Kroĉetaĵo

she/her audhd bipolar and lymphedemic crafter who speaks Esperanto

[citronavalkiro]

One of the songs I played during my wedding for our first dance was Kiseki, the ending theme of Pokemon X and Y with the vocals sung by the Youtuber Serena. Whenever I hear it it takes me back to the happiest day of my life and reminds me how I met my husband by chance in a chatroom connected to a random forum about video games and how lucky we were to meet. X and Y was announced around the time we started dating so the games always hold a special place in our hearts and so when it played at the end of Legends ZA you bet I cried my eyes out during the credits. We were together for almost thirteen years total at that point so it was really special

[citronavalkiro]

When I played Windwaker as a kid, it always felt kind of weird to me when Tetra transforms into Princess Zelda how she loses her tan and her skin gets lighter. That always felt a little unfortunate to me especially as someone who was blonde who tans pretty easily. Like it implied that being tan wasn't pretty. I asked my mom about it and she is like "oh it is just make up" but still, it felt really gross to me as someone with the same hair and skin tone as Tetra because it was basically telling me if you wanted to be pretty you couldn't stay outside in the sun too much. Has anyone else thought that when they played the game?

[citronavalkiro]

I used to think that Mystery Meat was like those mystery flavored dum dums, popsicles, Airhead candies, etc. that were all the rage in the 2000s where it was fun to eat because you didn't know what meat it was going to be when you bite into it. Was it going to be chicken? beef? pork? bison? some sort of fish? you just didn't know! I didn't really understand the negative connotation. I figured a lot of people didn't like it because they had dietary restrictions and not knowing the meat was dangerous for them (Alfagal is a thing, also seafood allergies, and some religions/cultures forbid certain meats too). I remember asking for mystery meat nuggets and getting a weird look from my mom

[citronavalkiro]

Where there's a WIP, there's a way, Where there's a WIP, there's a way Where there's a WIP...

I wanna start some more today, but the lord of the stash says nay. nay, naaaaay...

I'm gonna craft all day, all day, all daaaaaaay

Where there's a WIP there's a way

[citronavalkiro]

While I am thinking about it and on this train of thought, for the longest time, I always hated the words "consent" and "enthusiastic consent" very triggering and I couldn't figure out why until recently and not for the reasons people may think.

Basically, as an autistic woman who went to an evangelical Christian school, I was constantly told stuff like "smile", "stay sweet", "fake it until you make it" and not show any negative emotions outwardly and the concept of enthusiastic consent brings a lot of that back because I constantly feel like I have to mask and pretend to be enthusiastic to get what I want even though masking is next to impossible for me. It also feels like the antithesis of what sex and true intimacy should be about which should be coming in as your authentic self, but I can't do that when I constantly have to preform enthusiasm every step of the way. A lot of neurodivergent people especially if they are on the schizophrenia spectrum like me have unusual affects which often means my emotions don't match my outward appearance and I have to tell a lot of people that because it often confuses them because I can be completely happy, but I have a distressed or bored look on my face. I do not outwardly appear enthusiastic or look like I am enjoying a sexual activity even though I am having the time of my life, but I make sure to let them know, but I know a lot of times, especially early on in relationships it does trip people up a bit.

I also think that enthusiastic consent doesn't take into account for the fact that a lot of people, especially women, have often been conditioned to develop a fawn response and not show any negative emotions. Constantly in Christian marriage and sex books women are told to appear joyful and enthusiastic even when they are tired and basically put on a mask even when sex is the last thing they want to think about so someone might appear enthusiastically consenting for the entirety of sex, but in reality, they really don't want it.

The problem is, how is the other partner supposed to know that the enthusiasm is genuine? I can see why a lot of people, especially men, are confused and maybe terrified at the prospect that an enthusiastic yes might not mean yes, but there is an easy way to tell, but it will take a lot of self reflection and that is asking the question:

"Do I come off as a safe person when it comes to rejection?"

In other words, do you handle rejection and constructive criticism and feedback from the other person maturely and respect the person's feelings and try not to convince or pester them or get angry or give them the cold shoulder when they say no for not just sex but mundane things in the relationship. Does their no matter in other aspects of life? Also, do their opinions truly matter to you and you don't just call all the shots in the relationship.

If you can truly answer yes to all of that then you should be fine, but if not you need to take a break from sex and have an honest conversation with your partner and work on dealing with rejection better until your partner feels safe saying no without any negative reaction.

This is also why I think when it comes to true complementarian relationships or those "tradmarriages" as they call them, authentic consent is not really possible because consent requires people to be on equal footing and someone being completely subordinate over another person is not equal no matter how much they try to spin that as equality using the same arguments racists used in the 60s. Even BDSM relationships are technically equal because the subs opinions and preferences matter as much as the doms and a good chunk of the time the people in these relationships are constantly negotiating and communicating in a mature manner vastly more than the average complementarian couple. A person who is constantly the "tie breaker" never works because when it is with two people (assuming you don't have kids or don't take their opinions into account on family decisions which I think you really should in an age appropriate manner if it is going to affect them) because the other person will never have their decisions made unless the other person agree with them so every single time the one person wins and the other person loses or draws and their opinions and wants no longer matter.

[citronavalkiro]

While I am also thinking about the enthusiastic consent model and how it can be problematic for neurodivergent people (see my previous post about bipolar). I want to tell everyone a very funny story that happened in the early days of dating my now-husband.

Okay, so I was dating him for about eight months at this point, we haven't had sex yet, but we kissed (we didn't figure out we were both demisexual until much later) and I was transferring to a state university from community college and every new student had to do these courses on drugs, alcohol, and consent. In the consent course, they mentioned the concept of enthusiastic consent and how "if it isn't a heck yes, it is a heck no" and my autistic brain freaked out because I was scared that I was doing something wrong to my boyfriend when kissing him because he was like all "sure why not?" and I was worried that meant he was not excited enough about it and I thought "sure, why not?" is not enthusiastic enough. Also. I read somewhere after that (I think on Scarleteen because I was confused still from doing the course and looking for answers and why the stuff taught rubbed me the wrong way) the importance to discuss your STDs if you have them to a person before you had sex and I freaked out because I didn't tell him I got cold sores from my family so I was afraid I accidentally gave him cold sores even though I never kissed him while having an active one. I remember having a meltdown crying over Skype (this was like 2012) because I felt like I violated him even though he laughed saying I was taking the concept of enthusiasm way too literally, but he was glad I was concerned about him. He explained that he very much loved me and enjoyed kissing me, it is just he is not really a person that wears his emotions and really outwardly shows them which I think is fair.

I think the problem with enthusiastic consent is a lot of conversations about it usually revolve around brand new relationships and hookups and, while you shouldn't have sex or anything when the person is outright repulsed at the idea at the moment in a relationship and marriage or having a long term relationship with a person isn't a pass that you get to do anything you want with them, there is more nuance when you are in an established relationship, especially when you start getting complacent with having sexual activity with them and while you still very much enjoy it, it is not longer new and exciting.

So that is how I learned that realistically true consent is more like if it isn't a "sure, I'm fine with that" it's an "I'm gonna pass" it is just those nuances don't make a good slogan. It is kind of like how "Love is Love" is a slogan even though it isn't totally accurate since there are aromantic people in the community where love to them isn't necessarily love, at least not love in the traditional romantic sense of the word.

[citronavalkiro]

I feel like a big problem people don't talk about the enthusiastic consent model has to do with people with bipolar. When you are manic, you can appear enthusiastically consenting even though in reality you are in an altered mental state, but the tricky thing is, is that the other person or people you are having sex with may not ever know about it especially if you are strangers with no history which a lot of discussions on enthusiastic consent is based on. If you are in an established relationship like me, you can discuss what you want your partner to do when you are manic as sometimes, having sex with someone you trust can be a good way to deal with the hypersexuality of mania. I think enthusiastic consent really neglects to mention these situations since mania to a stranger might seem like enthusiasm and it is harder to detect to the average person compared to someone who is drunk, especially if they have seen that person drinking beforehand whereas, to an established partner, since I am normally very sex indifferent they would likely know something is up and want to discuss if it is okay beforehand, maybe it is okay if as long as they initiate and take the lead as an example of a boundary someone might have. Still, I think enthusiastic consent is lacking when it comes to these situations.

[citronavalkiro]

One advantage of having a CPAP is that you can put your blankets over your face and use your CPAP to go scuba diving under the covers. It's those little advantages that make everything better! I can't wait to be able to do that in the winter! It will be so much easier to stay warm!

[citronavalkiro]

I will be honest, if you boycott Hobby Lobby, but then shop on Amazon for craft supplies, you are a hypocrite. Amazon is just as bad of a company as Hobby Lobby. I think a lot of people tend to forget that because unlike Hobby Lobby who is very open about their Evangelical, Christian Nationalist views, people tend to forget that any company who is worth over a billion dollars probably has a lot of skeletons in their closet and has done stuff very unethical, Amazon being no exception, they just hide it better than Hobby Lobby who is proud about the bad stuff they do.

Also, you shouldn't shop on Amazon for craft supplies anyways from a practical standpoint because I once purchased some Clover Amours from there because people were raving about them only to find that the silicone started rubbing off and coming loose on the inside from using them and then I realized that real Clover Amours had a matte finish on them and I got a knock off from Amazon so I went to an actual online craft store with a good reputation and got the real thing and I can see why people are raving about them. There is a HUGE problem with knock offs on Amazon and I really don't want people to end up like me so yeah, don't shop for craft tools on Amazon especially.

[citronavalkiro]

It's been a long time, it was because most of the time I was sleeping for up to 20 hours a day. I always had trouble getting up in the morning and being tired, but it didn't get this bad until recently where I could barely function.

It is kind of funny because it turns out I had sleep apnea my whole life but it wasn't until I put on a bunch of weight and it got so bad that doctors started taking it seriously. Weight bias can sometimes go the other way if you are thin, but have a disease or disorder commonly considered a "fat person disease" which is exactly what happened to me until I put on weight mostly due to medication and inactivity from being tired all the time. A lot of times they dismissed my sleep problems as being due to being depressed or my bipolar for years and it really sucks because now that I have my CPAP, I am finally a morning person (Though I am still kinda tired in the afternoons because I am trying to ween off of caffeine that I had to take just to survive).

Now I know what people mean when doctors don't listen or dismiss their issues. I regret not getting tested earlier, when I did get tested, I had an API score of almost 100 episode per hour which could have been avoided if they just gave me a sleep test earlier while I was still thin.

[citronavalkiro]

It took me so long to get through Neon Clash because I kept falling asleep whenever I tried to play it which turned out because I was coming down with a stomach flu. Anyways, I found the guys to be kind of meh, especially disappointed you couldn't date Yuan. Yeah, I know he is a trash person, but I love trashy men and what is not to love about a trashy gambler? Seriously, whenever Yuan asked the main character to join him, I was always screaming like "Say yes you dumb bitch!" and was disappointed they didn't even give you the option.

[citronavalkiro]

I am playing Temirana and I am just wondering how the hell the kingdom hasn't collapsed since your profession is determined by your birth month which means couldn't people just time their conception to ensure that their children get good jobs? Wouldn't their be a shortage of undesirable jobs if people did that? Also the fact that the king is determined by a lottery system is just asking for trouble too infact a lot of how this society is run is based on luck. Seriously, I have no clue how this mostly luck-based society hasn't collapsed. A luck based society in general seems like a bad idea

[citronavalkiro]

Plusle and Minun from the Pokemon Cross Stitch Book

[citronavalkiro]

I remember being at an anime convention over a decade ago back when I was able to have the time and money to go to such things and there was this Storm Trooper and someone was like "Why is there a storm trooper? Star Wars isn't anime!" and someone just turned to him and said "At any sort of nerd con there must be at least one mandatory storm trooper, that is a rule" and then they shut up

[citronavalkiro]

I liked Tengoku Struggle, but I think they shouldn't have translated the afterlife as "Hell" and should have translated as "Naraka" or something would have been better just because I think in English, the word "Hell" is very loaded with Christian imagery and this afterlife is more similar to the Catholic Purgatory than the Christian Hell. The translation didn't totally ruined it for me, but it did confuse me a little at first. I do say it has one of the better Goemons in an otome game though I totally called the huge twist at the end. I just think the translation could have been better.

[citronavalkiro]

The Villainess is Adored is a good otome game except there is just one major flaw to it and that is the fact that all of the good choices are first on the list EVERY SINGLE TIME. I followed a guide and I didn't even need to because all I needed to do was pick the first option and get the best ending. It is still a good game. I haven't read the series the game was based on, so I was kind of going in blind much like my playthrough of the My Next Life as a Villainess game, but the romance is quite laid on heavy. I know a lot of people including me were a bit disappointed you only date Aquasteed and not the other guys included, but at least it makes up for it in there being a ton of sugary sweet romance.

[citronavalkiro]

I like Cyrus in Steam Prison, she is probably one of my favorite otome game protagonist because due to how blood types are connected to their personality in Japanese culture and Cyrus is Rh Null, the creators probably wanted to obviously give her a unique personality and I guess the way to give her a unique personality is by making her neurodivergent and demisexual.