#this is like... idk this feels very low grade reading level to me

[gwyns]

"Just like she paired Elain and Azriel--Death and the Lovely Fawn. He willingly lives with Vassa, instead of in Velaris, with Elain."

i found this comment while trying to find information to answer an ask so if i had to see it, you all do too

[twisted-wonderland-but-gayer]

I'm having trouble writing a personality for my 'raised by g7' yuu, what kind of personality should they have? I'm kinda leaning at a manipulative type

I'm open to suggestions

🐱

Based on what I've read here's some suggestions— some may contradict each other since they're just ideas and you prolly shouldn't add ALL of them

I'm imagining them to be much more soft spoken and introverted— not shy though. They don't get nervous around people they just don't really see the point of small talk/are more quiet. Maybe when they speak is an "Everyone listens" situation depending on how rare it is for to speak without prompting.

Manipulative and Influential are two different things. (Ur smart but I feel like making this point since ppl confuse them.)

+Maybe if you go more influential you can tie in the "Everyone listens" more.

As for manipulation:

They would probably mostly speak the truth and if they give their opinion, they say so. They also never say bold faced lies maybe dancing around the subject. (Think Alhaitham/Ayato). It would be more subtle and people can just see them as being private/ weird like everyone else at school.

Or you can pull a Cater and give Yuu a "speaking face" to put on during interactions. Granted it won't be as fake.

People rarely see them put too much effort into things.

^^ like maybe they never do assignments but Ace tests. Or they never participate in PE but are peak condition for exams. (Seriously they refuse to run laps but here they are with 80+ pull ups in their record)

Maybe their grades can be purposely low but never failing.

They tend to pawn off work to others after making them think it's their issue/convincing or by simply being in the right place in the right time. They can easily hide from Crowley making him give work to others.

^^^ "Oh you're gonna talk to *sworn enemy at school 1* Azul? Oh nothing he just had some choice words about you... Ah no no it was nothing... well fine ill tell you since I'd hate for something similar to happen to me"

No one knows anything about them and aren't even sure if "Yuu" is their name. Take advantage of it. They can easily make up stories about their origin to excuse how out of touch they are. "Damn I didn't know that rule. Where I'm from its considered rude."

I can see them being very calm. Really hard for them to make them show too much emotion.

Or maybe they're creepy calm. Maybe they always have a slight smile on their face no matter how they're feeling. How creepy would it be to be attacking someone who's smile doesn't drop for a moment? Or someone smiling while crying.

Blunt and explains things easily or they're more expressive in words and maybe make metaphors for people to derive meaning from or as a method to explain things.

^^ "You see Deuce to say magic is like *that* is to say that Floyd is either fully human or fully eel at any given moment wheh it reality its much more complicated— an analysis like that is surface level, blah blah blah"

Or maybe they're like Columbo. They allow someone to speak. They give their two cents and then point out a fatal flaw in what was said or bring up something that contradicts them. (Have a meme to basically explain it)

Extremely analytical?? Like they know who would be most suited for any situation and plans around people's personalities/how they clash.

"Oh you said you couldn't feel yourself move when you got into an accident. Hey Grim remember when ruggie approached you, what was that like"

"You can tell Leonas lying cause his tail swisher left instead of right." Ect

They either underplay/are modest about their magic or they're confident. I can't see them boasting but they wouke jusy be like. "I can do that without issue." Or "Ace stop, let me do it, I can do it faster."

Idk 🤷‍♂️ hope it maybe helped

[1892]

college does weird things to imposter syndrom I'll crap out a paper the morning it's due thinking it's absolute shit and I'm the worst writer and the worst student ever but then I get the highest grade in the class. am I the worst or am I the best because I'm putting in net zero effort here and the math isn't adding up

ugh i feel uuuuu it's like. i can (without trying very much To be honest) keep up low As and high Bs generally. but i don't feel at all exceptional or talented because i know that there are people at higher levels than me in the class..even if i do get good grades on hardly-edited essays or first draft reading responses. IDK i put in a bit of effort into the classes i care about but in my classes where i'm phoning it in i'm doing fine as well! so what am i supposed to think about that

[musicloveop3s]

Tw (?) Learning about relationships- good and toxic ones I mention a fanfic I once read that was disturbing.

I realized after posting it on twitter that maybe it would idk make someone uncomfy. It was a lot shorter and as I've been typing this I've realize I have a lot to say on the topic. So I took it down before anyone could see it and yeah. I don't know what exact warning I should add but I am typing this on my phone so there is no cut off! BEWARE scroll fast.

At the very LEAST people younger than 16-17 should not be involved in the creepy pasta fandom. Okay I believe this ^^^ because I started reading about creepypasta when I was maybe half way through the sixth grade.

AND IT RUINED MY PERCEPTION ON RELATIONSHIPS.

I started to idolize toxic relationships. I started to think "he's protecting me from the others" or that (when I would read fanfiction) "I'm isolated because he wants me all to himself heart heart heart"

I thought the yelling and threatening was hot and attractive. The fights and hunting down of Y/N was exciting! And yes I know what some of you are gonna say....

"Well that was fanfiction not the actual creepypasta stories!" I originally was looking for MORE, like extended version, of the stories which led me to creepypasta fanfiction.

Anyways this went on for years and what got me out of the fandom (not completely I just don't romanticize it anymore yaknow like a preteen does!) Was one specific fanfic I had read andddddd that I was moving towards DC shows and yes I KNOW the shows are not completely accurate to the comics but they're good to watch fuck off! But this fic I had read was next level shit it was gore and manipulative and human uh not disfigurement but like they cut them open blah blah blah whatever and it fucked me up.

But I loved it! Because-

1) I've loved creepy shit since I was a kid if it makes my stomach churn then great!! I love that disgusting feeling.

2) It was fake. It wasn't a real story.

3) I had a crush on this character and because of all the other fics I had read I wasn't going head first. I was already halfway in.

But this did make me kinda realize

"OH these are murderers, like they are incapable of loving people. They only live to kill and some of them love it too and that's hot."

So no it didn't take me completely out but it did help. I'm older now and I know better now.

I know that those were unhealthy ideals coming from someone who is mentally ill and is low-key afraid to be abandoned... so the idea of someone obsessively loving them, go as far as to kill them to keep them, or being someone's forever partner that they couldn't betray or leave because I'll take myself down and drag you with me or someone hunting another person down and you'll love me eventually I'll force you to or I'll kill all your friends and family so that you can never leave and I only see you as a toy and once I'm bored I won't leave! I'll kill you! I will be your first and last love....... well it was yeah. And yes I am talking about myself! This was a long time ago!!!!!!

I do have a better idea of what a healthy relationship is and I am learning but for a long time that is what I expected, what I wanted, what I thought I needed. Every love story leading up to that all ended the same, divorce, cheating, abandonment, death AKA heartbreak.

And if I've learned anything it's that I'm not special. There are ton of other people like this as well. I am not alone and sometimes love isn't scary or evil and maybe just maybe some people can find true love. Sometimes the scariest things, the most painful endings leave you with heartbreak but also with good memories.

Now I'm not saying never read scary stories or creepypasta everrrr just put a age limit or warning? Though most teens and preteens won't listen...

BUT IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR CREEPY OR SCARY OR WEIRD SHIT THEN

🎊SCP🎊

Great stories there!!!

[kissesandcream]

a smol sibling.,

w/ xiao, kaeya, & venti

— • request from anon : being the trio’s younger sibling! (separately)

xiao p1 || kaeya p1 || gn ! sibling ! reader || headcanon format || 1.5k words

; masterlist.,

; a / n - i’ve done xiao and kaeya before, but i had some more ideas so i’m making some more! links above if you’d like to read the others <3

xiao .,

• the other hcs i made for him where general, but here anon specified a younger sibling, so i’ll do that!

• he’s that sibling who’ll pretend ur the most annoying thing on the planet but would do anything for u so much as you ask

• “xiao when u come back could i have some glaze lilies” “get them yourself im the vigilant yaksha not a flower picker🙄” mhm then why did u literally wipe out qingce village’s flower population hm xiao 🤨

• teaches u how to fight!! but he’s not teaching he’s “helping you discover things yourself so you can be a functional person”

• it takes way too much effort to get this man to admit he loves you but you know it as much as he does so it’s okay <3

• cloud retainer has so much dirt on him it’s crazy. if you ever need some blackmail material head over to hers. also you can find some embarassing pictures she’s got a heckton

• verr goldet takes care of u a lot too, xiao’s a great brother and all but he lacks in this department called self care

• idk if you’re mortal or adeptus or half adeptus but if you need to eat and do basic body functions he does not got u covered

• mans would try to raise u on almond tofu until verr goldet bought out a food pyramid and explained about these things called nutrients 

• he also doesn’t understand how important sleep is so,,, “xiao i’m gonna stay up” “yeah sure whatever” passing out two days later “y/N WHAT’S WRONG-”

• yeah verr goldet and the innkeeper guy give him a guide to basic survival talk and all through it he’s glaring at you like why did you never tell me you needed human things to live >:( 

• now that he knows you need sleep, he makes u sleep at 8 pm every night like a grandpa!! good luck trying to get him to stop!!

• are these getting too guardian-like and less sibling-like??? 😭 but that’s the vibes he gives yk!! ur over protective adeptus parent-brother who has no clue how u work but wants to try to understand a little

• in the game u can tell how much more open he gets wit the traveller as friendship levels progress, and if you’ve maxed it out he’d basically do anything for you and would want you to trouble him than yourself

• and he’ll probably be closer with you than he’ll ever be with traveller since you’re siblings and whatnot, so it would make sense that he looks out for you more than your typical older brother yk

• plays the flute for you!! if he hears u humming a tune under your breath he’ll find it and learn it to play for u 

• he may not fully understand how relationships work but he’s trying his best for u <3

 kaeya .,

• my other kaeya hcs were in relation to you being close / living with diluc, but these will be more general and central towards kaeya!

• kaeya fits literally every older brother trope that exists. the brother who’s always got ur back? you got it. the brother who keeps secrets you don’t know about from you? heck yeah. the annoying brother who makes u do his chores for him? maybe a little too much.

• pls he (lovingly) shoves all of his small tasks onto u it’s infuriating but you can’t even say no bc then he gets all dramatic 

• “y/n 😩 you’re abandonning your dear brother like this 😩 how could you 😩 i didn’t know you were so cruel 😩” sir shut up <3

• since he’s a people person everyone knows u very well too, heck all the senior citizens probably voted u as second best in law after him or smth idk man 

• hanging out with best boy bennett!! he canonically sees kaeya as an older brother too so y’all def go on little adventures together <3

• ur one of the only people who have ever looked under his eyepatch, diluc and crepus being the only other two

• sometimes he forgets to take it off when he goes to bed and it leaves a bruise bc it’s pretty tight, so he let’s you change it for him 

• “i can do this myself, you know” well he can but you both know he likes it better when you’re there

• does not allow your closet to be anything less than exquisite, you’ve got a bunch of scarfs like his whether you like it for not

• makes u buy his wine from diluc for him bc every time he goes to the tavern diluc raises the price tenfold just for him

• he’s that sibling who will rile you up on purpose just for the fun of it. i have a cousin who used to do that when he was younger and it was annoying but he still adores me sm so i don’t mind <3

• besides even if he does get on ur nerves amber’s got ur back- you can rant to her about him for hours on end and she’ll add with her experiences with kaeya’s bullying

• what are siblings if not for sibling rivalry, yes he picks on u constantly but he also picks u up when you’re feeling low <3

venti .,

• oh my gods he would be sO FUN

• the two of you are the bane of diluc’s existence, venti loops u into his winery pilfering plans a lot 

• venti pulls the archon card if the two of you get caught by him idk what excuse you’ve got but it better be good 😭

• no way the god of wind and song’s sibling doesn’t love music- even if you’re tone deaf, or hard of hearing, music is about the pleasure it brings and he’ll bring it to you

• you guys go wind gliding a lot of the time too!! y’all don’t even need gliders you’ve got the power of anemo 😎

• he’s that cool brother who’s only rule is that you do whatever you want to do, life is too short for regrets so live in the moment and be spontaneous!

• even though he’s older he seems much younger than you at heart 😭 will wine if you don’t do something for him it’s hilarious

• you’ve got other things to do and he’s just “but hanging out!!!” and ur like “but work!!!” 

• it’s very hard to be productive with him around, he will distract u with something as mundane as an apple- it’s not his fault tho bb just has a poor attention span 😭 

• he’s very clingy, if you’re together he’ll link your elbows like everyone did in sixth grade, and in turn u can kick him in the kneecaps when he does stupid things

• he’s the ceo of stupid things so u get to kick him a lot, it’s a mutal symbiotic relationship we love to see it <33

• my brain is dead and i can’t english rn but. his vibes yk he’s so fun to be around, he gives out surprisingly killer advice too

• i have this man’s teapot lines plastered on my wall bc they help me deal with stuff, so if you’re ever down you can always, always, always go to him and he’ll have the exact things to say

• if it’s words, he has them, if it’s silence you need he’ll lend you his shoulder; but there was never an instance he doesn’t leave you better than before

• you haven’t seen his archon side a lot, since he doesn’t show it all that much, but it’s so far from venti it’s a little scary; but in a sort of admiring way yk

• you guys visit zhongli sometimes, and it’s a free real estate for blackmail material bc of how terrified venti is of him

• zhongli is like that long lost uncle who visits once a year, and you’re his favorite child so he gives you candy and picks on venti for not taking good enough care of you

• “i’m their sibling not their parent” “you’re older have some responsibility >:(”

• if you ever get drunk he will hear about it and will come all the way from liyue to i will have order venti’s head, regardless of whether he was the cause of you being drunk or not

• that about wraps it up! im sure i could think of more but my brain is sorta dead rn so this will have to suffice 😭 i can’t think of a closing statement sO i hope u enjoyed!! bye bye!! <3

[tyunni]

(imma try to make my asks shorter lol cuz i feel bad for taking up sm room on your blog dkdjdkjd) oooh that’s fun! i love kids lol i have a job as a teacher assistant and i work with kids that are like 4-6 years old 🥺 oH which is where i got the inspo for that one riki drabble with lil yn kissing lil riki on the cheek and stuff lol. that actually happened in one of the classes 😭 it was so cute skdjsjsj

how did you learn english btw? and ugh i totally understand. english grammar is SUPER confusing. even as a native speaker, sometimes i question my own grammar lol. so i always admire ppl who learn english when it’s not their native language, esp when they’re as fluent as you! <3 srsly

and i’ve heard of georgia. idk much about it tho lol. i only know of it bc when i was in grade 8, for fun (literally FOR FUN 💀 SKSJSK), i memorized all of the countries of the world and where they’re located on a map lol i was a huge nerd ig skjdksjd so yeah i’m familiar with georgia but ik like nothing about it sksjsk and the alphabet is sooo pretty pLS. is it an easy alphabet to learn? like compared to english let’s say lol

naur really? my vocab has impressed you??! whEN?? sksjsdkjs i remember in your work there were words that impressed me lol which is another reason why i find it so hard to believe eng isn’t your first language!!!! naurrr thank you 🥺 your def one of the vv talented writers on here too, i’m serious. also also! the long hc in your drafts (did you say it was a hc? lol i can’t remember already skdjskd im soRRY) idk if you’ve talked about it more before bc i’m literally terrible at keeping up w things but mind me asking what it’s about? 👀😏

HELP PLS DONT WORRY ABT THE SPACE ON MY BLOG😞😞 i have over 1.5k posts alr and its literally just me screaming and crying so we're good dwdw

AND PLEASE THATS SO CUTE :( i love kids too but theyre such a pain in the ass sometimes, especially the very young ones like 2-5 years old cuz during that age they're more... actuve ig :/ HOW DO U EVEN TAKE CARE OF THEM I WOULD'VE GONE MAD HELSPSMNS

and we learn english at school, from grade 1 up until grade 12 but the level is VERY LOW. we use the same A2-3 or smth levels EVERY SINGLE YEAR so it gets very infuriating as someone who's i guess ahead of everyone else because i know all that stuff already 😭😭😭 and yeah english grammar is a bit confusing but it's nothing compared to russian AND ESPECIALLY GEORGIAN GRAMMAR. as a native speaker,,,, yeah georgian grammar is fucking hell. it may look simple but it's far more difficult than english, german, italian, french & all that jazz :/ its a very difficult langauge overall. sometimes even i'm not fluent in it, that's how difficult the grammar is 😭😭

also grade 8 u was insane bcuz WHY?? WOULD U DO THAT 😞😞 i can't even memorize the name of my own country were you okay??? and yeah our culture is actually very unique and just overall based more on the artistic side. we have our own dances, singing, our own food, clothing and a very very long history. we may be small but we have definitely kept our traditions throughout the centuries and i'm very proud of that, so that stuff is also very hard to get used to when it comes to foreigners visiting or even moving here because it's VERY different from other places. as for the alphabet oH GOD NO ITS DEFINITELY VERY HARD TO LEARN, we spend at least 4 years with different types of textbooks that are specifically made to learn how to write the letters with step-by-step tutorials and guides. we also have some letters shortened a bit like ლ,დ so it's even more confusing for people who aren't fluent to read what we write 😭😭 and as the years pass everyone develops their own calligraphy (which is even more unique because of our strange alphabet) yet we can still somehow understand what the other is writing? it's very weird and definitely not an easy language or an alphabet to learn for foreigners.

ALSO YEAH WHAT IM WRITING IS KINDA?? HEADCANONS??? bulletpoints? idfk atp its a mixture of drabble + headcanon + bulletpoint and i had the time of my life writing it but now im too lazy to proofread (which i probably wont do at the end of the day OOPS) and write for the two members that i have left :///// and i'll give sort of a hint (?) it has smth to do with enhypen and highschool 😋😋 the rest is up to your imagination (well until it's released ofc) its smth that i haven't really done before cuz i usually do normal bulletpoints so it's kinda hard for me but Oh well there's a first for everything and i need to step out of my comfort zone sometimes 😈💪

[luminous-studiess]

Ummm so I'm new to tumblr so don't judge if I did something wrong.Ummm how can I be like you? Like you know? Productive and smart.I always push myself but ended up being distracted by things (I have adhd and depression).I can't even remember anything after.I suffer,and continue suffering, from my mental illnesses.I just can't keep myself on track.My family makes fun of me for trying.I'm actually trying to find a part time job here but nothing hires minors.Idk please help meee.

hi, friend! answer under the cut because this will be long. 

please know you’re doing nothing wrong, and that the fact you keep trying to become better and to push yourself to always get things done despite difficult circumstances already shows that you ARE already productive and smart. 

second, it also helped me when i was struggling very heavily last year to learn  two things: 1) there will always be particularly bad days when you live with mental illness, but all the little efforts you take, it slowly does get less difficult. getting better does not mean completely getting rid of all the symptoms you experience, but mostly just learning the best ways and small, gentle things you can do for yourself to manage your condition. this really requires a gentle but firm balance between pushing yourself to do the things you absolutely need to do, but also knowing when what level of work/school/self-care or hobbies is the limit, so that you don’t get too overwhelmed.  this means most of the time, you don’t have to worry about being productive for its own sake. it helps me when i feel like i’m drowning to know how little i can do/the most non-negotiable bare minimum, that still helps me not to fall behind.

^ this is a small, cheap pad of sticky notes i carry with me throughout my entire day. it’s only big enough so that i can only write a few school tasks/personal things i need to do/chores, which helps me evaluate what exactly i can only get done, especially on days where i don’t feel well. checking off absolutely everything on my tiny list makes me feel like i’ve accomplished a lot, because i i have-- they aren’t necessarily a lot of tasks, but they’re the ones that i know really do need to get done. it also helps me focus when i have a lot of nervous energy, and have a panicked sense of “so many things need to get done!!!?” because i can give myself a bit of time to sit down, maybe turn on an episode of a show i like or make some coffee, and write down my tasks. it really helps me with the faint, tiny guilt and dread i used to feel day by day that i was being unproductive or lazy, because now i know i’ve fulfilled all my obligations to myself (everything from doing laundry, to making dinner) and to other people (schoolwork and other tasks). it’s okay to move at the pace that’s only possible for you right now. it’s better to feel comfortable with the smallest things you can do, and build on that as the days come. 2) getting distracted is normal, given Everything Happening Right Now, plus with a mental health condition that makes it hard to focus. it can also be hard to remember things when i study, because of my own health conditions, but i’ve found that the following things have helped: regarding distraction - use a small system that keeps you from accessing any distractions when you need to get something done. i try to leave my non-essential device in another room, and set up a timer-based blocker, to limit the websites i access. - i try to acknowledge the distractions as they come, and try to figure out why: am i hungry? am i tired? have i gotten enough sleep? do i need a break? if it isn’t anything serious, i just acknowledge that i’ve gone briefly off-track-- without guilt, without judgment. then i try to turn my mind back to the task at hand. - a good ambient playlist can make me feel more focused during hard tasks in the sense that i have some form of stimulation to keep the “itchiness” at bay. video game soundtracks and film soundtracks are also wonderful for long, tricky tasks.  - sometimes i just have to start to feel motivated-- the focus actually comes in in the middle of the task. the fact of starting something may actually make you feel motivated.

- procrastinate productively: sometimes when i really don’t want to study i turn on a movie or a show and use the time to clean my room or fold laundry. my life still feels put-together, and i enjoyed myself! win-win.

- and sometimes i realize that focus may be impossible at the moment: take a break, go for a run, do something you like, take a nap.  regarding learning and remembering things i used to have the worst time recalling things for school, until i prioritized two things: SLEEP, and not cramming. i used to get extremely poor grades in my first year of law school because i would put off studying at the last and latest moment-- a few days before exams, pulling all-nighters right up until the hour the exam started. i would also just use my free time to scroll on social media, instead of taking a nap or going to bed early. this was absolutely wrong. during the exam, i couldn’t recall anything because i was too tired, too frazzled, probably didn’t have breakfast, and because i had started and finished half a semester of reading in one night. my grades have gotten much better lately-- i’d like to think it’s because i’ve centered it around two things: (a) getting enough sleep every single night (helpful ESPECIALLY if you have health problems-- mental or physical), and (b) making exam day the least stressful it can be. how do i do this? - this means not only learning things for the exam, but also for classes on a daily period. you don’t have to study particularly hard, but you just have to study enough that you can understand what the professor is saying in class. set definite study hours every day, stop at a very specific and reasonable hour, and go to bed. try to get at least 6 hours of sleep. sleep helps me absorb everything better (idk science but this is from experience and also some very smart people i know ALSO prioritize getting sleep). wake up at a reasonable hour.  - how to study: read the syllabus, and try to get a decent overview of all the topics you need to cover before you start testing/making flashcards/doing active recall (which is IMPORTANT bc this helps you actually train your brain to retrieve information). imho as someone low-energy i find that rewriting notes/making reviewers/making flashcards makes me very tired and leaves very little time for actual studying, so it just helps to test myself by looking at the syllabus and trying to explain the concept to myself, then peeking at the textbook or materials to see what i’m missing. mind-maps are also energy-efficient ways of figuring out how concepts fit together. - how to study for exams: the very latest you should start is a week ahead. two weeks ahead is ideal. map out how much information you need to re-learn from the syllabus. move slowly with the aim of finishing the coverage by the first week. the second is for reviewing and RESTING. - THE NIGHT BEFORE THE EXAM: do a final, gentle survey over the topics you may not understand. stop at 10 pm. go to sleep.  - EXAM DAY: you’ve done the work. take the time to eat breakfast, test yourself SLOWLY AND GENTLY (avoid reading huge chunks of textbook at this point-- youll only confuse yourself), and set up your workspace to take the exam. crush said exam. as a final note: it can be hard to get things done when the people closest to you aren’t supportive. try to reach out on studyblr and find discord study with me servers, or study communities on reddit (they’re actually really nice), or with students in your class. if you need to talk, just dm me. you can do this friend, okay? take care always. gentler days will come. 

[kris-p-banana-bread]

Here DOAFP fandom, have some organic, locally-sourced, home-grown pain. This is basically just me, a scarred older sibling, projecting on Bobby, another scarred older sibling. I really reached into my post-loss psyche for this, so I hope you enjoy the headcanons and meta (AKA I hope you shed at least one tear).

It won’t let me link it here so the post that inspired this is under the read more at the bottom ✨

- When I first watched doafp, I couldn't understand Elena's aversion to Sam becoming a prominent figure in her mom's and her life. Now I understand it almost too perfectly. There was never supposed to be someone after Robert. He and Gabi were deeply in love and happy. Robert was it; he was the first and true love of Gabi's life. Sam showing up probably felt like a huge and utterly disrespectful slap in the face of Robert's memory, because he wasn't even supposed to be there. I don't know if that's as eloquent as I wish it was, or if it makes sense, and it probably sounds really mean to Sam, but it's not even really about him. It was always supposed to be Robert; Sam hasn’t earned the right to be apart of or associated with her family

- After Robert dies, Gabi and Bobby make it a habit to find and keep photos and recordings/videos of Robert, even if the latter only has him saying one sentence. They won't make Elena join them for the search, but after they find some of those old audios of Robert, they'll sometimes play them back for little Elena

- Bobby put up the keep out sign (I credit this to a few other blogs for discussing this tho) because that's where he would cry sometimes. He actually used to be pretty close with Elena, but after he put up that sign and started distancing himself from them a bit so they wouldn't see the times he cracked, he got a little more short and jaded with her. It's that, plus just growing into a teenager and stuff. And I'm not saying that he and Elena have a bad relationship, but he's become more snappy and has more walls up than he used to

- Sometimes Elena feels bad because she doesn't always remember her dad's voice. She was pretty young when he died, so even though she recalls it a bit, and the recordings help, it's been a while since she's talked to him in person, so of course she doesn't quite remember what it's like to actually talk to Robert and she's forgotten some of his mannerisms. She likes to think she's all done (she marked the stages down in her grief journal after all) but grief isn't linear or all that rational, so it hits her hard sometimes

- I keep reading as an action close to my heart because that's a strong bond me and my mom shared. She would rec books to me, and we would joke and talk about them, or she would hint to some future event and then refuse to tell me until I caught up to that part. So Elena and Bobby do something similar in their grief. Elena has writing and words, because that's something Robert loved if I remember correctly (but if I’m not and that’s not canon, then I now declare it so) and Bobby has tennis. But besides tennis (I sent a couple anons to @freshlybakedfandoms about it but I'm not sure where she went) Bobby also was taught to play guitar by Robert (I liken it to Devi Vishwakumar and her harp) so when he misses his dad or is just sad, he'll take out his dad's old acoustic and strum

- (This next one is something I also think a lot about so this is pretty much 98% projection) Bobby thinks sometimes about the fact that he was never able to come out to his dad. He hadn't really started growing into that part of himself yet, and he never got to show it to his father. He wonders what he would have thought of him. Would he be angry? Would he dismiss him and say it was just a phase? Bobby didn't think so, but a little part of him insisted that you could never be too sure. After he comes out, Gabi and Cami assure him that Robert would've been so proud of him and would've loved him regardless (Since we know virtually nothing about him, I maintain that Robert was one of those dads who teases their kid relentlessly about their crushes and I think he would've done that with Bobby and eventually Elena)

- When Elena's quince rolls around (if she chooses to have one of course), Sam dances with her during the father-daughter dance. A part of her still hurts, still aches and wishes that Robert were dancing with her too; still knows on some fundamental level that he and Gabi had planned for this day, but he had simply never made it. But she's known Sam long enough that she feels comfortable here. Nobody can replace Robert, but Sam is her family, and it feels right like this.

- I might do some more research and deliberate, but for the moment I'm saying that Robert had cancer, I’m thinking along the lines of colon. My mom was terminal, but idk if I should make Robert terminal? Maybe towards the end. Or maybe he was diagnosed as incurable early on but Gabi kept it from the kids because, tbh, being told your parent is balancing on that kind of edge is traumatic for them. So anyways, I’m going on that assumption for this last point, and I’ll see if I can recover some of my old knowledge and talk about technical stuff later if anybody would like to hear it

- Elena and Bobby were both pretty young. Bobby understood about PET scans and tests somewhat, and knew generally what different answers from doctors meant. Elena mainly just understood what was happening by reading her parents' and brother's expressions when getting lab results in from the doctor. They both remember on some level what it was like when Gabi would leave the kids with Cami and take Robert out to the car (later she would have to help him) and they would all feel like they were holding their breath until they got back and confirmed that everything was ok (and later, the little shocks of fear when the answers were no longer as positive and there was more apprehension and risks. After all, cancer doesn’t deal in absolutes)

- Bobby can still remember Robert when he had to stop walking around a lot. He still remembers the phone call that Cami got from his mom, saying that something had gone wrong, and if this last treatment didn’t work, he wouldn’t have much time before he passed. Still remembers Cami rushing into a room when she got that call, and trying to hide what was happening until Gabi could get home and explain it; but Bobby was a sharp kid believe it or not. He heard about the treatment, heard Cami crying. He still had hope... but when Robert came home in a gurney, when he could barely stay awake sometimes, when his voice was quiet and his skin was a little jaundiced, Bobby felt incredibly empty. But Robert always had a smile for his wife and his beautiful kids, even if it was small and very tired, his eyes still crinkled the same. He always had a smile; right up until they had to say goodnight and get some sleep one night. And then... he passed.

- After he passed, the Cañero-Reeds needed help, and a lot of Gabi’s coworkers would bring food or materials if they were running low. Cami and Danielle would babysit and would distract the kids when Gabi needed a good cry.

- Like you’d imagine, and because of what is sort of implied in canon and in my own head, the kids dealt with it in different ways. Bobby put up that sign, and withdrew. He wasn’t awful, but his patience with certain people got a bit shorter and he was a bit quieter. And he was a really good helper when he had the energy and he cared deeply, but he would sometimes get physically and emotionally exhausted after helping Gabi/Elena/Cami/anybody else with something and would go into his room or mentally tap out to recharge. He took comfort in things that seemed natural and that he sometimes took for granted before, like video games and skateboarding (hehe bobby skateboards. Anybody second me on this?) and clothes etc... and other stuff. A lot of materialistic things or experiences that he would skip out on before. But they bring normalcy back to his life now so he loves them for that.

- Bobby doesn’t wanna think about big themes or anything anymore, which I can’t remember but I think it was Vi (freshlybakedfandoms, again, idk where she is and I hope she’s ok) who said he was a math and science person and I think that as much as that could transfer over to those subjects as well, it’s much harder to avoid existential and emotional themes in English and History class and Bobby doesn’t like it as much as Elena does for that reason. He had to live with the back and forth of his dad’s treatments and tests, so math and science is comforting because it’s more concrete (There could be a million arguments for why he would distrust math and science because of his dad’s passing though, I realize) Ultimately, though, it reminds him of Robert too much.

- On the other hand, after a period of shock and confusion, Elena threw herself into new things. First it was a grief journal, to make sure she was going through the motions. Then she read a lot, and when she felt too alone or like she wasn’t doing enough, like she was stagnant, she’d just find something to focus and persevere on again. That feels like her personality type to me; something is wrong so let’s fix it right away. But that could also transfer sort of negatively into “Something feels off or I’m very sad, let’s get this thing done and be productive so we can put off having to confront that but at least we get work out of it” but I could be entirely wrong (this is based off some of my family members and how they dealt with the loss.) And Elena throws herself into history and english because her dad loved it, and she wants to remember more of him. Because she believes words have power and history is a lesson and that’s incredibly interesting for her

[19thcenturyedgelord]

TW: Transphobia, Homophobia, abuse, neglect, p3dophilia, s3xual assault, su!cide, alcohol

~Vent~

My mother is constantly saying that they is only two gender and is always dead naming me, the one time I get her to say my preferred name she rolls her eyes and scoffs as she says it.

My mother has told me my whole life that she owns me and that I don't get to make any decisions for myself, she was dressing me until I was disowned at 14.

My mother would threaten to k!ll herself is I ever did something she didn't like, this includes: having a panic attack, dealing with over stimulation, trying to dress myself, telling her to stop walking in on me while I was showering/changing, going to bed early, going to bed late, saying I was hungry, asking to be allowed to go outside, wearing my headphones, not being strictly christian/not eating kosher, ect.

My mother got rid of my pet hermit crabs without telling me and was constantly trying to release my turtles even though they would die in the wild and they were being taken care of very well with a large, clean tank and plenty of food and hiding places, a special light that was good for their shell, and a great water to land ratio.

My mother slut shamed me because I was wearing shorts that went above my knees (they were perfectly appropriate btw).

My mother would scream at me for hours if I got anything less than a 100% on a test and even if I did get a 100% she would ask me why I didn't get any extra credit even if there was none available and even if I'd did get extra credit she would ask why I didn't get MORE extra credit.

While I lived with my mother I had a diet of nothing but microwave meals and chips and chips because she spent all of her money on vape, cigarettes, and alcohol. I would constantly be near unconsciousness due to my low blood sugar because I had nothing to eat.

She has slapped me across the face multiple times, one time with sharp plastic that cut my chin, she did this as a punishment. One time she slapped me because my blood sugar was low and I was grumpy, this is how it went down:

Me: Hey I know you wanna talk right now but can I make some food first my blood sugar is low this should take me 20 minutes max"

Her: No, I'm you mother and your going to talk to me right now

Me: Can I please just get something to eat

Her: *yells at me wich causes me to get distracted*

Me: *spills uncooked mac&cheese because distracted*

Her: *yells at me then slaps me across the face*

My mother nearly beat me to unconsciousness because she was very drunk, I had bruises all over me the next morning but I was to afraid to say anything because I new she would scream at me and hurt me more.

She molested me daily, forced me to change in front of her, forcefully spooned me in bed for hours even after I said no, and would "playfully" spank me.

She was constantly talking about how sexy a 17 year old at her work was and even bought him vape. She would also talk about some of my friends like that and even tried to internet stalk two of them, we are all minors.

She would lock the door to the apartment and wouldn't give me a key and would force me to wait outside in knee deep snow for hours without any warm clothing because she stole it all. She also refused to drive me to school in -8 degree (f) weather because she didn't want to loose her parking spot. I was also forced to bike to and from band practice (with she forced me to to do because she wanted to live through me) in 30 degree (f) with heavy rain because she didn't want to loose her parking spot.

She would consistently make fun of me for reading or doing anything that I enjoyed because I was a "nerd" and a "looser"

She disowned me after she stole my phone, went through it and found out I was a lesbian.

I couldn't even go into my yard without telling her where I was going, if I didn't tell her I would be screamed at and not allowed out my room, for a day and then not allowed out of the house for two more weeks.

She routinely went through my phone and my belongings without my permission, knowledge, or consent, in case I had anything "suspicious".

I tried moving in with my dad and she sued him.

She stole my most prized pokemon cards, a bag, most of my clothes, all of my old toys, and over $200 from my in the span of two weeks.

My room didn't have a door and she positioned herself so that she had to go through my room to get anywhere else in the house.

She would frequently lock the bathroom door so that it was only accessable from her room.

I told her I like pop music and she called me a failure then continued to play her extremely s3xual, vulgar, music about dr*gs, alcohol, and r@pe.

From the time I was 8 she tried to force me to drink alcohol because its "cool"

She forcefully pushed me against a wall because I refused to give her a hug after she made an offensive joke and I called her out for it.

She screamed at me because I corrected her after she misgendered me.

I had to learn morse code just so I could speak to my friends without her knowing what I was saying.

When I started counseling because I wanted to k!ll myself and because I was having upwards and 15-25 panic attacks per day, she forced me to tell her everything that happened in counseling even if I didn't want to.

She always gangs up on me in fights but if I try to get back up she just yells at me more.

She refused to take me to the hospital when I had a concussion and forced me to go to school all week even though I could barely stand or speak and now I have verbal and motor tics which she makes fun of.

She would scream at me because I sit down in the shower even though I have arthritis. (Yes I have arthritis at 15, it runs in the family and before to long I might develop psoriasis, I have shitty genes)

I wasn't allowed to wear anything that revealed my shoulders, that was low cut, shower any part of my stomach or back, short that went above my knees, ect.

I wasn't allowed to get my hair cut below my chin because it " wasn't feminine enough"

I wasn't allowed to have anything that was "for boys" this included clothes, toys, books, stickers, blankets, posters, movies, ect.

She forced me to watch R rated movies with her even if I didn't feel comfortable watching them.

I wasn't allowed to have any friends over and I wasn't allowed to go to any friends house, the one time I did have friends over she judged all of them and tried me to stop hanging out with them after they left. My friends are all very good people and are the only reason I'm still alive rn, she was just mad that I was talking to people who weren't her.

She screamed at she because I got one (1) drop of dark green ink on her black coffee table that she got for free.

I wasn't allowed to draw any male characters because she was afraid I would get off to them or something idk (this was before I was forcefully outed)

She bought me a triple chocolate cake for my birthday once. I'm allergic to chocolate. She forgot my birthday the next year.

Anytime I would tell her about the terrible bullying that was going on she would tell me to get over it, even after I had been thrown to the ground and strangled by one of my classmates.

If I got into a new game or hobby she would either take it away or shame me for playing it.

She spent all day on the computer playing Sims 3 to the point where I had to feed myself, take care of myself, and play by myself as young as 5.

She screamed at me because while talking about Pokemon lore I mentioned how Arceus is the god of the Pokemon world and she said I shouldn't say that because it would "make god mad" ( I have nothing against christians or christianity btw, just the people who shove it down your throat like she does)

I wasn't allowed to eat or drink the last of anything (finishing a bag of chips, taking the last soda, ect.) If I did she would scream at me and slap me as punishment.

She threatened to forbid me form seeing my cousin (who for the first 11 years of my life was my only friend) if I ever "talked back" to her.

She wod frequently strangle me as a form of "tough love".

When I was 2 she tried to teach me how to swim by holding me under water over and over again, drowning is now one of my greatest fears. Luckily I did learn to swim with the help of cousin and granny and even enjoy swimming but it is hard for me to do things like wash my face in the shower or stay under water for more than a few seconds without panicking.

She never taught me how to cook but then would scream at me because I didn't know how to cook.

Her smoking inside and while driving has caused me to have some lung issues, she denies that she ever smoked near me.

She tried to take me away frome everyone in my life including my family and friends so that I could only spend time with her.

When I was in fifth grade she homeschooled me and forced me to do college lever reading, learn how to code, learn at least two other languages that weren't english, learn how to play guitar, do gymnastics, do jujitsu (japanese), do soccer, learn to sing (keep I mind I had no interest in music, but she did), do a digital homeschooling program set at a highschool level, and learn a bunch of useless skills like knot tying and making friendship bracelets because it was "feminine". This was in FIFTH FUCKING GRADE.

We didn't have a washer or dryer and she would never go to to town to get laundry done so I never had clean clothes.

If I had more that $10 I had to give the rest to her.

She tried to kidnap me once.

One time on accident I stood in a bull ant hill and got stung all over (if you don't know ants all sting at once), I was swollen all over and screaming in pain and she did nothing, not even give me ice or ointment, she just told me to be more careful.

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

warnings: extremely negative feelings towards a sibling, distressing / intrusive thoughts. placed under a break due to the content of the message. remember, I'm not a mental health professional.

updated with additional viewpoints from readers at the bottom!

I'm sorry in advance.

I really hate my older sister. She never respects my boundaries, insults me frequently, and is just annoying and hypocritical in general.

I've always had these issues with her, but she lived at her own apartment away from me and the rest of my family, so I've been able to control my hatred of her. But last year in March she moved back in and sold her apartment. She has no plans of leaving anytime soon, and I can't stand her.

We shared a bedroom for about a year because we were also taking care of my cousin who also moved in with us last year. My cousin has since moved out, but my sister is unfortunately here to stay for a couple of years. But with extra space, I was able to move into the spare bedroom and thought that would be the end of my problems.

It wasn't. In fact, she has become even more unbearable. The hardest part of this relationship is that she has a weird obsession with being with me. I'm not sure if this is because she loves me, or she's just weird. I think she's weird because my parents never act like she does.

Our bedrooms are right next to each other. There's really no reason for her to miss me. But every single fucking minute she's coming into my room to bother me. I would have more empathy for her if she acknowledged my limits, but she doesn't.

She's constantly cuddling me after I've said for MONTHS that I don't enjoy it and it makes me uncomfortable. She constantly belittles me by saying I couldn't live without her, and that I would be a mess if it wasn't for her (mind you, I've lived without her at the house for YEARS and I was perfectly fine). She's constantly in my business, interrogating me about every little thing. She once locked the door and wouldn't let me leave the room without answering her questions for 20 minutes; she asked me about a $30 Amazon order containing manga I ordered with MY OWN MONEY. And I had permission for my parents to order it! It wasn't her business whatsoever.

I've tried to keep her out numerous times; I've gotten in trouble for it. My parents say I'm being mean and that this is her way of loving me. What I feel like they ignore is that I'M UNCOMFORTABLE. Her way of "loving me" HURTS.

I've tried communication. I've had multiple meetings with my family about my boundaries and they say they'll change, but they never do.

Another factor that worsens this is that I have borderline personality disorder. I'm currently being denied therapy or intervention of any kind. I get told my mental illness is a result of me having an attitude and hating my family.

I writing this to you because I've been having very alarming thoughts recently. I'm been somewhat suicidal as long as I can remember, but this is different. I've been having nightmares about killing my family/my family killing me. I don't want to kill my family. As much as they have abused me, I know they truly love me deep down. But when I'm in a mental breakdown, I don't think for the most part. I'm afraid I'm going to do something to hurt them if they continue to push me. I'm too scared to turn myself into the police and I don't want to be taken away from my home. I truly need therapy, but it's expensive and I'm not allowed to get it.

Are there any options left for me? I love my family and I want to get better, but I can't stand them. It'll be a while before I can live on my own, and I don't think I'll make it that long.

I'm so sorry.

I appreciate that you came to me, however, please remember I am not a mental health professional.

I do not have the best relationship with my family. I've come to accept that they just exist and I moved away from them. I keep a strict level of familiarity with them for my own sanity and well-being. There are people in my immediate family I don't talk to anymore or only speak to in certain situations, with other people around to buffer my emotions. No one in my family understands or respects my mental health issues and I have ceased talking about it with them.

I will admit, I had to ask for help. I'm going to share the answer of someone I trust, because they are much more level-headed when it comes to something like this.

Use different words with your sister. Instead of "I'm mad or annoyed", use words that bring out more empathy - "You're making me sad and uncomfortable. You're hurting me." Anger is usually perceived as something within you, something you must control. But sadness is usually not perceived in the same light. People usually see sadness as something that has a cause and perhaps letting her know that she is the cause will have an effect on her. Using different words when speaking to her may slowly change her perspective.

When it comes to your parents, well, parents do not usually understand sibling dynamics. They're fucking useless most of the time when it comes to problems specifically between siblings. It might be better if you say something like, "Her constant intrusions are affecting my school work. My grades are going to drop." Usually, parents respond more urgently if you say you education is affected - and it doesn't matter if it's true or not, we're just trying to get them to help in some way.

I had to remind them it's summertime lol

Oh shit, you're right. Er. Well, In any case, it seems you've tried having reasonable discussions with your parents and it doesn't seem helpful to continue discussing this particular topic with them. Maybe get into fitness since it's summertime. Go outside, do something active. She can't cuddle you if you're running, right? Then you can also be stronger and feeling better physically improves mental health. Put some music on, go hiking or running, take yourself out of the situation.

I don't know if this is possible, but perhaps if you're experiencing a mental breakdown and you're afraid of hurting your family, run out of the house? It might be better to be physically away from them at that time to avoid saying or doing anything you regret. It may help clear your head and help your family realize that this is something that is truly debilitating to you.

I don't know your age, so I don't know if the school thing is relevant. It's only a suggestion.

You said it will be a while before you can live on your own. When I knew the cons of living with my family outweighed the pros, I did everything in my power to prepare myself for leaving because I needed a goal in order to survive. I needed distractions, reading, writing, gaming, music, anything else to occupy my mind and help control my thoughts. There was a time when I needed music to fall asleep (headphones in on low volume).

Also... uh.

I'm not saying you should do this. I'm only saying I did.

My siblings and I have physically fought before. One has scars from fighting me. The scarred one is the one closest to me currently.

Not saying you should do it.

But I did.

If anyone feels comfortable enough to share how they dealt with it in their own situation, please do. Maybe more perspectives can help this person.

--

some other experiences sent to me:

anon #1

I don't think I had a situation that extreme but my brother was a little like that. I honestly had to become kinda rude and indifferent. Like he'd always use my laptop and stuff and I put passwords on everything and just don't tell him. And then when he tried to hug or cuddle id say I don't liek it and just push him away physically now this soudns fucking obvious when I say it this way but like I don't think I read that u tried it ? Idk I discovered I have a loud annoying scream that neighbours will hear, and fucking strokg legs I used to kick him away but like I was tiny so I don't really endorse violence but I didnt like being close to a 'boy' essentially at taht age so yea... Idk man siblings are weird and I have had intrusive thoughts so I think I didn't handle it well but for a few years I became an asshole to him and then now I'm good with talking sometimes and I keep it short and sweet and I've mentioned that I'm sorry for being mean in the past bcuz like I am ? Bcuz I'm not an asshole ? ( But like I did what I had to do ) I hope u get the help and support u need

anon #2

I read the message from the previous anon and I have to say I relate to what they say. I wouldn’t say i’ve completely dealt with the situation when it comes to my parents.

I have 4 siblings and i’m the oldest, my sister that’s 2 years younger than me always gets in my way and is a tyrant. Because she’s much taller than me she overpowers me and i also have scars from when we’ve fought. My parents don’t intervene because they say we’ll make up soon and I honestly can’t stay mad at people for long. I also live with my parents and am not able to move out anytime soon until I get my degree.

A few weeks ago my mother was complaining to my father that I don’t help around the house and all that bullshit but it’s obviously not true. Anyway. My father came into my room and threw all my clothes from my cupboards on the floor and said my sister and I must get out of his house. He was literally pulling us and we were crying because where the hell would we go. My smaller siblings were begging for him not to chase us out of the house but he was ballistic. He was constantly throwing insults at me, calling me selfish and disrespectful. I was having a mental breakdown and I said i hope that God takes my life away because i’m too weak to do it myself. I kept saying that and when my parents heard me. They called me crazy and were laughing at me and said i should take it back because instead of me another one of my family members would go.

My parents don’t care about mental health and therapy. It’s all unnecessary to them. But after that night I tried to find my own way of getting rid of the negative thoughts, I choose to ignore what everyone tells me. I agree with everything that you said about trying to get away from their family when they have those thoughts. I try meditation and praying. I’m not sure if that person follows any religion but that’s what helped me. And writing can be cathartic. Also remember that you’re not alone, there are so many people out there who share your sorrows and can relate to your situation. I think about my little siblings who i’m close to and what it would be like if i wasn’t there.

Maybe if they could get a pet? I know having a pet can make you feel less alone and you feel a sense of responsibility towards them. As for their sister, she needs to see their point of view and tell her that she makes her feel overwhelmed with the things she does. She can spend time with her and try to make her understand that they need their space too.

anon #3

I also have sum advice 4 the sibling anon frm a fellow bpd buddy:

Does ur view of ur sister change from "i hate her" to "she's alright" sometimes? Viewing sum1 as all bad or all good is common in bpd ppl and usually changes alot. I rec writing down the moments where she shows she loves u. This could be thru buying smth for u or doing smth 4 u. I had a similar relationship w a friend and this exercise helped me remember that she might not have intentions to hurt me and might b trying 2 bond. Repairing the relationship might take a while. Talk alot if u can, it seems like ur family is at least willing to hear u out, even if there behavior doesn't change much. Keep sum distance if needed. Working out and finding fun hobbies is good.

If u feel like ur breaking down, try breathing exercises n identify 5 things u notice thru ur senses. What do u feel? What do u smell? What do u taste? What do u see? What do u hear? I personally like taking myself down rabbit holes. For example: I see a yellow jacket > this shade of yellow is a cool tone > what makes a color "cool" or "warm" > why do we associate red with warmth > what if the sun was blue > what if ocean water looked orange > is water wet

I usually end up forgetting what was making me upset. If it was a big deal I would still remember, but at least I would b less emotional and a bit more rational.

Search up cognitive behavior therapy and dialectical behavior therapy and try 2 practice sumthing similar 2 exercises u would perform w a therapist. Squeeze stress balls. Masturbate (this blog is perfect 4 that lol). Maybe watch some videos done by therapists on youtube. I watched a couple of videos abt therapists reacting 2 fighting in movies and I learned alot (this video was very fun to watch)!

Anyway that's what helps me! Good luck 2 u!!!

[1990jeevas]

hi hello i dont think we have talked b4 but i would love 2 hear ur craig ND headcanonz :))

hehe hello!! thank you for the asks!! here's my ND craig headcanons aka me projecting onto one of my kins :>

note? ig: im diagnosed with adhd buuuut i probably also have undiagnosed autism and idk how to separate those symptoms tbh so im not gonna be too specific about what's what ig. this truly will just be Pure Projection soooo

let's go!

-was absolutely that one kid growing up that got either "never applies himself" or "has good grades, but issues with socialization" on report cards

-bad at making and maintaining friendships :/

-school probably tested him and was like "yeah there is something here but we arent gonna diagnose bc that means we have to give him Actual Accommodations" and then stuck him in SPED classes which just got him bullied ajsksk

-has bad sensory issues with like. the feeling of skin and the sound of like silverware on plates, it literally makes him wanna peel his skin off. there's other ones obvs but those ones are the worst

-sensory overload makes him incredibly agitated or just downright pissed. gets very snippy but doesn't yell bc yelling feels Weird and he doesn't like it

-cant wear more than 2 layers, cant sleep with more than one thin blanket, it makes him feel like he's being suffocated and having his movement restricted

-always stimming but pretty good at making it unnoticeable, has a lot of normalized stims like playing with rubber bands, leg bouncing nail tapping, cracking knuckles, etc.

-but when he isnt trying to hide it? ohhh boy is he a loud motherfucker, very into stims that involve noise like rolling his r's, doin lil brr sounds, clickn buttons on like remotes and stuff, etc.

-not very good at masking tbh

-mmm echolalia galore

-flappy hands!! lots of flappy hands :]

-stims by hitting the balls of his hands/wrists together repeatedly, is probably one of his most used stims

-has like. harmful stims when he's upset or in pain? like hitting himself, scratching himself, etc.

-has lil dancey stims but only really does them in private or around close friends

-so flipping people off is already basically a stim in canon lbr but imagine he starts doing 👉👈 as a joke and then it just becomes a Default Stim. he jus be standing there and outta nowhere he's goin 👉👈 while having a completely normal conversation

-very bad at reading tone and social cues but he just wont admit it. refuses to ask questions either. leads to a lot of bad situations but he'd rather die than ask for clarification

-if you don't tell him exactly what to do he will just kinda. be confused. like you need to give him a step by step tutorial otherwise he will not do something very obvious on his own just incase he's wrong

-low empathy my beloathed /hj

-uhhh pls dont put him in a situation to comfort someone he will say and do all the wrong things even if he's trying his best

-red racer hyperfixation <3 guinea pig hyperfixation <3

-the most dry texter known to man bc he refuses to have important conversations over text due to Lack Of Tone Indication (his friends would be an exception bc tone indicators pog but still greatly prefers irl)

-its the having multiple swears as stimmy words for me /hj

-walks while leaning on the outside of his feet more than having them like. level? if that makes sense. similar to toe walking but like on the sides of the feet

-dont ask him to read a book he'll either hyperfixate or end up rereading the same page over and over again bc he retained nothing

-very blunt but he's not trying to be mean he just has literally no idea how to Not talk like that

-does a lil high picthed mm sound when happy flapping and usually rocks back and forth with it :]

-will be in the middle of the test and you'll just hear him softly muttering "bonk. bonk. bonk. bonk. bon-"

-that ^ or bababooey

-basically any tiktok sound he hates turns into a stim at some point

-has a playlist just titled "neurodivergent moment" bc he's that kind of person. the first song on it is the home of 47, followed by stupid mf (idk if the person who made the home of 47 ((trolleycat)) can reclaim the r slur but it's used a good amount in the song, stupid mf is just blatantly ableist tho lol)

-*info dumps by tearing apart his favorite media and then gets offended when a NT does the exact same thing*

-calls things ableist when they dont go his way

-has a lot of oral stims like give him anything he can chew on and he will fucking destroy it unless it's made to be chewed

-*sees strings on hat* *sticks end in mouf* *complains when its soaking wet 2 minutes later*

-hyperfixates on a lot of problematic media so he has become the most critical ass mfer when it comes to the shit he consumes

-sometimes he just. screams. bc he can. and he feels the need to.

-has rsd but shhh he'll never discuss it

[class1akids]

U might be getting this a lot idk but what is your opinion on mitsuki and bakugo's family life (like if he's been through domestic abuse and such)

Hmm, it’s one of those really tricky questions, because (1) we have seen Mitsuki only in one situation (which was very high-stress), (2) the definition of child abuse is very culture-dependent - in some places any physical or verbal attack would be immediately considered abuse, in many others, “physical punishment”, like light smacking is separate from child abuse, where some kind of injury is the threshold, (3) it’s not sure how much of the scene was supposed to be Hori’s slapstick comedy, like much of the scenes of physical retribution against Mineta, or when Bakugou stabs Deku in the head with his collar. 

So different readings can be made of the same scene. I can give you mine as for now (caveat: in my wider family there were many people with anger issues and aggressive communication, so my personal threshold for these things is quite high):

I can whole-heartedly agree with All Might, that the Bakugou family-home is at least highly dysfunctional, and Mitsuki’s parental style was definitely a big contributor to Katsuki’s own issues with not being able to read and process his own emotions appropriately - everything being translated into anger.

The first picture we see is Mitsuki lightly whacking Katsuki - it’s not meant to hurt, more a pre-emptive strike to keep him in check. I think she means it in a funny way, but clearly she’s inconsiderate of Katsuki’s feelings who probably feels humiliated. (Also, she’s not the only person using whacks - it’s used in a various parts of the manga to get people out of their own headspace - e.g. Mirio does it to Deku, so does All Might).  

Katsuki reacts with (understandable) anger - and to me the dynamic is not so much one of oppression and fear, but an ingrained dysfunction of communication, where Bakugou to cover up his embarrassment in front of the two teachers who at this point are the most respected adults in his life calls his mother rude names and physically threatens her, though I’m fairly certain it’s an empty threat and he wouldn’t actually raise a finger to her. While Mitsuki to cover up how rattled she is, is attacking Katsuki and blaming him for his own kidnapping (this is btw the scanlation, not the official VIZ-translation, which always uses much stronger language). This kind of victim-blaming and gaslighting is very harmful for the self-esteem of children, and obviously even worse in the state Katsuki is post-Kamino. 

Masaru’s intervention is very weak and ineffectual, his peacemaking efforts are rejected by Katsuki. But it is more about the appearances than the root-cause of the problem. In any case, it reinforces that the entire Bakugou family is aware that their behaviour is very much inappropriate, but they just can’t help themselves, because this style of communication is just so deeply ingrained.    

Now with this exchange out of the way, let’s focus on the second part that is much less referenced. 

Mitsuki first tries to brush off Aizawa’s question with a joke, but then she lets a rare moment of sincerity. 

And it turns out that she sees Katsuki’s problems quite clearly - that the too much empty praise all focused on his power (she seems to be a part of this) affected his personality and behaviour. (If I had to guess, but this is pure speculation on my part, Katsuki’s parents were early on also very much focused on his exceptional quirk, being proud of his talent and potential, and it took them a while to realize how it started to push Katsuki in a bad direction. And by the time they caught on that there was a problem, it was very difficult to reel in Katsuki’s willful personality, which could have lead to the spiralling of aggressive language and smackdowns in the family. They simply didn’t know what to do with him.)

And to their credit, Mitsuki and Masaru do realize that UA is a better influence for Katsuki than they themselves are, and she is clearly touched by Aizawa’s public support for Katsuki, so I think despite all the dysfunction, the aggressive and belittling language, they do truly love Katsuki and want to do what’s best for him. Also, Mitsuki understands that there is another layer to Katsuki underneath the insolent, self-centered brat, but she is unable to connect with that person, because honest, positive communication is basically non-existent in the family. 

And when she’s not trying to cover up her emotions, she’s actually able to express that she was worried about her son in a quite affectionate way (Katsuki’s face tells me in that panel that it’s the first time he hears that), and also has an acute assessment of the situation the school is in. Finally, the fact that she is asking them not to go easy on Katsuki, kind of shows that she knows that he badly needs a different type of influence than what he got at home and in his lower grades in school. 

The Bakugou household situation gets referenced two more times. Once during the remedial arc, where Bakugou advocates for a violent smackdown of the brats, saying that’s how he was raised. I think considering that they are dealing with a bunch of kids with their teachers watching, Bakugou is not advocating for serious violence, but more like a “show them who is top dog”. But he backs down at Todoroki’s request, because he knows violence in his experience is a whole different level, but perhaps also admitting that whether it’s low-level smacks or the Todoroki-household level of violence, it doesn’t lead to winning anyone’s heart and if anything will rile up the kids more. 

The other example is when Bakugou reacts to the shitstorm that goes down at the Todoroki dinner, which basically implies that he finds it less shocking that there are problems in itself and more just a question of politeness of keeping it under wraps (which was Masaru’s attitude during the teacher-visit).

TL;DR:

So in conclusion, I do believe that Bakugou’s household is very dysfuntional, especially how they seem to have elevated verbal and light physical aggression to everyday communication, which probably heavily contributed to Bakugou’s anger issues, low self-esteem, emotional constipation and his lack of communication skills. He was probably not an easy child to start with (precocious, confident, self-centered, extremely talented, wildly competitive children are hard to parent well), and clearly Mitsuki and Masaru were not up for the task. 

But I also think that they genuinely love him and want what’s best for him. 

[mszegedy]

You, too, can design a wrench to throw in the workings of the coronavirus

I pretty much never post about my job here. I do love my field, but it’s not a special interest of mine. Just a normal interest. And while the things I do are pretty easy to explain, it’s hard to explain why they matter.

Now it’s easy to explain why they matter, too. Unfortunately.

The term I’m most comfortable with for my job is protein engineer, but nobody uses that. So my bio says computational protein design specialist instead. I sit at a computer and design proteins. This is important because anything important that has ever happened has been accomplished with the help of proteins. They are the most useful thing to make living things out of, because you can use them as both structural components (struts, ropes, cages, armor plating, nets, pipes, spools) and as machines (assemblers, disassemblers, sorters, recyclers, dynamos, rotary motors, ratchet motors, pumps, locks and keys). They do all the things that make things be alive. (By the way, if you’re on desktop, every one of those words in the parentheses is a link, if you’re curious.)

More precisely, I wish I sat at my computer and designed proteins. Today, instead of doing that, I attended the first half of an emergency protein design conference called to discuss how we can design a protein that can be used to cure the coronavirus. It was five hours long and I’m really tired and I got nothing done today.

Even on a normal day, though, I don’t really design proteins. I just read papers, write programs that make charts, and write apologetic letters to my advisor.

This is because actually designing a protein is the easiest step. The rest is paperwork and tears. Designing a protein is so easy, actually, that I get computers to do it for me. But designing proteins is like playing Starcraft. You can beat a computer just by knowing what the hell you’re doing.

About a decade ago my research community made a program, called Foldit, that let anyone design proteins. We do the paperwork and tears, while you do the design. It’s a fair trade, because design is fun, and we still get paid. (Most of us, anyway.)

Right now, the world only has to accomplish one protein design task. This is the simplest it’s ever been: make a protein that sticks to some part of the spikes on the coronavirus. That’s it. Make the right protein, and you’ve cured the coronavirus.

Everybody in my research community is scrambling head over heels to attack the problem from all angles. With Foldit, you have… somewhere between 10 and 50 percent of those angles available to you. You make something even vaguely successful, and we can use it as fodder for our models and algorithms and clueless neural nets until we’ve aggregated the design for the stickiest motherfucking protein the coronavirus has ever seen. And it won’t be able to do anything to stop us.

Do you want to do something about the coronavirus, and think you can handle protein design? Read below the cut, I’ll explain exactly how you can do that. Do you want to do something about the coronavirus, and don’t think you can handle protein design? Read below the cut anyway, and you’ll change your mind, because protein design is about as hard as sculpting, except with a way lower skill ceiling.

Please help us. We believe in you. We discuss Foldit models at our conferences. We take you seriously. We take this pandemic seriously. We need you.

On board? Let’s dive in.

A protein is a sticky string. There’s two kinds of sticky: orange sticking to orange (”nonpolar” sticky), and red sticking to blue (”polar” sticky). Here’s a short protein, technically so short that we should refer to it as a “peptide”:

You can see that it’s organized into groups of 3, called “residues”: little red bit (a hydrogen), an optional orange bit of some kind (the “side chain”), and a blue bit (a carboxyl). At the ends, the red and blue bits get bigger. The fact that the red and blue bits are always there means that they can be arranged into some simple patterns, assuming there’s room. But let’s talk about the side chains for a moment.

Some side chains end in red and blue bits. These are the “polar” and “charged” side chains, and when the protein tangles itself into the right shape, they’re found on the outside. This is because outside the protein is water, and water molecules have a red part and a blue part, so the side chains want to stick to it. I put a water molecule, to scale, next to the first charged side chain, so you can have a visual. Polar and charged side chains are called “hydrophilic” side chains for this reason.

The pure orange “nonpolar” side chains, meanwhile, gather on the inside, sticking to each other in a gooey mess. They’re the opposite of hydrophilic: hydrophobic. When you achieve that gooey mess, you have “buried your hydrophobics”.

90% of figuring out what shape a protein will tangle up (euphemistically “fold”) into is burying your hydrophobics.

There’s only 20 kinds of side chains in total, and that’s also counting the weird residues with not-quite side chains like proline, that weird bend in the last but one residue in our little peptide, and glycine, the residue with no side chain at all. (Besides a measly hydrogen, and everyone knows hydrogens aren’t real. That’s a computational protein engineering injoke; feel free to use it. The joke is nobody knows exactly where hydrogens are, and nobody cares.) Here’s a family portrait:

I’m not gonna explain any of the weird ones here, because honestly, it’s not super important. Red sticks to blue, orange sticks to orange, and stuff that looks like it’s connected is connected. That’s it, that’s proteins. I guess it’s worth mentioning that the yellow parts are sulfur, but sulfurs are just large, bratty oxygens (the blue bits). They’re not special.

Remember how I said the regular alternation of red bits and blue bits on residues creates some simple, reliable patterns? “Some” is two. Well, technically a few more than two, but nobody really pays attention to the other ones, because they’re just knockoffs of the first two. Here is the first pattern. It’s the favorite pattern of isolated bits of protein with nothing better to do:

This is called an alpha helix. They’re stiff, like rods. You’ll see a lot of these. The other one happens when you lay bits of proteins side by side:

This is called a beta sheet. If you leave a bucket of any protein whatsoever in one place long enough, eventually it’ll fall apart and turn into these. That’s part of why cells have to clean their proteins up: otherwise, it’ll turn into this junk. (”This junk”, on the cellular level, is called amyloid fiber, and is deadly to the cell. On the human scale, it’s called silk, and it’s nice and soft.) But this is also a very structurally useful pattern; it creates tight but flexible weaves. They get shaped into barrels or parts of barrels, usually, but sometimes they get used as walls instead. And sometimes they’re very small and consist of just two short bits that need to get glued together at the sides.

The rest of the protein is just spaghetti, euphemistically called “loops”. The functional bits that attach to stuff outside the protein tend to be on the loops, because the loops are the most flexible and can be posed the most precisely. In real life, proteins are constantly undergoing vibrating motions on every level. The biggest motions are also the slowest; pac-man-shaped proteins will “breathe”, opening and closing at regular intervals. Usually the only time they’ll be able to bind stuff is when they’re open. The takeaway here is that all the stuff inside the protein is gonna wiggle anyway, and you have to make sure it looks the best when it’s wiggled open, if you’re trying to stick something.

Congratulations. That’s everything I know about how proteins get their shapes, pretty much. Your mission is now to make a protein that sticks really well to some important part of the coronavirus’s spikes. The spikes are made of protein, and when they get near an alveolar cell, they open up and jam a lockpick into a “lock” protein called ACE2 on the surface of the cell, which makes the cell sluuurrrp up the virus. Some good ideas are to cover the lockpick so it can’t activate the lock, or to jam the opening and closing mechanism so the spike’s shape gets distorted.

There’s also a couple of other proteins the coronavirus makes that you could try to mess up. A popular target is its two proteases. Viral proteins come like the plastic bits for assemblable toy models: all the pieces are there, but they’re connected together, and you have to break them apart before you can put them together. That’s what the proteases do. (The second protease also cuts off the “to be destroyed” tags that the cell’s proteins keep putting on the viral proteins.) It’s much harder to get your protein drug inside the cells, but once they’re there, they can be as effective as a drug that targets the virus before it gets into the cell. Leave the drug delivery to us. (Or to big pharma, idk. I got a C+ in drug delivery in undergrad, and got it bumped up to a B when I reminded the professor that my attendance grade was low because I was in the psych ward for a chunk of the semester. That’s still more drug delivery than most protein engineers have taken.)

You’re ready!

Here’s a “Getting started with Foldit” tutorial.

Here’s an in-depth analysis of the coronavirus spike for Foldit players, with an accounting of some of the more advanced tools at your disposal. (I highly recommend DDG, although it’s slow to compute in real time.)

[purplesurveys]

1043

survey by egooverdose

Japan: What is one stereotype you associate with Asian countries/people? :/ :/ Uhm...

Jelly Bracelets: Do you have any? In which colors? Have you ever broken one? I seem to have forgotten what these refer to, but I’m sure I had a couple that didn’t last long. I wasn’t much into bracelets as a kid. Joakim Berg: Who is your favorite foreign singer|musician? Do you translate his or her lyrics? Beyoncé, I guess. All Americans are foreigners to me. I don’t translate her lyrics, nor do I do that with any other songs in English.

Josh Todd: Do you have any tattoos? If yes, what made you decide to get them? No, but I’d love a couple that symbolize important things or people, like a bowl of nachos for Nacho and each of my dogs’ pawprints.

kent: Say something in a foreign language? The word ‘kampana’ is Filipino for bell.

Kundera: What is one philosophy you have regarding life|living|purpose? Idk, I’m starting from scratch after the shitstorm that was this year. I have to find one again. I’m not rushing, though, and I want to give myself as long as I need to regather. Fuck knows I need to be kind to myself right now.

Learning: What is something you enjoy learning about? Off the top of my head, anything that doesn’t involve machines tbh. I can read about anything Wikipedia and encyclopedias have to offer, but I draw the line at factories and automobiles and engineering and robots and stuff lmao, it’s just not my thing.

Minimalist Interior Design: How would you design the inside of your own home? You already mentioned it; minimalist. I don’t want a lot of furniture and a lot of color in my space. I’d be happy with a minimal number of items organized in a meaningful way with some pastel shades here and there.

Miserable Weather: What is a weather-type that you like that not many others do? Thunderstorms, I guess? It’s been a hit or miss for me these days though; I’ve found myself crying more when it rains...but for the longest time I’ve enjoyed bleak and rainy weather. I’m not planning to drop it as my favorite just yet.

Morning: Are you friendly in the morning, or are you barely awake? I’m friendly at work from the start to the end of my shift because it’s the nice thing to do, and because I have to be. But I’m almost always anxious and on the brink of breaking down every morning. Since it’s WFH, no one from work has to know that.

Music: How important is music in your life? It’s slowly becoming significant again. I got a Spotify subscription for myself after years of sharing with Gab’s account lol, so I’ve been revisiting the music that I had to set aside for months while I had to grieve on my own. It was brutal the first few days and I cried a lot when I heard my go-to sad songs again, but I soon realized I need releases like that and so I’ve been a little more unafraid to listen to music each day.

Oasis: What is a band you remember liking from your childhood? Paramore? HAHAHAHA they were the first band I ever loved, man. And I’m happy I get to say I still very much love them.

Opinions: Do you ever get mad at people for not having the same opinion as you (i.e. Abortion being wrong|right, Meat-eating being wrong|right)? If it’s the kind of opinion that will step on fundamental human rights, like being vehemently against same-sex marriage, then we will have a problem. Otherwise, I don’t care if someone prefers Android or having pineapples on their pizza unless they’re being an asshole about it.

Orchids: What is your favorite type of flower? Does it grow where you live? Peonies. Idk, I guess so? I don’t speak flowers.

Outerspace: Do you think there's a possibility of life out there? There sure is; the universe is so vast. I wish we’re able to learn more in this lifetime, though; I wouldn’t want to miss out on future discoveries.

Photo-Editing: Do you edit any of your pictures? In what ways? Sometimes I’ll add a cute or flattering filter; that’s the furthest my editing skills go. I don’t use advanced applications like Photoshop and I don’t know how to remove moles or stray hairs or whatever.

Photography: If you like to take pictures, what is your motivation? I’m not into photography per se, like it’s not a hobby of mine or anything; but I do like taking photos of special or funny events. It’s nice to have a memento for a little bit of everything going on in my life.

Poland: Would you ever consider living anywhere cold? Yes. Maybe not Norway or Finland levels of cold, but somewhere considerably cooler than the humid hot mess I currently live in. When I went to Jeju four Aprils ago, they had the p e r f e c t temperature I could ever ask for and it was sooooo perfectly and comfortably cold in that I got to walk around in shorts but I never shivered or got goosebumps.

Potatoes: What is your absolute favorite food? It used to be burgers, but my mom has been making so many cheeseburgers the last few weeks that I need to take a break from them lol. Right now, my favorite would be sushi.

Questions: Do you like to ask questions, or answer them? Answer them, hence this blog.

Quirks: What are some weird things about you? Depends on what you count as weird. By far, people have been weirded out the most by the fact that I don’t eat fruits and will avoid them like the plague. I don’t mind the reactions and it’s actually turned out to be a great icebreaker, so I whip out that factoid pretty often haha.

Quizzes: When was the last time you were tested on something? I had a blood test last May because we needed to know if my fever was dengue or something else. Turned out to be a UTI.

Radiohead: Do you like any depressing bands? After Laughter is sad as shit but I wouldn’t say Paramore is generally known by this image. None of the other bands I listen to would count as ‘depressing.’

Rings: How would you describe the size of your fingers? They’re long and slender, which I love.

Satire: Do you enjoy political satire? It’s a hit or miss. I generally don’t seek it out.

Singing: Who do you know personally that has a nice singing voice? Leigh.

Skinny Jeans: Would you wear them? Or do you hate them? I wear them, but I hate them. 

Smashing Pumpkins: Listen to the band, or take it literally and actually GO smash pumpkins? xD Neither.

Snakes: Would you ever wear snake-skin pants, or other animal clothing? I used to wear leather shoes because it was required for school. I avoid the practice now.

Snow: What, to you, is the best part about snow|snowy weather? You tell me, lol. I’ve never experieinced snow before.

Space: Do you like to have your own space? Are you independent? It’s definitely important to have it every now and then; I’m actually taking this survey from a Starbucks because I needed so baddddd to get out of the house. It’s the first time I’m out on my own without having to do errands since March, and it feels kinda nice.

As for being independent, I’ve been mostly a dependent person and I like having people to lean on, but my breakup has also been pushing me out of my comfort zone and to try out new things just by myself. We’ll see where this takes me in a few months.

Starry Nights: When was the last time you gazed at the night sky? Last Saturday.

Stockholm: What foreign country would you like to go to for a shopping spree? Do I really have to go to another country for this? Hahahahaha idk maybe Shanghai? The people there were dressed so well when I visited.

Studded Belts: Do you own any? What do you think of them? Nope.

Suave Shampoo: What is your favorite shampoo scent? Brand? I don’t have a preference for either. As long as it’s able to clean my hair, it’s fine.

Sunglasses: What kind do you own|wear, if any? Do you like them? I don’t really. I don’t like my vision getting tinted.

Surveys: How many surveys do you think you have taken since you've started? My old survey blog has nearly 1500 while this one has a little over 1000, then add what’s probably a few hundreds that I did in 5th grade but never saved anywhere...so maybe somewhere between 2500 to 2700 in total? Hahaha I honestly thought it would be more.

Sweden: Do you ever feel like you should have been born in another country? I think nearly everyone from the Philippines thinks this.

Swedish Fish: What is a candy you often enjoy? Gummy anything.

Tea: Do you like tea more than coffee, or the other way around? I love coffee; I’m drinking one right now :D I never enjoyed tea.

The Beatles: My brother gets mad if people say they aren't the best band ever; what about you? Then I guess I shouldn’t be talking to him.

Theories: What do you think will happen to you after you die? Sleep.

Thom Yorke: If you met your favorite musician, what would you ask him|her? If we were in a Covid-free society, all I’d ask for is a hug, really. I wouldn’t have anything to ask them.

Thought: What do you spend most of your day thinking about? I’m still grieving about the stuff I’ve already covered.

Thought-Provoking Conversation: What do you consider deep? This would be a little hard to verbalize and I don’t really feel like describing rn. I guess you can say this question in itself is deep, ha.

Tokyo: Where is a busy place you would like to go to? Aw man what an innocent question. I wish I could show this survey-maker what a trainwreck 2020 has been and how ‘busy places’ virtually don’t exist anymore, at least for now.

Unpretentious Gestures: If someone pays you a compliment, do you take it to heart, or do you pass it off as just flattery? I take it to heart, but I’m not always able to receive it well.

Video Games: Do you think they cause people to become violent? No. I spent my childhood going on killing rampages on GTA and I’m still unlikely to resort to violence.

Vocabulary: What was the last word you learned? The term ‘low latency.’ 

Warsaw: What is a funny fact about your heritage? Good question, but I can’t think of any at the moment. I don’t really think ‘funny’ when I look for facts to absorb but now I want to look this up haha.

Web Design: Have you or could you build your own site? My principal requirement for my Online Journalism class was to make my own website/blog, actually. But Covid blew up and we ended up having to cancel the entire semester altogether, so my classmates and I never got to pursue more of that class other than our first few meetings, which were used for lectures.

Winter: How long|cold are winters in your area? It does not even exist.

Words: How many pages of words do you think you type a day? Maybe like 5 or 6. It’s a WFH set-up, so I’m exclusively on the laptop typing away the entire week.

Writing: Do you try to avoid it, or do you embrace it? I embrace it as long as I don’t have to write fiction or prose. I like writing, but only through journals and surveys.

[complexedwriter]

·˚✎ ﹏ 𝙞𝙞𝙞. 𝙬𝙧𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙜𝙞𝙛𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙥𝙚𝙤𝙥𝙡𝙚

;; 0511

yes, i know, it’s been like three months since i last posted. do i regret it? yes. will i stop procrastinating making posts? nope. so yeah, with that out of the way, let’s get it.

as a diagnosed “gifted” person, i can say for all of us that the way we are portrayed in the media is... infuriatingly stereotypical. so, if some of you guys are planning to write someone gifted, here are a few tips, quirks, particularities about us, in no particular order.

disclaimer! every person is different, so these might not apply to everyone! i based these off myself and close people that are in the same situation!

it’s usually not something we’re proud of

no, like seriously. most of us see it as something that sets us apart from others, while all we want is to belong

personally, my intelligence almost has a negative connotation for me at this point. when people ask about my derogation (because they do. a lot. idk why, it’s annoying), i quickly try to change the subject, or downplay it whenever they say stuff like “oh, you got a derogation, you’re so smart!” because it makes me uncomfortable

on that same note, sometimes we pretend to be less smart than we are to fit in more. ie. saying you got 80% at a test where you got 95% because all your friends were under 85%, pretending you don’t understand new notions when the rest of the class is very confused, etc.

sometimes we forget people can’t catch up and we go on rambling about stuff and the people we’re interacting with either, 1. change the subject and/or ignore what we said and we feel like shit because it’s something that genuinely interested us or 2. flat out say they don’t understand what we’re going on about and we feel like shit because we didn’t want to make them feel lost. either way, we feel like shit.

it gets really lonely at times

it leads to more than average overthinking

being gifted usually comes with a lot of annoying stuff. i’m talking temperamental issues, adhd, hyperactivity, low social skills, a combo of any of the aforementioned, or none of them. it can vary from person to person.

personally, i have temperamental issues, and it comes to bite me in the ass very often because even though i got diagnosed very early on, i didn’t get the counseling or the thing they call “coaching” to help dealing with them. that also goes for a lot of people. taking care of over-average people isn’t where the system works best

“gifted” is a vague term. you can be gifted overall, in maths, in english, in arts. not every gifted person is that one science nerd with glasses and suspenders and no friends you see in every movie

we can act like real dumbasses sometimes

i’m not joking, my intelligence feels like it’s controlled by a random switch. one day i’ll be able to understand university-level physics and the next i’ll forget how to draw a molecule

the majority of us underperforms after ~8th grade. it’s either because the school program isn’t stimulating enough and we lose all motivation or because we sailed through primary school without studying at all and we never learned to have a proper work ethic or study efficiently

then we get bad grades and it destroys our self-esteem because we’re supposed to be gifted

all through primary school, i was the “smart kid” and i based myself on that label, so when i started to do bad in secondary school, i felt like a failure

that’s not all of us, though. some do really well in school during their whole life. those people are rare, but they exist, and they’re very lucky.

well, that’s all for today! thanks for reading, and happy writing!

[ais-n]

2| and where is the trauma? both hsin and boyd were severely sexually abused. and emilio's illness is always treated as a joke. look Ais, your series has done me so much good between the bad it did. i found i'm gay lmao and i'm grateful for that. i'm grateful that you wrote this ok. but there are things that were offensive, and maybe it was unconscious, since i doubt you wanted to be racist or write a mlm relationship but more like hetero. i wish i could just enjoy the books but my heart breaks

3| idk what the one who questioned that could possibly mean between all the things but thats what i mean. i appreciate you a lot. i hope this didn’t make you feel worse or whatever. but some people really did end up hurt badly after reading icos and im one of them. with all respect, and hope that i didnt disturb you much, farewell.

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Aha I just realized I can put both 2nd and 3rd asks in one! Which is good because, again, the gay comment makes me laugh out loud XD As I said in the other post, thank you again for reaching out, for explaining your concerns, and for the courage you no doubt had to bring forth in order to do so.

I’m getting right into the answers in this one although I will probably ask more questions for clarification on some of the points, as I did on the first one, to make sure I’m not misunderstanding or misinterpreting anything.

More below the cut! :)

EMILIO’S ILLNESS

I’m really sorry but I wasn’t sure what you meant by that. Which illness? How is it treated as a joke? Could you clarify? 

TRAUMA

So this I thought was super interesting that you felt there was no representation of trauma in ICoS, or I assume you also mean its aftereffects. That’s actually one of the few points I feel pretty confident saying the series does portray a lot of, both in some cases the experience of it and in other cases the repercussions. 

One of the reasons both of them are so severely dysfunctional individually and together is because of trauma.

I don’t want to muddy up this post with a huge tangent but someone had asked a few years ago about the result of the Aleixo mission on Boyd, if he was diagnosed with anything, and so on. If you’re interested, I wrote a long ass reply about the psychological effect of sex trafficking on survivors/victims and talked about some of the things you see Boyd do that are a bit reflective of that. More info at https://aisness.wordpress.com/2015/01/28/boyd-aleixo-psychology/

I think there probably would be more information on all this by now, or at least I certainly hope there would be, but at the time of writing Fade that was the sort of research that was available. 

Although, full disclosure, I don’t tend to write characters looking up the DSM symptoms for this or that; I write what feels right for them psychologically, mentally, emotionally, and oftentimes later look it up and realize they would have likely been diagnosed with this or that thing or they could be displaying traits of this or that.

At any rate, with Boyd, his trauma started early on, and pretty much everything about him is a reflection of that in some form. I don’t see trauma as specific to sexual assault; it’s most certainly a result of that but also of many other things. Boyd dealt with a lot of neglect and/or emotional abuse as a child, he was bullied by his peers, and generally speaking it was difficult for him to feel like he belonged anywhere. He was very often judged by others, often negatively, for things completely outside of his control, like his parents, their jobs, his home, the amount of money his family had, his looks, etc. 

If you look at the Mayo Clinic’s list of child abuse, Boyd falls pretty well under emotional abuse and a bit under neglect, and you can especially see the toll that had on his personality by reading the signs and symptoms of emotional abuse in particular:

Loss of self-confidence or self-esteem

Social withdrawal or a loss of interest or enthusiasm

Depression

Avoidance of certain situations, such as refusing to go to school or ride the bus

Desperately seeks affection

And general symptoms:

Withdrawal from friends or usual activities

Depression, anxiety or unusual fears, or a sudden loss of self-confidence

An apparent lack of supervision

Self-harm or attempts at suicide 

If you look at Complex PTSD, and in particular Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD) you can see a lot of Hsin:

Attachment – “problems with relationship boundaries, lack of trust, social isolation, difficulty perceiving and responding to others’ emotional states”

Behavioural control – “problems with impulse control, aggression, pathological self-soothing, and sleep problems”

Dissociation – “amnesia, depersonalization, discrete states of consciousness with discrete memories, affect, and functioning, and impaired memory for state-based events”

I wouldn’t say Hsin dissociates quite that extensively but I feel like he does display some dissociative tendencies at times.

Boyd has some too, like

Self-concept – “fragmented and disconnected autobiographical narrative, disturbed body image, low self-esteem, excessive shame, and negative internal working models of self”.

I think in some ways you could argue they both display aspects of:

Affect or emotional regulation – “poor affect regulation, difficulty identifying and expressing emotions and internal states, and difficulties communicating needs, wants, and wishes”

When Boyd was little, he often wondered why other people were treated better than him - why, when he was getting perfect grades, he was going above and beyond whenever possible, when he was trying to be “a good boy” all the time, when he went out of his way to stay quiet and not bother anyone – why, despite all his attempts, other people were celebrate yet he was reviled, even if the people being celebrated were awful people doing awful things. He used to study other people relentlessly, trying to understand what it was about them that made them acceptable and what it was about him that made him not.

That’s why, despite being such an introvert, he’s good at blending in and going undercover; it’s why he can adjust to new situations and, in a way, act - because he always had to monitor and adjust himself his whole life just to feel seen and loved. His dad loved him on his own so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but with the trauma that came from the loss of his dad, and what happened with Lou, plus everything afterward, it really messed everything up.

Boyd was not a victim of childhood sexual abuse, but more of emotional abuse. Well, I guess, I should say for the most part he wasn’t.

Hsin was definitely a victim of childhood sexual abuse and probably physical abuse (that bit I can’t recall for sure). He was raped even as a small child, and that led into different aspects of his life. One reason, for example, he would go berserk and was seen by the Agency as unreliable in cases of him seeing sexual assault was because he saw, in some way, himself in those victims. It was probably his way of protecting people when he hadn’t been protected, himself. 

I can’t speak too much on Hsin’s specific mental health status or repercussions because I didn’t write him so I’m not fully in his mind, but I do know that sort of berserker aspect is part of what came from his sexual abuse and physical abuse and just generally how he grew up. If I recall correctly, a lot of that led into why he was so unstable and dangerous when Emilio first found him; why it took so long to get Hsin to find a way to deal with the violence and aggression and anger in him, in addition to everything else that would have happened regardless of that childhood trauma. Why, too, it was such a huge deal when Boyd was able to earn Hsin’s trust, because he had learned in his life to trust almost no one.

You can see some of the way they both display aspects of C-PTSD as adults as well in the list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_post-traumatic_stress_disorder#Adults

I should be clear: I am NOT a psychiatrist or psychologist so I’m not suggesting that they would be specifically diagnosed with any of these disorders were they to get official diagnoses. However, the reason I bring it up is to show that a lot of the series reflects the way their coping mechanisms lead them to interact within themselves and with the outside world, all of which is often directly or indirectly tied to trauma.

Why is Boyd so terrified of anyone seeing him without his shirt in the beginning? Trauma. Why is he depressed? Trauma. Why is he suicidal? Trauma. Why does he go out of his way to avoid a certain block? Trauma. I would have to look at specific symptoms of different things but I would guess that you could also tie back some of his instability and his sometimes inconsistent reactions to trauma as well. Sometimes he does things or says things that may seem a bit reckless, or cold, or some other unexpected thing at that time - and a lot of times it’s probably in part related to how he learned to cope with things and what his levels of defensiveness are or his fears are at that moment. But he also has a complete inability to see the good in himself for a long time which also ties back, I would think, to some of the things he experienced growing up/previously.

Boyd is an incredibly unreliable narrator. He spends most of his narration thinking about how awful he is, how he should just die, how he isn’t doing a good enough job, and so forth. Yet, that fails to show the impact of some of his choices and decisions. Boyd was pretty much the first person to treat Hsin like a normal human being, to not see him as a surrogate of anything or anyone, to not have any ulterior motives or expectations of him (no matter how well-intentioned), and to truly gain his trust as a result. Yet, Boyd didn’t really see it that way. He didn’t see how important it was for Hsin that he ended up in his life; he didn’t get why Hsin was exasperated the times Boyd said he (Boyd) should just die, that there was no value to his life. He didn’t believe he could be loved so he couldn’t see it was even a possibility at first. Therefore, he spends a lot of his narration over the series belittling himself and downplaying any of his own achievements while simultaneously rewarding or acknowledging what others around him are doing. Not every moment of his narration, of course, but his default state of self is to think he sucks and others are probably better.

Conversely, Hsin is a confident narrator. He often doesn’t doubt himself, doesn’t care what other people think, and is very sure of himself in a lot of aspects like his physical prowess which, itself, is already above and beyond nearly everyone else. Yet he also learned not to trust or rely on anyone else in his life, so he’s incredibly suspicious of others because that’s how he had to learn to be. So, especially in the beginning of the series, in his narration he tends to be very factual about his own achievements and not shy away from acknowledging the things that are powerful about him (even if he doesn’t always see it as anything that special), while simultaneously seeking out anything untrustworthy, unreliable, incompetent, or unworthy about those around him. His narration tends to point out the flaws of those around him because he learned that if he doesn’t protect himself, he’s vulnerable, and when he’s vulnerable he gets hurt.

The result of that is, if you read their narrations straight as if it’s all perfectly reliable, Boyd seems even more unreliable and Hsin seems even more perfect than they actually are, because their default states of being overlap in a manner which magnifies the flaws in Boyd and the merits in Hsin. 

Both of them learned to be how they were because of how they were raised, what they went through, and more. Same as how they react to various things throughout the series.

I can’t more specifically comment on anything without knowing what in particular you were thinking of when commenting in the ask about trauma and sexual abuse. But I think generally speaking, they already start the series having learned coping mechanisms that work for them based on trauma they already individually experienced. Those coping mechanisms end up oftentimes being challenged and at times destroyed or reworked throughout the course of the series. That is what leads to a lot of their ups and downs as individuals and as a couple; why their story isn’t a straight arc going up but instead derails a lot. And why they both spend the entirety of the series coming to terms with who they are both internally and externally, and what that means for their relationship, and how they can find a way to grow as a person and a significant other. They both ultimately have to work on trust; Boyd has to learn to trust himself, Hsin has to learn to trust others, and they have to learn to trust each other.

The way people deal with trauma is not the same for everyone. Sexual abuse doesn’t result in the same reaction for all people. I’m not sure if maybe one of the things you were thinking is maybe about sexual abuse during the series itself? I already linked something that goes more in depth on Fade so I won’t touch on that book, and I really can’t speak for Hsin because he isn’t my character so I don’t want to misrepresent his thought process as hidden behind narration or actions at different points.

The only other thing I can think of that maybe you’re thinking about is Boyd’s valentine status, and how he doesn’t seem to have overtly strong reactions to anything until Fade. If that’s one aspect of what you were thinking about, part of that is just how Boyd deals with things. He tends to avoid things that are difficult for him or he has difficulty focusing on, and oftentimes shuts down emotionally. 

I think honestly he probably dissociated to some extent during a lot of things; kind of separated his body from his mind and felt like whatever happened, happened. For a lot of the time that he was a valentine early on, he had such little love for himself that regardless of how upsetting anything was, how little he wanted to do certain things, he felt on some level like he deserved it. Some things were probably a subconscious form of self-punishment for being born, for being who he is, for surviving when Lou didn’t, for surviving when his dad didn’t, for never being enough for his mother, for just plain existing. Then as time went on he grew to rely on Hsin and find strength in him. It’s also not like every mission he had was a valentine one, or even that every valentine has to end in anything physical. 

That’s why he was able to find ways of dealing with things in some form, even if he didn’t like it or was uncomfortable at times, until the Aleixo mission. He thought he knew how to handle things; he thought he had found apt coping mechanisms. But that mission tore that all apart and nearly destroyed him. His coping mechanisms didn’t work the way they had and now he had to find a new way to survive, and from there came a lot of his instability and more that you see in Fade and as I mention in that blog post.

But in short, I feel like the majority of the series ends up touching, indirectly or directly, on some form of trauma as experienced currently or in the past by one or more of the main characters, and their resulting actions then drive the plot. That is one thing we were very specific about doing: having the plot adjust to the characters rather than force the characters to adjust to the plot. That’s why Afterimage exists, actually; the original plan was sort of like 3/4 of Evenfall and then kind of jumping into aspects of Fade. But we realized at the end of Evenfall that certain things would occur which would then lead to Afterimage and Afterimage then led into aspects of Interludes, which then led into aspects of right before Fade, which then affected a huge part of Fade itself, which then informed 1/27. We didn’t set out to write a series specifically about trauma, it’s just sort of one of those things that happens if you take two characters who have been treated so cruelly or poorly for so much of their lives, and put them together as any sort of team - but especially a team that becomes a couple, and a couple that becomes all but married.

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Regarding the other stuff, I haven’t had a chance yet to check if you answered my question about the hetero relationship comment, so I can’t comment on that until I know more of what you mean. But I would say that generally speaking, I don’t know that I believe it’s necessarily fair to label anything as strictly “hetero” vs “m/m” vs anything else for a relationship. That brings with it a lot of assumptions of what it means to be not only gay or LGBTQIA+, but also straight. It seems to suggest there is only a single way or a very strict set of ways for a cis male and a cis female to be together both in a relationship and to have sex, and I guess I don’t feel like that’s necessarily reflective of reality. People are very complex and so are their relationships, as well as their sex lives.

I’m not sure how specifically the series ended up hurting you but I’m very sorry you felt hurt by anything. That’s a terrible feeling to have to experience. I hope that in whatever way, however it may work best for you, you have the time and space to reflect and recover and rejuvenate. You, like everyone, deserve it.

And honestly, if that means you have to leave the series completely in your past, never to think about it again, if that’s what’s healthiest for you, I truly wish you are able to do so. Stories are there to connect with other people, to share our thoughts and sometimes help us work our way through our own while reading. No story is worth your mental health being put in question. If it is truly upsetting to you to think about the series, it is absolutely not worth your energy. You are more important than a story will ever be. Everyone is. And I say that despite how much I love and rely on stories to get me through life.

If part of your duress is you like aspects of the writing style but the series itself and its contents upset you, you could try reading some other stuff. I have some things I wrote solo that you can find on my AO3 if you want. But also you can find other writers entirely. Depending on what you’re looking for in a story, and the sort of topics you’ve learned work well for you or don’t work well for you, you should be able to find a ton of great series out there and great authors out there who will leave you with the happier aspects of your reaction to ICoS without anything more detrimental like it sounds happened for you with ICoS.

Regardless, I truly wish you the very best. As I said in the other one, please stay healthy and safe! And, if you’re in a place to manage it, stay happy as well :)

Brightest of blessings to you and yours, my friend!