OH GOD… am I Amber and Liz? I know this is going to lead to really really bad consequences, but I also want to see this happen, for shipping reasons. ~<3
Well, the research institute she wasn’t working at for the last two (irrc) years, is located somewhere on the Canadian coast (forgot which one – assuming it was actually specified).
I mean, half the comments are always “WHY ARE THESE CHARACTERS NOT MAKING OPTIMUM DECISIONS FOR PERSONAL GROWTH AND SENSIBLE SOCIAL INTERACTION ALL THE TIME?” so maybe not all the readership.
It’s not gay if they’re roommates. Maybe next academic year (so, like, 2030 our time), Dorothy and Joyce will be roommates. Good friends, roommates, and laundry partners, who send each other crude and nude lewds. SO not gay.
I appreciate Dorothy’s care, but I do think Joyce would probably only be embarrassed that she sent them by mistake. I don’t really think she’d be too torn up that Dorothy saw her cleavage and panties.
Depends. Body shame seems to be the one that’s really stuck from all the religious baggage she’s tried to throw out, and this is the girl who wouldn’t let Sarah see her in her bra.
I work with someone with DID, who has a decent number of alts, and is very free with answering questions and talking about it when there isn’t an audience. And I know everyone is different, but… I don’t think its accurate to call one “real Amber” and one “the alt.” They are, together, Real Amber.
After all. My coworker has one alt that she calls “creature” who is simply herself from when she first had the traumatic experiences. And she has the one who presents most of the time. And she has some of the main ones which deal with stress, social situations, aggression, protection, etc, which often present. But its *all her.*
Amber is at once the horribly abused product / facsimile of her father, who is garbage and should feel like garbage, AND she is the steadfast hero who will leap into action to right wrongs and protect her friends, AND she is the critical voice of Mike, telling her that she wasn’t a terrible person and was worth saving. All of it.
This tracks with my experience dating someone with DID as well. My partner has a name they use for the whole collective as well as names for individual members. Amber + Amazi-Girl don’t really have a collective name, but neither of them is more ‘the real Amber’ than the other.
I mean, that’s pretty much exactly what Amazi-Girl has been saying for (real-time) months, yes. I believe her exact words were (after being told that “Amber has Batman in her head”) “I think of it more like my head has a Stucky slash-fic anthology in it.”
To put it another way: Amber is a complete person, Amazi-Girl is just the power fantasy superhero persona she created so she could feel good about herself. But also, Amazi-Girl is a complete person, and the personality we know of as “Amber” is just the persona where she pushed all her negative and slothful feelings so she could have a secret identity that knows how to relax! Those can actually both be true at the same time, no biggie.
So are Amber and Amazi-Girl able to speak to each other in real time, or is this just Amber telling Dorothy what she knows Amazi-Girl would want her to say?
Dorothy: “Sure I’ll send her a pic. If you send her a pic.”
Amazi-Girl: “HELL NO”
Amber: “HELL YES”
Joyce: “Why am I getting boob pics? Why not dong pics?”
Escalation: Probably what you expect.
Mini fanfic incoming:
Dorothy lets her inner goblin out.
Dorothy: “What’s with the spicy pictures? You’re gonna keep sending them until you get one from me?”
*Dorothy sends a pic of her butt*
Joyce: You finally got them? 😏
Joyce: OMG I’M SO SORRY DOROTHY I THOUGHT THIS WAS JOE
Dorothy: Hahaha it’s ok.
Joyce: …
Joyce: Your butt is cute.
Dorothy Aw, thanks. You too.
Both of them internally: Hold up-
Give it up.
Joeyce has won.
Dorothy x Joyce is never gonna happen.
Prediction: Willis is just going to tweak your noses with it like this every couple months for the rest of the strip.
Sending Joyce back a lewd would be a mildly subversive act which at worst will serve as a humanizing anecdote and not as anything truly threatening to the power structures at hand!
If they are stored in the cloud [normal MMS doesn’t but i don’t know what iMessages does], it would probably be Joyce that has the legitimate access required to delete them, not Dorothy.
I’m a litte worried about Dorothy being ok. Her facial expressions whenever it’s about those photos are looking like she is not okay. I just wonder, is she simply worried for Joyce, or is she negatively impacted by getting unsolicited half-nudes? Even if unintended, thit can still have a hurtful impact on the recipient.
Hell, Dorothy has not been okay for a LONG time, and her biggest problem seems to be that she doesn’t have a mom friend type to point out to HER that she needs to work on herself more.
Drunken pics would go against her long-held plan of being electable as first woman president.
She doesn’t need those photos gone anymore because she’s lost that dream. She knows it’s the right move for her not to try for the presidency anymore, but she still has feelings about it, and she’s kinda floundering without a new dream.
Not sure I’m loving that Dorothy is showing these to Amber, lol.
(Not so) funny story: I have been in a similar scenario to this one, where I received some partial nudes of a friend that were definetely not meant for me. I immediately deleated them and basically yelled at the person who accidentally sent them to me until they apologized to everyone involved. Be careful with nudes, folks 🙁
I’m really concerned at how much her entire circle of friends seems to be enabling this split personality. I know amazi-girl saved them and all but… This feels unhealthy and they’re all just acting like it makes perfect sense?
you don’t fix split personality disorder with shame. it’s essential to keep people from feeling unalienated and be able to walk them through emotional and logical things which requires a shared frame of reference. even psychologists will tend to address the personalities in question directly so they can help the person resolve issues.
also this is, for the umpteenth time comments section, a comic about college students. ex-children. young adults. they are not licensed psychologists. they are friends with someone with a mental illness and what do you do when you are in that situation? you adapt. you don’t take responsibility for ‘fixing’ their mental illness outside of things their doctor suggests.
It seems to be very healthy. Amber and Amazi-Girl are talking freely. That is a major step towards integration. If their friends encourage the cross talk, Amber/Amazi-Girl are likely to become more like a single personality. At some point Amazi-Girl may just say “We’ve become two pieces of the same person. I don’t need to be separate. Let’s just be Amber.” Amber, when the time is right, would say yes.
DID is a very complex topic, and I’m far from an expert, but even experts are divided on whether it’s even a thing that can or should be “fixed”. As it stands now, the Amber/AG DID system is stable and functional: sharing memories, speaking to each other, and generally cooperating. The only way it could get “better” is through reintegration of the two personalities, which may not be practical or even desirable, and regardless would be a *long* therapy journey to achieve.
In the meantime, what should her friends do? Refuse to acknowledge one of the personalities? Gaslight her into thinking her DID isn’t real? Try and force her into (additional?) therapy to “fix” her against her will? Pretty much any other reaction will just ostracize and alienate Amber, possibly leading to her hiding the problem and regressing to a less functional system.
The best and only thing they can do at this point is acknowledge and accept Amber/AG as they are and let them sort out things out further with a therapist.
amber’s certainly aware that therapists exist and also that she’s pretty broke
a college therapist isn’t going to be available for the long haul, maybe not even consistently available during term, and this sort of thing is a very fucking long haul
not to mention you can’t choose what kind of practice you get at a college making it far harder to get a compatible therapist
plus it’s far easier to manage therapy when you have a stable schedule that won’t be interrupted every 2d5 days with an assignment on top of classes
“I don’t actually know anything about therapy, what it can or can’t do, its pros and cons, etc, but I DO know it’s the easy thing to say to be dismissive of other people.”
Fuckin hate how “just go to therapy” has become yet another form of let-them-eat-cake obliviousness (-_-)
They aren’t really “enabling” it, they are just cool with it, they might not fully understand it but they seems to be functioning fine and acting like she some sort of freak would help no one.
Read an interesting article on studies for new therapies for people who hear destructive voices: Rather than the traditional advice of not ‘encouraging’ or acknowledging the voices, a *trained* psychologist helped clients to build an avatar, role played as it, and slowly come to a negotiation with it. It was more effective than the conventionall wisdom of dismissing it as imaginary.
It’s in The Guardian and called “You tried to tell yourself I wasn’t real” if anyone thinks reading it won’t stress them out (there’s some extreme mental health distress described in it).
On one hand, the butterfly effect of this would be immense that not even Until Dawn can match. OTOH, we haven’t seen Amber this happy in forever so replying would be a wild heat check.
Sarah, who in her new forced cheerfulness will decide to send one back and accidently send it to Jennifer, I dont know how it continues from there but it ends up in a huge orgy
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Amber and Liz should be goblins together
(the QC Liz, I forgot there was one here, too)
I mean, it still makes sense with the one here.
+1!
OMG yes! Lol
OH GOD… am I Amber and Liz? I know this is going to lead to really really bad consequences, but I also want to see this happen, for shipping reasons. ~<3
Shipping reasons are valid and important. What would the world be without its global interconnected shipping? 😀
I thought Marigold was the goblin.
What’s a webcomic without a goblin or two?
She hasn’t been for a long time.
QC is like 50% goblin by volume
The… The Quebec Liz?
Well, the research institute she wasn’t working at for the last two (irrc) years, is located somewhere on the Canadian coast (forgot which one – assuming it was actually specified).
Her little smile in the penultimate panel. It’s precious.
‘It would be irresponsible escalation, you should absolutely do it.’
RIGHT? ^-^ fuckin love her, she an adorable mischievous screwball XD
CHAOS GOBLIN!!!
YES ^_^
Amber seems less self-loathing and I’m so glad 🙂
That smile!
its me im amber
ugh what am i hitting WHY CAN I NOT AGREE
why cannot I say that I too am the trash goblin craving mess
whyyyyyy
THERE we go. Only took like four different ways of trying to say it lol
but i got there xD
Good chaos goblins don’t let a little chaos from stopping their goblining.
Pretty sure the entire comments section is Amber? but as fellow Ambers we will support your cause with all we’ve got.
I want what she has.
Big boobs and a devil may care attitude?
A big butt and a smile?
🎶 That girl is poison 🎶
hacking skills and Dina as her roommate? ^^
good songgg
Nice boobs, rippling biceps, a smart brain, and a devilmay care attitude.
This is the happiest we’ve seen Amber in a while.
I think she senses an impending disaster and is mentally making popcorn.
She truly represents the readership
Except the part that is always catastrophizing about it.
Amazi-Girl represents that subgroup.
I mean, half the comments are always “WHY ARE THESE CHARACTERS NOT MAKING OPTIMUM DECISIONS FOR PERSONAL GROWTH AND SENSIBLE SOCIAL INTERACTION ALL THE TIME?” so maybe not all the readership.
Amazi-Girl for our responsible side.
Amber for our goblinible side.
AG in the streets, Amber in the sheets
“Responsible” it’s a nice way to put it. Nicer that those comments deserve honestly.
Good choice. Mental popcorn is less filling.
Aren’t we all, Amber?
Aren’t we all?
+1!
Absolutely!
we can ship it!!!! UMF!!! <3
Dumbing of Age Book 15: I’m a Trash Goblin Who Craves Mess!
I didn’t anticipate Dotty and Joyce exchanging “nudes” but here we are
Oh, we were always heading here. It’s just been a long and bumpy road.
It was a long way to go but I’m glad we’re here.
I’m now convinced they will be in a polycule with Joe before Valentine’s Day.
Our Valentine’s day or theirs? Ours is a few months away, theirs probably a decade or so.
It’s been a long road, getting from there to here.
Thank you for the new meme in my arsenal, Willis
Dorothy why do you hate fun
Panel 5 Dorothy’s face. She knows exactly what Amber’s answer will be before she even finishes the question.
She could always just forward them to Joe.
That would be especially hilarious if she offers no explanation for why she has them.
idk if she currently approves of joe still even if she was willing to help out with that ‘sex list’
Friends can send each other titty pics, it’s fine.
It’s not gay if you’re friends first.
It’s not gay if you’ve done laundry together first. Especially if you held hands.
It’s not gay if they’re roommates. Maybe next academic year (so, like, 2030 our time), Dorothy and Joyce will be roommates. Good friends, roommates, and laundry partners, who send each other crude and nude lewds. SO not gay.
Look, they just fuck a little bit on occasion, it’s not gay.
Purely Sapphonic and Platonic.
The benefits of friendship!
Okay I do this but I’m pretty sure most friends don’t have orgies together so my viewpoint might be slightly skewed
I appreciate Dorothy’s care, but I do think Joyce would probably only be embarrassed that she sent them by mistake. I don’t really think she’d be too torn up that Dorothy saw her cleavage and panties.
Depends. Body shame seems to be the one that’s really stuck from all the religious baggage she’s tried to throw out, and this is the girl who wouldn’t let Sarah see her in her bra.
She’d probably be embarrassed that the angles were so bad after Dotty says how long it took her to figure out they were nudes
Amber in the last panel speaks for all of us.
When we say she’s a trash goblin? Yeah, definitely.
Amber in panels 3, 4, and 5 all speak for me. 😀
Amber and Amazi-Girl both speak for me quite well. Always be fully aware of the risks you’re taking.
Then take them, it’ll be awesome.
I think she should send some to Amazi.
Dorothy+Amazi ship!
I bet Dorothy’s boyfriend would… actually he would fuel this fire too he’s also a trash goblin.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a final panel in my entirely life that so perfectly sums up my inner voice.
Amber’s fun
trash goblin in the forest!
who fools around all day!
she horny and craves mess!
so gets her friends to play!
lalalalallalalalalaala
*plays “Fichtl’s Song” by Die Woody’s on hacked muzak*
do it; mama needs some draaaamaaaaa~
Hmm, so Dorothy doesn’t say she’s gonna toss em just that she doesn’t want em out in the cloud and hackable or whatever. Interesting.
Also yes, escalate.
this action would be an example of a total lack of responsibility and taste…
however…
What if, stay with me here, AG was the real Amber all along, and this alt is just “Trash Goblin”?
I work with someone with DID, who has a decent number of alts, and is very free with answering questions and talking about it when there isn’t an audience. And I know everyone is different, but… I don’t think its accurate to call one “real Amber” and one “the alt.” They are, together, Real Amber.
After all. My coworker has one alt that she calls “creature” who is simply herself from when she first had the traumatic experiences. And she has the one who presents most of the time. And she has some of the main ones which deal with stress, social situations, aggression, protection, etc, which often present. But its *all her.*
Amber is at once the horribly abused product / facsimile of her father, who is garbage and should feel like garbage, AND she is the steadfast hero who will leap into action to right wrongs and protect her friends, AND she is the critical voice of Mike, telling her that she wasn’t a terrible person and was worth saving. All of it.
This tracks with my experience dating someone with DID as well. My partner has a name they use for the whole collective as well as names for individual members. Amber + Amazi-Girl don’t really have a collective name, but neither of them is more ‘the real Amber’ than the other.
I mean, that’s pretty much exactly what Amazi-Girl has been saying for (real-time) months, yes. I believe her exact words were (after being told that “Amber has Batman in her head”) “I think of it more like my head has a Stucky slash-fic anthology in it.”
To put it another way: Amber is a complete person, Amazi-Girl is just the power fantasy superhero persona she created so she could feel good about herself. But also, Amazi-Girl is a complete person, and the personality we know of as “Amber” is just the persona where she pushed all her negative and slothful feelings so she could have a secret identity that knows how to relax! Those can actually both be true at the same time, no biggie.
So are Amber and Amazi-Girl able to speak to each other in real time, or is this just Amber telling Dorothy what she knows Amazi-Girl would want her to say?
I think they’ve been communicating the last while
From several previous strips we’ve seen, I think the two of them talk with each other. Maybe not a lot, but often enough. Kind of like roommates.
God I love Amber. She’s so happy! : )
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her genuinely happy about something.
Dorothy: “Sure I’ll send her a pic. If you send her a pic.”
Amazi-Girl: “HELL NO”
Amber: “HELL YES”
Joyce: “Why am I getting boob pics? Why not dong pics?”
Escalation: Probably what you expect.
Amber: “Why does this feel like I’m in someone else’s slashfic?”
Dorothy: “Your slashfics aren’t like this?”
Amber: “My slashfics have dicks.”
“Well, you sure spent a lot of paragraphs describing this woman’s naked body…”
“That…That’s for the readers benefit!”
It would be hilarious if Dorothy replied to Joyce with revealing photos of Walky.
Or a photo of a pile of laundry. That would be hilarious too.
A photo of Dorothy sitting on a washer.
Ooh hot!
*fans self
Listen to the trash goblin lady!
I. Love. This. Women.
Ever fucking part of her
‘I’m a Trash Goblin, who craves mess’ has to be the next book title. Get on it, Willis.
Awww she is smiling!
I don’t think we’ve seen Amber smiling for ages!
god. amber is so fucking peak forever
I am completely one with amber in the final panel
I don’t care if it isn’t long term, just give me the chaos of Joyce Dorothy kiss, the chaos from it would be so delicious
Amber and Amazi-Girl are both correct.
Mini fanfic incoming:
Dorothy lets her inner goblin out.
Dorothy: “What’s with the spicy pictures? You’re gonna keep sending them until you get one from me?”
*Dorothy sends a pic of her butt*
Joyce: You finally got them? 😏
Joyce: OMG I’M SO SORRY DOROTHY I THOUGHT THIS WAS JOE
Dorothy: Hahaha it’s ok.
Joyce: …
Joyce: Your butt is cute.
Dorothy Aw, thanks. You too.
Both of them internally: Hold up-
And literally everyone else: No, no, please continue.
Counterpoint to the “literally”:
Give it up.
Joeyce has won.
Dorothy x Joyce is never gonna happen.
Prediction: Willis is just going to tweak your noses with it like this every couple months for the rest of the strip.
I’ll give up my ship when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!
(to misquote charleton heston, who deserves it)
I don’t think Dorothy will ever send a photo back. But that would be so hilarious! Let’s hope Amber will be able to convince her.
Dorothy has been trying to provoke herself out of her box recently with quasi-destructive acts.
Sending Joyce back a lewd would be a mildly subversive act which at worst will serve as a humanizing anecdote and not as anything truly threatening to the power structures at hand!
If they are stored in the cloud [normal MMS doesn’t but i don’t know what iMessages does], it would probably be Joyce that has the legitimate access required to delete them, not Dorothy.
Dorothy didn’t say “legitimate”. She just wants it done.
It wkk ok uld be incredibly funny if she did 😌💖
Amazi-girl gives sage, boring advice.
Amber gives *interesting* advice!
I’m a litte worried about Dorothy being ok. Her facial expressions whenever it’s about those photos are looking like she is not okay. I just wonder, is she simply worried for Joyce, or is she negatively impacted by getting unsolicited half-nudes? Even if unintended, thit can still have a hurtful impact on the recipient.
Hell, Dorothy has not been okay for a LONG time, and her biggest problem seems to be that she doesn’t have a mom friend type to point out to HER that she needs to work on herself more.
Drunken pics would go against her long-held plan of being electable as first woman president.
She doesn’t need those photos gone anymore because she’s lost that dream. She knows it’s the right move for her not to try for the presidency anymore, but she still has feelings about it, and she’s kinda floundering without a new dream.
Not sure I’m loving that Dorothy is showing these to Amber, lol.
(Not so) funny story: I have been in a similar scenario to this one, where I received some partial nudes of a friend that were definetely not meant for me. I immediately deleated them and basically yelled at the person who accidentally sent them to me until they apologized to everyone involved. Be careful with nudes, folks 🙁
Yeah. Yours seems like the more even-headed and reasonable response to an accident.
Same, Amber. Same. I admit that in the right mood my advice is absolutely chaotic, but I do disclose beforehand.
I’m really concerned at how much her entire circle of friends seems to be enabling this split personality. I know amazi-girl saved them and all but… This feels unhealthy and they’re all just acting like it makes perfect sense?
you don’t fix split personality disorder with shame. it’s essential to keep people from feeling unalienated and be able to walk them through emotional and logical things which requires a shared frame of reference. even psychologists will tend to address the personalities in question directly so they can help the person resolve issues.
also this is, for the umpteenth time comments section, a comic about college students. ex-children. young adults. they are not licensed psychologists. they are friends with someone with a mental illness and what do you do when you are in that situation? you adapt. you don’t take responsibility for ‘fixing’ their mental illness outside of things their doctor suggests.
That’s really not how this works.
It seems to be very healthy. Amber and Amazi-Girl are talking freely. That is a major step towards integration. If their friends encourage the cross talk, Amber/Amazi-Girl are likely to become more like a single personality. At some point Amazi-Girl may just say “We’ve become two pieces of the same person. I don’t need to be separate. Let’s just be Amber.” Amber, when the time is right, would say yes.
Tl;dr they’re doing the right thing here
DID is a very complex topic, and I’m far from an expert, but even experts are divided on whether it’s even a thing that can or should be “fixed”. As it stands now, the Amber/AG DID system is stable and functional: sharing memories, speaking to each other, and generally cooperating. The only way it could get “better” is through reintegration of the two personalities, which may not be practical or even desirable, and regardless would be a *long* therapy journey to achieve.
In the meantime, what should her friends do? Refuse to acknowledge one of the personalities? Gaslight her into thinking her DID isn’t real? Try and force her into (additional?) therapy to “fix” her against her will? Pretty much any other reaction will just ostracize and alienate Amber, possibly leading to her hiding the problem and regressing to a less functional system.
The best and only thing they can do at this point is acknowledge and accept Amber/AG as they are and let them sort out things out further with a therapist.
I’m not saying force her but unless I’m forgetting something I haven’t seen anyone even amicably encourage her towards it?
Walky has mentioned that the therapist around here aren’t very good so that might be the reason.
amber’s certainly aware that therapists exist and also that she’s pretty broke
a college therapist isn’t going to be available for the long haul, maybe not even consistently available during term, and this sort of thing is a very fucking long haul
not to mention you can’t choose what kind of practice you get at a college making it far harder to get a compatible therapist
plus it’s far easier to manage therapy when you have a stable schedule that won’t be interrupted every 2d5 days with an assignment on top of classes
“I don’t actually know anything about therapy, what it can or can’t do, its pros and cons, etc, but I DO know it’s the easy thing to say to be dismissive of other people.”
Fuckin hate how “just go to therapy” has become yet another form of let-them-eat-cake obliviousness (-_-)
They aren’t really “enabling” it, they are just cool with it, they might not fully understand it but they seems to be functioning fine and acting like she some sort of freak would help no one.
Read an interesting article on studies for new therapies for people who hear destructive voices: Rather than the traditional advice of not ‘encouraging’ or acknowledging the voices, a *trained* psychologist helped clients to build an avatar, role played as it, and slowly come to a negotiation with it. It was more effective than the conventionall wisdom of dismissing it as imaginary.
It’s in The Guardian and called “You tried to tell yourself I wasn’t real” if anyone thinks reading it won’t stress them out (there’s some extreme mental health distress described in it).
Fascinating!
Alters are a normal part of life for some people. Trying to shut them down is a bad, bad idea.
Amber wants more crudes, nudes, and lewds.
(it’s me. amber is me.)
… to thine own self be true…
#WeAreAllAmber
Wouldn’t it be easier to text Joyce to stop though?
Today provides yet more evidence that Amber is secretly a “Twitch Plays” bot powered by the comments section.
Amber learning nothing from the last time she wanted friends to kiss.
Dorothy, Amber, and Amazi-Girl are…having a three-way?
George Takai: Oh my!
Dorothy: Three-way call. A three-way call!
I understood that reference
On one hand, the butterfly effect of this would be immense that not even Until Dawn can match. OTOH, we haven’t seen Amber this happy in forever so replying would be a wild heat check.
Book 15: I’m a Trash Goblin Who Craves Mess
I’m going to find a way to work “I’m a trash goblin and crave mess” into a conversation today
There should be Amazi-Girl posters around the university with cybersecurity PSAs on them
The big question is, when Dorothy sends a pic back, who will she send it to by mistake?
Sarah, who in her new forced cheerfulness will decide to send one back and accidently send it to Jennifer, I dont know how it continues from there but it ends up in a huge orgy
Becky! It has got to be Becky!
“Dotty, didja ever notice the freckles on yer flaps look exactly like the Pleiades?”
Love how we get advice from both responsible Amazi-girl and self admitted “trash goblin” Amber
Traditionally its called the Imp of the Perverse. I suffer from it most grievously.