#is my obsession with them healthy?

[mundivagantsoul]

Debating if I vocalise my thots and headcanons of bookshopist moonboys because all I do during my shifts is think about them and working with them

(Not my gif)

[stil-lindigo]

bedside bouquet.

--

a sapphic comic about a village girl and the fae she fell in love with.

creative notes:

[tangledinink]

new gemini update was so good as always but I can't stop thinking:

big mama: there's nothing wrong with my sons

splinter: you fucked up two perfectly good kids is what you did. look at blue. he's got an eating disorder

wwhhhattttt? nooo, don't be silly. leo doesn't have an eating disorder.

leo and donnie have eating disorders--

[cursedbygacha]

I love fakers. I love characters who hide their true selves behind masks to please others. I love characters who mask to fit in. I love characters who put so much effort into their act to seem effortless. I love characters who’ve been masking so long they don’t know where the line between their mask and their true self lies anymore. I love characters who think that this is the only way to survive and try to buy into their own act but bits and pieces of their actual selves poke out.

[corpsentry]

a love like burning

[sciderman]

dr peeper blocks ur peeper

😔

[keshetchai]

As someone who enjoys religion blogging/discussions, I've come to realize that it's a good practice to be aware of the general signs/symptoms of religious-OCD thinking (aka scrupulosity), because if the conversation is taking on all the hallmarks of scrupulosity, it's actually a definitive sign that we cannot meaningfully and compassionately engage in a conversation about religion in a healthy way. I've actually had this play out a significant number of times online, and when I realized what it was, I also began to realize that the intrusive thoughts/obsessive and compulsive thinking are only ever fed by continuing the discussion with that person.

[[ Important edit to clarify why I am saying it's not healthy — made after I went back to look for more concrete facts about OCD or anxiety (I have GAD, not OCD, but many resources overlap since they're both anxiety disorders):

When Reassurance is Harmful — this explains how/why reassurance-seeking specifically about an OCD fear is a compulsive behavior, and engaging with reassurance-seeking interferes with recovery/management/treatment.

This table from the Anxiety Disorders Center lists key differences between Information Seeking and Reassurance Seeking.

This IOCDF page on Scrupulosity info for Faith Leaders identifies "symptom accommodation" as enabling. Two of the examples of doing this by participating in the OCD behavior are: "Engage in excessive conversation focused on if-then scenarios (e.g., "If I did this, then would X or Y happen? And what if Z was involved? How about W?")" And, "Repeatedly answering questions about ‘correct’ religious or faith practices."

That page also goes on to outline more info about reassurance seeking. "Although providing answers to (often simple!) questions may seem harmless, providing reassurance serves to maintain the anxiety disorder cycle." (This BMC psychiatry article cites a lot of related studies establishing this.)

The IOCDF page on What is OCD and Scrupulosity? ]]

Imo, the responsible thing to do is to recognize that (even if the other person hasn't outright stated it/isn't diagnosed)* the conversation is not about religion, it is about needing mental health support from professionals and experts. Talking to me, the layperson who enjoys chatting theology and my religion — is not only not helping, but is actively harmful. I'm not just talking about the person who I replied to today, either. Like I've said, I've seen this happen dozens of times in various online forums.

*[while I am against diagnosing strangers on the internet, it's important to realize A) lots of people don't know what Scrupulosity is, so it's possible they've never considered this is a mental health concern that could be treated, and that B) for the purposes of my concern, it doesn't matter if they actually have diagnosed OCD. The only thing that matters is that their thought-process causes them genuine distress/fear, and every response given to them seems to only incite new/additional distressing questions/thoughts, or further entrenches the original distress.]

Ultimately, any discussion aside from "you might want to speak to a mental health professional about scrupulosity OCD" seemingly puts me in the position of feeling as if I am being used for their self-harm. I hate that feeling. I do not want to be leverage for fear and pain. I have GAD, I despise the idea that I am making things worse.

No matter how much I love religious discussion, the answer in these cases is always "please reach out to an OCD specialist/mental health professional. I am not qualified to discuss this." And then to stop there. I have never once seen anyone stuck in this compulsive thought spiral be reassured or feel any better by hearing from someone else's approach to theology handled with things like empathy, compassion, logic, or even atheism. It doesn't matter what we say, how we say it, or how we relate to our own religion. The urge to engage in this kind of conversation in order to chat about religion is a sign that we are not equipped to help.

You can't have a conversation here, because intentionally or not, ten times out of ten, you are adding fuel to the fire. Just like people can't simply tell me something that would erase/talk me out of my ADHD/depression/anxiety disorder, you also cannot simply argue/reassure/persuade people out of scrupulosity. We should not try. We have a responsibility to consider that it's outright harmful to do so, and to disengage.

[freedominthedarkmp3]

This morning I went to a hairdresser who specializes in curly hair and yall this is life-changing 😭 my hair has never been this curly in my life and she barely touched it, just treated them in the correct way & taught me how to do it by myself at home 😭 I'm so happy

[noahsbsf]

As promised: here are some icky alenoah sketches!

GUYS LETS ALL REMEMBER NOAH CANONICALLY HAS A BIG HEAD.

[kicktwine]

made a ninjago oc but all it wants to do is party

its name is WULFTRAX (all caps) and it’s playing this with zane extra info belooowww

pronouns: IT'S PRONOUNCED WOLF TRACKS LITTLE MAN (it/he/they) species: WULFTRAX. digital? like, it HAS skin, and a skeleton, presumably, just… not a human head. likes: game, rave dislikes: no rave wants: to party character motivation: biggest loudest party backstory: we think it came from prime empire, but that’s all we got. maybe an unused rhythm game dj…? strengths: WULFTRAX does everything at 100%, and it doesn’t tend to stick around after a fight. it isn't fighting to win, it's fighting to go hogwild. on its back are one to six doc ock-like arms made of wire and interwoven with the stuff in season 9 that triggered everyone’s elemental powers. weaknesses: can only attack on the beat, will only fight if there’s music. it’s actually not that strong, its robot arms and machinery do all the fighting. it prefers to fight/party using someone else — elementals party pretty hard, all their colors and glowing and exploding is its favorite. alignment: very chaotic neutral. it does things on impulse and regardless of morals. he doesn’t seem to want to hurt anyone, just wants to party, and if hurting someone is how you gotta party, shrug! you can sway him pretty easily with the promise of a better rave. it’s not that clever, there is no scheming with this thing, but it does somehow get a lot of machinery and builds massive batteries and speakers and light shows

speech conventions: IT TALKS LIKE A FRAT BOY MET A CHRONICALLY ONLINE GAMER. NOT THE MOST COMPLICATED SENTENCES LMAO.

it also yells like everything it says due to the speakers in its mouth. its favorite people to mess with are kai, jay and lloyd. they have the shiniest explodiest powers, and are more split-second competitive.

[toaster-fire-art]

There's something to be said for shades of gray

(they have consumed my every thought)

[shadowedvales]

when jane's powers return in season four (and because they were regained by her confronting and accepting her past, rather than being retraumatised with it!) they're stronger than they ever were. when she starts getting a handle back on them, she very quickly comes to realise not only have they affected her, but her mother, too. one of the biggest losses that came about with her losing them was the fact that she could no longer visit terry in the void; while there was no real communication there, it did allow jane to sit with her, and gain a little more connection than she could in the real world. when she first visits the void after their return, it takes her three hours to find terry, something that is both unexpected and incredibly worrying. but when she does, it's something of a miracle. jane's increased strength and control over the void actually wakes terry up from her catatonic state, but only in the void. there's no way to help her mother physically, but she does do so (unbeknownst to her) mentally. terry is reborn in jane's newfound control over the vale of shadows; she becomes the woman she once was, and while her body remains frozen in a "good dream", her mind connected to jane's own allows her some freedom. jane is able to speak to her mother in the void, is able to be held by her, and while it's still unfair and jane cannot stay in there forever, it's something. this only lasts for about eight months, as each visit slowly begins deteriorating terry's physical and mental state, and jane's health begins declining after spending hours upon hours in the void each and every day.

when jane finds out these visits are actually killing her mother on the outside, she deems to stop, but terry expresses the importance of them being able to speak, that she'd prefer to die on the outside, if it meant she could have just a few months with her daughter like this. terry and jane's connection was always so strong, which ultimately led to terry "waking up" in the void, but even jane's newfound strength cannot save her from the harsh realities. each visit nearing the end of those eight months, terry fades more and more, becomes weaker in the void, and her real body eventually gives up. jane's in the void when her mother eventually passes on, and physically feels their connection weaken, like some part of her suddenly becomes lost in the shadows, a part she'll never find again. jane falls into a depressive state for weeks after her mother's death, given she's technically lost her a second time, but soon comes to realise she was lucky to have even shared those eight months together. it was better than nothing at all. there is a proper burial and funeral, (and when jane dies, she's buried next to her mother) which allows jane some sense of closure. she never fully recovers from losing terry, nor from the fact that she never had a proper relationship with her, but she does eventually find some peace with it all.

[lycanr0t]

its funny to ship something but have 0 interest in exploring it in art/etc.

i do ship chil/senshi and love cute art of them but i genuinely think they would be so good for each other in a normal healthy way that its completely boring for me to explore myself since i favor the strange and fucked up

meanwhile i think laios and chil COULD be healthy i guess if the stars aligned but its more likely to be a unbalanced complicated obsessive mess where they hurt each other and need each other and get so tangled in their feelings for each other they basically eat each other alive 🤷‍♂️

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[morverenmaybewrites]

I dont wanna say this but girl we should stop being obsessed with dead people. It's unhealty

What do you mean, anon? Do you mean Yoriichi Tsugikuni?

Or Kyoujurou Rengoku?

Because let me tell you, anon, I am not on this site because I have healthy coping mechanisms. Like. At all.

[death-limes]

I apologise in advance for the Devil's Sacrament outing but I found you in the notes of another post & remembered that you were my favourite Homestuck blog back in the day. Hope you're doing well now!

no devil's sacrament outing here, i was there and i sucked his dick 🤘

which is to say, my active time in the homestuck fandom was one of the happiest in my life. pretty much the only ~community~ i've ever really belonged to. i could go to any con on Thursday and have a new friend group by Sunday, guaranteed. 🥰

anyway, thanks for saying hi! i'm doing okay now, though I don't draw nearly as often, and I post even less. :T but I'm trying to change that! it definitely gives me motivation when i get little reminders that people really did like my shit & still remember me.