Hello. I was dating her for almost 2 years out of which we spent 9 months in long distancing. We both were away from our families. When we started dating she had this habit of checking my messages and sometimes questioning about it. Not always but yeah whenever she had the opportunity like if I am driving she used to do it. I was initially okay with that because I thought maybe she has her insecurities and wants to be sure. Gradually we started falling for each other and eventually planned telling everyone at home. Things were going good, she was a bit dominating in the relationship but I always balanced the other end by understanding her. Then we started long distancing, initially things were normal we were missing each other terribly. We used to have a call everyday talking about hows life there and discussing about how was our day. Slowly she started making new friends there, started exploring places since back in our homeland it was kind of a restrictive environment for her. She sometimes went out with her friends for clubbing (Not very frequent). One day she along with her 3 female friends went to Italy and they went to a club to enjoy the night. They met random strangers (2 boys) who were staying in the same hostel as them. They went out and one guy was flirting with her, she told me all of this that "he was trying to get a hold of me but I clearly told that I am dating someone". I respected that and she said he was very childish, casually he still kept on flirting. Later they shared each others social media and whatsapp and not very often but there was some communication still on between them. I was okay but I genuinely conveyed my thoughts that I won't be comfortable he being around since she mentioned that if she someday visits his city not for him but just to roam around they can plan a meet. She said you need not get insecure or overthink about this. I understood and moved on. She came back to her town and her neighbour was a guy M(22). They shared the same kitchen so they had this casual friendship which she told me about. After this the calling frequency slowly decreased as she was getting busy with her work. But we still had those I love you's and i miss you's even if we couldn't manage to make a call. One day we both had a fight and I genuinely tried to convey my concern about her safety. She was mad at me since she thought I am over reacting and we didn't speak for a couple of days. I tried calling her to apologise but she didn't receive the call. 3 days later she called me and was mad at me for not putting efforts in reaching out to her. And all of a sudden started crying since she said something happened yesterday night. Her neighbour was in her room, she said we were chilling and I also got a bit vulnerable. He slept there even though he was living in the next door. And she apologised that this happened but also swore that nothing physical has happened. She was constantly crying over this. I was shocked and was mad at her but after that all I asked her that in order for this relationship to continue, I'll be needing that missing attention and I wanted her to be available for me if I am overthinking. She did it for 2 days after which I told her that you'll need to be more patient with me for a few days, and she reacted to it by saying "okay I'll leave aside all my work and run behind you, give me a script and like a robot I'll say the things you want to hear." I was hurt, we again had a fight after this but now she was in depression. I kept myself available for her and apologised. I kept my anxiety away and was there for her. I told her vent whatever is there in you you'll feel better. And she conveyed that she doesn't feel loved and doesn't feel understood. I replied by saying take your time I am here for you and did everything to make her feel loved again. After all this we planned to meet and we met last week. First 2 days were good, but I was anxious and didn't receive the affection I was craving for. One day I decided to login in from her whatsapp and instagram to check if she was cheating on me. I could see that the chats with that neighbour were archived. Even after showing my concern that his presence is going to disturb the dynamics of the relationship, she was engaging a conversation sometimes even initiating one. She was responding to the flattering messages that random stranger she met was sending. She had messaged her ex which she called a good friend that I tasted wine and while doing that I was thinking about you. This happened and she understood that I have logged in from her account. She started crying, I tried to talk about those messages and she said thats how friends talk. I tried to calm her down but she wanted me to stay away from her. She immediately booked a flight and went back. She blamed me for how badly I treated her since her only agenda for this trip was to see me. I am hurt with all that happened I apologised for doing what I did and today she gave me the answers to all those messages. I wanted to convince myself over that too but now I feel confused. Sometimes I feel i won't be able to find someone like her but looking at all that I have faced I feel what happened was for the good. What are your opinions about this?

Let's say that after the ending of Prototype 1 and almost at the ending of Infamous 2 Alex went to New Marais to conquer it
The battle is 1v1 so alex can't create enemies using the virus
Alex Mercer powers: Sentient Biomass Physiology: Upon being infected by the Blacklight Virus, Alex Mercer’s body was converted into living biomass. His body is now stronger than it has ever been before, lacking many of the weaknesses that comes with a normal body such as internal organs, the issue of stamina and much more, while at the same time gaining a vast array of abilities that comes with his new physiology, such as shapeshifting and enhanced stats. Near Limitless Potential: Mercer is pretty interesting, even among other fictional characters, and even those within the video game media, being one of the few characters showcased to have near limitless potential due to how his powers work. When the blacklight virus first infected Mercer, and later reforming it. Mercer was shown to be many times stronger than normal, this isn’t where his limits are however. Upon consuming other biological entities, Mercer is capable of converting them into biomass which is then added to his own, increasing his stats, such as strength and durability, with each body that he consumes. So long as there is enough biological materials for him to consume, Mercer’s physical potential is almost limitless. Similarly, due to his ability to assimilate the memories of those he consumes. There is no real limit to Mercer’s own intelligence, so long as there are living beings for him to consume, lastly due to the blacklight virus within Mercer’s body constantly evolving. There is a chance for Mercer to develop various new abilities simply due to a random mutation at some point down the line. Evolutionary Adaptability: Due to the Blacklight Virus’s ability to constantly evolve based on the situation and the information presented in consumed biomass. Mercer is capable of adapting to nearly any situation, forming Claws, and other such weapons from his body in order to better combat his foes. Developing resistances to things such as elemental damage like fire and electricity, and even developing a degree of immunity. In one case after being in a situation where Mercer was under 10gs of gravitation force. Mercer’s body quickly adapted by increasing his strength levels, allowing him to walk out of that situation as if he was never under that level of extreme pressure. Potentially Limitless Superhuman Strength: Mercer’s is shown having vast levels of superhuman strength, being strong enough to lift and toss heavy objects such as cars, helicopters, and buses, to objects as heavy as tanks several tens to hundreds of feet awaym and even being able to run with these objects without his speed being impaired. Mercer’s strength is on such a level that he could overpower other superhumanly strong characters such as the infected hunters, Elizabeth Greene, the Supreme Hunter, and even James Heller at times, despite their superhuman durability being at a level where even missiles and tank fire can’t hurt them. In the first Prototype game. Mercer demonstrates an insane level of strength, being able to create a concussive shockwave just by thrusting his fists forward, uplifting cars, tanks and throwing people several tens of feet with enough force to kill them if not outright vaporize them. Mercer’s strength can continuously increase as he consumes more and more biomass, even mutating and becoming stronger when consuming other infected individuals, and whatever potential mutations their variant of the Blacklight virus may have. Making his potential for strength virtually limitless so long as there is enough organic material for him to consume. Superhuman Leaping Ability: Mercer’s strength is shown to extend to his legs. Allowing him to jump several hundred feet into the air, allowing him to clear barricades, get on top of buildings, and even leap high enough into the air to catch helicopters. Due to his increased mass. Mercer is capable of producing shockwaves when landing after leaping from large heights. Superhuman Speed: Mercers speed is far above that of a normal human, being able to run far faster than the average car, making them appear as if they are standing still. He has been shown to out run helicopters chasing him at times, putting his speed around 200 to 500mph. He has even kept up and outpace other infected entities such as the Leader Hunters, the Supreme Hunter and even James Heller to a degree. Superhuman Agility: Due to Mercer’s enhanced physiology. He is capable of moving around far better than the average person. He can leap tall distances, perform various kinds of flips with the greatest of ease. This, combined with his constantly evolving parkour skills, allows him the ability to escape and move around the tightest of spaces without so much as losing his balance. He is capable of twisting his body in midair in order to quickly recover from being knocked back and landing on his feet in a battle ready stance. Superhuman Reflexes: Mercer, upon his mutation into the Prototype, had his reflexes enhanced to superhuman levels. He can dodge gunfire, and other projectile base weaponry at point blank range, keep up and overpowered various evolved infected creatures such as the Hunter, and Supreme Hunter, and even combat and overwhelm the military’s super soldiers with ease. Potentially limitless Superhuman Durability: Mercer’s durability, much like his strength, is potentially limitless as he absorbs more and more biomass. His body is capable of compacting the excess within himself, making his flesh far denser than that of a normal human. Similarly he can alter the density of his biomass to even stronger levels. He has tanked gunfire from all angles, survived being shot with missiles and other explosives, tanked and survived hits from other infected individuals such as Heller and the Supreme Hunter. He has survived dismemberment, being inside clouds of the bloodtox chemical, and more, and still continues fighting. Superhuman Healing Factor: Mercer’s healing factor is on an insane level. Being able to heal from bullet and shrapnel wounds nearly instantaneously, He could regenerate from having large sections of his body torn out, regenerate lost limbs just as fast. So long as there is still a single bit of the biomass that makes up his body. Mercer will continue to regenerate back to full health. Even regenerating from a few pieces of tissue flesh after being caught at ground zero when a nuclear warhead exploded. Immortality: Due to Mercer’s body being made up of biomass. Mercer’s aging process has come to a halt. Due to his body constantly healing and replacing any damaged biomass. Mercer is in a sense, immortal. It was shown with Elizabeth Greene that after she got infected with the Redlight virus. Her physical body was shown to still look around the age of twenty. Having not changed even after nearly forty years passing since she was infected. Elemental resistance: Mercer is shown to be resistant to fire and electric attacks. However, being exposed to either high enough heat or voltage can still cause him harm. Superhuman Senses: Mercer’s sense after his mutation is shown to have evolved to far higher levels than that of the normal human. He can hear far better than the normal human and his eye-sight has evolved in a way to allow Mercer to see through several different types of visual ranges. Infrared Vision: One of two known vision powers that Mercer is shown to have. By using infrared vision, Mercer is capable of seeing the heat signatures radiating from various living beings. By using this vision power. Mercer is capable of seeing in environments and conditions that would normally limit or blind a normal person’s eyesight such as total darkness or thick smoke and fog by tracking the heat signatures of living beings within the surrounding areas. It should be noted that Mercer is capable of using infrared vision despite the fact that those infected tend to generate enough body heat to blind other infrared vision devices. Showing that there are some differences between Mercer’s infrared vision and other devices capable of allowing users to see in infrared. Infected Vision: After connecting to the hive mind created by the blacklight virus. Mercer gained the ability to see and recognize individuals infected with the Blacklight virus. Superhuman Intelligence: Upon consuming the biomass of an intelligence entity. Mercer’s own intelligence is shown to increase dramatically as he will know what the person he consumes knows. Given the numerous individuals that he had consumed over the course of the Prototype series. Mercer’s intelligence is at superhuman levels. Making him one of the smartest if not the smartest person within the Prototype universe… at least until James Heller had consumed him. Superhuman Mental Processing: Due to Mercer’s physiology. Mercer’s mental capacity and processing is at a superhuman level. He is shown being able to understand and process massive amounts of information that he gains from consuming his targets. Similarly during the events of Prototype 2, Mercer was capable of controlling and directing various individuals infected with the blacklight virus through the hive mind. Matter Manipulation: While not really shown all that much. Mercer has the ability to alter the environment using the Blacklight virus as a catalyst. Through this ability. Mercer is capable of deteriorating concrete. Converting and absorbing the biomass of living objects such as living creatures and trees. Strengthening and converting even inorganic structures such as buildings into hives to fit his needs. Even converting inorganic material into layers of biomass over large areas which can be used to slow down his enemies, while not hindering his own forces or himself. He gains this ability after consuming Elizabeth Greene. It should be noted that even though Mercer is capable of altering the surroundings around him. His version of this power is very limited when compared to others such as Edward Elric from FullMetal Alchemist or Silver Surfer from Marvel Comics. As while he can make and convert things into organic matter. He can’t make inorganic matter like breathable air, or metal. Biokinesis: Due to Mercer’s ability to produce the Blacklight Virus within himself. Mercer is capable of controlling and altering the biomass both within his body and that of others infected to various effects. Being able to increase his physical stats to create various weapons abilities with his biomass. Similarly, due to his ability to constantly make new strains of the virus itself. Mercer is capable of infecting others with this virus. Allowing him to alter and control infected individuals by granting them a similar power set to his own or even morphing and transforming these individuals into monsters of various sizes and powers. Disease Manipulation (Blacklight Virus): Due to being infected and bonding with the Blacklight virus to the extent of becoming an entity called a Prototype. Mercer’s body is capable of constantly producing the blacklight virus. Even creating various strains of side viruses which can grant or evolve various abilities that he may not have had before. Similarly due to this virus production and the various strains he can make in his body. Mercer is capable of infecting others with a variation of the virus. Either turning others into infected drones which he can control or granting the infected individual a similar subset of powers as his own. Viral Gas Generation: Caught on a CCTV camera. Mercer is shown having the ability to generate and expel a cloud of gas from his body containing the Blacklight Virus into the surrounding area. Rapidly infecting and mutating those located on ground zero, caught within the cloud. Biomass Conversion: Mercer has the ability to nearly instantaneously consume and convert any organic organism into biomass which is then added to his body. Through this process. Mercer is capable of enhancing his overall physical stats and quickly recovering from any damage that he may have suffered during battle as well as gaining the memories and skills that the consumed individual may have had. Critical Mass: Upon consuming enough biomass. Mercer is capable of entering a critical mass state. Due to this extra mass, Mercer’s durability increases, allowing him to tank more damage. Similarly, due to having more biomass at his command. Mercer is capable of using his strongest attacks, called Devastators, moves capable of clearing and killing anyone and everyone within a certain range of Mercer. Upon gaining critical mass. Mercer’s body gains a defense mechanism in which upon taking enough damage. This extra mass would harden to an extreme degree. Making Mercer almost completely invulnerable to most forms of physical damage for a short time in order to allow him to either escape a battle or try and consume another organic organism in order to recover from the near fatal damage. Memory Assimilation: Upon consuming an individual. Mercer gains access to all the memories and skills that that individual may have had. Allowing Mercer to suddenly master various new skills such as weaponry, vehicle usage, and even military tactics and plans. Shapeshifting: Due to Mercer not having a stable form like most other organic organisms. Mercer is capable of shaping the biomass within him into virtually anything he can imagine. He can shape his arms into various weapons such as blades and whips. He can change his form to match the form of anyone he consumed no matter their gender. Even morphing the biomass within his body to form mundane items such as clothes. Mercer's shapeshifting abilities are only limited by his imagination and the amount of biomass he contains. Voice Mimicry: Due to both of Mercer’s abilities to shapeshift and assimilating the memories of those he consumes. Mercer is capable of altering his vocal cords to match the voices of the people that he has consumed. Allowing Mercer to move around in areas with more heavier security. Mercer has even been shown being capable of using this power in battles. Taking the forms of high rank officials to trick various Military forces into fighting themselves. Similarly, depending on who Mercer is fighting at the time. If Mercer is aware of himself having consumed someone close to his opponent. Mercer can alter his voice in order to mess with his opponent’s mind. Getting them to drop their guard enough for him to score a kill, or at the very least, land more easier hits on them. Shield: Mercer due to his shapeshifting ability, much like most of his other powers, is capable of manipulating his biomass to form various weapons and armaments. One of these powers is the ability to form a shield on either one of his arms. Taking some of his accumulated biomass and forming it into the shape of a kite shield. Mercer then hardens this shield shaped biomass to the utmost degree. Allowing him to block all incoming damage from the direction he faces his shield at. However, it should be noted that the shield’s durability is limited as enough damage can shatter the shield. Unlike his successor, James Heller. Mercer, when using his shield power, prefers having a mobile approach to his defense as opposed to being a solid unbreakable wall like Heller’s own ability. As such, Mercer is capable of moving around instead of being rooted in place, Similarly due to this approach. Mercer is capable of using this power with his other abilities. Adopting a similar fighting style to that of a knight of old, with a shield in one hand, and a weapon in the other. Armor: When faced with a situation where Mercer is either taking damage from all directions or facing a foe that rivals him in strength and power. Mercer is capable of hardening the outer layer biomass that makes up his appearance into an armor like texture. Giving his entire body a shiny black texture that blocks most damage and reduces all incoming damage to a large degree. This increase in durability allowed mercer to take on foes such as Captain Cross, the Supreme Hunter, and even tank multiple hits from high yielding artillery without suffering much damage from these encounters. Much like with his bio-shield ability. Mercer is capable of using his more offensive powers with this form. However, this form is not without its weaknesses, as upon entering this form. Mercer’s speed is greatly reduced. While still capable of moving at superhuman speeds. It's only about half of his normal speed. Similarly, while in this form. Mercer appears unable to use his bio-shield ability, however this may be due to this form providing potentially better defense and allowing him more mobility in combat. Claws: One of the first offensive powers that Mercer gains during the events of the first Prototype game. Mercer gained the ability to form massive, knife-like talons on his hand by consuming a hunter-type infected. These talons are sharp enough to cut through flesh and bones. Even being able to cut and destroy heavily armored vehicles such as tanks. When combining his Claws with his speed. Mercer can tear through hordes of basic enemies with ease, even developing this ability further into the ground spikes ability and the Devastator; Groundspike Graveyard Attack. Groundspikes: When using his claws as his main weapon. Mercer is capable of compressing his biomass into his clawed hands before slamming them into the ground. Upon doing this, Mercer expands the compressed biomass in his hands outwards towards the direction he wants. After either reaching their target or hitting a certain distance. The expanded biomass will erupt as sharp spires from the ground, impaling and cutting apart anyone and anything caught within eruption radius. GroundSpike Graveyard Devastator: An enhanced version of the groundspike technique. Upon entering critical mass. Mercer is capable of moving the extra biomass to his hands after a bit of a charge up time. Afterwards, Mercer will then slam both his hands into the ground. Sending the biomass out in all directions which would then track down any target within a certain radius before erupting out of the ground. This move is strong enough to bring down infected hives which were capable of withstanding the force of tank and missile fire. Hammerfists: When in need of some more brute physical force and attack power. Mercer is shown being able to move the biomass within his body to his arm. Covering them in the same fibers that make up his shield and armor form while at the same time enlarging them to the size of large warhammers, like those seen in games. With these new Hammerfists, Mercer is capable of dealing massive amounts of blunt force trauma to the point of even destroying a tank with a few hits. He is capable of doing this by pressing more and more biomass into his fist before compressing them. Increasing their density and weight in the process. However, doing so does cost him some attack speed, as he is shown having some trouble at times lifting and swinging his massive hands around. The attack power of these fist are shown to be on a level capable of inflicting massive damage to entities such as the Supreme Hunter, and even James Heller. He has even shown the ability to produce shockwaves and quaking the ground with a few hits, allowing him to stun foes with the aftershocks even when Mercer’s fist doesn't make contact with his intended target. Whipfist: Mercer’s main range attack. By moving his biomass to either of his arms. Mercer can morph his arm of choice into what could be called a grappling gun. By changing the normally rigid properties of his arm to be more elastic when compared to some of his other powers. Mercer can throw his arm forward, shooting out his clawed appendage at a target, allowing him to reel it back to him or him towards it. He tends to use this when dealing with airborne enemies or when he needs to reach a farther distance than normal distance that his jumping ability may not be able to cover. Similarly due to the whipfist’s elastic properties. It is a good power to use when dealing with mobs as it can swing his arm, extending it a certain distance and with his superhuman strength to cut nearly anything in his path in half. Tendrils: Mercer is capable of forming and using tendrils. While not really shown in the first Prototype game. Mercer does use them in dealing with foes, even creating two different devastator attacks with them. In the tied-in comics, Mercer is shown using the tendrils ability to impale and kill various individuals. In one case, killing Autumn with this ability after being shot in the head. Tendrils Barrage Devastator: Upon entering critical mass. Mercer is capable of condensing the biomass in his body, creating large amounts of pressure within himself before releasing it, causing an unknown amount of tendrils to burst from his body in all directions as well as impaling and dragging any organic being towards him. Anything impaled and killed by this attack is then absorbed by Mercer, healing and strengthening him. Bio-Bombs: While Mercer isn’t shown using this ability as it was one of the main attacks of James heller. As the ability came from one of Mercer’s Evolved soldiers, carrying a strain of the blacklight virus produced by Mercer. Mercer likely has access to this ability. The ability itself allows Mercer to implant a bit of his biomass into a target, before either allowing them to run off or simply throwing the individual at a group or target. The person in question will then explode in a mass of tendrils in all directions. Impaling, grabbing, and dragging all targets caught into a center mass. Crushing and killing anything caught in the center mass. Blade: Mercer is capable of shaping and forming the biomass in his arms to form a massive blade, capable of splitting humans in half, and piercing the armor of military vehicles such as tanks, and the thick skin of hunters and other infected entities. The Blade is Mercer’s strongest attack ability outside of his Devastator attacks. Not as fast as the claws nor as strong as his hammerfist. Mercer’s Blade ability doesn’t suffer from the weaknesses of either power, acting as a middle ground, allowing him a far greater dps, or damage per second when confronting enemies. Mercer’s version of the bio-blade is shown being stronger than that of Heller’s, being capable of dealing with crowds and more heavily defended enemies far easier than Heller’s version of the power. Density Alteration: Mercer, due to his shapeshifting abilities, is capable of altering the density of his body, allowing him to increase the damage potential of his strikes as well as altering the way gravity affects his body. In terms of offensive capabilities. Mercer has been shown being able to do sudden changes while in mid air and increase his density to the point of creating shockwaves and cratering the ground he lands on with enough height. Muscle Mass Increase: Mercer is capable of increasing his muscle mass in his arms and body, increasing his strength beyond his normal levels without suffering any loss in movement like many of his other defensive and offensive powers. Gliding: Mercer, by lowering his density while in the air, is capable of achieving a limited degree of flight by gliding through the air. He is capable of switching his body’s density on the fly to either slow his descent or rapidly falling. Similarly, it is due to this ability that Mercer is capable of clearing large distances as he can simply leap and glide over most obstacles in his way in order to escape his pursuers, or reach various locations far more quickly then simply running and parkouring his way there through the streets.. Air Dash: Mercer is shown being able to move the biomass around his body at such a rate that it is capable of slingshotting him in any particular direction that he wants. Mercer generally uses this ability to cover more distance, extend his gliding abilities and even dodge projectiles and other attacks in mid-air. Wall Running: While strong enough to climb walls using his hands, Mercer is capable of wall running at high speeds as his body will alter his feet in a way that allows him to cling to walls while running without the risk of slipping off due to lack of momentum or adhesion. As such Mercer can run at high speeds in any direction when on vertical surfaces Knuckle Shockwave: Using his strength, Mercer is capable of producing a massive shockwave by a double palm thrust. This attack is capable of cars and people down an entire street. Even potentially tearing apart the latter. Critical Pain Devastator: An enhanced version of the knuckle shockwave. Upon entering critical mass, Mercer can move the biomass in his body into his hands. Upon doing a palm thrust. Mercer creates a massive shockwave that uplifts and tears apart humans and vehicles alike. Adding insult to injury, Mercer, during the process of performing this attack, will also fire the biomass stored in his hands as tendrils into the shockwave, shredding and crushing anything unlucky enough to survive the initial shockwave itself
Cole Macgrath powers:Electrokinesis-The ability to absorb and control electricity in and out of his body. Over the last seven years,Cole has gotten much more powerful than in inFAMOUS 2. Able to deliver up to 15 supernovas of force. His maximum voltage is over 20 Gigawatts and the heat of his lightning burns up to 300,000,000,000 Kelvin,equivalent to three supernovas. -Immunity to electricity-Cannot be harmed by electrical energy. Any electricity that makes contact with his body is automatically absorbed. Electromagnetism-The ability to produce and manipulate electromagnetic fields and pulses. Cole can manipulate any object,no matter the size,using magnetism. Even non-metallic materials such as stone,ice,wood,and cardboard. Cryokinesis-The ability to manipulate ice and cold gas. Cole can deliver several cryokinetic attacks such as razor-sharp,steel-tearing Shatter Blasts,Ice Grenades,Freeze Rockets,Ice Pillars and Platforms for jumping great distances,Ice Barriers that can block missiles and knock up enemies. He can also produce freezing mist that freezes enemies in it solid if he hits it with a bolt. Superhuman Strength-Cole possesses superhuman strength. Able to easily lift up to 52 metric tons. His punches are on a Class PJ and he can regularly bench press giant monsters as heavy as tanks. Has even fought on par with Ares, the God of Warfare. Superhuman Speed-Cole is able to move at superhuman speeds. He can run up to 60MPH and during combat, he can move at Hypersonic speeds. He can react and fight at Massively Hypersonic+ speeds(Mach 1000-8810), able to easily dodge lasers and instant speed attacks and react to his own, natural lightning. Superhuman Durability-Cole is extremely durable. He can survive an attack that can level an entire island, ignores bullets, and shrugs off point-blank RPG's and grenades. Regenerative Healing Factor-Cole can heal extensive damage to his body in seconds. He can even regenerate lost limbs. If he absorbs energy, he heals instantly. Tactics/Leadership/Intelligence-Cole possesses increased intelligence. He regularly works out strategies during intense combat, he daily leads a team of superheroes into battle, he's able to logically deduce the outcome of any action he might take, and outsmarts incredibly clever opponents like Sasha, Alden, and Ray Zenji. Combat Experience-Cole is an incredibly experienced fighter. He was already he strongest Conduit alive, and now is even more so after training his powers in secret for 7 years. He has fought a multitude of foes stronger and more experienced than himself and won. And has survived impossible odds and has always come out on top. Even death. Electrokinetic Flight-Over the years, Cole has learned the ability to create a platform of electricity and surf on it through the air, granting him the ability to fly. Electrokinetic Constructs-Cole can create shapes of electrical energy and use electromagnetism to give it solid form. This can create several Electrokinetic weapons such as the Gigawatt Blades. Electroreception-Cole can pick up and read electronic frequencies and listen in on communications, he can also use this to read data as well. Electric Healing- Cole is able to release a massive charge of bioelectricity that heals everyone around him via hyper stimulating cells into a rapid state of regeneration. Precognition-Cole has the ability to see a few seconds into the future or see a whole future event. Mind Techniques-Cole can use neuroelectricity to manipulate people's minds. He can use this in a variety of ways such as mind-control, instant brainwashing, reading thoughts, and countering mental attacks. Lightning Dash/Dematerialization-Cole can turn his entire body into electricity and dash across short distances, he can use this to move at Massively Hypersonic+ speeds and travel through electrical power lines. Omnipresent Awareness-Cole can surround himself with an electromagnetic field that can give him omnipresent detection of his surroundings. Added by the fact that he can sense electrical energy in one's body, this makes him almost impossible to sneak up on. He can also use a Radar Sense that detects hostile intent, distinguishes friend from foe, sees through disguises, invisibility, and illusions, and scans for any electrical signals, anomalies, and sources.

Everyone's stuck at an intersection. Except me. I'm living three lives. Stuck at three intersections. I'm an Alter. I'm transgender. I'm a middle brother of three...
I just want to be who I am. I want my folks to have their little dream and be proud of me. I want to be myself. But the only way I can ever be myself...
...is when I'm her.

​

Introduction

Charlie is just your average teen, but he never felt like himself. Like an alien to his own life.
Never, that is, until he started taking estrogen, and, more interestingly, until she discovered that she was an Alter: a person with a genetic mutation found in 1 of every 50 million people. With the ability to ride on gravity waves and teleport via quantum tunneling, Charlie became the world's latest and greatest superheroine: Chalice.
Note: Many of her speed feats appear to simply be the same as her teleportation/quantum tunneling feats, with the only difference being how it is portrayed. For the sake of simplicity on my end, I've decided to put these feats in either speed or teleportation depending on the way that they're portrayed
​

Strength

Striking

• Although likely aided by her speed, she easily breaks through a ceiling
  • This hole can be seen here
• She punches Matter Man in the face, sending him flying and drawing blood
• Tackles MM to the ground and beats his face in, drawing blood
• Messes up MM's face and beats it into the ground by punching and headbutting him

Lifting

• Easily carries a grown man with one hand

Durability

Blunt Force Trauma

• Gets punched in the face by a pissed Ember
• Accidentally ran into a wall and came out with nothing but a busted lip
• A powerful projectile from Bombardier knocks her out, but she is still alive

Heat/Energy

• Takes a blast straight to the face from Matter Man, sending her flying backward
• Takes two more blasts from MM

Speed

Travel Speed

• She outruns several other Alters
• She can fly at 500 knots
  • This is equal to 575.4 mph and 926 km/h
• Takes a man from Matter Man's henchmen before they can react
• She runs laps around Matter Man
• She runs onto a baseball field while changing clothes

Reflexes/Attack Speed

• Grabs Matter Man by the neck, very briefly catching him off guard
• Manages to tackle MM after he blasted her three times, clearly damaging her

Flight

• She can hover in place
• When she first learned to fly she ran into a wall
• She can fly at 500 knots
• Octavian states that she flies by riding gravity waves
• Takes a man from Matter Man's henchmen before they can react

Quantum Abilities

Teleportation/Quantum Tunneling

• She turns blue and teleports away, presumably back to her house
  • Apparently, she somehow disappeared in two different directions
    • She splits in two and then re-appears very near to where she was before
    • Octavian compares this to what happens to an electron during the Double Slit Experiment, he also outright says that this should be impossible
• This teleportation is done by running through a quantum tunnel
  • She can take others with her when she runs through these tunnels
  • Clothes discarded while in a quantum tunnel seem to just disappear

Vision-Based Abilities

• She claims to be able to see Alters before their powers emerge
• She may be able to see through one-way mirrors
  • However, she may have just guessed there were people behind it

Equipment

• His outfit is just makeup/face paint, a cheerleader-esque outfit, and a wig

Weaknesses

• She has a dust mite allergy

Oh boy. Warning. This is long but this is also a long time coming, and I don't blame anyone reading for not believing someone can be so cruel to their own family but... here's the true story of my MIL from hell.
About seven years ago my Mrs, Alice (36F), and I (35M) rekindled a love lost in our teens, it was awesome and so easy. She had been engaged to some jerk for years and it fizzled out, he left her with a shit ton of debt and ended up costing her thousands.
Anyway, she moves back home to do some soul searching and I come moonwalking onto the scene.
Immediately Alice leaks all the details of her parents private discussions with her, she lets me know her parents consider me a rebound thing and dislike my lack of higher education and choice of profession, give us a couple months tops. Pretty fucking mean stuff, but I had no idea how bad it would one day become.
Three years later we move in together.
So we have our first big fight, Alice declares she actually has a problem with my lack of higher education too and I take it badly, we don't talk for two days and I come home from a twelve hour shift to find a note on my fridge.
It read like a lawyer had written it and I immediately knew it wasnt from Alice. In the note I was threatened with impending homelessness and promised that in the coming days the police would be called and told the car I drive has been stolen by me. This is due to the fact that the car's finance was in Alice's name.
I immediately drove to MIL's house and was told to leave. I drove home and expected Alice to return with intent to move out. She didn't. She apologised over and over, and I accepted her apology. She explained her mother had taken control of the situation and written the note, she didn't want things to end.
Fast forward a year or so. I'm enrolled in community college, with intent to go to University and we're home from the hospital with my newborn son, Archie. MIL has invited herself over to 'help us' for the first week of him being there; first day comes and goes and Ive done all the cooking and cleaning, MIL parks herself on the sofa and hasn't moved.
Second day and Alice asks if I'd be willing to give Archie a bath (against doctors orders) and I agree. Alice then asks my MIL to help me, I'm still on cloud 9 from the birth so idgaf and I agree.
We head upstairs and I run a shallow, warm bath for my son, part ways in and he pees during the bath, my first reaction is to leave the room to grab a towel from the bathroom, before I do I physically move my MIL's hand onto my son's leg and say "watch him, I need a towel".
I grab a towel in less than five seconds I'm back with my son. We wrap him up and she takes him back down whilst I happily tidy.
On my way back downstairs I pass my MIL who tells me she is off to bed. When I arrive in the lounge Alice is holding Archie in floods of tears. "My mum said you left him alone in the bath, he could've drowned!"
Fuck this noise.
I blow a fuse. I agressively shout for my MIL to get her lying ass downstairs. She doesn't come. I threaten to come up if she doesnt come down. She doesnt come. I begin up the stairs and she appears, crying, holding her suitcase and runs out the house into the pouring rain. She stands in the rain for nearly 90mins waiting to be picked up. Alice begs for me to get her indoors. I head out and ask her why she lied, I get no answer, just her crying her eyes out and insisting Alice is an abusive daughter who beat her up as a teen. I should've fucking known then and there what I was dealing with, but it gets worse.
Skip ahead to 2023. My son is 3 and my daughter is 1. My in-laws have moved to a different country across the continent and whilst we are by no means on good terms, I tolerate them.
Alice and I have the mother of all arguments and it ends with Alice becoming physically aggressive and manages to throw something at me. I react accordingly and make plans to leave. In the heat of the arguement Alice calls her mother who asks us both to calm down. We do and things are very difficult for a few days.
One morning I get told that Alice plans to take my children to see her parents abroad. We are broke so I immediately ask how, and I'm told she (MIL) has paid for all of their flights. Alice is ecstatic to be going and doesn't understand why I would be upset at not being invited.
A week or so later and I've managed to scrounge up the cash for tickets. I ask MIL if I'm welcome and she says yes.
Roughly three weeks ago (May of 2023) Alice tells me that her mother is not pleased I'm now joining them on the trip and that she believes we 'Need a break' as a couple and sees this trip as a chance for her to consider permanently moving in with them. She has also contacted a lawyer and asked if
A. Is it possible to take my name off of the deed to the house as I have been in higher education and contributed considerably less money to mortgage payments than Alice.
and
B. Do Grandparents have any rights over that of fathers if said fathers are reported to be abusive.
Alice reassures me none of this is possible, but, incredibly, doesn't seem phased by these hideous attempts at ruining my life.
Fast forward to the trip. 7 days ago.
MIL meets us at the airport and we drive to her house. Its a huge house, an absolutely beautiful mansion that has sadly been decimated by cats. The smell as I entered nearly made me sick. The floors are filthy, and the cats had completely covered the place in urine and its overpowering.
We are then told our bed has been used as a litter tray, the mattress is soaked in cat pee and on top of this the kitchen looks as if it hadnt been cleaned in months.
I'm polite enough to only divulge my disgust to Alice and even spend two hours cleaning the kitchen as a way of saying thanks for paying for the flights for my kids.
We head out in the car again and she shows us around her village, she strangely starts a 20min long speech about the local schools and job opportunities.. is she.. is she trying to convince us to live there? She then goes on to explain how she has been diagnosed with 'proper clinical depression' and begins to passive agressively explain how most people's depression is just a low mood and is 'nothing in comparison'. I should note that during my years at university I was diagnosed with depression, a fact she undoubtedly knew.
After more than I can stomach the MIL stops the car and declares she cannot drive down this particular road and must turn around. At which point she accidentally slams on the accelerator and drives head first into a brick wall. She all but totals the car and the wall is demolished, my kids are shook but fine, and I'm so fucking angry but I keep my cool. We limp home.
The first night in the house of many cats was unbearable. The heat and the stench had us gagging, I was pacing the room all night trying to figure out how to politely leave, but without any luck rearranging our flights.
Day two and we walk to a cafe for breakfast. I dont speak the local language and my MIL orders for us. My MIL reminds us she has recently had a gastric band fitted and I'am given an extremely small breakfast (one bread roll) filled with a meat I do not like but she werent to know so I eat it with sips of juice to help it go down.
Hours later we drive into the city, bear in mind the last time I ate a meal was in my home country, and Im famished after a small breakfast. We walk around the city for a couple hours and I ask if we can stop to eat.
My MIL rolls her eyes and throws her hands up in the air and this time I bite.
I explain how I haven't eaten a meal for going on 30+ hours and Im famished, my kids are hungry and I want something I know I'll at least enjoy. I wasnt overtly rude and I didnt blame anyone but I was clearly upset.
Back at the house and my fiance corners me "My mum said you attacked her, my Dad is furious, I said you didnt attack anyone but she is inconsolable".
I'm given ice cold treatment and ignored for most of the evening until later on and Alice and I are sat by the front door of the house, MIL walks up to the front door screaming to someone on speaker phone "I'm going to remind him who's house he's in if he thinks he is going to freeload off of us, I'm going to remind him who's food he is eating".
I look at Alice and just walk to our piss soaked room, defeated.
The next morning MIL has been told I overheard her and she has no intention of making any apologises. She hurls abuse about how childish I'am, how she has no time for drama and how she will not humour my attempts to bully her.
My FIL comes to me and asks me to reconsider my being upset, and insists the conversation I overheard was a misunderstanding. I let loose and explain it all - everything Ive explained here... and he immediately leaves the room and berates her.
She cries, plays victim, claims the whole family is ganging up on her and she goes to bed. That was four days ago. In those four days she has criticised Alices' weight constantly, threatened to hit my 3 yo if he misbehaves and insisted that my being 36 means my newly acquired degree is too little too late.
And so... Im still here, we've endured eachother for the sake of the kids, but I write this on the piss soaked mattress, miles from home, under the thumb of someone who I now understand is not mentally well at all.
We fly home tomorrow and out of hell, I can't wait, but I know this isnt the last I've seen of her.
TL;DR - MIL lies to S/O about me, threatens to ruin my life, report my car stolen, take my kids away, ridicules me, takes my family abroad and houses us in filth.
Edits: Grammar

So to put as easy as possible: I (31F) have not had the easiest relationship with my parents. They are very old style type of personality; start preparing your children at an early age to be an adult, the oldest carries the burden of the younger ones, tv families are fake and you don't show love to your kids by being soft, and can't make school events due to we have to work. Growing up I accepted the parents I had and loved them no matter how unfair or judgmental they were about me. I also started seeing other people in my family as a maternal and paternal figures. That being my mom's parents my grandparents) and her brother (my uncle/godparent). After so much emotional abuse from my mom in particular I decided to leave the house at age 20. A few weeks later my grandfather who I saw as a dad had passed away in the morning and she had refused to tell me so when I found out they were already burying him and I was unable to go to the funeral. The reason she didn't want me to know was because not only had I left their house but we had had our disagreements about how she treated me unfairly. Eventually I looked past it and worked on my relationship with her. As the years went by things did not get easier. Now I am a mother of 3 children I love to death that are unfortunately are a result of another abusive relationship with my ex husband. After our divorce everything in my life was great except for the occasional argument with my mom. Last year my grandma who had always been like a mom to me had passed away. A week before though I kept feeling like I should go see her and since my mom was with her due to medical issues my grandma was having, I asked her if she (my grandma) was doing ok because I was looking for flights to go visit. She had said there was no point and to just stay home because I had to make sure my kids who were staying at their dads were ok also due to his lack of actually keeping them safe. I had no reason to not trust my mom since we had been communicating every day about my grandma's health. When she passed my mom again decided to tell me after she was buried. Till this day I battle with trying to find an excuse for my mom. Well a couple a days ago my uncle who had always been like a dad to me called to let me know he was sick and going to the ER. I actually informed my mom about it because I felt she should know. Well when I get home from work the other day my now husband tells me that my mom had informed him of my uncle's passing and had also told him to not let me go to the funeral. I can no longer help but feel angry that she feels the right to decide what I am going to do. I was hurt by that my husband knowing everything waited until I was home but I also work an hour away from home so I understand he didn't want me to drive back home in that situation. We both tried looking for tickets to fly out but the prices we ridiculous. Now we have savings but regardless I wouldn't have made it to the funeral. She still had the nerve to say that she wasn't in the mental state to tell me and deal with how I was going to react. So AITA for being angry that she didn't let me decide or even see if I could go and say my last goodbyes to the ones I saw as a mom and dad's. Keep in mind I have never came at her for this.

Hello resumes!
I'm currently in my second year (sophomore) of my Bachelor studies and I'll be applying for 2024 summer internships.
I would love to have some feedback on my resume from you!
Some small points to note:

• Everything red is fake/dummy data
• While most of my (professional) experience is frontend development, I'd love to explore different areas. Can I somehow stress that in my resume?
• I'm not sure if the research part is really needed. I wanted to include it to demonstrate that I understand the importance of good tests and clean code ... and to fill space :D
• I don't really have projects that I implemented purely on my own. Furthermore, for 2/3 projects I can't provide a repo link since I no longer have access to them. Should I still leave those projects in?
• Next semester I'll be abroad in Asia for an exchange semester. Should I include that in my CV as well?
• I'm planning to apply to US-companies both in Europe and NA. Should I adjust my resume regionally?

https://preview.redd.it/rum9ndmqwu4b1.png?width=1700&format=png&auto=webp&s=20d696901780cc81606578d15ade6eb631dc4853

Dear people,
I'm addressing this to people who feel like they're stuck mentally. Whether you started out with getting help or not, I hope this piece gives you insight in what to do, but especially.. in what order. Looking on the internet there are 1001 ways of therapy, but it can feel a mess. I've experienced that some things are better before other. Take this account from someone who has tried 101 things, picked the useful ones, who got stuck multiple times, but ultimately can tell you my best experiences. But who am I, except for just another random dude on the intenet?
I've been insecure, depressed and suffering from general anxiety disorder for most my life, at least until some time ago. After I tasted the first moments of happiness I made it my mission to keep moving forward, every day possibly better than yesterday. Nine years, a lot of therapy and many hours of psychology self-study later, I want to share with you what I've learned in a condenced form. I'll start off with a little background information. Then I'll follow up with a listed summary followed by why I think doing it in that order is important. Lastly, I'll list a bunch of my sources that helped tremendously. I don't want to make this a feel-sorry story about me so I'll keep it short just for context. If you believe me for my word you can skip one paragraph.
I come from a family with an ISTJ dad and ISFJ mom, both horribly emotionally immature, unavailable, unpredictable and very suspicious of other people. They love me and my brother but were the worst in showing it. My dad hardly talked and stopped playing with us after a motor cycle accident. My mom was burned out most of the time and ready to explode. Now, what kind of things would that teach your kids? They had their own terrible experiences and upbringing, into which I won't go. Not to mention I was born 10 weeks early, lay alone in a machine much time with cordasol basically already coursing through my veins. All in all, me (the quiet good boy) and my brother (the ADHD ESTJ rebel) had completely different lives. He went all out in the rebel behaviour with his gang, vandalism and drugs, whereas I found out about Maplestory and built up an alternate life there, eventually also with drugs. (Real) friends, what are those? Getting beat up twice as freshman, who cares. The Fight/Flight/Freeze response was strong and consistent already at 15 y/o. I didn't know it at the time but the result was a near-permanent pressure on the Solar Plexus, always being tired and having burst of sweat when I came in social situations. The sweat didn't particulatly make it better. You want to try that new thing? Ah better not, you hurt yourself once as a kid so now everything is too dangerous. The result is what you may expect. A very quiet, badly nail biting, skitterish mommy-child ' adult' who bursts into tears on random moments when alone, never knowing exactly what causes the pain.
But now? What good is my story without a testimony? Now I'm finally starting a career, regardless of some obstacles. I don't nail bite anymore and handle stress way more easily. I was the star waiter of our restaurant and I'm having my first stand up comedy gig next week as well as acting school. Right now I work as the "very likeable" office manager at a sustainability company. Not everything is perfect, e.g. attachment to a partner and my ability in decision making, but it's all a process. Step by step. Keep your target (happiness?!) in mind and keep going.
(Step one and two are not processes but rather state of mind from which to work on. Let it sink in but don't get stuck on it.)
Step one: Acceptance of your own imperfection. It's okay.
This step sounds obvious but I don't think it is in practice. Too many people I've talked to are ready to talk about the bad things that happen in their life but as soon as you start about their OWN role in the situation, they will get all defensive and maybe even antagonized. Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has bad experiences that colour their judgement of things and the way they act. Only if you accept this and what you have done in the past as fact, only then you are open minded enough to change. Otherwise, whatever you'll learn what could've helped you, you'll dismiss from your mind as soon as you leave the therapist, either from stubbornness or as a unconscious selfdefence reflex because you don't accept that yes, also you have weaknesses. This counts especially for people whose insecurity is being percieved as weak, dumb or unlikable. You see, if your insecurity is that you're not good enough, then how painful is it to accept that yes, you have inherent flaws? LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE? That's what keeps people from learning. That's what's keeping people from changing. Accept that you're not perfect and have things to change. Why else are you looking for help? It's like an addiction where you don't like the addiction but the alternative seems worse.
Lastly, know that your perception of others is probably not true. Only you know you because you know your thoughts. You don't see the mind of other people. If only you knew. Other people may seem saint-like but they aren't. Even the nicest people have some dark(er) characteristics and their own insecurities. Once you recognize this you may not feel so crazy anymore. Guess what, the battle between your little devil and angel is a human thing. The difference, though, is that you're open to change. The difference is that you are not in denial or oblivious of your mistakes like your aunt Hilda.
Step two: Accept your own agency and so reject victimhood.
Let me introduce you to my ex-roommate Petrus (pseudonym), who always talked about his troubles in life and how life failed him. The thing is, he'd always go on and on about how it was the effing police who fired him, how it was the effing insurance company who effed him over, how it is the effing women who are all whores and bitches anyway so why bother. His near-exact words. Never him, though! Oh no, that would receive a "yea sure.... but..!" with a scowl. While deep down all this talk is fueled by deep rooted insecurities and pain. You think you're not like that, and you're probably right. At least not to the same degree as he. Be ready to take responsibility for your own (re)actions.
I understand that doing step one and two are actually quite hard. I just mean to point out that as long as you are aware of them, you can change. You'll find out along the way in what ways your own behaviour has shaped your life so far, and what you can do in turn to change it. Life is like a beach, it is up to you to make your sand castle with upcoming waves and running kids. Like everybody else. The roommate mentioned above never accepted his agency and so did NOT have any results from the same therapist that I had. And whom he quit after one session. Scary, I know.
I cannot stress enough that self-reflection is key for anyone who's willing to change !!!
Step three: What do I feel and why?
Or in other words: the popular phenomena called Mindfulness and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. What it boils down to is the focus on self-awareness, to get a good insight into your own emotions and how it subconsciously affects your daily life. Before you quit reading: this is only the start. It is the difference between your mask and your underlying feeling. For instance, I would have the emotional 'mask' of being the joker and pleaser, only because WITHOUT doing that, I'd feel... well, uncomfortable. Now this uncomfortable feeling is important to figure out. For me I could summarize it with "I am not enough" and "I am not likeable". God it sounds so simple in a few sentences but this is a process of trying and trialing, where you'll think it was one thing, but it was something deeper, or they could all be summarized in one overarching insecurity. Finding out your mask personas is an important but scary step. Without your mask you'll feel remarkably vulnerable.
A good therapist will help you decipher your insecurities and underlying sadness. Understanding what you feel and why is step 3. You will NOT get here just through talking about your day unless the other specialist knows what they're doing, for the simple reason that many people are unaware of many of their reactions in daily life and what childhood trauma's they may have surpressed. Otherwise you'll just repeat the lines you tell yourself without going deeper. Such therapists should have their license revoked ffs.
Step three 'n half: grounding a.k.a. to get into contact with your feelings
There's much to be found online about grounding so by all means find other technique if mine doesn't work for you. I'd suggest you first try the most common way. Don't sweat it, the more you do it the faster you can do this. It takes me 20 seconds tops. Anyway: sit up on a chair without distractions nearby, eyes closed, hands on lap, feet on the ground. Take a couple of deep breaths. 4 seconds in, hold 4 seconds, 4 seconds out. Blow out like you blow out a candle. While you do this you repeat to yourself 'relax' or 'calm' or 'it's okay, you're safe' or whichever works for you. Then, take all your attention to your left foot. Feel the contact with the ground. Feel any (dis)comfort, any pain, itch, whether its cold, warm. Observe it, don't analyze it. It's not wrong, it's not good. It's just.. there. After you're ready you go to the left calf. Same thing. Feel the cold, warmth, the pressure, an itch, anything. It's just.. there. It's you. Hold your attention before going to your left thigh. Keep this process throghout your body. In the end, after your face is calm. Forehead is smooth. Eyes are relaxed. Jaw is loose. Deep breath and turn your attention to what you're feeling. Where is it? In your head? In your stomach? For me it's the solar plexus but it differs. Feel the emotion. It's not wrong, it's not good. It's just.. there. Accept it. Name it.
Side note: you may get distracted often. This is fine. Don't get mad at yourself as this only works negatively. Accept it, see it happen like a cloud drifting by and gently return your attention.
Side note 2: Accepting the emotion is very important. I had issues with that but getting mad at yourself for feeling something will only make things worse and is counter productive. Anyway why would you? Think of a friend. Can he feel lonely sometimes? Of course. So why not you?
Congratulations, now you are what we call in contact with your feeling. This is DIFFERENT than the self-pitying saddness that's more common. THIS is the emotion that you can process. THIS is the emotion you can write down, cry out, talk about, whatever works for you. Also at the therapist. Especially at the therapist. It may feel redundant to do it with the little steps but believe me, if you're not used to grounding yourself then this is how to start. Sometimes it's harder than other, depending on your state-of-mind at the moment. Later you'll be used to it and 'go to your feeling' faster and more naturally than doing a detailed body scan. You're right if you think it's akin to meditation. Trust me. It's a human thing. You can do it too. Some people have put away their emotions deep down in order to protect themselves and for them it may be harder.
IMPORTANT: learning to ground may also mean you're nearer to your emotions. This is a good thing, as long as your work with them! Depending on the severity of your repressed traumas, it is highly advised to involve a therapist. You don't want to open up a well of misery only to do nothing with it. More on that in the next paragraph.
Step four: Accept your past hurtful experiences. Process the associated emotions
It is not to be underestimated how much internal conflicts will colour your perspective on yourself and the outside world. When you're so convinced of your own insecurities, working on them felt like mopping the floor with the faucet opened. For this reason this step is really important. It caused by far the most change in me. It would have saved me maybe three years.
Okay so see it like this. Two things to remember. First: emotions that you experience but were unable to express will STAY in your body. Your body is like an emotional hard drive and somewhere there's tension building up. Second: this system you can compare to a hydrolic dam. Imagine: when there's a bit of water in the reservoir, there's no problem. When there's more water in the reservoir it's also okay, but the force on the dam builds up. Still more water all kind of okay, except that the dam is under a lot of pressure. A relatively small damage has to happen for cracks to appear and water to escape. This is exactly how it works with emotions. This is how people have sudden burts of rage, sudden burst of sadness, over relatively small incidents. They just... burst. This tension in addition with perfectionism are root causes for burn out as well. Just how much energy must it take? Anyway, as for the actual processing, I have a few tips.
The major one is a therapy called Somatic Experiencing. This is specialized in bringing up past emotions, even from when you were just a baby (I can tell..). I can't much talk about how a therapist helps you because it will work ruin the effect when you can mentally prepare for them. Don't worry, it's not something crazy I promise. It's just very simple things that sound out of place here. All the stored up emotions will affect your daily life, likely without you noticing. It literally changes the way you react to things. E.g. how you react to some kinds of jokes, to how you may be very sensitive to situations, may feel angry or sad all the time, but also your attachment style in relationships. For me, processing all my fears and feelings of loneliness and betrayal on my innocense has given room for love, compassion, joy/playfulness and a general peace of body.
Another thing is the fact that our bodies can go into survival mode. Imagine you're 50.000 years in the past in the wild. You had dangerous encounters, nearly costing your life. You'll subconsciously be more alert than usual. The same happens with us still, even when you're in fact safe. It's the flight/fight/freeze response that's meant to protect you, that has lost control. This causes racing thoughts, this causes distractions (hey you, are you sure you have ADHD?), this causes you to feel like you can never relax. Why many of us turn to weed. Because you're like a whipped dog. That's not an insult. In fact I mean to say there's nothing is wrong with you. I mean yes there is, but you're not crazy! It's 'basically', complex psychology and survival instinct! This means one thing! It can change! First through somatic experiencing for the related emotions and later through step five for training your subconscious.
All in all, therapists are highly recommended for this. If you bring something up and don't know how to handle it it will work against you
I'd suggest journaling too. Or rather, emotion analyzing and bring them up while writing. Especially when you had a busy day and feel like your insides are all jumbled. Ground yourself first. The goal is to FEEL the emotion and so process it without storing it up again. Cry about it if you need to. You know when children are sad, then cry a lot, then are running around happily again? Same with us adults. INFP or no. Except that we, with a little training, can actually name what we're feeling. Warning: this should only be really possible after some mindfulness. Firstly, because how else are you going to identify your own emotions? And secondly, you need to learn to 'ground' yourself, go into 'feeling mode'. Without it, it'll just be feeling sad because you feel sorry for yourself, instead of addressing the emotion itself. Wallowing in your sadness (this case: own victimhood) will only make things WORSE in an vicious cycle of negative affirmation. This happened to me. It's not pretty.
Another tip: Ground yourself and write a letter to someone who hurt you. Pour in all the hurt, the anger, betrayal in all the words. No need to actually send it, just ritually burn the letter. Let the dam break, accept tears if you have to cry. It's all okay.
Step Five: self improvement. Learn by doing. Train your subconsciousness by experience.
It may feel like this step is late in the cycle, however it is not for nothing. To use the metaphor, Would it be easier to upgrade your dam into a hydraulic energy generating dam while the reservoir is still full, or while the water level is low? When all the body could think about was how to keep the dam in tact?
Self-Improvement really means to use your self reflection to not just see what you do, but mainly what do you want to do with it? Let's say hypothetically you feel like you don't speak up enough. You've found out this is because of an underlying insecurity, in this case maybe that you feel unimportant because your parents never acknowledged any idea that you put forward.
Look at yourself and the traits you want different. Maybe you want to be more orderly? Show love to people? Give a presentation without feeling like you're fainting? Write them down and what you would like instead. Don't push yourself by commiting to do everything. Just as much as you're comfortable with. Think of a dog for example. When a dog gets hit by a human he may just become aggressive or wimpering with his tail between his legs the next time he sees a human. Dogs are not aggressive or flightful from the start, but they learned that certain things are dangerous or scary. You teach an animal that something is not scary by slowly making it get used to the target. The same with humans, except that we're such complex creatures that sometimes it's hard to say exactly what makes you uncomfortable. This is literally what people mean with 'stepping outside your comfort zone'. It's not for nothing. It's not only for 'those bloody daredevils'. It's for a person to get used to situations. I had a fear in front of the class but I forced myself, after some proper therapy, to stand in front of a class to teach exams. Yes I was nervous. I had to calm myself several times, and I reflected on in afterwards. Well now, that actually went better than all the imaginative situations I had before! And even if it doesn't go well you can still write down WHAT you fked up and try to do better next time. Be mindful. Take steps.
Check out my sources for more useful tips on actual behavioural change.
Conclusion
It's a lot and I think I can add more but then it would be a book. I hope from this piece will bring structure to the whirlpool of information that's available. I'm not even sure 'regular' psychologists know this, as I've tried a bunch and they all start with something else. Every step is necessary, but some will work best only after the previous steps have been taken.
Now I'm tired. I'll write a proper summary after I see how this is recieved in the comments. Would love to hear feedback, questions, maybe even critique. Take care, you crazy diamond you.
Helpful sources:
Mindfulness training, meditation guides, Chakra healing (yes really)
Fysiotherapist on youtube to work on posture (you'll be surprised). I recommend Body Fix Exercises channel, to the point and effective.
Therapies: EMDR, Cognitive behavioural therapy, Somatic Experiencing
INFP guides on Personality Hacker
Books / audiobooks
J. Peterson's 12 rules for life + many lectures on having a meaningful life. (whatever your stance or opinion on politics, his psychological knowledge is undeniable)
Lindsay C Gibson's Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
M. Gladwell's Talking to Strangers
Mark Manson's The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck
Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now

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Chapter 3: The Noise In Ether
For this story I had to consult with five Gojids. I didn’t want to be insensitive for what happened on Cradle.
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Memory Transmission Subject: Barm, Gojid Survivor
Date [Standardized Human Time]: October 15, 2136
The sight of empty streets and abandoned homes was a horrible reminder of the aftermath that happened merely a month ago. To prevent the invasion of the human homeworld, Earth, they struck us first, targeting only our military facilities and paralyzing our forces. Any civilian casualties were the victims of stampede, humans only killed resisting combatants. When the victory was theirs, unexpectedly Arxur showed up out of nowhere and took advantage of our nonexistent defense. Humans had no chance to resist the grays, but they evacuated as many Gojids as their capacity allowed. They took us into refugee camps on Earth and Venlil Prime for the indefinite period. This is what really happened. Despite being predators, humans did not eat any Gojid and did not collaborate with the Arxur, and they did not put us in cattle farms on Earth, as the rumors implied.
Still, I can’t say I could ever forgive humans for what they did. Our culture has been shattered and our populace was decimated. I have returned only when humans formed a questionable alliance with the Arxur and retrieved control over Cradle. Our towns were completely forsaken. The infrastructure needed full reconstruction. The biggest cities were populated only by a fraction of previous denizens. There were not enough people to keep the civilization functioning like the old times. Many Gojids were working in the primary economic sector, mainly agriculture. The other sectors were maintained less, aside from shopkeeping and maybe medical help. Speaking of that field, there was a high demand for medical service, as previous doctors, nurses and specialists were dead, missing or did not return to Cradle.
My job was to secure the abandoned facilities from further decay. That involves critical branches such as sewage, waterworks and power plants. There were already issues with sewage overflowing in the cities and corroding pipes. When we emerged from the shuttles, we were greeted by a foul fetor coming from the manholes. I was glad when I was chosen to do a power plants inspection instead. Not only because of the filthy environment but because of my pressing desire to remain as far as I can from the populace. The time of invasion and stationing on the homeworld of predators was traumatic enough to afflict some kind of predator disease. In fact, it was probably the most abnormal kind of predator disease known to the Federation. Sometimes I could hear the voices of other Gojids, usually in the presence of radio receivers or any electrical speaker device. The voices were like eavesdropping the arguing bystanders out of context, sometimes they were screaming in fear or talking directly to me, giving me hints and sharing opinions. I could not sleep properly in the presence of my TV. It was acute enough that I could have let myself be screened if only these humans didn’t paralyze our medical care. The concept of being locked in a predator disease facility was unnerving, knowing in what state people leave them, but I suppose I could be a threat to society right now. If I could not get help, I would serve remotely, not endangering the already struggling community. But I couldn’t avoid being escorted by my colleagues to the nuclear plant.
There were two other Gojids with me, a middle-aged Solem and one not much older than me, Nadra. To my dismay, I’ve been given a handheld two-way radio to communicate inside the power plant. As I took it, I braced myself for more hallucination episodes, but it was not something I couldn’t just ignore. What adds up to my horrible situation is that Ki-yu, one of our two moons, is at perigee, and the pulling effect on tides might have an indirect effect on our success as well as the psychological welfare. Adding the possible radiation, I realized I want to get it over with as soon as possible. As I approached the looming silhouette of the nuclear plant, a sense of foreboding gripped me. The once bustling facility now stood in eerie silence, its towering structure’s a haunting reminder of the power it once harnessed. The rust was eating away any metallic surfaces. Even there I could smell the fetor of clogged drainage systems.
My colleagues and I cautiously made our way inside, our flashlights piercing through the thick darkness that enveloped the corridors. The rhythmic hum of machinery that once filled these halls were replaced by an unsettling silence, broken only by the sound of our own footsteps echoing off the walls. We were merely in an entrance hall, studying the layouts and evacuation routes on the closest map before splitting up. Nadra went to locate the emergency power generator in the auxiliary building, Solem went to check the turbine building and I headed toward the generator building. I passed the locker room before I stood in front of big metal doors that could not budge. I saw the keypad scanner on the side. I reached for my transceiver and informed my friends of my defeat, hoping that someone could fetch a crowbar from the tool supply.
“I left my keycard in locker fifteen.“ The voice resonated on my radio. It did not belong to any of my colleagues. A sudden realization hit me that it must be a hallucination, my predator disease. My quills bristled from the haunting presence. I waited a moment to calm my nerves. That delusion brought me the idea to scan through the lockers. I started checking from the beginning. The hallucinations are a part of my broken brain, therefore they could not know more than me to be that precise. Most lockers were either empty or closed all the way until locker fifteen. It actually contained a keycard. I thought to myself that I’m turning into my brother, who also had magic luck, until he hadn’t. I hoped he didn’t suffer in his last moments.
“H e ’ s n o t w i t h u s .” Enraged at my mirage I grabbed my radio and tossed it as hard as I could. The lights flickered suddenly, catching me off guard and only after a while I noticed that the device bounced from the wall without shattering unfortunately. The transceiver responded with a more familiar voice. “The generator is on, but hurry up. It’s almost running on fumes” Nadra must have located the emergency generator, her voice was a blissful reminder of what was real and what wasn’t. Having power means I could unlock the doors and operate the control panels. I made my way inside the reactor building, completely forsaking the cursed communication device. The giant reactor hall was bathed only by flickering emergency lights casting eerie shadows across the hulking machinery. The air hung heavy with a metallic scent, a reminder of the radioactive presence that still lingered within the facility. The buzzing of my dosimeter was unnerving. Having my health in mind, I did not want to linger in this place any longer than necessary. My primary objective was to ensure the safe shutdown of the nuclear reactors. In the absence of regular maintenance, the reactors could pose a significant threat if left unattended. I could see the control room only by the strong yellow lights illuminating through the window, it was the only well-lit room. The control panels were coated in dust, their screens displaying cryptic symbols and error messages. It was evident that the systems had been left to deteriorate without proper care. I started looking for a manual to study each symbol. I had a degree in FTL engines which required extensive training and expertise in the nuclear field as they also operated on nuclear fission, but I would not dare to misinterpret the pictograms in a power plant, especially now when it was left in unrecognizable filth. Power plants were, after all, much more powerful than spacecraft engines.
My dosimeter started turning up, and I could hear a noise coming from a speaker mounted in the corner of a wall. It was used as an intercom. I heard a chatter.
“Sir, there’s a quake a few miles from there. Strong enough to move small buildings.”
“Any structural damage?”
“Negative, but the grid is straining hard.”
“Has the mayor contacted us?”
“She’s not responding, sir.”
“Damn it, I can’t stand that woman. Reduce the output and disconnect the plant.”
I felt numbness taking over my head. The noise of the dosimeter filled my head, I started seeing things. Against my will, I walked to the control panel and pulled my claw towards the controls of multiple generators. I snapped out of the trance hearing an eerie silence in a room. Even my dosimeter stopped buzzing. It took me a while to calm my quills and shiver. I glanced at the controls realizing they were familiar to me. With trepidation, I began the delicate process of shutting down the reactors. I reached and started manipulating the controls of my interest, mainly shutting down individual generators one by one. Each step had to be executed with precision, ensuring that the dubious state reactors would be rendered inert and the potential for catastrophe eliminated. As I manipulated the controls, a sudden surge of power coursed through the room, causing the lights to flicker and the machinery to groan. Fear gripped my heart as I imagined the worst-case scenario unfolding before me. But, with a deep breath and a steadying of my nerves, I continued the process, determined to see it through. When the power output reached an acceptable level I went to the auxiliary building to locate the switchgear room. I passed the lockers and lobby without encountering any of my coworkers. As I reached the switchgear room, I opened the circuit breaker, disconnecting the plant from the grid. I had completed the first step in securing the nuclear plant, but our task was far from over.
When I reached the lobby room I was caught by Solem, a visible frustration painted on his face. “The fuck you’ve been? Why weren’t you responding, and why did you toss your dosimeter?” Taken aback, I reached for my device and realized that I did have that cursed radio with me. I returned to the locker room and found a noisy dosimeter tossed onto the corner. What’s unnerving was that it showed high radiation behind the wall of the reactor building. I realized how my hallucinations had a dangerous impact on my workflow and that I should withdraw. I said that I felt dizzy and I needed a break, before returning to the hovercar.
As I distanced myself I took my time to review what happened inside. My brain must have tricked me to absorb a possibly dangerous dose of radiation. I looked at the towering power plant thinking of the workers that used to provide the energy to most bigger cities in this district. What happened to them during the attack? The horrors of invasion still haunted me and the disturbing hallucinations only served to amplify my unease. The car radio spoke up. This time I could hear panicking crowds, followed by a roar. That sound definitely originated from an Arxur. The next thing I could hear was a low, pitiful sobbing, that slowly, gradually raised in volume. The frequency of these cries were truly bloodcurdling. I felt a sudden flight response, a precognition that I should not be here. I launched towards the entrance and closed the doors before the crescendoing sound reached its breaking point. Once inside the voice abruptly stopped. I left my radio in the car and I only had my dosimeter on me. I tried searching for a living soul to share my worries regarding this place or my mental state. Perhaps Solem could save me from myself. I went to check on the reactor building. I didn’t notice it at first, but the dosimeter was relatively silent inside. It still displayed radiation but at a moderate level, in contrast to the hellish amounts I’ve seen merely five minutes ago. When I found Solem, he was operating a crane and moving the spent fuel rods into a fuel pool. He did not look happy at my sight and descended to scold me. However, I was ready for anything as long as I could get some advice. I told him about the voices that haunt me through the radio and an unknown danger outside the facility. As I was recounting, I felt shame, realizing how ridiculous it sounded. Solem’s body language also displayed signs of awkwardness but he left to check the danger himself. I shouted to make him stop, that it was too dangerous, but he didn’t listen. He slammed the door as he entered the lobby.
I investigated the fuel pool. It was filled with more than a dozen spent or damaged fuel rods. Keeping in mind that there were much more inside the reactor, the pool could not handle that many rods safely. We should return some other time with more support and consider long-term storage. I covered the pool with a heavy plate and left the reactor building. As I was inside the locker room, there was a sudden spike of radiation on my dosimeter, followed by a loud slam of the front doors. Once again a silence filled the room. It took some courage, but I entered the empty lobby. Only my footprints were breaking the silence. My quills were bristling out of my control. I was slowly and silently heading toward the turbine building. If Solem left through the front doors, I could only wonder what happened to him. My only hope is Nadra. I must find her and leave this place immediately.
I opened the heavy doors as silently as possible, moving ever so slightly. But once I entered the turbine room and released the doors, they moved with a shivering scrape and closed with a loud thud. Nothing reacted to the amount of noise. Finally, I forced my quills to ease and began searching for Nadra. Parallelly I investigated one of three turbines, which also fell victim to neglect. The blades were rusted out in a humid environment and filled the room with a musty smell. Humidity also gave the chance for mold to culture. Every tiny gap was accumulating dust. Overall the machine could not be turned on again until it was revived. I found Nadra crawling out of the turbine. She was probably disassembling it for further cleanup. She looked at me with confusion, I didn’t want to repeat my mistake by shoving her away with my delusions. I told her it was not safe there and that we should leave. She paid no attention to the urgency of my words and downplayed me saying I should take a break at the car.
The prospect of returning outside gave me a panic attack. Strong stress reaction pressed on my chest, my ears laid flat on my scalp and my quills bristled. She must have noticed me, but before she could say anything, her two-way radio reactivated, giving away a static noise. We heard as someone banged at the doors, but it came from the radio. We slowly approached the exit doors and the banging continued, louder with each step. Without warning the room filled with a deafening bang accompanied by flickering lights. Nadra flinched and dropped the radio, which stopped working, leaving us again in the noise of my dosimeter. It was the only tool that could warn me of an unknown danger. Whatever it was, it was standing outside. The unspeakable, invisible horror that manifested in airwaves. It took the voice of an Arxur, but it was more terrifying than any greys that invaded this place. Suddenly the intercom started playing and resumed the banging sounds. In an impulse I darted, searching for another exit out of the turbine room. I desperately examined the walls until I found a door, leading to an auxiliary building. The revelation was not good enough. The auxiliary room also led to the lobby and the monstrum that haunted it. Inside there were cooling systems, switchgear, power generator and many other things that I had no time to identify. While Nadra was examining the generator, I stared at the doors leading to the lobby and realized they were made of much more yielding material. The banging also changed the pitch. The previous sounds resembled punching metal doors, and now it was behind these. Suddenly the door cracked open and my head was filled with the deafening noise of my dosimeter. The lights went black and out of instinct I took my dosimeter and slammed it at the wall until it went silent.
The next thing I remembered was Nadra driving our car. The car radio had parts ripped off. I saw that Solem wasn’t with us. We have never seen him again. We drove to a remote cottage in a forest. Every electrical tool was thrown out and smashed just in case. We lived there in radio silence together, in fear, comforting each other. The dread could not leave us alone. We slept poorly, haunted by nightmares. She was seeing the same images at night as me and if we could check, she might have had the same hallucinations. But we could not risk that much. We had a horrible feeling that the nightmare was still lingering somewhere close and would pounce on us the moment we heard the noise. We lived like that for four days, until on day five I woke up in delirium and visibly sick. I was puking and shivering so hard that I couldn’t protest when Nadra took me to a hospital. It must have been radiation sickness. I was rushed to an emergency room where very few doctors were operating on me. Few voices were asking me and Nadra about what happened. None of us could say anything, especially me. They attached me to a neural scanner to analyze my memories and figure out what led to my awful state. When I regained consciousness, I was in a bed isolated from the rest of the room by a translucent plastic veil to keep the outside germs from my nonexistent immune system. The machine was still analyzing my memories. The only thing that kept me company was the music coming from the radio. When I came to my senses I realized the danger of being in the presence of a device. It started humming and I could recognize the voice coming from it. “I m s o r r y”
It belonged to Solem.
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[!Error: Memory transcription Subject Disconnected]
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Emotional/narcissistic abuse is real abuse. Being a narcissistic abuser is a personality, it’s internal, the intent is to control through manipulation, gaslighting, guilt tripping and shaming. An emotional abuser uses these tools over sustained periods of time to break people down (their partners, their kids) for their own personal benefit (to feel in control and to get their supply). Whether they consciously understand that that’s what they’re doing or not.
Reactive abuse is a trauma response. Emotional/narcissistic abuse over sustained periods of time is psychological torture. The tortured mind will fight back with yelling and name calling and even get physical. But self-defense mechanisms don’t make an abusee an abuser. If the abusee is removed from the abusive environment, they don’t fly into screaming rages and hurt the people around them with their words. This behavior only occurs with their abusers. It’s self-defense. We generally respond to threats one of 4 ways: Fight, flight, freeze or fawn. Abusees often respond with “fight”. That does not make you as bad as your abuser.
Mutual abuse is a myth. In a situation that looks like “both people are abusers”, there’s almost always only one abuser, and one abusee that’s fighting back. Separate the two, and it becomes clear who’s who.
So don’t let anyone shame you for how you reacted to being emotionally neglected and psychologically abused by your parents your whole life. You were only trying to survive. You do NOT owe your abusers an apology for how you coped with their abuse.
(Disclaimer that unfortunately some abusees do turn into abusers themselves but that’s not the same as “mutual abuse”. With their abusive parents, they are the abusee. With their own victims, they are the abusers and their kids/partnesibling are the abusees. Mutual abuse is a myth.)

This is probably a question mostly directed to women who went through this. Long story short, after having a baby (10 years into our relationship) and becoming a stay at home mom, my husband became incredibly verbally and emotionally abusive (I say incredibly bc he never acted this way before). I reacted to most of it, by talking back, standing up for myself etc… Then I caught him talking to a girl he met on an international flight - he didn’t deny it and said he wants a divorce in order to persue someone else. The girl ended up telling him she is not interested (I saw the messages) and he kinda came around. NEVER apologized and never felt guilty or remorse bc he said our lack off sex life and my inability to compliment him and make him feel appreciated lead to this .
I know I should leave so please leave that out of comments - I can’t right now for a multitude of different reasons.
I don’t hold tremendous grudge against him for all this, but enough to find it uncomfortable to be intimate. I feel like if he at least felt bad and apologized I would connect better - but he did nothing wrong in his view and blames all on me. It also does not help he is exclusively mean to me and verrrryyyyy friendly and nice to absolutely everyone (exhibits a lottttt of narcissistic traits). He thinks he deserves all the affection and love bc he pays the bills and that alone entitles him. When I bring up that he needs to be nicer to me in order to connect better, he responds with: ”then you should find someone else who suits your standards”. I just can’t get through to him. He has also mentioned before how cheating in such situations is totally acceptable 😳
Any advice, if you went through this how did you do it. Sex will have to be a thing if there is even the slightest chance for this to work, even if it s for short term.
Thanks in advance.

PART EIGHT HUNDRED AND FORTY-TWO
[Previous Chapter] [The Beginning] [Patreon+2]
Friday
Thomas had no idea how Miss Webber did it, but by the time his phone pinged with her message less than ten minutes later, he was directed to the resort’s front entrance, where a town car would be waiting for him.
Thomas had showered, shaved and packed his duffle within the seven minutes he’d said he needed and had spent the next few minutes moving silently through the resort. As a licenced bodyguard (albeit an out-of-work one), he still had a valid multi-state CCW licence for all of his weapons, some of which he wore, and others were stashed in his bags.
The first thing he’d done after leaving the apartment he’d shared with Donald with everything he owned in garbage bags was go to the nearest army surplus store and buy himself an oversized duffle and shoulder pack. The guy behind the counter barely glanced at his CCW licence, already knowing a war vet when he saw one. Thomas also loaded up on ammunition and spare knives because one could never be too careful. He was offered a substantial discount for his service, but he declined and paid for everything with a swipe of his card.
Later that day, he had booked into a hotel where he’d considered his next move. There were a couple of brothers from the military who had started a security firm in Chicago that would welcome him with open arms. He also had a few favours owed to him inside the military, provided those people were still in the service. He hadn’t exactly had a lot of downtime to chase up old friends working for the Portsmiths.
In the end, after drinking half a bottle of vodka, he decided an overseas vacation would be the best thing for his frayed nerves. Especially when he thought if he stayed, he might be running into Sam … or the monster that was watching over him. It had to be a monster. Before that day, he’d only ever believed in the two-legged kind of monsters. Even as a kid, he was convinced everything had a weakness and could be killed.
And every time he convinced himself he’d been drugged into thinking it (which only took seconds because the concept was insane), he’d look at his chest or a reflection of his chest, see the lie for what it was and freak out all over again.
Now wasn’t the time to think about that. So he’d covered his chest in a black t-shirt and pulled on olive-green cargo pants and combat boots. He knew it was a long way from what he would be expected to wear around Mr Portsmith, but the clothes he’d been assigned had remained with Donald right along with all his electronics since they’d come with the job.
Sure enough, a dark green sedan with tinted windows was waiting for him in the loading bay with a driver standing at the back door. “I’ll sit up front with you,” he said as he tossed the duffle and his pack across the back seat.
“Very well, sir,” the driver said, shutting the back door while Thomas opened the front passenger door for himself.
The drive across the island to Grand Bahama International Airport took under five minutes, and Thomas knew for the price Portsmith Electronics had paid for this fancy cab fare, he could’ve saved them that money and run that distance in thirty. Maybe longer since he was lugging his overweight kit and his days of hauling ass while fully loaded up were a decade behind him, but still, he shook his head at the excessive expense.
A woman in a sharply pressed flight attendant’s uniform stood at the foot of the stairs of a seven-windowed jet with Reno Air Express painted across the sides in green when they pulled onto the tarmac. As soon as the car drew to a halt, Thomas removed his seatbelt and climbed out of the passenger seat before the driver could reach the door. He went to the back door and hauled out his gear, throwing his duffle onto his shoulder and carrying the backpack by the straps out of habit since that left his strongest arm free to handle the rifle he wasn’t currently carrying. Some things were just ingrained like that.
“Mister Cole,” she said as he approached her.
“Yes,” Thomas answered, snapping back into the professional façade he’d been using for almost a decade. He walked past her and climbed the stairs, ducking inside. As his eyes scanned the nineteen seats of the small cabin, he found himself biting the inside of his cheek in amusement. For the last nine years, he’d been flying in private jets set up for those who had more zeroes in their bank accounts than some small countries. After all that time, it was something of a step back to go from that to a basic commercial model.
“We’ll be taking off just as soon as you’re buckled in, sir,” the flight attendant said, hauling the stairs up and locking them into place. “Would you like me to stow your bags?”
Thomas shook his head, tossing his duffle across the two seats on the opposite side of the aisle from the pair he claimed for himself. As ingrained as it was for him to keep his gear with him wherever possible, it was just as hammered in to put himself as close as possible to the cockpit and the door in case of a problem.
Besides, with the equipment he had in that duffle, there was no way she could lift it. The two chairs groaned and sank under the weight. It was why he’d gone to the army surplus store to buy it. That sucker could carry over four hundred pounds without breaking if it had to. In comparison, the commercial versions fell apart just thinking about triple-figured weights.
After clipping the seatbelt through the handles and under the duffle to secure it to the seat, he threw his smaller pack in the overhead storage and took his front aisle seat. He strapped himself in, then watched the flight attendant do likewise in a rear-facing seat beside the cockpit door. She pressed a button on the wall that probably notified the pilot they were ready, and within seconds, they were taxiing onto the main runway.
“Where will we be putting down?” he asked just as soon as the jet leveled out and both he and the attendant unbuckled for comfort.
“We’ll be flying directly to the Pensacola International Airport and landing just before seven-thirty, sir. A car will be waiting for you there.” She stood up with a smile. “Are you hungry, sir? A hot breakfast has been supplied by one of the local hotels.”
Thomas tried really hard not to let his surprise show. Clearly, whoever wrote Marvel’s Pepper Potts character had met Miss Webber! Within ten minutes, she had a car and jet and a hot breakfast ready to go … on an island soooo not set up for any of that!
Note to self … stay on Miss Webber’s good side, Thomas reminded himself, for perhaps the millionth time since first meeting the scary executive assistant that had not been given her position to sit on the boss’ knee and look pretty. Tucker Portsmith and Martin Laurier were dangerous in their own right, but Miss Webber was like so many staff sergeants he’d worked with. Fuck with her at your own peril.
“Breakfast would be great, thank you.”
The woman beamed and moved down the seats, stopping in the hallway to open some manner of bag that had been strapped into the seat like a passenger.
She returned with a large tray with two domed lids. “Apple juice or coffee, sir?” she asked as he lifted the first lid and breathed in the sausages and scrambled eggs on toast.
He paused mid-whiff and suspiciously lifted his eyes to her.
“We were informed of your beverage preferences, sir.”
It was more than a preference. Thomas was allergic to citrus fruits. It was why he always carried at least two epi-pens on him, even though he was able to use the excuse of carrying it for Miss Geraldine since she had her own food allergies. He huffed without a word and went to work cleaning up the meal before him.
“Also, in case you wish to change before our arrival…” the woman stood up and made her way to the rear of the plane, returning with a sealed garment bag. “I believe these are your measurements.”
Thomas fought hard to curtail his reaction. Jesus Christ! A car, a jet, a breakfast that took his allergies into consideration, AND a semi-fitted suit?! The fuckin’ US military isn’t this organised!
It was novel to be the sole focus of the flight attendant. Normally he was the muscle that the plane staff ignored in favour of the family, so having her offer a range of beverages and even a few simple snacks like he was a VIP, despite the journey only taking a little over two hours, was a treat.
The ascent and descent were the most time-consuming parts of the flight, and about five minutes before he’d need to be buckled in for the second time, Thomas stood up and took the suit that had been draped over the back of the second set of seats.
“I’m about to get changed,” he said over his shoulder, more to give the woman time to do whatever the hell she needed to do. It wasn’t as if he was shy, though he’d react badly to being touched without being asked. That was a no-go.
He moved to the centre of the plane still facing the rear, unzipped the garment bag and unhooked it from the shoulders. As he expected, there was an undershirt, a long-sleeved grey silk shirt and a dark jacket with matching silk tie. Behind it were the long pants. “I assume there’s shoes somewhere too?” The combat boots he was presently wearing didn’t really cut it.
“Yes, sir. I have them in the overhead storage.”
With a nod of approval, he untied each shoe and kicked them off, then wedged his knees into the armrests on either side of the narrow aisle and hauled his t-shirt over his head.
Twenty minutes later, after taxiing into the private hangars, the stairs were lowered, and Thomas strode down them. In his left hand, he held the duffle over the thin rail that most would need for balance, while his right held the smaller backpack the same way. He still hadn’t allowed the hostess to kill herself trying to lift his duffle, and the pack offered him a small measure of counterbalance. He wouldn’t allow either to crease his suit. At the foot of the stairs stood two men, who broke apart as he descended with their hands up to relieve him of his bags.
One look at their sizes, and Thomas told them to switch.
“Why?” the much smaller of the two asked.
“There’s over a hundred and forty pounds in that duffle.” He knew that because it had cost him a small fortune to fly it to the Bahamas. “Are you good with lifting that kind of dead weight?” Tiny Tim? the snarky part of his brain added.
The only person of minute stature who Thomas had seen hold his own without batting an eye was a little blond bullet from Texas who’d been temporarily attached to his unit back in '03. Kelsey could also toss the biggest of them on their asses too, but this guy clearly wasn’t him.
“One forty?” the bigger guy repeated, then looked at his colleague. But instead of switching as Thomas suggested, that guy took the small pack and slung it onto one shoulder, then went the other side where both men shared the weight of the duffle between them back to the SUV parked a short distance away.
Thomas shook his head at them. They were both in their mid-twenties. The bigger of them should’ve been able to handle that duffle on his own for the twenty feet they had to cover to reach the car. Wherever Miss Webber dug them up from, they clearly weren’t former military.
But then, that’s what he was there for.
He followed them to the car, almost laughing when the bigger one put the duffle down (forcing his smaller companion to just about face-plant) and moved quickly to open the rear passenger door for him. “I sit in the front, bud. You take the back.” He actually preferred to drive, but that wouldn’t be up to him. Not when the company was paying him four-fifty an hour for however many hours he was needed.
* * *
((Author's note: I don't know how many of you are aware of this, but Reddit is attempting to force out 3rd party apps at the end of this month, and many, many sites across Reddit are undertaking a self-imposed posting ban from 12th June to the 14th June.
I'm talking very big hitters as well as little ones are joining this fight. I don't personally agree with Reddit's decision to charge each of the 3rd party companies 20 million dollars a year to maintain their programs either, so for those three days, I'll be withholding BtH posts in solidarity with the heavy hitters. Every little bit helps.
I'm not sure if it will only affect one or two posts yet, depending on if the timing of the 'strike' is all going to happen at the same time around the world or if everywhere is doing it according to their local timetable. I'll be watching some of the bigger AU sites to find out.
I hope you all understand my reasons, and I'll be back soon after that, as per usual.))
((All comments welcome. Good or bad, I'd love to hear your thoughts 🥰🤗))
I made a family tree/diagram of the Mystallian family that can be found here
For more of my work including WPs: Angel466 or an index of previous WPS here.
FULL INDEX OF BOB THE HOBO TO DATE CAN BE FOUND HERE!!

Hi,
I was originally going to make this a Tik Tok, but I figured here would be a place I could fully write all my woes and what not and release this thought.
For context. I love my brothers. I'm the youngest of technically 4, but we're gonna focus on the oldest, L. We're 6 six years apart. Ever since I was kid I always tried to be around my brother. Typical clingy lil brother things I feel like. My favorite colors, my love for anime, video games, taste in music started with him. Used to steal his clothes to be just like, even though he's 6'3" and at least 200lbs+ growing up, while I was 5'7" teetering on 150-190lbs. So always never fit me, but I didn't care cause I thought I always looked awesome. His friends were my friends. The first time I got high was with him. I was truly proud to be his brother at one point. And more prouder I was uncle to his 3 kids. But this is when I started to realize what our relationship truly... I was a leach. And he was tired of it.
Started when I was 15. When I received news that my brother was having his child. And that his baby mamma was moving in with us. I was excited. Ecstatic. Looking back, idk. I think they had a different expectation on how I would react. At the same time I wondered why didn't my brother tell me this? Figured since it's mom's house it's appropriate. Proper. 6months later(she wasn't premo, I was informed half way through the pregnancy) my first niece was born. Went to the hospital and was so happy. Days later when they came home. Literally not even 5minutes I was already down in his room trying to hold my baby niece. My brother proceeds to yell at me. "Get the hell out my room. Don't come down here without permission. And you will never be around her" not exactly what he said, but the jist. Possibly the most hurtful/meanest thing he's ever said to me. Still don't know why that was warranted. So I go to my room, cry my ass off wondering what did I do, tell my parents and proceed to accept that I won't ever see my niece thats 2 flights of stairs away from me. Then an hour of so later, parents and my brother tell me that there going out and need me to watch my niece. You have no idea how confused and pissed off I was in a split second. Then realized, that in order to be around my niece I gotta suck it up, whatever this bullshit is. So I say yeah, go in my parents room and proceed to watch my niece for 2hours. Fell asleep with her in my arms. Fucking beautiful.
So that was a stage setter. Wanna get through this so I'll go through the highlights.
My brother proceed to have 2 more kids he never once announced to me. 2nd child I found out at my 1st nieces 3rd birthday party. BM(now wife) was 6months pregnant. 3rd child go over to my brother's for something. See his wife with typical signs of pregnancy, so I asked and they said yeah, but they didn't tell me due to previous miscarriages and that this one is high risk. But then I asked who else knew... EVERYONE ELSE. my parents, her mom, their CLOSE FUCKING FRIENDS. BUT NOT ME. oh, and was never invited to the hospital for neither of his kids.
I will admit. I was a fuck up. I stole from him, lied to him, messed up his truck, messed up his house(broke a door, tore that window liner mesh), joy ride his and his wife's car. Causing his wife trouble, which means I'm really causing him trouble. There was one time my old kicked me out cause he caught tryna steal some crumbs of his weed. So I went to my brother's. He wouldn't let me in, so I had to sleep in my old man's Oldsmobile. Forget the model but it was a 76 if I remember if that matters. Lol. Brother caught me in here. Gave me a blanket and a fan. I was only allowed in his house we he, himself, not family, was home. And when they go to sleep, back in the Oldsmobile. It was like this for a week till the old man decided to let me back in.
I used to babysit his first 2 kids for years. 1st the first 5yrz of her life, 2nd the first 3ish. Wasnt around for the 3rd. Realized i needed to figure my shit when I got a job, but would call days off to babysit. Then my brother would cancel at the last minute. Or find another babysitter and don't tell me till I'm half way there. 13 years. Aside from visits and hanging out with the kids(and this is rarely), that is how long I haven't spent around him nor his family. I've missed pageants. Basketball games, small graduations, whatever life things that have happened, not because I didn't want to go. Simply because I wasn't invited. So I never knew. Knew the kids did basketball just never knew of any events.
Can you imagine, a family oriented emotional attached individual not having or being around family? By far the 2nd most painful thing I've experienced.
Now, to the nitty gritty. At 24, my old pulled a shot gun on me and threaten to kill me. Long story short, I made pho from scratch and it stunk up the house. This pissed him off, told me I can never cook in the house again in the most angriest I ever heard him speak. I unintentionally punched a hole in the wall, and he comes down with some shit You see in movies. A 2x felon with a fucking shot gun. Smh so he tell me to leave in the morning, but I left that night. It's been 7years since I last seen him. 1st time I seen was at my 1st neieces HS graduation. Can't say if he looked at me, cause I couldn't even look in his direction, but sho as shit never said anything to me. I sat in the row behind him. He sat right next to my nephew and brother. And they was chatting it up.
Understand. At 19years old, I found out this man isn't my real father. And he was a POS up to that point. Only father I knew so I still loved him, even though he gaslit tf out of me when I went to hear his side, but still loved. That day, I had no father. Now after I stopped babysitting, someone had to step up. And that was him. I can say at one point he was a good grandfather. But his true narcissistic self started to come out. My nieces love him, but don't go over to his house like that anymore. Nephew still does(he's 10, so I don't blame him. He does what he wants over there basically)
As I'm at the graduation, I'm just casually glancing over at them and I'm wondering, does my brother know what he did? Does he care? Does my life matter to him? It must not. I understand he's here for the kids. But come on. Do you have any morals or principals?
That's when it began to dawn on me. I don't think my brother loved me out of genuine love. He only loved me out of obligation. Can't tell you if every instance was genuine or not but for the most part. They weren't.
I can count on one hand how many times he said happy birthday to me and how many times he's given me a present in general. I can tell you he never contacted me during covid. He contacted me twice after. Once to see his new remodeled yard, and second to watch a fight. Both times he basically asked, "you good?" Looking back, don't feel there was genuine concern for me. And both times the man went on and on about him. Bout his music, his home, etc. Aside from the you good basically.
I realized I put alot of love into an individual who couldn't even do the simplest thing. Respect me. Or his mother.
So I lost all the respect i have in this world for him. It's up to him to get it back. And he has the absolute bare minimum of love from me. To be clear I do not hate my brother. I do love him. Wish him and his family great health, great fortune and hopes when he leaves this world he has no regrets. Cause I won't. I can't. Can't keep beating myself up wondering why or how things went the way they did. I did tell him a few times my issues with how we are in the past. Fell on death ears. As for his kids. When they need me my door is always open. My arms are always open. But they growing up and facing life. Don't need an uncle who's barely been in their life as it is.
And if by the grace of God my brother happens to find this. Hi Lunden. Like I said. No regrets. 👍🏽

This post is my answer to the question asked in this post:(https://www.reddit.com/reactivedogs/comments/143ftpm/obviously_this_is_situational_based_on_the_type/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
We adopted a rescue 8 months ago. We were told he was a happy, chill 1 year old. Turns out, he is an extremely anxious, hyper-aroused, fear-aggressive, disregulated mess. He’s also the sweetest, smartest, greatest boy. It's been a very intense ride. Medication has played an important role in our journey so far, and I expect it will contnue to do so. I'm not a dog professional and I'm certainly not a trainer. I'm just a layperson who has had to become obsessed with dog mental health and behaviour modificaiton. Here's our story, and some of the key things I've taken away so far about medication for reactive dogs. (For what it's worth, I believe my key takeaways apply to human mental health and medication too)

Pre-Medication, 0-2 months post adoption:

Before medication, my dog was in fight/flight and completely flooded for almost all of his waking hours, and he barely slept. He was hyper vigilant and always aroused. He lunged, bit, jumped, and alarm barked for hours every day. We worked really hard on basic relaxation protocols for 2 months, and could barely make any progress, even just to be able to settle at home.
We did manage to reduce biting during this early period by redirecting to toys and reinforcing “booping” with the nose as an alternative way to get our attention. Even though reducing biting was obviously a really important early win, it didn’t actually improve any of our lives as much as you might think. A frantic, terrified 70lb dog in fight/flight who needs constant attention and help is a serious problem, and makes his humans miserable and is miserable himself, whether or not he’s biting. My point is- we had a little training success reducing his most problematic behaviour. But the overall mental state was unchanged. His hyper arousal and constant panic was the real issue. We got him doing slightly less dangerous expressions of intense panic, but the real goal was to change the underlying panic.
Our highly qualified trainer told us we owe it to our dog to get him some pharmacological help. Training wasn’t going anywhere for him without medication. He was too panicked, flooded, and sleep deprived to be able to learn. He was living every day as if he was fighting for his life. The parts of the brain where operant conditioning works are not in command when a creature is in that state.
Our phenomenal, compassionate fear free vet helped right away. We began with round the clock trazodone and started fluoxetine. Trazodone made a difference within hours. Fluoxetine didn't do a thing for 10 weeks.

Medication Early Days, 2-4 months post-adoption:

Medication was life changing. It opened up a crack in his intense mental state that allowed us to get into his head and heart and start making progress. The first huge win was that he was finally able to truly relax in the house. He quickly picked up the relaxation protocols and learned to self-soothe (at least sometimes). He was finally able to get a healthy amount of sleep. All the out of control arousal behaviours were reduced in the house, because he was feeling just generally a little more at ease. My partner and I were finally able to get some sleep and relax a little too. We weren’t constantly managing an out of control dog who was permanently in the midst of a fear-aggressive reactivity meltdown. We were able to have calmer energies and do a better job building the relationship. He quickly picked up a lot of basic skills, and we realized that he is super smart and trainable as long as he isn’t in the midst of panic.

SSRIs kicked in- 4-6 months post-adoption:

The fluoxetine kicked in, and his emotional state was more steady throughout the day (trazodone only really has an affect on him for about 4 hours, but we could only safely dose him every 8 hours. Until the fluoxetine kicked in, every activity of everyone living in our home revolved around the timing of trazodone). With more stable emotion regulation and arousal, we were finally able to make some progress on desensitization. We greatly reduced alarm barking in the house with the Kiki Yablon's thanks for barking protocol. Basic skills became rock solid. Fear aggressive behaviours continued to decrease, until they were never directed towards us at all, and were generally more mild and infrequent.
He was still highly reactive in the outside world, and highly reactive to strangers in our home, but was even beginning to show some small improvement on these fronts. Our bonds became really tight, he came to deeply trust us. He started (occasionally) looking to us for help when scared, instead of aggressing. As long as we were home and conditions were just perfect, he was a well-trained, obedient, apparently perfect dog. Life was really limited because it took extreme management to keep him happy, and walks/ pottying were hell no matter where we went, but even so- this time period was a huge positive tipping point.
We finally had long periods of time each day that were peaceful, happy, and content. He had FINALLY decompressed. It felt like this is when he adopted us back. We implemented consent protocols and cooperative care techniques, which removed a little more stress from each day. We trained rock solid eye contact and began to do some successfule LAT. It took until this point for us to be in a position to really address the part of his issue that looks like what most people call reactivity (barking/lunging/snarling at triggers on a walk or strangers in our home).
We began counterconditioning and desensitizing. We struggled, because he was still too triggered in the environment too often. And it’s haaaard to desensitize a dog who is reactive to almost everything we encounter as soon as we walk out the door, even with the help of a good trainer. But despite the difficulty, we have made some progress. He’s less territorial around our house, and sometimes even likes saying hello to our neighbors. He doesn’t trigger stack as quickly. He can tolerate traffic much better than before (we live on a busy road, so this is important). He recovers from reactions in seconds/ minutes instead of hours/ days. Throughout this period we slowly reduced his trazodone, because it started making him frantic and confused for a couple of hours, and then super dopey for a couple hours (vet and trainer said this is a good indication that his physiological and neurological arousal is generally lower. Yay!).

Now:

We are now 8 months post-adoption. He’s doing really well. We’ve stopped trazodone completely, though we keep some on hand in case he undergoes a major stressor. He’s still on a high dose of fluoxetine. We’re experimenting with CBD to help with his GI distress and possibly reduce anxiety, but it's too soon to say if it is helping yet. Occasionally, when the stars align and our management is perfect (which is exhausting but possible), we can go days without him going way over threshold (at the beginning we would go seconds or minutes). His circle of trusted people has broadened. He can tolerate more/more intense triggers without reacting, and if he does react, he recovers much more quickly. He has a whole beautiful fascinating personality beyond just his fears and behavioural issues. He is silly, playful, mishcevious, intelligent, and sweet. He absolutely adores my husband and me, and we adore him too.
Now we are finally at a point that we can really address his reactivity. But we’re all exhausted, overwhelmed, and burnt out (dog and humans alike), so we’re taking a break from training and desensitizing. We are taking 4-8 weeks to just use management to get by, and take some time to enjoy our happy little family and appreciate how far we’ve come. We’re observing him closely, trying to get better at seeing his subtle stress signals as early as possible. We’re experimenting with his diet, trying to get his gut healthy (maybe the gods will smile on us, and when we finally fix his gut, his fear will disappear. I can dream, right?). I’m devouring Michael Shikashio’s podcast and reading Grisha Stewart’s book. We’re taking time off from constant training to rest, regroup, read, observe, and get ready for the next leg of the journey. Also my husband and I are going to see a therapist, because we're starting to think we may have experienced some (real though mild) trauma in those first few months. We need to get our own mental health back up to par too.
After our break, we’ll be getting back on the horse to really work on desensitizing and socializing him to the outside world. I don’t know exactly what that will look like- BAT, counterconditioning, pattern games... We'll be starting with a new trainer with expertise in complex reactivity and fear aggression. My hope is that she'll do an in-depth assessment and help us make sense of the the complex motivations and emotions my dog experiences when he is triggered, and then we'll all develop a training plan together. I expect it to be a marathon more than a sprint

Takeaways:

So- is my dog able to stay below threshold just because of the medication, or has the medication allowed us do more training, and the training is what has really helped? The answer is both.
We needed the medication to be able to make the first bit of real training progress. And I’m certain the SSRIs are still playing a very important role in keeping his mental state steady. But we no longer need to use the sedative (trazodone). And all our training work has made a huge difference. If all we did was drug him, he would not be as calm, happy, skilled, and able to function as he now is. If all we did was train him, he wouldn't have been able to relax enough to start training.
Management (for us that has included drugs) turns down the volume of experienced huge feelings. Training/behaviour modification teaches how to cope with feelings, and eventually changes them.
Will my dog be on medication forever? I don’t know. I don’t really care. My goal is for my dog and my partner and I to all have a good quality of life. I want us all happy, healthy, and able to navigate our world with confidence and ease. I want joy. I want routines that work for all of us. I want friends and family and some semblance of normal life back. I want Bruno to be able to feel happy and at ease in our world. I want to never have the option of rehoming lurk at the edge of my mind ever again.
If he always needs medication for that to happen, then he will always be on medication. If we continue to make progress with training, and he eventually becomes so resilient that medication is no longer helpful/ necessary, then we will stop the medication. But it doesn’t really matter to me. I care about the goal much more than I care about how we achieve it. The process that will get us to something close to a normal happy life will include an ebb and flow combo of management and training; management makes training possible, training reduces the need for management. I think of medication as a part of management.
I know that the cost of meds is a factor. On the one hand, his meds are an added financial expense, on top of the veterinary bills, specialty diet, thousands in destroyed clothing, enrichment toys, muzzle, harness, and expensive trainer. But if I measure the TRUE cost of getting this dog mentally well, which includes lost connections to friends and family, missed trips and events, the serious toll on my and my husband’s mental health, impact to our careers, hours spent (hundreds/thousands), and oh yeah money too I guess- then medication is one of the cheapest forms of management we've been able to implement. We’re in a good financial position, and I know not everyone can afford to think this way. But for us, ~$200-$300 per month on medication is money very well spent. It probably made the difference between it being possible for us to help him, and him having to be rehomed.
My dog is an extreme case. I sincerely hope that you and your dog will have a much easier journey than we have had and will likely continue to have. But even though your dog is (hopefully) not in as bad shape as mine was, I bet the basic ingredients to change the mind of anyone’s reactive dog are the same. The volume of the dog’s big feelings has to be turned down enough that they can learn, and then they have to be taught to make different choices and feel differently about the world. Management (sometimes including medication) turns down the volume of the feelings. Love, dedication, sacrifice, and science-based behaviour modification training teach the dog.
My advice: Don’t stress about whether or not medication will be a permanent fixture. You can’t possibly know that yet anyways, and it’s only one piece in the large puzzle you will put together to help your dog. Just get busy finding any/every solution that works for you that will get you and your dog some peace from huge reactions. Then get busy on behaviour modification. And in the meantime, take care of yourself too.

Dear fellow INFPs,
I'm addressing this to people who feel like they're stuck mentally. Let me start off by saying eveyone has their own issues, some just bigger than other. Some have more unfortunate situations, others have not-so-bad situations but they experience them negatively, and then there's people who see the beauty of life. Whether you started out with getting help or not, I hope this piece gives you insight in what to do, but especially.. in what order. Looking on the internet there are 1001 ways of therapy, all kinds of guru's who tell you this is THE way! The ONLY way! I mean sure, much of it comes down to the same thing over and over again, but I'm convinced that some things are better before other. Take this account from someone who has been through it, who has tried 101 things, picked the useful ones, who got stuck multiple times, but ultimately can tell you my best experiences. But who am I, except for just another random dude on the intenet?
Where to even start. I've been thinking of writing this piece for a long time but always found reasons to postpone. Ironically. I've been insecure, depressed and suffering from general anxiety disorder for most my life, at least until some time ago. After I tasted the first moments of happiness I made it my mission to keep moving forward, every day possibly better than yesterday. Nine years, a lot of therapy and many hours of psychology self-study later, I want to share with you what I've learned in a condenced form. I'll start off with a little background information. Then I'll follow up with a listed summary followed by why I think doing it in that order is important. Lastly, I'll list a bunch of my sources that helped tremendously. I don't want to make this a feel-sorry story about me so I'll keep it short just for context. If you believe me for my word you can skip one paragraph.
I come from a family with an ISTJ dad and ISFJ mom, both horribly emotionally immature, unavailable, unpredictable and very suspicious of other people. They love me and my brother but were the worst in showing it. My dad hardly talked and stopped playing with us after a motor cycle accident. My mom was burned out most of the time and ready to explode. Now, what kind of things would that teach your kids? They had their own terrible experiences and upbringing, into which I won't go. Not to mention I was born 10 weeks early, lay alone in a machine much time with cordasol basically already coursing through my veins. All in all, me (the quiet good boy) and my brother (the ADHD ESTJ rebel) had completely different lives. He went all out in the rebel behaviour with his gang, vandalism and drugs, whereas I found out about Maplestory and built up an alternate life there, eventually also with drugs. (Real) friends, what are those? Getting beat up twice as freshman, who cares. The Fight/Flight/Freeze response was strong and consistent already at 15 y/o. I didn't know it at the time but the result was a near-permanent pressure on the Solar Plexus, always being tired and having burst of sweat when I came in social situations. The sweat didn't particulatly make it better. You want to try that new thing? Ah better not, you hurt yourself once as a kid so now everything is too dangerous.
The result is what you may expect. A very quiet, badly nail biting, skitterish mommy-child ' adult' who bursts into tears on random moments when alone, never knowing exactly what causes the pain. My first steps in self improvement happened by accident when I went off for further education in the capital. One roommate of mine studied psychology and he introduced me to a mindfulness training.
This is where it starts.
But now? What good is my story without a testimony? Now I'm finally starting a career, regardless of some obstacles. I don't nail bite anymore and handle stress way more easily. I was the star waiter of our restaurant and I'm having my first stand up comedy gig next week as well as acting school. Right now I work as the "very likeable" office manager at a sustainability company. Not everything is perfect, e.g. attachment to a partner and my ability in decision making, but it's all a process. Step by step. Keep your target (happiness?!) in mind and keep going.
(Step one and two are not processes but rather state of mind from which to work on. Let it sink in but don't get stuck on it.)
Step one: Acceptance of your own imperfection. It's okay.
This step sounds obvious but I don't think it is in practice. Too many people I've talked to are ready to talk about the bad things that happen in their life but as soon as you start about their OWN role in the situation, they will get all defensive and maybe even antagonized. Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has bad experiences that colour their judgement of things and the way they act. Only if you accept this and what you have done in the past as fact, only then you are open minded enough to change. Otherwise, whatever you'll learn what could've helped you, you'll dismiss from your mind as soon as you leave the therapist, either from stubbornness or as a unconscious selfdefence reflex because you don't accept that yes, also you have weaknesses. This counts especially for people whose insecurity is being percieved as weak, dumb or unlikable. You see, if your insecurity is that you're not good enough, then how painful is it to accept that yes, you have inherent flaws? LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE? That's what keeps people from learning. That's what's keeping people from changing. Accept that you're not perfect and have things to change. Why else are you looking for help? It's like an addiction where you don't like the addiction but the alternative seems worse.
Lastly, know that your perception of others is probably not true. Only you know you because you know your thoughts. You don't see the mind of other people. If only you knew. Other people may seem saint-like but they aren't. Even the nicest people have some dark(er) characteristics and their own insecurities. Once you recognize this you may not feel so crazy anymore. Guess what, the battle between your little devil and angel is a human thing. The difference, though, is that you're open to change. The difference is that you are not in denial or oblivious of your mistakes like your aunt Hilda.
Step two: Accept your own agency and so reject victimhood.
Let me introduce you to my ex-roommate Petrus (pseudonym), who always talked about his troubles in life and how life failed him. The thing is, he'd always go on and on about how it was the effing police who fired him, how it was the effing insurance company who effed him over, how it is the effing women who are all whores and bitches anyway so why bother. His near-exact words. Never him, though! Oh no, that would receive a "yea sure.... but..!" with a scowl. While deep down all this talk is fueled by deep rooted insecurities and pain. You think you're not like that, and you're probably right. At least not to the same degree as he. Be ready to take responsibility for your own (re)actions.
I understand that doing step one and two are actually quite hard. I just mean to point out that as long as you are aware of them, you can change. You'll find out along the way in what ways your own behaviour has shaped your life so far, and what you can do in turn to change it. Life is like a beach, it is up to you to make your sand castle with upcoming waves and running kids. Like everybody else. The roommate mentioned above never accepted his agency and so did NOT have any results from the same therapist that I had. And whom he quit after one session. Scary, I know.
I cannot stress enough that self-reflection is key for anyone who's willing to change !!!
Step three: What do I feel and why?
Or in other words: the popular phenomena called Mindfulness and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. What it boils down to is the focus on self-awareness, to get a good insight into your own emotions and how it subconsciously affects your daily life. Before you quit reading: this is only the start. It is the difference between your mask and your underlying feeling. For instance, I would have the emotional 'mask' of being the joker and pleaser, only because WITHOUT doing that, I'd feel... well, uncomfortable. Now this uncomfortable feeling is important to figure out. For me I could summarize it with "I am not enough" and "I am not likeable". God it sounds so simple in a few sentences but this is a process of trying and trialing, where you'll think it was one thing, but it was something deeper, or they could all be summarized in one overarching insecurity. Finding out your mask personas is an important but scary step. Without your mask you'll feel remarkably vulnerable.
Now, I do not know where you are or if something similar is near to you. However, a good therapist will help you decipher your insecurities and underlying sadness. Understanding what you feel and why is step 3. You will NOT get here just through talking about your day unless the other specialist knows what they're doing, for the simple reason that many people are unaware of many of their reactions in daily life and what childhood trauma's they may have surpressed. Otherwise you'll just repeat the lines you tell yourself without going deeper. Such therapists should have their license revoked ffs.
Step three 'n half: grounding a.k.a. to get into contact with your feelings
There's much to be found online about grounding so by all means find other technique if mine doesn't work for you. I'd suggest you first try the most common way. Don't, the more you do it the faster you can do this. It takes me 20 seconds tops. Anyway: sit up on a chair without distractions nearby, eyes closed, hands on lap, feet on the ground. Take a couple of deep breaths. 4 seconds in, hold 4 seconds, 4 seconds out. Blow out like you blow out a candle. While you do this you repeat to yourself ' relax' or 'calm' or 'it's okay, you're safe' or whichever works for you.Then, take all your attention to your left foot. Feel the contact with the ground. Feel any (dis)comfort, any pain, itch, whether its cold, warm. Observe it, don't analyze it. It's not wrong, it's not good. It's just.. there. After you're ready you go to the left calf. Same thing. Feel the cold, warmth, the pressure, an itch, anything. It's not wrong, it's not good. It's just.. there. It's you. Hold your attention before going to your left thigh. Keep this process throghout your body. In the end, after your face is calm. Forehead is smooth. Eyes are relaxed. Jaw is loose. Deep breath and turn your attention to what you're feeling. Where is it? In your head? In your stomach? For me it's the solar plexus but it differs. Feel the emotion. It's not wrong, it's not good. It's just.. there. Accept it. Name it.
Side note: you may get distracted often. This is fine. Don't get mad at yourself as this only works negatively. Accept it, see it happen like a cloud drifting by and return your attention.
Side note 2: Accepting the emotion is very important. I had issues with that but getting mad at yourself for feeling something will only make things worse and is counter productive. Anyway why would you? Think of a friend. Can he feel lonely sometimes? Of course.
Congratulations, now you are what we call in contact with your feeling. This is DIFFERENT than the self-pitying saddness that's more common. THIS is the emotion that you can process. THIS is the emotion you can write down, cry out, talk about, whatever works for you. Also at the therapist. Especially at the therapist. It may feel redundant to do it with the little steps but believe me, if you're not used to grounding yourself then this is how to start. Sometimes it's harder than other, depending on your state-of-mind at the moment. Later you'll be used to it and 'go to your feeling' faster and more naturally than doing a detailed body scan. You're right if you think it's akin to meditation. Trust me. It's a human thing. You can do it too. Some people have put away their emotions deep down in order to protect themselves and for them it may be harder.
IMPORTANT: learning to ground may also mean you're nearer to your emotions. This is a good thing, as long as your work with them! Depending on the severity of your repressed traumas, it is highly advised to involve a therapist. You don't want to open up a well of misery only to do nothing with it. More on that in the next paragraph
Step four: Accept your past hurtful experiences. Process the associated emotions
This step is actually really important, and I wish I had done it way earlier. It would have saved me maybe three years. Okay so see it like this. Two things to remember. First: emotions that you experience but were unable to express will STAY in your body. Your body is like an emotional hard drive and somewhere there's tension building up. Second: this system you can compare to a hydrolic dam. Imagine: when there's a bit of water in the reservoir, there's no problem. When there's more water in the reservoir it's also okay, but the force on the dam builds up. Still more water all kind of okay, except that the dam is under a lot of pressure. A relatively small damage has to happen for cracks to appear and water to escape. This is exactly how it works with emotions. This is how people have sudden burts of rage, sudden burst of sadness, over relatively small incidents. They just... burst. This tension in addition with perfectionism are root causes for burn out as well. Just how much energy must it take? Anyway, as for the actual processing, I have a few tips.
The major one is a therapy called Somatic Experiencing. This is specialized in bringing up past emotions, even from when you were just a baby (I can tell..). All the stored up emotions will affect your daily life, likely without you noticing. It literally changes the way you react to things. E.g. how you react to some kinds of jokes, to how you may be very sensitive to situations, may feel angry or sad all the time, but also your attachment style in relationships. For me, processing all my fears and feelings of loneliness and betrayal on my innocense has given room for love, compassion, joy/playfulness and a general peace of body.
All in all, therapists are recommended.
Something else is a rage room. This is a place where people come together to literally scream and let emotions out. No experience there, just heard about it. I would think that the problem here is guidance. You can release stuff, but only things you are aware about. A good therapist can ask questions that will trigger things you can't do yourself. If you don't, you'll just scream from frustration which doesn't help much just like shower crying. Still, if you do it right I'm sure it may help.
NOTE: before going here, read the paragraph about grounding. This is an important asset without which you'll not get the results you want.
Step Five: self improvement. Learn by doing. Train your subconsciousness by experience.
It may feel like this step is late in the cycle, however it is not for nothing. To use the metaphor, Would it be easier to upgrade your dam into a hydraulic energy generating dam while the reservoir is still full, or while the water level is low? It is not to be underestimated how much internal conflicts will colour your perspective on yourself and the outside world. This is a major mistake I made, and what many therapists will still try.
Self-Improvement really means to use your self reflection to not just see what you do, but mainly what do you want to do with it? Let's say hypothetically you feel like you don't speak up enough. You've found out this is because of an underlying insecurity, in this case maybe that you feel unimportant because your parents never acknowledged any idea that you
I'd suggest journaling. Or rather, emotion analyzing and bring them up while writing. Ground yourself first. The goal is to FEEL the emotion and so process it without storing it up again. Cry about it if you need to. You know when children are sad, then cry a lot, then are running around happily again? Same with us adults. INFP or no. Except that we, with a little training, can actually name what we're feeling. Warning: this should only be really possible after some mindfulness. Firstly, because how else are you going to identify your own emotions? And secondly, you need to learn to 'ground' yourself, go into 'feeling mode'. Without it, it'll just be feeling sad because you feel sorry for yourself, instead of addressing the emotion itself. Wallowing in your sadness (this case: own victimhood) will only make things WORSE in an vicious cycle of negative affirmation. This happened to me. It's not pretty.
Look at yourself and the traits you want different. Maybe you want to be more orderly? Show love to people? Give a presentation without feeling like you're fainting? Write them down and what you would like instead. Don't push yourself by commiting to do everything. Just as much as you're comfortable with. Think of a dog for example. When a dog gets hit by a human he may just become aggressive or wimpering with his tail between his legs the next time he sees a human. Dogs are not aggressive or flightful from the start, but they learned that certain things are dangerous or scary. You teach an animal that something is not scary by slowly making it get used to the target. The same with humans, except that we're such complex creatures that sometimes it's hard to say exactly what makes you uncomfortable. This is literally what people mean with 'stepping outside your comfort zone'. It's not for nothing. It's not only for 'those bloody daredevils'. It's for a person to get used to situations. I had a fear in front of the class but I forced myself, after some proper therapy, to stand in front of a class to teach exams. Yes I was nervous. I had to calm myself several times, and I reflected on in afterwards. Well now, that actually went better than all the imaginative situations I had before! And even if it doesn't go well you can still write down WHAT you fked up and try to do better next time. Be mindful. Take steps.
Conclusion
It's a lot and I think I can add more but then it would be a book. I hope from this piece will bring structure to the whirlpool of information that's available. I'm not even sure 'regular' psychologists know this, as I've tried a bunch and they all start with something else. Every step is necessary, but some will work best only after the previous steps have been taken.
Now I'm tired. I'll write a proper summary after I see how this is recieved in the comments. Would love to hear feedback, questions, maybe even critique. Take care, you crazy diamond you.
Helpful sources:
Mindfulness training, meditation guides, Chakra healing (yes really)
Fysiotherapist on youtube to work on posture (you'll be surprised). I recommend Body Fix Exercises channel, to the point and effective.
Therapies: EMDR, Cognitive behavioural therapy, Somatic Experiencing
INFP guides on Personality Hacker
Attachment style podcasts (sorry mine was in Dutch)
Books / audiobooks
J. Peterson's 12 rules for life + many lectures on having a meaningful life. (whatever your stance or opinion on politics, his psychological knowledge is undeniable)
Lindsay C Gibson's Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
M. Gladwell's Talking to Strangers
Mark Manson's The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck
Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now
I'd suggest audio book because it moves me more, however I guess it's personal.

Im(19F) graduated from high school a week ago, and for as long as I could remember I've wanted to leave. I've applied to and accepted into a universit in a different state with their presidential merit scholarship so finances aren't the main immediate concern.
However, I grew up in a very traditional, conservative, asian family so this is way out of the norm. Especially in my family. Growing up, my parents have always been very very controlling and outright abusive. Emotionally, mentally, physically, and sexually to not just me, but my younger brother.
I told my parents that I planned to go out of state after pondering for a long time. I didn't know how they'd react and I was so sure theyd try to hurt me in whatever way they could. My bank account was created when I was 17, so my father co-signed and my parents have access to all my money. They can see every transaction, every deposit, and can even take out money as they pleased. I worked for a year to save up all I could, and the fact that they would take my money.
It was radio silence for a while and they acted like I never said anything. But lately my mom has been amping up the emotional manipulation ×10. Saying things like she didn't have a daughter and that I was "broken" and needed fixing for wanting to leave my parents. I ignore it as I always do, but then last night she dropped the bomb that my dad was planning to follow me to Florida and live there until I graduate I am freaking out. It makes me hyperventilate at the thought of being a goddamn servant for him, being in a house, much less a room with him after everything he did to me as a kid. I planned on moving in with my boyfriend (that they don't know of because they're major racists) and I didn't plan on telling them until after we got engaged. But sweet lord I am absolutely terrified. Even if he didn't move with me, he has family there and they expect me to live with them.
I've lost sleep over this and I can't even breath most times I think about it. My flight has been booked and I was planning on telling them that the school sent me the ticket. I can't pen a new bank account until I have an address for the new place. But they have access to my money, my location, and pay my phone bill. I don't think anything will deter them and I just want to avoid the fight. I'm so tired of yelling and the fighting, the guilt tripping. Being in this house is so suffocating and I want to leave so bad.

Side by side, we continued on our path, skirting through the lower section of the factory. After my initial shock, my heart rate had slowed to a healthier pace again. Frankie had assured me that his old boss most likely hadn’t heard us (“She used to have her earbuds in all the time with the volume cranked way up—you couldn’t have gotten her attention if you’d tried”), but we still considered it prude to move forward at a more hurried pace.
We soon came to the conclusion that we would have to go up one of the outside staircases. Frankie admitted in humiliation that his memories of the factory weren’t as accurate as he’d thought—either that or FunFlair had made a few changes to the building. The upper floor containers all had glass doors, presenting us with a sticky problem. If we were to go up there directly, we’d probably be spotted immediately.
“This warrants a change of plans,” I declared soberly, keeping my voice low. “We’ll have to knock her out, then.”
Frankie whimpered.
“Wouldn’t you like that?” I prompted. “I’d be the one to do it, of course.”
“Ye-es.” He shuddered. “It’d be satisfactory for sure, but that’s only assuming nothing goes wrong.”
“She can hardly be stronger than I am.”
“No. I guess not. She, uh… yeah.”
“Let’s go, then.” I offered an encouraging smile as I started leading the way back outside.
We rounded the container with the lights on inside, ascending the metal grate staircase connected to it. Every step carried us closer towards the light. Just before the door fully came into view, I turned to Frankie one last time. “Are you alright? This’ll be it in a moment.”
He made another chew-toy sound.
“Fran, what is it? If you know something I don’t about what might happen in there…”
“She shouldn’t see me,” he squeaked out. “I can’t control myself around her.”
“I don’t understand; did you two use to be an item?”
“No! No, no, no. I can’t explain it any other way. She can make me do things I don’t want,” he told me, his tone growing in desperation.
“How?”
“It’d take too long to explain now, it’s… it’s really very complicated. Please, can you do it without me? I can’t go up there after all, I’m so sorry but I can’t…”
I sighed, leaning in to put my arms around him. “It’s okay,” I whispered into his hair. “I’ll do it. Wait here.”
“I’m so, so sorry, Eva. I swear I’ll make it up to you. This is the last time I’ll ask something like this of you.”
“I doubt it,” I replied. “But it’s okay.” I drew back, reluctantly letting go of him. “For now, it’s okay.” I continued marching up the stairs. Behind the glass door, a feminine figure in a black rubber apron came into view. She seemed to be nimbly skirting around another operating table, this one occupied by a fully formed, petite doll. Now or never. I reached for the doorhandle, pushed it down and crossed the threshold in a single, large step. I slammed the door shut behind my back, drawing the attention of the woman.
She looked up at me, her eyes widening in shock behind her thick glasses. With a swipe of her slender fingers, she removed her earbuds, dropping them into her pocket.
“Are you Philomena Wallis?” I asked.
For a split second, she appeared to be too stunned to speak. Her pale face was framed by messy strands of jet-black hair that had worked their way out of her long ponytail. When she broke from her silence, she spoke with an irritatingly pearly voice. “Who’s asking?”
“A former delivery girl. Well, are you?”
“I am. I don’t understand; I-I’ve never seen you before… How did you end up here? What do you want?”
I took in a deep breath. I glanced over at the door, inwardly cursing myself for what I was about to ask her. “I need to know what you did to Frankie Preston.”
For a couple seconds, silence reigned. The other woman was staring at me with knotted brows. “I don’t know who you’re talking about,” she said finally.
“About yay high—,” I raised my hand above my head, “slightly built, blond curly hair, dreamy smile…”
Philomena narrowed her eyes. I cleared my throat, holding her gaze. Then a look of cold comprehension settled on her features. “Oh my god,” she muttered. “Holy shit… hold on.” She turned around, pulling up a photo on her computer. “Is that him?”
I cautiously stepped closer to get a better look, only to shrink back slightly. It was, indeed, a picture of Fran. He was entirely naked in it, lying on a table similar to the one I was standing in front of now, his wrists and ankles locked in restraints. His neck was craned, his face averted. The camera had caught him mid-motion, a blur around his head visually conveying a kind of violence in the movement. I couldn’t bear to look at it any longer. Instead, I moved closer to the doll on Philomena’s table, taking her in fully. Another blonde—her hair was straight, though. Her body was exaggeratedly curvy, her face delicate and fawn. Speechless, I locked eyes with Philomena from across the room again. She gave me a light shrug. “You look like you need some time for this to sink in,” she remarked, drawing out the words. “I take it you didn’t have all the information previously.”
“That’s okay,” I replied. “I think I get it now.” My head felt empty, my own voice seemingly echoing back and forth between my ears.
“So, you know my prototype,” she stated, confusion and disbelief mixing in her tone. “He told you how to get here, then?”
“In a way.”
“And you came here to find out,” she concluded. “There’s not much I can tell you that you haven’t figured out by now. We wanted to create the most detailed doll there was. He was our first attempt. I started developing him back in the late nineties as just a hopeful pet project. I kept adding more functions as time went on, though, and he turned into an insanely lucrative prospect. I wanted him to be able to move and dance and mimic an airflow, and it worked out better than I’d ever expected. So he can do a lot of things, but I never intended for him to have any sensory awareness or to talk… I have no idea how that happened. It just did. One day, I turned him on and he simply looked at me. There was something different about his eyes, and I knew right away he wasn’t the same as before. And then of course he spoke.”
A shudder ran through her entire upper body at the memory. “I have no idea how. None of us did at the time. He had no recorded voice lines or anything of the sort. And yet, he opened up his mouth and there was just… words coming out, like.” She shook her head in bewilderment at the memory. “After I got over the initial shock, I realized how big of a problem this was. He was telling me to stay away from him; he wouldn’t do a thing I told him anymore. There was my best invention in the entire field yet, rebelling like a teenager. When I tried to get him back in line, he got physical, too. Thrashed around like crazy. One of my assistants ended up concussed because that thing threw him down a flight of stairs. So we had to put an end to that, as well.”
A faint feeling of nausea seeped into the pit of my stomach, strengthening by the second. “What did you do?”
“Well, we had to take him apart, of course! And put him back together. Wash, rinse, repeat. We kept trying to figure out what was wrong with him, or at least to find a way to stop his babbling and hitting people. We didn’t, though. We managed to control his outbursts, though. He was made to react to voice commands, but obviously, that wasn’t working anymore. So after the umpteenth time we rebuilt him, we managed to make it so he couldn’t physically attack people. Don’t ask me about the finer details of his programming; the process was beyond tedious. Anyways, he kept talking and moving around on his own even afterwards. He’d only listen to what we told him occasionally and even then, he’d mouth off. We didn’t want to discard all the progress we’d made, though. He was still an incredibly well-made doll, even if he was… apparently possessed and sentient.
“We built two more like him. We tried harder with their faces seeing as that of the prototype had fallen very far into the uncanny valley. They turned out great, perfectly shaped and working smoothly. Their development took a lot less time than that of the prototype. Once we were sure they were all good, we started talking about destroying the first one. We’d kept him locked up in the meantime, but the little fucker kept on breaking out. We’d literally cuff him to the wall and moments later, he’d come up behind me and scare me half to death. He was becoming a bigger nuisance every day. We were set on taking him apart a final time, but before we could, he disappeared. He’d destroyed all our equipment he’d gotten his hands on, stolen unnameable sums from our online banking accounts—Lord knows how he did that—and worst of all, he somehow managed to… activate the two new builds. He destroyed most of the cameras, but the footage that was left clearly showed them walking around with him. And that’s that.” She palmed her forehead. “How did he get away from the people I sent after him?”
“Largely with my help.”
“Huh. So who are you?”
“Still just a former delivery girl.” Shrugging off my jacket, I made room for my extra limbs to breach my skin, simultaneously opening my mouth as my teeth morphed into fangs.
Philomena watched my transformation almost disaffectedly. Her steps as she carried herself over to her operating table however nearly faltered. Before I could advance on her, she’d cupped the sleeping dolls cheeks, causing the limp body to spring to life. The mannequin’s head jerked up along with her torso. In several clipped, mechanical movements, she slid off the surface, placing her naked feet on the floor. Her eyes flew open, fixing me with an empty glare.
“I don’t know what the fuck you are or what you want from me,” Philomena began, “but I’ve got weak nerd arms. So have fun dealing with this instead.”
I shrank back a step, the memory of Frankie picking me up like I weighed nothing fresh in my mind. Phil pressed her lips to the side of the puppet’s face, whispering something I couldn’t make out before quickly drawing aside. Before I could do so much as blink, the doll was upon me, crossing the distance between us in one impressive leap. She toppled me over, instantly reaching for my throat. I batted her cold, rubbery hands away, then pried her off of me with all my might. Using two of my tentacles, I flung her aside, sending her crashing into a shelf in the corner. Not wasting another second, I lunged at Wallis, delivering a blow to her head that sent her staggering. She sank back against her desk and I lashed out at her once more, briefly shutting my eyes to spare myself the sight of her face connecting squarely with the wooden surface as I bashed her down on against it.
She fell limp, and while I wasn’t sure if she was still breathing or not, I didn’t take the time to check. Her puppet was rising to her feet again, striding towards me in a vacantly determined fashion. I whirled around, bursting through the door and taking two steps at once. Frankie was waiting for me at the bottom of the metal staircase, his face falling when he caught my expression.
“Knocked her out,” I gasped. “We have a problem, though.”
Fran looked up at the glass door, the hinges of which were already groaning under the pressure of the mannequin throwing herself against it from the inside. With a sharp crack, a tear began to grow on the thick pane, and Frankie cursed loudly. “Get away from here!” he hollered, nudging me into the general direction of the woods. “I doused everything I could find down here,” he explained quickly. “If Phil’s out, I’ll do her room, too.”
“What about the—”
“Never you mind that! I can hold her off no problem.”
“I won’t—”
“You literally took out the one thing holding me back,” he insisted. “I’m not letting you get hurt out here. Just wait for me over by the trees.”
I still wouldn’t budge, so he grabbed a bunch of my tentacles and used them to turn me around. “Get your cute-ass face out of here, Sunshine!”
I started running, albeit reluctantly. A loud crashing noise rang out from behind me as the door burst under Phil’s puppet’s onslaught, but I forced myself to keep from turning around. Ignoring the searing hot feeling of panic raging inside my chest, I carried myself further and further away from the scene, only stopping when I reached the treeline. There, pressing myself up against the rough bark of the nearest trunk just to ground myself, I resigned to staring at the containers. I couldn’t see the waiter from where I was standing, but my eyes remained trained on the factory. They were gradually drying out, but despite the pain, I kept them wide open. I didn’t dare to blink.
For several minutes, all was still. The only sound I could hear was the frantic beating of my own heart and my pulse thrumming in my ears. Then, all of a sudden, inferno broke loose. Bright flames started to spread from around the sides of the building, quickly rising high into the sky. Crackling and roaring, they soon enveloped the entire site, lighting up the rooms behind the formerly dark windows. And emerging from the fire like a bird of myth came Frankie Preston. He was running, but with a light spring in his step that almost made it look like he was dancing.
He came to a halt in front of me, lifting his head to meet my gaze. His expression was difficult to read. It still looked empty, but in a different way. In a good way. “Hi,” he began.
“Hi.”
The firelight was bouncing off his curls and playing on his thick lashes, putting a reddish glint into his eyes. “You’re beautiful,” I added.
He drew in a little closer. No gasp preceded his smile. “Thanks.”
“How are you feeling?”
“I, uh… I don’t know yet.” He glanced between me and the burning containers.
“Okay. Take your time.” I stretched my arms and rolled my shoulders, shrugging my additional limbs back into the inside of my body.
“Say, where do they go when you don’t have them out?” Frankie asked with a raised brow.
“I never know.”
“Hm.” He turned to stand at my side. At first, his knuckles merely grazed mine, then he flipped his hand to link his fingers with mine. I briefly smiled at his profile, then went back to admiring the flames.
“Do you think the whole woods are gonna burn down?”
“Probably not,” he replied, shrugging. “Though that would be pretty cool…” He trailed off when I shot him a reprimanding look. “Yeah, yeah, we can call the fire fighters or whatever. Later, though, alright?”
I rested my head against the side of his arm. “Sure. Later.”
For a couple minutes, neither of us spoke. The only sound was the steady crackling and occasional thump as bit by bit, the structure collapsed. “So, um… this is pretty amazing,” Fran said in a low voice. “I mean, it’s not like I’ve never been happy before; my life’s kind of had its ups and downs, it’s just that this is better than any up there’s been so far. I guess I’m just really grateful and you ought to know that.”
“Don’t worry, I know.” I paused. “Can we get out of here? The place is starting to stink.”
He nodded agreeably and we turned our backs on the scene, only for our retreat to be abruptly stopped by a garbled, drawn-out screech. We spun around in perfect synchronicity. I couldn’t stop myself from letting out a sharp cry of shock. From the burning wreckage, a figure dragged itself forth on her hands. Philomena’s puppet had suffered immense damage in the fire. Her skin, obviously not made to withstand extreme heat, was melting off her face like molten candle wax. The wires that were bared beneath gave off angry sparks. She couldn’t seem to get up anymore, her legs were beyond repair and her movements overall were getting more and more arduous. She dug her fingers into the ground, pulling her body across the forest floor in slow, pained jerks.
“What the fuck? I thought I switched her off,” Frankie uttered beside me, sounding just as terrified as I felt.
“What do we do?” I exhaled the words in a single quick breath, unable to take my eyes off the doll.
“I got no idea… I-I don’t wanna deal with this…”
“We need to help her or something, she’s—she’s awake!” Before I could say anything else, the doll had emerged from the blaze. Rolling around, she managed to quench the remaining flames, pressing the dirt and leaves into her own dripping, melting body. Finally, she started trying to push herself up into a sitting position, only to fail miserably. I took a slow, tentative step towards her twitching form. Her face was contorted into a nightmarish grimace, and she let out an incomprehensible gurgle upon noticing me approaching. She reached out a mangled hand and I stumbled backwards before she could grab my ankle.
Despite the heat, beads of cold, fearful sweat were running down my face. I had no idea what to do. “We can’t leave her,” I said, my throat bone-dry. “There’s something in there, she’s not like before.”
Fran let out an exasperated, long-suffering sigh. “Is there any use in arguing?”
“Don’t be so cold.”
“Aren’t you used to it by now?”
I turned to look at him over my shoulder. He met my gaze and I could see something in his features change or perhaps even soften. He threw his head back, then pulled out his phone. “This is gonna ruin my night, but fine. I’m calling that insufferable news lady.”
X
1
2: deadbeat roommate
3: creepy crush
4: relocation
5: beach concert
6: First date
7: Temp work
8: roommate talk
9: a dismal worldview
10: warehouse
11: staircase
12: explanation
13: hurt
14: hospital
15: ocean
16: diner
17: government work
18: something in the caves
19: shopping cart
20: olms and Jewels
21: long hair
22: recruitment
23: waitresses
24: dollhouse

this is going to be a long one because there are a lot of things i want to talk about, but i didn't want to spam the subreddit.
my (20F) boyfriend (22M) and i have been dating for around 8 months now, he's my first official relationship. when we were around the 2 month mark, i told my parents about him, and around the 6 month mark they briefly met him when he drove me home from college once.
even before i met him i've always been wary about mentioning my romantic life and interests around my mom. it primarily stems from when i was young and had a crush on a friend, she found out, ridiculed and punished me for it. i always worried she would react negatively to me being in a relationship. while she had a lot of questions and was mad at me for "springing it on her" (she always says that me telling her something is springing it on her), she's been mostly positive.
now i feel that she's too positive, if that makes any sense. she likes him but now she thinks that she knows better than me when it comes to him. for example, my bf and i went suit shopping and she wanted to see the photos i took of him in all the different suits. every time i said i liked a certain color on him, she said i didn't know what i was talking about and that it didn't suit him (haha, SUIT, get it?), and vice versa if i said i didn't like a color on him. another time while on vacation i was picking out a sweater for him that he offered to pay for, but my mom hated everything i chose saying it wouldn't look good on him (mind you she met him once and for ten minutes). granted, because we were in a foreign country she was the one paying for it until we got back and he could write her a check, so she reasoned that she have more say in what sweater we picked.
i feel like she wants to have control and a large role in my relationship with him when i'd rather keep it separate from her. i've expressed this to my bf every time he mentions doing something to win her over - taking her out to dinner, buying her gifts. despite explaining otherwise, he's still under the impression that whenever she gets angry with me concerning our relationship, that it means she hates him. that couldn't be farther from the truth - she loves him.
it's frustrating for me when she gets involved in our relationship because she gets angry with me over every little thing. the other week my bf and i went to his friend's wedding. it was probably on both of us for not confirming travel plans earlier because he forgot to check how long it would take to both pick me up AND get to the venue, which became an issue because he wouldn't get off work in time to make it to the ceremony. this resulted in him throwing a plan in the air and asking me to ask my parents if it would be okay, but after i asked he would present another plan and ask me to ask again. this happened a few times until i got frustrated and told him that we needed to figure something out together and stick to it (which we did).
in the end, we were a little late to the ceremony, but got there in time for the important stuff (the vows and the officiant making a really weird and uncomfortable speech). however, the next day my mom confronted me because she looked at the ring camera at the time we left and saw that i only had one shoe on (i was holding back my aggressive dog from my bf inside the house since my dog refused to leave my side, would not have ended well in both heels). she got mad that i was rushing out of the house and blamed me that we were running late, even after i explained that we were late because my bf had a work call that ran longer than expected, and why i only had one shoe on.
she then said it was ridiculous that our plans kept changing a million times as for when we would leave and how we would get to the venue. i thought she'd be on my side, so i went "oh yeah i was really frustrated that he kept changing plans", but she said it was my fault and that i should have planned everything to begin with since he was doing me a favor and driving me.
her scolding turned into the usual "you don't help enough around the house, you're not up early enough, you're not doing enough" spiel (which i'll probably make another post about).
right now i'm on a flight for work and i was on a long call with my bf in the airport, and some of the topics we spoke about got me to think more about my mom in the context of my relationship with my bf. i expressed that as soon as i move out (which i hope is soon, but i know i'll be too scared to do so until she finally kicks me out) that i want to go no contact with her. i also know that when i do try and move out what her reaction will be - she will most likely say i'm too young to be moving out and turn on my bf, claiming that he's manipulating me and a bad influence.
i'm worried about how my mom is going to end up treating him as our relationship continues, i'm also worried about how she's going to treat me. she makes me feel like a bad girlfriend.

Gorilla Trekking from Kampala
How to trek mountain Gorillas from Uganda’s Capital Kampala – Kampala City excursion.
Kampala walking tours – Gorilla Trekking in Uganda.
It’s almost impossible to start planning for a gorilla trekking safari through Uganda without putting Kampala as part of the gorilla trekking adventure.
Combining a one-day Kampala city tour with Gorilla trekking gives you a blend of mixed cultures with an excellent wildlife encounter thus offering you the best African gorilla trekking safari of a lifetime.
Kampala is the pulsating heart of Uganda’s economic, social, cultural, and intellectual life. It is also the country’s largest urban center, with a population of 3.1 million (Microtrends 2020). And is the capital city of Uganda. Like Rome, Uganda’s capital was initially built across seven hills, but today, it sits on about two dozen hills.
Kampala derives its name from the local Luganda language saying ‘Akosozi k’empala,‘ meaning ‘Hill of Antelope.’ This a reference to the domestic impala (impala) antelope, which grazed the lawns of Mengo during Buganda’s King Mutesa’s reign in the 1880s.
Historically, Kampala Hill and the surrounding hills had lain at the Buganda Kingdom’s political center for several decades before the arrival of the first Europeans. Capt Fredrick Lugard arrived in 1890 and set up camp on Kampala Hill, so he is generally considered the founder.
You can choose to Visit Kampala either before or after your gorilla trekking adventure.
Some of the Iconic places and areas you can’t miss while planning for your Gorilla trekking from Kampala include the following.
Kampala City Center
Kampala’s most obvious reference point is the modern mufti-storied city center on Nakasero Hill. It is surrounded by more discreet but no less identifiable landmarks on neighboring summits.
Old Kampala Hill
Old Kampala Hill towers just a few hundred meters southwest of the city center, enclosed within the oval Old Kampala Road. Fine colonial buildings of Asian design mushroom the hill, generally somewhat rundown or strikingly renovated.
Old Kampala is historically known as Capt Lugard’s 1899 encampment site. It’s most notable today as the focal point for Kampala’s Islamic community and the sight of an imposing Uganda National Mosque.
Lubiri
Due south of Old Kampala, Kabaka’s Twekobe Palace stands on the broad, low hill of Lubiri. The ill-fated Kabaka Edward Mutesa was driven from this palace in 1966 by Idi Amin on Obote’s orders. The army subsequently occupied the site until 1993, gaining a reputation for terror. Amin and Obote’s agents took hundreds through its gates, never to be seen again.
Namirembe and Rubaga hills
Lubiri is neighboring Namirembe (Mengo) and Rubaga hills in the southwest, elevated by Anglican and Catholic cathedrals. The imposing dome identifies St Paul’s on Namirembe Hill and Rubaga Cathedral by two bell towers.
Mengo and Rubaga are Kampala’s oldest suburbs affluent in history and historic architecture, including the Royal Palace.
Bulange Building
Less than 500m past the turn-off to Namirembe, the Bulange Building — the traditional seat of the Buganda Parliament — stands on the south side of Albert Cook Road, directly opposite the junction with Sentema Road. It is one of the most impressive colonial-era buildings in Uganda.
Makerere Hill
Northeast of Namirembe is Makerere Hill, commonly known for housing the country’s oldest University. A white bell tower of Makerere University used to be visible on the green ridge of Makerere Hill until accidental fires gutted it in September 2020
Gorilla trekking In Uganda
Gorilla Trekking Information – Mountain Gorillas In Uganda
Most of these mountain gorillas do reside in South Western Uganda in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park. This Park consists of almost half of the number of Mountain Gorillas that are believed to be remaining in the whole world.
It’s also believed that the remaining Chimps in the entire world Co-exist in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park. For any interested person willing to visit Ugandan gorillas, you must pay for a gorilla trekking permit that goes for USD 700.00 per trek per person.
Mgahinga National Park; this park is found in the Virunga ranges shared between Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Rwanda. This Park is also another place that is known for being a home of Ugandan gorillas.
Gorilla trekking experience:
For a person to have a wonderful, memorable, and unforgettable adventure you will have to endure all the efforts needed to reach Bwindi and trek through this wonderful natural forest. There are thirteen habituated gorilla groups for tourists to trek. And all these groups are found in different sectors such as Buhoma, Nkuringo, and others are habituated in the Ruhija and Rushaga regions of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park
A proposed itinerary for Gorilla trekking from Kampala.
These four days gorilla trekking safari is going to allow you to watch two of the many Gorilla groups in this impenetrable forest. Therefore, allowing you two good hours of interaction with these primates and maybe a community walk to see the Batwa people and see how they live their daily lives.
Tour Highlights
Day 1: Kampala City Tour.
Day 2: Transfer to Bwindi Impenetrable National Game Park.
Day 3: Gorilla trekking in Bwindi Impenetrable.
Day 4: Transfer to Kampala
Detailed Itinerary
Day one
Kampala city tour
Early morning after breakfast, you will be picked up from your hotel of residence, for a tour of Kampala. We will visit the key sites that make Kampala a unique tourist destination and these will include the King’s Palace, the kingdom parliament, Namirembe and Rubaga Cathedral, the old Kampala Mosque, and nakasero Hill. Owino market, the Kabakas lake, and end with the Visit to ndere center for an evening of cultural performances.
We will return to the Lodge for a relaxing dinner and overnight stay and preparations for the start of the gorilla trekking safari.
Day two
Transfer from Kampala to Bwindi Impenetrable National Park
Be early to hit the road in the morning since a long journey to the southwestern part of Uganda where the park is located. During your journey, you will have a brief stop in Mbarara town where you will have your lunch meal plus maybe mini shopping if you, please, and thereafter head on. While on the road you will then be in sight of Uganda’s other amazing beauties inclusive of which is the beautiful scenery of the city. On reaching the park you will check in at the accommodation. dinner and overnight.
Day three
Mountain Gorilla Tracking and Community Walk
The day that you’re going to be the insight of the gorgeous primates the gorillas. Wake up early to buy yourself time to have breakfast and pick your packed lunch plus drinking water since you ought to have long hours in the forest searching for these apes. You will be expected to be at the park headquarters on time for your briefing and their head to the forest to engage in your first track which may take you 2 to 6 hours depending on the animal’s movement. A Full hour is allowed you to visualize the animals as they move around and react differently to your visit, while here you will be able to know why these apes are called cousins to man since the semblance to human character is positive. Thereafter the trek head back to the park headquarters and then finally the lodging. Freshen up and take on a community walk to see the Batwa people and their ways of life you can enjoy their cultural dances and songs as they demonstrate it all for you. Then dinner and overnight at the accommodation slept at the previous night.
Day 4: Transfer to Kampala
Wake up early enough to have your fantastic breakfast meal, then head for the stunning boat ride on Lake Bunyonyi that will allow you a view of some of the islands on this lake as you observe the well-terraced hills surrounding the lake and many more scenic views. Then you will pack up and be on your way to Kampala with lunch en-route plus other stopovers that you would love to make as we come to the very beginning of the end of our double trekking safari. On reaching Kampala you will either be dropped at the airport for your flight or to a hotel in case your stay is still on.
End of Tour

I just realised that Max’s audience is going to grow when streamers and YouTubers react to him vs Flight. 5$tar gunna be taking over!

Has any of you experienced that your anxiety got much worse after a ‘trigger event’?
So I’ll try to make this short: I moved overseas (to the us) in 2022 October and I was there for 6 months. I remember on the day of my flight I could barely get out of bed, I felt so sick I thought I got a stomach bug or something. While I was there my anxiety would get really bad, I had periods where I could barely eat / sleep for weeks, I also developed a bit of health anxiety because of all the physical symptoms I’ve been getting. I’ve always been a bit of an anxious type, but I never really had bad physical symtomps that would interfere with my quality of life.
So moving forward I got back home in March and I instantly felt better or at least that’s what I thought. I got dumped by my gf the first day we met after I got home (it was probably the best for us), so I just started trying to date again, but it’s making me very anxious and I don’t really understand why. Had this girl who I was talking to for three weeks then she just ghosted me and it’s making me rekieve those physical symptoms again. It’s weird because I know for a fact that I wouldn’t have reacted this way like a year ago.
I tried theraphy in the us, but they wanted to put me on medication after 3 sessions and I didn’t feel good about that. Maybe I should try and look for one here.