#i already forgot to order my meds in time once! i forgot to delay an autoship and ended up with too many boxes of cat litter! i havent been

[audiovisualrecall]

Last night my mom was like okay tomorrow let's spend the day looking into the state health insurance stuff together and I was like okay great! I'll enroll in the work one and we will see if the state options are any good. I Can dream about doing The Artist Thing and not just continue to try to do the Normal (aka Neurotypical) Thing of a normal Job when my brain isn't good at that and it leads to embarrassing meltdowns and lots of stress for me.

And today.... she apparently asked dad to start working on it with me but I didn't come down for breakfast till 11 at which pt he started working on the easel he's actually decided to Make me for my birthday gift (crazy man! Looks at the ones in stores and looks at plans and decides he can do better and just goes and starts!), and he didn't mention anything to me before that, and she was at services this morning and then got some groceries and got home at like almost 1, had a snack? Lunch? And was like I'm gonna just sit down for a bit and then we can do that, but I started reading and just realized it's almost 2 so went to talk to her and she's napping. So. Idefk. I'm disappointed.

[truthfulrebellion-blog]

Hysterectomy

Let’s call it what it is. No pussy footing around it. A necessary evil on the way to the end game: phalloplasty. I had been waiting almost six months to hear back about my approval for phalloplasty. I currently have health insurance through Kaiser Permanente, and they had a laundry list of things for me to do in order to present my file to the medical board. I had to transfer my files over from the organization I was seeking healthcare through, as it was cheaper than paying out of pocket for an endocrinologist, to Kaiser. I also had to obtain letters from two medical professionals confirming my need for bottom surgery. The whole process took nearly a year and several trips to medical facilities nearly thirty miles away from my home. My case manager finally called and said in order for the final review to occur, I had to get a hysterectomy.

At the time, I thought that was done by the surgeon performing the phalloplasty at the time of the phalloplasty. With Kaiser, that is not the case. They want anything and everything they have the capability of doing done within their facility. Likely to keep costs down. I didn’t mind. My hysterectomy was scheduled for December 15th, 2018. I had to get blood tests done and watch several videos that didn’t pertain to my situation regarding the procedure. The videos are, obviously, geared towards women. I did what I needed to do and prepared myself for the surgery date. I got a call to move my surgery up about 10 days, even better. Then not 24 hours before the surgery, I received a call stating that it was being delayed for a week. My new date was the 11th. This was terribly inconvenient as my care giver for after my surgery had already taken off work for the original surgery date.

I walked into the facility to check in about an hour early. I had yet another interesting surprise. The surgery was going to cost me money. $475, or close to it. Luckily, I had the money. I was very upset that I wasn’t told about this ahead of time, however. I am paying for the most expensive coverage this company offers so I had as little to pay out of pocket as possible. In the grand scheme of things, $475 is better than $10k. It still would have been nice to know before I showed up. If you have Kaiser, please make sure you know exactly what the costs are before you walk in the door.

I got checked in. I had to remove all of my clothing, put on a hospital gown & surgery cap, and take one final per break. I also forgot to mention I had to stop eating at midnight the day of and wipe my body down with these pre-surgery wipes. I was hungry and my skin smelled weird. They hooked up my IV, fed me my “lunch”, and several doctors came in to ask me questions and verify information. My surgery was supposed to occur at 3pm, but was delayed until closer to 5/530. My surgeon came in to make sure I knew what was about to take place. He also talked to me about a surgeon for bottom surgery in Arizona or New Mexico he was going to refer me to. He had given me the name in our prior consultation. When I looked that surgeon up, I was horrified. The man was fired from the California region Kaiser Permanente for botching transwomens vaginoplasties. The guy didn’t even specialize in phalloplasty. I expressed these concerns to him and told him it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to partner with him for any trans surgeries. Hopefully he heeds my advice. He confirmed that after the surgery, he would stick to the decision to refer me to Dr. Jens Berli of Portland, OR.

I knew nothing of Dr. Berli. There are no results to been seen online, barely anyone who has undergone his procedure even talks about their results, and I couldn’t find any other information besides his starting point in Maryland. I found his Facebook page and did some pretty intense research on him. He seems to genuinely care about his patients and has a passion for what he does. His only negative review is from someone who never had surgery with him because of a communication issue with his staff. Everyone else gave him five stars. So, I figured why the hell not. Hopefully my progress will help others who may be going to Dr. Berli for their phalloplasty be more comfortable with moving forward with him or the surgery itself. I am flying as blind in this moment as some of those who might read this in the future might feel. Trust me. I feel your pain.

I finally went in for my surgery. This time I wasn’t put under until I was on the surgery table. For my top surgery, I was out before I turned the corner on the way to the operating room. The next thing I remember is waking up several hours later and in pain. I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I was very disoriented. I’m not surprised considering I was on anesthesia. Apparently I wasn’t breathing enough either since my O2 alarm kept going off. I had to stay for an extra hour until I could get my breathing going regularly. Which is hard because I believe I have sleep apnea, and when I sleep I breathe much slower than I do when I’m awake. So I would fall back asleep, stop breathing, and be woken up by the nurses to get me to breathe. I didn’t feel any different than I usually do. I was actually quite comfy. But I’m sure it was uncomfortable for others around me to see me breathe 1-2 times a minute while asleep.

I was in so much pain. The pain meds hadn’t kicked in yet. I had had a total hysterectomy, oophorectomy, and partial vaginectomy. Let me tell you. When your genitals are covered in stitches, sitting fucking hurts. I couldn’t get comfortable. Then I had to go to the bathroom. Lord, that was an adventure in of itself. Once I was done, I had to have the nurse help me pull my maternity disposable underwear and extra absorbent pad on. And to help me get dressed. The was a humbling experience. But those disposable underwear are comfortable AF. I wish I had had more of them. I was only sent home with the 1 extra pair. After I got dressed, they sent my care giver to get the car. They sat me in a wheel chair and wheeled me to the pick up area. Wheel chairs are super uncomfortable. I begged the nurse to let me sit on the plushy waiting area seat, but she told me no. I couldn’t wait to get out of that chair. It hurt so bad.

I’ll spare additional details about the trip home. I was basically in pain in the seat, it took over an hour to get home, and I got right in the couch seat I’d be in for the next week and fell asleep. I had to wake up every 1-2 hours to pee and every 4 hours to take my pain meds. Compared to my chest surgery, the pain of the hysterectomy actually wasn’t too bad. I barely needed any medicine. The worst pain came when I peed. It burned like the surface of the sun, and I could barely get the urine out. This lasted for about 2-3 days. I was bleeding pretty regularly for 1-2 weeks and spotting until the 6th week. I had horrible colored discharge the entire recovery. I actually had to go get adult diapers when my last pair of those comfy underwear got worn out. I couldn’t find any of those huge puffy pads or anything without adhesive.

I think the worst part was not being able to poop. I could feel the poop in my back. I really could. But I could not get my bowels to work. Apparently, this is normal. I ended up pooping on day 5. Best advice? Take stool softeners religiously. I would go so far as to say take a laxative on day 3 or 4 because that poop is going to be quite solid. TMI alert, my first poop after surgery tore a little bit of the inside. Like a hemorrhoid. I’m getting into these details because I wish I had had them. It’s not rainbows and butterflies. It’s bleeding and inability to poop. I also could barely sleep as I had to sleep on my back, and I can’t sleep on my back. I get so unfortable. By day 3 I was sleeping on my side on the other couch. I’m also a bigger guy, so I had to hold my stomach when I got up since there was a lot of pain from my belly hanging. I’m not 300+ pounds or anything, but I do have a beer belly. If you are the same, just be prepared for tummy pain when getting up.

I slept on the couch for 3 weeks. It was so much more comfortable than my bed. And it was easy access to everything. I am almost 8 weeks post op and still get tummy pain. But for the most part, pain and blood free. I do still have discharge coming out. I’ll probably continue to wear the diapers until I run out just in case. I had already ruined a pair of pants when I thought the discharge was done. But after about 7-10 days, I was walking around and driving and doing what I needed to do. It was uncomfortable to sit and bend over, so my roommate had to help with a lot of things. My final observation is to leave the scabs alone. I accidentally picked at my belly scab and one of the dissolvable stitches came loose from my incision. I had that stitch hanging out for at least 2 weeks until it finally dissolved at the base and popped off. My scars look great and my hair has finally grown back on my stomach.

I’m doing all of this well after my surgery, so I am sure I have missed a thing or two. If you have any questions, please give me a comment or a message. I will answer anything.

[canaryatlaw]

okay it’s midnight and I should get writing because I can’t sleep in all day tomorrow which would afford me the ability to stay up later (that sentence was horribly phrased but I’m too lazy to fix it so oh well). today was pretty great! some stuff not ideal but overall still pretty good. I woke up to my alarm at 9 and got dressed and got prepared for our first quest of the day, which was trying to get yet another pair of concert tickets for a KPop band Jess wants to see. This was one she cares slightly less about so we weren’t under quite as much pressure to get the good seats, we were just aiming for the cheap ones. So I put our usual breakfast order in on ubereats and it arrived shortly after she did at around 9:30, the tickets went on sale at 10. Since we’ve had not great experiences trying to get tickets up to this point we wanted to try to maximize our chances of getting them by using multiple accounts (which is probably cheating but tbh idgaf I’m sure the ticket scalpers are doing much worse with many more tickets) so I had my main one up in my main browser and then the one attached to my old email up in another one (it was funny, I logged onto it and it was under the name “Ann”- my mom’s name- and the credit cards stored on it expired in like, 2012 😂) and then Jess had hers up on the chromebook. Unlike the other ones thus far this one wasn’t doing the thing where they had a virtual queue form 10 minutes beforehand, so it was just whenever they decided to let you in. The lack of a virtual queue was objectively a good thing because it meant there weren’t as many people trying to get tickets, but it also meant it was just totally random with everyone who was there at that minute. But thankfully we got in after not too long and Jess was able to snag two tickets before anyone else clicked on them (because it does this really annoying thing where the page with refresh with the available tickets and you’ll click two but when you try to go forward it says somebody else already got them and then refreshes your page and it’s a pain in the ass) and after some slight panic over getting the right credit card the tickets were ours for the least amount of money, so we were pleased with that result. May is gonna be crazy, as it stands we have at least 2 concerts (well 3 for Jess being that she’s going to BTS twice) in the same week and are very likely going to end up with another when the Monsta X tickets go on sale on Friday (and of course for them we’re trying for Chicago and New York, so it might involve a NY trip as well). so that’s gonna be a lot, but nothing we’re not used to haha at this point I think we thrive in chaos. So once we had that taken care of we grabbed our things and headed out to Jess’ car. In case I forgot to mention this up to this point we were cosplaying as Ariel and Snow White in their pajama outfits from Wreck It Ralph 2 which is 100% a lazy cosplay but I really give zero fucks because it was comfy and easy. So we drove down to the convention center, this isn’t in the one that most of the Chicago cons are in out by the airport (northwest of downtown in the top corner of the city) but rather C2E2 is in the convention center that’s adjacent to the loop that happened to be the place that they used for my law school graduation and bar swearing in, so I’ve had some very different experiences in this building, lol. I did my make up in the car and was fairly pleased with how it turned out. Once we got there there was some confusion about parking, we were originally planning on parking in one of their lots that’s right connected to the place so we didn’t have to walk in the cold (we were leaving our jackets in the car so we didn’t have to carry them all day; I was in shorts but was wearing my extra thick ice skating tights underneath them so it wasn’t terrible) but that didn’t end up happening so we had to walk in the cold a little bit but we managed. Later in the day Jess mentioned that apparently all of their parking had filled up and there were people with tickets who couldn’t get in because they didn’t have anywhere to park, so the con probably oversold their tickets in that sense. So we got in fairly easily, it was already opened at this point since we were doing the tickets that delayed our arrival a bit. So we start walking the show floor a bit and then decide we should check out artist’s alley first, but try not to buy anything on our first walk through, just consider stuff. the issue of course is that artist’s alley is generally full of great art, but I have literally no room on my wall for anything haha and I still have to hang up my 3 photo ops from London (though they are only 6x9′s instead of the standard 8x10′s so hopefully that will make it easier) and my Matt Ryan one from Cleveland. so I could really only consider very small things, lol. but there was a lot of cool stuff, always a pretty great assortment of different art styles and subject matters. I spotted a few things I may come back and get tomorrow, we will see. I really wanted to see if they had any art from The Cursed Child but I didn’t see anything, besides one drawing that I’m pretty sure was supposed to be Draco but could conceivably be Scorpius from the way he was drawn (but he was with drawings of the original trio so probably not). still a cool drawing though. so that took a while, though definitely less time than it did last year. So after that we went in search of anybody we might know that was there but didn’t see anybody, so we started wandering the show floor. Now, in terms of not needing to buy anything, this was even worse because the solid majority of it is clothing, and we both already own way too much clothing, especially comics related lol. so we made our way through most of everything, some cool stuff, not managed to refrain from buying anything up till that point. We had checked the schedule for panels at one of the smaller stages (their main stage panels are super crowded and there wasn’t anyone we cared that much about) and Colin Donnell (aka Tommy from Arrow) was doing one at 1:30 and it was like 12:50 at this point, so we went over to the little row of food vendors they had and managed to get some decent food for lunch that we sat and ate before returning to the panel stage and managing to find seats right before it started. It was pretty entertaining, he is very pretty in person, though that’s probably not a shock to many. He talked about Arrow of course but also about Chicago Med being that that’s his current show and it is after all filmed and set in Chicago. He also talked about his background doing Broadway which I wasn’t aware of so that was cool to hear about. one of the questions they asked him was like “if you’re on jeopardy, what category would you want the final jeopardy question to be from?” and I was like “musical theatre trivia” (answering somewhat for myself but also for him) and right after I said that he was like “broadway trivia” haha so I felt validated, that is definitely what I would choose given that question. So that lasted about half an hour and was pretty fun. After that we went back to wander the rest of the show floor that we hadn’t made it to yet, most notably a few KPop/Anime/etc. themed booths that were wild, Jess ended up getting into a conversation with these like high school girls about going to BTS and they were like, unironically fans of them when Jess is only a very ironic fan, and they were like “oh who do you stan??” and then the girl said she stans the one guy Jess hates and I busted up laughing at all of it, I couldn’t stop myself, it was truly hilarious. they were talking about the concert and what nights they were going and the girls were like “oh yeah Sunday’s gonna be tough you know because it’s a school night!” and I just fucking died because they’re clearly like 15. So that was very amusing. Jess ended up convincing me I needed one of the hats they sold at that booth, they were the snapback style with the big plastic letters attached across the top which said “THICC” in pink and I got it for the pure reason to wear to ClexaCon next month and it’s gonna be great, I of course put it on as soon as I bought it too. We then went upstairs to where they host the main stage panels just to check it out, there were a lot of people in very long lines, and I was glad I wasn’t in one of them. So we hung out up there for a while just to chill out a bit. We ended up heading back downstairs to see if we could locate an internet friend who’s working the con but we weren’t able to find her today (probably will see her tomorrow) and ended up finally seeing some people we knew, so we sat with them for a while until they ended up heading out, and after that we did a little more wandering before deciding to call it a day, it was a little earlier than we’d normally leave but Jess was feeling kinda crappy and there wasn’t really anything else we were dying to do so it made sense to just go home. Drove back and got dropped off, I changed into comfortable clothing and didn’t really have anything I needed to take care of so I ended up sitting on the couch and watching the last four episodes of season 5 of The Americans, stopping somewhere in there to make two eggs for dinner (which was a bad plan, I go through weird phases with food and I had convinced myself that I was fine eating eggs but I really wasn’t), and then before the last episode to shower before returning to finish it. This season happened to have a fairly brutal finale, in my opinion at least- trigger warning here for self-harm/suicide. So the plot was basically that they had befriended this family that had just defected from the Soviet Union and for some mildly important reason they wanted at least the wife and their son to go back, so one of the methods they employ is using their fake spy son (not their actual child) who had originally befriended him make things at school really bad for their son to the point where he would be so miserable that his mother would want to return to Russia with him. Well, it didn’t look like it was working, and their fake son ended up advising his friend to “slit his wrists” in order to get his parents attention enough for them to take him back, and the spy apparently “showed him” how to do it without hitting an artery, and the spy is calmly recounting this to his fake parents, saying he was going to do it at 7 pm that night, right when his parents were supposed to get home. Of course their majorly alarmed but were split on what to do because they didn’t want to compromise the mission, but the dad ends up storming out of their fake home and walking to their friend’s home and are trying to get in when his parents arrive, and so they get into the house and sent the spy son up to the other son’s room, and a second later you hear him yelling for help, so they storm upstairs to find the boy unconscious on his bed with blood all over his arms and bed. And I mean, I knew going into this episode I would probably see this (they left the previous episode at a cliffhanger about them intervening) but I really was not prepared for that image. And then of course his parents start freaking out and his mother is just next to him sobbing while everyone is scrambling to call 911 and try to bind his wounds the best they can until the paramedics get there and like.....the whole thing just made me so mad. To be fair, the main characters were very alarmed that this was used as a tactic and think their fake kid way overstepped in doing telling him to do this, but the whole idea of basically risking sacrificing the life of a child for a part of your mission that was not even very critically important meanwhile you go home to your own children.....like how as a parent could you ever live with yourself?? And I mean, I know these are spies that regularly just shoot people, some innocent some not, but like, interfering in this boy’s life to make him absolutely miserable and it culminating in something as horrible as this really just pissed me tf off. and I mean that’s for obvious reasons, this is an intersection of two issues I care deeply about, mental health advocacy and the wellbeing of children. So that whole storyline left me pretty angry. And I mean I know, it’s fiction, this didn’t actually happen, but just to see the callousness to the life of a child portrayed like that was really disturbing to witness. But I finished the episode and then turned the tv off for the night and started getting ready for bed, and shortly after I started writing this and now I am here. It’s almost 1 am and I have an 8:30 alarm set, so I think it is time for me to go to bed. Goodnight babes. Hope you’re enjoying your weekend.

[lisalymelife]

Other than “What are your symptoms?”, my least favorite question to answer is “What is your current medication list?”.

I immediately feel a wave of exhaustion come over me knowing there’s no way to answer it all on the spot, it’s going to take a long time to list them all, I’m not going to remember everything, and I don’t want to! It’s too much to just casually answer.

So I started keeping a printout of all my supplements and meds in my purse, and I try to keep it updated right before I go to a new doctor or appointment.

My current Lyme med list as of writing this post:

Why are there so many?

To many people this seems like an ungodly amount, and to me too, lol, but lemme explain why I’m on all these – because at first glance you might think my doctors just love to torture me, or are just throwing everything at me haphazardly. They are absolutely not. This list has been adjusted, subtracted from and added to on a monthly basis for years. It has taken years and years to find what works, what doesn’t, what causes side effects, what causes me to herx, what the bugs react to, what my symptoms react to, and is constantly evolving as my illness and diagnosis evolves.

Some of these meds are specifically taken to target the Lyme bacteria & co-infections, some are taken to relieve my symptoms, some are taken to relieve side effects from other meds (though thankfully not many cuz that’s a depressing cycle that’s very murky to wade through) some are taken to reduce inflammation, some are taken because of the secondary illnesses Lyme has caused, many are taken to build my immune system, and so on and so on…

I’m not using this post to go into all the details of why I’m on each item. I’d like to at some point, but instead wanna focus on how I manage all of it.

 My system for managing all these meds

I was not expecting to have to manage so many meds, side effects, allergies, etc. when I first started my Lyme treatment, and quickly realized I needed to find a way to keep track of it all.

It’s more than just having a list. You need to keep your records constantly accurate to show when you started the meds, when you stopped, how much you’re on, when you changed, any notes you want to remember, any instructions you need to follow, etc. This is not just for you, it’s for your doctor to know if there are any other things your other doctors have put you on, if there’s anything you forgot to add to your list that you should be on, if there’s anything you stopped because of side effects, it’s for any new doctors so they know exactly what you’re taking, it’s for hospitals if you have an emergency, it’s for medical leave paperwork, disability paperwork, insurance claims…

Finding a method that works for you and that is realistic for you to use on a regular basis is essential. Yours might not be mine, but through a lot of trial and error this is what works for me:

Here’s my routine of managing my many medications & supplements:

Private WordPress Page

I did not intent to blog about my Lyme journey when I first got my WordPress site for it. I actually purchased this WordPress theme I’m using now so I could use it to manage my illness. I needed something that would allow me to create my own custom taxonomy, something that was easy to hop in and out of, and something that I could access from my phone so I could pull up info during doctor appointments. I tried a bunch of different apps and google docs, but ultimately fell into using WordPress as my primary tracking system.

This is what the backend of a WordPress site theme looks like.

My most important private page is my Supplements & Meds page:

Whenever I get a new med (btw I’m gonna call all my medications, supplements and vitamins “meds” so I don’t have to write that out every time), I open up that private page, and add it to my list, in this format:

Medication Name

Brand: 

Ordered from: 

Cost: $

Type: 

Serving Size: 

Instructions: 

Schedule:

Symptom Tracker:

mm/dd/yy – Day One – 

mm/dd/yy – Day Two – 

mm/dd/yy – Day Three – 

Notes:

mm/dd/yy –

Here are a couple real med records (not gonna lie, a little embarrassed to show you my notes about Malarone, but I wanted to show that one because it’s a good example of just how complex that notes can be, and lets be honest – shit happens ).

It’s so important to record with as much detail as possible, because:

Lyme Brain makes me forget everything so I can’t trust my memory.

Lyme treatment is very lengthy. Over the course of your treatment you might start and stop the same medication several times, across months or years, and they may have differing effects on your system at different times (because of the state of your body at that time of taking it, because of what other meds your own, because of herxing, you name it).

Every time you take anything new, whether it’s a medication, a vitamin or a supplement, it’s important to give yourself 3 days with that one new addition, so you can clearly tell if you get a side effect from it. Sometimes I might be adding several new meds a month, several days apart, and without my notes I would not remember if my upset stomach came from new med #1 or new med #4.

Recording everything makes it easier to recognize patterns of how your body reacts to similar types of meds.

If you have an adverse or allergic reaction to a medication, your Lyme doctor might take you off it, but a future doctor might suggest it, not knowing your past with it. Especially with allergic reactions it’s dangerous to forget, and you also don’t want to waste time, money and awful side effects on a medication you’ve already tried.

In addition to my WordPress private page, I duplicate each med in a more simple format in Google Sheets, as shown in the printable PDF screenshot above. I don’t like having to record it all twice, but it’s been working pretty well for me now that I’m in the habit of it.

Bucket o’ Pills

I literally keep everything in a bucket. 🙂 It makes it easier than just shoving into a drawer, and takes up way less space. Plus, when it’s time to refill my pill organizer I bring out the bucket, take everything out onto the table, and as I fill my organizer I put the bottle back in the bucket. That way I know for sure I’ve added everything, and haven’t accidentally added something twice because so many of these look alike I wouldn’t be able to tell just by eyeballing the pill.

Two Pills Organizers

About 6 months ago I graduated from 1 pill organizer to 2 because of how many things I take each day. I love these dudes. They’re cute, colorful, and they stay closed (unlike other ones I’ve used that pop open in my purse). They’re separated by days so if you are gonna be out of the house for the day or going on a weekend trip, and don’t want to take the entire week’s supply, it’s easy to separate them out.

I got these, like everything else in my life cuz I’m obsessed!, on Amazon: 4-times-a-day organizer, 3-times-a-day organizer.

Lil’ Instruction Labels

Pill instructions are sooo annoying. Especially when they’re constantly changing. I’ve got too many to memorize, and I don’t like having to dig up my lengthy patient plan or medication directions each time, so I started adding instruction labels to every med. It makes the weekly pill organizer replenishment process much faster.

Keep & Reuse Empty Bottles

As I’m refilling my organizers, if there are any meds that are empty or will run out before the next weekly refill I set them aside so I don’t accidentally put them back into the bucket. Then I go through and reorder online or through my pharmacy.

A big lesson I’ve learned is to keep the empties! Here’s why:

Sometimes an Amazon order gets delayed, or cancelled, or there are pharmacy mistakes, or I got interrupted during my refill process and thought I reordered something I didn’t. This means I can’t go on faith that once I finish my weekly refill process I can throw the empty away, because if I don’t get it by next week and I don’t have the bottle in front of me I might forget to follow-up or that I’m taking the medication at all. It actually happens pretty frequently, so keeping the empties have helped me a ton.

I have the lil’ instruction labels on the bottles, so I actually like to just reuse the bottles instead of rewriting all the labels each time I get a refill. So when I get a new bottle of meds, I open it and pour the contents into the empty that has the label on it.

And… I think that’s it! 🙂 Phew! I did it!! My full medication, vitamin and supplement tracking process. I hope method of madness helps you too! 🙂

Hold onto your butts! This is my current medication, vitamin & supplement list, and how I keep track of it all. Other than "What are your symptoms?", my least favorite question to answer is "What is your current medication list?". 1,562 more words

[rhanieltriestoblog]

To my 25 year old self

April 28, 2020 2:23 am

To my 25 year old self, 

Yes. It’s 2:23 am, and yet, here you are. Writing this piece. You might be probably thinking, why are you still awake? Well, today has been revolutionary. I accepted what happened to me years ago and sought help to two of my closest friends. Several years of brushing off what happened led me to nowhere, so I realized, that maybe its time to bravely face it and tackle it head on and I’m so glad I did. It cost me my whole being to admit it. I know that the past cannot be undone, and there are times that I would feel so small and question the heavens why it happened to me, but I see it now. Loud and clear. He wants me to speak up for the oppressed and to be the voice for those people who were silenced by their oppressor. I’m glad I was able to share my story with Kat and Jums. Kat and I might have several differences, might stab each other on the past, but I know, that at the end of the day, she will tirelessly listen to me. Jums on the other hand, I think she’s a blessing in disguise. Remember the months you spent thinking, out of all the people in your batch, why were you the one who was deemed to be delayed? Well, I guess God has a reason. It was for you to meet Jums who will be God’s instrument to bring back your faith. You thought that first sem 5th year was hard, but thank God, Jums were there. You spent your afternoon breaks exchanging conversations about how you have positive experiences with people outside the church compared to those people who were inside of it. Long before you know it, the sadness of being delayed has now disappeared. Looking back at it, maybe the idea of being delayed wasn’t that bad after all. 

Anyway, for the past few weeks, you’ve been browsing ateneo’s graduate programs. You’re struggling if you should pursue medicine, or work after graduation and pursue taking masters. You want to study medicine because it has been your lifelong dream. Remember why you chose psychology in the first place? Jemma Simmons even inspired you to take up Biochemistry as your college program, but thank God, he opened your eyes and changed your mind. God knows, things will not work out if you decided to head on in Biochemistry. Your lifelong dream was buried once you entered UST. You realized that you weren’t enough to be a doctor and that you don’t have what it takes to finish medicine, be it in determination, financial capability, and intelligence. But recent news changed your perspective and reignited your passion once again. Helping others was always your interest for several years now, and you’re convinced that you can help more people if you become a doctor. You formulated various options on how you would achieve your goal, but at the end of the day, there are far more cons than pros. In accomplishing your lifelong dream, you have to create countless of sacrifices, and that includes burning away your parents’ money instead of saving it for their future retirement, working your ass off to save up for your books and other necessities for medicine school, giving up your dream of travelling the world in your 20′s in order to focus on med school, and renouncing your aspiration to provide the things that your brother wants so that he wouldn’t feel what you’ve felt when you were in college. Yes, the end result will be worth it, but are you willing to sacrifice all the things that you’ve mentioned to secure that 2 letters at the end of your name? 

Graduate degree on the contrary, will help you fulfill your academic ambition without sacrificing that much. You get to work and your parents are very much supportive of it. They even offer to pay for your materials, which you found weird because it was already established that you’re on your own after your graduation. You decided that you’ve had enough with Psych and its time to chase your first love. You decided to take up Master of Literary and cultural studies. Mom seems to be supportive when you finally informed them that you will take up masters but then, raised her eyebrows after learning that you decided in taking up literary and cultural. For them, it wasn’t a practical decision. What’s the point of studying Psychology if you’re not going to continue it in graduate school? They have a point, but for you, its time to pursue your interest in life. You’ve already obtained a degree, so no matter what happens, you will always have a fallback plan.

 Everything was going on smoothly, until you read the requirements. 2.0 gwa and they have an examination. Honey, what did I say? Literary, everything is a battlefield nowadays. There’s this barrier that you need to leap on in order to achieve your next step. You started to doubt yourself again if you’re good enough and if you will be able to pass the requirements given. But then again, what is your mantra in life? Try it first, then if you fail, its ok. At least you’ve done your best. No matter what happens, you’re going to get your masters degree. Even though the odds are mostly not in your favor haha

Oh, I forgot to mention, you’ve been rethinking your decision to stay in the Philippines. You wanted to work in the Philippines and help it a much better place, but you know it yourself that you won’t be able to fulfill your dreams if you stay in here. Unless, you have a high paying job. You wanted to move in Canada, but you’re heart is still not decided. Well, lets see after a couple of years. 

And hey, you also decided that your lifelong goal will revolve around on being always happy, traveling the world, and helping the oppressed. You want to help several charities and donate to orphanage (particularly the one you visited when you were in freshmen year). In your list of priorities, marriage will always be the last spot. But sometimes, you can’t help what its like to have a companion, but then again, will you be able to put up living with someone who do not belong to your family? Living enough with your brother seems to drain out your energy, what more if its someone else? Oh, and also marriage. The idea of dating seems to be applausable, but marriage? Spending your life with someone seems like one of the worst idea. As someone who loves to explore and navigate throughout my existence, I refused to be pinned down. I hope I get to meet someone who will allow me to be a free bird, but until then, marriage is a no no. 

If ever you meet someone who will revise your decision, you want your wedding ceremony to be simple. You want to conduct your wedding in a simple garden, with your loved ones and friends, wearing white dresses. A dainty simple wedding dress would do the job for you. You just want to exchange vows, have a simple program, eat the day away, and tada, go to your honeymoon vacation. 

Again, until you haven’t met the person who will change your perspective, its a no no. 

Well, you’ve reached the end of your letter. I hope everything works out the way you wanted (even though we both knew that IT DOESN’T ALWAYS WORK OUT THE WAY YOU WANTED HEHE). I must admit, you’re pretty idealistic. Wanting to change the world while achieving your dreams? We both knew that it doesn’t work out in that way. Those people who are privileged only get to attain those things. Oh and you’re pretty pessimist HAHAHA. Di ba halata?

So goodbye for now and see you in 5 years. I hope everything works out for you.