tf_talk | continued Thatfucker discussion

Skip to Main Content

Entry tags:

continued Thatfucker discussion

Since we've been kicked off FFA for the week, please feel free to continue the anon discussion here. Apologies if this is a big flop - I've never made a DW community before!

The rules are vaguely the same as they are over on FFA. Please refrain from being too much of an asshole, making personal attacks, posting identifying information or engaging in transfail.

ETA: If there's information you'd like to see archived (journal/blog posts related to Andy, etc.), please dump it here and link to it from the main post for discussing.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I don't think it's bipolar, primarily because his 'downs' don't mesh, but also because I've never seen anything that touches full-blown mania - it's difficult to explain, but he's controlled in the wrong ways. However, I /do/ think he'd have gotten away with more if he'd chosen that over schizophrenia for his fakery.

he's controlled in the wrong ways

Can you elaborate on this at all?

It's a lot of little things, really. For one: when he's snappy and irritable, it's only with people he can get away with it with. That's not just an abuser tactic, it's also really unlikely during manic irritability.

He can stop himself from doing something, if he wants to; make a choice to have a nice, safe tantrum and then going home to mom instead of the full-blown mania carrying him along.

I guess what my underlying feeling is, is that his moods are too controlled. He's up when it's convenient; he's down when it's convenient; his 'mood' changes to punish his current victim, rather than being a force which acts upon /him/.

+1

That's exactly it. His symptoms of mental illness only come up when it's convenient for him for something. Either to punish someone who isn't towing the line, get off the hook for doing something he promised but knows he can't deliver, to deflect from criticism being directed at him from other blogs by bemoaning 'I was mentally ill then, you can't hold it against me'.

It's kind of perfect really. With Tumblr's attitude of never questioning someone's diagnosis (or self diagnosis even), anyone who does challenge him risks a dogpile if the right (wrong?) people see it.

I think it is because the layperson knows delusions are part of schizophrenia, but are not aware confabulation is part of bipolar disorder (or might think all confabulation is willful, not delusional).

+1

Yeah, my abuser was/is bipolar. Even though sometimes they seemed to use their MI as an excuse for abuse, it really affected their whole life, even when they were on medication. That doesn't really seem to be the deal with Andy.

My abuser had a bipolar sister and it was very clear who among them has an illness - her sister constantly got into trouble (debts, especially) because of troubles with controlling her impulses and her reactions. When you got her in a swing, she would expose herself as a moody person.
While my abuser was very good at biding her time and strategically "losing control of things" (aka, that time I basically helped her write her thesis while being so depressed I barely fed myself). She never seemed to lose her composure.

There was about a year period when my abuser suffered from depression, and it was really obvious, because she became much less effective at controlling people and her little almost-cult fell apart at the time

like, mental illness makes it hard to be a cult-leader and serially abuse people! I have seen it first hand.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only