#rigid thinking

(On neurodiversity, lack of feedback and being seen like the Loch Ness Monster for being so protective of the true essence of Remus Lupin)

This is more of a stupid cry for help in a moment when I feel overwhelmed that anything else, and I’ll probably delete it later.

Hey, guys!

I know I don’t have many followers (but i”t is the quality of one’s conviction that determines success, not the number of followers” — sorry, I couldn’t resist! 😅🤭🫣) or even comments because my posts are polemic.

I’m just a neurodivergent woman fighting for people to know the truth about her special interest. I have a very rigid mind, so it’s really hard for me to deal with canon deviations, unless they can be explained by the fanfic plot. That means I don’t understand shipping at all, unless:

a) The ship is canon;

b) it’s an unfinished work and the ship can become canon;

c) It’s with an OC, because it automatically changes perspectives and feels personal (I could never read or watch anything without self-inserting in a character; even in original works. If I don’t find a character to self-insert, I just lose interest).

The thing is: this is a blog I mostly use to vent about Remus Lupin’s mischaracterisation and misconceptions. Because Remus has been my comfort character for over 20 years. I mourned his death as if he was a real person. I spent years feeling a punch in my stomach every time I heard the words “Harry Potter”. This is not just some entertainment to me. It’s real neurodivergent hyperfixation.

Remus’ character saved my life. Twice. And he’s still doing that, not letting me fall into severe depression again. So it feels really personal to me when people insult Remus or turn him into something that strips away his most remarkable traits. It even triggers me physically! (And yes, I’m working on that through therapy.)

I studied Remus thoroughly. I know his character inside out, I know all his lines, and although I do write fanfiction about him, I never deviate much from canon unless it makes sense and it’s explained in the plot (like time or universe travelling).

But people always prefer fanfics that change his personality rather than mine, which are utterly faithful to him. It’s ironic that my most successful fanfic is “Hey, Remus!’, the one that deviates from canon the most: a shamelessly self-insert OC gets pulled into the books due to “magical metaphysics” and finds out that in the Wizarding World she’s the fictional one and Remus had been reading about her too.

My other fics, especially “Bring Me To Life” (previously called “Awaken”), the one that emotionally drained me so much that I had to give it a stupid ending because I was starting to fall deep into depression, although it tells the whole canon Remus Lupin’s story through flashbacks, it’s the second least successful of them all.

And don’t get me started on the lack of comments. That’s one of the reasons why I stopped posting my fics online and only write for myself nowadays.

I’ll stick to the warming feeling I got from “Hey, Remus!”, where more than one person told me they related a lot to my OC (yep, a shameless self-insert), that my story made them dream, or — the most special one, by someone who became a virtual friend because of that — that it helped them cope with depression. Few people? Sure. But… well, you know what film Remus says about the number of followers.

Sorry about the venting. I’ve been feeling down lately, so I felt like openings my heart to you a bit.

Not my usual post, I know. But I needed to do it. Maybe I’ll exclude it later.

It’s sensory sameness / familiarity.

To assert that autistics’ need for sensory familiarity as rigid thinking is a disservice for their thinking ability in recognising patterns and connecting information.

This is what allistic professionals do not get.

Preferring a rigid routine ≠ rigid thinking

Rigid thinking is the inability to consider alternatives to viewpoints and issues.

something changes or is presented to me in an unexpected way, or the sequence of something familiar is mixed up, and while my logical autistic brain says “oh, okay, that’s different and it will take me longer to get my head around but it isn’t the end of the world”, my emotional autistic brain screams “!!!!!!!!!!! (the world is ending)”

I can’t function and do baby care in this state. It’s a very hard thing for me to admit that my body has reached its limit as I have a mentality that I should be able to keep going no matter what if I push myself had enough. So this feels like giving in and admitting weakness. Also I’m sad because I love carrying the baby and having him close to me and I know he likes it too and it has really helped with his attachment and development.