Didn’t even go that far, honestly, I was just referring to the… force of their fantasizing:))

In all seriousness, does the urge really get THIS bad?

As a guy who used to have long hair, this. If it’s long enough, you could also tuck it underneath your shirt collar in a pinch.

Oh, that’s so considerate of you! It really would be nice if these places managed to solidify into something as stable as possible, I think they’re thoroughly needed. Also an example of how the internet is supposed to be used!

I can imagine modding for a mental health community can’t be easy, can’t say I blame any potential reticence and churn…

Eh. Makes sense from the perspective of protecting profits, I guess, because the actual thing which bothers them is the volume of lost potential customers…

So, piracy is legal if you don’t distribute? What the fuck is Zuck smoking?

Eeeey, I’m in this one! Happy Today, everyone!

Sheesh, yeah, that’s just dickish… It’s clear he’s aching for some chaos…

Is there any way you could refocus that energy toward further protecting your niece, though? For instance, I once stepped in between my mother and grandfather when he was really pushing things toward treating her like a slave. Again, I didn’t even think of broaching anything related to our relationship, I just made it clear that I was setting some limits with an “our way or the highway” enforcement. And that was it for a good while.

I can see you’re suffering over this. I am truly sorry and what you’ve described is horrendous. You are fully justified in feeling this unbridled frustration with a person who not only failed in offering you the safety and security which was owed as their offspring, but it sounds like he fucked up liberally even outside of that. But ask yourself why you feel you need to do this and what it would acheive.

Do you hope to spark a moment of comprehension and acceptance on his end? Is this the polite alternative to punching him in the face (not judging, genuinely asking, been there myself)? Or do you feel the need to air out the truth? In either of these cases (other than the punching) do you think you’ll manage to achieve anything other than feeding his obvious thirst for chaos and generating more frustration on your end?

So, my maternal granddad died in spring last year. He and I were the last ones left alive out of the entire family, so I handled the burial. Similar situation, the guy was a massive insecure narcissist who behaved as though the entire world was at his beck and call, dragged mum through a lot of needless effort while she was going through chemo during the years preceding her passing (she fell into the Dutiful Daughter role), never helped a single living being in his entire life but expected everyone, regardless of relation or level of acquaintance, to kiss his feet indiscriminately.

Our relationship was non-existent, died at around the time I left home for my Bachelor’s (I moved at the other end of the country, just to add some nuance to how badly I wanted to get away). He was the source of 70% of my childhood traumas, as my grandparents essentially stepped in to fill the parental roles once mum divorced dad. He was abrasive, intellectually and philosophically regressive, physically aggressive, psychologically and emotionally abusive, perpetually unsatisfiable, rude, brash and just plain old fucking unlikable. The only reason why I maintained any sort of interaction with him after my mother’s death was that I still felt that “we’re family” obligation, but I interpreted it as “I’m here for medical emergencies, deal with whatever the fuck else you encounter yourself.”

We saw eachother about once every year. I tried to bring him closer to me, had him moved to a lovely seniors’ home I’d vetted with half the city beforehand, half an hour’s drive away from me and the largest medical point in our region. He chose to literally break out and move out in the ass end of the country, in the mountains, just because my moving him close to me wasn’t his plan - he wanted me to move in with him and essentially care for him. No, not wanted, expected. So he threw this massive fucking tantrum and bailed. This was all after he personally asked me to move him to a home.

Point is, last time we saw eachother was about two years ago. Our interactions were never more than purely utilitarian, with me asking him executive questions of things about which his incurious mind never thought to check (a.k.a. he was so used to everyone else wiping his ass for him metaphorically speaking, that he had no idea how to do it himself). I never bothered telling him anything, because it was obvious he wasn’t even willing to receive the message, let alone process it with any degree of integrity or honesty. The only things which worked were credible and tangible threats of restricting his freedom of movement (giving him a psych eval which I’m sure would have deemed him incapable of self-governing at that age, etc.). And I also knew that any attempted conversation or relaying of said truths would only serve to frustrate me and my need to be seen, to be understood.

I did write it out a lot. I have a quarter of a notebook filled with every thought I had about his behaviour and treatment of myself and of everyone who ever interacted with us. But I never sent him anything. And thing is, I now feel better for having maintained my dignity by not picking a hollow fight with him. He tried, but I never started or fuelled any such interaction.

I honestly can’t tell you whether or not sending him that letter is a good or bad idea, but I am urging you to sit on it a bit longer until you’re 100% clear on what you want to get out of it.

Thank you so much! 🫂 Yeah, it does, at least, give the self-blaming a break to hear it said. It’s one of those ethical situations which has layers upon layers of grey areas, feels like trying to find a specific shop in the middle of a foreign city without a map…

And thank you again! Honestly, places like this have helped me immensely in the past, not only for venting, but also when giving my two cents on someone else’s issue when I realise I may have something pertinent to add, the participation in collective support always lifts my spirits!

Thanks! Managed to pull through by the skin of my teeth, luckily life forced a Charisma secondary build on me, so Speech was a dump stat. She wanted to see me suffer, so I gave her more than she could handle - got a passing average by the end, good enough for me!:))

Yep, totally makes sense to have a Pandemic as a source. And, to be perfectly honest, there are plenty of valid reasons nowadays, even if one only pays attention in a passing manner.

Another thing which came to me, might wanna talk to your GP/ a GP about potential thyroid implications. I used to have massive anxiety episodes and every medical doctor who checked me up (from dentist to cardiologist) told me to check my thyroid, as apparently hyperthyroidism may push the body into overdrive and it looks a lot like an anxiety attack. Mine were “just” anxiety attacks, but it still felt better to check that off the list, at least.

It’s not and it doesn’t, mental stability is relative from one person to the other, your issue is and should be treated just as seriously as anyone else’s.

With that out of the way, are you dreaming at all beforehand? Specifically, anything related to loss of control, or deep anxiety, or do you have something major going on in your life? You don’t have to answer here, but those types of things can be enough to cause something like this, I think.

Not currently going through it, but I remember going through something similar during high-school. We got a new Chemistry teacher who really didn’t like my “love the concepts, hate the math” approach and made it clear that she was out to “fix” that (ideally, by holding me back a year). I remember waking up every single day with a brief (2-3 seconds, with the rest being the trail-off) shock of sheer terror and anxiety. I didn’t need to dream about it, I didn’t need to have Chem classes that day, even happened during the weekend. And I remember it stopping at around the time when I gave up trying to understand what I was studying and accepted my fate.

This is why I asked, maybe you have something similar in your life, some sort of overarching worry. And it’s not even necessary to be consciously aware of it, your subconscious has it all covered.

Heeey, that’s riiight! I know what I’m watching this weekend, thanks!

Moderately gloomy, yet discreetly optimistic Western guitar trills resounded from the heavens.

This is the way.

Edit: can we also give’em tiny cyberpunk shades and stuff?

I mean… c’mon, it’s New Vegas! Who wouldn’t!

Back to pen and paper it is! Start feeding the pigeons, everyone!

Sso… like my already existing smartphone. Only larger.

See, that’s just it, I already do that with my standard phone… At this point, they’re all basically phablets, Nexus 6 was right all along (although it still did it better, save for the weird speaker system…). Multi-window splits have also been a thing for a good while now, I honestly don’t see the point for more screen on my pocket device… Heck, I even mainline it as a secondary PC, use it to have YT/movies in the background while doing stuff on the big dude.

Wake me up when the quadfold drops. Heck, quilt me a smartphone/picnic blanket, then we can talk.

Edit: I’m sorry if this comes off as too snarky, I just don’t get the trend… I thought we were heading directly away from large form stuff with this whole smartphone thing. I mean, didn’t we already see this not working with tablets, and how they kinda’ ended up repurposed as quasi-laptops?