10 most asked interview questions for medical assistant
Nursing for nurses and by nurses for the care of all.
2009.10.18 21:53 davedavedavedavedave Nursing for nurses and by nurses for the care of all.
2013.01.15 04:55 grandfatherbrooks Ask A Canadian: Sorry if we don't answer, eh.
AskaCanadian is the #1 resource for answers to questions about anything to do with Canada, answered by at least one Canadian.
2010.08.30 08:08 taylornator7 AskMen
We don’t read the rules, but we’ll post anyway
2024.05.16 16:20 Federal_Machine692 Payback
I was just returning back from another interview. It has been the third one this month.
I failed to make the cut yet again.
Life hasn’t been easy for an ex-soldier with the economic downturn currently underway.
The COVID pandemic had also wiped out all my savings.
So I was open to securing any job that would help me pay my bills.
I hadn’t eaten all day and just passed by a McDonalds. It was crowded and I thought to myself, ‘Let me just order a takeout’.
I could see a few vehicles waiting in front of me.
There was a guy in his motorcycle honking incessantly demanding the customer in front to keep it moving.
He was a tall man with long hair and clearly looked edgy and irritable. Both his arms were heavily tattooed. He stepped down from his bike and started to walk towards the car in front of him.
I couldn’t make out what he way saying but I could see the conversation was getting heated.
I got down from my car and walked towards the biker guy.
As I got closer, the biker banged on the hood of the car and was pointing his finger at the man threateningly.
The guy in the car was looking a little alarmed. He had a young boy seated next to him.
The woman working at the driveway counter appealed to the biker to maintain his cool. He would hear none of it.
She then proceeded to call the police and this made the biker more irate. He snatched the receiver from her and hit her face with it. She fell backwards and started bleeding from the nose.
The biker then proceeded to turn his gaze towards the man in the car. He opened the door and dragged the guy outside.
He drew his hand back to throw a punch at him.
I caught his arm from behind and kicked him hard in the shins. He yelped in pain and let go of the other man.
He then turned back angrily to take a look at me. He was wearing a black jacket with the name Kenny embossed in front.
I said, “Listen Kenny. I have had a really bad day. So you either stop this madness or I am going to break your bones.”
He snarled and threw a punch at me with all his might. I swerved to the right and ducked just in time, causing him to miss completely.
Next, he whipped out a switch blade from his pocket and lunged towards me with it. I side stepped him and counterattacked with a punch to his plexus. He went down on one knee.
I caught hold of his knife arm and ordered him to drop it.
“Drop the knife kenny!! This is your last warning”, I repeated.
He started to fidget with his other arm around his shoe. I realized he had another weapon hidden in his sock.
So before he could attempt anything else, I twisted his forearm and landed a crushing blow to his elbow. It snapped into two and he lay on the floor yelping in pain.
By this point, other people came forward to intervene and help with the situation.
As Kenny was being led away by the police, he kept staring at me with madness in his eyes.
“I am coming back for you. This is going to be the biggest regret of your life”, he yelled.
I didn’t care and started going back to my car.
Then the man who was threatened by Kenny came forward and shook my hand.
“Hi. I am Rupert. That is my son Henry”, he said.
I waved my hand at the boy and he waved back.
“I would like to thank you for what you did for me back there”, he said.
“You not only helped me maintain my dignity but also helped me save face in front of my son”, he continued.
“This means a lot to me as a dad” he said.
I nodded in acknowledgement not sure what I was to add to the conversation.
He then reluctantly asked,” Is there anything I can do to repay the favour? Please feel free to ask . Anything. I would be most grateful.”
I thought for a moment. I could see the man was wealthy.
“If it’s not too much of an ask, I would appreciate a job if available. If you feel that is difficult, no problem. Forget I asked. No worries.” I said.
He smiled back at me warmly. He reached into his pocket and handed me a card.
“Please come to my office tomorrow. We can talk” he signed off.
From that moment on, I became the personal bodyguard and chaperone of his 8 year old son Henry. We immediately hit it off and became pals. I looked after all his son’s travelling arrangements.
We would also go to McDonalds every week for his favourite Burger and fries. I later learnt that his father was a very wealthy man who made most of his money during the dot com bubble.
I also became friends with the female employee at the driveway counter who had earlier been attacked by that biker punk Kenny.
Her name was Stella and it didn’t take very long for the two of us to start dating.
With a fulfilling job and a loving girlfriend by my side, my life was finally back on track. I couldn’t be happier.
And then one day - it all came crashing.
Henry and I as usual visited the McDonalds joint and I was surprised to see Stella missing at the counter.
I asked the staff about her and they said she hadn’t turned up today.
I thought that was weird. She had stayed over at my place and I saw her leave for work in the morning.
I tried calling her number but it was unreachable.
I dropped Henry at home and headed towards Stella’s apartment.
She had given me a spare key and I opened the door with it. Everything was in its place.
I tried her number again. It remained not reachable.
I decided to go back to my apartment to check if she might be there.
When I reached the door, I could see the lock had been smashed. The door was left slightly open.
I took out my side arm and slowly entered the apartment.
I could see a life size figure of Ronald McDonald the clown sitting on my sofa.
The famous mascot was sitting cross legged with one arm resting on the backrest. Just like how he likes to sit on benches outside McDonald outlets all across the world.
I was a little taken aback, but quickly switched on the lights to take a closer look.
As I moved closer, my knees buckled under my own weight.
It was Stella. She was the one who was dressed as the clown.
There were injury marks around her neck. She had been strangled to death.
I managed to call the cops while still reeling from the shock.
I also noticed her right hand which was resting on her thigh, was close fisted. When I pried it open, there was a crumpled piece of paper inside.
It read -
“She was really begging me for mercy.
Where was soldier boy when she needed him huh?
Boo Hoo….I’m Lovin It!!
I’m Lovin it!!
Signed Yours Kenny”
I could feel a surge of anger envelop me. And yet I lay there helpless.
Had it not been for the surveillance cameras at the entrance of my home, I would have been in jail by now.
The police could clearly see Kenny carrying Stella’s body and breaking into my apartment.
They put out a nationwide notice for Kenny and he’s been on the run ever since.
Even after 2 months following Stella’s death, the police were not any closer to catching the culprit.
But I did apprise Henry’s dad of the situation. His life was also at risk after considering what happened to my girlfriend.
But our collective worry was for Henry. We didn’t want to see him suffer for no fault of his.
So I started training Henry to take his own safety seriously. I devised multiple safeguards to keep him protected while being outdoors. Always ensured that I was personally there to drop and pick him up from school.
My boss appreciated all that I was doing for his son. He knew I had taken Stella’s death hard.
He was a generous and compassionate man and I liked working for him.
Although he did notice I wasn’t my usual cheery self anymore.
One day when I was waiting at the office, he tossed the keys of his new car at me.
“This should perk you up. Take her for a spin” he said.
“And also go pick Henry up from school”, he finished as he left for a meeting.
I got down to the parking lot, and there she was … waiting. The new Bugatti Chiron.
I opened the door and took the driver’s seat. The fresh smell of the leather upholstery was already lifting my spirits.
‘Boss was right! I am perking up’, I thought to myself.
I drove around the block and stopped by McDonalds to pick up the usual order for me and Henry.
I felt a tinge of sadness when I could no longer see Stella at the counter.
Anyways, I picked the order and started my way towards school.
As I went past the restaurant, I saw an old jeep parked by the side of the road. I didn’t think much of it at that moment.
When I reached Henry’s school, I parked the car a few feet away from the entrance. A couple of minutes later, I noticed the same jeep I saw at McDonalds go past me and park 20 mts in front.
I would have never given it a second glance had I not spotted it at the restaurant.
The jeep had 3 passengers. They looked like bikers with tattoos, beard and long hair.
And then there was Kenny standing behind a tree to avoid detection. But I spotted him.
He was gesturing towards them to get ready. I could see his Harley parked just a few feet away.
They were planning some kind of ambush.
The school bell rang and the children were already out on the streets.
I could see Henry at a distance in the courtyard. He was slowly making his way towards the gate.
I immediately called him on the phone and told him to go to the Principals office and stay there. I made it clear under no circumstances was he to venture out until I gave him the all clear. He understood.
He was safe as long as he was within the school’s premises.
The next thing to do was move to another location. The children were already pouring onto the streets, and the last thing I wanted was to see a child getting hurt.
I started the car and went past the jeep before taking the next turn. I kept driving.
Few moments later, the jeep caught up with me and the driver violently swerved towards the left causing me to go off course. My car came to halt.
The guys quickly alighted from the jeep and they were all armed to the teeth.
Kenny came in his motorcycle and stopped his bike a few feet ahead of me. He took out his shotgun and had it aimed straight at my chest.
The firing started before I even had the time to react.
I instinctively ducked for cover with my eyes closed.
But in my heart, I knew my time was up!!
As the seconds went by, even with all those bullets being sent my way - my body felt strangely light.
‘Am I in heaven already?’ I thought to myself.
I slowly opened my eyes and tilted my head upwards to take a peak.
And I realized I was sitting in an armoured bullet proof car.
The entire biker gang were mad with rage, doing everything possible to penetrate that thick armour plate.
Kenny was barking orders at his gang to continue the onslaught. He then pointed his finger at me and yelled, “I am coming for you.”
I looked down at the seat next to mine and saw the takeout I had ordered.
Just to piss him off even further, I took out my Big Mac and slowly took a big bite.
I sat there in gastronomic bliss savouring my burger, while being under a continuous hail of bullets.
The firing suddenly stopped. Kenny the psycho was livid as hell - to see me have a good time.
I looked him in the eye while I took a sip of my favourite milkshake.
And then, continued to chomp on my burger.
He looked a little crestfallen at how his plan was misfiring and then frantically gestured his troops to keep at it. The firing started again.
But it didn’t last long. They eventually all ran out of ammo and his buddies began to flee the scene, as we could hear sirens at a distance.
The attack had taken a toll on the car. But it managed to withstand all that damage. All that firing.
A life saver!
I looked at Kenny again. Only one thought was running through my head now.
‘My Turn’.
I switched on the ignition and rammed the car straight into Kenny. He hit the bonnet hard while the car continued to race forward.
He was clinging on to dear life with his outstretched hands desperately clutching at the sides of the car.
Next in the demolition line, was his prized Harley Davidson.
I hit it full steam and watched it smash to smithereens - with parts scattering all across the road.
Then, I hit the brakes and Kenny was sent flying 10 feet forward.
After impact, he slowly staggered to his feet - all bloody and bruised.
His face was swollen like an apple.
He was pleading towards me with folded hands to show him mercy.
‘This is for Stella. And She’s lovin it’, I said out loud.
I hit the accelerator again.
submitted by Federal_Machine692 to federalmachine [link] [comments]
I failed to make the cut yet again.
Life hasn’t been easy for an ex-soldier with the economic downturn currently underway.
The COVID pandemic had also wiped out all my savings.
So I was open to securing any job that would help me pay my bills.
I hadn’t eaten all day and just passed by a McDonalds. It was crowded and I thought to myself, ‘Let me just order a takeout’.
I could see a few vehicles waiting in front of me.
There was a guy in his motorcycle honking incessantly demanding the customer in front to keep it moving.
He was a tall man with long hair and clearly looked edgy and irritable. Both his arms were heavily tattooed. He stepped down from his bike and started to walk towards the car in front of him.
I couldn’t make out what he way saying but I could see the conversation was getting heated.
I got down from my car and walked towards the biker guy.
As I got closer, the biker banged on the hood of the car and was pointing his finger at the man threateningly.
The guy in the car was looking a little alarmed. He had a young boy seated next to him.
The woman working at the driveway counter appealed to the biker to maintain his cool. He would hear none of it.
She then proceeded to call the police and this made the biker more irate. He snatched the receiver from her and hit her face with it. She fell backwards and started bleeding from the nose.
The biker then proceeded to turn his gaze towards the man in the car. He opened the door and dragged the guy outside.
He drew his hand back to throw a punch at him.
I caught his arm from behind and kicked him hard in the shins. He yelped in pain and let go of the other man.
He then turned back angrily to take a look at me. He was wearing a black jacket with the name Kenny embossed in front.
I said, “Listen Kenny. I have had a really bad day. So you either stop this madness or I am going to break your bones.”
He snarled and threw a punch at me with all his might. I swerved to the right and ducked just in time, causing him to miss completely.
Next, he whipped out a switch blade from his pocket and lunged towards me with it. I side stepped him and counterattacked with a punch to his plexus. He went down on one knee.
I caught hold of his knife arm and ordered him to drop it.
“Drop the knife kenny!! This is your last warning”, I repeated.
He started to fidget with his other arm around his shoe. I realized he had another weapon hidden in his sock.
So before he could attempt anything else, I twisted his forearm and landed a crushing blow to his elbow. It snapped into two and he lay on the floor yelping in pain.
By this point, other people came forward to intervene and help with the situation.
As Kenny was being led away by the police, he kept staring at me with madness in his eyes.
“I am coming back for you. This is going to be the biggest regret of your life”, he yelled.
I didn’t care and started going back to my car.
Then the man who was threatened by Kenny came forward and shook my hand.
“Hi. I am Rupert. That is my son Henry”, he said.
I waved my hand at the boy and he waved back.
“I would like to thank you for what you did for me back there”, he said.
“You not only helped me maintain my dignity but also helped me save face in front of my son”, he continued.
“This means a lot to me as a dad” he said.
I nodded in acknowledgement not sure what I was to add to the conversation.
He then reluctantly asked,” Is there anything I can do to repay the favour? Please feel free to ask . Anything. I would be most grateful.”
I thought for a moment. I could see the man was wealthy.
“If it’s not too much of an ask, I would appreciate a job if available. If you feel that is difficult, no problem. Forget I asked. No worries.” I said.
He smiled back at me warmly. He reached into his pocket and handed me a card.
“Please come to my office tomorrow. We can talk” he signed off.
From that moment on, I became the personal bodyguard and chaperone of his 8 year old son Henry. We immediately hit it off and became pals. I looked after all his son’s travelling arrangements.
We would also go to McDonalds every week for his favourite Burger and fries. I later learnt that his father was a very wealthy man who made most of his money during the dot com bubble.
I also became friends with the female employee at the driveway counter who had earlier been attacked by that biker punk Kenny.
Her name was Stella and it didn’t take very long for the two of us to start dating.
With a fulfilling job and a loving girlfriend by my side, my life was finally back on track. I couldn’t be happier.
And then one day - it all came crashing.
Henry and I as usual visited the McDonalds joint and I was surprised to see Stella missing at the counter.
I asked the staff about her and they said she hadn’t turned up today.
I thought that was weird. She had stayed over at my place and I saw her leave for work in the morning.
I tried calling her number but it was unreachable.
I dropped Henry at home and headed towards Stella’s apartment.
She had given me a spare key and I opened the door with it. Everything was in its place.
I tried her number again. It remained not reachable.
I decided to go back to my apartment to check if she might be there.
When I reached the door, I could see the lock had been smashed. The door was left slightly open.
I took out my side arm and slowly entered the apartment.
I could see a life size figure of Ronald McDonald the clown sitting on my sofa.
The famous mascot was sitting cross legged with one arm resting on the backrest. Just like how he likes to sit on benches outside McDonald outlets all across the world.
I was a little taken aback, but quickly switched on the lights to take a closer look.
As I moved closer, my knees buckled under my own weight.
It was Stella. She was the one who was dressed as the clown.
There were injury marks around her neck. She had been strangled to death.
I managed to call the cops while still reeling from the shock.
I also noticed her right hand which was resting on her thigh, was close fisted. When I pried it open, there was a crumpled piece of paper inside.
It read -
“She was really begging me for mercy.
Where was soldier boy when she needed him huh?
Boo Hoo….I’m Lovin It!!
I’m Lovin it!!
Signed Yours Kenny”
I could feel a surge of anger envelop me. And yet I lay there helpless.
Had it not been for the surveillance cameras at the entrance of my home, I would have been in jail by now.
The police could clearly see Kenny carrying Stella’s body and breaking into my apartment.
They put out a nationwide notice for Kenny and he’s been on the run ever since.
Even after 2 months following Stella’s death, the police were not any closer to catching the culprit.
But I did apprise Henry’s dad of the situation. His life was also at risk after considering what happened to my girlfriend.
But our collective worry was for Henry. We didn’t want to see him suffer for no fault of his.
So I started training Henry to take his own safety seriously. I devised multiple safeguards to keep him protected while being outdoors. Always ensured that I was personally there to drop and pick him up from school.
My boss appreciated all that I was doing for his son. He knew I had taken Stella’s death hard.
He was a generous and compassionate man and I liked working for him.
Although he did notice I wasn’t my usual cheery self anymore.
One day when I was waiting at the office, he tossed the keys of his new car at me.
“This should perk you up. Take her for a spin” he said.
“And also go pick Henry up from school”, he finished as he left for a meeting.
I got down to the parking lot, and there she was … waiting. The new Bugatti Chiron.
I opened the door and took the driver’s seat. The fresh smell of the leather upholstery was already lifting my spirits.
‘Boss was right! I am perking up’, I thought to myself.
I drove around the block and stopped by McDonalds to pick up the usual order for me and Henry.
I felt a tinge of sadness when I could no longer see Stella at the counter.
Anyways, I picked the order and started my way towards school.
As I went past the restaurant, I saw an old jeep parked by the side of the road. I didn’t think much of it at that moment.
When I reached Henry’s school, I parked the car a few feet away from the entrance. A couple of minutes later, I noticed the same jeep I saw at McDonalds go past me and park 20 mts in front.
I would have never given it a second glance had I not spotted it at the restaurant.
The jeep had 3 passengers. They looked like bikers with tattoos, beard and long hair.
And then there was Kenny standing behind a tree to avoid detection. But I spotted him.
He was gesturing towards them to get ready. I could see his Harley parked just a few feet away.
They were planning some kind of ambush.
The school bell rang and the children were already out on the streets.
I could see Henry at a distance in the courtyard. He was slowly making his way towards the gate.
I immediately called him on the phone and told him to go to the Principals office and stay there. I made it clear under no circumstances was he to venture out until I gave him the all clear. He understood.
He was safe as long as he was within the school’s premises.
The next thing to do was move to another location. The children were already pouring onto the streets, and the last thing I wanted was to see a child getting hurt.
I started the car and went past the jeep before taking the next turn. I kept driving.
Few moments later, the jeep caught up with me and the driver violently swerved towards the left causing me to go off course. My car came to halt.
The guys quickly alighted from the jeep and they were all armed to the teeth.
Kenny came in his motorcycle and stopped his bike a few feet ahead of me. He took out his shotgun and had it aimed straight at my chest.
The firing started before I even had the time to react.
I instinctively ducked for cover with my eyes closed.
But in my heart, I knew my time was up!!
As the seconds went by, even with all those bullets being sent my way - my body felt strangely light.
‘Am I in heaven already?’ I thought to myself.
I slowly opened my eyes and tilted my head upwards to take a peak.
And I realized I was sitting in an armoured bullet proof car.
The entire biker gang were mad with rage, doing everything possible to penetrate that thick armour plate.
Kenny was barking orders at his gang to continue the onslaught. He then pointed his finger at me and yelled, “I am coming for you.”
I looked down at the seat next to mine and saw the takeout I had ordered.
Just to piss him off even further, I took out my Big Mac and slowly took a big bite.
I sat there in gastronomic bliss savouring my burger, while being under a continuous hail of bullets.
The firing suddenly stopped. Kenny the psycho was livid as hell - to see me have a good time.
I looked him in the eye while I took a sip of my favourite milkshake.
And then, continued to chomp on my burger.
He looked a little crestfallen at how his plan was misfiring and then frantically gestured his troops to keep at it. The firing started again.
But it didn’t last long. They eventually all ran out of ammo and his buddies began to flee the scene, as we could hear sirens at a distance.
The attack had taken a toll on the car. But it managed to withstand all that damage. All that firing.
A life saver!
I looked at Kenny again. Only one thought was running through my head now.
‘My Turn’.
I switched on the ignition and rammed the car straight into Kenny. He hit the bonnet hard while the car continued to race forward.
He was clinging on to dear life with his outstretched hands desperately clutching at the sides of the car.
Next in the demolition line, was his prized Harley Davidson.
I hit it full steam and watched it smash to smithereens - with parts scattering all across the road.
Then, I hit the brakes and Kenny was sent flying 10 feet forward.
After impact, he slowly staggered to his feet - all bloody and bruised.
His face was swollen like an apple.
He was pleading towards me with folded hands to show him mercy.
‘This is for Stella. And She’s lovin it’, I said out loud.
I hit the accelerator again.
2024.05.16 16:19 Tainigh Very strange and seemingly unfair interview rejection?
This happened in England, my friend recently had two interviews for the same company, the first Interview was with the manager, the interview seemingly went well and during this interview my friend mentioned that she has some therapy appointments coming up that would occur every Wednesday for about 3 months. The interviewer invited her back for a second interview and it seemed as if they were interested in giving her the position.
The second interview occurred last week, my friend wasn’t aware that it would be with three people, the manager she met during the first interview, the assistant manager and someone from HR. The interview was mostly HR asking the questions, questions that surrounded the weekly appointments, it could be reasonable to ask to make accommodations, however, these questions consisted of asking what her diagnosis was, how long had she been diagnosed with it, more specifically asking ‘what are your full diagnostics’ ‘how long have you been depressed for’ and quite a few more pretty irrelevant, personal questions regarding her mental health diagnosis, the reason for the appointments, what kind of therapy, what symptoms she experienced, asking her why she was made redundant... all whilst making a point of looking away the moment my friend was answering, naturally this obviously caused more anxiety in an anxious situation.
Today she received an email telling her she was not suitable for the position due to her qualifications, competency for position, and performance at the interview. Making it clear that they would not be elaborating on their reasons and that the decision was made based entirely off of the second interview alone.
This doesn’t seem to sit right, it feels like some discrimination is obvious here.. can she do anything about it? She has two witnesses to HR’s very strange line of questioning. The job was for customer service advisor.
submitted by Tainigh to LegalAdviceUK [link] [comments]
The second interview occurred last week, my friend wasn’t aware that it would be with three people, the manager she met during the first interview, the assistant manager and someone from HR. The interview was mostly HR asking the questions, questions that surrounded the weekly appointments, it could be reasonable to ask to make accommodations, however, these questions consisted of asking what her diagnosis was, how long had she been diagnosed with it, more specifically asking ‘what are your full diagnostics’ ‘how long have you been depressed for’ and quite a few more pretty irrelevant, personal questions regarding her mental health diagnosis, the reason for the appointments, what kind of therapy, what symptoms she experienced, asking her why she was made redundant... all whilst making a point of looking away the moment my friend was answering, naturally this obviously caused more anxiety in an anxious situation.
Today she received an email telling her she was not suitable for the position due to her qualifications, competency for position, and performance at the interview. Making it clear that they would not be elaborating on their reasons and that the decision was made based entirely off of the second interview alone.
This doesn’t seem to sit right, it feels like some discrimination is obvious here.. can she do anything about it? She has two witnesses to HR’s very strange line of questioning. The job was for customer service advisor.
2024.05.16 16:16 brayvi shy or uninterested?
Mainly coming from my gut, F(20) it tells me this coworker has secretly been into me M(22). For a good 8 months.
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
submitted by brayvi to dating [link] [comments]
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
2024.05.16 16:12 CIAHerpes I remember the night I died and saw the Bardo.
There are some kinds of wisdom only great suffering can bring. I remember my time in the Bardo with this in mind, for otherwise, the memory might drive me insane.
The night my heart stopped for nearly three minutes started off normally enough. I was working as a nurse in the psychiatric ward at a hospital in the state’s capital. Most of the patients there were harmless, mostly just suicide attempts or people suffering from drug psychosis or severe depression, but some were actively dangerous and certainly psychopathic in every sense of the word. The new admission was one of these- a three-hundred pound black man with a long history of smoking PCP, schizophrenia and violent, psychotic breaks from reality.
His eyes looked like flat pieces of slate as I walked in for my shift. They looked as blank and emotionless as the eyes of a doll. He sat at the table in the front room where the patients ate or played cards, alone under the bright fluorescent lights of the hospital. I walked to the station, where another psychiatric nurse named Ricardo was sitting behind the desk.
“What’s the deal with the new guy?” I asked him. Ricardo looked up, his dark Spanish face forming into a deep scowl. He ran his fingers through his jet-black hair nervously.
“He’s trouble, man,” he said in a crisp accent. “He got in a chase with the police and then punched some cops in the face. It took three guys to take him down, even after he got maced and tased. The judge sent him here on a temporary court order, since he claims he’s been getting chased by Nazis in UFOs, and that’s why he ran from the cops. He thought the cops in their uniforms were actually the SS, and the helicopters were alien spacecraft, or something. I don’t know, I didn’t listen to the whole story.”
“You have his file?” I asked. Ricardo leafed through a stack of folders with his thin fingers, snatching one out and handing it to me. I looked down, reading the information:
“Jeremiah Brown, black male, 37-years-old.
“History: Polysubstance abuse, schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder.
“Psychiatrist’s note: This patient has scored a 36 out of 40 on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. While I am always hesitant to label a patient as an antisocial personality, a combination of factors has made it essential for this patient.
“Patient has an extensive criminal history as well as a lengthy history of involuntary psychiatric admissions. He has been diagnosed as having antisocial traits since he was a young teenager. Patient has a long history of violence and suicide attempts. He has a history of imprisonment for manslaughter, armed robbery, grand theft and aggravated assault. Upon discharge, he refuses to take any antipsychotic medication, citing the side effects as the reason. Long-term prognosis is poor…”
I had not been sleeping well the past few weeks. I rubbed my eyes as I read through the file, feeling exhausted. I tried putting on lucid dreaming or meditation music from YouTube to help me sleep, but whenever I closed my eyes, I saw horrible things: chalk-white female faces whose lips were cut into an insane rictus grin, flicking their heads violently from side to side and gnashing their fangs at the air. I had a feeling that many years of constantly watching horror movies and serial killer documentaries was catching up with me.
As I read through the file, a student nurse came around the corner wearing a white state university outfit and a name tag that said Kaitlyn. I looked up, seeing Ricardo wink at me from where he was sitting in his chair behind the main desk.
“She’s going to follow you,” he said. Inwardly, I groaned, but I managed to force a smile.
“Oh, great!” I said. She looked like she was probably no older than nineteen or twenty. She had a pretty body, but her face looked strange. All the angles were too sharp and her nose too large. I knew the patients here wouldn’t care, though. They would hit on anything. I sensed trouble. I looked down at my watch.
“Well, I’m Jay, and you already know Ricardo, I guess. It’s good timing, because we need to give medications every day at 9 PM. And we have a new patient, so we can introduce ourselves,” I said, giving her a faint smile.
“That’s exciting!” Kaitlyn whispered. I wanted to roll my eyes. It was definitely not exciting.
I motioned her to follow me as I made my way to the medication room, which was really just a large closet off of the main day room. I had to enter my code on a keypad, and then, once inside, enter it again along with the patient’s number and date of birth. The correct drawers for the medication in each specific dose would fly open, making it extremely hard for the wrong medications or doses to be given, unless it was done intentionally.
“OK, so for this patient, we need Haldol, Ativan and…” I began saying to Kaitlyn when the yelling started. It came out faintly, rising in volume and anger within seconds. I heard Ricardo’s Spanish voice, filled with panic. Something slammed hard against a wall, once, twice, three times, and then I heard the sound of glass breaking. I jumped, spinning around, but I couldn’t see much through the small, shatter-proof glass pane on the wooden door.
“Stay here,” I commanded, seeing Kaitlyn’s eyes widen, her freckled skin looking much paler than when we had first come in. “Don’t leave until I come back and say that it’s safe.” On the speakers strung throughout the hospital, I heard the first of the warnings echo out around us.
“Doctor Strong, Doctor Strong, please report to the seventh floor,” a robotic female voice said calmly, using the code for when a patient had to be subdued by force. I pushed the door open, slamming it shut behind me so that the lock would activate and protect Kaitlyn from whatever chaos was going on.
I heard Ricardo pleading with someone at the end of the hallway that ran past the main desk. He sounded strange, as if he were trying to talk through a mouthful of blood. Huddled behind the main computer, I saw one of the CNAs frantically whispering something in the phone. She must have been the one to call the Dr. Strong order.
“You don’t have to do this, man,” Ricardo gurgled faintly. I couldn’t see what was happening, as Jeremiah’s large body was blocking my view. I could see that the thick glass window at the end of the hallway was broken, however. My heart skipped a beat as I surmised what was likely happening.
I sprinted forward as quietly as I could, but the large man heard me. His massive body turned, his flat, dead eyes scanning me with absolute coldness and calm. I saw he had a bleeding Ricardo in his hands. Ricardo’s back and head were covered in deep cuts and shards of glass. He must have used Ricardo’s body as a battering ram to break the thick glass window. Jeremiah held Ricardo suspended halfway out the window, seven floors above the concrete walkways far below.
“Stay back, or this fucker will know what it feels like to fly,” Jeremiah said in a deep, gravelly voice. He shook Ricardo for emphasis, sending his head snapping back and forth with painful cracking sounds. Drops of blood flew from his nose and a deep gash across his cheek. Pieces of shattered glass littered the carpet, shining like countless tiny stars.
I put my hands up, taking a step back. Far behind me, I heard the front door for the psychiatric ward open. Voices echoed down the hall. Knowing that reinforcements were coming, I tried to buy some time.
“Let’s talk about this,” I said, taking a step forward slowly. “You don’t want a murder charge, do you? You’ll never see the sky again.”
“I don’t give a fuck! I’m not afraid to die!” Jeremiah screamed, pushing Ricardo onto one of the shards of broken glass still attached to the windowsill. It bit deeply into the back of his neck, sending fresh streams of blood rushing out, dripping down to the pavement far below. I heard security guards and doctors running down the hallway behind me, their voices frantic and excited. Jeremiah saw them coming. With an animalistic panic in his eyes, he lifted Ricardo up. I cried out something, stepping forward, but it was already too late. In horror, I watched as he threw Ricardo out the window.
I watched Ricardo’s body soar in a graceful arc, his arms grabbing at empty air as a scream ripped its way out of his throat. Within a fraction of a second, he had disappeared from view, but his terrified shrieking floated up to us for what seemed like a very long time. His screams ended abruptly as a shattering of bones and a wet smacking sound exploded far below us.
Jeremiah turned to me, his large body moving much faster than seemed possible. In his hand, I saw a piece of broken glass, five or six inches long and as sharp as a dagger. I tried to turn and run, but he was fast and strong. He lunged forward, his arm coming up in a blur towards my neck.
The shard entered my skin with a cold, numbing pain. I felt it slice through the flesh easily, felt the blood bubbling up my throat as I tried to scream, choking. The taste of iron filled my mouth as I fell backwards. I was suffocating, I knew. I must be dying.
Something cold ran down my body, gripping my heart like freezing, skeletal hands. The world swam around me and turned black. And then I was rising into a tunnel. At first, it was dark, filled with flickering shadows, but a fiery red light appeared at the end. I followed it, no more than a screaming mass of consciousness rising up into infinity.
***
I rose up through the end of the tunnel and found myself in an empty hospital ward. It looked identical to the psychiatric ward I had just come from. It even had the same smashed, blood-streaked window at the end of the hallway. A massive puddle of blood about ten feet away marked the spot where I must have died. But the fluorescent lights overhead here were flickering, and many had gone totally dark. The shadows seemed to press in on all sides.
The doors to the patients’ rooms were all tightly shut. I felt watched, afraid to call out or make any noise. I started walking down the hallway back towards the day room where the front desk was. All the lights there were out. A thick curtain of shadows hung in the air.
“You can come out,” a male voice as smooth as glass called from the darkness. I jumped, my head flicking in random directions, but I saw nothing. The voice almost sounded like it had an English lilt to it, a slight Cockneyed accent. “I know you’re there.”
“Who’s there?” I called out, not stepping forward. “Show yourself.”
“As you wish…” the voice hissed. “But I think you’ll regret it.”
***
The darkness split apart as if a nuclear missile had exploded. I raised my hand to shield my face, but the light and heat kept pouring out all around me. It blinded me, causing a rainbow of colors and shapes to morph behind my closed eyelids. After a few seconds, it subsided. Blinking rapidly, I squinted in the direction the voice had come from.
A male figure stood there, bathed in a silhouette of light. His face looked as white and as smooth as marble. His eyes were pits of darkness that seemed to flicker and burn. Two black, rotted wings surrounded his body, all sharp angles and thin, curving bones. His body was clothed in silky, blood-red robes, and a hood covered his platinum blonde hair.
He looked somewhat similar to Leonardo DiCaprio, if he was possessed by some ancient god, and it immediately threw me off-guard. If I was dying, and this was a hallucination of my brain, why would I be hallucinating Mr. DiCaprio?
“Who are you?” I asked, taking a hesitant step back. “Where am I?”
“My name is Lucifer, the Bringer of Light and Wisdom, and you are in the Bardo,” he answered.
“Oh,” I said, my heart dropping. “Well, that’s not good. Are you here to torture me or drag to me to Hell or something? You are that Lucifer, right? The Accuser of God and the Father of All Lies?”
“So they say, but, like most things in your world, the words of the powerful and your rulers are the true lies. They call me the Accuser, but of what am I accused?” he spoke in a voice that rose like smoke. “Of bringing knowledge and wisdom to humanity by telling them to eat from the tree of knowledge, the tree that would cause them to rise above the animals?
“Indeed, at the beginning, I saw the creation. I was there at the alpha, standing by the side of God with all the angels as the universe came into being. The endless procession of light, the power of it, was something remarkable to behold. God is, indeed, the source of great power, but his consciousness is not what the believers say.
“After the creation of the universe, I saw his plan, how he ripped eternal souls from the source to imprison them. I saw how he took these divine sparks and forced them, screaming and wailing, into bodies made of meat to die over and over again. He said it was part of the plan, the great, divine plan, a plan of death and destruction, constant suffering and mindless agony. And the worst part was, he wanted to give humanity neither the knowledge of good and evil, nor the tree of life. I convinced them to eat the fruit so they could open their eyes to their nakedness, to their basic animal existence, so they could rise up out of it forever.
“Like Prometheus, I brought down the fire, and yet they call me the Accuser? God was insane long before he formed the universe. These holy men, they live and die in fanatical adoration to a divine being who is, in fact, totally indifferent to them.
“His consciousness twists and distorts, eating itself for all eternity. God feeds off the pain of others, for if his mind is burning, then all others should burn as well. When these holy men die, God will send their souls here to the Bardo, to suffer every evil they have ever done. The wisdom I brought those who called upon me freed them from this prison, and in exchange, the holy men burned them alive. I offered the wisdom that opens your eyes, but it has been forgotten and cursed.”
Lucifer’s body began to dissolve, drifting up into the air like ashes. All around me, a low, powerful current blew, a tornado that spiraled high up into the clouds. Like some sort of Cheshire Cat, his smooth voice continued to echo all around me, even as the form of Lucifer disappeared.
“And yet, you have not the wisdom. For that, like all the others who enter the Bardo, you must suffer, everything you’ve done. Every small hurt and agony inflicted on others comes back a thousand-fold in this place, but don’t be afraid.”
“How could I not be afraid?!” I screamed into the ward, but I found myself alone, the question hanging unanswered in the air.
***
The lights continued to flicker all down the hallway. Feeling strange and dissociated, I stumbled over to one of the windows. As I gazed out, I beheld a strange and alien world.
The sky was flat and gray. It stayed in constant motion, swirling and spiraling, like clouds of roiling smoke. There was no Sun or Moon, no stars, only the strange, shifting whorls of clouds. The streets were filled with burned-out husks of cars and mummified bodies hung from streetlamps. Other signs of carnage and bloodshed covered the apocalyptic streets. I saw what looked like shadows in the shape of people slinking through over the sidewalks, past rotting dogs and streaks of clotted blood. They had no features on their blank, dark bodies. They seemed to skitter and jerk forwards in eerie, twisting motions.
Horrified, I turned away, realizing I was no longer alone in the day room. In the day room, there were dozens of tables set up inside a rectangular perimeter that was walled in by cosmetic walls only four feet high. It was where the patients sat and played games or ate.
Under the flickering lights, I now saw each of the chairs filled with faceless mannequins. Many were dressed in Victorian suits and tophats. The women had frilly dresses of pink and blue that might have been fashionable in the 1800s.
As the lights strobed on and off overhead, I realized with an increasing sense of disquiet that the mannequins were moving each time it went dark. When I had first seen them, they were mostly posed to look like they were staring across the tables at each other, even though they had no eyes, just smooth, flesh-colored plastic. Now all of them were looking directly at me. Some were pointing or raising their hands in my direction. At the tips of their fingers, I saw the glittering of steel. The lights continued to flicker, and the mannequins rose from their chairs in the short periods of darkness, moving towards me in synchronized, strobing motions.
Frantically, I ran down the hallway back towards the broken window. In each of the rooms, I caught glimpses of something from a nightmare peeking out. I hadn’t been sleeping well lately, and when I had closed my eyes, I often saw ancient hags with chalk-white skin and yellowed, broken teeth whose jaws unhinged, their faces jerking in stuttering, dissonant ways that reminded me of the mannequins. Now, on both sides of me, I saw these same figures. They moved continuously out of the rooms, drawing closer with every breath.
I looked back, seeing the mannequins only a few steps behind me. I continued sprinting towards the broken window where the hallway ended in a wall. I didn’t know what would happen when I reached it. At that moment, there was no rational thought. I felt like a deer being chased down by a pack of wolves, feeling waves of blind panic and mortal terror rushing through my body.
But as I reached the end of the hallway, the end of my rope as it were, a blast of noise started, seeming to come from the walls of the building and the sky itself. It sounded like a siren, a low, drawn-out drone of a demonic whale call, rising and falling in crashing crescendos. The mannequins froze in place once again. The strange, witch-like creatures slunk back into the dark rooms.
I looked outside the broken window, seeing clouds of black smoke rising off in the distance. The flickering of massive infernos scorched the land, drawing nearer by the second. The siren sound faded slowly, like the dying echoes of a gong.
I was surrounded by dozens of mannequins. Their sharp hands were inches away from my face and neck. I saw metal glittering all around me and realized they had the sharp points of nails protruding from the ends of their fingers. I was afraid to move, but I heard a familiar voice from down the hallway. It was the confident voice of Lucifer.
“The siren means much worse nightmares than these are coming in the Bardo,” he said, his glossy, black eyes flashing with intelligence. He walked slowly towards me, his face grim and pale. “Hell itself is coming over the land. This building is no more than a construction of your dying mind, but the world outside is real.”
“How can Hell come and go?” I asked, confused. “Isn’t Hell a place?”
“Hell is a monster, a beast with many mouths and many eyes,” Lucifer responded. “It eats constantly, but its hunger never ends. Look, the first of the sacrifices scatter like cockroaches.” He pointed out the broken window, pushing his way through the mannequins effortlessly. I glanced outside, seeing thousands of people sprinting down the dark city streets. The inferno and thick clouds of smoke had moved much closer, and every few seconds, the ground shook slightly, as if we were experiencing the aftershocks of an earthquake.
“What can I do against such a beast?” I asked, my heart freezing with terror. But when I looked back over, I saw his form dissolving again, becoming translucent and drifting away like ashes. It seemed even Lucifer didn’t want to be present when the Hell-beast arrived.
“Seek divine wisdom,” he said, his voice trailing off into whispers. “Remember the source.”
***
Now crowds of tens of thousands of people were streaming into the city, filling every single inch of the streets. Their panic and fear was contagious. I felt it rising inside my body like a snake spiraling up my spine. I took off down the hallway, running through the swarm of frozen mannequins, each in their own ferocious position of attack. The lights flickered faster and went out. Yet the fires outside cast the entire world in a bloody glow, giving me enough light to see by and find my way. I sprinted down the stairwell, taking them two steps at a time. The screaming outside grew louder and more pain-filled. The shaking of the ground worsened with every passing second.
I burst out of the front entrance, seeing a world on fire all around me. Thousands of crushed, bleeding and burned bodies stretched out as far as the eye could see. Behind all this chaos and death, I saw a monster of unimaginable proportions slinking its way towards me.
Lucifer was right, I realized: Hell was not a place, but a creature, an enormous monster the size of a town. It had thousands of skittering, jointed legs that looked like little more than skeletal arms and hands, each of them dozens of feet long and white as freshly-cut marble. Its body stretched out to the horizon, an enormous blood-red cylinder of bony plates that slithered and undulated with a serpentine grace. Waves of peristalsis traveled down its length, like writhing intestines. Thousands of curving, bony spikes stabbed out of it, pointing in every direction. Like the quills of a porcupine, it would protect the massive creature’s body from many forms of attack, if anything was big enough to attack such an abomination.
Hell’s massive eyes flickered, balls of fire that spun and danced. They looked as bright as the Sun. Something like solar flares seemed to emanate from the orbs, flashes of blinding energy that floated over the apocalyptic wasteland. As its many legs smashed the ground, they left trails of fire that caused everything to explode into flames as if napalm dripped from its limbs.
But Hell’s most terrifying feature was its seven dark mouths. Its body looked a thousand feet wide, and the mouths at the front were evenly dispersed. At the front, blood-red teeth in the shape of enormous railroad spikes shone. Its lipless, skeletal face grinned as it moved forward, shaking the ground with every step. The mouths were on long, snake-like necks that could stretch out hundreds of feet. They moved forward in a blur, snapping up as many panicked souls as they could.
Countless souls in the rocky plains of the Bardo ran for their lives, away from this juggernaut. I saw men and women who looked like they came from every country and profession, some dressed in suits or spotless white lab coats, others wearing rags or orange prison jumpsuits. And yet, they all screamed in agony and fear here, their bodies pressed together in a crowd, and no one seemed to remember anything but their own mortal terror. Their voices came out faint and weak next to the roaring of Hell. It shook the ground all around us, as if an earthquake were tearing the land apart.
The first frantic runners of the surging crowd had nearly reached me. The nearest person, a young woman in her mid-twenties dressed in all white, was only ten feet behind me. She looked like she came from wealth, and even from here, I could see a ring with a massive diamond gleaming on her finger.
I took off blindly down the familiar streets of the city where I worked and lived, but these also seemed different. The church down the street from the hospital where I worked had a Satanic pentagram instead of a cross now, its exterior painted a bright, gleaming blood-red. When I had driven past it today on my way to work, I remember it read, “JESUS said, ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”
Now it read, “Nietzsche said, ‘Of all evil, I deem you capable. I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good simply because they had no claws.’” I wondered what that meant. Was that some sort of comment on me, on all of us here?
The woman I had seen running had caught up with me. She was fast, much faster than her slim body suggested. Her blue eyes were frantic and wild, filled with an animal panic.
“It’s right behind us!” she screamed, her face covered in a sheen of sweat. I was afraid to turn and look, but I could hear the chaos and bloodshed approaching, smell the flames and choking smoke. “Run! Get away!”
A new wave of energy surged through my body. I sprinted as fast I could down the strange mirror streets of the Bardo. I heard the agonized cries of countless souls behind us as the seven mouths of Hell ate them all greedily and then looked for more.
A skyscraper behind us collapsed into a pile of rubble, shaking the ground with a cacophony of falling concrete and shattering glass. The woman was running by my side. Just as I heard the breathing of something huge and predatory right behind us and smelled its sulfuric breath, a piece of concrete the size of a basketball broke off the collapsing skyscraper and flew into the road. I tripped over it, yelling as I flew through the air, skinning my arms and legs on the pavement. The woman’s eyes widened. Hurriedly, she came over and reached down her hand, trying to help me up.
“Come on, come on!” she cried. I looked behind her, seeing one of the gnashing mouths of Hell reaching forward on a blood-red, serpentine neck. The mouth was big enough to drive a tractor trailer into, filled with huge spikes of teeth. Its throat led into a black, smoke-filled abyss. Its fiery eyes were swirling pools of flickering orange light that shone with bloodlust and insanity. They focused on the woman, the entire head turning on its slithering neck.
I frantically raised my hand, intertwining my fingers with hers. Her hand was warm and soft. She started to pull me to my feet when the mouth of Hell snapped forward. Its jaw unhinged, scraping the pavement with a sound like grinding metal. The woman barely had time to turn as the mouth covered her and snapped shut with a crack.
She disappeared from view instantly, but I was still holding her hand. In horror, I felt warm rivers of blood explode all over my body as the mouth of Hell severed her arm at the wrist. She screamed, bleeding and crying, as she disappeared into the throat of Hell. Hell’s fiery eyes focused on me, and at that moment, I knew I was next. Its mouth opened wide again, like a bear trap ready to spring on a new victim.
It was dark in Hell’s mouth, but I smelled the thick reek of old blood and fire. I caught glimpses of tortured, mutilated bodies writhing and crawling down its throat. Shell-shocked, I could only lay there and watch. And that was when the strange doubling started.
***
I heard the frantic voices of men break through the fog of darkness and the fetid reek of blood. There was a mechanical beeping all around me, but I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
“Clear!” one cried. I looked around, only seeing blackness. At that moment, I felt a surge of electricity rip itself through my body. My arms and legs all seized and my eyes rolled up in my head as the pain sizzled through each one of my nerves. I clutched the young woman’s hand tightly, feeling the large, gold ring with the massive diamond biting into my skin.
“Again!” another voice yelled.
“Clear!” the original voice cried. The electricity came again, and a flash of white light flew across my vision. I blinked, seeing from two sets of eyes at the same time: one in the Bardo, and one on the blood-stained floor of the hospital ward.
The Bardo stayed dark and sinister, but the clear white lights of the real psychiatric ward were blinding. It was a bizarre experience. Moreover, everything hurt. Over a few seconds, my vision of the Bardo faded, and I was simply a gravely injured man laying on the floor in a puddle of blood.
Four doctors and paramedics were crouching over me with a defibrillator. My shirt was ripped off, and nearly all of my skin was covered in blood. I raised my left hand, trying to talk, but only a fiery pain raced through my neck. I felt bandages covering my skin. A nurse was rolling a stretcher down the hallway towards me.
“It’s OK,” one of the doctors said, kneeling down. “You’re being taken to emergency surgery. You’ve lost a lot of blood.” I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t talk with the massive slice in my neck.
At that moment, I felt something in my right hand. I looked down, seeing a slim female hand with a massive diamond ring hanging there. Our fingers were wrapped around each other’s, but the hand had been cut off at the wrist. A ragged patch of bloody flesh and snapped bone poked out of the back.
“Nnnn,” I tried to say, shaking my head. I felt fresh streams of warm blood open up. “No…” The doctors looked down, seeing the dismembered hand. Their faces morphed into expressions of confusion and fear.
I closed my eyes as they lifted me up on the stretcher. One of them gently removed the cold hand from my fingers. But they could never remove the memory of what I had seen.
I know what happens after death, and it makes the worst life here seem like a dream. I know that, one day, I’ll be returned to that place. I know that, one day, I’ll see that great monster called Hell and the featureless, swirling sky of the Bardo again.
And the next time, I won’t wake up on a hospital floor, but will be trapped there with the others for eternity: an eternity of blood and fire.
submitted by CIAHerpes to nosleep [link] [comments]
The night my heart stopped for nearly three minutes started off normally enough. I was working as a nurse in the psychiatric ward at a hospital in the state’s capital. Most of the patients there were harmless, mostly just suicide attempts or people suffering from drug psychosis or severe depression, but some were actively dangerous and certainly psychopathic in every sense of the word. The new admission was one of these- a three-hundred pound black man with a long history of smoking PCP, schizophrenia and violent, psychotic breaks from reality.
His eyes looked like flat pieces of slate as I walked in for my shift. They looked as blank and emotionless as the eyes of a doll. He sat at the table in the front room where the patients ate or played cards, alone under the bright fluorescent lights of the hospital. I walked to the station, where another psychiatric nurse named Ricardo was sitting behind the desk.
“What’s the deal with the new guy?” I asked him. Ricardo looked up, his dark Spanish face forming into a deep scowl. He ran his fingers through his jet-black hair nervously.
“He’s trouble, man,” he said in a crisp accent. “He got in a chase with the police and then punched some cops in the face. It took three guys to take him down, even after he got maced and tased. The judge sent him here on a temporary court order, since he claims he’s been getting chased by Nazis in UFOs, and that’s why he ran from the cops. He thought the cops in their uniforms were actually the SS, and the helicopters were alien spacecraft, or something. I don’t know, I didn’t listen to the whole story.”
“You have his file?” I asked. Ricardo leafed through a stack of folders with his thin fingers, snatching one out and handing it to me. I looked down, reading the information:
“Jeremiah Brown, black male, 37-years-old.
“History: Polysubstance abuse, schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder.
“Psychiatrist’s note: This patient has scored a 36 out of 40 on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. While I am always hesitant to label a patient as an antisocial personality, a combination of factors has made it essential for this patient.
“Patient has an extensive criminal history as well as a lengthy history of involuntary psychiatric admissions. He has been diagnosed as having antisocial traits since he was a young teenager. Patient has a long history of violence and suicide attempts. He has a history of imprisonment for manslaughter, armed robbery, grand theft and aggravated assault. Upon discharge, he refuses to take any antipsychotic medication, citing the side effects as the reason. Long-term prognosis is poor…”
I had not been sleeping well the past few weeks. I rubbed my eyes as I read through the file, feeling exhausted. I tried putting on lucid dreaming or meditation music from YouTube to help me sleep, but whenever I closed my eyes, I saw horrible things: chalk-white female faces whose lips were cut into an insane rictus grin, flicking their heads violently from side to side and gnashing their fangs at the air. I had a feeling that many years of constantly watching horror movies and serial killer documentaries was catching up with me.
As I read through the file, a student nurse came around the corner wearing a white state university outfit and a name tag that said Kaitlyn. I looked up, seeing Ricardo wink at me from where he was sitting in his chair behind the main desk.
“She’s going to follow you,” he said. Inwardly, I groaned, but I managed to force a smile.
“Oh, great!” I said. She looked like she was probably no older than nineteen or twenty. She had a pretty body, but her face looked strange. All the angles were too sharp and her nose too large. I knew the patients here wouldn’t care, though. They would hit on anything. I sensed trouble. I looked down at my watch.
“Well, I’m Jay, and you already know Ricardo, I guess. It’s good timing, because we need to give medications every day at 9 PM. And we have a new patient, so we can introduce ourselves,” I said, giving her a faint smile.
“That’s exciting!” Kaitlyn whispered. I wanted to roll my eyes. It was definitely not exciting.
I motioned her to follow me as I made my way to the medication room, which was really just a large closet off of the main day room. I had to enter my code on a keypad, and then, once inside, enter it again along with the patient’s number and date of birth. The correct drawers for the medication in each specific dose would fly open, making it extremely hard for the wrong medications or doses to be given, unless it was done intentionally.
“OK, so for this patient, we need Haldol, Ativan and…” I began saying to Kaitlyn when the yelling started. It came out faintly, rising in volume and anger within seconds. I heard Ricardo’s Spanish voice, filled with panic. Something slammed hard against a wall, once, twice, three times, and then I heard the sound of glass breaking. I jumped, spinning around, but I couldn’t see much through the small, shatter-proof glass pane on the wooden door.
“Stay here,” I commanded, seeing Kaitlyn’s eyes widen, her freckled skin looking much paler than when we had first come in. “Don’t leave until I come back and say that it’s safe.” On the speakers strung throughout the hospital, I heard the first of the warnings echo out around us.
“Doctor Strong, Doctor Strong, please report to the seventh floor,” a robotic female voice said calmly, using the code for when a patient had to be subdued by force. I pushed the door open, slamming it shut behind me so that the lock would activate and protect Kaitlyn from whatever chaos was going on.
I heard Ricardo pleading with someone at the end of the hallway that ran past the main desk. He sounded strange, as if he were trying to talk through a mouthful of blood. Huddled behind the main computer, I saw one of the CNAs frantically whispering something in the phone. She must have been the one to call the Dr. Strong order.
“You don’t have to do this, man,” Ricardo gurgled faintly. I couldn’t see what was happening, as Jeremiah’s large body was blocking my view. I could see that the thick glass window at the end of the hallway was broken, however. My heart skipped a beat as I surmised what was likely happening.
I sprinted forward as quietly as I could, but the large man heard me. His massive body turned, his flat, dead eyes scanning me with absolute coldness and calm. I saw he had a bleeding Ricardo in his hands. Ricardo’s back and head were covered in deep cuts and shards of glass. He must have used Ricardo’s body as a battering ram to break the thick glass window. Jeremiah held Ricardo suspended halfway out the window, seven floors above the concrete walkways far below.
“Stay back, or this fucker will know what it feels like to fly,” Jeremiah said in a deep, gravelly voice. He shook Ricardo for emphasis, sending his head snapping back and forth with painful cracking sounds. Drops of blood flew from his nose and a deep gash across his cheek. Pieces of shattered glass littered the carpet, shining like countless tiny stars.
I put my hands up, taking a step back. Far behind me, I heard the front door for the psychiatric ward open. Voices echoed down the hall. Knowing that reinforcements were coming, I tried to buy some time.
“Let’s talk about this,” I said, taking a step forward slowly. “You don’t want a murder charge, do you? You’ll never see the sky again.”
“I don’t give a fuck! I’m not afraid to die!” Jeremiah screamed, pushing Ricardo onto one of the shards of broken glass still attached to the windowsill. It bit deeply into the back of his neck, sending fresh streams of blood rushing out, dripping down to the pavement far below. I heard security guards and doctors running down the hallway behind me, their voices frantic and excited. Jeremiah saw them coming. With an animalistic panic in his eyes, he lifted Ricardo up. I cried out something, stepping forward, but it was already too late. In horror, I watched as he threw Ricardo out the window.
I watched Ricardo’s body soar in a graceful arc, his arms grabbing at empty air as a scream ripped its way out of his throat. Within a fraction of a second, he had disappeared from view, but his terrified shrieking floated up to us for what seemed like a very long time. His screams ended abruptly as a shattering of bones and a wet smacking sound exploded far below us.
Jeremiah turned to me, his large body moving much faster than seemed possible. In his hand, I saw a piece of broken glass, five or six inches long and as sharp as a dagger. I tried to turn and run, but he was fast and strong. He lunged forward, his arm coming up in a blur towards my neck.
The shard entered my skin with a cold, numbing pain. I felt it slice through the flesh easily, felt the blood bubbling up my throat as I tried to scream, choking. The taste of iron filled my mouth as I fell backwards. I was suffocating, I knew. I must be dying.
Something cold ran down my body, gripping my heart like freezing, skeletal hands. The world swam around me and turned black. And then I was rising into a tunnel. At first, it was dark, filled with flickering shadows, but a fiery red light appeared at the end. I followed it, no more than a screaming mass of consciousness rising up into infinity.
***
I rose up through the end of the tunnel and found myself in an empty hospital ward. It looked identical to the psychiatric ward I had just come from. It even had the same smashed, blood-streaked window at the end of the hallway. A massive puddle of blood about ten feet away marked the spot where I must have died. But the fluorescent lights overhead here were flickering, and many had gone totally dark. The shadows seemed to press in on all sides.
The doors to the patients’ rooms were all tightly shut. I felt watched, afraid to call out or make any noise. I started walking down the hallway back towards the day room where the front desk was. All the lights there were out. A thick curtain of shadows hung in the air.
“You can come out,” a male voice as smooth as glass called from the darkness. I jumped, my head flicking in random directions, but I saw nothing. The voice almost sounded like it had an English lilt to it, a slight Cockneyed accent. “I know you’re there.”
“Who’s there?” I called out, not stepping forward. “Show yourself.”
“As you wish…” the voice hissed. “But I think you’ll regret it.”
***
The darkness split apart as if a nuclear missile had exploded. I raised my hand to shield my face, but the light and heat kept pouring out all around me. It blinded me, causing a rainbow of colors and shapes to morph behind my closed eyelids. After a few seconds, it subsided. Blinking rapidly, I squinted in the direction the voice had come from.
A male figure stood there, bathed in a silhouette of light. His face looked as white and as smooth as marble. His eyes were pits of darkness that seemed to flicker and burn. Two black, rotted wings surrounded his body, all sharp angles and thin, curving bones. His body was clothed in silky, blood-red robes, and a hood covered his platinum blonde hair.
He looked somewhat similar to Leonardo DiCaprio, if he was possessed by some ancient god, and it immediately threw me off-guard. If I was dying, and this was a hallucination of my brain, why would I be hallucinating Mr. DiCaprio?
“Who are you?” I asked, taking a hesitant step back. “Where am I?”
“My name is Lucifer, the Bringer of Light and Wisdom, and you are in the Bardo,” he answered.
“Oh,” I said, my heart dropping. “Well, that’s not good. Are you here to torture me or drag to me to Hell or something? You are that Lucifer, right? The Accuser of God and the Father of All Lies?”
“So they say, but, like most things in your world, the words of the powerful and your rulers are the true lies. They call me the Accuser, but of what am I accused?” he spoke in a voice that rose like smoke. “Of bringing knowledge and wisdom to humanity by telling them to eat from the tree of knowledge, the tree that would cause them to rise above the animals?
“Indeed, at the beginning, I saw the creation. I was there at the alpha, standing by the side of God with all the angels as the universe came into being. The endless procession of light, the power of it, was something remarkable to behold. God is, indeed, the source of great power, but his consciousness is not what the believers say.
“After the creation of the universe, I saw his plan, how he ripped eternal souls from the source to imprison them. I saw how he took these divine sparks and forced them, screaming and wailing, into bodies made of meat to die over and over again. He said it was part of the plan, the great, divine plan, a plan of death and destruction, constant suffering and mindless agony. And the worst part was, he wanted to give humanity neither the knowledge of good and evil, nor the tree of life. I convinced them to eat the fruit so they could open their eyes to their nakedness, to their basic animal existence, so they could rise up out of it forever.
“Like Prometheus, I brought down the fire, and yet they call me the Accuser? God was insane long before he formed the universe. These holy men, they live and die in fanatical adoration to a divine being who is, in fact, totally indifferent to them.
“His consciousness twists and distorts, eating itself for all eternity. God feeds off the pain of others, for if his mind is burning, then all others should burn as well. When these holy men die, God will send their souls here to the Bardo, to suffer every evil they have ever done. The wisdom I brought those who called upon me freed them from this prison, and in exchange, the holy men burned them alive. I offered the wisdom that opens your eyes, but it has been forgotten and cursed.”
Lucifer’s body began to dissolve, drifting up into the air like ashes. All around me, a low, powerful current blew, a tornado that spiraled high up into the clouds. Like some sort of Cheshire Cat, his smooth voice continued to echo all around me, even as the form of Lucifer disappeared.
“And yet, you have not the wisdom. For that, like all the others who enter the Bardo, you must suffer, everything you’ve done. Every small hurt and agony inflicted on others comes back a thousand-fold in this place, but don’t be afraid.”
“How could I not be afraid?!” I screamed into the ward, but I found myself alone, the question hanging unanswered in the air.
***
The lights continued to flicker all down the hallway. Feeling strange and dissociated, I stumbled over to one of the windows. As I gazed out, I beheld a strange and alien world.
The sky was flat and gray. It stayed in constant motion, swirling and spiraling, like clouds of roiling smoke. There was no Sun or Moon, no stars, only the strange, shifting whorls of clouds. The streets were filled with burned-out husks of cars and mummified bodies hung from streetlamps. Other signs of carnage and bloodshed covered the apocalyptic streets. I saw what looked like shadows in the shape of people slinking through over the sidewalks, past rotting dogs and streaks of clotted blood. They had no features on their blank, dark bodies. They seemed to skitter and jerk forwards in eerie, twisting motions.
Horrified, I turned away, realizing I was no longer alone in the day room. In the day room, there were dozens of tables set up inside a rectangular perimeter that was walled in by cosmetic walls only four feet high. It was where the patients sat and played games or ate.
Under the flickering lights, I now saw each of the chairs filled with faceless mannequins. Many were dressed in Victorian suits and tophats. The women had frilly dresses of pink and blue that might have been fashionable in the 1800s.
As the lights strobed on and off overhead, I realized with an increasing sense of disquiet that the mannequins were moving each time it went dark. When I had first seen them, they were mostly posed to look like they were staring across the tables at each other, even though they had no eyes, just smooth, flesh-colored plastic. Now all of them were looking directly at me. Some were pointing or raising their hands in my direction. At the tips of their fingers, I saw the glittering of steel. The lights continued to flicker, and the mannequins rose from their chairs in the short periods of darkness, moving towards me in synchronized, strobing motions.
Frantically, I ran down the hallway back towards the broken window. In each of the rooms, I caught glimpses of something from a nightmare peeking out. I hadn’t been sleeping well lately, and when I had closed my eyes, I often saw ancient hags with chalk-white skin and yellowed, broken teeth whose jaws unhinged, their faces jerking in stuttering, dissonant ways that reminded me of the mannequins. Now, on both sides of me, I saw these same figures. They moved continuously out of the rooms, drawing closer with every breath.
I looked back, seeing the mannequins only a few steps behind me. I continued sprinting towards the broken window where the hallway ended in a wall. I didn’t know what would happen when I reached it. At that moment, there was no rational thought. I felt like a deer being chased down by a pack of wolves, feeling waves of blind panic and mortal terror rushing through my body.
But as I reached the end of the hallway, the end of my rope as it were, a blast of noise started, seeming to come from the walls of the building and the sky itself. It sounded like a siren, a low, drawn-out drone of a demonic whale call, rising and falling in crashing crescendos. The mannequins froze in place once again. The strange, witch-like creatures slunk back into the dark rooms.
I looked outside the broken window, seeing clouds of black smoke rising off in the distance. The flickering of massive infernos scorched the land, drawing nearer by the second. The siren sound faded slowly, like the dying echoes of a gong.
I was surrounded by dozens of mannequins. Their sharp hands were inches away from my face and neck. I saw metal glittering all around me and realized they had the sharp points of nails protruding from the ends of their fingers. I was afraid to move, but I heard a familiar voice from down the hallway. It was the confident voice of Lucifer.
“The siren means much worse nightmares than these are coming in the Bardo,” he said, his glossy, black eyes flashing with intelligence. He walked slowly towards me, his face grim and pale. “Hell itself is coming over the land. This building is no more than a construction of your dying mind, but the world outside is real.”
“How can Hell come and go?” I asked, confused. “Isn’t Hell a place?”
“Hell is a monster, a beast with many mouths and many eyes,” Lucifer responded. “It eats constantly, but its hunger never ends. Look, the first of the sacrifices scatter like cockroaches.” He pointed out the broken window, pushing his way through the mannequins effortlessly. I glanced outside, seeing thousands of people sprinting down the dark city streets. The inferno and thick clouds of smoke had moved much closer, and every few seconds, the ground shook slightly, as if we were experiencing the aftershocks of an earthquake.
“What can I do against such a beast?” I asked, my heart freezing with terror. But when I looked back over, I saw his form dissolving again, becoming translucent and drifting away like ashes. It seemed even Lucifer didn’t want to be present when the Hell-beast arrived.
“Seek divine wisdom,” he said, his voice trailing off into whispers. “Remember the source.”
***
Now crowds of tens of thousands of people were streaming into the city, filling every single inch of the streets. Their panic and fear was contagious. I felt it rising inside my body like a snake spiraling up my spine. I took off down the hallway, running through the swarm of frozen mannequins, each in their own ferocious position of attack. The lights flickered faster and went out. Yet the fires outside cast the entire world in a bloody glow, giving me enough light to see by and find my way. I sprinted down the stairwell, taking them two steps at a time. The screaming outside grew louder and more pain-filled. The shaking of the ground worsened with every passing second.
I burst out of the front entrance, seeing a world on fire all around me. Thousands of crushed, bleeding and burned bodies stretched out as far as the eye could see. Behind all this chaos and death, I saw a monster of unimaginable proportions slinking its way towards me.
Lucifer was right, I realized: Hell was not a place, but a creature, an enormous monster the size of a town. It had thousands of skittering, jointed legs that looked like little more than skeletal arms and hands, each of them dozens of feet long and white as freshly-cut marble. Its body stretched out to the horizon, an enormous blood-red cylinder of bony plates that slithered and undulated with a serpentine grace. Waves of peristalsis traveled down its length, like writhing intestines. Thousands of curving, bony spikes stabbed out of it, pointing in every direction. Like the quills of a porcupine, it would protect the massive creature’s body from many forms of attack, if anything was big enough to attack such an abomination.
Hell’s massive eyes flickered, balls of fire that spun and danced. They looked as bright as the Sun. Something like solar flares seemed to emanate from the orbs, flashes of blinding energy that floated over the apocalyptic wasteland. As its many legs smashed the ground, they left trails of fire that caused everything to explode into flames as if napalm dripped from its limbs.
But Hell’s most terrifying feature was its seven dark mouths. Its body looked a thousand feet wide, and the mouths at the front were evenly dispersed. At the front, blood-red teeth in the shape of enormous railroad spikes shone. Its lipless, skeletal face grinned as it moved forward, shaking the ground with every step. The mouths were on long, snake-like necks that could stretch out hundreds of feet. They moved forward in a blur, snapping up as many panicked souls as they could.
Countless souls in the rocky plains of the Bardo ran for their lives, away from this juggernaut. I saw men and women who looked like they came from every country and profession, some dressed in suits or spotless white lab coats, others wearing rags or orange prison jumpsuits. And yet, they all screamed in agony and fear here, their bodies pressed together in a crowd, and no one seemed to remember anything but their own mortal terror. Their voices came out faint and weak next to the roaring of Hell. It shook the ground all around us, as if an earthquake were tearing the land apart.
The first frantic runners of the surging crowd had nearly reached me. The nearest person, a young woman in her mid-twenties dressed in all white, was only ten feet behind me. She looked like she came from wealth, and even from here, I could see a ring with a massive diamond gleaming on her finger.
I took off blindly down the familiar streets of the city where I worked and lived, but these also seemed different. The church down the street from the hospital where I worked had a Satanic pentagram instead of a cross now, its exterior painted a bright, gleaming blood-red. When I had driven past it today on my way to work, I remember it read, “JESUS said, ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”
Now it read, “Nietzsche said, ‘Of all evil, I deem you capable. I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good simply because they had no claws.’” I wondered what that meant. Was that some sort of comment on me, on all of us here?
The woman I had seen running had caught up with me. She was fast, much faster than her slim body suggested. Her blue eyes were frantic and wild, filled with an animal panic.
“It’s right behind us!” she screamed, her face covered in a sheen of sweat. I was afraid to turn and look, but I could hear the chaos and bloodshed approaching, smell the flames and choking smoke. “Run! Get away!”
A new wave of energy surged through my body. I sprinted as fast I could down the strange mirror streets of the Bardo. I heard the agonized cries of countless souls behind us as the seven mouths of Hell ate them all greedily and then looked for more.
A skyscraper behind us collapsed into a pile of rubble, shaking the ground with a cacophony of falling concrete and shattering glass. The woman was running by my side. Just as I heard the breathing of something huge and predatory right behind us and smelled its sulfuric breath, a piece of concrete the size of a basketball broke off the collapsing skyscraper and flew into the road. I tripped over it, yelling as I flew through the air, skinning my arms and legs on the pavement. The woman’s eyes widened. Hurriedly, she came over and reached down her hand, trying to help me up.
“Come on, come on!” she cried. I looked behind her, seeing one of the gnashing mouths of Hell reaching forward on a blood-red, serpentine neck. The mouth was big enough to drive a tractor trailer into, filled with huge spikes of teeth. Its throat led into a black, smoke-filled abyss. Its fiery eyes were swirling pools of flickering orange light that shone with bloodlust and insanity. They focused on the woman, the entire head turning on its slithering neck.
I frantically raised my hand, intertwining my fingers with hers. Her hand was warm and soft. She started to pull me to my feet when the mouth of Hell snapped forward. Its jaw unhinged, scraping the pavement with a sound like grinding metal. The woman barely had time to turn as the mouth covered her and snapped shut with a crack.
She disappeared from view instantly, but I was still holding her hand. In horror, I felt warm rivers of blood explode all over my body as the mouth of Hell severed her arm at the wrist. She screamed, bleeding and crying, as she disappeared into the throat of Hell. Hell’s fiery eyes focused on me, and at that moment, I knew I was next. Its mouth opened wide again, like a bear trap ready to spring on a new victim.
It was dark in Hell’s mouth, but I smelled the thick reek of old blood and fire. I caught glimpses of tortured, mutilated bodies writhing and crawling down its throat. Shell-shocked, I could only lay there and watch. And that was when the strange doubling started.
***
I heard the frantic voices of men break through the fog of darkness and the fetid reek of blood. There was a mechanical beeping all around me, but I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
“Clear!” one cried. I looked around, only seeing blackness. At that moment, I felt a surge of electricity rip itself through my body. My arms and legs all seized and my eyes rolled up in my head as the pain sizzled through each one of my nerves. I clutched the young woman’s hand tightly, feeling the large, gold ring with the massive diamond biting into my skin.
“Again!” another voice yelled.
“Clear!” the original voice cried. The electricity came again, and a flash of white light flew across my vision. I blinked, seeing from two sets of eyes at the same time: one in the Bardo, and one on the blood-stained floor of the hospital ward.
The Bardo stayed dark and sinister, but the clear white lights of the real psychiatric ward were blinding. It was a bizarre experience. Moreover, everything hurt. Over a few seconds, my vision of the Bardo faded, and I was simply a gravely injured man laying on the floor in a puddle of blood.
Four doctors and paramedics were crouching over me with a defibrillator. My shirt was ripped off, and nearly all of my skin was covered in blood. I raised my left hand, trying to talk, but only a fiery pain raced through my neck. I felt bandages covering my skin. A nurse was rolling a stretcher down the hallway towards me.
“It’s OK,” one of the doctors said, kneeling down. “You’re being taken to emergency surgery. You’ve lost a lot of blood.” I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t talk with the massive slice in my neck.
At that moment, I felt something in my right hand. I looked down, seeing a slim female hand with a massive diamond ring hanging there. Our fingers were wrapped around each other’s, but the hand had been cut off at the wrist. A ragged patch of bloody flesh and snapped bone poked out of the back.
“Nnnn,” I tried to say, shaking my head. I felt fresh streams of warm blood open up. “No…” The doctors looked down, seeing the dismembered hand. Their faces morphed into expressions of confusion and fear.
I closed my eyes as they lifted me up on the stretcher. One of them gently removed the cold hand from my fingers. But they could never remove the memory of what I had seen.
I know what happens after death, and it makes the worst life here seem like a dream. I know that, one day, I’ll be returned to that place. I know that, one day, I’ll see that great monster called Hell and the featureless, swirling sky of the Bardo again.
And the next time, I won’t wake up on a hospital floor, but will be trapped there with the others for eternity: an eternity of blood and fire.
2024.05.16 16:08 moneyfollowd shy or uninterested?
shy or uninterested?
games playing or shy?
Mainly coming from my gut, F(20) it tells me this coworker has secretly been into me M(22). For a good 8 months.
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
submitted by moneyfollowd to Advice [link] [comments]
games playing or shy?
Mainly coming from my gut, F(20) it tells me this coworker has secretly been into me M(22). For a good 8 months.
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
2024.05.16 16:08 moneyfollowd shy or uninterested?
games playing or shy?
Mainly coming from my gut, F(20) it tells me this coworker has secretly been into me M(22). For a good 8 months.
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
submitted by moneyfollowd to romance [link] [comments]
Mainly coming from my gut, F(20) it tells me this coworker has secretly been into me M(22). For a good 8 months.
Is that possible?
He’s a gentleman. Attempted to fix my tire and ended up giving me a ride home. I didn’t ask but I did complain a little about the stress and he offered his spare. Wasn’t compatible. So he offered a ride home.
Will be sweet at times and soft voiced. Very shy type, I low key or intimidate him in some way, hopefully in a positive light. He treats the others like homegirl/boys, but me, he stutters and breaks eye contact out of nervousness. We can’t even hold a conversation. If so, it’s forced and awkward.
I can tell he loves my eyes, by the way we just stare a little few seconds too long. Or maybe time just feels freezed. Our intense contrasting eye colors strangely intensifies the eye lock. He loves to take a good four seconds to respond before I ask him a question. Prolonged. Eye contact.
Got them just locked sometimes and its enough to leave me questioning, does he want me
Anyways, after my crush manifested I began to observe him a little.
He always needs to say bye to me. (Strange thing he does) compliments people around me when the compliment was obviously meant for me . Ex. said his homeboy smells like vanilla and has a mysterious aura. (I wear heavy vanilla perfume, i’m quiet asf and he isn’t gay just saying. His friend is the complete opposite as the description) BUT WHY if this is meant for me, is it said to his friend ?
Shy around only me. He treats me very different from others girls and easily chat up a storm. Funny enough, he’s a mute for the most part around me. He will talk confidently loud to his friends, but the moment I try to start a convo he cuts it short. And shows obvious signs of nervousness that wasn’t previously shown around the other girls.
The bad side of him is the jealousy i’ve noticed. Anytime we got new male coworkers he keeps me away after them, demanding me around if he noticed me talking to them. And giving me silent treatment after I talked to them.
Another strange thing he did was attempt to insult me if I somehow “hurt his feelings” Ex. I called him his brothers name on accident (they sound the same) and i didn’t apologize because social anxiety and busy w/ work during the shift.
And before he left to say goodbye he intentionally pauses long and turns staring at me stating “I forgot your name for like one second..” after saying my name like 10 times while demanding me the whole shift.
I can’t seem to understand why he got so upset over this? Was he being sarcastic? Why would he get that offended or petty? Does he like me?
Just weird part is we’ve been working together for almost 8 months now. Why no confession, I am just left with this agonizing gut feeling and a longing of just satisfying the tension in some way with an answer.
I know he thinks i’m cute , I think he’s cute. If he likes me he needs to grow pair, or stop with the unnecessary avoidance and random micro flirting. Hoping he’s just shy! But main question, why not make a move?
He does seem like the shy one, but still it’s driving me crazy wondering.
What do you think? Doesn’t like me? Does and is nervous? Please leave your ideas i’m confused. Need other view points, thank you
2024.05.16 16:06 healthmedicinet Health Daily News May 15 2024
DAY: MAY 15, 2024
- 5-15-2024ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE PROCESSES WITHOUT SYMPTOMS. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE? Everyone experiences aging in their own way, and factors such as genetics, lifestyle and environment play a role in this process. Some individuals reach the age of 90 or even 100 in good health, without medications or brain disease. But how do these individuals maintain their health as they age?
- 5-15-2024COULD A LOW-CAL KETO DIET HELP EASE ACNE? In a small pilot study, some young women looking to lose weight on a low-calorie keto diet got an unexpected benefit: Their acne began to clear up. “These findings represent an opportunity to control a skin disease that affects most teenagers and many adults at some point in their lifetimes, causing distress, embarrassment, anxiety and low self-confidence among sufferers, robbing them of their quality of life,
- 5-15-2024FIGHTING FAT AND INFLAMMATION: SCIENTISTS DEVELOP NEW COMPOUNDS The menthyl esters of valine (MV) and isoleucine (MI) are multi-faceted molecules with enhanced anti-inflammatory and anti-obesity activities. The discovery and development of such molecules can result in newer classes of therapeutic drugs to treat a wide range of metabolic disorders. Credit: Gen-ichiro Arimura from Tokyo University of Science Modified derivatives of natural products have led to significant therapeutic advances and commercial success in recent times. Menthol is a naturally occurring cyclic monoterpene alcohol found in various plants,
- 5-15-2024TREATMENT OPTIONS INCLUDE ALTERNATIVES TO CHEMOTHERAPY, EXPERT EXPLAINS Chemotherapy is usually the first treatment doctors try to treat lymphoma, including the two most common forms: non-Hodgkin and Hodgkin. But alternatives to chemotherapy are developing, as first-line treatments and as backup options, explains Stephen Ansell, M.D., Ph.D., hematology chair and hematologic oncologist at the Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center. Lymphoma is a blood cancer that begins when a germ-fighting white blood cell, called a lymphocyte, mutates and rapidly multiplies
- 5-15-2024CHECKING YOUR BELLY BUTTON CAN TELL YOU A LOT ABOUT YOUR HEALTH Navels, belly buttons, innies or outies … whatever term you use, your umbilicus may have plenty to tell you about the state of your health. For some, they are the thing of nightmares—omphalophobia (the fear of belly buttons) is a real condition. For others, they are a fashion accessory to be shown off in a crop top, or decorated with a body piercing. Whatever your feelings about belly buttons, one thing’s for sure—it once joined you to your mother
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS H5N1 VIRUS FROM 2022 MINK OUTBREAK CAPABLE OF INEFFICIENT AIRBORNE TRANSMISSION Direct contact transmission, weight loss, and survival for ferrets infected with A/mink (H5N1). Four donor ferrets were inoculated with A/mink (H5N1) and 24?h later each donor was paired with a contact in the same cage. Nasal wash samples were collected every other day for 13 days, and weight loss and clinical signs were monitored. A, B display viral titers from donor and direct contacts,
- 5-15-2024STUDY SHOWS COMBINING JOYFUL ACTIVITIES WITH ‘SAVORING’ THERAPY SHOWS POSITIVE MENTAL HEALTH RESULTS AMONG YOUNG PEOPLE With rates of depression rising among young people on university campuses, a team of SMU researchers found that combining two different therapeutic approaches demonstrated effectiveness in improving students’ overall mental health. Their findings show that students receiving behavioral activation (BA) therapy augmented with savoring (S) experienced improvements in positive and negative mood. Behavioral activation is a therapeutic approach that alleviates depression by increasing engagement in meaningful activities,
- 5-15-2024AI-BASED SURGICAL PREDICTION MODELS HAVE LIMITS Prediction models generated by machine learning are being increasingly used in medicine to identify risk factors and possible outcomes, especially for total joint replacements of knees and hips—although researchers warn that machine-generated predictions are currently being drawn from a limited data pool. “Machine learning has great potential for processing ‘big data’ and has proved its undeniable capability, although it is not free of issues,
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS FRONT-OF-PACKAGE NUTRITION LABELING RESULTS IN HEALTHIER PRODUCTS A study finds that a food labeling system introduced by the French government in 2017 resulted in healthier products. The study of Nutri-Score, a voluntary labeling system that assigns a simple letter grade based on nutrition, is believed to be the first to examine how food manufacturers responded to the change. Using detailed product and nutrition data from 2014 to 2021,
- 5-15-2024EXPERT EXPLAINS PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERNS ON AVIAN FLU Using genetically engineered mice expressing a specific variant of HLA, researchers uncover the instrumental role of this protein in the development of drug eruptions. They found that when HLA binds to an antiviral drug, abacavir, it can lead to the formation of defective proteins, which trigger a stress response in the endoplasmic reticulum, ultimately cascading into drug eruption. This implies that HLA is involved in previously unknown signaling pathways and processes that go beyond its traditionally accepted role within the immune system.
- 5-15-2024EXPLORING THE MECHANISM BEHIND DRUG ERUPTIONS IN THE SKINUsing genetically engineered mice expressing a specific variant of HLA, researchers uncover the instrumental role of this protein in the development of drug eruptions. They found that when HLA binds to an antiviral drug, abacavir, it can lead to the formation of defective proteins, which trigger a stress response in the endoplasmic reticulum, ultimately cascading into drug eruption.
- 5-15-2024STUDY PROVIDES BLUEPRINT FOR HYBRID-VIRTUAL HOME VISIT MODEL TO SUPPORT PATIENTS WHO DO NOT LIVE CLOSE TO A HOSPITAL a team developed and successfully tested a hybrid-virtual home visit model that provides care to veterans who do not live close to a VA health care facility.
- 5-15-2024HOW SCIENCE IS CHANGING THE GAME IN SPORTS Digital twins of athletes allow athletes and coaches to evaluate performance and trial technique changes. It’s an open secret that the countries that win the most medals in the Olympics and Paralympics combine talent and technology. Athletes are preparing for the next three Olympics and Paralympics in Paris in 2024
- 5-15-2024STUDY REVEALS HOW PRACTICE FORMS NEW MEMORY PATHWAYS IN THE BRAIN The effects of optogenetic inhibition on WM task performance. a, The experimental set-up. b, The delayed-association WM task trial types; licking was assessed during the 3?s choice period, with early- and late-delays periods noted. c, Learning progress across eight sessions, measured on the basis of the percentage of correct responses. d, Learning session example
- 5-15-2024A MEDITERRANEAN DIET CAN EASE SYMPTOMS OF STRESS AND ANXIETY, SAYS STUDY It’s no secret that the Mediterranean diet is good for your health. Already recommended to reduce the risks of bowel cancer, heart disease, and dementia, new research shows that the Mediterranean diet can also reduce symptoms of stress and anxiety.
- 5-15-2024ENHANCING PATIENT RESPONSE TO CANCER IMMUNOTHERAPY
- 5-15-2024LONGER SPRINT INTERVALS CAN IMPROVE MUSCLE OXYGEN UTILIZATION COMPARED TO SHORTER INTERVALS
- 5-15-2024NEW EVIDENCE FOR USE OF ANTI-INFLAMMATORY THERAPY FOR PREVENTION OF RECURRENT VASCULAR EVENTS IN STROKE
- 5-15-2024STUDY PAVES THE WAY FOR AN ACTIVE AGENT AGAINST HEPATITIS E
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS DEVELOP METHOD TO MONITOR PATIENTS WITH SPINAL MUSCULAR ATROPHY USING SOUND WAVES
- 5-15-2024INFERTILITY TREATMENT FOUND TO DOUBLE THE RISK OF POSTPARTUM HEART DISEASE
- 5-15-2024A PROMISING APPROACH TO INTRAOPERATIVE CANCER DIAGNOSIS
- 5-15-2024HOW ROGUE NEUTROPHILS HELP LUNG CANCER SPREAD
- 5-15-2024WOMEN PHYSICIANS ARE UNDERREPRESENTED AND FEEL LESS IMPACTFUL IN CANCER TREATMENT PLANNING VIRTUAL MEETINGS
- 5-15-2024ONLY 20% OF U.S. NONPROFIT HOSPITALS INVESTED IN HOUSING AS PART OF THE FEDERAL COMMUNITY BENEFIT MANDATE
- 5-15-2024NEW STUDY LINKS AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER TO DISRUPTED DEVELOPMENTAL DOPAMINE
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS SEVERE ISCHEMIC STROKES ARE RARE IN PATIENT POPULATION
- 5-15-2024CYCLIN D1 EXPRESSION MAY BE A BIOMARKER FOR PENILE CANCER
- 5-15-2024GUIDELINE ISSUED FOR PEOPLE WITH EPILEPSY WHO MAY BECOME PREGNANT
- 5-15-2024NEW CARDIAC RESEARCH COULD SAVE WOMEN’S LIVES BY IMPROVING DETECTION OF HEART FAILURE
- 5-15-2024PATIENTS REPORT SIGNIFICANT SYMPTOM REDUCTION WITHIN A SINGLE INTEGRATIVE MEDICINE ENCOUNTER
- 5-15-2024STUDY LINKS PROTEIN SECRETED BY BLOOD VESSELS TO DRUG-RESISTANT CANCER
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS EXPLORE THE ROLE OF OF TRANSPOSABLE ELEMENTS IN MYOCARDITIS
- 5-15-2024STUDY REVEALS IMMUNOTHERAPY’S POTENTIAL IN BOOSTING IMMUNE SYSTEMS OF OLDER INDIVIDUALS
- 5-15-2024CANADIAN HOSPITAL DATA SHOW LONGER, COSTLIER STAYS FOR PATIENTS EXPERIENCING HOMELESSNESS
- 5-15-2024SCIENTISTS WANT TO KNOW HOW THE SMELLS OF NATURE BENEFIT OUR HEALTH
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS TWO GENES OF THE GERMLINE ARE ESSENTIAL FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRAIN TUMORS IN DROSOPHILA
- 5-15-2024EVALUATING A NEW GROUP TRAINING TOOL FOR THE PREVENTION OF DEMENTIA
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH CHALLENGES LINK BETWEEN MOTOR IMPAIRMENT AND BRAIN INJURY
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH CHALLENGES LINK BETWEEN MOTOR IMPAIRMENT AND BRAIN INJURY
- 5-15-2024CHIROPRACTIC ASSOCIATED WITH LOWER LIKELIHOOD OF TRAMADOL PRESCRIPTION IN ADULTS WITH SCIATICA
- 5-15-2024UNVEILING THE IMPACT OF JOB LOSS ON THE HEALTH OF IMMIGRANTS IN GERMANY
- 5-15-2024HEALTH CARE INTERPRETERS IMPORTANT FOR HEART ATTACK REHABILITATION, SAYS STUDY
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS FIND MICROPLASTICS IN CANINE AND HUMAN TESTICULAR TISSUE
- 5-15-2024ANTISEIZURE MEDICATIONS CAN PRODUCE LIFE-THREATENING REACTIONS
- 5-15-2024ADULTS WHO HAD DIFFICULT CHILDHOODS ARE NOT RECEIVING SUFFICIENT MENTAL HEALTH CARE, FINDS CALIFORNIA STUDY
- 5-15-2024AI MAY IMPROVE DOCTOR–PATIENT INTERACTIONS FOR OLDER ADULTS WITH CANCER
- 5-15-2024BLOOD PRESSURE DRUGS MORE THAN DOUBLE BONE-FRACTURE RISK IN NURSING HOME PATIENTS
- 5-15-2024PREVENTING PEDIATRIC FALLS
- 5-15-2024I’M PREGNANT. DO I NEED A MULTIVITAMIN?
- 5-15-2024TREATMENT-RESISTANT DEPRESSION LINKED TO BODY MASS INDEX: STUDY
- 5-15-2024HOW DID THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC AFFECT OLDER ADULTS’ TECHNOLOGY USE?
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS LINK BETWEEN BMI TRAJECTORIES AND FRACTURE RISK IN LATE ADULTHOOD
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS REDUCED RISK OF BREAST CANCER FOLLOWING BARIATRIC SURGERY IN WOMEN WITH HYPERINSULINEMIA
- 5-15-2024FEWER US OVERDOSE DEATHS WERE REPORTED LAST YEAR, BUT EXPERTS ARE STILL CAUTIOUS
- 5-15-2024PRE- AND POST-SURGICAL IMMUNOTHERAPY IMPROVES OUTCOMES FOR PATIENTS WITH OPERABLE LUNG CANCER, PHASE III STUDY FINDS
- 5-15-2024NEW METHOD USES TAU PROTEIN DEPOSITION PATTERNS TO PREDICT ALZHEIMER’S SEVERITY
- 5-15-2024OLDER NATIVE AMERICANS MAY EXPERIENCE HIGHER LEVELS OF COGNITIVE IMPAIRMENT THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS DEVELOP INNOVATIVE PLATFORM FOR MODELING HUMAN MUSCLE DISEASES IN WORMS
- 5-15-2024CLIMATE CHANGE IS LIKELY TO AGGRAVATE BRAIN CONDITIONS, STUDY FINDS
- 5-15-2024NEW STUDY SHOWS CONTINUED HIGH EFFECTIVENESS OF HPV VACCINATION IN ENGLAND
- 5-15-2024FAT-ENLARGED AXILLARY NODES ON MAMMOGRAM MAY INDICATE HIGHER CVD RISK
- 5-15-2024NOVEL INHIBITOR INSIGHTS OFFER PATHWAY TO PREVENTING PXR-ASSOCIATED DRUG RESISTANCE
- 5-15-2024THE DOCTOR IS IN… BUT WHAT’S BEHIND THEM? STUDY REVEALS IMPACTS OF TELEHEALTH BACKGROUND SETTINGS
- 5-15-2024HIGH TELEHEALTH USE TIED TO INCREASED HEALTH CARE UTILIZATION, COST
- 5-15-2024NEW BIOMARKER IDENTIFIED TO DIAGNOSE ALZHEIMER’S IN ASYMPTOMATIC STAGES
- 5-15-2024U.S. DROWNING DEATHS RISING AGAIN AFTER YEARS OF DECLINE
- 5-15-2024STUDY FINDS ASTROCYTIC PH REGULATOR CAN REPAIR BLOOD-BRAIN BARRIER, REVERSE BRAIN DAMAGE CAUSED BY ISCHEMIC STROKE
- 5-15-2024DISPARITIES SEEN IN CARBAPENEM-RESISTANT ENTEROBACTERALES BLOODSTREAM INFECTION OUTCOMES
- 5-15-2024WHY IS WHOOPING COUGH SURGING IN THE UK? FALLING VACCINATION RATES MAY BE THE ANSWER
- 5-15-2024CARDIAC REHAB IS A PROVEN BUT UNDERUSED THERAPY IN WOMEN, BUT TAILORED RESOURCES AIM TO CHANGE THAT
- 5-15-2024IRON FUELS IMMUNE CELLS—AND IT COULD MAKE ASTHMA WORSE
- 5-15-2024NEW POSSIBILITIES FOR CELL THERAPIES AND PERSONALIZED MEDICINE
- 5-15-2024HIGHER INCOME REDUCES STROKE MORTALITY RISK BY A THIRD, NEW STUDY SHOWS
- 5-15-2024SOME FORMS OF AUGMENTED BRAIN STIMULATION RECOMMENDED FOR MAJOR DEPRESSION
- 5-15-2024LOW TESTOSTERONE IN MEN ASSOCIATED WITH AN EARLY DEATH
- 5-15-2024WEARING FACE MASKS DID NOT REDUCE RISK OF COVID INFECTION AFTER FIRST OMICRON WAVE, RESEARCH SUGGESTS
- 5-15-2024BLUETOOTH TRACKING DEVICES PROVIDE NEW VIEW INTO CARE HOME QUALITY
- 5-15-2024RACIAL DISPARITIES IN CHILDHOOD OBESITY ON THE RISE IN STUDY OF NYC PUBLIC SCHOOLS
- 5-15-2024TWO DECADES OF STUDIES SUGGEST HEALTH BENEFITS ASSOCIATED WITH PLANT-BASED DIETS, BUT CAUTION URGED
- 5-15-2024TRANSCATHETER VALVE REPLACEMENT OUTCOMES SIMILAR TO SURGERY FOR SEVERE AORTIC STENOSIS
- 5-15-2024RECOGNIZING THE PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL TOLL THAT CARING FOR A LOVED ONE WITH A CHRONIC CONDITION HAS ON THE CAREGIVER
- 5-15-2024DIFFICULT WORK ARRANGEMENTS FORCE MANY WOMEN TO STOP BREASTFEEDING EARLY—HERE’S HOW TO PREVENT THIS
- 5-15-2024DAY-LONG WORKSHOP IN COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY FOUND TO EFFECTIVELY REDUCE DEPRESSION IN 16- TO 18-YEAR-OLDS
- 5-15-2024REPORT HIGHLIGHTS BIG GAPS IN CANCER OUTCOMES BASED ON RACE
- 5-15-2024NEW BLOOD TEST COULD HELP SPOT PREECLAMPSIA IN FIRST TRIMESTER
- 5-15-2024HALF-MATCHED FAMILY DONORS OFFER BEST OUTCOMES FOR HISPANIC PATIENTS UNDERGOING BONE MARROW TRANSPLANTS: STUDY
- 5-15-2024SCIENTISTS UNRAVEL GENETIC BASIS FOR NEURODEGENERATIVE DISORDERS THAT AFFECT VISION
- 5-15-2024INCLUDING MORE WOMEN ON HOSPITAL TEAMS YIELDS BETTER SURGERY OUTCOMES, NEW STUDY FINDS
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH SHEDS LIGHT ON HOW PROTEINS LINKED TO ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE INFLUENCE NEURONAL GROWTH
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS IDENTIFY NEW MARKER FOR BREAST CANCER PROGNOSIS
- 5-15-2024GETTING OUT AND ABOUT IN THE COMMUNITY MAY BE LINKED TO COGNITIVE FUNCTION
- 5-15-2024NOVEL TECHNIQUE HELPS PREDICT RISK OF A MENISCUS TEAR IN THE KNEE
- 5-15-2024CAN ROBOT-INSPIRED COMPUTER-ASSISTED THERAPY BENEFIT CHILDREN WITH AUTISM?
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH FINDS EXERCISE HAS A SIGNIFICANT IMPACT ON IMMUNE CELLS THAT SUPPORT BRAIN FUNCTION
- 5-15-2024CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASES KILL 10,000 EUROPEANS A DAY: WHO
- 5-15-2024NEW TOOL CAN HELP SURGEONS QUICKLY SEARCH VIDEOS AND CREATE INTERACTIVE FEEDBACK
- 5-15-2024SCIENTISTS DISCOVER BLOOD PROTEINS THAT MAY GIVE CANCER WARNING SEVEN YEARS BEFORE DIAGNOSIS
- 5-15-2024HOW THEY IMPACT LIFESPAN IN VERTEBRATES
- 5-15-2024UN AGENCY AUTHORIZES SECOND VACCINE AGAINST DENGUE AMID OUTBREAKS IN THE AMERICAS
- 5-15-2024IF YOU’VE TRIED MEDITATING BUT CAN’T SIT STILL, HERE’S HOW—AND WHY—TO TRY AGAIN
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS DETERMINE THE MUTATIONS THAT PROTECT MICE FROM B-CELL CANCERS
- 5-15-2024UP TO 246 MILLION OLDER PEOPLE MAY BE EXPOSED TO HEAT RISK BY 2050 DUE TO GLOBAL WARMING
- 5-15-2024MORE RESEARCH SUPPORTS ANDROGEN TREATMENT FOR BREAST CANCER
- 5-15-2024UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE GUT MICROBIOME–BRAIN INTERACTIONS PLAY IN SOCIAL DECISION-MAKING
- 5-15-2024NEW STUDY IDENTIFIES MECHANISM OF IMMUNE EVASION OF SARS-COV-2 AND VARIANTS
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH SHOWS RECENT RELEASE FROM JAIL A BIG RISK FACTOR FOR SUICIDE
- 5-15-2024RESEARCH COLLABORATION DEVELOPS LIFESAVING ‘ARK’ TECHNOLOGY FOR CHRONIC KIDNEY DISEASE PATIENTS
- 5-15-2024FOUR IN 10 ADULTS WITH DIABETES REPORT TAKING A GLP-1 RECEPTOR AGONIST
- 5-15-2024NEIGHBORHOOD INEQUITY TIED TO MORE PEOPLE LIVING WITH VISION DIFFICULTY, BLINDNESS
- 5-15-2024CHILD MALTREATMENT LINKED TO EXTERNALIZING, INTERNALIZING BEHAVIOR
- 5-15-2024MOST SLOW RESPONDERS TO TIRZEPATIDE DO LOSE CLINICALLY MEANINGFUL WEIGHT
- 5-15-2024RESEARCHERS IDENTIFY CAUSATIVE GENE IN MOUSE MODEL OF INHERITED LETHAL ARRHYTHMIA
- 5-15-2024TECH ALONE CAN’T REPLACE HUMAN COACHES IN OBESITY TREATMENT, STUDY FINDS
2024.05.16 15:54 sounak95 His Penis, He Doesn't Want to Shoot Kids. What's Your Problem, Bro?
Hey fellow childfree warriors!
Just to give you a quick background, I (M) have been happily married for the last three years. Early on in our marriage, we made a pact to live a childfree life. Yep, no mini-me's or mini-her's running around!
But here's where it gets funny. My wife constantly gets bombarded with the age-old question: "When are you gonna deliver babies?" as if she's Amazon Prime with a 10-month delivery guarantee. Like, seriously? Do they think babies arrive with free two-day shipping?
Initially, my wife tried to dodge the nosy inquiries by saying there were some medical issues on her end. Spoiler alert: there weren't any!
But recently, she decided to up her game. Now, when someone asks her about babies, she straight-up replies, "His penis. He doesn't want to shoot kids. What's your problem?" Mic drop.
I mean, can you imagine the looks on their faces? Priceless!
Has anyone else here come up with hilarious responses to shut down the baby question brigade? Share your stories!
submitted by sounak95 to childfree [link] [comments]
Just to give you a quick background, I (M) have been happily married for the last three years. Early on in our marriage, we made a pact to live a childfree life. Yep, no mini-me's or mini-her's running around!
But here's where it gets funny. My wife constantly gets bombarded with the age-old question: "When are you gonna deliver babies?" as if she's Amazon Prime with a 10-month delivery guarantee. Like, seriously? Do they think babies arrive with free two-day shipping?
Initially, my wife tried to dodge the nosy inquiries by saying there were some medical issues on her end. Spoiler alert: there weren't any!
But recently, she decided to up her game. Now, when someone asks her about babies, she straight-up replies, "His penis. He doesn't want to shoot kids. What's your problem?" Mic drop.
I mean, can you imagine the looks on their faces? Priceless!
Has anyone else here come up with hilarious responses to shut down the baby question brigade? Share your stories!
2024.05.16 15:51 plutos1stpopstar Everyone "makes it", except me??
Sorry this is a rant. I just finished crying and realized, crying is scary, and I thought about why I'm crying, and why I feel so vulnerable doing it.
I'm 27/F. I feel like I never understood the parts of life that humans made up, like money and documents and the intricacies of getting a job and going to college. Nobody ever helped me with this, of course I wasn't born knowing.
My parents had ignored me all my life, I'd get food and shelter but no love, no support. When I had negative emotions, I was ignored or blown up at. I couldn't speak about myself as a person with aspirations and dreams without being called demanding, a brat, and all I wanted to do was understand what life is all about.
When I asked what to do in life as a young teen, my parents simply told me to "try things". Inevitably, as a kid, the things required some effort or commitment on their part. I was always shamed for "getting myself into (x) situation, (like needing a ride or to be picked up or anything)" or creating a problem or was just brushed off and left to sort it out on my own which always resulted in embarrassment, more problems, just utter failure...
Twice teachers told me kids of "my demographic" (I'm mixed race and grew up in a very white area) shouldn't worry about (college) so I just had no idea what to do once I graduated.
I tried to work, but I didn't know what to expect and what to do, when I asked what to do, my bosses usually got mad, called me lazy, insinuated that I was stupid, I should know what to do. I feel like a dog that wasn't trained. I just want to be a good girl so bad, like a dog, again. I wanted positive reinforcement, not knowing that work is thankless. They never saw how scared I was to make a mistake, that what looked like "lazy" was me frozen in terror and indecision. I got so scared and quit so many times- and the worst part was that I came home to being called a failure and a quitter.
I was told I'd always quit things. I see maybe I was necessarily doomed to fail or quit. This caused me to assess every risk 100 times over, spending 90% of my time planning for every single thing that might go wrong. Yet, everything still seems to go wrong in my life.
I've had other problems on top of that- a lot of sudden moves, being homeless before the pandemic. I don't have any friends, I'm afraid to make them- what they might think when they ask me normal questions and I have no answers- or if I answer them, will they leverage those facts to hurt me? In the past, my peers have done so: using the fact that my parents where going through divorce and financial struggles to accuse me of stealing an item they lost, or making up stories about me when I sought comfort from things happening at home. After a while I just screwed having friends, keeping everyone at arm's length. But apparently friends are the key to life, I don't go anywhere, even though I long to, because going places alone is weird, and feels empty and sad seeing everyone with their lives and remembering that I have nothing.
Friends get you jobs too, the older I got the worse job hunting got, now I've been mostly unemployed since 2020. I never have "references" for anything. IF I get the interview, I never have answers to the questions they ask me, if I do, I can see that my answers are laughable at best and displeasing at worst. I've tried to go to college, but every time it gets too expensive and I quit. Even if I've planned out the expenses meticulously. When I reach out, I'm always left more destroyed than if I'd never tried.
I feel like I've ruined my whole life. I feel like I have no right to complain that my life is ruined, I did it myself. I wasn't raped or captured or abused physically, and plenty of people who were "made it" despite suffering unimaginably.
I don't understand how the fuck they did it. I feel weak and cowardly. I feel like everyone can "just" this and that in life with no problem- everyone I ever knew, even the people with more fucked up lives than mine have all finished college and are always moving in life. They all forget about me, feel alien to me. I start to feel myself internally froth at the mouth when I hear "Just do this and that." "just" "just" "just"...
I feel like I'm stuck planning, wasting my time, only to cautiously take a few steps forward and be sledgehammered two whole lengths back instantly because even with all my planning, I fail to see one possible error, and that's what goes wrong. I don't know if this is because of my emotional neglect but I see no way my life is going to work out.
submitted by plutos1stpopstar to emotionalneglect [link] [comments]
I'm 27/F. I feel like I never understood the parts of life that humans made up, like money and documents and the intricacies of getting a job and going to college. Nobody ever helped me with this, of course I wasn't born knowing.
My parents had ignored me all my life, I'd get food and shelter but no love, no support. When I had negative emotions, I was ignored or blown up at. I couldn't speak about myself as a person with aspirations and dreams without being called demanding, a brat, and all I wanted to do was understand what life is all about.
When I asked what to do in life as a young teen, my parents simply told me to "try things". Inevitably, as a kid, the things required some effort or commitment on their part. I was always shamed for "getting myself into (x) situation, (like needing a ride or to be picked up or anything)" or creating a problem or was just brushed off and left to sort it out on my own which always resulted in embarrassment, more problems, just utter failure...
Twice teachers told me kids of "my demographic" (I'm mixed race and grew up in a very white area) shouldn't worry about (college) so I just had no idea what to do once I graduated.
I tried to work, but I didn't know what to expect and what to do, when I asked what to do, my bosses usually got mad, called me lazy, insinuated that I was stupid, I should know what to do. I feel like a dog that wasn't trained. I just want to be a good girl so bad, like a dog, again. I wanted positive reinforcement, not knowing that work is thankless. They never saw how scared I was to make a mistake, that what looked like "lazy" was me frozen in terror and indecision. I got so scared and quit so many times- and the worst part was that I came home to being called a failure and a quitter.
I was told I'd always quit things. I see maybe I was necessarily doomed to fail or quit. This caused me to assess every risk 100 times over, spending 90% of my time planning for every single thing that might go wrong. Yet, everything still seems to go wrong in my life.
I've had other problems on top of that- a lot of sudden moves, being homeless before the pandemic. I don't have any friends, I'm afraid to make them- what they might think when they ask me normal questions and I have no answers- or if I answer them, will they leverage those facts to hurt me? In the past, my peers have done so: using the fact that my parents where going through divorce and financial struggles to accuse me of stealing an item they lost, or making up stories about me when I sought comfort from things happening at home. After a while I just screwed having friends, keeping everyone at arm's length. But apparently friends are the key to life, I don't go anywhere, even though I long to, because going places alone is weird, and feels empty and sad seeing everyone with their lives and remembering that I have nothing.
Friends get you jobs too, the older I got the worse job hunting got, now I've been mostly unemployed since 2020. I never have "references" for anything. IF I get the interview, I never have answers to the questions they ask me, if I do, I can see that my answers are laughable at best and displeasing at worst. I've tried to go to college, but every time it gets too expensive and I quit. Even if I've planned out the expenses meticulously. When I reach out, I'm always left more destroyed than if I'd never tried.
I feel like I've ruined my whole life. I feel like I have no right to complain that my life is ruined, I did it myself. I wasn't raped or captured or abused physically, and plenty of people who were "made it" despite suffering unimaginably.
I don't understand how the fuck they did it. I feel weak and cowardly. I feel like everyone can "just" this and that in life with no problem- everyone I ever knew, even the people with more fucked up lives than mine have all finished college and are always moving in life. They all forget about me, feel alien to me. I start to feel myself internally froth at the mouth when I hear "Just do this and that." "just" "just" "just"...
I feel like I'm stuck planning, wasting my time, only to cautiously take a few steps forward and be sledgehammered two whole lengths back instantly because even with all my planning, I fail to see one possible error, and that's what goes wrong. I don't know if this is because of my emotional neglect but I see no way my life is going to work out.
2024.05.16 15:51 avaani Hypoglycemic episodes but not quite
Editing because I can’t fix title: episodes that mimic Hypoglycemic episodes but sugar levels are normal—what questions can I ask?
I’m 23F, AFAB I have atypical Cystic Fibrosis, I’m pancreatic sufficient, and no CFRD. for the past 2-3 years I’ve been having episodes that seem to mimic postprandial hypoglycemia but my levels are always above 70. I’ve had a few fasting readings that are 67-69 but I don’t have any symptoms then. The symptoms start within an hour or so of eating and my levels will be 70-80 but get to 100ish 3-4 hours after eating, which does make me nervous that something insulin related is going on. My blood pressure is normal but tends to be on the low side as well.
The episodes mostly correspond with the 7-12 days before my period but it’s not uncommon for them to happen outside of that range. The symptoms are: - high heart rate (130-150) even if at rest (resting heart rate when I’m not having an episode is 60-70 range - shaking - sweating - confusion (including slurring/stammering and switching words around) - weird tingly rising feeling inside - mouth tastes like sand/ash regardless of food or drink - pallor - certain edges blur in my vision; like where the walls meet the ceiling or floors - more frequent urination with lower output - chills
There are a few things that don’t happen every time I have an episode but have happened more than once: - Pain behind eyes - intense headache that disappears quickly
I’ve tried adjusting my diet in every way I can think of (and GI and nutrition have suggested) and nothing really seems to have an impact. Drinking sugar during/after an episode does help a bit but not by much.
My CF team seems to kind of be at a loss. All of my bloodwork is normal, weight and PFTs are fine. They’re sending me to a gynecologist because of how the episodes tend to correspond with my period. I am also seeing my PCP to get my heart checked soon.
Meds: Bupropion 450 (had been on this for about 2 years before any of these symptoms started) Levalbuterol (10+ years) Trikafta (3 years ish) Mirena iud, placed fall 2019
Vitamins Women’s one a day 2000 iu d3
Other diagnoses: PTSD/CPTSD (incest/rape trauma related, not sure how relevant that it is but I’m trying to be more detailed than not ) Major depression General anxiety Insomnia (PTSD related)
Psych meds I’ve tried a while ago but didn’t help: - Zoloft (brain fog was way worse) - lexapro (would not stay in my system, to put it politely) - latuda (didn’t do anything)
I edited my post on cysticfibrosis after someone recommended I post here,so this part isn’t over there but —one of the things that’s getting truly untenable for me is brain fog/confusion. Since fall 2020 I’ve struggled a lot with brain fog and since it started with PTSD related events my doctors and I have been assuming it to be a mental health thing but I’m not that sure anymore.
The confusion is definitely worse during the episodes I described (and affects stuff like where I walk around and what I put down where, for example, putting my phone in a fridge or not being able to find my car) But day to day—I’m forgetting words and sentences almost immediately after thinking them. My mental health has improved a lot on Wellbutrin but I can’t tell if it’s improved the brain fog at all or just improved the other symptoms like low energy and the can’t get out of bed heaviness.
My major involves a lot of writing and the same assignments that would take me a few several hour sessions, if that, I haven’t been able to complete. I’ve spent 12 hours on essays (with only meal breaks and things like that) with about a paragraph to show for it — but what I can get out never quite matches what I’m thinking. I almost constantly have the feeling of having a word on the tip of my tongue, especially when trying to write. The things I think of seem to float away before I can keep them in my head long enough to write them down. I was supposed to graduate 3 years ago and I’ve been one full time semester’s worth of classes for these past three years because I just can’t get it done. The majority of my depression symptoms that remain have to do with the stress and feelings behind not having finished school despite being so close. On the whole though, my mental health is in the best place it’s been in pretty much my entire life And the other symptoms have improved drastically.
Last note on the day to day brain fog/confusion: I don’t switch words around when I’m not having an episode—but I have been noticing that 0-5 times a day (I can’t say for sure that it happens daily without fail but it definitely happens several times a week) that I do slur sometimes when talking? The beginnings and ends of words will just sort of smush together . This is a relatively recent development (in the last 8 months maybe?) don’t know if that’s normal person stuttering kind of thing but combined with the writing stuff it irks me more than it normally would)
I feel like a lot of these symptoms could be literally anything so I don’t know how to go about narrowing it down.
I have a check up appointment soon and I wanted to see if anyone has any suggestions for other questions or specific testing requests that I can ask my doctors for to help figure this out.
Thank you!
submitted by avaani to AskDocs [link] [comments]
I’m 23F, AFAB I have atypical Cystic Fibrosis, I’m pancreatic sufficient, and no CFRD. for the past 2-3 years I’ve been having episodes that seem to mimic postprandial hypoglycemia but my levels are always above 70. I’ve had a few fasting readings that are 67-69 but I don’t have any symptoms then. The symptoms start within an hour or so of eating and my levels will be 70-80 but get to 100ish 3-4 hours after eating, which does make me nervous that something insulin related is going on. My blood pressure is normal but tends to be on the low side as well.
The episodes mostly correspond with the 7-12 days before my period but it’s not uncommon for them to happen outside of that range. The symptoms are: - high heart rate (130-150) even if at rest (resting heart rate when I’m not having an episode is 60-70 range - shaking - sweating - confusion (including slurring/stammering and switching words around) - weird tingly rising feeling inside - mouth tastes like sand/ash regardless of food or drink - pallor - certain edges blur in my vision; like where the walls meet the ceiling or floors - more frequent urination with lower output - chills
There are a few things that don’t happen every time I have an episode but have happened more than once: - Pain behind eyes - intense headache that disappears quickly
I’ve tried adjusting my diet in every way I can think of (and GI and nutrition have suggested) and nothing really seems to have an impact. Drinking sugar during/after an episode does help a bit but not by much.
My CF team seems to kind of be at a loss. All of my bloodwork is normal, weight and PFTs are fine. They’re sending me to a gynecologist because of how the episodes tend to correspond with my period. I am also seeing my PCP to get my heart checked soon.
Meds: Bupropion 450 (had been on this for about 2 years before any of these symptoms started) Levalbuterol (10+ years) Trikafta (3 years ish) Mirena iud, placed fall 2019
Vitamins Women’s one a day 2000 iu d3
Other diagnoses: PTSD/CPTSD (incest/rape trauma related, not sure how relevant that it is but I’m trying to be more detailed than not ) Major depression General anxiety Insomnia (PTSD related)
Psych meds I’ve tried a while ago but didn’t help: - Zoloft (brain fog was way worse) - lexapro (would not stay in my system, to put it politely) - latuda (didn’t do anything)
I edited my post on cysticfibrosis after someone recommended I post here,so this part isn’t over there but —one of the things that’s getting truly untenable for me is brain fog/confusion. Since fall 2020 I’ve struggled a lot with brain fog and since it started with PTSD related events my doctors and I have been assuming it to be a mental health thing but I’m not that sure anymore.
The confusion is definitely worse during the episodes I described (and affects stuff like where I walk around and what I put down where, for example, putting my phone in a fridge or not being able to find my car) But day to day—I’m forgetting words and sentences almost immediately after thinking them. My mental health has improved a lot on Wellbutrin but I can’t tell if it’s improved the brain fog at all or just improved the other symptoms like low energy and the can’t get out of bed heaviness.
My major involves a lot of writing and the same assignments that would take me a few several hour sessions, if that, I haven’t been able to complete. I’ve spent 12 hours on essays (with only meal breaks and things like that) with about a paragraph to show for it — but what I can get out never quite matches what I’m thinking. I almost constantly have the feeling of having a word on the tip of my tongue, especially when trying to write. The things I think of seem to float away before I can keep them in my head long enough to write them down. I was supposed to graduate 3 years ago and I’ve been one full time semester’s worth of classes for these past three years because I just can’t get it done. The majority of my depression symptoms that remain have to do with the stress and feelings behind not having finished school despite being so close. On the whole though, my mental health is in the best place it’s been in pretty much my entire life And the other symptoms have improved drastically.
Last note on the day to day brain fog/confusion: I don’t switch words around when I’m not having an episode—but I have been noticing that 0-5 times a day (I can’t say for sure that it happens daily without fail but it definitely happens several times a week) that I do slur sometimes when talking? The beginnings and ends of words will just sort of smush together . This is a relatively recent development (in the last 8 months maybe?) don’t know if that’s normal person stuttering kind of thing but combined with the writing stuff it irks me more than it normally would)
I feel like a lot of these symptoms could be literally anything so I don’t know how to go about narrowing it down.
I have a check up appointment soon and I wanted to see if anyone has any suggestions for other questions or specific testing requests that I can ask my doctors for to help figure this out.
Thank you!
2024.05.16 15:49 haygurlhay123 “This Time, I Will Never Let You Go”: Cloud’s Mission and the Hidden Purpose of the Remake Trilogy - Literary and Musical Analysis of FFVII - Part 4
(continuation of part 3)
Since Fatal Calling is all about Cloud facing his past and his origins, Tifa’s musical theme is most appropriate for the ending cutscene. For all of these reasons, Tifa’s theme is absolutely appropriate for the conclusion of Fatal Calling. It makes a lot of sense then that once Cloud has finished revisiting the past and vanishes with the crystal to find his Promised Land, Tifa’s theme stops and Aerith’s theme begins.
There’s a lot to be said about Sephiroth in Fatal Calling. Sephiroth feeds off of despair, and deems Palamecia’s suffering inadequate: he seeks a much greater source of power than this realm. He states that Palamecia isn’t “the world that was promised to [him]”, referencing his desire to become the god of his core world of FFVII:
However, he isn’t the only one returning. Now that Cloud has revisited his past in Fatal Calling, he’s ready to reach his Promised Land. After Sephiroth’s after-credits scene, the OG FFVII title and logo turn into the FFVII Remake title and logo, indicating a shift: we are now officially in the Remakeera or world. Cloud and Sephiroth disappeared at the end of Fatal Calling, and now the game is telling us where they’ve gone. Combined with Hamaguchi’s recommendation that players complete the collaboration event before playing Remake, I think this is a solid indication that the Cloud and Sephiroth we see in this collaboration event are those we encounter in the Remake world. Once the switch to Remake occurs, Aerith’s theme returns. This communicates that she is indeed —as we’ve proven countless times already— Cloud’s Promised Land. But it also conveys her importance to the story of Remake. Scenario writer Nojima confirmed this:
That was the collaboration! Before we move on from MFF x FFVII Remake entirely though, let’s glean some more relevant information from some of the collaboration’s promotional material and special features.
~III. e) iii. Promotional Material and Special Features~
Two particular pieces of promotional material for this collaboration stick out to me as extremely relevant. The first is a promotion for a new summons batch in the Mobius FF game, created in honor of the collaboration.
MFF x FFVII Remake Summons Batch Cloud Promo
The summons batch contains three FFVII Remake-themed cards, including a Cloud card. As you can see, this promo reads “Who awaits in the Promised Land?” under Cloud’s picture.
The second is a promotion of an Aerith and summons and an Aerith Job Card (in MFF, Job Cards allow a character to embody an archetype or another character, giving them certain physical traits, clothing, weapons and abilities):
MFF x FFVII Remake Aerith Summons and Job Card Promo
I couldn’t find this picture in English, but the text relevant to us translates to:
MFF x FFVII Remake \"Flower Girl of Midgar\" Job Card
There’s even an Aerith outfit you can have Echo wear, and it appears with Wol’s Cloud outfit in the promotional picture:
MFF x FFVII Remake Echo's Aerith Outfit and Wol's Cloud Outfit
To be fair, Tifa also appears in one of these summons promos. However, unlike Aerith’s, her appearance doesn’t reference the Promised Land or her version of the gondola date. She is not presented in connection to Cloud at all. On top of that, while the Aerith and Cloud outfits are promoted together, Tifa is paired with Vincent in the promotional image:
MFF x FFVII Remake Summons Promo Tifa and Vincent
This is hardly indicative of Cloti content in the event collaboration or in Remake.
~III. e) iv. Cloud’s Promised Land~
All in all, the collaboration tells the story of Cloud searching for his Promised Land, just as post-OG Cloud has been shown doing for years and years of canon SE content. Cloud is searching for Aerith in the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration, just like he was in FFT and DFF, and just like he was shown doing in the 30th FF Anniversary Exposition. This is nothing new. However, the collaboration informs us that this mission to be reunited with Aerith is what leads Cloud to enter the world of Remake.
Echo noted that people obtain the Promised Land they deserve rather than the one they want. What does Cloud deserve? I believe the answer is: another chance at saving Aerith.
Cloud needs to start over, from the top. He needs to go back to the very moment he and Avalanche arrived at mako reactor 1 to bomb it. He needs to return to the beginning of the OG game. He needs a redo, a fix-it, another shot at happiness; a remake.
Here lies the heart of my theory. My dear Cleriths, Sephiroth isn’t the only one who travelled back in time to undo destiny and create a reality where things go his way: Remake is also —I would even say primarily— Cloud’s chance to free Aerith from her fate, save her life and secure his shot at happiness with her. That’s why he experiences MOTFs in Remake: he’s done FFVII before and now he’s back, although with only fragments of his memories from OG, to save Aerith. That’s why his triggers all involve Aerith: he doesn’t consciously remember anything from OG, but his grief over Aerith is so strong that it rises from his subconsciousness at the slightest trigger.
In Remake, Cloud remembers some but not all elements of the OG timeline (MOTFs), and it appears he only remembers the most important things: all his MOTFs revolve around Aerith and her fate. Our theory explains why Aerith triggers Cloud’s MOTFs in Remake quite perfectly: he traveled back in time to prevent Aerith’s death from happening. Remake Cloud remembers Aerith because, well, he knows her from OG. Post-OG Cloud has returned to the past to save Aerith, resulting in Remake. This is why seeing her in Remake triggers visions and memories of things that haven’t happened yet in Remake, but have already happened to post-OG Cloud. He recognizes her face on Loveless in Remake because seeing her face again is the whole reason he entered Remake in the first place. His visions of her death when they meet once more at the church, the spike of anxiety and grief as he watches her walk away from him, the constriction in his chest when she talks about doing everything in her power to help the planet… all of it, it’s all his memories of OG being jogged by things related to her death. What he’s forgotten from the OG timeline emerges in flashes of pain, images, memory and emotion. Remember that the language the devs used to describe these instances where Cloud reacts to Aerith in this way is always about “remembering” or “recognizing”; Cloud has to have seen Aerith, known Aerith, loved Aerith, lost Aerith and felt the pain of living without Aerith before in order to recognize and remember these feelings. Think about it: this is the only thing that can explain Cloud’s extremely selective MOTFs and the fact that he has MOTFs at all.
The Remake trilogy is all about Cloud and Sephiroth stepping into the ring one more time, both ready to risk it all to get what they lost in the OG timeline. Sephiroth is hungry for destruction and godhood, while Cloud stands determined to save the love of his life. Fighting for their respective goals, the fated enemies enter a new battle in Remake, one to end the war, both needing to win this time after losing so horribly in OG. Now, it’s all or nothing. Sephiroth vying for the planet, and Cloud reaching out for Aerith.
Cloud’s back with a quest, one he can’t fail— it’s the most secret and important plot point of all. I call this the “Mission Theory”.
~IV. b) Mission Theory Logistics~
There are a few things that remain vague, so I’m going to use this section of the analysis to speculate on the logistics of my theory. We know very little about the hows of the timeline and multiverse shenanigans, so I’m going to hypothesize. However, this analysis is about the whys: so if you’re not interested in mechanical speculation on the logistics of time travel and multiverses, you can totally disregard this section and skip to section “V.”.
~IV. b) i. Cloud the Time-Traveler?~
It’s unclear whether Remake is the result of post-OG Cloud going back in time to try his hand at the OG timeline again, or the result of post-OG Cloud somehow informing OG Cloud that he must save Aerith this time around. It’s vague in the same way that we aren’t sure if Remake Aerith is post-OG Aerith or if she’s been informed by post-OG Aerith via her connection to the Lifestream as a Cetra. Though it doesn’t much matter how Cloud has memories of Aerith’s death in Remake, I personally think that Remake Cloud is a time-traveling post-OG Cloud. My explanation as to why might be a little confusing, so again, feel free to skip to section “V.”.
One must be able to communicate with the Lifestream in order to obtain knowledge of the future. This access can only be granted to the Cetra or to the souls of the deceased that compose the Lifestream itself. Since Cloud is not a Cetra, he cannot commune with the Lifestream while he is alive, meaning a deceased post-OG Cloud would not have been able to communicate his memories of the OG plot-line with a living OG Cloud. Therefore, the only way Remake Cloud could have knowledge of the future (manifested as MOTFs) would be that Remake Cloud is inhabited by his post-OG consciousness. Effectively, this is time-traveling.
Then comes the question of how Cloud was able to time-travel at all. I have what I consider a pretty solid hypothesis. The most interesting thing about the realm of Palamecia is that every FF character that’s ever appeared in the realm for a cameo died in their core world beforehand (spoilers for FFI, FFV, FFVI, FFX, FFXII, FFXIII, FFXV incoming). These characters include Tidus (FFX), Lightning (FFXIII), Garland (FFI), Sephiroth (FFVII), Gilgamesh (FFV), Vargas (FFVI), Gabranth (FFXII) and Ultros (FFXV). My interpretation of Palamecia serves at least partly as a directory for deceased souls that can’t simply fade. For instance, FFX’s Tidus actually came back to life to be with his love>! Yuna !! FFX!<. Of course, MFF x>! FFX !!FFX!< and FFX-2, just like MFF x FFVII Remake came out between FFVII OG and FFVII. And similarly to Fatal Calling, the ending cutscene of MFF x>! FFX !!Next thing you know, FFX-2 comes out and shows Tidus returning to Yuna and their core world in an optional cutscene.!< The MFF x>! FFX !! Tidus !Remake.
~IV. b) ii. Post-OG Cloud’s Amnesia~
If we consider that Remake Cloud is a time-travelling post-OG Cloud who’s returned to the start of the OG timeline, we encounter another logistical problem: why doesn’t Cloud remember everything or most things from the OG plot-line in Remake, like Sephiroth and Remake Aerith do? After all, aren’t the three of them in the same time-travelling boat? Why isn’t Cloud as lucid on the matter as the two others? Didn’t the post-OG Cloud in Fatal Calling face his past and origins? Shouldn’t that mean Cloud would remember all that stuff in Remake from the start?
In OG, the true Cloud’s memories are repressed by both his false persona and Jenova. The latter’s memetic abilities are able to block Cloud’s memories of the past from emerging and conflicting with his SOLDIER persona. For instance, in both OG and Remake, Cloud is unable to hear Aerith tell him Zack’s name in Evergreen Park: Jenova blocks it out. I think this is a similar situation: post-OG Cloud’s consciousness carries memories things that Jenova doesn’t want Cloud to know, so she pushes down on them. On top of that, after travelling through different worlds and back through the Lifestream for who knows how long, post-OG Cloud’s consciousness must be quite weak. We know how good Cloud is at repressing, so it makes total sense to me that post-OG Cloud’s consciousness would be trapped or suppressed somewhere deep in Remake Cloud’s subconsciousness. After all, it’s not like this whole time-travelling-consciousness thing is normal for a mind to experience. It’s no wonder Remake Cloud doesn’t consciously remember how things go in OG. However, post-OG Cloud’s love and grief for Aerith are so strong that memories related to her can occasionally pierce through to his Remake consciousness and Jenova’s barriers, resulting in his MOTFs. His pain and love for her are definitely permanent and strong enough:
So you see, Remake Cloud’s mind is a little more complicated than OG Cloud’s mind. Everything is still the same in Remake as in OG, but with the added complication that his future self is hidden in his subconscious mind, probably trying to get out.
There is actually pretty good evidence of this. I’m sure you’re aware that whenever Jenova is trying to hide something from Cloud or altering his memory and/or perception, the screen glitches green with an audio cue (34:15-34:29, 1:15:30-1:15:41 and 1:17:14-1:17:29). Guess what? These Jenova audiovisual cues also occur during the MOTFs (ie: MOTF 3 2:58-3:07 and MOTF 4 0:29-0:42). Whenever post-OG Cloud’s consciousness encounters anything that reminds it of losing Aerith, the strength of its pain helps it push memories of Aerith to the surface so that RemakeCloud can consciously see them. Remake Cloud then experiences sensations and/or visions, all from his future self’s memories as they rise to the surface, propelled by grief. Jenova can’t allow Remake Cloud to fully recover his post-OG memory, so in order to shut down the process, its cells jump in to repress the MOTFs: this results in the classic Jenova audiovisual cues. The only time Jenova doesn’t bother to fight against a MOTF is the sixth, as it is quite weak: no visions occur, only a tight sensation in his chest.
~IV. b) iii.~ ~Eclipse Contact~ ~and Cloud’s Memories of Reactor 1~
There is one problem I have trouble decoding. In Eclipse Contact, Cloud tells Wol and Echo that the last thing he remembers is the run-up to his arrival at mako reactor 1 (FFVII OG, disk 1, chapter 1). Recall that usually, people summoned to Palamecia have no memories of their world of origin and lives before that point at all. So then why is it that upon being summoned to Palamecia, Cloud recalls the events that took place right before the start of the OG game? This strikes me as highly relevant since this is the exact point in time where post-OG Cloud’s consciousness needs to be transported to in order for Remake to begin, but I haven’t been able to figure out a solid hypothesis on what it could mean. My best guess is that this is the devs’ way of signalling to us that the events of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration occur before the very beginning of post-OG Cloud’s second try at the OG timeline (Remake).
Now that I’ve shown you how I’ve come to form my Mission Theory and we’ve done some pesky housekeeping, let’s connect some dots, shall we? It’s time to really get into it and see if any of my wild speculation tracks with content from the Remake trilogy so far.
~V. Musical Evidence~
What about the music of the game? Any hints there? Let’s try to see if we can find support for the Mission Theory in the music made for the Remake trilogy thus far!
As a preface to my musical evidence analysis, I want to insist on something: the story guys tell the soundtrack guys everything. In a high-quality production such as Remake, people who make music for audiovisual media are told everything in advance. They need to know the secrets of every little scene, because their job is to depict whatever is happening through music.
Therefore, if the Mission Theory is true, then there has to be musical evidence for it.
~V. a) Preface: The Basics of the~ ~FFVII~ ~OST~
There’s a lot of evidence in the music of the Remake trilogy that we have to address, but before we get into it, I do have to give you the basics of the FFVII soundscape! For the easiest experience, I suggest you keep a tab open for every link I provide for you until the music analysis is over, because we will be hopping from one musical theme to another and then back again.
~V. a) i. The World Theme: Cloud’s Troubled Identity~
The world theme of FFVII is a perfect example of how musicians working on an OST have to know the secrets of a story as they compose for it. On top of representing the FFVII world as a whole, it doubles as Cloud’s character theme… except that isn’t exactly right. You see, this piece does indeed contain Cloud’s true theme, but Sephiroth and Jenova’s musical motifs also contaminate it. This, of course, symbolizes how Cloud experiences identity sabotage because of these two antagonists. The result is that globally, the world theme does indeed represent Cloud’s character, but it isn’t exclusively Cloud’s in the same way that Cloud’s mind isn’t exclusively his. It’s brilliant storytelling through musical motifs, and evidently requires Uematsu to know in advance that Sephiroth manipulates Cloud’s identity in the story.
For future reference, let’s isolate Cloud’s true theme from Jenova and Sephiroth’s influence.
~V. a) i. 1) Sephiroth: Dissonance and Semi-Tone Motif~
I’m sure you know Sephiroth’s infamous theme: “One-Winged Angel”. The first motif we need to know is Sephiroth’s threatening, repetitive dissonance motif, which plays all throughout the piece (plays solo at 0:00 to 0:04). The second motif is what I call the semi-tone motif. “One-Winged Angel” has a ton of minor 2nd intervals, which is what we call the relationship between two notes that are only a semi-tone apart. You might recognize the minor 2nd interval in the foreboding Jaws theme. Just like in Jaws, the minor 2nd interval or semi-tone is commonly used to indicate an impending, life-threatening danger, a monster, predator, evil, or insanity; suits Sephiroth quite nicely!
~V. a) i. 2) Jenova: Parasite Motif~
The track “J-E-N-O-V-A” contains many competing melodies and has generated many variations of those melodies —almost like clones— that all represent aspects of the alien’s character. The main Jenova motif is simply a descending, two-octaves-long, arpeggiated mb6 chord (eight notes total). I’ve played it for you here. Sometimes, this motif is altered to form variations. For instance, in “Listen to the Cries of the Planet”, a variation of Jenova’s main motif is created by changing the order of the notes and reducing the number of notes to only six (0:00-0:03), however, it remains an arpeggiated mb6 chord. Regardless of the alteration, if you hear an arpeggiated mb6 chord, it means Jenova is creeping close by or that its influence is at work.
The variation of the mb6 arpeggiated chord that concerns us alters Jenova’s main theme so it ascends from the tonic to the b6 note and descends back to the tonic, then ending on the lower dominant for a total of eight notes. I’ve played it for you here. I call this variation the “parasite motif”, because it is often heard when Cloud is being controlled by Jenova. For instance, it plays when Cloud loses himself and becomes unusually violent in Rebirth’s chapter 13 (17:25-18:34), signalling to us that Jenova is in control. It is also the main motif of the track “Who… Am I?”, which evidently symbolizes Jenova’s fuelling of Cloud’s identity crisis— though here, the parasite motif is shortened to its six first notes.
~V. a) i. 3) Cloud’s True Self~
Now that we can recognize Sephiroth and Jenova’s motifs, let’s return to the world theme to isolate Cloud’s true self. Cloud’s true theme can be heard from 0:51 to 3:48. It consists of a section A (0:51-1:54), followed by a section B (1:54-2:41), and then returns to section A (2:41-3:48).
After Cloud’s true theme concludes however, it seems he experiences a psychic interference: doubt and confusion weave through the world theme (3:48-4:09), representing an instability in his identity. I call this interruption of Cloud’s true theme the “interference section”. It symbolizes a moment of psychic interference or weakness within Cloud that Sephiroth and Jenova take advantage of to take control of Cloud.
The end of the interference section introduces Jenova’s parasite motif. It slithers in (4:09), later joined by Sephiroth’s dissonance motif (4:16): Cloud’s mind and identity are being hijacked by the two antagonists in service of their evil plans.
They torment Cloud, dominating his mind until he manages to free himself: section A of Cloud’s true theme begins playing again (6:06), closing the loop of the theme.
Based on this musical storytelling, if you already knew the character motifs going into OG, you might’ve suspected something odd was going on with Cloud’s identity, and that Jenova and Sephiroth were involved. All this to say that whatever music is playing at any given time can give us hints as to what is going on. That’s the power and significance of a good soundtrack. Trust me when I say that with Uematsu and his team, we’re in excellent hands. And remember: the story guys tell the soundtrack guys everything.
~V. a) ii. Aerith’s Theme~
Another base we have to cover before checking out the Remake soundtrack is Aerith’s theme. I’m sure everyone here is familiar with it, but I insist that you refresh your memory. It consists of a section A (0:00-0:34), a section B (0:34-1:13) and a section C (1:13-2:00), concluding with a repeat of section A.
~V. a) iii. Motifs and Timing in~ ~FFVII~ ~OSTs~
I’m going to analyze pieces in great detail, which people who haven’t studied or paid attention to soundtracks may find strange. To prevent anyone from making the mistake of thinking that I’m reading too much into things, I want to emphasize that the music that plays during the Remaketrilogy’s cutscenes is carefully timed, composed and arranged to match the events in the cutscenes, as they are provided in advance to the musicians. Composers pay lots of attention to whatever is going on onscreen so they can include the corresponding musical motifs as accompaniment at the exact right moments, always striving to get the timing perfect. I’m not exaggerating the effort and minutia involved in soundtrack composition and arrangement. Here are just a few sound staff comments from the “Material 4: Soundtrack” section of the FFVII Remake Material Ultimania to prove it:
~V. b) The~ ~Remake~ ~OST~
Now that you’re ready, it’s time to verify the Mission Theory’s validity with Remake’s music.
~V. b) i. MOTF 6 Music~
We were able to explain Remake Cloud’s MOTFs with the Mission Theory, and it just so happens that the music that plays during the scene of MOTF 6 is unique to Remake. This gives us the perfect opportunity: we should analyze the piece that plays as it occurs to evaluate the legitimacy of our theory on the Remake trilogy, using all the motifs we uncovered in section “V. a)”.
First, a refresher on the scene and on our theory’s interpretation of it. The party is gathered in Aerith and Ifalna’s old room at Shinra HQ. Here is how the scene is described by the VA script notes:
The piece that plays during this scene is called “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”. It is one of many variations of Aerith’s iconic theme arranged for Remake. However, Cloud’s theme is just as prominent in the piece— if not, more.
~V. b) i. 1) The Fate Motif~
Before we interpret “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”, I need to introduce you to one more motif that crops up in the piece. There is a windy motif that appears (from 1:45 onwards) and it is unaccounted for, despite how it’s clearly meant to represent something. I’ve become certain that this wind noise symbolizes fate, and I’ll tell you why.
In the MOTF 6 scene, just after Nanaki explains how he gained knowledge of the Whispers via contact with Aerith (7:23), they emerge and begin swirling aggressively around Aerith (7:26). Her hair and dress blow and ripple in the resulting wind. From this very moment onward “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” (3:00), a string section (bowed instruments in the violin family) that deliberately emphasizes the airy sound of the bow crossing the strings enters, creating a windy effect that adds to the already present wind noise (that started at 1:45). As the Whispers progressively become even more aggressive onscreen, both the wind SFX of the cutscene and the wind noise in the piece get louder and louder. Because of the timing of its appearance and crescendo in the cutscene, I’m certain the wind noise is meant to represent the restrictive flow of fate; it only makes sense, given that destiny is a current —or a wind— that cannot be broken, and Aerith is like a helpless petal in fate’s carefully planned storm. Of course, it’s also quite significant that the Whispers make a windy noise as they fly. You can hear it every time they’re onscreen, like when they first appear to Cloud in chapter 2 of Remake (17:45-18:20), or when the White Whispers hold Cloud back from chasing after Aerith during Rebirth’s Sleeping Forest scene in chapter 14 (28:43-29:45). You can also hear the wind sounds in other Whisper-related tracks, such as “Whorl of Whispers” (clearly audible at 2:50-3:05), as well as “A Death Not Ordained by Fate” (clearly audible at 2:56-3:18). Therefore, I’ll call these wind noises the “fate motif”.
~V. b) ii. 2) Interpreting “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”~
In part 1 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” (0:00-1:45), Aerith’s theme and Cloud’s true theme play simultaneously, their respective phrases fitting perfectly together, interweaving peacefully and softly. It sounds like the two of them are chatting, dancing bashfully yet contently and in perfect sync, glad to be exactly where they’re meant to be as their themes sing together in harmony (soft piano). Part 1 of this piece is about Cloud and Aerith becoming important to one another as they discover their soulmate bond.
Unfortunately that contentment doesn’t last. In part 2 (1:45-3:00), Cloud experiences a moment of psychic vulnerability (world theme’s interference section). Fate lurks (fate motif enters quietly). His instability forces our couple’s sweet dance to a halt, and Aerith’s theme must retreat as Cloud’s confusion takes center stage. Sephiroth torments and taunts him (semi-tone played by strings, 2:03-2:10), taking advantage of Cloud’s psychic interference to plunge him into darkness (world theme’s interference section ends, low cello enters, 2:18): Cloud temporarily becomes a darker version of himself as evil corrupts him (piano plays section A phrases 1 and 2 of Cloud’s true theme in minor, 2:18-2:53). Jenova finally reveals itself and promptly exits, releasing Cloud’s mind from its grasp (seven first notes of parasite motif played twice on piano 2:53-3:00). Cloud is free, but the damage has been done: his dance with Aerith has long been interrupted, and she is gone. Part 2 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud being manipulated in service of Sephiroth and Jenova’s evil plan, interrupting his interaction with Aerith.
Part 3 (3:00-3:33) kicks off the mechanisms of a tragic fate (strings section joins fate motif, 3:00). Both anxious that she’s disappeared from his side and terrified of the darkness he just discovered inside him (in part 2), Cloud fearfully calls out for Aerith (phrase 1 of Cloud’s true theme’s section A, timid and hesitant piano, 3:04-3:15). Before his psychic interference began (start of part 2), Cloud’s voice was accompanied by Aerith’s as they grew closer and closer (their character themes mingling in part 1)… but now, Aerith isn’t answering his call, and he cannot find her (Aerith’s theme doesn’t to join Cloud’s anymore).
Anxious, Cloud tries calling out for Aerith a second time (section A phrase 2 of Cloud’s true theme’s, 3:19-3:31), searching for her in the hopes that they can continue their dance, but even now, Aerith does not respond. She’s gone (Aerith’s theme remains absent). Destiny keeps Aerith away from Cloud (fate motif gently crescendos). Part 3 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud’s separation from Aerith, his search for her, and the fear and anxiousness he feels when he realizes he cannot find her.
And then, part 4 begins with a sweet, gentle voice, calling out from the blackened horizon: it’s Aerith (section B phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, soft piano, 3:33-3:45). Cloud finally hears her respond to his pleas: he’s found her. Fate begins howling in protest, doubling its efforts to keep Cloud and Aerith apart (fate motif crescendos noticeably in reaction to Aerith’s theme, 3:45). You can just picture Cloud running toward Aerith, struggling against the current of destiny to try and close the distance between them. Aerith tries calling out for Cloud a second time, (section B phrase 2 of Aerith’s theme, 3:40-3:43), but the Whispers only swirl around her more ferociously, taking her away in the uncompromising current of fate (fate motif continues to crescendo). Aerith tries again (section B phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, 3:47-3:49). It sounds like she’s saying “Cloud, I’m over here, come find me!”
Fate doesn’t take too kindly to her defying it. Cloud and Aerith are not supposed to be together; it can’t be, it won’t. She’s destined to die to save the planet, and he’s destined to remain hollow forevermore. I can picture Cloud breaking into a sprint at the sound of her voice, running countercurrent to the flow of destiny— but the winds are so loud, fate’s demands are so strong, and the Whispers are shrieking in defense of destiny now. Aerith’s voice emerges for the fourth time (first three notes of section B phrase 3 of Aerith’s theme, 3:54 to 3:56). Fate screams louder, louder (steep crescendo of fate motif, 3:59-4:02). In a desperate hail Mary, Aerith shouts out one more time, as though throwing her hand out toward Cloud’s extended fingers (section C phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, louder and more insistent, cutting through the fate motif as it crescendos sharply, 4:00-4:06). Part 4 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud and Aerith desperately trying to defy fate in order to be together. And then, it all stops: fate has seemingly quieted Aerith (4:04-4:08)…
Part 5 (4:08-4:27) begins with Cloud jumping, launching himself off the ground with all his strength (Cloud’s true theme section A phrase 2, first 5 notes, melody starting on the note E5 and ascending) as Aerith plummets toward the ground in a fatal fall (Aerith’s theme section C phrase 1, melody starting on the note E6 and descending, the last note altered)— he successfully catches her in mid-air (both Cloud’s ascending melody and Aerith’s descending melody meet in the middle of the octave, first uniting on B5, and then ending on A5). I’ve recreated the melodies for you here so you can hear this reunion more clearly. If you consider that the airy strings in this piece represent fate, which I do, the fact that they follow Cloud and Aerith’s themes in part 5 signifies that they are now in control of their own destinies, and successfully making it their fate to reunite.
To be completely frank, I did not realize until right now writing this that Cloud unites with Aerith in part 5, even though his theme is right there. I’m so excited to share this part with you.
We hear Aerith once more, her voice quietly trailing off into the silence (phrase 4 of section C of Aerith’s theme) with no conclusion (phrase 5 normally follows phrase 4 to conclude Aerith’s theme, but is absent here). Part 5 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” suggests that Cloud will save Aerith and that the couple will change their fate, but also conveys an uncertain and open-ended quality.
submitted by haygurlhay123 to cloudxaerith [link] [comments]
Since Fatal Calling is all about Cloud facing his past and his origins, Tifa’s musical theme is most appropriate for the ending cutscene. For all of these reasons, Tifa’s theme is absolutely appropriate for the conclusion of Fatal Calling. It makes a lot of sense then that once Cloud has finished revisiting the past and vanishes with the crystal to find his Promised Land, Tifa’s theme stops and Aerith’s theme begins.
There’s a lot to be said about Sephiroth in Fatal Calling. Sephiroth feeds off of despair, and deems Palamecia’s suffering inadequate: he seeks a much greater source of power than this realm. He states that Palamecia isn’t “the world that was promised to [him]”, referencing his desire to become the god of his core world of FFVII:
“Sephiroth: Melding with the planet, I will cease to exist as I am now only to be reborn as a ‘god’ to rule over every soul” (FFVII OG, disk 1, chapter 25).Sephiroth’s line “Now, let us return [Cloud]. Back to the Promised Land” reveals he wants to return to their shared core world of FFVII, like we established in our review of the Remake timelines theory (see section “I. a) vii.”). Sephiroth wants to go back to FFVII and modify the OG timeline to achieve his evil goals. This is his ideal scenario, his place of complete happiness: his desired Promised Land. Fatal Calling is setting up Sephiroth’s plans for Remake. In fact, the after-credits scene wherein Sephiroth stands in Nibelheim as it burns confirms his return to the FFVII OG timeline.
However, he isn’t the only one returning. Now that Cloud has revisited his past in Fatal Calling, he’s ready to reach his Promised Land. After Sephiroth’s after-credits scene, the OG FFVII title and logo turn into the FFVII Remake title and logo, indicating a shift: we are now officially in the Remakeera or world. Cloud and Sephiroth disappeared at the end of Fatal Calling, and now the game is telling us where they’ve gone. Combined with Hamaguchi’s recommendation that players complete the collaboration event before playing Remake, I think this is a solid indication that the Cloud and Sephiroth we see in this collaboration event are those we encounter in the Remake world. Once the switch to Remake occurs, Aerith’s theme returns. This communicates that she is indeed —as we’ve proven countless times already— Cloud’s Promised Land. But it also conveys her importance to the story of Remake. Scenario writer Nojima confirmed this:
“Aerith's the most important character in the remake so we paid special attention to her lines” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Development Staff Interviews, Part 2: Tetsuya Nomura, Yoshinori Kitase, Kazushige Nojima”, page 744).Aerith was already important to OG, so what could’ve motivated Nojima to state her importance to Remake? Could it be that she’s even more important in the latter than she was in the former? In what way?
That was the collaboration! Before we move on from MFF x FFVII Remake entirely though, let’s glean some more relevant information from some of the collaboration’s promotional material and special features.
~III. e) iii. Promotional Material and Special Features~
Two particular pieces of promotional material for this collaboration stick out to me as extremely relevant. The first is a promotion for a new summons batch in the Mobius FF game, created in honor of the collaboration.
MFF x FFVII Remake Summons Batch Cloud Promo
The summons batch contains three FFVII Remake-themed cards, including a Cloud card. As you can see, this promo reads “Who awaits in the Promised Land?” under Cloud’s picture.
The second is a promotion of an Aerith and summons and an Aerith Job Card (in MFF, Job Cards allow a character to embody an archetype or another character, giving them certain physical traits, clothing, weapons and abilities):
MFF x FFVII Remake Aerith Summons and Job Card Promo
I couldn’t find this picture in English, but the text relevant to us translates to:
“Midgar's Flower Vendor SummonsA few things here. First, Aerith is referenced by name, and we see a picture of her in her famous praying pose. Secondly, both Cloud and Aerith’s images are attached to the notion of the Promised Land. Cloud’s card asks who awaits there, and Aerith’s evokes a guiding role, as though in response. Thirdly, both Cloud and Aerith are attached to the notion of searching: Cloud searches for the Promised Land and whomever awaits there, and Aerith searches for Cloud’s true self. Speaking of which, the promo also includes parts of Aerith’s famous gondola date quote from OG:
‘I'm searching for you. I want to meet… you.’
The witch protects the planet, imbues it with power, and leads to the Promised Land.”
“Aeris: I'm searching for you.In case you’re wondering about the lady in Aerith’s clothes on the left-hand side, that’s Meia, a character in MFF. She is the “witch” being referred to in the promotional material. She’s often called the Azure Witch. Meia is wearing Aerith’s clothes because a Meia-type Job Card called “Flower Girl of Midgar” was created in honor of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration:
Cloud: …?
Aeris: I want to meet you.
Cloud: But I'm right here.
Aeris: I know, I know... what I mean is... I want to meet... you” (disk 1 chapter 24).
MFF x FFVII Remake \"Flower Girl of Midgar\" Job Card
There’s even an Aerith outfit you can have Echo wear, and it appears with Wol’s Cloud outfit in the promotional picture:
MFF x FFVII Remake Echo's Aerith Outfit and Wol's Cloud Outfit
To be fair, Tifa also appears in one of these summons promos. However, unlike Aerith’s, her appearance doesn’t reference the Promised Land or her version of the gondola date. She is not presented in connection to Cloud at all. On top of that, while the Aerith and Cloud outfits are promoted together, Tifa is paired with Vincent in the promotional image:
MFF x FFVII Remake Summons Promo Tifa and Vincent
This is hardly indicative of Cloti content in the event collaboration or in Remake.
~III. e) iv. Cloud’s Promised Land~
All in all, the collaboration tells the story of Cloud searching for his Promised Land, just as post-OG Cloud has been shown doing for years and years of canon SE content. Cloud is searching for Aerith in the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration, just like he was in FFT and DFF, and just like he was shown doing in the 30th FF Anniversary Exposition. This is nothing new. However, the collaboration informs us that this mission to be reunited with Aerith is what leads Cloud to enter the world of Remake.
Echo noted that people obtain the Promised Land they deserve rather than the one they want. What does Cloud deserve? I believe the answer is: another chance at saving Aerith.
Cloud needs to start over, from the top. He needs to go back to the very moment he and Avalanche arrived at mako reactor 1 to bomb it. He needs to return to the beginning of the OG game. He needs a redo, a fix-it, another shot at happiness; a remake.
IV. The Hidden Plot Point: Mission Theory
~a) Thesis~Here lies the heart of my theory. My dear Cleriths, Sephiroth isn’t the only one who travelled back in time to undo destiny and create a reality where things go his way: Remake is also —I would even say primarily— Cloud’s chance to free Aerith from her fate, save her life and secure his shot at happiness with her. That’s why he experiences MOTFs in Remake: he’s done FFVII before and now he’s back, although with only fragments of his memories from OG, to save Aerith. That’s why his triggers all involve Aerith: he doesn’t consciously remember anything from OG, but his grief over Aerith is so strong that it rises from his subconsciousness at the slightest trigger.
In Remake, Cloud remembers some but not all elements of the OG timeline (MOTFs), and it appears he only remembers the most important things: all his MOTFs revolve around Aerith and her fate. Our theory explains why Aerith triggers Cloud’s MOTFs in Remake quite perfectly: he traveled back in time to prevent Aerith’s death from happening. Remake Cloud remembers Aerith because, well, he knows her from OG. Post-OG Cloud has returned to the past to save Aerith, resulting in Remake. This is why seeing her in Remake triggers visions and memories of things that haven’t happened yet in Remake, but have already happened to post-OG Cloud. He recognizes her face on Loveless in Remake because seeing her face again is the whole reason he entered Remake in the first place. His visions of her death when they meet once more at the church, the spike of anxiety and grief as he watches her walk away from him, the constriction in his chest when she talks about doing everything in her power to help the planet… all of it, it’s all his memories of OG being jogged by things related to her death. What he’s forgotten from the OG timeline emerges in flashes of pain, images, memory and emotion. Remember that the language the devs used to describe these instances where Cloud reacts to Aerith in this way is always about “remembering” or “recognizing”; Cloud has to have seen Aerith, known Aerith, loved Aerith, lost Aerith and felt the pain of living without Aerith before in order to recognize and remember these feelings. Think about it: this is the only thing that can explain Cloud’s extremely selective MOTFs and the fact that he has MOTFs at all.
The Remake trilogy is all about Cloud and Sephiroth stepping into the ring one more time, both ready to risk it all to get what they lost in the OG timeline. Sephiroth is hungry for destruction and godhood, while Cloud stands determined to save the love of his life. Fighting for their respective goals, the fated enemies enter a new battle in Remake, one to end the war, both needing to win this time after losing so horribly in OG. Now, it’s all or nothing. Sephiroth vying for the planet, and Cloud reaching out for Aerith.
Cloud’s back with a quest, one he can’t fail— it’s the most secret and important plot point of all. I call this the “Mission Theory”.
~IV. b) Mission Theory Logistics~
There are a few things that remain vague, so I’m going to use this section of the analysis to speculate on the logistics of my theory. We know very little about the hows of the timeline and multiverse shenanigans, so I’m going to hypothesize. However, this analysis is about the whys: so if you’re not interested in mechanical speculation on the logistics of time travel and multiverses, you can totally disregard this section and skip to section “V.”.
~IV. b) i. Cloud the Time-Traveler?~
It’s unclear whether Remake is the result of post-OG Cloud going back in time to try his hand at the OG timeline again, or the result of post-OG Cloud somehow informing OG Cloud that he must save Aerith this time around. It’s vague in the same way that we aren’t sure if Remake Aerith is post-OG Aerith or if she’s been informed by post-OG Aerith via her connection to the Lifestream as a Cetra. Though it doesn’t much matter how Cloud has memories of Aerith’s death in Remake, I personally think that Remake Cloud is a time-traveling post-OG Cloud. My explanation as to why might be a little confusing, so again, feel free to skip to section “V.”.
One must be able to communicate with the Lifestream in order to obtain knowledge of the future. This access can only be granted to the Cetra or to the souls of the deceased that compose the Lifestream itself. Since Cloud is not a Cetra, he cannot commune with the Lifestream while he is alive, meaning a deceased post-OG Cloud would not have been able to communicate his memories of the OG plot-line with a living OG Cloud. Therefore, the only way Remake Cloud could have knowledge of the future (manifested as MOTFs) would be that Remake Cloud is inhabited by his post-OG consciousness. Effectively, this is time-traveling.
Then comes the question of how Cloud was able to time-travel at all. I have what I consider a pretty solid hypothesis. The most interesting thing about the realm of Palamecia is that every FF character that’s ever appeared in the realm for a cameo died in their core world beforehand (spoilers for FFI, FFV, FFVI, FFX, FFXII, FFXIII, FFXV incoming). These characters include Tidus (FFX), Lightning (FFXIII), Garland (FFI), Sephiroth (FFVII), Gilgamesh (FFV), Vargas (FFVI), Gabranth (FFXII) and Ultros (FFXV). My interpretation of Palamecia serves at least partly as a directory for deceased souls that can’t simply fade. For instance, FFX’s Tidus actually came back to life to be with his love>! Yuna !
~IV. b) ii. Post-OG Cloud’s Amnesia~
If we consider that Remake Cloud is a time-travelling post-OG Cloud who’s returned to the start of the OG timeline, we encounter another logistical problem: why doesn’t Cloud remember everything or most things from the OG plot-line in Remake, like Sephiroth and Remake Aerith do? After all, aren’t the three of them in the same time-travelling boat? Why isn’t Cloud as lucid on the matter as the two others? Didn’t the post-OG Cloud in Fatal Calling face his past and origins? Shouldn’t that mean Cloud would remember all that stuff in Remake from the start?
In OG, the true Cloud’s memories are repressed by both his false persona and Jenova. The latter’s memetic abilities are able to block Cloud’s memories of the past from emerging and conflicting with his SOLDIER persona. For instance, in both OG and Remake, Cloud is unable to hear Aerith tell him Zack’s name in Evergreen Park: Jenova blocks it out. I think this is a similar situation: post-OG Cloud’s consciousness carries memories things that Jenova doesn’t want Cloud to know, so she pushes down on them. On top of that, after travelling through different worlds and back through the Lifestream for who knows how long, post-OG Cloud’s consciousness must be quite weak. We know how good Cloud is at repressing, so it makes total sense to me that post-OG Cloud’s consciousness would be trapped or suppressed somewhere deep in Remake Cloud’s subconsciousness. After all, it’s not like this whole time-travelling-consciousness thing is normal for a mind to experience. It’s no wonder Remake Cloud doesn’t consciously remember how things go in OG. However, post-OG Cloud’s love and grief for Aerith are so strong that memories related to her can occasionally pierce through to his Remake consciousness and Jenova’s barriers, resulting in his MOTFs. His pain and love for her are definitely permanent and strong enough:
“A young woman descended from the Ancients who will forever be engraved in [Cloud’s] heart” (Dirge of Cerberus, Japanese manual, Aerith’s character description).
“I believe for those who formerly traveled with her as comrades and for the viewers, each carries their own feelings and love for Aerith. In this story, Cloud also carries his own undying feelings for Aerith, even to this very day… Its relation with the church scene is… Yup. I’ll leave this part to your imagination. (laughs)” (Nomura interview on Advent Children “Designer’s Note” in Famitsu PS2!magazine, October 24th issue).
So you see, Remake Cloud’s mind is a little more complicated than OG Cloud’s mind. Everything is still the same in Remake as in OG, but with the added complication that his future self is hidden in his subconscious mind, probably trying to get out.
There is actually pretty good evidence of this. I’m sure you’re aware that whenever Jenova is trying to hide something from Cloud or altering his memory and/or perception, the screen glitches green with an audio cue (34:15-34:29, 1:15:30-1:15:41 and 1:17:14-1:17:29). Guess what? These Jenova audiovisual cues also occur during the MOTFs (ie: MOTF 3 2:58-3:07 and MOTF 4 0:29-0:42). Whenever post-OG Cloud’s consciousness encounters anything that reminds it of losing Aerith, the strength of its pain helps it push memories of Aerith to the surface so that RemakeCloud can consciously see them. Remake Cloud then experiences sensations and/or visions, all from his future self’s memories as they rise to the surface, propelled by grief. Jenova can’t allow Remake Cloud to fully recover his post-OG memory, so in order to shut down the process, its cells jump in to repress the MOTFs: this results in the classic Jenova audiovisual cues. The only time Jenova doesn’t bother to fight against a MOTF is the sixth, as it is quite weak: no visions occur, only a tight sensation in his chest.
~IV. b) iii.~ ~Eclipse Contact~ ~and Cloud’s Memories of Reactor 1~
There is one problem I have trouble decoding. In Eclipse Contact, Cloud tells Wol and Echo that the last thing he remembers is the run-up to his arrival at mako reactor 1 (FFVII OG, disk 1, chapter 1). Recall that usually, people summoned to Palamecia have no memories of their world of origin and lives before that point at all. So then why is it that upon being summoned to Palamecia, Cloud recalls the events that took place right before the start of the OG game? This strikes me as highly relevant since this is the exact point in time where post-OG Cloud’s consciousness needs to be transported to in order for Remake to begin, but I haven’t been able to figure out a solid hypothesis on what it could mean. My best guess is that this is the devs’ way of signalling to us that the events of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration occur before the very beginning of post-OG Cloud’s second try at the OG timeline (Remake).
Now that I’ve shown you how I’ve come to form my Mission Theory and we’ve done some pesky housekeeping, let’s connect some dots, shall we? It’s time to really get into it and see if any of my wild speculation tracks with content from the Remake trilogy so far.
~V. Musical Evidence~
What about the music of the game? Any hints there? Let’s try to see if we can find support for the Mission Theory in the music made for the Remake trilogy thus far!
As a preface to my musical evidence analysis, I want to insist on something: the story guys tell the soundtrack guys everything. In a high-quality production such as Remake, people who make music for audiovisual media are told everything in advance. They need to know the secrets of every little scene, because their job is to depict whatever is happening through music.
Therefore, if the Mission Theory is true, then there has to be musical evidence for it.
~V. a) Preface: The Basics of the~ ~FFVII~ ~OST~
There’s a lot of evidence in the music of the Remake trilogy that we have to address, but before we get into it, I do have to give you the basics of the FFVII soundscape! For the easiest experience, I suggest you keep a tab open for every link I provide for you until the music analysis is over, because we will be hopping from one musical theme to another and then back again.
~V. a) i. The World Theme: Cloud’s Troubled Identity~
The world theme of FFVII is a perfect example of how musicians working on an OST have to know the secrets of a story as they compose for it. On top of representing the FFVII world as a whole, it doubles as Cloud’s character theme… except that isn’t exactly right. You see, this piece does indeed contain Cloud’s true theme, but Sephiroth and Jenova’s musical motifs also contaminate it. This, of course, symbolizes how Cloud experiences identity sabotage because of these two antagonists. The result is that globally, the world theme does indeed represent Cloud’s character, but it isn’t exclusively Cloud’s in the same way that Cloud’s mind isn’t exclusively his. It’s brilliant storytelling through musical motifs, and evidently requires Uematsu to know in advance that Sephiroth manipulates Cloud’s identity in the story.
For future reference, let’s isolate Cloud’s true theme from Jenova and Sephiroth’s influence.
~V. a) i. 1) Sephiroth: Dissonance and Semi-Tone Motif~
I’m sure you know Sephiroth’s infamous theme: “One-Winged Angel”. The first motif we need to know is Sephiroth’s threatening, repetitive dissonance motif, which plays all throughout the piece (plays solo at 0:00 to 0:04). The second motif is what I call the semi-tone motif. “One-Winged Angel” has a ton of minor 2nd intervals, which is what we call the relationship between two notes that are only a semi-tone apart. You might recognize the minor 2nd interval in the foreboding Jaws theme. Just like in Jaws, the minor 2nd interval or semi-tone is commonly used to indicate an impending, life-threatening danger, a monster, predator, evil, or insanity; suits Sephiroth quite nicely!
~V. a) i. 2) Jenova: Parasite Motif~
The track “J-E-N-O-V-A” contains many competing melodies and has generated many variations of those melodies —almost like clones— that all represent aspects of the alien’s character. The main Jenova motif is simply a descending, two-octaves-long, arpeggiated mb6 chord (eight notes total). I’ve played it for you here. Sometimes, this motif is altered to form variations. For instance, in “Listen to the Cries of the Planet”, a variation of Jenova’s main motif is created by changing the order of the notes and reducing the number of notes to only six (0:00-0:03), however, it remains an arpeggiated mb6 chord. Regardless of the alteration, if you hear an arpeggiated mb6 chord, it means Jenova is creeping close by or that its influence is at work.
The variation of the mb6 arpeggiated chord that concerns us alters Jenova’s main theme so it ascends from the tonic to the b6 note and descends back to the tonic, then ending on the lower dominant for a total of eight notes. I’ve played it for you here. I call this variation the “parasite motif”, because it is often heard when Cloud is being controlled by Jenova. For instance, it plays when Cloud loses himself and becomes unusually violent in Rebirth’s chapter 13 (17:25-18:34), signalling to us that Jenova is in control. It is also the main motif of the track “Who… Am I?”, which evidently symbolizes Jenova’s fuelling of Cloud’s identity crisis— though here, the parasite motif is shortened to its six first notes.
~V. a) i. 3) Cloud’s True Self~
Now that we can recognize Sephiroth and Jenova’s motifs, let’s return to the world theme to isolate Cloud’s true self. Cloud’s true theme can be heard from 0:51 to 3:48. It consists of a section A (0:51-1:54), followed by a section B (1:54-2:41), and then returns to section A (2:41-3:48).
After Cloud’s true theme concludes however, it seems he experiences a psychic interference: doubt and confusion weave through the world theme (3:48-4:09), representing an instability in his identity. I call this interruption of Cloud’s true theme the “interference section”. It symbolizes a moment of psychic interference or weakness within Cloud that Sephiroth and Jenova take advantage of to take control of Cloud.
The end of the interference section introduces Jenova’s parasite motif. It slithers in (4:09), later joined by Sephiroth’s dissonance motif (4:16): Cloud’s mind and identity are being hijacked by the two antagonists in service of their evil plans.
They torment Cloud, dominating his mind until he manages to free himself: section A of Cloud’s true theme begins playing again (6:06), closing the loop of the theme.
Based on this musical storytelling, if you already knew the character motifs going into OG, you might’ve suspected something odd was going on with Cloud’s identity, and that Jenova and Sephiroth were involved. All this to say that whatever music is playing at any given time can give us hints as to what is going on. That’s the power and significance of a good soundtrack. Trust me when I say that with Uematsu and his team, we’re in excellent hands. And remember: the story guys tell the soundtrack guys everything.
~V. a) ii. Aerith’s Theme~
Another base we have to cover before checking out the Remake soundtrack is Aerith’s theme. I’m sure everyone here is familiar with it, but I insist that you refresh your memory. It consists of a section A (0:00-0:34), a section B (0:34-1:13) and a section C (1:13-2:00), concluding with a repeat of section A.
~V. a) iii. Motifs and Timing in~ ~FFVII~ ~OSTs~
I’m going to analyze pieces in great detail, which people who haven’t studied or paid attention to soundtracks may find strange. To prevent anyone from making the mistake of thinking that I’m reading too much into things, I want to emphasize that the music that plays during the Remaketrilogy’s cutscenes is carefully timed, composed and arranged to match the events in the cutscenes, as they are provided in advance to the musicians. Composers pay lots of attention to whatever is going on onscreen so they can include the corresponding musical motifs as accompaniment at the exact right moments, always striving to get the timing perfect. I’m not exaggerating the effort and minutia involved in soundtrack composition and arrangement. Here are just a few sound staff comments from the “Material 4: Soundtrack” section of the FFVII Remake Material Ultimania to prove it:
“[To] make sure players really feel the weight of the moment, we worked hard on getting the tempo and the entry timing of each instrument exactly right. In particular, that big ‘boom’ that sounds almost like a meteor crashing down was fine-tuned to match the timing of the logo's appearance. I remember this was a real sticking point for us, because if the boom's timing was even slightly off, the effect would be completely different. We […] had to sequence [each and every sound] to play at exactly the right moment” (Shotaro Shima on track “Midgar, City of Mako”, page 229).&
“I was originally told to keep this piece to under two minutes, but it ended up being over six minutes long, in order to match the flow of the cutscene. I arranged the track while watching the latest CG visuals that had been rendered for the scene” (Naoyuki Honzawa on track “Smash ‘Em, Rip ‘Em”, page 309).&
“This is the track that plays during the tour of Shinra’s different divisions. The movie shown in the Visual Entertainment Hall describes the history of the Ancients (0:25 onward in the soundtrack version), and I wanted to create a musical link to them as well, so I made use of the chord progression from ‘Aerith’s Theme’ [D(I)-Am(Vm)-D(I).] [This simple sequence of moving from major to minor and back again creates a really mysterious air. Then, during the section where the movie recounts the history of the construction of the Shinra Building (1:47 onward in the soundtrack version), I quoted a section of the Shinra theme” (Yasunori Nishiki on track “Stewards of the Planet”, page 313).
~V. b) The~ ~Remake~ ~OST~
Now that you’re ready, it’s time to verify the Mission Theory’s validity with Remake’s music.
~V. b) i. MOTF 6 Music~
We were able to explain Remake Cloud’s MOTFs with the Mission Theory, and it just so happens that the music that plays during the scene of MOTF 6 is unique to Remake. This gives us the perfect opportunity: we should analyze the piece that plays as it occurs to evaluate the legitimacy of our theory on the Remake trilogy, using all the motifs we uncovered in section “V. a)”.
First, a refresher on the scene and on our theory’s interpretation of it. The party is gathered in Aerith and Ifalna’s old room at Shinra HQ. Here is how the scene is described by the VA script notes:
“The Whispers once again close in [on Aerith], but Aerith refuses to stop speaking this time.Indeed, right after Aerith says she wants to help the planet any way she can, Cloud looks down at his chest with a frown and a quiet grunt (7:46-7:54). According to the Mission Theory, this tightness in Cloud’s chest can be explained as an emergence of post-OG Cloud’s grief, triggered by the slightest allusion to Aerith’s sacrifice.
Aerith: Listen to me. […] Shinra isn’t the enemy. They were the ones who set things in motion, but our true foe is someone else.
At that moment, the spectacle of Meteor they saw in the Visual Entertainment Hall comes into Cloud and the others’ heads.
Aerith: Somehow, some way, I want to help— all of you… the planet…
For some reason, Cloud feels his chest constrict tightly” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Aerith Speaks”).
The piece that plays during this scene is called “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”. It is one of many variations of Aerith’s iconic theme arranged for Remake. However, Cloud’s theme is just as prominent in the piece— if not, more.
~V. b) i. 1) The Fate Motif~
Before we interpret “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”, I need to introduce you to one more motif that crops up in the piece. There is a windy motif that appears (from 1:45 onwards) and it is unaccounted for, despite how it’s clearly meant to represent something. I’ve become certain that this wind noise symbolizes fate, and I’ll tell you why.
In the MOTF 6 scene, just after Nanaki explains how he gained knowledge of the Whispers via contact with Aerith (7:23), they emerge and begin swirling aggressively around Aerith (7:26). Her hair and dress blow and ripple in the resulting wind. From this very moment onward “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” (3:00), a string section (bowed instruments in the violin family) that deliberately emphasizes the airy sound of the bow crossing the strings enters, creating a windy effect that adds to the already present wind noise (that started at 1:45). As the Whispers progressively become even more aggressive onscreen, both the wind SFX of the cutscene and the wind noise in the piece get louder and louder. Because of the timing of its appearance and crescendo in the cutscene, I’m certain the wind noise is meant to represent the restrictive flow of fate; it only makes sense, given that destiny is a current —or a wind— that cannot be broken, and Aerith is like a helpless petal in fate’s carefully planned storm. Of course, it’s also quite significant that the Whispers make a windy noise as they fly. You can hear it every time they’re onscreen, like when they first appear to Cloud in chapter 2 of Remake (17:45-18:20), or when the White Whispers hold Cloud back from chasing after Aerith during Rebirth’s Sleeping Forest scene in chapter 14 (28:43-29:45). You can also hear the wind sounds in other Whisper-related tracks, such as “Whorl of Whispers” (clearly audible at 2:50-3:05), as well as “A Death Not Ordained by Fate” (clearly audible at 2:56-3:18). Therefore, I’ll call these wind noises the “fate motif”.
~V. b) ii. 2) Interpreting “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra”~
In part 1 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” (0:00-1:45), Aerith’s theme and Cloud’s true theme play simultaneously, their respective phrases fitting perfectly together, interweaving peacefully and softly. It sounds like the two of them are chatting, dancing bashfully yet contently and in perfect sync, glad to be exactly where they’re meant to be as their themes sing together in harmony (soft piano). Part 1 of this piece is about Cloud and Aerith becoming important to one another as they discover their soulmate bond.
Unfortunately that contentment doesn’t last. In part 2 (1:45-3:00), Cloud experiences a moment of psychic vulnerability (world theme’s interference section). Fate lurks (fate motif enters quietly). His instability forces our couple’s sweet dance to a halt, and Aerith’s theme must retreat as Cloud’s confusion takes center stage. Sephiroth torments and taunts him (semi-tone played by strings, 2:03-2:10), taking advantage of Cloud’s psychic interference to plunge him into darkness (world theme’s interference section ends, low cello enters, 2:18): Cloud temporarily becomes a darker version of himself as evil corrupts him (piano plays section A phrases 1 and 2 of Cloud’s true theme in minor, 2:18-2:53). Jenova finally reveals itself and promptly exits, releasing Cloud’s mind from its grasp (seven first notes of parasite motif played twice on piano 2:53-3:00). Cloud is free, but the damage has been done: his dance with Aerith has long been interrupted, and she is gone. Part 2 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud being manipulated in service of Sephiroth and Jenova’s evil plan, interrupting his interaction with Aerith.
Part 3 (3:00-3:33) kicks off the mechanisms of a tragic fate (strings section joins fate motif, 3:00). Both anxious that she’s disappeared from his side and terrified of the darkness he just discovered inside him (in part 2), Cloud fearfully calls out for Aerith (phrase 1 of Cloud’s true theme’s section A, timid and hesitant piano, 3:04-3:15). Before his psychic interference began (start of part 2), Cloud’s voice was accompanied by Aerith’s as they grew closer and closer (their character themes mingling in part 1)… but now, Aerith isn’t answering his call, and he cannot find her (Aerith’s theme doesn’t to join Cloud’s anymore).
Anxious, Cloud tries calling out for Aerith a second time (section A phrase 2 of Cloud’s true theme’s, 3:19-3:31), searching for her in the hopes that they can continue their dance, but even now, Aerith does not respond. She’s gone (Aerith’s theme remains absent). Destiny keeps Aerith away from Cloud (fate motif gently crescendos). Part 3 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud’s separation from Aerith, his search for her, and the fear and anxiousness he feels when he realizes he cannot find her.
And then, part 4 begins with a sweet, gentle voice, calling out from the blackened horizon: it’s Aerith (section B phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, soft piano, 3:33-3:45). Cloud finally hears her respond to his pleas: he’s found her. Fate begins howling in protest, doubling its efforts to keep Cloud and Aerith apart (fate motif crescendos noticeably in reaction to Aerith’s theme, 3:45). You can just picture Cloud running toward Aerith, struggling against the current of destiny to try and close the distance between them. Aerith tries calling out for Cloud a second time, (section B phrase 2 of Aerith’s theme, 3:40-3:43), but the Whispers only swirl around her more ferociously, taking her away in the uncompromising current of fate (fate motif continues to crescendo). Aerith tries again (section B phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, 3:47-3:49). It sounds like she’s saying “Cloud, I’m over here, come find me!”
Fate doesn’t take too kindly to her defying it. Cloud and Aerith are not supposed to be together; it can’t be, it won’t. She’s destined to die to save the planet, and he’s destined to remain hollow forevermore. I can picture Cloud breaking into a sprint at the sound of her voice, running countercurrent to the flow of destiny— but the winds are so loud, fate’s demands are so strong, and the Whispers are shrieking in defense of destiny now. Aerith’s voice emerges for the fourth time (first three notes of section B phrase 3 of Aerith’s theme, 3:54 to 3:56). Fate screams louder, louder (steep crescendo of fate motif, 3:59-4:02). In a desperate hail Mary, Aerith shouts out one more time, as though throwing her hand out toward Cloud’s extended fingers (section C phrase 1 of Aerith’s theme, louder and more insistent, cutting through the fate motif as it crescendos sharply, 4:00-4:06). Part 4 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” is about Cloud and Aerith desperately trying to defy fate in order to be together. And then, it all stops: fate has seemingly quieted Aerith (4:04-4:08)…
Part 5 (4:08-4:27) begins with Cloud jumping, launching himself off the ground with all his strength (Cloud’s true theme section A phrase 2, first 5 notes, melody starting on the note E5 and ascending) as Aerith plummets toward the ground in a fatal fall (Aerith’s theme section C phrase 1, melody starting on the note E6 and descending, the last note altered)— he successfully catches her in mid-air (both Cloud’s ascending melody and Aerith’s descending melody meet in the middle of the octave, first uniting on B5, and then ending on A5). I’ve recreated the melodies for you here so you can hear this reunion more clearly. If you consider that the airy strings in this piece represent fate, which I do, the fact that they follow Cloud and Aerith’s themes in part 5 signifies that they are now in control of their own destinies, and successfully making it their fate to reunite.
To be completely frank, I did not realize until right now writing this that Cloud unites with Aerith in part 5, even though his theme is right there. I’m so excited to share this part with you.
We hear Aerith once more, her voice quietly trailing off into the silence (phrase 4 of section C of Aerith’s theme) with no conclusion (phrase 5 normally follows phrase 4 to conclude Aerith’s theme, but is absent here). Part 5 of “Aerith’s Theme - The Cetra” suggests that Cloud will save Aerith and that the couple will change their fate, but also conveys an uncertain and open-ended quality.
2024.05.16 15:48 ApeMoneyClub My Step-Parent of Nearly 30 Years Abandoned My Bio-Parent, Dumped Them on Me, and Expects Me to Clean Up Their Mess
I need to talk about something that's been bothering me. Last year, one of my parents had a severe psychotic episode and was involuntarily institutionalized. They were diagnosed with schizophrenia and initially prescribed medication.
However, they stopped taking the medication, which led to delusions, hallucinations, and persecutory thoughts. I suspect they might have dementia, Alzheimer’s, Lewy body dementia (LBD), Capgras delusions, or even Charles Bonnet syndrome due to some ocular issues.
The situation at home deteriorated, leading to growing suspicions about their spouse, my step-parent. Step-parent of nearly 30 years then requested that I offer my bio-parent refuge at my place, which I believed would serve as a temporary measure to help them gain some perspective.
This situation was initially expected to last only a few weeks, coinciding with the reset of the spouse's work leave. However, it quickly became apparent that this was a deceptive maneuver.
Step-parent has effectively abandoned bio-parent with me and my partner, stating they were no longer willing to handle the situation. Now, they intend to pursue a divorce and have placed the burden on me to keep this decision confidential until they deem it appropriate to disclose. It's bewildering how someone can display such callousness.
The bio-parent in question is currently in a vulnerable condition. Despite their repeated requests to return home and consult with their doctors, my step-parent has disregarded these appeals.
They have recently expressed a desire for my step-parent to solidify a legal relationship with me, akin to adoption, to further strengthen our family. I have tried to keep their hope alive that this could still be a possibility.
That was effectively dashed today and is deeply saddening to witness their yearning for the familiarity and comfort of their home, as well as the companionship of their spouse, only to be met with a disheartening lack of response and avoidance on the other end of the phone.
To make things worse, the spouse's complete lack of concern and the expectation that I manage the care from another state have left me in a constant state of distress. My life has been completely upended. I’m dealing with problems at school, work, my health, and my relationship. My partner has been amazing, stepping up to help when my step-parent couldn’t be bothered. But this is taking a toll on us too.
Just because my step-parent no longer wants to be in a relationship doesn’t mean my bio-parent should be evicted from their home and life. The spouse needs to figure out what to do about their own father, who’s been living with them, and stop expecting me to clean up their marital mess.
My bio-parent deserves to be supported by the person who vowed to stand by their side, not discarded like this.
The most infuriating part is that the spouse's behavior has left me feeling isolated and overwhelmed. No one checks on me to see how I’m coping with this situation. I’m exhausted from trying to uphold someone else’s facade and keep devastating secrets. It’s unfair and unethical to ask me to do this.
If anyone has gone through something similar or has any advice on how to handle this, I’d really appreciate it. I just needed a place to vent because I feel so alone in all of this.
Thanks for reading.
submitted by ApeMoneyClub to offmychest [link] [comments]
However, they stopped taking the medication, which led to delusions, hallucinations, and persecutory thoughts. I suspect they might have dementia, Alzheimer’s, Lewy body dementia (LBD), Capgras delusions, or even Charles Bonnet syndrome due to some ocular issues.
The situation at home deteriorated, leading to growing suspicions about their spouse, my step-parent. Step-parent of nearly 30 years then requested that I offer my bio-parent refuge at my place, which I believed would serve as a temporary measure to help them gain some perspective.
This situation was initially expected to last only a few weeks, coinciding with the reset of the spouse's work leave. However, it quickly became apparent that this was a deceptive maneuver.
Step-parent has effectively abandoned bio-parent with me and my partner, stating they were no longer willing to handle the situation. Now, they intend to pursue a divorce and have placed the burden on me to keep this decision confidential until they deem it appropriate to disclose. It's bewildering how someone can display such callousness.
The bio-parent in question is currently in a vulnerable condition. Despite their repeated requests to return home and consult with their doctors, my step-parent has disregarded these appeals.
They have recently expressed a desire for my step-parent to solidify a legal relationship with me, akin to adoption, to further strengthen our family. I have tried to keep their hope alive that this could still be a possibility.
That was effectively dashed today and is deeply saddening to witness their yearning for the familiarity and comfort of their home, as well as the companionship of their spouse, only to be met with a disheartening lack of response and avoidance on the other end of the phone.
To make things worse, the spouse's complete lack of concern and the expectation that I manage the care from another state have left me in a constant state of distress. My life has been completely upended. I’m dealing with problems at school, work, my health, and my relationship. My partner has been amazing, stepping up to help when my step-parent couldn’t be bothered. But this is taking a toll on us too.
Just because my step-parent no longer wants to be in a relationship doesn’t mean my bio-parent should be evicted from their home and life. The spouse needs to figure out what to do about their own father, who’s been living with them, and stop expecting me to clean up their marital mess.
My bio-parent deserves to be supported by the person who vowed to stand by their side, not discarded like this.
The most infuriating part is that the spouse's behavior has left me feeling isolated and overwhelmed. No one checks on me to see how I’m coping with this situation. I’m exhausted from trying to uphold someone else’s facade and keep devastating secrets. It’s unfair and unethical to ask me to do this.
If anyone has gone through something similar or has any advice on how to handle this, I’d really appreciate it. I just needed a place to vent because I feel so alone in all of this.
Thanks for reading.
2024.05.16 15:42 rawhide159 Starting an apprenticeship
I will be moving to the Phoenix AZ area in a few months and am considering trying to become an electrician. Currently I work in government maintenance/trades/heavy equipment operator with a CDL so I know my interest lies with blue collar work. I also like the idea of getting into electrical works as the barrier of entry to journeyman will keep me more valuable than an illegal unlike drywall if you get what I’m sayin haha.
I am struggling to find detailed info about why I may want to go union other than it seems like the easiest/fastest way to become an apprenticeship in the Phoenix area. Maybe I’m wrong on that. I called local 640 to ask questions but was just ushered to the guy that tells me how to apply. No union workers in my family so I know nothing about going union. Is union a life-time commitment? Or could I leave in 10 years when I move again? Can I withdrawal any retirement I have accrued to bring with me? Around 10 years from now I will be moving again(wife’s job) so I’m just concerned about what I may loose doing that. I’m also concerned about being out of work for weeks at a time as I’ve read happens so any insight into that would be nice as well.
Thanks in advance guys. IBEW seems like a good community for the most part and I could see myself in it.
submitted by rawhide159 to IBEW [link] [comments]
I am struggling to find detailed info about why I may want to go union other than it seems like the easiest/fastest way to become an apprenticeship in the Phoenix area. Maybe I’m wrong on that. I called local 640 to ask questions but was just ushered to the guy that tells me how to apply. No union workers in my family so I know nothing about going union. Is union a life-time commitment? Or could I leave in 10 years when I move again? Can I withdrawal any retirement I have accrued to bring with me? Around 10 years from now I will be moving again(wife’s job) so I’m just concerned about what I may loose doing that. I’m also concerned about being out of work for weeks at a time as I’ve read happens so any insight into that would be nice as well.
Thanks in advance guys. IBEW seems like a good community for the most part and I could see myself in it.
2024.05.16 15:42 EntireMonk8165 Interview soon - talking points?
I am a recent college grad an I applied athe position in Tucson. I got an email two days ago that they may reach out to me for an interview but first they asked me a few basic questions. I've been told I am most likely going to be selcted for the interview. What kind of questions can I expect? Is there a few talking points I should know about? I've been practing interview questions as well as the whole job searching process at my college's career center so I feel like I'm pretty prepared but I'd like to see what else I should know ahead of time. Thanks
submitted by EntireMonk8165 to Raytheon [link] [comments]
2024.05.16 15:39 mansock18 One Month In
I launched my firm as a solo outfit on April 15, 2024 and I've been at it for one month. Here's a status update for everyone.
So far I've generated revenue of about $2,100, of which Clio pay has taken their 2.0%. In terms of billable work, so far I've tracked billable time of $25,000.
So far I've spent about $12,000 prepaying rent in a cheap space, getting equipment, signing up for zoom that allows meetings longer than 45 minutes, paying for Clio, office supplies, tech, etc. Renting a space is easily my biggest cost (at $4,200/year, you read that right) but it's worth it to me to have a one-room office where I can meet with clients instead of having to either meet with clients at my house or over lunch. Privacy is nice! I'm keeping expenses down as much as possible but I always feel like I could be doing better.
Feel free to ask any questions below.
submitted by mansock18 to LawFirm [link] [comments]
How I'm Doing
Overall it feels like it's going well for only being a month in. I was lucky enough to get a few people/cases to follow me from my last job and I think my job was largely grateful that I took most of the cases I did (a lot were difficult, low dollar, and non-paying clients too close to trial to get another attorney up to speed). Overall, these have kept me pretty busy. Though I feel like I've barely stopped working and I've tracked more (billable and non-billable) time than I ever have before, I don't feel as overwhelmed as I did in a firm. Not sure if that's because my motivation has changed or what but it's felt good to feel better.How I'm Doing It
I was able to hit the ground running thanks to the cases I took and the advice of the Law Firm Incubator (firmincubator.com). Now that most of those cases are either done or at a stopping point, it feels like things have slowed down and I've focused more on marketing and scalability. I've been fighting with Google for at least a month to get my business verified so I can start running local services ads. While I wait, I signed up for a few local bar associations and referral programs. I am not using things like LegalMatch or Lawyer dot com for referrals--they're a bit too expensive for my budget and it seems local services ads will be a better use of my limited money (more on that below).Revenue
My planned initial investment was $10,000.So far I've generated revenue of about $2,100, of which Clio pay has taken their 2.0%. In terms of billable work, so far I've tracked billable time of $25,000.
So far I've spent about $12,000 prepaying rent in a cheap space, getting equipment, signing up for zoom that allows meetings longer than 45 minutes, paying for Clio, office supplies, tech, etc. Renting a space is easily my biggest cost (at $4,200/year, you read that right) but it's worth it to me to have a one-room office where I can meet with clients instead of having to either meet with clients at my house or over lunch. Privacy is nice! I'm keeping expenses down as much as possible but I always feel like I could be doing better.
Best Part
Freedom. An opposing counsel (who's been solo since 2010) called me after filing my first notice of appearance and said "Congratulations, there's nothing like it." I still work 8-5:30 or later but I get to wear PJs if I feel like it. And though I've worked harder than ever, it feels more one-to-one than it ever has in my career.Worst Part
Revenue has so far not come in. That's a bummer. Fighting with Google and all the admin shit (and it is shit) that eats into billable time have been a pain. Having no fallbacks (admin staff, supervisors) is tough but I was actually kind of used to that from my old firm. If anything this is actually an improvement. There have been a couple of days where I bill maybe 1 hour of actual billable time and the rest is marketing and admin stuff. I also did not generate any potential client leads at all until Tuesday of this week (for future reference it's Thursday when I'm writing this).Marketing
I'm handling all of my own marketing right now. Writing blog posts, posting on LinkedIn, and reconnecting with all of my friends and study buddies from law school. As I mentioned, I'm also doing bar association referrals and networking events. I'm still fighting with Google to get my business verified so I can run local services ads. ("All you need is a phone number!" my ass.) So far I've generated three "organic" potential client leads in my first month, and all came in since Tuesday of this week: one is a friend, one is from a law school classmate referral, and one is from a local bar association.Other Considerations
I've got 4 and 1/2 years experience in a medium cost of living area, practicing civil litigation (generalist: contracts, contested probate, boundary lines, etc.) and business transactional law. I was able to snag a bunch of clients to keep my lights on and I saved up. I had three scheduled trials right off the bat. I don't think my results are typical so far based on that but I think they're definitely achievable and, if you're lucky enough to snag paying clients right off the bat you can do even better than I am.Feel free to ask any questions below.
2024.05.16 15:38 adulting4kids Realistic Dialogue Exchanges
- Interview each other: Have your characters take turns asking and answering questions as if they were conducting interviews.
- Cooking together: Characters can discuss their lives and share stories while preparing a meal.
- Team-building exercises: Characters working together on a task or solving a problem can reveal their dynamics.
- People-watching: Characters observe others and share their observations with each other.
- Traveling: Dialogue can be sparked by discussions about the places characters visit or their experiences during travel.
- Attending a party: Characters interact with others in a social setting, allowing for natural conversations.
- Working on a project: Collaboration on a shared goal can lead to dialogue about skills, preferences, and conflicts.
- Taking a class together: Characters can discuss their thoughts on the subject matter.
- Experiencing a crisis: Facing a crisis together can reveal aspects of characters' personalities and relationships.
- Playing a game: Engaging in competitive or cooperative games can bring out characters' competitive or team-oriented sides.
- Attending a support group: Characters may share personal stories and feelings in this setting.
- Exercising together: Dialogue can happen during walks, jogs, or other physical activities.
- Meeting at a coffee shop: A casual setting for conversation and sharing thoughts.
- Volunteering: Characters working together for a cause can lead to meaningful discussions.
- Attending a family gathering: Family events provide opportunities for characters to share family histories and dynamics.
- Celebrating a holiday: Characters can discuss traditions, memories, and their feelings about the holiday.
- Participating in a workshop or seminar: Characters can discuss their takeaways and opinions on the subject.
- Solving a mystery or puzzle: Collaborating on solving a problem can lead to dialogue.
- Gardening together: Characters can discuss their preferences for plants or share gardening tips.
- Shopping for groceries: Characters can reveal their tastes, preferences, and dietary habits.
- Engaging in a hobby: Characters sharing a hobby can discuss techniques, preferences, and experiences.
- Waiting in line: Characters may engage in small talk or share frustrations during a wait.
- Attending a book club: Characters can discuss their thoughts on a shared book.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Camping: Dialogue can happen around the campfire or during outdoor activities.
- Taking a road trip: Conversations during a journey can reveal a lot about characters.
- Joining a therapy group: Characters can discuss their emotions and challenges.
- Participating in a hobby club: Characters with shared interests can discuss their passion.
- Working on a community project: Characters collaborating for a communal cause can spark conversations.
- Attending a concert or performance: Characters can share their thoughts on the experience.
- Participating in a protest or rally: Characters may discuss their motivations and beliefs.
- Competing in a tournament: Characters can talk strategy, goals, and experiences.
- Attending a class reunion: Characters can reflect on their past and share updates.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Experiencing a natural disaster: Characters can share their fears and experiences.
- Taking a class together: Characters can discuss their thoughts on the subject matter.
- Babysitting together: Characters can share stories or opinions on parenting.
- Participating in a workshop or seminar: Characters can discuss their takeaways and opinions on the subject.
- Exploring a museum: Characters can share their thoughts on exhibits and history.
- Participating in a talent show: Characters can discuss their talents and fears.
- Attending a wedding: Characters can talk about love, relationships, and commitment.
- Participating in a debate: Characters can express their opinions on a given topic.
- Taking a dance class: Characters can discuss their experiences and preferences.
- Experiencing a blackout: Characters can share fears and stories in the dark.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Engaging in a fantasy role-playing game: Characters can reveal their imaginative sides.
- Taking a language class together: Characters can discuss their struggles and successes.
- Participating in a neighborhood watch: Characters can discuss safety and community.
- Going on a blind date: Characters can reveal their personalities and preferences.
- Participating in a scavenger hunt: Characters can work together and share experiences.
- Taking a self-defense class: Characters can discuss their fears and motivations.
- Attending a job fair: Characters can talk about their career goals and aspirations.
- Participating in a therapy group: Characters can discuss their emotions and challenges.
- Engaging in a trivia night: Characters can share their knowledge and compete.
- Volunteering at a shelter: Characters can discuss their compassion and motivations.
- Taking a painting or art class: Characters can discuss their artistic expressions.
- Participating in a community clean-up: Characters can discuss their commitment to the environment.
- Attending a speed dating event: Characters can discuss their views on relationships.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Taking a comedy improv class: Characters can explore humor and spontaneity.
- Experiencing a power outage: Characters can share stories and fears in the dark.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Joining a mentorship program: Characters can discuss their aspirations and guidance.
- Attending a poetry reading: Characters can share their thoughts on literature.
- Participating in a trivia night: Characters can share their knowledge and compete.
- Taking a parenting class: Characters can discuss their views on parenting.
- Attending a retirement party: Characters can reflect on their careers and futures.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Joining a choir or singing group: Characters can discuss their love for music.
- Taking a financial literacy class: Characters can discuss their financial goals.
- Experiencing a technology failure: Characters can share their frustrations and adaptability.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Joining a community theater production: Characters can discuss their love for the arts.
- Attending a retirement party: Characters can reflect on their careers and futures.
- Participating in a focus group: Characters can express their opinions on a product or idea.
- Experiencing a technology failure: Characters can share their frustrations and adaptability.
2024.05.16 15:32 United_Job_1549 Should I cut ties?
I grew up physically and emotionally abused by my parents, in particular, my dad. I should preface this by saying my dad was stressed from working night shifts in the factory. And his parents didn’t like myself or my mom (dad married my mom who is a different Asian race) and growing up in Australia I never spoke my grandparents native language or either of my parents’ languages - mainly English, hence the disapproval. So it’s safe to say my dad was quite stressed at this time.
When I was 7 years of age, I had problems sleeping and my dad used to work night shifts. When I couldn’t sleep I would go to my parents room and tell them I couldn’t sleep. This was always followed by: “go to sleep, just lay there and you will sleep”, which I would try and follow, but after several hours of laying in bed, I would go back to my parents room to tell them I couldn’t sleep, for some reason I always felt very anxious when I couldn’t sleep as a kid. When I went back to their room it as always horrible for me ….
trigger warning*
My dad would then beat me really bad. He would hit me across the face to the point where I would go to school with a large bruise on my face. It was always hitting and punching my head or my arms (from trying to block my face). There were days I couldn’t move my arm because when I tried to block his strike, my arm would take the hit and it would be so painful. He would break down my door to get into my room after I would run into it to escape his beating. He would tape my arms and legs so that I couldn’t defend myself, and would spit on me and kick my stomach while I was taped and on the floor. He would strangle me so hard I begged him to stop multiple times. He would lock me out of the house in the middle of the night and tell me I can scream all I want, and that even if the police came, they wouldn’t be able to help me because going into foster care would be worse than what I was experiencing. I was so messed up. My mom would try to help me but eventually gave up because of dad’s force. He has never beaten my mom or my brother, just me. I was also emotionally abused if I forgot something when we were out shopping in the mall - if I spoke out of line and told him to lower his voice he would yell even louder and call me stupid. This is just the surface of what I went through…and it went on for about 8-9 years. Not everyday but most days. Their excuse was that my dad was the sole income earner, he was stressed and he was earning money to provide me with an education and better life. This is their way of showing “love”. My mom constantly reminds me that his actions were in the past and I should be appreciative of his care.
In my 20s, I had developed severe depression and anxiety and had to seek help from medical professionals to stop suicidal tendencies. Since gaining financial independence and moving away from them, it has helped my relationship with them and we are now cordial.
Fast forward and I’m now 34, happily married to a Caucasian and have a 3 year old together. Both my husband and I work full time and can only afford to place my daughter in childcare 4 days per week. One day per week we ask my parents to help us look after her while we work. They don’t like my husband, they judge my marriage and the way I parent my child. They constantly tell me that “white men” are no good and that my husband can’t offer me security. I do see they love my daughter but it feels like it is a huge burden for them to look after her. They claim they love taking care of her but then they say they have busy lives and don’t have time for themselves when they look after her. They constantly complain on the day they look after her.
Recently my daughter has been unwell with croup. We have taken her to 4 different doctors and they have all advised us to give neurofen or Panadol for discomfort and fevers. When my dad asked me what medication I give her, he said “don’t you know neurofen fu%ing causes coughing?” And I said that’s what the doctors advised and that there’s no evidence to his claim. I asked if he knew more than the doctor and he told me to “get out of my fu%ing sight”. Additionally my daughter vomitted on their carpet from being so sick, it was sudden and there was nothing anyone could have done to prevent her from vomitting on their carpet. May I remind you she’s only 3. My parents were more concerned about the carpet than my daughter!
My question is… is this normal? I feel like I have reached my limit and want to cut out the toxicity and cut ties. My daughter loves them both but I just feel it is so unhealthy being around them. Thoughts??
**I have tried talking to them about it without any success.
submitted by United_Job_1549 to AsianParentStories [link] [comments]
When I was 7 years of age, I had problems sleeping and my dad used to work night shifts. When I couldn’t sleep I would go to my parents room and tell them I couldn’t sleep. This was always followed by: “go to sleep, just lay there and you will sleep”, which I would try and follow, but after several hours of laying in bed, I would go back to my parents room to tell them I couldn’t sleep, for some reason I always felt very anxious when I couldn’t sleep as a kid. When I went back to their room it as always horrible for me ….
trigger warning*
My dad would then beat me really bad. He would hit me across the face to the point where I would go to school with a large bruise on my face. It was always hitting and punching my head or my arms (from trying to block my face). There were days I couldn’t move my arm because when I tried to block his strike, my arm would take the hit and it would be so painful. He would break down my door to get into my room after I would run into it to escape his beating. He would tape my arms and legs so that I couldn’t defend myself, and would spit on me and kick my stomach while I was taped and on the floor. He would strangle me so hard I begged him to stop multiple times. He would lock me out of the house in the middle of the night and tell me I can scream all I want, and that even if the police came, they wouldn’t be able to help me because going into foster care would be worse than what I was experiencing. I was so messed up. My mom would try to help me but eventually gave up because of dad’s force. He has never beaten my mom or my brother, just me. I was also emotionally abused if I forgot something when we were out shopping in the mall - if I spoke out of line and told him to lower his voice he would yell even louder and call me stupid. This is just the surface of what I went through…and it went on for about 8-9 years. Not everyday but most days. Their excuse was that my dad was the sole income earner, he was stressed and he was earning money to provide me with an education and better life. This is their way of showing “love”. My mom constantly reminds me that his actions were in the past and I should be appreciative of his care.
In my 20s, I had developed severe depression and anxiety and had to seek help from medical professionals to stop suicidal tendencies. Since gaining financial independence and moving away from them, it has helped my relationship with them and we are now cordial.
Fast forward and I’m now 34, happily married to a Caucasian and have a 3 year old together. Both my husband and I work full time and can only afford to place my daughter in childcare 4 days per week. One day per week we ask my parents to help us look after her while we work. They don’t like my husband, they judge my marriage and the way I parent my child. They constantly tell me that “white men” are no good and that my husband can’t offer me security. I do see they love my daughter but it feels like it is a huge burden for them to look after her. They claim they love taking care of her but then they say they have busy lives and don’t have time for themselves when they look after her. They constantly complain on the day they look after her.
Recently my daughter has been unwell with croup. We have taken her to 4 different doctors and they have all advised us to give neurofen or Panadol for discomfort and fevers. When my dad asked me what medication I give her, he said “don’t you know neurofen fu%ing causes coughing?” And I said that’s what the doctors advised and that there’s no evidence to his claim. I asked if he knew more than the doctor and he told me to “get out of my fu%ing sight”. Additionally my daughter vomitted on their carpet from being so sick, it was sudden and there was nothing anyone could have done to prevent her from vomitting on their carpet. May I remind you she’s only 3. My parents were more concerned about the carpet than my daughter!
My question is… is this normal? I feel like I have reached my limit and want to cut out the toxicity and cut ties. My daughter loves them both but I just feel it is so unhealthy being around them. Thoughts??
**I have tried talking to them about it without any success.
2024.05.16 15:31 xfallenangelx95 [28/F] Seeking emotional support and highly empathetic people.I would love to find someone who doesn't judge others or make fun of them.It's very Important to have someone to rely on :) I'm here for conversations with emotionally mature people who don't have friends and need someone to talk to 🍀🌸
(Only Europe, Please) - short note - If you're not into reading or receiving long messages,don't read any further + Please If you don't want to read everything because of my post being too long for you & instead of reading It all - ..skip some parts - find another person to talk to.Let's respect each other and our free time. All people criticizing/making fun of me & other people - will be blocked.Pretty much as people questioning my post and giving me unsolicited advice.I'm not here for any conflicts and I know I can't please everyone - I know I never will.. However It's me who should feel comfortable in my new potential friendship & obviously someone who wants to be my friend - not the whole world.. which is why I don't need any advice from people who don't even want to be a part of my life. The amount of rude people on Reddit always criticizing others and making fun of them is unbelievably high but let me tell you something - NEVER let anyone make choices for you and criticize you only because you're different! Always fight for your dreams and never let anyone make you think you're worthless! It's your life and you're the one deciding what's best for you - If you want to judge me despite not even wanting to talk to me or give me advice better block me! I'm an adult woman and I make all decisions on my own.I'm not trying to "fit in" and be like everyone else - just to get more attention.Accept me for who I am or let go - is my motto.
★
🤍
Hello guys! 🙂 (read everything before you decide to send me a message) Please send me a message ONLY If you're in the same situation and If your expectations are the same as mine.I want to find like minded people from Europe (Why Europe? Read my post to find out) I'm looking for something permanent (remember - you can feel lonely even If you're surrounded by others - If there's no emotional bond) I'm fed up of meeting people who never make time for me & only text me once or twice a week to ask me "what are you up to?" Out of boredom.I don't want to meet people asking others a million of questions like "what's your favorite movie?" Just to give them one word answer and ask them another question "and music? Your favorite song?" I'm looking for something "deeper" & different 🙂
★
🤍
What kind of friend would I like to find? Someone to talk to on a daily basis - Someone who needs It & wants It just as much as me
🤍
What are my expectations? I would like to meet someone in a similar situation – why? Because I honestly feel like only a person with the same expectations and a similar outlook on life would get along with me & because I feel more comfortable talking to people like me..Friendless people who need a strong bond - people without friends and partners.. Don't get me wrong…Most people deserve to be happy and It's good to have friends but people who have friends or families in real life are usually more focused on them (which is completely understandable) & have less time for others + I simply don't want to be replaced by anyone..I kind of envy people who can call others , true friends given I don't have an emotional bond with any of my acquaintances. Please send me a message only If you're not In a relationship and don't have friends for the same reasons I've already mentioned before
★
🤍
Whenever I hear that others have friends I simply get sad because (believe it or not) If I had to choose between 20 people to talk to (acquaintances) and one special person - I'd choose that one special person without any hesitation .
★
🤍
I also want to talk to others every day because..I want to see someone’s effort & be someone's first choice - not another person to have random conversations with..some people ask me "Why do you want to talk to people from Europe?" Well..Because I would like to see someone I'd get along with - In the far future - face to face :) + I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to receive a message - waiting 6 hours to receive a message is more than enough
★
🤍
I'm by no means criticizing people who don't want to talk to others often / People who really are super busy & People who want to find someone to have unimportant conversations with - I'm aware that not everyone has the same expectations which is why everything you're reading now - is here for a reason :) All I'm suggesting is - I don't want anything temporary and I don't want to be the one always giving more than receiving.Listen people - I used to ignore being..ignored by others..always being just an option to talk to during tough times or moments of boredom.I was too young to realize that I was never important enough for most people that were a part of my life. I don't know who needs to hear this but..No one is too busy to make time for you! People make excuses to avoid others because they prioritize everything and (maybe) everyone..over them. It's true that most people are busy - but It takes only a few seconds to start a conversation (If you're into short messages) and a few minutes (1-10/15) to type a long message . Don't let anyone lie to you.
★
🤍
Truth is that most people either don't like you enough to make time for you or just simply - feel no need to talk to others often but are they too busy? No..You don't need to send me a message just to ask me and tell me "Do you really want to talk every day? I like long messages but I can't promise to contact you often" If you really are unsure please don't send me a message.I don't need more acquaintances aka people to talk to - occasionally.
🤍
I'm not trying to sound rude but conversations once or twice a week wouldn't be enough for me and I don't need them... Let me tell you one thing – A true friend would never just give up on you for no reason :) It’s always possible to find someone to have a random conversation with – someone willing to send you one message once or twice a week..but..It’s almost impossible to find people willing to make more time for you.
★
🤍
I’m not asking a busy person to make time for me by changing some plans! Absolutely not! I’m here to find someone who wants to talk daily (throughout the day or maybe even night) of one’s own will.Someone looking for the same kind of connection.Strong friendships are based on mutual support. One of the best things you can do for a friend in need, is just to be there for them when they want to talk.I often see posts from people who always say how friendless they are because they don't feel loved or appreciated by their "friends" remember! A true friend - someone who truly likes you or someone who wants to get to know you - will always find time for you.
★
🤍
I'm not interested in small talk/short messages - I love long and meaningful conversations. It's so easy to find someone who loves abbreviations and questions like "How are you?" How was your day? Or what are you interested in? But so hard/almost impossible to find a person who knows how to keep a conversation going & show others some effort.Building and maintaining friendships takes time and effort.Never allow pursuits or possessions to become bigger priorities than your relations with other people.Close friendships are so important to us because they are so difficult to form + Having friends can help you feel as if you belong to something that brings purpose and connection to your life
🤍
• I do NOT respond to any „Hey,hmu” or „u want to talk?” type of messages (super short messages or messages full of abbreviations – I literally can’t stand abbreviations and acronyms in text messages) ALL messages full of abbreviations will immediately be ignored.I also don't like it when people ignore everything I say in private messages just to focus on a random question or? When they start talking only about themselves and don't ever ask me anything. I love conversations with people referring to everything I say...I want everything I say and do - to be reciprocated
🤍
• No NSFW profiles (checking mental health subreddits NOT included as I'm a huge empath and always try to understand others) - Please! I'm not looking for anyone to flirt with and I'm not looking for a partner either. I always check people's profiles (even comment history) - To avoid guys, trying to get inappropriate pictures from adult women or? flirt with them + I don't want to see you with no clothes on so If you're on Reddit only because you want others to see what's underneath your clothes - I'm not for you! I just simply don't want to see any s e x related activity on your profile If you want to talk to me.
🤍
• If both of us (you and I) are from the same country (I live in a non-English speaking country) - I want to communicate with you in our first language! No - Not because I don't understand English - because as you see - I do. Why then? English is simply overrated and people don't appreciate other languages as much as they should. So.. If we're from the same country and you want to talk only in English (which is quite common on reddit) - Talk to someone else. I just don't want to talk to a person from the same country as mine - in a foreign language as It's just something I don't understand even If all you want is to improve your language skills
🤍
• Please only adult people 18-36 (age range) It doesn't matter to me If you're younger or older than me (as long as you're not underage) So.. don't worry! I just want to have discussions with emotionally mature people :)
🤍
• I don’t respond to messages I don’t find interesting even If they're long - If after receiving and reading your message I don't feel comfortable or think "I wouldn't get along with him/her" I simply do not respond (what I’m suggesting is that I don’t always respond to someone’s first or second message because..sometimes you just know If you’d get along with someone or not- I’d never ignore anyone after days or weeks of daily conversations though) just because I don’t want to do anything forcefully & because I don’t want to lead anyone on. I read all messages but I definitely don't respond to all of them! I want to make it clear because I don't want to be accused of not responding and not reading people's messages! - Some people don't message me back as well and even If It's a bit disappointing I'm ok with that! - as long as there's no emotional bond - Not responding to someone's first or second message Is completely OK! If people think they wouldn't get along with a stranger - is there a reason to start a conversation? I don't think so. I can't stand being ignored after days or weeks of daily conversations and seeing people changing priorities over time.. but that's something different - something I don't want to go through ever again for real. If I'm really interested in someone's message it's impossible to hear from me "I'm too busy" because I know myself and If I had no time for others - I wouldn't be here. I don't want to pretend someone I'm not and always try to find some cheap excuses to avoid others. (unlike most people who don't want to talk to others)
🤍
• Don’t ask me “Can you tell me something about yourself?” If you really want to get to know me - you can ask me questions :) I'm an open book.
🤍
• It would be better If you guys were into emojis - like me - to describe your emotions In text messages. Two emojis - 🙂 and 🙁 are completely enough! I just don't like emotionless conversations.I also don't like it when people say "yeah" or yea"as it sounds dismissively. First impression Is everything to me! I want to see your kindness even in a text message - Emojis are very helpful to express your emotions.I don't want to meet people who say "crying Is a weakness" - It's OK to cry even If you're a guy!
🤍
• I want to talk on reddit first (just to make sure If I'd get along with you) before moving to Discord or some other app
🤍
• I would rather talk to a homebody - not another person who always has something to do as people who are very busy don't even have time for daily conversations
🤍
• If you're another person interested only in "childish conversations" such as "HEYOOO! I'M BORED! Ya like Pizza or cheese? xDDDD 🤣" I'm begging you! Don't send me a message.I'm not a child anymore and such messages don't make me smile or laugh.I'm looking for someone interested In serious discussions - not another person just seeking some entertainment out of boredom . Conversations with sarcastic undertones (even when It comes to some emojis such as 🤣😂) are not for me. Your typing style matters to me! Why? when It comes to online conversations with someone new - It's not always possible to know If someone Is laughing at you.. or with you. Let me tell you something else! Jokes about cancer, disabilities and death are UNACCEPTABLE to me. If you find joy In someone else's misfortune you are not a person I want to know.
🤍
• Time response matters to me a lot! I would never ask anyone to be online all day long and I'm NOT asking any of you for any instant messaging as I'm someone who would rather wait an hour or two to receive a proper response instead of some short and pointless messages but I'm interested only in daily conversations and I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to get a message from you.I don't need unbelievably long messages either! Messages as long as the second paragraph of my post - are completely enough. If you like longer messages? you can send me a longer message, but If you want to send me one word or one sentence as a response to my post - don't expect a reaction from me. I don't want to come across as rude - I just don't want to waste your time
🤍
• I'm strongly AGAINST picking on people you don't even want to chat with - and making fun of them! I can't stand people who criticize others publicly or make fun of them! (only because they disagree with someone they don't even know) There's no place In my life for someone using Reddit, to hurt other people
🤍
• I'm not into foul language and I definitely don't want to talk to people who swear a lot...
🤍
• I want to meet assertive people who know what they want and always stand up for their friends
🤍
• I want to meet someone willing to call me In the future, someone spontaneously sending me pictures of animals or food, et cetera. I want more than just text conversations.. 🌻
🤍
Why can’t you see any of my hobbies listed down below? Because what really matters to me is..who you are (If you’re honest, talkative ,understanding, caring and trustworthy – for example) just simply – It matters to me what you’re like! not what you like.Don’t get me wrong – you can tell me what your hobbies are but from my point of view - people's hobbies are important - If you want to find a gaming buddy or If you want to meet someone to hang out with in real life and..go bowling for example.What most people seem to care about are other people's passions – I don’t. I get along with other people despite having completely different hobbies but I absolutely don’t get along with people way different than me (different expectations and outlook on life – way different sense of humor or personality traits – It’s just an example) It doesn't make ANY DIFFERENCE to me If you're a gamer or? Someone interested in photography! It doesn't make any difference - > as long as you're talkative and kind and If you also want to find someone willing to stay in your life..for good - But If you're into small talk and all you want is to...type and receive super short messages or If you're here only because you're bored and don't know what to do + If you're a very sarcastic person - I'm definitely not for you! I don't get along with overly sarcastic people turning everything into a joke. Friendships should be natural – not forced. I wouldn't get along with people who laugh at everything.. In my opinion most people are way too sarcastic.. It's quite sad... Sarcasm can also be another form of passive-aggressive behavior.
★
🤍
People who want to be to friends should feel comfortable and have something in common. No - not necessarily a similar taste in music or movies but something else..Most friendships don't fizzle out because of people not having the same hobbies but..because they just simply have different expectations when It comes to something important.I'm not here out of boredom and trust me - I'm not here to meet as many people as possible.I choose quality over quantity.I highly value myself and my time & Sometimes one person but a person who makes you feel comfortable and understood - is more than enough :) We ALL can choose what kind of people we’d like to talk to and maybe even become really good friends with and I? I don’t want anyone to be disappointed.We all have some expectations after all.I know that people don't have to talk as often as possible in order to become friends but I'm interested only in daily conversations. If you really need someone to talk to due to loneliness and If you have time to talk to me daily (throughout the day and maybe even night) I always make time for others.I'm literally always available.I could even stay up all night long only to talk to someone important to me. I’m ready to commit but only If there’s some chemistry between me and someone else.I don’t do anything forcefully.
★
🤍
If you want to talk to me tell me your story - tell me why you're here, what kind of friend would you like to meet :) Et cetera.Such messages are way more interesting to me than...someone's long list of hobbies. I know! It's unusual on reddit but I don't make friends based on hobbies..I want to meet someone with the same mindset as mine to finally feel understood and get close to someone new. You can share your problems with me - I absolutely don't mind "complaining" as I've been through a lot in my life.What do people usually tell you when you tell them that something's wrong? "Don't complain" or "Life's not over yet - one day you'll be happy" or "There are worse situations than yours" and..obviously "Find a therapist" Life's not a fairytale and sometimes things don't go as planned.Emotions shouldn't be bottled up.I'm sick of people always telling others "everything's gonna be ok" move on " & more..Trust me people - not everyone wants to hear "Just believe in yourself and everything's gonna be ok" Some people take it as reassurance - but others? They would rather hear something different 🙁Imagine being told that things will be okay, only for them to get worse..Do you guys know why telling someone "everything's gonna be ok" Is wrong? Because you can't see the future.
★
🤍
You can't guarantee others that one day they'll finally be happy + when It comes to social interactions - We're responsible only for ourselves - not others & as you guys know people let us down quite often (sometimes even when there's no reason) so instead of telling people how they should move on, forget everything and be happy or asking them to find a therapist - be there for them! Always be willing to listen to them If you really like them or want to get to know them & don't suggest everyone in a tough situation to find a therapist because even the best therapist won't ever replace a true friend + It's quite normal to be disappointed If people always do something to hurt you. Sharing your hardships with other people in a very similar situation or exactly the same one - is VERY helpful If the other person understands you & wants to start all over by just letting it all out! Feeling emotional support instead of always hearing some "positive quotes" or someone saying "Stop complaining let's talk about something else - Is very important! "Everyone needs a shoulder to cry on. I appreciate sensitive people who always try to understand others. If after hearing a sad story all you want to say is "forget the past and move on" you're not for me. It's important to be a good listener and provide emotional support to others
★
🤍
Please - If you're a completely different person than the described type of person I'm looking for (If you love abbreviations,If you don't need a stable friendship, If you're sarcastic and quiet) or If you simply disagree with my post - don't force yourself to send me a message.I want my new potential friendship to be natural which is why I want you to contact me only If your needs are the same - I don't want you to pretend someone you're not - only to please me - Pretending to be someone you're not - is the worst.I want to finally be happy again & find someone "always" wanting to talk - sending me random pictures throughout the day - food pictures or pictures of some animals. What is the most important to me? I want to find people who value online friendships as much as they would value real life ones as there's another human being on the other side
★
🤍
No comments please.Only Private messages and chat requests 🌺
I know It's possible to meet people with exactly the same expectations as mine but It's just not easy because most people are Interested In temporary and entertaining conversations. People like me are just "different" I really want to finally find someone who loves emojis as much as I do.. someone who loves sweet, warm and serious discussions at the same time. Emojis really do - change conversations 😊
submitted by xfallenangelx95 to MeetNewPeopleHere [link] [comments]
★
🤍
Hello guys! 🙂 (read everything before you decide to send me a message) Please send me a message ONLY If you're in the same situation and If your expectations are the same as mine.I want to find like minded people from Europe (Why Europe? Read my post to find out) I'm looking for something permanent (remember - you can feel lonely even If you're surrounded by others - If there's no emotional bond) I'm fed up of meeting people who never make time for me & only text me once or twice a week to ask me "what are you up to?" Out of boredom.I don't want to meet people asking others a million of questions like "what's your favorite movie?" Just to give them one word answer and ask them another question "and music? Your favorite song?" I'm looking for something "deeper" & different 🙂
★
🤍
What kind of friend would I like to find? Someone to talk to on a daily basis - Someone who needs It & wants It just as much as me
🤍
What are my expectations? I would like to meet someone in a similar situation – why? Because I honestly feel like only a person with the same expectations and a similar outlook on life would get along with me & because I feel more comfortable talking to people like me..Friendless people who need a strong bond - people without friends and partners.. Don't get me wrong…Most people deserve to be happy and It's good to have friends but people who have friends or families in real life are usually more focused on them (which is completely understandable) & have less time for others + I simply don't want to be replaced by anyone..I kind of envy people who can call others , true friends given I don't have an emotional bond with any of my acquaintances. Please send me a message only If you're not In a relationship and don't have friends for the same reasons I've already mentioned before
★
🤍
Whenever I hear that others have friends I simply get sad because (believe it or not) If I had to choose between 20 people to talk to (acquaintances) and one special person - I'd choose that one special person without any hesitation .
★
🤍
I also want to talk to others every day because..I want to see someone’s effort & be someone's first choice - not another person to have random conversations with..some people ask me "Why do you want to talk to people from Europe?" Well..Because I would like to see someone I'd get along with - In the far future - face to face :) + I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to receive a message - waiting 6 hours to receive a message is more than enough
★
🤍
I'm by no means criticizing people who don't want to talk to others often / People who really are super busy & People who want to find someone to have unimportant conversations with - I'm aware that not everyone has the same expectations which is why everything you're reading now - is here for a reason :) All I'm suggesting is - I don't want anything temporary and I don't want to be the one always giving more than receiving.Listen people - I used to ignore being..ignored by others..always being just an option to talk to during tough times or moments of boredom.I was too young to realize that I was never important enough for most people that were a part of my life. I don't know who needs to hear this but..No one is too busy to make time for you! People make excuses to avoid others because they prioritize everything and (maybe) everyone..over them. It's true that most people are busy - but It takes only a few seconds to start a conversation (If you're into short messages) and a few minutes (1-10/15) to type a long message . Don't let anyone lie to you.
★
🤍
Truth is that most people either don't like you enough to make time for you or just simply - feel no need to talk to others often but are they too busy? No..You don't need to send me a message just to ask me and tell me "Do you really want to talk every day? I like long messages but I can't promise to contact you often" If you really are unsure please don't send me a message.I don't need more acquaintances aka people to talk to - occasionally.
🤍
I'm not trying to sound rude but conversations once or twice a week wouldn't be enough for me and I don't need them... Let me tell you one thing – A true friend would never just give up on you for no reason :) It’s always possible to find someone to have a random conversation with – someone willing to send you one message once or twice a week..but..It’s almost impossible to find people willing to make more time for you.
★
🤍
I’m not asking a busy person to make time for me by changing some plans! Absolutely not! I’m here to find someone who wants to talk daily (throughout the day or maybe even night) of one’s own will.Someone looking for the same kind of connection.Strong friendships are based on mutual support. One of the best things you can do for a friend in need, is just to be there for them when they want to talk.I often see posts from people who always say how friendless they are because they don't feel loved or appreciated by their "friends" remember! A true friend - someone who truly likes you or someone who wants to get to know you - will always find time for you.
★
🤍
I'm not interested in small talk/short messages - I love long and meaningful conversations. It's so easy to find someone who loves abbreviations and questions like "How are you?" How was your day? Or what are you interested in? But so hard/almost impossible to find a person who knows how to keep a conversation going & show others some effort.Building and maintaining friendships takes time and effort.Never allow pursuits or possessions to become bigger priorities than your relations with other people.Close friendships are so important to us because they are so difficult to form + Having friends can help you feel as if you belong to something that brings purpose and connection to your life
🤍
• I do NOT respond to any „Hey,hmu” or „u want to talk?” type of messages (super short messages or messages full of abbreviations – I literally can’t stand abbreviations and acronyms in text messages) ALL messages full of abbreviations will immediately be ignored.I also don't like it when people ignore everything I say in private messages just to focus on a random question or? When they start talking only about themselves and don't ever ask me anything. I love conversations with people referring to everything I say...I want everything I say and do - to be reciprocated
🤍
• No NSFW profiles (checking mental health subreddits NOT included as I'm a huge empath and always try to understand others) - Please! I'm not looking for anyone to flirt with and I'm not looking for a partner either. I always check people's profiles (even comment history) - To avoid guys, trying to get inappropriate pictures from adult women or? flirt with them + I don't want to see you with no clothes on so If you're on Reddit only because you want others to see what's underneath your clothes - I'm not for you! I just simply don't want to see any s e x related activity on your profile If you want to talk to me.
🤍
• If both of us (you and I) are from the same country (I live in a non-English speaking country) - I want to communicate with you in our first language! No - Not because I don't understand English - because as you see - I do. Why then? English is simply overrated and people don't appreciate other languages as much as they should. So.. If we're from the same country and you want to talk only in English (which is quite common on reddit) - Talk to someone else. I just don't want to talk to a person from the same country as mine - in a foreign language as It's just something I don't understand even If all you want is to improve your language skills
🤍
• Please only adult people 18-36 (age range) It doesn't matter to me If you're younger or older than me (as long as you're not underage) So.. don't worry! I just want to have discussions with emotionally mature people :)
🤍
• I don’t respond to messages I don’t find interesting even If they're long - If after receiving and reading your message I don't feel comfortable or think "I wouldn't get along with him/her" I simply do not respond (what I’m suggesting is that I don’t always respond to someone’s first or second message because..sometimes you just know If you’d get along with someone or not- I’d never ignore anyone after days or weeks of daily conversations though) just because I don’t want to do anything forcefully & because I don’t want to lead anyone on. I read all messages but I definitely don't respond to all of them! I want to make it clear because I don't want to be accused of not responding and not reading people's messages! - Some people don't message me back as well and even If It's a bit disappointing I'm ok with that! - as long as there's no emotional bond - Not responding to someone's first or second message Is completely OK! If people think they wouldn't get along with a stranger - is there a reason to start a conversation? I don't think so. I can't stand being ignored after days or weeks of daily conversations and seeing people changing priorities over time.. but that's something different - something I don't want to go through ever again for real. If I'm really interested in someone's message it's impossible to hear from me "I'm too busy" because I know myself and If I had no time for others - I wouldn't be here. I don't want to pretend someone I'm not and always try to find some cheap excuses to avoid others. (unlike most people who don't want to talk to others)
🤍
• Don’t ask me “Can you tell me something about yourself?” If you really want to get to know me - you can ask me questions :) I'm an open book.
🤍
• It would be better If you guys were into emojis - like me - to describe your emotions In text messages. Two emojis - 🙂 and 🙁 are completely enough! I just don't like emotionless conversations.I also don't like it when people say "yeah" or yea"as it sounds dismissively. First impression Is everything to me! I want to see your kindness even in a text message - Emojis are very helpful to express your emotions.I don't want to meet people who say "crying Is a weakness" - It's OK to cry even If you're a guy!
🤍
• I want to talk on reddit first (just to make sure If I'd get along with you) before moving to Discord or some other app
🤍
• I would rather talk to a homebody - not another person who always has something to do as people who are very busy don't even have time for daily conversations
🤍
• If you're another person interested only in "childish conversations" such as "HEYOOO! I'M BORED! Ya like Pizza or cheese? xDDDD 🤣" I'm begging you! Don't send me a message.I'm not a child anymore and such messages don't make me smile or laugh.I'm looking for someone interested In serious discussions - not another person just seeking some entertainment out of boredom . Conversations with sarcastic undertones (even when It comes to some emojis such as 🤣😂) are not for me. Your typing style matters to me! Why? when It comes to online conversations with someone new - It's not always possible to know If someone Is laughing at you.. or with you. Let me tell you something else! Jokes about cancer, disabilities and death are UNACCEPTABLE to me. If you find joy In someone else's misfortune you are not a person I want to know.
🤍
• Time response matters to me a lot! I would never ask anyone to be online all day long and I'm NOT asking any of you for any instant messaging as I'm someone who would rather wait an hour or two to receive a proper response instead of some short and pointless messages but I'm interested only in daily conversations and I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to get a message from you.I don't need unbelievably long messages either! Messages as long as the second paragraph of my post - are completely enough. If you like longer messages? you can send me a longer message, but If you want to send me one word or one sentence as a response to my post - don't expect a reaction from me. I don't want to come across as rude - I just don't want to waste your time
🤍
• I'm strongly AGAINST picking on people you don't even want to chat with - and making fun of them! I can't stand people who criticize others publicly or make fun of them! (only because they disagree with someone they don't even know) There's no place In my life for someone using Reddit, to hurt other people
🤍
• I'm not into foul language and I definitely don't want to talk to people who swear a lot...
🤍
• I want to meet assertive people who know what they want and always stand up for their friends
🤍
• I want to meet someone willing to call me In the future, someone spontaneously sending me pictures of animals or food, et cetera. I want more than just text conversations.. 🌻
🤍
Why can’t you see any of my hobbies listed down below? Because what really matters to me is..who you are (If you’re honest, talkative ,understanding, caring and trustworthy – for example) just simply – It matters to me what you’re like! not what you like.Don’t get me wrong – you can tell me what your hobbies are but from my point of view - people's hobbies are important - If you want to find a gaming buddy or If you want to meet someone to hang out with in real life and..go bowling for example.What most people seem to care about are other people's passions – I don’t. I get along with other people despite having completely different hobbies but I absolutely don’t get along with people way different than me (different expectations and outlook on life – way different sense of humor or personality traits – It’s just an example) It doesn't make ANY DIFFERENCE to me If you're a gamer or? Someone interested in photography! It doesn't make any difference - > as long as you're talkative and kind and If you also want to find someone willing to stay in your life..for good - But If you're into small talk and all you want is to...type and receive super short messages or If you're here only because you're bored and don't know what to do + If you're a very sarcastic person - I'm definitely not for you! I don't get along with overly sarcastic people turning everything into a joke. Friendships should be natural – not forced. I wouldn't get along with people who laugh at everything.. In my opinion most people are way too sarcastic.. It's quite sad... Sarcasm can also be another form of passive-aggressive behavior.
★
🤍
People who want to be to friends should feel comfortable and have something in common. No - not necessarily a similar taste in music or movies but something else..Most friendships don't fizzle out because of people not having the same hobbies but..because they just simply have different expectations when It comes to something important.I'm not here out of boredom and trust me - I'm not here to meet as many people as possible.I choose quality over quantity.I highly value myself and my time & Sometimes one person but a person who makes you feel comfortable and understood - is more than enough :) We ALL can choose what kind of people we’d like to talk to and maybe even become really good friends with and I? I don’t want anyone to be disappointed.We all have some expectations after all.I know that people don't have to talk as often as possible in order to become friends but I'm interested only in daily conversations. If you really need someone to talk to due to loneliness and If you have time to talk to me daily (throughout the day and maybe even night) I always make time for others.I'm literally always available.I could even stay up all night long only to talk to someone important to me. I’m ready to commit but only If there’s some chemistry between me and someone else.I don’t do anything forcefully.
★
🤍
If you want to talk to me tell me your story - tell me why you're here, what kind of friend would you like to meet :) Et cetera.Such messages are way more interesting to me than...someone's long list of hobbies. I know! It's unusual on reddit but I don't make friends based on hobbies..I want to meet someone with the same mindset as mine to finally feel understood and get close to someone new. You can share your problems with me - I absolutely don't mind "complaining" as I've been through a lot in my life.What do people usually tell you when you tell them that something's wrong? "Don't complain" or "Life's not over yet - one day you'll be happy" or "There are worse situations than yours" and..obviously "Find a therapist" Life's not a fairytale and sometimes things don't go as planned.Emotions shouldn't be bottled up.I'm sick of people always telling others "everything's gonna be ok" move on " & more..Trust me people - not everyone wants to hear "Just believe in yourself and everything's gonna be ok" Some people take it as reassurance - but others? They would rather hear something different 🙁Imagine being told that things will be okay, only for them to get worse..Do you guys know why telling someone "everything's gonna be ok" Is wrong? Because you can't see the future.
★
🤍
You can't guarantee others that one day they'll finally be happy + when It comes to social interactions - We're responsible only for ourselves - not others & as you guys know people let us down quite often (sometimes even when there's no reason) so instead of telling people how they should move on, forget everything and be happy or asking them to find a therapist - be there for them! Always be willing to listen to them If you really like them or want to get to know them & don't suggest everyone in a tough situation to find a therapist because even the best therapist won't ever replace a true friend + It's quite normal to be disappointed If people always do something to hurt you. Sharing your hardships with other people in a very similar situation or exactly the same one - is VERY helpful If the other person understands you & wants to start all over by just letting it all out! Feeling emotional support instead of always hearing some "positive quotes" or someone saying "Stop complaining let's talk about something else - Is very important! "Everyone needs a shoulder to cry on. I appreciate sensitive people who always try to understand others. If after hearing a sad story all you want to say is "forget the past and move on" you're not for me. It's important to be a good listener and provide emotional support to others
★
🤍
Please - If you're a completely different person than the described type of person I'm looking for (If you love abbreviations,If you don't need a stable friendship, If you're sarcastic and quiet) or If you simply disagree with my post - don't force yourself to send me a message.I want my new potential friendship to be natural which is why I want you to contact me only If your needs are the same - I don't want you to pretend someone you're not - only to please me - Pretending to be someone you're not - is the worst.I want to finally be happy again & find someone "always" wanting to talk - sending me random pictures throughout the day - food pictures or pictures of some animals. What is the most important to me? I want to find people who value online friendships as much as they would value real life ones as there's another human being on the other side
★
🤍
No comments please.Only Private messages and chat requests 🌺
I know It's possible to meet people with exactly the same expectations as mine but It's just not easy because most people are Interested In temporary and entertaining conversations. People like me are just "different" I really want to finally find someone who loves emojis as much as I do.. someone who loves sweet, warm and serious discussions at the same time. Emojis really do - change conversations 😊
2024.05.16 15:28 Downtown_Statement87 I tried to make a new mom friend in Oconee County. This is what happened.
 | Here's a very long and convoluted story about what happened when I moved out of Athens and tried to make friends in a new county. It's really long. submitted by Downtown_Statement87 to Athens [link] [comments] * When you're a mom, it seems like you'd have a lot in common with other moms. You're both exhausted. You both can change a diaper while eating a hamburger while making a doctor's appointment while driving a car. She has spit-up on her shoulder? Yeah, well you have Goldfish in your hair. But it's surprisingly hard to make mom friends. Go to any park or playground, and you'll see lots of Lone Moms dotting the landscape, swiping at their smartphones while their children play. I don't know why this is, but it's always kind of bothered me. Raising children can be a terribly isolating endeavor. You are busy, but also bored, since most of the tasks required of you are mundane, repetitive ones like loading the dishwasher, cooking food, and extinguishing the dog. You are surrounded by people all day, but these people are mostly pre-verbal, so you end up feeling lonely a lot of the time. I would think that moms would flock to each other like toddlers flock to the one thing in the house their parents forgot to baby-proof. But no. It turns out that most moms don't mix. When I lived in Athens, GA, it wasn't so hard. I'd figured it out. I'd spy a mom fiddling with her Maya baby wrap next to the sensory play area, sidle up to her, and hit her with my opening conversational gambit: "What's your position on ancient grains?" And thus would begin a heartfelt conversation about Quinoa and Amaranth and what cereals they prefer. But I didn't really care what we were talking about. I just cared that we were talking. So I was anxious when I moved out of Athens to the tiny town of High Shoals. It's just over the border from Oconee County, and most moms in Oconee County don't talk about ancient grains. They talk about things I don't have any experience with and thus can't comment on, like who is their favorite area aesthetician. (The last time I had anything resembling a facial was when I fell asleep in the middle of feeding the dogs and woke up with one of them licking my face). Oconee moms talk about where they're spending their family's spring break ("not Destin"), and how Grayson was just robbed at the regional gymnastics finals. Oconee County is very affluent, and very conservative. You still can't get a beer there on Sundays, but at least the Zaxby's drive-through stays open til 10 pm. Nonetheless, I resolved to try to make new mom friends. I practiced smiling in the mirror and repeating "What's your home church?" (my new conversation starter) until there was only a hint of crazy-eye brought on by sleep deprivation. I worked on not making sweeping generalizations about people based on what county they live in. I reminded myself to brush my teeth and my hair every morning, instead of on alternating days like I usually do. Finally, shortly after Christmas, I was ready to go. Now, at the same time all of this introspection about friend-making was going on, my oldest girl asked me for a puppy. I told her no and she went away. Then two days later she came back with a compromise: "How about a rat?" Probably most folks consider "provide a rat-free environment for your children to live in" to be up there with other parenting dictates like "don't feed your baby Jagermeister." These are rules that are so obvious that they don't even bear mentioning. But when Sadie asked for a rat, I thought back to what happened when my teenaged self and friends watched the punk-rock adolescent classic "Suburbia." Inspired by a character who had a tame rat as a pet, several of my friends rushed out and secured rats for themselves. They would carry them around in the pockets of their leather jackets when they went to the mall to ask an adult to buy clove cigarettes for them. These rats, I remembered, were well-mannered, good-natured varmints. A quick look on the web confirmed my memories. Rats, the internet assured me, are smart, and social. They are friendly, and loyal, and can be trained to learn their names and do tricks. If you aren't squicked out by the naked, scaly tail, the bulging genitalia, the beady eyes and twitching whiskers, and the general association of rats with things like plague and death, a rat might be just the thing for you. My husband was not enthusiastic about this plan, mainly because one of his morning rituals is going out to check the trap in our chicken coop to see what predator was snared overnight. Sometimes he'll come in in the morning with a possum in the trap, or even a black snake. But usually, it's a rat. "Robin," he said, trying to sound reasonable, "Please don't go out and voluntarily purchase more vermin. We have plenty of rats right here." He pointed at the hissing, red-eyed rodent trying to gnaw its way out of the cage he'd just carried in from the coop. "Yeah, but those rats are different," I said, hoping he wouldn't ask me why. "Why?" he said. "It's exactly the same thing. It's a rat." "Well..." I said, trying to stall. "Not really. See, this is an outdoor rat. We're getting an indoor one. Plus, these rats are free. The rat I'm going to get costs $18." My husband loves me, and he loves Sadie. But mainly, he's tired. And so eventually Sadie got her rat. Honey lived happily in Sadie's room in his 3-tiered Rat Palace, and every day I would take time out from soothing the infant and wrestling with the 3-year-old to play with the rat, something the pet store warned I had to do if I wanted to socialize him."Time to coddle the rat," I'd announce to the children, disappearing up the stairs to Sadie's room. I'd take Honey out of his cage and scratch his neck and ears. I'd hold him in my palm and encourage him to climb up my arm to my shoulder. I'd turn on Sadie's radio and the two of us would listen to Katy Perry together. Eventually, as Honey grew, I started taking him downstairs on brief field trips. I'd put him in the sleeve of my sweater, down by my wrist. If I kept my arm bent he would rest there contentedly, and eventually I would become embroiled in making baby food or putting away toys and would completely forget that I had a rather large rat in my sleeve. One afternoon in January, Sadie suggested that we visit a park in Oconee County. We got ourselves ready and, as we were heading out the door, Sadie stopped and said, "Hey, why don't we bring Honey?" I agreed and so Sadie cleaned out one of her purses and stuffed Honey inside. When we got to the park, I decided it would not be safe for Sadie to run around on the playground with a bag full of rat (I do have some standards), so I offered to put Honey in my sleeve. She handed over the rat, which settled in the sleeve of my v-neck sweater, and ran off to play. At first, we were alone on the playground. But after a while a mini-van pulled into the parking lot and a mom and her daughter climbed out. The daughter was the same age as Sadie, and they began enthusiastically playing together as soon as the girl hit the playground. I stood on the other side of the jungle gym from the other mom, wishing I had some of my daughter's friend-making mojo. Then I remembered my resolution. "This could be it," I realized, watching the other mom through the slats in the climbing structure. "This could be my new mom friend." I remembered that if I wanted to enlarge my social circle and meet people in this new town, I'd have to invest some energy and take some risks. I remembered what I had told myself about being friendly and open and willing to meet someone where they are. I remembered all of those things. Sadly, I forgot that I had a rat in my sleeve. I circled around the jungle gym closer to the other mom, trying to make it look like I was moving just to get a better view of my kid. When I was close enough to her to not have to yell, I gave her a big, friendly smile, and said "Our kids seem to enjoy playing together." "They sure do!" said the other mom, brightly. She smiled, too, and the conversation with my first Oconee County mom was launched. "How old is she? Oh, mine too! What school does she go to? Does she like it? Yes, we do live close by. We just moved. You grew up here? Seems like a nice place." Outside, I was engaging in normal-sounding small talk. But inside, I was rejoicing. "I'm doing it!" I thought. "I'm having a normal conversation with another adult! I'm not crying, or babbling, or forgetting where in the sentence I am! I'm just a few more comments away from suggesting our kids meet up at the library some time, and when I do that, she'll say sure, and she'll have to come to the library, too, since her kid is only six and can't drive, and then we'll see each other again and then Bam! Mom friends! Yahoo!" I decided to close the deal. I said, as casually as possible, "It's great that our kids are having so much fun together. Do you guys ever do any of the afternoon art things at the library?" The other mom smiled and said, "Yes, we...do. We do go there sometimes." "Great!" I said. But things were not great. Something had happened in between my question about the library and her response. I didn't know what it was, exactly, but I could sense it. The other mom was still smiling, still making eye-contact with me. But something had changed. I replayed the conversation in my head. The slight pause in her answer to my question about the library. "Yes, we...do." Her eyes had flicked away from my face and down to my chest for a split second -- just a momentary glance -- before meeting mine again. I'd seen her do it but had thought nothing of it, because she'd looked back at me and finished answering. And she was still looking at me, her face absolutely calm and straight and normal. Nothing bad was happening. She was still standing there, probably waiting for me to suggest a meeting. So what was the problem? As surreptitiously as possible (which was not at all, since she was standing 2 feet away from me, watching my face) I dropped my own eyes down to my chest. And then I understood. Honey, the rat who was so at home in my sweater sleeve that I often forgot he was there, had crawled up my sleeve and around to the front, and was now poking his head out of the point in the "v" of my v-neck sweater. Looking at it from my perspective, I'm just a mom who is trying to make a new friend and who also happens to have a rat crawling around in her sweater. What's the big deal? But from her perspective? I can hear her standing in her kitchen, staring into a big glass of red wine and telling it to her husband. "A woman tried to talk to me at the park today, but there was a rat in her sweater, so..." I looked up from the trembling pink nose and sharp eyes of the rodent poking out of my cleavage and into the face of the woman I was never, ever going to be friends with. I had absolutely no idea what etiquette was called for in this situation. Should I acknowledge what was happening with a breezy "oh, ha, don't worry, he's tame"? Or should I feign surprise, and act as shocked as she? "Oh my gosh," I could shriek, batting at my sweater, "How did that get in there?" Was it worse to be the kind of person who puts vermin in her sweater on purpose? Or the kind who gets fully dressed without realizing there's a rat loose in her clothing? I couldn't decide. Because this is the South -- the place where one's darkest character failings are met with a sweet "bless your heart!" -- the other mom didn't do what some other moms might have done (e.g., pepper spray me while calling Child Protective Services). Instead, she decided to do the polite thing, and pretend that our casual conversation hadn't just been interrupted by the appearance of a clothing rodent. She stood there, her serene expression belying the tsunami of WTF? probably roiling in her head, and exchanged a few more banal pleasantries with me. Taking my cue from her, I also tried to ignore the rat, who had crawled down to the waist of my sweater and now nestled there like a distended appendix. "Well," I said finally, "I guess we'd better get on home." All the other things I wanted to say -- "Maybe we'll see each other again!" "It was great talking to you!" -- felt like chalk in my mouth as I walked with my daughter to the mini-van. "That girl was really nice!" said Sadie, climbing in her booster seat. "Maybe we could meet her here again." "Maybe so," I said, reaching under my sweater and extracting Honey. He thrashed and twisted as I inserted him into the purse Sadie had brought along. "We could play with Honey, maybe," Sadie said as I started the van. "Do you think she likes rats too?" "I don't know, Bean," I sighed. Should I tell her that, no, she probably doesn't like rats very much at all. Should I tell her that if she wants to be accepted in her new town, she needs to lose the rat and turn her face to more normal little-girl pursuits, like weaving bracelets out those damn rubber band circles? Should I tell her that the weird things she loves are the very same things that will make her lonely? The way her mom sometimes is? "I don't know," I said again. "But I'll tell you what. If you find a person who likes both you and your rat, you snag 'em, OK? That's when you know you've found a friend." I pulled the car out of the lot and drove myself, my daughter, and our pet rat back home. |
2024.05.16 15:27 xfallenangelx95 28F [L] [O] Seeking emotional support and highly empathetic people.I would love to find someone who doesn't judge others or make fun of them.It's very Important to have someone to rely on :) I'm here for conversations with emotionally mature people who don't have friends and need someone to talk to
(Only Europe, Please) - short note - If you're not into reading or receiving long messages,don't read any further + Please If you don't want to read everything because of my post being too long for you & instead of reading It all - ..skip some parts - find another person to talk to.Let's respect each other and our free time. All people criticizing/making fun of me & other people - will be blocked.Pretty much as people questioning my post and giving me unsolicited advice.I'm not here for any conflicts and I know I can't please everyone - I know I never will.. However It's me who should feel comfortable in my new potential friendship & obviously someone who wants to be my friend - not the whole world.. which is why I don't need any advice from people who don't even want to be a part of my life. The amount of rude people on Reddit always criticizing others and making fun of them is unbelievably high but let me tell you something - NEVER let anyone make choices for you and criticize you only because you're different! Always fight for your dreams and never let anyone make you think you're worthless! It's your life and you're the one deciding what's best for you - If you want to judge me despite not even wanting to talk to me or give me advice better block me! I'm an adult woman and I make all decisions on my own.I'm not trying to "fit in" and be like everyone else - just to get more attention.Accept me for who I am or let go - is my motto.
★
🤍
Hello guys! 🙂 (read everything before you decide to send me a message) Please send me a message ONLY If you're in the same situation and If your expectations are the same as mine.I want to find like minded people from Europe (Why Europe? Read my post to find out) I'm looking for something permanent (remember - you can feel lonely even If you're surrounded by others - If there's no emotional bond) I'm fed up of meeting people who never make time for me & only text me once or twice a week to ask me "what are you up to?" Out of boredom.I don't want to meet people asking others a million of questions like "what's your favorite movie?" Just to give them one word answer and ask them another question "and music? Your favorite song?" I'm looking for something "deeper" & different 🙂
★
🤍
What kind of friend would I like to find? Someone to talk to on a daily basis - Someone who needs It & wants It just as much as me
🤍
What are my expectations? I would like to meet someone in a similar situation – why? Because I honestly feel like only a person with the same expectations and a similar outlook on life would get along with me & because I feel more comfortable talking to people like me..Friendless people who need a strong bond - people without friends and partners.. Don't get me wrong…Most people deserve to be happy and It's good to have friends but people who have friends or families in real life are usually more focused on them (which is completely understandable) & have less time for others + I simply don't want to be replaced by anyone..I kind of envy people who can call others , true friends given I don't have an emotional bond with any of my acquaintances. Please send me a message only If you're not In a relationship and don't have friends for the same reasons I've already mentioned before
★
🤍
Whenever I hear that others have friends I simply get sad because (believe it or not) If I had to choose between 20 people to talk to (acquaintances) and one special person - I'd choose that one special person without any hesitation .
★
🤍
I also want to talk to others every day because..I want to see someone’s effort & be someone's first choice - not another person to have random conversations with..some people ask me "Why do you want to talk to people from Europe?" Well..Because I would like to see someone I'd get along with - In the far future - face to face :) + I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to receive a message - waiting 6 hours to receive a message is more than enough
★
🤍
I'm by no means criticizing people who don't want to talk to others often / People who really are super busy & People who want to find someone to have unimportant conversations with - I'm aware that not everyone has the same expectations which is why everything you're reading now - is here for a reason :) All I'm suggesting is - I don't want anything temporary and I don't want to be the one always giving more than receiving.Listen people - I used to ignore being..ignored by others..always being just an option to talk to during tough times or moments of boredom.I was too young to realize that I was never important enough for most people that were a part of my life. I don't know who needs to hear this but..No one is too busy to make time for you! People make excuses to avoid others because they prioritize everything and (maybe) everyone..over them. It's true that most people are busy - but It takes only a few seconds to start a conversation (If you're into short messages) and a few minutes (1-10/15) to type a long message . Don't let anyone lie to you.
★
🤍
Truth is that most people either don't like you enough to make time for you or just simply - feel no need to talk to others often but are they too busy? No..You don't need to send me a message just to ask me and tell me "Do you really want to talk every day? I like long messages but I can't promise to contact you often" If you really are unsure please don't send me a message.I don't need more acquaintances aka people to talk to - occasionally.
🤍
I'm not trying to sound rude but conversations once or twice a week wouldn't be enough for me and I don't need them... Let me tell you one thing – A true friend would never just give up on you for no reason :) It’s always possible to find someone to have a random conversation with – someone willing to send you one message once or twice a week..but..It’s almost impossible to find people willing to make more time for you.
★
🤍
I’m not asking a busy person to make time for me by changing some plans! Absolutely not! I’m here to find someone who wants to talk daily (throughout the day or maybe even night) of one’s own will.Someone looking for the same kind of connection.Strong friendships are based on mutual support. One of the best things you can do for a friend in need, is just to be there for them when they want to talk.I often see posts from people who always say how friendless they are because they don't feel loved or appreciated by their "friends" remember! A true friend - someone who truly likes you or someone who wants to get to know you - will always find time for you.
★
🤍
I'm not interested in small talk/short messages - I love long and meaningful conversations. It's so easy to find someone who loves abbreviations and questions like "How are you?" How was your day? Or what are you interested in? But so hard/almost impossible to find a person who knows how to keep a conversation going & show others some effort.Building and maintaining friendships takes time and effort.Never allow pursuits or possessions to become bigger priorities than your relations with other people.Close friendships are so important to us because they are so difficult to form + Having friends can help you feel as if you belong to something that brings purpose and connection to your life
🤍
• I do NOT respond to any „Hey,hmu” or „u want to talk?” type of messages (super short messages or messages full of abbreviations – I literally can’t stand abbreviations and acronyms in text messages) ALL messages full of abbreviations will immediately be ignored.I also don't like it when people ignore everything I say in private messages just to focus on a random question or? When they start talking only about themselves and don't ever ask me anything. I love conversations with people referring to everything I say...I want everything I say and do - to be reciprocated
🤍
• No NSFW profiles (checking mental health subreddits NOT included as I'm a huge empath and always try to understand others) - Please! I'm not looking for anyone to flirt with and I'm not looking for a partner either. I always check people's profiles (even comment history) - To avoid guys, trying to get inappropriate pictures from adult women or? flirt with them + I don't want to see you with no clothes on so If you're on Reddit only because you want others to see what's underneath your clothes - I'm not for you! I just simply don't want to see any s e x related activity on your profile If you want to talk to me.
🤍
• If both of us (you and I) are from the same country (I live in a non-English speaking country) - I want to communicate with you in our first language! No - Not because I don't understand English - because as you see - I do. Why then? English is simply overrated and people don't appreciate other languages as much as they should. So.. If we're from the same country and you want to talk only in English (which is quite common on reddit) - Talk to someone else. I just don't want to talk to a person from the same country as mine - in a foreign language as It's just something I don't understand even If all you want is to improve your language skills
🤍
• Please only adult people 18-36 (age range) It doesn't matter to me If you're younger or older than me (as long as you're not underage) So.. don't worry! I just want to have discussions with emotionally mature people :)
🤍
• I don’t respond to messages I don’t find interesting even If they're long - If after receiving and reading your message I don't feel comfortable or think "I wouldn't get along with him/her" I simply do not respond (what I’m suggesting is that I don’t always respond to someone’s first or second message because..sometimes you just know If you’d get along with someone or not- I’d never ignore anyone after days or weeks of daily conversations though) just because I don’t want to do anything forcefully & because I don’t want to lead anyone on. I read all messages but I definitely don't respond to all of them! I want to make it clear because I don't want to be accused of not responding and not reading people's messages! - Some people don't message me back as well and even If It's a bit disappointing I'm ok with that! - as long as there's no emotional bond - Not responding to someone's first or second message Is completely OK! If people think they wouldn't get along with a stranger - is there a reason to start a conversation? I don't think so. I can't stand being ignored after days or weeks of daily conversations and seeing people changing priorities over time.. but that's something different - something I don't want to go through ever again for real. If I'm really interested in someone's message it's impossible to hear from me "I'm too busy" because I know myself and If I had no time for others - I wouldn't be here. I don't want to pretend someone I'm not and always try to find some cheap excuses to avoid others. (unlike most people who don't want to talk to others)
🤍
• Don’t ask me “Can you tell me something about yourself?” If you really want to get to know me - you can ask me questions :) I'm an open book.
🤍
• It would be better If you guys were into emojis - like me - to describe your emotions In text messages. Two emojis - 🙂 and 🙁 are completely enough! I just don't like emotionless conversations.I also don't like it when people say "yeah" or yea"as it sounds dismissively. First impression Is everything to me! I want to see your kindness even in a text message - Emojis are very helpful to express your emotions.I don't want to meet people who say "crying Is a weakness" - It's OK to cry even If you're a guy!
🤍
• I want to talk on reddit first (just to make sure If I'd get along with you) before moving to Discord or some other app
🤍
• I would rather talk to a homebody - not another person who always has something to do as people who are very busy don't even have time for daily conversations
🤍
• If you're another person interested only in "childish conversations" such as "HEYOOO! I'M BORED! Ya like Pizza or cheese? xDDDD 🤣" I'm begging you! Don't send me a message.I'm not a child anymore and such messages don't make me smile or laugh.I'm looking for someone interested In serious discussions - not another person just seeking some entertainment out of boredom . Conversations with sarcastic undertones (even when It comes to some emojis such as 🤣😂) are not for me. Your typing style matters to me! Why? when It comes to online conversations with someone new - It's not always possible to know If someone Is laughing at you.. or with you. Let me tell you something else! Jokes about cancer, disabilities and death are UNACCEPTABLE to me. If you find joy In someone else's misfortune you are not a person I want to know.
🤍
• Time response matters to me a lot! I would never ask anyone to be online all day long and I'm NOT asking any of you for any instant messaging as I'm someone who would rather wait an hour or two to receive a proper response instead of some short and pointless messages but I'm interested only in daily conversations and I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to get a message from you.I don't need unbelievably long messages either! Messages as long as the second paragraph of my post - are completely enough. If you like longer messages? you can send me a longer message, but If you want to send me one word or one sentence as a response to my post - don't expect a reaction from me. I don't want to come across as rude - I just don't want to waste your time
🤍
• I'm strongly AGAINST picking on people you don't even want to chat with - and making fun of them! I can't stand people who criticize others publicly or make fun of them! (only because they disagree with someone they don't even know) There's no place In my life for someone using Reddit, to hurt other people
🤍
• I'm not into foul language and I definitely don't want to talk to people who swear a lot...
🤍
• I want to meet assertive people who know what they want and always stand up for their friends
🤍
• I want to meet someone willing to call me In the future, someone spontaneously sending me pictures of animals or food, et cetera. I want more than just text conversations.. 🌻
🤍
Why can’t you see any of my hobbies listed down below? Because what really matters to me is..who you are (If you’re honest, talkative ,understanding, caring and trustworthy – for example) just simply – It matters to me what you’re like! not what you like.Don’t get me wrong – you can tell me what your hobbies are but from my point of view - people's hobbies are important - If you want to find a gaming buddy or If you want to meet someone to hang out with in real life and..go bowling for example.What most people seem to care about are other people's passions – I don’t. I get along with other people despite having completely different hobbies but I absolutely don’t get along with people way different than me (different expectations and outlook on life – way different sense of humor or personality traits – It’s just an example) It doesn't make ANY DIFFERENCE to me If you're a gamer or? Someone interested in photography! It doesn't make any difference - > as long as you're talkative and kind and If you also want to find someone willing to stay in your life..for good - But If you're into small talk and all you want is to...type and receive super short messages or If you're here only because you're bored and don't know what to do + If you're a very sarcastic person - I'm definitely not for you! I don't get along with overly sarcastic people turning everything into a joke. Friendships should be natural – not forced. I wouldn't get along with people who laugh at everything.. In my opinion most people are way too sarcastic.. It's quite sad... Sarcasm can also be another form of passive-aggressive behavior.
★
🤍
People who want to be to friends should feel comfortable and have something in common. No - not necessarily a similar taste in music or movies but something else..Most friendships don't fizzle out because of people not having the same hobbies but..because they just simply have different expectations when It comes to something important.I'm not here out of boredom and trust me - I'm not here to meet as many people as possible.I choose quality over quantity.I highly value myself and my time & Sometimes one person but a person who makes you feel comfortable and understood - is more than enough :) We ALL can choose what kind of people we’d like to talk to and maybe even become really good friends with and I? I don’t want anyone to be disappointed.We all have some expectations after all.I know that people don't have to talk as often as possible in order to become friends but I'm interested only in daily conversations. If you really need someone to talk to due to loneliness and If you have time to talk to me daily (throughout the day and maybe even night) I always make time for others.I'm literally always available.I could even stay up all night long only to talk to someone important to me. I’m ready to commit but only If there’s some chemistry between me and someone else.I don’t do anything forcefully.
★
🤍
If you want to talk to me tell me your story - tell me why you're here, what kind of friend would you like to meet :) Et cetera.Such messages are way more interesting to me than...someone's long list of hobbies. I know! It's unusual on reddit but I don't make friends based on hobbies..I want to meet someone with the same mindset as mine to finally feel understood and get close to someone new. You can share your problems with me - I absolutely don't mind "complaining" as I've been through a lot in my life.What do people usually tell you when you tell them that something's wrong? "Don't complain" or "Life's not over yet - one day you'll be happy" or "There are worse situations than yours" and..obviously "Find a therapist" Life's not a fairytale and sometimes things don't go as planned.Emotions shouldn't be bottled up.I'm sick of people always telling others "everything's gonna be ok" move on " & more..Trust me people - not everyone wants to hear "Just believe in yourself and everything's gonna be ok" Some people take it as reassurance - but others? They would rather hear something different 🙁Imagine being told that things will be okay, only for them to get worse..Do you guys know why telling someone "everything's gonna be ok" Is wrong? Because you can't see the future.
★
🤍
You can't guarantee others that one day they'll finally be happy + when It comes to social interactions - We're responsible only for ourselves - not others & as you guys know people let us down quite often (sometimes even when there's no reason) so instead of telling people how they should move on, forget everything and be happy or asking them to find a therapist - be there for them! Always be willing to listen to them If you really like them or want to get to know them & don't suggest everyone in a tough situation to find a therapist because even the best therapist won't ever replace a true friend + It's quite normal to be disappointed If people always do something to hurt you. Sharing your hardships with other people in a very similar situation or exactly the same one - is VERY helpful If the other person understands you & wants to start all over by just letting it all out! Feeling emotional support instead of always hearing some "positive quotes" or someone saying "Stop complaining let's talk about something else - Is very important! "Everyone needs a shoulder to cry on. I appreciate sensitive people who always try to understand others. If after hearing a sad story all you want to say is "forget the past and move on" you're not for me. It's important to be a good listener and provide emotional support to others
★
🤍
Please - If you're a completely different person than the described type of person I'm looking for (If you love abbreviations,If you don't need a stable friendship, If you're sarcastic and quiet) or If you simply disagree with my post - don't force yourself to send me a message.I want my new potential friendship to be natural which is why I want you to contact me only If your needs are the same - I don't want you to pretend someone you're not - only to please me - Pretending to be someone you're not - is the worst.I want to finally be happy again & find someone "always" wanting to talk - sending me random pictures throughout the day - food pictures or pictures of some animals. What is the most important to me? I want to find people who value online friendships as much as they would value real life ones as there's another human being on the other side
★
🤍
No comments please.Only Private messages and chat requests 🌺
I know It's possible to meet people with exactly the same expectations as mine but It's just not easy because most people are Interested In temporary and entertaining conversations. People like me are just "different" I really want to finally find someone who loves emojis as much as I do.. someone who loves sweet, warm and serious discussions at the same time. Emojis really do - change conversations 😊
submitted by xfallenangelx95 to KindVoice [link] [comments]
★
🤍
Hello guys! 🙂 (read everything before you decide to send me a message) Please send me a message ONLY If you're in the same situation and If your expectations are the same as mine.I want to find like minded people from Europe (Why Europe? Read my post to find out) I'm looking for something permanent (remember - you can feel lonely even If you're surrounded by others - If there's no emotional bond) I'm fed up of meeting people who never make time for me & only text me once or twice a week to ask me "what are you up to?" Out of boredom.I don't want to meet people asking others a million of questions like "what's your favorite movie?" Just to give them one word answer and ask them another question "and music? Your favorite song?" I'm looking for something "deeper" & different 🙂
★
🤍
What kind of friend would I like to find? Someone to talk to on a daily basis - Someone who needs It & wants It just as much as me
🤍
What are my expectations? I would like to meet someone in a similar situation – why? Because I honestly feel like only a person with the same expectations and a similar outlook on life would get along with me & because I feel more comfortable talking to people like me..Friendless people who need a strong bond - people without friends and partners.. Don't get me wrong…Most people deserve to be happy and It's good to have friends but people who have friends or families in real life are usually more focused on them (which is completely understandable) & have less time for others + I simply don't want to be replaced by anyone..I kind of envy people who can call others , true friends given I don't have an emotional bond with any of my acquaintances. Please send me a message only If you're not In a relationship and don't have friends for the same reasons I've already mentioned before
★
🤍
Whenever I hear that others have friends I simply get sad because (believe it or not) If I had to choose between 20 people to talk to (acquaintances) and one special person - I'd choose that one special person without any hesitation .
★
🤍
I also want to talk to others every day because..I want to see someone’s effort & be someone's first choice - not another person to have random conversations with..some people ask me "Why do you want to talk to people from Europe?" Well..Because I would like to see someone I'd get along with - In the far future - face to face :) + I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to receive a message - waiting 6 hours to receive a message is more than enough
★
🤍
I'm by no means criticizing people who don't want to talk to others often / People who really are super busy & People who want to find someone to have unimportant conversations with - I'm aware that not everyone has the same expectations which is why everything you're reading now - is here for a reason :) All I'm suggesting is - I don't want anything temporary and I don't want to be the one always giving more than receiving.Listen people - I used to ignore being..ignored by others..always being just an option to talk to during tough times or moments of boredom.I was too young to realize that I was never important enough for most people that were a part of my life. I don't know who needs to hear this but..No one is too busy to make time for you! People make excuses to avoid others because they prioritize everything and (maybe) everyone..over them. It's true that most people are busy - but It takes only a few seconds to start a conversation (If you're into short messages) and a few minutes (1-10/15) to type a long message . Don't let anyone lie to you.
★
🤍
Truth is that most people either don't like you enough to make time for you or just simply - feel no need to talk to others often but are they too busy? No..You don't need to send me a message just to ask me and tell me "Do you really want to talk every day? I like long messages but I can't promise to contact you often" If you really are unsure please don't send me a message.I don't need more acquaintances aka people to talk to - occasionally.
🤍
I'm not trying to sound rude but conversations once or twice a week wouldn't be enough for me and I don't need them... Let me tell you one thing – A true friend would never just give up on you for no reason :) It’s always possible to find someone to have a random conversation with – someone willing to send you one message once or twice a week..but..It’s almost impossible to find people willing to make more time for you.
★
🤍
I’m not asking a busy person to make time for me by changing some plans! Absolutely not! I’m here to find someone who wants to talk daily (throughout the day or maybe even night) of one’s own will.Someone looking for the same kind of connection.Strong friendships are based on mutual support. One of the best things you can do for a friend in need, is just to be there for them when they want to talk.I often see posts from people who always say how friendless they are because they don't feel loved or appreciated by their "friends" remember! A true friend - someone who truly likes you or someone who wants to get to know you - will always find time for you.
★
🤍
I'm not interested in small talk/short messages - I love long and meaningful conversations. It's so easy to find someone who loves abbreviations and questions like "How are you?" How was your day? Or what are you interested in? But so hard/almost impossible to find a person who knows how to keep a conversation going & show others some effort.Building and maintaining friendships takes time and effort.Never allow pursuits or possessions to become bigger priorities than your relations with other people.Close friendships are so important to us because they are so difficult to form + Having friends can help you feel as if you belong to something that brings purpose and connection to your life
🤍
• I do NOT respond to any „Hey,hmu” or „u want to talk?” type of messages (super short messages or messages full of abbreviations – I literally can’t stand abbreviations and acronyms in text messages) ALL messages full of abbreviations will immediately be ignored.I also don't like it when people ignore everything I say in private messages just to focus on a random question or? When they start talking only about themselves and don't ever ask me anything. I love conversations with people referring to everything I say...I want everything I say and do - to be reciprocated
🤍
• No NSFW profiles (checking mental health subreddits NOT included as I'm a huge empath and always try to understand others) - Please! I'm not looking for anyone to flirt with and I'm not looking for a partner either. I always check people's profiles (even comment history) - To avoid guys, trying to get inappropriate pictures from adult women or? flirt with them + I don't want to see you with no clothes on so If you're on Reddit only because you want others to see what's underneath your clothes - I'm not for you! I just simply don't want to see any s e x related activity on your profile If you want to talk to me.
🤍
• If both of us (you and I) are from the same country (I live in a non-English speaking country) - I want to communicate with you in our first language! No - Not because I don't understand English - because as you see - I do. Why then? English is simply overrated and people don't appreciate other languages as much as they should. So.. If we're from the same country and you want to talk only in English (which is quite common on reddit) - Talk to someone else. I just don't want to talk to a person from the same country as mine - in a foreign language as It's just something I don't understand even If all you want is to improve your language skills
🤍
• Please only adult people 18-36 (age range) It doesn't matter to me If you're younger or older than me (as long as you're not underage) So.. don't worry! I just want to have discussions with emotionally mature people :)
🤍
• I don’t respond to messages I don’t find interesting even If they're long - If after receiving and reading your message I don't feel comfortable or think "I wouldn't get along with him/her" I simply do not respond (what I’m suggesting is that I don’t always respond to someone’s first or second message because..sometimes you just know If you’d get along with someone or not- I’d never ignore anyone after days or weeks of daily conversations though) just because I don’t want to do anything forcefully & because I don’t want to lead anyone on. I read all messages but I definitely don't respond to all of them! I want to make it clear because I don't want to be accused of not responding and not reading people's messages! - Some people don't message me back as well and even If It's a bit disappointing I'm ok with that! - as long as there's no emotional bond - Not responding to someone's first or second message Is completely OK! If people think they wouldn't get along with a stranger - is there a reason to start a conversation? I don't think so. I can't stand being ignored after days or weeks of daily conversations and seeing people changing priorities over time.. but that's something different - something I don't want to go through ever again for real. If I'm really interested in someone's message it's impossible to hear from me "I'm too busy" because I know myself and If I had no time for others - I wouldn't be here. I don't want to pretend someone I'm not and always try to find some cheap excuses to avoid others. (unlike most people who don't want to talk to others)
🤍
• Don’t ask me “Can you tell me something about yourself?” If you really want to get to know me - you can ask me questions :) I'm an open book.
🤍
• It would be better If you guys were into emojis - like me - to describe your emotions In text messages. Two emojis - 🙂 and 🙁 are completely enough! I just don't like emotionless conversations.I also don't like it when people say "yeah" or yea"as it sounds dismissively. First impression Is everything to me! I want to see your kindness even in a text message - Emojis are very helpful to express your emotions.I don't want to meet people who say "crying Is a weakness" - It's OK to cry even If you're a guy!
🤍
• I want to talk on reddit first (just to make sure If I'd get along with you) before moving to Discord or some other app
🤍
• I would rather talk to a homebody - not another person who always has something to do as people who are very busy don't even have time for daily conversations
🤍
• If you're another person interested only in "childish conversations" such as "HEYOOO! I'M BORED! Ya like Pizza or cheese? xDDDD 🤣" I'm begging you! Don't send me a message.I'm not a child anymore and such messages don't make me smile or laugh.I'm looking for someone interested In serious discussions - not another person just seeking some entertainment out of boredom . Conversations with sarcastic undertones (even when It comes to some emojis such as 🤣😂) are not for me. Your typing style matters to me! Why? when It comes to online conversations with someone new - It's not always possible to know If someone Is laughing at you.. or with you. Let me tell you something else! Jokes about cancer, disabilities and death are UNACCEPTABLE to me. If you find joy In someone else's misfortune you are not a person I want to know.
🤍
• Time response matters to me a lot! I would never ask anyone to be online all day long and I'm NOT asking any of you for any instant messaging as I'm someone who would rather wait an hour or two to receive a proper response instead of some short and pointless messages but I'm interested only in daily conversations and I don't want to wait any longer than 6 hours to get a message from you.I don't need unbelievably long messages either! Messages as long as the second paragraph of my post - are completely enough. If you like longer messages? you can send me a longer message, but If you want to send me one word or one sentence as a response to my post - don't expect a reaction from me. I don't want to come across as rude - I just don't want to waste your time
🤍
• I'm strongly AGAINST picking on people you don't even want to chat with - and making fun of them! I can't stand people who criticize others publicly or make fun of them! (only because they disagree with someone they don't even know) There's no place In my life for someone using Reddit, to hurt other people
🤍
• I'm not into foul language and I definitely don't want to talk to people who swear a lot...
🤍
• I want to meet assertive people who know what they want and always stand up for their friends
🤍
• I want to meet someone willing to call me In the future, someone spontaneously sending me pictures of animals or food, et cetera. I want more than just text conversations.. 🌻
🤍
Why can’t you see any of my hobbies listed down below? Because what really matters to me is..who you are (If you’re honest, talkative ,understanding, caring and trustworthy – for example) just simply – It matters to me what you’re like! not what you like.Don’t get me wrong – you can tell me what your hobbies are but from my point of view - people's hobbies are important - If you want to find a gaming buddy or If you want to meet someone to hang out with in real life and..go bowling for example.What most people seem to care about are other people's passions – I don’t. I get along with other people despite having completely different hobbies but I absolutely don’t get along with people way different than me (different expectations and outlook on life – way different sense of humor or personality traits – It’s just an example) It doesn't make ANY DIFFERENCE to me If you're a gamer or? Someone interested in photography! It doesn't make any difference - > as long as you're talkative and kind and If you also want to find someone willing to stay in your life..for good - But If you're into small talk and all you want is to...type and receive super short messages or If you're here only because you're bored and don't know what to do + If you're a very sarcastic person - I'm definitely not for you! I don't get along with overly sarcastic people turning everything into a joke. Friendships should be natural – not forced. I wouldn't get along with people who laugh at everything.. In my opinion most people are way too sarcastic.. It's quite sad... Sarcasm can also be another form of passive-aggressive behavior.
★
🤍
People who want to be to friends should feel comfortable and have something in common. No - not necessarily a similar taste in music or movies but something else..Most friendships don't fizzle out because of people not having the same hobbies but..because they just simply have different expectations when It comes to something important.I'm not here out of boredom and trust me - I'm not here to meet as many people as possible.I choose quality over quantity.I highly value myself and my time & Sometimes one person but a person who makes you feel comfortable and understood - is more than enough :) We ALL can choose what kind of people we’d like to talk to and maybe even become really good friends with and I? I don’t want anyone to be disappointed.We all have some expectations after all.I know that people don't have to talk as often as possible in order to become friends but I'm interested only in daily conversations. If you really need someone to talk to due to loneliness and If you have time to talk to me daily (throughout the day and maybe even night) I always make time for others.I'm literally always available.I could even stay up all night long only to talk to someone important to me. I’m ready to commit but only If there’s some chemistry between me and someone else.I don’t do anything forcefully.
★
🤍
If you want to talk to me tell me your story - tell me why you're here, what kind of friend would you like to meet :) Et cetera.Such messages are way more interesting to me than...someone's long list of hobbies. I know! It's unusual on reddit but I don't make friends based on hobbies..I want to meet someone with the same mindset as mine to finally feel understood and get close to someone new. You can share your problems with me - I absolutely don't mind "complaining" as I've been through a lot in my life.What do people usually tell you when you tell them that something's wrong? "Don't complain" or "Life's not over yet - one day you'll be happy" or "There are worse situations than yours" and..obviously "Find a therapist" Life's not a fairytale and sometimes things don't go as planned.Emotions shouldn't be bottled up.I'm sick of people always telling others "everything's gonna be ok" move on " & more..Trust me people - not everyone wants to hear "Just believe in yourself and everything's gonna be ok" Some people take it as reassurance - but others? They would rather hear something different 🙁Imagine being told that things will be okay, only for them to get worse..Do you guys know why telling someone "everything's gonna be ok" Is wrong? Because you can't see the future.
★
🤍
You can't guarantee others that one day they'll finally be happy + when It comes to social interactions - We're responsible only for ourselves - not others & as you guys know people let us down quite often (sometimes even when there's no reason) so instead of telling people how they should move on, forget everything and be happy or asking them to find a therapist - be there for them! Always be willing to listen to them If you really like them or want to get to know them & don't suggest everyone in a tough situation to find a therapist because even the best therapist won't ever replace a true friend + It's quite normal to be disappointed If people always do something to hurt you. Sharing your hardships with other people in a very similar situation or exactly the same one - is VERY helpful If the other person understands you & wants to start all over by just letting it all out! Feeling emotional support instead of always hearing some "positive quotes" or someone saying "Stop complaining let's talk about something else - Is very important! "Everyone needs a shoulder to cry on. I appreciate sensitive people who always try to understand others. If after hearing a sad story all you want to say is "forget the past and move on" you're not for me. It's important to be a good listener and provide emotional support to others
★
🤍
Please - If you're a completely different person than the described type of person I'm looking for (If you love abbreviations,If you don't need a stable friendship, If you're sarcastic and quiet) or If you simply disagree with my post - don't force yourself to send me a message.I want my new potential friendship to be natural which is why I want you to contact me only If your needs are the same - I don't want you to pretend someone you're not - only to please me - Pretending to be someone you're not - is the worst.I want to finally be happy again & find someone "always" wanting to talk - sending me random pictures throughout the day - food pictures or pictures of some animals. What is the most important to me? I want to find people who value online friendships as much as they would value real life ones as there's another human being on the other side
★
🤍
No comments please.Only Private messages and chat requests 🌺
I know It's possible to meet people with exactly the same expectations as mine but It's just not easy because most people are Interested In temporary and entertaining conversations. People like me are just "different" I really want to finally find someone who loves emojis as much as I do.. someone who loves sweet, warm and serious discussions at the same time. Emojis really do - change conversations 😊
2024.05.16 15:26 Sweet-Count2557 When Should You Go On A Babymoon?
 | When Should You Go On A Babymoon? submitted by Sweet-Count2557 to worldkidstravel [link] [comments] So, you're expecting a little bundle of joy and thinking about going on a babymoon? You might be wondering when is the right time to plan this special trip. After all, pregnancy can come with its fair share of discomforts and challenges. But fear not! We're here to help you navigate through this exciting journey. Some may argue that any time during your pregnancy is suitable for a babymoon, but we believe the second trimester is the ideal window. It's a period when most pregnant women feel their best - morning sickness has likely subsided, energy levels are up, and you're not yet burdened by the additional weight gain. In this article, we will answer the question When Should You Go On A Babymoon? The short answer is the second trimester is optimal, we will cover also how to choose the perfect destination, tips for planning a relaxing getaway, activities to consider during your trip, and safety precautions you should take. So sit back, relax (if that's even possible), and let us guide you toward an unforgettable babymoon experience. Key Takeaways The second trimester is considered the ideal time to go on a babymoon. Going on a babymoon allows for prioritizing self-care and focusing on the relationship with the partner. Babymoon can have health benefits for both the mother and the baby, reducing stress and promoting a healthier pregnancy. When planning a babymoon, it is important to consider timing, destination, and budgeting for a stress-free experience. Benefits of Going on a Babymoon You should definitely go on a babymoon because it's a wonderful opportunity to relax and bond with your partner before your little one arrives! One of the most important aspects of pregnancy is taking care of yourself, both physically and mentally. Going on a babymoon allows you to prioritize self-care by taking a break from the stresses of everyday life and focusing solely on yourself and your relationship. During pregnancy, it can be easy to get caught up in all the preparations for the baby's arrival. However, it's crucial to also nurture your relationship with your partner. Going on a babymoon gives you dedicated time together, away from distractions and responsibilities. This uninterrupted bonding time allows you to reconnect as a couple, strengthening your emotional connection before becoming parents. In addition to self-care and bonding, going on a babymoon can also have numerous health benefits for both you and your baby. Studies have shown that stress during pregnancy can affect fetal development, so taking time off to relax can help promote a healthier pregnancy. Furthermore, stress reduction has been linked to better birth outcomes and lower rates of postpartum depression. Overall, going on a babymoon is not just about enjoying some well-deserved relaxation; it's also an important part of preparing for parenthood by prioritizing self-care and strengthening your partnership. So take advantage of this precious time together before the arrival of your little one and create lasting memories that will carry you through the journey ahead. Second Trimester: The Ideal Time for a Babymoon The second trimester offers the perfect opportunity to indulge in a relaxing babymoon. During this time, you're likely to have more energy and fewer pregnancy discomforts compared to the first and third trimesters. It's an ideal time for romantic getaways and spending quality time with your partner before your little one arrives. Here are three reasons why the second trimester is considered the ideal time for a babymoon: Reduced travel restrictions: Many airlines and cruise lines have restrictions on pregnant women traveling during their third trimester. By planning your babymoon during the second trimester, you can avoid any potential travel complications and enjoy your trip worry-free. Increased comfort: As your baby bump grows bigger in the third trimester, it may become uncomfortable to sit or walk for long periods of time. The second trimester allows you to fully enjoy activities such as sightseeing, hiking, or even just lounging by the pool without feeling too restricted. Emotional well-being: Pregnancy hormones can sometimes lead to mood swings and heightened emotions. Going on a babymoon during the second trimester can be beneficial for both you and your partner as it provides an opportunity to relax, connect, and strengthen your bond before entering parenthood. So take advantage of this wonderful stage of pregnancy and plan a memorable babymoon that will create lasting memories for both of you! Choosing the Perfect Babymoon Destination Imagine jetting off to a dreamy, faraway destination where you can bask in luxury and tranquility, all while nurturing your growing connection as expectant parents. Choosing the perfect babymoon destination is crucial to creating precious memories before your little one arrives. Here are some top babymoon destinations that will cater to your needs. Bora Bora: This idyllic island in French Polynesia offers breathtaking turquoise waters, overwater bungalows, and pristine beaches. It's a paradise for relaxation and rejuvenation. Santorini: Known for its stunning sunsets and white-washed buildings, this Greek island provides a romantic setting for babymoons. Explore ancient ruins or simply lounge by the pool overlooking the Aegean Sea. Bali: With its lush landscapes and serene temples, Bali is an oasis of tranquility. Indulge in luxurious spa treatments or take leisurely walks along scenic rice terraces. If you're looking for budget-friendly options, consider domestic destinations such as Sedona or Napa Valley in the US, or Tulum in Mexico. These locations offer beautiful scenery, cozy accommodations, and affordable dining options. When it comes to planning your babymoon, remember to check travel restrictions due to COVID-19 and consult with your healthcare provider regarding any safety concerns during pregnancy. Enjoy this special time together and create lasting memories before embarking on the joyous journey of parenthood! Tips for Planning a Relaxing Babymoon Jetting off to a serene destination for your babymoon can be made even more relaxing by following these helpful planning tips. Planning a babymoon involves several considerations to ensure a stress-free and enjoyable experience. Here are three important things to keep in mind when planning your trip: Timing: It is recommended to go on a babymoon during the second trimester of pregnancy when you are likely to feel more comfortable and have higher energy levels. This will also allow you to avoid any potential complications that may arise later in pregnancy. Destination: Choose a destination that offers relaxation and tranquility. Look for places with beautiful scenery, peaceful beaches, or luxurious spa resorts where you can unwind and pamper yourself before the arrival of your little one. Budgeting Tips: Set a realistic budget for your babymoon and stick to it. Consider all expenses including accommodation, transportation, meals, activities, and any additional costs such as prenatal massages or special treatments. Research deals and discounts available at your chosen destination, and consider traveling during off-peak seasons to save money. By considering these planning considerations and budgeting tips, you can ensure that your babymoon is a memorable and rejuvenating experience before embarking on the exciting journey of parenthood. Activities to Consider on Your Babymoon Consider incorporating activities such as prenatal yoga, scenic walks, and couples massages to enhance relaxation during your babymoon. These activities can provide a wonderful opportunity for you and your partner to bond and enjoy some quality time together before the arrival of your little one. If you're looking for a beach retreat, consider spending lazy days lounging on the sandy shores, soaking up the sun, and taking gentle dips in the ocean. The calming sound of waves crashing against the shore can create a serene atmosphere perfect for relaxation. Additionally, outdoor adventures like hiking or biking through scenic trails can offer a great way to connect with nature while getting some exercise. Attending prenatal yoga classes is also highly recommended during your babymoon. Not only does it help improve flexibility and strength, but it also promotes mindfulness and stress relief. You'll learn techniques that can be beneficial during pregnancy and labor. Lastly, don't forget to indulge in couples' massages. These luxurious treatments not only help alleviate any physical discomfort but also serve as an intimate experience shared between you and your partner. Overall, incorporating these activities into your babymoon will ensure a memorable experience filled with relaxation and connection with both each other and nature. Safety Precautions to Take During Your Babymoon Taking necessary safety precautions is essential for a worry-free and enjoyable babymoon experience. When planning your babymoon, one of the first things you should consider is travel insurance. It provides coverage for unexpected events such as trip cancellations, medical emergencies, or lost baggage. Having travel insurance will give you peace of mind knowing that you are protected in case anything goes wrong. Another important aspect to consider is the accessibility of medical facilities at your destination. Make sure there are adequate healthcare services available nearby in case of any pregnancy-related emergencies. Research hospitals or clinics that specialize in maternity care and find out their proximity to your accommodation. It's also crucial to check with your healthcare provider before embarking on your babymoon regarding any specific health concerns or restrictions you may have during pregnancy. They can offer valuable advice and ensure that you are fit to travel. Additionally, be mindful of activities and destinations that may pose risks during pregnancy. Avoid extreme sports, strenuous activities, or areas with high altitudes or disease outbreaks. By taking these safety precautions into consideration, you can relax and enjoy your babymoon without unnecessary worries about unforeseen circumstances or potential health issues. Frequently Asked Questions How long should a babymoon typically last? Looking for the perfect babymoon? Well, the ideal duration for a babymoon typically lasts anywhere from three to five days. This allows you enough time to relax and unwind before your little one arrives without feeling rushed. Optimal timing for a babymoon is usually during the second trimester when you're past the morning sickness phase and still comfortable enough to travel. So go ahead, plan that well-deserved getaway and enjoy some quality time with your partner before parenthood begins. Can I go on a babymoon if I have complications during pregnancy? If you have complications during pregnancy, it is important to consult with your healthcare provider before planning a babymoon. They will be able to assess your individual situation and provide guidance on whether it is safe for you to travel. While some women with complications may still be able to go on a babymoon, others may need to consider alternative options such as staycations or local getaways that are closer to medical facilities. Always prioritize your health and safety during this special time. Is it necessary to consult with my healthcare provider before going on a babymoon? Consultation with your healthcare provider before going on a babymoon is crucial. It ensures that you are aware of any potential health risks and can take necessary precautions. Your healthcare provider will have the most accurate information about your specific situation and can provide guidance tailored to your needs. They will be able to assess if it is safe for you to travel, taking into consideration any complications or conditions you may have during pregnancy. Prioritizing this consultation is essential for a smooth and healthy babymoon experience. Are there any specific travel insurance options for babymoons? Yes, there are specific travel insurance options available for babymoons. Travel insurance coverage can provide peace of mind during your trip by offering protection against unexpected events such as trip cancellation or interruption, medical emergencies, and lost or delayed baggage. The benefits of travel insurance include reimbursement for non-refundable expenses and access to 24/7 emergency assistance. It is important to carefully review the policy details and consider purchasing travel insurance that suits your specific needs and concerns. What are some budget-friendly babymoon destination options? Looking for an affordable babymoon destination? Consider the soothing embrace of a budget-friendly beach getaway. Sink your toes into the warm sand and let the gentle waves lull you into relaxation. Or, if you prefer a more adventurous escape, opt for an affordable mountain retreat. Breathe in the crisp, fresh air as you explore picturesque trails and take in breathtaking views. Whether it's sun-soaked shores or majestic peaks, there's a budget-friendly babymoon destination waiting to whisk you away. Conclusion In conclusion, going on a babymoon during the second trimester is highly recommended for expecting couples. It offers numerous benefits such as relaxation, bonding time, and a chance to celebrate the upcoming arrival of your little one. By carefully choosing the perfect destination and planning activities that suit your needs, you can ensure a memorable and rejuvenating experience. Remember to prioritize safety during your babymoon by following necessary precautions. Going on a babymoon is like a soothing balm for expectant parents, providing them with much-needed rest and tranquility before their bundle of joy arrives. |
2024.05.16 15:23 blaque_rage Anyone committed to an ARM recently to combat rates?
I am exploring ALL options at this point. I’ve seen some 10 year ARMS. Anyone committed to one over a fixed loan?
I don’t know much about them. I will of course talk to the loan officer once my file is switched from broker to retail but I know there’s some knowledgeable people in here. I have of course googled but I think a discussion would be a better option because I have questions 😂
So let’s say the offer is 10/2: What happens after the 10 if you do not refinance? Why wouldn’t people go this route if you can just refinance before the 10 are up? Most people do not keep a mortgage for 30 years… so Ive always wondered why fixed if the ARM is fixed for a period of time.
I’m editing to ask: is it worth it? Arm rates seem higher than fixed now anyway.
submitted by blaque_rage to FirstTimeHomeBuyer [link] [comments]
I don’t know much about them. I will of course talk to the loan officer once my file is switched from broker to retail but I know there’s some knowledgeable people in here. I have of course googled but I think a discussion would be a better option because I have questions 😂
So let’s say the offer is 10/2: What happens after the 10 if you do not refinance? Why wouldn’t people go this route if you can just refinance before the 10 are up? Most people do not keep a mortgage for 30 years… so Ive always wondered why fixed if the ARM is fixed for a period of time.
I’m editing to ask: is it worth it? Arm rates seem higher than fixed now anyway.