That’s high praise!

I’ve only been posting announcements on the neurodiverse comm because I’m still feeling out everything and making sure the project is on solid foundations. I’m “working” in a pretty different context so I’m still adapting to that change and I need to get a sense of the degree of need (e.g. do people need some gentle reframings or are we talking through managing major childhood trauma, kinda thing?) so at the moment I’m really cautious about underpromising and overdelivering, which is why I haven’t taken this to the larger subs yet.

That being said the Drop-In Peer Support server is open to anyone. You’re welcome to come along and check it out sometime if you like, I can even add you to the ping list if you’re interested. It’s a very relaxed space - if you want to talk things through with me or you want to ask me questions, cool. If you want to listen in on the discussion or join in on it, cool. If you just want to hang out in a safer community space that is pro-good things and anti-bad things, cool.

Hmmm… it’s hard to know how much seasoning that would be. If you have a liquid that you’re putting with TVP, I’d put all your seasonings in that as the flavour will get absorbed through the TVP rather than just sitting on the outermost part.

As a rule of thumb, the broth or liquid should taste too strong as a broth. Like borderline unpleasant without it tasting like you’re eating broth powder straight. That can apply to taco seasoning mixed into water or other spices or a combo of things.

Here’s how to make god-tier TVP Obviously you don’t need to follow it all the way through to make the meatballs though.

TVP requires lots of flavouring. Did you soak it in a very concentrated broth? If not, then it’s a bit like eating unseasoned tofu. You can reduce the sawdusty taste of TVP by putting it into a sieve and shaking it lightly to get rid of the defatted soy flour, that way the flavour won’t be all through your dish.

If you happened to be struggling with keyboard input this time in the server and you happen to see this message, this is the app I was talking about which turns your android phone into a sort of bluetooth keyboard.

It might be a little bit awkward having to switch between your device and then using your phone for keyboard input but it might make things somewhat more accessible for you. Thanks for coming along I appreciate the effort you had to go to in order to contribute :)

Thanks so much for coming along! It wouldn’t be anything if not for people like you who are generous with their time. It means a lot that you’d come along even though you’re low on spoons.

May you have more spoons than a restaurant supply store but, even if you don’t, remember the low-spoonie gang is welcome to just come in and vibe, always.

Been running a little sideproject on here. I used to be a peer worker and I’ve worked in mental health and stuff. So I decided to find a game with a live chat option and a setting that would suit a a drop-in space except online, essentially to offer freebies to the community. Or to volunteer/to contribute to the site and its culture. However you want to slice it.

If you’ve ever seen my effortposts on mental illness and especially ADHD or autism around the place here I guess it gives the impression that I am pretty knowledgeable on these things. What you don’t get to see is that this stuff is the hard facts that I draw on, the “theory” if you will. I’m also decent at application side of things, where this “theory” is turned into “praxis”, but you don’t get to see much of that at all in a forum because it’s much more like writing letters than it is a real-time conversation. And generally speaking it’s those critical conversations that often lead to improvements, not just reading a wall of text. Otherwise mental health services would supply you with books and call it good, y’know?

Also it’s just fucked trying to find the holy grail of a therapist who is in your region, whose books are open, who doesn’t charge an arm and a leg, who actually does a good job, whose approach fits with your needs. Throw in the radical politics or, at least, not wanting a therapist who is steeped in liberal cultural hegemony and then maybe one who specialises in ADHD or autism or trauma. Maybe all three. Good luck finding that particular unicorn.

Not that I’m a therapist. But I can cover a lot of bases that are currently grossly underserved. And I can do it for free because I’m a bit of a veteran at this stuff and I don’t really require practice development or a supervisor who I can go to for guidance or to process difficult things that might come up. Not saying that I’ve arrived at the end point and I have no learning to do but I am very seasoned when it comes to this. It’s never going to be a replacement for therapy but if people cannot access therapy, especially due to cost or disability, or they cannot access appropriate therapy then the peer work that I can do is hopefully a way to bridge that gap.

Anyway it’s been exceeding my wildest expectations. Turnout has been great. It’s definitely challenging doing this in a live chat context because I’m flying blind in many respects and I can’t rely on observations through stuff like tone of voice or body language. But you work within the confines that you find yourself in. It’s against my own project’s rules to go into any depth on this I feel as though I’ve been able to achieve some good outcomes in conversation so far, so I am satisfied with my performance and overall the game I chose seems pretty well fit for purpose. There has been a lot of demand, an overwhelming amount of support, and people have been so encouraging of me. It reinforces to me that I made the right decision to try this project out with the community here.

Just ran my third session earlier today. You can read about the whole damn thing here if you want to know more.

I guess it’s nice that I’m in a position to provide something which is uncommon but high in demand for free. You know how libs ask “What kind of job do you think you’d do after the revolution? Do you think you’d be a poet or something?” Well, here’s my answer.

Why am I not surprised at all to hear that a producer or a director would go and screw it all up like that?

Side note, I always thought it was funny that they had the Dothraki repeating “armor” with two tapped /r/ sounds after hearing someone with an accent that doesn’t pronounce /r/ there say it. They apparently had understanding of English writing despite not speaking it.

You get it! I feel so seen!! It’s this shit that wrenches me out of my suspension of disbelief and it just hurts when shit like this happens.

Excellent, thanks so much for the link!

Thank you for being a part of it

Thanks for stopping by

Done!

Okay, I’ll try and block that user next time I see them. Hopefully that will resolve the issue.

Sorry about the issues today!

Heck yeah, comrade - that’s exactly what we’re here for!

I’m really glad that you could drop in. Maybe some day we’ll even get to chat, but all in due time.

Feel free to pop in and out as much as you like, even within the same session. The intent for the server is to have a supportive environment that facilitates people’s learning and growth. If you’re doing exposure therapy by popping in and out then you’re using the server in exactly the way I had hoped it would be used and that makes me happy.

Make sure you leave a little bit of room for feeling proud of yourself today. You did great!

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That’s weird? Server error maybe?

Did you copy-paste the lobby code at the top of the post?

We’re still going tho! It looks like we’re winding down now.

Just fyi - the lobby code will be available as long as the server is running. I’ll delete the code and change it to “Server Closed” when the party’s over. I tend to run overtime intentionally - I’ll make a commitment to a certain period of time in the post and then as long as I’m not exhausted and if people want to keep going then I’ll keep it going.

So just because you might have missed that 2-hour window doesn’t mean that you can’t come in a bit later, as long as you can find that lobby code in the comment/post body.

I think I misread the time and set a reminder for exactly two hours late, so it’s already too late to join :(((

Time zones are such a pain. Don’t worry, there will be another one soon.

I’m considering pinging people via Element when I go live with the server. I have to figure out how to use Element yet but if you’re on there and you’re comfortable with adding me then I can send you a message when we go live so you’re less likely to miss it in future.

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I shouldn’t be laughing about this but Santa has clubbed fingers in the ad. The old boy needs to lay off the sauce because it looks like his body is packing up:

Thanks. I figure I’d just do my best, hope that it’s enough for people, and learn from the mistakes I make along the way so I can git gud asap.

Oh you’d best believe it!

I know it’s only 2 hours before we go live with it but would you like to be added to the ping list? I have started sending out pings when the server goes live as well as when a new announcement post goes up (+ you’ll get pinged when the ad-hoc, non-peer support server goes live too.)