#sometimes unlearning doesnt make you a completely different person

[spurgie-cousin]

ok i couldn't resist i had to read the Jinger NYT article immediately:

(CW: sexual assault and r*pe mention)

they almost exclusively refer to Jinger as Mrs. Vuolo which for some reason makes me feel feral. it's just clunky and I don't like it.

the Jill Dillard erasure!!!!!! another article claiming Jinger is the 'first' to question her parent's religion when that is just 1000% not true and like, what kind of fact checkers would not investigate if any of her siblings were up to something similar?

and on that note, why won't Jinger herself acknowledge Jill???? purely to sell more books as the 'first' to break away, bc that's pretty irritating

i learned from this article that Bill Gothard never married which is just fucking hilarious to me. all these rules about how to live as a married couple and this bitch really had no experience or idea what he was talking about (another example of how men really do just be saying any old thing and getting away with it)

Jinger makes a point to the interviewer that the reason she is trying to avoid the term 'deconstruction' is because she doesn't want to scare off readers who might currently be involved with IBLP or similar structures, to which I say, fair. she says that of all the people who'd possibly read the book those people are her intended audience (although I'm sure she's not mad at being an NYT bestseller right now).

the interviewer notes that the book is very generous to Jim Bob in Michelle, which I know I've talked about a lot before, just noting it again.

apparently she talks about Josh a bit, says they haven't spoken in 2 years, calls him a hypocrite and compares him to Gothard so. at least there's some kind of shit talking.

Bill Gothard is still alive and has started a new organization, apparently. Jinger adds in the book that she believes the women who have accused him of harassment and r*pe.

here's what they include about MacArthur's church, which I think is important for people to know:

"Mrs. Vuolo characterizes her current church in Southern California as very different than the environment she was raised in. The church, Grace Community Church, is led by John MacArthur, a popular pastor known for his rigorous preaching style, his opposition to “superstitious” charismatic theology and, more recently, his resistance to keeping his church closed in the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic.

The church is conservative on issues like homosexuality, gender, and women in church leadership. Christianity Today reported this week that leaders at the church repeatedly advised women to avoid reporting their abusive husbands and fathers to authorities, and instead to forgive and submit to them. ..... The church plays a large role in Mrs. Vuolo’s family’s life. Her husband leads a Bible study group for college students and is employed by a seminary affiliated with the church, the Master’s Seminary, where he is working on a doctorate of ministry. “Becoming Free Indeed” credits a ghostwriter named Corey Williams who is the seminary’s chief communication officer. “This is what people won’t like about this story,” said Austin Duncan, director of the seminary’s MacArthur Center for Expository Preaching, who knows the Vuolos well. “They still have a standard of authority that’s outside of themselves.”"

To which I just have to say, nobody's issue with Jinger's religious affiliation is that she still "has a standard of authority outside" herself 🙄🙄🙄 or at least not people who are coming at the story in good faith.

The issue is listed clearly in the paragraph above that one: it's a church that still promotes misogyny and homophobia, and is anti-science and intellectualism. As did Bill Gothard, he just added a bunch of stupid extra rules on top of it.

[schizosupport]

hey there

im exploring this all still. i might be on this schizotypal-psychotic spectrum but i have a... confusion.

pretty much everything that i might classify within that diagnostic realm i experience as essentially a spiritual event. sometimes this comes with fatigue or dizziness or other physical reactions to a non-physical event. and to be clear none of this falls neatly into a given religion. i grew up around hippie type believe in whatever you want people.

i guess my question is, is it possible to tell if something is spiritual or psychotic in nature? or even if there is functionally a difference, since theres nothing physical i can point to?? this has been bothering me for a while, but largely the only information ive been able to find online vaguely indicates that having religious experiences is distinct, and doesnt elaborate on why or how, just that its a diagnostic disqualifier.

and also. thank you for this blog, its really cool and awesome to see this happening (both as a community thing and a psych special interest go brrrrrr thing)

Hello there!

The border between spirituality and psychosis can be hard to define. As you've stated, religious experiences and beliefs shared with a subculture generally aren't considered delusional, even if they aren't believed to be true by the wider society. This includes things like religious beliefs and conspiracy theories shared by groups, and it also does include some more personal spiritual beliefs, though it can be troublesome to define exactly when something is "so personal that it becomes delusional".

In my mind one important distinction is about whether you came up with the belief yourself, or whether it's something you have learned from someone else. Another important distinction is whether it's harming you. Those two don't have to follow each other. Being a part of a cult doesn't make you clinically psychotic if you were indoctrinated into your beliefs, but the beliefs can still certainly harm you. But if you got away from the group you would be able to start to unlearn the beliefs as you are presented with new evidence.

And likewise, personal beliefs that aren't shared by anyone else aren't inherently harmful. For example as a kid I believed that if I was tired, hugging a tree would give me access to a bit of its life source, and that would allow me to keep going. It was a completely harmless personal belief. I would classify relatively harmless personal belief systems as a type of magical thinking if I was wearing my pathologizing hat, but I also don't think that it is inherently a clinically problematic experience.

Now it's worth noting that there is a difference between beliefs and experiences. You are talking about "spiritual events", so that sounds like you are experiencing things that are "abnormal", and then attribute spiritual significance to them. Now I don't know the nature of said events, but if we take the most bland view of reality, then such events generally aren't a real thing that occurs, so by that logic the experience itself is a sign of some mental fuckery. And then with the pathologizing hat on, we might say that you are experiencing psychotic events, and interpreting them as spiritual events, which we might then consider delusional.

But by that logic a lot of people who aren't in treatment, and who are leading perfectly functional lives, are delusional/psychotic. And therefore I think that it's helpful to bring in the "is it harming you?" distinction. Because ultimately it's less interesting to me whether something is "psychotic" or not, and much more interesting to figure out whether it's a problem for the person experiencing the belief/events. I don't think there's any sort of moral or even functional high-ground to be found in having a super down to earth view of reality, where you only ever believe something if its been scientifically proven beyond any reasonable doubt. There's nothing wrong with being that way, but it's not inherently more healthy than having some fantastical or spiritual beliefs mixed in there. And you won't catch me arguing that organized religion is inherently more healthy than personal spirituality, either!

A personal distinction that I make is that a delusion is less so something you believe in, and more so something that you are convinced of. Most things that I believe in, I have reason to believe. I've arrived to my opinions after careful research and consideration. If I haven't done a lot of research and consideration, my belief is generally less strong. When it comes to spiritual stuff I believe some things but I'm not convinced of them. They are beliefs and I'm aware that they aren't proven truths, they are things that I believe in. For me, one thing that's a red flag for psychosis is when I'm sure of something. The world is so complex, so how could I ever be completely sure of anything?

I think that as a field, noting that religious/spiritual experiences are different from psychosis has been important, because otherwise we would be pathologizing a lot of otherwise healthy individuals based on a conviction that there's no such thing as a religious experience. Humans have evidently always had religious experiences and beliefs - it seems pretty inherent to our nature! And most of the time, at a personal level, it isn't inherently harmful.

Psychosis is problematic because it often hurts the person who is experiencing it, not because it diverges from consensus reality.

So I can't give you a one size fits all solution, but these are some of my thoughts.

[neongreenllama]

okay here are some random german antifa wolfstar thoughts for u:

remus grew up working class, he was in SJ (sozialistische jugend... is that a thing in germany too? either way, i think the name is pretty self-explanatory), they had a karl marx reading group there and he actually enjoyed reading marx.

he hates pretentious academic leftists who have read karl marx and get their university degree financed by their parents who are upper middle class, you know the kind that study philosophy or sociology and will spend hours debating you on gramsci, lenin or bakunin but have never once tipped a taxi driver or greeted the person cleaning the hallway of their university building. remus hates them with a fiery passion.

he knows all the lyrics to die internationale and whenever he hears bella ciao he forgets everything else and needs to dance & sing along, it doesnt look good bc his limbs are so long and dangly and uncoordinated but there is a strange kind of beauty in him dancing so completely uninhibitedly (idk if thats a word, youre getting direct brain to keyboard word vomit here sorrynotsorry!).

so that's remus.

now sirius?

sirius grew up rich rich. like, his family doesn't just own the appartment in whatever is the most expensive district of berlin he grew up in, they own the whole fucking building and they have a villa on sylt. sirius and regulus have spent most of their summers there. idk anything about sylt except that's where rich people go on holiday in germany and that it would actually be beautiful if the rich people weren't there.

anyways so sirius grew up with conservative ideas all around him and had to educate himself on everything left wing in secret. obviously james had a big influence, he introduced sirius to lots of new ideas and encouraged sirius's curiosity about social justice and left-winged politics.

sirius has also read karl marx, in his 2nd semester at university, in a pretentious student reading group with other pretentious students. sirius is a radical antifacist, and he fights with so much passion it sometimes consumes him. he has had to unlearn all the things he was told by his family and the people they surrounded him with, and he fights with every fiber not to be like them.

sometimes, especially in the beginning, he still slips up. he makes mistakes, forgets that the way he was brought up is not the norm for everyone. sometimes he even tries to hide how he grew up, especially because he doesn't have any access to his parents money anymore, but then he also realises he shouldn't hide the privileges their money let him have access to in regards to education etc. when he was younger. it's something he spends a lot of time thinking about, and having working class friends, and friends from different backgrounds, and friends who are immigrants is so eye-opening to him, it's like this whole new world has opened up once he entered university. he's doing his best, he's still learning, and sometimes he messes up and assumes everyone has done a spontaneous trip to a different continent to visit a friend or spent 200€ on a night out because they were too drunk.

so when remus and sirius meet for the first time in their early 20s? sirius is immediately so intrigued by remus and falls in love with him quickly, remus thinks sirius is incredibly hot but he also hates him with a fiery passion at first because who is this rich guy who most likely lives off daddy's money and probably just goes to protests to post pictures on his instagram when real antifascists know you never take photos at a protest.

It took me forever but I am finally answering to this!

I have not heard of sozialistische Jugend before but Remus reading Marx and actually really enjoying it is perfection! Mark is probably completely unironically his hero for a little while there. And he walks down the corridors of his uni, all judgy and quietly loathing everyone who doesn't understand Marx like he does.

Remus doing a terrible and awkward dance to bella ciao every time he hears it??? I didn't know I needed this but I do!!!!! (everyone is just like 'who tf is this guy? ' but sirius sees it once and is immediately completely gone -> starts listening to Cordula Grün on repeat)

Sirius' family owning a villa on Sylt is canon! I have never been there either but I agree with your assessment.

And yes, Sirius is such a little radical!!!! He still makes misguided mistakes in the beginning but he definitely knows what he stands for and believes in!!!

Him slipping up and trying to hide how rich he grew up bc he's ashamed ??? 🥺🥺🥺 that's so important to me now actually

Remus judging and hating him when they first meet! Yessss!!! He's like *scoff* who is this guy acting like an antifascists bc it's 'cool'? He thinks he's one of those exact people he loathes at uni! But Sirius is immediately gone for him and after a while Remus has to admit that he is too

And then they can hold hands at protests how romantic jdajkhag <3

Thank you so much again for sending this to me I love it so much!!!! <333

It's not exactly a coherent answer but I couldn't hide this in my inbox from the public any longer, even if no one else cares about this

[zestyjesty]

The Barbarian keeps rolling around my brain so I have many many thoughts under the cut

1. I saw someone talk about the house itself having layers and yes absolutely, the house and the different men we meet represent rape culture in a very literal sense. We start at the top of the iceberg in the house with Keith's "i wont take no for an answer" and not believing Tess about the basement because women who are upset just arent to be believed, and then AJs and then Frank in escalating worseness as we delve deeper into the house.

2. On the Mother ultimately being a victim but still being the monster who Tess has to kill, I actually think it does a lot about how you are raised and how that shapes what you think is normal and the harm you do. Again we start with Keith who is slightly traditional and says its "how i was raised", then we have AJ at the bar with a very old friend and went he tells him he had to "persuade" this girl and "yeah she said no at the start but like totally not by the end you know" his friend agrees and doesn't think thats rape. Basically, if you dont do the extra work to unlearn what youve been brought up to think is normal, you will absolutely inflict harm and be part of rape culture because thats how society currently is. (Clearly we dont hear about frank but if hes the type for 70s rapist/serial killer firstly is a very sexist society and secondly hes parents are 90% likely to be abusive, that combo is what made most serial killers from the 60s-80s). And the thing is despite being raised that way despite thinking it was normal AJ still deserves to be punished for harming that woman because he still did harm. And the mother doesnt know any better but she will still hurt Tess if Tess let her.

3. The final scene where Tess doesnt let her empathy stop her from thinking about herself for once is very important! Over and over she has thought about other people and got herself kidnapped and hurt for it over and over. So at the end when we still the Mothers incredibly human eyes for the very first time up close, and seeing how she cares, and its meant to pull on your heart strings, and Tess says I dont care what you want because Im going to think about me first. Clearly theres a gender gap not addressed (god i wished she got to kill AJ) but it works if we think of the Mother as the concept of distilled rape culture rather than a real person

4. I loved seeing the mechanics of the script happening in the real time. The story of the director writing himself into a corner 30 pages in and thats why the mother shows up in her first scene (i think thats why Frank shoots himself, like straight up wrote himself into another corner and goes fuck it Frank shoots himself).

5. I saw someone else didnt like the shift to AJs storyline but i really liked it, most horror movies have a hard time with pacing so they either start reallyyyyy slowly (peele) or just try to keep the suspense and terror up the whole time and theres always a flat bit in the middle and you get desensitised to it all and stop caring (halloween.....all of them). So i loved this take of doing it all again but from a completely opposite POV, normally they wouldve run the storylines concurrently so having it 1 and then 2 was just really interesting and pretty bold

6. I cannot tell you how many horror movies ive seen where the closing shot is a wide shot of the house/maze/town whatever of the final girl, and its all lit up with red/blue cop lights. Like thats normally when the film ends, when the cops show up we roll credits. So to have just the most unhelpful, apathetic, fucking rude cops cops instead was cool. I didnt even find them to be over the top (sometimes movies when theyre trying to do a 'cops suck' segment make them caricatures of villainy or bafoonery rather than making then real), but to have their very casual but unflinching demand of respect to themselves from everyone above all else, not seeing a filthy terrified woman with no possesions at all as anything unusual but a broken window thats for sure a crime. Yeah that was scary real, really well done.

7. It felt very classic horror with enough modern twists to keep it grounded in this year without being overbearing about it. Like when horror films are trying a bit too hard with that its just very sighhhhh (like in halloween 2018 they had a teen boy say out loud "i like you that means im gonna get some right??" Like no one talks like that whereas AJs version of events sounds like something a real person would say). And the house with a monster in its walls has absolutely been done before and yet watching this felt fresh bc it was playing on your expectations of the genre.

For a horror debut from a guy whose background is 2000s comedy I think he did really really good! Looking forward to what else he does

[e8luhs]

btw got this ask on my classpecting blog (which is basically super dead because i rarely ever have the time/energy to get around to posting on it) but since its cb related and were on a spree here, i wanted to put some info here because well... you know me :3c

yes i made the base of the characters personalities with their classpects in mind. obviously they still developed past that point (quite a few of the characters ended up completely different from how they were when i originally wrote them (rivian, crylus, vergas) because of the original writing being more based around classpects)

also ill write some real quick classpect descriptions for all of them under the cut since i dont want this post to get too long. i dont really want to say exactly why the puzzle pieces fit together because i think its fun to hear about other peoples opinions and also show w/o telling but i also really love classpecting and just some baselines doesnt really count as spoilers i dont think

rivian: witch of void, typically witches are quite a bit more fun and optimistic and generally just all around more Expressive than rivian is but like... youll understand when we get to it. witches are also just Incredibly Stubborn and i think thats quite a rivian thing.

witches have their aspects permeate throughout their life, and manipulate their aspects actively; they bend their aspects to their will, either by going totally against the notions and boundaries of their aspect or by simply modifying it to suit their needs. they thrive in environments where theyre able to go along with their own organized chaos and sense of structure. 

void is about secrets, irrelevance, the enigmatic the mysterious et cetera. i think void is also about hidden interpersonal knowledge. its working on the sidelines and in the background. void players always seem to do the hard work, but are in someone/something elses shadow.

lyreni: sylph of time, honestly lyreni is still basically The Definition Of A Sylph. shes caring, very aware of her surroundings, acts according to what she deems is important, shes patient shes exacting... but she can be a bit meddle-y and pedantic and pushy due to her own anxieties.

sylphs analyze and heal their aspect. they find where people and where their session is lacking in it and essentially poke and prod and go about whichever way they possibly can to fix the lack of their aspect. theyre very opinionated about their aspect and what it means to them and what it should mean to others, and therefore sylphs need to learn to wield these ideas and use them to help others.

time is about time itself and the flow of it, death, progression, etc. not only that, but its about order and structure, singleminded focus, all of which selfimposed. time is more like a chain of events that needs to be kept in order than it is about inevitable events that are out of your control.

kapreo: rogue of rage, i usually say rogues follow two different archetypes (1. they either start with an abundance of their aspect and need to find a comfortable balance, or 2. they start with a percieved lack of their aspect and need to accept it into their life. either way, once both of them grow into those second stages they then redistribute their aspect to others). kapreo is a v2 rogue. rogues also as a whole are very friendly and generous, passionate, determined. though on the other hand, rogues can sometimes have the tendency to isolate themselves from others when they face stress and other struggles.

although both types of rogues have different types of deeprooted insecurity when it comes to their aspect, v2 rogues in particular lack in confidence comes from the fact that they could never handle their own aspect. therefore, they might have difficulties ever allowing themselves indulge in their aspect even when worse comes to worse. as stated above v2 rogues need to learn to accept that their aspect CAN be a part of who they are, and that they CAN handle it.

rage is about skepticality, defiance, boundaries, intense feelings, adrenaline, its putting your foot down and not taking anymore bullshit. its about putting yourself first. rage is also just a very like... sensory aspect. its the burning feeling in your chest that you get when youre in those states of passionate, unrestricted emotion.

sebran: knight of space, You Know Why Lets Be Real Do I Even Have To Say It. knights are boundlessly loyal, committed, reliable and nuturing people, however obviously they have a tendency towards the Emotional Constipation and are constantly concerned with their own sense of usefulness and competence.

knights essentially have to unlearn their obsessive facades and sort of... perfectionism when it comes to the way they come off and the way they interact with their aspect so that they can exploit and wield their aspect. basically knights have to put the metaphorical shield down and take out their sword instead. their facades usually tend to reflect their opposite aspect due to their insecurity with their actual aspect. 

space is about creation, lack of bounds, infinite possibilities, the universe, isolation, loneliness. making something out of nothing. everything is at the universes whims, its unable to be contained. theres kind of a lack of any sort of structure or stability when it comes to space.

crylus: prince of doom, now hold your fucking horses before you say anything okay i know a lot of the times princes make everyone go “Oh god oh fuck” but i can promise you that crylus is a GOOD prince. princes can be incredibly capable and confident, goal oriented, helpful players. on the other hand though YES they can be a bit impulsive, arrogant. princes also tend to be a bit hypercritical as they hold people to high standards but they hold themselves to even higher ones (see dirk) a lot of the time.

princes ghost their opposite aspect and either just straight up destroy or destroy WITH their ACTUAL aspect, as they have strong internal brewing anger and hatred for their aspect and what it stands for. for the most part, princes need to learn how to channel this energy towards only flushing out the genuinely NEGATIVE parts of their aspect, as destruction sometimes isnt inherently a bad thing. in fact, sometimes tearing things down to make new ones is necessary and part of the process. but princes are REALLY high risk/high reward.

doom is about order thats outside of your control. its pre-established rules, guidelines, fate and futility and inevitability. similar to the death card in tarot though, even if doom is about the unavoidable end of a cycle, its also about the beginning of a new one.

vergas: bard of blood, i think its pretty easy to understand Why. originally he was going to be a bard of light which youll still see some remnants of that when his land comes up. bards are faithful in their beliefs and can be very committed to those ideas... but due to that faith they can be at their best just kind of annoying and stubborn to at their worst, antagonistic, unaccomodating, and dogmatic. 

its kind of hard to explain, but bards ghost their opposite while destroying THROUGH their aspect. i usually say that to mean that bards use their own aspect as a sort of vessel of destruction. theyre also incredibly unpredictable players, as if their convictions ever waver theyre likely to go totally off the shits. i usually call that their Bardly Revelation aka when a bards world views and ideas about their aspect are finally challenged. a bards challenge then is to figure out how to take these challenges in stride and become open to new perspectives rather than letting it consume them whole. (hint: a lot of bards have a very hard time doing this. you can kind of figure what im getting at here).

blood is about bonds, strength, unity, responsibility, society, norms. i relate blood also to expectations, and relationships but more like… in the sense of working together as a team. commitment.

hopefully thats vague but informative enough for you to get why i picked their classpects out. as always im really excited to get deeper into the story and actually really Show like Why they fit rather than just give some overly wordy explanations

[citrus-feline]

the ultimate difference between me and my sister is our idea on how a life is supposed to be lived. even if i didnt have depression i would feel the same.

i hate how it is considered ‘normal’ to actively destroy your body and mind for the sake of capitalism. but she is the type of person who amplifies that expectation x100. she has no understanding of the concept of having fun. i swear the only thing keeping her sane is her dogs, which she has 3 of. because just one or two isnt enough for what shes doing.

she also shoves that expectation on everyone else. if you dont meet that, you are automatically a failure to her. when i told her at thanksgiving how we just moved out, her response wasnt “good job!” it was “okay now do something else”...... she was crying to me a few months before about how i was “killing our dad” because i was still at home. so i moved. a big, difficult thing. but that meant nothing to her.

she doesnt understand my personal need to take things slow or i will literally try to kill myself. she doesnt fucking get that. ive explained it to her. once even mentioning how bad my suicidal thoughts get. and she just got MAD at me. she acted like i have no right to feel like dying, because i don’t DO anything. look, i don’t do a lot, but i still do some things. i have a job that i make okay money with and i clean a little and cook a good amount of the time. yes i should be doing more, but the fact that im doing ANYTHING is fucking incredible compared to how i was a few months ago.

i know i go on and on about my sister all the fucking time but its because about 90% of my awful thoughts / expectations of myself can be lead back to her.

i dont even keep my depression and anxiety a secret from my family or anything. i have been open about it (or, as open as a very anxious teen can be). she never believed me. she never thought it was REALLY a problem. and she continues to feel that way about me. she thinks im weak and a disappointment. “you used to be so smart and talented!!” yeah. i was. but serious mental illness can easily ruin that if it is ignored for years like she wanted me to do.

honestly i fucking wish i wasnt the “smart” kid when i was younger. FUCK, i wasnt even for that long in school. i STOPPED being the smart kid by high school, even earlier. my only talents were writing papers and understanding the content without much trouble. that is NOT enough to consider me smart.

i dont know what she wants. well, i DO, but i wish it would be something POSSIBLE. she wants me to have a high paying job that i work full time & get benefits with like health insurance. she wants me to stop having fun and to focus on just work. she cant comprehend the way my body works because she has never dealt with anything like that. she has never experienced that dread and empty tiredness. that feeling where you think the best way to get out of it would be to just die or sleep.

sometimes i wonder what she would do in the scenario of my committing suicide. i planned on doing it before graduation, so it is something i think about a lot. what would have happened if i actually went through with that? would she care at all? she claims to love me but then she turns around and shows me every single way im worthless and a burden.

you wanna know WHY i SINCERELY believe that i am a burden? something that i am constantly told is a horrible thing to say but no matter what i still believe it? because of HER. the guilt tripping and the shouting and feeding all of these thoughts into my head how i am selfish and horrible for what i am doing / lack of what im doing.

i thought a long time about what my suicide note would have been. and i still think about it every few days just in passing currently. ‘I’m sorry I was such a burden’ or, ‘I’m sorry I’m so worthless’. Or maybe just ‘I’m sorry. I love you.’

its an awful thing to think about, i am aware. and i am aware that my view of myself is basically the most self-damaging it can be. but its fucking hard to unlearn that shit!! ive been SO SLOWLY starting to appreciate my appearance (which i still have tons of problems with), and even just that is taking so fucking long. i dont know HOW to fix myself. i could see a therapist, yeah. and just say how i feel and feel a little bit better afterwards but have nothing really change. my medication is already very high doses, so increasing that is not on my list of to-do’s.

i don’t know how to better explain that most of the time i sincerely believe that i am worthless. literally completely void of worth. i don’t think i have a right to be alive and where i am now. i don’t think i deserve any of the kindness i’ve been given. i don’t think i can get better in a meaningful way without it taking a decade if not longer.

it is true when they say that you are your biggest bully. but sometimes you have to pay attention to WHERE those ideas came from. what was the seed for that toxic thinking? a parent? a teacher? a sibling? or even just the media?

sometimes i imagine how different i would be if i never believed what i was told and never thought too hard about it. my sister has never outright called me a burden (i dont think?), but she has implied it enough for me to believe it. it can be the subtext that causes all of this. which REALLY fucking sucks because i pick up on subtext like a fucking natural.

im sorry. this post is too long and i am going to end it now.

[readmylip-s]

thank u, next.

so here we are, a week left until we usher in the new year. 2018 is probably one of the more major roller coaster rides i’ve had for a while now. i’ve had quite a few accomplishments and fcos the usual emotional-down-turns. i’ve also had tons of blessings and a lot of lessons learnt through the year. i’ve always been told to count my blessings so thats exactly what i’ve been doing. 

if you know me you’d know i prefer keeping my social circle small, though it may not seem that way on socmed. but thats the thing, thats social media. i dont revolve my life around social media. i think i’ve said this way too many times - what you see is only what i choose to show. on a personal level, i rlly prefer the company of a small group of people, even if it means just hanging out with one or two friends. i think 2018 is also the year i’ve had one of the most me-time. i enjoy going to the movies alone, having the entire couple seat to myself, i love sitting at starbucks sipping on GT Cream or seasonal drinks and occasionally with a plate of beef pie. teehee.

i’ll prolly share some positive and not so positive highlights of my year, as well as all the blessings i’ve had through the year. 

this year, just like the past 2 years, i landed myself in the hospital. 

pretty much because of the same old issues i’ve been having. was put on oxygen supply for quite a fair bit, had multiple needles poked through my skin, and multiple bags of glucose. it was a crazy period because it was during the fasting month and prior to the hospitalization, i was fasting. and even when i was in the a&e and eventually warded, i was still not allowed to have food. i was cranky, i was upset and best of all? i felt like i was gna faint. i was due for surgery, again, the next day so i couldnt eat. but i was a rebel. during the night, i secretly chewed on Mr Bean pancake that my brother got me when he accompanied me for a bit. so glad i didnt get caught hehe. fast forward, post surgery, i ate like a monster. the little brother was supposed to fly off the next morn for his school trip but he still came to visit me during the night. he even brought me bubble tea?! i was discharged after what seemed to be a torturous 3d2n staycation at NTFGH. 

2018 was the year i get to tick off certain things in my bucket list. i finally, finally did something i really wanted to do.

i got myself a septum piercing. its a pretty unorthodox thing considering how i dress and all but hey, a girl can dream, and make her own dreams come true. it was on a very random sunday that i decided to get it. but i’m kinda glad i did. i guess all the needles from all my hospitalizations helped me coped with the needle that poked through my septum. pretty sure this is only gna be a phase so all you hateful people, shut your trap. hahahaha. :)

also this year, i finally got to climb a mountain again. 

it was DFOALC’s first overseas staff expedition. (no, i wouldnt consider pulau ubin ‘overseas’, haha) it was the toughest climb i’ve had of all the 4 climbs i’ve done before. in summary - my injury acted up during the ascend and descend, and i also almost lost my life to Gunung Berembun. i survived, alhamdulillah. i just needed my cast when i got back to Singapore. phew. 

moving on to counting my blessings, i call them my constants. 

#4. 

its no surprise that AY is one of the greatest blessing i never knew i needed in my life. i never know where to begin when it comes to how beyond blessed i am for his presence in my life. its still so surreal how we were friends for the longest time and now we’re planning for a future together?! WHAT. hold on, time! 

it is rlly crazy how this whole love thing works. but whatever that is, it has brought so much joy in my life. and AY has made me the happiest kid ever since we began our journey in chasing NZ! thank you, AY. you’re so bloody amazing, and i can’t wait to spend forever and a day with you. dont know what i did to deserve you but i’m glad i did. x

#3.

my bestfriend; nurul. we went through our poly days together, and even when we were separated in to different classes, we still made it a point to have lunch together atleast once or twice a week. clingsterzx much. we even applied for the same job together and among our group of friends who applied, only the two of us got it. is this fate or what?! thank you sissy for being there, always. and for always being the one with the sneaky pick me ups, and listening to all my sob stories. but please dont degil when i try to help you find a boyfriend??? but if you insist then i hope you find your oppa lah okay. we have had our differences and our bumpy ride but what doesnt kill us makes us stronger, yes? so much love for you, sissy! x

my other bestfriend, zulh.jsmn. this photo is the exact representation of our bestfriendship. he annoys the living shit outta me but i have got no choice but to accept him the way he is. unlike nurul, this one is lowkey always asking me to find him a girlfriend. smh. your day will come soon, buddy. i’m grateful for all the times you made sure i was always in check. also for being my guitarist bcus i’m that much of a loser who cant play the guitar, and most importantly for the letter you wrote to me 5 years ago for me to look back to when i feel like the worst person on earth. oh and all the times you traveled down for me just to send food that you cooked so i’d have food to break my fast with during my internship?!?! you always have the most interesting gifts for me whether its for my birthday or just a random gift. the box of clouds from genting, i still have it! appearing in Chicago with SD and a guitar to sing me a birthday song at midnight for my 19th birthday. and the lantern we flew for my 20th birthday in Tennessee at midnight? i choose to believe its still flying somewhere in the sky! thank you, buddy for everything. smell ya in futura tomato saucin, buddiok! #OHOS #GBT #NZV lives! 

#2

my sister, SD. oh sisthur, the resemblance we have is uncanny. it is no wonder people automatically recognize us as sisters through photos. our taxi stand incident will always be etched at the back of my mind. it is one i would never forget bcus it is that one short incident that led us to how close we are up till today. though things cannot be exactly how i imagined it to be, i’m still glad i have you almost entirely. here’s to more sisthur hangz! sayang sawah! x

#1

and of course, my number one constant, my only older brother. you suck and you’re such an idiot but you care for me in ways no other human would. no one, and i rlly mean no one, can ever take your place in my life, for blood is thicker than water. i promise, to always make you proud of me. and i too promise that when the day comes that you shed your tears for me, i’d cheer you up and promise to always be the same baby sister you grew up with. thank you, for calling me your bestfriend, and for loving me with all your life. growing up together hasnt been an easy feat but i’m glad our rivalry only lasted through the times we wore the same sneakers, shared the same room and have the same mp3 player. you rlly suck sometimes but i love you every other day. x 

/wow so much of a summary and a wrap up, nurfa./

but yep, these pretty much sums up my 2018. fcos there were pockets of crazy shit that happened through the year; from suffering cuts and bruises bcus of anxiety attacks, to losing my sanity, to falling out of a relationship, to my injury and to losing friends i thought who would be around a little longer. 

some other things i ticked off my bucket list was meeting Haqim Mokhtar and watch him perform live, singing on stage (i got to sing with sufian suhaimi!), being present for TLV gigs, and fcos, completing my desired Nike Collection hehehehe.

i am very much thankful to God for allowing me to unlearn and relearn whatever i needed to. i dont really do resolutions but in 2018, my goal was just to seek happiness. i’m glad to say that i have achieved my goal of being happy. and in 2019, i pray for constant happiness with the people i love most, and for inner peace. may 2019 be the year i break the chain of having to be hospitalized, and may 2019 also be the year of recovery. 

x, nvrfa 

1623 | 23rd December 2018

[an-actual-real-live-eevee]

Stpd anon-yeah hi i was diagnosed with schizoid originally but in therapy (my therapist is a psychologist but cant give medical diagnosis bc hes not hired for that) weve decided im actually stpd . Im just.... extremely irritated bc it seems like everything is telling me i should not be me bc its a personality disorder but thats super fucking stupid bc i generally like me. And people look at me like im crazy when i say i believe fairies or unicorns could exist which is super irritating. CTD 1/2

CTD 2/2 because im a science perosn i just dont think its right to say just because we havent seen them it means theyre not real. That doesnt make sense. Also like "ideas of reference" im christian, of course whatever thing could be a sign from god? Im so irrittated. I like being me i dont get why i need to "recover". Like recover from my social and generalized anxiety disorders and depression yes but ??my personality?? How??? Have a great day

Also i am 🦄 from now on ok

duly noted, I approve of the chosen emoji. unicorns are A+.

now then.

here’s the thing.

STPD is a personality disorder, yes, but it’s....not quite in the same situation as BPD, or DPD. DPD or BPD, those are....I don’t want to say learned behaviors, because they’re not just behaviors, they’re a part of your personality, but they’re basically developed over time in response to outside stimuli, they’re not built into your brain function and personality from day one, so they can be unlearned.

STPD and SZPD, on the other hand....sure, you can minimize symptoms and behaviors, but they’re part of the schizophrenia spectrum, is the thing. so, like all things on the schizophrenia spectrum, you can’t get rid of it completely because the thing is hardwired into your brain. you can’t unlearn something you were born as. you can try to suppress it if you so desire, but you can’t completely perfectly alter the way your brain naturally functions.

and if you like the way you are, I think that’s perfectly fine! I mean, I like that my fashion sense is ‘strange’, which is part of my STPD. I don’t really mind when I see a cat named Bunny and think it’s fate and I need to get the cat. I don’t have an issue with the fact that I need to sleep with a stuffed animal at night, or perform certain rituals as part of my ‘weird beliefs’. just because something’s a disorder doesn’t mean you have to fix it, you know? I mean, take the modern treatments for Dissociative Identity Disorder--we used to think the treatment we should be using was getting all the personalities to integrate. now the treatment we’re turning towards is simply trying to get all the personalities in the system to function well together. just because something’s called a disorder doesn’t mean you need to get rid of it. you just need to be able to function with it.

and if your therapist, or your friends, or your family, or anyone, is pushing you to “recover”, that’s bullshit. if your friends are treating you differently because of this or being rude about it or your beliefs, they’re not great friends anyway. if your therapist is pushing you to change in spite of you liking who you are, you should get a new therapist. if your family’s being dicks about it, well, you’re kind of stuck with them, probably, but you can try and talk with them about it, and tell them you like who you are. basically, the way I see it is, as long as you like who you are and who you are isn’t actively hurting anyone else, then who fucking cares? why should you have to change if you’re comfortable?

as for anyone who’s not a friend/relative, I mean, sometimes you’ll get weird reactions from people if you tell them you believe in unicorns or fairies or what have you. I feel your pain on that one. but the only thing to do at that point, I think, is just accept that some people will react weirdly to you, and just make a point of not spending too much time with them. find people who accept you or share your interests in those things, you know? don’t bother sticking around people who just think you’re a crazy weirdo for believing in stuff (especially when the reason is that lack of proof is not the same as the thing not existing, like, that’s actually pretty logical imo).

[thegeminisage]

hella spoilery zeldablogging from earlier tonight

feel kind of bad cause i had to look up the gerudo maze desert thing but i was SOOO close on my own

oh my god there's a lady over here by this shrine failing at cooking and all the recipes she teaches me give me dubious food

there are PILES of rotting garbage that have flies around them and the thing in the pot is sending up this black cloud of smoke lmao

wow the blood moon came in the middle of me clearing out an enemy camp :/

good god there's a stable out here in all this deep snow? how?? would the horses not, like, die?

aww beedle's here but he's cold ):

WOW you can upgrade the boy gerudo clothes but not the GIRL ones? that is SEXIST

oh noooo shield surfing DOES damage your shield i hate this i love my current shield what if i can't find another!!!!!

lol the ridge tower si surrounded by water and electric enemies. Great

omg i found the royal lab ruins ):

ok, i gotta begin prioritizing here

while i'd LIKE to complete all 120 shrines before i beat the game just for the armor, i don't think that's going to be possible - i haven't even unlocked some of them yet bc i don't have the snowballs or the quest takes so long

but the most important thing to me is memories

so after i check out all the ridge shrines on this map i'm gonna get the hyrule field map as well and get those memories

and i'll just save a lot and if i fuck something up and trigger endgame stuff i'll reload

god idk how to do this trial on the thunderplanes so like...im gonna let it be

see? i could never do all 120 before tmrw night

PLEASE this memory i just got was so cute zelda was being a nerd over plants and caught a frog she wanted link to eat :')

i love this zelda like i'm super not crazy about her voice actress sounding much older than i think of her as, and the fantasy british accent, but she has so much more personality than many of the others

ah, and i see now why she loved the silent proncess so...can't be grown domestically, only thrives in the wild

much like herself if you watch some of the other memories haha she feels trapped by her own destiny that's easy to see

i think it's super clever how even with a map you still have to look around for shrines bc they are hidden semi-underground

and i wish i had more time to stop and enjoy the little things like that, but i CAN come back and explore later, i can't unlearn a plot point

this spoiler fear might be a little baseless...tbh i also want to finish the main story tho bc like

i want it to be something i play in my free time, not something i obsess over 24/7 and HAVE to play and think about all the time

it's been a beautiful fun and absolutely life-changing experience but also it's been two weeks and i gotta get back to my actual life, i can't be Like This indefinitely

i'm kinda stunned that it took me this ling tbh? like, even skyyward sword was like a week and a half the first time iirc and i did that at like, a pace where i could stop and explore, i remember thinking how huge skyward sword was

omg im so glad i decided to ride epona down to where i need to go next rather than fast travel + walk bc 1. faster maybe? and 2. THE MAIN THEME PLAYS WHEN YOU'RE ON EPONA OVER THE NORMAL HORSE THEME i could weep

KASS IS BY THIS BRIDGE HI BUDDY I LOVE YOU

i solved the puzzle! this time im talking to him BEFORE i go in

he told me it was stupendous ;_; thanks pal

aw dude another memeory and it played the trailer music but

is zelda really only SIXTEEN about to turn seventeen? how old is link?? i guess under 21/18 if they wouldn't let him drink...

jesus, they're just babies ;_;

also, she quoted link's horse advice so like

this + the dialogue options gives the feeling that he does actually speak, you know? so as much as i love mute link i also like these glimpses into his personality as well, bc he's always been such a blank slate

he's empathetic, playful, sometimes downright goofy, and very tenacious - confident, but not in a cocky way, and obviously always a bit shaken when he gets a memory back

it's nice getting to know him a bit, even if you have to patch most of it together - kinda like narrachara lol

;w; it's so nice to have epona gallop over when i call her again

omg i think i found kass's house! i see his journal :3

haha i got this song "when the blood moon rises stand naked on that platform" ok nintendo

i wonder if you get all the puzzles do you get to tell him who you are ):

im tempted to unlock this one now lol

like, it takes a long time to get here and it's almost the blood moon

SIGH this is gonna take awhile but it'll save me time later

oh lmao it was JUST the blood moon so i'd actually have to wait a SUPER long time nvm tbh

well. welp. welly well well

i guess.......its time for hyrule field tower

Im Scared

wow. holy shit. i can see the great plateau from here...and it looks so small. i can see the temple of time, i can see the tower from which i first saw hyrule castle. i can even see the little path i nearly followed, when catching sight of my first moblin and becoming curious, before i got myself back on track. damn. Damn. i have come FULL CIRCLE, holy shit

and like, it's just the way i played it. hyrule castle for last. but you know? i love that shit. journeys ending the way they began. gets me in the feels every time

i'll be honest, THIS i could really stop and explore. forget those awful snowy mountains. this is where the #history is

oh god. i see a guardian down near that tower. please god don't let it be a mobile one

FUCK

i saw two still ones and relaxed and a mobile one snuck up RIGHT FUCKING BEHIND ME

[wheezing]

i don't wanna stop and grind but i worry i might HAVE to get some guardian armor before i can do this, even just one piece...!

i have a diamond circlet so all i'd need from the prof is the chest and/or legs........oh god. jesus fuck

motherFUCKER the range on those still ones, i wish i had been able to take them out...!

oh jesus i made it

this is it. final tower. thank fuck

there'll be more guardians, way more. i gotta at least check and see if i can afford some arrows without setting myself back further for the armor

i think i had all the mats i needed actually i just needed cash...maybe i can cook to earn some since i sold my monster parts

k, i only have enough gears for the chest OR legs, and i don't have enough rupees for either... :/

i COULD buy some arrows and still have enough mats for the armor but then i'd be setting myself back HUGELY re: rupees

ok, i FINALLY got the chest, jesus, now i can go back to hyrule field

altho it doesnt have any def and without even going to the fountain i know i cant upgrade it so rly is it worth it at all, but w/e

also, i read online that if you can learn the timing of parrying their lasers they go down REALLY easily but i suck so much at combat

i guess i'll just wear my anti-guardian stuff, i have daruk and mipha's abilities and fairies AND FAST TRAVEL if anything goes wrong

YES i did it holy FUCK

oh my god! three-shotted!

oh

i just climbed a small hill and got my first look at the rolling green plains...i missed you

no, no, i gotta go get epona to make this perfect, there's a stable i can warp us both to

omg it's the very first people i ever encountered outside the great plateau again

NOOO i hit epona when i was aiming for a monster baby i'm sorry!!!

i gave her an apple and some pats to say sorry ;w;

"legend says that an ancient voice resonates inside that sword...can you hear it yet, hero?"

frankly i'm glad they finally got their timeline shit together bc even tho the games are SO far apart im LOVING these continuity nods

yeesh, only two memories left but they're both RIGHT at the castle...im scared LOL

): i wouldn't feel right taking epona any further

reasons i never have money: cannot physically stop myself from buying arrows

oh, hyrule field is just beautiful ;___;

ohh god im scared

its fine its fine they wouldnt put a memory that close to the castle and then make you go back to impa if hat wasnt POSSIBLE its gonna be ok

awww no zelda sees link as a living reminder of her own failures?? whyyy

ha i love fighting guardians for the first time in ages im like COME TO ME LET US BATTLE

im uh. still working on the timing, but

oh JESUS

my mouth fell open in horror i climbed over a wall to get to the outsideish of the castle (castle town ruins, so says my map) and

the music was already creepy but jesus CHRIST

there's no color except for that blight evil goop stuff...no life...it's awful

poor hyrule, oh god

it's a lot like finding hyrule castle town devastated in oot when you first wake up, except of course this time we've nothing to compare it to visually, only emotionally...

i see a fuckton of guardians too so its a good thing i learned not to be scared of them

ok, god, i can do it, just one memory, i know RIGHT where it is

apparently the hylian shield is in here too and i am sooo sorely tempted

i mean if i have to get that fucking close anyway...

lord i googled it and apparently this memory is super hard to get you gotta Activate some shit but they did it this way they made it so you have to go back out i know i'll be able to come back out i WILL

ah, apparently you need to fight a stalnox for the hylian shield.ok. ok. good, great, Nice, Perfect

haha im soooo scared ;_;

ok, apparently the two paths are COMPLETELY different, so One Thing At A Time

we'll start with the memory, it's more important

tbh, i can't even bring myself to go in. i gotta go around anyway to get to the starting point of this path so i will

lmao i am almost PHYSICALLY ILL with dread this is SO stressful

JESUS

the music went all scary and the map is in 3D like a beast!! which i knew but it's so Much

and i got a cutscene of the calamity screaming with the Classic ganondorf theme i'm Dying how the fuck does anyone just get this memory and LEAVE holy shit

oh my god the main theme comes in!!! jesus

even ballad of the windfish a little?!?!

oh FUCK and ofc with the lightning

haha aww there's a "leave area" button on the map i can bail whenever i guess tat's reassuring

not yet!! i'm gonna have Courage

ohhh i dipped into a doorway just to wait for revali's thing to recharge and the music changed!! so i got scared and went back outside lol

oh god the higher you go the oranger the sky turns it looks like the blood moon jesus fuck

I MADE IT INSIDE

oh god, zelda's STUDY, the rooms all have names bc ofc they do

holder of the triforce of wisdom of COURSE she had a study she's such a nerd im crying i bet she loved it here and it's totally decimated

a silent princess sprouted in her study too ;_;

HER LULLABY IS PLAYING IN HERE IM GONNA CRY

oh good there's the memory!!

ohhh this picture of how it used to be is hurting my heart it was BEAUTIFUL

holy FUCK dude

ok old man is struck from my heart forever he was such a DICK to zelda no wonder he called himself a fool

link knelt right away but god damn i would have interjected on her behalf

you can't expect a person to pray 24/7!!!!

and deny her her passions, which are obviously machines and learning!

omg she has a journal in here and i almost missed it jesus

TODAY SHE MET WITH IMPA im cryin

omg this is her finding the sheikah slate!!!

jesus, and she found the shrine of ressurection too and hoped she'd never have to use it, and Yet...

oh GOD i hit leave area and it plucked me down in the middle of castle town nope nope nope fast travel outta there

ok to impa and then last memory i can do it and then do stream

and for once not play again afterwards bc to be quite frank i could never stress myself out this bad right before bed again, FUCK

hylian shield and all the rest of it tomorrow

h o ly fuck

he DIED protecting her, or he was going to, but she stood in front of him for once and finally unlocked the power, that's how she unlocked it, for HIM

i'm WEEPING and the sword made the fi noise from SS

even the sheikah warriors ran like sheik in smash bros

im gonna cry that was so much!!! there's so much continuity

fi is in TWO GAMES like...that was such direct referencing!!!!

SHE HAS BEEN FIGHTING ALONE FOR 100 YEARS jesus CHRIST she is SEVENTEEN

ok, im gonna watch all the memories in order and then quit for the night

i just realized the ceremony scene is where she mentions embers of twilight and adrift in time - putting us on the mm/tp timeline

aaaah im sad

god and i LOVE her princess dress i wanna see it in her classic pink why is everyone in this game blue??

so like, despite me not being crazy about zelda's voice ACTRESSS and the VOICE she's using, she actually does the best ACTING out of the entire cast

high key loving this zelda who is smart but has trouble with feelings, also

holy SHIT

ok so one of the first memories i got was of zelda coming down mt lanayru

amd it was badass and i enjoyed it

but there's SO much in there once you know more context

mipha was highkey about to spill to zelda that she was in love with link

revali's distain for link

urbosa seems less stern and more caring now that i know her better

now i know what zelda was trying so hard to do

"we have to keep trying until we find the thing that unlocks your sealing power [long shot of link]"

and "i'm not a child anymore" ofc it's bc she just turned 17! like link in oot!

oh man oh man

i love so much link's expressions in these serious moments especially that very last look into zelda's eyes before he "died"

it feels a bit like, with the other stuff i was talking about, i'm getting just a hint of character

and it's kinda close to My Headcanon but even if it wasn't i just like getting to know him

warped back to the temple of time & i'm leaving it there for the night

tomorrow: The End

(and my shield)

[relativelyanonymousgirl]

Who am I?

If I ever do get a real blog (maybe in a couple of weeks, maybe in a month? we’ll see), then this would be my ‘about me’ page. Probably tumblr has one as well but I’m taking this exploring a blog thing one step at a time. And I already added an image to one of my previous posts so..

So who am I and what am I doing with this blog (and why should you be doing the same?)

Right, let’s skip on the who am i question and get to the interesting stuff. I’m 21, which means for me that I’m in the phase of my life where you have to unlearn all the ‘bad stuff’ your parents raised you with and you kind of have to raise yourself on all the stuff you wish they’d raised you with. I think for some people this happens automatically and probably at a younger age and for some people this doesnt happen at all. But I have wanted to do this (to change) for as long as I remember and it never really seemed to work. Now it is working and I guess I’m taking you all (that would be all the 0 (zero) people that follow this blog and the 0 people I’ve told about this blog) along for the journey. Both for me, because typing shit out makes them more real and makes the changes more real and because I’m learning a lot and I think other people might benefit from the lessons I’m learning.

So what’s the starting point? Like I said, I’m 21 and I just finished my bachelors in artificial intelligence. I spent my last semester in Spain and this is where I realised I couldnt continue living the way I was. I didn’t not only not want to keep living the way I was, but I genuinely couldnt. I think I have anxiety disorder and it’s been interfering with my life in many, many ways. But even if you do not have anxiety disorder, the same mechanisms that are making my life really hard are probably making your life a lot more difficult than it has to be. So in a way I should be grateful for my anxiety because it’s forcing me to explore these concepts that I otherwise wouldn’t have and maybe my life at the end of this journey will be better than Iif I hadn’t been given these obstacles in life. Yeah. Maybe someday I’ll actually believe that.

So anxiety is the big problem and then there are the sideproblems and coping mechanisms that initially, if you’re walking a similar path to mine, you might think are the things ruining your life and are also the things that you want to change so badly, but can’t seem to. You think that doesnt make sense, why can’t I just stop picking my face? Why can’t I stop binging on chocolate? But it’s because I didn’t factor in the underlying reason: the anxiety. So my coping mechanisms aren’t that original probably. Number 1 would be ‘distraction’. Whenever the anxiety kicks in, which ranges from 50% of the time to 100% of the time, I’ll feel stress and fear and I’ll try to distract myself from feeling that and my brain from thinking related thoughts by either looking at memes, scrolling on pinterest or watching series. I would spent literally every minute of my time I’m not doing something and thus occupying my brain on my phone/laptop. Now I’m not saying memes are bad or series are bad, or unhealthy food is bad (woo shocker), it’s all about your relationship with them. Number 2 is food. I am not lying when I say that I would think of food every couple of minutes. And that’s hard. Because it feels like your dieting your life away, every time you have to tell yourself no. Then there is the fact that you have limited self-control. So for example, you have to finish a project for uni. This project in itself is giving you anxiety, of course so you’ll get the desire to eat unhealthy food. Now you can either put your self-control in denying yourself food, or you can put your self-control in working onthe project, both are a lot harder than they should be and both are a lot harder than they are for most other people. Obviously, I chose working on the project, which meant I was always eating a lot of crap when I’m studying. C’est la vie. Number 3 is a bit more strange. I pick my face. I look for any unevenness and god forbid clogged pores and I scratch, pimp and tug on my skin until the unevenness is even and bleeding or the clogging oil is out of the pores. And bleeding. This means my face often looks like a warzone (at least to me) and it’s been one of the harder habits to kick and it’s also the one that makes the least sense to me. I’ve never really cared about appearances much, I wear comfortable clothing (usually from my current boyfriend, and I don’t mean just a cute oversize blouse. I’ll wear his pants and his already oversized sweaters etc. I just care about comfort, which I think is also partly to do with my anxiety), I don’t wear make-up and sometimes I’ll brush my hair. But there have been nights where I laid awake hating my face, wanting it to burn, simply because my skin is not ‘perfect’. Yeah, it doesn’t make sense to me either, but that’s how it often is with anxiety. 

Then, what I think lies at the core of my anxiety is fear of failure. And this one is different, because fear of failure I’ve had my entire life. Beating anxiety takes a lot of determination. Just like changing yourself does (not if you follow my amazing advice, that is, I truly believe that change isn’t that hard if only you know how). And I’ve always been able to refer to the person I was ‘before’, so back when I had a healthy relationship with food, I simply didn’t think about my skin at all and seeing my roommates around the house didn’t fill me with a sense of fear and impending danger. If I had been that way before than I could go back to it. I’m stubborn enough to think that if life can change me this way, I’ll change my way back (that’s not how it works, you become someone else, but more about that later). But it’s harder when there is no ‘before’. Because if someone hasn’t showed you that you can change then who are you to believe you can? Well fuck that, I’m me and that’s all I need, I truly believe I can change EVERYTHING and I will keep believing this until proven otherwise, but guess what, since I’ll keep trying until I die, you won’t be able to prove me otherwise. 

Fun fact on this matter actually is that not having this belief can truly, seriously be one of your biggest enemies of change. So apperently it’s a big deal to run a mile in under four minutes and nobody thought it could be done. Until one guy did it. So this ‘barrier’ that stood for decades get broken and less than fifty days later someone else breaks it too. And then a year later, 3 people also break it, in one and the same race. By now, thousands of people have broken that ‘barrier’. It’s not a barrier. It’s your thinking. So stop that. 

So I had Fear of Failure (FoF) all my life and then there were some circomestances (it was high school, big shocker) and then I developed anxiety disorder. I’ve been talking mostly about a lot of symptoms of this mental foe, but there is also of course, the social aspect. And that one is so, so hard. It’s not the worst side-effect for me. I have friends, I know how to make friends, I go out to parties etc. But it’s the one that’s most debilitating. No one can prepare you for this one. For thinking you are not ‘normal’, for never fitting in, for that to even become an option, then a self-fullfilling prophecy and then just a part of who you are. 

It’s also the hardest to change, because you can stop eating food and stop looking at your phone (this is completely the wrong way to go about change, but Im siumplifying) but you cant just ‘feel comfortable’ in social situations. You can’t just ‘increase your self-esteem’, you can’t just ‘set bounderies and feel good about it’. I mean I tried to do the things while ignoring the emotions thinking it would go away. AND THIS DOES NOT WORK. it made it all so much worse. So don’t beat yourself up for ‘isolating’ yourself. Sure, isolation without a solution is gonna make the problem worse and you should definetely still catch up with your close friends and do the things that are light-to-medium-exhausting. But just ‘getting out there’ isn’t gonna make your anxiety go away, it’s just gonna make it worse. That said. You need to actually address the problem if you are noticing that social situations have become harder for you. 

Okay, so this is me. This is where I am at right now. Finishing my bachelor thesis for uni was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, even though the stuff I actually had to do wasnt that hard, but I had to fight for every single word I wrote. I couldn’t have continued to my masters. My parents came to visit and I cried at a restaurant, finally telling them my problem and then I decided to take a year off and focus on getting my life back on track. I’m now four months into this year and there has been many, many changes and definetely not enough. You can read about them here if you want to.

Sidenote. I’m living at my parents, which has its own challenges of course. But it’s been really helpful for me, since I didn’t feel like I had a comfort zone anymore, and this place is the closest thing to a comfort zone and I think it had slowly become one. Well at least my room has. One thing that seems obvious when you want to ‘find yourself’ is to travel, but I don’t think that would have been the best decision for me. I’ll write about that some other time. 

[maghrebim]

this is SUPER mean and shitty and im aware and im trying to unlearn this or like learn better or whichever one i need to work on but i already have kind of a limited amount of the whole empathy/sympathy thing and because ive been through one traumatic shitshow after another pretty steadily for the past 18 years i fundamentally cant relate to most other peoples experiences like in a completely non-exaggerated way i had a really unusual childhood and adolescence to put it mildly and i havent really had a lot of normal human bonds i guess so i just sometimes feel that other peoples problems are kind of trivial and its not because i dont think it is affecting them or that i dont know that different people can experience similar things wildly differently and its not because i dont care or look down on them or anything but i only have this very limited and frankly kind of abnormal pool of experiences to base the rest of my interactions off on, and sometimes.......other peoples problems seem kind of minor and i guess easy to handle, from my own limited skewed perspective? i know that that doesnt apply to the other person and that their struggle is hashtag valid and real and all that and im not trying to discount that! im really not, but i have huge trouble relating to others because my experiences and the general populations experiences diverge a whole lot, in ways i cant even articulate yet, and in one way im actually kinda envious of people who have what i considered small problems because for me to consider anything that happens to myself a problem it has to be, like, DISASTROUS. its pretty self-centered and sounds like i care more about myself than others which isnt really true because as anyone who knows me even a little bit knows i have no real regard for my own wellbeing (which is no bueno either but thats a whole nother can of worms) but. i just dont understand a lot of the time and its actually frustrating like i dont know how to respond to or help others at all because the only thing im ever geared up for is survival and i think if thats your only priority for pretty much your literal entire life and all of your formative years it makes you a kind of selfish person. i think its less because im apathetic and more because i just dont understand problems that arent sometimes very literally about life or death or at least grievous bodily harm or equally reprehensible things. which is not really a normal people thing im pretty sure