#mentions of parental abuse

[nerdpoe]

Danny's really, really good at making peanut butter fudge.

Not even Jack can make it better than him.

So when Kord Industries very own Ted Kord himself comes by to look over the weird stuff the Fenton's make, his parents go just shy of begging him to make that fudge.

Mr. Kord very enthusiastically chows away at it, and while Jack and Maddie go downstairs to get more inventions, asks Danny how he perfected the recipe.

Danny answers honestly.

"Well, the only edible things in the house for a lot of the time are peanut butter and maple syrup. I learned to work with what I had."

He's pretty proud of it, but doesn't really get why Jazz turned red or why Mr. Kord got pale.

for those who do not know, Ted Kord is Blue Beetle before Jaime.

[incognitopolls]

"Abusive" includes forms of abuse like physical, mental, emotional, or any other form.

–

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[wilwheaton]

if you know this secret handshake some of us use today, i see you and i’m so sorry.

I don't celebrate Father's Day (or any other Hallmark holiday) for reasons that will not surprise you if you know anything about my life.

But I do celebrate all the other children of fuckers and pieces of shit who survived like I did, who broke the cycle of generational trauma like I and my sister did, whose mothers forced them to praise and worship their abuser "because it's father's day" like mine did, who fucking hate the endless reminders to celebrate the dad we never had (in my case, because he chose not to be a dad to me like he chose to be a dad for my brother. I guess being a bully was more satisfying to him).

I see you, friends. I see you, and I know you see me, and I am both grateful and sad. We know this secret handshake we wish we didn't know. We know a very specific kind of loss that only we know, a type of lingering pain that never really goes away entirely, that can only be reduced to part of the background noise, but can crank itself up to 11 without warning.

I just want you all to know that I see you, and I love you. I know how tough it is, how much it hurts.

I want to specifically make meaningful eye contact with all of my fellow survivors who are also dads, who show up for our kids in spite of the pain and loss. It's such a challenge, and it means so much. We broke the cycle and that is massive. I'm so proud of us.

[hajihiko]

Family Business

[schnuffel-danny]

trying to do an infographic of my headcanons of Jack/Vlad pre-college 😅

it was Them VS The World for years and then Vlad had to go on and die in a freak accident and ruin everything smh 😒

oops they really are just OCs at this point aren't they....

[blu3b3rryj4mp1r3]

Friendly reminder that "I bought you nice things", "I gave you food and a roof over your head" and "I've never hit/physically hurt you" does not justify emotional abuse, neglect or parentification.

And if when being confronted they make you feel guilty and get defensive and passive aggressive saying some variant of "Oh well I must've been such a terrible parent!" and tell you how they bought you nice things for your birthdays and how your basic needs were met, that does not make your feelings and trauma invalid. You're not a bad person or ungrateful for feeling hurt.

[one-time-i-dreamt]

I chased my abusive father on a pogo stick through an American suburb (he was also on a pogo stick) with malicious intent.

[punkstylerecovery]

Generally speaking, your parents often owe you a lot more than you're taught to believe. A lot of people are raised to believe that parents do not really owe you that much beyond food and shelter and that's not true. In fact, you can have parents who give you food, shelter, patience and kindness and STILL deserve more from them.

By being your parents, they've accepted a very special relationship and amount of responsibility for you. Do you know how many people I know whose parents have never genuinely apologized to them? How many people’s parents physically hurt them, how many people’s parents mock their insecurities, how many people’s parents don’t care for their children’s health, how many parents make their children (intentionally or otherwise) want to die? 

And so many people don’t give a fuck. We’re raised in cultures that more often than not treat us to respect our parents in spite of most anything while also teaching everyone that children don’t deserve shit. We’re raised in cultures that more often than not teach us to “respect our parents” in spite of most anything while also teaching everyone that children don’t really deserve shit. It varies but its so common that lots of people don’t even think twice about it. 

But children DO deserve more than they’re generally given. So much more! And so many things that are literally just abusive are considered normal parenting all around the world and that’s vile, especially considering children are the most severely affected by this and have no “societal power” to wield to put a stop to it beyond what they can scramble together through a combination of sheer determination, shock value, strength and fucking luck. 

Not to sound radical, but I think we owe children a fuck ton more than they’re being given now and I think people need to learn so much more about abuse and how that ties into the common underplaying of what we’re owed in parent/child relationships. 

[nerdpoe]

Young Justice is always a little...concerned. With Phantom's living situation. Now they're outright afraid for him, and Bart has decided it's time to Ask An Adult.

It was the little quips. The tiny little things. Stuff that didn't seem to matter to Phantom at all, or appeared to be normal for him, that he didn't realize weren't normal at all.

"Oh, better not hope my mom catches me." "Doing what, staying out past bedtime?" "Nah, using my powers; she'd vivisect me!"

"Another stab wound. Great." "Don't worry Phantom, I've got the med kit-" "Oh, I'm not a baby or anything, I can handle it just fine. Just gimme a sec to take it out."

"My dad has better aim than that." "...Like, when he's hunting, right?" "...At what other times would he be shooting at me?"

"Huh. Not as bad as my parents place. Look; they have a decontamination shower!" "Phantom, this lab has been vandalized to the point of needing a hazmat suit." "Did I stutter?"

Finding out each others identities did nothing to soothe the worry. Tim quietly told the others that every time he tried to run facial recognition, he kept hitting a government firewall he couldn't breach. Phantom never told them his last name, just his first, and 'Danny' is super common.

The thing that really did it though, the thing that made Bart snap and run off to ask Max, was when Danny had a nightmare.

He was talking in his sleep.

"No. Don't-stop. Stoooop. I need...my skin. Mom, no. You can't...peel off...my skin..."

Bart didn't even wait for them to wake Danny up before he was standing in front of Max, talking a mile a minute as he tried to figure out what to do, with Wally staring in horror over a plate of waffles as he computed everything that Bart was saying.

~~~~~~

Danny had a dream about his mom and Skulker arguing about how to skin him. He wouldn't really call it a nightmare, because it was just Skulker, but the scariest thing was Skulker insisting to his mom that it was possible to skin him with a potato peeler. Dream mom was arguing that it was not, and that from a scientific standpoint that was a really piss poor way to preserve a specimen.

He hadn't been begging them to stop hurting him, he'd been whining at them to knock it off.

But when he wakes up, it's to a room full of worried friends and an old man who calls himself Max.

"Kid, I think we need to talk."

[furiousgoldfish]

my parents: punishing and humiliating me under duress and torture for having any kind of reaction, for crying, for complaining, for getting angry, trying to fight back, breaking down or showing any kind of pain and fear

also my parents: increasingly annoyed when they can't easily get a reaction out of me and stooping to worse and more horrid provocations and violence to still be able to get a reaction

[tarucore]

screenshotting this one bc I can acknowledge that I’ve got shipper goggles on and op isn’t about that life which is fair but

I feel like batfam fans misunderstand the term parentification a lot and conflate it with Dick filling a parental role for his siblings, which might be part of the “oldest daughter syndrome” that’s so often pinned on him but that isn’t what parentification actually means

If I say that Dick Grayson was parentified, then that isn’t referring to him taking care of his siblings, it refers to the way Bruce treated him. As someone capable of taking care of his emotional needs and not as the child in need of care in the relationship

Parentification is a term that’s been around for decades, and while having to care for younger siblings might be a part of the definition, it focuses mostly on the role reversal of the parent-child dynamic. I’m not going to get into the psychology of it but being parentified has very little to do with if he actually acted as a parent for his siblings and everything to do with if he acted as a parent for Bruce

This is honestly why I prefer the term spouseification, which is less ambiguous than the term parentification and I feel accurately describes their “equal” relationship and the type of emotional abuse that Dick went through

Also from what I’ve read, Dick doesn’t act as a parental figure for any of his siblings except for Damian. While he might have given extra emotional support to Tim due to Bruce being Bruce, Dick still fits solidly into an older brother role. I’m not even going to touch on Dick’s relationship with Jason which is too weak to even be considered fraternal never mind parental

[arcanecalligrapher]

Outrageous and Terrifying

Have you ever had one of those days where the universe just suddenly takes a massive dump on someone you care deeply for who has been struggling through an awful situation?

That was yesterday for us.

Romana is a twenty-one year old computer science student, coming up on two years into her degree. She escaped her abusive, toxic, controlling parents in November 2021 and has been living peacefully, renting on her own for a year now.

Yesterday afternoon, her parents showed up on her doorstep with social workers and a court order for guardianship. They ordered her into their car, and acted like the fact that they hadn't called the cops yet was them being nice. They guilt-tripped her about how much they missed her for the entire ride back to their house, and then the next morning had to be talked down from taking her phone and computer away twice.

That's what guardianship means, y'all, that she's not permitted to make property decisions. She is not permitted to live where she chooses. She is not permitted to talk to who she wishes. If she attempts to make her own decisions, she risks being held in contempt of court.

They did not serve her the required notice, nor did they serve her lawyer notice. Romana and her lawyer were not contacted by mail; were not contacted by email; and were not contacted over the phone, despite all these methods of contact having been given to her parents and their lawyers.

There was no attendable court session, where evidence could presented or witnesses could take the stand. She has not been permitted her right to look a judge in the eye and say "See for yourself. Ask me what you wish. Do I seem like I'm my own person to you?"

This happened because the justice who signed the judgment did so without reading any of it. Justice Smith did not read the application, the responses from Romana's lawyer, the capacity assessment report, or even the text of the draft judgment that was signed. How in the inkstained void does that happen?

Romana is eloquent, intelligent, and a great friend. She's been stripped of nearly every right at a moment's notice due to the selfishness of her parents. Honestly, I don't really feel comfortable referring to them as her parents, as though she were some upstart teenager depending on them for everything.

In the province of Ontario, there are two adults who want to keep a de facto prisoner and discreetly got the state to rubber stamp it. That prisoner is my friend, someone I care about deeply.

Try to imagine how that feels. Please, put yourself in Romana's shoes, trapped in that absurdist nightmare. Please try to imagine a fraction of the frustration dawning on horror, the confusion dawning on fury.

Ontario has given Romana no help to pay legal fees. There's no program that will help cover it, no charity that will pitch in. I should know. I looked. I know that sounds like an insane state of affairs, but we spent weeks looking and found nothing. She's got only the resources of a college student, barely scraping by with the help of friends, her sister, and GoFundMe.

Romana is just a person. And like any person, she just wants to live a life of basic freedom and dignity.

[five-flavor-soup]

I personally think that basing your interpretation of how Ursa treated Azula on Zuko’s memories shown in ‘Zuko Alone’ is kind… incorrect. You can obviously — they’re the only real images of their childhood we get in the cartoon, other than the tiniest of snapshots in sepia — and that’s fine, but for me personally I just don’t think they’re complete enough.

These memories are from Zuko’s perspective. Not Ursa’s, not Azula’s, not Ozai’s or Iroh’s—Zuko’s perspective, his memories. And they’re all about him and Ursa together: every one of these memories have Ursa at their centre. We see her protect him and be kind to him, see her be physically affectionate and gentle, see her encourage him to be kind to himself and to Azula.

They essentially tell us that Zuko is Ursa’s son first, Ozai’s son second. Ozai remains a hovering, intimidating shadow on the sidelines (we still don’t see his face, we don’t see him genuinely interact with his children, and we see him irritating his father while being a very hands-off kinda dad himself) but Ursa is fully present. And ‘Zuko Alone’ is about Zuko trying to figure out who he is: the memories show that he views being his mother’s son as an exceptionally important part of his identity, which means they are about Zuko and his relationship with Ursa alone.

They are not supposed to tell us that Ursa neglected or abused Azula emotionally—that she only focused on protecting Zuko, while leaving Azula to suffer in Ozai’s incapable hands. Sure, we see Ursa scold Zuko for acting like Azula and cuddle him right after, and we see her scold Azula for acting mean and not cuddle her right after, but the key differences here are that Zuko shows guilt after frightening the turtleducks and Azula doubles down on trying to scare Zuko. The behaviour is different and will be, by any halfway decent parent, treated differently. 

I’m absolutely not saying that Azula wasn’t abused, because she 100% was. She was absolutely abused by Ozai, and I’m not ruling out that Ursa didn’t have a hand in how Azula ultimately turned out. But my point here is: these memories are far too limited and narrow for the viewer to properly determine whether Azula was treated incorrectly by Ursa. 

Zuko isn’t going to remember an intimate, lovely moment between Ursa and Azula when all that’s on his mind is his identity, and how it’s entangled with his mother and what she may have sacrificed for him. Additionally, he’s not particularly fond of Azula at this moment in the show (she did kind of kickstart his being a refugee, disregarding how the audience sees this sequence of events having begun), so he’s not going to remember her fondly either. Why would Zuko try to remember Ursa’s relationship with Azula at that point, instead of his own?

(Small tidbit: we also... don't know if Ursa's last words to Azula were 'what is wrong with that child', disregarding the comics which completely ruin azula anyway. Again, the memories are from Zuko's perspective and therefore won't show any private moments between Ursa and Azula. We're not even certain whether Azulon actually ordered Ozai to kill Zuko, or if that is simply what Azula interpreted it as/thought would be funny to say--causing the sequence of events that ultimately put Ozai on the throne. But whatever)

[vikingpoteto]

I've seen people compare Lucas setting up a meeting between Jean and Grayson to Luther bringing Drake to see Andrew, but I don't think that's fair or accurate. I think Lucas parallels Nicky in this situation.

Yes, Lucas had more than enough evidence that Grayson harmed Jean, just like Luther heard from Andrew that Drake was an abuser.

However, Lucas' denial comes from a place of grief. Lucas loved his brother, he couldn’t accept that the person he grew up with became such a monster. Even though Grayson had been violent towards Lucas himself, there is a part of him that refuses to believe Grayson would go that far. Until the last moment, Lucas was telling himself that his brother couldn’t be the villain (even though a part of him suspected the truth, given the fact that he tries to keep the gate closed between them.)

Just like Lucas, Nicky knew it was unlikely his parents were going to accept him but he wanted to try again, unlikely as it may be.

Lucas asking Jean to follow him as a desperate attempt to get his brother back isn't different.

[phoenixyfriend]

A recurring thought I have about neopets is that, all evidence given, they are not pets. They are children. They have human intelligence. The vast majority of work is done by other neopets who happen to be adults, since the fairies are usually too busy being bitchy at each other to, you know, do real work.

But we dress them up. We decide what they wear, and (most of) what they eat, and what they read, and what they train, and how they fight, and what toys they play with, and what their skin looks like, and are basically their lords and masters. If we get bored, we can just… put them in the pound.

Neopets users are really shitty teen parents who all ended up 'my child is an extension of myself.'

This is surely a thought people have had many times over the past twenty-plus years of virtual pet care, but I have been rolling it around in the brainflesh for a few months now.

Also I mentioned this in a server and @thelifestoryofkara brought up that an added complication is the whole "Neopets can and will eat other neopets." She was thinking blumaroo steaks, but I managed to ruin everyone's day a little by revealing that all Chocolate Kougra Paws come with the item description:

No need to worry - we declawed this paw before dipping it in [dark/white/mint/milk] chocolate.

[uncanny-tranny]

It's weird how people paint "daddy issues" and even "mommy issues" as, like, a joke or a failure on part of the person who has those issues, rather than recognizing that daddy and mommy issues stem, for so many people, from abuse. What this all is is just abuse apologia, and nobody seems to either notice or maybe even care.

When somebody with daddy or mommy issues opens up about the "why," I can't ever seem to shake the fact that they tend to have gone through a ton of abuse and bullshit as a child. It's just crazy that other people would look at that and see a joke or a failure of the once-child who was abused.