🍉melanin & sunshine🍉

Anyway. If you struggle with negative self-talk I feel for you. It’s hellish, and it’s not something that can just be bludgeoned out of someone by telling them it sucks. We know! I’m not out of the weeds just yet by a long shot, but here’s some of the stuff that’s been helpful for me:

Fake it til it’s real: cliche, I know! but it really has helped for me, even though it makes me suuuuper uncomfortable at times. but literally tell yourself that you’re super charismatic and sexy and everyone loves you. or whatever version of that feels good for how you’d like to be seen. it’s gonna feel silly and untrue for a really long time, but it helps!

Reframe: I struggled to phrase this one, but what I mean basically is like… taking that notion of “hey negative self-talk sucks for the people around you too” and turning it into “wow, it is kind of mean to my friends to just assume they’re lying when they say they love me. I don’t want to be mean to my friends. I’m going to take the risk of trusting them”. Try not to go too far in the direction of “oh god I’m being mean to my friends” and stay on the path of “I want to and CAN do right by them”

Separate from it: I like to kind of act like my negative self talk is something of a different entity from me. Your mileage may vary on this one. I was a really mean really sad teenage girl once, and for me that kind of feels like the place the negative self talk comes from. So instead of being like “I guess I just hate myself and always will”, I can be like “I have this wounded inner child who is lashing out. I’m going to be gentle with her, but I’m also not going to listen to the things she tells me we are, because she is 16 and hasn’t experienced anything good yet.”

"i'm so stupid" "no i'm not. i'm so silly. why am i so silly?"

"what the fuck is wrong with me?" because "a lot is wrong because i am doing the best i can in a sick society that wants me to do and survival is a middle finger to capitalism"

"i'm not doing enough" became "why do you feel you aren't doing enough when you donated $100 this week and shared lots of information with people? wanting to be able to do more is not same as refusing to do more. be gentle with yourself. this is going to last 50 more years at least"

"i don't need to bother bc i'm not going to see anyone" became "no one is more worthy of my efforts of getting dressed up than me"

"i'm so ugly" became "i would never say that to another woman with my body. other women with my body are hot. maybe i'm hot?" which eventually became "i am fucking hot"

For the fourth year in a row now, it's time for Small Fandom Summer! Join me for Small Fandom Summer! It's real easy to play:

Make a fanwork for something that has fewer than 1000 English-language works on AO3

Post it to AO3

And then you've done it! You've made a thing and you've diversified the fandom ecosystem! You're basically a hero.

Q: The fandom I want to create for has more than 1000 English-language works on AO3, but the specific pairing I want to write for has fewer than that. Does that count? A: Yes! Q: What if it has more than 1000 English-language works on AO3, but, like, just barely? A: Okay! Q: What if it actually has a lot more than 1000 English-language works on AO3, but it still feels small? A: Sure! Q: What if I don't want to post it to AO3? What if I don't even have an AO3 account? Can I post it somewhere else? A: Wherever! Q: What if-- A: Just do a thing, friend. Make a thing. Share the thing. This is not meant to be restrictive; this is meant to be inspirational. Create the fanworks you want to see in the world. Make a stranger happy by appealing to their niche interests. Bring joy.

And if you want to give yourself some silly little Steam-like achievement badges to commemorate your accomplishments, well, you're in luck! I've made a bunch of them right here! You can grab the ones that apply to your work and paste them wherever you like and feel good about what you've done. Here's a few of my favorites:

So you see? This is meant to be silly and fun.

There's nowhere to sign up. There's nothing to commit to. There's zero pressure. You just do it if you do it, and don't if you don't. But if you do want to play (yay!), tag your stuff with #small fandom summer so we can all swoop in and appreciate everyone else's efforts.

And since some other people have asked: There's no start date for this, nor is this an end date. "Summer" in this context is an extremely arbitrary unit of measurement. I'm starting now because my personal summer runs from about mid-May to mid-August. Yours may vary.

The plot:

bonus...😔

Hou Minghao as Wang Ye

Nearly 9,000 women have been killed in Israeli attacks in five months. Another 2,100 are missing and presumed dead, while 23,000 have been wounded and over half a million are displaced.

“Palestinian women, especially in the Gaza Strip, are exposed to the worst humanitarian catastrophe,” Ashraf al-Qudra, the health ministry’s spokesperson, said on Thursday.

Dozens of women and girls have also been detained and face harsh conditions in Israeli custody, including sexual abuse.

Women in Gaza also struggle to find menstruation products and access the necessary pregnancy and post-natal care. The consequences on reproductive health, including a rise in stress-induced miscarriages, stillbirths and premature births, have increased significantly.

Women in labour are undergoing caesarean procedures without anaesthetics, and a shortage of post-operative care such as medication, antibiotics and pain relief further exacerbates the situation.

According to the health ministry, 5,000 women give birth monthly in Gaza under “harsh, unsafe and unhealthy” conditions caused by Israeli bombing and displacement.

There are 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza suffering from “malnutrition, dehydration and lack of medical care.