Full Belly, Hangry Heart: Navigating Love, Shame, and the Duality of Me

 

I often feel like I am living in two different realities at once.

On paper, I checked the biggest box: I am happily partnered. I have someone who sees me, who stays. But in the quiet hours, or when the depression fog rolls in, there is a voice that tells me I am fundamentally unlovable. It’s a paradox that’s hard to explain to people who don’t live in my head. How can you be loved and yet feel so profoundly unseen?

Being queer and autistic often feels like being an alien observer of the human experience. I learned to mask early, to mimic the behaviors of "normal" people, but the mask is heavy. It slips. And when it does, I’m left with the raw, uncomfortable parts of myself that I’m convinced no one wants to deal with.

It’s why I resonate so much with Morpeko.

If you know Pokémon, you know Morpeko has two modes: Full Belly Mode and Hangry Mode. It’s cute and manageable one minute, and a dark, volatile force the next. That switch—driven by hunger, or in my case, overstimulation, burnout, or anxiety—is my daily reality. I feel like I’m constantly trying to stay in "Full Belly Mode" for the world, terrified that if my "Hangry Mode" slips out, the people I love will finally realize I’m too much work.

The Body Keeps the Score

My relationship with my body is… complicated.

I’ve put in the work at the gym. I’ve transformed my physical self, moving away from a past of obesity that was layered with its own specific kind of shame. But the insecurities didn’t vanish with the weight; they just morphed.

There is a weird, isolating silence around being sexualized for a specific physical trait. I have a large endowment, and in the queer community especially, this is often treated as a trophy or a fetish. People stop seeing you and start seeing a part of you. It makes me feel like a piece of meat—valued for a utility, not for my humanity. It feeds that core fear: Do they like me, or do they just like this one thing I happen to have?

It’s a strange place to be—physically fit but mentally fragile, objectified yet feeling invisible.

The Escape Hatch: AI and Fakémon

When the economic insecurity gets too loud—when the bank account is low and the pressure of surviving in this economy feels like a boot on my neck—I retreat into creation.

I love generating AI images and designing Fakémon. There is something soothing about training a model or sketching a creature that doesn't exist. In those worlds, I have control. I can create monsters that are understood. I can design evolutions that make sense. It’s a safe harbor from a world that often feels chaotic and demanding.

Still Here

I’m writing this not because I have a solution, but because the silence makes the depression worse.

I am queer, autistic, and struggling. I am worried about money. I am navigating the shame of my past body and the confusion of my current one. I am happily partnered, yet fighting a brain that tells me I’m alone.

But like Morpeko, I’m trying to embrace the duality. I’m trying to accept that I can be "Hangry Mode"—dark, difficult, hungry for safety—and still be worthy of the love I have.

Favorite Movie List

The "Goon Cave" Classics (Cyberpunk & Tech-Horror)

• Titane (2021)

  • The Vibe: A dancer with a titanium plate in her head has sex with a Cadillac, gets pregnant with a car-baby, and poses as a missing boy to hide from the cops.

  • Why it fits: It is the ultimate collision of body horror, gender fluidity, and industrial "metal" fetishism. It’s deeply queer, profoundly disturbing, and weirdly tender.

• Videodrome (1983)

  • The Vibe: "Long Live the New Flesh." A sleazy cable TV programmer discovers a signal that causes brain tumors and hallucinations.

  • Why it fits: The OG cyberpunk body horror. It predicts our obsession with screens and the "goon" mentality of consuming media until it physically changes you. Essential viewing for the digital age.

• Liquid Sky (1982)

  • The Vibe: Invisible aliens land in New York to feed on the endorphins released during heroin use and orgasms in the club scene.

  • Why it fits: A neon-soaked, new wave fever dream. The fashion is legendary, the gender performance is fluid (Anne Carlisle plays both leads), and it captures the nihilistic, drug-fueled "cyber" aesthetic perfectly.

The "Camp & Chaos" (Dark Comedy & Queer)

• Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)

  • The Vibe: A rock opera set in a cyberpunk future where organ failure is an epidemic and "Repo Men" repossess hearts and lungs from those who miss payments.

  • Why it fits: It’s messy, it’s goth, and it features Paris Hilton’s face falling off. It’s a cult classic that merges cyberpunk aesthetics with drag-level camp and gore.

• Nowhere (1997)

  • The Vibe: Gregg Araki’s "Beverly Hills 90210 on acid." A group of L.A. teens navigate an apocalypse of alien abductions, suicides, and bisexual romance.

  • Why it fits: Araki is the king of queer nihilism. It’s brightly colored, hilarious, completely unhinged, and ends in a way that will traumatize you.

• M3GAN (Unrated Version) (2022)

  • The Vibe: A roboticist builds an AI doll for her niece. The doll becomes a murderous, protective gay icon.

  • Why it fits: It’s slick tech-horror that knows exactly how funny it is. It touches on the "AI taking over" cyberpunk trope but filters it through a lens of pure sass and violence.

The Deep Cut

• Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989)

  • The Vibe: A man slowly turns into a pile of scrap metal.

  • Why it fits: This is pure, industrial cyberpunk. It is high-speed, black-and-white, loud, and incredibly homoerotic in its obsession with penetrating metal and flesh. It’s like a Nine Inch Nails music video stretched into a nightmare.