Cw Panic Attack Mention - Tumblr Posts
i cannot stop thinking about this. Heart's pain is psycological, not physical, and the mental illness metaphor falls perfectly into this. Heart has panic attacks and heartaches from stress and the whole, and no matter how much angst it allows it's representation that no matter what your pain and suffering is valid, visible or invisible. amazing reflection
As much as I love all depictions of Mind’s headaches and Heart’s heartaches (sweet sWEET ANGST) my personal take seems to be slightly different. I feel like unlike Mind’s headaches, Heart’s heartaches aren’t physical pain like it’s often depicted, but emotional pain. Essentially, rather than “heartaches” referring to physical chest pains on their own, like before a heart attack, it’s referring to the chest tightness and pain being caused by crying and struggling to breathe, such as during a panic attack or his depression kicking in. It would make sense, he is the manifestation of emotions and when we say “heartache” we are typically describing emotional pain rather than physical pain. Heart’s heartaches are an emotional ache- a sudden debilitating sinking feeling of dread and/or panic that either sends his adrenaline through the roof or just makes his chest feel heavy. He’ll always grab at his chest as if he’s been stabbed, as if it is physical pain, but it’s him trying to ground himself, trying to get his heart rate to slow down a little so he can b reathe, or trying to sooth the sudden inexplicable feeling of loneliness and hopelessness out of nowhere. It’s just as debilitating for him as if it were physical pain, and often the fear of a heartache can cause a heartache to happen (even more of a metaphor for mental illness.) It’s the kind of dread that sends you into a fit of sobbing and gasping for air and leaves you feeling too sick and lightheaded to stand, the feeling you get when something terrible’s happened, but it’s random and inexplicable. Theoretically, nothing should be wrong. The way he reacts, you can tell he’s in pain, but it’s emotional pain. He is the emotional side, after all. It also may be part of why Mind thinks he’s so weak. Mind’s headaches are physically debilitating and the pain actively stops him from functioning, and because it’s physical pain and Heart’s is emotional pain, he assumes that it’s not like that for Heart, that he is just over dramatic and should be able to snap out of it (again, mental illness metaphors!!!) But Heart is no more capable of making the emotional pain stop than Mind is at making the physical pain stop, and he’s no more able to “power through.”