The black dog

my dearest and strangest friends: may this longest day bring you something good and unexpected, and the shortest breathless night bring you wild thrills and unmatched excitement. raise a toast in my name and in yours - or kiss someone sweet, and have joy and mischief in your heart.

may your fires reach the skies - and may your songs reach the gods!

fragmented.

Source material synthesized with Stable Diffusion

I was always far too sensitive

to sound, sight, touch;

it was all just too much.

The world itself was so

loud and bright,

it triggered my fight or flight

and I always fought.

It was—and still is—exhausting.

Sensory overload was something I experienced

but I didn’t know how to define it.

So I just internalised it,

pushing the panic further and further down,

learning to mask and learn how

to ignore the overwhelm

so I wouldn’t seem so weird.

For years I passed as a gifted, but strange kid

who hid the feelings of too much,

who sifted through the clouds above

that my head kept disappearing into.

Soon I aged out of the gifted label.

My potential faded

and I was left unstable,

with minimal coping skills that could get me through school;

I was drowning in expectations that I couldn’t live up to.

So I did the only thing left to do.

I rebelled in an effort to survive,

becoming disruptive, defiant, defensive;

the three dreaded D’s

of teenage life.

And when it all fell apart and I couldn’t mask it anymore,

my mother took me to a professional.

And for the first time, I felt seen.

I felt heard.

No longer walking a blurred tight rope,

trying not to fall.

ADHD

Attention Deficit (Hyperactive) Disorder.

So much made sense.

I was no longer the broken daughter,

I was just different.

But still, I chose ignorance.

Only years later have I begun to explore

what my adhd and neurodiversity

actually mean.

I was so close to fully accepting myself,

and my brain,

and my mental health,

when it all started happening again.

I’ve been living in sensory overwhelm for the past few months,

looking for routes and back roads so I wouldn’t have to confront

the reality that it’s more than ADHD.

Don’t get me wrong,

my diagnosis still stands,

it’s still a part of who I am,

but there’s more going on inside my mind.

A Spectrum of more to clarify.

ASD to be specific.

Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Autistic:

a word I never thought would apply to me;

an added layer of neurodiversity.

I don’t know how to feel.

I’m oscillating between relieved

and devastated.

If I had known back then that I wasn’t broken,

maybe it wouldn’t have been so frustrating.

Maybe I would have been kinder to little me.

But I know I can’t change the past.

All I can do now is give myself permission to unmask;

and love myself throughout the process.

I know that some days I won’t get it right.

But I’ll give myself space and acknowledge

that forgiveness looks different for everyone.

There is no proven equation,

no one true answer to the, ‘How do I accept myself?” question.

I suppose, in a way, self-love is also a spectrum.

L❤️VE is L💜VE

After my first colonoscopy I like to think that all those alien anal probes were just free intergalactic cancer screenings.

Denizler Kitabevi Bookshop in Istanbul, specializing in antique maps and maritime books.

Painting by Didier Graffet

Join us on Telegram https://t.me/steampunktendencies

The Ash by Ars Thanea

I was always able to write my way out The song always made sense to me Now I find that when I look down Every page is empty There is nothing to describe Except the moon still bright against the worrying sky

Florence + The Machine - My Love

Hamburg , New york 📸 wnyscenery