Someone calling in sick to work in order to sleep for their hour long shift.
Someone breakdancing to a boombox blasting Christmas music on the quad.
Someone crying because they got a free sandwich.
Someone walking into the lounge at 1 am with a huge stack of books, and the determination of someone who forgot a term paper.
Someone putting off writing their thesis because someone else needed math help and “logarithms are fun!”
Someone taking a lighter to a notebook as soon as they left the science building.
More than one flask being carried to class.
Someone literally giggle evilly when given a 6-pack of beer.
A freshman taking gen eds complaining about everyone else complaining about how hard finals are. (Note: the freshman may or may not have ever been seen again.)
Someone crossing campus at a run in slippers.
A nursing major explaining that finals are actually natural selection, and that she is the strongest and most adaptable and she was going to survive, while talking to herself.
A different nursing major looking very forlorn because she just ran out of wine.
Someone sleeping on a bench in the music building, with actual pillows and blankets and everything.
Sticky notes with swearwords written on them littered around the science building.
A group of students trying to one-up each other about how badly their juries had just gone.
Someone leaving for the library at 3 am, because there was free coffee there.
Someone flipping off the professor after being wished good luck on the final.
The same person realizing that they have an entire lifetime of that class ahead of them, because it’s their major.
Someone being questioned about how they wanted their funeral to look, after talking about the 8000 words they had due.
Just, so many people sprawled on floors because it’s easier to do that than anything else. So many.
The most genuine gratitude I’ve had directed at me possibly ever, because I gave someone a peanut butter cookie.
Finals: we’re all tired, hungry, and a little unhinged. It’s okay.
hey also remember that guy, martin shkreli, who bought the rights to that HIV drug then jacked up the price like crazy?
not only did he get arrested today but his lawyer increased his hourly rate by 5000%
“Shkreli, who reportedly received the news about the price hike while he was being fingerprinted, cried foul and accused his attorney of “outrageous and inhumane price gouging.” (Source)
let’s stop seeing sex as the biggest thing you can do to show someone you love them
everyone knows that the real way to show someone you love them is to find them a really cool rock. not a diamond. just a neat rock that you think they will enjoy
Not a rock THE ARKENSTONE
Why just one rock Why not three Why not the silmarils
Listen up turd turrets, I WANTED to just play video games, I WANTED to just have fun, I NEVER wanted my gaming to be political or a struggle, I just wanted to play.
But you wouldn’t fucking let me, you brought up my gender, you judged me based on it, YOU made it political.
So now I WILL wreck everything with my fucking feminism, I am the feminist nightmare you fucking created.
“The truth is, chivalry has basically fuck all to do with women, and everything to do with horses.
See, the word “chivalry” comes from the French word “chevalier,” which comes from “cheval,” which means “horse.” Chivalry is literally just “rules for if you have a horse.” This was an important set of rules to have in chivalry times. Horses were the Blackhawk Helicopters of the Middle Ages; if you had a horse, you could absolutely kill anybody who didn’t have a horse and nobody was going to say a god damn thing. The only thing stopping you was chivalry.
That’s what chivalry was for. Chivalry was – and still is – basically a way of saying, “okay, I have an optimized death machine between my legs, maybe I should look out for people who don’t have one of these.” So it’s not that chivalry is specifically about defending women because women are weak. It’s that chivalry is about defending people who don’t own horses, and in the middle ages women didn’t own shit.”—
“Chivalry boils down to three things: mercy, charity, and humility. Mercy means being conscious of your advantages, and treating other humans gently. Charity means giving without expecting anything in return. Humility means accepting your mistakes, and recognizing that those who don’t have your advantages aren’t your inferiors.“
*bangs fists on table repeatedly* TELL US THE STORY TELL US THE STORY
SO OKAY
Picture the scene. Eighth grade. Tiny baby earlgraytay- young, scrappy, hungry, and with a chip on their shoulder from being the Weird Kid who was constantly in and out of trouble.
Tiny baby EGT has an American History teacher that we’ll call Mrs. B. Mrs. B. was very loud and very Long Islander and liked baby me for being just as nerdy about history as she was (though I think she occasionally wanted me to stop blurting out all the answers so that the other kids could learn something.)
We did a Mock Constitutional Convention wherein every kid in the class got the part of a delegate. If you were quieter and/or needed to watch more than talk, you got an obscure delegate and could mostly watch.
If you were a blabbermouth, like me, you got Alexander Hamilton.
So, I was really proud of myself, because Alexander Hamilton was a big important guy who talked a lot and had a lot of opinions.
My mom helped me make a terrible tiny Hamilton cosplay. I had a frilly shirt and buckle shoes and I distinctly remember putting my hair in the rattiest boy-ponytail in the history of boy ponytails.
I spent like three days reading over all my notes and vibrating intensely, and vowed I would give, like, the best performance ever, and do all the arguing.
Unfortunately, there was a flaw in my clever plan.
The flaw in said clever plan was that everyone else in my class was in eigth grade. They thought history was a thing you slogged through to get an A, and no one else was as into this as I was.
So, I basically had the floor for the entire mock Convention.
I seem to remember spending a lot of time talking about the National Bank and making compromises with imaginary opponents because our TJeffs and our John Adams and just about everyone else were wayyyyy happy to let me talk and get graded for my performance.
tl;dr: Imagine an AU wherein Alexander Hamilton wrote the entire Constitution single-handedly because no one else showed up.
clint and nat getting into arguments about stupid things and nat calling him ridiculous bird names like ‘bluetit’ and ‘penguin’ just to watch him get irrationally angry over it like “PENGUINS AREN’T EVEN REAL BIRDS!” and “I’M A HAWK! A HAWK!” and her responding with “whatever you say, goose”
and one day in the middle of a fight, he just stops yelling and looks at her and whispers, “brown recluse.” she doesn’t talk to him for two days.
“There’s also the argument ‘Books are supposed to challenge you!’ which is an interesting argument, but I don’t actually like it very much. Most of my books aren’t actually supposed to challenge you, they’re supposed to comfort you because life is a hard country and we all need a little kindness along the way. (It is totally fine if other people’s books are supposed to challenge you, just… er… #NotAllBooks or something.) I do not actually feel bad about this, because I think comfort is hard to do and generally worthwhile.”—Ursula Vernon, as if speaking directly to me. (via lotstradamus)
Also, apparently we’ve all decided that we’re all going through life like the most important part of The Winter Soldier wasn’t that Pierce referenced Mama Fury? Like we’re okay with the movie throwing out her existence and none of us picking that up? It’s not like we needed canonical confirmation that Nick Fury was in fact of woman born, but like…she’s real, guys. She was recently alive. She was probably a SHIELD agent in the Civil Rights Era and left her son with her dad for weeks on end as she worked some real Cold War shit. She probably tangled with the Winter Soldier once in go-go boots. She probably told her son to believe in heroes, but you gotta go looking for them. She probably should be fancast as Nichelle Nichols and featured with Grandpa Fury in a billion different fanworks because Mama fucking Fury, are you kidding me
Seeing this old post getting new notes has reminded me that timeline can be whatever we need it to be, and these characters can be as old or as young as suits the story, and we need Mama Fury in Agent Carter, this isn’t even a question, we need it, we need her, we need the Fury family representing and being as much a legacy as the Starks ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Mama and Papa Fury meeting in the fledgling SHIELD under Director Carter, though.
Let’s put problems with spelling, grammar, narrative flow, plot structure, etc. aside and just look at the story and, in particular, the character arc of Bella Swan.
At the beginning of the story, she is moving from Arizona to Washington on her own volition - she has decided to give her mother and her step-father some time and space and to spend some time with her father. At this point in the story, she is, admittedly, a bit of a Mary Sue, but an endearing one. She is sensitive to the needs of others (moves to Alaska for her Mom’s sake, helps her Dad around the house, is understanding and tries to give the benefit of the doubt even when the other students are somewhat cruel to her when she first arrives), clumsy, out-of-sorts, and a little insecure. She’s not a girly-girl or a cheerleader type, doesn’t get caught up in the typical sorts of high school behavior, and in general functions as an independent person.
It’s worth noting that if Tyler’s van had smashed her, she would have (at that point) died as a fairly well-rounded, empathetic individual. We certainly wouldn’t say she died in need of redemption, at any rate. Instead, Edward ‘saves’ her - and this supernatural ‘salvation’ marks the beginning of a journey that ultimately destroys her.
As she gets more entangled with Edward, she becomes less and less independent, more and more selfish. She is accepting of his abusive behavior (stalking her on trips with her friends, removing parts from her car so that she can’t go see Jacob, creeping into her window at night, emotional manipulation) to the point that when he completely abandons her (walking out on the trust and commitment they’ve built together, in spite of having vowed to remain with her no matter what), she is willing to take him back. Edward is clearly entirely morally bankrupt.
Her father, Charlie Swan, is sort of the Jimminy Cricket of the story. His intuition is a proxy for the reader’s intuition, and he’s generally right. He doesn’t like Edward, because he can sense the truth - not that Edward is a vampire, that doesn’t matter in particular - but that Edward is devoid of anything approximating a ‘soul’ (for those strict secularists, you could just say Charlie can see that Edward is a terrible person). Bella is warned by numerous people and events throughout the course of the story that she is actively pursuing her own destruction - but she’s so dependent on Edward and caught up in the idea of the romance that she refuses to see the situation for what it is. Charlie tells her Edward is bad news. Edward tells her that he believes he is damned, and devoid of a soul. He further tells her that making her like him is the most selfish thing he will ever do. Jacob warns her numerous times that Edward is a threat to her life and well-being. She even has examples of other women who have become involved with monsters - Emily Young bears severe and permanent facial disfigurement due to her entanglement with Sam Uley.
Her downward spiral continues when, in New Moon, she turns around and treats her father precisely as Edward has treated her - abandoning him after suffering an obvious and extended severe bout of depression, leaving him to worry that she is dead for several days. She had been emotionally absent for a period of months before that anyhow. Charlie Swan is traumatized by this event, and never quite recovers thereafter. (He is continuously suspicous of nearly everyone Bella interacts with from that point on, worries about her frequently, and seems generally less happy.)
Her refusal to break her codependence with Edward eventually leads them to selfishly endanger Carlisle’s entire clan when the Volturi threaten (and then attempt) to wipe them out for their interaction with her - so she is at this point in the story willing to put lives on both sides of the line (her family and the Cullens) at risk in favor of this abusive relationship. Just like in a real abusive relationship, she is isolated or isolates herself from nearly everyone in her life - for their safety, she believes.
Ultimately, she marries Edward, submitting to mundane domesticity and an abusive relationship - voluntarily giving up her independence in favor of fulfilling Edward’s idea of her appropriate role. Her pregnancy - which in the real world would bind her to the father of her children irrevocably (if only through the legal system or through having to answer the kid’s questions about their paternity) - completely destroys her body. The baby drains her of every resource in her body (she becomes sickly, skeletal, and unhealthy) and ultimately snaps her spine during labor. Her physical destruction tracks with and mirrors her moral and psychological destruction - both are the product of seeds that she allowed Edward to plant inside her through her failure to be independent.
Ultimately, to ‘save’ her (there’s that salvation again), Edward shoots venom directly into her heart. Let me repeat that for emphasis: The climax of the entire series is when Edward injects venom directly into Bella Swan’s heart.
Whatever wakes up in that room, it ain’t Bella.
I’ll refer to the vampire as Bella Cullen, the human as Bella Swan.
Bella Swan was clumsy.
Bella Cullen is the most graceful of all the vampires.
Bella Swan was physically weak and frequently needed protection.
Bella Cullen is among the strongest and most warlike of the vampires, standing essentially on her own against a clan that has ruled the world for centuries.
Bella Swan was empathetic to the needs of others before she met Edward.
Bella Cullen pursues two innocent human hikers through a forest, intent on ripping them to pieces to satisfy her bloodlust - and stops only because Edward calls out to her. Not because she perceives murder as wrong. (Breaking Dawn, p.417). She also attempts to kill Jacob and breaks Seth’s shoulder because she didn’t approve of what Jacob nicknamed her daughter (Breaking dawn, p.452). She no longer has morals .
Bella Swan was fairly modest and earnest.
Bella Cullen uses her sex appeal to manipulate innocent people and extract information from them (pp.638 - 461) - she does so in order to get in touch with J. Jenks.
In short, her entire identity - everything that made her who she was - has been erased.
This is powerfully underscored on p. 506, when Charlie Swan (remember, the conscience of the story) sees his own daughter for the first time after her transformation:
“Charlie’s blank expression told me how off my voice was. His eyes zeroed in on me and widened.
Shock. Disbelief. Pain. Loss. Fear. Anger. Suspicion. More pain.”
He goes through the entire grieving process right there - because at that moment, he recognizes what so many readers don’t - Bella Swan is dead.
The most tragic part of the whole story is that this empty shell of a person - which at this point is nothing more than a frozen echo of Bella, twisted and destroyed as she is by her codependence with Edward, fails to see what has happened to her. She ends the story in denial - empty, annihilated, and having learned nothing.
holy shit
now who wants to write fanfiction emphasizing this point
Now that’s cool
Did I just read a Twilight literary analysis that I liked?
What have I become?
This was so good oh my god. I’m actually so tired of people hailing Twilight as a love story and this was the most accurate thing I’ve ever read on the matter.
omg i really want this mixed with actual gore and horror
y’know if i were mother gothel i wouldn’t tell rapunzel that her birthday was ACTUALLY her birthday. like i’d probably tell her that her birthday was any other day where floating lanterns from the castle do NOT fill the sky and make her think they’re for her. hell whats the point of even telling her that birthdays exist, its not like she’s gonna ever know anyone else besides mother gothel who’ll tell her about birthdays
also what is rapunzel’s real name? is it actually rapunzel; is that what the queen and king named her? if that were the case then mother gothel should have definitely renamed her and had her grow up with a name that is different than the missing princess. like if she got to the town in the movie and heard someone say “this is for the missing princess, rapunzel” she’d be like “holy FUCK”
kiana this is a children’s movie
a man gets fatally stabbed and a woman literally turns to dust as she falls from a 60 foot tower. im talking about birthdays and names so i dont know what the fuck your point is
Moves by truck, train or boat. Ridiculously common. And see those holes on the bottom? Mobile by forklift. Also, HEAVY, even when empty they’re in the tons. If you had some warning you could string these things end to end for miles and human bodies can’t move them. Plus they’re nice and wide so you can comfortably walk on top of them for patrols.
“But we don’t have easy ways to kill them!”
Put the shotgun down you fucking idiot.
No tires to pop. Heavy and slow but inevitable. Climbing required to enter and thus, relatively zombie proof, especially if you spend like an hour to protect the glass.
A lot of large farming equipment can destroy cars.
Want to guess what it’d do to a decaying human body? It’s not pretty.
Now I know what you’re thinking. Merely flattening them with common construction equipment or farming gear isn’t enough.
“But we need ways to move a lot of people that zombies can’t stop!”
BEEP BEEP MOTHERFUCKER. Deer don’t have a chance and neither does a zombie.
“But that’s not good enough!”
NOW it’s time to call our friend the military because this ride stops for no one.
Do I need to keep going or is it clear the movies are bullshit yet? Seriously a dozen prepared people with heavy equipment licenses could clear an entire street of zombies AND powerwash it after.
I was looking up the etymology for Succubus and Incubus to find a gender neutral term, and I found your post. From what I can tell, Incubus comes from in+cubare, Latin for "to lie upon" and succubus from sub+cubare, Latin for "to lie beneath." Using this knowledge, I made the term Procubus, which should be the equivalent of "to lie beside." I thought to share it with you, in hopes that you may find it useful.
Hey this is a really interesting concept to consider! Also takes away the sexism that incu/succubus connotate. Thanks,
I was looking up the etymology for Succubus and Incubus to find a gender neutral term, and I found your post. From what I can tell, Incubus comes from in+cubare, Latin for "to lie upon" and succubus from sub+cubare, Latin for "to lie beneath." Using this knowledge, I made the term Procubus, which should be the equivalent of "to lie beside." I thought to share it with you, in hopes that you may find it useful.
Hey this is a really interesting concept to consider! Also takes away the sexism that incu/succubus connotate. Thanks,
i love moviegoing experiences where people clap and cheer because there’s no point to it, the people who made the movie can’t hear you, but people do it anyway because they’re just so moved or excited by the film that they burst into applause even though the only people they have to share it with are each other. that’s nice.
mccoy:
are you out of your mind what is this bullshit we're in the middle of nowhere what do you want me to do make bandaids out of rocks?? replace a limb with a cactus??
kirk:
well if it's too hard--
mccoy:
YOU LISTEN HERE YOU LITTLE SHIT DON'T YOU SASS ME NOW GET YOUR OAF HANDS OUT OF HERE AND LET THE PROFESSIONAL DO HIS WORK DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM
I was musing on the everyday passive-aggression of business emails at work the other day after a particularly pissy back-and-forth with my least favorite coworker, in which we basically told each other to fuck off in plain view of both our bosses (who were cc’d on the whole thing), but because we did it in professional language we can get away with that. So, I decided to make a list of the most common code-words and phrases and what they really mean, for anyone entering their first white-collar business environment who might want help translating or need to know how to deliver a polite, professional “fuck you”.
“I’d just like to get some clarity on this/can you clarify for me” = what the fuck are you talking about/what the fuck did you do?
“Let’s discuss next steps” = get off your ass and make it happen you lazy shitwad.
“Thanks for following up with me about this” = I’m busy and I’ll get to you when I have a moment. Quit fucking riding my ass.
“If you need it sooner than that” = I have my own work to do; do it your damn self if it’s that urgent.
“What’s our timeline on this?” = I have no intention of doing that for you right now. How long can I put it off?
“It’s going to be challenging, but…” = do you have any fucking idea what you’re asking me to do?
“I see where you’re coming from” = you are so fucking wrong
“Would you like to take the lead on this?” = this is not my problem and I refuse to clean up your mess.
“Maybe we could schedule some time to discuss this over the phone” = stop avoiding me and answer the fucking question, asshole
“[Someone on the CC line of the email], please feel free to weigh in!” = I don’t have the authority to tell this shithead how wrong they are. Kindly step up and do it for me.
“It was my understanding that” = we’ve already had this conversation, please shut the fuck up
“Please reach out to [person]” = I’m tired of hearing you whine about this, go pester someone else for awhile.
The only one of these I will never use is “Maybe we could schedule some time to discuss this over the phone”. Even if it takes a thousand messages, email whenever possible, because phone conversations don’t leave a paper trail and in a month you’re going to be sending out another email anyway demanding to know why the asshole in question hasn’t done what they said they’d do and you won’t have anything to back it up.
I’ve learned my lesson on that one.
True, but there *is* a way to make it work. I do that one as a two-parter: call and go over whatever it is, then *immediately* - literally 30 seconds after hanging up the phone - send a follow-up email “just to confirm, we discussed X, Y, and decided to do Z by N date. Did I forget anything or leave anything out?” That way you can pin them to the metaphorical wall and force them to stop avoiding answering your question by calling them and having a voice-to-voice conversation, but *also* have a paper trail to go back to. And, for bonus points, ending the email with a question like that pretty much forces them to reply and commit themselves to having confirmed whatever the discussion included and the decision was, and they can’t go back later and say “but you didn’t include ABC!” because you already gave them the opportunity to address any missing agenda items from the call in your initial email.
(This is a technique I was literally explicitly taught by my supervisor, an HR manager with like 15+ yrs of experience, and I’ve seen it used to excellent effect several times. 10/10 do recommend.)
Reblog if its ok to message you during this holiday season incase Im feeling lonely or out of place during family events because no one should be alone on Christmas
God designed everything. Every star, every flower, every heart that beats. It’s all a testament to His great love and great power. If you truly believe that God is powerful, why fear learning about the wonder of His works? If it is discovered, if it can be known, He intends for it to be known. He reveals Himself in the wonderful glory of His world.
Are you afraid that somehow, somewhere, there is something in nature or medicine or psychology that will be God’s great undoing? That somewhere there is something to disprove Him?
Do you really serve such a small God?
this post is actually getting notes and i could not be prouder
A quick perusal of posts tagging the tumblr user in question shows that a lot of people think this is a joke and/or shitpost.
I am a biological anthropologist. I am a scientist who studies human bones and the ethics surrounding them. I am here to remind you that grave robbing, while in and of itself pretty abhorrent, has a particularly nasty history attached to it, especially in America. Early medical specimens were not curated with consent; they were often bought from China and India at best, or taken from graves of poor and/or minority communities. Shit, a couple dudes in Scotland straight up murdered people for medical specimens, not to mention the real-life serial killer/doctor from Devil in the White City. Universities are still finding remains of Holocaust victims among their collections. This is why we have laws like NAGPRA and the Human Tissue Act. Today, medical specimens are donated with consent. My university department and so many others operate thanks to these amazing gifts.
By extension, I don’t find non-scientists buying human bones any more ethical. They were once people. They don’t belong in your curio cabinet and are not yours to own. Want one because they look cool? I don’t blame you, because bones are pretty rad. But there’s an alternative. I’ll let one of my personal heroes, Dr. Kristina Killgrove, explain it to you.
Want one for religious practices? Definitely do not. Look, I don’t advertise this, but I used to be pagan. I get the appeal of human remains for spiritual practices; it’s not uncommon throughout the world. But you’ve got to understand how icky it is for white, New Age American pagans to use the bones of a complete stranger for religious purposes. What kind of energy do you think can possibly come from them?
If you find a bone just hanging out on the ground, call authorities and don’t touch it. Best case scenario, it’s an animal bone (which might also be illegal to take - check local laws). Worst case, it’s from a grave or a modern missing person, and now you’re complicit in a major crime, and their living, breathing family members will have a problem with you.
This neo-colonial attitude of entitlement to access to other humans, living or dead, is disgusting. Learn some empathy. I don’t care if you wouldn’t care if someone were to do that to your skeleton; everyone’s beliefs are different, and it’s the assumption that your beliefs matter more is what is so dangerous about this. You don’t speak for the dead, and they don’t belong to you.
did anyone ever actually read animorphs or did we all just glance at the covers and assume it needed no explanation on the way to the goosebumps section in our elementary school library
animorphs is a scifi series about the grey morality of war and child soldiers experiencing trauma, depression, PTSD, being frequently and brutally dismembered, disemboweled, literally tortured to the brink of death, forced to murder their own family members with their bare hands, and on page 22 of the very first book they watch the alien prince who gave them their ~wacky animal morphing powers~ scream while be eaten alive in vivid and gory detail
One dude permanently turned into a bird for a while, forgot how to make facial expressions when he was a human and ate roadkill. And that was one of the tamer things.
You know the starfish cover everyone likes to mock especially? The girl beat someone to death with her own severed arm in that one :)
What the fuck did I miss out on
Okay, but, real talk, Animorphs may have lost the cover art lottery, but that series went hard as fuck. Like. My mother was in her 30′s when I started reading them (I was like seven) and she started reading them because I was determined to buy ALL THE BOOKS and like she’s as into them as I ever was. If you missed out on them as a kid, I 100% endorse reading them as a grown ass adult.
i have no issue with atheism as a concept but if you mock people who rely on their god to help them get through hard times, you are trash and you are not nearly as intelligent as you think you are
Okay, yes, this, very much this.
You’re an atheist? All right, friend, live your life. I’m glad you know what you believe and/or don’t believe. Honestly I don’t care that much, but I’m happy that you’re happy.
You’re an atheist and you’re judging me for believing in a higher power? You’re trying to force me to stop believing in a higher power, or trying to intellectually hump me on the logic that you’re somehow ‘better’ because you’re oh-so-rational? NO. BAD HUMAN. NO BISCUIT. I have given you unconditional respect as a human being, including unquestioned affirmation of your right to believe or not believe the same thing that I do. I am within my rights, God-given or otherwise, to expect the same from you.
never let anybody tell you that spite isn’t a motivator. i’ve gotten out of writer’s block and finished drabbles and shortfics because of spite. i’ve done swaths of fanart for whole fandoms out of sheer seething over a notp. i’ve gotten up and done laundry and all the dishes in the house because i saw some nasty ship art and needed to step away from the computer. misdirected fictional butthurt is a fossil fuel my friend and some days you gotta leave a carbon footprint
i feel so bad knowing that atleast 1 of my followers is going to have a bad holiday experience this year. please please message me anytime of the day any time in the holidays if you need me or you want to talk about it.
So, as I explained in this post on the basics of how early trauma affects us, abuse and neglect during our formative years add extras into our experience of PTSD and one of those is physical illness. (a reminder that ‘formative’ is in terms of brain development; so up until the age of 25)
One of the big reasons for this is hypervigilance and the limbic system. How being constantly surrounded by an abusive environment makes you highly sensitive to sensory input (hypervigilance), and how this affects you physically.
Basically “why am I so fucking sick all the time and why doesn’t it seem to have a cause” or “what does it mean when they say that my PTSD is causing these physical symptoms”.
First you’ll have to bear with me while I explain some things about your brain and it’s parts, because otherwise this won’t make any sense.
Your amygdala is part of the limbic system that controls instinct and the panic response. It’s sometimes referred to as your “lizard brain”. And because you don’t really need to know how the whole thing is rigged, I’m going to keep calling it that. (Like you can look it up if you want, i’m not going to stop you). It’s the instinctive part and also where your core beleifs about the world are (called schemas; which is another topic).
This is the part of your brain that tries to keep you alive at any cost, where the ‘flight, fight, freeze or feign’ response lives.
Your amygdala develops very early, which is why babies can experience fear. But it develops before the conscious thinking part. Much like an actual lizard, your lizard brain doesn’t ‘think’ or reason, it just watches and notes what is dangerous, and what has worked to save you and stores that information. Because what your lizard brain’s main function is is to keep you alive in a crisis.
Don’t know what I’m talking about? This is the part of your brain that has already slammed on the brakes before you decide to when you’re cut off in traffic, or that gives you that feeling that ‘this is dangerous’ when you can’t really figure out why, but later find out that WOW you were so right. It is activated when it sees that you are in danger, and it is going to take too long for you to decide what your response will be.
Ok so now we know what it is, but how does this relate to PTSD or hypervigilance and how can this make me sick?
In an untraumatised brain, the limbic system (specifically the amigdala) will dump stress hormones into your brain and body when you are in extreme danger. One of these we already know is adrenaline, but the hormone that is most important here is a steroid called cortisol.
Cortisol basically cuts off all the regular limits your body sets so you don’t get injured, because when you’re in danger it doesn’t matter if you get injured so long as you survive. This means you can run faster and longer, you’re stronger, your senses are sharper, you’re hyperaware of your surroundings and you don’t feel pain.
This is how mothers can lift cars off their babies in a crisis. Or how come you don’t notice that you’ve broken your arm in a car accident until later.
Cortisol is great when your brain functions properly.
However; when you’ve been exposed to extreme and ongoing trauma, you become hypervigilant. You have to be constantly aware of every tiny change in facial expression, every sound, every change in tone or every slight movement. You are always prepared for danger and always trying to pre-guess what and when is going to happen. In an abusive environment, you have to do this to stay safe.
The thing is that when you’re constantly in this state of hypervigilance and hyperarousal (not sexual arousal but sensory; where you could hear a cricket fart next door), your limbic system is constantly wired up. And it’s constantly activating your FFFF (Fight, flight, freeze and feign) response, and constantly dumping your cortisol to keep you ready.
What ends up happening is that your limbic system eventually stops being able to turn OFF your cortisol tap. So instead of a dump, its a leak. Constantly dripping into your system as it’s created - even after you’ve escaped the abuse.
But cortisol is good isn’t it? It makes us stronger and faster and feel less pain?
Yes; but if it didn’t have a downside we wouldn’t only have it as an emergency plan.
Cortisol is a steroid and an immunosuppressant, in a dump it forces more blood sugar production and shuts down the digestive system. Long term it decreases cartilage and bone formation, affects glucose levels along with a whole swag of of other things.
People with this ‘cortisol leak’ can experience
Lupus
Fibromyalgia
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Osteoarthritis
decreased bone density leading to osteoporosis
gastrointestinal problems (nausea, vomiting, bowel problems, difficulty digesting food or absorbing nutrients leading to nutritional deficiencies, IBD, constipation, and diarrhea)
Severe allergic reactions and other autoimmune disorders
decreased immune response causing slower healing times and more infections
heart disease
memory issues; short term memory, and issues relating to the maintaining or accessing of memories
and on top of all that are 300% more likely to self harm.
It also has the fun circular effect of… making you hypervigilant.
*sigh*.
So, much in the same way that anxiety stops us from doing things which then gives us more anxiety which means we can’t do even MORE things, over and over, the limbic system makes us hypervigilant which breaks the limbic system which then makes us even more hypervigilant. And also sick.
PTSD is, as you’ve probably already realised, pretty good at cycling into awfulness like that.
But this is why the effects of traumatic abuse when our brains are forming is so profound, and so hard to heal. We quite literally have been given a form of brain damage, and our brains no longer function physically in the way they are designed.
Next up; I’ll be talking about the psychological effects of this; Maladaptive Schemas. (Which means that the things you learn as ‘’life truths’’ in an abusive environment while you’re developing can end up being warped, and that affects our ability to process information; including therapeutic information.
Till then, stay safe and know you’re not alone in this shit. Hollow
i overheard these two guys in the hallway at my school and one of them was like “you always look hot dude… no homo tho” and then like 5 seconds later he yelled “sike!” and slapped the other dude’s ass
If you’re ever like “but what do fic writers even WANT.”
a book report
They want a book report.
They want you to get 9th grade English up in their shit.
Remember having to write ad nauseam about the symbolism of that stupid conch in Lord of the Flies? They want you to do that about Steve Roger’s shield and Emma Swan’s jacket.
WHoa seriously?? People WANT this? Holy crap, I always thought I’d be really rude to leave an overly long comment on something, or it’d just be super creepy for me to babble a load of emotional attatchment I had to their product, or all my wild fan theories which are probably wrong… I mean.. I know if I ever created something I’d wanna see comments like that, but I’m a weirdo and I haven’t even created anything anyway so what do I know? Umm.. yeah.. so… at my followers and friends and stuff: does anyone agree with this? Do I have permission to really ramble embarrassingly and honestly when I like your stuff, or would you prefer short and semi-rational comments?
I agree! I really like to read people toughts on my stuff, no matter the writing style.
I always LOVE knowing that readers understand why I chose certain ways of getting things across! I also love seeing which bits OTHER PEOPLE liked best! Since I’m the author, I’m biased. I either think my work is brilliant or I have crushing doubts.
So - whichever you want, or feel comfortable with!
YES
YES YES YES
We ABSOLUTELY want you to ramble at us! We put a lot of work into our writing and seeing someone love it enough to ramble about their reactions is EXACTLY what we want.
Babble at me! Babble away! Tell me all the things!
No, really. I truly believe one of the best compliments you can give a writer is letting them know their words made you feel things. So by all means, tell them! Long rambling comments are my FAVORITE.
I have gotten more awesome inspiration from someone else’s “harebrained babble” than anything I could have come up with on my own. How are we writers gonna write if no one wants to analyze???
Oh man, those long rambly reaction / analysis / speculation comments are the BESTEST
Aries: Captivation. Someone who not only captures but holds their flickering flames of interest, someone they can’t look away from if they tried, who melts their hearts with slow burning lava. Taurus: Fluidity. In the midst of their sturdy calm, someone who will surprise them and move them, who pushes them to their limits, who is exasperating and irresistible. Gemini: Adoration. Someone who loves the quickness of their minds, who thinks they are the world’s most beautiful puzzle, who touches them like they are a map they will never quite completely understand. Cancer: Security. In the depth and curves of Cancer’s love, they crave someone who is unwavering, who will forever hold their hand. Leo: Passion. Someone whose heart burns as brightly as theirs does, someone whose fierce spirit matches their own, whose kisses are intertwining flames. Virgo: Understanding. Someone who studies them carefully, who knows that they try their hardest, who loves their quirks and reads their bodies, who makes them feel like their every movement is a blessing. Libra: Determination. Fearful Libras with fleeting hearts crave someone who will go to the ends of the Earth for them, someone who proves with every smile that they hold unconditional love. Scorpio: Acceptance. Someone who knows their darkest shadows and brightest lights and loves it all, who never lets them forget that love. Sagittarius: Freedom. The spirit of Sagittarius is untamed, and never will be; they crave someone who will travel the world with them, who looks at them like they are the universe but will always set them free. Capricorn: Romance. The misunderstood, intricate heart of Capricorn craves boldness and sweetness, romance and adoration that overwhelms them, makes them feel like they have the world in their hands. Aquarius: Excitement. Someone who startles them, who takes their hand and leads them to new worlds, who makes them laugh harder than they ever have, whose mind is filled with things they never knew existed. Pisces: Fascination. Someone who delves into their worlds, who explores them and listens to their soft spoken stories at 3 AM, who theorizes and hypothesizes with them, who never tires of hearing them speak.
