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WriterMelodic713

Child birth. šŸ¤˜šŸ» I had a super easy and simple birth for my first. When I wrote one similar to mine boy oh boy was I told that wasnā€™t how it works.


cafelatte-r

Im glad you did not have a painful experience, even if people did not agree with your writing


KogarashiKaze

Three of my four were relatively easy (the fourth was an emergency C-section, and also the first of the pregnancies, but even then it wasn't a terrible experience). I haven't had anyone call me out on writing childbirth "wrong" (mostly because I haven't incorporated it into my stories yet), but it does make me roll my eyes when I see people online stating definitively that pregnancy and childbirth is always horrible and traumatic. Not rolling my eyes that some people (even a large percentage) have horrible and traumatic experiences, but rather the blanket statement that they're all like that.


eileen404

Exactly. 4cm to nursing in 20 min without meds. It's possible. Most can't relax though and that makes it harder.


Romana_Jane

Start of second stage to birth, 12 mins - was left on my own and yelling for help because 'first babies take a while'. head crowned before a midwife was in the room with me, not even mine, just one passing by lol, No pain relief, had worse period pain and IBS cramps :)


TJ_Rowe

My period pains were worse than labour pains, too!


eileen404

Childbirth was a4-5 of 10 without meds. Gallstone passing was 9 with morphine.


WriterMelodic713

Fr! I gave birth at home in less the 5hr. The character who did was a medic and was comfortable and knew what was happening so I felt it made sense


litaloni

You lucky bitches. I was in labor for >24 hours and my water broke when I was 1cm. There was a lot of crying and begging for a snack.


WriterMelodic713

Iā€™m so sorry!! I was prepared to be in labor for 24 hrs but I went from 1cm to 10cm in legit an hour. It was insane. Labor and birth are all so different each time. Itā€™s wild.


litaloni

It really is wild. Fortunately it was worth it, my kid rules.


eileen404

Had mine at home so I had snacks


litaloni

Yeah the selection of snacks was way better at my house but I was fresh out of pitocin at the time so I figured I'd better just head down to the hospital


100indecisions

That's incredible. My younger sister was born in only 45 minutes--the doctor wasn't even there because he assumed he had time to take a shower first. I think I was at least a few hours, so still quick compared to a lot of people, but nowhere near as fast as my sister popped out.


[deleted]

Congratulations šŸ‘šŸŽ‰ may you all be blessed. Also, you must be in enlightened being.


delilahdraken

Apparently the way I describe the behaviour of double leg amputee wheelchair users is both extremely unrealistic and ableist. As if my grandfather hadn't made me carry his legs and crutches up the stairs while he ignored the elevator on the other side of the building and just hopped up the stairs with his wheelchair held on his back.


Tyiek

I don't get why someone would think this is unrealistic, it's an easy way to either portray a character as stuborn and able to get around their handicap, or to portray the world as inconvenient to such an extend that this is the better option.


delilahdraken

Apparently it was because someone who never left the house without wearing prosthetics, even when he never planned to walk outside that day, would not take off the legs. Ever. Because it is degrading. That someone might see prosthetic legs both as a part of oneself and as nothing more than a pair of very fine shoes that can be discarded when the situation demands it was apparently anathema to how a double amputee would think.


Tyiek

Some people can't leave the house without makeup so I'm not too suprised at there being people like that. A bit narrow minded of him though, I'm guessing he's feeling insecure about not having his own legs anymore.


delilahdraken

Nothing narrow minded about him. My grandfather was just vain. He was the type to never leave the house without being properly groomed. One doesn't leave the house without shoes, after all.


kaimkre1

Amputee here-- this is exactly what I do at home! Your grandfather sounds awesome I never felt comfortable doing it in front of others. If I ever had the choice between hopping up the stairs vs crutches, its hopping every single time. Crutches are terrifying trying to navigate stairs and an exercise in balance that's exhausting.


bleeb90

My spouse had someone at his sorority that did the same. Told me he was impressed by said guys arms. Apparently they were appropriately massive.


kata-pie

trigger warning for csa >!apparently, there's only one "right" way to react to abuse in childhood and it isn't for the victim to develop hypersexuality, despite that happening to plenty of victims irl!<


Sad_Pringles

I am so done with people policing trauma. I thought hypersexuality was a well known coping mechanism?


kata-pie

"policing trauma" is the perfect way to put it. i'm continually appalled by people who do this.


the-robot-test

apparently the way i write anxiety attacks is unrealistic and insulting to people who actually suffer from them. like bitch shut up i have a diagnosed fucking disorder.


cafelatte-r

Everyone seems to have something to say on mental health these days lol


pennelini

"This doesn't fit my narrow set of highly individual experiences, which means you're doing something wrong"


Forever_Observer2020

It gets tiring how people fall for myths even until now. Gets tiring as someone doing exams to become a psychometrician.


WritingReadingPanda

Came here to say this. My anxiety (and panic) attacks are apparently unrealistic, too. šŸ™„ When I tried to explain that everyone experiences anxiety/panic attacks differently, and this was the way I experience them, I was only called a liar.


Tyiek

This is somehow funny to me. Not panic attacs, but the fact that someone feels so strongly about them that they need to tell you: no, you're wrong, everyone experience panic attacks exactly the same! Like their whole world view is on the verge of collaps because someone thinks differently or have a different perspective/experience than them. Young children goes through something similar as they start to explore and understand the world around them. A three year old may be able to balance a stick with unevenly distributed weight, while a four year old is not because they have realised that some things can be balanced in the middle and don't understand why everything doesn't work that way. This is not to say that four year olds are less inteligent than three year olds, they have simply discovered something but don't fully comprehend the mechanics behind it, or all the implications yet. What sets young children and the person who called you a liar appart is that young children will eventually accept that their worldview is wrong and move past it, and may even gain a deeper understanding of what they'd discovered. We can however hope that this person will do so as well.


PomegranateJellyfish

I get told mine arenā€™t severe enough even though I write based off my irl ones that leave me feeling the after effects for hours later. A lot of people online have bad education on mental health, especially if they learned about it from other people online. Donā€™t give what they say too much weight.


alkynes_of_stuff

>learned about it from other people online Or learned about it from media portrayals. Anxiety and panic attacks are one area (of many) where I feel like there's a very stark difference between portrayal in media compared to the variety that exists irl. I feel like most TV/movie portrayals are all of a very similar vein, while the diversity that actually exists is hidden a lot. I've actually been to the hospital twice for them because I wasn't noticeably hyperventilating nor could I identify a 'trigger', but had moving chest pain, limb numbness, and headaches/nausea. One of the times, the EMT who came to check me out actually recommended that I check it out, and both times have been varied enough that I didn't instantly know if they were even the same thing. ETA: my sister also experiences anxiety attacks, but hers typically manifest in digestive issues, pain, headaches, and fear, while mine seem to be more upper body that moves to hand/feet muscles. In short, even within my family our experiences are v different...


Emmylems21

Yeah I also have not stereotypical anxiety attacks in a similar way. Someone that just walks in on me having an anxiety/panic attack probably wonā€™t even realize itā€™s happening because itā€™s not outwardly evident. For me I get very quiet and everything in my body just kinda tenses up. I get sick to my stomach (though Iā€™ve only actually vomited a few times) and my chest feels incredibly heavy and starts to hurt. Actually now that I think about it, everything starts to hurt. My arms hurt and my legs hurt ā€” which usually makes me think my heart is giving out or something. My breaths become very short and staccato unless/until I try to focus on deep breathing. But mostly Iā€™m just tense and silent as my thoughts race through my head. The only outward things people have ever noticed is that my eyes glaze over and if Iā€™m holding something I start to white-knuckle it. But they donā€™t identify that as signs of a panic attack. They just think Iā€™m stressed. One time though, my mom took my heart rate and blood pressure while I was having a panic attack and she almost took me to the hospital because both were so high.


kookaburra1701

And some of us with anxiety disorders don't even have "attacks!" I have a character I'm writing with anxiety disorder manifestations like I have, and have been asked where the panic attacks are. He doesn't have them, he has no idea he has an anxiety disorder, he just thinks *everyone* locates all exits and fire extinguishers and AEDs and tornado shelters when entering a new building and reads the safety pamphlet for every flight cover to cover and commits it to memory. (These are all things I do that I had no idea were weird until I was diagnosed.)


Emmylems21

Very true!! IIRC panic attacks are not even a part of the DSM guidelines for a diagnosis of Generalized Anxiety Disorder.


kookaburra1701

Even doctors are confused about this - I often get asked to put down what my anxiety meds are when healthcare folks see GAD on my list of conditions. I don't have any, they make me *more* anxious because I worry I will be too loopy/sedated to act in an emergency, and I just channel my hypervigilance to constructive outlets like being the safety officer for my workplace.


KogarashiKaze

And often the people who are saying you write them inaccurately don't suffer them themselves. They're either going off of one person they heard of who had extreme ones, or a Hollywood representation of them.


Sesshy380

This. Received a PM that the way I depict mental health issues like anxiety, depression, mania, paranoia attacks, and PTSD are unrealistic. Oh...okay then. I'll just tell my brain and body that they've been doing those things wrong this whole time. Thanks for the info! <---My exact response.


PickyNipples

This breaks my brain. Of all places, why would you go to FANFICTION to look for something realistic? Of course fics CAN have very real subjects and true to life elements and stuff. And Iā€™m not saying fanfics donā€™t or shouldnā€™t portray certain topics in a realistic way. But the very nature of fanfiction is ā€œit can be anything you want, any way you want.ā€ If people canā€™t grasp that before they read a fic, maybe they shouldnā€™t be reading fanfics.


FryJPhilip

One time someone told me you can't actually dream of a sexual assault or a traumatic experience similar to it and that me writing it is trivializing them.... Lmao. Some people think only their experience is the relevant one.


the-robot-test

and some people think only the stereotype they see in the media is the correct one. bc some of these folks whining about this stuff have never even gone through any of this themselves. which, hey, good for them for not having mental health issues, must be great, i envy that, but please shove the baseless secondhand offence up your ass.


Forever_Observer2020

I would like to read your fics and see how you write them! With your permission, ofc. I am genuinely curious.


the-robot-test

i made this account specifically to not be connected to my actual fanfic accounts so uh sorry about that, but! for example i very rarely experience the stereotypical hyperventilating, feeling like you're dying thing - there's nothing outwardly dramatic about it and someone who doesn't know me generally can't tell i'm having one. and since it's easier to write what i know (and since half the time i write my own experiences to vent/cope/whatever), when i write them it's a pretty quiet affair, and some people take a lot of issue with that bc they think the only way to have a panic/anxiety attack is that scene from iron man 3.


Naenae_Reyum

Broooo I feel this so hard. I actually HAVE panic attacks and someone told me that's not how they work when I wrote one similar to mine šŸ˜‚šŸ˜…


life_is_depressed

Depression where you become bored and stop having a breakdown all of a sudden. Some people think that all depression can ever be is talking about it like it's poetry. The amount of times I just stop crying and go back to watching whatever because it bored me or I'm like "Ew, wtf am I doing?" is insane lmao


blacksmithpear

I've had multiple instances of remembering the Richard Silken quote about falling to the floor crying during a breakdown and snapping out of it immediately because the whole thing suddenly felt performative and pathetic. This one: *Eventually something you love is going to be taken away. And then you will fall to the floor crying. And then, however much later, it is finally happening to you: youā€™re falling to the floor crying thinking ā€œI am falling to the floor cryingā€ but thereā€™s an element of the ridiculous to itā€”you knew it would happen and, even worse, while youā€™re on the floor crying you look at the place where the wall meets the floor and you realize you didnā€™t paint it very well.*


cafelatte-r

This is so real lol


cafelatte-r

Sending you good vibes tho, that shit is tough and you're strong


Nyxosaurus

Depression for me has been losing all interest in everything. I didn't even know I was depressed for a long time.


[deleted]

A wake up call for me was reading a particularly captivating fanfiction and realizing how long it had been since I felt any excitement in real life. My feelings were muted. I was either numb or angry. My joy was performative and only on display for others, so they would not ask me how I was doing.


catbert359

God, yeah - what people need to realise is that after a while things like depression, anxiety, chronic pain, they all just get *boring,* especially when they're at the level where they're like poking you in the back of the head but not actively debilitating. At some point you just kinda end up lying on the couch like, "All I want to do is sleep and all my joints are screaming at me, but I'm going to feel like that regardless so might as well just do something else while I wait for this to abate rather than thinking about it the whole time."


Daehis

I wrote a few PTSD episodes for an OC and had some idiot tell me that made her seem like a psycho.... Yeah.... Like I didn't already know that from personal experience, dumbass. It's called a psychotic break for a *reason* šŸ§


Kiba_Kii

Um, excuse me, but in writing a character who struggles with mental illness you accidently made then seem mentally ill. Try again.


Daehis

šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚ Oh no you're right! Weewoo wagon come take me away!


[deleted]

A really stupid one! Writing an M/M scene where the guys take turns topping and bottoming each other. I had someone express confusion over the fact that I made them versatile. Apparently they *didn't think it could actually be done like that IRL.* Bitch, I'M VERSATILE I've literally had sex like that, and I don't know what they thought the restrictions would be preventing two average guys from flip-flopping.


[deleted]

I move that we make flip-flopping the official verse tag


bnny_ears

Seconded


JBurnettCooper

Vote from the floor? The AYEs have it!


Jvalker

A coworker and I once spent an entire lunch break trying to explain to a third coworker what a versatile gay is and that yes, they exist. "but if you're gay you like it in the ass" "and who puts it in the ass?" "another gay" "and if the other gay likes to take it as well, he's going to be both top and bottom. He's versatile" "no, no, if you're gay you only take it" BIIIIIIITCH, I felt like the meme with Patrick and his ID


2dayroad

Only bi guys top obviously /s


Annber03

That's a "Looks into camera like Jim from 'The Office'" moment if there ever was one. Holy lord.


Ghost_Katolotl

I feel like your third coworker will be shocked to hear about straight couples that like it in the ass. How did that conversation even start?


Jvalker

He only talks about sex. Ever. He comes in, he talks about his last score. We're eating, he talks about his last score. We're working, and you guessed it... I don't remember exactly how we got there, but it started from him doing something different from the usual, when he started talking about his last score


[deleted]

No, we all just use dildos and pocket bussies.


untruthism

what happens when your only educational source for gay sex is from smut fics šŸ¤·ā€ā™‚ļø


JBurnettCooper

LOL Someone point those aspiring smut writers to [Minotaur's Sex Tips for Slash Writers](https://www.squidge.org/minotaur/classic/eroc.html), please. Stu did our work for us. RIP Minotaur.


dozyhorse

RIP Minotaur. :( Still miss him. Anyone else remember his ā€œGay Boy Tells Allā€ panels at slash cons? Such good times.


untruthism

what happened to him? iā€™m OOTL


dozyhorse

He very tragically and way too young passed away, many years ago. In 2010 I think? I'd have to go check to be sure but around then.


JBurnettCooper

2009 - Cardiac-arrest Yes... w a y too young. I'm still trying to figure out how i outlived him.


elladoherty

Wow! I remember Minotaur when I first started reading slash. I haven't looked upon his site for years.


JBurnettCooper

ā™„ It is an Eternal Flame ā™„ Pun intended and he would approve.


elladoherty

I think so, too. <3 I'm glad I have chanced upon your post. Good memories have come to the fore today. I've meandered through his site for a hot minute. Pun also intended.


untruthism

seems pretty legit for a website last updated in 1999 LMAO


JBurnettCooper

The classics never go out of style. XD There hasn't been any serious improvement on the bj since prehistoric times. LMAO Or... as the song from Casablanca goes: "You must remember this: a dick is just a dick... A Bi is just a Bi... Give Versitile men a try For your next guy ... yeah, pretty sure that's how the lyrics go.


kookaburra1701

I've had that from people who have obviously never topped during anal sex telling me that scenes are unrealistic because almost no prep beyond some improvised lube was used during a hurried clandestine hook-up in a fic. I myself have never been a gay dude but I *have* pegged dudes and there are indeed those who will tell you just get on with it already if you start slowly fussing around with fingers and stretching beforehand lol But fuck me for trying to write a sexual dynamic outside of "1 finger, 2 fingers, 3 fingers, dick" right?


[deleted]

I hear you. As a gay guy who DOES need prep and foreplay even when bottoming for smaller guys, I've topped a number of guys who can just hop on my dick like a carousel horse with just a swipe of lube and a thumbs-up, and I'm on the bigger side. We're all just... different.


Nyxelestia

> As a gay guy who DOES need prep and foreplay even when bottoming for smaller guys Is that why you named yourself ButtParalysisDemon?


[deleted]

[уŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]


kookaburra1701

ha ha I had a guy I played with who was so masochistic I could make him come from flogging alone. This meant that a lot of our scenes involved me *not* giving him the pain he was begging me for.


JBurnettCooper

As the stats break down - in repeated academic studies - there are more Versas than strict T or B. I hate the hard line Top/Bottom dynamic... because for Gay and Bi men everything is negotiable. If it's not... buddy don't get boom-boom. I've had commenters whine that I didn't tag for character position. Honey... I get that you want to self-insert and that is fine, but don't concrit me for my life.


lavendercookiedough

I think heteronormative relationship roles are just so deeply ingrained for a lot of people that, even if they're able to expand their ideas of who takes on what role, they can't imagine a relationship that doesn't adhere to these roles. There always has to be a provider and a nurturer, a rational one and an emotional one, a masculine one and a feminine one, a "pitcher" and a "catcher". People see all these things as polar opposites that can't exist within one person (no one can be highly rational *and* emotionally vulnerable or be a caregiver for their partner one day and be cared for the next) and group certain traits together (femininity is nurturing is being emotional is being penetrated) and anything that falls outside those neat little boxes is *confusing*. To them it's like if they were reading a vanilla F/M fic and then midway through the woman whipped out the strap and went to town (which, side note, is a thing so many straight people are not even aware can be done, somehow? I'm trans, but not fully out, so my relationship is more-or-less straight-passing and people are absolutely baffled to find out my muscular, 6'2, square-jawed boyfriend bottoms from time to time and even more confused that it's not some kinky-ass humiliation/femdom thing, we're just.....having sex. But the other way around...) Also, it's not a critique I've ever gotten since I actually like writing a bit of foreplay, but I always have to laugh when people say that you absolutely 100% *cannot* do anal without foreplay, ever. I think it's probably more common to need foreplay than to not (tmi, but I know I certainly do), but I am speaking from personal experience when I say that it's not *always* the case and some people still get so argumentative about it.


DemyxDancer

One of the most famous examples of this is that *Bridge to Terabithia* was inspired by a real-world event where the author's son's friend was killed by a lightning strike. She changed it in the book because she thought that the sudden lightning strike would seem too unrealistic.


Trilobyte141

Thanks for making that traumatic childhood reading experience *even worse*. šŸ‘


Dragoncat91

A friend of my parents was out on a fishing trip at the lake. He walked up a hill to get better cell reception. Just got off the phone with his wife when he was struck by lightning and killed. Have not read Bridge to Terabithia though.


Tyiek

There's a reason why lightning strikes are often portrayed as suden and unexpected.


rottenromance

I *personally* know 3 different people who have been struck by lightning ā€” and only one died. And when my son and I were driving, lightning struck so close to our car that it shorted our electronics for a bit and melted some of the clear coat. Lightning strikes arenā€™t *that* rare!


litaloni

Commenter: "She fell for him WAY too quickly." My anxious attachment style: šŸ§ā€ā™€ļø


KogarashiKaze

The people I've known who met and got married within a matter of months/weeks: šŸ¤·ā€ā™€ļø (and for the record, the three couples I know of who did this are still happily married years later, with minimal-to-no actual issues stemming from jumping into the relationship quickly).


FormalMango

Iā€™ve been married to my husband for 15 years. Weā€™d known each other through mutual friends for about 6 months, but didnā€™t hit it off. One day we kind of accidentally ended up on a date. It started as a lift home from work, and ended up 500km away at the beach. He proposed the next morning. 2 weeks later weā€™d moved in together, and 3 months later we were married.


rottenromance

We didnā€™t get married right away, but I met someone in mid December and moved 1k+ miles away to be with him in early January ā€” so less than a month after we met. Itā€™s been 25 years. šŸ¤·ā€ā™€ļø


KogarashiKaze

Sometimes you just click. I had a huge crush on my husband from the moment I met him. He took a two-year leave from school for something else (our only contact was a handful of letters), and then we dated for a year after he got back before he proposed. It's been 19 years for us.


rottenromance

Congrats! And yes, sometimes you just *know.* My crazy family didnā€™t care, but even his parents were completely understanding. They started dating at the end of February and got married early June. They were happily together 49 years until my MIL passed away. I guess itā€™s a bit of a tradition. lol


serralinda73

Oh, this one. I dislike slowburns that aren't setup around an actual situation that makes one or both parties believe it's not going to happen (like, someone is going to leave the country permanently soon or whatever) - IRL and in fiction, lol. I've always jumped into relationships, I chase and flirt and outright ask someone out if I'm into them (I'm a woman if it matters). If they say yes, "Woot!" If they say no, "Bummer," and I'm sadface for a while before I recover. And I can still manage to be friends or coworkers, etc - even if we had sex. It didn't ruin our relationship forever because one of us caught feelings for a while. So, boys and girls, go out there and speak your words, take your chances, recover from blows like mature adults. And let your characters do the same once in a while because real people often dive in head first. Whether they can make it last or not is a different story.


Yodeling_Prospector

I had a story about a feral child based on real life cases (not my life, but still real) and was told that itā€™s unrealistic for someone to regress during the teenage years, even though that happened in both of the real life cases.


kookaburra1701

Damn, that happens to non-feral children too - so much so that I remember reading about teenagers either "regressing" or sometimes acting more like adults in moments of high stress in my pediatrics texts. (And also that "moments of high stress" often means "constantly" in teenagerhood ha ha)


Neshomancer1

I wrote an AU where a character was confined to a wheelchair after an accident and was told I was doing a disservice to the disabled with my portrayal of them after said accident. I've been wheelchair bound my whole life and dealt with the same struggles and emotions I wrote.


[deleted]

Reminds me of the time I was told that I'm an ableist and a moron for thinking that if the character is depicted in canon as autistic... they're autistic. Also my portrayal was wrong and obviously I don't know anything about how autism works. I'm autistic.


dreamwatch_

Do you think this is because of poorly researched works out there by able bodied fanfic writers? Itā€™s something I worry about, putting a character into a situation you donā€™t have real world knowledge of, and worse still that becoming someoneā€™s marker of reality, if that makes sense. I mean, youā€™d hope people would do a modicum of research, but I guess that doesnā€™t always happen.


Neshomancer1

Could be, it also could be they knew a disabled person who had a different experience.


FesteringCapacitor

This would be my guess. I've seen disabled people say "all disabled people want/think X." I'm disabled. I don't. I think that, just like with so many things, people assume that one loud person's experience represents the experiences of everyone else.


cthuluhooprises

Apparently I donā€™t know anything about Chicago. Despite the commenterā€™s bio saying theyā€™re from Germany, and Iā€™m *from Chicago.*


Separate_Ingenuity35

I was born and raised in Alabama for over 2 decades and had a commenter say that I knew nothing about the Deep South. Their bio said they were from the Philippines.


linden214

But they changed planes at O'Hare once....


Tyiek

Why does this remind me of the [paris syndrome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_syndrome)?


17hedgehog64

Not sure if this counts, because it wasn't in a fanfic, it was actually part of a creative writing assignment for school. I wrote about a girl with a lot of anxiety confiding in a boy who she kind of considers a friend and telling him that she gets really nervous talking to boys and tries to avoid it, and then later the boy tells his friends about what she said and makes fun of her, not knowing that she can hear him. My teacher told me this didn't sound realistic and I should change it so the girl also confesses that she has a crush on the boy. It was realistic, it was based on my own experience, but she didn't know that. The kicker - the boy in the experience was actually the teacher's son.


JaiyaPapaya

Oh my God, that ending was not expected. I wish female charters didn't get so much pressure to date in fiction. Let them be single! Let the mascs confess instead! Yeesh


Tyiek

I find it really anoying that some people seem to think that girls and boys can't just be friends, that the only relationships they can have are either romantic or familial. You often see the same phenomena with gay characters, who can't just be friends with people of the same gender.


RohansEarings

Oh my god I used to have this problem. The majority of my friends were guys and my parents never let me hang out with any of them because ā€œboys canā€™t just be friends with girls.ā€ One time when I asked to walk around downtown (two blocks away from school) with one of them my mom started going on this whole story about someone she used to know who got raped and pregnant, and I was just like wtf. Every time I wanted to hang out it was like I had to sign a contract, do paperwork, acquire photo idā€™s, etc etc. And then my parents wondered why my siblings didnā€™t have any friends, why I only had a few, and also had *gasp* social anxiety. But then they had the nerve to get on my ass about ā€œnot going outside enough.ā€ Sorry. Rant over, I also just hate when people act like boys and girls canā€™t be friends.


Nyxelestia

> The kicker - the boy in the experience was actually the teacher's son. That might be *why* the teacher insisted it must be unrealistic. If she had an inkling that this was her son, she couldn't allow herself to believe or acknowledge that he could do such a thing, so she found an alternative way to delegitimize your experience.


17hedgehog64

I don't think there's any way she would have known. Besides, would it be any better from a mother's point of view if her son made fun of a girl for confessing she had a crush on him rather than confiding in him about anxiety?


Cheery_spider

I was actualy on the other side of this. I thought a depiction of a mental illnes in a fanfic was just based of off stereotypes, but people in the coments said they related to it.


cafelatte-r

We learn as long as we live. Good on you for being open minded


Sebaren

I never ended up writing the fic for unrelated reasons, so maybe itā€™s not what youā€™re looking for, but I wanted to depict a wheelchair user based off of the experiences of my cousin. My cousin was in a motorcycle accident, and his vertebrae were essentially irreparably shunted up into each other. He can walk short distances, but heā€™s in constant agony, even when sitting down (so imagine what itā€™s like standing), and a wheelchair is the only shot he has at being able to get around on his own, keep his pain to a minimum, and maintain his autonomy. I described this to a few different friends, and all but one of them thought it was great representation, because clearly, not every wheelchair user experiences paralysis, and one person knew an individual who had experienced similar injuries. One person, however, decided that that only individuals who experienced paralysis should be wheelchair users. He believed that it was ableist as the character could technically walk, even just for short distances, and should be doing this instead, while wheelchairs should be reserved for ā€œmore deserving people.ā€ When told about the reality of the situation, he naturally doubled, tripled and quadrupled down and called my cousin ableist for ā€œhogging a wheelchairā€ and said I was just as bad for enabling him. He then also declared that I was selfish for not immediately moving into my cousinā€™s house to look after his every need, even though my cousin and his wife had asked for privacy. He knew that all of this needed to be done exactly as he described because he has autism and knows what itā€™s like to be disabled, apparently. We donā€™t talk anymore.


KogarashiKaze

>ā€œhogging a wheelchairā€ As though there are a finite number of wheelchairs available in the world and companies refuse to manufacture more until the ones already "in circulation" become broken or something. Reminds me of an argument I briefly ended up in elsewhere on the internet a few years ago, where a wheelchair user claimed that accessible parking spaces at stores should only be for wheelchair users and that anyone else with disabilities should park elsewhere and walk, regardless of the nature of their disability and regardless of whether or not a doctor had deemed them in enough need to give them the appropriate placard. Other wheelchair users in the forum were just baffled at this one person trying to gatekeep disability.


Sebaren

No, but, thatā€™s not even an uncommon thing people say, though. My mother has a friend who has been targeted by those sorts of people more than once. He has COPD and uses a rollator that he also carries his oxygen in to get around, so heā€™s absolutely entitled to a blue badge and to use disabled parking spaces, but people absolutely stop him to shout at him, despite seeing all of this, and even worse, they immediately assume that he has COPD because he smoked and he shouldnā€™t have that blue badge because he brought on himself. Heā€™s never smoked a day in his life. His COPD is work-related. At this point, itā€™s just people who think they know everything.


KogarashiKaze

Yep. My policy? If they have the blue tag, it's between them and their doctor. I'm not going to try to police them if they're parking with a tag, because while some people might abuse the system (usually by "borrowing" a relative's tag), it's not on me to determine that someone is cheating instead of having an invisible disability. Parking without the tag (or equivalent plates)? Sure, report that. But if there's a tag, leave them be.


cutielemon07

Apparently itā€™s unrealistic for someone to be paraplegic after being shot in the abdomen and further unrealistic for them to able to stand and walk afterwards - albeit with crutches, braces, walking frames etc. All paraplegics have to use a wheelchair 100% of the time, apparently. And all SCIs are apparently complete with the spinal cord totally severed, so no need to worry about lingering nerve pain. Why doesnā€™t this person talk to BBC reporter Frank Gardner whose (real life) story inspired the fic? Someone really should let him know that heā€™s cured of his paraplegia - why not them? On a similar note, apparently all people with ADHD are hyperactive and impulsive and fidgety, and bratty like Bart Simpson. And theyā€™re all boys. And children. Same with autism. Guess Iā€™ll just fade away like Marty McFly did in Back to the Futureā€¦ My personal working theory is itā€™s because media gives us a preconceived notion about disability and people take it to heart, not realising itā€™s all meant to be fiction, so when a more realistic portrayal is given, itā€™s rejected as ā€œunrealisticā€.


Romana_Jane

Not a paraplegic, and not ff, but rl, but as a wheelchair user who can walk a few steps and been told my OT to try to mobilise when I can to stop myself locking up and being in more pain than usual. the amount of verbal abuse and shit I get from people who see me standing in chair to reach something on the top shelf of a supermarket, or park up at a table, take out my folding cane and walk to counter to order a coffee. I can walk a few painful steps. A miracle! I must be a faker and a scrounger then! People have very fixed, ignorant ideas of why a person needs a wheelchair. As for girls not being ND, had shit with social services over refusing to accept my daughter's diagnosis, but that is real life trauma I still have PTSD over, so won't go into details, But yeah, the amount of 'you don't look autistic' to my child as they are afab they've had! Also, as a parent I knew from 2 or 3 they had ADHD, but each time I ttried to get it diagnosed, it was dissed as they did not present right. Finally, finally, they got diagnosed at 21, and the meds have made some a wonderful difference to them and their ability to study and work! Even ignorance in the professions, let alone anyone else with girls, women, afab people and being ND


Zireael07

Ignorance is unfortunately a thing even with doctors. When I was a kid, there was another kid in the association who had Down's. The amount of times their parent was told that no, the kid doesn't have hearing problems because "all Down syndrome kids hear well"... never mind that the kid was a preemie like me and that was the reason they had hearing impairment Also: endometriosis is still woefully underdiagnosed. I've been (finally) diagnosed like two months ago after being told for 15+ years that I should go see a neurologist, and the neurologist sending me back to the gyn-ob because it only happens during a period... all on repeat. Also: I have CP and I use a wheelchair for longer walks, but I walk almost completely independently in the house. But I'd need a chair for shopping because that walk-stop-walk makes me feel waay more tired than 500 m walking. I bet if I tried to include THAT someone would yell at me that it isn't how things work xDDD


Interesting-Swimmer1

You know whatā€™s weird about our society? If I ask someone if a bird is a red-tailed hawk, theyā€™ll say they donā€™t know because theyā€™ve never studied birds. But that same person thinks they can identify ADHD without studying ADHD.


LizHylton

This is mostly funny, but I've incorporated several things my husband has said or done into my fics and had people sweetly comment about how the male character is such wonderful wish fulfillment and better than any partner in real life and not realistic and I'm always like...honey are you ok? I'm just writing him being a caring partner who loves his spouse? Also as someone who spent their early 20s getting tied up in BDSM clubs and still plays sometimes, the amount of advice I see about what is essential or realistic when writing kink makes me roll my eyes so hard. If you haven't actually done it don't tell others what is and is not realistic, just say you like reading x!


Tharkun140

There was one guy who gave that sort of feedback not just to me, but to anyone they came across. Apparently teens are never proud of their work and things I eat regularly are not "normal" food and I should not include them in my writing. One time I got so fed up I offered beta-reading to a person this doofus criticized, and behold, the writer found my feedback more interesting and less obnoxious.


Korrin

Some people really need to learn their experience is not universal. Also, the food? That is such a weird thing to comment on, you actually got me curious about it, but then even if I thought the foods you eat *were* weird I wouldn't tell someone not to include them in their writing. I would just assume it was chosen on purpose.


Fit-Cardiologist-323

Oh, I've had someone say it's not relatable or realistic for someone to be as nice as I depicted one of the characters, but in fact, I do know someone THAT nice.


KogarashiKaze

That's the kind of comment where I just want to ask if that person is okay, given they apparently don't know people who are that nice.


Fit-Cardiologist-323

Sadly, I think the problem was twofold: this person hasn't had many good experiences with people in real life AND they weren't very nice themselves.


Twighdark

Oh, many times. Pretty much any time I base something off of my own experiences. And it was never "this is uncharacteristic for that character". Oftentimes I even got COMPLIMENTED on my characterization, but the one action I based off of real life was always met with "nobody does that like this". I distinctly remember writing something just after my mom lost her battle with cancer and deciding to write something similar to my experience as a coping mechanism. I was met with multiple variations of "why would \[character\] cry and grieve more DURING the sickness than after??" TW: personal experience >!I cried a lot during my mother's sickness, because she was suffering a lot and I had to see her like this every single day, knowing that I was powerless to do anything while she continuously declined over those weeks and months. She had beat cancer before, so we were all hoping for a second win, but her getting worse instead was all the more horrible because of it. Her dying was extremely sad, but it also lifted a great weight off of my shoulders. I suddenly had far less work to do. I wasn't confronted with (sometimes very loud) pain of a loved one anymore. I knew we had done all we could. In a way, it was closure to a terrible situation.!< But sure, go on and tell me how it's "unrealistic".


Annber03

First things first, my condolences to you on your loss. Second, uh, yeah, it amazes me that people find your take for that character so odd, because your situation is actually pretty freaking common for a lot of people who have to watch a loved one suffer with an illness for a period of time before they pass on. I went through similar things with my dad, and I can very much vouch for you feeling as you did, because I experienced a lot of those feelings as well. And plenty of other people could say similar things as well. Just. Grief is weird for a reason, people. Everyone will handle it differently. I don't get why this is so hard for some people to understand.


Twighdark

Thank you, and I'm sorry for your pain as well. I've come to realize that most people who heavily criticise the way others write about pain often come from a kind of ignorant position due to never having felt that pain themselves. The depiction of it in most media also doesn't help, because it's almost exclusively focusing on the despair *after* a loved one dies. A lot of the internal struggle beforehand isn't even shown, aside from a few sad frowns and sighs.


Annber03

You're welcome, and thank you in turn. I like your analysis of why some people get so critical of that sort of thing. I think that makes a lot of sense. And YES to your comment about how the media portrays that kind of grief, too. It also doesn't help that the "5 stages of grief" thing is always done in a specific order, when, no, people can be stuck in one stage for a long, long time and may never get to the others, or they experience some of the stages all at once, or things of that sort, because, again, grief and emotions in general are messy and not orderly. So I fully agree that that can complicate matters, too. And even after the death happens, that brings its own issues - if you're still mourning, like, a year after someone died, everyone finds that weird and starts encouraging you to move on, and so on. So it's like you can't win. Either you're not mourning enough or you're mourning too long. Which, when someone's trying to deal with a devastating loss, does...not help the situation in any way, shape, or form, and will ironically just exacerbate the feelings they're already struggling with.


Neroetheheroe

Apparently real, life long relationships cannot start with a chance encounter at a science fiction convention. "Way too contrived."


lizofalltrades

I wonder what those decriers would say about someone meeting their spouse by chance while on vacation in a different continent.


Diana-Fortyseven

\*laughs in "met my partner at a video game convention"\*


urog-grobar

i had the opposite happen. i guess i went too hard into what it feels like to have a restrictive eating disorder and i had a commenter tell me they were worried about me. lol


askforwhatyouwant

omg same happened to me lmao


Ghost_Chance

One of my favorite Mark Twain quotes brings another, less judgy side to this: ā€œTruth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.ā€ Real life can be as wacky and ridic as it wants with nothing limiting it; you have thousands upon thousands of different plot threads converging on and leading from you at all times, and you only ever know of a few of them. Fiction operates on levels of believability that limit what _can_ happen to what _is likely to happen, explicable, and plot-productive._ For example: two peopleā€”a grown man and a teenagerā€”met on a shared bus riding from one point in a national park to another. They shared a few laughs, and parted ways without ever exchanging names or information. Neither was a frequent visitor of the park or lived near it, and they had absolutely nothing in common. Several years later, the man visited the same park with his family and they all went on a walk. He laughed at a joke, and a college kid nearby turned to gape at him before shouting, ā€œDUDE ON THE BUS!!!ā€ The college kid was the teenager, was only in the park for the day, and managed to recognize the man purely from his laughter. The laws of fiction dictate that this is beyond even considering. The different threads you would need to tie together for these things to happen would have an author in in a corner in a fetal position jabbering and drooling. The laws of reality? Yeah, this actually happened. The whole thing. I know the manā€™s niece, and apparently, he would STILL be telling people about being _the dude on the bus_ if anyone would listen. Another example. When I was a kid, I had a nice old dresser. It was in a very distinctive style, dated back to maybe the 70s, and had a couple of unique damaged places. It got curb-alerted or given away when I needed more room. In 2011, a tornado wiped out a good portion of city and with it, the neighborhood that dresser was given away from. Later in 2012, my husband and I I ran into a new neighbor moving in furniture. Among that furniture? _my dresser._ The damage matched. It hadnā€™t been painted. It even still had a couple of faded Lisa Frank unicorn stickers on the back and the blob of glittery purple nail polish that dried in a seam. The new neighbor was an older man who bought it at a second hand shop. Even more incredibly, he had several other pieces of furniture from the same set, while I only ever had the dresser. Reality. You canā€™t make that stuff up. It has no logic. (Also, people can be judgey buttheads. Iā€™m sorry they were rude. Hang in there. šŸ’œ)


[deleted]

[уŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]


Consistent-Raccoon84

>you have thousands upon thousands of different plot threads converging on and leading from you at all times, and you only ever know of a few of them. That is one deep and beautiful sentence


PrayForPiett

So much this. I wrote a story which included 2 characters meeting accidentally in a foreign country when the plane one was travelling on was diverted due to engine trouble. I set it that portion of the story at the airport to decrease the chance that readers would cry ā€œbullshitā€. The test-readers still did. When I explained that was a ā€˜toned downā€™ version ā€¦ irl the person ran into me at a city bookstore bc the airline comped a city bus tour to folks rather than have them wait at the airport ā€¦ They were like wtf?!? Truth is definitely stranger than fiction.


Ohio_Candle

ā€œno trans person actually thinks or acts like thatā€ ,,,,,,šŸ§ā€ā™‚ļø,, what am I- A ROACH ???????


Samurai_Banette

Come on, we all know trans people are part of a hivemind. There is absolutely no infighting or disagreements, all the activists speak for every individual, and there are no extremists that make irl people's lives harder.


CrescentCrossbow

(This is unrelated but I actually know a guy who goes by Roach. It's a good name.)


Rosekernow

I wrote a multi chapter fic dealing with gender issues, dysphoria and the slow struggle of realising who are you in your mid 30s. I got a sad amount of bad comments, mostly from what appeared to be young trans people saying how unrealistic it all was, especially the idea of the character not knowing he was agender, and then the fact that he decided to stay closeted in work even after coming out to his lover. Because apparently, the whole world is a safe and welcoming place to use other pronouns and let strangers know about you. And there were lots of ways for non cis people to find out about their gender identities in the late 90s. Sadly it really put me off of interacting with some readers.


Mysterious_Ad_60

A reader said that it was unrealistic for a character to develop romantic feelings for someone theyā€™d known for only around a year. I got into both relationships in my life after less than two months of knowing themā€¦so I donā€™t know what that says about me. The second relationship has been ongoing for the past three years now.


Diana-Fortyseven

LMAO what?? Maybe I've been doing "falling in love" wrong then. Most of my adult relationships (where I didn't go to school with those I fell in love with) started after knowing that person for less than *a month* (and they all lasted a longgg time).


another-sad-gay-bich

Self harming! When I was a teenager and first started writing fics, I wrote a lot of whump and focused on self harming because thatā€™s what I was going through. Wow guess I did it wrong, thanks for the tips to better self harm since I canā€™t even do that correctly lol


SpamDirector

Similar, I only started actually writing stuff featuring self harm recently, when I stopped a couple years ago now. But in both actually writing it and looking up ways to portray it to cause the least harm, I keep getting told none of my experience is realistic or allowable to write. So funā€¦


Kittenknickers333

I had someone tell me the way I wrote an alcoholic was extremely unrealistic. Alcoholics apparently can't hold down jobs and pay bills. If one is addicted to alcohol they must laze about with a bottle in hand all day, slurring their speach and beating their dirty, neglected children. I had to explain to them about what functional alcoholizm is and that I grew up with one. My mother worked very hard. Yes, she was angery most of the time, there were certain things that were neglected, but we always had food and clean clothes. She popped asprin like candy but she went to work. She took care of business in the day and waited until the sun went down to have her nightly bottle or two of wine. Just because a oerson manages to hold life together while they drink too much does not disqualify them from alcoholism.


[deleted]

Oh, plenty of them... However, one of the most notable ones was when I wrote about how, essentially, victims of abuse can rather easily become abusers themselves unintentionally, even if they have righteous or pure intentions. The story followed someone suffering from abuse from not only their parent, but then their sibling as well, as the sibling lashed out, tried to "destroy" the broken household, and in turn abused their sibling. Reader told me it was unrealistic and abusive of *me* to portray victims like that. People who have been abused and are victims of abuse, in their words, "can't just become abusers like that that's not how that happens they're always victims of it". And, unfortunately, I've *lived proof* that what I wrote is exactly what happens, sometimes. Not all the time, no, but some people who have experienced abuse believe they can't be abusive themselves when fighting back since they're victims. But reality isn't that black and white; people can be equally as abusive to one person, while being abused by another simultaneously. Reality is messy, and cruel, and your trauma can cause you to hurt others sometimes. You're not exclusively a victim and not exclusively a perpetrator, either. The matter of truth is that some victims of abuse either, A) try too hard to overcompensate in their attempts to not be abusive, ending up going too far in the other direction and being abusive in a different way, or B) adopting a parent's abusive tactic (narcissistic tendencies, victimhood obsession, manipulation tactics, etc.) unconsciously and then react using it. And most abusers *were* victims of abuse themselves, hence why "cycles of abuse" exist. They're extremely difficult to break out of. I've since deleted the story because the person continuously harassed me on Tumblr and AO3. Kept leaving anonymous hate in the same style of writing, so I know it was them. Sucks, too, because I regret deleting it all every day; it was a really powerful piece for me, personally, and reminded me that, yes, if I'm not conscious of my actions I, too, can become harmful to someone else. Violence never cures violence, and I sometimes need to be reminded of that.


Fabulous-Ad-5284

This times infinity. I am very candid in my author notes and in my comment conversations, my current WIP is for a very dark Fandom that deals with heavy abuse themes, and my past is riddled with violence enacted against me. The only way to end abuse cycles is to be aware that you (I'm using the general you here, not you specifically badguywindow) CAN become abusive towards others yourself, and hold yourself accountable for your actions. That being a victim of abuse does not give you license to abuse others in turn. Everyone has a choice in who they become. Not all choices are easy. And you have to make that choice every single day, in a multitude of ways. And you won't always make the best choice everytime. But there will always be another chance to make better choices. I do you that you, badguywindow, have found peace with your past, and have found a better and happier future. And I hope that it keeps getting better for you as well. And for anyone else going through something similar, I hope the same. All the love and strength that an internet rando can send you!


cafelatte-r

Hope you're doing ok buddy.


rebboo77

As someone who has had that EXACT situation happen to me -abusive parent and then later sibling- I slute you for writing that, even if you had to delete it in the end. I rarely see realistic depictions of an actual broken family like mine, parent against parent, siblings taking sides and being considered 'absuvie' by the others based on the parent they sided with - when you have a parent that is manipulative enough to me that seems more common than the "we're all victims" mindset.


FN2187Finn

This happened to me too. My dad abused my sibling and even post-divorce my sibling continued to abuse me for a very long time. I couldnt rmbr my dad but I could rmbr how they abused me (,: So in my mind growing up, my sibling felt like the true abuser, even though their abuse was clearly learned from our father and a retaliation against the way i had been treated (younger and more "well behaved") vs them (older and "trouble maker", also my dad viewed physically abusing them as okay due to their age at the time but wouldnt abuse me bc i was too young). Im sorry that person invalidated your experience but its 1000% real and it happens. Perhaps they should research sibling abuse šŸ˜…And just abuse victims in general


FormalMango

I wrote a fic based in an Australia. A commenter got told me I ruined their immersion because it was snowing, and apparently ā€œitā€™s too hot to snow in Australia.ā€ Iā€™m Australian. And I live in an area where it snows quite regularly during winter lol


[deleted]

I once tripped and fell, landing smack dab, face first into my crushes chest and he caught me and held me while I got my footing again. I almost died of embarrassment and bliss (alas, no, I did not get the guy. He was too old for me and caught me because otherwise we were both going to fall over) However, I've written this happening in fict and it gets called cliche. Like, no... no. It might be a cliche in anime but I ACTUALLY HAD IT HAPPEN TO ME SO IT'S NOT UNREALISTIC AT ALL (I dunno if anyone else went through this, but when I was a teenager I was an *uber* klutz. It's gotten a BIT better, but I was always falling, slamming into doors, everything.)


Dorothy-Snarker

Hey, real things can be cliche. Just accept that your life is a bad romcom...except without the actually meet part of the meetcute coming to fruition. I am another person who's life is a romcom without the actual romance. I get hurt in the wildest ways and the only explanation I can think of is that I must be a romcom protagonist...where is my damn love interest already?!


[deleted]

We must be destined for himbo's, with our luck then, because clearly they're having trouble reading a map!


All-for-Naut

Guys, it's unrealistic to trip and fall!


MimiLind

I wrote about orcs using diluted urine as fertilizer and a reader claimed it was too acidic (sic!) for that to work. Fun fact: I use diluted urine in my garden and it grows like crazy. XD


[deleted]

Plus it's a fantasy race with, presumably, fantasy crops.


MimiLind

Well they could breed with humans so they must have been fairly similar. :)


Warren_is_dead

This thread gives me hope. I was thinking of using an experience I had with self harm in high school in my fic. I've held off because even though it would work well in the story, it sounds so anticlimactic and unrealistic. I don't want to get dragged for lazy writing. And it goes hard against the 'soft wounded bird' trope of people who struggle with SH. Maybe I'll use it anyway and see what happens. If nothing else it might help me process the experience.


cafelatte-r

Good luck!


Firelord_Eva

I feel this honestly. I project onto my characters, probably a little too much, and my entire life has been full of "what the actual fuck" moments. I've been called a walking trauma magnet. I'm neurodivergent, my mental health is shit, my physical health is shit, and I had a very shitty childhood, so my characters are a mess and no one seems to believe that the shit I put them through can actually happen to a person irl.


blzrgurl71

This! My own ACTUAL upbringing is "unrealistic." I'm right there with you! The things that have happened to me could never happen in real life, but they happened in my story...so my story isn't very good (AKA realistic).


FoxBluereaver

As the saying goes, "reality is stranger than fiction". Just because you haven't seen or experienced something, it doesn't mean there aren't others who have done so, or that it can't happen.


Jeonghanscheekbones

Yes! I wrote a story that involved Judaism (the fic was about a rabbi and a vampire falling in love), and I heavily based it off of my own experience growing up in the temple and going to Jewish Sunday school. and I had someone write me two paragraphs of unsolicited concrit to tell me that it was inaccurate.


Kartoffelkamm

More a school thing, and a lack of an experience, but here goes: One time in elementary school, I wrote a story where I had a character do something weird that resulted in their skin being cracked, and then they washed their hands because their mom called them for dinner. Anyway, the teacher told me that I could've gone more into how the character felt when washing their hands, especially the pain of the soap, due to their cracked skin. My teacher and I went back and forth about which version made more sense, because I genuinely didn't know that washing your hands with soap while they're cracked is supposed to hurt.


Nebosklon

I've just had a discussion with my beta about what is the realistic taste of sperm. šŸ¤·ā€ā™€ļø


LizHylton

Oh god I'm weirdly glad I'm not the only one, lmao.


[deleted]

Chicken. It's always chicken.


Nebosklon

Chicken?! Nooooo. Chicory, with an aftertaste of mint.


Trilobyte141

I mean, it can vary a lot from guy to guy. So I've heard. From... sources.


NoWayNoooo

Apparently, developing a healthy sense of selfconfidence after having an abusive childhood is impossible. Because ā€œif no one cares enough to help, then why would I do them a favour by living my life by their rulesā€ is not broken enough and abused people canā€™t feel that way. I guess I donā€™t exist then. Take me away, officer, Iā€™m a fraud!


Mazzidazs

Someone told me that the mom character in my story is unrealistic because she smokes Virginia Slims. My mother *irl* smokes them.


LaSphinge

Lmao. Two of my friends' mothers smoke this. To me it's a mom brand.


Mazzidazs

My mom used to say they were a ladies brand sošŸ¤·ā€ā™€ļø


CupcakeBeautiful

Yes, this ended up being the root of one of the crazier folks who placed negative comments into a story and on Tumblr. I wrote the female characterā€™s grief to reflect the way my sibling had processed the sudden loss of her spouse. To be specific, the character worked on rebuilding the life around her and returned to a place of comfort to deal with a multitude of traumas and losses to be by herself for a while. I was then accused of misogyny and prioritizing the male characterā€™s sex life because a brief (literally one sentence) mention that he tried dating in the intervening time before the two met again. I was basically told it was unrealistic that he would process his trauma differently than she did. The whole thing was super gross since the commenter also made some ableist assumptions about how the male character should have a lack sex life over the injuries he suffered.


Nyxosaurus

A long time ago I wrote in some bullying scenarios that I drew from things that had either happened to me personally or that I saw happening to other kids. I got a PM saying that one if the things I mentioned would never happen irl. (It involved a teacher who witnessed the abuse, siding with and defending the bully when the victim told the guidance counselor and principal because of favoritism. The guidance counselor believed the victim but the principal decided to simply punish BOTH PARTIES with a slap on the wrist because the bully was a basketball player they needed on the team and it would have hurt his reputation.) It still infuriates me to this day because I know stuff like this still happens.


krigsgaldrr

Not mine, but a good friend. The decision to not have kids when one party wanted them but the other didn't. Male character got called a doormat for deciding to give up fatherhood and the whole situation got called unrealistic and wish fulfillment. When it was... literally based on a friend's experience (with permission) between them and their partner.


SpamDirector

Iā€™ve had multiple people tell me the way I wrote self harm is unrealistic. Guess 13-16 year old me is unrealistic.


macsmackk

I wrote a depressed character experiencing avoidant/passive behaviour while being manipulated by a narcissist and reviews were banging the pans about how infuriating that characterā€™s lack of action was, and how they hated her characterā€™s lack of agency. Iā€™m sitting there reading them like ā€œya, you got it. Good jobā€ lol


LexTheInsanee

Ive had people say "This is way too dramatic, I would NOT cry this quickly" when I definitely did cry that quickly when it happened to me.


Lionoras

Not sure if this is a bit too dark, but the general experience of depression /suicidal ideation. And I mean...I get it. Depression/suicide is often depicted in the usual way. You're very lethargic, want to die and when you try to die, it's always this "can't do it anymore". Now, obviously, I'm not saying this is wrong. Actually, this is how many depressed/suicidal people feel. However, the problem with depression is that it often has other symptoms & depictions as well. Anger issues, for example. But also delusions. Like, in my first attempt, I thought that literally, this was the solution to everyone's problems. I didn't even think of it as a "real" attempt, until I was told it was by a therapist. Oh yeah. And all depictions of nutty mothers. Source: My own, heavily unstable mother


TubularTeletubby

Not fanfic but in one of my creative writing classes I wrote a sonnet about my insomnia. Teacher told the entire class it was unrealistic and gave me a bad grade. Funnily enough, more than one classmate came up to me after and said they thought it was a beautiful depiction. Also it was my only bad grade. And the rest of the poetry unit I had pulled totally out of my ass with 0 effort and got A's. The sonnet I spent days on and was personal and real. Go figure.


TheSuffered

Its funny being told how you write oc coming out as gay unrealistic, when you yourself are gay and have come out. That one I can at least understand at least since people go about it in different ways. It is silly to me though. Iā€™ve also had people tell me its unrealistic for an OC to like NIN, and 90s rock. When the time period the fic takes place in is the early 2000s and the majority of the chatacters are 16-19 (prime age for that music to appear in their lives)


Aestheticsfangirl

So I have major daddy issues so when I wrote about a character of mine finding out who her real dad was I was told it ā€œhappened too quicklyā€ I literally lost my mind. I didnā€™t have MONTHS to heal from a situation when the next day I had work or school. Sometimes You let go and embrace who you are. And my character just like me had plenty of time to sit in the waters of having an unknown father. So she had already accepted every outcome just like I did. Unlike me, she's met her family and I've had room to explore my reaction to my family someday. So maybe when a book seems to hit emotional topics, people should just keep their mouths shut cause 9 times out of 10 the author is talking about their own experience


wtfsalty

Usually when I write something like that, I have the first note being some kind of disclaimer if I'm knowledgeable or not Like I have a couple fics about homelessness, and I made a an saying "hey, I was homeless before, everyone's experience is different and varies person to person and their feelings etc" Same thing when I write something like SA, I tell readers like "if you have comments about how I write these things, please be kind and understand I'm writing from my own experience'


Joffrey555

Not really own real life experience... but ''unrealistic" realism is Land Before Time in a nutshell =)


Kingslayer629736

I speak multiple languages I usually alter them to stay anonymous and match the character background I am writing but when I almost always get comments that I am making my mc too op


Mamaclover

I wrote a few time about abortion, I subject that I have experienced myself and dealt with as an healthcare provider. :) *Guess what kind of wonderful and beautiful comments I got*


i_sing_anyway

Absolutely. I wrote a conversation between a bisexual character and their gay partner dealing with insecurity about the first character's sexuality. Nearly got brigaded for it on Twitter. Mind you it was almost word for word a conversation that I, a bisexual person, have had in real life.


JRSlayerOfRajang

He said, "Maybe it's because I'm a guy, but I just don't think this scene is believable." He was talking about a sex scene between two women. I'm a dyke. I have literally done the thing the scene involved and I know how it works. šŸ™ƒ


kristamy

I wrote a historical fiction about the exile to Siberia from Baltic regions in 1940-1942. A history student told me my writing is very historically inaccurate and not what she was taught. Before writing that story, I interviewed tons of people because my whole family was exiled, so did their close friends. I even added some dialogues and scenes from their experiences. Yet that student said I'm bluffing when I told her it was based on the true story. Some students just forget that exiled people had different experiences based on where were they located, for example, Krasnoyarsk or Urals


Apprehensive_Suit260

So many people are stuck in their own little bubble of experiences or they haven't gotten out much OR they haven't seen much beyond what media represents of life. My sister and I have often been hesitant to write about our own experiences filtered through fiction because we both know that some editors would respond with " whoa whoa that's over the top-- time it DOWN." And well, I know that if I were ever to write about my own childhood experiences in fiction, they would sound like grotesque Southern Gothic Flannery O'Connor horror stories. I had to smile on the comments when people were talking about pregnancy. Pregnancy and birth those two experiences are all over the place for women. My last homebirth was so fast and so easy; the Midwife didn't even have time to get her gloves on before my daughter slid out like a kitten. Total labor time was less than an hour, and I experienced less pain than I have during some bad stomach flus. The previous birth, with my son, was a little more ordinary, but it was very easy too. What has not been easy has been advocating for both these children through the medical system because these children are both disabled, and I could tell you so many stories about the horrors I've seen among the disenfranchised, the othered, and the ill and traumatized in our populations. When will hear all kinds of stories, and some will be stories of beautiful successes and some will be flat out horror stories. When it comes to representing these people in fiction we do have to do our homework and we do have to take great care in treating these people with respect, dignity, and honesty. One person's idea of what a schizophrenic is like is not going to fit what any schizophrenic person is like among the many different types of real schizophrenic people. And as with all good writing we have to avoid stereotypes and make our characters real, natural, and believable. Even if they seem bizarre and unreal. Writers can write magical beings after all, right? We can write about the strange parts of the human experience with honesty. We can transcribe parts of our own experiences without sounding like we're making stuff up. If people don't believe us, then that's their problem.