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terajkI haven't been writing fic for very long, but this has never happened to me before.
Thanks to my love of Soul Eater, I have lots of new characters with disabilities to play with! Which meansmore ableist books at the library research! Actually, I don't think the library books will be that bad, since in one case the books are written by people who actually have one of the disabilities in question. (Obsessive-compulsive disorder, or something close enough, although I think if you wrote the character according to a laundry list of DSM-IV criteria you would break everything--but that's true of every disabled character ever, and also disabled people in real life.)
There's lots of canonical evidence of what this character's disability is like, so too much research would break everything, too. But because Soul Eater is a visual medium and also an actiony shounen series, there are things I don't know. Like, quiet coping-mechanism type things. Does having duels with Black Star help some days, so that when Black Star is all: "I will surpass God!" he makes sure to scoff just loud enough for him to hear? Does he take breaks and hang out in Ms. Marie's office (although that might be hard, as she wanders around the school for hours)? What would have prevented this (contains: blood, screaming)?:
ANYWAY, here's the thing that's never happened to me before! While the disabled character doesn't want to talk about it, (his name is Kid--no, really), his friend Maka has said, "Hey, I would like to read things about OCD, especially things for friends!" (Maka loves books.)
And...we have a problem. Because the stuff we've found for her (I made Kid vet stuff with me,* as it's his impairment and also I'm a jackass) assumes several things:
1) That Kid is not an eldritch abomination and the personification of the force of order in the universe. This make a lot of advice irrelevant. To wit:
2) That his OCD-ness can be thought of as entirely separate from the rest of him, almost like another person. (Canon treats it as just part of him.) Trying to think this way breaks Maka's brain, and mine.
3) That his friends should be his therapists. Nobody wants this--not even his pistols, who come the closest to being his therapists in canon. (Except maybe Blair-chan, who is a secretly awesome psychiatric service cat in my head--but even she isn't so much his therapist as "playing that game where I try to get the guy who gives me shrimp sometimes to move. Really, I don't know why you guys don't think this is the most fun EVER.")
4) That part of being his friend doesn't involve beating the crap out of monsters and witches. But we all expected that.
The solution is to read things with KID and poke him about his feelings and what he wants of his friends, and then he can write Maka a note. (Yeah, he hates me pretty hard right now--always an excellent sign. And no, I'm not being sarcastic.)
*He told Ryoga that the only reason he, Ryoga, didn't have to vet stuff for his friends is because is because I can do it for him, as we have the same impairment. Ryoga said, "No, dude. It's because Ranma's never asked for a book in his life." Also, our impairment is less well-studied, so there is not as much to vet.
Thanks to my love of Soul Eater, I have lots of new characters with disabilities to play with! Which means
There's lots of canonical evidence of what this character's disability is like, so too much research would break everything, too. But because Soul Eater is a visual medium and also an actiony shounen series, there are things I don't know. Like, quiet coping-mechanism type things. Does having duels with Black Star help some days, so that when Black Star is all: "I will surpass God!" he makes sure to scoff just loud enough for him to hear? Does he take breaks and hang out in Ms. Marie's office (although that might be hard, as she wanders around the school for hours)? What would have prevented this (contains: blood, screaming)?:
ANYWAY, here's the thing that's never happened to me before! While the disabled character doesn't want to talk about it, (his name is Kid--no, really), his friend Maka has said, "Hey, I would like to read things about OCD, especially things for friends!" (Maka loves books.)
And...we have a problem. Because the stuff we've found for her (I made Kid vet stuff with me,* as it's his impairment and also I'm a jackass) assumes several things:
1) That Kid is not an eldritch abomination and the personification of the force of order in the universe. This make a lot of advice irrelevant. To wit:
2) That his OCD-ness can be thought of as entirely separate from the rest of him, almost like another person. (Canon treats it as just part of him.) Trying to think this way breaks Maka's brain, and mine.
3) That his friends should be his therapists. Nobody wants this--not even his pistols, who come the closest to being his therapists in canon. (Except maybe Blair-chan, who is a secretly awesome psychiatric service cat in my head--but even she isn't so much his therapist as "playing that game where I try to get the guy who gives me shrimp sometimes to move. Really, I don't know why you guys don't think this is the most fun EVER.")
4) That part of being his friend doesn't involve beating the crap out of monsters and witches. But we all expected that.
The solution is to read things with KID and poke him about his feelings and what he wants of his friends, and then he can write Maka a note. (Yeah, he hates me pretty hard right now--always an excellent sign. And no, I'm not being sarcastic.)
*He told Ryoga that the only reason he, Ryoga, didn't have to vet stuff for his friends is because is because I can do it for him, as we have the same impairment. Ryoga said, "No, dude. It's because Ranma's never asked for a book in his life." Also, our impairment is less well-studied, so there is not as much to vet.
