#you don’t fucking know or understand how adhd works so shut the FUCK up

[copperbadge]

Having ADHD and Being A Little Punk Rock

So....a huge amount of the discourse on Tumblr around neurodiversity generally is just venting. Which is good, it’s good to vent and Tumblr is a good place for it. And I know that often, when venting, the LAST thing you want to hear is someone trying to offer help or solutions. So generally I keep my mouth shut unless someone is speaking to me specifically. 

But a while back I saw someone asking (rhetorically) about what people with ADHD wish their parents had known, and I had a lot of thoughts about that which I started jotting down. Reading the various ADHD tags, I also see a lot of teens and twentysomethings with ADHD who visibly have no coping mechanisms and no way of creating them. I don’t blame the kids, and it’s not some kind of personal failing on their part; they’re young, and nobody has taught them. But I look at them and I think, A little sideways thinking would help you out so much. Then, recently, I got an ask (thank you for the permission not to respond directly) that was full of feelings about not being able to process or communicate well, and feeling a lot of negative emotions because of it. 

So, maybe it’s time to just throw this out there. I want to offer some advice as Fandom Dad with forty-three years of being neurodiverse and exactly seven months of actually being aware I was neurodiverse. Which for once is actually going to be pretty helpful! Because I looked at the world and I assumed my own neurotypicality and I thought, well, okay, but fuck all that.

Allow me to explain.  

I think this can apply to a number of ways in which people are neurodiverse, but I have ADHD so that’s what I’m really speaking to here. With ADHD, there’s medication, and I strongly urge people to explore that option because medication is awesome when it works. But there’s also a lot out there about how to try harder, or trick yourself into doing something in a very neurotypical way, or use systems that may not work for you. I know; I tried some too, and the sense of failure, the sense of being an ongoing failure, is terrible. So I want to offer an alternative which has helped me a great deal, and may help other people with ADHD, particularly younger people. 

People of any age, but especially young people who have ADHD, should be made aware that it’s okay to suck at things, to struggle, and to fail. Even if you think you should be good at something, even if everyone around you thinks so too, it’s okay to just be garbage at it and to acknowledge that fact. But just saying “well I’m dumb and can’t do this” of course isn’t actually helpful, and harms you a great deal, because you are a living person with feelings and if you’re self-aware enough to notice, you’re also too smart to be calling yourself dumb. Acknowledging that you’re bad at something, and even acknowledging that you’d like to succeed at it, is only part one of figuring life out.

Part two is deciding what to do about it, and more importantly, how. 

I was always told I was smart, but I was told “You’re smart so you should be able to do this”, not “You’re smart, so let’s come up with a way around this.” I don’t think many people are encouraged to explore why they are bad at something, to understand their own brains and thought processes which cause them to struggle.

Decades before I knew I had ADHD, I had to figure out that one of life’s most important skills is not being able to creatively solve problems but to recognize when you have to. Anyone can sit around and come up with three or four ways to solve a problem, but it’s not actually often taught that you should also be aware of when this is needed. Often, when faced with a problem that is difficult to solve, we’re taught that our reaction should be the socially approved “I just need to try harder”. Sometimes that’s true, but usually it’s not.  

More often, when we feel that instinct, especially as people with ADHD, we should say instead, “I’m not going to try harder, that’s bullshit. I’m trying already. I’m going to find another way to solve this problem.” Trying harder doesn’t work, after all, when your own brain is fighting you.

So you stop and think, if there were no rules to the world, how could I do this? You don’t have to work smarter; a lot of my solutions could reasonably be described as “work dumber”. The point is to work differently in a way that helps you specifically. 

Stop trying to remember to take your keys when you leave the house and get a lanyard and hang them on the doorknob; if you lose them a lot, hang the lanyard around your neck when you leave the house. 

Stop pretending you’ll remember to scoop the litterbox every night and set an alarm that tells you to do it. Or don’t, that works for me but might not for you! Maybe you have to put the litterbox somewhere you’ll see it right before bed (I ALSO do this for the days I turn off the alarm and then promptly forget it happened). 

There are phone charging cords in every room of my home so that I never run down my phone battery, something that is mildly inconvenient to have happen but deeply anxiety-inducing to think about for me. And now I never worry.

The point is, don’t ask how you can do better at something, ask how you can make something easier for you.

Even rewiring your brain to ask the question is a learned skill, though. You have to consciously stop when you find something is fighting you and consciously think, how can this be easier for my specific brain? If we assume I am not stupid but am in fact fighting an invisible monster, how do I make the monster visible? 

Life became roughly 60% easier for me when I started thinking this way. Of all the tips for time management and list making and organizing and de-organizing you can try and implement, none of that is necessary if you know how to ask yourself, “How do I do this differently?” and come up with alternatives that suit your brain. 

Especially with neurodivergence, there’s no “one size fits all” when it comes to handling it, neurologically or emotionally. So I think that it’s important to be a little bit punk rock. Not necessarily in the way of defying authority but in the way of defying convention -- the ability to say “fuck you” to the Way Things Are Done and do one’s own thing is very liberating and healthy. You lose a lot of the benefits of creative problem solving if you’re also ashamed of the solutions. So I think the best trick I know of to succeed despite unmedicated ADHD is just to say “fuck you, there must be an easier way to do this.” 

I’m garbage at cleaning my home (I can say that because I’m not only calling myself garbage, I’m using “I’m bad at this” as a stepping stone to solving the problem, and then I no longer feel like garbage and can joke about it with a healthy ego). I vacuum regularly and do the dishes and such but like...I don’t scrub the floors or dust or wash out the bathtub. That’s part of why I do November Cleaning -- so that at least once a year those things, that I never want to do but always think I should do, get done, but only have to be done once and at a specific designated time. So now if the bathroom floor is a bit grimy in the corners I just think, “Ah -- that’s for November” and add it to my November Cleaning list. 

For my friend who struggles with communication, which is something I also used to really struggle with (and still do in some ways), one of my “make stuff easier” techniques for this was simply to...tell people.

“Hey, I tend to talk really fast when I get excited, so please tell me if I need to slow down.” 

“Sorry, I have some hearing issues, I may ask you to repeat something -- it’s fine just to do it slower, I don’t need louder.” 

“I’m upset and struggling, I need a minute.” (or even just “Hey where’s the bathroom?” so you can sit quietly for a moment and gather your thoughts. If you’re too upset to talk, it also helps to type them out, which I often do.) 

If someone tells me something I want to remember, I’ll get out my phone and say “Sorry, I’m still listening, but I want to write that down so I won’t forget it.” I do all my writing-things-down in Google Tasks, then once I’m somewhere quiet and private I review the notes and move stuff that isn’t actually “to do” to another list. Sometimes I’ll tell someone “I’m so sorry, you just said something and I totally missed it, but it’s important to me -- can you repeat it?” 

Most people find that kind of honesty, where you’re open about why you’re maybe talking at cross-purposes, really charming. It indicates that you think they are important, and you’re putting in effort to hear what they’re saying and respond to it thoughtfully.  

I hope this is helpful in finding ways around some basic problems, rather than through them -- that being able to stop and think “This could be easier -- how?” is something that people can internalize and make use of. Going around a mountain rather than through it might look like it’ll take more time and energy, but it beats trying to punch through granite the whole way there. 

#sam has adhd

[withgreatpowercomesmyfuckingdick]

brief rant on me hating online school scroll if uninterested

i just. fucking hate online college.

im going to start with omfg these people don’t give two shits about their students which nah fucking duh. this is a technical college putting courses online to cut corners and do more courses with less teachers because they’re BROKE. it isn’t ideal and i am completely self taught. let me repeat that. i am COMPLETELY self taught.

i am also working at a tax office. during fucking tax season. my teachers are pretty much completely unsympathetic.

and sometimes im like well maybe im lazy, maybe im not doing enough, and then i have to remind myself: I’m fuckin ADHD. I’m severely under medicated, as in my meds don’t do shit anymore and I currently can’t access new ones. I TRIED to get on disability, because schools CAN get you accommodations for ADHD, and the lady in charge of the office ignored me. I emailed her several times, got the read receipts, and she ignored me. She doesn’t even have an office on campus, so I can’t ask to speak to her.

and it’s not like im dumb or can’t keep up in learning. i know my shit. i ALWAYS know my shit. i just don’t do well with conventional assignments and i don’t do well with the online schooling system because i have no way to separate my personal and school life. assignments just rack up in front of me and im procrastinating on them right fucking now because it intimidates me when its like that, even when i know if I don’t complete these my grade will get worse. i’ve hit a point where the urgency makes me shut down instead of going into overdrive because there’s too much shit going on at once for me to stress myself out, even though i SHOULD be stressing

I’m doing my best. I am, but the odds are stacked against me and my teachers are no help. I feel whiny and bratty saying that because it’s fucking college, ofc teachers don’t give a fuck, but I don’t understand how these people don’t even teach me and can’t find it in themselves to give me some leeway on an assignment I’m turning in late or didn’t even know existed, or straight up giving me a ZERO over an assignment I broke my BACK over because the annotations weren’t the specific format she wanted. im fucking exhausted and so so sick of watching the grades decline because I can’t keep up, and no matter how I try to explain, they’re giving me the polite, roundabout version of “skill issue, tough break, get good” and fucking moving on. i know im a drop of water in the bucket and this means absolutely nothing but its so FRUSTRATING and i’ve got parents breathing down my neck that hate to see C’s, and C’s might be the best I can give them at this point.

i want to just quit at this point honestly, but i wont, because i didnt get to this point just to fucking quit. im going to aim for B’s out of spite, and I’m going to bug the shit out of my teachers, and I’m going to ace my fucking finals just like I did last semester so i can walk out throwing birds over my shoulder.

thanks for coming to my tedtalk or wtv

#college #adhd problems #actually adhd #adhd student #fuck college

[freckles-dean]

Here are some of my thoughts on Young Royals S3 ep 1-5

I’m just rambling here. This is probably going to be long, all over the place and not well articulated, so bear with me. 

And before I talk about the show, I just need to say that it never ceases to amaze me how incredibly talented all the actors are.

First of all, I don’t blame either Simon or Wilhelm. They are in an incredibly stressful situation. They are bound to make mistakes and I think their actions while being stubborn and lacking common sense are understandable.

I really loved Simon this season and i was so exited there was more of a focus on him. We finally got to some of how everything affected him. It broke my heart to notice he wasn’t the loudest in the choir anymore and then him saying he’s not enjoying music. Side note: Dude had some banger lines this season 

I find it ironic that everything that Wille found attractive in Simon’s in s1 became things that Simon has to shut down in order to be with him

If you told yesterday me that today me was actually okay with an August redemption arc, I would not have believed you. This in no way excuses his behavior, and he still has a lot to work on, but I think it was one of my favorite parts of this season. 

I am not at all surprised by the Erik thing. since s1 I kept wondering when Willie's perfect image of him would come crumbling down, but can’t imagine how devastating it would be to learn that the person who was there for you the most was not this perfect person you thought they were and might not even accept you.

I was rooting hard for Micke and Sara. I knew it was unrealistic that he wasn’t going to hurt her again, but it was still so heartbreaking that he couldn’t pull it together for her. I think there are bigger issues going on than his ADHD that needs to be handled. 

Why does the queen get space and help with her anxieties and grief, but when Wilhelm is struggling he gets no support and is seen as embarrassing and problematic???? 

Why the fuck was it Wilhelm's responsibility to teach Simon what not to do? Obviously, this kid who has never been in the public eye has no idea what he should or shouldn’t do, it almost seems like it was deliberate to get Wilmons relationship to fail idk. It would have been so easy to get something to teach him some basic media training. It's just disturbing how the court had absolutely zero regard for Simon’s safety. 

I’ve seen people talk about Wilhelm being controlling over Simon. Is it acceptable or excusable behavior? Absolutely not, but let me put things into perspective. Wilhelm was raised in an abusive and very controlling environment. His opinions and feelings didn’t matter, and he was told it was love, so it made sense that he would try to do the same for Simon and expected him to go along with it. I think expecting Wilhelm to have healthy relationship skills is unrealistic, and the show never pretended he did. It’s been pretty obvious throughout that Wilhelm consistently projects his feelings and emotions onto other people. 

I still don't know if Simon was breaking up with Wille or not, or they were just trying to frame it that way to scare us (honestly hoping it leads into a more mature conversation), but if he was… Wilhelm had it coming. He hasn’t been handling things very well and is taking it out on Simon, which is just not okay, and he doesn’t deserve that.  

Before this season, I wasn’t sure how I felt about Wille abdicating, cause i still had this fantasy in my head of him as this queer king, but after everything I’ve seen this season, it’s so obvious how much this institution is killing him. He needs to get out and heal from his traumas and find out who he really is without all those rules and pressures.

I don’t even know if I want Wilmon to be an endgame. Obviously, I do, but at this point, I don’t think that’s what’s best for either of them. It’s been very clear this season how much they don’t (at the moment) fit into each other's lives.. Either some major things have to change (Wille abdicating) or they need to split up. I just hope that both boys get a good ending, even if it’s not with each other. 

I don’t know... I’m emotionally exhausted, there are so many plot lines and I really don’t know how they are going to fix everything in one episode.

#young royals #yr s3 spoilers

[merakimagic]

Ummm… if you have every wondered what it’s like to have ADHD, Autism (Lvl 1), Anxiety and Depression but also have an overwhelming sense that you need to be strong and perfect then here’s a message I just sent to my friend because I needed to let someone in and didn’t know who else to say it to.

It seems to give a pretty clear explanation in my view.

I don’t know why I feel so annoyed and frustrated with myself for saying I have ADHD and Autism. I have those things and I’m not ashamed of them but why do I always need to tell people… so they understand why I’m different. I mean everyone’s different and have different ways of doing things, it’s not like I’m special nor does anyone care. It’s not an excuse! I should be completely cable of keeping that part of myself in and not feeling like I have to tell people.

Does the way I explain it to people make it sound like I’m trying to get attention? Does saying that I’m proud of it and love how it makes me more curious about things and how it has made me good at art, music, languages, school, mythology, sports, pretty much a lot of things because I enjoy knowing them make it sound like I’m arrogant or trying to brag or just put a label on things.

I have anxiety, Autism level 1, ADHD, Depression, have experienced an eating disorder and still at times do, I’m a red head with blue eyes, I’m bi/pan, anemic, have asthma and ahhhhhh. Does all of this when I contribute to a conversation and say something about one of them just make people think that I have a need to be special?

Im sure I don’t feel that way. I think the only reason some of my reactions to things like how I may have a panic attack need stimming and stuff like that only happen know because I know there’s a reason for it but what if I’m just making a big deal out of nothing.

I really need to learn to shut up at times I think, I don’t think people really care about my long spills nor do they really want to know what’s going on with me. Why are relationships so fucking difficult?!

Why can’t I just understand them and the way they work? Can’t they just be simple? Why if your dating someone does there have to be this whole thing of you have to do this with them and you can’t do this with other people? Why do I need sounds to go away when I get overwhelmed, the worlds loud! It shouldn’t matter? Why do I feel like it’s okay to be flaws but I need to be flawless all at the same time? Why am I afraid of not being perfect? Why if I felt like I told my parents about this they would just get angry at me and tell me it’s all in my head? Why am I crying? These are thoughts are dealing with on a daily basis why are they bothering me now? Why can’t I just keep it to myself? I’ve been handling shit on my own my entire life it’s nothing new? Why do I know that tomorrow I’m gonna be fine and this is just a moment where my walls have fallen down?

Why am I so confident sometimes and then the rest I’m just completely fucked up? Why do I always need to restrain myself? Why can’t I just scream and then get back to it all? Why do I have to feel ashamed? Why should I have to feel like my mum doesn’t want to admit I have Autism?

Why do I care if I have Autism or ADHD so much? They have always been apart of me? It doesn’t mean anything? They’re just caused by a genetic mutation and makes you neurotypical why does it even matter? They’re just labels, who even gives a damn? You could have neither one and act the same way as me and people might just call you weird? Why do I care so much about this shit? No one else fucking does, maybe I should just shut up for a while. It’s clear that when I make a joke that it’s taken offensively, it’s clear that no one wants to hear about my problems, it’s clear that no one wants to here my rants, it’s clear that no one wants to here about my hobbies or opinions, it’s clear that I don’t get how to properly interact with others. Maybe I should just shut up, but if I did then my parents would just go on about how somethings wrong and get angry at me for not talking to them about it and we would just end up in a fight where they are telling me to just get over it and if I turn it back on them for how they have made me feel this way then they would just get even more angry and deny it.

Dad brought up a post that said about how a guys son used to sing and never stop talking and now they will be in the same room and his son will have his headphones on not say a word and that his son doesn’t know how much is dad misses him. And dad said that reminded him of me. Doesn’t he get that they’re part of the reason I don’t talk all the time. Because evertime I did I got told to calm down or my joke was offensive or that they don’t need the elephant. Don’t they get I like my phone because it has my hyperfixations and ever since I was little have loved cartoons and looking at fanart because they were what got me through the hard days at school and my parents fighting. Don’t they get I used them to cope because everything was solved in 22minutes and that’s the world I like to escape to when I day dream.

Why the fuck does all this even matter, why the fuck am I just being so overly emotional? Why can’t this just be all there is going through my brain right now?

Obviously there’s more.

There’s the voice telling me to just let myself cry and the voice telling me to suck it up and another one telling me to get ready for work and another one telling me to stop messaging and another one saying don’t put this on them and another one asking why I’m shaking and another if one saying I’ve done well to hold back the tears and another one saying I wonder when this message thing will cut me off and I’ll have to send two seperate messages? And another one asking is this just what my head is like? Is this what everyone’s head is like? Is this just because of my mental health shit? Am I just weak? Am I really this pathetic that I can’t pull myself together? I don’t want anyone to feel bad for me so why do I need to let anyone in? Why do I want to so badly to talk about this but also say nothing at all?

What the fuck is wrong with me, why can’t I just get the hell over it and move on, people deal with way worse stuff then this and here I am complaining because my low self esteem and hyper active over thinking head is just having a bad day and pulling me into it and won’t fucking leave me alone… what a pathetic excuse. You can’t use excuses in life. No one cares and no one has time for them, no one’s gonna help you so stop making excuses and just get on with it.

Put on your uniform, pack your bag and go to work and put on a happy cheerful face and just go take care of other people so that you don’t have to think about this. Just get on with it, there a bigger things then yourself and you just gotta get over what’s going on in your head

I’m Okay… I’m okay now.

If you’ve every felt this way, please let me know.

I don’t want to feel so alone anymore, nor do I want others to feel alone either.

I just felt these were necessary to make the whole thing a little less sad and full on serious and honestly feel like these characters would get it. Also this is not my art💫

#autism #adhd creature #adhd culture #actually adhd #adult adhd #adhd mood #undiagnosed adhd #living with adhd #adhd brain #adhd feels #mental heath issues #mental illness #mentalwellness #positive mental attitude #mentally drained #mental instability #rottmnt #rottmnt leo #rottmnt raph #rottmnt donatello #rottmnt michelangelo #rottmnt mikey #rottmnt leonardo #over it #my love #self love

[tabithatwo]

“Why do you keep watching the show if you hate it so much?”

Not publishing one of the asks because I’m not rewarding the bad behavior lmao but this is such a consistent refrain for me (still!) in asks AND reblogs AND comments etc and I’m gonna get real with you in hopes people chill out (not just in my inbox but in others), because last time I answered one of these it did slow for a while. This is going to be my don’t make me point to the sign post, I’m not going to talk about it again but I will likely reblog when it comes up.

I’m a nurse and I worked through the worst of covid. I’m not going to get into the details of that because ifykyk and if you don’t I can’t begin to describe how fucking horror movie trauma fest it was. Take whatever you’re imagining and multiply it by a hundred. I was working constantly in horrific conditions being retraumatized daily and having no way to deal with it AT ALL. I’ve had addiction issues in the past. I started smoking again. I could feel other shit trying to creep it’s way in.

Enter: yellowjackets. I hadn’t hyperfixated on a show or movie or book in years (since childhood really) but it CLICKED into place for me. So this show (plus writing for it—learning to write, having something to think about that was creative and not destructive because when you’re surrounded by death you start to feel destructive, practicing hours and hours a week) actually stepped in and took that place. I even stopped smoking cigarettes eventually.

Then my other favorite comes in: “actually you can enjoy things more if you stop obsessing over them”

I have adhd. My brain goes HARD. That’s literally NOT how my brain works. I LIKE obsessing over details. I don’t CARE if it’s meaning making from nothing. I intellectually UNDERSTAND when it is. I interact with the world this way. I promise you that I know the limitations, but I also promise you that it doesn’t ACTUALLY make my experience negative. I don’t think having critiques of things I’m obsessed with hurts my experience and quite honestly, I don’t have a BRAIN that has EVER allowed me to not think critically and analytically about ANYTHING. So I don’t know what I’m missing out on and I can’t just make myself experience it lmao like this is who I am! I’m used to operating this way and it’s my only setting tbh.

I DONT hate the show. I LOVE it. Like so very fucking much. I see a stark difference between s1 and s2, I personally liked the things in s1 that are not present in s2 more, I personally hope that s3 ties in some of the old theme, vibes, editing styles, and narrative build of s1. You do not have to agree, you can think they’re the exact same or even that s2 is 100x better. But I’m probably going to continue being hyperfixated on this show. I’m going to continue caring deeply. I’m going to continue analyzing deeply.

Is that healthy? I don’t care! I would rather be addicted to a tv show and writing about my little lesbians than actual substances! It positively impacts my life, even if I’m feeling a lot of disappointment right now. I’m upset because I care, I care because that’s how my brain is hardwired, and I wouldn’t want to change that if I tried because this show and learning to write and actually sticking to a healthy hobby for once in my life is really fucking amazing to me.

If you don’t like ever seeing any criticism of this show, I would invite you to ask yourself why it upsets you so much that you need to try and push someone into leaving their own space. If nothing comes to your mind or your heart or you simply don’t want to reflect, block my fucking blog. It’s a fucking button. Press it. You’re not going to make me shut up lmao trust me, I don’t function like that <3

#yellowjackets blogging #yellowjackets #cw addiction

[more-thoughts-than-money]

Born “gifted”; grown chronically depressed

// long, personal post. basically a tutorial on express therapy (and by express I mean 10 years of rationalising, learning psychology on myself and fictional characters + 48 hours of not sleeping)

When I was grieving I spent 48 hours sleepless

it’s not that I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been on insomnia medication for 3 years now. I just had to “have a reason” and time to actually acknowledge my emotion and thoughts which caused my body to struggle with setting a “proper” circadian rhythm

Living with a 5 person family in basically a studio flat for 13 years of my life low-key harmed my ability to think and “feel” without privy eyes

this accidentally sent my brain into survival mode where I could only “think rationally” at night

So when we moved out and I got to have a room of my own

that’s when *serious* sleep problems started

my brain would just REFUSE to shut the fuck up

first off I was used to tv noise while falling asleep

i fixed it up with some rain sounds or watching ATLA when I was feeling funky

it distracted me enough

still I wouldn’t fucking sleep.

because my brain didn’t feel like it

probably hyperactivity which I could never “treat” with sport as an asthmatic kid

also an outcast but it is what it is

unable to name the cause of my insomnia I would just head to sleep at 10pm. Two reasons for that:

a) you know what they say! Don’t trust your thoughts after 10PM

b) 8h of sleep is THE healthy amount. And it seems like my brain likes waking up early for whatever reason!

yeah also I went through a fair share of medication before they got it right

anyways whoops I’m depressed now. Very depressed and even more anxious. Day by day my brain is giving me more compulsive behaviours and thoughts! Yaaay!

so I went through a 3 years worth of antidepressants

also a lot of unintended research (thanks, tiktok.)

basically I “subconsciously” KNEW what my problem is but “consciously” my brain refused I acknowledge it because haha living in the state of constant survival mode is way more fun! right?

right?

basically it was like being a doctor and being pretty certain about the diagnosis but having to go to some other doctor to objectively either confirm or discard my diagnosis

yeah anyways I changed medication, SNRI, venlafaxine

known to help some adhd folk with severe vegetative depression for “no reason”

Yeah basically my new psychiatrist kept on upping the dose until I got “a kick in the ass” so we know it works

and then my aunt died.

wELL my workaholic and emotionally constipated child brain would NOT acknowledge it

hell you’d catch me dead before I’d admit that I felt shitty but didn’t know how to deal with that because at the same time I “saw it coming”

No one ever told me she’s sick

I just saw her hair loss (or rather a sudden haircut change and awkward silence that followed) and had some foggy memory of someone saying her sister died of cancer

Mind you I don’t fucking remember my childhood that well

hell I don’t remember it at all but it is what it is

I just “know” some things and some are more of a “hunch”

I have this information buried in my brain but I can’t recall how it got there, ykwim?

yeah basically I was suspecting she’s dying of cancer but I was trying to stay optimistic and told myself I’m “overthinking it”

and I thought the mourning was “good enough of a reason” to stay up for 48 hours, write down my “thoughts” and wail all day long (yes, everyone gave me shit for crying growing up, how did you know?)

anyways yeah I did this and suddenly I “solved” the root of ALL my anxieties and minor paranoias.

as if it was a fucking riddle. Or a fucking house MD episode.

I hope you can understand WHY I’m so livid.

I SPENT OVER 3 YEARS ON ANTIDEPRESSANTS AND MADE ONE THERAPIST CRY JUST BECAUSE MY BRAIN WENT SO FAR INTO THE SURVIVAL MODE EVERY TIME I INTERACTED WITH A HUMAN BEING. IM JUST FUCKING AUTISTIC AND TRAUMATISED NOT “ANXIOUS” AND “PARANOID”

OH FOR FUCKS SAKE

Also I’m fucking dyslexic. But hyperlexic at the same time. I mean I’m hyperlexic in my native language, and I “remember” the spellings so I went undiagnosed

but I love technology. I want to be a CS student and then I’ll see where I can go from here. I’d love to work on an online learning platform for “gifted” children

y’know so they don’t lose their childhood but at the same time can associate learning with something nice and actually enjoyable

I think a lot of “gifted kid burnout” comes from the | dopamine <—> habit making | mechanism

so if children can learn they don’t HAVE TO be good at every subject and learn their “strengths and weaknesses” early on

Hardships later on won’t be as depressing

cause hey maybe I’m not the best at english but I know a lot about maths and I like maths and maybe when I grow older I can be a mathematician!!

you see what I mean?

at least this is what I’m trying to do for myself

generational trauma and neurodivergency running in the family made me develop some shitty coping mechanisms (example - perfectionism in order to cope with my actual time blindness and the “need” for structure while hating organisation and refusing “unreasonable” authority)

I wasn’t raised catholic, not really

nor was I raised queer lol

but my brain reacted to religion the same way people who went through religious trauma did

basically I put myself through religious trauma on accident!

fun, aye?

what I mean is, I grew up religious because that’s what “felt right”

tradition and all that

and then I realised the catholics hate me for no fucking reason

and then I thought “well fuck you too!” And called myself an atheist

later it went into agnostic

and a couple of weeks back I grew OBSESSED with religion

christian one I mean

Fuck I even started reading the nsrv bible in english (!)

and then I tried to interpret it “by myself” using some historical context and googling some stuff

WHAAAAAAAT! Turns out the bible is a product of its own time and is not to be taken literally!

That’s crazy innit?

Yeah and then I realised all of my recent hyperfixations (last two years) were a silent ways of rationalising ALL my “unreasonable” anxiety and trauma caused by; you guessed it

NOT UNDERSTANDING SYMBOLISM AND SOCIAL CUES AS IT IS

IN MY NATIVE FUCKING LANGUAGE

I can learn *any* language

I just need some books, movies, music in said language

But don’t ask me about any grammar. I don’t care about grammar. And you can’t make me. Idfk what present simple is but I can shove it so far up your ass your own mother won’t recognise you. so yeah

I’m great at learning languages cause they’re a “brainless” work for me

I mean

I learn languages for fun - it’s a tool to communicate with broader audience AND find more knowledge on the internet (I Google EVERYTHING in english)

and when someone tries to make it into an actual job of mine. This is when it goes downhill.

also english being coded as “language of knowledge” is my “main” language

my native language is way more complicated and I never really had to acknowledge my emotion in polish

I mean maybe I did but I just never wanted to cause I never learned that! English in comparison is simple. It allows me to communicate simple ideas without the need to “sound smart”

this and isolation from my peers (kids are bastards) gave me an actual “language barrier”

which isn’t the case really

it was just my overthinking

I started enjoying polish music way more recently cause I can never get the lyrics

so I listen only to what sounds “cool”

in english on the other hand the most of my music taste was built around midwestern emo and folk punk

cause I listened only to songs that felt “somewhat relatable”

yeah all of that understanding makes me want to write an essay but i kind of don’t care and I’m too lazy to do that!

so yeah this is how I “cured” my compulsions, anxiety, depression, irritability and perfectionism. By having fucking adhd and being a massive nerd. because I would hyperfixate on linux, customisation, open source applications, cybersecurity, programming

turns out I’m great at maths since I KNOW HOW to solve the problems

My brain is just too quick to do it step by step so I tend to skip and get lost in my own fuckin notebook 💀

schooling just made me believe I suck at maths and i should actually kms for trying to improve at it /hj /lh

And I suck at my own language. I know a lot of “complicated” words and can deduce what certain words mean (logically) but I have issues adapting my language to my listeners. I either cuss every other word (too comfortable; thanks mom LMFAO)

Or I speak like an university professor. To my peers. And they don’t know what the fuck is going on. And I end up isolating myself because of crippling fear of being misinterpreted. And people think I don’t have a sense of humour whatsoever because I don’t “get” jokes. But I joke a lot and am very sarcastic cause that’s just how I am. God damn it

When were y’all going to tell me not everyone thinks I want to use them and be a bastard overall when I need to ask someone for help. when. were. you.

icb I had to go to paid therapy, feed myself some subliminal messaging, deprive myself of sleep for 48 hours, force myself to talk to my dad about things I don’t understand or scare me, go manic for a week on venlafaxine, my aunt had to die and I had to have a reason not to go to school for 2 days for me to actually acknowledge my emotion instead of rationalising it.

also everyone in school + my therapist thinks I’m still manic and in need of hospitalisation. How do I even begin to explain it’s not that I have superiority complex, and I just realised I’m hella smart, just in a pretty unexpected way….. because thorough my entire life I never acknowledged it for the sake of being “humble”. bitch it’s not humble it’s the lack of self worth and being someone else’s doormat.

y’all think that if I say “house md and one tumblr post cured me” they’ll let me off the radar?

no honestly I have too much to catch up on (maths, c++, reading in POLISH, and learning German for fun) to actually care about “depressing” things of this world

I mean sure it does sound unhealthy in hindsight

but thing is

this is the first time in my life where I don’t feel hopeless both about present AND the future

and I guess that’s enough for now

I have “a goal” and that’s enough

Later I might catch a job as an actual university professor. Maths or computer science. Biology or physics maybe?

it gives me an excuse to be “eccentric” lol

cause the students are here to learn not to make fun of who I am and focus on that

sure it’s a funny anecdote to mention like “dude my physics teacher is fucking nuts but at least his lectures are interesting”

and that’s all I care about

I get to express myself instead of internalising anything

and the students get to learn

yay and yay

mutual benefit!

yeah anyway fuck I have so much shit to catch up on and I’m so lazy I actually have to reorganise my room and desk so I don’t try to do my homework in bed……. (Yes I was THAT depressed and lazy)

when I do my chores in bed I keep on losing my pens and I’m one minor inconvenience away from doing something I might not particularly want to do…….

yah

thats it I guess

If this post made anyone realise something (“connect some dots”)

congrats and I’m sorry you had to find out this way LMFAO

if not

scroll ahead, not the target audience probably

#neurodiversity #gifted kid burnout #mental health #txt #long post #personal #also you’re not “evil” but possibly have some developmental trauma. Probably. Who am I to judge. Have fun with the realisation! #hate crimes md #don’t take this too seriously #Im the last person I would take actual advice from #🦐🦐

[itsgivingautism]

01/18/24 — Zia rants about being autistic & physically disabled & chronically ill in a fucked ableist society & having to be dependent on their partner

Started to have meltdown over this & other stuff to my partner before he left for work…. I didn’t meant to have a morning meltdown. I found myself shutting down and feeling guilty before he left bc I can recognize it’s hard on him even when he doesn’t wanna show it. But needed a place to rant and ended up going off down below for a like an hour. I don’t want to open up but I made tumblr after not being on here since high school for an outlet for a lot of reasons, with support & encouragement from therapists to do so. But I also hate being perceived. I’m just so fucking annoying tho I somehow always bring attention to myself that I never want….. but I’m also learning to tell my story & share my experiences. As an autistic person late diagnosed who was severely abused throughout my entire childhood opening up, learning to unmask & not shutdown, understanding my own thoughts, feelings, & experiences is so fucking hard.

I am so grateful for my partner but god I wish I was independent. I wish I had the ability to take care of myself. I wish I wasn’t so fucking dependent on his love and support. I wish I wasn’t so needy, or clingy. I wish I wasn’t disabled physically and mentally. I wish I wasn’t so wounded & traumatized. I wish I wasn’t so chronically ill. I wish I wasn’t in autistic burnout, a state of prolonged cognitive decline that one average can last 2-10 years.

I wish I could get a job. Even working from home but my mind can’t even. I’m constantly age regressing and going across different timelines of my mind and getting trapped, constantly disconnecting from this current physical reality even when I seem like a part of it to others - but it’s just automatic masking as a trauma response. All a result of my CPTSD+autism+adhd

I haven’t been able to work a real job since 2020. I’ve been fighting to get the support & benefits I need but constantly being shit on. Having to go thru constant channels to prove how severe my issues are and then being told try this treatment first and when it doesn’t work its still somehow my fault. I’m sick of having to prove my disabilities & illnesses and then when I show how bad they are I’m being dramatic. But when I mask & show strength, I must be making it up. How could you be so strong about then? There’s no winning. Only losing. I don’t see a point in showing weakness or asking for help. But then refusing to and bottling it all up, that has lead me to deeply problematic bad spirals. I just want to be taken seriously by doctors & medical professionals. I hate this country.

I wish I was normal. I hate burdening my partner. Although I know he doesn’t want me to feel like one and he genuinely wants to help me, I also know I stress him out….

I am dependent on him financially while his job is fucking over their contracts, refusing to give him & his coworkers the raises they were supposed to get a year ago. Him and his coworkers have collectively trying to unionize for months (which is the only reason they actually didn’t get a pay cut which the company was tryna do even tho they were supposed to give raises last year) and ofc my partner has been the one leading the unionizing. (We joke about my radicalism really rubbing off on him)

I’m constantly trying to find ways to make money, which end up doing more damage to my body. He hate what it does to me. He wishes he could do more while stuck in his work contract. it’s a lot on him. And I feel like his life would be so much less stressful without me tho….. or at least if I could just be normal & healthy….

Even my friends point out that unless I’m talking about my emotions & trauma I don’t make any sense talking…. like burnout really shows…. It’s embarrassing constantly. I sound like a so clearly disabled most of the time. I used to exceptionally smart & articulate before this burnout. Ik they mean it accepting my but it’s hard when 90% of what I say comes out wrong. It’s hard when I’m trying to be supportive and it sounds like asshole shit bc my issues with speech & cognition. I want to be a lovely validating friend. Not the one they have to dissect my word vomit to find the love & support in foolish clumsily words. I’m technically hyperlexic so I can keep creating words but my other learning disabilities downgrade the quality & meaning of those words.

But I also only make sense when talking about my looping emotions & trauma is bc I only share what I can (the deeper stuff is vaulted by selective mutism & shutdowns). This is the shit going thru my brain, talking to myself about and looping constantly. Ofc it’s the only thing I can talk about. But even most the time I’m still not making sense entirely. But it’s all I can think about, talk to myself about, and it’s all the my brain is giving me permission to share about myself.

#disability rant #autistic rant #actually autistic #actually disabled #actually chronically ill #autistic adult #autistic blogger #disabled blogger #autistic experiences #disabled #chronically ill #actually cptsd #Zias diary 🌿 #Zia 🌿 #chronic illness

[proudfreakmetarusonniku]

Here’s a funny story from my childhood which might actually be depressing for everyone but me. Big TW for mass shootings bc this is about the time one happened on my street.

So, I was six but nearly seven and living in a small town in the middle of nowhere. You can probably figure out vaguely where from the fact that there’s not many mass shootings in the UK- we’ve moved, it’s fine. I don’t wanna say nothing bad happened- the local primary was abusive, so I was already ✨traumatised✨ when this occurred- but it was a quiet place.

So, as you can probably guess, not only living in a country where mass shootings are rare because guns are all but illegal but also living in a town of like 2000 people, and also being A Baby, I had no idea what to do when there was a mass shooting in the streets I lived on.

I was in my house, so I didn’t see anything or honestly was really in much danger, but it was still fucking terrifying. Dad kept telling us to sit on the floor and away from windows or doors and I didn’t understand why at the time, and now I understand it’s because if me and my brother were seen through the windows we could have been shot at, which is… a fucking terrifying thing to think about happening to your six year old self, y’know. Mam was away at work, in a town where the shooter had already been, so until we heard who was injured or dead, we weren’t sure if she was OK or not (she was completely fine).

Anyway, here’s where the funny comes in. So, I hear a knock on the door, and knowing that Doors And Windows Are Bad, six year old me quickly reasons that means the knock Has to be the shooter! So, convinced that my entire family was going to die, I run to my bedroom door and lock it shut, and stand by it to hold tightly on it to make extra sure it was shut. My bedroom was the attic- it meant I had the extra space to hold whatever hobby bullshit I wanted so I loved it- so I guess I must have hoped that it wouldn’t have been noticed.

I was there for, well, I don’t know how long but for a terrified six year old with undiagnosed ADHD, it felt like forever. It probably wasn’t actually that long, but it felt like an eternity of terror, until my dad comes and explains what actually happened.

It was this poor Asda delivery man, who had no fucking clue what was going on. He didn’t even know there was a shooting going on, he was just going ahead and delivering these packages that he was meant to as part of his job. So my dad had to explain to this poor fucking dude that there was a mass shooting going on, that there was literally a gunman in the streets, which must have been even more of a shock to him than it was watching the news. I wouldn’t know, I was curled up by my attic door terrified out me mind lol.

… this isn’t even the most traumatic incident from that time lmao. Baby Metaru was a fucking mess.

#sorry 4 traumadumping #tw mass shooting

[blonkk]

shut the fuck up about the layers of your problems and “oppression”. this has gotta be the worst fucking thing that’s come out of “social conciousness”. like idk how to tell you this but everyone’s life is fucking hard. OBVIOUSLY when you’re part of a marginalized group things get harder but fr why is everyone so fucking dedicated to being miserable victims. deadass this is why white people are obsessed with being “queer”. it’s so annoying and i’m not giving you my fucking money. you know what i am if everyone needs to go there so fucking bad??!???? i’m a brown FEMALE person child of immigrants chronically ill chronically depressed diagnosed with ADHD and even thought to have autism by some. fuck if i’m gonna let all these awful labels define me for the rest of my fucking life and use them to make people feel sorry for me. i don’t even believe the ADHD and autism — honestly i think the adhd is a result of the conditions i live in and the fact that i just don’t respond to authority. but anyways like using this shit as a way to beg for money is just so pathetic and lazy and self absorbed lol. get a fucking job. i don’t even care anymore. yes i know getting a job doesn’t fix all your problems and that especially today there’s no reward for working but seriously why do you think you’re special???!!? i bust my balls working and have been since i was 16. i don’t get to use the child of immigrants excuse because IM NOT THE IMMIGRANT THEY WERE LMAOOOO seriously people are so pathetic it makes me so mad. there are people in the world that genuinely need help, need aid, can’t work. i’ve been directly beside those people. i’ve seen how the system fails the people who rely on it the most, and a lazy 20something with adhd and anxiety from a lower-middle-class background is not one of those people. i’ve worked in the lowest rungs in society and make no money, even now with qualifications, and i can’t afford basic things. is that ok? no it is not. do i think everyone should struggle? no i don’t . but i’m not gonna sit here and watch you freakish beggars try to manipulate people into feeling sorry for you because of your “identity”. stop being lazy and self centered. get a job and struggle like everyone else; maybe then you’ll see the value of work and money and why begging people for theirs is greedy. (no i’m not talking about poor people asking wealthy people for help, no i’m not saying luckier people shouldn’t distribute wealth if they can. they definitely should, that’s always been my belief.) i’m talking about these young kids acting like they’re at the forefront of some revolution by refusing to be a part of the real world and “advocating”; you’re not advocating for shit, you’re excusing your own selfishness and laziness. not to sound like a boomer but my taxes pay for your ei and disability that you steal from those who actually need it. my taxes are not meant to be YOUR public property. obviously it’s not right that the government takes my fucking money and i’m not even making a basic salary. but i can’t stand seeing these whiny children abusing public funding with such greed and entitlement. you’re doing harm whether you believe it or not and you’re splitting people more and more. there’s stubborn conservatives who refuse to understand other perspectives and think everyone has it the same and then there’s these loser lefties who see nothing wrong with taking what’s not theirs and refusing to get off their ass and try. seriously you’re mentally ill? maybe stop coddling yourself. you CAN work. you CAN get up, open the blinds, go outside, be a part of life.

it fucking sucks. but you don’t constantly need “rest”. you don’t get to treat everyone else like shit because you feel bad. grow up. all you big babies do is make people question the validity of mental illness and refuse to take it seriously because you want to be treated like special children. life is hard. life doesn’t make sense for most people until they get older. you’re in your twenties or teens or even thirties???? newsflash no one’s “happy”! no one’s got it figured out!!!! now quit being such a crybaby and go experience life instead of sitting in your room on tiktok all day thinking you’re so educated for having different labels to attach to everyone based on knowing next to nothing about who they are besides maybe their skin colour and background. touch grass. stop asking for money and co opting your way into marginalized group’s spaces because you’re a leech. i hate u all fr do you think during the mf depression 22 yr olds were rotting in their parents houses complaining that life is hard and they can’t work because they have anxiety and it’s too much?? no they went and did what they had to do and starved and struggled because that’s what you do. some people are luckier than others. bitch i was i was growing up in the 80s but that’s just not my choice. but hey if you wanna sit on the sidelines and complain all your life you do you. just don’t expect people to pay for it. freaks and weirdos!!!

#big rant #but i’m tired of these beggar posts #yeah you know what i do think i’m better than people who refuse to get off their asses #everyone needs to fucking work. whether you’re rich poor idc #if i ever get rich as fuck and have kids guess what they’re doing in high school??? #working shit jobs like i had to #paying for their own shit #because that’s what makes people understand the value of work and money #like my parents could have helped me a lot and i wish they had but having my own money in high school was awesome #but anyways. big boomer moment #im tired of people’s excuses #im tired of people thinking they’re the only ones who have it hard #and then trying to leech off of others in the same boat!!! like we’re both depressed and broke #but i have a job #and you think you’re entitled to MY money?! #get a grip

[saint-magdalena]

thing # 18 Saturday, November 12 2022 8:37 pm

ok so mostly i’m just writing this as a test because right now i have a youtube video pulled up of those minecraft platforming videos and it like an hour long. i think i saw somewhere on tiktok that it helps them focus during class? so i’m just testing to see if it works on writing as well. though, i donat know if it’ll help with when i have to do actual schoolwork, because at least on here i can choose whatever i wan’t to talk about unlike in essays where i don’t really have much of a say. nevertheless i still might discover a new way to focus on this instead of being distracted every few seconds so yeah.

i kinda wanna rant about my experience on tinder. well, “experience” is a bit generous. mostly i’ve been doing the swiping, i haven’t really talked to anybody yet. still, i have a few thoughts abut it. i don’t think tinder is for me. i feel way too judgy on people i’ve never even met before. even though i’m sure a lot of them are great people to hang out with, i can’t really figure that out from a few photos of them. their bios(if they have one) don’t help either. they mostly just have their height and instagram handles written down. if not, they’re just asking for a hookup, which i would be totally down for, if not for the fact that. people who are looking for hookups, don’t even have their face in any of their pictures.

okay side note, the minecraft video bg music did more for my focus than the actual video. and i think the effect doesn’t last that long cause i eventually got distracted, so i’m switching to an asmr video now.

anyways, most of the time, i feel like i’m just judging people’s ability to take good photo of themselves. it feels so awkward when i come across a photo of someone and just feel embarrassed that that was the best that they could do. like, do they seriously think a blurry-ass photo of themselves shirtless with basketball shorts on is gonna make someone interested. like ew. and before you start thinking that i should be humble and not judge people based on their pictures, that’s internally what tinder is shut up. whatever, i’ll just keep swiping until i find—i don;t even know what i wanna find but yeah, maybe this is just one of those cases where i’ll know it when i see it.

asmr isn’t working by the way, i’ve gone on my phone multiple times during that last paragraph. maybe i should try some generic relaxing music like the one ion t he minecraft vid? aesthetic lo-fi it is.

and by the way, still haven’t fixed my procrastination problem. i still have about 17 assessments that i have due in about two weeks. i don’t know how i’ll be able to do them all in that timeframe. but let’s hope my adhd-fueled speed running abilities won’t fail me this time. see, it would have been fine i f i were still at my other school in my hometown, because compared to everyone else’s outputs and presentations and shit, even though i didn’t even pass them on time, they were still actually pretty good. when it came to recitations and ppts, i just bullshitted my way through the english language and teachers would eat it up. i even graduated with honors because of this. but college professors, understandably, aren’t as impressed with late-but-still-quality outputs because the standard in my school right now, which is in a big city, is way way higher than back there. people just aren’t as easily swayed by showy english because literally everybody speaks english here. pretty canva layouts won’t catch anybodys eye since guess what? i’m in a fucking art school so literally anybody could do what i do. i don;t know, maybe i’ll just have to accept that my stuff will just have to be mediocre and god, that pains me to say.

anyways, if i’m lucky i might be able to pass two of the math assessments by tomorrow night. maybe i’ll work on one of the essays too, but i doubt i’ll get anything good out of me. i’ve literally started over three times with one of my essays because literally everything that came out of me was like hot garbage.

ok bye for now maybe i’m getting really sleepy.

btw the music works so much better pog.

[thatorangedrank]

Recently, I’ve been educating my boyfriend on my ADHD so that he can understand me better when I’m unable to explain what’s wrong in a time of need. Two things recently came up that he thought were helpful, and after his explanation I could understand why he thought this, but were actually quite harmful in the moment.

1. “I understand how stressful XYZ is, but everyone deals with that. It’s ok.”

He’s correct. Everyone experience emotions such as sadness, anxiety, depression, excitement. However, when any variation of this gets said to me all it does is piss me off, make me roll my eyes, double down on that negative emotion, and start rambling about the complexities of ADHD.

The reason it’s so frustrating to be told something like this is mainly because I’ve heard this shit my whole life. And regardless of if he or anyone in my past has intended to, all it does is make me feel alienated NOT included. NOT relatable. NOT comforted. It’s important to find the common ground in emotions with neurotypicals sure, but all I hear is “everyone goes thru this so deal with it like everyone else”. He wasn’t intending to make me feel like I should shut up about what I’m feeling, but that phrase makes me feel like one grain of sand on a beach when my emotions are coming in uncontrollable waves.

Especially being diagnosed as an adult, all those negative ADHD stereotypes that everyone shares were never associated to my ADHD until I was 19. Until I was 19, all I knew is that I was worthless and sub-par compared to everyone else. When you’re compared to random peers, children, siblings, and studies your entire life, saying “everybody feels that way” makes me want to scream.

2. Learning to laugh off my forgetfulness

I’m a really clumsy, forgetful person and as an adult I feel confident in that statement because I’m ok with it being a part of who I am. But sometimes it’s the same mistake over and over in a matter of minutes. I know it’s my ADHD, and he knows it too so we work together to make sure it’s not too overwhelming. But some days it’s worse than usual, some days I can barely remember if I’ve brushed my teeth minutes after doing it.

The other night I had left our game room (it’s a loft with a spiral staircase going up) to go grab my glasses because I had forgotten to bring them up. While I was down there I got some water and noticed he didn’t replace the TP roll in the bathroom so I did both of those things and went back up. No glasses. I went back down the stairs, got distracted by our cats, got HIM a glass of water and walked back upstairs. No glasses. I walked back downstairs again, randomly saw my phone on the coffee table- omg I need that! I didn’t know I left it down here! Grabbed it and walked back upstairs.

No glasses.

I got so frustrated, I felt so stupid, and the rabbit hole of negative thoughts inevitably made me spiral as I stormed down the spiral staircase. And that’s when I heard him laughing. Not at me of course, but yea his silly adhd girlfriend is going to be making 4 round trips up and down the stairs for her glasses. Then I started to cry and he promptly shut up lol. He came to comfort me and he tried to help me find the humor in those kinds of situations because sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself. To which I explained that when you live with this kind of constant forgetfulness, it really isn’t that funny. The frustration that builds up because jfc I am accidentally giving myself a stair-workout just because I can’t remember my god damn glasses and all I want to be doing is playing video games. If I’m in a better mood I can be like “well here I go again with my adhd ass! Haha!” But it’s all forced. It’s forced to cope with the anger I feel at myself every fucking time I forget something. If I don’t force myself to laugh then my mental health gets negatively impacted in the long term because I’ll obsess over how hopeless I am.

But there are some days where that anger and that hopelessness just leak out and I can’t control it anymore.

#I feel lucky to have a partner so willing to learn and work with me and understand me #he provides a lot of perspective I really haven’t gotten from other people before #but I love that when I tell him that there’s no way his perspective is going to help my own he accepts it #we can talk about anything #we talk through it all and we take deliberate care to understand one another #it makes me really happy #adhd #adhd brain #adhd tag #adhd education #partners in adhd #hee my acountabilibuddy

[15hammerheadsharks]

I stg if my brother is like ‘why don’t you just do your work earlier 😏 got em lol’ when I complain about having to finish my art project in 1 day I’m gonna go ape

#YOU do NOT KNOW how my brain works #you could not fucking handle having my brain #you don’t fucking know or understand how adhd works so shut the FUCK up #I would fucking love to be able to do my work earlier but my brain won’t fucking let me and it’s incredibly frustrating #you would think that the fact that he has dyslexia would make him at least a little understanding but no #I could handle dyslexia but my brother could not handle adhd

[eroticcannibal]

Listen. Not to be Alarmist but I have many thoughts and feelings and Fears about voice recognition technology and the effect it will have on identity.

Like, we are already living in a time where maintaining a Regional identity is becoming a fight, specifically with regard to language. Trying to preserve your identity and community and heritage through ur children with language is so. fucking. hard. When u have only RP being recognized as “correct” English, and media is dominated by American ways of speaking.

And now we are very much being left behind by technology, which honestly fucking sucks for many people, and is straight up harmful for many disabled people with regional ways of speaking!

Now I know someone is gonna be all “oh u gotta speak slowly and clearly” no. Shut up. *You* need to speak slowly and clearly. That don’t work with many regional ways of speaking. We’ve been trying to use speech-to-text for my ADHD kid who can’t write without struggling A LOT and IT DOESN’T WORK. We TRIED slow and clear, even then it does not work! In fact recognition of their accent is so poor we couldn’t even do the training to recognize their voice. And they do not have a particularly hard to understand accent. They ain’t geordie. They ain’t full yorkshire. They ain’t that rural. How the fuck is voice recognition not recognizing really standard midlands-ish speech?

This is a choice. Those people developing voice recognition have chosen to not spend as many resources on recognising reigonal speech than on RP. It has been around so fucking long at this point, how the fuck in 2021 are we at the point where my child cannot even dictate one single fucking sentence?

They should not be forced to strip their identity from their speech to be understood. They should not be forced to go through the, for them, grueling process of learning *how* to strip their identity from their voice just to use an accessibility tool they need NOW.

What kind of a message is this going to give them? I went my whole life hearing how talking like I did made me thick, uneducated, scum. Now they’re hearing they aren’t even worth a basic accessibility thing that other people can freely access. They aren’t worthy of being allowed to do something as simple as write, just because of how they talk, because of how their family and community talks. How is that fair?

And like, not to bring up subtitles again, but this same issue effectively limits certain disabled groups to content produced only by people of certain backgrounds on youtube and no doubt other platforms eventually (cus why pay a person if a computer can guess). Is that not fucked up? Is it not quite fucked up that deaf people just straight up can’t understand content made by certain people cus no fucker can be arsed to have their voice recognition actually recognise voices?

I’m just so fucking mad about this.

#word of god #long post

[emonaculate]

Streamer Eren Headcanon pt 2

`❥ AU: Modern!AU

`❥ Genre: Fluff

`❥ Pairing: Streamer!Eren x Black!Reader

`❥ Warnings Include: Profanity, Established relationship, Eren is a dork

`❥ Author Note: You guys loved the first one so much I decided to do it again. Sorry if it isn't as good as the first one, I'm working on other projects at the same time

Eren met you during college and was instantly smitten

You were a foreign student studying abroad

He spent months trying to learn English just to properly talk to you

You finally cave in and go on dates with him because slfkssrlw how could you not when he's that sweet

Having said that, when you're frustrated whilst he streams, to check on you he'll switch over to English.

"Hey pretty girl whats wrong?"

"I can't find the letters for my cross word."

"....Aha lemme see."

He is trying his hardest not to laugh at your cute little scrunched up face as he helps you find the word.

During his charity streams, by popular vote, he lets you do his make up

Despite the stream being 24 hrs long people continue to watch because the interactions are too cute.

" 'Ren stay still."

"It feels moist."

"Never say that again."

"Wait. Babe. I want the thingy on my eyes."

"Thingy?"

"Yeah the sharp shit and the stuff on my lashes."

"Its called wing liner and mascara, Eren."

"Yeah that shit."

"Don't swear. Kids are watching."

"Man fuck them-"

"Yeager."

"....Ahem... sorry."

He is definitely the baddest bitch after you finish <3

Kept the make up on even after the stream finished

He may be a COD player but he does not have toxic masculinity

LOVES how he looks when pampered and whilst he'll never go out of his way to do make up or use your products; if you ever offer he's down

"What that's shit on your face?"

"It's an Indian face mask."

"It looks like throw up."

"Do you wanna try it?"

"Yes."

Once talked shit about braids not hurting that bad.

So the only natural solution was to make a bet

You styled his beautiful long hair into nice and neat cornrows (if you can't braid, take him to the africans)

He couldn't even sit through the procedure, literally got up and left midway through

"Fuck no. I like pain as much as the next guy but hell no."

"Aw baby what wrong? I thought it wasn't that bad."

Went on stream the next day to talk about the experience and why he wouldn't wish that on anyone.

Everyone can tell that your relationship is serious when you accidentally broke his PS5

Like he gets absolutely livid and wants to do nothing more than yell at you

But after seeing your teary eyed expression and your broken apologies in German

He just accepts it and steps completely out of the room to keep from blowing up on you.

It takes a few days and even though you feel completely like shit, you dont bother him

He finally comes around and just holds you tightly

No words or anything

His gesture is enough to let you know he forgives you.

He gets a new one immediately and is more careful when it comes to letting you mess with alone though lmao

Decides to do the little draw my life video and moves people to tears without trying

He thought his trauma was normal pfft

While that gets to people, what really affects his audience is when he get to how you make him feel

"If I can describe Y/n with one word, I'd have to say sunshine. You know that feeling when you've seen nothing but depressing rainstorms for months at a time but just that one day, the sun pokes out and shows that the world isn't so gloomy and bad. It's actually quite beautiful. The sun manages to make those sad raindrops look like diamonds. Thats Y/n to me. She makes the days where I feel at my worst better in every way. "

Eren suffers from a couple mental illnesses which is why he donates to their respected charities

He suffers from ADHD, Depression, and Anger issues.

Now you can't just magically make all of his issues go away but you being around does soothe him in a special way

Not many people can do that and LOTS have tried

But you just manage to get him in ways he cant explain

Even the videos with all of his friends involved, his focus on you

Fans can tell when you guys are not together during streams

Eren's temper is a lot shorter and he pops off quickly.

And of course he just so happens to play "getting over it"

This is one of those times he gets cancelled

Coochie-manz63: wow ur trash

"You're literally someone who hides behind a fucking screen to talk shit but I know if I was in front of you; there would be no exchange because if you so much looked at me wrong, I would have beaten your ass into fucking next year, you dyslexic fucking waste of space. Learn how to goddamn spell before you try to talk shit again."

IloveYEAGGGGER23: Damn..

You ended up being the one to clean up his mess, yet again

"Eren is very sorry for his actions, He understands how his words can be hurtful to others.. Right babe?"

"Huh? Oh um yeah.. My bad ig."

After the apology video, you give Eren one of your famous lectures.

"Eren you can't treat others like that just because you get a little upset. Remember what your therapist said about controlling your temper. You can't just do it when I'm around, you have to do it all the time.

Now Eren loves you to pieces but your lectures just do not help his ADHD mind.

So to shut you up, he does the only thing he knows how

Takes your breath and thoughts away with his passionate kisses.

His pattern is always the same

He pretends to listen, nodding occasionally, stands up and moves closer to you.

Grabs your jaw gently and tips your head back before capturing your lips into a sheering kiss that always leaves you breathless

"What were we talking about?"

"We were just going to get some food."

You're just as weak for Eren as he is for you <3

#eren x black reader #eren jaeger #eren aot #snk #aot headcanons #eren headcanons #eren yeager x black reader #black reader #eren has anger issues but is still sweet

[cabinofimagines]

can i request a poly! lercy fic where percy doesn't know(or completely forgets) that aluminum foil shouldn't go in the microwave, y/n doesn't pay any mind to it cause they don't realize it's not supposed to be microwaved, and then all hell breaks loose, so leo comes home to a basically melted microwave and percy & y/n rubbing burn cream on each other while they're murmuring stuff like 'why does it hurt so much!' 'you'd think with leo, we'd be used to it by now.' thank you!

Everyone SHUT UP I have to give you some Leo appreciation after the angsty shit Asja wrote -Danny

Sleep Deprived —(Poly!Lercy xGN!reader)

“I’m so tired I just want to fall flat on the bed and sleep for the next week,” Percy grumbles beside you.

It was the end of the semester of your first year in college, both of you were basically dead inside with the amount of nights spent finishing assignments and studying for tests. 

You’re focused on finishing your bowl of cereal while Percy opens a box of something, you weren’t paying enough attention to see what he was about to put in the microwave.

“I can’t remember the last time I actually felt well rested,” You mumble. 

“Makes you wonder how Leo can keep up with his schedule without fallin apart, huh?” The soft sound of the microwaves’ buttons accompany his comment.

“Probably his ADHD, I don’t understand why you’re falling apart though,” You raise a brow.

“Well, I’m not a son of Hephaestus—”

“Which is great, otherwise you and Leo dating would be gross as fuck—”

“So probably my brain function on a different level than Leo’s...”

“Everyone’s brain works on a different level than Leo’s,” You yawn. “He’s so freaking smart—that bastard.”

Percy presses the start button, almost immediately something starts hissing inside the machine and a loud bang sends you out of your chair. When you stand up the microwave is in flames and Percy has a very ugly burn on his arm.

“What the fuck—!”

You circle the counter and look around for the fire extinguiser, once you find it you push Percy out of the way and unlock the tool, showering the machine with its white substance.

“What the hell did you put in there, Percy?” You ask in shock.

“I-It was a burrito! You know, from the ones Leo bought yesterday?”

“Did you make sure to take off the foil before putting it in there?”

Percy blinks, he lowers his gaze to the messed up microwave and a grimace quickly forms on his features. 

“I’m sorry, Y/N, I wasn’t paying attention...”

“Don’t apologize, you’re the one who got hurt!” You shake your head. “Where’s the ointment?”

“Gotta be under the sink,” Percy hisses when trying to touch his burned arm. “You know, it’s sort of insulting, as the son of Poseidon, to get burned by an inanimated object that I own.”

The front door swungs open to reveal one happy Leo Valdez, he’s humming whatever song he’s listening through his earphones, he hasn’t noticed the mess in the kitchen since his back is turned to his boyfriend but the smell is so strong he notices after five seconds.

“Hey, what are you cooking?” He scrunches up his nose. “Guys?”

Leo sees Percy’s injured arm and he messily drops his backpack on the entrance before rushing over to him.

“What happened?” He looks at the kitchen and his frown deepens. “Did you fight with our microwave?”

“I put a burriton in it without taking the stupid foil,” Percy groans.

You walk into the room once more holding a small tube of ointment. 

“Don’t move, I’ve got you—Oh, hi Leo!”

You kiss him shortly before starting to rub the cream on Percy’s forearm. 

“How was work?”

“Fun. But not as crazy as whatever the hell just happened in here five minutes ago,” He leans back against the counter. “Do I have to set up cameras inside the house to make sure you don’t kill yourselves on accident? This is like the third fire you guys start this week!”

“We’re just a little tired.”

“A little?” Leo asks teasingly.

“You should be kissing the pain away from my body instead of making fun of us!” Percy demands. “If you got no useful advice then please leave the room so Y/N can take care of me.”

“You’re a spoiled child,” You reply, although your tone is sweet.

“Hey, I never said that!” Leo pouts, he quickly pushes you aside playfully and plants a firm kiss on Percy’s lips. 

The older boy smirks against Leo’s mouth and happily reciprocates. You finish your work on Percy’s arm and put the ointment away, looking at the microwave with a tired expression.

“First the coffee maker, now this,” You sigh. “We have no money to buy a new one, what are we going to do?”

“I could ask my dad to build us one,” Leo offers, he moves away from Percy and ignores his complaint. 

“Isn’t he busy with—dunno, God stuff?”

“I’m sure it’ll take him like five minutes to make one, and I bet it’ll be cooler than any of those mortal versions.”

“Okay, you sure can try to convince him,” You snort. “In the meantime, we should keep Percy away from the kitchen until he finishes finals week.”

“I would fight against it, but I honestly don’t trust myself now,” Percy replies, his weariness slowly coming back to his body. “I’m still hungry though...”

“Oh, I brought you doughnuts!” Leo grins. “They’re in my backpack, you can take the bag if you want.”

“I love you so much,” Percy sighs in bliss, standing up and walking directly to the backack Leo has abandoned at the front door.

“Love you too,” Leo beams, his head turns to the side as he sees you clean the mess your boyfriend caused without meaning to. “And we also love you, Y/N. Thank you for looking after Mr Trainwreck.”

“It’s my pleasure,” You grin.

Leo opens his arms and silently waits for you to get closer, you don’t keep him waiting for long.

Taglist.

@beneaththeiceandsnow @lovinghufflepuffgirl @diaphragmjellyfish 

#Danny's writing #poly!lercy #pjo imagine #lercy #hoo imagines #leo valdez x percy jackson #leo valdez x reader #percy jackson x reader #poly fic

[thedeadhandofseldon]

The Anti-Mercer Effect

On the Accessibility of D&D, Why Unprepared Casters is so Fun, and Why Haley Whipjack is possibly the greatest DM of our generation.

(Apologies to my mutuals who aren’t in this fandom for the length of this, but as you all know I have never in my life shut up about anything so… we’ll call it even for the number of posts about Destiel I see every day.

To fellow UC fans - I haven’t listened to arc 4 yet, I started drafting this in early August, and I promise I will write a nice post about how great Gus the Bard is once I get the chance to listen to more of his DMing).

Structure - Or, “This is not the finale, there will be more podding cast”

So, first of all, let’s just talk about how Unprepared Casters works. Because it’s kind of unusual! Most of the other big-name D&D podcasts favor this long, grand arcs; UC has about 10 hours of podcast per each arc. And that’s a major strength in a lot of ways: it makes it really accessible to new listeners, because you can just start with the current arc and understand what’s going on!

And by starting new arcs every six or seven episodes, they can explore lots of ways to play D&D! Classic dungeon delve arc! Heist arc! Epic heroes save the world arc! Sportsball arc! They can touch on all sorts of things!

And while I’m talking about that: Dragons in Dungeons, the first arc, makes it incredibly accessible as a show - because it lets the unfamiliar listener get a sense of what D&D actually is. (It’s about telling stories and making your friends feel heroic and laugh and cry, for the record). If I had to pick a way to introduce someone to the game without actually playing it with them, that arc would definitely be it.

And I’d be remise not to note one very important thing: Haley Whipjack and Gus the Bard are just very funny, very charismatic people. Look. Episode 0s tend to be about 50%(?) those two just talking to each other about their own podcast. It shouldn’t work. And yet it DOES, its one of my favorite parts, because Haley and Gus are just cool.

And a side note that doesn’t fit anywhere else: I throw my soul at him! I throw a scone at him - that’s it, that’s the vibe. The whole podcast alternates between laughing with your friends and brooding alone in a dark tavern corner - but the laughs never forced and the dark corner is never too dark for too long.

Whipjack the Great - Or, the DM is Also a Player!

I think Haley Whipjack is one of the greatest Dungeon Masters alive. The plots and characters! The mechanical shenanigans! The descriptions!

Actually, let’s start there: with the descriptions. (Both Haley and Gus do this really fucking well). As we know, Episode 0 of each arc sees the DM reading a description - of a small town, or the Up North, or the recent history of a great party. And Haley always strikes this tricky balance - one I think a lot of us who DM struggle with - between giving too much description and  worldbuilding, and not telling us anything at all. She describes people and events in just enough detail to imagine them, but never so much they seem static and unreal - just clear enough to envision, but with enough vagueness left to let your imagination begin to run wild.

While I’m thinking about arc 3’s party, let’s talk about a really bold move she made in that arc: letting the players have ongoing control of their history. Loser Lars! She didn’t try to spell out every detail of this high-level party’s history, or restrict their past to only what she decided to allow - she gave them the broad outlines, and let them embellish it. And that made for a much more alive story than any attempt to create it by herself would have - but I think it takes a lot of courage to let your players have that agency. Most Dungeon Masters (myself included) tend to struggle with being control freaks.

And the plots! Yeah, arc one is built of classic tropes - but she actually uses them, she doesn’t get caught up in subverting everything or laughing at the cliches. And it’s fun! In arc 3, there really isn’t a straight line for the players to follow, either - which makes the game much more interesting and much trickier to run. And her NPCs are fantastic and I will talk about them in the next section.

Above all, though, I think what is really impressive is how Haley balances mechanics, and rules as written, with the narrative and rule of cool - and puts both rules and story in the service of playing a fun game. And the secret to that? She’s the DM, but the DM is a player, and the DM is clearly having fun. Hope Lovejoy mechanically shouldn’t get that spellslot back, but she does, and it’s fun. The changeling merchant in Thymore doesn’t really make some Grand Artistic Narrative better, but wow is it fun. And she never tries to force it one way or the other - the story might be more dramatic if Annie didn’t manage to banish the demon from the vault, but it’s a lot cooler and a lot more fun for the players if Annie gets to be a badass instead - and the rules and the dice say that Annie managed it.

Settings feel like places, NPCs feel like people, and the narrative plot feels like a real villainous plot.

Anyway. I could go on about the various ways in which Whipjack is awesome for quite a while - she’s right, first place in D&D is when your friends laugh and super first place is when they cry - but I’m going to stop here and just. Make another post about it some other time. For now, for the record I hold her opinions about the game in higher esteem than I do several official sourcebooks; that is all.

Characters - Or, Bombyx Mori Is Not an Asshole, And That Matters

Okay, I said I would talk about characters! And I will!

Just a general place to start: the party! All of the first three parties are interesting to me, because they all care about each other. Not even necessarily in a Found Family Trope sort of way, though often that too. But they generally aren’t assholes to each other. The players create characters that actually work together, that are interesting; even when there’s internal divisions like SK-73 v. Sir Mr. Person, they aren’t just unpleasant and antagonistic all the time. Listening to the podcast, we’re “with” these people for a couple hours - and it isn’t unpleasant. That matters a lot. (To take a counter-example: I love Critical Role, but the episode when Vox Machina pranked Scanlan after he died and was resurrected wasn’t fun to listen to, it was just uncomfortable and angering and vaguely cruel).

All of the PCs are amazing, and the players in each arc did a great job. If you disagree with me about that, well, you have the right to be incorrect and I am sorry for your loss. Annie Wintersummer, for one example: tragic and sad and I want to give her a hug, but also Fuck Yeah Wintersummer, and also her familiar Charles the Owl is the cutest and funniest and I love him. And we understand what’s going on with Annie, she isn’t some infinite pool of hidden depths because this arc is 7 episodes and we don’t have time for that, but she also has enough complexity to be interesting. Same with Fey Moss: yeah, a lot of her is a silly pun about fame that carries into how she behaves, but a lot of how she behaves is also down to some good classic half-elven angst about parenthood and wanting to be known and seen and important. (Side note: if your half-elf character doesn’t have angst, well, that’s impressive and also I don’t think I believe you).

There are multiple lesbian cat-people in a 4-person party and they both have requited romantic interests who aren’t each other. This is the future liberals want and I am glad for it.

Sir Mister Person, the human fighter! Thavius, the edge lord! Even when a character is “simple,” they’re interesting, because of how they’re played as people and not action-figures. And that matters a lot.

In the same way: the NPCs. There really aren’t a lot of them! And some of them come from Patreon submissions, so uh good work gang, you’re part of the awesomeness and I’m proud of you! The point being, the NPCs work because enough of them are interesting to matter. It’s not just a servant who opens Count Michael’s door, it’s a character with a name (Oleandra!) and a personality and history. They’re interesting. Penny Lovejoy didn’t need to be interesting, the merchant outside the Laughing Mausoleum didn’t need to be interesting, but they ARE! And Haley and Gus EXCEL at making the NPCs matter, not just to the story but to us as viewers. I agree with Sir Mister Person, actually, I would die for the princesses of the kingdom. I actually care about Gem Lovejoy of all people - that wouldn’t happen in an ordinary campaign! That’s the thing that makes Unprepared Casters spectacular - and, frankly, it’s especially impressive because D&D does not tend to be good at making a lot of interesting compared to a lot of other sorts of stories.

And, just as an exemplar of all this: Bombyx Mori. Immortal, reincarnating(?), and described as the incarnation of the player’s ADHD. I expected to hate Bombyx, because as the mom friend both in and out of my friend-group’s campaigns, the chaos-causer is always exhausting to me. And yeah, Bombyx causes problems on purpose! But! She is not an asshole.

And that’s important. Bombyx goes and sits with the queen and comforts her. Bombyx gives Annie emotional support. Bombyx isn’t just a vehicle to jerk around the DM and other players; Bombyx really is a character we can care about. To compare with another case - in the first couple episodes of The Adventure Zone, the PCs are just dicks. Funny, but dicks. Bombyx holds out an arm “covered in larva” to shake with a count, and robs him of magical items, but she also cares about her friends and other people! She uses a powerful magical gem to save her fertilizer guy from death! Yeah, Bombyx is ridiculous, but she’s not just an asshole the party has to keep around for plot reasons; you can see why her party would keep her around. And one layer of meta up, she’s the perfect example of how to make a chaotic character like that while still being fun for everyone you’re playing with, which is often not the case. And I love her.

The Anti-Mercer Effect - Or, “I think we proved it can be fun, you can have a good time with your friends. And it doesn’t have to be scary, you can just work with what you know”

The Mercer Effect basically constitutes this: Matthew Mercer, Dungeon Master of Critical Role, is incredible (as are all of his players). They’re all professional story-tellers in a way, remember, and so Critical Role treats D&D like a narrative art-form, and it’s inspiring. Seeing that on Critical Role sets impossible standards - and people go into their own home games imagining that their campaigns will be like Critical Role, and the burden of that expectation tends to fall disproportionately on the DM. And the end result, I think, of the Mercer Effect is that we get discouraged or intimidated, because our game isn’t “as good as” theirs. (And I should note - Matt certainly doesn’t want that to be our reaction).

So the Anti-Mercer Effect is two things: it’s D&D treated like a game, and it’s inspiring but not intimidating. And Unprepared Casters manages both of those really freaking well. Because they play it like a game! A UC arc looks just like a good campaign in anyone’s home game. They have the vibes of 20-somethings and college students playing D&D for fun because that’s who they are (as a 20-something college student who plays a lot of D&D, watching it felt like watching my friends play an especially good campaign). They’re trying to tell a good story, sure, and they always do. But first and foremost, they’re trying to have fun, and it shows, and I love the UC cast for it.

And that’s the other half of it: it’s inspiring! It’s approachable; you can see that Haley and Gus put plenty of work into preparing the game but it also doesn’t make you feel like you need hundreds of pages of worldbuilding to run a game. Sometimes a cleric makes Haley cry and she gives them back a spell-slot from their deity! That’s fantastic! It’s just inspiring - listening to this over the summer, when my last campaign had fallen apart under the strain of graduation, is why I decided to plan and run my new one!

That quote from Haley Whipjack that I used as the title for this section? That’s the whole core of this idea, and really, I think, the core of the podcast.

The Mercer Effect is when you go “that’s really cool, I could never do that.” But Unprepared Casters makes you look at D&D and go “wow, that looks really fun. I bet I can do that!” And I love the show for it.

And I bet a lot of you do too.

#unprepared casters #bombyx mori #haley whipjack #long post #this is really rough but I don't have time to keep working on it and it's already a month later than intended