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★ 【袖化饼】 「 杂 」 ☆ ✔ republished w/permission ⊳ ⊳ follow me on twitter

it's always so fascinating and heartbreaking when a character in a story is simultaneously idolized and abused. a chosen prophet destined for martyrdom. a child prodigy forced to grow up too fast. a powerful warrior raised as nothing but a weapon. there's just something so uniquely messed up about singing someone's praises whilst destroying them.

i like the concept of soulmates—not a “you’re destined to meet me, and love me” kind of soulmate, but a “i’d pick you, every time.” kind of soulmate. a “no matter what happens, and what has happened, i want to go through it with you.” kind of soulmate. a “i love you by choice, and you’re a blessing, and i’m going to continue thinking about you this way not because i have to but because i want to.” kind of soulmate. a “you help me rest easy when everything is difficult” kind of soulmate. a “in every possible outcome, i want you there, to share it with me.” kind of soulmate.

honestly while i can understand that ruby might not actually know how to chain together a string of punches in the same vein of yang and tai, it wouldve been cool if they showed that ruby is just super good at dodging, purely because she and yang used to fight all the time and she got very good at dodging the fists thrown her way whenever she touched yang's bike

Honestly, during my first read of AGOT, I thought Sansa was in love with Joffrey because she was still naive. Now, during my reread, it feels like she’s forcing herself to love him, she’s forcing herself to think he’s a good person even though she knows he is not: he’s her betrothed, because of an arranged marriage, and she just wants her marriage to be like her parents’, who managed to actually fall in love with each other. Also, I think that she’s so obsessed with still wanting to marry him, even right after her father’s ‘treason’, not because she’s in love, but because that’s what a lady’s supposed to do. Let’s not forget she always has Septa Mordane by her side telling her to shut up, act like a lady should and not to question anything because ‘your father knows best’. That’s what she has always been taught for a lifetime, to act like a highborn lady and do the only thing a highborn lady is supposed to do: marry a highborn lord and have his heirs. And she’s up to do this, she’s up to marry Joffrey and be a lady, but she wishes her wedding could be real. She wants to marry someone she loves but she knows she can’t, so she’s trying to see Joffrey in the brightest way, just to fool herself. She just wants to be the lady everyone expects her to become. Yet, that lady died the moment she got to King’s Landing, symbolically as Lady the direwolf. Sansa’s not a lady, nor she will ever be: Septa Mordane wants her to keep quiet and be polite, yet Sansa is curios, she wants to know things, she wants to know what the hell is going on. She can be snarky, teasing, whether it’s towards Arya or Joffrey or Jeyne everyone else: that’s not a lady’s behavior. Sansa is no lady and Sansa won’t be no lady. She’ll be much, much more.

This opinion is probably a given but... I don’t know, my reread in English is making me appreciate the books a little more and is making me notice things I didn’t realize at first.

I talk to many people who say things like "oh I have trauma but I don't have PTSD", but then when I talk to them a little more I realize that they most likely do, they just can't recognize it as such due to how lacking PTSD awareness is, even beyond the whole "it's not just a veteran's disorder" thing.

The main reason they think they don't have PTSD usually has to do with flashbacks and nightmares, either they have one but not the other or have neither. But here's the thing, those are only two symptoms out of the 23-odd recognized symptoms. Flashbacks and nightmares are two of the five symptoms under Criterion B (Intrusion), which you only need one of for a diagnosis. The other three symptoms are unwanted upsetting memories, emotional distress after being reminded of trauma and physical reactivity after being reminded of trauma (i.e. shaking, sweating, heart racing, feeling sick, nauseous or faint, etc). Therefore you can have both flashbacks and nightmares, one but not the other, or neither and still have PTSD.

In fact, a lot of the reasons people give me for why they don't think they have PTSD are literally a part of the diagnostic criteria.

"Oh, I can barely remember most parts of my trauma anyway." Criterion D (Negative Alterations in Cognition and Mood) includes inability to recall key features of the trauma.

"Oh but I don't get upset about my trauma that often because I avoid thinking of it or being around things that remind me of it most of the time." Criterion C (Avoidance) includes avoiding trauma-related thoughts or feelings and avoiding trauma-related external reminders, and you literally cannot get diagnosed if you don't have at least one of those two symptoms.

"Oh I just have trouble getting to sleep or staying asleep, but I don't have nightmares." Criterion E (Alterations in Arousal and Reactivity) includes difficulting sleeping outside of nightmares.

"But I didn't have many/any trauma symptoms until a long time after the trauma happened." There's literally an entire specification for that.

Really it just shows how despite being one of the most well-known mental illnesses, people really don't know much about PTSD. If you have trauma, I ask you to at least look at the criteria before you decide you don't have PTSD. Hell, even if you don't have trauma, look at the criteria anyway because there are so many symptoms in there that just are not talked about.

PTSD awareness is not just about flashbacks and nightmares.