Suddenly had a flashback of being in IT when I was like year 7 or 8- and I'd looked up something on whatever search engine we were using- it might've been ask jeeves- and ending up on an article entitled 'mummy i want to be a boy' and the girl next to me looking at my screen and laughing so loud that the teacher came over.
I hit the back button as many times as i could in a panic, and he took both of us into the hallway to find out what was going on. She rats me out and I try to pretend it just popped up. He then went back into the classroom and i guess checked my history- which i didnt know was a thing when i was like 12- and berated me for lying to him and looking up 'inappropriate' things
so anyway suddenly remembering this incident makes me wonder if that experience pushed back my ability to perceive myself as queer or nb despite the vast majority of my friends at the time being LGBT, cuz like I didnt start using she/they pronouns for myself until I was almost in my 30s and didnt allow myself to recognise that I was bi until my probably mid 20s at least.
not “oh my god it’s just a tv show” as in you are not allowed to find genuine joy and form a true connection to fiction, but “oh my god it’s just a tv show” as in, if it legitimately stresses you out and impacts your mood when things don’t happen exactly the way you want them to, and it causes you to lash out at other - real - people, maybe you need to take a massive step back.