#i don't know if i'm going to get any substantial vacation this month

[asterdeer]

was supposed to have an extra day off sort of tomorrow because of bathroom renovations going on at work (it would have been wfh but that would still have been another day not doing the same task for 8 hours) but the reno got pushed back to next week and now i don't have a cushion day between being the only person in office at work and "mother's friend(s) and many children showing up for a cookout" day. i think my brain is going to liquefy if i don't get to take at least a few days off soon

[rabbitindisguise]

I keep getting really introspective about disability and internalized ableism and how some people claimed that I'd want cure narrative representation/medical model of disability If I Just Understood what it was like to have things like CFS and autoimmune conditions (since I've recovered a bit from my recent problem and relaxed the answer has been No, Absolutely Not to all of these things)

and like I think folks are kidding themselves a little bit. Not about their own feelings, but lots of the things people were claiming were immutable facts about living these sorts of symptoms (and therefore a sort of symptom itself) and experiences were defeated with therapy exercises I've been using for years. So they were wrong about what I would feel because I ultimately don't, even though I "should" since I'm having the problems. It's true that I cried a bit and made some dumb decisions and now it's just as normal as before I knew I had the problem. I'm having a hard time regulating my emotions because I don't have the energy to maintain that kind of composure, so I started being really careful about my daily activities. I know it's easy for me to get short with people, so I'm going to be faster to apologize and avoid touchy subjects for myself. I'm getting repeatedly traumatized and dismissed and undertreated by doctors, so I'm skipping past all medical stuff on my tumblr feed before bed. It hasn't prevented the bad feelings but merely knowing what's happening allows me to use my coping skills, and lets me realize that this isn't my life it's just a current problem I have to deal with.

According to the things people have said before this started happening, I'm supposed to hate my body, to mistrust doctors inherently, to loathe the medical system, and to believe the world is out to get me specifically as a consequence of experiencing these symptoms. I'm supposed to find people embracing disabilities as part of their identity and wanting to see it represented in fiction insensitive to my own experience. And most of all I'm supposed to be angry and bitter and never stop talking about how angry and bitter I am, no matter if other people are uncomfortable by it, and believe people who are uncomfortable by it are the problem.

If I don't, despite all these symptoms and malnutrition and my body having an extended four month long flu vacation, I don't think I ever will. I know my body could get worse and I could get even worse emotionally, but fundamentally there's a phenomenon of people who refuse to accept mental health care because it means that if it helps then it doesn't mean they're actually disabled (despite all the tests and imaging to the contrary).

I also have a huge motivation to maintain my mental health despite all the Physical Problems because psychological symptoms make physical symptoms worse. The stress of having PTSD in a body that is scrambling to do things properly to begin with is a Lot. If I didn't already have a strong motivation to do therapy (to improve my relationships with other people, to achieve my personal goals for being the person I want to be in life), now I have the additional reason that improving mental health improves health outcomes substantially. I'm not sure if the people who have told me these things believe that's science at all, or have even heard of it, because of the ideas that depression is always a misdiagnosis/a diagnosis made in ableism in someone with a physical disability (false). And beyond that it doesn't even matter for me because frankly I've been bipolar and autistic for a long time so the boat has sailed. Maybe that's the schism? By avoiding mental health care seriously they don't have to find out if they were just mentally ill, which their doctors mistakenly assert is a possibility all the time (NO fucked up liver enzymes do not just ~happen~ and any doctor that thinks that is a quack, much like mental health symptoms don't just ~happen~ for three months or more). Any improvement alongside their mental health improvement could be an attack on the sense of self established in the idea that "I have a physical disability, I'm a physically disabled person, anyone who says otherwise is wrong" which reminds me of how I tried so hard to not be like my parents I just ended up acting more and more denial of anything that could be similar to them.

And all this has reminded me of how adults are like "you'll understand when you're older!" but with ableism I guess?? I think there is no practical difference other than that the mental illness and neurodivergence community I had more access to intracommunal mental health supports. In medical condition support groups I've been in they've been actively toxic to my mental health- and even now I sort of group myself as Other from the problems (autoimmune issues) they also assumed I couldn't have (like doctors) because "I'd know what they felt like" if I shared the condition. I'm mentally ill first because anyplace that is inhospitable to the idea that mental welfare is important is inherently inhospitable to me because it goes against my goals for the environments I'll tolerate being in. It sucks that medical illness communities are as toxic as medical doctors, but I guess monkey see monkey do- no good examples to follow, no way to maintain good support skills. Therapists can be bad at stuff in unique ways but self dx is a godsend and therapists being pro self dx is a big reason why I think people are figuring out more about themselves in an autonomous and healthy way (even if the answer is "I'm neurotypical actually" which does happen). I need to start self dxing physical illnesses to get proper assessments that might be productive before I get seriously hurt by doctors not investigating abnormal lab results.