#this shit is why it took over a decade to even get the autoimmune diagnoses i needed to understand why i was infirmed half my fkn life but

[deosilplanarglitches]

Reason #345734 why I don't tell my mom shit.

Her pain and suffering is the only kind she cares about, and she'll play stupid games with me like ghost me for 3+ weeks after a minor surgery, just to make sure I'm worried enough about her life to check, so she "has permission" to start in with the talking my ear off about her problems without boundaries or preamble. She won't know shit about my issues til after they're over (if she hears about them at all) bc she never asks a damn thing about my life, and literally only ever leaves room for herself and her feelings in any equation literally ever and then peaces tf out like. Bitch I'm permanently disabled and in a degenerative spiral that's gonna last my whole fkn life, and you're still bitching about yourself? Wanting me to cater to your emotions when you haven't even spared a CRUMB of consideration in return?

FUck all the way off.

Should have known that if she had died or sth bad happened, I'd have heard something right away. After 30+ yrs of her pulling the "yeah my kid tried to kill themself for the 7th time, but have you asked ME how hard it is to raise them doing the nothing I have been, bc I still don't know them as a person at all or even try to? Where's the compassion?!" shit... you'd think I would know better, but my compassion gets me fucked over YET AGAIN.

If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty. If she's being flighty, she's being petty.

Back to no contact.

Let the bitch suffocate if she can't self soothe.

[ikesenhell]

American Dream

AMERICAN DREAM, Chapter 1. You can find all other IkeSen works of mine here. NOTES: HOLY SHIT IT HAS BEEN A MINUTE. Thank you so much to @missjudge-me, who commissioned this whole piece. You have them to thank. I’m sorry it took so long for me to get back up, but being homeless and in grad school and working and getting formally diagnosed with an autoimmune illness and being in a pandemic and moving kinda takes it out of you. This was very fun to write. Enjoy!

---

Masamune wasn’t used to his childhood bedroom anymore. His mother had converted his loft bed desk into her scrapbooking station. That was fine, in theory, except that it meant two things: one, she hadn’t changed the sheets in actual years, and two, the loft bed was still there. 

“Sweet!” He announced with a laugh, scaling the ladder in a single bound. It’d felt so tall once. He ducked low against the ceiling, pressing his back flat. “Holy hell, I was smaller then.”

“Duh.” His brother, Kojiro, smirked from the door. Time changed everything. Masamune felt so big when he was in high school himself, but looking at his teen brother changed his perspective. “You’re a big lunk now. You eat like The Rock.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” Masamune kicked off his boots and army-crawled into the loft. 

“How much clearance you got?”

“Eh. Six inches from my chest to the ceiling?” He tried to roll onto his back and failed, laughing against the drywall. “Did you know about the time that I knocked myself out up here?”

Kojiro’s luminous blue eyes appeared over the lip of the bed. “Really?”

“Oh, yeah. Got too excited freshman year of high school, bolted straight up when the alarm went off.” He motioned at a dent in the ceiling. “I was late. Dad didn't stop laughing for about, I dunno—”

“—the whole ride there.” Kojiro chuckled. “Yeah. Sounds like him.”

The funeral wasn’t so far behind them that it didn't hurt, but it sure as hell hurt less. Masamune checked his knuckles into the dent. It was the whole reason for his coming home. His mother needed someone to sort out all of the old things, all the memories and bills she couldn’t bear to look at. It didn't matter that they’d never gotten along. Kojiro was her favorite; that was obvious (and Masamune couldn’t blame her for that, Kojiro was a joy by anyone’s standards). Even then he couldn’t let her hang in the lurch. His dad taught him better than that. 

Damn. He missed his dad. Everywhere he looked in this old town, in this old house, were reminders. There was the trashy diner where they used to get the world’s best milkshakes once a week. There was the old stove with the broken burner they’d never replaced (because it was ‘perfectly good’) where he’d learned how to cook. And it wasn’t just his father he felt the absence of. Masamune fingered along the space between the wall and the loft bed where he’d pasted all the pictures and keepsakes from his friends. Him and Nobunaga, posing in a picture by the beach with matching glasses. Hideyoshi and Mitsunari peering at homework, Mitsuhide poised to drop an ice cube down his shirt. (Nobunaga was a broker in New York City, conquering Wall Street with Hideyoshi. Those two shared an apartment in SoHo, all the way across the country on the other coast. Hideyoshi worked with Nobunaga now, and no one knew what Mitsuhide did. Mitsunari was off in the Peace Corps.) There was a snapshot of Masamune and Ieyasu squished together in the back of an old 1960s Volkswagen Beetle his mom had for decades, Ieyasu frowning over a mouthful of jalapeno poppers. Ieyasu was a doctor in Maryland now. He was terrible at texting back, too. Masamune made a mental note to call. 

And then there was Her. 

Even after all this time, he missed their friendship. He fingered the worn photograph; After-Prom senior year, her in a bikini that made his stomach somersault, him holding her on his shoulders. She was laughing. He still wore the fake eye back then, and it sat oddly in the socket, but even that didn't take away from the sheer joy as he gazed up at her. When she lived with her parents in the little green house across the street, he used to build paper airplanes with stupid jokes scrawled in the folds and fling it at her window, hoping that they’d hit and knowing they never would. They’d measure how far it got from his front door and compare their poorly-kept notes, misremembering all the numbers. 

Now she was out there in the world. 

Kojiro craned his neck over the loft edge. “What’cha got up there?”

Masamune didn't answer that. Instead he wondered if she was happy. “If I’m gonna stay here for now, we gotta fix this situation. I’m too manly and brawny to fit up here. Wanna swap beds?”

“No! This thing is so uncool, you can’t get—” And the teenager furtively checked the doorway, lowering his voice. “You can’t get anyone up here with you.”

As an adult, Masamune rolled his eyes. As a brother, he snapped back, “I promise, you can.”

“Gross, why the fuck would I trade with you now—!?”

Downstairs, their mother shouted, “Who is swearing up there!?” Kojiro paled. Masamune, bolstered with smug elder brother energy, kicked him from the ladder. 

“Move, punk! Run for your life! You fucked up!”

His mother, louder now. “Who said that?!”

“That was Masa!” Kojiro bellowed, fleeing the scene of the crime. “Masa said it that time!”

“That time!? Kojiro—!”

Masamune finally wriggled himself free from the narrow confines of the loft. On the way down, he pocketed the picture of Her. 

---

The only reason he remembered the day his dad bought the ‘85 Camaro was his mother was well and truly pissed about it. It wasn’t a pretty looking thing then. Masamune later sussed out that his dad had picked it off a side road out in the country because it was ‘a nice looking car’ and ‘could be fixed up’. Of course it could. Maybe it was his time in the military, but there wasn’t a damn car under the sun that his dad couldn’t fix. The Camaro was better than new, but his mom drove a newer Hyundai, so it sat neglected in the garage, shiny and electric blue and begging for a test run. When Masamune backed it into the driveway, his mother sighed ragged. 

“I ought to sell that thing,” she announced. 

Masamune bit back his reflex answer of ‘not on my watch’ and replied, “Kojiro’s gonna need a car when he can drive.”

“I’m going to get him something new. A nice car. That one is too old for anything now.”

“I could take it.”

“You already have that infernal death trap.” She thumbed at the Harley parked in the grass, right where she hated it most. In the name of getting along, neither of them had mentioned it. “You don’t need another car payment. Besides, don’t you have anything better to do right now? We have all sorts of things to settle with your dad’s estate.”

“Ma, the car is paid off.” But she was right in one way; he did already have a vehicle, and paying the taxes and insurance on both was a waste. It was sort of pointless, keeping the car in the garage forever. “I can’t do anything until I get the extra copies of his death certificate, and that’s gonna be a minute. I ordered them today. Did you want me to put the car on Craigslist or something?”

She gazed at it, her steel expression softening. Ah, yes. There was his mother. His parents loved each other dearly. It just took moments like this to remember it. 

“Would you?” She replied. Her feather soft voice broke his heart. “I can’t bear to do it.”

“Yeah, Ma. I’ll get it to a good home.”

---

All it really needed was a wash and an oil change. The guys at the auto parts store whistled enviously when they handed over the filters. No; it wouldn’t be hard to sell at all. No doubt he could post it on some Reddit forum and get a hundred hits in an hour. 

Masamune was about to post the listing when fate intervened. 

The driveway was warm on his bare back, the first chill wind of autumn cooling his shoulders. His phone was stark against the sharp blue sky, his shirt rolled under his hair. 

A shadow fell over him. “Masa?”

He blinked his only good eye, floundering against the sudden contrast. The woman murmured an apology, stepped away, and blinded him with sunlight again. 

“Hey!” He laugh-yelped, rolling onto his stomach. “Goddamn!”

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry—”

“No, no, it’s fine.” He clutched at the Camaro’s bumper and pulled himself up, blinking sundots away. “Gimme a sec, hang on.”

And then—she swam into view, all bright eyes and curves and nothing like she used to be and everything like she used to be and so much better. Was this his friend, this fully grown woman with a face like all his best memories? Where his words? He was usually so good with them. 

“That you, Masamune?” She asked, the ghost of a smile on her mouth. 

“Well, hell.” SAY SOMETHING, YOU STUPID BASTARD. He forced a grin back—but then it arrived all on its own. “Wow. Damn. Where have you been this whole time, Kitten, Hollywood? You runnin’ everyone out of a job out there? Puttin’ those Hadids out of work?”

Her laugh was the same. Good God, it sent shivers all the way down his spine and into his toes. Her eyes crinkled and he wondered if he could bottle that expression. “You’re still calling me Kitten, huh?”

“Your fault for wearing cat socks all the time. I don’t see a reason to stop now, ‘specially now that you blinded me in my own driveway.”

Even her eye roll was a shot of nostalgia to the veins. What now? Did he shake hands? Masamune stared at his oil-slicked palms from changing the filter. “Well, if you don’t mind me smearing grease all over you… Shit, what am I asking for?”

“Oh my God, Masamune, do not rub motor oil on me!”

“Too late!” He charged forward. She squealed but didn't run; he caught her around the waist and squashed her against him, bringing her feet from the ground. Those eyes were wide with surprise and delight and so much joy. Something smelled of cinnamon and cloves. “God, is that your shampoo?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s great. You look great.”

She batted against his chest, wriggling in his grasp. “And you bulked up. What, you one of those CrossFit junkies or something now?”

“C’mon, don’t insult me like that. Their form is terrible.”

“And you ditched the glass eye.”

“It was hurting. Figured I might as well let the lid close up and deal with it. Not like I could see from it anyway.”

But she laced her hands around the back of his neck and tapped just above his brow. Such easy physical intimacy. Oh, how he’d missed that! They’d always been the most handsy of the friend group, never shying away from each other. “I wasn’t complaining. You rock the pirate look, Captain.” 

Masamune snickered and clicked his tongue. “I’ll own that. I love some booty.”

With a roll of her eyes, she let the comment slide. “You busy? Wanna catch up?”

At last he let her slide from his arms, setting her feet on the ground. Why was the world so much colder when her body parted from his? “Hell yeah. Let me make you some gyoza and we’ll chat.”

[omgktlouchheim]

Word Vomit Wednesday - Traveling While Healing

CW: Sexual Assault

 A little over a year ago I realized I needed to change my life. I had been living and bumbling around New York City for nearly a decade and was finally receiving some great career opportunities and a sense that my life was coming together. This “sense,” of course, was something I was just trying desperately to convince myself of. The fact is, I was constantly getting sick and was consistently in a huge amount of pain. Which wasn’t new to me. I’ve been in physical pain since I was, at least, eleven or twelve years old and just coped with it because it was my “normal.”

Jump back to June 2016. I’ve been to an allergist, ENT, had a CT scan of my sinuses, given so much blood to labs for testing I might as well have been at a blood drive, and I’m sitting in my PCP’s office as she’s going over results. I know exactly what those results say before she opens her mouth. I’ve been in this scenario over and over and over again in the course of my 29 years on this earth. The verdict: I’m healthy. Or, as the lab results put it, “unremarkable.” Oof. (My whole body is one giant flaming knot and the medical establishment has to then go ahead and bruise my ego too? That’s low). Given that all the labs came back fine but I was still in so much pain and had so little energy, my doctor diagnosed me with fibromyalgia.

What is fibromyalgia, you ask? In a nutshell: no one f*cking knows. Is it an autoimmune disease? Maybe. Are there genetic components that would make a person more likely to develop it? Perhaps…? What are the best ways to treat it?? *Shrug*. Essentially, it’s a diagnosis that doctors of the western persuasion give to people who they just don’t really know what to do with and don’t really have the growth mindset to figure out. *Side note: fibromyalgia has been strongly linked to trauma, which does make sense in my particular case, and I will come back to this later. So, one of the ways in which I began to make changes to my life in order to heal was making more time to travel.

It started off small, taking the Amtrak to visit friends in Vermont in August, heading out West to visit family in Washington, California, and Arizona in September, hopping on a quick flight to Montreal for my birthday in November. It felt so good to get away. I was all of a sudden having new experiences while also spending time with people I care about. Every time I left it felt like the “refresh” button was being pushed on my life. I began to feel like I was living my life instead of watching it pass me by and I began to be excited about the future even though I was still hazy about what it looked like. One thing that I knew for certain was that I needed to put myself first in ways that I had never been able to before (i.e. not feeling bad about having needs and getting them met). Which, let’s be honest, can be truly terrifying in and of itself.  On top of that, I still needed to contend with many American medical institutions. If you don’t know anything about the healthcare system in America, here’s the Cliffs Notes synopsis: It’s a shit show and everyone is screwed except for super wealthy people. Fun!

I literally didn’t go to the doctor, any doctor, for years because it can be such a nightmare and it overwhelmed me to the point of defeat. I didn’t see the point in fighting if I was never going to get the help I needed so I continued to ignore all the messages my body gave me because that’s what I knew how to do. The difference between late-twenties Katie and early-twenties and child Katie though, is that late-twenties Katie knows that she is worth fighting for and deserves better. She deserves better treatment, she deserves respect, she deserves getting what she needs come hell or high water. I (thank you third person, your services are no longer needed) am only one person and, chronic illness or not, need help and shouldn’t be shamed or ignored for asking for it.

Here’s what I know about traveling with chronic conditions. When traveling, medical issues don’t just go on vacation from you. And it’s imperative that you have a doctor you trust to communicate with you if something happens while you’re away. This was not the case for me. On the aforementioned trip in September, I was just coming out of severe withdrawal from a drug my doctor (who is no longer my doctor) had put me on to treat the fibro, which my insurance (which is no longer my insurance) decided to, out of the blue, no longer cover. Not even the amount to wean me off (it was some serious shit). It was one of the most frightening experiences of my life. So frightening that I was afraid to go to sleep in case I died. Not a trip that I was planning or am planning to take any time soon. By the time I got to Washington most of my withdrawal symptoms had gone. Except on the second day there. My right leg seized up and I was unable to walk for the rest of my stay in Seattle with my brother and his wife. Oh and I was in an excruciating amount of pain. So, what did I do? I called my doctor. For three. Straight. Days. I left so many messages that one time I got a recorded voice saying that the health clinic’s mailbox was full.

Thank goddess I was with family and that they didn’t mind pushing me around in a wheelchair or switching around plans so I would be in the least amount of discomfort before heading to California. Thankfully, by that time the pain had let up and of course that’s when my doctor #nolongermydoctor decided to call, chastise me for not going to an ER (FYI: unless I am bleeding out of all of my orifices I refuse to enter those rings of hell and that’s a whole other article in itself), and ultimately offer nothing useful in trying to help me in case it happened again. This should have been my first big tip-off that I needed to find another doctor. Instead, I convinced myself it was a fluke until she and her office pulled similar shit with me right before I was leaving on a two-month trip that would take me from New York to Hawaii, New Zealand, Australia, back across the United States to The Bahamas, then finally back to New York. Once again, thank goddess for my uncle who is a retired doctor and was able to call in my medications for me the night before I was leaving and with a half an hour before the pharmacy closed.

For people who have chronic illnesses, or any illness that requires medication and who plan to travel, one thing to find out about from your insurance company is a “vacation waiver.” Because I was traveling extensively for the first time and out of the country, I needed to have extra refills of my prescriptions so I didn’t run out and burst into flames (*not necessarily a side-effect of stopping medications early, but you never know). I was surprised and relieved that my insurance actually offered a waiver specifically for that purpose. So make sure to give your company a call and find out what the waiver is, how long it’s effective for and how many times a year you’re able to access it. This was probably one of the only times where my insurance was actually helpful.

So, what have we learned so far? Living with chronic illness means needing to be on top of every medical issue to make sure that it helps you live your life rather than keep you stuck and in pain. It is no easy task. Some medical professionals will not help you. On the flip side, vacation waivers! Besides keeping in order all of the things meant to keep a person with chronic illness functioning, there is still needing to deal with symptoms. Chronic illness is exactly what it sounds like. Chronic, consistent, every moment of every day. Some days are better than others. People can also be happy and chronically ill at the same time. Around the time that I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia I was also diagnosed with PTSD (told ya I’d get back to trauma!). It is very common for people who have been diagnosed with fibro to also have a history of and are survivors of trauma including sexual assault/abuse, which is the case for me.  It’s kind of a chicken and egg conundrum which is also why treating fibromyalgia is so difficult. Not only do scientific and medical institutions know very little about our nervous systems, they also can’t treat the things that can trigger us.

I could be anywhere in the world and if my brain senses anything resembling my traumatic experiences, my nervous system goes haywire and I’m stuck in our very primal fight, flight, or freeze mode. And it did happen. Here are examples of the most extreme experiences from my New Zealand/Australia trip. One time was walking around in Melbourne with my mom. I felt so overwhelmed from the moment we got there and once that feeling set in it did not go away. Even eating didn’t help. My body felt like it was on fire, I had no patience for anything, I didn’t feel safe, I just needed to get back to my room and my stuff as soon as possible. The other time we were heading to Dunedin, New Zealand. The night before we got there, I woke up super early in the morning because I started having flashbacks of my assault. I don’t know what triggered them, it just sucked and it took me forever to get back to sleep. When I woke up to get ready for the day I realized I couldn’t move. My hips felt like they were locked and it was extremely painful to do a few things. Things like: lie down, sit, modify my position to get from lying down to sitting, standing, and any movement in general.

Being a person with chronic illness who also wants to function in society and explore the world is really hard. You can’t leave your disease in your desk at work to take care of when you get back. You can’t leave your symptoms with the cat-sitter. You can’t even put your baggage in your baggage to whip out just in case you have a day where you’re not doing anything. It’s just going to be your travel companion no matter what, and it will pop up when it gets the message to. The way society is set up does not make it easy for those of us living with chronic illnesses and even the most well-intentioned people don’t understand or know what we really need. That also doesn't mean that you're going to ruin any travel experience because you have particular needs that you need to put first. At this point, my healing journey is tied into all of the other journeys I’ve taken and will continue to take. Right now my takeaway is learning to accept myself no matter where I am and what I’m feeling. And have better doctors because ain’t nobody got time for that bullshit.

Katie Louchheim is a wide-eyed wanderer who takes a lot of pics of where she goes and is not opposed to a shameless plug! Follow @ktjlouch on Instagram for awesome travel pics, blurbs about living with chronic illness and more.