#but my ex also had adhd and i felt he understood me in a way i hadnt been understood before bc how could anyone without the same brainweird | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

onyxheartbeat · 7 months

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Lots of people might disagree with this but I think emotional abuse extends to when your lover says things to you in a tone you never use with them.

This is different from tone policing, because obviously everyone has the right to get mad and yell, but I’m talking when you’ve never once yelled at them, you’re patient with them, you cry in front of them and they know you’re sensitive to how they feel about you, yet they’re totally fine routinely yelling when they’re mad or triggered by you.

I remember the first time my ex yelled at me. I was ALWAYS so calm and loving when I was at his house and when we’d talk on the phone and always being soft spoken and kind because I was so happy to finally be with him and be receiving any affection from him at all. Never once did I reprimand or criticize his habits or yell at him because his life was a mess and I felt he was just in a bad spot. Still, one night I was telling him that I knew he wasn’t going to choose to stay with me here in the city, and that I knew he will go back to his family and move away eventually. And he just blew up and took it so wrong. I meant it as a way to take weight off of him and let him know I understood he was going to have to move away eventually, since he was constantly talking about it and prepping me for it and telling me it was going to “break me.” Mind you, he at this point had regularly begged me with walls of texts while was at work to come over and love him one day, then telling me I shouldn’t the next because he’s leaving in a few months. Anyway, he just started yelling and giving me the cold shoulder, and saying shit like “I have never once made you think it was even an option that you would be a choice!” Which was such a cruel way to say that, but also was so not true for many reasons. There was a strong chance I felt he would marry me, which he fucking did tell me he thought of me as his wife later down the line! But I was so sad that I made him angry and I kept saying I was sorry and that I didn’t mean it like that, and I started crying, yet he just kept going, shaming me for what I said till he cooled off.

This was a pattern for him. Completely taking something I said and twisting it to start a fight in which he could yell or have a breakdown, meanwhile I NEVER would yell back, I would just cry and try my best to reassure him until he calmed down.

Another example was when he told me he wanted to buy me a “wedding ring,” and he asked me what style I liked. He asked me to send him links to some things. He went ahead and bought something that wasn’t my style before I got a chance to, and he didn’t listen when I said details about what I liked. I wrote long messages about what I liked and he didn’t respond. I thanked him profusely when it came, sent him photos of me wearing it. He saw how happy I was when he put it on me. One day, all I did was mention that I might like to get a simple silver band to go with it sometime, and I asked if he liked one I showed him, and he broke down again. Just started telling me I didn’t like what he chose, and that I should’ve told him what I wanted (even though I did and he just didn’t listen because he makes impulse decisions and has strong ADHD). Just guilt tripping me to the max. I kept saying “I LOVE the ring you gave me. I TOLD you I love it.” He went cold for hours. He was like “I’m really sensitive, I guess.”

Also, after multiple months of him going on random coke and booze binges, blowing up my phone some nights telling me he needs me, acting like he loves me so much and clinging to me, keeping me on the phone and worrying me while doing reckless shit, I’d be right there supporting him when he was sad, and staying calm for him. I always came over no matter what. And it would be punctured with him withdrawing and going cold and acting like he doesn’t need me on certain days, telling me to get out because I dared to say he was worsening his health or that he shouldn’t do something. YET, he got so triggered by something I said again. We were having a totally normal conversation and I told him that I felt really sad a few nights ago and wanted to reach out to him to comfort me but didn’t feel like he would’ve received it well. I said something like “Yeah, I was wondering what he would do if I pulled a him on him and called and broke down,” and I laughed a little because I really did mean it like a joke since he’d always had a good sense of humor about his behavior and admitting when he was an idiot. Anyway, he got up and left the table while I was eating and shamed me for an hour. I asked what was wrong. He was like “you basically just called me a little needy bitch.” And again, I had to coddle him back to normal and apologize for an hour. Looking back, the inability for him to ever give me a scrap of the same patience and care when he was upset as I always gave him was just NEVER there.

I never had breakdowns in front of him despite him having like 20 in the months we were together. I cried like four times in front of him and even though he was always telling me not to cry because it would make him uncomfortable and make our departure more painful, HE still cried in front of me a billion times and felt completely safe to unload. I’d HOLD him while he cried and told him it was ok to cry. Never once was I given that same grace in return to cling, act desperate for him, ask him to come whenever I needed without some kind of “I’m leaving soon so this is just going to be painful in the end” type of attitude.

It stayed that way until the last call we had when I finally FINALLY yelled back and allowed myself to snap the way he snaps. I stayed calm for an HOUR because it was him venting about his heart failure and him saying he felt sick. He didn’t acknowledge one thing I was saying about how he was completely cutting me off to like one day a week of interaction and that he’d dropped the ball in his promise to check my messages to him. I told him he was hurting my feelings by refusing to even read a journal entry I wanted to send him, and him acting like it wasn’t important. Then he said “I don’t need photos of rabbits” too, since he knew I like to send animal vids to him. Then he called me selfish for mentioning any of that at all while he talked about how he’s dying. How dare I bring up my need for some emotional availability? I finally started yelling. He yelled over me. Just kept saying “I’m dying and you don’t get!” Over and over and over. As if I didn’t know that despite me literally hearing him talk about it for seven months and me cradling him in my arms on nights he looked like he was going to die.

And what did I get when I finally yelled back ONE fucking time? Hung up on. He’d mentioned before that he never hangs up on people because it’s so disrespectful, yet he did it to me. I never once did that to him. I waited for him to call back. Never did. I had to do it. He pulled his “If I’m so terrible then don’t talk to me anymore,” bullshit that he’d pulled with me so many times. But I felt he really meant it that time and wouldn’t have cared if he’d never heard from me again. He just had such a wall up. The thing he said wouldn’t happen after he moved away, happened. All because I dared to finally ask for consistency.

I gave him a few days to cool down, and he still couldn’t admit he was being ridiculous, and wouldn’t apologize. I’ve been stonewalled ever since. All my attempts to have a conversation like an adult have been met with the worst apathy and one liner responses that mean nothing.

The point I’m making is, it’s really true that you take things personally that you would’ve never done to that person. In hindsight, that’s what hurts me most about that relationship. It wasn’t like we were fighting a lot. We weren’t rude to each other. It was him doing things that were so disrespectful UNPROVOKED. I seriously don’t understand how someone can have such anger or disrespect for someone who’s never done anything like that to them. Especially baffling when you know they’re not a narcissist, they’re just a fearful avoidant.

I can’t believe I’ve known this person for ten years and this is where I am with it all.

#rant #venting

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autisticqueerlostatlife · 7 months

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11.20.23

feeling a bit off today.

i watched that netflix doc about twin flames and all i could think about was my ex. he believed in a lot of the same things they preached and he is also trans.

of course i started down the rabbit hole of thinking about what happened between us and how shitty he treated me. how he told me he loved me and wanted to marry me and spend the rest of his life with me, to turn around and break up with me. how he is now supposedly having a baby with someone else and how is just so happy.

while im sitting here afraid to let ppl in again. i felt like i had finally found the one person who knew me and understood me. as a woman who is demi, autistic, adhd, fat and who has anxiety, depression, cptsd, and just way too many labels to count at this point - i thought i had finally found the one person who understood, respected, and accepted me.

but he was liar and now idk if i can ever open up to anyone else ever again.

how do other autistic queers do it? how do other ppl who are like me deal with all of this and still find their soulmates?

i dont know what im doing wrong other than being afraid.

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flashmod · 10 months

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How do you know if God is talking to you? I was Christian for a while, and through a series of unfortunate things in my life turned away from the church. Do you think He would forgive me if I wanted to go back?

Okay, as I stated earlier, this is gonna be a long post.

To answer your first part of the question.

The Holy Spirit is what makes me aware of God speaking to me. Though, my experience with God will always be different compared to anyone else, because God speaks in many different ways (dreams, a word, through prophecy, a song, a simple phrase, a conversation with a friend/family/stranger, ect.).

When it comes to speaking to us, God uses the Holy Spirit as a sort of speed dial to talk directly to us.

That is my best way to explain that.

Now as my personal answer to that question, one thing I tend to know that God is speaking to me is when my thoughts stop being chaotic, and I hear a simple (almost audible) phrase or word among the noise my brain makes (because of my ADHD). Then on top of that, I test/challenge what I hear to know if it's from God or if it's my own thoughts.

One example I can share was that I was at work one day, and I started thinking about an old friend of mine that hurt me so bad many years before, that I basically cut all communications with him. Upon that thought, I kept on speaking to God, asking what I needed to do with this thought (even though I knew what the answer was going to be. But I was stubborn). Upon understanding what was going to be said, I asked, "How can I even reach out to him when he hurt me?"

And almost as clear as day, I immediately heard, "Does he NOT deserve the same grace I have given you?".

Instantly, I froze, a bit taken back by it. As if I wasn't expecting that answer. I felt a quick sense of humility and understood what needed to be done.

To answer your second question.

Absolutely! He will accept you back!

When I see your ask, I'm reminded of two stories.

The first one is the "Prodigal Son" (which Jesus talks about in the bible) in which the son took the money he asked from his father and wasted it all away to where he eventually became homeless and poor. So poor, that he became jealous of the pigs he was tending to having a better life than his.

Upon his return home, he was expecting to return to not only being a servant to his father, but to his father also being disappointed in him. But instead, his father joyfully ran towards his son, hugging him, clothed him in the best robes, and even threw a party, because his son (whom he thought was dead) had returned to him.

(A side note to this. This is a rough summary of the whole story)

The second story is a story of a friend of mine (I already asked him if I could share it and he said it was fine)

He was the youth pastor at my previous church I was attending. A God loving man, happily married, and a father of 2 boys. He was very much leading the youth groups and teaching them well from the bible.

Eventually, he had moved and took on a new job at a different church a few years later.

After that, I lost contact with him and was ghosted.

Eventually, during 2021, I received a text from his (now ex) wife about what had happened. He had cheated on her, followed his own personal desires, and fell from God. It honestly shook me hard because it was because of what God led him to tell me that led me to this path I'm on now with music.

About a year later, I continued to work on learning more about God and learning more about music, and my wife decided to send him a text (I wasn't expecting him to reply). And he responded.

Something happened to him while he was lost on his walk with God. And suddenly, he felt lead to run back to God. It was an amazing experience when I saw him again. I could see the wonders that God has done in his life. He was completely changed.

He's now pursuing God even more. He is even writing books that he's going to want to publish soon to reach out to others who are lost in their walk.

I still keep in touch with him to this day. He even mentions doing some big projects with me in the near future.

I hope this all helps. I know it was a lot to read, but I wanted to make sure I gave this answer a genuine response.

#tmi tuesday #answered on a Wednesday #Christianity #thanks for being patient Anon

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delusion-digs · 2 years

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I have severe anxiety, and I was dumped because of it

I had felt like I wasn't able to be with someone who loved me anyways, until I met my ex boyfriend a year ago. He told me it was okay, and that my ex before him was awful for making me feel like it was a problem. Although he wasn't quite abusive as the first, he still turned around in the end, and said he couldn't handle it.

I believed he was one who could accept me and he used to tell me it was okay I had anxiety and he would support me as I am. Then he didn't anymore. He wanted me to be someone else. He liked my personality, my looks, my values, my thoughts. But he couldn't stand how scattered I was. He couldn't stand that I struggled to be happy all the time, that being in social situations wasn't always something I could be strong in, that I procrastinate everything I do, that I wasn't ready for school again, that a lot of days I needed a spurt of emotional reassurance to distract my mind. He tried to fix me instead of accept me. He always told me I needed to be better and try harder. I need to be better? I had told him countless times I am doing my best, and the pressure he put on me only hurt me. I had felt better, but it wasn't linear. It wasn't fair.

He said it drained him to be around me, he felt like he was always taking care of me. That was always the last thing I wanted. I only asked for someone to listen. Maybe I talked too much and needed to self soothe more, but I only asked for someone to listen, hold me. I only asked to distract me by being themselves. I never wanted you to try and fix anything, I was fixing myself. There were so many times I recognized I needed to step back and deal with my emotions on my own, but he'd go out of his way to pull them out. I felt conflicted on if I should be sharing with him or keeping to myself. I don't think he even knew what he wanted me to do. He just expected I get better. Anxiety doesn't just go away in a few months. I have physical symptoms. My body gets exhausted. I was always trying my best to not let it get to me but I can't do it every moment every day. I thought you understood me and that you accepted me, but you didn't. You even once told me if you don't see improvement then it's done. He said he has thought about breaking up, and isn't sure he can handle me. He did it to himself. I didn't ask him to spend all his time with me, he played his games, he hung out with his friends, I didn't feel like I ever asked too much. I am not a controlling person, I want everyone to be happy.

I tried forcing myself to be better, burying emotions and hiding my needs. It made things worse, I felt worse, and he felt worse.

I felt insecure I felt like a problem I felt avoided I felt distance I felt confused I felt scared.

I thought I could hide it all and I'd be better and he'd love me. He loved me less. There was never anything I could really do, except accepting myself.

I had followed that a few times, like I 10000% accept my ADHD quirks. I hate them sometimes, but I know that they're who I am. Even when he told me I need to change, I knew that, (yes always strive to not lock yourself out or spill your drinks), but this is also who I am and I will do this more than others for the rest of my life. I wanted him to cherish those quirks, laugh at them with me. I laugh and cherish yours. I accepted every piece of him and all I wanted was for him to feel the same.

He barely respected me as an adult. I could feel it. He'd talk down to me, and it made me feel helpless and regress. I hated it. He took it upon himself to treat me like someone he needs to care for. It made me feel like shit. I didn't feel like he was my partner either, I felt like he was an authority figure. It was uncomfortable and devastating. He'd talk to me like a child. My parents saw it too. He ridiculed every mistake I made and found a way to weave it into his reasons why I can't do anything for myself. I make mistakes. Let me make them, at no harm to you.

He expected so much from me and couldn't even take a look at himself. It hurt to have someone I loved treat me this way. I let him, because I thought, anything to make him see me the way I see him. I respcted him and looked up to him and was proud of him. He had problems, like with alcohol, but he always was doing his best and I felt elated and proud to say that's my boyfriend and my best friend. He never seemed to feel like that for me. I felt like a failure, a disappointment. I just didn't feel good enough anymore, and he would tell me in so many words how he really did feel that way. It was never in my head. I did so much to try and please him, I just wanted him to see me like I saw him.

I'm *sorry* me not being able to work full time yet is unattractive to you. I'm *sorry* me having disassociative panic attacks in a social situation I felt lost in was bothersome, when I was already trying my best to go to them with you (and 80% of the time I had fun, no thanks to you). I'm *sorry* you're disappointed that I'm late sometimes, because I physically have no real concept of time. But I'm not sorry at all. I'm human. I am an amazing human, and all I ever tried to do was be the best version of myself. He said he saw "potential" and is waiting for me to "get better" and he's just pushing me to be "my best". He held me back. He made me feel inadequate. Where's the girl you met a year ago? It's all me.

I hate that I still love him, when most of what I miss is idealized, or never a constant. I didn't want to be fixed or taken care of. I wanted to be myself. I'm a nice person, I am understanding, I'm funny, I am smart (at least smarter than he made me feel), I am an amazing support system, and I always try my best.

I only ever wanted to make him happy and make him proud of me. He checked out and lost sight of the nature of that relationship a long time ago. This wasn't my fault. I never should have lost confidence in myself, I should have stood up for myself more than I did.

There's nothing wrong with me.

#anxiety #depression #relationship #codependency #toxic love #emotional rant

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nishwrites · 2 years

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I miss it so much.

emotional safety. this term I used with shayna to describe times in the past that I look back to.

when I told Farah about my first rape and she was the first friend I ever told and instead of judging me for being in that situation or not fully listening...she just hugged me. no words asked.

when I told chloe ganesh wasn't the guy for me. that I didn't really love him but desperately wanted to. that I had spent 3 years trying to mold myself to be the girl of his dreams but I had forgotten I could also be the girl of my own dreams. that I had basically wasted 3 years loving someone who had nothing in common with me. and she just said "I understand." and supported me all the way - even when I ended up using arjun to break up with him even though I already knew well before. I just lacked the self respect. but she still stood by me.

when matthew believed me, no questions asked. and he made sure to make me feel safe that summer. even if he wanted to see other girls, he never made me feel like I was inherently worthless. even if I wasn't always the easiest to like...or love. whatever that summer was. he knew I was hurting and was always gentle with that wound. if you're reading this, I hope you know how much i value you despite the pain you caused me later. you were the first guy to ever treat me with respect and patience, and that is a low bar.

when i drunkenly tried to sleep with arjun right after telling him about the rape. stumbling around his kitchen drunk while he poured me water. it was embarrassing but he held my hand instead of laughing at me. and he didn't sleep with me at all that night, just tried to make me feel safe.

when arjun dedicated most of our relationship to making me feel safe and whole, even when he did not. no matter what happened, he always put me first and treated me like i was worth the pain. he only really walked away when he felt there was nothing more and it was awful but I get it. but before that? a love so whole and complete and all encompassing that I never felt less than. my quirks were okay. even when I had adhd problems they were just adhd problems. every conflict could be solved with logic and love. also if you are reading this, you are the only ex I can securely say I will always love somewhere inside because you were the blueprint for everyone to come. I wish you didn't leave the way you did and we probably were only ever meant to touch each other's lives in our early 20s, but when you did fit me...you fit me so well. and if not for you I never would have learned to love or value myself at all. thank you, and I hope you make anuta happy as hell. you deserved a love with someone who could complete you rather than be just like you. and now you do - you made that warm chai and biscuit come true.

when I ran away from jazz bašta in belgrade after a trauma reaction and santi ran after me instead of letting me be angry. and even though we never fully resolved it, he made sure I knew my place in his life - special, valued, understood. even if that wasn't exclusively romantic. before leaving. I didn't think I deserved closure and care before that. now I do.

when even when i was floating in Budapest, angry and sad, and jes and steve made me feel safe and not judged for what I

when matthew came back as a friend and treated me with respect and accountability. though I have no idea if I trust you enough to be a close friend, I didn't lie when I said you are important. thank you for showing me that I'm worth accountability. I'm worth earning and gaining respect and trust. I'm not sure what this means, but I'm just happy i don't hate you and still feel the emotional safety I used to feel. you didn't lose all the trust and I still think you are kind and decent.

when gauri showed me that friends can be critical. that friends can hold each other to the highest standards. that friends can be angry and loving at the same damn time. that friends can have conflict but still resolve and be better later. the world may not ever fully get you, and I know you feel misunderstood much like I do. and that's why you are my travel soul mate and the only one to really get me. you never assume the worst of me. I still remember when i told you what that guy did to me and you believed me immediately. you introduced me to him and you knew with no words exchanged how much pain it caused and you didn't question me once. thank you, thank you, thank you.

when I told anuja about my suicidal year - 2019 - over arjun leaving me the way he did. right after her own stint of it. I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. and we just understood.

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that-nd-infp · 3 years

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A Lesson In Dating As Someone With ADHD:

“Stop staring off like that, it makes you look rude and disinterested.”

That’s what my ex told me any time that would happen. The one time it stood out in particular was a day that we were at an unfamiliar, crowded restaurant, with a large group of people (most of which I didn’t know and was not comfortable with), after a stressful day full of activity and social interaction. There were so many sounds everywhere: people talking, ice clinking in the glasses, forks scraping the plates.

When that happens, my brain can’t process all of that input at once and some functions stop working. Usually it’s my sight. I end up staring off into the distance at nothing in particular and I essentially stop taking all visuals in. Everything blurs together and stops registering. People have told me before that I look like I’m in a trance. The more overwhelmed/overstimulated I am, the longer it lasts and the more often I do it. I can’t control it very well.

My ex was aware that I had social anxiety and that I was easily overwhelmed. He said that he understood and that he would support me. But when my social anxiety would affect the quality of our time spent together, or it would make him look bad, he would get frustrated. Suddenly it wasn’t okay anymore.

Often, I would also use my phone as a crutch in uncomfortable social situations. He told me it was rude to do, that it made him feel like I didn’t want to be with him or his family. So I would put my phone away and try to ignore my rapidly rising anxiety levels.

Despite taking away my coping mechanisms, he did nothing to help fill that gap. He still continued to pressure me into anxiety-inducing interactions and situations. He still put me on the spot constantly and stole so much more of my mental energy than I had to give. Then he would complain that it wasn’t enough.

No matter how many times I felt I explained that I couldn’t interact as often or intensively as he wanted me to, he still complained that I wasn’t calling him or texting him or getting together with him enough. Every free moment I had away from work I ended up giving to him, not out of want but out of guilt. Because of his own mental illness and emotional turmoil, I felt like it was selfish of me to withhold that from him. So I gave him so much more of myself than I had to spare and it left me feeling drained and exhausted and numb.

It took me months to process exactly what I was feeling and why. Why I was burned out. Why I was depressed. Why I was avoiding him. And why exactly I was so scared to confront those thoughts. He promised he listened to me even though he only heard what he wanted to hear. He told me he cared how I felt even though he disregarded that in favor of what he wanted.

I thought I was crazy, that I was just perceiving things wrong. I second-guessed myself until I didn’t know what was real anymore and I doubted all my memories. When I finally did sort through my thoughts enough and gained the courage to tell him I wanted to end the relationship, it didn’t go how I planned.

He told me he didn’t understand. He told me I never communicated any of those problems to him, and that I misinterpreted his words and actions. I second guessed myself again. He told me I didn’t know what I wanted. He told me it wasn’t fair of me to end things without giving him a chance, that he deserved another chance.

I had never felt so lost and confused in my life. I didn’t know what was real and what wasn’t. Maybe he was right, maybe my memories were wrong. Maybe I forgot things. Maybe I misinterpreted things.

From everything I just described, my ex sounds like a bad guy. His actions were certainly harmful and unhealthy and did a lot of damage to me. There are details I’ve chosen to omit for the time being. But he’s not actually a bad person, and I’m going to explain why.

After years of analyzing all of that and trying to understand, I realize now that part of what he said was correct. While to me, I did communicate things, to him I didn’t. I’ve always struggled with direct communication, especially with regards to my own feelings. I sugarcoat everything; I fail to assert myself. I put it gently and indirectly. Making my needs clear felt selfish and I avoided it if I thought I could handle it, which was often. And that was when I would attempt to communicate. A lot of times I didn’t address problems because I didn’t know they were there. I had no idea I was depressed. I had no idea I was overwhelmed and burned out.

He was the kind of person that needed direct and blunt honesty. He needed things repeated. At the same time, he was too fragile for that. He took things personally and would spiral into a depression, so I felt even more scared of being direct. He didn’t understand his own emotions or how to express them in a stable or healthy way. He lacked social awareness. He was an impulsive and selfish and obsessive person. I enabled those behaviors with my own lack of communication in order to avoid what I assumed would be conflict because I didn’t want to hurt him. I felt that taking time for myself or responding to my own needs was selfish.

We were not compatible. Neither of us were aware of our own needs to the extent we each thought we were. Those needs conflicted. He needed way more attention and interaction than I was capable of giving. I needed way more space and alone time to process than he could give. I know in relationships sometimes both parties have to make sacrifices for each other, but your mental and emotional needs are not something you can sacrifice. I know that now. If we had each know ourselves better, this wouldn’t have happened. But we didn’t, and the relationship dragged on and on way past when it should have with me being miserable and him thinking anything was fine and having false hope. In the end we both got so much more hurt because of that.

My reason for sharing this story is to help others with ADHD/anything else understand this:

You need to make learning about yourself your priority. Understand yourself before you date anyone. Learn your strengths and weaknesses, your triggers and your limits, your needs, your coping mechanisms, your habits and behaviors. Learn all of them. Set boundaries in place to protect these things. Then learn how to express them to other people. Those around you cannot read your mind, they won’t know your needs unless you make them clear. If a person isn’t willing to learn those things and respect them for you, DO NOT DATE THEM.

Understand your needs and limitations and make them clear to those around you.

Do not date people who refuse to respect your mental and emotional boundaries.

Please.

Learn from my mistakes.

#add #adhd #neurodiversity #neurodivergent #depression #relationship #mental health #unhealthy relationships #dating #dating advice #infp #infp relationship #9w1

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perksofbeingbisexual · 4 years

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Panic Attacks for Jesus

Alright friends. I promised this for awhile so let’s get down to telling some of my church camp stories! Now a little warning before this starts: I have about 3-4 stories or particular incidents in mind to talk about. These all happened at one camp over multiple summers from the time I had finished 4th grade (turning 10) until I had finished 7th grade (turning 13). I grew up going to a Methodist church and at the time church camp was something I LOVED. I felt safe and secure in just being “myself”. Now looking back there was some weird shit going on but eh what can you do. My stories are going to get a little weirder each time. Also let me know if you’d like a story time about my Methodist Girls Conference adventure because that was a trip.....

I’m making a “keep reading” because while I talk about these stories as being funny to me and just seeming weird, I do acknowledge that it could trigger someone and I don’t want to do that.

Okay so the church camp that I went to from 4th to 7th grade was all about teams and earning points and outdoor sports....woopee. However, it was the first camp where we did so many things and activities changed so often that I was actually stimulated and having fun (turns out I just have adhd). But now LET’S GET TO THE FUN PART.

Campers were split up into different cabins and teams for the week. And during “break times” I spent quite a bit of time resting in my cabin and talking to the other girls there. We’d have trivia contests about Harry Potter and looking back...maybe our counselor would have been in trouble for organizing those. However, one day a friend of mine got mail and showed us all a letter that her “boyfriend” had sent her. We all immediately started gushing about boys we had crushes on or that we were “dating”. Remember folks.....most of us were 9 - 11. Soon though, the conversation turned to ex’s because you know...that’s a thing we understood.

Me being the show off that I was, I casually mentioned that I had had two boyfriends in 3rd grade.....at the same time and that they had both told me they would love me forever (This clearly didn’t last). The girls in my cabin are absolutely mind blown and asking me what happened. But everyone gets DEAD QUIET when one of the high school co-counselors looks over at me and says “You’re a little harlot then aren’t you.” I didn’t know what this meant....so I said yes and that was that. Never crossed my mind until I was in college that hey....maybe don’t call a 10 year old a harlot??????? After she called me a harlot we all started laughing and then she told all of us that we needed jesus and that we needed to ask for forgiveness for talking that way.

Now, if you’ve ever been to church camp then I’m sure you know that the evening time is the most tense. The reason that all of us church camp kids were able to actually get any sleep is because we’d spend a solid hour or so before “lights out” crying and reliving emotional trauma or just tough times in our lives.

After dinner we’d go directly to our large gym area for singing/dancing, an evening group worship, and then the cherry on top was the evening devotional and silent prayer time. Each counselor would pick one night of the week to share their come to jesus story and woooooooooooo let me tell you. They would go into detail about troubled pasts and love outside of marriage and how it made them feel dirty and used and then they’d be on the brink of giving up BUT THEN Jesus saved the day. Then they’d go on about how life was better with jesus and he had saved them from certain evil and death. As a ten year old, I’m sitting there praying that I didn’t get into any of that kind of trouble and being so scared that I was like yep....time to give it all to God.

Silent prayer time was also just awkward and intense. All of the counselors would sit at the front of the room while slow, somber Christian Rock played in the background. You never turned to talk to your friends, you were supposed to be focused on this indepdent moment with God and checking in on yourself. But then counselors would invite kids to come up and talk with them. This always turned into kids in absolute tears and panic every time without failure. It would also lead to shouts of praise and cheers as kids would decide that tonight was the night they needed to pledge their lives to god. I never did that, but I did force myself one evening into a really good panic attack about the passing of my great grandmother. I told my counselor that I felt gross and disgusting because maybe I should have felt worse about the fact that she passed. This time never felt like it was about really sharing feelings and thoughts, but more about dredging up the worst thoughts and worst memories that you had to throw at the counselors and then have everyone else watch you cry and feel so proud of you for opening up your heart. It was a show and it was exhausting. If you were up there with a counselor it was only a matter of time before you’d have all these hands on your back and shoulders as people prayed for you to be cleansed or whatever the hell that meant. We’d all go back to the cabins just absolutely numb to the world and pass out only to wake up the next day and it would be like nothing happened. But you knew who had pledged their souls to god the night before because the counselors made sure that everyone knew who had done it so far. Looking back, those evenings make me uncomfortable and even now if I end up in a room where slow christian rock music is being played I still feel a little tightness in my chest.

The craziest part for me now is seeing people make videos about this evening worship situaton on TikTok and seeing them call it emotional manipulation because my brain is just like wait what......

Stay tuned for next week! Because like I said it only gets stranger from here. Please feel free to send any questions you would like to have answered or any messages. I’d love to know others who have been through something similar

#story time #methodist #christianity #church camp #personal experience

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camphalfbloodkit · 4 years

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Back when I was 12 myself I started on my journey with Percy thanks toThe Lightning Thief being added to the Bluebonnet Book List that year. I got lucky and managed to grab the copy my teacher kept in her classroom and read it despite the high demand for any book on that list from other kids just because they wanted to go to an ice cream party later in the year. From the moment I opened the book and read Percy's iconic warning I felt like I'd found a home.

Here was this kid my own age at the time who'd been thrown into a situation he'd never wanted, who had to face down monsters not just mythological, but also mortal. I realated to him on an insane level. Maybe I didn't have dyslexia, (or at the very least I don't have it to a degree that's able to be diagnosed, I have my suspicions at times) and maybe at the time I didn't have an ADHD diagnosis, but still I connected to Percy on a level I'd never connected with another book character ever in my life. He knew the pain of a bad home life, of striving to do your best in a bad situation for the sake of someone you love. It wasn't the same but I knew he'd understand my pain. He might not have been real but I had a new best friend.

When I saw Sea of Monsters as soon as we walked into the bookfair the following semester I didn't even hesitate or bother to look at any other book in the whole place. I already knew that was going to be the one I took home with me, even though I knew I only got to pick one book and that it was probably going to be the only book I got that entire year. I had to have it, I needed to finally take a piece of my new home with me. I have read and reread Sea of Monsters more times than I can count, and honestly I'm due another reread but I plan to do the whole series this time. For the next four or so years that book was my main gateway home. I checked Titan's Curse and Battle of the Labyrinth out of the school library but I wouldn't hold another piece of Camp Halfblood in my hands and know it was mine until the release of The Last Olympian, which I once again obtained from the school bookfair.

I cried when I finished it. I thought that was the end of the era, I thought I would never walk on another new adventure with my best friends again. I thought I was saying goodbye to Percy, and Annabeth, and Grover, all of whom I saw pieces of myself in. I thought I was saying goodbye to Nico who I loved as my own family because I understood the full tradgedy of his and Bianca's situation, being an older sister and caretaker to younger brothers myself. I, like my friends and family I had found within those pages, thought that the Prophecy of the Seven would fall to a new generation. And though I looked forward to the chance to make new friends I grieved the ones I had already found, along with those who died within those pages.

And then Lost Hero dropped. At that time I couldn't actually read the books, I couldn't find them because now I was in High School and they didn't stock middle grade books in the school library, and I couldn't get to the public library, and I couldn't get anyone to buy it for me. To this day Heroes of Olympus still eludes me and I haven't read it in it's entirety. But I needed to know what was happening, needed to meet the people who I was sure would be my new best friends, though they'd never replace the ones I already had. So I dug up every spoiler I could get my hands on. And I met Jason, and Piper, and Leo. And I was right, they were my new best friends, hell Jason resonated even deeper to me than Percy initially had because we both were the "gifted child", so he understood things that Percy didn't. But I discovered that my old friends were still around. Percy was missing, which scared me, but I got to walk hand in hand with my friends again. It was amazing.

But that wasn't all. Thanks to Jason, Leo, and Piper I was able to connect even deeper with a new real life friend I made at a new school that year. She had started her journey late and had to go back and properly meet Percy and Annabeth and Grover, but I was mire than happy to guide her on her journey with them, even handing her my own precious copy of Last Olympian to borrow when she couldn't find it anywhere else. In return she kept me appraised of Heroes and then together we began to craft our own stories.

Stories of family, and romance, and finding each other even across different lives. Stories of people who reincarnated not to seek the Isles, but in the hopes of finding the ones they left behind again, even if they wouldn't remember them. Stories of people who never made it to the spotlight of the main story, but who lead had amazing adventures all their own anyway, the ones who kept things going when the big names weren't there. Are they necessarily "good" stories? No, not by most people's standards. They're self-indulgent and full of deus-ex-machina and handwaving of things. Sometimes the romance moves way too fast. But we love them all the same, and we still create new ones even now. They help us get through even the worst of times, and I think that matters far more than them being "good" by anyone else's standards.

I've had Percy for 14 years of my life at this point, and thanks to his guidance I've had my irl best friend for 10. Even if I can't read it yet knowing that the main story of Camp Halfblood has drawn to an end pains me more than I can say, it hurts worse even than when I thought it was over with Last Olympian. But there will always be more stories, even if I have to make them myself, and I know that no matter what Camp Halfblood will always open it's doors to me.

#pjo #hoo #personal #kit speaks #essay #I guess?#more like a rambling diary entry probably

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cxlvins · 4 years

Text

...000. INTRODUCTION.

helloooo lovelies ! my name is naomi (he/him), i’m twenty-two and from the gmt timezone ! i’m super excited for this to open because i’ve got so much muse right now. i’m down for any and all plots, seriously, i love plotting ! this is calvin, he’s an angry mess of a character, but he’s fun to play, so ! if you just wanna get to know the character, you can skip past the other sections and just focus on personality, i’ve also put some wanted connections in there too ! if you would like to plot, then either shoot me a message here or on discord (heterosexual? how vintage!#8600) or alternatively, like this post and i will message you !

caution: alcohol, drugs, mental health, death.

°☼ ◜ xavier serrano, cismale, he/him ◞ ∗ ∘ good to see you again, calvin marx. you're twenty-three now, right ? i heard you’ve been streaming professionally on twitch … crazy how time flies. you were always known as the crimson. i’m glad to see you’re just as gregarious as always — and volatile, too .. kidding ! bella used to always mention it …you were her bad influence, after all. don’t worry, we’ll find her soon. what matter is that we’re together now, right ? not really. + thrift-store clothing, bruised knuckles, a scent of cologne & cigarettes. + watermelon sugar by harry styles.

...001. BRIEF HISTORY.

calvin grew up very underprivileged for the first 11 years of his life in brooklyn, ny.

his father died when he was 5 years old to a drug overdose, leading his mother became a single mother to him and his younger sister, essentially meaning that calvin had to grow up and be the ‘man of the house’ without having a choice.

because of her new single-mother status, calvins mother had to work 3 different jobs in order for the family to pay rent (a cleaner in mornings, a store assistant in the day and a bartender in the evenings), which meant she was rarely home and left calvin to raise both himself and younger sister.

from a very early age, it was apparent that calvin suffered from anger issues, dyslexia and adhd, constantly getting into fights at every opportunity, his complete inability to focus and never managing to make it through a week at school without a phone call home.

these issues remained untreated, due to his mother putting it down to the ‘boys will be boys’ ideology, and concluding that calvin was just an energetic one at that.

because of this, calvin fell into the wrong crowd pretty quickly and settled into his mindset that he was never going to achieve all that much anyway, because no matter how hard he tried, he could never score well on any test at school.

at the age of 9, calvins mother met, fell in love with and soon married a former client for whom she cleaned for. calvins new step father was incredibly wealthy, due to being a successful franchisee and also being very largely into stock trading.

calvin, his sister and mother were all moved to his home in wilmington, which calvin struggled to adjust to, as he missed his friends back north.

he quickly made friends with the clique as he was brought into it by jordan and it did put some ease on his pressure, but part of him always felt like he should still be back in brooklyn.

now having access to as much money as he want led him down an early path into experimenting with drugs and alcohol, which soon became a bad habit.

although he wanted to drop out of school, his new step-father would not allow it, which became a large source of conflict for the family over the course of the next few years.

failing to graduate high school at age eighteen, calvin couldn’t deal with living with his family any more and left the house to move into a small apartment, 30 minutes away, with a roommate (possibly a member of the clique).

calvins only real passions were for gaming and sport, and as he smoked and did way too many drugs to make it in any sporting profession, he turned his attention to twitch streaming. he began this pretty soon and built up a solid fanbase (which he wanted to call the marxists, but in calvins words, apparently some dead man already claimed that title).

...002. PERSONALITY.

calvin is a naturally angry person who can lose his cool and go from 0 to 100 in a matter of seconds, he rarely gives off signs that he is getting angry until he boils over, so people tend to watch what they say around him.

calvin is self-serving, his feelings will always come before those around him. although he is getting better at managing this, if something will result in calvin gaining something at the expense of somebody else, he will most likely go ahead with it.

calvin is not well educated, so he doesn’t tend to enjoy arguing with words, as he can never seem to find the ones to correctly express how he feels. instead, calvin is much more likely to act physically when something has irritated him (whether this be on a person or inanimate object).

calvin is an awful liar, he cannot lie to save his life as his face always tends to show when he doesn’t agree with an idea/opion/thought that somebody says. because of this, he is very outspoken, and will just say what he’s thinking regardless of if it’s going to hurt somebodies feelings. he’d rather upset them with the truth, than get caught out for lying.

calvin is an extrovert and gains energy from being around people - the more people the better, because of this, he has become a major party animal and loves attending any and all parties that is going on, despite if he’s fond of the hosts or not.

calvin is a heavy user of drugs, alcohol & cigarettes. this is primarily down to his naturally addictive personality and constant need to feel like he’s happy, so that he doesn’t get sad again. there will rarely be a day where he will not be intoxicated in some way and he will have a cigarette at least once an hour -- and that’s on a good day.

calvin is very much into sports. although not a natural athlete, nor somebody interested in playing sports competitively, calvin loves watching any and all sports, and he likes to play them when he can. due to his smoking habit, he can’t play sports for too long, but will always give it a good go.

similarly to this, calvin is very much into gaming. calvin loves fast-paced games, because they manage to keep his attention despite him not having a very long attention span. most games that he plays are first person shooters, and he’s usually the guy on the mic screaming when a teammate fucks up during online play. a big appeal to him was that games were the only thing he could focus his mind on as a child.

calvin is very much a boys boy, he genuinely abides by the bible of ‘ bros before hoes ‘ because he’s stupid.

calvin hates movies but loves tv, he finds that watching moves involves sitting still for too long, but tv allows him to take more breaks and keeps his interest for longer. although. he’d probably trade both of them for a chance to leave the house.

...003. TRAITS.

[ G R E G A R I O U S ] (+) — a person fond of company; sociable.

[ I N T U I T I V E ] (+) — using or based on what one feels to be true even without conscious reasoning; instinctive.

[ F O R T H R I G H T ] (+) — direct and outspoken.

[ V O L A T I L E ] (-) — liable to change rapidly and unpredictably, especially for the worse.

[ V E N G E F U L ] (-) — not willing to forgive or excuse people's faults or wrongdoings.

[ H E D O N I S T I C ] (-) — engaged in the pursuit of pleasure; sensually self-indulgent.

...004. BELLA KIM.

when calvin met bella, he never took too much of a shine to her, deeming her to be a rather fake individual and not understanding the rest of the groups investment with her. however, because he was a new introduction to the group and not there from the beginning, calvin felt he couldn’t really speak up and vocalise that without being dropped from the group himself.

for whatever reason, bella herself took a liking to calvin and he decided to use this to his advantage. for a girl with such a clean reputation, it seemed only the sensible thing to try and corrupt her -- which proved successful.

calvin introduced bella to the world of bad decisions and the two spent many nights breaking several laws and it created a sort of bond that only the pair really understood. they never talked about anything personal -- or, if they did, they were too high to remember -- but calvin saw a side to bella that not many others did, which he liked.

after moving out, calvin and bellas meetings became much less frequent as the group drifted apart. they would still meet up for occasional meet-ups, their last one being 3 months before the disappearance of bella.

calvin does not believe that she is alive and is dealing with it, as expected, not very well.

...005. WANTED CONNECTIONS.

CURRENT BEST FRIENDS — Possibly a boy squad? I live for a good boy squad. This person will have similar interests to Calvin, or be able to tolerate his volatile mood.

CHILDHOOD BEST FRIENDS — Someone with a similar upbringing from Brooklyn, most likely they grew apart when Calvin moved to Wilmington.

RIDE OR DIES — Although he primarily looks out for himself, I’m down to have Calvin have one person who he’s loyal to and will refuse to betray, we can come up with a fun reason for why he cares so much if you’re interested in this one.

HIS ROOMMATE — Somebody that moved with Calvin into his current apartment when he moved out at 18.

A GOOD INFLUENCE ON CALVIN — One of my favorite connections for Calvin to have is somebody who knows all of his flaws and attempts to help fix them. They’ll have to be patient, though, as Calvin doesn’t see himself for having any issues.

SOMEBODY HE IS A BAD INFLUENCE OF — On the opposite, I love when Calvin has somebody that he can introduce to bad things, corrupt easily and get a kick out of watching the commotion.

EXES ON BAD TERMS — Cheating on each other is usually an easy one to go with, but if you want, we can think of something more unique as to how it all fucked up and why they now hate each other.

EXES ON GOOD TERMS — Maybe they still occasionally fuck? There could still be an attraction there, but just no romantic chemistry. Alternatively, they tried it and both just couldn’t see it going anywhere.

EXES WITH LINGERING FEELINGS — There’s a ton of different reasons for why there’s still lingering feelings. The feelings could be one-sided or both ways.

EX FLINGS — Started as friends with benefits, one of them wanted more, the other didn’t, they decided to stop before someone got hurt.

FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS — No romantic intention, just a good way to kill time at 2 AM, or maybe it’s easy to know you have someone to go home to if you don’t find someone at a party.

FRIENDS FOR NECESSITY — This friend may not have that much in common with Calvin, they may not really get on in day to day life, but they are always there to get high, attend a party or do something dumb. an easy person to talk to when they’re both bored and wanna get out.

HIS YOUNGER SISTER — If anybody fancies a second character, I’m always down to have Calvins sister in the roleplay. They can either get along or not, we’ll just figure out the details.

EX FRIENDS — Used to be close but now aren’t, plenty of reasons as to why.

ENEMIES — Despise each other, seeing this person literally makes Calvins blood boil. Possibly sexual tension too if that would work, if not, they can just fight a lot.

WILL THEY / WON’T THEY — Lots of leading on and teasing each other, maybe they both think they’re stringing the other along but it turns out neither of them are interested? Maybe they start out not interested and it backfires later, by that time the other could’ve lost interest.

ANY OTHER IDEAS YOU THINK WILL WORK !

...006. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION.

Calvin is bisexual but heteroromantic, so any sexual-based connections can be taken by any gender.

Calvins Pinterest can be located here. Please note that it contains triggers for alcohol, drugs, blood & violence.

#clique.intro

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bigskydreaming · 4 years

Note

For the fic ask meme, 4, 16, 24, or 28

I will answer 16 now, because No Reason, Just Whimsy, but stay tuned as I’ll probably end up answering 4, 24 and 28 at some point anyway, because like. No Reason, Just Whimsy. *Shrugs*

16. If you only could write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be?

I can’t tell you, see, because I would simply make that one pairing endgame and everything else leading up to it like, contain all the other ships I could not bear to be without. (Hahahaha this is why I could never be a romance author, I can not abide by the rules of HEA or HFN in relationship stories to save my LIFE). So, y’know, SPOILERS.

No but also I’m completely aware that this is cheating and not the point of the question. But I can not choose though, that is the point, like, have you met me? I am the original poster child for ADHD. I’m THAT old.

So instead I will simply say that in the realm of Teen Wolf, Scanny is very very very important to me, which like, surprises no one. But also I would still fight someone who tried to take either Scira or Scallison from me, I remain obnoxiously fond of Scackson’s potential, and I’m still out here being like, the sole Scosh (Scott/Josh Diaz) shipper in all the land, I’m pretty sure, lmfao.

And I mean, also there’s Scyle, of course. I could never give up the Scyle.

As far as Marvel goes, like, I am going to be riding the high of Bobby/Christian being canon for quite some time, as anyone who has known me long knows that I have been shipping this ship since Christian was first introduced and then written offstage like two issues later….seventeen years ago.

(I have a lot of issues with straight writers making gay characters’ gay-specific tragedies and traumas like….someone ELSE’S angsty back story, while they themselves are just shuffled off the page and considered irrelevant. For those who don’t know, Christian is Emma Frost’s gay older brother who she adored and when their father had Christian institutionalized against his will because he was gay, this was what made Emma break away from the rest of her family for good and set her on the road to becoming the White Queen of the Hellfire Club.

And then, despite like, this being life-defining for her, not a single writer in the next fifteen damn years ever thought to ask themselves…..hmmm, why would Emma Frost, one of the most powerful telepaths in the world and someone whose personal morality in no way makes her above using those powers, her wealth or Hellfire resources however she damn well pleases in the name of protecting herself, those she cares about, and advancing her agendas…..why would this woman who has never let anything stand in the way of what she cares about before like….simply just…never once in all the years since she was a teenager think to herself….hmm, what if I simply go to the institution where my beloved brother is kept against his will, and just…..made them release him?)

So, aside from always thinking Bobby/Christian would be a great ship with amazing potential given Bobby’s unique history and dynamic with Christian’s sister and the fact that Christian shares a lot of the same traits, backstory and other elements that make Emma an amazing and multi-faceted character and he’s just been sitting there in Limbo for fifteen years with all this untapped potential just waiting to be mined….

I’m always going to be gleeful about this ship and with a special fondness for Sina Grace for bringing Christian back from comic book Limbo and laying the foundation for this ship, like, just because like……I feel its long overdue and the only way to ACTUALLY make anything decent out of the bullshit that was mining his oppression for the sake of another character’s angst: by finally giving HIM the chance to be a character who is affected by all that, developed and moved forward from all of that, is the FOCUS of all that…..and even more importantly, now after being left offscreen for fifteen years by writers who considered his narrative nothing more than tragic filler….he finally has a chance to be an example of a gay character who gets to come BACK from all of that and move FORWARD from it, and like…find healing and happiness with another character, like Bobby.

So Bobby/Christian is actually hugely important to me for a variety of reasons, especially right now since this is all just happening recently, and I will love them forever and in defiance of the inevitable bullshit some future writer pulls that will piss me the hell off. Y’know, just going off of Vegas odds or whatever.

Aside from Bobby/Christian I’ve also always had a weakness for Bobby/Johnny Storm because they are the most iconic ice and fire characters out there and I am basically twelve. I also have blogged at length in the past about all the reasons I’m a huge fan of Bobby/Bishop and not just because their ship name would make them a literal bop. Again, I refer you to the thing where I’m basically twelve. But yeah, there’s a whole history there where when Bishop first came back into the past and met the X-Men who’d all been legends in his time, he kinda fanboyed a little over Bobby because of Bobby’s future legend, and then was kinda like….oh, that’s it? about him once he got to know Bobby and Bishop became like, the physical embodiment of underwhelmed.

And ever since then Bobby’s always low key been like, a hyper-active puppy around Bishop, like, trying not to SEEM like he cares an awful lot about whether or not he’s managed to impress Bishop but because he can’t be subtle to save his life, mostly just coming across as “am I living up to the hype now? how about now? am I legendary NOW? What about now?” and I dunno. Its just kinda cute and a fairly unique dynamic, and Bishop has this deliberately bland, blink and you miss it sense of humor with the right writers and that I’ve always thought has a ton of potential for him to be privately amused by this tendency of Bobby’s, enough that he’s unwilling to confess to him that Bobby actually earned his respect years ago by this point, and he just doesn’t want to let Bobby know because then he’d stop.

And then in terms of DC, I’ve posted a lot a lot a loooooooooot about my love for Dick/Kory in canon, and how they - and by extension we - were robbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbed, and if DC doesn’t give me my canon Mar’i and Jake Grayson one of these days, I don’t care if they have to import them from another universe and then have this universe’s Dick and Kory awkwardly try to co-parent them while living their own lives separately before finally coming back together and falling in love all over again and then becoming a single united family unit forever and ever in the most ridiculously complicated comic book version of the Parent Trap ever, like…..

I can’t even think of an over-exaggerated threat creative enough to convey just how badly I want and need this, DC, give it to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee plzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

And then also, I’ve actually posted a lot a lot a loooooooooooot (though not in a few years, probably, so those posts are all super old, lol) about how I think Kyle and Donna are a criminally under-rated canon couple and were actually really really good together because they went through so much together and Kyle literally grew so much as a character specifically on the things Donna called him out for the first time they dated, like, literally so he could be BETTER, and then with how anticlimactically they ended...because the thing is, they never actually even broke up! It was this thing where like, when Donna went to LA with Kyle for his high school reunion and to literally MEET HIS MOM, like HELLO, that is not a basic relationship step, that is Advanced Dating, like…..that is where they were at in their relationship when Donna literally got the call then and there that her ex-husband and her son had just died in a car accident.

And Donna was devastated of course, and Kyle was devastated too - for her, and also in his own way, because he’d adored Robert and like, there were these issues where they were super cute and took him to the zoo together and Kyle was bonding with him and just like, melting over this kid, and Robert and Terry were killed by a drunk driver, and like, there was a later story where Kyle just went apeshit on this drunk driver he encountered because he had all these repressed feelings about Robert’s death and how it had hurt Donna and he’d made sure not to show any of that to her or even let on that he hurt for Robert’s loss in his own way, because he didn’t want to make it about him, he KNEW better…

And anyway, the point is…they never actually broke up in the sense of either of them at any point being all, oh we no longer love each other or think this can work, we need to end it. Instead, Donna said that she needed to take some time away from Kyle and everyone else and just…come to terms with what she’d lost and figure out who she even was now in the wake of that….and Kyle totally understood, didn’t argue or try and change her mind, he just said take as much time as you need, I’ll be here when you’re ready, and oh btw, here’s this lantern construct of a locket that I want you to keep because as long as it exists you’ll know that a part of me is still thinking about you and wanting you to be happy, wherever that is.

And then like…..less than a year later, DC did their super weird Dark Angel story where Donna was erased from reality and then had to be ‘recreated’ from Wally’s memories, and for awhile just existed in the form and identity she’d been recreated from, which was based entirely on what Wally knew of her and thought and felt about her, and so there were huge gaps in her identity where she was missing stuff she should have known but didn’t now because WALLY didn’t know about it.

Such as how when Donna met Kyle’s subsequent sorta-girlfriend Jade some time later - I say sorta because she and Kyle were still figuring things out at that stage, and Jenny-Lynn in part didn’t know if she wanted to actually get into a relationship with him because she thought he was still in love with Donna - well anyway, when Donna and Jenny-Lynn met in a later issue and she said all this to Donna, Donna reassured her not to worry about it, she was reading more into it than actually existed because she and Kyle had never been that serious anyway.

Which. SCREECH! Brakes please. HOLD UP.

Like, I’m sorry JAY FAERBER YES I REMEMBER IT WAS YOU WHO WROTE THAT ISSUE UGGGGGH, but like, in what UNIVERSE is “dated, broke up, then got back together later because she thought Kyle had matured a ton since they first tried dating and now they were so much stronger as a couple that she oh I dunno, introduced him to her son and they went on playdates together, went with him to meet his mom, had a never-vanishing lantern locket construct that signified just how much he would always love her” uh…..’never been that serious anyway’? I’m. What? Does not compute.

BUT WHATEVER.

LOL. Anyway, point is, so things like that actually make sense when you factor in the role Wally’s memories and perspective played in who Donna literally WAS for awhile (and the understandable existential crises she went through as a result). But like, at the point in time when Kyle and Donna were most serious, Kyle was still fairly removed from a lot of the rest of the DC universe, he wasn’t a core member of the JLA yet and usually operated independently, and he and Wally were NOT close at all yet, let alone friends….in fact, for as long as Donna and Kyle dated, Wally pretty much still actively hated and resented Kyle for just existing, since he’d always been close with Hal since he was a kid and Hal was his Uncle Barry’s BFF-and-homosexual-life-partner-in-all-but-name.

Like, it was only after Kyle became one of the core JLA alongside Wally that the two of them finally worked out their mutual antagonism and became friends, but before that, Wally was NOT shy about expressing he hated this new GL guy and wanted nothing to do with him, even though it was for unfair reasons, sooooo……like, its not really that shocking that even though Wally and Donna are two of each other’s oldest friends and super tight, like, he was never going to be the friend she called up to let him know how great things were going with her and Kyle these days, lol, y’know?

So it makes sense that when Donna was first magically reconstituted thanks to Wally’s memories/view of her (btw, this was because Wally was out of phase with reality and was in the Speed Force at the precise moment that Donna was erased from reality by the Dark Angel’s magic, and that’s why he alone remembered her and was the template for undoing what the Dark Angel had done). But anyway, it makes sense that she would for a time have had very little memory or even knowledge of her and Kyle’s prior relationship, and basically just know/remember what little Wally actually knew of it. So from her perspective then, it could very well have seemed that they were never that serious, and everyone but Kyle like….kinda just nodded and figured okay, you would know after all, and just…..everyone ended up walking away with the idea that they were just this brief fling and neither had ever had strong feelings for each other, let alone love.

The problem I’ve always had is that eventually Donna DID regain her full memories and her own sense of self, and like….she was Donna again, through and through, existing as she always had without being limited to just Wally’s view or memory of her.

Soooo, at THAT point, she should have been perfectly aware of what her and Kyle’s relationship had ACTUALLY looked like, in its entirety, and I mean, I can understand them not getting back together at that point. It’d been years, they both were in very different places, Kyle had eventually gotten together with Jade after it was expressed by Donna herself that there was no reason not to, given that its not like they were ever that serious….so by the time Donna herself would have realized otherwise, I can totally understand her feeling that the moment had passed for them, that Kyle had moved on (just as Kyle had only ‘moved on’ once he felt there was no longer a chance of them returning to what they were). Like, all of that is super weird and complicated even by ridiculous comic book soap opera standards, so I mean….lol, how do you even BEGIN that conversation, y’know?

Buuuuuut, it just kinda sucks that at no point after that Faerber issue has any later writer ever had either Donna or Kyle discuss their previous relationship(s) in terms of what it ACTUALLY was, for BOTH of them, rather than just this trivial, ancient history fling that neither had ever been super invested in….even though for several years in the nineties they were one of THE major hero couples in comic books.

So. Yeah. As evidenced, I have a lot of unresolved Donna and Kyle feelings lol.

And then of course, there are and always will be my epic “OMG DICK AND KYLE COULD BE THE GREATEST SHIP AND END ALL THE SHIPS LIKE COULD YOU EVEN IMAGINE” feelings, but like. That’s a thirty pound tome in and of itself, so. Like. Just picture the two of them standing staring soulfully into each other’s eyes and then me, creepily fixated on them twenty feet away, chin propped up on my hands and going awwwwwwww while my own eyes like, sparkle anime style but also are the heart-eyes motherfucker meme at the same time.

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k1ngtok1 · 5 years

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This is my story, made into Leo’s:

This story is based on what I went through becoming a T1D. I was diagnosed sometime between June 22 and 23, 2018. I didn’t have people to help me until it was very late in the day, when my doctor father decided that enimas and constipation medicine were not helping. During the day, the only people that took notice of me were my stepmom, who cooked and gave me water when I asked, and my sister, who only helped because you can’t play Minecraft with someone dying of dehydration in the background. In the story, Piper is taking the place of my mom once they get to the infirmary, and Jason is my dad the whole story. (I didn’t include Calypso for some reason).The stuffed animals are all real (franks present isn’t). They came from my grandparents, sister, moms ex boyfriend, and my 4th grade teacher. The teddy bear was my dads. Friends would visit, my grandpas girlfriend would wheel me around the hospital. A friend, not a close one, watched me cry while getting a shot. The whole experience is jumbled and blurry, everything is out of order. We go to the meeting then home where I stay until the next day, where I feel pressured enough by my diabetic step-grandpa to give my own shot, my friends come over and swim.The End. I didn’t get as much support as Leo did in this, I’m always the one comforting and not getting comforted. I felt a little alone and abandoned, still do. I rediscovered this series in the middle of the school year, and instantly I felt a connection to Leo. He looks like me if he was a girl and had strait hair. I have the same ADHD, the same urge to create, to help others, and now, we both have a bad past, and it stays with us in some way. His flame and my condition. He is the only one that I know that has suffered like I have. I buried myself in stories about this person like me, and I felt like there was someone who understood me. Someone pushed away by others. Who is happy on the outside but not that much inside. Someone who even in a group of accepting friends, feels like they are the outsider, like they aren’t good enough. I found myself in Leo (plus my best friend is a Leo clone with glasses). I wanted to tell my story, so I did it using the story character that was in the same boat as me. I wanted to explain what it really feels like to be burdened, by both yours and other’s problems. So here’s my story, molded into Leo’s.

When Leo woke up, he knew something was seriously wrong with him. His throte was dry as a bone. His stomach felt like Godzilla and the kraken were having a wrestling match. He tried to move but found he didn’t have the energy to. He curled into a little ball and let out a pained moan.

“Buford” he called out in a weak voice. The table immediately scuttled over to see what was wrong with his friend.

“Please, bring me water, and Pipes” he choked out, before promptly dozing off.

Buford obediently hurried along the path to camp. He was worried Leo had worked himself too hard. He found Piper sitting with Jason, having lunch. If Leo had slept this long, there must have been something wrong with him, as he was always anxious to work on his projects. Buford head butted (or table butted) Piper.

“What? Oh hey Buford! What’s wrong?”

Buford thought of a way to communicate on the way here, he dug one of his legs into the wet dirt.

“What are you doing?” Piper asked.

Buford continued to drag his legs through the dirt.

“I think he’s trying to tell us something. Look!” Exclaimed Jason.

The table had written a message saying ‘bring water, Leo needs you’ in the soft earth.

Piper’s eyes immediately shot open with worry. Before anyone could say anything, she grabbed her magic glass from the table and sprinted towards the woods. Buford and Jason ran to catch up to her.

Upon arrival, they heard groaning noises. It was like someone was in pain.

“Leo” muttered Piper, before running inside.

Leo was curled into a little ball. Now an important thing to know is that when someone goes through what Leo is, they tend to get delirious. They may imagine scenes from a book they have read, with them in it or as the main character. Leo had just read ‘heir apparent’ and was (still in pain mind you) imagining how he was crowned king. In his mind all he had to do was sit on the throne, and the pain would go away. He was utterly confused when it didn’t.

Meanwhile Piper was shaking Leo. He finally snapped out of his daze (if only a little bit).

“I’m hallucinating” said Leo “go get Will and the others please.”

It pained her to she her little brother like this. She tore herself from the bed, leaving Leo the glass of water, which he gladly took a sip of. Jason was sitting next to him on the bed, helping him drink as he was too weak to do it on his own.

“I’ll be right back” said Piper, “take care of Leo”

Leo was moaning and muttering incoherent nonsense. This frightened Jason, he had never seen Leo as anything other that calm and thinking strait. He sat on the bed next to Leo, casually petting his hair as Leo cuddled up to him. Leo did not look content, though. He looked as though he was going to throw up. Piper chose that moment to bust through the door, Will, Hazel, Frank, Percy, Annabeth and Nico trailing behind.

“What’s going on?” Demanded Will rushing to Leo’s side.

“I don’t know.” Replied Jason “Buford guided us to him, he was like this when we got here. He said he was hallucinating before he fell asleep.”

Will took Leo’s hand. His eyes widened almost comically. “We need to get him to the infirmary, NOW! He’s going into kinoacidosis, his blood sugar is through the roof! He might be T1D!”

Nobody knew what the hades Will was talking about except for Nico. His face paled as Frank scooped up Leo and everyone raced through the door. He had enough experience in the infirmary, and had a medical genius as a boyfriend, of course he knew what T1D was! But he didn’t tell anyone as they were already worried enough.

After racing through camp with campers gathering around the infirmary, Leo had woken up. However, he was in an extreme delirious state.

“We need a gurney STAT!” Yelled Will. “Someone get me an IV and insulin!”

All of a sudden, while still on the gurney, Leo bucked his hips upward and screamed “WATER” at the top of his lungs. This happened many times before he was wheeled to the intensive care section and fully woke up.

The 7 were worried as the doctors fussed around Leo, he thinks they gave him shots and an IV, but he couldn’t be sure as is brain was picking and choosing what moments to process. He didn’t notice the tiny flames in this hair that needed to be put out.

Leo fell asleep and woke up many times. Each time a nurse would ask him the year, his birthday, and who was president. Leo answered the questions, and as he was about to go into a rant on how much he despises Trump, the nurse left. He passed out for good after repeating this many times.

When Leo came too, he found himself in a closed off section of the infirmary. All of his friends plus his siblings were standing against the wall at the foot of the bed. Leo could bearly move.

“Where am I?” He managed to croak out.

Piper looked up from where she was staring at the floor. “Oh gods Leo! You scared us all to death! You’re in the infirmary, you went into diabetic kino asidosis, you’re lucky to be alive. 30 more minutes and you would have died!” Piper sobbed against his chest.

“Wait a minute!” Leo said as loud as he could, which wasn’t very loud, “can someone explain what is happening to me?”

Will decided that was a good moment to walk in “You’re awake! I’m assuming you want to know what’s going on?”

Leo nodded his head.

“You went into diabetic kino asidosis, which means that your body did not have enough insulin, causing ketones to form. Ketones destroy fat as fuel, instead of using regular sugar.”

“Okay, but why don’t I have any insulin in my body?” Questioned Leo.

“Have you been having stomach pains? Has it been hard to eat sugary foods?”

Leo thought back to during the past 2 months. “yes” he replied.

“Your blood sugar has been high for over these two months, maybe even longer. The young adult body is very strong, but even it gives out at some point. Your pancreas some time around 2 months ago was attacked by other cells in your body that saw it as a threat. I don’t mean to be so blunt but” he took a deep breath. “you are a juvenile diebetic now, otherwise known as a type one diabetic. This is the type where it is permanent, so unless new technology or cures come out, or you happen to strike a deal with a god, you will have to use an insulin pump for the rest of your life.” He finished.

Leo didn’t really take it all in. Only later did he really understand what all this really ment. His friends and siblings were all in tears. They all came over and gently gave home a group hug, as if he were made of glass.

~Line break ~

After 3 days in the infirmary. They let him eat for the first time.

“Okay, your meal had 53 carbs in it, your correction factor is 1/15. How many units do you take if your blood sugar is also 157?”

Asked Will with his clip board out. Only Piper and Jason were in the room, with Leo of course.

“‘Bout 5 units” said Leo with his mouth full of food.

“Good, I’m going to go get the syringe now,” Leo almost choked on his food.

“Wait what?!” Leo started freaking out. “No one said anything about needles!”

Piper and Jason were doing their best to console the panicked Latino, who was doing his best to keep from crying. Leo had a huge fear of needles from some bad experiences while he was on the run. He was starting to panic until Piper soothed him with her charmspeak. Will walked in with a syringe, vial and alcohol wipe.

“Everything will be fine Leo” said Piper, as Will began to prep the syringe with insulin.

“Hey Piper?” Leo started.

“Yes?” She replied.

“Can I like, hold your side and hug you” Leo asked, close to tears.

“Of course.” She replied, “you don’t have to ask.”

Leo snuggled into Piper’s side. Will lifted up Leo’s sleeve and wiped his upper arm with alcohol. He was put off by the scars on his arm, but he did not want to ask incase it panicked the Fire user further. He injected the needle with a small wimpier and sob from Leo.

“It’s okay Leo, it’s over.” Consoled Piper. Leo backed up a little and snuggled into the blanket that Annabeth and Percy got him. He held the stuffed owl that he received from Harley. Around him were others, such as the the fluffy brown dog holding a smaller dog from Hazel, the spherical squishy dog from Piper and Jason. Frank gave him his thoughts and prayers, at which Leo laughed and Hazel smacked the shapeshifters arm. And lastly, the small teddy bear, so worn you would never be able to guess it used to be fluffy. Nyssa used to be the only one who knew about it. It was the only thing that he managed to escape the fire with. It used to be his mother’s and she gave it to him. He asked Nyssa to bring it to him, and was surprised his friends didn’t judge him when he told them the story.

Leo promptly fell asleep. While in the hospital, he took frequent naps. He once woke up and described what he did the previous day, to find out that it happened 20 minutes ago! To be fair, he was still the tiniest but delusional still, his mind still slightly addled.

Piper sat down in one of the chairs next to the bed, exhausted. She has yet to leave Leo’s side. She has been sleeping in the bed with him, resulting in being woken up for a nurse to draw blood or test his blood sugar. Jason would come and go, letting the two honorary siblings be alone. She rested her head on the bed, holding Leo’s hand. A few minutes of sleep wouldn’t hurt , right?

~Line break ~

It was Leo’s last day in the infirmary, well, day in the hospital part of the infirmary. He still needed to go to a meeting with a nurse to be taught more about his condition and how to handle it. Leo sat in his original clothes, returned by the nurses. His room was bare except for a wagon full of his stuff, to be hauled to his cot in bunker 9. Piper took the wagon to drop it off, as he and the rest of his friends accompanied him to the big house for his meeting.

Leo knew most of this stuff, like how to use his insulin pen and how to dispose of needles. He mostly fiddled around with a few rubber bands and metal scraps from his tool belt. This meeting was mostly for his ‘family’, so they could understand what they were getting in to. On the bright side, he got a stuffed lion with pads where he could practice giving injections!

After the meeting, he spent the day in the more populous areas of CHB. He wanted to be somewhere not all cramped after being in his room for a week, save for a few short walks. During lunch and dinner, and before bed, he had Nyssa give him his shots in the arm after he checked his sugar and ate.

He had a few times where he went low. It was the worst. He was shaken and could hardly walk, as his legs felt like cooked noodles. He couldn’t build when he shook! Luckily, he didn’t die, so it’s all good.

The next day, he wanted to gain control over his disease. He decided he would finally give himself his own shot. After assuring the rest of the gang, who were very apprehensive about giving Leo Valdez any sort of sharp object, Leo managed to slowly sink the short needle into his leg and push the end. His friends were all very proud. They gave him a group hug. For a moment, Leo forgot that anything was wrong, he forgot about his condition, his newfound problem. All that mattered is that if he could find a way to come back from the dead, he could manage to survive another disorder.

#T1D #leo valdez #piper mclean #Jason Grace #percy jackson #Annabeth Chase #Frank Zhang #Hazel Levesque #PJO #HoO #Heroes of Olympus #Percy Jackson and the Olympians #my expirence #story #my story #Leo becomes a T1D #leo valdez disorder #liper

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ducklover52 · 5 years

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On the close #WorldMentalHealthDay I wanna say how proud I am of my friends going to therapy and taking care of themselves.

Also how jealous I am.

warning: this is a very long/extremely personal post. if you don’t wanna get into it, basically, I’m proud of you for going, I’m proud of you for trying, I’m jealous of your strength, of finding a good fit and sticking it out to do so. I wish us all the strength we need to ask for help (we’re not weak, but I know that it feels that way, especially when you’re deep in it), the resources to make it work, and the success of finding someone/something that works for you.

I promise, you can stop here. goodnight.

No? Then strap in because this went on tangents I wasn’t even planning on and I’ll admit I even got lost along the way. I think I picked it back up at the end but oof, it took a minute to get there and that transition isn’t good. Okay here we go:

I saw a therapist a few times during my senior year of college. My ex had started seeing one earlier. I had gone with him a couple times and he helped convince me that it was time. I had lost my mom two years earlier. I thought it would help and he said it would.

His guy wouldn't see me/didn't have time to? I don't remember what exactly the issue was. He gave me a number. I called her and we set up an initial meeting, with my ex's help. I never had the "strength" to ask for help by myself. He came with me the first couple times, just to the appointment itself-not into our meeting. I stopped asking him to go with me after a couple weeks. I was over him. I didn’t want to see him at all in my life and I hated associating him with therapy.

I didn't like my therapist. I didn't think she really understood me. I told her about feeling rejected when I didn’t get cast in the last musical of my college career. She basically said oh well. I told her about the stress I was feeling to get my requirements done. She said make a list. I had a list; I’d been checking off my degree audit since freshman year. I didn’t feel any connection. I stopped wanting to share and started feeling judged. I had always been anxious about seeing her to begin with. I stopped seeing her January before I graduated. I had to miss an appointment to go to the regional theatre festival. I never called to reschedule. It wasn’t a good fit.

I met a guy at the festival. We fell fast and hard. We both had issues. He had someone to see/talk to about it. I didn’t. I remember being jealous of having a doctor who prescribed anti-anxiety meds. I also remember him needing substances to assist the meds, or replace them when he couldn’t get his prescription refilled. I didn’t envy that. When I had had enough of being ignored, as he lived 3hrs away and I was the only one willing to make the drive, I started seeing other guys.

Or rather, I started getting really drunk at parties. The “cast party” of my only time stage managing included getting really drunk at the student conductor’s apartment and playing strip spin the bottle. Sorority parties would lead to making out with a sister’s formal date or going home with a guy I’d known since freshman year. I’d talk with them for a week or so before making up shit about not wanting to date an underclassman since I was graduating. Once I actually started dating one of them, after bonding over our parents passing away. I decided he was too good for me, especially after I had gone to visit the theatre guy one night and the next day had to drive straight from Charleston to a Chipotle date and almost ran out of gas getting there. But that was right before finals, so the timing worked for me.

Before graduating, I started rehearsing for my first post-grad show. It was community theatre near my house, my best friends were in charge, and I was just happy to get a production credit and work with my friends. A friend in the cast started making friends and I followed suit. About a month in I was dating one of the leads.We spent almost every day together. We also drank together almost every night, but we were young and didn’t think anything of it. I thought this was it. I had always wanted a showmance and I got it. We talked about our feelings, about his ADHD, how he went to therapy every week. I thought I found someone else I could really connect to. I shared how I’d struggled with my self-image all my life, how I’d tried therapy but didn’t like it, how I wanted to try again but didn’t know where to start. I thought he could help. I thought he could save me.

But three months in and a party with my high school friends tore us apart. I still don’t really know what happened that night but it threw my into a whole new depression. It didn’t help that we had just agreed on a new show to audition for together. And of course we were both cast. And he started dating another cast member. I tried not to care but I was hurt and jealous. And he kept reaching out. He said we could be friends and I was desperate for attention. When I couldn’t see him I acted out by sleeping with a friend.

He acted upset but never really cared. He told me I needed to see and talk someone to help myself move forward in life. Then he’d stop for a day or so before coming back, usually while drinking. And she found out, though it’s not like I tried to hide it (hey girl, how’s it going) cause I was selfish. When she’d had enough she called it quits. I thought maybe we could go back to before. He stopped coming around. My heart was broken all over because their relationship ending didn’t mean ours would start again.

I had gotten on tinder while I was fooling around with him. During that time. I had matched with and started talking to my now bf. I don’t think he was really looking for anything then. We’d go through slow periods where I’d doubt myself and my worth if he didn’t reply. Eventually my bf ended up ghosting me. My ex had given me the contact info for a new therapist. I’d call the number and hang up before I stopped ringing. I’d visit the website and see how much I could do without giving them my info. I was nervous to start again. I didn’t know if I could trust these people, after they guy who showed me to them had given up on me. I never did get into contact with them.

My bf came back into my life about 5 months later. But this time when we started talking we didn’t stop. We finally started dating. When I got moody, I tried to express how I felt and why. He did a good job of expressing his feelings and telling me how much he cared. I hadn’t experienced that in a while that I was feeling so good about us. During this time, my dad was dating someone. She and her two kids moved in over that summer. Shit got complicated. She and her kids destroyed my life. I leaned on my bf as much as I could, but we were long distance. My sister had just gotten engaged and she and her then fiance were doing some premarital counseling. She had had a lot of issues coming from my dad and his then fiance and it led to us all needing to go to a session.

During the one or two we attended, my sister tried to explain how we felt about our dad’s fiancee taking over. They’d ask me to chime in and I wouldn’t be able to speak for myself. I was scared. I was still living with my dad at the time and I couldn’t be honest about what I was feeling or experiencing. I was singled out during these sessions and asked about my mental health history and things I didn’t feel comfortable discussing with or in front of my family. I shut down. I was asked to find my own help or see someone else to discuss these things. And I couldn’t get the attention off me. At the time I felt picked on and judged. Like I did when I first talked to someone in college. I felt discouraged. I was scared.

Since then I’ve been kicked out of the house I grew up in, I’ve fought with my bf about the same topics I don’t even know how many times, and I’ve had a couple of the shittiest years to date, including things that I’m still not quite ready to discuss, even in anonymity on the internet. And through this all, and what I was eventually trying to make my way back to, I’ve known that I should probably be seeing someone. I have friends who are in therapy and I’m jealous. I want the relief that comes with sharing your thoughts and feelings with someone who’s job is to help you make sense of it all. But I’ve never found that. I don’t know what it’s like. I don’t know where to find it and I don’t know where to look. And now I’m off my dad’s insurance and couldn’t even afford it if I did.

I don’t know how to end this, except to again, praise those of you are seeking the help you need/want because good for you, you deserve it! We all do. If you’re not currently seeing a professional but you want to, I wish you nothing but success in finding someone you jive with because I know it’s not just a one and done situation. And to those of you like me who don’t know how to go from here, or how to reach out, or even what you want/need, I wish you clarity to figure it out and resources to try to make it work. I hope we all get what we need and deserve in the end.

#world mental health day #long post #like REALLY long #therapy #idek

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leggigoesabroad · 5 years

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we’re only here on borrowed time

Sitting on a lovely, smooth, high-speed train from Nuremberg, Germany to Paris. Yesterday was a day from hell which I'll lightly get into but not dwell on, but for now, I'm so happy. I'd be remiss to not mention why!! Part of the reason I decided to book the train instead of flying from Prague to Paris was for many uninterrupted hours to listen to this new book my doctor recommended for me, called "Stress Less, Accomplish More" but Emily Fletcher. It obviously sounds like a typical self-help book, but I have a crush on my doctor and she really sold it for me. (BTW she's no older than like, 32, is married with two kids, super pretty, and totally gets me. She's very female-centric and one time said 'I'll never let you leave here without a prescription for more birth control, we will never let the system be the reason you're struggling with something' after asking if I had enough for the foreseeable future. Joke's on her, I'm single AF, but it really spoke to me.) She said it's a book about meditation and although I've tried meditating before, I am a little bit of a natural skeptic as to allllllllll of its listed benefits. She said this super simple technique helps you sleep better, greatly reduces anxiety/depression, get sick less often, be more effective at work, eliminate jet lag, on and on. She said she honestly can't say enough about it and it completely changed her life. I took this as a way to be more like her and immediately bought it. Also because I wanted her to like me. Incidentally, she texted me a few days ago inviting me to a new women's group she's developing for people in my demographic who are going through the same things. Because like of COURSE she did!! She also tells me to call her Casey instead of by "Doctor" and man I should stop now this is getting weird.

Anyway, this book is by an ex-Broadway performer who noticed she was going grey at age 28 (cough cough I am too) and was sick of all the medications she used to treat these symptoms and wanted to get more at the root. She talks about how simple this meditation method is - 15 minutes twice a day - and how it is literally the best thing she's ever done for herself in her life. After her course, she asks people how much money it would take to stop meditating. They all say something between "500 million dollars" and "no amount of money in the world, because what would be the point without everything else meditation gives me?" I booked the train so I could set aside several hours to listen to the book, especially on this trip, because we all know from the Thailand blog era that being far away in new countries is often what helps me make decisions in life and really self-reflect. Yes, I hear how extra that sounds, but I'm fine with it. I'm only on Chapter 5 and I keep intermittently crying!! We haven't even gotten to the part where she tells me HOW to meditate! Just her background on why it works and the entire theory behind it. The author talks about one case in which a guy with advanced Parkinson's started her sessions and after literally the first one, his tremors disappeared during the entire 15 minutes and for 5 minutes after. She said when they both opened their eyes he asked if she had noticed, and she said she did, and started crying because it was arguably the most profound moment of her career. I'm crying typing this. Ugh. She doesn't claim that meditation will cure chronic illnesses of course, but rather that it's the best thing one can possibly do to supplement medical instruction and for some ailments, it can indeed end up replacing them. She said after she started the practice, she didn't get sick again (cold, flu, anything) for EIGHT AND A HALF YEARS!! Because when the body can use sleep at night to fully rest and not just as a band-aid for stress relief, your immune system can work at its intended level and not allow any of these small things to come into play. You'd think I'd be getting paid for this post, but alas, I'm only 5 chapters in and get ready for me to be even more insufferable than usual when I get home.

Onward. Last I left off I was in a cafe with Lizzy in Prague. We stayed for a few hours and actually got a lot of work done! Turns out my freelance deadlines don't disappear when I go to Europe, hmm. We then walked to an area called Petrin, which from afar just looks like a tree-covered hill. It's actually an uphill path in an expansive park that ultimately overlooks the entire city of Prague. The more we went up, I kept thinking "we must be at the top by now" and then new buildings and castles and paths and orchards would appear. It felt like a hidden fairyland with twists and turns and new beautiful sights along the way. I posted a pic on the gram, but at one point we came to a clearing and there was a picture-perfect snapshot of the entire city through the trees. With the red roofs and striking architecture I again almost felt like crying. Also saw a bunch of couples making out in the orchards with no shame all, so that was something. Good on 'em, ay. We stopped for a glass of wine at the top (duh) and ended up chatting about work/management styles/feelings about jobs/etc. Something great about Lizzy is that it turns out for everything I'm interested in, she's in grad school for. I felt like she was the manifestation of all things fascinating to me. Kinda like when you meet someone really smart who is able to vocalize all the things you feel about things, but better. Like Hilary, but not my sister. Like Jay Wong, but not my boss! We talked about Kitty and her job search and then got into the concept of finding a job by figuring out what you love and what comes naturally to you, and then seeing how you can get paid for it. She loved hearing about Kitty and SpotX and the proposal she had to do about team-building and customer engagement, and we chatted all about different marketable skills. I remember crying to Hil many years ago (Hil if you read this, do you remember??) about how I *thought* I was smart but I hated studying/learning/school and my grades reflected that, and how I've squandered all my potential, I'm actually really dumb, etc. BTW in retrospect I now see a lot of that as my undiagnosed ADHD and I wish I had understood it earlier to get ahead of it, but it's okay. Hil at the time told me that she may have great grades and a good job, etc., but that she can't walk into a room and command attention or just become friends with everyone, and that skills come in all shapes and sizes and one isn't better than another. I'M GETTING EMOTIONAL AGAIN. Remember when my blogs used to be carefree and funny? Me either.

After that, Lizzy and I walked all through the grounds of the Prague Castle and wound our way down the hill to the Charles Bridge, and stopped for another drink. Then we got into a whole discussion about relationships and sexuality. Later, when we were hanging out with her husband, Rob, I found myself saying over and over: "It's like what Lizzy and I were talking about earlier..." and he was like "how did you guys somehow talk about EVERYTHING today?!" Females, man. Eventually she went back to her place to shower and I checked into my Airbnb across the street. Got SO EXHAUSTED and almost fell dead asleep while waiting for her before dinner, but rallied, and so glad I did. We took the tram up the hill to a nice restaurant for dinner, then went to an Irish pub to watch the Liverpool/Barcelona game. No one there remembered the epic call from 2010 World Cup that Ned and I quote all the time, but hey, we do and that's what counts. ("AND YOU COULD NOT WRITE... A STORY LIKE THIS.") We got there at halftime and were ordering drinks at the bar when a guy sitting at the bar was a real dick and says to me and Lizzy, "just so you know, when the game's on again, you've gotta move. I sat here on purpose for a good view, so make sure you move." Then turned to his partner and we could clearly hear him saying things like, "Fuckin' ridiculous they're standing right there during the game... I'm not going to let that happen... no fuckin' way" Um, a) it's half time. b) it's a bar and we're at the bar ordering drinks. c) WE KNOW. d) fuck off. He kept talking about us after we moved and she and I briefly thought about starting shit but you know, foreign country and all that. Luckily he was cheering for Liverpool and they got stomped in the second half to lose the game and we rejoiced. :)

Went to a weird, dark "Books" bar after that and we were almost the only people there. There were condoms in the bathroom and I took one as a joke to show Rob and Lizzy, but now it's still in my bag and freaks me out every time I reach for my Chapstick. We went back to their house afterwards and I kid you not, just watched Harry Styles videos. Turns out they both love him, especially Rob, which is so rich to me. He was like "this guy is just like coolness personified and he's so talented and he's weirdly attractive in kind of a feminine way but also masculine and he has such a nice voice and swagger...." you'd think I planted Rob to say this to me, but no. We watched the entirety of his Carpool Karaoke as I told them all of my favorite parts ("I was back middle." "Why am I always Julia Roberts??" "I cry in like, a cool way.") It's like when someone says to me, "you know, I'd love to know more about the meanings behind Taylor Swift's songs but I never learned, what are all of the albums about?" And I look around expecting that I'm being Punk'd. Parted ways with them and thanked them for everything and told them I was very grateful for our summer camp relationship. You know, the kind that is intensely strong, and very brief. I may never see them again and yet we spent 15 hours straight together on Wednesday and I had one of the best days ever. See you in another life, brotha.

A series of hiccups led to a very stressful morning on Thursday that I won't fully get into because my poor family already lived through it with me via WhatsApp... but it started with extreme random nausea, (the kind you have a serious internal talk with yourself about: "no. you are okay. take deep, slow breaths. do not throw up here. you are completely fine, this will pass. breathe. you're not sick. this is just random. you cannot throw up here.") and then I got on what was supposed to be a train from Prague to Nuremberg with a stop in Schwandorf, but there was a service interruption on the first leg and everyone knew but me. Probably because everyone speaks Czech and I, ya know, do not. BTW so far Czech is the least intuitive language I've ever come across. I could read an entire book in it and wouldn't be able to give you even the slightest context, like you can with French/Spanish/German. I know, romance languages and all that, but man I really underestimated how important it is to know some of the language when you're traveling through remote towns. I notice everyone in Plzen has gotten off the train and I think "well that's weird, but maybe they're all local commuters." A lady comes by and yells at me to get off, I say, "English?" She says, "NO. Bus." and shoos me off. In the panic I forget my suitcase from where I stored it - thank the heavens above, it was still there when I realized 15 minutes later and fought my way back on a closed train. I have such PTSD today and can't fathom what would have happened if the train had left. Imagine my suitcase just taking off on a train to the Czech countryside by itself. Zero percent chance I get that back. Work computer, my treasured leather jacket from Kathy that I swear I'd save in a fire, all of my toiletries and pills and prescriptions...ugh I can't even think about it.

No one spoke English except for a kind man at the info desk who spoke very little, and gave me directions ("directions" is a loose term here, I did a lot of critical thinking and problem solving to vaguely understand what I was supposed to be doing next) to take a bus in an hour that would take me to Stod, where I could then catch my train to Schwandorf and hopefully ultimately Nuremberg. After a series of mishaps and incredible uncertainty, eventually all of that happened. I walked into the hotel in Nuremberg and almost kissed the floor. I had big plans to wake up early and explore, but alas, I'm embarrassed to admit that all I did in Nuremberg was buy some wine/chocolate/gummy bears and stay in all night and sleep late this morning. Bodies need rest, y'all. My audiobook author would tell me that my body is in recovery mode after releasing an unnatural amount of adrenaline and cortisol. NEVERTHELESS SHE PERSISTED!

I'll be staying with rig friend Angie and her family in Paris, and seeing rig Aaron there too. He messaged me yesterday and said, "so do you want to see museums and such? Or I can show you my favorite brasseries?" I said, "I've been to Paris, I'd just like to day drink honestly." Luckily he is on board, shawoooooooo. Oddly there's no WiFi on this train like they said there would be, but it's not that bad because it's so smooth and comfortable and I still have my audiobook. Will post this blog sometime later when the WiFi shows up. Cross your fingers that I get the romantic countryside train ride I pined for. And happy weekend!!!

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vulpes-vixen · 5 years

Text

To You. From “Someone You Slept With.”

I’m sorry you’re angry because I told someone what you did. I know, I know. I’m “ruining your life.”

But darling here’s the thing - you ruined mine.

You came in to my home and lied to my face. You told me you wouldn’t hurt me and that you felt the same way I did; that you were also demi-sexual. That you fundamentally understood my trauma and you understood it because you had been there yourself.

But when I said no, you said yes until I gave in...

I guess I shouldn’t have told you about the scars from my past traumas so soon. I never imagined that someone who could hold me that way and whose eyes I got lost in could reopen those old wounds.

I should have told you no. I should have fought. I should have kicked you out. But I was vulnerable and I was hurt. And you knew. Gods, you knew. You packed a damn bag because you thought you might stay the night because you thought I needed the company after all I’d been going through with my Ex and with work.

I was broken and when you kissed me I believed you. How could I believe you?

It never felt right, and I kept trying to convince myself it was. I tried so hard to make you happy, to satisfy your needs since we’d become intimate in that way. But you couldn’t even keep it up no matter how hard I tried. I was mortified and hurt and self conscious. I was afraid.

But you, this guy who I was so wholly head-over-heels for, you assured me it was fine. That you were just tired.

I wanted to believe you...I wanted to believe that a guy like you could feel that way about me too.

I kept playing it over and over again in my head. Unaware of what you were (and weren’t) telling and to whom you were telling it to. A thing I am still not quite sure of. I kept breathing and telling myself it was alright and reliving the feeling of your embraces and the tender way you touched my hair.

I knew, but I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to think about how your messages lessened and how you wouldn’t hold my hand when we were out.

I didn’t want to believe what you told my best friend when he called you on one of the darkest days of my life. That your heart was fickle and that you couldn’t handle being with someone so weak. That you’d had your fun and now you wanted out.

You told him you were going to break my heart; that it was premeditated, and then you swore him to secrecy so that he had to send me off to you knowing full well that we weren’t just meeting up to hang out that Saturday afternoon in May.

You knew full well when you told me I looked beautiful and how you wished you were there lying in bed with me two days before.

You knew full well when you hugged me hello and walked with me for hours. You knew while we sat and drank margaritas and laughing. You knew full well when I blindly followed you down onto the sandbank in the creek that runs behind your house.

You knew exactly what you were doing all along. It wasn’t about you having kids or not being able to handle the mentally and physically ill girl who was sitting beside you, saying you needed someone stronger while the girl beside you had been fighting from her life and had only tried to help you with your own depression, anxieties, adhd, and alcoholism. The girl who was being bullied by everyone at her work (including HR) because she was the only one brave enough to stand up and say that the newest guy at her work was saying and doing inappropriate things.The girl who just confessed to you about the abuse her parents had unloaded on to her.

The same girl who you then pulled in to your chest and wished that we could just do this platonically.

Did you see the tear roll down my cheek as I rolled away from you and put my feet into the water, wishing for it to wash away the black hole growing in my stomach. I tried so hard to play it cool. To be the level headed girl that you could still be friends with while inside my heart was breaking, burying my toes in the sand and catching a frog, wondering how he was the Prince and you were the Toad.

I thought that was that until you burdened me with the knowledge that you’d told your Ex. And your friend... And for good measure, that you had also told my Ex what you were doing today. But it was all to “protect my feelings” because you didn’t want to “lead me on.”

Only, when your ex and my best girlfriend came over to tell me the truth about you...the reality of it all came crashing over me.

I felt so sick. They had no idea how far you’d gone.

I still don’t know if they know it all, or how deeply I was hurt. How deeply violated I felt.

You infiltrated my sacred space. You came in to my home and gained my trust, defiled my heart and my mind, and used my body and told me that it was my fault because I couldn’t play the Shieldmaiden in your little Viking fantasy.

I’ve held it in for so long. I have shown my friends a smiling face. I pretended to be okay for so long...but I can’t anymore.

I have just relapsed with about a decade’s worth of trauma resurfacing.

I have cried and screamed at the top of my lungs. I have made pilgrimages to my holy sites. I have hexed you and started to speak about what you have done.

But I cannot shake the memory of you from scratching its way back up to the surface, screaming about how I had fucked it all up. About how I wasn’t good enough for someone like you. About how the sight of my naked body disgusted you so much that you couldn’t keep it up.

I am afraid to love anyone else, and moreover, after speaking to your exes, I am even more afraid to what you might do - or what you might have already done - to other women. I want nothing more than to protect them from your special brand of cruelty.

But it seems that no one wants to hear what I have to say. Especially you. You were finally provoked to stop creeping on me after I finally started to tell my side of the story and it got back around to you.

I wish I could say that I didn’t care. That I didn’t wake up in the middle of the night unable to go back to sleep because the memory of you still lingers, I wish I could say I hated you, and on some level I suppose I do for playing with what’s left of my heart; for playing with my emotions like a carnival game, only to toss me out after you’d had your fun - I’d stroked your ego and your dick and that’s all you really wanted in the end.

How do I exorcise the ghost of you that haunts me still? How do I unshackle myself from the memory of you? How do I learn to trust someone again so that I can shake this deep loneliness from my soul?

I want so much to cry and have my friends embrace me, not to ignore this post I can’t bear to share anywhere else for fear of them thinking I’m making a mountain out of a molehill. I want to find a lover who will make me feel the way I started to feel about you. I don’t want to think of you anymore when I hear a song about heartbreak. Or love. Or sex. I want to be able to trust others the way I so fully trusted you. I want to be driving down the road and realize that I haven’t thought about you in months - no nightmares, no anxiety attacks; nothing. I want you to become the distant memory you deserve to be.

Please, just let me be free.

#venting #personal #I'm sorry #you don't have to read this #I just have to vent all of this out before I explode

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