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because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.

you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.

you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.

don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.

if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.

you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:

how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!

aren't you happy yet?

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Natalie Portman being confused by the fact that you have to say “hi” to someone before starting a conversation in France got me like ?????

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unsung benefit i think a lot of ppl are sleeping on with using the public library is that i think its a great replacement for the dopamine hit some ppl get from online shopping. it kind of fills that niche of reserving something that you then get to anticipate the arrival of and enjoy when it arrives, but without like, the waste and the money.

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Since the OP made their post unrebloggable (and blocked me. Both actions they are well in with their right to do)

I'm going to make my response it's own post because I think the point is important

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As someone who is autistic and has BPD and CPTSD and loads of trauma yes you sometimes need to change how you interact with others to keep people around

When I was 13 I hit the few friends I had when I was angry

I had to change that in order to keep those friendships

When I was in my early 20s if I was losing an disagreement with my husband I would threaten to kill myself. My husband told me it hurt him and was cruel and manipulative behaviour, because it was.

So I worked hard to change that to keep my relationship

It's easy to say "I shouldn't have to change for others" and that's true to an extent. You shouldn't change your interests or passions or dim your light. And you should have space to be imperfect and flawed and not have to pretend your ugly bits aren't real. But if something you are doing it causing other people harm you kinda need to change that.

That's called "living in a society"

People adapt to each other and make space for each other in their lives. You adapt to them and they adapt to you

You start being more diligent about throwing away the empty toilet roll because it really bothers them. They start warning you before they run the blender because you hate loud noises

I stopped threatening to kill myself because I was mad I was losing an argument and my husband stopped being so vocally judgemental amount media he personally dislikes

There is a certain type of person who heard the phrase "your emotions are valid" and took that to mean "my emotional reactions and my behaviour are always objectively correct because my emotions are valid and if you have an emotional response or react to what I'm doing negatively then you are wrong and you can't be hurt because my emotions are valid"

And that's a recipe for disaster

Your emotions are valid to feel. They are how you feel and there are reasons you feel the way you do

However, your reactions and behaviour are something you can learn to control and can be irrational

We live in a society and we as people change each other as we interact and that isn't necessarily a bad thing

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i don't know man, i just wish that we could [suddenly realising i'm coming dangerously close to expressing a real and earnest thought instead of filtering everything through several layers of intangible running bits] blow up the entire world. or something.

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you should be able to say "line" if you don't know what to say in a social situation

#say ‘line’ and everyone lines up like bowling pins and you gotta knock them all down to win the conversation

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Ok there’s a lot of debate around sex work and whether it’s right.

My take is that it’s never morally right to but sex from someone. It is, however, never morally wrong to turn to sex work. Especially if it’s the only thing you can do to survive.

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its so sad that radfem just means transphobe and not like. this

#queer #please #please do this #I hate the appropriate of the coolest word ever

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Hey aroaces ily I'm aroace too, but please stop tagging aromantic posts that don't mention asexuality as “#asexual” or “#aroace”. Like, this is one of the reasons aroallos are seen as “weird”, we immediately assume someone's asexual because they're aromantic.

#as an aroace #I feel like tagging aroace is fine. tagging asexual when it’s not relevant tho *is* an abuse of the tag system #asexual #aromantic #aroace

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Palestinian tatreez in Japanese kimonos: A cultural symbol of solidarity

#palestine

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forget Resting Bitch Face, I have Resting Competent Face. People see me and think ah yes she can point me to the nearest train station. Fellow grocery shoppers ask if I know what kind of butter they should buy. If a strange man speaks to me on the street it is literally always an inquiry and never a catcall. Once someone randomly asked me what an equinox was and after I told her she nodded and said "you seemed like you'd know." why am I assigned oracle at random interaction

#I’m usually assigned ‘loner introvert who’s clearly avoiding others’ #only for me to turn around and be the only person with a spare euro or directions

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theres actually no rules to transitioning and youre allowed to want contradictory things for your transition. it's fine if you only want some of the changes that come with hrt and take preventative measures for the rest (like wanting bottom growth but not body hair or vice versa). you can want to have vagina AND a dick. you can be a woman and want top surgery, or wear a packer. you can be a man and want to have a pussy. you can change your transition goals one or a million times or not have any goals at all and just take things as they come or as they feel right.

there are no rules.

#wanna have broader shoulders and a deeper voice but genuinely cannot handle the thought of my genitals changing #:/// #queer #trans

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I've always had chronic fatigue. I remember being twelve, and an adult mentioned how I couldn't possibly know how tired they felt because adulthood brought levels of exhaustion I couldn't imagine. I thought about that for days in fear, because I couldn't remember the last time I didn't feel tired.

Eventually I came to terms with the fact that I was just tired, and I couldn't do as many things as everyone else. People called me lazy, and I knew that wasn't true, but there's only so many times you can say "I'm tired" before people think it's an excuse. I don't blame them. When a teenager does 20 hours of extracurriculars every week and only says "I'm too tired" when you ask them to do the dishes, it's natural to think it's an excuse. At some point, I started to think the same thing.

It didn't matter that I could barely sit up. It was probably all in my head, and if I really wanted to, I could do it.

When I learned the name for it, chronic fatigue, I thought wow, people that have that must be miserable, because I am always tired and I cannot imagine what it would feel like if it were worse.

Spoiler alert, if you've been tired for a decade, it's probably chronic fatigue.

Once I figured that out though, I thought of my energy as the same as everyone else's, just smaller in quantity. And that might be true for some people, but I've figured out recently that it absolutely isn't true for me.

I used to be like wow I have so much energy today I can do this whole list for sure! And then I'd do the dishes and have to lay down for 2 hours. Then I'd think I must gave misjudged that, I didn't have as much energy as I thought.

But the thing is - I did have enough energy for more tasks, I just didn't go about them properly.

With chronic fatigue, your maximum energy is obviously much smaller than the average person's. Doing the dishes for you might use up the same percentage of energy that it takes to do all the daily chores for someone else.

If someone without chronic fatigue was to do all the daily chores, they would take breaks. Because otherwise, they're sprinting a marathon for no reason and it would take way more energy than necessary. We have to do the same.

Put the cups in the dishwasher, take a break. Put the bowls in, take a break. So on and so forth. This may mean taking breaks every 2-5 minutes but afterwards, you get to not feel like you've run a marathon while carrying 4 people on your back.

Today, I had a moderate amount of energy. Under my old system of go till you drop, I probably could have done most of the dishes and wiped off the counter and then been dead to the world for the rest of the day.

Under the new system, I scooped litter boxes, cleaned out the fridge, took the trash out, cleaned the stove, and wiped off the counter and did all the dishes. And after all that, I still had it in me to make a simple dinner, unload the dishwasher, and tidy the kitchen.

It was complete and utter insanity. Just because I sat down whenever I felt myself getting more tired than I already was.

All this to say, take fucking breaks. It's time to unlearn the ceaseless productivity bullshit that capitalism has shoved down our throats. Its actively counterproductive. Just sit down. Drink some water. Rest your body when it needs to rest.

There will still be days where there is nothing to do but rest, and days where half a load of dishes is absolutely the most I can do. But this method has really helped me minimize those, which is so incredibly relieving.

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Worst thing happened

I stopped to have an in-depth conversation with an Amnesty International Representative for 30 minutes and he asked me if I could sponsor Amnesty International for 12€ a month and my brain shut down because I would love to. Genuinely. But I have bills and whatnot and I’m losing my only source of income in less than 2 months.

The only thing I can do ig is to spread the word but Damn.

#amnesty international #palestine #Israel

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I’m with my granny right now. She’s in the hospital

She’s in the bathroom, and she’s been ringing the assist bell for the past 5 minutes. Not a single nurse has come to help.

I can hear them, just chatting away to themselves outside.

I am weak af and shit on my feet, and even if I wasn’t she’s a Fragile Old Lady. I could hurt her if I tried to help.

And they’re not fucking helping her.

#jfc I’m one more call away from storming out myself and getting help. she’s an old lady she can’t get up on her own #hospital #nurses #healthcare