#what a HEADACHE

[rockk-lobsterr]

me: *sees that “‘land back’ is meaningless” post*

the millennial voice in my head: that’s enough internet for today!

[enbyleighlines]

Damn I had a long, rough weekend.

(exasperated ramblings under the cut)

Actually, it started before the weekend.

I recently switched insurances because I now make too much for medicaid, a process that took several months because why not?

But finally I had insurance and I could go see my doctor, yay me!

They upped my dosage of zoloft, because I’ve been super irritable lately and I think it’s mostly burnout from work, but it had been a long time since my dosage had been adjusted, so I thought it probably wouldn’t hurt.

I start taking a higher dosage, work still sucks, but I feel a bit better, so yay.

Then a few days later, I get a letter from my insurance saying that they will not pay for my zoloft, because it’s not on their list, and I will have to find a different anti-anxiety medication.

My doctors receive a similar letter and message me, asking me to schedule a time for another apt so that we can work on that.

Fuck that, I do not want to go through the emotional turmoil of trying a different anti-anxiety med. It took a long time for me to find one that works for me, and I don’t want to go thru that process again, esp with all the stressors currently in my life.

So I tell them, pls just let me stay on this for now, I will pay out of pocket, I don’t have the time or energy for this at this moment.

Flash forward, and it’s time for me to get a refill of zoloft. I’ve already been paying for it out of pocket for those months I didn’t have health insurance, so I knew it was gonna be costly, but I think it’s worth it. I ask my doctors for a refill, as per usual.

That was on Thursday.

Unfortunately, due to my adhd brain, I forget to go grab my prescription from the pharmacy. But that’s okay. I can go one day without zoloft. I’ve done it before.

But by the end of Friday, I knew I needed to pick up my prescription. I don’t want to go two days without zoloft, or else I start to feel funky: brain zaps, headache, nausea, etc. And of course there’s the anxiety and depression coming back, stronger than ever.

So I remember to go to the pharmacy on Friday afternoon, after work.

Except… they don’t have my prescription.

I call the on-call doctor, and ask them what happened to my zoloft.

They say they sent it to hannahfords.

I’m at cvs.

I haven’t used the pharmacy at hannahfords in the past 4 years, because I moved, and now cvs is closer.

Weird, but fine.

I could go to hannahfords, but I would have to take the bus, and it’s raining super hard, and I don’t want to walk from the bus stop to hannahfords in the pouring rain.

I ask cvs if they can transfer my prescription. They say sure but not right now. We can do it tomorrow.

Alright, well that’s fine. I can pick up my meds in the morning, and then I will still have only skipped one day. No biggie. Feeling relieved, I head on home.

The next morning, I return to cvs.

They say it’s too early, they just opened. They can transfer my prescription later in the day. They will call me when it’s done.

Alright. So it looks like I might be skipping another day of my meds. It sucks, but okay.

The hours go by. I don’t get a call. I focus on drawing and watching anime, and I try not to think about it.

The evening finally comes. My head is starting to hurt a little bit.

I get a call.

Good news: cvs successfully transferred the prescription.

Bad news: they are out of stock of my medication and will need to have it shipped in. It may take a couple of days.

I can’t wait two more days.

I have a panic attack.

I calm down. I tell myself I can go to cvs tomorrow and see if they can help. Maybe they have some zoloft in the back? Idk, I just need enough to tide me over until the shipment, and I’m desperate.

I go to cvs. I tell them my predicament. They are sympathetic but their hands are tied. They have no zoloft. They tell me to maybe check another pharmacy. Except it’s Sunday, so the closest pharmacy that’s actually open is…

Hannahfords.

Well, okay. It’s a beautiful day, no rain, so I don’t mind taking the trip.

I get to hannahfords. I say hey can you please transfer my prescription back here so I can have my medicine.

They say, sorry. They’re out of stock, too.

They’re also all out of zoloft???

Except, no. The woman at the desk explains they have plenty of the 100mg tablets in stock.

I say great, I take 2 of those a day, per my doctor’s instructions.

But that’s not what is on my prescription this time.

The prescription my doctor wrote says to take 1 200mg tablet a day. And yes, that amounts to the same, the woman explains, but because your prescription asks for the 200mg tablets, I can’t give you the 100mg ones.

I can order the 200mg tablets for you, she tells me. It will take a couple of days.

Now that’s just infuriating.

I ask her, please, is there any way I can get my zoloft sooner?

She tells me I can call the on-call doctor and have them change the prescription from 1 200mg tablet a day to 2 100mg tablets a day.

So I do.

And finally, finally, on 2pm on Sunday afternoon, I get my medication.

God fucking dammit.

Why was all of that so complicated???

[shiiocha]

trying to learn microsoft access at work and my head is about to explode off

[beeaboutthis]

i dont do calls cuz i wanna protect my privacy and i also just want to get prettier before i start putting myself out there like that, but it feels sooo bad to disobey when ppl tell me to do that. urhguhgguh

[acosmicwayfarer]

Meanwhile, Sal, gazing out longingly at the seemingly endless expanse of freedom beyond the castle window while she thinks no one is looking:

[catbureau]

My parents who had been incessantly asking me for a ps5 for like two years now finally decided to buy one on their own last month and then forget to tell me before I did my Christmas shopping

[incredubious]

MODERN AU ACESAN !!!! first impressions with a guy who barely passes the No Shoes No Shirt No Service rule

[ayo-edebiri]

You don’t get to yell at me like that!

[teaboot]

Okay so I may have been struggling under a miscommunication issue

[wardensantoineandevka]

Warden Antoine is so funny for being someone who will make a stirring declaration about how the Wardens have an opportunity to reach for a future in which they are dedicated to protecting and restoring and nurturing the life and landscapes lost to the Blight, that it is their duty and it will give them purpose as they reckon with the end of Archdemons, then immediately provide you with like three hundred pounds of explosives he personally developed from scratch so you can blow something up for him

[inkskinned]

even 2 years ago people still said autism with a whisper. it was also how people sometimes whisper lesbian, like they're afraid of uttering a slur. autistic was either an insult or it was something terrible, a horrible burden only select people endure. "select people" were usually 9 year old boys and skinny white men.

they are not hispanic young adults with a dog and a life and friends. i can make (sustained, calculated, painful) eye contact. with certain people, i don't even have to count how many seconds i am holding their vision - i can just look at them. i can wear clothes that bother me, i will just have a worse day than usual. i might cry about any changes to my schedule - but change is scary! this is normal!

when i was 16 it was OCD. i mean that was the thing everyone said. i totally have ocd. they would arrange 6 colors of gel pen in rainbow order (no worry for indigo feeling left out) and they'd be "so ocd" about it.

if you struggle with intrusive thoughts, be careful at this next paragraph, but. at 16 i developed a compulsion that involved self-harm. my ocd was convinced i was simply forgetting that i'd hurt someone terribly - a thought that persisted for no clear or delineated reason.

at some point i will probably write about how the idea of "morally pure thoughts" was hell for me and others with ocd, but this was the odd dichotomy for many of us: they liked our "aesthetic", but were genuinely repulsed by our lived experience. "intrusive thoughts" now means "cutting your hair in the sink" instead of talking yourself down from believing horrible things. "so ocd" is a label without any true understanding.

it's something i've talked about before - in multiplicity - but i firmly believe in the veracity and necessity of self-diagnosis. i think it saves lives and it saves tragedies from occurring. as someone raised in a house that wasn't safe, self-diagnosis was, for many years, the only viable option. 15 and honestly googling: am i depressed or are there demons affecting my behavior.

but it is not genuine self-diagnosis anymore, most of the time. it is a strange, blanched version of that whispered word autism. now certain traits are constantly seen as "autistic" - any passing intense interest. any flubbed social interaction. people say it while laughing - a touch of the 'tism.

and i like the acceptance! i do. i like that people are talking about it. i like that if i self-identify, more people speak up and say me too, bitch. but there is something-else quietly happening, the way it happened to OCD. the quirky, "fun" parts have been washed and sanitized and removed of all suffering. now it is just something that makes you "a little bit silly."

it took me 27 years on this planet before i learned to make friends. something about me just seems incredibly odd, i guess, some kind of radiation monitoring. someone once (in a way that was almost friendly) told me i am doing the right things, but in a way that's off-putting. i have scoured myself raw attempting to be charming.

someone on tiktok does a deep dive into their particular passion. the top comment says "what kind of autism is this lol". like we are a breed of animal. like it has no influence on our experience. like our life is a fresh breeze, an open meadow.

more often for me, life was a drowning.

[goosesartblog]

“close your eyes, evbo” or whatever she said

[pterouras]

My promethea caterpillars are so bad at caterpillaring it’s so wild 😭 even though they’re supposed to feed in groups they keep knocking each other off the leaves which can be fatal to caterpillars that are trying to molt too

[slutforest]

got another blog made up, but the thought of switching over sounds annoying and exhausting to me, lol. all this so one (1) person can’t see my shit. i love this blog. i want to post original content. i just don’t feel completely comfortable doing so

[jzargo]

"The Hissing Wastes is the WORST" the Hissing Wastes is great if you bring Blackwall because he proceeds to tell you about the time he got lost in a desert storm, he and his men got drunk and high, and then they woke up naked and had to fight a bunch of ghasts. Most riveting story in the entire game. Solas and Varric wish they had stories to tell like this.

[sunderwight]

Shen Qingqiu gets hit by a rare wife plot.

And it actually is a rare one because Airplane didn't even write this one down! He toyed with the idea before ultimately dismissing it as being too controversial for the tastes of his readers, and adapting only a few of the same elements for a subsequent chapter of PIDW.

But apparently the System can pull inspiration even from the author's thoughts, especially when there's nothing to contradict the concept and even a few threads of it still to be found in the original, and somehow Shen Qingqiu runs afoul of this previously-unwritten plot bunny.

The core concept was a cuck scenario, of all things. One of the Luo Binghe's wives gets afflicted by a poison that can only be cured by dual cultivation, but specifically can't be cured by by dual cultivation with anyone who has mastery over demonic qi. Something something conflicting energies, something bullshit something. Peerless Cucumber would have ripped the chapter to shreds if it had actually made it to publication, not just for the insult of implying that Luo Binghe should let one of his wives sleep with someone else, but also because why would Luo Binghe -- able to use both kinds of cultivation -- somehow not be able to keep his demonic energies from influencing the situation just in this one case?

Well it turns out that in his specific case it's because sex gets him too worked up to keep things strictly separate, and the degree of control required to treat the affliction whilst dual cultivating is extensive enough that even a little slip-up would be fatal.

Of course, in the actual chapter of PIDW, this same plot device was altered and used to create a harem orgy where Luo Binghe oversaw several of his wives "treating" one another's "afflictions", but Shen Qingqiu just had to go and get a fatal of dose of the more severe version (he didn't realize the risk, because again, this version didn't even make it into the novel).

Anyway, of course this ends up with Shen Qingqiu trying to figure out another way to cheat death, while Luo Binghe goes through the five stages of grief before accepting that he's just going to have to let someone else fuck his husband. This leads to an argument because of course Shen Qingqiu's not going to cheat on Luo Binghe, and he's especially not going to force one of his martial siblings to sleep with him, come on now, and Luo Binghe trying not to cry tears of blood while bringing himself to explain that a fair few of Shen Qingqiu's sect siblings would be happy volunteers for this task.

Shen Qingqiu's just like, well of course you think that, for some bizarre reason you think everyone wants to sleep with me. Bias is what it is. Really it's flattering Binghe but obviously every other person we know is straight, that's just statistics, and everyone in the entire cultivation world knows that Qi Qingqi would sooner chew glass than have sex with a man!

Luo Binghe, weeping now: Shizun please. This is serious. I need you speak words that make sense in the order you're saying them.

They argue, they reach an impasse, the clock is ticking. So Luo Binghe reluctantly turns to the most reliable source of information (outside of himself) on Manipulating Shen Qingqiu to Do Things That Are in His Own Best Interests -- Shang Qinghua.

At first Shang Qinghua is like, well I'm flattered Junshang but I don't think I could shoulder the baggage of fucking Cucumber-bro for you. But then Luo Binghe is like no I need someone who is way hotter and more capable than you, if Shizun is going to fuck someone else at my behest they're going to be TOP TIER so that when I fuck him better afterwards he's really impressed with me. Liu Qingge, obviously.

Not Yue Qingyuan, Shang Qinghua asks? (He'd take the insult a little more personally but honestly he's just relieved that he's not being asked to navigate this social minefield.)

No, Luo Binghe says. He's not 100% sure he could beat Yue Qingyuan in a fight even to this day, which in his mind also translates to not being 100% sure he could do sex better than him either, so Yue Qingyuan is an emergency last resort. He's way more likely to cry on Shizun too and Shen Qingqiu is into that shit, it's too risky.

Alright, says Shang Qinghua, and he thinks about it, and then he comes up with the beautifully simple solution:

Luo Binghe has to fuck Liu Qingge first.

Because of course the crux of the issue is that even with permission, Shen Qingqiu doesn't want to cheat on Luo Binghe. But in the twisted annals of his mind, Luo Binghe himself is still entitled to a harem, even if Luo Binghe is also happily monogamous in this life. So if he shacks up with Liu Qingge first then Liu Qingge essentially joins Luo Binghe's harem, at which point if Shen Qingqiu sleeps with him it's not an affair, it's the gay version of those fanservice-y 3P scenes that the wives in PIDW did. Shang Qinghua translates the concept as best as he can to Luo Binghe, who -- though slightly dubious -- must accept that so far Shang Qinghua's wisdom hasn't steered him wrong with regards to his shizun's eccentricities.

Luo Binghe's mission: seduce Liu Qingge, or at least convince him to have sex, or possibly to lie and (convincingly!) tell Shen Qingqiu that they had sex. That last one is the longest shot so he's probably going to have to just fuck him (Luo Binghe still underestimates how willing his husband is to believe that just about anyone would have sex with him).

Shang Qinghua's mission: convince Shen Qingqiu that he owes his husband steamy threeway gay sex or something so that this plan he pulled out of his ass doesn't backfire and get him killed.