#this is a joke but also real. the antidepressants are making depressed in new ways

[caffeinatedopossum]

Taking antidepressants not to cure me but to experience depression in a completely new way

#this is a joke but also real. the antidepressants are making depressed in new ways #because im finally able to focus on other issues #its just theres a lot of issues. like A LOT. and i gotta work my way throught #the layers #but the meds help me think that i can

[astaroth1357]

Demigod MC Series: Hades

Demigod MC Series: Intro, Aphrodite, Hermes, Hades

Lucifer

Well… this is awkward…

He’s actually met Hades multiple times for business reasons (Underworld-Devildom relations are amiable if not a little odd. Hades was something of an uncle figure to Diavolo as a wee demon lad, which should speak for itself really). He’s a gloomy fellow and not much for chit-chat, but he never thought they’d end up taking one of his kids by accident…

He had to send a formal apology letter to the Lord of the Underworld immediately, but thankfully he didn’t seem very concerned for his offspring - if anything he appeared to think the Devildom would suit them nicely which was… concerning.

And he was not wrong. The darkness, demons, ghouls, and frights of the Devildom hardly seemed to faze the MC, if anything they fit right in. He’d dare say they were thriving if not for one thing…

They were So. Damn. Bleak.

Getting a smile out of this one AT ALL was rare. For once he felt the need to check up on someone constantly just to be sure they were alright... They’d keep assuring the House that they’re not actually as sad as they look but it’s hard not to assume…

He was a little mortified at first when they first met Cerberus cause… well they called him “Cerbi” and the massive demonic guard dog rolled over for them like a Golden Retriever! 

Apparently he and the Cerberus that they knew are from the same litter and they must have smelt familiar... He would have probably limited their interactions just to keep his dog on his side but after seeing the MC smile for once while they played with the big oaf well…

Cerberus got a new playmate and the MC got a massive, three-headed therapy animal. Win-win. 😌

Mammon

Do ya really gotta be such a downer all the time, MC…? 😔

He thinks they’re nice, like really nice. They’re always super concerned when his brothers attack him or when he gets injured, but he’s pretty sure it’s because they’ve seen people die before so…

At first, he had no idea why he had to be saddled with this depressing wisp of mortal but over time he started to understand that they weren’t all that sad. They had… Resting Gloom Face? Is that a thing? 

They also had a different way of seeing things. He could win the lottery and they’d tell him to stay inside so he wouldn’t get hit by lightning or if he pissed off the wrong people, they’d joke about him keeping his fingers and toes. Dark stuff, but not intended to be so… well morbid.

However, what he eventually found out that the REAL advantage to having a Hades kid in the Devildom was that nothing scared them. Literally nothing. Not even the ghosts - which to reiterate, are terrifying!

Cue Mammon getting dragged to horror movies nights with his brothers and pulling the MC along to be his personal security blanket. He’ll hold onto them for dear life as they just pat his head or something, watching and not even flinching at the jumpscares.

The first time the House had an unexpected power outage he clung onto the back of their shirt like a lost child while they calmly looked for the circuit-breaker...

If he could jump into their arms every time something scary happened like Scooby-Doo, he absolutely would. His brothers make fun of him, but after seeing the MC handle Cerberus like a puppy any time something frightens them they hide behind the mortal as well…

Leviathan

In some ways, he totally relates to their moodiness but come on! Who can still look so sad when watching The Magical Ruri Hanai: Demon Girl?? Ruri-chan can make anyone smile! 😠

When he first met the MC, he was a little confused about why they didn't find him intimidating at all. He even reverted to his demon form and showed his fangs but no dice! All they said was, "I've walked along the edge of Tartarus. You're gonna have to try a lot harder than that, buddy…" 

That was probably his first sign that the "human" wasn't normal…

After Mammon told him who their Dad was, things made a lot more sense. A child of Hades in the Devildom? That's ironic enough to be its own anime plot!! They certainly felt like an angsty protagonist at times. 🤷‍♀️

Truth be told, they could relate to each other in a lot of ways. You wouldn't think that an offspring of the Underworld and a demonic shut-in would have much in common but the one thing they share between them is that sense of never really fitting in.

Turns out that Hades kids are black sheep, even among other demigods, and Levi? Well, he's had trouble relating to others since his angel days. He and the mortal were like off-beat kindred spirits!

Which, I mean, you wouldn't get just by looking at them together. Levi being the impassioned super-otaku rambling their ear off while his somber companion would just go along with him quietly, but hey, there's more beneath the surface. Probably. 

Now if he could just get them to cosplay as the Lord of Emptiness with him… They'd be perfect! Perfect he says!!

Satan

Highly considered drugging their food with antidepressants for a while… 

This was before getting to know them better, of course, but for the first couple months he honestly couldn't shake the feeling that the mortal looked miserable! 

Now, he's one to particularly care for the comfort of strangers, but just looking at them like that every day would sour his own mood quite considerably. It was very irritating...

It was only on closer inspection that he realized there was something else at play, though.

The mortal was different - even for a demigod he imagined. They took to the Devildom easily and the realm almost accepted them right back!

The flora looked better in their presence, the hellish beasts that roamed the wilds would roll over for them, and they even seemed to be welcomed in by the never-ending shadows… 

It was fascinating. Like the effects of the Underworld were baked into their DNA and mingled with the environment around them… Two layers of darkness coexisting within one person.

I mean, what other creature - other than Lucifer - could ride Cerberus around like a pony??

Had they not been so kind, they'd probably scare him shit-less... Their potential power was too great to ignore. But after getting used to their gloom, at least they made for pleasant company. 🤷‍♀️

Satan likes them well enough, but even still he has to wonder just what they were capable of… you know?

Asmodeus

Oh. My. WORD. What a buzzkill!!!

Really, the new mortal was no good at parties or pictures for that matter!

Not because they looked bad, or even because he couldn't get them to smile, but because GHOSTS would always photobomb any pictures they were in!! 😫

One time he got a selfie with them on the couch and a creepy ghost child could be seen hiding behind the cushions so NOPE. No more photos with the mortal around!!

Aside from that, he couldn't say the mortal was all bad or anything…They were pretty friendly, despite their general look and feel. 

Though, personally, he thought they wore far too much black... Even in the Devildom, there's normally a pop of color, you know? Was that just the Hades dress code?

And you want to know the weirdest thing? Despite everything about them screaming "Doom and Gloom," they're straaaangely popular among the RAD dating scene…

Like. Not as some heartthrob, "Love'em and Leave'em"-type, but he's found that there's a LOT of his demonic classmates who think they're cute or have a crush on them in some way…

Naturally, he can see the appeal of the mysterious, moody demigod with a dark, troubled past. It's just the demigod in question is completely oblivious to it! 🤷‍♀️

He tried to give them dating tips or play matchmaker from time to time but eventually gave up when it was clear they weren't interested. Alas, students of RAD, this is one forbidden fruit that refuses to be shared…! Such a tragedy… 😔

Beelzebub

They remind him of Belphie… like. A lot.

The similarities were obvious. They had a similar feel, made similar jokes, and even the same somewhat dreary attitude about them...

If he were being honest, at the beginning there were times when he'd open up to them a lot more than he intended because he'd forget that he wasn't actually talking to Belphie…

Thankfully, he knew better than to try and treat them like his replacement or anything. They were two different people after all. But it didn't stop him from feeling extra protective around them for a while.

Besides, there was ONE thing that set them leagues apart from Belphie and that was the fact they were a shit cook. Not quite as bad as Solomon but uh… Actually no, that's a closer call than it has any right to be...

Apparently, Hades kids don't need to eat as much and when you hang out with shades and skeletons for most of your life, you don’t really worry about making food that's any better than… "Well, technically it's edible." 🤷‍♀️

Their food won't kill a person like Solomon's, but you WILL start seeing stuff you probably shouldn't. He tried their "soup" once and swore he saw the ghost of his mother… and he doesn't even have a mother!!!

He swears that if he ever sees the MC and Solomon working together in the same kitchen he's skipping town… Whatever culinary abomination the two of them could create would probably gain sentience and eat HIM instead. He's always figured he'd go out with Death by Food, but not like that!! 😫

Belphegor

Ever meet someone who’s like looking in a mirror? Yeah, he’s getting those vibes…

He never expected the "human" to be so similar to him, it was kind of uncanny.

Upon first laying eyes on each other there was a pause… then a squint… and then… a nod.

Honestly, their combined dry wit, dark humor, and pessimistic outlook played off of each other surprisingly well. Too well for him to hate, really.

Not that it mattered because they didn’t believe him for a second when he tried to trick them (they had dealt with loads of lying monsters before). He hated to admit it, but they had a good head on their shoulders and knew better than to trust a locked up demon…

And yet, they seemed to stick around with him anyway. Because of the good conversation or just empathizing with his loneliness was anyone's guess. 🤷‍♀️

Sometimes they'd come up and sit outside the door in comfortable silence… Or they'd talk about whatever:

MC: *sitting out by the attic with their back against the door* So what happens to demons when they die…?

Belphie: *laying on the floor on the other side, staring at the ceiling* Depends on the kind. If I die, I'll just reform later.

MC: Like a reincarnation?

Belphie: Eh. *shrugs* Maybe. Haven't died yet.

MC: You could die in there, you know.

Belphie: *throws a side glare* Well thanks for bringing that up…

MC: *shrugs* What? It's true. But don't worry, I won't let you. *small-ish smile*

Belphie: *stares at them wide-eyed and pink-cheeked before turning on his side quickly* Ugh… whatever…

They did their word, somehow. They eventually got the door open and let him out, but by that time the anger was gone and he was just happy to finally talk to them face-to-face...

And good thing too, because apparently it's not smart to fight a death-child in what is essentially their element - as he saw when they summoned an army of skeletons to kick Levi's ass when he cheated them in Devil Cart...

He would not have lasted in that fight... Dodged a bullet there. 

#obey me #obey me shall we date #shall-we-date-obey-me #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon #obey me leviathan #obey me satan #obey me asmodeus #obey me beelzebub #obey me belphegor #obey me headcanons #obey me demigods #obey me scenarios

[thesquishyrogue]

Rogue's relationships with the rest of the mercs

Scout:

Almost like a brother-sister relationship. They're always goofing off together, joking around, getting on Spy's nerves. Just being the chaotic force of the team. Scout constantly convinces Rogue to play baseball with him, especially after seeing that they both use bats as a weapon (albeit Rogue's has nails driven through it).

Scout: "Aw man, sick bat! Say, you ever actually played baseball? If not I could teach ya. Though, you should probably use a different bat. I'll let ya borrow one of mine!"

Soldier:

He's definitely sort of a weird uncle figure to her. She's always giggling at his ridiculous antics, and he's surprisingly protective of her. Although at the same time he's always impressed by her ability to fend for herself, and fight off men larger than her despite her size.

Soldier: "Hell yeah, look at her go! Kicking ass just like a true American! She makes me proud!"

Pyro:

Oh my goodness. These two. Rogue almost always puts on a tough attitude, especially around the other guys. But around Pyro? They're probably the only person Rogue will be a softie towards. They're constantly seen platonically hugging and cuddling, and Pyro loves when Rogue covers their mask in stickers. They always return the favor by covering her face. Once they come off she treasures them. The others will always comment on how adorable the two are, usually followed by Rogue telling them to fuck off.

Rogue: "If anything were to ever happen to Pyro, I would kill everyone in this room and then myself."

Pyro: (灬º‿º灬)

Demoman:

Their relationship is quite explosive, to say the least. When Demo isn't trying to get Rogue to try some of his alcohol (which always results in Rogue gagging and choking from the bitterness) they're always assisting each other on the battlefield. Mostly in the form of Rogue catapultng Demo's bombs at enemies with her slingshot. They always share a laugh when a BLU team member is blown to bits.

Demoman: "Boom, right in the head! Look at all that blood! Yer aim is getting better and better, lassie!"

Heavy:

Just looking at these two stand next to each other is almost laughable. With Heavy being incredibly larger than everyone and Rogue being incredibly smaller, he practically dwarfs her. He's extremely gentle with her though, and takes care of her in sort of a protective big brother kind of way. Whenever the team is lounging around, she's often either cuddled into him or resting her legs in his lap. He doesn't mind it. He's also let her beat him in arm wrestling numerous times. She knows he lets her win, but she still take the opportunity to boast to the other mercs about it.

Heavy: "Little girl is so strong. You've beaten me again."

Rogue: 😏😏😏

Engineer:

He's also like an uncle figure to her. But unlike Soldier, he's more of the chill laid-back uncle that she can go to for advice. And she often does. Sometimes when she's bored she'll go into his workshop and talk with him as he plays his guitar or she helps out with whatever he's working on. Even if that help is something as simple as just handing him tools, he appreciates it. He appreciates the company too.

Engie: "Alright darlin', can you hand me the screwdriver?"

Rogue: "Uh... which one?"

Engie: "The Phillips."

Rogue: "Uh..."

Engie: "The pointy one."

Rogue: "Oh! Yeah sure I knew that."

Medic:

Like with Engie, Rogue will often go into the infirmary to talk with Medic as he works (she also makes sure he takes a break once in a while and doesn't overwork himself). He also does what he can to help with her depression once that's out in the open, prescribing her any antidepressants he can get his hands on. Though when she first joined the team and he gave her her first annual exam, he was astounded by how many fractures and injuries he'd found that were just left to sloppily heal on their own. The sadistic doctor was actually kind of worried for her, though honestly impressed by her high pain tolerance.

Medic: "Goodness fräulein, this is the fifth fracture I've found! How are you even walking?"

Rogue: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Sniper:

Despite having quite good aim from using a slingshot for years, Rogue was quite inexperienced with guns (not including when she killed her old caretaker at the end of her fighting days). So naturally, Sniper took it upon himself to teach her. He educates her on different types of guns in order to find what works best for her, and the two partake in target practice together. Of course, the two end up bonding during the lessons. She tells him all about her life in the ring, and he tells her about what life was like back in Australia. One thing that Rogue wasn't anticipating, however, was how strong the recoil of a gun can be. She was so unprepared she was thrown right onto her ass in shock.

Sniper: "Crikey! You alright there, mate?"

Rogue: "Yeah I'm fine... fuck, what was that?!"

Sniper: "Recoil, love. Did you not know guns did that?"

Rogue: "...no..."

Spy:

Although she and Spy certainly took the longest to warm up to each other, the two are as close as can be now. Once they finally accepted each other, Spy took her under his wing as his apprentice. He helps her perfect her thieving skills and educates her on how to take tough situations in stride. She really looks up to him, and they almost have a father-daughter relationship. And of course, when her depression comes to light, he's her biggest means of support. He's always available when she needs him and he does whatever he can for her.

Spy: "You make me so proud, mon cheri. You've captured the intel once again, our training has really paid off. Great job."

Rogue: "Thanks dad."

Spy: "Excuse me, what was that?"

Rogue: "....nothing."

Bonus!

Miss Pauling:

Miss Pauling is literally the first woman Rogue has ever been close to in her life. Throughout her entire childhood she's been surrounded by creepy older men, and even though things are different now with the mercs... they're still men. There are just some things Rogue isn't quite comfortable talking to them about. But with Miss Pauling, going to her for help with things like clothes shopping and feminine problems almost feels natural. Hell, there were so many things Rogue didn't even know about periods until Miss Pauling explained them to her. And of course Miss Pauling takes the time out of her busy work day as often as she can to make sure Rogue is stocked up on sanitary items, and whatever else she needs. Rogue is always extremely greatful for it. And while part of her sees Miss Pauling as sort of a mother figure...another part sort of has a crush on her. Yeah, Miss Pauling was pretty much Rogue's bisexual awakening. But she hasn't said anything about it, one because it would just be awkward and two because she knows Scout also likes her, and she doesn't wanna stand in his way (but little does either of them know, Miss Pauling is a lesbian 👀)

Miss Pauling: "Rogue, honey, you don't even know what a pad is? Or a tampon??? What- what do you do when you get your period?"

Rogue: "What, you mean that weird time of the month that I start bleeding? I just... live with it I guess? Maybe put toilet paper in my panties if it gets too messy-"

Miss Pauling: "Rogue. Come with me, I'll get you stocked up on the things you need. And we'll get you some new panties too."

Rogue: "But don't you have things to do?"

Miss Pauling: "This is more important. You shouldn't have to suffer every month just because no one ever properly taught you about periods. I'll help you out."

Saxton Hale:

Rogue thought he was obnoxious upon first meeting him. Called him a "corporate clown" to the other mercs. But, she had to  earn his approval in order to join the team, so Miss Pauling insisted that she be on her best behavior around him. But, even when on her best behavior her spunkiness still shined through, and Saxton noticed it real quick. However, that spunkiness only raised his interest. He commented on how he, "Hadn't met such a scrappy sheila in a long time." Truth be told, she reminded him a lot of Maggie, but he wasn't about to mention it. During their one on one meeting, he demanded that she punch him in the face to test her strength. After a short hesitation, she did so. Saxton was impressed that she actually hit him hard enough to dislocate his jaw and bust his lip, and gave her the job on the spot with the promise that she keep up that energy (and learn to use some weapons, of course). Miss Pauling and the mercs were shocked to see the two of them come back with Saxton's arm slung around Rogue's shoulders and his face dripping with blood, and the two of them laughing with each other. She took back what she said about him being a corporate clown. Although, the only thing she still doesn't like about him is how he treats Miss Pauling, considering how close she is with her. She has a mind to call him out on it, but Miss Pauling begs her not to.

Saxton: "Let's see just how strong a little gal like you can really be. Go on, hit me RIGHT here! Hard as ya can!"

Rogue: "Uh...Mr. Hale, I really don't-"

Saxton: "Oh don't wuss out on me girly, you want this job or not?!"

Crack.

Rogue: "Oh my god- Mr. Hale! I am so-"

Saxton: "Now that's what I'm talking about! You pack a hard punch for such a cute little thing!"

Rogue: "You're bleeding..."

Saxton: "Consider yourself hired!"

Administrator:

Doesn't trust her. Not one bit. She only respects her because she has to, and even then her "respect" is so shallow that anyone could see right through it. She hates the way she berates, overworks, and oftentimes gaslights Miss Pauling, and the fact that even all the other mercs seem to be intimidated by her concerns her greatly. She knows something's going on with her behind the scenes, and she's determined to figure out what. In the few times she actually saw her in person, Rogue definitely smarted off to her more than once, despite Miss Pauling practically begging her to watch it. The Administrator, however, almost finds it adorable. Almost. She kind of views Rogue as a bratty child. A bratty child with skill and talent that is essential for her team. And for that, she lets the sassiness slide...for now. Luckily these two don't butt heads often though, considering the Administrator is rarely seen.

Administrator, over the loud loudspeaker: "Well done, let's see some more."

Rogue, mumbling: "Bite me..."

#tw period mention #tw depression mention #tw medication mention #team fortress 2 #tf2 #tf2 oc #10th class oc #tf2 rogue #red rogue #tf2 scout #tf2 soldier #tf2 pyro #tf2 demoman #tf2 heavy #tf2 engineer #tf2 medic #tf2 sniper #tf2 spy #miss pauling #saxton hale #tf2 administrator #i hope this all makes sense this story is kind of a jumbled mess #also you don't fuck with miss pauling when rogue's around #she and scout are basically the miss pauling protection squad #well honestly the whole red team is but especially those two

[living-with-pmd]

11 Women With PMDD Share What It's Really Like

Premenstrual dysphoric disorder is the evil cousin of PMS. They share the same types of symptoms—moodiness, increased hunger, cravings, fatigue, cramps, pain, brain fog, and depression, among others—but for PMDD sufferers, those symptoms get so bad they can cripple a woman's ability to lead a normal life.  

While up to 85 percent of women get PMS, according to the US Department of Health, only about 5 percent of women experience PMDD, according to the American Journal of Psychiatry.

We asked women with PMDD what it's really like living with the disorder. Here are their stories:

"I was diagnosed with PMDD last summer. Six months prior to my diagnosis, I started taking a certain birth control and soon every month I was experiencing severe PMS issues. I am a generally happy person, but during those few days I was someone entirely different. I was extremely depressed and anxious, having much more frequent panic attacks, and was super sensitive and lonely. I was even suicidal, which was terrifying. And the worst part was I was convinced that I had always been this miserable, and that I would always be this miserable, and it was never going to change. It felt as if someone had completely burned out the light in me and all happiness and joy and hope was gone. I didn't make the connection that it was related to my period but thankfully a close friend did. I have since switched birth control, which helped a lot, and increased the dosage of my anti-anxiety and anti-depressant meds. Most importantly, I am aware of the way I feel those few days so I know to expect it, and I can logically remind myself that I will stop feeling that way soon. Looking back, I realize that I've probably always had pretty bad PMS or PMDD. The birth control worsened it but it was also causing a lot of issues I wasn't aware of previously as well." —Katherine H., 22, Edmonds, WA

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"PMDD is out of control. I cry really easily for about a week. My biggest issue is that I am convinced that I am failing at everything—being a wife, a mom, work projects, fitness, my whole life! And even though it feels so real I constantly have to question if my feelings are valid or if they are amplified by my cycle. I just set an alert in my phone to remind me to consider my hormones the next time I feel that way." —Krysten B., 32, Toronto, CA

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"A week before my period, I become a complete psycho, completely unlike myself. I'm tearful, want to eat everything that's sweet or salty, have absolutely no tolerance for anything other than perfection, and prefer to be left completely alone. I already take an antidepressant but my PMDD was a complete nightmare so my doctor gave me Prozac to take for just 10 days a month. Basically, I start it when I start to get that irrational feeling and keeping taking it until my period starts. And that's just the emotional stuff. On the physical side, I have debilitating cramps, backaches, and headaches that last for days. Yep. I'm a peach." —Kristen L., 40, Knoxville, TN

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"In the past, PMDD almost made me suicidal and totally broke my spirit. Yes it wasthat bad. Every month. Eventually I got tired of being a 'crazy PMS woman' and decided I needed to fix this. Since I don't like to take pharmaceuticals, I branched out to homeopathic remedies and I discovered St. John's Wort and essential oils, especially clary sage and Doterra Calm-Its. It's a lot better now but I still have my hard days." —Amy S., 43, Zebulon, NC

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"My PMDD got so bad I had to go to a psychiatrist and be put on Prozac along with another antidepressant I was already taking. I was a mess—anxious, crying randomly over the smallest thing, and eating everything in sight. One example is someone made a YouTube mashup of the Age of Ultron trailers with Pinocchio footage and the 'I've got no strings on me' song and that wrecked me for weeks. Every time I thought about scenes from Pinocchio I would start panicking and crying at my work desk. It's been a few years and I'm better now. I'm off birth control and weening myself off the Prozac. I notice a week before my period I will sob during any sad part in a movie or book I'm reading, and a day or two before, I notice I'm more likely to be anxious." —Kate W., 36, Alaska

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"This has impacted my ability to work effectively. My pet peeve is when people say 'it must be close to your time of the month' when they simply don't like what I'm saying. I have run into that problem a lot at previous jobs and it makes it really hard to be taken seriously. It's bullshit because my feelings are valid regardless and also PMDD is not a joke. I am so lucky now to have a male boss who understands but it wasn't always that way. I have also have found a lot of relief with naturopathic and herbal remedies." —Amalia F., 28, Vancouver, Canada

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"My PMS was tolerable until my second child was born and then everything went off the rails. I'd be looking forward to plans with others, happy, and then about 10 to 14 days before my flow would start, my mood would turn on a dime. I'd be horrible—crying, screaming that ~nobody understands~, just so much emotional pain. I'd basically lock myself up in the bedroom for a full day to cry, get angry, and feel sorry for myself. It took three doctors before I finally found one who would listen to me before I was finally diagnosed with PMDD. I took Prozac for three years for it but it made me feel numb, like a zombie and not like myself. So I quit and my family just deals with me now. As I've gotten closer to menopause the PMDD is not as bad, but can be very unpredictable due to hormonal swings from perimenopause. The worst part now is I feel like my friendships have suffered. I always seem to have episodes around major holidays and events and I end up bumming everyone out if I do show up so I end up staying home a lot." —Colleen T., 50, St. Paul, MN

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"I'm overly emotional for the week before my period. Saying that makes it sound like it's not that bad but I get so distraught that my fiance has actually scheduled it in his phone as 'blood sport' to remind himself what's coming. I'm thankful that he's patient because I also feel like everyone hates me that week, too." —Kenlie T., 36, New Orleans, LA

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"All month long I'm fine and feel even and calm and then suddenly, the week before my period, I can't handle even the tiniest little thing. My irritability goes through the roof (which is not great since I have a 5-year-old) and I feel like I have no friends. It really makes me sad." —Jessica S., 28, Broomfield, CO

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"I know my period is coming because all of a sudden all of my joints hurt, especially my knees and ankles. I also get crazy gnarly cramps and once I even had a cyst that ruptured while I was on a date and the guy had to take me to the hospital! It was so embarrassing. Thankfully my husband now is very understanding when this time rolls around each month. The worst part is people who just think I make this stuff up. Some months are better than others and sometimes the pain is completely debilitating! My emotions are also a rollercoaster. Anytime I see something cute or inspiring, I burst into tears." —Ivie C., 21, Rexburg, ID

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"My PMDD manifests in both mental and physical symptoms. From the time I got my period at age 12, I've had extreme cramps and heavy bleeding. I'd leak at school through a super maxi pad every class so I'd tie sweatshirts around my waist and have to scrub my clothes when I got home. It was super humiliating. I'd have to take six to eight ibuprofen at a time to deal with cramps, and if I didn't I'd end up on the floor sweating like I had the flu. Sometimes I'd even throw up. This meant I ended up spending a lot of time sick in bathrooms and knew where every restroom was at all times. Birth control helped manage the PMDD and other issues, but as soon as I was done having kids, I had a hysterectomy. That was the best thing I've ever done." —Mandy P., 39, Mendon, UT

https://www.womenshealthmag.com/health/a19972132/premenstrual-dysphoric-disorder/

#premenstrual dysphoric disorder #PMDD #pmdd awareness #living with pmdd #actually pmdd #mental health awareness #mental health #women's health #pms #premenstrual syndrome #afab problems

[tarunsaravana]

BRAINWASHING CHILDREN THEORY

Now I’m warning you the next theory is pretty dark and probably one of the most unsettleing ones we have talked about in this Blog.

This theory starts with subliminal msgs in kids shows.

SUBLIMAL MESSAGES

By far Spongebob square pants has the most messages that are clearly hidden in grown ups.

There’s jokes about prison “Don’t Drop Them”

Patrick licking sand.

Those are all just jokes, clearly hidden for adults

But there are lot of jokes, some involves suicide.

In a 2001 episode , squidward is being sad the entire time. There is scenes of him walking around dazed stage. There is a scene of him putting in a oven. By far the most darkest moment of them all is sponge bob looks after him thinking his okay. And then he’s says “at least we know he’s alive”. Yeah that might be the darkest line I have ever read in a kids cartoon show. There are plenty of suicidal messages left in other episodes. As I was looking more into it , I found out suicide was in a lot of cartoon tv shows. The ending of looney tunes.this one really gave me chills down spine, in one of the cartoon characters from looney tunes jumping off the bridge shouting “IM FREE”. Once again glorifying suicide. And its not just these clips. Bunny , Daffy Duck, woody woodpecker, daisy and a bunch of cartoon characters ending their life with gun for no reason. the strangest of them all how they made it look exciting to kids.There is a cartoon where mickey gets depressed over Minnie. In that cartoon 3 ways of killing yourself is shown gun, petroleum and for some reason jumping off a bridge. Now I’m not saying this to scare you or not to watch cartoon. These are all just theories none of them are “facts” and they are not meant to hurt anyone/anything. I mean the daisy cartoon where daisy is shown depressed , in that cartoon almost 5 ways of killing yourself is shown and poured into youngsters mind. Gun, grenade ,knife, hanging and bomb.

THEORY(just speculations)

Now why would they put suicide on younger generations brain some people think control of over growth of population, some people think to keep society weak and depressed and fearful state. Because the more younger you are between 1 - 5 years your brain develops and everything you see on your favourite cartoon shows killing themself and also make it exciting. The more society, the more power control over weak society. Think about it kids are depressed , we’re medicating them and putting them on pills and sitting in front of TV while their watching their favorite cartoon character kill themself and also making it seem exciting to kids. I mean the global antidepressant market is estimated over 11.6 BILLION dollars. The government and the economy love depression. We also glorify things like money, fame, success. And of course if we can’t afford things we were told it will set us “free”. That’s why back of our heads teens think suicide is an option. YES , people have severe depression,OCD ,suicidal thoughts me too included in the past. But it is wondering who started all of these negative energy. Think about it your child entertainer Logan Paul filming a dead body in the suicide forest. The nickelodeon shows who show unessasacery content to kids.it involves talking about feet a lot. Even think about the board game which targeted to us as kids.

“THE GAME OF LIFE”. The goal is to succeed or you’ll lose. To win the game of life you need to make money. You should be better than those who are playing against you. Literally the commercial says “Be A Winner in the Game of Life”. I MEAN , COME ON. And the original version of the game of life in 1860 ,created by Milton Bradley ,it literally had suicide on the board as a option. Now its not just suicide being poured into kids pure brain.there’s darkness in every single form. I mean think about the games we used to play as kids. I mean just google “Ring around the Rosie meaning”A rosy rash, they allege, was a symptom of the plague, and posies of herbs were carried as protection and to ward off the smell of the disease. Sneezing or coughing was a final fatal symptom, and "all fall down" was exactly what happened. Again a another event where people die and has shown as exciting to kids. London Bridge. A song about a huge bridge falling down.“London Bridge is Falling Down” could be about a 1014 Viking attack, child sacrifice, or the normal deterioration of an old bridge. But the most popular theory seems to be that first one. More specifically: the alleged destruction of London Bridge at the hands of Olaf II of Norway sometime in the early 1000s. There’s even a darker line singing iron parts will bend and break , bend and break.

Ouija board, a game that makes fun to contact evil spirits in your house.Twister , a game that is marketed to tight teenagers up and down. Imagine the creepy uncles wanna play the game at thanksgiving.and then we have the darkest of them all Hangman , game where you have to choose the correct word or your little stick figure gets hanged. And the darkest part of them all is that , this classroom game is actually based on real life game in the 18th century, prisoners that were sentenced to death by hanging should guess the word, the exicutioner will give and if they guess the word right they’ll live or if not death. The most messed up part of all of this ,that almost all of the prisoners were illiterate which means they didn’t have a chance , that game was to just publicly humiliate them before they died.

NURSERY RHYMES

And it’s not just games which have a darker turn , what’s the first thing you remember as a kid, nursery rhymes. rock bye baby , a song which a baby’s cradle is in the branch of a tree and the branch breaks and the baby falls to the ground. Humpty Dumpty , he sat on a wall and suddenly “had a great fall” and nobody can save him because he’s dead.”its raining and pouring” a song where a old man hits his head on the wall and then dies, “he couldn’t get up in the morning “

Now one of the most disturbing is Peter peter pumpkin eater. A song about a guy who he’s wife doesn’t want him and puts her in a pumpkin and again, song which normalizes holding women against your will. I mean looking back at London bridge there’s a reference to something along the lines of “LOCK HER UP,LOCK HER UP” “LOCK HER UP,LOCK HER UP “(lyrics from London bridge).

INTERNET

Now on the internet kids start watching YouTube kids but don’t worry there’s bunch of dark messages hidden there. Murder,suicide, violence and for some reason lot of vomiting. Then when you’re a teenager you watch plenty of violence movies, tv shows and now internet challenges like momo challenge and blue whale challenge.

DISCUSSION

Everyone on society questions how much evil, death, hatred, depresssion, destruction but do we even have to question it? By looking back at our childhoods what was being put into us and right in front of our eyes. So what’s the overall theory ,”the way to keep a society in large is by fear, chaos ,the only way to make vote for them is to through destruction”” the only way to unite is through tragedies.”

“The only way to keep people happy , is by showing constant realistic expections that don’t really matter”” money, success”. The society that’s peaceful is not a society that can never be controlled.

CONCLUSION(spreading awareness)

So ,what do you do to make sure that chaos doesn’t appear continuously , well make sure to SHOW children how scary and dark the world is at very young age.

News

A mother bought a toddler this princess wand in the dollar store. Imagine the curiosity , shock and surprise when the child carefully peeled the foil to find a image of a another little girl cutting her wrist full blood.

“If you looked close enough its not a joke ,its actual image of a child slit her wrist, I want to know , what they think,how that’s suitable for a child.

Tarun

[kennedycatherine]

things may be shitty but sometimes I'm shittier

I’m overheard retelling half a joke my friends have heard 30 times over. One of the greats in my rotating stock of five. 

“Wait, what’s this about?” Asks someones boyfriend and I lean on an elbow, angle myself toward him with a grin.

“It’s actually a really funny story.”

His girlfriend rolls her eyes, “it’s not funny.”

My eyebrows go up, in, “I think it’s funny?”

“Kennedy,” she begins and looks at me with even eyes, “it makes people uncomfortable.”

She says it like a mother warning her toddler not to pull his pants off in front of the dinner guests, not again. And I feel a lot like he might;

Defiant - it is a funny story, I’ve done the math on which details can stay in, which have to go out, I know where to pause for a laugh or a sigh. He’d probably like it. 

Ashamed - it probably isn’t funny to everyone, perhaps my math was just enough to keep people engaged, the pauses great for a sympathy laugh. He probably wouldn’t like it.

“Another time,” he whispers with a soft, consoling smile and I silently curse his girlfriend. 

Fuck you, Kierstan, you don’t know the first thing about comedic timing.

The story in question is about the time I found my sister cold and unconscious. I thought she was dead. The punchline about my being in a pink velour costume when the EMT’s arrived and the bit about the stolen laffy taffy, oh and her not being dead - fully worth the undeniable emotional lows. 

Believe me when I say that in some circles, it’s a funny story. There are branches of comedy, Netflix specials, peoples entire careers and livelihoods that are rooted in dark comedy - there is a vast market for illuminating and lightening the horrifying. Also trust me when I say I know how deeply unfunny it is to watch someone you love overdose. 

The story is funny now. A few years ago it wasn’t. It was a nearly unspeakable thing. An experience that happened and it wasn’t funny. 

But life goes on. 

You have no choice. 

Around the time of the pink velour tracksuit and the laffy taffy, I found myself laughing uncontrollably at my desk. I’d just left the job I’d gone to college for and found myself in the pit of broken dreams - an 8 to 5 desk job. The absolute thrill of it all - somedays you might file, somedays you might answer a few more calls than usual. Somedays your boss might ask you to bend over and pick up his pencil while you wear the skirt it was gently (but firmly) implied was mandatory. Mandatory only in the sense that no one could tell you that you couldn’t wear pants but they sure were more forgiving of car naps running 15 minutes over if they could glimpse a knee. 

And boy, did I need the car naps. 

It’s funny because I thought I was doing great. Really, for awhile I thought I was the best I’d ever been. I was laughing pretty much all the time, at everything. I’d never found the world more funny. By all accounts, I was having a great time.

So imagine my surprise when one day I found my eyes full, my face damp and my car hurdling down the highway past the exit to my work. When I did arrive, this time with pants, therefor low forgiveness - I was asked to my boss’ office for a closed door meeting.

Why was I late?

Somehow telling my boss that I wasn’t exactly sure the reason but my brain was telling me I should just keep driving, maybe to the next town, maybe for hours, maybe until the border, didn’t really seem like an option. “I think I have the flu.”

Despite all the things I didn’t know, I did know I didn’t have the flu. I found myself laid out in my doctors office anyway.

When he finally threw the door open, all white coated and anxious, just like I like em’ - I sat up. We made a sort of frenzied eye contact and he asked me what was wrong. 

“I think I might be, like, totally fucking losing it.” 

I left with a plan and antidepressants.

It all sounds kind of simple and quaint.

But it wasn’t.

Stopping to consider if you’re a danger to yourself or anyone else so your doctor can qualify if you need counselling, pills, maybe a psychiatric hold isn’t charming. Those first few weeks of pills, even though you’ve been told and you know you’ll feel worse for awhile, they’re simply awful. This isn’t some beautiful woman on HBO popping a white pill with her chardonnay, suddenly noticing a pink bloom on her neglected cactus. This is ugly and painful before it’s anything else.

And slowly it did become “anything else” … most of the time. 

Depression isn’t a joke. But it is a static way of being that loses it’s edge. 

It softens. Like a shitty haircut, you come to expect the blunt, harsh edges. Your body adjusts to the sight of it. It’s still kind of scary to look at but you know what to expect.

Life goes on.

It’s just not precious anymore. 

I could barely say I’d been diagnosed. I only told the people who were close enough to see the new medication was wearing me out. Now it’s an introductory fact, “Hi, Kennedy Catherine, daughter, lover, lesbian, writer, major depressive disorder.” 

I felt for a long time like it was all behind me. The worst was over! Family, outside of some trick hearts, healthy. Depression, diagnosed, plans made, helpful medications on standby. Experiencing another dark episode seemed dull,  ya know? Just a tad fucking redundant. Been there, done it, bored by it. 

Then: March 2020. 

There was a period of limbo. I still had a job, I just couldn’t be there or do it until things got better - hardy har. I packed up my truck and settled into my families cabin for five or six weeks. It was fine, I was fine, I thought. One day I went out for a walk and awhile later watched my sister rumble through a long stretch of prairie toward me on an ATV. My phone was dead and I’d be gone, oh, three hours longer than expected?

“What happened?”

I just kind of… lost track of time? Lost my sense of direction? I don’t know, I thought. I was here but I sort of went away from myself for a second. When I sunk into the bath later with achy muscles and a blister, I felt nervous.

Now, I haven’t scared myself in years. My depression isn’t so severe that I feel unsafe with myself. Anything I did or have done to effectively terrify myself, I shed by the time I was 20. Because that can happen, you can do that. You can change coping mechanisms and learn real, healthy ways to parent yourself. The mood instability that came later, the dark times, I still felt mostly fortified. I felt like I could figure it out, like I still had access to myself to do the figuring out. 

But I could feel myself slipping away this time. 

I was talking fast about something or another when I finally said to my mom, “I think I might need help.” I wasn’t sure exactly what I meant because I didn’t really know how to help myself and I wasn’t really sure what was wrong. 

And that in and of itself is a problem. I didn’t know what was wrong? 

I was out of the job that got me out of bed Monday to Friday for three and a half years, I left the house that had become my comfort cathedral, I hadn’t seen any of my closest friends in months, I was living with my sister and my mother who I hadn’t spent longer than a handful of days with in like five years. There was global fear and uncertainty and the risk of contracting a virus that could or could not kill you but I didn’t know… what was wrong? Well that’s just deeply moronic. 

Sometimes when you need help, or when I need help, that does come in the form of professional counselling or medications or an anonymous support group. Sometimes, it’s just circumstantial and circumstances can change.

I went home.

And in a few weeks, when I’d more or less returned to myself, I could clearly see the hills and valleys my mind had just wandered. I felt strength again, a sense of renewal and excitement about my imminent return to work and society.

Then I actually lost my job.

I know, redundant. I’m tired of myself too. But bullshit is cyclical, that’s just a fact. 

And if there is one thing I’ll give myself credit for, it’s my ability to immediately concoct a backup plan in the face of a threat. Moments after I was officially terminated, texts and emails went out. The idea of not knowing where my next paycheque would come from and how much it would be, having lost the place I strolled into everyday with a sense of purpose and not knowing when and where I’d have that again was simply not an option.

My head went down, I narrowed focus and the efforts resulted in… enough. I’m living. Which wasn’t and isn’t the hope for life. Unstable stagnancy is deeply uncomfortable.

So, generally speaking, things are not great. 

I lost my humbly secure job. A place I comfortably could’ve lived and died if I’d prioritized everything other than work and my sort of crippling ambition. This effectively led me down the path of questioning every decision I’ve made past the age of 16. First and foremost, choosing radio. An industry that was at it’s peak in the 1930’s and on the decline ever since was perhaps not the most lucrative or secure of career choices. 

My romantic life developed far enough to remind me that often times I am a crusty, avoidant crustacean human and suddenly all those popular tweets about my deep emotional inabilities and intimacy issues seemed, well, not that funny.

I decided I probably shouldn’t drink. I don’t have a drinking problem but I do have a problem with drinking. Namely, waking with no memory, my legs shaking and my stomach clenched so tightly I could sense my body wanted to flee - itself, mostly. And let’s not forget the part where I get fighty and mean.  

When shit hit the fan and then shot off the blades into the face of life in my early twenties, it wasn’t my fault. To be clear, mental health is a no fault area. I was always predisposed to depression, mental illness is genetic. I had no control over that. But there were plenty of variables, extenuating circumstances if you will, that I also had no control over but sure as fuck could and did blame other people for.

This is not the same thing. 

This is a moment where it is necessary to discern illness from circumstance and living from coping. 

Like I said, bullshit is cyclical. And it this point, it’s pretty much just my own bullshit on repeat, forever and ever amen. At twenty or twenty three, when the circumstances weren’t my fault, it also felt like my reactions weren’t my fault. I was floundering, I didn’t know better. I learned some hard lessons about how I cope and handle things. I learned that I didn’t really like the person I was when I was figuring out how to survive myself and life. 

I was unkind, a lot. 

I hated the way that felt, I hated the way it affected my relationships and decided to learn from it.

Except, I didn’t learn. I said, great, noted. Dashed a nice little ~fini!~ at the end of that chapter, closed er’ on up and bypassed the bookshelf for the dusty box in the corner labelled, “garage sale.” Because surely no one would need to read that again! 

And then a few weeks ago when I had a breakthrough in counselling, I dug that chapter back up and allowed myself a few days of surprise. Bitch, you been done knew the WHOLE time. This isn’t news, this isn’t shocking. This is the part of you that developed somewhere along the way and it didn’t work and you didn’t like it but! But. It was comfortable. So you gave it a few years and then when things fell out of control again, let it settle back in all warm and snuggly.

You know what they say. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, I guess I need to financially prioritize a CBT therapist. 

So here I am, again. 

Only this time feels deeply, deeply different. Because it’s not the first. 

I sat down with a friend to tell her how I was feeling. How much I felt like I needed and wanted to change my default settings. 

I need a factory restore. 

“I think you’re being hard on yourself.”

No, no, I have grace for myself! I actually have a lot of understanding. I’m parenting myself through this which includes showing myself love while I also discipline.

“I just feel like maybe you were doing the best you knew how.”

Well, I mean, sure? Sometimes? But there were moments where I knew I was saying or doing the wrong thing, where I was even challenged by someone else but I wasn’t challenging myself, you know?

“Well maybe that’s just who you are?”

Right… but this is also who I am? And we do actually have a say in that, you know? Like how I evolved from throwing toddler tantrums on the grocery store floor? I could actually just keep doing that, no one is stopping me, but I don’t.

“I think you’re being self deprecating and that is not healthy.” 

Since when is self identifying a problem self deprecation? 

“Oh, don’t be so hard on yourself.”

… but change is hard? 

I appreciate that people want to protect me from myself or from bad feeling or whatever they perceive that all to be. More often than not, I think they, we, you, I, we’re all just trying to protect ourselves. But it’s not helpful. Pretending that everything is fine and that we’re fine and adopting an overarching, “I am perfect as I am, namas-fucking-te” mantra isn’t actually helpful.

What’s the harm in me saying I have been shitty? That I have acted poorly? That I have neglected to be better when there was clearly a different option? That I wasn’t honestly showing myself to people when I could’ve or allowing them space in me?

That it’s… not nice? That just like the joke about my sister not being dead, it’s not comfortable to listen to? It’s true and it is compassionate to view yourself as a whole, to know yourself and think I actually do like myself and this life enough to want to be better.

Just like what is coined the unfortunate evening of Velour and Ambulances or the depression diagnosis or life being turned on it’s head by a plague sent from hell, once it was deeply painful and then it wasn’t. None of this is precious. Being a shitty person sometimes isn’t a rare affliction. You’ve been shitty before, you’ll do it again, I’ll do it again, hey, you might even be shitty right now! Isn’t that something? 

Things are not great right now. They’ve been not great tens of times before. Only this time it isn’t taking me 2 to 4 years to talk and laugh about it. Because this is a muscle, the shit muscle and it’s exercised. It’s buff. 

And you know what? Things could be worse. They could even get worse now! I’m hoping they don’t but they certainly could, and in the thick of it, we’ll always have that glimmering possibility to hold onto. 

[operationwell]

Reflections on Past Institutionalization

Today was the day that I knew would be coming. The day I would have to face, process, and differentiate between my past experiences in psychiatric facilities, and my future stays. I know that all of this doesn’t necessarily happen in one day, but rest assured - it is happening. 

5 years ago, In April of 2015, I entered a hospital in Schaumburg, IL at around 8pm. My Auntie had heard that this hospital offered free psychiatric evaluations, and we had planned to go and have a simple assessment where they could provide insight into which medications were hurting and which were helping my cause. About 6 weeks prior to this, I had been prescribed Celexa as an antidepressant and it caused my depression and anxiety to skyrocket beyond my control, and I became flooded with suicidal ideation. My doctor (the psychiatrist of every student on psych medications throughout my university) insisted that I remain on the medication for 6 weeks. As my symptoms worsened, he prescribed me Trazodone as a sleeping aid and Klonipen to help with my multiple panic attacks daily. As medications were thrown at me, my health worsened. I struggled with sleep disturbances (insomnia, night terrors, inconsistent sleep schedule), I lost weight (food quickly became unappealing on the medications, I had no appetite, I had difficulty eating as I would become nauseous and vomit during and after consuming food) and my health deteriorated. I stopped going to Yoga and working out multiple times a week because I was no longer functional enough to continue. My grades slipped and I received 3 “incomplete”s in my classes and had to finish my work months later for credit. I dropped my commitments to the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, alongside many clubs and school groups. I was closeted from my family and all but 2 friends, I had recently broken up with my partner of 3 years. I was in therapy on my college campus, and nothing seemed to be working... so a free psych evaluation sounded like the right thing to do.

That day, I received an award from Loyola University Chicago School of Communications that I was their top student in the Advocacy and Social Change program. Little did the school staff know that within a few hours I would be Baker Acted. I got dressed up and invited my Auntie and 2 friends to the celebration. Like most days when the world feels like it is crumbling, I laughed and smiled and moved through the motions. Saying goodbye to my friends, I packed a weekend bag to head to the suburbs, this was typical seeing that my Auntie is one of my closet friends and mentors, and I frequently “ran away” to her guest room in order to escape my troubles. We agreed to go to dinner with my uncle and cousin, then go for the free evaluation. I pushed food around on a plate and I drank a Shirley Temple with my then 9 year old cousin, Dylan. 

I entered the hospital with Auntie late in the evening. I put in my headphones to listen to Bon Iver because my anxiety was triggered by the hospital environment. I filled out a form that asked two yes/no questions: 

Within the last 24 hours, have you had thoughts of killing yourself? Yes No

If yes, do you have a plan to kill yourself? Yes No

I circled yes for both.

I told myself that dishonesty was not going to get me the help I needed, so I told the truth. After I handed in that questionnaire, my hands were tied. No matter what I said in the clinical evaluation, they would legally have to keep me under the Baker Act. I tried to explain the ways that the medications I was taking were making it worse, how my anxiety and depression were related to trauma, but they were not interested in that. They were interested in protecting me from the threat of myself. The admissions staff informed me that I would be staying for the next few days in the hospital. When I protested and tried to leave, they threatened to call the police. I looked to my Auntie for guidance and she broke down saying “I am so sorry, I wouldn’t have brought you here if I knew they would take you from me”. My auntie is the light of my life and even though this experience was incredibly trying, I am so glad that she was there with me holding my hand and making sarcastic jokes throughout the process. She was, and continues to be, my rock and my safe space. Thank you, Auntie.

I was stripped of my clothes, searched, asked to squat and cough. I was brought into the adult ward with nothing besides the clothes I wore in, and a notebook. I was shocked as I finished the evaluation process - it was now the middle of the night. One of the night staff saw me enter my room and was intrigued because “I don’t look like the other patients in here” to which my response was “what should I look like?” we spoke about religion, and what my goals were; I shared with him my purpose - to bring peace to the world through advocacy, conflict resolution, and vulnerability. He was kind. He very well might have been an angel. But I am convinced he was real. He gave me a gift, and I still have it. A book about hope, religion, and peace. Inside the front cover he wrote “Be at peace and know that you are love”. When he left my room less than 30 mins later, I showered and got into my bed, I slept till the techs woke me to take my blood and I never saw that man again.

The next 72 hours consisted of sharing a room with an older woman who insisted on being naked 24/7 and caused plenty of problems in the ward, attending all-day therapy and coping skill development groups, trying to convince the doctors and nurses I was cured and able to leave, attempting to escape my parents worried calls, being constantly poked and prodded by nursing staff, commiserating with other patients (most of whom were much older than me), and coloring in mandalas and calling it “art therapy”.

During this stay, the psychiatrist kept my diagnosis of depression and anxiety and added “You need to watch out for Bipolar”. He immediately started me on Abilify, an antipsychotic, and after 3 days was convinced the Abilify helped enough to discharge me. I went straight to the pharmacy after my stay and found the medication was $116/ pill. The drug was new, did not have a generic at the time, and I could not afford that, so I discontinued the use of the medication. 

By this time, I am deeply concerning my parents and they have bought me a one way flight to South Florida for the summer after my sophomore year. I was planning on working at Boston College for the summer and spending my entire junior year abroad in the Philippines and Vietnam, but the international travel was not brought to fruition. My parents were hurt by my secrecy, terrified, and looking to help alleviate some of my suffering. They helped me to get to a psychiatrist that might be able to help with the medication situation, and he did. I was put on Zyrexa, an antipsychotic, and the next day the sun came out. I stayed on the medication for over 4 years, but it caused grueling side effects including excessive sleeping, sedation, mixed mood episodes, and extreme weight gain to name a few.

After I was institutionalized, I told myself that I would try whatever I could to avoid the trauma, the expense, and the repetition of my experience in the ward. I felt that while I was held there, I was a prisoner, I had no rights, I had no resources, and I had a one person support system. I never wanted to go back.

Now, I am in very different shoes. I have knowledge and information. I have an entire degree dedicated to better understanding mental health and the system, I have years of experience working clinically in the field, and I have an incredible support system. I am currently seeking treatment to titrate off all unnecessary medications, to stabilize my mental and physical health, and to work intensively with clinicians on sustainable coping mechanisms. This is not like before. 

Today I spent most of the day crying and wondering how I could possibly face being stripped of my agency and belongings again, being isolated from my supports again, and being forced to take medications without consent again. The answer that I found in my tears is that I don’t have to face that again. This new situation of seeking residential treatment is dredging up emotions and memories from my experience 5 years ago; but this is different. I am afraid, and I am allowing myself the grace to feel that fear and tend to it. As I care for myself I am also caring for my younger self, my self at 19, and at any other age when I felt alone, afraid, and out of options. Once I have done my tending, I am able to open my eyes and see that in the here and now I am surrounded by support, I am brave, and I am patient with my options. 

I am surrounded by love. I am love. I am at peace.

Here is something I created in 2015 while in the psych ward. All text is quotes of staff and peers during my 3 day stay.

#psych ward #psych #mental health #triggers

[arielwinter-daily]

Ariel Winter on Mental Health, Trolls and Life After "Modern Family"

The changing seasons are always tumultuous, with storms washing away the stains of months past and nature struggling to shed or regrow. This spring has been particularly uncertain, to say the least. But in early March, when actor Ariel Winter showed up in Manhattan, it seemed spring had come early, and it wasn’t just the warm temperatures and premature blooms that indicated the shift.

On April 8, Modern Family will air its final episode, closing an 11-year chapter in Ariel’s life. The 22-year-old has played Alex Dunphy on the Emmy-winning show for exactly half of her life. With more than ten million viewers per episode, Ariel is very recognizable as Alex; she is someone viewers think they know. She has a dry sense of humor and a quick wit; she speaks fast and delivers punchlines with ease. In those ways, she’s like the character she plays on TV. But that’s where the comparison stops.

Ariel seems cognizant of the balance between performing, what people think Ariel Winter is like, and actually being Ariel Winter: She’s a smart, kind, and strong young woman who’s developed a thick skin over the years — but she’s not untouchable.

Some celebrities maintain a quiet, different-than-you air, even when you’re standing right next to them. But Ariel isn’t like that; she speaks easily and honestly and looks you in the eye. On a gray day in New York, stylists and makeup artists flurry around her, primping and preening her for a photo shoot. Ariel jokes with all of them, remaining flexible, working with the team to find outfits she likes. In front of the camera she moves with the confidence of someone who’s done this many times before. There’s no pretension to her.

Ariel is now emerging from the security of her long-running show as an adult, tasked with making her way in the world as a young woman. She’s still figuring out what that will look like.

“Life is not predictable,” Ariel tells Teen Vogue, sitting on a couch with her leg tucked under her newly red hair flowing over her shoulders. “That’s why it’s unknown and it’s scary. So I try to go with the flow as much as possible.” She’s just finished one photo shoot, and is pausing to chat before she rushes to another. “I do not like lack of control,” she adds. “I don’t like that. So that’s definitely been hard for me.”

But just because Ariel doesn’t know what the future holds doesn’t mean she doesn’t know who she is.

Born Ariel Winter Workman, she grew up in Hollywood. Ariel first hit the scene at age five, in a Cool Whip commercial. After various smaller roles, she landed the part of Alex Dunphy on Modern Family, in 2009, when she was just 11, playing the nerdy middle child in a quirky but close family, often acting as the grounding presence in a head-in-the-clouds bunch. In real life, Ariel’s family life wasn’t quite as picturesque. She moved in with her sister, Shanelle Gray, when she was 14, and was legally emancipated from her mother — who she’s spoken about in the past — a year later.

Ariel has said that her sister has been an overwhelmingly positive force in her life. In fact, it was Ariel’s sister who first recommended she go to therapy, something Ariel says has changed the game for her.

“I go to therapy every week and I’ve been doing it for eight years. It is fantastic,” she says. “For me, therapy is so important. I never want to quit therapy. I feel like people are never ‘cured’ [with] therapy. It’s not a ‘cured’ thing, because you’re not going in sick. You’re just going in.”

For Ariel, therapy is about putting in the work to better yourself, which she says everyone should try to do. “What’s negative and wrong and embarrassing about bettering your life?” she asks. “Isn’t that what everyone wants — to be better and feel healthier and be happier?”

Ariel’s journey to being happier has been bumpy. She started taking antidepressants a while ago, but she struggled to find the right drug and dosage. She isn’t alone: One study posited that the rate of effectiveness for antidepressants was lower than previously thought, possibly because people stop taking them when they experience adverse side effects.

“The only negative about [mental health medication] is the process to finding the right one,” she says. “Some of them have really negative side effects, and it can be really disheartening to take something that’s supposed to make you feel better but it makes you feel ten times worse.’”

Eventually, Ariel found that a low dose of three different medications was the key — they help her feel happy and stave off depression. As a result of switching medications, she also happened to lose 30 pounds. Ariel says the public homed in on her weight loss, both shaming and praising her for it. Many, she says, even suggested she switched her medication to try to lose weight.

“A lot of people commented on my post like, ‘No, she changed her antidepressant because she wanted to lose weight,’” Ariel says. “No! I thought every medication I was on, I was going to stay at that weight, and that was fine. It had nothing to do with that.”

Aside from people conjecturing about her mental health, medication, and weight, Ariel says she sees something on social media that is perhaps even more concerning: “I get so many DMs [asking] ‘What medication are you on? I want to lose weight; I want that medication.’ What I would really like for people to understand is, every medication affects everyone differently. We’re all made differently. Everything is different.”

Of course, any questions about Ariel’s weight loss because of antidepressants is missing the bigger point of a young woman taking steps to improve her mental health.

But Ariel is used to people missing the point because of how she looks.

If you Google “Ariel Winter” right now, you’ll almost exclusively see headlines about her body: her low-cut top, her thong dress, her “baring” all. You might see articles about her weight, about her “clapping back” at body shamers, about her friend and costar Sarah Hyland defending her from trolls. The theme is clear.

The headlines about Ariel’s body often overshadow her accomplishments. For example, the headline about her thong dress could have been about her celebrating the Emmy-winning show she just wrapped; a headline about her “showing skin” in a costume should have been about her 22nd birthday. And it’s not just headlines. On Instagram, Ariel gets comment after comment about her body, and it hurts.

“People on the internet really suck. It bothered me for so many years — I mean, it still does. It never goes away. When someone calls you a ‘fat slut,’ you’re not feeling happy about it. It doesn’t matter what you look like now, it doesn’t matter what you looked like then,” Ariel says. “You’re still going to read that and be like, ‘Oh, that sucks.’”

Ariel has been known to defend herself against detractors, but it’s something she’s doing less of these days. Many take her confident responses to trolls to mean the negativity is not affecting her, but the truth is, Ariel says, that she’s put in a lot of work to make the negative comments matter less.

“I feel like that [pain] never goes away. People are like, ‘How do you get that to go away? It doesn’t bother you at all anymore.’ Again, that’s missing the point. What I’ve said is, I’ve learned to deal with it more,” Ariel explains. “It’s a journey of being confident enough to look at that and evaluate my opinion of myself, which I’m not fully at yet. I’m still working there.”

When she started receiving nasty comments, Ariel said it was all-consuming. She’d fire back nasty comments to her nasty commenters, but that didn’t help.

“That doesn’t feel good,” she says. “I don’t like to hurt people. It doesn’t bring me joy. And at the same time, when I’m writing that negative comment back to them, I’m not being like, ‘Yeah! I defended myself!’ and, like, laughing and feeling good. I’m writing it back, and I’m sad that they wrote me that, and then I’m sad I wrote that back and started this whole thing.”

Now Ariel tries to remember that the only opinion that really matters is her own, taking the power away from her detractors. While years of therapy have no doubt helped Ariel give less credence to negative comments, she remembers one specific Instagram comment that helped shift her focus.

“I had someone comment on one of my pictures, and it really bugged me. They said, ‘So many people on your photos, it really is divided. So many people show so much love and support, and you spend so much time on the negative comments and ignore all the positive ones.’ It really sucked to read that because that’s true,” Ariel says. “You overlook the positive comments, because as soon as you see the positive ones it’s like, ‘Okay, great, but these people don’t agree.’ But why do those people’s [negative] comments matter more than those [positive] comments?”

Still, wouldn’t it be nice if we all noticed Ariel for who she is and what she does, and not what she looks like?

“I’d love for people to see the things I do, not really what I look like, because that’s mainly what’s talked about.”

Ariel says she’d like recognition for her actions, not her looks, but she also says she doesn’t need the world to know everything about her. Like a lot of celebrities, she’d prefer a bit of anonymity in her daily life. She posts sparingly on social media, compared with other young stars, and the bits she does share don’t tell us too much about who she is or what she’s doing. It’s not that she’s holding back or hiding things; it’s just that Ariel is busier actually living life than documenting it.

“I would like for [people] to, of course, see the real me. But … I know that’s not really feasible,” she admits. “It’s rough sometimes, people being like, ‘I don’t know anything about her at all.’ That might be because I don’t put it out there as much.”

“Some people, on social media, they love to share everything, and they know how to share everything, and they’re comfortable sharing everything,” Ariel observes. “I know who I am, and the people around me know who I am; but expressing that to somebody else and having to prove to somebody and be like, ‘I need you to see me this way,’ is not something I do very well.”

The other part of it, Ariel says, is that she’s just like anyone else. She likes sitting on her couch, ordering takeout, watching TV, and hanging with her four dogs: Casper, Chloe, Cash, and Cleo. She likes her dogs so much that on the emotional last day of filming Modern Family, to cope, she went on an online shopping spree and ordered a phone case with the dogs’ faces on the back.

“I was sitting in my trailer, and I might have gone [online] and personalized a bunch of things and sent them to my house, and this was one of them,” she says slyly, holding up the plastic case featuring the fluffy faces.

Dogs are a huge part of Ariel’s life. Her ultimate goal, she says, is to open a shelter for senior dogs and dogs that have been sheltered for more than a year. A pit bull lover, Ariel is part of many animal rescue Facebook groups, and seeing those tiny faces behind bars tears her up. She’ll post on social media to help a dog, but much of her work to help dogs, and others, goes unseen on purpose.

“People may not see the things I do that matter to me,” she says. “That’s okay, because the people I do them for, it matters to them and they know.”

Ariel will stick to firm ground as she blossoms into her next phase of life. She’s hoping to help more dogs, continue to do good by others, still planning to work hard, and trying to get comfortable with the untold path her new season holds. Beyond that, she doesn’t really have a plan — no benchmarks to reach by a certain age because, she says, “I feel like nothing works that way.” But that’s okay.

“This is new territory for me,” Ariel says. “I was doing something very specific for so long. Now I have to reset my mind and retrain myself to be in that place of, ‘All right, I am ready to look for the next thing.’ I am ready to work,” she continues. “I am ready to do everything I can. I am ready to be in the right mindset to go in there again and be able to face the rejection that will come, and be able to move past that and go to the next audition and be ready for it. And be ready for things in my personal life. Just living.”

It’s not that she has no plans. Right now Ariel is working on filming a video game, an experience she says is totally new to her. As for the bigger picture?

“I want to stay the same person I am,” she says. “It’s way more rewarding at the end of the day. I want to stay the person I am, work hard, and see what happens.”

Source: Teen Vogue

#ariel winter #article #interview #teen vogue

[anarcho-smarmyism]

God i fucking feel the whole psychiatrists are shit / fuck the medical system vibe. My shrink ignored and downplayed my complaints about antidepressants and kept increasing the dose until i went full on manic state mode. Now i dont trust anyone and im still suffering lmfao

yeah you would not BELIEVE the shit i had to do to get doctors in Texas to take me seriously about any mental disorder that wasn’t either bipolar, anxiety, or depression. people really think that it’s just as simple as “getting up and going to the doctor!!!” but in reality it’s more like: 

(this got WAY long so it’s under a cut lmao) (trigger warning for basically everything you can imagine btw)

fucking read up on the DSM, try to figure out which symptoms you have, go on goddamn tumblr and sort through the tags of various MIs until you find someone who seems like they’re not full of shit (professionally diagnosed or otherwise). try to have conversations with these people about these conditions, and what it’s like to live with them meanwhile a bunch of irrelevant assholes are hounding you trying to “prove” you’re lying for attention or something. go look through forums of people with the Edgy mental illness you think you might have, watch how they talk, try to figure out if that’s what you do, or if maybe you’re just over analyzing, or paranoid, or something.

THEN you gotta make calls and calls and calls trying to get seen by a real doctor in the first goddamn place. the only ones that take medicaid are shitty and obviously mostly aimed at “rehabilitating” addicts, but you take what you can get. meet the doctor and be polite and try to, like, surreptitiously feel out whether you can be honest, or need to heavily edit what you tell them so you don’t end up fucking institutionalized. pretend you’re too stupid to use Google and you’ve never heard of the DSM, try to describe the symptoms you have as honestly as you can without letting on that you’ve done any of your own research. have the motherfucker blow you off and say you can’t possibly have what you think you have because you’re “too nice” or “too self-aware” or because you’re in any way interested in self-improvement that you can’t POSSIBLY have a personality disorder. finally convince him that it’s possible you MIGHT have a cluster B personality disorder, but he won’t diagnose it because of ~the stigma~. get prescribed whatever standard mood stabilizers and anti-anxiety he feels like giving you.

go to see a therapist. the therapist ALSO does not believe you when you say you may be dealing with something worse than “depression and anxiety”. when you talk about why you think you have the thing, she asks a million weird, invasive questions that sound like she thinks you live in a fucking Lifetime movie. she OBVIOUSLY doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but she’s a ~professional~ and you’re not, so you just try your best to get whatever out of it you can. you get very, very little out of it, because she’s trying to treat “depression and anxiety”, and that’s not what you have, and she is not qualified to treat what you have, and you both know it, but you’re poor and can’t afford a doctor who’s qualified. all the doctors keep telling you about the godawful stigma and telling you how you want to “avoid the label”. you try to explain that you don’t give a fuck about the label or the diagnosis, you just want the treatment. they obviously don’t believe you, and obviously think you can’t tell that they don’t believe you.

so you think, fuck it. i’ll do it myself. i’ll talk to people online who have the Edgy mental illness i think i have, i’ll ask for their advice. and they actually have good, practical, helpful advice! they share worksheets and stories and tell you ways to cope. and it’s hard and it sucks at first, but you practice and it gets easier. but if you ever try to talk to people irl about that? you’re full of shit. you’re making it up, you’re too crazy or stupid or young, too female and too poor, to know what you’re talking about. “you gotta go talk to the PROFESSIONALS”, people insist. “you gotta get a DOCTOR to tell you what’s going on.” try all day to convince any of them that the doctors are sometimes full of shit. it won’t work. it will NEVER work. you are too easy to dismiss and Professional Authorities are too easy to believe.

and the people who don’t tell you to have blind faith in The Professional Doctor Authority? they tell you that “it’s all in your head”. they tell you, if you would just Buck Up and Try Harder, the shit would go away. they say everyone gets sad sometimes and if you try to explain you didn’t just “get sad”, they roll their eyes and say you’re dramatic. exaggerating. it’s just How Your Generation Is. entitled and spoiled. oh what, you’ve been dirt poor for the last decade? you actually DIDN’T always have laptops and iphones and wifi and all that shit? oh whatever, that’s a fluke, doesn’t really count, you’re STILL entitled because of your “””generation””””

one day, after you’ve been having panic attacks nigh on constantly and deliriously telling yourself that you’re just imagining it, you’re just MAKING IT UP, eventually realize there’s no way you’re making this up. that you don’t know what you’ll do if you don’t get help soon. someone tells you, if you’re thinking about killing yourself, just call the hotline! they’ll help you! you’re suspicious, but what you’ve been doing isn’t working. so you give it a shot. you call them and tell them what you’re going through. they tell you to go to the ER. you go to the ER, they ask you questions, reassure you that you really do need to be here, then have some fuckin’ cop tell you, very slowly and softly, that he’s gonna walk you across a parking lot to a building where they’re gonna help you. for some reason he jokes about how ugly the walls on the inside are. you do not give a SINGLE fuck about how the walls look, but you’re “a girl” and you’re in texas, so you act like it’s funny. he’s annoying you, but he’s also obviously trying to help. you shouldn’t blame him for not knowing how. he’s a cop, not a doctor.

when you get to the building, you talk to a woman who asks you what’s going on. you tell her the truth, she tells you it’s okay if you need to pace around, then she tells you that you should never go through the ER because that’s a $1000 bill. you’ve never even seen a thousand dollars in cash before. what the fuck? she tells you you’re gonna stay for probably about 3 days, and then they tell you to sit on a bench, in a room by yourself, nothing to occupy yourself with but a fucking TV blaring news about the weather, apparently there’s a big storm somewhere and people are scared. you are hysterically crying and panicking and they leave you there for HOURS. you think maybe you’re in purgatory. you hear doctors in the next room laughing, talking cordially. your mind is devouring itself as you sit there shaking and trying to hold it together through faith and tenacity alone, and this is just another day at work for them.

before they’ll let you in, they strip search you. they count your scars and comment, almost laughing, to one another about how many there are, how neat they are. where you hid them. you try to make conversation and they ignore you. you are not a person, you are a patient. you want to scream at them but you know that will only make things worse, so you grit your teeth and stare into space and try not to react to anything at all. finally they believe you aren’t hiding anything and they walk you into the room with the other “general” patients. the woman says something about how “some of them are quiet and some of them are loud”. she smiles at you and you want to tear her fucking face off but you know she just doesn’t know what to say. there’s nothing to say. so you just nod and go talk to some of the other patients. they’re pretty cool, pretty nice. they try to hug you but they get yelled at for it. touching isn’t allowed.

you dont even realize for a couple hours that you’re still wearing the thin blue hospital clothes they gave you after they strip searched you. you have to go ask one of the nurses to give you your clothes and let you into a room to change. you put on your clothes, feeling slightly more human, but you still have to wear those goddamn socks instead of shoes, because your shoes are too beat up and shitty to wear without the laces. you zone out for a while and at some point, realize that while you were hysterically sobbing and packing some clothes and notebooks and books to take with you (most of which they would confiscate, telling you to go read some boring magazines about babies and dating and flowers and shit), you without realizing it, grabbed your Harley Quinn t shirt. the one where she’s looking at the camera, smirking as two cops are, apparently, about to drag her away for questioning. for some reason this is the funniest thing that has EVER happened to you. you start laughing and you can’t stop, and everyone looks at you like you’re crazy -the patients look concerned, the nurses look smug and knowing.

you eventually get it together. you remember you can’t sleep without the mood stabilizers you’ve been prescribed. you tell the nurses that, tell them you brought the pills with you, should be with your things. they politely blow you off with what is clearly a canned response, saying you’ll be able to talk to a doctor tomorrow. they ask you what your dose was, you say you don’t remember but you think it was 200mg, you tell them your doctors’ name so they can check. they nod understandingly and you think they’re gonna check. (you will later find out that they just took your word for it, and you were WAY off; you were only on 50mg. they gave you 200mg anyway. you later find out how fucking lucky you were that quadrupling your dose didn’t ACTUALLY fucking kill you.) when you eventually give up on sleeping at 4am and drag yourself up to pour some of the shitty hospital coffee they’re serving, the nurses ask you how you slept and act surprised when you say that you didn’t. “oh, you poor thing.” then they ask when’s the last time you ate and when’s the last time you took a shit and blah, blah, blah. you don’t remember most of it.

when you try to talk to any of the nurses about trying to actually TALK to someone about what you’re dealing with, they tell you they “don’t do that here”. they tell you that’s the “outpatient program”. they make you go to group where they hand out these cute little pamphlets with cute little cartoon stereotypes of people in abusive homes, make you all go around and say which one you are. the nurses think you don’t notice them smirking at you, but you do. during group one day, they talk about a man who lost his wife of 50 years and who was smiling and whistling the next day, because when asked if the cup is half empty or half full, he replies "it's a beautiful cup". the girl about your age who came here after a bender for help with her drinking problem thinks that is so profound that when she gets out of here, she goes and gets a tattoo of a cup with that quote. later, you will admire her tattoo and be happy that the story helped her. on the other hand, they also say things like that "every situation can be good". they use the example of the big storms that are currently happening, somewhere in the world: the storm is bad, but look at how people are helping each other! it's a good thing, after all! the other patients smile. you don't; you say, but a lot of people still died. a lot of people still lost their homes. that's bad. it doesn't matter if some people also helped. the nurses glance at each other nervously and double down: no, you have to "find the good" in the situation. they smile at you and tell you patronizingly how very, very smart you are. you know that's not a compliment, and you also know that THEY don't know that it isn't a compliment. you decide to just keep your mouth shut; the other patients seem to be comforted by this crap. who are you to tell them they're wrong? you shut up.

every night, one of the nurses announces that she is a motivational speaker “outside of here” and talks about Jesus and Overcoming Adversity for about twenty minutes. she clearly has been through some real shit in her life, and she also clearly believes she is really, really helping somebody with her Motivational Speeches. you don’t know if anyone else is getting something out of this -other people are often comforted by things that seem completely ridiculous to you- but you suspect they don’t. whatever. good luck getting her to shut up about whatever she’s on about. (you confess to the doctor later that day that you sometimes think about hurting people. that night, the Motivational Speaker talks specifically about ‘wanting to hurt people’. you pay close attention, knowing she thinks she’s helping, but actually just thinking that they were lying their asses off when they said this shit was confidential. you think to yourself that you need to remember that.) at one point she tells a story about a girl who tried to kill herself and failed, ended up paralyzed. the moral of the story, she says, is that “if you try to end your life before God is ready to take you, he may send you back worse off”. you stare at her and wonder, vaguely, how anyone worships the God you worship and talks about Him like that, like he’s some evil tyrant who would paralyze a child because she wanted to end it all, had the audacity to believe her life was her own to do with as she pleases. you are used to other Christians talking about God that way by now.

the main benefit of being in here is that you get actual, real anxiety medications -not the cheap, weak shit that Texas prescribes poor people asking for anxiety medications. that, and you’re in a safe place. well, not completely safe; a man much older and quite a bit taller than you overhears you and another inmate trading sex stories, most of them sapphic. he sits next to the two of you and listens to you talk for about fifteen minutes, then gets up and says something about d*kes being disgusting. you joke about him, but nervously. the other girl tells you “well if he tries anything, i’ll kill him”. you laugh and say thank you, but you know that’s bullshit. if he tries anything, everyone around you will be too late to help you. you think oh, maybe i’ll just avoid him, but the next time you go to get coffee he glares at you like he wishes you were dead, shakes his hand at you limply, and it takes you a second to remember that it’s sign language for “f*ggot”. you flip him off, but then go tell the nurses about it. you’re very careful to specify he didn’t actually threaten you, ‘cause he’s a black man and you don’t want to get him in Real trouble for “threatening” a white girl when he didn’t. the nurses tell you to “remember where you are” and that people in here are sick. you nod and say yeah, it’s probably fine. he probably won’t do anything. he has to sleep in a separate room from you, anyways.

at some point, you’re playing cards with about five other patients. talking and shooting the shit, starting to enjoy yourself. one of the guys who is in here for a suicide attempt keeps making “jokes” where the punchline is that women did something sexual. people keep not laughing and he’s obviously getting frustrated that people laugh at your jokes more than his. he starts talking shit about “sluts” and you try to, politely, reasonably, tell him that it isn’t his business who anyone sleeps with, that so long as nobody is lying or getting hurt, everybody has the right to sleep with whoever they want. he slams his hand on the table and says, “No! It’s disgusting and it needs to be destroyed.” He stalks off, too furious for words. You glance at the other “slut”, the same girl you talked about being gay with, and she agrees. everyone else takes his side, follows him around reassuring him that he totally respects women, and you’re just a crazy bitchy SJW. you know you’re right and you know he’s not just some poor wounded frat boy. you know he’s an actual danger to any woman he’s around. you also know that no one will believe you, so you just try to hold your tongue and not pick fights with him, because it doesn’t matter if you’re right. everyone will take his side. everyone always takes the man’s side.

eventually, 3 days are up. you feel calmer but just as empty and lost as you did before, except now you are approximately $2k in debt. you go to a nearby elementary school’s park, even though it’s overcast and cold, and you sit on a swingset and stare into space. there are a couple of kids there, but you figure so long as you leave them alone it’s okay. you stare into space for a good twenty minutes before you realize you still have that fucking bracelet on, the one with a bar code that they would scan every time they called you up to get your pills. you tear it off viciously, immediately. 

a few minutes later, a woman walks out of her house, across the street, toward you. you watch her curiously. she approaches you and asks you “if you know where to get any bud”. you say sweetly, “i’m sorry, i don’t,” as if you don’t know for a fact that the woman is a cop because you live on this block, and have seen her cruiser, and also what fucking stoner walks up to someone they don’t know and asks for pot in front of 2 children and on a public school’s property? she wasn’t even dressed like a stoner, for fuck’s sake; just a cop’s approximation of what a stoner looks like. jeans and an oversized t-shirt and hoodie. please. was she even trying, or do cops really just think all stoners are complete morons? do you really look like that much of a stoner right now? doesn’t matter, anyways. you knew she was a cop, and you never tell strangers you do anything illegal anyways -not when you remember to watch your mouth, at least.

the outpatient program turns out to be more of the same bullshit. starts at 7am and they make you empty your pockets and stand with your arms out so they can use a metal detector on you and make sure you’re not smuggling anything in. they make you put your knife in your locker, and that annoys you because you always carry your knife with you when you’re not at home, but you know if you say that they’ll think you’re Violent. so you put it up and feel naked and exposed and try to act like everything is fine. try to be civil with people while you’re tired and irritable and everything is so fucking stupid but you never know, right? maybe they do have SOMETHING to teach you. maybe you’re just being full of yourself thinking these people are full of shit. so you make the pain in the ass arrangements for the little bus to come pick you up, dodging questions about whether the car outside your house runs and whether you have a license and whether it would be technically possible for you to drive yourself, even though you don’t have a license still and you know for a fact if you get pulled over for driving without a license it may be years until you can actually get your license.

the ‘group therapy’ in the outpatient program turns out to be mostly about making fucking collages and shit. they hand out pamphlets about Christianity and about how a butterfly can’t become a butterfly if it doesn’t fight its way through its cocoon. one of the days, the woman leading the group will not shut the fuck up about how she “knows” that talking to a different woman in a different room is going to give you all soooooo much anxiety. you want to tell her to fuck off, but you figure she’s just really green, they’re probably using you all to break in the brand-new “therapists”. you smile at her and make nice because she’s obnoxious and dumb but she’s trying. the woman who usually leads the group is obviously annoyed with you; you are too blunt, too aggressive, too confident in yourself, even now, even at rock bottom (except fuck,don’t tell yourself this is rock bottom, don’t say that, because then like clockwork, the rug will be torn from under you and you’ll find a way to sink even lower), for this woman’s comfort. you try AGAIN to tell her what you think you have. she tells you there’s no way you have it because you’re “too self aware”. you irritably explain that you think there is a strong possibility you do have it, and you explain why, and you try very hard not to scream when the most you can get out of her is some empty platitudes about “having self control” and “seeing the other person’s point of view”.

when she leaves the room, the other patients commiserate with you about what a fucking waste of time this is. one of them is mourning the death of her daughter, lost to suicide when she wasn’t even in high school yet, and she went to the office like she was supposed to, and had an argument with the girl working there and annoyed the girl, so the girl claimed that she was “suicidal” even though the patient said she’d been dealing with depression for decades and knew it wasn’t an emergency, and that’s why she was even here. she starts crying in group and you wonder if you should go up and hug her, or that would be overstepping a boundary. you stare helplessly. the woman leading group watches sympathetically for a few seconds, clears her throat, and diverts the conversation back to her lesson plan.

at some point, they call you in to talk to a doctor. there are three people about your age also in the room, writing stuff down on notepads. one of them asks you questions about every possible trauma and hardship you may have gone through. after you admit to each one she says softly, “im sorry that happened to you.” you are grateful to be treated like a human by somebody in the room, even as the doctor himself is clearly bored with this whole schtick. the meeting takes about fifteen minutes; within a few weeks they will send you a bill for several hundred dollars. that’s how much it costs to sit in a room while a doctor ignores you and lets medical students do his job, asking you about the worst things that have ever happened to you, for college credit so they can finish medical school.

they tell you to do “homework” that amounts to writing about your feelings, your worst memories, your deepest secrets. you try to convince yourself that you might actually get something out of this whole shitshow if you just go along, but you can’t stand the idea of letting that fucking woman read anything you write. whatever. you show up every day and say no, you did not do the homework. no, you do not feel guilty about not doing the homework. the woman who leads the group glares at you. you are an incorrigible crazy girl who must not want to get any better, after all. one day they have you all go outside, hold hands, and move a hula hoop around in a circle without letting go of each others’ hands. you make a skeptical face and the lady who leads the group says something about “being resilient enough” to do her stupid little exercise. you want to tell her to go fuck herself, there’s no part of this shit that has anything to do with resilience, but you know better than to argue. you participate and, incidentally, you pass the hula hoop quicker than everyone else did, and then you say “i don’t like to touch people”, because you don’t, and the other patients let go of your hands immediately. the lady who leads the group looks pleased with herself.

on the seventh day you drag yourself up in the morning to go to this stupid outpatient program, they just have you watch Inside Out and then fill out a paper about “what emotions does society tell us to repress”. you go through the motions, go eat the lunch they serve you, and go home, knowing you are not going to bother going to the next day. These people are full of shit. you have to figure this out on your own, as usual. at least you got the higher dose of mood stabilizers you needed, though.

you get a new job, because you quit your old one in a panic. you’re too anxious and pissed off all the time and awkward and unsure of whatever the fuck these people are so mad about when you can’t sit them down immediately or whatever, to be good at customer service, so you just start doing the grunt work. you’re still under the impression that being a hard worker when you first start a new job will help you keep the job; this job will be the one that lets you figure out you don’t actually want to give 100%, because then your coworkers will slack off and when you try to slack off, your boss will be mad at you for not performing the way you usually do. 

it’s almost unbelievably difficult, but you keep showing up to work. you hide the panic attacks and you push through the depression. you smile and play nice even though everybody is full of shit and thinks you’re an idiot and you can’t ever, ever change their mind. you feel like you’re going to explode all the time, but you don’t explode. you don’t die. you don’t relapse. you toe the line and you slowly, slowly learn and improve and heal.

you try to talk to people about it. they won’t believe you. crazy people can’t fix themselves. they can’t reason their way through a problem, they can’t realize their behavior is an issue and take initiative, they can’t. it’s impossible. crazy people don’t know they’re crazy. only the Doctors can be trusted.

whatever. they’re full of shit. you have to figure out your own way to survive, just like always.

#actuallyborderline #actuallybipolar #adhd #yes it's offically diagnosed by a real doctor fuckin finally #asks #modestmousecankillme #this is a very frank and thorough description of what i went through trying to get help #i dont want pity and i dont want outrage. i just want ppl to know. #but it is long and it is upsetting so god please be careful clicking read more

[marginalgloss]

r&R

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh has had fine reviews everywhere I’ve looked. I found it hard to fault. It’s funny, bleak, and strangely elusive. It is in some ways an uncomplicated realist novel, but in its dedication to cold, calculated bouts of absurdity, it slips away from straightforward analysis. It has the feeling of an extended joke — like a very long episode of a sitcom based around a very dark idea, which only briefly permits the reader to glimpse into the depth in between bouts of audience laughter.

At the start of the story it is 2000, and our narrator is about to settle down for a year of heavy rest. She is quite clear about her intentions. She wants to spend the best part of her days asleep (often for about fifteen or sixteen hours) because that is where she is most comfortable. This is not a suicide attempt: initially it seems more like a gentle parody of current rhetoric around the rituals of ‘self-care’. 

She will still eat, sleep, and perform the usual human ablutions; the rest of her waking hours will be dedicated to watching movies on her VCR. In this, she will be aided by her eccentric therapist, who is only too happy to provide her with a vast array of antidepressants in between bouts of quackery. Money is not a problem either — the book is keen to explain that the narrator lives in a central New York apartment without a concern for rent, and her parents have left her a substantial inheritance to pay the bills. (Her parents are, incidentally, both dead.)  

It was, I suppose, the right time for me to be reading this kind of thing. I don’t find this time of year especially easy for a variety of reasons; a few weeks ago I came down with a minor eye complaint, and the treatment for that has my vision partly blurred by dilating steroid drops. Not being often ill, this has left me feeling out of sorts, like a perpetual convalescent stuck between getting better and getting worse. There is a strange tension between wanting to be an idle person and knowing I am not really capable of it. When my alarm goes off in the mornings for work I propel myself out of bed whether I want to go or not. The motivator is less dedication than it is anxiety; fear of lateness, failure, and various kinds of redundancy. And when I’m not at work, my chosen pastimes are ideal for the kind of person who wants to pretend they are switching off when in fact they are simply shifting their brain into a different gearing for a different kind of work. All this is to say that the idea of a year of R&R, aided by a serious arsenal of chemical downers, starts to seem pretty appealing at this time of year. 

For many pages, it’s unclear why the narrator is actually doing this. A reader might associate staying in bed all day and stunning oneself with a vast array of drugs with words like: depression, failure, anxiety, grief — at one end illness, at the other end melancholy. But the narrator is very careful and deliberate in the way she expresses herself. ‘Depression’ doesn’t really come into it: there is nothing so banal, so obvious, as a declaration of feeling bad. Perhaps the feeling of badness has ceased to be overwhelming and it is now only whelming. It is the thing in which she is submerged, and it is so very much all around her that she has ceased to think of it as worth talking about. Instead she would rather go to sleep. 

Things, however, don’t go entirely to plan. Despite her best efforts she is rarely alone: her best friend Reva has a habit of appearing at unexpected moments, with a considerable amount of emotional baggage in tow. And the cocktail of drugs she is taking leaves her with gaps in her memory. Sometimes she finds evidence of having gone out and come home while believing herself to be ‘asleep’; she stumbles on IM chat logs on her computer that she doesn’t recall having; she finds bags of expensive clothing piled up in her apartment, all bought while she was unconscious. A different book might have used this as the prompt for a mystery story about what the narrator’s other self gets up to when her real self is asleep, but here, much of this is allowed to be inconsequential. 

Again, this feels like a very deliberate contradiction to similar stories about a ‘shut-in’ personality. While reading this I thought often of Money by Martin Amis, which was another novel chiefly concerned with scenes of shocking excess; that book used the same conceit of missing memories, which became the trigger for a descent into Hitchcock-esque paranoia. There’s also The Enormous Space, a short story by J. G. Ballard where the main character chooses to lock himself inside his suburban home as a sort of life experiment; boredom and desperation drive his thoughts relentlessly inward until the dimensions of his surroundings appear to change out of all rational proportion, and a kind of madness takes hold. 

Moshfegh’s novel does none of this: the narrator’s drug-induced nocturnal excursions are simply permitted to occur. They are not permitted to be mysterious. This is a book which is not at all surprised by the idea that many of us (perhaps all of us) have lives which exist in the dark side of our waking lives; it would not be right to call them unconscious thoughts, since they become all too real in the execution; they happen, and ought to be seen as another side to ourselves, and not like the sinister shadow to our ego. 

 A few words about the setting. It is the early 00s; the internet is there, but is of peripheral importance. DVDs are starting to become a thing, but the fact that the narrator actively spurns them in favour of VHS tapes seems important. There’s something about the act of going and getting the tapes that is a thing for her: it is one of the few active motivations she has for leaving her apartment. But those tapes also dealt with time in a different way to DVDs. Each one was like a complete wedge of duration unto itself; you could fast-forward and rewind, but it was clumsy and difficult; they were designed to be consumed from start to finish, in one sitting. DVDs contained multitudes of scenes, angles, options; tapes were somehow so much more one thing. 

There’s something worth saying about the kinds of movies the narrator spends her hours watching. These are very much ‘movies’, not ‘films’. Their names must be familiar even if you’ve never seen them. They come from a certain stable of middlebrow, middle-of-the-road, late 80s and early 90s repertoire; today you might see them today in the early afternoon or late at night, on a TV channel in a foreign hotel. They’re chosen not because they are great, but because they are fine. They have a passable quality. Broadly, they’re anaesthetic, and antiseptic: they only allow as much feeling is as required, and for their duration they suppress unhappiness as long as the attention is held. Whoopi Goldberg is the particular object of the narrator’s affections, for complicated reasons which seem to have something to do with her inimitable charisma. Whoopi is so utterly unmistakeable, never less than absolutely herself; always involved in the world around her, always a pleasure to be around. She is the complete opposite to the narrator.

The book’s treatment of movies made me think of the film Brigsby Bear, which the main character is imprisoned by his family in a bunker entirely isolated from the rest of society, with his only experience of popular culture being a TV show filmed, directed and voiced by his father. In the same way, this novel paints a picture of a person who is the prisoner in part of a certain kind of entertainment. But that film ended with the protagonist making the entertainment his own, and in doing so finding his place in a larger community. My Year of Rest and Relaxation offers nothing so consoling. The narrator of Moshfegh’s novel actually does something similar — she offers herself up to an artist, and allows him to enter her apartment while she sleeps to make herself into a kind of art project. It’s a bizarrely specific kind of gesture: a conscious surrendering of one’s own unconscious. It’s uncomfortable: consensual, but with limited understanding of the outcome. Does anything come of it? It’s unclear. It feels more like an inversion of the idea that creativity can be a route out of depression: what if, instead, I had someone do the creating for me, while I slept? What would that feel like? 

The expectation with a book like this is for the whole thing to move towards a conclusion where the narrator comes to understand the error of her ways. She will dump the drugs, lose the crackpot shrink, and perhaps come to achieve a degree of what some people call ‘closure’. None of this is what happens here. The most we can say is that over time she realises some things about her relationship with her parents, and she comes to regard the people around her with a little less active contempt (especially Reva). Is she a better, more capable human being? Possibly not. But it would be hard to argue that there wasn’t some benefit in all that time spent out of mind. 

#books #ottessa moshfegh #my year of rest and relaxation

[bitchwork]

depression corner

I’ve realized I need an outlet for my copious research regarding my ongoing depression treatment. This outlet has been my mom, and anyone else who will listen, but I think they are tiring of it. 

Quick background: I’ve been in and out of treatment for depression for 10+ years. Have been on about 9 medications including SSRI, SNRI, NDRI, atypical antipsychotics, stimulants, cocaine-based treatment plan, mood stabilizers, etc., with basically zero effect either positive or negative. 

Two weeks ago I started selegiline, which is an MAOI. MAOIs were actually the first ever antidepressant, discovered by accident, when patients who were being treated for tuberculosis suddenly got a lot happier. (Pretty much all antidepressants were discovered accidentally, as are a lot of other medications.) After being THE THING in depression for a bit, MAOIs fell completely out of favor due to a (now known to be overblown) fear of people going into hypertensive crisis when they ate cheese. This is known as the “cheese effect”. Now they are prescribed to like 1% of people with depression, despite actually being really powerful antidepressants according to people who know about such things. Also, the so-called cheese effect, while real, can be totally mitigated by not eating certain foods. Not being able to eat sauerkraut or soy sauce is annoying, but in my opinion it’s not even close to as annoying to crying on the floor of your office. 

So, the selegiline actually seems to be working. After about 9 days of taking it I started to notice a marked decrease in depression. Basically it was just gone. I also had several people I know comment that I seemed less depressed. (They actually noticed before I did, which is pretty common.) However, I’m having some pretty uncomfortable side effects. The worst is this sort of depersonalization feeling. The best way I can describe it is the physical feeling of being really high on weed or just not being quite in my body/head like the lid is not quite snapped on the Tupperware. I keep having the thought of “I’d like to come in now.” The other bad feelings were increased agitation and very transient but intense rage! Fun! So, I actually stopped taking the selegiline four days ago, and it took four days but I did finally “come in” today, and am no longer feeling weird. Because of how it works, the medication will continue to work for 2 weeks after you stop taking it so I’m still feeling the antidepressant effects, and now finally am not feeling the side effects. This is great, but it’s not going to last if I don’t start taking it again.

Quick aside: I think it’s interesting that I never experienced either an antidepressant effect OR side effects on any SSRI, but now that something is finally working I am also getting side effects. I feel like the SSRI’s just didn’t touch me at all, and think there is probably a connection between feeling side effects and feeling a positive effect and if you don’t have one you’re probably not going to have the other. We’re the ones who put them into those artificial categories anyway. They’re all just “effects” really. 

Anyway, I saw my psychiatrist today and we are talking about potentially switching to one of the oral MAOIs, which are supposed to be stronger. (Selegiline comes in a patch that you put on your skin, a form that is relatively new.) Now I’m just waiting for him to do some research on making this switch because, like most psychiatrists, he has basically zero experience prescribing MAOIs. I like my psychiatrist even though he doesn’t seem to enjoy my jokes at all. I can imagine it’s hard to work with someone who did 2 weeks of (intense) research and now considers herself the leading world expert. I regret arguing with him about everything he says, but I sort of do know a lot about MAOIs now...

This has been my Depression Corner. Hope to be back with an update soon!

[a-woman-apart]

Right in Front of Me

I love games in the Life is StrangeTM Series. In the first game (and I don’t think this is a spoiler) you play a symbolic/dream sequence level. These sorts of departures are common throughout the game. You are chased around a maze by some of the antagonists and secondary characters of the game. If any one of them comes around the corner and shines his flashlight on you, then it is game over. You are given the choice to rewind time and try again.

During the first part of this sequence you are being chased around by the game’s main antagonist. The goal is to make it through the dream/maze and make it to the lighthouse in the distance. I could see the lighthouse looming ahead, but I couldn’t figure out how to get past this character to get there. I spent more than an hour ducking around corners and rewinding time whenever I got caught, to no avail. I even called my boyfriend for help.

In true anti-climactic fashion, it turned out that the way ahead was directly in front of me, but I couldn’t see it. Being called after and taunted by this main antagonist had unnerved me so much that I had missed what was probably clear to everyone else. I was trying so hard to hide and avoid him that I became confused. What’s more, I saw that instead of just being a last resort, rewinding time was what I was supposed to be doing all along. I utilized it strategically and traversed the rest of the maze/dream sequence easily.

Reflecting on this experience from almost a year ago had me wondering if I was similarly missing out on important things in real life. It is possible that fear and anxiety have been blinding me to solutions that have been there all along. What have I been unable to see because of trepidation and confusion? With Life is Strange, even my boyfriend couldn’t explain to me over the phone what I couldn’t see, because there was no way to explain why I couldn’t see it. He had played through the same level in the game and had continued without a problem. He couldn’t see why I was stuck.

Maybe it’s similar when we are trying to relate to each other about mental health problems. I know that he loves me, but I feel like sometimes he gets impatient with me because I just don’t “get it.” As I lamented on the blog, I often lament many of the same things repeatedly. I get hung up on the same issues, and it can be extremely frustrating for us both.

There is a clinical term for this, and it is related to depression. The term is “rumination.” My boyfriend joked that the only ruminating that needs to be done is by a cow, and that is accurate. Cows “ruminate” by regurgitating their food and then swallowing it again, in a process meant to aid them with digestion. In the same way, mental rumination refers to “vomiting up” the same issues and going over them again, and again.

The frustrating thing about rumination is that greater focus on the issues at hand does not bring relief. It is closely tied to depression because of how helpless it can make the ruminator feel. Unlike with a cow’s rumination, the problems are not being broken down into easily digestible bits. There is no smoothing over of moods with rumination. Instead the person becomes more and more frustrated the more they think over what’s wrong.

It is easy to see how rumination can make you miss out on details. Just like I focused so much on the unsettling voice of the main antagonist in the game, people with depression and anxiety become overly focused on a limited number of solutions. We tend to feel trapped and lost because we don’t see a way out, even when it is right there in front of us.

Often, the problem is neurological, as expressed by this video that I linked to a few weeks ago. Brains of people with depression look different on scans than brains of people who have never been depressed before. Neurons misfiring could be responsible for the disconnect between things you understand logically and why you emotionally cannot separate yourself from feelings of self-blame, or why you cannot stop the destructive cycle of rumination.

If you are unable to break the cycle on your own, therapy and antidepressants might be very useful for you. I have utilized both myself in my battle against depression and anxiety. I still have trouble finding clear solutions, but medication and cognitive behavioral therapy do help to clear the fog. I still question a lot of the choices that I make, but using coping skills helps me to deal with my everyday symptoms and cuts into some of the self-blame. Also, I read a hell of a lot of books about resilience and/or seeing things from a new perspective. These are books like Grit by Angela Duckworth, Adulthood *For Beginners by Andy Boyle, Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely, and Presence by Amy Cuddy. I also read funny books that remind me that we’re all human, like the memoir/essay collection We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby.

Another point about the Life is Strange games is that they are often about characters who are isolated by the choices that they make. They often only have each other to truly depend on. I feel isolated at times as well, but I know that there are always people that love me and on whom I can depend. Having someone who can offer me a new perspective when I am stuck has been vital for me in moving through my life, whether that’s my mom, another family member, my boyfriend, a friend, or my therapist.

I don’t have to go through “the maze” alone, and one day I will come out safely on the other side.

#schizoaffective disorder #depression #life is strange #rumination #anxiety #living with mental illness #therapy #depression help #mental illness #mental health #coping skills #not seeing the forest for the trees

[accidentally-logince]

Deadly Red - Chapter 2

A/N: In this chapter, there are a couple of references to a one-shot I wrote titled ‘Side Effects’ (that takes place in the same universe). If you want to read it, the link is there, or, if you are unable to read it due to the content (or just don’t feel like reading it, which is fair enough), basically all that you need to know is that Patton takes a sort of mind-space specific antidepressant- they aren’t quite antidepressants, that’s just the best word I could think to relate it to- that the other sides don’t know about. The short story itself is obviously more in-depth and has more to it, but I’m not gonna tell anyone to go read it if they don’t want to but anyways I’m rambling I’ll shut up now

If you missed

Prologue

Chapter 1

Warnings: Minor food mention, blood mention, mentions of medication

(If there are any more, PLEASE let me know!)

Word Count: 1.6k

Pairings: Royality

---

I’m back on the path in the morning, now with a coat and bag- with food and a change of clothes, thankfully- that Elaine and Isabelle had given me. I hadn't wanted to stay for much longer, but I had to know what Isabelle was talking about. 

I'd learned that Roman had come into his room a week ago, and the shadows- as Isabelle called them- showed up very shortly after. That seemed to be about the time that the kingdom began referring to Roman as the King, as opposed to the Prince, which he'd always been- inside and outside his room- up until now. But why did he change his mind so suddenly? 

Elaine also told me that- despite the clear sky now- the blizzard I'd walked into when I came into the room was a common occurrence during the war. 

And from what I've heard, it sounds like Roman is losing.

---

The forest is surprisingly quiet. I'd expected it to be full of animals- birds, squirrels, rabbits, and the like. This is Roman's room after all. But the only sound is the wind- the snow doesn't even crunch under my feet- and even that is barely making a sound. It's... depressing. Roman's signature style has been drained of its usually flamboyancy and colour. 

He would be able to make winter comforting; decently warm and beautiful. But here, the cold permeates through even my coat, and the snow looks packed and dirty. The sky is grey, birds are silent. There's no trace of the usual Disney-like elements.

My legs get sore after an hour or two of walking- there's really no way for me to tell how long I've been out here- and I look around for a place to rest. A familiar clearing in the trees catches my attention, and I push back branches as I walk down the path. 

The fallen log is still there, covered in snow. The pond in front of it is frozen, but it's void of any patterns in the ice. Usually, during the winter time, Roman would make the water freeze over in delicate swirls and snowflake formations. The ponds would look like something out of a fairy tale, which I suppose in some ways, they were. 

I wipe snow off of the log and sit down, my feet sitting on the ground. They don't sink down into the powder; the snow is hardened. Everything that changed about Roman's kingdom has made it feel unwelcoming. I remember when Roman and I used to come into this clearing all the time. Whichever season it was, he would go above and beyond trying to impress me.

"I don't think there are a lot of pink leaves that show up in Autumn," I joke, picking up a rose-tinted leaf and twirling it. 

"Do you like them?" Roman asks. Even though there's a sure smile on his face, I can hear the longing in his voice. I lean over and rest my head on his shoulder. 

"I love them," I reassure him, still admiring the leaf between my fingers. It's surprisingly soft for an Autumn leaf. Roman's shoulders relax, and he puts one of his arms around me. 

Above us, a flock of strikingly red birds flies into the clearing, all chirping the same song in unison. I look on as the lead bird flies forward, twisting and looping around- almost as if performing- as the other birds follow his lead, perfectly synchronized.

"They're so beautiful," I mutter, a small smile spreading across my face.

"Would you like to join them?"

My head lifts off of Roman's shoulder, and I turn to look at him. He has a knowing grin on his face. 

"Join them?" I ask. I cock my head, my eyebrows pulling together.

Roman stands up, holding out his hand. I grab it, and he pulls me onto my feet. Before I can ask what happens next, two huge red wings sprout out of Roman's back.

"Woah," I say, my eyes widening in awe. Roman grabs my other hand and flaps his wings, and our feet lift from the ground. 

"Why don't we just..." Roman readjusts his grip, pulling me up so that I end up sitting bridal style in his arms. I wrap my arms around his neck and look out into the trees, letting the soft breeze ruffle through my hair. 

"It's really pretty up here," I half-whisper. "And the clouds look so fluffy, like cotton candy." 

"I'm very glad you like it."

I tilt my head up and squint. Behind the clouds... it looks like...

"Why is the moon so clear during the daytime?" I ask, pointing up into the sky.

"It helps me keep track of things."

I cock my head and wrap my arm back around his neck. "What kinds of things?"

"Well, I can only stay in here for so long. You know that. So when the moon becomes full, I know that I've been here for too long." Roman looks down and gives me a lopsided smile. "Luckily that's never happened."

"Luckily," I repeat, smiling back at him softly, feeling my eyelids drooping. "I love you, Roman."

"I love you too, Patton."

The moon!

I crane my neck to look up. The moon should be visible from here, but the sunlight is harsh despite the cold, and I find myself shielding my eyes. I look back down and put my hands on my hips. "Should I..." I walk up to a tree and grab a low hanging branch, tugging at it to make sure it's sturdy. If I get higher, maybe I could find the moon and get a better idea of how long I have. 

I hoist myself up, branch after branch, until I'm clutching onto the middle of the trunk. I stand tiptoe on the branch so my feet don't hang off the edge, and to get a tiny height boost.

The outline of the moon is just far away enough that I can't make out whether it's a crescent or quarter, and I lift my hand to climb higher for a better view. A loud crunch comes from underneath my feet, and the next thing I know, I'm on the ground.

Nothing is broken, but my leg hurts to the point where I don't think it would feel too nice if I tried to stand on it. My knee is scraped too, and a steady stream of blood soaks into my pants.

"Ah, shoot," I groan. I pick up my glasses from where they fell beside me. It's a wonder they didn't break from the fall, though there is some dirt on the lenses. No big deal, I just need to be able to see the contents of my bag. I could probably clean up my scraped skin with some water.

I grunt, pushing my torso up a bit more and twisting to find the bag. It didn't fall far, but it's just out of my reach. 

"Not a problem," I mutter to myself, leaning over to grab at it. I catch one of the straps with a finger and pull it toward me, revealing a black rat that had been sneaking around in the pockets. I can't see too clearly with the dirt on my glasses, but I can tell there's something in its mouth.

"Watcha got there, buddy?" I ask, pulling the bag into my lap. The rat lets out a squeak and falls onto all fours. I'm glad to see there are actually animals here at all. I rustle around in my bag, opening each pocket. "What did you take, huh?"

All my pockets seem to have what they're supposed to, until I reach into the little hidden compartment in the back. My pills are gone. My eyes widen and I turn to look at the rat. Sure enough, if I squint through the dirt, I can see that it has my little pill bottle in its mouth, dragging it across the forest floor.

"Oh no," I say. I lean forward a bit, and the rat steps back, regaining the space between us. "C'mon buddy, I need those." The rat starts to turn. "No, no no. Oh jeez. I-I have food. Do you want something to eat? Oh, jeez, no don't-" I reach my hand for the bottle, and the rat turns tail and scampers away.

I shove my bag off of my lap and push myself to my feet as quickly as I can. I ignore the pain in my leg as I run, trying to follow the rat, but it darts off the path and through a patch of bramble. I part the branches and rush through, the thorns scraping at my legs, making it harder to move. The rat is nowhere to be seen.

"Oh, no... no no no..." I whisper. I feel tears stinging at the back of my eyes. I blink them back, sinking to my knees. The pain in my leg has worsened from the thorns and running. 

Those pills gave me my drive. Without them... I usually can’t even get out of bed in the morning.

But then... why is there still that feeling in my chest? That confidence that’s barely there, telling me to ‘get up, get up, you need to find Roman’? 

I could brush it off as the last of the pill’s effects, almost worn off. But that explanation feels defeatist. I’m in Roman’s room. One of the positive effects has always been enhanced confidence. I can work with that until Roman and I are out of the room. I can get new pills later. But they’re not as important right now as my real goal. 

Even thinking that seems to make the barely-there confidence become stronger.

Enduring the pain in my legs, I stand up and go to find my bag.

---

My Other Fics

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[johnlockedslashprincess]

Hello world.

How are you? I’m... still alive. Maybe more alive than ever? 

I’ve had a pretty weird day today. Reading an old fic of mine that plays the old, sad strings in my brain and it got me thinking all those not good things that make me regret I chose to live in the end. 

I like to talk about myself. I like to think about myself. And most recently, to everyone’s surprise, my therapist finally made me realize why that is a thing. I like all these things just to persuade myself I am worth having a life because I hate myself. I hate myself so much, I feel like I’m unworthy of love of any kind. 

Everytime my mind turns a wrong turn and everything goes dark, I cry, trying to figure out where is the joke. When is everyone going to laugh at me for being so stupid, for thinking that they actually loved me. I stare at my boyfriend, who’s telling me all the good stuff that he can; telling me he’s there for me no matter what, telling me he will always love me and I stare at him, asking why’s he still with me. Because I’m gonna be like this forever. Why would he choose to take care of someone unwilling to understand they’ve got a place in this world? 

I keep thinking about what I’ve done. Mostly... I still wish I was dead. I’m doing better than I’ve ever been but the thought is still there. Everyone would be better without me. 

This is the first time I’m going into details. I’ve told everyone that I don’t remember most of what happened and it was true for some time. But I really got better so my brain finally let these thoughts back into light from being repressed, and I keep thinking about the moment I’ve decided that death was all that was waiting for me. Not just hypothetically but for reals. 

I was home alone for a weekend. I’ve had a panic attack of some sorts which logically led to me cutting myself. It was nothing serious, just some usual few scratches here and there. If you didn’t know where to look, you wouldn’t see them. It didn’t work at all so I took some benzos to make me fall asleep but they didn’t work as well. They just made me calm enough to realize I was getting to the point of having enough. 

I took every single drug I could find in my room and threw it onto my bed until there was quite a nice pile of various kinds of medication... but mostly just psychiatric ones. There were at least three or four kinds of antidepressants, some benzos, my mood stabilazors and antipsychotics, medication for my asthma, some painkillers. Who knows what else was there. I was sitting by this pile, probably crying my eyes out. Evaluating if it was enough to kill me, if this really was the moment to end it all. I texted some of my friends, trying to reach out for the last time but they were busy at the moment (don’t get me wrong, I’m not blaming anyone, I respect everyone having their own lives and I will always love these people). But no one answered, unfortunately, making me more convinced that yes. This was the right moment to kill myself.

Yep, that’s right. I hate myself so much, I decided I was not worth having a life.

I started taking all of the pills out of the plates, making a new pile, more colourful this time. It was mostly white but also green and pink and orange... When I finished, I brought apple juice and a bottle of Jägermeister to my room and I locked the door. 

There was no dramatic thought, no dramatic... anything. I just sat myself on the bed, and totally calm took a handful of those pills and put them into my mouth. I swallowed them with the apple juice and from this moment I couldn’t stop. I kept doing so for quite some time. I also managed to open the bottle of Jägermeister but according to my medical records there was no alcohol in my blood. So I just probably opened it and forgot about it or had no strength to drink anything anymore.

This is where it gets tricky because I don’t know what’s real anymore and what’s not. 

I started feeling dizzy, I collapsed on the bed because my body couldn’t sit straight anymore. My stomach wasn’t cooperating even though I wanted to take in more. I felt like throwing up but I was trying my best not to do it because how would I die if I threw everything out after fifteen minutes? Needless to say... I threw up. Once, twice, thrice. I remember the bitter taste of slightly dissolved pills. 

What it is that I don’t remember is the moment I decided I couldn’t die that day. I decided I couldn’t hurt and probably kill my mum like this. It took all that I had to open my eyes that I didn’t close willingly, it took even more to find and grab my phone (that was in my bed thanks god, because if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be able to get it, my body just wasn’t cooperating). I dialed the ambulance number, telling the nice lady that picked up, I have just overdosed. Pretty badly.

All that goes after this is just a series of broken memories... Me giving the ambulance woman all the details on how to find me; me still throwing up everything that I’ve worked so hard on getting down; the woman on the phone still talking to me, asking me why did I do that, why didn’t I call for help. 

There were ambulance, fire fighters and police on their way to my shared flat. I caused quite some fuss that afternoon. I remember hearing the lock getting picked out with a power drill, I remember the sound of all those legs running around the tiny flat I used to live in. I somehow managed to unlock the door to my room by just lifting my arm beacuse I didn’t want them to destroy it as well. 

Then it kind of ends... There were voices talking to me, asking me again, why, what, where, so young, so pretty, why... There were hands touching me and moving me around. My eyes were still closed and my body numb. My consciousness very unstable, turning itself on and off.

I remember being in an elevator, lying in a stretcher, being pushed inside an ambulance car. I thought it was night already because my eyes were still closed, while it was just around 4 or 5 pm. 

I remember the engine and siren starting and after that it was just salt and water and throwing up the whole evening. I got taken to ICU when my stomach was empty and then there was a second hell waiting for me. 

This is all just fragments again, mixed with things I’ve been told or that I’ve read in my records, because there’s almost nothing in my memory. 

I got a fever over 40°. The nurses couldn’t give me any medication so they just kept wrapping me in wet and cold sheets. I was hysterical and screaming, halucinating, biting my tongue and the insides of my mouth. I remember opening my eyes and being unable to see which made it even worse because I thought I went blind which kept me screaming and calling for help the whole night. 

The next thing I remember is the morning when my consciousness came back. 

One of the nurses got me my phone with millions of missed calls from every person close to me. The nurses already called my mum letting her know what happened (she had no idea there was anything wrong with me by the way, I never told her I was depressed). So except my mum who already knew I was alive there was only one person left I could call. I will never forgive myself for the pain in her voice when she picked up, after a sleepless night of crying and worrying... I’m sorry, so sorry, Elis. I love you and I hope you will never read this thing that I’m writing.

Lots of people came to visit me afterwards. Crying, apologizing, asking questions I couldn’t answer. Later I found out I somehow managed to make a post on Facebook that read just “i’m sorry” before I swallowed the first dose of pills. I managed to make a post on Tumblr as well. 

It’s been over a year. And... I don’t know how I feel. Like I said once, my therapist told me that suicide is the most selfish thing you can do. It hurt when I heard it. But I took my time thinking about it and I found my answer. Because what if it feels like it is the least selfish thing you are capable of? I tried everything. I tried every single medication given to me, I was in therapy, I called for help so many times for fuck’s sake. Attempting a suicide was the last call that was left for me to try. 

And guess what? I’m here. Better. Than. Ever. With a boyfriend that I love, having future with him together and having something I have never felt before. 

#my story

[notagoodplace4gods]

[FIC] It’s funny (because it’s true) (Stozier)

Even now, he’s hanging out with his friends at the quarry, he looks at his bird book, reading all the description and inspecting the drawings, and all he can think of is: “remember when i used to enjoy things?” He laughs at that. It’s not funny, not really, but he can’t help it.

It’s on AO3

A/N: okay so this is depressing, richie and stan are depressed as fuck and they joke about it a lot (because relatable) they’re not okay but they’ll be. Trust me. I’m sorry y’all

It gets harder after Neibolt and Pennywise. Everything does: talking and joking take a lot more effort than it did before. Getting out of the bed takes longer because now he needs to spend a great deal of time psyching himself up to do it. Caring is hard too, it’s like all of his emotions were sucked out of him and all that’s left is that horrible sense of nothing. Stan doesn’t care about school anymore, or doing his homework, he doesn’t care about making his father proud, but at the same time, he avoids making him mad because he doesn’t care enough to argue with him. Even now, he’s hanging out with his friends at the quarry, he looks at his bird book, reading all the description and inspecting the drawings, and all he can think of is: “remember when i used to enjoy things?” He laughs at that. It’s not funny, not really, but he can’t help it.

His friends look at him, and he realises he said it out loud. He regrets it immediately, not because it’s not true (it is), but because he just gave his friends another reason to worry about him. They’re all so very concerned, it’s funny. It’s funny because it’s another thing for Stan to fail at. He can’t even comfort his friends right, instead he worries the fuck out of them with self depreciative, bordering on suicidal jokes.

He was diagnosed with depression a few months ago. He’s been seeing a therapist ever since, but she can’t help when he can’t really talk to her about what happened. The antidepressants help a little though, and so do these jokes.

“Hey, are you okay?” Bill asks, carefully and, god, Stan hates that he asks even though he knows that Stan isn’t okay. Well, to be truthful, neither of them are, but Stan is the only one who’s not pretending to be.

Still, Stan thinks about lying (sure, I’m okay, everything’s great, almost dying was fun, I don’t have nightmares of It returning or anything) he thinks about telling the truth (I’m not scared of dying anymore, and that scares the hell out of me), he thinks about only shrugging and answering with a “lol,” but he does neither, because somehow, deep down, he still cares that none of these answers are what Bill and the others want to hear right now. He knows that their friends all want him to be okay, but he isn’t and he doesn’t think he can ever be. He tried to be okay, he tried so hard, but he can’t, he just can’t and he doesn’t want to disappoint them once more after all they’ve been through. He cares and it’s exhausting. So he excuses himself and runs away. He only slows down when he reaches his house, but he doesn’t go in, he passes it, goes into the nearest alley, sits down at the floor and tries to calm his breathing.

He can’t do this. He doesn’t want to do this anymore. He just wants to… “God, I want to die.” He admits and it surprises him how easy it is.

“Bitch, me too, the fuck?” He hears someone says, and turns around to find Richie, parking his bike at the beginning of the alley, having followed him all the way from the quarry. His voice is louder than he probably intended to.

Stan can’t help it, he snorts. He laughs, and he laughs so much it begins to hurt, but he keeps on laughing. Richie sits by his side, fingers interwining with his best friend’s and he’s laughing too.

“I know I shouldn’t, but I’m kinda relieved?” The laughter dies down, but Richie’s still giggling. “Everybody is so keen on moving the fuck on, but I just… I don’t think I can move on, hell, sometimes I can barely move, I just want it all to stop, for a second.”

Stan nods and lets Richie continue. Richie has always been good at talking.

“I thought that there was something wrong with me, for not getting over it, for still having nightmares, for…” He swallows whatever he was going to say, but Stan still nods at him, because he knows. “But apparently you’re also falling apart and I’m glad… I mean, I’m not glad you’re falling apart, I’m just…”

“I hate that this is happening to you.” He hates that he didn’t even notice that Richie was suffering like this, but now that he’s thinking about it, it’s as clear as day. He remembers Richie getting really quiet and then really loud, as if to overcompensate it. He remembers seeing his hands shaking as he grew anxious more often. “Hell, I hate that this is happening to me, but it is, and I’m just glad that we don’t need to go through this alone.” Stan finishes for him, because he does know, because he’s finally feeling something other than this stupid apathy that has been ruling all his days, and it’s definitely relief.

Richie closes his eyes and throws his head back. “God, we’re so stupid, we’ve been going through the same stuff this whole time, but we never talked about it, not even once.”

“Me? Talking about my feelings like an adult? Unrealistic.” Stan shrugs.

“Healthy coping mechanisms?” Richie smiles and turns to him. “I don’t know her.”

Stan shifts and gets closer to him, before he can even realize what he’s doing.

“I didn’t even cry about it yet.” Richie whispers. “I mean, I want to, but I… I just feel so empty…”

“We’re so fucked up, we can’t even do depression right.” Stan breathes out. “Here we are, talking about how much we want to die, and we’re laughing.”

“Well, it’s funny because it’s true.” Richie shrugs.

“It is.” Richie’s hands are shaking, so Stan holds them. They hold hands for a long time in that dark alley where no one can see them, they keep holding hands when they get up and head for Stan’s, and they keep holding hands as they go up the stairs to his bedroom. They lay down on Stan’s bed, and it’s so tiny it’s hard to keep holding hands, so Richie lets him go. Stan has a moment to feel disappointed, but then Richie is holding him, hugging him tight.

It’s nothing like when the other losers hug him. Stan always feels like he has to control himself when he’s around the others. He can’t let them know how he’s feeling. He can’t be a bummer, he can’t be a burden. But now that he knows Richie understands what he’s going through, he allows himself to have this. Stan holds him back, resting his forehead against Richie’s, it’s all so tentative it’s so new, and so so good, Stan is in completely in awe. But the most surprising thing is what he does next. He cries.

Richie holds him harder, but he doesn’t say it’s okay (because it’s not), he doesn’t say it’s going to be okay (because how the hell would he know), instead he says “I’m here.”

And he is here, holding his best friend like his life depends on it, he is here, kissing the top of Stan’s head and playing with his curls. He is here, despite feeling just as awful, and desperate and scared. He is here and Stan is not alone.

“I’m here too.” Stan tries because it’s the only thing he can offer. If Richie’s there for him, he needs to be there for Richie in return, it’s only fair. He still wants to die, but maybe if he doesn’t try to, if he just holds Richie’s hands and stays, it will be enough. Richie smiles at him, it’s reluctant and small, but it is enough.

It takes a while, but they eventually fall asleep, and miraculously they don’t have any nightmares. Stan dreams Richie convinces him to let him make lunch, but then they blow up the kitchen trying to make sandwiches.

Richie laughs the next morning when he tells him the dream. They both do because this is actually funny.  Also a very real possibility, so they call in the losers to help them. They use the dream as an excuse to not do anything while everyone else works, they sit side by side, holding hands and avoiding their friends worried glances.

This is still not okay, they are not okay, but, somehow, this is… Better. They’re getting better.

#stozier #richie tozier #stan uris #stozier fic #mine #sometimes i write #oh wow so i deal with my depression making my faves depressed as fuck #stan and richie like to joke about dying a lot because that's how they deal okay #it kinda helps #and they help each other #tw for suicidal thoughts #and suicidal jokes #depression #dealing with depression with humour