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fanficflaneuse · 4 years

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Life in Black - Episode 2

A/N: Hey lovelies! I know I said I’d update the series every Friday, but this week I just started my master’s and it crushed me lol so, better late than never? I hope you enjoy it. Also, GIF’s not mine, found it on Giphy.

Index

Pilot

Opening Sequence

Episode 2: The One with the Anniversary

Words: 1951

Summary: the family celebrates Sirius and Remus’ anniversary.

Narcissa, Bellatrix and Lucius stood on Grimmauld Place, waiting for the building to stretch and reveal number 12. Sirius and Remus had moved in after Walburga Black’s death and redecorated the house, weeding it of horrible memories.

“Do we really have to do this?” groaned Lucius, “it’s still a good time to bail.”

“Coward,” muttered Bellatrix, who eyed the street uninterested.

“It’s their anniversary. And they were kind enough to invite us, so can you please drop it and enjoy the evening?”

A few minutes later, Regulus Black stood on the other side of the door and welcomed them inside.

“You’re early,” Bellatrix pointed out.

Regulus scoffed. “I live here.”

(REGULUS BLACK) TALKING HEAD

(Regulus sits, legs crossed, on a wooden chair with a red cushion. The walls are covered with some very intricate tapestry, as well as painting, moving and still. The room is heavily decorated with items. The thick rug, in a pattern of red and gold, matches the chairs and the curtains. Behind him, there’s a piano and a bookcase. Musical scores sit everywhere, as well as open books and notebooks and a couple of empty teacups. Regulus is wearing a three piece suit and looks pretty much at ease.)

“I moved in one day,” he says gingerly, “at first it was just for a week, but then I never left. Why would I? I was our parents’ favourite son. It’s Sirius who should be paying rent.”

[Back to scene]

“Salazar, this is tacky. Are you poor? Auntie Walburga must be rolling in her grave,” said Bellatrix as they made their way to the living room.

“Bella! Those are the kind of things you think and not say. Sometimes it’s impossible to live with you,” chastised Narcissa.

“Well, imagine how it is to live with Elio and Oliver,” said Regulus offhandedly.

“Who are Elio and Oliver?” Asked Lucius.

Regulus stopped on his tracks, utterly mortified as he realized what he had just said.

“Reggie, is that a muggle reference?” Narcissa asked, eyeing him humorously. He looked away.

“Poor baby, what have they done to you,” commented Bella as she shook her head in disapproval.

The whole family was waiting for them. Andromeda stood up to greet her sisters, as their relationship had gotten a little better with months of almost weekly meetings.

“Happy anniversary,” Lucius said to Remus as he took a seat by Ted’s side. As Andromeda, Bellatrix and Narcissa rekindled their relationship, Lucius found himself constantly talking to Ted, Sirius and Remus. Out of the three, he liked Ted better because he was the most discreet. He could also really identify with Remus, as they quickly came to the conclusion that being married to Sirius was very much like being married to Narcissa.

“Yes, anniversary,” murmured Remus, eyeing his husband with an amused expression.

“I’m here, bitches” said James Potter as he burst into the room.

Sirius squealed and soon he was clinging to his best friend like a koala. The family eyed the exchange wearily, already used to Sirius’ fits of dramatics. What they didn’t expect, though, was Narcissa’s outburst as Lily Potter crossed the threshold. The blonde gasped and stood up from her place, her whole face distorted by surprise and histronism. Soon, both women almost tackled each other.

When Narrcissa and Lily started getting handsy, the room went wild.

“What is this?” Asked Lucius, his face drained of colour.

“Seriously, what’s going on?” said Nymphadora from the other side of the room.

“They’re...they’re kissing very close to the lips?” said Lucius unsurely.

“Are you blind? Your wife is snogging mine!” answered James, Sirius still hanging from his neck.

(NARCISSA MALFOY) TALKING HEAD

“Lily Jean and I had a histoire d’amour back in our Hogwarts days,” she says with a nostalgic smile, “we were young and crazy. We sneaked into each other’s dorms, made out in every hallway. We even had a bucket list of forbidden places to have sex in. Merlin, I miss those days. When did I get so...domestic?”

[Back to scene]

A few minutes later, Narcissa and Lily share one very small armchair.

“You know those are made for one?” Regulus said.

“Reggie,” said Lily, trying to sound motherly.

“You can’t ‘Reggie’ me after you snogged my cousin, Lillian.”

Lily laughed it off and snuggled into her ex-girlfriend. For a while, everyone tried to keep the conversation going. Ted made sure Lucius had his fix of firewhiskey so he wouldn’t have a fit. Sirius and Remus humoured James. Andromeda tried her best to keep Bellatrix at bay.

After the first half an hour of relative peace, everyone noticed how Narcissa kissed Lily’s neck and caused her to giggle. People - namely their husbands - turned uncomfortable. Sirius then set his foot down.

“You two ruined my soirée!”

“Sweetheart,” said Remus as he came closer to his husband, “right now it seems like Bellatrix might not be the only divorcée in the family. The celebration is the least of our worries.”

(BELLATRIX LESTRANGE) TALKING HEAD

(Bellatrix smokes a cigar)

“Divorcée life is treating me wonderfully. I’d prescribe this to Cissy any day.”

[Back to scene]

Sirius looked at his husband like an annoyed child. He even pouted a little before complaining again: “It’s not fair. Today marks 17 years since I realized I had the hots for you!”

“Wait, aren’t we celebrating your fifth anniversary?” asked Regulus.

“Do you really believe we’d serve this lowly chardonnay if we were celebrating five years of marriage?” asked Sirius in disbelief.

“What’s wrong with the chardonnay?” murmured Nymphadora to herself after downing her fourth glass, much to her mother’s chagrin.

(SIRIUS BLACK - LUPIN & REMUS BLACK - LUPIN)

(Sirius and Remus seat in two champagne coloured poufs. Behind them, there’s a royal bed with many pillows and a spread in the same colour scheme. The room is big and airy, with big windows on one side, overlooking the street. The couple have their hands intertwined.)

“We’ve been married for five years, but we’ve been together for sixteen,” said Remus, smiling dreamily at his husband.

Sirius lets go of Remus’ hand and hugs him. “I’m lucky I fell in love with my best friend.”

“I’m not your best friend,” said Remus matter-of-factly.

“What? Of course you are! Who else would my b-”

“James.”

“He won’t see this,” said Sirius nonchalantly.

Remus gave him a knowing look. Sirius proceeded to sit up straight and look straight at the camera. “I love you Prongs.”

Remus rolls his eyes.

[Back to scene]

“So, you are telling me we came here, brought gifts and are trying our very best not to kill each other,” said Lucius as he eyed his wife and Lily, who were blissfully oblivious of the scene, “to celebrate you realizing you wanted to get in Lupin’s pants?”

“It was one autumn day when I saw Moony’s face and said to myself, this is the man I want in my bed right now,” said Sirius dreamily, making his husband blush.

“Who does that?” asked Regulus, rolling his eyes at his brother.

“Someone who enjoys life?” answered Sirius.

“I can’t believe you all went to the wedding - “

“I wasn’t invited,” Bellatrix interrupted

“I can’t believe most of you went to the wedding and don’t even remember the date,” huffed Sirius.

“Bitch, please last year I forgot my son’s birthday. Right, Lily?” asked James, only to be greeted by silence.

As everyone looked around the room, they realized Narcissa and Lily had ditched the party. Lucius looked like he was about to combust and James was on the verge of tears. Andromeda called her cousins and cousin-in-law to an emergency meeting on the hallway.

“Listen here,” she said, trying not to give too much attention to the giggles and moans coming from a broom closet, “if Cissy divorces Lucius, both she and Bella will need a place to live. So either we fix this mess or we share custody of my sisters. Got it?”

Sirius shuddered. “Cissa’s ego takes too much space.”

“Exactly,” said Andromeda.

“Alright everybody,” decided Regulus “we’re going to therapy.”

“What did you do to him?” Bellatrix demanded Sirius and Remus.

Regulus scoffed. “I’m perfect. I don’t need therapy.”

“Doubt that,” murmured James. Ted snorted in response.

“It’s for your sister,” said Regulus, trying not to feel offended by James. His statement coincided with Narcissa and Lily coming to the room, disheveled, unkempt and hand in hand.

“I didn’t know Andy and Ted needed therapy,” Narcissa said.

“We have the most perfect marriage, right Ted?” Said Andromeda. Ted nodded stiffly.

“If you need any help, breath once and we’ll take you out of it,” whispered Lucius to his brother-in-law.

(ANDROMEDA TONKS) TALKING HEAD

“Ted’s mother inspired me to enroll in a muggle university. It was hard, being pregnant with Nymphadora and all, but I got a degree in psychology and then a masters in family therapy. I’m loaded now, all thanks to the wizarding community’s crumbling interpersonal relationships.”

She shifts uncomfortably. “It would be unethical to try psychotherapy on my own family. So we resort on...roasting each other and calling it a day.”

[Back to scene]

Andromeda sat on a chair in the middle of the room. Lucius and James sat side by side on a sofa as Narcissa and Lily shared the same armchair as before. The rest of the family stood behind Andromeda, watching the back and forth between the spouses. Andromeda tried her best, asking questions for them to open up, but they proved to be the hardest people ever.

“Andromeda, I’ve got a minor in psychology, none of your tricks will work on me,” said Lily.

“Fix this, Malfoy,” said James to Lucius.

“So, James,” asked Andy, “how does it make you feel, to see your wife in another woman’s arms?”

“Are you really a shrink? Because I could do better,” said Bellatrix.

James gave his wife a look. She was snuggling Narcissa. “C-confused?” he said almost in disbelief, “distraught? And frankly a bit turned on.”

“I really don’t understand straight people,” Remus sighed.

“Me neither,” said Nymphadora. Her eyes widened when she realized the room had gone eerily quiet and everyone was eyeing her.

(NYMPHADORA TONKS) TALKING HEAD

(Nymphadora sits on her bed, cross-legged. Her room is painted black, the walls covered with frayed band posters and political messages. She has some drawings around, a stringless guitar long forgotten in a corner and a desk full of papers and some pictures.)

“Did I just come out to my family with two careless words? Perhaps. Did I pretend it was a joke? Definitely”.

[Back to scene]

“Listen,” said Narcissa, “we are not wrecking anyone’s marriage. We are happy with our spouses and overjoyed with our children who won’t stop babbling about each other. We decided to be best friends.”

“Best friends?” asked James unsurely.

“Best friends,” agreed Lily as she kissed Narcissa’s cheek.

Lucius and James exchanged worried glances.

“Pads, Moony, we’re sorry we ruined your night,” said Lily, “we were just excited to see each other after so many years.”

“Bitch, I didn’t ruin anyone’s night. If anything I gave them a show...and a sense of purpose,” she said, eyeing Andromeda, “and just for the record, if I was to divorce Lucius, I’d keep the house, Draco and the peacocks.”

Lucius gulped.

(NARCISSA MALFOY) TALKING HEAD

“It’s good to rekindle old friendships. You discover pieces of yourself you left with them and realize how much you’ve grown…” she smirks mischievously, “bonus points if you find out you never really broke up with your Hogwarts sweetheart and so you’re technically still a couple.”

“I invented side pieces,” she adds, seemingly very pleased with herself.

Roll credits.

Executive producer: @hufflefluff-writer

Tags: @gloriousrebelrunaway

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anxietycalling · 3 years

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Ugh. Ugh. It's been a week since the Atomic Mom went off and, like, I still feel weird about it. I keep not doing anything about it thinking that that's progress because I used to be volatile and reactionary, but is it? Or my silence making me an accessory to her transphobia?

I thought cutting her out would make me feel better, and for a second it did, but I am anxious about it so I keep checking her page like that's going to give me some insight. Spoiler alert: it doesn't. And I just keep thinking about all the things she doesn't know about or doesn't want to know about - Husband, my name change - and it's a mess. It's a mess!

Part of me keeps thinking I should write her a letter, or something, but then I remember the way she absolutely refused to read anything I write despite admitting I had talent. She found something I wrote once, when I was 12, and I used curse words in it so she decided I was a terrible pornographic miscreant forever. I think I was 18 the first time I even wrote a sex thing.

And, like, what would I even put in a letter? "Here's a list of all the horrible things you said to me? Here's my updated birth certificate but also please take me out of your will?" Saying something feels like a nuclear option, but not saying something means she gets to live with her blindfold on pretending she's the greatest mom ever.

I know, I know, this is probably stuff for therapy, but it's too fucking expensive right now, and one of the cats needs a vet visit because she broke a tooth, and I think I am moderately spiraling because in the past I would ask her for help but I don't want to "use her" - her words, not mine.

I don't know. It's complicated because at one time she did give me literally thousands of dollars while I was ruining my life in California. She did bail me out when I needed it, even if she did think I was on meth. (Please note, I have never even done one drug. I am a recovered alcoholic, but that's it, I spent a year drinking my feelings and hated it.)

But also! Also, she tried to get the SPCA to break literal federal confidentiality law to punish me, tried to have me arrested for animal hoarding, all because the drug addict who lived in an apartment before us left her two pregnant cats behind. We tried our hardest to rehome those fucking kittens and keep them healthy with no one helping us. Like, the majority of my money from working went to cat care and she still thought we were just doing drugs all the time. I don't even know. I don't even know!

I am so not the drug sibling in this dynamic. My older brother sold drugs up until he moved out the second time, he sold them from our garage and she never even blinked. My older sister got busted with weed and a bong in the front seat of her car, even did jail time for it (which shouldn't have happened, but still!) and that was just fine. But I constantly try to be a better person and I'm just, like, evil or something?

I know I am never going to win her approval. She sees me as something less than human, okay, some kind of Frankenstein monster.

Some days I wake up and just wish I could hurt her as big as she hurt me. I think maybe that makes me a bad person. I don't know. Can you even hurt someone who doesn't have a heart?

It bothers me a lot that she's never once asked about Husband or my dating life or, like, anything. She wants the beautiful pictures from my sisters' weddings and all the trappings that go along with it, but my actual marriage is a sham to her because I didn't ask her fucking permission. And, like, hell yeah I ran away from her house to be with Husband, because he's awesome, but also because we both recognized if I didn't get out of there I would be dead by now.

Like, I was essentially a prisoner in my own home. I had to account for everything I did to her, constantly, and every dollar I spent, and every phone call and communication. It's exhausting. Who wouldn't take the opportunity to escape if they could? Who wouldn't take the opportunity NOT to be constantly surveilled?

We have never once talked about it, but I know she installed keyloggers on all my devices up until I moved out at 19 and cut her off the first time. I am still constantly terrified that I'm being monitored. I still have trouble even letting Husband use my phone or laptop just in case. He's very considerate and he knows how hard it is for me, but sometimes I wish I could just let him google something without feeling like I need to hover over him the whole time.

I wish I knew what to say. I want to write her a letter, something really scathing, but I know it's useless. She'll just use it to make herself the victim, like she always does, and just add it to her arsenal of why trans people are the enemy and only transition specifically to hurt her.

What is there to say?

Hey, you say and do really hurtful things whenever I try to open up to you? And every time I do you act like I'm personally attacking you with my happiness, so don't call me your kid anymore unless it's to call me your son who you love and support. Don't send me your pity money on holidays so we can sidestep the fact that my appearance in your family tree is an embarrassment. Just don't, okay? Don't act like our family is good and normal when you can't even acknowledge my existence, when you lie to all your friends about how I've been and who I fucking am. Don't act like you didn't try to squash all my interests constantly, or treat me like a deviant, or tell me my first tattoo made me look like I belonged in jail.

The tattoo thing makes me really mad, actually. When things were briefly good between us I had a really cute mother-son tattoo idea. I wanted her to get R2-D2 and I'd get BB-8, because we both love Star Wars and BB is the little baby droid. Maybe it's a good thing we never did it. I don't get why tattoos are this awful, ugly thing to her when she literally got her belly button pierced during her midlife crisis. Especially cause any time I got a new piercing she freaked the fuck out. I got my septum pierced at 16 and hid it from her for years. I was 22 when she found out and her reaction was exactly what I thought it would be. The piercing wasn't even out, it was just the shadow of the retainer in my nose, and she acted like I'd tattooed my entire face or something.

I am so angry that my mom never told her shitty friends I'm trans. It shouldn't be my job to out myself to her redneck friends. It shouldn't be my job to put myself in danger constantly to justify my existence in the hopes of eventually getting the crumbs of affection she's willing to throw my way when she feels guilty enough. It's supposed to be her job to protect me. It's supposed to be her job to protect me from feeling bad, and that extends to the dysphoria of being dead named when I am a literal man with tattoos and a beard and enough back hair to knit a sweater out of.

I just! I wish she'd come out just once and say "I am horrible and transphobic and don't think you should be allowed to exist and be happy, and I think your body is gross." Like, it wouldn't be so bad if she would actually admit what is going on here. It's been 15 years and she is not trying at all.

I wish I could figure out what the fuck to say. I want to just shove everything into an envelope and send it and be done with it. The ball can be in her court to decide what she wants to do.

The worst part about all of this is that I can almost see it from her perspective. Well. Her perspective if she were a human being and not an emotional vampire. She's never been able to look past herself and see situations as they actually are. And I feel bad for her sometimes, because her sisters have fulfilling lives and leave her to do the crappy stuff like caring for my grandparents. I feel bad that she's probably jealous of how close my aunts and uncles are with their kids. But she doesn't realize that that's her fault for being so rigid and unforgiving and stubborn. If she were willing to change, or admit fault at all, we'd be a lot closer.

My brother still cries about her and why she doesn't love him sometimes. He's still looking to fill that hole where parental love should be. He's repeating our parents' patterns because he's hurting, too, and until our mom learns to be a human person he's just gonna keep getting hurt.

Times like this make me really wish there were an easy solution. I've read so many books and articles on estrangement I could be an expert by now.

Is it bad that a very petty part of me just wants to post more pictures and tag her on Facebook to make all her friends have to see it? Is that something? I know I shouldn't actually do it lest she cause a huge shitstorm, but it would feel so personally satisfying for a minute before the regret and panic set in.

Maybe I will print out that thing she posted and just literally mail that to her along with whatever letter I end up eventually writing her.

#personal #nothing big just #momblogging

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bitchscavenger · 3 years

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find me

I've been living with my parents for twenty years before I moved out. My parents were happy, until my dad got heart attack and dying. That's where everything changes. Mom not really pleased when dad is drug induced and sleep all the time. She starts find another person to satisfy her attention. That time she got herself a boyfriend, who she talks bad all the time. I’m not mad at her, I’m glad she's happy, so was my dad.

Later, he got worse and died. Mom cried so hard, but she got her boyfriend by her side. She collects herself pretty good. Dad left enough to make her live her life alone. He even left her with her boyfriend. What a thoughtful man he is. I don't know where I stand or what should I feel for him to let her have another man while they are together. That's their problem, not mine. Then again, I’m such an ungrateful bad kid who didn’t care about what my parent do.

Despite that story, my mom always made me listened to her. So did my dad. I got no voice in my life. Only got ear to listened and body to do what I’ve been told. Even when I am stressing about my grades. Even if I got bullied in school. Even if I have eating disorder. They don’t know because they didn’t tell me to talk. Always listened and decide in silent. That’s what I do best. Every argument I made is a stupid idea. As a prestige’s well-mannered family, I was born into, you need to be lady when you're a girl. I’m far for it, never have been a lady for once. Yes, I listened to them, but they’re not around enough no caging me in their house. I go out a lot. I join lots of school project and extracellular. That’s how I spent my live, living outside the world. Even they never really knew what I’ve done or who I’m with.

Mom always said "Don’t be stupid, you can’t do that, we don’t do that, I raised you to be better than that, go find something else"

That “stupid” word been embedded in my head. That phrase where she said how not enough I am. You can only being told so much before you start believed in them. That it did. I believe my voice isn’t good. My word doesn’t matter. My existence isn’t important.

I left to go to college abroad. Building my carrier into Olympian. I'm happy and contented and busy with work. Do job that I love, it’s heaven. I don’t even think of anything that time. I’m in love with my job and myself, never disappointing.

I get close with my family. Go home every year and call every month. But that just not enough. No matter how much I call them, I only listened, that’s what I do best and what they expect me. Pleasing everyone is exhausting, changing you into someone you don’t want to looked in the mirror.

Nonetheless, I always listened and try to help as much as I can, just not vice versa. Maybe that’s my fault. I never tell them anything, just tell them what everybody already knows. Never let them in, hoping is hurting, I never open for hope. Hoping people do what you try to do, making them happy, when they can’t do the same.

I didn’t tell how sick I am with myself. How hard to build myself. How tiring to eat something. How hard to looked into the mirror. How hard to be accepted. How hard to find something worth in you to fight. How exhausting to fight every time darkness took me back to the old me. Not even when I’m confident to tell my argument. Not when I’m happy knowing my worth. Not when I’m satisfied after five course meal I finish. I’m so used with my new self, living it and don’t need anyone to judge and don’t care. I don’t share myself with them. I’ve been raised to listened and that's what I best do and what made them happy. Until my disease kick in.

It's an autoimmune disease where there's inflammation in spinal cord and optic nerve. Google it NMO. First time I thought it only a near-sighted, then it became colorless and more and more blurred vision. I’m scared I’ll be blind, so I go to hospital. Well, knowing how hard I work and how little I rest, thought it only lack of focus from being tired. Two year later my body gave up. I just finish my Olympic final game in Brazil when all my arm and legs start to burn and tight and painful until I feel nothing. Can’t feel my arm and leg anymore. I give up and lost my gold medal. Collapsing on locker room.

It was my first injury, or so I thought. There just no muscle that inflamed. I work so hard for this I never risk my body. When my doctor said I need to stop because I push my muscle too much, I stop. I took my time and rest. Working on debate club in school or lazily study so I can graduate. I'm not ambitions but I enjoy doing sport, i love it and that's what my live have been.

They took me to hospital. I forget how long I was there, but nothing works. They give lots and lots of drug and nothing work. My body keep boring and I start losing my vision. Until my MRI test said I have spinal cord inflammation. That's the treatment start. A whole year I do psychotherapy. Alone. There only five people who know at first, my doctor my coach, my coach assistant and two of my teammates. They support me so much I’m grateful having them.

I start focusing on finish collage while climb debating carrier because I got no energy to work my body muscle. News said I bailed and what a coward, close, cocky bitch I am. Yap, they talk trash about me because I don’t mingle on my first Olympic party. That what my family know too, and I let them.

Also, at that time I felt that I am. Or my body is. My body bailed on me. It's such a shame that your body can't keep up with your mind. Living in your head, knowing what to do but can't.

But I didn’t regret it. I’m glad I colas, so I get rid of toxicity in my live. Saving the best part and keeping it close. I’m happily working in school and climbing my debate carrier. Having debate teammates that never took pity on me. Country paid half of my treatment and I get help from support system, charity, and foundation. I know I won't heal. After a year full of physical therapy, I got my strength back. The relapse is on and off. I had my roommate slash best friend and debate teammates looked after me. It's pretty easy to treat me, either you wait until get better by myself or call ambulance which is my first and only emergency contact. Mostly the former because it isn’t a bad relapse.

I’m so lucking having her-kind of friend. The one who call all my bullshit no matter how sick I am. The kind who nagging me for my stupidity while clean up my mess. She knows I can feel when the symptoms start, just like get warning form deep down. That, usually I ditch the warning and she'll get crazy mad cause I didn’t tell her. But sometimes the symptoms came so suddenly I can’t even get a warning, that's when the worse came. God only know what cause it and she's the only one who really care. I don’t even care. My coach only care if it's interfered my training or impact my skill. Usually it isn’t. My relapse isn’t that bad, thank god. Even when I need to hit hospital, the recovery only takes one- or two-days max. But my best girl has too big heart not to care about me. And for once I hold on to her cause she knows my struggle from start, and I know her struggle from broken heart. Can’t say I have experience on that, but so far, my advice is good. Even my debate club friend asked me relationship advice. Guess romance movie hit on me very well.

I got back to Olympic eventually. After two years finishing collage and there's nothing to do than living my life the way I can, I decide I’m capable go back to field. It helps releasing stress and prevent relapse. My doctor clears me out. He can't say much actually. This is the kind of disease that you carry as long as you live. Only you can choose whether living your life the fullest or drowning in your misery. I choose the former.

Until one day, when I visit my parents. They told me merry this man. And I still have no voice in it, no matter how much debate competition I won, I won't win this because it’s no competition, purely dictating. It's for the best and he's a good man. We get married a year later. In his house back yard with a thousand guest. Besides my best friend as my maid of honor, my Olympic team that consist of ten people, my coach, and two coach assistant, my specialize doctor who treated me, and my eight teammate debate club friend that I know well enough to invite, it's nothing compared to his, his family or my family acquaintance. What can I say, I’m a person of myself, in my twenty-seven years I live, no other close friend I want to invite in my unimportant wedding. Can't say I’m happy to get married, but I don’t hate it either. He's a good man and I can do the same. He needs to get married to get his grandparents company and his parent is close friend to mine. Besides, I’m in my prime age to marry. I’m well mannered, independent, and have as much money as he is so he doesn’t need to worry I took all his wealth.

Until two year later when I got my first relapse after three hurt-less happy life. Just when I thought the disease gave up on me, it came back. What a bitch. We were having a gala that night, celebrating second company he builds. My body just give up on me after a dance. The problem is, I just finish my dance with his buddy I’ve been friend with when I told him to give me one more dance with him after he asked me. Media caught it. They all thought I’m having an affair and make a scene when my husband caught me. It gets worse when no one know what to do and took me to wrong hospital. I stay paralyzed and untreated right until the gossip reach my best friend, she's in other country, she called my doctor. He practices in different hospital, luckily, I paid him well and we kind of close and he came to my wedding, so he came as fast as he can. Though I still feel like an eternity cause my body burn like hell and it hurt so much, and I can’t move.

A week later I got home without my husband there. He's mad cause I didn’t tell him anything and everything. The those feeling change into something else. He relied that we're only partner in this relationship. He's sick of me listening and doing whatever he wants without knowing what I want. I never mad, never cry, never disagree on his decision. Even if it’s wrong and cost him a lot.

Like when he tells me we were going to move closer to his grandparents’ company, so he won’t need to much time on the road. And I told him that his grandparent company isn’t health, but I didn’t push. What can I say? Graduated in sains not business.

Told you what, I’m right. His grandparents’ company is collapsing, and he work ninety hour a week, only resulted more collapse. He wore himself so I retiree and help him a little in his company. I’m good at finding loophole and opportunity, so that I did. What he doesn’t know is, I’ve been invested my money on this company while I help him. In the end he got back. His company run well, and I resign. I built a home-schooling program and get coaching certificate, can't go too far away from field.

That only the beginning of his bad decision. Lots of bad client picking or investment choosing. But he always come back. Come home and winning like a child getting low grade in class. Again, I pick him up. I help and help and help until he builds his second company. Me, I’m just a night talker and helper of decision making, a nice, good wave that coach high school student while making multi million from good investment.

That time when I wake up from relapse. He knows everything. He knows I put money on his company, lots of money, and on rival company. He sees me as the good face wave turn into viper. With all the gossips running around. With me helping my husband turn into me stabbing him.

"I know we don’t love each other the way husband and wave should be. Doesn’t mean we weren’t respect each other. I respect you and I care for you and I thought that the feelings mutual. I was wrong. Big wrong. They're right, nobody's perfect. Everyone has skeleton in their closet they try to hide, and I’m okay with that. I’m no saint, I have my sins. But you what hurt most, I never thought you capable on stabbing me behind my back, cheating on me, taking my company, controlling all my life with your sweet talk. I’m honest and open with you. I just want this marriage to work and I was happy. Verry happy until I realize my wave only want to take everything, I’ve been fighting for my whole life then leaving me cold."

He said it calmly. He used to have emotion pouring his eyes. When has he said it, his eyes flat? Nothing left here. Not even when I told him the truth. Nothing change when I told him I did that to help him, I never want anything from him, and I didn’t cheat on him, I never had much friend and his buddy is good to me like he is. I like both and I respect them. But that's not enough. Apparently caring for each other not enough to hold relationship.

The divorce not going smoothly. Media talk, but we didn’t go to court. I told my lawyer to give him everything I can to give. I’m the bad guy. But I didn’t take any think from him. I let go off my connection with him the day he chooses to trust media than his own wave. I know I didn’t live him the way I should be, but his feeling mutual, I do care of him. He just couldn’t see it and I couldn’t be sweeter just like any other woman.

I lost lots money; I left the house. I left the program I build, left my jobs as a coach. The job id enjoys so much. I left with two little bums in my stomach. Didn’t know I can get pregnant. My disease usually prevents to get pregnant. I had lots of miscarriage in the past. That’s why I’m used to having my heart broken. But never know that my pregnancies could go into seventeen weeks without complication.

I was debating with myself whether to tell him or not. We're only divorce for two months and I don’t want to him to think worse of me. Deciding to leave and live near the best friend and her husband. They live in small town with great art program in the community.

For the past five months of pregnancies is hard. Not just hard, its nightmare. The babies strong but I’m not. Lots of relapse and drugs and when the baby finally born, I was hospitalized for two months. It’s been hard and even harder with twins. But I survived. We survived. We live.

While I was hospitalized, my ex-husband came looking for me. He never gets hold on me. In this small town, everyone knows everyone. They knew me from media and the used to hate me. But they love my best friend, so they love me eventually. Knowing my real story, they understand. Life is hard, they make it easier. The community is very open and helped a lot. So, when my ex looking for me, they took pity one us, me, and him. They see us as the victim of media.

A month later he came back again and found me with my baby. I tell him they're his. I know because I only had sex with him. I don’t even contact his buddy anymore. Turn out he just want to apologize for his behavior. He wants me back but we both know we won’t love each other. So, he goes back to the big city after asking me to live with him again because we had babies and he want to be together with them. I just don’t feel it. I’m done doing whatever people told me to do. I like live in small town and I’m happy. Working as an artist in new community. Knitting, crocheting, sewing, painting, sculpting, doing all new art I haven’t done before. With my baby and my disease that have been came on and off more after I gave birth. Finally, I found myself. After lots of struggle, lost and found, ups and down, I know I’d like to try my new life and again living my live fullest. After all, that’s all I can do

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fuhrmana · 4 years

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An Incomplete List of Fics I’m Not Writing (Pt 2/?)

I would come up with a title based on Texas and LA (Slight AU, set around the time of the Halloween episode in s3)

Probably when Captain Strand was recruiting, Buck got an offer (c’mon, you know that Owen would have a soft spot for a man fighting to not let an illness keep him from firefighting)

Buck probably turned it down initially, because he was convinced that the lawsuit was going to work, and his family would accept him back with open arms

Then Buck gets back, and it’s off. Eddie’s closed off and mean, Bobby keeps punishing him, and Hen and Chimney keep making jokes that Buck doesn’t get, and that, that’s even worse than them being mad at him. He missed so much, and he feels so left out, and it’s hard to jump in and stay positive when the two feelings he gets from work are “begrudging hostility” and “you’re third wheeling on the greatest friendship in the house”

Buck starts worrying that the lawyer was right, and maybe he should have taken the money

That’s when Buck reaches out to Captain Strand and asks if he can come and formally interview

Buck usually thinks things through, but this time he’s pretty impulsive and he requests a week off

(note, I don’t know how firefighter interviews go, but in this case he’s doing a few shifts with the team to see how they fit)

Bobby signs off on it

There would be panic from the 118 except they think he’s doing Spring Break in Texas and there is some good natured teasing going on in one of the group chats, not one Buck is a part of

(Well this got aggressively long)

Buck fits in even better than he thought he would

TK and Captain Strand’s respectful and loving Father/Son relationship is #goals af, and Buck basks in the reflected light of it

Marjan Marwani (who Buck has 10000% watched youtube videos of) is possibly the coolest firefighter Buck has ever met. They bond over videos of them doing amazing rescues, and no one at the 126 treats her like she’s an idiot for jumping into danger to save people

Meanwhile, Mateo is hanging with them, watching all of these videos, and Thriving. Buck is so happy to have someone who looks up to him? It’s what he thought he was going to get when Eddie joined as a probie

Paul looks at Buck for three minutes on the first day, and says seven insightful things about Buck

Buck frantically googles “are psychics real” on his phone

Judd doesn’t know how he feels about Buck, but hell, he’s always liked dogs, and Buttercup and Buck are pretty similar

Buck loves being liked, so he considers them fast friends by the end of the first shift

TK and Buck bond over shared hospital trauma, and TK ends up taking Buck to the gay bar with Carlos and Paul

Paul looks at Buck while they’re in the car and says “I guess I’m the token straight again”

Buck blushes but does not deny it

Buck watches TK and Carlos a lot

It makes him. Think about. Things.

There is an ambiguous scene where Buck maybe goes home with someone

Buck goes on two more shifts

There are some funny calls

Some serious calls

And one call that makes local news

And picked up by national news

Buck gets a pinged in the group chat about how funny it is that he has a lookalike in Texas

Austin Texas

Where he’s on vacation

Wait a minute that’s not a look alike

Buck why are you riding with the 126?

Buck leaves them on read

Halfway through his final trial shift, Buck is drinking a coffee out of a truly magical device, when Marjan, Mateo and Paul drag him over to some couches, and shove him up next to Buttercup

Judd spots them across the firehouse and walks in another direction

Owen and TK are at the chemo place

It’s kind of an intervention

Buck has been pretty chatty about his current team, and they’re all confused as to why he’s thinking about leaving

Marjan makes at least one joke about not wanting to share the spotlight with him

Buck tries to explain, but he’s stumbling over his words and he ends it with

“You’ve known me for five days, but you asked me to explain myself. My team’s known me for years, and they would have told me what I was thinking. I’m worried I can’t. Grow with them. And that’s why I left Pennsylvania”.

Buck looks stricken after he says this and gets up walks away

Paul sighs

“He’d be a good fit here, but I don’t think he’s going to accept the offer.

At the end of the shift, Captain Strand says “we can make it work for you to join us, but I need an answer within a week.”

Buck shakes his hand, tells Captain Strand that he’ll be letting him know as soon as he’d had a chance to talk to his family

This is mostly referring to Maddie, but...

Buck gets back to LA, and finally responds to all of the messages he’s gotten since the lookalike kerfuffle

“Haha, yeah that was me. It’s kind of a funny story, I’ll tell you all tomorrow during the shift.”

He shoots a different text off to Maddie

Hey, can I see you? Just got back from the airport

He ends up at Maddie’s place, explaining how the whole week has been, and how he doesn’t want to abandon her in LA after she moved there for him, and that he feels stupid because he sued to get his job back and now he’s thinking about leaving, and probably both of them cry

Buck probably sleeps there (for old times sake)

In the morning, before he heads off to work, she stops him and says “Don’t stay for me. But see if you want to stay for yourself”

Buck goes into the firehouse, and Bobby does the breakdown of the day, and then looks at Buck and says “we’re all waiting to hear how you ended up helping the 126 during your vacation”

And Buck laughs nervously and says “Well, so I was actually doing a trial week with them” and there is a Ruckus

Chim is upset because of Maddie, but also Buck

Eddie is furious because of Eddie reasons

Bobby had kind of assumed it had to be something like that, but it Hurts to have it confirmed

Hen looks conflicted. She’s thought about leaving this job before, but never to transfer somewhere else, and she needs a minute to think it through

Buck frowns and says “I really liked working with the 118, but they aren’t my family. I don’t want to leave another family, but I need to know that you all want me here too”

Bobby is starting to wonder if he should call out his whole team and do emergency therapy

Buck is kind of hoping the bell will go off so it can end here

The bell does not go off

Bobby starts talking, but trails off before he finishes the sentence and restarts

“Athena told me I either had to let you do the job or go somewhere where you could. Buck, I want you here, and I’m sorry I haven’t shown it. I don’t think this can be fixed overnight, so maybe we should talk about your timeline

the bell rings right after this

Bobby gets dramatic timing better than Buck does

When they get back from the call, Buck and Bobby and the spirit of every sponsor and therapist the two of them have ever had have a conversation about what Buck needs at his job

And the fact that Bobby is willing to make a few concessions and admit that he was in the wrong about a few things

Buck leaves the office to find that the rest of the team has divvied up his time to talk through why exactly he was leaving and why he shouldn’t

Chim is blunt, Hen is supportive of whatever decision Buck needs to make and Eddie glares at Buck and tells him that they’re meeting at Eddie’s house after the shift

Buck wants to see Christopher, but he’s hoping that Eddie isn’t going to use Chris as the reason that Buck should stay

Buck gets to Eddie’s house after shift, only to find out that Christopher isn’t... home that night

Buck is uneasy

Eddie sticks Buck on the couch, shoves a beer into Buck’s hand and starts pacing

Eddie and Buck both aren’t great at words

Eddie starts and stops for an eternity (three minutes)

Finally Eddie sits on the couch, takes the beer he gave Buck, takes a swig and hands it back

I have to stress, there is only one beer

Eddie got Buck one, but not himself

Eddie finally settles on a sentence

“I finally started seeing a therapist”

Buck doesn’t say anything and neither does Buck

Eddie continues

“He thinks I’m projecting. Like I’m mad at you for what I was doing, and I think he’s right.”

Buck opens his mouth, but Eddie holds his hand up.

“I want you to know that I don’t want you to leave, but I won’t be angry at you if you leave, and I’ll make sure we stay in contact.”

Eddie won’t be mad at Buck, he’ll finally get mad at the person who deserves it

(that’s himself, just fyi)

Buck very carefully takes a sip of the beer.

It doesn’t seem like Eddie has anything else to say, so Buck finally speaks

“I don’t think I’m leaving. I fought to come back to you for a reason. If we’re all ready to work towards each other, I’m not going to bail.

There’s silence for a little longer. Buck hands the beer over to Eddie and continues.

“I think it was good that I tried it though. I think I needed to see how other houses work to see what I should be asking for.”

Buck wants to talk about some of the other things he’s seen but it feels like too much

Instead they play video games

Buck calls up Captain Strand and volunteers for any temporary help they may need, but nothing permanent. Bobby and Buck continue working on their relationship. Slowly Buck becomes a part of the inside jokes of Chim and Hen again. Eddie and Buck continue to spend time together, and Buck continues talking to the 126 for a while.

This is probably where this particular story ends

#9-1-1 #fic prompt

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goldeneyedgirl · 4 years

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TwiFicMas Redux: NYE Edition

STL Alice is being a reluctant brat in telling me what she wants to say, so instead of a surprise chapter, I bring you... more of The Unexpected Second Life of Mary Alice Brandon: Magnolia. This is the official end of FicMas until I decide that the thing the world needs is some ridiculous lead up to Valentine’s Day with 12 variations on Alice and Jasper being cute.

So, onwards my dears, and I hope everyone has a happy and safe NYE.

(Alice has met the Cullens, had a very Pro-Jasper vision, and bailed poor Jasper up in public to try awkwardly flirting with him. Rosalie tells Alice to fuck right off leave Jasper alone, and Alice is feeling very sorry for herself, especially since her new stepsister Ellie has told everyone at Forks High that Alice was in a mental institution, and has a pretty strained relationship with her mother and sister.

Anyone who might have read Memento Mori can probably recognize aspects that I later used for it, and will probably be changed for the final posted version as recent read-throughs have agitated the Editing Badger that lives in my brain.)

Halloween was fast upon us, and everyone else seemed excited for the dance - it was already the only thing that anyone talked about. Not that many people were talking to me at school – Ellie’s rumour spreading had made me the subject of a lot of gossip, but no overtures of friendship.

And I hated Halloween.

My previous Halloween had consisted of watery green cordial in paper cups, cupcakes with chalky orange icing and a sad pair of cardboard wings I'd made in art therapy. Trick or treating at various doctors' offices and the nurses station had been compulsory and the ‘treats’ had consisted of sugar-free candy or fruit that most of us left to rot in the day room.

Forks kids seemed really psyched about it. The school was decorated in green and purple streamers, with cardboard bats and twine spider webs. Cynthia was having a Halloween Costume Parade at the middle school. Every food outlet in town had Halloween specials, and even the gas station was selling costumes.

I couldn't bring myself to care about costumes or anything else. Ellie was planning on going as Marilyn Monroe, and Cynthia was going as Dorothy, bouncing off the walls in excitement over the red-sequin shoes she had made herself.

Forks High had a costume contest that involved free movie tickets or something, and it was clearly a big deal, from the plans I overheard. I had absolutely no intention of dressing up, not so much as a pair of orange socks.

It was only when mom got annoyed at me that I dug out an old, long-sleeved leotard and a frilly skirt. Paired with leggings and flats and a sleek bun, I looked like a pretty half-assed ballerina, but it passed Mom's scrutiny. I had, of course, attempted just to leave the house in PJs, but had been marched back up to my room.

With my hoodie zipped up, I didn’t look like I was in costume at all. However, everyone else definitely was – even the Cullens had managed to get in on the act. Rosalie was a gorgeous flapper, her hair pinned up elaborately to look like pin curls; the biggest Cullen who was Rosalie’s boyfriend made a convincing if friendly-looking gangster. Edward and his dark-haired girlfriend were hippies, complete with an elaborately painted guitar and flower crown.

Jasper looked about as enthused about the holiday as I was, with a cowboy hat and boots.

The teachers were handing out candy and snacks – my Lit teacher had actually made mini-cupcakes for every single one of her students, complete with little candy pumpkins. The cafeteria provided bat-shaped cookies and disgusting pumpkin-flavoured mains, which meant my lunch ended up being a cookie and a soda, and the candy from my morning classes.

I wasn’t expecting to open my locker that afternoon to find a small pile of candy and two of Ms Lowe’s mini-cupcakes on a napkin. Who even had my locker combination? Was this some ill-planned attempt to make me feel better from the administration?

Candy was candy, and I popped the cupcakes into my mouth as I pulled my books out and crammed them into my shoulder bag. I had a headache coming on, no doubt from the amount of sugar I had consumed and my tight hairdo. Yanking the pins and hairnet out, I let my hair tumble around my face in loose waves.

It was only when I shut my locker and turned around, I saw Jasper Hale watching me from the end of the hallway, an utterly inscrutable look on his face.

I popped a piece of gum in my mouth and walked out, pulling my hood over my head to avoid the ever-present drizzle. Another wet walk home, to hand out candy all evening – both Ellie and Cyn had Halloween dances at school, and Mom and Craig were chaperoning for Cyn’s school.

As I walked across the cafeteria towards my usual corner table, I felt my vision blur and darken, and the last thing I was aware of was the sound my tray made as it fell from my hands.

Blood pooling in the snow, a house of mirrors. Feet – my feet, my old boots – running through the forest. Cold, blue lips, my father’s dead eyes as he stared at me from the seat next to me, blood everywhere, black and red and warm… My own strangled screams, and the bitter taste of powdery pills on the back of my tongue, leaving me feeling dull and clumsy. My hoarse calls. Myself screaming as the ECT went terribly wrong.

I came back with a gasp to find myself standing in the middle of the cafeteria, my tray at my feet, and people were whispering, giggling. My vision was still swimming, and I couldn’t get myself to move; I was worried I would trip or faint. I could still see myself running in the snow, smell and taste the blood.

And then there was someone at my elbow, murmuring in my ear. I heard nothing as they guided me, my legs feeling gelatinous. I was gently, carefully helped onto a seat and when I blinked I was looking at Edward Cullen, who was beside me looking concerned.

“Alice, are you okay?” he asked in a low voice.

I swallowed hard, and just nodded my head. It was pounding, but reality was fitting itself back together slowly. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes again for a second.

“Alice,” the dark-haired Bella was beside me, holding a paper cup. “I got you something to drink.”

“Thank you,” I croaked, taking the paper cup. As I sipped, I realised the rest of the Cullens were at the table – the big one was staring at me curiously, Jasper was pointedly ignoring me, and Rosalie was giving me a death look.

I set the cup down on the table. “Thank you for helping,” I said simply to Edward. I knew where I wasn’t welcome, and I wasn’t going to be a verbal punching bag for Rosalie twice in one week. I could get something out of the vending machine in the doorway and hide in the library again.

“Do you need to go to the nurse?” Bella asked kindly.

“No, I’m fine now. It happens,” I offered her a smile that was far too brittle to be convincing, and stood up carefully. My balance was still slightly off but it would be enough to get me away.

“Please, sit with us for a while,” Edward said, shuffling along. Rosalie sneered at me. “Ignore her, she’s naturally unpleasant. Stay, please.”

I knew that I probably wouldn’t make it across the cafeteria without stumbling like a drunken toddler. I also knew that Rosalie was probably one lunch break away from dumping me in a shallow grave.

But I took the seat again.

Rosalie’s gaze landed on my wrist, where my hospital band had fallen loose of my sleeve.

“What is it?” she asked, nodding at it. “A hospital band?”

I found myself almost cowering at her words, shrinking back as I slid the band back under my sleeve.

“Yes,” I said quietly. “You’ve probably heard the rumours.”

“We don’t exactly keep abreast of the Forks High rumour mill,” she sniffed as if I had told her to eat out of the garbage.

“Why should we? We are the rumours,” the big guy grinned and Rose, Edward and Bella all collectively rolled their eyes.

“What were you in for?”

Jasper. Rose scowled at me, and then him, and then refocused her ire on me. I was done. This was uncomfortable and weird and if I had wanted to be somewhere with people who didn’t want me, well, I had a lot of choices.

“I’m the crazy one,” I said and stood up. “Thanks, again.”

I felt their eyes on me as I walked away, and didn’t even bother to stop for lunch. I just headed to the library.

#my nye included test-driving new sleep medication so i think that explains more than it probably should #TwilightFicMas2019 #TwilightFicMas: Redux #It never fucking ends #FicMasGothic: the end never comes #everyone just has to read snippets of my unfinished writing with no resolution for the rest of time #twilight fic #twilight #alice cullen #jasper hale #jalice #my fic: tuslomab #my fic: magnolia

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butterflyinthewell · 5 years

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I had a violent meltdown last night because my mom burst into my room and told me I had to update dad’s medication list RIGHT THEN. (My computer was off, so I had to boot it up.) I was watching a livestream on my iPad that I waited all day for and had to bail out of it over this shit.

Dad has DBS probes in his brain and the battery packs are in his chest. He has to get them replaced via surgery every few years. It’s minor outpatient stuff, no big deal. He goes to pre-op tomorrow. Well, mom had all week to throw this damn medicine list at me, and she chooses the night before pre-op to do it.

I was livid. I let her know I was pissed and that she had all week to do this, but she chose the middle of something I waited all day for to come in and demand I do it RIGHT THAT SECOND. I do not respond well to sudden demands and pressure like that. She knows this. Okay, she didn’t know I was watching a livestream, but I said I was busy and could do it later, and was told NO, NOW.

The medicine list is important. I get that. But I am always made to feel that everybody else’s shit is important and my shit is always silly unimportant stuff with no meaning to anybody but me. Even things that would be considered important if it was somebody else’s is treated as unimportant when it’s ME.

I fixed the damn list. Then it turns out I did it wrong the first time because I didn’t see something had been crossed off and that’s where I lost my shit.

I was screaming and swearing and throwing papers around the kitchen, so that’s when I got the hell out of there and went to my room because I was going to break dishes if I didn’t. I slammed the door, kicked it several times and paced around and that’s about when I turned on the camera to record this fucking useless nightmare of a thing I become when I have meltdowns.

I get horrible looping thoughts when I have meltdowns. Sometimes they are “I wish I would die right now” and other times they are “I hope this fucking planet burns up and takes me with it.” They’re thoughts I have because I want everything to stop. I wish I could freeze time. I want everything to stop so I can calm my worthless ass down. A meltdown feels like dying, and then it’s every emotion ever coming up at once in a wave of metaphorical emotional puke spewing forth from my limbic system. Fun times, NOT.

I didn’t leave my room again last night except to give my mom the correctly fixed list and to use the bathroom before going to bed later on. I got on fb messenger to tell @donnywinter I was sorry for bailing on his livestream and he talked me out of the spiral I was going into. He isn’t autistic, but he can understand the spiraling thoughts because he deals with depression and experiences similar thoughts. We both gave those feelings words. I said it feels like becoming empty and he said it’s like being swallowed by hollowness. (We’re both poets, so sometimes we say creative stuff like that to each other.) He helped me not hate myself all night, so I didn’t go to bed wishing I never existed.

Now, cue this morning.

Dad tried to give me shit this morning. He said he wanted to “talk” about it, but I knew he was going to give me his same tired shit he always gives me after meltdowns. It went as predicted-- he tried to tell me how my emotions make him feel bad and how I’m embarrassing and need to stop that. It’s all about how my feelings make him feel, and never mind why I feel that way or how much pain I’m in. He was upset with me for yelling “fuck” so much. I laughed at him and said “Dad, I learned that swearing when you’re stressed is actually healthier. I don’t say fuck outside of the house.”

He tried to tell me that kind of language isn’t okay when he talks like a fucking sailor when he’s mad, so I called him on his bullshit hypocrisy and swore a whole lot while doing so. I didn’t cuss him out specifically, I just used, as Spock once said, a lot of colorful metaphors.

I told dad I’m going to therapy to deal with my anger because it’s so bad I can’t handle it alone anymore. I was too much of a fucking coward to say he was the reason I need it, but now he knows why I “go to the doctor” once a month. I told him it’s probably going to get worse before it gets any better because I’m still learning how to deal with it.

But the fact remains that he cares more about how my feelings make him feel than how and why I’m feeling something. As long as it doesn’t embarrass him or cause him discomfort, it’s fine. As soon as he feels a little bit uncomfortable, oh no no, Cyndi stop that, don’t get mad, don’t feel that way, you’re not really that upset, you get upset over everything, that’s not important enough to get mad about, oh honey give it a rest, that’s enough, stop it, nobody wants to be around you when you’re like that, this is why people don’t like you, this is why I have to be hard on you, get over it kid, I say this because I love you, that’s not how ladies talk, nobody is going to listen if you yell like that all the time, nobody else on the planet acts like this, stop being a fucking baby...

That’s my life. My feelings don’t matter to him as much as his own feelings about my feelings. Fuck that noise.

I walked away from him and said, “I got nothing to say to you.”

Our talk lasted all of 2 minutes because I shut it the fuck down. He’s usually the one who shuts me down, so I turned his own bullshit back on him. He can stew in it for all I care.

#actuallyautistic #dad issues #emotional abuse #swearing #tw emotional abuse #tw vomit mention #tw suicidal ideation #I am not in danger of suicide don't worry #it's a meltdown thought that goes away when the meltdown is over #then I freak out about it afterward sometimes

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starryknight09 · 5 years

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Whatever It Takes Ch. 18/18

Summary: Peter’s struggling to cope after the loss of Mr. Stark. Everyone keeps telling him it’ll get better and that he needs to move on, but Peter doesn’t want to. He can’t envision a life without his mentor. So when an idea comes to him, he doesn’t hesitate, no matter how crazy it is. He’s going to get Mr. Stark back.

“What exactly are we going to do?” Ned asked.

“Whatever it takes.” Peter answered.

Read on AO3.

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Peter didn’t get better all at once.

It was definitely a process, and it was frustrating, but he kept at it. He put in the effort with Ruth even though he didn’t think it was helping, he took his medication even though he didn’t really want to, and as time passed, things slowly started to get better.

He got to go back to school and see his friends and reclaim some semblance of his normal life.

As he got more comfortable being away from Tony, he started spending more and more time with May in the evenings and on weekends, but he still spent all his nights in the penthouse with Tony, not quite ready to leave yet. A part of him worried that after what he’d gone through with losing Tony, he might never be ready, and no matter how understanding May had been with everything, he still felt guilty about essentially abandoning her, even though Ruth told him he shouldn’t.

Staying in the penthouse meant the nightmares had thankfully decreased, but they still hadn’t disappeared. Every time he had one, he woke up to Tony. He was always there to speak soothing words, to hold him, to comfort him, and to reassure him that he was alive. And after the first four or five times, Peter had even stopped feeling embarrassed about it. Honestly, the consistency of Tony always being there for him was probably a big part of the reason he was getting better.

He loved this new relationship with Tony. Something he never would’ve gotten to experience if he hadn’t saved him. Tony treated him like his own kid and he wasn’t afraid to show it or let Peter know it. It meant everything to him.

Before Peter knew it, a month had passed, and then two. He hadn’t had any more panic attacks or flashbacks or whatever since that last one in the kitchen with Tony. He was only seeing Ruth once a week now, he was back to a healthy weight again, and he was feeling more himself. Smiling more. And happy. He only had one week of school left, and he was actually excited for the summer and for college instead of dreading it like he had been.

“Hey kid.” Tony knocked on his bedroom door. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah.” Peter answered as he finished shoving everything he needed into his backpack. It was his last day of classes before the weekend. Finals started next week, which he was more than ready for with all the free time he’d had to study since he hadn’t been given the ok to go out as Spiderman yet.

“Got a minute?” Tony asked as he sat down on the end of his bed.

Peter glanced at the clock. He was already running late. “Um not really?”

“It’s ok. I’ll drive you to school.”

“Are you sure?” Peter asked. Usually he took the subway because he didn’t mind it, and Happy lived with May in Queens now so the man wasn’t exactly available to drive him, and he didn’t want to burden Pepper or Tony by making them drive him to school every day even though they definitely would if he asked.

“Yeah. Come here. Sit.” Tony said, patting the bedspread next to him.

“Ok.” Peter dropped his backpack on his desk chair and shuffled over to plop down next to Tony. “Um what’s up?”

Tony draped an arm around his shoulders. “I have some good news.”

“Ok?” Peter looked at him quizzically and somewhat suspiciously. He could see a mischievous gleam in his eyes.

“I talked to Ruth last night.” Tony said, waiting for his reaction. Peter knew Ruth talked to Tony about him, but he mostly tried to ignore that fact. They’d never talked about it, but he’d caught on pretty quickly when Tony would bring up certain things he knew he’d only told Ruth, and when he started coaching him after his nightmares using the same calming techniques he and Ruth had discussed in therapy.

“Yeah? About what?”

“Spiderman.”

Peter frowned and then his eyes widened when he finally got with the program. “Wait. Are you saying... What are you saying?”

He didn’t want to get too excited if he was wrong.

“We discussed it and we both think you’re ready to go back out as Spiderman. If you want to.”

“If I want to? Of course I want to!” Peter jumped up. He couldn’t help it. “Are you serious?”

Tony nodded, smiling in amusement at his excitement.

“Oh my god this is awesome! Can I go right now?”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“No?”

“Don’t you have school right now?” Tony reminded him, raising an eyebrow.

He groaned and fell backwards onto the bed next to Tony. Shit. That was right. He’d completely forgotten.

“Nooo. Why couldn’t you have waited until after school to tell me? I’m never going to be able to concentrate now.” He whined. Not that it mattered. He was pretty sure they weren’t getting any new material today, just reviewing old stuff and going over study guide material before finals next week.

“Because I have meetings scheduled all afternoon and into the evening, so I probably won’t be home until way after dinner. I didn’t think you’d want me to wait until then to tell you, but maybe I was wrong.”

“No no no. You weren’t wrong. I take it back. I’m glad you told me. Thanks for telling me.”

“You’re welcome kid. Now let’s get going.” Tony patted his leg. “I’ll even stop at that gross donut shop you like on the way and let you stuff yourself full of sugar.”

“Moe’s?”

Tony nodded.

“Yes!” Peter bounded back to his feet, beaming. “Best day ever. Thanks Tony.”

He flung himself at the man to give him a quick hug, before grabbing his backpack and making his way out the door. He couldn’t wait to tell Ned.

A school day had never dragged along like this one. Peter swore he could feel every second crawling by. It was slow torture. He just wanted to be done so he could go home and suit up and get back into the swing of things as Spiderman.

“Calm down there tiger.” MJ muttered from the desk across from him.

He tore his gaze away from the clock and looked at her questioningly.

She nodded toward his rapidly twitching leg. “You’re shaking the desk.”

“Oh.” He was. “Sorry.”

He forced himself to take a deep breath and relax. There were only fifteen minutes left until the day was over. He could make it.

He tried to focus on what Mr. Bryant was saying about which topics would be higher yield for the final, but it was hopeless. Everything went in one ear and out the other. He’d have to grab the notes from Ned this weekend.

Finally, the school bell rang. Peter catapulted out of his desk and practically sprinted out of the room, ignoring MJ’s raised eyebrow.

“Have fun man. Call me tomorrow.” He heard Ned say after him. He’d already explained things to him, so he wouldn’t be upset when he bailed the second school let out.

The trip back home passed in a blur, but he finally made it home. He wasted no time tugging his suit on. One of the best things about living in a penthouse apartment was that he could just jump right off the balcony and start swinging. He didn’t have to worry about changing and hiding his backpack behind a dumpster somewhere.

The free fall into the air made him whoop in delight. He webbed to the side of a nearby building and swung through New York headed towards Queens. It felt like coming home. He didn’t feel dangerously untethered like he had last time he’d donned the suit. Because this time he knew that if anything happened, he’d have Ironman for back up.

“Petey!” Morgan slammed the lake house door open and called out to him. “Dad wants to know what’s taking so long.”

“We’re almost done!” He yelled back. “Tell him five more minutes.”

“I will but he’s not going to like it.” Morgan said in response, but he heard the door slam shut again a second later.

“Spirited little thing, isn’t she?” May commented from beside him.

“That’s one way to put it.” Happy grumbled.

“Hey that’s my little sister you’re talking about.” Peter joked. “She’s perfect.”

They all laughed at that.

“Here honey.” May said, handing him the tray of hamburger patties they’d finished putting together. “You can bring those out. I’ll bring the rest out when they’re done.”

“Ok. Thanks May.” He grabbed the tray, filled with twenty patties and started toward the door.

“Here let me get the door for you kid.” Happy said, hurrying past him to hold the door open.

“Thanks Happy.”

“You need help with that?” Happy gestured to the large tray.

“No I’m good.” Peter shook his head.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“I know how you are. You can do all those acrobatic gymnastics in the air but you trip over your own two feet on the ground.”

“I do not.”

“Yeah? Tell me again how that vase broke last weekend?”

“That was an accident.”

“Exactly. You’re accident prone.”

Peter narrowed his eyes at him. “Your concern for me is touching, but I think I can carry a tray of hamburgers twenty feet without dropping it or hurting myself.”

“Ok. If you’re sure.” Happy shrugged.

“Kid! Quit gabbing and get over here. People are hungry. And by people I mean me.” Tony yelled from across the yard where he stood by the grill with Rhodey and old Cap.

Peter and Happy both rolled their eyes, but Peter started walking over to him as beckoned. On the way, he didn’t come close to tripping or dropping the plate even once.

As he approached Tony, he caught the tail end of his conversation with Cap. “I’m just saying think about it. I know you already got to do the whole life lived thing, but if you want, I could use the time travel technology to push time through you like Bruce accidentally did to Scott, remember? It made him younger. I could do the same thing to you.”

“It turned him into a baby.” Steve argued.

“Semantics. I’m not going to turn you into a baby. I’d tweak it first so you’d go back to your spry thirty something self. You could live your peak years all over again.”

“I don’t know Tony.” Steve shook his head.

“At least think about it before you tell me no.” Tony waved the grill spatula at him. Rhodey had to jerk back to avoid being hit by it.

“Ok I’ll think about it.” Steve smiled.

“I’ve got the burgers for you. As requested.” Peter said as he stopped in front of Tony and held the tray out to him.

“About time. What took you so long? Were you making sure they were all perfectly symmetrical?” Tony complained, but Peter could tell he was kidding as he took the tray.

“That’s exactly what we were doing. How’d you know?” Peter joked right back, smiling at the unamused look he received in return.

“Hey, can you do me a favor and go make sure Pepper doesn’t need any more help?” Tony asked, head nodding toward where she stood at the extra long picnic table they’d probably bought just for this occasion.

“Sure.” Peter agreed.

As he walked away his enhanced hearing overheard Rhodey tell Tony, “You know, he acts more and more like you every day.”

“Believe me, I’m well aware.” Tony said dryly.

Peter smiled.

“Do you need any help Pepper?” He offered once he’d made it over to the picnic table. Laura was already helping her and between the two of them, it looked like they had it pretty well in hand. Dishes of fruit, chips, dips, all different kinds of salads, hamburger buns, condiments, and blue plastic plates and cutlery were arranged over a white and red checkered table cloth. Old fashioned steel buckets filled with ice and every beverage you could imagine sat nearby. Peter couldn’t recall ever attending a more perfect Fourth of July party. If this was what dinner looked like, he couldn’t wait to see what Tony had planned for the fireworks.

“No honey I’m good, but thanks for asking.” Pepper shooed him away.

“No problem.” He turned away, figuring he could go mingle with everyone else until the food was ready.

“Actually,” Pepper’s voice stopped him before he could get very far, “could you find your sister and have her wash up before we eat?”

“Sure. Do you know where she went?” He glanced around, not spotting her right away.

“I think she’s playing with Nate and Cooper on the other side of the house.” Laura answered, half distracted, as she helped finish arranging things on the table.

“Ok.” Peter headed over there. They had a badminton net set up and Clint and Natasha were playing against Sam and Scott. It wasn’t hard to figure out who was winning.

“I said I had it tic tac!” Sam rebuked Scott as he picked up the birdie on the ground while Clint and Natasha and high fived on the other side of the net.

Peter held back a laugh at the scathing look Scott gave Sam in response. He walked past the court, giving them a wide berth. Cooper, Nate, and Morgan were running around in the grassy area behind it, playing water balloon tag with Professor Hulk. They were all soaking wet but wearing swimsuits so it wasn’t like it mattered much.

“Morgan.” Peter called out to her to try to get her attention.

She looked over at him but didn’t stop or come any closer, clearly engrossed in her game.

“Come on. It’s almost time to eat. Your mom says you have to go clean up.”

“Five more minutes.” She told him as she took off running in the opposite direction.

“Nope. Now. Come on, let’s go.” He closed the distance between them, ready to grab her if she wouldn’t stop.

But she did stop.

She turned on her heel and whipped the water balloon in her hand right at him with a wide grin.

It nailed him directly in the face. Water ran down his body and completely soaked him.

“Morgan.” He said her name tersely in reproof. “We don’t throw water balloons at people who aren’t in swimsuits.”

Great. Now he had to go change.

As he stood there dripping wet and attempting to look reproachful, Morgan was overcome with a fit of giggles. It didn’t exactly help his ego that Cooper, Nate, and Professor Hulk all started laughing at him too.

“All right that’s it.” He declared and ran at Morgan. She squealed and turned to run. He chased her down easily while she laughed the entire time.

“Gotcha.” He said as he grabbed her under the armpits and hauled her up into the air and into his arms. “You’re in trouble now.”

He pushed up the SPF sunshirt she had on over her swimsuit and gave her three raspberries in a row right on her stomach. She kept laughing almost manically and squirming to get away.

He set her back down on her feet and then said, “Tickle attack,” and started tickling her sides. She absolutely screamed with laughter and would’ve collapsed to the ground if Peter hadn’t caught her and lowered her down. She flailed around, laughing.

“Stop. Stop! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” She finally yelled.

Peter granted her mercy and stopped. He grinned as she glared at him.

“Next time you hit me with a water balloon while I’m wearing clothes you go in the lake.” He told her, not actually serious.

Instead of looking appropriately chastised, she smiled and asked excitedly, “Can we go in the lake after dinner?”

“Kind of defeating the purpose of my point, but sure.” He said as he helped her stand back up.

“Yay! Race you back to the house!” She said and took off.

Peter shook his head. Well, at least she wasn’t fighting him anymore about getting cleaned up. He ran after her, catching up easily but letting her think it was going to be a close finish. In the end, he let her win.

“Go wash your hands.” He said once they were inside the house and he’d wrapped a towel around her. “I’m going to go change since someonegot me soaked.”

“Ok.” She agreed easily with a grin, wiping dripping strands of hair out of her face as she headed to the bathroom. He hoped she actually listened. He figured he could always throw some hand sanitizer on her just be sure.

He rubbed at his hair with his own towel as he went up to his room where he peeled off his wet clothes and finished drying off before pulling on a pair of swim trunks and a plain white t-shirt.

Appropriately clothed for possible water activities, he walked back down the stairs and called out for Morgan, but she didn’t answer, and he didn’t see her.

“Morgan?” He tried again.

“She went back outside.” Dr. Strange answered as he walked out of the kitchen carrying an enormous serving platter filled with cookies, brownies, and mini cupcakes.

“Oh. Thanks.” He was about to go, but he stopped. It was just him and Dr. Strange inside. May and Happy must’ve gone outside already too. He couldn’t imagine getting another opportunity like this to ask the question that’d been on his mind, bothering him.

“Was there something else?” Dr. Strange asked with a quirk of his eyebrow. Peter realized he’d been staring at him.

“Um…yeah actually. Can I ask you something?”

“You just did.” Dr. Strange pointed out unhelpfully.

“You know what I mean.”

Dr. Strange set the dessert platter down on a nearby table.

“Ask away.” He said, holding both his hands out, palms up.

Peter glanced around. No one was coming in and there definitely wasn’t anyone else in the house.

“Ok.” He took a deep breath. “You told Tony that the other reality I created by bringing him forward in time, bringing him here, still ended up winning.”

“That’s not a question.” Dr. Strange said.

“I know. Um, my question is…was that true?”

Dr. Strange’s brow furrowed and his head tilted slightly. “Why would I lie?”

“I guess what I’m asking is,” he took another deep breath and continued, “what do you mean when you say they won?”

Dr. Strange brought his hands together in front of his chest, steepling his index fingers into a point as he appeared to consider Peter’s question.

“You and I both know that when it comes to winning, it’s all a matter of perspective.” He answered cryptically.

It was true. They’d won the war against Thanos, but Peter had felt like he’d lost everything when Tony had died.

“So what are you really asking?” Dr. Strange prompted.

Peter chewed his lip and asked, “Did anyone die because of me? Because of what I did?”

“No.” Dr. Strange answered simply, and Peter felt as if an enormous weight had been lifted off his chest.

“Really?”

Dr. Strange gave him a single nod.

“And they really won? They defeated Thanos?” Peter asked tentatively.

“With the stones out of play it was much less complicated. They were able to defeat his army, and Captain Marvel was the one that finished Thanos.”

Peter nodded. He chewed his lip again before garnering the courage to ask, “And me? What happened to me? And Pepper and Morgan?”

“All alive.”

“But without Tony.”

Dr. Strange lifted his eyebrows slightly, as if to say ‘of course’.

“And they’re handling it ok?” He asked.

“Did you?”

No. He hadn’t. Obviously. So the Peter in the new timeline or reality or whatever it was called, was just as miserable as he had been.

“So I took him away from them.”

“That was always going to be the outcome. You know that. He would’ve died snapping the gauntlet. At least this way he’s alive in one reality.” Dr. Strange’s voice softened at the end. “He’s alive for you.”

“I guess.” Peter mumbled. “Kind of seems like a shit deal for some other people, though.”

“Winning usually is.” Dr. Strange said.

Peter let out short exhale through his nose at that truthful nugget of wisdom.

“It’ll be all right Peter.” Dr. Strange said as he picked up the platter filled with sweets. “You saved a life. No reason to feel guilty about it.”

“Yeah.” He gave the man a weak smile. “Thanks.”

He had saved a life, and not just his own. Tony’s. The man who had become as much a father to him as his own father or Ben had been before. And because Tony was still here, Peter knew that even though he wasn’t completely back to normal yet, he would be. He was healing and he was happy. With the help of his family, it was all going to be ok.

He and Dr. Strange walked out of the house together back toward the picnic table where everyone was congregated, either eating or dishing up food onto their plates. Pepper was helping Morgan get her plate together, May and Happy were smiling huddled over their food, and Tony was laughing with a mouth full of burger as he talked to Rhodey, Clint, and Nat. Instead of going to get his own plate right away, Peter walked over to Tony and wrapped his arms around him in a hug. Tony instantly reciprocated, but Peter could feel him tense in concern.

“Hey, you ok?” Tony asked lightly, setting his empty hand on the top of his head.

“Yeah.” He looked up and smiled. “I’m just really happy you’re here.”

He could tell Tony knew exactly what he meant. His eyes softened and he smiled back.

“Me too kid.” Tony said and kissed the crown of his head. “Me too.”

#my fic #irondad #peter parker #tony stark #may parker #pepper potts #morgan stark #happy hogan #the rest of the avengers #and dr strange #or is he an avenger now?#whatever it takes

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tgr489 · 5 years

Text

Hello World!

That seems like the first thing to write, after all it’s the first thing you learn when coding. Don’t get me wrong I’m not a coder, or that’s not my job, I just dabble a bit in these things.

I’m new to this blogging thing but here seems like a good a place as any to write things down, and my new therapist says I do need to write stuff down, plus I move around a lot so keeping everything in one place without the need to carry something around like a diary makes some sense.

Some recent background: I’ve just spent the last few weeks travelling, as a friend kindly bought me a RTW ticket as a Christmas present. Very nice of her and was a thank you for me apologising profusely to her for being a real dick. I’ll come back to the story of our friendship and why the apology another time as she and it warrants a separate post.

So 5 countries in just under 4 weeks saw me sunning, snow boarding, eating epically, partying extensively (it was New Years after all) oh and a little bit of work thrown in. Was all fairly exhausting but absolutely worth it.

LA to Sydney to sort a few long standing niggling work things that I’ve not addressed for far too long (procrastination is an issue I have). Sydney to Vienna (via Bangkok) for Christmas and snowboarding in St Anton (via traumatic internal flight to Innsbruck). This is one of theeee best places to hit the slopes.

Vienna to Berlin for New Years and recovery. Those Germans sure do know how to party.

Berlin to Amsterdam for some extended fun that wasn’t initially planned.

Amsterdam to London for more overdue work and legal things to sort out, plus a touch of culture.

And finally London to NY, which is where I am now in an attempt to sort a lot out and make sense of the last few years of my life, and hopefully give myself some purpose to the next few years.

Everyone makes resolutions at new year, which I used to do too, but don’t any more as apart from the parties, clubs, fireworks etc etc. it’s just another day in the year where you always wake up with a sore head. I make all my resolutions on my birthday, which is in the summer if you wanted to know. This feels more real and aligned to me and I just use new years as a progress check.

Coming back to New York after being away for a while was comforting. I’m sure I have some mild form of agoraphobia as I like the confines of the concrete and the buildings which prevent seeing too much horizon. Maybe there’s some psychological reason for that which my shrink will delve into and uncover... we’ll see. My long standing housemates hadn’t changed the locks in my absence so thankfully didn’t have to hang around all day for them to finish work. The place was quiet and apart from the mid-morning traffic from the street, was a retreat of calm after the journey from the airport. The place had a kind of dull, almost close sound, that was enveloping.

The fridge was fairly well stocked, so I help myself to some fruit, made some coffee and sat on the couch amongst the many cushions that perennially multiply there and promptly fell asleep. I was woken a little while later to the sounds of someone moving around in the kitchen, singing, and from my slouched position I could occasionally see a girl shuffling back and forwards in a dressing gown. I sat there and watched her for a while but couldn’t make out who it was so figured someone’s guest, no one breaks into an apartment in a dressing gown. After a while she came walking into the lounge so I said ‘hi’, which made her jump and then totally freak out. She started shouting at me as to why I hadn’t said anything sooner and that it was wrong to scare people like that. I had no idea who this was but she didn’t seem bothered that a total stranger was in front of her. I casually introduced myself and then made enquiries as to who she was. Her name was Sky, a cousin of my housemate Lucy, had come over for Christmas and is staying for a few weeks before heading back to Ireland. I said her name wasn’t very Irish, but was nice anyway. She asked lots of questions of me, but I kept my answers brief, told her I was tired so I could make an exit.

My bedroom was a bit of a mess, and someone had obviously stayed here for a while at some point over the past few months judging by the random plates, glasses and clothing (female) dotted around. Never mind. I emptied the contents of my suitcase onto the bed, separated the random bits from the clothes which I decanted into the washer. i couldn’t be bothered to sort the rest out and it was getting on for lunch so I decided to head out. I was craving junk food after eating pretty well over my trip, despite the airline food which isn’t really food. I wondered if Sky fancied coming with me but she never answered to my shouts so I bailed.

I wandered aimlessly for a while just soaking in the atmosphere, listening to some tunes. Was nice to be back but something was missing and I had an emptyish feeling, which was probably the hunger. I ate noodles, they were good. i got back around 3 and raided Jason’s room for some weed, then cleared all shit out of my room that didn’t belong, before sitting on the floor and went through my camera memory cards. Too many photos, again. I keep telling myself I’ll sort them all out one day…

Lucy was first to arrive home, her shrieks of happiness as she saw me reminded me of how much I’d actually missed her. She called me the C word for not telling her I was returning. Jason came home about an hour later, by which time we were a bottle of wine down, thinking of a second. He suggested going out for dinner so we went to Burger & Barrel for the night, his treat, was nice. We got back home and Nicola, the last of our crew, was there with a guy, talking something over in the lounge fairly intimately. They got up and started heading for her bedroom when she spotted me and came and gave me a big hug with a kiss on the cheek. ‘Let me sort something out and I’ll come and have a chat’ were her words. I didn’t feel up to it but I couldn’t duck her. It didn’t take her long to do whatever she needed to ‘sort out’ and we sat up for hours catching up, her soon to be ex boyfriend was left to his own. She eventually went and joined him and I sat just watching the street below, the jet lag keeping me up, thinking of nothing and everything.

I feel the need to erase the last few years of my life, but that won’t really resolve anything. So I’m going to face up to a few things, make some peace with people and some of the things I’ve done and try to do something meaningful with my life. Hopefully the therapy will unlock a lot of what’s buried.

OK I’m done here for now. It’s another day and I have people to see and there’s so many things to do in this city.

Later Gator

#life story #welcome home #travel #city living #boring #muddled #confused

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mosylufanfic · 6 years

Text

Blowing Off Steam

I picked this AU idea up from @dailyau: “I’m egging a random person’s house to relieve stress and you join me and as it turns out the house belongs to your ex and now they are chasing us as well as the police and now we’re both in jail waiting to be bailed so um you wanna talk about it?” It sounded like Cisco and Caitlin to me.

Also, this has a description of an emotionally abusive relationship, so take care of yourselves, dear readers.

Mosylu, I am confused!

Blowing Off Steam

The lights of the police cars swirled around the nice suburban street. Cisco shifted his weight on the cold, hard curb. "Sorry about this."

The woman next to him said, "This isn't your fault."

"I'm the one who brought the eggs and was chucking them at the house. You're just the one who walked up and asked if you could help."

She looked ruefully at her hands, which still had traces of raw egg. "Yes, well. I didn't have to. But I did." She folded her hands in her lap and hiked up her chin. "So, I guess we'll both face the music together."

He nodded a little. “Explain to me why you wanted to help? I mean, I know why I'm here."

"Why are you here?"

He shrugged. "I dunno, I have seven million freshman finals to grade and I'm mad stressed? Egging some guy's house seemed like a good way to blow off steam." He eyed her. "But I get the feeling random petty vandalism isn't usually your style."

She picked at her fingernails, chipping away at the polish. "That's my ex's house."

"Ooooo," he breathed as a lot of things came clear. "So, I take it you didn't have a particularly amicable breakup?"

"Not really."

He waited. "That's all I get?"

"I barely know you."

"And yet it's like we've known each other forever," he said solemnly. "C'mon, spill. What else is there to do while the cops do their thing?"

She looked over her shoulder. "They are taking an awfully long time."

"Oh, I've been in trouble before," he said airily. "Trust me, everything cops do takes forever."

She sighed and he knew he had her. "We were together for two years. And in the beginning, he was so sweet. So perfect. He said all the right things, he did all the right things - "

"I’m getting the sinking feeling that didn’t last.”

She nodded. "He started getting more demanding. Nothing I did was good enough. He would call me names and tell me I was stupid and couldn’t get anything right."

"Did he ever hit you?"

"No," she said. "But some of the things he said to me - they were worse than a slap or a punch. And he would always say that it was my fault he had to treat me like that. If I would just be sweet and not provoke him, he would be a good boyfriend again. He'd let me go out, he'd let me see my friends, I just had to behave myself and do everything he asked."

Cisco cringed. "How'd you get free of him?"

"I wish I could tell you a story about my triumphant breakup and walking out with middle fingers held high - but the truth is, I waited until he went out of town, packed only what I needed, and bolted. I changed my phone number and shut down all my social media and moved three cities away."

"How long ago was that?"

"Two years."

"What did he do?"

"Nothing," she said. "Six months later, I got a letter in the mail that was just a picture of everything I'd left behind, at the dump."

If the cops had't taken the eggs away, Cisco would have stood up and lobbed the rest of them at Hunter's dumb front door. The message was as clear as a shout. He'd wanted her to know he could find her whenever he liked, and that she was just so much garbage to him. "What happened then?"

"That was the last I heard from him. He didn't stalk me, he didn't threaten me, he didn't so much as send me a creepy Christmas card. It’s the best way it could have ended. Exactly what I hoped for. And I was devastated. Isn't that awful?"

"Hey," he said. "I've been around other people who got out of abusive relationships."

"It wasn't really - " She stopped. "Yes. Yes, it was." She started picking at her fingernails again. "Sorry, I'm still getting used to saying that."

"Don't apologize. It's complicated. You loved him - I mean, you loved the guy you thought he was. Even though he's a waste of atoms, that feeling still hangs on."

"Yes, that's what my therapist says. Among other things."

"You doing better now?"

"After a lot of therapy, yes." She looked over her shoulder. "This was worth at least two or three sessions."

"Glad to be of service," he said, and she gave him a shaky smile. "Hey, should we clue the cops in about this history? So if he comes back then you don't have to see him?"

"I never took out a restraining order or anything," she said. "And I came here of my own free will. I don't think I can't ask that."

Cisco thought maybe she could. He happened to know one of the detectives on duty tonight had a grown daughter and not a lot of fondness for Hunter Zolomon. But before he could wave Joe West over, another cop came up to them. "All right, you two. Names and IDs."

His new buddy got to her feet, head held high like she thought she was Marie Antoinette about to go to the guillotine. "My name is Caitlin Snow," she said, handing over her driver's license "This is my ex's house. That's why I egged it."

"Ah," the cop said, scribbling it down. "Okay. I don't need the whole history. You know playing out some damn Taylor Swift song is still vandalism, don't you?"

"I'm aware."

Cisco butted in. "Hey, Officer, it ended real badly, so if there's any way to do this without her having to see him, or - "

The cop's bored eyes swung his way. "And you are?"

"Friend of hers," he said. "Just here supporting her perfectly justifiable lady-rage. He did her dirty. Seriously."

It was a good thing the cop had his back to Caitlin, because she blinked and looked extremely puzzled for a split second before schooling her face into blandness again.

"Yeah, I'm still going to need your name."

Cisco sighed. "Cisco Ramon. I got my ID somewhere here - " He started digging in his pocket.

"Hold up a moment," another voice said, and he almost dropped with relief. It was Joe West. He leveled his gaze at Cisco for a moment, then beckoned the first cop away.

They conferred. The first cop said, "Serious?" really loudly, then looked over at them. Joe sent him away and came back to them.

"What's going on, officer?" Caitlin said. "Are we going to get arrested?"

"Not at the present moment."

Caitlin looked at the house, egg-spattered, two windows cracked. "But - "

"It's private property, so Zolomon would have to press charges, and between you and me and the mailbox, he's got bigger problems."

"What do you mean?"

"There's a little matter of some stolen property we noticed in the garage when we were checking out one of the windows you two broke." His eyes crinkled up.

Cisco told himself that it was a little early to punch the air and let out a victory howl. "Wow," he said, wide-eyed, conscious of Caitlin's gaze pinned to the side of his head. "No way. Forreals?"

"Mhm. So if this comes up again, we've got your names and addresses. But honestly, it probably won't."

"So we're free to go? Is what you're saying?"

"Cisco," Joe said. "I know what this was about."

Cisco gave him puppy eyes. "I know. It's juvenile delinquent nonsense. I don't know what came over me. Thanks for having my back."

Joe rolled his eyes. "Juvenile delinquent? Sure. Let's go with that. Don't do it again."

"Scout's honor," he said, giving a muddled salute somewhere between Boy Scouts, US Navy, and the Full Rimmer from Red Dwarf.

Joe suppressed a snort and waved him away. He took the hint and scooted.

Caitlin chased after him. "Did you know that cop?"

He kept walking, unwilling to let any cop change their mind and haul him in. "Uh, yeah, for a few years. His daughter is engaged to my best bud."

"Is that why he let us off the hook?"

"Partially, but mostly it's because ol' Hunter has bigger problems, and it couldn't happen to a nicer guy."

Her eyes went narrow. "I never mentioned his name. Neither did the police."

"You, uh, you didn't?" Oh, shit. They hadn't.

"Did you pick his house on purpose?"

"I told you," he said. "Just letting off some steam. Youthful hijinks."

"I believed that initially, but I also believed Hunter when he said he loved me and he'd never mistreat me, so we've established I'm kind of gullible."

He paused on the corner to face her. "Putting me on a level with that skunkbag? Girl. Low."

She crossed her arms. "You said you had finals to grade. Are you a professor in his department or something?"

"You're giving me a lot of credit I don't deserve. I am but a lowly TA without even a master's degree yet. Professors barely know I exist."

"Is that why you egged his house?"

"Not exactly." He glanced over her shoulder and pulled her along until they could no longer see the police lights, just the occasional dancing reflection. "Okay, full disclosure? I called the cops myself."

"What?" she shrieked.

"Shhshshsh! Look, cops won’t just come out to some dude’s house without a reason, and if I just called in a prowler, they'd do a drive-by, maybe swing a flashlight around. I knew that stolen property had to be somewhere. So I thought that if I egged his house, maybe cracked a few windows, they'd have to look closer and maybe they'd find it." He grinned. "And they did."

"How did you know about the stolen property in the first place?"

"Because Zoloman pinned the theft on my brother."

Her mouth fell open, then closed and opened a few more times, like a goldfish. "Of course," she said. "Of course he did. That sounds just like him."

"It's a little early to do a victory dance right now, but my brother swears he had nothing to do with it and he has an alibi. They're going to re-open the case, and with the stuff turning up in his garage, the outcome should be way different."

"Why didn't you say this in the first place?"

“If it hadn’t worked, I’d’ve been in a whole mess of trouble. I wanted to spare you. It sounded like you had enough of your own. And - “ He shrugged. "I dunno. It sounds kind of crazy."

"I think it sounds amazing."

He felt himself blushing. "He's my brother. It's what you do."

They were passing someone's garbage cans, parked out on the street for pickup in the morning. She said, "Can you wait a moment?"

"Hmm?"

She pulled something out of her pocket. "A letter," she said. "I was going to put it in his mailbox. But I - I think I don't really need to do that anymore." She tore it into shreds and dumped the fistful of confetti into the garbage can.

"Awesome," he said, holding up his hand.

She high-fived him back, grinning broadly. "Listen," she said. "I was going to get myself a very big drink after I dropped off the letter. I don’t see any reason to change that plan. Would you like to come with me?"

He felt the same grin creep over his face. "Can't think of anything I'd like more."

FINIS

#Cisco Ramon #Caitlin Snow #Killervibe #fanfiction #mosylufanfic lives up to her damn name #NaNo prompts #no powers AU #the flash

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scripttraumasurvivors · 7 years

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Hi! This character's life is messy, but I figure it's important to elaborate so as to double-check if her reactions make sense. My tritagonist was sold to a cartel at age 6 by her abusive rural family, where she was used as a slave (menial labor/sex), tortured to the point that she's disfigured and in chronic pain, before finally being dumped in a slum, having given birth to her first kid at age 11. She abuses her daughter, partly from resentment and constantly being reminded of her captors 1/?

(2/?) And partly because she’s modeling parenting from the cruel people she’s known and is currently living with. Specifically, she is callous to her daughter’s emotional needs, verbally & physically abuses her if she isn’t submissive, forces her to dress inappropriately. She wants her daughter to conform, believing she’ll avoid the same abuse the mom suffered. She’s stuck in a job at a slaughterhouse where she kills terrified animals whilst the manager abuses and robs her. (more)

(3/?) She bears a 2nd kid from the manager, but when the kid’s deformed and he denies being the dad, she decides to keep the kid anyway to raise her more kindly - although she still struggles with feeling affection for her first daughter. Eventually, the manager sells her out to the police, leaving her in jail for a week, but another middle-aged man - the father of her first daughter’s girlfriend - bails her out and looks after her while she’s delirious. (One more ask after this!)

4/4 Got a few questions for this set-up - wanna show how, once removed from her abusive situation at the slaughterhouse, this abusive mother struggles to mend broken bonds and form new relationships. How could she try to reach out and apologize to the daughter she used to mistreat? How to trust the older man who looked after her while she was weak? How to deal with constant flashbacks of death, pain and abuse - of herself and others - without lashing out violently? Thanks for reading all this!

(5/5) Sorry, forgot to specify - by this point, the mother would be 21. Perhaps that can give a better idea of how she can process all that trauma and guilt? While under stress she’s impulsive and sadistic, once removed from her job she’d be far quieter and sensitive; although her emotional state would still be heavily warped. I figure she might try to hug her older daughter or speak intimately with the older man, only to either clam up immediately because of her remaining insecurities.

—-

(For clarification, I have touched base with the asker re: the ages that everything happened.

To summarize: Daughter#2 was born 7 years after the first. So kid number one at 11 and kid number two at 18.

The majority of this ask takes place a few years later when she’s left the slaughterhouse)

So your oldest kid is going to be 10ish when her mother decides to well… be a mother.

Which is good for you in terms of ‘likelyhood daughter wants to make amends’ bad for her in terms of ‘very likely already had severe trust issues.’

I am going to say- I think it’s in our other correspondence that you mention one of the… things that makes mom wake up us a single incident where someone else mentions how nice her daughter is to his kid…..

That’s not very likely. Outsiders complimenting abused kids doesn’t usually make abusers realize they’re being irrational or cruel- it just makes them think that their kid has the wool pulled over someone’s eyes. The kid may even get punished for that or pulled away from that person because clearly, they’re too lenient/a bad influence. Or even the abuser taking it as the fact that the abuse is working.

Which isn’t to say that it should cause that reaction in your story- just to keep in mind that it will take a lot more than a single person’s good word to convince them.

Back to the present question

How can mom try and mend things?

Honestly, just think of Awkward Mom things, and add in ‘child wildly distrustful that this isn’t a trick to get them hurt.’

Mom might try and mimic behavior she sees the man doing or even the other girl doing. Oh? They pat her back when she’s upset- mom’s going to try and do that now.

Mom trying to compliment the daughter, but the daughter flinching back after years of being told she’s horrible.

Mom maybe giving the girl something? Poverty limits what it might be, but even picking a flower or trying to make a homemade toy.

Mom might try and apologize for some of the behavior, though keep in mind that while some abusers are willing to do this- if pushed on what they’re apologizing for or pushed to apologize for more than what they’re offering- they often become defensive and aggressive again.

Mom might overly apologize. Which is also.. not a good because the kid will most likely feel required to try and soothe mom. And now you’re building a cycle of ‘I have to help people not feel bad about hurting me’ in the kid. It is, however, a realistic cycle.

A lot of this also depends on what sort of… abused kid you want your eldest to be.

Fun fact, I used to volunteer heavily at an elementary school. I was well known and for the most part, I worked with one type of child. Children teachers suspected something was wrong with. some of them just needed extra attention, some had a bad case of ‘I fell behind and now I’m acting out’, we had kids whose families were in bad financial situations…

General profile of abused kids I’ve known/kids I suspected were being abused but could never get enough evidence to report:

- Soft, sad little boy who literally brightens up the moment anyone says a kind word to him ever. Often accused of being violent and aggressive when the worst he was was… well.. hyper and maybe a little unaware of his body. (….. racism also played a big role there.)

- My overly friendly thief.

- Angry little girl who was well… Angry. At school. Didn’t want to work with anyone, didn’t want to have friends. Very angry. Very defensive. Very dead eyed and personalityless at the end of the day when she knew she’d have to go home.

- Big Guy trying to make himself small. Hunched shoulders, tucked in knees, didn’t want to play with the other kids.

- Mr. Sleep All Day.

- ‘What do you mean I can’t come home with you? I’ll wash your floor. I’ll do the dishes. I’ll do whatever you want I just want to come home with you so bad. You’re so nice, TS.’

- Class clown that cried when the other kids were told not to pay attention to his antics.

- Kids who cut off stories in the middle and suddenly jump somewhere else because they realized that the story they were telling involves a Bad Event. Pulling them back to the story they were telling is damn near impossible.

- Mr. ‘I’m going to climb the book shelves and try to escape out of the window’

I’ll break down possible responses to Mom trying to make things better by general…. profile.

Your ‘I do my best to try and please my abuser’ types are still most likely going to be distrustful. This may be in the direction of ‘I know you could flip on me at any second’ or ‘I can’t figure out what’s different now so I may fuck up at any second and then you’re going to hurt me again’. There’s going to be some confliction in these types too. They want their abuser’s approval and kindness, they’ve been fighting for it- but it usually doesn’t feel as good in real life as it does in our heads. In our heads- now that they approve of us, we’re safe. and when that feeling of safety doesn’t follow…. This may cause the child to avoid the abuser more often. It may cause them to double down on trying to win approval.

Your acting out types is where… you have a lot of potential issues. The mother doesn’t currently have coping skills to deal with normal child behavior. If the child lashes out? Abusers will often revert back to abuse and take it as a clear ‘see, they behave better when I hurt them.’ Or, if they do feel guilt- ‘they made me do it’

Depressed sad kids .. might not even realize that an attempt is being made. A lot of them have just… checked out.

As for the mother trusting the man… Do you want her to trust him? Because you could have her go the route of ‘I would not be surprised if you touched me inappropriately, but at least you’re kinder than the rest, let me try and make you happy’

Do you want her not to trust him and him have to win her over? Small acts over a long period of time. Her trying to sleep with him (because that’s why she thinks he has her) and him turning her down, small pieces of kindness. There won’t be a quick fix.

Either way, in general, if he gets extremely upset (say… he witnesses her being Not Great to the oldest), expect a fear response. Or argument and then recant of the ‘you can’t tell me what to fucking do with my kid- oh god I’m so sorry I’m a horrible person you’d be right to kick me out’ variety.

As for flashbacks, you have two general… routes here.

One: She learns coping skills or at least to pull back. Possibly because there are other people there that can take care of the kids, possibly he’s told her to go to another room if she feels like that, or he does get upset with her over something she lashed out over- and she’s trying to avoid that.

These don’t have to be good coping skills. Nails biting into her own arms, smoking/drugs/drinking. They also don’t have to be ‘therapy’ coping skills- deep breaths/imagine a _____ place. They can also just be ‘now that I’m in a safer place… throwing myself into cleaning/cooking at least makes some of the flashback recede.’

Two: In a different environment, her response to flashbacks change. She doesn’t lash out. She gets quiet or she gets scared or she just freezes.

Maybe the man encourages her to talk about what happens. Maybe he validates where she’s been and tries to soften the blow re: how she treated her daughter. She was doing the best she could at the time with the information she had- but now? Now she has to do better because she knows better. Now if she wants to stay, she needs to try.

Hopefully that helps,

#ts answers #rape tw #abuse tw #ptsd #thehungryvortigaunt #long post #i think i hit all the questions here

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capnyazz-blog · 7 years

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my right to die or: how i learned to stop worrying and love euthanasia

I rarely post anything personal here, I prefer to re-blog stuff about artistic works and Marxism but I feel like it’s important I get my thoughts out there on this subject: the right to die and mental illness. I will address large issues with America’s relationship with euthanasia as well as how they affect me personally.

American society has a problematic relationship both with it’s views on end of life care and mental illness. It’s at times expected for people to prolong their life as long as possible. Conversations about death are quickly shut up around “polite company.” Sick parents comfort crying children who tell their parents lines about always needing them, that they can’t help but see themselves as the child they once were still needing their parent’s guidance at times, though they themselves could be in their late forties and fifties. This isn’t to say that the loss of a parent isn’t something traumatic to someone, that they aren’t often times losing their most important role-model, but rather this is to highlight the societal pressure which manifests itself in familial expectations on how long someone should live.

A study published in Ageing and Society discussed a survey of 1600 participants with an average age of 42 and a slightly higher than average level of educational achievement found the single largest factor in people answering positively to questions like “do you want to live past 80?” was their expectations on quality of their final years. People who expected to have relatively healthy and financially secure life when reaching 80 years of age wanted to live longer, some past 100 years. Minority raced and people who identify as religious tended to want to live to or past 80.

In order for the average person to reach 80 years old they’ll generally have to receive expensive, and at times, painful, treatment towards the end of their life. American’s spend on average of $316,600 in their lifetime on medicine with half of that money being in their senior years, even more so if they make it past the age of 85.

My family carries a rare gene which triggers Lou Gehrig’s disease. I have seen my grandmother, cousins, great aunts and uncles die a, usually, slow and painful death. In the past 5 years there’s been too many to count, I think like 8 people in total, with more when you look back generations. More of my relatives carry the gene which triggers the disease, but knowing you carry the gene doesn’t tell you if you will develop ALS or when it will hit or how quickly it will take over your body. I do not know if I carry the gene because I cannot be tested unless my mother is, it would be a breach of her privacy for me to be tested. After ALS progresses typically your lungs stop working and you end up suffocating. With modern life support technology you can be kept alive in a conscious though vegetative-like state indefinitely, an option my grandmother, the most stubborn person in all of Minnesota history chose to do for sometime, like three years or so.

Seeing so many people die such a death you would think my family would have developed the skills to speak earnestly and openly about death but that just hasn’t been the case.

There has been a push among healthcare providers to have elderly patients file an advance care directive or living will with them in order to be sure that the health workers and patients are all on the same page as far as end of life care is concerned. A key point missing from many of these conversations is the option of euthanasia or assisted suicide. Currently assisted suicide is only legal in Oregon, Washington, California, Colorado, Vermont, Montana, and D.C. though, the option of withholding healthcare is almost always an option, such as do no resuscitate orders in people’s end of life plans.

Oregon was the first place in the country, and one of first places in the world, to allow doctors to prescribe a lethal amount of a drug, though not deliver the dose themselves to the patient. There is a documentary named How To Die In Oregon which follows an organization which assists people who have chosen to die after being diagnosed with a terminal illness. The film includes interviews with volunteers from the organization, patients, healthcare workers, family of those about to die, and even includes footage of the patients dying.

Belgium may have the most just and fair euthanasia laws in the world. Belgium allows for so called non-terminal patients as well as children to request physician assisted suicide. There are roughly 1400 assisted suicides preformed each year in Belgium for non-terminal (nearly always people suffering from non-treatable mental illness).

The laws and culture of Belgium regarding euthanasia is a great step forward for humanity. There can be no freedom without the freedom to control one’s own death. These laws don’t simply address the ability to have a say in one’s own death but also allows for an honest discussion on quality of life.

Most mental illnesses are treatable diseases that, like other diseases, can be addressed simply and effectively, coming in phases, sometimes for no reason, sometimes triggered by life events. With proper medical treatment the sufferer can find relief, or get their disease treated to a point where it is possible to live a full and fulfilling life despite it, typically with some combination of pharmaceuticals and talk therapy.

Some cases of mental illness are not like this though. Select cases do not come and go as episodes, rather constantly present in a severely debilitating way. My mental health problems are like this.

I have rarely felt happiness in my life. I have suffered from major depression and dysthymia, a combination sometimes called double depression, for my entire life. I do not remember a point in my life where these problems were not present, as far back as one can really remember. Simply waking up and going to school was an unbearable pain and burden my whole childhood. 9th grade year of high school I missed over 100 days of school.

I have used a variety of treatments my whole life. We would try one prescription for a while with little results then either adjust it or move onto the next one. I had pushed a psychiatrist to preform ECT on me when I was around 18 which resulted in my mother and the doctor shouting at each other, completely turning me off of that facility, the largest healthcare provider in the area. Then six months ago after a failed suicide attempt a doctor suggested ECT and we proceeded. For a while I did actually feel something resembling happiness because of the treatment but that faded and I fell back into the same slump I am so used to being in.

I found comfort in partying, never becoming dependent on drugs as others around me did, but had heavy use of them. Starting at 14 or so I had moved on from simply smoking pot to doing cocaine, drinking, smoking meth, nearly every common drug one can think of I put it inside my body. Thankfully though I had the ability to compartmentalize the drug use as simply for partying, while close friends could not. I, at times, feel responsible for two of my childhood best friends drug additions which they still wrestle with years after I introduced them to those particular drugs. For whatever reason I assumed others had the ability to be able to get really fucked up on whatever we had around and be able to walk away from those drugs just as easily. I have had to end those friendships because of the guilt I feel.

Then at 19 things got even worse. I was at a point where I was getting messed up, typically drunk, three or four days a week. I would go out with my friends at 10 pm and wouldn’t stop partying until 7-8 am, get a couple hours of sleep then do it all again the next day. I had been doing this for nearly two years. We lived only a few blocks from my college in a part of the city which was full of students. We had our own little community there, everyone knew everyone, parties almost always had an open door policy so long as you were cool.

It all changed one night where I was drinking with my friends. We were roughly half a block from our apartment, bottles of liquor in hand, it was around 4 am at this point. We see cops approach us and did what we had done so many times before and split and take off running as quickly as possible. We weren’t really concerned with tickets for minor consumption or open bottles, rather simply enjoyed the thrill of running from the cops. For reasons I still don’t know the cop decided to ignore my friends and go for me. They caught up with me tackled me to the ground, through the handcuffs on me in no time at all and proceeded to kick and punch me leaving my whole body badly beaten, bruised, and bloody. Arriving at jail their torture only continued, more beatings, being dragged by my hair. It climaxed when I was being finger printed, all the liquor I had had that night decided it was done being in my stomach, and I ended up throwing up on myself, the finger printing machine, and the cop doing my finger printing. They put me in a choke hold, drug me to my cell, stripped me naked while yelling homophobic slurs at me, and forcibly gave me an anal cavity search. I was not able to sit down for over a week after that.

After leaving jail on bail I prepared a cocktail of drugs, consumed them with a shot of whiskey, turned on some music and waited to drift off. The next day I woke up feeling absolutely awful, with yellow skin, and vomit all over me. This was by no means my first or last suicide attempt.

Thankfully the judge on my case was sympathetic to the abuse I received in custody, as well as respecting my relatively clean police record and was basically given a slap on the wrist.

The whole ordeal left me with PTSD. I cannot be around police. I’ve developed a spidey sense where I can feel when a cop is near and act in a way which will minimize any possibility of interacting with police. I have been on medications since then for treating the nightmares that I have from them, making it easier to sleep through them. I doubt that the PTSD will ever get to a point where I can function normally around police though.

All of this is to say my mental health is fucked. My medical bills have completely destroyed any hope for having a financially secure future. I can sometimes do extremely well in college despite my issues and at times have to drop out because of them. I have never made it more than three consecutive semesters without needing to stop because of my mental health. I haven’t gone more than a few weeks without some form of suicide attempt or self harm since I was nearly 13.

After I finish this post I will be walking to the store to pick up a box of razors and slicing my arms open and hopefully going deep enough to bleed to death. For some reason I have really come to like the idea of killing myself through cutting my wrists, it’s just always been the method I’ve had in mind when dying. I have used other methods, some which are generally more effective than my preferred method, without success.

Many doctors have said that it’s possible I will never live a life resembling normal because of my mental health problems and it’s treatment resistant nature. This is not a life that is worth living. My inability to feel happiness, to get myself out of bed, to feed myself, why is it I’m forced through societal norms to continue this life?

It should be my right to sit down with a doctor and explain the pain I have experienced my whole life, have them review the extensive medical history, and allow me to die in such a way that is painless and allows for me to die surrounded by my friends and family. But because it is not currently possible I am forced to use violent, painful methods to take my own life while I’m alone. I want to be able to close my eyes for the last time after seeing my family in the same room.

I fully understand the consequences of death, that there is no returning, and in my opinion, nothing on the other side. This is fine with me. Please understand that a life like this is not a life worth living and please support local initiatives which help those in deciding what their final moments will be like. Death is a part of life and one the person experiencing it should have total control over.

#me #personal #euthanasia #assisted suicide #death with dignity #mental health #depression #ptsd #suicide

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phynxrizng · 7 years

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A HEALING RITUAL FOR A THE APRIL FULL MOON

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New post on The Women's Tribe

A Healing Ritual For the April Full Moon

Source, by The Women's Tribe

Happy Full Moon Women's Tribe :)

Here we are all the full moon and in the bingo bango bongo of four retrograde planets! Eekers.

It is a time evaluation, of reflection, of looking back at what needs to be healed in the past so we can carry forward with more ease and gentleness in the now and in our futures. That is the gift of retrogrades.

It's not always easy as our old stuff emerges and comes to the for front but heck, let's let it. Allow it. Make room for it at the kitchen table as though it were your long lost aunt. We must honor its' existence and take a look. Feel it. Set it on its' way...out of body, out of our bones, released from our tissue.

For me, I've been lingering in trauma memories. I thought I had done my healing around this but life and emotional breakdowns, says the healing is not done.

When I had my first baby my first husband just didn't deal with the transition into fatherhood well and basically bailed. He did it in a manner that was hurtful, in a way he knew best...to cheat and chose another woman.

My highest conscious Self knows that he wasn't conscious or aware enough to talk and tell me that he was struggling or lost or unsure if he could handle being both a husband and father simultaneously.

And so he left and chose her. He didn't know how to say that he could not be who I needed or was asking of him so he acted it out to express it to me. I get that on a soul level, but it was still emotionally and mentally devastating and one of the most painful experiences of my life. (As well as the best thing that could have happened in the long run).

I associate having a baby with pain and struggle and loss.

I ended up on my own with baby, in a new apartment (he got the house), lost my job (found another), he got our dogs as he was in the house and me in an apartment. And there I was in the threshold of new motherhood trying to keep my head above water, wondering if I could support myself and baby, manage motherhood and a full-time job, etc..etc..

It was devastating, so much change all at one time. It was shocking actually. I felt really abandoned and alone. Navigating custody battles when you were wronged and nobody gave a poop was crazy making.

I struggled most with the fact that I could not be with my baby all the time cause of the choice he made, I had to lose time with my son. I had to share custody. There was little to no consequence for him or his actions...he got to keep the house (he did have to buy me out), he had his regular job, and he got what he wanted...to be a part-time dad all by betraying our vows, lying, and being with another woman.

I on the other hand got my world shattered and was continually told in court that I had to keep the emotional stuff separate from the custody, like I was not supposed to have feelings for what I went through. I was treated like the problem, not him.

CRAZY. MAKING!

Anywho...years have passed. I'm happily remarried with a new baby who's almost 9months old. Well my husband has been working out of town for the last few months and I have been on my own with the kids for weeks at a time.

It has totally triggered all those memories. The emotions, the forgotten dark times, the memories I blocked out...all coming back with a vengeance....to the point I cry and cry and cry. I've done trauma therapy, emotional release work, journalling, creative expression, you name it...I've released so much and yet the memories of being on my own with a baby linger in my gut, in my blood, in my immune system. There is more to be released.

This full moon is asking us to revisit past sore spots and evaluate how they impact the now. What's been coming up? An old relationship? An old patter of self-sabotage or job loss or endings, break-ups, loss in general? Allow it my friends. Pull out the chair and have it sit down with you.

FULL MOON HEALING RITUAL

Find a cozy space, light a candle and some incents. Have a cup of tea or a glass of wine and grab and pen and paper. We are going to write a letter to ourselves in the past that was struggling (And still has some to release). We are going to offer this part of ourselves what she

Allow what comes.....but here's some points to remember to

-Honor and recognized and validate your younger self's feelings and experiences.

-Ask that part of you what she needs.

-Allow her to answer.

-Imagine bringing this part of you to a time in your past where you experienced and received what she is needing. So if you are needing to feel love or trust, remember a time when you did. Who's with you. What are you doing? What season is it?

time of day? What are you doing together? What are the smells in the air.

What colors and temperature is it? Breathe in the sensation of experiencing what she/you needs. Where do you feel it? See it as a ball of energy and let it spread throughout your body, allow the feeling to expand and really experience it sensationally for a few minutes.

Write about it...and bring her back now with the memories.

To my 28 year old self,

First off, I see you. I hear you. I honor you. I know how much pain you endured and you still carry. I see it, I feel it, I honor that it's there. I think you are so strong for making it, for carrying on, for doing what you need to do to survive and care for your son. I'm so proud of you.

I know you are struggling, I see you, I feel you, I hear you with all the emotions that you are arising within me....what do you need

I need to feel not so alone...not so abandonned, not so isolated like I have to everything myself. I feel trapped and caged and scared. It's so heavy and painful to carry it all myself. I can't believe I have to do this myself.

As I reflect on when I have felt the most supported and loved and held is when I was in Lynn Andrews School. My classmates were my sisterhood. And so I bring her to one of our circles and fires where they all gave me healing and love. They drummed and rattled and held me in loving energy like I never felt before.

I was one of them, and they were part of me. They held me, they supported me, they were always there for me, even though we lived all over the world. I let them offer to her what they offered me then. I imagine her feeling the drum beat and the sound of the rattles....we are in a dark space with candles and fairy lights and the smell of sage burning lingers in the air. I tell her to let the drum fill her body up with strength and support and to feel the love.

I tell her to look into the fire and hear it crackle and to see how a web of women in the spirit world also connected to her and holding her, the Sisterhood of the Shields, the Grandmothers, her guides, her power animals, her ancestors, the fairies...they are all surrounding her and with her at all times giving her strength and power.

They all have a hand on her shoulder, she is the farthest thing from alone. I ask her to imagine that strength and love and power is like gold dust being sent from everyone in the room and in the energy world to her. I ask her to imagine it going in her and with each inhale in her body and with each second that passes she is being beamed with the light of strength and sisterhood.

I close my eyes and feel the sensations with her. I feel the web of women weaving love around me and her supporting us and

Each drum beat strengthens us with inner power

I tell her to see it filling her body, to feel the confidence and love and support. She does and so do I. I can see she feels stronger and supported...a shift has happened I feel it in my heart chakra.

I thank everyone at the circle with us for such a powerful experience and I grab her hand and go through a door that lingers in a giant boulder into the now... bringing with us the felt experience and gifts of support and love and strength into the now. I imagine putting a shawl on her to remind her of the hands that hugged her and literally have and touched her back offering their support.

I allow that image of her feeling stronger with her shawl in my heart to expand and fill my body.

Happy FULL HEALING MOON.

If you feel called, I'd be so honored if you followed the BLOG or the Women's Tribe Facebook Page.

SOURCE, The Women's Tribe | April 11, 2017 at 12:55 am | Tags: April Full Moon, emotions, healing, meditation, release, the womens tribe, writing | Categories: Uncategorized | URL: http://wp.me/p4uMzN-

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mclennunf · 7 years

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This Boy - Chapter 17

A/N: AHHHH THE APPOINTMENT ~John's~ I had to admit Ritchie was an amazing drummer. I wanted him in the band. But every time I looked at his smug little face I heard the voices in my head telling me to kick his ass again. But, I didn't. Paul was very content and forgave him very quickly last night. Paul asked me to spend the night, but I said no. I needed some time to myself before my appointment today. Although I knew he understood, he was still upset I wasn't going home with him.

My appointment was in a half an hour. I grabbed the phone and dialed Paul's number. "Hello?" "Paul? It's John." "I've been waiting for your call. What time are we meetin' up love?" He asked, I could tell he was excited. "I'll come get ye' now." I said and then hung up the phone. Way to be nice. I was scared, okay? I didn't want the worst possible news. I knew there was an outcome that could completely end Paul and I, and I didn't want that. I didn't blame Paul for pushing me toward an appointment though, I knew he was right. I walked to his house and fought with myself in my head. It's not gonna go well. Bail out. Don't go. Go, this is your only chance at a normal life with Paul. This going to end you and Paul. Shut the hell up, we're here. I knocked on Paul's door nervously. The door opened and revealed his beautiful, flawless face. You shouldn't bring him. I began to walk away from his house, he was close behind me. "John!" He tried to catch up. Don't be unfair. I stopped and turned to him. "I'm sorry m'love. It's not you. I'm just..." I began, not wanting to admit to him that I was scared. "I know John. I'm here." He smiled at me as he casually touched the small of my back as we approached the doctor's office. "Are you ready?" Paul asked as he opened the door for me. I nodded. "I wish I could kiss you." I mumbled as I walked by him, through the door. I approached the nurses' desk as Paul took a seat in the waiting area. "Name?" She said. "John Winston Lennon." I mumbled back. "Take a seat, the doctor will be ready any moment now." She smiled and gestured toward the waiting area, where my lovely boy was waiting for me. Just call him your bloody boyfriend ya fag. I sat down next to Paul. "Do you think they're going to let you come in with me?" I asked, nervously. Paul looked around the room, scanning it before taking my hand. "I hope so." He answered, quietly. "John Lennon?" The doctor said, coming out from around the corner. My stomach flipped. I stood up. "My friend.. Can he come in?" I asked, my voice obviously shaking. The doctor nodded. "Follow me." I smiled at Paul, who took my hand secretively behind the doctor and followed him with me. I sat down on the evaluation table, Paul on the extra chair and the doctor on his fancy swirly chair. "So, John. What seems to be going on with you?" The doctor asked, grabbing a clipboard and pen. Don't fuckin tell him. Yer gonna get thrown away in a loony bin and never see Paul again. "Well sir, I-uhm, I have trouble, y'know because I hear voices - uhm, in me head." I said, staring at my hands. "What do the voices say John?" He asked. I looked up at him. He wasn't judging me, he was sincerely asking. No he's getting ready to call the loony bin. "Well, ugh-they tell me what to do a lot of the time, or y'know call me names and what not until I believe them. Sometimes they're so bad I can't focus on reality, y'know it's like I'm disconnected from real life. I dunno." I shrugged, realizing I had began to ramble. I looked over at Paul, who had a slight smile on his face. I assumed he was proud of me. He's not proud of you. "How often are the voices there?" "Every day. A lot. Most of the time." "Okay, John. Don't feel like this is going to ruin your life. You're not the only one in the world who suffers from this. But we will treat it, and get rid of those voices. How does that sound?" The doctor asked me. I smiled. "It sounds bloody great." I answered, feeling a little calmer. He's lying! "Great. What you've got is called early psychosis. It's very serious, John. But I think we've caught your's early enough to treat it. I'll write you a prescription for some medication to help calm you down and stop the voices. It won't help completely, though. I want you to attend some individual cognitive behavior therapy." The doctor said as he wrote out my prescription. I began to panic. Medication. Therapy. Psychosis. You're a fucking LUNATIC. The voices kept repeating. "I c-can't, I don't, I mean," I tried to form words but I kept hearing the same thing over and over. "Shall I give you a minute?" "Yes please sir." I heard his voice. The door shut. Paul. I felt his hands on my cheeks. "John, are you there?" I felt him but my eyes couldn't him. I was looking up, down, side to side. "John." I felt shots of electricity on throughout my body. He was kissing me. He brought me back to Earth. "Paul." I managed to say. "Ah, there you are." He smiled. "Why're you upset? We've got a solution, love." Paul told me. "I don't want to go to therapy. I'm suppose to be strong. I don't want medication. I'm suppose to be strong." I repeated myself, hoping he would understand. "This is going to help you, John. I promise." He doesn't know what he's talking about. He wants to you to be locked away. "Paul I think I want to do this alone. You should go." I blurted out, shoving his hands off of me. His eyes looked hurt, and he hung his head. "I'll, ugh.. See ya 'round then John." Watch him leave. He would stay if he cared. ~Paul's~ I wasn't going to leave. I know John had asked me too, but I didn't think it was a good idea. I stood outside the doctors office and lit up a cigarette. I wanted to know what got him so upset. He got an answer, he got a solution. I wanted to be there for him. But I had to remember this was HIS illness, not mine. I waited patiently for him to come out the door, hoping his mood changed back to being happy and needing me. I was also worried he would be upset I hadn't listened and just gone home. The door opened and I spun around. "Paul," John began. "Are you okay?" I asked, hesitantly. "I'm sorry I was a dick." He said as we began walking down the street. "It's alright Johnny, do you wanna tell me what happened after I left?" I asked, trying not to sound too pushy. "No Paul, not particularly. I'm going home, I'll see you... whenever I see you." John spat as he began to quicken his pace and I began to fall behind. "What the bloody hell!" I ran up behind him. I watched John roll his eyes. "John?" I said, trying to sound pathetic enough that he would feel bad. I watched his eyes soften. "Go home, McCartney." He mumbled, clenching his jaw. "I don't want to leav-" I tried to say before he cut me off. "Paul, what aren't ye grasping? I'm telling you to go the fuck home. Leave me alone." He almost yelled, clearly not wanting to make a scene in the middle of the street. My heart began to ache. "Fine." I said quietly, holding back my anger and frustration. I stormed off ahead of him toward my house. I wanted to make sure he made it home safe, but I didn't think I could do so without him knowing. I wasn't about to be a stalker boyfriend. I stormed up to my room, not saying hello to Michael or Auntie Gin. I slammed my door shut and fell into my bed, my face in my pillow. I held back my tears, John didn't deserve my pain. There was a knock at my door. "What?!" I answered, rudely. A small Mike peered through the door. "Paulie?" He said. "Come in," I sighed and sat up on my bed. He came in and sat down next to me. "What's wrong?" He asked as he leaned his head on my shoulder. I smiled at him. "Nothing is wrong, Mikey." I lied. "You can tell me Paul!" He said as he looked up at me. "John and I had a bit of a row, s'all. No big deal." I lied again. Oh, how I wanted to scream and punch the wall. John just shoving me off like that, talking to me so rudely even when I was trying to help. "Is everything going to be okay?" Mike asked. "I hope so, Mike. I really hope so." I said quietly, looking down at the ring on my left hand. Seeing it made my heart skip a beat, and a lump threatened to form in my throat. "Do you love John?" Mike asked me. My eyes widened a little. "Of course I do, Mike. He's me best mate." That wasn't necessarily a lie. "No, George is your best mate. John is your boyfriend, I thought," Mike began. "What?!" I said, shocked. "Isn't he? Or does John have another boyfriend or girlfriend?" Mike asked. He was so young and naive, he had no idea how wrong it was for two men to have that kind of relationship, how illegal it was. "Yeah Mike.. he is." I mumbled, waiting for another reaction. "Well I like him. He's funny." Mike smiled. "Do you wanna talk about y'row?" Mike asked as he straightened his back. I shook my head. "Well, I bet he's gonna call you tonight and apologize." Mike said, as he smiled and left me alone with my thoughts. For all that it was worth, I hoped Mike was right. I did want to talk to someone about it, though. Mostly John, but obviously that was out of the question. I thought about calling George, y'know, to get his input or even just have someone listen, but the more I thought about it the more I felt as though I was disrespecting John's privacy. George didn't need to know about John's voices. Instead I strummed my guitar and scribbled lyrics down, hoping for some sort of satisfaction. Unfortunately, I knew I wasn't going to have any kind of satisfaction without John. I hoped that he was just having a bad moment and that everything was going to be okay. He would apologize and we could forget all about it. But I also had a scary thought, that John was mad that I pushed him into the appointment and he was actually finished with our relationship. I didn't want the validation that it was true, so I didn't call him. I would wait until he came crawling back to me. But I didn't want to wait, you see. I wanted to hear his voice, to touch his hand, to kiss his lips and to hear him tell me everything was going to be okay. Bloody hell, I couldn't sit like that all night. I got up and dialled his number. "Hello?" "John, baby, it's Paul. Can we talk?" I asked, my stomach now filled with butterflies. Dial tone. John hung up on me.

#mclennon #mclennon fanfiction #this boy

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brittanyyoungblog · 5 years

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You Are the Sun: How to Avoid Losing Your Identity in Relationships

I’m a BIG believer in therapy. I think everyone should be in therapy. We are all constantly growing and changing and struggling and overcoming. We all have things we could use an unbiased person to help us work on.

For me, one of my big struggles has always been maintaining my identity in relationships. Honestly, relationships of any kind. Romantic and friendships. I struggle to find balance between my personal life and my professional life. I can be guilty of becoming single-minded; for example, I’ll go through phases of life where I morph into such a social butterfly, I let my work completely slip. Or I’ll get so caught up in the guy I’m dating, I’ll lose touch with my friends for a season. Or I’ll get completely wrapped up in work and allow it to completely eclipse everything else.

Where does this lack of balance stem from? Well, for one thing, I’m human. I think humans in general struggle with balance in their lives. But in my case, and I suspect this is true for a lot of people, it’s also because I tend to attribute my worth to other people. How other people are treating me or responding to me or loving me or not loving me tends to be the compass I follow for determining how I’m going to treat myself or love myself. That’s why I often get so wrapped up in other people and in earning their approval or time or love or attention that I completely lose track of myself.

And that, my friends, is a recipe for a completely unbalanced life. Why? Because it’s all backwards. YOU have to determine your worth, and then other people will fall in line with your beliefs. If you wait around on other people to decide how you’re going to feel about yourself on any particular day, you will always be miserable, unhappy, and unfulfilled. If you wait around on other people to “complete” you, you will always be unfinished. No matter what Jerry Maguire said.

Or, as my therapist put it so succinctly a few weeks ago…

“You are the sun in your solar system. Everyone else in your life rotates around you. You do not rotate around them.”

Good grief, did you just hear all the mics in all the land drop after that, or is it just me?!? It reminded me of one of my all-time favorite Grey’s Anatomy quotes, said by Cristina to Meredith about Dr. McDreamy:

“Don’t let what he wants eclipse what you need. He’s very dreamy, but he’s not the sun. You are.”

How many of you, like me, have surrendered your sunlight to stand in someone else’s shade? Last year I got into a very serious relationship with someone, probably the most serious relationship I’ve ever been in. We fell in love and things moved very fast and we were talking marriage and everything. And I was so excited to find this great love that I completely, and I mean COMPLETELY, surrendered myself to the relationship. Which sounds really lovely and romantic in theory, but in reality, tends to spell disaster for a relationship.

Why? Because when the other person met you, they fell for the you that had a life other than them. And when that busy, vibrant, full life gets pushed to the side in order to make the relationship the center of your universe, everything gets thrown off balance. In my case, when I met my ex, I was finishing up my fourth book and spending lots of time with friends and had tons of other things going for me and my life other than that relationship. In other words: I was the sun. And I was shining brilliantly. And that’s who my ex fell for.

But slowly, a little at a time, I made him the sun. And I stopped shining. And the more I made him the sun, the darker and colder our relationship became. I even went against my gut several times at key moments in our relationship in order to keep him happy, and keep him as the sun, at my own expense. For example, he pushed me to meet his two small children really quickly and it felt way too fast for me. But I was scared to speak up and say so, for fear of hurting his feelings or making him feel like I didn’t want to meet the kids (I did, just not so quickly). Ultimately, I went with his timeline instead of my own. The same thing happened again the first time he told me he loved me. I knew I was on my way to falling in love with him, but I wasn’t quite there yet and wasn’t ready to say the words. Yet I went against my gut and said it back because I didn’t want to push him away by seeming noncommittal or like I wasn’t as into him as he was me.

Yes, the more I rotated around him and the more I sacrificed my needs for his wants, the more our relationship deteriorated. You can guess what happened next. He broke up with me one Monday night in a ten minute long phone conversation that wasn’t anywhere near worthy of the seriousness of our relationship.

Where did I go wrong? I made him the sun. I didn’t maintain any sort of balance or set healthy boundaries in the relationship. And the relationship spun off its axis until there was no way to recover.

So how can you make sure you remain the sun in your relationships? Here are a few easy tips:

1. Maintain your life outside of him. Don’t be that girl who completely bails on her life, her friendships, and her hobbies for any man. You don’t need to see him every night of the week. My ex and I would often sacrifice sleep to spend time together and wind up exhausted and miserable the next day. That inevitably leads to resentment and is not a healthy foundation for a relationship. Keep going to the gym, keep having girls’ nights out, and keep up with your self-care. A relationship is designed to add to your already awesome life, not become your life.

2. Set healthy boundaries and listen to your gut. Establish how many days you’re going to see him in a week and don’t apologize for it. If you’re not ready to take a great big relationship steps like meeting the kids or saying I love you, don’t. A relationship that isn’t a two-way street is a dead-end road.

3. Finally, throw out the notion that you need anyone or anything to “complete” you. You’re already a whole, complete person just as you are. Or as I like to say, you are the cake and a relationship is the icing. With or without the icing, a cake is still a cake!

One of my favorite quotes by Jennifer Aniston says this: “A relationship isn’t going to make me survive. It’s the cherry on top.” So in other words: YOU be the cake, the sundae, the sun. Let him be the icing, the cherry, and the stars in your solar system. That’s how to maintain your identity in relationships, and how to have your cake and eat it, too.

The post You Are the Sun: How to Avoid Losing Your Identity in Relationships appeared first on The Date Mix.

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meditationsinausterity · 6 years

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Losing Shame and Using Guilt

Anyone who knows me well enough will know i'm fascinated by the specificity of language. I had a lecturer tell me once that the more precisely you can express yourself, the better you'll be understood. Granted, he was talking about getting to grips with Derrida, but the underpinning sentiment of being understood caught at my very core. As a result, I'll often, mid-sentence, correct myself if the word is not exactly what I mean, particularly in terms of expressing emotion. I get frustrated if I can't make the exact clarification I want to express my point, but in the process of correcting myself I usually arrive at the point I'm driving at. I'm sure we all do this to a certain extent, or the qualifier 'Do you know what I mean?' wouldn't be so prevalent in everyday speech.

I do it in my support sessions all the time when I'm asked how I feel - I take the approach that I need to get as much out of these sessions as possible to progress with my week, my general recovery. If I'm not making every effort to understand and be understood, I don't see the point, do you know what I mean? One such time was after a particularly horrific binge, that saw me physically injured and put the nail in the coffin of my short-lived but long-suffering relationship at the time, where I was asked how I was feeling about it. I said: 'Guilty. But I think it's normal to feel guilty. I don't mean the kind of guilt that paralyzes you and stops you doing anything. I mean the kind of guilt that makes you ask the questions, tell the truth to yourself, and try to learn. There should be another word for it.'

I thought about this conversation while I was walking to the job centre this week, anxious as fuck, and trying to talk myself out of feeling guilty. 'There should be another word for it' kept rolling over my brain, and I scrabbled to think of something until I realized I'd been wrong in the session. What I was feeling after that binge, WAS guilt. what I was feeling on the walk to the job centre, the 'I shouldn't be doing this' breathlessness that made me want to just go home to bed, was shame. And the penny started to drop as to why they were different feelings when I examined the two situations.

On the way to the job centre, my feelings of shame weren't directly coming from anything I did, am, or genuinely believe. Shame can only exist in the light of other people. As a society we're pretty good at shame. There's body-shame, slut-shame, poverty-shame, and probably loads more ways other people make people feel like shit. Shame is a tool used to police others according to the norms of, usually a majority. As a society, the fact these terms exist for different ways in which certain majorities enact this policing shows we're slowly growing into that realization. Shame, and its younger, less crippling cousin, embarassment, can't exist, without other people. If you have a shameful secret, it doesn't technically become shameful until you speak it to anybody else. More prosaically, if you fart in a lift alone there's no shame until someone gets in at the next floor.

I felt ashamed of going to apply for jobseeker's allowance because of how it would have looked to someone on the outside: I'm young, able bodied, adept with people, energetic, and have a work ethic; so what fucking right have I got to ask for help when it ought to be easy for me to get a job? I could hear the imaginary 'you should be ashamed of yourself' in my head, stopping my little trainers in their tracks. Because shame creates paralysis. Shame is what's going to stop you doing something you maybe really need to do, or even just want to do.

There's no arguing with shame if you treat it as something that springs directly from the inside of you. I realized the key to stopping shame from stopping me lies directly in that voice, that 'You should be ashamed of yourself'. For a start, I can tell it's not my own convictions at play here, because I don't call myself 'You' - other people do, when they're not mispronouncing my name. So if it's not me, who the fuck is talking? Once you've asked that question you've already created an access to whatever the external narrative is that's influencing the shame. In the case of me and the job centre, we can cite tabloid hysteria, my working class upbringing, and coming from a long line of proud women who struggle to accept help from anybody; a real tasty blend.

The other key disarming tool here is 'should' - the singlemost efficient way to convey obligation that i know. Think about the amount of times you've bailed on something and explained yourself to someone else by saying 'I should go, but...' That 'should' is the point of tension between what people expect of you and your desires and intentions. Asking 'WHY SHOULD I?' a la an angry teenager, as I did on my walk, may be the fastest and most explosive way to deal with external shaming narratives from stopping me in my tracks. The answers to 'why should I?' are never convincing to the person who questions the power of 'should', which is why the last resort is always 'Because I said so', which, let's face it, never convinced anyone ever. Asking 'why should I?' is a fast and powerful way of undermining all the reasons you are being shamed.

So shame, once you unpick what it is, is simple to counteract. Which is good, because it's the thing that stops people doing what they need to in order to get help. Guilt, however, is more complicated. And I'm going to posit a theory, in no doubt a stupidly long-winded way, that guilt is not there to stop you from doing things, but is in fact a motivational emotion.

I was wrong in my session. There was no better word for what I should have been feeling than guilt. Because guilt is directly related to your inner self, to something you did or didn't do, or say. Guilt was absolutely the right word for how I felt after that binge, because I had done things I knew were wrong. And I knew them to be wrong in accordance with what I genuinely and fundamentally believe in myself, for the simple reason that if i didn't believe I shouldn't be resorting to drinking to blot out anxiety and pain, then why was i engaging in therapy to break that pattern? or, put more plainly and simply, despite all my endeavours to do the right thing lately, I had massively fucked it up, by myself, and guilt is the way in which my mind was holding me accountable for what I had done wrong, by holding it at the forefront of my mind and not allowing me to concentrate on anything else.

And, to go back to what I said earlier about shame being an external process that can't exist without other people, you can be perfecty capable of feeling guilty all alone. To go back to my fart in a lift metaphor, If you fart in a lift alone, and then get out, you'll feel guilty about leaving that fart in that space to fester because you know you did it. You feel guilt because you're to blame. Guilt without culpability already has a name: paranoia. To apply this to my situation; even if nobody had known about my binge and it hadn't affected anybody else (which was emphatically not the case), even if I hadn't sat in a room telling somebody else all about it, I would still have felt guilty. Because I would have known I'd done wrong. But it would have been a kind of double guilt; the guilt of my own culpability, underneath the the guilt of not revealing it, which i'm going to rename 'concealment anxiety' for clarity.

I once read somewhere that 'we're only as sick as our secrets', and in terms of this kind of double-layered guilt, I genuinely believe it to be true. When I sat in the office talking about the binge, there was a definite sense of pressure relief, like the first door of an airlock opening. But the removal of the concealment anxiety is only the first door; it doesn't free you, it just lets you breathe and focus. Concealment anxiety is why problem pages everywhere are crowded with letters asking if people should reveal their adultery to their partners - the uncertainty stems from the knowing it would provide that rush of relief vs. the fact it won't remove the guilt that comes from the actual culpability. Telling the truth about what you did can only remove the concealment anxiety, it can't remove the guilt of culpability.

The reason I use the metaphor of breathing space and an airlock is because until you untangle concealment anxiety and guilt, you can spend a long time in that pressure zone, confusing the two. My therapy, this blog, the practices I'm putting into place to reach out to more people and to be honest about everything, they're all ways in which I've realized i was existing in this dead, hidden zone where all the things i was doing to harm myself were hidden. And that environment was slowly making me sicker, and more isolated, and withdrawn. I wasn't admitting to my actions, which meant I was stuck alone in this space, at eye level with my guilt at all times, and unable to address any of it because I couldn't focus.

Breaking that first seal by gritting my teeth hard and admitting to all the things I was guilty of to people (professionals and loved ones alike) provided me the breathing space I needed to look at the real guilt in a more focused way. The guilt that, as I put it, 'makes you ask questions, tell the truth to yourself, and try to learn.' And it was chronic, in this situation. I say chronic because guilt is visceral, it's a physical emotion. You feel sick, your heart pounds, you sweat, and if you're me, your posture goes totally insular and you can't look anyone in the eye (I'm pretty sure this is also what dogs do). Guilt is your mind's equivalent of putting a huge billboard in front of all your other emotions saying 'YOU FUCKED UP. YEAH, YOU. WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT?'

And that, I think, is the key function of guilt. On first glance it seems like an unfair emotion - you can't undo what you did wrong, because what's done is done, so the 'what are you gonna do about it?' can seem overwhelming. But guilt's 'what are you gonna do about it?' doesn't have to be interpreted as a threat; it's your mind's way, at least I think, of saying, 'you did something horribly wrong, and now we need to focus on ways to make sure you don't do it again.'

((DISCLAIMER: I'm not, here, disregarding the fact that if you did something to hurt somebody else, you should say sorry, or try to make amends, but I am not dwelling on that, because a sorry can't fix anything, and sometimes the amends aren't possible. That's not to say they're not a necessary part of facing up to what you're guilty of, as I certainly said my sorry to the concerned party, meaning every single word of it (as I'm sure he was fully aware), but knowing in the pit of my stomach that no matter how heartfelt the sorry was, it wouldn't fix the damage I'd done. No matter how fundamentally important it is to say and mean, never has any sorry I've ever said had any more power than words ever have over actions.))

But back to that 'what are you gonna do about it?' - That's what's made me see that guilt can be a motivational emotion. For a start, there's the fact that it's so sick-making and anxiety-inducing that you would, in its throes, probably do whatever it takes never to feel it again. And I think that's no coincidence; warning signs are eye-burningly bright, sirens are ear-splittingly loud, because urgent messages need urgent attention. But the process of guilt, the constant reminders; I am finding, the more I notice and interrogate my thoughts; often take the form of ways in which you could have done things differently. I used to think that this was just my brain compounding things by telling what a fucking idiot I was, but now I'm starting to realize that actually, these alternate-plays are not nasty mind tricks, they're useful tools for me to interrogate, using direct example, why I didn't do things differently. I'm using guilt as a motivational tool, by letting these replays provoke questions, and therefore answers, that inform my future decisions. I'm still working on it, but it's very effective. It is literally the emotional equivalent of 'learn from your mistakes'. Guilt isn't your enemy, guilt is your teacher. It's just that it's the teacher you thought was really savage at school who you only grew to respect when you realized that they got shit done (not unrelated: Hi Mrs. Pearman, hope you're well!)

That was probably more long winded than anyone needed it to be, but we all have these negative emotions, and I'm starting to learn that engaging with them is both practical (because they're not fucking going anywhere unless I get lobotomized), and useful (because they have more to tell me than that I currently don't feel very good). So I'm going to become shameless (or more so, as anyone who has encountered how chill I am with being seen naked will attest), I'm going to be as honest as I can to stop that concealment anxiety airlock from closing me in and stopping me breathing again (a decision I've already committed to), and when I am to blame for something, I am going to let my guilt guide me into examining why the hell I did it in the first place, to stop me doing it again.

#personal blog #recovery #guilt #shame #anxiety #emotion #tl;dr #musings

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