Aziraphale and Trauma

[Just a note that I initially wrote this in response to this post: https://www.tumblr.com/theangelyouknew/732357015604756480?source=share&ref=_tumblr which is full of insightful info. I'm reposting my response here with some minor edits so it's easier to find in tags.]

This is something I actually find interesting within the fandom, because there seems to be this weird divide in fandom when it comes to Aziraphale.

See, I love Aziraphale. I think he's an amazing and well nuanced character, but a lot of the time fandom boils him down into this really simple version of himself. This happens both with people who dislike him and claim he's a bad person as well as with those who want to soften him up and make him more palatable. Aziraphale isn't the only one who has trouble with black and white thinking here!

Things like Coffee Theory remove Aziraphale's agency because the thought of Aziraphale doing something to hurt Crowley deliberately is something they can't stomach. If Aziraphale is acting under some kind of major magical influence, it means that it's possible to brush over the fact that he can - and has - hurt Crowley in the past and it certainly hasn't always been accidental.

There's a lot of Psychology I could touch on here, but it's honestly such a complicated topic that I don't really feel I can do it justice attached to a completely different topic.

But one thing I do want to touch on a bit is how Aziraphale asserts control in his own life via his connection with Crowley, and that touches on something equally complicated, which is something that's probably hard to understand.

Abuse victims are often manipulative.

I don't mean this at all as some kind of slight or insult. I've been an abuse victim myself and it's one reason I know it's true.

Fandom talks a lot about Crowley's trauma and he's got loads, to be sure. I think of that meme about "this bad boy can fit a lot of trauma" and it's very true. I've even seen people mention that Aziraphale has a different kind of Trauma than Crowley, which is also true.

What I haven't seen is someone addressing that the type of religious trauma is a form of CPTSD. CPTSD or "Complex PTSD" is a very specific form of PTSD. PTSD is characterized as being the result of a traumatic event - Crowley's fall, for example, is a good example of PTSD and I can go into that at some point. CPTSD is different because it's not a singular event, it's the result of being in a constant high stress situation. A lot of abuse victims - especially those abused by parental figures or significant others - have this form of PTSD.

A good way to see the difference is in comparing how they relate to their trauma. When Crowley thinks he's lost Aziraphale in S1, it sends him into a spiral. But importantly we see that this traumatic event is causing Crowley to go back to another traumatic event in time, triggering his memories of his fall. This emphasizes how much Crowley's fall defines his trauma. We rarely see him experiencing trauma at the hands of Hell, as he's mostly allowed freedom to handle his job on earth the way he wants.

https://cptsdfoundation.org/ defines CPTSD as "the results of ongoing, inescapable, relational trauma. Unlike Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Complex PTSD typically involves being hurt by another person. These hurts are ongoing, repeated, and often involving a betrayal and loss of safety."

In humans, this is caused by having no sense of safety in key moments of development. It strips away sense of self, sense of worth and really any agency. We even see the angels using direct gaslighting tactics on Aziraphale in S2, which I'm surprised doesn't get mentioned more often: When they come to the bookshop looking for Gabriel, they mention Gabriel and then almost immediately when Aziraphale asks "you were looking for Gabriel", Uriel outright says a line that goes something like "Did we say we were looking for Gabriel?", leading Aziraphale to fumble and try to remember if they did, in fact, say that at some point (they did).

So, one big thing to know about CPTSD and this kind of abuse related trauma is that learning to lie and be manipulative is often what people have to do to survive. Children with abusive parents will learn how to be manipulative in order to get what they need or avoid losing things they need.

We see this with Aziraphale, time and time again. He could just ASK Crowley for things he wants. A lot of people point out that he could ask and that Crowley would probably give in to him most of the time anyway. But that's not how it works in an abusive home. Instead, Aziraphale maneuvers Crowley into situations where Crowley is forced to give him what he needs or wants.

His lack of agency, as a result of his CPTSD, is also why he needs to be worked into making decisions that he already knows - or at least suspects - are right. That's why they have their little dance every time Crowley has to talk Aziraphale into something by finding the right way to frame it so it makes sense with Aziraphale's strict rule structure. These rules exist as a defensive mechanism too. Having rules makes it easier to figure out how to avoid being hurt and Aziraphale cannot simply step outside the rules because it's Not Safe. Not even with someone he trusts as much as Crowley.

The entire apology dance scene stands out for a few reasons. Everything Aziraphale does in the entire scene is an act that allows him to take control of the situation. He's already won, so to speak, because Crowley is back and Crowley is going to do what he wants. The apology is unnecessary on every level.

This post talks about how uncomfortable Crowley has to be sharing a space with Gabriel. Gabriel is with the abusive team, whether or not he was directly involved with Crowley's fall. Crowley also harbors a severe distress and mistrust of Gabriel because of Gabriel's attempts to destroy Aziraphale, the most important person to Crowley. But it's worth noting that Aziraphale is uncomfortable too.

Another good indicator of how stressed Aziraphale is with all this is that he doesn't eat ANYTHING when Gabriel is in the shop. The only food he consumes in modern era is when he's in the Bentley which is a "safe" space. Gabriel constantly hounded Aziraphale over eating and despite offering Gabriel hot chocolate, we don't see him partaking himself. He does briefly drink to demonstrate how "drinking tea" works for Muriel, but he doesn't seem to drink from his cup at all after demonstrating.

The bookshop is also Aziraphale's safe space, his ONLY safe space - Crowley still technically has the Bentley, and honestly I feel like Aziraphale wanting to borrow the Bentley is actually partially because he needs to get away from Gabriel and the Bentley is the only place that feels safe for him at the moment. Shax ruins any illusion of safety for him, but Aziraphale is much more enthused for his trip in ep3 and a fair amount of it is because he's not trapped with Gabriel.

A small note here, as a thought occurs to me. Aziraphale asserting that the Bentley is "our car" is probably mostly for himself. He's trying to realign his thinking to make the Bentley an acceptable "safe space" for himself prior to the trip.

There is a very different relationship dynamic when it comes to Gabriel and Aziraphale because Gabriel is the constant source of Aziraphale's trauma. He's Aziraphale's superior, the one he has to report to, the one who passes down his missions and his punishments. When Aziraphale takes Gabriel in, he's just invited his former abuser of over 6000 years into his safe haven. This is a hugely uncomfortable thing for an abuse survivor.

Worst of all, because Jim is, for all intents and purposes, NOT Gabriel, Aziraphale can't bring himself to lash out at his former abuser the way he wants to.

That brings us back to this apology scene.

There are two major things going on here and both of them are bad and hurtful toward Crowley. They're also both intensely unfair. I love Aziraphale but this was definitely a dick move.

Firstly: Aziraphale is using Crowley to reassert a sense of control over the situation because he is spiraling. He can't assert control over his life and his shop, which is one thing that he falls back on heavily, and that leaves him scrambling to find somewhere where he can control his situation. He makes Crowley go through this whole unnecessary apology and dance routine because it makes him feel like he has control over SOMETHING in his life right now.

Secondly: Aziraphale is also enacting his own trauma on Crowley. He's treating Crowley the way Heaven treats him. This is a direct parallel to the way Crowley terrorizes his house plants because he can't do anything to the people who actually caused his trauma. This is, obviously, wildly unfair of Aziraphale to do - and I'm fairly sure there are other small moments where Aziraphale does this in a mild way, I'd have to rewatch again.

These are both behaviors common in CPTSD caused by environments that apply this constant state of stress.

I'm not going to say it's right, or that Aziraphale isn't being a bit of a bastard in this moment - he absolutely is - but this behavior does have some obvious triggers that might be easy to overlook. It's just important to understand that Aziraphale is falling into self-preservation habits that are actively detrimental to his relationship with Crowley. It's not just the manipulation, he's also hiding things and lying to Crowley when he really shouldn't be - both things often necessary in abusive environments - but he's doing it because that's the method that he's created that works with his abusive relationship in Heaven and he's falling back on it because he feels unsafe. The trouble is, this survival tactic does not work with Crowley and actively makes things worse because it shuts down open communication entirely.

irispurpurea

This makes me think, once again, about the Ball.

Aziraphale starts season 2 under high stress. He and Crowley have had four years since Armageddon, but they’ve spent those for years tentatively working on this life together while also waiting for the other shoe to drop. It’s a really fragile situation and Gabriel’s arrival shatters it.

OP’s point about Aziraphale inviting Gabriel into his safe space — that’s characteristic of this whole season. Everything safe, everything sacred to Aziraphale, the bookshop, the Bentley, food and other earthly pleasures, Heaven/Hell encroaches on. So Aziraphale’s story over this season is him trying to reassert control over his situation, getting increasingly desperate for control. His stubborn insistence that everything’s going to be fine, everything’s going to work out.

The Ball is the culmination of that arc for Aziraphale. He comes back to Soho reeling from Shax’s invasion of the Bentley and immediately throws himself into planning the perfect Ball, the perfect love story for Nina and Maggie (and for him and Crowley). Literally orchestrating the entire thing, literally controlling the outfits, the dialogue, the music and the dancing. The vibe is very ‘This has to go exactly the way he’s envisioning it or he will fall to pieces’ throughout that whole scene. OP makes me think of how he shuts down Crowley’s warnings to his face, pulls him onto the dance floor.

And then Hell storms the bookshop, and Aziraphale does the most drastic thing to regain control of the situation: he throws his Halo. The only thing he can think to do that will make everything just stop.

So thinking of Aziraphale this way, looking at his arc throughout the second season in this light, his reaction to the Metatron’s offer and the way he presents it to Crowley makes more sense. A lot of y’all have pointed out that he never actually verbally accepts the Metatron’s offer. He says “I don’t know what to say” and the Metatron says “go tell Crowley the good news.”

Aziraphale is trapped again, feels powerless again. He doesn’t actually get to make a choice here. That’s clear to him. What he can do, though, during the walk across the street, is convince himself that this is a Good Thing, Actually. They can remake Heaven together, won’t it be wonderful?

The only thing Aziraphale can control in this situation is his own mindset, his own mental framing of what’s happening. I’ve seen people theorize that his enthusiasm in the bookshop is an act, and I sort of agree? But it’s not an act he’s deliberately putting on to hint to Crowley that something’s wrong. It’s an act he’s putting on for himself, that he needs to put on for himself, convincing himself that everything has worked out for the best and he’ll have Crowley and it’s all going to be great.

And then Crowley’s refusal to come with him shatters him. Crowley’s kiss hurts him. And so he hurts him back. “I forgive you.” Fine, go then. I release you. I said “I need you” but I don’t need you after all. And his smile in the elevator, once again, everything is fine, and I don’t need Crowley, and I can do this on my own. Everything has worked out for the best.

#good omens #good omens meta #aziraphale's trauma #complex ptsd #abuse victim becomes manipulative #recreating the familiar #aziraphale's bookshop #the bentley #safe space

sarahthecoat reblogged

holmesianpose

dancing-with-the-madmen

The other day I was babbling to a friend about OFMD, as I am wont to do, and casually mentioned cPTSD and the different types of trauma responses Ed and Stede employ in stressful situations, and, hey, maybe I shouldn’t just assume that’s common knowledge, and also, maybe I'll just go ahead and write a whole essay about it? So first, it’s only responsible to say that I am NOT an expert: I did study psychology in college, and I have researched this condition, but all that was ages ago, and I am not a mental health professional. So take what I say with a grain of salt, and anyone who knows better than I do is welcome to correct me where I am wrong. With that ringing endorsement, cPTSD, or complex post traumatic stress disorder, is a form of PTSD that is caused by long-term, repeated trauma as opposed to a single traumatic event (usually, and in the case of Ed and Stede, the result of prolonged child abuse). It presents with extreme mood swings or difficulty controlling emotions, pervasive feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness, difficulty forming or maintaining friendships, dissociative behaviors, and frequent suicidal ideology. Surely this all sounds familiar when applied to our favorite pirate captains, yeah?

Trauma response refers to the coping behaviors used to deal with traumatic situations and inform the way one responds to stress-inducing scenarios. Everyone has heard of Fight or Flight, but less commonly known are Freeze and Fawn. Freeze behaviors can have a physical component (anything from actual immobility to sensations of heaviness, rigidity, or numbness, or restricted breathing, or mindlessly following instructions even when counter-intuitive), and/or a mental component (failure to recognize stimuli, or being slower than usual to process information, inability to communicate, “brain freeze”). Fawning behaviors include being a “people-pleaser”, saying “yes” to requests even when they are inconvenient or painful to you, putting other people’s comfort and needs above your own, and changing your behaviors or mode of expression to try and fulfill the expectations or desires of others. It’s important to note that no one chooses their trauma response; it’s based on what kinds of behaviors have kept you safe in traumatic situations in the past, and is completely involuntary. A given individual will also usually employ a mix of the different responses, though it’s not uncommon for one or two strategies to pop up most frequently.

With Ed’s reputation as the dread pirate Blackbeard, one would expect to see Fight as his primary coping behavior. And while we do see that some of the time, far more frequently we see him Fawn.

Fight

In his childhood flashbacks, we initially see him Freeze when confronted with his drunken father’s abuse, and while that works in the moment, it’s the Fight response that keeps him and his mother safe on a more permanent basis.
On the French Merchant ship, when the captain insults him, we see his Fight kick into high gear. He yells, looms menacingly, and even when Stede calms him down, still demands physical violence be enacted on his tormentor,
When the fickle favor of the French aristocrats turns against him, Ed initially responds with Flight, removing himself from the situation. But that doesn’t let him outrun the feelings of humiliation, so we see him turn to Fight, growling that “No one laughs” at him and pulling his gun with the intention to go inflict physical violence on those who inflicted emotional damage.
In response to Izzy getting in his face and snarling about the real Blackbeard, Ed pins him to the wall with a hand around his throat.

Fawn

He tells Izzy that he intends to kill Stede and take over his life, putting Izzy in the position of captain in order to stop him from leaving after the lighthouse incident.
While initially reticent and seemingly off-put by the French aristocrats, we see his manner change over the course of the party to mirror their behavior. He becomes increasingly braggadocious, louche, and insouciant, eventually even sacrificing his friend on the altar of a crowd-pleasing witticism.
At Izzy’s insistence, he agrees to go through with the plan to kill Stede, even though it’s clear that he very much does NOT want to do that.
He goes on Stede’s treasure hunt even though he makes no qualms about how cringe-y and uncomfortable he finds the whole ordeal.
We see Ed’s mirroring behavior again with Calico Jack. He’s more raucous and rowdy than we’ve ever seen him, and often looks at him to see how he's acting before he starts doing a similar sort of behavior (like when when Jack starts whispering apologies for the cannon fire that awoke Stede, or when he brings up "whippies" at the breakfast table). Even when the things Jack says are making Ed visibly uncomfortable, we see him returning to match Jack's energy again and again.
When Ed and Stede are at the Royal Privateering Academy for Wayward Seamen, Ed’s adjustment is near instantaneous and flawless. He cheerfully confirms his name on the roster with a cute little rhyme, is visibly excited about the block of soap he receives, throws himself into mundane chores, and even shaves off the eponymous beard that is his claim to fame.
And finally, Izzy goads him in into his Kraken transformation, and Ed goes full “You want my crazy? I’ll SHOW you crazy” even though we see in his private moments how much it pains him.

Unfortunately, because Ed is such an emotional chameleon, it’s not always easy to tell when he is acting according to his own genuine desires and when he’s doing what he thinks other people want from him. Did he lean in to Stede on that moonlight drenched deck because he thought that’s where Stede was going with the whole “You wear fine things well” moment, or did he do it because he wanted to kiss those honeyed words off Stede’s lips for himself? Does he concoct a plan to run away to China because that’s what he wants to do, or is he just coming up with a plan to please Stede because he knows that Stede doesn’t want to stay in the service of the British? And even more unfortunately, Ed would probably say that all of the examples listed above WERE his idea, because even the ones that clearly make him uncomfortable are better than the agony of disappointing someone, or pushing a disagreement to a crisis point where he would have to relive the trauma of his childhood violence.

Stede, on the other hand, uses the trauma responses of Flight and Freeze, the latter more frequently than the former.

Flight

Runs from the bullies of his youth.
Runs away from his family to become a pirate. He’s done everything he’s been told all his life he’s supposed to have done; got married to someone appropriate, even if they would never have chosen one another, not in a million years, made babies, even made sure one of them was male for patriarchal inheritance purposes, but he’s been miserable for nearly the whole of it. So after Mary confirms that their differences are, indeed, irreconcilable (he wants nothing more than to live on a ship, and she HATES the ocean), off he slinks in the middle of the night, (when Louis is about the age real-life Stede was when his father died, which I thought was an interesting way of squaring the narrative with history. Also, real-life Stede and Mary had four kids; three boys and a girl over the 6 years of their marriage; I think it an interesting and important detail that the writers decided to pare it down to two kids, Louis being the younger. It gives a very “copulation for the sake of procreation and NOTHING ELSE” vibe that adds a layer to the misery and desperation of their marital situation. I would not be the least surprised to find Stede had not so much as touched Mary since the birth of their heir. They must be SO touch-starved, and yet mutually repulsed. This parenthetical aside seems to have gotten away from me…).
Runs from Ed in response to the trauma of Chauncy’s screed about Stede ruining everything he comes in contact with, the veracity of which is immediately and fatally confirmed in Stede’s mind by Chauncy’s accidental death.

Freeze

The beheading of the goose in his youth is where we see this first solidified. He is initially frozen in shock as the blood spatters across his face, but it isn’t until tries to turn away that his father remonstrates him, effectively telling him that coping strategy is NOT acceptable. Incidentally, this flashback sequence is an illustration of Stede experiencing an emotional flashback as he Freezes on the deck of his ship, eyes unfocusing and breath shallow, while, all around him, his crewmates gleefully prepare for a slaughter.
We see another emotional flashback at the tea party of re-lived trauma as Nigel wistfully recalls the abuses he subjected Stede to in their youth. Stede sits silently, eyes unfocused and shoulders hunched as he dissociates into the filmic flashback.
After Nigel’s death, he is again Frozen in shock.
The tribal tribunal trial again sees Stede dissociating in a Freeze as he focuses on the mental construct of Nigel’s ghost instead of paying attention to what is being said by those around him, muscles so rigid he’s shaking.
He Freezes when Jackie threatens to take his nose.
When Mary gets upset over the model boat and all the implications thereof, Stede Freezes again, shoulders bent, eyes averted.
Ín the “You wanted to be Blackbeard. This is what it's like” scene from episode 4, we see a prime example of mental AND physical Freezing. As the questions keep coming and the tension mounts, Stede fumbles his words and sputters, repeating himself, and saying “I don’t have an idea. I don’t know what to do!” while his body goes rigid and his eyes go glassy.
On the French party boat, we see mockery of Sir Godfrey: “Oh, Thornrose, will you never cease with your incessant nattering?” to which Stede draws in on himself and falls silent.
Just everything Calico Jack. It’s like Nigel all over again without even the veneer of civility. Stede just spends so much time in stunned, shamed silence from the initial insult introduction (“Who’s the big girl?”) to the crab/turtle battle that no doubt is bringing back goose flashbacks (“Loser gets his head cut off, and winner gets his fuckin’ head cut off!”).
Freezing shows up once more when Chancy wakes Stede with a gun to the face, and again after he shoots himself.

I also think the Freeze instinct is tied up with Stede’s death wish. But wouldn’t that be Fawning - agreeing that he deserves disrespect and death? There’s an element of that, yes, but I think it’s less a case of him trying to please his tormentors and more a case of him mentally freezing and failing to process all the very good and valid arguments against passively submitting to that kind of treatment.

I don’t have any real conclusion to draw here, It’s more of a “Behold this thing I noticed” kind of exercise. Was it all an excuse to make a collage of Stede’s wonderful stupid face looking like a Podling from the Dark Crystal? You’ll never prove anything. Actually, this started out as a very different essay with a VERY different tone, but then I started defining terms and it turned into a whole thing. All of which is to say, I’ve a little more tinkering to do, but more to come soon.

#ofmd meta #stede bonnet #edward teach #tw ptsd #tw mental health #tw trauma #complex ptsd #trauma response #fight or flight #freeze or fawn