Gregg allman i'll be holding on

I 15 F think I know everything there is to know about abuse however it’s really difficult to identify if what I’m enduring is abuse. My mom is mentally Ill to say the least, she has never hit me or done anything to physically harm me and half of the time she’s a pleasant person and I do love her I think, maybe we’re trauma bonded but I don’t want to get too into that. Anyway she has recently been medicated for some of her issues and it did help slightly but my entire life she has been what I consider to be emotionally abuse. She will yell at me for being a terrible kid and make me cry until I can’t breathe (i would like to note the worst thing I’ve ever done is not clean my room). I honestly can’t think of too many examples but at least one blow up happens per week which leads me to want to harm myself and other things. Anyway today i really wanted to get some things to eat because we have no food in the house that I like (she never asked me what I waned) and when we got to the store she had one of her outrages and said “I did groceries yesterday wtf do you need now” first of all why did you drive me all the way here if you didn’t want to get me food, second of all I didn’t know you even did groceries and if I knew I wouldn’t have asked. Anyway this outrage led her to throwing food at me in the store and storming out of the store and then she sped with me and my 8 year old brother in the vehicle all the way home. she continues to say things about how she wants to off herself and go back to being a drug addict and i feel like it’s my fault for being so terrible. I was planning on continuing to live with her while I go to uni because I know a lot of her issues stem from her mental health issues but honestly I can’t put up with this bipolar mess and I’m just sad and need advice. Maybe this isn’t abusive and im being sensitive but I need to know.

⚠️ LONG
I (18f) always had abandonment I due to personal issues with parents and my ex, ex boyfriend. When I first moved to my new school last year, I had no friends besides the ones I left behind. I made one friend (18m) towards the beginning, and we quickly became attached. I played hard to get, but he waited. And after a few months, we kissed and had been more attached after that. We went everywhere, constantly with each other. I grew to love him, but I didn't realize it soon enough. He fell in love before I did, and everyone saw it.
I told him everything. Every past trauma, every little detail that made me the way I am, every unfortunate story of my previous relationship and he did the same. He promised to never hurt me, promised to be better. At first I had a hard time believing, because it's just the same story. But I learned to believe it. He always apologized if he made me upset. Would always comfort and hold me. It was the best few months, he was the absolute sweetest. There were a few problems here and there, I always kept quiet because I didn't want to stir up anything. An example is, he'd get upset if I was on my phone while we hung out, because his ex would always do that. Early on in the relationship, even before dating, I would put my phone on DND (do not disturb), and put all my attention on him. Which he loved and appreciated. But then he wouldn't do the same. Not the DND, but would always be on his phone when we hung out. I'd only look at mine if I got a message from my parents to come home. But of course, I ignored it because I just wanted him to be happy.
I later found out I'd be moving away again. Which broke his heart and at first I was ecstatic about where we were moving to (would prefer to keep it secret, but it was very far plus a big giveaway). It was a lot of back and forth on the move, not knowing, knowing. It was overwhelming and frustrating for both of us. And when it was coming closer to the move, I became more vulnerable towards him. More open. We spent more time together. However, he started talking about this other girl, and then started messaging with her more. I was always very open with his friendships with opposite/same sex friends. I didn't want to be that jealous, controlling girlfriend. So again, I ignored it. But it became all the time. I'd notice her contacts always showing up, he'd almost always answer instantly. I started to hurt a little, but I didn't want to come off as insecure so I just didn't say anything.
About a week before the move, I became burnt out. I fell very deep in my depression and just needed to be alone. I broke up with him because I started to push him away, I couldn't get the energy to hang out, I could barely get out of bed or ready in the morning. It didn't feel fair on him. So I called him over and did it. I felt awful, and when I saw him upset, I wanted so badly to hold him and apologize and take it all back. But I knew I couldn't. We remained friends. He started to hang out with that girl now physically, and I became jealous that I broke down in tears. The day before I left, I invited him to dinner. We had gone, we joked and ate. But he kept looking at his phone, texting other people, her. I started to get upset. Because the dinner turned into a date. We had gone back to the car and started making out though after the dinner, which then turned into something more later into the night, which then also turned into us getting emotional, holding each other and sobbing uncontrollably. This happened until I left the following day.
When I had gotten to the place I moved we still talked. I became very stressed and emotional. I couldn't help but cry about everything, and I started to feel more alone than ever. He promised he'd never leave me alone, never to block me. Promised he'd always be my friend and to always talk to me. I believed him. Because I realized how madly in love I became, how much I wanted him back. And he reciprocated. But then about 2 days later. He asked out that girl after telling me he didn't want to move on, about how he couldn't, how i'd always be his girl no matter where I was and who I was with. It completely broke me when I heard. They were planning events and he told me everything. How happy and excited he was. I was still broken up, still holding on for something.
I then told him I wanted to visit him soon again. And he didn't like that, because she wouldn't be happy. (She didn't like me when we were together because I was with him and not her). I told him it was dumb and apologized. He still said he'd never block me or leave me, and told me to believe him. The next day though I completely broke down. I couldn't stop crying. I wanted him back, and I couldn't. He then told me that evening that we should block each other, because it would be better for the both of us. I broke down again. I asked him if everything he said even meant anything. If he was just saying that so I was happy. He apologized the next day saying he only said that because she was reading the messages and that he didn't actually want to. So I told him that it was okay, and if he wanted we didn't have to continue talking but remained friends, and that i'd always be here whenever he needed me, someone to talk to. He told me that I was his best friend and always would be.
Later that day, I found that I was blocked on everything by him. Everything became a lie. I had let myself become vulnerable to him. I let myself believe something when I knew I shouldn't because it could have turned into a lie. And it did, The boy I loved left when I needed someone the most, I never felt so alone. Ever since then, I keep having nightmares about him leaving me. About us cuddling and then him walking away from me. Or him ignoring my presence if we ever passed each other. Now I keep seeing guys who look similar to him and I can't help but feel so shitty. Did I do something wrong? I can't help but feel like maybe this was my fault. Maybe I should have just pushed it all down and pretended to be happy. He said that she knew how much I meant to him and why we were still friends. I feel so stupid. I'm sorry for how long this is. I don't know what else to add. I want to know how to move on, how to be okay. I keep hoping that i'll get a message from him someday, I always check that maybe he's changed his mind. I just don't know anymore
TL;DR - I used to date my best friend, and once I moved away and before completely ending things, moved on. Now I can't stop dreaming about him after he broke all promises. How to grow past this?

My big boy has only eaten once since his molt which was just after he came out of his web (I didn’t know there was still a meal worm in his enclosure) and now a few weeks later he won’t eat. I can tell he’s hungry and he’s very very skinny and he tries to eat but he won’t latch on to his food, I try to hold it there for him but I can’t hold it for hours. He picks it up in his mouth and almost immediately lets go but he keeps trying and trying and I feel so bad. He used to be such a good eater and was always a little plump(but healthy) and now he’s completely the opposite. Any help would be great. I use meal worms for all my other spiders and he ate them really well before so I know he’s not being picky.

For the second time I have taken my 3 year old shih tzu to the groomer and it didn't go very well. We have a 3 year old shih tzu (Arya) and a 2 year old bichon/shih tzu (ollie). Ollie was adopted and has done great with grooming. We got Arya from a breeder as a puppy and she has always had an extreme fear of the vet, being groomed, etc. She has been treated exceptionally well all her life but will even duck her head when we go to pet her. When taking Ollie to his groomer, I spoke to the owner about how I would love to take Arya but she was very fearful so we have always scissor cut her ourselves. She recommended starting to take her in for a bath and nail trim and work up from there. We took her in November but our children (1 and 2 year old) have been plagued by illnesses and We've been overwhelmed this winter. Today I took her back to the groomer with Ollie (he goes every 8 weeks), and the groomer came out and said she had to have a talk with me. She said that Arya was very afraid during the bath and so scared she couldn't even clip half of her nails. She let me know that she saw it had been five months since Arya had been in and if I couldn't commit to taking her every four weeks or less for a bath and nail trim she would refuse her from the salon and we would need to take her to the vet for sedation and grooming. Number one we wouldn't do that because we can scissor cut her ourselves and we don't want unnecessary sedation. I did ask her if Arya was aggressive and she said there was no aggression just shaking and being scared but no nips or aggression. She said that it was our fault for not bringing her before 3 years old and she was willing to try to change her bad disposition at the groomer if we were willing to commit to her the groomer but if not she was too bad. Supposedly this girl is the best they have with anxious dogs but she seemed very rude and short.
I feel like her attitude was offensive. She didn't act like that at all the first time and said she did well with Arya back in November (but the owner was standing beside her at the time). I tried over 40 groomers in our area before finding them. No one else was accepting new dogs after the pandemic. This is a brand new boutique so they had openings when we started taking ollie. Our PetSmart does not have a good reputation.
Are there any groomers who have experience with nervous scared small dogs. Is there any advice? Is this what you would say to me as well? New to the grooming experience but I felt as if it was such an attitude and fait accompli to take her every four weeks. I had already talked to the owner about bringing her on the 8 week schedule same time as our other dog. We really don't have the money for $100 bath and nail trim every four weeks, but I don't want to give up on our dog getting groomed professionally. Any advice?

A few years ago when I started studying, I joined a student union, and made some great memories there. They organise an annual weekend activity (with about 20-25 people present), and five years ago I joined it and had a great time. I'd gladly have done it again, but some things intervened (like covid and schoolwork). Meanwhile, I've graduated, as do most of my friends, and almost no one from back in my active days is still active in the student union. Yet one person half-key invited me to join it again this year a couple of months ago, so I decided to join on a whim.
The problem is, I don't really know most of these people all that well. Most of them will be far younger than I am (I'm 23, the average age will be around 19-20). And the few people I know relatively well I thought would come along have all cancelled or passed the opportunity. So, essentially, I'm joining a weekend with a bunch of strangers to me who are already well-acquainted with each other for the biggest part. On one hand, I'd really like to join along and just get to know these people, but on the other hand, I'm worried it will be awkward since I don't really know them all that well and I'm not socially talented enough to just make friends in just a single weekend. I'm especially insecure about it because someone I know made a snarky comment about me joining the activities. So, I'm conflicted whether to cancel at the last minute (a safe bet that might leave me a little regretful that I never took the opportunity), or just go along knowing that it might be awkward.
In short: should I take the opportunity, or do I play on safe? In any case, how do I best navigate this?
If any of this is confusing, please just let me know, then I'll clarify things. Big thanks if anyone can help me here.

Disclaimer: I know using bindings which are not explicitly compatible with a boot is a terrible idea. I will be getting a new setup over the summer.
Recently got some new boots which have gripwalk soles (Fisher Ranger One 130 for those curious - they're superb boots). My current pair of boards use some old Rossignol FKS bindings, which are identical to the look pivot. The old pivots and FKS bindings were obviously made before ISO 23223 (gripwalk standard), but new pivots are listed as compatible.
I can't find any documentation for design changes for the pivot pre- and post- introduction of ISO 23223, but it really doesn't look like anything was (aside from maybe the thickness of the foot plate, relative to the top rim of the binding).
Not gonna be sending it too hard the rest of the season, gonna focus on tele. I guess there my main question is: is it safe to assume that my bindings are "compatible" with gripwalk? I'd really like to hold onto this setup as a backup, otherwise they're gonna be relegated to wall decoration.
side note: recently crashed in the woods while decently hauling where by foot was torqued out of the binding (tip got caught on a stump and ski was rotated 90 degrees relative to direction of travel), and my foot released just fine - din is 12. So, it should be fine. Really just looking for someone to tell me whether I got lucky or not.

I am loosly planning to start a fanfiction poddcast doing poddfics. Focusing first on Eruri, my current obssession.
I would love to get a hold of authors of good fics both long form and short. That would be interested in having me read your work. Anything from gen to explicit is not a problem...
Full credit to author of course! :)
Can record a snippet for anyone interested so you can hear how it would sound. Hoping to get some pepole who would like to let me work with your storys

I am a huge urban-fantasy fan, but there's precious little of it out there that meets my standards. The combination of the mundanely familiar mixed with fantastical and impossible is my favorite genre, especially if it's in the monster of the week format. I've enjoyed classics of the genre, from Narnia to Dresden Files to Stranger Things to Goonies, and the list goes on (though not much longer. For example, I enjoyed but couldn't finish Lockwood and co.)
Oh, and I should probably note: SPOILER WARNING, and also SCROLL WARNING. This is long.
Ever since I heard of supernatural, I'd assumed it was bad. In my mind, it was a darkly lit, broody, shallow show about two highly attractive actors doing things the writers thought "sounded cool" to impress an audience of screaming fan-girls.
This was based on a couple of google searches, while I scoured the internet for intelligent and well written urban fantasy. I read part of a plot summary once, and it said basically "This brother died, then came back, but the other brother died, and then when he came back the first one died now," and I was like "this seems contrived, and kinda boring," Secondly, this show was produced by CW, which has developed a reputation for the kind of writing in their shows. Lastly, it was apparently "very gay" which, while admirable, isn't my taste.
This was an incomplete understanding. A friend of mine said I was good at dissecting media, so here goes. I'm going from memory, so there might be a few errors. It was 12 hours ago.
The first episode opens by establishing character motivations by showing us the inciting incident, and then cuts to the future so we can see how that has effected our characters. We are then treated to both eye and soul candy as one of the brothers is in a wholesome relationship with his girlfriend. This is not something I was expecting, since it will help to create contrast with the darker things happening in the show, making them appear even darker by comparison, and lures the audience into getting invested with these characters. The acting was amateur, but not bad. Kinda reminded me of Buffy, which is a show I adore (Especially the first 4 seasons).
After that, we are interrupted by Brother 2. I do not remember which is Dean and which is Sam, so for the sake of not annoying a lot of people brother 1 is the younger brother who looks like Luke Skywalker, loves the idea of living a normal life, and has resigned himself that there is nothing to be done about the supernatural. brother 2 is older, loves the idea of hunting monsters, and holds out hope. This contrast is layered on with brother 1, the resigned one, being overall more hopeful about the future, while brother 2 is more grim, and puts on a "tough guy" facade (or maybe that was just the acting).
The plot itself was tightly written, and it obeyed the laws of physics and magic it established. I know that might sound like a low bar, especially considering it was a pilot episode, but you'd be surprised how often Hollywood writers mess up obvious physics for no reason. " I mean, it's a supernatural show, so it already doesn't make any sense because magic, so who's gunna notice," BUT I DO, because without physics being consistent, you can't have an understanding of what's going to happen, and it makes it damn hard to have stakes. The physics of earth are right there, and easy to research. For example, I appreciate how the windows explode at the beginning due to a sudden burst of heat. That is both "logical physics" and a cool visual. Sometimes physics go out the window in favor of a cool scene, like shooting out the tires of a car, but doing that shouldn't cause the car to start flipping end over end, unless you don't want to be taken seriously.
This is a good sign moving forward, along with the depth of character that was established in the first scene the brothers meet. So far I've seen Efficient Writing, with scenes accomplishing multiple things at the the same time, and Good Writing, where we've been introduced to people we like, who want to do something, and don't want to do some other thing. I know that's vague, but it's my baseline.
Brother 2 asks Brother 1 to help save their dad, brother 1 is like "Oh, I'm sure he's fiiiiine," and brother 2 is like "there's a chance he isn't, Are you coming?" and brother 1 says "ok, but I have to be back by for an interview," which established a time limit. Brother 2 scoffs at the idea, but doesn't push back very hard because it's what his brother wants. Brother 2 couldn't imagine living like that, getting a job, trying to live a normal life after what happened to their mother, with the whole "being sucked into the ceiling by fire or maybe burned alive" thing. The best part is that the interview immediately creates a looming clock, which will cause conflict if it's not met. If the brothers get stuck out there, brother 1 will miss his interview, and that will be a conflict in their relationship. Neither of them want that.
They hit the road, but what the audience is shown isn't a road trip scene. It's the monster. And we aren't shown it. The first we "see" of the monster is the two bro's analyzing a voicemail from Dad, in which the message is "encoded," or something. I couldn't really hear, since I was whispering back and forth to my cousin the whole time these scene was taking place. I think they said it was on a different frequency or something. Regardless, we hear the words "will you take me home?" coming from an unnerving female voice.
THEN we see the monster. She glitches out of the woods, gets into a random young man's car, and has boobs. My first thought was "why isn't he running, she's acting really odd," but then boobs. But, as my cousin pointed out, he could just think she was a drunk woman on a walk home, who wanted a ride. The fact that they move the camera to show that "she isn't actually in the car" enforces the idea of her being a ghost, without anyone saying it. And we aren't given enough information to know why she's killing people, like it doesn't seem Malicious but it doesn't seem Innocent either. We don't even get to see how he dies, since the camera cuts away before a spray of blood splatters the windows. My cousin said this was for "budget reasons" but I think it's a good writing technique. As a rule of thumb, don't show your monsters abilities right away. Figure them out if you need to, but simply show the results of their actions. Then the audience knows what they saw happen, but they don't know exactly what they were looking at. Stranger Things does this a lot in Season 1. There is an explanation, but we don't get to have that right now, so our mind wanders into dark imaginings. How did she kill him? I guess we'll find out if it's relevant, otherwise it's unnecessary information that degrades of mystery factor of the monster.
Ok, so the two get to town, and I don't remember exactly what happened next. They visit the crime scene, posing as US Marshals with fake ID's. Brother 1 acts like he's not a US Marshal, brother 2 acts like he knows everything, and they get a little bit of information. The cops don't suspect anything supernatural could have caused this. They then go to their dad's apartment, which includes this shot where one of them is standing outside, and the other reaches out a hand and yanks him into the apartment. That kind of creative touch added to my enjoyment of the show, creating a little levity, showing their relationship, and stylizing the show. It's those little details that build up to create a mountain, and part of the reason I'm looking forward to watching episode 2.
Plotwise, the cops show up, arrest brother 2, ask him about all the weird stuff in their dad's apartment (I just realized it was actually a hotel room), and very importantly: The cop tells him him and his dad are a suspect in the case. Why? well, from a meta-writing perspective, you want to amp up the stakes and make the cops a human antagonist. Especially since from brother's 2's perspective, they are. The law is just another thing to get in the way of fighting and uncovering supernatural stuff. But in world, why would the cops suspect a random pair of shifty young men who had a hotel room full of strange occult stuff, and a bunch of pictures of women in a white dress. Well, because that is suspicious. It's not something that's easily understood or explained, and akum's razor indicates they are probably just psycho's going around and creating ghost stories for some arcane reason in their madness. Criminals be crazy. But also, brother 2 is acting antagonistic, was using a false name, fake credit cards, and refuses to elaborate or explain anything. He's already a criminal, so the jump to crazy criminal isn't far.
There is a thing that pulls the cops away, so he handcuff's brother 2 to the desk, and leaves after demanding an answer to a large cryptic note. It was clearly written recently. There are still cops around, and he's handcuffed to the desk. It's convincing, if not entirely realistic for the cop to be this relaxed, especially since he's not a proven "dangerous criminal" just a proven fraudster. But, this slightly unrealistic thing is used to enable something awesome. Brother 2 reaches over and opens the notebook. He grabs a paperclip, and we see him holding it. This is "subtle" writing, since we never actually see him picking the lock, but it's not subtle because everyone knows what he's about to do without being told or shown it. It's engaging, builds his list of skills, and his disdain/deference for the law. Efficient Storytelling baby!
I would like to note that there is a part earlier with Inefficient Storytelling, but it's excusable because it was both too subtle and too on the nose. When Dean and Sam first go outside to brother 2's car, he opens a compartment to reveal a bunch of weapons. The modern audience is aware of what the show is "vaguely about" and the presence of the weapons tells us he uses them. Brother 1 then says the line "we were trained to be warriors," which felt off because both people knew this information. It comes off as awkward, and inn inn-efficient. We already knew this! They already knew this! Why is it here?!?! WELL, it's because this is a pilot to a show with no future. Nobody knew it would take off. Nobody's knows if the general audience is going to pick that up from the way they've been speaking to eachother, or the oodles of weapons. A lot of people turn their brains off when they watch T.V, and they don't want to have to work to pick up essential information. "We were trained to be warriors" also fills in the time gap some, shows their relationship with their father by the way he says it, hardens the differences between the characters "one turned away to become normal, and the other accelerated to become a hunter, to the point where he's getting permission to go on solo missions,"
Interesting Trivia: At this point I took a pause to get a drink of water, and scrolled back up. I think I'm probably either 1/2 through or 1/4 of the way through the post.
So far, the plot has led from action to reaction to action smooth as silk, with nuggets of interest building up along the way. There are several questions hanging over the characters, pushing them forward. If I remember correctly, this is when brother 1 goes to the old man, and accuses him of infidelity. His reaction is an answer, and brother 1 runs into the ghost. I really don't remember the order of events after this, but basically what happened was: brother 1 is driven to the ghosts house, she starts to seduce him, he flat out refuses so she transforms, sticks her fingers into his chest, and does "the big suck" with her fingertips. Brother 2 shows up and shoots out the windows of the car to distract the ghost, which gives brother 1 enough time to hit the gas and ram the car through the side of the house. This allows the ghost to reunite with her children, and (after the only special effects I disliked. They were horrendous) she is at peace. There is a small sense of finality on one of the big questions: "what's going to happen with the ghost?" but we still have "what's going to happen with their dad, what did happen to him, etc" and "what's going to happen with the Interview?"
So brother 2 tries to tempt brother 1 into coming with him to find Dad, but brother 1 wants to go home. There's a bit of adorable banter, and then brother 1 is home. Here's where the show surprised me. I was expecting stuff and this point, trying to predict what would happen next. Logically, and heartbreakingly, brother 1 has to go with brother 2. I mean, that's the whole point of the show. But how to do it? As a writer, you have to break the character's underlying motivation for staying. You have to disprove brother 1's philosophy that "a normal life is possible" but how? Well, the episode was already about infidelity... well, not exactly. It featured infidelity of a husband, and brother 1 did the interviewing of that guy. AND there's are sounds in the apartment when brother 1 enters it. Something is going on upstairs. So, I assumed brother 1 would go upstairs, find his lover cheating on him (despite there being no foreshadowing for this, and in fact she shut down brother 2's advances), and realize that a normal life wasn't possible because he can't trust girls, or something. BUT IT'S SO MUCH WORSE... uh, I mean better.
Brother 1 goes upstairs to find the bedroom empty, despite the sound. He then finds his wife stuck to the ceiling, and the audience knows exactly what comes next because we saw it all in the beginning. Every step, from the fire to the stunned expression, to the pain, to brother 2 dragging brother 1 out of the burning apartment. This is so perfect!
For all he knows, She loved him to Last. Brother 1 has no hope for a normal life anymore because he is to become his father, a man who's wife was murdered by magnetic ceiling fire. Why? We'll find out at some point. But this is so good!!! The brother who is least like the father now has a massive parallel with him. He can no longer believe that it's possible to live a normal life and ignore the supernatural. He has a responsibility to make sure this kind of thing doesn't happen to normal people. And!!! this puts him in contrast with his brother, who has already been shown to be a "heyyy girl," type of guy. Brother 1 will likely have trouble with another girl, as his lover loved him to the last. Perhaps he should have told her more, enough to be prepared. Perhaps there was something he could have done...
Those are my thoughts. I loved it, the characters are deep and developed while fitting into the familiar archetypes of Lumberjack and Homemaker, and I'd really like to talk about my cousins "New paper nitpick" but I don't have time. I'll be back to read comments. Ideally don't spoil anything too big for me, but I don't mind. This show looks awesome, and I look forward to watching it all throughout the rest of my life.

So I need to read a book from the list given to compare to the Great Gatsby for my oral which is going to be 4-5 minutes long. I’m mainly into romance, mystery/murdecrime, fantasy, sci-fi and am looking for a short book. Any recommendations from below?

1. Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi - Purple HIbISCUS
2. Ahmed, Samira - Love, Hate and Other Filters
3. Albertalli, Becky - Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda
4. Anderson, Laurie Halse -The Impossible Knife of Memory, Twisted
5. Anderson, M.T. - Feed
6. Arnold, David - Mosquitoland
7. Austen, Jane - Emma, Sense and Sensibility
8. Blackman, Malorie - Boys Don't Cry
9. Bradbury, Ray - Fahrenheit 451
10. Brown, Jennifer - A Thousand Words, Torn Away, Perfect Escape
11. Capote, Truman - Breakfast at Tiffany's
12. Dessen, Sarah - Saint Anything
13. Doeer, Athony - All the Light we Cannot See
14. Hannah, Kristin - The Great Alone, The Nightingale
15. Hashimi, Nadia - The Pearl That Broke its Shell
16. Hossein, K- The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns, And the Mountains Echoed
17. Keyes, D- Flowers for Algernon
18. Khan, Muhammad - I am Thunder
19. King, A.S. - Ask the Passengers
20. Kingsolver, Barbara - Flight Behaviour
21. Lockhart, E. - Disreputable History of Frankie Landau Banks
22. Manal Al-Sharif - Daring to Drive
23. Marchetta, Melina - Saving Francesca, On the Jellicoe Road
24. Mashigo, Mohale - The Yearning
25. McEwan, lan - On Chesil Beach
26. Murphy, Julie - Ramona Blue
27. Nelson, Jandy - 1'Il give you the sun
28. Ness, Patrick - The Rest of us just live here
29. Ng, Celeste - Everything I Never told You
30. Nicholls, Sally - Things a Bright Girl Can Do
31. Niven, Jennifer - All the Bright Places, Holding up the Universe
32. Nyathi, Sue - Gold Diggers
33. Obama, Michelle - Becoming
34. Pan, Emily - The Astonishing Colour of After
35. Robert, Na'ima B- Far from Home
36. Rowell, Rainbow - Eleanor and Park, Fangirl
37. Ruby, Laura - Bone Gap
38. Saenz, Benjamin Alire - Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
39. Salinger, J.D. - The Catcher in the Rye
40. Sepetys, Ruta - Salt to the Sea, Out of the Easy
41. Smith, Dodie - I Capture the Castle
42. Stedman. M.L. - The Light between Oceans
43. Stevens, Courtney - Faking Normal
44. Thackeray, William - Vanity Fair
45. Thomas, Leah - Because You'll Never Meet Me
46. Tlhabi, Redi - Khwezi
47. Watson, Renee - Piecing Me Together
48. Weir, Andy - The Martian
49. Wingate, Lisa - Before We Were Yours
50. Yousafzai, Malala & Lamb, Christina - I am Malala
51. Zentner, Jeff - Goodbye Days

I’m a smart, sexy, extremely kinky, creatively cruel, surprisingly kind, self-aware, unexpectedly witty and seriously over-sexed dominant male. I want a long term, joyful and delightful relationship with a compatible submissive. I have wide ranging kinks, but more than anything I get off on a mix of emotional and physical sadism, serious mindfuck, and seriously rough sex alternated with genuinely affectionate and mutually empathetic aftercare. Ultimately, what I want most is an affectionate, trusting, and intense relationship with a like minded partner who also wants to be in a slightly unconventional 24/7 TPE-esque relationship.
I say "esque" because in the long run, while I require a great deal of control, there are some areas -career and education, forex - what I want is for you to be yourself, in the best, most exciting way possible. More generally, I am very aware that however kinky we are, there are some things in a couples life that simply have to be addressed by consensus if both parties are going to be themselves in the best way possible. Perhaps if I were inclined to life as a backwoods yokel, I might feel differently. But I spent the first eighteen years of my trying to escape the rural nightmare of my birth. I’m a very progressive urban professional by choice — almost by design, even. And I want the same thing in a partner: someone who shares my unabashed enthusiasm for cities and everything to do with them; someone (else) for whom living in dense urban neighborhoods isn’t a brief bit of tourism before retreating to the suburbs and raising a couple of over-privileged brats to repeat the process. It is a vital component of my life and my happiness. And while my personal politics are complex, because I’m a nerd who thinks that discussing policy white papers on the merits of UBI vs a federal jobs guarantee is a perfectly reasonable thing to incorporate into any exploration of kink that hasn’t involved a ball gag.
(And this can go here as well as anywhere: I’m looking for something involving touch; I’m a fan of the slow epistolary burn, and I am very open to meeting someone who isn’t in Chicago; depending on the person and circumstances it is not impossible I might be the one to move if we really, really hit it off. But I want someone to have adventures with, sexual and otherwise. Not talk about the adventures we hope we get to have someday. I’ve done the part of my life where I hope wistfully for what is coming, and I’ve done the part where I’ve been madly in love with a seriously compatible partner. One of those is worth any effort to repeat and improve upon and -notwithstanding the behavior of an alarming number of other men my age - it sure as shit isn’t high school.)
All that said.
I'm looking for a girl who is helplessly driven by her need to be owned, controlled, disciplined and I am by the need to control and degrade and punish. A girl who wants and needs to be micromanaged; who wants her clothing, her grooming, her hair style and her posture to all be exactly what Daddy wants. She feels a little heat between her legs every time she says the word Daddy, the way it is at once filthy and sexy and a little demeaning. A prized possession, a well-trained servant. But no more allowed to rebel against doing what she's told than the couch or the coffee table. She knows that praise is something to be earned; that being called "Good Girl" should be a reward for doing well, not a wage for showing up. She knows that her owner won't accept any excuses, or waste any mercy, and she is grateful: she wants to be perfect for her owner, and the only way that can happen is if she knows that nothing less than perfection will be tolerated.
She knows that punishment can range from a spanking as hard as her owner - who is stronger than he looks (and doesn't exactly look weak) - wants, to being given corner time, to being locked in a closet for hours in the dark, sometimes with a recording of herself or her owner to berate her, sometimes with nothing but blackness and her own feelings of guilt and shame.
She knows that she belongs to someone both loves both the visceral joy of delivering "simple" physical punishment to his plaything and who rarely loves her as much as he does when she is looking at him, bruised and bound and overwhelmed with lust and telling him how much she loves him, suffering for him, being degraded and humiliated for someone who uses her exactly how she needs. Just as much as I love that, I love longer term more cerebral torments just as much: lecturing and writing lines are at the low end (and lines, especially isn't a punishment so much as a normal daily routine), keeping you in sensory deprivation, depriving you of sleep or human contact until you are vulnerable and suggestible and even more frantic to please me. And then, as I comfort you and hold you and give -sincerely - the care and affection and attention you need to build you back up, I'm manipulating and molding you into exactly what I need. Until your desperate eagerness to please fills you so completely that you can't imagine any higher caller: belonging to me and serving me is the only thing you can imagine wanting, and pleasing me is a source of almost transcendent joy to you: a smile leaves you almost light-headed with pleasure and relief, and the words "Good Girl" from me will cause an automatic and intense orgasm. Because in the end, what you are, more than anything, is an art installation. Valued and incredibly valuable, the product of planning and thought and because of that cared for and prized. Because you are a person being shaped into a specific kind of sex and service toy, rather than an inert and inanimate lump of marble to be sculpted, your opinion is frequently sought and seriously considered: one of the things a good girl helps her owner with is figuring out how she can be a better girl, after all. But I'm no more going to be bound by your opinion (on your hair color or hem length, on how tight I should make your waist via corset training or what the best daily schedule to hold you to might be). Because it is my art project, and because my tastes run that way, the end result is going to be a person whose company I immensely enjoy, who I feel is an asset as a bauble on my arm and entertaining companion. I am going to make of you: Someone with whom I can spend one night relaxing at home, lounging on the couch reading while you sit curled up at my feet, working on your lines for the evening or with book of your own but always with one eye on my water glass and another on any intoxicant I I'm consuming: most likely a cocktail, but sometimes a cigar or a joint. No matter what it is, you always make sure that when I reach for a sip, or a puff, or a drag, I can be certain that it is there, whatever, perfectly prepared if it needs preparation.
Moreover, whenever you stand and walk to the kitchen or bar or whatever, your every movement appears effortless and graceful and feminine and sexy; I want you to feel my eyes on you even if they aren't and I want you to know that if I what I see could be improved -if you didn't put enough sway in your walk, or a hair was out of place, or your smile wasn't quite inviting enough that I will make a little note, and perhaps then, perhaps in an hour or perhaps in a week. (I didn't say it would be effortless, btw. This is a relationship that will be profoundly loving, breathtakingly intense, and -for us, for myself and the right partner, satisfying in a way nothing else ever could be. But it is not and never will be "fair" or "equal", and it isn't supposed to be. That is why we like it, after all).
Someone who I can imagine taking out to dinner at some place very nice like Alinia or Per Se and make her dress in a way that is merely obviously oversexed (if you've been good) or deliberately, humiliatingly trashy (if you've been seriously failing to shape up). And all night as enjoy the meal and as we enjoy each others company, you are aware that your skirt is not only so short that anyone looking can see your legs but that with the plug in your ass -one with projection designed to both push it in as you squirm on your seat, each movement affecting both the plug and the balls I'm making you hold in your snatch. And finally, at the end of the night, I'll turn to the waiter or waitress, and I'll apologize for your inexcusable nasty and wanton behavior. And then, with a level voice and gaze but glowing, shame-filled cheeks, you'll do the same and then invite both any of the waitstaff or busboys who want to come watch in the alley, because you are going to be punished by your owner for all the ways you are a nasty little bitch. Someone who I can take out dancing, doing shots in some filthy nightclub and filling your ass with my cock in its bathroom, for any number of reasons (I like to dance, to pick one, and while I'm a bit of a nerd I'm actually not bad) but one of them is that knowing that most of the male heterosexuals in the crowd are thinking about what a sexy piece of ass you are even before it becomes clear that you have a collar on and cum dripping out of you. Because what is the point of making you into art if I can't show you off?
If you've gotten all the way down here, you are probably dripping and certainly curious. I've listed only a fraction of what I might like to, but if you don't have a basic understanding of what I'm after, you never will. For myself: I'm a bright, handsome, white male, 5'10 and 44 years old. I'm active and while I've got a bit more of a gut than I might wish (COVID UPDATE: Considerably more gut. This whole section was obviously premised on being able to leave the house), I'm mostly big in the "can throw you around sense" more than the "morbidly obese". I'd say I'm trying to lose the gut, but that wouldn't be true - what is true is that lately I've enjoyed going to the gym and working out as well as going to the pool and swimming in a way I never before have, and as a result I've lost a great deal of weight and moved some of the rest around. (This was more true when I initially wrote these lines than it is now... lockdown has not been good for me. At all. )
While the forgoing has mostly focused on what you might call the "negative" space of a power exchange dynamic, it is important to know that I'm just as moved and just as driven by the "positive" space as well: I love feeling my partner in my arms, shaking and spent and intensely vulnerable. Being able to make her feel safe and protected in my arms and on my lap, feeling her relax into that space of safety and approval and affection is differently, but exactly equally, as rewarding as it was to put her into subspace in the first place. When we're in deep enough, are compatible enough, and have shared enough and done enough, those moments of affection also mean that when I look into her eyes and see a look of lust and approval and need and adoration that borders on worship. And that is an amazingly power and empowering feeling; a feeling that makes all the work and thought and attention to detail that goes into a project like turning a smart, interesting human being into a plaything who aches for my approval without (and this is important) damaging or disrupting any of the qualities of intellect or ability or confidence that make her both desirable in the first place and a capable of submissive, in the second. And of course, in making you my perfect submissive I'm necessarily causing it to be the case that I'm your perfect dom, and that is a nice feeling. Also in the realm of positive space: I'm a big fan of affectionate touch. Of hugs and kissing and making out, of having my hand rest idling on your thigh or caressing you as I walk by, running my hand along your flank or through your hair. As a dom, it is one thing with which I am almost always unstinting: I'm almost never going to withhold affection like that from you, and the question "Daddy (or Sir, or Whatever), could I please have a hug" is vanishingly unlikely to get a negative response. And, for that matter, the right sub will understand: sometimes, the only kind of safe word you need is my first name — you as a person will always, automatically, be more important to me than you-my-sub. And if we do it right -if we are right, together - the various roles we occupy in relation to one another (As friends, as romantic partners, the D/s dynamic) end up ceasing to be in tension with each other; one just finds oneself shifting to the the best role for the moment without either of us having to think about it. More generally, one of the satisfactions of being someone's dominant is being able to help them push through their anxieties, whether the anxiety is over some punishment I have planned or task I've assigned (on the one hand) or regarding an interview for a job you really, really want or deal with a boss or co-worker who is being an asshole. Some of my favorite moments as a dom, a boyfriend, hell, as a person, have been like that. Have been sitting on the end of my couch, her he on my lap and stretched out along the length. Letting my hand play along the hem of her skirt and idle reaching and pulling it back and playing with the cunt between my sluts legs. Feeling her shift her weight and legs and alter her position slightly to give me better access and seeing her hair spread out and just listening. Intently, interested as she tells me about a worry about her dissertation[1] or anxieties,
I'm successful in my profession, capable and very demanding. I'm a city dweller by choice and am not interested in changing that: I might move to a different exciting major city, but I'll never choose to live in the burbs. I'm intelligent and intellectual, with quite a bit of old school nerd (I like knowing things and trivia and politics and science and ideas) and a little bit of the new school: I read science fiction (among other things; god save me from the sort SF fan who's only fiction after high school was SF) love the idea of space travel and wish I could walk on the moon. Also, glasses. While I like being called Daddy, sometimes by some partners, I'm not really an age player; while a bit of DD/lg type tension can be fun, and the occasional bit of teachestudent, priest/penitent or similar role play is sometimes sexy and entertaining, I am ultimately want my partner to be present as herself. If my adult submissive is coloring in her adult coloring book because it is soothing, that is awesome. But I don't want someone who is going to pretend to be six, or even sixteen. When I scold you or praise you or spank you or kiss you it needs to always be you: an adult human person who has kinks that are twin to my own, who is living her life this way because, in the general case, she is self-aware, intelligent and introspective enough to know that she, for whatever reason, can only be happy in a relationship with a large, constant, and significant power exchange component and (in the specific) is choosing to do that with me as her dom because she believes that she can be a good sub to me and I make a good dom for her: that our kinks and curiosities and ambitions, our sense of humor and hopes for the future line up in a way that means that we are happy and healthy and mutually supporting in our relationship, even though it might look -and be- viciously abusive as well as so regressive in gender norms as to seem positively antediluvian, if stripped of context and consent. But it is what works for us, as individuals and as a couple.
Finally: I have only one solid and specific "must have" requirement: I need a person who has a quick wit, a filthy mind and a very dirty mouth. If you can't turn me on with words and speech, in the long run we simply aren't a good match. I want to be able to hear you beg, in detail. I want to watch you struggle to come up with some sufficiently outre act of deviance to forestall some punishment, and then see your expression change as you come up with and finally delight in the filth that comes out of your mouth and the smile that you wear while it does so. For everything else: I have enough experience, with both kink and relationships, not to have many remaining preconceptions about what the "right" person is. The right person is the one who reads this ad and sends me a thoughtful PM that is interesting and seductive. And respects me enough not to be a single sentence or, worse, not even a sentence. At one point or another I've been massively turned on by women of any number of shapes and a myriad of colors. I've also been left cold by the same. Don't ask me if I like xxx (BBW/black/asian/tall/short --interestingly, I've never had anyone put "white" in that variable. I'm going to assume that this is because I'm white; otherwise the despair will make my brain hurt, and at 3am I'm allowed a comforting untruth). Point is: I have to be interested in you, specifically, and if you can't or won't bother to respect me enough to try and seduce me back I can assure you: no matter what the answer to the PM "Like xxx" is, if you send that I'm going to enter into this not liking you. (Oh. And while a picture may be worth a thousand words, I promise: it won't substitute for any one of them).
[1]My tastes run toward the bright and the competent more than other single thing, which perhaps explains how it is that despite the fact that going to grad school has for me always been more in the way of a pleasant but never very serious daydream (there being no present niche for IT professionals with Ph.ds in either International Relations, nor ones who've written dissertations on the English Civil War and Cromwell's protectorate, nor ones who have made an extensive study of the social history of class mobility and the role played by the American military in hindering or supporting it. To name three things I've wished I might devote myself to understanding at one point or another in the last couple of weeks), I have a surprising degree of experience with the process whereby an almost comically specific question, like "If married Up and Down quark are inadvertently invited to an orgy and have unprotected quantum tunneling with a submissive-Truth quark (who is lying about his vasectomy) a switchy Bottom quark with body issues and a poly-triad made up of two Charm Quarks and a Higgs Boson that may or may not have been a mail order bride, will the baryon later left on the steps of the local firehouse b: a) Closed and Timelike b) Open, and spacelike c) lemon-flavored d) Pope Sixtus the Third?(a) or -on the Humanities side "Unprotected Casual Prose: Exactly When Did It Become Obvious that The Only Explanation for Brett Easton Ellis is Tertiary Syphilis" - and, these things, combined with pile of research about which I will spare the jokes, results in the right to annoy people by making hotel clerks and gas station attendants call you Doctor. (But not me. At least if we're dating; it isn't the kind of insecure I do and one of the points I try and get across above is that my whole approach to kink in an LTR is: if YOU eagerly choose to be MY submissive, then, by the transitive property of awesomeness, I, ALSO, must be awesome.)

I recently found this subreddit and I am already incredibly grateful for everyone here and the information that's shared. I'm hoping to get some advice on how best to support my son. Here's our very, very abbreviated story:
In June 2022, my now 16yo son was diagnosed with ADHD. Before that, in November 2020, he was diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum (high functioning). Before that, our life had been 13+ years of constant daily struggle. Since learning of his ADHD, he has been taking Ritalin, which has been an absolute miracle. My once totally dis-regulated child who had frequent and destructive outbursts now can function, at least emotionally, in a much more even-tempered way. It's been 9 months of bliss, from that perspective.
Our constant struggle with him is over school. He hates going. He's already at an independent, non-traditional school where he fits in beautifully with all of the other "quirky" kids who chose to exit the public school realm. But he still hates going. It's a daily struggle to get him out of bed. It's a struggle for the teachers to keep him engaged when he's at school. It's impossible to get him to do homework ever. He sees no value in going and there is little to no chance that he will graduate in 5 years, say nothing about in 4 years.
I know from reading on here that there are lots and lots of adults with ADHD who made it through high school and even college, and are now holding down jobs and are in relationships and are living fruitful lives. My husband and I are having a hard time seeing the path for our son. If he can't manage to string together 5 days of school, how is he ever going to function in society?
TL;DR: My 16yo son with ADHD won't go to school. What do I do?

I'm about 4 months sober from an addiction to opioids that has lasted the last 2 years. Quite early into the start of my sobriety I was playing Disco Elysium and first read the Wasteland of Reality solution from the Thought Cabinet.
"Full recovery will take years, though. It’ll be depressing. And it’ll be boring. Don’t expect any further rewards or handclaps. This is how normal people are all the time."
It really hit me hard. Over every book or movie or game I'd seen that featured an addict, none of them spoke like this. So many of them focused on that one pivotal night where the character had a big revelation, swore to do better and poured all their booze down the drain. None of them really focused on what it was like after that moment. I can tell you from experience that recovery is so fucking boring. It's one of the best decisions I've ever made but it isn't exciting. Too often I've fallen into the mindset of sobriety being something I should be rewarded and celebrated for and that any break from it was tragic. It was really something special to be told 'this is the norm you should get used to it'.
Too many shy away from the actual effects of recovering. It's not just boredom but genuine changes in behavior and relationships. Both good and bad. Finally being able to hold a pencil without shaking to the notorious weight gain. It can fucking suck for a lot of the time but but at the end of the day, this is how normal people are all the time. I know it's just a paragraph but I don't know, it was something I think I needed in those early days when I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to see it out.
Hell that's not even going into Harry as a character. I can't tell you the amount of times I've had to take a break from playing from something he's said being a little too real. He's one of my favorite characters in all of fiction.
I'm not quite sure why I've written then but I just re-read the paragraph and wanted to get my thoughts out. I guess if there's anything to take away from this, sobriety is totally fucking worth it and if any of y'all reading this are struggling with it then I believe in you, be vigilant and I love you.

Firstly I'm not tryna throw shade or hate on anyone in the sub. I've just noticed that a lot of people on this sub have a very defeatist attitude and seem to have given up or not even tried at all.
I include myself here. I spent years trying to improve myself, finding styles that worked, going to the gym, all the usual self improvement stuff. I sat there wondering why it hadn't happened yet but realised that I don't do anything. Like I'll go to work and the gym, and that's great, but other than that I just sit at home. I'll go out with friends maybe once every few months. At the end of the day no one's gonna knock on my door and ask to date me.
My biggest issue is just a lack of effort when it comes to putting myself out there. I've known this for a while but never made a change. Maybe cause it seems stressful idk.
Just wondering how many of you guys are the same as me, where there's no effort being put in, or whether you've put yourself out there continuously and landed flat on you're face.

Hey y'all,
I submitted my request for a refund on my payments made during COVID on 11/14/22 and was told to wait 90 business days (via MOHELA). It's now been 100 business days, and they won't respond to any of my messages past the following:
"We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. All refunds are issued by the U.S. Treasury. MOHELA is not able to verify a maximum timeframe on behalf of the U.S. Treasury’s processing."
I'm going to call them, because I've asked them twice now via messaging how/if I can contact whatEVER department is responsible at the U.S. Treasury for pushing my refund through and was only given this vague message. Has anyone else had to wait forever long for their check to arrive? This entire process is so frustrating, and I don't trust any of these companies/entities to do it without intense pushing on my end. Every time I've called MOHELA, though, I've been on hold for hours. The longest was 6 hours. It was so fun and fresh.
Any insight you could offer would be super helpful.
PS - I am aware that the refund is going to be added back to my balance due.

Hi! I put this in legaladvice but was told here would be better!
It's my first time posting here so apologies if I don't get this quite right!
I'm writing to ask for advice on retrieving a sum of money from an ex. I'll detail more below, but in general the amount owed is around £6,500.
So just to preface this, we've already exchanged messages about the money and he's even gone so far as to accept the amount that he owes - we started a payment plan over several years to recover the money with no interest, and he has made 3 payments according to this plan.
This takes me to today, when I get an email (all other communications have been through messenger or Snapchat), arguing that the amount owed is incorrect and that we had agreed on lower prices and that there was no understanding that money sent to him would be paid back.
He's proposed a new amount of around £2,000 and called it a 'take it or leave it offer'.
Honestly £6,500 is a conservative estimate of the amount of money I spent to support us both. This total comes from all of the outgoing bank transfers over the period of 9months we were together, plus the value of the car which I purchased him. Obviously there were many times where I was present and would pay for things such as large shops or his fuel in person (and so have no way of determining this amount) but can account for the £6,500 stated above.
I'm mainly wanting to know how much the original agreement we had is worth in terms of binding him to pay the amount back, what the chances are of getting the full amount back and how to go about this.
Please let me know if you need any more info! I'm in the UK, so would be great if any advice is relevant to me!
Edit: just seen automod, I'm in England!
As a sidenote, he's currently borrowing money from his new girlfriend, so it would really be an added benefit to show him he can't keep getting away with it.
Thanks in advance!!
TL;Dr: An ex built up a debt of over £6,500 before we broke up and after 3 months of paying it back decided now he doesn't agree with the amount.

Recently there's been a huge increase of people posting spoilers without any warning on my socials. Reddit and Instagram are fairly safe since people tend to put a spoiler warning which is obviously the good thing to do.
However on twitter and YouTube it's a whole different story. On twitter I'll get pages spoiling the whole chapter without a warning even after I click see less often or even block the accounts and on YouTube you get people putting spoilers all over their thumbnails and in their titles. No matter how many times I click not interested they keep coming back because I watch a lot of one piece content. So either I stop watching one piece related content or get spoilers for chapters all over my feeds.
I understand that some people want to read the spoilers early which is fine but some people really just ruin it for others who actually want to wait for the chapter to drop whether it be scans or official. Myself and many feel like reading the spoilers completely kills the hype of a new chapter (I know this isn't the case for everyone but still) so obviously we want to avoid these spoilers.
To anyone who posts spoilers without a warning fuck you. You ruin the experience for so many fans...

Airplay is not offered on Arc (specifically YouTube airplay).
Is the functionality not yet implemented in Arc? Is there a setting I can change or an extension I can download to enable airplay?
I'm not sure if this should be in Help or Feature Request but I'll know soon enough.

I've been researching tens if not hundreds of hours and I'm still failing to come to a conclusion. Most sources I go by don't even come with a conclusion themselves so how could I? I think there's a bit of analysis paralysis going on here. I know kind of what I want but I don't know how to obtain it since once I've made a purchase I'll have to stick with it.
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Right now the idea is the Londinium R24 and Weber-Eg grinder. The grinder seems to produce a lot of clarity and the Londinium seems to produce reasonably consistent shots with it's spring design. I don't like how long it takes to heat up (Up to an hour apparently) but given you can turn it on using your phone, maybe it's not so bad? Aside from that and potential inconsistency (even though it's a spring lever) might also be a frustration point.
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I have thought about going the Decent route but the amount of electronics built in (Which will cause it to break over time), software bugs, no real buttons or levers and a seemingly weird attitude from the founder. I also don't like how it looks at all. Also if most Decent owners base their shots on the Londinium-based profiles then why not just get the original instead (Not saying that a lever machine is limited to one shot). According to some- you should get slightly more body in the R24 versus Decent which I'm all for.
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I generally do light to medium roasted coffee if that makes any difference in the purchase (Which it probably does, I just don't know the extent). I love well balanced shots with lots of clarity. I of course like to drink different cups too though.
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I do think the Decent will contribute a lot to the coffee industry (So excuse me of I seem harsh with my wording) with its experimental take I just don't know if the consistent shots make it a better contender than something like an R24.

TLDR, my unconscious has become conscious, therapy failed but I'm kicking trauma butt generationally, yet I'm still so broken. Is there a version of talk therapy that would help me and my daughter?
I (M40+) have CPTSD, 2months premie, no touch for 8 weeks in an incubator, sick brother who passed away from 2-6. Violent childhood “you should have died instead of ” beatings, homeless teen 30+ PTSDs, no education past 16. Turned my life around at 21, successful adult working just below C-Level in large MMCs, lived in a couple of different countries, still don’t own a house but who can these days if you live in a major city.
Therapy of 5 years went wrong for me 1 1/2 years ago. We had a rupture and she told me she felt a deep love for me, she thought our inner childs connected, Im one of her favourite client, always in her head, she always envisioned she would ask me to be friends 2 years from when she retired or I finished treatment, if I left she would be devastated and need therapy herself. 100% invested in me and my daughters outcome.
I ran, that’s terrifying to me… not aware I was attached and it ripped all my repressed trauma out and I started to have nonstop flashbacks from when I was 18months old to 21. I went back asking what the hell is happening help! but she made mistake after mistake desperately trying to salvage and repair but my trauma just consumed us e.g. complimenting my inner child and angering my protector parts as she wasn’t safe, poking a flashback instead of grounding, she started to be in my trauma nightmares, I ended up burning the relationship to prevent me from keep going back and she probably should have terminated/transferred me out long before that point as it always made me worse if I tried to re-engage with her. I was stuck in flashbacks for a year, my log comes to approx 69,700 flashbacks, it was rough and terrifying. Private Hospitals turned me away, 80% of therapist will not touch me, the few that would had no idea how to help get me out of that state. My daughters attachment completely shutdown from the way I was neglecting her from being so nonfunctional and broken.
I used to be bitter at the lack of accountability and how the industry turned away, apparently it as my attachment that played out… A hospital even said “We have seen this a few times, its sad when this happens but imagine what it would be like for the other patients, hear how you talk, everything you learnt, all your work and yet this can happen, what would it do to them?” I felt like the industries dirty secret.
This isn’t an anti therapy post though. I'm glad it went wrong as I wouldn’t have been able to do what I did with my daughter’s challenges. I just don’t know what to do next and want to see if anyone has any ideas or resource materials that might help?
I found Dr Dan Browns 3 pillaPerfect Parent work via a podcast: therapy uncensored TU87 complex trauma and attachment. It taught me that CPTSD is a disorganised attachment with trauma on top… heal the attachment then the trauma can clear without much work, or you can then clear it relationally… It made me realize I gave my daughter a disorganised attachment, her fear of my voice/face expression is the fear of us rupturing from my triggers and me withdrawing, dissociating instead of watching over her from the pain my love for her brings me. A separation incident when she was 2 her first “PTSD”, (who am I kidding, Im probably PTSD 1-10). We thought she was HSP, intense from birth, smart, deep, very verbal… She has just been diagnosed ASD1, her behviours only really kicked off after the separation incident and got worse as I got worse. I figured I have to get myself out of the flashbacks, I can’t give up as that would be another PTSD for her… I have to heal our attachment to heal her challenges. In my hardest night as a teen, my 16 year old self swore if he ever had a child they would never feel what he did and yet I had failed this badly? It might be ASD but Im going to visit the elephant in the room… Im going to call it pre-verbal PTSDs/sensory overloads, developmental and attachment trauma all from me that is probably implicit memories now… She has CPTSD if Dan Browns view is right and developing in constant flight/flight would present as autism from the sensory overload.
I ended up creating my own therapy modality for when therapy goes wrong. I work in an industry where if things go wrong we fix it and then spread awareness, if Dan Brown knew why therapy goes wrong for some or makes them feel worse and had a solution, the signs of too much trauma and disassociation, why does the industry not know and try to fix that failure rate? Just look at therapyabuse, its all attachment trauma, BDP/CPTSD. I can’t be angry at my ex-therapist when she was doing what she taught and was setup for failure - Trauma informed would make me worse due to my sensory and trauma profile.
It worked, my approach stopped my flashbacks, I then adapted it for my daughter. Heal her attachment and her trauma will pass. As I was reading more psych stuff, scraping university’s for learning materials and reading books to understand therapy, the process, what it should have been, I came across Aletha Solters developmental psych work… This women is a child whisperer. Her books tears and tantrums, attachment play and healing your traumatised child are incredible, it was all the missing pieces of my kids behavior. Bruce Perrys work and the concept of a child not being able to get themselves out of the trauma brain stem… My wife was stressed by my first few flashbacks when she was pregnant. Our kid was 4+Kg and we are small… All early signs we were unaware of and not getting picked up by the health industry, GPs should have a checklist our family situation is so textbook its tragic.
I took my kid to the beach and we went in the cold sea for cold therapy, use our reflexes if we can’t do it together naturally: shocking us both back into the parasympathetic nervous system, I did this a few times every couple of days, it also matches the concept of the intensity of the play should be close to the trauma that Aletha writes about. Me holding her as she can’t swim bringing her arousal up and down via cold temp and keeping her safe (She loved putting her private parts under the cold tap which gave me that idea! Very Freudian her parts knew what she needed, my version of IFS, I listened to your sensory parts as senses comes before emotion, that is how stupid I went with therapy concepts, joking around and doing the opposite). I got her OT to train to do Proges Safe and Sound protocol, hit the polyvagal nerve too (I wasn’t going to rely on just one approach). I then used attachment concepts and Aletha’s Attachment Play concepts to be the perfect parent as per Dan Browns approach, as I can’t teach my kid to visualize yet. I need to be that parent. I’ve built a plan up until 12 for a child 3 pillar approach, teaching her meta cognitive awareness and more explore/group activities to heal her attachment wounds and feel more safe with people.
Here is an example, my daughters ASD food sensitivity behaviour: treat it as a pre-verbal “trauma/stress” that was some how caused by me (I rushed her one time and playing over sad another time that she didn’t like a new dish I made… she is that empathic and sensitive…) I noticed she was activated in a flight fight by the way she was moving her body and lips like I would when I struggle to eat feeling sick when triggered and figured of course you wouldn’t want to eat in the mode, I asked to leave the room to make her feel safe, let her know I wasn’t angry at her. My wife attuned to her fear and made her feel safe, set the boundary that we can’t cook something else and then gave her the choice to eat it on her own or be spoon fed like a baby but Mum will pretend to be a robot to feed her… Aletha’s concept of regression play to heal … they laughed together though the meal. Afterwards I come back and ask if I can do that with her next time. She laughs and says yes but you have to pretend to throw food in my face if Im too slow (One of my concepts is that people hide insecurities in humour… ) It worked, she asked to do it again every now and then if she struggles as she might not be sure if she likes a dish, sometimes she likes it sometimes she just gives it a go and leaves a bit but its laughter between us all then the next time she eats the dish on her own if she liked it.
She started to ask to play hide and seek outside, in groups of people, in supermarkets, taking it more and more extreme healing her own separation trauma. She asks for pillow fights with me, building games with all the concepts Aletha writes, it so profound to witness… Its textbook, my daughrer hasnt read the book but she is asking to play the exact games written in the book for each challenge. We can watch other kids and see the same in them. She started a new school and just walked in from the car with no tears on day 2, didn’t even need a teacher. Pre-December she used to cry up until I passed her to the teacher for handover.
We played hide and seek for a year in OT but nothing changed. It wasn’t until my idea to get her out of the trauma brain stem did we see the shift, she no longer loops over fears, her attachment system opened up and made friends. She stopped grinding her teeth in her sleep. Now she acts like a sensitive anxious kid and people don’t believe us if we tell them she has ASD. My wife cried at what I had achieved last year but at the same time says she feels disgust that she loves me and had a kid with me. That me being me broke our daughter.
The therapists Ive tried to see just say I’m intimidating, the self awareness and the amount I have read this year, how does your brain even put that together, there is too much going on in there. I take them through every concept that impacted me growing up my modality and approaches. The way I mashed up lots of concepts, natural reflexes/Wim Hoff/Porges/IFS/Dan Browns/Love Languages/Alteha’s into a healing force. How I used symbolic play to heal my therapy trauma via my complaint that I never bothered submitting like a silly man child. I feel like none of them can help though. I need someone that can help build practical interventions for the challenges based off the psych concept at play or guide me to them. Not just talking about the problems, if I had reframed and listened that I was doing enough, there is no such thing as disorganised in a child, its just 33% of the time you have to get it right, its not me, its never the parents etc my child would be way down the spectrum with a closed attachment system. Therapist also don’t give advice… e.g. My child hid pain… No one could help figure out what to do… It was poor Interoceptive awareness plus the fear of showing negative emotions. e.g. a parent hitting a wall whilst holding their baby and pretending the baby is hurt then the baby starts to cry but in reverse. She is too shocked by the external impact to process it so shutdowns. I used DBT concept, a whiteboard to draw out what just happened, describe what she might be feeling but visually, bringing her back into awareness… She cried! She now scolds me if she hurts herself as somehow its my fault as it makes her feel safe to cry straight away. Now it is just me holding that anger at me, accepting it and then gently DBTing describing her experience to help her process what really happened in the moment. Building that trust and safety back.
An example for how I treat myself now. I lost my hearing in Feb, Nerusensori hearing loss, it came back and sound hurt like knifes digging in my ears. Loud noises left me in agony for 2-3 days. The Drs went be glad your hearing is back, get therapy for the life adjustments… You read of people close to suicide, relationships ruined by this condition. My daughter started to regress as I withdrew, her laughter hurting my ears too much. (Pretty cruel after a year of flashback to get a setback like that)
So I treated it like the trauma it was… I went and did cold therapy for me(I have other tricks for getting out of the trauma response, people reading this please don’t throw yourself in the sea or your autistic kids either), dive in the sea and screamed a rude word every couple of days, I figured I can’t get myself out of the brain stem too and this was really traumatic. Remedial massages to loosen the muscles around the ear that would have tensed up in the trauma guarding response. That would be pinching the ear nerve making the muscle tense stuck in a loop… Acupuncture as that is better than massages and a lesson in mindfulness to relax else it hurts more and then the Watson headache technique to loosen up C1/C2 that would also be upsetting the brainstem by the muscles all tightening up…. It worked, in 5 days hearing stopped hurting, then I went and got a muscle relaxer from the GP which took all the remaining pain away and went out forcing myself to go hear loud noises in the city and heal the trauma response that had started to happen from the fear of the pain. Trauma doesnt seem to stick anymore, I have a slightly stronger base.
I don’t dissociate anymore, when I struggle I visualise the energy in my nervous system as what some people would call your spirit but in the form of a flame, mine is strong but burns red (anger), green, orange, giving off toxic smoke, sometimes gasping its last breath other time roaring out hurting people around it, no matter how hard Im trying its hurting the flames around it, suffocating them too. I have to hold my flame in love, pure and white, strong but not too intense, the white light people say they see is just someone achieving non-duality with the collective conscious, the energy within us all etc. I picture the moment with my ex-therapist, the safety, attunement, the moment of profound deep love between us (it wasn’t sexual just a deep human connection, I prefer the label kindred spirits). That is my calm base what I am taking from the relationship and integrating, the rest I am letting go of. I find that space within me and then I bring the love I have for my daughter into that space, the first 4 months oxycontin feeling. I give that to myself then I roar my spirit/flame in delight.. upwards, not grounding for coming up with this nonsense. I then bring the disregulation back and hold it in that love and delight like a parent would to their baby in the first few months. After a while the disregulation passes and then I ground myself briefly… My daughter taught me that. “Sometimes its good to have quiet play but other times I need to let the energy out”. Like “circle of security” you should always end any trauma work in delight.
I hold my daughters disregulation and the way it triggers me the same way. The disgust in myself for how I failed so badly that makes me lash out in frustration, how that disgust brings onion layers of my own traumas to the surface that I hold in that flame meditation in the moment of trying to sooth us both. I do things like swimming in a cold pool with her so I have to watch her nonstop as she is learning and she can delight as she sees me watching her nonstop plus the top up of cold therapy just in case. Go jump together in a trampoline park (its a way kids regulate and I need it too!), finding activities together that take my weaknesses and make them strengths. Sit on an exercise ball so I can bounce and rock when I watch over her play to keep me present, I almost fall off if I go too much in my head and it brings me back.
I’m going to be her earned secure attachment and she will heal and her sensitivity will be her strength too like they are mine, they say trauma changes your DNA, humans don’t change for it to be a curse, it’s the source of healing.
The thing is… Im still so broken, its been 4 months since I stopped the flashbacks, my nervous system is so fragile, it still has a feather trigger for disregulation, worse than it was before the rupture. Every day is the same activation in the morning that I have to work through or family ruptures/life stresses, my kid is scared of my voice, I can’t not instruct/parent her and have no idea how to really heal that last part, its the old 80/20 rule, its the hard part now. My brain has been problem solving to get out of a life or death situation for so long. I know Ive done it, Ive created a space for my daughter to heal, its just time now, probably for me too, practicing with her will help me heal my nervous system. It just can’t switch off.
I miss my ex-therapist so much. We both said ”its the relationship I needed not the therapy I needed”. My inner child yearns so badly for that safety and attunement, to hear her voice or laugh, her offer of friendship. I wish she kept that to herself as I never thought about that stuff. My protector kicks the inner child in the nuts when he thinks about it, its frowned upon for a reason. You have to learn about separation and endings as part of attachment healing and integration of relationships. It took 4 years to get attached. To even try again with a therapist seems pointless, I’m even less trusting but I need help. That homeless 16 year old that did it himself, he isn’t better off alone… He needs someone to guide him through the chaos so he can go back to being the child he didn’t get to be… The one challenge with doing Dan Browns perfect parent metallisation is “how do you give yourself something you didn’t get, what is that like to experience?” How can I tell myself “I am enough” when I broke my kid and my wife hurts so much from just being near me when Ive been trying so hard? Its a DBT dialect , I am more than enough yet I am not enough. There is only one place that does IPF work in this country and they are in a different state.
If talk/relational therapy would take 4+ years to get attached again and its so hard to find someone due to my situation. What next for me, is there a different type of therapy I should look for? I need relational therapy that helps problem solve and someone wiling to intellectually masturbate this nonsense with me and come up with approaches for my kid. e.g. draw her morning tasks and I’ll just point at them so I don’t have to use my voice to give her instructions causing a meltdown in the morning if she is slow… (a concept from How to talk to kids book but using drawings as she is 5). Any good resources or material I should read?
Now for my stupid theory that I cant see why it upsets people for some reason. What are your thoughts? If some people view CPTSD and BPD as pretty much the same thing just different flavors of trauma... In my daughters case and possibly mine... a highly functioning presentation of ASD or extreme HSP is a presentation of CPTSD where there was a failure to attach before 4 months old, more pre-verbal stuff. (Ive found a few of us with this profile - see Immi [email protected] eggshelltherapy.com, there are types!)
ASD - some one joked your level of diagnoses depends on how much your behaviors annoy your parents
BDP - a diagnoses that depends on how much your behaviors annoy your therapist
Does that mean girls who are over diagnosed with BDP and under diagnosed with ASD are actually an overlap who's sensitivity to trauma and intensity is being mis-diagnosed?