u/TheDanishThede

Tl;Dr

(To me) Malicious earworms signify an under stimulated mind.

Bonus: when properly cared for, my mind apparently - by way of my subconscious - uses earworms to point out unrealized issues.

Context:

I have been frustrated with my brain to the point of tears, the past decade.

It drives me completely insane on the regular by latching on to some song and then playing it over and over and Over AnD OVER!! (I'm sure you know the feeling).

And not just the song but bits and pieces like the lady half of the chorus, that one almost-screamed word, three words from one line, on repeat ad nauseam, until I want to stick an icepick up my nose and give it a good stir.

Sometimes it's songs I genuinely love and they're ruined for me. Because if I listen to them or even just think about them, I risk starting this shit up.

But.. something occurred to me yesterday when I was reaching levels of frustration where tears may appear; I'm under stimulated.

It's happening because my brain is desperately bored and needs SOMETHING to play with. It's like a caged animal chewing on the bars or pacing a rut in the floor.

So I put on a random playlist as background noise, something I used to always have as a matter of course, but haven't these past years for some reason? Dunno why, actually.

And.. it helped.

And I remember that yeah, I used to get these earworms back then, too, but much less severe and usually if there was something in the lyrics mirroring my current situation or emotions - usually subconscious.

Pretty much half the time I got them, I'd spot unnoticed frustrations or hangups just by looking closely at whatever was plaguing me, and then the earworms would stop when I'd figured it out.

So.. yay?

My brain isn't actually my enemy?

I've just been neglecting it criminally.

Go me.

Can anyone recommend me literature on folklore regarding changelings?

I'm from Denmark and stories about Skiftinge (changelings) are numerous in our folklore; Children stolen by trolls or other fey beings and exchanged for a changeling, which were either one of their own children or a be spelled construct of dirt and plants made to look and act like a child.

The changelings were never true copies, though, and would often be found out or revealed as they grew older, and acted or looked increasingly inhuman.

I'm looking for collections of stories with changelings both similar to these and also anything different, both from Scandinavia and the rest of the world.

Literature discussing the myths from an anthropological or psychological angle is a major bonus.

Can someone recommend a decent read set in the Empire in Warhammer Fantasy? Or even just heavily featuring it?

I've read absolutely nothing from this setting but am going to Krigslive (a LARP set in WH:F) next year as a mercenary out of Freiburg, and I'd love to get a feel for the setting.

I should probably mention that I am aware of the overall quality of WH fiction and don't expect any great literature.

As long as I can get through it without having my arm off due to misogyny and overt self insertion power fantasies, I'm good.

Arthritis.. sucks. And at 46 and as part of perimenopause, it doesn't exactly suck less.

So I'm having to start on glucosamine and I'm flailing a bit.

What should I look for in a glucosamine supplement? What makes one preferable to another?

TRIGGER WARNING:

Suicidal ideation

I'm 46 years old.

Late diagnosed at 41.

I've entered perimenopause.

My body is rapidly deteriorating.

I haven't even gotten all the old shit, like C-PTSD fixed and now I'm drowning in a ton of new issues, some, like the body dysmorphia, are old issues now wildly exacerbated.

So what's even the point anymore?

Is there anything left to do in this life?

There's a point when a thing is so broken, you gotta accept it can't be fixed. It can't go back to what it was.

And human bodies and minds..

C-PTSD cannot as far as I understand, be fixed.

Perimenopause.. I've reached the sell by date.

From here on its slow death:

Vaginal and clitoral atrophy, osteoporose, arthritis, muscular atrophy, declining mental faculties, constant pain in joints, beasts, muscles, thin, sagging skin that bruise constantly, even further issues with food and digestion, migraines, being constantly soaked in sweat, never sleeping and the risk of various cancers and heart diseases skyrocketing.

Mentally I'm just fucked.

The overlap between what doesn't overstimulate me and what stimulates me sufficiently shrinks every year and I'm in a constant state of burnout of one or the other kind.

And sex, which I've LOVED My whole life.. My amazing, loving hunk of a husband.. my head has grown bored with sex with him after 9 years and my libido has further tanked from peri.

We're even poly amorous so I could technically find a lover or bf but I'm so far and broken* that that isn't even an option.

Winter just about kills me with SAD and low vitamin D no matter what I do or eat, even after ten years of desperately trying every recommendation from doctors and every new thing being researched.

I've lost all my major interests, either because I can no longer handle actually engaging with them or they just fizzled out after lifelong devotion.

I'm lonely af.

I have two friends + my husband.

I have issues with my dear dysfunctional family, so they can never count.

The frequency of meaningful social interactions aren't high enough, but there's no way to raise it.*

I'm medicated as well as several experts can manage. Duloxetin, Lamotrigin and Elvanse.

I eat supplements in fistfuls three times a day to manage deficiencies due to eating and food challenges and live off two or specific frozen meals and otherwise candy, junkfood and ice cream.

I regret SO MANY THINGS in my life at this point, that it feels like I'm tangled up in mourning, sorrow, remorse, to the point I can't live anymore.

The only exercise I can manage is gardening and in this heat, and because we're under siege from horseflies this year, that's not happening.

I'm far, broken, exhausted, under and over stimulated, traumatized, depressed, frustrated, angry..

I've been in therapy on/off since I was 31 and sincerely don't feel there's anything left I can learn.

Though whether I've learned anything is debatable as I can't implement all the techniques and insights to any extent.

I never remember they exist when I need them or they simply do nothing for me.

Unmasking is killing me.

I don't know who I am anymore. I hardly have anything left of the identity of built and honestly loved.

Every single trait is turning out to be masking or a trauma response (did I mention the C-PTSD?).

I've been broken since I was 14, when the depressive episodes started.

I never had the opportunity to build the scaffold of personality I feel like I am meant to unearth by unmasking.

Under it all, behind all the layers, there's just.. nothing.

At least nothing I can act on.

I'm bright, but brain fog kills my intellect.

I'm creative, but nothing has my interest and that which does is impossible to engage in as my debilitating perfectionism stops me dead in my tracks.

I'm kind, pretty (if you can look past the weight), funny, caring, but have to beg for attention and time even from friends. (And laying everything on my husband would be wildly unhealthy).

If my life was a videogame, I'd stop playing.

I want a do over.

I don't want this.. this limbo. This Is just waiting for life to be over.

I want my body back! Enough that just writing it makes me cry!

I want the years I wasted breaking myself to look like a successful neurotypical, back!

I want to be able to be happy, hopeful, KNOW with all my soul that life is good and the best is yet to come.

Because the best is just a memory now.

I don't want this.

I want my potential back.

*Meeting new people? Nope!

I read bedtime stories for my husband as a fun cuddle friendly activity to end the day together.

So far we've read

Sourcery

Color of magic

Light fantastic

Equal Rites

Wyrd Sisters

Witches Abroad

Lords and Ladies

He's a huge fan of the Igors, from seeing a couple of quotes and I'm wondering:

Is it possible to read an Igor timeline? All the books containing Igors in chronological order?

I'm a Worldbuilder working on the Pantheon of my WIP, a fairly standard split affair with two opposing sides, but I have hit a pothole (as opposed to plot hole) in my research.

Given the odd facts and knowledge redditors tend to hoard, I'm hoping this is the place to ask for help on where to look for examples.

I'm hoping someone can point me towards fiction, wiki pages, names of religions, cultures or anything else which might have what I need, since I seem to have stared myself blind.

I am specifically looking for:

Examples of fictitious/historic mythologies/religions containing adversarial dualities of gods, representing the opposing concepts of:

- Staunchness/Adaptability

- Growth/Stewardship

- Autonomy/Community

- Law/Morality

- Logos/Pathos

I do not - to be specific - need all of these in the same pantheon. It's not a full Pantheon I'm looking for, just examples of one or more of these dualities.

An example - the only one I've been able to think of - is some of the entities of the opposing factions in American Gods, and I'm certain this can't be the only source exploring these dichotomies!

I recently read an article about a study (didn't read the study, sorry), on a Finnish bedtime technique for parents:

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Asking the child to remember and describe, a positive (joy, beauty, gratitude etc) moment of their day.

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I've incorporated this into the bedtime routine of my husband (late diagnosed Aspergers with PTSD) and I (VERY late diagnosed Aspergers + ADD with C-PTSD), replacing our usual check-up question of

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"Are you satisfied with how today went?"

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and asking him and myself

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"What was a good moment today?"

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every night has actually helped.

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Sometimes, on bad days, it can be really hard to answer, and I fall back on "eating ice cream", "seeing the cat sleep with a happy purr" or just "cuddling here with you, now".

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But trying to remember that moment of hearing a blackbird's serenade, enjoying a walk in the forest, feeling grateful for living in our house with all the joys it bring such as seeing the wildflowers I seeded back in spring starting to bloom, or laughing at a meme with a friend via txt, can make a real difference in my mood, not just while falling asleep, but the day after too.

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And solidifying this memory makes it easier overall to remember that there are good times.

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Because my brain is absolutely crap at remembering that! Goes with the missing object and temporal permanence as well as the depression stemming from the C-PTSD, I guess.

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I used to journal as a teen.

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Just stream of consciousness stuff like musings on my life and emotions, things I wanted to remember.

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I think I might start doing that again because of this.

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Now tell me, please?

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What was a good moment today?

Premise:

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ADHD/ASD/AuDHD, especially when diagnosed as late as adulthood, has a high risk of (causing) C-PTSD.

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ADHD/ASD/AuDHD burnout as well as C-PTSD is often comorbid with, or initially mis-diagnosed as, depression and/or anxiety.

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Question:

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Should the later diagnosis of ADHD/ASD/AuDHD and/or C-PTSD change (medical/therapeutic) ongoing treatment of the prior diagnosis, apart from the, if applicable, added medication towards ADHD?

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Bonus question:

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Would the added complication of perimenopause and its (myriad) symptoms further change the equation, apart from possible MHT?

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And when I say weird, I mean the kind of weird that The Black Company experience on The Plain of Fear, The Mournland of the Eberron d&d setting, Peter Clines 14 or The Fold or Jeff VandetMeer's AreaX.

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House of Leaves, There Is No Anti-memetics Division, Lovecraft's Silver Key and Dreamquest stories, Neverwhere.

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You hopefully get what I mean, because I don't really know how to quantify it further.

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Please?

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It's an itch I need to scratch and it's driving me crazy!

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I was looking into Elder Scrolls lore and I love the take that they are all just more or less variations of Mer.

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If your world has non human races and you haven't taken the road most travelled with aliens, gods creating a race each or never to explaining it.. then what did you choose to do?

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- And how do half breeds work? If, of course, they are at all possible?

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I woke up with this idea for a story and I have to get it out somehow, because my head refuses to let me actually write it!

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I'm currently wrecked by multiple shit things (existential crisis, perimenopause, body dysmorphia, worry about pet, little sister in self destructive spiral, trying to unmask AND finding a psychologist capable of handling ALL of this shit) and can currently only eat, doom scroll, play stupid mobile games or sleep.

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I'm putting this idea in here, simply to gain some kind of relief from its constant nagging! Srsly, it's kept me awake since 3 AM!

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If anyone wants to grab it and run with it, you're more than welcome, nevermind if you get three words or a full story out of it or just grab one concept you think is neat, I don't care.

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It wants to live, and now I've done my part. Hopefully that'll put it to rest and let me sleep tonight.

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Genre: Modern day fantasy.

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*The Setup:

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Dragons have used magic to live ever more hidden from humans, since our earliest recorded history and attempts to exterminate them.

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At this point they never openly show themselves, except by rare accidents when glamours fail, or the rare gifted humans see 'lizard people' or 'reptilian aliens' or interpret sightings of Dragons in the sky as UFOs.

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There are three factions of Dragons:

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The greatest number by far are megalomaniacal, resource hoarding psychopaths, making it anybody's guess who might be a Dragon in disguise among the top billionaires.

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In more ancient times, they'd set themselves up as emperors, pharaohs, tyrannical Gods, or even monstrous rulers like Vlad the Impaler or Lady Báthory.

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A few are protectors of our planet and oppose their hoard-crazed kin.

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The few survivors from this faction, who aren't currently in a trauma or despair induced torpor, in the deepest caves of the planet, have retreated to the few remaining, truly wild and untouched regions on Earth:

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Inner Antarctica, Gangkhar Puensum, Namib Desert, the Mariana Trench and Abyssal Plains, the Australian Outback, the Arctic Tundras, Surtsey, Chilean Ice Fields, Canadian Deep Forests and the untouched parts of Greenland and North Pole and the last few parts of the Amazonian Rainforest, that 'civilized' humans haven't yet disturbed.

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The last, and smallest fraction, are of a more mischievous nature and simply live their best lives as chaotic forces of nature.

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A sole example is the Dragon currently known to humans as 'Jack Black' and in other times respectively, as Triboulet, Dionysos, Saci-Pererê, Gwydion, Tenali Raman, Loki, Púca, Sun Wukong and Horace de Vere Cole, but there may be more of them hidden among us.

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The story:

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A Dragon representing each faction is meeting on North Sentinel Island, for their centennial negotiations.*

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Gawds, that helped!

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I really hope this kind of post is ok in here. This stuff doesn't fit in WritingPrompts or any of the other writing subreddits afaik.

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I'm looking for books where the author obviously understands whatever neurotype, trauma or mental illness their character has and manages to show it through actions, dialogue, motivations etc.

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My best example is Snake-eater by T. Kingfisher (one of my absolutely favorite authors, whose portrayal of the above is stellar throughout so many of their books!

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Snake-eater follows a woman who has left an emotionally abusive relationship. She's either ASD or AuDHD (my money is ASD) but it's never openly stated. Instead it and the trauma from the abuse is simply shown in how she acts, her priorities, inner and outer dialogue, choices etc.

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And done so well that I actually cried from feeling seen when reading it.

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I recommend reading more of (honestly, everything!) T. Kingfisher's work, especially the Saint of Steel series. Romantacy at its finest, with a few spicy scenes, plenty of neurospicy characters and set in one of my favorite fantasy worlds.

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Do y'all have any recommendations for me?

I need to figure out a fun way of running a treasure hunt in game.

The best takes I've seen, has been in video games have been Elder Scrolls Online and Sea of Thieves, but they rely on visual clues which don't really translate well to Ttrpgs.

I've been considering a strong of riddles, but I'm not sure if that would really be the best approach either or even what the format of the string of encounters would then look like.

Do y'all know of any outstanding examples of how Ttrpgs can incorporate treasure hunting, that I could look at or have ideas that are better than mine? Because I'm frankly stumped.

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