“You remember your parents?”
“Well, they’re not my parents.” I explained, “They’re not ponies, and they’re not in Equestria.”
They were the human me’s parents, the pony me had no parents since I’d been brought into the world fully formed. Well, almost fully. The much taller, fully grown ponies gathered in the room looked at me expectantly, and I felt very small.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“That’s all right Green,” Dayglow noticed my discomfort and wrapped a wing around me, “You’re being very brave, you can tell us about that when you’re ready. You don’t have to talk about it in front of everypony.”
Having fur sucks. It turns out, not all of my vomit was on Applejack - I got some of it on myself, and it couldn’t just be wiped off. While I did have magic now, it still wasn’t up to the delicate task of cleaning myself. Soothing Melody - my trainee nurse minder - was tasked with giving me a shower.
I was worried that Melody would be cross with me for giving her more work, but she actually seemed to be enjoying herself. I got the sense that she was treating me like one of her dolls; she put so much care into styling my mane and tail - all without standing me in front of the mirror or asking what I’d like. I can’t really blame her for treating me like a doll when that’s how I was acting.
Melody helping me in the bathroom was uncomfortable. She was a female, close enough to my age as a human, and she didn’t have the sense of professional detachment that Redheart displayed. I knew, intellectually, that the looks she was giving me were just because I was a cute little filly that she got to play with, but my human mind was interpreting them in a very different, very creepy way. That type of female attention had always been frightening to me.
I guess I should explain. In my life as a human, I had good people skills... professionally. Personal relationships, however, ranged from exhausting to terrifying. I like things to be predictable, I enjoyed the fact that shifts had routines and a procedure manual that I could study so I would know exactly what to do at all times. People are unpredictable, but at work, there were very clear boundaries and expectations and, most importantly, I didn’t have to trust them. I always had it in the back of my mind that they could suddenly snap, spit in my face and cuss me out, make false complaints about me, or try to stab me with a pen; So, when they did, I wasn’t angry with them. Their irrationality was just another symptom that had to be managed. Most often this type of behavior was the result of dementia or mental illness; For the rest, while being a complete dickhead isn’t technically a mental illness, it might as well be.
I can’t turn it off. I don’t have another way to interact with people. Some of my earliest memories are helping my mother with her mental illness, I couldn’t blame her for being irrational; and caring for my baby brother, who was as irrational and impulsive as you would expect from a six-year-old. My dad really tried, but he never managed to understand how to deal with anxiety and panic attacks. I didn’t blame him for trying to be assertive and snap Mum out of having a panic attack by telling her forcefully that she was being irrational and spouting nonsense. He honestly thought that would help.
If you know anything at all about anxiety, you can probably imagine how well that went. For anyone left wondering, not well. It’s possibly the most counter-productive thing you could do short of actual violence. I didn’t have the words to explain it to him at the time, and to this day he doesn’t really understand, though he has at least stopped attempting it.
I know my family better than I know anyone else in the world, I love them, I would do anything for them - but I don’t trust them. I’ve never really trusted anyone.
They’re not even my family though, are they? Am I a terrible person if that’s a relief to me? If it feels like a burden lifted? It’s not like I was abandoning them. The original was still there, and, by virtue of us being essentially the same person, he was actually, for the first time ever, someone I could trust to see things my way. Too bad we’d never meet.
Not trusting anyone, being afraid of new social situations, being afraid of people being irrational... can you see where this is going? I was terrified of having a girlfriend. That didn’t stop me from having one. A girl asked me out. I wanted to say no, but I was too afraid to turn her down in case she and her friends retaliated against me. So I said yes. We dated for three months and the furthest we went was a kiss on the lips, which only happened because my Dad told me I should do it because it was cruel to string her along.
I felt nothing but fear; she was ecstatic and literally skipped back to her father’s waiting car. She broke up with me a couple of weeks later, said she would hate me forever and threatened to have her dad beat me up.
It was cruel of me to lead her on, but being honest and telling her I never felt anything for her seemed even crueler, so instead I pretended to be sad about it.
Since then I’ve made sure to be clear about rebuffing romantic or sexual advances towards me. Most of my colleagues have taken the hint and assume I’m gay. While this would be a handy excuse for why I’m terrified of female sexual interest, I don’t actually like men in that way either. It terrifies me because I have no idea how to respond. From my experience, rebuffing these types of advances is something that makes people completely irrational, and reciprocating is equally bad, if it’s not done correctly.
I knew, with reasonable certainty that Melody wasn’t going to try anything weird, so I just sucked it up and stood there with a blank expression, complying with her requests to raise each hoof, stand, or sit.
She was efficient with her work, and despite taking time to style my mane and tail we were finished up within ten minutes. Most of what she’d done for me had been accomplished with magic, so it was a shock when she touched my hind quarters with a hoof to direct me out of the bathroom. With the thoughts going through my head at the time, I about jumped out of my skin.
I squeaked and wrapped my tail around where she had touched. An involuntary shudder ran through my body, interrupting my breathing exercise. I took a new breath and controlled the exhalation over four seconds, waited another four seconds, then returned to breathing normally.
“I’m so sorry,” I apologized, my face flushed red with embarrassment. “I wasn’t paying attention and you startled me.”
Melody didn’t answer immediately, and when I gained the courage to face her, I could see why. She had recoiled away from me, holding the hoof she had used to touch me tight against her chest. Her coat was somehow three shades lighter, her pupils were pinpricks, and I wasn’t entirely sure she was breathing.
“Are you okay?” I asked with concern.
“I-I’m going to get the nurse.” She mumbled before beating a hasty retreat out into the hallway.
Looking at the bed I noted that it was raised up too high for me to safely climb into it without help; I just lay on the floor and waited for my caretakers to return. My broken leg was throbbing again, but I couldn’t tell them about it; I needed a clear head to deal with whatever nonsense I was wrapped up in now.
Why does this keep happening to me?
Damn, poor pony. I can't imagine how that feels.
Oh dear, poor traineE.
And of course Melody is now assuming the worst of the situation.
Wow our protagonist definitely is having issues adapting to this new world. With what we learned about him/her in this chapter they are going to have many issues fitting in Equestria as they are a very emotionally driven group and they are going to struggle with somepony who is so closed off. I hope they gently introduce Pinkie as she is so exuberant.
Oh lawd, that image of green is so damn adorable!
It just makes it all the worse with what that trainee is likely thinking her reaction ment.
Here's a bit of a mindscrew for Applejack: Green refuses to tell the truth because if he did, Applejack would refuse it and invent her own reasons to call truth and impose them on the one who was honest to her, further keeping him from his family forever.
Really, the best thing to tell ponies would be that all this was done to him specifically so that when found ponies would impede any attempt he made to fix it all out of a belief they are helping.
Well that's a hell of a reaction
Yea, shes probably thinking Green was sexually abused now.
Well, that is a bleak outlook on life. Green and Twilight might get along!
... or brutally murder each other.
10081963
It's funny because the idea that they would murder one another is unexpected enough to be comically absurd.
10075999
Live in your head all you want, I guess, but the body keeps score whether you want it to or not.
I can put my feelings in a box too, but neglecting your feelings and ignoring your fears is no way to live. Your main "strength" and method of enduring reads as white-knuckling through everything. From my observation of others, life is better than that if you actually live it.
on what did she see?!
10081969
... clever filly.
Well that's not gonna help with the sexual assault argument.
Thanks for the update!
Yeah, I can see where Green is coming from. I can't say I have the same feelings for my family, but outside that? I've seen too many relationships go sour, and the fallout of them afterward. I might be able to appreciate a woman's looks, but the thought of being in a relationship terrifies me.
That trainee... is going to be feeling awful about this. Considering that she's most likely read Green's chart, she HAS to have an idea of what they're all speculating happened. And this is just gonna be one more checkbox.
At this point, I'm starting to believe she really was abused. All the events were repressed and replaced by the fantasy of being a human nurse.
10082060
I mean, when you really think about it, you have to wonder if your life actually makes sense, or if it just seems that way to you because you're delusional. I mean at that point you'd need a second opinion right?
What if they disagree with you, do you trust them? How do you even know if they are real?
If you can't trust your own mind, how can you trust anyone else?
So I'm thinking Green was abused when they were still a little padawan. Can't tell the truth, and is afraid of the truth to the point an encounter with AJ makes Green physically ill. And now being startled by simply being touched. Not to mention the whole sex thing. Green is a foal and has no hormones driving her to be thinking about sex, and yet that's the first thing on their mand. Worse yet, they are ponies. Green should not be thinking sexual thoughts about beings who back in the human world would be cute cuddly pets.
I'm Ace. I don't fear sexual encounters or the opposite gender, I'm just not interested. Being outright afraid of intimacy is not normal. Green has got some serious issues.
10082130
This is what I'm beginning to think. It's starting to feel more and more like Green never was a human, and was both mentally, and possibly, sexually abused that her mind started replacing reality with a convenient, and safer alternative.
Damn, just damn.
10082165
That's an interesting theory. Granted coming up with a back story of being a medical professional from a species that no one has ever heard of is a bit of a stretch, but crazier things have happened. Also, another theory that would equally valid could be that "human Green", was abused at one point, and that psyche and mental weight carried over to "Pony Green". Also, could just be a irregular phobia combined with a mild case of an anti-social development disorder (Aspergers for example), or something to that effect. Guess we'll have to wait and find out!
10082072
Interestingly, this is pretty valid. Apt, even, even for regular 'normal' people. You can't trust your own perceptions. Visual blind spots, mental schisms, preconceived notions, personal language interpretation, pain, etc, etc. Where it gets really fun, is that you have to. You don't have a choice. You can develop strategies or take medications to work against these things, but they are still there, and you need to own them. The honest truth is that if you find yourself in a situation where everything seems wrong, current sensory evidence must outweigh past evidence. Otherwise you can't continue, and might as well give up and go to sleep.
10082218
Coming back to points initially explored in chapter one.
There are no brakes on the
rapemisunderstanding train.Also write bigger chapters, you fuck.
Ah think the picture is ah-dorable. Dawwww.
10082015
Three things she certainly saw were a fear/threat reaction to being touched unexpectedly followed by an obviously habitual calming exercise & the victim apologizing to her and for the inconvenience.
Those are all tells of a history of abuse.
It was the same for me for a long part of my life. Though fortunately, my mother was actually very logical in the way she handled information (which came from her own abuse), and she was an extremely safe person to be around as a result.
This, though, resulted in an existential panic later on, when she no longer became the absolute bastion of safety she had been all my life. (She didn't go nuts. She just got burnt out after years of having to deal with our entire dysfunctional family's BS without any break.)
Basically, I've gotten to the point where I can reasonably predict even the most irrational behaviours, and even if I can't, I've learned to be able to generally handle the fallout and not panic. But even now, any social situation with more than one variable (i.e. another human not in my immediate family), a considerable amount of stress is involved, due to my brain going into predictive overdrive.
This MC need deep and intensiv therapy... Her age is perfect. She has all the time she needs for it to take effect.
Well...
10082130
10082165
To be fair I similarly had problems with any physical contact to the point that a friend was convinced I was going to deck him. It’s gotten better with meds but I still dislike physical contact and I’ve never suffered any abuse.
If Applejack causes Green to become ill, imagine how worse it would be for her to meet Pinkie and Twilight.
10081808
I don't think this is "having trouble adapting". To me it looks like the protagonist had issues on the other world and they just brought all the baggage. And human baggage is probably not something ponies know how to deal with.
10082072
Therein lyies the torture of schizophrenia.
10082280
Don't forget the complete non-response, and fully pliable reaction during the bath. Probably wasn't noticed during the cleaning, but after the reaction to the unexpected touch would be recognized after the fact. By Greens own admission. Green was doing the complete removal of the self from the situation that some abuse victims use as a coping mechanism.
Yeah, whoops, you're squawking like a duck, flapping like a duck, reacting like a duck, pretty big hill you're building to climb up on...
The horn is missing in the picture.
10082060
Deepest lore
Definitely not helping Green's case. And I can certainly empathize with preferring a structured, predictable approach to social interaction. I don't have those kinds of trust issues, but stepping outside of my usual experiences and trying to deal with a scenario where I don't already know what to do... Yeah, that's pretty terrifying.
It'll be interesting to see where it all goes from here. What do ponies have in place for cases like this?
"Highly illogical," indeed. The logical thing to do in this situation would be to just fess up with the truth. Hello, magical world with magical creatures,strange magical phenomena like interdimensional body swap/transformation shouldn't seem TOO far outside the scope of possibility.
10083382
There's almost certainly sapient life in the Universe, and them visiting us is definitely not outside the scope of possibility. Still, if a child in a hospital presumed to have mental problems claimed to be a space alien, how likely it is that anyone would believe her?
It often works in pony fanfiction only because it is, well, fiction.
Author, are you okay? Someone said this is a straight self insert.
Also, I gotta say, after catching up completely this story is very...good? It’s interesting to say the least, and to say the most is to say it’s pulled me in with an anchor. Too bad it seems to update rather infrequently.
10082280
oh dame
10083493
Okay is relative. I'm no worse today than I have been previously. I've reached a happy equilibrium where I have managed to eliminate most stressful things from my life. It was tough getting here, but in most regards I would say my life and upbringing have been quite privileged. My parents weren't "rich" but Dad made enough money that Mum could take time off work when she needed to, and I never had to worry that we'd lose our house or there wouldn't be food on the table.
There's no reason I can't continue living as I am for the rest of my life, generally I'm quite happy. I'm aware and slightly concerned that my lack of caring (and fear) about friends or relationships is unhealthy and a sign of mental illness, and I have been to therapy, but without any motivation to change it wasn't really doing anything.
I'm good at my job, I'm professional, I obey the law and I pay my rent and taxes on time. Far as I'm concerned no-one has any right to ask more than that from me.
I'm glad I'm not in the same situation as Green as I probably wouldn't react well... As this story will attest.
10083496
This story tends to get an update about once a week on average. That's actually pretty frequent compared to most stories. I do miss deadlines but I still have to keep setting them to help with motivation; otherwise I'd keep putting off working on a chapter forever.
I don't have much of a life outside work, but my work consumes a lot of my time and makes me just want to rest sometimes. Two of my patients tonight are violent "Code Black" patients that have previously sent staff to the ER. I tend to be okay because a lot of patients find me intimidating, and just because my reach is long enough to keep them from hitting me in the face. I don't feel like I'm in much danger from them, but man is it tiring to deal with their crap for a whole shift. I wish they would give us more nursing assistants to deal with this sort of thing.
New chapter on Wednesday, hopefully.
10084370
You’re very forthcoming with information about your life. It’s a strange and nice change of pace: this world feels alive because you put someone alive in it.
I see what you mean, though. I’ll eagerly await updates!
10084374
I'm trying to figure out some things about myself and I figure the ultimate test of understanding myself is if I can explain my life to a stranger in a way they can understand. I wasn't really expecting so many people to be interested in this story, but I was hoping for at least a few. So long as I don't give personally identifying information it should be fine I think; hopefully I don't regret this later.
Some people have suggested I change aspects of my life in this story to improve the narrative (in particular my skin problems), but that would defeat intended purpose.
10084391
I think it’s a great idea as long as you don’t accidentally give out your address or what hospital you’ve clearly worked at.
Godspeed, I’ll be reading along
10084418
Well beyond staying pseudo-anonymous for privacy's sake I hope nothing I've revealed about myself is so egregious that people want to come to my house and beat me up.
People are unpredictable though, so I guess that's something else to worry over.
10084631
Glad to hear it!