#me @ the American healthcare system: *STABS YOU STABS YOU STABS YOU*

[theharlotofferelden]

I fuckin hate how health services are connected to apps.

I’ve been procrastinating on finding a certain kind of specialist and didn’t realize that part of the reason for doing so had to do with not having an account for a certain app.

So every time I try to look up the specialist it’ll open up the app and not have the proper login info because it’s 9pm and I’m too lazy to find my health insurance card.

I’m just wondering: why the simple fuck can I not just find the specialist that is covered under my insurance without having all this bullshit in the way? There is literally no reason for this beyond the American Healthcare System being designed to be this fucking annoying.

If the American Healthcare System was a person I would’ve stabbed the fuck outta them rn.

[traumabasin]

So, Deteriorating Waters Heart went to the hospital at one point via being stabbed with Soul's Trident, and I was doing my daily pacing-in-my-front-yard-imagining-myself-answering-a-Q&A-as-if-I-was-famous, yeah? (Well, except this time I was imagining DW Heart was real and he was being interviewed by my fanbase, my fantasies get pretty wild.)

I imagined DW Heart would have an adult version of Gruelling Duty in his universe…

…what's Gruelling Duty? Well, in the Pillow Club universe, Gruelling Duty is a cartoon about superheroes in Hawaii of all kinds of species in the Pillow Club universe, all in one place, as if they all evolved together as one in the same environment.

This is also where the fictional "God-Killer" concept was first used in the Pillow Club universe; at first, it was only told in mythology of gradient sticks (a type of stick figure from one of my original stories), but it quickly became a trope in the PC universe instead, similar to how things like zombies or mummies are taken from mythologies or cultures and pop culture-ified.

But that's besides the point; I had the idea that in Deteriorating Waters, yk, Pillow Club but edgier, that Gruelling Duty is instead an adult animated show, to reflect how DW is an adult series instead of the children's series that PC is.

Which leads me to my idea that DW Heart, who was a """""freshmen""""" (heavy quotations bc DW takes place in Iceland but has intentionally (in a bad way) very American-based societal structure), so like around fourteen-fifteen for his species due to weird Axon-species-workings, wouldn't be allowed to watch an adult show in the hospital.

Instead, I imagine that DW Heart, with three big holes in his belly rapidly gushing out acidic blood, half-conscious probably hooked up to a lot of things and too weak to hold his phone to tell his friends he doesn't know when he'll be back, or even tell them he's gone at all, away from home for weeks and cut off from the outside world with the corrupt healthcare system of the Deteriorating Waters universe, had to watch propaganda young children's cartoons teaching him that he's a cuck for not having magic and deserves to be working class and have a fraction of human rights in the most condescending way possible for all those agonising days he thought his insides would spill right out of his torso.

Enjoy, I hope that was as much of a roller coaster for you as it was for me thinking about it.

[cynocardia]

do you have a favorite oc?

i um

ID: 2 anthro dogs, sasha and morgan. sasha is a tall, thin fawn and white belgian tervuren with orange eyes, an atrophied, saggy face, and short, messy bangs, wearing a brown coat with darker lapels. morgan is a short, fat black and white siberian husky with splotches over his eyes and short, combed over bangs, wearing a black turtleneck and coat. sasha has their head on morgan's, squishing his ears, and their hands on his shoulders. morgan squeezes his eyes closed, contented. the background is orange yellow. end ID

i hear they're having a 2 for 1 sale at the favorite oc store,

sasha: couldn't finish medical school, was rejected by all other jobs they attempted to get, and was tricked into joining the mob. former cleaner/back alley doctor. after their boss died they continued to work for his son. they are now a contract negotiator for deschamps family pharmaceuticals, a corporation similar to johnson&johnson in terms of legal controversy. they are passionate about bugs, especially cockroaches because they sympathize with them and are fascinated by their resilience in a... world that's not particularly fond of what they are... and they like poetry. they sketch and paint, mostly bugs and landscapes. and bugs. they are irritable, elegant, thin skinned, and easily amused, and they like protecting and taking care of people. they have a muscle wasting disability, vision issues, and cognitive issues, but are mostly undiagnosed and completely untreated due to medical neglect. is for me a response to a lot of disabled character tropes, mainly the evil cripple trope and the trope where a terminally ill character becomes morally bankrupt and commits atrocities to stay alive, the ethical model of disability, monetized healthcare, and medical neglect. indifferent to the concepts of gender and sexuality (/does not, at least currently, care), but claims facets of masculinity.

morgan: former private eye who threatened the deschamps so much they blackmailed him and he was forced to prematurely retire. did a bunch of random jobs to make ends meet for years; current job is data entry and is probably his favorite. still does investigative work on the side, connecting with former deschamps employees and funneling whatever information he can collect to the journalists he's personally in contact with. while his own personal vendetta lies with the deschamps, he has turned his interest to everything related to the US american medical system in general. irritable apathetic wisecracker. ridiculously, stubbornly secretive and reclusive; never really recovered from being stabbed and losing his job, his identity and sense of purpose, made it worse. likes johnny cash, the cold, old maid, and his cat. he is a trans man and his sexuality is he's too tired to think about it.

[arttuff]

Okay, so I've wanted to get top surgery for years, but I have no idea how to get it started? Do you just like, call up your doctor and be like "hey can you cut off my tits thx?" How did you get started? (And how much did it cost...) Hope this isn't too personal, thanks.

this is gonna be real informal cuz im just some dude im not a professional

here’s a super basic overview of how I went about it :) let me know if you have any questions anon! I’ll be happy to take a stab at answering

disclaimer is i live in australia so this is probably very specific to australia but if it helps, medicare (our public healthcare) didnt cover much except a couple hundred off the anaesthetist’s fee (but i wont include that in my estimate ily americans)

also this is just how i did it im sure everyone goes about it differently

but my first step was hrt (you dont need to go on hrt for top surgery but if you do it's recommended 6 months on testosterone before you get the surgery so you can get pecs goin beforehand and have more natural looking results. my pecs were juicy as hell by the time i got top surgery, so much so that my mum was surprised lol truly living up to my artstyle)

to do that i had to get a letter from my psychiatrist (this was covered by medicare) saying that i have a documented history of gender dysphoria and am mentally sane enough to seek treatment for it (this is just because of my medical history im pretty sure that not everyone has to do that plus you can look into informed consent)

with that letter of gender confirmation in your hot little hand you can then google around to find who it is you want to be doing your top surgery! i am so insanely lucky that i live in the biggest city in my country, meaning i had some good options. i settled on an award winning plastic/cosmetic surgeon that specialises in gender reassignment-- i love his results, and im so glad i went with him everything looks better than i expected it's so worth it!!!!

anyway once you choose a doctor you ring up and ask for a consultation-- this is not bulk billed but medicare can rebate a bit i think

thanks to covid all of the openings for consultations were full so i rang back once a week for 6 months (oh my god that's obsessive as fuck now that i put it together) until they had an opening

at the consultation you pretty much talk to your doc to let them know what you want, your identity, etc. im a nonbinary butch lesbian and i wanted some pecs but no nipple reconstruction (no nips no worries mate xx) and he made sure i was certain that's what i wanted and that i know the risks associated

the doc gives you an estimation and you decide whether you want to go through the public system (i think this is australia specific) and get put on a waiting list for 3+ years depending on demand, or do it privately (medicare, which everyone has, plust any private healthcare-- i have none)

i decided to go private because i do not think i could handle that wait, and ended up just being able to make it through with overtime at work heehee :) but good lord my wallet is starving

the cost is split up 3 ways between the doctor’s fees, the anaesthetist’s fees, and the hospital fees. there’s more expenses if you stay overnight at the hospital, so it’s better if you have someone to take you home and look after you

so all up i saved money in 2 places: the surgery itself was shorter because there was no nipple reconstruction, and i didn’t stay overnight so i didn’t have to pay that massive amount

all up my cost of surgery was around $11 000 aud (which is around usd $7 600) and the estimate he gave me was $14 000 aud ($9 600 usd) 

that’s a vague and rambly overview! let me know if there’s anything you’re confused about anon! or if there’s any questions you have about top surgery recovery etc :) remember i can only give my perspective from how it’s done in australia I’m sure it’s way different elsewhere in the world

[justfor2am]

hi sry no dog pics today im spending the night w a friend .however i did walk for 45 minutes to a walmart (n back ofc) while also learning how to ride an electric scooter (i do not know how to ride a normal scooter. or a bike. or a skateboard. or roller skates.) it was very fun n the sunset was pretty :3 then i played beat saber n absolutely rocked at one of my favorite songs ever (nee nee nee by pinocchiop u will ALWAYS be famous in my heart 🫶) n then sucked at everything else why r custom charts almost always in expert or expert+ (my shit got completely rocked on a chart of hibana just for both my friend n their roommate to play it after me n easily clear it ..embarrassing) ANYWAYS!! hope ur day was good at least :33 food update uhhh we had pizza!! we each got our own n mine had alfredo sauce n a parmesan/asiago blend on top (i love cheese) ok bye :p just wanted 2 check in n send an ask today!!

wil im gonna level with you i am doing complete fucking ASS rn lol

i got a double middle ear infection, plus my left ear is impacted. which means i can't hear for shit, got hella pain, and have been guzzling ibuprofen like it's my last meal on this bitch of an earth. as i type this i've had several random stabbing pains in both ears, and i am moments away from clawing at the walls of my bedroom in despair

i got meds yesterday tho, which hopefully will help this shit go away. btw the american healthcare system is a sham and i hate it.

anyways: i have HORRIBLE balance so i can't ride a bike either lmao, i've always wanted to learn how to roller blade but for sure would bust my ass immediately

people that do custom beat saber charts are try hards i stg, maybe i just wanna lowkey enjoy a song without a whole ass work out (beat saber makes me dizzy as shit anyways so i can't play it lol)

waough alfredo sauce pizza........ i want pizza >:((( i can't really chew either so it's all been soft things uhhhhhh i had bacon grits earlier tho those were pretty good

kk i'm gonna try not to die bye friend

[sovereignsolace]

A tale of the American healthcare system, in November 2023

It's a Saturday, and we're free for the afternoon, so I convince my daughter (who is seven years old) that it's a good day to go get our COVID shots. She doesn't love this idea, but she understands that getting sick is worse than getting stabbed, so she screws her courage to the sticking place and agrees to go. A small bribe helps: if she can get the shot with only modest amounts of complaining, then she can pick out a little treat from the store. Last year she picked some very sparkly nail polish.

We get in the car, and drive to the place we got our shots last year. It's a major/national retail store, that has a major chain pharmacy inside it. As we drive, we talk about the fact that it's very uncomfortable to have someone poke you in the arm with a needle, but also about how amazing vaccines are, and the importance of protecting ourselves and our loved ones from communicable disease. She wishes there was a vaccine that you could drink instead, and I suggest that maybe someday she will be the person who invents that.

When we get to the pharmacy counter, we are told that they don't do walk-ins for the covid vaccine (even though there is a sign that says Vaccine Walk-ins and my spouse got one via walk-in at the south side location just two days ago) and they also don't have the kid version, only the adult dose of the Moderna vaccine.

Okay. Huge bummer, but we live in a metro area of close to a million people, so there are probably 20 places to get vaccinated within a 20 minute drive, right? My now-crying daughter and I head back to the car and I call a nearby major chain pharmacy. I cannot get through to an actual human to ask if they have the pediatric vaccine in stock: the phone robot keeps taking me in circles.

I call a major chain grocery store that has a pharmacy inside. They are out of stock of the kid vaccine, but she thinks that their other locations might still have some. I call a different location. They have the right vaccine! We can come right now! So we do.

When we get to the pharmacy counter, the very helpful gentleman takes our details, including my insurance card, and informs us that they are frequently "having trouble" with our insurance company (a huge, common insurance that we have via my spouse's corporate job). He'll run it and try, but he warns me that the odds are not good.

I briefly consider just paying the $100+ out of pocket for kiddo's shot, just so the poor dear can have this over with, but that's really not in the budget right now.

The major chain cannot process our major insurance. Argh! Back out to the car we go, for more searching and more phone calls.

The city health department offers pediatric vaccines, but the clinic is only open a few hours here and a few hours there, none of which are on the weekends.

Another major chain pharmacy has the right stuff in stock, but it's by appointment only, and they have no more appointments until Tuesday.

Eventually I find a pharmacy with a Sunday (tomorrow) appointment, so we give up and go home.

I guess the upside of all these "out of stock" messages is that those shots have already gone into pediatric arms, but sheesh, if you want a population to get vaccinated, you have to make it easier than this!

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are Weird: Aliens reacting to popular tv shows

Alien: Friend Human, why is it called “Game of Thrones” when there is no one playing a game at all? Human: That’s because they are playing with peoples lives.  Alien: But is there not already a board game called “Life”? Why do they not play that instead? Human: Because there aren’t any tits or people getting stabbed in that one unless it’s being played on a drunk Friday night.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: This doctor house does not seem like a good doctor. All he does is shout at people until they get better. Human: Sometimes that’s just what we need.  *Several days later when the human catches a cold* Alien: YOUR SNIFFLES ARE MEANINGLESS! GO BACK TO WORK AND EARN YOUR PAPER CURRENCY!  Human: When I *sneeze* get out of this bed I am *cough* canceling your cable.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: Why does this human pretend to be a psychic detective?  Human: Because humans can’t read minds.  Alien: *Shockingly glances at human* Alien: Then how did you know what to get me for my birthing day!?!?!?  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: If the enemies are all walking dead humans, why is it the surviving humans keep getting caught by them when they have functional vehicles that can easily drive thousands of your earth miles faster than them? Human: Because they’re all idiots.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: What is this show about? Human: *Looks at title* Human: Oh, that’s “Friends”. It’s about a group of close knit friends.  Alien: *Looks at box, then human* Alien: *slowly embraces human* Alien: I had no idea your species was so lonely that you made entertainment programming about normal people with larger community circles than yours.  -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Alien: Why is it so many humans were entertained by a talking car?  Human: Because we didn’t have robots at the time we could communicate with so it seemed futuristic.  Alien: *Nods* Then why did they stop making more shows like it? Human: *Shrugs* After Terminator people realized how terrifying sentient machines could be so we stopped. Alien: That was very wise of your species. You did not suffer the same fate as the Poltark species when their machines overthrew them and turned them into living furniture.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: What are these women “Desperate” for?   Human: Attention.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: What is this doctor character’s name? Human: Who. Alien: The doctor character, from this British science fiction drama, what is he called? Human: Doctor Who.  Alien: If you will not answer me directly then this conversation is over.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: When the police catch these criminals do they rip open their skulls to observe the mind and discover why they committed their unlawful acts? Human: *Looks on with horror* Ew! No!  Alien: Then the title is very misleading.  -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Alien: Friend human! Come quick! Human: What is it? Alien: *Points at tv* Alien: Why did your people make a show about a psychopath that eats his victims?  Human: *shrugs* Because he kept eating everyone else we wanted to make a tv show about.  Alien: *Internally screaming*  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: If you humans were truly exploring the universe via this gateway portal in your mountain fortress, why did the teams always bring guns?  Human: Because in our long history we have either come in peace or come in war. There has never been anything between the two. Human: Plus, that’s Richard Dean Anderson so you gotta give him a gun just to hold and keep him from controlling your mind with his hand movements.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: What made this teacher go mad and want to use their knowledge to make harmful narcotics? Human: The American Healthcare System.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: So this young woman hunts down vampires and other monsters by herself?  Human: Pretty much.  Alien: Does her mate not ever get called upon to aide her against the monsters? Human: Only when she needs help digging the graves. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: I do not understand why you humans love this “Zim”. Clearly he is an invader come to destroy your world. Human: It all harkens back to a little song we like to call, the “Doom” song. .  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alien: Why is no one impressed by the talking dog? Human: They’re all distracted by some random guy who thought it’d be a good idea to dress up as a ghost, scare some people away, then sell an amusement park for millions. 

[leftistranting]

So I just got my first Covid test done today and I’m mad about it

tldr; I paid a total of $230 for a covid test after the test was taken. I was not aware at any point that I would be paying anything. I fucking hate America and our shitty health care system the fact that it’s run by profiteers who would rather watch you die than lose out on profit.

As the title says, I had my first Covid test today. Did the nasal swab because I’ve been feeling a little off lately and I seem to have the early symptoms of general sinus issues which overlap with Covid-19 symptoms. I decided to just simply not take any chances and get the test done because it’s just not worth it to accidentally expose my loved ones. Luckily I live alone and 85 miles away from my family. But we all generally keep to ourselves as it is.

Now for some background, I’m laid off due to Covid. I was furloughed from mid March up until September. Then it switched officially to being laid off. However, I still have my position held for me. The legal terms are all that changed. My company is unionized and I will be hired back to my original position when they are able to open to full capacity again. But due to the increase in cases after the election, they had to cut back on staff and hours again in my state. I accept this as my reality. I accept the fact I may have to look for a new job that I genuinely don’t want because I actually love my career and I was making great money doing it.

Now on to today, December 7th, 2020. I went to a scheduled appointment for the test this afternoon at a Well Now Urgen Care center. They’re spread around Central and Western New York and they were the fastest test I could get before it was too late.

I spent a solid 45 minutes at this facility. I saw 4 different medical professionals. one took my vitals, one did the swab, and one was the actual Doctor who just asked me the same damn questions and listened to my lungs. The 4th person was an intern with the Doc. None of these people spent more than 4 minutes with me. I spent most of my time on my phone in the room alone. Doing nothing.

They wasted all of my time and exposed me to so many people it’s insane. I could’ve been in and out in a matter of 10 minutes tops but they dragged it out to 45 minutes.

The thing is, due to my current employment status, I am not ensured. I assumed I’d pay something MAYBE for the test. No. I paid $230.

$230 to have 4 people do the job of essentially half a person. I was under the impression that the facility I went to would be cheaper than say Walgreens or CVS. But no. $230. And for the record, $100 of that went directly to the lab that handles the actual testing. So $130 was paid to the medical facility I was in. 

$130 for 10 minutes worth of work that was stretch out to be 45 minutes.

$130 for them to check my vitals and shove a q-tip up my nostrils.

$130 for me to sit on my ass and scroll through the internet on my phone for 35 minutes total.

What the actual fuck am i paying $130 for when it takes 5 fucking minutes to do this shit and one entire human being to handle it???

Why is testing at the lab $100??? Are you telling me that after literally millions of tests throughout the year, they haven’t streamlined a single part of it to make it cheaper?

Also, why is it that when I Google “Covid testing sites near me” the shit I get is a bunch of ads intermingled with Walgreens, CVS, and urgent care centers? By the way, none of these places openly tell you how much a test is before you sign up. New York State is supposed to be doing free tests. Turns out it’s only free if you go to a government run facility. How do you find one of those? You literally have to Google FREE covid testing sites. Otherwise, Google only gives you the paid for corporations. Because Google is making money off of the sickness and death of everyone during this pandemic.

On top of all that, I wasn’t asked about insurance nor was I given a price range until AFTER the test was taken. I wasn’t told shit about it. None of these corporations give you the information up front before you make a decision. Let’s not forget the fact that if I can’t afford insurance, I sure as FUCK can’t afford $230 to get tested. But I had no fucking clue I was being charged such an outrageous amount when I had a 6 inch cotton swab stabbing my brains.

Wanna know how all this could’ve been avoided? Socialized healthcare. But my fucking country cares too fucking much about money. They want to profit off the suffering and death of the poor. They would literally burn you alive and roast marshmallows over you if it meant they could make a profit off of it. 

Fuck the American healthcare system. Fuck the Liberal cucks who simp hard for capitalism. Fuck the Coservative monsters who literally do not believe in human rights no matter how hard they try to say they do.

Fuck America.

[trustmeimadoctor]

I’m trying to find the words. There is so much going on inside my head and my mind is so clouded. There is a pending transaction in my checking account and it doesn’t give me any real details about it. Even under “amount” it says “details”. Like yes assholes I’d love some details. I need to know if I’m being fucked or what. If this is the place I tried ordering my eye drops from I’m going to be... annoyed. Yeah we’ll go with that. Because the day after I ordered they sent me an email saying that I needed a medical licence ID number. That is not something I have. Despite the name of my blog I’m not actually a doctor. Who would have thought? If they charge me anyway and don’t send the drops I’m going to be upset I think. For the past few days or so Donatello has been saying that we don’t need the drops. Are you fucking kidding me?! There is no fucking way I’m going to attempt to cut into my eye without trying my very best to numb the fuck out of it first! But he keeps showing me that when the time comes that he’ll take over and just stab the fuck out of it so I won’t have any time to react. Sounds fucking pleasant, doesn’t it?

I’ve been getting a feeling since yesterday that I shouldn’t go through with the plan. Nothing strong but just a slight nagging feeling. I don’t see why we wouldn’t. I had that feeling but much much stronger a week or so before my last suicide attempt. This won’t stop us. It never has before.

I’d like to thank the american healthcare system for all their help on getting me to this point. I am going to loose one of my fucking eyes because I can’t get the help that I clearly need. MEDICAL and... admittedly psychological as well. But if my physical health wasn’t neglected like this I wouldn’t be where I’m at right now psychologically. Fuck them all. Fuck them for doing this to me. Fuck them for punishing me for responding in these ways after I’ve begged for help so many times before. I hope they burn.

[xtruss]

Decadent like the late Roman Empire, the West is committing suicide through its irrational response to Covid-19

For years, I was puzzled why the Roman Empire ceased to exist and was replaced by barbarians. Looking at the West's response to COVID-19, I know now.

Decadent like the late Roman Empire, the West is committing suicide through its irrational response to Covid-19

— 25 March, 2020 | RT

Colosseum and Arch of Constantine during the Coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19). Rome (Italy), March 19th, 2020

By Dr. Luboš Motl, Czech theoretical physicist, who was an assistant professor at Harvard University from 2004 to 2007. He writes a science and politics blog called The Reference Frame

Many think Covid-19 is some kind of alien invasion that spells the end of the world. But the real threat to us is a much deadlier virus: a hatred of all the values that have underpinned our civilisation for centuries.

For years, I was puzzled as to why the Roman Empire ceased to exist and was replaced by communities that were uncivilized by comparison. How and why could mankind’s progress reverse in this way? Recent experience has eliminated the mystery. No special devastating event was needed; the cause of Rome's demise was simply the loss of its people's desire to support their ‘empire’ and its underlying values. And as it was 1,500 years or so ago, so I fear it is now.

The Covid-19 crisis – specifically, the reaction to it – demonstrates that people have grown bored, detached, and easily impressionable by things that have nothing to do with the roots of their society. We are all – or too many of us – fin de siècle Romans now.

A large number of Westerners are happy to accept the suicidal shutting down of their economies to try to halt a virus that predominantly causes old and sick people to die just a few weeks or months before they would have anyway. Just as they enthusiastically endorse proclamations such as that there are 46 sexes, not two; that the flatulence of a cow must be reduced to save a polar bear; that millions of migrants from the Third World must be invited to Europe and assumed to be neurosurgeons; and so on.

The widespread opinion that everything, including economies, must be sacrificed to beat coronavirus is a revival of medieval witch hunts; the sacrifice seems more important than finding an effective method to deal with the problem.

Our increasingly decadent mass culture has gradually become more ideological and openly opposed to the values Western civilization is based upon. And while it boasts of being ‘counter-culture’ and independent, it’s acquired a monopoly over almost all the information channels that determine opinions, including mainstream media and political parties.

Our leaders have become sucked into this group-thinking and happily institute policies that unleash shutdowns that may cause the worst recession in history. Thousands of businesses are closing and long-term prospects are bleak.

Governments are stepping in to pay wages and fund other services. As tax revenue will be virtually non-existent, public debt will soar. Some governments may default on their debts or resort to printing money, causing soaring inflation. These countries may be unable to fund healthcare, their police or their military, and be so weakened they will be invaded by others and be erased from the world map.

That may be a worst-case scenario, but it’s almost certain that the impact of the shutdowns will be a recession comparable to the Great Depression. Yet what do most Western citizens make of it? Well, they are either unaware, uncaring, or they’re happy about it. They don’t seem to appreciate the consequent dangers. Instead, they are more obsessed with the latest celebrity who’s caught the virus.

The consumers of this mass culture haven't built anything like what our ancestors did – enlightenment, the theory of relativity, parliamentary democracy, industrialisation, major advances in philosophy, science, literature and engineering. They don't have to defend any real values against a tangible enemy, because hiding in a herd with uniform group-think is good enough for them.

Our ancestors had difficult, short lives; they had to work hard, produce enough to survive, fight enemies, and defend what they’d inherited. Numerous lasting values emerged from those efforts. The current generations of Westerners are good only at producing and escalating irrationality and panic.

If a two-month lockdown isn’t deemed enough to contain the virus, they’re happy to extend it to six months, if not years. China decided to impose strict policies, but they were assertive enough to be relatively short-lived; many Westerners want less perfect policies to last for a much longer time. That’s clearly an irrational approach; instead of ‘flattening a curve’, rational leaders (like Beijing’s) try to turn the curve into a cliff. The faster you eliminate the virus, the cheaper it is.

Immortality As An Entitlement

This support for economically suicidal policies didn't start with Covid-19. Westerners have spent recent decades amid a prosperity in which they took material wealth and good healthcare for granted. They forgot what hunger (and, in most cases, unemployment) meant. They got used to demanding ever deeper ‘entitlements’, such as the ‘right not to be offended’.

Activists sensationalised smaller and more implausible threats and demanded that governments mitigated them. In particular, the climate change movement advocated that the 1-2 °C of warming caused by CO2 emissions in a century was equivalent to an armageddon that had to be avoided, whatever the cost.

In this context, it could be expected that the first ‘real challenge’ – and a new flu-like disease is certainly one – would make people fearful. Because if people were led to believe that 1-2 °C of warming was basically the end of the world, is it surprising that they're absolutely terrified of a new disease that has the potential to kill a few million old and sick people?

The existential threat posed by coronavirus – or at least, our irrationality towards it – is greater than the climate threat (though still very small). Westerners who haven't seen any real threats for a long time have developed a condition – termed "affluenflammation" by the American musician Remy – which is a pathological habit of inflating negligible threats. When this inflation of feelings is applied to a real threat, namely a pandemic, they lose their composure.

The context of Covid-19, where every death is presented with horror, makes it clear that ‘immortality’ is just another ‘human right’. This wisdom says that our leaders are failing because they cannot defend this so-called right. But this excessive sensitivity is just one part of the problem.

Many Westerners actively want to harm their economies, corporations, rich people, and governments, because they don't feel any attachment to or responsibility for them. They take security and prosperity for granted. Their money and food arrive from ‘somewhere’, and they don’t care about the source.

And they believe that the structures which allow them to survive – the governments, banks, and so on – are ‘evil’. Some are just financially illiterate. But others know what they are saying, and rejoice in demanding that trillions be sacrificed in order to infinitesimally increase the probability that a 90-year-old will avoid infection and live a little bit longer. They don't accept their dependence on society and the system at all. They don't realise that their moral values, their ‘human rights’, are only available if paid for by prosperous societies.

I have used some dramatic prose, so let me be clear: the scenario I’ve outlined – ending in the suicide of the West – is avoidable, and I hope and believe it will be. I know some who are willing to fight for its survival.

But even if this acceleration towards shutdowns is reversed and countries restore their pre-virus businesses, our world won't be the same. Many people will conclude that the crisis was exciting, and try to kickstart a repetition. The curfew is likely to reduce CO2 emissions this year, so climate activists may try for similar results in the future. Terrorists may deploy some new disease – which, after all, is likely to be more effective than any stabbing or bombing.

It's conceivable that the West’s brush with mortality will lead people to regain some common sense and survival instincts. Perhaps several nations going bankrupt will be a wake-up call. Maybe people will realise that the reaction to the coronavirus was disproportionate. But even if that is so, I’m afraid it won’t be enough.

We need to accept that the positive relationship of Westerners to the roots of their civilization will be still missing – and that this is a virus that poses a much more fundamental existential threat than Covid-19.

[201701673caic1920]

Apple Pie: unavailable on U.S. prison menu.

Some might say why should it be? Why should anyone who is serving time have the pleasure of eating America’s favourite dessert? Prisoners can request it as part of their last meal on death row. They can try and make an imitation but other than that, this staple, along with plenty of other food types are conspicuous by their absence in the diet of the American prisoner.

            Nasty, unidentifiable, rotten, maggot infested, rat nibbled ‘chow’ unfit for human consumption, which would get food providers anywhere else shut down, is available.

The reason? The average daily budget for feeding a U.S prisoner is around $2.65 and as low as 56 cents per meal in some Arizona jails.

  Studies have shown the food is nutritionally poor, usually processed, high in sugars, salt and fat. And, just like on the outside this leads to weight gain, heart disease and diabetes.

Diabetic inmates cost the state of Virginia $2.17 million per year. It now costs more to treat prisoner’s health issues than it does to feed them.

           Prisons used to cater ‘in house’, cooking from scratch and sometimes using ingredients grown on site. Now, catering is industrialized and privatised. It is outsourced to profit seeking companies like Aramark who stand accused of everything from serving inedible cheese to halving rations, charging for meals never served and violating food standard codes.

           Powdered food was reported in Alabama county jails. What even is that?

Dickensian style gruel, bread and water, Nutraloaf, sure, there will be people who think prisoners deserve it, but those incarcerated in Alcatraz in the 1940s had a better diet! Including apple pie on Mondays!

Why should we care? Because, this is now a public health problem, affecting not just the prisoners but their families, communities and wider society especially when prisoners are released with chronic and costly medical conditions. Food low in nutritional value has also been shown to affect mental health which prison populations already have a higher incidence of to start with.

This is not new. Journalist Alan Elsner reported worsening state prison cuisine in his book The Gates of Injustice: The Crisis in America’s Prisons as far back as 2004.

He also gave this security warning; ‘hungry inmates are angry inmates.’

           Food used as punishment and the domino effect is just one of the crises currently faced by the American penal system. Rising prison healthcare costs are also attributable to the aging prison population.

We have an aging demographic, but reports suggest that prisoners suffer age related illness and disease 10-15 years earlier than the general population. Add to this, harsh, long mandatory minimum sentences and an increase in admissions of people over 55 and it is not difficult to appreciate some of the challenges.

Correctional officers are not trained nurses or carers, correctional facilities were not meant to be hospitals, elderly care homes or shelter for the mentally ill.

An illuminating Washington Post article by Kenneth Dickerman and photographer Lucy Nicholson article says that 20 years ago only 1 percent of California’s state prison population was over 60 but by 2016 that figure had risen to 7 percent.

Nicholson captured scenes in the California Medical Facility in Vacaville where sick and elderly prisoners are cared for in its medical unit and hospice. It is already overcrowded and understaffed. And it is expensive. KPBS reported that providing prisoner health care cost California $1.9 billion ten years ago, with producer Wendy Fry warning ‘If we think we’re having a prison crisis right now, we just need to wait about 5 years.’

Well, that time has come and gone, and as she pointed out the ‘Three Strikes Laws’ of 1994 (those harsh mandatory sentences alluded to earlier) had far reaching and costly consequences that the ‘lock’em up and throw away the key’ law makers of the time did not care to think about.

There are sick and elderly prisoners who do not even remember why they are there. Some are serving long sentences for non-violent crimes and some who committed heinous crimes but are now to ill or frail to be a public danger. Is prison the right place for them? Is there a case for release on compassionate grounds?

15 to life, 25 to life, does that mean you should get out? And how would we feel about this if we or one of our family members were the victim of a crime?

To be fair, California has begun to rethink its position and according to The Guardian will reconsider the life sentences 4,000 non violent prisoners.

A relief maybe for those given life sentences for ‘stealing a bicycle, possessing less than half a gram of methamphetamine, stealing two bottles of liquor or shoplifting shampoo.’

Various news outlets have given column space to new legislation called the First Step Act. Introduced under the Trump administration but with cross party support, the program aims to release those with good behaviour early.

Crack cocaine offenders affected by the penalty disparity for possession of crack compared to powder cocaine at the height of the ‘The War on Drugs’ have benefited, with 1,691 getting reduced sentences. And, in November 2019 Oklahoma released 500 prisoners in one day according to The New York Times.  

These ‘good news’ stories splashed across the front pages give a positive impression but hold on a minute. These figures are drops in the ocean compared to the total American prison population. Estimated at a staggering 2.3 million according to the non-profit organisation Prison Policy Initiative, who have plenty to say in their in depth report Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2019.

 America is still incarcerating the same amount of people that inhabit a small country. Statistics show that despite having 5% of the world’s population it has 25% of the world’s prison population and there are multiple reasons for this ‘mass-criminalization’ but long, harsh sentences, even for low-level misdemeanors stand out.

It is not hard to imagine how difficult the management of such a system must be. Two million people to feed and administer along with the organisation of thousands of personnel and the maintenance of 100’s of buildings. Some have fearsome reputations such as Rikers Island in New York, due to close in 2026 and not before time.

In October 2019 BBC journalist Rosie Blunt told us some alarming tales from Rikers, one of modern civilisation’s most notorious jails. Stories of stabbings, teenagers hanging themselves, officers selling drugs and razors, and soul-destroying solitary confinement in an old and frightening building that is falling apart.

Most are held in state prisons but privately-run institutions are increasing and raise further questions. Here the prisoners have become a workforce, contracted out to private companies. They cannot complain or go on strike. They do not take holidays or turn up late.

They are paid 25 cents an hour.

There is no incentive to rehabilitate or educate, recidivism just boosts the investors bottom line. It is in their financial interest to keep the prison population high.

There is also a sinister element to this forced labour which has not been lost on commentators who compare it to slavery and Nazi Germany. Exploitation is occurring.

Issues such as nutrition, healthcare, and work camp ethics are just the tip of the iceberg where American prison crises are concerned. Many of the problems concern Human Rights but, and correct me if I am wrong, America has yet to adhere to the United Nations ‘Nelson Mandela Rules.’

Until then we can say, “mass incarceration is as American as apple pie.”.

[bitchesgetriches]

Hi Bitches, I have a question that's not really financial, but more about maintaining empathy in this capitalist hellscape. It's long, so I apologize in advance. So. I live in NYC and there are homeless people everywhere. I can remember being a kid and having huge amounts of sympathy for the homeless in my hometown city; I always gave some of my allowance money if I walked by a homeless person, or asked a parent for a dollar to give. Fast forward to now. I'm 27, have lived in 1/4

           NYC for 2+ years, and have lost so much sympathy for the suffering of the homeless. I know logically that I should be much more sympathetic to their situation, but I also can't help but to think that they are such a nuisance. I almost never give them a spare dollar or two now. I mean, I really need every dollar I make right now, at least I think I do. My family & I just can't afford it. I loathe them for inconveniencing me with their shouting and their stench. I think that if they've 2/4   

           reached the point of needing to beg strangers for help, they must have alienated all of their loved ones; I'd never be in that position. If the people who love them won't help them, why should I? But then logically I know that's not true either. I could be in that place with just a few family tragedies. It's this internal battle I deal with every day on my commute: I dehumanize these people, I feel guilty and logically know I'm wrong, I do nothing to help. I want to stop my dehumanization 3/4       

           of the homeless because I know it's wrong, and because I know I can do better for them and society can do better for them. The homelessness problem is clearly related to this capitalist world we live in, but what can be done? How do I stop mentally battling myself and actually get over being annoyed and repulsed every time a homeless person inconveniences me? Thank you bitches for everything, even if this never gets answered        

This is SUCH an interesting question. Thank you for asking it, dearheart! And I applaud you for your self-awareness, pragmatism, and compassion. It’s clear that this is a mental struggle for you, and the very fact that you don’t simply stop the introspection at “Well IIIII would never end up homeless, alone, and stinking up the sidewalk” but instead are working to improve your outlook speaks very highly of you.

So let’s talk about homelessness.

As John Oliver so eloquently explains in this clip, the vast majority of Americans are sooooo much closer to being a homeless beggar on the streets than they are to being on MTV’s Cribs. Our individual financial security is fucking precarious! That’s why we write this blog! Yes, you can build up an emergency fund and save six months of your income, but when you get right down to it, most of us are one major medical emergency away from bankruptcy.

And if you can’t recover from said emergency, if you don’t have a support network to get you out of that mess... that’s it. You’re done. You’re staring down the barrel of homelessness and getting judged by strangers on the street for your inability to stay clean and hygienic while you literally sleep under the overpass and rummage through the dumpster behind Panera for day-old bread.

Now let’s address your knee-jerk reaction that homeless people must’ve really fucked up to lose all support and end up on the street. Surely, someone like YOU could never end up there because you have people who love and support you, right?

Sadly, a lot of homeless people are mentally ill, and slipped through the cracks left by their caretakers and an imperfect system. Others are kids who have aged out of the foster care system with no helping hand and no prospects for an education or career. Others are gay and trans youth who were literally kicked out of their homes and disowned by their families. Others are addicted to substances in this great nation where we treat addiction like a crime rather than the public health crisis it is.

Put even the most normal, patient, chill person in any of these situations, grind them down with bad weather, abuse, lack of nutrition and healthcare for months and years, and I guarantee they’ll get a bit surly. When you meet a loud, annoying, unhygienic homeless person on the street, you’re meeting them at their worst. I defy you to act any better in their situation!

All of which is to say that even a homeless person who you find personally repugnant and unsympathetic is probably not so different from you. Non-homeless people can be massive fucking dicks, so why not the homeless?

I know I keep using “you” in a sort of accusatory fashion in this post, and I promise I’m not condescending to you or picking on you. It’s all meant to reinforce the idea that there is a very thin line separating all of us financially stable people from the homeless. That alone makes them worthy of our compassion and respect. Basic human decency goes a long way to someone who gets alternately ignored and shat upon by most of the human race.

Here’s s’more on why we should all cut the poor and homeless a break:

"Poor People Are Poor Because They Are _____. Rich People Are Rich Because They Are _____." 

It's More Expensive to Be Poor Than to Be Rich

Lastly, here’s what you can do to stop feeling impotent, useless, and heartless when you see a homeless person and you can’t afford to give them money.

Vote.

I personally very rarely give money to the homeless. But I do donate to a number of charitable organizations that help to alleviate the plight of the homeless and impoverished in my country. I also vote for politicians and policies that will improve life for those struggling to make ends meet. I support policies and politicians who aim to get at the root of the homelessness problem--not just systemic poverty, but inadequate mental health programs, lack of support for veterans and the disabled, and lack of protection for children suffering abuse or lacking stability in their home lives.

I pay taxes in the hopes that my money will be used to stab the root problems of homelessness in the heart. When I see a homeless person on the street, I remind myself that I am making informed political decisions to help them. I remind myself that they are the reason I donate to charities and food banks. And yeah, sometimes if I can, I spare a dollar for their plight. But if I can’t in that moment, then I know that I’ve still done something on a broader scale.

You need to start thinking this way to alleviate your guilt. Be the logical, pragmatic person you appear to be from your question. And remind yourself that some day, you could be in the same position whether you expect it or not.

Good luck, honey. It’s going to be ok.

Here’s some further reading:

Ask the Bitches: "How Do I Protect My Own Mental Health While Still Helping Others?"

Raising Awareness About "Raising Awareness"

Raising the Minimum Wage Would Make Our Lives Better 

How to Spot a Charitable Scam

Judging Charities Like Judgey McJudgerson: How Can Your Donation Make the Biggest Impact? 

[stephenmccull]

What the Slowing Vaccine Rates Mean for One Rural Montana County

KALISPELL, Mont. — The covid vaccination operation at the Flathead County fairgrounds can dole out 1,000 doses in seven hours. But demand has plummeted recently, down to fewer than 70 requests for the shots a day.

This story also ran on NPR. It can be republished for free.

So, at the start of May, the northwestern Montana county dropped its mass vaccination offerings from three to two clinics a week. Though most of those eligible in the county haven’t yet gotten a dose, during the final Thursday clinic on April 29, few cars pulled up and nurses had time to chat between patients.

“It’s a trickle,” said Flathead City-County Health Officer Joe Russell. “Not enough people will get vaccinated to reach herd immunity, not in Flathead County and maybe not in Montana.”

Daily covid vaccination rates are falling nationwide. Gaps in vaccine uptake are starting to show, especially in rural America. That leaves many communities grappling with an imperfect pandemic endgame.

Flathead stands out as one of Montana’s most populated counties to fall behind. There, 25% of people had been fully vaccinated by May 10. To compare, nearly 33% of Montanans were fully vaccinated, and that figure is closer to 35% nationwide.

Flathead County is a medical destination for the top corner of the state, a gateway to Glacier National Park and neighbor to two tribal nations. It’s Montana’s fourth-largest county by population with more than 103,000 people, yet it’s rural — 18 people per square mile. It’s also conservative, with the majority of residents voting for former President Donald Trump last year. National polling has shown rural Americans and Republicans to be among the most resistant to getting vaccines.

Russell said he hopes at least 40% of Flathead County residents eventually get the shots. That’s well below the 70% to 80% believed to be needed to create widespread protection from the pathogen that has stalled normal life.

Public health experts worry about reservoirs of the virus fueling outbreaks. That possibility further strains year-old tensions in places such as Flathead County, where strangers and family members alike can be split on whether the virus is a threat and the decision to wear a mask marks where people stand. Covid vaccines are the latest phase of that divide.

Cameron Gibbons, who lives outside Kalispell, has worried about how covid could affect her 13-year-old son. He’s had coughs turn into lung infections that landed him in the emergency room for trouble breathing, so the family has played it safe during the pandemic.

“We haven’t seen family in a long time because they haven’t chosen to be careful, which is OK, as long as when we get back to normal we can all set our differences aside,” Gibbons said. “Now there’s this judgment of ‘Oh, you got the vaccine.’”

Some of Montana’s most vaccinated places overlap with tribal nations. Chelsea Kleinmeyer, the health director of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, said the tribes’ members seemed to largely accept vaccines after the pandemic disproportionately sickened and killed Native Americans. But the reservation crosses four counties, including Flathead.

“We travel to those counties every single day,” Kleinmeyer said. “It goes back to: Are we really protected against this virus, these variants, if we don’t achieve herd immunity?”

States are shifting from mass clinics to bringing shots to where people are, but that strategy, too, can be unpredictable. The same day of the county’s final Thursday clinic, the local health system hosted a walk-in clinic in the middle of the Flathead Valley Community College campus in Kalispell. Most of the chairs for people to wait 15 minutes post-shot remained empty and, by early afternoon, the clinic had to send 200 doses to the county health department to avoid wastage.

Although organizers had hoped to vaccinate at least 100 people that day, Audra Saranto, a registered nurse who heads Kalispell Regional Healthcare’s vaccination team, said she counts the college event as a success — 50 people got vaccines who might otherwise not have.

The health system may host similar clinics at major job sites, like for a lumber company. A mobile team will offer shots in busy places like farmers markets, even if it means risking people not following up for a second dose.

It’s not surprising that covid vaccinations aren’t universally accepted yet in this divided county. Flathead’s board of health deadlocked over mask rules and crowd size limits amid the area’s worst covid outbreaks. Two top county health officials resigned in the past year. Thousands of people have signed dueling petitions to remove or keep one board of health member who had stirred doubt over covid-19 cases and opposed mask rules.

And the city of Kalispell is home to state Sen. Keith Regier, a Republican who repeated false claims on the Senate floor last month that covid vaccines may contain microchips to track people. Regier said in an interview he was “offering caution in how we progress with this vaccination.”

Meanwhile, Whitefish, roughly a 20-minute drive from Kalispell, has maintained a mask ordinance that has outlasted the statewide mandate. Banners downtown show local leaders asking people to mask up so people can pray together and keep schools open. Even so, the rule isn’t always followed there.

At the county’s final Thursday clinic, John Calhoun, 67, undid his pearl snap shirt to get his second shot and joked with the nurse, “I’m doing this so Joe Biden doesn’t throw me in jail.”

Calhoun said he hopes being vaccinated will help him ease tensions the next time someone tells him to wear a mask. He believes covid-19 is real but doesn’t think it’s as serious as health officials claim, even though he has diabetes, a risk factor for covid complications.

“Nothing seems to bother me all that bad,” Calhoun said. “I had a horse fall on me, broke my hip, and once stabbed myself with a hunting knife. All that caused me a bit of a problem, but other stuff just doesn’t bother me.”

He decided to get the shot after an old high school friend with a degree in biochemistry told him it was important — an opinion Calhoun trusted over those of government-paid experts and liberal politicians who he said have used the pandemic to grab more power.

Calhoun said he’s still trying to talk his wife, Lola, into getting vaccinated to play it safe: “She’s one of those ladies that you don’t talk her into much.”

Lola Calhoun, 59, said she got her shingles vaccine within the past year because she trusts the protection it offers. When it comes to covid, she said she’d rather risk the virus than be injected with vaccines that feel too new, despite decades of research underpinning their unprecedented development.

“The covid vaccine to me is experimental and we are the case studies,” she said. “Maybe a year from now, I’ll see what happens to these people who got the vaccine.”

On a recent evening, Ray Sederdahl, 63, sat on his girlfriend’s Kalispell porch while his grandkids picked dandelions. The Air Force veteran said even if he wasn’t skeptical of the vaccines, he thinks of covid as an illness that’s much like the flu.

“The VA keeps trying to get me to schedule an appointment and I just say, ‘At this time, I’ll pass,’” Sederdahl said. “A lot of the older vets I talk to, they didn’t get it either, and they’re not gonna get it.”

To Sederdahl, things feel normal enough. Businesses are open and he doesn’t have to wear a mask most places.

Erica Lengacher, an intensive care unit nurse in Kalispell who has worked covid units and vaccine clinics, said she’s sad but not surprised that vaccine rates are slowing. But, she said, the overall feeling at the county’s vaccine clinics is hopefulness — people are still showing up, even if the crowds are smaller.

Lengacher said Flathead was hit so hard this winter, she hopes some natural immunity from those already infected, along with the growing vaccination levels, will be enough to hold off further outbreaks over the next few months.

“Just given our lifestyle — single-family homes, no public transportation, a few people per square mile — we may get away with it,” Lengacher said. “But there’s a big question mark of how variants show up here. There are just a lot of big question marks.”

As of May 10, the county had 116 confirmed active cases of covid, up from 71 on April 23.

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

What the Slowing Vaccine Rates Mean for One Rural Montana County published first on https://smartdrinkingweb.weebly.com/

[shirtshoping]

Please allow me Dont Flirt With Me I Love My Wife She Is A Crazy Nurse She Will Stab You With Sharp Objects shirt . to frame the issues involved with “the wall” in its actual terms. Despite what the media is saying, this is not about Democrat vs. Republican. In short, the executive branch of our government is threatening to declare a national emergency since the legislative branch will not authorize the seizure of private American property for a federal works project nor will fund it. The branch has already shut down the federal government. It is currently threatening to extend this government shut down for however long it takes for the legislative branch to cave. First of all, the framework of our government is based on checks and balances. Power is divided into three branches: the Executive, the Legislative, and the Judicial. The Legislative branch controls the purse strings of government and creates laws. The Executive branch carries out those laws. The Judicial branch tells us whether the laws are constitutional or not. Each branch was designed to be able to balance the other branches. Dont Flirt With Me I Love My Wife She Is A Crazy Nurse She Will Stab You With Sharp Objects shirt, hoodie, sweater, longsleeve and ladies t-shirt Classic Ladies Hoodie Sweatshirt Unisex Crossed our border and committed crimes against proud legal Americans starting with they came here against our i Dont Flirt With Me I Love My Wife She Is A Crazy Nurse She Will Stab You With Sharp Objects shirt .migration laws, the law enforcement murdered or injured, the citizen murdered or injured, the jobs lost because they work for cash, the robberies, the drugs etc. Report facts, not your anti trump agenda I have to wonder if the writer of this article lives behind a wall, a fence, a gate, has private security in their building or a security system installed? If so, this is a hypocritical article. I also wonder where this article writer was when the President promised if the “New Obama Healthcare” was passed costs would go down and everyone could keep their Doctor. The Executive branch carries out those laws. The Judicial branch tells us whether the laws are constitutional or not. Each branch was designed to be able to balance the other branches.

[thesinglesjukebox]

Tom Petty

He was the unlikeliest of pop stars in the hairsprayed and shoulder-padded MTV era, a thin-lipped, stringy-haired Florida ne’er-do-well whose toothy smile never seemed far from a sneer, whose band played swampy rock & roll with a pub-rock snarl and whose thin, scouring-pad voice sang anthemic highway-ready pop choruses about the feelings you wish you didn’t have and the bad decisions you have to learn to live with. It was a one in a million chance that a gang of dropouts and weekend rockers from Gainesville would ever amount to anything but a few not unhappy memories dating from the mid-70s; but Tom Petty was a one in a million talent, a clear-eyed writer with a knack for honeyed melodies that drew on the thirty-year history of rock to create songs so indelible and evergreen that it seems as must they must always have existed.

For many of us, born since his heyday, they have: Petty’s last Top-40 hit, “You Don’t Know How It Feels,” was from the 1994 album Wildflowers, which sounded thirty years old when it was new, but if it were a person would have graduated from college by now. But an unmatched catalog of perfect pop-rock songs stretching from the late 70s to the early 90s, many of which went unappreciated at the time, have gone on to a deathless life on classic-rock and throwback radio formats, peppered throughout movies and TV to underscore reflective or joyful or wistful moments, part of the ever-shifting tapestry of pop history that does what mass art at its best does: give voice to complex or transient emotions, unite us in shared enjoyment, remind us of beauty.

Here are some of the things we were reminded of this week.

Anaïs Mathers on

"American Girl"

something that's so close/yet still so far out of reach

I could tell you about being eight years old and seeing Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers with my parents at the old Miami Arena in 1995, long since torn down for a newer, shinier building. I could tell you about how my dad let me climb onto his shoulders when they played "American Girl." I could tell you how I waved my arms in the air while my dad sang along in thickly accented English. I could tell you about how Tom Petty records often played in our house not just because it was good music but because it was some of the music my dad listened to in order to learn English when he came to the US; Tom was clearer than most. I could tell you how I tried to keep my eyes open in the backseat of the car on the drive home as my dad hummed.

I could tell you about being a college freshman in Gainesville, Florida, sitting on the floor of some guy's dorm with him as we mixed vodka with Gatorade. I could tell you about how hot it was that night and how his AC window unit was doing us no favors. I could tell you how we listened to the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' self titled album and when we got to "American Girl", when it got to the end, this guy told me about how the song was about a girl who jumped off her balcony in the same dorm we were sitting in and swan dived right into traffic on 441. I could tell you how he was pretty annoyed that I was more interested in hearing about this urban legend (the dorms didn't even have balconies!) than I was in hooking up.

I could tell you about living in Gainesville a few years later just a few blocks from that dorm in an apartment that overlooked 441. I could tell you about being so depressed I couldn't go to class, about sitting on my windowsill eight stories up (no balcony here either) and smoking cigarettes while watching traffic. I could tell you how homesick I was for a home that didn't really exist anymore. I could tell you about how bright it was, even in a not so big place like Gainesville, and how on nights when it seemed like I wasn't entirely in my body anymore, I wanted nothing more than to push off that windowsill with eyes closed. I could tell you how it was only the thought of how 441 was so long that it extended not only from where I came from to where I was right then but to places I hadn't even seen yet. I could tell you how I climbed back into my bedroom and tried to sleep based only on imagery and promises made in Tom Petty songs.

I could tell you about when I finally left America. I could tell you all the good things about therapy and falling in love and Canadian healthcare but what hasn't already been said about them? I could tell you about how relieved I was to leave but how much my heart ached the night before I was set to cross the border as a landed immigrant. I could tell you how in a Days Inn in Buffalo, I took my own photo in front of an American flag my dad had packed with me. I could tell you what a relief it was to leave and how it broke my heart that I was right that there was a little more to life somewhere else.

I could tell you about how strange it is to be an American girl these days. I could tell you about wanting to turn your back on everything you once knew. I could tell you about how sad it is to grow up and realize everything you were taught was bullshit. I could tell you how much sadder it is to realize the privilege you have in that system. I could tell you how complicated it is to be OK with being an American girl. I could tell you that there is shame there.

I will tell you that Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers recorded "American Girl" on July 4th, 1976, the bicentennial of the United States. I will tell you that this song has the jangliest guitars I've heard played the way you might a new wave song: fast, danceable, hopeful. I will tell you that Tom Petty seems like one thing ("dad rock") to a lot of people; I will tell you that those people are idiots. I will tell you that Tom Petty is not only one of the finest songwriters and musicians of any period but he is exactly what we could want in an artist: open, curious, flawed. I will tell you that Tom Petty was open to growth, open to change, open to being wrong. I will tell you that this is almost more important than his music; the risk with which he lived and created is the most American thing I could ever imagine: being able to be wrong is being free.

Jonathan Bogart on

“Here Comes My Girl”

In the wake of the news, grieving in my particular way (listening through a Spotify playlist), I tweeted: “Have I ever felt an emotion that wasn’t expressed by Tom Petty in songs millions of people love?” This is one of the rare songs whose central emotion I haven’t ever really experienced, but that’s in large part because I’ve never felt a tithe as cool as Petty sounds here, drawling spoken-word verses like a redneck Lou Reed (or Clarence Carter) over a musical bed that is all tension and sparkle, beat poetry overgrown with kudzu and lit by burned-out neon. Of course beyond the affect, I know the feelings the verses express, intimately: “I ain’t really sure but it seems I remember the good times were just a little bit more… in focus.” Ain’t that the truth. “It just seems so useless to have to work so hard, and nothin’ ever really seems to... come from it.” It does indeed. But then Benmont’s piano stabs into a key change, and Petty’s relaxed voice strengthens into song, and “she looks me in the eye-eye-eye” and all that exultation and pride and joy and no, it’s gone. I don’t get looked in the eye-eye-eye, or the solidarity of thatlittlegirlstandingrightbymyside, or told “we gonna last forever,” and if I did I would certainly begin to doubt it. But I still keep listening to it, as though to teach myself how to someday feel it, to prepare my soul for the eventuality that the unspeakable hope (heaven, an earlier thinker might have said, and I can’t say they’re wrong) embodied in the crooning, crashing chorus might become fulfilled, somehow, in my hearing. "Here comes my girrrrl," Petty purrs, as dewy-eyed and shimmering as a lovestruck Merseybeat combo, and the posturing verses resolve into just another line, something to say to pass the time until love happens. All you need, they say.

Rebecca Gowns on

“The Waiting”

I had a feeling that my baby would come early, but she didn't -- she made me wait. I kept checking the validity of my pregnancy as it progressed, and as soon as I hit 36 weeks, I was more than ready. I woke up every morning and thought, "This is it. Today could be the day." I had my hospital bag packed; our parents on speed-dial; my to-do list was empty. I dutifully attended prenatal yoga classes every week and watched the room shift week by week as the other women started to disappear. "She was past 9 months," the yoga instructor would say of a disappearing woman, "so we probably won't see her anymore. It was just her time!" The chorus of "The Waiting" kept coming back to me, a distant refrain that grew louder and louder. "You take it on faith, you take it to the heart. The waiting is the hardest part." Like all of Tom Petty's songs, the melody is simple, the hook grabs, then you realize, when you look a little closer, that it's made from strange glass. It's the ballad of the bad boy gone good, the absence making the heart grow fonder, the time that stretches between each date with someone who's really special. And then, as I pulled up the song and unpeeled the verses, it came to me through another lens: a song from a parent to the child on the way. Where did these words come from? What I'm struck by the most now is the bridge — "Don't let em kill you baby, don't let em get to you / I'll be your breathin' heart, I'll be your cryin' fool" — a vulnerable plea almost buried by guitars, but when you hear it, it's gutting. These are exactly the words I was thinking of on the surgery table, when I saw my daughter for the first time. She was a week overdue, and the hardest part, oh, all the hardest parts, just fell apart as I kissed her face. When I look back at those long hours of anticipation, this song will always be the score.

Thomas Inskeep on

“You Got Lucky”

In the fall of 1982, I was in 7th grade, and thanks to a contest at school (which involved selling tickets to a “variety show” put on by the parents of the band and choir members in grades 7-12), I won my first stereo of my own. It was a Panasonic boombox (very similar to this one), and I was very quickly in its thrall. I was already a huge fan of American Top 40, and now, whenever I was in my room after school, the radio was on, tuned to the local top 40 station. Top 40 radio as 1982 became 1983 was a fascinating thing: there were still plenty of soft, AC/pop records on the charts (from “Baby, Come to Me” to “You and I”), along with a heavy dose of AOR from the likes of Journey, Don Henley, Sammy Hagar, and John Cougar — but there was also the creeping influence of Britain’s new wave, as Culture Club and Duran Duran were each on their first US hits, and A Flock of Seagulls their second. And while Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ “You Got Lucky” was ostensibly AOR — by this point Petty, alongside the likes of Cougar and Bob Seger, was one of the kings of “heartland rock” — this single was different, too. It was the first of Petty’s singles I remember knowing when it was out, and it opened with (and was based around) eerie keyboards from Benmont Tench. “You Got Lucky” sounded futuristic in a way that, say, “Jack and Diane” didn’t, and it was fitting that its video (whose concept was the band’s own) echoed the prior year’s Mad Max, because this wasn’t regular old meat & potatoes rock ’n roll. This sounded unusual, especially to a 12-year-old whose musical tastes were just forming. I’d often play the radio low, after I had to turn out my bedroom light, listening to every bit of top 40 magic I could before falling asleep, and “Lucky” sounded even better, and eerier, at night, like a transmission from somewhere distant, coming to me through the night sky, bouncing off the stars. I’d later learn that being synth-based, it was a bit of an outlier in the Petty catalog, but in a way that makes it even greater. “You Got Lucky” is still one of my favorite Tom Petty songs, and it still, 35 years later, sounds better (long) after dark.

Ian Mathers on

“Don’t Come Around Here No More”

In all the tributes to Tom Petty since his death, people keep (understandably) coming back to the clarity, consistency, and quality of his songwriting; something about it seems to have dated less than many of his contemporaries. I know as a little kid growing up in the “Free Fallin’”/“Into the Great Wide Open” days, when radio or MuchMusic would play “Don’t Come Around Here No More” the clearly, uh, stylized (and so impossible for young me to peg to an era) fashions in the Alice in Wonderland-homaging video combined with that evergreen nature of Petty’s talents meant that it took me a lot longer with him than with many of his peers to actually understand that he’d had a lengthy, productive career, and not just an amazing clutch of out-of-time hits. Now, older and with more of a basic grounding in the production sound of various decades, the relative datedness of those stiff electronic drums (or at least the treatment given to Stan Lynch’s drums, once you look at the credits) and co-writer Dave Stewart’s forebodingly sleazy electric sitar seems like it should date “Don’t Come Around Here No More”, but as more than one admiring musician has noted (cf. here for some examples), it still doesn’t. It’s like, to take an example that otherwise has very little in common with this song, the way the Stooges used sleigh bells on “I Wanna Be Your Dog” — a totally incongruous element in the band’s sound that, by virtue of the strength of the song, sounds in this one context perfectly natural. One of the amazing things about Petty-as-craftsman was that you could get such an off-kilter, hugely loved, emotionally compelling song out of such disparate parts; a song called “Don’t Come Around Here No More” from an album called Southern Accents you might think would dip into politics somewhere, but it’s based on the time Stewart crashed at Stevie Nicks’ mansion after a party and woke up to hear her telling off recently ex-boyfriend Joe Walsh with the title phrase. Which then turns into Petty (a close friend of and potent collaborator with Nicks, and that’s where we’ll leave it for this blurb) giving an amazing performance, his voice sounding authentically strained throughout as he groans and wails and moves through arch disdain, richly self-mocking sarcasm, genuine sounding ache, pained fatigue, and several other examples of the densely textured, often unsung, totally quotidian emotional registers he could summon so effortlessly. Like so much of his work, it feels like a magic trick; rare are the singers or songwriters (let alone both) who could do so much, not with so little (never forget that the Heartbreakers are one of the greatest bands-as-indivisible-units ever forged, and his own talents were staggering) but with so much that just seems standard or normal. The flashiest thing about “Don’t Come Around Here No More” (even that sitar feels totally normal by halfway through) is the memorably creepy video, yet another example of Petty being one of the only acts at his level to consistently come out with actually really good videos, probably because he was willing to put them in the hands of others and had seemingly no ego as to how he came off (neither the snide, vaguely murderous Hatter here nor the pathetic creep in “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” were particularly good looks, which only made him seem cooler — he got that he not only didn’t have to always be the hero, but that it would get boring and honestly weaken the emotional storytelling in his songs if he insisted on it). There are probably dozens of Petty songs I could have picked to illustrate just how amazing (and, thankfully, loved) he was and in such often unassuming ways, but I kept coming back to “Don’t Come Around Here No More” because, no matter what the emotional truth of the situation that inspired Stewart and Petty in the beginning or even whatever Petty brought to the performance, this is for me maybe the strongest example of Petty willing to appear potentially wrong, cruel… hell, petty. More than many of his peers Petty seemed to realize that great songs can’t and shouldn’t just be aspirational, that we need songs just as much (or even more) when we are feeling uncharitable, wounded, disdainful, and so on. Plenty of people have given us indelible songs, but Tom Petty might have been the only songwriter at his level of prominence who covered as much of the emotional spectrum in doing so.

Anthony Easton on

“Southern Accents”

I am ambivalent about Tom Petty in the ways I am about most classic rock, acknowledging the talent and skill that they display, but never quite thinking that they are for me. Americana’s ambivalent relationship to country gives me more room to interleave my own fears of labour and of working class desire on a history that plays with a generic geography. The South is never generic, the politics are never quite clear, but the clarity is about overlapping crises of very specific locations.

Patterson Hood talks about the crisis of specificity in an obituary for Petty, about how he is not really sure about how to be southern, or what the negatives of being in the South are, he talks about the gap between expectations and reality, between representation and the failure of those representations to represent: “Doing what I do, I am often asked about my favorite Southern rock band. It’s a term I always hated (and used it with that in mind as part of a title for one of Drive-By Truckers’ albums). The question is usually prefaced with another, framed as a simple choice: Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd? The correct answer for me is R.E.M. and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers...”

This song is an argument for the South — which is slow, local, interior — a ballad with a tight harmony, a deconstruction of the sweetness of the South (“that drunk tank in Atlanta, just a motel room to me”) and a reification of southern instinct (how he sings about his momma). It’s not the line about Orlando that makes it local, or even how he talks about his mother, but how it threads the needle between Stephen Foster and the Allman Brothers, between hymnody and Michael Stipe’s lonely baritone.

This was a title track for an album from 1986. There are things that must be said. I wonder whether the oranges in Orlando would be picked by someone less pale than Petty. Whether the drunk tank would be as hospitable if he weren’t white — or to someone who is quite local, whether all the accents of the south are as laconic as Petty’s. He had the Stars and Bars decorating the tour for this album, and he apologized for that oversight (and oversight is a politeness) more than a decade later.

All of that said, maybe the most southern thing about the song is that the South is constructed as a narrative of nostalgia. That one always seeks to return to a South, if one is white, if one can afford that desire. It is a song that was written, in a grand historicised style, by a man from Florida who was living in Los Angeles. It is about the idea of Florida as a metonym of the South, of the South as a metonym for this swamp of nostalgia that can only be written about outside of the actual, material swamp.

Maybe that’s why it’s so perfect.

John Seroff on

“Spike”

Part of what made Tom Petty an artist whose work survived comfortably into the new millennium is that while his songs reflected the perspective of an affable and genuine Southerner, there warn't a lotta peckerwood in him. That's clearest to me on "Spike," a misfired 1985 Heartbreakers single about a young punk frequenting a shitkicker bar. It's fun to hear Petty gleefully set up the genesis of the tune in this 2012 live performance of "Spike" as if it's his own personal Alice's Restaurant, drawling wise about "hippie killers in The Cypress Lounge." Can there be any doubt about where Petty's sympathies lie? Surely he knew the firsthand frustration of being thought "another misfit, another Jimmy Dean," laughed out of the club for being a white trash, would-be new wave poseur in a leather jacket. But Petty was more than petty; there's a meaningful final reel twist of sympathy for the redneck when our narrator comes around to asking the punk with the leather jewelry more and more seriously to tell him about life. In the end, this backwoods Budweiser guzzler cops that maybe he "need me a dog collar too, boy." All this over the train track chug of drums, a twangy lean guitar and a trotting organ nipping at the singer's heels like an old hound dog. "Spike" never quite got the radio toehold that its psychedelic, sitar-driven album-mate "Don't Come Around Here No More" did, but I happen to think it has aged better. It's sharp, catchy, demands a little hard fought insight from its subject and, perhaps, from the listener. Anyways, in an American South divided by the urban and the unemployed, what message could land more squarely true than that the future ain't what it used to be?

Josh Langhoff on

“I Won’t Back Down”

Behold the Annunciation: In early 1990 I got musical advice chiefly from Breakaway magazine, the adolescent boys’ indoctrination ministry of James Dobson’s Focus on the Family empire. Their reviewer was a kindly dad type and an enigma. He told me to avoid Paula Abdul’s “Opposites Attract,” because of the line “She makes the bed/ and he steals the covers”: clearly Paula and the Wild Pair were sleeping together, rendering the song off limits for Christian teens. A reasonable reading; but even so, thoughts arrived like butterflies. What if Paula Abdul was supposed to be married to the Wild Pair? By quoting this troublesome line in Breakaway, wasn’t the fatherly columnist soiling boys’ minds as thoroughly as if we’d listened to “Opposites Attract”? In fact, the sexual implications of the line only occurred to me because of this fatherly columnist’s advice! After which they continued to occur to me, daily. Again and again.

So when the columnist recommended Full Moon Fever, and particularly “I Won’t Back Down,” whose summer of ‘89 radio run I’d missed, I was intrigued. He speculated that some of Bob Dylan’s “Christian principles” had rubbed off on Petty; I’d only recently learned how to pronounce Dylan’s name. “Look!” I said excitedly to Mom, jabbing my finger at the magazine I’d stuck in her face, “Breakaway says I can get the Tom Petty tape!” That was good enough for Mom, who really had nothing against secular music — particularly oldies radio, which we enjoyed together during her crossing guard shifts. Upon purchase, I was surprised to learn “I Won’t Back Down” contained the word “hell,” which I wasn’t allowed to say lest I trivialize the place and spend eternity paying for the privilege. I also found puzzles I couldn’t solve — songs about Zombie Zoos and Micanopy, mysterious romances that appeared briefly and then drifted off like cattail fluff. On the Christian tapes Mom put in my Easter basket every year, forthright literalism was a given. With Petty it seemed merely an option, to be discarded on a whim.

“I thought that it was maybe just too direct,” Tom Petty once said of “I Won’t Back Down.” “There isn’t really anything to hide behind here, you know?” Which probably explains why the Christian reviewer recommended it. But listening to Full Moon Fever daily, again and again — in my room with the door closed, or on the Walkman while Mom ran errands and practiced the organ — I never heard the song as an anthem. Repeated scrutiny simply forced “I Won’t Back Down” further down inside me. Singing the song in public, with other people, seemed as gauche as Soldiers for Christ using a metaphor. That dry opening march of guitars, the build into the explosive chorus harmonies, the tuneless way Petty pronounced the song title (fun to imitate in the shower!) were all private pleasures, to be treasured up and pondered in my heart. As Mary said upon learning her son was adored by multitudes: “Huh. Weird.”

Jessica Doyle on

“Runnin’ Down a Dream”

The Florida Turnpike features some of the dullest driving in America: miles upon miles with no exits save to the white-grouted, Dunkin-Donuts-equipped rest centers, and nothing in between to lay your eyes on save the occasional landfill or billboards informing you, for the 33rd time since you left Kissimmee-St. Cloud, that a baby's heart starts beating at 18 days. The last time I drove the Turnpike I had two kids in the back seat and thus couldn't put "Runnin' Down a Dream" on; it would have been irresponsible; my foot would have put the gas into bad-mom territory as soon as I heard those opening chords. The song isn't actually set on the Turnpike, like I self-absorbedly thought — Petty mentions trees — but I have the two linked together: because to have the career he had Tom Petty had to get the heck out of Florida. The United States, the southern half especially, has been justly criticized for its longstanding love affair with cars and the nature-chewing, community-leveling highways built to accommodate them; and maybe I should be condemning "Runnin' Down a Dream" for its unabashed embrace of the promise of traveling on your own, even if there isn't that much to look at outside, even if there's no one else in the car. Petty wrote plenty of songs later about discovering that there was not, after all, something unequivocally good waiting down that road. But listening to those guitars, and his voice as if he's telling you his story at sunrise after returning your lighter, it's easy to rejoice in the going; as if even a desultory drive down a lonely highway could be an adventure.

Gin Hart on

“Free Fallin’”

"Free Fallin'" is a perfect aphorism. Petty's mild-mannered opening strum and supine vocals offer a kind of blankly evocative space. The mind spores and the spores bloom, emanating across a succinctly yet thoroughly located Los Angeles. You find yourself there on the map by the naming: Reseda/Ventura/Mulholland — they signify themselves, need not be described. You ride through at a near-miraculously spooky hour, the streets devoid of traffic. You could drive fast but don't, letting the heat and the haze impress themselves upon you, the unified field of sheer atmosphere allowing each plot point (map pin) to sprawl through, dig in.

Genius dot com calls this escapism; I can't agree. Even though the first chord switches on a projector in my head, the whir of which I can almost hear, which unspools a film I can almost see. (It'll be useful to note that I have aphantasia. I lack the capacity to visualize... this song makes me feel as though I can grope my way into mind-sight through my feeling-sense, they way Toph can "see" through her seismics. This is visceral every time. Click, flicker, whir). Cinema in its social modality is, sure, joined at the hip with collective fantasy, sure sure. But do you feel unfettered to think of the facts of a life, your life, and not be able to grasp onto them? To know you had and lost sweetness, a girl who's crazy bout Elvis like you are ("my picture of Elvis was... was the American Dream" [btw my personal actual feelings re: Mr. Presley are more like this])? To know you're the villain in the story, and your villainy derives from your apathy, and your apathy is what makes you wanna write her name in the sky? It's wanting to want, which is wanting to stand on something solid. Heartbroken girls have it good — heartbreak as a fetter but also as a certificate of humanity. Proof of being someone, somewhere — gravity, ground.

Los Angeles is mastodon of place and plurality and pavement. If you're there, but not there, if you're above and in the sky and, without a parachute, falling, you're either death-doomed to splat or damned to a perpetuity of disorientation. Petty and Lynne's vocals soar through the chorus, describing the plummet of unreadiness. Tumbling and repeating and ultimately fading out, gonna leave. this. world for a while.

Ian Mathers on

“Zombie Zoo”

Maybe it’s because I grew up in such a sarcastic family (where, crucially, it was used both for humour and to express affection), but a lot of the Tom Petty songs that others seem to take as being fairly straightforwardly negative I read as a little more…. not necessarily positive, but let’s say multivalent. I know I’m not the only person my age to assume that making fun of something and loving it can coexist without friction (and I know that problems that can lead to, but that’s another blurb). When you combine that with me being not-quite-eight when Full Moon Fever came out and my mom picked up the CD and I started playing it obsessively, you get a little kid who wouldn’t realize for, uh, at least a decade that many people think of “Zombie Zoo” as a song where Petty officially becomes a grouchy old man, sneering at the punk kids. Now, I guess I’d point out that if that’s the way he felt, 1989 is kind of a weird year to start taking potshots at punk (being both too late and too soon) and that the less positive lyrics here feel more to me like rueful remembrance of what it’s like to be a kid than some sort of damning indictment. But when I was less than a decade old I mostly would have just told you that 1. the synthesizers sound like a baseball game 2. a “zombie zoo” sounds like something out of a video game i.e. awesome 3. this was probably the song on the album I most wanted to put on repeat and jump up and down to, three minutes at a time. I’d find out later that the Zombie Zoo was an actual club Petty and company walked past or went into one night (I can’t track down the anecdote) and were slightly nonplussed by, and that the line wasn’t the evocatively ungrammatical “painin’ in a corner” but in fact “painted in a corner” (which is probably better, and again speaks to the sympathy I feel like Petty clearly has for his “target,” but I still have a sentimental fondness for my mishearing). And now I can appreciate the steady gallop and sturdy construction of the song and Roy Orbison’s backing vocals, but one thing hasn’t changed: especially for a star as resistant to quick-changing notions of “cool” as Petty was, I’m not at all convinced that “you look like Boris Karloff and you don’t even care!” was intended to be insulting instead of admiring.

[2whatcom-blog]

Think about Dragons’ Dan Reynolds on Mission to Make AS Mainstream

In 2015, Think about Dragons entrance man Dan Reynolds took the mic in entrance of a stadium filled with adoring followers. No, he wasn't about to carry out one in every of his band's hits. As a substitute, he was on the brink of make a private, susceptible admission. Reynolds was affected by the power ache of ankylosing spondylitis (AS), an autoimmune illness that could be a sort of arthritis of the backbone. He was able to share his standing with the world. "This is the truth, I've never said this publicly ever, and I'm just going to say it tonight it because it's just part of my life now. Does anybody out there suffer from any disease? Nobody wants to raise their hands," Reynolds mentioned to some laughs and cheers. The viewers was hanging on each phrase. "I have something called ankylosing spondylitis. It's an autoimmune disease. I've never spoken about it because, to be frank with you, I've been embarrassed. And tonight I'm gonna share it, because there's probably other people out there who suffer from it, too."

Monster Ache within the AS

It was a giant admission for Reynolds. Till that evening at Leeds Enviornment in West Yorkshire, England, as a part of the band's "Smoke + Mirrors" tour, he'd by no means come ahead along with his analysis. Now, he was making himself the face of a situation that impacts hundreds of thousands however would not stand as a recognizable title to the general public at massive. "I was diagnosed with AS in my early 20s so I've been dealing with quite a while. It's been a frustrating process and also educating for me, I guess. Not a lot of people know about it. It's super hard to pronounce. It's such a hidden disease that hasn't been in the mainstream," Reynolds, 31, advised Healthline. "Finally, I spoke up about it at my show, and basically said, 'well, this is part of my life.' I wanted to start to live a little more, just be a little more human. It's a big part of my story." Reynolds is at the moment serving because the face of Monster Ache within the AS, an ankylosing spondylitis consciousness marketing campaign from Novartis Prescription drugs. Reynolds mentioned that utilizing his superstar platform to "bring AS to the mainstream" was necessary to him as a result of it demystifies a less-acknowledged illness and provides different folks with power ache a way that they are not alone.

What's ankylosing spondylitis?

Signs of AS embrace intense swelling, warmth, redness, and power ache within the backbone in addition to the realm the place the underside of the backbone and the pelvis meet, based on the Nationwide Institutes of Well being. It tends to affect males extra severely and runs in households. The again ache and stiffness most usually related to the situation have a tendency to start out in late adolescence or an individual's early grownup years. As time goes on, it may possibly fuse an individual's vertebrae collectively, limiting motion, the American Autoimmune Associated Illness Affiliation reported. Dr. Suleman Bhana, a rheumatologist at Crystal Run Healthcare in Middletown, NY, who has been working with the marketing campaign, advised Healthline that the situation is much less uncommon than many individuals assume. He mentioned AS impacts about 2 million folks all through the USA, however that quantity might be even greater, as many individuals who've it may not even understand it. "It's not as easy as diagnosing something like appendicitis. This requires a lot of thought of where the pain is originating from. It can affect the whole body, not one organ, specifically," Bhana defined. "We look at the whole body and see where joint pain may have a connection to eye symptoms and skin symptoms and bowel symptoms. Arriving at a diagnosis may take time... before a person can put a name to what is going on with their body."

Placing a reputation to power ache

Reynolds remembers the primary time he skilled unexplainable ache in his early 20s. He remembers going mountain climbing alongside a canyon in Los Angeles and feeling a deep, stabbing ache in his thigh joints and hips. "It made no sense. I had no point of injury. Over the next week it got worse and worse. At nighttime it was bad. Then, in the morning, I would have bad morning stiffness for hours, to the extent where I wouldn't want to get out of bed," Reynolds recalled. "I had X-rays to figure this out -- this was before our band was even signed. I remember living in my studio apartment with a wife and a baby and no health insurance. It was a really scary time." Reynolds noticed a revolving door of medical doctors. Completely different situations have been ascribed to his ache. He mentioned it took a yr of trial-by-error makes an attempt to determine what was incorrect earlier than he discovered a rheumatologist who recognized him. He was 24 when he was in a position to definitively say he had AS. Reynolds mentioned he instantly felt higher lastly having the ability to put a reputation to his ache. "You would think it would be a scary, overwhelming feeling when someone says you have an autoimmune disease. It really was a relief. The rheumatologist made me feel good, 'hey, we are going to sit down, get a treatment plan,'" he mentioned. "Within a week, I was feeling better. This was after over a year of debilitating pain with no results, doctor after doctor." Reynolds's expertise is not unusual, mentioned Leonard Calabrese, DO, director of the R.J. Fasenmyer Heart for Medical Immunology in Cleveland Clinic's Division of Rheumatic and Immunologic Illnesses. He mentioned that given how many individuals expertise power again ache and irritation on the whole, it may be onerous to diagnose AS instantly. "It's diagnosed with a combination of factors," Calabrese, who is not affiliated with the marketing campaign, advised Healthline. "If back pain generally persists for greater than three months, if it's worse in the mornings, then gets better, then inflames again -- that inflammatory back pain is a cardinal symptom of ankylosing spondylitis. There are a variety of other manifestations as well, such as tendinitis and inflammation of the eyes. It's quite systemic. The pain spreads through the body." Calabrese added that after AS is suspected, an individual wants a correct analysis, which can embrace a sequence of X-rays or an MRI of the again.

Utilizing his platform for good

Reynolds -- who additionally has ulcerative colitis -- mentioned that dwelling with power diseases requires a degree of self-discipline. To handle his AS, the therapy plan he and his rheumatologist devised consists of train and food regimen. He has additionally discovered yoga to be a useful means of getting blood circulating to components of his physique which may usually be painful or sore. Reynolds is on an anti-inflammatory food regimen as nicely, having pinpointed that some meals are likely to set off his irritation. After adhering to this adjustment to his food regimen and train routine for the previous decade, he calls what he has a "low active disease" now. Whereas he nonetheless experiences flare-ups and ache, he has been doing the whole lot doable to stay "relatively free of pain." Calabrese and Bhana each mentioned that this sort of persistent ache administration is the most effective recourse for folks with AS. At the moment, no remedy exists. After all, when one leads a life on the highway, discovering the self-discipline to handle power diseases will be troublesome. Reynolds mentioned that a job with excessive stress and many journey can result in poor sleep and the temptation to eat unhealthily. Earlier on in his profession, when he did not have that a lot cash, Reynolds mentioned it was simple to fall right into a lure of consuming inflammation-inducing quick meals. "It's a balancing act. I do have flare-ups if I'm not careful. I just have to keep it up," he mentioned. Being a dad to a few daughters has additionally influenced Reynold to be as wholesome as doable. His life as a mum or dad has prompted him to make use of the privilege that comes along with his worldwide platform for good. "I've found that there's strength in numbers for the community of people who have autoimmune diseases," Reynolds mentioned. "What are you doing to help? When I spoke about AS on stage that time, it was a product of me being in the middle of a flare-up. I was in a bad place, playing a show overseas. I thought 'I'm in a roomful of friends and fans, I'm in a lot of pain, this is why.'" Permitting himself to be open about AS opened up a brand new group for Reynolds. He mentioned that connecting with folks, whether or not on-line in boards or on social media, or in particular person at concert events and occasions, is highly effective. What's some key recommendation he'd provide others who're affected by power ache and do not know the place to show? "I would just say if you have unexplained back pain like what I've experienced, stop Googling it," he confused. "A lot of people in the world think they're doctors, everyone thinks they are doctors now, they go on Google for a diagnosis. I say that you see a rheumatologist, seek real help. No, you don't have to suffer alone." Read the full article