i want to see more people write the silverwood like a chronic condition! i want to see more people write the silverwood like a chronic condition!!! we know that simply "being happy" is, contrary to many fandom jokes and hypotheticals, not enough to trigger a fatal silverwood event (treeing out) since qifrey describes his life as happy in chapter 40. instead, it seems more likely that treeing out happens when the host has achieved a feeling of peace on a deeper, more existential level, where the word "closure" becomes pertinent. we see this both in how the trigger for custas' big tree event is portrayed and how the one time qifrey's twinges of tree sensation seem to become physically visible in his body, it's after he's told coco his secret, which is one step closer to setting down the huge burden he's been carrying all this time. therefore, positing that qifrey has reason to fear comfort and happiness on an everyday level seems to be an overstatement that is more convenient for angst content than anything else. for example, while his relationship to olruggio is undoubtedly fraught, it seems to be fraught much more due to the guilt of keeping this secret from him and putting him in the amnesia timeloop than "if we have sex and i like it too much i'll die" (to name one example).
however! we just as canonically have evidence, through multiple panels in qifrey's backstory, that more small-scale feelings of comfort, belonging, etc, can trigger unpleasant sensations from the root system parasitizing the host's body. in light of that, and in light of the pre-existing parallels between silverwood parasitism and any number of degenerative often-fatal conditions (including qifrey's canonical fading eyesight and migraines), i submit that experiencing comfort and belonging on an everyday level might cause lingering pain on a level similar to chronic illness flare-ups. this is something that chronically ill people have to experience already when choosing to do fun activities that they know will take a toll on their body. i would like people to explore this angle or headcanon or whatever you want to call it because i think it fits neatly with the existing themes of disability in witch hat, and because it still provides a source of angst and difficulty forming relationships without misrepresenting how the silverwood works and in a way that ties satisfyingly to underrepresented real-life experiences. in other words, instead of "if we have sex and i like it too much i'll die", let's consider "if we have sex and i like it too much i'll have to spend tomorrow in bed popping magic ibuprofen and being sad about my curse"
