Reading The Symptoms Of Autism As A Now Grown Adult After Being Bullied For No Explainable Reason All

reading the symptoms of autism as a now grown adult after being bullied for no explainable reason all your life

a selkie by the sea 🌊

this was from last month :)

Huey moodboard!! He's my secret favorite of the Duck-Bunch ♡ Dewey moodboard is probably next!

Yellow pasha butterfly caterpillar, Herona marathus, Apaturinae (Emperors)

Photographed in China by jiangyou

YOU AND ME SHAKING HANDS, NO ONE IN THE MOUNTAIN FAMILY IS NEUROTYPICAL!!!!! They are blended and patchwork and trying their best!!!!

you 🤝 me mountain family takes

They really are trying their best!! And I'm very sorry it's taken me so long to reply and also that the reply is so long!! i just have. a lot of feelings and my hand slipped and this got very long? please feel free to offer concurring/opposing thoughts about this if you feel so inclined, i'm rotating them in my head constantly

like, Demetrius works very much in the framework of Technical Definitions (see: the great tomato debate). he likes rules. he likes well-defined roles. (speculating a bit here but I also think he likes well-defined roles in social situations, because it makes it easier if he knows what behavior is expected of him?) and so when he marries Robin, he sees the family unit as very simple (himself, Robin, Sebastian) and immediately in his mind becomes A Step-Father, with all of the responsibilities that role entails. meanwhile, Sebastian still sees his family unit as himself + Robin, and Demetrius is just.... some guy who married his mom.

this leaves Demetrius in the position of thinking that he has a Moral Obligation as a parent to Guide My Child Down A Good Path and Offer Guidance (read: unsolicited opinions and clumsily-veiled admonitions that, although well-intentioned, toe the line of healthy boundaries and appropriateness; he does this with Maru, too, in the two-heart event). Sebastian understandably doesn't take super well to this, because Demetrius hasn't actually built a parent-child relationship with him, he's just presumed it, and Sebastian hates that, actually. Sebastian is his own person, and his independence is important to him; he doesn't need guidance, he needs support.

and like, Demetrius' idea of a "Good Path" is very rigid and doesn't leave much room for variation? e.g. Demetrius would cope very badly with being a freelancer, because his brain needs routine and structure. so he needles Seb about getting a "real career" even though freelancing is a real career and works really well with Sebastian's needs (freedom and flexible scheduling)-- because he would be miserable freelancing, he can't see how it's an ideal situation for someone else.

also like. while he does favor Maru, I fully maintain that the snowman vs. snowgoon thing is less about Maru and Sebastian specifically and more about "correct" vs "incorrect" behavior. "why would you make something upsetting/scary instead of something good and nice?" it's very black-and-white thinking. I feel like Maru has a more similar communication style to her dad (likes rules and frameworks, friendly and well-intentioned but sometimes overly blunt, and occasionally a bit open-mouth-insert-foot without meaning to be), and she's much better at staying within the parameters of Demetrius-Approved Behavior. this, stacked on top of Seb's social anxiety, absolutely leaves him feeling like he's Handled The Social Interaction Wrong whenever he interacts with her and contributes to his feeling that she dislikes him and that he doesn't fit in with his own family, even if his family doesn't actually feel that way. (eta: this also leads to him getting offended or hurt by comments that she simply does not think twice about, because he constantly overanalyzes social situations and she doesn't)

anyway this is all very disjointed but i have so many feelings and thank you for your good mountain family takes they give me life

a trip to the aquarium

request for anon ♡ became a little self indulgent because this is literally my dream trip!!

☆ requests are closed!