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void-galaxy-shenanigans · 3 years

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Infodump/Long Post: Caffeine, Sugar, Dopamine, & ADHD

Hi. I’m Nico. I don’t usually infodump on here but Aiden did before & fellow neurodivergent people seemed to enjoy seeing nd centered content, & people gave him a lot of attention, so…

Here goes I guess. I hope y’all like it.

It’s gonna be a bit long but I found it fascinating so—

So first important thing is, this is based on research studies I found & theories I know, as well as my own observations, & may not be absolutely perfect because of that. But for the purpose of sharing information I’m going to tell you the theories & findings & build from there. Just bear in mind these aren’t set in stone & knowledge could change in the future - this is based on recent/current findings & understanding.

((& I don't want any arguing about the theories, the existence of ADHD, the addictive nature of caffeine/sugar (that's not the central topic here), or the way I formatted this in replies/reblogs please))

——

So many of you may know that ADHDers are affected differently by caffeine (coffee) than non-ADHDers (& neurotypicals). It’s actually been so consistent that I can tell if someone is ADHD or not based on their reaction to coffee - even before they’re diagnosed. It’s generally accepted that stimulants affect ADHDers differently. Coffee/caffeine usually puts ADHDers to sleep, or makes them drowsy, or makes them very focused, & it’s sometimes baffling as an ADHDer that some people can drink coffee to feel energized & jittery (it feels like a lie sometimes). That’s not to say that people who aren’t put to sleep by caffeine can’t have ADHD, but it’s very common to be put to sleep/calmed down by coffee.

Based on my personal experience with coffee, I’ve had a 20 ounce black coffee put me to sleep for four hours. I also, just yesterday, had a 20oz sugared latte & ended up hyperfocusing on this (topic of infodump), rewriting an intro template we made around a year ago, & writing stories (a special interest of mine) for around 6-8 hours total.

Now I think I might know why.

So I suspected the other day that maybe it had something to do with dopamine, & I did some research on how caffeine affects the brain. But because I also know sugared coffee (e.g. syrup-flavoured lattes, which is what I prefer) seem to have a different affect (especially depending on how much sugar you use), I looked into how sugar affects the brain too.

——

This is gonna use a few technical terms so I’ll explain them first for anyone who doesn’t know—

Adrenaline/Epinephrine: “A hormone your body can release (especially when you’re under stress) that increases blood circulation rate (quickens heart beat, strengthens force of heart’s contractions), breathing speed, & carbohydrate metabolism, & prepares your muscles to be used. It’s part of the human ‘fight or flight’ response to fear, panic, or perceived threat. An adrenaline rush can feel like anxiousness, nervousness, or pure excitement as your body & mind prepare for an event.”

Adrenaline Simplified - It gives you heightened energy, excitement, strength, & alertness, & a lot of it will make you jittery, anxious, or panicky.

Serotonin: A neurotransmitter compound which constricts the blood vessels and acts as a neurotransmitter. It’s responsible for influencing/stabilizing mood, feelings of well-being & happiness, cognition, reward, learning, memory, & numerous physiological processes (nausea & vasoconstriction (narrowing (constriction) of blood vessels by small muscles in their walls to slow blood flow)).

Serotonin Simplified - reduces depression, regulates anxiety, heals wounds, stimulates nausea, maintains bone health, helps with sleeping, eating, & digesting, & regulates happiness, well-being, & mood stability; it’s a soother & a happy chemical. A lot of it will make you extremely energetic & jittery.

Dopamine: “A neurotransmitter compound. When dopamine is released in large amounts, it creates feelings of pleasure (happiness, achievement) & reward, which motivates you to repeat specific behaviours; low levels of dopamine are linked to reduced motivation & decreased enthusiasm for things that would excite most people. It controls mental & emotional responses but also motor (physical) reactions. Known for being the “happy hormone”; responsible for the experience of happiness. The anticipation of most types of rewards typically increases the level of dopamine in the brain (anticipatory pleasure), & then you get a larger dose later when you get the reward.”

Dopamine Simplified - It’s your happiness/pleasure response to achievements, rewards, praise, etc. It functions as both motivation & reward, & when it’s functioning properly it’s what keeps you focused on tasks until they’re done.

Residual Dopamine: Dopamine that’s “floating” around in your brain, ready to be deployed as needed to motivate you & help you get through less fun tasks.

Temporary Dopamine: Dopamine that you get as a reward from things like beating a level in a video game, winning the lottery, etc. (accomplishments); is released after an accomplishment or event is over.

Note that typically, these chemicals (dopamine, serotonin, & adrenaline) are supposed to be balanced, & they’re supposed to be generally not very difficult to get. In mentally ill or some neurodivergent brains, however, these chemicals are imbalanced.

——

Now that the technical stuff is out of the way -

Caffeine lowers your serotonin levels, majorly increases dopamine, & releases adrenaline.

Sugar raises all three - serotonin, dopamine, AND adrenaline.

So sugared coffee will raise serotonin, dopamine, & adrenaline levels.

So how does that make them affect ADHDers differently?

——

This part is based on something called Low Arousal Theory (& no that’s not sexual).

Basically, the theory states that what makes an ADHDer appear inattentive or hyperactive has to do with dopamine in the brain - both how much we have & how easy it is to get it.

ADHDers, according to this theory, have lower residual dopamine. This causes an imbalance between dopamine and other neurotransmitter compounds/hormones.

Because of this, then, ADHDers have to rely on temporary hits of dopamine, both to focus & to boost their mood. There are often less ways we can get enough dopamine, since our brain doesn’t pre-produce enough & we thus need more dopamine total to be able to focus. So we end up hyperfocusing on anything that automatically gives large doses of dopamine - which usually ends up being things like TV shows (binge watching), video games (blackout hyperfocus where you play for hours & lose time), & social media (like, scroll, comment, scroll, lots of feedback/reward).

——

(Note in this case sugared coffee can mean coffee with sugar cubes/physical sugar added, coffee with sugary creamer added, coffee with milk added coffee with sugar syrup added, coffee with flavoured sugar syrup added, & coffee with any combination of those added (because those will all add at least a little sugar); & black coffee means coffee/espresso with not even milk added)

So if black coffee raises your dopamine levels, that means, for non-ADHDers, that it makes them energized, jittery, anxious, motivated and alert. Sugared coffee has a more significant/amplified, but similar, affect & this often shows up as shakiness & inattentiveness.

Non-ADHDers will get an artificial imbalance & a whole lot of dopamine, adrenaline, &/or serotonin. Since they already have enough dopamine naturally, this spike causes hyperactive/inattentiveness.

For ADHDers, however, their dopamine levels are low, so black coffee will cause an artificial imbalance but will leave the ADHDer with enough dopamine (higher levels of dopamine) to be motivated to do tasks & focus, & this usually causes focused drowsiness in small doses. Large doses (usually 20+ ounces of black coffee) will put the ADHD brain to sleep.

Sugared coffee though, for an ADHD brain, will cause an artificial balance with higher levels of dopamine, so this usually creates either blackout hyperfocus (medium dose of sugar + medium (16-20oz) coffee), calm focus (large coffee (20-32oz) + some sugar), or amplified hyperactivity (small coffee (8-16oz) + a lot of sugar or large coffee (20-32oz) + a lot of sugar; jittery, jumpiness, running around).

((Note the oz are an estimate & will vary depending on your personal tolerance for caffeine & sugar))

Essentially, sugared coffee could have a similar affect to prescription meds for ADHDers who don’t trust meds, get bad side effects from meds, or aren’t allowed meds? (I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it or say anyone should ditch their meds to try it, especially since coffee can be addictive, but I found it fascinating either way (since it explained (potentially) why black coffee could put me & other ADHDers to sleep).)

It also means being put to sleep by coffee, or suddenly able to Do The Thing™ because of coffee, is ADHD culture. (/lighthearted)

~Nico

#adhd #infodump #low arousal theory #LAT #coffee #caffeine #sugar #adrenaline #dopamine #serotonin #epinephrine #psychology #actually adhd #adhd adult #adhd post #undiagnosed adhd #adhd culture

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five-rivers · 4 years

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Orb/Reanimation

Another part of Doorways! Link to series here.

“What’s his name again?” asked Danny, picking at the hem of his shirt. Today had been… stressful, for a number of reasons. Partially the long drive and the disastrous breakfast stop, but also the fact that they were driving to meet a guy who was possibly:

a) Vlad Masters version 2.

b) A horrible hole in reality that would try to kill him.

c) Possessed, like the Keens.

d) Using ghost stuff without knowing it was ghost stuff.

e) Messing around with ghost stuff while knowing it was ghost stuff, but without any of the skill to keep it from messing him up in turn.

f) Crazy in some wonderful, unforeseen way.

Or, finally,

g) Mom and Dad’s one and only normal friend.

Danny really wasn’t holding for the last one, if he was being honest. After all, unlike Marianne, this guy had been part of the Paranormal Research Club.

Okay, maybe there were other, positive, options. It was completely possible for someone to be weird or crazy and not be evil or even particularly threatening. Most ghosts were like that, in fact.

Still.

“Frank Stone,” said Dad, cheerfully.

“If he turns out to be a Dr. Frankenstein type, I quit,” groaned Jazz. “Just so you know.”

“You won’t quit,” said Danny, with complete confidence.

“He is a doctor,” said Mom. “He was studying biology when we met him, for his undergraduate degree.”

“I quit; I’m telling you.”

“If you were really quitting,” reasoned Danny, “you’d just open the door and jump out.” He was pleased that Jazz was taking her turn as the resident overdramatic teenager. She carried that burden only rarely, but it did seem like long trips in the GAV really brought it out.

Maybe they made her remember the whole Youngblood thing. Who knew? Not Danny.

“I’m not going to jump out of a moving vehicle. That’s more of a ‘you’ thing.”

“I can’t really dispute that,” said Danny, remembering all the times he had, in fact, jumped out of a moving vehicle. “In my defense, I can fly.”

“Why you can fly completely negates that as a defense.”

Danny held up a finger. “Okay, so, first off, reality is not a moving vehicle.”

“Anything can be a moving vehicle, depending on your reference frame.”

“I agree on the moving part, but I dispute the vehicle part. Vehicle comes from the Latin vehiculum, which is ‘a means of conveyance.’ Reality is not a means of conveyance. Ergo, it cannot be a vehicle.”

“Not so fast, brother dear. Words change meaning over time.”

“Yeah, but that’s still what vehicle means,” said Danny. “Unless you’re doing the medicine definition, anyway. I think.”

“Reality is a metaphorical vehicle.”

“Well, if it’s metaphorical, it doesn’t matter whether or not it’s moving. Does it?”

“I’m… not sure.”

“I think this is the place!” exclaimed Dad, pulling into a parking lot. “Golding City University Medical Research Lab.”

“He doesn’t live here,” said Danny, slowly, “does he?” They weren’t ambushing this guy at work, were they? Even if he did turn out to be just as bad as all of Mom and Dad’s other friends, that was kind of mean.

(Except, the Keens had been acceptable, once they were no longer possessed, and even the ghost possessing them hadn’t been too terrible.)

“He’s in the building behind the lab,” said Mom. “They let the teachers live on-campus, here. He’s expecting us, anyway.”

Right. Because they had called ahead, giving warning to their potential enemy. Curse you, common courtesy and sundry social conventions.

Jazz was glaring at the small name sign on the building, which was just barely visible through the rain. “Golding City University,” she said, eyes narrowed.

“Uh, is something wrong?”

“Frankenstein,” she said.

“Um,” said Danny. He looked more closely at the name. “Golding City. Ingolstadt.” Oh, no. Now he was glaring at the name, too. Because Jazz was right, and it would be his luck. Their parents’ luck. Whatever.

“Do you feel anything?” asked Dad.

“No,” said Danny.

“Well,” said Mom. “We’ll have to run a bit, try to stay out of the rain. It’s too bad there isn’t a closer parking lot…”

“I could also just make us all intangible,” said Danny.

“What?”

“I could make us all intangible. I do it all the time to miss the rain when no one is looking too closely.”

“Huh,” said Mom.

“It isn’t as if my powers disappear when I’m not fighting ghosts,” said Danny. “I get to use them for other things.”

“I know, I know, it just seems… petty.”

“Petty is one of the best words to describe ghosts with,” said Danny.

Frank Stone did not look like a Frankenstein. Not the monster, and not the ‘doctor.’

(Because Victor Frankenstein had not, in fact, become a doctor, had he?)

He was actually pretty average looking. The same age as Mom and Dad, of course. Brown hair. Glasses. Skinny, but not that skinny. Could Dr. Stone rob a grave? Probably. But carrying the loot away without some mechanical advantage was probably out. Unless it was old loot. Dried out. Maybe just bones.

Corpses were heavy.

(No, Danny was not going to elaborate.)

Dr. Stone appeared to be somewhat confused about why Danny and Jazz were there. Evidently, Mom and Dad had managed to give the man the impression that they wanted to fund his research with the fortune they had inherited from Vlad.

Which, incidentally, had been inherited by Danny, who couldn’t really do much with it until he was twenty-five. Not that he was particularly keen on funding… Whatever it was that Dr. Stone was researching.

Maybe that would be different if he could tell what Dr. Stone was talking about. Danny wasn’t stupid, far from it, and had a good background in any number of esoteric subjects, but, well. It was hard to rival an adult lifetime of learning and research. Especially when he didn’t have any context.

Mom and Dad’s briefing on Dr. Stone had generally focused on what he had been interested in as a member of the Paranormal Research Club, not his true field of study.

“Oh,” said Mom, suddenly, “this is about your organ transplant project, isn’t it? You really need to provide more context. When you just jump right in like that, even we’ll get lost!”

Okay. Danny felt better.

“Well, yes,” said Dr. Stone. “I have been working on this off and on since college, you know how it is. I know you kept up with that portal business!” He flashed a nervous smile and set his coffee mug down on his coffee table. It made a soft chinking sound against the glass. “But the university gave me a grant, Vladco’s been donating some supplies—From their chemical division, mostly—and I’ve been having a lot of success! I can’t wait to show you. We’ve actually got a few specimens in near-stasis right now, all from mice. We’re going to be implanting one tomorrow. See how it functions.”

“Have you implanted any before?” asked Mom, leaning forward.

“A few, but, well. I can’t say they were resounding successes. The most recent subject only lasted a few days… Although, that is better than the first! We’ve been adjusting some of our ratios.”

“Say, Frank,” said Dad. “What chemicals are you using for this, anyway? I know you’re using them in conjunction with low temperatures, but keeping crystals from forming in the flesh—”

“Yes, yes, that’s always been the problem with cryogenics,” agreed Dr. Stone. Then they dove back into jargon and technical language.

Danny glanced sideways at Jazz, uneasy. Chemicals. From Vladco. Yeah. Not suspicious at all.

He leaned over. “Ten dollars says that he’s using ectoplasm to reanimate dead bodies.”

“I’m not taking that bet. Do you feel anything weird from him?” Jazz whispered back.

“Weird, yes, but…” Danny bit his lip. “I’m not sensing any… doors. Or ghosts.”

“Okay,” said Jazz. “So, when we do find his mad science lab full of dead body parts, what do we do?”

“Well… Nothing? As long as they’re legal dead body parts, I guess. You know, from organ donors, or people who donated their bodies to science. I mean…” He shrugged. “You’ve read Frankenstein, too. And met Ellie.”

“Hm. True,” said Jazz. “I have to check my biases. I’m still quitting, though. As soon as we find his Frankenstein stuff. Just so you know.”

“No, you aren’t.”

Jazz just sighed.

Danny walks silently through the halls of the research facility. True, Dr. Stone was planning on giving his family a tour of his workspace first thing tomorrow and had implied that other researchers would be doing the same, but Danny believed in being prepared.

Well. Sometimes. He was allowed to be inconsistent and contradictory. Like any teen, he was still learning how to exist.

Maybe he should stop comparing himself to ‘any teen,’ though. It was beginning to feel dishonest, even in his own head. Even though, technically, it was true.

Anyway.

This place was kind of creepy. At least, he presumed a normal person would find it creepy. Too bad he didn’t know any normal people. Sam would think it was cool. Tucker would be freaking out because it was a medical research lab. Ancients, Danny was as bad as his parents.

It did have a number of features that one would typically only find on the set of a horror movie, however, so he felt fairly confident in his assessment of its creepiness. Also, he had encountered at least five different crimes against nature and sanity (it took one to know one), and he hadn’t even gotten to Dr. Stone’s lab yet.

He was impressed. He hadn’t expected such a high concentration outside of Amity Park or Vlad’s hideouts.

At the thought of Vlad, Danny drooped. Yeah. He still wasn’t over the stupid fruitloop. Still hated the fact that he had died.

Back to the crimes against nature. Ectoplasm was definitely a component, if a small one. Hard to get things to glow that precise, reality bending shade of green otherwise. Also, well. Danny can sense ectoplasm.

And… Now he was in a room of jars full of diluted ectoplasm and… He sniffed. Formaldehyde? He frowned and decided the number, size, and arrangement of jars was suspicious. He walked around the table. Yep. That was in the outline of a human body. Yep.

Honestly, this wasn’t any more alarming than the living mice impaled with various glowing needles, or the disturbingly brown heart beating in a fish tank a few rooms back. It was, also, significantly less alarming than the prosthetic face (mainly because, dang, that thing looked realistic), the (fresh) skeleton someone had been injecting ectoplasm into (yikes), and the weird flesh… blob… thing that someone had just left out in their workspace.

Still. This was another point for the ‘someone is building a Frankenstein’s monster in this building’ theory, and Danny had kind of been hoping that he was wrong.

He walked out of the room, on alert for random murderous corpse monsters (or sad corpse monsters that needed a shoulder to cry on, a restraining order against their creators, and a loving home). Or mad scientists. Because, at this point, he was fairly certain that everyone who worked here was crazy, and not necessarily in the fun way Mom and Dad were.

He was glad they had decided to sleep in the GAV and ignore Dr. Stone’s invitation to stay in his apartment.

Dr. Stone’s office was just next door. His lab, just beyond that. Danny approached cautiously, his ghost half on high alert, and his deeper self stirring uneasily.

He laid a hand flat against the door, and that stirring became wakefulness.

Crimes against nature. Hubris. Pride.

Superbia. It had to be.

A hole. A wound.

Well. This was fast. Even with the Keens’ list of Paranormal Research Club members they had encountered while possessed, Danny hadn’t expected to find another thing like Gula so quickly.

He hadn’t wanted to. Despite his outward pessimism, he had hoped that there weren’t any more.

After several frozen moments where Danny braced himself for an attack, he realized one wasn’t forthcoming. The tear beyond the door had not noticed him, was not trying to consume him.

So, he had a choice. He could either try to deal with this alone, right now, or he could sneak away and tell his family what he had found. Both choices had pros and cons.

Before even a second had passed, Danny was easing away from the door. He hadn’t quite promised to share if he felt anything strange, if he had detected anything bad, but… It was a near thing, and he didn’t want to be dishonest with his family after they had been so accepting of all his… Stuff.

Yeah. Call it stuff. Nice and generic. Covers everything.

Plus, his encounter with Gula had confirmed that he needed backup.

He refrained from calling on his powers on the way out. He didn’t want to draw attention. The limits of the doors to the place which should not be mentioned were largely unknown to him.

Luckily, the doors weren’t alarmed, and he got back to the GAV without a problem. He poked Jazz awake first.

“Hey,” he said, “we’ve got a problem.”

“This portal is just… Sitting there,” said Mom.

“Yep.”

“In Frank’s office.”

“Well, I think it might actually be in the lab, but yes. It’s kind of freaking me out.”

“Is Frank sleeping in his lab?” asked Dad, stroking the stubble on his chin.

“No, I checked that before I went in,” said Danny. “He’s in his apartment.”

“You just… broke into his apartment?” asked Mom.

Danny shrugged. “I didn’t break anything,” he said. “But, I mean, what else was I supposed to do?”

For a moment, it looked like Mom was about to argue or scold him, but she shook her head. “Alright, then someone else is in his office.”

“Maybe. I’m not sure if these portals need a person attached or not. Using person in the very loosest of senses, because…” He made a gesture he hoped would be interpreted as a soul being forcibly removed from a body without killing the body.

“You don’t think it’s in the, um,” Jazz also made a vague gesture.

“You mean the hypothetical Frankenstein’s monster he’s made? Yeah. I think that’s likely. Also, judging from the sheer amount of, um, weird stuff in the other labs, I’d say it’s influencing everyone and everything around it, too.”

“Is that a thing it can do?” asked Mom.

“I mean, I can do that,” said Danny. He paused. “’I’ in this case being the portal. Yeah. That’s why Amity Park is so… Amity Park.”

Mom breathed out, slowly. “Sweetie, trust me on this, Amity Park was strange long before we made the portal.

“Well, yes?” said Danny, not seeing what that had to do with it. “So?”

“So, that strangeness couldn’t be caused by the portal.”

“Mom. I’m—It’s a hole in reality. Do you think it’s going to obey the laws of cause and effect? You went to Amity Park because it was already a ‘thin spot,’ right? I was already there.”

Mom looked vaguely ill.

“Okay,” said Jazz. “Let’s table that discussion for right now. What are we going to do about this? Break in? Wait for our ‘tour’ tomorrow?”

“I don’t like the idea of waiting for Dr. Stone to give us a tour,” said Danny. “I don’t want to give them time to prepare for us.”

“He doesn’t know what we’re here for, though,” said Dad. “Does he?”

“I don’t know,” said Danny. “I can’t read minds.”

“Yet,” added Jazz.

“Do you think he even knows about the…” It was Mom’s turn to enter the gesturing game.

“Let’s just call it a hell portal for the sake of communication,” said Danny, despite the fact that the term did not do the actuality justice. “Or Superbia for this particular one. I think this must be Superbia, anyway.” He didn’t want to imagine the possibility of even more of these things out there.

“I’m not sure how he couldn’t notice that something strange was going on,” said Dad. “Even if he was using ectoplasm and other supernatural elements in his research, we gave him a good grounding in what to expect from ectoplasm in college.”

“Yeah,” said Jazz. “But not everyone is like you and Mom. Your college days were over two decades ago.”

Something moving in the dark and rain beyond the GAV windows, catching Danny’s eye. He pushed past his family to get a better look, blinking to adjust his eyes.

“Heck,” he said. “We have a mob.”

“What?” exclaimed Dad, rushing to the console to turn on the GAV’s exterior floodlights.

They illuminated Dr. Stone and a crowd of college and graduate students quite nicely. Their eyes reflected a dim red. The GAV was, as far as Danny could see, surrounded.

Very briefly, the thought of gunning the GAV and crashing through the crowd crossed his mind. It was just as quickly dismissed.

He didn’t know what the line between influenced and mind controlled was, or how easily Superbia could cross it. It was even possible that the ‘hell portal’ could vault over both of those and land directly in possession.

“Ghost shield?” suggested Danny.

“Will it do anything?” asked Mom.

“Won’t hurt,” said Danny with a shrug.

Mom flipped the switch.

“What are we going to do?” asked Jazz, softly. “Wait them out?”

“Realistically,” said Danny, “we don’t have enough food and water to do that. With this many people, they could take turns watching us.”

“Call the police?” suggested Maddie. The other three turned to look at her. “They are still human, aren’t they?”

“Yeah,” said Danny, frowning. “But I don’t know how much, um, agency they have right now. If we were in Amity, I’d say sure, our police understand, mostly, but… Also, bringing extra hostages into this might not be a good idea.”

“If it’s the campus police that would get called, they might be affected, too,” said Jazz.

“They have campus police? How do you know?”

“This college sent me a brochure once.”

“Right. Um. I could always just fly us out of here,” said Danny.

“Assuming they don’t have ranged attacks,” said Mom, dubiously.

“Hm. Yeah. I think I could lift the GAV, and then we could just leave the shield on.”

“Assuming the shield does anything.”

Danny shrugged. “I can always just try to fight them outright. I’d prefer not to do that, though.”

Mom inhaled as if she were about to say something but was cut off by a loud noise from outside.

“Jack~ Maddie~ I know you’re in there.” That was Dr. Stone’s voice, warped by a megaphone speaker. “Why don’t you come out and see what I’ve done? I dare say I’ve exceeded even our wildest dreams from college.” A long pause. “I even made a portal… Weren’t you trying to get one of those? Isn’t that what got good old Vlad hospitalized?” There was laughter. Too much laughter.

The mob was laughing, too.

Superbia. Pride.

Danny knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to walk out and deal with the threat that was grating on his every sense. But… He knew that prideful actions were contraindicated under the present circumstances.

Influence. Right. How much could Danny be influenced?

How much could his family be influenced?

He looked up at his parents, seeking guidance. They seemed uncertain, too.

“I didn’t destroy any lives- I made new life. New life! Powered by an interdimensional portal, oh, yes… Can you imagine the application? Can you imagine a new world?”

“Okay, he didn’t seem like this in the apartment,” muttered Jazz. “We have human nonlethal weapons, right?”

“Still have to worry about running people over,” said Danny. He looked back at the lab building. “We could try to cut this off at the source. They aren’t protecting the building. They’re using it as part of their perimeter.”

Eyes turned to the dimly lit building.

“We can cover you,” offered Dad.

“I don’t like this any better than you flying off with us,” said Mom. “But… It offers a more permanent solution.”

Danny should have gone after it when he was in the building the first time. Well. Time only rewound for one ghost, and that ghost wasn’t him.

Unless he counted… Never mind. The point was, despite all his other wonderful and troubling features, Danny couldn’t go back and change a decision he’d already made. Agonizing over it was a waste of time and brain power.

Dad got behind the wheel. Jazz crawled up into the well-disguised turret. Maddie manned the other weapons.

Danny stood at the door, ready to run, ready to transform as soon as he was through the shield.

Family bonding activities. So much fun.

The mob attacked before he got the door open. He still made it to the building.

Danny didn’t bother with doors or windows or halls. He remembered what floor Dr. Stone’s office was on, and, now that he was sensitized to it, he could feel Superbia. He went through the walls, straight as an arrow.

(He wondered, briefly, if he was being as bigoted as he’d often felt his parents to be. If he was ascribing more evil to the portals to the Red Country than was warranted. If he was simply holding up a dark mirror and seeing what he feared from himself.)

(But no. He did not command like that. He did not force his people to assemble armies in the night or attack people. He kept them safe. He had rules.)

The lab was awash in sick red not-light that burned in Danny’s mind. It was barely physically perceptible, more present in senses that couldn’t translate to human terms than anything to do with Danny’s eyes, ghostly or not.

In the center of the lab, on an operation table, was a stitched-together corpse. Perhaps, under other circumstances, it would have been a very pretty corpse. A young woman with long dark hair and broad shoulders.

Its chest had been torn open. Half-in half-out of the cavity was a red orb, the source of the not-light, like some sick imitation of a ghost core.

(It reminded Danny of Freakshow’s staff, and he realized that he never did find out where that horrid thing had come from.)

They had been trying to make something like Danny.

He felt like he had eaten those blood blossom pancakes.

Danny gritted his teeth and let his light, white-green and clear, fill his hands. Ectoplasm fought against the miasma in the air, an oddly purifying presence. It wasn’t enough to chase away the wrongness. This wasn’t his space.

The fight against Gula was different. Both he and it had been within nominally living bodies. They had been next to the heart of Danny’s territory, his home ground. Danny had been tricked and trapped, taken off guard, unable to use the tricks he had grown used to while fighting ghosts and Vlad.

(He could feel Superbia in his mind, pride urging him forward towards error. Pride in his abilities, in his mind, in his family.)

Danny drifted sideways, watching. Listening. Other things in the building were stirring. Sparks of wrongness growing and twisting, warping into fountains and springs. This whole building was full of it. Rotten to the bones. It pressed against his teeth.

Careful.

He had to be careful.

The orb shone.

(Too much like Freakshow’s staff.)

(Influence, Danny remembered. Just how close was it to mind control?)

Doing this as a human was impossible. Trying to fight that as a ghost was unwise.

The always-open always-closed door that both contained and laid within Danny’s soul shifted. So did the corpse on the table, its constituent parts sliding over each other gruesomely. Death had lost its hold, lost its meaning. The ghost that was Danny twisted, and he was too human, too alive.

Special little thing. You think you can defeat us.

He could. He could open himself and wash all this away in an instant. He could burn with electric fire and the cold of deep space. He could reach out. The orb would be as dust under his hand.

He didn’t move.

In thinking you become…

Un-light burned up from the grooves in the tile floor. It didn’t reach the soles of his boots, didn’t reach his soul. He gritted his teeth.

US.

YOUR VICTORY IS OURS.

“Wow, you picked the wrong person to use that strategy on,” said Danny, out loud. Internally, he pulled on the delicate and frayed strands of reality that persisted even here. “I have so much imposter syndrome and anxiety that it isn’t even funny. I know I can’t beat you. Not here.”

But then, he didn’t have to.

He found the right string and pulled. He found the key and opened the door. Death was in the room again. Danny could move again. Not so much the pile of flesh in front of him. It was hard, it hurt, to keep hold of something like this, but half of Danny was this, was dead, even if he had far too many halves to ever be whole.

Ice coated the floor, the tiles cracking under the sudden temperature change. He dropped to the floor and was human.

An impossible thing.

And behind the human—

Well. Danny didn’t have to defeat Superbia. It wasn’t like Gula, didn’t have that strength, that experience. He just had to make it so the things that would, could.

(Danny had rules. Some of them were to protect himself.)

He walked over to the orb. Ultimately, it was just a representation, not Superbia itself. Still. He put his foot down on it and slowly transferred his weight to it until it cracked. Until it splintered. Until it shattered. Until he ground its dust under his heel.

Then, the building collapsed. Danny didn’t move, didn’t have to move. He was a ghost again, floating in the air, exactly where he had been, all the floors having passed harmlessly through him.

Outside, the faculty and student body of the college were sprawled in piles on the ground. The GAV was, somehow, halfway up a tree. A shockingly sturdy tree. Several statues were in pieces.

The sun was coming up.

Danny put a hand to his chest and assessed himself. Yes. Still here. Still himself. The Ghost Zone still sang in his bones, in his core. He was still anchored in Amity Park. Everything in order.

This place, though… This place would be tainted for years, a thin spot forever. He could feel it, now. Why couldn’t he feel it before, when they drove in?

He shuddered. Then he flew down to the GAV and knocked on the window. Mom rolled it down.

“Want me to fly us away to somewhere secluded before the cops get called and we get asked a bunch of awkward questions?” he asked.

Mom closed her eyes. “Please do,” she said.

#danny phantom #ectober #ectober week #ectober week 2020 #ectober 2020

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bbq-hawks-wings · 4 years

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I see there was something you must've really liked about drawing what's now your new pfp 😉😏😛

It has every kind of energy I could want: exhaustion and annoyance at the current state of events; an implied lack of concern for outward appearance (robe and stubble); a socially acceptable (chemical and/or emotional) dependence on caffeine in the form of oversized, fast, sweet coffee (because I'm not a masochist who drinks it black); and last but certainly not least Hawks just letting himself be done with this BS.

I can't believe I almost went for a straight panel redraw when this was obviously the better choice.

#she speaks

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fontfolly · 4 years

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Socially acceptable chemical dependence in the morning

“I just love the smell of socially acceptable chemical dependence in the morning.”Today I am drinking coffee made from the very last beans out of the last bag of the many types of Holiday Blend/Christmas Blend I purchased during this last holiday season. I opened the first bag of holiday blend coffee a day or two before Thanksgiving, and I have been working my way through them—without making…

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#coffee #life #personal

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lithugraph · 7 years

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#coffee #socially acceptable #Chemical dependence

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calleo-bricriu · 4 years

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“Try to use their nostalgia and insecurity over their broken dreams to get them on your side.” (From your favorite Goblin, Aldig. Hope you don't mind me requesting that)

(( Hyperbole and a Half Sentence Starters Always accepting. ))

"What?" Calleo's response more a laugh that a word, partially because he was trying, at the same time, to not choke on his coffee.

"You know what that'd entail right? I'd have to start swanning about--and being about as aggressive as one of those feathered bastards at that--knowing my luck I'd just trip over whatever ridiculous, flashy clothing they'd be expecting and end up flat on my face."

Aldig's nod was a thoughtful one, "That's one hell of an amazing mental image but I think we both know you do it on purpose." The Goblin reached over to poke Calleo with a sharp nail, "Makes you seem eccentrically harmless when you're clumsy and socially awkward."

Calleo blinked owlishly, staring for a moment, "It--isn't purposely the majority of the time, it's the times that I'm perfectly put together and look as though I have even the slightest idea of what's going on around me that require effort. I'm still aware of what's going on around me, I just largely don't care and file it away for those times it'll be useful as blackmail or calling in a favour."

"I'm not exactly agile outside of a duel either; never have been, half the charms around me are to keep me from walking straight into a wall because I'm often focused on dozens of other things at the same time."

The look Calleo received told him that Aldig simply didn't buy a word of it.

"Aldig, how often do you see me outside of a work related context?"

The Goblin canted his head slightly.

"It's a serious question but if you don't need exact numbers, it's 'not often' isn't it?"

"Doesn't matter, I know how you work and that's how you work," Aldig shrugged. "Harmless, engaging, friendly, stuck in some sort of fashion time warp, you're telling me that's not the act and the bits that have you pulled together and ruthlessly cutthroat even by my standards are what takes effort?"

Calleo shrugged in return, "It takes a lot of energy to be horrible even to horrible people and what you're suggesting in this case is I start acting like the horrible thing they used to work for. I don't know that that'll work, they know where that leads."

Calleo leaned back, resting his head on the sofa cushions and looking upside down at Aldig. It never did any good to sit on most of the furniture at Aldig's house, he had never had the inclination to have furniture that was even remotely sized for humans and Calleo found it easier to simply sit on the floor instead of trying to fold himself to awkwardly fit on things not meant for someone his size.

"Exploiting their insecurity and broken dreams, as you so colourfully put it, would work; however. Not in the sense of, 'Okay let's try this again' of course, far too much work and it wouldn't work unless it somehow got sandwiched in with that whole EEC nonsense they've got going at the moment, and you know people would fight that tooth and nail because how on Earth could Muggles have a better idea of a relatively unified Europe than the people who think mass murders will start if someone sees you use Accio in front of them."

"How many pins does it take to hold that all up?" Aldig often changed the topic when the topic skirted too closely to things he preferred not to think or speak about. He move to inspect Calleo's hair more closely. "And why do you still put it up like that? Not even old ladies do it anymore, it's been out of style since the 1920s. You're one complicated dress and a too tight corset away from a Gibson Girl at any given moment."

"Around three or four dozen depending on how loose I want it, plus the wands in the back. Magic is unpredictable, it's too long when it's down, and removing everything on it so I could cut it, then putting all those rituals back on it is more work than pinning it up like that." Calleo sat up a bit, "What are you doing?"

"Counting the pins." In the few seconds it had taken Calleo to get to asking Aldig hat he was doing, the Goblin had already removed all three wands, which were now sitting on the sofa, and had a good dozen pins out, holding a few of them in his mouth and setting the rest in a pile.

"You'd best put those back when you're done counting, Aldig." Calleo laughed quietly, and did not shake his head for a change; that would have made a mess of things, and likely resulted in pins being buried somewhere in his hair that he'd only find when he next went to wash it. "I'd imagine I'll have to take the route of, 'Hey, remember how you lot completely fucked everyone over about fifty years ago? And how you all owe me several dozen favours for what I had to put up while you all had a great deal of fun with the fact that I was a prisoner and you were allowed to treat me as such? You can rationalise me calling in every one of those favours as wanting to do some make-up work as reparations for what you've done if the former is too much of an ego blow.'"

"That'll probably work, and where it doesn't work--"

"Blackmail." The word was slightly muffled by the amount of hairpins in the Goblin's mouth. Aldig, as usual, didn't cut Calleo off so much as he finished the thought.

"That's such an ugly word, Aldig. I prefer to think of it as my having access to evidence that was conveniently hidden away at their original trials that kept the majority of them from execution or long prison sentences. It'd be such a shame if those documents found their way back to the correct authorities, after all."

"Mm." At some point, the conversation must have drifted beyond what Aldig felt like speaking on. It wasn't an uncommon occurance when the topic of any sort of war or having to deal with what amounted to old war criminals who had managed to escape the amount of justice they'd deserved. That point became more evident when he dangled a fistful of hair down in front of Calleo's face, "These had silver bits in them the last time I saw them."

"Vanity." Calleo shrugged. "I'm allowed to have at least one or two harmless vices. Besides," he moved Aldig's hand (and his own hair) out of his face, "where did you ever get the impression that I intended to grow up or age gracefully. I like it that bright orange-red and what nature decides I'm not allowed anymore, charms and occasionally chemical dyes can counter."

"Probably just as well. You'd look enitrely mad if it were all silver or white as opposed to your usual maybe thirty-six percent mad," Aldig stopped talking after that statement. After he'd fished out all of the pins he could find from Calleo's hair he started the process of putting it either back the way it was or into something entirely different. Calleo wasn't exactly certain as he couldn't see behind him and Aldig didn't seem to be interested in further conversation (apart from telling Calleo to stop moving if he tried to turn around and say something).

#stories #hp rp #1986 #Anonymous #v: ftbawtft

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bookfreaky · 4 years

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A Small History of Chemical Beings

An average adult suffering of major depression can present the symptoms of hypersomnia and / or insomnia. During the hypersomnia periods said average adult can sleep for about anything from 12 hours to 3 days without a waking moment, and still feel tired. The depressed brain feels tired because it is overworking to produce your daily dosage of dopamine (a hormone associated with pleasure, joy and motivation) and serotonin (a hormone associated with well-being, satisfaction, and self-esteem), these substances need to be produced because they make you happy. As it happens, being happy is very important for humans, as their enormous brain are in constant search for meaning to add up to their complex ideas that they think that constitute the world in their perspective, such ideas like politics, money, religion, philosophy, arts, and whatever else they create.

Warning: humans should know that the world is actually made out of earth, water, air, some other gases, and living carbon species. But somehow, they insist on the money thing.

The problem with a brain that cannot produce the right amount of dopamine and serotonin is that human brains generate a stupid association of pain and illness with sadness, and happiness with well-being and health. So, depressed people actually feel pain. That’s their brain telling their body that they are really fucking sad because they must be really fucking sick or wounded. Probably, when our ancestors were hurt by a lion or something, their brain learned how to make this association, because it doesn’t make fucking sense to be happy while attacked by a lion. That’s why today, when you’ve been 6 hours watching Big Brother without moving in the dark of your room, sometimes it feels like you’ve been hurt by some carnivorous animal.

This association between hurt and comfort, pain and health, sadness and happiness that human brains do make people crave for another substance, one that is much littler, but very addictive. Endorphins. Endorphins are a hormone associated with pain-relief and immediate pleasure, that’s the substance you get when you eat a chocolate bar. But there are things that can produce much more endorphins than a fucking chocolate bar: drugs. Humans love drugs. And there are a lot of options for drugs. Like for example, nicotine has a 200.5 concentration of endorphins per minute; while cocaine has a 700.6 concentration per minute; and methamphetamine has a 1001.1 concentration per minute. While food has mere 75 concentration for minute. Endorphins are cool because they offer a temporary relief to pain and sadness, but since it is temporary your overloaded brain asks for a next hit of it as soon as it stops working, that’s what we call addiction.

Generally, humans deem addictions to be bad thing, which really sucks because humans tell each other that drugs are a good thing. Contradictory. Addictions can be socially acceptable depending on their legal status, their price, and their association with certain ethnical groups and cultures. Some drugs take a slower burn in your body, those are more well accepted mostly: like weed, alcohol, coffee, nicotine, painkillers. The other ones, the heavy drugs are normally considered bad because they generate such a flow of endorphins in your brain that they can cause addiction in a short usage, fucking up your brain’s ability of producing happy hormones on its own, making you waste all your money on them, lose your job, sell your house and end up on some charity rehab – oh, here’s the money thing again. – Yes, heavy drugs such as coke, synthetics, heroine and crack aren’t only addictive, they are also very profitable.

Okay, it’s clear now that a shitload of endorphins isn’t exactly the most plausible solution to our poor depressed, dopamine/serotonin deprived, brain. So, humans, the smart ones I guess, invented other drugs, the controlling drugs. Sometimes it’s difficult to tell the difference, like heroine was used as an anti-psychotic for many years, and we all know how it went. The controlling drugs are used not to inject a substance in your brain, but to assist on its production or maybe block the excessive production of hormones (that can also fuck you up). There are many of them in the market and they are quite expensive: Prozac, Xanax, Carbonated Lithium, Paroxetine, Sertraline, Clonazepam, Haloperidol, Seroquel, Lorax, Lamitrol, Sumatriptan, Tegretol, Lexotan, so on, so on. They usually work with a right combination of them along with a healthy sleeping cycle and frequent exercising.

The shit thing about them is that they are also addictive, most them at least. That’s why is so important to keep visiting your doctor. In a way, they are like your drug dealer but they are a little more concerned about your mental health, or at least they should be. Unfortunately, for chronic cases of mental illness, which they are various: major depression, dichotomic depression, generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, bipolar affective disorder, anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, obsessive compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, schizoid-paranoid disorder, craziness, craziness, craziness. For most of these cases the solution will be one or two of these drugs, allied with a lot of therapy. Psychotherapy is basically two or more people talking but one of them is trained and charges you money for it.

Still even, it’s not uncommon that our little depressed brains, although with a lot of therapy and a lot of drugs (the right ones, duh!) still relapse, collapse, break-down forever and eventually die because that two substances are not in correct balance. And there’s no explanation, no real data that determines the criteria for telling which of these sad brains that will get happy, and which will remain sad. Excuse me, though. Looking back in evolution, natural selection has given us another powerful little tool that can help us.

Oxytocin. This is the hormone associated with love, physical contact, childbirth, breastfeeding, it is the hormone that is produced when humans commune, when they share food, when they have sex, when they kiss, dance, play or do whatever it is together.

When the first mammals started to walk together in small groups, they realised that they had better chances of surviving than if they’re alone. The problem is that living together often sparks aggressiveness due to a competition for food, reproductive partners and whatever. So, their little primitive brains started to produce a hormone that would not just cause joy, but affection. Affection is any manifestation of emotion, but normally used in the meaning of the manifestation of love. Human females discharge a huge amount of oxytocin during labour, and also during lactation, so the baby human is involved in this hormone. Oxytocin is responsible to our ability to form life-long bonds, this is not fucking endorphin, I’m talking life-long bonds.

Whenever oxytocin is produced the brain also produces levels of dopamine and serotonin which causes pleasure, calmness, butterflies in the stomach, and a basic sensation of being loved. It’s proved that just by looking at the smiling face of some you love can make a healthy brain produce oxytocin. Yes, no need to swallow it down, to smoke it, to drink it, not even touch it. Of course, touching makes it much better, hugs, kisses, cuddles, caresseses in general are great oxytocin deliverers. Sex is the up-most oxytocin deliver, but not any sex, only good fucking sex. That’s the reason why humans can’t stay around each other having sex for too long or they fall in love.

Perhaps the secret solution to our depressed brain isn’t just stabilizers of dopamine and serotonin, moderation in your intake of endorphins, but also a little oxytocin production every now and then. A little company must help.

#chronicle #mine #mental illness #depression #mental health #comedy

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sirro85-blog · 6 years

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Humans are Weird: Addiction

T'Loss marvelled as the humans poured themselves small glasses of more concentrated poison and with a chant of "drink 'em high, drink 'em low: friends forever, here we go!" performed "shots".

Many of the more junior members of his unit were drinking with the humans keen to take part in this ritualistic celebration following their successful operation. T'Loss had insisted that those in his command stopped after they had imbibed 3 of the human "units" knowing how poorly his race tolerated the ethanol.

"It's good to see humans can even corrupt entirely different xenotypes to their ways of debauchery and excess"

T'Loss turned and saw Major Kovac standing a few strides away, he was clutching a mug of steaming brown liquid, T'Loss assumed it was filled with coffee seemingly ever present in the Major's life.

"Our juveniles can be foolish in the extreme, it is understandable to see humans with your fractional life spans behave so perilously and for the Rahtoul to be swept along by it when you proved so...adept in this last campaign."

Gesturing at the steaming mug of coffee T'Loss asked, "you do not partake?"

"No." The Major answered

"A command issue?" T'Loss half queried, the captain had already explained why she only stayed for a single drink.

"Not for me, I don't drink any alcohol"

"I believed it part of your culture?"

"Well part of some of our cultures certainly," the Major said, "I don't drink because I'm from a long line of alcoholics"

T'Loss didn't recognise the word: alcoholic.

"My parents and their parents were addicted to alcohol, they drank it to the point that it controlled their lives, it killed them in the end." The Major explained.

"I am sorry for your loss," stated T'Loss, recognising the human custom, "I don't understand, addiction?"

Major Kovac sighed and turned his head away from T'Loss slightly, "Well in my family it's alcohol or narcotics...Well that's true of so many families, especially Glasgow my home town"

T'Loss paused, he'd been through this before with humans, "I'm sorry I do not understand the word addiction"

Major Kovac grinned and shook his head, "of course you don't, well it's when humans develop a physical and psychological need for a substance or action" he paused and gave a little groan, "this might take a while...Humans release Serotonin and dopamine when they enjoy something, or rather the enjoyment is the serotonin...I don't fully understand it but essentially if you experience pleasure there's serotonin involved...dopamine is in there also, oh and endorphins there is a pleasure experience of some kind involved with endorphins, i don't know I'm a specialist in urban conflict not an endocrinologist"

T'Loss nodded, it was known how human brains responded to chemical release.

"Well if a human starts to use a specific substance or action to elicit this pleasure response that can become the only source of their pleasure...is a simplistic way of describing it. If the human becomes reliant on the substance then, at the very least, they experience severely low mood if they don't partake in the action or substance, we call it getting a fix."

"And this dependence on the addictive source of serotonin is viewed as a negative?" T'Loss did not see a danger with this.

"Well not always, in the case of my father he started drinking alcohol more than socially normal and it's inebriating effects led to his unemployment, eventually he lived his remaining life perpetually drunk and died from the poisoning effects." The Major appeared to lose his train of thought and stared into the distance, "not all addictions are necessarily bad but they become an issue when they become the focus of your life."

"So addiction is an issue when it has affected your life negatively?" T'Loss asked, feeling he was beginning to understand, "it has a neuro-chemical manifestation but is only viewed in the negative if it's impacting on social constructs?" T'Loss felt something akin to panic, it was known that human behaviour was literally alien, more so than any other race, they were quick to anger, pack-bond and to feel joy, it was an entire race of badly raised juveniles. "As a species you all accept the risk of alcohol!?" He choked out staring at his juniors now watching one soldier "Strapedo" a bottle of wine.

"Ahh most people enjoy a drink in the evening or at the weekend to limited ill effects, it's just people like my family that take it too far...and yes as a society in general we accept that."

"You have a genetic disposition to alcoholism?" Why hadn't this been bred out?

"I suppose I do, but perhaps it's behavioural, at times it seems worth it, some of our greatest minds have had addictions."

"So only certain members of your race can become addicts, I used that correctly?" Perhaps the Rahtoul could screen fore this trait before hiring any humans in the future.

"Yes, you did," the major paused, "well, I suppose we all have some form of addiction, I 'need' my coffee, but without it all I suffer is headaches, irritation and increased fatigue, also 'needing' caffeine is so socially acceptable, we print it on t-shirts, that being said we do the same with alcohol..." Major Kovac grinned, "amongst my group of Godless lunatics I have 31 smokers, I'm not supposed to know that 12 of them take pain relief medications they aren't prescribed, about eight have real adrenaline addictions, a solid core of them probably 40-50 would easily be described as addicted to the gym-they get super cranky and stressed if they don't work out," he paused looking fondly at his "godless lunatics" and gave a small smile, "I probably fit that description too, and the Captain, Becca probably easily fits the description of a sex addict."

"Addiction is intrinsic to your nature?" T'Loss said struggling to keep his voice calm, inside he felt both awe and dread sweeping through him.

"We like pleasure releases and will seek them out, repeatedly."

T'Loss stared at the band of humans on his vessel, quite how these bizarre chemically dependant, impulse driven juveniles with apparently no impulse control or common sense had ever managed to get out of their caves let alone manage interstellar travel while chasing every second of pleasure they could find baffled him. Humans it seemed were entirely driven by their emotions and desires.

So I am aware that I haven't really done justice to the intricacies of addiction, feel free to add to the recovery and treatment aspects. Feedback is always appreciated =).

#humans are space oddities #humans are space australians #humans are insane #humans are space orcs #space australia #space orcs #humans are space fae #humans are weird

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