• shneancy@lemmy.world
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    19 days ago

    honestly, this is not a terrible idea

    if you see someone at the verge of a panic attack that means they’re fully in their head spiraling - you can try to calm them down the normal way, but you can also try to force them out of their own head and ground them by saying something weird, ideally a question so their mind can latch onto it. It won’t always work, but it might shock them just the right amount to ground them!

    • TriflingToad@sh.itjust.works
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      19 days ago

      The idea of someone just sobbing then you come up and yell “WHATS THE OPPOSITE OF YELLOW ON A RUBIKS CUBE!?!?” at them is so funny to me.
      I think it’d probably work on me.

    • notabot@lemm.ee
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      19 days ago

      I was told that one way to help a young child break out of a tantrum is to ask them an odd question, something like “What color shoes are you wearing?” It does seem to work sometimes, usually by annoying them so much that they forget what they were upset about in the first place. I can well see it working for someone who needs to get out of a mental spiral.

      • vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works
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        18 days ago

        I was actually asked this as a kid while on the verge of a meltdown, it annoyed me so much it pushed me over the edge and I responded with throwing a chair. I then started swearing and looking for anything that could be used as a melee weapon, I settled for a table. So yeah your mileage may vary when it comes to autistic kids on that one.

        • notabot@lemm.ee
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          18 days ago

          Oof, yeah I could see how that could happen. I guess you really should know the kid before trying something like that. I usually find that making mine laugh is enough to start to reset them, and then helping them calm down is a lot easier. Also, a question like that is definitely for small kids, not those who can fling furniture.

      • MBM@lemmings.world
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        18 days ago

        Reminds me of the “make an angry child laugh” trick. Which I absolutely loathed as a child, because it worked but it also wasn’t taking my emotions seriously.

        • notabot@lemm.ee
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          18 days ago

          Sometimes their emotions have gone so far past reasonable that the first thing you need to do is bring them back to the point you can actually reason with them. After that, yes it’s really vital to take their emotions seriously, they need to understand them and trust that the people around them will take them seriously, but they also haven’t yet built the skills to moderate their own feelings, so sometimes you need to add those externally.

  • Please_Do_Not@lemm.ee
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    19 days ago

    That’s why Mr. Pibb emphasized clarity to avoid misgendering. He actually has a Ph. D. in archaeology, but made the humble choice to still go by Mr.

  • Snot Flickerman
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    19 days ago

    How many licks does it take to discover Dr. Pepper’s gender?

    The world may never know.

  • Python@programming.dev
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    19 days ago

    That unironically might work tho Like getting their mind off of the current thought spiral can be pretty helpful sometimes

  • BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works
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    19 days ago

    WTF?!? I’ve always thought of Dr Pepper as the looking like the Pringles man cos playing as an old timey doctor. You know: mustache, bowtie, head mirror and lab coat. Dr Pepper is married to another doctor though, Dr Pepper Cherry. All the other men in the neighborhood wants her. The Peppers have one child, who’s going through a rough patch, dealing with a negative self image, never being as good as his parents, and anorexia. Child’s name is Dr Pepper Light.

    Dr. Pepper has a brother too. The brother got into some stupid shit and didn’t finish high school. Now he lives in a trailer park, trying to prove to everyone he’s just as good as his brother, but everyone thinks of him as a redneck drunk on account of his last name. He goes by the name Root Beer. His wife’s name is Ginger, she’s a hottie from Jamaica.

    So how dare you question my world view? Hey would you look at that my panic attack is gone. Now I just have a hard on, a can of cherry pepper and a wish to mix it with some ginger beer and rum. I call the drink a “drunk ffm”.

  • abbiistabbii
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    18 days ago

    This is actually a very good way of dealing with people in an emotional state: Say something so off the fucking wall and irrelevant that it snaps people out of it.

  • WastedJobe@feddit.org
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    19 days ago

    I’ve always thought of Dr Pepper as either a can or a company, never a person, let alone specifically enough to have a gender.

  • Fox@pawb.social
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    19 days ago

    Dr. Pepper’s pronouns are we/us, because 🎵 Dr. Pepper you’re a part of me 🎵

  • pancakes@sh.itjust.works
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    19 days ago

    When I first saw this I realized I had assumed Dr. Pepper (beyond the drink) was a man, but I think for me it was because as a kid I remember commercials with a deep voiced man and my dumb kid brain thought that was the doctor.