Made A Playlist For Both Horror And Dust!

Its come to my attention that a lot of people do not know how to deal with a hot car in summer. A lot of people will get back to their car, after hours of it being parked in the full sun, and will open the door to be blasted in the face with furnace-level temperatures, and you'll just clamber in and shut the doors and leave the windows closed and you'll start driving that thing, and you'll wait for the air-conditioning to battle and overcome the heat.

Thats. Insane to me.

The inside of a car can get up to 40°C/104°F hotter than the outside temperature. Why would anyone get inside that????? It's gonna take your air-conditioning at least half an hour to combat that and bring the temperature down to something even remotely reasonable, and in the meantime you're sitting there risking heatstroke.

Now, I understand that it's currently winter in the northern hemisphere, which is where most of this site lives, but a) I'm in the southern hemisphere and today was Lots Of Degrees, and b) y'all should read this now and commit it to memory or queue it to reblog in summer or whatever, because it boggles my mind that some of you get into a car whose interior is literally oven-hot.

So!!!! Some tips!!!!!

Get a sun visor. One of the big ones that goes inside your windshield. You will not believe how much cooler those things keep your car. Get one, use it. Leave it to bounce around in your back-seat on cooler days, but have it on hand for the stinkers. They range in price but two-dollar stores usually have them for pretty cheap.

Leave the windows of your car cracked open. It doesn't have to be much. Literally just the tiniest amount will mean that the heat building inside your car has a way to escape, meaning the interior temp will naturally be kept lower. The larger the opening, the better, but depending on the neighbourhood you're parking in, maybe it would be better to have them open just a sliver. Even the tiniest crack will help. Ever tried warming up an oven with the door open? It doesn't work well. This is the same concept. If there is a way for the hot air to escape, the inside of your car will stay a lot cooler than it otherwise would have.

If you're fancy enough to have an openable sunroof (that's the dream) then leave that open a bit as well.

Youve just gotten back to your car and opened the door, and its hot as fuck in there. Open another door, ideally on the other side of the car, and let the hot air escape. If you can open all four doors and the boot, then thats even better. A bunch of the hot air will flush out. Not all!!! But a lot. Give it anywhere from a few moments to a few minutes, depending on how much of a hurry you're in.

Get in, start the car, open all the windows. Yes, even if you hate having the windows open.

Put the air-conditioning on full blast, and make sure the recycle is turned OFF. This means it pulls fresh air from outside the car (hot, but less hot than inside) and pumps that into the car, further displacing the heat inside the vehicle.

Start driving, still with the windows down. Once you get up enough speed, the force of the air from outside coming in will blast the rest of the excess heat out of the car.

The temp inside the car will now be roughly equivalent to the temp outside the car. Still hot!!!! But MAJORLY less so, and majority more handle-able by your air-conditioner.

Put all your windows up, and switch the air-con over to recycle. This means it takes the air in the car and cools it, then spits it back into the car, meaning that with each cycle, the air gets progressively cooler a lot faster.

If you do this, your car will be a hell of a lot more comfortable a hell of a lot sooner than it would be if you got into a 60°C/140°F cabin and just.... endured that, until your aircon could overcome it.

This post has been brought to you by an Australian who knows not one but TWO people who get into 60°C cars and wait 15 to 30 minutes for their car to drop back down to a temperature that's even REMOTELY tolerable.

New commissions poster with updated prices and information!

How to Write a Schizoid Character

Schizoid Personality Disorder (SzPD) affects an estimated 1% of the population, similar to rates of autism, but is widely overlooked both in real life and in fiction - to the point where it is often colloquially labelled "the silent disorder". This is a somewhat comprehensive guide in how to write a character with SzPD, from someone who has it.

Quick research guide

I'm writing this guide with the underlying assumption that you've already done some cursory reading into the basics of SzPD. At this point, you need to understand two things: One is that this disorder is incredibly poorly researched, due to schizoids often not seeking treatment for the disorder itself (they sometimes seek treatment for comorbidities like depression or anxiety); and two, as a result of this, there is a lot of over-simplified misinformation out there about SzPD. This disorder often gets boiled down, even by mental health professionals, to the DSM-V or IDC-10 diagnostic criteria, which are criticised widely in the schizoid community for being incredibly superficial descriptions of overt SzPD. This is the kind of case where you need to seek out the SzPD specialists or the schizoids themselves for information about the disorder.

Akhtar's profile is a good overview. Psychologist Elinor Greenberg has a quora where she answers all sorts of questions about SzPD, and she typically hits the nail on the head. Other resources include Schizoid Angst, a youtube channel run by a man who has SzPD (this convo in particular is really good). If you're interested in a deep dive, I recommend reading The Divided Self by R.D. Laing for a deeper understanding of the inner workings of schizoids, as well as the relationship between SzPD and the rest of the schizophrenia spectrum.

Understand the "root" of SzPD

SzPD typically forms as the result abuse, neglect or abandonment in childhood. Schizoids have learned through trauma that emotional intimacy, vulnerability, and dependence on other people all have the potential to harm them badly, and as a result, they tend to avoid those things. In that sense, schizoids don't have a problem with other people, per se. Understanding this fact can help you write your schizoid character with more realism and nuance.

For example, it's a common misconception that all schizoids are averse to having sex. Many schizoids are, to be fair - but plenty of schizoids also frequently engage in hook-up culture, or form other sexual relationships. Physical intimacy can be entirely seperate from emotional intimacy, and thus pose no real risk to a person with SzPD. It's also possible for schizoids to form good relationships with other people, if those relationships are based on non-emotional grounds, such as recreational interests, work, religion, etc.

You can show this in your schizoid character by thinking about which of your other characters your schizoid might gravitate towards. In general, they will feel safest with characters who place few (or no) emotional demands on them, don't place high value on phatic gestures, don't pry into their emotional state or background, respect their need for independence and agency, and so on.

Overt or Covert?

Once you've researched the disorder a bit, you need to decide whether your schizoid character is overt or covert. The overt/covert split is about 50%/50%, so neither is more likely than the other.

Overt schizoids tend to be a lot more blunt about their indifference, visibly detached and aloof, and are typically way less likely to engage in social settings (or be in social settings at all). These are the characters who have blunt affect, ie. won't have much of an emotional reaction to their surroundings, even if it directly involves them (ex. getting praised/criticised). They may have odd speaking patterns, such as stilted or vague speech, and can sometimes come across as cold and uncaring. Overt schizoids are noticably reluctant to reveal what's going on in their internal world, so they might also come across as enigmatic, secretive, or mistrustful.

If your character is an overt schizoid, think about how their behavior and personality are percieved by other characters, what kind of reactions might arise. Think about how your schizoid character might navigate these reactions - after all, they're probably used to getting comments. How do they react if someone comments on how disinterested/moody they seem? Do they tell the person to fuck off? Do they raise an eyebrow, and that's that?

Covert schizoids, or "secret" schizoids, experience the exact same symptoms as overt SzPD, but they hide it behind what's called a false-self system. You can think of it as a form of compulsive masking. Apart from perhaps vaguely eccentric behavior, you typically won't be able to tell that a secret schizoid has SzPD unless you know what you're looking for. If your character is a secret schizoid, they will behave in a way that seems socially engaged and interested, maybe even extroverted, but they will be emotionally withdrawn and safe within an internal world.

If your character is a covert schizoid, your other characters might not notice that anything is out of the ordinary with them at all - until they learn more about your character's lifestyle. Secret schizoids are not as used to being confronted about their odd behavior as overt schizoids are, and, depending on the character overall, might respond to these confrontations with awkwardness, defensiveness or confusion. Many secret schizoids are also unaware that they have SzPD, but are instead just vaguely aware that their behavior and preferences seem strange and different to other people.

Figure out the internals

An intricate internal fantasy life makes for a well-thought-out, sharply self-aware character. Schizoids spend most of their time in their own heads, so you need to have a good understanding of your character's internal world, fantasies and reflections, and how these things affect their behavior, priorities and decisions.

For many schizoids, their fantasy life is rooted in their own lives, either their past, present, or future - what-ifs, what-if-nots and could've-beens. They'll have internal "interactions" with other people they know, play out entire conversations and scenarios, and respond and react much more vividly than they tend to in real life. For other schizoids, their fantasies exist in a world entirely seperate to our own, with its own rules and structure, which they can explore to their own liking. For others yet, they think up fictional stories, sometimes inspired by real life, sometimes not.

Themes in the internal world often reflect the schizoid's own struggle with independence and intimacy. A lot of schizoids use their fantasies as a safe and sufficient way to feel "connected" to others. Others have violent, vengeful fantasies, which often juxtapose the indifferent demeanor - these fantasies tie in to the need for independence and emotional control, sometimes referred to as schizoid omnipotence.

Beyond the intricate fantasies, consider your character's moral beliefs. Schizoids tend toward idiosyncasy - we're in the "odd and eccentric" cluster for a reason. Akhtar described this quality as "occasionally strikingly amoral, at other times altruistically self-sacrificing." Take some time to figure out how this might express itself in your character, and how it is percieved by the characters around them.

Schizoids and relationships

You know how borderlines have their favorite person, and narcissists have their chosen person? A schizoid might just stumble upon someone who will become their interest person, or IP.

An IP is someone outside their immediate close family who the schizoid feels safe enough to be vulnerable with, are genuinely interested in, and who the schizoid forms an honest-to-god emotional connection to. This relationship can be either romantic or platonic in nature. If you choose to give your schizoid character an IP, make sure to emphasize how much this relationship stands out as uniquely meaningful to the schizoid - this is the one person they are even capable of having a genuine bond with, and that bond alone can keep them grounded against feelings of cosmic isolation. Your schizoid isn't likely to take this for granted.

An interesting tidbit of information is that schizoids paradoxically tend to gravitate towards relationships with highly extroverted, emotional people, to the point where the schizoid-hysteric relationships are an entire category of psychological research. Here's a really good snippet that describes how that dynamic tends to play out.

(Also keep in mind that just because a schizoid doesn't have an IP does not necessarily mean they are miserable. A lot of schizoids are capable of finding their own peace with whatever tools they have available.)

Another notable term for schizoid relationships is the controversial stock friend. A stock friend is a person who considers themself friends with the (typically covert) schizoid, and who thinks they have an emotional connection with them, but who the schizoid feels no emotional connection to, has no real interest in, and only interacts with out of convenience or happenstance. Is this immoral? Are schizoids leading people on, or are we justified in masking to avoid a constant stream of awkward confrontations, that have the potential to hurt other people's feelings? Who knows.

Splitting

You might have heard of idealization/devaluation-splitting as it pertains to borderline PD (bad/good) or narcissistic PD (worthy/unworthy). Splitting happens in SzPD as well, along the axis of safe/unsafe.

Schizoids will occasionally cut other people out of their lives, and this usually happens when they get overwhelmed with another person's attempts at emotional intimacy, or their boundaries have been deliberately or repeatedly crossed. They will often view the person as relentlessly prying, controlling, demanding, or dangerous, and will desperately seperate themself from that person as a way to avoid being consumed, or "smothered". At this point, if the other person doesn't let the schizoid get away, the schizoid might become overtly hostile. This is a fear response.

If you want to write a schizoid splitting, be aware that a split with a schizoid usually marks the end of the relationship altogether - especially if the relationship hasn't lasted for very long, and double especially if the person isn't the schizoid's IP. Once a schizoid has lost trust in someone, that trust is very, very difficult to build back up, even if both parties agree to try. Your schizoid character is going to be incredibly wary of the other person, and the relationship is probably never going to feel like it did before.

Beware of stereotypes

Every once in a while I'll encounter a story that features a character who has very obvious schizoid traits, and almost every single time, their arc leaves me disappointed and frustrated. Here are some tropes I would personally avoid writing for a schizoid character.

"He just needed love all along." Kill this trope, no exceptions. Strong emotional intimacy can erode or overpower a schizoid's sense of self, and usually leads to feelings of smothering, being trapped/crushed by the other, and losing autonomy and independence. A schizoid is capable of love on their own specific terms, but if it's on the terms of other people, they will strongly feel like it's something being forced on them against their will. They might still outwardly "accept it" as a form submission or compliance, but it will not be out of love. This trope gives me psychic damage.

"He sacrificed his life for others, which proves that he cared all along." This trope isn't necessarily bad, it just always leaves me with this impression that neurotypicals can only interpret caring when it happens in the extremes. And while it's true that schizoids can sometimes be altruistically self-sacrificing, it's kinda depressing to see schizoid-like characters die all the time. There are other ways you could show schizoid altruism that would also leave the door open for more closure for the character themself.

"He turned evil and violent." While this trope isn't quite as common as it is with other disorders, notably those from cluster B, it does still exist. So here's your friendly reminder that mentally ill and neurodivergent people are more likely to be the victims of violence than to be perpetrators, by far. I'm not saying you should never write a schizoid bad guy, you certainly can - I'm just telling you to be very careful about how you go about it, so you don't end up sending the wrong kind of message.

Conclusion

Schizoid characters are cool, and I wish there were more well-written canonically schizoid characters out there. But I'm also clearly biased, so what do I know

I literally can't keep up with all these gofundme asks and messages, forgive me but I'm not doing anymore reblogs or answers for the gofundme, they just keep coming and I can't keep doing this. They come every few minutes, all throughout the day, and I'm not on here 24/7 to do this. I think it's a little too much. I understand the importance but getting asks and messages everyday is too much for me here. Please ask someone else to do all these reblogs. I already did a few hoping to help, but now they just keep coming even after I've already helped. I don't want to see anymore.

I will result in ignoring or blocking if this continues. I'm sorry for the ones they hoped for me to do something but I've already had multiple people asking and pleading as it is before you. Something like this is meant for someone that can genuinely help, I'm just a simple person, one that doesn't really communicate and can't really do much for you. So please respect my wishes, and I'm sorry it's come to this.

(like this is happening so much that it's starting to become spammy and suspicious from accounts different or not constantly contacting me over it.)

I just got an ask about a Native spirit that many Natives have asked monsterfuckers to not use.

It starts with a W.

People from the culture it’s from do not say its name because in their culture, saying the name summons the spirit. Out of respect for my friends from that culture, I do not say/type the name either.

I would kindly ask you not put that creature in my ask box in the future. I know the person that submitted it likely didn’t know so there’s no hard feelings. It’s alright. I’m not upset.

I’m not really the best person to educate folks on this topic and I wish I had some resources on why that’s not a good thing for non-Native people to use for their fiction.

I’m sure even my wording here isn’t great. I know the spirit is from a specific Native culture (there’s a lot of them, for those that didn’t know lol) and I can’t remember which one(s) and my brain is still fuzzy from being sick.

So if any of my followers are familiar with this issue, please feel free to share the info of why this isn’t good.

Again, I understand the person that sent the ask likely didn’t know all this. I’m not upset. I just think it’s worth mentioning.

how to have a healthier relationship with your stats page

1. Understand what stats can tell you - and what they can’t

AO3 stats tell you whether or not another user clicked something. That’s it. Hits tell you whether a user clicked the title of your fic. Kudos tell you that a user clicked the little ❤ at the bottom of the page. Comments tell you that a user typed something into a box and then hit the comment button. 

Stats do not tell you why a person did any of those things. They also don’t tell you why a person didn’t do them. You know why you do those things yourself, but there are many types of people in the world and we all have our reasons why we do things. You can’t assume that every other user of AO3 uses the site the same way you do. 

Stats are not a reliable way to find out if you’re good at writing. They’re not a way to tell if you are loved. They have nothing to do with the quality of your work or your worth as a person.

2. Don’t compare yourself to others - or yourself

Because stats are not a reliable way to judge quality or skill or the effort you put into a story, comparing your stats against another author will also not tell you which of you is the “better” author or which of you has a “better” story. They can tell you which story was more popular, but popularity itself has very little to do with skill or quality. 

This is also true of your own work. Chances are very real that the story you’re most proud of is not the story with the best stats. Don’t let one story’s relative success or failure affect how you feel about another’s. 

3. Focus on things you can control instead of things you can’t

Once you’ve posted your story, the reaction to it is out of your control. It will get however many hits, kudos, and comments other people decide to give it and you can’t do much about that at all. 

What you can control, however, is the work you put into the story before you post it. Celebrate statistics like word count or time spent writing or the number of WIP you’ve managed to finish. Those are all numbers that are in your control, that you have the power to alter and affect. 

Find something in every story that makes you happy. It doesn’t have to be the whole fic. It could be one particular characterization, a scene, or a line. Maybe you wrote a particularly funny joke or a really moving description or a hot love scene. 

Highlighting positive emotions and being proud of your own work will make you less reliant on the opinions of other people. You’ll develop more confidence, and that will help you avoid the stats spiral in the future. Finding motivations inside of yourself is much more reliable than getting motivation from people who might or might not continue to provide it.

4. If you can’t ignore stats, avoid them

The first time I had an unhealthy relationship with my stats page, I ended up quitting fic entirely for about a year. I still wrote, I just didn’t post anything on AO3. I couldn’t trust myself not to focus on the numbers and make myself crazy, and so I didn’t allow myself to look at them at all. 

The second time I found myself starting down the stats spiral, I knew the signs and I was able to pull myself out of it. I stopped looking at my stats page, but I was able to continue posting work. I still refreshed the page for the first day to see the hits/kudos/comments but after that first day I only returned to the fic in order to post a new chapter or answer another comment. 

There are tools you can use to help you avoid stats. This AO3 skin hides stats entirely. This code hides hits. Here’s one for hiding kudos with additional instructions on how to hide any stats you choose. 

5. Be your own cheerleader

When it comes right down to it, the reason why we focus in on stats is because we’re looking for reassurance. We want to know for sure whether we’re a good writer or not. Unfortunately, our stats are never going to tell us that. 

A lot of us are also told by others that being proud of something we’ve done or liking something that we’ve created is boastful or bragging or other negative personality traits. But there’s a difference between bragging about how good you are and acknowledging your own skills. 

Give yourself permission to like your own work. You might never get that permission from someone else, so you need to take that on yourself. 

Start talking to yourself the way you’d talk to a friend of yours who was working on a fic or a piece of art or doing anything else that requires time and skill. You wouldn’t tear them down, so don’t tear yourself down. Build yourself up. That positive self-talk can be difficult at first, but it’s a habit that pays off over time. 

6. Know that I’m proud of you

It takes courage and strength and determination to have an idea and then to act on it. It’s easy to think. It’s a lot harder to write things down. No matter whether you post your story online or you keep it to yourself. No matter whether you get a thousand hits or a dozen. You’re still amazing, and I’m so glad you took that leap ❤

HI!! some doctor :))

I would really like this trend of donation scammers sending anons to stop. I block them yet they still send anons. It's very annoying.

The first image is a reference I found on Pinterest, I'm not sure who the original artist is. But if anyone does know, comment the original artist, or original artist comment yourself and let me know, so proper credit can be given.

Below that is my own drawing and I'll sign my art with 'HPT' for 'Hot-Pink Tsunami' or part of my username initials 'ATW'. This is the first thing going up I guess.-