maybe this is too woke but i really hate the trope of naked older women = scary or vomit inducing or gross or whatever. like you even see it used in horror on occasion like oooooo so scary theres a woman with saggy boobs and wrinkles. There is something to be said for unconsensual veiwing of nudity. sure. it’s uncomfortable and violating for someone to be nude in front of you that you don’t want to see. but rarely that’s seen as the issue and instead the real ‘horror’ or gross out joke is the very idea of a woman who does not have a body that is sexually desirable to men. The very idea of an older woman’s body is treated like it’s something that we should all know is gross, sick and wrong. It’s just something that really bothers me
Are you a Visual Novel writer? Or at least are you writing a visual novel? Don't know how to format it?
good news, I'm here to give you some tips for formatting your script to make it 10x easier on the programmer to implement into RenPy!
All of these tips apply to Google Docs, since that's the most commonly used script writing platform for VNs, especially given the collaboration that goes on for them and for game jams!
Page Set Up
These tips are the most important of this whole doc, because it prevents everyong (writer or programmer) from having to find and replace later!
Turn off Smart Quotes
Turn off replacements for ... and -
To do that, go to your tool bar at the top and go to tools > preferences
see it down there at the bottom?
then just uncheck tthe smart quotes box.
Here's an example of what mine looks like to make things easier, though the others don't matter as much.
To turn off substitutions, you have two options.
Manually uncheck the boxes
Turn it off altogether.
I personally chose to turn it off all together, most of what it is is just things like 1/2 becoming a visual fraction, or < - - turning into <-.
If you chose to manually uncheck them, there's only really two that'll need to be checked off!
The one for ... and the one for -- or ---
Why do you need to do this?
Well unfortunately, renpy and most code editors don't recognize them as characters, and it can cause some issues with the dialogue text being displayed.
Choice Dialogue
This one isn't a huge deal, but after working on quite a few jam projects and personal VN projects, I've found a way that seems to work best for allowing your programmer to efficiently implement them! (Or yourself if you write and code for your projects like I do)
use tables in google docs!
Here are some examples from some of my projects:
It's pretty c lear what the options are for each menu choice this way, since they're color coded and have some sort of indicator before them to seperate them.
This also makes it easier to know where the choice menu dialogue ends.
The colored parts are the menu label itself, so what shows up on the screen
and then the rest is the dialogue branch for that choice!
between these two, the biggest majority of your programmers job will now be making sure things don't break, instead of spending hours finding and replacing certain things, or having to pause to wait for an answer if your team is in all sorts of time zones!
A wonderful commissiong bought by @wolfsbayne4995 for their friend of their half tiefling oc. I had fun writing a playboy type. I’m surprised I hadn’t before.
You had heard stories from several people. Rumors really, but you wanted to investigate it for yourself. There was a bar near the edge of the village where, supposedly, there was a man who frequented the bar. There were tales of his conquests and sexual exploits. But the one people seemed to whisper the most about was that, after sleeping with him, one tended to find their true love.
If you had to be honest with yourself, you weren’t so much as looking for love as you were trying to forget it. You had just gone through a rather painful breakup and if this led to love again that was fine. You just needed even one night of passion to make the ache stop hurting.
Very generally speaking, when you see a black man in a piece of media, be it tv show, movie, video game, etc. there’s something you often see a lot of writers do. To go against the stereotype of black men (and black people in general) being dumb and lazy, you’ll see this black male character being smart and an achiever. 
The Black Nerd. A common character type, the nerd will always be very interested in all things nerdy: science, video games, mathematics, etc. In an continued effort to combat stereotypes, the Black Nerd will be lack athleticism, probably being asthmatic (the nerdiest of conditions). The Black Nerd will dress smartly, suspenders and bow ties. They’ll always talk smart too, using proper English with complex words.
Now, I don’t have a problem with a black character being a nerd, indeed black people are a people; we aren’t all the same and we all have varying personalities. The problem I have is that too often we see a distinct disconnect between Blackness and the Black Nerd. The Black Nerd doesn’t listen to hip hop or rap, only classical music. The Black Nerd only has white friends, the only other black characters are into not nerdy stuff. The Black Nerd never ever uses AAVE at any time in any context.
And again I must say that Black people, not being a monolith, there are no hard fast rules to being Black. I’m more than sure there are Black people like what I’ve described above, I’m not saying it’s impossible; what I’m getting at is that the only Black Nerd we see. There are Black Nerds that play basketball, that bump Kendrick Lamar, and use AAVE since it’s an ever changing dialect. I’m just saying there’s no one way of being a nerd and no one way of being Black.
And then we have the Quirky Biracial Black Girl that at this point I feel is just the Black Girl version of the Blerd
Of course there are Black girl characters that are nerds. They just don't show up as often like other women nerd characters in media. Maybe because nerd/geek culture actively gatekeeps women out of these intellectual fields and/or fan spaces? Look at Childish Gambino and other nerds that throw a tantrum seeing Megan Thee Stallion into (the most mainstream) anime titles. That certainly will reflect on tv somehow someway🤷🏾♀️
But yeah, the Quirky Biracial Black Girl has been coming about a lot more lately. They are usually biracial because the idea of a monoracial Black girl into nerdy/alt/geeky interests doesn't sound realistic to writers. So clearly they have to be mixed with a nonwhite identity to justify their quirkiness 🙄 8/10 they usually are mixed white cuz that's the only kind of mixed identity available these people can write. Or I guess its more accurate to say they can only write whiteness as that's the default in everything.
Also the reason Black nerd boys don't really face this treatment is cuz the industry still views dark skin as an inherently masculine trait. So it's fine for the boys to be darkskinned or just monoracially Black. The girls, however, gotta be lighter in comparison to still emphasize that whole they are out of ordinary, they're still feminine 😬
That's why I like shows like Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur
A Black nerdy teenage girl who wheres her fro out with love. She's surrounded by a diverse group of friends and family. And she's got a unique nerdy geek side to her that some people don't really get, not even her friends. That's ok, she got friends who are into the same stuff as her, many of which are other Black women!
Clearly she doesn't have to sacrifice her Blackness for the sake of being nerdy. She is a nerdy Black girl. She can be into the roller skating scene (which she incorporates in her Moon Girl alter ego). She can be into cassettes and Black genres of music (which she incorporates in her fights and sources for inspo). Like it ain't hard yall
All of these things are because most of the white people being given budgets to create toe the line of the two minorities that they think of to write - the villain or the model minority.
Depending on where society is, they will more often than not choose one of these. They used to go heavy on villainous. A few years ago, they decided to see racism and started writing all of these respectables, to show that they, too, were an "ally." And companies keep giving them money to make stuff with people whose humanity they're not familiar enough with to make caricatures and stereotypes.
Too many people think that as long as its not somebody ghetto or sassy or mean that it is "good" representation.
Because in those minds, Black people (and I guess Asians as well) are characters in their heads while the made up white characters in their head are actual people that they created.
Please keep interacting with this post because when I come to tumblr to procrastinate, this shows up again in my notifications and guilts me into writing again
oh hey i never posted these here. here, have some goofy handcrafted artisan OC memes by yours truly. i also post them here on toyhouse when i make new ones. feel free to snag, use, post without bothering to credit me, modify to your liking (instead of telling me what i forgot), simply go nuts out there 👍
What are the steps from being total strangers to becoming best friends? And what different things should/could happen between two people to develop a friendship?
Writing Strangers to Best Friends
As with most things in life, there are no hard rules for how people become best friends or the steps they go through. However, there is a typical process a lot of friendships go through as they evolve. That's what I'm providing here, but you can stray from it as much as you need to. Ultimately, do what feels right for your characters and story, and feel free to bring your own experiences into it. :) ♥
Guide: Developing a Close Platonic Friendship
Developing a Continued Friendship (once it's established)
Have fun with your story!
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That you don't have to keep That Thing™ in your story just because you came up with it a long time ago and now it's hindering your story or doesn't fit anymore. Even if you came up with it with someone. Even if you've shared it with a million people.
Save it for something else. But cut it out of the story that it isnt working for.
Open your writing software, right now. Microsoft Word, LibreOffice, Scrivener, Notepad, whatever you use. Create a brand new blank document.
That Thing™ that isn't working, that you're contemplating cutting out, or you literally just cut? Write it down here. Save the document as something that you'll remember but not too serious. "Burn Book", "Trash Pile", "Cutting Room Floor", "Sourdough Discard", doesn't matter so long as you'll remember what it's for but not something you'll take too seriously that you won't be able to move on from it.
I mean it, if you take everything you write too seriously and treat every idea as something that must be ✨ Important and Official ✨, you'll inevitably ruin the actual fun of writing and close yourself off to better options that were staring you in the face the entire time. So do something fun and silly for yourself for once and give the document a fun and silly name.
From here on out, every time you're stuck trying to make a certain idea work, extract it from your story like you're playing Operation and put it in the other document. Don't bother organizing it or stylizing it, the only point of this is to put the idea out of sight, out of mind. It's like an ex-boyfriend, if you don't throw out his things or resist looking at his Instagram, you'll never get over him. Doesn't matter if it's 50 words or 5,000 words - thank it for all the time it's spent ruining your good time and chuck it in the fucking bin.
With that idea gone and out of the way, living its best life elsewhere, you are now free to live your best life anew. This is where the grieving finally ends and you can start having fun and mingling with other ideas again.
I don't remember who said it, or where I even read it the first time (I've tried and failed to find it) but some of the best writing advice I've ever gotten and has continued to save my ass even when I thought I didn't need it, is that the source of your problem is 10 sentences ago.
If you hit a mental block in your writing, if you're struggling to make an idea work, stop. Go back. Ten sentences, a paragraph, a chapter, just go back. Chances are, the source of your problem - and subsequently the solution to overcoming it - has been there from the start, and it's usually an idea we had that we thought could work in theory, but in practice, became unmanageable and uncooperative.
Might be a big idea like an entire concept, might be a little one like a character interaction or scene, might even just be one single sentence that isn't co-existing peacefully with the rest of the text.
Stop spinning your wheels. Stop stressing while you try to figure out how to make a square fit into a circle hole.
Pause, go back, find the culprit at its source, yoink it out, put it in that separate document, and move on with your life as a released prisoner.
As for that separate document? Treat it as a time-out corner for the naughty ideas that aren't getting along with the rest. If they're biting and kicking at the other ideas in the room, your first step should be separating them. It's not necessarily a punishment, just a moment of separation so tempers have a chance to cool off. Most of all, it gives you a proper moment of peace so you can come back to the problem with a more level-headed approach, without the intensity of trying to problem-solve on the fly.
The ideas that are in that time-out corner do not have to stay in there forever. The important thing is that they're separated and now you have time to explore other options. Your mind can get the peace it needs to think clearly without the stress or imaginary obligation to an idea you came up with ages ago holding you back from completing that first draft.
Maybe some day you'll remember one of those ideas out of the blue and realize they actually get along perfectly with the new ideas you've come up with since then. Or you might even peek into that document months later and realize, "Oh shit! I forgot about that idea that I convinced myself was completely necessary! Turns out it wasn't!" More often than not, you'll forget about these ideas completely, and upon re-discovering them (if you ever do), you'll be thanking yourself in hindsight that you didn't keep throwing yourself at the problem with an idea that simply wasn't compatible. And if it's an idea that you still think is cool but simply wouldn't work for what you were writing, well, now you have notes for the next story.
Just keep moving forward. Be willing to put both yourself and your ideas in separate corners, especially when they start biting and kicking you.
Treat your mind as a home and your ideas as visitors. Not everyone who comes through the door would make a good roommate; a lot of them don't even make for good guests. You are not married to them just because you might have carried them over the threshold one time. It's okay to tell some of those visitors to come back later, or to take a hike and never come back. You do not owe them your home.
“Across cultures, darker people suffer most. Why?” Multiethnic and Multicultural Blackness
“Across cultures, darker people suffer most. Why?”- Andre 3000
Tell me what's wrong with this picture.
Hint: This is Miles Morales- from the video game depiction- canonically an Afro-Puerto Rican. Jefferson is Black American; Rio is Puerto Rican.
So why is the Cuban flag on their wall?
This is what happens when no one (with any saying power) in the board room is representative of the group being depicted! And mind you, this was produced under SONY and MARVEL, for the PS5, a product under two brands that combined churn out hundreds of millions in profit! And… No one on any level corrected them until the beta came out and fans saw it. That's how pervasive this sort of ignorance of other cultures can be. How are you writing a story about a character, and you don't even know how he identifies?
Multiethnic & Multicultural Blackness
Realistically, you’ve probably walked past many a biracial, multicultural, or multiethnic Black person before and assumed they were “just Black”. One example: Rae Dawn Chong- known as Mama du Pointe du Lac- is Afro-Chinese, but that Chinese background did not play into the role she played. A more personal example: my recent loctician was also Afro-Chinese, with very dark skin (she made jokes about how her eyes reveal it, but we can’t make those jokes here). I would have never known.
Point is, we reacted to what we saw, and that’s not an accident. Blackness is treated as a monolith, and an indicator of social level whether you realize it or not. You see a ‘Black’ person, and without wondering any further about their identity, you will treat them as you’ve been socialized to treat ‘Black’ people! But every Black person is not the same!
You don't have to write an entire essay with citations mid-story about how you learned so much about the Afro-Chicana or Afro-Iraqi experience for your main character. We didn't ask. But, slipping natural things here and there into the story of a character’s culture helps cement that yes, this character has this multicultural identity and it matters to them; it is who they are, it has an effect on their life and character in some way. It is how you deepen the character and show respect for the culture you are depicting!
I love using Miles as an example, so here’s a good example. In Across The Spiderverse, he goes to a party to celebrate Jefferson’s new position. In that scene, Miles walks through a mix of all his family members. Even when he speaks with his parents in this scene, they managed to incorporate his Afro-Puerto Rican identity without shouting to the rooftops “HEY! HE’S BLACK AND LATINO! SEE HOW I’M TELLING YOU?”
Race vs Ethnicity
The Black experience stretches as far as the African diaspora- worldwide! It's why it's frustrating when people assume "Black people" means "United States" and the West's perception of "Third World Africa" (especially when it comes to existing in media that people have strongly claimed is just White). Latin and Central America? West Europe? East Europe? Southwest Asia and North Africa? The Mediterranean? East Asia? Australia? You will find Black people!! Just because we aren't the majority doesn't mean we aren't there!
But just because we're Black doesn't mean we're all "African-American". Ethnicity is "the quality or fact of belonging to a population group or subgroup made up of people who share a common cultural background or descent." Race is "a categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society."
"But I thought you said Black is an identity!"
It is! Black does not only mean “Black American”. The reason Black Americans identify as just Black (which is why I demand that you show respect by capitalizing it) is due to the loss of our specific heritages from the enslavement meant to scourge us of them, to make us property. To call us by our actual names would be acknowledging our equivalent humanity and culture. In order to enforce slavery without qualm, they had to be violently removed. Black Africans of numerous ethnic groups, now violently forced into this amalgamation, had to come together and forge something new. We had to find a common connection- our Blackness (and that experience as defined by whiteness in this society) was it. It also functions as a reclamation of our identity, of our presence in this world. We are a culture, we are an entire group of people, and we should be acknowledged as such.
Again: all Black people are NOT the same!!! This is like… anti-racism 101, but so many people continue to fall for it, even those ‘well-meaning’. You cannot ask one Black person to represent the ENTIRETY of the world's Black experience. Many other factors will come into play, and this includes their culture.
Keep in mind how being multicultural and/or biracial and Black will put many people at a crossroads that is complex and difficult to traverse. There will always be parts of incomplete acceptance, an extra layer of code-switching based on where you are and who you're with. A Black Kenyan is not a Black American, who is not a Black Greek, who is not a Black Colombian, who is not a Black Filipino. They're different cultures, that will treat each other differently. Society- from strangers to your own family- may try to pull multiethnic Black people one direction or another- are you ‘Black’ enough, are you ‘technically Black’, are you ‘technically’ something else, are you that ethnicity enough?
(I will discuss Black biracial people with whiteness in the next lesson, because I felt like the interracial and biracial White & Black topic needed its own talk, but this is relevant there as well.)
Where- In the world- Is-
Coming back from the opening of this lesson: keep in mind that you need to know specifically WHERE your character is from! For example, just saying they're "Afro-Latino" reveals very little- there's an entire chunk of the planet that falls under the "Latin America" category (as defined by U.S. standards).
A follower of mine- they identify as Caribbean Latine- sent me this in discussion about the topic:
"I wish people actually thought about where their Afro-Latino characters are from. It’s always very vague and it’s so reductive because an Argentinian Afro-Latino is very different from a Puerto Rican Afro-Latino. This is very subjective but I think this issue is pretty blatant in The Owl House. They flash the Dominican flag a couple of times, but when it comes to actually making her Afro-Latino…I don’t think they did a very good job. They barely made her Black in the first place. I don’t want to dog on the voice actors too much because there are a million factors that might have affected this but. When they make a point to have the characters speak Spanish, it’s really noticeable when the accent/dialect doesn’t align with their ethnicity. Dominicans have a really identifiable dialect in Spanish. When the Afro-Latino characters speak in Spanish, it’s the most neutral accent I’ve ever heard. This is such a me-issue, but this is to say that people should actually research where their characters are from instead of vaguely painting them as Afro-Latino. We are all SOOO different. Our dialects vary so much that sometimes an Afro-Mexican and an Afro-Puerto Rican won’t understand each other even though we speak the same language.”
WHO are we talking about? How does that factor into their identity, and the way the world- both in story, and how readers from around the world- will perceive them? Will an Afro-Dominican know that they're supposed to relate to your character if they're vaguely Latino?
Note:
While I was doing my research, I noticed that searching for “Afro-_” doesn’t always offer much, as it does the ubiquitous antiblack experience and roles in politics and resistance. And while I think that’s super cool and mandatory, I think another way to approach this would be to focus on the culture as a whole, and then go from there. So for example, if I wanted my character to be Afro-Mexican- maybe even from a specific location in Mexico, or their family is from that area- it would be easier to look up the cultures and activities of that area itself, and then inform with my knowledge of how Blackness is treated there.
As I am not a member of these groups, I thought it would be better for me to find resources that better explain, than to try to speak for them myself. Hell, just from doing this research, I learned that I have far more to educate myself on. There are so many good resources out there! People speak on these topics that y’all want to know about, and there are so many books and videos- find them and educate yourselves! This is a long section filled with links, so I'm going to put them under a readmore.
I also could not possibly sit here and name every single ethnic combo because that would be endless. So what I'm going to do is give some broad strokes of a few major groupings, that will hopefully start you on the path of how to conduct your own research!
The African Diaspora
This is such a good resource. There are short chapters going into the details and history of Black people in many regions, all around the globe. I’m honestly in love with how this is set up. It's a good starting point!
Black Africans
This one isn't specifically an example of multiethnicity; I just want to emphasize that there are many ethnicities and cultures within Africa itself! One is still multiethnic if they are Black American and Ivorian, for example! As the birthplace of humanity, there are plenty of ethnic groups in Africa with endlessly rich cultures, and all of them will come with different foods, fashions, languages!
Internalized antiblackness in African countries is due to the long and violent history of western imperialism in Africa. “The Carving Up of Africa” by European nations has long worn on the continent, its resources, and its peoples, and that includes remnants of their beliefs. Another pervasive idea in media is that all African peoples are ‘poor’, ‘living in huts’, and ‘starving’. There are people doing that all over the world, it is not inherent to being Black African. But even if that were the case- and it is not, every African does not live that way- it would still be the fault of aforementioned imperialism. Please do your research, and do not EVER write that if someone is African, they ‘must not be used to food’ or ‘have never seen such magnificent things as [what white character offers]’.
Notable music styles- Reggaeton? Salsa? Rumba? A lot of the best music of the area has roots in Blackness.
Antiblackness in the Afro-Latino community
Colorism plays a huge role in perception, to the point of putting you into classes of people. From the same Caribbean Latine follower:
Also, they have to do research on racial groupings in LATAM. It’s unavoidable. A Latino that’s considered Black in the USA may not be considered Black in LATAM. This is because of Blanqueamiento. That is a LOT to explain, but TLDR: A big difference between racism in the USA and racism in LATAM is that white people aren’t focused on segregation. It’s racism through imposition. “Blanqueamiento” refers to whitening and it’s the belief that you can cleanse the bloodline by having children with white people. The lineage will get increasingly lighter. That is why whenever a child comes out lighter than their parents, people will praise the parents for “bettering the race” (mejorando la raza). So a light skinned Black person in the USA may have another racial classification in LATAM (prieto, moreno, mulato, etc)."
One example is 'pelo malo' (bad hair)- how afro-textures are deemed unwanted, as a holdover from Spanish colonization and ideas of whiteness being equivalent to purity. Another severe example is of the slur "mayate"- apparently, it means "f*ggot black bug". If you're Black, and someone ever calls you this, know that you are being severely insulted. If you are interested in more Afro-Mexican history, Colonial Blackness by Herman Bennett is a book that follows the stories of enslaved Africans and their descendants in 17th century Mexico, questioning the existing history told that often leaves out their presence.
Afro Indigenous
*Indigenous doesn't just mean "to America", though the links are to the Afro-indigenous experience in the U.S.
Notable Figures: Crispus Attucks, Lucy Parsons, George Henry White, Charlie Patton, Jimi Hendrix, Eartha Kitt, Lena Horne, Ausben Jordan
What’s interesting is that it was much harder for me to find solid evidence of people who are Black Natives, mainly because it seems this history was lost and/or never recorded, or due to Blood Quantum and antiblackness, not acknowledged. That is something worth thinking about, if you are writing an Afro-Native character.
Blood quantum: A system developed by the United States federal government to determine how much “Indian blood” an Indigenous person has and if they are qualified for Tribal enrollment. Blood quantum limits accessibility to citizenship and is designed to decrease enrollment numbers. Today, some tribes still use blood quantum as criteria for Tribal enrollment. As part of their sovereign status, every federally recognized Tribe determines its own criteria for membership and enrollment.
Further reading:
Young, Black Native activists say it's time to appreciate Indigenous diversity
Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage
Blood Politics: Race, Culture, and Identity in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma By Circe Sturm (2002)
We Refuse to Forget: A True Story of Black Creeks, American Identity, and Power By Caleb Gayle (2023)
Afro-Arab/SWANA
Notable figures: Bilal ibn Rabah, Fatima Bernawi, Layla F. Saad, Samirah Srur Fadel, Ahmed Osman, Sara El Hassan (known as bsonblast), Ali Jiddah, Maryam Abu Khaled
Here's an amazing resource cataloguing the history of Afro-Palestinians, as well as a timeline of the solidarity between Black Americans, Afro-Palestinians, and Palestinians!
I sat here and tried very hard to come up with a way to summarize this, especially given current events in our world, and I found that at this moment, I lack the skill to do it. Not because there’s nothing to say- God knows there’s plenty- but unraveling the intersections that comes with the SWANA experience would take me far longer than a summary. I think Maryam Abu Khaled can speak on her experience far better than I, anyway:
Afro-AAPI
Notable figures: apl.de.ap, Michael Ealy, H.E.R., Karrueche, Rae Dawn Chong, Naomi Campbell, Naomi Osaka, Chanel Iman, Anderson Paak
Interview from famous R&B artist, guitarist, actress for Belle, and Afro-Filipina: H.E.R.
There is a strain between Black and Asian communities, in the United States and beyond, white supremacy playing a major role. But that does not mean that we cannot move forward together, or have not shown one another solidarity.
One of my biggest pet peeves that happens often in fandom spaces is fans who claim that Asians- East Asians in particular, but Asians in general- don't know what Black people are and what we look like. It's racist to every ethnicity and background involved. Yes, there are Black East Asian and Black South Asian people. Yes, these countries have access to the Internet to look up what we look like. There have been plenty of well-drawn Black people by those artists. Just like every white artist isn't going to draw a caricature, every Asian artist isn't going to. It all comes down to practice, their commitment to their craft, and their commitment to not being racist. Being from these areas is not an excuse for not drawing Black people accurately- the same amount of effort they can be put into depicting a white person (that would also be a minority in these places), can be put into depicting us as well. Knock it off.
Conclusion
Antiblackness is unfortunately ubiquitous, yes, but that doesn’t mean the rest of every Black person’s life experience is going to be. We are everywhere on this planet, which means there’s a planet’s worth of experiences to be had. If you decide that you want to create a Black character with a multiethnic or multicultural background, you need to commit to that! Even by mentioning their music, or their food, or- if you’re going to get into it- how others might treat them due to their Afro-identity. Something that lets us as the viewers know that you didn’t just write a white person and then claim they were “Afro-Blank” for clout. If you mean it, do it, because as always, it’s the thought that counts, but the action that delivers!
Grief comes in many forms. We’re often taught that grief only follows death—but in truth, grief is far more complex than that. As writers, understanding the many faces of grief can help us craft scenes with deeper authenticity and emotional resonance.
In this post, we’ll explore different types of grief to help you write characters who feel real, layered, and human.
Grieving the Living
Grief doesn’t only come from death. You can grieve someone who’s still alive.
- A breakup, whether romantic or platonic, can leave someone mourning the version of the relationship they once had.
- Estrangement from family can feel like a living loss—especially when the person is still physically present but emotionally gone.
This kind of grief is often overlooked, but it can be just as devastating as bereavement.
Grieving While Alive
Sometimes, grief comes from within.
When someone is in a dark emotional or mental space, just existing can feel like a burden. They may grieve the life they thought they’d have, the person they used to be, or the hope they’ve lost.
It might sound strange, but for someone in pain, every breath can feel like a reminder of what’s missing. This kind of grief is deeply personal and often invisible—but it’s real.
Grieving a Part of Yourself
Another form of grief that’s rarely discussed is the loss of a part of one’s body or identity.
- Losing a limb, a sense (like sight or hearing), or even a career-defining ability can trigger intense grief.
- It’s not just about physical loss—it’s about mourning what you used to be able to do, and who you were before.
This kind of grief can lead to depression, identity crises, and a long journey of adaptation and healing.
Why This Matters in Storytelling
Grief is not one-size-fits-all. It’s messy, unpredictable, and deeply personal.
By exploring the many dimensions of grief, you can write characters who feel authentic and relatable. Readers connect with stories that reflect their own experiences—even the ones they’ve never been able to name.
Understanding grief in its many forms allows you to:
- Add emotional depth to your characters
- Create more nuanced, human stories
- Offer comfort and validation to readers who may be grieving themselves
Final Thoughts
Grief is not just about death. It’s about loss in all its forms—relationships, identity, ability, hope.
As a writer, your job isn’t to simplify grief. It’s to honor its complexity and give it space on the page. When you do, you create stories that resonate, heal, and endure.
I hope this helps you write with more empathy and insight.
This list is obviously subjective. There is no “right” or “wrong”, but as an emotionally reserved person, these are some things I thought were worth mentioning! You don’t have to do everything on this list, it’s simply here for inspiration/a bit of help.
Show your character’s struggles with holding in emotions. Just because your character won’t let themself go in public, doesn’t mean they don’t struggle holding everything in.
Find a motive. Pride and/or consideration for those around them can make emotionally reserved people hold back more than would be considered good for them. There are other reasons too. Think of something, perhaps the initial cause and the reason now are different, but try to give them a reason.
Show side-effects. Everything you bottle up shows itself in another way, whether it’s physical or mental. This can be long- and short-term, depending on the severity of the emotions.
Give them coping mechanisms. Everyone who wishes not to show certain emotions has a trick or two to keep themselves in check. Taking a sip of water, not looking people in the eyes, clenching their fists, breathing just a bit too deeply/shallow. There are a few lists of these online, I believe.
Write subconscious signs that they give off, which their close friends or family might pick up on. Just because these characters want to keep their emotions to themselves, doesn’t mean they don’t give off signs. Some manage to keep said signs well hidden from those closest to them, but it’s more common for their environment to pick up on something at the very least.
Perhaps make some characters perceive your OC as unable to feel certain emotions. There’s bound to be at least one person in their environment who thinks the character just doesn’t feel some emotions.
Convey their confusion/bewilderment when they’re confronted with others’ emotions. Most of the time, it’s difficult for an emotionally reserved person to understand why on earth someone else can’t keep themself under control.
Pick one main emotion to hide. This is the one they’re most uncomfortable showing, one they decide they’d rather go through physical and emotional pain than showing. Depending on whether their keeping to themself has to do with pride, your character might not even want to let this emotion surface when they’re alone. Generally these are the “weakest” emotions: sadness, fear, etc.
Let them cover up one emotion with another when they really can’t keep a straight face anymore. Generally speaking, anger is an amazing cover-up for a variety of emotions. Your voice is less likely to break when you raise it, that upset look on your face will suddenly make sense, and the fact that fear made you shaky suddenly seems to correlate with anger instead.
Learn the difference between suppression and repression. They’re two very different words often used as synonyms. I’m not a professional, so I don’t think I can explain it properly, but there are some great articles online!
Try to steer clear of making them unsympathetic. Not every reserved person is unsympathetic, but they can come off as such because they just have no idea on how to deal with emotions or show them to the outside world. Focusing on their internal conflicts, both with what caused them to feel strongly about something and keeping it concealed.
On that note: you don’t have to make them cold-hearted and stoic. Not every emotionally reserved person is the same. In fact, depending on the emotions they wish to keep private, they might be very cheerful and empathetic friends.
Do not, and I repeat do not, let them “give in” to their emotions the moment they’ve found their true love. This isn’t realistic. It’s laughable to any emotionally reserved person. Finding someone they’re really comfortable around is great, and your character might be able to let go later on, but things like that take time to develop. A month won’t suffice; a few years are more likely to be realistic.
Not everyone who is emotionally reserved has some kind of trauma that caused it. Yes, some people become quite guarded after experiencing a trauma of some sort, but other people just are the way they are. No specific reason, no tragedies, they are just who they are. There’s always our society to rely on for steering them in the “right” direction.
Keep in mind that everyone is different. I write from my own experience, as would anyone else, so my post is by no means complete. Try to find different views on the topic – from real people instead of scientific articles.
some people think writers are so eloquent and good with words, but the reality is that we can sit there with our fingers on the keyboard going, “what’s the word for non-sunlight lighting? Like, fake lighting?” and for ten minutes, all our brain will supply is “unofficial”, and we know that’s not the right word, but it’s the only word we can come up with…until finally it’s like our face got smashed into a brick wall and we remember the word we want is “artificial”.
Trauma is a mental injury, and our body may react to unconscious memories of significant negative events unknown even to us. Our body subconsciously protects us from future trauma.
How we respond to trauma has consequential implications on how we live our lives. Trauma responses ensure physical and emotional safety; however, these unintended reactions may interfere with our ability to flourish.
Trauma responses are innate; they occur without our consciousness.
A reaction to a perceived threat is called a trauma response. It is a survival instinct; it is reflexive and automatic.
Your body reacts to this perceived threat without your approval. Smells and sounds may remind your clients of the trauma they experienced and bring about memories that perhaps at one time were repressed. Despite the individual’s awareness, the unconscious self still remembers, and the body reacts.
A trauma response is how your nervous system has adapted following a significant situation and can manifest in various ways, whether there is an actual threat, or a threat is perceived.
Trauma responses cause a person to be hypervigilant, which may create an overwhelmed individual under normal circumstances. Contrarily, a person experiencing hypervigilance may also prove to be an effective person during crises. Trauma responses get a bad rap; however, if clients can recognize them, they can prevent them from controlling their lives.
Typical Trauma Response Types
Originally, fight and flight were thought to be the only responses to stress, which focused on the autonomic nervous system (McCarty, 2016; Katz et al., 2021).
Freeze, as a trauma response type, was later developed after observing lab rats in stressful situations (Katz et al., 2021).
Today, the 4 most commonly known trauma response types include fight, flight, freeze, and fawn. Each of these actions is an adaptive, functional short-term survival counteraction.
Fight
As we know, the fight response involves combativeness toward the perpetrator. Example demonstrations of fight may include kicking, punching, or threatening the attacker (Katz et al., 2021). It may also include being verbally argumentative and yelling.
If an individual is quick to anger, they may be demonstrating a fight trauma response. This symptom of arousal may indicate self-criticism when someone feels internally threatened (Germer & Neff, 2015).
This reaction may include any attempt to stand up against a threat. It is a form of assertiveness. At a healthy level, it delineates healthy boundaries.
At a primal level, if an animal feels it is being attacked, it may choose to fight back if the threat is manageable. If the animal feels that it cannot successfully fight the threat, it may resort to our next trauma response.
Flight
Flight involves literally or metaphorically running from an actual or perceived danger. It is an act of nonconfrontation and avoidance of a threat. More importantly, it is a biologically determined sequence of responses to stress (Bracha, 2004). Flight is a disengagement from the stress-inducing stimulus. Paired with fight, it is the cornerstone of stress response research by Walter B. Cannon (McCarty, 2016).
Flight may include the habit of leaving the room or fleeing from the home following an argument. It may also include drug and alcohol abuse to avoid emotions. Further, individuals demonstrating the flight response may be disconnected from their family, friends, or coworkers. Someone exhibiting the flight response may isolate themselves.
Over-sharing, over-explaining, and trauma dumping may indicate compartmentalization. If an individual shows compartmentalization, it may mean that they are unconsciously trying to distance themselves from the trauma, thus allowing them to speak of the event nonchalantly.
Further, this practice allows the individual to avoid direct confrontation or processing of the distressing experience. Considering the purpose of divulging the information, this response could also be intended to gain attention (Shabahang et al., 2022), including sympathy or validation.
Individuals may be unconsciously seeking external support or validation to cope with the trauma. Seeking refuge or solace in the empathy or validation of others is an illustration of the flight response.
Hyper-independence occurs when an individual internalizes that dependence on others is unsafe. They avoid asking for help and instead build a wall. This could be a trauma response of flight, as the individual is avoiding an interaction or relationship.
Hypersexualization may also suggest a flight response. Someone who is hypersexual may be fleeing from other emotions.
Likewise, this response may also represent the fawn response as an attempt to please others, which we will discuss later.
Freeze
This is an effective technique when fight or flight are not an option (d’Andrea et al., 2013). When the typical fight-or-flight responses are put on hold, this is considered the freeze response (Kozlowska et al., 2015).
This stress response involves the typical stop, look, and listen response and commands hypervigilance (Bracha, 2004). An individual may resort to this response when assessing a situation. Some suggest this response precedes the fight-or-flight, as the animal or victim is determining which response to employ.
Example: During a bear encounter, physically attacking the bear may be unwise; likewise, running from the bear may not be helpful either. Feigning death may be your way out of this critical situation. This immobility eliminates auditory and visual clues that would otherwise provoke aggression (Baldwin, 2013).
Binge eating could be considered a freeze response (Rodriguez-Quiroga et al., 2021). Instead of facing the situation, a person who engages in binge eating consumes an unusually large amount of food in a relatively short amount of time. This type of food consumption may serve as self-soothing behavior or self-medication.
Eating large quantities of food may induce a dissociative state, thus providing an escape and helping to cope with the overwhelming experience of trauma. This type of eating disorder can be just as dangerous as bulimia and anorexia.
This stress response helps the individual to hide, and it shows that you are not a threat. Further, the person experiencing the freeze response is provided the opportunity to process the threat.
Fawn
This lesser-known and least-understood trauma response may be confused with being a character trait. Arguably, this may be the only response where one engages with the potential threat and attempts to change the other person’s behavior. The trauma response stems from our innate need for social connection and co-regulation.
In this response, a person may mirror the other individual’s gestures, facial expressions, or speech. They are hypervigilant about everyone’s happiness and safety in the room.
Physically speaking, individuals who consistently show fawning as their trauma response may also experience temporomandibular joint disorder (TMJ), more commonly known as lockjaw, or pain in their jaw (Kim et al., 2009). They are overly agreeable and frequently sacrifice their boundaries.
For example, a man orders a well-done steak with a side salad from a notable restaurant. What he receives is a steak that is cooked medium rare with a side of French fries. That was not his order; however, he does not bring this oversight to the server’s attention for fear of disappointing someone, whether that be the wait staff or the chef.
People who frequently demonstrate the fawn response may be described as people pleasers, workaholics, over-explainers, and over-apologizers. During a traumatic event, a victim may experience Stockholm syndrome, which is when an individual attempts to appease one’s abuser or captor (Bailey et al., 2023).
Codependency can also be a fawn response (Walker, 2013). This is an unhealthy and dysfunctional relationship dynamic involving one person assuming the role of the “giver.” This response may also be referred to as the “friend” and “appease” response.
Lesser-Known Responses to Trauma
Besides the typical fight, flight, freeze, and fawn, there are a few more responses you may not be familiar with. Fright, flag, and faint are a few of the lesser-known trauma responses that are theorized by professionals of this field.
Fright
The fright response indicates tonic immobility. At first, the freeze response was theorized; however, it soon became apparent that this response could be differentiated from fright (Katz et al., 2021).
Similar to freeze and faint, the person experiencing fright will play dead, so to speak (Bracha, 2004). This is better understood when a predator has its prey in its grasp, and the prey goes limp and ceases its struggle to make itself less desirable for consumption. In this case, the fright response involves a heightened state of arousal and readiness to confront or flee from danger.
Flag
The flag response is characterized by numbness of emotion, cognitive failure, a drop in arousal, and surrender. Schauer and Elbert (2015) assert that the flag response is part of a sequence of six fear responses that progress as a function of defense during a life-threatening situation. The cascade consists of the following responses in sequential order: freeze – flight – fight – fright – flag – and faint.
The individual’s attention may be elsewhere, and they may feel like they are observing themself, which is an example of disassociation. This is a built-in defense mechanism that increases pain tolerance or numbs emotional response.
The person who experienced the trauma may exhibit memory lapses as their brain attempts to protect its emotional well-being.
Faint
Also a biologically determined response to acute stress defense, faint is a lesser-known response (Bracha, 2004).
This may also be referred to as the “flop” response, also indicative of tonic immobility and is a preferable option for the body when fight or flight is not possible. A common example of this phenomenon is when a person sees blood and literally faints from the sight of it. They are not “playing dead” as illustrated in the fright response; their body unconsciously suspends movement.
Instead of the arousal and readiness associated with the fright response, this type of response centers around immobility in response to overwhelming stress.
Clients who have been diagnosed with PTSD may benefit from the following techniques:
Sensory Grounding
To help them ground themself and bring awareness, encourage your client to try the following practice: Name 5 things you can see, 4 things you can hear, 3 things you can touch, 2 things you can smell, and 1 thing you can taste.
They could also carry a grounding smell, such as a scented lotion, perfume, or cologne, or carry a grounding sensory object, such as a fidget or soft item.
These grounding tools can be used discretely and have profound effects.
Cognitive Grounding
A process where clients must show themselves that they are safe.
They could verbally review the following thoughts: Remind yourself where the trauma occurred and how physically far you are from that location. Remind yourself when the trauma occurred and how long ago that was. Repeat inspiring quotes say coping statements such as:
