#the chronic fatigue has been BEATING MY ASS

[1-8oo-wtfbro]

i think being put down like a dog would fix me actually

[thessalian]

Thess vs Resolutions

Happy New Year! I know the last few years have been rough, and we all have some pretty rough times ahead of us. It can be hard to get excited for a new year when so much is being ... this. *gestures at basically everything* It’s okay to feel overwhelmed and a little “Okay, what now?” about it all.

Now, I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions. They’re too often used to beat up on ourselves, and honestly don’t seem to help that much with actually establishing healthier behaviours because of the ... all-or-nothing nature of them, I guess? Like, if you’re trying to do a thing and you backslide a bit, you can generally go, “Okay, I had a slip-up there but I can try again tomorrow”. Saying “I broke my New Year’s resolution” sounds so final, and it’s easy to feel like, “Well, I broke it, that’s it, I failed” and avoid trying again because you already failed so why bother? So I avoid that kind of New Year’s resolution. However, something @blumineck said in a recent TikTok gave me something of a better idea. He said something about, if you’re making a New Year’s resolution, have it be something you can’t use to beat yourself up, but something fun, like learning to skateboard. So my idea is also a way of celebrating what I did over the course of 2022. It’s “Okay, look at the things you did last year that gave you pride and joy, and do more of that”.

So here’s what I did in 2022 that gave me pride and joy:

Growing things. My windowsill-and-balcony garden gave me great joy, and while some of it has not handled the cold snap well, I can and will replant next year. So I will do more of that, with a better idea of what works and what doesn’t.

Cooking things. Christmas 2021 was me asking for things like a new skillet, a baking dish, and some other stuff, and I made good use of them. I got a dehydrator and started drying my own fruit snacks. I learned to make candy - granted, mostly fudge at the moment, but it’s a start. I made risotto, and cottage pie, and I learned to make a bomb-ass lasagne. When I asked for and received a new toaster this Christmas, I spent some time looking up the best way to cook bacon and put BLTs back on the menu for me. I subscribed to a YouTube channel called Epicurious that may well give me more ideas, and I’ve attempted about three of the recipes B Dylan Hollis tried. I did all this to make it easier to eat a good, varied, and largely healthy diet despite cost of living increases, dietary restrictions, and a chronic pain condition that causes fatigue and IBS as well as pain. It’s worked out well. So I will do more of that, and every kitchen appliance or utensil I get that’s more than just “cheap but vaguely functional” will help.

Hobbies. I mean, most of the above pretty much qualifies (I’m never sure about cooking because you do need food to live, but I guess it’s the effort and stuff; you could theoretically live your whole life on frozen dinners and instant ramen). Gardening, candy making, stuff like that. But there’s other stuff that I really enjoyed and should do more of, and things I want to try. I’m thinking more Lego. Maybe some more jigsaw puzzles. I have to wait on resin casting until the weather’s a bit warmer because I did try a keychain but it didn’t cure properly and I’m not sure if the cold was responsible. I have plans to start making soaps for my own use, and was thinking of getting a slow cooker to make my own essential oils as well as having another tool in my culinary arsenal. I also have designs on a lock picking set because learning to pick locks sounds like fun. Basically I got a lot of pride and joy out of expanding my “Things I Do For Fun” options this year just gone. So I will do more of that.

Friends. I tried to be good to my friends, and I seem to have succeeded. So I will do more of that, because they give me joy and they deserve all the goodness I can provide.

Thing is, a lot of the other stuff that makes up the more usual type of New Year’s resolutions follow more or less automatically from a lot of these, at least for me. Eating healthier? Cooking helps. Keeping things tidy? Well, if you want to garden and cook and have all the hobbies, you need space to put the things, so it makes sense to keep things at least moderately organised. Being more careful with money? Good ingredients and Lego are expensive; that’s an excellent motivator for being careful where money goes. This way, I’m not nagging myself to do things because “That’s What Normal People / Functional Adults Do” (I mean, that’s bullshit for a start, but also it’s terribly othering); I’m doing these things because it makes the things I do that give me pride and joy easier. And then I can look at the other benefits - the “normal people / functional adult” benefits - that my just arranging my life the way I need it to be provided, and feel pride and joy in that.

Some might argue that this could backfire because people seem happy doing unhealthy and self-destructive things. Except ... I’ve done unhealthy and self-destructive things. (Hell, I smoke, so I still do.) Thing is, none of the unhealthy or self-destructive things I’ve done have made me proud or joyful. Anxiety can be viewed as excitement in the wrong state of mind, but mostly I think it was a kind of relief I was feeling at the time; that I was getting what I deserved. Not ‘wanted’, not ‘needed’ - deserved. When you dislike yourself intensely enough, what you feel you deserve is generally harmful in the extreme, and I think the thing I’m proudest of is having finally got it most of the way through my head that I deserve better. These days, the few clinging remnants of self-dislike (because self-hatred’s too strong a term) get appeased by the fact that doing things hurts, and every day, that part of me gets a little smaller as I take joy and pride in the fruits of my labours. Every day, the pain I go through is more and more “worth it for how its end result will better my life” than “I deserve this”, and maybe one day, that self-dislike will be entirely gone. Until then, I work with what I have.

So, yes, I weaponise my depression and ADHD symptoms against each other. That’s honestly something else that gives me pride, if not necessarily joy. And instead of resolving to Be Better At Being Normal People, which implies that I’m not normal and therefore somehow unworthy, I’m going to continue Marie Kondo-ing my life from the inside out. I will keep what sparks joy and pride, and let the rest take care of itself. I hope all of you can find something similar in whatever trials and tribulations life throws at you in 2023.

[justmaghookit]

My chronic fatigue has been beating my ass lately and I can barely get up out imof bed without feeling like I'm weighed down by a ton of bricks.

[shesmorethanfibro]

“Fibrophobia” the fear of doing absolutely anything physical that could provoke a fibro flare-up. (Original creds to @ Dear Fibromyalgia for this definition) When you have fibromyalgia it seems and sadly is a reality that really anything can negatively affect your pain. Stress, exercise, temperature, etc. and because of that I will admit, I get anxiety more often than not thinking that everything will lead to bad pain. I hate living that way, but sadly it is a very possible reality. I think it scares us from living, but it’s also hard to get over that fear when it’s rational and can really lead to more pain. ⠀ ⠀

I want to share my biggest fear that fibromyalgia could negatively effect. I want to be an actress. I once shared this fear of mine in a support group and this lady who does makeup for shows and movies once commented and gave me SOME peace of mind that acting may be an easier job as a lot of acting is sitting around waiting to shoot, they have water and healthy foods on deck, can nap when I don’t have a scene in my trailer or dressing room, can still get some exercise so it’s very accommodating. That has been a relief, but there are also some fears that come to mind. ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀

One thing I know for sure is that this is the thing I’ve wanted more than anything, and whether I have to get a massage everyday, or bubble baths every night, even if it hurts terribly every day I will not let it stop me. But there are some things that leave me hesitant. For example, Id love to be on type of shows that wouldnt be too bad like a cw one (like tvd), a teen high school one like Degrassi, one tree hill, the oc, pll, etc. greys anatomy, a Netflix one, and for the most part wouldnt be too bad. but my dream is to do movies and shows that are more demanding. Like marvel, Harry Potter, stranger things, Jurassic world, Godzilla /Kong ones, tbh any franchise, heavy action ones. So I constantly fear that is going to beat me down physically everyday or that they would rather cast someone who’s healthier who is less than a liability. In a marketing standpoint it’s nice to hire someone with fibro to show people it’s possible, to tell children to never give up but idk if that is worth risking their projects over. I would work my ass off even harder if I got the chance because of fibro, but you just never know. ⠀ ⠀

Another fear is one that people might not understand if you don’t have fibro and don’t live like this to be honest. My sleep. Yes 9-5 jobs in the acting world are possible, it’s more of the sitcoms ones but as we’ve establish I have my heart set on other type of shows which are ones that can go on into the middle of the night. I take meds to help me sleep and I have to take them at a certain time for them to kick in in 3 hours. With acting especially with the kind I want to do, it could go over schedule, change and what if I take my meds and it goes over schedule, and I’m even more tired. Or if I get out late and take my meds too late so going to bed basically in the morning, and what if I just have a scene in the morning. Yes I can nap in the day but with chronic fatigue you want and need to sleep at night. Or could just not take them that night if i have to, but i need to to sleep. I’m sure it’ll be a cross this bridge when we come to it thing, but when I don’t take my meds I fall asleep and wake up right after, all night. The longest staying asleep like 20 minutes at a time, but more often waking up right after I pass out. I know I will figure out what works best for me, and will just depend on what may happen that day but it just gets me nervous. ⠀ ⠀

I think that fear has a large part on fibromyalgia and it stops us from doing things sometimes because we want to avoid what we feel is the inevitable. But I’ve also learned that fibro is unpredictable, and some days when you think it’ll be too bad to do something and you have to do it anyway it may not actually be as bad as you may have thought it would be. I would never not follow these goals because of these fears because I know that even if it will be a lot harder, it is still possible and that’s all I need. It just scares me. But as I look back on my childhood, I see little things that I did that make sense when I realized that I wanted to be an actress. I don’t even remember exactly when I figured it out but it just all made so much sense. I have a bunch of goals, but acting is the thing I want most, that I think of everyday, that drives me. And pain or not, I won’t let it stop me from my goal. ⠀ ⠀

Another thing that inspires me to not give it up out of fear is knowing that there are other people with dreams who have fibro that feel as if they’ll have to give it up because of fibromyalgia. I was the same way. I so often hear why you’ll have to quit because of fibro, that most things are impossible, that an ever lasting love story isn’t realistic because of fibro. But I want to show people and not only them but myself that it is possible. I want everyone to know that yeah it may be hard, but when I go up to get an academy award or something someday that I have fibromyalgia and I’m doing it. And that is something that’ll make me push through that fear everyday.

[ivanabaqero]

Since I just returned from rehab, here is my.. idk, emotional journey on my chronic illness + mental health or wtf ever u wanna call this. This is the most personal thing I have ever posted but I need to get it out. 

Before you read, I guess I gotta tw this for suicidal thoughts and descriptions of my symptoms.

I don’t even know where to start. It feels like all of this happened in one week and at the same in a span of several years. But no idea, time just kept passing and more shit happened. 

Last summer was pretty cool. I worked hard and made a fuckton of money - not really considering the consequences of the fact that I overstepped the boundaries of my body every single day. Either way, I regret nothing it was pretty cool and another experience I am glad I could make. Well, but when I came back home, I started to notice a few things. Among some weird shit nobody wants to know about, I noticed a change of my eyesight. There was a cloud right on the vision on my left eye and it got blurry. At first, it started with minutes and then it passed. But I knew my body responded to exhaustion in an odd way so I let it slide. As doctors have instructed me, only when it lasts over 24 hours it’s an actual episode/flare and I should go to the ER -- to elaborate this further, I have been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2015 and have not had any bigger flares since, only the regular symptoms like fatigue, etc.

 I got treated with the regular medication; cortisone. This shit gave me some energy boost for a few days and then, things went back to somewhat normal. The blurry thing in my eye has changed into a weird ass thing called nystagmus. Basically, my eyeball was twitching. It was better than the blurry sight and my doctors told me that physical therapy was the only thing to help me with that, and up until some weeks ago this didn’t stop, at the moment it’s gotten way better though - a relief because that caused me mad headache and made reading really difficult.

Anyway, that was the smaller problem. A few months later, in December around Christmas, I have gotten really weak and have been constantly dizzy. As usual, I let it slide for some days. Up until that point when I couldn’t move from the bed or look at anything else but right up at the ceiling or I would get fucking dizzy. Back to the ER again, the same procedure began. Cortisone  resulted in a massive push of energy that lasted for some days, but after that, all the symptoms slowly returned. Not only that, but it started to get worse. I have been dragging and limping with my left foot since months but I still managed somehow to walk and get around. In January I had a major panic attack when I noticed that I couldn’t walk on my own to my doctors, which is merely an 8 minute walk away. I had to call my mom to bring me back home because I couldn’t go any step more. My doctor sent me to the ER but the next day, I decided that I was fine and being over dramatic and everything was perfectly fine. The whole thing kept getting worse, I could not walk anymore, I kept feeling dizzy all the time unless I was staring at only one spot: my laptop or phone. So that was what I did, ignore my symptoms. Adding to my chronic fatigue, dizziness, inability to walk and my eye problem, a sensitivity problem spread all over my body from the chest downwards. My hands hurt and my fingers cramped up and got stiff, I lost all feeling in my feet. I had an appointment at the neurologist thank god, or else, I would have let it gotten worse and kept telling myself that I am being over dramatic and nothing is actually wrong. Delusional? Maybe. I don’t understand myself there either.

The neurologist decided to keep me in hospital for a whole ass week, getting cortisone every day. I got in there with the ambulance in a wheelchair and left out of there walking again. Not perfectly, but I thought things were looking up. Of course, once the high dose of steroids begins to wear off and you slowly come down from it, you first catch sleep. Steroids this time have been given to me five days in high dose instead of three and in addition, I had to take pills that I had to reduce slowly over another two weeks. I did not sleep in those three weeks more than 3-4 hours per night and then I finally could. To make this more understandable; my brain was tired but my body was buzzing. I also had a tremor that has still not entirely left me as a wonderful side effect from the medication. 

That time stationary they finally put me back in a MRT and found 2 bigger new lesions. One of them in my cerebellum and the other in my spinal cord. Each of them causing me all those massive problems. Back at home I had physical therapy every day, but despite all of it, I had to rely on a wheelchair. I got my wheelchair in march and named him Otto because he is the best man ever. Next time in hospital, I was mentally and physically just fucking done and tried to just ignore how much my mental health was going downhill along with my body, the neurologist offered me stationary rehab at a very well known center where they treat several physical as well as mental illnesses. I said yes, and luckily got a place in July.

The initial plan was to stay there for four weeks, but the doctors suggested to extend to six. I did. And good that I did. I made slow progress. Very slow. To imagine, in twenty minutes at the first day I could barely walk 130m with four  breaks in between, with walking aid and what not - and my last day I made 640m in the same time with no breaks. I know this doesn’t sound like a lot but fuck -- I made it out of a fucking wheelchair. I am walking again. Not perfectly or any good, but my legs are used for their purpose again; to get me through this world. For someone who loves hiking and going for little walks alone, this was such a big deal to just not be able to anymore. 

The day I had the panic attack was the day I realized that in 2015 I made a promise to myself that if I ever have to rely on other people, I would end it. But I felt selfish for not wanting to end it. I felt selfish  for wanting to live and being a burden to people. I know, none of this is my fault and I am the first to give good advice, but am I good at handling my own shit? Absolutely not. 

With all the physical therapy I did for six weeks every day, I also had a psychologist that helped me understand myself better and deal with the trauma this experience brought me. I have to find another psychologist at home as well, because I didn’t feel the one I have helped me at all. I had to make a lot of promises to myself, such as accepting and asking for help and that it’s no shame in doing so. I feared losing my independence and I still do. But fuck, this experience was an eye opener in so many ways. I made new friends in rehab as well, which was one of the coolest things. And I got hit on by two attractive men - can you believe? I was in a wheelchair, dressed like absolute shit and not making any kind of deal of how I look! But yeah, my interest wasn’t really there to get involved in anything. I’ve got a lot of love to give but I need to give it to myself rather than pour it out on someone else.

I learned so many lessons, about my body and about my mind. My brain is an idiot and I have so many fears I was never even able to see until now. I thought optimism could beat everything and well... while it helps me a lot to get through every day life, every now and then I just need a slap in the face to look at things in another light. Not everything is fine if you tell yourself it is, no, you are not over reacting and you are allowed to feel sorry for yourself when life is dealing you a bad card. It doesn’t matter that other people have it worse -- it doesn’t mean your own shit is any less valid. And with that, I am going to wash my face and stop crying. I am still in a shock of reality state because I am  back at home now and everything is different. And I got to admit, I feel a little lonely. But I don’t want to reach out to my old friends at the moment with whom I felt like the “sick friend”. I want more friends in similar positions as me so I don’t have to feel bad for... well, feeling bad, and I don’t want to hear any more optimism monologues from healthy people who have absolutely no idea what it is like to have chronic pain, fatigue and overall; an illness. Whether it be mental or physical.

If you really read all of this, thank you. There was no need to, but I appreciate it. I honestly just needed to let it out. Because I haven’t done so properly since all of that started. 

[the-satellite]

Hello friends and welcome to ☆Hateful Nostalgia☆. I was exposed to the mob talker mod WAY too young bc I was an unsupervised child on the internet watching mod showcases and SkyDoesMinecraft. Looking back these sucked, the stories were often bland and the designs were milk toast at best and tits out at worst. So for the sake of procrastinating on working on anything substantial I grabbed the main 6 I remembered and gussied em up. Redesigns, rewrites, better names, all that bullshit. If your interested in better photos, design notes, story details and rambling hit the basement, otherwise here's a line up you should click for better quality.

Also I wrote all this once before already but I deleted it like a dumb bitch. On the night Unus Annus was murdered in front of my eyes no less. Was a rough fuckin night.

The Creeper- Kupa. An explosive pyromaniac with a habit of making empty threats and yelling. She protects what she believes to be her territory with a suicidal passion, but if you manage to get her to cool down and soften up she's pretty sick to hand out with. Hard of hearing, has at least one bout of head trauma at all times, and deathly allergic to cats.

Because the creeper is kinda the og I wanted to reference AT2's design more than the others, but I'm p sure the only thing I actually kept was the red hair and brown gloves. Otherwise I was doing whatever. I really wanted to lean into the explody bit of creepers, so I gave her some bite and dressed her in clothes referenced from Irish railroad workers. This may also be why I keep imaging her with a very heavy Irish or Scottish accent, whichever would be most incomprehensible when angry. Every color but her skin was color picked from one of the references, with some minor alterations for makes my eyes happy reasons.

With Kupa I imagine a story line with her would largely be about her as a character and her development than like an actual adventure narrative like everyone else. She starts off ready to blow up both you and herself in a misguided attempt to defend what she sees as her's and opens up and learns not everyone is out to get her. Lots of time taken to understand her childhood and how she ended up how she is. Very simple, probably the default or tutorial run people would go through.

The Zombie- Bee. The ill husk of a missing explorer suffering from a less than conventional appetite. She wallows in her self imposed loneliness, believing herself to be an irredeemable monster doomed to hurt those around her. What she really needs is a buddy and some clue to who she used to be. Rough voiced, chronically fatigued, and prone to spontaneous combustion in sunlight.

 I definitely consider this one the weakest for design sadly. I imagined Zombies as humans who went into strange caves and caverns and didn't come out for years, only to pop up as completely different people. I just tossed AT2's design. The first thing I did was make her a bit of a genderbent Steve and tinted her green bc Zombies in game are just Steve but green. Tore up her clothes, colored picked the darkest colors I could from the clothes on the in game and boom, Bee. I do vaguely regret not making her eyes pure black but I also still wanted her to be human enough to fit with the other overworld mods.

 Ok so Bee actually has a basic story. When you meet her she's aggressive, but as a warning. She fears the possibility she may hurt somebody so heads for threats immediately. Going back and forth between her cave and village for a while you learn more about the situation with the missing folks who come back and Bee as a person. After a bit you pick her up off her depressed ass and start a nocturnal adventure of refinding your past, adapting to who your becoming, overcoming self destuction, and slow burn babey!!! 

The Skeleton- Ulna. One of the few surviving warriors of a now destroyed kingdom and dead culture. She spends most of her time now traveling alone, hiding in trees and shooting anything see sees as a threat- which is everything- in the face with homemade arrows. Very much suffering from loss of her home and a bad case of lost purpose. A woman of few words, very antisocial, and naturally nocturnal.

 I came in with the Skeleton wanting to make her seem mysterious, so my first thought was immediately a cloak and a mask, but I wanted her face to like be visible so I went with the face paint. I didn't actually know that I wanted to do under there so I went with wraps that are reminiscent of the original outfit but still not tits out bc it's so fucking easy! Gave her a quiver, color picked the cloak and face paint from the in game model and the wraps from AT2'S art. I did like. Subconsciously draw her eyes the way I do Asian characters but I didn't have anything specific in mind so like go nuts with what you think she is.

 Ulna's deal is very much her lack of purpose or home and the entire thing is about finding that again. She's found sitting up in a tree during a storm pointing a bow and arrow into your face. She eventually let's you stick around until the storm is over and theres some bonding into deep night until the rain stops. You ask if she wants to come with on your little travelling sword for hire business, she says sure, sleep schedule shenanigans, backstory angst, and road trip bonding happens and she eventually decides that helping people is her new purpose and you're her new home

The Spider- Park. A young adult experiencing the world for the first time through her tribe's rite of passage. She's really just trying to figure out how to live life outside of the cave she's been stuck in her entire life and aggressively trying to be an independent adult despite not knowing anything about being an independent adult. Its projection. Blind in the daylight, naive and excitable, and taken to refusing help at her own risk.

 Ok so. I don't know who looked at the spider and said "purple haired loli with puffy pants" so I once again yeeted the whole thing, only really keeping the kinda cutesy and childish bits. Spiders are a tribe of humans what live in caves unless they've broken off to live on the surface. Kids are kept inside until they hit a certain milestone, where they come up to explore at night. They're usually small and pale, but are pretty kickass when necessary. Again picked the colors off the in game model, played with the lightest gray for the skin, and bc I couldn't figure out anyway to use the stripes so they're on the patches lol.

 Park's meeting is probably the funniest and most meet cute one here, in that she accidentally drops on top of you from a little cliff drop off. Cue loads of apologies and an explanation about the spider deal and being blind in light. She asks for some help getting around and bam babey friendship and emotional attachment! What follows is kinda a buddy of coming of age story with the obligatory goes home and is miserable scene. Generally it's just about being a scared young adult and having someone to fall back on and why that's important. Also crushes and young people being bad at that.

 The Blaze- Amber. A demonic entity who would let the world burn and the sun die if it meant she'd get her soul back. She's known for being ruthless, taking souls through force instead of making deals like other Blazes. Keeps this forceful nature even once she's become friendly, makes you do dump shit. Territorial, eyes glow and dim with her life, and runs remarkably warm.

 Amber here is the first one I actually did! I was just. Really tired that she was in a bikini. I decided early on I wanted overworld mobs to be human and everyone else was decidedly not, so Blazes are demons who gave up their souls under false pretenses to other Blazes. Because of how little clothes AT2's design wore I had essentially free reign and my thought was immediately to lean on golden knight bc of how Blazes are found protecting fortresses. The gold isn't picked from anything bc I was looser with the colors, but everything else is, and the hair is supposed to represent the smoke. Also the sticks in her hair are blaze rods bc I don't like them just floating around her.

Amber is found in the Nether obviously, protecting a fortress and immediately trying beat your ass and either incinerate you or make you give up your soul. During you prove yourself a p damn good fighter and she makes a deal to show you how Blazes exist and pursade you to give your soul up willingly. Bonding happens and she explains where the souls go and what happened to her. Insert line about how she dug in the sand for her soul until her fingers bleed bc I'm an Arcana freak lol. In general I'd just like her to learn to adapt to who she is now and learning to live life well instead of letting her anger burn her up from the inside out.

 The Enderman- Violet. A confused but sweet young bit of void created by and connected to the Ender Dragon. Her relationship with reality is tenuous at best and abusive at worst, making stable existence rather difficult. She doesn't know a name, age, gender, anything about herself aside from that she likes sweaters. Communicates primarily through psychic connections, docile and sweet, and melts like a witch in water.

 Violet was incredibly easy, so this may be way short. Endermen are decidedly human shaped void from the End with varying sentience. They're direct extensions of the Ender Dragon, and nobody knows how they're made or where they come from, not even they do. Adventurers who escaped The End say they seem scared of it though. Violet in particular is pretty damn new and extraordinary nonconforming, and I tried to show that with her sweater and ponytail. Once again, literally all colors picked. Definitely the simplest but one of my favs.

Violet is the sweetest meet up I think. As your traveling between villages you notice a strange enderman watching you and plant a little flower in front of her. She picks it and you hear a happy little trill come from you and a pretty voice say thank you in your head. Now you have a tall dark teleporting travel buddy! After a little bit of back and forth she tells you in some broken English that the Ender Dragon made her but she doesnt know how, and that it's bad and needs to be killed for the sake of Endermen and that's the new goal. Spoiler they're the corrupted souls of those that died fighting it, with it gone Endermen are free to exist as their own being and do whatever, hurray!

[carriecutforth]

The Shit

Tumblr is telling me to go ahead, put anything...so here it goes

I haven't been public about this for reasons that will be apparent but gonna start this with all the trigger warnings. I'm writing it here cause I can't talk to the majority of people about it cause most people can't even grasp, and then questions start, putting me in the situation of feeling like my GIANT SWEATER of trauma is being unraveled answering questions that lead to more questions and gah PLEASE DO NOT RETUMBL-- I just need to scream in the void This is the shit: On the day my sister-in-law's mother died she had to call form-1 my baby brother because his psychosis (undiagnosed mental illness which I will get to) was terrorizing their family (three small kids). My mother WHO IS SCHIZOPHRENIC had him released into her and my ANTI-VAXXER ANTI-MASKER narcissist father's care, but NOT before they found out, incidentally due to the FORM 1, he is ALSO really sick with leukemia. I only found out because I decided to dip into the special folder for emails called MOM that I try to avoid reading as long as they can FOR REASONS. But I felt for some reason an urge to, and then I had to try to parse out what had happened from her ramblings that are A LOT. Then I had to confirm with my poor sil who is at her wits end and was in no position to tell me herself. My dad stopped talking to me back in November when I called him for his anti-vax rhetoric as being EUGENICS when he told me it is just the flu and only killing old people and the disabled. I reminded him I've been immuno-compromised my whole life (he KNOWS this) and got chronic fatigue after a flu in late 2016 (he knows this), and did he not care if I DIED? (apparently not) But I was like lol, fine, don't talk to me anymore. Die mad about it for all I care. A lot of people are like: 'oh, that's tough, losing a relationship with your father' and I'm like YOLO (it really isn't if you knew him). SO THEN I have to reach out to my dad: "Why isn't my brother in the hospital being treated by medical professionals for YOU KNOW, HIS LEUKEMIA." My dad responded that the doctors were JUST GOING TO PUMP HIM FULL OF DRUGS! And that HE is treating my brother's leukemia with I dunno baking soda (he told me before it is a cure for cancer). THEN HE GOES RADIO SILENT. I have no idea where my brother is cause they got him an apartment somewhere in Toronto. *though I do have a Machiavellian plan to try to find out. The reason my brother has untreated psychosis is that even though I've begged my parents since he was a TEEN to get him diagnosed, they refused. It's like they have the opposite of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy in that their ABLEISM is soooo bad they refuse to see he has been very sick, and even if he was really sick, 'doctors are stupid' <--quoting my dad. This is the backstory. My dad was always on the road for his job. My mom had my baby brother AGAINST all wishes of her doctor to ever get pregnant again. I'm not talking aborting, she got PREGNANT on purpose again to SERVE GOD'S GREATER PURPOSE even though it might kill her and said future fetus. So he was born with a lot of issues because of the very bad pregnancy's complications on TOP of the very hereditary bipolar/schizophrenia, AND everything else we got going on besides. After he was born, my mom went into a very deep depression for years and then would vacillate between that and mania. Which meant me: THE ELEVEN year old was forced to raise a baby that wasn't hers and had no ultimate authority over. I was called by everyone his *BROTHER'S NAME* SECOND MOM. *More on this later Our relationship is very strained because of this, particularly when at 17 I had enough momming a child while being constantly undermined by my parents absolute shenanigans. So there was resentment when I quit being his 'second mom' and that he equally resented for things like, trying to put him into bed, when my mom would come in and say let him stay up all night or getting him to eat something other than candy for breakfast (you can guess the dynamic with my parents here). Even if my disabled ass could sue my parents for his

care, he doesn't WANT me to be in charge of his care.

And yet still, I tried to advocate for him for years fighting my parents TOOTH and NAIL to get him on disability and out from underneath their thumb so he could have a measure of independence and autonomy. They had every excuse in the book not to get him diagnosed including expense. It was so goddamned awful fighting with them on this cause in their mind: he was going to live with either them or me forever (they decided this for me and my ex-husband and kids with no consultation), so WHY bother set up his future for him??? So when he was 20?, I hatched a Machiavellian PLAN: I got him, against my parent's wishes, into college for the sole reason of getting the resources for him to get diagnosed so that he could get on disability. AND IT WORKED! (kinda) Except my parents twisted him so much into only talking about his autism spectrum symptoms and NONE of the psychosis because their ableism is sooooo entrenched. (but I did manage to get him on ODSP). And subsequent times I forced my dad to take him to a psychiatrist, he's like: 'oh, I forgot to talk about the psychosis we just talked about the aspergers. Besides people with psychosis are untreatable, you can't convince them otherwise' (see again, my mom). Over the years, I have begged my dad to take my brother to get properly diagnosed and treated (I'm not meaning forced, my brother is also agoraphobic, and won't leave his place UNLESS he is driven by my dad and was living in a city far away from me). I said, I was very concerned for his kids but my dad always gaslights me (and tells everyone I'm crazy -- the IRONY). So now my mom is writing me emails about how this is all my sil's fault because 'she is on drugs' (she is not), 'she is sleeping around' (she is not), 'her kids are scared of her not my brother' (it's the exact opposite). WHICH IS A HUGE TRIGGER FOR ME because She did the exact same thing to ME with my other brother (a diagnosed PSYCHOPATH) who used to beat me and the rest of us mercilessly when my parents weren't around (and they never believed me, and told everyone not to believe me because I was crazy), who pulled a KNIFE on me and threw a drawer at me when I was NINE MONTHS PREGNANT, and how absolutely awful I was AS HIS SISTER to kick him out of my house with no place to live or go (cause he was living with me and my ex-husband at the time because THEY KICKED HIM OUT OF THEIR PLACE and didn't want him back.) Are you beginning to get a sense of the dynamic of my family? Soooooooo the last few weeks my brain has just been in total trauma mode going processing, processing, processing, processing as the final total realization of how absolutely awful my family is finally laid bare (I mean I knew but at least I can stop feeling guilty about cutting them out of my life). So back to the 'second mom' shit, as relevant to my trauma brain processing the last few weeks. This whole shit above is just the tip of the iceberg. I was raised as a Joho in which a lot of my trauma comes from a pedophile left loose on three generations of girls in my family over a thirty year period, and if anyone came forward they were threatened with disfellowshipment and there is SO MUCH there it would take me several Tolkien novels to get how absolutely awful, extensive it was, and how the coverup went straight to the top. ANYHOO. So who was calling me my brother's 'second mom???' Well since, I wasn't allowed to have any association with non-witnesses, it was my congregation. No one questioned that I was being parentified and it was a deeply abusive situation. NO WHAT HAPPENED instead was, this sister in the congregation told everyone (when I was fifteen and 80 pounds soaking wet at the height of 5'10 1/2) that my brother WAS REALLY MY CHILD cause it was so obvious the way that I was the one who took care of him. And the elders of our congregation MARKED me as bad association for loose morals for having a supposed child out of wedlock when I was ELEVEN YEARS OLD. AND NO ONE in my congregation would talk to me, and I had NO IDEA why, cause they never told me that I HAD BEEN

MARKED. But the caveat was I was not allowed to talk to people outside of the faith. And we only found out about this a year an a half later when she said the same shit back in my hometown where he was born to a sister who was at the hospital where my brother was born. AND NO ONE thought, hey: maybe if we think she had a baby when she was eleven we should um CALL CHILD SERVICES or some shit? So i was like 16 1/2, not allowed to have any friends OUTSIDE OF MY PARENTS, find out THIS SHIT, and then people wonder why I had my first manic episode at 17??? Yeah, so this is where my brain has been stuck the last month, complicated that I knew I would be at risk for hypomania with things opening back up, and I'm supposed to be shooting a pilot for a potential series I'm the creator/co-shorunner of, so now I've had to go BACK on seroquel and it's the worst while i try to acclimatize myself to the drugs and stave off hypomania at the same time. WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!

[unboundbnha]

hoooo my god. this is for ME

for me. for godzilla. :’) 

➤ rules; make headcanons of you and a character of your choice, be it sfw or nsfw.

Thank you so much for tagging me @spicyness​! I’m gonna SKAJHDSKJ. HHHHH. This is everything? Fuck I just want a purple boyfriend 😫 this will be about Shinsou because I like him a normal amount :-)

First off, I’m a pain in the ass. My sense of humor is wack (it’s basically just ‘annoy my friends and loved ones’), I’m always fricken TANKING The Mood (because it’s funny and I physically cannot resist making a Funny if the opportunity’s there), everything turns into a game unless you make me stop wink wonk. Shinsou seems like the type to snort in amusement and roll his eyes at my dumb antics, and I appreciate that! If I could make him legit laugh I’d die happy. (I am also emotionally savvy enough to know when to draw the line though, don’t worry. It’s just, man, my idea of fun is ‘LET’S ROAST ‘EM’)

I love cats. I’ll lose my whole mind over them. They NEED head kisses. Shinsou also likes cats. He also needs head kisses. That’s it, that’s the bullet point

Being open and honest and genuine is important to me. I believe most any relationship (friendship or otherwise) can work if you’re willing to communicate and empathize with the other person: I would 100% be willing to hear Shinsou’s shit, and he seems like he’d be a good listener too. I’m also good at logicking things through and he seems like he’d appreciate that. Likewise, he seems like he’d do the same for me, and as long as we stayed humble and weren’t looking to be offended (I don’t Do That -- he’s a Cancer -- love you, Cancers -- so it might take him a minute to get on the same page, but he’s emotionally smort and cares about me so I think he’d be willing to work at it) then we could help each other through emotionally hard stuff with hard truths. Plus, I’m a super honest person: if he was in a relationship with me he’d probably be pretty secure in knowing I wouldn’t hurt him on purpose. If past shit comes up with him, I’ll talk to him. Talking’s the good shit, y’all: utilize patience and empathy and you’ll be so well off!

I also battle, with a big fucking sword, a lot with mental health stuff (LMAOOOO WHO DON’T!!! YEET). I used to struggle with agoraphobia and still deal with anxiety and depression. On top of that, I have something like chronic fatigue -- I’ve been calling it chronic fatigue because I’m fucking tired, all the time. My top energy levels are like a 35% on a fantastic day. I really like the idea of this boye seeing me melting into a puddle, face down on the carpet, and bein like “how’s it going down there? you okay?” and the answer being obviously no, but him just like. Man I dunno. He seems like the kind of person who’s tired, but who can live with it. I can’t! When I’m tired, that’s it babes! I hit a 0% on my battery and I’ll collapse! So I just, hhhh. Don’t laugh, but I like to fantasize about him bundling me up and into bed. Thinkin’ about Birthday Snoot by my good friend @lord-explosion-baku​ and melting, okay?? OKAY???? I’m soft, the truth’s OUT, FUCK! I want to be taken care of like a sad but pampered cat.

(Please read Birthday Snoot I still cry over it)

Also I’m gross and struggle to shower often enough because it’s exhausting so bein given a gentle bath? oh MAN. Hands softly running through my stupid, terrible hair...asking me about my day and if anything happened that triggered me feeling this bad...just....the tenderness....the gentle affection.....being loved even when I’m at my lowest. Being cared for when I can’t do it myself. That’s a legit fantasy y’all. We out here!

I love to SNOOZE. I love being COZY. You bet your sweet bippy I’m gonna sprawl over a couch and take up the whole thing. Shinsou’d better be willing to snuggle the fuck up. I’ve got great squish which I personally feel like’s great for cuddling: I’m like warm taffy. How better to gently seep into every crevasse of your Favorite Person while enjoying a cozy cuddle?

Listen, everyone fucks hard with Shinsou calling his S/O ‘kitten’, and I agree (def have written leetle -- HOO -- leetle scenarios with that nickname because wow) but I get all wibbly with the idea of He calling me ‘Angel’. A joke at first because, like, guys, I’m really nice. (I know it sounds bad when people say they’re nice and LSDFLKJDF I AM, OKAY. I’ve worked on it. Cultivated the skill of kindness! Being kind isn’t easy, and sometimes you just wanna go apeshit, but I’ve worked hard to improve upon myself! Yeet!) But I also just really fucking love being annoying. I simply cannot resist the urge to sneak up behind someone and poke them in the ribs. I rib-poke while in the deep depths of making out too, I’ve tanked the mood a lot so picture my dumb ass Pink Panther’ing behind Shinsou, prepared to be Evil while he’s, idk, making breakfast or something, and before I can commit a Rib Crime he uses his hero training and fast reflexes and honed senses and all that good stuff to snatch my wrist and ask “what’re you up to, angel?” the answer is nothing, because he’s killed me by being sexy and fast and hero-y, and he’s probably actually killed me by startling me into collapsing like a fainting goat

He gets the deep stuff. Unfortunately for everyone and especially myself, I’m a Thinker with a capital T: it never fucking stops. I had an existential crisis for like three years in a row because of course, but I feel like he knows what it’s like to get lost in your head. Working each other out of panic attacks because holy jesus the universe sure is fucking huge huh? We’re not even a blip on the radar in the history of existence and we’re gonna be dead basically tomorrow aaaand that’s why we’d be good for each other, because I feel like we both have coping mechanisms that keep us from spiraling too bad, and we could share them with each other.

I also so fucking admire his drive, but it makes me angry that stupid fucking hero society would discriminate in the first place. 

Oh, yeah, that’s another good point: I’m hella mad about 98% of the time and I work hard to hide it! Because innocent people don’t deserve to get yelled at! I feel like Shinsou’s smart enough to sense when I’m about to pop and he can be like “heyyyyy...you wanna talk this out constructively instead of getting into a public brawl?” and I’ll be like “NO but I’ll do it for you because I love you” and then we get pizza.

Because I’m fine and balanced and stuff, I made a quirk for myself if I was in the BNHA-verse, and basically I can get stronger at the expense of higher thinking skills and will turn into a weapon of mass destruction against whatever I’m pointing at (ugh, that’s so sexy. Fuck I wanna be a big spooky buff as shit monster thing), friend or foe, so Shinsou and I would work well in tandem because if I got too rowdy he could use his quirk and get me to calm down! Keep me from accidentally doing a murder! Nice!

Okay this is nsfw so if you’re under 18 DON’T READ IT. I’LL CALL YOUR PARENTS. GET OFF MY BLOG. 

Relating to the point above, QUIRKPLAY. Mind control me into stuff I want to do but am too awkward to ask for, please and THANK you. Also, Shinsou’s a top. Gotta be, and thank god for it because I’m certainly not. I’m not happy about being a fucking bottom, because my first and most powerful personalty trait is ‘be as annoying as possible to the people you like; don’t let them tell you what to do.’ Can’t make it easy on myself, nope. Anyway, I want the appearance of being a top without the responsibility because damn, gotta be like, suave and shit. Gotta plan stuff. I don’t like that! I do that enough in real life and I don’t like it there, either! But whatever. I’m a brat and I feel betrayed by my coochie for it. But Shinsou’s a top and he’d tease me for being Fucking Terrible, and suddenly I wouldn’t be so mad at my coochie. She has her reasons.

I...like Shinsou for a lot of reasons, but a really big one, for sure, is that I feel like he can communicate about the important stuff. He likes to tease, but he knows when to be serious too. I’m really wack about being close and intimate with people and I have, hhh, special requirements to be able to sleep with them, and I feel like he’d both be able to respect AND honor that. Like, run through the rest of the BNHA boys with me here: would Bakugou be able to be completely cool, calm, and collected while still teasing, but knowing where to draw the line? Todoroki’s closer maybe, but he’s not as people-smart (which is also a big thing for me). Confidence (or at least the appearance of it when it’s important), respect, communication, listening and respecting what I ask for even if it seems wack -- Shinsou has that, and god is it attractive. 

Also, mind control. 

Also, his capture weapon. 

Also you know this motherfucker is kinky as shit. Thank the good lord.

Also, sexy-slow makeouts with his long, nimble hands running up my outer thighs to squeeze my waist -- teeth on neck, stolen gasps of breath -- 

\\\\\\

I feel bad because all of this, fuckin, WALL of text is pretty much ‘this is what purble boy can do for me’ and I don’t say a lot I’d do for him, but if I got someone like him I’d go to the end of the earth for them. I may be a perpetually-sleepy bitch, but one of my best -- and worst -- character traits is my unwavering loyalty. I’ll be 110% down to kick anyone’s ass who insults him: he can fight his own battles, but he shouldn’t have to over some dumbass with a big mouth and a little brain. Making him smile and laugh, oof, be still my beating heart. Words of encouragement when life gets too much. Genuine thanks for his help, whatever it may be. Hugs, because we’re both touch-starved as fuck and he deserves gentleness, dammit. He doesn’t seem like his love language is receiving gifts -- more like quality time and words of affirmation? Maybe physical touch? -- but I’d still get him little things that made me think of him, that could help him in his day to day life or maybe just bring a smile to his face. We could rescue each other at social conventions, have dates to the humane society and play with cats. Support each other through our depression days, prove that even having a brain that’s mean to you sometimes doesn’t make you unlovable. Man, idk. The whole thing’s soft and makes my heart go doki-doki. Hitoshi Shinsou is an extremely good person and god damn I’d want to show him I appreciated him and existing at the same time as him. He deserves love and kindness. He deserves someone to kiss every knuckle of his hand. He deserves hugs in the kitchen and blankets being pulled over his shoulders when he falls asleep at the desk. He deserves only good things, and I’d be honored to give them to him. 

HHHHH.

Okay! If you made it to the end of this, congratulations! You don’t actually get anything, but boy oh boy you have a lot of information about ME now! Aren’t you delighted? Heh. So! You tag people for this stuff, and I’m gonna tag @lord-explosion-baku​, @bnhascribbles​, @perpetual-bed-head​, @russianonion​, @weebsinstash​, and last but certainly not least, @usernamekate94​. Tell me about Monoma, Kate. Tell me.

[prettysoldierprojectarchive]

1:3 – Mysterious Sleeping Illness, Protect the Girls’ Hearts in Love

[Original Post made 13/08/2013]

Alternative Title: If You’re Going To Run An Evil Radio Show, Learn How To Mute The Goddamn Mic

First aired: 21st March 1992

“OK Jadeite, what fresh turd have you pulled out of your ass today then?”

Jadeite continues his slow descent into ineptitude by starring in his own radio show, Midnight Zero (that’s a cool name), and calls himself J-Dite (…oh Jadeite, you need help bro.). Lovelorn ladies of Juubangai are encouraged to send in love letters to be read on air, and in return they receive a nasty-looking purple turd flower. This sucks the energy (what else) out of those who touch it, sending them into a deep sleep. It’s time for Sailor Moon to suit up, but this time she’ll be facing the malevolent DJ J-Dite himself.

This episode opens in the Dark Kingdom, with Queen Beryl giving Jadeite shit for being so incompetent. She sounds more playful than reproachful over his last two crappy plots, and Jadeite seems to take it as an opportunity to once-again flaunt his hubris. Personally, if I were Queen Beryl (and I think of little else in my daily life), I’d think of employing the 3-strikes-and-you’re-out-system to improve employee motivation.

Jadeite’s latest plan is a radio show. Let’s consider this ‘scheme’ for a second. Rather than his previous two attempts, the Midnight Zero plan appears to target far fewer people. It also takes quite a bit more effort; getting people to write in, delivering the evil flowers, learning how to use the rather complex broadcasting equipment, having to put up with the inane prattlings of teenagers. It’s unwieldy to say the least, not to mention that the entire energy-farming plot can be foiled by the victims simply refusing to wear the garish flowers.

“What’s a cool DJ name? This is going to take a while…”

Usagi seems quite keen on the show, and why shouldn’t she be? Stupid as Jadeite may be, he certainly has a smooth radio voice. When Usagi arrives at school, it’s to discover that her teacher, Miss Sakurada, is suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome or something. She falls asleep on the desk and refuses to wake up – sounds like a regular day at the office for me.

Usagi isn’t particularly sympathetic to the victims of the “mysterious sleeping illness”, she is of the opinion that sleeping forever is awesome. I couldn’t agree more. Here is a girl who’s got her priorities straight.

Classmate Naru (we’re going to be seeing a lot more of her, in more ways than one) reveals to Usagi that she’s been sending dozens of love letters to Midnight Zero, despite the fact that she has no object of affection. It’s a little sad, by Usagi is rather taken by the idea. Unfortunately, Usagi and poetic prose go together like apples and toilet water, and she gives up on the idea.

See, she can’t even use a pen correctly

That night, Naru’s letter is read on Midnight Zero by J-Dite! ZOMG! The next day, she’s wearing the giant shitty flower that J Dite sent her. Naru, too, succumbs to the sleeping illness almost immediately after putting the flower broach on (no one seems to associate the two events for reasons I cannot provide). Usagi brushes the flower, and she is also rendered unconscious! AND THEY STILL DON’T TAKE THE FUCKING FLOWER OFF. Jesus, these kids are thick. 

“Let ’em sleep. They’re noisy as shit anyway”

Now realising that J-Dite must be EVIL (and yet still not removing the flower from Naru-chan) Usagi and Luna plan to break into the radio station. Usagi gets a new toy, the Luna Pen, which gives her whatever disguise she can think of. Can you think of a more powerful and inappropriate magical device to give a 14-year-old with the IQ of a grape? 

“Moon Power! Make me Harry Styles!”

Now a stylish and confident radio producer, Usagi marches RIGHT into the broadcasting booth, straight past the monster, and sits down right across from Jadeite, who sits there looking like the vacuous cretin he is as Usagi casually announces over the radio that the flowers are dangerous. Come ON Jadeite, DO SOMETHING. She’s ruining all your stupid plans and you’re just LETTING her! Good LORD, Jadeite, put some effort into it! 

“Guys I licked the flower and now I’m totally tripping balls.”

This is the first time we’ve ever seen Sailor Moon face-to-face with Jadeite, Although Sailor Moon dispatches the monster with relative ease (it does dodge her first attempt at jewelry-based murder), a pissed-off Jadeite is a different matter altogether. Her Moon Tiara Action is useless against him, and he appears immune to her attempts to kick him stoutly in the groin, but Sailor Moon is spared certain death by Tuxedo Kamen, whose only action is to throw a rose at the floor. Jadeite seems utterly terrified of this completely ineffectual move and runs away crying. 

“Wait wait wait wait WAIT. Let’s set some ground rules. Number 1: No roses. I seriously HATE roses.”

We get the most obnoxious exit by Tuxedo Kamen yet, who bids Sailor Moon farewell before laughing hysterically as he leaps off a building to his death.

There was a lot of stupid in the episode, mainly because of Jadeite, but I found it enjoyable nevertheless. Usagi has some great lines, and we see Sailor Moon trying to beat Jadeite to death with her bare hands, which is worth a gold star right there.

Episode Score: 3/5

Monster Freakishness Level: 1/5 (She sucked balls)

Naru-chan Attack Count: 2

[shankmeharder]

Post Stroke Update: So I've decided to make some lifestyle changes(worst title ever, I know).

Since my stroke( we've so far learned that it really was a freaking nature fluke) my motivation has been greatly reduced even beyond what it was, I haven't been eating as much or as well, mainly the last three months, the restrictive diet that had me on didn't do much to help anything. I keep forgetting my meds(I'm still not back on antidepressants but I'm off the keppra so that's a start), I keep forgetting a lot of short term goals and necessities, and unless something is for my child, I can hardly make myself do anything meaningful. In my moments of clarity, when the brain fog clears, I've noticed that I don't like what I'm becoming.

So with the support of my partner and those close to me, I'm gonna try to kick my own ass into submission.

I'm starting with intermittent fasting, remembering to feed myself, trying to meet my exercise goals a little more often than I have been, and just trying to get "me" back.

A subset of those is:

making my salads ahead of time so I don't have an excuse not to eat or and excuse to eat garbage.

doing smoothies on mornings when I can't be bothered to put together something complicated for myself.

Putting produce front and center in my fridge so I can't forget about it,

lifting weights again(starting small and trying to tone those mom wings a little),

keeping a food journal so I'm more conscious of what I'm consuming.

Drinking as much water as humanly possible

Doing squats, I miss my booty

Using a fitbit or similar apparatus (my mom might have one for me) to help me keep track of daily goals and activities, as well as helping with my short term recall issues

Dancing with my child more(we used to dance all the time to everything that had a beat and now the only "beat" seems to be how I feel)

I do have a weight loss goal, in part because I'm just not happy with how I've been carrying my weight since I had the bean. If I don't lose much, but rather reshape myself, I will still be happy. My goal is 30 lbs by the anniversary of my stroke (Oct 18th) or fitting into certain pre-pregnancy clothes by the same date. So I've got 5 months to meet this goal. If I meet this goal and feel happier and healthier, we may consider getting the ball rolling on a few other big life events.

I purged my fridge and freezer this morning, I'm going food shopping tomorrow for foods we need and thrifting for some things that might make this whole goal set easier. I'm also calling the therapist I haven't seen in two months and asking her to refer me to someone closer (there is one taking patients within walking distance of my place and she has glowing references). I need to be back in treatment and I think answering to someone about my goals and feelings will help me.

I'm trying to do it all before I run out of steam completely. If anyone has any tips for fitness and lifestyle changes with chronic illness and fatigue, Hit. Me. Up.

Please.

This will not become a fitblr with thinspiration photos everywhere. I still love being a pudgy mess but I need to do it in a healthier way. This is still my purging station for all my brain sludge, and hopefully posting about this will be a way to keep me honest.

I love you all, let's do this.

[crocoguile]

“Y’all will have 8 kids and then complain when you actually have to take care of them.”

I live in an 800sq/ft apartment with two partners, one kid, two cats, and a dog. 

We had issues with cabin fever, sanity, and such even before this. It’s not that We have to “finally take care” of our six year old - we do that already.

It’s that suddenly, we have to be his sole teacher, a week after he finally got put into a good special education course that was well suited to his educational needs. 

It’s that a chronically -ill, -fatigued-, and -pained mom who is pregnant is having to deal with even more struggles with her nesting and ptsd-driven ocd while her pregnancy gets closer to the end, and there’s an indefinite timeline to when we’re going to be back to a less wildly cramped waking-hours.

It’s my disabled ass with my mental illnesses that are suddenly wildly more un-medicated because I CANNOT GET AN APPOINTMENT TO SEE A DOCTOR because every able-bodied person is panicking and booking them out. It’s that I cannot rely wholly on coping mechanisms and suddenly stopping medication without intervention is dangerous to not only my self but my child who doesn’t understand what’s going on because suddenly he’s home and constantly seeing things that I’m struggling with (and possibly aggravating in his well-intentioned desire to love and help) because he’s not in school.

It’s our husband possibly losing his job do to “unnecessary service” which as an electrician is a strange and terrifying level of how utterly bigger than the level of bad you think all of this is, and being stuck at home without any outlet for his high energy levels even while he’s still working.

It’s that there isn’t a healthy and safe way for us to do laundry because we don’t have in-unit hookups and have to do the washup at the clubhouse - and then have a canvas bag by the door that all clothes worn into public areas go that is by the door for us to strip into so we don’t get my multi-reason immunocompromized wife sick, or our kid sick, which leads to even less space. 

It’s that we are suddenly over-stressed, with less ability for many of our society to work, and panicked about the state of our health, our families health, our pets health.

It’s that we are stuck finding the best ways to have a lick of our own space and humanity to retain some semblance of sanity while trying to continue our kid’s FIRST YEAR OF EDUCATION while maintaining the levels he is “supposed to be at” because of state expectation and regulation for his age based on an arbitrary system developed by able-bodied and neurotypical people to beat the humanity out of you and set you on a bell-timed routine with little individuality to benefit the industrial and post-industrial capitalistic society that we have been damned into. 

And we are stuck in this with a sudden, poorly timed situation with no safety net as a society or community. 

Some old white bastard has said things like “keep calm and carry on,” and “please make sure to apply your own mask before assisting others,” and it’s really really hard to have those two things coexist, you ill-prepared, thoughtless, insouciant rotting sweet meat-

Whether or not I trust you to understand the gravity of the situation or the struggles of others depends on whether you understand why it’s more than simply “you had a kid and now you have to take care of them.”

Quarantine means finally painting my three year old’s room, since we will all be home for the next two weeks.

[merrikstryfe]

Hey, you know what, huge shoutout to my lovely @maybee25 who’s been kicking major ass this week and beating her chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia to get the house cleaned up and organized after the move. It’s been a ton of work and she has a super limited energy budget and I wanted to publicly call her out on being awesome as fuck.

[csolarstormhealthjournal]

I’m afraid of the femur pain.  It abused me so much last night, I will stay in bed today as much as it might take to recuperate.  I’m afraid of it in approximately three ways, I think.  First, I don’t want to experience it.  A sharp bone fragment is poking my muscles and nerves and it feels like that.  It feels like my leg is asking to come off.  A telling moment about this is Diane drawing the distinction last night between being in pain and being sick.  I wish she asked herself why I took for granted that there was no distinction.  For me, this pain is making me sick.  The strain of holding off two or three waves of neuropathy for an hour had me nauseated and hot last night.  It had me fatigued and beat up.

Honestly, I don’t make a big distinction in general between...well, instances of bodily disrepair.  In a way, I generalize death and disadvantage so much, that even depression, even the flaws that make it hard to fight off disrepair, to support your loved ones, classifies as a state of disrepair to me.  One of my big poems is called “Death and Disadvantage” where the implication is that disadvantage is a kind of death.  Some of it comes from high school where my infections hounded me so much, I felt like I was a goner so often even BEFORE I actually finally had a near-death experience at the end of the year around my birthday.  Then, the rumor went around at school that I had died.  And I kind of felt like a zombie, because PTSD, making me stuck drawing pictures of the force of death that was I felt was hunting me.  Every time I got sick or hurt, I felt it approaching.  I felt like it was winning. 

The first time I think I felt this mindset, when I think of it in the context of now, was when I felt out of my wheelchair in the backyard and bent my leg backward.  I remember freaking the hell out because I was convinced that I had ruined my leg forever.  It was very similar to my hysterical reaction last year when I broke my left leg in that wheelchair crash.  I felt a permanence about both events, even when I was sixteen, even before that NDE later that year, as if I had a mental reason to take for granted that my leg was never coming back from what I did.

And this mindset has varied in different ways.  In 2007, it was in a way consuming me, as the feeling of approaching death in the form of the Spinal-Fusion was something I had to cope with somehow.  I reconciled with it in different ways.  In a way, it became such a presence that it was poisoning me, the way I saw other people, my worldview, my morals.  Other people didn’t really understand the way I was seeing the world in terms of fearing death and not fearing death; people seemed either appropriately traumatized or foolish.  Then the Spinal-Fusion kind of took a lot of this and played it out to the extreme, so that my perception of death and disadvantage came, ate me, spat me out.  As of 2009 once the two years of suffering played out, I adopted a more feral approach to these fears with the determination to fight them tooth and nail, stave them off, FullMetal Brotherhood style.

So it’s not that what’s happening now hasn’t happened before.  On the contrary, in 2013, I probably had more stuff going wrong.  But this femur pain seems like the ultimate form of “you’re screwed this time”.  Because what can you do?  The doctor almost certainly should not open up the leg again, because we barely got it to close last time.  It’s not even an issue of not having any structural option to take out the rest of the femur, which I don’t think he would do; it’s an issue of the leg every closing up after cutting into it.  The leg is, in a sense, nearing its last leg. 

I’m starting to fear that as I get older, this chessboard of encroaching health problems that I’ve felt since college is getting more spacious.  I’m feeling all these different issues assemble in their respective forms of bad disrepair.  What happens when they get here all at once?  When my malrotated intestines don’t let me eat enough to avoid the electrolyte imbalance that makes me feel like sleeping, between breathing issues from chronic pneumonia, while I have to do everything from bed because my hip literally can’t take being in my chair for more than hour, and I’m taking antibiotics every six hours for my infections until I have to go to the ER to get IV antibiotics?  I went to special ed school and I knew other handicapped kids, and so I know it’s failure of logistics that kills handicapped people, often.  Hell, it’s failure of logistics that kills normal people.  Christopher Reeves died of freaking bedsores, something that should have been prevented by turning him over, but Monty Oum died from a petty allergic reaction!

And even worse, the same chessboard is closing in on my parents too.  My caretakers, the only people who know how to take care of me, are now racing me to the end.  Do you know how terrifying that is?  To know that people who have already revealed their flaws in the ability to support me when I’m suffering, who stormed out of the room angry when I wouldn’t sit up a couple of days after my Spinal-Fusion when I felt like my whole body was alien to me to the point we needed family counseling, people who left a heavy light fixture hanging above me when I was stuck in bed because they didn’t want to finish it because they wanted to go back to the bar, people who know that I have some painful mental health problem but won’t confront me over it because of either baggage over their inability to get help or sympathy for their own mental health issues or a sense of pride or status quo that I should just be content with them helping me survive, people who I know and love despite understanding their shortcomings and having a rough approximation of what stretches them to their limits because I roughly know and acknowledge their hurtful pasts as peers to me rather than as monolithic caretakers -

(I mean, it’s not like I blame them anymore, but the point is I know better, I know the flaws that make it difficult for me to trust them with my care in the same way that I did when when I was a kid.  I trust Diane and Dorothy in ways that are more nuanced now, more informed, and more balanced with my care for them as peers.)

- to know that these people are slowly getting to the point where they might likely be able to take care of me even less as I need more help - this is not funny.  This is a bad future.  And I'm scared.  I need to make money and more support just to take care of my family, because there will come a point when the pressure gets so bad that the instance where one of us might break will be so painful, so inhumane that the day might feel like any of us could break, and only one of us will.  I understand the prospect of us breaking, but I will be as feral as I can, fight as much as I can against the disadvantage drawing it out so that life around that point is hell.  

But I’m scared that this femur pain will be more and more unforgiving, and I’ll be able to do less and less.  As it is, last night I spent five hours out of the house, and it kicked my ass and made me literally sick.  The scary part is I’m not stuck in bed.  Maybe this is my normal pain.  The scenario I’m scared of is that the normal is getting worse.

[stephanieulrich-blog]

Late Stage Lyme Disease, Artistic Determination & Resting Bitch Face - March 8, 2016

Lyme disease has changed my life more than my first period, more than moving out of my parents’ house, more than graduating college, more than being raped and more than testifying against my abusive ex-husband. It has changed my lifestyle more than falling in love, epilepsy, mono, herpes or HPV. Lyme disease has really fucked some of my shit up and I’m here to talk about it.

Life with Late Stage Lyme disease turned everything I am on its head and shoved all of my plans up some hellish, sellfish asshole that is hiding in Mystery Land. I don’t know how long it will be until I’m feeling better or what life will be like when I “return”.

THE FUN, PLAYFUL, PARTYING, GIGGLING, DANCING, HEEL-WEARING, FLIRTING, DRAWING, PAINTING ME HAS BEEN SHELVED FOR MONTHS.

Now my heart and soul is focused on being able to get out of bed every day. Life with Lyme disease has forced me out of work and cost me roughly $4,000 in the last five months. Lyme has made me both caffeine and alcohol intolerant. It has debilitated me so much that I secretly wore leg braces to work at a neighborhood pub, until my neurological symptoms got so extreme that I couldn’t work this simple job anymore.

Today is just like every day: I woke up feeling like a train hit me. My lungs ache like I smoked a million cigarettes last night, my stomach is turning like a horrid whiskey hangover, my head hurts, my vision is blurred, my legs feel tight and weak. Joints in my hands, feet and knees ache and burn, my eyes burn and water from looking at this screen.

Today I’ll be lucky to leave the house and pick up more medicine from the doctor’s office.  Plans to giggle, work, see friends, exhibit at a gallery or clean the house are currently all postponed until further notice. When I do leave the house, you’re likely to see me in a motorized chair in the grocery story or sitting in my car, resting to gain enough strength to drive home.

LIFE WITH LYME DISEASE HAS RID ME OF A SOCIAL LIFE AND MADE ME A FUCKING DRAG OF A GIRLFRIEND.

When the physical symptoms are eased, the neurological symptoms start to flair their fucking irritating nostrils at me. When I get out of the grocery store, I’ll have forgotten where I’ve parked, I’ve accidentally put soap on my toothbrush, I can’t remember any new names, I write different words than I am thinking and the right side of my body sends shooting pains from my foot, through my legs to my hand.

After 11 years of untreated, misdiagnosed Lyme disease, my innards are so swollen with scar tissue that I can’t start antibiotics yet. Due to the high risk of internal failure, I need to do my best at digesting a limited diet before further medical treatment. My body has tried to shut itself down and I’m lucky to take a shit that I can believe in once every three days.

This is not the lifestyle that I want but the complexity and controversy in/around Lyme disease has forced me to become my own expert at what I’m dealing with. So, through all of the neurological mishaps and physically debilitating pain, I have pulled countless peer-reviewed articles from college databases, bought and read over a thousand pages by Lyme and epidemic specialists.

CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING BEATS PERMINANT DIBILITATION OR DEATH.

It’s a good thing that I want to know everything before I die. In fact, if it wasn’t for this being a life or death situation (Yes, Lyme disease can be fatal), I’d have surely stopped reading it.

To understand the greater idea behind Lyme disease, I have read about the history of medicine and neuroscience, the history of Lyme disease in our country, I’ve studied its causes, cures, medical/social politics and have just started to dive into the ecology surrounding this epidemic.

On one hand, science is totally badass. I love science, always have, always will. On the other hand, new science, like the cure for Late Stage Lyme disease is far from known. New science is bullied more than the smelliest of new kids at school. Combining new science with the medical field means adding money to the equation and no one wants to lose money over a new science, especially if they’ve built a whole practice around a dated treatment.

The struggle between dated treatments and understanding how to cure Late Stage Lyme disease is where things get confusing. While the Centers of Disease Controls (CDC) recognize 300,000 diagnosis of Lyme disease in the States every year, the Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA) refuses to review new research of Lyme disease.

THE HOPE FOR STANDARDIZED TREATMENT FOR LATE STAGE LYME DISEASE IS LEFT UP TO THE FUCKING GODS. SO, IT’S A GOOD THING THAT I AM MY OWN.

Instead of “believing” in Late Stage Lyme disease, the IDSA insists that Lyme can leave lasting, chronic conditions including chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, polyarthritis and early onset Alzheimer’s. The rough thing about these diagnosis are in the treatment and cure. There are no standardized cures for these chronic conditions but there is hope in treatment for Late Stage Lyme disease. For this reason, I have refused the above diagnosis and will bust my ass through Lyme treatment.

In complete rebellion of my current physical/social circumstances, I have started a children’s book on Lyme in kids, am mapping out a graphic novel about my Lyme journey, have started a large-scale self-portrait, will be uploading more video blogs to my YouTube channel and keeping up with this blog.

Art is the only thing that I know to be stronger than Lyme disease.

I will be returning back to the studio to proceed with my Sex Positivity Coloring Book Project and will be publishing a coloring book on Costume Culture and Baby Culture soon. All proceeds will be used to support my studio and to keep mending my life with Lyme disease so that I can be bursting with sex positivity and fun culture again soon!

As always, my anarchist heart and rebel soul is hungry for more development, more badass art, more knowledge and a better way of life. In the determination to make art that matters and have a brain to do it with, I’m happy to think outside of the box…

HAIL SATAN

[bleunicorn]

the coolest part of my current (not excellent) mental health situation is that being depressed & anxious is just kind of a baseline of my fucked up existence, but depression and anxiety can ALSO be caused by ms so it’s basically indistinguishable when i’m mentally fucked up because of the classic chemical imbalances vs damaged myelin around my Mood Neurons. there’s also the natural grieving process that comes with being diagnosed with a chronic illness and lifestyle changes and losses that come with it.

and! fatigue is a typical part of depression but it’s ALSO one of the most common & debilitating symptoms of ms. i actually am able to distinguish ms fatigue from other kinds of fatigue so it doesn’t have that fucked up mystery aspect to it but it’s still fatigue on top of fatigue which is garbage. another fun thing is that stress obviously has a big impact on mental health but stress can also be a factor in triggering ms relapses which just turns into this hell cycle where i’m stressed about the issues with my flesh prison which makes those issues worse and and also it’s almost finals week and i’m working myself to death and then i have a flare and get stressed about THAT and i’ve got doctors up my ass like “hey! consider managing your stress? :)” 

but guess what it gets even more wild & crazy because then treating the flare means i get to spend 5 days hangin out in the hospital getting high doses of steroids pumped into my bloodstream (which also causes more stress bc im rearranging my schedule and not working as much) and steroids just have a way of... fuckin with you real good. personally they make me feel exhausted and weak but VERY overstimulated, all i want to do is sleep but i cannot relax. the lack of sleep is obviously Not Very Helpful for like, recovery or general mental health or anything. that anxiety thing spikes waaay up, heart is beating way too hard constantly, general feelings of “i think i’m going to literally die if i don’t spend the next 18 hours sleeping in a sensory deprivation tank.” bonus points for the fact that the treatment of the flare up usually isn’t immediately effective so there’s still some neurological impairment going on there.

so anyway that’s how my past week has been. today was a better day & i did some things that made me feel like a functional human being but i also cried like 6 times so you win some you lose some right?? i would like to think that i’ll want to die significantly less in the next week or so when the steroids stop fuckin with me psychologically and actually.. do their job and treat my fucking inflamed brain scars. but we’re just gunna have to wait and see!