When Ordinary Frustration Returns
(Comparison, Limitation, and the Reappearance of Scale)
One of the least discussed signs of recovery is pettiness.
Not cruelty.
Not bitterness.
But the return of small, ordinary comparisons.
In Chapter Twenty-Four of Fought Disorder (“Apples and Oranges”), the world finally regains something it has lacked for a long time:
proportion.
From Existential Stakes to Everyday Limits
Earlier chapters were dominated by total meaning:
Everything mattered
Every interaction carried consequence
Every decision felt irreversible
Here, the stakes drop.
Not to zero —
but to human scale.
This chapter is not about triumph or collapse.
It is about limitation.
Why Comparison Matters
The title matters more than it seems.
“Apples and Oranges” signals a return to:
Differentiation
Incommensurability
The idea that not everything must align
During psychosis, everything was comparable — because everything belonged to the same symbolic system.
Here, that system finally breaks apart.
Some things simply don’t relate.
And that’s a relief.
What’s Happening Linguistically
This chapter introduces a twenty-fourth shift:
Restored proportionality.
In ordinary cognition:
Comparisons have limits
Frustration is local
Disappointment is survivable
Here, language begins to respect those limits again.
Not everything is weighed against everything else.
Not every outcome implies judgement.
Not every frustration demands explanation.
Why This Feels Strangely Flat
Readers sometimes describe this chapter as “quiet” or “uneventful”.
That’s accurate.
Drama is not the point anymore.
Ordinariness is.
After months of interpretive intensity, normal frustration feels anticlimactic — but also grounding.
The Return of Annoyance (And Why It’s Healthy)
Notice what emotions appear here:
Irritation
Resentment
Mild unfairness
Comparison without despair
These are not symptoms.
They are signs of reintegration.
Psychosis abolishes the small.
Depression flattens everything.
Recovery restores the middle.
Language No Longer Inflates
Earlier chapters magnified:
Loss into catastrophe
Error into guilt
Discomfort into threat
Here, language shrinks again.
Words do not escalate.
Thoughts do not spiral.
Meaning does not metastasise.
This is not insight.
It is containment regained.
The Reader’s Experience
Readers often feel something subtle here:
A sense that the book is no longer trying to prove anything.
That’s because it isn’t.
The work of simulation is nearly complete.
Now the book is showing what it looks like when:
Meaning is imperfect
Life is uneven
Comparison exists without collapse
Why This Matters More Than Revelation
Recovery is often misrepresented as clarity.
In reality, it looks like this:
Accepting limits
Living with unfairness
Comparing without imploding
This chapter demonstrates that shift without announcing it.
Where This Leads
Once proportionality returns, life can resume — not dramatically, but practically.
The remaining chapters move into:
Exit
Adjustment
Re-entry
Acceptance without closure
The book does not end with answers.
It ends with scale.
