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#trauma-dumping
antimony-medusa · 1 year
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So this fandom has a problem with trauma-dumping. We all know it. People are bad in streamers TTS, and we all cringe, and it seems like every major author has to have something in their Ao3 notes to say not to trauma dump, and last night I saw people telling tham n0phis, who is an artist and like 18 or 19, just details and jokes that you should not tell a random person on the internet. It's bad.
But Why is it bad? What's wrong about being honest about how you're feeling?
Okay, this is gonna take a while.
The basic test for "am I being weird/overfamiliar/trauma dumping" is "would you say this to a barista/cashier". Would you walk up to someone whose job is to take your money and give you coffee, while they are at work, and would you say this. This is the place that like 80% of TTS and a surprising number of anons falls down. They break the social rules, and make it awkward and terrible for everybody. But again, why is it bad to say these things to a stranger? If I think someone's hot, if I've been having tramatic things happen why shouldn't I say so?
Conversation is a game for two or more players. You have what you're actually saying in words, and you have a huge amount of information that is being communciated and things that are being assumed based on things like body language, cultural context, setting, etc. Some people find conversation very natural and keep track of all the rules easily, without thinking about it. Some people have to memorize the rules manually. I have had to memorize the rules manually. It is difficult and it sucks, but it's necessary, because the failure state of a successful conversation, what happens when you break the rules of the conversational game we're playing, is you being rude. That is all being rude is, it's breaking the rules of the conversational game. So. How do you avoid being rude?
If you boil allll the rules down to a single rule, it is "if I say this, do I know what the other person is going to say, and are they going to be comfortable with this. Am I changing the rules or setting of the conversational game we're playing." Not what I want them to say, in some imaginary world where we're best friends, but what is likely that this person who doesn't know me, and is having a causual interaction with me, is going to say. And if you have any sense that you are putting the person on the spot, or you're making them uncomfortable, if you are changing the tone of the conversation from "i am here to get you your coffee" to "things you say to a therapist", don't say it.
This is why you don't make suicide jokes in someone else's inbox, because how are you supposed to respond to that? This is why you don't bring up cancer, even if it's very on your mind, because it is rude to inflict the topic "cancer", or any other heavy thing, on someone who is not currently dealing with cancer already. (This is why it's not rude to bring up cancer at the cancer support group, because the setting has shifted and everyone here has already opted in to cancer. The barista has not opted in to cancer.) This is why you don't tell a stranger they're the cornerstone of your mental health, because again, how do you respond to that? If someone you've never seen in your life walked up and told you that, you'd be going "what the fuck, uhhhhhhhh" and then you'd be stuck between "you're welcome I guess" and "holy shit get away from me".
When you are in a causual conversation with a stranger. You throw them the ball of the conversation already knowing what they're going to say next. (In a general sense.) You say A, knowing that the normal response is B. You set them up for little interactions like "I like your hair/thanks" or "Oh what do you do for work/I work in a bakery/Oh what's your favourite thing about that". You keep that conversational ball in the air, and that's why people do things like talk about the weather, because we all already know what a conversation about the weather is like, so it's a chance for us to non-verbally communicate "politeness" and "friendliness" and "I aknowledge you as a human being and not a machine" while you have the same conversation at a bus stop you have twice a week. That is what small talk is FOR, and that's not a weakness of small talk, it's what it's designed to do.
The less you know someone, the more you are operating on a conversational level where it's vital that you don't say or do anything that you don't already know what they're going to say. Because it is rude to walk up to a conversation that's operating on a level where we're just basically waving at each other and going "hey, human! I am also a human!" and trying to drag it over to the level of intimacy you have with someone who already knows you and loves you, and would help you move without being asked, because this person does not know and love you and did not sign up for that. You're walking up to someone who doesn't know you from Adam and basically throwing your arm around their shoulder and going Heyyyyyyy, I think you and I are best friends, which is just so rude. You're making it weird. You're breaking the rules of the game.
To your friends you can walk up and tell them the terrible thing, because they're your friends, and they signed up for this. You will do the same thing when the terrible thing happens to them. You can move the conversational level beyond talking about the weather, to actual bad things (and jokes that would be inappropriate to say to a stranger), because even if you don't know exactly what your friend is going to say, you know you're not making them uncomfortable, and you have a history where you know you can bring these things up. A streamer/artist/author does not have this history with you. They did not opt in to these topics. They don't know you.
Basically just think about the person on the other end of the conversation and how it feels to be them when someone tells them that if their family finds out they're a lesbian they're going to kill themselves. They don't know what to say to that. You just took the conversational ball and you threw it in their face, breaking their nose. That is not a comment you make to a stranger.
Stop trauma-dumping, stop being over-familiar with people who don't actually know you, it makes it uncomfortable for everyone. Save it for the GC.
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bestjeanistmonster · 18 days
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Dc au- felt like being goofy
…but since Shadow is raising these plants i think we can classify this as a case of passing on generational trauma.
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deadsetobsessions · 4 months
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It’s been months since he’s settled into life at Wayne Manor. It’s hilarious that they don’t think he knows about their obvious nightlife (and that’s coming from someone whose hero name was just their last name spelled differently) but they don’t know anything about his own past as a vigilante. To be fair, a dimensionally displaced Ghost King wasn’t really on the board for reasonable guesses. Danny Fenton blinked innocently at Duke, blue eyes watery and oh-so-trusting of his adopted older brother when Duke claimed that his bruising came from getting caught in Ivy’s attack on the busses today.
(“Oh my god he’s so trusting and pure what the hell?” He heard Steph whisper to Dick, who nodded emphatically.)
“Oh man, you should get some rest. You guys are seriously unlucky, you know? Do you need to go to the hospital?” Danny asked Duke, his core trilling as he allowed himself to fuss over a member of his ‘fraid.
“Nah, man. I’m good. I think I’ll take a nap and sleep it off.”
“Okay. Oh, here!” Danny fumbled for his bag, grabbing his prescribed pain meds- for his chronic pain, but they don’t actually do anything for him since his ectoplasm burns away most of it- and handed it to Duke. “Take one, and only one. Those bruises look nasty.”
And then Danny gave him the puppy dog eyes and Duke folded, because Danny knew that he wasn’t supposed to hand his meds out but these situations were kind of the reason he claimed chronic pain to being with (even if it was true and his hands shook with aftershocks).
“Thanks, Danny. I feel like death warmed over.”
Danny laughed, the opportunity to mess with the family sparking in his head. “Yeah, I’ve died before. Wouldn’t recommend it.”
With that, Danny threw Duke an easy going smile and walked towards his room, bag on his back.
From his peripherals, Danny watched Jason drop his bowl of snacks, Dick’s pale face, and the concerned and shocked look of everyone else. Except Damian, who just kind of scowled thoughtfully. Tim looked like he was going to rip Danny apart like an interesting puzzle, Cass sat up straight (and he made sure every micro expression he caught on others stayed unconcerned on his own body), and Duke froze.
He snickered- well out of regular earshot- as whispers and whispered shouts rung out after he left the room.
He can’t wait to drop the “I know you’re vigilantes” bomb on them. It’ll be hilarious.
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spacelazarwolf · 1 year
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is he “trauma dumping” on you or have you just not unpacked what the patriarchy has taught you outside of “woman bad” and you think men expressing any kind of emotion or vulnerability is bad actually.
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inbredlamb · 8 months
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Home
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wilcze-kudly · 3 months
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So um. I genuinely don't have many thoughts on the live action atla. It looks fine.. i guess
Except. Zuko's scar.
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It's so... underwhelming. Like yeah it's there. It's red and it has a little bit of texture. But I guess i was hoping the live action would make it a little more prominent.
Like I'm a burn victim myself, who very much went through a similar struggle Zuko did. Where i felt like my scars define me. This. This feels not like what i hoped for. They even let him keep his eyebrow 😤
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And I'm hoping that it's just because it wasn't practical to go all out with it. Like it was too expensive to put full prosthetics and special effects on such a young actor for every shoot.
But i have this sinking feeling in my gut that its because he's 'meant to be attractive'. Or even more heartbreakingly, that making it bigger would be considered too 'gory' or 'body horror'.
And im just tired of seeing scars and other 'deformities' as being seen as something to only be shown in full capacity in horror movies. That it would be too visceral or too 'gross' to fully show. It reinforces the idea that people like Zuko, people like me have something inherently disgusting and ugly about us. That our features have to be toned down in order to be palatable to a wider audience.
I remember seeing Zuko for the first time as a kid and seeing a part of myself that was rarely represented. I was bullied for my skin grafts as a child. Of course i was, kids are cruel. But seeing Zuko go through the struggles i went through and to have him find people who didn't treat him differently was so important to me. Like to me, that part of his story was arguably more important than his redemption arc.
And seeing Zuko seen as attractive by people in the fandom was also a profound experience. Because it felt like i could too exist in my full burnt chicken nugget glory and still be treated as a full person. Not looked at with pity or disgust.
So that's why live action Zuko's scar is such a disappointment to me.
I have other thoughts on the atla remake but really, they don't matter that much, since i don't think ill be watching it
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nerdpoe · 18 days
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Young Justice is always a little...concerned. With Phantom's living situation. Now they're outright afraid for him, and Bart has decided it's time to Ask An Adult.
It was the little quips. The tiny little things. Stuff that didn't seem to matter to Phantom at all, or appeared to be normal for him, that he didn't realize weren't normal at all.
"Oh, better not hope my mom catches me." "Doing what, staying out past bedtime?" "Nah, using my powers; she'd vivisect me!"
"Another stab wound. Great." "Don't worry Phantom, I've got the med kit-" "Oh, I'm not a baby or anything, I can handle it just fine. Just gimme a sec to take it out."
"My dad has better aim than that." "...Like, when he's hunting, right?" "...At what other times would he be shooting at me?"
"Huh. Not as bad as my parents place. Look; they have a decontamination shower!" "Phantom, this lab has been vandalized to the point of needing a hazmat suit." "Did I stutter?"
Finding out each others identities did nothing to soothe the worry. Tim quietly told the others that every time he tried to run facial recognition, he kept hitting a government firewall he couldn't breach. Phantom never told them his last name, just his first, and 'Danny' is super common.
The thing that really did it though, the thing that made Bart snap and run off to ask Max, was when Danny had a nightmare.
He was talking in his sleep.
"No. Don't-stop. Stoooop. I need...my skin. Mom, no. You can't...peel off...my skin..."
Bart didn't even wait for them to wake Danny up before he was standing in front of Max, talking a mile a minute as he tried to figure out what to do, with Wally staring in horror over a plate of waffles as he computed everything that Bart was saying.
~~~~~~
Danny had a dream about his mom and Skulker arguing about how to skin him. He wouldn't really call it a nightmare, because it was just Skulker, but the scariest thing was Skulker insisting to his mom that it was possible to skin him with a potato peeler. Dream mom was arguing that it was not, and that from a scientific standpoint that was a really piss poor way to preserve a specimen.
He hadn't been begging them to stop hurting him, he'd been whining at them to knock it off.
But when he wakes up, it's to a room full of worried friends and an old man who calls himself Max.
"Kid, I think we need to talk."
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notaplaceofhonour · 1 month
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it’s october 7th. you hear about the attack by seeing people you followed glorifying the terrorist attack—a massacre, a pogrom—as victory & justified resistance, glorifying a terrorist group that was founded with the explicit intent to kill your entire people
you make a post in which you make it clear you support palestinians and oppose the ways israel has wronged them, explaining that the terrorist group is still not good. you know you will probably get some flacc from the pro-Hamas side, but naively underestimate how much.
you get thousands of notifications on that one post, the majority of them hateful comments.
some of the response is positive. multiple messages thank you for the post, expressing bafflement that it’s controversial.
a few Israelis are upset at the loaded language in your post, but explain their problems with it civilly. you called Israel “apartheid”. they ask you what apartheid laws Israel has. you admit you honestly don’t know.
your inbox is flooded with anonymous hate from anti-Israel leftists.
over the course of a few weeks you have received hundreds of death threats, a dozen rape threats. people accuse you of being pro-genocide. you’re a literal Nazi. you’re racist, you thirst for the blood of Palestinians. you’re brainwashed by propaganda, a shill for The Zionist Entity. a few of the hate messages are from literal Neo-Nazis; the overwhelming majority are from leftists, many of them queer.
you are considering suicide.
you see footage of the october 7th attacks. you see footage of the bombings in gaza. you see footage of a Jewish man being murdered at an anti-Israel rally.
a popular creator you follow posts in support of an antisemitic hate group that masquerades as a Jewish organization. this organization regularly posts blood libel and other antisemitic rhetoric, works with groups that are even more explicitly antisemitic, including celebrating October 7th, holocaust inversion, blood libel, “Khazar theory” and others. more than one of the orgs they work with is pro-Putin.
your former roommate liked the post.
graffiti appears on a street you frequent that says “#freepalestine” and “end settler colonialism”
the boyfriend of the friend you spent most of the summer with makes his first post about the war. it’s a reposted comic that mocks and downplays the october 7th attack.
you doubt he’ll be receptive to criticism. he’s shared leftist memes about “monied elites” pulling all the strings and evangelicals being modern day “pharisees” in the past, and getting him to understand why that was antisemitic was like herding cats. you try anyway.
another of his Jewish friends also pushes back. he smugly dismisses her, tells her she’s falling for Zionist propaganda and uses several antisemitic tropes. you go off on him. he just deletes your comment.
you give up. you’re done. you block him.
you see anti-Israel posters and billboards around town
you mention what happened with the guy you went off on to his girlfriend—the friend you’ve grown very close to, who you’ve been listening to as she unburdens her fears for the future and complains about her bf’s BS over the last year. she doesn’t respond to you.
a friend of a friend shares posts tokenizing fringe groups that spread blood libel and have collaborated with holocaust deniers. you know they don’t know what you know, so you explain what those groups are. they seem somewhat receptive, apologize, and take it down
the next day they share several more posts that dip into antisemitic tropes. you mention this to your mutual friend, that you’re worried about them being radicalized. you’re not sure how receptive they’ll be to continued criticism
you have a confrontation with the foaf. in the meantime they’ve shared even more antisemitic posts. they say they didn’t mean to cause you distress but instead of stopping they effectively block you.
the “end settler colonialism” vandalism has been counter-vandalized with the words “commie propaganda” in place of “settler colonialism”. you don’t know if this is an improvement.
a month passes. the friend whose bf you went off on still hasn’t spoken to you. you see she shared a post defending an SJP chapter that posted Nazi cartoon caricatures of Jews repurposed in “Anti-Zionist” memes. you unfriend her on all social media platforms but you can’t bring yourself to block her number.
you see a friend of someone whose couch you surfed when you were homeless harassing Jewish celebrities with “Free Palestine” comments. you block them.
you’ve lost count of how many people you’ve unfollowed or blocked, or who’ve blocked you. friends, content creators.
when a friend takes an unusually long time to respond you worry if it’s because of your posts about antisemitism.
most of the podcasts, youtube channels, and other content creators you regularly engaged with no longer feel safe. you wonder who will be next
a couple friends wish you a happy hanukkah. you don’t celebrate much aside from lighting the hanukkiah and making some latkes.
you see posts about a destroyed chabad menorah, antisemitic comments on Jewish celebrities’ Hanukkah posts.
your neighborhood is covered in pro-Palestine & anti-Israel posters. some are seemingly innocuous, some are JVP “not in our name” posters. some call for intifada. “globalize the intifada” “Zionists fuck off!” “solidarity means attack!”
a man kills himself shouting “free palestine”. you learn about his suicide by seeing posts from several popular accounts you followed glorifying it.
you follow a bunch of jewish accounts on social media and commiserate with them about everything happening
your jewish friends post screenshots of the dead man’s antisemitic, pro-Hamas views. you look at his reddit and find even more horrific shit: anti-Ukraine posts. mocking Zelensky. “elites” are “lizard people”; the only named individual he calls a lizard person is Jewish. you start to notice a pattern: a lot of the people he dislikes just so happen to be jews.
several people you know share a post glorifying this man’s suicide. most are acquaintances, one is someone incredibly important to you.
you wonder how they would respond to your suicide.
you tell the close friend that shared this post how it scares you. you show them the receipts of the man’s antisemitism. their response is a single sentence. they didn’t know about the antisemitism.
they don’t apologize.
you notice none of your irl friends, even your closest ones, interact with your posts about antisemitism. you are able to vent to a couple friends, but no one has reach out to you
you try not to read into it. you try not to take it personally.
you haven’t slept well in months. you’ve always been an insomniac but not like this. you’re not sleeping until 4am, 6am, even 9am. even when you get to bed at a decent hour and get a full night’s rest it takes you hours to get out of bed.
a few weeks go by. the friend with the single sentence response shares a post saying they’re excited and proud to join a group to help palestinians. you’re excited and proud for them.
a couple days later, they share a post about a fundraiser to help a palestinian family get out of gaza. you note to yourself this is a much more effective & less concerning form of activism than the pro-suicidal antisemite post.
your friend shares another post about the fundraiser. it’s a joint post between their group and another group.
you open the other group’s page
the page is just a wall of signs from rallies. you swipe through one after another: “from the river to the sea”, “by any means necessary”, justifying/denying the atrocities of october 7th, calling for violent revolution. anything done in the name of resistance can’t be terrorism, all Israelis are terrorists. Jews aren’t indigenous; they’re white colonizers. holocaust inversion. other vile, thinly veiled violent rhetoric
you feel sick to your stomach imagining talking to your friend about it.
you already feel like you’re burdening the few friends you can talk to about this. you already feel like you think about it too much, talk about it too much. but you can’t not think about it; it affects every aspect of your life.
you’ve filtered out relevant keywords on more than one social media site to avoid the worst of it. some still manages to leak through.
there isn’t a single friend you regularly interact with that you don’t fear the moment when they will switch from listening to your concerns to seeing you as the evil zionist or indoctrinated hasbaranik they’ve been warned about.
it’s not an irrational fear. it keeps happening. you knew it would then, and you were powerless to do anything about it before, and you continue to be as it happens again and again.
you don’t know what to do about any of it.
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nelkcats · 9 months
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Therapy needed
Danny needed therapy, that was pretty obvious. After the whole "my future self killed everyone because my family died" thing it became pretty obvious that he needed to acknowledge his traumas and deal with them properly before another Dan happened or his emotions just exploded. The fact that his parents wanted to kill him and no one would acknowledge his death was making things worse.
So he asked his sister for help, but Jazz being annoyingly responsible commented that he couldn't become her patient, something about how personal feelings could cloud her judgment and family can't give each other therapy. Danny thought it was a bit hypocritical considering she used him as a lab rat with her psychology books but decided not to say anything.
The fact that Jazz could not be his therapist made everything 10 times more complicated. First of all because Danny had a trauma with psychologists (and wasn't that ironic? He blamed Spectra for that), and secondly that no one would believe his whole life story or keep it a secret. It was unfortunate that the Yetis were general health doctors and not mental health doctors because that would have solved his problem.
Just as he was about to give up and continue to treat his traumas as a recurring joke, Jazz introduced him to someone. Her name was Harleen Frances Quinzel and she was completely crazy, but according to Jazz she was excellent at her job. Danny had his doubts but in the end he agreed to have an appointment with her.
Strangely, Harley Quinn lived up to his sister's expectations, not being upset when Danny asked to change the decor of the place (Spectra had done a number on his head, common offices became uncomfortable for him), nor when Danny almost froze her by accident. Harley was patient, attentive and considered all his suggestions, accepting or denying as needed. Danny liked it.
The only complaint the halfa had were about the stalkers on the roof who were always watching him on his way to and from Harley's house, it was getting very annoying. One of them panicked when Danny came out crying - couldn't a ghost face his traumas in peace!?
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wistfullywaiting2 · 1 month
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The biggest misconception in the bsd fandom ever to me is people constantly portraying Atsushi as someone who trauma dumps excessively when he canonically barely talks about it at all.
The entire point is that Atsushi does not talk about his trauma he’s just constantly thinking about/reliving it. He can’t escape the memories of his past so he tries not to acknowledge them.
He only mentions it when asked, either directly or when someone asks him to explain himself.
Atsushi doesn’t even give a cohesive explanation for what he saw while under Dogra Magra, he just apologizes to Haruno and Naomi.
If Lucy hadn’t had her whole “you’ve never suffered the way I have” spiel then I doubt even the audience would’ve gotten to find out about his scars
If Akutagawa never asked him how it felt for the orphanage headmaster to die Atsushi would have never told him that he’s been hallucinating.
In the omake where Kyoka asks him why his hair is like that it’s clear he wouldn’t have told her that unless she had asked.
In 55 minutes Atsushi very briefly mentions sleeping on a dirty floor somewhere to Kunikida because he was trying to explain and justify his behavior.
And the thing is that there are scenes that implies that the other characters see Atsushi behaving strangely and are visibly confused because they do not understand what’s wrong with him.
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Remember, we as an audience get to see things about characters that the main cast doesn’t. Just because we see into Atsushi’s mind doesn’t mean the other characters know what’s going on in there.
Also little footnote here that I think the scenes with Lucy and Akutagawa in specific are probably references to the moon over the mountain but I digress
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hopeinthebox · 9 months
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bts + reductress headlines pt.12
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mfdragon · 10 months
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The Advice
Jasmine enters the fray! And she’s spotted herself the perfect psychological test subject >:3
Good luck Jazz! He’s gonna be a lot to handle ✨
<<First < Previous Next >
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sasukehoe · 8 months
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samkerrworshipper · 24 days
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the monsters gone
part 3 of beautiful girl series -> part 1 -> part 2
leah williamson x reader, jordan nobbs x reader (wobbs as moms)
warnings: drug addiction, drug abuse, talks of illicit substances, depression, intrusive thoughts, would not advise for people in a bad mental headspace
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You wanted her to leave, or you were desperate for a fix and well aware that it wasn’t going to happen until she was gone and you could retreat up to your room like normal. 
You scratched at the incision on your forearm, it was hidden underneath your hoodie but you could feel it all the same, it made you feel guilty. 
You’d never felt guilty for taking drugs, why would you? It was your choice, your body, your brain that you were fucking with. Yet for some reason, the little mark that you knew was sitting right on top of your vein was making you feel guilty. You didn’t want to admit it, but it felt oddly like the start of something, you weren’t sure what though, whatever it was though, it didn’t feel good. 
When the door clicked open around 2 o’clock you felt far more at peace, watching your mom hobble through the door with Lia following her. Jordan stood up almost immediately and if the room hadn’t already been awkward then the awkwardness found a whole new definition as the two women looked at each other. 
“Hey Jord, thanks for hanging around, you’re looking good.”
Your mom looked relieved to see Jordan, your ma on the other side looked slightly terrified as she eyed up the two women. 
“It wasn’t an issue, you know I love spending time with my chick.”
Leah smiled, looking down at you on the couch, you buried your head in your phone, ignoring her gaze. 
“Whether she admits it or not she likes seeing you as well.”
Your ma laughed awkwardly, it took everything in you to not burst out laughing at all of the tension between the two of them. 
“Look I’ll be heading off, gotta me back in Birmingham for game review tonight but can we talk for a minute though Le?”
Your mom’s head cocked to the side, a look of curiosity evident on her face. 
“Yeah sure, come with me.”
Lia watches them with the same look of curiosity as you, your eyes meeting as the trail back from the doorway to Leah’s office that they both step into. 
“They’re talking about me.”
Lia doesn’t bother trying to ignore you or deny what you’re saying, she nodes her head. 
“Probably, that’s what most parents do.”
It’s a absentminded answer, and for a second your aware that maybe Lia is in on whatever is happening, that she knows exactly what is going on behind the door. If anything important came from the phone call earlier you know Lia would be the first to know, she was like the third parent you never asked for nor wanted, but somehow ended up with. 
“Ma thinks that Mom’s parenting is shit.”
Lia cocks her head, she’s harder to read then your moms, more calculated, more clean, less obviously emotional. 
“She just disagrees with some of the things that your mother does, so do I. Nobody else is in her shoes though, she makes the decisions that are necessary and best for you.”
Lia sounds convinced of her words, even though you doubt them. 
“Ma doesn’t think so.”
Lia bit down on her bottom lip, finishing with tucking her kit bag away so she could focus her attention on you. 
“She worries about you.”
You did your best to suppress the eye roll, it didn’t work. 
“She worries that mom is too nice and isn’t strict enough.”
Sometimes you thought that your mom compensated for the void between the two of you by letting you do whatever you wanted, other times you were reminded by your grandma that she’d told Leah she needed to go easy on you and that not everyone could be as perfect as Leah Williamson. 
“Your mom knows what you need better than anybody else.”
The conversation paused, the two of you flinching at the sound of yelling from the other side of the door, you couldn’t make out what was being said, both of them were yelling though. 
“Set the table for lunch for me, kiddo?”
You couldn’t pull your eyes from the door, you hadn’t hear your moms yell in a long time, it took you back to when they were breaking up, when they tried to act like they weren’t, when they saved the fighting and yelling for when you’d been tucked into bed and they’d thought you were asleep. 
“Kiddo, table.”
You stood up from the couch, your eyes staying stuck to the door, even as you pulled cutlery from the drawer and laid it out with the placemats on the table. Eventually, the yelling ceased, and the room was over come with a silence like no other, only being broken by the door opening and your two moms walking out, both of them looking far more content considering that it had sounded like they were screaming at each other, not thirty seconds ago. 
“Bubba, Jord is going to head off, if you want to say bye.”
Jordan’s arms opened up to you and as mad and confused as you were, you weren’t going to deny her. You walked around the table, leaning into her hug, wrapping your arms around her the same way she did for you, letting her hold on for a little bit longer. 
“I’ll be back when I can chicky, I love you so much.”
You wanted to tell her she was lying, that they were all lying, they didn’t fucking love you, it was so fucking obvious. But for the sake of keeping the peace you didn’t. 
“I love you too Ma.”
Jordan let go of you, pressing a kiss to your forehead. The same way she had when they’d adopted you when you were eight, the same way she had after your first game when you were 12, the same way she had when you were 14 and you’d been top of your form and given an award, the same way she had when she’d left for good when you were 16. It was the same kiss, yet everything about it was different, the meaning, the purpose, the intention, it was all different. 
You watched as she walked out the door, the same as every time, you listened to the sound of her car starting and the sound of gravel underneath her tires as she pulled out and onto the road. 
Once you were sure she was gone you turned around, sliding into a seat at the table, across from your mother, staring at her. 
“What were you guys talking about?”
Leah looked at you, poker face as good as ever. 
“Football, some other stuff.”
It was a obvious lie, both you and Lia knew it. 
“You were talking about me, what about me?” Leah rolled her eyes at you. 
“It was a conversation between your Ma and I, not for your ears.”
You didn’t bat an eye as Lia set lunch down in front of you, to fixated on your mother. 
“You don’t yell over nothing, what were you talking about.”
Leah pushed her tongue out against her lips. 
“Your ma had some concerns about you, that’s it, I told her she had nothing to worry about and that we were doing just fine.”
You knew that even if you didn’t want to admit it, Jordan probably had some valid points, your mom seemed unphased though. 
“That’s it?”
Leah looked at you, and you could tell that she was holding something back. 
“She told me that you’d told her you smoked weed last night and that you were vomiting this morning.”
You tried to keep your face from changing, keeping the confident exterior even if you were slightly scared on the inside. 
“I got drunk, I had some fun, it was no biggy.”
Leah’s eyebrow rose in the trademark question. 
“It’s a biggy to me because you told all you were doing was vaping and a little bit of drinking, you said you’d be honest with me and it’s clear you haven’t been.”
You hesitated for a second, the air thickening around you as suddenly the tension was between you and your mother. 
“I was just having some fun mom, I didn’t do anything stupid, I was safe, just like you asked.”
Leah’s face shrivelled up as you used her words against her. 
“You were out with friends I’ve never met, at a house on the opposite side of town that I’ve never been too, Jord said you looked like you’d been on a three day bender and I told her that I didn’t believe her but now you’re here admitting it.”
You reached into your pocket for your vape, desperate for something to take the edge of the conversation off, to make you feel calmer. 
You pulled it out and Leah’s face immediately pointed inwards.
“How many times do I have to say no vape at the table?”
You frowned, shoving it back in your pocket. 
“It was just a bit of weed mom, it’s what kids my age do.”
Leah shook her head. 
“It wasn’t just a bit of weed, I’ve been smelling it on your clothes for weeks and trying to tell myself I was being delusional because you’d told me you were just on the vape, that you had no interest in drugs and yet you were lying to me, you have been for a while bubba and I don’t know how to feel about it to be honest. I thought we were closer than most parents and kids, I thought we had boundaries and that I was giving you enough space, and now I don’t know what to think.”
You pursed your lips, struggling to find words. 
“And if you’re lying to me about weed then what else is there? What else is there you aren’t telling me because there has to be more. I let you drop football, I relaxed on the school because I know you were struggling but this doesn’t work if you aren’t honest with me.” 
You really didn’t know what to say, your mind was in a million different places, the container underneath your bed, the joints on your windowsill hidden behind the curtains, the three vapes in your bedside table, the drug dealer numbers in your phone, what had happened last night, the meth track mark on your arm. 
“Nothing, it was just some weed, I just wanted something to take the edge off, it was no big deal.”
Leah’s eyes closed for a second and you knew this was all about to get a lot harder. 
“Except it was a big deal because you’ve been doing it behind my backs for weeks, I’ve tried to be understanding bubba, I have, I know it’s been tough for you with me and Jords breakup, you’ve had a really hard year, I let the vaping slide, I let your attendance drop at school, but drugs bub, it’s no joke.”
You took a deep breath. 
“It’s just some weed, I don’t know what you want me to tell you.”
Leah wants to say that if you’re this relaxed about being caught doing weed then she doesn’t want to know what else you’re hiding from her that would make you less relaxed, but she keeps it to herself, or for this moment at least. 
“I want you to bring me whatever you have of it, I won’t have you smoking illicit and illegal substances underneath my roof.”
You figured there were worse things that could happen, she could find your stash, she could take your vape, she could ground you or make you go to school. 
“Okay.”
Your mom nodded, happy she had at least won a small battle. 
“After lunch.”
You nod again in agreeance, looking down at the caesar salad in front of you and stabbing your fork down onto it, picking up the different pieces of lettuce and chicken scattered throughout. 
You make it through half the meal before you grab your bowl and pick it up, walking into the kitchen to do you washing up, your mom follows behind you, her bowl empty. 
You take the dish from her, cleaning it out and stacking both of them in the dishwasher, knowing whats to come now. 
You slow yourself down on the stairs giving her the time to follow behind you as she dragged her bad leg up every individual stair. 
Leah had been putting in hours everyday for her rehab, it was her main focus, over everything else. 
Eventually the two of you made it to the top of the stairs, and eventually to your bedroom door.
You hesitated before opening it, you couldn’t remember the last time Leah had been inside it, way before her acl, ever since she’d gotten injured she’d been avoiding the staircase. 
You opened the door, hand pausing on the cold metal doorknob for a split second before pushing it open. 
Your room was still freezing, you didn’t miss how your mother shivered from the breeze that hit her face immediately, coming straight from the open window. 
“Jesus kiddo, you trying to replicate antarctica in here? You know I pay good money for heating, right?”
It’s a lighthearted joke, yet somehow it hurts for you, you don’t know how or why, you just know that it does. 
“I like it cold.”
Leah looks at you, both brows furrowed inwards. 
“Alright then polar bear.”
You try not to flinch away when her hand reaches up to ruffle your hair, it’s something she’s done to you since you were a kid, it feels wrong now though. 
“Let’s just get this over and done with.”
You walk over to your windowsill, reaching behind the curtain and reaching for the bag of joints that you have stashed behind the material. Leah frowns as you walk back over to her, shoving the bag into her hands before she can even ask. 
“This is all of them?”
She looks completely unconvinced, you probably would be too, most kids don’t give up their drugs willingly. 
“Yes.”
Leah looks at you, eye to eye, like she’s trying to reach into your soul, or read your mind. 
“Bubba, this is your chance, I’m giving you an opportunity to be straight with me, and whatever you tell me or give me I won’t be mad about. I might want to sit down and question your decisions, but I won’t be mad. Teenagers are stupid, they make mistakes, they try new things, I get it. Be honest with me bubba, please.”
You didn’t really know what Leah was insinuating, but it was clear that she knew there was a bigger picture here. 
“That’s it mom.”
You had to tear your eyes away from her, you couldn’t handle the way that she was looking at you, the mix of disappointment, resentment and worry mixed into her blue irises. 
“Bubba, don’t make me search your room, don’t make me have to ground you, don’t make me have to call Jord and get her to turn the car around to help me out.”
You brought your eyes back to Leah’s. 
“That’s it mom, I don’t know what you want me to tell you, I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
You were lying through your teeth and the fact you couldn’t look eye to eye with Leah would have been enough of a warning sign of that. 
“Drugs bubba, that’s what I’m talking about, you’re lying straight to my fucking face right now, I don’t know what about or why but you are.”
You didn’t know what to say, you weren’t going to admit it, you couldn’t, but you needed to say something. Fuck, you were so fucked. 
You tried to spin it in your head, tried to think about how you could make this work out. You were caught, you were done, this was bad. 
Your eyes darted to below your bed, rookie fucking mistake. 
Leah caught your line of sight, and you knew as soon as she did that it was all about to go to fucking shit, that you were done for. 
“Lia.”
Your mom’s voice was urgent, a yell that had the swiss woman bounding up the stairs in a matter of seconds. 
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. 
You were so fucking fucked. 
You were frozen in your spot, your mom’s eyes looking at you like she’d just been stabbed in the heart. 
“Bubba, you can get whatever you are hiding from me or I will get Lia to tear this whole room a part, I’m not fucking around.”
You felt torn down the middle, your brain couldn’t think, you felt the same sickness sink in from this morning, instead of it being withdrawals from drugs though it was the realisation that your whole life was about to be turned upside down. 
You tried to think, tried to think about how you could spin this, make it a little bit better than it really was. 
Lia looked more uncomfortable then possible, you wished a blackhole would randomly pop up and swallow all three of you. 
Something hit you, it wasn’t a full resolution but it was better than what you currently had going for you. 
You walked over to your bed, with unsteadier legs then last night when you were so drunk the world was spinning, crouching down when you got to the edge, feeling for the familiar container that held all of your deepest darkest secrets, or at least that’s how it felt. 
It took you back to a time when you’d made Leah check under your bed everynight for the monsters under your bed, now though she was looking for the monsters in your head, the monsters that had turned her little perfect girl into whatever you were now. 
Your hand eventually met the hard plastic, you pulled it out, biting down on the inside of your cheek as you stood up and sat down on the edge of your bed. 
Leah took a couple steps closer to you, standing directly in front of you. 
“Look, it’s not mine, I only did it twice, my friends bought it over, I swear.”
Half of it was true. 
“Open the box, bubba.”
You felt your throat tighten, you felt like you were going to vomit, or pass out, or have a heart attack. 
“Mom, I didn’t want to, I don’t even like it, I just did it because my friends were, I swear.”
It was also another half truth. 
“Bubba, open the box.”
You bit down even harder on the inside of your cheek, reaching for the edge of the plastic box and opening it, revealing the two baggies of white powder inside of it. 
Leah’s face fell, in a way that you’d never seen, you’d seen her disappointed before, this wasn’t it, it was something else entirely and you weren’t sure what. 
“Bubba.”
Your mom was a overly emotional person, you couldn’t handle her crying right now though, you couldn’t do it, you couldn’t deal with her pretending she gave a shit when this was the first time in months that it felt like she cared, and it was all because of Jordan, not on her own volition. 
“I swear mom, I swear, it’s not mine, I promise.”
It wasn’t a lie, it hadn’t started out as yours, you’re friends had left it behind after a weekend hangout and had never asked for it back, so it technically wasn’t yours, technically. 
“Bubba, what is it?”
Leah reached for the box, picking up the two bags, the bags that you felt like held your whole life together. 
“Cocaine, it’s just a little bit of coke, my friends were using it before parties, I didn’t like it, it made me feel dizzy and it hurt my head.”
The cocaine bit was a lie, but the fact you didn’t like cocaine wasn’t, it was the kind of stimulant which put you into over drive, the high lasted no where near as long and it made you feel like you weren’t making sense.
You were hoping she would believe the cocaine, inevitably, cocaine was a pissy drug. Leah would have been at thousands of parties were cocaine was handed around, hell, you were fairly certain your mother had taken plenty of it. Cocaine was less addictive, good cocaine was also stupidly expensive, the value of it was fucked. Meth was cheap but a thousand times more addictive, cocaine was a better like. 
“Lia, get rid of it.”
Your mom handed the bag of joints over to Lia, as well as the bags of drugs, shoving them into her hands like they were burning her hands. “I don’t even know what to say to you bubba.”
Your mom looked genuinely at a loss for words, her eyes kept darting between your eyes and your hands, which were shaking in front of you. 
“Mom, I promise, it was only a one time thing, really, I was just keeping it for my friends.”
As soon as the tears started spilling down Leah’s face you knew it was about to get bad. 
She walked over to your desk, pulling the chair out from it and dragged it across the room until it was directly in front of you, your mother taking a seat. 
Her hands came out to rest on your knees, they were shaking like yours, not as badly but still shaking, though for different reasons you assumed. 
“You told me the weed was a one time thing, that was a lie. I don’t know what to believe anymore, you’ve put me in a impossible situation, bubba. On one hand, I want to believe you. I want to believe the kid I raised, on the other hand you haven’t given me reason to. You broke my trust, you lied to me, you broke the house rules. I don’t ask a lot of you, I let you get away with more than your ma would let you, and I was fine with it because you were showing me you were a good kid, but now I honestly don’t know what to think. You told me it was just the vapes, I thought you were using a little bit to much nicotine and now it turns out that you’re smoking pot and doing drugs. You’ve been hiding and lying and I just don’t get why. Why bubba? Tell me why.”
Big tears were dripping from your mothers eyes, big, wet, fat tears pooling in her icey blue eyes. 
“I don’t know, okay? I’m sorry mom, I’m really sorry. I’m sorry. I love you, I didn’t mean it, it was just some fun, it was a one time thing, I promise.”
Leah pursed her lips, the same way you were, the sleeve of her shirt was pressed to her face, picking up the tears that were dripping down her jaw. 
“I’m going to go and call your ma, this is a discussion we need to be having together, I need her here for this.”
Little did they know how bad it really was. 
Leah stood up, you thought she would just leave, heading back down to make a call to your ma that would inevitably change your life, instead, she sat down next to you, her arms opening up. 
You leaned into her side, letting her wrap both of her arms around you. 
“I’m sorry mom, I’m sorry.”
It was the only thing you could think of saying, the only thing that sounded right coming off the tip of your tongue. 
“I love you so much my beautiful girl, we’ll figure this out, your ma and I, we’re all going to figure this out.”
Leah held onto you for a little bit longer, her arms tightening onto you like you were holding her down to earth, like she would float away if she didn’t. 
Eventually she let go, her face was puffy and red, her sleeves were red and she sounded all sniffly. 
“I’m going to go and phone Jord, we’re going to sort it all out, we’ll figure this out, okay? We’re both here for you, we both love you so much, you’re our little girl.”
You found it weird how easy it slipped off of her tongue, you wondered if she actually believed that she meant it, you wondered if when your mother said it that she meant it without really meaning it. There were words but there were no actions to support those words, just empty syllables and letters all formed together in a intricate lie. 
You watched as Leah limped her way out of your room, her bad leg trailing behind her good one, rule number one of parenting a child you now know is drug addicted, never leave them alone in a room they can escape from when you’ve just confronted them. 
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