Wings To Fly Dreams

Hewo ... a little goblin (that's me, 34) would like to share some of her poems and stories with you lovely people (yeah, you, that's you I hope you enjoy! :') Logo by @something_wild_designs on IG

[wingstoflydreams]

Yes, It Hurts 

Beat against the prison bars of a restless soul.

Beat until

your hands are torn,

your eyes are bleeding tears,

and the heart that once led you in dreams and trust

lies cracked and bleeding on the floor of a wasteland world.

Keep your screams silent,

your sobs private,

and the shadows of your soul far away

from darkening the sunshine of other people’s lives.

Keep quiet the voiceless screams of anguish in the dead of a soul’s night. 

[wingstoflydreams]

Cost Versus Worth

$30 gone for an afternoon of people I didn't want to spend time with.

Now the afternoon is gone, too.

And so is my strength.

But, the memories, yes? The memories I traded money, time, and strength for, they'll be warm reminders of youth in my older years, yes?

No. Not at all. Just more memories of Me things sacrificed for yet more They things when the They things were nothing I wanted, needed, or was helped by when the They things could have occurred literally just as well without me. But, oh, it was the Presence of Me that was wanted. The shy, quiet Presence of Softness and Smiles.

So they could take the softness and wring it out.

So they could see the smiles and focus on their own reflections in the pleasant crescents of light.

Only to then give nothing. Why give They things when the Me things were free to take?

Who valued me less?

They who took because that was all they wanted?

Or me who gave because that is all I know?

[wingstoflydreams]

I don't have a job anymore ...

I have worked for a long time. Many years. Many places. Changing as needed per moves and and mental health and marriage.

And then.

For over four years, I was trapped working at a place I came to hate in inverse proportions to how much I knew of it. I didn't hate the people, though I hated the choices many of them made, microaggressions in a social scene of macroturmoil. And I hated the company.

This broke me daily. Was I an enemy because I worked for the enemy? Can a victim suffering in such circumstances be a victim?? Or is said suffering invalidated because it earns a paycheck which helps feeds a family, pays bills, and chips away at debt???

And then I realized ...

No. No enemy was I.

I was a warrior going behind enemy lines forty hours a week, visually and vocally representing my core beliefs and objective truth.

I took up space in the midst of those choosing the perceived comfort of cognitive dissonance and thusly reminded them every second they saw me of the reality they want to be blind to.

I used their resources to support myself and loved ones, the causes I believe in, and the people who need to be cared about.

And now ... I've been set at liberty ... and I kind of ... really ... don't know how to feel ... about feeling ... so free ...

[silly-little-arson-frog-offical]

toast 🤤

[wingstoflydreams]

TLDR: @silly-little-arson-frog-offical helped me figure out what to eat for breakfast today by their lovely art post reblogged above, which is a much bigger deal for me than it might sound to someone else, and therefore I’m really, really grateful to them, thank you, thank you, @silly-little-arson-frog-offical!!

TW: Please be aware that the following contains references to panic, anxiety, mental illness, food struggles, appetite loss, emotional eating, very minimal weight loss, healthy weight loss, nausea, and vomiting (I reread this a couple times to not miss any possible problems subjects, so I hope I’ve listed them all). If any of that or similar stuff is triggering for you, you, my friend, are very, very loved and can add to that by please loving yourself enough to not continue reading. Sometimes self-care is to just keep on scrolling. Also, it’s a really long ramblepost, so maybe consider yourself saved. 😅🤪😂

Now. Story time. For those in a story time mood. Which mood I am clearly never not in. 😁😅

Ahem. Please don’t doubt the power you have for positive influence in this world!! @silly-little-arson-frog-offical posted the above lovely original work of digital art (which I totally thought was a photo at first😅) yesterday (in my time zone), sharing their creative talents and general delightfulness as always. In the scenario context I’ve made up for them in my mind for this story, they were likely simply excited to share something that had taken a lot of their time and skill. Probably didn’t think beyond that as far as the effect of their post.

Meanwhile. Did you know that appetite loss doesn’t particularly refer to not being hungry? It refers to not wanting to eat. Sometimes this results in a lack of hunger, but sometimes it means you’re hungry but can’t figure out what you can stomach in a given moment.

I found out very recently that my weird quirk for the last couple years (which developed after months of working through and past some mildly unhealthy emotional eating habits that I’d had for years) of just kinda not eating until I HAD to or get faint/throw up is actually appetite loss. All this time I thought it was me allowing the anxiety and panic disorders to drive the brain bus in food situations (cuz it all being my own fault is definitely and for sure how having mental disorders works🙃😭🤦🏻‍♀️🙄🙂‍↔️🙅🏻‍♀️), that it was simply due to hOw DOpeY I aM aBoUT MAkinG dECisOnS. Nope, it’s likely an effect of the anxiety and panic disorders making me nauseous at some level almost literally all the time, but it’s not just me being dumb (shocking, I know, dealing with stuff like like this is not always, cough, *actually just not* our fault).

Now, gratefully, this hasn’t really been a problem in my life (comparatively speaking, lol). I’d have two or three panic attacks a month about it and I lost some weight, but only like 15-20 pounds in two years, just enough at a totally unconcerning pace to get to a bit healthier, more personally preferable weight for me. I didn’t lose an unhealthy amount nor become underweight because fortunately food and eating can be fairly social for me, and I’m married as well as, possibly oddly enough, a bit of a foodie. So when da hubby was home and ate, I followed suit. Again, this was just not something that I thought about much outside of the occasional panic attacks and even those I’d only bring up in therapy during discussions of the panic disorder. I didn’t consider myself as struggling with eating cuz it legitimately didn’t really feel like I was.

But! Times change (she mentioned with overly dramatic foreboding for narrative emphasis😂). The reason I finally determined what the actual problem is was because it’s gotten WAY worse in the last months due to other stuffs going on, and I rabbit-hole researched about eating struggles to figure out what I was dealing with.

So finally I am armed with situational knowledge but, again, due to the other stuffs going on, eating continues to become even worse of a daily Sisyphean endeavor. I have panic attacks about simply being hungry and having to eat and deciding what to eat multiple times a week now. I have to take anti-anxiety meds to calm down enough to make meal decisions, cuz spiked anxiety and panic causing worse nausea of course very much augments the problem, causing throwing up to enter as a possible probability (not jus something that rarely happened when I got too hungry/super panicked). Now I’m not just dealing with “meh” and “not meh” food option deliberations, I’ve got “safe” and “not safe” food issues per trying to avoid said vomiting. And what is “safe” varies, sometimes on the daily.

So this morning I’m reclining on the couch scrolling Tumblr trying to create enough mental chill to initiate the “what’s for breakfast?” battle. I can tell I’m hungry, and unfortunately I have to do something about it. Per the stuffs, I can’t just drink herbal tea all day until my stomach is calmed enough and I’m hungry enough to eat whatever anymore. Which is VERY annoying. 😅🫠

And then.

Behold, a post!

Behold a charming post of French Toast, beautifully rendered by @silly-little-arson-frog-offical, a very nice offering of their art.

And you can think I’m getting all mushy and long-winded about something small, but it’s not small for me. I’ve been up for three hours today managing to drink some Gatorade and then juice but unable to Sherlock a breakfast that will stay down into a mental vision that I can the cook into existence (I also have OCD, which is WAY helpful, aka not, in that it roots me in the whole “considering my present options in the light of past context” process for, as you can see, hours).

But I saw that yummy digital French toast and thought … “I think I could eat that this morning. And the stuff to make it is presently in the house!!” That last being also critical as additional facets of the struggle are me being on the spectrum of agoraphobia (going into the out is stoopiddumb and me no likey it), having obsessions and compulsions around financial security/overspending, and simply that I obviously can’t keep ALL possible safe foods in the house at one time.

Anyway. I just made French toast. In the immortal words of Linguini from Ratatuille, I even started “gettin’ fancy with the spices” and dashed some cinnamon and vanilla extract into the whisked eggs. Then to literally top it all off, I have powdered sugar in the cupboard for a little extra fancy!!

And now I have breakfast. All thanks to @silly-little-arson-frog-offical’s yummy-looking French toast post.

So yes. Here at the end of this excessively long share, I’m feeling deeply the truth Inigo Montoya nuggetized for us in The Princess Bride, “Let me explain, no, there is too much, let me sum up!”, lol.

Therefore, after graciously letting me over-explain, please allow me to sum up:

You Matter.

Your words matter.

Your art matters.

Your interests matter.

Your contributions to this world, however objectively or subjectively small one could consider them, matter.

And sometimes you’ll find out they mattered to someone else in a way that confuses or amuses you.

Regardless. No matter what,

you matter.

You can’t be replaced.

And your influence has made a difference in somebody’s life for good, whether you ever find out how or not.

So please be you. Be loud and proud, be shy and quiet, be something in between, but be you however puts a smile on your face. Cuz somewhere you living in a way that puts a smile on your face has put a smile on someone else’s. Like mine happily nomming down my yummy breakfast of French toast.

❣️🥹❣️🥹❣️🍞🥚🍯❣️🥹❣️🥹❣️

[wingstoflydreams]

Written on January 30th of this year:

Today is very hard.

I think one of the frustrating things about work is that I’m so tired and dealing with such brain fog from the pain half the time that I can’t get stuff done. Which freaks me out AND is just simply annoying. I want to DO things, even if they’re not things high on my recreation list. I still like to keep busy. And I. just. can’t.

I hate this.

And in the beginning of this job, I still had energy to try and work on my stuff and my projects. I worked a part-time job for like nine months through 2022 and 2023. Then through 2023-2024, I wrote the word count equivalent of a very long novel and did markets a couple times a month.

All that while trying to heal physically and mentally, too. Getting therapy. Finding meds that worked. Reading all the books on the struggles. Doing workbooks to help with the struggles.

And then it’s like in August of ‘24 something just snapped. And slowly, slowly I’ve had to cut back even more than I’d been cutting back on things I wanted to do throughout my twenties. But now I can’t even do the things I NEED to do. I’ve always been able to make at least THAT work, to make those things happen at the very least. And I know that with enough will power I still can, at least, that's how I've always managed, but … days like today come, the will power just feels ... gone ... and I get scared.

[wingstoflydreams]

Being me COULD be fun!

My offerings COULD be good!

Maybe? 🥹

[wingstoflydreams]

A thought I thunk. And I made another picture! :)

[wingstoflydreams]

Thank you, @crazyalien87 and everyone else who has given me 50 reblogs! This happened a while ago, but I've been on an unplanned posting sabbatical due to life lifing in a most lifing way. 😂

Anywho, I was very touched to see that 50 people liked my stuffs enough to put it with their stuffs!! I think I want to make a reblog account so I can do this, too, cuz I read someone's post about doing that yesterday and went AHA!! a way to reblog without my neurospicy self getting SO confused (I don't know why, but like, my brain short circuits at not having separate folders for things😒).

Thank you all once more, and thank you to those who have reposted my stuffs since. You are all very kind and make me feel special.🥹

[wingstoflydreams]

It is not entitlement to avoid settling for less than you want and/or need, but people who did thusly settle will view it so.

[wingstoflydreams]

I think I’m posting so much today because for once I am concurrently lonely and alone. Usually I’m not lonely at all when I’m alone. Usually I only ever feel lonely when I’m in a group of people larger than like, three total, soooometimes four depending on the people. And sometimes even in a group of two or three I can feel quite lonely. It all depends on how much I don’t feel safe unmasking around the people I’m with or the situation I’m in. Also on how unseen/unimportant I’m being made to feel.

Which leads to the hypothesis that I pretty much only feel lonely when I’m feeling unseen/unimportant or don’t feel safe unmasking.

So it therefore follows that perhaps the more pertinent question in this moment of solitude is not “Why am I feeling lonely right now?” but rather “How am I making myself feel unseen, unimportant, or unsafe?”

😳

Hmph. Not where I expected this post to go. I am now feeling uncomfortably self aware and therefore self-conscious, thank you very much, me. 🙄😅😂😭

[wingstoflydreams]

Presently annoyed by the cyclical nature of a lot of women’s/hoomans with uteruses’ monthly lives.

What do you mean that this THING making me feel all kinds of ways right now only seems like a big deal because hormones??

Excuse me, I can’t create the stuff FILLING my head and heart URGENTLY because too much or too little of the “your body can make babies” chemicals (is this a way to describe that, help me smart people, please?) in my body at this time of the month are making me exhausted and brain foggy??

Hold up, the circumstance that I’m actually able to create right now what I’m PASSIONATE about creating right now isn’t because the muses have found and tenderly smiled upon me with loving inspiration but because, again, of present levels of these invisible “able to keep the human species in existence” components of my biological make-up (that sounds not just sciency but accurate as well, right?)?

You’re telling me that being more HorMOnaL some weeks than others means that I must examine what I think and feel not just in terms of subjectivity versus objectivity, not just from separating logic from emotion, not JUST to note which stem from preferences and from principles, NOT JUST keeping my mind safe from unacceptable perspectives ingrained into childhood me now replaced by those stumblingly but fiercely erected ones actually representative of my values by the me I rebuilt after leaving my family’s home … BUT ALSO THROUGH A LENS OF WILL I FEEL/THINK THE SAME WAY ABOUT THIS NEXT WEEK CUZ MY BRAIN AND BODY WILL HAVE DIFFERENT STOCK AMOUNTS OF THESE MAGICAL CREATE A HUMAN INSIDE ME FIZZY POTIONS (yeah, I gave up on synonyms for hormones that sound remotely like a normal person wrote this)?!?

It’s SUPER gaslighty, and howy fwackerdoodles, I don’t wike any of it!!!!!!!!🥺😭

And this from someone who likes kids, plans on having kiddos, and is quite happy about being a woman, just to give context. I am straight and cis, and even ME feels this way. Like, I WANT my uterus to exist and to work, I just wish it had a “sleep” function like computers do, wouldn’t that be nice?!

[wingstoflydreams]

I’m not completely sure about the below cuz, granted, I grew up very isolated and sheltered therefore gaining little to no context of the “growing up as a millennial” experience until I entered the realm of social media about the time that older-mid GenZ/Zoomers (which is preferred, please?😃) were posting from their 20’s about growing up in their generation.

Meanwhile. I maybe think that “going nonverbal” due to nuerospicy overwhelm is something that girls/afabs are usually kinda socialized out of? But also I didn’t grow up with brothers, so maybe guys/amabs are socialized out of that, too? Except I’ve met some (specifically white) guys/amabs talking about how hard it is to go nonverbal/having their partner coming up with solutions for those situations, and I’m just always like … that’s an option?!?

And I’m not talking about being nonverbal, I’m not taking about usually being verbal but having times where being verbal, for whatever mental illness/mental spectrum reason, simply cannot occur. I’m taking about going nonverbal. Like, everything in you feels like talking will make your soul vomit, but talking is The Necessary Thing To Do, So We Talk. Except some folks (white males if speaking of my personal experience with people my age-ish or if speaking of my online experience also younger folks raised by not Boomers/older GenX/parents of any age ascribing to those child-raising approaches) … just don’t? They actually don’t talk when their brain says don’t talk, even if technically they could force themselves to?

Cuz, well, that just wasn’t an option growing up as a kiddo of Boomer parents with most of the parenting done by my Boomer mom. There was no physical abuse going on in my childhood (literally thank heaven), but, ya know, having a parent distressed and disregulated cuz you won’t TELL THEM WHAT THE PROBLEM IS ain’t no fun, right? And it makes anything causing overwhelm noticeably worse, yeah?

So you just … pushed the words out. Even when it felt painful inside to do so. Even when it felt almost violating to have to do so to keep from rocking the boat and making the ride more uncomfortable for the other people in your sad little dysfunctional family’s metaphorical boat.

And if you were normally a happily chatty sort of smol bean, that added to going nonverbal being a nonoption as well. Cuz “you don’t normally have trouble talking, you normally talk SO MUCH” dialogues are gonna both persuade you to talk more when you’re not feeling well and convince you talking less when you are feeling well is preferable.

Anyway, I’m SO grateful emojis exist!! Because of them, I can comment on people’s tumblr posts when I don’t know what to say cuz my head is too loud, am having trouble wording due to IT HAS TO PERFECTLY EXPRESS WHAT I MEAN IN A NON-MIS-UNDERSTANDABLE WAY issues, feel too sad or tired or broken inside for lingual expression (are those aspects of going or being nonverbal, I don’t actually honestly know, I’m legitimately trying to figure out if that’s another neurospicy thing little me learned to mask about/big me still does or if that weird sense of your throat being too closed up for the words that you’re feeling compelled to push out cuz ANOTHER HUMAN WANTS YOU TO is not particularly neurospicy to experience, like, a lot of the time, especially when your brain and your body don’t feel tethered correctly/you just aren’t doing well?).

Anywho, if I leave emojis instead of words/both in a comment on your post, just please know that what you shared meant enough to me that I simply had to respond somehow, and I specifically only used two emojis so they could appear big (learned this recently).

And if any seonbaes, senpais, eonnis, oppas, or nonbinary equivalents wanted/had time to soapbox about this a little bit, that would be lovely. Also I mean those terms in the most platonic of ways having nothing particular to do with calendar age. I am a smol neurospicy bean wif big eyes that is in internet age much younger than probably/possibly most of you. 🥺🫶🏻

And please, to try and clarify again, in NO WAY am I talking about the nonverbal equivalent of being wheelchair-bound, I am talking about the nonverbal equivalent of knowing that walking is not a good idea for you today, but technically you can move your legs if you force yourself, so oh, well, humans who can walk need to walk, right?, so you yet again use the fumes in your empty gas tank to Please The Others (even if you’re basing whether they’ll be pleased by this on how people in your past were pleased). Yet it seems others experiencing the nonverbal equivalent of knowing that walking is not a good idea for you today, but technically you can move your legs if you force yourself … don’t force themselves? And I’m sure it’s not just whites males/amabs who don’t, I just referenced that because those are the only in-person people I’ve interacted with that do this. Who have explained to me that they do this cuz sometimes talking is hard, not cuz sometimes they literally cannot talk. AND I’M NOT SAYING IT’S BAD!! It just … confuses me? And I experience the slightest touch of, “well, that seems like it would be nice to be able to do” before my brain police slap me across my internal face for being a horrible person yet again.

DOES ANY OF THIS MAKE SENSE?! No? Yeah, probably not. Also it’s really long, so if you got through any of it, that was really nice of you, and I’m sorry there wasn’t a good payoff for doing so.

[josephbrassey]

Some myths that need debunking because they're being pushed by bots and it’s making me angry:

1. "He's gonna declare martial law!" Okay, so what then? This isn't something you can enforce nationwide on a country of 350 million people with a military that has a combined force of less than 3 million people, including all support and logistics staff. That doesn't equal half the population of Los Angeles. Y'all need to fucking stop acting like we're approaching a mythical point where shit gets "serious." We're already there. People are already being disappeared.

Civilians are already being killed in the streets. We're there. And you know what? They're already getting near the limits of their ability to force compliance. ICE is dedicating a double digit percentage of their manpower to Minneapolis and they're not controlling shit. People are pushing back. Your default response when the administration says "We will force you to do this" shouldn't be "Oh no they're gonna make us do this!" It should be "Fuck you. Make me."

2. "Americans are doing nothing!" I did a post about this recently, but it bears revisiting: I don't know where the hell you're getting this, because everywhere that ICE or other arms of the federal enforcement apparatus go, they are being pushed back on, humiliated, driven out of neighborhoods, and shown the door. People are fighting back on a truly awe inspiring level. Stop assuming that "doing something" looks like an armed mass of civilians storming Washington and fighting the military in a pitched battle. This is movie bullshit. The world has not looked like that since the early 20th century. What you are seeing, right now, is what "doing something" looks like. Stop it stop it stop it. We ARE doing something, in vast numbers.

3. "He's gonna cancel elections!" This one has been pushed by bots for the last year, and big name people have been picking it up, and it frustrates the hell out of me so I'm going to hold your hand and tell you bluntly: He. Cannot. Do. This. There is no mechanism. Elections are controlled by the states, and they decide when they happen. There is no federal mechanism for control of elections. What's Trump gonna do? Post soldiers at every polling place in every swing state? Do you know how many polling places there are in every district? How much manpower this would require? He doesn't have the people to do it. He doesn't have the mechanical ability to do it. There are no tools to execute this plan. Is he gonna try to make elections unfair? You bet your ass, but our elections have never been fair. Voter suppression has always existed and will continue to exist until we fix it... but a blanket ban of elections or even some ability to make them not happen? Lol. He doesn't have the manpower or the means.

But what if he did? Let's game this out: Congress--or at least the House of Representatives--is not a perpetual body. At the end of 2026 the current congress ceases to exist, and the next one isn't convened until the following year. Mike Johnson will cease to be Speaker at the end of the year and wont be Speaker again in '27 unless his party wins a sufficient majority to elect him. Remember if there are no elections then republicans will not have their seats in 2027. There will be no congress, and without congress, Trump does not have a mechanism for governance. I dunno about you, but those Republican reps like having their jobs, their staff, their salaries, and all the perks that come with office. They do not get those if there is no Congress. That is not something they want.

But he said he was gonna! And? So fucking what? He says a lot of things. He issued an executive order at the start of his second term ordering all school districts in the country to immediately cease teaching "DEI" whatever the hell that means. Do you know what most districts that weren't actively kissing his ass said? "That's nice. Make me." And then he didn't, because the states control their own education systems, not Trump. His words don't have the force of law, and are limited by what he actually has levers of power to accomplish. We are **still having elections.** Several happened last week. The States decide this. Trump doesn't.

The Midterms are gonna happen. They're gonna matter and they're gonna have consequences. And you all need to stop acting like he has power over things he doesn't just because he says he does. That's propaganda and you're falling for it.

As with all things Authoritarian, when Trump says "I'm gonna force you to do this," your response should be as I articulated above:

"Fuck you. Make me."

I love you all. Be safe. Don't comply in advance. Don't give them power they don't have just because they say they do.

[wingstoflydreams]

Recognizing the difference between what is “normal”, meaning healthy or balanced or safe in a given arena/scenario, versus what has been normalized is very important, I apparently think.

[makingdonalddrumpfagain]

[shubbabang]

[dark-wizard-guy-fieri]

context (via @mellorocket)

[chimthecappy]

doubly funny that I saw a compilation of all the corporate accounts like "aw thanks elmo, we're doing well" meanwhile all the flesh and blood real human people are extremely not okay

[artistefish]

Okay but Elmo had actually the best and sweetest response to all this trauma dumping:

And then all the other Sesame Street character accounts joined in:

And now I’m thinking maybe we’re gonna be okay… 💗

(Comment compilation from this Twitter)

[aqueerkettleofish]

I kinda feel for the poor person running Elmo's Twitter.

"So, boss... I may have messed up."

"What did you do, Ray?"

"Well, I made a post for Elmo saying 'Hi, how's everybody doing?'"

"I mean, that's kind of what we pay you for."

"Yeah, but.... <sigh> it turns out pretty much everyone is hanging on by a thread, badly enough that they needed to tell Elmo."

"Oh."

"God help me, boss, I think Elmo needs to be there for them."

"Get the others."

[shu-of-the-wind]

this is the energy that jim henson would be proud of.

[anna-neko]

and important addition

Source: instagram

[snowysoul-squrirel]

Always reblog this. Elmo and his friends will be there in your times of trial and doubt, to help you through your torment

[wingstoflydreams]

Ilovethissomuch,Ilovesofthoomans.

[wingstoflydreams]

A thought I thunk. And I made another picture! :)

[wingstoflydreams]

Sooooooo I was trying to work on some of my writing cuz we’re still on holiday at my lovely in-laws’ house. What a perfect opportunity, right?? Time without externally assigned obligations. Such bliss. ☺️

And of course as I’m reading through and doing little edits on what I’ve written to date in a particular novel in progress of mine (we’re at over 160,000 words, folks!!), I’m feeling like I’m not WORKING ON MY WRITING enough since I’m not ACTUALLY writing … mmmmmmHMmmmm …

Rolling my eyes inwardly, right?

Calm down self, this IS good for me to do because [mentally listed SO many legitimate reasons why this read-through is productive].

And after reading through most of what I’ve gotten down for the novel, I can CLeArLy see that this is ALL trash, that it is a WASTE of time, that I’m practically insulting my laptop by using it for my writings instead of some more worthy individual doing WAY better stuff with it, negative self-talk, blah, blah, ho hum.

And I’m just TIRED!!

Like, WHYYYYYY can’t I just BE?!

Why can’t I work on something in MY time that is something enjoyable for ME to do even if it’s not something that a not me would like or think worth any effort?! Seriously starting to get grumpy and frustrated with myself and feeling the volume rise on panic’s radio station in my head (I have generalized anxiety disorder and panic disorder, so, yeah, those radio stations are never not on, they’re just sometimes quieter and sometimes not).

WHY CAN’T I JUST CHILL?!

WHY IS THERE ALWays a judgmental voice at the back of my head observing me and trying to come up with acceptable reasons for literally almost everything I do … ?

Oh.

Yeah.

That’s probably the OCD.

The Obsessive Compulsive Disorder big stoopid I live with.

The mental illness I have.

In the brain.

The brain that is the control center for this flesh gundam I’m in.

And my control center has the doubting disease thingy.

The one that makes the brain question everything up to and including whether I’m questioning everything sufficiently.

Yeah, anyone who has OCD probably knew this, but reminders are always cool, and hopefully some of you don’t have OCD, in which case you might benefit from hearing this: … um, like, OCD actually does affect the lives of those who have it on a daily basis. 😅 Sometimes on a minute to minute basis. 🥲 And it’s mean. 😭 And it makes us feel very guilty, almost especially when it notices us not feeling guilty for some strange reason. 🙃

Yeah, it’s kinda exhausting … 🫩😮‍💨🥴

So this is officially your permission to feel a little sorry for yourself if you have OCD and, if you don’t have it, a request to feel a little sorry for those who do. Not an unhelpful wallow of pity, obviously, although I personally think we as a civilization have been socialized by people with zero empathy and excessive desire to see other people work into thinking self-pity is a crime and is the same thing as self-compassion when it isn’t either, but whatever. 🙄

I’m just talking about a nice little validating amount of, “dang, I’m/you’re dealing with this all the time, and I’m/you’re not out glaring at pretty butterflies and moths just for existing? I’m/you’re not running about switching salt in sugar containers and versa visa in one of those inexplicable human attempts to lesson internal pain by causing external suffering? Hm, I/you deserve [insert whatever treat would make you feel happy or at least some semblance of it].”

There. Go eat chocolate. Or whatever you like better than chocolate. Or whatever you can eat that isn’t chocolate and therefore won’t hurt you if chocolate is on your no-no list. Cuz I said so. Boop. 🍫🍬🍭🍮🍿🍩🍪🥧🧁🍰🍡🍧🍨🍦🍥🥠🥮🥟🥨🥐🧀🥯🥞🥖🍕🍟🍓🍏🍉🫐🍊

And here’s head pats if you’d like some: 🫸🏻⤵️🫳🏻🫸🏻⤵️🫳🏻🫸🏻⤵️🫳🏻🫸🏻⤵️🫳🏻🫸🏻⤵️🫳🏻

Yeeeaaah, dunno if my mad attempt at slow-action animating that via emojis remotely made sense … so also: 🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻🤟🏻