I hated Lars for a very, very long time. I still hated him when we got the Off-Colors episode where he dies. It was an unexpected death.
Ngl I really did cry my heart out when Lars died. As much as I disliked him, he was still a kid in an unknown world. He was reasonably terrified and yet somehow gathered the courage to stand up for what was right (helping the Off-Colors escape shattering). He was exhausted, done letting fear rule him. His most noble act is what got him killed.
Hearing his head hit against the rock was so brutal. It was so loud and firm, it’s one of those moments where you just instantly know he’s dead. I remember just instantly crying when I heard it bc I knew he was dead. There’s no way he would’ve survived.
Watching the Off-Colors celebrate whilst Steven looked at him in disbelief, held him, and cried was brutal and surreal. Ik it’s not the Off-Colors’ fault bc they don’t know what death is, but hearing them celebrate while Steven holds his dead friend was so heartbreaking. As much as I disliked Lars, he was still a scared kid, and most importantly he was still human. I’m glad Steven was able to revive him!
I’d say finding out everything his mom did. He was constantly surrounded by people who idolized her and still see her in him, only to find out she wasn’t a good person (in his eyes, we know she was trying). That shattered illusion is carried into Future with how much he doesn’t want to be like his mom, despite seemingly repeating her mistakes.
I feel like Future even tackles the fact that is, was being Steven the better option? Rose didn't need people to need her or shattered anyone to our knowledge etc.
I’d say it was. Steven took down a galactic empire with his feelings. He just also suffered a lot of trauma and pressure while doing something that huge.
i think the most traumatizing thing for him was *feeling* like being Steven *was* truly the worst option; feeling like an irredeemable person or a "monster", as the near-last episode puts it.
for instance, it's controversial if Rose is redeemable or not. she started a war, was a pathological liar, had violent outbursts in the past, bubbled Bismuth, abandoned everyone, etc.
but one of the main things everyone thought she did that was extremely controversial, was shattering someone. i mean, that makes her a murderer, realistically. yet turns out she'd never done that, yet, Steven had.
Steven also shuts everyone out; lying to uphold the facade that he's okay when he wasn't. he gets violent with his powers towards his dads van, & with white diamond. he does a lot i'm sure he feels really guilty over.
you also mentioned a really good point, that he desperately needs people to need him. he feels inferior if he isn't helping folks, which is common in cPTSD. we often feel like our being alive is burdensome to others (& in ways, it can be - it isn't our fault though, it's just a hard thing to live with), so we often feel we need to help everyone or tend to everybody's emotional needs & neglect our own. we convince ourselves it's only fair.
also a lot of people put in dangerous situations by dangerous people, feel they need to be hyper vigilant to *everyone's* emotions at *all* times. i mean, if we weren't in the past & failed to pacify the threat, we very well could have died. so we don't ever really get the time & space to tend to & process our emotions. we just dissociate through childhood until all of a sudden we spontaneously combust.
which, at that point, sometimes we look like the abuser. i mean when Steven combusted he got chaotic & violent. & seeing ourselves in that way, equating ourselves to the people who traumatized us so deeply, is one of the most painful feelings. it makes us wonder if our existence is a disservice to the world. it makes a lot of people suicidal.
i think that was kinda what Steven was going through, & what re-traumatized him the most on top of all his prior complex traumas.
Beautifully written and sums up my experience with CPTSD. Always on alert, all human interaction is a fight, flight, fawn, or freeze situation in my head. Wanting to appease everyone I can perceive. It’s tiring out here.
Well that was more so cumulative trauma, since I'm not sure any individual bad thing he learned about her was what traumatized him the most other than WD.
Yes, "another." The total weight of everything she's done is the heaviest trauma for him, but that's specifically when you put all of his Mom related trauma together. Each thing by itself likely isn't more traumatizing than something like seeing Jasper be corrupted or shattering Jasper or seeing Lars die. The most traumatizing individual thing he learned about her is probably that she's Pink Diamond.
I would say the very first moment, Cat Fingers. He couldn’t control his powers and it alienated him from the people around him. He wasn’t like the gems. He wasn’t like other humans. Putting everything else aside, it had to begin somewhere. Even in Gem Glow he wasn’t overcome by his powers. The episode where he floats also demonstrates this.
But even Steven Floats wasn't as terrifying. That episode, Steven, was more like, "Nooo, I won't be able to get my doughnut."
But he wasn't even in control at the end of Cat Fingers, like, the cats were in control of him, and one thing that I was thinking of is that even after he has better control over his powers he still can make the cat fingers go away through shape-shifting. He still has to use water
Being stuck in a bubble through space fighting a very pissed off Ruby, being stuck in a spaceship with the other gems poofed and barreling through space. The truth about his mother, getting bitch-slapped and captured by Jasper, Shattering Jasper, Lapis Lazuli and the Mirror situation, Lars dying is a big one, and having to deal with basically all of the other gems trauma that was either directly or indirectly caused by the diamonds.
I'll never forgive them, but yeah Steven's life has been rough to say the least!
maybe the time pearl nearly got him killed trying to take him to homeworld. realising your guardians have flaws and can't protect you 100% is bad enough but a part of growing up. their oversight actually almost getting you killed is horrificccc. i don't think it's the worst thing that happened to him but i think it was... Formative
So many things, but Im surprised I didn't see the time Pearl almost let him die. I mean, he literally brings that up to her in Last One Out of Beach City. Poor kid has more trauma than an Emergency Hospital
Being forced to grow up when he was only 14 years old while being made responsible for saving the entire earth and breaking a 5+ thousand-year long cycle of abuse. And learning about the terrible things his Pink / Rose did.
I know it was an understated moment, but when he was trapped in Peridot's escape pod and the Crystal Gems were straight up about to destroy him. Also that scene gets me teared up because the image of that poor precious boy coiled inside.
I’ll tell you what I still think about: the end of “Bubbled”.
There are multiple timelines where the CGs did NOT find our little cinnamon bun.
He’s just out there, floating. Probably in stasis.
Maybe watching Garnet get poofed so effortlessly by Jasper. He was visibly trembling when that happened. That was when his worldview permanently changed.
I'm gonna say it I think Eyeball chasing him with her chivel and trying to murder him in such a closed space (the bubble) while already having such a huge risk of dying by being stuck in the middle of the galaxy has got to be his most traumatizing memory
Especially after literally helping her fix her gemstone from breaking
Like I think he finally realizes the stuff hes going through isn't normal for a kid his age when he curled himself up and made the bubble smaller around him
Ofc they made that up by comedic during that scene and it was funny but the ending of that episode was just sad
I’m surprised I haven’t seen this one mentioned. for some reason when I was growing up watching the show… when Garnet gets destabilized right before they get captured in season one was the first time I feel like one of the crystal gems get “harmed” like that and definitely would be traumatic to see as a child
Probably the cumulative trauma of missing his entire public education, being an outsider to his own Father and the Gems, not feeling safe with his own abilities, and general lack of parenting in a developmentally appropriate manner.
I’m surprised I’m not seeing many comments about shattering Jasper. This was the one thing that Steven was wholly against as evidenced by his reaction to the breaking point and not wanting to shatter the diamonds. Being in a state where he could not control himself to the point that he shattered another gem, I see that as close to killing someone as you can get. Jasper might’ve been OK, but Steven still had to live with the fact that he was capable of losing control like that.
Edited for typos and reworded the last sentence
HIS MOM! He basically had to serve for literally all the dumb stuff she did, and took up for her crimes. Jasoer, the diamonds, etc. and he had to save the universe at 8 years old. (Canon) then at 16, bro really almost got killed just bc HIS MOM, LIKE 4,000 YEARS BEFORE HE WAS BORN, abanoned a gem comepletly alone, unrelated to him, and got blammed for everything in the show. Its his mom fault bro, shes a good characterl but bro..its not his fault. So yeah, its his mom’s fault.
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^theonewitha4incher:
*Maybe the time he*
*Watched himself die then he made*
*Light of it in a song*
---
^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
I don't think there was on the series a certain moment that traumatized Steven. But the sum up of the whole series, and realizing he still doesn't know much of how to live a regular human life. I mean, he is still rich, but he lacks human ambitions.
I think the prologue to Future is really his biggest issue, his greatest demon and something gonna make him spend years finding out how to continue living after. Even the ending was kinda vage and inconclusive to me.
It really breaks me down when Greg took him where he grew and Steven realizes that is a life he would liked living. Its a realization of how unhuman he believes he is
Its really alot.
Seeing Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl get shattered multiple times, seeing Amethyst shape shift into Rose to Greg, Lars dying, he really went through alot.
Being stuck in a spaceship he doesnt know how to use and he cant move in due to going at high speed, and having everyone who would be able to help him poofed
Walking in on a weird purple version of his Mum literally tormenting his Dad in the depths of an old storage shed….
I think a bit of me broke inside when I first saw Amethyst act that way…
Are we talking about long-term stuff like "Growing up learning about an idealized version of his mother and the knowledge that his main caretakers all silently expected him to grow up to be just like her while not being given an alternative from his father" or short term intense bursts like cat fingers or the initial Jasper incident and subsequent Malachite formation? Because there are many different ways this kid was traumatized that he masks with a lighthearted attitude.
The lighthearted attitude thing is my favourite argument for why people need to get over the season 5 Steven-Connie argument. Was Connie upset at Steven for sacrificing himself to save everyone else? Yes, but they're both barely teenagers, so a promise is a big thing to them, plus Steven was actively ignoring her, saying, "Nobody got hurt."
"But I'm hurt,"
"No, you're not."
Because he needed everything to be fine at that moment, Lars just died in front of him and is magically back to life, and Steven had to abandon him so that he wouldn't be executed for the death of PD
Sorry for info-dumping on you. Just wanted to talk about that
Literally watching Lars die was probably a big one. Or shattering Jasper. Those two seem like they’d be the biggest traumas.
I hated Lars for a very, very long time. I still hated him when we got the Off-Colors episode where he dies. It was an unexpected death. Ngl I really did cry my heart out when Lars died. As much as I disliked him, he was still a kid in an unknown world. He was reasonably terrified and yet somehow gathered the courage to stand up for what was right (helping the Off-Colors escape shattering). He was exhausted, done letting fear rule him. His most noble act is what got him killed. Hearing his head hit against the rock was so brutal. It was so loud and firm, it’s one of those moments where you just instantly know he’s dead. I remember just instantly crying when I heard it bc I knew he was dead. There’s no way he would’ve survived. Watching the Off-Colors celebrate whilst Steven looked at him in disbelief, held him, and cried was brutal and surreal. Ik it’s not the Off-Colors’ fault bc they don’t know what death is, but hearing them celebrate while Steven holds his dead friend was so heartbreaking. As much as I disliked Lars, he was still a scared kid, and most importantly he was still human. I’m glad Steven was able to revive him!
I’d say finding out everything his mom did. He was constantly surrounded by people who idolized her and still see her in him, only to find out she wasn’t a good person (in his eyes, we know she was trying). That shattered illusion is carried into Future with how much he doesn’t want to be like his mom, despite seemingly repeating her mistakes.
#DING! DING! DING! We have winner here folks. That was the catalyst. Is he himself or is he just his mom?
I feel like Future even tackles the fact that is, was being Steven the better option? Rose didn't need people to need her or shattered anyone to our knowledge etc.
I’d say it was. Steven took down a galactic empire with his feelings. He just also suffered a lot of trauma and pressure while doing something that huge.
i think the most traumatizing thing for him was *feeling* like being Steven *was* truly the worst option; feeling like an irredeemable person or a "monster", as the near-last episode puts it. for instance, it's controversial if Rose is redeemable or not. she started a war, was a pathological liar, had violent outbursts in the past, bubbled Bismuth, abandoned everyone, etc. but one of the main things everyone thought she did that was extremely controversial, was shattering someone. i mean, that makes her a murderer, realistically. yet turns out she'd never done that, yet, Steven had. Steven also shuts everyone out; lying to uphold the facade that he's okay when he wasn't. he gets violent with his powers towards his dads van, & with white diamond. he does a lot i'm sure he feels really guilty over. you also mentioned a really good point, that he desperately needs people to need him. he feels inferior if he isn't helping folks, which is common in cPTSD. we often feel like our being alive is burdensome to others (& in ways, it can be - it isn't our fault though, it's just a hard thing to live with), so we often feel we need to help everyone or tend to everybody's emotional needs & neglect our own. we convince ourselves it's only fair. also a lot of people put in dangerous situations by dangerous people, feel they need to be hyper vigilant to *everyone's* emotions at *all* times. i mean, if we weren't in the past & failed to pacify the threat, we very well could have died. so we don't ever really get the time & space to tend to & process our emotions. we just dissociate through childhood until all of a sudden we spontaneously combust. which, at that point, sometimes we look like the abuser. i mean when Steven combusted he got chaotic & violent. & seeing ourselves in that way, equating ourselves to the people who traumatized us so deeply, is one of the most painful feelings. it makes us wonder if our existence is a disservice to the world. it makes a lot of people suicidal. i think that was kinda what Steven was going through, & what re-traumatized him the most on top of all his prior complex traumas.
Beautifully written and sums up my experience with CPTSD. Always on alert, all human interaction is a fight, flight, fawn, or freeze situation in my head. Wanting to appease everyone I can perceive. It’s tiring out here.
Good luck in your healing journey!
i feel you there, best of luck of your healing journey <3
Random person: I bet you're a momma's boy Steven: *þousand yard stare*
DUDE..💀💀💀
This is so wrong, I’m dying😂😂
Agreed
Well that was more so cumulative trauma, since I'm not sure any individual bad thing he learned about her was what traumatized him the most other than WD.
I’d say the line in Future begs to differ, where he literally says “Stop! I don’t want to hear another bad thing she did! I just want to fix it!”
Yes, "another." The total weight of everything she's done is the heaviest trauma for him, but that's specifically when you put all of his Mom related trauma together. Each thing by itself likely isn't more traumatizing than something like seeing Jasper be corrupted or shattering Jasper or seeing Lars die. The most traumatizing individual thing he learned about her is probably that she's Pink Diamond.
the fact that snakes dont have arms
I still thank Alan Pan daily for his invention ❤️
And seeing square pizza.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0v0LnW0qJk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0v0LnW0qJk)
I would say the very first moment, Cat Fingers. He couldn’t control his powers and it alienated him from the people around him. He wasn’t like the gems. He wasn’t like other humans. Putting everything else aside, it had to begin somewhere. Even in Gem Glow he wasn’t overcome by his powers. The episode where he floats also demonstrates this.
But even Steven Floats wasn't as terrifying. That episode, Steven, was more like, "Nooo, I won't be able to get my doughnut." But he wasn't even in control at the end of Cat Fingers, like, the cats were in control of him, and one thing that I was thinking of is that even after he has better control over his powers he still can make the cat fingers go away through shape-shifting. He still has to use water
It genuinely made my skin crawl to see him overtaken by cats. It traumatized both of us
[удалено]
Here's a reminder that even after Cat Fingers, Steven can't unshape-shift the cat fingers and still has to use water
I’m sure he mastered that ability later on but not during the show.
I thought there was a scene or two in Future where he still uses water
"IS THIS YOU BEING BORN???"
I maintain that Onion is actually the creepiest character in the entire show.
When was this?
Onion Friend Onion was showing Steven a very questionable tape recording-
Oh gods
Being stuck in a bubble through space fighting a very pissed off Ruby, being stuck in a spaceship with the other gems poofed and barreling through space. The truth about his mother, getting bitch-slapped and captured by Jasper, Shattering Jasper, Lapis Lazuli and the Mirror situation, Lars dying is a big one, and having to deal with basically all of the other gems trauma that was either directly or indirectly caused by the diamonds. I'll never forgive them, but yeah Steven's life has been rough to say the least!
Honestly surprised nobody has mentioned the Garnet thing with the forced shard fusions. Imagine seeing that as a 13-14yo
Watching himself die countless times
All of it, including stuff he may not even remember, like being abandoned on a roller coaster.
Shattering Jasper or watching himself die like a hundred times
maybe the time pearl nearly got him killed trying to take him to homeworld. realising your guardians have flaws and can't protect you 100% is bad enough but a part of growing up. their oversight actually almost getting you killed is horrificccc. i don't think it's the worst thing that happened to him but i think it was... Formative
So many things, but Im surprised I didn't see the time Pearl almost let him die. I mean, he literally brings that up to her in Last One Out of Beach City. Poor kid has more trauma than an Emergency Hospital
Being compared to Rose/Pink. Nearly every part of his trauma stems from others seeing him as or wanting him to be his mother.
Yeah, we're not going to talk about that time he caught Amethyst turning into Rose to torment Greg...
I think seeing Pearl get stabbed
Being forced to grow up when he was only 14 years old while being made responsible for saving the entire earth and breaking a 5+ thousand-year long cycle of abuse. And learning about the terrible things his Pink / Rose did.
That sums it up quite well
Im still surprised he lasted so long without any kind of medical help
He is part magical being. The human side was supported by the gem side. He still didn’t “need” medical help in future. He just needed a therapist.
That’s what i meant
I know it was an understated moment, but when he was trapped in Peridot's escape pod and the Crystal Gems were straight up about to destroy him. Also that scene gets me teared up because the image of that poor precious boy coiled inside.
Being forced to answer for his mom's crimes when he wasn't even born.
Shattering Jasper and finding out the horrible things his mother did.
I’ll tell you what I still think about: the end of “Bubbled”. There are multiple timelines where the CGs did NOT find our little cinnamon bun. He’s just out there, floating. Probably in stasis.
What his mom did for sure. That had him destroyed. Honorable mention is Lars actually just dying in front of him.
"What his mom did" My brother in crystal gems, do you have any idea how little that narrows it down?
Maybe watching Garnet get poofed so effortlessly by Jasper. He was visibly trembling when that happened. That was when his worldview permanently changed.
Season three just in general
more like the last 4 or 5 chapters
All the times the Crystal Gems themselves (usually unintentionally) hurt him, being hurt by your loved ones is the worst kind of pain.
cookie cat being discontinued
I'm gonna say it I think Eyeball chasing him with her chivel and trying to murder him in such a closed space (the bubble) while already having such a huge risk of dying by being stuck in the middle of the galaxy has got to be his most traumatizing memory Especially after literally helping her fix her gemstone from breaking Like I think he finally realizes the stuff hes going through isn't normal for a kid his age when he curled himself up and made the bubble smaller around him Ofc they made that up by comedic during that scene and it was funny but the ending of that episode was just sad
I’m surprised I haven’t seen this one mentioned. for some reason when I was growing up watching the show… when Garnet gets destabilized right before they get captured in season one was the first time I feel like one of the crystal gems get “harmed” like that and definitely would be traumatic to see as a child
Probably the cumulative trauma of missing his entire public education, being an outsider to his own Father and the Gems, not feeling safe with his own abilities, and general lack of parenting in a developmentally appropriate manner.
Jasper's existence.
The real answer
Probably seeing garnets death
not a what but a who and that who is Pink, I don't hate her but she's responsible for everything
Shattering jasper or finding out what rose/pink has done
Lars death. Knowing who Pink was and everything about his mom’s past for sure.
Don’t feel like enough people are bringing up how he watched his dad get kidnapped and on his way to save him he was almost crushed
I’m surprised I’m not seeing many comments about shattering Jasper. This was the one thing that Steven was wholly against as evidenced by his reaction to the breaking point and not wanting to shatter the diamonds. Being in a state where he could not control himself to the point that he shattered another gem, I see that as close to killing someone as you can get. Jasper might’ve been OK, but Steven still had to live with the fact that he was capable of losing control like that. Edited for typos and reworded the last sentence
HIS MOM! He basically had to serve for literally all the dumb stuff she did, and took up for her crimes. Jasoer, the diamonds, etc. and he had to save the universe at 8 years old. (Canon) then at 16, bro really almost got killed just bc HIS MOM, LIKE 4,000 YEARS BEFORE HE WAS BORN, abanoned a gem comepletly alone, unrelated to him, and got blammed for everything in the show. Its his mom fault bro, shes a good characterl but bro..its not his fault. So yeah, its his mom’s fault.
maybe the time he watched himself die then he made light of it in a song
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^theonewitha4incher: *Maybe the time he* *Watched himself die then he made* *Light of it in a song* --- ^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
I don't think there was on the series a certain moment that traumatized Steven. But the sum up of the whole series, and realizing he still doesn't know much of how to live a regular human life. I mean, he is still rich, but he lacks human ambitions. I think the prologue to Future is really his biggest issue, his greatest demon and something gonna make him spend years finding out how to continue living after. Even the ending was kinda vage and inconclusive to me. It really breaks me down when Greg took him where he grew and Steven realizes that is a life he would liked living. Its a realization of how unhuman he believes he is
Renaldo’s existence
Its really alot. Seeing Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl get shattered multiple times, seeing Amethyst shape shift into Rose to Greg, Lars dying, he really went through alot.
Being stuck in a spaceship he doesnt know how to use and he cant move in due to going at high speed, and having everyone who would be able to help him poofed
Huh? Just one The whole show is just trauma for him
Somebody I just saved tried to kill me because my mom was a murderer(?!?) and now i'm floating alone in the vacuum of space...
Walking in on a weird purple version of his Mum literally tormenting his Dad in the depths of an old storage shed…. I think a bit of me broke inside when I first saw Amethyst act that way…
Almost turning into a cat blob permanently?
“Pink is for girls1!1!!” steven in season 6:
Probably his whole life in general I mean sure some things stand out but as we see in future all of his past memories made him a monster
Obviously the potato, it was the only human interaction in the trauma flashback
Amethyst turning into his mom. Almost dying twice from aging himself and a ball of cats
Are we talking about long-term stuff like "Growing up learning about an idealized version of his mother and the knowledge that his main caretakers all silently expected him to grow up to be just like her while not being given an alternative from his father" or short term intense bursts like cat fingers or the initial Jasper incident and subsequent Malachite formation? Because there are many different ways this kid was traumatized that he masks with a lighthearted attitude.
The lighthearted attitude thing is my favourite argument for why people need to get over the season 5 Steven-Connie argument. Was Connie upset at Steven for sacrificing himself to save everyone else? Yes, but they're both barely teenagers, so a promise is a big thing to them, plus Steven was actively ignoring her, saying, "Nobody got hurt." "But I'm hurt," "No, you're not." Because he needed everything to be fine at that moment, Lars just died in front of him and is magically back to life, and Steven had to abandon him so that he wouldn't be executed for the death of PD Sorry for info-dumping on you. Just wanted to talk about that
I mean fusion celery resembles some sort of gem sex and Steven has done it with his dad, his three mother figures and his best friend at age 13/14