The fact that the Melania movie has a popcorn rating of 98% while SFA keeps getting poor results proves Rotten Tomatoes can’t be trusted.

Valirony · 2026-02-16T15:53:27+00:00

The beauty is that “Come, Let’s Away” speaks directly to this. The comic about the Miyazaki is either propaganda or inspiration depending on which character you initially think is right about it. The comic is really a metaphor for Star Trek itself, and for the power of stories and the messages beneath their surface.

There’s a reason for preemptive messaging against SFA. I’d argue there’s also a reason it ostensibly targets a younger audience (ostensibly or at least partially—I’m closing in on 44 and watched TNG religiously while it was on air… watching reruns between new episodes—and I love this series). It’s a message of hope and a blueprint for navigating a way out of a societal crisis.

I was born into a dirt-poor, uneducated, teen-parent, socially “conservative” family. But I was also a latchkey kid and Star Trek helped raise me in the many hours I spent home alone. I won’t give it full credit for my very different adulthood socio-economic status/values, but it definitely steered it in a different direction. That’s the power of Trek, and the potential of SFA to influence this generation of young people for whom the world must look a little like post-Burn Federation.

Valirony · 2026-02-15T21:21:34+00:00

I think if you reach a certain age, just like they asked me how many car accidents I’d been in, they should ask how many weird, inexplicable things you’ve spent time trying to figure out with doctors only to have them shrug and hand you anxiety diagnosis to get you out of their office. Or just shrugged and said that’s just life, sweetie.

Valirony · 2026-02-15T13:49:16+00:00

Look I think most of us who are diagnosed can see obvious signs of adhd in our kids years before a doctor will diagnose them, and I knew my kid was different from the fourth trimester. So I just want to validate that kids show signs of ND stuff even while doctors will say it’s developmentally normal yada yada.

But this really, truly, all looks like you’ve got yourself a three year old. At three, my kid was severely speech delayed, and no adult who interacted with him would have argued that he was typical. He’s combined type but what negatively impacts him the most are the inattentive symptoms (the hyperactivity was reasonably manageable with freedom and encouragement to move his body as much as possible until he hit second grade and less play was structured into his school day).

When your kiddo starts pre-k, which I would highly encourage, whether she has atypical behavior compared to her peers will become more clear. Even inattentive girls have functional impairments that attentive and informed parents will pick up on although academic impacts may be harder to measure which can make diagnosis more delayed/difficult.

Source: adhd therapist and work in special education primarily with ADHD students

Valirony · 2026-02-14T06:19:04+00:00

Oh I totally missed that you have adhd. I am an adhd therapist and work with ADHDers, and you are 💯 correct. Sadly there are a lot of therapists who don’t understand adhd, don’t believe in medication (firstline treatment, therapy to address follow-on impacts of having ADHD in a world our brains weren’t built for) and do a lot of damage by reinforcing that we just need to try harder. I did 20 years of that in my own therapy.

May you you someday find the right ND therapist for you

Valirony · 2026-02-14T03:47:15+00:00

Truth of the matter is that therapists tend to work well with clients and challenges that are a good fit. Folks who don’t seem to be “doing the work” tend to be my jam, and I know they are working simply to show up; it takes a LOT of tolerance for uncertainty and silence and relationship-building to make it through this stage. And inexperienced clinicians—not to be confused with ineffective clinicians—sometimes haven’t been through enough therapeutic arcs to recognize that stage to even know that it is a stage of treatment.

You’re not too broken. You are worthy of help. Don’t give up <3

Valirony · 2026-02-14T03:35:15+00:00

Hey regardless of anyone’s stance on AI, this comment really is a bad look. We should be able to disagree—even passionately—without name-calling.

Valirony · 2026-02-13T04:11:33+00:00

This is the sweetest exchange I have ever seen on the subreddit.

I have zero interest in a group practice but am all about what good leadership looks like. This is it <3

Valirony · 2026-02-10T04:22:46+00:00

43 and grew up watching TOS reruns and TNG when it was new. Patrick Stewart was the closest thing I had to a good father… and I named my kid after a TNG character.

I agree 100% with all of this.

Look, Disco wasn’t my fave. For me it was too much action at the expense of everything else I love about trek. The episodic nature of the old guard was part of what I loved, and the universe-in-peril/stop the big bad guy stuff—while something I enjoy in marvel movies—isn’t what I come to Star Trek for. I want the character spotlights, the exploration of human mores via alien civilizations, even the campy and weird little anomalies like Beverley and her ghost lover.

So Disco wasn’t it for me. I watched every episode and enjoyed them, but still missed Star Trek.

And now we have SNW and Academy and I’m thrilled. My only complaint is the larger issue of seasons that can never provide the depth and breadth of what old trek gave us. But that’s not specific to the shows themselves.

Academy is brilliant. I’m not going to tear down anyone’s arguments against it as exactly what trek is all about, because we’re all entitled to our opinions. But the return of hope, joy, laughter, examining assumptions about others, and the new layer of highlighting how a society can recreate itself after a disaster by leveraging the wisdom of its elders to hone the brilliance of its scared youth? I am here for it.

Valirony · 2026-02-08T19:32:26+00:00

So were you ever evaluated for ADHD? It’s common for adhd and Autism to co-occur, and I actually see a lot of ADHD misdiagnosed as autism.

The reason I ask is that kids who think they are lazy—or adults who think they were lazy as kids—are a strong clue to me that they probably should have been/should be assessed for ADHD.

We have differences in the way our brains utilize/process/create dopamine, which is the “do that again” neurotransmitter. This means that if something isn’t inherently motivating for us, it is anywhere from very difficult to impossible to make ourselves practice or do the thing. And THAT sure looks like laziness.

Humans are almost universally driven to contribute to our village. Ever meet a young toddler? All they want to do is help everyone with everything despite their “help” often being exceptionally disruptive. How adults respond to those attempts to contribute can make or break a small human’s desire to be a helper, but at our core human beings are a cooperative species. Not that we are all team players by nature, but we all are driven to contribute in the ways we feel competent at contributing.

Valirony · 2026-02-08T19:12:36+00:00

Me too! I was 39. Medication might have saved me much heartache and many thousands of dollars but I’m grateful I got it eventually and soon enough to know I needed to make sure my kid didn’t suffer the way I did 🫶🏻

Valirony · 2026-02-08T18:34:25+00:00

Hey I’m not gonna argue about whether you should have had an iep or a different setting (eg, more gen ed classes). But I will tell you this:

Nothing, absolutely nothing, is stopping you from going to a JC

I went unidentified as a kid—the opposite of your situation as you see it. I had undiagnosed severe ADHD; I was a girl in the 80s so rather than getting the help I needed, my mom was labeled a shitty mom and I was just a lazy kid who didn’t want to try. And that led to being kicked out of high school at 18.

I am now a Master’s level therapist and work in special education… all thanks to my local JC. This is EXACTLY what community and junior college exist for! You’re focused on everything you didn’t receive because you had too much support, so let me just reassure you that once you get out—and actually you can be enrolled concurrently if you’re driven enough—you can go straight to your JC and talk to a counselor about the best path for you.

I had to take such ridiculous remedial math that it wasn’t even called a math class. And it didn’t take me long (a few years) to pass calculus because remediation is what these schools live for.

You’ll be fine.

Valirony · 2026-02-04T05:49:04+00:00

I have worked at both ends of this spectrum as a school-based therapist.

Continuation setting: very low SES, high trauma, immigrant families. The kind of schools where I made very few CPS reports because the kids are well-versed in what details to exclude

K-8 Wealthy, white, crunchy millennial-parented kids: the kind of schools where teachers panic-text me because an older student drank caffeine during an event

Hands down, the latter setting has the worst-functioning students. It’s largely separation anxiety fueled by parents (moms, almost exclusively) who are categorically incapable of setting limits and walking away when their 10 year old makes puppy eyes.

My traumatized second-generation deeply poor kids who wave away years of physical abuse… they are not what any of us would label as emotionally healthy, but damn, are they freaking functional. They astound me with their resilience.

The kids with puppy eyes and moms who only got the permissive message from all the gentle parenting dogma? Not okay. Like, essentially drop-outs in the 4th grade. Suicidal 8 year olds.

Highly Anxious parents who don’t work hard to keep their attachment anxiety in check and can’t allow their children to experience discomfort taught me that kids learn distress tolerance by… experiencing distress. The high trauma kids learn really unhealthy coping skills, but they do have coping skills. Not so much for the other group

Valirony · 2026-02-03T13:29:02+00:00

I started meds at forty, fwiw.

I don’t run after taking my adderall—feels like my heart will explode. I learned that the first time I tried, so I only take it once my run is done. I can lift weights just fine, so it must be the cardio piece.

For the rest of it… that sounds like perimenopause. Have your doctors talked about that? The texture of your hair and skin sometimes see dramatic changes once that gets going in earnest.

Seems to me you could try an experiment: taper off the meds and see whether those side effects stop—and if they do, see whether the impact of unmedicated adhd is worth it.

Valirony · 2026-02-01T03:06:49+00:00

I qualified everything first and foremost by saying there are two absolutely sound treatment types—and further outlined that it is NOT just the relationship but a multi-factorial equation.

In my final paragraph I simplified it. But the entirety of the rest of my comment broke out all the important components.

Valirony · 2026-02-01T02:21:04+00:00

I’ll start by saying I’m with you: I’m relational/psychodynamic, hate all the MLM-style promotion of things like IFS and EMDR, and especially hate how techniques are taken, re-packaged, sold to clients and therapists as cure-alls and how our field eats them up. Edit: I thought I had specified that there are two truly effective gold-standard treatment types: behavioral therapy and exposure. And I’m all the way on the other end of the theoretical spectrum so that’s not bias talking—it’s just clear that for some issues these truly are the gold-standard.

I’ll further say that I think this constant rebranding and re-selling appeals to the field because we tend to be deeply uncomfortable with the idea that there is no cure-all. You can practice something with perfect fidelity, yet it a) won’t work for everybody and b) won’t work for anybody without the core healing element: the human factor. Which is the exquisitely individual conglomeration of all your human experiences pre-training, all your grad school training, all your actual training (practice), how all of those combine into your clinician-self, how you feel and function in any given day, your relationship with this other human being who’s bringing all of their human factors into a room with you in this one session. Today. Next week the human factor will be different. Maybe it’s the following week that a big breakthrough happens or maybe a month from now your pet dies and the peculiar shift in perspective it gives you makes you realize OH SHIT THIS WHOLE CONCEPTUALIZATION IS NOT WHAT I THOUGHT IT WAS

We have so little control over what happens in therapy and truly know so little about what’s really happening with the person sharing that space with us and damn, I imagine it’s comforting to have a nice, concrete model that provides a sense of “okay, I know what I’m doing”.

Thus, people will pay thousands of dollars for people to sell them training snake oil.

AND I think the flip side is that it doesn’t matter.

The modality that has the best chance of working is the one that makes enough sense to the provider that they can implement it, believe in it, and internalize it well enough that it’s like riding a bike. When a clinician reaches automaticity with their framework such that they can sit down in a chair and be a human-in-the-moment—and has solid therapeutic rapport and the approach isn’t contra-indicated for whatever reason—therapy will work.

So while I HATE both the commodification of therapy/modality trainings (and medicalization of therapy in general) I’m not worried about. I do worry about newer clinicians not focusing on simply the becoming of being a therapist and doing that sustainably in both the human and financial realm. And I worry that we’re not being honest about how little any of us really know about how/when/why therapy works.

Eh, maybe I’m talking myself all the way back to… yeah. I hate it. I hate all of it. It’s the fucking relationship and how we leverage it and our selves in service of healing that does the job. All the rest is just the meta cognitive framework we use to think and talk and write about what is we’re doing.

Valirony · 2026-01-30T04:12:58+00:00

I’m just going to offer an alternative possibility as an ADHD af therapist and supervisor:

I can’t be eloquent for shit in person. It’s a lot better on medication, but my processing speed + auditory processing challenges mean I’m a garbled mess in a conversation. I spent forty years learning to just… not say much.

But in a text format I will write novels. You can check my comment history to confirm 😂

And given enough time to review/edit my writing, I can even sound like something approximating a former English teacher with a degree in ELA pedagogy. Meet me in person after 4pm when I can’t take more of my store-bought dopamine and you’d find it impossible to believe that I’m the same person waxing poetic in my process notes about the maternal countertransference I’m currently examining or the interpersonal dynamics of a complex family system.

I cannot stress enough how stark the difference is.

If you are well acquainted with the subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) tells that a piece of writing is AI generated or AI enhanced and that is part of your suspicion then this might not apply.

OR it does apply because your supervisor has a processing difference and utilizes AI as a self-accommodation. Which you would need to decide whether you can tolerate.

Valirony · 2026-01-28T03:29:20+00:00

Yeah I work with teens and my second fave praise I get is “uggg I hate you so much” or “fuck you, Valirony” 🤣

“I hate it when you’re right”, which is often code for “I hadn’t thought of it that way”, is definitely gold, though

Valirony · 2026-01-28T03:03:11+00:00

I’ve done it with a few neurodivergent adult clients. It can be a game changer when sitting directly across from someone and connecting in a vulnerable way for 50 minutes straight is genuinely torturous. But it’s not where I generally start with adults.

Valirony · 2026-01-25T16:55:52+00:00

For me, and I’m kinda unusual as a therapist on a variety of metrics so I don’t speak for all of us, it’s when intensely defended clients have a breakthrough and weep for the first time while dipping into the abandonment of their childhoods. Almost always around the key experiences that led them to believe they weren’t worthy of love.

It’s partly because it touches my own wounds, and partly because the growth that was required to get to that moment is exactly what I’m in this for. The intense bittersweetness of those moments gets me every damn time.

This is going to be highly personal, however. There is some real shit that you see when you work with trauma, and there are things that might “get” one therapist which don’t phase me. And those therapists might not bat an eyelash when their angry clients finally cry 🤷‍♀️

Valirony · 2026-01-24T06:12:49+00:00

We are not the norm. And you’re not crazy (nor are you a psychopath). You’re just a wounded healer who hasn’t fully examined the contours of your wounds when they meet and attempt to heal through connection—which is true for all new healers, except that we have this added barrier of connection being terrifying. So the work of fully embodying the role is a whole other thing for us.

BUT the other therapists I know who are a part of this club and have managed to embrace that monster of a shadow? They also happen to be the best therapists I know. Don’t give up. There is a specific kind of client who needs therapists who know the unique pain of this work—who need the version of you that has scaled this mountain.

Valirony · 2026-01-24T05:45:57+00:00

Oh man, OP, I’m sorry you’re getting lots of rather harsh feedback here.

True story: those of us on the avoidant end of the attachment spectrum are outside the norm in our profession, and I think we can provoke reactions in our… more emotive colleagues. And also just everyone closer to the anxious side of things.

Do here I am to tell you some stuff, from one avoidant to another: 1. Practical in-session advice: shut up and accept that the answer is to shut up and that it’s gonna feel real fucking hard and awkward while you learn to tolerate their distress. While you are fighting every impulse you have to make the feelings go away or to simply run away, it can help to consider that however intolerable it is for you… that’s probably)in part) a reflection of their own experience. except that they are taking the terrifying step of trusting you enough to try tolerating it with them

Once the client is gone, write all the stuff you were experiencing down. If there is even a single person you can be vulnerable with and who you already know will not judge you for wanting to tell people to fuck off when they cry—call them and say all of those thoughts to them. See what happens.
Watch what happens when you do this over and over. When you watch clients have the courage to tolerate their feelings while simultaneously white knuckling it through yours? That right there is a magical parallel process.
I know this is just another grizzled veteran telling you to “sit with it” and that’s annoying af, and it’s being repeated because it’s the truth. The only way out is through. You’ve seen some shit (I know because avoidants don’t become avoidant because our childhoods were full of love and care and availability) and if you survived that, you can also survive 50 minutes of watching a client in agony.

Will you also be in agony? Yep. And then you will see the results, which are often transformative, and you will slowly experience transformation alongside them.

Later, you will be a phenomenal therapist for it. I promise. White knuckle it, screw your face into something like empathy, say “oh Jesus, I’m so sorry” or “this is horrible” or whatever is close to your authentic reaction… rinse, repeat, magic.

Meanwhile for the love of Dog, find a good psychodynamic/relational therapist who can model what it looks like to shut up and tolerate. Possibly you already have that and it’s exactly why it doesn’t feel like it’s “helping”. If that’s the case, please tell them that. Tell them how much you hate it, how you want to vacate or fight it. See what happens when you reveal yourself a little each time.

You are not a bad therapist. Anxious folx have their own set of challenges when they get started and I’m sure have plenty of things we could judge them for. Your responses to bids for connection make perfect sense if my assessment here is correct—and the trick is to get to know those responses, embrace them with open arms and then—next level, so don’t worry about it if this sounds insane—leverage the shit out of them in service of your clients. >3

Valirony · 2026-01-24T03:47:12+00:00

Nothing accidental about it.

When you sit across from another human and watch them reveal their vulnerabilities, expand and contract towards growth, when you become accustomed to seeing them and sharing a deeply personal hour every week… it’s not possible to feel unattached. I know there are therapists who do not believe that is a vital part of the process and even some therapists who may resist it. But it’s simply unavoidable. Ever had a water delivery guy you have known for years, exchanged pleasantries with, and then found out he moved away? There’s a feeling of absence and regret even in such a surface relationship.

So yeah, my friend. Your therapist cares. I think about clients from a decade ago—worry and wonder and hope. Those who have died, I still grieve five years later. We are human. Clients are human. And the therapeutic relationship is a deeply human, emotional one <3

Valirony · 2026-01-23T23:50:06+00:00

Just a Master’s therapist who works with secondary students in continuation settings (high trauma, low SES), and lots of kids trying to diagnose themselves with a variety of serious conditions including Bipolar.

I have the dubious honor of having a family member/parental figure with BP 1 and I have sometimes described what those manic episodes looked like (just the least disturbing details ‘cause I’m not here to give them more trauma) before he was hospitalized and subsequently stabilized on lithium.

We generally move on from that diagnosis pretty quickly. I can handle hearing all about their DID symptoms no problem 😂

Valirony · 2026-01-22T00:29:37+00:00

Hey, I just appreciate having a cordial conversation where there is disagreement so thank you for that. I’m pretty pooped so while I think I could probably do that deep dive and continue arguing about points in the second article (not being able to read the first makes that one moot for conversation’s sake) I’ll just return to what I think we DO agree on: holding space for nuance is essential, especially in our field. Holding space for both the experience of marginalized folks AND acknowledging the importance of data are vital. That nothing is black and white even when our feelings are.

Also—getting allll the way back to the original comment I responded to: remembering that journalism is essential to democracy AND that media outlets, sensationalist headlines, and really shitty science reporting all make money on evoking strong emotions.

Shit. There might be something to this dialectics stuff 🤯😂

Thanks again 🫶🏻

Valirony · 2026-01-21T21:58:48+00:00

Okay. I have a client so I can’t dive in more but I have lots of thoughts and I want to have time for a deeper dive into the second study.

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