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scarluxia · 4 years ago

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Let's talk about some Adventures I had in Phoenix, AZ in 2015. It came up in my FB Memories and even though I determined to let everything from last decade go, this one still rankles. I got "in trouble" with these people for being open about my experiences on my Facebook because, even though I hadn't mentioned names, they didn't like me "putting their business out there".

CW for ableism, depression, rejection sensitive dysphoria, and I'll try to put all that in the tags.

My partner, Loki (yes real name), and I had been urban camping in Portland, OR for about a month. It had gotten cold and rainy to the point where we couldn't safely stay living outdoors, and Loki's father (who didn't approve of me) had demanded he come back to California and live with Loki's uncle. He made it quite clear I was not welcome, so I ended up going to Arizona because I had a friend who was willing to put me up. She and I had known each other since 2008 and I figured I would be safe with her. At the time, Loki was much more easily influenced by what his family wanted, and we ended up having kind of a nasty set of conversations over whether he was abandoning me.

While in Portland, my wallet had been stolen so I had no ID or SS card. I had reported it stolen of course, but had received no response until I was leaving Arizona.

My friend in Arizona had two young sons, a husband, and a boyfriend. Now, I have some sensory issues that make it so I have a hard time being around children. High pitched noises hurt me to my bones, like, even now I have to leave the room if my son gets overly excited and starts shrieking.

I was sleeping on the couch in the living room, which was where the kids would go when they woke up and where the TVs and entertainment consoles were.

Anyway, they wanted me to contribute to the household and whatnot but I was severely depressed and I think I've provided all the context I can remember? If the rest of this doesn't make sense, please know that there was a part 1 but it came up in my Memories on a different day and i didn't think I would be rehashing it.

So I couldn't do work, couldn't do anything anyone had asked me to do to satisfaction because various things that did not, in fact, depend on me. Maybe I wasn't being enough of a ~team player~, I don't know. But anyway, I did my best with what I had. Sometimes, because of THE EXTREME FUCKING SENSORY ISSUES THAT COME WITH AUTISM, I would get overwhelmed by the kids screaming. Two little boys, barely school age, and their parents sat them in front of a TV and gave them controllers. That's it. They had toys in their room, sure, but they weren't getting outside. I suggested taking them out a couple times, but firstly, I didn't know the area and wasn't about to go out alone, and secondly, I can't split in half and I'm not in good shape, so even if I had known the area, I wouldn't have taken TWO small children outside to run around where they could run out of the designated area. I'm kind of anal that way, I guess. But Woman A (mum) and Man B ("uncle") never got off their arses to help me take them outside, and Man A was at work.

Oh, yes, parental interaction with the kids. Woman A loved her sons very much. But at their age (3 and 5), they both should have been toilet trained. They should have gotten at least two hours outside every day. They threw fits when they weren't allowed to play video games because, instead of games being a special treat that was earned with good behavior, they were toys carelessly tossed at the kids to keep them out of everyone's hair. Conversely, and bizarrely, reading to them WAS a special treat. The father woke up, played games, basically brushed off his kids, and went to work. Same when he got home for lunch, and he *ordered* us to have them in bed by the time he got home for good. The mum did somewhat interact with them, but mostly just wanted them out of her hair. I wasn't so nice because I'm not good with kids in general and also loud screeching HURTS, IT HURTS IT HURTS MAKE IT STOP. (Same with snoring, or any noise made when I want to sleep.) This isn't me being a ~diva~, it is an actual manifestation of a mental disability.

Woman A was of the opinion that "everyone who lives in a house with kids automatically becomes a coparent", maybe because she wasn't willing to actually parent her kids herself.

Note from the future: I still disagree with the idea that "anyone who lives in a house with kids is automatically a co-parent". Parent your own kids. I don't expect my dad to parent my son when we go visit him and he made it quite clear when I was pregnant that he would not take on a co-parenting role (because his wives 30-50 years ago had handled the babies and he doesn't really know how to calm them down beyond entertaining them)

She got a really bitchy look on her face whenever I (who have been around children, especially TROUBLED children, all my life) made any sort of suggestion. Well sorry, lady, but it's not like you're doing such a great job with them. Y'all act like you barely want anything to do with them. Like they're cute and little and fun to snuggle, but actually teaching them anything? Forget about it, just toss em a controller and hope they don't kill each other in the game or real life. Meanwhile, they have no outlet for their natural physical energy, no real outlet for their curiosity. They're going to grow up stupid and sedentary, with "no one paid attention to me during childhood except when it was convenient for THEM" to deal with. The older kid recently got on meds for a condition that, from what I observed, was likely much more nurture than nature. And what everyone ate, my God, those kids were the only non-overweight people in the house, and it's little wonder! I bought ACTUAL NUTRITIONAL food for everyone, and the adults look at me like I'm from some demon dimension. I made a light comment about how I'd never eaten anything like what they had growing up. You know, boxed potatoes, veggies out of a can, white bread, sugary peanut butter. And Woman A was like, "well YOU don't have kids."

Um, no, but my father did.

I have a kid now, am working part time at min. wage because my boss sees my performance as so-so (plus she's been forced to give me a raise every time the County of Where I Live raises the minimum), in a single-income household, on as much Family With Kids welfare as My County will allow, and I still wouldn't feed my kid that crap LOL

Spoiler alert: they made me use all my food stamps on their household and then kicked me out later that month so... When I bought food I bought HEALTHY food, like, I've been on food stamps my entire life... Also, WIC specifically pays for WHEAT bread, fruits & veggies, and they do let you get peanut butter without sugar so idk what was going on there with them.

My father was a SINGLE PARENT raising a daughter in America after 20 years of living in Europe and raising kids with his previous wives. Well, up until the divorces, anyway. I was the only kid he ever got to keep. He told me things about how the others had been raised compared to how I was raised, and I saw the outcomes of different parenting styles in my peers as well. My father was a very poor man whose trade had been outsourced and who struggled to support us for years. And yet, we never went hungry, and he never fed me boxed potatoes. Never fed me sugary peanut butter, white bread, or veggies out of a can.

Ok I understand canned veggies are better than no veggies, and not everyone can get fresh, but you CAN get frozen in AZ. I always had fresh or frozen growing up.

It wasn't because we were living in the lap of luxury. It's because...

HE FUCKING VALUED OUR HEALTH OVER CONVENIENT, CRAPPY, NUTRIENT-FREE FOOD!!!! This is not a difficult concept. He ALSO read to me every night, despite having what I now realise was a very grueling day at work just to put said healthy food on the table. I didn't get to watch TV or play computer games (edu-tainment, the only kind I was allowed) until after all my homework was done. I can't remember if I was a particularly active child, but I'm sure I had the OPTION!!!! TO GO OUT.

Meanwhile, when I was at various stages of my life, I met kids whose parents shunted them from guardian to guardian because they didn't want to deal with them, kids whose parents were kind and supportive but rubbish at enforcing discipline, kids whose parents were abusive in every kind of way, and kids whose parents did their best.

You know, I wasn't raised perfectly. My upbringing lacked social grace and included some toxic ideas about womanhood that I've only been learning to overcome recently in my adulthood. But DON'T FUCKING ACT LIKE I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT RAISING KIDS JUST BECAUSE I DON'T CURRENTLY HAVE ANY. I have my own life, the lives of my peers, and a wonderful online community of new parents raising children in kind and socially aware ways, to draw inspiration from. I can go to any one of them, and to my own parents, and ask "hey does X seem weird to you?" And they'll give me their honest opinion, which *is valuable*. I have even mapped out a general idea of how to get through some parts of my children's lives, and I'm not even planning to have kids for at least another few years. I mean, honestly, it used to be "I don't want kids ever", but dear gosh, if I can have any part of raising someone in a manner that defies procrastination culture, entitlement culture, and everything wrong with the way my husband and I were raised, maybe it wouldn't be a complete horror. If I can ensure that not all hope for the next generation is lost, hey.

Anyway, I've gone off topic...

I also had some issues with the men. Man B just didn't seem to like anything ever. I had no idea what Woman A saw in him. I remember one time he tried to tell me, a Christian, that I can't tell people what a "real Christian" is because it ~invalidates their identity~. Excuse me, no. It doesn't work that way. There are things that Christ taught, and anyone who blatantly goes against them IN THE NAME OF CHRISTIANITY, IS NOT A REAL CHRISTIAN. And yes, I realise this entire rant has been very judgey and technically I'm not supposed to do that either, but it's not like I'm saying they're going to Hell. Just that their kids are going to be sluggish and stupid, and I can't understand how these people have the gumption to try to lecture anyone else about life when they're not even TRYING to get their own lives together.

Yeah so they tried to lecture me about how I was "letting" Loki mistreat me and how I cared more about "socializing" with my estranged husband (I have separation anxiety) than helping around the house e_e They also implied I used depression as an excuse to be lazy.

Man B was supposedly "super employable." Well, okay, even though his "job hunt" seemed to consist more of sitting around playing video games, he was larger than my father (who is 6 ft tall with a protruding gut and weighs 240 lbs at last count) (My father and I are both 60 lbs above our ideal weights. But we're working on it!), and never seemed to get past the phone-screening process.

Now, Woman A told me that Man B was looking for work and that her family and some friends looked down on him for being a freeloader. Probably because she was anxious about me thinking the same. But here's the thing: I wouldn't have cared. Honestly. If you want to sit around playing games all day in your married girlfriend's apartment with her and her husband playing video games all day, go right ahead. If you want to bake three potatoes at a time and take them back to your room for a snack, hey, more power to you. But don't piss out the window and call it rain.

I don't care how employable you are, where you live, who you're living with, or what your lifestyle is like. It doesn't affect me in any way. But don't act like you're doing something you're not just to appease someone's judgmental family. That doesn't ever end well.

Now, see, I clearly have a problem with people who do that. I don't hide many aspects of myself, though I will refuse to answer a question if I feel it's none of someone's business or if they're just asking it to be a judgmental asshole. I refuse to compromise myself or my safe space to accommodate someone who can't make peace with who they are. Hell, you know me! You know my show!

Wait, this is Tumblr, so you might not know my show. It's a YouTube storyboard dedicated to processing and mocking some spiritual and psychological abuse I've undergone in my life. On Facebook, it was one of the things I was known for at the time because I was constantly posting clips and art, and trying to recruit voice actors.

I sell anyone out who I catch lying to me about anything! That's nothing new! And these people knew that about me. For SEVEN. FUCKING. YEARS.

So anyway. Woman A has a lot of great short term goals but no actual follow through because "I'm just not in the mood right now." No judgment there. I've totally been there. The only problem is when it gets ME in trouble.

"Let's walk the dog." "I'm not in the mood." Okay, then the dog doesn't get walked because I can't figure out my way around the place alone.

"Let's do the dishes." Woman A doesn't let me know when the washer stopped. Okay. Then the rest of the dishes don't get washed.

"Let's take the kids outside." "No I'm too tired." Okay, then they're going to be RUNNING AROUND THE APARTMENT SCREAMING WHICH MY EARS CANNOT FUCKING HANDLE so bye I'm just gonna borrow your room and isolate myself for a bit.

"Let's go to the gym!" "Maybe later." But later never comes.

Do you see where I'm going here? As for the men, they BOTH complain that they're "doing too much" around the house. Okay, probably fair for Man A, who works full time and deserves to come home to a clean house. But Man B. Wtf. You literally do nothing, except when you do, and when you do, we're meant to throw you a parade? That's not how adulthood works, or so I've heard.

Note: All three of these people are older than me. I was 24? at the time, fresh out of trade school, on my own for the first time in my life. (Maybe 2nd? I ran away when I was 17 but ended up with my grandparents so idk if that counts.) Woman A was 26 at the time and had been married since 2008, had experience with office work and parenthood, etc. Both men were older than her. I was a chronological adult with the life experience of a teenager, so I felt comfortable saying that.

So did I mention that I'm sleeping in the living room during this stay? And the adults don't go to bed until like 2 AM, which means, because of my disability, wherein I cannot sleep if there's any sort of non-ambient noise, *I* don't get to sleep until AFTER 2 AM. And the kids? They come in the living room screaming at 6 AM. Yep. Okay. Living on 4 hours of sleep, for the mathematically challenged. That and dealing with the emotional turmoil of being separated from my husband when I've got high separation anxiety in the first place. All my pain, everything, it's up to 11. and I'm supposed to contribute but there's not really anything that allows me to contribute.

So what do they do? They ambush me. Call a "family meeting" to tell me absolutely everything that's wrong with me, after WEEKS of telling me what a big help I am and how grateful they are to have me around. Tell me I'm letting my "social life" get in the way of me helping around the house. Hmm. Social life. You mean, VENTING IN MY SAFE SPACE (Facebook, no names named) AND TRYING TO MEND THINGS WITH MY HUSBAND??????????????? Okay. Well since you guys treat your woman like shit, you clearly don't understand or appreciate devotion to one's spouse. Seriously. Woman A told me she used to have extreme separation anxiety with Man A, and that he would brush off her emotions as irrelevant. Her solution was to make it a poly relationship and take a lover WHO TREATS HER THE EXACT SAME WAY. I'm serious. She got no emotional support from either of them. They basically just threw pills at her and trained her to lie down until her feelings went away.

And she had the gall to lecture me (24 at the time) about how Loki (19 at the time & from a pretty horrific family) treated me. LOL ok. Log. Splinter.

As she knew, I'm monogamous. I do have some opinions on polyamoury based on individuals I've gotten to know who are in those types of relationships, but those opinions are irrelevant to this series of rants. Except one, which is pertinent: if you're going to take another lover, they should provide something that your existing lover(s) don't. If you're suffering from low emotional support and you just find someone else who doesn't emotionally support you and who treats you like a child who can't be trusted??? What are you even DOING? Like, she told me NEITHER of her men trust her judgment. What the fuck is a relationship without trust? And don't even try "dick too bomb" as an excuse when you tell me you haven't gotten laid in months and your husband is using your condoms on Woman B.

They don't support you. They don't trust you. And yet YOU'RE telling ME that things with my husband won't get better unless I follow your lead and take another lover? HELL TO THE NO. My husband has his faults, but if I tell him Person X can be trusted, he believes me.

Except for his ex-girlfriend whom he tried to add to our relationship when he tried to be poly, months later. That went Badly.

Or maybe he just knows I'll deal with them myself, with my hot, hot temper, if they turn out not to be trustworthy. He also doesn't treat me LIKE A CHILD. And while I sometimes point at things and make small motions when I can't physically talk, or sometimes even use baby talk when I'm feeling cutesy, I DON'T POINT AT A PIECE OF PAPER AND GO "THE CARRRRRR!!!!" IN AN INCREASINGLY HIGHER PITCH BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW HOW TO SAY, "Honey, I think we missed the car payment this month. Can you double check while the agent has you on hold, please?"

Okay, being a dick about losing words due to stress was not my finest moment, but at the time, I was just so appalled by how they treated her and how she allowed them to treat me.

So basically these adults who are nowhere near having their lives together, and aren't even really trying, put me on blast for not having everything running perfectly when THEY expected it to.

Let's reiterate. I couldn't get a job because I had no ID or social security card. I was waiting for them to be returned to me. I couldn't walk the kids or the dog, go to the gym, or complete all the household chores because no one would guide me. I need that guidance because of various components of my disability, which I really hate admitting to because I'm super fucking prideful, but I figured hey, she's not neurotypical either. These people will understand.

Their response when I brought this up? "You're an adult. You should know better." Sure, okay. But you should know that a child ought to be potty trained before he turns 5, or even 3; that kids need to run around, are entitled to their parents' attention and consistent discipline, and need!!! healthy!!!! food!!!!

Oh, discipline! So, she would send Older Boy to his room over misbehaving. But rather than enforce time-out, she'd go, "oh, I think I'm being too haaaard on him," and just... Relinquish. He's not about to learn anything that way, ma'am.

They called me trying to reconnect with the person I love more than almost anyone on this earth "obsessing over your social life". Well again, you treat your woman like shit, so MAYBE my undying devotion to the person I love goes a LITTLE bit over your head.

They told me that the household should be my first priority. Except no, because I am an autonomous person and my FIRST PRIORITY is, was, and ever has been the love of my life, whomever that may be at the time. That is 70% of my personality. I'm pretty sure anyone who had ever met me can vouch for my extreme devotion, and this woman had known me for SEVEN. YEARS. I'm not going to throw away 70% of myself to do an impossible task that no one will help me with.

They told me a lot of things I wasn't doing right, and for those of you who also struggle with anxiety and depression, you know that being told for weeks that everything is okay and you're so great and so helpful, and then being told that you're rubbish at everything... You know that that is hurtful. Devastating, even. I wanted to kill myself. I said that. I said that and expressed my feelings about some other things, in my safe space, without naming any names.

And even though I was posting in my safe space, I was polite about it. I was as gentle and rational as possible. I wasn't calling anyone out. Not like I am now. I wasn't trying to lead a witch hunt. I was just overwhelmed and trying to express my feelings. Trying to get myself not to kill myself. I had to tell myself over and over again that it's not what Loki would want for me.

In the morning, they woke me up and kicked me out. Said it was rude for me to say I don't care about their household. I never, NEVER said that. I said "Loki is my first priority." Something along the lines of "that's just how I am and I shouldn't be vilified for it." That doesn't mean I DON'T CARE ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE. IT JUST MEANS THAT MY PRIORITIES WILL *NEVER* BE WHAT SOMEONE ELSE WANTS THEM TO BE. I AM A PERSON. I HAVE THE RIGHT TO DECIDE WHAT TO PRIORITISE, AND I HAVE THE RIGHT TO LOVE MY HUSBAND!!!

I MEAN, FOR FUCK'S SAKE. MY NAME IS *SIGYN*. WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU IGNORANT ASSHOLES EXPECT?! WHY THE HELL SHOULD YOU HAVE FELT THREATENED BY ME SAYING ANYTHING IF I DIDN'T NAME NAMES AND WAS ACTUALLY RATIONAL? IF YOU SAW THIS, *MAYBE* YOU WOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO BE PISSY, BUT NOT THEN!

They kicked me out after having asked me to buy them all food. I had used up all my food stamps. Because I hadn't anticipated this at all. I hadn't known they would take such offence to my existence, to my ways. To the fact that I value the man I married more than I value... Whatever they wanted me to value, I guess.

Fun fact: I ended up in a women's shelter after this, and one woman told me to actually kill myself because she was tired of hearing me cry at night.

They said I hadn't made any effort to get my life on track. Because I can just snap my fingers and make my ID appear. Because I can just manifest the money for a replacement. They said all these things that left me almost unable to breathe, in retaliation for me posting that I was suicidal.

Later, Woman A told me that this had been a long time coming and that they were trying to make room for Woman B and Woman C, both of whom were willing to have sex with the men, which is something that I would not. I feel the first woman I met at the shelter was accurate when she said they basically kicked me out because I wouldn't sleep with them.

I also later found out that my ID and SS card had been returned to sender. The Portland PD called me and told me. So my father came to the conclusion that the people I had been staying with sabotaged me from the start. For a while, I didn't feel it, but last night I dreamed about it, and the dream made me angry. I didn't deserve to be treated that way. And I really had to get all this off my chest, so for those of you who didn't immediately whip out your tiny violins, thank you.

#ableism #depression #rejection sensitive dysphoria #sensory sensitivity #child neglect #child abuse #resource insecurity?#i forgot about the part where someone tried to mansplain Christian gatekeeping to me #emotional abuse #polyamory but make it toxic #suicidal ideation

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samtheflamingomain · 2 years ago

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on hope and disappointment.

I was instilled with 2 fundamental ideals as a young child of extremely nihilistic parents. First: "Aim low and avoid disappointment". Second, perhaps contradicting the first, "Always vote, no exception."

And I've followed both to this day. Well, except yesterday when, for the first time in 9 years of voting, I didn't.

And the guy I hate won. But I knew that. Everyone knew that.

Our voting is almost identical to that in the States; we elect our local representative and they get a seat in Provincial Parliament (our State Senate). I knew my area was going to be Orange no matter what. And it was. I still feel a bit bad because I always harass others to vote, but this time was different.

It felt like a waste of bus fare. I know my girl is winning here, but I know that dude is winning overall. The only thing my vote would've done was to up the voter turnout. And I realized that. And stayed home because of that fact alone.

Because, after a week of blaming the 57% of Ontarians who didn't vote, we'll turn that number in a shining beacon of our desperate need for electoral reform. At least, that's what I hope can come out of this.

Hope. That's where I'd like to reintroduce "aim low and avoid disappointment". While I still do this, and I'm one of the most pessimistic people I know, I'm also one of the most optimistic in one singular sense: hope.

It takes a fuck of a lot of aiming low to get me to a place where I don't have hope. I've been diagnosed with an incurable, rarely-even-treatable disease, IH. I'm finally starting a new med next week, and while I'm 99% ready for it to do absolutely nothing just like the cocaine-level dose of Adderall I'm on. Still 10/10 tired every day all day.

But no matter how low I aim, it's never low enough for zero hope. Because, while I don't think the new med will work, it could. There's always, always a chance. It's why I've never refused any kind of mental health treatment, including ECT and rTMS. There's always been hope that the right drug is the next one. This is my last try, though, because it's literally the only option. Then my chances of waking up again become as close to 0 as possible. At that point, regarding my IH, I will be out of hope.

And while I "knew" when I hit the subreddit this morning, I still had that sliver of hope that the NDP would eke this one out somehow. But it rarely gets easier to have hope dashed, even 1% of it. Before today, I had that bit of hope that I'll get a raise to my disability so I'm not living in abject poverty. Now that hope, too, is gone.

Maybe I need to aim lower.

Usually, if I'd woken up to a 43% voter turnout, and after the math, realizing that about 14% of Ontarians decided the election, I'd be livid. But I'm not. I'm not even disappointed, because I did aim low enough to avoid that. But I am hopeless. For 5 more years, minimum wage and disability won't go up. Health care will be privatized. Teachers are likely to strike come September. Nurses will be walking off the job.

I'd usually be angry at my fellow Ontarians for not voting. But as someone who also didn't vote, I don't have that right. But I also don't believe it this time.

Our system is so broken that Ford won a majority government by 14% of people deciding so. Another 10, 20, 30%, this time, I don't think would've mattered much.

Add in that we all knew he was going to win again, and I don't blame anyone who didn't vote. This time, your vote really didn't matter much.

But I still had a right to my hope. And even when it's as miniscule as 1%, it still hurts to have that hope disappear. I've been mourning my chances of waking up again reaching near-0 for months. This one was more like ripping off a bandaid. You know it'll need doing eventually, and prepare for it and the sting is gone pretty quick and replaced with a milder form of pain that sticks around a bit but which, too, fizzles away quickly.

I've been planning my suicide since I discovered what IH was and that I was sure I had it. (Got a formal diagnosis last month). When I read up on it and found case after case of nobody ever waking up, no studies, no meds... hope seemed lost. But there's still this one drug that might improve my quality of life enough to live in poverty. My 1% of hope.

I had one (1) exception - if the Conservatives lost the Provincial election. Because that would mean I'd get an increase to my disability. And that might improve my quality of life enough to live with 10/10 fatigue. My 1% of hope.

In 3 weeks, I'll know if the drug does something. In 3 weeks, in the 2 categories of "stuff ruining my life", I will have 0 hope left. And that's going to be the most painful loss of hope in my entire life, because it will mean the end of it.

Aim low and avoid disappointment, Flamingos.

#hope #ontario election #voting #sam #suicide tw

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ghostblackberry · 6 years ago

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Why I have been so off lately

my mind is focused on the reality that will likely always be legally disabled and on welfare. I was approved in 1993, before I was even 2. My mom was a newly divorced college dropout, my great-grandmother a retired waitress. We needed the money, I needed medical care.

The assumption was (because even at 2 I was very clever) that it was temporary. I'd go to university & law school, get an excellent job with excllent health insurance, and maybe move to another country. At 16 I wanted to study journalism and international law.

The backup plan was marriage to a guy who was going to be a minister. I didn't agree with his faith. Either way, the plan was to get off welfare as quickly as possible after turning 18. I didn't want to be poor just because I needed to use a wheelchair and medicine to survive.

Flash forward to 2013, I'm 21 and my mental health forces me to leave university. I try to get a minimum wage job for years, forcing my ability to walk to it limits, but my limp too is noticable. If I show up in my chair, I don't even get a call to say they picked someone else

I try freelance work, writing, teach myself photoshop and video editing. Work six months for a YouTuber that never made enough to warrant staying on the platform or paying me. I couldn't even get an unpaid internship or volunteer position. So many people try to give me hope.

It's always "You'll find a way to go back to school" or "You'll write a bestseller/make the perfect video/meet the right guy." No one ever considers that disability is repulsive, a risk to employers, or that without access to doctors and medicine I will probably die young.

The scariest part is knowing that early death risk is not from my physical health issues but from suicide. Antidepressants, while not 100% perfect, have probably saved life the year and half I've been on them. My feelings of worthlessness run so deep I need meds to manage.

Now, I'm nearly 27, still single, living in a room in a shitty *inaccessible* apartment that costs 60% of my income, can't find a doctor that will take my concerns seriously, and people STILL think there's some way out, if I pull hard enough on my bootstraps and pray.

Like the last 9 years have been nothing. I'm angry and sad. I just want a chance to prove I'm worth it, to live somewhere I can actually thrive, to use whatever gifts God as given me for my own improvement and to help people. I'm never going to get that. All because I have CP.

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imitchingonafeminist · 7 years ago

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That shit is so elitist, I'm 100% behind @malaquitedreams ! I'm talking as someone from Quebec in Canada, so everything might not applied to all countries, but I believe it's pretty general.

Cellphone & laptop as luxuries; most public places don't have public phone anymore, a landline is often more expensive than a cellphone, how are you supposed to be able to call the emergency service, be reachable (cause most place require you to have a phone number, such as job application, your bank, your school, etc.). A laptop is cheaper than a desk computer & for most jobs & any students it isn't a luxury but a NEED.

Giving up internet: I can't pay my rent IRL, I have to wire it, which require a safe connection and cannot be done on public computer or public WiFi without risks. How am I supposed to pay my rent/tuition/insurance without internet access?

A car is needed by a lot of people, it's not a luxury either; whether for health reasons (can't walk for long distance) or for lack of access to public transport (my hometown, by example, doesn't have public transportation but it's too large to safely walk everywhere and there's no safe way to bike everywhere either).

Having a home isn't mandatory, but it's quite fucking useful, no? Also, for a lot of things you need a stable address, by example for insurances or job application. Also, in some places like Quebec, to keep your citizen card that gives you access to free health care you need to not be out of the country too much (th only exception being if you're traveling as an exchange student, since you still pay tuition in Quebec).

Oh - and how does someone travel on a minimum wage when it barely allows people to pay rent? How do you get the time off to travel?

I want to travel a lot; I don't have the money for it, but, mostly, I DON'T HAVE THE HEALTH FOR IT. I need to pay my meds, which is a) expensive b) require me to often see the same doctor (so I cannot travel all over the place for years) c) I can't get my meds for any pharmacy all around the world and I can't carry more than three months worth of meds in my suitcase (and if it gets stolen I'd be in deep shit). So, yes, I have priorities before traveling, it's called trying to stay alive!

Also, the first post doesn't even mention how you can be indebted from your parents, medical bills, how race and gender can play against someone to travel (some countries don't accept people from some other countries), etc.

So for all of you doing your best and not being able to travel yet/as much as you'd want; it's okay. It's easy to feel pressured by richer people, or by people who had opportunity we didn't have. It's okay: don't give up on your dream! Fuck off what others say! Take your time, you have your whole life to travel ♥️

Did you know, you can quit your job, you can leave university? You aren’t legally required to have a degree, it’s a social pressure and expectation, not the law, and no one is holding a gun to your head. You can sell your house, you can give up your apartment, you can even sell your vehicle, and your things that are mostly unnecessary. You can see the world on a minimum wage salary, despite the persisting myth, you do not need a high paying job. You can leave your friends (if they’re true friends they’ll forgive you, and you’ll still be friends) and make new ones on the road. You can leave your family. You can depart from your hometown, your country, your culture, and everything you know. You can sacrifice. You can give up your $5.00 a cup morning coffee, you can give up air conditioning, frequent consumption of new products. You can give up eating out at restaurants and prepare affordable meals at home, and eat the leftovers too, instead of throwing them away. You can give up cable TV, Internet even. This list is endless. You can sacrifice climbing up in the hierarchy of careers. You can buck tradition and others’ expectations of you. You can triumph over your fears, by conquering your mind. You can take risks. And most of all, you can travel. You just don’t want it enough. You want a degree or a well-paying job or to stay in your comfort zone more. This is fine, if it’s what your heart desires most, but please don’t envy me and tell me you can’t travel. You’re not in a famine, in a desert, in a third world country, with five malnourished children to feed. You probably live in a first world country. You have a roof over your head, and food on your plate. You probably own luxuries like a cellphone and a computer. You can afford the $3.00 a night guest houses of India, the $0.10 fresh baked breakfasts of Morocco, because if you can afford to live in a first world country, you can certainly afford to travel in third world countries, you can probably even afford to travel in a first world country. So please say to me, “I want to travel, but other things are more important to me and I’m putting them first”, not, “I’m dying to travel, but I can’t”, because I have yet to have someone say they can’t, who truly can’t. You can, however, only live once, and for me, the enrichment of the soul that comes from seeing the world is worth more than a degree that could bring me in a bigger paycheck, or material wealth, or pleasing society. Of course, you must choose for yourself, follow your heart’s truest desires, but know that you can travel, you’re only making excuses for why you can’t. And if it makes any difference, I have never met anyone who has quit their job, left school, given up their life at home, to see the world, and regretted it. None. Only people who have grown old and regretted never traveling, who have regretted focusing too much on money and superficial success, who have realized too late that there is so much more to living than this.

— Susanna-Cole King

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the-wanderer-that-stayed · 6 years ago

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So.. so tired..

Well, this week so far has been the most exhausting I've had in a very long time. My mum arrived Wednesday night, when she went to bed, I went out to District (my favourite emo/metal/alt-rock night) for the first time in 4 months.

The next morning, valentine's day, I woke up to my mum wanting to go for breakfast, but I was feeling worse than I had in over half a year, we still went out to eat tho, with me nauseous and half asleep with the stiffest neck imaginable. Later in the morning I had a doctor's appointment, and after I finally got to go for a nap back at the hostel while she did her thing. And then I woke up to go for dinner with my mum (you can see how little social life I have), and went to have some Greek food at Yefsis, the only place outside of Greece that nails Greek food. I didn't get to sleep that night tho, because I had to work midnight to 6am.

Once I got back from work I was absolutely broken and exhausted, but just my luck, the new guy sleeping in the bed underneath me snores like a fucking bulldog so I couldn't fall asleep until he was up around 10am... Anyway, who needs sleep, dark circles are the new eyeshadow :') Around 2pm my mum wanted to go for some food again (I'm never complaining about the food, just the fact that I need to go outside and deal with anxiety when getting it), after that we went to get my prescription meds and while waiting I got a message from Ryan, one of my old flatmates.

Now the thing about Ryan is that we used to be very, very close, it's safe to say he used to be my best friend. Then when our flat got evicted, I panicked and ran away after helping out with the bare minimum, while leaving the rest of the flat with all of the shit to throw out and stuff. I completely understand why he didn't contact me for half a year, but it hurt so much I cried for days on end when I first lost him. After a couple of months I got accustomed to not having him around, tho it was difficult, still.

The moment I received that message, asking if I was alright, felt so good. I don't know whether it's weak or strong to forgive that easily, but he meant the world to me and I want to make up for running away when they needed me.

Anyway, after talking to Ryan for a bit, he asked where I live now, and after explaining the hostel situation he wanted to stay here in the hostel for the weekend as well, as it's convenient with the bar crawl that he's been managing for almost a year by now. After hanging out with him for a while, the crawl started, so like any sensible person I tagged along until I had to go to work at 10pm (probably not the best idea, it was an exhausting shift).

Fast forward to coming back from work at 6am, Ryan was still awake as some of the lads on the crawl "didn't let him leave the stripclub" (fair enough, he still goes there after almost every crawl I think, next week I'm joining them). We had a smoke and talked a bit, like back in the day where everything was good and we all lived in our happy place, and then said good night with a friendly kiss like we used to in the prime of our friendship.

And then my alarm went off at 1pm to have lunch with my mum and a friend of hers. The evergrowing bags under my eyes hurt more and more every day at this point. My mum's friend, Sarah, is a really nice woman, living about an hour's train ride away, and with her own fair share of depression and anxiety. It was great getting to know her, it felt like I'd known her for way longer already. The food was good too, tho I got a bit too excited and burned my mouth several times in several places.

As I had the night off I decided to go on the crawl again, this time my mum wanted to come along too, so that was interesting. She's not really phased by me drinking, she's carried my drunk arse home before, and she had a great time. I really missed the bar crawl, I forgot how much of a social thing it is, while not being exhausting and full of expectations. I made 3 new friends that come on the crawl on a regular basis, I haven't had that many friends since the flat got evicted.

We had a great night which ended at burger king, it had been such a long time since I sincerely had fun. But as my mum wanted to meet up with another friend of hers in Oxford, I had to wake up at 9am. Unfortunately for me, the guy underneath me still snores like a chainsaw, so I couldn't fall asleep. Around 6am Ryan returned to the hostel, so we went outside for a smoke again. He'd smuggled a duvet outside to lie on while smoking (fantastic idea), and we stayed outside for over an hour, and after a while we started getting it on again like we used to, but when we looked up at some point we realized it was way to bright outside to go on so we'll just leave that til next time 😅

When we went back inside to go to sleep I texted my mum that I still hadn't slept, and she texted her friend to ask whether she would make it to Oxford, but thank fuck she said she wasn't, so I finally got to sleep for a bit, tho I've been waking up every half hour or so.

Anyway, I'm going for some food again with my mum.

As always, if you want to know more, send a message.

See y'all next post 💚

Bonus pic: me and my mum (my eyes are red af)

#brighton #hostel #im so tired #food #sleep #i need sleep #cant sleep #i don't have time to breathe

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