Personal post in which I am processing old trauma.
It's weird how you can clearly recall an experience but have no emotional response/true comprehension of it until many years later.
My relationship with my ex fiance happened during my first three years of college, if you don't count the stalking and harassment that went on for several years after. I'm in my 30s now, that was a long time ago.
It took me a few years after breaking up for the last time to realize that the relationship wasn't just "really shitty" but had in fact been extremely abusive. To this day when I think of him I think of screaming and crying, breaking glass, blood, absolute terror, and the inability to breathe.
Over the years I've been processing the truth of things he'd normalized/minimized/gaslit me on and trying to give myself grace for the long term effects it's had on me. And for a while I thought I'd acknowledged all of it. But recently (last year or two) it's hit me like a sack of bricks that he tried to murder me. I don't mean going too far in a fit of anger, I mean he planned out and followed through on a deliberate plan to kill me that I survived by sheer luck.
That day has always been a cold, stop motion memory since it happened. I can recall it in a series of snapshots, each clean and neat and utterly detached from each other.
He tells me we'll have the house to ourselves.
He's drawn me a bath in the big Jacuzzi tub with rose petals in the water.
I undress and get in.
He is sitting on the side of the bathtub.
He is cupping my face for a kiss and whispers something about Ophelia.
My head is underwater.
I am flailing and grabbing at his hands, the side of the bathtub. Water is going everywhere but I can't get out from underneath his hands.
I can't breathe. My lungs are burning. I am beyond terrified. This is the inevitable end. This is how I die.
His hands are off me and I am able to get my head above water.
He is taking keys off the counter and handing them through the cracked open door.
I am soaking wet and holding my clothes against me in a bundle that mostly covers me.
I shove past the person on the other side of the door and run barefoot back to my dorm.
He gaslit me hard about this that it never happened. I didn't even get a chance to bring it up. He just showed up the next day to take me on a date (which he very rarely did) and complained about how outside of sex we never had one on one time because there were always people in the house. I was still in shock I think and don't really remember what happened in between my running out of his house and him showing up at my dorm apartment. I do remember being in the living room of his house after the date and having a very public fight that he pulled out of nowhere.
For a long time that memory has been something I shied away from even thinking about. It was a cold spot in my brain that gave me mental frost bite.
And then when I did acknowledge it, it was framed as 'I almost died' in my mind. But the more I think about it, the more clear that this was a planned murder becomes.
We were in college and he lived in a busy frat house/known party house with four other guys. He either dedicated significant time to tracking people's coming and going to find a long enough window of time to drown me and dispose of my body. Not a small feat considering the near constant foot traffic in the house. Or he engineered having that house be empty.
The tub, which wasn't normally used due to being disgustingly dirty, had been spotlessly cleaned.
He never got undressed or into the tub with me. He was wearing a short sleeved shirt with shorts and angled his legs away from the tub.
He referenced Ophelia, who dies via drowning. I was a theatre major at the time.
He very much intended to murder me by downing me in that bathtub.
The only reason I survived is because someone forgot their keys on the bathroom counter and had to come back for them. That's it.
It's so wild to me how long it's taken my brain to feel, I don't know safe??? enough, to really put the severity and full implications together. I didn't repress the memory, just avoided it. And I'm not even shocked that he tried to kill me, more that he tried to murder me - though I'm not sure how much sense that distinction would make to anyone else.
Seeing romantic gestures between couples makes me feel cold and frightened and grief stricken. And for a long time I attributed that to my most significant/serious relationship being an epic shit show and a half. But I'm starting to realize that it's also because one of the few romantic gestures I've received was actually part of the plan to murder me. So I'm trying to be gentle with myself when I experience those feelings.
I'm not some bitter shrew who hates seeing happy couples. I am experiencing the fallout feelings of an extremely traumatic and very nearly fatal event.
Anyway I'm not really expecting for anyone to have read this whole mess. But if you did, here's a picture of Forte snuggling me from this morning as thanks for sitting with me for a bit.
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i love how so many of the great will/yhvh’s avatars are either ball, face, or ball with face
they’ve become a bit more detailed overtime (namely ancient of days and that one avatar from sjr) but there’s something about the simplicity of the older ones that i prefer especially with the ones lacking much in their design.
they’re mainly from smt 2 which i think is really fitting at least from what i’ve seen of the plot. it’s also just neat for there to be demons based on different variations of god’s name/interpretations throughout different cultures. this is technically not all that new as this was done with abaddon long before smt 2 (his name is sometimes translated as apollyon and yet apollyon in smt are treated as separate beings that happen to be at least loosely connected) but needs to be given more credit with how they do get connected, usually with the designs sharing motifs or inspiring later iterations. it’s really clever.
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If I may be weird and petty for a moment, I don't get AUs where Martin is the Archivist when Melanie and Sasha are right there?? I mean I get why: roleswaps are popular AUs and martin is a popular character. And maybe its just my specific headcanons re: archivist requirements but I feel like the other two would be so much better?
Yes, Martin reads statements and yes, he gets marked, but I really don't think those are the Only Requirements to do the big ritual? Cause at that point Elias could've chosen any web-marked dude off the street, especially if they have the mark of another entity as well already.
Melanie and Sasha shared several important traits with Jon, most notably a burning curiosity, a willingness to put themselves in trouble for information, and (in Melanie's case (and Sasha's too, arguably) an ability to antagonize extremely dangerous fear avatars. Sasha's whole statement is her putting herself in a dangerous situation without telling anyone or acquiring any help (remind you of any main characters?) and running face first into supernatural dangers (sometimes to protect her friends, sometimes out of curiosity). Useful for collecting marks, but also useful for collecting information and developing her own powers as the Archivist. Considering her seemingly unrepentant willingness to look through her friends' and coworkers' personal files via accessing their accounts, I'd argue that her curiosity and boundary crossing could easily get stronger when investigating supernatural entities. Obviously, this never happened because of how early on she died, but I think you could make a strong case for Sasha's strong curiosity making some avatars incredibly mad. Not to mention how incredibly Beholding it is of her. None of this is criticism btw, I think Sasha should have access to whatever personal info she wants and I love it when characters are so obviously Eye-aligned. I know "Sasha wasn't promoted because she'd solve all the problems and find a way to kill Jonah" is also a popular headcanon but please think for a MOMENT about her appearances in podcast. There weren't many, but there's a very obvious through-line in almost all of them. She's curious, she takes risks in the face of the supernatural, she wants to Know. It's literally what caused the circumstances of her statement. Those traits are arguably the ones that got her KILLED. I'm sorry this went off on a tangent. I just love Sasha very much and I'm constantly filled with Thoughts of Sasha.
Melanie also has curiosity about the supernatural AND a much more obviously antagonistic personality!! Her first appearance is being a total asshole to Jon, mocking him, the place he works at, the equipment they use, and what they do. But she also dedicated basically her entire career into uncovering the supernatural? She ran a Youtube channel about it, and when she discovered that everyone was sticking to the same "safe" sites, she started looking off the beaten path for the real stuff. And she found it! She went looking for ghosts of war and violence and even without access to statements, probably working alone and sifting through bunk on the internet, she found them! She got stabbed by a ghost and instead of trying to avoid ghosts in the future, she decided to look for more violent ghosts. The slaughter tendencies might be a drawback for her becoming the Archivist, yes, but by that point Jon had already survived multiple marks and was developing his powers. If he failed by that point, Elias might've wanted an Archivist who'd be better able to defend themselves. By S4 Melanie was probably far enough gone to the Slaughter (and hated the Eye enough) that she was probably off the table as a candidate. By that point, however, Jon was expected to fully Become and only needed a few more marks.
I understand that Sasha was approved for a transfer to the Archives because Elias let Jon choose who take with him and Jon chose Sasha. And Melanie was almost certainly chosen to keep Jon in close proximity of a Slaughter-aligned person who'd be likely to mark him but unlikely to kill him. But I think that they served a secondary purpose of being backup Archivists in case something happened to Jon.
Obviously this is more headcanon than theory (not to mention it relies on other headcanons to fully stand) but I'm very fond of it. I guess I think that, even if Elias wasn't really looking for another Archivist when Jon seems like the perfect candidate in every way (and I'm not saying this JUST because I love him), I think that if something did happen to Jon, they'd be Elias' next candidates.
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On the tenth anniversary of Matt Smith regenerating into Peter Capaldi, I'm thinking of my relationship with the doctors - my reaction to their casting announcement and my feelings once they showed up on screen.
With Matt Smith's announcement, I was bereft. I was out for a family dinner in Glasgow on the night he was announced and specifically wanted to avoid my day being ruined by the announcement. Of course, one of those electronic screens with breaking news in the town centre told me anyway. He was so young, so odd, but of course anyone would've been wrong. David was my doctor, the first doctor I watched live, and so it wasn't an issue with Matt himself but in the possibility of change.
When David regenerated, as a stubborn ten year old I refused to accept the new doctor. Series 5 won me over, of course, and a new age of love for the show began, one with countless rewatches at sleepovers and theorising in Morrisons over what the resolution to That Cliffhanger could possibly mean.
By series 7, I was jaded. The resolutions to Those Cliffhangers were never nearly as clever or as exciting as I'd thought up in my head, and the trailer for series 7a was dire. Despite my love for Asylum of the Daleks, A Town Called Mercy brought the first ever episode I didn't watch live, and didn't bother catching up on for many years. Watching The Angels Take Manhattan, I discovered true disappointment. This was the first episode where every minute felt like a betrayal, everything wrong with the world. I rewatched for the first time a couple of years ago and unfortunately I still feel the same! Then came Clara. I disliked her intensely, to the point where I was banned from watching the show after The Rings of Akhaten (I snuck round to my friend's house to watch Cold War) and didn't watch again until Name of the Doctor.
Then came the news Matt was regenerating. An excerpt from a note of my thoughts at the time "I can't say I'm too surprised, but I don't know how I feel about it. I guess I'm disappointed but I won't miss him too much. I have mixed feelings. I guess if it was the Pond era then I would've been really sad but not so much with Clara." Of course, the rumours of his replacement quickly began, and Peter Capaldi was the frontrunner from very early on. I hadn't seen him in anything (other than Doctor Who but I don't remember having any opinion on his performance there) but I was okay with the rumours. Watching him come out of the doorway on Doctor Who Live: The Next Doctor, something settled within me. It was instant - this was the doctor. Despite my lack of knowledge about him, everything in me screamed that he was born to play the doctor. The future was in safe hands.
I won't bother going over my feelings about Day of the Doctor, that's for another day if ever, but I was suitably excited to see Peter's eyebrows, and went on about them for ages after the episode. In the end, when Matt regenerated, I was sad. It was an emotional episode and despite my opinion souring by the end, he had been such a big part of my life and shaped the way I consumed media and shared my love of television with friends after the primary school playgrounds were left behind. And then we met Twelve and saw a preview of series 8, and all my sadness faded into sheer excitement.
Series 8 brought a trip to Cardiff for the premiere of Deep Breath. Fifteen year old me was captivated by the red carpet and all the actors who we were yet to meet (Samuel Anderson! Michelle Gomez!) and Peter and Jenna themselves! (Jenna especially in that red dress, how I didn't know I liked girls from that day is truly a mystery.) The episode itself was... bad, even if it took me several years to admit it, but my love for the show felt as though it was at a peak all over again - and actually the red carpet experience was probably a foundation for going to soap awards and comic cons going forward. Waiting 3 weeks for the second episode was agony, as was the two week wait to talk about the episode itself - the clockwork droids had relatives! The gatekeeper of nethersphere showed up in the first episode?!?!?!? Was the half-face man pushed or did he jump? (Still waiting on the answer to that one Moffat.)
To cut a long story short, series 8 was everything. Series 9... not so much. My disappointment and anger over series 7 was back, in a limited way after Zygon Invasion/Zygon Inversion, but after Heaven Sent in a massive way. I felt the show was ruined again. Then came series 10 and, to put it bluntly, any companion that wasn't Clara was a win in my books. Bill did more than win me over though! Series 10 was a triumph and is still my favourite series. I was devastated at the thought of losing Peter. He was my second favourite doctor, next to David (he was joint favourite even then really but I was still so in love with the tenth doctor that I wasn't willing to admit it to myself and honestly it's only been in the last two years that I've admitted to myself and others that he's now my actual favourite).
The Kris Marshall rumours began and continued relentlessly, and I hated it. Despite my misgivings over a female doctor back in 2013, I was now in favour of a more diverse doctor. I could not handle another white man. It was with trepidation that I watched the dreadful Wimbledon final (nothing against Wimbledon, everything against RF), praying that Kris Marshall wasn't about to appear in front of my screen. I had a shrine next to me, dressed up and filmed my reaction, it was all very cute. Jodie emerged from under the hood and my relief was immense. Some of my tumblr tags from that day "I've never yelled so much in my life, she was outstanding in broadchuch and I just??? It hasn't sunk in yet, I've been watching this show since I was 7 and never in my wildest dreams did I actually believe we'd get a woman doctor, and someone as amazing as her. I can't believe my fave character as a kid is now a girl, she was already an icon but now she can be an inspiration to thousands of little girls like I was". It was a breath of fresh air and despite how sad I was to lose such an amazing doctor, I knew the future was in safe hands - mostly. Privately, I worried. Jodie had been amazing in Broadchurch but I'd only ever seen her act miserable and I wasn't sure she had the range to pull off the light hearted, fun aspects of the doctor that were so central to the doctor. Still, I was so hopeful.
The regeneration episode came and I fell head over heels from the moment the ring dropped to the floor. I remember thinking how lucky I was, that I could love a show so much that I was so devastated to lose such an amazing character, but know the future was so bright. In a way thirteen would put it eventually - two hearts; one happy, one sad. I had nothing to be worried about after all. Her era brought the brightest and happiest time of my life as a doctor who fan - I finally met the doctor! I engaged properly with the fan community and made amazing friends. I got to see a sapphic doctor who relationship front and centre. Flux brought my second favourite ever series, and gosh, Yaz is just my favourite companion ever, joining Bill and Rose as the companions that have my entire heart. I've never felt so loved by a show.
Bringing us (mostly) to now. Jodie announced she was leaving on the day I left my job which was mostly very funny to me but honestly the whole thing wasn't terribly unexpected - she'd filmed three series like the previous three doctors, and I'm sure there were rumours going around before that she was going. It was almost a year before Ncuti was announced and my reaction was very ?????? because it was all so lowkey and weird. But I was excited! I hadn't seen Ncuti in everything but it was about time we had a doctor of colour and he's Scottish so that was enough for me! A little disappointed it wasn't a woman again but I know we'll get more chances to be the doctor. And he's great so far! I love his energy and he's such a fantastic advocate for the show. I'm so excited to see his take on the doctor properly and I'm sure that once again, the best is yet to come.
Peter Capaldi, though, I've never had such an instant reaction to a casting announcement, with no worries, no sense of disappointment, nothing but pure joy. And my goodness, was I right to be so sure. Peter, I adore you. Happy ten years, my love.
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