cap_ironman | Crazy!Tony time.

omg great minds think a like -- I'm doing the something like this to him, too XD We're so mean.

I think he was develop someone who could replace Steve for him and generally be his voice of reason. All in all, it would be the sort of embodiment of everything Tony is not.

Well, so far I have Iron Man- logical, calculating, cold, Eddy- female, mother-hen, protective, angry. And there's this entire sub-plot of Steve remebering being dead and being in Tony's head that comes back to bite them all in the ass.

Ah, yes, Iron Man would be very separate from Tony. I like the idea of having a protective feminine side, though the "angry" part confuses me -- angry at what? What's happening to Tony? The Steve idea sounds fun :D

Yep. Eddy's very protective. By the by, this is the fic you've been helping me out with. ;P *g*

Hooray for helping \o/

Also, there's a theory going around of a collective, hive-mind of this comm. We keep getting further evidence of it.

But what exactly are you diagnosing Tony with? Schizophrenia or DID? the PTSD and depression could be caused by either of the mentioned disorders. And schizophrenia isn't a dissociative disorder. Plus, I can't see Tony as having multiple personalities with DID because he doesn't fit any of the criteria. He doesn't really fit for schizophrenia either. Depression? yes. PTSD? absolutely. Substance abuse? for sure. Tony seems like he could fit into the category of a late developing anxiety disorder or a personality disorder.

Again, I'm not trying to be mean or anything! I'm just trying to help make the story concept fit a bit better with the character and the disorders that's all!

Alright, here's the thing: After Steve's death, something in Tony's head gives way, and when since Girltron strained his brain (there's a plot device involving this and I don't want to give it away), causing all of these other sides of Tony (who before had all the personalities connected, kind of), to split off and develope themselves, leaving main!Tony to drift of into Lala Land in a way. I've been reading a lot of the back!canon, and Tony refers to Iron Man and Tony as two separate beings a lot, especially when he doesn't have to/is by himself so there's really no point in it, etc.

No, I totally get where you're coming from. I asked myself the same questions when I the idea popped into my head.

Here, email me. I'd really like your imput on the plot and explainations of things. camelonajourney(@)yahoo.com

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Thank you for the information. Could a personality disorder or the traits, as it were, have a sudden and massive increase due to trauma or extreme emotional distress?

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I agree with you. But I do see Tony as having manic symptoms sometimes. If anything he'd be a Type II Bipolar. Also, he could develop a type of dissociative disorder what with his leanings towards escapism. As far as a personality disorder, his symptoms would have been more noticeable to others over the years and would have caused more impediments to functionality this late in his life. (I know it's comics, but Tony seems to be pretty much in his perpetual 30's).

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Re: Please don't take it as mean!

autumn-lily.livejournal.com - 2008-12-07 23:05 (UTC) - Expand

I'll be looking up Type II, but I hadn't really thought about bipolar disorder, or manic-depression. It just didn't seem to fit in my head, but thanks for the query.

Thank you so much for the information. Personally, I have AS and an anxiety disorder, so I get where you're coming from. The thing with the schizophrenia is just a plot device that I would explain to you, but it would give away a lot of the fic, and yes, it's essentially just for the auditory/visual hallucinations.

Thank you again, this help out a lot. I've been doing a lot into the disorders, but sometimes it's hard for me to grasp concepts without getting different views of them, so this help a lot. Thank you.

I'm glad I could help.

I myself have Bipolar I type disorder as well as a borderline personality disorder. Also, very social phobic, I never really leave my house unless I have to for work / school. I'm studying to be a forensic psychologist.

Yes. But usually it's gradual, takes years. And the person who has the disorder never thinks there is anything wrong with how they're behaving / thinking. Either they are sent in for treatment on the recommendations of other people, or they came in for something different (like to get medicine because they can't sleep at night) and then the doctor or whoever notices their odd behavior.

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Would you mind checking over the fic as I went along and give me notes on his behavior and such?

It's not really as blatant in the fic as I've made it seem. It's really more of a gradual explaination than a HERE'S WHAT HAPPENED IN A MINI-ESSAY MID-FIC kind of thing.

Be happy to. (see e-mail from sapphirebutterfly_01@lycos.com)

Would you mind if I sent the story as I went along to get your input on his behavior, etc?

No problem at all.

I don't see it as mean at all! The reason I posted it the way I did was to get people to ask questions an poke at my theories and explain their theories in turn.

Thank you for your input!

Love the Nightwing icon!

...that is NW, right?

*doesn't follow DC*

Actually it's Jason Todd after he'd been brought back to life. The icon was taken from when he broke into the Teen Titan tower as Red Hood to 'test' (read, beat the crap out of) the newest Robin, Timothy Drake. I love Jason Todd, he's a complete brilliant violent whirlwind of stab you in the face!

Yes! Someone writing crazy!Tony! XD I have been secretly pining for this for some time, but didn't want to write it myself because that's pretty much what I've done in the last few fandoms I've been in O.o;;
I do enjoy crushing the hopes and dreams of the characters I love...

I'll be interested to see what you come up with. Good luck with it! :D

Thank you! I love your work, by the by...

Hopes? Dreams? Replace them with despair and nightmares, I say! Muwahahahahahahahaha... "I've been working with a vocal coach, stregnthening the Ha..."

Oh yes, I could buy him developing some serious mental issues by now.

The major thing that's always struck me about Tony is that his coping mechanisms keep going haywire. The alcohol abuse, the thrill-seeking, the distancing himself from his friends, the occasional bouts of near-pathological lying and secrecy... When he picks a coping mechanism, he invariably pushes it too far.

He's always had a bit of dissociation going with Iron Man. He always knew about it, but he seemed to keep his equilibrium best when he kept Tony and Iron Man separate. I imagine it gave him a way to escape from being himself sometimes (he's never really liked being Tony very much), and also I suspect that it let him keep Iron Man separate as something noble and heroic about himself when Tony Stark seemed too dirty and useless.

But if you take that kind of persona separation far enough, you can get the multiple personalities. As for who: there's Iron Man, of course--tough, noble, often able to say things Tony couldn't. There's Tony the cool, confident man of the world, and Tony the man underneath, who's frequently depressed, desperate, lonely, and self-loathing. There might also be the sexy socialite. Personas in MPD are always generated according to need. You're faced with a situation you feel unequipped to handle, and you either leap into a persona you already have that can handle it, or you generate a new one appropriate to the situation. They become ingrained due to habit. The more frequently you resort to it, the more it takes on a life of its own.

PTSD? Totally. And I'd bet it wouldn't be the first time. Depression, yes, I think we've seen that in the comic. Not sure what you mean by MDD, though. It's an abbreviation used for a number of things. But if by MDD, you mean manic-depressive, that's an either/or thing with depression, and I don't think he's ever displayed anything resembling a manic episode.

As for schizophrenia, I wouldn't think so. On the other hand, he has demonstrated a certain amount of paranoia (Armor Wars), and he has experienced psychotic breaks before, even if they were always externally triggered--during The Crossing, and I think he inflicted one on himself due to alcohol abuse at one point. Extremis has also done weird things to his brain, so hard to say what that could result in.

You... basically typed out my entire explaination. Further proof of the hive-brain!

It was supposed to be MPD, but I hit the wrong button and didn't notice.

Dissociative in regards to Iron Man? Not any more than any other super hero, and definitely not as much as say the Sentinel or Batman when it comes to their persona. For instance, Batman and Bruce almost seem like two separate entities, Bruce compartmentalizes as to completely preserve his secret identity and there was no way he could live all day every day as either one without doing some serious damage to himself.

Tony tries to find redemption as Iron Man. Iron Man seems to be more like what Tony strives to achieve, he wants to be a hero, a good man. But as Tony stark he carries all the baggage of his past mistakes and just who he is.

I think the separate persona line of thought could be confusion from when Tony was actually trying to make the world and his fellow Avengers think that they were two different people. But if you notice, once they other Avengers find out, you lose that whole 'two different people' concept. But I see where you would think that.

Okay, I'll give you that Tony is nowhere near as cracked as Batman or Sentry. :) And I agree that as things stand, it's obviously a conscious categorization on his part and not a pathology. But I think he does imbue the division with more significance than most superheroes, and I could see how it could become problematic, for the purposes of a fic that's speculating on consequences of the psychological trauma he's endured over the years.

Oh! And there was the fairly recent story about the robots his dad had built, that were basically being controlled by his own subconscious thought-streams. The one where he ended up electrocuting himself to save Cap. I don't think it's the same thing, really, but taken together, I think there's definitely some logic to the idea.

Oh! And the fact that he actually, literally is a combination of multiple versions of himself, if you want to dip back into the canon. He has the memories of his original self (who sacrificed himself fighting Kang), the teenaged Tony from an alternate timeline, and a version of himself who existed for a while in a pocket universe and came about being Iron Man in a whole different way.

True, but Tony never displays any sort of symptomatology if there were a split in his personality. Even so, it's not the same as DID, it would come from external sources (something similar to head trauma), and not from psychological factors seeing as how he doesn't fit any of the other criteria. So it wouldn't be a diagnosis of the disorder, but of injury presenting with pathological symptoms.

Yeah, I can't disagree. I can see how I could get from here to there if I wanted to write a story where I was inflicting him with it, but I can't say that he suffers from DID now.

Self-harm, on the other hand? Oh yes! And some emotional detachment ("You stopped his heart!" "Why are you so upset? I started it again.").

Self harm is probably one of Tony's calling cards. And yes on the detachment. He can;t escape from his life / job / mistakes physically, so he must distance himself emotionally, or else risk being overwhelmed and lost in his own sea of misery and self pity / loathing.

But what he truly never understood was that if he HAD showed all of that internal hurt, Steve totally would have cuddled him better (hopefully in the nude); much to the delight of the fangirls.

I think that's the lesson we have to take away from this, yes. :)

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autumn-lily.livejournal.com - 2008-12-08 05:48 (UTC) - Expand

Could an external source be similar to trauma induced by Ultron/Extremis, or would a more extreme measure have to be taken?

No, I think the whole process of Extremis (how he received it under duress and without a whole lot of choice. As well as the line of thought that made him decide that was the ONLY way to get rid of the enemy) as well as the sudden onslaught of neural input would be alot for anyone, it's a constant day to day stress that would go a long way in wearing a person down with depression, anxiety, just generally being overwhelmed and disconnected from what's going on around his actual body in favor of all the action in his head.

Also, having an evil robot take over your brain and rewire your body into a chick when you have an obvious love of your penis the way most men do, bound to cause some residual gender confusion (or maybe not, Tony seems to be pretty stable with his sexuality and gender, if I remember a certain hot pink mid drift baring shirt thing correctly...)

Also, the number of times Tony has been mind controlled / had other versions of himself merged into himself / been brain hacked / ditched his body and was left as a sentient armor, just might cause him to develop that type of personality split.

But once you fix the 'injury' the split should also heal as well, though it may take a little time.

I suddenly have an idea of a fic with Tony + Multiple Personality Disorder, caused by repression (there are thousands of reasons for repression in him, after all) and splitting, and it all bursting on him and somehow turning around into a fluffy ending. Damn you. XD

...sshh, don't give it away!

Please don't forget to mention the guilt complex. :\ I know it's minor, but it's something he'd harp on. Guilt, I mean. He does, canonically, anyway, but no one mentions it....and if bringing up PTSD and depression (all canon too), then the guilt thing should get a mention

You can't write Tony without guilt! It's just not possible when angst is involved! ;P

mmm. he has lots and lots of guilt for lots of different things. I have a guilt complex and sometimes it gets crippling to the point where i can think of anything else. tony's stronger, yes, but he also has a shitload more guilt.

I cannot fault this logic. Honestly, Tony would be a straight ace bad ass if he didn't feel so guilty / hate himself so much he ends up screwing himself over trying to fix things that don't need fixing.

He'd be a villain. We already know that he feels the means justify the ends, but if he didn't have then angst and guilt? pretty sure he'd be as bad assed as anyone else out there and yeah.... ;;

But...can't you picture how hot Evil!Tony with Captured!Steve smexxings would be?
....but then again, maybe that's just a fantasy of MINE <.< >.>

mmm, yeaaaaah~ its a kink. *squirm and wiggle*

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Re: It goes like this...

jynx.livejournal.com - 2008-12-10 00:53 (UTC) - Expand

He went from a rich sheltered playboy with the world at his fingertip to a captive in a cave. Add Survivor's Guilt.

Parental issues, emotional neglect. Unstable childhood...did that guy have any childhood friends other than Tiberius Stone? Ty who went ebil, and if Ty and Tony's parents were friends, that's the circle they were raised in. The more industrialized version of the Hiltons. Hmmm...I wish I could remember the essay I read a while back on Paris Hilton that's actually kinda SAD. That lady is a wreck and her behaviour is that of the anti-role-model...but she is the product of her upbringing.

Crazy!Tony time.

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Please don't take it as mean!

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Also!

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Re: It goes like this...

I think it's PTSD