Writer Culture Is Creating A Sunshine Character And Then Making Them Go Through So Much Trauma That They're

Writers on their way to kill off your favourite character

As a late diagnosed autist I will say one of the most damaging but transformative experiences I've ever had was being misdiagnosed with BPD.

Everyday my heart goes out to people with BPD.

The amount of stigma and silencing they face is astonishing and sickening.

I took DBT for years. Therapists use to turn me away because of my diagnosis.

I would be having full blown autistic meltdowns, crying for help literally - but because I was labeled as BPD ANY time I cried I was treated as manipulative and unstable.

As if the only reason I could be crying was if I was out to trick someone.

95% of the books out there with Borderline in the title are named shit like 'How to get away from a person with Borderline', 'How to stop walking on eggshells (with a person who has BPD)'

I was never allowed to feel true pain or panic or need.

That was 'attention seeking behavior', not me asking for help when a disability was literally inhibiting my ability to process emotions.

There were dozens of times where I had a full meltdown and was either threatened with institutionalization or told I was doing it for attention.

My failing relationships weren't due to a communication issue, or the inability to read social cues. No, because I was labeled borderline, my unstable relationships were my fault. Me beggong nuerotypicals to just be honest and blunt with what they meant was me pestering them for validation.

Borderline patients can't win.

And the funny thing is - I asked my therapist about autism. I told her I thought I was on the spectrum.

BPD is WILDLY misdiagnosed with those with autism and I had many clear signs.

Instead - she told me 'If you were autistic we wouldn't be able to have this conversation'. She made me go through a list of autistic traits made clearly for children, citing how I didn't fit each one.

And then she told me that me identifying with the autism community was the BPD making me search for identity to be accepted - and that I wasn't autistic, just desperate to fit in somewhere.

I didn't get diagnosed for another ten years. For ten years I avoided the autism community - feeling as if I were just a broken person who wanted to steal from people who 'really needed it'.

Because of my providers - I began to doubt my identity MORE, not less.

Ten years of thinking I was borderline and being emotionally neglected and demonized by a system meant to help me.

To this day, I still don't trust neurotypicals. Not fully.

I know I'm not borderline now - but my heart aches for them. Not for the usual stuff. But for the stigma. And the asshole doctors. And the dismissiveness and threatening and the idea of institutionalization hanging over their head.

I love Borderline people. I always will. I'm not Borderline but if you are I love you and I'm sorry.

You're not a bad person. You're not a therapists worst nightmare, you are a human with valid feelings and fears.

Borderline people I'm sorry.

I love you mean girls in literature, I love you manipulative and scheming elder sisters of the protagonists, I love you ambitious women washing damned spots from bloody hands, I love you “she was always the perfect/favorite child,” I love you Emma Woodhouses and Caroline Bingleys, I love you mean girls with complex and morally questionable but ultimately understandable motivations, I love you mean girls they called evil and never bothered to explain at all, I love you mean girls who are not even girls, I love you queen bees, bullies, cheerleading captains, and heads of the school play in teen flicks, I love you weapons of war and calculating politicians and manipulators of royal court, I love you sirens and succubi and vampiresses, I love you changed by the end, I love you still the same bitch as before-

Someone: So what is your novel? Middle grade? YA? Adult? NA?

Me:

So writers joke a lot about "drinking the tears of our readers", but I want to be so honest with you when I tell you that making you cry isn't our real goal. Making you feel is.

Kicking your feet? Giggling? Can't stop smiling? And yes, crying? Feeling anything, everything. That's our goal. That means we did The Job.

love when writers are like “this character is SOOOO tormented. they are undiagnosable. no one could possibly understand them. they’re just so disturbed and impossible to label. they’re a mystery. no one will ever quite comprehend what goes on in their mind” whole time the cunts just autistic

"How's the writing going?"

‼️

And the other thing I did yesterday.

I finally hit the launch button on GoFundMe for my surgery fund.

gofundme.com

Dee's Gender Confirmation Surgery Fund, organized by Dee Arbacauskas

Hi, I'm Dee. I'm an artist, a leatherworker, a writer, a mom, and a few other … Dee Arbacauskas needs your support for Dee's Gender Confirm

I... if you can donate, that's awesome, but really, the operations are in November (yeah, I have GCS and FFS just a week apart from each other and that recovery is going to suck). The biggest thing I'm asking for and need is help sharing right now. I don't do reddit, or twitch, or streams, or twitter anymore, or any of the media where a lot of folks manage to get their funds magically filled by big donors. If you do, mind putting the word out about mine over there? I just want to be able to make sure I can recover in peace without the rest of my family struggling to make up for what I can't do during that time.