A more proper swing at blogging here.

"How do you start a blog post?" "How do you write a personal essay?" and "Personal blog posts" were the three desperate searches I put into Google on loop, as I was trying to figure out if I was capable of doing this. Of creating again. Eventually, I finally ended up settling and deciding that I can, it just might not be good, and that was fine. So here I am, writing my very first blog post on my own little website I set up myself. But who am I? Who are you? Do we know each other? Do you want to know me? Do I want to reveal myself to you? The answer to those questions might be varied, but I can at least answer the first one.

My name is Mycena, I am a 25 year old collective that lives on the internet. I joke I am a highly sophisticated mycelium fungal network, masquerading as a human. Though, I think even that's too elegant, deeper down I'm a bunch of frantic rats in a trench-coat. I am what you call "plural". Or if you're really far behind, I have a really complex case of "multiple personality disorder". The nicer term for that now would be DID. If you already knew that, good on you, but hey, I have to cover all my bases.

Aside from being multiple, I have my depth. Like any person, I'm someone with a plethora of passions with a desire to share it all with the world. So let me share, let me be, let my network tangle with yours.

Introduction - (Take Two):

Let's backtrack and go over what I mentioned earlier, you know, about being "multiple" or "plural". What exactly does that mean? Though I think that the word "plural" is succinct enough to explain my situation, it can be a complex idea. The way I view my plurality is relatively clinical, but you may hear different things from different people. For me, my multiplicity is trauma born. I had a very poor upbringing that lead me to develop DID. I was unable to just figure out how to be one person.

That's what the theory is, anyways. The implication now, is instead of there just being one core part of you that each alter (or personality) splits off of, the layman starts off as multiple themself. This idea is that called structural dissociation. To sum that up, basically, all of the human brain starts off as little personality slivers, and each one slowly sticks together over time as you get older (until about 10? The goal post keeps moving, unfortunately).

Hopefully, you integrate life skills, play, eating, into something coherent enough you can call it a personality. If you don't "stick together", you end up with DID. Of course, everything I've described here has been paraphrased for simplicities sake, and without the nuances and intricacies of someone who is a scholar in this field would be able to provide. I am not a psychologist or a doctor, but I find that some kind of vague explanation as to what's going on with me is helpful.

But let's not get distracted. Why does this pertain to me? Well, what this means for me, is that multiple people are driving my body and conscious day to day. Sure, sometimes bits and pieces of my day are missing. Yes, sometimes multiple people try to share the driving seat that's my brain. There's a lot of questions I can answer, but that's for a later time. I am more than just my parts. However, as a collective, it's difficult to talk about everything. So because of that, I plan to write extensively on my system-hood in the future. If you have any questions or something you want me to write about, feel free to leave a comment about it so I can consider it for my next blog post.

With multiple alters driving my day to day, everyone will be posting art, writing blog posts, or corresponding with viewers. If a particular blog is a collaborative piece, there may be paragraphs in different colors, but most of the time, I believe alters will sign their name at the end and put it within the tags up top. This blog is promised to be very varied in what it posts, as we all have different interests and passions. In fact, I'd say being a system influences the way I express and interact with my passions inherently. Which goes onward to the next question, if we know what I am now, what do I like?

Interests - (….Highly Condensed):

Simply put, I like a lot of things! There's a lot of mes to like a whole lot of things. As I stated earlier, there's either a little or a lot of overlap for certain system experiences, so it can be a bit hard for me to quantify my interests. The most direct way I can describe my passions is I love science, physical art, and writing. There's many more interests and things that take up my brain space, but I simply cannot write an essay about it all. So we'll start shallow and dig deeper.

Science is one of my less focused passions, I think. Perhaps because I was (falsely) taught that people who are creative, cant appreciate science, and those who are scientists, can't appreciate art. Now, I wouldn't consider myself a professional scientist, but I dabble in some scientific thinking. Much like people can casually make art. Primarily, I find myself researching. My first and most researched thing for a while was animal biology. I would spend hours watching Animal Planet, fascinated by all of the facts that I was able to learn. Then as I got older, wiser, I would find myself reading lots of books about animals. Of course, It was hard to just stay obsessed with animal biology. After all, animals and humans are one in the same. So in a lot of my studies, I'd find myself being enticed by human anatomy and otherwise. Truthfully, I didn't get into human biology until I got into psychology. Psychology ended up winning me over when it came down to it.

I was fascinated by the way the human mind worked! I wanted to know why we thought the way we do, and I didn't even know that something so malleable could have been considered a science. It was artistic, in a way, the thought process of trying to figure out why people think the way they do, why they act the way they do. In a way, it became an important aspect in my life to not understand myself and others, but as an aid to create art.

My art goes hand and hand with my love of science. That, and the psychology of why we create art also is fascinating to me. I consider myself more of a professional artist than I do a professional scientist. One of those things requires more school (unless you're a really talented con-artist). I've been doing commissions for about a decade. I have experimented with many ways of making art, going from traditional drawing, digital drawing, collages, to sculpting, to beadwork, and so much more. I have always appreciated being able to make what is in my mind a reality. Whether something I make with my brush strokes, or pencil scratches.

I separate writing from art because while it is art, creating art and writing have always been very different for me. Incidentally, writing was not something I aspired to be good at, I just kind of …happened to be good at it. Despite this, writing for me is something that is desperate and trying to crawl out of my brain, through my fingers, and on to the page. Whatever it is. It was almost ritualistic for me when I was younger. I recall desperately scribbling down nonsensical one off scenes and drafts, writing fanfic, and roleplaying with friends online.

Writing isn't just something I love to do, it's something that I have to do. Which is why it's become a bit more frustrating, as the years go on, to struggle so much with it. As I said, I never aspired to be good at writing, I just happened to be. When I was a kid, I struggled very badly with spelling and my handwriting — later on in life I learned that I was dyslexic and likely had dysgraphia. So I'd always kind of had a hurdle when it came to actually conveying my ideas, but when people could read them, they really liked them.

Now I have tools and I don't have to write by hand anymore, so what's my hurdle now? There's a couple of things, most devastatingly a head injury being one of them. That definitely makes it harder for me to convey my ideas so people can understand what I'm saying. It wasn't just the head injury that came with it, it was the dysautonomia, and brain fog. The dysautonomia lead to depression, lead to burn out, and so on, and so forth.

However, despite that, I obviously haven't let it stop me, and I refuse to let it get between me and creating. My only true issue is that I really haven't published anything.

Okay, well that's not true. I've "published" a few things. The most official thing I've ever published was a poem when I was in 6th grade. It was a haiku based off of a Vocaloid song… classy. The other things I've published, less officially, were fan fictions. I've had my fair share of Ao3 accounts, Fanfiction.net accounts…. and Wattpad accounts. So I've had my immature foyers with writing, and I'd love to make something a bit more concrete as proof of my writing.

So Why Am I Doing This? - (Seriously)

Bluntly: to prove to myself that I can. I am a harsh self critic who's also a bit of a nihilist, a genuine pessimist. I always chicken out, I always run away from the concept that I could actually be someone- do anything. As you've been reading things, I hope there's a thought going through your mind that he& is pretty passionate and creative. Usually, I would agree with you, however, I have been in a slump, an awful, terrible slump. I've been clawing at sand, trying to get out of this creative rut I've been in.

On top of the creative rut that I've been in, there's been a lot of physical things that have been contributing to it. For starters, I mentioned my head injury I've been nursing, and with that comes the complications of healing. The brain fog is truly, utterly, awful. There are days where I feel like I am operating through sludge because of how bad the fog is. The dissociation also is like brain fog's sibling, or maybe they're one in the same. The brain fog then turns into apathy, a burning desire to do absolutely nothing- because why would anyone care? Why should anyone care about what I'm writing.

Which, I think that's the biggest issue with this. Why does anyone care, why should anyone care, does anyone care? Those are questions I ask myself a lot. I don't find that they have easy answers, I don't think there's a such thing as an easy answer anymore, really. Especially with the way that the world has turned to some… troubling things, especially in the creative sphere. The rise of AI and fascism has made me feel even more hopeless, drab about everything that's going on. With that, why should anyone care about what some queer on the internet is saying?

The answer to that is, I don't know. I can't make them care, and the bigger truth is, I don't want to make them care. This blog isn't about them, it's about me. That's why I'm doing this, to prove that I can - despite everything - I still can. The world cannot take creation from me as much as I would like to think it can. Creativity is something that seems to possess me, and I've been denying it that capability, I've been turning away at any creative endeavor because I care about what some faceless entity thinks. I'm ready to be now, all of me, the many mes. I am ready to create. I'm ready to be heard.

And I welcome you on this journey, of being heard, of hearing others. I encourage you to start somewhere, to do something , to be something today, even if there's so many other people already doing it. There can always be more writers, more creatives in the world. There can always be more people thinking, speaking, feeling. There can always be more of humanity. The world is for you, as much as it is for me.

You can create if you want, you can love again, if you try again. And that's the beauty of it all, trying again.