#A Painful Pot

[zegalba]

Johnson Cheung-shing Tsang: A Painful Pot (2013)

[vtk13]

“slut era” i whisper to myself as i rot in my bed, sick like a frail victorian child

[chroniclesofchronicillness]

This makes so much sense

[potsiepumpkin]

When the chronic fatigue is chronic

[colourmeastonished]

Body swap movie where one of them has invisible disabilities and when the other one lands in their body they immediately collapse catatonic on the floor from the pain and fatigue and the first one is like 'oh damn guess I don't have to worry that I'm faking it anymore'

[chronicallydragons]

anyone else ever wish they could lie down harder? Like, I'm already horizonal, but I need more horizonal. I need to be absorbed by the floor. I think that would fix me

[stellaltumi]

stop villanizing disabled people. stop assuming we're just being lazy. stop assuming we could be trying harder. stop assuming that we'll "feel better" in a few weeks. stop assuming that we have the same energy levels as everyone else. thanks for coming to my ted talk.

[mybodychoseviolence]

“surely this will not cause my chronic illness to flare up,” i say, actively doing something that has never failed to flare my chronic illness

[gayaest]

[ID in alt-text]

Bora! She’s blasian (black and korean!) she has POTS (postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) and Chronic Pain! 🩷💜

She takes her rollator everywhere!

[love-me-love-my-weirdness]

I think the reason why people want to know what's "wrong" with disabled people is because they want to reassure themselves.

They want you to say you were in a horrific accident or that you have a well known and treatable disease because they think they can stop it happening to them.

They think their health is a given because they aren't a dangerous driver/ an alcoholic/a drug user/obese/an unhealthy eater etc. Obviously this isn't true but it's easier for them to think of it like that.

Until one day they meet someone who did nothing. They're not really asking "what's wrong with you". They're asking "what went wrong" because they think they can avoid it.

So when they meet someone who made all the right choices, who was healthy, who was safe and one day woke up sick and never got better, it scares them because some part of them realises that it could happen to them.

They can exercise and eat a balanced diet and be as careful as possible and it doesn't do a thing and they can't do a thing about it. That terrifies able bodied people.

People like to look for something or someone to blame and they hate it when there's nothing there.

[hellyeahsickaf]

When I say "I can't do that" what I'm not saying is:

I don't feel interested in doing that

I don't care enough to

I'm too good to be doing that

I don't think you deserve that of me

I'm not in the mood to do that

Not now, I'll do it later

Maybe

If that's what I meant, that's what I would say

What I am saying is:

It will negatively affect me in ways I can't afford

I simply can't physically fucking do that

I can't risk the potentially severe consequences I may experience if I overestimate my ability to do that

And if I explain that I am unable to do that, it is not an invitation to:

Tell me how much my disability hurts your feelings

Ask if I'm sure

Interrogate me because you believe yourself to be the judge of how unwell is unwell enough

Put words in my mouth ("why don't you care?")

Tell me how easy it would be

Remind me of how many other things I've been unable to do. I keep the score more than you do

Accuse me of exaggerating or faking to avoid doing it

Ask me again shortly

Make assumptions about additional explanations. (I must be mad at you, I must not care about this)

Offer compensation in return ("I can pay you" "we can do something you want to do after" "I'll get you something you like")

Ask what it would take for me to suddenly be capable of doing it

Tell me how you do things you have to do when when you're tired and then you can just rest and recover. I am not like you

Remind me of a time I was able to do that. Either I had more spoons or was less severely disabled if at all.

Say that if I was well enough to do X today, I should be able to do this as well. Energy doesn't work that way. Are you capable of running 8 miles right this minute just because you were okay to work a 10 hour shift today? That's what I thought

Suggest simply doing it a certain way ("take your time", "do it sitting down", "we can stop and take breaks", "just take your painkillers", etc)

But it is an invitation to:

Leave me the fuck alone about it 💕

[chronically-evie]

my mom keeps trying to get me to go to the ER when im having a flare up and i have no idea what to tell her.

because ive BEEN to the ER before. you wanna know what they did? while i was sweating, shaking, and sobbing, curled in a ball of pain?

they asked me if i was on my period. when i told them no, they asked me if i was pregnant.

when i told them no, because i wasn't sexually active, they forcibly tested me anyways, and then when it came back negative said, "well maybe you should just take a few deep breaths", gave me liquid ibuprofen, and sent me home.

disabled people, in this particular situation disabled afabs, are never fucking listened to.

the ER staff literally LAUGHED at me multiple times. they pointed at me when i was having one of the worst episodes of my life and snickered.

so no, i do not want to go to the fucking ER. my heating pad, ice packs, and nausea meds are going to help me more than anything a hospital could do.

[chroniclesofchronicillness]

Sometimes best isn’t always possible

[potsiepumpkin]

Useful information

[pots-plus-pans]

destigmatize having a body/body parts that look “gross”

destigmatize having a reoccurring rash that you can’t control

destigmatize “strange looking” veins

destigmatize “gross” scarring

destigmatize having bodies that are broken and express that

destigmatize being disabled and having “atypical” physical manifestations of said disability

disabled bodies are beautiful

[autisticbokutoenthusiast]

they should invent joints that dont hurt