#she’s just got some major arthritis issues

[gendervapor14]

my old lady kitty says hello and thank you 🥰

[theminecraftbee]

the summer before THE END...

(this fic contains @hotguycomiczine spoilers! go read it first! i'll wait!)

It’s midday. The sun is heavy and hot, bearing down against the asphalt and visibly making the air shimmer over the road. Summer in Hermitopia can be miserable, and frankly Cuteguy thinks it’s far more miserable than the bruises. The humidity makes his feathers stick together and itch in awkward ways, he’s sweaty twice over because he hadn’t had time to actually wash his costume between the last major villain attack, his recent part-time line cook job, and then this fight.

He’s in his early thirties and he’s becoming an old man, he thinks. His knees should not hurt this much, and yet here they are. Vigilantism is going to give him early arthritis.

They’ve driven off the villain. Didn’t manage to catch him, though. He wasn’t even from Hermitopia. That’s been happening more lately; people who see Hermitopia as some lawless wasteland where they can come visit, avoid drinking any water, and live out their dreams of being a comic book character, damn the consequences or collateral damage. It’s frustrating. Sometimes, deep in Cuteguy’s soul, he sort of thinks the Soup Group has a point in calling out all this bullshit.

Of course, they do all that murder about it. So. Not much better, really.

He leans against a building and tries to breathe. Normally he has a water bottle with his costume, but this guy had homemade napalm. Luckily, not real napalm! The water did work for putting out the fire! Unfortunately, it’s ninety-seven degrees and humid and Cuteguy has just done enough cardio that he’s honestly worried about the odds he passes out. 

Out on the street, Hotguy is chatting with every civilian he comes across. He’s grandstanding. He’s giving blow-by-blows. He’s acting like his sweat doesn’t stink like a mere mortal’s. He has a water bottle, and he’s taking sips of it between chats with reporters and posing for cameras. There are enough cars and civilians that Cuteguy isn’t all that worried about the TCG yet. Hotguy’s still pretty damn wanted, what with the whole possession thing that they don’t exactly have the means to prove to the public, so Cuteguy’s got to keep an eye out for them, but with this many cameras on him? The TCG isn’t about to arrest him on camera. Despite everything, he's still too charismatic; he'd still make them look too bad. 

Cuteguy wipes his forehead again. He does notice when someone starts approaching him; he might be exhausted, but he’s acting as Hotguy’s situational awareness while he’s busy playing up crowds. He can’t afford to be that exhausted, so he isn’t. That, and the woman approaching him is hardly as stealthy as the Bleeding Hart. Another thing he might have to give to the Soup Group were he willing to give them credit for anything: he’s never been able to fully stop noticing where everyone is around him. Hotguy had winced and called it “hypervigilance”. Cuteguy had said that he wasn’t any better, he just calls it a superpower. Hotguy had said it is hardly his fault his superpower promotes vigilance. Cuteguy had—

“Uh, good fight. Thanks,” says the woman.

“Oh, uh. You’re welcome,” Cuteguy says.

She’s tall and blonde. Also, she has four arms. Cuteguy should have probably noticed that first, but he didn’t, and that’s on him.

“Bit of a mess, especially in this weather. Hotter and they’d issue a heat advisory, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Cuteguy says.

He is not good at post-battle smalltalk. That’s why it’s Hotguy’s job. He’s good at causing chaos if needed, but chaos is the opening the TCG would need to get to Hotguy. Cuteguy glances in his direction. He’s posing and signing autographs still. He can’t help but sigh. They’re going to be here all day.

The four-armed lady follows his gaze.

“You know, I’d always wondered why you stick to him,” she says.

“Sorry?” Cuteguy says.

“I just mean—I watched the fight. Yeah, he’s good, but you’re decent at range too. You can get enough height to really not need perfect accuracy because you’ll be hard to hit. Wings are, uh, a pretty overpowered combat tool, really, especially when most of your enemies are on the ground. But you’re good at close range, so, uh, inside isn’t awful for you either, really.”

“I mean, you’re right, I am pretty good,” Cuteguy says, interrupting her. “I don’t really get—”

“Look at him,” the woman says. “You ran around more than him and he took the water bottle.”

Cuteguy wants to defend Hotguy for that one; it’s hardly his fault that Cuteguy dumped his water bottle on napalm like it would do anything. It did, which is convenient, but still. Not Hotguy’s call. He doesn’t quite get the chance.

“Even after everything last month, he’s still grandstanding too. Sure, he’s stopped shooting people for not being grateful enough, or holding rescues hostage for cash, but look at him. Hardly any better, is he. Sure, he says he was possessed—”

“He was,” Cuteguy snaps.

“—but like, is the guy he is now actually all that different? Just saying.”

Cuteguy stares at the man trying to get extra photo ops out of a group of passing runners. They’re topless to account for the heat, which is probably why Hotguy wants photos with them. Cuteguy can just barely hear the man asking to trade phone numbers. Is it worse or better, Cuteguy wonders, that the phone number Hotguy gives out just goes straight to Cub’s inbox? Is that catfishing or just good sense?

“He’s trying to help,” Cuteguy says.

“He’s desperate for attention,” the four-armed woman says. “You know, you’d probably be better without him. After everything that happened, your reputation would be better too. A little more in the shadows, a little less associated with his crimes.”

“He’s…”

“I just want the real reason, really,” the woman says. 

“What do you…”

“Why would you stick with him when you’re so much better?”

Hotguy waves goodbye to the runners. He takes another sip of the water bottle. Really, there’s so much that Cuteguy can say here, watching that. He could say something about how, in the terrible days when the Soup Group had first come onto the scene, Hotguy had barely left Cuteguy’s side until Cuteguy started pushing him away. He could say that Hotguy is earnest, that he really does want to save people, despite the fact he also wants attention. He could say that he knows the man behind the mask now, and he’s seen his films, and frankly getting a little recognition as Hotguy kind of makes up for not getting recognition for his decent acting talent. He could say something about playing Mario Kart on the couch, or learning to aim a bow, or fights with Doc, or secrets shared that Cuteguy wants to make sure Hotguy never has an incentive to spread. He could say something about how dangerous fighting alone is. That’s probably the more sensible thing to say, actually; Cuteguy knows exactly how dangerous fighting alone is.

What Cuteguy says is this:

“He makes me happy.”

There is a long not-quite silence as sirens and cicadas fill the summer air.

“Huh,” the woman says.

Cuteguy doesn’t say anything else.

“Well. I mean. I don’t really know how to save you from that, so I guess I’ll just leave you to it,” the woman says. “Consider if he’s really worth it.”

She leaves. Cuteguy stares after her a moment before shaking his head and going back to scanning the crowd for any known TCG elements.

“Birdie!” Hotguy crows, running over from the reporters. “We’re on the 5 PM news!”

“Really? An out-of-towner with questionable pyrotechnics made it?” 

“I got it worked out,” Hotguy says confidently. “But, uh, with that said, you look like you need some AC and a drink. I have so much Gatorade in my fridge that it isn’t even funny. All the labels are pulled off because it’s for that one football movie I did, right? And for some reason they didn’t want to give Gatorade the product placement, so they made all these sports drinks without—”

“Not in-costume, Hotguy,” Cuteguy says, but he doesn’t put any heat into it.

“—oh, you know no one’s listening, lighten up! Anyway, so the movie ended up somehow ordering far too many bottles, and you know what they say about underpaid actors and free food—or, I’m not sure it’s actually an expression, but let me tell you, I have never turned it down. And with the number of ele… electo-mites? I think? You know, all the sweat we’re sweaty about—come on Cuteguy, I don’t want you passing out on the pavement, I really didn’t mean to get caught out that long!” Hotguy says, grabbing Cuteguy’s hand to take him back to his apartment.

Miserable heat or not, Cuteguy can’t help but smile slightly.

“I don’t want to pass out either, that’s why I’m not running, Hotguy,” he says, and he lets himself be tugged along in that man’s wake once more.

[amusementofaprincess]

I swear my nana thinks I’m staying here because I want to and not because I’m not 100% ready to be on my own.

I could probably do my stairs at least once but i don’t think I’m up to cooking 3 meals a day for myself, plus I need to get groceries before I go back to my own apartment for good. And I’m waiting to see what my follow up CT scan says Thursday.

She acts like I should be doing all of the housework. I get tired going to small stores like dollar general! Not as bad as I did when I first got out of the hospital for the 3rd time but still.

And I do housework- i sweep the whole place every day, do laundry, and help with dishes. I also have pulled the trash when it’s not too full and feed her cat and mom’s dog.

She wants me to swiffer and bring the trash to the dumpster but she made the trash bags so heavy I can’t lift them either. And I told her I’d swiffer tomorrow, but she just made a comment about how she asked me to do it today. Her new swiffer is in the back of my mom’s car, which is currently at my apartment while she cuddles and feeds my babies.

I don’t think she understands that 1) I had MAJOR SURGERY 2) I had complications from said MAJOR SURGERY not once but twice 3) I have psoriatic arthritis and psoriasis - even with out the whole surgery issue some days I just can only do so much. But they cut open my whole stomach. My muscles are still getting used to be used as muscles and I think the abscess by my liver is still there because sometimes it hurts.

And she makes me feel bad that mom is taking care of my animals. I know doing my stairs is hard for my mom - I tell her she can skip a day since she always leaves them plenty of food and water - but she LIKES spending 2-4 hours over there. She gets to cuddle my cats, who she loves, gets alone time and gets to pet my rats, who she is less scared of as time goes on.

My goal is to be home by new years and I will be. My mom said she’ll come over a few times a week (or more) and help me out. And I am working on a grocery list that is basically all crock pot meal ingredients. My plan is get my mom to help me pre-prep a bunch and toss them in the freezer.

But this woman is driving me insane. I am not here to be your maid. I am trying to help as much as I can but if I do too much I’ll never ever better.

[stealtharchaeologist]

@modernpolymath Hoo boy, that was a LOT. Sorry for the very long responses in turn, I am working through some thoughts. Thank you SO MUCH for all of this good information. Here we go:

I looked up the tests for IH, I've done overnight sleep tests but not the naps. I will totally bring this up to my sleep doc. Very curious if the naps would find anything interesting or useful.

Yeah, I have a gastroenterology appointment in May. It's funny that you and I had discussed Crohn's a long, long time ago, but I never considered it for myself until recently. I've got SOME sort of IBD, for sure, but we'll see what exactly. Very interesting that there's some sort of connection between IBD and sleep issues? Makes sense inasmuch as, if you're not properly absorbing nutrients, you'd be tired, but I wonder if there's more connection than that?

I had NO IDEA narcolepsy was potentially autoimmune! Fascinating! My pain doc told me at some point that she usually sees autoimmune disorders come in threes. I've had rheumatoid arthritis my whole life, and was just diagnosed with Hashimoto's thyroiditis, so gotta find number 3. Likely Crohn's. It totally makes sense, if your immune system is gonna erroneously attack one thing, why shouldn't it attack all the things?

Have you been able to stay off of the Remicade? I know biologics are super rough, so even if going off of it didn't help your fatigue, I hope you are able to do okay without it.

I will do some more research on the modafinil. The liver toxicity language was starting to get too technical for me when I was digging before, but I'll stick with it this time, lol.

Ohhhh. Thank you for the heads up. I'm between birth control methods right now. I was on Depo Provera for like... eight years? Then got a new gyno and she didn't want to continue it. Apparently long term use causes bone density loss, and since osteoporosis runs rampant in my family, I saw the wisdom in discontinuing. She suggested the arm implant, but, uh... I have... a Major Problem with picking at any sort of blemishes or weird spots on my skin, so I am Concerned that I would not leave it alone. ://// Really stupid, I know. But I'll bring up the modafinil interference at my next appointment so that we can make a decision with that in mind. I have GOT to restart birth control ASAP. My last period sent me to the ER. 🙃 Fucking love endometriosis.

Oh. Well, shit. I very much ruin my routine on weekends; I tend to not take the modafinil (or drink coffee) and sleep through either Saturday or Sunday. Wahhhh. I'll, uh. Have to seriously consider stopping that.

... to be fair, staying awake on the weekend would improve my mental health. Like. Being only ever at work or in bed means that I do basically nothing wrt leisure activities, which weighs really heavily on me, lol. It would be nice to like, play a video game. Make art. Read a book.

HMMMM. Never even considered that since I'm not hypermobile... though as I say that, I'm reminded that my physical therapists tend to comment on my flexibility... but I've never dislocated anything and my skin isn't stretchy. I will do some digging. I've got a friend with EDS, I'll see if she'll let me pick her brain a bit.

So you did 23&Me? Did it find anything else useful? I am deeply skeptical of the DNA testing trend, but like, if it has actual medical uses, I may reconsider?

Again, thank you so much for all the info. You're giving me a lot to investigate, think about, and potentially act upon. Which I've desperately needed.

[lunasalix]

My grandmother tried to kill herself last week. She has bipolar disorder which she refuses to treat because she likes the manic phases. It got really bad after she married her current husband, C. C is a rapey misogynist, chronic cheater, feral Trump supporter, and just all-around unpleasant. The entire family dislikes him, though most won’t admit it out loud. 

Suddenly, her manic and depressive phases became more pronounced - spiraling into her buying a house she couldn’t afford, fully furnishing it, deciding it needed major remodeling, getting into fights with contractors who understandably walked out, and eventually reselling it at a loss years later, meanwhile going through her various phases and at some points talking about moving there and leaving C. 

Her depressive phases first involved listlessness, but progressed quickly into severe alcoholism. C hid these incidents from the family until it eventually hit crisis level. He covered for her until the times when when she fell and broke her arm, when she fell and gashed her face open, and when she laid in bed without eating for over 2 weeks straight. We only found out when she was in a hospital. 

After the overdose death of my step brother a year and a half ago, she swore off of alcohol. We believed her. She would talk on and on about how his father saved her life by sharing my step brother’s story. Soon after my step brother’s death, she lost one of her brothers to alcoholism. A month later, she lost a nephew to the same thing. 5 months after that, she lost another brother to cancer. We waited for the other shoe to drop, still believing when she said she was done with alcohol. 

Turns out, she had been drinking herself into a stupor for weeks at a time all year long. Last Thursday, C went out to run errands at noon, thinking he had locked up all the alcohol in the house and taking her keys with him. She had made a spare key in secret and used it to buy 1.75L of liquor, which she proceeded to drink 3/4th of over the course of 2 hours before he returned. He took the rest of the bottle, but did nothing else. She told him between episodes of unconsciousness that she was trying to kill herself. He waited until the next morning to call an ambulance. She told them she was trying to kill herself, too. She was in the ICU for 2 days waiting for her BAC to drop enough so that she could be analyzed by a psychiatrist, because even a day later, she was at a blood alcohol content of 2.76. 

She is now in a psychiatric hospital, and my mom (a psych nurse) thinks she will likely be released this coming Friday after a 1-week involuntary hold. She is currently in a manic phase and is saying that she will not be returning home to C, but doesn’t know where she will go yet and is refusing all offers to stay with family. She is also talking about divorce - which is huge given her extremely religious background. My mom is afraid that she will wind up on the streets. While I agree with my grandmother that returning to C is probably not the best idea, the fact that she has no backup plan and no money of her own is worrisome... not to mention her inability to care for herself. 

Here’s the thing about my grandmother: this woman has lived through enough health issues to cripple a small town. She started out with lymphoma when she was almost 40 years old. Shortly after, arthritis set in. Skip forward 20 years, and it was lung cancer from all the smoking. The treatment from that left her with a “wasting disease” that ate away at her muscles and nervous tissue for 2 years before doctors were able to successfully treat it. Another 5 years, and one of her breast implants leaked and gave her breast cancer. Countless skin cancer operations - thankfully all minor.  The arthritis made her hands unusable about 15 years ago, forcing her into disability and early retirement. The lack of routine didn’t help with her bipolar disorder. A few months ago, her emphysema became so severe that she could no longer walk across her own home without getting out of breath, and forget stairs! 

It has been years since she has been capable of doing any of the things she loves. Most of these issues will never improve. There is no treatment or cure for arthritis or emphysema. Nothing will fix her many autoimmune disorders that lead to regular, hospitalization-level illnesses. Her life will not get much better, even without C, bipolar disorder, and alcoholism. In fact, it’s likely to get worse. 

This woman helped raise me. My mom and I lived with her for the first 2 years of my life, and I stayed with her every other weekend for my entire childhood and teenage years. We used to be extremely close before C came into the picture. She was my childhood hero, confidant, advocate, and teacher. It was through her that I found my love of the medical field and science. I don’t want her to suffer. I understand why she has done what she has. I hold nothing against her. The thought of losing her is unimaginably painful, but I feel that it is unethical to keep her locked away or under strict supervision for the rest of her years for fear that she might choose not to live when it is HER life. It is her choice. I have always supported the idea of physician-assisted suicide for the elderly and terminally ill, assuming the proper precautions are taken. I can’t change that opinion just because it’s my grandma and I don’t want to say goodbye yet. It’s not my life to choose. It’s not my suffering to endure or not. 

I guess I’m doing my mourning now, knowing that she doesn’t have long left either way. I will support her in whatever choice she makes, and I want her to know that without being too forthright. I have always supported her choices when the rest of the family fought her. That isn’t going to change now. 

[sirfrogsworth]

Good news, everyone!

Man, it has been rare that I get to say that lately.

But I do actually have some good news.

My mom is home from the hospital and she feels better than she has in months.

They cut out all the infected bits, blasted her with IV antibiotics, and checked her down to the bone to make sure they got everything. She'll need some oral antibiotics for a few weeks yet, but her leg infection seems to be mostly cleared up. She'll have to take good care of the wounds, but she is working with a specialist to make sure we get those healed properly.

She's been living with this infection for MONTHS. Two doctors just wrote it off as a symptom of psoriatic arthritis and told her there was nothing she could do. In fairness, wounds like these are common and usually a bitch to try and get healed. But they didn't even consider an infection on top of that issue.

We could have resolved this a long time ago if they had just suggested she get it looked at by a specialist. That's a little frustrating.

All the signs of infection were there when we have the benefit of hindsight. Mild fevers. Severe brain fog. Dizziness. And, of course, the immense pain.

The moral of the story... it is always super important to advocate for yourself when dealing with doctors. They do not always have enough time to properly assess things like this. If they had lived with my mom and saw the day to day things, I'm sure they would have caught this early. But 20 minute visits are just not suitable for tricky diagnoses. Especially when you have one thing acting like another thing that is more common with her condition.

So it's important to listen to your body. Keep track of every symptom. And when the doctor writes you off and takes an easy out... keep pushing. Keep telling them something more is wrong. And, if necessary, ask to be referred to a specialist for another opinion.

To be clear, these aren't bad doctors. Both of them have come through for my mom on many occasions. It's just that doctors are not infallible and sometimes they screw up. I wish doctors were able to reduce their patient loads and spend more time thinking about each patient. But that just isn't how things work in our current system.

My mom is walking much better already. Her head is so much clearer with no more confusion. She's already talking about coming downstairs to work on laundry.

She still has some healing to do and I am careful not to count my chickens and whatnot, but I truly think we finally have some good news.

Now we just need to get my dad home in his chair.

He did a progress test yesterday and he was able to stand up and sit down from a wheelchair 5 times. He could only do it once a few weeks ago. I'm not sure how many times he needs to do it before he comes home, but this is his last major obstacle he needs to conquer. He needs to be able to stand on his own and do it consistently without dizziness or balance issues. I'd say he's suuuuper close to being there.

That's all the news from The Frog Household.

Have a good Saturday.

[thetimelordbatgirl]

For a show that chose Amphibians as a major plot element because such animals represented change very well, it feels like most of the Amphibian cast is honestly fairly flat and stagnant. They all feel pretty 2-D and puppets of the plot, while the girls stand out because their development is actually consistent, builds off of who they are, and overall just feels more real; They feel more like real characters while 99% of the Amphibians feel like puppets of the plot who don’t actually think and make decisions, because we need a lesson of the day story!

It’s telling that the fandom is totally apathetic to the Plantars; They’re just not interesting. And part of the reason for that is they’re just largely stagnant... They don’t really change or develop save Polly, but that’s in the second half of the show tbh. They’re totally disconnected from the plot when they don’t need to be (remember when Hop Pop was set up as a revolutionary at the end of S1 only for that to be dropped?), so they just feel like bystanders who distract. Mother of Olms could’ve been an episode about the lore and prophecy, but no I guess we need her to be amnesiac and waste time on a useless gross-out adventure so Hop Pop can feel better about his arthritis that sprang up out of nowhere, despite not being an issue a few minutes ago in the previous episode.

The Plantars just feel arbitrary and superfluous for the most part; Any ‘flaws’ they’re given have no buildup and are introduced at the start of the episode to be resolved at the end, and then those lessons never come up again, assuming they aren’t repeated for some reason. They’re honestly stagnant and HP and Polly feel like the only ones who changed... But even HP became a useless flanderized idiot in Season 3. The Plantars are supposed to be Anne’s emotional support yet they pressure her to take them back home out of nowhere with zero guilt???

I think the show believes that more screen time exposure to the Plantars will automatically make us like them more, but that’s not necessarily how it works. The show has all this runtime but it never does anything meaningful with it, so most of the Plantars’ screentime feels redundant and even makes us RESENT them for wasting time, instead! It feels like the show is just fulfilling an arbitrary quota by giving them something to do because they’re main characters, instead of properly fleshing them out and giving them actual arcs that are both personal and connected to the plot, they just don’t contribute beyond ‘emotional support’ I guess. The herons were shoehorned into the finale for the sake of giving the Plantars something to do... It all feels forced and not at all natural.

The fact that they literally did the Hop-Pop getting old not once but twice in S3B....like....we get it: he's getting old and getting mad people don't have as much interest in gardening as he does. How about we actually see that damn revolutionist we were foreshadowed back in S1 already? And I just....look at how they dumbed Sprig down, I swear. Like, this show really telling us he'd be so stupid that he'd potentially fuck up a mission just because he and Ivy got told they can't work together for this mission??? And....yeah, no, you right about Polly. She really the only one that developed in the end and I am somewhat concerned the baby character is the one that developed more then her brother and grandfather.

Like, if they had just done SOMETHING with the Planter's, their screen time wouldn't be so annoying. But because it was either generic plots or plots that made them annoying. Like, Spider Sprig or Sprig and Ivy could have been something, but they won't, and they literally wasted an episode on Hop-Pop in Hollywood, let alone how they handled the three as a unit in S3A as a whole. Like, again, S1-2? Perfection. But dear lord, S3 was a mess for everyone.

[lihikainanea]

An open call for advice from dog mammas

hey frenns!

As some of you know, I am the proud mama to a lil perfect Aussie bb who will be 2 in January. We’ve had some ups and downs but he’s just so fucking perfect.

Long story short he started limping a bit this past January, and his original vet was like “oh it’s hip dysplasia for sure” and was like, ready to wheel him in for a $30,000 surgery for titanium hips when he wasn’t even a year old. Needless to say, we switched vets pretty fast.

I’ve been seeing a new vet who is pretty fantastic and takes a very conservative approach to treatment. We have weekly “desensitization” visits where he just goes in and gets a shit ton of treats, gets pet by everyone, gets told he’s a very good boy--just to help him not be so nervous at the vet. His new doc is really fantastic and I love her.

His limp was intermittent--it would go away for a few months, and then show up again. Always on his right hind leg. In June, it became more present--after a very active day full of playing (he goes to a daycare twice a week), I notice that he’d lie down to nap and when he got up, he’d limp. We tried one week on anti-inflammatories, which did wonders--but came back when we stopped the meds. So we did another week--and the same thing happened.

His vet and I finally decided it would be a good idea to do some XRays to see what’s really going on, and it took a lot of convincing on my part because he had to be sedated and I hate doing that.

The X Rays showed, what the vet thinks, is a teeny tiny MCL tear. She referred me to an orthopedist to see my options.

Now, here’s the issue. The surgery to repair a small torn/completely ruptured MCL is major. They saw into bone. They use steel. The rehab is 3-6 months--and that’s like, no walking. NO WALKING. I live on the second floor, and my dude is an Aussie. He’s active, and I travel a shit ton. This is a major life decision.

But like, the first step is with the orthopedist, which we have an appointment September 21. And already, when I emailed my pupper’s file over, the doc got back to me and said “okay well don’t feed him the day of the appointment because I’m going to re-do the x ray, it’s not up to my standards.”

Um...No? FUCK NO?

I don’t want to do that--not only because it’s a fuck ton of money, but because I fail to see the point. The X Rays are two weeks old. I’m not re-doing them just to fit your standard--work with what you’ve got. The x rays are perfectly fine, and there’s 4 views. My dude, I ain’t redoing that shit.

But that, right there, makes me feel like an irresponsible pet parent. I want the best for my little guy.

But then also like...look, I’m not convinced on the surgery front. My bubba doesn’t seem to be in pain, and he only limps SOMETIMES--other times, he’s perfectly fine. And like, right now--okay, he’s at risk of arthritis if I don’t fix it, he limps and has some soreness when he’s too active.

And if I get the surgery? The side effect are....he’s at risk of arthritis when he’s older (because it’s SURGERY and they saw into BONE), and he’ll still limp and get sore if he’s too active because it’ll be the scarred tissue form surgery.

I don’t know. I fail to see the fucking point, but in saying that, I also feel like a TERRIBLE and irresponsible pet parent for potentially letting my doggo live with pain?

HALP.

[prof-peach]

Out of all of the pokemon you have taken care of, which one do you think it was the hardest to deal with? Be cuz they were in a pretty bad shape, or just personality wise?

We get rumbunctious and rowdy Pokemon all the time, our works nature brings them to us probably more than any other issue, outside of grass Pokemon care and management. Anger and nervousness is something we have a good hold of here, and try to help iron out of various species. I do a lot of that work, and on occasion, Grey will do the odd water type with these problems, as I tend to shy away from those. For the most part, they are short stint stays, a couple months, to a couple years helping them to rewire their anger into a more productive feeling or energy. That being said, there’s alwasy the odd Pokemon who comes our way who’s just a step above the rest. So here’s some stories of the ones who have had to stay with us, for their temperament and behaviour.

On the north side of the island, we house the biggest, meanest Pokemon, and the individuals who are very timid and nervous around people. We do this to ensure they have space to live undisturbed in peace, but also to protect guests and visitors from being eaten, crushed, blasted, or otherwise harmed. Some of the northern residents are difficult yes, but most are just stroppy or uncomfortable with the majority of humans, but there are a handful that are actively engaged in harming or hunting people.

One such Pokemon is a rather nasty tempered Drampa, he came to us about five or so years ago now, kindly donated by being abandoned on our shores, it’s original trainer leaving the ball and hopping on a boat without alerting us, or letting the individual know. We figured it would be possible to rehome it, they’re usually a rather reasonable Pokemon to handle, considering their typing. We were wrong. This Pokemon when let out of the ball, went on a monsterous rampage for four days, destroying forests, toppling buildings, blasting holes in the mountain to try to burrow away, and picking fights with anything it’s size or bigger, often causing great harm to others. The island didn’t rest for that entire time, most Pokemon cowering from it, bigger species trying to halt them, all in vain. It took an entire troop of grass Pokemon using sleep powder to knock it out, the Drampa moved about so fast, one single grass type didn’t stand a chance to produce enough spores in time. It took a lot of work but we knocked the old boy out, and got a good look at him. His body was riddled with arthritis, not medicated, he would thrash about and cause himself so much pain and discomfort. He had overgrown nails, the feet hidden in the fur they have around their torso, often overlooked, and it’s ability to fly was limited because of its general condition and state. We began helping it, medicating it’s aislments, aiding it’s inflamed joints, but it never really calmed down, so now it chills out alone on the coast of the north side, left well alone, it doesn’t even like the company of other Pokemon.

We’ve done our best to interact with it, to socialise it, to generally get it use to people enough to do medical checks, but it’s still very resistant. We have decided that after two years of hard work, and it being tolerant to me, at least to check it’s health and wellbeing, that it’s best to let it live it’s life unbothered. Many would push a Pokemon to be a perfect social being, but we don’t believe it’s necessary for happiness. Some species are happy to be away from others, I wouldn’t push a human to be social, I know how awful that can be, so we didn’t force the individual to be around others either. It’s not that it’s unhappy, we spot it from time to time sitting on the rocks by the ocean, humming to itself, and the small pidgey and tailow that come by don’t bother it, and even give mild brief conversation. He seems ok, the medicine given means he’s in less pain, despite still having stiffness, and in the winter we’ve built him a unique space, rocky cover much like a cave, just above a Macargo hide where they lay eggs. The heat from those Pokemon keep its cave very hot, and help in the cold to ease the joint aches. The two species have different entrances, making sure they never meet within the hide at any point. There’s a good slab of rock dividing them, so it’s not an issue, and saves us having to pipe hot water over that far for him. He eats well, has a few items he’s kept from the labs, a toy sentret, and a large red ball, and generally is in a good place to live out his life in peace now.

Another difficult member would be a particularly timid Slazzle, gifted to us by a police member who had confiscated it from a rather mean individual close to her home town, they had been hurting the poor Pokemon, forcing it to produce an insane amount of poison liquid, throwing water on the poor thing every time it tried to ignite to retaliate, generally abusing the poor thing for its life, apparently it had been locked away since it was a young unevolved Pokemon. They’d been harvesting the poisons from the Slazzle and dropping it into various water sources to try to control the local Pokemon population, as they blamed the wild ones for the state of their land, and diminished crops yield from their allotment. Jokes on them, that water poisoning affected them too, and their garden died very quickly, and made the man quite sick through consumption of the crops he grew there. The slazzle is still very skittish, will hide at any given moment, we’ve seen her ignite an entire building in one move, and then bolt away through the flames to lose our line of sight. She managed to stay hidden for two weeks on the island, before we caught sight of her again. Generally she’s just a case fo neglect but we have been working with her now for a long while, 3 ish years, and her temperament is at least manageable amongst our staff. We have found her others of her kind to help her settle, and she’s become good friends with a Wartortle who came from the same area, they bond over memories of the place, and seem very happy in each others company.

We’ve found ways to keep her grounded, but she never goes near people when we have open days, slinks off through the big fence to the north side, and waits out the visiting hours until night. They’re not usually nocturnal but she likes the night, and spends her time looking about, foraging and feeding in the later hours. If you’re quiet you can catch her moving around the forests and the base of the mountains here, talking with the occasional individual, she seems to enjoy Murkrow too, their company seems to keep her quite social, as they usually move in large flocks here. She may never be rehomed, but for now we try to socialise her, we don’t battle her, and she has a very calm and peaceful nook to go to when she’s having a rough time. We make sure to provide support where possible, and though she’s a little skittish she’s somewhat happy to have myself and Grey, even Pari take a look at any wounds or scrapes she may gain while living here. She’s become trusting enough to come to us if we call, and who knows, maybe someone will come our way who she takes an interest in. There’s hope for her yet, we have however become quite fond of her, and she’s part of the furniture now. It may end up that she never leaves, and lives her life in peace here, surrounded by people and Pokemon who love her. Her panic makes her very difficult to pass to another trainer, and she’s prone to spitting up huge quantities of toxic liquid when spooked, and bolts at a slight bang or rumble.

One I have kept back for a number of reasons, is a rather mean tempered Aerodactyl. Normally we get Pokemon sent to us, but this one I ended up finding myself, some circus had her chained up in a box hardly big enough to turn around in, an attraction to the masses as they travelled through the area. The leader of that troop was particularly awful, treating Pokemon as commodities, items to be bought and sold, used as toys in his big performances. Boiled my blood. We called her Zeplin, and after 12 years she has still got a nasty temper on her, when not focused on a task. Her condition when we first found her was quite something, tattered wings, unable to fly straight at all, and she was littered with cuts and bruises, not in good health. Val has melted the chains that bound her, and the lock in her cage, and she just went, like a bat out of hell, flew off, blasting the tent that hid her quarters, burning a lot of the circus as she went. Little did I know, my foot was in one of the chain links, and I got dragged off with her, the ground, Val, all my other team mates, falling from my pocket, or being left on the floor where we had once been standing. She flew, and kept going, not aware I was still attached, you could see her wings were having a hard time catching the breeze, littered with holes and tears, she went for about two hours, I nearly froze that high up, trying to get a good grip on what chain was left so I didn’t come falling from that height. We came to a very sudden crash landing, she hadn’t had much chance to practice the whole take off - land thing from the feel of it, we both ate dirt, and she became very aware that I was there all of a sudden.

I had about three seconds while she assessed my presence, to get out of the chain, and dive behind a rock that gave me cover from an almighty blast of energy, chipping away bits, catching my arm a little. Trust me when I say, it’s terrifying coming face to face with something that stands a fair few meters taller than you, with more teeth and claws than you’re comfortable with dealing with, with none of your Pokemon, no weaponry, no real plan or cover other than a rock. How she didn’t eat me, I don’t know. Perhaps she knew it was me that let her go, maybe she just ran out of energy, but for whatever reason, she made a few bits and tail lashes at me, missed the lot, and gave up, turning to stomp off into the forests around us. She was still shackled with heavy irons, one on the neck, two on the legs, and was in serious condition, so I did the stupid thing and followed her, tried to sneak my way behind, though every now and then she would look towards me, and try to focus on my form in the dark of night now. It was a few days, she had stalked some prey, fed, and was starting to ooze from some wounds. Though the circus was unkind, they were providing her with medication that stopped further infections occurring, perhaps a scarred beast of great size drew more punters, maybe they were just making sure she survived to make them money, I still don’t know.

I hunted herbs, dug out roots with rocks, used river water, and common berries and managed to fashion some kind of salve, nothing amazing, especially back at that age, but it would work, I knew it would because I used it on my own wounds first. Just had to convince her it was a good thing to let me get close. Not an easy task. We physically brawled, she was clearly spent, not able to use any attacks, just thrashing about, I managed to trip her with the chains still attached to her legs, and once downed, you can jump on the head of these Pokemon to keep the jaws shut, just long enough to lather the wounds you can reach, then bolt fast. It was a small act, but she took off running again. With some wounds sort of cared for, I followed again, fishing for dinner, forraging roots to chew on. It wasn’t much but it kept me going, then one night, where I had climbed to a crook of a large tree, using my jacket to tie myself in for a nights sleep, I was awoken by loud rustling, thudding of feet, and a mighty huff.

Below where I sat, the Pokemon had returned, being no doubt well aware of my presence, following the smell of human, she had noticed the salve do a good job on the wounds I managed to reach, but the ones I couldn’t get near had become far worse, red, inflamed and weeping terribly, no doubt hurting and itching. I’d seen her rubbing her sides in the day, itching gasinst rocks and trees, smearing blood and ooze along her path as she trudged. So here we were, alone in the woods, I veeeeery carefully climbed down, staying in cover as much as possible, and over the space of an hour or two, she let me come out into the open, teeth bared yeah, but she hadn’t attacked, and other than a very uncomfortable, low growl, she allowed me to creep closer, some more of that salve made more for my own wounds than hers, being sniffed at, she licked it too, but wasn’t happy with the taste, very bitter, and I was cautiously optimistic, allowed to help her heal the rest of the cuts she had acquired from her old home. So we began our....I want to say friendship but that wasn’t it, it was a collaboration to survive.

We had landed somewhere far from others, I missed my team, and she had never experienced anything outside of the cage, and so we banded together, tentatively. We caught dinner as a team, and climbed for fruits, foraged for berries, reapplying what loose form of medicine I managed to make, before coming to some kind of comfortable companionship together. A week passed, wandering without a clue where we were, before a path was found, she seemed to want to avoid it, and while I wasn’t keen on people much either, it was impossible not to want to find my team again. They needed me, and I needed them. If they had been found, a police officer or the likes may have sent them to my original professor, waiting to be called from the PC system again, but knowing Val, she had grabbed the balls, my things, and bolted to hide, waiting for my return. In desperation I tried to explain this to the Aerodactyl, who had not experienced a trainers care before, and seemed reluctant to return.

It was only upon mentioning revenge, to burn the circus to the ground, that I regained her attention, and we came to a slow agreement to get aid, gather items, and return to where she had been released from. She waited in the forest while I went to town, checking my PC space to see if my team had been handed in, which they had! It was lucky, I was reunited with Val (vulpix), Booker (teddiursa), and Potato (bulbasaur) who I took back, and returned to the woods with.

We had to get some revenge, and in turn we devised a plan to free the Pokemon first, sneak in and pick the locks, melt the chains and gates, and then finally, let the aerodactyl do her thing once the vulnerable individuals were loose. I did my best to hold back my own personal rage, and simply aid the demise of a group who were awful towards Pokemon through this one big flying type. I wint go into details but no one perished in the fire, they were arrested and charged for unsafe work conditions, and abuse towards Pokemon, not to mention false advertising, having no worker’s Compensation in pace for injury, which many staff complained of, and several incidents of sexual harassment in the work place that were brought to light.

Once one started to talk, the others all joined in, and the fire was put down to unsafe working conditions and a lack of health and safety. From what I heard, the whole circus worth of Pokemon were rehomed, helped and generally lived much better lives after that. However now we had one very mistrusting angry Aerodactyl on our hands, a Pokemon I had not worked with before, who had seemingly become quite tolerant of me, but would snap at just about anyone who clocked eyes with her. So I kind of just kept her, no ball, not for a fair few years, we both didn’t think it was important. She was nursed back to health, and we had to go through a lot of training together, she bit booker once quite badly, but we’ve all put that in the past, and have worked on it together.

She is still testing, she won’t be ridden by anyone else, she doesn’t care for other Pokemon much, crowds will spook her, she doesn’t like when people talk with raised voices or hostile tones, and gets real irritable if you come at her in any kind of way that isn’t open handed, calm and slowly. She’s now a very capable flier, wings healed up, spending her first half of life locked up made her long for the open sky, so now we take time together to go off and ride winds when work is slow, and she’s helped in many ways to make the island functional, by moving logs, clearing paths, helping lift building materials around, and generally being there for me when I’m full of rage, which is actually annoyingly often. We’re anger buddies hah, kind of get on the same level with it. She’s become so much part of my family, and I feel like i’m part of hers now too, so I doubt she’d be rehomed, but should she find somewhere she would rather be, we wouldn’t stop her going. She is difficult, angry, snappy, tempermental, difficult, won’t be touched by strangers, likes to fight, but I’d not change her, she’s our testing monster, who we love and adore.

Went off a bit, but I figured why not, I know her, and can write more about her life and story than the others.

[ectoimp]

Ecto- My name is Rae and I am a LONG time follower from your MSA Arthur comic days (good times<3) I saw your post about pain and never realized you are a fellow chronic pain sufferer. While I can't guarantee you're issues are the same as mine, I would be absolutely happy to discuss pain/solutions with you. especially if -anything- I've found that works for me could potentially work for you as well. Getting doctors to take you seriously is literal hell. I am happy to listen and to help however able.

Aw that you for the support. Wow thats a long time (every now and then I think about cleaning up and finishing that comic >> maybe someday) Yeah, ive been dealing with chronic pain flares for years now, that I suspect are Rheumatoid arthritis (seronegative, because of course I need it harder to get diagnosed)

But I had been stubborn about really admitting how much pain I was in, until I was forced to start using a cane to get around. I had just been dealing with a severe limp like it was 'no big deal' >>;

Previously I had Cyclical vomiting syndrome, that was most likely tied to a severe tooth infection, since it seems to have stopped around the same time that I started getting my mouth fixed. but that could have been a coincidence, so im trying to be careful about things that are harsh on my stomach, like alot of painkillers are.

Current pain killers of choice are kava for when im at home, and voltaren for my hands so i can still work. I still havent found something to help the vague general leg pain I have. Its like a very intense restless leg syndrome.

I got lucky recently, when I tried to make an appointment with my GP and she canceled. Kaiser insurance will let you schedule with an available doctor instead if you want. I was like 'sure, why not'. And the doctor I got was an absolute angel. If her office wasnt an hour away (and I cant drive) I would ask her to be my primary. I really felt like she listened to me, and she got me all the tests I needed and a crap ton of xrays. She refered me to some specialists to rule out fractions/damage in the most painful areas. Neither saw anything major on the xrays, so they both want me to go to physical therapy, but thats booked until late December :/

But hopefully thanks to this good doctor I can finally get other doctors to listen to me, since some of the inflammation marker tests came back high

[drake-the-incubus]

Post Note: This is long and I’m sorry.

I want to expand on what I mean but not use that post to do so.

Believe it or not, “x is a sign of y” isn’t as harmful as everyone is screaming about.

For example, my knees. I intermittently use a cane. Recently I haven’t had to use it- or I’ve forgotten it- but I have had days where I needed it.

I’ve had bad knee pain for a long ass time. Issues with pain in my legs in general.

But a lot of the time it would be a dull throb and I was fairly active as a kid and teen.

I also have a joint cracking problem. And I don’t mean I’m purposefully cracking my joints- though I do- I mean I’ve earned the nickname, “snap, crackle and pop” and “rice krispies”.

And my mom, when I was 12, went in for osteoarthritis and after years of pain finally found out she had a degenerating back that caused her back to create shards and she had a pinched cyatic nerve.

Forgive me as I’ve never seen this written down.

I’ve also had a problem with being incredibly sick as a child. Bronchitis to Bronchial Pneumonia almost yearly, and a couple of gland infections.

Do you know what mom tells me and I do?

Warning signs. Very common and not at all unusual warning signs.

I’m at risk for arthritis. In fact mom and I are both certain if it’s not there in my knees it’ll develop at some point.

In fact, earlier this year, I had back pain. God awful back pain. It ran down one leg at some point.

So I asked my mom because these were the symptoms for her issues. She told me to immediately see a doctor.

To most, that’s an overreaction. But it’s not.

I’ll round back to my sickly childhood.

I have a devil of a cough, I’ll hack up a lung if I have a fit. In fact if I’m ill I have the chance to seriously damage my throat- Halls my saviour.

I’ve had colds turn into serious medical issues because they don’t go away on their own, and what was considered a cold turned out to be an infection.

So now I’m hyper vigilant. A cold that last three days with medicine, I go to the doctor. If it’s just a cold, I’ll refuse their medicine, if it’s bronchitis, I’ve caught it early and now can avoid an emergency room visit.

Because of this sickly thing I’ve had for over two decades of my life- since I was an infant/toddler- I now have to tell people I live with, “hey if I’m sick too long tell me I’ll need to see a hospital”.

COVID came around and I literally got messages from multiple people worried I was going to die if I caught it, and I’m going to say, I’m terrified. I’ve been in the hospital multiple times due to illness, days away from being hospitalized.

The virus fucking terrified me. I’ve had more than ten scares of having it, with no idea what I should do, so I treated myself with care, waited for day three, when it didn’t come I was relieved.

I’ve nearly died twice to an allergic reaction, to this day, I’m deathly allergic to two things and I don’t know what they are.

I’m also allergic- but not even close to severe- to other things I can shrug off.

I’ve also had a negative general allergy test. It’s where I found out my blood type.

But I’ve had my throat slowly close up as I took a specific anti depressant. I didn’t notice until my tongue had started swelling in my mouth, that I had more itchy skin than usual and I was having breathing issues. I got told I was a few days out from actual death.

For mental health. I have very weird applications of symptoms.

I can tell if someone is angry or not, I can have genuine conversations with someone and notice minute details.

I’m also traumatized and was forced into recognizing emotions.

But I don’t know when to stop a conversation. I don’t know when to interpret someone’s polite way of ending something. I don’t know the social etiquette to not embarrass people. I can be sociable, but I hate people and I never seek them out myself.

I’m not the model someone looks to for an AFAB with autism.

My trans status really pushed the diagnosis.

But I do have the symptoms, they’re just not presenting in ways that make people scream autism- more like scream freak.

And as a teen I never knew I had it. But I found people who related to me outside of a psychological textbook who explained my issues and gave tips that worked for once.

I was Fourteen before it clicked in my parents were abusing me. That it wasn’t normal to stop and listen to make sure those were their footsteps. If they were coming to my room. How heavy? Is that anger?

I’d explain normal life things and get people telling me it wasn’t normal and I needed to be away from it. That the behaviour was terrifying.

That if my parents were threatening to beat me black and blue, I should be trying to get out.

Trauma causes memory issues? How would I know that as a teen going to the police and not being able to say anything other than, “they threaten me when I brush my teeth”.

A terrified seventeen year old, describing how they were punished and the police couldn’t take them seriously, as they sobbed and begged to not go back.

In a week I had to return because there was no where else to go.

I couldn’t tell the police office my parents threatened my life that night.

I couldn’t remember why I was convinced by my friends online to run away.

My teachers got mad: “Did you think of your grades, you’re graduating this year”

Not even thinking about how I was suffering so much I got sent to the councillor- and then dumped- multiple times for suicidal ideation and the absolute terror I had in ever speaking of my issues.

It took meeting someone who was traumatized to learn I had panic attacks.

“Go take Your medication they give you for anxiety, you’re having a panic attack”

I’ve had them since I was a child and it took frantically talking in a chat room to figure it out.

I got half my diagnoses from the people around me before medically getting them. And that’s not a joke.

I had abnormally painful periods for my entire childhood, and it took a friend telling me it was probably bad I needed my mom’s painkillers for her back sometimes to even exist.

And do you know what, extremely painful periods is a sign for something really bad. And about 1/3 of afabs have that experience.

It’s considered normal. And yet it can lead to a deadly disease if you’re not careful.

A painful boob can be breast cancer.

A cough and fever could be COVID.

People relatively will explain their experiences in a way that people see is normal.

Making it Hard to actually convey how these experiences are normal for US but they’re not normal.

“Haha I Just found out reading a lot as a kid was a sign of PTSD” isn’t someone taking the piss abt PTSD, it’s a common experience due to escape fantasies. I know a lot of people, most who hate reading now, that explained how they’d read for hours as a child to get out of life, sometimes pretending to be something better.

And so in good conscience, I can’t say that post is great.

TDLR; The post that insinuates “x is a sign of y” comes off as ableist, as my lived experiences I know where this comes from.

Sometimes minor things can be a sign of something major and ignoring it doesn’t help.

Physical and Mental health are hard to convey, and most of the time someone doesn’t have the language or forethought to in depth describe their experiences.

[pictureamoebae]

Best wishes to you and Peggy! It's frustrating sometimes trying to get them accurate care when you know something isn't right because you know them so well, you really do have to be on vets sometimes. I had a similar thing with my dog years ago, I knew her back was the problem but they said it was arthritis in her hind legs. I'm glad you're at least getting answers now. Best of luck to Peggy with her surgery, take care of both her and yourself, and good luck with the new job

Thank you so much, anon -- and to everyone else who sent sweet and kind replies to my post <3

I’ve had this fight with vets in the past too. It’s becoming a bit of a pattern! I know I don’t have the medical training, and I know they see hundreds of cats every year and have the experience I don’t, but I have something they don’t: 24 hour a day (more or less) observational experience of my cat. You get a feeling for things. There has to be room for pet owners to be able to offer up their observations and suggestions, beyond just reporting symptoms. But of course I understand some people spend hours scouring pet forums and reading about someone’s aunt’s best friend’s neighbour’s cat who had this thing once and so therefore that must be what their cat has too. That must be frustrating for vets. I’m not one of those people, but of course the vets have to balance between listening to the owners and being wary of the owners projecting their own ill-founded fears. It’s just that I’ve got a 100% record of being right so far lol.

I’m nervous about Friday, about the anaesthetic more than anything, but it’s tempered by being eager to just get the toe gone so she can start to heal and so we can find out if she needs further treatment for anything. Hopefully once she’s over the initial couple of days of post-op discomfort she’ll start to feel a lot happier in herself.

And thank you for the good wishes for the job. It’s nothing major. I’ve been working for myself for the past few years as an audio transcriber, but the work can be patchy at best, so I wanted something flexible and part time that I could supplement it with, without being tied down to anything with rigid hours. My official new title will be ‘Disability and Dyslexia Support Worker’ at a local university. It sounds far grander than it is. In actuality I’ll just be sitting in on lectures for students who have various physical and mental accessibility issues and taking notes for them. There’s scope for more one-on-one work once I’m settled in, helping individual students at the beginning of their first year as they settle in and learn the ropes, and doing access sessions in the library when needed, but for now it’ll just be the university paying me to sit in lectures and learn fun things lol. My first week was going to see me sitting in on applied mathematics, history, and psychology lectures. Luckily, because it’s a flexible, casual contract, it means I don’t have to be there if I’m unable. I just wasn’t expecting to have to use that benefit in my first week!

[jordm]

Heartland 13x09 - Fight or Flight review

So, the episode starts with a wholesome scene of Amy, Ty, Luke & Lyndy playing in the blow up pool with water guns. It’s so wholesome and looks so ideal, yet I know it’s setting up whatever is to come for Luke in this episode.

Oh and hey, we hear that Ty is still helping out with Scott at the clinic, but do we know if he’s still partner since he cut down his hours? Or did he perhaps pass the torch to Cassandra whose there full time?

Also fun fact, I wrote the word major instead of mayor a billion times in this review. But a mayor of a town is kind of like major of a band or army or something? So, apologies if you see the word major a few times haha.

Amy & Spartan

Spartan is still recovering and showing signs of Arthritis. Georgie wants to play horse matchmaker with Amy since Spartan is getting younger, and i’m just glad that it isn’t human matchmaker. Georgie, with Lisa’s permission wants to bring Atlas to Heartland for Amy, but Lisa wisely remembers how Jack reacted with Paint and cautions Georgie to tread lightly. I think it’d be nice to see Jack help/talk to Amy about how she’s feeling seeing as he went through it himself, or even her father Tim since he may have gone through the same thing with his own horse as well.

Amy eventually gives in and tells Georgie she’s not ready but wants her to continue pushing her to get a new horse, which is partly due to her needing a distracting and partly due to her wanting to help. That is, until she notices the wild animal coming up and bonding with Spartan and decides she doesn’t want the perfect horse - just a horse she has a connection or the feeling with like she did with Spartan. It does not go unnoticed that she might’ve been getting flashbacks of taming Spartan when she saw the wild horse approach her. Amy likes a challenge with her horses as opposed to having the perfect horse. 

If the seasons ends with Amy taming this new horse with Spartan watching, ‘passing of the torch’ why don’t you - I won’t be mad.

Oh and hey, we also learn that their house has WALLS and a first photo courtesy of Luke for the wall!! Progress y’all and they still have 2 months to winter!

Georgie

Oh and hey Georgie is surprisingly still not over Quinn and she’s off to BC to meet him! From the promo I saw, it shows her telling Quinn that she loves him so... that’s gonna happen. I’m glad that Lou let her go and trusted her to go on her own, plus if there ever is an emergency, her father, Peter is in Vancouver and seemingly a short drive away if she needs a place to stay. Had Georgie asked to go anywhere else, perhaps she might’ve been more hesitant but knowing that she’s going to a province where her father lives might’ve provided a little comfort. Or perhaps she just has so much on her mind she’s didn’t want to fight her on this and knows she needs to trust her since she’s going away to University next year.

Plus... Western Canada isn’t Ontario. You can drive 10 hours and still be in Ontario, but you can drive 10 hours and drive two provinces in the west. I drove 3 provinces in less than 10 hours on East Coast Canada and did a road trip in the West and there is a lot less driving required to go province to province in those areas since you don’t need go to around Lake Ontario :) And there’s your unasked for geography lesson.

Luke

Amy and Ty have a meeting with Clint, having to do with Andrea being on the mend and making tremendous progress, to the point where she can go back to parenting full time. This is great news for Luke - and great news for Andrea, and even for Katie I suppose who might get her own room back even if she’s finally warming up to him.

Speaking of Clint, he’s one of the few non-main character who has been guest-ing since season 1 eh?! Ever since he brought Ty to Heartland in the early days of the show. He did right with Ty and he always has the best intentions (he has too) when it comes to foster kids.

“I’m totally moving up to the loft when you leave, but i’m going to miss you” - Katie for the win

Gifting him the chess set and everyone telling Luke the kind words (ie. you’ll always have a home, come visit anytime, you’ll always have us in our heart) and they complete the chess set showed how much Luke became apart of the family. I have no doubt that everyone was sad to see Luke go - Amy and Ty especially but it was nice to see everyone in the family support him as he goes back home to his mother full time. I was glad that nobody tried to stop him or delay him going back to his family but rather supported him - this is the storyline I wanted to see.

Did the scene of Amy Ty and Lyndy waving goodbye to Luke as he drove away (how cute was Lyndy patting Luke’s hair?) remind you of when it was just Amy standing there when Ty drove away to Mongolia?

THE ELECTION

JD Worth running for election seems to have an impact on everyone in the Heartland family.

Lisa

Oh ayeee, these “cash flow issues” come back up again. Apparently, Lisa tried to solve the issue from last season by having investors bridge the gap... and one of them is... Worth Investments (or something like that), by the one and only JD Worth, Lou’s opponent and now they want Lisa to repay the entire loan immediately. Yikes. This has nothing to do with the election and that her grand daughter is running against him... right? Yeah, likely false. Lisa manages to pay him out and i’m just glad this doesn’t end badly.

Bob/Ty

Bob (via Ty) has a theory about why there has been so much wildlife in the area. Mountain View resorts, who, oh yeah JD IS BEHIND. Due to development, wildlife have fled which is why residents have had cougars/wolves in their backyards and an increase in animal attacks the last couple of days. Yikes, this is a big no and honestly likely the issue to get everyone riled up since everyone loves their animals. 

Lou

First of all, it’s kind of hilarious that Tim is seemingly Lou’s new campaign manager, handling her schedule.

Now, I never liked JD but I also didn’t blame him for wanting to modernize and keep Hudson up with the upcoming changes, but him telling Lou what she probably already knows - being mayor requires sacrifice is running thin and that nothings worse than “children with no mother” and berating him for her divorce and that her children have no mother doesn’t look well. I know some of us were on his side of this debate last week but it’s hard to still be on his side after this week.

It also appears that JD is lightly treading the line of threatening, which hey, its probably the reason why all his opponents dropped out. Coincidence that JD happens to threaten to “recommend” to Garland some new pea feed beef (or something), he “pulled out” of a bad investment (Fairfield) and sent a notice to Tim that he couldn’t live in an RV for more than 6 months even on private property (since when is this a law?!). Something tells me that there is a reason why all his opponents dropped out...

Lou initially coups and drops out but after hearing about the wildlife theory below, Lisa, Tim and the “private residence” was caused a health inspection, with Mitch’s encouragement, encourages her to get back into the race. And with one cleverly timed article about how JD Worth’s mountain development has caused the wildlife (MVP FOR BOB!!) seems to tip the scale in Lou’s direction. 

And thank god because JD is seen BRIBING some guy to deal with the wild life problem (by killing Wildlife? because that solves everything) so he’s definitely done it for every other thing that miraculously “got solved.” Lou may not be the ideal mayor but also, she is definitely better than him. With him as mayor, nothing is safe.

Does anyone else have the feeling that bribe guy might tell all to the press based on the look on his face when he saw JD didn’t pay him the full amount? Maybe he’s secretly a wildlife lover and doesn’t want to kill them? I mean, there’s no way the season ends with JD winning (think: poacher) so the question is how they make him lose/reveal the bribing.

Oh and...

Mitch

Mitch is mad that Lou didn’t tell him about running for mayor but Mitch didn’t also run turning their vacation property into a business (and seemingly moving away full time). And hey Mitch? Lou literally didn’t tell anyone she was thinking of running for mayor. Literally no one. She just stood up in the stands and announced it so it’s not just you. Don’t feel left out. No one was part of her decision really, except her.

PLUS, where the heck are Lou’s face all over these posters because so far all I’ve seen are JD’s! Lou, you need to step up your poster game. How is she allowing JD’s face to be across the diner & no posters of her?!

Songs in this Episode @heartlandians​

The One I Need - Amy Stroup

Another Lie - Jacob John

[ketopian]

Putting Your Money Where Your Research Is

So my wife and I are starting a business selling all the Ketogenic Diet related things that we wish there was already a website for. We've been eating keto for a couple of years now and it has had a huge impact on our health and our lives. My wife has lost a huge amount of body fat and overcome multiple metabolic issues and I've been able to stop taking immunosuppressants for Crohn's Disease and am now completely drug free. We both have hugely increased energy levels. There are loads of great Keto and Low Carb blogs in the world, so I thought long and hard about writing yet another one, but I thought that a) it might help me to get more clarity on certain issues b) give me reason to experiment a bit more with my meals, as I've gotten a bit lazy of late and everyone loves a recipe, and c) force me to consolidate all I have learned from reading various bits of scientific literature in relation to nutrition, which is something I do a lot given my past as a scientist, engineer and science teacher. While my background isn't medicine, I have spent the last few years educating myself on biochemistry. This was originally to help my wife with various issues (many of which a plan to go into at a later date), but I quickly discovered that there was a lot more I could learn.   

I, like most scientifically minded or "sceptical" (there's a word that's been seriously corrupted by the internet) people, thought I knew all there was to know about nutrition: a calorie is a calorie, an energy deficit is all you need to lose weight, and no, you aren't fat because of your hormones. I went at least a little further than most; I understood how digestion worked and that starches ended up as glucose in the body, a message some medical professionals still seem to have trouble with. Nonetheless, it came as a shock to me when all this stuff didn't seem to work for my wife. I was seeing how little he was eating, how hungry she was getting and how difficult it was for her to shift those fat stores. Her pregnancy was a major turning point. PCOS had been mooted before but it was never confirmed until a scan ended up with the radiographer saying “Your ovaries look a little polycystic to me”. This was followed a number of weeks later by a diagnosis of Gestational Diabetes, accompanied by the standard advice – eat regular meals (six per day plus snacks) and make sure you have loads of carbohydrate at each – accompanied by the offer of medication. Well, we were both determined that that wasn’t going to happen, so I set about researching, which is what I do best (well, one of two things, but we’ll come to the other much later). The obstetricians could not believe her blood sugar readings – they were better than most non-diabetics. One of them even asked to see the glycometer, as such low readings could not be possible. How did we do it? By ignoring all the advice we were given, reducing carbohydrates to a very low level (although not keto levels at that point) and using a small number of carefully researched supplements. We didn’t mention the supplements to any medical professional; we had enough patronising advice from them, but it was following the science that allowed my wife to avoid medication and to produce a daughter who was born incredibly healthy and with a great start in life.

I don’t want to criticise the medical community too much, most of them are only trying their best, but there is a certain amount of arrogance which tends to come with being a doctor, which often is not concomitant with their intelligence or knowledge. Just as in any other field of endeavour, ability as a medical practitioner is on a bell curve. In other words, there are a few who are fantastic at their jobs, a few who are truly awful, and most are pretty much middling in ability. I’ve taught students who became doctors, and if I were ever given an appointment with them, I’d run a mile! Most doctors follow the guidelines, and it’s a lottery as to whether you get to see the occasional few who do enough research in the right areas to go beyond that. If we educate ourselves to a high enough level, we may be able to help our doctors to help themselves and then eventually to help everyone else.

So back to the story. So this whole pregnancy episode got me really intrigued. Was everything I knew actually complete bullshit? I had spent around close to 300 hours during Hayley’s pregnancy reading papers and getting familiar with the biochemistry and biology of nutrition, and countless more hours not sleeping but thinking about what I had read. It completely changed my attitude to my own knowledge. It had also deeply concerned me. How could everyone have been so wrong on this for so long? Well, it turns out that they absolutely could be, and the reasons are complex and too long for now (stay tuned for a post on this precise subject), but there was something else that intrigued me.

I have Crohn’s Disease. For those of you who don’t know, Crohn’s Disease is an autoimmune disease of the gastrointestinal tract. What this means is it causes inflammation, ulceration and pain, anywhere from the mouth to the anus. It is essentially when your own immune system decides that your gut is a foreign object and therefore needs destruction. My own Crohn’s was mainly confined to the colon, although I also got very large and painful mouth ulcers. Crohn’s is usually treated with steroids, anti-inflammatory drugs, immunosuppressants, which damp down the immune system, and a more recent sort of therapy called biologic therapy. I had been a biologic many years ago, but I was fairly lucky in that I was OK on just anti-inflammatories and immunosuppressants, however the immunosuppressants were not pleasant. I got every illness going. If I got a cold, I had it bad for two weeks, including having to spend a day or two in bed. I had got to the end of my tether; there had to be another way.

Enter ketone bodies. So if you know anything about ketogenic diets you probably know that when you restrict carbohydrates enough that your body starts to use fat to create substances called ketone bodies, the most important of which for human metabolism is a chemical called Beta-hydroxybutyrate (BHB). Well, it turns out BHB has a strong anti-inflammatory effect. “Aha,” I thought to myself,” This might be worth a go”. It was. I had tried to come off medication several times previously, under medical supervision, of course. Always, within about six weeks, I would have a serious and painful relapse. Not this time. I bit the bullet, stopped my medication (this time without telling any medical professionals) stopped the carbs and waited, fully expecting the usual relapse. It’s now been two years drug free and I have never felt better. I would go as far as to say I have no symptoms of Crohn’s. While I would hesitate to say all Crohn’s sufferers should do this, especially the way I did it, it might be worth a try if you’ve had enough of the side effects of your drugs, or if you can’t get any relief and just want an extra bit of help. With medical supervision, of course. It might also be worth a try if you have any other autoimmune disorder, such as ulcerative colitis, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, lupus and maybe even multiple sclerosis. Please don’t take this as medical advice but try to educate yourself and your medical practitioners as much as possible on this subject. If you want any help in this endeavour please let me know.

Well, this has been a long and rambling story, but we’re almost up to date. Since my discoveries I have helped a number of friends and family members send their type 2 diabetes or prediabetes into remission, lose weight and become healthier, both physically and mentally. My wife is slimmer, healthier and feels generally better. I didn’t even realise I had fat to lose but the recent appearance of my abdominal muscles seems to confirm that I actually had a fair bit to get rid of. All by getting rid of refined sugar, starchy carbs and the vast majority of processed foods, and getting BHB levels up. Do I think that everyone should be doing keto? Absolutely not. Everyone’s biology is unique – some people will respond fantastically to a ketogenic diet, some people will get less than nothing from it. But for those for whom it works it is life changing. Hopefully via the website, this blog and the planned videos we will be able to help more people get what they need out of this incredibly powerful dietary intervention. 

TL;DR: For lots of people Ketogenic Diets are awesome. Welcome to Ketopian.

[itmightbemikey]

UPDATE ON MIKEY THINGS, OR SOMETHING

Been a bad, stressful month, even aside from those lovely Presidential Election Year Bullshit stressors

To start off with, it became clear in early Feb that my sweet baby, my cat Aurora had gone blind. So, I was depressed over my baby being blind, but I was also super anxious that there was something more severe that was an underlying cause, and it was a full week of that before I was able to get him into the vet’s to have him checked out. When I did get him in, vet examined him, and said it was retinal degeneration, likely either due to genetic predisposition or just old age (my baby is 16 years old), with no other problems that he could find. Aurora is still active, has a good appetite, and seems otherwise healthy, except for maybe some arthritis. He also has no probelm navigating my apartment and climbing into all his favorite napping spots.  Here, here’s even a picture showing he can still find sunbeams to lie in despite not being able to see them:

Next, a day after the vet appointment, I had an appointment with a disability attorney to see if he would represent me in my case with Social Security (I am currently at the hearing stage). Gave him the background, about how I was shot in the face during a mugging, the subsequent problems with major depression and severe anxiety. He said that given what I had been through, and from my general demeanor during the meeting, that he believed that I was disabled.  But.

But...

According to him, right now the current environment is particularly rough for getting disability approved for cases based around mental illness. Anything short of cases involving psychiatric hospitalization or suicide attempts is hard to convince a judge to approve, and the fact that I can sometimes leave my apartment under my own power means they’d likely just say “NOPE YOU CAN DO UNSKILLED LABOR, CLAIM DENIED”.

And, with that in mind, he declined to take my case.

He gave me some advice on statements I could collect from my psychiatrist that may help, and I walked out of the office, walked home, walked into my bed, and stayed there for quite a while.

Up until that point my current dosage of meds had been working quite well.  The wombo combo of BLIND AND POTENTIALLY SICK CAT and SORRY I DON’T THINK I CAN WIN YOUR CASE SO GOODBYE just kinda knocked me on my ass, and I was back to sleeping 10, 12, 14 hours a day, sleeping erratically, not wanting to do anything, barely able to throw a frozen pizza in the oven (let alone doing the actual cooking I had went out and gotten food and supplies to do), not even having the appetite to eat some days (at least a couple of days I just didn’t eat, and one day all I had was spoonfuls of peanut butter straight from the thing).

I’ve been getting back out and doing things.  Finally managed to call another attorney and get an appointment set up with them for this coming Monday (with the help of my sister because goddamn making phonecalls is terrifying, how does anyone do it on the reg), and I had an appointment with my psychiatrist today and she upped the dosage on my venlafaxine, and gave me a script for buspirone to help with anxiety, AND got me set up with a therapist so I can start talking about those unmedicateable issues (though the first available slot isn’t until May).

I’m pushing forward.

It’s hard.

Animal Crossing needs to hurry up and get here.

But for now I’m surviving.