#I don’t even think it is truly because of adhd right?

[adhdblues]

I went many years not realising that something was wrong with me.

Many years of thinking that how I feel and how I process things was normal. Everyone experiences similar things, is what I thought.

School was okay. I ended up with good grades in the end - A, A, B for A-levels.

But I didn’t realise that I was struggling to understand textbook language. I didn’t know that comprehension of that type of text could be a learning disability. I just thought I wasn’t good enough.

I never really did any work in class. I was actively involved in discussions. Always had an idea to share, and my teachers seemed to really enjoy those discussions. But putting them on paper was fucking hard.

And the research never really got any deeper than the ‘contents’ page and half of the ‘introduction’ of a book. I had piles and piles of books to look through, they all intrigued me. But they just sat there, in a pile, looking cute.

They sat there as the guilt (of not reading through them) weighed on me more as deadlines got closer.

If we had to take notes in class, I wasn’t able to focus. Notes were mandatory, as per my teachers’ expectations - that’s the only way they’d know whether we are concentrating or not. But, I would leave the classroom feeling like I didn’t learn anything that day, because it was all too fast.

Now I know why.

I knew I was smart (sometimes I truly believed that), and I knew I could understand everything that was communicated to me verbally. But the classroom setting just wasn’t right.

I never thought that I’d be one to have ADHD, or that disability they called dyslexia. It felt so foreign, so out of reach - I shouldn’t even consider it because I don’t need the help, is what I thought.

I needed that help.

I never thought I deserved extra time during exams - even though I never fucking finished my papers. No matter how fast I tried to get through the questions, I always had 3 or 4 or 5 pages left once the time was up.

I was actually never told about such things existing, I didn’t know what ‘accommodations’ were. Not until I saw a handful of classmates sitting in a separate room, taking the exams at a different time to us. But still, no one really talked about it.

I just wish that my school, one of the ‘best British schools in the country’, would take learning disabilities more seriously.

I wish they had taken the time to educate us about such things, instead of telling us off for the eyeliner or nail polish we wore.

Instead of giving us detention for wearing pants tighter than their liking.

Or the assemblies they forced us to sit through, where they would bring in alumni to talk about all the amazing things they had achieved since they left school.

If only I had been told about what learning disabilities were:

- I would have struggled less in GCSE.

- I wouldn’t have had those multiple breakdowns because I thought I was stupid.

- I wouldn’t have thought that I wasn’t good enough.

I was always so intrigued by learning new things. But the classroom setting just wasn’t right. The teachers never came to me to ask why I’m struggling, they came to me to tell me I wasn’t good enough.

My biology teacher said she’d be surprised if I get a C. Out loud. In front of the whole class. As she gave out our mock exam results.

I got an A in biology when the real exam came around. Because I studied my ass off. At home. In my own space.

She did nothing to help me.

My math teacher told the whole class that I got the lowest score in my mock exam. I wasn’t there, but my classmates told me. It was embarrassing. I fucking cried. But now that I look back, it’s because I couldn’t understand textbook language at the speed they wanted me to.

I got an A in that too, when the exam actually mattered.

I never really cared much for mock exams. They didn’t mean anything towards my final grades, or my future. I couldn’t care less and they didn’t deserve the stress I’d have to go through.

I just knew I would study for the real exams. I knew I could pull all-nighters and study better under pressure.

Now I know why.

I would wonder why it was so hard for me to keep up with deadlines. I would think that maybe I just don’t care enough. But I kind of did, because I enjoyed learning. I enjoyed discussing and sharing ideas.

But the school system just wasn’t right.

I look back and wonder what it would have been like if I got the extra help that I needed. If I knew I was dyslexic, maybe my English teacher wouldn’t always make me read out loud to the class “to help with my reading skills”.

That was torture for me and everyone else involved - (I think she enjoyed seeing students struggle though).

I remember I specifically went and asked her to stop making me read out loud. Because I felt ashamed of all the long pauses, when I couldn’t find the line I was on. Or for saying the wrong thing, or pronouncing the words wrong. I was ashamed that everyone had to listen to me struggle, because I thought I was wasting their time.

She asked me to read to the class, that same day.

#adhd #living with adhd #adhd problems #learning disability #dyslexia #gcse exams #a levels #education #reading comprehension #adhd things #personal #adhd post #actually did #adhd feels

[malinaa]

2023 WRITING REVIEW

tagged: no one i just wanted to do this and i forgot about it soz </3 tagging : board of directors i'd tag u here but this is mostly fic-based so sorree... anyway if u have already done this my b.... i wld like to see ur post tho @evcndiaz | @brimay | @usignedupforthis | @seek--rest | @posallys | @dustorangeheartssnowman | @adhd-merlin | @queerofthedagger

number of stories posted to ao3: 34 ±1 bc i updated a fic from a while back <3

word counted posted for last year: 90k... a feat (i wrote more but it was ofic so add like maybe 10k to that)

fandoms i wrote for: alex stern series, merlin, house md, pjo, spidey, hunger games, doctor who, & the grisha trilogy

pairings: merthur / arwen / mergwenthur / mergana, darlingstern, hilson, percabeth, petermj, everlark, tenrose, malina

stories with the most KUDOS: jealousy, jealousy (house md) with 522 <3 BOOKMARKS: except my life (merlin) with 137 <3 COMMENT THREADS: rip current (pjo) with 38 <3 *technically the answer to all of these is tested with torment but that's a fic i updated so i don't reallyyyyyy count it

work i'm most proud of (and why): thread of gold (arwen, bbc merlin) because i don't exactly post 2nd person fic and tbh most people HATEEEEE 2nd person fic AND i got people to enjoy it. HA!

work i'm least proud of (and why): coffee drinker (gen fic, bbc merlin) because it was just a promptfic and i didn't even really feel like posting it but i wrote it so i might as well yk?

share or describe a favorite review you received: any review that quotes a line but this one from judas kiss (arwen, bbc merlin)...

THIS. IS. WONDERFUL ❤️❤️❤️ *creates bookmark with gusto* I LOVE that you dug into what it might have been like for Gwen while she was under that enchantment! It was so creative to have her past memories blurring with glimpses of the present during the enchantment. I *felt* her disorientation, and it *hurt*. I felt so bad for Gwen all over again! 😭😭😭 That aspect of this story could have been a fantastic standalone one-shot in its own right, but noooo, you raised the bar and KEPT GOING and made it even better!!! I love that you showed Gwen and Merlin staying friends after Gwen becomes queen, and I love how she confides in him and how he immediately drops everything to go look for the offending piece of jewelry. The bit about Arthur’s incredulity at Merlin’s method of testing the enchantment was a great dash of humor, and I love that you fleshed out the concept of the enchantment to be something the others could experience so that they could truly *know* that Gwen had been innocent. And don’t even get me started on how much I love Arthur’s “Forgive me.” I love how he doesn’t think twice about humbling himself in front of everyone because his focus is solely on Gwen, consumed by the urgency of doing the right, honorable, and loving thing in that moment. You write Arthur and Gwen��s relationship so beautifully. 💕 Well done; I hate you (/affectionate) for all these feels. 🥰🫂👏

a time when writing was really, really hard: august through october... idek why i was literally in agony not writing

a scene or character you wrote that surprised you: writing jj in spider-man: homewrecker because i've NEVER written him before (in my memory) and i was like. Hello .

a favorite excerpt of your writing: cannae lie i have a few favs so... killing is a love language (mergana, bbc merlin) Heartbreak snakes up his throat, constricting him at the sight of her. Morgana’s beauty is incontestable even like this, but her hatred wore her down to her bones. Gone were the full cheeks and rosy lips, the perfectly combed hair, the wardrobe that would put princesses to shame. Now, her face is sunken in, her hair a curled storm, her dress is merely black rags at this point. thread of gold (arwen, bbc merlin) Your father’s presence is larger than life. Larger than love. It looms. It casts shadows long enough to hide every hope and dream you’ve ever had for yourself. the boy and the girl (malina, the grisha trilogy) Memory fractures into shards. Real or not real? There’s Mal in the meadow. Mal buried beneath the hanging tree. Mal cold in her palms. There’s a sky darker than night. Her hands bloodied. A knife lodged in his heart. Her knife. His blood. Her fault. She killed him. She loves him. Her fault. Rest her head on his still chest. Her fault. No heartbeat. Her fault. No warmth. Cold light spilling from her palms. She killed him. The Saint’s only true worshipper martyred.

how did you grow as a writer last year: my hopes from last year was that i finally finish a multichap fic.... 😭 does a short 3-shot count. besides that i wrote more consistently and i'm finally Used to my writing style. i think.

how do you hope to grow this year: hell if i know if i could write something longer than 20k that'd be great 😭😭😭😭

who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer, beta, cheerleader, etc.): the board.... @rosesau / @bipercabeth / @stellwood fnh...... i'd tag katie but she absconded from tumblr smh. anyway hi freaks n geeks

anything from your real life show up in your writing last year: oh i don't even know. nothing ig

any new wisdom you can share with other writers: bro idek the more i write the more writing becomes fundamentally so hard to talk about ... sorreeee

any projects you're looking to starting (or finishing) this year: IF I DON'T FUCKING MAKE PROGRESS ON MY PLAY I WILL BASH MY HEAD INTO A WALL. THIS CAN'T KEEP HAPPENING. ATLAS AND VIVIAN YOU WILL BE WRITTEN ON THE PAGE INSHALLAH

#tag games #2023 #writing #text #tais toi lys #not the numbering getting fucked. whatever

[makeste]

[39 weeks later]

well all right then. I owe some explanations and some updates, so let's just get straight to that.

1. "what the hell, makeste. you can't just disappear for nine months and leave a sign on your blog that says "gone leavin'.'"

yeah I know. sorry guys.

so there are a lot of reasons for my long absence, but when you boil it all down, the essence is basically as follows: at its absolute max capacity, my ADHD brain is capable of keeping up with any two of the following: (1) work; (2) school; (3) tumblr. that's it. only two. no more and no less.

and for years this has not mattered at all because school was no longer in the picture! but as mentioned in my last two update posts, as of this past January, I had to start taking classes again for career advancement reasons, meaning my brain was quickly overloaded and something had to give. so yeah. I can assure you the past nine months have absolutely sucked and I am not AT ALL sure that it was worth it, but it is what it is.

I also want to add that I never intended to basically fall off the face of the earth anywhere near to this extent, let alone for this long. but in retrospect I probably should have seen it coming, seeing as this is not the first time it's happened, sob. and also in hindsight, towards the end of last year (during which I was already struggling to keep up with the weekly BnHA reactions) someone mentioned that it sounded like I was showing signs of being potentially close to burnout. turns out that observation was spot on lol.

so yeah. tl;dr, burnout + an obnoxiously busy real life schedule + a sprinkling of good old-fashioned ADHD "somehow I always underestimate how hard it is to restart something after taking a long break from it, and the longer I go without returning the worse it gets" brain shenanigans (more on that last part further down).

2. "MAKESTE. WHILE YOU WERE GONE, IN THE MANGA, THERE WAS A THING -- "

yes I have unfortunately been spoiled about The Thing.

3. "so wait, exactly how spoiled are you?? CAN WE TALK ABOUT THE THING"

I will make a separate post to talk about The Thing! I expect that many people will want to talk about this, and tbh I've really been wanting to talk about it too! I'm telling you, when I say the past nine months have sucked, I mean they have truly SUCKED, you guys. school is so fucking boring and I miss rambling about fandom stuff so fucking much.

anyway but with that said, ~*~PLEASE DO NOT TALK ABOUT ANY SPOILERS IN THIS POST~*~. I don't want to delete anybody's comments! but I will if necessary because I am a spoiler narc and I don't want to risk accidentally ruining stuff on the off chance that a non-spoiled person comes across this post. so yeah. however please do feel free to message me or comment in my other post (which I will link once it’s up; eta: here it is) if you do want to talk about The Thing.

4. "so aside from The Thing, are you otherwise caught up with the BnHA manga currently?"

so here's the hilarious part: no, I am not caught up. not even remotely. literally the last chapter of BnHA I read was chapter 339, which is the most recent chapter that I liveblogged, all the way back on December 31, 2021. I literally have not read a single new BnHA chapter in the year of our lord 2022 lol. :') basically for the same reasons I mentioned in my previous update post. tl;dr, reading/liveblogging a single new BnHA chapter is a minimum 4+ hour commitment for me, and by this point I have accrued a backlog of... oh sweet lord. 35 total chapters lol. so yeah. that's approximately 140 hours of catch-up that I need to do, which is paralyzing just to think about.

I do still plan on catching up, obviously! I'm just not sure how, lol. I may have some time to spare this weekend, so I might try to binge a few chapters and see how it goes. then I'll have to come up with some sort of sustainable posting schedule. I've been thinking about this for a while and I might try to do a Mon/Wed/Fri thing if I can swing it, but I don't want to commit to anything for sure yet until I see how those first few chapters go. fingers crossed, though.

anyway so I guess that's it. post is getting long. anything more will just be rambling.

sorry again, guys. how is everyone? what did I miss. aside from twitter dying and tumblr welcoming the refugees into our culture by inviting them to participate in the newly created fandom of a nonexistent 1970s mafia film.

#makeste reads bnha #real life update

[identitty-dickruption]

mad for life

It's been six months since I started meeting with a social worker. I like him. He’s a transman. Autistic and has ADHD. Openly a recovering addict. He’s the kind of guy I can see myself growing up to become. It’s been six months, and I finally feel comfortable enough to tell him about me. Once I finish talking, he just looks at me for a second, and I can’t breathe. “I can help you get a mental healthcare plan. The government will pay for ten sessions a year”. I barely manage to suppress laughter. Me? On a mental healthcare plan? Me? The person so bad at being a patient that I’ve never lasted longer than four out-patient sessions? Yeah, right. 

Four sessions. She tells me a metaphor about a chair, where she makes it clear that I have a leg missing. She doesn’t say it exactly like that though. “Sometimes we become unstable if one of our four pillars is missing”. I fight the urge to tell her that she’s mixing her metaphors. I fight even harder to not ask her, “but what if I’m not a chair? What if I’m a perfectly good stool or tricycle or some other three-part object?”. There is no room for questions here. There is only room for repeating the same metaphor until it’s drilled into my head. There’s no room for perfectly good stools. There’s only room for unstable chairs.

Two sessions. He asks me what I mean when I say that I think there’s something deeply and profoundly wrong with me, but I can see in his face that he knows what I mean. He asks me what I think being a good person looks like when I say that I think there’s something truly evil within me. I can’t give him a good answer. I think about the fact that I was conceived the weekend my mum was freed from the psych ward. I think about the fact that she was admitted voluntarily, meaning that the doctor told her he’d call the police if she said “no”. I think about the fact that she still screams if anyone other than my dad touches her. He tells me he wouldn’t call the police, even if I admitted that I was evil. I don’t believe him.

One session. Three hours long. I’m not sure if I’m even allowed a bathroom break, and I don’t know how to ask. She closes the door. She takes me through something she’s calling a “personality inventory”. I’m smart enough to lie at all the key questions. No, I’ve never felt so happy I felt invincible. No, I’ve never been so depressed I considered killing myself. No, I don’t hear voices or see visions or wake up screaming without knowing why. I’m here to get enough of a diagnosis that my university will give me the resources I need to get my degree. I’m not here to get the kind of diagnosis that will end with them dragging me kicking and screaming back to the place where university is seen as a silly unattainable goal. 

After this session, I tell my dad I’m worried that she thinks I’m a bad person. I have a 39 page report full of detailed analysis about how I’m broken, deranged, wrong, despite showing “no signs of past trauma”. My dad looks at me, his head cocked slightly. “She doesn’t think you’re a bad person, because this isn’t a person-person relationship, it’s a psychiatrist-patient relationship”. And in that second, everything starts to click together in my head. I’ll never be a person to these so-called professionals. I’m an unstable chair, an unruly client, a bad patient, but never a person. Why should I be? Afterall, I’m just another lunatic. 

One session. 50 minutes long. I tell him that I’ve been suicidal in the past, but that I’m not anymore. He tells me that I don’t seem distressed. I tell him I have a diagnosis of OCD. I tell him that I can’t sleep until I’ve checked that everyone in my family is alive. I tell him that I cross myself every time I have a bad thought. I tell him that I can’t stop imagining myself hurting everyone I love. He slowly explains to me that the DSM has a distress criteria for all diagnoses, so maybe I don’t actually have OCD. He’s right, I’m not distressed. I leave the appointment ten minutes early. 

Zero sessions with the woman who won’t stop calling me to ask if I’m ever going to reschedule the appointment I never showed up to. 

It's been eight months since I started meeting with a social worker. I show up drunk, because that’s how I show up to everything at the moment. He asks me if I followed up on the doctor’s appointment we talked about, and I shake my head. “I’ve decided that medication isn’t for me”. He gives me that long look again. “The only difference between taking medication and living the way you live is that medication is safe”. I give him my own long look. Before I allow myself to yell and scream, I stand up and walk out. I never see him again. There goes my longest ever streak of being in the crazy system.

#psych critical #mad #tw institutionalisation #mad pride #creative nonfiction

[engagemythrusters]

Okay. Watching The Bad Batch for the first time and I’ve only gotten 2/3rds of the way thru the first season thus far, but I feel I now understand the characters well enough to start making conjectures.

So here’s what I’ve got so far:

Due to the inherent Muchness of heightened senses, I wouldn’t doubt a sensory processing disorder for Hunter. It’s clear that he’s gotten a handle on it (aka learned to adapt to, compensate for, and understand it) by the time TBB appears in The Clone Wars, but I bet it was hard to deal with when he was younger.

Wrecker appears to have a developmental/learning/intellectual disability of some sort, compounded by a TBI. He struggles with bigger words and is impulsive, along with other notable markers. This could have stemmed from the accident that left the facial scar and blinded his eye, but it seems that, based on how the other three original bad batch clones act around him, that this has always been a thing. A TBI likely added to this, because he seriously just keeps getting smacked in the head, the poor guy. He’s just a walking headache.

That being said, he likely gets lots of migraines. Seriously, that much head-smacking can’t result in a fun, happy time up in his head, pain-wise. I suspect the other four get them, too. Hunter has to process a lot of information from all senses, and Crosshair from his sight. That’s a lot to deal with, and I know I get headaches from a lot less. Tech… he’s staring at screens all day. Blue-light headaches much? And Echo… he’s literally got so much going on up there, technology wise, that it’s undoubtedly the cause of many a migraine. He’s one bad interface connection from a seizure, practically.

Crosshair has some attachment issues, I think. Like I believe all the clones would, had they not been programmed otherwise. They never got held by a caring individual, for gods sake. Maybe later generations had older brothers to hold them every so often, but that’s not enough. They never got one-on-one care. And, since his programming never kicked in correctly, Crosshair has all of that just shoved into his twig body. So, RAD, due to his obviously avoidant nature.

Tech is autistic and I don’t think that’s debatable, really. Like that textbook autism (which leads to a discussion about his savant nature being paired with a highly autistic-coded character and the harmful impact that could create for us autistic people in real life. The same harm of Wrecker’s disability vs how he’s treated as an ‘it’ in the show (said explicitly by Cid) and how Crosshair, with evident attachment issues, is demonised as the villain. BUT THATS ITS OWN ESSAY TO WRITE.)

Omega has ADHD and that one’s not heavily coded like the rest, but I think it fits!

None of them have true favourite siblings, but each are easier to go to for different things. Hunter, for leadership and emotional advice. Crosshair, for silent understanding (pre-chip activation). Wrecker, for emotional understanding and grounding. Tech, for intellectual advice and rationality. Echo, for interpersonal advice. Omega, for intrapersonal advice and a fresh, new perspective on everything.

I truly believe, in my heart of hearts, that Hunter would have the highest, shrillest scream. It doesn’t make sense, but it just seems right (to me personally).

Tech and Echo spend a lot of time on Echo’s implants and prostheses. Echo clearly isn’t using them for their original intent—some not even used at all—so they have to be updated, modified, or taken out. (As evidenced by the—I’m assuming what is a—neural interface he now wears and the lack of other implants he used to have in TCW.)

Echo has chronic pain, due to phantom limbs. That, and it must take a lot out of him for those prostheses. They're melded to him in a way that seems... not user-friendly. Techno Union wasn't doing it because they wanted him to live a fulfilling life. They did it because they needed him. They wouldn't care about his pain. It's unlikely that he doesn't feel constant pain. I'm guessing his everyday average pain level it's equivalent to what normal people (i.e.: people who aren't me or other chronic pain-havers) would consider a 4 out of 10.

I have a feeling that most of them know the basics of swimming, but likely aren’t good at it—Wrecker especially. And, with all that armour, it probably wouldn’t matter if they could swim or not. That shit will absolutely sink them. Omega, once taught, would LOVE IT, though.

Crosshair would let a tooka adopt him. As in, he would let the cat follow him around. Whether or not he’d do anything for or about the tooka… I don’t know. But he’d allow it. (Wrecker would dote on the thing if it followed him. Lula and said tooka would be his best buds. He may like explosions, but he’s a sweet guy at heart!)

Echo and Crosshair have absolutely held staring contests. Asserting dominance. (Somehow, despite not having been involved in the first place, Wrecker has won at least two of them.)

Hunter has a taste for meilooruns. Tech does not.

All of them snore. Echo’s even has an electronic buzzing to it. Tech is absolutely the loudest. Omega has wished to smother them all in their sleep.

#and they’re all Māori xoxo I’m not taking the fucking whitewashing #anyway that and also I really need to do a LONG WINDED ANALYSIS on the affects of handling disability in this show #it’s got a few good things #but mostly bad #(side note: please do not feel the need to agree with all these things! these are personal. if yku reblog you can say which— #—are the ones you do agree with and ignore the rest!) #(and another side note: maybe things like the swimming one will be proved wrong—that’s okay! this is based on the data I currently have #which isn’t much bc we currently only have one full season and two eps of the next as of this point) #(so overall: take with a small grain of salt! these are my headcanons based on current information!) #star wars: the bad batch #the bad batch #tbb #tbb omega #tbb crosshair #tbb wrecker #tbb hunter #tbb echo #tbb tech #god I have to tag a bunch of shit don’t I cause I don’t know What Is The Right Tags To Use #the bad batch omega #the bad batch hunter #the bad batch wrecker #the bad batch tech #the bad batch crosshair #the bad batch echo #clone trooper hunter #clone trooper crosshair #clone trooper wrecker #clone trooper tech #arc trooper echo

[copperbadge]

My folks just dropped me off at the airport, so I’m sat at the gate in Austin-Bergstrom with a protein bar and a bottle of water, waiting for the cue to board and considering life, as one does in an airport.

I didn’t discuss the ADHD diagnosis with my folks, not that I had planned to, but being medicated while there (and unmedicated, for some of it) was informative. I got to bring up some disability stuff with my mum; I don’t want to spill detailed family beans, but they didn’t give her a name for her diagnosis. It was mostly a net-zero gain but I’m glad I asked. With the benefit of a longer attention span and improved active listening, I suspect if she were a man she probably would have had an autism diagnosis, but I’m going to let that grenade sit unexploded, I think. I did get screened for autism, at least in the ways they can screen, and that came back a pretty clear negative as expected. 

There’s enough other emotional ordinance in my life right now to navigate around, anyway. The whole concept of “twice exceptional” is proving to be an issue to process, not so much because I’m gifted-and-also-disabled (still adjusting to that word) but because I didn’t think I was all that exceptional to begin with. I joke about being “clinically diagnosed as a real cool dude” but...in some ways it’s not actually funny. We none of us truly know what other people think of us, but I used to think I could gauge it pretty well and I’m beginning to both wonder in some cases, and in other cases comprehend that my assumptions of other peoples’ beliefs about me have been very, very wrong. 

And I don’t know what to do with any of that, in part because there’s a fine line between owning one’s intellect, one’s gifts, and being a real fuckin’ dickhead to people because you think you’re better than them. I never want that. So I’m just holding this information, trying to determine how to handle it safely. I don’t love ambiguity, so I’m not pleased with that, but I’ve learned to sit in a certain amount of uncertainty and it’s been six weeks since the diagnosis, two weeks on the meds, so I can own that I’m being impatient with myself. 

I’ve thought about building a separate tumblr to talk about all this stuff, since even for people who are interested I can comprehend some of this might be traumatic, and for everyone else perhaps not that interesting. A dedicated tumblr is on brand for me in some ways (the mustard blog, the louvre blog) but a bit antithetical in others, in that my blog has always been a weird swirl of personal life, fandom, and aesthetic, so I don’t know. Opinions welcome. 

I think I’m going to send the text of the horse metaphor post to my psych, but mostly so he understands how I’m interacting with the meds. He’s not meant to be my therapist -- neither he nor I want that -- but I really liked him when we spoke, so I do want to be as easy a patient as I can be. The rest will wait; it’s waited this long, after all. 

#sam has adhd #'copperbadhd' probably isn't taken but also looks like a Klingon swearword

[drabblecreature]

Nervous Habit

Calculester x Reader w a bad tendency to pick at their fingers/cuticles. TW for blood mention? Reader is Gn! Pure fluff tbh, just a short drabble :]

You can’t help but pick at your hands; listening to lectures, reading, trying to solve a hard problem, tests- you were always mindlessly picking or biting at your cuticles.

Cal’s worried about you, as you’re technically causing harm to yourself and engaging in auto-cannibalism.

You try to assure him that it’s not that bad and that a lot of people monsters pick at their hands, that it’s because of your (adhd/ocd/anxiety/etc).

He’s convinced for a short bit, until one day in class he looks over and realizes you’ve completely bloodied your hands picking at them. Like. Dripping on the desk bloody.

You didn’t realize what was happening as he pulls you out of class and practically dragged you to the nurse, until of course, you looked down and saw your bloody hands. Once you were in the nurse’s office and sat on a cot, Cal began attaching bandaids to your fingers with a [:( ] displayed on his screen.

“Cal, it’s okay really- I just spaced out, I won’t die from a little bit of bleeding from my hands.”

“Your hands have [17,000] Seventeen Thousand nerve endings in just the palm. Bleeding from the hands can cause serious damage-“ [:,O ]

He gently sticks another brightly colored bandaid around one of your fingers.

“-And there’s a 2.9% chance that you contract an illness or infection from your exposed finger injuries. I would like for you to care more for your health.” [:/ ]

You sigh. There’s no use in arguing with him. He is technically right, you are causing harm to yourself, even if it’s unintentional.

“Maybe you can just hold my hands so I don’t pick at them?” (So Charming!)

His monitor changes to a [ :O ?] expression;

“It isn’t possible for me to always hold your hand, I would have to be by your side at all times.”

“I think I’d like that…” You mumble, your face growing warm.

His hands freeze around yours as his screen goes red, bright ERROR message displayed on the poor bot’s face, fans whirring.

“ERROR: FEELINGS OF ROMANCE TOO STRONG.”

Laughing, you take his metal hands in your bandaged ones and quickly lead him to the freezer to cool down. Despite your suggestion being a flirtatious joke, he seemed to hold your hands far more after that. And you truly didn’t mind.

#calculester hewlett packard #calculester hewlett packard x reader #calculester x reader #monster prom calculester #calculester #monster prom #drabble #monster prom fanfic #Spotify

[babyyweebbitch]

Hello this is the Anon that requested the zoning out ECT S/O I understand you aren't doing mk, what about Demon Slayer, with Tengen, Misturi, Shinobu, Obanai(rlly hope I spelled that right) and Rengoku

yep! thank you for requesting! again it will take a bit for me to do my other requests because i am stressed out currently and i’ve barely had any motivation to write. thank you for your patience :)

Content warning : being tengens 4th wife 💃🏾🕺🏽 , insecurities , ADHD ,

Tengen U.

i feel like tengen would be able to deal with your zoning out and stuff pretty well… i have a feeling Suma zones out a lot as well plus he is friends with Rengoku and all the other pillars so ya’know he kinda deals with their different personalities all the time

whenever you’re talking to him you tend to fidget with your top or something random you had gotten from the house or outside to help you concentrate, tengen noticed this when you first got married and joined everyone but he didn’t wanna bring it up just incase you got insecure and tried to pretend to be “normal”

with being cut off during conversations he kinda gets a tad bit annoyed because he does have four wives now with different personalities and a lot to say, but he never really gets upset with you, suma, makio or hinatsuru if one of you ever cut him or each other off. he just listens to what one of you have to say then go back to whatever he was saying or whatever one of you guys were saying, he’s very patient when it comes to you four to be honest

your relationship is pretty open and there’s a lot of communication so if you’re getting distracted or even bored with a certain topic you kinda just say that whenever it’s your turn to speak or something, then you talk about something else or do whatever you want in another room

makio tends to get very upset with the cutting off people thing, Suma doesn’t really care because she does the exact same thing (it’s giving adhd 😀👍🏾), hinatsuru is very calm and willing to listen to whatever any of you guys have to say. she’s a very patient person and doesn’t really get upset and tengen has learned to deal with each of your personalities over time so depending on which one you are he’ll either give back that energy (makio🗿) or be patient.

Mitsuri K.

congratulations, you’ve found your perfect match 👁👄👁👍🏾 how’s it feel?

Mitsuri gives off a lot of zoning out, can’t concentrate and getting distracted very quickly energy so ya’know perfect fucking match made in heaven by god himself. he can get distracted by a lot of things very easily she just tries not to during pillar meetings so she doesn’t get yelled at by Tengen 😔

if you cut her off in the middle of a conversation she doesn’t mind at all honestly! she probably does the same thing too so y’all have 5 minute conversations about one thing then “OH as i was saying earlier about that cat!” or “WAIT i just remembered! did you do that thing” every five minutes i kid you not half of your conversations are forgotten because you guys just keep piling different topics onto each other

as for the fidgeting thing she doesn’t do that but whenever you do and you don’t have anything to fidget with she gives you her hand to mess with. she does really mind so be honest and it happens so much that it’s so normal so her

if she starts seeing you get more insecure about this and trying to “mask” your personality with another one that isn’t like you she’d be so sad…. she loves how you are normally. one thing she hates is whenever you get overly insecure and stop talking around others

she helps you with being more confident about yourself personality wise. she thinks it’s a big deal if you’re confident in the person you truly are instead of trying to fake it for others approval

Shinobu K.

you and shinobu are both similar and different in a lot of ways… she zones out, gets distracted and even unintentionally interrupts people that isn’t Tomioka (she does that intentionally). she may not zone out as much as you do but she does get distracted a lot.

if you can’t concentrate on something she always offers help or even suggests you take a break from whatever you can’t concentrate on and work on it later. whenever she helps you she kinda just sits with you and gets you back on track, even grabbing you a snack because she says a small snack could help with focusing again and it does :)

i literally had no idea how to write for her 🗿

Obanai I.

complete opposites 😀 he is very calm and stuff while you aren’t a lot of the time. you also zone out alot which reminds him of Muichiro because of how often you do it. you also get distracted mid conversation and kinda just stop listening to what he’s saying and go to do something else, he gets hella offended by the way but never tells you that

there was one time someone said something negative about your personality and how you unintentionally interrupt others and you got insecure and started trying to change yourself. Obanai was fucking livid… he hated how someone made you insecure for being you. he loves the person you are, even though you zoning out or something does get a little frustrating it’s who you are and he wouldn’t trade your personality for the world… imma just say that person got an ear full 😁

if you fidget a lot or can’t really stay still he lets you hold Kaburamaru if you need something to help you. the snake actually really loved you btw and it normally doesn’t like a lot of people but you’re the only one he allows, congratulations — the snake has claimed you as second person

Kyojuro R.

you both are so similar in the cutting people off and zoning out that it’s like you both were made for each other. though he doesn’t fidget or get distracted easily he does like to learn more so please! do tell him more! he will listen very carefully and will definitely do research on how to help

if you zone out mid conversation he will simply just sit and wait until you come back so he can continue the conversation with you again. this man had an incredible amount of patience when it comes to you, his fellow hashira are always so amazed on how he can sit and wait for minutes for you to snap back and remember what he was saying. i feel like while he’s waiting he kinda thinks of what to say ans even what to bring up about the conversation

if you are getting bored with a subject you always tell him so that he can change it to whatever you’d like and continue the conversation that was being had earlier later. he also does the same with you as well. just like with Tengen your relationship is very open and there’s alot of communication, so there is nothing that is hidden from one another unless it’s a present or something

this took a whole because ✨writers block✨ :(

#demon slayer #demon slayer x reader #demon slayer x female reader #uzui tengen #tengen x reader #tengen headcanons #mitsuri kanroji #mitsuri x reader #mitsuri headcanons #shinobu kocho #shinobu x reader #shinobu headcanons #obanai iguro #obanai x reader #obanai headcanons #kyojuro rengoku #rengoku x reader #rengoku headcanons

[greghatecrimes]

I like you and i don't think you're a bad person but I feel like you don't understand Thirteen as a character, you seem to idolize the hollow caricature of her you've created that allows you to insert yourself inside. I'm telling you, you don't need to look like Olivia Wilde to talk about your passions and interests!

You don't have to attribute these things to a fictional person, you can let go of the mask and just be truly you! I promise you will find a new appreciation for Thirteen, and more importantly yourself. I wish you all the peace and love in the world, and I hope my words help you find yourself. Take care 💖

Wow, this was so enlightening for me about my insecurities and the inner workings of my psyche! Even more than five years of therapy, EMDR, and an entire psychology degree!! Anon, I’m assuming you’re the same person that sent me the ask I answered this morning. I see now that I assumed wrongly when I answered that ask under the belief that it was just genuine curiosity. The huge irony here is that I’ve grown a lot over the past five years, and lately I’ve been reflecting on how I’m in a place now where I’m perfectly happy to be who I am, to love what I love, to be unapologetically me. As a follower of my sideblog on tumblr (not even my main blog!!!) you’re only seeing a tiny portion of who I really am as a person (because I KNOW you’re not someone that knows me in real life). Having said that, it certainly takes a HELL of a lot of audacity to come into MY inbox and tell me on anon that you think you know me and my insecurities and how I think about Thirteen better than I know all of those things about myself. 

This is actually HILARIOUS to me, because I WISH the things I “hide behind a character”, as you would say, were as simple as passions and interests. When I was talking about attributing emotions to fictional characters, I didn’t mean silly things like the fact that I like video games, or being a cat person, or even deeper things like being autistic/ADHD (which I 100% admit, when I headcanon the House characters as neurodivergent, that is me projecting because I wish we had more ND representation in media. And you know what? PROJECTION IS OKAY. this is TUMBLR. I reblog fucking pony versions of my favorite characters! I write crack headcanons! Bestie, I’m just trying to de-stress on this blog. 95% of the stuff I post here is not as serious as you’re trying to make it.) Here’s the short version of my REAL “insecurities that I project into a hollow caricature of Thirteen” for you: I grew up being abused. I wasn’t allowed to express any emotions. Ever. I wasn’t allowed to have any needs. Ever. Now I have post traumatic stress disorder and my life is a mess. My life kind of sucked for the first 21 years and guess what? It still kind of sucks right now! I write and think about Thirteen processing trauma she might have faced in her life because it’s cathartic to me as someone who is healing from their own trauma, and to help myself cope with living in an actively stressful/shitty environment. (And guess what? It's a clinically approved coping mechanism. I highly doubt my therapist of five years would let me invest so much time and effort and emotion into a hollow caricature of a person that leads me to lose sight of who I really am!)

This is fanfiction and tumblr headcanons, not a published writing gig. You clearly care too much about my characterization of Thirteen aligning with yours, and unfortunately for you, I don’t. I write what I write because I want to read it. If you want to write her a certain way, no one’s stopping you! Make your own tumblr posts! Write your own damn fanfics! I’m not the authority on Thirteen and I’ve never pretended to be. If you don’t like anything about my characterization of Thirteen, then fucking move on. I’ve put way too much time and effort into giving everyone in my life the benefit of the doubt and striving to be the bigger person, to be the nicest person. And you know what? I’ve spent my entire life being ashamed of what I think and doubting everything I feel. I’ve already got five years and counting of working to undo that damage. I’m not about to let an anon on tumblr make me feel the same shame and doubt about my thoughts and writing for one of my favorite characters.

#ask #anon #goodnight. i am logging off for the night and if anyone needs me you can reach me on discord

[divinctions]

✿ ━━━━ ARLO HWANG

Is that Cha Eunwoo ? oh, no, that's Arlo Hwang ! A twenty-seven year old Gaming Content Creator/Streamer who uses he/him pronouns. They currently live in Viña Del Mar, and the character they identify with most is Arataki Itto from Genshin Impact. Hopefully they find their own little paradise here in el país de los poetas!

your resident gamer boy with brainrot here only to be loud and wrong / more below

━━━━━━━━━   B  A  S  I  C  S :

full name: arlo haneul hwang ( contreras )

nickname(s): hannie ( by his mother ), lo, lolo

age: twenty - seven .

ethnicity: korean american . korean chilean ( dual citizenship ) .

gender: cis man .

pronouns: he / him .

orientation: heteroromantic / heterosexual .

occupation: youtube gamer / streamer .

language(s) spoken: english , spanish ( valpo spanish ) , learning korean .

career claims: lazerbeam fortnite content, markipliers fnaf content, and quinbobins youtube channel .

aesthetics: glow of a computer screen in a dark room, the sound of someone feverishly typing on a keyboard, and screams of delight followed by hours old monster energy and axe body spray

most replayed song: snooze - sza ( patrick star ai cover )

━━━━━━━━━   P  E  R  S  O  N  A  I  L  I  T  Y  :

absolutely unhinged . speaks without thinking . impulsive . he’s comfortable in his skin, career, and outlook on life which makes him confident beyond belief ( alot of the time unjustifiably so). he’s an idiot and he knows it. anyone can correct him and he won’t say anything, even if it’s a topic he knows like the back of his hand; he just assumes they’re right because he’s really dumb like barely graduated dumb and that’s okay. which means he’s so fucking gullible. it doesn’t even take much to gaslight him, it’s more of a match that won’t strike and he’ll still believe it. truly takes everything at face value. easily gets hyper fixated on his interests and will talk about them nonstop, you don’t have to be listening to him but he’ll yammer on and on; he swears it’s just the streamer effect but honestly he’s just like that. like i said he’s dumb as hell but the knowledge he does retain is all very irrelevant and useless on the grand scheme of things like he couldn’t tell you the right way to use a comma but if you have a few hours for to go over five nights at freddy’s lore he’s excited to share . very kind mainly because he’s not someone who will do well in a fight. his comebacks are limited to ‘ i know you are but what am i ’ and ‘ i’m like rubber, you’re like glue; what you throw at me bounces off me and sticks to you ’. he has to be nice. always has a joke on his tongue that it’s okay not to laugh at because he’ll laugh enough for everyone . over all has very good energy, he’s a go with the flow kind of person, the kind you can call on a whim to go out and he’ll be down. can make the most out of a bad situation and tries to see the positive in everything. that being said though he is dramatic af, but it’s over minor inconveniences like his package is delayed or he’s hungry and his food got delivered to the wrong address. then he’s the biggest baby around. 

━━━━━━━━━    B  A  C  K  G  R  O  U  N  D  :

arlo grew up in a extremely loving family. as the only child with a single mother who worked from him, he wasn’t necessarily spoiled, there were a lot of guidelines he was expected to follow and his mouth often got him in trouble in school, but his mother was always very gentle with him. he had undiagnosed adhd as young as four years old and had no place to expel that energy; he was no good at sports, didn’t have the athleticism for it, it only left him with injuries. but he was restless so his mother decided to introduce him to a variety of video games she was working on the concept art for..

it was a way to get him to settle down and focus on something, and also spend time as a family. he got to learn more about his mother’s job as a concept artist and what sparked her interest in video games and the kind of escape they give. arlo was very bad at them from the start, no matter how long he played or how easy the mode he set himself in, but it never turned him off from the games. he was really attracted to the idea that he could fail however many times he wanted and would still get the chance to try again and correct where he went wrong until he did get it right. or the game took pity on him and pushed him forward anyway.

his mother would go out and purchase a variety of consoles and games to have family game nights that she would use to slowly introduce her new boyfriend to. what started as a weekend thing quickly turned into a nearly every night of the week thing and something he looked forward to the most. At first, the addition of mr. contreras ( the name arlo still calls the man to this day ) bothered arlo to his core. there was a routine he’d fallen into and he loved it. he lived a comfortable life, but him showing up meant nights with babysitters and limited time in front of the tv or in front of his games to be sent to his room or go out on family outings where they’d pretend to a big happy family, but arlo always felt they were just that without mr. contreras.

despite arlo being a dramatic little shit, his step-dad was determined to get on his good side. he worked hard to prove to arlo he was someone he could trust and that he wouldn’t be going anywhere with a beautiful engagement ring to his mother. his soon to be step-dad, a costume designer, would hand make arlo’s costumes for halloween or events where he wanted to be his favorite video game character. it was a process he actually really enjoyed learning about and taking part in. by the time they packed up and moved to chile when arlo was 11 for the wedding, he was beginning to make his own costumes and tailoring his own clothes ( not always the best but he was getting there ).

as he got older his parents interest in the games dwindled as his mother turned to the beautiful mural work of valpo and his step-father focused more on the local theater scene, but they had already created a monster. he tried to connect with his classmates, joined gaming clubs, and online spaces available, but the thing is he’s not very good??? at playing games??? easily confused, has a hard time figuring out controls, and panics at any sudden music change which makes him forgot how to play the game completely because he thinks he’s about to die anyway. his game play style didn’t really mesh well with the people who are very good at games and they figured why let him play if he was only going to die or bring his team down. not to mention he was still adjusting to learning a new language, being in a new country, and missing the time when it was just him and his mother. he wasn’t use to sharing her, and it had always felt like it would be him and her against the world. it’s not that he didn’t like his step-father, arlo just couldn’t adjust to change well. once he was comfortable in a space that’s where he thrived, where he wished to stay. his step-father took that comfortability away and pushed him into something new, and he wasn’t doing so well with new.

like all us lonely, ostracized folks who wanna share a space with people who share like interests, he turned to the internet ! at first, he started uploading on youtube and streaming to get better. he was looking for tips, and hoping others would reach out to help him out. games had become a solace for him when he was growing up, and he hated feeling like he was being torn away from it because he couldn’t find anyone to connect with. what his bad gameplays actually brought him was a community of people who liked that he just enjoyed the game for what it was without worrying about being the best. they laughed when alongside him as he managed to die for the fourth time in ten minutes, they cheered when he managed to win a match by pure luck, and they felt comforted knowing there was someone out being bad at games and having fun with like most of the game players at home. he had created a space for players of any level to just have fun and not have to worry about the pretentious ridicule from others in the community.

after having that realization he completely embraced the brand he unintentionally created and the upward success. his parents are super proud of him and brag about his career all the time. of course, he’s insanely active on social media always posting but he’s especially active in his discord servers and in the comments of his posts because he really does love engaging with his community. he loves collaborating with smaller creators and pushing the notion that gaming should be fun and relaxing. and never cruel.

━━━━━━━━━   H  E  A  D  C  A  N  O  N  S  :

he absolutely ADORES music. could be the adhd but he often has to have it on in the background when he’s playing games no matter what. during his streams he’ll have a 15 minute dance party with viewers to hype himself up before playing. also enjoys learning gg dances and tiktok dances on stream. he’s actually a pretty good dancer too but you won’t catch this man in a class. closest he gets to sweating is when he plays just dance and takes it very seriously, obviously.

sza’s number one fan. if he could uproot his life to become her groupie he’d do it without hesitation.

He’s a cosplayer!!! Very serious about it to, he’s invited to hella conventions to host cosplay contests and has talks with some of the most famous cosplayers in the game. He thinks the craft is really cool and is super proud of the work he does. His current favorite cosplays to do are: Sidon from botw/totk, Childe, Itto & Zhongli from Genshin Impact, Levi Ackerman from Attack on Titan, and Tuxedo Man from Sailor Moon.

the gaming chair he has is really just for show, because he stands almost immediately whenever he’s playing games bc he panics. spends a lot of time walking in laps around his room whenever he does something more stupid than usual in game. 

he doesn’t really have “gaming rage” he finds it more funny if anything. that doesn’t mean there’s no shouting, there’s a lot of shouting, it’s just not angry and vile. It’s a lot of laughter and a lot of begging, but whenever he’s playing horror games his spanish comes out. he’s been living in chile for 16 years so the language is second nature to him he just blurts it out very passionately, very terrified. It’s very funny.

absolutely hates horror games, he has a gentle heart, but he also has fomo and a curious mind so he plays all of them that are requested. especially since his fnaf videos skyrocketed his career forward. He actually had a cameo in the fnaf movie as the security guard in the beginning of the movie, and yes his fear was very real and yes it’s one of the coolest thing he’s ever done. 

has a fortnite skin and locker bundle and it’s his pride and joy he loves it so much. Will brag about it whenever he gets a chance, so give him a CHANCEEEEEE.

does not pull at ALL. he simply does not know how, and does not know when anyone is interested in him so he really is just out here spinning like a ballerina with his steam deck in one hand and his switch in the other.

Has a pet turtle named after his queen, his icon, the goddess he preys to: urbosa from the legend of zelda games.

━━━━━━━━━    W A N T E D C O N N E C T I O N S :

A vampire by olivia rodrigo esque plot where arlo is just used for money, status, company ( dont know why youd want that BUT FDKGIJKODFUKHJIS We can plot ), but he’s very gullible so he believed that it was real and it was fine but they only ever came around when it benefited them, never wanted to talk about anything he was interested in or any problems he had was basically just so awful to him and it took him way too long to get the picture honestly UFIJDKSFUFIJSKO

FESTIVAL PARTNER. This would be someone he goes to musical festivals with, like all the festivals. It doesn’t matter where in the world it is or how last minute it is, if there’s a festival they’ll get tickets and catch the flight, rent the car, etc. It’s led them on so many great adventures and they’ve landed in some very funny situations because of it. Just an all around great time.

ROOMMATES !!!! I think its funny if they didn’t know arlo was a streamer when they agreed to move in and so are shocked when he’s not only home all the time but shouting at top volume at 4am. He’d definitely try to convince them to game with him, and try bribes. He’s always ordering food bc he cant cook so at least he’s eating good.

Influence/Celeb/Socialite frenemy. I’d like to see him in a collab contract for a clothing company, or energy drink, or something influencers are paid insane amounts to promote, but they can’t stand each other BKJFGKODUHFIJKOS Arlo is notoriously hard to work with because he doesn’t find the work fun so he pouts a lot until it gets fun and then he can manage but only for a little bit because he’d rather be doing something else so I can see them bickering a lot but at the end of the day they’ll stand up for one another if they think they’re being mistreated.

#smhqintro #ANOTHER LONG ONE IM SORRY #DUFISJKODFSIJFKDSIJFKODL

[operationslipperypuppet]

all prime numebrs for the fic writer ask! 💛😊

I will pretend you spelled numbers correctly lol. thanks for the ask!!

2. How many fics did you work on this year? (They don’t have to be finished or published!)

I want to say 12. I published 6, I’m currently working on 2 different ideas for the naddpod gift exchange so I’ve started both and will be making a full decision tonight or tomorrow (lmao), and then there are a couple I just decided to not publish and a couple I’m always working on but will never actually commit to finishing because I can’t come up with a satisfying ending.

3. What’s something you learned about yourself as a writer?

That I can allow myself to do the things I want to do and go back and fix the other stuff later. I had previously only done this with a fic that included a bunch of time skips and that was why I wormed around the document but I did this with one fic that I consider my magnum opus and it worked. (I like to write dialogue more than scene descriptors so I wrote all the dialogue back and forth and then went back and added names and descriptors and everything else and it was so much more fun)

5. What fandom(s) did you write for this year?

Naddpod. It was just naddpod. I’m thinking I might break into d20 next year but I make no promises, naddpod is so fun to write for.

7. What character(s) captured your heart?

Hardwon Surefoot. Moonshine Cybin. For some reason I find them easiest to write even though getting Moonshine’s voice right was incredibly daunting every time I wrote her. There’s just so much to play with and it was very fun. Plus the Hardwon being alive reveal rewired my brain.

11. What fic was the most satisfying to finish writing?

how to think about you (without it ripping my heart out). God that was a doozy to write. It was my first foray into doing something multi-chaptered and I did have it finished before I even began publishing it but doing the daily updates and my every chapter mini edits took so much time that it was so much fun to finish. Plus I thought about the idea for truly so long before I started writing it that it was very relieving to finally finish.

13. What fic was the easiest to write?

Fools Rush In (Idiots, However, Take 200 Years). This is the fic I mentioned for number 3. I wrote all the dialogue in basically one pass because it’s a long, drawn out conversation that lasts an entire day. I immensely love writing dialogue and the back and forth, hitting what Hardwon and Moonshine would say and how they’d react was easy. And then, even though I was dreading the descriptors, they came so easily because I could picture them so perfectly. It does feel weird to say that my longest fic to date was the easiest to write but it was.

17. What are your go-to writing snacks?

Doing that classic ADHD thing where you hyperfocus and forget to eat all day and then start shaking and put fistfuls of m&ms in your mouth while waiting for chicken to heat up. But when I remember to snack, Smartfood popcorn.

19. Share your favorite opening line.

“You love me?” (Fools Rush In (Idiots, However, Take 200 Years).) I knew I’d open this with that before I finished the previous work in the series. I enjoy getting straight to the point.

23. Share the final version of a sentence or paragraph you struggled with. What about it was challenging? Are you happy with how it turned out?

This was a hard goddamn choice but here goes:

“Look - “ She paused, took a deep breath, and started again. “Can I make a suggestion? You two know him better than I do, obviously, but this might be a time where you give him some space. I know that’s not really what you three do, but he’s going through one of the worst days of his life. And you are, too, but he’s incredibly in his head about it right now. I think maybe if you give him a moment to work out his own feelings, he’ll be able to articulate them to you. And you will then be able to assure him that you need him. Besides, your MeeMaw will take great care of him, Moonshine.” (The Void of an Absence)

Alanis is speaking here. And I wanted her to be pragmatic without seeming insensitive while also staying relatively true to the character she is in the show. I ended up with this slightly more emotionally aware Alanis than we’ve seen but she does switch straight to business afterwards, and that is kind of how Murph RP’d the scene with her and Hardwon. But I overthought it a lot. I’m pretty okay with its final version, but mostly because I got to sneak a “tell me your feelings and I’ll tell you that I need you” reference in there.

29. If this were an awards show, who would you thank?

Obviously the two crew for creating characters that so thoroughly destroy and entertain me, and the people who got excited when I said shit like “I have a terrible idea that’s going to hurt” and responded with “do it.”

Fic writer asks list - ask

#please send more these were hella fun #asks #writing #jlinns #specifically shoutout to benny on the last one. thanks bestie #ask game

[cognitiveleague]

Truly one of the more frustrating recurring experiences of trying to navigate life as a grown-ass person with ADHD is that like… it’s so goddamn hard to keep my brain (which is, y’know, diagnosably deficient in Reward Self for Accomplishing Task juice) motivated to put forward the effort to take care of chores and errands and shit, because I have so many unpleasant memories of failing at that sort of thing and I feel so little sense of reward (or even relief) when I do get things done that it’s this huge effort to not just… ignore tasks until they develop into a Bullshit Avalanche that I can no longer ignore? And when I do force myself to Do Something, running into obstacles can make me feel so frustrated and embarrassed that it’s almost as if I’m being punished for trying to accomplish the task and it would have been better not to try in the first place

Like today I noticed that I’d worked about an extra hour over the last few days, and instead of doing overtime I was like “ok, it’s payday and the ‘get your oil changed, bitch’ light has been on for a while, let’s clock out at the 40 hour mark and go do that before it’s time to pick my wife up from work so I don’t have to try to make that happen this weekend”

Which meant not just the actual task of taking the car to the oil change place, but also sheepishly explaining to the folks there that a) I did not have the financial means to be upsold on anything that was not likely to be a life or death issue before tax refunds come in so please don’t bother unless you are literally afraid for my life if I don’t get the additional service, and b) I actually already know about the headlight that’s out and the old-ass air filter but please don’t replace them, I have the replacements in the car and just keep forgetting to install them myself and only remembering about it when I don’t have time or the engine is too hot for me to go feeling around for where the fucking headlight bulb goes

And to add insult to that injury, they finish up and I’m like, oh. Right.

I lost my debit card like 2-3 weeks ago (yay, absolute garbage perception of time) and KNOW it’s on the floor of the car or maybe in my apartment somewhere so I haven’t reported it lost to get a replacement I just need to find it but the car’s a huge mess and I keep always being too tired or busy when I think about it. And also it’s hard to not be underemployed when I don’t have the spoons to look for a better paying job on top of holding down the job I have, and my wife has similar issues, and the cost of living these days, guys, am I right?? And we’ve got a little windfall coming soon that will help us pay off our debts, but crucially. That is still ‘soon’ and hasn’t happened yet. Anyway so the credit card is apparently maxed out from us having to use it to get around not being paid a living wage the last couple of years :))))))) And the “emergency use only because the bill goes to my parents’ house and I don’t want to abuse the privilege of having parents who can afford to and are willing to help financially when I really need it or to keep being a burden on them, and also they WILL judge me if anything unnecessary is on there” card in my wallet is expired and the new one is somewhere in the kitchen (or living room?) mess at home so I can’t use that right now either

So I had to explain in front of the other customers that I just straight up forgot that the only functioning card in my wallet was maxed out and like, stand there while she looked at records to confirm I was a regular client who’d never pulled shit like this before and also put a note on my file so they could like, know about it and refuse service in the future if I didn’t make good on my promise to come back and pay once I pick my wife (and their debit card) up from work in an hour and a half

And the embarrassment of all of that so thoroughly outweighs whatever minuscule satisfaction my brain can derive from “but I got the task done!” that it feels like I didn’t accomplish anything and also like I put myself through a shitty awkward experience for (what feels like) nothing. And it’s that, but with like…. every fucking thing that I have to deal with when I get home from work and I’m tired and my meds have worn off. So I just have to keep powering my way through a wall of experiences telling me “you will have all of the suffering and experience none of the reward, OR you could not bother and do something that does make you feel nice instead because wow fuck that” for EVERY GODDAMN LITTLE THING.

Anyway I love my brain for so many things, but goddamn it would be great if the “positive reinforcement machine broken” issue impaired me as little as ableists seem to think it should

#long post #well. longish #personal #actually adhd #adhd #adhd problems #adult adhd #mental health #executive functioning issues #venting #mental health venting

[shrekgogurt]

Oh by gosh by golly, I miss writing for fun. I listen to my fic playlists and get sad because I do not have time and then I get mean to myself because I do not have time and the reason I do not have time is my own fault. Do you see the blame game happening?

In between writing my god papers, I have been taking the time to draft little thoughts ‘On Loving Being a Woman, as a Cis Woman Desperately Avoiding the TERF Traps’ in my notes app. The TLDR so far is: “I’m a woman because I love being one. It’s a deep knowing; my body feels warm and fuzzy when I think about it. In turn, I’m a cis woman simply because society happened to guess right when I was born.” I have also been working on editing a Captain Von Trapp thirst trap in my enemies-to-lovers-to-enemies-to-lovers-to-enemies-to lov…Adobe Premiere. I’m going balls to the walls on it. What lovely priorities I have!

I have also been playing around on my guitar more and improving! I’m no star, but it has been a fun break from using my academic brain. It gets my body moving and makes my ADHD sing. I’ve been paired with my COBB writer for my artist responsibilities and I’m excited to get to songwriting! Speaking of songwriting (not fandom related) I have this chorus of a miscellaneous song I haven’t fully written that I am obsessed with:

I have not touched Escape to Space since February 5th and am feeling so incredibly guilty about it. This is sort of a combination of vague writer’s block (I have some ideas and scene fragments but no end goal yet which makes things hard) and no time. I would say if anyone wants to be someone I can bounce ideas off of I am game but it’s not feasible for me to carve out that space right now. Spring break is next week but I have to spend that time drafting the second part of my thesis. Truly, don’t go to grad school friends.

I have been especially missing IKAB, IKAM so very desperately. I might just chug along a little bit a day for an outlet. Oooooop look at me! I did just that!

(flashback, year 11 aka fifth year)

The scent of him hits my nostrils and it’s effort not to make a face. Great. Weed too. We have a bloody match tomorrow and his eyes are fucking bloodshot. I’m fully minging at this point. Only Baz would flaunt his privilege like this. He can afford to lounge on a roof breaking every rule because someone will bail him out. Meanwhile, it’s people like me who will do all the heavy lifting. I briefly consider letting go, watching him stumble off the ledge to the ground five stories below. The thought makes me sick to my stomach, or maybe it’s just the stench.

“We’re both rather tragic, aren’t we?” Baz mutters. I can only hear him because he’s leaning into me. His breath is airy on my ear. It makes me twitchy. I recoil on instinct.

“You think this makes you tragic? Stargazing?”

Alright! I feel like that’s enough for this post! Tagging as a thank you for keeping me in the loop this past month even though I haven’t been active with SSS and WIPsday: @artsyunderstudy @theimpossibledemon @palimpsessed @hushed-chorus @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @larkral @fatalfangirl @letraspal @chen-chen-chen-again-chen @ileadacharmedlife @captain-aralias @forabeatofadrum @ivelovedhimthroughworse @blackberrysummerblog @confused-bi-queer @cutestkilla you are much loved! Now, making my rounds and tagging the rest of my beloved mutuals: @gekkoinapeartree @boyinjeans @technetiumai @takenabackbytuesdays @ninemagicks @yeonjunenby @cows4247 @sillyunicorn @upuntil6am @excalisbury @takitalks @foolofabookwyrm-activated @dragoneggos @carryonmylovelies @giishu @messofthejess @aristocratic-otter @ic3-que3n @nausikaaa @thewholelemon @taramemberence @yellobb-old @whogaveyoupermission @moodandmist @asocialpessimist @onepintobean @umdiasujo @erzbethluna @bazzybelle @johnwgrey @raenestee @martsonmars @ebbpettier WHEWWWWWW okay I think that’s everyone! I’m sorry if I missed you!!!!

#im gonna go enjoy the sunshine #and pray to the high heavens that this mysterious itchy bump on my chin #is just a stress hive #and not another cold sore #as the one on my lip is on the tale end of healing #also let me know if my use of welsh slang is actually cringe #im just using google and trying my best

[sarcasticsra]

Excuse me a moment while I YELL INTO THE FUCKING VOID.

Vyvanse is having shortage issues now. Had to call my pharmacy because I hadn’t gotten a notification on that one and wanted to see if there was an issue. Evidently yes, the issue is that it is out of stock and they don’t know when they’ll get it again.

I hate everything about how we handle ADHD meds in this stupid fucking country. Because now I have to either hope they have it in soon or call around to the other five pharmacies in town to see if they have it, and if they do, then I have to call my doctor to get an entirely new prescription sent, and THEN I have to call my original pharmacy back to have them cancel the old prescription in their system so the new pharmacy can fill it.

Why? Because it’s a schedule 2 drug and that means they can’t just transfer the fucking prescription.

Why? Because the War on Drugs has rotted our collective societal consciousness.

Why? Because there’s not a single fucking moral panic this godforsaken country won’t embrace with open arms, I swear to god.

So naturally that means we had to put the fucking drug cops in charge of medication quotas. And as we all know: ACAB.

“There’s so many new prescriptions!!! Zomg!!! Who knows if they’re legitimate because they were prescribed via telehealth!!!”

Oh wow so this disorder that makes it extremely hard to sustain and regulate attention and thus makes it difficult to do routine things like setting up doctor’s appointments (oftentimes multiple appointments) and then remembering them and getting to them on time… that somehow got diagnosed way more when we took away some of those obstacles? Madness! Witchcraft! Sorcery!

Before I was diagnosed/medicated there were literally days where I couldn’t even get out of bed. I would be laying there, staring at the ceiling, yelling at myself in my head to get up, get up, get up, you need to go to work, get. up. goddammit… to no avail.

Vyvanse has literally given me my fucking brain back. I can look at a task and think, “hmm, I should do that,” and then I just fucking do it. Do you know how many weeks’ worth of laundry I used to have just laying around in baskets because forcing myself to put it away was literally impossible? Do you know how fucking painful it is to look at a task that you have failed to complete, over and over, a simple task, a stupid task, you should just be able to do this, why can’t you just fucking do this…

I think people who have never experienced this can’t truly understand how horrific it feels to have to fight your brain on every. single. thing. Every single task is a calculation: can I do that now, if I don’t do that now will I be able to do that later, wait I already have to do task X and once I do that there’s no way I’ll have the mental energy to force myself to do task Y too. It’s like trying to get your work done on a computer with 80% of its resources being bogged down by bloatware. Can you get some things done? Sure, probably a few. But it’s going to take you three times as long and if you’re not careful the whole system will freeze and you’ll get absolutely nothing accomplished, and oh yeah, it’ll be wildly fucking frustrating the entire goddamn time.

It just absolutely infuriates me that we’re so fucking scared of the potential for “drug abuse” that we fuck over everyone, as if drug abuse is somehow the biggest moral failing in the world. Maybe if we addressed some of the things that lead to it, there would be less of it! Maybe just criminalizing everything is stupid, counterproductive, does not help in any measurable way, and oftentimes just makes everything worse!

And not for nothing, but if not for the truly incredible insurance I am lucky to have through work, getting diagnosed would have cost me $1200. My husband and I are doing well enough that we probably could’ve managed that in a couple installments, but for a large percentage of people, that prices them right out. And I live in a very low cost of living area. I can’t imagine what it costs elsewhere. How many of those “abusing” these meds just actually fucking need them but can’t afford to get them prescribed? Because even after the initial diagnosis, my first scrip cost $230 thanks to a deductible, and then $40/month after that. $40 isn’t awful, but there are plenty of people who do not have an extra $40 per month. (And my copay is on the lower end. I’ve seen people with insurance saying they’ve had to pay $200+ every month.) And then you have to have regular meds check ups, every 2 months or so. So add another $200 for each of those without insurance.

I’m extremely fortunate that the place I work not only offers great insurance but also pays 75% of the premium so that it’s actually affordable, and all of my outpatient mental health visits are covered at 100%. But I shouldn’t fucking have to be glad I won the employer lottery. I shouldn’t have to worry that I won’t be able to get the medicine that makes me functional just because we continue to exist in a society still fucked up by Calvinism to this day.

None of us should have to an endure a fucking asinine, callous, broken system that, whenever any of the myriad problems with it are brought up, has the audacity to go, “oh, don’t blame us, blame those other people who are also suffering!”

Fuck all the way off. We made all of this shit up. None of it is immutable. We just don’t give a fuck that people are hurting, and it shows.

#rant #adhd #adhd struggles #medication #medication shortage #this shit is why the villain is always capitalism

[pandorem]

I find it kind of interesting when people try to ignore Elias, Not!Sasha, and Jon’s burgeoning beholding powers when it comes to Jon’s paranoia and obsession in season 2. On the one hand, I completely understand the impulse, given that leaning too far into those explanations can feel like making excuses for Jon or sandpapering out his very real flaws. I actually have the opposite problem with how some of the fandom treat Sasha, Georgie, and to a lesser extent Basira, making them less flawed and therefore less complex and interesting as characters. Making them less like whole and real people. And with Jon, given that he’s the main character and canonically goes by he/him pronouns, I’m also used to fandoms historically being way too forgiving of their male characters and their flaws, so I also totally get the instinct to fight against that.

On the other hand, in this specific context, it feels less like refusing to make excuses for Jon and more like ignoring the very real context of the situation. Elias killed Gertrude and has lying to and manipulating Jon since the day they met. Not!Sasha replaced his friend, and was at times actively trying to make Jon feel threatened and afraid, and we still don’t know how much Not!Sasha was purposefully doing things to feed of everyone’s fear outside of some specific instances. Jon has just experiences a traumatic event, found out his predecessor was murdered, and his Beholding powers are slowly creeping in without him realizing it. Beholding powers that are both the antithesis of the Stranger and not yet strong enough to oppose the Stranger yet, just strong enough to Know that Something is Wrong Here. There is danger, something is not right.

I don’t think any of that context has to be excuses, because the state of paranoia it leaves him in leads him to some truly fucked up and hurtful choices (mainly stalking Tim to his home, etc.). I do think acknowledging the context can actually make the situation that much more messy and interesting. He was RIGHT, but his actions still hurt people that cared about him. Tim didn’t kill anyone, but if he had been not!Them’d instead, then Jon would’ve been right not to trust him. Where does that leave Tim and his hurt and his grief? Fics that run with that idea and have that be an aspect of Tim’s anger, that Jon was right in the end, so it’s like he can’t even decide if his very valid feelings about the situation are allowed, and worse, maybe he was only right because he’s becoming a monster! And Jon Knew something was wrong when Tim didn’t (couldn’t) realize Sasha was gone and something was pretending to be her… and that just drags him further into the spiral of grief and anger and resentment, unable to untangle the feelings there. It’s so messy. I wanna take the huge snarl of string of Tim and Jon’s feelings and untangle it, following each thread to its own painful feeling and give it a name.

So like…. I guess my point is that Jon made fucked up and hurtful choices bc he has always been predisposed to obsession and paranoia (as well as impulsivity, thank you adhd), and I don’t think that acknowledging the broader context of the situation in this specific context means we can’t hold him accountable for that or feel empathy for his natural paranoia. Like, you can paint a complex picture of someone going into a paranoia spiral, but the situation is different when that spiral is explicitly being affected by multiple people deliberately trying to gaslight that person. And Jon’s situation feels closer to the latter than the former.

#tma jon #tim tma #tim stoker #jonathan sims #tma meta #the magnus pod #the magnus archives #sorry I always tag so much I’m v bad at tagging #season 2 spoilers #season 2 Jon #season 3 spoilers #jon my beloved