decided i'm not gunna share my full story regarding my self ship hiatus, more just a brief overview here, untagged. i did some thinking on this, and the full explanation with backstory bears the risk of painting the hobby in a bad light and a "warning others to avoid doing it" more than anything else, which wouldnt have been my intention at all, it's definitely personalised risk

my circumstances health wise and why self shipping had a severe negative effect on me are exceptional circumstances and not something that an overall PSA brush could paint the whole community with in a non bias way. i dont want to scare anyone! youre probably fine and dont need to step back from it if your relationship with selfshipping isnt as detrimental as mine was. people can be uncomfortable with doubles without experiencing delusion as well, they're not hand in hand and my experience while likely shared by at least one other person, cant be seen as a be all end all risk warning for everyone that does it

the TLDR (not really lol), it got too real for me and was affecting my ability to live a normal life dodging doubles and losing months of my life to states of disassociative delusion. i'm awaiting to be seen by a high intensity team who deal with this sort of thing (they were supposed to see me in November, still waiting, god save the NHS) until then i'm not engaging too heavily in selfshipping in order to retain my sense of self and stay grounded to reality - as morbid and unpleasant it is to be grounded to said reality rn anyway. focusing on my new job and videogames and drawing other stuff. not stopped completely just keeping it at arms length, to keep in touch with myself and my current state

it's a lovely creative outlet if it doesn't border into the line being blurred too much, something that probably only becomes a risk if you've got similar health conditions and i dont want to make anyone second guess themselves if theyre having a good healthy time with it ;; i wasnt having a healthy time with it, scrolling social media was like a minefield of risk, i was constantly upset and uncomfortable due to circumstances i had no control over, i lost months of my life to disassociation. it is what it is

i'll return to it properly someday, when i know it's just gunna be a fun artistic hobby for me when i've resolved all my Issues™ and i'm not doing it for escapism or comfort or filling a hole anymore, just a side hobby to an otherwise regular headspace