#new doctors get told horror stories about house to weed out the weak

[superhell]

office politics at ppth are literally wild both deans of medicine we’ve seen have been like i need to be able to get house to do what i want BUT house is never gonna listen to me on my own so i have to get wilson on my team bc wilson CAN control house and meanwhile the rest of the hospital needs like. actual running. so i can only assume most of the place is self sufficient and house’s department is the literal only department that needs constant dean of medicine interference like the job is sign papers smile big and get on good terms with wilson

[betterdaysareatoenailaway]

Random Review #3: Sleepwalkers (1992) and “Sleep Walk” (1959)

I. Sleepwalkers (1992) I couldn’t sleep last night so I started watching a trashy B-movie penned by Stephen King specifically for the screen called Sleepwalkers (1992). Simply put, the film is an unmitigated disaster. A piece of shit. But it didn’t need to be. That’s what’s so annoying about it. By 1992 King was a grizzled veteran of the silver screen, with more adaptations under his belt than any other author of his cohort. Puzo had the Godfather films (1972 and 1974, respectively), sure, but nothing else. Leonard Gardner had Fat City (1972), a movie I love, but Gardner got sucked into the Hollywood scene of cocaine and hot tub parties and never published another novel, focusing instead on screenplays for shitty TV shows like NYPD Blue. After Demon Seed (1977), a movie I have seen and disliked, nobody would touch Dean Koontz’s stuff with a ten foot pole, which is too bad because The Voice of the Night, a 1980 novel about two young pals, one of whom is a psychopath trying to convince the other to help him commit murder, would make a terrific movie. But Koontz’s adaptations have been uniformly awful. The made-for-TV film starring John C McGinley, 1997′s Intensity, is especially bad. There are exceptions, but Stephen King has been lucky enough to avoid the fate of his peers. Big name directors have tackled his work, from Stanley Kubrick to Brian De Palma. King even does a decent job of acting in Pet Semetary (1989), in his own Maximum Overdrive (1986) and in George Romero’s Creepshow (1982), where he plays a yokel named Jordy Verril who gets infected by a meteorite that causes green weeds to grow all over his body. Many have criticized King’s over-the-top performance in that flick, but for me King perfectly nails the campy and comical tone that Romero was going for. The dissolves in Creepshow literally come right off the pages of comics, so people expecting a subtle Ordinary People-style turn from King had clearly walked into the wrong theatre. Undoubtedly Creepshow succeeds at what it set out to do. I’m not sure Sleepwalkers succeeds though, unless the film’s goal was to get me to like cats even more than I already do. But I already love cats a great deal. Here’s my cat Cookie watching me edit this very blog post. 

And here’s one of my other cats, Church, named after the cat that reanimates and creeps out Louis and Ellie in Pet Sematary. Photo by @ScareAlex.

SPOILER ALERT: Do not keep reading if you plan on watching Sleepwalkers and want to find out for yourself what happens.

Stephen King saw many of his novels get adapted in the late 1970s and 80s: Carrie, The Shining, Firestarter, Christine, Cujo, and the movie that spawned the 1950s nostalgia industrial complex, Stand By Me, but Sleepwalkers was the first time he wrote a script specifically for the screen rather than adapting a novel that already existed. Maybe that’s why it’s so fucking bad. Stephen King is a novelist, gifted with a novelist’s rich imagination. He’s prone to giving backstories to even the most peripheral characters - think of Joe Chamber’s alcoholic neighbour Gary Pervier in the novel Cujo, who King follows for an unbelievable number of pages as the man stumbles drunkenly around his house spouting his catch phrase “I don’t give a shit,” drills a hole through his phone book so he can hang it from a string beside his phone, complains about his hemorrhoids getting “as big as golfballs” (I’m not joking), and just generally acts like an asshole until a rabid Cujo bounds over, rips his throat out, and he bleeds to death. In the novel Pervier’s death takes more than a few pages, but it makes for fun reading. You hate the man so fucking much that watching him die feels oddly satisfying. In the movie, though, his death occurs pretty quickly, and in a darkened hallway, so it’s hard to see what’s going on aside from Gary’s foot trembling. And Pervier’s “I don’t give a shit” makes sense when he’s drilling a hole in the phone book, not when he’s about to be savagely attacked by a rabid St Bernard. There’s just less room for back story in movies. In a medium that demands pruning and chiseling and the “less is more” dictum, King’s writing takes a marked turn for the worse. King is a prose maximalist, who freely admits to “writing to outrageous lengths” in his novels, listing It, The Stand, and The Tommyknockers as particularly egregious examples of literary logorrhea. He is not especially equipped to write concisely. This weakness is most apparent in Sleepwalkers’ dialogue, which sounds like it was supposed to be snappy and smart, like something Aaron Sorkin would write, but instead comes off like an even worse Tango & Cash, all bad jokes and shitty puns. More on those bad jokes later. First, the plot.

Sleepwalkers is about a boy named Charles and his mother Mary who travel around the United States killing and feeding off the lifeforce of various unfortunate people (if this sounds a little like The True Knot in Doctor Sleep, you’re not wrong. But self-plagiarism is not a crime). Charles and Mary are shapeshifting werewolf-type creatures called werecats, a species with its very own Wikipedia page. Wikipedia confers legitimacy dont’cha know, so lets assume werecats are real beings. According to said page, a werecat, “also written in a hyphenated form as were-cat) is an analogy to ‘werewolf’ for a feline therianthropic creature.” I’m gonna spell it with the hyphen from now on because “werecats” just looks like a typo. Okay? Okay.

Oddly enough, the were-cats in Sleepwalkers are terrified of cats. Actual cats. For the were-cats, cute kittens = kryptonite. When they see a cat or cats plural, this happens to them:

^ That is literally a scene from the movie. Charles is speeding when a cop pulls alongside him and bellows at him to pull over. Ever the rebel, Charles flips the cop the finger. But the cop has a cat named Clovis in his car, and when the cat pops up to have a look at the kid (see below), Charles shapeshifts first into a younger boy, then into whatever the fuck that is in the above screenshot.

Now, the were-cats aversion to normal cats is confusing because one would assume a were-cat to be a more evolved (or perhaps devolved?) version of the typical house kitty. The fact that these were-cats are bipedal alone suggests an advantage over our furry four-legged friends, no? Kinda like if humans were afraid of fucking gorillas. Wait...we are scared of gorillas. And chimpanzees. And all apes really. Okay, maybe the conceit of the film isn’t so silly after all. The film itself, however, is about as silly as a bad horror movie can get. When the policeman gets back to precinct and describes the incident above (”his face turned into a blur”) he is roundly ridiculed because in movies involving the supernatural nobody believes in the supernatural until it confronts them. It’s the law, sorry. Things don’t end well for the cop. Or for the guy who gets murdered when the mom stabs him with...an ear of corn. Yes, an ear of corn. Somehow, the mother is able to jam corn on the cob through a man’s body, without crushing the vegetable or turning it into yellow mash. It’s pretty amazing. Here is a sample of dialog from that scene: Cop About To Die On The Phone to Precinct: There’s blood everywhere! *STAB* Murderous Mother: No vegetables, no dessert. That is actually a line in the movie. “No vegetables, no dessert.” It’s no “let off some steam, Bennett” but it’s close. Told ya I’d get back to the bad jokes. See, Mary and Charles are new in town and therefore seeking to ingratiate themselves by killing everyone who suspects them of being weird, all while avoiding cats as best they can. At one point Charles yanks a man’s hand off and tells him to "keep [his] hands to [him]self," giving the man back his severed bloody hand. Later on Charles starts dating a girl who will gradually - and I do mean gradually - come to realize her boyfriend is not a real person but in fact a were-cat. Eventually our spunky young protagonist - Madchen Amick, who fans of Twin Peaks will recognize as Shelly - and a team of cats led by the adorable Clovis- kill the were-cat shapeshifting things and the sleepy small town (which is named Travis for some reason) goes back to normal, albeit with a slightly diminished population. For those keeping score, that’s Human/Cat Alliance 1, Shapeshifting Were-cats 0. It is clear triumph for the felis catus/people team! Unless we’re going by kill count, in which case it is closer to Human/Cat Alliance 2, Were-cats 26. I arrived at this figure through my own notes but also through a helpful video that takes a comprehensive and complete “carnage count” of all kills in Sleepwalkers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmt-DroK6uA

II. Santo & Johnny “Sleep Walk” (1959) Because Sleepwalkers is decidedly not known for its good acting or its well-written screenplay, it is perhaps best known for its liberal and sometimes contrapuntal use of Santo & Johnny’s classic steel guitar song “Sleep Walk,” possibly the most famous (and therefore best) instrumental of the 20th century. Some might say “Sleep Walk” is tied for the #1 spot with “Green Onions” by Booker T & the M.G.’s and/or “Wipe Out” by The Surfaris, but I disagree. The Santo & Johnny song is #1 because of its incalculable influence on all subsequent popular music. 

I’m not saying “Wipe Out” didn't inspire a million imitators, both contemporaneously and even decades later…for example here’s a surf rock instrumental from 1999 called “Giant Cow" by a Toronto band called The Urban Surf Kings. The video was one of the first to be animated using Flash (and it shows):

So there are no shortage of surf rock bands, even now, decades after its emergence from the shores of California to the jukeboxes of Middle America. My old band Sleep for the Nightlife used to regularly play Rancho Relaxo with a surf rock band called the Dildonics, who I liked a great deal. There's even a Danish surf rock band called Baby Woodrose, whose debut album is a favourite of mine. They apparently compete for the title of Denmark’s biggest surf pop band with a group called The Setting Son. When a country that has no surfing culture and no beaches has multiple surf rock bands, it is safe to say the genre has attained international reach. As far as I can tell, there aren’t many bands out there playing Booker T & the M.G.’s inspired instrumental rock. Link Wray’s “Rumble” was released four years before “Green Onions.” But the influence of Santo and Johnny’s “Sleep Walk” is so ubiquitous as to be almost immeasurable. The reason for this is the sheer popularity of the song’s chord progression. If Santo and Johnny hadn’t written it first, somebody else would have, simply because the progression is so beautiful and easy on the ears and resolvable in a satisfying way. Have a listen to “Sleep Walk” first and then let’s check out some songs it directly inspired. 

The chords are C, A minor, F and G. Minor variations sometimes reverse the last two chords, but if it begins with C to A minor, you can bet it’s following the “Sleep Walk” formula, almost as if musicians influenced by the song are in the titular trance. When it comes to playing guitar, Tom Waits once said “your hands are like dogs, going to the same places they’ve been. You have to be careful when playing is no longer in the mind but in the fingers, going to happy places. You have to break them of their habits or you don’t explore; you only play what is confident and pleasing.” Not only is it comforting to play and/or hear what we already know, studies have shown that our brains actively resist new music, because it takes work to understand the new information and assimilate it into a pattern we are cogent of. It isn’t until the brain recognizes the pattern that it gives us a dopamine rush. I’m not much for Pitchfork anymore, but a recent article they posted does a fine job of discussing this phenomenon in greater detail.

Led Zeppelin’s “D’Yer Maker” uses the “Sleep Walk” riff prominently, anchored by John Bonham and John Paul Jones’ white-boy reggae beat: 

Here it is again with Del Shannon’s classic “Little Town Flirt.” I love Shannon’s falsetto at the end when he goes “you better run and hide now bo-o-oy.”

The Beatles “Happiness is a Warm Gun” uses the Sleep Walk progression, though not for the whole song. It goes into the progression at the bridge at 1:34: 

Tumblr won’t let me embed any more videos, so you’ll to travel to another tab to hear these songs, but Neil Young gets in on the act with his overlooked classic “Winterlong:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RV6r66n3TFI On their 1996 EP Interstate 8 Modest Mouse pay direct homage by singing over their own rendition of the original Santo & Johnny version, right down to the weeping steel guitar part: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VT_PwXjCqqs The vocals are typical wispy whispered indie rock vocals, but I think they work, particularly the two different voices. They titled their version “Sleepwalking (Couples Only Dance Prom Night).”

Dwight Yoakam’s “Thousand Miles From Nowhere” makes cinematic use of it. This song plays over the credits of one of my all-time favourite movies, 1993′s Red Rock West feat. Nicolas Cage, Lara Flynn Boyle, Dennis Hopper, and J.T. Walsh https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tu3ypuKq8WE

“39″ is my favourite Queen song. I guess now I know why. It uses my fav chord progression: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE8kGMfXaFU 

Blink 182 scored their first hit “Dammit” with a minor variation on the Sleep Walk chord progression: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT0g16_LQaQ

Midwest beer drinkin bar rockers Connections scored a shoulda-been-a-hit with the fist-pumping “Beat the Sky:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSNRq0n_WYA You’d be hard pressed to find a weaker lead singer than this guy (save for me, natch), but they make it work. This one’s an anthem.

Spoon, who have made a career out of deconstructing rock n’ roll, so that their songs sometimes sound needlessly sparse (especially “The Ghost of You Lingers,” which takes minimalism to its most extreme...just a piano being bashed on staccato-style for four minutes), so it should surprise nobody that they re-arrange the Sleep Walk chords on their classic from Gimme Fiction, “I Summon You:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teXA8N3aF9M I love that opening line: remember the weight of the world was a sound that we used to buy? I think songwriter Britt Daniel is talking about buying albums from the likes of Pearl Jam or Smashing Pumpkins, any of those grunge bands with pessimistic worldviews. There are a million more examples. I remember seeing some YouTube video where a trio of gross douchebros keep playing the same progression while singing a bunch of hits over it. I don’t like the smarmy way they do it, making it seem like artists are lazy and deliberately stealing. I don’t think it’s plagiarism to use this progression. And furthermore, tempo and production make all the difference. Take “This Magic Moment” for example. There's a version by Jay & the Americans and one by Ben E King & the Drifters. I’ve never been a fan of those shrieking violins or fiddles that open the latter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bacBKKgc4Uo The Jay & the Americans version puts the guitar riff way in the forefront, which I like a lot more. The guitar plays the entire progression once before the singing starts and the band joins in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKfASw6qoag

Each version has its own distinctive feel. They are pretty much two different songs. Perhaps the most famous use of the Sleep Walk progression is “Unchained Melody” by the Righteous Brothers, which is one of my favourite songs ever. The guy who chose to let Bobby Hatfield sing this one by himself must have kicked himself afterwards when it became a hit, much bigger than "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling."https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiiyq2xrSI0

What can you say about “Unchained Melody” that hasn’t already been said? God, that miraculously strong vocal, the way the strings (and later on, brass horns) are panned way over to the furthest reaches the left speaker while the drums and guitar are way over in the right, with the singing smack dab in the middle creates a kind of distance and sharp clarity that has never been reproduced in popular music, like seeing the skyscrapers of some distant city after an endless stretch of highway. After listening to “Unchained Melody,” one has to wonder: can that progression ever be improved upon? Can any artist write something more haunting, more beautiful, more uplifting than that? The “need your love” crescendo hits so fucking hard, as both the emotional and the sonic climax of the song, which of course is no accident...the strings descending and crashing like a waterfall of sound, it gets me every fucking time. Legend has it that King George II was so moved by the “Hallelujah” section of Handel’s “Messiah” that he stood up, he couldn't help himself, couldn't believe what he was hearing. I get that feeling with all my favourite songs. "1979." "Unchained Melody." "In The Still of the Night." "Digital Bath." "Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?" "Interstate." "Liar's Tale." “Gimme Shelter.” The list goes on and on. Music is supposed to move us.

King George II stood because he was moved to do so. Music may be our creation, but it isn't our subordinate. All those sci-fi stories warning about technology growing beyond our control aren’t that far-fetched. Music is our creation but its power lies beyond our control. We are subordinate to music, helpless against its power and might, its urgency and vitality and beauty. There have been many times in my life when I have been so obsessed with a particular song that I pretty much want to live inside of it forever. A house of sound. I remember detoxing from heroin and listening to Grimes “Realiti” on repeat for twelve hours. Detoxing from OxyContin and listening to The Beach Boys “Dont Worry Baby” over and over. Or just being young and listening to “Tonight Tonight” over and over and over, tears streaming from my eyes in that way you cry when you’re a kid because you just feel so much and you don’t know what to do with the intensity of those feelings. It is precisely because we are so moved by music that we keep creating it. And in the act of that creation we are free. There are no limits to that freedom, which is why bands time and time again return to the well-worn Sleep Walk chord progression and try to make something new from it. Back in 2006, soon after buying what was then the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs album, I found myself playing the album’s closing track over and over. I loved the chorus and I loved the way it collapses into a lo-fi demo at the very end, stripping away the studio sheen and...not to be too punny, showing its bones (the album title is Show Your Bones). Later on I would realize that the song, called “Turn Into,” uses the Sleep Walk chord progression. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exqCFoPiwpk

It’s just like, what Waits said, our hands goes to where we are familiar. And so do our ears, which is why jazz often sounds so unpleasant to us upon first listen. Or Captain Beefheart. But it’s worth the effort to discover new stuff, just as it’s worth the effort to try and write it. I recently lamented on this blog that music to me now is more about remembrance than discovery, but I’m still only 35 years old. I’m middle-aged right now (I don’t expect to live past 70, not with the lifestyle I’ve been living). There’s still a whole other half life to find new music and love and leave it for still newer stuff. It’s worth the challenge, that moment of inner resistance we feel when confronted with something new and challenging and strange sounding. The austere demands of adult life, rent and routine, take so much of our time. I still make time for creative pursuits, but I don’t really have much time for discovery, for seeking out new music. But I’ve resolved to start making more time. A few years ago I tried to listen to and like Trout Mask Replica but I couldn’t. I just didn’t get what was going on. It sounded like a bunch of mistakes piled on top of each other. But then a few days ago I was writing while listening to music, as I always do, and YouTube somehow landed on Lick My Decals Off, Baby. I didn’t love what I was hearing but I was intrigued enough to keep going. And now I really like this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMnd9dvb3sA&pbjreload=101 Another example I’ll give is the rare Robert Pollard gem “Prom Is Coming.” The first time I heard this song, it sounded like someone who can’t play guitar messing around, but the more I heard it the more I realized there’s a song there. It’s weird and strange, but it’s there. The lyrics are classic Pollard: Disregard injury and race madly out of the universe by sundown. Pollard obviously has a special place in his heart for this track. He named one of his many record labels Prom Is Coming Records and he titled the Boston Spaceships best-of collection Out of the Universe By Sundown. I don’t know if I’ll ever become a Captain Beefheart megafan but I can hear that the man was doing something very strange and, at times, beautiful. And anyway, why should everything be easy? Aren’t some challenges worth meeting for the experience waiting on the other side of comprehension or acceptance? I try to remember this now whenever I’m first confronted with new music, instead of vetoing it right away. Most of my favourite bands I was initially resistant to when I first heard them. Queens of the Stone Age, Kyuss, Guided by Voices, Spoon, Heavy Times. All bands I didn’t like at first.  I don’t wanna sleepwalk through life, surrounding myself only with things I have already experienced. I need to stay awake. Because soon enough I’ll be asleep forever. We need to try everything we can before the Big Sleep comes to take us back to the great blankness, the terrible question mark that bookends our lives.

[flowrxchild]

🌼Get To Know Me Tag🌼

Thanks @satans-helper for tagging me!!! This is gonna be a long one so if anyone feels it’s necessary, please tell me to shut up! oke doke les do it❤️

1. What’s your middle name?

Olivia!

2. How old are you?

20, very cool and very funky years..

3. When’s your birthday?

January 8th

4. What’s your zodiac sign?

Capricorn 🐏 also an Aries rising, Libra moon if anyone cares lol

5. What’s your favourite colour?

Rn it’s yellow!

6. What’s your lucky number?

Ok I rlly gotta pick one soon cuz I just don’t have one lol

7. Do you have any pets?

Used to have a chubby brown lab but she was an old girl:( BUT recently I have fed a stray cat enough for him to come back everyday so he is now mine by Ricky Law™️

8. Where are you from?

Toronto, Canada baybee

9. How tall are you?

5’5

10. What shoe size are you?

7 and a half? I think?

11. How many pairs of shoes do you own?

Not that many like 5 tops lol

12. What was your last dream about?

Last night I dreamt about going horse back riding?? I woke up like ...she’s a horse girl, I knew it..

13. What talents do you have?

I can draw/paint?? Also I’m a pretty snazzy photographer

14. Are you psychic in any way?

I’m definitely intuitive...I’ve experienced some very strange coincidences in my life...

15. Favourite song?

Jimi Hendrix’ Voodoo Chile

16. Favourite Movie?

Moonrise Kingdom

17. Who would be your ideal partner?

*stares in Josh Kiszka yearn*

18. Do you want children?

Erm not sure yet

19. Do you want a church wedding?

Lol I want whatever the opposite of a church wedding is..

20. Are you religious?

Nope.

21. Have you ever been to the hospital?

Yes. I’m so clumsy I am a danger to myself at this point...

22. Have you ever gotten in trouble with the law?

No I’m literally a baby chicken and will cry if u raise ur voice at me

23. Have you ever met any celebrities?

Not formally? I’ve seen a lot of random celebrities just walking around tho cuz I live in a big city

24. Baths or showers?

Showers, practically but I love me a good bath now and again

25. What color socks are you wearing?

Im not wearing any ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ;-) Sam Kiszka tease ;-) ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

26. Have you ever been famous?

One time my painting was put into a community art gallery and they took my photo for the local newspaper except they made the centre fold of the page fold into the picture around my face so it got all distorted and it was like when Mike Wazowski was in the Monsters Inc commercial...

27. Would you like to be a big celebrity?

Not rlly..

28. What type of music do you like?

Rock, folk and indie but I will listen to anything

29. Have you ever been skinny dipping?

Yes. Me and my friends do it every year as a cottage tradition!

30. How many pillows do you sleep with?

3...I need to be snuggled AND supported

31. What position do you usually sleep in?

I don’t sleep unless I curl up into the smallest ball possible like a friggin cat

32. How big is your house?

She smol

33. What do you typically have for breakfast?

Literally just coffee most days. I love anarchy

34. Have you ever fired a gun?

Nope. Don’t have the desire to either.

35. Have you ever tried archery?

I have not but I’ve always wanted to!

36. Favourite clean word?

Cozzy

37. Favourite swear word?

Cunty but like as an adjective

38. What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without sleep?

Not rlly sure...probably only a day. I’m a very sleepy person

39. Do you have any scars?

Yep

40. Have you ever had a secret admirer?

If I told you, they wouldn’t be secret ;-)

41. Are you a good liar?

No not at all. My face gives it away so badly

42. Are you a good judge of character?

I like to think so. My first impressions of people tend to be true.

43. Can you do any other accents other than your own?

Ya but not well ahsgag

44. Do you have a strong accent?

I don’t think I do, but my family from the states always says we have the stereotypical “Canadian accent”.

45. What is your favourite accent?

I loooove Irish accents. I find them very pleasing to hear!

46. What’s your personality type?

INFP-T to be precise

47. What is your most expensive piece of clothing?

My prom dress I think? I got it a Free People for 90$ and at that store, that’s a steal...

48. Can your curl your tongue?

Yeth

49. Are you an innie or an outie?

If this is referring to my belly button then, innie

50. Left or right handed?

Right handed

51. Are you scared of spiders?

Ew ya

52. Favourite food?

Ok my fave food is also my fave foreign food and it’s Indian!

53. Favourite foreign food?

^

54. Are you a clean or messy person?

messy...ITS CAREFUL CHAOS OK?

55. Most used phrase?

I really am not sure...

56. Most used word?

probably ‘like’. Yes I’m gen Z, yes I have trouble articulating my thoughts. And what about it???

57. How long does it take you to get ready?

I need at least an hour...I like to plan

58. Do you have much of an ego?

I don’t think so??

59. Do you suck or bite lollipops?

If you bite lollipops, you’re in jail now, I don’t make the law.

60. Do you talk to yourself?

Yes, I’m the funniest person I know.

61. Do you sing to yourself?

Yes, funny you ask, I’m not only the funniest person I know, but also North America’s greatest entertainer!

62. Are you a good singer?

No! But I will preform for myself and the spiders living in my room. Yes, we exist!

63. Biggest fear?

Losing the people I love, being trapped.

64. Are you a gossip?

No yuck i hate it.

65. Best dramatic movie you’ve seen?

this is too broad and difficult but The Witch. It’s spooky and dramatic.

66. Do you like long or short hair?

I don’t rlly have a preference...

67. Can you name all 50 states of America?

Probably if I try really really hard lol as a Canadian, this is a good road trip game

68. Favourite school subject?

Art or English!

69. Extrovert or introvert?

Introvert

70. Have you ever been scuba diving?

No but something about makes me anxious

71. What makes you nervous?

I would really love to find something that doesn’t make me anxious. Let’s start with that.

72. Are you scared of the dark?

No! I find it comforting sometimes actually

73. Do you correct people when they make mistakes?

Depends. I hate confrontation so I only do it if it really matters...

74. Are you ticklish?

Ok I wanna know who isn’t! Like whomst is not ticklish??

75. Have you ever started a rumour?

I hope not...I would feel very stinky

76. Have you ever been in a position of authority?

If by authority you mean telling my sister to get out of my unassigned-assigned spot on the couch even though my voice cracks a little as I do it causing her to laugh even harder, than yes.

77. Have you ever drank underage?

Yes. *police sirens grow closer*

78. Have you ever done drugs?

I have done a weed or 2. Yes

79. Who was your first real crush?

My neighbour lol

80. How many piercings do you have?

3! My ears and also my cartilage! Used to have my septum, but it caused me too many problems so i let it grow over :(

81. Can you roll your R’s?

Ya!

82. How fast can you type?

So fast *spongebob voice* wanna see me do it again?

83. How fast can you run?

I would probably be the first to go in a horror movie

84. What colour is your hair?

Dark brown

85. What colour are your eyes?

Brown

86. What are you allergic to?

Nothing substantial.

87. Do you keep a journal?

Ya I do!

88. What do your parents do?

My mums a school secretary and my dads a fraud investigator

89. Do you like your age?

U know what, ya..I can’t complain.

90. What makes you angry?

Injustice and rudeness

91. Do you like your own name?

Ya I don’t mind it

92. Have you already thought of baby names if so what are they?

I mean I have names that I like but it’s not something I write down so I always forgot lol

93. Do you want a boy or a girl child?

I really couldn’t care less

94. What are your strengths?

Physically, I’m a sack of bones with the upper body strength of a new born baby but I like to think my sense of humour makes me tolerable *finger guns*

95. What are your weaknesses?

I am one frightened human bean.

96. How did you get your name?

Tru story: throughout my moms whole pregnancy, everyone including the doctors were convinced I was gonna be a boy because they could never get a clear look at me in the ultra sounds so my parents had only picked out boy names until I was born to which they changed their choice of “Eric” to Erika :))

97. Were your ancestors royalty?

Not at all lol

98. Do you have any scars?

Did I already answer this one? I think I did?

99. Colour of your bedspread?

White with pink floral pattern! (From ikea lol)

100. Colour of your room?

It’s an off-white

Ok I wanna tag these lovely beans @pe2chie @turntonightfirelight @camomillacatalina @witchgoddess @blackdressedtinyone 💗💗💗

[oneandonlykysra]

Autobiographical:  It’s Like This

This was written about a year ago and is a pretty accurate account of my struggle with infertility and the end of it.  I’m posting this now because - due to a recent stint with cancer my doctors all agree I should not try for a second baby which was the plan for April before I found out about the cancer.

It’s Like This

by Kysra

Here’s how it is:

Ammonia cooling on fingers shaking in the lamplight.  A clear Solo cup on the vanity, half-full and leaking (Need to get the disinfectant and clean that) with a stick – a lackluster reminder of coffee spoons I’ve had to give up �� rising from the foam.

I should have brought a book, the porcelain warming beneath my lower cheeks even as the decision is made to get my feet and flush the nothing in the bowl and wash my tainted hands. The rest of a small eternity is spent half-pacing forth and frantically looking for something to do, willfully forgetting the empty sink, folded laundry, and dusted furniture.  

The book shelf is full but the contents have been read at least once.  The waiting is the hardest part (After all, what is two years of trying?).

Trying to be nonchalant is more difficult.   I barely know the date anymore, don’t really keep track of the days of the week or months of the year.  My calendar is all about the day of my cycle – Is it a fertile day?  What is my temperature?  Oh, it’s day 12, I should be seeing a spike now.  Why is my mucus drying up when it’s day 9?  Maybe I should start doing the ovulation kits today . . .

There are highs of course – the build up to getting that phone call, “You can trigger tomorrow at 8 A.M. and be here the next morning first thing” (like fertility is some sort of gun and synthetic hormones are the bullet); the hellish two week wait where every symptom imaginable is . . . imagined; and finally, today, when all the chemicals, mood swings, barely there self-hatred, public scrutiny and untamable Hope (too important for a mere lowercase) come to a head.

Returning to the bathroom takes some effort.  My breath is ragged from taking the ten steps from the hall.  A glance tells me everything I already knew, the screaming silence of a single line echoed in my heavy sigh.

I get the disinfectant, clean the mess.  The stick is in the garbage first.  I don’t want to see it anymore.

***

There are times I want to stand up, deform my jaw, and scream until my uterus explodes.  

“Do you want to hold her?”  The baby is staring at me with a baleful look that says, ‘I don’t know you. I don’t like you.  I don’t like how mommy’s fingers are digging into my pits either.”

I shake my head and make some excuse about not holding kids under a year old.  (It’s true but not the truth.)  

Social gatherings are almost as hellish as the two week wait only somewhat shorter and somewhat missing the desperate itching of anticipation that WILL.NOT.DIE.  I weather them with a staid sort of semi-calm that just barely masks the sinking isolation that I actually feel.

Because, seriously, when you’re going through a fertility journey alone (and make no mistake, even partnered infertile people are alone in their suffering) it seems as if the entire fucking population is in some stage of successful procreation just to spite you.

And in some weird twist of crazy, despite the bellowing green monster behind my eyes, I still like seeing baby bumps and talking mommy-shop and playing peek-a-boo.  If I can’t be a mommy (yet), I guess being ‘doting auntie’ isn’t such a short change.

It doesn’t stop me from crying myself to sleep though.

***

The thing is, after you’ve been molested as a kid, you never think of your body as fully yours.   Infertility reinforces this.   Unexplained infertility twists it into a psychosis.  Because if your body isn’t yours and it’s defective anyway, who the fuck is in charge?   YOU.  So you become a little reckless, a little crazy because this body isn’t yours but you’re the one having to deal with it.

You’re willing to do things most sane people would never entertain.  You take drugs and supplements and drink strange drinks and eat strange food and it doesn’t matter how much money it all costs or how many doctors you see or how many hours of work you miss.  You will allow anyone to touch, poke, prod, and manhandle your lady parts even though you hate being touched in even innocent places and want to kick these people in the face until their eyes are gouged.

And you do it, because this body that isn’t fully yours is telling you it wants to be an incubator for a brand spanking new baby.

And even though you know that spanking new baby and your spanking new incubator body will be touched, poked, prodded, and manhandled even more, perversely, even as you would prefer drinking acid under normal circumstances . . . you want it more than anything on God’s green Earth and you will do the aforementioned things-most-sane-people-would-never-entertain for as long as you can stand it.

***

Driving an hour and a half and missing work time stinks in and of itself, but being escorted to a claustrophobic little office with a huge cherrywood desk (cheerily justaposed as it is to the sickly yellow wall paint) and told, “At your age, with your medical history, and how you’ve responded so far, I have to think something is wrong with you” is just the straw that breaks the weary, beaten down camel’s pack-laden back.

My doctor is a certifiable jackass of the first water.  I don’t trust him a wit and even if I did think he had my best interests at heart, I would still want to bitch slap the smirk off his face.

I attempt to breathe through my nose, a painful weight in my chest, and try to stem the prickling in my eyes, nose, and whine that’s bouncing around between my vocal cords.

Something is wrong with you.  Story of my life.

He goes on talking about my three options (another IUI, IVF or laparoscopy) and I do my best to pay attention through the ringing in my ears.  I can feel the heated wetness of tears brimming at my lower eyelids and my nose is starting to run.  I faintly recognize my voice – stronger than it has any right to be – saying I want to move on to IVF.  

Nevermind that the last two years have cost me more than $30,000 already, I will find a way to finance the procedure even if I have to sell (excuse me, I mean donate) my precious eggs.  Who cares if it will absolutely kill me if they work for some stranger and I never reap the benefits of my own gametes, at least I’ll be able to give myself that good old college try.

He leaves to find the financing information and I let the tears come.   It’s not hard wracking sobs.  It’s not a steady drip.  It’s not a satisfying cry.  

It’s a weak, shuddering cry that cools my red cheeks and staggers my breath and drains my energy. I feel frail sitting here in this room with its pomp and polish.  I’ve never felt so lonely and in need of a simple hug.  

But there’s no one around (despite wishing for a nurse) and I probably wouldn’t accept a hug anyway. It would be like an agreement on my colossal failure.

Something is wrong with you.

I end up crying all the way back to work, through the day, on the way home, and into a bottle of tequila until I fall asleep on my bedroom floor.

When I wake, I feel scummy and dirty and to-my-toes sad.

My three options are in the back of my mind.  The doctor told me to let him know what I decide as soon as my period comes; and wouldn’t you just know it – “The Red Flood begins,” even my voice sounds weighted and empty as I look down at my soiled underwear. . . like Eeyore on estrogen.

After work, I pass my house and find myself at the park.  The green grass and canopied trees are brimming – ironically – with life, but I bypass them to walk all the way to the back where I can see cars pass but they can’t see me.  

I lower myself slowly to a swing, grasp the suspension chains and begin to rock.  The rocking becomes a creak-pull, the creak-pull smooths out to a soft aerial glide.

The sobs are not unexpected nor is the conversation-like prayer that breaks from my lips.  I want God to know how angry I am, how sorry I am, how hopeful and trusting and thankful I am.  I want him to know I’ll accept whatever outcome I’m given but how I will never understand how he could give me this imperative for motherhood yet not allow me to conceive.

“I guess that’s something I’ll just have to live with, right?”

Something is wrong with you.

That evening I call the doctor to let him know I choose the laparoscopy.

***

Missing a cycle hurts but (a grudging but) it was most likely necessary to my sanity.  I feel a renewed sense of positive anticipation and it shows in the smile on my face and the spring in my step.

I’m not even snarky with the doctor as he pulls the bandages off my “bullet holes” and he goes over the surgical report.  

Endometriosis . . . weeds in my garden.  Burned out but bound to regrow.  Time is of the essence.  “You will never be more fertile than you are right now.”

So how do we proceed? “You can do another Clomid cycle or a monitored cycle with injectibles . . . “

“I want to do IVF.”

“Well, then you just wasted a surgery.”

“I want to do IVF.”

“IVF isn’t going to give you a better chance of conceiving.  I recommend injectibles.”

“I’ll need to think about this . . . “

“Let me know what you decide before your next period.”

In the bathroom at work, I look down at my underwear with something between exasperation, laughter, and horror on my face.   The blood there taunts me.  

“Well, shit.”

***

Ask a woman who’s gone through fertility struggles what drugs she took and they will always fall into three categories:  stimulation, trigger, or arrest; and all of them take your sanity and stomp on it . . . because apparently, being through the emotional ringer every month when you see that negative test isn’t enough.

That being said, I dealt with the daily injections with grace (and the occasional rage-filled mood swing).  I say my prayers morning, noon, and night focusing my inner eye on the space just between my hips and beneath my belly button (where most of the medicine is injected).  I don’t complain about the near daily monitoring visits or the amount of time I have to make up at work.  And I never tell anyone I have decided to quit after this cycle.

I’m tired, and more than that, I’m stressed to the point of nightly body tremors and hair falling out. If I don’t quit, I might just give myself a heart attack.

Monitoring only makes my feelings of failure and inadequacy worse.  All it takes is the transvaginal ultrasound to make the air in my lungs thin out and my stomach drop.  My follicles – despite the stim drugs  - are not growing.

The nurse doesn’t seem overly concerned, but after every visit, I go to work with the knowledge beating down the crown of my head that it isn’t happening this month either.

And then it happens . . . Day 11.  The wand is prepped and inserted.  I crane my head back to see the blown up screen.  And there it is:  Big Bertha.  

The follicle takes up the entire screen  - a morbidly obese cell at once Frankenstein-ish and terrifically beautiful.  I have an insane urge to shriek, “It’s ALIVE!!!” but settle for tittering impotently.  Nonplussed, the technician says, “Oh yeah, that one’s ready . . . 18 millimeters.  You’ll probably trigger tonight.”

My jaw is still dragging on the floor.  Yesterday, that thing was only a tiny speck of light on a gray board and now it was Follizilla.

Another day comes and I pack my trigger shot with all the care of a desperate woman at the mercy of her ovaries.  I cannot take it till 8 A.M. and tomorrow I will lay on the table one more time, open my legs for a stranger in a lab coat one more time, and submit to the rigors of the dreaded two week wait.  ONE. MORE.  TIME.

I am almost giddy at the idea of – what will most likely be – freedom from fertility-related insanity.  So giddy, I book a trip to Cedar Point Amusement Park because after two and a half years of frequent doctor visits, blood draws, fertility drugs, acupuncture, teas, supplements, injections, ultrasounds, fertility yoga, inseminations, and negative pregnancy tests (not to mention painful HSGs, laparoscopies, and hormone-induced mood swings), I was ready to get on a few roller coasters and scream my grief to the world without worrying about being committed.

The trigger shot is injected.  The work day is done.  I have trouble sleeping, think maybe I’m not ready to let it go just yet.

I ask God silently for guidance, for peace; and that night I dream of a baby in a gray jumpsuit and dancing with Batman.

Maybe I need to be committed after all.

***

It is the stupidest, most crazy thing ever but as I walk into the doctor’s office and say hello to the receptionist, “You should go get some breakfast down the street.  It’ll be about a half hour before they’re ready for you,”  I realize I chose this blouse and these shoes and this hair style and put on make up because I feel sexy and –WORSE- randy.

Grinding my teeth, I go down the street and have a light breakfast then make my way back to the office and promptly lock myself in the bathroom.  

After two and a half years of charting my cycles, I am an old pro at feeling myself up for cervical mucus and for the first time ever, I have buckets of the stuff.  My underwear is soaked.   It’s mystifying but also exciting (in more ways than one!); and I don’t quite know what to do with myself.

Failing any other ideas, I clean up as best I can, wash my hands three times, and step into the waiting room.  I have a book in my bag (along with an mp3 player with a new “insemination mix” and a few snacks, some water) but I can’t concentrate for all the involuntary rubbing of the thighs.

I am about to go absolutely batshit (in the most self-loving way) when my name is called.

The nurse is one I’ve never met before but I like her instantly.  She has long blonde hair in braids and reminds me of my mother. “We’ll take good care of you,” she says, and – for once – I believe her.

The doctor is also one I’ve never met before – an old lady with graying frizzed out hair and square-frame glasses.  She’s looking over my chart when she enters and looks me in the eye while shaking my hand. I am completely in love with her in an instant because after so many inseminations performed by so many doctors (never the same one twice), I finally feel safe.  She feels like a grand-mother.

It is done and over with in a seeming instant . . . I’m actually surprised because there was no pain, no discomfort, no violation and ask if maybe she forgot to do something.  She laughs and says she wishes me luck and just as she’s leaving, I remember to ask, “Can I have some progesterone suppositories, please?  I always have low progesterone . . . and this is my last shot.”

My main doctor – the one I want to slap – wouldn’t be happy with me right now; but I never did buy that the suppositories “wouldn’t fix my problem”.

Papers are ruffled as she looks through my lab reports, “I’ll get you some samples . . . Honestly, I don’t know why they haven’t given you this before.”

I want to scream, crow, beat my chest and poke Dr. Jerk in the shoulder and say, “BOO-YAH!!” Instead I say a quiet thank you and wait alone for the nurse to bring the samples.

As I move to get dressed, I can’t help but think, “Man, I hope I don’t leave a huge ass puddle on this table.”

***

It starts here:

Barely there, shuffling feet against carpet, heat radiating off skin like an invisible sunburn.  I haven’t seen or spoken to my family in a week (even though I live with them) because I wake up, eat, leave, work, get home before everyone, take a shower, cook a quick dinner (steak- rare- and macaroni and cheese), and then go to bed before 6 P.M.

Progesterone  - apparently – is a hard task master; and yet, I’m sort of relieved.  Being so tired means I can’t really think about the two week wait and all that entails.

I loyally take my temperature when I wake (yet another thing I will be SO happy to never worry about again) at around my 4 A.M. bathroom break, and a negative pregnancy test on day 20 revealed that the trigger shot medicine was out of my system.

All in all, I feel like I’m going through the motions rather than expecting anything to change.  Even when my temperature fails to begin falling around day 24 like it usually does, I know it’s most likely the progesterone. Nothing to do cartwheels over.

On day 25, I go to work (so tired I am caught dozing off in front of a spreadsheet that once had figures and now has a running commentary of ‘RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR”) and feel a stitch in my back that feels something like, “Damn cramps.”

I shift and stand and bend and stretch but the pain gets worse till I imagine a storm cloud rolling into my belly, all black and gray and shot with lightning.  I laugh a little at the visual even as I wince and try not to be disappointed.

Carol offers me some pain relievers but I refuse – there’s still a small, itsy-bitsy, microscopic chance and I don’t want to screw it up with chemicals.   I’ve come this far, I can bear the pain, thanks.

I’m bone tired when I get home but manage to see my mother before heading off to bed, the sunlight still filtering through my window.  

“I’ve been worried about you,” she says, “You should call the doctor.”  I tell her it’s just the progesterone and soon I’ll be off of it, don’t worry so much.

I sleep hard that night.  Dreamless and restful, interrupted only once at 4-ish A.M. with a full bladder and the bleary knowledge that – oh yeah, still have to take my temperature.  I get up when the stick beeps, carry it into the bathroom, don’t bother to turn the light on (I know where the toilet is well enough).

Sighing as I feel the cool porcelain, I vaguely remember to hold the nearby cup under the stream before my bladder erupts.  I don’t care that I get some on my hand, care even less that a little bit runs down the side to create a urine ring on the vanity.  

These things can be washed. The months of disappointment can’t.

I do this every night and always forgo testing after convincing myself it’s too early.  I’m testing tonight just to give myself closure. The blood hasn’t come yet, but the pain of the day promises a negative.

Squinting as hard as I can to see the numbers spelling out my temperature,  I add two degrees for every hour until I usually get up.  It takes a moment but I suddenly realize how high that number is.

My brain wakes up and my heart trips.  

No.  No.  It has to be a mistake.  I’m calculating wrong and I’m too tired to get my hopes up.  Resolved, I finish my business, wash my hands, dip the test applicator into the cup, cap it and set it aside.  

Going back to bed is hard, a not-to-be-ignored what if? whispering softly against my doubts.  Sleep doesn’t come, despite that ever-present progesterone induced exhaustion, and I get up to look at the damn test and put this whole wasted chapter of my life behind me.

In the dark, I find the test, see the digital readout spells the result.  

It’s one word.

That’s about all I can make out but it’s enough.  To make sure, I bring the stick close to my face (cursing myopic eyes), but there’s no mistake.

Pregnant.

Squeezing my eyes shut then opening them again . . . the letters do not change nor do their order or meaning.

I put on the light.

Pregnant.

I shuffle into my dark room, don my glasses and return to the light.

Still Pregnant.

My thoughts are jumbled and I can’t decide what to do.  I pace towards the family room – no – and turn to the hall, to my brother’s door – no – I try to lie down – need to move – and I’m up again, pacing and talking to myself – jibberish – and trying to contain the fireworks zooming just beneath my skin wanting to explode from my mouth in a squeal and whoop of joy!

I open my mouth, muscles tight and eyes squeezed shut, and scream silently.  Then I jump up and down like a monkey on a caffeine high.  Yes, yes, yes!!!!

Then, I’m down on my knees, face upturned to the ceiling.  Thank you.  Thank you God.  Thank you.

And my hand finds that place between my hips, just above where the storm was brewing yesterday.  I don’t know you yet, but you need to know  . . . I love you more than anything and I need you to be strong and scrappy and grow because my one soul-deep wish now is to meet you and hold you and care for you.  I know you won’t always be happy, but I will do my best to be the best mommy I can be. I love you so much.

I give a little laugh and whisper, “I think we’ll need to cancel that trip to Cedar Point.”

And here’s how it is:

Infertility sucks. Fertility treatment even moreso; but I would do it again for the pleasure of seeing that Big Fat Positive and seeing the little hatching egg on my fertility chart and watching my waistline grow and change into some alien pod with moving skin and being unable to sit down or stand up from sitting because there’s an entire new person with bones and joints and independent movements nestled somewhere in the vicinity of my lungs (I can’t breathe!)  . . .

I would do it again to feel the elation of hearing that first cry – at once so new and familiar, to hold that weight that my hips know so well in my arms, to introduce myself and child to the crazy learning/bonding experience that is nursing, to change that first diaper, to barely sleep during that first nerve-wracking night,  . . .

And to stare into my child’s face every day and know without a single doubt or regret that it was all worth it.