#i feel like this can also to apply to people who grew up for undiagnosed dyslexia or adhd

[sunnycanwrite]

Growing up never being told I had dysgraphia was wild. I got diagnosed but my parents hid it from me. As they thought knowing might make me try less, and use it as an excuse.

Anyway this meant there's been times where I have questioned my ability to spell, and write completely. It was very hard, being so someone who would read constantly. But struggled to piece together words or would write them in the wrong order. That's not even talking about the wonky way my handwriting would shift constantly. It was very disheartening when all I wanted to do was write.

My Dad told me a while ago, he used to wonder if I was actually reading as much as it seemed. Because I would read a dozen books a week, and than prced to struggle with my spelling still. Which is silly when you account he knew I had dysgraphia, and I didn't. I'm mostly writing all of this to say, there are names to these things. That it's okay, it's not your fault your struggling.

#dysgraphia #actually dysgraphic #i feel like this can also to apply to people who grew up for undiagnosed dyslexia or adhd #adhd #dyslexia #writing disability

[dapperinsanity]

Sometimes I oddly feel bad for enjoying a fanon version of a character, everytime I see someone complain about it. Like I understand that it’s not everyone’s cup of tea but some of the complaints I’ve seen in general, act like it’s a sin. As if to make someone feel bad for portraying said character, out of character ya know?

Of course, this doesn’t apply to extreme situations like fans forcing a creator to make fanon, canon for example. I’m just talking about the harmless stuff where fans are just doing their own thing and still respect canon, the creator, and etc. If it’s not your cup of tea then that’s fine and even complaining is fine, just don’t act like someone writing a character OOC, is the worst possible thing and making them feel bad. It’s just harmless fun, why don’t we all calm down.

I don’t know if I’m being dramatic as well but it just rubs me the wrong way you know? Usually, I’m not the type of person to be bothered by something like this. I can handle people hating on stuff I highly enjoy and not bat an eye but there’s just something about this that gets to me a little. You could say my special interest is the suckiest thing ever and that it’s shitty and boring and I’ll be like “you’re valid” because it’s just an opinion. Not everyone is going to like the same things.

Maybe it has something to do with living through the years where cringe was big thing. Back when Mary sue’s/Gary Stu’s were a thing. OC or S/I x canon was considered cringe and something that should be stopped. That and being constantly shit on for the things I enjoyed and being the weird kid.

Again, if you don’t like it that’s fine but this person is just having fun you know? I’m surprised that after all these years that there’s such thing as anti-cringe because the internet in my younger years, was BRUTAL. Also,this doesn’t apply to genuine educational criticism by the way. Criticism can help an individual improve and it isn’t an attack. I’m sure you all get what I mean by complaints rather than criticism.

But yeah, I think I’m just tired of some people still complaining as we’re somewhat at a time where cringe is culture is dead or at least dying in some way. Oh and most people know how to ignore a thing they don’t like instead of giving fans of that thing hate. I mean complaints are even fine, it just gets bad when those complaints start shaming people and commanding others to stop having their harmless fun. Again, this doesn’t apply to the problematic fans. More so, just a general fan or even a casual fan having harmless fun.

Like who cares if they portray a character as OOC just because fans want to self indulge in said character? Ie. said character who is portrayed as more romantic and flirtatious than they actually are or making hot human versions of non human characters. Those are two common things that come to mind. Theres a lot more but you get it. Obviously I’m not talking about the problematic portrayals and stereotypes, btw. If that’s how someone interprets a character, then so be it. Not everyone interprets media in the same way.

Note: This is where I go off topic and end up ranting about a childhood experience I had that is (sorta?) related to this topic.

Again, could just be a me thing. I grew up on people shitting on my interests for many years in childhood to the point where I’d get rid of an interest because someone else found out it to be cringey. I did it to fit in and make friends and wanted to avoid getting bullied (both by peers and adults *cough* family members). Also, to avoid being “annoying” somehow. I was ashamed of my interests. Like yeah, I could give less of a shit now if someone finds me annoying, as we all know people that can be annoying at times.

I admit I know for a fact I had my moments growing up but that was mainly due to my undiagnosed adhd. Despite that, I always tried not be “annoying” and would genuinely “dial back” about my interests. Then I became genuinely confused when I thought I was not being annoying and on my best behavior. Turns out my peers just didn’t like me because I was the weird kid and could care less about me but you get my point right?

I’ll never forget a moment where another student in my elementary years told me (in response to me asking if he knew about a movie I love) that “yeah I know about that movie. You never shut up about it”. Mind you this was a peer I hardly talked too so the only way he knew I wouldn’t “shut up” about it was because he overheard my conversations with my friends who also enjoyed the same movie and didn’t mind talking about it with me.

And most of the time, I only brought up my interests as an absolute last resort topic of conversation and made sure to keep myself in check most of the time. Other than that, I preferred to talk about other things my friends wanted to talk about and to listen to them. I have more fun with that than me just infodumping about my interests. I’ve always been that way. If my interests come up in a conversation that usually means that me and my friends have nothing else to talk about. Silence usually meant a bad thing and I didn’t want people to feel like I was ignoring them. If I didn’t know what else to say, I chose a topic I found engaging rather than engaging in small talk.

Basically it can all be summed up as “why can’t people let me enjoy the things I like in peace?” Cause good grief, am I all too familiar with that chaos.

But yeah, rant over.

#op rambles #tagging as vent just in case #vent #rant #can you tell I’ve been having a lot of things on my mind lately? #I’ll make a tag for those who want me to stfu lol #op please stfu #there’s the tag there ya go yall

[eclecticvalor]

7 Things I experience as a DID System. Mental Health Awareness Month.

In light of May being America’s mental health awareness month, I wanted to talk about something that has consumed my entire life for the past year and a half: Treatment and healing from a disorder that is stigmatised into the ground by poor representation and misunderstandings both socially and in the medical field. Those who are close to me know first hand how my symptoms and experiences have shaped the way I interact with the world since starting treatment, but aside from my closest friends and family, and the people I live with, I don’t normally talk about the fact that I have Dissociative Identity Disorder, and what that means to me. 

Hi. My name is Atlas, some people call me Cadyn, and I am the primary host of 26 fragmented parts of my consciousness. I am not dangerous, none of my parts or alters are dangerous, and no, it is not like “Split”. 

Dissociative Identity Disorder is a trauma based dissociative disorder listed in both the DSM IV and V,  and is recognized as an uncommon disorder characterized by two or more distinct personality states existing within the same consciousness. These personality states come to be when natural childhood development is disrupted by severe, continued, or repetitive, trauma, the child has a natural inclination towards heavy dissociation, and a lack of adult or parental support to develop the means to cope with the things happening to them.

Unfortunately popular mental health media has seen an uptake in people viewing DID as a quirky “trait”, the ability to have functional imaginary friends living in your head... but in reality DID is a lot darker, a lot scarier, and isn’t something I’d wish upon my worst enemy. Because of this media spike I wanted to share 7 things that living with Dissociative identity disorder means to me

1. Amnesia

Living with DID means that I miss out on a lot of my life. A primary symptom of DID is amnesia. I have no solid memories before the age of 13, and the memories I do have are often skewed, incorrect, or completely false as my brain fought for a way to fill in gaps and cope with the loss of memory. I forget a lot, and not just things like forgetting where I left my wallet and keys, or forgetting the day - those do happen, but I also mean forgetting big things, important life experiences and things I wish with all my being that I could remember like my highschool graduation and my wedding reception. 

I often forget important day to day things that make it difficult to maintain life as an adult, like doctors appointments, work schedules, meetings, and important daily tasks. I’ll forget that I’ve eaten at all that day and risk going days without eating, or overeating due to having no recollection of the last time I’d eaten. I forget birthdays (especially my own), anniversaries, and important holidays. 

To an outsider, who has no idea what’s happening inside my head, this can come across as though I’m thoughtless or unreliable. That I am cold for forgetting an important date, or simply that I just don’t care when this very much is not the case. 

2. Alienation

Oftentimes DID comes with a sense of alienation from people who you’re supposed to know. For me a really clear example of this is when I previously mentioned my childhood memories being skewed - I have a clear memory of a conversation I was having with some blood relatives a few years back in which I mentioned that one family member I had happy childhood memories of, and remembered playing together as kids, but with another family member they were practically a stranger to me. I had, and still have, no memories of ever spending time with them growing up, no memories of having any kind of relationship with them at all. My understanding of our relationship was that it was “forced” because we were family and our parents expected us to exist in the same space as we grew up, but that we never talked. But I was informed by a separate member of the family that I was very wrong, and this “stranger” was actually someone I had been close to growing up. This is a common experience with DID patients, and also a very frustrating one. It creates feelings of “You know me but I don’t know you”, and it’s extremely difficult to trust your own judgement of the people you know, because you often can’t tell if your judgement is skewed by your memories or lack thereof. 

3. PTSD and Flashbacks

A diagnosis of C-PTSD (Or complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) is required for a diagnosis of Dissociative Identity Disorder. This means that while the individual symptoms of DID can be frustrating, scary and sometimes depressing, the most difficult aspect of DID, and the most important to focus on in treatment is the PTSD symptoms. 

PTSD symptoms in DID can be extremely powerful due to the additional dissociative aspect. This can mean that for a lot of DID patients, flashbacks can produce full blown body sensations, hallucinations and terrifying delusions. This is One thing that I find incredibly difficult to talk about, but I also believe is extremely important to understand. It can be embarrassing, shameful and while I only speak for myself in saying this, can cause a lot of guilt and grief. There have been times where I have been experiencing powerful flashbacks and did not recognize my own husband, resulting in lash outs and fear towards him being delusioned into thinking that he was out to hurt me, or had harmful intent for just existing in the same space as I was. 

For me, a single wiff of a familiar smell, hearing a sound, a certain color, an idea, a name, a passing thought or comment can throw my previously stable mental state into one of pure panic, hyperventilation, hallucination, delusion, fight-flight-freeze and reactionary responses. Through treatment I’ve developed adaptive and healthy coping skills and management responses but trauma responses can be so quick, and so unexpected that I don’t always have time to process my coping skills before my body and mind respond in negative ways. 

4. Decision making and skewed Behavior

Because living with DID, means living with a shared or fragmented consciousness, this often means that while I may not remember, my life is still being lived during my time of memory loss. Alters or parts will take control and operate my body, reacting to things, interacting with people, completing tasks and functioning. But oftentimes parts who take control are very different from myself, and make choices and decisions that I wouldn’t normally make, and sometimes decisions I wouldn’t *ever* make. An example of this is the fact that technically I am a conservative voter, despite myself as an individual having leftist or NDP views, or decisions to leave or apply for jobs and work positions that I have no interest in, or that I don’t even have the qualifications or physique to do, or leaving ones that I personally loved and excelled at. This also reflects a lot in everyday life in more subtle things, decisions like what food to eat, things to buy, activities to do shift between parts while they’re in control. 

To outsiders this can look a lot like impulsivity, lack of self-control, or lack of a sense of identity. This is a huge reason why a lot of DID patients are often misdiagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder or Bipolar Disorder because the behaviour between alters can be so drastically different that it can look a *lot* like manic or depressive states. 

5. Denial and Dismissing Trauma

A very common experience among DID patients is denial and being dismissive or disregarding the things that happened to them. I often find myself in a state of questioning whether my symptoms, my disorder, and even my trauma were ever real to begin with. In therapy I find myself saying “It’s not that big of a deal” or “It wasn’t that big of a deal” more times than I’m actually saying anything productive. A huge part of this is why I wanted to make this list, because the media, and a lot of medical circles deny that DID exists or believe it’s impossibly rare and those, while both false, can cause intense feelings of “Maybe I’m just doing this for attention”. DID is a very real, very difficult disorder to diagnose, to treat, and to live with disorder, and while it is uncommon, statistics show that approximately 1-2% of western population is diagnosed, and up to a suspected 7% are living with the disorder undiagnosed because of these misconceptions. It is not common, and it’s not something that everyone is going to have, but it is a very possible response to very real trauma and is a valid diagnosis to give to those meeting the criteria. 

6. Hidden Symptoms

DID is often referred to as a “covert” presenting disorder. What this means is that most commonly outsiders, friends, family, employers and even the patient themselves can have a nearly impossible time recognizing the symptoms, and it often goes unnoticed until an event destabilizes the function of the person’s life. This can lead to a lot of backlash or denial coming from peers and family close to the person. This leads to the patient hearing a lot of:  “I’ve never noticed personality changes”, “You don’t act like you have it”, “You couldn’t possibly have that”, “No, I would have noticed”, “You have to be mistaken”, “There’s no way, it would have been obvious”. And so, so much more. The reality of DID is that it’s *not* noticeable. It’s a safety response that the brain created to protect the psyche from the intense damages that come with long term trauma experiences, so it’s often designed to hide itself from abusers or perceived threats as a way to compartmentalize trauma memories and maintain the ability to survive through stress and unstable situations. Not being able to “notice” is kind of the point in most cases.

 7. Wandering and Dissociative Episodes

Living with untreated or unmanaged DID can potentially be dangerous due to episodes of dissociation, “wandering” experiences (where the patient will wander away from home, family, or life in a confusion, attempt to return to a perceived life never lived, or in a state of belief that their current life is unsafe). For me this took a head last year, and was actually an event that led to the solidification that this disorder was the explanation to my experiences. According to nurses and my husband, I had wandered into the emergency room of a hospital in the middle of the night, with no idea who or where I was, with no idea how to return home, or even where home was. I was wearing a t-shirt, and it had been raining, and my body was so cold they needed to retake my vitals nearly 6 times because they were unable to get an appropriate reading. After discovering my identity, my husband was called to take me home. Working with a therapist helped to develop a safety plan during events like this to prevent harm from coming to my body, or from ending up in newly traumatic environments, but I was lucky. These situations can lead to re-traumatization, victimization, it can lead to kidnapping, assault, it can lead to being injured or harmed by environmental factors and so much more and it is so incredibly important that DID patients work with their therapist to develop solid safety plans proactively to make sure that the patient doesn’t experience any worst case scenarios during episodes like this. 

Conclusion

My experiences are individual to me, and to my psyche. Not everyone will experience the disorder the same way, because not everyone experiences or responds to trauma the same way. I am so lucky, and extremely privileged to be able to access consistent care and treatment, that I found a professional who trusts me, and is focused on stabilizing and supporting. Too many people living with this disorder have no access to supportive mental health care because of the misconceptions that parts of the medical field hold regarding the legitimacy or frequency that the disorder develops, and too many peers and circles of people outcast or disregard the very real, very difficult experiences because they don’t understand the disorder, or believe it doesn’t exist, or believe it looks like split. If you, or someone you know is struggling with Dissociative symptoms, or dissociative identity disorder do not be afraid to reach out to a professional for support, and educate yourself on the reality of the disorder. 

#dissociative identity disorder #DID System #dissociation #mental health awareness #mental illness #mentalhealthawareness #mental health #actuallydissociative #dissociative amnesia #education #psychotherapy #experience #actuallytraumatized #trauma #actuallydid #did/osdd

[danisnotofire]

as someone who grew up online i think maybe younger teens should step back and really learn to develop their own opinions and thoughts and not blindly slurp things up from random people on websites like this. i mean that very kindly and genuinely. sure it can be funny to say “no thoughts head empty”, but after awhile you find yourself doing things like absorbing posts that blindly tell you you have bipolar disorder, or that letting your room get messy is an undiagnosed symptom of ADHD, and suddenly you find yourself believing things you shouldn’t necessarily accept without actual due process.

like, just because someone online says it’s cool and normal doesn’t mean it definitely is. I mean that with everything. girls on tiktok doing contour because they tell you they can’t leave the house without it or calling out skinny jeans. boys saying what’s good in bed and calling that a universal truth. “ladies, here’s what you’re missing in your skincare routine that you need to get RIGHT NOW if you wanna look 20 at 40.” and it’s some prescribed medication that that person got to deal with a specifically personal problem they’ve been handling. memes about red flags in men that are like “he doesn’t text you good morning every day”. like, it is up to you to define what is cool and what isn’t, what you need vs what is being sold to you for money or clout, and after a certain point those posts stop being educational and start being this weird type of brainwashing that you don’t even realize you’ve internalized until you don’t wanna wear that green cargo jacket for fear some fifteen year old on Instagram is gonna turn you into a meme because they want to also assert their opinion as fact when in reality it’s not. like. your opinion matters just as much as theirs, but what it means to you DOESNT mean that for everyone, and it’s essential to take the time to develop it. learn yourself and your needs. obviously I don’t mean that contouring or whatever is bad, but maybe there is a reason why you feel you can’t leave the house without it. like maybe we should stop blindly accepting relationship advice or fashion advice and whatnot from people whose last names we don’t even know. we are so inundated with opinions we aren’t asking for and they’re being thrown at us as truth. anyone can go online and say “my therapist says this” but that doesn’t mean it applies to you. you don’t even know the context it was given or why the person needed to hear it in the first place. nor do we need to know, because it’s not for us. you are what you don’t need to tell other people. that’s where you really grow because you define those spaces for yourself and only you. it’s impossible for me to even say this without acknowledging you blindly listening is part of the problem. growing up would have been so much easier if I didn’t have to make that conscious decision to Not Subconsciously Accept everything i consumed. idk if this makes sense I’m just speaking out loud but it makes me sad seeing how much I believed strangers over myself on even the smallest things, and how those small things eventually began to add up.

#and before anyone comes for me you know EXACTLY what I’m saying and what I’m not #there is a difference between normalizing sexuality and neurodivergence #and then there’s this whole other line #I’ve been thinking about this a lot idk #especially as I go through my own therapy and relearning myself #and being on medication that has helped #that I was afraid to take because people would always make jokes about how it didn’t do shit #like these small jokes have consequences #and they sneak up on you

[whattaloser]

Why I’m a Leftist

I know I’m probably just some dude who reblogs cool stuff to most of my followers but I’ve got a nice long story/rant about my political beliefs here that I’ve been wanting to write for awhile

I am a leftist first and foremost because I value human life. Everyone matters. No person is inherently more important than another person. Everyone has inherent rights that should not be infringed. People who infringe on other’s rights are morally wrong to do so. In essence my leftism is based on doing what is right. Obviously everyone has their own opinion on what is right but what is vitally important is knowing why your moral code is right. This is why so many people become liberals or conservatives or otherwise rather than leftists. They simply do not know enough about how the world works. There are a lot of reasons they don’t know, not the least of which is intentional covering up history and preventing education. I don’t believe people who aren’t leftists are stupid, but I do believe leftists know more. It’s kinda fucked up but it’s the only way you can explain inconsistencies in other’s values.

My path to leftism was full of cringe. When i was 7 years old Al Gore was running against George Bush for president. I did not know enough to have a real opinion on it but I am happy to say that I wanted Al Gore to win. This thought was based on very little if any logical reason. I basically flipped a coin in my head I think. Or maybe there was some outside influence that I wasn’t aware of, like my older sister who I looked up to might have said she liked Al gore. Either way, from then on I was in favor of democrats and did not like George Bush. When 9/11 happened I remembered thinking how dumb it was that people lined up around the block to get gas. Even as a child I knew that some buildings going down wasn’t going to end the great nation of the United States. In general I thought the United States was a great country. I knew from movies and tv as well as elementary school history that the United States was the most powerful country in the world. 

I recall in Sixth grade my teacher mentioned she liked George Bush because he was against gay marriage. Somehow at the time my opinion was the opposite despite being raised Catholic. I believed in god until I graduated high school and suddenly my desire to be religious slipped away and so did my belief. I do not consider this a great loss. 

Sometime in middle school or early high school I had solidified my opinion that the war in Iraq and Afghanistan was pointless and George Bush was a bad president. I was heavily influenced by movies and somewhat by video games that had imparted plenty of anti-war messages. Talks with my dad about nuclear missiles, watching History channel shows about world war 2, and playing Metal Gear Solid which had explicit nuclear disarmament messages, all informed me on the horrors of war. This was not enough to make me totally anti-military. In high school I wanted to join the military because I thought it was an easy way to get life experience and eventually pay for college. I was attracted to the Marines because of how cool movies like The Rock and video games like Call of Duty made it seem to be a Marine. I thought they were the best of the best. I was simultaneously against war, against veteran worship, and very pro-military. I was indoctrinated by years of government propaganda but also disillusioned by all forms of media including the book All Quiet on the Western Front which was about a soldier becoming disillusioned by witnessing horrors of war and the negative impact it had on everyone in his country. I spoke with a recruiter during my senior year and expressed my desire to be a Marine but I told him I wanted to wait a year after high school so I could get physically fit enough. The recruiter did not care that I was underweight and out of shape. He didn’t even care that I was very enthusiastic about joining, he was still putting on his best salesman demeanor which made me incredibly uneasy. The experience is supposed to pressure people into signing up on the spot, I think they even had forms for me to sign (i can’t really remember though) but I was not ready and was aware enough how I was being manipulated although not entirely cognizant. After that I no longer wanted to be in the military.

I also have to point out that I grew up in an unstable household. My parents were both loving but they were flawed and made mistakes and had problems. My dad was a typical Gen x man’s man. A little bit too emotionally repressed, but actually really good with kids when it came to play time and still is. He worked a lot because my mother couldn’t. My mother has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder as long as I can remember. Her medical bills related to her problems combined with other financially bad decisions by my parents caused my home life to be fraught. I lived in varying degrees of poverty until my parents separated and me and my siblings moved with my mother to her parents’ house away from my father. Prior to moving though, we endured great financial difficulty. We were unable to afford school lunches but could not apply for free or reduced lunches because technically my father made a lot of money, however it was all garnished for medical bills. My father always tells about how he bought a car that had hidden frame damage and when he attempted to sue the dealership for selling a bad car he lost and was garnished for that as well. Despite making over 25 dollars an hour in 1999, my father could not afford school lunches for three kids and couldn’t afford to pay the gas bill. Without going into too much more detail, life sucked and continued to suck until I graduated, at least financially. I still found plenty of joy and it wasn’t always that bad. We still found ways to have good things like video games and we could always rewatch old movies but there’s a lot of psychic weight that comes with being that poor as a child and I’m sure it affects me and my ability to empathize with others who in bad conditions. 

So i watched a lot of movies and documentaries, read a lot of books growing up, discovered internet forums at the age of 11, played video games, moved to a town that had a very large Hispanic population, and I even grew up poor. All of this life experience turned me into a very average liberal upon graduating high school. I was a very optimistic 18 year old. I thought science could save the world. If I was 18 today I would be an average redditor stereotype probably. The point here though is I still wasn’t a leftist. Only vaguely progressive and full of optimism. This is when I got sucked into the anti-feminist pipeline.

I can’t remember what exactly what I had going on in my life but I remember it was around the time of Gamergate. Everyone on the internet, celebrities, and pop culture were saying “if you believe in equality between genders you’re a feminist” an did not like that. And there was a ton of people online to tell me I was right in not liking that. They all said feminism was not necessary anymore because legally you couldn’t discriminate against women and I agreed. Gamergate made it worse for reasons too complicated to get into in this already long post but suffice it say I was “pro Gamergate.” This put me at odds with my closes friends who thought feminism was great and had no qualms with it, and were already embracing the idea of being a “social justice warrior.” Despite reading all kinds of anti-feminist think pieces and reveling in the discourse, I was still very progressive and liberal minded person. Still thought the military was bad, that black people were discriminated against etc. But so many aspects of anti-feminism were appealing to me as a white guy who tried their hardest to do what they’re told is right, had low self esteem, undiagnosed adhd and depression, and a fundamental misunderstanding of what feminism was. Two things got me out of anti-feminism though. The first and most important thing was having friends who were patient with me about it. I didn’t reveal how into anti-feminism I was because I was ashamed but they could sense it and pushed back when they could. The second thing that got me out of it was actually finding feminists online and reading what they had to say, staying away from poorly written clickbait articles that fueled misogynist tirades against feminism. After reading and learning from feminists it finally clicked. Our society is patriarchal and that affects how people interact with each other regardless of what is legal. Many of the complaints of anti-feminism talk about how men have it in society, so how can society be patriarchal. It’s because of patriarchy that men are put in bad positions. Some of the more self aware anti-feminists had retorts against these ideas but they were emotionally charged. There’s still some anti-feminists I have respect for because of how well prepared and logical they were when it came to disputing feminism. But when it came down to the fundamental tenants of feminsim all they could respond with was anger or outright denial of reality. (If you’re like I was and don’t understand how anyone can thing modern feminism is good please feel free to ask me more, I just can’t get into specifics in this long ass post) Anyways, once you understand patriarchy and how it affects an individuals actions then you can start seeing how other institutions and cultural norms can affect an individual. This is basically fundamentals of leftism. I’d say about 90% of my path to leftism was just naturally absorbing cultural and historical information through consumption of media. The most conservative people I know are people who haven’t read very many books or seen very many movies. I’m not saying watching Austin Powers at the age of 10 will make everyone a leftist but constantly recontextualizing the world by learning something new, even if you learned it from some dumb comedy movie, can give you better grounding in a shared reality.  Don’t know how to end this but I want to say when I was a teenager I thought “communism is good in theory but it doesn’t work in practice” and I had almost no historical basis for it other than the vague notion that USSR = bad despite having consumed a massive amount of media. None of it taught me what communism actually was, I didn’t know who Karl Marx was, and I had no clue why communism in the USSR failed. You can know a lot without knowing the truth so if you’re struggling with a loved one who is mind poisoned by conservative keep in mind that they know a lot but they’re missing something important to give clarity. 

This has been my Ted Talk

#rambling #rant #Leftism #Conservative #feminism #anti feminism #Communism #Media #I definitely did not accomplish what I wanted to with this lol #Someone please clap #uwu

[allysficpics]

Snakes and Sunflowers Character Analysis

Ok so I got a comment and I’ll post that for context and my full response, in which I talk about my thoughts on specific characters. Send in an ask if you want me to talk about any other characters, or another character I mention a bit in here more in depth. It’s a bit rambly, I apologize for that lol

Comment from @ mariammk on AO3

I just binge-read this. 

Your characterisation and plot are so realistic! Some stories I've read that involve Weasley-bashing (specifically Ron) are a bit careless in their explanation, but yours is believable. I really hope Harry gets his head out of his ass soon, and I do hope Sirius plays a part in that, but I also appreciate how you've made Ron's influence on Harry - because I truly get that a boy who has been orphaned and grew up in a less-than loving home would cling on to the first friend he had and believe every word that comes from his mouth.

Dumbledore is driving me insane, but I can't wait for you to poke holes in to his 'holier-than-thou' persona!

Side note: I'm really scared for when Voldemort resurfaces, but I'm hoping Harry doesn't follow Dumbledore blindly.

Also, I'm so happy to see Sirius there!!! I hope Remus comes back too and that he gets the opportunity to start his life again, and please get Andromeda reinstated in the family again! I want her to reunite with Narcissa <3

Can not wait for the next update! :)

My response-

Awwww! Thank you so so so much! Reviews like this absolutely make my day, you have no idea. I can't promise Harry will get any better any time soon (ah! I'm sorry! But it's necessary to the plot, for now), and Sirius will play a part in it. I definitely can understand what Harry feels-personally, when I was a child, I had a tendency to latch onto the first person who gave me attention, and I would give them my unwavering loyalty, for better or for worse, because I was worried of being abandoned if I did or said anything wrong and the feeling I couldn't leave them because there wouldn't be anyone else who would want to be my friend. For me, this stemmed form an (at the time) undiagnosed and untreated anxiety disorder. Obviously, this is nowhere near as bad as Harry's situation, but I'm using this to try and apply this to Harry and his character and to understand him and where he comes from.

A lot of these characters I've based in part off myself or people that I know, especially with the characters that are less explored in canon (which is basically all of Slytherin.) One of J.K. Rowling's many faults, in my opinion, is how one-note she makes her characters. She focuses on one aspect and drives it into the ground and typically doesn't explore the why behind any of it. The character that I play around with the most is obviously Hermione, being that she's my main character. Her character in the book is very similar to how I was in my pre and early teenage years--stemming from the lack of a large and supportive friend group (for Hermione until Hogwarts began), and she has an innate desire to prove herself because of it. She is an outsider, both socially and societally. She's going to try and prove herself, but she doesn't exactly know how to navigate the waters. Hermione in this story grew up with a very strong support system and lots of friends who love her very much. She knows how to navigate the waters and knows that she has a place in the world, because she's always had a place in the world. There's a bit of a self-assuredness born from that. She's still a know-it-all, she's still passionate and smart, but she isn't desperate to prove herself. If we're comparing her to me again, this is quite a bit like how I was in high school, once I had gotten a really good support system and had started getting treated for my anxiety, thus making me less desperate to please everyone around me at no matter the cost, as well as making me more confident and self-assured.

With the other characters, with as one-note as the main characters can be, there's even less for the others. Even Draco Malfoy, a main antagonist of the series, all that we really get is that he can be a bit of a snob and sometimes a little mean. However, this is portrayed from the view of Harry, someone who doesn't understand pureblood society, and doesn't care to look deeper than what he sees. For Ginny, all we know is that she's athletic, outgoing and driven. We don't get much else. So for these two characters, even though they're prominent in the books, there's so much to build on and explore. And with little changes to how they were raised-like with Draco growing up in a more tolerant household in my fanfiction than what he probably did in canon, with lots of friends, that changes pieces of their characters. The remorse of Lucius leads to Draco not idolizing the views of Death Eaters and the like. So does the Malfoy's closeness with the Greengrasses, a Neutral family.

With characters like Theo, Daphne, Astoria, Hannah, Pansy, Blaise (and on and on), we've got absolutely nothing. Those characters are really fun to play around with because there is no such thing as being out of character for them. I can make their characters whatever I like. Narcissa is a bit like one of my senior friends when I was a freshman in high school, and Daphne reminds me a bit of a friend I had in the second grade who moved to Texas. Astoria is some parts of how my little sister (when she was little) and Pansy has some of the more harder aspects of my little sister at a bit of an older age.

I just love character driven things and inspecting a character from all sides and then seeing how they interact with other things and other people, and I'm glad that you enjoy the characterizations. I hope I didn't bore you half to death with my long ramble character-study sort of thing lol but it's something I could obviously write a lot about (I mean I'm writing a whole fanfiction about it so I'd hope I'd be interested in it).

Again, if you want to ask anything at all, throw it in my asks and I’ll get to it! I truly love talking about my characters and my stories and I’d be thrilled if you guys want to listen to my rambles about them lol

#snakes and sunflowers #my fic stuff #my fic #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter fanfic

[krisroley]

February 9th, 2021

One Small Moment

Today I want to talk to some specific friends who I won't name, but I'm fairly sure that this will apply to way more of just them.

First things first, I'm not going to insult your intelligence by giving you a bunch of platitudes. In my experience, they're nothing but empty calories. Filler and no substance, they're designed to make the person giving them feel better, not the person who needs help. In some cases, people who need help end up feeling worse. I'm one of those people, so I absolutely understand the feeling. So, no bullshit from me. Cool? Moving on.

Let me describe my lack of bona fides right upfront. I'm a guy with a high school education and one year of college because I let my dick do the thinking up to the point that I ended up homeless and friendless. I tried to follow in my Dad's footsteps and join the military and washed right out after six months because I have a mouth bigger than my brain. I come from a family that describing as dysfunctional is exceedingly generous. My dad had anger issues, my mother was a narcissist manipulator, as is my brother. He's got a criminal record and is probably on his way back to prison for at least 12 years as I write this. I'm the voice of reason in my family, and as I have said repeatedly, this should scare the fuck out of you. I got married at 24, and I had three kids by the age of 30. I've been dirt poor most of that time. At this stage of my life, I believe that I am an undiagnosed case of autism from the 1970s because my kids--all of them--are on the spectrum. I didn't have a bad childhood if you looked at it from one angle, but I had a horrible one if you looked at it from the inside out. I inherited my Dad's anger issues and my mother's narcissism. I was a horrible husband for years until my wife walked out on me in 2005. It made me face myself in a way I had not seen before, and I couldn't take it. I had a nervous breakdown. My wife thought I was worth saving, and I am forever grateful for it. I promised I would work on my issues, and I have. Three times in my life, I thought I was at the end of my rope. Not from a thought of suicide ideation, just that there was nowhere else to turn. No one else to ask for help. No one else I could lean on. Just Roley.

That moment right there is the point. The entire lesson. One small moment when your brain says, "Well, you're really fucked now, aren't you?" There is only one answer to that question, and that answer is yes because if you answer no, you ain't there yet. Trust me on this. You have to answer yes. This is the moment where you're accountable to no one but you, and you cannot lie to yourself. You can TRY. It ain't gonna work. Not for long.

Let's not bullshit ourselves. There is a lot of work in repairing a life that you fucked up on your own. You climb up out of a hole for years before you ever see daylight. I was a shut-in for two years because I thought it better that the world forgets about me. I tried to make a living from home in 2006-2007, but this world we live in hadn't come to pass yet, and I was living a fantasy. It made me feel worse that I couldn't provide for my family, but I could barely function as a human at that point. So I decided to do the only work I was capable of: Working on myself. I read every self-help book and mental health book I could lay my hands on. I dug deep into myself to try to figure out why I was the person I was, how I became that way, and the answer was straightforward. First, I thought I was absolutely normal. My behavior, though abhorrent, was how I was raised. My parents treated each other and us kids horribly, but it wasn't physically abusive save for a couple of times I'll keep to myself. I grew up in the same environment I perpetuated. I was continuing a cycle. Secondly, to accept that fact and to change meant work I wasn't ready to take on. But human psychology is a lot like a car in that regard; you can do the work now, or you can do it later, but it's going to cost you a lot more. In my case, it almost cost me everything. It was the third of those three times that I faced myself in the mirror and heard that voice, and this was the time I said yes.

For two-thirds of my life, my story is a story of failure, of self-hatred, of being a bad example. But from the age of 35 to 50, it's a story of repair and redemption. I'll put my humble path to today up against anyone's and dare them to do the work I've done to heal myself and come out who I am today. I'm still married to the same woman for over 25 years now. I've got three amazing kids who I adore. Up until May of this year, I had what I consider to be a dream job until COVID ate it, but I'm still with the same company, and I'm going to bust whatever amount of ass it takes to get my job back or demonstrate the skills I learned there to someone else who's willing to take me. I have a sense of self-worth and purpose that I've never had before, and I'm not taking being a call center tech support agent for the rest of my life. It is a means to an end, and it is not my life's work. I know what that is. It's helping you in the best way I know how: By being not the example of how to fix it, but from showing you by my example, it CAN BE FIXED that you can go from being a person full of anger and self-loathing and cruel behavior to being a person of kindness and compassion and love for people. That you can go from being a person who has no prospects to a person who can go to a job every day that fulfills them personally and professionally. That you can go from being a person who hasn't got their shit together at all to a person that can get morning to night without falling apart at the seams. This is my road, and my lane, but it's big enough for you, and I want you on this road with me. Some of you are gifted and talented beyond description, but the world doesn't know it yet because you have these problems. I know. I get it. I also see who you are, and the world deserves to see you as well. I had no one else to turn to at that last moment, so I did what I had to do. Myself. I'm asking you to take a walk with me because I don't want you to have to do it on your own. I may not know your way home, but I can get you as far as Anchorhead. You can get transport there to Mos Eisley or wherever you're going.

I had to get one joke in there somehow.

Did Joe Know About This?

On the heels of the news of Joe Budden maybe-kinda-sorta-moving his show to Patreon (which is weird since it looks like it’s being hosted on Libsyn now), Spotify has announced plans for multiple business models for podcasts, possibly to include ad-supported subscriptions and a la carte options. These may be discussed at a live stream event later in February.

Asked if Spotify thought customers would be willing to pay for podcasts, Ek on the earnings call responded that he believed there were several new models that could be explored.

“I think we’re in the early days of seeing the long-term evolvement of how we can monetize audio on the internet. I’ve said this before, but I don’t believe that it’s a one-size-fits-all,” he said. “I believe, in fact, that we will have all business models, and that’s the future for all media companies — that you will have ad-supported subscriptions and à la carte sort of in the same space, of all media companies in the future.”

“And you should definitely expect Spotify to follow that strategy and that pattern,” Ek added, more definitively.

The answer seemed to indicate that Spotify is considering some of the ideas in that recent survey — of getting consumers to pay for some podcasts, instead of accessing them all for free or having them bundled into their music subscription.

I wonder if Budden was aware of this and balked. Would there be a revenue split between Spotify and the creators, and what’s the ratio? Now that I think of it, isn’t that what they’ve been crying about re: Apple?

For more than a year, Spotify has been making noise about Apple’s unchecked power over the App Store, and in March 2019, it filed a complaint against Apple with the European Commission. Spotify claims Apple’s practice of taking 30 percent of an app’s revenue is unjustified, and says the company operates as a monopoly on iOS.

Suddenly, I find this Budden/Spotify deal more intriguing.

Wait, You Can Make Money Doing That?

Julie Miller from Vanity Fair writes about Hollywood coming over to the Pod Side for ‘fun and profit’:

…entertainment types began orbiting the audio space about two years ago in earnest, as the number of Americans listening to podcasts every month headed toward the 100 million it is today. It was also around 2018 that agencies like CAA began incorporating audio deals into their development packages. One insider estimates that many celebrities could get a six-figure guarantee per year, with the biggest actors receiving between $1 million and $3 million to launch an unscripted podcast. Scripted projects offer less up-front money but can be adapted into TV shows, films, books, and so on.

For the record, I am Steve Jobs, “Podcasts are Amateur Hour" Years Old. For years, podcasting was seen as less-than, so when I see stories like this, the little imp of the perverse in the back of my head tosses a bone at every true media elitist who, strangely, has a podcast now..

How About Not Doing That?

Chris Curran over at PES has a question about your thin mouth:

When I’m doing my fine-tuned editing on a podcast episode I use TwistedWave or Sound Forge because they allow me to VERY QUICKLY zoom in, highlight very small things like single mouthclicks, and delete them. 

When I try to make the same kind of edit in a DAW (Reaper and others) it takes forever. 

What say you?

For the most part, my workflow tends to remove mouth clicks, or at the very least minimize them. If they still show up through my noise gate, I highlight and remove them. I can’t say this happens often because I like to make sure I keep some water near me while I’m recording. The single biggest thing you can do to prevent mouth clicks is to keep hydrated. Remember, you can’t fix it in Post if it never happens in the first place.

Shot Of The Day

#Joe Budden #Spotify #Monetization #Podcasts #Hollywood #Vanity Fair #Julie Miller #Podcast Engineering School #Mouthclicks #PES

[homenum-revelio-hq]

Welcome (again) to the Order of the Phoenix, Karli!

You have been accepted for the role of BENJY FENWICK with the faceclaim change of Nick Robinson, along with the requested bio changes! I loved how you dug into and fleshed-out Benjy’s ills and issues without obscuring the bright, optimistic (naive) core of him. I also adored reading the relationships section and how you wove so many other members of the Order into his life and perspective. I can’t wait to see him interact with everybody on the dash! I’m so glad you’ve decided to bring us the rest of the Chaos Trio!

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours! Thank you for joining the fight against Voldemort!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME: Karli

AGE: 29

TIMEZONE: CST

ACTIVITY LEVEL: Same as it has been, fairly active. Less so in the fall when school starts up again.

ANYTHING ELSE: None.

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Benjy Fenwick

AGE: 19 | September 18, 1962

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Cis-Male, Him/Him, Heterosexual. 

Benjy is very comfortable with his sexuality and isn’t afraid to be friends with people who are not heterosexual. In fact, a majority of his friendships are with people who are discovering their sexuality or already identify as LGBTQ. With a gay father, he sometimes considers himself “knowing” and forgets that his experience is very privileged. Just because he’s accepting and aware doesn’t mean he truly gets it and, being young, that’s sometimes hard to remember.

BLOOD STATUS: Half-Blood

HOUSE ALUMNI: Ravenclaw

ANY CHANGES: Even though I wrote the bio and the FC originally, the more I solidified Benjy in my mind, some of the things I originally wrote ended up needing to be changed. For instance, I would like to change my FC to Nick Robinson. As I got to know Benjy, I realized that KJ’s expressions and resources didn’t really fit the mold I’d created with this portrayal. Also, I think it might be important to change the “he’s the newest member” thing in the second part of the bio, as he is no longer the newest member - just started that way when the roleplay began. I would also like to change the Caradoc connection up a bit - I will include it below under “relationships.”

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY: 

The first thing many people notice about Benjy Fenwick is his energy. He is very talkative and likeable in the sense he’ll not only talk to someone, he wants them to talk back. He’s a good listener, even if he doesn’t always look like it. With that energy needing to go somewhere, it’s not always easy for him to sit still (something that the healers were frustrated by during his recovery) and often will be found moving around or doing something with his hands. This can be offensive to those people he’s supposed to be listening to - but he does keep his ears open, even if his eyes aren’t concentrated.

He likely has a mild case of undiagnosed ADHD - which sometimes shows up in the form of struggling to stay focused and hyperactivity. This happens, typically, with those things he cares less about. He could talk for hours about Quidditch without needing a break (or used to, anyway, it hurts a bit more now that he’s on the outside of the sport) and even the art of healing has become important enough to him to have much of his attention. The program at St. Mungo’s is harder for Benjy, given his need for extra support that wouldn’t be given in the Wizarding World, but he manages to stay afloat, even if he’s not at the top of the program.

Benjy is accepting and loving, but sometimes has the complex that he doesn’t really have to do much soul-searching - or doesn’t really have to grow. In modern terms, Benjy thinks himself to be “woke” without realizing that his naivety means he still has a lot of self-awareness left to find. Just because he sees an experience doesn’t mean he knows that experience - and he might need someone to force him to take a step back and really look. 

Currently, he’s in a bit of an identity-crisis. For years, Quidditch had been his focus. It had been his life. He chose healing, not because of passion, but because of a lack of other things he could think of. When Quidditch ended, the hospital visits began and the healing program sort of fell into his lap. He is learning to find a love for healing, but it hasn’t fully developed yet. 

Benjy is curious and creative. There is a reason he was sorted into Ravenclaw - and it isn’t the stereotypical “booksmart.” He learned that Ravenclaws often have an open-mindedness about them that allows for thought in different ways. While he’s not very artistic, his creativity comes in the ability to think outside the box and look at things from a new perspective. This helped him with his Quidditch skills and it could help within the Order, too. 

He doesn’t always come off as though he truly cares, however. Because he picks and chooses what to really put his heart into, sometimes he might seem indifferent to others’ suffering or what they have to say. He’s got a bit of that British-polite in him and doesn’t always stick up for what’s right without someone backing him up. For this, he is a follower. He was pulled into the Order by Dorcas - and doesn’t really do much within the organization without someone telling him what to do. He might get radical at times, but that’s only because Dorcas is telling him to be. He’s a Yes Man in that way and often struggles to make his own decisions. Without her pressure, he likely wouldn’t be in the Order right now and just safely hiding under the radar as a “normal” half-blood.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY: 

(Once again, this isn’t brief and it’s about his whole life, not just family WHOOPS!)

Benjy was seven years old when his father, Jaison, came out as homosexual. Benjy’s mother, Maeve, had been mildly shocked for a bit before praising her husband for his true acceptance of self. They promptly divorced, but remained friendly and shared custody of their two children. Benjy’s sister, Haley, was too young to ever remember a time where their parents were together - so the situation of co-parenting and blended family structure had always been her normal.

For Benjy, it was a bit tougher. He was confused by the fact that Daddy and Mummy weren’t together anymore, but still spent time together. He questioned a bit about love in the capacity a child could. Until he met Lucas. His dad had taken months with Lucas before feeling comfortable enough to introduce his kids, but Benjy learned a bit about love watching his father with his boyfriend. Eventually, Lucas became a staple in the Fenwicks’ life, moving in with Jaison despite their inability to get married.

What won Benjy over about Lucas was Quidditch. While Maeve worked for the Department of Magical Games and Sports, it wasn’t until Lucas entered his life that Benjy actually got to go see a Quidditch match. They would go to as many as they could, buying food from the stances and watching the players fly high into the air, shooting the Quaffle or knocking the bludger or catching the snitch.

He learned to fly early. With his mum at one home and his step-dad at the other, Benjy always had someone to practice with. He grew to love the position of Keeper best. The idea that he was in charge of surveying the entire pitch - that he was the final defense against the opposition and the goal - was exhilarating. He lived and breathed the sport and, by the time he went to Hogwarts, he had his life planned out.

Ravenclaw was surprising until he met some friends and learned the house was about creativity along with intelligence. It helped with his game. Benjy didn’t need a crystal ball to tell him his future: he would get on the team his second year, he’d be promoted to captain by fifth year, get scouted during seventh, preferably by the Falmouth Falcons.

But then a bludger hit towards him by the Gryffindor team’s beater, which caused Benjy to roll the wrong way - he’d practiced the Zelig Flip a thousand times, but he’d positioned his hand a bit too much to the left and slipped. The fall from such an incredible height should’ve killed him - he was lucky, they said. You should be dead, they said. And Benjy wanted to shout but a life without Quidditch is death! 

Perhaps the worst thing of all - besides the injuries and healers and learning to put weight on his leg again - was that the Falcon scout had been there. He wouldn’t play again - he couldn’t play again. And the person he most wanted to impress witnessed it all.

He was back at Hogwarts by the time N.E.W.T.s rolled around, but spent the better part of the year between St. Mungo’s and the school. It was because of this he recklessly - and without much thought - applied to the healing program at the hospital. He got in, accepted, and mourned the loss of who he was supposed to have been. Perhaps Dorcas recognized his identity-crisis because he barely thought about it before agreeing to join the Order with her. Searching for something to fight for again.

OCCUPATION: Healer-In-Training at St. Mungo’s. 

Benjy applied for the healing program upon graduation because he just didn’t know what else to do. It had never been a real passion for him - but the idea of Quidditch was over and he’d been spending so much time at the hospital lately that he went for it. His N.E.W.T.s were just good enough to get him accepted. Looking back, it’s actually a good fit for him. It’s always different day-to-day, which keeps his interest, and learning all the new healing techniques quells his curious streak.

Currently, he’s still in year one of the two-to-three year program.Recently, he began the portion of the training that involves rotations, where he gets to spend some time in each of the wards of St. Mungos. During his third year, he will have to declare a speciality, but he has no clue what that will be. Right now, his favorite bits of healing have to do with the Order and working with Emmeline. 

ROLE WITHIN THE ORDER/THOUGHTS ABOUT THE ORDER: 

Benjy is a lower level member who joined the Order in September 1981, through Dorcas Meadowes’ pushiness encouragement. At the time, he was the newest member and knew little about the organization. As the months have passed and they’ve failed missions and lost members (most notably, one of Benjy’s idols, James Potter), he’s learned to grow more and more passionate about the cause.

He typically stays back during missions, both to help with healing given his qualifications, but also because he just physically can’t do all the dueling. His leg injury makes him slower and the slight tremors in his wand hand can be controlled in moments of healing, but not necessarily high-energy duels.

He believes in the Order, but isn’t overtly vocal about it. Given his nature as a Yes Man, he is known to nod and agree and go ohhh, so that’s how it is depending on whichever person is “explaining” things to him. This makes him fairly susceptible to manipulation - and often spouts Dorcas’ words rather than making his own opinion on the matter.

SURVIVAL: 

Benjy survives through his “normalcy.” He’s not rich, but he’s not poor. He’s not loud, but he’s not quiet, either. He’s a half-blood from a few generations back; nothing really special about it all. Had he become famous like he anticipated, the spotlight might be on him more. But, as it is, no one really cares much about the could’ve beens of the world. 

He lives with his mum in his childhood home, in his childhood room, and is more than ready to get the fuck outta there! It might be easier to sneak away if his sister wasn’t off at Hogwarts, but all his parents are worried about their son that nearly died. Since the fall, they’ve had eyes on him more than they might’ve had things panned out differently for him. Once allowing him to be fairly independent, now his mum wants to know where he’s going at night - and, whenever he’s at his dad’s, he has two sets of eyes watching over him. It’s rather exhausting making up lies or avoiding the question with the teenage-angst shout of I’m of-age now, Mum!

Still, he’s mostly under the radar and, if any of his parents suspect anything, no one has mentioned it to Benjy. He knows what they’d say if they do find out about the Order, however; they’d want him to stop. Maybe in the beginning, he would’ve listened. Now, especially with James’ death, he’s in too deep. And he likes that.

RELATIONSHIPS:

Dorcas Meadowes. Having been friends since their Hogwarts days, Benjy listens to her maybe more than anyone else. He’s very much the “Yes Man” when it comes to Dorcas - he joined the Order for her, helped with the creation of the Phoenix symbol before the explosion of the Atrium, and is willing to do more destruction for her. Benjy thinks of Dorcas as his best friend, though in truth, she might just be using him. He’s blind to it, whatever it is, and he’s bound to get himself hurt following in her footsteps.

Emma Vanity. A newer friend, but closer than most of the ones Benjy used to have in school (which mainly consisted of the Quidditch team and a few outliers, like Dorcas) these days. While the rest of his friends have moved on to other things not regarding the war, Emma found her way in it. She doesn’t need to fight - she’s a pretty, rich, pureblood, after all! - and Benjy admires that she is. 

Emmeline Vance. What started out as an odd pairing (seasoned, weary war healer and over-eager trainee with a limp) has become something really special. Benjy values Emmeline’s guidance more than any of the other “adults” (he’s an adult too, but different sort of adult!) in the Order. She’s sensible and level headed and nothing seems to shake her. She’s taught him more in battlefield healing than he learned in his first 6 months of healer training and he respects her. She might get a bit annoyed with all his antics, but he can make her smile! He knows she’s fond of him!

Caradoc Dearborn. Benjy judged Caradoc too harshly at first - a product of finding the Marauders so cool and knowing that at least half of them didn’t enjoy Caradoc’s presence. Once he learned that Dearborn did, in fact, play Quidditch in school - and once he actually talked to Caradoc - the tides have changed. They’re not close friends, but he’s not as much of a stick-in-the-mud as Benjy thought. 

(This is the connection I’d like to change, please!!)

Sirius Black. He’s very cool. Benjy bought a leather jacket because he saw Sirius wearing one, but then felt like an idiot, so it’s never been worn outside his own bedroom (and he’s sure Dorcas will make fun of him, if she ever sees it!). Benjy knows he’ll never be as effortlessly awesome as Sirius Black - the bloke always looks rather careless and that’s just so killer, man! - but he likes taking tips anyway. Maybe he’ll get a girlfriend if he’s more like Sirius. Now that James has died, the easy, cool bloke from before is shifting to something darker and that’s scary. Benjy doesn’t want to get rid of his old idol, but he also doesn’t want to die for Sirius. 

Dedalus Diggle. It might be calling the kettle black, but Diggle sort of annoys Benjy. He talks a lot - tinkers a lot - messes with things. And maybe that’s just Benjy seeing himself in Dedalus, but two people who are this energetic together can sometimes be a bit of an explosion.

Daisy Hookum. Benjy doesn’t know Daisy well at all. She was years ahead of him in school and was off on some Muggle retreat when Benjy joined the Order but, now that she’s back, he’s interested in some of the things she learned over there. Especially the Muggle sporting! 

Remus Lupin. Just before the disastrous event at the party, Remus was outed as a werewolf. Benjy never really got to know the bloke - he, too, was on some mission when Benjy joined up - but now he’s almost afraid of him. Benjy himself doesn’t realize that’s internalized prejudice coming into play… but he doesn’t want to become a werewolf!

Severus Snape. Benjy doesn’t know how to feel about Severus Snape. It’s clear that Sirius hates him, but Dorcas loves him. Those are two people who could really sway Benjy over to their side if he doesn’t quickly form his own opinion. Severus doesn’t really seem to care about Benjy, though, so it’s not really a priority. But if Severus does want people on his side in the Order, Benjy could be an easy target for loyalty. 

Isla Selwyn-Macmillan. She actually played Quidditch professionally for years - Benjy has old magazines with her picture in it! He’s a bit too afraid to ask her about her experience on the major league pitch, however - not just because he’s a bit starstruck, but also because it hurts to talk about what he might’ve been able to have, too. He doesn’t realize it wasn’t Isla’s choice to leave the sport, however. If he were to find out, they might be more kindred spirits than anyone would think.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: Benjy/Chemistry. Since I made him straight explicitly for the goal of providing that “oh so woke, but not exactly” cis, white, straight dude, any ships would have to be heterosexual. But I’m open for whatever within that realm!

WHAT PRIVILEGES AND BIASES DOES YOUR CHARACTER HAVE?

Benjy is right down the middle of privilege, meaning he doesn’t really get the perks of being a pureblood, but doesn’t get the prejudice of being a muggleborn. He’s a halfblood, white, cis-male wizard. His family grew up fairly middle class and, while his parents are divorced, they managed to stay friendly and Benjy never had to go through the trauma of feeling as though he had to choose.

With accepting parents, one of which is gay, Benjy has grown up learning about the importance of tolerance and acceptance. Because of this, he believes he’s (in modern terms) “woke.” However, there is still internalized prejudice in all of us. While he would never dare to utter the word mudblood and would scoff at someone who does, he still might look at a talented muggleborn with a bit of wow, look at that! as though it were surprising they could be just that good. He also wouldn’t fight the person using the word Mudblood. He would likely tell him it’s not cool, but forgive and move on easily. Not realizing that it wouldn’t be his place to forgive. It’s not his story to tell.

While he doesn’t hold the rhetoric of all werewolves are bad and all house-elves should be servants and other things along those lines, he inadvertently acts on it without knowing. It’s very naive -- “You mean werewolves don’t have canine teeth and claws in their human form?!” and “But don’t they like not getting paid?!” -- but Benjy is willing to listen and grow. He just sometimes forgets he still has room to grow because he generally does try to be accepting to all people and creatures. He also doesn’t always care enough to seek out more information because he doesn’t really think he needs it -- it doesn’t affect him. And that’s privilege. 

Being a straight bloke with a gay dad and a lot of LGBTQ friendships, he really thinks he understands sexuality. And maybe he gets some of it, but he doesn’t really “get it.” It’s not his experience. He’s also very confused about bisexuality, which makes sense given the timing of the world as well. What he saw in his life shaped his understanding of sexuality - his dad presented straight until he accepted his sexuality and then he was gay. Benjy gets that, but struggles to understand that there are sexualities in-between the two. For instance, Emma and Dorcas -- if they get together, he’d assume that means they’re lesbians, despite sexuality not being so clear cut as that. Once again, it doesn’t come with malicious intent or the desire to erase anyone… it’s just naivety. People need to teach him because he’s willing to learn. 

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO? It’s the roleplay I created and I love how amazing it’s become. It’s honestly a bit eerily relevant to our life right now and I’d like to explore that with a different character than Regulus. Benjy more closely resembles James, but he’s still his own and he has a story to tell.

PLOT DROP IDEAS: All chalked out, sorry! All my ideas are already in the process through admin stuff. I’d love the chaos trio to fuck some shit up together, but that’s all I’ve got! 

ANYTHING ELSE? I’m not sure where else to discuss Benjy’s injuries, so I’ll just do it here. When he fell from his broom, he landed on his left side, which also happens to be his dominant side (he’s left-handed in both writing and wand). He walks with a limp all the time - it will likely never go away. For a while, he was forced to use a cane, especially during the healing process, but hasn’t needed that since prior to graduation. If he pushes himself too hard, there’s the possibility he may need that again, but he likely would just rest on those days more than bringing out the old cane full of unwanted reminders. His wand arm’s muscles had torn in the fall and, despite the ability to put them back together through magic, there are some lasting effects. He sometimes has tremors, especially if having a wand raised for long periods of time. Typically, this can be remedied with some techniques taught to him by the healers, but in extreme cases, he needs to put the wand down for an hour or so. This is most difficult when he’s in the middle of healing, otherwise it doesn’t get in the way much. 

#homenumaccepted #harry potter rp #hp rp #marauders rp #marauders rpg

[ill-be-istj-if-no-one-else-is]

I went through the shitty introvert tag recently and now have some questions: 1) a lot of them are self proclaimed HSPs which confuses me. Is there scientific backing for HSP and why would sensory and emotional sensitivity be linked? Is the term ever applied to extroverts and if not, why? 2) why are so many of them feelers? like there're annoying IxTxs but they seem just more misanthropic/edgy and less whiny/convinced that they're unique. why are they all N types? why're the S types more chill?

1. HSP is a fuzzy concept at best; the psychologist who coined the term doesn’t believe it’s a disorder and believes it affects 20% or so of the population - significant enough to just be a thing true of a lot of people. As she defined it it does include both emotional and sensory stimuli. My personal take is that of the people who identify as such, some are actually people with real medical processing/sensory disorders who have gone undiagnosed and a lot of these disorders are comorbid with conditions that also carry emotional sensitivity (autism being just one example). The rest are just, yeah, people who are more sensitive to stimuli of various sorts than average. Basically all of human experience is a spectrum - I mentioned this recently when it comes to reading vibes. Like, I have friends who can fall asleep on a couch in the middle of a party; I have to put my phone on silent when I sleep because if I’m not in a pretty deep sleep I’ve been known to be woken up by a single text message vibration. All humans experience stimuli differently, both from a physiological standpoint (younger people can hear higher-pitched sounds) and a psychological. It’s also adaptive/learned; people who grew up in louder environments often can tune out sounds better, for instance. So HSP really just means “of the human spectrum of sensitivity to stimuli you are in the top fifth of sensitivity”; it doesn’t make you any more special than people in the bottom fifth and both those groups have benefits. Like, there’s value in being a coffee snob with a great palate but there’s also value in being able to drink Folgers crystals without gagging when you’re at your parents’ house, you know?

Extroverts can be HSPs and iirc the book Quiet by Susan Cain (which is an interesting book but also jumpstarted a lot of Introvert Superiority Culture) talked about HSPs. It’s considered more of an introvert thing because introverts in general are less good at handling the outside world, but it’s not unheard of for extroverts.

2. I’m going to split this into valid reasons why HSPs might more likely be I, N, and F, and reasons to be suspicious.

Valid: I already mentioned, but extroverts by non-MBTI definition are energized by being around people and by MBTI definition favor a function that involves direct involvement with the outside world; as such there’s an inherent conflict between being super sensitive to the outside world and needing it to be energized. Extroverts tend to be good with the outside world and HSPs struggle with it.

This is also why it fits better with intuition; sensors enjoy sensory data. We still can be sensitive to it but this is our preferred method of understanding and processing the world. HSPs are not good at processing sensory data in the same way.

Finally, feelers: the emotional part of HSP is the part I’m most skeptical about, and I also suspect thinkers in general are going to be more skeptical of HSP as a concept due to the lack of hard science thereof, but when it comes to emotional sensitivity, while thinkers can be emotionally sensitive, they’re less likely to admit it.

Now, the less valid reasons. I’ve alluded to this a lot lately but MBTI and personality theory can be awesome tools. However, they are just tools and can be used in ways both good or bad. There is a small but vocal subset of people who see personality theory as justification that they are Special and Different and more worryingly, somehow more deserving of respect and humanity and accommodation than others. The pattern of these people is generally quite predictable: look at whatever type is getting the most praise in that space and they will say they are that type. And so: introversion, intuition, and feeling - more often Fe, as it is stereotyped as benevolent more frequently than Fi, though Fi gets more of a free-spirit reputation. HSP is another ribbon to pin on their imaginary trophy wall, where they are hailed and loved for a bunch of labels since lord knows it’s nigh impossible to love these people for the selfish narcissists they actually are.

(my guess for why INTPs and INTJs, which are types picked by I am More Human than You types at times, are not as likely to identify as HSPs, is similar to yours. The the people who pick those tend to favor a “I have no emotions/it’s just logical that I am better than you” persona and therefore eschew labels like “sensitive.” The INFx I am More Human than You persona is less blatant and leans more on “no one understands my specialness and how deeply I feel everything and that’s why I’m cruel and manipulative.”)

(as always: there are plenty of people who are actually INxxs who are lovely, and still more people who are not INxxs but mistyped due to biased information/barnum effect reasons and not out of the senses of superiority and they are also lovely; and also some are teens going through an edgy phase who will deeply regret everything they are currently putting on the internet and will grow into perfectly lovely adults, hence the statement “small but vocal subset”.)

#mbti #long post #whykellothere

[murderhewrotee]

☾  ↪  matt hitt, cismale, twenty-eight, he/him.  ／ ❛  have you heard from SAWYER STRAUSS lately ？ yeah, the TWENTY-EIGHT year old JOURNALIST/RADIO SHOW HOST. pretty sure they’ve been here EIGHTEEN YEARS / A FEW WEEKS, and from what i’ve heard, STRAUSS can be kind of ARROGANT  & RECKLESS, but i caught them on a good day once, and they were pretty DRIVEN & BRAVE. i��m probably overthinking it, but given all the crazy shit around here, i hope they’re okay. maybe they’re watching their favorite scary movie, i heard it’s ZODIAC.

001.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Sawyer’s terribly distraught over the death of poor Shanon Meyers. What? Her name was Shelly? Woops, must have slipped his mind.

Sawyer, despite having been eight when the Hollow Man first swept through the town, was sheltered by parents that were incredibly concerned with their oldest son being exposed to such grizzly affairs at such a young age. As such, Sawyer didn’t learn the true extent of the Hollow Man’s terror till he was much older. By then though, he was already exploring the world of true crime with wide eyes and the Hollow Man became a fun hometown murder story for the young man. Sawyer grew to harbor a fierce love for the morbid and the macabre and from a young age he knew that he wanted it to be part of his life - forever.

Holloway quickly became too small for the ever curious Sawyer. He applied to college everywhere and he wound up attending NYU - nearly the furthest point from home. He took to the city immediately and earned a degree in journalism. His almost whimsical love for true crime persevered even in the big city. If anything, it bloomed. In fact, soon after college, Sawyer made a name for himself as a true crime reporter. The young man became most known for his column “Murder He Wrote”  which soon turned into the national radio show, “Murder He Spoke.” Sawyer’s dry-humored takes on crimes scenes old and new won the heart of audiences all over America.

It should be no surprise that Shelly Meyer’s death caught Sawyer’s eye. As fate would have it, Sawyer was in town for an old classmate's wedding and upon the news of the murder, Sawyer decided to extend his stay, ready to cover the story of the Hollow Man’s alleged return; “one with a personal twist” his editor commented and Sawyer wholeheartedly agreed. Perhaps it was because he’d become desensitized to the matters at hand after covering endless murder story after story,  but Sawyer wasn't truly afraid of the implication that the Hollow Man had returned. If anything, the reporter and radio show host found himself intrigued by the killer’s supposed return. Now, he wants to be on the frontlines to report it. 

002. 

It is easiest to isolate Sawyer's fear of being forgotten. Sawyer cannot stand the thought of being mediocre, of dying a mundane, boring death. He’s trying to make a mark on the world with his work and he feels like he’s finally hit Pulitzer material with this potential Hollow Man story. Sawyer’s arrogance eclipses so much of reality, but, if one were to dig a little deeper, they would notice that underneath layers upon layers of of swagger there’s a man who cares deeply about his family. Sawyer regrets never living up to his parent’s expectations and not taking a more “respectable” career; he regrets leaving town the first chance he got and not being around more for his little brother. At his core, Sawyer is terrified he is incapable of being the son or the brother his family needs him to be. Were he to lose them, his world would crumble. 

003.

Sawyer is a man that is trying to convince the world he is not falling apart. The first thing one notices about him is his surefire demeanor, this is immediately followed up with the faint smell of whiskey. Sawyer is almost constantly drunk. A high functioning alcoholic, the man avoids feeling anything by numbing himself to the world. Escapism for the American masses is the particular ware he sells, but it would serve him miles more if he were able to turn that good on himself. But don’t let his drunken display fool you though, Sawyer can be sharp and quick. And if he’s quick enough when he’s three whiskeys in, he’s a serious force to be reckoned with the second he sobers up.

Sawyer is a natural extrovert who enjoys being the center of attention and the life of the party. (He is also the kind of narcissist to pout when he isn’t.) If you can hold his interest, you’ve earned his respect. He’s always smiling, whether he means it or not, and he has a reputation of throwing a few punches if provoked. There is nothing steady about Sawyer, he is about as volatile as they come. 

004. Other. 

Did we mention he’s constantly drunk?

Brother of Jaxon Strauss

Still runs his true crime radio show “Murder He Spoke” from Holloway. 

Has a smile like the sun, has often been described as cheeky 

loves being active, hates being bored, big on camping 

is always down for a game of pool 

has a heart for adventure and travel 

About as Gay As They Come. But follows a “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy. It’s the 90′s, folks! 

is a pretty snazzy dresser, that’s the New York in him 

bit of a daredevil, will do stupid shit while drunk 

a natural flirt. Even if he’s very much into men, he’ll flirt with anything that has a pulse 

skilled in the art of denial 

has depression. undiagnosed. tries to numb it out with booze. 

005. Wanted Connections. 

Give me the lover he had in high school that was part of his sexual awakening 

One night stands

People who do or don’t want to be on his radio show 

People for him to get in barfights with

Literally anything goes with this one, friends! 

#hollowfm.intro #( i will add more to this too as we go along !! ) #( about )

[misbhaves]

CIRO GUERRERO

i used to punch WALLS until my knuckles [ b l e d ] because I was filled with rage andANGER, now I punch walls until they bleed just to FUCKING FEEL SOMETHING, or to at least try.

cigarette butts, broken glass, sleepless nights, looking through crumpled family photos, tombstones, biting into flesh to keep quiet, a moral compass that’s always pointing north and bruised fists that are always chasing it, his mother’s cross, a permanently broken fuse and a watch that runs on the wrong time.

IMPORTANT: his biography is triggering - and not just because of the content but I have been told several times it’s upsetting so just be aware. actual content warnings: murder, abandonment, references to assault, violence.

++ ciro has an undiagnosed mental illness. he suffers from auditory and sometimes visual hallucinations as part of undiagnosed ptsd.

phew ok let’s proceed.

some quick fax.

+ ciro is one angry boy

+ he is a leo

+ actually here’s his whole ass birth chart

+ ciro’s a bit (a lot) of a smart ass

+ he’s very true to his moral code, even if it doesn’t fall in line with what’s expected of him

+ he’s not an unfriendly dude but a lot of people are probably wary of his temper and like, i don’t blame them. it burns hot, real hot.

+ he’s full of vengeance

+ his ability is SUPERNATURAL ATHLETICISM -- (desc:  The user is glaringly, obviously and super/unnaturally more acrobatic than other beings in their universe because their capabilities are pushed beyond the natural level; they are obviously superior in speed, explosiveness, power, quickness, and other various acrobatic abilities than regular beings (in that verse)). this is because he’s a master thief and i just felt it was fitting. the variants under that which apply to him are as follows: dexterity, agility and parkour. basically, if spider-man were a criminal :/// 

+ weaknesses uh probably ... many ... he’s just super acrobatic i don’t see why he wouldn’t be taken down by a lot of powers. there’s nothing absolute about his abilities either so i feel like each fight is really just a matter of who reigns supreme. 

+ has a real robin hood complex where he thinks you can balance things by taking from the bad and giving to the good, taking from the rich giving to the poor, shit like that. it’s a mess.

+ mr happyfists is fluent in spanish, russian, arabic and english. breaks into spanish when he’s angry. he learned russian and arabic just to run cons.

+ really emo over his ex gf mentioning her to him is a guaranteed fist in the face

+ i’m really bad at writing intros can you tell?? but also i’ve written so much collectively for ciro that i’m a bit like!!! what else is there to say.

+ he grew up in an orphanage for the most part, both his parents are dead. they were police detectives.

+ he blames himself a lot for their death.

+ he’s always trying to overcompensate for his guilt by throwing himself into work and fighting the good fight.

+ will double cross you INSTANTLY if he thinks you’re doing something wrong. a bad boy.

+ resident bisexual.

+ he’s demigender meaning he only loosely identifies as male and is comfortable with both male and gender neutral pronouns. so he/they.

+ proud mexican tbh you won’t hear him refer to himself as american ever.

+ has a sailor’s mouth and a pirate’s fists.

+ loves animals !!! way more than people, fuck people.

+ basically a guilty angry boy

+ loves videogames

+ ok i’m done feel free to read more in the links above. you will find plenty of info i think and like this if you want to plot, or better yet just go ahead and msg me. come at me bro.

anyway real bio ahead 

#gloryhqs.intro #blood cw #glass cw #cigarettes cw

[comeondowntosouthparkrpg-blog]

Rebecca Cotswolds

Is she gonna kiss Kyle again? Rebecca has been accepted! Send your blog to the main ASAP.

out of character info

Name/Alias: Alice

Pronouns: She/Her

Age: 18

Join Our Discord: I’m already there

Timezone: Central

Activity: 9

Triggers: N/A

Password: jimmy can fast pass my ass

Character that you’re applying for: Rebecca Cotswolds

Favourite ships for your character: HMU

in character info

Full name: Rebecca Ruth Cotswolds

Birthday: January 17th

Sexuality, gender, pronouns: She’s not sure about her sexuality, she’s a female and goes by she/her pronouns.

Age and grade: 18, Senior

Appearance:

Rebecca has shoulder length, curly brown hair that she often keeps back with clips or bobby pins. Although she does put her hair up in a messy bun occasionally. She has pale freckles that dust her cheeks and arms. She has pale skin that betrays her nature of not going outside in favor of studying. She has deep brown eyes. Rebecca stands approximately five foot and weighs a healthy 94 pounds. She’s rather partial to flowers or other nature clips in her hair or accessories.

As for fashion, you could commonly see her in lace or some kind of sundress. She prefers neutral colors that compliment her dark hair and light skin. Colors such as white, pink, or pale purple. She loves to hang out in her black ballet flats. She wears fairly natural makeup, except for her lips which she prefers to do a red shade. If she’s feeling it, she can do her eyes darker as well. Her fashion wouldn’t look out of place at a garden photo shoot. Since her big episode whenever she was like, eight, She largely dropped the revealing clothing. Except whenever she really feels like rebelling.

Personality:

Rebecca has grown a lot since her time as a third grader in South Park High School. Her parents took her right out of public school until middle school, so her growth definitely stagnated. They kept her sheltered, so this has a direct result on her personality as a high schooler. Growing up in a conservative mountain town under the watchful eye of her mother and father left her with very little experience regarding things such as sexual endeavors or even how a girl her age is to supposed to act. She’s still very innocent in that regards, and that inherent innocence seeps down to her core. She’s definitely kind, willing to donate to whatever charity or organization needs her help. However, there is a darker side to her that’s even more deeply rooted than her innocent and kind nature. She has a defiant streak in her, that expresses herself in weird ways. She fantasizes about intense emotions, good or bad, that she could one day feel. She’s fascinated with her inherent desires that she was trained to suppress all her life, which drives her to do the extreme on occasion.

She’s a compassionate individual, despite having not really deep emotions at all and her yearning to feel them. She does find herself feeling compassion for others situation or those in need. Never let it be said that Rebecca isn’t intelligent, she’s very intelligent. Still harboring her desire to become a brain surgeon, and she focuses a lot on her studies. A thirst for knowledge leads her to be extremely curious for the world around her, yearning to know all its secrets and feel all its emotions. Deeply, she’s in resentment towards her sheltered life and wants to experience the world and gain an independence she never had. In her, she harbors a deep sadness within her at her current situation and the way her knowledge intake is stagnated by her fanatic parents. Rebecca, in a small aspect, still wants to remain a sheltered child and a subconscious part of her that’s been indoctorined into her still wants to uphold her parents and be willfully arrogant.

In short, she’s a confused child who is trying to find her place in the big world.

History:

Rebecca was born on January 17th to two loving parents. A deeply Christian household, they took a fundamentalist approach in her and her brother’s upbringing. From a young age, she was not allowed to watch TV except for documentaries or Bible specials. She was homeschooled for the majority of her young childhood, and often had nothing to do except for play board games with her brother or parents, study, or wander in the very extensive garden. Her mind carried beyond the fence borders, yearning to see the world. Her chance came with the spelling bee. After the antics of ‘Hooked on Monkey Phonics’, she was pulled out of public school, unlike her brother who got to remain. She was homeschooled, and her parents drilled into her what she was doing was wrong, even though they never explained to her why it was wrong leaving her incredibly confused and hurt. So began her struggle on why something so bad could feel so good.

Just before fifth grade, she approached her parents and begged them to let her attend public school again. At first they vehemently denied her, but she remained relentless and with help from her brother managed to convince her parents to enroll her in the local public middle school. Instantly, she was overwhelmed and felt like an outsider. Still, she refused to allow herself to be sunk. She slowly became more and more confused as time went on. She knew she couldn’t bring it up with her parents or else they would just pull her out again. She was also forbidden to study anything regarding sexual practices or drugs. This was out of the paranoia of her parents that she would end up as some bitch of a pimp. So throughout middle school she remained by choice willfully ignorant, although a growing desire and yearning was filling her.

Rebecca in high school is no less confused than she has been all these years, however a budding resentment was starting to brew at her parents for refusing to explain what her urges are and why exactly they are so bad. She began fantasizing about feeling something deep. Anything. Pain, sadness, ecstasy, true anger, she isn’t allowed to feel any of that and was denied it so often as a child she’s definitely more twisted inside. Come senior year, her full self as she knows herself now has formed. Innocent, knowledge hungry, compassionate, and fucked up in a way that could only be faulted by her parents.

Sample paragraph:

As another day dwindles to a close, the brown haired girl walked slowly through the garden. Taking in the flowers and the colorful shrubs that were so intricately chosen. Her black flats subtly jumped from one stone to the next, her dress fluttering in the wind. She was in deep, meditative thought. About everything and nothing. She could spend hours roaming the gardens and never come across the same thought twice. She was largely introspective, because where else would they go? Her brother certainly did not understand her desires or confusions, and her parents were out of the question. In fact, any minute she would be called inside for dinner. The routine would follow with her and her brother cleaning the kitchen, before the gathered around the fireplace for their nightly scripture reading, until the grandfather clock dinged 10 and it was time for her to bed. She allowed a sigh to escape her red tinted lips, a surge of sadness coming at thought of that routine. Something she should find comfort in gives her none. She couldn’t help but think she would find comfort in something much more dark.

Rebecca paused, coming to a little hole in the fence. She stepped off the cobblestone path, and pushed aside the vines that artfully grew on the fence. Her parents called it art, she called it prison bars. She peeks outside of the hole, seeing the town mall. She had been to the mall on occasion, but her mother preferred to have her clothes custom made by a family friend. She tucked a stray strand of brown hair behind her ear before carefully setting the vines back in place before continuing her garden stroll. She looked down, there was some moss growing in between the stones, and she looked to a bed of daises, her favorite. She tutted softly, seeing the weeds. She would have to weed the bed tomorrow. Of course, with summer closer than ever she would have hours upon hours of time to do whatever she wanted. In the borders of the bubble they forced her in, of course. Instead of sadness, there was anger. And she didn’t find herself pushing it down.

Still slightly stewing, she took a seat on the white wicker bench they had that looked like a scene straight out or Romeo and Juliet. She looked to her side seeing Lillies. Beautiful, pure, innocent flowers. She reached out a hand and began stroking the petal. “How lonely you are,” Rebecca said quietly in her mezzo soprano voice. “I daresay you haven’t had the pleasure of seeing the world. Your roots are planted here, after all.” Rebecca said, gazing at the flower with eyes filled to the brim with longing. “And even then, what is in the world except for dirty boots and rotten people to pull out your petals or crush your stem.” Rebecca said, knowing full well what she was saying. “Still though, you want to go? Yes, pain could possibly be therapeutic. Or is that what you’ve read in storybooks? What is reality?” The flower said nothing, it could not hear nor speak. That suited Rebecca fine. She sighed softly. “You won’t be finding out will you?”

No sooner did the words escape her lips, she heard the call of her father. She looked over her shoulder, before she got the inexplicable urge to lay her lips lightly on the flower, before walking softly and quickly away, to wash up for dinner.

Headcanons:

-Isn’t in the top ten, but the top fifteen taking the 13th spot.

-She’s still an incredibly good speller.

-Is going to Norte Dam University. She wants to pursue neuroscience.

-Finds herself fascinated with documentaries regarding death.

-Plays the flute

-Her voice is definitely on the lower side for a teenage girl.

-Has undiagnosed anxiety

-She helps her mother with their extremely beautiful garden.

-Has a diary, it is the only place she lets out her frustrations.

Anything else: N/A

#accepted #submission

[viampythonissam]

Intro, continued...

It was then I became obsessed with death and the occult, desperately trying to make contact with my grandfather through anything possible. Being clairaudient, I was expecting to hear a message from my grandfather all throughtout the whole funeral and mourning period, but to no avail. So in my desparation, I went into research, and stumbled upon things such as the ouija, seances, and many more. I even considered dabbling into necromancy, just in order to hear from him again. His death broke me so much that I was for the most time wishing I were dead too. I had suicidal thoughts but somehow something has prevented me from attempting. It could be I'm too chicken to hurt myself (getting hurt by other things besides self-infliction doesn't scare me though) or the thought of my mother crying over my dead body is another thing that would crush my heart.

I started questioning my religious beliefs then. We were Roman Catholics, and we go to church, but not too often. I am very religious though when I was a child, having been schooled in a private Catholic school, and I know all the prayers by heart; but it all changed. I felt resentment for praying so hard but never getting answered. That everything happens for a reason. A reason still so vague to me to this day, which I continue to believe was the same reason of the breaking apart of this family and eventual downfall. The family is in ruins, and the family home is crumbling apart. My father's only brother, my uncle Aldrin, died a little over two years after my grandfather; and his widow and only child, my cousin, was estranged ever since then, because of inheritance issues. My father decided to sell the house, my childhood home because of this; splitting the family fortune already so that we can all go off our separate ways and stop the bickering. The only thing that's keeping him from doing so is my grandmother who is still so attached to the house built by my grandfather.

At 16, I eventually traversed my way into the craft, dabbling on it. There was a kind of pull into these mystics that appealed to someone like me. Was it power? Was it danger? Mystery, perhaps? Or maybe I just got all too familiar with the unknown for me to be comfortable chasing after it? This craft, shunned by my faith since the dawn of time and even killed tons of people because of it, felt like home to me; learning it felt like retracing my steps back from where I came from. There was a sense of calm, relief, and freedom learning the ways of the earth, elements, and spirits and those who came before. Its unrestrictive nature was a stark contrast to the repressive and dominating teachings of the Catholic scriptures. Wherein Christianity demands a million things to do and not to do to save your soul, the craft only ever wanted you to do anything you want, just as long you harm none, even yourself. I have a lot of arguments to make against my old faith, that's why I consider myself an agnostic in all fairness. That's a topic for another day.

When I got to college at 17, I applied for nursing school under my father's wishes. It was in my misfortune to be enrolled in a school with a toxic environment of sorts: unhealthy clinic hours, unreasonable school workload, toxic Christian classmates who bombarded me everyday with bible verses and inviting me to join Sunday worship thingies. I am very respectful of other's beliefs and opinions but I really have a bone to pick with the Born Agains because upon knowing I am interested in dark movies and occult, they've started telling me that the Devil has a grip on my soul and that I should stop it so that my soul can be saved. They're even worse than the Mormons and Witnesses who knock on your door at certain days. I'd just ignore it and they'll go but BAs will stop at nothing to guiltify me of being possessed and that I need deliverance. It was also the time my parents went to Australia for work because of the failing finances due to to my late grandfather's hospital expenses, my uncle meeting his untimely demise, and my uncle's greedy widow who already demanded their inheritance even though my grandmother was still alive. My best friends of highschool also attended different schools and pursued different career pathways which left me feeling more isolated and unsure of myself. These issues fed my undiagnosed depression and relapse of suicidal thoughts all throughout my 4 years in nursing school. It was a mix of emotions, a rollercoaster ride of disappointments, achievements, first-time experiences, full independence. All without a proper support system. Nevertheless, I grew wiser while treading the craft, and for the first time since I lost my grandfather, I felt safe and sound and complete.

Then I met my elementary school sweetheart again in my final year and we became a couple. He was a sweet guy, smart and responsible. We had our similarities, our quirks, but we also had differences. I was already quite a learned witch, studying tarot and palmistry as my supposed-to-be expertise, when he told me how he wanted to be baptised as a Born Again (he and his family are Roman Catholics as well). He told me how he was deeply affected by the one time he went to a worship service of his friend's church. This struck a chord in me, a subtle reference to my beliefs. At the time, I have fully believed he is the man I'm gonna settle for, the one I'm gonna marry. He's everything I have hoped for then: he's finished school, on his way to a very decent career on a ship as a marine engineer. He's from a good family as well. Well-mannered, and not to mention that we've got a pretty long history way back when we we're 10 or so. He even made a subtle proposal of a civil marriage before he hops on board the ship. I know it was betrayal of myself, but I love this man so much so, I am ready to submit myself to him.

Worst decision of my life. I started to try and mingle with Christians so I may understand just why I needed to be saved. I joined worship services and sang with them against my own beliefs. I taught myself to be like them just so I could fit in, so that I may have friends. In return, they've burned all my books and tarot decks. Even my Slipknot t-shirt that my grandmother bought me was not spared from the Christian pyre. Said that it's to release me from the grip of the Devil. They even did deliverance to me. For a while I thought I was given a new lease on life and that this is the only right thing to do. I was easily convinced since it was the most trying time of my life so far: I was killing myself reviewing for the nursing licensure exams, my parents are already coming to get us and live away in Australia for good, my bf and I hit rock bottom and broke up (the girl who is the 3rd party confessed to me that they're having an affair, and that she was so guilty she can't sleep at night knowing we are good friends and they're doing this behind my back, also I've noticed red flags about him that made me doubt him a bit. I factored everything and the dots connected like a damn constellation so I've called it quits), and I was caught in an identity crisis because of inner turmoil. Maybe it was a time of personal upheaval and the mix of situations was too much for me to handle. Maybe it was a good thing though that I never got baptised because my life just got much more complicated after that.

So I did pass the licensures, ex and I never got together again, I went to live to Australia, but I never recovered from the inner turmoil thing; which made me spiral down again the depression lane, this time in its dangerous, ugliest and darkest recesses. I was fighting with my parents which I never did before, I was angry all the time. I started drinking then and I was exhausted all the time I just want to sleep. All the activities I've enjoyed before like sketching, playing the piano, afternoon strolls, and cooking for the family, I've totally lost interest in. My health deteriorated and I cut off and isolated myself from my friends overseas, ignoring their messages and emails. I tried to cope up by immersing myself in Christian songs and scriptures but it was not enough. I was still empty and numb. I was like a zombie, waking up just enough not to get late for work, then go home after, eat unhealthily, play video games, chug a bottle or two of beer, surf the net for worthless and trivial things, and sleep very late, like around 3 to 5 am, only to wake up again a few hours later for work. This was a vicious daily cycle that went on for 4 years. The only reprieve I had was my video games, and my sombre playlist, just enough to block the deafening screams of suicidal thoughts and ideations before I go to sleep. There was also a time I was going home from my internship waiting for the train home, that I thought of just jumping on the train tracks to end the struggle and pain. I was more than ready to attempt as I felt braver now. That was the time I lost all fear for death. Hell, I was ready to buy a rope at Bunnings too as well. But at the back of my head, the same sad picture of my mother crying over my dead body stops me from doing such thing. They said the deliverance was supposed to stop these things, but guess what? It was it that brought it back. It was supposed to keep the demons away, but it did the opposite, and felt so trapped in a cage of deceit and lies. I was supposed to be saved, but why did it felt like I was dying?

It was then I pondered over everything that's happened in my life so far. Where did I fall, where did I stand tall, where did I pick myself up? I thought long and hard enough and decided to start off where it began to crumble: back home. Retracing my steps back to Manila, now 25, I found my old stuff in my old room, before things happened. It reminded me of my simple life and my freedom and innocence. Back when I had complete control of my life. Back when I was the master of my fate. I let the people around me convince me that the man from the sky take the wheel, and it damn well crashed. A head-on collision with a destructive force. I decided to go back to my roots, the one where I felt best. And embracing it tighter than ever and promising to never betray it anymore for any reason.

My ex is now preparing to marry his girlfriend of 3 years. We met accidentally and forgave him already. I'm happy for him and that hopefully his happiness continue on. My old friends are still my friends, but there's already a notable gap between which I do not intend to close at all anymore. I do have new friends now and I keep a healthy distance from them whilst making a worthwhile connection. I am now preparing to enter med school in August and become a surgeon someday. The old house is in shambles, and I realized that a house is not a home, but the family that lives in it. I miss my parents and that my family will always come first, but I am happy to be more independent now and live by myself while studying medicine. Things are well between me and my cousin (my late uncle's child) and that I have forgiven his mother already for the hurt and trouble that they caused us. We see each other as he visits me and grandmother here at the old house every 2 months. When BAs, Mormons, and other religions try to do bible study to me, I am now assertive to tell them that I am agnostic and that I am firm in my beliefs. I am now recovering from my self-destructive ways and more optimistic and living healthier. Love is around, but it felt to me that I have lots to undertake first before I commit myself to someone again. I have backlogged so much that my time has to be devoted to the craft, my family and myself first before anything else. I am trying hard to pick up all the pieces and it seems things are finally going back in its right place. And the craft, after all these years, welcomed me back with open arms without any questions, like a mother does to her child. The sun, moon and the stars never shone brighter before, the day I returned home and answered its longing call.

Now. I have to let this off my chest now once and for all. Pleasure. Why is it a sin to pursue whatever makes you happy? Why must you endure pain just so you can be saved? Isn't that a crooked logic? Why must you be averse to your own will just so you get into a good place in the afterlife? I am only human, I am flawed, but it isn't my fault because I was born and created this way. Why must I be punished for something that is natural for me? If being free and happy costs me a one-way ticket to Hell, then I'd best be off. If my witchcraft, which teaches the opposite of your tyrannic religion, is a surefire way to deliver me there, then I'll make sure I will be a remarkable witch and enjoy my lifetime, and be very ecstatic to march down the fiery highway to Hell after I am gone. But I will never again submit myself to a narcissistic, psychopathic religion who has to kill millions of innocent people, and shun and humiliate people who think in contrast, just to justify and preach the existence of their god and its scriptures. My argument does not end with this and I will not back down anymore in defending my faith.

The craft is my world, and nature is my home. I am a daughter of those who came before, of those who are truly enlightened, of those you can never ever kill. I am a witch, and you can never take that away from me again.

*** Sorry for the long post. Thanks for reading, if you did. I hope you had something to take from my story and may it help you with whatever is botheringvor troubling you right now.

May the journey of life be kind to us all. Blessed be! ❤

[kngjunhwi-blog]

h-hewwo i’ve been out of this loop for a long time but i’m trying to get back in the Game! i’m jing, i’m 23 and i’m in gmt+! ! this is junhwi, 23 y/o gaming/vlogging youtuber.  i’ll just ctrl+c ctrl+v his bio here because i’m lazy !! like to plot or add me on discord #8118 ! ps i don’t do aesthetics so please love my minimalist theme and lazy ass tags! big love and smooches ♥

bio !

junhwi was born in seoul to a scientist father and english teacher mother

moved around a lot as a result of his father’s job - moved to japan when he was 9, stayed for 4 years. then moved to russia for 2 years, then germany for another 3 years. returned to seoul when he was 18, managed to take the university entrance exams and got in to korea university to study computer science smart boi

grew up loving video games, especially nintendo as he got older for nostalgia porn. as gaming/esports became huge in south korea and the country became known globally for it, he decided to become part of the movement and start his own channel. he reviewed new games, took a look back at old games, and streamed himself playing games as others do.

he saw relative success in his home market of sk with gaming, a decent popularity comparable to that of any homegrown gaming youtuber. nothing spectacular, but it was a fun hobby for him.

real success came from when he jumped on the vlogging bandwagon. his first vlog was a typical “my daily life in seoul” video, which received attention from many international/western viewers, in the particular era where creators gained views from focusing their videos on aspects of korean/japanese/chinese culture.

junhwi found that he also just enjoyed vlogging and sharing his life with his subscribers, the count of which increased impressively with each vlog he posted. they were simple, detailing his days at uni, meeting friends, travelling around seoul and showing off his city to the world.

after graduating from university, youtube essentially became his career. he does most of his editing alone, aside from larger scale videos, such as interviewing the seoul public on various topics or collaborations. he managed to enlist friends from university as occasional cameramen/editors, which helps a lot.

now, he keeps up the format of uploading two videos per week - a gaming video and a vlog. he switches up whether he speaks in korean or english, the two languages he’s fluent in, but always adds subtitles of either language.

he applied for mansions because he wanted to do something new for his channel. he’s making a series about his experiences on the show, and it’s created some buzz in the korean vlogging/youtube community.

personality !

suffers from an undiagnosed dissociative disorder. his psychiatrist believed it stems from moving around so often as a child when it was his prime time to make friends and socialize. instead he had to adapt to vastly different cultures, learn new languages, fit into new schools and make new friends repeatedly. he mostly fits into having denationalisation disorder, where he doesn’t feel connected to reality and is detached from his surroundings. he has trouble remembering that he is not the main character in the world, that other people are not just npcs in a game.

with his detached personally, he is extremely bad at vocalising his feelings and emotions. he may seem like he doesn’t care about anything, and is stoic, but it’s more like there’s a block in his mind which stops him from accessing and expressing his feelings. it’s frustrating for others around him, but it’s something that he himself barely notices.

he’s never uncovered the truth about his mental health to his subscribers, and he doesn’t think he ever will. it’s personal to him, and he’s worried that people wouldn’t view him the same if he did. he’s funny, witty, weird and interesting, but he’s scared that people knowing about the workings of his mind would be construed as him not caring about the people who support him.

he came out as bisexual in one of his vlogs - he didn’t make a big deal out of it, didn’t make it the focus of the video. it was just a statement when he spoke briefly about past relationship experiences. fans made a big deal out of it, however, and constantly ship him with whatever male appears in his videos.

wanted connections !

perhaps a youtuber he’s collabed with? they can be close or not so close! or someone who is frequently in his videos, a pal of sorts? a youtuber who he gets shipped with by their fans?

an ex-love interest who somehow managed to be in the house with him too oh lord

someone who wants to be in a vlog with him and has never done it before

someone who he became very buddy buddy with, everyone knows them as the bestest buds of the mansion

a subscriber? :O

fwbs lmao

♥ love interest ♥

IDK let’s just discuss anything

#intro. #mnsintro

[beautifulstarsbeastars]

How do you think Melon’s life could have been different, if he had love/support when he was younger?

Let’s say Melon grew up in a stable and loving environment with an equally loving and supportive family. Here’s what would be different:

- Melon’s hybrid status being an open and accepted topic talked about between him and his parents. His life as a hybrid would still be hard but knowing that he has people he can turn to and who’d love him no metter what he looks like would improve his self-worth and, though he may still hate his hybrid status, he might be more accepting of it and recognize that him being a hybrid does not change who he is.

- No abuse and no abandoment. If Melon was shown unconditional love, spoiled with affection (hugs, kisses, comfort, being told ‘I love you’), and spent time with both of his parents from an early age, he’d know what love feels like and what it means to be loved and maybe, in turn, known how love others too.

- Being allowed to speak his mind and knowing he can tell his parents about being bullied. Continuing on here, Melon would trust his parents and know he could tell them if he were being bullied and how he felt about being a hybrid and that they’d listen and help and reassure him. 

- Looking past his hybridness. Like I said, Melon may still struggle with being a hybrid even if he did have a happier childhood but maybe he wouldn’t be so self-concsious about it. For example: Instead of fixating on the fact that everything tastes like sand to him, maybe he’d enjoy food-related events (birthdays, Rexmas/Thanksgiving dinner, going out to get ice cream) not because of the food itself but because of the people he’s with. Furthermore, he doesn’t like food for it’s taste but rather because of it’s smell or maybe because it’s associated with a happy memory.

- “No species, no friends”. I don’t know if your question was just about having a loving/supportive family growing up but this is still relevant. Making friends may still be a struggle for Melon but having friends would make him feel accepted, not just by his family but by others. It may also improve his conversation skills and his self-worth. These friends would look past him being a hybrid and like him for who he is. They’d see his hybrid nature more as: “Oh, that’s just Melon.” I have two OC’s based off of this idea.

- Self-care. First of all, I do not believe at all that people with mental health problems are inherently dangerous. There are people who have mental illnesses or disorders and live normal lives-they may have some struggles but they are not all bad people. However! If mental disorders are left undiagnosed or untreated, it can negatively affect and contribute to a person’s behavior and/or actions. 

That being said, if Melon does in fact have a mental disorder he may be more likely to get help if he had people who loved him and taught him that that he mattered-thus, making him more willing to take care of himself (also, AntiSocial Personality Disorder (one of the mental disorders Melon is believed suffer from) is thought/believed to be linked to child abuse. I’m not sure the validity of this but if it’s true then it strengthens the likelihood of Melon having it). This also applies to his body dismorphia and his suicidal tendencies (jumping out of a winodw, shooting himself). 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4801766/ Here’s the link to an artical regarding ASPD and child abuse if you’re interested. 

Again, having a mental disorder or illness does not mean a person is bad or dangerous! It may affect their behaviors or actions but it does not make them bad!

When I say family or parents here, I don’t really mean Melon’s mother and father I mean what if he were adopted by a different family-such as Gosha or Gouhin (unless it’s an AU where his parents aren’t abusive or neglectful). I explore and play around with this sort of thing in my Gouhin adopts Melon stories (though I haven’t written anything for that series in a while) but would love to see others interpretation of it.

Sorry for the long reply but there’s just so much about Melon that would be different if he’d had a loving homelife growing up!

#Ask #beastars melon

[gothify1]

Several weeks ago, I got an email from Cartier’s PR team inviting me up to San Francisco to attend its Women’s Initiative Awards. From previous experience, I knew that press trips with Cartier are fun and fancy. However, I didn’t know I was in for an experience that would move me deeply. Upon arriving to an uncharacteristically sunny and balmy San Francisco, I was introduced to the Women’s Initiative program from previous laureates and Mercedes Abramo, president and CEO of Cartier North America. I learned that the Cartier Women’s Initiative is the world’s largest competition that gives female entrepreneurs who are running social impact-driven companies the opportunity to win coaching, mentoring, and financial support. I’m going to hit you with some facts to put this in context: Since the initiative started in 2006, more than 18,000 women have applied, and more than 200 businesses from 51 countries have been supported, which has created almost 7000 jobs around the world.And not just any jobs, but jobs that are directly making the planet a better place. These businesses are doing awe-inspiring and frankly humbling work. I heard from finalists who were doing everything from creating a centralized 911 emergency system in Kenya to providing employment opportunities to Middle Eastern refugees. And it’s not like Cartier has to run this program. I would guess they might sell just as many Love bracelets without it. Yet the company sees tremendous value in supporting women all over the world. In Abramo’s words, “It’s very dear to who we are and what we stand for. We’re a company primarily targeted at women, so it aligns very well with our values of bold, pioneering women.” After getting to hear elevator pitches from all 21 finalists, there was one woman I knew I had to interview. As you might have guessed, she and her two co-founders have a fashion-related product, but one that happens to be changing the lives of people with chronic illnesses. I sat down with Emily Levy in a sunny little corner of the room to learn more about her story. Levy went undiagnosed for seven years with chronic neurological Lyme disease, and when she finally got her diagnosis, she was told she would need a long-term IV to pump antibiotics to her heart. As for how Levy was supposed to protect this expensive medical device (known as a PICC line)? She was advised to wear a sock on her arm. Yes, as in a sock designed for feet. “I was known around campus as the girl with the cut-off sock on her arm. I noticed that people were treating me differently once they could tell that something was going on with my health,” says Levy.  Drawing from her experience, she was inspired to create Mighty Well, a company that sells stylish clothes and accessories for people with chronic health issues. “What we’re putting forward is a sick girl who started a company with her two best friends,” says Levy. “I was in a sorority, but not many of my ‘sisters’ were there for me. It was really my two best friends—now my co-founders, Maria del Mar Cortez and Yousef Al-Humaidhi—who helped to take care of me when I could only take on a partial course load, could no longer go to parties, and getting dressed in the morning was hard. Even just dealing with the amount of medical supplies and nursing visits to my dorm room, they were there for me.” As if this story couldn’t get any more moving, Levy’s friendship and business partnership with Al-Humaidhi grew into a romantic relationship, and the pair were just married last month. When I asked Abrams about what stood out to her about Levy’s business, she remarked, “At [just 25 years old], she identified a problem from personal experience, and she found a way to instill confidence in others and help them through this process. It’s just magic that she put those pieces together to create a wonderful product.”. That first product is a PICC line protective arm sleeve using sportswear fabric technology—a stylish, serviceable solution for the six million people who get a PICC line placed every year, including people receiving chemotherapy. The company has expanded since then to include the Mighty Wrap, which conceals IV lines, the Mighty MedPlanner, and the Mighty Pack, a backpack designed to fit over wheelchairs that has a hidden insulated medical compartment. Levy brought up the recently released Mighty Pack when I asked her about any anecdotes from customers. “We’re a scrappy startup, and within 24 hours of releasing the backpack, we had two young women both in wheelchairs tag us on social saying that the product gave them mobility and that no one was staring at them because they had medical supplies. Dealing with my illness, I’ve felt ‘less than’ too, and I want to be a face for them and show them that just because you’re sick doesn’t mean you have to live a sick life. I still face a lot of health challenges and a lot of doctor visits, but what motivates me every day is getting tagged in those pictures.”  It’s clear that Levy’s company has a significant impact on her customers, so next I asked about the impact being part of the Cartier Women’s Initiative had on Levy and her business. In what I’m learning to be typical Levy fashion, she draws on personal experience to make her point. “My husband, Yousef, is from Kuwait, which is a huge market for Cartier. A lot of women go to Kuwait as teachers and end up marrying men they meet there. Unfortunately, a lot of women are seen as coming there with the aim to find wealthy husbands. In my case, Yousef and I met in college in the United States, and for a year and a half, I didn’t even know where Kuwait was on a map. “When I went to Kuwait for the second time to get married, I told his family members that I was a finalist for the Cartier Women’s Initiative, and they treated me like a businesswomen instead of someone who was coming to find a husband. It was a completely different level of respect because a brand like Cartier stood behind Mighty Well.” Indeed, Ambramo concurs, “It’s all about helping get these women the recognition and exposure they deserve.” That’s respect and exposure for a business that not only does social good, but also reflects inclusivity in multiple ways at its core. For my last question, I asked Levy if she had anything else to add. “Yes,” she replied, “I want to highlight that my co-founder Maria is here on a H-1B visa. She’s originally from the Dominican Republic, and we have faced the challenges that are being talked about in the media. I think it’s so important that we’re sharing our story that I’m a Jewish American, she’s Latina and Catholic, and Yousef is Muslim and Arab. And all three of us have started a social-impact company. The world is telling us we shouldn’t be friends, but I don’t believe that.” As the interview concluded, I rose from my chair without a second thought and then realized Emily was struggling and couldn't immediately lift herself from her seat. Before this moment, there had been no visible cues that Emily was sick, besides the IV port she showed me below her clavicle. Mighty Well often talks about how chronic Lyme disease is an invisible illness, and it was to my eye (until that instant). I helped her up and we swiftly moved on from the moment, nervously laughing a little as we exited the room. In retrospect, I should have paused and asked her what that felt like. To have this great interview—here she was being honored by Cartier and getting to share her and her co-founders’ important work with Who What Wear, a company she mentioned she loves and follows—and then as our conversation ended, being reminded, for likely the millionth time, that her illness can get in the way of simple actions like standing up from a chair. It could have been an opportunity for me to further step into her shoes and gain a deeper perspective on the condition that inspired her company. Without speaking on behalf of Levy, I can only assume that it didn’t feel good. But by creating Mighty Well, she’s a part of the solution—a solution that makes the daily reality of those who have chronic conditions feel just a little bit better, a little bit more supported, and a little bit more confident.