welcome to another episode of: ultimate feels terrible about something but venting on discord where other people are clearly struggling way more makes him feel bad so they decide to just talk about their problems on a site he doesn't use anymore

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my life isnt as bad as i make it seem, okay?

im fine. im fine. my life is FINE.

yes i cry almost daily, yes i have frequent breakdowns, yes i have homophobic family members and get misgendered daily. but its fine. my family isnt terrible. my life isnt terrible.

and i dont want to take the spotlight away from people who really need it.

i am not suicidal. i have never  harmed myself. i have never had the urge to harm myself. ive never even considered it.

because of this, i know that i dont need to vent. other people deserve help more than i do.

i beg of you, read the venting books of someone who really needs it. someone who actually needs help.

i dont need help.

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so a few days ago i created a dragon drawing class. fullbody and everything. i wrote up a word document, spell-checked it twice, made a series of slides, made a whole schedule and plan, got ready to teach...

and two people came.

two.

people.

i advertised it everywhere. my howto videos used to be my most popular. i thought for sure that this would be it. i was so so excited. "they'll like this," i thought. "so many people who see my art tell me how bad they are, how terrible they think their art is. maybe some of them will come and want to learn!"

evidently, i was wrong.

and im just done.

i know people had better things to do. i know some of them cant make it. some dont care.

i guess i just thought that with all the "my art is so bad pls help me" i always get on my art, people might want to actually try and improve, but maybe not.

it doesnt matter. ill edit the stupid video of me rambling and second-guessing myself and post it on youtube where itll get a hundred views max and no one will care.

i dont need sympathy. im just sad. sad that i put so much work into something that no one seemed to care about.

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my family has gotten increasingly good at dodging being supportive.

my mom being the exception. she calls me by my name and uses my pronouns. but my dad? he's a different story.

he has already said he doesn't like my name. he says he doesnt like it because its a traditionally masculine name and since he still sees me as a girl, he wont call me it.

he has never called me noah before. he calls me "bum", "sum", etc- all pet names, nicknames that I was given for my deadname

what none of them realize is that it's not that i hate my deadname.

its not that i dont like my deadname. its just not me.

so when they use nicknames to avoid calling me by my real name, it feels the exact same as when they use my deadname.

it's just another way to avoid calling me by my actual name. just another way to be supportive, but only kind of. just enough so that if i call them out on it, i'm "not giving them enough time" or "asking too much" or "just looking for problems" (that last one is an actual thing my mom said to me once when i asked her why she wouldn't use my pronouns)

and no i cant voice this opinion to them.

they are of the strong opinion that "you can't force other people to have your same opinion, and it's okay if other people have different opinions than you"

this is fine.

but they also think that if you're trans, it's fine, as long as you dont try to force anyone to use your name or pronouns. my mom got mad at me when i first asked because she said "you're trans, it doesnt have anything to do with me, why do i have to be involved and do this for you?"

im just tired of defending myself.

i shouldnt have to convince people who i am.

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whatever im just exhausted now.

i dont want to hear that itll get better, either. its around the anniversary of when i first came out a year ago, and this is still happening.

the only thing i can wish for is that i can actually graduate from this stupid school, move out, and not have to deal with gaslighting whenever i ask someone to use my f**king pronouns.

- ultimate