aintashes

[aintashes]

hi besties !! a little announcement:

my apartment complex just announced that it's renovating all of its apartments, which is great for me irl but it means that i have a lot of work ahead of me to do as they're asking and prepare my space for the work getting done.

it also means that there are going to be maintenance workers in here for 4-5 days, which is going to cause a lot of disruption for us— especially because my husband works from home. i want to write, but this is also going to be a stressful time period for me and i might be much more likely to just sit down and play video games to decompress.

so i guess you could consider this a little bit of a semi-hiatus notice. i don't have any set date yet for when these things are happening yet but i know it'll be soon. just expect me to be relatively sparse on the dash unless it's coming from my queue !

tl;dr: this is a semi-hiatus notice because lots of stuff is going on irl ! i'll be around but not as much as usual !

#notice.

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how have his childhood & adolescent experiences impacted the relationships he forms in adulthood? (:

send me questions you have about daryl — currently accepting !

oooh, this is such a good question and it's a topic i love to talk about ! thank you so much for letting me ramble about this, lmao !

this is also going to have to be under a read more, because it is a massive behemoth of a post. proceed with caution and bear in mind triggers for child abuse, neglect, death / grief, etc !

so... we all know that daryl was abused and neglected as a child ( by his mother, father, and brother ), as a teen ( by his father and brother ), and well into his adulthood ( by his brother and the type of company he kept ). there's no question about it, and the severity of the abuse he endured has definitely had a massive influence on the way he navigates his adult relationships.

you can see him struggle a ton with this while merle is still alive in the first 3 seasons of the show. merle makes daryl feel like he's all daryl has—

because family, kin, blood, comes before all else, right? it doesn't matter how much i abused you growing up and still abuse you now, because i'm your big brother and i know what's best for you, always. i spent years trying to make a man of you, so you owe me something. you're worthless without me and you have been since you were born. i'm older, i'm wiser, i always protected you even though i abandoned you at the drop of a hat every time i could to get away from the man we both suffered under our whole lives. i'm the only one who cares about you. nobody else will ever care about you. just me.

—and it's to the point where daryl literally leaves people who are better for him in every way in order to rough it on his own with merle. even when daryl decides that enough is enough, that he'd rather go be with people who appreciate him and give him a much better life, he still lets merle come back with him ( despite his awful behavior while they're on their own, such as merle's aggression with the family on the bridge ). he tells rick that if the group wants daryl to stay, then they must accept merle back into the fold even if they don't like him.

the degree to which daryl is so easily manipulated by his brother is astounding, but that's how that kind of abuse goes. they make you feel worthless, like you're nothing without them, like they made you the person you are and that you should be grateful to them— and if you ever try to leave them, to detach yourself from their hold over you, they make you feel like you're the piece of shit who doesn't care; like you are the one who's done wrong, not them.

and it leads into daryl being easily manipulated by people like rick, for example. there are countless times throughout the show where daryl does as rick asks of him even though he vehemently disagrees and / or doesn't want to, and every single time there's an overarching theme of do this because i need you to. because we're family, and that's what family does for one another. it's very much the same sentiment that merle instilled in daryl from a young age, and it's something that rick has literally seen merle to do daryl before but it's still something he chooses to knowingly repeat. it's a dynamic that becomes even more interesting the more daryl refers to rick as his brother ( and i could go on about this forever, but this post isn't just about the way that rick treats daryl. that can come sometime later ).

but then there are people like carol— daryl's best friend above all others from the very beginning. the woman he would do anything for. you don't have to look too deeply into their relationship to understand that part of the reason they get along so well is because of their similar backgrounds of abuse and neglect. even after years and years, the fact that their tight bond began and persisted because of their traumas is still referenced ( in season 10 ep 1, daryl's quote: sometimes i think we're just surviving one fight to the next. / and carol's response: it was like that for you and me before all this ).

i think it's important to acknowledge how daryl's history and experiences play so hard into the bonds he makes with other trauma survivors ( specifically trauma pre-outbreak, because yeah, everyone suffers horrific traumas once the dead begin to walk ). it carries over into his relationships with people like leah ( see this post for my thoughts on their relationship and why it's strictly platnoic ) and with lydia.

lydia is actually a really big one, too, because she's the most prevalent example of an abused child / teenager who daryl can bond with and who he sees himself in. during the time that he meets and gets to know lydia, however, he's in a position where he's more healed and has let go of much of his past life. it lets him relate to her, but it also lets him reach out to her. help her. show her that she doesn't have to stick by the side of someone who is / was atrociously abusing her. it goes back to him choosing merle over the people who actually cared for him— lydia is sort of an opportunity for daryl to come full circle and show the audience just how much he has healed in a lot of different ways ( even though he does still display some aggressive and stubborn behaviors. this is daryl we're talking about, after all ).

moving on, i can't talk about how daryl's past impacts his relationships without talking about his guilt and shame. this could be a whole separate post in itself because there's just so much to it, but i feel like it needs to be at least touched on here.

i believe it goes without saying that guilt and shame are two very large parts of what makes childhood trauma so debilitating. there's an air of responsibility that comes with it, like you need to set aside your own needs and dissociate from them in order to do and be what others need you to do and be ( people-pleasing ). and a lot of times, the guilt comes in when you push yourself so far that you break.

some examples of this are: not being able to find / save sophia, especially with her being another abused child and after he felt like the only person who cared enough besides her own mother to go looking for her; not being able to save beth at grady memorial after she became such a good friend to him in their solo travels after the tragedy of the prison falling; being taken advantage of by dwight, which eventually results in denise's death and daryl running off to go find him ( which then further results in michonne, rosita, and glenn being captured alongside him by the saviors and ending up being included in negan's lineup ).

the common thread between all of these events is that daryl feels like he's let his people down. maggie even has to pull him aside after he escapes the saviors to tell him that glenn's death was not his fault, and that he doesn't need to carry that shame with him.

and then there's the guilt he feels surrounding his reactivity throughout the show: for example, when daryl is tasked with leading their people away from the saviors after the fall of alexandria, he gets in tara's face for letting dwight go. his outburst frightens judith, which is perhaps the only thing that stops him from continuing to escalate. this leads into his shame surrounding children in general, as well— he is good with kids, as evidenced by his uncle daryl status with judith and rj, but one of the main themes of his time as their acting parent later in the show is that he has no idea what he's doing. he's never had a frame of reference for what actual good parenting looks like, and he constantly asks himself what rick would do instead of trusting in himself that he won't turn out to be what his own father was.

to make a very long story much, much shorter... the way that daryl's family treated him at large before the outbreak culminates in: intense trust issues; self-sacrificial behavior; people-pleasing; poor emotional regulation / reactivity; self-doubt / self-loathing; a deep fear of abandonment, yet the need for extreme emotional distance from others; dissociation from personal needs; feelings of unworthiness when it comes to relationships; struggles with emotional intimacy; hypervigilance; avoidant behaviors; confusion and unsettling feelings surrounding close relationships; and more.

it's also worth it to note that daryl does work through these feelings and trauma responses throughout the show ! you can see how much progress he makes as he gets closer to people in the group and how much he really begins to blossom into his own person without the influence of his old life hanging over him.

there are so many other things i could have mentioned, too. i didn't mention how daryl's trademark quiet nature is in itself fueled by his trauma ( what has talking ever gotten him? most likely, a beating ). how his willingness to sacrifice himself for the people he loves comes, in part, from his past.

and to that point, i never mentioned how daryl's physical body and the things he went through as a child and adolescent shape the way he interacts with people. how he shies away from physical touch until much, much later in the show. how his bodily autonomy is almost always in question ( and if you're curious about that, i have a post on it here ) and how every piece of his body has been used over and over again, down to the very blood in his veins being sold for money as a child.

i also didn't dive into how he's such a good judge of character that it's literally spelled out for you and mentioned countless times throughout the show, but that when he's faced with one of his abusers asking him to go away with him, he does it even though merle is a terrible, awful, horrific, piece of shit person— which just goes to show you how deeply ingrained the trauma bond between him and merle really was. and, beyond that, how trust issues because of childhood trauma made it so difficult to really put his faith in the group when merle was in his ear telling him that daryl didn't need them. that they didn't actually care about him at all.

i never even got into his older brother-little sister relationship with beth, and how she was the first person to help him let go of a huge piece of his old life by burning down the old shack. and i didn't talk about how easily he's able to talk about merle when he tells connie the story about the boat.

all in all, there are countless ways in which daryl's childhood and adolescent experiences impact his adult relationships. so many that there are still more than this, but i feel like i have to stop now because this has gotten so long ! thank you so much for the question !!

#so proud of this one fr #proud enough that i’m reblogging LOL #rubs my little hands together— feel free to send me more questions about my boy !

[aintashes]

I like your style

#soulbond. ( peter graham / painmon ) #painmon #i should'a queue'd ya.

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Some people are just born to fight, I think.

It’s not that they’re born brave. It’s not that they’re born strong. It’s just that the universe has decided that this one, this one will have grit and fire and steel in their blood. And it’ll be tested, this cosmic mettle of theirs. They’ll face trial after trial, be broken and damaged in countless ways.

But this one was born to fight. Maybe it’s not the life they would have chosen. Maybe they’d love to lay down their arms. But they were born to fight. It’s what they know. It’s what they do best. It’s all they can do.

#codex. ( daryl dixon ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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i am a sucker for the typical stoic fictional man who is actually so soft for his s/o. who buries his nose into the crook of your neck and wraps his arms around your waist whenever he can. maybe he’s not always good with his words, but for you? god. he literally hands you his heart on a silver platter

#this is daryl about peter after the soul bond happens #painmon #if we ever get far apart; i'll still feel the pull of you. ( painmon ) #you and me then? ( peter / daryl ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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Talking about the scene where Daryl beats Fat Joey to death with the pipe on Talking Dead Ep. 708

#codex. ( daryl dixon ) #ugh. just. yeah. ugh ! #i have so many feelings about this scene always #i should'a queue'd ya. #death // #violence // #murder //

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@othunderous said: ‘ you should see the other guy. ’

other guy? does he mean ten other guys? or better yet, twenty? because that's how many people daryl feels like it would take to leave someone as sturdy as thor as bloodied and beaten as he is right now. but no matter what happened to him and no matter how many people it took to make it so, the notion that there could still be danger lurking nearby hangs in the air.

‘ how fuckin' big was the other guy? ’ daryl asks, disbelief coloring his words as he begins to lead thor into the relative safety of the walls of alexandria. his eyes dart to either side to check their surroundings, but upon seeing nothing particularly out of the ordinary, daryl signals to the alexandrians on watch to keep an eye out. the last thing any of them need is something ( or more likely, someone ) ambushing the walls.

the infirmary isn't too far away once they cross the threshold of the front gates. as he encourages thor in the right direction, daryl can't help the seed of dread that slowly begins to plant itself into the fertile soil of his gut instincts. it begins to grow and blossom with immediate unease:

to thor of all people, who could have done this? his mind flickers through every tragedy, every awful twist of fate to befall daryl's family over the past decade— the wolves, the saviors, the whisperers, the reapers... all a little bit worse in some aspects than the last, all taking the lives of his people without mercy. something inside of him clenches with anxiety, the concern that this could be the beginning of yet another terrible stroke of luck heavy on his mind.

‘ the hell happened?— y'need stitches. c'mon. ’

#othunderous #tag tbd. ( othunderous ) #starter. ( closed ) #memes. ( answered ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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daryl's gaze drops to the floor between them. his thoughts are heavy in his mind, piling up and pressing down on his very soul like they have actual weight to them. he knows that peter means well with his words; it warms daryl's heart that he's sitting there listening to him at all. but there's still so much he doesn't know, so many details that are missing from the full picture. it makes it difficult to continue when he feels like there's such a need for constant exposition.

at the same time, however, explanations are something daryl is finding himself more and more willing to provide. peter could just as well have let it all be— he could have set his things down and shoved his nose into his spellbook without another word about any of it. he certainly didn't have to open up about his feelings, or ask daryl any questions. but he did. and now here they are.

‘ lucky you avoided 'em, ’ he says, a somber note to his voice as he looks at his companion. he can't imagine what it might have been like for peter to be stuck like that— trying to avoid the eyes of the saviors while, at the same time, trying his best to run from the ever-encroaching hands of the cult. a rabbit caught between two big, hungry wolves, hiding in the burrows and brush until there's enough of an opening to slip by.

it's a damn good thing peter is so good at hiding and running. daryl hesitates to consider where he, and the world at large, might be if he wasn't.

‘ thing is, it wasn't just us. ’ daryl takes his lower lip into his mouth, biting at it with his teeth. that day is so vivid in his mind: bright red spilling out of negan and onto the dirt; the glint of stained glass shining in the afternoon sun; the feeling of an unnaturally calm breeze carding through his hair; the smell of gunpowder and blood all around him; maggie's desperate screams for rick to end it.

if there's anyone who had the right to see negan dead stripped away from them, it's her. the widow. but daryl knows that she's not the only one who feels stripped of justice.

‘ when rick made that call, he didn't just make a call for alexandria. he made it for everyone. for three other communities who fought, an' died, an' wanted to see 'im gone 'cause that's what we all agreed on. s'what we kept losin' battles for— so we could win the war. ’

he hesitates for a long moment as a debate begins inside of his mind: should he tell peter that negan is, in fact, alive and well inside of a cushy cell somewhere in alexandria? it's not that he wants to hide anything from his traveling companion. the whole underlying theme of this conversation seems to be the act of opening up, after all. but he fears what peter might say, or more importantly, what he might try if he knew.

in the end, he decides that he can't hold back on being honest. not with peter. so it's with a detectable level of shameful unease that he continues.

‘ but rick an' michonne— they kept him alive. stuck 'im in a jail cell. said they were usin' him as an example for the future; that rottin' in a cell an' watchin' the new world go by without 'im was a better punishment than killin' him. s'another reason i ain't been back here in a few years, ’ daryl says softly, lips pressing into a thin line. he hasn't even mentioned some of the inhuman levels of brutality that negan would stoop to, or the torture that daryl himself endured at the saviors' hands. ‘ couldn't stand to be in the same place as him. ’

           he gets the impression that this is a conversation daryl has needed to have for a long time, as much as he may not have wanted to. his confessions are made with such a palpable weight that even after years of not practising empathy, peter feels bad for him. for the position he and his people were forced into.

           the saviors, huh...? he swears he's heard that name before...

           ❛ ...well, i wasn't there. but from where i'm standing, it doesn't seem that hard to work out why you feel that way, ❜ peter says warily, eyes now focused on the floor. even from the minimal detail he's been given, an image fuelled by anxiety has started to take shape in his mind; one of tyrannical servitude, the definition of living on one's knees. he tries to picture daryl knelt, taking orders that ultimately serve another, but his mind rejects it completely. ❛ i mean, these people hurt your friends. killed them. you don't need to be a mathematician to solve this equation. ❜

           peter tries to envision what it would be like to be part of a group of people he cares about, but the truth is that he can't. he had it briefly with ronnie and his crew, but that was around twelve years ago now; he couldn't even use his family, shattered as it was, as a frame of reference. while he knows he'd have done a lot to preserve his sister's safety as a boy, he knows he'd never have been in the position necessary to kill over it.

           worriedly, his teeth catch his bottom lip, a pensive glint in his eyes as he works out whether to say what's on his mind or not. he has opinions... but as somebody not involved in the crisis, he doesn't entirely know if they'd be appreciated or not. he only seeks to connect with daryl— to offer some kind of reprieve from the disconnect this disagreement seems to have caused, however isolated an incident it may be— but he runs the risk of running his mouth regarding something he knows nothing about.

           ❛ ... he might be the leader of this place, but rick didn't have any right to just change the plan like that. i'm assuming you all made it together. decided as a group what you'd do? i can, um... understand, if you felt like you had a right stripped from you. ❜ peter frowns, his head ducking. it's bothering him now, trying to figure out how he's come about the name of this mysterious group on his own. it's familiar. he knows that much. ❛ he was supposed to die. and now... what? he's just out there? he was let go? or they're being held somewhere. which— i don't see the point in. i just don't. people need to stop pretending this is the old world. even with walls and people, that time's gone. it's not all bad that it's gone, either. ❜ people pay an apt price for their cruelty now.

           after all, if they're not dead like the plan originally outlined, what else could have happened to them? it isn't as if a group as large as theirs was—

           ❛ oh, i remember... ❜ peter mutters to himself, a look of recognition crossing his face as he finally looks back up at daryl. ❛ the saviors, you said? yeah, i'm pretty sure i had a run-in with that crowd. ❜

           it's coming back to him now; the stakeout in the woods while these teams of men he didn't know had assembled and attempted to look for him. he'd stayed all but buried in leaves for several days, moving little by little; as they manoeuvred their way around the trees, so too did peter, until he was clear of their vehicles ( threateningly parked in the way of the road, no less ) and out into the great beyond. at the time, he hadn't understood why they'd done so much to try and catch one man. though peter supposed they didn't know he was alone overall, how many supplies could a single person really have on them? with daryl's account to consider, the implications are less than savoury.

           ❛ i hid from them for days. they were really persistent. i got through without any trouble in the end, but it was scary... i just got the feeling that they were bad. ❜ though, given peter's paranoia, that's not particularly strange of him to think. he'd thought daryl would hurt him at first, and he certainly hasn't yet warmed up to the idea of dealing with an entire community. ❛ guess my gut didn't fail me that time. ❜

#this conversation is legitimately reducing me to tears killjoy #if we ever get far apart; i'll still feel the pull of you. ( painmon ) #painmon

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daryl can't claim to know exactly how emilia would retaliate for the twizzler incident. for all he knows she would be perfectly content to pull a worse prank on him than this, and the thought leaves him with an uneasiness that wasn't there mere moments ago. it's not like she's cruel— he doesn't assume that she would do something so drastic that it would really make him upset, but who knows? maybe she'll dump a bucket of cold water on him while he's sleeping, or something.

whatever it could be, he's assuredly had much, much worse growing up with the likes of merle. so if putting ten, twenty, or a hundred flowers in his hair is her idea of getting back at him for eating worms in front of her, he'll absolutely take it.

‘ yeah? ’ he says with a small smirk, looking to her from his own spot on the ground. although their friendship is still relatively new, this kind of back-and-forth has come somewhat naturally to them. in a gentle breeze that flows by them, the petals of the flower flutter and its leaves brush like feathers against freckled skin.

‘ m' i gonna have'ta keep on lookout for you? sleep with one eye open? ’

it’s difficult to tell which out of the two of them might just be the most surprised that her little drive - by - flowering had been successful — he’s sitting there looking completely flummoxed while she’s an escaping giggle or two shy of going full - on cheshire cat when she sits herself down an arm’s length away. she allows herself to bask in her little victory while she settles herself on the ground, a good part of her curious to see what he’s going to do with the accessory he’s acquired with no warning.

"you think this is how i'd retaliate for the twizzlers?" she’s still doing her best not to let the smile on her face get too broad when he brings up the incident, opting to simply shrug instead. “...... might be.”

giving up her angle seems like a bad idea anyway, as does gloating about one little flower; especially if she’s looking to give that one little purple blossom some friends. ( which of course she is, meaning she already has another stem at the ready pinched gently between her fingers; the purple petals slowly twirling back and forth with a roll of her thumb ) but it’s difficult not to smile while he’s sitting there trying to figure out the 'why' of it all.

"maybe i'll even go full flower crown on you when you aren't looking."

#florrentine #in the quiet light. ( main verse ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

[aintashes]

how have his childhood & adolescent experiences impacted the relationships he forms in adulthood? (:

send me questions you have about daryl — currently accepting !

oooh, this is such a good question and it's a topic i love to talk about ! thank you so much for letting me ramble about this, lmao !

this is also going to have to be under a read more, because it is a massive behemoth of a post. proceed with caution and bear in mind triggers for child abuse, neglect, death / grief, etc !

so... we all know that daryl was abused and neglected as a child ( by his mother, father, and brother ), as a teen ( by his father and brother ), and well into his adulthood ( by his brother and the type of company he kept ). there's no question about it, and the severity of the abuse he endured has definitely had a massive influence on the way he navigates his adult relationships.

you can see him struggle a ton with this while merle is still alive in the first 3 seasons of the show. merle makes daryl feel like he's all daryl has—

because family, kin, blood, comes before all else, right? it doesn't matter how much i abused you growing up and still abuse you now, because i'm your big brother and i know what's best for you, always. i spent years trying to make a man of you, so you owe me something. you're worthless without me and you have been since you were born. i'm older, i'm wiser, i always protected you even though i abandoned you at the drop of a hat every time i could to get away from the man we both suffered under our whole lives. i'm the only one who cares about you. nobody else will ever care about you. just me.

—and it's to the point where daryl literally leaves people who are better for him in every way in order to rough it on his own with merle. even when daryl decides that enough is enough, that he'd rather go be with people who appreciate him and give him a much better life, he still lets merle come back with him ( despite his awful behavior while they're on their own, such as merle's aggression with the family on the bridge ). he tells rick that if the group wants daryl to stay, then they must accept merle back into the fold even if they don't like him.

the degree to which daryl is so easily manipulated by his brother is astounding, but that's how that kind of abuse goes. they make you feel worthless, like you're nothing without them, like they made you the person you are and that you should be grateful to them— and if you ever try to leave them, to detach yourself from their hold over you, they make you feel like you're the piece of shit who doesn't care; like you are the one who's done wrong, not them.

and it leads into daryl being easily manipulated by people like rick, for example. there are countless times throughout the show where daryl does as rick asks of him even though he vehemently disagrees and / or doesn't want to, and every single time there's an overarching theme of do this because i need you to. because we're family, and that's what family does for one another. it's very much the same sentiment that merle instilled in daryl from a young age, and it's something that rick has literally seen merle to do daryl before but it's still something he chooses to knowingly repeat. it's a dynamic that becomes even more interesting the more daryl refers to rick as his brother ( and i could go on about this forever, but this post isn't just about the way that rick treats daryl. that can come sometime later ).

but then there are people like carol— daryl's best friend above all others from the very beginning. the woman he would do anything for. you don't have to look too deeply into their relationship to understand that part of the reason they get along so well is because of their similar backgrounds of abuse and neglect. even after years and years, the fact that their tight bond began and persisted because of their traumas is still referenced ( in season 10 ep 1, daryl's quote: sometimes i think we're just surviving one fight to the next. / and carol's response: it was like that for you and me before all this ).

i think it's important to acknowledge how daryl's history and experiences play so hard into the bonds he makes with other trauma survivors ( specifically trauma pre-outbreak, because yeah, everyone suffers horrific traumas once the dead begin to walk ). it carries over into his relationships with people like leah ( see this post for my thoughts on their relationship and why it's strictly platnoic ) and with lydia.

lydia is actually a really big one, too, because she's the most prevalent example of an abused child / teenager who daryl can bond with and who he sees himself in. during the time that he meets and gets to know lydia, however, he's in a position where he's more healed and has let go of much of his past life. it lets him relate to her, but it also lets him reach out to her. help her. show her that she doesn't have to stick by the side of someone who is / was atrociously abusing her. it goes back to him choosing merle over the people who actually cared for him— lydia is sort of an opportunity for daryl to come full circle and show the audience just how much he has healed in a lot of different ways ( even though he does still display some aggressive and stubborn behaviors. this is daryl we're talking about, after all ).

moving on, i can't talk about how daryl's past impacts his relationships without talking about his guilt and shame. this could be a whole separate post in itself because there's just so much to it, but i feel like it needs to be at least touched on here.

i believe it goes without saying that guilt and shame are two very large parts of what makes childhood trauma so debilitating. there's an air of responsibility that comes with it, like you need to set aside your own needs and dissociate from them in order to do and be what others need you to do and be ( people-pleasing ). and a lot of times, the guilt comes in when you push yourself so far that you break.

some examples of this are: not being able to find / save sophia, especially with her being another abused child and after he felt like the only person who cared enough besides her own mother to go looking for her; not being able to save beth at grady memorial after she became such a good friend to him in their solo travels after the tragedy of the prison falling; being taken advantage of by dwight, which eventually results in denise's death and daryl running off to go find him ( which then further results in michonne, rosita, and glenn being captured alongside him by the saviors and ending up being included in negan's lineup ).

the common thread between all of these events is that daryl feels like he's let his people down. maggie even has to pull him aside after he escapes the saviors to tell him that glenn's death was not his fault, and that he doesn't need to carry that shame with him.

and then there's the guilt he feels surrounding his reactivity throughout the show: for example, when daryl is tasked with leading their people away from the saviors after the fall of alexandria, he gets in tara's face for letting dwight go. his outburst frightens judith, which is perhaps the only thing that stops him from continuing to escalate. this leads into his shame surrounding children in general, as well— he is good with kids, as evidenced by his uncle daryl status with judith and rj, but one of the main themes of his time as their acting parent later in the show is that he has no idea what he's doing. he's never had a frame of reference for what actual good parenting looks like, and he constantly asks himself what rick would do instead of trusting in himself that he won't turn out to be what his own father was.

to make a very long story much, much shorter... the way that daryl's family treated him at large before the outbreak culminates in: intense trust issues; self-sacrificial behavior; people-pleasing; poor emotional regulation / reactivity; self-doubt / self-loathing; a deep fear of abandonment, yet the need for extreme emotional distance from others; dissociation from personal needs; feelings of unworthiness when it comes to relationships; struggles with emotional intimacy; hypervigilance; avoidant behaviors; confusion and unsettling feelings surrounding close relationships; and more.

it's also worth it to note that daryl does work through these feelings and trauma responses throughout the show ! you can see how much progress he makes as he gets closer to people in the group and how much he really begins to blossom into his own person without the influence of his old life hanging over him.

there are so many other things i could have mentioned, too. i didn't mention how daryl's trademark quiet nature is in itself fueled by his trauma ( what has talking ever gotten him? most likely, a beating ). how his willingness to sacrifice himself for the people he loves comes, in part, from his past.

and to that point, i never mentioned how daryl's physical body and the things he went through as a child and adolescent shape the way he interacts with people. how he shies away from physical touch until much, much later in the show. how his bodily autonomy is almost always in question ( and if you're curious about that, i have a post on it here ) and how every piece of his body has been used over and over again, down to the very blood in his veins being sold for money as a child.

i also didn't dive into how he's such a good judge of character that it's literally spelled out for you and mentioned countless times throughout the show, but that when he's faced with one of his abusers asking him to go away with him, he does it even though merle is a terrible, awful, horrific, piece of shit person— which just goes to show you how deeply ingrained the trauma bond between him and merle really was. and, beyond that, how trust issues because of childhood trauma made it so difficult to really put his faith in the group when merle was in his ear telling him that daryl didn't need them. that they didn't actually care about him at all.

i never even got into his older brother-little sister relationship with beth, and how she was the first person to help him let go of a huge piece of his old life by burning down the old shack. and i didn't talk about how easily he's able to talk about merle when he tells connie the story about the boat.

all in all, there are countless ways in which daryl's childhood and adolescent experiences impact his adult relationships. so many that there are still more than this, but i feel like i have to stop now because this has gotten so long ! thank you so much for the question !!

#over and out. ( answered ) #othunderous #memes. ( answered ) #details. ( daryl dixon ) #abuse // #child abuse // #child neglect // #death // #grief //

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#keep dreaming. ( michonne grimes ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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it's lucky for peter that daryl took a couple of months to get himself together. while he's not a bad person ( and not generally a violent person, either, as difficult as it might be to believe after their few quarrels ), his temper does sometimes get the better of him— particularly when he has reason to feel indignant, or like he's being backed into a corner. the drinking didn't help, either.

but now, after he's had time to right himself and think about his actions? after he's taken the step to apologize and try to move on? his baseline is a distinct level of calm that those who have known him for years recognize him for. so as peter starts asking questions, real curiosity crawling through each lilt of his inflection, daryl simply listens. ponders quietly on how to respond.

in truth, there's a lot to unpack about peter's inquiries. it's immediately clear to daryl, as it was when they first met, that he doesn't know very much about what it's really like to live out here; particularly about landownership, it seems. but part of him does find it amusing, as well, that his counterpart believes him to be strong enough to crack the wooden handle of a hunting knife with his bare hands.

‘ wood cracks, ’ he says plainly. ‘ you got a knife with a wood handle, it don' matter how careful you are— moisture and wear n' tear will do it. ’

his carving knife is held with confidence as it slices easily through the wood. the shavings fall to the ground around his feet. making a new handle isn't exactly what he wanted to do; he would much rather just fill the crack with epoxy and then seal it off and be done with it. however, the crack wasn't exactly shallow; it was more like a complete break, leaving the wood in pieces due to its heavy usage and exposure to the elements over the years. he won't get into those nitty gritty details, though. daryl believes what he's said already is enough.

the more pressing explanation, he thinks, revolves around peter's belief that he must be some kind of well-off just because he owns land. it's a common misconception by folks who haven't grown up this way— not peter's fault, by any means, but incorrect nonetheless.

‘ can't afford to jus' buy a new one. gotta fix what i got, or i don't got nothin'. ’ he allows the statement to hang in the air for a moment before his eyes flicker up to peter. it applies to everything he has: his vehicles, his personal possessions, his household appliances... even his crossbow was a gift from his uncle jess a long, long time ago. but daryl has always lived this way, as do so many in rural america— one paycheck away from being completely behind on bills, but self-sufficient enough to hunt his own dinner and craft and fix his own possessions.

it's a shame he never learned how to make his own moonshine or grow his own tobacco, or he'd be able to live off-grid forever.

‘ bought this land from my uncle back in the 90s. i was prob'ly yer age. he was on 'is deathbed, sold all of it t'me for five grand so i'd have somethin'. been here ever since. ’

he won't mention his brother, or his father, or the circumstances which led to him taking his uncle jess up on the offer to move out here. not for now— maybe not ever. it's a story full of shame that he doesn't want to lay bare.

        woeful as it may be for daryl and his apparent short fuse, his reply inspires a number of questions in peter. a curious peter is a relentless peter; it likely stems from the fact that usually when he has questions, his only option is to trawl about the internet and read up on it on his own. getting the information directly from the mouth of another? it's all but novel to him at this point.

           "dooo i even wanna ask how you broke it?" and though it's most definitely a joke, the more he considers it, the more he thinks he might be right not to turn that particular stone. "i mean... i've broken a knife exactly once. it's pretty hard to do." he doesn't want to explain that he did so because he was in the midst of a mental breakdown and thought that stabbing an ice-cold watermelon might be a good idea, but it doesn't take away from the fact that he broke a kitchen knife. "i guess you're stronger than me, though..."

           based on looks anyway.

         "um... not that it's a bad philosophy to have, making good on what you've got, but what's the problem with buying it?" he hesitates briefly, a nervous smile forming on his face. it isn't that he forgets about the common man's wage despite never really being on it, rather... "i just ask 'cause... y'know, you're a land-owner? they're typically pretty well off? i wouldn't think a knife, even a good quality one, would put you out too much?"

           it doesn't matter to him what amount daryl has to his name; whether it's millions or mere dimes. despite having a large excess himself, he acknowledges that he only does so because of his extremely unfortunate circumstances in his youth. he has started earning a wage now; his online musician persona, gray, is now what most would consider incredibly large and it makes him very good money despite his anonymity, but it wasn't always this way. in fact, through most of his twenties, he was simply a troubled kid living an incredibly depressed life on the wills of his dead parents, then a late student pinching pennies in an unfamiliar city. he'd hardly earned that money, even if he arguably deserved all of it and then some for the hell he'd been dragged through.

           no, this has nothing to do with money at all. he's merely curious.

           "uh— sorry. if that... came out wrong. having projects is always a good thing regardless. i wasn't shitting on that."

           he can deal with being known as a bitchy little brat; an ill-tempered, rude piece of shit; an idiot, even. but he draws the line at rich prick... the last thing he's categorised by is cash.

#they're killing me killjoy. they're truly killing me #take me to the nearest famous city middle where they hang the lights. ( modern verse ) #substances // #death mention // #painmon

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Natasha Trethewey, from Waterborne.

#codex. ( daryl dixon ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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hi besties !! i'm here and i'm ready to bust out some writing. i hope everyone is having a wonderful thursday ♡

oh, and this is your reminder that you're doing a really good job and that daryl and i love you :')

#i DO have my coffee today but i do NOT have my sandwich #i need to go grocery shopping tomorrow because this is clearly a tragedy and the tradition must not be broken #they're hugging in minecraft! ( astraea )

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joel's immediate confidence irks something in daryl. it's an admirable thing, of course, to try and make this work— the sentiment that no man shall be left behind still seems to ring true for many people even after the end of society as they once knew it. but where is that going to get joel, other than dead? daryl is injured. there's no telling if he'll make it all the way back home, anyway; and yet here joel stands, trying to prove to him that beyond a shadow of a doubt, he will.

he eyes the filing cabinet for a short moment. if it helps to hold the door in place, they could crawl out the window— but what then? it won't be easy to escape the area unscathed. the thought of joel going down with him and because of him churns something awful inside of daryl.

but joel has also made it very clear that he's not leaving. so, they may as well try.

daryl gestures for joel to go ahead and move the cabinet. with gritted teeth he holds the door, suffering a hard swallow as it thumps and thuds against his back. he can almost feel the mutated hands of the clickers on the other side— but it's only when joel manages to bring their new barricade close enough that he moves to help him set it in place.

〝 yes, you are. 〞 if joel was anything, it was stubborn as hell. there was no chance he was leaving the man behind. not now, not ever. his eyes brushed away from daryl's momentarily; taking in the room they were stuck in. there wasn't much but there was a window. it wasn't huge but it could work. they could wiggle their way out. but first ⎯⎯ first they needed to barricade the door properly to give them both time. 〝 the filing cabinet. 〞

it was close enough that the door would hold long enough to move it into place. or maybe he was just delusional.

〝 i'll move it closer . . . all i need you to do is help me guide it into place. can you do that for me ? 〞

#ovtsidrs #counting the clicks with the living dead. ( tlou verse ) #i should'a queue'd ya.

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he isn't sure what else he expected, but the words coming out of negan's mouth still irk daryl to his core. negan is the type of person who makes too much sense when it's convenient for him to make sense— the kind of person who will use this roundabout method of manipulation to make you think you're in the wrong for being upset with their wrongdoings, past or present.

even though it's been years, daryl still holds on tightly to it all.

‘ s'that all what you did is t'you? mistakes you can just leave behind while the rest of us gotta live with it? ’

❛   if  ya  want  me  to  be  frank  with  you,  boy,  no,  i  would  not.  past  is  past,  daryl,  nothin'  can  change  that  shit.  we  make  the  choices  we  did  'cause  we  felt  it  was  right  at  the  moment.  how  the  hell  are  we  supposed  to  grow  if  we  don't  make  mistakes?  can't  change  the  past,  so  why  the  hell  would  i  dwell  on  it?   ❜

#of course !! i'm thinking we can set this in whisperer times ?? lmk what you think ! #in the quiet light. ( main verse ) #insufferablemonsters #i should'a queue'd ya.

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#codex. ( daryl dixon ) #i should'a queue'd ya.