#more pontificating on Ichigo's character

[orenonahaichigoda]

Ichigo (and Chad, and Uryu) and Skinship (Platonic Physical Affection)

For what it's worth, it'd be easy to picture Ichigo as longing for physical affection like hugs. Any kind of skinship, really. First canon, and then what him being trans adds:

Canon: When he was young, he was quite a crier, and his mother, a living sunray, would always comfort him. She's almost always seen at least holding his hand. It's not hard to imagine she was a hugger. Sure, Ichigo is seen hugging Yuzu a couple of times, but he's the one there for her. It would take care of the completely neurophysical aspects of touch starvation, he wouldn't get as bad as I've seen some people put forth that some of the non-Nel Arrancar might be (seen one or two fics about Grimmjow, in particular, and it wasn't hard to imagine).

Issin cries crocodile tears as a gag, but we never see him exactly look Ichigo in the eye and tell him earnestly... anything, except in S1 at Masaki's grave. So he might tell his son his *mother* loved him *once a year.* It's clear he loves his kids, and that they don't doubt that (like they do his sanity), but again, he's not emotionally open in any honest way. Just manic gags.

Chad and Uryu are probably the people he would be most likely to feel he could fall back on. If you want to envision that literally, that could work, too. There's an episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show spinoff Rhoda that...most of you are too young to know, but the main character and her husband are made to do a trust excersise where this is literal, and slapstick ensues. And this fits somehow.

But anyway, yeah, in a way, Kubo told a story that was coincidentally very American Gen X-esque. The kids, none of them really has a parent *there for them,* for that age group in Japan (20 year generations are not universal, so there's a couple in those years, but I'm Post Dankai Juniors,and so is Kubo), latchkeyism wasn't really a thing. But anyway, these kids, Kisuke and Yoruichi are really their best adults from the beginning. Kisuke will make sure they go forth as prepared as possible, and Yoruichi tries to go along to watch them. Others come in and out. Hachi almost takes on Orihime,But this is quickly ditched/forgotten by the narrative. The Vizards mostly only support Ichigo for a time. In the epilogue, wecan assume that Hiyori remained supportive of Ichigo when the rest went to Soul Society (leaving her after 100+ years herself...), as Kazui knows her by name and they seem to have a banter routine. But the epilogue was two chapters. For that matter, we don't see what became of Kisuke's family or Nel and Grimmjow at all.

Chad... had his band mates in the beginning, but they get quickly forgotten. We have no idea who he has. Before he can work, there must be some financial support, but it could be as clearly distant as Orihime's. Uryu... Ryuken is an emotional wall, clearly loves his son, but only knows how to show it practically and financially. He is as warm and cosy as those new all-steel-and-black kitchen designs. Even when his son is unconscious and can't hear him.

But focusing on Ichigo, because that's my muse, he's the best off of the gang, but his role is mostly*giving* support. Giving support is kinda his happy place, sure, but he's still a kid, and also, everyone needs to *get* support, too. You can't invite a homeless person to a hot meal if you don't have any food yourself.

My stuff:

So, men don't tend to receive much physical affection. If you're cis, you may compartamentalise it as physical affection being hugs for small children, claps on the shoulder from friends, and sex as a adult.

When you're trans, and you transition, you suddenly notice hugs are harder to come by. One of the great things about always having had mixed friend groups is female friends will hug you (when they know you're really a friend and not a creepy grabber) Women are freer with skinship, period, because men are stigmatised against it by machoism/sexism against women (it makes you "girly," which is posited as worse than death. It affects men, but it's from anti-woman bigotry) so men with male friends are always a distance apart and more emotionally reserved. And you'll notice you're expected to be that.

If we're in my verse where Ichigo and Chad have a daughter,well, *they had a baby together, obviously touching is not off-limits* even if they're no longer an item, per se.

And Ichigo had two things happen during transition that I didn't: death of the emotionally open parent, and leaving childhood. I had both of those happen as well, not just one, but decades before transition. So it was very clear once I started passing where the sudden distance was coming from. And easy to place--remember, always mixed-gender circles. So he might not automatically be able to assign anything a cause. And also, I can't exactly be sure of the amount of skinship-type stuff in older-teen/adult female relationship in Japan, even if I can say the emotionally open part remains the same on both sides of the pond. I came to the US as a teen.

I still feel like he might notice the sudden drop in open affection from others in general, that are not young children that rely on him some way or another (including his sisters, Yuzu in particular, canon included. Karin has accused her of hero worship...)

Either way, it would have tanked when Masaki died. I just kind of added another reason for it to. And since he would have had it, from her, at least in canon, in my stuff, in spades before that whole time, and there would be a loss he would definitely feel. Again, less so if we're further from canon for him and Chad both, though, because they've broken past the no-touching with each other.

I wasn't really intending to *go anywhere* with this, per se. I'm just stuck at home again because of what is probably 退行性関節症 and live alone, and don't take work home, I opened Tumbler, and this is where my thoughts went.

One cool thing to think about is I'm sure the majority of modern fiction really wouldn't change whether a character was cis or trans. I'll tackle the epilogue in a second, but for example, in my project, Kenpachi is trans. He's AFAB... Nothing changes except it's as far from that transphobic thing on this site a few years ago "trans men are all soft little flowers" as you can get. Most of the characters, nothing would change. Even the younger kids, to go all out here, the girls could be on puberty blockers, and several years of HRT in the epilogue. I'm not writing that anywhere, but I'm trying to make a point. Nothing changes.

In the epilogue, or for any former or timeline couple with kids, obviously both parents would have to be trans, as these are all M/F couples. The only case against Orihime being flippable to trans is how the heck would she be getting her hormones. She'd have to, as I have Ichigo, been on them for some time pre-series. And puberty blockers beforehand. Sora could've done that much, but voices only naturally drop, so intense training or puberty blockers to estrogen, which, after Sora's sudden death, would be hard for her to procure.

It'd be just as easy to flip Uryu the same as I did with Ichigo. Doctor dad.

Chad, honestly, he is just such a blank slate in many ways. Anything with him needs to flesh him out more. You can really go banananas. Obviously, I write him cis, but I still had to add more for him than for any of the teen combatants. He's as unfleshed as Chizuru, who I also went banananans with.

But, I mean, honestly, though, other than the fact it would be very hard for some characters to obtain any treatment they needed, it kinda doesn't change anything...

This is the beauty of fandom overall. Fans all putting our own ideas and works out there.

[orenonahaichigoda]

About Ichigo's Compartamentalisation of AFAB Programming, Emotions, Masaki's Death

Anything pre-series that doesn't affect canon much will generally follow my verse so long as no one I'm playing with would be affected by it, unless they would like to play in this setting. (This does include Ryuken and Uryu RPers for ones that would have to opt into Masaki's backstory. What will always be true is what went unresolved when Masaki died, and Issin's failing to teach emotional health is pretty canon. Anything else, anyone playing with me opts in/out, but the choice is there if you like)

My verse: Souken Isida was South African, mostly Black, and a small part Japanese. Mrs. Isida was white, according to the original definition, of Dutch blood. Masaki and Ryuken were often kept apart growing up as well, by Apartheid. Kanae was Japanese, and in real life, the Japanese went from being Coloured to being white around 1960. Everyone was legally assigned one of the three classes, and mandated to carry passbooks of their designation everywhere. There were things like trying to pass a pencil through someone's hair, witch hunt games to take away others' white status. Anyway,this is also when Souken established contact with a distant relative in Nagasaki, who would sponsor them immigrating to Japan and save them from further brutal violence.

The one unfortunate thing Masaki brought with her was colonial views on queerness, from her son's gender identity to being ashamed of her husband's and her own bisexuality. Masaki promised to set aside some time and truly try to listen to her newly out son, as Issin, born and raised in the fairly queer-friendly Edo period, had already put forth solid evidence that insistence that it was "a phase of playing pretend" would only deeply hurt their son, something that horrified Masaki to tears to realise she'd been doing.

However, she would die in his arms before they could talk.

Ichigo has never really quite made peace with this. Similar to Orihime/Sora/Hairpins except not really anger and yelling, and it's not so much a regret as something that just never got resolved, words of acceptance Ichigo never got to hear.

There's a lot of reasons why going to her grave and really facing that she's dead sends him into a spiral. Another is here, she died much later, Ichigo was twelve, and here, he got pregnant really young, at 13, but while Issin was still learning about hormone therapy, so it also really drives the point that Masaki didn't live to see Yasuko, because only another 14 or so months, and she would have. There's a lot that he really just tries desperately not to think about there. And the wound of her death is fresher here than in canon, if I am using this verse.

(Eventually, in my project, they find her in Soul Society's Korea, and she says something like "I'm so proud of the man you've become," and that seals that. And she and Issin both start dating Ikumi, which of course, they're cool and older and she's closer to Ichigo's age, so that's part of her arc, etc)

As for RP, this is one of the reasons he's more guarded about being stealth than might be really necessary in his environment. He did deal with someone he thought the world of not believing him, not just kids looking for reasons to pick and right-wing outsiders, and they were denied the ability to patch it up.

AFAB people on both sides of the pond are also taught to "Be a good girl." As in "Be a good girl and make everyone happy by hugging your creepy grabby uncle" kinds of things. Orihime clearly suffers so much from this. She's actually a really good example of it. (Ideas for RPing with an Orihime?)

Ichigo got a bit of both growing up. Issin listened to him from the beginning and renamed him, which is why he still fits the fruit-naming theme.

As a man, it's your duty to protect.

As a woman, it was your duty to sublimate yourself for others.

Add the fact that the planned talk with Masaki would've been highly unusual, as Kurosakis just tend to bottle things up, and this is why Ichigo doesn't consider himself much at all.

If someone comes at him with a fist, well, that's easy to fight back, although maybe not as important as someone coming at someone else with a fist.

But he doesn't WANT anyone to know about his anxiety, his depression, his trauma at becoming a child soldier for a dystopic martial law government sent in to fight unstoppable beings.

The only thing is in the end, he is a teenage boy, as subtle as a category five hurricane, as teenage boys are wont to be. In canon, most turn blind eye because they are too focused on what they think is best for him. Here, if your character is willing to see it, it's right there. If he has his non-canon daughter in the thread, she sees it clear as day, and she's four.

He'll resist. He's got that AFAB training that his feelings are a burden. And he wouldn't know how to name them if he wanted to, because Issin hasn't exactly modelled emotional health, here. Ichigo sees himself wholly as someone there *for* others.

NONE OF THIS IS HEALTHY. I'll say that because naturally, there are people probably young enough to be my kids here, so I do need to say that. He's not okay, and he needs help. He needs a lot of things. He probably won't be able to talk about a lot of this with a counsellor, which is really unfortunate, but this isn't something to aspire to.

But healthy and peaceful doesn't make a page-turner, although getting there does.