reblog and make a wish!
this was removed from tumbrl due to “violating one or more of Tumblr’s Community Guidelines”, but since my wish came true the first time, I’m putting it back. :)
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Thank you tumblr for being a real one. Twitter is diagnosing me with dementia
mutuals stop putting this on my dash challenge
Every Friday. Every Friday i either see this post or live in fear of seeing it. I can’t wake up and say ‘it’s friday’ anymore without thinking of this post. I am living a nightmare and it’s your fault
my most treasured photo folder is out of context messenger screenshots from my best friend sera
The first year I had Emily, I learned to put my finger in front of her nose every few pets. If she moved to touch her nose to my finger, I could pet her a little bit more. If she stayed absolutely still, she'd bite me within the next few pets.
It took a long time for her to be willing to share softer signs of discomfort, like lashing her tail or making noise, before she escalated into attacking my hand.
Or maybe not "willing" so much as... literally able? I might be reading too much into it, but I got Emily as a year-old cat who'd been living on the streets for part of her life, when I was at the underemployed end of the grad school program that never ended, a therapist with nobody to therapize, so I ended up looking at her as a survivor of trauma and bringing therapeutic perspectives and techniques to the table. Some of which are about how we have to actually learn to understand and recognize our own internal states, especially because when we're living in fight-or-flight, that goes way down on our brains' priority lists most of the time.
So it might have taken her a while to be able to understand that petting felt nice but also overstimulating, so while she could enjoy it, it also caused that buildup of discomfort, and she could do something about it that wasn't biting.
All of which is just the context necessary for me to say, today she crawled into my lap and rested her chin in my palm, and demanded via headbutts that I just keep continuously scritching her jaw, for 20 minutes straight.
ALTWe've come a long way, babygirl.
“I don’t care about dumb weed jokes,” I said naively, before I saw this
This 420 is a palindrome!!!! 4/20/2024
It is!
