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“You have your lunch?” Seungmin’s mother asked, as she pulled into the parking garage underneath the JYP building.
“Yes, eomma,” Seungmin replied, smiling and patting his backpack where he had tucked the food she’d prepared and several snacks to eat throughout the day if he got hungry. While everything in his bag was considered a “safe” food, Seungmin knew that he would likely struggle with finishing everything before his mother picked him up again in the afternoon. Despite the fact that his diagnosis had nothing to do with wanting to lose weight, ARFID was still an eating disorder and Seungmin couldn’t force himself to rush through his recovery. He’d spent too long eating next to nothing, and it was taking much longer than he’d hoped for his body to get used to eating again.
Seungmin had been out for almost two months, and he was still sleeping at his parents’ apartment instead of the dorms. While he had been back and forth to the company building most days, given the fact that he needed the structure and order for his days, Seungmin was still on pretty strict restrictions in terms of what he was and wasn’t allowed to do while he was there. While he was finally being allowed to start working a little again - Seungmin had managed to gain back a few kilograms, and the team that had been treating him had decided that it would be good for him to start easing back into everything with some vocal lessons and preparing to record for the group’s next comeback.
“Okay… just do your best today, okay?” his mother replied. “Eat whatever you can, and take breaks if you need them. Don’t push yourself too hard.”
Seungmin nodded slowly, taking a deep breath as he started to get out of the car. “I love you, eomma,” he began.
“I love you, too, baby… have a good day.”
Seungmin took a deep breath as he made his way to the elevator, trying to calm down the nerves that were building up. It was his first official schedule in two months, and Seungmin was nervous about starting to go back to the stress and pressure of Idol life.
“Hey… how are you feeling, Seungmin-ah?” Seungmin looked up as he heard the familiar sound of his manager Sunghyun’s voice walking up to the elevator.
“Nervous,” Seungmin admitted, looking down at his shoes instead of up at the older man. His relationship with their managers had grown a little strained over the past couple of months, mostly because the men didn’t quite understand how to handle this new situation - Seungmin just wanted things to be the same as they’d always been, because most of the time things had been fine. The issue was that everyone outside of his family and his group members didn’t quite understand that he wasn’t suddenly a different person just because he now had an autism diagnosis. “I don’t… I don’t want things to be different…”
There was a brief moment of silence as they entered the elevator, Seungmin watching as Sunghyun hit the button for the floor they both needed before the older man spoke. “Seungmin-ah… we’re only changing things because we want to do what’s best for you…” the man began, as the elevator began to move.
“I know,” Seungmin replied. “I just… my brain needs things to stay the same as much as possible. I need the routine, and the predictability of everything…”
The manager hummed softly, before he spoke again. “We still have to make some changes, because you aren’t cleared to go back to a normal work schedule…”
“I know,” Seungmin replied, nodding but still not looking up at the older man. “But I… I want to go back to normal. I feel like everyone in Div1 is treating me like I’m made of glass lately, but I’m not a different person than I was three months ago. I’ve always been… having a name for what’s going on in my head doesn’t change me, you know?” Seungmin could feel his anxiety levels starting to rise even further; he hadn’t prepared himself for having this conversation with the managers this soon, and he really didn’t like the way that it made him feel.
“I get that, Seungmin-ah… but if we can make changes that would help you…” Sunghyun began.
“But no one is asking me what changes would help me… everyone just wants to tell me what they’re going to do. But I’m an adult, and I’m capable of speaking for myself…” Seungmin interrupted. He knew that it was kind of rude, but now that he’d started he really didn’t think he would be able to stop until he finished saying what was on his mind. “I don’t need to be held out of future schedules… I just need to know what’s going on, the same as I always have. And permission to take breaks when things get overwhelming. I need to be able to figure this thing out for myself, because it isn’t helpful if you’re just making a bunch of accommodations that I don’t need and ignoring what I actually do need…”
Seungmin took a deep breath, burying his face in his hands. “Fuck, I’m sorry… I just feel like everything is so out of control and there’s nothing I can do about any of it, and I just need to be able to control something…” he added, sighing. Seungmin hated the itchy, uncomfortable feeling that followed his outburst, knowing that there was a good chance that his little outburst would not go over well. While Sunghyun was probably the most likely to listen and actually hear him, he knew that some of the other staff in Div1 would be less understanding if they had been in the elevator with him at that moment.
“No… you don’t have to apologize for telling us what you need, Seungmin-ah,” Sunghyun commented. Seungmin felt the man gently placing a hand on his shoulder. “You’re right, we should be asking for your input and giving you a chance to participate in the plans that we’re making for your future. No one understands how your brain works and what you need better than you do… and that’s good information for us to consider when we’re figuring out what to do to accommodate you moving forward…”
Seungmin wanted to respond, but all he could do in that moment was nod and try to take deep breaths to calm himself down. The idea of trying to actually talk was too overwhelming in that moment, especially as they finally reached the right floor in the building. Sunghyun seemed to sense that something was off, as the manager squeezed his shoulder gently. “Come on… let’s go to 3RACHA’s studio to check in with Chan-ah before time for your lessons to start. He’s got a rough plan for today’s schedule, and we can alter it if we need to depending on how you’re feeling.”
The manager guided Seungmin to walk ahead of him towards the studio, which thankfully wasn’t that far down the hall. Seungmin was already starting to shut down, and he knew that he was going to need some time to just rest and calm himself down after the frustrated outburst he’d had in the elevator.
“Hey… Seungmin-ah, are you okay?” Seungmin didn’t look up at Changbin’s greeting or his question, moving to sit on the couch and pulling his knees up to his chest. “Right… hyung, did something happen?”
“We had a chat in the elevator about accommodations and stuff… and I need to go talk to the rest of the managers, because Seungmin-ah made some really good points about the fact that we haven’t been talking to him about what accommodations he needs,” Sunghyun replied. “I think it may have been a little too much for him…”
“We’ve got this,” Chan’s voice commented. “I’ll let you know what we need to do about the schedule for the rest of the day, once Minnie and I have discussed what we were thinking and how he’s feeling.” Seungmin felt someone moving to sit next to him, handing him a pillow to hold onto as he began to gently rock back and forth on the couch.
Seungmin wasn’t sure how long he was allowed to just sit there clutching onto the pillow, not looking at anyone or making any attempts at communicating with anyone else in the room. He felt a little guilty, knowing that there had been a schedule for the day and that nothing was happening the way it was supposed to. But Seungmin couldn’t get himself to actually say anything to Chan or Changbin, or even to acknowledge the fact that they were in the room with him. Even when Jisung came in, Seungmin wasn’t able to get himself to do anything other than wince as the youngest 3RACHA member got a little too loud for his current situation.
Eventually, Chan finally moved to sit next to Seungmin and gently put a hand on his knee. “Hey, Minnie… I really need you to drink some water for me, okay?” Chan suggested, moving to hand Seungmin an opened bottle of water. Seungmin glanced at the bottle for a brief moment, before he reached out slowly and took the bottle to take a sip. The moment the water touched his lips, Seungmin realized that he had let himself get dehydrated while he was sitting there stuck inside his own head. Seungmin couldn’t help taking several rather large gulps of water from the bottle, until Chan gently pried it away from him. “Hey, hey… not too fast. I don’t want you to make yourself sick.”
“S-sorry,” Seungmin forced out, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes again.
“It’s okay… I’m sure you’re thirsty,” Chan reassured. “Just take it a bit more slowly, okay? You definitely need some water, but I don’t want you to get sick.”
Seungmin nodded slowly, taking a few smaller sips before he tried to say anything else. “I’ve probably ruined the schedule…” he began.
“You haven’t… everyone knew that it was tentative,” Chan replied, squeezing Seungmin’s knee gently. “We can still do everything we had planned today, if you’re feeling up to it. Or we can cut back on some things, or even just cancel it all if you’re having too rough of a day. It’s up to you.”
“I want to do it…” Seungmin began.
“Okay… I think we should start with recording prep, just because it’ll be easier for us to accommodate whatever you need right now here in our studio,” Chan suggested, moving to grab a set of headphones for Seungmin. “I’ll play the demo for you, and then we can work on your part together…”
Seungmin nodded, taking a deep breath and reaching out for the headphones as his stomach made an ominous growling noise. The last thing he had the energy for at the moment was trying to eat, but it seemed as though his body was suddenly deciding to make all of its needs known at the same time. “S-sorry…” he muttered.
“It’s fine… we have some snacks, if you want to raid our stash instead of eating what you brought,” Jisung began, moving to pull open a drawer that Seungmin knew usually held a pretty wide variety of snacks and drinks. “We added some stuff we knew that you would eat, or one of us can run get something…”
Seungmin shook his head slowly, reaching for his bag to grab out some of the snacks his mother had helped him pack that morning. “No… it’s okay,” he replied. “I have snacks…”
“You can eat whatever you feel like, okay?” Chan reminded him. “The drawer is for everyone… we have pretty much everyone’s favorite snacks in there, and it isn’t a big deal for us to change what’s in there if something doesn’t work. You shouldn’t have to always be responsible for everything.”
“But… it’s my problem…” Seungmin began.
“We’re your friends, Minnie… we want to help you,” Changbin commented softly. “Trying to do it all on your own is a lot… if there’s something we can do to help, then we want to do that.”
“We make accommodations for each other all the time,” Jisung added. “You’ve all done everything you can to make life easier for me with my anxiety - making sure I’m never alone, reminding me of my coping strategies when things get bad, just getting me out of places when I’m not feeling great… it’s not any different for us to do things that will help you, like keeping safe snacks around. And we’ve been doing a lot of this stuff for years, without knowing why we were doing it… it just feels weird now because we know why we’re doing these things…”
Even though he understood what Jisung was saying, Seungmin couldn’t help feeling overwhelmed by everything; he didn’t want to be the reason they were making accommodations constantly, he just wanted to be Seungmin. He’d been fine for years before his diagnosis, before he knew that he was autistic. Seungmin really didn’t know why he couldn’t just keep going the same way he always had, or why he needed to be accommodated now just because they were aware of the fact that he was autistic.
“Hey… hey, Minnie, don’t hurt yourself…” Chan’s voice commented softly. It wasn’t until he felt the leader gently grabbing his wrists and trying to move his hands that Seungmin realized he was pulling at his own hair. Seungmin let his fingers relax as Chan guided his hands down towards his lap, unsure of where the water bottle had gone. “It’s okay… you’re okay. Let’s just get you some more water and something in your stomach, and then we can figure out what you’re ready to do, okay?”
***
“Do you want to try?” Seungmin felt Changbin squeezing him gently as the older man asked the question. Seungmin had been sitting on the couch with the rapper for a while, just listening to the demo tracks that 3RACHA had prepared for them to work on that day. “You can even choose what you want to try, if you’re feeling up to it. No pressure.”
“Could we… maybe the first one?” Seungmin suggested, looking up at the computer screen as Chan moved to click on one of the tracks again. “No… that wasn’t it… it was one more to the right…”
Seungmin watched as Chan leaned in to check the icon more closely, shaking his head. “You’re right… yeah, let’s try this one first, and see how we go,” Chan commented, loading up the track that Seungmin had referenced for him. It was slow going; the software they used always seemed to take forever to load everything in, no matter how up to date the company kept their computers and other equipment. Finally, the program loaded and Chan was able to set up the track to the point he wanted Seungmin to work on. “This is the part I was thinking for you…”
Seungmin closed his eyes as he listened to the section again, focusing on the vocal line he was going to have to recreate once they got started. It wasn’t easy, but that was to be expected with anything 3RACHA wrote for their group at this point - the trio enjoyed showing off the talent they had within the group, and Seungmin was usually up for whatever challenge they could throw at him. The fact that Chan wasn’t pushing him towards something easier first was comforting, because it was normal. They usually focused on the more challenging lines first, at least for Seungmin, and then moved on to the things that he would be able to knock out in just one or two runs.
“Right… are you ready to try it?” Chan asked, after playing the section one more time as Seungmin hummed along with his line.
“Yeah… yeah, let’s do this,” Seungmin replied, taking a deep breath and getting himself up to move into one of the rolling chairs by the microphone that was usually kept set up all the time for their group to use.
The first run went better than Seungmin had expected, until he had a pretty large jump up to one of the highest notes in that section and missed it by almost half a step. It was off enough that the note was uncomfortable to Seungmin’s ears, and he couldn’t help stopping and wrinkling his nose at the uncomfortable feeling that spread through his whole body.
“It’s okay,” Chan commented, as the elder stopped the track when it was clear that Seungmin wasn’t going to jump right back in. “That was actually really good for a first try… there were a few other things I was thinking you might have a hard time with that you got perfectly. Let’s just practice that jump a couple of times, and then we can try again, okay?”
Seungmin nodded, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes to focus on the notes as Chan played them for him a few times before he started trying to copy the notes first before he switched to the words for the actual song. They went over everything at least half a dozen times, before Chan finally stopped playing and let Seungmin just go over it on his own a few times. “Okay… I think I’m ready…” Seungmin began.
Seungmin lost track of how long they were working, repeating each section until they had two or three good takes of each of them before moving on to the next section that they wanted Seungmin’s vocals on. It wasn’t until Chan turned off the track in the middle of a section despite the fact that Seungmin hadn’t made any mistakes. “Huh?” Seungmin asked, confused as he looked over at the producers.
“Your voice needs a rest,” Chan commented, shaking his head. “You’ve been singing non-stop for a while, and we’re starting to hear that your voice is tired. Sung-ah went to grab you some tea, and you should probably take a break to eat something, too… it’s past the time you normally have a snack when you’re here with us in the mornings…”
Seungmin glanced at his watch. “It’s almost eleven…” he began. “It’ll be lunchtime soon…”
“Are you hungry?” Changbin asked. Seungmin shrugged, not really sure of what the answer was. One of the things he had been working on was trying to recognize the signs that he was hungry before it reached the point that his stomach was hurting - it had been a shock to him to learn that other people actually felt hungry before it got to that point, and that he wasn’t actually supposed to feel that way to know he needed to eat. “Maybe just try something small, to see if that helps you figure it out? Meal times don’t really matter - you should eat when you’re hungry, no matter what time of day it is.”
It wasn’t a new thought; Seungmin’s therapist and his new nutritionist both frequently talked to him about listening to his body when it came to meals and snacks, and just eating whenever he felt the need and any real food that he felt comfortable with. But it was still difficult to remind himself of that whenever Seungmin’s brain latched onto the idea that he could really only eat when it was the right time - that was one of the things that his first nutritionist had put in place during his brief amount of time with her, and he was having a hard time breaking out of that routine since he’d started it.
Seungmin didn’t respond at first, as he grabbed his backpack and started to pull out something that he’d brought to eat. It still felt wrong, but he knew that he needed to listen to Changbin because the rapper was telling him exactly what he needed to hear - that he didn’t need the food rules that he’d put in place for himself, that he just needed to listen to his body and feed it whenever he felt the need to eat. “I don’t think I’m that hungry…” he began, pulling out a small granola bar and a juice box.
“Just remember, you can always eat more if you’re still hungry after you eat that,” Chan reminded gently. “We just want you to be healthy - and we have some safe snacks in here for you, too, if you ever need more or just something different from what you’ve brought with you.”
“And we’re going to keep it stocked for you,” Changbin added. “You just let us know what you’re okay with, and we’ll make sure that you have everything you need.”
Seungmin could feel his eyes welling up with tears, as it hit him that his members were still going so far out of their way to take care of him. While it wasn’t anything new - they had been taking care of him for months already, making changes to their schedules so that he could be at the company building without being left alone and adjusting the way they responded to him to make sure that he didn’t end up in a meltdown or shutdown because his reactions had become more pronounced since he’d been diagnosed.
“Hey, hey… we didn’t mean to upset you…” Chan began, as the leader noticed what was going on.
Seungmin shook his head quickly. “Not… not upset…” He knew that it wouldn’t make sense to the two older men - it didn’t really fully make sense to Seungmin why he was crying in that moment - but Seungmin couldn’t really stop himself from feeling something that even he didn’t fully understand.
“Is it just too much right now?” Chan asked softly. Seungmin nodded, taking a deep breath and trying to keep the crying under control at least to some degree. “Okay… is there anything we can do to help you right now?”
Seungmin shook his head again. “I… it’s just a lot…” Seungmin replied softly. “I don’t know what’s going on in my head…”
Thankfully, the 3RACHA members seemed to understand that more talking wasn’t going to be helpful. Instead of trying to get Seungmin to talk it out, Changbin simply moved to put Jisung’s weighted blanket around Seungmin to see if that would help. The weight was comforting, as it usually was whenever they broke out one of the devices. Seungmin closed his eyes after a few moments, pulling the blanket a bit tighter around his body because he felt the need for a bit more pressure. Changbin joined him after a moment, the rapper putting his arms around Seungmin and gently squeezing him as well; they had learned rather quickly that having someone squeezing him just a little bit was really helpful when he was having a particularly hard time.
“Do you want some tea, Minnie?” Jisung asked softly. Seungmin looked up at the question, smiling slightly at the warm cup of green tea that Jisung had brought in for him.
“Thanks, Sung-ah,” Seungmin replied, extricating his hands just enough to grab the cup and take a few small sips. It actually felt really good on his throat; Seungmin hadn’t realized just how tired his voice was until he was being forced to stop and take care of himself properly.
Seungmin watched as Jisung opened his backpack, pulling out the bag of snacks and food that Seungmin and his mother had put together that morning for him to eat throughout the day. “Let’s get something in your stomach, too… you’ve been working for a while, so you probably need something to keep you going…” The youngest member of 3RACHA started digging through Seungmin’s snacks, before pulling out a small baggie of dried mango - one of the foods Seungmin had only recently managed to get back into his diet. “Try some fruit, okay? Just to get you a little fuel so that you can keep going until lunch time.” Seungmin nodded, taking a small piece from the bag and starting to chew on it. It tasted really good, and Seungmin couldn’t help smiling happily at the food as he ate.
“Right… Minnie, can I ask you a question?” Chan asked. Seungmin couldn’t help feeling worried. “It’s not bad… I just want to understand, so that I know what to do to help you in the future…”
Seungmin nodded slowly, taking a deep breath. “Yeah… yeah, okay…” he replied.
“Was it easier for you to eat the mango because Jisung-ah chose it for you instead of making you choose?” Chan asked.
Seungmin nodded slowly, taking another sip of his tea before he responded. “I… I think too much sometimes,” Seungmin admitted. “It was easier, because I just had to say yes or no… I didn’t really have to think…”
Chan nodded, smiling at him. “Okay… so in the future, if you’re having a hard time making that choice, are you okay with us just giving you one choice to say yes or no to?” Seungmin nodded, thankful that the leader was asking questions and making sure that he understood what Seungmin needed.
“Sung-ah… how did you know?” Changbin asked.
Seungmin watched as Jisung shrugged. “It just… it felt like the right thing to do,” Jisung replied. “I know when my anxiety is bad, it’s easier if the options are more limited. I just kind of guessed that it was the same for Minnie, so I decided to just try it…”
“Thank you, Sung-ah,” Seungmin replied, smiling at the rapper. It was nice to know that his members cared enough to try and come up with solutions that he didn’t even know he needed, and it really helped make Seungmin feel more comfortable with coming back to work.
“I just want to help…” Jisung explained.
“You are helping. You all are.”