#but!! all of it will be worth it if my gallbladder really was the cause of the pain attacks I had

[running-in-the-dark]

I'm pretty sure I can never let myself have any kind of surgery that isn't absolutely necessary ever again and it really kind of sucks

[vintagerpg]

Shifting gears slightly, this is The Forest-Lords of Dihad (1982), the first of two products detailing the Land Beyond the Mountains, a setting developed by Gamelords for Metagaming’s Fantasy Trip system. Despite the promise of the material, the deal fell apart when Metagaming closed and Fantasy Trip slipped into copyright limbo. The pair of modules from Gamelords are, to my knowledge, the only third-party material produced for Fantasy Trip during its first incarnation.

I’ve never looked at any of Metagaming’s later adventures, and Tollenkar’s Lair is just a large dungeon, so I can’t really judge Dihad against the mainline content, but I am willing to bet this is pretty different. It’s very much a setting book, comparable with something like Griffin Mountain in terms of the size of the territory and the sort of details the book is interested in (social groups, topography, factions, as opposed to a more encounter-based focus like X1: The Isle of Dread, or even the overland details in Mines of Keridav). It’s…very good. It makes me seriously wonder what Thieves Guild might have developed into had Gamelords had the staying power of Chaosium and RuneQuest.

It is not at all what I expect for Fantasy Trip, which I think of as more of a tactical combat game. In fact, there is very little sense of system in the text. TFT stuff is there, but it isn’t in the foreground, making this material essentially generic.

Pretty sure that is a Wyman cover, but not one of their best. Wyman, Larry Shade and and Wallace Miller are all credited as interior illustrators, and they do a very good job. Really love that gargoyle. Which, gargoyle hunting is a big thing here — their gallbladders are important components for all sorts of arcane doings, and someone one has been overhunting and stockpiling them, causing a general shortage. This whole plot thread is delightfully odd and worth the price of admission alone (which was about 25 bucks, at least until I posted about it). I wish I had the second volume!

[sigridstumb]

My autism journey: Physical sensations are unreliable narrators

So I've been working with a therapist on my alexithymia. I asked her where the key is for this map. Other people seem to be able to detect when they are having a feeling and can also identify it. I asked, how can they tell that they are having a feeling? She said that frequently there are physical signs in one's body.

Great! What are they, and which symptom correlates to which emotion?

WHERE IS THE KEY FOR THIS MAP.

Apparently there really isn't one. She sent me a link to the Emotion-Sensation Wheel, which is mildly useful. Mostly in my objecting that when I have X physical sensation is has nothing to do with whatever emotion-word she correlated. This is useful in two ways. First, it let me know that I do have some sort of internal definition of some feelings, that I know that "restless" does not mean I am feeling "anger." Second, every time I thought, "no, that's not what that means," I then pondered what it might mean instead.

Here's the thing. Bodily sensations are a SHITTY guide to ANYTHING, because they all indicate more than one thing. Hands-shaking could mean anxiety, or rage, or an essential or intention tremor, or lack of food, or fever and chills, or over-exertion, or a dozen other things. Bodies communicate shit all the time, and most of it is worth ignoring. Yes, Meatsack, I know your shins hurt, they've been hurting for two days, I have stretched and done massage, now shut the fuck up. Yes, Meatsack, I know your digestion is disordered, it has been for years, you don't have a gallbladder anymore, shut up.

I do not listen to my body except under certain specific conditions.

New pain requires that I examine it, assess it, determine a cause (if possible,) and decide what the best mitigation is (if possible.) New pain that either prevents my daily function or does not go away after two weeks indicates that consultation with a medical professional is required. For instance, when I caught my finger in a blender it was a new pain, the cause was evident, it interfered with my daily function, I knew it would not resolve on its own in a manner I desired, so I went to urgent care. Another example, when my (already permanently damaged) foot had very sharp stabbing pain that was new, I waited two weeks to see if it would go away, and when it did not, I got an x-ray.

If I am very irritated with everyone, I eat a food. When I have a headache that will not go away, I eat a food and drink some water. When I cannot focus my eyes properly, I go to sleep. Like I said, I have a rule-set for when bodily signals require action on my part.

The notion that random fluctuations in signals from this mildly-electrified container of moist clinging conglomerate adhered to a living frame might indicate important changes in my mental-relational state offends me. It offends me. I mean, a human body is like a mobile coral reef. Does a coral reef feel grief? Joy? I mean, maybe, I don't know, but my point is, people just correlate shit. What a fucked-up system. Who fucking designed this bullshit?

Anyway, I refuse to participate in this buffoonery. Unless and until someone can show me a reliable correlation between the manifestations of endocrine system fluctuations and specific, SPECIFIC, emotional states, I opt out. None of this tea-leaf-reading "oooooh, your skin is flushed, you must be angry!" bullshit, when flushing is merely a rush of blood to the surface of one's skin and can result from temperature, exertion, a number of medical conditions, not to mention any number of emotions such as shame, arousal, excitement, grief, etc.

It is rank buffoonery.

If any of you have an actual, functional, reliable key to this whole "physical sensations indicate emotions" theory, let me know.

Until then, I opt out.

[mejomonster]

hi! Not to be nosy sorry but what do you mean you're doing physical therapy for your scar tissues now?? I've never heard of it. If you don't mind explaining, that would be great. No worries if you don't want to!

If you've got any scar tissue that's causing physical pain or limitation I definitely think physical therapy is worth trying out!

Below the cut:

So I started PT for general intense pain across my whole abdomen which I figured was from my intense gi health issues ive had for the past 2 years, and 3 bulging disks in my back from an injury I got this past September.

When they started helping me they noticed I had a lot of acar tissue by my gallbladder removal scar that had attached somewhat to my diaphram, making breathing harder and meaning I struggled to diaphram breath. Also causing my muscles near that scar tissue to be tenser, causing additional pain. They did a lot of myofascial releases on muscles for several weeks, and gave me stretches to do at home and during PT to help keep the muscles from re-tensing up. (Also I imagine going to a massage place for myofascial release could also help in this way). Since about 2 months in my whole upper ab section, sides, and part below ribs feels significantly less painful and less painful during exercise and generally the muscles don't tense as much as they used to. I can actually diaphram breath when I lay down now which I couldn't before. But I still struggle go diaphram breath when sitting as the area is still tighter than pre having scar tissue.

Now we are mainly focusing on my lower abdomen. I have scar tissue they were able to feel near the middle and left of my belly button, which makes sense as most of my surgeries had to cut or remove (other older) scar tissue or staples from that area or just did incisions on my abdomen. At first the pain was across my entire abdomen, PT says it's because the muscles guard from the pain I'm in, and others overcompensate (also related to me overusing back muscles when my abdomen hurts so much and my back injury causing me to try to over rely on my abdomen muscles and that's a big negative loop mess right now lol since both are in pain). So my hip flexor muscles are really tight, my hip muscles that go around to back are tight (causing back pain to increase), my pelvic muscles are bound up, and just in general muscles connected to the scar tissue area also feel that increase in pain. Same treatment at PT: myofascial release frequently to the tense muscles, stretches at PT and home to keep them from re-tensing as much, and the last few sessions specific work where the physical therapist is breaking down the scar tissue. It's also a kind of massage or pressure. So far its working great and now my general all over abdomen pain is only directly below and to left of my belly button in about a 6 inch chunk area. The pain is way more manageable since it's a smaller clear location, and I'm no longer vomiting frequently from intense abdomen pain and haven't for the last 2 months which I'm really happy about, since I was vomiting weekly or more for the last 1.5ish years before PT. I'd feel an intense pressure like my abdomen was a hard bowling ball or a thick metal bar was being shoved against me hard constantly, have nausea, and throw up a lot. I threw up until November 2022, kept getting just the nausea until about December, and as of last month I'm no longer getting the nausea at all. So I'm steadily improving wooh!

I'm also doing abdomen and back strength training exercise for the back injury and fixing it/preventing future injury, and because more back strength will help abdomen muscles overcompensate less (and therefore hurt less), meanwhile the abdomen strength training I'm doing will help back muscles overcompensate less (and hurt less). But that's unrelated to scar tissue, more like long term side issues that developed cause I was in pain so long that just need to be worked on too.

I definitely again recommend trying it if you have scar tissue and pain in your body near that scar (or near where stuff was moved internally etc). The main things PT will do are myofascial release (you can Alternatively go to a massage place for this), stretches (you can also look up these online), and scar releases (which is similar to massage). I am not sure how much more aware of it though a physical therapist is than a massage place, the physical therapist can feel my muscles and pinpoint by feeling exactly what's a scar, normal tense muscle, how deep to go into a muscle to loosen it, where that muscle connects to another position on the body so how a tense muscle on the side may actually be causing pain on the back. So if you can do PT I find their knowledge on that stuff really helpful.

If you think you need help with the pain, feel free to try. I feel eons better than when I started in September 2022. Mainly because my back injury I recovered great from with their help, also not vomiting ever is so amazing I am so grateful I was over the moon when that was no longer happening because of PT progress. I can wear pants with less pain and sit up longer and hike again. I can eat more reliably without increase in gi/abdomen pain. The diaphram area loosening just makes breathing itself easier and my whole body hurt less when walking since my sides/ribs used to hurt so bad when standing or sitting. And I'm so glad we are still working on the scar tissue in my abdomen because I think if it gets better I may eventually be able to stop needing a heatpad daily and nightly and just my nonstop pain there will be less intense which I'm really hopeful for.

[feminexisting]

One of the Survivors by Susan Shaw

I’ve presumably owned this book for a few years now, but I don’t remember buying it. There’s a Quality Guaranteed sticker, as well as a price sticker on it pricing it at $3.49. I decided to read it because I wanted a short book I could read this month, since I knew I wouldn’t be up for reading for some time after having my gallbladder removed on the first of the month. 

The premise is that teenager Joey Campbell and his best friend Maureen are the only two people in their entire history class who survive a fire after Joey, previously traumatized by fire, runs out and Maureen follows him. The story follows the aftermath and the lead-up to the funeral of their classmates, chronicling how they handle survivor’s guilt and the angry mob of people who believe that they were the ones that set the fire. 

Honestly, it was a pretty simple book, but for the most part it was charming in how it handled and portrayed grief. Frankly, I didn’t keep notes for this book, in part because it felt almost wrong to (being of such a serious subject matter, regardless of being a work of fiction), but also because it just... didn’t call for it. There were very few things that made it stand out for most of the time. Charming as it may have been, it didn’t have much going for it. 

I thought it was interesting how the reader was basically acting as Joey’s journal, at least given the point of view that Joey was writing from. I’ve always enjoyed diary/journal books, wherein events are described and we see completely and exactly how the writer of the entry (not necessarily the writer of the actual book) feels and thinks about said situations. 

I appreciated how Maureen and Joey never started dating or anything like that. I knew it wasn’t that sort of book, but I’ve been burned by books before, books that had no business having some sort of romance but which shoehorned it in anyway, so I’m thankful that didn’t happen in this book and wasn’t even really hinted at it happening in the future. 

One thing I didn’t like was the ending of the book. For the most part, I thought the book was pretty well paced, but the ending was too sudden; I think it would’ve benefitted from another 20 pages, at least, but maybe 30 or 40, just enough to pad out the ending. The entire story takes place over a few months in the summer following the fire of the school, allowing the characters to breathe and move and act organically, but the ending of the book felt rushed. Perhaps this was because the rest of the book moved at such a leisurely pace, but it just wasn’t a satisfying ending, both in regards to speed and also in regards to the characters themselves. It felt like they made choices that didn’t match up with where they were in the healing process, or else the characters around them didn’t react realistically to them. The grieving daughter of the teacher who died in the fire almost immediately believes the boy when he says her father was the one who kept them all in the classroom, even though it seemed like her rage was the only thing keeping her going. The parents of the dead teens and the community members all welcome Joey with welcome arms and apologize (?) to him after seeing the drawing that he did. I don’t know, it just didn’t really feel right. Plus, frustratingly enough, we never learned what the cause of the fire was. Of course, it’s a story about travelling through grief and survivor’s guilt, so the cause of the fire wasn’t really necessary, but it still would’ve been nice to know, y’know? If nothing else, I was glad that, in the end, Joey decided that he would no longer drop out of high school when he turned 16. 

One thing worth remarking upon, even though it wasn’t intended by the author, was the fact that it was initially a surprise that the book was about a fire and not a school shooting. Though this should have been (and, perhaps for other people, was) obvious based on the fact that there was a fire alarm on cover of the book, school shootings are such a common occurrence nowadays that the title made me think of survivor’s guilt, which made me think about school shootings, completely overlooking the design of the cover. Hell, there were a few times even while reading the book that I had to remind myself that it was about a fire and not a shooting. The book was copyrighted for 2009, and although there were already school shootings back then, they weren’t anywhere near as commonplace, so I doubt the author had really had them on the mind when writing about the book. In one way, that is interesting, seeing how perceptions can change over time, especially within your own lifetime. In 2009, I would’ve been around 11 or 12, and if I’m remembering properly, I don’t think I really thought much about shootings at school; I wasn’t really aware of them, I think, until I was in high school. 

Overall, it wasn’t a bad book. It wasn’t my favorite, but it was fine, for the most part, anyway. Not great, not bad. 3/5. 

My bookmark for this book was the flaps of the dust cover. 

[khaotic-kitsunes]

Fireworks

Alright, so here’s my first piece of writing in...a while...? I kind of wanted some fluff, I guess? So have some Tamaki fluff! As for getting back into the swing of writing, that might still be a long time off. To explain, I have gallstones and an chronically inflamed gallbladder. Plus some other unsettling news that I won’t go into. All in all, I am mostly in a constant pain. Crazy exhausted and really just, struggling to do simple tasks because of everything.

I hope you all enjoy the Tamaki fluff, and I figured I should give a brief update? I dunno. Feel free to let me know what you think about the writing!

Navigation 

Cheeky Kitsune 🦊💋

.

 “You still haven’t told me what’s in the bag!” You found yourself shouting at the top of your lungs, the chilly midnight air biting at your flushed cheeks harshly from the speed that Tamaki had settled on for the late-night flight. With his heightened senses, Tamaki probably didn’t need you to shout at him for him to be able to hear you; and yet that’s exactly what you found yourself doing, despite knowing such facts.

 Partly because you were only a half-cast and it was hard to hear yourself think at such speeds, let alone speak.

 .

 “I told you that it’s a surprise, didn’t I?”

 .

 If you had been able to, you would have puffed up your cheeks at his rumbled growl of a response; but given that you were far too focused on not falling off of his dark-scaled back, you decided to instead clutch the large bag closer to your chest. Nestled safely under your chin so that you couldn’t peek into it like you so desperately wanted to.

 You cast your gaze to the sky above you, allowing the sight to overwhelm your senses with the help of the wind and misty clouds that surrounded you. It was hard not to, given that you were only capable of a select few traits of your dragon bloodline; wings not being one of them.

 Any time that you went joyriding with your partner, you found yourself immersed with the glittering skies above. The night sky less harsh than the day, easier to cope with for the both of you. When Tamaki was around, that is.

 .

 “We’re here, close your eyes (Name).”

 .

 You jumped at the sound of Tamaki’s voice, any and all thoughts being wiped from your mind as your eyes slid shut; not wanting to disobey when it was only that morning that he had returned home to you from helping one of his closest friends. A dragon that he had been raised with if you were to recall correctly.

 The sudden, heart-stopping feeling of scales disappearing from under you was something that had taken you a long time to adjust to and even as you fell towards the ground, it was hard; almost impossible not to open your eyes. But the strong, familiar arms belonging to your lover soon curled around your body; cradling you to an overly warm chest that you soon melted into, leaning your head up to nuzzle Tamaki’s jaw.

 An affectionate action that he soon returned whilst setting you down onto the ground; safe and sound, just like always.

 “Keep your eyes closed for me, alright?” His voice was softer in his human form, yet it still sent a shiver down your spine to feel his warm lips brush against your sensitive ear. Strong hands prying the bag from your grasp and leaving you to stand there with your eyes squeezed tightly shut; determination the miracle that kept you from peeking now that you had nothing to hold onto.

 “I don’t see why you’re being so secretive about this Tamaki…” You wrapped your arms around yourself as you spoke, rubbing at your arms so that the goosebumps would fade away sooner rather than later. Even being a half-cast, you weren’t nearly as warm as you needed to be for such late night flying.

 After all, there were reasons why dragons were built the way they were and producing ridiculous amounts of heat was generally to battle against the winter and icy skies.

 “Because it’s a surprise.” You wanted to roll your eyes at his chuckled response, a soft growl of annoyance spilling past your lips; causing Tamaki’s laughter to increase, quickly followed by a deep growl that made your knees feel like jelly.

 “Just a few moments more, I promise it will be worth it” Your tail curled around your legs as he spoke to you, his voice sounding further away with each word until you could only hear faint rustling from the bag that held a mysterious substance.

 “Probably…but you know how much I hate surprises Tamaki…” You grumbled out the words under your breath, certain that he could hear them now that the wind wasn’t tearing its way through you without mercy.

 “Mm, I do…” Tamaki trailed off as a faint hissing sound filled your ears, piquing your curiosity and causing your eyes to snap open.

 “Not so fast!” You snarled out in frustration when Tamaki enveloped you from behind, hands sliding over your eyes and preventing you from seeing the surprise that you weren’t allowed to look at yet.

 “Tamaki!” Your growl trailed off into a whine while he pulled you closer, warm lips brushing against your neck as he smiled against your cool skin; not moving his hands.

 “Three…” You perked up at the number, leaning back into him properly and even relaxing when you felt his hands begin to slowly slide away from your eyes; revealing nothing before he was ready and taking his time with the newly started countdown.

 “Tamaki…come on!”

 .

 “Be patient (Name). Two. One…”

 .

 You squirmed in his hold, going still only when his hands fell from your eyes down to your jaw so that he could tilt your head up towards the night sky; a loud explosion echoing around the empty clearing while glittering colour filled the otherwise plain night sky.

 “See? I told you that it would be worth it (Name)” Tamaki hummed quietly from behind you, nuzzling you affectionately while your eyes remained glued to the colourful show; each explosion startling you just enough to make him chuckle before the beautiful colours against the dark sky soothed your nerves.

 “What are they?” You spoke quietly, your voice barely above a whisper while Tamaki continued to hold you close; taking great care with how he showered you with love and affection, a small smile tugging at his lips.

 “Fireworks. When we first met, you were upset because you missed them at the festival…so I thought they might make up for missing your birthday the other week” Tamaki kept his voice quiet as he explained, his hands making their way to your hips to keep you close; despite the fact that you weren’t going anywhere.

 “I told you I don’t celebrate my birthday” You glanced back at him, a frown beginning to form at the thought of celebrating a day that hasn’t ever meant anything to you; especially considering that Tamaki knew that.

 “You told me that you don’t celebrate it because it makes you feel lonely” Tamaki paused, watching as your head dipped in confirmation; a pained grimace taking away the enjoyment that you had been experiencing for the beautiful display of fireworks.

 “Are you still lonely? With me here?” Tamaki tilted his head, his question making you blink in confusion before you closed your eyes, debating over your answer; deciding that he made a surprisingly good point.

 “No…”

 .

 “Then open your eyes and enjoy your birthday present. You don’t need to think tonight (Name), you just need to enjoy the night.”

[bigolegay]

i just feel like because i was never thin, was never even anything more than a toe under the “obese” bmi category (and i KNOW that bmi is shit and not a measurement of worth), that i just... failed. like i did all of that, lost everything, and for what? lost my job, lost my time, lost my gallbladder, lost my sense of self, my identity, my sense of self-worth, my health, and for what? i didn’t even get close to even looking normal, let alone even looking good. i still have all those thinspo pictures saved on my pc and phone and i look at them and then me and it’s like we’re a different species.i fucking failed! and now here i am, putting myself through the hell of recovery, gaining weight because i’m making up for two years of resctriction and my set point is higher and i’m using constant over-eating as a form of self harm and self sabotage because i really want to relapse.... and for fucking what??

it just kills me, i want to be acceptable so fucking bad but i still see myself in the mirror and like... i hate it! i hate myself!! i think i look horrific! i still don’t know who or what i am, and now i just pressed a fucking key on my keyboard and something happened and i can’t undo it, because my fucking hands are so FAT right now, they look like i’ve got overstuffed sausages for fingers, and i just want someone to tell me “it’s okay, i give you permission to relapse” but no one is going to do that and no one should because i’ll fucking end up killing myself with this shit! i want to fuckign scream!!!

all i’ve eaten today is an iced coffee and an ice cream and i feel like such a fucking horrific piece of shit for eating them because they were sugary and that is BAD but also good because hey, that’s all i’ve eaten. and maybe i’m going for a 6 mile hike this afternoon, but honestly i probably shouldn’ because i feel this way and i still haven’t eateng jhsdfkjhsdfkjdsh i want to fucking stop everything, i want to just sleep for 50 yearsd and wake up in my 70s and then die the next day of natural fucking causes. i HATEa this

[clouds-of-wings]

I wrote this like 3 weeks ago and actually got over it since but @tardigradedeathposture wanted to read it, so here’s the lightly edited rant.

---

I was going to not write about how crap I thought the Witcher TV show was but it keeps bugging me and whatever here’s my rant.

So as my followers might know, I played the games (yes even the first) and mostly liked them, especially the second, which I think is a great game and actually better than the third, which I still enjoyed. The first, well, had its moments. I’ve read the first book about 5 years ago after playing the second game for the second time but couldn’t really get into it, I watched the old Polish TV adaptation and found it sort of quaint but nothing special. So of course I was skeptical of the prospect of a TV show but also sort of interested.

Well good things first. I thought Henry Cavill played Geralt pretty well actually. People hated him when he was first introduced but I think most were won over by his performance. He isn’t quite like the Geralt I know, but that might be due to the script. Second good thing, Jaskier isn’t quite as incredibly annoying as he is in the games, though still annoying. But at least he isn’t a pimp here. Third good thing, Chireadan, because Elves <3

But apart from these aspects, I think I haven’t watched such a stupid show since Once upon a time (which was so terrible that it caused my gallbladder to ache non-stop, so I had to stop after the first half of season 1. Witcher didn’t do that, so I guess it wasn’t quite as bad as OUAT). I know the series follows the story laid out in the books, and actually my problem isn’t even what happens, but how it’s presented, in that story and characterization manage to be tepid and tropey and also illogical and self-contradictory.

Take Yennefer for example, because her character annoyed me the most.

Now I’m not a fan of her in the third game either but at least she has a consistent (terrible) personality and a will of her own there. I read that she’s a better character in the books, so okay. Maybe they butchered her on the show. I honestly don’t remember the book I read very well anymore, as I said, I couldn’t get into it.

She is explicitly said and shown to do very badly during her mage training and to be bad at court politics, she’s barely even shown doing magic before the last episode, but she gets to “ascend”, whatever that means, while the other (far more deserving?) students get turned into eels. Later her teacher says she was the best student she’d ever had (?? when? where?) and gives her trust and responsibility for zero reason and Yennefer goes on to save the day, sort of.

She gets, in one of the most unrealistic scenes on the show, cosmetic surgery that involves an extensive spinal operation and the removal of her uterus WITHOUT NARCOTICS and half an hour later she wows everyone at the prom ball. IIRC, in the books and the games the sorceresses and sorcerers alter their appearance using, uh, magic instead of having some guy rip out their spine. And the sorceresses explicitly make themselves beautiful because “that’s what their clients expect”, just like the sorcerers make themselves appear as “venerable” old men - because it’s the pre-conception their clients have. It’s subversive, John-Karen, because the mages somewhat cynically show themselves to be genre-savvy by exploiting the... why am I explaining this. It’s obvious to everyone except the idiots who wrote the show. The point is, it’s not about their personal empowerment, but they could have done something with Yennefer’s “ugly to beautiful” transformation and they didn’t, so that sucks too.

From the whole way she’s presented, it becomes clear that she would be a terrible mother (”happy childhoods make for boring conversation”), yet we’re supposed to feel sympathy for her quest for fertility. And she’s constantly bitter about her lack of it - when the surgeon told her very clearly that she’d be losing her fertility as a side-effect of the operation and she explicitly agreed to it. This wasn’t something that was forced upon her yet she acts like it was.

Just like in the game, she has zero concern for other people’s wishes or boundaries. I mean she cast magic upon a bunch of people and made them sexually assault each other, and the show just frames it as “sexy lady hosts an orgy”. Then she accuses Geralt of not paying attention to other people’s boundaries because he made a wish she doesn’t even know the specifics of (lol).

Yennefer is a pretty terrible person, which would be fine in terms of character, if she were actually presented as terrible. Yennefer actually has pretty exactly the personality of Cersei Lannister, but Cersei was intentionally portrayed as vicious, power-hungry, dishonest and irrational. We weren’t supposed to see her as a good person and that made her a great character. Watching Cersei was fun and interesting. Watching Yennefer is grating because in any sane universe, a woman like that would not be the hero. That’s also why I think it’s absolutely false to call TW “the new GoT”. TW is worse than even late seasons GoT.

However, the show loves her so much that it randomly gives her super-powers whenever it suits. In the fight in front of the dragon cave, she’s as good with a sword as Geralt, even though she has no training and no muscles and he’s literally been mutated to become a better fighter. In the last episode, she easily deters the attack by Nilfgaard and then destroys their camp (??) with magic when up until then she was only ever shown to be very bad at magic. (Unleash *~the chaos inside you~* god who wrote that script?)

But in the end, almost her whole story is determined by the effect she has on men. Despite all her qualities that we’re supposed to blindly believe she has, it’s her looks and the fact that some men like her constant pointless insults that determines what happens to her. The archeologist guy in the beginning is the only one who stops her from totally failing at mage training. The king she wows with her good looks and her early 21st century dress becomes her employer. Geralt and the Elf guy falling for her. The knight guy she manipulates into going to dragon mountain with her. Her only skill that she is somewhat consistently proven to actually possess is the ability to charm and seduce men with her beauty and her sparkling personality.

Unfortunately, this characterization is somewhat common among “strong female characters”. All the important female characters on American Gods are that way as well. Wonder Woman is (in the film, I haven’t read the comics) close to it as well. Random pointless superpowers, but her story is actually determines by everyone being head over heels for her because she’s pretty. I don’t really know why this counts as “feminist”, but for the media industry apparently it does. I think it’s rather the opposite.

But, god, Yennefer wasn’t the only terrible character. I also hated the way they portrayed what were apparently supposed to be Scoia’tael adjacent Elves in the first episode. Can you imagine Iorveth or Yaevinn make common cause with those planless caricatures? I absolutely love the clearheadedness and ruthlessness of the Scoia’tael in the games. They rebel against human oppression with the decisiveness of people with nothing left to lose. The Elves are portrayed as a mentally somewhat superior race who see themselves as the rightful owners of the land and are absolutely furious at humans using brute force to disinherit them. I love the absolute lack of moral high ground and of “virtuous victimhood”. I love the elitism turned to bitterness. I love the way they frame things like telling Elvish legends as acts of resistance (which is something that has plenty of real-life parallels). I love (since it’s fictional and all) the vicious treatment of human civilians, since, you know, from the Elves’ perspectives there are no civilians among the humans. In the games, you’re clearly made to understand that both the Scoia’tael and their opponents have committed terrible acts, and then, because this is war, you’re expected to pick a side anyway. Which was both easy and fun for me as a huge Elf stan in general, but I love that it’s not supposed to be an easy choice.

So I’m just talking about a short scene in the first or second episode, because that was the only time we see Elves who have Elf-specific problems, but I just hated that scene, because it steps into exactly the tropes that the games avoided. They complain, act irrationally and are portrayed as helpless, morally pure victims who won’t actually do anything that will do more than just slightly inconvenience humans. Toothless! Exactly as Hollywood would like oppressed peoples to be, righteous in their suffering, maybe stealing some bread but that’s all they will do.

Another thing that really bothered me was how unpolished it was. Hahaha! Terrible pun alert. They took everything Polish out of the story, see what I did there? I would have loved to see those houses with the flowers painted on them for example that are based on a real Polish village. What we got was just a bland Medieval(TM) world that could be anywhere and had no discernible features. It also obliterated the charm of the costume design. I found myself longing even for King Henselt’s unbelievably stupid belt because at least it had some character. And the weird and awesome creature design as well. None of it was on the show. Can you imagine that in a million years creatures like the three Crones from TW3 would show up on the show? Of course not, because a female character who won’t give the viewer a boner is obviously not worth showing.

And I don’t even understand how they managed to include Geralt being aware of his outsider status and thinking about it and to somehow make it boring anyway. But I’m really tired of writing and thinking about this now, so this is the end of my rant about like... half the things that annoyed me about the show.

[himeshhasan]

Leptitox Review

Leptitox reviews: How it helps you lose weight and is it worth it?

Losing weight is essential, and not just because you’d want to fit in those jeans. As much as we support losing weight for fashion or beauty choices, we also want you to consider losing weight as a part of weight management to manage your health and wellness.

There is no doubt that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes; however, obesity is a dangerous disease that can lead to serious health consequences later on. Being overweight puts you in jeopardy of health conditions and surges your chances of getting a heart attack at a young age. It is also the cause of high blood pressure, and in some cases, it can even cause cancer.

Being obese has its challenges. There is a reason why you feel tired all the time. Having unnecessary weight on your body is causing you to feel worn-out when you even walk for 5 minutes. Even the small act of picking up a pen from the floor makes you feel like you deserve a vacation for doing the deed. If you work for longer hours, the chances are that you go home way more tired and drained out than your co-workers, and the reason is none other than your obesity.

You don’t even need to lose a hundred pounds, just getting your weight fit according to your weight and height can improve your overall health and give you much more energy and vitality to enjoy the events of everyday life. Not only that, weight loss can enable you to witness an improved lifestyle and provide you with greater confidence, promote better sleep and help you be a part of vigorous social life.

I get it, you don’t have the patience to go to the gym every day, but want to lose weight. But none of this is possible if you don’t have the right products to aid in your journey of weight loss.

I have had the chance of trying out one of the most popular supplements that claim to help you reduce weight, really fast, known has Leptitox. Here’s my honest Leptitox reviews after trying it out personally.So without further ado, let’s dive in.

What exactly is Leptitox?

Leptitox is a dietary supplement that helps you lose weight by decreasing leptin resistance inside your body. It also converses the natural baseline of your body and resets the hypothalamus. As a result, your body can control the fat and cut through any unnecessary fat that is causing health problems. It works on your body to provide a herbal solution and create a strong barrier between preventable fat and your body.

It is an entirely herbal product that includes more than 22 nutrients to provide you with power and energy throughout the day. It delivers the right aid and making your weight loss journey more comfortable and pain-free. If you’re thinking of it as a magic pill, then be assured that it is not. It is merely a nutritional supplement that breaks your enzymes and provides the right nutrients for your body to start working correctly to drop extra weight and makes sure that your body mass is precisely according to your height.

Morgan Hurst the creator of Leptitox dietary supplement

Highly skilled doctors developed Leptitox under the supervision of Morgan Hurst. If you don’t know who Morgan Hurst is, trust me you’re missing out on a lot.

Morgan Hurst is as crazy about herbal medicine as I am about food. He works in the field of natural medicine and naturopathy. He believes that diseases can be easily fixed without putting harmful chemicals and drugs in the name of medicine inside your body. Morgan also assumes that your body is a temple, and only products that are provided to you by nature itself should be used to fix any problems or ailments that may arise.

Naturopathy has been gaining a lot of popularity in the world, and if you’re wondering if it is a real thing. Let me solve that dilemma for you.

Yes, it is a real thing, and people can even get certified as the doctor of naturopathy by taking a 4-year course program like any other doctorate. However, Morgan Hurst has received a degree in it. Yet he knows more than enough, thanks to his enthusiasm and his natural pursuits and many successful experiments.

It all started for him when his wife started gaining excessive weight. It was becoming more and more difficult for her to perform daily tasks without any external help. Naturally, it occurred to him to find a solution for this ailment as well. He started researching weight loss and realized that not all bodies could burn their fat by merely running on a treadmill. Some of them require external help from herbs and pills that would provide relief to the body without putting much exertion over it.

After all, you only get one body. You need to make sure that you treat it right.

He contacted industry experts and collaborated with them to develop a formula that has proved to be unstoppable against any stubborn fat that refuses to leave your body. With his method, he has left behind even the Keto, low carb and no sugar diets. As a result, more and more people are now inclined to try out this formula and benefit from it.

The result: Slimmer, more physically fit individuals who feel confident in their body and physique and feel like Leptitox has completely altered the course of their life for good.

Who is Leptitox Nutrition for?

Leptitox is for people who are looking to upgrade their health and lifestyle choices by making positive reinforcements in their life. It is for anyone who has a hanging belly and thick arms. Leptitox is for you and me.

It is for everyone over the ages of 18 who is not pregnant. Men and female, both can use this as long as they are using it in the right quantity and not overdosing on it. The best age to apply is 20 to 38 years old. After the age of 40, it takes some time for your enzymes to break down. However, even though the start of your weight loss journey will seem to be slow, you will be successful in losing weight and becoming slim like that person in the magazine.

 How does Leptitox help you lose weight?

 Your body has a natural system of digesting the food that is fed to it. Your stomach is the bank of all food that stores and provides you with a place to grind the food before it gets digested. Now, your stomach contains powerful acids and enzymes that aid in the process of breaking down food particles and sending the energy to all of your body’s required places such as eyes, ears, head, legs, hands, etc. But before the heat is transferred, food is transferred to the small intestine which then breaks down the food completely using the pancreas and bile.

Bile helps in digestion of fat and breaks it down while eliminating any waste materials. In some people, however, the process is a little different. Metabolism is slower, and the food is not broken down properly, which leads it to create fat in parts of the body. Instead of becoming waste, it becomes a part of the body and makes a home there.

Leptitox dietary supplement attacks all the fatty acids in your body and breaks them down to provide you with the energy that these food particles were supposed to give you. It merely detoxes your body of all the toxic, unhealthy food material that your body was unable to break down on time. It provides thorough internal body detoxification while gaining you the power to take more control over your body and dietary habits. As a result, you are burning any outsized fat deposits that have made a comfortable home inside your body and have accumulated there to make you obese and overweight.

Another way of saying it, your body can only lose weight when the fat is burned and broken down, after which it gets dissolved in the acids and is digested for good.

It gets that outcome when you run or perform cardio to improve your metabolism. However, what Leptitox does it that it provides the same effect, but without you having to run. It breaks down enzymes and burns down fat inside your body, slowly and steadily to make your body seem like you’re running when in actual you were just lucky enough to find a product that does it all for you.

Is Leptitox safe?

There is no doubt that excessive weight gain is extremely unhealthy. But is you think about it, diets are unhealthier. Your body requires proper nutrients and the right amount of carbohydrates, fibers, and fats to working correctly. Diets such as Keto, Atkin, raw food or no sugar plan disrupt the natural cycle of the body, which ends up backfiring when you leave the diet plan for a month or two.

For these diets to work correctly, you need to continue it for the rest of your life since your body becomes constant of the new food, and if you leave it, it gets disturbed.

Leptitox is a more sensible choice, considering that you are not cutting out on vital nutrients but choosing a healthier supplement that improves your metabolism without pushing your body to the extreme. It keeps a balance between all kinds of diets and normalizes the body mass index according to your age and height. The supplement will not unsettle your body’s mechanisms, instead of improving the process and help you lose weight without making you feel hungry all the time.

It includes the following ingredients:

Barberry

Barberry is a medicinal herb that has plentiful health benefits. It aids in discharging toxins from your body and cleanses the liver, gallbladder and improves your digestive system. It helps you improve your cholesterol level. Additionally, it also fights bacteria and viruses and provides the right energy and nutrients to you so that you don’t feel feeble and frail. Instead, you feel a sudden burst of energy.

Brassica

Brassica limits the calories by providing more energy but lesser fat. Thanks to brassica, you don’t feel hungry but your body has the right energy to function properly throughout the day without making you feel tired or drained out. It provides super-quick and easy weight loss.

Taraxacum Leaves

We have all heard about water weight and how it adds weight to the body that is impossible to remove without proper sweat through running and exercise. Taraxacum leaves are a solution to that problem since it increases urine output and motivates your body to excrete the unnecessary water weight through waste materials. It is a completely natural way to lose weight without having any side effects.

Chanca Piedra

For digestion to work properly, it is important that your body produces the right amount of bile. Chanca Piedra is a natural herb that stimulates the creation of bile inside your body so that your body produces the right acids and promotes the healthy functioning of organs that are responsible for improving metabolism.

Grape Seed

Grapeseed is a very important ingredient if you want to lose weight, simply because it postpones the absorption of your food. As a result, you feel less hungry and feel less food without going crazy. Your body simply uses previous food and as a result, it is melted down from the extra fat inside your body.

Jujube

Jujube is known for its anti-oxidant properties. It completely purifies the endocrine disrupter inside your body. It is very high in fiber, but low in calorie count to provide the right nutrients and boosts your immunity system.

Burdock root

Burdock root kills germs and eliminates harmful toxins from the body. it also burns down unnecessary fat, which is then wasted in the form of urine.

Apium Graveoleons Seed

Apium Graveoleons Seeds provide you with the right vitality and drive to control your appetite and improve your overall health. It even eliminates toxins that are built in your body from the artificial food that we consume, such as low-quality chips and carbonated drinks.

Pros and Cons

Before you dive in to purchase the product, you need to know if it is even the right option for you. I need you to carefully evaluate the pros and cons and then decide for yourself if spending money on it is the right choice for you. This Leptitox review is all about making sure that you make the right choice, so here are a few pros and cons that might make it easier for you to make your decision.

Pros

Leptitox helps reduce weight

We all require help sometimes, and there is no harm in admitting it. Leptitox provides you the aid that you require in losing weight and getting a slim body. It naturally balances Leptin levels.

The ingredients used are completely natural

All the ingredients used in the production of the Leptitox dietary supplement are 100% herbal and natural and can be consumed safely.

The price is extremely reasonable

The price for Leptitox is incredibly low, which gives everyone more motives to at least give it a try and see results for yourself.

There are no reverse effects

Once you get the desired shape and weight, you can quit using the supplement. Your weight will remain the way it is and won’t rebound.

Provides 60-day Money Back Guarantee

It comes with a 60-day money-back guarantee so you can be assured that your money is never wasted.

Cons

The only con that I’ve seen in this product is that it is not advisable for people under 18 years of age to use it. But if you think about it, you can immediately start using it as soon as you hit 18.

Conclusion

To sum it all up, Leptitox has worked for a lot of my friends in bringing down our weight on the scale and slimming us up in no time and me. It is an entirely herbal dietary supplement, so you can be assured that you are not disrupting your body’s natural process by adding harmful drugs to it or consuming any chemicals. Instead, you are providing help to your body in performing better by aiding indigestion.

It is an incredibly safe and healthy product, and the results are way quicker than any other supplement out there. It is pretty economical, and also offers a straight-up 60-day money-back guarantee if the product doesn’t deliver what it has promised. I’d strongly recommend this product to anyone who wants to lose weight in a healthy manner but in less amount of time.

The best part: you don’t even have to perform cardio while you’re at it. Leptitox takes care of everything.

[swiftie5891]

Taylor Swift is no Snake – only Karyn is

My response to “30 THINGS I LEARNED BEFORE TURNING 30”

At the beginning Taylor refers to social media and says that many people hide behind it to insult and hurt others emotionally. Although Taylor wants to use it as a connection to her fans, she has learned that she does “not need the validation of someone telling me that I look 🔥🔥🔥”. Here, Taylor addresses the exact danger and disadvantage of social media. Today’s generation is using it to get validation, while creating an image of a perfect life. They post pictures or videos of them partying, drinking, doing sports, eating healthy food. Especially make-up tutorials are very popular among teenagers. Thus, the dream job of them is not being a firefighter, a police officer or an astronaut any more, but being an “influencer”. When you don’t adjust to a beauty image, you are called names and are prone to insults. Also Taylor has learned that. In her article she writes, “you could unwittingly see someone telling you that you look like a weasel that got hit by a truck and stitched back together by a drunk taxidermist.” People who write comments like that either don’t realize that they seriously hurt someone by writing this or they want to hurt them intentionally and hide behind the internet’s anonymity.

The second lesson Taylor has learned is that a kind behavior is not always beneficial. When you are always kind, people might get used to this and take advantage of it by using you for their own goods, or they do not take you seriously when you clearly state your opinion. I’ve also learned that saying “No” does not mean that you are selfish, but that it is good for yourself to stand up for your opinion. Whether people accept your opinion shows your true relationship. Do it Taylor-style: “Be like a snake – only bite if someone steps on you”. Be kind to people who are kind to you, but if you feel used or oppressed, stand up for yourself, you deserve it.

Taylor’s third lesson is important for everyone who feels bad for failing. Just because you have failed does not mean that you are a “loser”. It also does not mean that you haven’t given your best. Like Taylor says, “it’s good to mess up and learn from it and take risks”. Having learned from your mistakes or failures can help build your character, and it makes you stronger. In my case, I´ve failed my driver’s license test the first time. Although I was really really sad at first, I suddenly realized that it was for my own good because I had to take five or so more lessons, which helped me gain more self-assurance. So, I’ve passed the second one. It has also helped me learn to accept my failures, to live in it and to come out stronger.

Everyone who hates his or her body should take a look at lesson four. DO NOT HATE YOUR BODY BECAUSE OF A CERTAIN IDEAL PORTRAYED IN ANY KIND OF MEDIA! Especially in times of social media, showing your skinny and/or trained body has become an influence on people, especially on young people. Being confronted with pictures of those “perfect” bodies every day can make you feel bad when you don’t adjust to that beauty ideal. Like Taylor says, “a lot of us push the boundaries of dieting”. We search for various diets Hollywood stars have used to get “in shape”. But when you look at the consequences of those hard-core diets that make you lose a lot of weight in a short time, you should recognize that you’re harming your body. In my opinion, you should do sports – but not to adjust to a certain ideal. You should do it to make and keep your body healthy. You should also not lose weight to become as skinny as possible. You should do it to relieve pressure off your joints and to stay mobile. You should always remember that you have ONE body and that you shouldn’t stress it with an excessive diet. I have lost 20 kg myself during my senior year at school to be able to wear a nice dress. But most of all I recognized that my knees started to hurt while walking and I was out of breath after taking the stairs. Those two factors encouraged me to do sports, and it has helped me so much. Additionally, it supported my learning process during the finals. I am glad that Taylor has shared her opinion on that to show especially young people that pushing “boundaries of dieting […] can be really dangerous” and that “there is no quick fix”.

As lesson number five Taylor names banishing drama from your life. It is nice to hear from her that she is also suggesting blocking poisonous people. When your life is so consumed by people who cause drama in your life, you do not get to focus on yourself. Especially when you’re feeling down yourself and other people decide to knock you down additionally, you have every right to block them. Like Taylor says, “be discerning” of those around you. Sometimes you’ve tried to solve the problems with those people but then it happens again and again. Here, you have to decide if the person is worth it or if a further contact is just hurting you. Sometimes you gotta let go of people, even if it feels weird or hurts at first. If the drama queens are taking swings or the jokers are dressing up as kings, just let go and say “here’s a toast to my real friends”!

I love that Taylor is addressing it in lesson six: women are allowed to age. She says that the pressure on women regarding “everlasting youth” is not fair because it “isn’t even remotely required of men”. When men get older, they are told that they look wiser and that aging makes them sexier. When women show visible signs of their age, they are told that they look old and should do something about it. When you look at the amount of anti-aging cremes for women available in beauty stores, you can see the apparent importance of that matter for women. Also when having a look at the many Hollywood stars and their faces, it seems that aging women in the entertainment industry do not exist. Sometimes those frozen Botox faces are really scary, especially when you see pictures of those women before they have (in my opinion) destroyed their faces. I do not say that women should not take care of themselves, but I think that at some point in our lives, we should accept that we get older and that our bodies will change. It is natural, and all of our scars and wrinkles stand for the things we have experienced in our lives. And this does not refer to plastic surgery after an accident or anything else which has disfeatured someone’s body and face. On the contrary, I think this should be supported by health care.

Lesson seven has seriously touched me. It is so sad that Taylor and other artists have to be scared of any kind of violence. Those two examples Taylor addresses have touched me personally because I love going to concerts. Especially the attack during Ariana’s concert shook me because so many young people were killed and got hurt at a place where they wanted to have a great time seeing their idol. I don’t get why people hurt other people like this. At the same time I start to understand why the safety arrangements at concerts have changed a lot. It is terrifying to read that Taylor only felt safe(er) on stage wearing QuikClot army grade bandage dressing and that she does not feel safe privately at all. I have the biggest respect for everyone involved in the planning of the tour and for the security people who had to do their best at keeping everyone safe. For this reason I try my best to get through the security check as fast as possible by looking what is allowed beforehand and by already opening my bag when the person in front of me is checked. I am also being nice by saying “hello”, “thank you” and “good-bye”. Taylor’s last sentence shows how we can deal with those threats best: “We have to live bravely in order to truly feel alive, and that means not being ruled by our greatest fears.”

Lesson number eight is very important for our self-esteem. It is a lesson I have also learned myself: “For an approval seeker like me, it was an important lesson for me to learn to have my OWN value system of what I actually want.” It is so important to have your own values and to stand up for them. When people say, “don’t listen to what others say”, I always answer, “that’s right, but I care what I think”. We do not have to follow everything other people say when we do not feel comfortable with it. Unfortunately, when you say this you are mostly called stubborn or not able to compromise. But I think in the end it is most important what we think of ourselves and that we can be proud of our decisions, although it might sometimes annoy others.

Lesson number nine: self-made cocktails. I should really try that because there’s nothing cooler than hosting your own birthday party for example and being able to offer some really nice cocktails.

Lesson number ten is really relatable. When you like to cook, you’ll always find some recipes which you love to cook and which taste delicious. I started to cook myself to be in better control of what I am eating and to reduce the amount of fat I am eating because too much fat causes a really bad feeling in my stomach since I’ve had to get my gallbladder removed in 2015 (1 week after Taylor’s 1989 show in Cologne). I am also using the garlic crusher because it helps to have little pieces of garlic in your meal without it being too strong. Moreover, I’ve just heard that garlic is a good way to make some meals more digestible. At this point, I’d recommend Taylor to release an own cook book with her favorite meals because those dishes sound amazing.

Number eleven is great. Command tape is so so good. I’ve also used it to put a hook for my jewelry on my wardrobe because I did not want to have a hole in it. It has not disappointed me because it has not fallen down yet (for about 10 years).

Number twelve is really important. Although it is sometimes hard to admit that you were wrong, apologizing is really important for a friendship / relationship. This can help the friendship / relationship to build trust, and it helps the ones affected get past this.

Unfortunately, lesson thirteen is a very current issue. This exactly is the problem: many victims of sexual assault do not come forward because they think that no-one will believe them. Moreover, like Taylor writes, going through the trial must be horrible because you have to talk about it and to live through it again. I am lucky that I have never been in this position. Maybe this is why I don’t understand why you could feel ashamed for it because like Taylor says, “It’s something no one would choose for themselves.” The ones that have done this should be ashamed for doing this to the victims, not the victims themselves. It is so important for the victims to speak up to hold the offender responsible for the things they have done, to start the process of putting it behind them (at least to regain some normality) and to prevent others from being assaulted by the same person. I hope in the future more victims will be believed to reduce those horrible deeds.

Lesson fourteen is something most people have to deal with. When a person close to you loses someone or has to go through any other kind of tragedy, you mostly do not know what to say. Mostly the only thing helpful for them is to let them know that you are here and to hug them. I think you know it is a real friendship when you are in a bad place and see if the other person is here for you or not. I have experienced this various times. Every time I thought I have finally found a best friend whom I can depend on in all situations, I have gotten disappointed. I have always been there for her when she had a bad fight with her boyfriend, and I have listened to her relationship problems and the problems she had at work. However, when I was in a really bad place because my grandparents have died within a short time and was totally looking forward to a movie night to get some distraction, she wrote me that exact day that she would rather go out with another friend to a bar. This was the time I stopped believing in that friendship. It is hard when you try your best to help your friends but mostly do not get it back. Now I’ve gotten to know some Swiftie friends whom I have never met personally, but feel really connected to and get really good advice or encouragement, which I love to return. I am so glad Taylor wrote about this in her article because I feel like the feeling of mutual support has declined nowadays.

I have learned lesson fifteen as well. Vitamins can make the way you feel so much better. Some years ago, I was feeling really sad all the time and I didn’t know why. My doctor one day told me to get my blood tested and it showed that I lacked Vitamin D and B12. So, I started to take supplements and a few weeks later I felt so much better. Taylor says something helpful here: Magnesium. For someone who loves going to the gym 5 to 6 days a week like me, magnesium is really helpful for the muscles, especially to avoid cramps due to overload. It seriously helps.

Lesson sixteen is important for everyone who trust people they haven’t know too long too soon. Taylor explains that “the layers of a person you discover in time” are “more valuable” than the ones you see when you first meet them. I have experienced that too. For example some years ago I got to know someone of whom I thought could be my best friend. We had so much in common and we had fun at the beginning. However, over the time I learned that she was only talking about herself, and when I needed her, she wasn’t there. Those are the moments when you realize that that friendship won’t work out. I have also experienced that a short time later. I was part of a dance team for about 20 years. Then one day we had a discussion about our costumes. Something that I didn’t feel comfortable was suggested, although it was well known that this was the only thing I would never wear. It was a long discussion and I said that I’d rather quit before wearing that because it would make me feel horrible and uncomfortable. In that situation no-ne really stood up for me and understood me. That was the moment when I saw that we were not a real team, because in a team no-one would be left behind and no-one should be forced to wear something that they don’t feel good with. That was the moment I knew that I would never feel happy there again and some month later actually quit. And I have to say it was for the best. I had so much fun the years before but with the time that (long) first impression has changed for the worse. That’s why I can really understand Taylor when she says that we shouldn’t trust everyone’s first impression they make on us.

I think lesson seventeen is learned by everyone someday. In our teens we do stuff to our body of what we later think, “why did I do that exactly?”. I think it is part of the process of discovering and growing up. I once cut my hair and especially my bangs. I looked like … I don’t want to say what. Over the time I have learned how to treat my body well. I also use moisturizer and body lotion, although I have to treat my face differently due to acne-prone skin. I use special cream for it some days, I use peeling about three days a week, and once a week I treat myself with a face mask with activated carbon and hyaluronan to reduce my pimple scars. Remember, you have only one body. So, treat it with kindness.

In lesson eighteen Taylor addresses the importance of dealing with your childhood “scars”. She explains that our childhood scars can haunt us into our adult lives. I think it is important that someone like Taylor is opening up about not being popular as kid because we can relate to her and learn that we can rectify it. Besides being not popular as a kid, like Taylor, I have also been made fun of because of my weight. Although I have lost 20 kg already, it is still a factor that makes me feel insecure sometimes. I have learned to live with it and I want to lose some more weight to improve my health and lower the risk of getting diabetes or something else. Moreover, I think many shops have awesome clothing for girls with some more weight and we are able to dress nicely and according to our body. Everyone can dress like they want to, especially nowadays, but it is most important for me to feel comfortable, even with some more weight than the average person. I am glad that today I can say that I have found some amazing friends who don’t care about my weight and are also very protective when I’m made fun … although today I seriously ignore that because I know what I have achieved and what I am able to do. I am probably more flexible and can do more sit-ups than an average-weight person. And I am proud that I can do the splits like Taylor in the Delicate music video … although I haven’t tried it on a car yet.

Lesson nineteen is really relating. It is so important to tell your friends how you feel. And you have to be honest. A real friend should be interested in how you feel. If you can’t share this with your friends, then with whom can you (except your family of course)? It is always good to know that you have friends who care about your feelings and try to understand. Also when you have problems with someone, it is best to address them instead of only thinking about it. Communication is everything, both in a relationship and in a friendship.

Lesson twenty is something we all learn in our twenties: “the difference between lifelong friendships and situationships”. When you’re new somewhere, like a job for example, you try to find mutuals of whom you soon think as your friends. I am a person who is searching for mutuals very quickly because I hate being alone. Although you might get along with many people quickly, it doesn’t mean that you’ll be BFFs. I think a friendship can develop when you spend some time outside of your “situation” and get to know each other more closely. In that case you can learn that you’re perfect in your “situationship” but not in a friendship. I am glad that I am friends with people who I know for more than twenty years (I’m 27, by the way) and who I see at least twice a year because we don’t live that close to each other anymore. And I am glad that I have also friends who I have met later but write with consistently.

Lesson twenty-one: fashion = experimentation. I can only say: so true. When I look back at pictures from my primary-school years, I think, what did I wear? Then I’m like, I was a kid … and it was the 90s. That’s ok. Later I had a time when I loved wearing black leather bracelets with rivets, my hair couldn’t be dark enough and I had a skull and crossbones phase thanks to Pirates of the Caribbean. I think it takes some time, a long time, to find a style that we feel comfortable in and that fits us. I still like to try new things. For example, I’ve changed my hair from a dark blonde to red. And I love it. I actually feel more confident with it. By the way, Bleachella is nothing to be ashamed of, Taylor. Although I prefer your fair hair like it is now, I also loved the brightness.

In lesson number twenty-two Taylor addresses fighting fairly. In a relationship or friendship a fight should not be about who is winning. Like she says, the best thing in a fight is communication and trying to talk about it calmly. Communication should also be used to prevent a big fight. When you have a problem with something or someone, talk about it. It is so true what Taylor says at the end: “They don’t give out awards for winning the most fights in your relationship. They just give out divorce papers.”

Number twenty-three: WE WILL ALWAYS HAVE YOUR BACK, TAYLOR!

Number twenty-four: I am glad that I haven’t had to deal with illnesses like this yet. When I read this it always makes me thankful that my parents are healthy. I can only imagine how helpless you must feel. I totally get that you learn to prioritize other things and that you feel like other worries feel so much less important.

In lesson twenty-five Taylor clarifies that artists don't have to feel miserable in order to produce great art. I think that the artists’ experiences influence their art regarding the atmosphere of the song, painting or so on. When I was feeling bad and had to write an essay for college, I was not able to produce something good. I know it is not comparable to writing a song, but I think our feelings influence our productivity. However, creative writing or painting can be used as a way to come to terms with negative experiences. But the thing that is produced during that process does not have to be the artist's best work. I am so happy that you, Taylor, have left the negative experiences behind you and are doing better than you ever were.

In number twenty-six Taylor says that she likes to make countdowns for certain events. I love countdown apps too. I have a countdown for my birthday, Christmas and New Year’s Eve and for concerts. I also have a count … back for the Reputation album. Look What You Made Me Do, Taylor! It is good to know that things you’re excited about are in your future when you’re feeling down or stuck. I hope I can soon add the release of TS7 and hopefully a concert to my countdown app site on my phone.

In lesson twenty-seven Taylor explains how to deal with bullies and how to disarm them. Especially in a time of social media, where bullying anonymously is so easy, especially celebrities have to deal with any kind of “opinion” about themselves. Taylor’s handling of the hate campaign against her is awesome because she has used the word she’s been called and turned it into a symbol for her sixth studio album “Reputation”. She has exchanged the negative association with a snake (being devious) with a positive one. Now Swifties associate the symbol with the phrase, “Be like a snake - only bite if someone steps on you.” The best way to deal with bullies is either to ignore them and don’t give them what they want: attention. Or you do it like Taylor. You use the word you’ve been called for yourself and turn it into … Karyn. She has become the icon of the tour, and her shiny eyes and the way she rose behind Taylor during Look What You Made Me Do will never be forgotten. I’ve been bullied because of my weight in school myself. It hurts a lot because you don’t know how to deal with that at a young age. But as I grew older I learned that although they were bullying me I got better grades than them and graduated from high school and even got a university diploma a few weeks ago, while they left school after the 9th grade. There are so many things which are more important than what people have to say about you. Today I know that, like Taylor says, you learn how to deal with people like that and grow stronger. It’s the best revenge you could get because all they’ll ever gonna be is mean.

In number twenty-eight Taylor talks about her connection to politics. Although many people say that celebrities should just do their job and act or sing, I think it is important for people like Taylor to speak up politically and to encourage young people to educate themselves about and engage with politics as well. I still can’t understand how people with reactionary concepts can be voted to be in such high positions. I hope that here will be more celebrities who use their influence on their fans to put the right people in high positions, or at least to animate more people to use their voice and vote. Sometimes the reason why the “wrong” people win is because of those who do not vote because they think that nothing will change anyways and that one vote does not matter. But when many people think like this, there are more and more lost votes which might cause a different outcome.

Lesson twenty-nine: the hair changes its texture. I always wondered why the texture of Taylor’s hair is so much different now. The curls were so sweet and totally fitted country-Taylor. I think her hair has changed with the eras and adjusted to the “New Taylor”. Maybe the new era will also welcome her curly hair back. But we love you no matter what your hair looks like, Taylor.

Finally, lesson thirty. When Taylor has done something wrong, she has punished herself. On the one side it is good if a child recognizes when he or she has done something wrong, but on the other side it can cause a hard life when you will always question your decisions to an extent that is not good. Of course it is good to consider the outcome, but when you have actually failed and made the wrong decision punishing yourself for the decision you have made is not healthy. Like I’ve learned watching The Bold Type, living in your failure is good and important to learn from it and to build your character. You can’t change the past anyways. It is good to deal with your decision and your failure but it is also important to Shake It Off afterwards.

   @taylorswift @taylornation @elle

[colorisbyshe]

Do Not R*bl*g This. This is the one post you should not r*bl*g. You can reply or message me about it but Do Not R*bl*g.

It’s really hard to talk about being a fat person and knowing that I’ll likely always be at least someone fat and still getting excited, without even meaning to, about losing weight. Like, I am a confident fat person. I don’t subscribe to the idea that weight = health or weight/health = value as a human being. But I’ve still been so trained into viewing weight loss as “progress” that when I see I’m losing weight because of my new gallbladder diet... I get happy. I start doing the math to figure out when I can hit some arbitrary goal weight.

It’s... weird to contend with.

We talk a lot about women have to deal with the idea of knowing that their worth shouldn’t come from their looks but many of us still want to look pretty. But it gets so much more convoluted when you are fat AND a woman (or in my case woman-aligned but whatever).

And in my case it does get complicated because in my specific case my health IS tied to my weight (losing weight, gradually actually helps gallbladder health(.

And idk I feel like I’m betraying the cause by being happy I’m inadvertently losing weight (because it’s not intentional, I’m just changing my diet for my gallbladder). Like, I’m not intending to get excited about it but when my fucking foodtracking app says “You’ll lose 10 pounds by [x] date,” the happiness is there. I’ll still be fat--even very fat--at 10 pounds lighter but my self worth really still is tightly attached to the idea that less fat = better human being, even though I know rationally that is not true and I don’t think that while thinking about other fat people.

Like I’ve never looked at a fat person and thought, “I would like you more if you were skinnier” but I still look at myself and think that all the time.

Internalized fatphobia really is a beast of its own because weight is so fucking complicated, especially when sometimes being fat actually isn’t good for you but then sometimes it’s absolutely fine. In my case, being fat made me sick and it sucks and it’s complicated and I’m annoyed. Like, no, I’m not gonna stay my current weight because of my ideology or whatever but I do wish I could just like... casually be like, “Oh, I guess I’m probably gonna lose weight if I keep eating like this” instead of getting so goddamn gleeful over it. It feels shitty.

[hellyeahsickaf]

Update on my condition and experiences with fibro/CFS

A lot has happened in the last few years but I just sorta want to put my story out there and talk about my treatment and experiences since I finally have the energy to think and type things out some days. Even if it just helps or resonates with one person or makes someone feel less alone In 2019 a traumatic event happened that made my ME/CFS and fibromyalgia symptoms take a turn for the worse. That's when I stopped being able to walk my dog so much, but on a good day I could still go down the street and pick up groceries, sometimes even cook an easy meal on the same day. I wasn't as aware of how important it was to limit myself so I gradually had more worse days but I could still do light chores etc For years in various stages of my conditions I always thought "god I hope I never get so bad I long for days like this" but my greatest fear would be realized as I got worse In late 2021 I developed symptoms of gallstones and with every episode my body wore down more. Each time it happened I'd feel a wave of extreme fatigue and would never completely come out of it. I lost around 20 pounds in the course of a few months. Of course I had my gallbladder removed but the surgery itself took its toll. I got worse, way worse than I thought I could be. On a good day I could walk down the street to Starbucks or something but those days became rare. One thing that really comforted me was watering my plants though I learned the hard way that the worse I got the more susceptible my energy baseline was to change. When I got vaccinated and infection numbers were getting better (and I tested negative for covid), I just really wanted to go to the arcade. I thought I could just push through it this one time. It wouldn't kill me after all. I would normally give myself time before and after going somewhere for rest if I knew it would likely cause a crash. I've always dealt with it that way if I knew I'd be pushing past my energy threshold Before the increase in severity (post gallbladder surgery), this wouldn't have done much more than cause a crash for a few days where I'd just rest and return to my baseline. Except the next few days I could hardly get out of bed, even holding my head up was hard. I wouldn't be sleepy but sometimes I hardly had the energy to keep my eyes open so I'd just shut them and be. I could hardly think and I mostly was stuck alone with foggy thoughts. My plants died Except it wasn't just a crash. I was hardly better and from then on I would find myself debating whether I wanted to use the bit of energy I had to go make a TV dinner or take a shower. If I went days without a shower I'd do that and dinner would be a breakfast bar or something. Eating was hard. I ran out of breath if I talked too much and sometimes I was manually breathing because of how little energy I had. If only I hadn't gone to that god damn arcade you know?

Between December 2020 and August 2021 I went from being able to have short nerf battles with my kid sibling, cooking easy/moderate meals when I had the energy, and going to my favorite crystal shop to being stuck in the house aside from rare occasions. I wasn't strong enough to do this for long and I was starting to plan out how I'd end my suffering before I physically couldn't Being treated by Dr. John Chia for my ME/CFS was pretty life changing and the reason I'm alive if I'm honest. I still have work to do in getting better but he's helped a lot and given me some hope for at least improving my condition. He's cured his son, and helped/cured many others. He's an infectious disease specialist but most doctors who treat it don't look at it from the perspective of infectious diseases. I think more should

Also worth noting, he wasn't shocked that the gallstones took such a toll. He's had patients whose conditions worsened drastically because their body couldn't handle the stress of so much as having a tooth pulled He prescribed me the antiviral Tamiflu. If you have a bad flu you could expect a 5 day supply or something. Strong stuff, only comes in packs of 10. But I just take that indefinitely now. I made some progress in recovery even if for much of the day I'm still resting. Plants are still dead but I can hold my head up and talk to my friends again. I can play video games and my hands aren't killing me after 5 minutes Before that he'd prescribed Lamivudine and was surprised it didn't work since with the strain of enterovirus I have, it usually helps to some extent He also had me start microdosing abilify which surprisingly has been shown to help symptoms, especially brain fog. That was my most recent addition to my treatment but that didn't do much either- just made me a little chunky again despite my dose being extremely tiny lol. It sucks because he seemed confident that it would help- helps most people but my case is a stubborn one I keep having anxiety that when these things don't work he'll give up on treating me because that's what I'm used to but he's been doing this for so long that he doesn't just give up and turn you away. It feels kinda wild tbh. For the first time I have a physician that makes me feel heard and knows what they're doing

So yeah. More recently some stress has caused a small decline but I'm not at the level I was last July/August. Back then I probably couldn't have even articulated these thoughts. I'm trying to stay optimistic but it's not always easy yknow? I can only hope that I'll get there

[austinpanda]

Gallbladder Surgery, with Firefly

5:00 a.m. - Wake up, make coffee, then realize, “Shit, I can’t have anything to eat or drink.” And Zach won’t have any coffee, because he’s both empathetic, and nervous on my behalf, so a whole pot of coffee went to waste. I hate that.

6:05 a.m. - Stacy shows up! She’s going to do the driving. She has brought with her a gift for me, a plush gallbladder holding a handful of pretty stones it created. Basically my sister is the shit.

6:15 a.m. - Stacy, Zach and I head for Seton Southwest Hospital on FM 1826. That “FM” stands for “farm to market” which makes it sound like my hospital is in the middle of a cow pasture, but this is not so. It’s actually a pretty busy part of southwest Austin. They said there’d be plenty of parking, and they were right! Since it’s not yet 7:00 a.m. when we get there, we pretty much have the whole place to ourselves. And it’s not an emergency room, so the reception area has no one in it when we show up.

6:50 a.m. - The receptionist (who is almost certainly not called that, maybe she’s a nurse?) is curly-haired and ebullient, a bit too much for this early in the day, but it beats grumpy and curt, I suppose. She cheerfully takes my driver’s license, my insurance card and $1607.22. She prints about a hundred stickers with my name and barcodes on them. She isn’t shy about showing us the spiral notebook where she keeps all her passwords written down. Again, though, polite and cheerful!

7:00 a.m. - We take the elevator to the second floor and head for the Day Surgery area. We’re shown to a little three-sided cubbyhole room with the hospital bed, a couple of chairs, a TV and a crucifix on the wall, and stuff starts happening.

[At this point, I begin to lose track of what time things happened, so I’m giving up on that format. I blame the drugs they gave me. The sweet, sweet, wonderful drugs.]

Over the next 90 minutes, I’m seen by numerous people, completing many, many tasks. They put an IV in my left arm. Blood pressure cuff on my right arm, which is never removed until just before I’m discharged. I’m given socks. They have a name: Pillow Paws, and they’ve thoughtfully provided me the XXL-sized ones.

They got me a gown and said to get completely naked and put the gown on. “It ties in the back, so your hiney is going to be sticking out.” “Great.” Once I had it on, Zach advised it was inside out, so I did it again. Put the special socks on. Gave Zach my glasses, my watch, and my wedding ring. Everyone wanted to make sure I was comfortable and not too cold. Everyone was so kind!

They put this stuff that looked like green food coloring in my IV. It’s a dye called, no shit, Firefly. It’s something they can use to illuminate something inside me, for the purpose of making something they’re doing inside me easier to see.

They make a point of asking me the same questions repeatedly. What’s our date of birth? What’s your height? Who’s your surgeon today? And what procedure are we having done? I take great (and undoubtedly insufficiently concealed) pride in whipping out my special English Major Superpowers to give them the exact name of my procedure: Laparoscopic cholecystectomy, with robots and Firefly. (My English Major Superpower is that I took the time to look up the term and teach myself how to say it, because not knowing what my own surgery is officially called would bug the shit out of me.) They laugh. They say, “It not a bunch of robots or anything, just the one robot.”

I notice the same thing I noticed in the Emergency Room at St. David’s: Almost every woman there has a trim waist and a HUGE diamond wedding ring.

At one point, one of the women came into the room to give us The Talk About Pain. She went to great lengths to point out that, not gonna lie, it’s gonna hurt. You’re gonna have, you know, a big incision in your belly button, and that’s right at your core, so everything you do, every move you make, every breath you take, every leaf you rake, etc. is going to hurt a bit. I’m just saying, gotta be honest with you about this, we can do a lot to make the pain tolerable, but we can’t make it go away completely, so...yeah, there’s gonna be some pain. You’ll notice it especially when you sit down or stand up, or cough, or try to lift something, so don’t. The idea with the pain medications is to keep the pain from getting up to 8 by keeping it down at about a 3 or 4 proactively. She said: you’ll take your pain meds every six hours. Do not skip a dose because it’s in the middle of the night. You don’t want to wake up with the pain at an 8. Set an alarm and take the overnight dose, without fail.

The TV in the room just happened to be showing a movie I loved as a child, and hadn’t seen in decades: Halloween II. I used to watch this over and over when we first got cable TV as an adolescent. This movie was my introduction to the song, “Mr. Sandman,” which was its end theme. It honestly felt a little bit magical to be seeing Halloween II while waiting for my surgery. This may sound banal, but it gave me hope, when I hadn’t realized I needed some. Movies do that kind of thing to me.

More questions. Date of birth. Surgeon’s name. What’s the procedure? Laparoscopic cholecystectomy with one damn robot and Firefly juice. Am I a little bit loopy? Must be the Versed they gave me. Not sure why they give me this. The stated purpose is to relax me, but the unstated purpose seems to be that it gives you amnesia, so you don’t remember anything that happens next. Oh well. I was relaxed, and I don’t remember shit, so I guess it worked, and I guess I’m okay with it.

The surgeon came. He said, “Hey, how’s it going, just doing some paperwork here, we’ll get started soon, everything looks good, any questions, kay I’m outta here, see you the operating room, can someone get me a Campari and soda?” (I made up that last thing.) Then the anesthesiologist came, and while Stacy observed that he had a really rich, deep voice, I don’t remember that at all. All I remember was having to ask, “So...if I’m something of a professional-grade pot head, you know, is that going to interfere with--” He was already smiling and shaking his head before I finished the question. Normally I don’t like my questions being dismissed so glibly, but this was, in fact, the answer that I was hoping for. “No, it’s not going to cause any problems. You won’t wake up during the procedure.” Maybe I woke up lots of times, and the Versed made me forget them! Didn’t think of that, didja, tough guy?

Finally, it was time. As they wheeled me out, Zach (the guy I married) had them stop so he could give me a kiss. He said later that it felt weird, us being two big gay homosexuals, kissing in front of everybody, but it felt great that he did it. A couple of women took me to the operating room. I asked, “The boil-water restrictions just lifted yesterday...how did everybody scrub in for surgeries when that was happening?” I have no recollection of her answer at all.

In the emergency room, the first thought that hit me was, “Money, money, money. All the money. I’m surrounded by millions and millions of dollars worth of medical equipment.” Being lower middle class makes you conscious of when you’re sitting next to something that’s worth more money than you’ll make in your whole lifetime. Where does this happen? Museums and hospitals.

I scooted off my bed onto the surgery table while they laid me flat and started getting me ready. I assumed the (and this is the name of a Soundgarden song) Jesus Christ pose, with my arms outstretched, like I was being horizontally crucified. I looked right, saw my arm had a strap holding it to the arm rest, then looked left and saw the same thing.

They asked, “How we doin?” And I said, “I’m good! Except now that I know my arms are tied down, my nose itches.” So, and this is why I love nurses, they scratched my nose. I repaid them with happy sounds and a hearty, “THAAANK you!”

Then they put the breathing mask on. I didn’t sense that anything was coming out of it, and I didn’t get the result I’d anticipated, which was, “Count down from one hundred.” “Okay, ninety-zzzzzzzzzz.” What they said was, “Now take deep breaths, deep as you can...deep as you can. The last patient was able to take breaths about twice as deep.” And I thought, seriously? You’re going for my nuts at a time like this? And the other woman said, “Well, the last one was a meditation expert.” Fine. Whatever, dude. BIG DEEP BREATHS while I waited for the lights to go out. It wasn’t instantaneous, until it was. I took a deep breath, and woke up an hour or so later in the recovery room with a woman puttering around me.

Her name was Kathleen, and that’s about all I remember of her. I’m sure she told me things and I responded, but I don’t recall what was said. I wasn’t in pain, but I could feel that a few things weren’t like they were before. (Later I realized it was the stab wound in my belly button and the sore throat. More about that in a bit.) I remember being more comfortable than I’d ever been in a bed in my whole life. I knew my feet were sticking out the bottom of the bed, because I’m tall, and that felt great, too! I felt half weird, half great. Anesthesia is just the best.

The fog lifted, gradually. Kathleen puttered, made notes, talked to me, people walked by. Before long, Kathleen said I was recovering nicely and wheeled me back into the pre-op room, where Stacy and Zach were waiting. Apparently I was more alert and lucid than they anticipated. I attribute this to my life-long ah...efforts to appear alert and lucid while fucked up. They were paying off now, dangit! I was not hurting. I was pleased that it was over, because I knew it must have been boring for them to wait.

Over about another hour, they did all the things they do after the surgery. How are you feeling? You sound good. Want some water? (Ohmygod, yes. I’d been fasting since the previous midnight.) The surgery went well! You’re really recovering quickly! I seemed to be their ideal patient, and it was sweet of them to say so. It’s not that I was pleasant and funny, although they did really like the gallbladder plush, which I took with me. It’s that they liked how smoothly everything had gone, and how quickly and chipperly I seemed to be recovering.

The surgeon spoke with Stacy and Zach after the surgery, and gave them some pictures taken by the surgery robot. Apparently, my gallbladder did NOT look good. He could tell it had needed to come out for some time. He showed them pictures, and sent some on his phone to Zach, and then got Stacy’s number and texted her the pictures too, and showed them some of the pics he’d taken on his phone, just like he’d shown me in our first consultation visit. This guy really likes showing you pictures of gallbladders on his cell phone. I hope he’s not taking his dirty-ass cell phone into the operating room.

I marvel that my stomach has been shaved, and I’ve been covered with iodine, which has been cleaned off, leaving an orange stain. My hairless, orange tummy reminds everyone of the president.

Time to leave! IV out, bandaid on, blood pressure cuff off, backless gown off, clothes back on, and yep, just like the movies, they don’t let you walk out. They wheelchair your ass out. I could tell it was time when they said, “Who’s driving? Okay, you’re probably going to want to go now and get the car and pull it up front,” which Stacy did. I thanked the nice lady who wheeled me out for everyone’s hard work and kindness.

On the way home, Stacy said, “Want to get your pain pills from the pharmacy?” And I said, “Sure!” Then I did a body check: I was beginning to feel the stab wound in my belly button. I was really beginning to feel the sore throat, and it was getting unpleasant. So, despite my desire to make this easier for Stacy, since she was working so hard to make things easy for me, I said fuggit, “Um, can I go home instead?” After getting home, Stacy and Zach went to the pharmacy to pick up my Hydrocodones The charge for the 30 pills was just over a dollar. Sometimes insurance is so sweet, I could kiss it! Other times, like those $1607.22 times, not so much.

Now it’s Tuesday and the surgery is more than 24 hours in the past. My belly button hurts like a sonofabitch, but the hydrocodones and the ice pack are keeping it manageable. They make it so that it doesn’t actively hurt when I’m just sitting here; it only hurts when I stand up or sit down or cough.

Next pain pill in 42 minutes. Cautious optimism! :)

[uncloseted]

what do you think about pressure on people being pretty and skinny? i am a little chubby and i used to have problems with this but i actually think i look really nice and i learned to accept myself and love myself too, and i hate that most girls like me dont feel the right to feel pretty or wearing a bikini or crop tops or whatever. but i have friends who are even more out of the convencional beauty type than me, and they are bigger than me, and one of them told me that you can be fat and+

Anonymous said:                                                 

+love yourself and accept yourself, but the world around you will still be made for thin people, and that means that maybe they wont get a job because they are fat (this may sound over but it REALLY happens, it used to happen with my mother before she loses weight) and they cant find pretty clothes that fit them (only plain clothes of plus size fashion, which dont include lots of options), and they maybe dont fit in their sit on the bus, etc. and what is worst is that people say to them they+             

Anonymous said:                                                 

+need to lose weight because ''they are not healthy'' but i mean people dont bother my fat friends who smokes about the cigarettes, but they bother them about losing weight because they are bothered to look at fat people. and only because someone is fat it doesnt mean they are not healthy. im chubby myself and i eat lots of fruits, vegetables, etc, and my medical exams are great, really, and i know thin people who feeds on soda and nuggets and just stay thin because of genetics. its unfair.     

 Anonymous said:                                                 

(huge text about being fat anon here) and i also hate that people want everyone to be pretty. i personally try and almost everytime can see and appreciate the different types of beauty on people, but supposing that there is one person who really is, in fact, ugly. SO WHAT?? people are not here to please your aesthetic standards!! people have plans, dreams, their life, you know?? even IF they are not the best looking, they can still be interesting, intelligent, nice,funny. it makes me mad af.                  

I wrote out a huge response to this and it got deleted (shakes fist at Tumblr), but hopefully I can remember what I wanted to say a second time.  This is a topic that has a lot of dimensions and is hard to talk about because it is so complicated and so persona to so many people.  I think you’re right that people shouldn’t feel obligated to conform to a beauty standard and that everyone should be able to appreciate and enjoy the way that they look.  And I think you’re also right that some people aren’t beautiful, and that’s okay.  There are other traits that those people have that other people love about them, and those are just as important, if not more, than being physically appealing.  By trying to push this idea that “everyone is beautiful”, I think we’re sort of discrediting all of the other things that might be important and interesting and lovable about a person.  That said, I think you also speak to a reality of the situation- beauty is prized and seen as something that’s important, and it will take systemic change for us to get beyond that.  And that change should and does need to happen.  It’s not fair for a person who’s heavier or less attractive to earn less money in their lifetime than someone who’s thin or pretty, and yet that discrimination is a reality right now.

I think it becomes complicated, though, because being overweight or obese is a real health concern, and at least in the US, it’s a public health issue.  Excess body fat isn’t (uniquely or necessarily) a symptom of unhealthy behaviors, as you mention.  A person can eat fruits and vegetables and be overweight, and another person who has a less healthy diet can be thinner (but it’s not really about genetics- more about environment and upbringing). 

But excess body fat is unhealthy in itself.  So even if a person has other healthy habits, such as healthy diet and exercise, the excess body fat itself puts them at an increased risk for heart disease, hypertension, stroke, diabetes, gallbladder disease, osteoarthritis, arthritis, osteoporosis, sleep apnea, respiratory problems, and certain cancers, among (lots of) other health problems, especially if the person is overweight or obese for an extended period of time.  It’s also worth noting that obesity is one of the leading preventable causes of death worldwide.  (Also, on a side note, I don’t know where you live, but in the US smokers are publicly shamed much more frequently than people who are overweight or obese, which has actually led to a decrease in smokers overall.)

I wish I had a more conclusive note to leave this on, but I think it’s a topic that should be a discussion, so I’m interested in hearing what you all think as well.

[kattakk]

Day 1,239,692 of the pandemic. We're fine y'all, everything's fine, the crew's fine, it's all fine. Really. I think? We virtual school still currently, and I'm still very happy with that. Middle does very well, and it's a lot of work, but its worth it. I'm rewatching Bones again for the 3rd time, maybe 4th? Not kid friendly, so the remote is always next to me, ready to switch to some baking show. The little crew like to watch baking shows together, and over the years we've eaten through Cake Wars, Cupcake Wars, Nailed It, Holiday Baking shows, etc. Currently we are watching Worst Cooks in America and Master Chef Junior. Those young people on the show are A-freaking-mazing. Then littlest pipes up that I would win if I cooked my pretzels and mac n cheese. Oh sweet summer child, these people are cooking filet mignon, whole fish, and these sides of delicate artistry. I make a nice hot pretzel is all. I do like learning cooking tips though. I make a decent seasoned burger now thanks to Gordon Ramsay on Hot Ones. I just wish my hips would allow me to stand longer with no pain.

Speaking of me and pain, my gallbladder was removed a couple weeks ago. Boy, I don't miss that mother y'all. I had no idea that tiny angry ninja of an organ could cause so much hell. Eating had been painful since October. I could handle rice, oatmeal, broth, salmon at times, and grilled turkey. Man it got boring. First trip to doc, I was given gas pills, fiber, stool softener and probiotic. No change after a month, so I was sent to gastro who ran a HIDA, endo and colonoscopy. Everyone was sure it was diverticulitis. Turns out my gallbladder was majorly inflamed. Bye Felicia! I can eat fruits and veggies again, because when you're an adult, these things are exciting.

[eternally11yours]

Basically my entire life story....

It took me like an hour to write this and forever to hit the send button.. I sent this to someone I really cared about that I pushed away.... he replied with a thumbs up..... either I really hurt him or even guys 14 years older than me aren’t capable of being mature enough to give an actual response to a heartfelt message:

Those things I wrote. They weren’t about anyone in particular, they were about what I want not what I have. I’m a dreamer... writing is what I do to vent and dream and wish.

I didn’t mean to push you away like I did... nobody has ever fought to keep me and I’m really good at unintentionally pushing people away. I’ve only ever truly loved one person in full and I even pushed them away.

I really did like you... a lot... and I always fuck everything up. I always mess up good things. I tend to self sabotage, because I have low self worth and don’t feel like I deserve to be happy. I hate myself a lot actually. I try to be the person others want me to be instead of being myself. Things have happened in my life that have made me this way... and I haven’t told many people but I’m going to tell you all of it:

My anxiety started when I was around 3... maybe younger. My depression started at 5 when my dad got arrested with a loaded gun on him and was planning suicide. He was hospitalized for 3 weeks because of it. He was always short and irritable with me and my sisters and I was a daddy’s girl so it hurt me a lot. I’ve always been bullied by other kids for being awkward and shy... and at 12 I started cutting myself and s struggle with the addiction of self harm.

At 15 I developed bulimia and started abusing prescription codeine cough syrup. At 16 I overdosed on it... nobody knew because they were used to me spending so much time alone in my room. I would cut myself all over my body every day and nobody even found out til I was 16.

At 14 I started what would be 8 years of an on and off relationship with a guy from Oregon... my mom had to scrape my crying ass up off the high school lawn when I was 16 because of him. I started dating a guy from Winnipeg, Ontario (Que) at 17 who was 21 and lost my virginity to him at 18 on my birthday. 6 months later over Christmas break he raped me...

...that was the main thing that has made it so hard for me to open up to people. I’m scared of getting hurt again....

At 18 I also met up with a guy twice who was 14 years older than me and slept with him out of sheer loneliness.

After high school I couldn’t afford to go to the college I got accepted to so I went to mcc to be a preschool teacher failed out and later went back for forensic anthropology... failed out again.

At 19 I overdosed again... passed out for 16 hours and woke up to the cops and my parents at my bedroom door. That was the first time I was hospitalized.

After that I started dating the only guy I ever loved completely... and in 2014 I broke up with him cause the guy from Oregon asked me to come back to him and I was really depressed and idk what I was thinking but I fucked up and that same day broke up with josh (also from canada) and the guy from oregon(Kurt) came to visit in the fall of 2014... we slept together... and I got pregnant but had a miscarriage when I was 3 months along. ...

In the spring of 2015 I got my phlebotomy certificate, and in October of 2015 I moved to Portland Oregon only to find out Kurt talked me into selling everything I owned and moving 1500 miles just to tell me when I got there he just wanted to be friends with benefits.

I went along with it despite being hurt about it and angry... but a week after I got there I made my first of 3 suicide attempts while there. I went on a whisky and Xanax binge and had to have my stomach pumped. The third time they finally hospitalized me and I agreed to go home to Iowa. I was on Oregon for seven weeks but it felt like a lifetime.

Spring of 2016 I had chest surgery due to calcified lymph nodes in my chest and an abscess that needed drained by my lung. I thought I was going to die from all of that honestly.

In the summer of 2016 I met Brent and dated the immature 19 year old for a while but it didn’t work out because we were too different.

In fall of 2016 I went to job corps, left on medical leave in spring of 2017 for my gallbladder and a 9mm kidney stone and never went back.

I have been hospitalized for my depression and anxiety 11 times now, have self harmed and attempted suicide more times than I can count. And I don’t cope well with my emotions. I’m a mess and push people away because I am scared they will find me as worthless as I find myself.

I also lied about not watching porn... I go months without watching any and then get into binges of it which is ridiculous. And I’m into some weird stuff that I don’t think anyone would accept, so I don’t really talk about it. I also left out something that happened at 19 that I consider to be my deepest darkest secret and it makes me a freak and a horrible person.

In short ... I was almost to the point of falling for you and was terrified of it ... I don’t open up to people easily, and I know I’m blowing your phone up and you don’t even want to hear any of this. But this is my way of opening up and apologizing :( I’m sorry.