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piratesfromspace · 5 months

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After the rain (141xReader)

Pairing: Reader x Soap (& implied Reader x 141)

Rated: Mature

Word count: 900

Summary: After being kidnapped and rescued, Rain needs to make sure Soap is still alive

Note: In the same universe as my "Rain or Shine" fic, it is the epilogue of the part 4. Some people requested this chapter, and I was happy to write a little something to offer some comfort to our poor Soap. Reader callsign is "Rain", she's bi and autistic (I am autistic myself).

Content: angst, hurt/comfort, aftermath of torture, medical setting, happy ending (kinda)

MASTERLIST // PART 1 // PART 2 // PART 3 // PART 4

Rain has a hard time opening her eyes. She’s not quite sure where she is, she’s slow to wake up, her brain still foggy from the sleeping pills. But then she moves in the bed, and everything starts hurting. Her muscles are so sore, bruises are painfully blooming under her scratched skin. Her head is heavy, throbbing. She feels like she’s been run over by a humvee. With the pain, everything comes back to her in a second. She rises with a gasp, a shot of adrenaline wringing her guts to the point she thinks she’s gonna puke.

The light of day is peaking through the half-opened curtains of her room. She’s back on base, and everything is so vividly painful she’s sure it can’t be a dream. The memory of the past few days invades her - their capture, Johnny’s sacrifice to protect her, her crawling on the floor to rest her cheek against his bloody leg when their captor finally stopped. The sudden thought that Soap might not have survived the torture is suffocating her, she can’t breathe, it’s breaking her mind and her heart. Last she saw him he was laying on the heli floor surrounded by medics.

A flash of white in the corner of her eyes attracts her attention when she finally gathers enough strength to get out of her bed. There is a crisp white strip of paper on her night-stand. It only says “he’s OK” in black ink, and she instantly recognizes Simon’s angular writing. Soap has made it. Tears wet her cheeks without her realizing she’s crying.

—-

She tucks her fists inside the pocket of her hoodie. A black one that belongs to one of the boys, she can’t really tell which one. She keeps her head down, doesn’t want to cross the panicked gaze of colleagues at her face. She’s sporting various scratches, a mean bruise on the side of her jaw, her skin has a sickly yellow-ish undertone - she looks like shit and she knows it.

She crosses the base in a hurried bee-line for the medical bay. She probably should call up her captain for further instruction, report to debrief or go see a doctor. But the only thing on her mind is finding Soap. She had always liked him - it was hard not to, he was funny, kind, quite handsome, always laughing. But she knew that he was growing obsessed with her, and it had frightened her at first. Situations like those could easily delve into unpleasant territories for everyone involved. Except it was Soap, smart-ass Soap, kind-hearted Soap, and he made it work even when it was obvious he was sad Rain had chosen Simon instead of him. After Siberia, things didn't really change, they rather shifted. The group was tighter, Rain was not shy with her attraction to the other guys, with her attraction to him. She let Johnny more into her bubble, into her heart.

And here she is, the wet tracks of tears drying on her cheeks as she leaps through long corridors in search of Soap, when she should get checked for her own injuries, when she should maybe not stay alone like this. Her brain is still drowning in diluted stress hormones and the end trail of painkillers, the mix giving her a distant headache that will probably force her down in a couple hours. For now, she persists.

When she finally finds him, she’s simultaneously disappointed and relieved to find him alone. Ghost, Gaz and Price must be somewhere else, maybe they just went out for a quick break. She doesn’t know how much time she has on her own with Soap, before someone, a nurse, or one of the boys, comes back. He looks like he’s sleeping. Bandages are wrapped around all his visible limbs, snaking around fingers, his wrists, part of his right arm. Around his head also, his already short hair clearly shaved for access to wounds. One of his eyes is hidden by a plastic shell. His lips are swollen, split in a few places. Skilled hands have been at work here, in dressing his wounds, wiping out dried blood, setting up electrodes and drips. It’s easy to forget how simple it is to destroy, and how labor-intensive it is to heal. The regular bip of the heart monitor is the thing that prevents her from spiraling further down. Alive. Her sergeant is alive. No need to explore the devastating thought of him being gone.

She climbs on the bed, finds a place against him. His warmth makes her want to cry again. Her own scratched fingers hover over his cheekbones - the skin there is purple - then over his neck, she needs to feel his pulse under her scorched skin. Alive. She tucks her face next to his shoulder, tries to find the familiar smell under the antiseptic. Rain holds him the best she can without risking hurting him more, and decides that’s all she wants to do for the time being.

That’s how the boys find them when they arrive some time after that. They had been looking for her after Simon had discovered her empty bed. They weren’t really scared. They knew she would be here. Where else? They swore to take care of each other - and that’s what they will keep doing, no matter what.

MASTERLIST

#ghost x reader #cod fanfiction #soap x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #price x reader #gaz x reader #poly 141 #141 fanfic #task force 141 #141 x reader #tf 141 #poly tf141 #polyamory #hurt/comfort #whump writing

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himbeereule · 28 days

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Орлёнок Demo Release

Finally, the demo is here! It's not exactly January anymore, but better late than never, right?

You can play it right here!

I also made a post on the CoG forums, if you want to check it out: Link

Features include:

Meeting your family! And getting bullied.

Getting executed!

Rising from the dead!

Celebrating life by slaughtering some rebels!

(Being extremely miserable!)

Feedback:

This is, quite obviously, a work in progress. It is made available so that you, the reader, can give feedback that improves the game.

So, while you can - and should - obviously tell me whatever you want, a specific list of what I need most in terms of feedback can be found here:

Language. English is not my first language (actually, not even my second one), and I mostly read non-fiction academic works when I read in English, so my writing is certainly not at the level it should be. If you have any concrete issues, please tell me, and I'll try to learn how it can be improved.

Spelling. I don't expect much in the way of outright errors, but I do know that I mix up British and American English all the time. The intended style is American English, so please point out spellings that are wrong in that regard.

Inconsistencies. There are a lot of variations between scenes, and I'd like to make the story as immersive as possible; so, if a phrasing, a character's behaviour etc. feel like they don't fit into the choices you previously made, please tell me. In detail, if possible, otherwise I won't be able to amend it.

Sensory descriptions. AuDHD makes my brain process sensations, including visual impressions, very differently, which means I often end up forgetting those exist. Please tell me about scenes that lack description in that regard. (My first grade elementary school report card called my writing 'efficient and devoid of feelings', and I'd very much like to move past that.)

Technical problems. The code should be pretty solid, but with how complicated it is, it'd be weird if there weren't at least some problems. If you find them, please try to include as much detail as possible when telling me about it. (CS Quicktest and Randomtest are not usable due to the complexity of the code, lol.)

You liking the story. I remain thoroughly convinced that I am a worthless person who isn't able to, nor deserves to create anything, and currently my only motivation to continue this project is derived from pure stubbornness. So, if you, for some reason, actually like this demo, please tell me. It won't change my mind about how bad I think it is, but it will force me to continue in order to avoid being even more of a disappointment.

Additions. If I like your idea, I'll probably add it right away; if I'm unsure, I'll do a poll. You can get me to do almost anything if you say you're sad if I don't do it.

Formatting. Although I try to playtest as much as possible, it's not that easy with how many variations there are, and in VS Code it's sometimes hard to see how well or badly readable text passages actually are.

CWs/TWs (v0.0.1):

Graphic violence and gore

Attempted sexual assault (against the player, avoidable, f!MC only; also against an NPC if massacre route is chosen (is dealt with quickly))

Suicide attempt (by the player, avoidable; f!MC only)

Loss of loved ones

Massacre of civilians and/or PoWs (avoidable)

General misery

(please let me know if you think this needs additions)

As of yet unfinished content:

Autistic variations do not exist yet for the latter part of the demo

Only one of three locations for taking a walk available for now

Tooltips are incomplete

Asexual is not available yet, as it requires a lot of additional scene variation text

Special (psychopath) routes are missing from some scenes as they were added late in development

Choices that are locked and marked as (WIP) are unfinished

Interaction routes for Semyon/Selena, Mikhail/Marina and Leon/Leah. They are top priority for the first set of updates

It is recommended that you play this with a stable state of mind. If you choose the suffering paths because it's relatable and/or as a coping strategy, please make sure you have support available and avoid triggering yourself too much.

The whole point of this game (apart from the dress-up part) is that, no matter how bad things get, you shouldn't stop fighting. It's your enemies who deserve destruction, not you.

Please keep in mind that I am both literally insane and pretty reasonable, so: if there is anything you find grossly offensive, don't assume I meant anything bad by it. Just explain to me why you think it shouldn't exist, and if I am convinced, I will amend it.

#choicescript #eaglet #орлёнок #interactive fiction #wip #work in progress #if demo #release

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thosewildcharms · 2 months

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Your rhetorical questions have lit up my brain lol like what if Rick had met Michonne and Andre first instead of Morgan and Duane? 🤯 But anyway on a separate note, it’s so wild to see Rick and Shane’s first scene and Rick laughing along to Shane’s mysoginistic weird ass rant in light of who he is now. He really was just some emotionally repressed small town guy, And while Lori telling Rick “I wonder if you even care about us” in front of Carl was horrible, I wonder what Rick could’ve done or not done that would make her feel that way? And Shane said women’s problem is they don’t know how to turn off a light switch, to which Rick says part of the problem is he’s the one who’s leaving light switches on; I hate to be missing something that’s probably obvious but what did he mean with that?

oh that's a great idea for an AU anon. your mind!

this got long because who am i, so under a read more it goes.

maybe i got my rickgirl blinders on and am giving him too much credit but i thought rick was laughing at least somewhat incredulously at shane's speech (he was at the very least shaking his head a lot until the very end) but yes present-day rick would probably not have entertained that quite so much lol. but to kind of go along with that, my interpretation of light switch thing was rick kind of dismissing shane's, as you pointed out, misogynistic joke by saying he's the one with the issue turning off lights, and also to shift the conversation into the Actual Problems he and lori are having. also in retrospect it kinda feels like the show was lowkey already telling us lori and shane were more suited for each other than lori and rick but i could be reading into that. but listen metaphors have a habit of flying right over my (probably) autistic little head so i could also be missing some hidden meaning there.

as for the fight with lori, there's a flashback (i think in season 2?) where lori is talking to a friend about that same fight and she admits that she was the one who was being the asshole and how she got even more pissed off over how even-tempered and reasonable he was in response. from rick's perspective, he said he would try to talk about his feelings only for it to seem like lori didn't actually want to hear them after all. honestly i think they were just fundamentally incompatible, as we saw over and over in seasons 1 and 2. it wasn't anyone's fault, and their fights probably escalated because they didn't even know how to argue the way the other person wanted them to.

and not to constantly compare rick/lori to richonne, but rick similarly almost never yells or gets mean the few times we see him and michonne argue. the couple of times he did in towl were such an anomaly it set off alarm bells for michonne that something was really wrong with him (and also the situation was just objectively insane). but michonne and rick know how to disagree without getting ugly, and she certainly never has to try to provoke him into communicating because they have a fundamental understanding of each other that rick and lori never had. for sure rick learned from his mistakes with lori but i don't think the rick who was with lori was an entirely different person who said horrible things to his wife. he couldn't express himself the way we see he can with michonne because he just didn't have that type of connection with lori. and to be fair, lori didn't feel that with rick either, and again, that's okay. they probably should have just called it quits well before rick got shot. @cantstayawaycani and @jonesywrites go into this far more eloquently than I did here in their very excellent towl season 1 reaction video that you should definitely watch, because it's wonderful from start to finish.

#richonne #answered #like can i ever be fucking brief #anyway. this was sitting in my drafts for WEEKS i'm so sorry #also re: shane/lori i don't really like to entertain the thought that they should have been endgame or w/e #because he's an asshole who sexually assaulted her but. she seemed pretty happy with him before that tbh #tbh i kinda don't buy that she was just sleeping with him to ~feel something or whatever she said #she was like. giggly and happy. she said she felt safe with him. like. girl?

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tismrot · 7 months

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UNHEALTHY, NEURODIVERGENT GOOD OMENS BRAINROT

It really gets to me - how my brain was my own (my obsessions, emotions and intrusive thoughts were about me, my life, my relationships) until I watched that last episode.

I’d seen Season 1 a couple of years back and thought it was cute. I noticed the #ineffablehusbands hashtag via Instagram and I remember thinking “aww” - I didn’t care all that much. It wasn’t a Thing for me.

And then I notice season 2 is out on Prime, I wait a couple of weeks to see it and then, having finished some other shows I needed something new to watch while walking on my treadmill.

First episodes were… cozy. I shamefully have to admit I went “oh, right, they had that impossible love thing going on” when watching these episodes, and I thought it would be nice if they got together by the end, and it certainly looked like it was heading there, in a meandering, fuzzy way.

By the fifth episode I’m quite invested, of course, and after Beelz and Gab revealed their love in episode six, I was like YEAH, now Aziraphale and Crowley kinda gotta, don’t they? Still no brainrot yet, just the regular “I’ve watched almost all of this show now and the main characters are into each other, so I’m rooting for them”.

And then, of course, the Final Fifteen. It took me from [casual viewer in her 30s] to [teenaged, autistic me, alone in my room all of the equivalent of junior high, obsessively teaching myself to read and understand Elvish, sewing elven dresses for myself that I wore to school, listening to nothing but Gregorian chants and the LotR soundtrack, watching the movie until the cassette was ruined].

I’ve now read Ars Goetia, Paradise Lost and Dante’s Inferno. I re-read all of Jane Austen (and I’m not even a fan). I bought the script book, I’ve read thousands of pages of fanfics, and I’ve written probably 300 myself (of which some is published. It’s not very good, but it’s there, I made it, it’s the child of my brain that was born from this obsession). I draw again, and I haven’t for years. Everything I do and say and feel finds a parallel or reference within then GO universe.

And. I mean. I may be autistic, but since the days in my room during my teen years, I have lived. I have been around the block and I haven’t kept my nose clean, I’ve been terrible and terrific and out there, I’m an extrovert and I’ve made so many friends and enemies, I have experiences. When I was 14, I had very little of that at all. I did not see the brainrot coming, I had no idea I was still capable, I thought my own life had been dramatic enough.

3 months later, and I still can’t sleep. I see them when I close my eyes. I watch other kind of media and make notes for my fic. I want to break free, but God knows I’ve fallen in love, and I am BROKEN over this. Give me season 3 or give me a stash that lasts until then.

(This gif depicts me throwing Good Omens out of my brain)

#crowley #good omens fandom #ineffable husbands #aziraphale x crowley #good omens 2 #crowley x aziraphale #ineffable spouses #innefable husbands #crowley edits #ineffable divorce #good omens brainrot #good omens tv #crowley good omens

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gtzel · 2 months

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G/t

So have you ever had something that was so special to you, you felt that other people just wouldn’t understand? That’s basically gt for me, it’s a huge part of my life. I don’t mean like as a hobby, I mean that my brain is literally hardwired for gt. Anytime I find something remotely gt related, I get extremely protective over that thing. I feel that even people who also like gt won’t get it. It’s a passion, it’s how I see the world, it’s my obsession. You look at something like a button, or a pin and think ‘wow, that sure is a neat thing right there’ but my brain goes something like ‘oh look a button! I bet a tiny would just love to have that. If I were tiny I sure would like to have that for myself’ or you see a bug or other small thing and probably just pass it off. But I think about how I would take care of that bug, how I would treat it. Which is mainly why I care about animals so much. But it doesn’t even end there! Even as I child I remember doing and liking things that were gt related, even before I discovered it. I found the gt community 2 years ago and I feel like I found myself. Sort of like a puzzle piece that didn’t fit quite right before, but now I’m complete. I know it’s weird, and I know most other people don’t get it. Some say I’m autistic or some other form of neurodivergence but this is just me. I get gt, it’s important to me and I care deeply about it. I want to protect it and keep it safe. I get extremely insecure when people don’t get it, or when they say I’m wired for liking it so much. But in reality I just cherish it deeply. Sorry for the long text, it’s just really hard to express how much I love gt. Gosh I’m so weird..

#yesh #autistic rant #gt #gt tips #gt talks #gt merch #gt ideas #gt photography #gt meme #cute gt #gt ao3 #gt rants

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bluedalahorse · 5 months

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A highly incomplete introduction to AuDHD for YR fans who want to write more Sara Eriksson

Greetings, friends! In my time in the Young Royals fandom, I’ve seen a few people mention they were interested writing Sara but they didn’t know how to approach her neurodivergence, or that they find it intimidating. I figured it might be worth compiling a post where I share both ADHD and autism resources I’ve found helpful, as well as elements of my personal experience I draw on when writing Sara.

This post is by no means exhaustive, and I could probably say a lot more. But I figured I’d get it out there in case it was helpful to anyone else.

Part One: Resources and Such

Yo Samdy Sam is an AuDHD vlogger who talks about her experiences, and I find her video about how autism and ADHD show up together pretty informative. Since Sara is both it’s good to have a grasp on these nuances! Yo Samdy Sam’s other videos are also ones I’d recommend.

I’m autistic, now what? is also a good channel to check out for someone talking about their day to day experiences of autism. Her videos are a little longer, but she focuses often on how things have changed from her childhood to her adulthood, which can be helpful if you’re thinking about Sara at different ages/writing flashbacks/working on fic set in the future/etc.

Chloe Hayden, who stars in another teen drama called Heartbreak High, is both autistic and ADHD, and very fun and positive. She presents quite differently than Sara does—lots more talking and energy—but I think she’s a good example of every neurodivergent person presenting differently. Also, people should watch Heartbreak High and write me some fic where Sara and Quinni meet because I want it.

How to ADHD is mostly geared toward practical life skills when you’ve got ADHD, but it doesn’t neglect the way those interact with emotional well-being. Sara might try some of these strategies while working on her school work and chores, either because an adult recommended she do so or because it’s part of a system she worked out for herself. Also, the videos are perfectly designed for ADHD brains, and i have acquired many ways to self-accommodate by watching them.

Jessie Gender is autistic and does commentary about lots of nerdy things and trans rights. I really liked her video on The Queen’s Gambit where she talks about autistic girls and sex. If you’re planning to write spicer fic about Sara (which people should write more of imo) then Jessie might be a good resource!

Marieke Nijkamp is a multiply disabled author, and one of her disabilities is autism. I still have to get around to reading her novel length books but her short story “Better For All the World” made me cry and is one of my formative sargust mentor texts. I really recommend it if you can get a hold of the anthology The Radical Element. (Although, heads up, the story deals with the Buck v Bell case of 1927, which is difficult subject matter.)

Disability in Kidlit has some great resources on writing autistic characters from a craft perspective. If you’re going to write specifically from Sara’s point of view, or even if you’re not, it’s worth reading this article about the autistic voice in fiction and this article about humanizing autistic characters. Other articles on the site are also great!

I’m going to talk more about my personal experiences under the cut below…

Part 2: My personal experiences & takeaways

Sooooo if you’ve met one AuDHD person, you’ve met one AuDHD person. I can’t really claim to speak for all AuDHD people, and I’ve only recently gotten my diagnosis anyway. That said, a lot of my own personal experience colors how I write Sara. So in the interest of transparency, I’ve gone ahead and listed some of the things I’ve thought about when I write her.

An important note before I get started—this is not, actually, meta or analysis of the show. I’m not trying to tell you want I “really” think is going on with Sara Eriksson, or what the writers intended, or what the show is saying. You may read her differently, and I’m sure your interpretation is just as informed by your own experiences as mine. So please don’t take this as a criticism if your interpretation is different.

What I am explaining here instead are the ways that my personal experiences as an AuDHD person have influenced my perception of Sara, which in turn translates to how I’ve made sense of her storyline and written her in fanfic. None of these are “excuses,” but they are explorations. You can look at it as me examining my own thinking and writing process. I’m also opening up about some of my experiences and being a little bit vulnerable. If you have questions about any of these things below, or you want to know more for your own fic, you are always welcome to message me. I may not be able to get back to you right away but I can help however I am able. There are also some things I might feel more comfortable discussing in depth one-on-one, so direct messages might be better in that case, too.

Anyway, let’s begin…

Polarized strengths and weaknesses: In my own experience as an AuDHD person there are some pretty dramatic contrasts between what I’m good at and what I suck at. I’m in the 99% percentile in some skills and the 2% percentile in others. This adds up to stuff like, I read the Sherlock Holmes stories for the first time when I was eight and Les Misérables when I was eleven, but I cannot drive a car or learn a choreographed dance no matter how hard I try. This is inexplicable to some people because they’re like, omg but you know all these advanced words! Surely if you can’t drive a car, it’s just because you aren’t trying hard enough! Likewise I think it makes sense to write Sara with a spiky profile of her own, and have characters react to that accordingly.

Perceptions of maturity: AuDHD adults aren’t children. AuDHD teenagers aren’t children either. And yet part of ableism is the infantilization of AuDHD people. I don’t have a lot of huge narrative squicks, but this is one of them, and it’s rooted in frustrations I’ve had over people treating me like I’m still a child. I always write Sara as the age she’s intended to be in the fic. If I see fanfic scenes or headcanon scenarios where someone is treating Sara like she’s five, and that’s spun as positive or never questioned, it can make me really upset and it’s an immediate back button. This is something I would recommend writers be on the lookout for if they’re incorporating Sara into a scene. Maybe this one bullet point is spinning a little far into criticism of other folks, but I think if I could communicate one thing to other people writing Sara, this would be it.

Special interests/hyperfixations: The thing about special interests is that autistic people often turn to them to replenish their energy and get their nervous systems back to a state of equilibrium. (For instance, me writing this post right now about my blorbo Sara Eriksson is me engaging with a special interest to put my nervous system in a state of equilibrium and put energy back in my body.) Sara’s time spent with Rousseau isn’t just wonderful because she loves horses, it’s also something that’s probably helping her recharge after a complicated day of navigating social situations at Hillerska. This is why she panics at the thought of losing Rousseau. Now, there’s still issues here in that Rousseau isn’t actually Sara’s horse. And I do think many teenage and adult autistics with low support needs, like Sara, understand that they can’t engage with their special interests all the time. But in order to write and understand Sara, I have to understand that she’s counting on Rousseau and horses more generally as something that helps her self-regulate and stay grounded. (In Heart and Homeland I also added art as one of her hyperfixations, so she often draws to recharge and make sense of things.)

Alexithymia: Alexithymia is essentially a trait people can have where they struggle to read their own emotions. It’s pretty common in autistic people and other neurodivergent folk; I have a mild version of it. For me, tuning into my emotions is a bit like trying to figure out what song is playing on a staticy radio. I might have to wait and “mess with the dial” a bit before I can fully understand what I’m feeling in a given situation. The question “how are you?” is a bit of a nightmare for me sometimes. Because my alexithymia is mild, I usually can figure out what I’m feeling in time, but I still often need extra effort to discern the nuances. I tend to apply this trait to Sara when I write her, mostly because she seems to need to sit with her feelings to understand how they’re affecting her. This is most evident when she’s trying to figure out if she like-likes August, though it comes out in other ways, too. Sara might just need a lot of time to process her emotions. Even when she’s showing her emotions and in them, they might take a lot of time to leave her system, and she might not catch on to how they’re affecting her right away. In Heart and Homeland, part of the reason Sara keeps a diary in the first place is so she can sort through what she’s feeling.

Heightened empathy: There’s an old stereotype that autistic people don’t have any empathy. This is not true, and some autistics even have an excess of empathy. I would argue that Sara (at least the way I interpret and write her) is one of them. This may seem counterintutive to some, as I have seen people argue that she is insufficiently empathetic to Simon and/or Linda. I see it differently, however. In my own experience, having an excess of empathy doesn’t always mean that I come across as loving and sweet to the people in my life. Sometimes it can make it so you’re so full of feelings toward others that you can’t act. I often function clumsily in conflicts, and feel like I’m caught between different parties, especially if it’s a situation where everyone appears to be hurting. It’s enough to make me shut down and not do anything, or even side with the person who to everyone else is obviously wrong. Especially when I was a teenager, the answer about “who to side with” in a conflict wasn’t always clear to me. For instance, in college, I dated a girl who constantly belittled me and many of my friends, and I let her get away with it because I was sensitive to the ways she was genuinely hurting about life. I am not proud of it now, and I did break up with her eventually and made efforts to patch things up with my friends when I could, but it also took me two and a half years to get there. Thanks to life experience and therapy, I am now better at recognizing red flags and overriding my excess empathy to call people out on their shit when they need it. It took me time, though, and I can’t help reading a lot of that into Sara. In a way, I tend to think her hope that August will own up to his actions is born out of heightened empathy for both August and Simon. She pins her hopes on this solution because, in her mind, it meets Simon’s needs because the person who harmed him has come forward and is willing to be held accountable for his actions and it meets August’s needs because he can find relief in owning up to his shit and stop drowning in regret. Now, yes, Sara is absolutely misleading herself and ignoring crucial details of the situation because she’s in love, and she does misread what Simon actually needs in the situation. This is very typically teenage. At the same time, when I write her in fic, I see this as tied to an excess of empathy, and not a lack of it.

Inertia/Executive Functioning Struggles: Building on what was said above… some AuDHD people (like myself) can really struggle with making a plan and getting started on tasks, and the bigger the task, the bigger the struggle. “Tasks” is a word we usually apply to things like doing laundry, so we tend to think of executive functioning as an unemotional thing, but it can also apply to emotional stuff like, say, having a big conversation that needs to be had or breaking up with someone you know you need to. (Like I said above. Two and a half years with that shitty person in college!) In fact, I would say inertia can even make things harder with social/emotional stuff, because math homework is at least consistently math homework, but social/emotional situations can shift and become more complicated over time. At Hillerska, we see Sara get involved in ever-shifting social politics, and it takes things escalating to the field scene for her to take action at the end of S2. (In a more minor example, Sara taking a while to get ready in the parents’ weekend episode, and Linda rushing her out the door, is a great example of Sara being affected by inertia.)

Menstrual ick: Increasing numbers of studies show that people with uteruses who have ADHD, autism, or both are way more likely to have painful periods and PMDD. This is true for me—one of the biggest signs that my period is coming is that I am absolutely convinced everyone hates me. I don’t know how to apply this to Sara directly, but periods are part of life and if you happen to write about her dealing with menstrual nonsense, this might be something to keep in mind.

Sensory issues: A lot of people are aware of sensory issues for neurodivergents, and every neurodivergent experiences sensory issues differently, and not always in ways that are immediately apparent to neurotypicals. For me, I hate vacuums and car horns and bananas, but for my roommate, she hates any lights on after 7 PM and finds chocolate overwhelming. Sara doesn’t mention any particular sensory issues, but presumably she has some and masks her reactions, so uh… make up the ones that make sense to you, I guess. Or, don’t make them up, but maybe read about a bunch of different people’s experiences of sensory issues and work from there. External stuff like being tired, sick, or being on one’s period can heighten sensory issues, so think about vulnerability factors that might increase them for Sara.

Rejection sensitivity: Many people with ADHD feel rejection or criticism from others with a high level of intensity, even as physical pain. (Fun fact: PMS makes my rejection sensitivity even worse!) I don’t know if we see Sara feeling rejection sensitivity onscreen much in YR, but I can’t help but imagine she’s dealt with it in the past, based on the way she says she sometimes feels like the worst person in the world, when she’s talking to August in 2.3. If Sara’s had therapy (which I assume she’s had in some form because she knows breathing exercises) then maybe this is something she’s worked on coping strategies.

Accommodations in school: I don’t actually know how this works in Sweden specifically or at a school like Hillerska, but I’d love to hear how it works! Someone else should weigh in if they know things. But I would not be surprised if Sara has the legal right to certain accommodations in school such as extended time on tests, guided notes, etc. (Not being Swedish myself, I’m not sure what the equivalent to the Americans With Disabilities Act would be in Sweden.) One thing to note here is that Sara would get to decide herself whether she actually uses her accommodations or not. I would say, based on my observations of teenagers, is that some neurodivergent teenagers tend not to use their accommodations so they can avoid sticking out among their peers. This seems like it might be the case for Sara, since she wants to make friends at Hillerska and not stand out. The other thing she might encounter at Hillerska specifically is teachers who don’t want to meet those accommodations because they’re “old school” and, frankly, ableist. Accommodations are something one should take into account when writing Sara’s academic life, though.

Double empathy problem: This is something that the psych community is talking about more lately, and essentially the idea here is that neurotypicals communicate best with other neurotypicals whereas neurodivergents communicate best with other neurodivergents. That doesn’t mean both groups can’t communicate with one another (and even reducing it to two groups is kind of oversimplifying things, because obviously culture and other things impact communication too) but there are different patterns of communication at work here. In my own life, I vibe well with people whose neurotypes are similar to mine—this is exactly why @coruscantrhapsody and I are such iconic roommates. The Double Empathy Problen is theorized to have played a role in stereotypes about autistic people not having any empathy. (PS: I don’t actually think August has undiagnosed ADHD in canon, at least not according to the writers. Still, I think it would be pretty interesting to write him in fanfiction as someone who has a missed childhood diagnosis given the way he struggles with rejection sensitivity, impulsivity, and emotion regulation, and the way that the adderall addiction could be a form of self-medication that has gone awry. For that reason I think it’d be interesting to see a fic where the sargust relationship is viewed through the lens of the double empathy problem. Obviously not in a way where the ADHD excuses August’s harmful behaviors, but you know. An added layer of delicious nuance. Alternately, I know some folks like to headcanon Wille as autistic. Sara really clicking with autistic!Wille when they finally get a chance to talk is something I’d like to see!)

Neurodivergent community: As far as I can tell, Sara doesn’t really have neurodivergent community. This makes me sad, as someone who strongly benefits from friendships with other neurodivergent people. I would like her to have some in someone’s fic, please! Let me know if you write it.

That’s all for now… maybe I’ll add more in a future post.

For any other AuDHDers, do you have any elements of your personal experience that you incorporate into how you interpret or write Sara’s character? Feel free to reblog and add on, if you feel so inclined. (But also, no pressure.) Like I said, every ND person experiences this stuff differently, so someone else may have completely different experiences than me.

#young royals #sara eriksson #yr fic resources #actually audhd #first time using that tag so it’s kind of a milestone

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dgtn · 1 year

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Hey all! So I wanted to take a few to introduce myself. Another blogger did this a few days back and I was just like omg I need to do that too!

So my name is Diane and I am at midlife now in terms of age. I have been married for over 20 years and have 2 amazing kids, a young man and a daughter.

We live in Tennessee. I love so many different genres of music - my playlist has everything from BTS to Carrie Underwood, Troye Sivan, Coldplay, Bon Jovi, Metallica, Aretha Franklin…you name it…it’s probably on my list!

Outside of BTS and Jikook I love spending time with my family, health, fitness, and making jewelry, and yes that includes BTS themed jewelry of course 😏

My favorite shows to watch are crime dramas and anything sci fi. I’m a huge Star Wars fan (I still remember going to see A New Hope when it came out!)

I have 5 fur babies- 4 dogs and a cat. We also have a gecko.

I am a cancer survivor, coming up on 8 years now. I've also had brain surgery - crazy crazy!

So now that that’s out of the way….let’s talk BTS.

I’ve always heard the saying: you don’t find BTS, BTS finds you when you need them. This is true for me too (more on that later ).

I discovered BTS when I heard Butter for the first time back in 2021. I thought it was a catchy song and wanted to know more about the band behind the song. And so it began. I looked up BTS on the internet and the first member I came across? Jimin of course. My first thoughts were my god he is gorgeous. And his voice - are you kidding me! I’ve been around a long time and I have never heard a voice like that! So of course I needed to know more. Next came Jungkook. Uh….wow! That man is beautiful too! And his voice! I mean come on!!!! I had never heard of kpop before BTS so I had no idea about the world of kpop or any of its inner workings.

So into the world of BTS I dove. I went on line and started watching their music videos and started listening to more of their music and really really liking it. I slowly discovered the world of BTS online; Bangtan Bombs, In The Soop, Lives, Run Episodes, etc. Of course, watching all of these...I started to wonder, what's up with Jimin and Jungkook? Definitely caught a different vibe from them. So.....started watching jikook videos. Then, I discovered GCFT - and that sealed the deal for me. No looking back from that point. I remember the first time I watched it (yup, like yourself Ive watched it way more than once!!!) I was blown away and my reaction was "these 2 are in love with each other".

I absolutely love love love Jimin and Jungkook (as I’m sure you can tell from my blog!). I love them as individuals and I love them as a couple. They have something SO very special together and I just get so much joy out of seeing their relationship now and how it has grown over the years. They went from seriously crushing on each other in the early days of BTS to being in a long term fully committed monogomous relationship. I do believe that they are in this for life and have committed to each other for life. What that exactly looks like I'm not sure as they are still "In the Closet". My hope for them is that one day they will be able to show us their love for each freely and openly.

So getting back to BTS and how they found me when I needed them. I am officially mid life, in my 50's. I have always been a stay at home mom. My son is high functioning autistic. Throughout his schooling we really struggled with finding the right fit for him academically. When we moved to TN we eventually decided to home school him which became a huge priority of mine. Homeschooling was not easy. When he graduated high school it was such an accomplishment. I will admit that it also left me very emotionally drained. Being a mom in general is really hard (best job in the world!!!). We always put our children first before everything else; it's just what we do.

As my children have grown and continued to become more independent I actually started thinking about what I want to do for me. It's a foreign concept because as a mom I've never really thought that way. That was right about the time I discovered BTS (see where I'm going with this?). Their message of love yourself, take care of yourself, was something that really resonated with me. I know it might sound crazy but that "glow up" that some people have experienced through BTS happened to me too. I have found the time to "love myself" as BTS says. I am really putting myself first for the first time in my life. I am still here for my family 100% but I am also finding the time to take care of myself :) I am on that journey to find balance in my life and BTS has most definitely played a big role in that!

I absolutely love BTS as a band and as individuals. I have really enjoyed getting to know them and I look forward to sharing my love of BTS and jikook with all y'all for years to come :) I have met some wonderful people through Tumblr; some of whom I have become very close to and consider dear friends; and I feel so grateful and blessed to have these peeps in my life. I am really excited to see what the future holds for these 7 incredibly talented young men who came into our lives.

One thing for sure, The Best is Yet To Come.

Xoxo 😘

#me as a blogger

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popping-greenbean · 1 year

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hello I am here to appreciate your art thoroughly like I’ve been meaning to for weeks and am finally actually doing here we go

this is my favorite of your recent works and the only thing I can think about when this image is in front of me is (well, my brain turns to mush in awe mostly) but THE SHAPES. i will now point out all my favoritest little details because I’m obsessed w your art

first we have poofs. these shapes make my brain so happy it’s like my favorite shape ever and that’s why I love Venti’s design so much AND YOU JUST MAKE THAT EVEN BETTER!!!!

like just look at that perfect curve!! it’s so pointy in it’s roundness and it’s so voluminous and just the epitome of *poof*

your clothing fold lines are also incredible the convey so much while being so simple it makes me rrrrhwhrhbwbsbnsnfnf this sleeve in particular

and can we talk about how you do the corset shape. PLEASE can we talk about it my brain goes nuts for it because like corsets are stiff and they bend strongly AND THE ANGLE OF THIS LINE!!!

ITS SO SHAPED!!!!!! and the crease I can do distinctly imagine this sharp bend making in the material of the corset uuuuuuuuwhdhsnnfndnf urgh I love art so much I love artists so much I love thinking about art and shapes so m

next I have to focus on how amazingly you shape legs and your anatomy in general because. just look how gorgeous????

the shape of the knee. the smooth transition from knee all the way down to ankle the way the ankle bones are shaped, EVERYTHING. I am obsessed. I am GOING to do a study of your style one day I swear your style makes me so happy and your anatomy and how you stylize your shapes is everything I want in my art which I why I have so much to say

anyway a moment to appreciate this little guy and especially this shape

yes it may be just one line and a scribbly one at that but it is so. shaped (apparently that is the only word in my vocabulary but like what other way is there to describe it. it’s like a really nice texture but for my eyes it makes my autistic brain so very happy) and also his eyes and his face in general look so cute and squishy here I want to bite his cheeks

and can we take a moment to talk about these wings. I am in so much awe at how gorgeously shaped and detailed these are I want to stare at them for literal hours I’m not even joking I absolutely could and would

I’m also soooo obsessed with your expressions grins like this one are my favorite ever I swear and yours are so shshhdjsncjfkwjfnfnf

okay I only have room for one more image on this ask and I’m saving it so I’ll just mention how much I love the way you shape Venti’s braids without an image to accompany it. they’re so flowy and you can tell they are actively being blown by the wind at all times and I love with all my heart did i mention I love your art

OKAY!! last image is to mention my probably favorite piece of yours of all time you have no idea how often I think about this image I have so much to say about it

this Heizou spread right here. THIS!!!! IT MEANS EVERYTHING TO ME!!!!! what I adore about your style is that you can so easily do both very squishy chibis and more realistic and more detailed in anatomy and stuff while still being very stylized and it’s so clearly the same artist and ough. I want that so bad when I stumbled on you it was insane because somehow your art is everything I wanted for my style (mostly in terms of anatomy and expressions and things you are SO cool) and now I can study your art!!!! (also I don’t want to sound like I’m gonna go copy your art style I just love a lot of the elements you put in your style and I really want to learn from you and how you stylize so :] thanks for being on the internet where I can see your amazing work because every time I do I’m reminded of how much I love art!!!!! and I have so much love and appreciation for you you have no idea) also that shoe is gorgeous and so shaped and your hands are so pretty they make me want to trace the shapes with my eyes and make weird little gremlin noises in happiness

alright that has been me thoroughly appreciating your art!!!!! I will continue to adore you probably from afar and through way too deranged tags because I’m shy but anyway one last I love you and your art okay bye

HELLO I OPENED THIS UP AND I WAS SO SURPRISED AT HOW IN DEPTH THIS IS HI THIS IS THE SWEETEST THING I'VE EVER EXPERIENCED????? WHAT OMG THANK YOU SO SO MUCH ??

no bc like literally all the things you've pointed out are some of the things i especially love to do when drawing characters!!! i love folding and creasing fabric to emphasize a pose, i love the complex elegance of muscle shapes on bone structure of the body, i love drawing facial expressions!!! and your wonderful detailed remarks being done on a page of venti drawings i did makes me so happy too frfr because even though i've sort of moved away from genshin-posting here, he's a character that i've really loved and loved to draw since the start, and all the things you've commented on from this page are little things that i had at some point made conscious decisions to do when i draw venti in particular fjdjhghh little things like the hair and clothing never falling straight down bc i want it to seem like hes always moving or drifting or theres always a little breeze surrounding him! and giving him rlly big smiles and expressive faces because of how wide his range of emotions is in the story and his voices !! and wings and feathers are things that i'm constantly doodling and messing around with in my sketchbook so it .im just :)) reading this has made me feel very warm and fuzzy inside and like actually i cant thank you enough for taking the time to just?? do all this??? ;o; not what i expected to see today

#ooops sorry i just made this post even longer #but like tumblr user sinhasfluffyheadfur???this is definitely one of the nicest things ive ever experienced when it comes to #when it comes to comments on my art and ur insane /POS #i know i've still got plenty of ways to grow here so ;) thanks also for boosting my confidence a lil #and straight up youre inspiring me now to keep drawing and improving so again thank you

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parental-unit-of-chaos · 1 year

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Clark and Kon react to Autistic Reader.

[Teen Titans (2003-2011) #10]

So, you can 100% blame me staying awake at 02:40 because I can't stop cackling like a crow being waterboarded on @gatorbites-imagines and his/it's/xyrs kyrtontian's purring at a frequency that humans can't hear headcanon. I'm autistic, and I hear shit on the other side of the building, sometimes on a different floor.

Cw: Swearing, idk else, unhinged/ blunt replies ( R giving).

__Clark Kent__

Clark having his super hearing, I feeling like he hears distracting noises constantly but feels like he can't say anything about them.

So when he hears a frustrated voice say,' Can we please fix that god damn janitor's closet door on the floor under us!? It squeaks all day'.

Clark is shooketh, I don't put it past him thinking you are possibly kryptonian. Like he did with Shazam. Probably try to phish out info to see, but bad at being subtle.

'Why do you keep bringing up Superman??', 'Oh.. Well I mean, he is this City's hero'. You probably read his inquiring wrong, and believe he thinks your SuperMan.

'The reason has to why my hearing is above average, is because my autism makes me more sensitive to sounds. I promise you, I'm not Superman. I could not live comfortably with such a jarring unpredictable schedule.' , you word vomited, pitching the bridge of your nose.

'Oh.. uh I'm sorry if I made you upset', the more exhausted tone reminded him of Bruce a lot, when he bugged him too much. 'Its fine, just so many people make jokes about it. It can get old fast.'

Basically the mf would be balanced between panic and false hope of finding a relative he could keep on earth.

__Kon-el Kent__

I feel like he's got so use to no one being able to hear his purring, he doesn't care to suppress them. At times when he's to lazy to do this hair himself, he gets one of his friends to do it. Not worried.

He just enjoys the comforting feeling and begins to pur away. For the sake of it, let's say Tim was the victim of doing Kon's hair.

Tim would be the first to notice you walking around the common room, looking like you are going insane looking for something. Kon not really caring has he doesn't see it has important.

'Did you lose something?', Tim questioned, pausing shortly from combing Kon's hair. 'There is a sound and I don't know where it's coming from', you kept walking around the room listening.

Tim would try to reassure that you'll get use to the sounds of building, the more you stay. At some point, you walk over to where they were on the couch, and figured out it's coming from kon. 'The sound, it's coming from you!?'.

Kon would be so confused and Tim would be too, for different reasons. Tim doesn't hear it, Kon is not sure if you're referring to him purring or not.

'Huh?', 'You, it's coming from you. It sounds like a rumble or some shit'. Well fuck, he can't really play that off. 'You're not suppose to be able to hear it..', his tone resembling that of Oz media reading a cursed post.

'Hear what, exactly?', Tim feeling more like a third wheel in the conversation and wanting to be in loop. 'Kryptonian's have an organ that can make a sound, the best way I can describe it in human experience is a cat pur. But, we can only hear it.', Kon tries to summarize.

Tim would be the one that's extra, and suggest a DNA analysis. 'Tim I assure you, my mom used the excuse of popping me out of her, far too much for me of too be found in a capsule.', you then explained the autistic symptoms you have. Sensitivity to sounds being one of them.

This dose not stop Kon from jokingly referring to you has his sibling from now on. Which would confuse everyone that wasn't there to hear this interaction. Kon being Kon, he wouldn't explain it anyone, because he feels like that would ruin the joke.

_____________________________

Ha ha ha, it's 04:30 and I get up at 05:00. This is gonna fun.. but at least my dad feeds my caffeine addiction by giving me offerings of energy drinks, in hopes to encourage my autistic brain to be okay with doing the dishes, and other medial tasks.

#Crow!Writes #conner kent #clark kent #x male reader #x gender neutral reader #this is my first attempt at bullet point fanfic style.#autistic reader

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eds6ngel · 11 months

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hey, love! i absolutely adore your writing and thought you’d be the best person to write this:

maybe reader is neurodivergent and gets overstimulated during class. the teacher just yells at her for not paying attention and the other kids are just making snide comments. eddie sees how overwhelmed she is and does his best to help by sticking up for her (however you like).

love you! <3

hi, my love! of course i can do this! i based this on a lot of personal experiences, so it probably leans more in the direction of autistic!reader (although not clarified because of the time period), but a lot of neurodivergent conditions overlap, so it could apply to you as well!

warnings: fem!reader. neurodivergent!reader. use of y/n. pet names. meltdowns. yelling. use of ableist slur (r slur). ableism. overstimulation. hurt. comfort. tooth-rotting fluff by the end [1.5k].

A digger. It was always a digger. Why was this school always been built upon? Could they not take a break for five minutes?

And it being a hot summer’s day in Hawkins meant that your Math teacher Mrs. O’Donnell just told everyone to ignore the sound, closing the window meaning herself and the other students would become overwhelmed by the suffering heat.

Which you found pretty ironic, considering that feeling is what you experienced from the head-aching drilling of the machine outside.

Luckily, your other teachers were pretty familiar with your condition, allowing you to use fidget toys, headphones and other items that would help keep you at ease. But, Mrs. O’Donnell was a completely different story.

“Miss. L/N! I asked you a question!”

The sound of her screaming voice snapped you out of your head, the volume of her yelling overtaking the loud drilling.

“I-I’m sorry Miss, what did you ask me?”

She huffs, “It doesn’t matter what I asked you, you were not listening to me. I’m giving you one more chance else you will be sent out of my classroom. Understood?”

That’s another thing you hated: non-straightforward answers. What was so hard about her repeating the question? If anything, although you weren’t fully focused, you understood the content pretty well, and could probably answer what question she asked.

And then came the snide comments, the snickering from the students on the table just behind you.

“She definitely uses it as an excuse.”

“Oh, totally. She can hear perfectly fine, she just doesn’t want to do the work.”

“Look at her, she doesn’t even look like she has her supposed condition.”

“Maybe I should start doing it, get a free pass out of work.”

You turn around in your seat to see the boy behind you looking around in all directions, frantically waving his hands and talking in a robotic voice.

And then comes the word, “Dude, you look so retarded right now.”

That word. You hated that word. It cut like a knife through skin. And it really fucking hurt.

“Excuse me, Miss. L/N!” Mrs. O’Donnell screams again, you realising how long your back has been turned staring at the boys, “I told you I’d give you one more warning and you have broken it. Outside, now!”

You sigh, putting down your pencil and walking out of the classroom, every student eyeing you up as you exit. Every stare felt like it was burning into your soul. Although, there’s one boy situated right in the back left corner who gives you a sympathetic smile.

There was so much you wanted to say, there always is. But, your brain wouldn’t allow it. You turned into a mouse the second someone punished you. You want to scream and yell about how rude the boys were behind you, how the digger was giving you a headache and how your whole body felt like it was on fire. From the loud machine, to the scratching of the chalk, to the snickering laughter behind you. It just felt all too much, and now that you were sat on the floor in the corridor, everything was starting to feel a lot less hectic.

However, from inside of the classroom, you can hear continued yelling, before the door opened once more, that boy now outside with both his bag and your own in his hand.

“Jesus. You okay?” he asks, a worried expression on his face.

You nod, sniffling a little from the tears that had pricked at the corner of your eyes. “Yeah, I’m fine. This usually happens a lot, so I just kind of ride through it at this point.”

What you said wasn’t a total lie. You’ve learnt over the years that riding through the pain was healthier than suppressing it. But, it sure did help when you had your headphones with you.

And your knight in shining armour had seemingly come to save the day.

“Hey, um, I’m not sure whether you’re the same as me,” he leans down, opening up his backpack and pulling out his cassette player and orange headphones, “But, I always find music is the key to calming the mind. So… my offer stands.”

Looking up from your curled-up state, you notice the boy holding out his music towards you, a warm smile on his face. And his eyes… God, his eyes were pretty. If anything could improve your eye contact, it would be staring into his chocolate brown orbs.

You hesitantly take the cassette player off of him, instantly sliding the volume down to zero, knowing that he would’ve probably had it blasting beforehand. You slide on the headphones and press down on the ‘play’ button.

“Yeah, sorry about the music choice. As you can see, metal is kinda my thing.”

You softly laugh at his apology, “It’s okay. It’s not all bad. Although, I would say ‘Paranoid’ is the better album over this.”

Eddie almost choked on his own spit at your comment. A pretty girl who likes Black Sabbath? He thinks he just died and went to heaven.

“Um,” he coughs, “Yeah, I mean, I absolutely agree that ‘Heaven and Hell’ isn’t their greatest works, but I would personally argue that ‘Master of Reality’ should be everyone’s top pick. ‘Paranoid’ is the easy option out for any baseline Sabbath fan—“ He stops himself, this poor girl had just experienced the worst humiliation of her life, and here he was practically calling her a fake fan. God, why was he like this?

You smile up at him, noticing his change in demeanour as he looks away and rubs the back of his neck in embarrassment, “Keep talking. It helps me ground myself.”

His eyes light up at your comment, and my God was it one of the cutest things you had ever seen. You were exactly like him in that sense, super strong interests that you had learned to suppress. People had always told you to “calm down” or “shut up” whenever you rambled about Blondie, and it made you give the same response as him, catching yourself before you knew you would annoy somebody.

“Really?” he asks, you nodding as you direct him to continue, “Well, of course, music taste is subjective, and I didn’t mean to call you some fake fan or whatever by your favourite album choice, ‘Paranoid’ is a killer after all, it’s just a beginner’s choice sweetheart, I hate to tell you.”

You laugh and take a huge gasp, clutching your hand to your heart, “Actually, they did a ranking of all of their albums recently in ‘Heavy Metal,’ and you would be shocked to know that ‘Paranoid’ came out on top. So, is everyone a fake fan according to your rulebook?”

Pretty girl, rambling about Black Sabbath to him. Maybe love at first sight was real after all.

He shakes his head, “Sweetheart, I read it too, don’t you worry.”

Sweetheart. Why did that make your heart jump?

“And I have to say, still a basic choice regardless. They didn’t even put ‘Master of Reality’ in the top three, which I personally think is a disgrace to Sabbath’s legacy. They seriously put ‘Dehumanizer’ at number two. I thought we all collectively agreed that Ozzy was always the better vocalist over Dio.”

If there was one thing that would instantly bring you out of your shell, it was mutual interests. You were known as the “quiet mouse” in the walls of Hawkins High, but with him? You may have been the most talkative you’ve been outside of your friend group in years.

“Yeah, ‘Dehumanizer’ was a shocker at the number two spot for me too, I can’t lie to you. But, as a Sabbath fan, I would argue that the top spot was well deserved.”

“Well, I guess we’d have to agree to disagree there, sweetheart.”

The pair of you laugh softly as you come to the realisation that all the tension had evaporated from your body. You pause the tape halfway through ‘Die Young,’ handing it back over to the curly-haired boy, “I think I’m okay now, you can have this back.”

This was one of the fastest times you’ve ever calmed yourself from a meltdown. You were no longer curled up in the messy ball you once were, with your legs now sprawled out across the floor instead. And your head wasn’t pounding either, it felt clear as day.

“Hey, um, do you wanna skip? We can finish the rest of this album then.”

You look up at him, eye contact becoming the easiest it had ever felt. No questioning how much was too much or too little, it just came naturally to you.

God, he was having such an effect on you already.

“Sure, why not? I’d take any place away from the sound of that annoying digger.”

He softly laughs as you get up off the dirty floor, “Yeah, it wasn’t the most peaceful sound in the world.”

“The halls were heaven, that place was hell.”

Pretty girl makes references too. Was it normal to fall head over heels that quickly?

“Yeah, pretty great timing to play that album,” he chuckles. He turns to you, looking you deep in the eyes, “I’m Eddie, by the way.”

Beautiful name for a beautiful boy.

“Y/N.”

Pretty name for a pretty girl.

this was kinda self-indulgent i can’t lie to you :’) but i hope you enjoyed it regardless and could relate in a sense! <3

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x neurodivergent!reader #eddie munson x autistic!reader #eddie munson hurt #eddie munson comfort #eddie munson fluff

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kaija-rayne-author · 11 months

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Is Solas neurodivergent?

Of course, unless Weekes confirms one way or another, we'll never actually know. But I'd like to point out a few things.

Firstly. I'm autistic/ADHD, so are my kids and I've been an advocate for invisible disabilities, especially those two, for almost a decade now.

I offer an option on my Patreon for parents (or even just people) who need or want advice.

I have a little bit of a clue here. (More like a massive clue by nuke, but I digress 🤣.)

Why I code Solas from Dragon Age: Inquisition as neurodivergent.

1. Mentally ill fits under the neurodivergent (ND) umbrella. There's no way on Thedas that Solas isn't mentally ill.

(Yes, it really does fit. I'm not going to entertain arguments on the topic. It originally meant 'autistic' it no longer means that and hasn't for a long while. Neurodivergent brains = brains that work in any way other than 'the average'.) The antonym is Neurotypical. I tend to abbreviate them. Neurodivergent = ND, Neurotypical = NT.

At the very least, he likely has survivor syndrome. I'd wager on Depression and CPTSD too. (I have these conditions and am comfortable with saying he has a lot of the traits.) The guy was the leader of an enslaved elves rebellion and a war against the Evanuris. In his own words, he got his hands bloody.

No matter who you are, violence, whether you're the perpetrator or the victim, causes trauma to the psyche. And it went on for actual ages. An Age, in The Dragon Age franchise, is considered to be 100 years, so for hundreds of years, if not thousands, this dude has been fighting. Humans can get CPTSD just from a bad childhood. There's no way he hasn't developed it too.

Survivor syndrome is the response of a person when they believe they have done something wrong by surviving a traumatic event when others did not, often feeling self-guilt. (Can we classify Solas clearly with this? Yes, yes we can.)

He wakes up in a world so horrific to him that he can't even conceive of the people as people.

That's a type of disassociation, which is a symptom of many mental illnesses. Depression is the most obvious. He fucked up, he knows it, he's now trapped in a hellscape. (Heeee, we're all trapped in a dystopian hellscape right now and Depression is on the rise, the correlation is there.)

Disassociation is feeling disconnected from yourself and/or the world around you. For example, you may feel detached from your body or feel as though the world around you is unreal.

There could be a few other things there. He'd be a classic case for Disassociative Identity Disorder, for instance, but given the shit rep on the topic, I'm not going there.

2. ADHD

ADHD is still not very well understood by the average person. Sometimes people think it means we can't hold still. But a lot of the time, the H-Hyperactivity portion is only evident in our brains. For me, for instance, I have to constantly be feeding my brain written stuff or I get very antsy and uncomfortable. (ADD no longer exists, we're all ADHD now.) It's why i developed the habit of reading encyclopedias for fun. (Yes, I really do this.)

Solas is constantly reading, or studying, or thinking.

He shows a pretty typical type of temper for an ADHDer several times. Our tempers can be hot, flaring up suddenly for seemingly unexpected reasons. He absolutely does that. Now, there's always a reason for it, but few people on the outside of us will be aware of whatever the issue is.

ADHDers can also experience incredibly fast (compared to neurotypicals) shifts in emotion. Solas does this. Especially in the after the well of sorrows/pre-breakup scene and the break up scene itself. He see-saws emotionally a lot.

He's incredibly creative. He paints (and probably draws at least a little to paint the way he does). So many neurodivergent people are incredibly creative.

Snark. Many ADHDers tend to be snarky or sarcastic because of, well, everything that usually happens to us in life. The snark and salt simply spill out of Solas. Especially on the 'make him hate you' route through the game. Or any time he's around Vivienne.

Finally, ADHDers very frequently have a deep seated drive to change the world and make it better. Stares at Solas. Yup!

3. Autistic

So, firstly, let me say that most people don't understand what autism is or what autistics look and act like.

As an autistic/ADHD person, my experience of life is completely different from a neurotypicals simply because my brain is wired differently.

Reminder that you can't see autism or ADHD. You can sometimes see common comorbids, but without a brain scan, you cannot see autism or ADHD.

I connected and empathize so heavily with Solas because he's a well written, complex character, and because I love anti-heros.

But also because he's exhibits the exact same type of autistic/ADHD traits that I have. (Both autism and ADHD come in different flavours.) Seeing that rep in a triple AAA game was an incredibly powerful experience.

Even though, given Bioware's absolutely shit rep re: disability, it had to be accidental. I credit Weekes with that rep. I read on Twitter they were recently dxd with one or the other (ADHD or Autism, I honestly can't remember which. And up to 80% of ADHDers are also autistic.)

Solas practices esoteric arts. It's a common thing for many autists & ADHDers to learn and practice arts that just aren't as common anymore. Mine? I spin with a spinning wheel, drop spindle, or Andean hand spinner. I make maps. There's several other strange hobbies and skills I've picked up along the way too.

He shows hyperfocus several times in the game. (Hyperfocus is a trait of both ADHD and Autism.)

He stims with his hands a lot. Especially in the kiss scene. I don't recall seeing any of the other characters do this. I'm not talking about the 'dry hand wash' movements most of the characters do. Solas does a thing I do, taps the tips of his fingers against each other. Whoever did his modelling (is that the right term for making a game character?) understood neurodivergency or are ND themselves. Whether they know it or not.

You could even call his painting a type of stimming.

Stimming is where someone will use repetitive motions or sounds to self-soothe. It's really bad to prevent an autistic/ADHDer from using their stims.

I used to have to have a book on my person at all times. I'm late diagnosed, so I didn't know I was using the books as both a stim and a comfort item.

Solas has something autists call 'flat face effect'. Basically, his face is a bit masklike. He doesn't show emotions strongly on his face or in his body language (unless you make him angry 😅 which is also pretty typical for many of us). I've seen rather a lot of discourse about how emotionless Solas appears. I can read him easily, the emotive cues are there, just subtle, like they would be in an autistic & or ADHD person.

He's a decent actor. Now, most autists will agree that we're not innately good at lying or acting. But we're also really good at acting, at least, many of us are by the time we're adults. It comes from having to mask (autistic masking) almost every second of every day just to survive. Masking kills us. So it's not good that we are forced to do it. But it does make many of us incredible actors.

Anthony Hopkins is argueably one of the best actors of the past several decades. He's openly autistic. And he's spoken of how he got to be a good actor. Dan Ackroyd and Darryl Hannah are a couple of others who are out about it. I code a lot of other creatives as being one or the other, but it’s considered rude to assign a diagnosis like that to a living person. That's for them to do.

Solas managed to stay hidden as a 'unwashed apostate hobo' for however long the Inquisition took to fix things. I've seen estimates of 18 months to 2 years. That's a looooong time to be acting like something you're definitely not.

We see in Trespasser that he's not like that at all. But he still sold it so well his reveal at the end of the game shocked many people.

He's a nerd. An absolute nerd about the fade. Nerdery isn't solely the domain of autistics and ADHDers, but it’s a really common trait.

He's stand-offish.

Many autists and ADHDers are rather stand-offish with people for a variety of reasons.

1) We've been hurt so many times because of people refusing to do half the work of communicating with us. (Trust me, autistics and ADHDers are trying ALL THE TIME to communicate with neurotypicals. Y'all could pick up your part of things, y'know?)

2) We've been rejected so often for a genetic condition(s) we can't change. But accommodations for us, which are usually pretty simple and often help neurotypical people too, are considered 'too much'. There's something called RSD that most, if not all, autistic and ADHD folks experience. Rejection Sensitivity Disorder is a bitch kitty and there's no dealing with it well. It hurts.

3) We're often stand-offish while we try to figure out whatever social rules exist in that space/time. We often warm up when we know (or think we know) the rules. Or once we get to know people.

4) Solas is often alone, he's rarely pictured as being with anyone else other than Cole and the Inquisitor. NDs often end up either pushed to the edge of the crowd, or we choose to stay distant as a preventative measure so we aren't rejected.

Food sensitivities: Solas utterly loathes tea. There's a whole cutscene about it. (Fun fact, Solas doesn't like tea because Weekes doesn't.) But that extreme reaction to a relatively innocuous drink is a classic example of a food sensitivity. Most autistics and ADHDers have food or texture sensitivities or both. I can't abide raw tomatoes, and I'll get the urge to cry if I touch corduroy fabric.

Sensitivities can really be anything, but if you know someone who has them, please understand we're not trying to be difficult or to ask for extra attention or to make trouble. The modern world is frankly hell for most autistics and many ADHDers. Brain scans of us when we’re exposed to our sensitivities show that they actually are causing us physical pain. Pain centres in the brain light up like a Yule tree.

Solas is quiet, until he's not. Then he'll talk your ear off. This is pretty common for many of us too.

Solas and the fade. Special interest, anyone?

Special interests: Most autistics and ADHDers have Special interests. It's something that can utterly enthrall us. We tend to want to learn everything we possibly can about the subject we're fascinated with. And we love to share that information. In something called 'infodumping' we're trying to connect with other people. It's one of the ways many of us say we care about someone. By sharing our favourite things. We're also deeply penalized for something we can't change, there, too.

We deeply enjoy the thing and want to share our enjoyment with people we like/love. This can utterly backfire on us, but it doesn't change the urge to share. Often until our audience is giving us the 'dead fish face'. It's where the person's eyes are a little glazed over and they look a bit concussed. Anyone who has ever taught a class of students or is a parent or child caretaker, or is autistic/ADHD knows the look I'm talking about.

I'll stop blabbing for now, but those are most of the reasons I heavily code Solas as autistic/ADHD/mentally ill. Or, in another word. Neurodivergent.

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