hi, this is astral speaking
you may not recognize me, I'm probably a stranger to most of you, but you probably likely know me as the person that Drumstick groomed, that psa which Star made in April
alongside with Pazz being outed as a groomer by Ourself and Null.
I fear that I will get a lot of backlash for this, but I am expecting it and think I deserve it for what I did.
I was not groomed by Drum. To put it simply, I lied about him grooming me.
I need to give you all a bit of backstory between me and him
Drumstick has been my friend for nearly four years, and our friendship in the past has been far from great. Though we started off really good, since then we have had many falling outs and
disagreements and blocking each other became common for us starting last year.
With the most recent occurrence taking place in February, where we had our biggest falling out. I blocked him and he followed suite and then he hadn't talked to me ever since. Until March where I decided to talk about him to a friend (Star), it started pretty light where I was just talking to him about how Drumstick would have been my regular customer with how much me likes my art (I was in the transition of opening up commissions for the first time during then, this was the initial start of our conversation), but that didn't end up being the case because I mentioned to him that we had a falling out and blocked me ever since.
The conversation steadily became more intense as I learned more about Drum.
The reason we kept having falling outs was because I always felt like he never went through so much effort for me as he did with his other friends, and that I did way more for him than they did, and I was always so jealous and/or left out because of so (admittedly a very toxic mindset).
What I've been told were instances proving that point, him spending on friends WAY more than what he ever spent for me (none). Expectedly, with my over jealousy and mindset, I became so furious and filled with rage, I felt betrayed. I was overwhelmed and upset and mad and I didn't know what to do.
and then, a thought came to mind.
In a fit of rage, I made up a lie and said that Drumstick groomed me, he did NOTHING for me while I did everything, I couldn't care about anything else I just wanted him to be seen as the bad guy.
Things quickly unfolded, and Drumstick came back to me again.
I was expecting the conversation to be me lashing out at him being mad, but at the time of him returning, it was when shit hit the fan, and my psyche starting coming back to me and I realized what I did. We instead had a long talk about each other and how we treated ourselves.
Few more days have passed and we started building up again, he paid me for everything I made for him, told me he didn't want giving me empty promises anymore but said he wanted to include me in things I wasn't part of. I didn't consider him my friend yet, we were just on talking terms, but I was starting to feel hopeful again. We started being more honest, open and communicated with each other's thoughts (something we NEVER did in the past, which was a main cause of why our past friendship has been so bumpy)
I considered him my friend again, and we were both confident, we've been the best we've ever been together, no more assumptions, no more bottling up feelings, no more hiding our doubts, listening to each other instead of being clouded by our judgement.
I felt more and more happy with him, it felt like the start of our friendship again from 2019-2020, but we were determined to make it even better. But on the other side, I felt more and more guilty, I never forgot and forgave myself about what I did, and on the other spectrum, everyone who knows him now thinks of him as a groomer.
At this point we were really good friends, which only makes me feel worse because of the fact that I did this big charade of him falsely grooming me, painting him in a bad image.
He knows what I did, he forgives me for it and says I shouldn't worry, and that he doesn't mind if others view him as a vile groomer.
I wasn't. I've been bearing this guilt for 3 months now. The longer I keep doing nothing, the longer people keep thinking of him in a bad light
I don't even blame Star or anyone else for making an announcement PSA of him, because they're simply doing so out of the goodness of their hearts, not knowing I was never actually groomed.
So now it's my turn to make a PSA:
So have I been lying about him? Have I been spreading misinformation?
Yes, I'm not giving myself any legroom for defense. He didn't groom me, but it goes without saying that our relationship did get into that territory in the past, but we were just teenagers being teenagers, I was completely aware and consensual, and I do not feel any trauma or regret of what we did. It's just another case of friends being close and just so happen to have a lot of hormones.
I will say that I have had other (actual) abusers in that same period of time, one of them namely being Pazz, an actual cynical person, and I absolutely am filled with dread looking back into him, but I don't feel anywhere close at all with Drumstick
(side note I can't provide proof about me and Pazz because he deleted ALL his dms with me assuming to hide evidence)
I believe that is all there is to say about him. I am really really sorry to everyone to have lied to you about him, if you still think badly of him because of your own past experiences with him, then I will not pry. I am not inherently trying to convince you that he is a good person, but I want it to be known that Drum is a lot of things, but a groomer isn't one of those.
What I feel even more sorry for is the timing of Drumstick being "outed", as it was in unison with Pazz, an actual groomer, being outed. I am presuming that a lot of you were (and still are) on high alert on groomers, and I am really really sorry that I had to push in my stupid nonsense of my fake allegations of Drum into this. It reminds me of those fake SA allegations and the reason why people don't take actual abuse cases seriously because of those.
To conclude my message, I want to return on something I said:
He forgave me for it, he said I didn't have to do anything about it, and that I should not worry about it, he was perfectly fine with what happened, and that what I'm essentially doing changes nothing between me and him.
My attempt to remove this bad image of him I made up, at the cost of my own, by admitting that I lied about him. But with how big of a mistake this is and how much I escalated it all, I deserve it, and I deserve how I was treated badly as a friend in the past, I really truly am sorry for everything. Drum you're not here but I just want to say that I'm sorry I ever did all of this to you, this is no one else's product but mine and mine alone, I will be taking this to my grave.
With that said, it's 4AM as of me writing this, (edit: 2pm the next as of making this website) happy pride month, and I hope you all have a good day.