#national kidney month

[lets-donate-a-kidney]

It's National Kidney Month! Did you know:

Over 80,000 people in the USA alone need kidney transplants.

The average wait time for a kidney transplant is five years on dialysis.

Kidney donors actually have a lower risk of kidney disease, and a higher life expectancy, than the general population.

Donating a kidney can extend the recipient's life by 20-40 years!

Kidney donation is actually one of the "easier" surgeries, with most people only spending one night at the hospital.

In most countries it costs no money to donate a kidney, and in the USA you can get compensation for lost wages while recovering from surgery.

You don't need to know someone who needs a kidney before you donate one. In fact, these "non-directed donors" often enable the transplant waitlist to create donation chains, in which multiple people receive kidneys!

Registering as an organ donor means you could even donate an organ after you die, without needing to do anything while you're alive.

If you want to learn more, check out the National Kidney Registry, or you can read about my personal experience on this blog. Or, if kidney donation isn't right for you, there are other ways you can help folks with kidney disease!

[emotionsofateen]

Selena Gomez Via Instagram Story Sending Love to all the Lupus Warriors 🥺 and thanking the Lupus Research Alliance for their work 🫶🏼

[sayruq]

Police in the Turkish city of Adana detained 11 suspects, five Israeli and two Syrian, on allegations of organ trafficking, the Daily Sabah reported on 5 May. The Provincial Directorate of Security's Anti-Smuggling and Border Gates Branch began investigating after examining the passports of seven individuals who arrived in Adana from Israel about a month ago by plane for the purpose of health tourism. The two Syrian nationals, ages 20 and 21, were found to have fake passports. Further investigation revealed that Syrian nationals had each agreed to sell one of their own kidneys to two of the Israeli nationals, ages 68 and 28, for kidney transplants in Adana. During searches at the suspects' residences, $65,000 and numerous fake passports were seized. Israel has long been at the center of what Bloomberg described in 2011 as a “sprawling global black market in organs where brokers use deception, violence, and coercion to buy kidneys from impoverished people, mainly in underdeveloped countries, and then sell them to critically ill patients in more-affluent nations.” The financial newspaper added, “Many of the black-market kidneys harvested by these gangs are destined for people who live in Israel.” The organ-trafficking network extends from former Soviet Republics such as Azerbaijan, Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova to Brazil, the Philippines, South Africa, and beyond, the Bloomberg investigation showed. Accusations of Israeli involvement in organ trafficking also apply to the occupied Palestinian territories. In 2009, Sweden's largest daily newspaper, Aftonbladet, reported testimony that the Israeli army was kidnapping and murdering Palestinians to harvest their organs. The report quotes Palestinian claims that young men from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip had been seized by the Israeli army, and their bodies returned to the families with missing organs. "'Our sons are used as involuntary organ donors,' relatives of Khaled from Nablus said to me, as did the mother of Raed from Jenin as well as the uncles of Machmod and Nafes from Gaza, who all had disappeared for a few days and returned by night, dead and autopsied," wrote Donald Bostrom, the author of the report.Bostrom also cites an incident of alleged organ theft during the the first Palestinian intifada in 1992. He says that the Israeli army abducted a young man known for throwing stones at Israeli troops in the Nablus area. The young man was shot in the chest, both legs, and the stomach before being taken to a military helicopter, which transported him to an unknown location. Five nights later, Bostrom said, the young man's body was returned, wrapped in green hospital sheets. Israel’s Channel 2 TV reported that in the 1990s, specialists at Abu Kabir Forensic Medicine Institute harvested skin, corneas, heart valves, and bones from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians, and foreign workers without permission from relatives. The Israeli military confirmed that the practice took place, but claimed, "This activity ended a decade ago and does not happen any longer." Israel’s assault on Gaza since 7 October has provided further opportunities for the theft and harvesting of Palestinians’ organs. On 30 January, WAFA news agency reported that the Israeli army returned the bodies of 100 Palestinian civilians it had stolen from hospitals and cemeteries in various areas in Gaza. According to medical sources, inspection of some of the bodies showed that organs were missing from some of them. On 18 January, the Times of Israel reported that the Israeli army confirmed reports that its soldiers dug up graves in a Gaza cemetery, claiming its soldiers were trying to “confirm that the bodies of hostages were not buried there.”

[vicholas]

(...)Even under the best of circumstances, it is difficult to maintain a vibrant Olympics training program in Gaza, the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Nine months of war between Israel and Hamas has made that challenge next to impossible.

Much of the country’s sporting infrastructure, clubs and institutions have been demolished, said Nader Jayousi, the technical director at the Palestine Olympic Committee.

“Do you know how many approved pools there are in Palestine? Zero,” said al Bawaab, who noted that the Palestinian economy is too small and fragile to consistently support the development of elite athletes. “There is no sports in Palestine. We are a country right now that does not have enough food or shelter, and we are trying to figure out how to stay alive. We are not a sports country yet.”

The Palestinian diaspora has always played an important role at the Olympics and other international competitions, Jayousi said.

Jayousi said it’s not the first time that most of the athletes representing the POC come from abroad. He said the Palestinian diaspora is always represented at any big international sporting competition and Olympics.

More than 38,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the war between Israel and Hamas began, according to local health officials. Among those who died were about 300 athletes, referees, coaches and others working in Gaza’s sports sector, according to Jayousi.

Perhaps the most prominent Palestinian athlete to die in the war was long-distance runner Majed Abu Maraheel, who in 1996 in Atlanta became the first Palestinian to compete in the Olympics. He died of kidney failure earlier this year after he was unable to be treated in Gaza and could not be evacuated to Egypt, Palestinian officials said.

Only one Palestinian athlete, Ismail, qualified for the Paris Games in his own right. The seven others gained their spots under a wild-card system delivered as part of the universality quota places.. Backed by the International Olympic Committee, it allows athletes who represent poorer nations with less-established sports programs to compete, even though they did not meet the sporting criteria.

“We had very high hopes that we would go to Paris 2024 with qualified athletes,” Jayousi, the team’s technical director, said. “We lost lots of these chances because of the complete stoppage of every single activity in the country.”

Palestinian athletes will compete in boxing, judo, swimming, shooting, track and field and taekwondo.(...)

[feminist-space]

"“It’s not your fault,” I told 16-year-old Cara, whose mother died of a SARS-CoV-2 infection [Cara] gave her. To be clear, the doctor confirmed Cara (not her real name) had passed on the virus and Covid was entered on the death certificate as the cause of death.

Cara’s mother had not been outside their home in the weeks preceding her death.

When masks were dropped in the “Omicron’s mild” phase of the pandemic, Cara continued as the lone masker at school to protect her immunocompromised mother, who was undergoing chemotherapy. It was tolerable until a child psychotherapist said on the national airwaves that some girls would continue to mask anyway “to hide their acne”.

His words were used to bully her. Cara left, but without support from teachers she strugg­led. Her parents pleaded with the school to use the Hepa filter they bought. The school refused.

Cara eventually returned to school unmasked, caught Covid and infected her mam. It killed her. Cara self-harms because she blames herself. She hasn’t been to school since.

Research shows that more than 70pc of Sars-CoV-2 transmission in households started with a child.

The incidence was highest during unmitigat­ed in-person schooling. In a recent paper, Dr Pantea Javidan, of Stanford’s Centre for Human Rights, described the ways children’s rights to life, health and safety during the ongoing pandemic have been falsely rendered oppositional to education and development.

Methods used to manufacture consent to forcibly, repeatedly infect children, according to Dr Javidan, include minimising harms to children (“kids don’t get it or spread it”, “it’s mild”) and moral panic around mental health and educational attainment.

Regarding mental health, in August a study looking at paediatric psychiatric emergencies found school openings – not lockdowns – were associated with an increase in the number of emergency psychiatric visits.

In May, a study found that children with and without congenital heart defects showed increased risks for a variety of cardiovascular outcomes (including cardiac arrest, clots, palpitations) after Sars-CoV-2 infection.

In July, a study found that children and teenagers experienced cognitive impairment 12 months post-Covid infection, consistently correlated with poorer sleep and behavioural and emotional functioning.

Last month alone, several studies were published documenting Covid paediatric harms.

One found that children and adolescents experience prolonged symptoms post-Sars-CoV-2 infection in almost every organ system.

Study co-author Professor Lawrence C Kleinman said: “We have convincing evidence that Covid is not just a mild, benign illness for children. This is a new chronic illness in children. We need to be prepared to deal with it for a generation.”

Another study analysing paediatric and adult hospitalisations found teenagers were at greatest risk of severe disease among all children. Yet another study showed compelling connections between viral infection and subsequent autoimmune disease. Early in the pandemic, some children showed negligible Covid symptoms, only to later develop organ failure.

Researchers found the children’s immune systems had latched on to a part of the coronavirus that closely resembles a protein found in the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes and GI tract and launched a catastrophic attack on their own tissues. “Experts” who claimed asymptomatic paediatric Sars2 infections equals mild were catastrophically wrong.

Covid is consistently a leading cause of US child mortality. Paediatric mortality has increased markedly with each year of the pandemic in the US, UK and elsewhere. In 2022, over six times as many children died from Covid than from flu in the US."

[yessoupy]

Majed Abu Maraheel was Palestine's first flag bearer, in Atlanta ‘96. Abu Maraheel was killed in Gaza last month.

Due to the IDF's policy of destroying hospital infrastructure, Abu Maraheel was unable to get the care he needed and died of kidney failure.

You won't see Russian or Belorussian athletes at this Olympics (or, only very few) because the IOC banned them for their invasion of another IOC nation. You will, however, see Israeli athletes (even one who bragged of writing messages on bombs headed to Gaza), despite their ongoing war against another IOC nation, Palestine. Why the double standard?

In Paris at my ticketed events, I will wear a keffiyeh in the Fan Section. The IOC is stringently non-political, but this is allowed because it's a national symbol of a nation that is competing at the Olympics.

[mountrainiernps]

NPS Photo of a cedar tree at Mount Rainier National Park with a section of peeled bark. Shorter sections of bark like this could have been used to create folded baskets with sewed edges. Longer peeled sections are also collected for strips to weave baskets.

Native American Heritage Month - Western Red Cedar

Going back thousands of years, nearly every part of a Western red cedar tree has a use by indigenous people. The wood is harvested for house planks and posts, storage containers, canoes, ceremonial materials, and religious items. In coastal areas, the withes, or thin flexible branches, are made into ropes for whaling and for bindings. The roots are used for binding and basketry. Uses of red cedar bark include basketry, clothing, and cordage. Bark infusions were consumed to help regulate menstruation while an infusion of twigs and bark treated kidney conditions. Drinking infusions of boughs was used to treat colds, coughs, and sore throats. Chewing the buds served to relive the pain of toothaches.

Jack McCloud, a member of the Nisqually Tribe, describes traditional tools to peel cedar bark. “Back then we used like a sharp rock and pounded it through the bark. …to get it started you take anything sharp …, some people would sharpen a horn, something … to get underneath the bark. That is, all you have to do is get it started, then take it by the hand, and start peeling it. And you can peel it, if you are lucky, 50-60 feet… everybody had a different method… As we were told, take up to a third to a quarter of the bark and it won’t kill the tree, and we were taught that. Don’t kill the tree and let the tree grow again. It will grow back, some of the bark, not all of it.” (Jack McCloud 2015)

NPS Photo of bark peeling tools. Tools can be knives or fashioned out of antlers.

Studies of traditional cedar bark harvesting have found that bark harvesting in this fashion (peeling a single strip two-hands wide or no more than a third of the circumference of the tree) does not reduce the growth rates or survival of bark-peeled cedars.

Excerpts are from “Plants, Tribal Traditions, and the Mountain”, G. Burtchard, D. Hooper, & A. Peterson, 2024, pp 135-148. Available at https://go.nps.gov/Plants-TribalTraditionsReport

[woso-fan13]

Sicktember 2023: 15 (USWNT)

Sick in an Inconvenient Place

Your career was at an all time high. You would say it was peaking, but it seemed to get better everyday. You had millions of followers on social media, you were a brand ambassador for countless companies, you were constantly starting for the national team, you were on a freaking Wheaties box. To top all of that off, you weren’t old enough to legally drink or rent a car. 

Your days were stressful, to say the least, but that was to be expected. You would wake up before the sun rose to have time to run and get a few hours of unofficial practice before you had to go to the stadium for actual practice. You would then train with the team, recover, and then do assorted media/brand commitments in the late afternoon. After that, it was time for a quick dinner before a final run for the night. Then a shower, pajamas on, and into bed where you would update social media and respond to any messages. A few hours of sleep and you were up the next morning to do it again. 

It was exhausting, but it was necessary. If you wanted to be the best, it was necessary. At this place in your career, there’s no time to take a break.

So you continued. Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months, and your sacrifices became worth it as you could see your career growing. You were unstoppable. 

—-

You were not unstoppable, you soon found out. You didn’t wake up at your usual time, you must have been exhausted the night before and forgot to set an alarm. Despite the extra hours of sleep, you felt a bone-deep tiredness unlike anything you had felt before. 

Every muscle in your body hurts. As you moved to grab your phone off your nightstand, you were barely able to lift it. Your arm was shaking with the effort it took. 

You tried to power through these changes, forcing yourself out of bed and into the bathroom. You ignored the fact that your pee could have easily passed as tea, but the feeling in your chest made you stop. It felt like your heart was fluttering. 

You knew not to take any problems with your heart lightly, so you called your doctor’s office to try and schedule an appointment for that day. The very lovely nurse on the phone had informed you that there were no appointments available until the week after next before she asked you what your current symptoms were. As you listed them off, you heard the line go quiet for a few moments. 

Then, she was telling you to get to the emergency room. 

—-

As soon as you mentioned the problem with your heart, you were immediately seen. Once they ruled out a heart attack, they calmed down, but continued to leave you hooked up to a monitor as they completed various tests. You allowed your eyes to close as you waited for results. 

You awoke to someone standing in front of your face with a packet of papers and a pen. You listened as she rushed through an explanation of your condition- rhabdomyolysis, something you would have to research later. You weren’t fully paying attention until you saw her pass over a stack of consent forms. 

She walked through them with you, explaining everything. With each new form, you could feel panic rising. The first form was for admission to the hospital- not ideal, but okay. The second form was for admission to the intensive care unit. At this, your eyes shot up. 

You listened to an explanation on how your electrolyte levels were so unstable that you were at extremely high risk for cardiac irregularities and cardiac arrest, so you needed to be closely monitored. You were so focused on this that you didn’t notice as she continued talking about liver and kidney damage. 

The next few hours passed in a blur as you were transported to a private room in the ICU. Seemingly, your career successes caused you to get labeled as a vip, meaning you bypassed some of the rules. Normally, you would protest any special treatment, but you felt like you deserved nicer blankets if you would be staying in the hospital. 

You called your parents, sure that they would be made aware of it soon enough. They were concerned, but you reassured them that you were okay. You made it a point not to tell any of your teammates, knowing that they would freak out. 

By the time the sun went down, you were so exhausted that you fell asleep. You slept through the night, unaware of the constant medication adjustments and lab tests. 

—-

You woke up the next morning to the entire united states’s women’s national team crowded into the room. Several people were crammed into couches, asleep. Others had pulled chairs up around your bed, some of whom remained awake. They noticed your eyes opening. 

It was silent as you woke up, a competition to see who would speak first. Eventually, you broke, speaking a quiet,

“Sorry.” 

You were quickly stopped from apologizing and reassured that nobody was mad at you. What followed was an hour-long lecture about setting limits and not pushing yourself too far. 

Thankfully, the lecture was stopped when the door opened. A familiar head peaks in, a look of relief crossing their face. She pushes fully into the room, walking over to wrap you in a hug. 

“Oh, Y/N/N, I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“Me too, Mally. Are you doing alright?”

“Me?” she responds, sounding shocked, “you’re in an intensive care unit of a hospital. And you’re asking about me?”

You just shrug, a small smile on your face, “I really missed you.”

She leans down to pull you into another hug, squeezing tightly. You returned the hug similarly.

She pulls back, looking around the room. As you do the same, you realize that there are no empty chairs left. Painfully, you scoot to one half of the bed, motioning for her to join you. 

“I don’t think that’s allowed,” she says, shaking her head. 

“It’s fine, what are they going to do?” you respond, “they’re not going to kick me out to die on the street.”

Mal rolls her eyes before climbing in next to you. She wraps her arm around you, pulling you to rest against her. Your body relaxes, slumping against her. 

It’s silent in the room for a few minutes before Mal leans over to grab the bag she left on the side table. She rummages through it for just a second before pulling out a worn book. Looking at it, you recognize it as the one she had read last camp and had been begging you to read. 

She allows you to settle again, as you had been slightly displaced by her movement. Once both of you are comfortable, she opens to the first chapter. She begins reading- loud enough for the people in the room to hear, but quiet enough to be soothing. 

You allow yourself to be transported out of the hospital bed and into the fictional world, joining the characters as Mal describes them. 

[covid-safer-hotties]

Living with Long COVID: What it’s Like to be Diagnosed with the Debilitating Disease - Published Sept 3, 2024

By: Nicole Pajer

Even mild cases of COVID-19 are linked to potential long-term repercussions — some of them deadly serious

Chrissy Bernal has caught COVID-19 three times, most recently in ­October 2023. “My symptoms were always pretty mild,” she says. But after her third round of the virus, she ­developed extreme allergies to foods she used to eat all the time: oats, dairy, gluten, sesame seeds and peanuts.

“I literally have some level of anaphylaxis every single day,” she says. In May, Bernal, 46, a public relations professional in Houston, went into anaphylactic shock during a virtual meeting. “I had to inject myself with an Epi while everyone watched in horror on Zoom,” she says.

Natalie Nichols, 53, has been struggling with debilitating asthma and severe food allergies since she first caught COVID more than three years ago. “Last fall, I spent ­two-and-a-half months confined to bed, ­motionless, because moving, including holding a cellphone, made me too short of breath,” she says.

She’s also experienced brain fog, high blood pressure, hyper­glycemia, fatigue and gastrointestinal symptoms. Nichols, the founder of a nonprofit in Nacogdoches, Texas, recently underwent surgery to repair joint damage caused by COVID-induced inflammation.

Lorraine W., of Clarence Center, New York, was looking forward to an active retirement when she was diagnosed with COVID in March 2020. “I’ve never returned to my pre-COVID self,” says Lorraine, 65.

She’s on medication to treat small blood vessel damage to her heart and continues to battle a lingering cough, fatigue and breathlessness, as well as kidney disease. Neurological changes have made her legs unsteady when she walks, requiring her to use balance poles. “None of these conditions were present before COVID,” Lorraine says.

In June, the National Academies of ­Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine released a comprehensive definition of long COVID: “an infection-­associated chronic condition that occurs after COVID-19 infection and is present for at least three months as a continuous, relapsing and remitting, or progressive disease state that affects one or more organ systems.” According to that definition, 18 million Americans have experienced long COVID; currently, more than 1 in 20 of us are living with its symptoms. Researchers have begun to link long-term COVID with another recent phenomenon: our shrinking life expectancy.

The disease we’re forgetting COVID doesn’t seem that scary anymore. More than 98 percent of the U.S. population has some degree of immunity — from vaccination, prior infection or both — and Paxlovid and other medications are available to counteract acute symptoms. For many of us, contracting COVID is like having a bad ­upper respiratory infection.

But “COVID isn’t gone,” says Ryan Hurt, M.D., director of the Long COVID Research and Clinical Program at the Mayo Clinic. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that COVID still kills at least 1,000 people every week around the globe — but “we only have data from about 40 countries,” says Maria Van Kerkhove, M.D., director of WHO’s Department of Epidemic and Pandemic Preparedness and Prevention.

Older adults and those with preexisting conditions remain among the most at-risk populations for severe, acute COVID. ­People 65 and older accounted for 63 percent of COVID-related hospitalizations and 88 percent of in-hospital deaths during the first seven months of 2023, according to CDC data.

Although the dangers of acute COVID ­infection may have ebbed for many, the ­reality of long COVID is coming into view. Of those who contracted COVID-19 within the past four years, 10 to 20 percent have experienced long COVID.

“With every new case of acute COVID [the initial phase of infection when diagnosed or symptoms first appear], there is risk for developing long COVID,” says Caitlin McAuley, D.O., a family physician at the Keck COVID Recovery Clinic in Los Angeles. She’s had patients who developed long COVID fully recover, get reinfected several times with no lingering effects, then develop another case that leads to a new bout of long COVID. She’s also seen patients who got COVID twice with no lingering effects, and the third time they ended up with prolonged symptoms.

“We still have a number of individuals who had the first wave of COVID who are suffering from long COVID symptoms now, several of them many years out,” says Jerrold Kaplan, M.D., medical director of the COVID Rehabilitation and Recovery Program at Gaylord Specialty Healthcare in New York.

Having escaped long COVID previously doesn’t mean you won’t face it in the future. Indeed, some research has suggested that catching multiple COVID-19 strains puts you at increased risk. A study published in 2022 found that reinfection can increase the risk of complications in major organ systems, and these risks persist at least six months beyond the initial infection.

We don’t yet know the true impact of catching COVID. “Many chronic disease processes, such as cardiovascular disease, dementia and cancer, take years to develop. And whether acute COVID-19 puts people at risk for some of these issues? Time will tell,” Hurt says. What doctors do know is that patients are flocking to their offices complaining of symptoms they never had before COVID.

Is long COVID boosting our death rate? In July, COVID accounted for less than 1 ­percent of all deaths in the U.S. Life expectancy in the U.S. is 77.5 years, reflecting an uptick over the past two years but still lower than prepandemic levels. Many factors contribute to that statistic, but it’s clear that the long-term effects of COVID have played a role.

For example, a study in the journal Nature Medicine found that those hospitalized with COVID had a 29 percent greater risk of death in the three years after their infection.

“But what was also alarming is that in people who weren’t hospitalized, there was also an increased risk of a variety of medical issues,” says John Baratta, founder and codirector of the COVID Recovery Clinic at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Even patients who’d had mild bouts of COVID-19 had an increased risk of respiratory, cardiovascular, metabolic and neurological issues lingering for three years after the initial infection. Long COVID patients had a significantly increased risk of severe health issues affecting the brain, lungs and heart.

We have long known that an acute case of COVID can compromise heart health: Compared with those who didn’t contract COVID, people who caught the virus were 81 percent more likely to die of a cardiovascular complication in the ensuing three weeks, according to a study of 160,000 patients published by the European Society of Cardiology. But the risk lingers long after the symptoms abate. Those who caught the virus were five times more likely to die from cardiovascular disease as long as 18 months after infection, the same study found. Heart disease deaths, which had been on a downward trend for decades, began to spike in 2020 and remained high through 2022, the last year for which data is available.

Stroke, blood clots in the legs leading to clots in the lungs, abnormal heart rhythm (arrhythmia) and inflammation of the heart are among the challenges COVID poses, says Mohanakrishnan Sathyamoorthy, M.D., professor and chair of internal medicine at the Burnett School of Medicine in Fort Worth, Texas. In long COVID, this collection of cardiovascular disruptions can present as postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), in which patients’ heart rates increase abnormally when they go from sitting or ­lying down to standing up.

One theory to explain COVID’s long-term effect on the heart — and the body in general — centers on inflammation. “Every time you get infected with COVID, there is a possible increased risk of long COVID, and some cardiac disorders can occur — especially if you have a history of heart disease, including stroke, heart disease and heart attacks,” says Pragna Patel, M.D., senior adviser for long COVID at the CDC. All of these problems can be exacerbated by the virus entering coronary tissue and triggering inflammatory responses that can damage the heart.

Researchers say COVID may also alter the gut microbiome, a primary controller of inflammation, thereby triggering the immune system to rev up the condition. “There is no single agreed-upon mechanism that’s causing the issues,” Baratta says. “An individual may have multiple factors going on in their body, and not everyone will have the same underlying mechanism causing their symptoms,” which increases the complexity of both research and treatment.

One factor that seems to matter: vaccination status. “Several studies show that vaccination can decrease the risk of developing long COVID,” Patel says. Vaccination rates tend to increase with age, with people 75 and older being the most well vaccinated — hence the most well protected from long COVID, Patel theorizes. That may explain why long COVID most commonly affects people ages 35 to 64; the risk seems to drop for those 65-plus, according to CDC data.

From long covid diagnosis to treatment No single test can determine whether a ­person has long COVID. Doctors typically diagnose long COVID by reviewing the ­patient’s health history and current symptoms and trying to rule out other causes. A positive COVID test is not required, as someone could have been infected without knowing it, then experience strange symptoms later, Patel says.

Though there are many ongoing clinical trials on long COVID, there is no umbrella treatment. Primary care physicians address what they can, then call in specialists — such as a cardiologist to handle arrhythmia or a therapist to treat anxiety — for more targeted care. There are long COVID centers around the country where teams of professionals work to help patients through their unique symptoms.

“Because the effects of COVID are so wide throughout the body and mind, there will not be a single treatment for all long COVID issues,” Baratta says. “This is ­going to be treated by many different types of providers and specialists, and it will be treated, often, symptom by symptom.”

Long COVID is recognized as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act if it substantially limits one or more major life activities. About 200 symptoms fall ­under that umbrella, Patel says. Here are some of the conditions we’re learning can linger months and, in some cases, years beyond an acute COVID infection. If these or other health changes seem familiar, consult your primary care physician.

1. Extreme fatigue It’s common to experience fatigue when your body is busy fighting off an illness. But some people still struggle with fatigue long after their initial COVID infection. In fact, a lack of energy is the number one symptom reported by long COVID patients. In some, this can be diagnosed as chronic fatigue syndrome, which has been on the rise since the start of the pandemic, Baratta says. He defines this as “a disabling level of fatigue that severely limits daily activities.”

This lingering fatigue may be due to limited production of energy within the muscles caused by damage to the mitochondria from a COVID infection. It can happen to anyone — no matter their level of fitness before infection. “I’ve treated patients who have been triathletes and now may only be able to do 15 or 20 minutes of exercise a day, when they’re used to running and swimming miles at a time,” Kaplan says.

He recommends starting slow and pacing yourself with everything you do around the house, “doing shorter intervals several times throughout the day, rather than trying to do everything at once.” Whether it gets better depends on the individual. Some people’s symptoms clear, and some people may battle them indefinitely.

2. Shortness of breath An analysis of chest CT scans from 144 patients ages 27 to 80 found that more than one-third of people hospitalized with a previous COVID infection had lung scarring and thickening two years after coming into contact with the virus. Even patients with milder cases who walked away without scarring can experience changes in their breathing.

“Some research shows that people ­after COVID start to take shorter, shallower breaths,” Baratta says. “This essentially causes a type of hyperventilation they are doing without even recognizing it, not getting good fresh air deep into the lungs, and [this] can lead to shortness of breath.” ​

Doctors have found success using respiratory exercises to help patients relearn slow, deep breathing.

3. Cognitive changes Difficulty concentrating, spaciness and forgetfulness are just a few of the brain challenges COVID can bring on. These can last for weeks or months or — in some with long COVID — become an everyday occurrence that lasts indefinitely. COVID may linger in a person’s gut long after an infection, altering their microbiome and hindering the body’s ability to produce serotonin, leading to cognitive disturbances.

COVID may also disrupt the blood-brain barrier, allowing chemicals or molecules in the rest of the body to enter the brain blood circulation and potentially lead to brain fog, Baratta says.

One study found that 30 days after testing positive for COVID-19, people were at greater risk for cognitive decline, as well as for mental health disorders including anxiety, depression and stress. Another study found inflammation in the brains of people with mild to moderate COVID-19 was similar to the effects of seven years of aging. Doctors are leading neurologically affected patients through cognitive rehabilitation exercises that show promise in reducing symptoms.

4. Depression and anxiety “Mood-related disorders are one of the top five issues that happen to people after COVID,” Baratta says. There may be a direct relationship between the virus’s effect on the brain and mood issues. A 2021 review of eight studies found that 12 weeks after a COVID infection, 11 to 28 ­percent of people had depression symptoms, and 3 to 12 percent of those individuals reported their symptoms as severe. If you’re feeling more stressed or down after catching COVID, tell your primary care physician, who can refer you to a therapist. Or visit the American Psychological Association’s search tool at locator.apa.org to find a qualified therapist in your area.

5. Sleep disturbances Nearly 40 percent of people with long COVID have reported major changes to their sleep patterns. One study looked at 1,056 COVID-19 patients who did not have a severe enough infection to require hospitalization. Of that population, 76.1 percent reported having insomnia and 22.8 percent severe insomnia. Sleep ­apnea may also appear post-COVID, another way the disease affects the respiratory system.

Talk to your doctor if you’re having sleep issues. A CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine can help with sleep ­apnea. Lifestyle habits that prioritize healthy sleep, such as keeping consistent sleep and wake times and avoiding large meals before bed, may also help. “Post-COVID sleep has literally been a nightmare! We saw a 23 percent increase in sleeping-pill prescription during and post-COVID,” says Michael Breus, a clinical psychologist and clinical sleep specialist in Los Angeles.

6. Digestive upset Diarrhea, constipation, abdominal pain, bloating and gas: These symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome can be by-products of an encounter with COVID. A survey of 729 COVID survivors found that 29 percent experienced at least one new chronic GI symptom six months after their infection. “There is evidence that parts of the COVID virus linger in the GI tract for many months after the initial illness, and it’s been suggested that the presence of these ongoing viral fragments causes dysfunction or problems with the GI tract, leading to mostly symptoms of diarrhea and gastric distress and discomfort,” Baratta says.

Talk to your doctor about any new digestive symptoms or seek help from a gastro­enterologist. You can keep a food journal and note if your condition flares after eating certain foods. Try cutting out those foods, then reintroducing them one by one to see what you react to, Kaplan advises.

7. New or worsened allergies Some people who develop COVID experience allergies they never had before. One study found the risk of ­developing allergic diseases, such as asthma and allergic rhinitis, rose significantly within the first 30 days after a COVID diagnosis. This may be because one’s immune system stays hypervigilant after fighting the virus, McAuley says.

In severe cases, like Chrissy Bernal’s, this can lead to mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), a disease that can behave like a series of severe allergies: The body’s cells become hypersensitive, causing strong ­reactions to everything from food and pollen to even a hot shower or exercise. Antihistamines and other medications may help, so talk to your doctor if you experience skin itching, a rapid pulse, wheezing or gastro­intestinal symptoms.

8. Pain Some COVID survivors battle chronic pain, everything from aching joints to testicular pain. There is a higher risk of inflammatory arthritis, and women are at higher risk than men. One review of studies estimated that 10 percent of people who contracted COVID experienced musculo­skeletal pain at some point during the first year after infection.

Reducing stress, eating a healthy diet and exercising may ease some post-COVID ­discomfort. Massage therapy, movement therapy, acupuncture and over-the-counter pain medications may also offer relief. Your doctor can refer you to a specialist, such as a rheumatologist, who can help manage symptoms including joint pain.

Fast-moving research means new hope If your symptoms last after a bout of COVID, start with your primary care physician, who can help treat your symptoms or refer you to a specialist. Despite previous dismissals, long COVID is more recognized these days, Patel says, and the CDC is doing its part to educate both patients and providers. And initiatives such as the National Institutes of Health’s Recover program are researching treatment options.

“In a year, things will look different, because research is moving so quickly,” says Sara F. Martin, M.D., medical director of the Adult Post-Acute COVID Clinic at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The CDC, for instance, is funding a series of clinical trials that the NIH has in the works. This new information, Martin says, may guide doctors, including herself, who treat long COVID ­patients to better ease their symptoms.

[schmergo]

So I know there are over 430 sites in the National Parks System but only 63 official National Parks. The rest have designations like National Monuments, National Historic Sites, and all that jazz. But sometimes you hear about one of these lesser parks jumping up the ranks to become a National Park.

Now, I know a lot of bureaucracy goes into determining the qualifications for these categories, but a little fantasy makes life on this cold unfeeling space rock more bearable, so I like to imagine these promotions happen because the landscape just… got cooler.

Picture a young park ranger making his rounds at Chattahoochee National Forest, making sure there are no fires or anything, when he steps into a familiar clearing and freezes in place. He takes off his sunglasses and stares like Sam Neill in Jurassic Park. A 4-mile long, 5,000 foot deep canyon has opened up overnight. “Well, that’s gonna mess with the Ruby Falls trail,” he whispers.

That evening when he gets back to his cabin, he hops on his Park Ranger group chat, ready to share the good news. Turns out his friend Steve in Arizona got there first.

“New waterfall just dropped.”

“What?”

“Yeah, there’s a huge waterfall in the middle of the Sonoran Desert.”

“That should definitely promote it from lame National Monument status, right?”

“I don’t know, did you hear about the Ohio redwood?”

“Is that just what it sounds like?”

“Yeah, a 300 foot redwood tree grew in the backyard of the James A. Garfield National Historic Site and they didn’t upgrade that one.”

“Okay, but historic parks don’t really have that upward mobility, Steve. Like, it’s not gonna get more historic.”

“A giant redwood in Ohio is pretty historic! I heard it’s all politics. They already made Cuyahoga Valley a National Park and they’re not gonna do another Ohio one so soon.”

The ranger vaguely remembers another interesting story that had been rumbling around the group chat. “Becca, how are those crystals coming along?”

A few months before, his colleague Becca had been giving a tour at Blanchard Springs Caverns in Ozark National Forest when she stumbled upon a hither-to unseen chamber in the caverns filled with hundreds of iridescent flower-shaped crystals that gently sang in four-part harmony when water dripped onto them.

“Oh yeah, some higher-ups from NPS came by and took some notes, but they said keep an eye on the crystals and let them know if they multiply into the thousands or if we identify any incidents of missing body parts regrowing after rubbing one of the crystals.”

“That seems like overly harsh criteria.”

“That’s what I said. Apparently Carlsbad Caverns has one that can regrow kidneys. But only kidneys for some reason.”

“That’s weird. New River Gorge became a National Park and it’s way less cool than your crystals.”

“It’s my understanding there were some classified elements at play.”

The young ranger leans back and takes a deep pull from his Gatorade. He knows what “classified” means for the NPS. Those darn sasquatches.

[beefromanoff]

Project Mockingbird Ch. 1

summary: Natasha identifies a girl who needs their help and makes a case to the rest of the team. the problem? the girl who needs the help was genetically engineered to oppose their friend.

pairing: Bucky Barnes x OC

chapter list

________________________________________

Three Months Earlier

The team filed into the conference room at The Avengers’ Compound in their usual order: Steve and Vision (fifteen minutes early), Peter, Bruce, Wanda, and Sam right on time, and Tony striding in five minutes late. 

“I have to admit, when I heard you wanted to see me, I was hoping for more of a one-on-one situation.” Sam joked as he plopped down in his chair. 

“Keep dreaming, Wilson.” She shot him a side-eyed glance, a shadow of a smile on her face. 

The room held a strange energy, remaining unusually quiet as everyone waited for Natasha to explain the reason for calling the meeting. Steve and Tony had historically been the only ones to call official team briefings. 

“I found a girl.” Natasha slid a stack of folders across the table. 

“Hey, love is love. As long as I can watch.” Tony grinned. 

“Shut up.” She ignored him and clicked a button on her computer, bringing a set video footage to life on the screen behind her. “Her name is Charlotte Julianna Rossi. She’s 21 years old, according to her Drivers’ License. According to her birth certificate, she’s closer to 100.” 

The room fell quiet, Steve and Natasha exchanging a sobering gaze. The screen on the wall showed several clips at once, all featuring a pretty young girl. Her hair was different colors across all of the clips, some showing her with long, blonde locks and some showing a cropped dark haircut with severe bangs, others showing varying shades of red. 

“She’s hardly been on the radar until the past two years. In that time period, she’s been hospitalized seventeen times for injuries consistent with overuse and extreme fatigue. Rhabdomyolysis, kidney damage, severe muscle strain, dehydration, the list goes on. Every single time, she’s admitted in a critical state but checks herself out against medical advice less than 24 hours later.” 

As the team shuffled through the documents in front of them, putting pieces together, Natasha continued. 

“I found her because she made headlines earlier this year after getting kicked out of Team USA Olympic trials for women’s gymnastics. They tried to cover it up, didn’t want to get any questions they didn’t have an answer for. From what I was able to gather, she came out of nowhere, competed at the last National Championship meet as an unaffiliated gymnast, and won every event with a perfect score. The entire gymnastics community was up in arms about it. They tried to figure out where she came from, where she trained, but there was nothing. No record. Of course, Team USA begged her to come to the tryout, she blew them away. Somehow, one of the families of the gymnasts at risk of losing their spot got her kicked off for use of performance enhancing drugs. The thing is, there’s no record of her ever even being tested.”

“No offense, Nat, but we aren’t exactly looking to start a Cirque Du Soleil Troupe here.” 

“Tony, shut the fuck up and let me finish.” She gave him an austere look as he put his hands up defensively. 

“Since then, she’s won a dozen amateur MMA matches, three boxing matches, and won fifteen straight games of poker before being banned from the majority of Vegas casinos. She’s making her money drifting, picking up random things and kicking everyone’s ass at them. Clearly, it’s not without a toll, if you look at her hospital records.”

She clicked a button and the screen shifted, sending a chill down everyone’s spine. A grainy document had been scanned in, the HYDRA symbol emblazoned on the top of the letterhead. 

“Project Mockingbird. It was pioneered two years after the Winter Soldier project. Specifically, it was initiated only ten days after a record seventeen HYDRA agents were critically injured trying to contain their primary test subject during an attempted escape.” 

Wanda spoke slowly. “You mean…”

“Bucky.” Steve breathed out. 

“Right.” Natasha was solemn. “I didn’t want to leave him out of this, but I didn’t know how he’d handle it. I figured it was better to tell him once we have more information.” 

Steve nodded, brow knit together in concern. 

“Okay, so I think I’m tracking all of this, but if you could - just so I’m clear, what exactly does all of this mean?” Peter leaned forward nervously. 

Taking a deep breath, Natasha answered. “This is just a hypothesis, but I don’t see much wiggle room. It appears that when HYDRA was working on the Winter Soldier project, on Bucky…they had difficulties containing him. Controlling him. When it became apparent that ordinary agents couldn’t do it, they took to experimenting on others. Orphans, mainly. People no one would miss. Trying to create something…someone to be able to stand against him.”

She pulled out a chair and sat for the first time, regarding all of them seriously. “They had dozens of test subjects. The majority of them didn’t survive the initial round of experimentation. A few others suffered complications in cryo. She’s the only one left.”

“Forgive me for being so forward,” Vision spoke up. “But, if I’m understanding correctly, we have reason to believe that Ms. Ross, she was created to oppose Sergeant Barnes.” 

“Yes.” Natasha avoided Steve’s eyes like her life depended on it. “I believe that Charlotte Julianna Rossi was enhanced by HYDRA as a sentient weapon with the primary purpose being containment and control of The Winter Soldier.” 

Present Day

“Thank you.” Natasha gave a polite smile to the driver as he opened the car door for her to step out. They’d arrived at the Wynn, one of - if not the nicest hotels on the Las Vegas strip. 

She’d wasted no time after the mission was approved, spending the majority of the flight putting on full glam and finishing it off with the perfect red lip. Black cocktail dress, gold heels that caught and reflected all the Vegas lights, studded clutch purse with cash, lipstick, and a pistol. Tony had offered to book her a hotel room through his connections, but she’d waved him off. 

They’d be back in New York by sunrise. 

It didn’t take long for her to locate Charlotte. Though 8pm was early by Vegas accounts, the casino was lively. Natasha dodged several attempted pick-up attempts by drunken gamblers as she wove through the tables to her end destination: the high stakes room. A sultry smile paired with her low cut dress made quick work of gaining entry. It wasn’t unusual for beautiful women to be welcomed into the high stakes room. The only thing rich men loved more than blowing money was doing it in front of a pretty audience. Nat slipped into the intimate room, the air full of cigar smoke and jazz music. 

Seated at a small table was a pretty brunette, eyes dark with smudged shadow and lips glossy. A martini sat in front of her, completely untouched, judging by the lack of a gloss print on the rim. Charlotte tapped the table in front of her, signaling for the dealer to give her another card. She already showed a nineteen, meaning standard play said she shouldn’t hit. The crowd murmured, exchanging glances. In the betting circle was a stack of $1,000 chips that Natasha estimated to be around $20,000. 

To the shock of everyone but Natasha and Charlotte, the dealer flipped a third card to reveal a two of diamonds. Blackjack. 

Charlotte grinned, leaning back and relishing in the applause as the dealer paled and began counting out chips to pay her. Nat cracked a smile but immediately felt a jolt in her stomach. The dealer had given a nod to the guard at the front, who was now touching his earpiece and speaking softly. She couldn’t hear him over the music, but his lips read clear as day: She must be counting. 

Acting quickly, Nat stepped to the table, making herself wobbly and heavy lidded.

“Ohmygod, THERE you are,” she put a hand on Charlotte’s shoulder, who immediately tensed. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere, c’mon, the girls are waiting with the Uber,”

She squeezed Charlotte’s shoulder and briefly broke character to give an urgent look, hoping she’d pick up on the fact that the drunk persona was intentional.

“Oh, look at the time,” She said in mock surprise. “It’s been fun, don’t have too much fun without me!” Her manicured hands slid stacks of chips into her purse, a few falling to the floor with wide-eyed spectators locked onto them. 

“Get yourself something nice, Gary.” She flicked a purple $1,000 chip to the dealer who fumbled to catch it. Out of the corner of her eye, Natasha saw two men approaching them from across the casino floor. She elbowed Charlotte, who tracked her gaze and clocked them immediately. 

Waving her arm, Natasha knocked the still-full martini glass onto the felt of the Blackjack table. The gin spewed across the cards and glass splintered on contact. “Oh, jeez, I’m so sorry, I really shouldn’t have taken that last shot,” She called the apology over her shoulder into the chaos that descended over the mess, linking her arm through Charlotte’s as she fumbled to close her small bag around the massive amount of chips. 

They slid out the door under the cover of the bachelorette party walking past, slipping right into the middle of the drunken parade. 

“What’s going on?” The brunette hissed through a fake smile, keeping the facade up. 

“You were about to get busted. I thought I’d help a girl out.” Nat said through her own plastered smile, eyes darting around the room in search of their next problem. 

“I know what I’m doing.” 

“I know. That’s why I’m here in the first place.” 

Charlotte side-eyed her as they walked through the casino, still covered by the herd of pink boas and giggles. 

“Stark sent you.” 

“No.”

“I’m not stupid, I-”

“He’s the stupid one. I wanted to come in the first place, it was him who thought the testosterone brigade was the way to go. We can get into that later, but right now we’ve gotta move. There’s two coming up -”

“Yeah, six o’clock. Two more probably waiting around the corner up ahead. If we cut through the floor, we can make it to the cashier before they get to us.”

Natasha raised an eyebrow, impressed at how they jumped to the same wavelength. “You still want to cash out?”

Charlotte grinned, a wild gleam in her eye. “Duh.” 

A few minutes later, they’d steered the group of girls to the cashier and fanned them out so that each of the six windows had two girls standing in front of it. Each of them with roughly $4,000 worth of chips in their hands. They got through the exchanges in record time, leaving the bachelorettes in a flurry of drunken “iloveyou’s” with a stack of bills to show their appreciation for the help. 

“That should cover the rest of their weekend.” Nat smirked as they strode quickly to the lobby, positioning her body slightly in front of Charlotte so as not to draw attention to the thick wads of cash she was zipping into her bag. 

“I don’t know, I can blow three grand pretty quickly on my own, let alone with ten of my closest friends.” 

“I don’t think I want ten friends.” 

Charlotte matched her pace, the bag finally zipped. “I don’t even know ten people, I just thought it sounded good.” 

They reached the front doors, nodding at the valet who held the door open for them. 

“I have a driver, this way.” Natasha cocked her head to the front of the valet line, full of sports cars and sleek SUVs. Glancing over her shoulder at the casino, the men seemed to have lost them in the crowd. Charlotte weighed her options quickly, deciding that taking a getaway car with the Avenger was preferable to whatever awaited her if she stayed.

They slid into the backseat of the black sedan, breathing quickly from adrenaline. 

“You’re back so soon, Ms. Romanoff.” The driver called from the front seat. 

“It was getting stale, figured I could find something more fun.” 

The driver’s eyes crinkled in a knowing smile in the rearview mirror. Charlotte had a feeling he knew much more than he should, choosing to live in ignorance. 

“You hungry?” the redhead asked nonchalantly. 

“Starving.” 

_________________

The duo sat in a secluded corner booth of a dark bar. The remnants of two burgers sat strewn across the plates, a few leftover fries getting cold. Natasha signaled to the bartender for another round of martinis, extra dirty. 

“Who knew the best burgers in Vegas would come from a strip club?” Charlotte downed the remnants of her drink to make room for the new one. 

“Hey, I’m no stranger to Vegas.” 

“So I can tell.” She shifted to sit up straighter. “Do you wanna get into your sales pitch now, or should we wait for the drinks?”

Natasha remained casual, leaning against the pristine leather of the booth. “There’s no sales pitch. Just an offer. Take it or leave it.” 

“And the offer is…?” 

“Come with me. Back to New York. Live at the compound. Be around people like you.”

Charlotte shook her head. “There are no people like me.” 

“Spare me the pity party bullshit.” Nat leaned in. “I don’t know the specifics of your story, but I know enough to tell you that we are like you.”

Taken aback by her forcefulness, the brunette narrowed her eyes. 

“Enhanced individual? Pretty much all of us. Dark, twisty past? We’ve got ‘em. Done things we aren’t proud of? Goes without saying. No friends, no family? We have a very dysfunctional Thanksgiving of our own.” She gave a small smile. “Experimented on, dehumanized, controlled, stripped of autonomy? Specifically by one particular Nazi rogue science division?” Natasha changed her tone, speaking gently. “One of my very best friends knows a little something about that, too.” 

Charlotte tensed, eyes glazed as she stared into the dark room in front of them. “James Barnes.” It wasn’t a question. 

“We call him Bucky.” 

Chewing her lower lip, Charlotte seemed lost in her thoughts. A cocktail waitress interrupted with two fresh drinks, setting them down with a smile. Eyes still defocused, she reached out to sip the drink slowly. 

“I don’t think it’s smart.” 

“Why?” Natasha took a sip of her own. “There’s nowhere safer for you. The Compound is literally the most secure place on Earth, except maybe Wakanda, and before you say you’re worried about hurting someone there - don’t. We live with Dr. Banner, who you probably know as the Hulk. I’m sure you’re a force to be reckoned with, but I can assure you that even on your worst day you wouldn’t be putting us at risk.”

She spun the wooden stick adorned with olives between her fingers, thinking. “I don’t want to be an Avengers. I’m not a hero. I don’t want to fight.” 

“Then don’t.” Natasha shrugged. “I’m not a military recruiter. I just remember what it was like to be alone, scared. Unsure where to go or who to trust. I’m offering you a home and a group of people you can count on. Anything else is up to you.” 

Charlotte smirked. “You’re much better at this than the last three.” 

“Story of my life.” She rolled her eyes.

“So, what would happen if I said yes? Hypothetically.” 

“Well, hypothetically, I have a jet waiting at the private airfield. We’d go to whichever hotel you’re renting the penthouse out of, get your stuff, and fly back tonight.” 

“Why do you assume I’m renting out a penthouse?” 

Natasha grinned, biting an olive off the stick. “It’s what I would do.” 

Narrowing her eyes, Charlotte cocked her jaw. “I’m at the Cosmo.”

“Great choice.” She held her martini up, signaling for a toast. “How about this, we go out tonight. Do Vegas right. Do it big. If you have fun, you come back with me and try living with us. If you don’t have a good time, I’ll accept that I’m no better than the guys and go back on my own. We won’t bug you anymore, but the offer will always stand.”

“You know, a bet predicated on having fun in Las Vegas seems like a very unfair advantage.” She raised her own glass.

“I’ve never been much of a gambler.” 

“That makes one of us.” Charlotte grinned. “You’re on.” 

_________________

It was just after 4:00am when their dutiful driver opened the door on the tarmac. Heels in hand, two sets of bare feet walked up the steps into the sleek jet, Stark Industries emblazoned on the side. 

“I still can’t believe they kicked us out.” Charlotte rubbed her temples as she sunk into the white leather seat. 

“Well they don’t really encourage doing backflips off of the craps table.” Natasha sat down across from her. 

“Here I thought Vegas was the one place where anything goes.” She dropped her purse on the table in front of them, the thud echoing in the empty cabin. “At least we made out alright.” 

“I expect a cut for saving your ass.” 

“I’ll consider it.” 

“You like pancakes?” Natasha punched a few buttons on a screen embedded in the wall.

“Um, who doesn’t?” 

Grinning, the redhead slid her feet onto the seat, getting comfortable. “They’ll be ready in fifteen. Probably best if we get something in our stomachs besides tequila.”

“If I knew you were offering private jets and pancakes at four in the morning, I might have been an easier sell.” 

“What are you talking about? You hardly put up a fight.” She winked. 

“Whatever, you won fair and square. I’m just holding up my end of the deal.” Charlotte tucked her knees under her, relaxing into the chair as the plane ascended.

“We’ve got a couple hours back to New York. Eat, rest, and we’ll be there before you know it. If you aren’t up for meeting people when we land, I’ll sneak you to your room. You can socialize when you’re not coming off of an all-night bender.” 

“What, you don’t think I’d make a good first impression right now?” She joked, fully aware of her smeared eye makeup and tousled hair. 

“Au contraire, I think you’d make too good of an impression. I’m just trying to give the guys a fighting chance here.”

Giggles subsiding, Charlotte looked out the window at the pinpricks of light shrinking beneath them. The smell of pancakes and overly sweet syrup filled the air as a stewardess wheeled the food out towards them. 

“Natasha?” 

“Hm?”

“I’m glad you came.” 

She smiled, warmth extending to her eyes. 

“Me too.”  

[thenationaltreasuregazette]

Why so Many F*cking Lemons??

National Treasure is the kind of film that presents many mysteries and asks its viewers the hard questions. Questions like:

What if there was a treasure map on the back of the Declaration of Independence?

What if American history was a cool connected puzzle?

What there was a big ol' treasure?

But most importantly it asks us to consider:

4. Why does Patrick Gates have a whole fridge full of lemons???

Now the most obvious answer here is because the plot demands it. Ben and co need to cover the whole back of the Declaration in lemon juice, (although do they?) so they have to have enough lemons on hand.

The second most obvious reason is because the cinematography demands it. I mean this shot looks a lot better than, like, a single lemon. (Probably the same reason for Dakota Johnson's bowl of limes. It looks better.)

But neither of those answers are very fun, so let's dig deeper.

What is the plausible, in-story reason why Patrick Gates has a bowl of lemons?

Theory 1: Patrick Gates is a connoisseur of homemade lemonade

According to this hypothesis, Patrick loves homemade lemonade so much that he makes it for himself on the semi-regular. Yes, it's like October, but why should that stop him.

Does this check out?

When we meet him, Patrick is hanging out alone in his bathrobe late on a Friday night, having had pizza for dinner and something from a soda fountain to drink. That doesn't strike me as a foodie who wouldn't just buy lemonade if he wanted some.

Theory 2: Lemon Fish

In this version, Patrick is about to grill some fish. There's a way to do it (which is really tasty, and doesn't require a grill pan or rack) where you place bunch of slices of lemon directly on the grill grates and grill the fish on top of them. The fish doesn't stick and it imparts a delicious citrus flavor.

But again, we run into the same plausibility issues:

it's autumn

the Patrick Gates we meet here doesn't seem dedicated enough to the food he eats to do through the somewhat tedious process of grilling fish, especially not in not-summer

Theory 3: Cards with the Boys

What if Patrick is part of a weekly rotating card game? It's maybe a few masons he knows from his treasure hunting days and some of the guys from the insurance company (I don't know what I think that Patrick sells insurance, but I guess that's the most 'square' job I could come up with).

They rotate houses every week or month, and it's soon to be Patrick's turn to host. The drink of choice amongst the group is whisky sours, tom collins's or another straightforward drink that requires lemon juice.

This at least I think is more plausible with what we see of Patrick's lifestyle than an explanation with a more foodie-type bent. With Ben and his ex-wife both out of his life, Patrick must be a pretty lonely guy. I like the idea of him having a circle of friends.

Theory 4: Health Benefits

And here I think we have the most plausible answer: that Patrick might be interested in the health benefits associated with lemons and drinking lemon water.

Different compounds in lemons can have benefits regarding

lowering cholesterol

managing blood sugar

kidney health

and more, but those are the ones I suspect Patrick might be interested in. He's of a certain age, lives alone, and (unless we caught him on an off night) might not take the best care of himself as far as his diet. Perhaps he's been found to have high cholesterol, is pre-diabetic or has other blood sugar concerns, or has the decreased kidney function that can be associated with aging.

Perhaps he's had kidney stones or another health issue or scare in recent years and is attempting to take better care of himself.

Maybe that soda fountain cup is full of lemon water.

Conclusion

While all of these are plausible to various degrees, I find myself more interested in the last two. Patrick as an aging man without any family (or at least not any family who still speaks to him), living alone and becoming concerned with his health is heartbreaking, but I think adds a certain softness to the character, and extra layer to him and to his reconciliation with Ben.

And in any case, I also like the idea that he hasn't been completely alone since his falling out with Ben. While Patrick does behave in a way that suggests a fairly traditional 'breadwinner,' family man masculinity, we at the National Treasure Gazette will always stan platonic relationships and social supports. I'd like to believe that Patrick has his own squad of friends he can rely on.

I don't think I've ever thought about Patrick Gates this much, but now that I have, I find myself kind of wanting to give him a hug? He may not be the easiest character to love, but he has his own struggles.

What about you?

What are your theories regarding the lemon bowl?

I'd love to hear in a reblog, reply, tag, etc!

[partisan-by-default]

According to the Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA), more than 103,000 individuals are currently on the national transplant waiting list. However, health officials are hoping to cut down on this list with a new rule allowing HIV-positive individuals to donate their organs to others with HIV—which will shorten the wait time for all recipients. The more acceptable donors there are, the shorter the waiting period for those in need.

“This rule removes unnecessary barriers to kidney and liver transplants, expanding the organ donor pool and improving outcomes for transplant recipients with HIV,” U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement.

Research published in the New England Journal of Medicine has found that transplanted organs from HIV-positive donors vs. those from HIV-negative donors had similar success rates, per AP News. Of course, these donors would only give to those already positive for HIV.

This is incredible news for anyone in need of an organ transplant, as many individuals wait months or even years to receive one. Delaying such transplants can leave patients vulnerable, many requiring other medical treatments like dialysis, which can be both costly and time-consuming in addition to the potentially devastating side effects.

[coffbeanie]

Decided to post some EJ hcs i’ve been sitting on-not sure how much of these are just me just repeating canon. They’re more like notes I took while relistening to the story and trying to answer my own question

Anyways just remember their hcs and ur welcome to think differently-this is just all in good fun

Enjoy!! <3

-Jack and Chernabog are now forced to inhabit one body

-Jack can keep Chernabog down by eating humans organs-he chooses kidneys because he can take them without killing his victims-he steals the materials he needs and uses his schooling to take them without causing much damage. Since we only need one to live, he takes one and leaves the other.

-When Jack doesn’t eat, Chernabog takes over. This results in physical changes-he becomes much larger, sharper fangs, a more muzzle like nose, pointier teeth, larger hands with sharper fingers, tar dripping down his eyes, and his legs turn into hind legs reminiscent of a lion (or honestly any other predatory mammal)

-In this state, he follows the scent of blood and will eat anyone who crosses his path, leaving nothing but bones. He will keep eating until he is satisfied, where he once again lets Jack take over

-He’ll take people’s cars and drive to different neighborhoods (townhouses, apartments) to stock up on kidneys and see what's going on in the world-then drive to a woodland area to hide and eat. Sometimes he’ll steal kidneys from any campers that happen to be nearby. He moves frequently and at this point has lived in many different states. He’ll also just sleep in abandoned buildings

Now for some bigger picture thingies :))

-The cult at the college specifically was started by Jenny. She felt that what she read in her books was real, and started to spread this idea to her friends, who spread it to their friends, which led to the creation of the cult. They believed that they had to summon Chernabog, as he would release them from the suffering of life. As they satisfied his hungry spirit, he would, in return, lead them to paradise.

-People in the school weren’t really aware of this. The most people saw was this group of friends going into the woods to hang out, and they would sometimes make a bonfire, but nothing more. Even if people saw it as a cult, they never took it seriously-just some people worshiping some fake demon. They haven’t done anything wrong, so why should they care?

-The cult aspect of this story brought it to a national news level, putting a highlight on secret societies at different universities. However, the story died down, though it was still talked about for months later on a local level as the authorities tried to find out who killed the cult members

-Jack is still the primary suspect, seeing as his roommate could support his going to the meeting, and as his body was not found in the massacre. It’s also assumed that he took the missing cult mask. However, the one detail that lowers Jack’s possibility as a suspect are the claw and bite marks of the victims-the scratch marks are obviously from an animal with claws, and the bites are from a creature with sharper teeth than a human, which leads to the possibility that it could have just been an attack by some wild animals, even though wild animals with those characteristics are not native to the area

-The attack was first reported by Greg, his roommate. He knew Jack was there and was the first to see the massacre. Greg, along with Jack’s parents, still deny he had any part in the Cult Massacre. Greg insists that Jack would never hurt anyone, and he was way too focused on school to get involved in that cult stuff seriously. Jack’s parents were proud of their son and the bright future he seemed to have ahead of him-they’re still waiting for him to come home.

-When Jack first started taking kidneys, many of his early victims died as he did not have access to the proper materials and was not used to performing these at home surgeries. As he continued, the mortality rate of his victims went down, though there was still a chance they would die. It was easy for investigators to link these to one person, due to the trend of taking one kidney.

-In between these were cases of people being brutally mauled to death. It was first assumed that it was a person assisted by some kind of animal, as the state of the bodies afterwards had markings made by some kind of animal (though the specific animal was never pinned down, it was just obvious they weren’t human), but doors were still unlocked, and windows were opened, which suggested that a human had to have been involved

-The connection between these two crimes were made after Mitch’s (the mc from the original EJ story) story was released-it got both attention not just on national media, but also on the internet. Both the stories of people waking up with just one kidney, and people being brutally mauled were now connected and could be attributed to one person, though this only confused investigators more, due to his two methods of killing, the now lack of clear motive, the inclusion of now possibly cannibalistic tendencies, and questions as to how this person could have left claw and bite marks similar to that of an animal

-People later reached out to Mitch afterwards online, thanking him for his bravery in posting his story. The people were either victims of this mysterious killer, or knew someone who was attacked by him. This led to a small support group on the Internet where people talked about their experience with him, and how it affected their life. Most victims have moved to less wooded areas, more in city areas, in fear that he might come back for them.

-There is a small subgroup of people on the internet that connected this animalistic cannibal to the Cult Massacre story. They dubbed the name “Eyeless Jack” as they believe that Jackson Novikov of the Cult Massacre story is the same person in Mitch’s story. The blue mask is similar to the mask of the cultists, it was revealed that Jackson was in med school which explains the in-home surgeries, and the state the cultists were left in is similar to how some of Jack’s victims are left. Few are quick to believe this, seeing it as only a conspiracy theory.

-Investigators have come to predict where their cannibal will strike next, as medical supplies from hospitals will have been reported stolen a few days before someone would report either being a victim of the cannibal, or knowing someone who was attacked by the cannibal. This has led to an increase in stolen materials from hospitals and other medical facilities, and after a few too close for comfort run ins with the police, Jack has learned to move around before making his attack, though this has led to a increase in attacks that resembles ones done by Chernabog

If u read through all that u should share ur ej hcs with me :)))

[deadmomjokes]

oh wow I am so sorry to hear about your daughter having EOE - that sounds really rough. How do you navigate that?

At this point, with a lot of flailing.

It took 3.5 years to even get her properly diagnosed, not through lack of trying-- it's just a hard thing to differentiate, and the specialists that can actually do the test are dealing with a huge number of patients so they're always backed up. We're lucky: we live only an hour from the state children's hospital where they can do the diagnostic procedures, and it has a dedicated EOE specialty clinic that's one of the best in the country. It still takes 2 months to get an appointment as an established patient, and it took even longer to get her in on the initial referral. We're also lucky that she was able to explain to us what she was experiencing in a way that a doctor could take seriously and act on, and we're lucky that her primary care doctor did so.

But generally speaking, things suck spectacularly for pediatric EOE and GERD patients right now, at least in the US. The best medicine for treating it is omeprazole (prilosec), and there was exactly one manufacturer that made it in a suspension that small children could take. Well, that manufacturer decided it wasn't profitable enough, so they quit making it altogether. So now the next best, lansoprazole (prevacid), is on national back order for months because every child that was on the other one is now needing to switch.

So my daughter is currently on the next next best thing, because it was that or nothing, and it's just not working great for her. It keeps her from the worst of the pain, but she's back to not wanting to eat anything but bagels, one specific brand of cereal, and string cheese.

Back when she was officially diagnosed, her doctor gave us the option of going on a super dose of PPI meds, jumping straight to the steroids, or doing a full elimination diet with a nutritionist. For a kid, none of those options are great.

The PPIs reduce absorption of nutrients, which are already few and far between for a growing person with only a few tolerated foods. The steroids may have effects on a growing liver and kidneys, and also make you more prone to fungal infections and upper respiratory illnesses. Both have to be routinely dose-adjusted because the child is growing constantly, but you have to get an official weight/height check at the specialist to do so, which is always backed up. Then the elimination diet is...well, it's hard, to put it mildly, and it takes a really long time because of how delayed the reactions can be. Plus when you already don't like eating and only have a few 'safe foods', it's hard to cut back. Most people with EOE also have more than one trigger, so you have to eliminate a ton of things and hope you get them all, and you can't be on any medication while you're doing it because you have to be able to identify the point at which symptoms get better and then return.

In short, all the options suck.

We eventually decided on trying to get it under control enough with the meds to hopefully expand the foods she was willing to eat, in preparation for doing the elimination diet. It was working. Then the forced medication switch blew that all up. So we're just gonna grit our teeth and go with the elimination diet unless her specialist has another option for us.

But aside from that, it's been a lot of phone tag and appointment waiting, and a lot of readjusting the way we look at food and eating.

For her, whatever she will eat is a win. We've taken pressure off her to try new things. We still offer it, but we don't press if she's not feeling up to it. Reducing stress around the concept of trying new foods is super important, because she's already up against the stress of wondering whether it'll 'get stuck' or feel yucky or make 'the fires' worse.

We've also had to make sure we don't fall into the trap of trying to dictate how much she eats and when. Unless a meal is coming within the half hour, we let her have a snack when she's hungry-- wait too long, and she's in pain. Plus we want her to kind of train herself to respond to those hunger cues because her appetite can get so drastically reduced at times, every instance of her listening to an 'I'm hungry' is a win.

We also had to abandon the idea of the 'perfectly' balanced diet. Proteins are a struggle for her. Leafy greens are a struggle. So are other calcium containing foods like dairy and dairy alternatives. She really only likes carbs, mostly bread and fruit. But it's not like she can help it. Nobody purposefully restricts their diet just to be difficult-- a "picky eater" is someone who is struggling and needs accommodation, not judgement.

So we let her eat what she will eat, and work to find options that can get her the stuff she needs. Protein bars are a big hit with her right now, for example. A better texture than meat, they come in 'treat' flavors, and there are options that don't have all the added sugar that's gonna trigger the acid flareup. We make sure we get enriched flour and bread products so she gets at least some iron. We pick varieties that have added protein and calcium. We get juice with added vitamins and minerals. We stock the pantry with things that cater to her capabilities and needs wherever the two overlap. The goal is nutrition, whatever form that takes and whatever it looks like right now. Getting it "right" will come later. For now, we just need her to be comfortable with food and to learn how to work with her body.

This has also meant teaching her about nutrition, so we can help her take charge of her body's needs and help us think of ways to meet them. That's hard for a 3 year old, but there's a show called Storybots on Netflix, and they have a great episode on nutrition called "Why can't I eat dessert all the time?" Super accessible for kids, and has a catchy song describing macronutrient categories and why we need lots of different kinds of food, not just one kind. It was a perfect starting point, and we just kept at the explanations. Like when we would eat an apple with breakfast, we'd talk about how it has Vitamin C to help her cells be strong, fiber to help her tummy and intestines work well, and carbohydrates to help her have energy. Every time we try a new food, we talk about what's in it to help her body. That includes things like chips and cake--we're big on the concept of "all food has value, it's just some has more than others, so we eat the most of those."

So now, when she's had a "just bread" day we remind her that her body needs more than just carbs, and we can't get all our protein, fats, vitamins, and minerals from bread, so we should probably have something else too. 9 times out of 10, she'll add something to her request, like some blueberries or carrots. She might not eat a ton of it, but she tries, and that's what counts.

I know this is a mile long and probably way more than you were asking, but it's just one of those things that I have a lot to say about. I could talk all day about accessible eating and nutrition, as well as Going Off on our current medical system in the US, so if anyone has further questions, feel free to reach out.

[exitrowiron]

Adult Fieldtrip

TW Graphic description follows.

The realtors office in our resort arranged for a tour of the local Yakima Nation fish hatchery. This hatchery is one of many dedicated to restoring salmon to the Columbia River Basin.

The tour was short but very interesting. We saw them collect roe and sperm from a few river caught adult male and female Chinook.

First the fish are killed by removing a gill which causes them to bleed out. Then they are checked for tags, weighed and measured and then the sperm/roe are collected. Lastly a fish pathologist collects a kidney sample for testing. The roe are fertilized immediately but quarantined pending results of the kidney biopsy performed by the University of Washington. The carcasses are frozen for a month to kill any pathogens before being pulverized and spread in the river to return their nutrients to the ecosystem.

From the ~400 adults collected, approx 1m eggs will be fertilized and -800k fry will be tagged and released the following Spring when they will make their way to the Pacific. Fortunate fish will mature in the ocean and smell their way back to this river in 3-4 years.

This is a very professional operation and the Cle Elum hatchery is a world class research facility.