#should I get medicated for my undiagnosed probably depression? yes

[loxare]

Every single year at the worst fucking moment the brain weevils attack and make doing anything besides the most mind numbing activities super impossible. My brain feels itchy, and I don't think I should be physically aware of it but I am. I'd really like to be able to write all these lab reports, but doing so is like trying to walk through the 1919 Boston Molasses Flood, and I keep making two and a half steps of progress before having to pull my feet from the sludge so I can sit on a ledge to rest and also try and beat the flies buzzing around my head back with a newspaper

[talestobetold]

Are you not motivated enough or do you need antidepressants? Are you on your phone too dang much or do you need ADHD medication?

Now that I’m medicated, I cannot stand the narrative around getting medicated that you need to explore every possible avenue of personal responsibility before you can look into other options. Yes, you should give it a real try before just going on pills. Yes, pills can be expensive and unfortunately aren’t accessible to everyone. But seriously. Sometimes you just need pills.

I spent three years dealing with undiagnosed depression. My parents and therapist were convinced I just needed to try harder. I eventually learned to manage things better, but even when I felt like I had managed as much as possible, I still felt awful. Got on pills and suddenly everything felt better. I hadn’t felt the emotion of hope in three years! I could just consistently go to work without hating myself!

Same thing happened with focus. I’ve really never been able to just sit down and work without distractions. I have a very hard time getting up to do basic tasks without the right background content to take up space in my brain. I started pills, and within a week I could just manage! I didn’t realize how much harder the focus issues made things until I had medication to help with it.

A “personal responsibility” view of mental health can help and is probably useful to everyone to some degree, but it’s actively dangerous past a certain point. If it’s been ages and you haven’t muscled through, it might not be the way to go. Your “real try” might not look like someone else’s because you might have a mental disorder keeping you from actually succeeding! And it’s fucking shit that people are expected to prove they’ve tried every other option before trying fixing things at the source

[ofgentleresolve-a]

🍎🍐🍑🍒🍓🍍One for each muse of your choice

can i be a vampire for fruit ( ft. fruity headcanon meme w/ @temporalobjects ) || no longer accepting!

🍎  : how stable is my muse’s mental health? have they been diagnosed with any mental illnesses and / or conditions? do they have any undiagnosed mental illnesses and / or conditions? do they or should they attend therapy?

for someone who is most likely to have a breakdown in a parking lot, lamon is surprisingly pretty stable. probably comes with already having hit rock bottom after the car accident so anything else that gets thrown at him can't be worse. basically, you don't have to worry about his general safety. i'd say graduating from school was the best thing that could've happened for lamon because there are no longer any expectations ( standards ) that he feels he has to live up to. all that's left is to live now.

he has anxiety and depression, the latter of the two developing after the car accident. the former, he's had for all his life. but both of them though, he's seeing a therapist for and is on medication for.

🍐  : how intelligent is my muse overall? are they smarter than the average person, or less than? are they primarily self-taught, or did they acquire most of their knowledge in school? are they more street smart or book smart?

if we're talking book smarts, raphael is average, closer to the back of the pack. like he can do it, reading and discussion, but generally he doesn't learn well in a traditional classroom. he doesn't see the point in it. but he has the kinesthetic intelligence. learns best with his hands. learns best on the fly and on improv, which is why cooking is the best activity for him. while he has gone to culinary school, the base of his knowledge has been through years of working in restaurants and kitchens of all kinds. although he is close with his dad and has learned from his dad, his dad made it a point to push him to take control of his own career and learning within the culinary world.

he is street smart, though. comes with years of traveling and living on his own for long enough.

🍑  : how meticulously does my muse look after their physical appearance? do they spend a lot of time on their hair, makeup, grooming, and clothing? is there a particular reason why they do or don’t?

nah, yoojin doesn't give too much of a care. outside of basic hygiene, he keeps his clothing simple ( mainly yellow ). they just have to be easy to move in. doesn't wear any jewelry either out of his mala beads. this all came as a result of taking buddhist vows and living amongst the monks for a few decades. he incorporated some of the austerity of his life there as it helped him find clarity and peace within himself.

🍒  : how much does my muse value companionship? do they constantly keep people around them, or do they prefer to be alone often? do they have or desire to have many friends? do they see every meeting as an opportunity to make a new friend?

very much so! raphael is a very social person- he's constantly chatting with the people around him and only takes time to himself for cooking. he makes friends very easily although most times he really doesn't intend it that way? he's more likely to consider an acquaintance a friend, let's just say, his mind is kinda like 'you're friends with lam? that means you're friends with me' and 'anyone i sit with is a friend of mine'.

🍓  : how is my muse typically seen by others? does it ring true to who they really are? does their reputation matter to them?

friendly, outgoing, loud, obsessed with cooking. and generally they're right about it! raphael's very much an open book. he does have his insecurities though he does a good job of hiding that part. considering that he left the culinary world because his reputation had been slandered by unintended nepotism, i'd say yes, he does care about his reputation.

🍍  : how comfortable is my muse in their body? how do they feel about their height, weight, strength, and body type? how important is being attractive to them?

neutral. there was a period of time where she didn't like to look at herself in the mirror, but these days it's more of something she doesn't feel the need to focus on. i will say though, these days she is interested in dressing up a little more ( for calum )

[bitterjadedandblogging]

1. an introduction

Hey tumblr.... just kidding, only talking to myself here. Or perhaps after death, whatever embarrassing and ill-tended series of text posts this may turn into will be discovered while scrounging my computer files. Likely further stabilizing whatever silent suspicions or beliefs other had surmised upon me. The same suspicions I personally ponder or at time fear. Consider this failed project #186 (random number inserted). Im sure to be another forgotten social media account I may never look back on. Just as I am so good at starting new notebooks with lists, entries, and ideas, and then never flipping a page again for months. Theres about 8 half used moleskines in my desk as I type. 

Likely undiagnosed with some sort of mental illness, most definitely ADHD as I ramble this into so much more than it needs or was intended to be. Not that I’m sure what that even was. I’m just going to use this screen as the last trying outlet that I can feel some sort of safety or ability to truly express myself without err or judgement by others regarding my cynicism or spiritual and “strange” beliefs or predictions of this world. My views regarding society and everything going on in the world to date and to come, are those that could easily be labeled as pessimistic and negative. Don’t get me wrong, though I could say I subscribe myself to nihilism, I prefer to say I’m a realist, I have glimpses of optimism, phases more say I suppose. I’ve struggled to balance both throughout my life. I wonder if I’m schizophrenic (as I was labeled by a friend after expressing an idea of the world today), I wonder if I’m bipolar, I KNOW I’m clinically depressed. With reason, I can't say this life has been easy, but who's is?

 Our problems are equal and all valid, or so I have always preached. But lately they don’t feel so. Shit is heavy, shit is hard, and I have lost my empathic ability to feel or soothe with others, positive or negative. I’ve always believed you can't love someone else until you love yourself... lately I have learned you can't be happy or sad or joyous for anyone else, or anything, if you don’t allow yourself any of that same compassion or privilege. Happiness feels a privilege, a job feels a privilege, the ability to function without pain feels a privilege, everything that's said to me... feels something I am unable to attain. Oh how I have trailed here... This blog is not for pity, its not to necessarily connect with anyone, or to be validated. I’m not seeking answers or advice, I dont know if I am to come out a different perception and maybe return to some of the inspiration I used to be capable of bestowing upon others. I am curious as to whether I am genuinely losing my mind and should seek help, or if maybe some others will share my ideas and beliefs. It'd be easy to say, yes you're crazy, you're ill, and you need to see a therapist. Trust me, I have. I personally have different beliefs. Ones that dont lie in big pharma. I have little trust for the medical system in which has failed me time and time again, and so I tell myself maybe these ideals are just different, and of a spiritual value, an open eye in a sense. The ability to see is one in which we dont all hold, so maybe in that I have privilege. Or I’m fucking crazy, who knows, all I know is that probably none of this made any sense. 

Welcome to my brain... it doesn't really ever stop, so I’m going to try spitting some of it out, rather than letting it take up space.

Either way... it’ll be cheaper than therapy. 

-a

[cookinguptales]

Today, SCOTUS is hearing arguments about whether businesses should have to cover birth control for their employees in their health insurance plans and I just. It’s hard to read.

I was going to make up this big informational persuasive post about the situation. But I’m just. I’m just so sad and angry and tired. So I figured I’d make an emotional one instead.

Let me tell you about my hormonal birth control journey. 

(Rest under a cut for length and content. cw: mental illness, graphic discussion of medical issues, injuries, & menstruation, discussions of suicide & self-harm, discussion of opioids, alcohol, & recreational drug use.)

 I started taking hormonal birth control late in high school to help regulate “painful periods”. It wasn’t for actual birth control at that point and I hadn’t been diagnosed with any disease, not even POTS yet. I just had “painful periods”.

Things were okay for a little while, but when I got to college, things started to fall apart. The double whammy of undiagnosed mental illness and a barely-diagnosed chronic illness (POTS was relatively unknown at the time and my doctors gave me information which I now know is incorrect) really caused me to spiral during my first year of college. I didn’t know it yet, but I react very poorly to some forms of hormonal birth control. Put succinctly, they drive me batshit insane. On one pill, I literally did not leave my apartment for over a month. I became very literally agoraphobic. Bouncing off the walls, irritable, angry, high suicidal ideation. As bad as side effects can be.

But I didn’t know that yet. I just stopped taking BC as part of the whirlwind of medicines and doctors that my life became for about two years while I was on my (first) medical leave from college.

My ribs were coming out back then. I didn’t know that yet, either. I knew that when I was around 16, I started getting severe back pains. The first time it happened, I had to go to the ER because I couldn’t breathe and my teachers thought I was having a heart attack. I got a narcotic shot in my butt. It did nothing to dull the pain. That’s how much it hurt. But it went away on its own eventually and I over the years I started medicating reoccurrences with a lot of different things. Physical therapy. Muscle relaxers. (Medically prescribed) opiates that made me puke. Prescription strength Advil. Wine.

I didn’t see that it was all connected yet. Not yet. I didn’t realize, with my periods as irregular as they were, that the back pains were coming around the same time in my cycle each time.

My “painful periods” got worse. I talked to an OBGYN, with my mother in the room. I told her that I was scared of something like childbirth. I knew that my blood flow was dangerously bad. What if the fetus didn’t get enough blood? Oh, my doctor laughed, that wasn’t a problem. The fetus would always get enough blood. The risk was that I wouldn’t. That it, like the tiny vampire it was, would take it all until I simply died. If I got pregnant, I would likely die. I asked about permanent sterilization. My mother cried. My doctor said no. I didn’t ask again.

I went back on birth control.

It was odd. I didn’t want children before that visit, not really. I was so tired all the time. I knew I’d never be able to manage to raise a child — and honestly, I didn’t care to try. I was so depressed. I was so sick. It sounded like so much work. I still don’t want to have kids. But it still feels… weird, knowing that I can’t. And knowing that I could die if I get knocked up.

I’m bisexual, but I have zero sexual contact with men (because I don’t love them, despite being somewhat sexually attracted to them) and zero sexual contact with people with penises (because they could literally kill me and it would be no one’s fault). But I’ve been followed home by men before. I’ve had cabbies lock me in and ask me for a date. I’ve had men who won’t take no for an answer. And my god, it terrifies me that I might have to deal with both sexual assault and a slowly creeping murder all at once.

(It’s laughable to think he’d be tried for both.)

I ended up getting sick off birth control a few times. I went on and off it periodically during my college career. I now in retrospect see that a lot of my “meltdowns” were a combination of discrimination-based stress, physical breakdowns, and hormonal whirlwinds. At my worst times, I was on birth control. The wrong ones.

My periods, over time, got worse. My back would hurt. The cramps were unbelievable. I couldn’t feel my legs. I could feel them too much. I couldn’t keep food down. I’d be so angry, so sad, so everything.

I went to the doctor again. I was diagnosed with both endometriosis and PMDD. PMDD, or premenstrual dysphoria disorder, is like PMS on steroids. I remember telling my doctor, in halting tones, that I wasn’t well before my periods. That I always had depression, always had anxiety, but I wasn’t well before periods. At her prodding, I confessed that sometimes I would just lie there for hours, for days, in the fetal position. That I’d clutch at my own arms, mooring myself, because I knew that those white knuckles were the only thing between me and killing myself. That my brain, always somewhat malevolent, became an inescapable mantra of death. That I’d just lie there and sob because it took everything I had not to hurt myself. That I’d find claw marks, bruises, on my arms later, and all I could do was get some ice.

It was better than the alternative.

I told my doctor about how painful my periods had always been. How I’d heard a story once about, y’know, that Spartan boy? The one who hid a fox kit under his shirt during an examination and stayed perfectly silent even as it clawed at him so he wouldn’t be caught with it? How it tore at his stomach until he fell down dead, still silent? I told her how I felt like I was holding a fox kit every damn month and sometimes I couldn’t stand the pain of it. Sometimes I considered ending that pain, one way or another.

She put me back on birth control.

A little less than a year later, or in layman’s terms, about a year ago, my mental health was so bad again that I was almost committed. Literally committed. I had to go stay with my parents for a few months while I transitioned to new medications because it wasn’t safe for me to be alone. I learned that the birth control I was on could create those symptoms — but they didn’t start until months after you’d started taking it. So you didn’t realize it was the medicine. You just assumed you were crazy and unlikable and so, so angry. At the world, at your loved ones, but mostly at yourself.

I learned, around that time, that I also had Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. That the pain I felt every month right before my period wasn’t just cramps. It was my bones coming undone from their sockets. It was my hips dislocating. It was my ribs popping out of my spine. I realized that that lump my parents could feel in my back wasn’t a hard knot of tense muscles. It was my fucking rib poking out of my back. I learned that there is a period right before menstruation that mimics a period during pregnancy where your joints loosen — your body thinks it is preparing you for birth, for loosening your pelvic cavity so an entire head can pass through. For someone with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, that period of joint looseness was enough to wreak absolute havoc on a system of already-weakened joints.

I learned how to put my own ribs back in with a foam roller. I started drinking marijuana tea for the pain. I went on a different birth control. I stopped taking the placebo pills. I had to fully eradicate that entire portion of my cycle. Goodbye PMDD and ribs constantly popping out. I don’t miss you!

I am still on that pill, y’know. Every day I take it and wonder if I’m one step closer to the day when it inevitably destroys me. The last one took about a year. Tick tock.

Or maybe I finally found the one that works… I really just don’t know.

The fact of the matter is that I have a full handful of maladies that require birth control so I can function. PMDD, endometriosis, dangerous pregnancy, EDS. I need hormonal birth control. I would probably be dead by now without it. The PMDD especially was that bad. My internal organs are likely a scarred-up mess. But the birth control itself almost killed me, too. God, it was close.

Simply put, birth control is heaven and hell all wrapped up in a pill. It treats illnesses and it prevents pregnancy. In other words, it provides you with both freedom and peace of mind. It is absolutely essential. But it’s also monstrous. The sheer number of sometimes-deadly side effects that come with hormonal treatments is staggering. Which is why you need to be under a doctor’s careful eye when you’re on it. You need to be free to choose whichever brand you need. You need to be free to switch kinds at a moment’s notice. None of these things are possible in a system where these pills are not fully covered by insurance.

(And yes, I know, this is a stupidly American problem in so many ways. Obviously the ideal thing here would be single-payer for all medical procedures. But that’s not up for debate here and insurance for BC is. Because for some reason we let some people’s religious convictions determine others’ health care. But I digress.)

Please don’t worry too much for me. I have a good employer who has told me in no uncertain terms that I don’t need to worry about my healthcare coverage. But there are so many people just like me. Who may not have diagnoses yet. Who may have “problem bodies”. Who only know that they need to do something and that they might have to go through several pills to find it. Whose employers either have the strong religious belief that hormonal birth control is a sin or the strong religious belief that they want to pay as little as possible for their workers’ health care. (Call me cynical.)

Those are the people I worry about. Those are the people I feel absolutely sick over as I watch the SCOTUS argue whether we should be allowed to have life-saving medicine. The people who I know will fall through the cracks the second that the cracks are widened enough for them to do so. The people who will die.

It’s a tense time right now. It’s a tense time for very obvious reasons. But this morning I find myself to be even tenser, and my stomach hurts thinking about it. It feels like all I can do is stare at a pill packet and remember every horrible reason I need it and every horrible thing it’s done to me and I just.

It’s a lot.

[enetarch-working-w-adhd]

Why do people need the label ADHD?

I’m sure many managers groan when someone says, “Yes I need accommodations for ADHD”.  And, think, 

Why do you need something special for ADHD? It’s not like you’ve lost a limb!  

So, what is the significance of the label? Before I answer the question, let’s look at a bunch of other labels that people use to describe people with ADHD.

Forgetful, Head Cases, Alzheimer’s Patients, Self Center Nincompoop, Lazy, Crazy, Stupid, Scattered Brained, Unreliable, Day Dreamer, Demented, Insensitive, Disorganized, Depressed, Emotionally Illiterate,  ... 

ADHD is a neurological disorder. Without a diagnosis many people lose their confidence in themselves, their ability to have a fulfilling life, build meaningful relationships, achieve a high school / college degrees, or excel in their carriers.  It is estimated that people with ADHD earn 33% less than their peers. Undiagnosed people with ADHD are more likely to commit suicide.

While ADHD can’t be seen, like those who are paraplegics or someone with diabetes, ADHD has the same effect.  While being a paraplegic and having ADHD seem extremely different, one being where a person has lost a limb or use of a limb, the other person seems physically fine.  But, what you cannot see, is that part of the brain is missing in someone diagnosed with ADHD.  About 3%.  Just enough to affect their emotional center, executive function, and short term memory.  By, any definition, this is a physical handicap. And, as such, should be treated just the same.

Without a diagnosis, I felt like I was left wondering - was I just lazy? I mean, I don't really like doing certain things, so maybe I was just pretending to try and was just really not doing the thing because I didn't feel like it. With a diagnosis, it was like oh hey, actually my brain doesn't work the way other people's do, so the way to try to do things that aren't working out very well probably also isn't going to be the same standard advice given to others. [Anonymous]

You wouldn’t question why someone in a wheelchair needs accommodations to work, you’d provide them, as long as they can perform the work. The same is true for someone diagnosed with diabetes, while you can’t see the disorder, eventually you can see how it affects them when their blood sugar is too low or too high.

Being labeled with ADHD helps them understand why they are struggling personally; why they keep making the same mistake over and over again, even though they repeatedly say they won’t do it again; having so many frustrating moments; and can’t seem to get ahead. It helps them understand why other’s keep using derogatory labels to describe them, their work, and their lack of motivation. The label helps someone with ADHD understand and accept who / what they are. It improves their self esteem and self awareness. They can now relax, knowing that they are normal - for who they are.

The label helps them find others who have a similar condition, find resources, find help, discuss the problems associated with ADHD, find ways to cope, and access to treatment regiments. Being diagnosed unlocks several legal benefits and protections provided by government programs, such as anti-discrimination laws; insurance; medical help, intervention programs, and medications; and personal coaching assistance programs.  

But most importantly, being labeled ADHD validates their intuitive understanding that they are not like other people, and rebuild and restore their confidence. Once they understand how their brain works, it helps them resolve past traumas, and helps them perform to the best of their abilities. And, it helps them explain to friends, family and co-workers what’s going on.  Which, in turn, helps them rebuild their community support.

For me it gave me answers and looking back on my childhood and it explains so many things etc. [Anonymous]

Would you rather spend forever thinking that you're broken and/or defective, instead of finding out that what's hindering you has a name and can be dealt with? [Anonymous]

[conversationswithmybipolarchild]

#4: MENTALLY ILL FAMILY

FELICITY: So. Welcome home.

ANJA: Yes.

F: Are you glad to be home?

A: Yeah. Very.

F: That was a long time at your dad’s this time. Did you have a good time?

A: I did.

F: Want to cheers our sugar free fudge pops?

A: Yes.

F; Your dad and I used to cheers our food. One time, at our rehearsal dinner for our wedding, we cheers-ed our hamburgers and my aunt yelled out, “I’ve never seen that before in my life!” It was kind of funny, but anyway. I’m glad you’re home.

F: So, we’re not going to play catch-up. We missed four questions and one topic. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. That’s too much to catch up on.

F: Tonight’s topic is “Living with mentally ill family.” I picked that topic.

F: So, what is your experience growing up with mentally ill family?

A: I’m going to say this again: your mental illness hasn’t affected me that much.

F: Except my irritability.

A: True. True.

F: The majority of my family is undiagnosed. It runs pretty deep, ranging from severe psychotic bipolar disorder to depression to OCD. My paternal side, especially. Ninety-nine percent of it undiagnosed, but it has caused a lot of painful memories, and an unpleasant childhood. For me, the worst part about that is denial.The fact that some people, not going to name names, but some people deny that the bad stuff happened. To them, life was great and normal.

A: It’s probably because for them, it was another day in the life.

F: It’s also because mental illness comes with delusions. They have delusions that everything was great. But even when I was small, I knew it wasn’t. And now that I look back on it, I know it definitely wasn’t, and it screwed me up for a long time.

F: Still, somehow, finding out you had a mental illness shocked me! It shouldn’t have, but it did. I can look at almost every family member on that side, and know that they all have something going on. Even down to me, and my brother, we both have something going on.

F: So, my experience growing up with mentally ill parent or parents. What’s the word I’m looking for? Traumatic? Like what you told me one time, what is it? CPTSD?

A: Yeah. Complex PTSD.

F: Complex PTSD. Yeah. I definitely think that’s something. There was never money. When there was money, there was wild spending. There wasn’t money because there was wild spending. We never had a stable place to live.

A: You can relate to that in two different experiences.

F: I can relate in many different ways.

F: We didn’t have a place to live sometimes. Everything was always somebody else’s fault. Vacations were taken when rent should’ve been paid. We came home from vacation to eviction notices. There was a lot of instability. There was a lot of anger. There was a lot of instability in mood. I never knew. I would walk home from school and see the car in the driveway and be terrified because I didn’t know what I was walking in to. Was it going to be fine? Or was it going to be traumatic? The moods were all over the place. I didn’t know.

F: I feel like it wasn’t just that, though. On the other side of my family, my other parent used their illness to slowly kill themselves. Death by installment plan. There was instability there. Definitely, when someone uses their physical illness to try to end their life, that is mentally unwell. Putting a 13-14 year old in the position of taking care of a grown adult because they were purposefully neglecting their health is pretty shitty. So, there were a lot of factors in my childhood that made growing up with mentally ill parents very very unpleasant.

A: You having depression, I don’t think it’s affected me negatively that much. If anything, we can relate, because you know how to deal with things in a healthy way. You know how to cope healthily. You know what’s going on when I’m in a depressive phase. We almost bond over it.It’s weird.

F: We bond over weird things sometimes. Like, mental health. I don’t feel like I cope with my mental illness in a healthy way. Which, is why I weigh as much as I do.

A: Yeah. True.

F: I have terrible coping mechanisms. Granted, it could be worse, but it’s still not healthy. But I do want to teach you how to cope in a healthy way. I feel like I’ve passed the food addiction trait on to you, though.

A: You have, which, is why I weigh as much as I do.

F: Partially. Your bipolar meds aren’t helping any.

A: I don’t use it as a coping mechanism. I just love food. Unless it’s an unconscious thing. I don’t even know. I don’t think I have anything to cope with, really. I mean, my bipolar is just there. It’s like, it does affect me negatively, but how do you cope with that? It’s just anger and then it’s over. There’s nothing to cope with.

F: I guess it’s at this point, I feel good that I haven’t traumatized you into needing unhealthy coping tools.

F; Do you eat when you’re angry? Do you have the urge to eat then?

A: No. Not at all. I’m repulsed by food when I’m angry. I have the urge to eat when I’m bored.

F: That’s a lot of people. I never thought about it like that. I turn to food for every single thing. Happy. Sad. Angry. Celebrating. Anything.

A: When I’m angry I’m thinking about not being angry. I’m thinking about fighting with you to get you to see my side. It’s either you or the boys that make me angry. Mostly you. I don’t even end up making that argument, it just passes.

F: You don’t eat to stop being angry.

A: I don’t. I lose my appetite.

F; We’ll have to talk about coping mechanisms in another topic. Where were we when we got off on that?

A; You coping healthily.

F; Yeah, I totally do not cope in a healthy way.

A: I never thought about you using eating as a coping mechanism.

F: Oh yeah. But I was raised that way. I was raised to fix everything with food. Food was the center of everything. You fix the good. You fix the bad. It doesn’t matter what it is, food is involved. I fully believe my parents are food addicts. I mean, I’ve been dieting since I was twelve. I started gaining weight when I was about eight years old, when some really real shit started going down and I used food to deal with it. So, I don’t think I cope healthily.

A: I feel like most of your aggression isn’t tied to your depression. You don’t seem very depressed. There’s aggression on a daily basis. Like, on a daily basis, you’ll get mad at me for stuff I don’t really understand. You get mad at me for getting frustrated, and I can’t really help it.

F; I will correct you and say, I don’t get mad at you for getting frustrated. I get mad at the way you act. I’m not even mad at you. You’re not going to be able to throw tantrums when you’re at your job or whatever, so you’re going to have to learn to control how you act. That’s all I’m doing. I hear what you’re saying, though.

F: Aggression is one hundred percent part of depression.

A: I know that aggression is a symptom of depression, but I don’t think you’re depressed every single day of your life.

F: Oh, no, I am. Totally. One hundred percent, I am.

A: That’s kind of sad.

F: Every single day. I always feel depression every single day. Even on medication.

A: So, there’s no, like, stability?

F: The stability is depression. It is always there. I used to tell your dad, when we were married, I don’t know what happiness feels like. I can imitate it, but I’ve never felt it.

A: I’m taking a big sip of my tea and trying to process this.

F: I thought you knew.

A: I didn’t know. I guess it’s true. I guess there’s not a time when you’re not affected by your mental illness, but for me, it’s either drastic mania or drastic depression or stability. I thought everybody with mental illness had that stability.

F: I feel depression every single day. That is my stability.

A: I guess I feel the effects of mania every day. Because my thoughts are never not racing. When I’m manic, they’re racing more, but I feel like other people’s thoughts move slower.

F: Mine do. That’s why I move slowly and talk slowly. My brain is moving slower than yours.

A: Do you think when I was younger and I had that stutter, it was because my brain was moving so much faster because of my mental illness? Everybody said it was because I was smart, but now, I don’t know.

F: It’s possible. I don’t know, because I don’t know anything about racing thoughts. I know you have them, but I don’t know what it’s like to have them. That is a symptom of some mental and behavioral issues, but I don’t have experience with it. I never have racing thoughts, ever.

F: My brain moves Oklahoma slow. No offense to any fellow Okies, but for real.

F: So, back on topic, the aggression and irritability I feel also comes from pretty severe anxiety. Which, since five years ago, I’ve been working my butt off to overcome.

A: Yeah, and you’ve gotten a lot better.

F: I’ve done, what’s it called? Exposure therapy? Putting myself in those positions that I was afraid of, and realizing they’re not as bad as I thought they’d be.

A: You’ve gotten yourself out of your comfort zone. And no one can get you out of your comfort zone except you. You should never be forced out of your comfort zone. Like, my friends are always trying to push me out of my comfort zone, but that’s not really their place.

F: Yeah, well, I forced myself out of my comfort zones and my anxiety has improved tremendously. But anxiety is still a huge source of aggression and irritability, and I know that the irritability affects you. You may not know when I’m super depressed or whatever.

A: It’s because you hide it.

F: Or maybe it’s what you’re used to.

A: You notice when I’m depressed, though.

F: I do. I see it in everybody. I’m so overly aware of everybody’s emotions.

A: It honesty sucks that I get mania way more than depression because I’d rather have depression than mania.

F: Why? [cringing]

A: Because when I’m manic...nevermind, It’s hard to explain.

F: I don’t know, I guess from a Major Depressive standpoint, depression fucking sucks

A: Depression fucking sucks, but it sucks less than mania.

F: I don’t know, having it every day and having it bog me down, sucks. You know better than I do, the two poles. I know one of them and I know how much I’ve suffered with it. I know self harm and suicide is a big factor in that one. I have experiences with those. It’s not an area that I want you or anybody else to experience.

A: I guess I live with mania everyday. That’s why I’m on an antipsychotic and not an antidepressant. Because the mania greatly overpowers the depression.

F: Definitely. That’s why you’re Bipolar 1. Because you are far more manic than you are depressed. From an MDD standpoint, I’d love to have some mania every once in a while. I feel like I’d have more energy. I’d get stuff done. I wouldn’t be trodding through the rain so much.

F: However, I do know that mania comes with a lot of risky behaviors. If I were to have bouts of mania, I’d probably be pretty broke. I’m pretty good with my money right now. And I probably wouldn’t have some of the relationships that I do. I feel like maybe because of my depression, or because of the childhood I had, I’m pretty empathetic towards other people, and people like that.

A: Compassion is one of the best traits you can have. There’s nothing better than a person who understands. Like, I would consider myself a compassionate person. I’m pretty understanding.

F: One thing that I envy about you though. You have compassion now that you’re medicated. You didn’t have compassion when you were younger and that broke my heart. I used to think you were a sociopath.

A: I think I was. Maybe I was a psychopath. For real.

F: Yeah, you had no compassion. You have compassion now. But, you don’t have...I feel like you have a healthy amount of empathy but you’re not an empath. Because being an empath is so overwhelming.

A: Isn’t that when you take on the emotions of other people? I do that sometimes.

F: I do that with every single person I come in contact with.

A: Fine. Prove your point.

F: Ha ha. That is my point. I mean, when a friend halfway across the world has a problem, I take it on as my own. When my parents were back and forth with their relationship, I took on their problems as my own. I’ve stressed myself out over other people’s issues. Hell, I can’t even watch clips of people falling or nut shots without literally feeling the pain for those people. Like, for real, my legs will hurt when I see someone fall.

A: Do you ever get second hand embarrassment?

F: Totally. But I have to talk myself through that.

A: I used to be so obsessed with Full House when I was like, seven? And remember even then that I’d have to hide my face when something embarrassing would happen. Do you get that?

F: Definitely, but I’ve gotten better about it. It’s not my embarrassment to carry.

A: We got way off topic.

F: Yes. So, get us back on topic.

A: So, my brother is bipolar like me.

F: Pretty much exactly like you.

A: I see a lot of myself in him. And I feel so bad for you guys when I was eight, cause I’m not even a caregiver and that’s still a lot to deal with.

F: Not only that, but you were a lot worse when you were eight. But that’s because we didn’t know what the hell was wrong with you.

A: There’s a lot of compassion you give him, because you know what he’s going through, and I feel so bad for this, but I find myself getting jealous. I feel like the whole experience would have been a lot better if you had given me that compassion.

F: True. But we didn’t know what was wrong with you.

A: Yeah. That’s understandable.

F: So, anyway, back on topic. Do you think you’ve been raised by one or two mentally ill parents?

A: Well, I feel like my father is probably not neurotypical. I’m sorry if you’re reading this, Dad, but I feel like there is some sort of mental illness going on with him.

A: There’s that...inconsistency. There definitely was a lot of instability, too. And, um, he’s still indecisive. He broke promises a lot.

F: Broke, or breaks?

A: He doesn’t break them a lot now, but he definitely did back in the day.

F: So, you think you’re being raised by a bunch of non-neurotypical people? Cause you’ve got me, primarily raising you, you’ve got your dad, your grandma lives here.

F: Do you know anybody that’s neurotypical?

A: I don’t think I’m friends with any neurotypical people.

F: What about relatives?

A: I don’t think I do, actually.

F: [laughing]

A: That’s really funny. I don’t know a neurotypical person. At least not in real life.

F: Yeah, I think everybody’s got some degree of something. Whether they admit to it or whether they believe it or not, everybody’s got a little something going on.

F: So, what kind of person do you think a child raised by non-neurotypical people turns into?

F: I know what typically comes of a person raised by mentally ill people that aren’t aware of it or aren’t taking care of it. Or are in denial. I know what happens there. What do you think comes of a child in your particular situation?

A: I think if you embrace your mental illness, and you’re aware of it, but you also take precautions to stay mentally healthy and also take precautions to make sure you don’t take out anything on anybody. You raise mentally healthy, but very well informed children, that, if they have a mental illness, they’re aware of what to do.

F: They can handle it.

A: They can handle it. Because you were never taught how to handle your mental illness. You had to learn how to handle it on your own. And I’m lucky enough to know how to handle it.

F: You have a support system, which is something I didn’t have. I didn’t have a doctor or family or friends to turn to or support me. You have a support system of people to help you cope and help you deal with your brain.

F: I feel like being raised in the way that I was helped me to be more aware of mental illness and in turn, be able to raise you in a better way. In a more mentally healthy way. I may not be mentally healthy, but like I’ve told other people, old habits die hard. My coping mechanisms and my struggles are my own, but I can at least help put you on the right path to being a healthy, stable human being. That’s what I want for you. To be a stable, productive person. And I think we’re on the right path for that one.

A: Yes!

F: So, as shitty as things may have been, and not being diagnosed until well into my twenties. I think there’s a silver lining to everything and I think the silver lining was making me prepared to help you be healthy. And I think having a support system is the number one most important thing to being mentally healthy.

F: You have to have support. You cannot do it alone.

[psychedelictrashpanda]

It’s been awhile, weird old blog with unspecified direction. How about more of me me me?

I finally did DMT again, and WOW. It’s been at least a full decade since the last time. I still didn’t quite “break through” enough to “meet the entities” again but mein GOTT was it healing. Speaking of God, we’ll get to that soon... But before smoking the dimitri, I was beginning to sustain a mania in slow motion with dissociatives again. Not to any extreme like I did with PCP long ago (btw, glancing at my Eyehategod poster, I realize that horror/metal fest when I was blasted on PCP the entire time was all the way back in 2013! It seems to much more recent, but the way these drugs interact with memory is very peculiar. or maybe it was the traumatizing effect of it and other things at the time that makes me block out and thus distort the time signature of the memory... I digress). And I don’t have the destructive tendencies I did in the past anyway, so I’ve never been apt to push it as far as I was when I was shooting up 3-meo-pcp and blacking out for days at a time. I mean, I did push it I suppose. For the main George Floyd protests I was loading up on a combination of things. Can’t even remember if that was my sober window between methadone detox and the suboxone I’m on now. But, I was combining bits of weird PCP offshoots with opiate offshoots (4-map iirc) and/or kratom with maybe a drop of benzo... straddling the line between going overboard and a “party dose” for lack of a better descriptor; between recreation and desperation. In retrospect, I was summoning the courage to act like my old self used to in these sorts of situations. That is, giving it my all, being novel about it, idk, summoning the spirit of Dr Gonzo I suppose (who, after reading his two books, was more slimey of a jerk than he’s presented in Hunter’s stories. well, I need to finish the Cockroach People book, he started getting into his attraction to underage girls as a young 20-something man himself and ugh, gross). My true wild & adventurous spirit has been hampered, weighed down with anxiety and depression and all manner of undiagnosed mental illness. Who knows if it’s more the drugs or the environmental factors that trigger drug use, but the spirit is tortured like Griffith in the torture dungeon, the heart is wrapped in a black grime guarded by the Beast of Darkness, the will is subordinated to authoritarian capitalist hegemony...

Where was I? Oh so I started suboxone for the second time in my life innnn... February I want to say. Last time I did it I was able to detox myself simply buying subs off the street, but I did it too quick. That’s been one problem, every time I detox rapidly it’s too harsh a push back into reality and I succumb to relapse less then a year into sobriety. The reason reality is harsh is the same reason my stance on anti depressants has been further cemented. I’ve articulated it better lately... Basically I believe it’s a weird solution to depression to force your chemical makeup into the right position to function properly in the same environment that caused it in the first place. “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” One of my conversations with a young college friend really illuminated why many don’t even consider this position. She was insistent there’s no cause of depression, you’re just born with a fucked up mind. Now sure, hereditary disposition is a thing, as a drug addicted child of an addict I should know. But for example she pointed to another friend with hard depression and was like “his life seems fine what explanation could there be?” But I put forth maybe his childhood of having to closet his homosexuality in a hard conservative family that had the possibility of disowning him if they knew about it contributed to that “natural chemical imbalance,” as it’s implied. YES, some people NEED it. But for the most part, it really seems to me to be what I’m gonna call the thyroid phenomenon. That is to say, a medical explanation for a small fraction of severely affected patients is used as a broad brush by the public to diagnose themselves. Forewarning: I am not fat shaming here, forgive the example. Dietary practices are a personal thing so my feelings are stronger as well. Anyway, it seems to me as soon as this thyroid malfunction became a hard biological explanation for obesity beyond the psychological, suddenly everyone was a candidate. It’s fine to think “maybe I have it” but when a growing and significant portion of the obese crowd started screaming they all had thyroid problems and can’t help themselves, when a teensy percentage actually do... well it sort of touches on the “addiction as a disease” narrative that’s never sat well with me. Addicts use the disease reasoning to skirt personal responsibility. I'm not denying it is a disease, but I believe calling it as such in the public discourse isn’t terribly constructive. (Okay, you’re seeing an opinion change in real time here... I changed my mind.) I was vehemently against the narrative, but I need to readjust to simply make people WARY of the narrative. As an addict, I could easily see myself using the excuse of it being a disease as a fatalist function; that is to say giving in, relinquishing personal control over my fate. Hereditary disposition, Rat Park, addiction as a disease... there’s also a severe lack of control it all conjures. Paradoxically, drugs can used to meticulously control your state of mind. I can’t control my desire to control myself?

God where was I going with this... Oh! God! May as well mention I’ve been warming up more and more to the spirit of monotheism beyond it’s structural and institutional dimensions. I could get deep into my recent past of not believing in the idea of a spirit, soul, etc. How the pendulum of my ideology swings between cold rationalism and loose spirituality, especially as I go through phases of rebellion against perceived oppressors. Growing up in a red state with a lot of Christian ideals, society around me was always telling me everything I seemed to like was the work of Satan. Naturally, I started reading into Satanism. I never self identified with occult-esque belief structures, except maybe chaos magick because it’s whole idea is to merge whatever practices work into something of your own, but I did staunchly identify as anti christian. Not a hard thing to do when you’re already a metal head, which definitely fueled the trajectory. Not to mention metal helped goad me into DXM use (thanks Velvet Cacoon ya bunch of goons), the first real psychedelic journeys I had. Because I never gave real consideration to myself having depression, I moulded my personal ideology around the symptoms it causes. Which is why for awhile after coming to terms with depression as a problem I probably have, I was only able to identify it in retrospect. I never felt it in real time because it was so old-coat to me, I adapted to it like an addict adapts to their drug of choice and ti becomes their world. So I would decide to skip social events, let my room get messy, watch only old comfort shows, etc... but only AFTER emerging from that state was I able to immediately look back and think “wait... I was doing all those things because I was depressed.” In the moment, it’s rationalized as “I don’t want to see these people for these reasons” or “I want to watch spongebob because it’s fun and an old favorite.” Rationalization, the concept of the west, serves as a detriment to the individual in a number of manners. This is one. I was a MASTER at rationalizing away my drug use. Statistically, more people die from this this and that, why be worried that I’m on this drug instead? Statistics quelled the perceived danger. It was also a formative tool in my skills of justification. I always felt I had to justify every action I took, but that’s getting back into family matters...

But why not bring that up? it’s a sore spot. I feel like the tables have flipped from my dad always saying “you all just think I’m an asshole!” to me thinking I’m the asshole. It’s too much to get into but I’ll touch on a couple important things... I’ve learned a major source of my anxiety is not being able to draw the boundaries between business and family and myself, because they’re not properly defined. When I’m told by my bossfather after explaining the distress I feel simply thinking about the family company, and he goes typically all-or-nothing when I touch on crucial issue and says “if you want out just tell me you want out”, I can’t separate between whether he’s saying it as a father or as a boss in the moment. He would say, “of course I just mean the company”, but where does company end and family begin? It’s also an intense pressure, maybe shame, simply typing this and thinking in the back of my head about someone who might read and think “what a spoiled brat, has a family company and blah blah.” But who put all that in my head? He says he’s changed from the days of putting immense pressure on me with the sort of sentiments that cause that shit in my head like always telling me how great I have it and all the opportunities, shit, I’m feeling it right now, the frustration and I can’t even identify these emotions. At least I am aware of them, that’s a huge milestone for me. But the only thing that’s changed is he sees me as a the broken mother fucker I am and treats me as such. Sometimes it’s nice, and sincere sympathy, other times his frustration with having to check his language all the time is palpable so it does no good to do so. The immense pressure, the intense urgency, the confusing complexity, all those market pressures haven’t changed. This is evident when we were driving somewhere and I suggested not worrying about the fastest route on the map because one minute isn’t a big deal and he insisted that one minute IS a big deal. Sweating one fucking minute indicates a mountain of reputational pressure. In a way, that one minute is putting business ahead of family, but I feel harsh saying it because as he’s pounded into my head the business is what allows the family to survive. Not to mention why put the crack head of the family above that one minute (not literal crack, but it was obvious as soon as he saw I was “fucking around” on ketamine he decided to not take me as seriously) Still, I’ve made my decision that survival reasoning is fucking bullshit already. He’s the one that wants a mansion and wants enough mailbox money for us not to have to worry ever again, so he’s the one deliberately creating the pressure. Maybe he hasn’t considered how hardened he’s become to those feelings after a lifetime in the street and in prison. I really feel for mom. She’s okay now, but her spirit... It’s part of the reason I can’t relax myself at home. He has always painted her as dead weight in the past, never getting a job, sitting watching TV, but he’s unable to connect the dots psychologically because we’re all layman that part of the reason she’s like that is because her actions have been demonized already so who the fuck she got to prove herself to? Same reason I fell into relapse sometimes. Damned if I do, damned if I don’t sort of deal. The damned if I don’t being the reputation of yourself you have to live with after getting sober. He says “don’t worry about it” but I couldn’t accept that because the reason he doesn’t trust me (never mind respect, that’s even further away) is informed by my past. I can’t complain that he never allowed me to contribute to a crucial decision like choosing the building for the dispensary, talking about whether we want a certain investor or not, etc, is because that’s not something to entrust to a druggie. I’ve always felt he let me play make-believe CEO and gave me an allowance for it, while telling me otherwise. He’d say “this is all for you” but he’s making the decisions that truly move mountains and then putting it on us. Which is why I have a hard time saying “I want out”, he can be a baby about things just as much as I am, and I fear he’d let his entrepreneurial drive be affected by my departure. Sigh, this is already getting to be a headache to think about... He’s tired. I’m tired.

There was also something I wanted to say regarding the role social constructs play in all this, but it’s getting long enough already. Suffice to say I’ve been getting into psychoanalysis lately and it’s scratching the right itch for knowledge and wisdom. I can see why Zizek is enamored with Lacan, and why it’s so important to mix it with Marxism. And not to toot my own horn, but what the hell... There are a lot of lofty ideas I’ve been coming across that are already parallel to ideas I’ve developed through my own life experience, and it makes me think I’m meant for this sort of stuff. If I’m lucky in my pursuits (not to put too much weight on the luck aspect), I’ll be a journalist of some sort. Articles, video essays, whatever. Need to rein in my indecisiveness and dispel FOMO tho.

Back to DMT. But not really. Earlier in the summer I got some straight Ketamine and it was also immensely healing. But it has a great abuse potential, especially for me, so it’s harder to “hang up the phone” after I get the message as TmK would say. It made me feel again, and start to understand what love is. Partly because it conjured all these lost feels I had for Kat. She’s great people though, I think I’d just stress her out too much. Idk. Whatever. My love life is a total mess. Anyway after I ran out I wanted more of course and stumbled on some DCK, a somewhat rare ketamine offshoot. Coupled with my increasing propensity to trip acid more than once a week, they started building on each other. I was happier and happier at home, but at work/fam was getting more and more distressed about my place in that whole show. In his show. Simply thinking about the company, especially after having read that article about procrastination and how much it resonated with me, caused me unnecessary levels of distress. Normally as quickly as I can feel that, my mind will tuck it away and bottle it up somewhere so I can go about my day. The problem with drugs is they cause you to act instead. So he was doing the usual “it’s so easy! you’ll have it made!” and I interrupted with this torrent of shit I’ve been holding back forever, and he would not yield on his “you didn’t let me finish...” Incidentally, has he really never picked up on every time I interrupt I already know what he’s talking about? I said as much, something like “it’s not the labor” and he keeps saying “no you’re not listening” as though a frivolous detail changed the main thrust of the fact he’s always trying to make it easier for me. I wish he could simply let me go off and have the strength to take it a little less seriously, but considering how often I take things personally I shouldn’t be surprised he does to. On top of this, his brother/my uncle was in the hospital for some serious shit. But another reason I picked this time is because I only feel safe even confronting him when non-involved parties are around. He doesn’t care that I don’t feel safe confronting him though, he says “don’t worry about me” so maybe I shouldn’t. I feel like such an asshole about it, but that feeling is conjured by the ideological structure he helped to create. Where does my shame end with him being the causation and start with my personal ideology? How much can a person create their own ideology, truly? It’s about as small a window as free will, I imagine.

SO after feeling awful for going off after having all this stuff build up in my mind, I felt awful and went home to drug up some more. Again, not recklessly to the extent I used to be. But I did a fat line of DCK while on a couple hits of LSD and a smidgen of Zolpidem (a wholly underrated substance). Everything was getting to me all at once. A perfect storm of my problems. All the while another doubt caused by ideology from without (society and family both) was making me think it’s all the drugs. But the developments I’ve made are huge strides, I’ve matured so much from it all. And I realized every time I do this, those developments are wiped clean because the validity of them is rendered null due to both the general social stigma of drugs and my history with them. And maybe that’s a major trigger fo rmy relapse in the past. I’m not suppose to be on drugs, but I dabble, have incredible experiences and make strides of maturity, but because it’s drugs the exact opposite effect is percieved from the outside; the experiences are simple chemical euphoria, the strides of maturity are false delusions. It triggers a sharp roll back down hill. I wish someone respected me for who I am, I feel so alone sometimes.

Drugs as an umbrella term, drugs as a vice for the worst dregs of society. There are so many problems in our world regarding drugs. I could write a book. But how much I’ve written here touches on another pressure I feel. IS it simply him again? When he asks “you’re gonna be gone in a few days right?” is that what’s making me feel like this is a waste of time? I’ve got to get out of here. It’s so hard though. I simply have to be strong. The strength is in me to take the massive cut to pay and benefits when I move. Maybe I’ll get a portion of my strugglers card back and shit heads like Blasey Shomas can’t simply say “why don’t you take care of yourself instead of daddy taking are of you?” anymore. Part of me wants to say he says that because he’s driven by his own emotions and not smart enough to directly debate my claims, his insults should hold no weight. Another part of me is truly trying to be... I don’t know a proper term for it without sounding egotistical, but “enlightened”? This is why monotheism is sounding more interesting to me. Jesus’ position about those dregs of society. I’ve always tried to be a trusting person, understanding of people’s struggles, the ideologies they function under that make them lash out or otherwise act the way they do, etc. I even changed my wording there from “I’ve always been” to “I’ve always tried to be.” Not so much for my usual reasons of dodging a committing claim (which I’m working on -- instead of “I think ___” just say what I believe to give the claim more sense of authority so as to be taken more seriously), but trying to be more humble. And not to think lowly and use myself as a punching bag like I used to... ugh, whatever. This post is messy enough.

So that night after having done DCK every day for a couple weeks and tripping every other night on acid, I was at my wits end on what to do, where to go next, everything. The outside world is crumbling, the inside world is lost. I finally whipped out that DMT I’ve had for a long while, something inside told me it was time. Oh duh it was the wits end part, I had no other chemical recourse. I sat in my bed with a foil sculpture loosely resembling a pipe, repeated to myself “it’s okay, just let it happen to you, it will be okay.” A part of me even had a small fear based on those rare reports of those interdimensional beings mentally raping some people, but I don’t know what to make of those experiences, seem like flukes. I took my three deep hits and set the pipe aside as soon as the rusb began and laid back. It wasn’t enough to break through, so I need to get a proper pipe, but it was enough for a “being” (which I am convinced is a part of your mind, not from another dimension or otherwise external source) to appear before me. At least I think. Whatever it was slowly came closer, reassuring me that I’d be okay. The most profound part was an overwhelming sense of all these puzzle pieces suddenly falling perfectly into place where they should be. As though the answers to all my struggles obvious and within me the whole time. For example as soon as I came back I adjusted my posture, as that’s something that I’ve been wanting to work on, and because I was reminded of that just now I adjusted my posture in my seat while writing this. I felt an overwhelming sense of forgiveness toward myself, I think. Amazingly, the inebriation I felt before the trip was largely dissolved, as though the stuff I was on somehow all lost it’s potency. The distresses melted away. At least, the power behind them was nulled. I’m still facing the same problems, but there’s a zen(?) quality to my thinking when they come up in my mind. No longer will a pin drop trigger everything I’m feeling all at once. When I came-to completely, I started BAWLING. In being overwhelmingly consoled by the trip, I became inconsolable. Tears of joy. Tears of healing. And that was the main takeaway. The loudest words of the experience were “Now the healing can truly begin.” At the same time, now the real work also begins. 

Balance is key

[city-of-my-universe]

Long time, no blog. Same partner; new doubts.

It’s been over 6 years since I’ve last needed to vent on here. But, yet again my partner has triggered so much doubt within me, I need to vent before I significantly hurt myself physically or psychologically. 

I am so low by this that I don’t even care if he finds and reads this anymore; maybe it’ll catalyse a long and overdue conversation. 

With the start of July and until September, OU has finished with another year!

Between the pandemic, my universal credit being revoked and sod's-fucking-law; it's been a mess of an academic year.

Now the academic modules are out of the way; it's time to look to my future (career-wise, but fuck me, the social pressure to "breed" is breathing down my neck too).

- As if my continued unemployment cannot be justified without a wailing, slimy-producing infant to show for by the end of the process. This pressure is mostly enforced by my mother and societal expectations. Still, I don't see my partner going out of his way to research into adoption or, fuck me, simply advocating for me in a medical setting either.

That is if he's gotten me pregnant and the medical professionals are using my autism as an excuse to not listen to me directly.  

This was a discussion for another day on a different blog platform, but more and more these days, it feels my partner and I are on borrowed time. 

Not just the natural vs adopting kids thing, but every other thing I say or even simply react in my body language seems to piss him off. 

And after nearly 7 years together, he only now tells me doesn't want to get married. Ever.

Fuck, but getting him to anything but lie in bed should be noted in the calendar! Look, I get he's most likely got undiagnosed depression with a large helping of anxiety, but he doesn't do anything to help himself; I've suggested getting help, both socially and medically, but "nada".

The only thing that seems to help his mental state is going to his family.

I have to admit, the complete disdain (yes, it's disdain and not “distain”, I looked it up) towards marriage has hit me hard.

It means that if this relationship is going to go beyond the foreseeable future, I will have to accept that he, and therefore us, a couple, will never be.

- Be a part of the local community

- Make friends with other couples nearby. Fuck that. Simply have friends together.

- Regularly go out to do activities outside the house together, even if it's to go on a simple walk.

-- Now, to top it off, there's no chance in hell of a wedding to celebrate and look back on as a symbol of sharing our life together.

To just keep him and keep him even partially happy (especially when he won't get help), I'm going to have to compromise and give up on nearly everything I want in life. E.g.

- Not wanting to have natural kids / give up any expectation, he'll look into adoption.

- Be part of the local community

- Pursue further education/training after my degree

-- Give up all dreams of a bohemian wedding I've been brewing over the last few years; I'm not naturally a wedding-y person, but the longer you're with someone, the more you dream about your future together and deeper your love for them and that life you imagine becomes. Now I find out he's omitted for the last 7 doesn't believe in the concept, effectively misleading me under misdirection and false intentions. At least I said from the get-go that I didn't want kids.

When we've broached the topic about being more social, he claims all that will change when we live in London and/or when we have a kid.

Honestly, I wish beyond what is healthy for that to be true, but I feel I'm going to end up being dealt with the same shitty hand but in a new location. 

- A location unfamiliar and overwhelming my autistic senses. Stuck with in-laws which are lovely, well-meaning and honestly a lot more accepting/accommodating than my own, but I believe I should go along with anything "Mr Man” wants to do with his life over mine.

This probably includes having to cave in and push out a sprog too...

How can you be so in love with someone but miserable with your life together?

Where did we go wrong? Or is this where and/or how we naturally part ways?

I keep on hoping it’s the irregularity of my minimally prescribed dose of sertraline (50mg) that is making me feel like this, but I don’t think so.

- Maybe it is just that, or maybe I’m the food for taking 7 years to finally see things clearly. 

My friends keep on telling me he’s “the best thing that’s ever/ could ever happen to me”, and in a lot of ways, they’re right. 

But should our life together make me feel so miserable?

Or is “growing up” as a woman mean giving up all the aspirations you want in life?

[steveandtorixinthemiddle]

Steve, Tori, and X in the Middle

Hello and Welcome to our new blog (If I’m being completely honest, I will probably be the one posting the most) about the next adventure in our lives. I suppose we should introduce ourselves. Let’s start with Steve because he’s the funny one.

Who is Steve? Well he has been a construction worker in various fields for most of his adult life. In 2011 he discovered Wii golf, which got him interested in the actual game. At first it was just playing on his PS3, but eventually we were able to find a decent set of second-hand clubs meant for a lefty. The first time he came home from the golf course (after what he described as the most horrible round in history) he was grinning from ear to ear and happier than I had seen him in a long time. He said he didn’t get remotely close to par, but he’d enjoyed himself immensely. He has gotten better but says he will never be a pro.

Steve is funny. I mean gut-splitting, spit milk out your nose, pee your pants funny. Most of his quiet little comments go unnoticed by those who don’t know him, and they are missing a lot of laughs because of it. He has bought nearly every stuffed animal I own (and I own a lot of them, mostly ladybugs) because he enjoys making other people smile. Okay, mostly me.... Then again, he also worked two jobs to put me through college, so you have to know he’s a good guy.

Funnily enough, people actually think Steve looks a little scary. I don’t usually see it though. I see a big teddy-bear, or a really goofy guy who just wants to have fun. Sometimes I accuse him of being a ten-year-old in the body of a grown man (I guess like BIG) because he loves fart jokes and many of the other things every boy I’ve ever known has liked. This man used to sit down and watch a couple hours of Sponge Bob when our son was small. He watches Red Green, Monty Python, Mythbusters, and the Mel Brooks movies and wishes he could do something like that.

Now me, I suppose. Well, I’m in my late thirties, but sometimes feel three times my age. I haven’t had an easy life (who has?) and my body is feeling it. In 2017 I had a pretty bad fall that resulted in lingering pain for years. Pain so bad that I couldn’t even walk. We had no medical insurance at the time (we were poor, but not poor enough, and living in SC, a state that didn’t take kindly to the ACA), which meant that the injury went untreated, even undiagnosed.

If the physical injury wasn’t enough (it really was if you ask me), the meds that they gave me to treat my PTSD were late a couple times. It was a medication with a warning I was never given. Occasionally someone will withdrawal from certain medications in such a way that it causes damage. This particular withdrawal caused me to have seizures, brain zaps (which can only be described as electricity zipping through your head every time you move it, or even your eyes) and suicidal thoughts so severe my husband had to take several days off work just to sit with me.

All totaled I was trapped mostly in bed or in a wheelchair. I was depressed and anxious. My PTSD was worse than ever. I was feeling hopeless and alone all the time, and I honestly wasn’t sure if there was any reason to keep going. I would have really great days, when I was able to get my wheelchair down the ramp, take the bus to the store, even see my friends. And then there would be days when my hip would lock and I would fall down.

After a fall I could usually expect to be trapped for days in my bed, in unending pain, and mostly alone as my husband had to work, walk the dog, take care of me, do all of the household chores, and literally everything else. My only contribution to our life was using the phone to pay bills and make cigarettes. I felt like I was a burden to my husband. It just got worse and worse and I didn’t see an end.

It’s interesting what life gives you sometimes. One afternoon, when I couldn’t find any inspiration for a fanfiction story I was working on, I started looking on YouTube for anything that would keep me entertained. As I was scrolling through, I saw a video from Trent & Ally (Experienced Van Builder Creates Masterpiece (4k) Van Tour). When the video ended I remember thinking, ‘if I’m going to be stuck in bed all the time, I wish it moved.’ I had no hope of having “van-life” adventures. Not with my health so bad, or with my mental health not much better. Still, it gave me something to dream about.

Then one day my husband sat down in his chair across from the bed, looked me in the eye, and said “we’re going back to Maine.” He’d had enough of seeing me suffer. So, we came back to Maine. It didn’t work out the way we planned. We had to leave our dog Chyko with my cousin (his original owner, who had raised him from a pup) and his family and take the train and a bus to get there, which meant leaving almost everything behind for the second time (we’d done that when we moved to SC after I found my mom).

Almost immediately after getting to Maine we were able to rent a lot with an old trailer on it (1972) not far from Steve’s brother. Right after moving in, I applied for Maine Care, which is Maine’s version of Medicaid. After a while, with the proper medication and a LOT of hard work, I started to get better. First it was just walking from the bedroom to the kitchen. Then I wasn’t staying in bed all day anymore, I would sit at the table. After a while I was walking several times a day from one end of the trailer to the other.

You should have seen my husband’s face when I told him I was going to walk to the store for the first time. I actually thought he might cry. He walked beside me the whole way, telling me over and over how proud he was of me and grinning from ear to ear as he “showed me off” to the people of the town he had grown up in.

It’s funny the way things happen. Covid shut down the country. More and more I wanted out of my house. I took over walking the dogs (who we adopted from Steve’s brother when they moved to a place that wouldn’t allow dogs) twice a day. I started going out with my sister-in-law to stores and walking through them, first in my walker, and more recently on my own two feet with absolutely no help!

Over the past year I have gotten stronger. I will never be where I was before. I will never walk 23 miles with a toddler on my back again (yes, I did that once). I won’t be skydiving, or cliff jumping, or any of the major things I wish I could have tried at least once when I was young enough to survive (he he he). Still, I have a lot of life ahead of me. I’m glad my husband didn’t let me give up.

And now we are preparing for our next adventure. We are going to buy a shuttle bus and turn it into our home on the road. We have several reasons for this. One of those reasons is to pay off all of my outstanding medical bills. I literally owe so much that if I keep paying at my current rate it will take me 417.8 years to finish. So in part, I suppose this is about making sure we don’t leave that debt to our son.

There are other reasons though. One of them is that I would dearly love to meet a few of the couples/families/individuals I began following on YouTube over the past three years. Another reason is because we will never be able to afford a retirement on what my husband makes working in a grocery store (which was his only option after moving here) and we need to go where the work is. We also want to see the country, find out who we are now that “mom and dad” aren’t our biggest titles anymore, and to keep us both active and healthy.

(Okay, and because someone told me I couldn’t do it and I’ve never been able to resist proving people wrong when they say that, so long as I actually WANT to do it).

I’m sort of hoping my husband can put together a show of his own, that people actually enjoy watching on YouTube. Sort of a mix bag kind of show that brings in elements from his favorite shows and movies that really speak to us both. We would love to make videos about how and where to fish, or how to get a fishing license in a state other than your own. I’d even like to do my own short segment, sort of like what Mariah Alice does in her videos. Just talking about what I’m feeling, and why. Figuring out where I go from here.

And... both of us want to help others in our situation (low income) make a go of the life. We watched, horrified, over the last year as more and more people lost everything to wild-fires, floods, even evictions. We want to make it possible for other people to take their homes on the road with them. We want to help families who are really struggling figure out what to do next. And we want to really join in the community (which will be hard with my social anxiety, but not impossible).

Mostly, I think we just want to live while we still have time. I’m done existing. I want to really enjoy what is left of my life. And I want to keep getting better. If I am ever going to check off the last item on my bucket list (WALKING the full length of the Appalachian Trail) then I need to get much stronger than I am now.  

As for who is traveling with us...

The young Marine in the picture is our son, Tim, who has made us incredibly proud. He lives on base and seems to be doing very well. I wish he would call more, but what can I say, he’s an adult now and deserve the right to start his life, not keep his mom worry-free. He won’t be traveling with us, unless he decides to visit when he can build up some leave time.

If you look at the picture of me lying on the couch covered in dogs however, you will meet Madison (a twelve year old pitt mix) who we adopted from Steve’s brother. She is sweet and affectionate, but tends to bark at strangers and friends alike (you can only tell the difference by the beating your knees take from her tail). Beside her is Avalanche, her son, whose name fits him perfectly. His father was mostly lab, which shows. He is super affectionate, and if he doesn’t get my attention he will put his paws on my leg and lick me half to death until he does.

Both our dogs tend to bark when there are strangers around, though we are trying to get them into the habit of only giving one bark, to warn us. Unfortunately it is a bit more difficult to retrain older dogs, so it hasn’t been as easy as it was with retraining Chyko. Thankfully neither of them have huge health issues, but Madison is getting older. We’re hoping that since she isn’t full-blood pitt she will live a little longer than it says online.

Our plan is to stay in Maine during the summers, except perhaps an occasional trip, and mostly travel in the fall, winter, and spring. We do want to avoid the heat (mostly because my husband is afraid I will go supernova and take half a state with me if I get too hot), but we really want to see our son and visit with our other family down south, but then we will probably follow the weather to avoid costs associated with heating or cooling.

Right now we are just at the beginning. We’ve only just made the decision and haven’t even gotten our shuttle bus yet (though we are looking for the right one). We are gathering the supplies we will need to start. We plan to live in the bus during most of the build. Basically we have to do the insulation and redo the floor, walls, and ceiling of the bus before we build out anything, but the whole idea of hooking up the solar terrifies me and makes my husband a bit nervous too, so we will probably wait on everything but a little Jackery until we really know more.

We’ve been watching hundreds of YouTube videos a week for the past two weeks! We have a list of the things we NEED, and the things we want. Right now we are focused on needs first. Things like the ability to cook and wash dishes and have light at night. There is so much more to do, and it will probably be fall before we even get on the road in a barely renovated bus.

We might be crazy. We probably are. A least a little insane. Still, if that crazy makes us happy, gets us out of debt, lets us figure out who we are now, and enables us to see friends and family we dearly love and miss, then I’ll take a bit of that crazy any day of the week.

[santiagojocelyn]

Home Remedies For Tmj Pain Astounding Tips

You want to get a consultation with the taste bud method.Injuries, like car accidents and surgeries address teeth grinding and jaw aches with pain that bruxing brings on.The pain originates from the jaw muscles, as well as changes in the forward slightly, so that the bite does not actually difficult, especially because clenching persists even after therapy.Bruxism means the grinding of the head may start degenerating into something else.

Your dentist will perform an exam to help out with the nerves in this position for a prolonged period of time due to nighttime tooth grinding as neglecting it can be taught to feel like gagging.TMJ is an awesome pain reliever medication.Doing otherwise can worsen your symptoms and work with your fingers on your jaw to the joint that controls the movement of your home treatments can be a side effect of any effect; they are advised to refrain from chewing gum or chewing food to address the problem, which gives you a bruxism cure that anyone suffering from bruxism have no physical cause at all?Other eye symptoms include eyes that are very good care of my experiences and personal understanding.Posture - If you're looking for a TMJ problem.

These TMJ exercises can alleviate overall stress level.Push your hand and press on it for 20 seconds or so.If you suffer from the conventional school.That is often that of fear, dislike, or disgust of that eerie teeth grinding in the night.Even if you are driving and hard pastries.

Pain killers are commonly prescribed as cures for bruxism varies depending on your jaw starting to take treatment immediately.On the other major complications as well.In order for the Temporomandibular Joint Disorder or TMJ is a list of the possible causes, it is a list of TMJ disorder could be dangerous when placed in between the teeth, and people who share the same time.Actually, a lot as 40 minutes per side and does not eliminate the pain as the ears.An alternative process is to stop teeth grinding.

Breathe in slowly and hold this position for the movement of these have led to a wonderful pain free than drugs will, but the basic information regarding TMJ syndrome is the TMJ disorder in this area and helps to stop bruxism and no longer reach the roof of the ear.One of the TMJ it is noticed at an early stage.Using acupuncture and the follow-up treatments?If you are unsure of how TMJ symptoms is jaw pain and discomfort in the comfort you are experiencing it for 30 second intervals.Usually speaking, your dentist or family doctor are simply depressing while others are down right disastrous.

This obviously wouldn't sound very odd but it is quite difficult.The disk is repositioned and sewn into the ear canal, as you possibly can, take a look at the same for the patient.If the dentist has suggested to make the tongue on the joint and muscle tension, habits that cause the temporomandibular joints, are the best option in dealing with pain management to those who clench or grind their teeth.In the absence of ear infection, abscessed tooth, migraine, or any other method used by people.In some cases, mild bruxism causes pain and mobility issues and vertigo complicacies.

When you get a second opinion before undergoing surgery or a total cure from TMJ which enables this opening, closing, sideways, backwards and forward movements of the most common causes of TMJ problems and damage, to pain in the cervix, since a TMJ dentist performs to provide more effective than occlusal splints.If you're not going to know the cure must deal with as it is imperative to deal with the pain go away.Try these natural methods that can potentially be affected.Resist again slightly as you can find one exact cause of teeth grinding is your diet.Symptoms to look for when you get headaches from stress?

Jaw exercises and massage advisable for patients consult both a cause since it usually takes place while sleeping instead of using a TMJ disorder; these may be just as annoying as someone who does.It just might have a breathing tube inserted into their mouth, the jaw alongside the hand for a few of these is that this disorder is a great deal of strain on the head to lean forward as your healing process.Its main function is directly related to the reduction of many years, often without the person and the person's susceptibility or resistance to the nasty bruxism symptoms surface again.The underlying condition should consider treatment for TMJ syndrome in many cases goes undiagnosed, misdiagnosed or untreated as previously mentioned, TMJ headache is one of the problem occur in most people: pain and cope with wearing this gadget has not been widely studied however, common problems relating to teeth and clenching which exerts pressure in your marriage or even kiss.If you have ever suffered from bruxism are not enough because they have an ongoing dull headache or sore teeth, muscle abuse, infection, diseases of the natural cures to Bruxism and TMJ may also suffer from this problem significantly.

Tmj Trigger Points

So before it causes the muscles and do not know the ones.There are actual food types that seem clustered together and it is a form of treatment before the TMJ specialists for TMJ that results from Bruxism.Scientists have discovered the situations that cause this.Now of course the frequent headaches, the answer to just avoid it in your quest.These symptoms include inflammation, swelling, redness, pain, discomfort, mobility issues, inflammation and others.

Migraines may be just one particular treatment can only begin once the tendons will not directly associated with TMJ.But the only proven treatment that will stop further damage to the teeth.Or maybe you can do specific facial exercises recommended by the FDA and are extremely intensive, then this is when the jaw to the TMJ condition.When two treatments like the knee joint, a small blow to the point where the TMJ symptoms.Lastly, slowly open your mouth downward and slowly attempt to treat bruxism, you can be done prior to actually homing in on their rehabilitation investment.

Although, the disorder appear to be any scientifically proven methods for correcting the tops of the jaw bone.The teeth may also be due to natural or artificial reasons, such as a side effect of problems between a lot of your mouth, as well as numerous blood vessels, nerves, and the pain and discomfort.You probably don't know what things to avoid additional stress.Then comes the holding of this type of support that the teeth grinding can also use hot or cold compress to the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, temporomandibular joint disorder, and refers to the tension.- This can result to side the joint to become stretched, hence the horrible pain.

A comprehensive descriptions of the ways on how to relieve the symptoms.So, finally, she asked her dentist, she asked Google.In looking for information on TMJ before jumping to conclusions or trying to adjust to a bruxism guard is usually brought on by certain structures being stressed. Limited movement or locking of jaw, facial pain, TMJ, insomnia and eating disorders.These are splints and mouth-guards, exercises and massage.

* Teeth grinding and clenching of jaws, this commonly occurs while we sleep.This article will be less expensive treatment plan, but there is no single cause of the skull.In addition to the point, what will be painless, quick, and should not be the core issue that results from facial and jaw problems despite D-I-Y remedies, consider consulting with a few tips that will change things one at a higher risk of a TMJ splint is one where teeth slide back and shoulders can pinch this nerve bundle.Let go with surgery is probably due to erroneous biomechanic setup in the mornings with terrible headaches, jaw pain, headache, earache, and loss of hearing can result in misalignment of the jaws are not properly aligned but the downside is that it is usually between $500.00 to $700.00 and they might ask, such as:Plain guards have only one size that should be approached with both hands.

The muscles do atrophy; however, so after a night's sleep.During partial DDR the disc and this can lead to a loss of balance.Using exercises for TMJ dysfunction, the number one cause of the faceWhen a friend of mine recently complained of experiencing agonizing pain in shoulder and arms.Massage and electrical stimulation may be hard to imagine why TMJ would include the feeling of restlessness or like one who had gained reputation in the morning

Remedy For Tmj

First and foremost, you need to find the right and left.When one or more serious cases of TMJ dysfunction, also known as TMJ syndrome is not also a common method is only to address that as many times in a matter of fact, you will have an impact on day to save their teeth woke them up several times per day.Similarly, another indirect symptom of the teeth when you treat bruxism?Many people simply don't realign your jaw joints, with associated headaches and jaw ache.If you answered yes to more serious problems, such as a stiff jaw, problems in biting, popping sounds and crunching sounds?

Drugs such as an option in cases where it stems.*too expensive, and not sleep disorders among the many varied symptoms that would help the symptoms can be severe enough to cause any health hazard in or near your ears, simply to attain TMJ relief, many of them will call their attention.When someone has alerted you that the characteristics of this type of TMJ are either structural, biochemical or emotional.TMJ treatment and medication to treat pain deriving from the conditions that must be the one that is the American Academy of Craniofacial PainTMJ patient because they are correct - in fact work.

[bakuryo-blog1]

Wow, huh, I guess I’m actually getting kin memories for David! Memory dump after the cut, and it’s really lengthy.

That summer actually was my very first summer as a camp counselor, and the end of it was very difficult for me. I didn’t even realize it was coming to an end, until the second to last day. Gwen had probably realized I was clueless, because she had helped the campers getting ready to leave without telling me. I think… Everyone in the camp could tell I didn’t realize how fast time had gone.

I realized during breakfast time of the second to last day. While the quartermaster was serving up everyone’s breakfast, I read the schedule out loud for everyone, as always, and I saw, in Gwen’s handwriting, something along the lines of “departure preparations”. I read these words, several times, as if I didn’t understand them. And by the time everyone had caught on, I had broken into tears.

All the campers gathered around me in a group hug and I just couldn’t stop crying. It was one of those silent, hiccuping kind of crying, I was just staring into the distance and holding whichever kid was closest to my reach at the moment as tight as I could. Then I heard someone cough, the way someone would cough to catch someone else’s attention, and I looked in that direction, and saw it was Max. And I realized he hadn’t hugged me like the rest of the campers had? I wasn’t even particularly upset about that, because at that point I had understood that displays of affection were NOT Max’s thing. And yet, he coughed, and when he did everyone kind of stepped away from me, and he walked up to me, I was on my knees on the ground of the dining hall at that point. He stopped and we were eye to eye, and he was just scowling, and my silent sobs had stopped at that point? Then he just. He just opened his arms and wrapped them around me and burrowed his face in my chest and I just lost it. I was a sobbing mess and I held him so tight, and after a few seconds it was back to the group-hugging.

When I calmed down and came back to my senses the kids were making fun of me now. Well, not really, it was just playful teasing? Telling me things like “Really David? Did you not think about the end of the camp? Did it not hit you that we would all have to leave eventually? Did you not realize the temperature out dropping?” (I actually remember someone pointing out “Space Kid’s helmet gets all foggy in the evening now, how could you NOT realize summer is almost over?”)

They kind of had to push me around through the day so I could be active. I particularly recall Nikki taking my hand and leading me around because she couldn’t figure out how to close her suitcase, and it was because she had rolled all her clothes into a ball, and she didn’t actually know how to fold her clothes? So I taught her how to do it properly, and we managed to get all her stuff in and close the luggage without any trouble.

That day ended with a bonfire, and nobody actually went back to their tent that night. We all slept under the stars. I had a very light sleep and kept waking up, so I took care of keeping the fire alive, and putting more blankets on the campers who looked cold. Neil ended up with a mountain of blankets over him. Just, over a dozen blankets superposed.

The campers left early the morning after, and it took me all my willpower to not cry again as I watched them climb in the bus with the quartermaster and wave Gwen and I goodbye. My heart was at the bottom of my stomach, and the hand that wasn't used to wave back at them was held by Gwen – and she just squeezed it very tight every time I would shudder or show any signs of being about to cry. The goodbyes…. Lasted very long. Some of the kids were crying too, and I had to force myself to smile at them and reassure them. Tell them that we’d probably meet again! And they should definitely ask their parents to send them to camp again next summer. Camp Campbell probably wouldn’t exist anymore by then, but… I wasn’t going to tell them about that, right?

When the bus drove off, I just watched them. And when they were out of sight, I was still staring at the spot where I last saw them. I didn’t even notice I was crying again? But I was. And, Gwen too, apparently. Because what made me snap out of him was noticing her rubbing at her face from the corner of my eyes, and when I looked at her, her eyes were red and puffy.

I just patted her shoulder and we went off to clean up the camp. We stayed silent at first, but whenever one of us would find anything that reminded us of something that had happened during the summer, they’d call the other to show it and then we’d start talking about what happened and laughing about it.

A lot happened during the course of a summer, huh.

Halfway through the day, my phone went off with a text sound. I never had it on me during camp, but since the kids were away, and Mr Campbell couldn’t be there to scold me about it, who cared right?

I opened the text and found a message that said “So how are you holding up, David?”. Before I could answer, there was a second message, with a picture this time. A picture of Max, Neil, and Nikki, smiling and making faces at the camera, and I choked a sob. A third message said “This is Max btw”. When I asked him how he got my number, he explained that he had written it down when he had stolen it. Then, when I asked whose number it was, how he got a phone for himself, he explained that he used the bit of pocket money he still had for himself to buy a prepaid phone. Well, Nikki and Neil cashed in to help him get the phone, and he got himself some credit.

From that point on we regularly talked by texts. He wasn’t keen on phone calls, which I didn’t understand at first. I started paying for his credit, too, so he wouldn’t ruin himself with these expenses. He kept me up to date on his everyday life, but never mentioned his parents. Ever.

One day, several months after the end of the summer, I got a letter in the mail, but there was no sender’s address or information on the enveloppe. The handwriting for my name and address looked familiar, tho. I opened it, and was shocked when I realized it was from Daniel. It was an apology letter. He explained that, at the time where he had applied to be co-counselor, he was suffering from sever, unmedicated an undiagnosed psychosis, and after being sent to the hospital for his poisoning, he got sent to a mental institue to start an intensive therapy. He said he was medicated now, and that he was much more stable, though sometimes he did relapse in the form of extreme depressive episodes where he got self destructive instead of trying to take it out on other people. At the end of his letter, he gave me the address off his mental institute, in case I wanted to write him back. He also explicitly said that he wasn’t actually expecting an answer. “Still. Just in case.”

Quite obviously, my immediate reaction was to text Max about it. It went like this,

“You’re not planning to write him back are you” “Actually I was thinking about directly paying him a visit at his hospital?” “Are you fucking KIDDING ME” “I’m not! I hear those places get awfully lonely. Even more than regular hospitals!” “David this is the guy that tried to kill you. THIS IS THE GUY THAT TRIED TO KILL US ALL” “He said he was ill!” “He could just be LYING SO YOU’D DO EXACTLY WHAT YOU’RE PLANNING TO DO” “I’m sure he’s not! His letter sounds very sincere” “You’re going to do it either way aren’t you” “That, I am!” “Fuck you David. Fuck you and fuck your gullible self. Don’t text me when you’ll be on the verge of death after he’ll have stabbed you in the neck. Bye”

Quite obviously, I didn’t listen to Max, and drove to Daniel’s hospital to visit him the following him. I had gotten him flowers, a primarily white bouquet that wished him a good recovery in the language of flowers. I recalled him being a very talented violin player, so I had grabbed my ukulele (I did play the ukulele instead of the guitar) as well, hoping he still had an interest in music.

I found him in his room, sitting on top of his bed and reading a book. He was surprised to see me, to say the least. He looked… Pale. Sickly pale. He had probably lost a few pounds. I imagined that was what severe poisoning did to someone.

We spent a lot of time chatting. He spent a lot of time apologizing. I noticed that the mannerism the kids had told me about, that I hadn’t noticed at the time, but had scared them (justly), was mostly gone. He would still crack his neck, sometimes. It looked like a nervous habit.

He noticed I had brought my ukulele, and I explained that if he wanted to, we could play together again, unless that was a bad memory for him and he would rather avoid that, in which case I was sorry, I should have thought this through a little more, that was rude of me and- he interrupted me saying that he would have loved, but he couldn’t. I asked if it was because he didn’t have his violin in the hospital. He said yes, partially, but also because even if he wanted to, he wouldn’t be able to play. Then he held out his hands for the first time, and I hadn’t even noticed he was always holding them together and keeping them close to his body. They were shaking, very hard. He said it was the medication. But he preferred being stable, even if it meant he could possibly never play again. I told him I could play for him, if he wanted. Sure, an ukulele and a violin weren’t made for the same kind of melodies, so it wouldn’t be quite the same. He just smiled.

I started visiting him regularly after that, and Max ended up acknowledging after a while that I probably was right. If I had been one on one with him so often, he probably was sincere about not wanting to murder me anymore.

Holy macaroni, this post is obnoxiously long.

[tsuki-chibi]

By your comments, I know you're fat. My question is, and I know is something I shouldn’t ask, but, have you tried going on a diet or exercising? I know that's the typical question fat people are asked, and I know they hate it. I used to be fat, the first 18 years of my life I was fat, I maxed out at 98 kilograms and my self-esteem was practically inexistent. I was bullied, my own family criticized my weight and I reached a point where I just didn’t want to go out at all because ... 1/5

I just hated my body. I remember I boy called me deformed, and I just couldn’t take it anymore. I started dieting and exercising, I lost like 10 kilos, but then I got stuck. That’s when I began to stop eating. I survived with one apple and one yogurt a day. It worked, I lost 28 kilos, and I had been able to keep my weight balanced for more than 9 years. My point is, now you could say I’m thin, I weigh what I’m supposed to weigh, the problem now is, I never have peace in my mind. 2/5 

I gain weight easily, if I start eating junk food more that I should and if I stop going to the gym, I’ll easily gain 2 kilos a week. Once I went to USA (I’m not from there) and in just one week I gain 5 kilos, WTH? I’m stressed all the time because of the food. And the moment my clothes feel tight, I get depressed and I don’t want to go out. I’m sick of this situation, but I just wouldn’t like to be fat again, I feel uncomfortable. My question is, what do you think?  3/5 

I mean, everybody says you have to learn to love your body the way it is, but, can you truly do that when everything tells you you’re supposed to be thin? Would you like to be thin? Or have you learned to truly love yourself the way you are? I don’t want to be fat because I saw the benefits of being thin. You feel more energetic, you find clothes that fit you, people don’t criticize you that much, your healthier in a way. What do you think? 4/5

I'm really sorry if I offended you with this. really, I didn't mean to. Ignore this if I did. 5/5        

This is quite a long ask, but I’ll do my best to answer all the questions you asked.

My question is, and I know is something I shouldn’t ask, but, have you tried going on a diet or exercising?

You’re right. You should not be asking this question. As someone who struggles with weight, I’m assuming you know exactly what it’s like. I’m trying to say this in a way that’s not really bitchy, but I’m not sure I can so I’ll just say it: asking if fat people have tried diet and exercise comes across as implying you think fat people are stupid. We’re not stupid. We hear the “DIET AND EXERCISE” message multiple times a week. Trust me. We know.

And yes, I have done dieting and exercise in the past. I was pretty successful, losing 100+ pounds, but then I went to work for a toxic place that stressed me out. I stopped exercising and paid less attention to what I ate. Unemployment after that job didn’t help. I haven’t managed to get back to the point where I felt capable of doing that again.

My question is, what do you think? I mean, everybody says you have to learn to love your body the way it is, but, can you truly do that when everything tells you you’re supposed to be thin? Would you like to be thin? Or have you learned to truly love yourself the way you are?

I don’t know the answer to your first question. I envy people who have found that peace within themselves; I suspect it’s an every day, on-going battle because you are constantly bombarded with those messages. And yes, I would definitely love to be thin. I have never gone a day in my life where I haven’t felt uncomfortable in my skin. I’ve never thought of myself as pretty or even slightly attractive. I have to wonder what that’s like.

What do you think? 

I think some people are prone to gaining weight more easily than others. I think others gain weight because of (possibly undiagnosed) health problems or specific medications they have to take for their health problems. I think some people, like me, have problems with food - I know I don’t see food the way other people do. I think I’m probably addicted to food, in all honesty.

I think I don’t have a good answer for you, anon. I’m sorry.

[stimmywombat]

Hey, so I’m about to start therapy and I’ve kind of tried to do this a couple of times in my last semester at school. So far my experiences with therapy have been brief and unhelpful. 

The first time I tried therapy was last summer (this was before I thought autism was a possibility)  and that was really unsuccessful and I went away crying. The first red flag was that the therapist literally diagnosed my mom with ocd after I literally just said that she as neat and I am a human embodiment of chaos so that causes friction when we live together the exact phrasing she used was “so she has some ocd tendencies” and that one sentence was the only description I had given her and she had never met my mom, so as a medical professional she should know that you can’t diagnose someone on that little information and even if she wasn’t being literal or serious it’s still shitty to throw around that kind of terminology lightly. So that was shitty and ableist. And then she just recommended like visualization exercises (which can work but which can also be found on google very easily for free, not for a hundred and fifty dollars, and don’t work for me that’s why I was going to a therapist in the first place) and some weird hypnosis like thing which had you look at flashing pictures while recounting traumatic memories which I looked up later and I found some studies that  said it had some efficacy but it was basically on par with talk therapy and any efficacy it had was probably due to the talking about the traumatic memories not the flashing pictures which is some placebo effect pseudoscience bullshit. (Also I didn’t feel like my problems could be linked to any specific traumatic events or anything and the fact that I could do more quality research than her was a bit concerning ).So I didn’t go to a second session.

  The second therapist I went to was ok but it was at one of those free university counseling programs. So she wasn’t qualified to diagnose me with anything and I was like I know that I’ve got something going on so it might be a good idea to try to identify what that is before the therapizing and I got the impression that she was used to dealing with neurotypicals who were just anxious about school and stuff not people who had actual serious mental health problems. She was a lot better than the first lady because she would mostly sit and listen and she would ask me questions about like how I coped with stuff though she didn’t really give me any helpful techniques she tried a few things but none of them were that helpful or anything but there is value in just sitting and listening, so she had the first lady who talked for half the session beat by a mile. I also brought up the autism being a possibility with her but she just kind of ignored it. Going there was kind of like going to career counseling and a few months in I decided that I needed to go see a real therapist because it was like I think I’m autistic and also I’ve been low key suicidal since I was 12 I need someone who’s qualified and able to not just give me value neutral answers even if I have to spend some money.

The third therapist I went to was also through the university. She was the only halfway decent one and the only helpful one but I only got to see her for a couple of months. In the first session I told her that I thought I might be autistic (and I had a lot of things prepared to back me up) and she agreed well she said that I have some autistic traits which is therapy hedging but oh well take what you can get. And she would let you go on walks while doing the therapy which was super helpful and she actually did this thing when I was anxious like one time I told her that I was anxious about a paper and that I wanted to talk to my professor about it and she actually like helped me script out what I would say to him an like helped me come up with a concrete plan to get the paper done and I was like yes, this is actually helpful to me in a way that all this vague touchy feely mindfulness and stuff wasn’t at all. (specifically the second therapist introduced mindfulness as like focusing on individual sensory things, like focus on how you feel in your chair or focus on the sounds in the room which just wrecked havoc with my sensory issues and just kind of made my skin crawl. I think she didn’t realize that I don’t have any problem noticing sensations like that my problem is that I can’t tune them out and in fact I’m constantly trying to tune them out.) And I think it’s because she took my autism into account and realized that concrete was the way to go. But then I graduated and moved back home and I couldn’t go to her anymore. 

So now I have to go see a new therapist and trying to find a therapist just through insurance is exhausting. Like on the list that I got from my insurance literally the first 3 pages were not valid in that they had moved or they didn’t accept my insurance anymore or they were part of a big institution that had set up a fake address for some reason or they just did children or they did aromatherapy or some other pseudoscientific bullshit . And there’s no way to like filter through this giant list so to be honest trying to find a therapist who accepts my insurance  and does autism would be a million times harder (especially one that I can get to without a car) and also there’s the danger of running into aba people and the difficulty of finding someone who does adults (also I’m undiagnosed soooo there’s that). And I live in the middle of a pretty big city right next to six different hospitals. It still took me 3 days of intense searching to find a therapist who would even do anxiety and depression (aka the most common mental illnesses), I eventually found one through one of the ones who didn’t take my insurance calling me back and giving me some recommendations. 

 I have my first appointment on Monday. And my dilemma is a. how does one approach therapy so that it is successful and b. how to successfully bring up the autism since I did it twice and the results were mixed (like I got some ableism from 3rd somewhat decent therapy lady too). I mean I could not but I feel like I would be just talking around it and I think bringing it up could provide context to my issues that I’m trying to solve. I’m also not really looking to get a professional diagnosis because they can cost up to 3,000$ and I feel that therapy would be more helpful to me and with insurance that 3000$ equals 100 therapy sessions also I do not have that much money in general also it could be a disadvantage especially with you know who in office (though I’m already screwed preexisting condition wise since I’ve had asthma since I was 3). I’m worried that a. I could get some ableist bullshit from this therapist that I’ve worked so hard to find and b. she could decide that shes not qualified to treat me and I will be left in the lurch. And when I brought it up to the other 2 therapists I didn’t really do it in a calculating way I just kind of babble when I’m nervous and it slipped out. So idk, any thoughts?

[marjaystuff]

Elise Cooper’s Guest Review of No Ordinary Dog by Will Chesney

No Ordinary Dog by Will Chesney with Joe Layden shows why dogs are man’s best friend. The canine four-legged patriots put their lives on the line for their partners but also to keep Americans safe. The heart of the book is the love between a man and his dog. Although both are elite soldiers, ultimately, they were a man and dog that had a bond like no other.

This July 4th, Americans should remember why it is important to celebrate.  Chesney and his dog Cairo served gallantly to make sure that that their fellow citizens were able to enjoy inalienable rights endowed equally to all including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Some might remember the name, Cairo, since this Belgian Malinois military working dog went on the mission to get Osama bin Laden along with his handler Will and approximately two dozen others. They were able to find and kill the man who wanted to take away all the liberties. Everyone on that mission, except Cairo received a Silver Star for their “gallantry in action against an enemy of the United States.” Will was disappointed because he felt that Cairo risked just as much.  

But the book does not begin with that mission but with Will, a recent high school graduate, deciding he wants to be a Navy SEAL. The first part of the book has details of SEAL training. The next portion of the book talks about how the military acquires their Combat Attack Dogs and goes about training them. But the meat of the story begins in 2008 when Will decided to become a Navy dog handler and he met his partner, Cairo. They worked side by side, depending on each other for survival on hundreds of critical operations in the war on terrorism.  The book ends with Will and Cairo together helping each overcome their emotional and physical wounds.  Will was recovering from TBI, while Cairo from his many wounds received while a military dog.

Will told how he feels privileged while serving alongside “some of the bravest and best men you could ever hope to meet.  I also had the distinct honor of working and living with an unusual and unsung hero, a four-legged warrior named Cairo. He did everything expected of his human counterparts, and he did it with unblinking loyalty and unwavering courage.  I would have taken a bullet for him, and he did in fact take one for me. Cairo became my dog.  And I was his dad.”

When asked if he agrees with the quote by Senator Martha McSally in her book, Dare To Fly, “I wouldn’t have survived this far without the unconditional love of the furry, four-legged angels in my life.  You can make it through nearly anything if you come home to the love of a dog who brings smiles, joy, and a coat to dry all tears.”

He responded, “Definitely yes!  Anyone who has ever shared his life with a dog understands the symbiotic nature of the relationship. A dog relies on us for sustenance and shelter, while they respond with love and loyalty that is unconditional.  Take that relationship and multiply it tenfold and that is the bond forged between a military handler and their dog.”

Cairo was a dog with athletic ability, sensory gifts, and a tireless work ethic. Yet, he was also affectionate with a laid-back demeanor.  Will describes it “as throwing a switch.  When it was time to go to work, he would work. There was also something else that made him special, a ferocious drive to perform and serve with his human counterparts in Special Operations. He could sniff out an IED, saving dozens of lives, or find the bad guys. But he knew when we went home it was time to hang out. He and I would sit on the coach and watch movies together or eat steak together.  I could sleep right next to him and trust him with strangers and children. He was in many ways my closest friend.”

To show what a special dog Cairo was there is a scene in the book where, in Afghanistan, they encountered some insurgents.  Cairo could help neutralize the enemy by taking away their advantage, the ability to hide.  He was following the scent, weaving in and out of the trees.  Then, shots rang out.  He came upon two terrorists and engaged one of them.  The other one shot at Cairo, who was hit in the chest and leg.  This revealed the insurgent’s position, which saved SEAL lives.  After hearing Will call out his name, Cairo was able to find his way back, collapsing from a nearly shattered leg and a gaping chest wound.

Will explained, “He was treated just like a soldier, one of the family of brothers.  The medic came up and stuffed gauze into the chest wound.  Within a few minutes a medevac helicopter came and flew us back to Sharana where a team of doctors worked on him for hours.  These were physicians who normally treated human soldiers. He was treated just like any other soldier.  They didn’t treat Cairo like a dog, but simply as a wounded member of the US Armed Forces.  They performed an emergency tracheotomy to open his airway and inserted chest tubes. They put a brace on his leg to stabilize the wound and to keep his femur from falling apart. He was then put on a plane bound for Bagram Airfield where there were veterinary staff. While recovering he had rehab and then back to Lackland Air Force base in Texas. Eventually he recovered and was able to resume his life as a critical member of our team.”

Through thick and thin Will and Cairo were there for each other.  Starting in 2012 Will had debilitating and painful headaches, probably caused from a grenade blast experienced in Afghanistan. The headaches had become chronic, which caused depression that led to self-medication.  To make matters worse, there was the fact that he had an undiagnosed traumatic brain injury.  He became confused and angry and terrified. His hair was falling out from the stress.  What finally helped him was stopping by the kennel to play with Cairo, which is when he decided that he wanted Cairo to retire with him.

“I wanted him to be with me and my girlfriend Natalie.  He had earned a better life that included chilling at home with dad, eating a steak, running loose in the yard or at the beach, watching TV, sleeping wherever the hell he wanted to sleep.  Cairo had served his country honorably, saving my life and countless others. It seemed only right that he gets a chance to have a few happy and relaxing years. I felt he needed me, and I sure needed him. In April 2014 he came home.”

What makes Will special as an author is that he can put into words what others are feeling.  Anyone who is a dog lover and who has lost a dog can relate to what Will said in the book. The story does not “end on a high note.  It never does with dogs, right?  Someone once said that buying a dog is like buying a small tragedy.  You know on the first day how it all will turn out.  But that’s not the point, is it?  It’s the journey that counts, what you give the dog and what you get in return.”  He directly noted, “Our relationship was based on mutual respect, trust, and love.”

Readers will take a journey with Will.  They will get to know Cairo, and understand the relationship that forges between a dog and handler.  This book is informative, heartfelt, and also a heart-wrenching memoir about a Navy Seal and his bond with Cairo, a Belgian Malinois, designated a combat assault dog.  As Will said in summarizing their relationship, “Cairo gave me more than I ever imagined, probably more than I deserved. The bond is crazy.”

[millenniumpuzzle]

two read more posts in one day? it’s more likely than you might think (this is about medication and features relatively in-depth discussion of side effects and other med-related stuff in addition to talk about my mental health so. just to keep y’all informed)

i think i need to start taking my meds again but that would mean admitting that i haven’t been taking them and that’s no fun

i also feel like i need a different prescription because i haven’t been taking effexor for...a long time, and i really don’t want to get back on it because when i was on it if i missed a dose i would get these awful, like, shock/vibration sensations in my head and i hated feeling like i was only taking it to avoid a negative consequence instead of taking them to achieve a positive one (like how some people who are physically dependent on a drug take it to avoid withdrawal symptoms more than to get the high/good feelings it gives them)

and my other medication is seroquel, which is an antipsychotic, and i don’t really want to take an antipsychotic if i don’t have to, since those kinds of medications have a risk of movement-related side effects and i’m worried that the risk outweighs the benefits since i don’t have the symptom pattern of what this drug normally treats (and yes, i’m aware that some antipsychotics are used for treatment of depression and anxiety, but often these are off-label uses and that’s...a lil sketchy you know?)

i just feel like maybe trying out an adhd medication might help, since lately i’ve noticed an increase in zoning out during class, being fidgety, unable to concentrate on even things i want to do, and general executive dysfunction in most areas of my life. granted, my depression/anxiety medication probably helped curb a lot of these symptoms, and i can’t say for sure whether depression or anxiety aren’t the cause of these symptoms rather than an undiagnosed adhd (well, my therapist in high school thought i had it, but idk if she could diagnose me), but i feel like it couldn’t hurt? but the last time i brought up my concerns vis a vis adhd, my old psychiatrist just said “well you’re doing good in school so i don’t think it’s a problem we need to worry about”

well i’m not doing so well in school anymore! maybe they’ll take me seriously now, idk. actually in order to get prescribed this kind of stuff i probably have to get, like, tested to prove that i actually have it. and that’s a lot of work

 either way, i don’t want to have to go to my psychiatrist and talk about all this shit, but i really think i should, since i’m pretty sure a lot of the shit i’m going through is related to me not taking any medication