Hey y'all! A little bit ago, somebody gifted me Discord nitro (I'd never actually buy it otherwise, it's a waste of money imo), which was amazing! I created a discord server to upload emojis for myself to use, and I started using gimp to try and create some of my own. I ended up structuring it like an actual server, adding a variety of channels for different things, and structured it as a way to announce things I've created and make it a small community server for myself. I ended up inviting a bunch of people and now it's surprisingly relatively active, with a good mod team, roles set up, and bots n shit. I am very proud of it. I'm not a big fan of discord but as I have nitro I thought I'd use it, I boosted the server so it has high quality streams and calls, which me and my friends have been using the shit out of (we've called and streamed very often on there which has been very fun). Anyways I've decided to make it open to you guys as I feel like I have a decent following now and like to stay close with people, especially people I've just met and become friends with through newgrounds n stuff. Feel free to join 😄 https://discord.gg/JZfG4K9uvj

So. I uploaded my second audio post on newgrounds, in the form of another podcast-like segment. This one was a bit more personal, obviously, and was more me kind of explaining what life has been like lately for me. TLDL I have a kind of severe, not very well explained neurologic condition which makes life incredibly painful for me every waking moment. It's not very fun, and I honestly was feeling very hopeless and depressed about it, since the doctors have already done a whole bunch of tests and I have yet to get very many meaningful answers or diagnoses. What I am currently diagnosed with is functional neurologic disorder, which I believe to be a fairly large blanket term. It doesn't explain a whole lot, it's basically just saying that I have neurologic symptoms without a concrete organic cause or explanation. It used to be called conversion disorder, but that is a slightly outdated term, as the idea of thinking of it as "converting" mental trauma to neurologic and/or physical symptoms is a very outdated way of thinking about pain and trauma in general (better than hysteria, I guess). There is not a whole lot that the doctors currently understand about this disorder, and there is a lot of new research being done to try and understand it better. It's kind of frustrating, because all of the tests I have taken, such as blood tests, and an MRI, have came back saying that I am healthy. But the pain I feel is so unbearably excruciating that I know something is very wrong, I just don't know what it is. If you are curious to hear more about my personal opinion on the subject, I would highly recommend listening to my new podcast. Fair warning, I talk about a lotof really deep topics here, including suicide and suicidal thoughts, as well as very in depth descriptions of what I'm feeling. It's not very pleasant to say the least. Anyways, thanks for reading this. Peace, love yall 🧡

Yknow what? As a person who absolutely despises using twitter to this day, why don't I start microblogging on here? There's not a stupid character limit, no politically charged environment or audience, and I have a place to TRULY be myself, not scream into the void where nobody will hear me and I have to worry about harmful or deceptive data collection and social manipulation. (Yes, that is very much a problem with a lot of social media. Look at Tik Tok, fucking hell.) Newgrounds doesn't seem to be as driven by an algorithm or data collection as Youtube is, and I mean, cmon. Will it ever? It doesn't have a need for users' data besides advertising, which is slowly being fazed out due to supporters' donations. I plan to support newgrounds in the future, once I get a debit card or something, and once I continue creating on here and finding my audience and community. Anyways. Thank you for listening to me being loud and stupid, yet again. Peace

I've been thinking a lot about creating content for various platforms. Making video essays for Youtube, streaming on something like Twitch, creating content for other more creator-controlled platforms such as Odysee or Peertube, or posting video streams on my own website that I've been meaning to create. While my progressive ideals especially when it comes to free software make me want to stray away from a lot of more traditional platforms widely used by a lot of people.... Newgrounds is special. And it always has been. It's seen a really surge in activity after Friday Night Funkin got released, and started to come back in popularity. And that is the reason I've decided to stay here, for what I have wanted to make. I have a lot of ideas for things I want to do, and it seems like there is no limit here on Newgrounds as to what I can make. I want to make video essays talking about some of my thoughts on mental health, politics, and other silly things such as talking about music theory, game design, and talking about culture and my commentary on societal norms and psychology (one of my biggest interests). So, yeah! I'm Henry, I'm a high schooler who has recently struggled with a lot of things in life with my mental health, and been thinking way too much about life and what I want to start pursuing and thinking about as life goes on. I'm considering looking into going to school for psychology or something like that, so that I can share my ideas about how certain things such as functional neurological disorder (what I have), clinical depression and autism are stigmatized and misunderstood by society and the medical system at whole. I hope don't come across like I'm trying to act morally superior to anyone, or like anything I say has any meaning at all. I'm just throwing out my own ideas, and trying to speak up and say something that is meaningful, even if I'm just spouting nonsense. I like to think big when it comes to life, and I like to try and think about purpose and spending my life in worthwhile ways, and that seems to include sharing my voice, which I think I have started to find recently. Thank you for reading this, and I hope you have a good day :)