Until I Become Me - Vol. 5 Ch. 54
- Thread starter MangaDex
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I'm finding Akira cuter and cuter as we move on in chapters, is it just me or do y'all see it too?
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It's because more and more she's accepting who she wants to be/who she is.
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The most telling thing about this chapter is that Akira's dad had no problem playing card games meant for children with his nephew. That must have burned for Akira. These specific chapters seem to indicate that Akira's dad is more interested in appearances than his actual child't welfare.
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I dont like the dad much but to be absolutely fair it was the nephew who brought up the video game(seemingly a pokemon go parody) and the dad simply showed him, had Akira showed interest he'd probably show her too. Sure its on a parent to try to connect with their kids but if Akira doesnt try showing interest the dad cant really know either.
He did also get her the sword keychain, which is "boyish", assuming she'd like it so he does try to treat her like a boy because thats what he seems to think she wants even if...that's not really what she wants but still).
So he's not great but I don't personally think this is an example of him only caring for appearances.
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I saw the key chain as a poor attempt from the dad to make amends. Not knowing how to even express himself to his son/daughter, he wanted the key chain to just be in the same bag she got the pants that didn't fit (beginning chapter 53), for her to just find it without the need for any interaction.
But to get to my point, I say "make amends" because on mangadex page 7 of chapter 53, Akira wanted the school bag with the dragon on it, and so this key chain is like "sorry for making you upset that you didn't get your bag back in grade school, here's a key chain as a way of apologizing."
There were theories floating around before this chapter that he just up and left the family after the sickness struck Akira, though - for the better in my opinion - this chapter has proven that that is not the case. He is not on hostile terms with his family, and still considers Akira his child, even if his gestures of connecting with her are quite dispassionate.
Maybe that's just another instance of a salaryman parent syndrome where his job drains his time and energy to care for his family, and so he probably would've been as much of a neglectful parent to Akira if he wasn't struck with the sickness. But since Akira was, and she needed - and still needs - all the support from her family, that is moreso damning that he isn't really there to help her.
But yeah, I didn't pay much attention to this scene initially before you pointed it out, but since we were shown it, and there's a panel during it where Akira's expression can be interpreted as frowning, it might be a plot point, and we might get back to it in a later chapter
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In my opinion, I think Akira's mom is kinda worse than their dad. Unlike their dad who was kinda in the background for the majority of the time, their mom had actively pushed back any inkling for Akira to express her feminine state just so she can keep herself and family intact (suggesting cutting their hair to look boyish, suggesting Akira to cover up their cute bikini with a boy's jacket etc...)
not knowing she was putting her feelings over Akira thus planting the seeds of confusion and dysphoria that Akira is still dealing with right now
Oof MC thinking about Seji and his love confession which makes it seem like MC is going the male partner route instead of the yuri route that I wanted 
but also I find it funny that the Seji thing is still on the table cause my god I feel like that confession was like 100 chapters ago and oh boy there was drama about it because some other girl liked him alot too
but also I find it funny that the Seji thing is still on the table cause my god I feel like that confession was like 100 chapters ago and oh boy there was drama about it because some other girl liked him alot too
Still kinda the same issue though, imo Akira's mom is trying her best with how she thinks Akira wants to be treated, but Akira is just too scared to be honest about how they actually feel. I don't think Akira's mom does anything maliciously, if anything she's often going out of her way to try and accommodate in ways that she thinks will make Akira comfortable, even if it'd potentially be easier to just force them to be more like a girl because they're biologically a girl. I think she'd be perfectly fine with Akira being more fem, but like she can't read their mind and so long as Akira avoids confronting the issue she'll just continue to assume that Akira's feelings haven't changed from back when they strongly wanted to be a boy again.
The example that sticks out most to me is her buying the Yugioh cards thinking that that was what Akira wanted instead of the dress. And I can't blame her lol; it's such a relatable depiction of well intentioned people accidently stepping on your dysphoria with gendered assumptions, but like you can't be upset at them because why tf would they assume you're dysphoric. It's kinda your problem for not being able to be honest to them
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Overall Akira's mom is a real hero to raise Akira and largely give her a loving home. She's not really understanding her child but then that's a common thing with parents. Sure the mom could try a bit harder on that dimension but she's definitely a strong net positive in Akira's life regardless.
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I think it might be bleed over from the preserialization version. Akira's dad was the one who broke it to him (i feel like it's premature to call akira a her until at least chapter two) that there was no cure in what feels like a lot more mean-spirited a tone than akira's mom did here.
Pre-Serialized version:
Serialized version:
Serialized version:
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Technically the twitter version is still operating from the father story line, since you can read it from start to finish there and it uses the original father version, not the mother version which came far later. That being said, in my head canon, volume is real, twitter is no longer true. Certainly the volume edition has more polish around correcting inconsistencies, and Hatsuki does not make a lot of effort to making sure new chapters of the twitter version align with the original twitter chapters.
