#if u have bipolar disorder pls pls pls get on and take ur medication

[violentviolette]

im gonna be very real and only say this once because there is zero room to change my mind on this

i am very psych critical and i agree with antipsych pricinicples and points, but bipolar disorder is a physical genetic condition that requires medication. point blank. medication is the Only proven effective treatment for bipolar and u cannot actually get better without it

and when i say get better i dont mean just slightly alleviate some things. i mean that remission means a complete and total lack of symptoms. if u are on the proper medication and taking it as perscribed then ur bipolar symptoms will stop. you will no longer experience mania, hallucinations, breaks from reality, delusions, ect. they will literally stop. and i say that so strongly because i know its factual because it is my very literal lived experience. it is also the lived expereince of everyone in real life that i have met and known throughout my 15+ years of treatment for bipolar disorder, which is dozens and dozens of people. I was diagnosed at 14 and have been in and out of treatment and on and off medication for over half my life at this point, and this is very much the reality but u also don't have to believe my lived expereince alone. bipolar disorder is one of the oldest recorded mental illnesses (we have literally known about it since the early 1800's) and treatment for it has existed almost as long. lithium is a naturally occuring salt and the only known antimanic agent in existence and humans figured out very quickly that this specific salt made some of us not insane anymore. the effectivenes of lithium and other mood stabilizers and the rates at which proper medication will result in full remission for bipolar patients and how relapses almost always only occur when people stop taking their meds is Very well documented. a reputable study done in 2003 reported that over 90% of bipolar patients recieving medication as treatment entered full remission within 2 years. and 72% of those people reported ZERO symptoms going forward

do not listen to people who tell u that u dont need medication for bipolar disoder, that it wont really help, that it only helps a little, that u can manage without it, that it wont actually make ur symptoms fully go away. they are lying to u, often to justify their own misguided decision to not take medication and ruin their own lives. do not listen to them because that kind of thinking will literally kill u. take ur fucking medication.

[bluesfm]

(  park  chaeyoung  ,  twenty two  ,  &  cisfemale  )  who  ?  these  days  ,  it’s  all  about    blue hyong,  who  comes  from    los  angeles  &  ca    and  is  making  headlines  as  a    singer    .    she   currently  has  a  fan  count  of  42k    ,  no  thanks  to  the  rumors  of  them  being  inflexible  !  but  ,  on  the  other  hand  ,  their  most  devout  fans  say  they’re  actually    imaginative    .  last  i  heard  ,  they  caused  quite  a  buzz  when    she   publicly   dissed    her  new   record    label  and   the   misogynistic  treatment   she  was   receiving   from   their  reps  !  it’s  no  wonder  they  remind  me  of    long   rants   in  the  notes  app   being  posted   to  her   twitter  account  ,  empty  bottles   of  wine  laying  at   recording   studios’   floors   &  notebooks   upon  notebooks   filled  with   lyrics   she  might   never  use   but   refuses   to   let   go  of   .  

well hello human friends !! n also hello to the non human friends too , wassup . i’m angie a  dumb  noodle  from  the  middle  of  the  south  american  jungle  , and i’m here to introduce yall to this mess i call blue  who’s  a muse i have had  for yrs now n carry w/ me wherever i go , with some minimal changes but she’s still the  same  messy  bitch  on the  inside  don’t  worry  folks !  so   i  will   provide  u w/  some  background  info  on   her  n  some   possible connections  under   the  cut . issa  lil messy  but  we’ve   been  away  for  a while   pls  bear  w me

blue  is  the  only  daughter  to  a  couple   of  south  korean  immigrants  that  came  to   america  when  they  were  in  their  very  early  20s  n  already  expecting  blue  in  order  to  chase  the  american  dream  n  create  a  better  life  for  themselves  n  their  family  .  their  life  was  pretty  hard  for  a  big  part  of  blue’s  childhood  ,  while  they  were  both  studying  n  working  odd  jobs  to  pay  for  their  education  all  the while  taking  care  of  a child .  so  blue  didnt  have  the  best  childhood  ,  not  that  her parents  were  bad  or  anything  they  just  didnt  have  time  for  her  . nowadays  ,  they  are  a  lot  more  comfortable  in  life  ,  since  her  dad  became  a  lawyer  n  her  mom  is  a  nurse  ,  but  they  definitely  didnt  have  an  easy  beginning  .

ok  so  maybe  bc  they  werent  present  durant  most  of  her  childhood  they  didnt  notice  a  lol  of  signs  that  might  have  made  things  a  lot  easier  for  them  ,  bc  by  the  time  they  were  available  to  emotionally  be  there  , during  her  early  teenage  years ,  blue  was  already  kinda  a  mess . she  had  grown  up  w  very  lil  structure  n  refused  the  rules  they  tried  to  instill  on  her  n  was  already  used  to  doing  things  her  own  way  .  that  lead  to  a  lot  of  conflict  between  them  ,  since  they  expected  her  to  study  hard  n  do  well  for  herself  in  a  nine to fiver  when  she  was  already  sure  art  was  the  only  way  to  go  n  while  she  did  ok  ,  she  definitely  wasn’t  as  good  as  her parents  expected  her  to  be .

so  ...  u  know   her  teenage  yrs  were  basic  girl  angsty  she  fought  a  lot  w  her  parents  n  rebelled  frequently  n  ran  away  from  home  like  ...  weekly  ,  but  she  never  rly  had  any  real  hardships  .  life  was  reasonably  good  but  she  always  had  something  to  complain  abt  ...  just  as  she  liked

[  MENTAL  ILLNESS  TW  ]

but  then  she  reached  her  late  teens    they  all  realized  there  was  something  going  on  other   than  the  usual  teenage  angst  she  displayed  all the time  when  she  had  her  first  manic  episode  .   her  parents  thought  it was  a  “  blue  thing  “  at  first  bc  she  was  usually  a  very  impulsive  person  n  she  rly  didn’t  have  a  habit  of  thinking  before  acting  on  her  impulses  ,   but  her  mom  quickly  noticed  the  signs  of  a  manic  episode  when  she  realized  how  aggitated  n   restless  she  was  , specially  when  blue  described  an   hallucination  she  seemed  to  be  having  .   they  took  her  to  a  psychiatrist  ,  she  was  admitted  to  a  hospital  n  diagnosed  w  type 1  bipolar  disorder  n  very  quickly  medicated .  while  the  medication  brought  her  out  of  her  episode  ,  n  she  was  allowed  to  go  home  after  her  mood  seemed  to stabilize  ,   blue  also  noticed  it  stunted  her  severely  emotionally  n  decided  (  against  medical  n  parental  advice  [  pls  dont  do  it  fam  !!  take  ur  meds  ]  )  to  quit  her  medication  ,  falling  into  her  first  major  depressive  episode  a  few  weeks  afterwards  . n  for  abt  four  years  she’s  been  living  w  her  disorder  ,  n  she  doesn’t  medicate  at  all  .  she’s  super  open  abt  her struggles  n  she  has  a  Lot  of  them  ,  specially  w  how  much  drugs  n  alcohol  she  consumes  .   i  never  said  she  was  smart  yall  .

[  END  OF  TW  ]

ok  so  as  u  probably  assume  ,   blue  is  an  emotional  mess  .  she  has  a   very  chaotic  personality  ,  n  most  of it  isnt  even  from  her  illness or  anything  she  just  is  a  very  chaotic  person  in  general  ?  she  is   one  of  those  artsy  ppl  who  forgets  to  wash  her  own  clothes  so  she  ends  up  wearing  the  same  dress for  like  ,  3 days .  she’s  super  outspoken  n  outgoing  n  rly easy  at  making  friends  if  u  can  get  past  the  dumbass energy  she  exudes 24/7  ?  but  yes  just  a  very  outgoing  person  n  a  outright  mess  most  of  the  time  .  she  is  also  soooo stubborn  u  will  never  get  her  to  change  her  mind  abt  smth  she  believes  to  be  right  about  in  any  way  .  u  just  cant  .  she  loves  a  good  time  n  loves  partying  n  is  the  lack  of  impulse  Queen  soo if  u  got  any  bad  ideas  she  is  the  one   u  should  go  for  if  u  need  any  company  .  also .... so dramatic  .  she  makes  a  big  deal  of  everything  n  has  0  apologies  abt  that  .  just  catch  her  crying  over  high  school  musical  3  or  smth  like  that  .

but  yea  on  the  bad  side  tho  ,  blue  takes  up  n  gives  up  on  projects  so  easily  n  she  can  be  super  fickle  abt  things  in  general  .  like  ,  she  will  defend  an  idea  for  7  hours  but  2  days  later  she’s  already  onto  smth  else  n  doesnt  even  remember  being  so  obsessive  abt  that  other  thing  ?  a  mess .  is  also  Quite  abrasive  ?  if  she  thinks  ur  acting  dumb  shes  not  gonna  be  scared  to  call u  out  on  it  .  can  also  have a  Reaally  explosive  temper  .  not  usually  but  specially  during  manic  episodes  she  can  be  quite  easy  to  annoy  ngl  .  is  very  unreliable  ,  especially  if ur not  too  close  ..  tbh  that  is  something  connected  to  her  disorder  .  when  she’s  on  a  manic  episode  ,  she  will be  too busy  planning  things  she  will  never  get  around  to  doing  or  painting  her  entire  house  or  spending  3  days  awake  n  drunk  writing  17  songs  by  herself  .  n  during  her  depression  is  very  hard  to  get  her  to  do  anything  n  even  if  she  feels  terrible  , she  rly  cant be  an  available  friend  .

in  regards  to  her  sexuality  ,  she’s  an  open  bisexual  and   also  is  a  crazy  romantic  n  falls  so  hard  for  literally  no  reason .  but  like  ...  doesnt  have  the  healthiest  mentality  for  relationships  ?  not  like  in  a  toxic  way  but  she  will usually  give  145%  of  herself  at  all times  n  honestly  believes  all  of  the  ppl  she  falls  for  are  the one (1)  just  wants  to  make  things  work  no  matter  what  .  she’s  v  impulsive  w/  meeting  n  falling  for  ppl  tho  so  things  dont  rly  end  up  working  n  she  always  ends  up  heartbroken  over it  .  Well  .  At least she’s  trying  right  ?

in regards  to  her  career  n  art  , she’s  posted  youtube  covers  n  original  songs  for  a  couple  years  and  gathered a  decent  following  ?  she  wasnt  huge  or  anything  but  she  did  get  a  record  deal  w  an  actual  big  label  out  of  it  a  few  months  ago  .  blue  was  pretty  happy  abt  it  but  then  when  the  recording  process  started  she  realized  they  werent  treating  her  as she  thought  she  deserved  at  all  ?  which  resulted  on her  taking  her  thoughts  to  some  reps  of  the  label  n  when  she  didn’t  feel  any  difference  in  the  way  she  was  being  treated  she  took  it  to  the public  ?  which  definitely  caused  quite a  sitr  bc  she  wasn’t  a  huge  name  but  she  was  big  enough  ?  so  now  she’s  in  some  considerable  trouble  w  her  label  but  Also  more  famous  than  ever  so  they  are  choosing  not  to  bury  her  for  now  ?  she’s  in  some  definite  trouble  though  so  it’ll  be  fun  to  see  what  happens  next  n  what  her  moves  will be  ?  spoiler  alert :  it’ll prob  be  smth  dumb.

i  still have  so  much  to  say  but  i’m  so lazy  wow .  dont  start  ur  intros  so  close  to opening  time  folks  thats  my  tip  as  an  old  internet  auntie  .  OK SO  ONTO  SOME  CONNECTIONS  NOW  

some label  mates  who  she  may  or  may  not  get  along  with  ?

hookups !!  she  prob  has  a  few  she  regrets  too   bc  who  doesnt  am i  right

best  friends !!  ppl  who  actually  support  her  n  she  loves  w  no restrictions  just  love  all  around  friends

exes </3  not  gonna  lie  i  have  some  sad  ideas  abt  this  one

good  influence  bc  blue  is  a  mess she  needs  one  of  those  pls  someone  slap  her  head  n  make  her  drink  some  water

a  fling  she  has  feelings  for  but  may  not  be  requited  ...  i  like  my  romantic  connections  to  be  angsty  did yall  notice

artistic  soulmate  !!  someone  her  artistic  bitch  side  just  vibes  with  ?  could  be  a  songwriter  or  singer or  anything  tbh

some   indecisive  romantic   shit where blue rly  knows  sh’s  too messy  n  this  person  is too amazing ?  but  they still  have  feels  so   ... now  what ?

this is  p  mcuh  it ??  it  has  taken so long  to  finish  this  i  hate  myself  but  HEY  if  u  like  blue  or  dislike  her  u  should  hit  me  up  so  we  can  come  up  w  some  plot  ideas  ?  i wish  i  had  a  quirky  goodbye  idea  but  my  brain  has  just  quit  working  guys  so  u  get  nothing  from  me  other than  a  good  old  fashioned goodbye  thanks  for ur  attention  i  love u

[sunsetsover]

I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on Ben having BPD

ok WHEW you just opened a fucking can of worms this about to be the longest post i’ve ever made i hope you have your seatbelt on

let me just preface this by saying nearly everything i talk abt in this post will be based off of my personal experiences w bpd. some people experience it differently, some people might not agree w some of the things i say, but i can only talk abt my own pov. therefore, this just my own personal opinions on ben having bpd. so yh lmao

and disclaimer!! i’m not a doctor!! don’t take anything i say in this post as diagnostic criteria! i’m not an expert or mental health professional!! when it comes to your own mental health or the mental health of ppl in your life, do not consider me a source to reference like ‘oh well lauren sunsetsover said xyz’ like pls just don’t do that. do your own research. and most importantly consult a doctor!!!!!! i am not one!!!!!!!!!

also there are very few sources in this post bc most of this is just shit i’ve absorbed over the years from doctors and doing my own research lmao

now that’s out of the way let’s go! (this became part character study, part informational masterpost on bpd. also it got really fuckin long, hence the read more, so be warned lmao)

warning for potentially triggering content (abuse/mentions of suicide and self harm - nothin too bad but i do touch on ben’s behaviour and history, and this is a p serious mental health issue we’re talking abt here so! take care of yourselves!!)

ok so! some things to keep in mind before we even get to ben:

i believe (at least in the uk) borderline personality disorder is considered to be an outdated name, and one that essentially isn’t appropriate or fit for purpose anymore, so in my experience, a lot of the time now it’s referred to as eupd (emotionally unstable personality disorder) in medical settings. which is way more apt name imo, and tells you more abt what bpd actually is (but i still call it bpd bc it’s easier and ppl know what that is lmao). so like. emotionally unstable personality disorder. i bet that conjures up a way more vivid idea in ur head than borderline  personality disorder does.

no one 100% knows what causes bpd, though it’s thought to be a combination of genetic and environmental factors, like most things. but the general consensus is that bpd develops when something (usually traumatic, but not always in an extreme sense. ppl w bpd have often been victims of some type of abuse in their childhood, but that’s not necessarily always the case) happens in your childhood that impacts the development of your personality. kind of a bizarre metaphor but hopefully it will help u understand: u know how in finding nemo, the egg nemo was in got damaged by the shark? and even tho the damage looked minor, it actually meant that one of his fins was permanently damaged - it was malformed, it didn’t grow right, he couldn’t use it properly? well imagine the fin = the personality; that’s what happens to a person w bpd’s personality. smth happens to us in our childhood that permanently damages our personality, and so it doesn’t grow and develop properly as the rest of us does, making it less functional than an average person’s. u can imagine how that can lead to all sorts of problem (we’ll get to them later)

but bc it’s a mental disorder that affects the personality, you can’t be diagnosed w bpd until you’re 18, when your personality is basically developed fully (i believe it can be diagnosed slightly younger, but those are rare and extreme cases). however, symptoms can start to present themselves earlier, as ur personality begins to develop and mature. (mine started presenting in my early teens)

bpd doesn’t really go away, and treatment with medication generally isn’t effective for long periods of time. however symptoms can be treated with continued therapy, and symptoms sometimes can start to ease as you get older!!

bpd also gets misdiagnosed a lot bc a lot of the symptoms are similar to that of other mental health problems. the biggest one it gets misdiagnosed as seems to be bipolar disorder, which i get tbh. i’ve always considered bpd very similar to bipolar, just like… quicker cycles. there are even memes about it. also bpd has a tendency to coexist w other mental health issues, which makes it harder to recognise and diagnose.

so now lets look at this from a diagnostic perspective

in order to be diagnosed w bpd you basically have to deemed, by a medical professional, to be meet certain criteria, and to have been meeting these certain criteria for a significant amount of time. there are some variations to this criteria, and proposed subtypes and basically different flavours of borderlines but i’m not even gonna go there. i’m just gonna talk abt what i’m most familiar w and how i think that applies to ben.

i’m copying and pasting the diagnostic criteria part from here bc as far as i’m aware this is the criteria doctors use for diagnosis. there are 9 different ‘indicators’/’criteria’, and you have to display or meet at least 5 of them in order to be considered for a bpd diagnosis:

1. Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment

this is one of, if not the biggest part of bpd. that trauma i mentioned earlier? often stems from or is related to abandonment, or perceived abandonment, in childhood, be it physical or emotional. for example, a child that’s being abused by one parent might feel abandoned by the other parent if they don’t do anything about it, even if the second parent has no idea the abuse is going on. sound familiar? a similar thing happened to ben, with stella. phil not doing anything about the abuse ben was facing at the hands of stella - even though he didn’t know it was happening, even though phil did do something once he found out - was an abandonment to ben. and that’s just the tip of the abandonment iceberg for ben - kathy faking her death and leaving him was an abandonment (even when he thought she was actually dead), phil’s own abuse was an abandonment, as was his reaction when ben came out, and so on. and abandonment like that skews your thinking so you believe that everyone is going to abandon you, sooner or later, that they must be abandoning you for a reason, you must be a terrible person, you must be unworthy of people’s effort/time/love etc etc.

even when paul died, that was an abandonment to ben! like logically we know - and ben probably knows too - that paul didn’t want to die, he didn’t want to leave ben, he didn’t deliberately leave ben. but that doesn’t matter. mental illness is illogical, bpd is illogical, esp when it comes to abandonment. e.g. my therapist had to cancel a few of our appointments once bc she was ill, and it felt like an abandonment. like it was personal somehow, like she wasn’t coming into work bc of me, bc i was too much work, too hard to handle. ofc that wasn’t true, but that’s how it felt. it’s illogical. so ofc my solution was to just not go to my appointments even when she came back, bc like what other response is there lmao. it’s just that everything a person does feels personal, like it’s because of/about you, even when it isn’t. even when it has nothing to do w you. that’s probably why ben can come across at selfish at times, like he’s making everything about him. because it is all about him, in his mind. everything is because of him, is his doing, his fault etc. his way of thinking is skewed into thinking like that, bc shit keeps happening to him and ppl keep leaving him, so it must be his fault.

and!! ‘frantic efforts’ isn’t necessarily what u think it is!! it can be desperate begging ‘i’ll do anything to keep you in my life’ type actions, but it just as equally can be lashing out and abandoning someone in order to prevent them from abandoning u first - a ‘get them before they get me’ mentality  (the whole scene where phil was in the hospital comes to mind - the ‘why doesn’t he love me back?’ was the more desperate part of him, tho it wasn’t necessarily an ‘effort’ per se, but then him trying to kill his dad basically in order to have the abandonment be at least on his own terms? that’s lashing out, and def qualifies as a ‘frantic effort’ lmao). and how often do we see that in ben? lashing out at jay in the hospital because he knew he was mad at him, and he’d rather hurt jay physically before he could hurt him emotionally? ben trying to support callum and showing him kindness, only to turn around and threaten to out him when he finds out callum asked stuart to sort him out? everything that happened w his dad, trying to fuck him over before his dad can get there first, trying to get rid of keanu so he can’t be abandoned in favour of him (although that didn’t really work, but it rarely does work the way u want it to lmao). and the biggest one to me, though probably one that people have already forgotten, is him breaking up w that guy he was seeing in newcastle even tho they were into each other bc he ‘had to, otherwise [he] would have ruined his life’. even tho we don’t really get details, that says it all to me. it’s v much a pattern that’s present in ben.

2. A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by extremes between idealization and devaluation (also known as “splitting”)

i feel like this one doesn’t need much explaining lmao

here is a definition of splitting from here (which is a very good article on splitting imo if u wanna read more abt it): ‘Splitting is a term used in psychiatry to describe the inability to hold opposing thoughts, feelings, or beliefs. Some might say that a person who splits sees the world in terms of black or white, all or nothing. It’s a distorted way of thinking in which the positive or negative attributes of a person or event are neither weighed nor cohesive.’

a little explanation of it from me: ppl w bpd can sometimes have very simplistic, all or nothing views on things. and splitting is basically when ur opinion on something or someone changes very quickly (sometimes instantly), often to an extreme (e.g. going from loving and idolizing someone, to absolutely fucking hating them, or from having a neutral opinion on something to suddenly becoming extremely angry abt it) sometimes without even having an identifiable trigger. it links into black and white thinking, which u may have heard of before - u either love someone and they can do no wrong, or u hate them and they disgust you. either something is amazing or it’s terrible. there is no grey area, no in between. it goes back into the whole ‘not being able to regulate ur emotions properly’ thing lmao there’s rarely nuances to our emotions or feelings, we’re all or nothing a lot of the time. so splitting is when ur opinion rapidly changes to one of these extremes. sometimes u can even go back and forth, splitting over and over on the same person/thing which is super fun.

ben splits on his dad all the time. all the fucking time. he doesn’t care about phil at all and wants to ruin him, then he wants phil’s approval and to be welcomed back into the family fold and the business. then ben hates him and wants him dead, then 5 minutes later he wants his love, wants to be a good son again. that’s splitting. u can also see it w jay, too, but no where near as extreme as w his dad. and i’ve seen it a couple of times w callum too, but again, it’s way more subtle. u probably wouldn’t notice it if u weren’t looking for it, whereas w phil it’s obvious.

but like i don’t need to explain ‘unstable and intense interpersonal relationships’, do i? just look at the relationships w phil, w jay, w lola, w callum, even w paul - they were unstable back when they first got together, and were arguably kind of intense too. (he settled a bit w paul, but his death/perceived abandonment fucked him up a lot beyond the expected ways). he’s always arguing w the ppl he loves. he tried to get poor billy killed, and yet since then he’s had no problem w him!! none of his relationships - apart from maybe his mum and ian (i don’t include lexi bc she’s a child) - are stable. and i would definitely describe his relationships as intense lmao

3. Identity disturbance: Markedly or persistently unstable self-image or sense of self

u can see this most - as most things - in his relationship w his dad. he fluctuates between seeming to know his worth (and demanding other people know it too), knowing he deserves his dad’s love and approval (why else would he be so mad abt the fact hes not getting it, if not bc he knows he’s worthy of it? if he didn’t think so, he wouldn’t be so angry abt not getting it - he’d be accepting/understanding, wouldn’t he?) and being desperate to do anything to get his dad’s love/approval, even things that are below him, turning into a child, begging to know why his dad doesn’t love him, why he’s never been enough. that scene where phil had found out abt ben trying to frame keanu and leaving him for dead is the epitome of this. u can see ben fluctuate between a hurt, traumatized little boy, begging his dad for some answers, some explanation as to why he’s not enough, begging him not to start drinking again, and a man who is angry, angry at his dad, angry at himself for crumbling like this, bc he should be stronger than this. u see him change multiple times in that one single scene. go watch it again. you’ll see it too.

some more examples: his absolute certainty that he is better and more qualified than the likes of shirley and keanu for working with his dad, and then being like ‘my dad was right, i’m good for no one’ - they don’t line up. does he have self esteem and know his worth or not? also his entire relationship w callum is an example of this - all those changes in his attitude towards cal and their situation? he often treats callum like they’re equals who understand each other, yet sometimes it seems like he thinks he’s superior to callum (e.g. the scene outside the cafe), and others he behaves (keyword) as though he thinks he’s not good enough for callum (why else would he just take all that shit from whitney and not say anything in retaliation? why, if not because he deems it more important that callum has an easier time of it than he does; that he regards cal’s comfort more important than his own? and why would he do that, if he held himself in such high regards? i mean he certainly acts like it sometimes, so why not then?)

also like……. who is ben? is he the bastard who cares about no one but himself, who’s always causing trouble not only for himself but for the people he cares about? is he the guy who just completely folds when people he knows hurtle abuse at him, accepting it lying down, who thinks he’s no good for anyone? the guy who goes out all night and drinks himself silly and purposefully gets himself into fights? the guy who shows callum so much empathy even tho it brings him nothing but pain, who loves jay unconditionally, who tried so hard to help bobby when he came back from prison? which one is he? which one does he want to be? does he even know?

(and you could argue that people are just multi-dimensional, but there’s just such a vast gap between these different facets of ben’s character and he can flip through them so fast it’s jarring, which is why i think it’s more like he straight up doesn’t have a consistent sense of self. which is a big part of bpd)

4. Impulsive behavior in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., spending, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving, binge eating)

again, does this need explaining?

doing illegal shit, excessively drinking, becoming unnecessarily violent, fucking up his relationships, just generally doing reckless things regardless of the consequences - this has always been a part of ben’s character.

(his constant hook ups could be another one, but the jury’s still out on that one. if anything it’s less the sex that worries me and more the flippant attitude he has when meeting up w ppl - they could be anyone and do all sorts, at the end of the day)

it became most obvious recently around the anniversary of paul’s death - drinking himself sick, gambling all his money away, deliberately starting fights. but even before that and since then it’s been there.

it’s basically just a way to self sabotage.

i feel like this one isn’t a consistent part of ben’s behaviour like the others are, but it is undeniably there, so.

5. Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, or threats, or self-harming behavior

although ben (to my knowledge) hasn’t displayed any suicidal behaviour, he has at times spoken in ways that could kind of sway that way. (i’m no good for anyone, i’m not worth it, why do you care etc)

also self harming!!! just because he doesn’t hurt himself in a direct way doesn’t mean he doesn’t deliberately put himself in situations where he’ll get hurt, and that is self harm!! letting stuart beat him at pride was self harm!! picking that fight w those homophobes at e20 was self harm!!! drinking to excess is a form of self harm!!! putting himself in harm’s way, even if he doesn’t get hurt, is self harm!!!! just bc he might not be self harming in the traditional sense doesn’t mean he’s not hurting himself!!! this one has been on my mind for so long!!!! oh my god!!!!! he absolutely has a pattern of self harming/self destructive behaviours, and just a general disregard for his own safety and well being!!!! the fact that it doesn’t worry more ppl in his life is so upsetting to me!!!!!!

6. Emotional instability in reaction to day-to-day events (e.g., intense episodic sadness, irritability, or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days)

aka the biggest part of bpd: pt 2

i feel like this definition doesn’t really do justice to this aspect of bpd. this is basically you literally having no control of your emotions. ‘day-to-day events’ have fuck all to do with it half the time. u could be sitting there minding ur business and all of a sudden you wanna smash up the entire room, for seemingly no reason. one time i was crying - like uncontrollably sobbing, a complete mess - and had been for maybe half an hour? and then all of a sudden, literally mid sob, it stopped. like it just stopped. i was done, i wasn’t sad anymore. i went from inconsolably crying to perfectly fine in a split second. can you even imagine that? it’s fucking crazy. that’s what having bpd is like. it’s like mood swings x1000 (that���s why i describe it like bipolar on a smaller scale - their mood swings last days/weeks/months, ours last minutes/hours, sometimes days but not often). you can be fine, then all of a sudden you’re not. or you can be not fine, and then all of a sudden you are. you can be ecstatic, then all of a sudden all the joy gets sucked out of ur body n u wanna die. then 5 mins later ur fine again. u can cycle thru every single human emotion in the space of a few hours with no warning whatsoever. u can go from feeling so many emotions u don’t know which one to focus on to feeling none at all. it’s exhausting. so yes ‘day-to-day events’ (this can be as minor as the way someone speaks to you, or not enjoying ur food as much as u thought u would, and it can make u terrifyingly sad or spark uncontrollable rage in u) can trigger it, but it’s like… at least that’s kind of justifiable. most of the time u just cannot regulate, control or predict ur emotions whatsoever. and often the emotions u do feel are not appropriate for the situation at hand lmao

on top of that, ppl w bpd have massive problems processing their emotions. while most ppl have the capacity to identify what they’re feeling and why, ppl w bpd often can’t. and bc they can’t identify it properly, they don’t know how to process it. that’s why emotions and feelings are so often black and white - we might develop the ability to recognise Big Emotions, like love and hate, happiness and sadness etc, but we can’t figure out the smaller, nuanced emotions. it becomes or, not and.

this is also why our emotions feel so big and all encompassing!! we can’t ignore our emotions!! they are our focus in a lot of ways. when ur sad, it feels like the world is ending, every single time. when ur happy, ur euphoric and nothing else matters, and so on. every emotion has the volume turned up to 100. that’s why our emotions sometimes come out in extreme or unhealthy ways - our emotions often feel so big we have such a hard time handling them. so we go to drastic lengths, whatever they may be, to cope.

(also bc most ppl w bpd are victims of abuse, we’re often hyperaware of other people’s moods, which can impact ours. someone can be annoyed for some innocuous, innocent reason, and yet bc we can sense it, we become scared or defensive and may lash out.)

and ben… little old ben, have u ever seen him have a rational reaction to anything in his life? how often have we seen him have an appropriate response to smth? my dad is shit, so i have to destroy him. failing that, i have to kill him. oh, my brother isn’t gonna let kill him? time to punch him in the face. my daughter ate all my cereal? it’s Overreaction Time. (this one in particular is Very Me like yes lexi is a child and he was unfair but my 7 year old cousin once drank all my j2os and i almost had a breakdown so i Get It) i’m feeling like shit? time to antagonise these homophobes until they beat me in the middle of the street. i sleep with this man once? time to get overly involved. he shows me a little bit of love and kindness? time to develop feelings for him despite him insisting he’s straight, the fact that he’s with a woman and i have been harassed and beaten by his homophobic family multiple times. but it isn’t going the way i wanted it to? time to impulsively hit him for not knowing what he wants, then immediately regret it.

and like. he went from crying his eyes out in his dad’s kitchen to threatening kat slater within the span of what, 10 minutes? he went from trying to kill his dad, to falling tf apart w jay, to trying to manipulate his dad - who had just woken up from a coma - for his own gain again, in the span of maybe an hour. if that doesn’t say rapid cycling, inconsistent emotions idk what does.

like idk enough about the old bens to say if this is a consistent characteristic of his or not (although based on the fact he killed a woman bc he was angry w his dad, i’d say it’s fairly safe to assume lmao) but ever since he came back his reactions and emotions have been pretty much never once been rational, stable or consistent.

(and like i wanna say i am saying all of this from the perspective of the bad days. so if you’re thinking ‘well, ben isn’t like that all the time’ ur right. neither am i. some days i’m fine, some days it’s not that bad, sometimes i can cope. but i still have bpd, even on those days. and imo, so does ben.)

7. Chronic feelings of emptiness

this is one i don’t really see in ben. we maybe see moments of emptiness, but certainly not enough to call it ‘chronic’.

also a lot of the moments we do see emptiness in ben, i feel like it’s forced emptiness, more for his own benefit or for the benefit of others rather than actual genuine emptiness. it’s not that he’s not feeling anything, it’s that what he is feeling he’s not showing. that’s very different from actually feeling empty.

8. Inappropriate, intense anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights)

this! is! such! a! massive! part! of! having! bpd! and it’s a part that no one ever fucking talks about either!!!

and again, does this one need explaining?

ben is anger. he’s a ball of it, and he has been for a very, very long time. he’s angry at his dad, at the world, at himself. for all sorts of reasons, both complex and simple. if i sat here and tried to get into all of it this post would be twice as long as it already is. and i don’t think i really need to, anyway. it’s not as if any of us need to dig very deep to see it, is it?

‘frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights’ like i really don’t need to elaborate do i? bc what does ben do when he’s angry? his temper flairs up, he gets physical, lashes out, makes threats.

and he’s so often angry in response to emotional pain, which is the saddest (and for me, most relatable) part. just look at paul’s anniversary, how angry he was just in general, to everyone - even his mum, who is like the only exception to his anger since he’s been back - when he was just hurting and sad. how angry he got when he found out keanu had replaced him in phil’s will, when really he was just hurt. he gets angry and violent so people don’t see him as weak bc he’s hurting. he has been conditioned to get angry instead of getting sad. it’s not healthy at all.

there is so much more but i feel like it’s unnecessary for me to get into it. bc u know. ben’s not exactly subtle in his anger is he lmao

9. Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation or severe dissociative symptoms

this is the only other one that i don’t see in ben at all, and it’s one that i don’t really experience myself either so i don’t even have any insight to offer lmao

so!! more or less 7/9!! that’s a passing grade for diagnosis!!! welcome to the club, mr mitchell!!!!

all of this, of course, has been purely from a medical, diagnostic standpoint (w some of my personal experiences sprinkled in lmao). there’s so much more to say from like a ‘living w bpd day to day’ standpoint but like, this post is already way too fuckin long so i’m just gonna hit on a few that i feel are important in regards to ben, and ones i have’t spoken abt yet

most ppl w bpd have a ‘fp’ or ‘favourite person’ (tho it can be multiple people), which sounds nice but it’s kind of a really complicated and difficult thing tbqh. here’s the best definition i could find: ‘When someone with BPD uses the term “favorite person” to describe someone else, they are typically insinuating that this is a person they cannot survive without. For BPD sufferers, the favorite person is the person who is a source of emotional support and dependence. This individual has the ability to truly impact the BPD sufferer’s day in either a positive or negative manner. The favorite person to someone with BPD holds a critical role in their lives by holding the power to ‘make or break’ the successful navigation of daily tasks and struggles.’ it’s a difficult thing to explain/understand (so please feel free to google ‘favourite person bpd’ to get a better understanding), and is not always as dramatic as it sounds, but it’s like… even if they aren’t a source of ‘emotion support’, ur mental wellbeing can hang on this person’s every move. (which is not healthy, i know, but it’s just a thing that happens w bpd!) and phil is absolutely ben’s fp. ben hates phil, and yet is still so desperate to be in his good graces, in his life no matter what that costs him… and ben’s self esteem, his actions, his moods are so dependant on phil. it just?? makes so much sense to me. i realize it may not make much sense to someone who doesn’t have any understanding of what a fp is, but like if u do, i’m sure u see what i see.

i think maybe jay was another fp of ben for a while in the past. i don’t think he is as much since ben has come back, but in the past?? maybe. like less in the ‘my happiness is dependant on u’ way and more in like a ‘i’m very very attached to u and need u in my life and would maybe go crazy if anything or anyone got in the way of that’ way.

and i think callum might be sneaking into territory now too tbqh. it would explain why callum’s actions and words have such an impact on ben’s moods despite not much really happening between them. and like i wanna say: someone becoming ur fp is not a choice. it just happens. it’s not like ben is going ‘oh im going to get overly attached to u just for a laugh’, no. this would be completely out of his control. and when it happens, it fucking SUCKS. so if that is what’s happening, it’s going to have a massive impact on ben - and it seems like it already is.

and like taking the whole fp thing out of it (bc i know it’s complicated and hard to grasp) bpd would explain why ben seems to be so attached to callum even tho very little has actually happened between them!!! like bpd will have u falling in love w someone who just shows you basic human kindness and decency, and i mean that very literally!!! bc like i said when you have bpd, you struggle to navigate and handle basic emotions, so all the nuances of romance and love? jesus christ. it goes back into black and white thinking - i either love this person or i hate this person, there is no in between. so callum, showing ben kindness? showing him support with what’s going on w louise and what happened w phil? not hating him and thinking he’s despicable and evil and all those things people say about him? and ben, having bpd? he probably wouldn’t be able to comprehend that maybe cal’s just being friendly, esp not after they slept together. so ofc he would latch tf on to that. i would latch tf on to that. his behaviour towards callum just seems very on brand for having bpd to me, genuinely.

and !! all those things whitney said the other night !! people complained about him not arguing back, but like… she’s almost saying what ben wants to hear, when it comes to callum. bc i touched on it before but like the thing is when, you have bpd ur thought process is like ‘i care about this person, they are good, i don’t deserve them, i am bad, i am going to ruin them, i’m probably manipulating them into spending time with me and caring about me, but i can’t let them go, i need them, i bet they don’t even like me, i don’t deserve them, i don’t want them to get hurt, i don’t want to hurt them, i am going to hurt them, in the end.’ (and eventually it spirals into ‘actually they’re probably going to hurt me first bc everyone always does so let me completely destroy this relationship so it’s unrecoverable and hurt them now so they can’t hurt me later’ but that’s another story) and whitney more or less confirms that for him!!! in essence, what she says to him is ‘you’re bad, he didn’t want anything to do with you but you manipulated him into it. you don’t deserve him, you’ve hurt him, you’ve hurt me, how could you do this?’ so like… ofc he’s not gonna argue w her. he’s already had a shit day, all of the fight is gone from him, and he agrees w her!! i’m sure he was thinking that he deserved what whit was throwing at him - not necessarily for what he’d done to her, but because he is Bad and callum is Good and he needs to stay away from him, otherwise he’ll ruin him. bc that’s just what bpd brain tells u, even when u’ve got no basis to believe it. (unless ur splitting or experiencing a big emotional high, but again, that’s a different story)

and that kind of makes sense as to why he’d go to the wedding. going back to the anger instead of sadness thing - he’s hurting, so he’s going to get angry and vengeful. he has been hurt, so now he is going to hurt in return. esp considering both callum and whitney have seen him in such a vulnerable state. it’s probably a pride thing, too.

also just to expand a little more on the ‘unstable sense of self’ thing - ppl w bpd (and also victims of abuse, but sometimes that particular venn diagram is a circle) tend to change the personality based on who they’re with. which is what most people do, yes, but i mean the Extreme version. it’s a trauma response thing - u’ll reflect parts of a person’s personality back at them, or even take bits from personalities of ppl u know they like in the hopes that they’ll like u more like that, as opposed to ur real personality (if u even know what that is). and sometimes those parts stick (esp when you idolize the person u stole them from/they’re your fp), and it’s like u all of a sudden realize ur entire personality is built of parts of other ppls personalities that you’ve stolen. so it makes sense to me that ben seems to have so many differing personalities/sides to his personality, bc he’s learned which parts to show to who, and in what situations - in response to his abuse as a kid, if nothing else.

(and before anyone can even go there: that is not an act of manipulation. it’s a trauma response. it’s something that happens without us consciously having any say in it, as a way of self-preservation. it’s like if i make myself likeable and appealing to u, you’re less likely to hurt me, physically or emotionally. and yes ben has a habit of manipulation, but this is not a part of it. none of ben’s manipulation is directly bc of his hypothetical bpd, it’s bc that’s just who he is. i don’t ever want to see the two equated, or see anyone say any shit like ‘ben must have bpd bc he’s manipulative’, ever.)

just for the hell of it, here are some spicy bpd memes, bc that’s how we communicate on the internet. (here are two in particular seem quite relevant to ben rn lmao + bonus one for phil!!)

so! there we are!!! i’m sure there’s some important stuff i overlooked and that this is not what u expected when u sent me this question, but there are so many misconceptions and stigmas out there surrounding bpd that i wouldn’t have felt right half assing it. and i hope, if nothing else, u learned something abt bpd that u didn’t know before :-)

if u read this far ur a trooper lmao but if anyone has any questions, be they abt ben having bpd or bpd in general please feel free to ask!! i’ll do my best to answer them to the best of my ability 💖💖

[tessacxstello]

hello im (F, 24) an idiot and forgot to post tessa’s (F, 22, fictional) intro!

pls bare in mind most of this was written 5+ years ago n i haven’t written tessa since 2015...... but lets get this show (LOCKWOODRP) on the road (DASHBOARD). 

tw school shooting, tw bipolar disorder

art hoe. always covered in paint. why?? she bad at painting

the mark rothko jackson pollock kind of bad tho wher people are like.... omg.... revolutionary..... its a badly drawn vagina

fuckin loves astrology, but cant take it that seriously bcos one of her bfs was a gemini so there’s some lenience there. but she WILL blame her hormones and mood swings on the positon of mars

embodies pure sunshine. 

one of those really annoying people that can go through the most traumatic shit and still find a positive spin. 

cares so much for others but does not really care for herself n it’s meant she just bottles up all this shit n when someone asks her how her day has gone she just falls on the ground like tht bit in midsommar when florence does that loud wheezy noise and sits down 

has never really had much money at all. learns to make-do with what she has. loves upcycling!! her bookshelf is made from cardboard which she’s reinforced by pappering it over with pages ripped out of thrifted books. her sofa is an old car boot which she’s repainted, put on wheels and stuffed w cushions so that it’s actually bearable to sit on.

her knitted cardigan? its made out of wife material.

knits all the time. will crochet you a christmas scarf. if ur lucky you might get a knitted jumper with a penis in a santa hat

still sleeps with cuddly toys n then wonders why ppl dont think she’s mature enough for a serious relationship

very passionate about Sister Doing It For THemselves!! raised by a single mom who worked her ass off so that tessa could do fun activities after school, have lelli kelly shoes, and go to college (not necessarily in tht order of importance)

tessa was born out of wedlock as the result of an affair between her mom (a journalism intern in her early 20s) and a new york times editor. 

the editor offered to pay tessa’s mom off to have an abortion, but she was like fuck u and told the papers he’d done that and used the money to cover the cost of her internship which they refused to pay her for

and because of the scandal, he ended up going through a pretty messy divorce with his wife, and losing custody of his kids. so as a child  tessa was seen as the cause of a divorce and received mutliple letters from the editors wife (to tessa personally!) and his kids saying how she had ruined everything, but her mom moved them to another town so tessa didn’t have to deal with that crap. 

her mom worked 3 jobs to put her through school, so in return tessa pushes herself incredibly hard to succeed. needs a break and a hug and to get laid to be honest. 

an old soul. likes old films, old music, old people. only recently got an iphone 5s so not really with this century yet

very sweet and soft and kind but also a fucking mess and won’t listen to anyone else’s opinion. she’ll take comfort, but not advice. 

feminist buddhist bisexual vegetarian for human rights and animal welfare. standing on a soapbox shouting about the climate in the quad, shoving flyers into your hands. flyers everwhere. she turns up at your grandmas funeral and shoves one into her mouth. she’s stolen the mic from the vicar to talk about pandas.

says “mother of pearl” and “heavens to betsy”.

had an affair with her married piano teacher and he’s now facing a custody battle and his wife is leaving him and tessa has completely internalised that guilt despite her being the victim in the scenario

aesthetics: paint splattered jeans, loose curls spilling from a scrunchie, thrifted blouses in bright yellow, guzzling coffee in the library at three am when a term paper’s due, shoddily illustrated campaign posters to save endangered species, polaroids plastered to your bedroom walls with scribbled dates on the frames, jumping into a stack of autumn leaves, jumping off piers in the summer months and stripping off your wet clothes on the beach, digging your thumbs into peaches to leave a bruise, smoking with the extractor fan on to hide the smell, bath bombs, letting the girls at lush rub samples all over your skin, cacti with knitted bobble hats, decorative pillows and sun and moon blanket throws, basic bitch fairy lights hanging from every single window, painting the name of the boys you’ve loved inside your wardrobe door.

studies fine art and philosophy, and wants to become either a lecturer or the first woman president. vibe wise, very similar to leslie knope, missy from big mouth, and basically the naive everygirl with a high opinion of themselves trope

gets drunk off like one double vodka lemonade because she’s small and she’s a pretty messy wild drunk. it’s when slutty tessa comes out, and the next day she’ll thoroughly regret every choice made and decide she’s never drinking again and cutting out all men and starting daily sudoko

on the cheerleading team and is a flyer, which she sees as a HUGE responsibility and she works really hard to make sure she’s on it for her team. one of those get up at 7am and go to the gym before school types its sickening

she had a really traumatic time at high school because there was a shooting in her school. she was in the next classroom when it happened, and she lost one of her friends in the shooting. she had to take two months off school, was diagnosed with depression and put on anti-depressants because of it. in her 2nd year of uni she was rediagnosed with bipolar disorder and anxiety, which she’s now on medication for. she can be really good for several months at a time and feel super creative and determined (she actually finds manic periods helpful for her creativity n art, n sadly sometimes doesn’t take her meds in these periods to push herself more which is obvs super bad.....). but when the bad periods come they can also last months n she had to take a semester out of school last year because of her mood, so she should be a senior by now but she’s retaking junior year

she attends weekly stress-management sessions prescribed by her doctor which she finds pointless.

very childish in the sense that she can only see her own point of view and kind of views herself as the “protagonist” and thinks her ideas are super important and life changing and she IS Destined for Greatness! despite being pretty much average af

pinterest board.

STATS

age: 22

height: 5'2"

positive traits: kind-hearted, gregarious, selfless, philosophical, open minded, idealistic, courageous, feisty, charismatic, loyal, adventurous.

negative traits: stubborn, hot-headed, reticent, escapist, self-destructive, easily led, naive, troubled, complicated, stepford smiler, envious, overdramatic, explosive.

distinguishing Marks: heart-shaped birthmark on the right of her chest, splattering of freckles across the cheeks during summer months, full lips, large eyes, porcelain features, long wavy hair, tattoo of a bird and a cage on her ankles and a basic bitch arrow tat on her wrist (srry to anyone with an arrow tat).

skills: jack-of-all-trades, talented pianist, perceptive, knows the correct way to throw a punch, good survival instinct, is able to remain calm in stressful situations, endures, artistic, excels in academic studies, hard-working and self-motivated, expert liar and talented actress.

likes: wolves, vintage thrift store fashion, old leather-bound books, left-wing democratic politics, cigarettes, poetry, John Hughes movies, cold coffee, hot tea, the sound of laughter, staying up til 4am having deep conversations, Tchaikovsky, having deep conversations about life, stationary, DC Comics, horoscopes, winged eyeliner, cats, knee-high socks, house music, abandoned buildings, studio ghibli, the smell of the earth after rain, Wes Anderson films, herbal tea, old people, solitude, esoteric things, the smell of freshly baked bread, Charles Bukowski, the moon.

fears: death, oblivion, global warming, losing those she loves, isolation, clowns, guns, enclosed spaces.

nicknames: Tess, T-Dog, Tessie, Socrates, Princess, Sunshine Girl, Florence Nightingale.

alignment: Neutral Good

MBTI type: INFP

BIOGRAPHY

tw school shooting

Her story begins with Cordelia Costello, a twenty-three year old college drop-out, turned beautician, turned columnist, turned intern at a local publishing company. She was a youthful, beautiful, siren of a women, always surrounded by an aura of enigma and an entourage of men. It was no surprise to the gossips in the office that within six months working at the company, Cordelia had added to her list another title – mistress to Franklin Hozier, the Editor of the New York Times. After two blissful months and three hundred and twenty seven orgasms, Cordelia decided she wanted a baby. Franklin laughed in her face. Feeling isolated and used, Cordelia continued her affair with her boss’ boss for another month, before deciding to take matters into her own hands.

It started with a turkey baster.

Soon the infant cries of a baby girl graced the world, her wrinkled skin puckered and pink as her mother held her in her arms, glancing upon the most beautiful thing in her life. Once Tessa, named after Cordelia’s favourite literary heroine, entered the world, Franklin left her life and things took a turn for the better. Despite living in a rented one-bedroom apartment in Staten Island, on what little money Cordelia had saved, Tessa’s childhood years were filled with nothing but the happiest of memories. Times were tough, but what they lacked in money, the Costello’s made up in love. While Tessa was at school, Cordelia did odd jobs cleaning, child-minding, working in local nurseries, in order to save up enough money to give her daughter the best start in life.

Despite what she had been led to believe by television shows and teen movies, the first few years of High School were some of the best years of her life. Tessa threw herself into a multitude of activities that High School offered her, including the drama club, the orchestra, choir, badminton and the school newspaper. While she certainly wasn’t considered ‘popular’ at school, Tess had a wide circle of friends and acquaintances. In fact, High School was a place where she made some of the greatest memories of her life, but come her final year, it was also a place where she was haunted by some of her worst.

On the January 17th of Tessa’s senior year of high school, a shooting took place in Westville High School. For two hours Tessa locked herself in a supply cupboard, her head between her knees as she tried to stay silent despite the screams of horror from the corridor. Eighteen students were caught in the crossfire, two of which were Tessa’s best friends. Bouquets of flowers, laminated photographs, Teddy Bears in cling-film bags attached to balloons littered the streets as families and friends came to pay tribute to the eighteen students withered before they had a chance to bloom.

It took two months of therapy before Tessa could return to school. Some of the survivors could never return due to the horrors that their eyes had laid witness to. Sometimes Tessa felt like a part of her had died with the friends that were stolen from her too soon, but one thought kept her going through: she had survived, she was alive and breathing, and she could not afford to loose a second of the precious time she had been granted on this earth. Despite the nightmares that continued to haunt her each night, Tessa found in the aftermath of the disaster a new sense of motivation. She began applying for scholarships for colleges without her mother’s knowledge, in the hope that her academic success would be enough to carry her through further education. Thankfully, it was, and after three torturous months of waiting Tess was offered an arts scholarship to her dream school, Lockwood University, where she hoped she could finally start to rebuild her life.

THE PRESENT:

Life at university was like a separate world. Students came and went like moths among the whisperings and the tequila and the stars. In this new world, Tessa was exposed for the first time in her life to alcohol, drugs, and the sexual appetites of other students her age – though she politely declined all three. Instead, Tessa threw herself into the vast array of activities in the hope that by distracting herself she could escape the terrible flashbacks that continued to haunt her. Tessa joined the lacrosse team, despite never having played before, and took up cheerleading discovering a new talent; she joined the musical theatre group, and the film club, and even set up her own acapella singing society. But despite how much she tried to throw herself into student life, her past hung around her like a bad smell, and with the added pressure of the Sinking Ships zine, Tess began to feel the weight of her secret tying her down like a pair of shackles around her wrists.

PERSONALITY:

If someone was to describe Tessa in a single word, it would most likely be ‘bubbly’, ‘open-minded’ or ‘sweet’. But they would be wrong – Tessa is not bubbly, or sweet, or stubborn, or hotheaded, or fiesty, or infectious, or any of the things the world see her as, but merely a numb and lonely echo of the gregarious, halcyon girl she once was. Tessa Costello was one of life’s enigmas. No one knew who she was, for to each person she met she wore a different mask – she dripped confidence, or was painfully shy; she was an exhibitionist, or a brooding wallflower; she took things too seriously, or not seriously at all. She was an actress and the world was her stage, each person she met a different member of the audience in the performance of her life. In truth, Tessa no longer even recognised herself. Insecure, and self-destructive, she tried to hang on to the extroverted, mischievous pieces of herself that everyone had once loved, but day by day it got harder to know what lay in the vacant holes blown through her mind. While she was stubborn and hot-headed, Tessa always saw the best in people, which meant that she was easily led astray. While she had grown up learning to be street smart and astute, she was idealistic and allowed silly fantasies to cloud her mind. By nature, she was passionate, which lead her to misimagine and romanticise those she met. Despite the hell she had witnessed, and the anxiety that feasted upon her, she believed that people were innately good and that to have courage and be kind could cure anyone of their sadness – yet she was unable to cure herself.

TWITTER:

@500daysoftessa: i blame disney films and musicals for my high expectations of men

@500daysoftessa: i am in love with the boy who works at starbucks. today i asked for a double latte and he gave me a tripple, which i think is proof that my love is requited. our children will be smart and talented and beautiful.

@500daysoftessa: little known historical fact: pharaohs were burried with their hands crossed over their chests because it was a popular belief there would be countless water slides in the after life.

[trippz2ill2ace8itout]

🔥🔥🥀🥀Hey xx my name is Izzy Magdalinoz-Martinez, and I am a drug addicted alcoholic with 2 years clean! I’m 22. I have 20 mental illnesses I know rock bottom, hell, trauma , pain, and darkness from top to bottom x I’ve been homeless 13 times, 215 mental hospitals , Trauma occurring 24/7 from 2001-2018.

Here's a list of my doctors diagnoses (they were actually diagnosed , DO NOT SELF DIAGNOSE)

•Bipolar, Schizo-affective, PTSD

OCD , ODD, ADHD, anxiety , depression

Insomnia , autism, anorexia

Attachment disorder , narcolepsy

Borderline personality , multiple personality. Dissociative identity fugue

Critically/clinically insane

Tardive Dyskinesia, body dyamorphia

Dissociative Amnesia

Depersonalization/derealization disorder

Intermittent Explosive disorder

Severe Brain Damage

🌙🌙🔥🔥🖤🖤🥀🥀HUGE TRIGGER WARNING🥀🥀🖤🖤🔥🔥🌙🌙

🥀🥀🔥🔥Hey my name is Izzy && I'm a recovering drug addict && alcoholic x This is the longest I've been sober being out of treatment. I've used mostly every drug there is. Been In 3 foster homes (2 out of 3 were abusive) group homes, unlocked and locked treatment centers, rehabs shelters, crisis centers. Short and long term treatment centers. And boarding cares , no home from 2011-2018 Which none will take me back cuz I've been there to many times. I've sold myself && got tortured abused raped drugged up for drugs and money to raise my unbio son, Anthony. I lost custody cuz of false accusations. I've had multiple near death experiences (some were suicide attempts && some were naturally done) my drug of choice was meth x Most of my life I've gotten abused raped, literally tortured and drugged up. Sold. Prostituted, almost killed. But no pity sympathy or attention pls.

a shout out to my unbio son that I raised as my own, Anthony Castillo-Martinez, I met him at one of the many abusive foster homes. Where it was owned illegally by Andrea/Angela && Jimmy Miller. We got tortured daily. They were not licensed foster parents. I met Lil Toni there and I escaped with him to meet up with Kimberly. We lived in a run down hotel in LA. I became homeless again. Toni got me through so much and even tho I can't find him (he's been gone for years) your my lil baby. I will always love u. U are my world and one day I hope to see u again. I hope you have a good home now. Going to school. Just doing well in general. And I'm sorry for you witnessing what Kimberly was doing to me. I love u babes with all my heart. 🖤

🔥🔥every day and night I deal with

20 mental illnesses

Vivid flashbacks 24/7 of the trauma that occurred 24/7 from 2001-2018

40-80 mental breakdowns all day and night

Not being able to aak for help cuz since I've been in 215 mental hospitals the next time I go I'm going to a state institution

Michael Alvarado Alvaro (my main demon) constantly tortures me

No options cuz: I've been in over 100 treatment centers none will take me back

Been on all medications (dosages, types, combinations)

Being the most high maintenance mental health case in the system of California

My dog slowly dying

My mom being constantly sick

Feeling like I dont belong anywhere

My psyical health is getting worse

-feeling weak

-blacking and passing out

-throwing up

-body aches

-memory loss

-constant headaches, stomach pains , nausea, soar throat , body numb

Narcolepsy

-ear aches , my whole body aching Sinusitis

Being overly sensitive / wanting to save the universe and everyone in it

Fear of telling people I'm not OK cuz:

I feel like a burden

It's the same thing over and over again

It gets tiring

I feel like my existinese is a waste

Being literally possessed by my demons

Being autistic

Not eating and not sleeping

Wanting to hurt myself

Wanting to end it

Wanting to escape

My family doesnt want me home

They would be better off without me

Constantly missing my un biological son Anthony

Hearing my torturours in my head

This is not for pity or sympathy

I'm trying.

Im here for all of u . My 2nd Number: 951-460-8418

Suicide Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

Also u can text 711-711

Don't give up , u matter x 🔥🔥

60-80 mental breakdowns a day vivid flashbacks every day _ nightmares every night. Being a recovering drug addict/alcoholic.

215 mental hospitals, 3 foster homes, 2 were extremely abusive. , bouncing from unlocked, locked, short and long term treatment centers, group homes, rehab, residential, crisis centers, homeless 13 times. Shelters, most of my life I've been literally tortured, raped, abused, sold, drugged up, I sold myself/prostituted, got tortured and abused in every way possible. Sold drugs to get money to raise Anthony "Lil Toni" Castillo-Martinez (why I have the last name Martinez) who I met in one of the abusive foster homes and raised him as my own. Kimberly M. Olivarez was my deceased ex fiance, she made a false accusation that I gave Anthony drugs (not true at all) , CPS took him away. Kim tortured and abused me in any way possible. She called 60+ people every day and night to abuse, rape, torture , almost kill me. I have attempted suicide over 100+ times, my "dad" who I don't consider my dad abused me in anyway possible from age 4 till he died in 2011. I've been abused by several more people. I have been on every single medication for mental health, every dosage, combination, type. In every sort of treatment. They are trying to concerve me again, last time I talked to my therapist, doctor , treatment team etc they said my next admittion to the mental hospital they are gonna send me away to a state institution. Last time they concerved me I was past my 52/50 and I was at this one hospital, I was there for a few months I can't remember, they had a hearing then they took me to court. I already got my criminal record when I was under 18, they cleared it. I lied to the judge and then later on they took me off concerveraship . so let's say I'm suicidal , unsafe, I can't tell anyone cuz of what I just mentioned. When I was 12 years old I for sent to a level 14 (higher level of care) mental health, addiction, behavioral treatment center for over a year. They couldn't even handle me and they were tryna send me to a higher level of care, but that was the highest level of care. The state of California named me "the most high maitence mental health case in the system" from 2011-2018 I had no home. From 2001-2018 there was trauma occurring 24/7. My soberiety date is 9•18•2018. I have a name for myself from several people. Over 200. Have told me I "help everyone obsessively" I get told to put myself first but that ain't ever gonna happen. I don't trust people, I'm extremely sensitive and I can't take confrontation without me breaking down. I don't date at all cuz of the many traumas. I'm a bi-romantic asexual. I'm 22 and I've always been a female. I accept all of u for who u are, no matter what race, color, sexuality, illness, circumstances ur in, etc etc. I can name more, I accept everybody. Everybody needs somebody , we deserve care, love, help , support, acceptance, appreciation, etc etc. U don't kno someone's story, what they have been and/or currently going thru. U matter, ur existence is a huge blessing to this universe. U are doing the best u can and I'm proud of u. There's more but its 2am and my meds are kicking in. Don't judge anybody. I appreciate all of u and I'm here for u. -- Izzy M. Martinez🌹🌺🌷🔥

[hellooogaynow]

1-100

omg ok tbh i forgot that i reblogged that ask thing but thank u fren here u go

1. spotify, soundcloud, or pandora? 

spotify

2. is your room messy or clean?

um ok so my room at my mom’s is technically the office and just full of mine and everyone else’s storage so it isn’t really my room i guess and my room at my dad’s is nearly empty and i haven’t been there more than a couple times in a while and i’ve been crashing at friend’s and family’s houses and living out of a suitcase for weeks so i’m just gonna say i don’t really have a room

3. what color are your eyes?

dark brown

4. do you like your name? why?

alright well this is complicated because i hate the name emily and lately i’ve been going by emmitt for a while and it’s just weird because i feel so disconnected from emily and not super connected to emmitt either and i feel like i should just be a nameless person because i hate being referred to as anything tbh

5. what is your relationship status?

happily in a relationship with someone i really care about

6. describe your personality in 3 words or less

a detached mess

7. what color hair do you have?

my natural dark brown color

8. what kind of car do you drive? color?

ah it’s a purple mini van that’s rusting and dying

9. where do you shop?

target lol

10. how would you describe your style?

almost exclusively button ups and baseball shirts

11. favorite social media account?

tumblr probably i use this the most out of all of them

12. what size bed do you have?

queen

13. any siblings?

i have 2 sisters

14. if you can live anywhere in the world where would it be? why?

i honestly have no idea how to answer this question i don’t have a dream destination or anything

15. favorite snapchat filter?

omg probably the cute cat one that changes ur voice cuz my friends look so cute when they use it

16. favorite makeup brand(s)?

i don’t know anything about makeup

17. how many times a week do you shower?

every day sometimes multiple times a day

18. favorite tv show?

buffy the vampire slayer and dollhouse kill me

19. shoe size?

idk i’m pretty sure i’m a 6

20. how tall are you?

5’1

21. sandals or sneakers?

sneakers

22. do you go to the gym?

no lol but i do plan to start going once i actually move in to my new place and get settled

23. describe your dream date

i want to spend a day in chicago with emily doing whatever we want just walking and wandering into stores and go to a zoo or a museum or navy pier or honestly just anything at this point i miss her so much i don’t care what we do as long as we’re together

24. how much money do you have in your wallet at the moment?

$6

25. what color socks are you wearing?

they’re both different variations of black white and light blue

26. how many pillows do you sleep with?

at least 2

27. do you have a job? what do you do?

yeah i recently got a job in the mental health field and i work primarily with adults with various mental illnesses in a 24/7 supervised living area at the moment it’s mostly individuals dealing with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression, and borderline personality disorder and i help them with symptom management, building the skills they have chosen to work on in their treatment plans, and help them carry activities of daily living so they can become self-sufficient and can transition out and live on their own

28. how many friends do you have?

ah i mean i know i have a lot of friends but as far as really close friends i know i can count on and will most likely always have around i’d say i have about 8

29. whats the worst thing you have ever done?

ah fuck well i went through a really destructive phase in my recent past where i was just in a bad place and i withdrew and lashed out a lot and was super emotionally unstable and i hurt a lot of people and i regret it

30. whats your favorite candle scent?

omg i have no idea i usually just smell all the blue ones and go from there

31. 3 favorite boy names

elliot (this is my favorite name in the world probably)

max

derrick

32. 3 favorite girl names

bennett

caroline

sara

33. favorite actor?

i thought about this for a solid 5 minutes and no one is coming to mind i’m gonna leave this blank

34. favorite actress?

eliza dushku and alyson hannigan kill me every time i watch dollhouse or buffy i’m in love with her

35. who is your celebrity crush?

amber liu

36. favorite movie?

selena

37. do you read a lot? whats your favorite book?

i used to read a lot when i was a kid and the music of dolphins by karen hesse has always stuck with me for some reason idk if it’s my favorite but when i was a kid i checked it out at least once a month on our elementary library visits and even now i always find myself thinking about it

38. money or brains?

well if u don’t have money u can’t survive in this capitalist society so i mean

but if this question is asking what i want in a person i’d want the smart

39. do you have a nickname? what is it?

my family calls me mimi and tbh it’s the only thing i actually feel comfortable with weirdly

40. how many times have you been to the hospital?

i’ve been to the hospital multiple times to visit people but i don’t remember actually needing to be there myself besides when i burned my hands as a child

41. top 10 favorite songs

this is def subject to change depending on my mood at any given moment but for right now:

hold me tight by bts

house of cards by bts

lie by bts

all mine by one ok rock

deeper deeper by one ok rock

we are by one ok rock

decision by one ok rock

clock strikes by one ok rock

como la flor by selena

moon river waltz by shinee

42. do you take any medications daily?

no i had issues with family and insurance so i had to stop seeing my psych and taking meds

43. what is your skin type? (oily, dry, etc)

dry

44. what is your biggest fear?

my mom having anything else bad happen to her

45. how many kids do you want?

this is most likely not going to be my choice lol i don’t have a number in mind if i do have kids

46. whats your go to hair style?

short and whatever it wants to do when i get out of the shower

47. what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc)

well i don’t really live in a house rn but my mom’s house is huge she just moved in and it’s crazy big i’m so happy for her also the house i’m gonna move into soon is p small but still cute

48. who is your role model?

idk probably my mom she’s been through a lot and is still going strong

49. what was the last compliment you received?

“you’re so sweet, you know that?” from a client

50. what was the last text you sent?

“nini

51. how old were you when you found out santa wasn’t real?

tbh i have no idea i was probably in elementary school

52. what is your dream car?

something that runs, is either blue or grey, and magically doesn’t cost me anything to drive it

53. opinion on smoking?

it smells terrible and i don’t like to be around people who smoke

54. do you go to college?

yeah i just graduated

55. what is your dream job?

i have no idea i don’t know what i want i haven’t really thought that far ahead but i love my job so far so i’m alright with where i’m at

56. would you rather live in rural areas or the suburbs?

i don’t really have a preference as long as i’m with and near people i care about

57. do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels?

i don’t think i’ve ever personally done that

58. do you have freckles?

yeah i have a couple scattered around

59. do you smile for pictures?

i make this weird stupid half smile face and i can’t stop

60. how many pictures do you have on your phone?

761

61. have you ever peed in the woods?

i have not

62. do you still watch cartoons?

i never want to not watch cartoons

63. do you prefer chicken nuggets from wendy’s or mcdonalds?

i don’t like chicken nuggets from anywhere

64. favorite dipping sauce?

wait for what

i like soy sauce for potstickers

65. what do you wear to bed?

usually shorts and a t shirt

66. have you ever won a spelling bee?

no i’m terrible at spelling out loud

67. what are your hobbies?

i like to dance idk not much else tho i guess

68. can you draw?

nooooo

69. do you play an instrument?

i played guitar once but i forgot everything smh

70. what was the last concert you saw?

the bts wings tour

71. tea or coffee?

tea

72. starbucks or dunkin donuts?

dunkin donuts

73. do you want to get married?

yes

74. what is your crush’s first and last initial?

e g

75. are you going to change your last name when you get married?

i’ve thought about this actually and i’m mostly just hesitant about how difficult it would be to change my name on like all the legal paperwork and like bills and work things and it just sounds super complicated but i wish it could be easier because i hate where my last name comes from and if i married my current gf we would literally have the exact same name and we would be able to confuse people even more and i just think it would be funny

76. what color looks best on you?

black i think

77. do you miss anyone right now?

yes oh my god

78. do you sleep with your door open or closed?

closed always closed

79. do you believe in ghosts?

yeah i do

80. what is your biggest pet peeve?

ok i get so mad when i go to a friend’s place who has long hair and i’m walking barefoot through their house or i’m sleeping over or i’m under a blanket or something and it just makes me so mad when i feel dumb long single strands of hair in my toes i hate it so much it makes me so mad idk man but this happened to me last night and i’ve been thinking about it ever since

81. last person you called?

ah well the last phone call that i was on was with the director of all the residential living things at my work

82. favorite ice cream flavor?

idk probably chocolate and vanilla with caramel

83. regular oreos or golden oreos?

regular oreos

84. chocolate or rainbow sprinkles?

no sprinkles pls

85. what shirt are you wearing?

black and grey v neck t shirt

86. what is your phone background?

a picture of my gf i took a while back of her from a distance with the river and sunset in the background

87. are you outgoing or shy?

shy with everyone besides my friends

88. do you like it when people play with your hair?

only like a very specific like 2 people but when it’s anyone else i get really uncomfortable with being touched and you’d think that people wouldn’t just come up to you and start touching your hair and telling you how soft it is but it’s more common than you think and it makes me want to d ie

89. do you like your neighbors?

my nonexistent neighbors r gr8

90. do you wash your face? at night? in the morning?

i always wash it in the morning but sometimes i wash it at night too if i feel gross from the day

91. have you ever been high?

nope never

92. have you ever been drunk?

yes

93. last thing you ate?

a blizzard from dairy queen with pieces of brownies in it

94. favorite lyrics right now

ok i’m gonna be honest and just say i’m not in a place to listen to music rn i’ve been listening to exclusively podcasts and i have not listened to a song and not zoned out completely during it in a very long time and no lyrics are coming to mind

95. summer or winter?

summer

96. day or night?

night

97. dark, milk, or white chocolate?

ah milk or white i guess i’m not a super big fan tho

98. favorite month?

june cuz my birthday also gay

99. what is your zodiac sign

gemini

100. who was the last person you cried in front of?

my dad