#is this the medication or just my personality and the way i’ve developed with condition? who can say

[lucky-clover-gazette]

i have the type of adhd that makes me try aggressively harder until it consumes me when it’s extremely difficult to acquire medication, instead of giving up because phone calls scary

[reasonsforhope]

Story from the Washington Post here, non-paywall version here.

Washington Post stop blocking linksharing and shit challenge.

"The young woman was catatonic, stuck at the nurses’ station — unmoving, unblinking and unknowing of where or who she was.

Her name was April Burrell.

Before she became a patient, April had been an outgoing, straight-A student majoring in accounting at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. But after a traumatic event when she was 21, April suddenly developed psychosis and became lost in a constant state of visual and auditory hallucinations. The former high school valedictorian could no longer communicate, bathe or take care of herself.

April was diagnosed with a severe form of schizophrenia, an often devastating mental illness that affects approximately 1 percent of the global population and can drastically impair how patients behave and perceive reality.

“She was the first person I ever saw as a patient,” said Sander Markx, director of precision psychiatry at Columbia University, who was still a medical student in 2000 when he first encountered April. “She is, to this day, the sickest patient I’ve ever seen.” ...

It would be nearly two decades before their paths crossed again. But in 2018, another chance encounter led to several medical discoveries...

Markx and his colleagues discovered that although April’s illness was clinically indistinguishable from schizophrenia, she also had lupus, an underlying and treatable autoimmune condition that was attacking her brain.

After months of targeted treatments [for lupus] — and more than two decades trapped in her mind — April woke up.

The awakening of April — and the successful treatment of other people with similar conditions — now stand to transform care for some of psychiatry’s sickest patients, many of whom are languishing in mental institutions.

Researchers working with the New York state mental health-care system have identified about 200 patients with autoimmune diseases, some institutionalized for years, who may be helped by the discovery.

And scientists around the world, including Germany and Britain, are conducting similar research, finding that underlying autoimmune and inflammatory processes may be more common in patients with a variety of psychiatric syndromes than previously believed.

Although the current research probably will help only a small subset of patients, the impact of the work is already beginning to reshape the practice of psychiatry and the way many cases of mental illness are diagnosed and treated.

“These are the forgotten souls,” said Markx. “We’re not just improving the lives of these people, but we’re bringing them back from a place that I didn’t think they could come back from.” ...

Waking up after two decades

The medical team set to work counteracting April’s rampaging immune system and started April on an intensive immunotherapy treatment for neuropsychiatric lupus...

The regimen is grueling, requiring a month-long break between each of the six rounds to allow the immune system to recover. But April started showing signs of improvement almost immediately...

A joyful reunion

“I’ve always wanted my sister to get back to who she was,” Guy Burrell said.

In 2020, April was deemed mentally competent to discharge herself from the psychiatric hospital where she had lived for nearly two decades, and she moved to a rehabilitation center...

Because of visiting restrictions related to covid, the family’s face-to-face reunion with April was delayed until last year. April’s brother, sister-in-law and their kids were finally able to visit her at a rehabilitation center, and the occasion was tearful and joyous.

“When she came in there, you would’ve thought she was a brand-new person,” Guy Burrell said. “She knew all of us, remembered different stuff from back when she was a child.” ...

The family felt as if they’d witnessed a miracle.

“She was hugging me, she was holding my hand,” Guy Burrell said. “You might as well have thrown a parade because we were so happy, because we hadn’t seen her like that in, like, forever.”

“It was like she came home,” Markx said. “We never thought that was possible.”

...After April’s unexpected recovery, the medical team put out an alert to the hospital system to identify any patients with antibody markers for autoimmune disease. A few months later, Anca Askanase, a rheumatologist and director of the Columbia Lupus Center,who had been on April’s treatment team, approached Markx. “I think we found our girl,” she said.

Bringing back Devine

When Devine Cruz was 9, she began to hear voices. At first, the voices fought with one another. But as she grew older, the voices would talk about her, [and over the years, things got worse].

For more than a decade, the young woman moved in and out of hospitals for treatment. Her symptoms included visual and auditory hallucinations, as well as delusions that prevented her from living a normal life.

Devine was eventually diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, which can result in symptoms of both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. She also was diagnosed with intellectual disability.

She was on a laundry list of drugs — two antipsychotic medications, lithium, clonazepam, Ativan and benztropine — that came with a litany of side effects but didn’t resolve all her symptoms...

She also had lupus, which she had been diagnosed with when she was about 14, although doctors had never made a connection between the disease and her mental health...

Last August, the medical team prescribed monthly immunosuppressive infusions of corticosteroids and chemotherapy drugs, a regime similar to what April had been given a few years prior. By October, there were already dramatic signs of improvement.

“She was like ‘Yeah, I gotta go,’” Markx said. “‘Like, I’ve been missing out.’”

After several treatments, Devine began developing awareness that the voices in her head were different from real voices, a sign that she was reconnecting with reality. She finished her sixth and final round of infusions in January.

In March, she was well enough to meet with a reporter. “I feel like I’m already better,” Devine said during a conversation in Markx’s office at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, where she was treated. “I feel myself being a person that I was supposed to be my whole entire life.” ...

Her recovery is remarkable for several reasons, her doctors said. The voices and visions have stopped. And she no longer meets the diagnostic criteria for either schizoaffective disorder or intellectual disability, Markx said...

Today, Devine lives with her mother and is leading a more active and engaged life. She helps her mother cook, goes to the grocery store and navigates public transportation to keep her appointments. She is even babysitting her siblings’ young children — listening to music, taking them to the park or watching “Frozen 2” — responsibilities her family never would have entrusted her with before her recovery.

Expanding the search for more patients

While it is likely that only a subset of people diagnosed with schizophrenia and psychotic disorders have an underlying autoimmune condition, Markx and other doctors believe there are probably many more patients whose psychiatric conditions are caused or exacerbated by autoimmune issues...

The cases of April and Devine also helped inspire the development of the SNF Center for Precision Psychiatry and Mental Health at Columbia, which was named for the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, which awarded it a $75 million grant in April. The goal of the center is to develop new treatments based on specific genetic and autoimmune causes of psychiatric illness, said Joseph Gogos, co-director of the SNF Center.

Markx said he has begun care and treatment on about 40 patients since the SNF Center opened. The SNF Center is working with the New York State Office of Mental Health, which oversees one of the largest public mental health systems in America, to conduct whole genome sequencing and autoimmunity screening on inpatients at long-term facilities.

For “the most disabled, the sickest of the sick, even if we can help just a small fraction of them, by doing these detailed analyses, that’s worth something,” said Thomas Smith, chief medical officer for the New York State Office of Mental Health. “You’re helping save someone’s life, get them out of the hospital, have them live in the community, go home.”

Discussions are underway to extend the search to the 20,000 outpatients in the New York state system as well. Serious psychiatric disorders, like schizophrenia, are more likely to be undertreated in underprivileged groups. And autoimmune disorders like lupus disproportionately affect women and people of color with more severity.

Changing psychiatric care

How many people ultimately will be helped by the research remains a subject of debate in the scientific community. But the research has spurred excitement about the potential to better understand what is going on in the brain during serious mental illness...

Emerging research has implicated inflammation and immunological dysfunction as potential players in a variety of neuropsychiatric conditions, including schizophrenia, depression and autism.

“It opens new treatment possibilities to patients that used to be treated very differently,” said Ludger Tebartz van Elst, a professor of psychiatry and psychotherapy at University Medical Clinic Freiburg in Germany.

In one study, published last year in Molecular Psychiatry, Tebartz van Elst and his colleagues identified 91 psychiatric patients with suspected autoimmune diseases, and reported that immunotherapies benefited the majority of them.

Belinda Lennox, head of the psychiatry department at the University of Oxford, is enrolling patients in clinical trials to test the effectiveness of immunotherapy for autoimmune psychosis patients.

As a result of the research, screenings for immunological markers in psychotic patients are already routine in Germany, where psychiatrists regularly collect samples from cerebrospinal fluid.

Markx is also doing similar screening with his patients. He believes highly sensitive and inexpensive blood tests to detect different antibodies should become part of the standard screening protocol for psychosis.

Also on the horizon: more targeted immunotherapy rather than current “sledgehammer approaches” that suppress the immune system on a broad level, said George Yancopoulos, the co-founder and president of the pharmaceutical company Regeneron.

“I think we’re at the dawn of a new era. This is just the beginning,” said Yancopoulos."

-via The Washington Post, June 1, 2023

[butchpeace]

Begging you to stop assuming that trans people are just gay people who can't admit to being gay. I'm bi regardless of whether I'm the woman the body I was born into is supposed to make me or the man that I feel like I was supposed to be. I won't say that no one has ever transitioned to avoid homophobia, but there are better ways to address that than to stop genuinely transsexual people from transitioning.

I've been in therapy for 27 years. Since puberty sunk its teeth in me. NOTHING is going to make me feel like being a woman is the right fit for me and trying to force myself to fit into that box has made me suicidal for decades. Convincing myself I could just be a masculine woman barely soothed any of that. I'm sorry that transition wasn't the right fit for you, and you deserve all of the support you need for that, but it's no more fair to force me to be a woman just because of the body that I was born into than it would be to force you to keep identifying as a man and taking hormones.

I don’t know you and it’s none of my business how you live your life.

My opposition to transition is primarily due to the medical risks of testosterone therapy on women.

Testosterone causes our reproductive organs to atrophy, potentially irreversibly. I’ve heard stories of people who develop chronic pain, persisting even after stopping T. People whose ovaries no longer work correctly after only a few years on T, causing various problems from low hormone production. People with urinary incontinence and pelvic floor issues caused by T essentially putting them into early menopause. PCOS worsening. Ovaries twisting. People who have had unnecessary gynecological surgeries due to the effects of T. People with chronic chest pain after top surgery. People who developed arthritis in their joints, or autoimmune conditions while on T. People who had mental health crises triggered by being on testosterone. People with chronic debilitating vocal pain or clitoral pain due to the effect on those areas. People who developed cholesterol or blood pressure problems only after being on T, causing them to be at higher risk for heart health issues.

That’s just off the top of my head, and that’s just things I’ve personally witnessed in myself and friends, both trans and detrans.

Live your life, do what makes you happy. I’m not going to stop talking about this health crisis that’s currently affecting young women, many of whom are just gay or tomboys, and would eventually become fine with themselves if they were able to grow up with masculine female role models and actual feminist education.

Even if there was a small minority of “true transsexuals”, even if you are one of them, that doesn’t make what I’m saying wrong or unimportant. You can’t deny that women are getting harmed by transition.

[theautisticdoctor]

Entry #012

Hypermobility

A problem many autistic fellows of mine, including me, are suffering from is hypermobility. It's a underdiagnosed, underrecognized part of autism.

I personally deal with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS), which runs in my family. My great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother all have it, and so do I. It comes with a host of symptoms: atrophic scars, mitral valve insufficiency, postural / orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, gastric motility disorder, pelvic and bladder dysfunction, extremely soft and stretchy skin, and, of course, extreme hypermobility. I can bend my joints in ways that I only learned in medical school was abnormal, and I’ve often felt like a bit of a freak during skills practices. I remember asking an orthopaedic surgeon during training why people couldn’t do 90 degrees flexion and extension with their forefeet, only to be met with confusion. When I demonstrated what I meant, the look on his face was one of pure astonishment. This highlights how different our experiences can be and how misunderstood they often are.

One of the most frustrating parts is not being taken seriously by some doctors. I’m lucky to have a medical degree and trusted colleagues I can consult, but many autistic individuals don’t have this luxury. Too often, our symptoms are dismissed or attributed to our mental health, leading us to delay seeking help until things get really bad. Please, don’t wait. The longer you put off seeing a doctor, the harder it becomes to treat your symptoms. Find a physician who listens and takes you seriously. Hypermobility doesn't necessarily mean you have EDS, but hypermobile or not, moving and living isn’t easy. Chronic exhaustion is real and debilitating. I touched on managing energy levels in entry #003 with routines based on my modified spoon theory, which I call the cutlery theory. I’ll dive deeper into this in a future post.

Living with hypermobility means constant joint pain, frequent dislocations, and early arthritis. I’ve never known a pain-free day, and overdoing it physically just makes things worse. Recovery takes time, and I’m still figuring out if physical and mental fatigue recover together or separately. Overstraining definitely not only impacts physical, but also my mental state. Not everyone can access rehabilitation programs, but there are steps you can take on your own to make it a little easier or better. Start by tracking your symptoms to identify patterns. This can help you find ways to support yourself. Working with a physiotherapist or occupational therapist is ideal, but you can also use trial and error to find what works for you. I’m always here to brainstorm and offer support.

I’m a big believer in creative therapy. One exercise is to color in a body image to show where you feel comfortable, uncomfortable, or in pain. This helps you and your healthcare providers understand your condition better and develop a personalised treatment plan.

Also, braces can be a lifesaver for dislocated or overstretched joints, even though I hate wearing them. They help prevent further injury and aid in recovery. Despite the awkward looks and comments, they’re definitely worth it.

In conclusion, hypermobility is often a comorbidity of autism. It can cause mental fatigue and chronic pain, among other symptoms. Don’t suffer in silence, but find ways to accommodate yourself and make life easier. Medication and surgery aren’t always the answers, although they can help. Awareness and lifestyle adjustments can make a big difference too. Talk to your physician, physiotherapist, occupational therapist, and fellow patients to find what works for you.

[anarchoherbalism]

Hi I do education stuff including public facing sliding scale online workshops and classes n shit. More deets below cut

This workshop covers a variety of holistic pain management strategies for individuals and practitioners, primarily focusing on chronic pain.

Upcoming class date: Sunday March 3rd, 4:00PM-5:30PM EST

Registration: Send an email to mildewamyx(at)protonmail(dot)com and specify the email or phone # you would like me to send the class link & recording to. You don't have to attend live to recieve the recording but you do have to register.

Requirements: This is an intermediate-level workshop that assumes familiarity with western herbal terminology and herbal medicine making. (pssst! All background knowledge required is covered in An Anarchist Free Herbal)

Suggested donation: $15-$45; No one turned away for lack of funds

Recording policy: Registration is required to receive the recording. There will be an UNRECORDED q&a portion at the end of the class.

Background

I’ve been in pain every day for over half my life, from a varying combination of joint instability, neurological problems, and repetitive injuries. Like many chronically ill and disabled people, my experience of pain is not just a sense of urgency or a signal to stop doing something: It’s brain fog, immobility, dissociation, low empathy, a short temper, mood swings, both an ever-present sensation and something I have to actively remember to address. Naturally, I’ve spent a lot of my life thinking about and discussing extreme pain. Many friends and accomplices and I have been dissatisfied with pain management options available via western medicine; especially when we’ve been presented with potentially-dangerous long-term NSAID prescriptions or non-indicated medications with unpleasant side effects. Herbalism can offer a wider range of potential management strategies that can be compatible with western medical treatment for underlying conditions or offer relief to those of us who have chosen not to pursue or continue medical treatment for any number of personal reasons.

Course Description

Over the years, I’ve developed a set of specific indications centering around different experiences of pain, which I will now share with you! We’ll talk about ways of conceptualizing and communicating about pain and explore a wide variety of pain management options—Not just analgesic herbs (although don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty!) but strategies and practices for living with chronic and long-term pain like sensory redirection, ritual, nervous system support and more. This workshop intends to develop a rich, multifaceted and adaptable toolkit that focuses on increasing quality of life in difficult situations with strategically-targeted, doable steps.

[eldritchamy]

WAIT hold on hi abt the tags on the post about terfs being stupid about periods you reblogged - does HRT really end up causing similar hormone change cycles to periods? i've never heard abt that before and it's kind of boggling my mind because on the one hand why WOULDN'T HRT do that but on the other hand why WOULD it?

So keep in mind I am not an expert on the subject and everything I’m about to tell you is for the purpose of introducing you to the subject matter.

The short answer is yes. And it’s not similar to periods. It’s EXACTLY periods. Caused by the exact same hormones interacting with the body in the exact same way.

So yes it does happen, and it happens because a period doesn’t come from a uterus. It comes from the hypothalamus. A uterus is just the organ most noticeably affected by it. A uterus is not necessary whatsoever to experience period symptoms.

Everyone has a hypothalamus. It’s just a little thing in your brain that does some endocrine/hormone stuff. Under the right hormone conditions, ANYONE can have period symptoms. Not everyone can bleed because you need uterine lining tissue for that (some amab intersex people do! I’ve read at least one account from an amab person who found out they were intersex BECAUSE they had a small amount of uterine lining in their rectum which caused monthly bleeding when they hit puberty).

But literally every other period symptom is fair game.

And yes, that sucks.

If you want quick links to some sources I’ve read about the subject without clicking through for my rambling bullshit, here:

Yes, Trans Women Can Get Period Symptoms (2016)

Cycle Dynamic - Why Trans Women Can Have Periods (2018)

If you DO want my rambling bullshit, buckle up because I’m Very Normal when I find a subject interesting.

The background fact you need to understand the rest of this is that the human body doesn’t actually HAVE separate “versions” of anything for ‘male’ and ‘female’ bodies (I may be using these terms more liberally than they should really be used for ease of reading, but for the record the gender binary is bullshit, which is the point of where this is going). Even a penis is just a modified clitoris. It’s not an analogous structure. It’s literally the exact same organ. (And it does change in response to hormones).

The human body is just the human body. It decides how it behaves based on chemistry, not genetics. There are CERTAIN STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT (namely embryonic/EARLY fetal and puberty) in which major diversions in form and function happen. And of those embryonic is faaaaaaar more significant because it’s what sets the harder to change things (primary sex characteristics) in place. Most secondary sex characteristics can be changed later just by changing the hormone chemistry of your body, which is the entire principle behind why HRT is possible.

At no point ever in the entire span of a human life cycle does anything like “oh okay, you have a BOY hypothalamus :) enjoy :)” happen. You just have the same hypothalamus as everyone else, barring medical conditions.

SO. Basically how it works is your hypothalamus knows how much estrogen is in your body at any given time, and if it notices a spike in that level, it says to itself, “OH SHIT! WE HAVE A MATURE EGG! Time to MAKE SOME CHANGES.”

Your hypothalamus does not know or care whether you have a uterus. It only responds to the estrogen cycle.

Both cis and trans women (and anyone else who either has a working uterus or takes an estrogen supplement, but again, using simple language to get the ideas across) have estrogen cycles.

In CIS women, the estrogen cycle is internal and based on ovulation. TL;DR, your ovaries release different amounts of estrogen throughout the cycle based on the maturity of an egg cell.

In TRANS women, the estrogen cycle is external because we get our estrogen from pills or injections instead of from ovaries, and it’s based on how your body metabolizes that medication. You usually get a big hit around the time you get the dosage and then it tapers off until you take the next dose. Back to this in a second.

IN EITHER CASE, your hypothalamus tracks those changes and responds to them by releasing the period hormones (GnRH (Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone), FSH (Follicle Stimulating Hormone), LH (Leutinizing Hormone)) at a certain point in that cycle. When your hypothalamus feels that estrogen spike, it doesn’t CARE where that estrogen came from because it’s not its JOB to know where the estrogen came from. It only cares that it’s there. And you have the exact same hypothalamus no matter what genitals you have.

This next bit is speculation on my part based on experience and anecdotal evidence, but it seems like the greater and more predictable the VARIATION over the course of that cycle, the easier it is for your hypothalamus to be like “AHA! NOW!” and keep you on a regular cycle. Trans women who take INJECTIONS, which are on a much longer release schedule than pills, tend to experience more ups and downs in their estrogen levels and more noticeable, and regular, period symptoms. FOR ME, I’ve only ever been on pills, at a few different dosages. Earlier on I noticed that for (surprise) about 3 to 5 days every month, I would get all kinds of symptoms like headaches, backaches, joint aches, muscle aches, irritability, mood swings, depressive episodes, odd cravings (usually just crunchy and salty but sometimes really specific things), bloating, cramps (yes really), gastrointestinal stuff, etc. I suspect, with no evidence either way, that these symptoms were mild, but I’ve heard other trans women describe their symptoms as much less severe than mine, so idk.

ALSO earlier on, I used to take all of my pills at once, one time per day. I noticed something interesting when I switched to splitting my dosage and taking half twice a day: a huge reduction in severity and regularity of period symptoms. My levels are a lot more consistent throughout the day now, and I guess my hypothalamus can no longer sense a spike in my levels. (It used to be ESPECIALLY severe when I ran out and it took a few days to get my prescriptions refilled, cause then I had an estrogen crash (which gives you symptoms of menopause and wow THAT’S a wild ride, hot flashes are the actual worst) followed by a spike when I got back on them and almost always would have a super noticeable period within days of this happening).

So when I started spreading my dosage throughout the day, I basically made my hypothalamus too confused to know when to release those hormones. Either that or it thinks I’m pregnant. I’m not sure.

Coming back from that tangent.

It is a VERY KNOWN THING that when you take estrogen INJECTIONS, you need to work with your doctors a bit to figure out the exact dosage and timing that works best for you, because a lot of the time what happens with that is you’ll experience pretty severe dysphoria and depression symptoms in the days leading up to your next injection, and if this describes the experience of anyone you know, congrats, that’s PMDD (pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder), and you need your injections to be a few days closer together to prevent those symptoms. It’s literally your body experiencing an estrogen crash because your last dose wore off too long before you got the next one. This is also more common in people who take Progesterone.

The long and short of what happens when your hypothalamus registers an estrogen spike is that it releases the period hormones, which basically among other things go down to your abdomen and say W̶̫̬̒I̶̧̬̤͛Ĝ̴̦͆̽G̴̢̞̈́L̴̩͖̂E̷͇̲̊͐̀. And if you have a uterus, all that wiggling is what makes your uterus cramp up and squeeze out its lining and start bleeding. It ALSO has the delightful side effect of not really caring enough to target the uterus specifically, so it also makes your INTESTINES start cramping up and squeezing themselves, so fun fact that’s where period shits come from if you have those.

Everybody say “thank you, hypothalamus.”

So yeah that’s why it happens. The TL;DR is blame the hypothalamus. The human body is differentiated by chemistry not chromosomes. Put the right chemistry in place and you can absolutely get periods.

And yes, they suck for us too.

[satanachia666]

Hot take: Taking medication for mental health reasons is NOT the enemy of spirituality. Medication doesn’t inherently dull/reduce your intuition, psychic abilities, or spiritual gifts. In fact, in my experience, taking medication is an important form of psychic self-defense for many of us neurodivergent people. I find that when I take my medication, I’m more grounded, which helps me function better in both a worldly way and spiritual sense. Medication also makes it easier for me to use discernment and apply the knowledge I’ve gained as a worldly and spiritual being to my life. Taking my medication regularly has contributed to a lot of the progress I’ve made in my life, health, and spirituality. I’m far from perfect and still have my struggles, but I’d be far worse off without my meds.

I have no doubt that if applied without a bigoted lens, medical science, psychology, medicine, and medication count as healing magics in their own right. While it’s possible to experience problems with any of the aforementioned things, I’ve found that they’ve helped me WAY more often than they haven’t. It’s true that the medical world has a lot of catching up to do in terms of social issues, seeking unbiased research, and giving people the help and care they need. Nonetheless, I still got the COVID vaccine because the science behind it is MUCH more solid than any other available option out there, and I’m happy with my decision. Getting vaccinated didn’t reduce my spiritual awareness or intuition, nor did it change my DNA.

Any spiritual fear-mongering related to COVID vaccines is anti-science and harmful because it’s not only fake, but it actively discourages people from getting vaccinated for COVID or even just the flu shot. When less people get vaccinated, sickness is more likely to spread, especially to people with compromised immune systems. This is all-around Not Good. If this sounds like you, then at some point, you need to ask yourself why you need to do *this specific thing* (not getting vaccinated) to protect/cultivate your spirituality, when there are plenty of other ways to do exactly that without endangering other people in the process.

It’s not your fault if you can’t get vaccinated due to health reasons. I realize it’s not possible for everyone. But many people who aren’t getting vaxxed are not in that situation and are deliberately refusing to get vaxxed, including for spiritual reasons.

If you’re actively not getting vaxxed because you think not getting the vaccine will benefit you spiritually, you’re wrong. If you think not getting vaccinated somehow benefits the world, you’re wrong. If you don’t understand how refusing to get vaccinated when you can/should is bad for humanity (especially for people with chronic conditions and disabilities), I definitely question where your spiritual journey is taking you and what you’re getting out of it. After all, part of developing spiritual awareness is realizing how your actions impact other people.

I encourage all of you to question all anti-science rhetoric and conspiracy theories. While I don’t think the people who fall for these ideas are necessarily bad people, I think they’re misinformed to their own detriment. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Plus, I’ve learned that it’s much easier for ill-meaning entities and malevolent spirits to attack and manipulate people who aren’t taking psych meds when they actually need them. I’ve experienced this myself and I’ve seen it happen multiple times since then. Basically every time a person doubled down on not taking their meds, the more they were attacked and harassed by bad spirits and entities with ill will. Taking the right psych meds makes it harder for spirits and entities to aggress you. Don’t say you’ll skip meds in favor of psychic protection techniques when medication is already an important part of protecting yourself mentally.

If you’re someone who needs psych meds, then the stability you get from taking them will benefit your life, health, and spirituality way more than not taking them ever will. Getting vaccinated won’t change your DNA or hinder your psychic growth, but there’s a good chance it could either prevent you from contracting COVID or decrease the severity of your case. That alone makes it worth it. There are plenty of others ways to cultivate your spirituality and psychic abilities that don’t involve risking your life and other people’s lives.

Question anyone who tells you to forgo any kind of medical treatment or psych treatment you need in the name of their spirituality. They have their own agenda they want you to conform to. Cults often encourage people to refuse medical and psychiatric treatments in favor of prayer and other practices that aren’t science-supported treatments on their own. Science is its own form of magic and embracing it won’t hinder your spirituality.

[tobeabatman]

fatness and health

Being fat means that people call me unhealthy even though I’ve been to all possible blood tests and I’ve been described as ”healthy” by all the health professionals I’ve met… And there’s no reason they would believe otherwise besides my weight.

And so what if I will become sick in the future? I probably will: my family already has all sorts of conditions that me, and my skinny siblings alike, will most likely develop in the future. You too, will become sick at some point, regardless of how good you think your health is. You might also get into an accident and die any day.

You see, if fatness was as unhealthy as you think, fatphobia would have started as an actual medical concern, and not as eugenicist propaganda. I’m not saying that fatness and certain conditions have no correlation: we know that they do. However, this doesn’t mean that fatness causes those conditions: researchers and doctors have kind of just assumed that it does, and further research is still ongoing.

We also have research stating that ”obesity paradox” exists. And there is research claiming that slightly overweight people (BMI under 30) live even longer than skinny people.

And whether that or any research is true or not, it doesn’t change the fact that fat people don’t need to change their bodies. Heavy smokers can die even 12-13 years earlier than non-smokers, but heavy smokers still do not owe you smoking cessation. We fat people also don’t owe you weight-loss, just because some research states that people with a BMI higher than 30 die about 4-6 years earlier than people with a ”normal” BMI (BMI is not accurate, but it is also what most weight-related research uses).

(…Even just an every-day (non-heavy) smoker can lose 8 years of their lifetime: if you cared about our health and lives so much, then you’d also go harass skinny cigarette users about their health (I’m not advocating for it, but I recognize that there is a clear difference in how much shit we fat people get for our health vs skinny smokers). And for stuff like vapes, we don’t even know what they do to our bodies in a long term, yet! But I digress.)

Whether you think that we are ”glorifying obesity” or whatever, it doesn’t change the fact that we are human. We are not a type of subhumans you can bully or joke about. If we say we deserve respect, you should realize that that is a basic ass human right, and not a reason to whine about ”glorifying obesity”.

Especially if you are a part of another marginalized group, then it’s about time you educate yourself on fat experiences. I for sure want the queer community to accept my body the way it is.

We just don’t owe you weight-loss, we don’t owe you our health history, we shouldn’t have to listen to any bullshit on how we are a burden on society. The point of society is to take care of the people who need care!!

If you ask me, I believe a massive part of why we fat people die faster isn’t our fatness: it’s medical mistreatment, unemployment, homelessness, and poverty, all of which are more prevelent among fat people.

I know of too many fat people who have died because of medical professionals not taking them or their health seriously: my ”obese” grandpa actually died in surgery in which not all safety protocols were followed. This isn’t necessarily proof of medical mistreatment because of fatness, but he was a 70 year old ”obese” man with type 2 diabetes, BED, and sleep apnea. This make him at least an example of a fat person who died not because of his fatness, or other conditions that are correlated with fatness. My other, skinny, grandpa died 7 years earlier than my fat grandpa with diabetes and sleep apnea.

And I know that some troll will likely reblog this as well: someone even reblogged my book recommendation on a book that debunks parts of fatphobia. You guys are literally broken records that dedicate their entire accounts on reblogging fat people’s content as a way to get back at them… Kinda pathetic and useless: you guys think you can say anything more hurtful about my weight than my own literal mom said to me at 9? You’re most likely grown ass adults: go do something else instead of scrolling tags related to fatness and reblogging every single post with the same talking points.

[homeostasister]

I’m in a very Modeling sort of mood right now, so have a framework for life based on the levels of organization in biology:

Biosphere—The actual world we’re living in, and the knowledge and experiences we have of it that provide a reason to keep living, independent of values and goals—the existence which precedes essence, so to speak.

Ecosystem—The values you hold, the things that matter to you and that you want to support in some capacity.

Community—The system and environment you’re directly a part of, which impacts both the conditions of your day-to-day existence and the means by which you learn to support your values.

Population—Your obligations and responsibilities to the people around you, which emerge as a result of your own personal values and the needs and values of your community.

Organism—A long-term plan for your own life. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy or certain, but it should hopefully give you a starting point for how you could fulfill the different levels of organization. Right now I think my plan is to major in environmental science and try to get involved in restoration work at my school, and see what emerges as a result of that.

Organ systems—The practical goals you set to work towards fulfilling your plan and engaging with your community in a functional, enjoyable, and sustainable way. I’ve been taking a break from school to figure out exactly what these are for me.

Organs—The specific obligations and responsibilities that come about as a result of the goals you set for yourself and the things that people need from you—the work you have to do, the things you need to schedule, the ways you can support the people you care about, including yourself.

Tissues—The short-term means by which you fulfill your obligations—the strategies you use to stay organized, motivated, and happy in the life you’re trying to live.

Cells—The physiological and psychological mechanisms by which these strategies work—which you don’t necessarily have to know, but I’d say the more you can work towards figuring out why and how something works for you, the better equipped you’ll be to apply it appropriately.

Organelles/molecules/atoms—The physical basis for everything that you do and are. Every level of biological organization actualized—your evolutionary history, your genetic makeup, your environmental influences, your individual development, the physiological and molecular mechanisms by which you are able to maintain homeostasis and interface with the world around you. The essence which precedes existence, and which is never going to be truly and completely understood, no matter how thoroughly we work to tease it apart. And for so long I’ve been living in this mindset of wanting to Know Everything and Unify Everything, and thinking about molecular biology always gets me in that emotional space, only now that I don’t feel like I actually Have To Keep Learning About Molecular Biology, it’s honestly just exhausting. I hope it’ll be less exhausting once I’m off my medication, and I can engage with molecular biology and immunology as I want to engage with all of biology—with empathy and curiosity and appreciation, and the occasional research rabbit hole.

[killian-whump]

Obligatory Health Post

Some of you might remember my right ear from such happenings as “What the fuck is this noise in my right ear?” “Why won’t this noise go away?” and, my personal favorite, me likening the noise to this:

At some point, I stopped bitching about it. It didn’t go away, mind you, but I just got sick of talking about it and - I assume - everyone else probably got sick of hearing about it. I did, however, continue seeing doctors and trying to figure out what the fuck was wrong with the damn thing. Well, long story short, my ear is perfectly fine - but I got a CT Scan a few months back that showed, and I quote, “a constellation of abnormalities” inside my motherfucking head.

Chief of which is “severe” venous sinus stenosis - fancy medical words that basically mean the main vein that moves blood (and cerebral spinal fluid) out of my head and into the rest of my body is functioning about as well as JJ Sneed’s knees at this point. The noise I’m hearing is the blood (and CSF) literally having to force its way through the vein.

Allegedly, I can somehow continue being not-dead with this shitty hardware malfunction going on, but it’s causing a back-up of cerebral spinal fluid inside my skull, as it’s not able to drain properly. So my head is, right now, literally full of shit you guys. There’s so much shit in there, and the situation’s been building up for so long, it’s actually changing the shape of my skull. Fascinating.

Pictured Here: a slightly less alarming way to reshape one’s skull.

Aside from remodeling my brain cavity, the fluid also causes headaches and dizziness and nausea and coordination problems and visual disturbances... that eventually lead to blindness. The condition’s called Pseudotumor Cerebri, because the symptoms basically mimic those of a brain tumor. Or, as my sister puts it, “All the fun of a tumor without the cancer.” I mean, I guess.

Thankfully, I only have some headaches and the infernal noise from hell inside my right ear. However, I have an appointment with a new doctor on Friday - who is going to give me some kind of massive eye-and-head exam that’s supposed to take 3-6 fucking hours. He’s gonna tell me how bad the fluid issue is and what I might have to do about it (could be nothing, could be meds, depending mostly on whether or not he thinks I’m in danger of losing my sight). I’m hoping he can determine that through the eye exam and the scans I’ve already had done - otherwise, he might order a spinal tap to measure the pressure on my brain. The only way that’s gonna happen is if he gets me so motherfucking high I have no clue where the fuck I am or what’s going on - which would be like any other day for me, really, aside from the ginormous needle in my fucking back.

The doctor’s also going to tell me what we’re going to do about the stenosis itself. That’s likely going to be “do nothing and keep an eye on it” or “put in a stent” - depending on which route the doctor feels poses less of a stroke risk. If he does nothing, then I’ll probably need to be on meds (reportedly unpleasant ones, yay) to control the fluid in my head and keep getting CT scans to keep an eye on the stenosis’s development. If he opts for the stent, it should fix everything all in one quick shot, but it means 24 hours in the ICU and fucking brain surgery. If I need to be higher than a kite to even consider getting a spinal tap, just imagine the kind of carnival of insanity I’m gonna need to survive that.

However, the stent is metal, so maybe I’ll set off metal detectors? Also, I might be able to get away with calling myself a cyborg afterwards. I mean, it’s not a pacemaker or anything, but it’s metal in my body, right? If I can’t be a cyborg I just don’t see the point of any of this at all.

Anyway... Despite my attempts at humor here, I am scared to death. Humor’s just my way of dealing with... Well, everything. The only alternative is not dealing with it at all, which... Well, let’s just say that there’s at least a 50% chance that on the day of whatever procedure I have to get that I’ll just be here posting Colin pics and talking about his butt like nothing’s going on at all - because I’ll be hiding in the fucking coat closet of the medical clinic, praying the wifi signal holds because Colin’s butt is magical and might be the only thing that can save me 😭

Pictured Here: Magical Leather-Clad Butt of Wonder

So that’s your update! Friday’s the day. Please send me good vibes, positivity, prayers, Colin shower GIFs, butts, or whatever it is you feel comfortable doing. I could really use the help. I’m (probably not really, but maybe) dying here 😭

[yourbrainonbraindrugs]

How to stop taking your mental health medication: the right way

First, let’s acknowledge where I am coming from. I have Bipolar 2, and consider myself in remission. And I have never stopped medication ever since I started a year ago. I’ve taken all of my meds nearly daily, I may have missed about ten total days in the last year. I’m very diligent with it. I am not a mental health expert or professional in any regard, but I work very closely with my psychiatrist and therapist to maintain a strong understanding of my brain and my meds. Before reading this post, I recommend doing the same — working closely with whoever prescribed your meds and whoever helps your brain work through things. And also, acknowledging that this post is not a legitimate guideline, but rather, a kicking-off point to help you and your prescriber adjust your medications. If this post sounds helpful, show it to your doctor and let them walk you through what may or may not work for you.

Next, let’s talk about the purpose of medication. Medication doesn’t heal the brain. If your disorder comes from trauma (and bipolar does), there’s a chance you can heal the brain in diligently intricate therapies over time. CBT, DBT, and other structured therapy work wonders on many trauma brains, but no one is guaranteed an understanding of their past, current, or potential brain development. It’s not common for people to consider themselves ‘in remission’ from a mental condition. I am lucky to feel safe enough to identify this way. But medication is the thing that, for many of us, makes therapy healing possible. Without meds, I am just talking at someone. With meds, I can ignore whatever my body is begging me to do in my bipolar symptoms, while actively addressing the root cause of my bipolar (for me, it is repeated grief — five major losses at different times). And if I’m only taking meds, I am simply keeping my body in a stable state. Nothing about my body is actually changing. I need my brain to want to make these brain drugs on its own.

Now, let’s look at how medication works. External chemicals are added to the body, and slowly sent to the brain. Many meds don’t kick in until 2 weeks to a month because often, the chemical itself has a hard time traveling the body, or perhaps the brain struggles to accept external chemicals like that medication — there are a number of reasons but any medication that takes time to get on, is likely to need time to come off of. These external chemicals help balance the brain’s bio chemicals by blocking certain receptors, activating others, or creating new ones. The brain almost always becomes reliant on these medications for making these changes, and to stop taking the medication suddenly, it will shock the brain, because it won’t know how to make these chemicals on its own. Depression worsens than before, because before, there were times when you could encourage your brain to make the chemicals you needed to feel better, but that won’t matter once those internal chemicals link to an external chemical.

So how do you stop?

TALK TO YOUR PRESCRIBER. Your psychiatrist or whoever prescribed you these meds NEEDS to know that you even WANT to see a day where you’re no longer reliant on medication. They are going to be the first person you call if something goes wrong, and they’ll need to know where you are in that journey at all times to accurately assist at any given moment. Also, there’s a chance you may still need some adjusting to find a working medication plan. That is pretty much necessary to find before you start to stop. You need to know what chemicals work before you can stop, because the specific meds that work will help inform the specific habits and behaviors that help manage the brain.

Determine why you even want to stop. Have you found a lot of coping mechanisms in therapy that have, for the long term, impacted your mental health towards the growth you intended? Have you figured out where your trauma comes from and how to manage symptoms on your own? Have you cut out anyone in your life who contributed to enabling trauma or abuse in your life? Are you confident in your stress management skills? Because if the only reason you want to stop is ‘i don’t want to be reliant’, then you’re probably going to remain reliant for a while. Hate to break it to you, but if you’re reliant, not wanting to be is not going to be enough motivation to get you through the next stages of stopping your meds. It’s difficult and often demotivating.

Choose a date! If you find yourself one day thinking “I feel like I can stop now”, then choose a day 6 months to a year from that day, to actually officially begin the process. Give yourself this time because you will need to assess how your body responds to stress with these intentions. If you go through another stressful event, are you struggling to maintain those coping skills while you’re still on your meds? If yes, you’re might not be ready to stop. I like to call this stage the ‘testing stage’, because here, you want to treat your body like it needs to pass a test, to prove itself capable of handling things without meds. Remember, it’s your BODY that is reliant on these meds — not You, Personally. Test your body, not by putting yourself in stressful situations but by being vigilant and intentional in monitoring your stress, mood, irritability, and etc. as you naturally go through life. 6 months to a year of mental health monitoring on a working medication plan will definitely help you make a more informed decision about what you want to do with your medication. This is where I currently am in my healing journey. I haven’t chosen a date but I’ve chosen a timeframe to choose a date! Give yourself as much time as you need.

After you’ve talked to your prescriber, begin stopping at their instruction. Some of your meds, you can stop cold turkey, and others, you need to ween off of. Some of those normally-cold-turkey meds are balancing out your weening meds, so those too will need to be weened off of. Only your prescriber can help you in this situation to know exactly which medication to stop, how, and when.

Closely monitor how your body is changing. During this stage, just like how you monitored your body before, you’ll want to watch what’s changing this time. Try to figure out which medication is causing which symptoms because you’ll likely experience symptoms as you come down. This is not because you’ve made the wrong decision, it’s because your brain has been relying on those meds and is now trying to make the bio chemicals on its own. If symptoms are difficult to manage, just go slower, and keep using those coping and management skills you’ve been learning in therapy. Over time, your brain will learn to accept the changes and even learn how to ‘make up’ for the external chemicals that have been reduced. But that can’t happen if you’re shaming and punishing yourself, that will only worsen symptoms.

Whenever you get to the end of the previous stage — for some, it will take months, for others, possibly years — discuss with your doctor when the right time to completely stop will be. And when that date is determined, spend the next several months doing what you did in step 4. Just monitor what it does and how it responds to stress. Remember that most brain disorders are incurable, so you’re probably going to experience symptoms. Again, that doesn’t mean you’ve made a bad decision. If you have a strong support system, a strong set of coping skills, and you’re in a safe environment, it is okay if symptoms return. Because you can always return to your safe places with your safe people, and those coping skills will be celebrated, by you and others.

And you’re off! Congrats, your goal has been met. But that’s just it, this is your goal, not everyone else’s — and that’s good, because your goals are meant to change over time. There might be a day where your goal will be restarting meds with a new plan. And that’s okay! Again, it doesn’t mean you made a bad choice or a mistake. This is all part of your life experiences, and none of it should be stigmatized, let alone by yourself. The goal is not to stop being reliant on medication, the goal is to have another way to manage your mental health. And if you lose that method for any reason, or if you go through something new that your method won’t work against, you shouldn’t hesitate to talk to a prescriber again who can help you. Hopefully, the same one from before, because they have a history with you that helps you make an even more informed decision.

Notes:

you have to stop expecting yourself to do this all alone. Mental health is a personal journey but being a person requires other people. We’re social creatures. Pretending like you’re capable of “adulting” all alone is asinine, especially if you have a diagnosable mental condition.

stop looking at yourself like you’re broken or sick. We only call these things mental ‘illnesses’ because they inconvenience us the way a virus or bacteria would. Your brain actually developed the best possible way it knew how. All of those horrible symptoms were designed to protect you from harm. Depression keeps you in bed because the people in your life or the systems you’ve lived under or etc are unbearable. Anxiety puts fear in you thinking you’re in danger. Your body and your brain are working together to protect you, the person, the experience beyond any flesh and blood. You, as a person, are not sick. You just have a brain that figured out the wrong lessons at the right time, and now you just need to get that brain to a place where it can learn the right ones, now.

Fire your doctor and find a new one if they aren’t doing a good enough job helping you, especially if the reason you don’t want to take your meds is because you don’t trust their judgement. There’s a doctor out there who will love working with you, who has the same goals and desires as you, and if it takes years to find them, it’s better than years of struggling all alone or with someone who doesn’t care how you need them to. Plus, you’ll get used to filling out new patient paperwork, it is a hassle but I’m a pro at it now. I’ve been switching psychiatrists as often as I need, and if I don’t like how one of them talks to me or about my mental health, I find a new one. I still work closely, asking all I can to understand, but I will not hesitate to fire someone if I don’t think they have my best interest in mind. Remember, you have hired a stranger to help with something deeply personal. If they’re not compatible, move on without remorse.

Please, please, please remember that I’m not a professional. You should never take internet mental health advice without talking to one first. I’m only sharing this as a basic guideline. I know I said that at the start but it needs to be emphasized. Please do not use this post as an excuse to stop your meds on your own. Even if you’ve been self-medicating, you need a professional to help you with this. And yes, this includes street drugs, alcohol, and any other substance you’ve been using to manage your stress. A professional is the only one who can truly help you walk through this.

Resources:

How psychiatric drugs work

How to stop taking psychiatric drugs

[confusedgoldenflower]

Pop culture has conditioned us to say "I forgive you" when someone apologizes, but you're not obliged to follow the social ritual, so I didn't.

I’m so glad someone added this!

No one is owed your forgiveness; for absolution from their actions they still performed and continued at an age they knew it was wrong and after being told it was wrong.

No one is owed absolution for taking away your childhood! For making you live in fear, and see what should be a safe place and one of learning (preferably also fun) as a DANGER. They don’t deserve to have that weight lifted off their shoulders—if they even felt a weight to begin with.

If one of mine came to me, I’d tell them I was impressed they were able to get over themselves enough to even come close to unpacking what the fuck their issues were back then and why they took it out on another child. I’d probably ask them what the bug was that they’d had up their ass for years on end because my largest vice is needing to know.

If they had a child(ren), I’d tell them that I hope better than either of us had for their kid(s) and for them to be a decent parent, but that no matter how good of a parent they are or person they’ve become, nothing would undo or override what they did to me. The years of fear, the buckets of tears and the insane levels of stress. The literal ptsd. (Literally, somehow, getting adults to join them!) All of which will impact me for the rest of my life.

But is it really being healed to demand catharsis and then revert when you’re told you don’t deserve it?

But my views on forgiveness are different than a lot of peoples’, and a lot of that is because of what I went through. There’s no right or wrong way to view “forgive and forget” in whatever light is best for you. Hence, I’ve added another view to this post.

Part of me wishes they would. I’m a believer is retributive karma: experiencing what you gave out. I want them to understand in the realest posisble terms what they put me through. But I also know the closest way is by proxy, and that my child self will never have catharsis. Her window for going to school without fear of a prosecutor is long past; even high school having been tainted. Her and all those other children she knew. We won’t get what we deserve.

Now I’m crying and forgot where exactly I wanted to go with this. I think just to show the severity of “child antics.” Those were formative years. Those were years designed to impact the rest of our lives. No matter what development and realizations or “healing” those bullies go through, it will never, ever excuse their behavior, nor will being better for their kids or nieces unwrite the deeply ingrained trauma patterns in our brains. Again, trying to “redeem” themselves by being better parental figures is good, but it’s not magic.

So I won’t be saying “I take the responsibility of your own actions off you.” But I will say “I curse you to hold more of the responsibility of what you chose to do to me, and you being a better adult (or parent figure) is the LEAST you owe everyone.”

Y’all can disagree with me, but I won’t be arguing with you. And yes, I’m healing. I’m in therapy. Still, that doesn’t mean I’m obliged to them, especially not to say “it’s okay you hurt me so deeply and so long because I’m in medical debt over therapy and spent years trying to overcome my own trauma.”

Life really does align in weird ways.

My bully from 5th grade who snapped my glasses in front of his friends just found me on social media a few weeks ago.

He wrote me a long apology saying how he was now a father to a 3 year old little girl and was taking her to get her first pair of little glasses in the next few days—and it brought back what he did. He said couldn’t ever handle the idea of someone doing that to her.

My first instinct was to tell him to get lost, but I realized I was getting what I always prayed for. I just wanted the people who were mean to me to eventually understand it—even if it took a personal experience to relate to and 14 years to open their eyes.

A piece of me healed in that moment as I gave him glasses advice for his daughter because I was the same age when I got my first pair.

Kids are really ruthless, but it takes a healed adult to reach out to apologize. And there is always time to change; it’s never too late.

[felicitymatima13]

Understanding the Role of Occupational Therapy in Mental Health Recovery

When we talk about mental health recovery, most people immediately think of therapy or medication, and I have to admit, I was one of those people. I had to sit down and ask myself the other day when I was preparing to go on my psych block for the first time since last year that what is going to be my role exactly here? Well, now I know the answer but I didn’t know before, OT focuses on helping people find meaning in their daily activities, which can play a huge role in their mental health. Research shows that engaging in these meaningful activities can improve mental health by adding structure, purpose, and better ways to handle stress (Crisp, 2022).

As an OT student, I’ve often wondered how our work fits into mental health, especially with clients who don’t have obvious physical problems. This was exactly my experience a few days ago when I was preparing my write-up and trying to decide on an activity for my client. I found myself thinking, “What activity should I choose?” My previous physical block seemed more straightforward—patients had clear physical limitations, so it was easy to identify activities to do with a patient like bathing or dressing. But now, faced with a client who has bipolar disorder and substance use disorder, I was confused. This person could bathe and dress themselves—so what was my role here as an OT? 

My confusion made me question the unique role of OT in mental health settings. What do we offer that psychologists, social workers, or psychiatrists don’t? As a third-year student, this felt like a question I should already know the answer to, especially since I’d had a psychosocial block before and I also know that OT is just way more than bathing or dressing. According to Homewood Health Centre (2024), OTs help individuals with mental health challenges engage in meaningful activities and improve their overall well-being. This made sense to me—but what if the patient already knows how to do those activities? They have no physical limitations, so for example with my patient, how does bipolar disorder affect their ability to function?

It was only after I thought deep and read through my observations and deductions that I wrote down before when I saw the light. As I thought more about it, I remembered that OT isn’t just about physical ability. For example, someone with bipolar disorder—especially during a manic phase—might struggle with attention, concentration, and task completion (Stan Clark, 2021). These challenges can make it difficult for them to perform activities like cooking, grooming, or leisure tasks that require sustained focus. This realization was a breakthrough for me. Even though my client might not have physical impairments, their mental health condition impacts their ability to complete activities that require cognitive skills, attention, and emotional regulation.

We always hear the word holistic in class and that’s what OT is- HOLISTIC, that’s what’s makes us unique. We look at the whole person—not just their physical abilities, but also their cognitive, emotional, and social needs. In the case of my client with bipolar disorder, I could focus on helping them improve their task completion skills through structured activities. These activities could also be used to teach mindfulness, develop effective coping mechanisms, and set healthy boundaries—areas where OTs can make a big difference (Courtney Gardener, 2024). It’s different from the work of psychologists or psychiatrists because we focus on practical, everyday tasks that help clients integrate therapeutic strategies into their daily lives.

Reflecting on this experience, I realized how i was so stuck in the mindset of my previous block. I was so focused on physical limitations that I wasn’t thinking “outside the box” as an OT should. This experience taught me that being an OT, especially in mental health, requires flexibility, creativity, and a holistic view of the person. It’s not just about what the client can or can’t do physically; it’s about how their mental health impacts their overall functioning and quality of life. It’s about helping people find meaning in their everyday lives, even when they seem capable on the surface

So, why are OTs in mental health? Because we bring a unique, holistic perspective that considers the person’s ability to engage in meaningful activities, their cognitive and emotional challenges, and their environment (HPCSA, 2022). We help clients navigate the complexities of their mental health conditions in a way that’s practical and grounded in everyday life. That’s what makes our role so essential—and it’s why I’m proud to be on this journey, even when it feels overwhelming.

In future practice, I will be definitely considering the fact that every client, regardless of their condition, has the potential to engage in activities that enhance their well-being. Our job as occupational therapists is to guide them toward those opportunities, empowering them to lead fulfilling lives.

REFERENCES

hw_admin. (2023, November 9). The Role of Occupational Therapy in Mental Health Treatment. Homewood Health Centre. https://homewoodhealthcentre.com/articles/the-role-of-occupational-therapy-in-mental-health-treatment/

‌Does Bipolar Disorder Affect Someone’s Ability to Learn? - International Bipolar Foundation. (2021, April 14). Ibpf.org. https://ibpf.org/articles/does-bipolar-disorder-affect-someones-ability-to-learn/#:~:text=Driven%20to%20Distraction%20by%20Mood

‌HPCSA. (2022, November 10). The occupational therapist’s role in promoting mental health -. Hpcsa-Blogs.co.za. https://www.hpcsa-blogs.co.za/the-occupational-therapists-role-in-promoting-mental-health/#:~:text=Occupational%20therapists%20use%20standardised%20assessments

‌Occupational Therapists and Mental Health Interventions - Moving With Hope. (n.d.). https://www.movingwithhope.org/posts/occupational-therapists-and-mental-health-interventions/#:~:text=Occupational%20therapists%20use%20activities%20of

[katlove80]

**From a Bipolar Mind: What It’s Like to Not Be Able to Do Anything But Sleep**

Living with bipolar disorder can be an emotional rollercoaster, characterized by extreme highs and devastating lows. One of the most challenging aspects for me is the periods of debilitating fatigue where it feels like the only thing I can do is sleep. It’s not just feeling tired; it’s an overwhelming sense of exhaustion that seeps into every part of my being, making even the simplest tasks feel insurmountable.

### The Overwhelming Fatigue

When I’m in a depressive phase, my energy levels plummet to the point where getting out of bed feels impossible. This isn't your average tiredness after a long day; it’s a bone-deep exhaustion that blankets my entire existence. The mental fog is so thick that concentrating on anything feels futile. My body feels heavy, and my mind is clouded with a sense of hopelessness. Sleeping becomes a refuge, a way to escape the relentless grip of depression.

### The Guilt and Shame

As I succumb to the need to sleep, guilt and shame often follow. Society values productivity, and there’s immense pressure to be constantly active and engaged. When I’m unable to meet these expectations, I feel like I’m failing. The guilt is compounded by the awareness that others might perceive my need for rest as laziness. But the truth is, bipolar disorder is a medical condition, and these episodes of extreme fatigue are a symptom, not a choice.

### The Isolation

During these times, isolation becomes a significant issue. The world keeps moving while I’m stuck in a cycle of sleep and inactivity. It’s hard to reach out to friends or family when I’m in this state, partly because I don’t have the energy, and partly because I fear judgment. This isolation only deepens the depression, creating a vicious cycle that’s hard to break.

### Self-Care and Understanding

Managing bipolar disorder is a constant balancing act, and self-care becomes crucial during these episodes. I’ve learned to be kinder to myself and to recognize that rest is a legitimate need. This means creating a supportive environment where I can sleep without feeling guilty and where I can slowly regain my energy. Understanding and compassion from loved ones also make a significant difference. Knowing that I have a support system that acknowledges my struggle helps alleviate some of the emotional burden.

### Seeking Help

If there’s one piece of advice I can give to others in a similar situation, it’s to seek professional help. Therapy and medication can play vital roles in managing bipolar disorder. Talking to a therapist provides a safe space to express feelings and develop coping strategies. Medication can help stabilize mood swings and reduce the severity of depressive episodes, making it easier to manage daily life.

### Conclusion

Living with bipolar disorder means navigating a complex landscape of emotions and experiences. The periods of extreme fatigue and the need to sleep are just one aspect of this condition. It’s essential to recognize these symptoms for what they are—a part of the illness—and not a reflection of personal failure. With the right support and self-care, it’s possible to manage these episodes and find a way back to a more balanced and fulfilling life.

[thomascarterpd]

Cerebral Palsy and Inclusion

The moment I knew I was different: A story for the fight for inclusion

Growing up with a disability, you may sometimes feel like you are different from your peers. Briar, an adult with cerebral palsy, writes about how she grew to understand that others around her may perceive her differently, and how she handled those perceptions.

As I sat on the bus on my way home from school the reality that I was ‘different’ to everyone else became apparent. I sat with another girl at the front of the bus in the area normally reserved for people with disabilities. She commented, “It was fine for me to sit here because of my hips”. I smiled confused as to what she meant, but then it dawned on me that I was ‘different’; I had a disability. It wasn’t until I became an adult that I realised just how much having a disability made you ‘different’ to others, and that life would be spent fighting to be included.

My cerebral palsy was so mild to begin with that it didn’t really register with me that I was ‘different’ to my peers. I knew that I had a lot more medical appointments and that all the physical therapy hurt a lot. I knew that my handwriting was terrible, and that I must be slightly ‘different’ to others as I got to type all my work at school. I still ran around and played just like everyone else and participated in things I could do, but it wasn’t until that moment on the bus that I realised that I was a person with a disability.

At that moment, I was determined that I wasn’t going to define myself by my disability. What I didn’t realise was how the world would define me by my disability. I was going to study hard, do my best at school, go to university and start a career, all of which I achieved, despite many people telling me I wouldn’t be able to do so. However, as I grew older, I developed more chronic health conditions. With every passing year and new diagnosis, my hopes and dreams of having a ‘normal life’ seemed to disappear.

My cerebral palsy was so mild to begin with that it didn’t really register with me that I was ‘different’ to my peers.

I have found myself in and out of employment, as I’ve struggled to find suitable jobs for a person with multiple health conditions. The barriers to employment come from some employers not being willing to provide flexible employment. It can also come from health professionals believing that I’ll never be in a position to work. I’ve seen that community attitudes towards people with disabilities, no matter how mild the disability, has left me on the outside unable to ever feel fully part of a community.

Read the full article to know more about Cerebral Palsy and Inclusion

[all-minds-matter]

Hello everyone, Lucas here. I’m a 26 year old learning to live with multiple mental health diagnoses including; BPD, CPTSD and MDD with psychotic tendencies. This journal is my attempt at externalizing my feelings about my journey of healing and hoping that it might help some people who don’t have a voice about their own problems to know they aren’t alone.

My Discovery:

You know that inner voice? The one that’s like a personal GPS, guiding you through life’s decisions, like reminding you to look both ways before crossing or nudging you towards that lemon ice tea you can’t get enough of. It’s a mix of a coach and a critic, especially when you’re beating yourself up over a mistake. But here’s the kicker: I recently discovered that what I thought was just me… isn’t just me. I’ve been hosting an uninvited guest in my head, let’s call him “Jeremy.” This guy, Jeremy, isn’t the cheerleading type. He’s been with me since I was a kid, whispering sweet nothings of the not-so-sweet variety, convincing me I’m less than, leading me down paths best left untrodden.

This revelation hit me like a freight train during a group therapy session focused on the not-so-gentle art of self-talk. We were peeling back the layers of self-criticism when suddenly, my internal dialogue split right down the middle. For the first time, I could hear “Jeremy” as someone separate from me. The realization that I wasn’t alone in my head was terrifying. I mean, hearing voices is one thing I never wanted to check off my list, and here I was, thinking I had just unlocked a new level of “not okay.”

The aftermath of this discovery had me floored — literally. I was a mess, tears and tremors, caught in the grip of fear. It felt like my mind had turned against me. But, salvation came in the form of my psychiatrist’s timely intervention. He explained that “Jeremy’s” presence wasn’t as outlandish as it felt. For someone juggling BPD, CPTSD, and MDD, hearing a voice like Jeremy could be part of the complex tapestry of my mental health. It seems my brain’s eclectic mix of conditions created the perfect stage for Jeremy to perform his unsettling monologues.

A New Chapter:

Switching meds isn’t always smooth sailing, but in my case, the timing couldn’t have been better. I was already in the process of tapering off my old antidepressants when “Jeremy” decided to crash the party. Given the new developments with my diagnoses, my psychiatrist thought it was time to introduce anti-psychotics into the mix. It’s been 2.5 days since I started the new medication, and the difference is night and day. My mood has lifted in a way I hadn’t dared to hope for. “Jeremy” has been unusually quiet, and there’s a newfound sense of joy threading through my days.

While I’m savoring this peaceful phase, I’m conscious that the immediate uplift might be due to the novelty of the new medication. There’s a chance its effects could diminish over time. That’s where my therapy plays a crucial role. Thankfully, my diagnoses respond well to Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), which equips me with skills to maintain this level of mental peace alongside the medication. I won’t lie — it feels daunting. The path to managing my mental health seems like a steep climb, and part of me questions if the effort is worth the reward. However, the thought of the people who care for me, who support me unconditionally, reignites my will to push forward. I owe it to them, and to myself, not to give up.