#tw mental health discussion

[loveofastarvingdog]

talking with my neurotypical mother about adhd and autism and anxiety and depression and she’s using metaphors i don’t understand

[ei-makesstuff]

small update on why i havent posted anything, or responded to asks;

so life stuff came up and i had (and still have) a big "mental episode" going on, which means i havent had any motivation to work on things unless they're stuff i know really well already.

just three days ago, in the midst of everything, i had completely ditched this blog as it didnt fit my newer style of things. i wont go in-depth, but i essentially just dropped this entire thing impulsively one day and changed my entire identity.

because of all this, i think im just gonna scrap the current requests people sent in and keep my requests limited to fandoms i have genuine knowledge about. (unless it's a stimboard/moodboard, those are easy to do with limited information)

i apologize for all this- if anyone would like to send in a new request or anything, feel free to. just keep in mind im only doing fandoms im familiar with for now, with the exception of mood/stimboards, for the sake of not stressing myself further. (this isnt the fault of anyone on here btw!! so dont worry about that part <3)

[idolomantises]

I think I’m gonna discuss this once and hopefully never have to bring it up again. Originally I wanted to talk about it on Twitter but people are very disrespectful when it comes to mental health so… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Basically, I haven’t been doing so great, mentally. Nothing bad has happened to me, I’m safe and surrounded by people I care about, and it’s been like that for months. I just, I haven’t been feeling good.

For people who do follow me on accounts like Twitter and Instagram, you may have noticed I haven’t posted anything new since January. I was struggling to feel motivated to make something for my main accounts despite having countless ideas I’d love to work on. I feel better now and do plan on getting something done in March, but that sudden lack of motivation is pretty rare for me. Art is not only my job but a big hobby for me, I just love drawing. I did get some nsfw art done at least.

I don’t know what really prompted my mental health decline, I’ve been getting a few worried messages and fanart because someone insulted my art. But that didn’t hurt me at all, it actually boosted my account and patreon.

I guess I just… got sad?

I have a really bad tendency to suppress and even ignore my trauma and feelings of guilt. And I guess one day I really sat with my thoughts and I just, lost it I guess. I have so much traumatic memories and sudden and intense feelings of self loathing, something I’ve never felt in almost a decade, that it got overwhelming. I couldn’t reassure myself, I couldn’t really talk to anyone about it because how do you confront things that happened years ago? You feel almost irrational. It’s just memories that haunt you, it’s nothing physical or tangible and yet it’s a crushing feeling of anxiety, self hatred and resentment.

I was crying almost every day, and crying so much that my eyes kept hurting long after I was done, and I could barely see my own screen. I’ve had paranoid thoughts about myself and others, thoughts I can’t get into because they’re so deeply irrational. I was feeling suicidal urges and thoughts of self harm. I don’t see myself doing it, but it’s so frequent and overwhelming it’s like I’m already planning my suicide note.

I was talking to my therapist about it, that I was starting to hate being alive. That I hated living. That I could spend the next 50 years of my life with no more conflict or trauma and I’d still be in intense misery and turmoil. They’re feelings I couldn’t really bring myself to tell friends about because what could they say? How do you calm yourself down and reassure yourself. I can’t even talk about my trauma verbally without crying. And it’s funny because sometimes minor irks started to affect me negatively. I was feeling anxious about what to draw because I didn’t want to do deal with homophobic backlash.

I went to a therapist, I talked to friends, Ive been working out more and eating better, I did everything I should do to improve my mental health and all of a sudden a single night just sitting in my room destroyed everything I was slowly building up over the past 5 years.

It’s been really difficult for me. I think also, I just felt so much guilt over not being the best person I could be. I decided to lessen my online usage, not just for my mental health but because I really wanted to work on being a better person. I want to stop hating myself and letting my trauma push me down and I want to do just be better and do better as a person. A lot of people have been very forgiving and kind to me but I don’t feel like it’s enough and I want to do more and I want to feel better about myself. I want to give everything I can to people around me. I’ve been going to therapy a lot more lately and things are getting better for me, but it’s been a very slow process.

I just want to repeat that nothing serious has happened to me. Nobody attacked me in a way that negatively affected my health. A lot of people, friends and strangers have been really nice to me these past few months. I just was doing a lot of self reflecting and unintentionally forced myself to confront a lot of my trauma. I’m saying trauma a lot. I don’t want to get into depth about what I endured because it’s my business but people who do know me know how bad things were for me. I don’t want to feel like that again. I want to feel better, and I want to do better.

Sorry for the long read. That’s just how I feel.

[uncanny-tranny]

This might be controversial to some, but you cannot "tough love" your way to preventing suicide. You cannot have the attitude that people who complete suicide are selfish or are ungrateful or immature. If your mindset about suicide isn't coming from compassion rather than judgment, it won't help suicidal people. You will never help us with a slap on the wrist and a lecture about how we're awful for even thinking about completing suicide.

Suicide intervention starts with compassion and care.

[coffeexxcigarettes]

Almond Milk

-

Sometimes I don't know what's actually me.

I'm sure that's confusing,

So hear me out, if you have the time.

I believe we are made of wires

And memories.

Pathways to which we learn lessons.

For example,

If you speak too loudly and are shushed,

The wire bends within you.

You learn to speak softer.

I'm not sure, I suppose,

If I really like almond milk,

Or if you taught me that there were good foods

And that there were bad.

I'm not sure if blending almonds with water really does taste better,

Or if the wire within me tangled into a ball

To fill my stomach instead.

I trusted you to teach me young,

Yet I have memories of us,

Counting every damn almond in the house.

Strange how I have no memories of us

Actually eating one.

x

..

..

..@nosebleedclub April 17th- Almond Milk

[therainbowwillow]

I am not by any means someone who has a large platform on the internet, but seeing as my most popular post of all time, seen by tens of thousands of people, was on hbomberguy's Plagiarism and You(Tube), I would like to publicly get my thoughts straight on what has happened since.

I've seen a lot of discussion about who is to blame for James' recent mental health crisis and I would like to firmly state that hbomberguy (and Kat, his producer), others who made good faith videos on the situation (The Ace Couple, Jessie Gender, Todd in the Shadows), and people who commented on the situation in good faith are not to blame in the slightest. At the same time, I understand that the sudden loss of support, friends, and a career undoubtedly harmed James Somerton and that it is upsetting to me to see anyone put in that position, regardless of their actions. I believe that hbomberguy used his platform responsibly. From the beginning, I noticed that he was making clear, intentional choices regarding his treatment of the situation, including framing Nick as a possible victim rather than an accomplice to the plagiarism, reminding his audience not to harass James Somerton, and refusing to stoop to personal attacks in his video. Having seen hbomberguy's professional handling of the situation, I believe that he is a person who has a good understanding of the sway he has online and how to use that power delicately. I'm sure a choice was made weighing the benefit of speaking out against the possible harm and I believe that hbomberguy & crew made the correct decision. The same goes for The Ace Couple, Jessie Gender, and Todd in the Shadows. I think it is a creator's duty to understand that regardless of how professionally they treat a situation, there are bound to be some bad actors in their audience who will attempt to harass others in their name. It seems to me that all of these creators understood that and made an educated decision to speak out publicly. Had they kept quiet, harm would have continued to be done to the authors and artists who had their work stolen and monetized by someone who did not fairly compensate them (or even acknowledge their existence). With this in mind, I do believe that it is important to have empathy for James as well. I understand feeling hurt, betrayed, and skeptical of the legitimacy of everything he says from this point on, knowing what we know now about how he built his career. I have those feelings myself. They are valid. However, there is no situation in which people should be publicly speculating on the legitimacy of his mental health struggles or celebrating his suffering. I do believe that James knew what he was doing, I believe he knew that he was causing some harm (to what extent he understood that, no one but James can say), and I do believe that it was wrong. At this point, the community does as well. I think the best thing for him would've been to step away from the internet, but at the same time, I understand why he did not. He went from being a fairly popular online queer voice to one of the community's most hated content creators. I imagine there was some whiplash and confusion and that it must've been upsetting and scary. James did not make the right decision in trying to come back and that poor choice was his own, but at the same time, I don't think there's much use in rehashing that to him in the comments of his apology or on Twitter.

I don't think it would've been any better to let his actions fade to complete obscurity, but I also believe that trying to hold him immediately accountable was doomed from the start. If there was a path forward as a content creator, James strayed far from it. Regardless, I think the moral thing to do right now is to treat him with grace and not speculate about his honesty or intentions online. I hesitate to invalidate people's concerns, but regardless, they don't belong in the public sphere at this moment.

Ultimately, I wish James the best. I hope he finds safety, comfort, and happiness going forwards. I also wish hbomberguy & team as well as all the other creators and audience members who spoke to their experiences in good faith all the best. These people are not to blame for James' mental health struggles. If we mean to reduce as much harm as possible, I think the ideal path forwards is show empathy for everyone involved and lay the idea of blame to rest.

[kiarabanetmi]

“Poison” and how it speaks to all types of abuse

Hi there! I’m posting again. This is a small analysis/commentary on how the song Poison from Hazbin Hotel describes not just sexual and drug abuse, but other types of abuse as well. If you haven’t seen Hazbin Hotel or haven’t heard the song, I’ve put a link to the song below. Even if you don’t watch the show the song is amazing and I highly recommend it. Note: this is not the official episode music video, which is triggering to people, this is the before episode release version.

I also made another post earlier on my opinions on episode 4 of Hazbin Hotel. Give it a read!

Ok, so I’m going to cover some very specific lines and moments in the song. The majority of my analysis focuses on verse two and the the final verse.

This song at its core is about abuse. Angel Dust’s type of abuse is a combination of largely S/A along with physical and verbal Abuse by his pimp Valentino. But if you analyze these lyrics, this song speaks to all types of abuse and abuse victims and/or survivors, except for a few lines that are highly specific depending on situations. I’m going to focus on how this song can speak to domestic abuse victims, myself specifically. If you do not feel comfortable hearing about the following triggers then please scroll on and have a good day. You have been warned.

So context before I get into this: I was raised with a mentally ill parent as well as victim of my other parent’s former Fiance who also verbally and emotionally abused but the two of us. My mentally ill parent suffers from untreated unconventional borderline personality disorder, known as BPD. My other parent’s ex Fiance suffers from grandiose narcissistic personality disorder, known as NPD. I am no longer in contact with the ex Fiance and have no plans to see them ever again. However, I am still suffering from my parent with BPD, specifically over the holiday. We had a major fight because they believe my other parent is truly the abuser in their reality and by taking their side, I was starting to abuse them as well. This has caused me to (at least temporarily) cut off the unhealthy parent and live with the other one full time. And the unhealthy parent is a master at verbal, emotional and psychological manipulation.

Now getting onto the actual song:

Whenever I listen to the back half of verse 1 into the first chorus, I really relate to the lyrics through personal experience. It starts at the following line:

“I shoulda known that this would happen,

“I shoulda known it when I looked into your red-hot eyes

“Spewin’ all your red hot lies”

Now let’s go back to the lyrics and how it relates to me. As part of their BPD, this is especially true, and true for those who are involved with family/spouses/loved ones who are verbally and emotionally abusive. I believe any person who has different under an abuser will relate to this simple like. At some point we know the pattern, we know the signs for when we “fucked up” as it were. And we know at some point, consciously or unconsciously, that our abuser is lying.

“What’s the worst part of this hell?

“I can only blame myself.”

This line can be relatable depending on the type abuse you suffer from. In Angel’s case, he signed his soul away (literally) to his abuser. In a way I do that with my abuser every time I choose to go see them and enter that unhealthy environment. The problem for me personally is that BPD does have patterns but I find myself surprised and shocked by them. Know that now I am doing research to try and learn how to properly deal with family members with BPD, but that personality disorder does not excuse the abuse I suffer from t I’ll his parent. Mental illness is NOT an excuse for inflicting abuse, even if it’s as complex or rarely treated like BPD. But every time I go back into that environment I can only blame myself for entering that hell willingly again. Because despite the pain I know they will inflict upon me at some point, I still love my abuser. I imagine this is a similar mindset to what other victims of domestic abuse feel as well. We walk back to our abusers, usually choosing to because we still love our abuser and hope they’ll change and this time they’re telling the truth.

But that’s usually not the case.

“Cause I know you’re poison,

“You’re feeding me poison

“Addicted to this feeling I can’t help but swallow up your poison

“I made my choice and

“Every night I’m living like there’s no tomorrow.”

In my situation I relate to this line INCREDIBLY hard. It’s not just my unstable parent who is abusive. That side of my family has a long cycle of generational abuse that I am trying to break away from. But because I grew up in that situation, despite now knowing how bad and unhealthy it is, it’s what I’m used to. And unfortunately, I am used to or addicted to that chaos. For the past few months I have lived with my healthier parent and during that time, I have developed a non-chaotic, healthy lifestyle. Growing up everything was constantly shifting and changing based on the needs/wants of my unhealthy parent, since I was predominantly in their custody in my youth. Because of this, I grew up used to that chaos, considering it normal and fine, until I was shown another alternative by my other parent when they filed for custody and finally got rid of their own abusive fiancé. But because of the way I grew up, I became used to the chaos, and every time I go back to visit my abusive parent, I run the risk of falling under their spell. And unfortunately, more often than not, I do fall for it. And when I do fall for it, I fall into survival mode once again. This means that in a sense I’m “living like there’s no tomorrow”, like Angel. I don’t think about the consequences of anything other than escalating the situation, of making sure I make it out of there without some sort of fight or confrontation.

“I got so good at being untrue,

“I got so good at telling you what you want to hear,

“I disassociate disappear”

When I enter this survival mode, as I’m sure many other abuse victims and survivors do, I tend to lose myself for a time. I become someone else in order to be who my abuser wants me to be. In my personal case, I end up regressing to a smaller helpless child (not literally, but my body language does, as an unhealthy form of self soothing, being untrue and becoming who they want me to be: someone they control. I tell them what they want to hear, usually that they are right or that their pain is valid and nothing is their fault because they are the victim (which in my parent’s case of BPD is a reality that they ACTUALLY believe). Half the time when my abuser parent is tearing into me or trying to make me feel guilty or into he the bad guy (with depressingly frequent success rates), I tend to enter a sort of humble stage. I disassociate until it’s my turn to speak. I disappear for a while until it’s safe to come back out and say or do something. And when I do disassociate it’s awful. I lose small chunks of time. This has not happened yet outside of these instances of interaction with my abuser, thank goodness, but it is still dangerous to disassociate too often. I’m sure survivors of all types of abuse have disassociated at least once in their time with their abuser.

“So far beyond difficult to resist another gulp.”

Since I grew up so used to this behavior and pattern, it is like fighting my own nature to try to stand up and not fall for the lies. It’s so hard because I still love my abuser but because of their illness and their refusal to acknowledge it or seek real treatment this pattern is unending. It’s hard to resist swallowing down the poison they force in my face and flood me with. In my case, unlike Angel, my form of poison is in a pool, slowly raising towards my mouth, and I struggle not to get it not. And I imaging that’s what most other victims of abuse also feel like. That physical, emotional, sexual, psychological abuse is a poison that if left unchecked or stayed near to long will eventually kill us, either minor abuser’s action or our own.(Note, at the end of this post I have posted links the contact information of various services to help people in these situations, at least for those in the United States). Angel’s situation is also like that too, but he’s also drugged and forced to take poison by Valentino.

“My story’s going to end with me dead from your poison.”

This line hit me hardest out of everything in the song. During the latest fight with my parent, they tore into me overall and so brutally that for the first time in my life, I truly contemplated suicide as a better alternative. The verbal and mental poison they fed me for so long overwhelmed me and I felt myself wanting to die from it. I am not suicidal now, but it was an overwhelming feeling of pain, hopelessness, feeling trapped with no escape (at one point literally when I threatened to go drinking and they blocked the door, which is a tricky situation). If I hadn’t gotten out of then not already had the support system in place that I spend years setting up and learning to build, I may not be making this post right now. And there’s thousands of others like me who are still stuck in that pool of poison, but have already choked too much and succumbed to it. Never forget them.

“Poison, I’m sick of the poison,

“Im filling up my glass but it’s always hollow

“Full of poison, I’m sick of the poison,

“Wish I had something to live for tomorrow.”

And like Angel here, I’m sick of the poison as well, and every other abuse victim of any type can relate to this. At some point nothing helps anymore when you are stuck in the situation long enough. There’s no escape, and everything is hollow. There was a time when I was like this as well. My abuser had isolated me from nearly everyone else in my life save for my healthy parent, and it nearly broke me. But I found a reason to live for tomorrow at the time.

And I hope you can too. If you are reading this and relate to my story, or you heard this song and related to it in some way, then please know you are not alone. This song is not just a bop, it’s a real look at the kind of a severely abused victim that we don’t always see.

If you or your loved one are being by abused in some way, you are not alone. Here are some resources if you are in danger and need to call for help:

The Suicide Hotline: 988

The National Domestic Abuse Hotline:

The National Sexual Assault Hotline:

Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Parents

[clownrecess]

(tw for implied sh, and discussion of scars in general)

Hey, its summer so I just wanted to say that I do not care what someones scars look like. What color they are, the size, shape, etc. It does not matter. Do not stare at them. Do not comment on them.

Bodies with scars are good bodies. People with scars do not owe you an explanation, nor do we need to cover up.

[raayllum]

“Sometimes, I think it would’ve been better if you had just killed me when we first met.”

They’d been staring at the fire, despondent and silent for so long that Rayla hadn’t thought Callum was going to talk at all, everyone else asleep in the vague quiet of the Uncharted Forest. But her head snapped up now, eyes wide awake and sharp, her voice spitting like venom.

“Callum, how could you say that—”

“They have the map,” he says listlessly. “And I have his Key. There can’t be a lot of other ways for this to end. Either you kill me first before the world is doomed, or he will, after—”

“Nothing is going to happen to you,” she says past the lump in her throat, daring to reach for the hand he has curled over his knee, his fingers shaking. Hers aren’t much better, even as she gives what she hopes is a reassuring squeeze. 

She wonders if this is what he feels like, when he’d tried and failed to get through to her after the war that Viren was dead and they were safe. Now they’re very decidedly not safe, Callum’s white shock eyes flashing in her mind’s eye when she lets her thoughts wonder too far, and Viren is somehow the least of their problems.

“It’ll hurt you more this way,” he continues, like she hadn’t said anything. He still won’t really look at her. “Than it would have if we were strangers—”

“You are the reason the world has peace—”

“And I might be the reason there won’t be much of a world, peace or none, aren’t I?” he snaps back, finally looking at her. Then the ire fades, his shoulders slumping. He turns his hand over to lace his fingers through hers, even if she’s the limp one now. He runs his thumb over her knuckles. “No world for you or your parents, or Ez, and I—”

Concerned for his inner circle, like always. For her. Sometimes, she thinks he’d seal all of them up in a little magical air bubble, away from the fighting, if he could, and if push came to shove. 

His voice breaks. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Because he might, under Aaravos’ command. Because if she kills him, he knows she’ll never really forgive herself.

Callum has never revoked his request though—just selfish and insane enough to keep it, to put that on her shoulders. But maybe she owes him after everything she’s put him through. A way to make her live with the horror she put him through, of surviving without her, of leaving first. Maybe he believes this is her price to pay, even if the thought settles over her like ice, because no—Callum isn’t like her people. He doesn’t believe in prices. He never has.

“I don’t care if you hurt me,” she says softly. “I’m not leaving you.”

She knows she’s said the wrong thing, somehow, even if she doesn’t know how or why by the way he grouses and slips his hand out of hers.

“You should’ve killed me,” he reiterates, “before you fell in love with me.” 

[subparcarrion]

CW//TW: kinda vent, discussion of tics and tic attacks (and some of the aftermath for me), discussion of high stress and anxiety situations, cussing/cursing, discussion of physical pain, discussion of pills.

(ACTUAL POST UNDER CUT.)

So... yeah,,,

Tic attacks, gonna have to go with ☆☆☆☆☆/★★★★★ (0/5). Especially at close to four in the morning at a sleepover.

Not really sure why I'm deciding to put it out on the internet, but I guess I wanna talk about it or smth. And with March break and my crippling social anxiety the closest I've come to talking about it irl is a quick "that was kinda traumatic ngl" to a close friend over text.

In retrospect it makes sense, it's the most stressed I've been in a while now paired with a lot of just having to be constantly "on" and feeling scared to say no.

For context I did a pseudo babysitting job for a family friend from around mid afternoon to nearly midnight. I then decided to go a sleepover with my friends late since they had been kind enough to move the date so I could attend. (Probably not the best idea for the future who has a bad anxiety disorder and probably a lot of other stuff, but when have I ever said no.)

The job itself was pretty stressful but the kid and her mom's are super nice and did their best to accommodate me, so that was really nice. (They also paid me really well when I would have honestly done if for free so I'm not gonna complain. Anything bad was kinda just unavoidable considering it was me who was doing the job.)

Im also not really gonna bitch about the sleepover too much, my friends are lovely, the timing just made things rough.

Since I was arriving so late we hung out for like an hour and then went to bed (at least tried to go to bed), a lot of tha time was just kinda spent getting ready for bed though. There's nothing wrong with that, I just ended up feeling a little like I had missed out on the best part of stuff. (Again, no one else's fault.)

Everyone else fell asleep pretty quick, however I was not tired at all. It wasn't unexpected though, going from one high stress situation to another doesn't really let you let your guard down. Let alone feel properly sleepy.

So I just kinda did some stuff on my phone for thirty minutes to see if I would get tired and then decided to finally turn in for the night still very much all to aware of everything.

At this point it's probably important to mention that everyone in my froend group has at least a passing interest in a game called "The Stanley Parable". And if you didn't know you can go into an elevator in that game, and it kinda just plays this goofy elevator music in loup until you leave.

It is thus tradition in my friend group to play the elevator music while we fall asleep at any and all sleepovers where it is possible and everyone is chill with it.

The elevator is kinda some basic lyricless pop-ish kinda techno song where you can occasionally, if you listen closely enough hear the narrator hum along with the tune. The song itself is a certified banger, but I was stressed as fuck and hyperaware of everything. It was safe to say it was driving me crazy, especially the humming part.

I didn't really have any means to turn it off though and I would feel bad doing it. After all, I had agreed to it any it would be distruptful to try since it was super late and the room was pretty packed. To move around too much would probably wake someone up. (Wow, foreshadowing or smth.)

I never really got to sleep and it was around late three in the morning, nearly four when shit really started to hit the fan.

(Another bout of context before I continue: so I've had what I'm just calling tics at this point for about a year now, maybe a bit longer. At least that's when they started getting really noticeable and causing real problems for me. Personally for me it's mostly motor ticks that get much worse in stressful situations. Stressful situations being an iffy description that could cover pretty much anything on acount of the anxiety disorder. Albeit over time it has developed into mostly motor ticks with occasional verbal ones.

I can have periods where they are happening very few times a day and then ones where they are happening several times a minute, either way they never really go away. I had been doing pretty good tick wise before this whole ordeal, now it's definitely leaning towards the worse, more disruptive and painful side.)

It started off with a ciuple of my usual motor tics, getting more and more aggressive very quickly. For the most part these would consist of things like my shoulders jumping up and hitting the vase of my head and neck or my hands doing weird shit.

By the time the verbal tics started the motor tics were so aggressive and frequent they were getting pretty painful. This would be the same time I would start making small squeaks as a verbal tick.

It became pretty clear after that this wasn't stopping any time soon so I sat up and used my pillow to cover my mouth in hopes to muffle the noise so I wouldn't wake anyone.

This was the point where something changed and my tics got the worst they'd ever been. It went from squeaks to small screams and loud grunts. And I was just sitting there in pain scared out of my mind for nearly and hour before the noise finally woke up my friends. Cuz despite all my effort a pillow can't hide constant screaming for very long.

When my friends woke up they were reasonably concerned, they knew I had tics that could occasionally get kinda bad but this was the worst it had been, and I could barely explain through the ticks that it had been going on for about an hour. There was definitely no way I was calming them down, and in all fairness I was freaking out too and they handled the whole shitshow remarkably well.

They probably spent twenty minutes or more trying to calm me down or help, but nothing was working, in fact it might have been getting worse. One of my friends also tried Google-ing it, but Google pretty much said drug him or ignore them were feasible options for yours truly, the little bitch boy.

My friend eventually got their mom and I regained enough control to pack my shit and got driven home. I downed as much sleeping and pain meds as I was allowed to take and continued ticking until I passed out.

Idk,,, not a particularly entertaining story, ig I just wanted to get it out somewhere.

As for me right now, it's been two days and I can't go five minutes without some sort of tic at most.

However, I'm feeling somewhat better, even if my neck hurts like shit.

I suppose that's all, thanks for listening to me bitch and moan tumblr. <33 /p

-carrion_

------------------

[mogai-sunflowers]

I’ve said it a million times before and I’ll say it a million times again- exclusionists don’t define you. You are so much more than all the things you wish you weren’t. You are not just a bi lesbian or a gaybian or a fagdyke or a boygirl or a boy lesbian. You are your queerness and yet you are more than that too.

You have dreams, goals, fears, passions, hobbies, quirks, desires, etc. You have the power to be the good person that exclusionists don’t see in you. As hard as it can be to deal with exclusionism and its affects on your mental health, you just can’t give up.

Maybe I’m being dramatic, or maybe I’m remembering all the times I’ve felt like giving up because of it, and all the times other people have told me they feel the exact same way. Either way, the world has enough room for you in it. It has enough room for every part of you, including the ones you’ve been forced to hide. It’s fucking hard. It’s isolating. It’s scary. And, it’s not what defines you.

you are beautiful for who you are, not who small-minded people want you to be. who you are, right now, is enough. Even if you want to become a better version of yourself, that doesn’t mean the you of right now is any less important. I love you all so so much, please take care of yourselves.

[beyondthisdarkhouse]

What is the Tumblr kokobot mental health thing and why does it keep messaging me when I go into various mental health/neurodivergent tags? I'm generally looking for community and I don't appreciate this site deciding I am In Danger. You're a therapist and I feel like you've probably talked about mental health apps before so thought I'd ask

Uuuugh, that thing. I think I blocked it a couple months back. BUT, I'm going to be as fair to it as I can.

The part you and I bumped into is their automated chatbot, which monitors traffic on social media sites to detect people having mental health crises and try to convince them to access mental health support. Apparently their bot got good enough at detecting human behaviour patterns online that they actually spun it off into a separate company for a while and then sold their tech to a corporation, before returning to the mental health idea. They returned to it, critically, as a non-profit, which is why I'm willing to give it a second look at all.

tl;dr: I would not immediately warn everyone away from using it! Which is more than I could say for a lot of Silicon Valley mental health startups. I don't love the current implementation, but I think they might have the makings of a decent mutual aid platform for temporary moments of stress.

Long version below

Like, I was not a fan at all of Trill when Tumblr partnered with it, because I felt that they were using well-intentioned volunteers to do potentially harrowing and dangerous work without adequate training or support. (Or not-so-great volunteers, since I was dubious about their vetting process) And a lot of Kokobot's origin story is in some ways really similar to Trill.

Most of these startups and initiatives mean well. They want to make the world better and help provide comfort and support to people who need that. I admire them for their dedication to a good cause. However, I believe that when you are devoting significant resources to building a system where you ask people to choose you for support in their moments of vulnerability, you cannot put your intentions ahead of their needs.

Like: It is really great that people want to help the less-fortunate. I think it shows warmth of heart to want to go somewhere and build homes for the homeless. But if you've never built a house before, and the houses you build are so poorly constructed that they fall down or catch fire or whatever, and they wouldn't have if you'd put the equivalent amount of money into hiring local out-of-work carpenters to do the work properly, I don't think you should keep operating like that as a charity.

I'm also judging Koko a bit as the former teenager who wanted to help people, in terms of how much they provide guidance and support to the helpers they've recruited.

Finally, I feel the need to remind all of us, as useless as such reminders feel, that if you are not paying for a social media platform, you aren't a customer; you are the product. "Kokobot", the organization, the platform, the AI, are not the core producers of its value. Its users are. Without people in distress to whom to provide support, and without supportive people there in times of distress, it would not exist.

Maybe this will never be an issue. Maybe this conflict will never arise. Maybe the nonprofit organization will be devoted enough to the needs of its userbase that they will serve them faithfully and well. I hope so.

I'm just... jaded, by things I've seen before.

What I don't like at all:

It took me a lot of work to go from looking up Kokobot on Tumblr to understanding how the company worked, what using the app was like, and whether their work was being informed by anyone with a lick of knowledge about mental health care. I still don't know a lot of stuff about how they handle anonymity in situations like imminent suicide or homicide, or abuses of the platform.

Kokobot messaging people out of the blue is creepy as hell. My first response was, "Fuck off, I can TELL you're not ethical." Most ethical guidelines I know of for mental health therapists explicitly forbid directly soliciting clients ("Hey there, I can tell you've got a few issues. Here's my card"), especially when people appear psychologically vulnerable or in distress. The only wiggle room there is when you're working in disaster relief and crisis intervention, but that does not make it an "anything goes" situation.

@kokobot posting lots of testimonials from users about how great their service is. Again, something usually strictly forbidden by ethical standards! When someone has just come to you in distress and you've provided them help, and then ask them to give you a Yelp review, you're not usually going to get thoughtful, measured, and informed feedback. It's a weird power dynamic that might be great advertising, but not great informed consent.

While Koko might be a legit company that does its job well, its presence and behaviour opens up the field of what is acceptable behaviour on social media. If one app can track mental health tags and solicit vulnerable people into joining their group, why not another? What will stop Scientology (which has done this in person for decades) from creating a similar app, pitching it to people in need, and coaching its users to go off all their psychiatric medications and use pseudoscience instead? Where are the safeguards?

What's Not Terrible

Kokobot is clunky and weird, but like I said on my post on Trill, the hardest part of moderation on social media is the amount of labour it takes, and the human cost of that labour. It seems to me that by using AI, Koko might have found an efficient way to automate much of that labour.

I tried out the actual app itself, messaging on Telegram; for my "problem", I just said I was concerned that a friend was messaging Koko a lot and I wanted to make sure it was legit. Sending it out required answers to some pretty vital questions—did I feel hopeful or hopeless about the world? What kinds of best- or worst-case scenarios was I imagining? They were worded in a way that felt human and genuine, and the chatbot was responsive and encouraging before my problem ever got human eyes on it.

(For the record: These are questions that can very quickly give information on whether someone is likely to be a danger to themselves or anyone else, which are really important.)

Then, at the bot's suggestion, I also helped a couple other people, where I was given very rough and ready training on active listening, then coached into writing a response. It avoided a lot of on-ramps to community toxicity, inasmuch as the problems and replies were private and anonymous, and there were instant feedback options if anything was worrying or upsetting.

This process showed what I think was a more sophisticated and useful implementation of AI than, uh....... like 99% of the AI I've seen. This is mostly a statement on the state of AI, but still. Koko seems like the bot's responses were really carefully workshopped and designed by actual humans who knew about crisis intervention and risk assessment.

The replies I got to my "problem" were fairly good, empathetic and genuine. (The bot encourages people to be a little dorky, and seeing an auto-generated response I myself was suggested made me roll my eyes; this could reduce the value for some people.)

I can definitely see the benefit of encouraging people who are feeling distressed to help others. Engaging in peer support encourages empathy, and helps people feel like they've got something to offer, and that problems might be solvable.

In the end, Kokobot is an expansion of the kind of work volunteer-run distress and crisis hotlines do. It has the potential to do a lot of good, but the organization itself has to consider so many other factors and processes than its users do. I sincerely hope it and Tumblr are being extremely thoughtful and careful in how they handle this work.

I would be delighted to be proven wrong, and have them turn out to be totally amazing. I really hope they do.

[the-entity-down-the-street]

I want to talk about suicide. Wish we could have more open discussion of suicidal ideation without getting shut down by goddamn search engines going "are sure you're okay??? Here's the suicide hotline!! Also we won't show you anything related to this search because it's triggering and might encourage you to self-harm!!"

Like no bitch I'm not trying to die, I'm trying to open a dialogue about suicide rates in the trans and autistic community you stupid fucking algorithm.

There's a societal squeamishness around suicide that definitely plays into why it's treated like this. Social media censors it, forcing sanitized language like "unalive yourself" because it's more ad-friendly.

Of course, hiding it doesn't discourage folks from attempting. All it does is add more stigma around suicidal thoughts, and that keeps people isolated.

There's also not enough discussion about what happens when you *recover* from suicidal ideation, and have to live with the lingering scars (psychological and physical) of it. Like, when we talk about recovery, it's always about how much better things are, how you get your life back, etc. And yes, that's important, but like most things, recovery is more nuanced as that. For me it feels like being haunted by my own ghost. It's eerie, and sad, and I'm angry about the childhood I lost to abuse and depression. It's a whole second phase of suicide recovery that I never see conversation about. Not to mention that my idea of "a future" getting stretched out by a few decades is disorienting.

We deserve to be able to talk about all this. Sorry a good chunk of my life experience isn't monetizable, or ad-friendly, or suitable for all ages. It's still worth talking about.

[uncanny-tranny]

In discussions about mental health, I am so tired of the only voices mattering being other people or other people who do not deal with a condition/disorder or a specific situation.

"Here's how I deal with loved ones with [x] condition!"

"If you do [y] because of [x mental health reason], you're selfish and everybody who loves you is having their lives made harder by you!"

"If your symptoms are [z], you're gross, and you deserve no sympathy for struggling"

I understand to an extent why people do this, but holy hell, as somebody who struggles and struggles often, the last thing any of us need to be told is that we're a burden that others have to carry. And it's terrible how everybody else's feelings but ours matter - even if we are the ones most affected by our condition or situation.

If you are dealing with issues surrounding your mental health and well-being, know that everything above isn't true; you are worthy of patience, understanding, kindness, and love. You are worthy of being listened to without judgment. You don't have to apologize or "make up" for who you are or what you struggle with.

[coffeexxcigarettes]

Recovery

-

I will never be the girl

That turns heads

With her body.

I will never start wars with my curves,

Or set hearts aflame with my smile.

This is not for lack of trying.

Starving.

Crawling.

Bending.

Breaking.

But I will never be that girl.

And some nights,

That's harder to cope with

Than others.

[c-ptsdrecovery]

I’ve recently figured out something from my childhood.

Although my mom did compliment me on a job well done, she also always seemed to find something to criticize or “correct”. This led me to feel like nothing I did was ever quite good enough. (Interestingly, one of the only areas she didn’t seem to do this in was my artwork, and art/crafts are one of the few things I don’t have a complex about as an adult!)

I couldn’t figure out why my mom always did this, but I’ve worked it out. My mom has a narcissistic personality disorder. She wanted to be a good mom, but her instincts were not great as a parent. So she would compliment my work--but then she would make a correction. When you correct somebody, you get a little boost to your self-esteem: you are teaching them something. You know something. You are better than them at this. So my mom just did that all the time. Heck, I doubt she even realized she was doing it! But it had an enormous effect on my mental health and self-esteem. It wasn’t that my work wasn’t good enough, it was that she wanted to find something to criticize to get narcissistic supply, and if there was nothing to criticize, she would make something up. Because it wasn’t about my performance; it was about her self-esteem.

The other thing I’ve started to understand is her moving goalposts. I never knew if I was doing tasks the way she wanted me to, because she would always find something to fault me about what I did, even if I did it exactly the way she had told me to do it the last time. This was, of course, incredibly anxiety-inducing. As a child I used to ponder how it was that my mom was so PERFECT? Because everything she did, she did RIGHT, while I so often got everything wrong. I’ve realized that she didn’t just move the goalposts for me, she moved them for HER. If she wanted to keep working on something--well, the obviously right thing to do was to keep working on it! If she wanted to take a rest--well, taking a rest is good for you! You should always take a rest! (Either that or she would laughingly describe herself as being lazy, which was also not helpful to her children.) But when *I* wanted to take a rest, that was a time when I should’ve still been working on it! The goalposts were always subtly moving to put me in the wrong, and also subtly moving to put her in the right. That way she could always feel a little superior and always get a little self-esteem boost. 

I *am* actually capable of making good decisions for myself as an adult. I can figure out when I need to stop, take a break, when I’ve done something well enough, when I need to try again. I don’t have to look to external validation to tell me when I’ve measured up: I have a good yardstick inside my own heart and head, and as an adult, it’s my privilege to use my own measurements instead of measuring myself against an always-moving external goal.