#tw religious guilt | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

basu-shokikita · 3 months

Text

Possibility, a Toki from a different reality

So @dalberadiata has an AU where Toki never left the cult and, therefore, never joined Dethklok. But the call of destiny is much stronger, so he accidentally catches a glimpse of Dethklok when they're visiting Norway and pretty much instantly becomes infatuated with Skwisgaar. The interest isn't one-sided and Skwisgaar teaches Toki about the world of music...and many other things. 🎸💘

I've been wanting to do something with this AU for a while because I'm fascinated with it. So, after many talks, I decided to write the scene where Toki wears non-religious clothing for the first time. More specifically, the clothes Skwisgaar lent him. Needless to say, this is a Skwistok AU 🥰

You can also read this work here!

Hat in his hands, Toki looked at his feet. Or rather, the lack of them. Covered by the dark robe he had been wearing everyday for the past 8 years, it was like he was floating on the floor. Some kind of ghost that still managed to trip on his non-existent feet sometimes.

His eyes kept going back to his legs, his arms, his torso, his neck even. All dutifully covered so there was nothing in sight, nothing to tell apart. Not even the top of his head was safe, protected by the hat of the same color of his robe. He was one undefined silhouette not to be confused by a mere mortal wearing vulgar clothes or showing skin. At least, that’s what his parents had taught him.

He was always to be covered, never to expose anything. Never to embarrass or as shame the family with his indecency. Long ago were the days where he was allowed to wear a simple t-shirt and shorts for his daily duties. He was a real member of the family now and he had to behave as such.

His eyes met his own hesitant reflection, worry scattered all over his features. Should he really be doing this?

“Eh, Toki,” Skwisgaar put down the black magazine he was reading. “Don’ts..think abouts it too much.”

Toki glanced at Skwisgaar in the reflection, and simply pursed his lips in response. He knew Skwisgaar meant well, but he had no way to understand. He had no idea what this meant for Toki, the weird guilt swelling in his gut just from his thoughts. The feeling that his parents, his dad especially, had always been right about him. That he was a failure to the family and the whole town.

He tossed the hat on his bed, as if that would make his dad’s eyes stop glaring at him from inside his mind. He wanted this. He wanted to do this.

“Okay.” He said, more to himself than Skwisgaar. “Turn around.”

“Whats?” Skwisgaar squinted like he hadn’t understood him.

“Turn around.” Toki repeated, this time gesturing with his fingers.

Skwisgaar grimaced for a good couple of seconds before throwing his palms into the air and turning around. “Talks about overkills…” He muttered under his breath but Toki still heard him.

Not that he cared, this wasn’t about Skwisgaar, it was about him and he wanted it his way. This was hard enough as it was, he didn’t need Skwisgaar’s prying eyes on top of it. Toki inhaled deeply and then closed his eyes. He counted until 10, an old trick to calm down his anxiety that he had learned from a nice old lady at the local market a couple of years ago. Then, he exhaled slowly and opened his eyes.

His stare wasn’t all quite confident, but he had to make do. Determined, he brought his hands to his collar and started unbuttoning his robe. It had exactly 16 buttons, so he took a while to undo them. The buttons were worn out and old so they always took several pulls to get off the buttonholes. One time, as a teen, Toki suggested getting new ones but his mother gave him a glare of disappointment that made him never want to ask again.

Undone, the robe fell to the floor and Toki’s first instinct was to immediately pick it up and carefully fold it to place it on his chair. However, his fingers hesitated when he was inches away from the floor.

He remembered the first time he refused to wear the robe, because it was uncomfortable to wear, to move in. Because he thought it was ugly, because he was tired of following this charade he had never wanted to be part of.

His dad ordered him to take off his clothes and made him stand in the snow for hours, with nothing to cover himself with. At some point he lost consciousness, and when he recovered it, he was shivering in his bed. His dad told him, just as cold as the snow that he had been surrounded by, that it was his own doing for rejecting the Lord’s graces.

A few years later, Toki fell off the mountain while running errands. He slipped with the ice and rolled for a few meters before crashing against a rock. He managed to limp his way down, though his sides really hurt and he was pretty sure he was bleeding from his leg. When his mother saw him, the first thing she was worried about wasn’t him, but the robe.

She made him take it off, quickly tossing the snow off it and washing it to remove Toki’s blood. Not even a glance of concern when Toki was stitching himself as she dried the robe next to the fire and carefully sewed the holes back. Toki watched his mother treat his robe with more care and gentleness than he had ever received from her.

When, just two years ago, Toki had taken his picture with them. It was his first official family picture. During his childhood, he had only seen his parents in the framed photographs around the house, never seen himself, like he wasn’t allowed to be part of it. So, he was pretty excited, to be finally acknowledged by them. He tried really hard not to smile when the town’s photographer came to take it.

However, when he saw the final picture, he felt nothing but cruel disappointment. Because the person in it, between his two parents, didn’t feel like him, it didn’t look like him. With the serious face and the dark robe, he looked like any other member of the sect. Nothing to tell him apart from the rest, and that’s exactly what his parents had wanted all along for him.

Toki straightened instead, not even giving a spare glance to the robe on the floor. He proceeded to unbutton his dark purple shirt, trying not to feel self-conscious when the skin of his chest began to reveal itself. He always undressed looking away from the mirror, it was a habit his parents had taught him. Dress with the mirror, undress without it. Flaunting one’s own skin, even in private, was sinful.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Skwisgaar’s head move. “I’m not ready yet!” He said, trying to inspire obedience but his voice came out squeaky instead.

Skwisgaar grumbled but he didn’t try to take a peek at least, and Toki was relieved. Undoing his pants took him way less time than the rest, and he just let it join the robe on the floor, along with the shirt.

The clothes Skwisgaar had lent him were resting on the edge of his bed and Toki hesitated again. Was this really him? Maybe he shouldn’t mess with the order after all. Maybe he shouldn’t be tempting…he didn’t even dare to think of the word. His eyes wandered around the room, until they finally fell on Skwisgaar’s mane.

Luscious bursts of golden cascading down his shoulders, leading to that black leather jacket that had enraptured him since he first saw him and the tight black pants that followed, finishing up with the elegant black boots of the same color. He was beautiful and, just as important, he was free. And Toki desired that freedom just as much as he desired him.

He made up his mind and grabbed the shirt first before forcing it down his neck and torso. Then, he spread the pants and shoved his legs inside. It was definitely tighter than he expected, and he had expected a lot. As he struggled to make his groin somehow fit comfortably between the fabric, he realized Skwisgaar was most likely a smaller size than he was. The last touch were the black combat boots that, ironically, were a tad bit too big for his feet.

With one last exhale, Toki took a glance at his reflection and almost didn’t recognize himself.

His usually hidden shoulder-length brown hair was exposed and slightly disheveled from the movement. His torso was adorned by a short-sleeved black shirt with an over-designed skull and the name of a band he didn’t know in red letters. The shirt had probably been loose on Skwisgaar but on Toki it fit just right. The faux leather pants made noise whenever he moved and, just like he suspected, made his crotch stand up. Packed with combat boots, they made him look like a rockstar, even if he could still see the reluctance in his expression.

Toki tried smiling, then he tried frowning and struck a pose. He put a hand on his hip and one foot in front of the other one and feigned the smugness he often saw on Skwisgaar. It made him laugh to see this much arrogance in his face, however, and he ended up cracking up in front of the mirror. Sighing, he stood straight and contemplated himself. It was weird, and it definitely didn’t look like his usual self. But maybe it could be.

Maybe this could be him.

Also, he could finally see his feet step on the floor, how crazy was that? Toki Wartooth, finally allowed to have visible lower limbs. Absolutely insane.

“Oh, heys.” Skwisgaar said, walking up to him with a smirk. “Has I met you befores?”

“Pfft.” Toki snorted, though couldn’t erase the coy smile on his face, especially not when Skwisgaar wrapped an arm around his waist.

“You looks good in my clothes.” He said, eyeing Toki’s body. His stare stayed for a little longer on Toki’s lower abdomen before it went up again. “Ja?”

Toki averted his gaze, chuckling lightly. “I look like you.” He said, feeling his cheeks heat up from Skwisgaar’s attention and proximity to him.

Skwisgaar took a whiff at his collarbone. “Smells like me toos.” There was something suggestive about his eyes, and Toki could’ve sworn the room was getting hotter despite being in the middle of winter. “Heh.” Skwisgaar seemed satisfied by the reaction and pulled away. “Wants to gets out of here?”

Toki didn’t expect that, though he wasn’t against it. “Where are we going?”

“There’s ans a metals show in the towns.” Skwisgaar said, his eyes were smiling at Toki with tenderness he hadn’t seen before. “I can gets us there.” His thumb slightly brushed Toki’s chin. “Hm? What you says?”

Light blue eyes got starry from the idea alone and Toki swallowed heavily. His first metal show ever…he imagined a raging crowd and killer instrumentals. An imposing vocalist growling incomprehensible lyrics, the chaos and sweat in the atmosphere…

His heartbeat sped up from anticipation and Skwisgaar smiled at him. His first metal concert would be with Skwisgaar of all people. Toki couldn’t help thinking it was the perfect date. A nod. “Let’s do it.”

Skwisgaar’s smile turned into a grin as he laced his fingers with Toki’s and dragged them away from the room. Toki allowed himself to be led, excitement bursting through his chest.

When he walked past the door frame he turned around and gave his old clothes one last look before leaving.

He would never look back.

#metalocalypse #toki wartooth #skwisgaar skwigelf #skwistok #my writing #tw religious guilt #tw child abuse #no beta we die like men etc #they're speaking norwegian in this btw which is why skwis is the only one making mistakes

83 notes · View notes

aliceindaisychains999 · 11 months

Text

General Postal Dude Sr Headcanons (Cool Facts)

Just your average guy trying to survive the horrors

Favorite music genres are oldschool EBM, various metal, dark ambient, grunge, goth rock, goth industrial and surprisingly some classical(He won’t tell anyone though). Sometimes he’ll listen to straight up 90s gabber or noise on high volume with headphones on because it’s weirdly satisfying to him. It drowns out the noise that usually goes on in his mind

A few top artists for example: And One, Terrorfakt, Alice in Chains, Front 252, KMFDM and Type-O Negative

Was involved in the military at some point, hence the machine gun he somehow smuggled out. He was discharged during basic training as he couldn’t hide his depression and schizophrenia any longer. So, his next pick at a government job was the United States Postal Service

Has a sweet tooth that comes in waves. The Dude will go without it for a long while until a spike occurs for two weeks and he indulges in baked goods and a lot of candy. Airheads and Zots are his go-tos

He had a deep relationship with a woman for a while, but she couldn’t handle his impulsive nature and harshly dumped him. He didn’t take it well. However, little did he know that this woman would soon bring The Postal Dude Jr. into the world

Is surprisingly far more sanitary than his son. If he knew Jr was pissing on strangers and the absolute lack of organization his trailer has, he’d be so disappointed. Although Postal Dude Sr’s bedroom is scrawled with chicken scratch and scribbled black sharpie all over the wall

The Dude does in fact lift weights to keep up his bulk. Arms be very strong and well-sculpted

The Dude had his own website which looked like every edgy teens did back in the 1990s… despite him being in his late 20s. Lots of cool stamps showing off his cynical sense of humor, tons of dark red and skulls everywhere. This is where his war journal entries would be uploaded. In between is him talking about his favorite weapons, how to make molotov cocktails at home and infodumping about paranormal topics. Mothman is a wonder to behold

The Dude is mostly a shut-in. He may go out to run errands, play frisbee with his dog and scope out the alternative/goth nightclubs JUST for the music to hear new artists. But he otherwise feels most comfortable homebound.

One of The Dude’s favorite past times is what he calls “Junkin’”. This is when he runs to a junkyard to collect stuff that he finds neat. He also loves to take out his anger by shooting at scrapmetal and breaking glass

He might practice misanthropy, but he hates bigoted people (which are one of the many reasons he became misanthropic in the first place).

If he could make more money, he wishes to be able to travel to Japan. He thinks it looks beautiful over there and wonders if it’s more peaceful than the shithole town he’s stuck in

He can talk to the demon in his dreams. He often is afraid to sleep because of it, so he forces himself some nights to stay up all night until it fails and he crashes to sleep at 2am. It’s always taunting him how he’ll inevitably burn in hell unless he gives in his divine purpose to cleanse the Earth.

#postal #postal 1 #postal 1997 #postal 97 #postal dude #postal 1 dude #postal dude 1 #writing #cw violence #tw violence #tw guns #p1 dude #p1dude #tw religious guilt #tw religious trauma #tw religious mention #tw piss mention

78 notes · View notes

spop-romanticizes-abuse · 4 months

Text

tumblr was being buggy today and this ask got deleted but i do have screencap of it, so i'm gonna answer it here.

hi! first off, thank you and i appreciate you being so civil about this.

i understand what you mean. i wasn't raised in a religious cult so i may not know the nuances of that experience but my problem does not lie solely with catra's toxic behaviour in s1-4. what i dislike is her redemption arc.

if you've read some of my previous posts, you might know that i was never against catra having a redemption arc. i don't think she's irredeemable. i do sympathize with her and i think it would be a powerful message if she really was able to become a kind and compassionate person, after all the hurt that she went through.

i just have a problem with how rushed and frankly unrealistic her redemption was. i wanted to see a drawn out redemption arc where catra makes amends for everything she has done, and earn the trust and forgiveness of the other characters. but instead of doing that, the creators decided that it was easier to have the other characters forgive her unprompted and to have catra act basically the same as she always did.

also, while catra was raised in a cult-like environment, what i find interesting is that the horde has almost no effect on her. catra was definitely very traumatized by shadow weaver's abuse, but there was nothing even close to religious trauma.

she knew from the beginning that the horde was evil, she wasn't taken in by the lies like adora was. i feel like the religious trauma reference falls apart there because catra was working for the horde in her own interest, not because she was forced or manipulated into doing so.

i have mentioned shadow weaver in my blog as well, i just don't go into detail about her abuse because i think the show was pretty straightforward and countless other people have done deep dives on it. shadow weaver was meant to be an unlikeable character anyway, we weren't supposed to sympathize with her or relate to her.

you said that catra was trying so hard to redeem herself. i would like to hear a clarification on that because as far as i can see, she wasn't trying at all. she went back to lashing out at adora, calling her names and guilt tripping her as soon as she was rescued from horde prime. not even a thank you. she doesn't address angella's death at all and glimmer seems to have completely forgotten about it. she still makes unsavory jokes about the princesses after she spend four seasons colonizing and destroying their kingdoms. her apology to entrapta and scorpia was half-assed, to say the least.

catra wasn't trying hard. the other characters just magically forgave her for all her war crimes because that's what the writers wanted. and she definitely did not deserve to get into a relationship with the person who she had been relentlessly abusing, both physically and emotionally, and trying to murder.

i get that a lot of people relate to catra and i'm not saying that anyone who relates to her is automatically toxic. even i relate to certain parts of her. but that doesn't mean she's a good character.

you said it takes time to unlearn toxic behaviours and i completely agree. (also i wouldn't consider 21 “a kid”. she's young, sure, but she's still an adult.) but if the writers cared about that, they would have redeemed catra earlier. they had five seasons to work with, most shows don't get that liberty. avatar the last airbender gave zuko an incredible redemption arc in just three seasons, the owl house wrote a believable redemption for hunter and amity in just one season each, infinity train wrote a good redemption arc for grace in only ten episodes! you can't use the “there was no time” excuse.

you have to keep in mind that a lot of people who hate catra and her arc are also people who relate to her. a lot of my mutuals relate to catra and her struggles, and that's exactly why they hoped for a better redemption arc. they wanted to see her work on her mistakes, face the consequences of her actions and change realistically. they didn't want to see her just get forgiven out of the blue. imagine if that's how we treated war criminals in real life.

if i was like catra and i heavily related to her, i wouldn't want to see her never face the consequences of her actions and be coddled. i wouldn't want that for myself either. if i made some serious mistakes (especially to the extent that catra had), i would be prepared to face the consequences of my actions and i wouldn't expect anyone to forgive me.

anyway, sorry about the long post but i hope this gives you an idea of why i have a problem with catra and spop as a whole.

#spop critical #spop salt #spop #spop criticism #spop discourse #she ra #anti catra #anti catradora #anti spop #anti c//a #antic//a #anticatra #anticatradora #tw abuse #tw religious trauma #tw religious guilt #tw cult

29 notes · View notes

s1llycilantro · 2 years

Text

May God, who has enlightened every heart, help you to know your sins and trust in his mercy, Amen.

380 notes · View notes

resident-cake-anon · 7 months

Text

fictional depictions of the following: implications and/or mentions of childhood sa, religious guilt/trauma, injuries, partial/implied nudity

[fe oc week] oct. 12th I tragedy

"i remember trying to wash the sin off my body...scrubbing away until my skin was red. even now, i can still feel it.."

Broken Vows

❀ catalina's father became a vassal to the knights of seiros for the sake of his family, especially for his daughter to have a better life than he once did

❀ in exchange for his pledge of loyalty, he asked for the monastery and the knights to protect and care for his daughter considering his work would occupy him

❀ they agreed, they vowed that no harm would come to her under their care

❀ some stray staff would break this vow whether it be for their own amusement or sick fantasies, the abuse becoming too regular of an occurance

❀ catalina knew that alerting higher members of the staff and church would only jeopardize the relationship they had with her father and family and all they had worked so hard for

❀ so she wore the pain and guilt every day underneath her tattered clothes and bruises, only finding solace in the fairytales and flowers she remembered from her home, yearning for those days of peace to return

❀ days in the sun turned into prolonged visits to the infirmary and hiding away in her room

❀ the more time passes, the more she holds resentment for the church and their broken vows. was it not their negligence that allowed this to happen? was it not their responsibility to protect her? did they not make a sacred vow?

❀ for now, all she can do is surround herself with with the petals and fantasies of the past, one of happier days

24 notes · View notes

dolliecworpse · 11 months

Text

🥀 ｡｡｡ FALSEGODEIC

ᶻ 𝗓 FALSEGODEIC : a gender connected to always doing good deeds, but not because you see yourself as a good person, but rather because you fear punishment if you don’t do them. this gender may feel fearful and fake, as though it is always walking on eggshells.

✎ term and flag by the virtual pup ｡｡｡ coined for day five of @lovesse ‘s event ｡｡｡ tagging @accessmogai for a flag id !

#— ˗ˋ ୨ self indulgent coins ୧ ˊ˗ —#lovesses666 #tw religious guilt #cw religious guilt #just in case #mogai #mogai coining #mogai community #mogai safe #mogai friendly #mogai flag #mogai positivity #mogai gender #mogai identity #mogai label #mogai pride #xenogender #xenogenders #coined by me

49 notes · View notes

clownrecess · 11 months

Note

As an autistic individual myself, I am interested in the intersection of neurodiversity and various identities.

You've mentioned that you identify as a Norse Pagan. I'm curious about how your spiritual beliefs intersect with your neurodivergent experience. Do you find that your autistic identity informs or impacts your spiritual practice in any way?

(Tw for discussions of trauma, religion, etc.)

Sorry for the late-ish response! I've been working on this post a little everyday to make sure I write it how I want it.

I dont think that my autism has impacted my religion or spirtual experiences/beliefs, but my brain as a whole does. (Update: It actually did influence it quite a bit. I'm realizing this after writing this post. So, uh, thank you for helping me realize something that I find quite interesting!)

When I was a kid, I was raised in christianity. I was very religious. I prayed everyday, I had a cross in my room, etc.

But heres the thing: I have OCD. A few different types, but out of those, one of them is religious OCD.

Most of my praying ages late 8-12 was done purely out of fear. At that point I wasnt even really a Christian, I was just really afraid, which really impacted how I viewed religion. I HATED conversation about it because it felt scary and icky to me.

I didn't understand why people would ever want to talk about it. It felt like a very private topic for me, so I figured people who go out of their way to talk about it must be trying to get extra "good points" with god (maybe that bit was caused by autism, actually.).

During that time, I would go through little phases of a month or so at a time in which I would try to "swing the opposite direction". This was around age 10-11. I was developing an intense anger toward the church, and I just wanted to be the opposite of they were, whatever that meant. Because I didn't want to think about religion (due to anxiety around it), I really didn't know what many religious labels actually meant because researching them made me very uncomfortable, so I briefly identified as a satanist (this would be on and off during ages 10-11.) despite really not knowing what that meant. I think I just wanted a way to separate myself from the church as much as possible.

A few months after I turned 12, I felt a really strong urge to research paganism out of nowhere (I didnt even know what "pagan" meant, I just suddenly felt the need to know things about it. It was very random.). It started sort of as a special interest (Maybe autism did influence me more than I thought! Interesting.), and so I would look into a lot of different branches of paganism, focusing most of my research around hellenistic paganism.

A few weeks after this, I had a very interesting experience which I now believe to have been a sign from Freyja (I dont want to go into specifics. It was personal and I want to keep that special to me. I might later, but for now it's just mine. Just know it was a very beautiful thing from her.). DIRECTLY following this event (Maybe an hour or two later), I felt another urge to research things, but this time to be looking into the Norse Gods/Goddesses (which I'd never even heard of at that point.).

At that point I ended up converting to paganism. It was an extremely sudden decision, but it made sense to me.

No matter what religion I had been apart of before, I always felt anxiety and guilt, causing me to try and fix things by becoming excessively religious again in a Christian way. But from the moment I became pagan, I just never had that ever again. It's been the only religion I've ever felt fully safe in.

It's obviously been quite a while since then, and I'm obviously still a Norse Pagan.

Whilst I now love all the gods and goddesses, Freyja will always be especially special to me.

At this point I have worked with: Freyja, Loki, Odin, Beyla, and Njord.

Now, I also think its important to mention another part of my brain that impacts my religious experience: I am in a system.

Nearly all of us identify as Norse Pagans, but we have a few Agnostics as well, a few Eclectic Pagans, an Atheistic Satanist, and a Theistic Satanist.

The primary religious identity within our system is Norse Paganism, with the majority of individuals identifying as followers of this belief system. Due to this, we say we are a Norse Pagan! We are also okay with just being called "Pagan" on it's own, though.

#tw religious trauma #tw religion #tw religious guilt #tw religious mention #religion tw #obsessive compulsive disorder #ocd #actually ocd #religious ocd #norse pagan #eclectic pagan #paganism #theistic satanism

37 notes · View notes

littlemoondarlingarts · 26 days

Text

I know you will never see this. But if you do I hope you know it's for you. I don't know what you're going through. Or what you are feeling. But I hope you know that there are people who genuinely care. And that your past truly doesn't define you. No matter what you did. Or what was done to you. You are here now. And that is what matters. You don't have to prove yourself. You don't have to show them. You don't have to keep thinking about them. They don't deserve your time or your worry. You don't owe anyone anything but still you give so much. I just. I hope you're okay♡♡

#my writing #poem #tw god mention #tw religious themes #tw religious guilt #just incase

7 notes · View notes

aspd-culture · 10 months

Note

is guilt-based anxiety (example: scared of being a burden), depression (example: feeling guilty for being alive, for being a burden and all that low self-esteem nonsense) and guilt/moral-based ocd (example: feeling like youre an abuser or committed a heinous crime that you didnt commit, like S/A-OCD or P-OCD), or themes of guilt in schz (example: delusions where you think youre guilty of having done something you havent, like murder for instance, or hallucinations of voices who encourage the themes stated in the example i gave for depression) or ptsd/trauma (example: for experiencing trauma) etc. possible in aspd? and/or how would these things present in someone with aspd (as opposed to someone without aspd? people w/o ASPD (generally) feel a lot of (genuine) guilt and remorse and i experience... walmart-brand guilt. i feel anxious and "guilty" but only because of 1. whatever remnants of christian doctrination is in my brain 2. my phobias 3. my need for control, or 4. a byproduct of my mental illnesses. (probably a learned thought process for me - its not really natural for me, not really out of care for others (unless you count ocd), and the thought pattern is what ive been told throughout my life/otherwise originated from others)

All of that is very possible and actually very relevant to my experience as a pwASPD, as well as OCD, PTSD, and religious trauma. Hopefully that means I can give you a relatively in-depth explanation of what this feels like for me firsthand.

So all of these types of Great Value guilt are moreso examples of shame. Religious trauma causes shame, guilt OCD is generally a misnomer for shame, and shame is a *major* symptom of clinical depression and of PTSD. Shame is a more personal take on guilt, in that it affects your opinion of who you are as a person, and it can (and often does) exist outside of actually having done something wrong both in prosocials and pwASPD. Guilt is an instinct when you have done something wrong to admit it and work to change the behavior in the future and make up for the harm it caused or had the potential to cause. Shame doesn’t care if you’ve actually wronged anyone nor does it care if you change the behavior in the future - and it doesn’t believe you can *ever* make up for it. Shame says you are a terrible horrible no-good very bad person because of *insert reason* and for that you must work your ass off to try to be redeemed while knowing you are never ever going to be. Shame is irrational while guilt is (considered by prosocials to be) rational.

In pwASPD, shame tends to be polarizing. I have talked to pwASPD who felt shame *much* more intensely because they had no experience with guilt to temper it, so the feeling was entirely foreign (this is how I experience it, although I’ve done some work to unlearn that), and I’ve met other pwASPD who can completely ignore the feeling of shame because they can easily identify it as not beneficial and therefore ignore it. I think part of it depends on how you take on things like ableism as well - it seems to correlate that people who don’t internalize any ableism are better at pushing away feelings of shame, whilst people like me who struggle with internalizing ableism are more distressed by shame.

It’s also worth noting that shame specifically associated with PTSD from the same place that led to the ASPD (so in other words, related to childhood trauma) can end up being the pwASPD’s only definition of guilt, and feel very all-encompassing because of that. They may feel haunted by any little thing they do that would have been wrong in the eyes of the person who caused the trauma. This can result in a pwASPD who is very timid and/or shows few symptoms. In my case, issues with this led me to lean away from the more obvious symptoms of my ASPD, which is why I had to fight myself on whether or not I truly had it before I was diagnosed. I was fairly meek for most of my life, and the classic behaviors many pwASPD experience like violent outbursts leading to breaking things and/or hurting animals or other children, breaking rules and defying authority, etc. was, for me, replaced by the more covert versions of those things. I broke things - but they were my things that I knew wouldn’t be missed. I would get bursts of rage and take it out on things I knew could take it or that I could excuse as being lost, or better yet, things that could have easily been broken by other means. For example, I had a tendency to break pencils when I was angry, so I would intentionally pick up any pencils I found on the floor at school and break *those* when I was angry, and for the same reason I washed and saved popsicle sticks “for arts and crafts”. I fell into the manipulation and deception (besides of my main caregiver who is an Exception) side more than the rule-breaking and violence side due to that trauma. The shame for the actions was something I could only tolerate if I could tell myself “nobody but you knows what you did” or “the only thing you broke are things that don’t mean anything to anybody and would be in the trash otherwise”.

I would say the biggest thing that pwASPD dealing with that intense shame feeling would do differently than most other pwASPD is to appear more “in control”. ASPD forms from trauma, so if that traumatic shame (and yes, growing up with OCD without knowing it and without having safe support *is* very often traumatic) is constantly beating on you as a part of the trauma, certain symptoms may not show up the same way as they would for someone where they didn’t have that. It’s not the same as not doing something because you can control the urge/impulse - what I’ve described here is just redirection of said impulse - and it’s not the same as feeling guilt. It’s a symptom of one or multiple other disorders playing in tandem with the ASPD symptoms.

As for how pwASPD deal with this shame compared to prosocials, I would say that it has the potential seriously numb us in a way that it doesn’t to prosocials. Generally, prosocials have a better idea of how to identify between the feelings of guilt vs shame, which is how most of them learn to recognize and act on one while not taking in the other. At the point where they can’t, it usually creates an anxiety disorder on top of whatever is causing the shame. In pwASPD however, if we feel shame like this, it often makes us even *less* receptive to the feeling of true guilt. For those of us who easily ignore the shame, guilt just gets lumped in with that and they move on, and for those of us that internalize the shame, guilt pales in comparison and we don’t see it as intrusive enough to listen to.

All of this is, as always, fairly anecdotal, but this is how I experience it combined with how people I have talked to describe it. It’s worth noting that many elitists will claim that feeling shame means you can’t have ASPD. I simply do not have the bandwidth to go into the details of *how ridiculous* that is right now, but it is in no way true. There is zero reason, in my opinion, to say that a symptom of another disorder cannot exist at the same time as ASPD. Afaik, there is currently no disorder that excludes you from the diagnosis of ASPD. The only disorders that even come close are bipolar disorder, schizophrenia/other disorders causing psychosis, and substance abuse disorder - but none of these truly exclude you from an ASPD diagnosis, they just require extra examination to make sure the symptoms do not only occur when manic, in psychosis, or while h1gh/drvnk respectively.

Sorry if this is a bit of a novel, I’m getting used to being back and trying to be concise again.

#tw trauma #tw ptsd #tw ocd #tw shame #tw religious guilt #tw religion #aspd-culture-is #aspd culture is #aspd culture #actually aspd #aspd #aspd awareness #actually antisocial #antisocial personality disorder #aspd traits #anons welcome

25 notes · View notes

basu-shokikita · 3 months

Text

Birthday fic for @dalberadiata, once again based on her wonderful AU I wrote a fic for last week!

Happy Birthday Dal, thank you for letting me ramble about Skwistok with you 💖💖 please enjoy your gift 🥳🎁

#metalocalypse #toki wartooth #skwisgaar skwigelf #skwistok #anja wartooth #aslaug wartooth #my writing #no beta we die like men etc #tw religious guilt #tw child abuse

24 notes · View notes

yourlocalmissingtexture · 1 month

Text

I’m not feeling great so I’m gonna quickly (“quickly” lol) infodump about a character of mine. Well, two of them. One is based on history so their info might be a bit shaky, just an fyi.

Introducing: Cecilia/Lamare!

Cecilia Perrot was born in 1330 in France and was surrendered to a monastery due to her parents being unable to care for her. She saw the onset of the Hundred Years War and petitioned St. Michael frequently.

When the Black Death swept through her area in 1348, she and her convent did what they were able to help the sick but to no avail. Frustrated, she left the convent and took on a masculine disguise so that she could work as a plague doctor outside of the monastery (which was proving to be more like a death house than a hospital). She felt better being “freelance” so to speak but still felt guilty and afraid. If these were the end times, she worried she’d be denied entry to heaven because she failed so thoroughly: as a convent sister, as a doctor, and as a woman.

During one intense bout of prayer she had a vision of St. Michael and St. Raphael, who praised her efforts but also let her know that her work would kill her. They assured her that if she kept up what she was doing that she was basically guaranteed entry into heaven.

Seems peachy, right? Well…

Enter Lamare (true name Lahar-harah), a demon*. He is rather small and weak physically and resembles a stereotypical goat-legs-and-horns demon, but his psychic and magical abilities are profound. He was lurking around France at the time, leeching energy from people who mistook him for a grotesque (gargoyle minus the water spout!) or who fell under his influence of persuasion.

One day Cecilia finds him and while initially frightened feels compelled to interact with him without invoking the name of Jesus. She felt she could bring him to the light. For all her brightness in her mind and all the kindness in her heart, this was unfortunately part of Lamare’s plan. He waited until she was especially close and vulnerable before he made his move and possessed her, pushing her soul into the depths of her psyche and leaving him to pilot her body.

Before he wasn’t very capable of interacting with the physical world, but now he had a body! A former nun’s body, even! How ironic! He’d make good use of it, keeping it alive far longer than a body was meant to last via his powers.

While in her stolen body, he enjoyed intentionally botching surgeries, dental procedures, embalmings, and anything else that involved the corruption of the flesh. Thanks to his abilities, however, he was never reprimanded. He also took classes in Oxford in 1503, ventured across the ocean to watch the American Civil War unfold, and researched poison dart frogs in the Amazon while the French Revolution was ongoing.

During all of this, Cecilia grew distant from reality at first. The violence and sadism wore heavily on her conscious, as did the general knowledge that her trusting a demon got her into this mess to begin with. No way she was going to heaven now. At points she felt she got some kind of pleasure from the cruelty she was forced to partake in, which worsened her guilt significantly. But she remained hopeful, deep down. Hopeful she’d be able to be herself again someday. Hopeful that maybe God would have mercy on her for her grave mistake and that those she watched slip away by her own distant hand would forgive her as well, perhaps.

Oh also Cecilia is agender. She still uses she/her pronouns and likes being called Cecil sometimes. Lamare is masc and uses he/him. Do not call him Lammy.

* For context, angels & demons in this universe are the same kind of entity, the difference being that angels are subservient to someone (compare to being employed) and demons aren’t (like working freelance).

#talking to myself #character info #infodump #oc infodump #cecilia/lamare (ocs)#my ocs #oc info #yourlocalmissingtexture #my writing #tw catholicism #tw demons #tw possession #tw religious guilt #if I’m missing a tag lmk

4 notes · View notes