t even have time to take his hand off the handle of the door before she’s in his space, shouting. Something about Jonathan. Something about Clary. Something—

Wait. He didn’t follow any of that, but something clicks in his mind. He felt pain in the parabatai bond, before. He didn’t really feel it, with how fucking tense he was, but he noted it in a corner of his mind somehow. Jace is hurt. Izzy is panicked. Clary is… missing, if what his brain is parsing together is right. Jonathan is gone.

Fuck.

Alec pushes it all away. He knows how to do it, how to switch to soldier mode. Dissociate his feelings from his actions, make his body and his brain do what needs to be done. He’s always known. It was the first thing he learned, long before the Academy, long before formal training. He closes his eyes for a second, and when he opens them again, there is nothing but complete clarity.

As long as he holds on tight.

He takes Izzy by the shoulders. “Tell me again.”

“Jonathan got into Clary’s head!” Izzy shouts again, too loud in his ears, like she can’t control the level of her voice in her panic. Alec doesn’t wince. He doesn’t feel pain the same way, when he does this.

It’s useful. He can just hold her tighter and get the whole story out of her, how Clary knocked Jace out and freed Jonathan. “They’re gone.”

“Okay,” Alec murmurs, for Izzy’s benefit. “Okay. Calm down. We need to secure the premises.”

“Already done, sir,” Underhill comes behind Izzy. “No sign of them. We have a Seelie knight dead in the observation cell. Three dead guards.”

Alec tightens his fists, remembering just in time to let go of Izzy first. He doesn’t feel his nails digging into his palms. He doesn’t feel his phone buzzing in his pocket with the Institute-wide alert. He doesn’t feel.

It’s a good thing.

“Izzy, go find Jace,” he orders. “Underhill, I need a full sweep. Where’s Jens?”

Underhill points to the Ops table, beside which Jens is talking on the phone. Izzy shakes herself – she’s no stranger to obeying orders, either – and she jogs away. Alec doesn’t bother tracking where she’s going. He knows he’s operating on limited bandwidth, limited energy. He has to rely on his subordinates.

“I’ve informed the Clave,” Jens says over the noise of the ops center as soon as he hangs up his phone.

Alec walks up to him, Underhill on his heels.

“Sir,” Underhill starts, agitated. “Won’t they—”

“They will, but we can’t do without it now,” Alec says. “I assume they’re reinstating the kill order?”

“Yes,” Jens confirms. “We have orders to put all our available teams on it, and they will send additional ones in the morning.”

Alec places his hands flat on the edge of the table, and takes strength from the pressure for a second. “Brief the teams. Capture, don’t kill. I’ll handle the Clave.”

Underhill nods at his dismissal and walks away, but Jens lingers. Alec grits his teeth. There’s so much to do, and so little time to do it, and he can’t let go now.

“Alec, is everything alright?” Jens asks – not softly, not exactly, but he can see what no one else notices. He’s known Alec forever. He’s known Alec better than his own siblings for years.

“I can’t do this now,” Alec responds honestly. He can barely make himself speak out loud.

“The Clave is handled for now,” Jens answers. He’s switching almost automatically to trying to relieve Alec of as many duties as possible, like well-oiled machinery. He knows exactly when to push Alec, and when to hold back. He knows that Alec can’t handle more pressure now. “They’ll call if they need more intel. Paperwork can wait.”

“Maybe it shouldn’t,” Alec says. Maybe he won’t be able to handle it later.

“It will,” Jens asserts. “Go to your siblings. I can hold the fort.”

Alec sighs. He can’t slip now. He nods at Jens and grips the edges of the table tighter.

Jace, Izzy and Simon, his presence almost incongruous, stride up on the catwalk at that moment. “Alec!”

Alec moves like he’s in a sea of treacle. Every muscle in his body is tenser than a guitar string. It must be visible, because Izzy gives him a look of concern. Or maybe she suspects what he abandoned them for.

Fuck. He was supposed to be there with them. If he had been, maybe—

It almost makes him crumble. He stumbles, just barely, and pulls his control back tighter. They have a whole conversation around him about the Clave’s orders and the Heavenly Fire serum, and Alec is sure that he participates in some way, but he would be hard-pressed to say how.

He’s entirely unsure of what happens for the rest of the night. Or the next day. He doesn’t have a single second to himself to reflect on things, and it’s good. He’s fairly sure that he allows Jace desperate measures that he would have never signed on otherwise, but, well, Jace needs to get Clary back. One of them needs to end this with their heart intact.

There’s one moment, during the day, when Jace asks about Magnus. Alec nearly crumples just at hearing his name. “Sometimes things don’t go the way you want them to.” He hears the words coming out of his mouth like he’s far away, in another world, another universe. There’s a version of him that enunciates them, and Alec has lost track which. Alec the Clave soldier doesn’t have room for any of that. And he’s closed the door on any other part of him.

He falters for one moment, and as soon as Jace leaves his office, he activates half the runes on his body, just to anchor himself on the rush of energy. Stamina. He hasn’t slept in almost three days. Strength. His body feels like jelly. Calm Anger. It pushes everything back down.

And if he abuses them, well, no one else needs to know.

*

He’s sitting on his bed when his siblings find him. It must have been, what, six hours since Jace was thrown back through a portal into the Institute? He’s frozen, afraid that if he moves an inch, he’ll shatter into pieces.

He hasn’t moved for hours. He’s sitting with his back perfectly straight, his feet flat on the ground, still fully dressed in patrol gear, long past the time when the position should have become uncomfortable – but he can’t even feel it. His hands are clasped together, too tight, his knuckles white with the effort. Stuck.

He doesn’t move when Izzy and Jace knock, and at his lack of answer, they slip inside. He can’t look up at them, he can’t react. He clenches his jaw hard and tries not to fall apart.

“Alec,” Izzy calls quietly, passing through his field of vision. She disappears briefly and reappears kneeling beside him, just shy of touching him. Alec wants to jerk out of the way, but his body doesn’t obey.

“Alec, you’re feeling really awful, buddy,” Jace says, crouching on the other side.

Alec breathes carefully, evenly, as he has for hours, until there’s a hitch. His breathing goes out of sync with his brain, with his locked down body, and it crumbles. He falls apart.

He crumples in on himself, chin reaching his knees as he curls up, gasping. He digs his thumbs into his forehead and, when that doesn’t work, he stuffs his fingers into his mouth and bites down hard. He slips off the bed and falls onto the floor, and the pain of hitting his back against the bed frame doesn’t even register as he starts to rock back and forth.

“Alec!” Izzy reacts. But she doesn’t try to touch him. She knows if won’t go over well.

Jace doesn’t have the same compulsion, not when Alec’s fingers are still in his mouth and he’s tasting iron. Blood. “Alec, you have to stop,” he tries. He approaches his hand to pull on Alec’s forearm, but as soon as their skins touch, Alec lets out a strangled cry and backs away, into the bed frame, then brutally onto the bed, until he’s backed up against the headboard.

Fuck. The urge to hit his head to dull the agony is irresistible, and it makes a thud as pain erupts under his scalp. He hears, vaguely, his siblings trying to stop him verbally, but nothing is coming through anymore. He screams silently, mouth open in agony, as his head hits the wall again and again.

“Alec.” Izzy is crying now. Alec thinks distantly that she’s never seen him this bad, not since they were little kids and she didn’t have to handle him. He’s long learned to hide his meltdowns, to shutdown instead, like he’s done for most of today – yesterday. Dissociate until there’s nothing left of him.

This time, it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough, because nothing is enough.

He’s been able to stay numb for twenty-eight hours, since he closed the door of his mother’s shop and left Magnus inside. He’s been—

Magnus.

Fuck.

He pulls at his hair, hard enough to uproot it. Nothing is enough. His skin is too tight for the pain bubbling inside of him, and he’s exploding, losing all control. He’s a giant knot, muscles taut and burning from staying so tense all day, runes overworked and overloaded.

His eyes stay dry, even as he craves the relief of crying. “Alec,” someone murmurs – he doesn’t know who anymore. “Shhhhh. It’s okay.”

It’s not okay. There’s no such thing as okay, now, not without—

His chest feels like a hole has been punched through it, and it’s been filled with self-expanding foam. He sobs without a noise, his shoulders shaking and his whole body trembling.

Suddenly, there’s a warm body against him, and for a moment, Alec is about to throw it off, to react violently against the unbearable touch. He resists, but the arms around him tighten until it almost smothers him — paradoxically, that calms him down. Jace holds him and rocks with him and slowly, very slowly, Alec settles.

The tears don’t come until Izzy’s smaller hands reach him, first checking him for injuries, then soothing him, running over his shoulders and his neck, always strong and tight. Alec hiccups and almost throws up, but he hasn’t eaten in too long. He dry heaves instead, coughing without breathing, gasping until his eyes water and finally he’s sobbing fully.

He hears Jace’s voice in between painful hiccups. “Izzy told me what happened. How do we help?”

Alec shakes his head when he’s finally parsed the sentence, probably too late for it to make sense. There’s nothing they can do, and Alec has no words in him to tell them. It’s over. Magnus is gone. Gone from his life, forever.

The sobs redouble, and Alec heaves over the arm holding him up, probably Jace’s. His chest is on fire, but it feels right. It should hurt. It should be so painful as to be unbearable, because that’s what it feels like inside.

There’s already a Magnus-shaped hole inside him, and it’s only going to grow deeper and larger. Alec wonders, vaguely, how long he has until it swallows him whole.

*

It feels like hours before his sobs subside, leaving him breathless and listless, like a puppet whose strings have been cut. Alec gradually slides down until he’s curled up on his side on the bed, his head on the pillow Magnus slept on just two days ago.

Jace and Izzy move with him, refusing to let him go. They scoot over until they’re framing him, Jace curled against his back and Izzy in front of him, one hand cupping his wrist. Alec lets himself soak up their warmth as he starts shivering.

He doesn’t stop crying in one go. He keeps seeing flashes of Magnus, and it only takes a half-formed thought to start again, the sobs wracking his body. It’s less violent every time, though, and after a while it only extracts a pitiful hiccup from him, his tears long dried out. Jace and Izzy keep holding him silently, though Alec can feel the looks they exchange over his shoulder.

“Alec,” Jace murmurs after a long time. “Was there really no other way?”

Alec struggles to focus his gaze on something – Izzy’s hand on his wrist, in this case – and he wets his lips several times without managing to speak. He shakes his head.

“It’s okay if you can’t speak right now,” Izzy whispers. “We’re here for you.”

Alec nods gratefully. She’s only recently learned to do this, to recognize when he’s struggling to form words. None of his family ever caught on – his siblings used to laugh at him, when he struggled with seemingly simple things. His parents would shake him and force him to hide it.

Magnus was the first one to understand.

Magnus was the first one to see Alec. The first one to love him for who he is, and not for the image of Alec he had in his mind. And Alec ruined it, over and over. He betrayed Magnus and let him suffer because of his actions.

He brought Magnus nothing but pain.

He tastes ashes. His mouth feels dry, parched by a thirst that will never be quenched again. He hurts all over from tensing so much, but it feels like a too small punishment for his sins.

“I can’t,” he starts, forcing the words out over the knot in his throat. “I can’t imagine living without him.”

It opens up yet another avenue of thoughts, that he’s pushed away until now. All his plans for the future include Magnus. There is no Alec without Magnus, not in his head. He’s dreamed so often about marrying him, recently, about seeing the Lightwood ring on Magnus’ hand and moving in together and—

What is he going to do now?

He can’t stop seeing Magnus’ face as he left the shop, the desperation in his eyes. Did he really do the right thing? Magnus has lost so much recently—

But that’s exactly why Alec did it. Magnus has lost too much. His magic is an intrinsic part of himself, something he can’t just do without, even if it took Alec too much time to understand. His immortality is a part of him. Alec… Alec is just a lover. One more lover in a long string of them.

Magnus has had many relationships, and he’s lost them all eventually, and he lived through it. But this, losing his magic? He was ready to risk dying from Lorenzo’s transfusion, just to be able to use this second-hand, wrong magic. Even Alec could see how weird the yellow magic was in Magnus’ hands, how sickening, but Magnus latched onto it like it was more important than breathing.

No, Magnus can replace Alec in a way he can never replace his magic. As bad as Alec feels for hurting him on the short term, it’s the only decision he could make.

From the moment the idea of going to Asmodeus went through his brain, he knew that he couldn’t live with himself unless he tried everything. He wishes, selfishly, that he’d never thought of it. He’d be holding Magnus right now in this bed, instead of lying heartbroken between his siblings.

It wouldn’t hurt like this.

“You can do this, Alec,” Izzy says softly, but even Alec can tell that she doesn’t fully believe it. “I know you can. We’ve just gotta take it one step at a time.”

“That one of your mundane group things?” Jace asks when Alec doesn’t react.

He doesn’t know how to react. He can’t think of tomorrow, of next week, of any time without Magnus. One step at a time implies that he even wants to go on.

He’s not sure he does.

“Yeah,” Izzy mutters. “It helps. Sometimes.”

Alec wonders if this is what Jace felt when they thought that Clary was dead. What he feels right now when Clary is out there somewhere, brainwashed by Jonathan. Alec can’t feel anything through the parabatai bond, not on top of his own pain.

He grits his teeth against the urge to hit his head again, just to overwhelm the emotional pain. His scalp is going to bruise as it is, unless he uses an iratze. His fingers are covered in teeth marks where he bit himself, some of them still bloody.

“You hope the pain here will overpower the pain there,” Magnus told him once, hand on his heart. Alec almost whimpers.

Oh, to go back there, to the beginning of them. The pain of that day, the overpowering guilt at Jocelyn’s death, feels so inconsequential now. So much has happened. They never had time to stop running, one thing after the other.

It’s been over two years, but Alec feels like he never had time to just breathe. Curl up with Magnus and just enjoy the moment. They always had to think about the next step, the best thing for their respective people, the next threat coming to rip them apart.

And now they’ll never have that time.

Alec jerks his hands out of Izzy’s grasp and he digs his nails into the skin of his scalp, pressing on his eyes with the heels of his palms. Fuck. He can’t do this. He can’t live with this pain.

Jace must sense his distress, because he slings his arm over Alec’s and holds him, so tightly that it’s nearly painful. It eases something in Alec, calming his crawling skin until he can relax just a little. “We’re here,” Jace murmurs in his ear. “We’re not going anywhere.”

“We can’t replace Magnus, but we’ll support you no matter what,” Izzy adds, slipping her arms around both of them. “We love you, Alec. That will never change.”

Alec closes his eyes.

It doesn’t make things better. It doesn’t make tomorrow any less daunting, and it doesn’t stop the excruciating pain. But it soothes something in Alec, making it just a little less unbearable.

His body exhausted beyond its limits, Alec finally falls asleep.

[dyspfanblog]

Social I̷͔̹̍͆͋n̷̗͔̂͜ṯ̶̛͎̞̀ê̴̡̨͉r̵͙̪͕̀a̴͎̋̄́c̶̭̬̠͊t̴͎͒̾į̸̛̰̑̚ö̶̭ń̷͈̐ Outeraction

Bonus Post!

Everybody likes a bonus from time to time! In this bonus post I’m collaborating with my best friend, Alex King. He has recently re-launched his blog and chose Social Interaction as his next topic. It’s a massive talking point! Different people have different experiences of it, so I’m chipping in with my own personal viewpoint. On Alex’s post he posed a couple of questions, which I gave a quick answer sum-up to each.

With this post I’ve gone into extra depth of what the topic of social interaction is to me. I encourage you to check out Alex’s post before continuing:  (https://dailykingblogs.wordpress.com/2019/11/16/social-interaction/)

Message from Alex (https://dailykingblogs.wordpress.com)

“Hi everyone, Alex here. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed teaming up with @dyspraxicfantastic today on each other’s blog; I hope you enjoyed a view point from two people who suffer with very similar mental health issues. We also hope our readers will share our blogs to reach other people like ourselves in the hope of helping other people who feel the same way or are looking for advice on how to deal with their anxieties”

Social Interaction

As humans we are naturally social creatures. Most of the things that get done or get created has been done by being social and interacting with each other. For some of us, social skills come naturally and others we have to muddle through the best we can. In this post I go over some different scenarios that is linked in with Social Interaction and how it affects me.

The Blight of an Introvert

As an introvert, my energy recharges from being in my own space. While I can be a social butterfly, given the opportunity, it is mentally taxing for me.  Physical exercising like walking is less exhausting than being in a social situation for an extended period of time!

Certain factors within a social situation can make these social batteries – as I call them – drain quickly. The main examples of these factors include;

The place is unfamiliar/new to me,

The people are unfamiliar to me,

Too much background noise/Multiple conversations happening at once all around me

Room too hot

There’s no structure/I have no idea of the plan of action

The place is crowded/No easy escape route

My current mental health/how anxious I am

Then there are certain factors which aid in my Social Interaction. Anxiety literally makes you warm up, so being in a warm/hot room it can make the anxiety worse. I work best in the cold as not only am I not getting anxiety from the warmth but the coolness helps cool my anxiety off (like a fan in a computer!)

The Flight of an Introvert

As with anything, there are positives and negatives to most things. So while sure being an introvert has its downsides, there are also upsides. Some examples for you;

+     Don’t have to rely on others to recharge +     Unique appreciation and connection to music, film/TV, and games, etc. +     And much, much, much more!

Social Meltdown

My meltdowns can happen when I push myself too far. My main meltdown is total shutdown where I can’t concentrate until I’ve re-established or grounded myself. I’m pretty in tune with my own mind, so I know when I can or cannot push myself socially. I do my best to read my inner feelings and do what I can to ovoid a meltdown. The more the social batteries drain, the more likely a meltdown may occur. If I’m about to breach my point of meltdown, I can escape to compose myself and return slightly refreshed. However, if a meltdown does actually occur, then the result critically hits my social batteries and I may not have the physical ability to come back until I properly recharge. Each circumstance and situation is different.

The Grounding Technique

Sometimes, especially when multiple things are playing on my mind, I don’t properly detoxicate the negative build-up. This makes my tolerance for the things that drain my social batteries a lot lower. With the anxiety of having faster draining batteries it plays on my mind. Suddenly, I’m now stuck in a downward vortex. Getting out of it is possible, using my empowerment tactics, but it isn’t easy. You probably already know where this is leading, but this downward vortex is my Pit of Peril – the route of my depression.

Telephones

One of the reoccurring compliments I get both in work and at home is my telephone manner. People either tell me directly or feedback to others, that I’m really good on the phones ~ which I probably should just agree with. Despite this praise, I absolutely hate telephones. If I’m talking to someone I know, especially if they know my struggles, then I find it easier to talk to them. Strangers are a different matter altogether. I prefer to ring out as it gives me time to prep myself. With some preparation time I can go over in my head what I’m going to say, get together any notes that’ll help me, and therefore mentally ready myself for the task. Although, weirdly, I do get shaken by voice mail and most times I have to hang up think through the message and then ring back to leave it.

Incoming calls are what I hate most of all about phones; but it is a necessity in many office jobs. The sole reason is obvious; most times I haven’t got the time to mentally prepare for it. Without this prep-time, my anxiety can take a sudden spike-up. Of course, if I feel I handled the call excellently then my anxiety defuses somewhat.

The issue with telephones is it combines multiple of my…issues…into one package deal.

Anxiety and stress – From speaking to strangers (the unknown of it all) and constantly having what if questions circulate around in my head like fiery ping-pong balls (‘what if I mess up’, ‘what if I embarrass the company’ etc, etc, etc…)

Processing Sound – My auditory processing and memory is one of my biggest weaknesses. It takes a great deal of concentration to even attempt to understand what the person on the line is saying. If there’s background noise and/or a bad line it takes even more concentration and effort. Even more so if the person is a realfastspeakeranddoesn’tunderstandthatIstruggleatthebestoftimeswithouthemturningthisphoneconversationfromdifficultintohardcoregodmode. Adding to the stress is if they get annoyed from me constantly asking for them to repeat themselves. Overall, it makes me feel useless that I struggle with something so basic.   

Social Situation – Drains me and I can’t exactly ‘escape’ easily.

Co-ordination – To coordinate everything from holding the phone (full concentration into trying not to drop it), writing/typing notes, along with concentrating on what is being said it is mentally challenging and draining to do all this at once.

Short Telephone Story

I remember a time where I was tasked with ringing out to customers, a job I embraced. I had all the time needed to mentally prepare myself for the mission ahead of me, so that was a big plus. It was such a big task that it was going to take more than a day to get through it all, but I ready myself and got on with it.

First day I got through with no real technicalities, as far as I can remember. I sure was glad when I was done for the day though! The second day I managed 2 calls before I physically could not pick up the phone anymore. Every-time I reached for the receiver I couldn’t lift it, I had hit my limit. Even taking a short break didn’t help; I was mentally exhausted from it all.

My manager thanked me for the effort I had put in and allowed me to do some non-people focused tasks (filing and data entry). It was positive that they understood my limit, especially for something as trivial as making phone calls. To most people telephone calls are just another fact of the job but to me it’s something that requires a bit more effort.

Filing and data entry, while a mindless and pretty thankless job, is something I absolutely adore. While doing these kinds of jobs the charge inside me recharges! I can allow my mind to relax in a zen like mode and complete my work.

So when people say I have a great telephone manner it’s probably me concentrating really, really, really hard. Maybe because deep down I struggle immensely, I come across as nice as possible to compensate.    

Initial Interactions

Telephones are one thing; actually meeting people is a whole different ordeal. I probably prefer meeting people in person compared to telephoning people though. When I meet someone for the first time or I am in a new environment, I am more reserved. Such is the nature of the introvert. With most new situations I start off shy and this is for 2 reasons;

1.

Because that’s how I best stop my anxiety going into absolute meltdown. I have time to process the environment and what is going on. It helps to deconstruct everything so my brain doesn’t get overwhelmed. Also, I’m drawing less attention to myself! Once I’ve processed the environment I can then attempt in breaking the ice. If I can get a pun or funny quip off that defuses the tension inside my head, especially if it gets a positive reception.

2.

Because I have a quirky personality people who don’t understand me, won’t understand my humour or quirks. With the dyspraxia mixed in I’m a quirky and awkward person. Then there’s the famous (or infamous) sense of humour. It is quick and dry making it an acquired taste. I’ll save details of that for another post though. Continuing on, they say don’t judge a book by its cover and for what it’s worth the first impression I give off is close to who I am. However, like any good twist in a novel, I can catch people completely off-guard.

To protect myself in such a way is for my own mental health, but has many downsides. It can take a while for me to warm up to people (if at all) and have my full true personality shine. Without getting to know me properly, you won’t know the true me ~ which is why interviews and any initial meeting is near-impossible for me to succeed at. I don’t shine until I’ve established a comfort zone.

The Comfort Zone  

Speaking of comfort zones I can leave my comfort zone given the right push, either by myself or others to venture out there. I use my comfort zone not to protect myself (well, occasionally to protect myself) but to energise myself enough to get out of it. For something like work, I slowly build a comfort zone at my workplace. As time goes by I feel more comfortable and slowly come out of my shell. My work-space is fairly unorthodox, it’s more than just a desk; it’s my space; a carefully put together space to suit me on all levels. Hot desking is one of the worse things for me but luckily all my jobs have had me with a fixed work desk.    

While I have order to where everything lives on my desk I don’t get upset if anything gets moved around. I have to put things back in its nice order though. Although, I hate it if things get removed from my desk – as off I go to retrieve or replace the lost items.

Faking Confidence in a Social Setting  

A little power I have is an ability to convert my social charge into a little zap of confidence. Even just listening to a tune or song can give my confidence a boost. This quick spark of confidence helps me to ‘fake’ through stressful situations before I get too overwhelmed. There’s also times where I have no confidence in myself, but can give others around me a boost in their own confidence.

Other than the people who actually know me well, I can hide my deep insecurities and anxieties from others. Having extra attention drawn to me isn’t good for the anxiety, so it’s something I’ve adapted.

Social Interaction as a Socially Inept person

Socially speaking I’m not that good at it. (Socially typing I’m better.) There’s a reason why I like fictional characters who are equally or more socially awkward than me. It’s because it’s an almost-instant click for me. For most people they’re laughing at these poor characters trying/failing at socialising and their awkwardness. For me I’m laughing with the character, because I can feel their struggle.

I used to be a shrinking violet because of the crippling anxiety and social ineptitude. However, I have slowly improved on myself with the help of others. Even though I still have the social anxiety and a draining social battery I do my best to socialise. Escape for me was never an option. I’m still pretty useless at the social side but I can laugh at my own incompetence from time to time. Of course, it is much easier to be social when people realise my quirky personality.

Perhaps I’m not Socially Inept or Socially Awkward, but simply Socially Quirky. Guess that’s for others to decide for me.

The Click

In most places like work and schools you get Clicks; groups of people who simply connect with each other. The topic of clicks and clickiness are a matter for another post though.

Post End

I hope you’ve enjoyed this in-depth post on social interaction. Please show my friend Alex’s blog some love by visiting and having a read of his posts.

Until the next time take care and see you next post!

The post Social I̷͔̹̍͆͋n̷̗͔̂͜ṯ̶̛͎̞̀ê̴̡̨͉r̵͙̪͕̀a̴͎̋̄́c̶̭̬̠͊t̴͎͒̾į̸̛̰̑̚ö̶̭ń̷͈̐ Outeraction appeared first on DyspraxicFantastic.com.

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