Author: Bug, mostly. We're having a blurry morning.
Date: 09/09/25
Time: 11:48 AM
Mood: Refreshed. Depressed but still here, which is something to be proud of.
We've been having a lot of system changes lately. For one, I, Bug, exist now. I'm not sure for how long, but it's been really hard getting used to this reality. I'm a dragon, and I'm learning about this world's beliefs in past lives & spirituality; I know most of the people I inhabit this brain with are atheists, but a lot of this spiritual stuff has been ringing true for me. I know one of the main "fronters", Khlo, is pagan, so there's no worries in us getting into needless arguments over spiritual differences. It's just... odd, being this way, I guess. Not bad, but... new. Foreign.
Anyway, onto the actual purpose of this blog entry.
We have been noticing, along with the major shifts happening in our system (front rotation, multiple dormancies, etc.), our depression has gotten worse. Our therapist agrees that our dissociation & depression go hand-in-hand; that is to say, if one increases, the other is guaranteed to as well. So, due to our brain essentially giving us an overhaul, we've been feeling... less than deserving of good things, I guess.
Something else we've noticed on this go around at a depressive episode is how it's interacting with our respective species. I'm a dragon, and most of my depressive thoughts are about species dysphoria. I hate the fact I was spawned in this human body. I should be nicer to the body, as none of us asked to be born this way, so it isn't any of our faults. However, that (albeit nice) thought doesn't make the dysphoria any better. My skin is too tight, my true form begging to burst out at any moment. I am hundreds of pounds larger than this small thing. I am extremely long, can fly, have a mixture of scales & soft fur, sharp claws... the list of incontinuities goes on. I know I'm not the only one in the system this impacts, either. The previously mentioned Khlo is a fox therian, and while I can't fully speak for xem, we share a brain & body, so I have a vague idea of how xe feel about this.
Interestingly, xeir species dysphoria is barely impacted right now. In fact, xe usually shapeshift into a human when under large amounts of stress, but that hasn't been the case lately. As I'm writing this, I wonder how I have access to this information. Oh well. Nobody ever said systemhood made any sense. In general, Khlo has been feeling... well, depressed. I won't get into too much detail, as the world wide web doesn't need to know every single detail about the inner workings of our brain (especially when we're feeling more vulnerable), but it's interesting to me how each facet of 1 brain interprets shared feelings in different ways. I'm feeling the "wrongness" of our body the most, Khlo's feeling the old feelings we're all to familiar with when we're in an episode, and Dave (a human, funnily enough) has gone protector-mode & is handling our self care & day-to-day life duties fairly well. While I'm still getting used to this reality, I'm learning to be grateful for what the system brings & how helpful they are in making living life easier. I know we exist as a collective instead of a singularity due to our shared trauma, but that doesn't make our existence any less interesting & sometimes beautiful.
Hm. Writing my feelings down here helped a lot, honestly. I'm feeling more confident than I was even 40ish minutes ago when we began writing this. We should probably do this more often.
Well, if you've read this far, I thank you. You may have too much free time, though. Hope you have a good rest of your day, wherever you are.