teef of the mind

22. they/them. cav. system & disability account. origin't. endo friendly, but i tend to post about trauma impacted system experiences. syscourse tagged as #syscourse

[cavityinmybrain]

intro post

hello, we are the cavity, 22 years old bodily polyfrag system. origin't.

find our alter list here

check out our website here

we have been prof dx with udd, bpd, adhd, depression, and anxiety. self dx as autistic and cptsd. issues with hypermobility and dysautonomia, medically recognized though both are undiagnosed.

pro endo and endo friendly space, though a lot of my posts cater to disordered plurals as we are one. dont break your dni by interacting with me pls n thanks.

other blogs: teefiesworld is my main blog, mostly reblog spam. rootcanal-brainstem is my vent/vent art blog, slow posts.

i block liberally.

updated july 29, 24

[cavityinmybrain]

haven’t taken prozac since i was like?? 13 maybe??? was skeptical but oh my GOD ITS WORKING

[eclogues]

i havent done anything or been anyone ever

[dimir-charmer]

Girls will be like Idk why im so unproductive recently and then you ask whats going on in their life and they list eight lifestopping crisies and then say 'yeah but i should be fine :/ '

[hillbillyoracle]

New Free Minizine: "Recovering from Reactivity"

[[ get a printable and read only version here (it's free) ]]

[jerreeeeeee]

the best analogy imo for ocd is mosquito bite. its so itchy its driving you crazy and you know scratching it will make it itch so much worse later but you need it to stop right now and scratching it feels so good and even when you dont want to scratch it and you feel like you could handle the itch you cant even stop your hand from scratching the second you stop focusing on not scratching. except ☝️ what if it was inside your brain and instead of an itch it was terrifying overwhelming distress

[damazcuz]

(Smugly after failing at a task) and they said it could be done.

[watercolormagicalgirl]

[forestgreenandgray]

Hey do you know what rumination is?

Rumination is probably the most common type of OCD compulsion, but I rarely see anyone talking about it. I've talked to multiple people diagnosed with OCD who didn't even recognize it as a compulsion.

Basically, if you have OCD you have terrible intrusive thoughts. They can be about anything, but common themes are fear of being a bad person, fear of hurting someone, fear of contamination. etc.

Rumination is when you get stuck in a spiral. Rumination is when you spend hours catastrophizing, overthinking, analyzing, telling yourself it's going to be okay.

I'll say it again:

Rumination is a compulsion.

Rumination is a compulsion, and that means you have to stop doing it.

I did ERP (exposure response prevention) for my OCD with a therapist! For 9 months! And it did help, but the idea didn't really click until I found this website a couple years later.

And Oh My God. It made things make so much more sense, and I was able to pull myself out of an episode even though I wasn't in therapy or on meds at the time.

Genuinely if you have OCD, or even if you suspect you have OCD, I'm begging you to read some of these articles.

Like this was genuinely life changing for me.

Here are some of the ones that were most helpful to me:

Defining Rumination

How to Stop Ruminating

ERP Exercises for Compulsive Rumination

What to Do When You're Triggered

[tikkunolamorgtfo]

Just want to add that if you're on the spectrum, you may also experience Autistic Rumination, which is distinct from the obsessive variety, despite the two having some overlapping characteristics!

[sandersstudies]

Sick list of symptoms bro. Now try humanizing your behavior instead of pathologizing it.

[sandersstudies]

Pathologizing: Hey sorry I yelled at you. I have this ADHD symptom called RSD that makes me really sensitive.

Humanizing: Hey, I’m sorry that I blew up like that earlier. In the moment I felt really attacked and overwhelmed and I reacted badly, but I know you didn’t mean to offend me with what you said, so that behavior is on me.

[queer-asinfuckyou]

Because I just saw a post bitching about this one, I want to add: this post is saying that you need to take accountability for the way you hurt other people, even if it happens because of a symptom of your disability/illness. It's also saying that using terms (especially acronyms) that aren't common knowledge isn't a helpful way to explain yourself. It is NOT saying that you need to let people walk all over you because "your disability isn't an excuse."

If you're diabetic, you don't have to eat the honey glazed ham that will send you into a coma (their example). But you also can't yell at the person offering it and accuse them of trying to kill you. You can just say "thanks, but my body can't handle that kind of sugar intake, so I'll pass"

[ayin-me-yesh]

If you run over someone's foot with your wheelchair you still apologise

[thememedaddy]

[berylian]

[cherabby]

[avantgarden-er]

not to be rude but if you’re losing consciousness you should dial for an ambulance not just use the computer.

I would liveblog Anything

[meanbuddhist]

*turns my attention inwards* mmmmm. no *turns my attention back outwards* oh god

[local-lesbian-tree-demon]

they should invent a body that feels normal to be inside of

[wizardarchetypes]

u think ocd therapy is impossible to do yourself and that it's all too big to start but you can get workbooks or even just try small things.

a lot of my ritual behaviors are "checking"

self-guided ocd exposure therapy can be as simple as resisting the urge to check if your door is locked more than once and sitting with the discomfort until it passes without engaging in any reassurance rituals.

it can look like sending an email and resisting the urge to re-read it over and over again obsessing over your wording, sitting with the discomfort until it passes without engaging in any reassurance rituals.

some of my rituals are also "avoidance"

in which case it can look like checking your email inbox you've been obsessively avoiding because you're anxious about receiving a specific email you don't want to see.

and YEP! ☝️

sitting with the discomfort until it passes without engaging in any reassurance rituals.

[wizardarchetypes]

!!!

it might be hard to believe, but learning distress tolerance for things like "checking" with emails and door locks actually prepared me for the Big Ones like harm and sexual OCD themes.

I think this article from 2007 is a good introduction to the basic concepts of exposures:

Self Directed Treatment for OCD The Irony of Doing the Opposite By Paul R. Munford, Ph.D.        I remember a movie in which one of the char

that SAID, a lot has changed since 2007! the idea that exposure therapy can (or even should) prevent fears from every happening has come into question!

now the conversation about OCD exposure has turned to training distress tolerance:

...rather than aiming for the decline of anxiety (habituation) during exposure, the inhibitory learning approach to ERP teaches people how to be open-minded toward experiencing anxiety and fear when these experiences inevitably show up. Indeed, fear and anxiety (and other emotions in OCD such as disgust or guilt) are universal and even adaptive experiences, not something that need to be “fixed” or gotten rid of. Most importantly, even if they can be unwanted, intense, and distressing, these emotions and thoughts are safe. From an inhibitory learning perspective, fear extinction (and long-term improvement in OCD) depends not only on learning that feared stimuli are safe, but that it is also safe to experience the emotional response that is triggered by these stimuli.

It should be noted that all of the following procedures are still currently being researched. While there is evidence to suggest that they c

And remember at the end of the day I AM NOT a specialist. I am discussing my own OCD journey and referencing the available material on OCD exposures.

I'm not always right, and I can't know what's best for you.

Which is why I haven't recommended any of the old workbooks I've completed, because some of them are old enough that there are better ones to follow that I haven't gotten to trying yet!

I recommend doing your own reading from OCD-aware organizations:

The International OCD Foundation

The mission of the International OCD Foundation is to help those affected by obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and related disorders to li

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder | Made of Millions Foundation

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is an anxiety disorder that causes unwanted intrusive thoughts (obsessions) and mental or physical ritua

[the-indigo-symphony]

One of my more minor gripes about the "serial killer alter" trope is that I think there is opportunity for genuine, well-made stories about a system that kills. You could potentially write some really interesting stories involving internal conflict over murder in a system – for instance, if a system killed once in self-defense, and one of the headmates is keeping that memory from the rest of them. Or if an alter came back from dormancy to find out the world's gone to shit and everyone knows "them" as the one willing to kill to protect their group of survivors. Hell, fuck it, have some kind of "no, I'm being literal when I say the version of me that you knew isn't present anymore, this isn't some metaphor for how I've become ~evil~" conflict! So long as it's done in a way that gives the system in question nuance and reason for their actions, I'd be willing to see where the story is going with this!

But nooooooo, it's all stock-standard "this one alter kills others for no good reason" shit with a dash of "don't look too long into the implications that this plural superhero/anti-hero just killed a bunch of people, just accept that they do this" hand-waving that makes people think we're going to stab them if they look away for too long. It's always "this imposter is pretending to be our loved one for nefarious reasons" angst and never "oh shit we treated this alter like shit for just being different than the host" angst. There's not even any originality smh smh. We've already gotten a thousand of these horror plots that use plurality as a one-size-fits-all villain cap; I'm sure horror, whump, and angst writers can do better if they really want to write about a system that kills others

[sailermoon]

having unwashed hair will have you believing shit like i can’t be saved

[silenthillmutual]

i genuinely think ocd is incredibly underdiagnosed bc i will see people posting what are obvious rituals, compulsions, intrusive thoughts, spiralling, hyper morality, etc and its like Have You Considered This Might Be An Issue

[silenthillmutual]

it isnt actually good or normal to have moral dilemmas every day about which posts you reblog. it isn't actually good or normal to check and recheck every message you send "just in case" you sent porn instead of a 'hi how are you'. it isn't actually good or normal to believe that your day will only go well if you have a specific keychain or whatever with you. like i'm not going to diagnose you but i do think some of you need to look into obsessive-compulsive disorder beyond "ha ha funny man wash his hands" portrayals.