~8:00pm Nov 30, 2023
Mood: resting
Listening to: anvii - you cry i cry ⧉

i think the longest week of the year is the week after thanksgiving, the week before december. i haven't had much to say or journal about. or, rather, i can't really formulate my thoughts into words, and i don't have as much drive to. i feel like i'm incubating, taking care of my comforts while i build courage to start driving. i'm settling into a very cozy routine, sleeping at sunrise and waking at sunset. this is very easy to do since that's like 7am to 4pm. my days are so full and long. there's something so soul healing about waking up in dark warmth when the cold night has already set in. this really is my season. then i occupy my time with new shows and playing games with friends. it's really nice to feel like i'm doing something productive even when it's just new leisure activities. but, as i said in the past, i'm looking to make a routine of breaking routines. next week or the week after i'll probably be driving at night. i'm going to enjoy this languid period for as long as it takes to bolster myself, then i'll break out again.

lately things are really overwhelming. not necessarily in a bad way. i feel hypersensitive, but there are only good sensations right now. i struggle to find words for my thoughts because i'm overwhelmed by the beauty of the world and its people. honestly the anime i've been watching is probably contributing. it's strange, i can feel sadness or melancholy and it feels nice. it feels. i am so used to feeling depressive or dissociative numbness and overwhelming pain whenever sadness is present. during this time the sadness comes, sits on my bedside, and leaves without a word. it's safe. i can only imagine that's how sadness is supposed to feel for most people. i had the urge to write 2 days ago, nothing came out though. then i had the urge to draw, which is exceedingly rare. the sketchbook and shit i ordered is going to have to wait until christmas because my f*mily is fucking stupid, so i opened ms paint lol. i didn't really have much in mind, so i sorta decided to let my hand go and see what happens, and i scribbled a pretty dysphoric self portrait. i don't plan on sharing it, i thought it was interesting to mention.

i guess speaking of christmas, i think i'm going shopping with my mom next tuesday. i'm really picky about textures, and i've needed new pjs for a long long time. for the last like 6 years i've let the clothes my family bought for me just pile up because i cannot fucking stand the way they feel, they never get it right. so here we are, of the ones i do wear, they've almost all ripped or something. i agreed to go shopping since truthfully i'm fed up with this fucking game. i need clothes and they literally can't clothes shop for me, but they always get mad at me for getting clothes for myself because that means they have less things to get for christmas or my birthday. they would rather buy me useless shit for the gift tradition than let me buy useful shit for myself, which i've pointed out to them 2 dozen times. whatever, i'm just going to go do it myself then. my mom is merely going to be there so she feels better about herself, but that's not my problem nor concern.

i see people are already putting christmas decorations up around the neighborhood. i really like looking at them on my walks. looking forward to seeing all the decorations i've never seen before on the new routes. and going back to the playground on slightly warmer nights to avoid frostbite, cuz i don't have gloves yet.

~2:00am Nov 27, 2023
Mood: contemplative
Listening to: ocha - into the night. ⧉

had a rough day. today has a strange aura. woke up after 3 hours of sleep with extreme chronic nausea that won't let me go back to sleep. a new mixed wave of starvation and nausea hits me every 15 minutes or so. just finished eating something for the first time today. at least everything is staying down, i would be most upset if i lost nutrients and had to eat again. must be some thanksgiving leftover food item that i have a secret intolerance to, my hunch is turkey on account of the minor bloating i sometimes get from lunchmeat sandwiches. there was a baldurs gate session scheduled tonight, so i wanted to sleep before that and wasn't able to. when it was time, i was still awake, so i showed up only to learn the usual flaker flaked again without warning. it's kinda whatever, these things are annoying but i don't feel like they're significant enough to let it get to me. they temporarily brush over me.

focusing on the present, i finished kino's journey earlier. i think it's firmly supplanted among my favorite shows of all time. it's very slow paced, so it's not for everyone, still it's probably a 9 or 10. everything about it is beautiful, and it gracefully explores topics of the human condition, religion, mortality, age, government, reality, happiness, gender, purpose, labor, ignorance, etc. impressive considering it's from 2003. the pace, cinematography, and dramatic irony are integral to the storytelling, so describing it does it no justice. kino is a precious and relatable character.

i had a passing conversation with my grandmother again. she does this a lot. whenever it's just us and i'm clearly leaving or passing through, she decides to drop something on me to force me to stay. most of the time it's something urgent, like a week overdue mail that she was keeping from me on purpose for this moment, or a last minute f*mily gathering i'm forced to join. her hope is always that i'll cave in under the time/confrontation pressure, since it's worked so many times on me throughout my life. (no wonder i fear spontaneity and change, it's been weaponized since forever.) other times it's her passive aggression disguised as innocuous questions, "how is the job hunt?," "what's your plan about money?," "is it time to change therapists yet?," or my new favorite "do you even like anything?" yesterday in particular made my blood boil. i stepped outside for air at 8pm instead of 3am, and when i came back in, she asked "do you want to take my car out at night?" in the 3 seconds it took me to formulate a response, i absolutely roiled behind my mask. i have such strong demand avoidance, if anyone suggests i do anything, it's an instant turn-off. motivation lost. especially when it's my grandmother because she thrives on giving unwarranted venomous suggestions and acting like she's the smartest and comes up with all of everyone's ideas. how DARE she make a suggestion for something i was already planning to ask her and just spent the last 2 weeks making conscious progress towards? how DARE she interrupt me and my pace? how DARE she rush me when i've been working up to this for a year or more? how DARE she ruin my motivation? how DARE she not say what she means? how DARE she raise me to be manipulable and then manipulate me? how DARE she not understand me? with balled fists and a straight face, the response i choked out was, "yes, i was actually already thinking that," and i walked away. so phase 2 of the plan is out of the way just like that, i have access to the car.

last night, when i glanced to leo for confidence, i saw a stray leonid meteor through the cloud cover. intensely bright, fast, and with a long bright tail. looking up at the moon looked an awful lot like looking down at air bubbles trapped beneath ice. there were thin, circular, overcast clouds, and the backlight of the moon showed the clouds to be completely motionless. frozen vapor, no wind.

as for focusing on the past, with any full moon i like to take the time and reflect on the past month. however, this moon is special. this day is special. first, last year's beaver moon was the first moon i photographed during the total eclipse, and today is the beaver moon also. second, since it's the last full moon before the winter solstice, it's also the mourning moon, which is supposed to be the pagan annual time of reflection and cleansing. and lastly, it was exactly 365 days ago that i took my first walk outside. furthermore, i've already been in the mood for reflection since i've been making tangible progress lately. fated maybe. essentially, i'm in the correct headspace for looking back at the year moreso than i would probably be for the calendar new year.

a lot has happened since last november. a lot happens in any given year, i suppose, but perhaps i'm incredulous because my life is quite literally boxed in. i started taking walks, which was an 8 year dream come true. i gradually learned all the constellations and stars as the sky rotated above me. i ran out of weed and i've been unfortunately sober ever since. i learned how to paint nails, bought the stuff, and painted them. i wallowed in depression and false hope. i saw the moonlight reflected in my nails. i got frostnip for the first time. i exercised my boundary of leaving f*mily functions for the first time last christmas. i got my first plush (love you greenland). i quit cutting. i realized my mom wasn't on my side either. i turned 23. i confronted my ex, i still have flashbacks to the uncontrollable trembling. i caught a stomach virus and threw up for the first time in 12 years. i participated in a friendly video game competition with randomly assigned teams. i had dinner and a movie with friends, my first time at an asian restaurant. i ran away from "home" and crashed at an online friend's place 2 hours away in the mountains for a weekend. i finally felt what it's like to live life without limerence. i found neocities, learned html, and created a website all in 2-3 weeks. i established a boundary with my best friend. i got tests done at the hospital because i have a new subluxing joint in my sternum. i drove and got a license. i met a lot of really cool new people on the neocities. i read a book. i kinda lost contact with my longest friend who apparently skipped out on the military after all. i wrote A LOT. my egg probably cracked. i burned out, regressed, and recovered. i started taking longer more adventurous walks. i played on the swings. i got frostnip for the second time. i restarted anime. and none of that even accounts for all my new favorite games or music, how many memes i saved, or how many tears i cried.

for as much shit as i constantly give myself, i'm not actually stagnating or regressing. i am working towards something and making progress at my own pace and it doesn't matter if it's socially acceptable or not. it's my life and i'm exactly on time for myself. the world is beautiful and i'm beautiful because i'm in it. i can be myself and people will still like me back. on top of that, i'm slowly beginning to open up to people 1 on 1. it's... exciting, rewarding. i'm really glad i found neocities. i am not alone; i might even belong somewhere. there's still a lot left to do, more life to live, more patterns to reprogram, but at least i can be proud of how far i've come, and certainly nobody can take that from me.

~10:00pm Nov 25, 2023
Mood: on edge
Listening to: tomppabeats ft. lapsihymy - falling in love with you over and over again in my dreams ⧉

just finished having a conversation with someone that recently entered my dms. i've mentioned them before, the same person who i had a few one-sided conversations with before. they started messaging me again, and i've been engaging because i don't want fears to get in the way of socializing, and i didn't want to be rude. in other words i've been guarded. well we've been getting to know each other a little bit at a time for a little while now, and i worry that i'm giving the wrong signals. or maybe they're receiving the wrong signals. or maybe i'm misreading things altogether. regardless, they keep saying things like "we are so similar" or "we just get each other" or how much whatever i say means so much to them. it's coming on very strong very fast, even if it's not romantically coded. i received a lot of flattery and praise today from them after a pretty mundane conversation, and i withdrew. their response to that was to give a short ramble about their oc and how personal it is, then indirectly told me i should open up more when i didn't open up too. maybe i should've just said outright that i was uncomfortable with this pacing, but i also didn't want that to invite some trying-really-hard restraint behavior either just to appease me. didn't want to be rude either and tell them i'm done dming after they just got done pouring out their soul. bleh, i'm so much more used to rejecting creepy sex pests, not anxious people trying to make friends. i'm pretty bad with boundaries when it comes to friendships. i just don't know what i want out of a friendship in the first place. i don't want to accidentally lead someone on and hurt them with the blunt truth. i guess no matter what it's better to do it sooner rather than later. this whole thing put me on edge after a pretty chill day.

besides that i guess, i did indeed start watching kino's journey. what a great recommendation. i lost contact 6 years ago with the person who recommended it, but she was right. i'm only up to episode 4/13 it's just really captivating. lots of themes/quotes that appeal strongly to me and the slow pace is more my speed too. glad to get back into something i used to like doing.

last night i went back to the playground. last time i said it would've been better if it was colder and the sky was clear, and so it was early this morning. i actually made an effort to be safe on the swings this time so i did NOT fall on my ass. i think it was like the perfect level of moonlight, ~95% full, but close to moonset. jupiter was in close proximity to her too. the air of the playground was much different than the first time. for the first, time crawled and it felt like i was there forever exposed out in the open. i couldn't relax or find a spot to rest that felt right. this second time though, it went by at a believable speed and i felt like it was my place. while i didn't feel like i could relax exactly, i felt looser and less serious in a way. i was SOOO much less hypervigilant and hypersensitive. i first noticed the chain squeak was nowhere near as loud as i remembered it. while i was there though, i got mild frostbite (frostnip), which i actually really enjoy. i feel the most alive when my cold skin burns, i can feel the air fill my lungs, and see when the air exits them. for safety though, i stopped swinging so the frostbite didn't advance. note to self: ask for gloves/mittens for christmas so i can stay on my bullshit. whenever i'm outside at night doing these new things, i glance at leo for confidence. i like to think i can draw on either my sun or rising signs for strength at any time of the year, since they are 6 signs apart, totally opposite sides.

the past few days i got into like 3 separate discussions about gender roles and relations in society with 3 different groups of people so i might make a short essay about my personal thoughts soon, if i feel like writing.

~6:30pm Nov 23, 2023
Mood: cold & nauseous
Listening to: lil soda boi - winterbleeds ⧉

i decided to sleep in all the way until thanksgiving dinnertime. i hate waiting, not in the impatient way, rather that waiting is a trigger for me. if i'm in a situation where i just have to stand around waiting for someone, my body reacts because i don't know if the way i wait looks weird, and i get emotional flashbacks to childhood waiting at the front door for my father to come back or for someone to come home and feed me. anyway, i decided to skip that whole part and i did. i hate thanksgiving because i both hate spending time with f*mily and hate eating. my stomach has been extra fucked for a month now and i fully expected to be on the verge of vomiting after i ate something, which is exactly what happened. honestly it was kind of fortuitous, since being sick let me slip out with no resistance, and nobody expects me back down for the rest of the night. normally they would try anything to force me to stay for their idealized version of a fake f*mily portrait, coercion, bargaining, grabbing and pulling, bodyblocking. so i still didn't enjoy it but it went about as well as it could have.

with that out of the way, i have better news. i did walk all the way to the playground and spent an hour there. i played on the swings for most of it and climbed some stuff for the remainder. it really put into perspective how much my worse my fear of heights has gotten since i was 10 or whatever. i mean i've always been terrified of heights, wayyy more than average, but if you asked me when i was 10 if it could get even more intense i would probably say no. but damn was i wrong. idk, maybe it's because i'm much taller and frailer, or because i'm even more of a nervous wreck. it was really fucking funny though, for the last 5 minutes before i had to leave, i decided i was gonna go all out on the swings for the satisfaction. my fuckin enormous hubris got the best of me and i fell off near the apex. i couldn't help but laugh really hard lmao. double irony since it's my first time swinging in a long time, AND because literally the other day vashti ⧉ told me she ate shit the last time she went on the swings too. my dumbass thought i was built different. i'm ok though, my spine and legs are fine thankfully. at worst my hands cramped from the chains. it's weird, i felt very noticeably different before and after. walking all the way there, past the new houses and the 9 or so cars on the main thoroughfare, i felt so tense and small, i had that pit in my stomach that's the exact same one right before giving a presentation. afterwards, it felt like the whole world melted away around me. i walked all the way to my house feeling the warm blood in my limbs, standing tall, and not even thinking about my surroundings. it was a gradual change, but while i was at the playground my confidence grew. in a way, through anxiety and/or dissociation, i'm always thinking about or imagining myself in third person, but i didn't have that by the end. when i think of freedom to do whatever i want, i don't think i literally mean doing something i want to do, i think i mean i don't worry about how it looks when i do it. i know i've technically had the freedom to do things i like for as long as i've been alive, but what i'm seeking is true freedom; freedom from myself. the only thing that would've made the trip better would be if it was a little colder and if the sky was clear. another time.

yesterday i decided to make a myanimelist just so i could keep track of things i want to watch. i felt like i couldn't bring myself to start watching things if i didn't have a plan. and while i could've just made a .txt, i thought it was probably just smarter to hook it up to a literal database for ease and for recommendations. i don't intend to use it to write reviews, make friends, or use a forum. i'm going to start today or tomorrow with kino's journey. it was recommended to me 7 years ago lol. i'm a little burnt out on music so i figure it's a good time for some other media.

~9:30pm Nov 21, 2023
Mood: cozy
Listening to: Bill Nykon - Bride ⧉

enjoying the gentle freezing rainstorm outside from the comfort of my little blankie and big pokemon sweater with dark type pokemon all over it. it has deino, vullaby, a-meowth, houndour, sableye, sneasel, zorua, murkrow, poochyena, and g-zigzagoon with absol as the centerpiece. i had therapy today and i talked a lot. it was mostly about the website, the walks, and how i'm feeling free and in control of my life for the first time. i've always been aware of my patterns and why i have them, but only after recovering from that hardcore emotional burnout have i felt like it's possible to do fucking anything about it. it's actually kind of miraculous how much better i feel all because i realized what it was i was experiencing, and then immersing myself alone in a creation. not only have i accomplished 2 goals, previously i would've had to allocate an entire week for 1 simple goal, but it's been less than a week. it feels like my life has periods where i have different colored lenses, and i can never tell what color i'm looking through until it changes and the last one is gone already. it's disorienting because my attitude itself is breaking routine, and i react strongly to any routine changes. it leaves me searching in the dark for a new one to hold onto for safety, and i picture in my head the gag where velma feels for her glasses and picks up a different pair. this is all new for me, because my motivation is to make a routine of breaking routines, and i have no idea what'll happen. i'm going to have to if i am to grow as a person. facing a dozen fears i guess. the last hue was a smokey grey with a reddish hint. i think in colors a lot.

i'm planning another goal too. the thought has literally never crossed my mind as long as i've lived here, until this morning passing it in the car. near my neighborhood, just barely the extent of my walking distance i think, is a playground. i had a fuckin lightbulb moment and on the drive back i scoped it for a swingset, and real shit there's one at adult height. you better believe i'm going to swing on that swingset in the dead of winter's night. not a care in the world that i'm almost 24. not tonight, it's going to rain all night, but holy shit. swinging was my main stim in summer camp for my whole childhood, it very literally kept me sane. i haven't swung in 13 years.

besides that, i'm feeling seen and vulnerable online. i usually don't care about my site's statistics. i have noticed though that it's only taking like 2 weeks per 1000 views and it's only going to increase in rate over time. plus, yesterday when i published the shrine my daily visits jumped 3x and i easily broke 1000 hits for the first time. it makes me self-conscious of the things i write on here because i don't hold anything back and it makes me afraid that i'm too much for people. another thing from my past really. i restrain myself every time i have the urge to delete something for a few reasons. 1) the most obvious is that it's my sanctuary and if there's anywhere i can be myself it should be here. 2) i shouldn't be pining for validation from everyone. 3) it would be nice to have a record of my progress to self-analyze one day, even though my memory is quite good. and 4) i have learned so much about myself and my environment from the idle thoughts, analyses, and blogs of random people that i hope someone in the distant future can look at my writings and learn something about themselves through my perspectives. as an observant person, i find the observations of others to be extremely valuable because their perspectives are always ones that i will never inherently possess. therefore, it doesn't matter how cringe or insufferable i think i'm being, there's always the chance my perspective is valuable to at least one other fellow human. and i think that's all i want from the internet, the ability for people to anonymously connect paradoxically in the most detached and the most intimate way, if only for a moment. as if our very souls anachronistically brush against one another. i wonder if that's just what it's like to be a writer in general. if people who authored books felt the same way decades or centuries ago. i still don't know if i count as a writer, i've certainly never tried to be, but whatever i'm doing i intend to keep going.

the only thing i'm hesitant about are current events essays because i'm hyperaware of the misinformation virus and i would hate to unknowingly spread it, especially since i'm not a very book-y kind of person. i prefer to observe situations and use my intuition/awareness to make judgements, not seek poisoned internet discourse nor absorb conclusions from other sources. perhaps "wisdom vs intelligence" is an oversimplification, but it feels appropriate. i just know my intuitions/observations are liable to be tricked by mis/disinformation whereas it's easier to see through if you absorb as many information sources as possible. i think i have pretty nuanced opinions about the world, i just feel underqualified to argue them on a platform lest i become part of the problem.

~4:00pm Nov 20, 2023
Mood: excited
Listening to: Injury Reserve - Superman That ⧉

i'm riding a high this week. i spent 33 hours over the last 3 days making the sybyr shrine and holy shit it was like the most fun i've had doing anything in... like over a year and a half. i simply loved being able to create some big project. i spent all my waking hours on it, then i went to bed thinking about what to do next, then i had dreams about it. even better, it was an infodump about sybyr! and i got to relisten to every song like 20 times each! i've been literally holding it in for 7 years. 7 fucking years. none of my friends have ever cared for the music i like, and usually they pretty quickly move topics if i bring him up in passing. well guess what! i can write thousands of words about whatever the fuck i want now! on my website! it's not a conversation so it doesn't matter if the other party is getting disinterested. holy shit how INSANELY FUCKING FREEING. it feels like my whole life is watching the interest fade from people's faces the longer i fucking speak. i also just really like being on the page myself. didn't get tired AT ALL listening to the same songs for 5 days straight. i did a great job on the design i think. i showed my 1 friend who DOES have similar taste a screenshot of the page and he called it "unfathomably based".

i also did some more walking outside the neighborhood. i took the right path instead of the left one, and tbh i like the left path way more. the right path has more car traffic because it can be used as a shortcut to get to the closest thoroughfare, plus it has a lot of hills and bends and drivers don't expect there to be anything on the road at 3am, so i'm liable to get fucking splattered way easier. besides the extra traffic, it's quite a nice path. the houses are generally farther from the street so i don't have to worry about everybody's damn motion lights. very few streetlights overhead as well. has a better view of the sky than the left path. both paths are quieter because they're farther away from the megahighway behind my entire neighborhood. since it's the farthest, maybe i'll save the right path for long quiet walks when it's not the weekend. unfortunately my stupid legs get worn out really fast, and i think the right path is the maximum i can travel before hurting myself, as much as i would like to keep exploring. now i feel like i have multiple routes to take depending on the time i want to be outside for. my range used to be 7-21 minutes, but now i have a routes that take 23-32.

speaking of walks, i noticed arcturus is rising alongside venus. i love arcturus. i've reclaimed it for my own. it was the first star that was pointed out to me and named, by my ex; so for a long time it was a really sad reminder of how alone i am when i stargaze. but loneliness is a subjective matter of perspective. i can be isolated doing my own thing and not feel lonely, likewise i can be surrounded by close friends and feel alone. so arcturus is mine now. the super sparkly red giant will be my beacon for doing what i love. maybe eventually for loving myself.

in other news, i hate dryness. ironic because i hate humidity even more, but the combination of low dew point and indoor heating has my lips cracked and bleeding. i have to eat my food like it's cotton candy, pulling bits apart so i don't have to open my mouth wide and reopen my scabs. and they're on both sides of my lower lip so i can't even eat from one side. i'll keep doing my thing so they heal faster and minimize infection risk. on the bright side, they look like snake bites from a distance. i should get lip piercings. i would look so fuckin hot.

i'm really proud of myself. it's so weird, i feel so disconnected from my past. like, even as recently as 2 weeks ago. it's as if nothing before mattered and i can't think about the future when i try. is this what it means to be in the present? it really makes me wonder how i'm going to fit my right now self back into my normal lifestyle. it makes me wonder if i even should, if it makes me miserable. it's probably just better to savor the feeling while it lasts. i'd imagine taking it easy now is the best way to cultivate it.

~5:00pm Nov 16, 2023
Mood: proud
Listening to: shamana - Roxas ⧉

well i did it. i walked out of my neighborhood into the next one over. it's actually even more bougie than i thought, and i look like a fuckin anarchist when i walk around at 3am (lowkey i kinda am). the houses there have fuckin pillars out front and shit. there are very few actual streets, which i came to realize is because the properties are larger, so the population density is thinner. the whole place is supposed to be quite wooded and whimsical(?) i guess, so as neat as it looks walking on a street caressed by foliage and tall trees, the sky is choked. can only catch glimpses of some celestials through the dense canopy. i did see a deer friend though! i don't recognize him, which is kind of wild that presumably each neighborhood has its own group of deer that feel at home there, even when there's like literally only half a mile of distance. it made me feel better about myself that even my deer friends are apprehensive about leaving their comfort zone too. i'm not going to pursue it right away, but the next step is driving around at night.

i played lunacid last night, which is still a great game btw, and i realized i haven't even opened steam in 11 days. i don't really know if i identify myself as a gamer necessarily, but it just feels sorta telling that for 11 days i didn't do anything to pass the time or interact with people. i'm going to go for all achievements in lunacid. what i DO identify as is an achievement hunter. when there's a game that i really like, i want to experience all of it, and the little achievements give me a permanent logged reminder of the good times i had with the game. and bragging rights tbh. i take a lot of pride in having all achievements in binding of isaac and hollow knight because those games are really long and really difficult. side note: i also love it when there's an achievement or two related to speedrunning. i'm not a speedrunner, but i do appreciate it when i have an incentive to learn the techs and compare myself against the leaderboard for something i was going to do anyway (i don't have a speedrun account to submit runs because i don't want to). according to steam stats and speedrun.com stats, i'm in the top 700 of hollow knight players, top 35 of solar ash players, and the top 0.1% of isaac players. i think that's pretty dope.

oh right i fixed (broke) my sleep schedule. i was really fed up with getting sleepy at 9pm and waking up at 8am, so i stayed up 24 hours. now i'm back on my stupid shit sleeping around 5am-1pm. i am so much more comfortable here. i don't have to set alarms to take walks at 3am. plus, i am so much more sensitive to cold when i'm still waking up. i think most people are to some degree because blood pressure is lower during sleep, and body temperature is cooler as a result. but damn my hypotension and bradycardia hits so me hard. either way i'm feeling pretty good today and i'm proud of myself. i'm going to try to make it a point to walk out of my neighborhood more often. i want to explore even if my neighborhood was already the best one for stargazing.

~6:30pm Nov 14, 2023
Mood: focused
Listening to: Sybyr - 101Dalmatians ⧉

i have like levels of survival mode. the last couple weeks were like spiral mode, the last few days were crisis mode. i feel like things have stabilized, which is good, but things still aren't ok. i still have to deal with the lack of viable food in the house, the lack of any temperature control, the miasma of high expectations plus feeling like a ghost, the bugs, the mold, the minefield of conversation, and now the pressure of upcoming holidays. i'm so tired of needing to be resourceful to make it through everyday. i ordered myself a hoodie so i can stay warm in my house and a new toothbrush, but i didn't get to the front step in time, so my grandmother already took them and hid them from me for christmas presents. every single christmas she says i'm impossible to buy for, so i tell her to stop buying things for me, and she refuses without explaining why. then literally anything i need, including hygeine products AND FOOD, she stashes them for 2 months. i am so close to just tearing her room apart to find my things. i fucking NEVER buy things, why do i have to deal with this on top of everything else? i don't want to be present for thanksgiving, christmas eve, nor christmas. it's a confrontation that's going to initiate exponentially increasing tensions. it's inevitably going to happen, i'm just debating if i should keep postponing and placating in baseline fawning mode so i can keep off the streets. i have to write it down to remind me. i can't let this euphoria of recovering from crisis blind me. i can't lose sight of my goals. i can't grow complacent.

i've decided i should watch more things. i don't dislike shows or movies, i would even say i generally like them, i am just completely indifferent to the process of sitting down and looking at a story for 2+ hours. i also strongly dislike movie theaters. as such, i have watched very little media compared to almost everyone else. people are consistently surprised by how many extremely popular classic things i've never seen or heard of. i'm not going to lie, part of me was waiting to experience new media with someone special. i think experiencing new things with someone is my love language or something. my usual routine includes playing games like once or twice a week, and otherwise watching someone else play a game for the remainder of the time. i figure if i'm going to be "wasting" time watching something, it might as well be something i can actually fucking talk to someone else about. i don't really have casual hobbies or life experiences to speak of (besides traumadumping), so if i'm looking to be even slightly more relatable there's like no reason not to pick up an anime or something. actually i guess i do kind of hate western shows, they're so fucking boring to me for the most part.

i would like to read more, but honestly i just don't think i have the mental capacity for it. i could trying getting into manga for once. idk, manga never quite appealed to me, but i shouldn't knock it til i try it. books are just the most committal form of story consumption, and i simply don't think i can add commitments to my life right now. my routine and stability are too fragile to allocate that kind of time. god, once i get my life together i'm going to be so fucking powerful. y'all don't even know.

i'm also probably going to start working on the sybyr shrine shortly. i've had the urge to code something big for a while, and that's coinciding with my sybyr hyperfixation reignition. i've said in the past i fall in love with sybyr every 4 months, and the last one was in july, so i mean... it's only right.

my therapist today said she understands why i would have all these fears of life. i'm one generation in a long line of abandonment issues, so my f*mily instilled these fears in me one way or another to get me to never leave. which is probably true, and i was always kind of aware of it, but it was odd hearing it come from someone else besides my own mind for once. it also reinforces the notion that in some way i was raised this way with intent, and in my mind that is unforgivable. it's not like i didn't already feel that way, it's just another path to the same conclusion. what it does do for me is make me feel even more spiteful. i am going to succeed against impossible odds. nobody can take this away from me. i am strong. i am resilient. i am unstoppable. i am the embodiment of 6+ generational lifetimes of fear and trauma, and i will break out of it. i will triumph where others before me have failed.

~2:30pm Nov 13, 2023
Mood: stasis
Listening to: Novulent - enchanting ⧉

i took my own advice and i did fuck all for the last few days. i slept for more hours than i was awake. i watched the r6 major and i watched paprika (2006) only because someone linked it to me and i wasn't doing anything else. the team w7m is so good i really wonder how anyone else is going to beat them any time soon. they've been on top for like over a year now. i don't really like sports, but i do like esports a bit because the teams are small and it's easy to follow the life stories of the players. it helps that i also really like r6 as a game, i've been playing it for just as long as many of them, and i understand the game at that level. as for paprika, i thought it was a pretty cool movie. people talk about satoshi kon all the time but this was the first movie i've seen of his. it had an interesting premise and even more interesting execution, but i could tell the movie wasn't exactly meant to be fully understood. that's fine, i prefer when abstract stories do have something more concrete hidden beneath something (like silent hill), though i can still enjoy abstract art for what it is. it was gorgeous and easy enough to follow the general plot at least. i couldn't get that into the game signalis for the same reason, it was fucking beautiful and had an awesome story, but the lore is basically nonexistent. and by nonexistent i mean it was created to be contradictory and confusing and make no sense on purpose, to add to the feeling of confusion in the main story. it frustrated me ngl. i still like signalis enough to call it a good game, and i like paprika enough to call it a fun movie.

beyond that, though, i just straight up didn't take care of myself. i got my emergency energy restoration, but i didn't eat or bathe. i really felt like i couldn't handle the sensation of eating, the decision of what to eat, even looking at my f*mily, or standing in general. i much preferred the pain of hunger than the pain of anything everything else. i was plagued by nightmares during most of it. things having to do with squalor, hoarding, abandonment, negligent death, and time passing me by. a rancid heterogeneous mixture of my existing triggers and my unwashed state. idk, hopefully i don't need recharges like that very often, since that'll only get in the way of functioning, but i don't think i have much of a say in if or when it happens. i also didn't walk out of the neighborhood like i said i would. i only took 1 walk, and i somehow knew out of instinct i shouldn't do something new right now. that walk was strange though, the stars were so much brighter than usual and they twinkled so much more. i could see dim stars i've never seen before. i could even see all the individual 7 sisters in pleiades. it was like the light pollution was a whole bortle lower. venus is over the treeline now too. it was a little overwhelming in a good way and i cried. i felt... seen by the sky? the trails froze to my cheeks.

i've felt strangely more in tune with my body than normal. i feel more in my body. less dissociated i guess. i can notice my physical aches and pains, my smell, the cold air in my room, the tension in my shoulders from stress and cold, the weight of my blanket, and the inertia of my movements a tiny bit more. it's not hypersensitivity, or at least i'm not any more hypersensitive than i always am. it hasn't been a good feeling though. the return into my body has only made me discontent with it. i don't know how else to describe it besides discontent. i don't hate it, i'm just not comfortable. i don't know if that's because i'm not used to it or if it's something dysphoric, or both. what i can say, however, yesterday my own shadow startled me. what disturbed me about it more was how i automatically registered it as a woman's silhouette before catching up to myself logically. that's new.

it's probably in my best interest if i drive around on my own at night first before going somewhere to accomplish something. i should focus on 1 accomplishment at a time. maybe i should work up the courage to walk out of my neighborhood first. then work up the courage to drive around. then work up the courage to drive somewhere and park, then drive back to the house. then i can worry about walking into a place for something after that.

~4:00pm Nov 10, 2023
Mood: static
Listening to: esselfortium - memory=entryrrrr///// ⧉

mmm turns out i lied about a few things yesterday. (i was lying, i wasn't wrong, i'm never wrong. /s) it turns out today got hands. last night i got so nauseous i broke into a cold sweat for about an hour and my mouth kept filling with water and my stomach kept lurching but nothing came up. i was really tired and i felt close to pre-fainting so i kept dozing off for a few seconds only to be woken up by a new wave of discomfort. i just wanted to sleep. it was pretty bad. i woke up 5 hours later heaving like a cat but nothing came up. and then, well, that's when i got really upset and i had my first thoughts of self harm and suicide in a really long time. i was totally inconsolable for... 3 hours or so.

i kept thinking about what i wrote in the last entry. it didn't sit right with me, chalking it up to depression. i needed a more satisfactory answer than a careless guess for what my fucking problem is. i hate hate hate hate not knowing things, especially about myself. it didn't take long for me to realize this is autistic burnout. i was under the impression it couldn't really happen because i'm not really fucking doing anything. i found it's more of an emotional thing, which makes sense. it turns out you don't need to be DOING anything to collapse under the constant pressure of transition, masking, and expectations, internal or external, without adequate support. then it just spirals because it causes a cognitive regression across the board. it gets harder and harder to do anything social or executive functioning or following steps. then it's harder to meet expectations and mask, it's a whole cycle. this would explain why it feels like i'm getting worse at everything, because i literally am, temporarily. so that's the good news, it's temporary. the bad news is that there are no known ways of just ending it, it goes away with time, but not if things remain completely the same. and really this just means i'm not in the position to DO anything new, rather all i can really do is change my mindset. that is, unless i can get an intervention, which is literally what i was looking for with a life coach, but that's apparently not an option, so. idk. all i do is mask in front of my family all the time, and my friends to a lesser degree, but i definitely do. i guess this also explains why i've been so hyperfocused on not being able to mask while thinking about trying to function. what bothers me the most about this whole thing is that i feel like waiting to recover is wasting time. but i think that's the internal expectation that got me into this fucking mess in the first place. i just want to escape so bad and i keep mentally straining myself to fucking do it already without any proper preparation. what is the proper preparation? i think i've been looking to my therapist for the answer and not getting it from her. i think i'm going to stop exercising. i can't really handle the commitment in my routine at all, and every time i try, the whole hour is FILLED with intrusive triggering thoughts. last year it was during these exercises when my self harm thoughts won. i've been isolating the past few days because i felt like i couldn't handle talking. i guess i should communicate my problems and needs more effectively with my friends, i normally say nothing about it. i think i'm going to walk out of my neighborhood tonight.

i'm trying. it's pretty fortunate the r6 major resumed today, it's nice to have something to watch all day today.

~3:30pm Nov 9, 2023
Mood: cracking
Listening to: Softheart - monster house - Copy ⧉

as much as i love music and i love discovering it and how it comforts me, i can't be fucked recently. i only want to listen to the same few recent songs on repeat all day. i felt pretty ok yesterday but i just as quickly fell back into the hole. i slept for 11 hours yesterday and still couldn't keep my eyes open so i slept for 3 more later this morning. i guess it's depression. i do feel quite helpless and stuck and sad and angry and my interests give me very little satisfaction. i think that probably meets criteria, but i'm much more familiar with the extreme dissociated/numb and suicidal flavor. so if i am depressed, it's a different better depressed than that.

on the topic of getting very little satisfaction from interests, i'm feeling less and less happy to go outside at night. it's becoming a routine and yet another reminder of how unbearably small my world is. i only get excited for things that break routine, like shooting stars and rising planets/constellations. the emotional connection with celestials i've been sort of relying on for a while is noticably absent recently. on tuesday i had a conversation with my therapist about comfort zones. she tries really hard to reassure me that i'm allowed to pursue my goals at my own pace. i appreciate the effort, but my biggest obstacle is my unconscious. i am aware of everything. it might sound melodramatic or self-aggrandizing or whatever, but it feels like my awareness of myself and my surroundings is omniscient. i learned of a psychological model of levels of awareness, and i think my default state is 7 or 8 out of 9, and the few times i've reached 9 it's so paralyzing and uncomfortable. apparently 7+ is supposed to be paralyzing. it's like i automatically overthink everything in a matter of nanoseconds, it's the default neuroelectrical pathway for me. then i'm overwhelmed and freeze up. how do you just ignore that? it's a behavior that requires unlearning, but how do you do that? moreover, how am i supposed to do that when i'm in a near constant state of panic? it's that feeling of knowing you're in sleep paralysis but you can't will yourself to sit up no matter how much you struggle.

all i've ever known in my life is pain, which also sounds melodramatic as fuck. in all my relationships in my formative years, i've either been a burden, a jester, a curiosity, an object of lust, or some combination of them. then discarded after they take what they want from me. i have never known love or safety. how am i supposed to not assume people are secretly horrible? how am i ever supposed to not recoil from people's passing glances when they all feel so hostile? how am i supposed to make people understand when they try to reassure me by saying people rarely pay attention to strangers in public? i feel like such an alien. an alien standing naked in a glass display box. i don't understand how to talk to people or how to meet people. how do people normally meet each other offline? does it really just boil down to whoever you're stuck in a room/situation with for an indefinite period of time? do people only ever meet each other in school, work, and the socially acceptable venues for escapism from school and work? do people only reach out to others because they have the expectation of shared commiseration? i am so unrelatable. in the past week or so, an acquaintance of mine decided they would prefer to get to know me better 1 on 1 in dms rather than a chatroom setting. as desperate as i am for closer connections, i only felt disgust that someone was invading my space. i tried to be as courteous as possible because i didn't want my triggers to get in the way of my life, but it took only a couple days for the other person to stop contacting me. i'm not necessarily sad about it because it turns out we don't really have common interests, but i still learned that i have no idea how to have 1 on 1 conversations. i didn't ask them anything about what they do or what they like. i just answered anything that was asked of me. it was so palpably one-sided. and i'm not used to being the avoidant one. normally i get myself stuck in one-sided relationships where i'm constantly vying for attention and validation. this is another reason why i think i'm getting worse, my attachment style went from anxious to disorganized.

all i ever do is repeat myself. i complain about the same fucking things everyday because nothing changes because i change nothing. this must get so annoying to read after a while. i spent my whole childhood feeling older than all my peers, even all through college, wishing i was an adult. now that i'm a 23 year old adult i feel like such a fucking toddler. i never learned anything about life or the world or sociability. i still feel gross and dirty even though i already broke my routine and showered today. my stomach has been hurting so bad.

~5:00pm Nov 7, 2023
Mood: mellow
Listening to: Yabujin - CHALICE OF MIND ⧉

hi gamers. i've been feeling a little bit better compared to the last 2 months or so, despite everything that happened this week. was dealing with really bad nausea yesterday, my mouth was constantly full of liquid but i never threw up. as it happens, in the last 7 days, i've published somewhere over 13,000 words on the site, not counting any coding that went into it. i feel pretty good about that, i had a latent baseline feeling of anxiety and i turned it into something productive. the lyrics page i created on a whim in a few hours and it was SO MUCH FUN. i also think making the 3500 word post about my dysphoria gave me some clarity and peace with myself. i remember when i learned what the most up to date definition was and that i was experiencing dysphoria, i broke down. "that's dysphoria? i'm dysphoric? i don't want to be dysphoric, not on top of everything else. i can't be," i said out loud to nobody. writing about it gave me an acceptance for something that i think i was subconsciously denying, i know it exists and i know there's something actionable i can do about it later if it persists.

but that'll come after independence i think. my therapist and i did our research and we had a long talk about it, there are no life coaches around me that can do what i need them to. they're all online appointments only. what i need is a teacher and chaperone for daily processes. it's disheartening, but i'm not giving up. for next week i'm brainstorming things that i truly WANT to do outside that aren't money intensive, and i'll probably have to drive myself so things that are nearby. so far i've thought of 2 things that i want to do and 1 thing that i need to but don't want to do. my first goal will probably be going to a nearby boba place. i really like it and never get to have it at my house. i've never went into a cafe and ordered it myself before, only a few times at sit down restaurants. at this one location it's apparently really good and you can make whatever you want diy there, so it's very common for people to walk in and ask for a tutorial. as for a long term goal, i want to drive all the way to a dead mall just to walk around for a while. i have a couple that are within a 2 hour drive, but that drive is obviously something i need to work towards. hopefully, optimistically, it'll be doable before the spring.

speaking of therapy, i had to do it over the phone today. we got news that my great aunt died last night. selfishly, i don't really care all that much. it sucks, but i saw it coming 2 months ago and i got all my grieving out of the way. i think that grief cycle led directly into a longer grief cycle i had for myself and my own childhood. either way, she was my grandfather's sister, and he's my ride, so he was understandably too shaken to take me. i'm grateful my therapist was able to change to a phone call last second. it was the 2nd time i've seen him cry in my entire life, and the only time i've ever seen him break down. i don't really know how to comfort people. especially when i'm not really that close to the person, or the person who died, or really empathetic about death at all. all i did was give him an extended hug and said very little. come to think of it, i don't think we've hugged in 9 years. it felt right to do, but i quickly worried if what i was doing was acceptable. how do people typically feel about death? what do they say to each other? am i noticeably not very interested? will he be angry later?

since daylight savings time ended, sunrise is earlier. that means the sky is essentially advanced by 1 hour compared to what i'm used to at 3am. jupiter and taurus are lower, orion and gemini are at peak, big dipper is fully visible again, the moon is visible for more days, and leo and venus are higher. venus isn't high enough to be seen over the treeline, but i can see her through the leaves sometimes, which is exciting. the other night was the peak of the taurid meteor shower, so i spent a long time watching for anything. i knew it was a low activity shower, so i wasn't getting my hopes up. it took about 45 minutes, but omg guys it was the coolest god damn meteor ever. it was huge, slow, left a long visible trail of dust that persisted for maybe 10 whole seconds, and the rock glowed super bright yellow-white as it burnt up and exploded. huge fuckin fireball. i was in disbelief for like a minute but i got really excited and i jumped and stimmed for like 10 more lol. fuck i love the sky so much. oh i also saw some deer, they were chilling. the young ones still run from me, but the adult ones, especially bucks, don't pay me any mind. i would take more pictures of them if they stood in light more often. i still see the local fox every now and again too, i hope she's doing ok. they only live for about 4 years and this would be the 4th year she visits for the winter. i know she's female because she had 2 litters of puppies in the backyard previous years. you could watch them play with each other from the windows sometimes. fuck i love nature so much.

i've been watching the major tournament for r6 siege. i fall in and out of the esports scene with it. this year the game and the players are pretty interesting though. so i'm gonna go back to watching that.

~11:00am Nov 5, 2023
Mood: dysphoric
Listening to: Softheart - scary games with the lights off (album) ⧉

well, here's the gender post. unusually, writing this entry gives me the same feeling that i get when i'm writing essays or reviews, that is, that nothing i say here is worth saying because i feel as though my experience is ignorant or invalid compared to a bunch of other people. my diary entries are normally the one thing i can write where i can feel like i can just talk about myself because i'm the only one who definitively knows the most about me. when it comes to gender, i feel like i don't know anything. i've explored this topic almost entirely on my own in my own head. on top of that, i've never actually discussed my dysphoria before with anyone at all, so i'm feeling much more vulnerable than usual. and indeed, i come across very few posts online that go so in-depth, probably for the same reasons i'm apprehensive right now. i made this a diary entry instead of an essay because of its deep personal look into my psyche, perceptions, and development. it's also really rambly and i'm going to write whatever comes to mind, i don't want to organize things on the page. sorry for the mess.

there are 2 main things that happened recently that made it get to this point. the first event was learning about a really popular webring that was secretly run by terfs. i read the forum posts by these people and they sounded exactly the same vitriolic hatred as the 4chan shit i left behind long ago, same lingo and slurs and everything. finding out some of the most followed neocities sites were possibly bigoted and transphobic made me feel sick and, frankly, unsafe. i should've known better than to assume any place was 100% safe. the second event happened yesterday. i was talking about the controversy with the game lunacid (great game btw highly recommend) where the developer added pronouns to piss off conservatives in the wake of the starfield pronoun controversy. the way i was explaining it to my best friend, i said "it's ridiculous how these people think pronouns are like some brainwashing propaganda to undermine the west," and immediately without a shred of irony he replied "well i agree it's brainwashing, but people can pretend to be anything they want in a game." i was actually floored that my own best friend said that shit to me, knowing full well i use they/she/he. does he think i'm pretending? does he think i'm brainwashed? is that why he slides in the comment "you never listen to worldviews besides your own" every now and then? is that why his wife dismissed our opinions and said "you're men" to my nonbinary friend and i? is that why there are no trans people in his server?

earlier today, when i was ruminating on it and my past, i violently sobbed and shook for the better part of 2 hours. i felt emotionally drained so i went to sleep early. i had one of those sleeps that happen in fiction where the mental anguish gives you a fever and fever dreams for like 12 hours. never knew that was actually possible. i've described myself for a long time as casually agender or just liking to be pretty, like i don't take gender that seriously, with only mild dysphoria sometimes at worst. i can still say at least for now i don't really have any body dysmorphia (but maybe that's because i'm not very masculine). whatever it was, condition advancement or new awareness or denial, i don't think it's possible to say anymore i experience little to no dysphoria. i previously thought dysphoria counted as something like always innately knowing your brain or whatever was different than your sex, the classic boy in heels story. over time i've learned that's an oversimplified outdated medical standpoint. i think, deep down, i do desire that i was born and raised as a girl, and i think i always have to some extent. instead i was born a boy and wasn't raised as anything. i was barely raised, i'm partially feral.

thinking about my past, i think there were a lot of clues that didn't seem like much by themselves, but there are just so many of them it makes me wonder how i missed them. i was raised by exclusively women, my mom, grandmom, aunt, great aunt, and literally all my cousins were girls. my f*mily did very little to push me towards anything stereotypically masculine, even the sports they pushed on me were the ones they did when they were little, soccer and softball. they didn't care when i wanted to stop. they bought me a handful of boy toys, but the majority were fairly genderless, and i never had a problem playing house or dolls with my cousins or girl friends. on tv, i wasn't attracted to the cartoon goth girls, i wanted to BE the cartoon goth girls. loved my little pony too. decided on my own when i was 8 i want long hair. started painting my nails at 22. idk i even sit down to pee. i got along much better with girls than boys, naturally even, even when i started having violent autistic meltdowns. i can't really explain why a lot of girls approached me to be their friend in elementary school, i never made any effort to approach anybody. it's possible it was pity or they were kind and didn't want someone feeling left out or something, while i could only interpret it as some sort of unknown magnetic connection. when puberty age came, all my girl friends went cold and distant. i can't consciously remember how that made me feel, but even typing it out my body has a visceral reaction in my chest. it was an abandonment trigger. something changed, and i was no longer wanted, discarded, and i didn't understand why. i've since learned of course that's just how girls and women have to protect themselves because the typical cis male falls for the competitive, controling, dominating, entitled, toxic male culture. for the next few years, i felt the weight of male expectations, with my autism not understanding cues or what's acceptable, and with my history of unaddressed sexual abuse by one of my female cousins, i thought the only way to make friends and be cool was to brag about all the sex i was having (i wasn't). thus began my pathological liar phase.

with the new hole opened in my social life, i made the most awkward most misogynistic attempts to fill it with my same sex peers. it didn't really work and instead i entered a few years of a violent bullying cycle, where boys would try to fight me, i would fight back, and i gained a reputation as the school fighter, so people would swing at me for clout. i never wanted that life, but i needed to protect myself, and i got suspended and nearly expelled for it at least 40 times in total, even got sent to the police station once for criminal psychology screening and the hospital for homicidal suspicions once. the principals and teachers hated me. when everyone calls you a monster, you start to believe it, and i started to like hurting people, so i became the bully. i left that life behind when we moved away so i could go to a totally different high school. (not because i was trapped in a bullying cycle, because my grandmother wanted to brag about me in a much academically harder district.) now i had no friends, and i had no male nor female social skills. everything changed when i met my ex. i was 14 and she was an adult, but she embodied everything i idolized and wanted to be then. i wanted to be accepted by girls again, i don't feel my age and wanted to be older, i wanted to merge with and be her. it was weird and unhealthy i know, but i was still sexually traumatized and thought that's just how the world works. it's fucked up she fed into it at all. it inevitably crashed and burned after a long drawn out series of hot and cold mind games, obsession and disgust and confusion. the entire 4 years of high school, i talked to nobody besides teachers and her.

college was when i found out i was on the asexual spectrum. i was lucky enough to find a small group of guy friends to spend those 4 years with. but the desire to fit in with the girls never went away, and i just felt confusion and shame and trauma whenever i thought about it. i was somehow worried that i would be perceived as horny, or worse, actually develop feelings for one of the women, ruining my primary goal of friendship. i was worried about my asexual label, and that if i was ever in a situation where i got a crush, my fragile identity would slip out of my fingers again. i had so much work all the time that i just repressed it and decided not to even try. at the graduation party, one of the women i think i did have a crush on asked if she could braid my long hair and put flowers in it, and i agreed. i felt so seen and pretty. afterwards, i felt so stupid. i could've been their friend if i just tried ever at all. it even felt stupid to think i wanted to learn how to braid or use hair ties from them. this desire has only gotten stronger since then, i want to learn fashion and makeup and hair and beauty and hygiene routines from other girls.

i've asked myself a few times, "why not just ask then?" the answer is that i'm very traumatized. any close relationship of any kind i've ever had with a woman has been turbulent and i've been discarded for either being a boy or an effeminate man. watching my f*mily raise my little girl cousin in the same house as me, i've learned they never wanted a boy. they treat her with 100x more enthusiasm and relatability and warmth. my ex was abused by men her whole life, and a misandrist and a terf who shamed me for being behaviorally feminine AND physically male, but always kept forcing me to be more masculine. if i recall correctly, she once said "you express love like a girl", but it was weird because she said it in a positive complimentary tone. i've thought a long time about why that made me feel so good about myself, i don't really fucking know what that even means. i think i've fallen in love with the fantasy of being a lesbian with a bi girlfriend. i've also tried to learn some skills online, but the problem i keep running into is that the majority of guides or blogs, even the "beginner" ones, the women writing them have some bias that they think their female audience knows some basics already. i would imagine transfem resources are what would be most helpful, i have yet to look into them.

in high school i fell into a few transfem groups because we had similar interests. in college i started to read a lot of feminist material. i grew to really empathize with the societal experiences of women and lgbt. ironically, it was during the tail end of my really misogynistic and homophobic decade on 4chan, part of my bullying cycle. i read the most up to date reports about women with autism, and i related to it way more than men with autism. i learned the asexual community is predominantly female. my stem-only university was majority female. what i eventually read is that a lot of women begin to study feminism because they feel ostracized, unseen, powerless, or alone under social pressures. there's an inherent community of women for women to feel empowered and seen and included who are united in their shared experiences of a society that isn't built for them. what i came to realize is that i was fascinated with this feminist community for the same reason, i wanted to feel empowered and included, only to hit a wall. the reality is that it isn't for me, i do not have the shared experiences, and i never will. i will never know in my inherent senses what it was like to be raised that way, even if i do transition, not saying that i will. this is where i understand terfdom comes from. in fact, i don't really have any inherent sense of what being raised as either sex is like. i'm more familiar with the oppressor-oppressed dynamic, because i've been both a misogynist homophobe and a feminist queer at different parts of my life, more than i'm familiar with the male-female dynamic.

but what even counts as masculine and feminine? these are social constructs. moreover, they're subjective perception from person to person even within the same culture. it's exceedingly difficult to think of traits that are concretely masculine. when it comes to male culture, especially that of formative adolescents, masculinity is merely the opposite of femininity by design. this can take any form, other boys often make shit up what isn't masculine, using "girly" or "gay" as insults or slurs for anything they simply don't like. so much so that it's become a meme. there's the viral tiktok of a guy doing normal everyday shit, sleeping curled up, drinking from a bendy straw, crossing his legs, and a loud disembodied booming echoing voice threatens him with "GAY" every time. people can recognize it to make jokes about it, but no solutions are being offered, comments will be along the lines of "bruhhhh nah that shit IS gay tho fr skull emoji". men are often foregoing all comfort, hygiene, and convenience because the only message coming across is that the ONLY thing that's masculine is extreme constant physical and emotional hardship. the only time a man is permitted to be emotional in male culture is with women. so women are expected to do all the emotional heavy lifting FOR an ADULT man. paradoxically, it's not ok in male culture to be too emotional with women because that's pussification, and obviously keeps the men emotionally stunted, avoidant/distant, and unaware forever. male culture also loathes therapy because it "doesn't help," but what nobody is telling them is that therapy only works if you want to get better and have an idea of how to do it. male culture offers zero pathways to healthy healing or awareness, so of course therapy doesn't work. the only acceptable coping mechanisms are reckless self-destruction: alcohol, stimulants, self-harm in the gym, racing cars, extreme competition, nihilism, sex/porn addiction, and aimless anger. it's morbidly fascinating to me how this exists to some extent in the gay man community too, and even within gay couples. it's no wonder the middle-age male suicide rate is so astronomical.

this male culture framework has absolutely nothing to do with me. i was subjected to it for my entire teenhood, and i've always rejected it. in some form, my main drive in life was always to improve my mental health, emotional development, and self-awareness. it's antithetical to masculinity, because that's deemed a feminine trait. as such, when i started really diving into trauma healing literature and the community, i found it's, again, predominantly female. with the trauma community, i relate so much to the women there. our childhood and upbringing stories are very similar. anonymously, i can exchange love and kindness in our shared experiences. when it comes to my mental and emotional development, it feels as though my brain is wired feminine.

but is there such a thing as feminine? i can identify with it in this societal framework and my perception/understanding of it. it's entirely possible that my experience with women is flawed and toxic in a unique way. perhaps my perception of women is shaped by my generationally traumatized f*mily, my abuse-cycle relationships, and the general magnetism that traumatized people tend to have to each other. perhaps i conflate womanhood with victimhood, which is problematic. feminist literature i think would lean towards agreeing with the statement, but i wonder if the concept of victimhood should be gendered. it implies men don't have the right to be victims of their own meat grinder systems. also, viewing a woman as a victim by default, even a little, reinforces the harmful stereotypes of delicateness and instability, even if there's a positive paired outlook that women are admirable and resilient. if what i'm seeking is to be socially accepted by women, then the common thread i find in female trauma victims is that they aren't accepted by women either, neither of us are fully accepted on average by either binary gender. perhaps gender has nothing to do with acceptance. if i associate victimhood with femininity, and i am definitely a victim, then is it valid to associate myself with femininity? is it a false equivalency? do i deserve it? are labels immoral?

now, with my background from 4chan, i am also very aware of the incel to trans pipeline. incels just are on the most extreme end of male culture's tenets. in these extremely misogynistic spaces, the belief is that women live life on easy mode and transitioning to women makes all their hardships poof away if they pass. they're so cynical and black and white about gender roles that they think they are failed men and any woman can be successful. there's also the whole autogynephilia thing that's weaponized and demonized by bad actors, but it does exist in these spaces (neutral connotation). by no means do i believe in these ideas, but any discourse community is valuable information if you're interested in the specialized topic (and can sift through all the dumb shit). it's true that the goals and expectations of men and women are different, those are socially constructed gender roles, although it is not true that being a woman is just easier. generally, it's probably harder being a women, but for someone who wants to be more approachable, feels prettier and more confident, wants implicit social permission to feel more emotions, would personally feel more empowered establishing boundaries, and doesn't particularly aspire to be taken seriously professionally, then it's a trade with few drawbacks. (am i being too transparent here?) i would not call myself an incel, i fucking despise those bigots, but the idea that i'm just really bad at being a male is definitely relatable. unlike them though i don't blame chads or staceys for ruining it. it's not the classic story of a boy growing up crossdressing, it's more of a switch from a societal role you're miserable in to one you're probably better at/happier in. when you put it that way it sounds like merely changing jobs, but is that valid?

something tells me i'm worrying about the opinions of transwomen who've gone through these thoughts a million times before and the opinions of women who hate gender bullshit and all AMABs anyway. i have a very strong sense that i have to have permission to feel anything, or that i'm constantly trying to justify my existence, or that i need everybody's approval. i think the answer i would get from almost anybody is "just be yourself" or "you're just you". they would be right, but i'm simply not in the right phase of healing to believe it yet. maybe today was the day my egg cracked and in 5 years i'll be on hrt. i don't really think so. gender is such a nebulous concept with no basis in objective reality. at the moment i feel like my body is masculine, my mind is feminine, and my soul is genderless. i think all souls are genderless though. personally, i've never really felt any connection to my physical body, i'm dissociated as fuck all the time, i've always identified with my mind being a separate thing, so a huge bias could be coming from there too. as i get more in touch with my body through healing, i might change my tune.

the only thing that i can presently say for certain is that i'm enjoying my time on neocities. i feel accepted by and connected to other women for the first time in a long time. i'm very comfortable having female acquaintances/strangers and male friends, but i'm still triggered by male acquaintances/strangers and female friends. i'm always comfortable around anybody trans though. hopefully i can get closer to people from neocities someday. i hope revealing myself like this didn't weird somebody out and they can't think of me the same and don't visit my website anymore, but if that does happen, well, what can ya do. i hope over time, somehow, i'm able to form healthy friendships with anybody. and i wish to have a healthy relationship with myself, whoever i am.

~10:30am Nov 3, 2023
Mood: crushing
Listening to: Softheart - sometimes i just walk around the house to move a little ⧉

i don't really listen to albums often but this new softheart album from halloween is really good. lil darkie released one too and it's decent but not the whole thing.

i feel like i'm getting worse. i suppose i haven't been getting worse in everything, i am slowly getting better at writing and expressing, coding, coping, taking my time, and introspection. it's just, i feel like my life is getting worse. i'm just surviving and it's getting harder to do that. for most of my life it felt like i was floating and drifting through life, emotionally distant and reacting when i had to. now it feels like i'm constantly fighting, i'm always clawing at the asphalt beneath me to keep stable. the more i think about emerging from hermitdom and trying my best to function, the more i feel like i'm starting from square zero. it makes me angry and overwhelmed and jealous, which is too much for my nervous system to handle and it just locks up and paralyzes me. my default state of being is the freeze response and it's ruining my life. if my life somehow wasn't already ruined. i hate talking about it so much. i feel like people don't understand. just yesterday someone i don't know very well decided to start asking questions and tried giving advice when i disclosed a little bit about it. his heart was in the right place, but it only ended up being humiliating and invalidating. i would say something like "i freeze up in public" and he said what everyone does: "well nobody is really paying attention or caring or judging you". i'm not stupid, i know that already. if it was that easy or if i had control over myself i wouldn't do it. i finally admitted in front of everyone that i've never made an irl purchase (and only a couple of online ones) or went shopping before, and people were all like "really?" as if i was fucking lying. i don't know why i kept answering questions, i guess i started fawning again too. then it was like "well try a mcdonalds kiosk first instead of talking to a cashier," it isn't about that, it's the fact that i've never used a kiosk and would have to figure it out on the spot. which i can do, i'm not some tech illiterate, but all my thoughts become totally incoherent and disorganized under that amount of stress. i need to operate in steps, and if something interrupts them, it will become nearly impossible to retrace them. i struggle with it enough in complete solitude with things i've done millions of times. i have a lot of crippling overlapping core phobias. change, stagnation, masking, abandonment, safety/intimacy, social cues, anxiety itself. exposure therapy literally doesn't work, i only feel worse after doing something i was scared of, not like it opened my eyes that it wasn't as bad as i thought as it would be. like, of course i'm aware i'm overreacting and fears are irrational. so, what i mean by "getting worse" i mean my fears are even stronger than they used to be. i didn't used to be THIS bad, i've always had to deal with it, but at least during college i could walk around or into place by myself occasionally.

i get so irrationally jealous of other people who struggle similarly but are actually able to go outside and complete purchases or get supplies to make little hobby crafts or what the fuck ever. it's very toxic of me. i think i picked it up from my ex. she was also extremely limited in the same ways i am, which we bonded over, but she was able to function just a little bit more out of necessity. if i ever indicated i wanted her help getting to that point too, she would do this thing like she could never understand why i would be so afraid and that it sounds so stupid and just kept putting me down. it was triggering and i just grew resentful and now i'm projecting it onto other people i care about. or, alternatively, like people who struggle the same at square one don't understand what it's like to struggle at square zero. but these are all arbitrary distinctions i made up in my head as part of staying frozen. this is what i mean by constantly fighting and clawing, i'm so acutely aware of where i am and why, and my emotions feel so overpowering that i can't bring myself to take action anyway. the only thing my will can't overcome is itself. chains and thorns coiled around my ribs, wrapping my entire torso and up my neck and into my temples, just under the skin. i can't decide if i'm procrastinating because i'm still frozen, or if i'm being kind to myself and the taking time i need to thaw. i'm repeating myself.

took a short break from writing this entry.
on the bright side i guess, it got below freezing last night. i stayed outside for an hour watching the taurid meteor shower. i was planning on going back inside once i saw 1, but that only took like 20 seconds, so i said fuck it and just wanted to stay cold and fill my lungs with it. it was beautiful, taurus was situated between the moon and jupiter, so it looked like the shooting stars were traveling from one to the other. at some point i must've started tearing or crying because it froze on my eyelashes. i went back inside when the outdoor lights turned on because someone probably accidentally set a daily timer and i don't know where the controls are. it'll still be chilly, but it's warming up again, and that makes me sad. i'm waiting for december and january.

i need to get out.

~5:30am Nov 1, 2023
Mood: war
Listening to: MIYA LOWE ft. Dvstrr - Damage Pattern ⧉

happy halloween i guess. i wish i was in the mood for it more, but i've been too deep in my emotions. lately i'm just irritated at all these festivities in my house, my f*mily is so unbelievably loud and it's impossible to get some peace or sleep. as much as i would've liked to celebrate somehow, namely finding some way of dressing up or learning how to carve a pumpkin for once, i didn't do anything because i'm stuck. instead i put on my scary binding of isaac shirt, hollow knight hoodie, black arm warmers with a white dragon print, and black sweatpants for comfort, and my nails are still black. i ate some candy too. i spent most of the day putting the finishing touches on my silent hill retrospective, which felt appropriate.

i'm satisfied with how it came out i think. there's nothing in it that is a revolutionary idea or anything, and idk there's probably some things i glossed over and they would be confusing to read. i struggled with myself for so long, feeling like i have nothing important to say and i shouldn't say anything at all. that my ideas don't matter and people would get bored and irritated reading it. i wrestled with it, reassuring myself that it's fine because it's a collection of my own thoughts on my own website, it's better to write for myself than anyone else. i know where these thoughts come from and i know they are irrational. i KNOW, i just can't bring myself to BELIEVE it. my nervous system is still too damaged to think i deserve kindness, from myself or others. turns out it's hard to heal from anything when you're barely scraping by for your bottom tier of needs on Maslow's hierarchy. if anything i'm glad that i did end up completing the review. even if i can't necessarily feel proud of myself right now, it does in fact exist, it's written and recorded on the internet forever, and maybe i'll be able to feel proud later. no matter how i feel about myself, i did factually overcome the things holding me back from completing it. hopefully, if i continue, it'll bring me closer to that point where i can love myself.

since it was tuesday, i had therapy on halloween. again, i wish i was in the mood for it more. i would've liked to have an easy day in therapy to keep spirits up. instead i walked in feeling really dissociated and noticeably tense, and today was the first time i cried in front of my therapist. i've gotten close before, like talking about assorted traumas and my past relationship while it was still going and when it ended. i don't really know what was so different about today. i just started talking about how nonfunctional i am and it all came out. how i want to be functional, but no matter what it'll always feel like masking. as if the process of becoming functional is just pretending to be functional. if something ever doesn't go according to plan in a store or workplace or whatever, then i'm prone to breaking down, and i can't cope with extreme anxiety to avoid it in that environment. my main problem isn't feeling different, it's feeling othered. i so desperately want to belong somewhere but i do not belong in everyday society, it's so paralyzing. i don't know, i guess it's life coach time for real. i need to learn expectations from someone if i have any hope of masking as an adult. i'm so indescribably angry at my f*mily for robbing me of life experience and the comfort to seek it out. for the last year, i've been sort of hoping that my masking would gradually lessen on its own indirectly as i learned healing. as i'm coming to realize, my masking is causing more wounds, and it's still just as untouchable directly as it always has been. it's so fucking buried in my unconscious, i'm waging constant war on myself.

it's been cloudy for so long and i haven't able to see the stars or the moon in almost a full week.