#mirror touch

Whumptober 2025 | Day 29

Fainting

Like bro, I’m telling you because I trust you and you are using that information to go out of your way to do something that I specifically asked you not to do.

I’m not asking you to change anything you are doing, I’m just asking you not to test my condition like it’s a fucking party trick.

No, I don’t feel everything the exact same intensity as the person/thing my brain is mirroring.

No, I don’t understand how this works. I am just as confused as you are. All I know is that this is one of the ways my brain is fucked up.

Yes, I’m sure I don’t want you to poke your arms because you want to pay attention to how I react.

i can feel silk by seeing the image, for example.

but, another thing is when i can feel a specific shade of blue - it feels like a jersey... or a specific shade of pink feels like a hard jello texture.

As essential as personification is, it can be carried too far when synthesis does not include adequate differentiation. For example, some survivors may come to believe that someone else’s experience is their own. One patient was confused about whether a memory involved him watching his father beat his brother, or whether he had an out of body experience in which he was watching himself being beaten. Another patient reported that she felt physical pain if she was near anyone in pain. A more common problem is that of becoming overwhelmed by someone else’s suffering as though it is our own: A difficulty perhaps not unfamiliar to many highly empathic therapists in response to their patients. In such cases we seem unable to “screen out” the experiences of other people and separate them from our own.