#and my health is actually getting worse and even cane is not enough anymore

[caffeineandsociety]

Honestly, as much as many people point out how much large quantities of money spent by the ultra-wealthy on frivolous things could change their lives as a reason that the level of wealth inequality we're at is absolutely unconscionable, and they're ABSOLUTELY correct that it's a great illustration of the problem...

I think an underrated and equally important illustration is how much those quantities CAN'T do.

Let's think about a million dollars. That's a quantity that says "HOT DAMN, you REALLY made it!" to most people. That's a lot. It's more money than most people will handle at once in a lifetime.

And it can BARELY buy most single-family homes in California. It can't buy many that don't even qualify as McMansions, just...nice houses. It's even worse in NYC, where you can find apartments the size of a postage stamp that it can't buy.

And if you want to RETIRE with "just" a million dollars? You'd better hope you die soon.

Suppose you retire at age 55 with a million dollars. Congratulations! If you live to age 75, that's 50k a year. 85, it's $33k a year. 95? You've got $25k a year...and it's likely that you're ending up with medical bills that take an entire year's worth of money in one go. Ending up in assisted living? Well, the median cost of assisted living in the US is...$54k a year. Congratulations, ALL your money goes to rent now! Every cent! Better hope you die within 15 years!

You COULD avert this by putting the money in a high-yield account and only skimming off the interest, yes - the average retirement account, with an interest rate of 5-8%, would give you $52-83k a year...but even then, you have to have a million dollars in the first place and not withdraw from your initial principal, which, good luck doing THAT with the complications that tend to arise in old age and health insurance deductibles and coverage limits and loopholes to make you pay out of pocket. $83k a year may sound like a lot, and it certainly is to most of us, and even so, life has a way of eating through it fast, especially if you're retirement age.

In addition, there's a concept that I call "item debt" - it's about those things that, sure, you can SURVIVE indefinitely without them, but you will live a longer and healthier life if you have them. This can be anything from a stove that can actually maintain a constant temperature, to a computer that lets you do your job without freezing and crashing every few minutes, to assistive devices. Item debt can be the need for transportation in the US's car-centric society - you can't even afford a shitty old beater, so you have to take the bus 3 hours each way; the first thing you'll do if and when you get the money is buy a car and...then what? Your bills are no less impactful; if anything, they're worse because now you have to pay maintenance on the car. It can take the form of, "well, I really SHOULD be using a wheelchair, but I can't afford that and I can walk ENOUGH that my insurance won't even partially cover it, so guess I'll rely on this $10 cane until it inevitably gets worse." It can take the form of saying "I'd aggravate my various orthopedic problems a lot less if I had more power kitchen appliances, but those are expensive, so I guess I'll make do without" until you can't lift a bowl anymore without hitting 8 on the pain scale. It can be the empty first apartment, bare mattress on the floor, that's a wonderful improvement over wherever you came from but if you don't get a bedframe you're either going to wear out that mattress really fast and have to spend a ton of money replacing it, or have to strain to pick it up and let the underside air out every day, which may not seem like a lot now but will destroy your back over the years if the cheap mattress itself doesn't do it first.

Thing is, most people who are not MULTImillionaires have some form of item debt - and if you have multiple disabled family members or a sufficiently expensive illness in the family (e.g., need for a lung transplant, which can cost upwards of $1mil WITHOUT complications, or cancer that requires a particularly expensive type of chemo), sometimes it'll take something like $10mil to get out of it.

Again, we're talking about WAY more money than most people will see IN THEIR LIVES. We're talking about quantities of money that MOST people are expected to live our entire lives without. We would all live longer, healthier, happier lives if we could all have basic food and water, sufficient living space, and health care including home medical devices as needed, guaranteed. There is no scarcity reason why we SHOULDN'T have these things guaranteed to everyone except a many-times-over-disproven myth that everyone would just stop working and then we'd have no supply chain if we didn't have death by poverty as a constant looming threat.

And so these things remain out of reach to EVEN THE LOW END OF THE WEALTHIEST 10% OF AMERICANS.

And for what? 90% of the country is left second-guessing, postponing, or even outright foregoing NECESSITIES, and FOR WHAT?? So the top 0.5% of fucking assclowns can have megayachts and eat gold and spend amounts of money that could change people's lives on stupid and dangerous shit whose horrible safety standards they can then inflict on the rest of us??

If that doesn't piss you off and tell you something needs to change I don't know what will.

#$250k would be able to clear MOST of my item debt #i would be able to get all the kitchen appliances i need to stop destroying my body to cook #id be able to get some mobility devices and braces ive been badly needing #but it WOULDN'T be enough to get me a house that could actually meet my accessibility needs without moving ro a cheaper state #where i would know no one and not be able to see my own doctors anymore #now that ive FINALLY found a medical team that ACTUALLY works for me #and tbh i find THAT to be an even more damning illustration of the problem than what that money COULD do

[frozenrose13]

the state of healthcare here is atrocious and we are hard being reminded of this bc [person] in hospital waiting on urgent surgery due to inadequate + too slow treatment

not trying to make it about us or anything but also fuck the reminders freak us out bad. how much damage will there be to try and mitigate once we finally get in for ours. will that genetics referral ever go through. how long until using my current wheelchair gets actually real harm without ot input.

even our good days, we still can see the decline. and there''s nothing we can do about it bc drs arent helping and can never find any potentially relevant research looking and dont talk people with relevant information so we're *guessing* at how to keep the decline slow and how to adapt our life to it and how to mitigate the effects of what decline is doing to us. we've gotten remarkably lucky so far with what we've had access to trying and what's worked for intended purposes. we can type faster with the wrist supports on. we can (mostly) transfer with my quad cane. our wheelchair still hurts us to use but its easier now with the new joystick + supports and we have access to pain management for that. the meds even help with the seizures to some extent.

we're doing writing about playing [sport] while disabled and have a section for basically what we need to bring/use to be able to participate and. its such a fucking long list : / not even including everything that goes in edc bag : /

not that want to be healthier or less disabled or life to be easier or anything like that but fuck we want ways to *respond* to whats going on. cause = effect type stuff. we are in so much pain even with meds which...doesn't happen a whole lot anymore. we are sick of feeling trapped by our limitations. know thats a brainwork thing but hate : /

we lean so far over now : / how much concern about the decline is reasonable. maybe feels worse bc didn't have a lot ability to start with to be losing. frustrated that dont know why + cant figure out + cant ask drs. with everything else we've been able to do bits of research and have plausible options to follow up on. we know enough about our dx conditions to dispute some of them that feel are inaccurate. we spent most of usable money this month on things to try and fix what we can that needs outside fix and the rest to cope with those things. we are exhausted of all this.

this is the closest we've been in a long long time to living a life we are genuinely happy with. we can spend our awake/active time working on our crafting, we do [sport], we're not struggling in any other way but health related, we're in so much of a healthier place mentally. and yet. and yet.

and we can't figure out how to help any of it. the only other things we can think of is ot. which is wait. : /

[probably-enjolras]

r.e. disabled les amis headcanons: omg please add yours

yay someone wants to hear mine! some of this will be projection on my part. i’m disabled myself, i need a cane to walk because of a condition called Amplified Musculoskeletal Pain Syndrome (AMPS) which is very similar to fibromyalgia. i’m also going to include some neurodivergent and mental illness headcanons, but i know some people don’t consider those disabilities, but from my own experience with them, i do, so that’s why i’m adding them!

jean valjean has chronic back pain, specifically a problem with the discs in the upper spine, from his time in prison. gradually gets worse as he gets older because of lack of treatment and him triggering the pain himself by lifting the crashes cart and then marius in the sewers. in my modern aus i like to think he gets an upper back/neck and shoulder brace that he wears, and he’s a bit insecure about it so that’s why he’s always wearing big coats even in aus where he’s not being pursued by javert

javert, marius, and enjolras are autistic. javert has known most of his life but marius wasn’t diagnosed until his late teens due to lack of familial support. enjolras would have been diagnosed as a kid but he’s afab and there’s lack of diagnosis for afab children and he doesn’t get diagnosed until he’s in his 20s after doing his own research.

enjolras, grantaire, courfeyrac, and bossuet have adhd. enjolras and bossuet have more hyperactive traits, enjolras’ manifesting in his need to constantly be doing something and chronic boredom, while bossuet doesn’t display his as physical hyperactivity but more racing thoughts and an inability to slow his mind down. courfeyrac and grantaire have more attention deficit issues. they can’t focus on one topic for a while unless they go into hyperfocus or it’s a hyperfixation. grantaire has a lot of self worth issues because of his adhd because growing up he was seen as a bad student and a bad child because of his attention issues and executive dysfunction. courfeyrac got medicated really early on in childhood. enjolras did too and it becomes a bit of an issue between him and grantaire because grantaire doesn’t start medication until he’s about 24 and enjolras has been on medication for a long time and he’s kinda forgotten about how difficult it can be being unmedicated so he thinks grantaire isn’t trying enough. that changes when the pharmacy won’t refill enjolras’ medicine and he has to go a week without it. it’s a really humbling experience he apologizes to grantaire once he’s back on meds (this is based on personal experience actually… i didn’t start meds until a few months ago and i had a friend who started meds in middle school do what enjolras did and ur sucked)

joly had to get his knee joint replaced through surgery and still can’t walk properly without pain in the area so he walks with a cane. he also has an autoimmune disorder that makes him get sick really easily, as well as chronic fatigue and brain fog that makes it hard to complete daily tasks even when he has a low pain day. he also has very bad anxiety that sometimes manifests in worrying about his health excessively and vigilance about staying healthy because he knows that if he even gets a cold, it will be worse for his body than someone without a chronic illness

cosette and eponine both have c-ptsd from living with the thenardiers, and i have so much to say about this that i’m thinking about making an entirely separate post about it. just know that both of them have trauma responses, with cosette becoming very docile and a chronic people pleaser because she doesn’t want to get in trouble even though she won’t be punished like that anymore, while eponine has become hardened by her trauma and puts up walls so she doesn’t get hurt. she also gets frequent nightmares about her siblings being hurt and wakes up sweaty and almost screaming. gavroche came home late one day and eponine was on the verge of a panic attack even though it had only been half an hour

combeferre is blind in one eye and his other eye is partially damaged so he doesn’t have very good depth perception in what he can see, and he also has very limited color vision

feuilly is deaf and grantaire is HoH. feuilly’s primary form of communication is sign language, though he can lip read but not very well. all the amis know basic signs like how to ask if he wants some water/food, hellos and goodbyes, and how to sign their names. once feuilly becomes close with them, he creates signs specifically for their names, which at least in the american d/Deaf/HoH community is very special. a very close family friend of mine is HoH and he gave me a name sign when i came out as trans (it’s a quick movement of the letters R and Y up in the position where male signs are signed like “father”) grantaire is hard of hearing and has hearing aids. sometimes when he fights with enjolras he just takes out his hearing aids and just lets enjolras keep going until he realizes what’s going on.

this next one is very personal to me and is something i don’t think i’ve ever seen before, but i hc jehan with having schizoaffective disorder (bipolar type). i personally have this disorder and i have found some comfort thinking jehan has it too. they started having mood symptoms first, which started as a depressive episode and then suddenly they felt like they had been shocked into a manic episode. once the mania started they began having delusions of grandeur and the belief that they were a prophet sent to help the world. they began thinking people were after them and they heard voices from “angels” telling them what to do. they started writing poetry as a way to get the voices out of their head and onto paper. it took two years to get a diagnosis and a some very rough nights where they weren’t sleeping and would show up to meetings with delusional ideas, and they were scared. they refused to go to the hospital but needed help, so grantaire took them to the community out reach center that he goes to for alcohol addiction treatment and jehan got a psychiatrist who started them on antipsychotics and a mood stabilizer. i like to think that jehan got better quickly, just because i’ve had this disorder for a very long time and i’ve tried almost every antipsychotic out there and im not really better, so i want them to not have my experience. they were accepting of treatment pretty easily, but they did worry that their poetry wouldn’t be the same afterwards. fortunately, they channeled their frustration into poetry as opposed to writing what they were hearing and even though their poetry changed once they got on medicine, they didn’t lose their ability to write it. they’ve also learned how to have confidence in themself and the revolution without becoming delusional, which did take time because hearing enjolras’ strong ideas, it just felt like too much for a while. but the longer they’ve been stable and connected to reality, the easier it becomes to believe that yes, some things may seem improbable, but they can still happen AND some ideas are delusions and can be differentiated between the improbably ideas

bahorel has hypermobile joints and has to be careful when boxing with grantaire because he has subluxed or even fully dislocated his shoulders, elbows, and finger joints while boxing. jehan bought him some colorful finger braces and has stitched patterns into his knee and elbow braces

that’s enough for now because this is getting really long but yeah. lots of projection on my part (whoops) but what is this blog without me projecting my issues onto les mis characters? is this not what this blog is based on 😂

#les mis #les mis headcanons #les miserables #disabled headcanons #les amis #les amis de l'abc

[fakeloveaskblog]

Remus. Honey. Look at me, take deep breaths. If you think you'll be okay, or you think you will have enough comfort people, go to the party! Worst comes to worse, bring Rowan! And if you dont want to sleep over, just do the party bit, no trouble or annoyances at all. N o n e.But if you get too anxious of the idea, or your just not feeling okay enough, dont go at all, it'll damage your mental health,,,more. Its your choice and no one, I repeat no one can judge you for that. -1/2

(I got another ask also asking for this same thing so I will probs sadly delete it but I want the anon to know I appreciate it even if I didn’t answer it. thanks <3)

(Words: 1829)

Remus tried to take a few deep breathes like you said. He kept twirling the ring on his finger to try and get the nerves out. Your comment about how much his crushes liked him made his heart warm. Remy was looking at him with such a sweet look as they waited for his answer.

'i dont know about a party' He finally wrote into the text to speech app.

"Party?" It took a moment before Remy leant their head back in laughter "Babe I meant like a party in like the we're gonna have fun way not like the literal way. You seriously think I would wanna stand around with this fucked up cane and have like 3 different guys try to kiss me" 

Remus' stomach sunk. He could feel the tip of ears heating up from embarrassment.

"Sorry babe" Remy wiped a fake tear away once the giggles started to die down "That was all on me. I know you got like problems with tone and stuff. You good if it's just me, you and Jannie?"

He shrugged.

"We can hang out right here and your sis will stay around right?"

'yeah'

"It don't gotta be a sleepover if you decide you don’t want it to be. We can just like vibe and then I can weasel my way into control over Jannie's bed and sleep there. Will that be okay?"

Remus nodded.

"Coolio!"

They held out their hand to do a high five but he didn't move so they instead got out their phone and texted Janus. They made themself comfortable on the couch like a main character in an early 2000s teen romcom.

"Sooo do you wanna gossip? Paint each other nails? Kiissss? That is what people do at sleepovers right?" Remy asked "Cause babe I've never actually been at a real one with like friends. Just with Virgil or I've been like staying over with some dude after getting shitfaced but that's not the same thing y'know"

'do you really think i've been to any? i slept over in a mossy ditch once though'

"Stylish!! Maybe Jan knows" They looked at ech other and both shook their heads "Nah he doesn't"

Remus perked up and quickly wrote something on his phone 'Ro knows!"

They glanced back to Rowan. She had promptly fallen asleep with her forehead slammed into the table. Snores loud enough to shake a squirrel came from her.

The friends sent each other sinister smiles. Remus rubbed his hands together evily. Remy tip tapped on their toes like a mischievous bitch. They both slowly sneaked up behind Rowan.

And evily laid a blanket around her shoulders!!!

The friends giggled over their evil act together. The duke was a bit anxious about her being asleep but he knew she was a light sleeper after the third time she woke up to frogs filling her room

"Don't you have like a flag?" Remy suddenly asked.

Remus blinked at them 'what?'

They pointed at the wall behind Rowan. The one where her lesbian flag hung "Don't you have like a flag too? like trans or something?” They glanced at Rowan “You can get one if you want right?”

‘of course. i havent thought about it. brain dead’

He was so used to the sighs and annoyed looks he got from his ex every time he talked about being trans. Every time he’d tried to correct his pronouns. Putting a flag would have been a constant reminder of how burdensome his identity was. Sometimes Remus forgot he wasn’t living with his ex anymore.

“Want me to like make a flag? I should have some pink fabric over from making this Charli xcx shirt- Oh bitch I could have talked about being a dick sucking savant and that sentence would have been less gay. Jeez”

‘would you really?’ Remus asked with big puppy eyes.

“Suck a dick? Ehh it doesn’t really interest me but-”

‘i meant sewing the flag’

“Oh- Oh yeah babe! Of course! Anything for my green goblin!”

Remus motioned him to follow as he went over to Rowan’s bedroom aka the only bedroom in the apartment. He opened the closet and took out some old bedsheets and curtains. A dust cloud rose up from them.

He chucked them all on the floor and pointed at them. Remy promptly took out a needle and some thread from their bag.

“A lady is always prepared” They joked “So how big do you want it to be-”

A hurried knock came on the door. A thud came from the living room as Rowan fell down on the floor from surprise. “Dragon knocking” She yawned out.

Remus grabbed all of the fabric and followed Remy as they stumbled over to the door. Janus was standing on the other side. His breathing was quick and his eyes wide. His shirt was buttoned on wrong and he had on Logan’s space themed pajama pants.

“REmus! You’re alive!” 

He exclaimed and reached out to hug his friend but Rem flinched back. Jan took a few extra theatrical deep breathes before half hissing towards Remy.

“I’ll kill you Remy. I will literally put poison in your food”

“Girl why this sudden flirting!?” They teased back.

“Your message made it sound like I had to hurry over because Remus was hurt or something! I was in the middle of snuggli- doing important work!” He sent a smile to Remus “I am however happy to be here”

“It’s only ‘cause I’m here. I know. You don’t have to say it!” Remy added.

They pulled Jan into a tight hug and whispered to him about how Remus wasn’t talking and didn’t seem to want to be touched. When they moved out from the hug they still had on a cheerful look.

Even so Janus looked a bit pale when he looked at Remus “Are you sure you’re physically okay? There is a tube going into your nose”

‘it is how i control my zombie army’ Remus wrote back.

“Oh....Understandable then”

“Alright Janny boy you wanna have a totally cool awesome sexy lil sleepover?”

‘we can make fake blood and throw it at each other’ Remus wrote.

“Well I can’t say no to some classic blood throwing”

He stepped inside the apartement. His back instantly straightened when he saw Rowan. He was very afraid of pissing her off somehow and in turn pissing off Remus. He did a shy lil wave. She was too busy fixing her hair to notice.

“Alright gals and babe how about we make some dinner and watch some movies until we fall asleep. Babe you can like choose the food and movie if you want” Remy rambled. “But first!” They did a dramatic pose “Truth or dare!!”

“Very classy” Janus commented.

“Let me live out my popular teen girl dreams okay!?” They looked over to Remus “Only if everyone is like comfortable with it obviously”

Remus in turn looked over to Rowan before writing ‘sure. jan?’

“I only just played it for the first time a few nights ago but I am also fine with it. You would think Patty had to be bad at something but no she’s good at kissing too” Janus very casually said.

“Oh yeah. She’s great!” Rowan agreed. 

Before anyone could unpack any of that Rowan had pulled Remus into the kitchen to make popcorn and smoothies for everyone. Janus awkwardly sat down on the soft mattress in front of the tv. Remy sat down next to him and started to work on organizing the fabric.

Janus kept glancing over to them. Them in their full glory of a Charli xcx shirt made out of fabric found in a dumpster and in a skirt that made him blush. His lips curled up into an excited smile at the thought of maybe spending the night with his 2 crushes....and Rowan......ANYHOW he fantasized about being cuddled between the two. Like a smushed together spoon. He had to hold back happy stims.

“Scissor. need a scissor” Remy mumbled under their breathe.

They got up and leaned on their cane. It only took a few steps before some of the tape holding the cane together slipped up. The cane loosened and Remy fell foward. They landed harshly on their elbows and palms.

Janus quickly hurried over to help them. He reached out his hand.

“Are you okay?”

They slapped away his hand “It’s fine” 

He looked at the cane “...Did...something happen?”

“I just like tripped. Girl it’s fine. It’s like old and stuff. Of course it would break”

Janus’ heart sunk. He lowered his voice “Remy I can tell you’re lying. I’m not stupid. Are you okay?”

“Well girl I would have been better if I didn’t trip. Which is what happened. Nothing else. And now I can’t get like a new one ‘cause I’m broke as fuck” They had that hint of anger in their voice, the one they always got when someone caught them in a lie. 

“I only want to hear what happened because I care about you. It’s not like I get worried about you or anything”

Remy met his eyes “And what are you gonna do if I tell you? You gonna run off and tell Logan all about it? Huh?”

“It’s not-”

“We all need to gossip about something. I get it girl” They said through gritted teeth “I’m just real sick of people talking about me behind my back-”

“Smoothies are ready!” Rowan announced while walking into the room. 

Remy immediately shone up into their usual relaxed smile “Perfect gal! You got any scissors around here?”

Janus stayed still even after Remy painfully had gotten up to talk to Rowan. He felt sick to his stomach. They’d been the one to suggest a sleepover hadn’t they? He couldn’t help but be afraid there was a reason behind it.

‘i think j anus is possessed’ Remus wrote.

Everyone else had made themself comfortable on the mattress. A lit candle sat in the middle. Remus had wrapped his arms around his sister like an octopus and kept poking her cheek to annoy her to which she threw popcorn into his face.

(Even though Remus’ heart was beating out of his chest and he felt nauseous and shaky and he kept hearing people yelling and his thoughts were racing. He still felt happy. He didn’t think it would go this well. He held his sister closer)

Janus forced himself to get up and join them. He sat next to Remy but they looked down at the fabric instead of even glancing at him.

Rowan clasped her hands together “So who shall start?”

“Well girl no offense but I’m scared of you, Janny is too much of a shy flustered fuck, Rem will dare us to eat bathroom mold or something and I’m too sexy to ask things so we’ve already hit a wall” Remy said.

‘floating orb’ Remus wrote. 

“Dukey you’re hallucinating again”

He shook his head and pointed at you, the floating orb with sick fucking sunglasses in the corner of the ceiling.

“Oh that one! One of my precious fans! Excuse me, yes that is indeed real”

“Perfect. An impartial magical being to give us truth and dares. This is what all people should have during sleepovers” Janus added. “You do want to be a part of the game right?”

You let out a long murmur of static that made a few plants shake. They all took it as a yes. They settled in and waited for your surely very good truth and dares.

#feel free to send in as many truth or dares y'all can think of #i have no like specific asks i want in mind #i just wanted to give yall a chance to fuck everything up if yall wanted to #or make everything better i guess C: #sanders sides #remus sanders #janus sanders #remy sanders #roman sanders #thanks for the ask <3

[amour-de-tous]

Finally, the update on my health

TW: lots and lots and lots of talk about health, and bad health, in particular, below.  So I know I never really updated everyone on What Was (is) Going On With My Health. It’s been a huge mess, and I run out of spoons every day just trying to eat meals at the right times to take my meds.  Shortest version possible (believe it or not): at the end of May last year, 2019, pretty much all my joints and extremities swelled up unbelievably. Like I couldn’t put my feet on the floor because they were so swollen it felt like the skin would split open. I had to sit in a chair all day with my feet elevated on a stool and pillows just to keep them from continuing to swell, and I had to sleep with pillows under my feet to keep them from swelling more during the night. I say “sleep” loosely, because I was getting about an hour to two hours of very interrupted sleep every night. The swelling was so bad that just to leave my chair where my feet were elevated, and go sit at the table to eat meals, my feet would swell so bad it was hard for me to walk from the table back to my chair. Then my hands started going numb and tingly, but not in a “my hands are asleep” kind of way, but more an “this is excruciatingly painful but I still can’t feel my hands” kind of way. I couldn’t close my hands into a fist, and I couldn’t open my hands either, they were frozen in a sort of half curled position. There were several weeks where I couldn’t hold a fork or spoon to feed myself. There were months upon months were I couldn’t brush or wash my hair by myself. I spent months with my hands/wrists/feet/ankles packed in ice every 20 minutes to try to control the swelling. I also had this awful brain fog situation where I couldn’t focus on anything. Even if I had been able to hold a book, tablet, or phone (which I couldn’t, because my hands were so bad), I couldn’t read because I had absolutely zero concentration or focus or comprehension. Even watching TV was almost impossible because I would zone out and come back to awareness and so much time had passed I’d have no idea what was going on. I literally spent three or four months just sitting in that chair in pain, staring at the ceiling, crying on and off. So, so much more below the cut.

I could barely attend my niece and nephews baptism. We were there for as long as it took for the actual service to happen, and while I tried to stay for the meal and gifts and such, I was in such excruciating pain--and using a cane to even be able to walk--that we had to leave early.  My niece’s 4th birthday was a few weeks later, in late June, and again I was there with a cane and in excruciating pain. I’m my niece’s favourite person and having to tell her Auntie couldn’t get down and play with her, or hold her, was terrible. By the end of June, my PCP had run enough tests to be outside his area of knowledge and referred me out to a rheumatologist. The earliest the one I wanted to see could see me was January. This was the first week of July. So I looked around for whoever could see me first and chose them. The soonest someone could see me was, unfortunately, on my birthday last year, July 15th. So I spent my birthday seeing the rheumatologist, being diagnosed with carpal tunnel, tendinitis, and what he suspected was rheumatoid arthritis. Once I left his office, I spent my birthday getting bloodwork (8 vials, yikes, which continued monthly for the remainder of 2019), and then getting fitted for a set of wrist braces that I would have to sleep in for maybe the rest of my life, and wear during the day when the pain was so bad. The rheumatologist literally said to me “well, none of your labwork confirms this and we don’t really know, but we’re gonna treat you as if you had rheumatoid arthritis”. Although he kept running tests to try to confirm the RA, he didn’t look anywhere else to try and figure out what I actually have. So they started me on medication(s), and referred me to occupational therapy and physical therapy. I was so bad when I started going that my PT consisted of sitting in a chair and (trying) to flex my ankles in different directions, and then a lymph massage to try to reduce swelling. My occupational therapy, when I started, consisted of trying to pick up pieces of sponges and put them in a cup. I was so bad that was actually almost impossible for me. They also referred me out to have a nerve conduction test, where they stuck needles all through my arms and electrified them. It was the worst thing ever, let me tell you. Then I got referred to a hand surgeon (who is lovely, actually) for surgery. He decided to hold off on surgery and see if steroid shots would help (they did, to an extent, and I am so grateful for that). Fast forwards through months and months of testing and bloodwork and physical and occupational therapies and medications, and the swelling had reduced enough that I could stand up or walk to the bathroom or eat dinner without swelling up so bad anymore. Being at PT and OT still meant I came home and had to pack my feet and wrists in ice and elevate to take care of the extra swelling, but it was better. Not good, not right, but better. Fast forward more, still, and it’s December. At that point I could stand long enough to help cook dinner, or even run an errand or two before I was in too much pain and had to sit and elevate again. In mid-March they released me from PT and OT. Not because I was better--I still couldn’t (and can’t, now) bend my wrists at all--but because the prescription had run out. I’d basically used all the allotted amount I had. This ended up being alright in the long run, since aside from one trip to the lab for bloodwork, I haven’t left my house since my last day of OT on March 13th, due to Covid. Turns out having an auto-immune disease and being on immunosuppresants makes you REAL high risk for Covid, and I’m just not playing that game. At the beginning of April, I finally got to see the rheumatologist I WANTED to see all along (via video visit! Didn’t even have to leave my house and be exposed!). She’s awesome and is really set on finding an ACTUAL diagnosis for me and not just saying “we don’t know”. Had 9 vials taken from me in her first round of bloodwork, and then she said it looked like it could be Lupus and did more tests. She’s now pretty certain I DON’T have Lupus OR rheumatoid arthritis. I had an appointment with her at the very end of July (video, again), and it turns out she thinks I have something called sarcoidosis. This is going to require a CT scan, for my lungs and heart, to see if the disease is in them. Evidently with this particular auto-immune disease, your body overreacts and encapsulates what it thinks are dangerous foreign bodies (but really are just part of your own immune system) and creates “granulomas” around them. Basically think of an oyster creating a pearl around an invading body, except in this case instead of pearls, I have lumps of stuff that hurts me.  Horrifying to know I have to walk into a hospital at this point in time, of my own free will. Like I said before, aside from one set of bloodwork, I haven’t been exposed or been out where I could be exposed at ALL. All that goes out the window once I walk into a hospital for a CT scan. :\ After the CT scan, depending on the results, there’s other tests I’ll need. Chest x-rays, EKGs, pulmonary function tests, lung biopsies (YIKES) and others. She seems fairly confident that this is the correct diagnosis for me, but wants confirmation and also to see progression of disease.  At any rate, she’ll be changing my medication. Which sucks for so many reasons, not the least of which is I just picked up 360 tablets of it that I now won’t be taking. :| Also the fact that now I get to try a new medication and do the “am I having side effects or am I just anxious” song and dance. She’s also talking about needing to put me on steroids which I am REALLY unhappy about. I suppose it’s better to go on steroids than to die, but I’m still really unhappy about it. In other, related news, I’ve developed hypercalcemia. Which means there’s too much calcium in my blood, which can cause a HOST of other problems. So I’ve been put on a no-dairy, low calcium diet. Do you know how many items have calcium in them? Almost everything, that’s what. Also, they fortify all the non-dairy “milk” products with calcium. They all have as much or MORE calcium than dairy milk. It’s been a NIGHTMARE, to the point where I’m actually afraid of food now. I’m obsessively reading labels and doing research online. “How much calcium is in 81 grams of kiwi, after all?”. Nightmare. Dairy was my #1 love and foodgroup, and having to suddenly figure out all new things to eat and ways to cook while simultaneously being in pain and *exhausted* 24/7 because auto-immune is not. fun. at. all. It’s already all my energy every day to help make, eat, and clean up a meal. I literally have to sit in my chair after a meal with my feet elevated to recover. Now having to spend all this energy on a whole new diet plan is a nightmare. Basically this whole thing has been a MESS. It’s been 15 months, I’ve been being treated for the wrong disease for 14 months, the news I’m getting now is worse than the news that flattened my emotional response all those months ago, I still can’t function, and I can’t work. Oh, yeah. I haven’t played an instrument since May 2019. My whole life revolved around my music, and now I can’t even play to make myself feel better, because my hands don’t work. I’ve also been out of work since then, too: my last concert was April 2019. I haven’t made any money since. But I have had co-pays out the wazoo! Which reminds me that they raised the price on two of my meds, because of course they did. Thanks, congress. This has been really, really hard. My anxiety has skyrocketed through this, and my depression isn’t doing much better. Although physically I’m not as bad as I was, I’m nowhere near normal, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go back to my normal again, either. The best I’m hoping for at this point is to be able to eat calcium again someday, to not have my organs eaten up by this disease, and to continue existing. It’s been exhausting. It really, really has.  That’s not to mention the added stress and anxiety over Covid, and the fact that neither mom nor I can even go to a grocery store because of my high-risk status. We’re averaging getting groceries about once a month right now. It’s super fun now because I have to read the label on EVERYTHING but Aldi doesn’t post their nutrition labels online and!!! That means I have to either guess or not get things! Great!  All this to say that I miss being on tumblr. I miss all my friends here. I miss talking to you all and being able to laugh with you and geek out. Things have been really hard for me (and there are multitudes I haven’t included in here; even if my hands would allow that much typing, I’d probably hit a character limit. Just: I miss you all. I love you. I’ve been a wreck, but I think of you all often. <3

#health stuff #diagnosis #health talk #medication talk #eating talk #uhhhh what else #needles talk #blood talk #disability talk #I'M A MESS Y'ALL #i love you and miss you #ponderings and musings #asa health stuff

[strangecore]

Medical Phobias

(TW: talk of medical stuff, anxiety, disability, ableism, mental health, fatphobia, brief mention of weight/size, and medical trauma) (also I’m tagging anything that could be a trigger in case y’all have it blocked so if my tags look weird it’s just so I don’t upset anyone <3)

I’m thinking about seeking out a diagnosis for something along the lines of iatraphobia (fear of doctors), nosecomephobia (fear of hospitals), trypanophobia (fear of medical needles), or tomophobia (fear of medical tests/procedures). I’ve been doing a lot of research and those sound like they’re the closest to what I experience, so I’m going to see if I can talk to a doctor about it (ironic, right? Looking for a diagnosis might straight up give me a heart attack). It’s severely affecting my life at this point so I can’t just leave it anymore.

I’m terrified of going to the doctor/hospital/etc. ANYTHING medical makes me have a full blown panic attack (last time I had to go to the doctors I passed out in fear at the thought of taking a fucking piss test and then again when they asked for a blood test - and then they couldn’t get enough blood because I got so tense that it just stopped coming out lmao). I straightup stopped going to the doctors whenever I was sick for like a whole year because my fear is so bad. I had to get COVID tested twice and both times I wanted to bolt straight out the door as soon as I sat down.

It never used to be like this - as a kid I was always in and out of hospital and it sucked but I was never properly scared, especially to this extent, and even just last year I went to doctors a lot and it was really anxiety inducing but it definitely wasn’t this terrible phobia-like reaction.

It possibly has ties to my disability and the mistreatment I’ve experienced from basically every doctor I’ve been to. I’ve had to deal with so much fatphobia - even when I was a size 10 who weighed fuck all I was told to just exercise (this was after I said I could barely move most days and could only leave the house if I was using my cane), or lose weight instead of, you know, seeking a diagnosis and maybe treatment for my debilitating chronic pain, and I experience it even worse now that I’m actually plus-sized. I’ve also had doctors tell me the pain is all in my head/I’m making it up for intention etc - I remember one doctor telling me to (and I quote) “just check (my)self into a psych ward"... you know, the standard procedure for joint pain. None of them ever seem to want to believe me when I explain that I’m constantly in pain (bc EDS really just Be Like That). It’s infuriating and it made me absolutely loathe doctors even before the actual fear became really really bad.

I also have medical trauma as a result of a TBI I sustained as a kid. I don’t remember a /lot/ of it, but what I do remember is terrifying. But why would that wait until now to turn into a full-blown phobia?

Idk. It’s getting really out of hand to the point where if I end up injuring myself/getting sick in the future I probably won’t go to the doctors unless someone basically forces me to.  

If anyone has been diagnosed with iatraphobia/nosecomephobia/trypanophobia/tomophobia (or even just someone who can relate to my fears that don’t specifically have a phobia), I’d love to hear your thoughts/experiences either in the comments or via messages. Obviously I can’t say for sure if that’s what’s going on with me but it’d really help to hear from y’all.

#iatraphobia #nosecomephobia #trypanophobia #tomophobia #medical #doctors #chronic illness #chronic pain #chronically ill #disability #ableism #medical fear #medical phobia #phobias #EDS #ehlers danlos #zebra #zebra problems #fatphobia #medical ableism #medical fatphobia #medical trauma #hospital #hospitals #brain injury #TBI #tbi survivor #anxiety #mental health #trauma

[fluidityandgiggles]

Dalton Big Bang day 22 - That’s What We’re Here For

Writing Masterpost, AO3 Link

Notes: Logan in therapy is a thing I care about very deeply and he needs a good therapist to help him out. Did you really think I'll write about anyone else in therapy?

"This is Dr. Blake's office," Johnny told Logan as they left the horrid medicinal smell of the office building and entered a room that could best be described as what would happen if a unicorn projectile-vomited.

Well, maybe he was exaggerating a little, but still! The walls were a light lilac color, decorated with fairy lights and childish doodles painted on colorful paper; the wall near the door had several bookcases on it, full of crafting supplies and tabletop games and books Logan didn't care to check out, and next to them was a white desk with two colorful chairs right up against the wall.

There were also a small coffee table and a light blue suede couch opposite the desk and chairs. The couch was covered with plushies and there was a soft blanket folded neatly on the armrest. That was the biggest offender in his opinion. That couch in particular.

On that couch sat a young man, about somewhere in his thirties, sipping a cup of tea and looking straight at Logan. He sported slightly messy light brown hair, in a way that still seemed intentionally so, and frameless glasses that sat high on the bridge of his nose; Logan believed that, had the glasses been different, maybe his green argyle sweater vest and khaki pants combo would look less nerdy and more… well, more like something. Anything, really.

"Dr. Blake," John greeted the man, nodding a bit as a courtesy.

"Senator Wright." His voice was calm, but as his face broke into a smile Logan could hear it change into something else. "And this must be John—"

"Logan."

"Yes, of course. Excuse me." As the therapist stood up, Logan could see him grab a cane he hasn't seen before, that until now was resting on the small table. At a closer glance, he could see the man's leg wrapped in a bandage of some sort. "It's nice to meet you, Logan. I'm Arin Blake, you can call me Arin, or Dr. Arin, or Dr. Blake if you so fancy, I honestly wouldn't mind."

"Yeah…"

"Don't fuck this one up," Johnny threatened Logan as he turned to leave. "Your psychiatrist recommended him to us. Don't make her regret it—"

"Actually, Senator, I'd rather you joined us today."

The man was already on his phone by then, but at least he didn't leave, which meant he listened probably. Still surprised at the suggestion though, which showed on his face. Logan just scowled as he went to sit on the truly offensive couch - as instructed by the doctor - and grabbed a cat plushie to hold.

A brown cat plushie, not too fluffy, with embroidered black eyes and a stupid expression.

Kinda reminds him of Julian. In a way. He's not sure which. 

"In order to understand what we're working on here, I'd like to also hear your side of the story," Blake continued as he sat down in a chair in front of them. Johnny took the other side of the couch. "Can I offer you coffee, tea? Water?"

"Coffee is fine," Logan shrugged.

"To me as well."

"Just remind me for a moment, which medication are you prescribed?"

Logan may have rolled his eyes at that.

"Prozac, and I'm starting to take adderall soon."

"I see…" he hummed to himself as he got up and left the office, leaving Logan and Johnny in uncomfortable silence.

Dr. Blake's cup of tea was in a big blue mug, decorated with a print of tiny cartoon citrus slices. A clear plastic teaspoon stuck a bit over the top, and Logan inspected the little tag on the tea bag. Hibiscus apple cinnamon. Sounds fancy enough.

He just about took his phone out and started playing something when Blake came back, hopping on one leg almost, and put two disposable cups in front of them. Johnny's was a cup of coffee. His, though…

"I asked for coffee."

"And isn't this it?"

He took a sip. "It's… it's fine." It wasn't. There was too much milk, he could tell just by looking it. This was just a confirmation. "Thanks."

"So how about you both tell me why you're here?" The doctor sat back down in his chair, waiting for an answer.

"I don't know if you've heard in the news, but there was a fire at Logan's school—"

"Don't act like that's the reason we're here." Logan waited for his father to get red in the face. He always did. So he just leaned back and counted the seconds. "You brought me here because you think that everything wrong in your life is the result of me simply existing, and your only excuse to actually do it is that the people you dumped me on when you couldn't bother with keeping me around anymore can't look after me now."

"How do you think people would have reacted to my campaign if they knew—"

"Oh, come on, not everything is about your FUCKING JOB!"

"Okay, okay, Logan put that cup down." He did as he was told. After all, he can't fuck this one up, can he? "Now, without exploding on each other, please tell me what's going on."

"Logan's school burned down back in March—"

"February."

"—and he's only been getting worse since. He's always had anger issues, but since then he won't stop acting out. Usually over quite… petty things too."

Blake pushed his glasses further up, if that was even possible. "Petty things like what?"

"Like…" Johnny faltered, fumbling for words. So Logan spoke for him.

"Like that time last week when I asked if I can go visit my friend in California and you said I can't because what if his mom says no."

"Ms. Larson is a very busy woman, Logan. You can't just expect her to let you stay over because you wanted to on a whim."

"Well, I'm not five anymore, I don't think it really matters so much whether or not she can—"

"Let's stop it right there, again, Logan." Dr. Blake's stare made Logan curl up into himself. "Repeat that, now calmly."

Logan swallowed rather hard before talking again.

————

"Tell me a little about your friends," Dr. Blake asked at another meeting, about five weeks later. Logan sat on the chair closest to the desk, hugging the cat plushie again, and focused on drawing some flowers.

Lily of the valley. It was the only flower he could draw well. And isn't that just sad.

"There's Derek," he started, drawing the stems. "He… well, if he put half as much energy into caring for himself as he does for caring for me, I think the world would be a much better place. I think he's trying to compensate for this with girlfriends. It's kind of worrying, to be honest."

"But he cares for you?"

"Yeah. Sometimes a bit too much. It's… it's funny, actually, because… he really needs to work on himself. He can't fix me no matter how much he tries, because he's not some miracle worker and my mental health isn't fixable—"

"But it is treatable. And that's what we're here for."

"Yeah. I just… I find it funny, because he spends so much time trying to fix me that he's completely ignoring himself, and then he goes off and thinks having a girlfriend is a good replacement for self care. But I can't just tell him that… he'll get upset and then say it's not important and I'm just obsessing over it because reasons, and then when I get upset over not understanding he says it's my anger issues and I should be medicated."

"And why do you think he's doing this?"

This was the type of question that Logan quickly learned Blake loved asking. 'Why do you think', 'why do you feel', as if he wasn't the expert here. It was weird, having someone interested in his opinion without calling it anger issues and shutting him up, or telling him it's stupid and all that. He wasn't sure he could get used to it, but he certainly felt like he was, and it scared him.

"I think… I think he's just worried… he has anxiety, and I think he's reflecting it onto others because he doesn't know how to deal with it himself…? I know his parents don't know how to. So neither does he."

"And your other friend?"

Logan put down his pencil and picked a yellow one, throwing Blake a look.

"Julian is… he's cool. I miss him, I haven't seen him in months and he can't come over for vacation because his mother won't let him."

"Is he just cool?"

"I mean… he's one of my best friends, so… he's cool. He's very snarky sometimes… well, most of the time… and we talked about it a while ago, about why he's like this, and it was before revising my diagnosis, and he didn't really understand that I was insulting him back as a fight or flight response and he thought I was enjoying it… umm…"

Blake just pushed a mug closer to Logan. It was a clear mug, full of a bright red liquid. The hibiscus apple cinnamon tea. He made it for Logan today, as an attempt to get him to like something with no caffeine. Apparently coffee was bad for adderall. He assumed it'll be okay though.

"We're working on it now. And he needs physical therapy, so it's not like we really can do it in person, but we call each other every day and stuff…"

"You should visit him, then," the doctor suggested, making Logan snort. 

"I don't think he wants me around… his boyfriend is there to keep him company. It's fine. Well… not his boyfriend. I'm not sure what they are. It's complicated, I think. Jules says they're not dating but they sure have a—"

"Dearie, are you jealous?"

He just laughed again. "Of Julian? Nope. Not in a million years. Of Sebastian? I… I don't actually know. I mean, he and Julian aren't together even if sometimes it feels like it, and Jules did say I'm his best friend and stuff, but on the other hand he makes him happy, and…"

"And being jealous is okay, so long as you put it into a healthy outlet and not into anger. Talk to Julian about it. See what he thinks and says."

"But… we talked about it… kind of… he said he's in love with me, but it wasn't at a very ideal situation, and… we agreed to not talk about it. Just… let ourselves work through it, figure out what we really feel… what he really feels… and then we'll see where we go from there."

"That's good. But ask him for clarification, okay? Don't make your head spin like this."

Logan just nodded along, grabbing a blue pencil to shade in the flowers themselves.

"So I think I'm going to visit Julian soon," he continues. "I'll ask Derek to join me too… maybe I can buy him a gift…"

"That's a nice idea. What does he like?"

"He likes… cats, and candy… maybe I can get him new sunglasses. I think he'll like sunglasses. Or coffee…"

"Is coffee a gift?"

"Expensive coffee, maybe."

The doctor just laughed. "How about starting small… what about flowers?"

"...I can get him flowers…"

"That you can. I fear we're running out of time, though." Logan looked up from his drawing, a bit disappointed. "We can keep talking about this next week too, okay?"

"Okay… sorry for wasting time like this."

"You've wasted no time, dearie. It's all good. Just remind your father to write me a check, yeah?"

————

Logan crashed on the blue suede couch and covered himself all the way up over his head the second he made it to Dr. Blake's office that day. Sure, he was still wearing his huge coat — New York was especially snowy this winter, like, much more than usual — but he didn't really want to show his face to the world, and the receptionist who asked him to wait earlier was on the receiving end of his panic attack. It wasn't fair to the others, and it just… it wasn't…

"Do you want me to make you tea, dearie?" Blake asked him, rubbing his back. He sounded worried.

Logan just nodded and whimpered.

"Okay… try to breathe while I'm gone, okay? In for four, hold for four, out for four. Think you can do that?"

He nodded again.

"I'll be right back."

As Logan waited for Blake to come back, he started crying again. Winter vacation wasn't treating him too well, between fighting with Julian back at school right before coming home and getting yelled at by his father for flirting with the son of an associate (well, the guy was pretty cute, and certainly down to fuck) and probably the cherry on top, he was late. It wasn't as bad as the others, but he was late to this appointment, and he had so much to talk about, and…

"Logan, can you hear me?" Blake asked after what felt like forever, holding his hand. Logan whimpered again in response. "Come on, let's breathe together. I'll count."

He didn't even feel how long it took before he was sitting up, a second, weighted blanket on his shoulder, drinking his tea. Dr. Blake was still there, helping wipe his cheeks with a tissue as Logan tried to calm down.

"...Julian and I had a fight."

"Okay… what was it about?"

"I… I tried talking to him again, about… about us, and our relationship, and where does our friendship go, and he screamed at me that he's tired of talking about it and that I need to stop bringing it up, that he's with Sebastian and that's it, and then I yelled back and I… I may have slapped him, but…"

"That's bad, dearie. You know it's bad."

"I know! And I hate myself, I hate myself so much for doing this! He doesn't deserve a friend like me, I'm… I'm possessive and an asshole, and he just…"

"Okay, here's where you're wrong," the doctor told him, taking one of his hands. "You're wonderful, Logan. You're a great friend, and Julian didn't tell you he hates you. He didn't say you're terrible."

"But he implied it."

"He did not. It was an intrusive thought. What did Julian say, exactly?"

"...he… he said it's, he said that he's tired of talking about it, and that… that he already has a boyfriend, so I can't... " He hiccuped.

"Exactly… nothing about you as a friend. Open your phone and call him for me, okay? I want you to talk to him, and I want to see you do it."

Logan just nodded, a bit hesitant. He fumbled with his phone, trying to avoid looking at Julian's number, but ultimately he just… did.

Julian answered at the third ring.

"Hey, Lo."

"Hey…" he sniffled a bit. "I just… I need clarification on… on something." He looked at Blake for approval, wiping his eyes with a finger. Blake just nodded.

"Sure, what's up…?"

"Just… when we… had the fight. And you screamed at me and I screamed back, and…" Logan took a second. "Jules, do you hate me?"

"...are you high right now? Seriously. Are you?"

"No… I'm in… never mind."

"Okay... Lolo, I can't hate you. You're my best friend, you know how much I love you, but sometimes I can get mad or frustrated. Just like you do." He could hear the disappointment in Julian's voice almost. "I'm with Sebastian now. I'm happy with him. I love you, I really do, but you constantly asking me if I'm sure I'm happy and if we can give it a chance is getting tiring. I'm sorry, but it's getting really difficult."

"I… I'm sorry… Jules, I—"

"I accept your apology. I'm not mad at you, you don't have to get so anxious about this. You're starting to act like Derek."

"I'm still sorry…" he could finally take a breath, looking at his therapist for approval again. "That's… that's all I… I'm just in therapy, and…"

"Okay… go back to therapy. Don't waste time talking to me. I love you."

"Yeah… me too."

Logan hung up after that and turned to sip his tea, which has now cooled down.

And then the doctor spoke. "I'm proud of you. You don't need to apologize so much, you're doing just fine, but you did great. I'm so proud."

"Thanks." Logan forced a smile.

Maybe… maybe things would be okay, at the end of it all. He sure hoped so.

————

"I'm going to ask Julian out," Logan announced one day, two years into seeing Blake, just waltzing into the office. He may have caught his doctor by surprise, but as he sat down and grabbed his cat plushie, Blake straightened back up and cleared his throat.

"Doesn't he have a boyfriend, though?"

"Not anymore! And he said he doesn't want a rebound but then we talked about it and—"

"Okay, slow down. Let's start from the top. Julian broke up with his boyfriend?"

Logan nodded, then started rambling — "apparently they grew apart, at least it's what he told me, but I'm kinda pretty sure Sebastian cheated on him with Blaine? Blaine is my ex, he's kinda… meh. But yeah. So they broke up, like, three weeks ago, and Jules said he doesn't want a rebound so fast after the relationship, but I can build up to it! I can… I can start talking to him about it, right?" — all while Dr. Blake listened, nodding along to what he was saying.

"...okay… we can build up to that, then. I can help you do it if you're nervous about it."

"I'm really nervous about this…"

"Okay, okay, I can help. But first, how was your week? I made you tea."

"I saw that, thank you, but…" his stomach fell. "My week was so boring… college is boring. I have an exam in two weeks that I'm not sure I'm ready for, Alex had a mental breakdown the other day that I had to help with because nobody else was around, my dad visited…"

"And how is your dad?" Logan rolled his eyes at this question. "No, no no no. You answer me. How is your dad?"

"He still thinks I'm gay for the rebellion part of it. I mean, he'll get over it, I have faith in Michelle to make him change his mind, but… he and Michelle visited, and it was really nice. I missed both of them so much. But the second he saw my friends again he started talking shit, because Drew's voice dropped a lot since the last time they met and he started making transphobic remarks and it was… it was bad. It was so bad."

"Did you help Drew out?"

"Yeah… and then my dad got mad at me and we went into a screaming match. But it's okay, Michelle… did her best to get us to talk. I think he understands it now… not the gay thing, but… the transgender thing."

"That's good…"

Logan opened his phone right before the end of the session, as Blake was reminding him to remind his father to pay and that next week they'll talk in video chat, same day same hour. He nodded along, looking through to his messages to Julian — there —  and getting up and out.

Lolo: I know you said you don't want to get back at it this early, but when you're ready, wanna go on a proper date…?

Lolo: also, can we talk about something? I have an exam soon and I'm anxious as shit

He kept staring at it as he went downstairs and to his car, watching the text on the screen dance with a pain in his chest.

J is typing...

#kylo cant write #daltonfic #daltonficbigbang #day 22 - therapy #logan in therapy is obvious but so good #logan needs help folksies #also his therapist is heavily inspired by bdg because why not

[jcunos]

uhhh. welcome to the Juno Has Issues™ show

First of all, in order to understand the vibrant cocktail of issues we're dealing with, we need to go back to Juno's childhood. Which, after his dad 'disappeared', was kinda idyllic, but at the same time his momma was pretty overt with the 'you're my beautiful boy, you're perfect, don't ever change' message. Which basically gave him the mentality that who he was then ('Bama Juno from hereon in) is the perfect, alpha Juno and deviating from that inherently makes him less worthy. And in some respects, yes, 'Bama Juno was the best version of him in terms of mental health and creative fulfilment, and physical health, but most of those aren't things he has direct control over -- so holding up that version of himself as the best version of himself was always going to be setting himself up for failure.

For a while after the truth about his dad coming out, that notion was completely destroyed -- Juno no longer trusted his momma, so he no longer idolised the version of himself she preferred. In fact, he didn't really know who he was when it felt like the happiest part of his life had been built on a lie, which was why he wholeheartedly threw himself into Prometheus: to get away from Alabama and get closer to the 'best' version of Juno. However, the longer he stayed at Prometheus the more homesick and depressed he got, leading to him once again falling back on the image of 'Bama Juno, this time not as the person his mother wanted him to stay as but the person he was before Prometheus. The best version of Juno. And, whoops, that version of Juno didn't have a great big depression hole in his chest! Time for some self-loathing!

The longer Juno stayed at Prometheus, the more depressed (and therefore more self-loathing) he got, until eventually he came to the conclusion that a defiant death would be better than slowly crumbling in this poisonous world.

But he didn't die. In fact, the crash didn't fix his problems but made them worse, now he was even further away from the idealised 'Bama Juno, and in a way that could never really be fixed. Therapy and theatre could help him mentally, only a time machine could get rid of his artificial kneecap and the rods holding the rest of his leg together. For a long time afterwards, he wanted to finish the job, but the experience had left him terrified of dying, to he was too afraid to really go through with it.

The disability issues begin to kick in here: with Juno internalising the belief that seen as it was self-inflicted, and he couldn't even kill himself properly, his pain wasn't deserving of other people's sympathy. It was his cross to bear. Besides, there was that perfect, distorted-by-time-and-distance vision of 'Bama Juno to live up to, so he quickly accepted that he was fundamentally broken, not enough, and would always have to prove himself. Which led to him refusing to admit when he struggled with anything, passing out on set and turning to painkillers to maintain the image of normalcy -- because 'Bama Juno could do everything, could swing-dance and laugh and play stupid games with his co-stars just to get people to see his film, therefore present Juno should be able to as well.

Of course, that wasn't the case, and after the Hairspray breakdown Juno had to forcibly accept that he'd never be able to be 'Bama Juno again. I guess he felt something approximating grief for a person who never existed, and plenty of self-hatred -- but he did start to make progress. Being forced to accept his disability put him on the right track to not hating it, to actually conceding that there are some things he can't do. The hospital stay also gave him time to think about Tomas and Miguel, coming to the painfully obvious conclusion that he was absolutely head-over-heels for Tomas. However, what he didn't shake was the idea that there was something fundamentally wrong  with him, and in order to be accepted he'd have to prove himself. So he found a new point of fixation: his relationship.

Honestly quite a lot of Juno's relationship anxieties come from wanting to make Tomas happy, but the whole 'I have to go above and beyond to prove my love' fixation definitely comes from his feelings of inadequacy and internalised ableism. Just because he isn't 'allowed' to hate his disability anymore doesn't mean he can't do it subtly by hating himself whenever he fails to live up to his own arbitrary standards, or prove himself 'enough'. Which is often down to mobility issues/chronic fatigue. However, being in a healthy relationship has mostly been brilliant for Juno, because aside from just the buzz of being in love, he's being supported and supporting in return, relearning more of those positive people skills he mostly knows from acting. Also, when he stops listening to Anxiety Brain he does have the realisation of 'this absolutely beautiful, kind, amazing angel of a human being loves me. Huh. Maybe I'm not as bad as I thought.' Also, getting back into theatre again is definitely helping him find his passion again -- incorporating his cane into his portrayal of Lady Macbeth would go a long way towards convincing him that even if he isn't 'Bama Juno, he's good enough how he is, and he's still got the same talent.

(Sidenote: in terms of disability issues, I doubt Juno would even use the label 'disabled', even though it fits, mostly because of the aforementioned baggage -- though I could see that being a big step for him)

#idk what to tag this #meta #i guess #also SIDE SIDENOTE: #these issues are why #juno has such a praise kink fkjlkfflk #it's about the validation

[creek-cryptid-deluxe]

WARNING DRAMA AHEAD

(Which is crazy because I try to actively have a drama free lifestyle)

So, awhile back I wrote about some issues in a friend group containing A & Em. Summary: I chatted with Em about A unintentionally making me feel shitty for FINALLY accepting my limitations & making lifestyle & wardrobe changes to reflect that. Em said she'd talk to A because if I did it, A might feel attacked & get defensive.

Day before yesterday, Em dropped by to hang, help me put together a shoerack, and go to a local costume shop that does rentals and serves all the theater departments & dance companies in a 70 mile radius. This shop is amazing, been around since I was little, almost everything is hand made with amazing care and detail, and the decor in their shop is ever changing, detailed, and super fucking cool. ANYWAY, we got on the subject of A, whom I've only seen once or twice since talking to Em about it & seemed ok both times aside from getting legit pissed that I'm better at macrame plant holders than she is. Apparently A currently thinks I dislike her or like her less or something. So I asked Em if I should gently talk to her about it and see if we can reach an understanding. She said she thought it was a good idea h really, I don't like one of my friends thinking I dislike them. So yesterday I pulled together some courage and messaged her. The following is the conversation that occured:

Me: So, I've heard that you are upset and under the impression that I don't like you anymore or like you less or something. So I'm gonna clear the air, but I'm gonna be blunt and honest with you because I'm not down for lying. K? (And let me go ahead and flat out say, I don't dislike you or like you any less)

A:I've just been feeling some reservations toward me lately. Go ahead I can take blunt.

(Spoiler: she cannot take even sugarcoated gentle level blunt)

ME: So here is the deal. My illness is eternal and is only ever going to get worse. In fact, it is constantly getting worse in small, large, and sometimes interesting & unexpected ways. Sometimes it creeps on slowly, sometimes it hits like an anvil was dropped on me. Therefore I am constantly having to adjust my lifestyle, activities, wardrobe... EVERYTHING. Very recently, I realized that I have spent the last 3 years trying to live my old life and just cope so my quality of life has been SHIT. I've finally truly accepted the shithole that is my health for what it is and have started to truly make real adjustments to my lifestyle, hobbies, wardrobe, ect. Because I will never get better and live in about 400 sq ft (at best) that means when I realize something doesn't fit my abilities or needs anymore, I get rid of it. However, I always offer those things to the kids & my friends first before donating them. But here's the thing, when I offer these things to you, I get a load of questions & comments that end up making me feel like I have failed as a person for realizing what has taken me 3 years to realize. For example: when I told you that Julia's candles were my last batch ever, there were loads of 'have you tried...' and 'I'm sure you can find a way.' I know you mean well, but if I'm giving something up, I've truly tried ever avenue to make it work within my limits and it just doesn't. Even after I quit candles in May, I kept the stuff (which took up massive space) until August because I doubted myself and was reluctant to lose another hobby. But I need to face facts and be realistic. Same with the sweater. I am drastically altering my wardrobe for whatever the upcoming season is to fit the fact that I need my cane at all times now (POCKETS) and the fact that my clothes need to be comfy enough for me to get dressed every day not just days I'm leaving the house. I've lived in PJs for the last year and a half and it's not good for my mental health. So all things that don't fit that criteria or my new altered lifestyle must go. And it's going to be a constant process because I'm constantly getting worse. The jewelry making stuff, I genuinely forgot you wanted it because honestly i don't even remember what happened yesterday, so I'm sorry. (I had jewelry making supplies that I can't use anymore due to -15 hand strength, which I gave to Em.)

A: I'm sorry that I've been putting you down and making you feel shity. That's never been my intention. If I ask a ton of questions it's not because I don't understand the severity and challenges in your daily life. I ask so many questions because I often find unconventional wacky solutions to peoples problems all the time and if I can be in the slightest bit helpful in finding a loophole or a way you might not have seen, I thought that would be better than just saying "I'm so sorry to hear that" I figured you hear that enough but idk how often you hear people actually trying to find a way. Like the sweater example, I would have been happy to take you shopping for a fun print material the made you some pockets. Outside like a cool patchwork with awesome prints, or inside like a bond detective. But you were so quick to snap at me and explain your whole situation like I am not taking you seriously. I ask because I want to hear your needs and maybe just maybe be able to help out. But if all I do is make you feel like your grandma did then I'll do you a favor and stop inviting myself over to make you feel shitty. I'm glad Emma always knows just what to say.

Now at this point, I stopped replying. I was kind of shocked at her response. Like, I expected her to explain her intentions, despite me making it clear I knew her intentions were good, because that's what people do. I expected us to discuss how things should be moving forward so I don't continue to feel like a failure. I considered maybe mentioning somewhere in there that if I want help or advice or solutions, I'll fucking ask. But I did NOT expect those last couple sentences where she basically stomped her feet and said well since this isn't going how I want, I'm not playing with you guys anymore.

After careful thought, writing & editing over a 5 hr period, I sent this (which are screenshots from my notes because typing is rough, I wanted to convey what I wanted just right, and now you have to click on them to see the full thing. I'm sorry I've failed you, the reader of this normal convo turned melodrama, in such a fashion.):

She responded at like 2 am (when I was asleep) so I saw there was a response when I woke up, but given the history of her behavior in situations like this (conveyed via Em, who has known her MUCH longer) I decided not to open it just yet, as I'd like to relax and enjoy my day. This shit stresses me out. I don't do drama and tantrums. I don't tolerate it from my teenage Spawn, much less fucking adults. I get the feeling that the response is going to be just as melodramatic & tantrum filled. If this is how she handles her intentions not aligning with the result of her actions that were driven by said intentions, then she's in for a real shock when she leaves the cuddlebox of college and enters the real world. Your boss isn't going to care about how good your intentions were when you accidentally burned down the kitchen of the bakery you work in. They will just care that you burned down their fucking business.

Welp, may as well rip off the bandaid. For you, my dear reader, to have closure I will read the response. Back in a sec.

OMG IT WAS SO MUCH MORE DRAMATIC THAN I EXPECTED.

A:I understand. And I told you where I stand. I am the type of friend that instinctually tries to help those she cares deeply about. I'm not the friend to just sit and feel bad when there's something I can do. But I have been feeling for a while now unwanted and you have confirmed it by not saying anything then, just talking about it to my former close friend, and then throwing it in my face that you have been holding on to a box cuz of me. And like the adult i am, I don't see why I should change the type of friend I am just because some one is ungrateful for it. I'll go help someone else leave their abusive boyfriend's in the middle of the night. for the people I care about I'd do anything, anything except sit and do nothing while I'm told how much worse I make things when I try and help. I will just take my good intentions elsewhere. I have had the worst year of my life but I don't remember you asking me once anyway. I wish you the best buy obviously your life is better without me and my negativity in it. I truly am sorry I hurt your feelings and I never ever wanted to. I cherished your friendship more than you'll ever know and you can ask anyone. But because I can't see myself sitting by biting my tongue around you and waking on eggshells because I clearly can't see the bounty between helpful conversion and being a cunt. Since I respect you so much I'll go ahead and remove that stupid cunt from your life so you won't be put down again.

HOOOLY SHIT. I'm not responding to that giant fucking dramatic pity party. She legit needs to grow the fuck up. Good god.

[sjscorner]

Vaping saved my life, Mi-Pod lets me live it

Now, I’m not the first to say that vaping saved my life, far from it, the number of people who have had their lives saved by vaping is easily in the millions and growing daily. The National Health Service backs vaping as a safer alternative than smoking, a 95% safer alternative to smoking. I myself have felt the physical benefits of making the switch from tobacco products to vaping. My asthma has improved greatly (yes, I’m the idiot with asthma that smoked) and things that used to leave me breathless, such as walking up a hill, no longer do. Then of course the other benefits such as being able to taste food properly, my sense of smell has also improved. Now for most people I’m sure that’s just an ok additional bonus but for me, this is actually a great additional bonus, particularly in the long run as I am having to learn more and more to rely on my other senses as I am gradually losing my eyesight.

My name is Sam but if you know me on instagram then you’ll know me as SJ or that girl with the eyepatch. I like to think of myself as a fairly honest person and because of this, I am very open not just when it comes to dealing with my sight loss, but with my mental health as well. If the acronyms for mental illnesses were viewed the same as those ones you get when you graduate college or university, then I would be considered a genius. I live with BAD, BPD, GAD, SAD, EDNOS, OCD and ICD. Both OCD and ICD have their own set of illnesses, some cross over with each other. Scared yet? That’s a lot of letters but I’ll simplify them for you.

BAD - bipolar affective disorder. More specifically bipolar type 1.

BPD - borderline personality disorder.

GAD - General anxiety disorder.

SAD - Social anxiety disorder.

EDNOS - Eating disorder not otherwise specified.

OCD - Obsessive compulsive disorder.

ICD - Impulse control disorder.

Needless to say I have a lot going on, that combined with my eyesight, I think is enough to explain how I became a prisoner of my own home. I also happen to be a warrior, I refuse to say survivor because to be a survivor I have to be a victim (in my mind) and I am not a victim, and have been through my own fair share of ups and downs in life including abusive relationships. Why is this relevant? Because now you understand why, at the time, I was incredibly reluctant to be around people. I trusted very few people for a very long time and this was not helped by my mental health.

I made the switch from cigarettes to vaping in June 2017, it had nothing to do with my desire to be healthier, I was fully aware of the risks of smoking but I honestly didn’t care. No, I switched to vaping out of frustration with my eyesight. I used to roll my cigarettes by hand but with the loss of depth perception and peripheral vision, rolling became an issue and more often than not I would miss putting the tobacco in the paper and end up with it all on the floor. I was in no way ready to give up smoking so switching to vaping made sense to me because not only would I still get my nicotine (I had tried other NRTs in the past) but I would still get the satisfaction of exhaling that all so important plume of smoke or in this case vapour that is entwined with the psychological side of addiction to cigarettes. My first vape shop experience wasn’t exactly brilliant, I was sold a faulty device, it was not local at all and at the time I had no knowledge of vaping and they didn’t provide me with any either. I worried that vaping was going to be a flash in the pan for me but between myself and my Mum (my biggest advocate of all aspects of my life) we were able to locate a local store. SpaceInvapers.

I cannot sing enough praises for SpaceInvapers because they have done so much for me. They gave me a safe place that I could go and spend time, talk vape, try new juices, get help and help me with socialising and learning that not all people are out to hurt each other. They even gave me a little corner of my own to stop people making me jump and because when I do get anxious I like being in a small space, it helps me to calm down. Through SpaceInvapers I discovered the vape community on instagram and that opened up a world of doors for me. SpaceInvapers were my step in the right direction but I was still locking myself away at home, though I now had the social aspect of the community online. My sight was stable enough that I was able to learn about ohms law, RTAs, RDAs and how to do my own build. Unfortunately my sight took a nose dive in the early months of 2018, I stopped going to SpaceInvapers, I was struggling to do my builds which made me frustrated and angry at myself because this was something I knew how to do and all of a sudden I couldn’t do it anymore and on the occasions that I did manage to do build, my builds weren’t very tidy and it would take me half an hour or more. I was seriously contemplating giving vaping up and going back to smoking, even if it meant having to buy packets of cigarettes now that rolling was pretty much no longer an option. I was even struggling with Subohm tanks. I’d often overfill them or I wouldn’t see that I hadn’t screwed the coil in properly and end up with juice all over my hands and desk and on more than one occasion I’d end up burning out the coil before I’d even really had a chance to use it. I tried to put a brave face on about it all, I tried to be proud of myself for still trying to build despite how long it took me but it was also causing me a lot of pain. My vision is permanently in and out of focus, my eyes get tired so much quicker than that of a normal persons vision, but on the occasions where I would push myself (which was happening more and more), it would cause pressure to build up behind my eyes, unimaginable headaches and migraines. My anxiety was increasing because of my vision, I was often bumping into things and tripping over things, vaping when I was out was a time of vulnerability for me as I had to stop, take my vape out of my pocket, use my vape, then put it back in my pocket so I could carry on. Now, I’m very aware that people know I’m visually impaired when I’m out by myself as I use a cane but to then reduce my vision even further with a big cloud? I would have no idea if someone were to approach me and that thought alone was enough to make chest tight with anxiety. I’m sure people will say, surely cigarette smoke would’ve obscured your vision also and they are right but I had the weird comfort of knowing that while my cigarette was lit, it was also an item I could use for self-defence. I may joke about using my cane as a weapon but 1) I’m not at all inclined towards violence, especially with something that could cause serious harm and 2) when you’re trained with a visual aid cane such as mine you are actually told to never hit someone with it, especially around the head because you could actually kill them (whether this is is true or not I have no idea, but I have no desire to find out).

I was back at square one, perhaps even a few squares further back as I’d had a brief taste of what the outside world was like. I’d lost all confidence in going out. I hated that I’d lost my independence when it came to vaping as I was at a point where I need other people to do my builds and help my change coils, dependent on the colour of the tank or juice, I sometimes had to have someone help me fill my tank. I was depressed, I was cutting myself off from the world again, I didn’t see the point in trying and was genuinely contemplating selling what vape stuff I had and just going to buy a pack of cigarettes and be done with it. While I was still debating, I ended up browsing online (as you do) and I came across something I had never seen before. The Mi-Pod. I’m not going to lie, I was intrigued. I’d never see a vape device that small before, nor was I familiar with pod systems at the time, so I gave it a click so I could find out more about it. It sounded so simple and easy to use. This was to be my last attempt at sticking with vaping. If this little device, as simple as it sounded, was too much for my eyes then that was the “sign” that vaping wasn’t meant me for me and I’d go back to cigarettes (because the last time I tried cold turkey the nicotine withdrawal impacted my mood so much that bipolar had a field day and believe me when I say it was not good for anyone).

March 8th 2018, vape mail! It’s daft, but I was excited and nervous. It felt like I had so much riding on the Mi-Pod, I felt that if I went back to smoking I would lose all of the friends I had made within the vape community and I really would go back to being cut off from the world. Even I have to laugh at how over-dramatic it all sounds, but I also knew that if started backsliding that it could potentially land me back in the psychiatric unit in hospital or worse.   I’d say it was love at first sight, but back then I couldn’t see the details of the Digital Orange Mi-Pod, but I can say it was love at first touch. I had such a little nerdy moment that I think you can only understand when you’ve had to learn to rely more on touch than your sight, this wasn’t smooth metal or plastic or even carbon fibre, this had lines that I could trace, smooth corners and edges that would mean if I were to grab it in a hurry (usually when I’ve knocked it off the table) that I wasn’t gong to hurt my hands, but oh the texture! It was a vape with a tactile experience and I loved it! The grey pod concerned me at first glance but once I had it flipped over and I saw that the little bung was white, my concern quickly dissipated. The pod was even opaque which meant I felt ok enough to fill it myself, admittedly I did hold it so a light was shining through, and it was easy to do. The bung was something that I soon found was something I could do without help at all or even having to look at it, I could do it simply by feel. While I let the juice settle in the pod, I explored the rest of the contents of the box. Charging cable - standard. Lanyard - huh? Little black doohickey to attach to your Mi-Pod so you can attach it to the lanyard - that’s bloody genius! I had no idea about the lanyard when I ordered it and I have to say, I did think I’d lose my Mi-Pod more than once, even if it was bright orange, because of the size. The lanyard solved that problem instantly and so much more but we’ll get to that. With the lanyard and the doohickey attached, the pod now in place, I finally tried out the Mi-Pod, I was expecting the flavour to be a dramatic loss after coming from RTAs but I was pleasantly shocked. The flavour was great, it was actually even better than some of the Subohm tanks I owned. I decided I’d give it a trial period, flavour is always amazing at first but there comes a point of drop off with most tanks, right? Or not as the case may be. I was so impressed that less than a month later I had ordered another.

The Mi-Pod was the answer when it came to my eyes, I have never (to date, touch wood) had to ask anyone to help me refill my pods or anything. I had a slight issue with my second Mi-Pod, I was heartbroken because I was beginning to rely on these devices, I got in touch with Mi-One and told them about the issue I was having. The customer service was amazing, they replaced the faulty Mi-Pod, their response time was insanely quick considering they’re in America and I’m in the UK, not only that, they were genuinely nice to talk to. I’m very old school in some ways, if you have you crappy customer service, I don’t care how good your product is, you won’t be getting my service. Mi-One had the product and the customer service. I was beyond impressed.

Back on track to stay off of cigarettes, I started to immerse myself more in the vape community but I needed to start doing more outside of the house. I needed to be able to go out by myself. A grown woman in her 30s should be able to do something as simple as go to the corner shop alone or go for a walk around the park for some fresh air, right? Anxiety is evil, it steals so much from you, destroys your confidence, brings along its friend, paranoia. I had my Mi-Pod, I could wear it around my neck which meant I could still use my cane with ease and when I wanted a vape I wouldn’t have to stop, I could keep on walking (albeit a little slower). I started out small, the corner shop was quite literally a two minute walk from my house. At first you’d think I’d sprinted there and back but I gradually slowed my pace until I felt that I was ok. Next I moved on to the local park, from my house, round the park and back to my house again is about a ten minute walk, a terrifying ten minute walk in the beginning. I did this everyday until I felt ok with it. I discovered that my Mi-Pod was more than just a vape, it was a source of comfort. When anxiety crept in, I would wrap my hand around my Mi-Pod and trace the pattern with my finger tips and tell myself that I’ve got this. All the while, I documented my journey with my anxiety through my stories on instagram. The support I received was mind blowing. I had so many people cheering me on, including Mi-One which I didn’t expect at all. In the grand scheme of things on instagram, I’m not much of anyone, I’m by no ones standards an influencer or the like, I’m just a person thats part of a community and yet this company, which I supported and had created a device that was helping me in so many ways, not only saw me but reached out and offered their support and encouragement. My family were supporting me, my friends were supporting me and so were Mi-One. I’ve never had so much support in my life! I’ve always been the person that gets torn down, kicked about, told they won’t amount to anything and suddenly my life is full of all these amazing humans who believe in me. Once I conquered the park, I moved on to the local pharmacy and doctors. As time passed I was even able to go to doctors appointments alone, something I hadn’t done since I was twenty one. Going to a doctors appointment alone was pretty freeing and it urged me to push myself further but I had done all the local places that I would actually go to, I’d have to go further afield. I hadn’t been on a bus myself in twelve years, even standing in the bus stop made me anxious as I can’t read the timetables as they’re so small. That first solo journey on the bus was terrifying. I felt like everyone was watching me, judging me. I think if I’d gripped my Mi-Pod any harder I might’ve cracked it, I was clinging to it that much. That first puff when I got off the bus is quite possibility the most satisfying vape I have ever had, I had gotten the bus to town and I hadn’t had a panic attack. I was anxious, it was my first trip on a bus in so long but I didn’t have a panic attack. I still get anxious on the bus sometimes but it’s more due to the people on it than the bus itself, but to be fair, it gets uncomfortable when people stare at you cos you have an eye patch so I think it’s fair to experience some anxiety over that.  

Vaper Expo UK October 2018, was an experience. I travelled alone by train, I felt fairly relaxed about it all. I would’ve been even more relaxed if I could’ve vaped on the train but then wouldn’t we all? Because of my cane, security helps me right to the desk to pick up my pass and is even kind enough to let me in an entrance that means I don’t need to go through the tunnel with all the lights that hurt my eyes a lot. Once inside, things changed. It was extremely busy, my anxiety was present but I was still able to enjoy myself. I’d customised my patch for Halloween with googly eyes and so many people had said they’d love it but it only takes one bad apple to turn good into bad. A random guy saw my patch and laughed at me. My confidence and ability to handle people disappeared and his laughter echoed in my skull. I was done. I couldn’t breathe. I stopped to say goodbye to a friend and was heading out. I paused for a moment to text my mum and let her know I’d be getting the next train home, I had my Mi-Pod in my hand and for whatever reason I decided that my expo was over but I wanted to go round to a few companies that I support and are always lovely to me to say thank you and hope they enjoy the rest of the show and get home safe. It was an excellent decision because it turned my expo around, instead of leaving on a bad note with some idiots laughter in my head, I had people that actually matter to me saying if I put him out, they’d sort him out. Obviously I declined that offer, but it made me laugh and I went home with a smile on my face.

Prior to Vaper Expo UK, a couple of weeks before hand, I was at a family meal to celebrate my Nana’s purchase of an apartment in Milton Keynes. We were planning on doing so much together, taking the bus to places, getting lost together. We were the blind leading the blind. Whist out to dinner Nana noticed my Rose Stars Mi-Pod, she couldn’t get over how cute it was. “It’s so small!” She couldn’t see the details in but she was able to see the colour and that it glittered. I remember her disbelief when I told her it was a vape, she really was gobsmacked by it. “I like this one much better than your other vapes,” I remember her saying. Every time I look at my Rose Stars Mi-Pod I’m reminded of that day and how happy my Nana was. It is a memory I cling to dearly as not long after that day, on November 8th 2018, my Nana passed away. It broke my heart in ways I can't explain. My Nana was the only person in my life who understood what it meant to be losing my sight as she too was losing hers. I found myself feeling very alone in the world and I wanted so much to disappear, but I was now part of a community that wouldn't let me, my best friends wouldn't let me and I am so grateful for all these people that I have in my life, because of vaping. Nana had put aside a little bit of money for myself, my sister and my brother, it was something she did out of the blue on occasion and would tell us to go treat ourselves. I had decided that with that money I would get a Mi-Pod that I was missing from my growing collection, I had a few by now, all different colours and textures which allowed me to set them up with different flavours and identify them by touch. I was missing a dragon skinned Mi-Pod, it was (at the time) the only texture I was missing. It would've made Nana happy to know that she had bought me something that I could use in a practical sense but also gave me joy. I encountered a slight problem though, no matter where I looked, I couldn't find a dragon skinned Mi-Pod anywhere. I posted on instagram that I was having trouble finding one, the amount of people that responded to help me was mind blowing. There were so many people scouring the internet, their local shops, to help find me a dragon skinned Mi-Pod and to say my heart was full, is an understatement. I'm happy to say, a Sea Dragon Mi-Pod was found and the shop someone had spoken to about it, was kind enough to hold it until I called them and allowed me to pay for it over the phone. It's one of my favourite Mi-Pods, because not only did my Nana buy it for me which she would've been made up about, but it showed me how remarkable this community is. It was such a silly thing, in the grand scheme of things, but in my time of grieving, all these people came together just to help me find this one Mi-Pod and that is something I will never forget.

Unintentionally, I've become known for my love of Mi-Pods, which I don't have an issue with at all, it amuses me sometimes that people know me because of my love of Mi-Pods even though I imagine a lot of them don't know why I love Mi-Pod so much. Anyone that knows me knows that I have some other loves that I also make no apologies for, in particularly Stitch. Yep, I am a grown ass woman and I'm obsessed with a Disney character. Stitch is special to me for a reason but that story is for another time. What does Stitch have to do with Mi-Pod? Nothing, except I thought it would be so amazing to have a Stitch Mi-Pod so I could have two things I loved as one. February 2nd 2019 I get tagged in a picture on instagram to find that a very talented individual (@vapeillustrate) had designed a Stitch Mi-Pod for me. I'm not going to lie, I cried. I was having a really hard time, the loss of my Nana and the events in my life after had rocked the boat with bipolar and I had lost my stability. I was in pretty bad shape, rapid cycling between deep depression and hypomania and experiencing an increase of psychotic episodes. Out of nowhere, this random act of kindness. It felt like an angel had sent me a reminder that even with all the chaos and uncertainty I was experiencing, there was still good in the world. One random act of kindness changed so much for me. I told anyone who would listen (and even those who wouldn't) about how this one person had designed this Mi-Pod for me, it had given me something to genuinely smile about. I wished there was a way to make the design a reality and once again, the community came to life, figuring out ways to make it so I could actually own a Stitch Mi-Pod (the design also featured my initials). Soon Zap Wrapz UK were found and the design (with the artists permission) was turned into a skin. I'm very much a person that believes in not forgetting important moments in life, I often commemorate them in some way or another, often via the means of tattoo. I'm sure you're not surprised that I got the design tattooed. Even if I ever stop vaping, I have this permanent reminder that there is good in the world, that with the right tools (Mi-Pod) I can achieve so much more than I realise I am capable of and that there are so many people that care about me, even when I feel entirely alone. It serves as a reminder to never give up, no matter how tough things get sometimes.

My life has been far from easy. I've spent most of my life with people grinding me down, I'd been made to believe that I was stupid, incapable, that I would never achieve anything in life. I am one of the, now all too many, that were told to go kill themselves. Finding this community has been a shock to the system. Instead of being told I can't, I'm encouraged to try. When I find that I can't do something, people reach out and offer help. For some people, being a brand ambassador is just another thing they've done, for me it is something I take great pride in. I've spent most of my life being told that I'm nothing, I don't look good, etc, etc, etc. That's why it means so much to me to be a Mi-Pod ambassador. I'm not a model, I never will be and I have no desire to be one. I live with mental health obstacles and sight loss. To have the people behind the very device that kept me from going back to cigarettes turn around and say we know you have sight loss, we know you have mental health obstacles but we don't care, we want you to be part of our family and we love you? No one will ever be able to fully understand what that means to me. I love my family and I love my friends but there comes a point where they can't boost you up anymore than they already have just because of the way the world works. Your family can think you're the greatest baker in the world but that's not going to get you the job in the bakery, you know what I mean? So for this company with over a million followers to notice tiny little me and say, yep, that's the person we want - it's mind blowing.

Mi-Pod even gave me the opportunity to be on the stand with them at Vape Jam UK this April, did I turn it down? Hell no! Was I anxious? I was terrified! Did I do it anyway? Damn right I did! For the first time since I began losing my sight, I not only took the train to London alone, I successfully manage the Underground by myself and I did it without having any panic attacks. That is a BIG deal! London is very different from Milton Keynes and Birmingham. The last time I had taken the Underground, I was with someone else, no one cared that I had a cane and my cane actually got stuck in the tube doors. I was terrified of doing it alone because I had no one else there to protect me but I did it. I went and I stayed at a lovely apartment with someone I had yet to meet (even more terrifying), and Charlie turned out to be one of the nicest people I've been blessed to encounter and I am genuinely thankful to have met him and still talk to him from time to time now. I got to meet Geoff (one of the co-founders), which as a Mi-Pod nerd was awesome but getting to meet him as a person, he's so genuine and down to earth! Don't let the suit fool you! Between Charlie and Geoff, I had some of the most mind opening conversations and neither one of them could give a rats ass about my eyepatch or cane. Vape Jam UK was very different to Vaper Expo UK, it's an experience I will never forget and it has boosted my confidence in so many ways. I got to meet so many amazing people, talk til I was blue in the face about something I love and have a fantastic time.

I cannot thank Geoff and Amir enough for taking a chance to get to know the random half blind girl on instagram and allow me to be part of something special and enable me to grow in ways that were just inconceivable to me. Two years ago, I was a shell of person, afraid to leave my house, unable to go anywhere alone. Now I'm constantly challenging myself to be the best version of myself I can be, testing my limits everyday and overcoming obstacles instead of retreating. My sight will continue to deteriorate, I can't do anything about that, but I know that I am capable of handling things and adapting. Mi-Pod stopped me from going back to cigarettes and because of Mi-Pod I've learnt to never say never because every never I said I'd never be able to do, take the bus by myself, do the London Underground, I've done. Vaping saved my life but it wasn't until Mi-Pod came into my life that I finally began to live it.

#Vaping saved my life #SJs corner #Mental health #vaping #bipolar #anxiety #bpd #ocd #icd #ednos #coping mechanism #my journey #personal growth #tobacco free

[lessthanhappyy]

I mean, I was expecting this, right?

I just left the rheumatologist. I have new information (I have old information repackaged as new information). I went in with theories and frustration and the recommendation of a well meaning nurse. I stumbled into this point, right? I saw doctor after doctor, explained symptom after symptom, and finally after years of nothing, because I was referred to a podiatrist half a year ago, I'm sitting at a bus stop after seeing a rheumatologist. Perhaps I should explain (perhaps I should not). I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrom, or EDS. I am always in pain. I am always second guessing my body, always hoping that when I walk up the stairs my knee doesn't give out this time, that while I'm working, my ankle doesn't dislocate this time. When I was little, doctor after doctor turned me away, or worse, told me to do stretches and I'd be fine (fun fact I learned today - stretching actually further injures and stretches the bodies of those with EDS and should be avoided at all costs). I felt like I was making it up. I felt fucking crazy. I felt confused. One doctor did blood work to see if I had rheumatoid arthritis. When the tests came back negative, he stopped looking for other options. My pain got worse, and I got quiet. It reminds me of the phenomenon of "smiling depression," where a person who is depressed, wants to die or self injure or what have you, is also a good student or incredible employee or appears happy. They're "smiling" through their mental illness. That became my approach to pain and the other not so fun quirks of my previously undiagnosed condition. It exists, and I'm going to keep on going. Even more so, I did what I could to make it into a party trick - at camp, one year for the talent show I showed off my weird overly bendy joints. In January I sat down with a doctor who my only experience of her was when I needed a medical signature in a minor emergency a few years previous, she gave it to me, no questions asked. And so I sat down with her and gave her a list of my fucking disaster of health problems, and asked what she could do. Turns out, not much. But oh! The recommendations to other doctors! This becomes a thing, bee the bi. You see one doctor, and they send you to another. They send you back and they send you to another. Then you have to see the first doctor again. Rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat. Specifically, she sent me to a podiatrist for my foot problem (it locks, it hurts, no, it's not just because I have flat feet, if it was just because of the flat feet I'd have symptoms in both feet and I don't). He was. Annoying. Possibly helpful, but annoying. Though, he did make the first of several (annoying) helpful calls. He told me to go back to my primary care doctor and ask her to send me to a back specialist. And then I slept through my doctor appointment because of a medication I was briefly on that was making me sleep in excess of 20 hours a day. This is possibly significant. Or maybe I would've ended up at the same place anyways. I called my clinic and asked if there was anybody who could see me, and there was one nurse available, so I went in and saw her instead of my primary care doctor. And I explained that my podiatrist wanted me to see a back specialist so I needed a recommendation for who to see, and she responds, "Oh! I'm actually this clinics back doctor. I can do your exam now." So she does. And I bend over backwards. We're back to my array of party tricks, including my ability to, quite literally, bend in half backwards. She stares at me and says, "You're very flexible" and I good naturedly smile and respond, "Always have been! It annoys every chiropractor or massage therapist I ever work with - my elbow's bend backwards too." She asks to see - I show her. (She looks concerned, which is new. I don't think I've ever had a doctor look concerned before, except for that one time I had bronchitis in fifth grade.) She sits me down and tests my hypermobility. She asks me about my pain levels - where the pain is. She asks if anybody else in my family is hypermobile. I say, "A little, but not like I am." She asks how old my scars are, and I tell her. (I understand now that the reason why my scars are so prominent is because EDS screws up your collagen, which is what forms scars, so you end up with long lasting, sometimes even sensitive, red puffy scars. It's also why ALL of my g'd damn piercings scar even though I don't know anybody else who has visible scar tissue around several year old piercings.) She tells me that she thinks I might have EDS, but wants me to see a rheumatologist, and that if she sent me to another back specialist, any good one would do the same. (Now I go back to the podiatrist and mention I might have EDS. He says, "No, no you don't want EDS," like it's some kind of choice. He sends me to physical therapy and says to come back in 8 weeks and we'll chat again and I can get an MRI if I'm still in pain.) I am in enough pain that walking can be hard, and my ankle gives out on me, so I use a cane now (the rheumatologist also mentioned to try walking sticks or forearm crutches, so we'll see). But I do physical therapy, until today, in which I cancel to go to the rheumatologist instead. He's... Friendly. Weird. It's a strange appointment. He jumps back and forth between genuine questions about my life - "oh, you're a farmer?? What all are you growing right now? I'm trying to have a garden this year" - to questions about where pain is, what joints are doing weird things, how often do I fall down the stairs (the answer to that, my friends, is a lot). And after everything tells me to wait, and that he had a book for me to read (it's called the Joint Hypermobility Handbook. It's about EDS. He explains how EDS causes my symptoms and explains a little of what I can do to make them more manageable. He tells me to join a support group and come back to him if I ever need anything). Diagnosis is what I was expecting, and yet it isn't. We often treat diagnosis as if it's this big pretty ribbon that fixes everything. It's not. Diagnosis is my ankle still fucking hurts, and it's always going to hurt. Diagnosis is it is entirely possible I will be in and out of physical therapy for the rest of my life. Diagnosis is, I kind of hope you're right because then I can stop fucking searching for what the fuck is wrong with me, and I also kind of hope you're wrong because there is no fix it button. I can't think it away anymore (not like I was doing that beforehand, but hey, I was definitely trying). I'm not really sure what this about anymore (I'm not really sure it has to be about anything). I have the diagnosis now. Wasn't I expecting this? (I don't think anybody is actually "expecting" things like this.) Mostly, I suppose, I am going to be okay, but I'm never going to be okay. I'm disabled. I will be disabled for the rest of my life. That does not mean I am unable, or that I'm inferior, or less, or faking it. It means I'm disabled. That this world will never quite be built for me. But I'm still a person. I'm still doing things as I can, at my own pace, in my own way. And hey, if you want be an asshole or a bigot about it, I'll fucking fight you, and I win because I have a motherfucking cane (and those things hurt).

#mine #writing #words #please don't steal #but totally reblog #eds #ehlers-danlos syndrome #chronic pain #disabled #cripple punk #diagnosis #doctor

[isakthedragon]

A Dragon Sized Adventure Chapter 36

Chapter 36: Whether Rain or Snow

*The next terrarium on the list is the Forest Terrarium. This place has more than just forests though. It also has rivers and even a few mountains.*

Knuckles: "Hmm... a forest. I wonder where we are."

Crash: "I think this terrarium is representing the forest on our home island."

Coco: "Yeah, it looks like it."

Spyro: "So we get to explore your home. Nice."

-----

Level 51: Forest Fumble

*Cortex appears.*

Cortex: "Well, you guys are lucky that I have somewhat of a conscious of taking Nina away. But don't think I will be so generous next time." *He disappears.*

Crates: 147

Time Trial

Sapphire: 1:25.00

Gold: 1:20.00

Platinum: 1:15.00

Spikes to Save: 5

Helping Partner: Amy

Badniks: Army-dillo: They are mostly just pests walking around and taking up space. Some wear armor to protect them that needs to be broken before they can be destroyed. Sawtle / Spiketle: Cybernetic turtles that have saws on their backs to prevent them from being hit from the top or spikes on their sides to prevent a touch from the side. Vulture: They look normal, but are actually cybernetic underneath. They swoop down and attack anything that approaches.

Beasts: Turtles: *Waddle Waddle* Crabs: *SNAP!* Venus Fly Traps: Already determined to be dangerous enough to not need a badnik flair. It will eat anything that comes by, even Crash.

Mutants: The Ratnicians: Lab Rat minions that have gone ravenous on the island since Cortex left them there. They are unstable to be around and can attack without warning. Spike: Was a Porcupine + Crab hybrid, but is now a Porcupine + Hedgehog + Echidna Hybrid. Eggman decided it needed hedgehog and echidna DNA so that it would make fun of Sonic (And the other hedgehogs) and Knuckles. Other than still raising spikes from the ground and having better claws, they are dangerous to touch in the air since they roll into a ball.

Ah, Crash's home, sweet, home. But there is no time to reminisce and enjoy the scenery, we have got work to do. It's a nice and simple walk trough the forest under a heavy rain. The only dangerous obstacles to note are the rolling rock traps that you have to time to avoid and the pits of Ratnicians. If you fall in, you have to kill them all to get a mushroom to escape. The level ends in front of a large, wooden-pole wall.

Achievement Unlocked: Soaked Bandicoot

-----

Level 52: Papu Papu's Village

Crates: 138

Time Trial

Sapphire: 1:35.00

Gold: 1:30.00

Platinum: 1:25.00

Spikes to Save: 5

Helping Partner: Big

Beasts?: Natives: Papu Papu's tribesmen seem to be very hungry for anything that comes by, so you may want to avoid them at all costs or hurt them.

Looks like have made ourselves to Papu Papu's domain and it doesn't look particularly pleasing in here. The natives have plenty of traps about to try and catch anything that comes by. Then you'll be making your way through their huts, avoiding the natives' spears and other sharp things. Unfortunately, we find ourselves ending up in Papu Papu's hut, and he isn't happy to see us.

Mini-boss: Papu Papu

His fight shouldn't be too tough. All he does is try to trip you with his staff until he tires of doing it and tries to whack you with the staff. If he misses, that is your time to hit him back. Do this 3 times to win. (Note: If you go super, he will go down quick.)

Afterwards you can leave his hut and head to the river just a little bit ahead.

Achievement Unlocked: *Witch Doctor Noises*

-----

Level 53: Waterfallin'

Crates: 153

Time Trial

Sapphire: 1:30.00

Gold: 1:25.00

Platinum: 1:20.00

Spikes to Save: 5

Helping Partner: Vector

Beasts: Piranha: They are hungry for bandicoot.

Our trek now has us climbing up these rivers and waterfalls to get distance away from the village and to get close to the mountain. There is good news that you can't drown in the river, you're just pushed back down the river. Still, it's probably better to keep on the stones, bridges. and stuff that are on the river. The level ends near the mountain on a path you can get off to.

Achievement Unlocked: Don't Go Chasing 'Em

-----

Level 54: Bee Wary

Crates: 178

Time Trial

Sapphire: 1:45.00

Gold: 1:40.00

Platinum: 1:35.00

Spikes to Save: 5

Helping Partner: Knuckles

Badniks: Lumberjack Lab Assistant Pawns: They mostly walk around trying to hammer you. Why do they look like Eustace Baag? Hunter Lab Assistant Pawns: Dressed in Safari clothes, they are hunting for 'wabbits'*. *Wabbits = you 

Beasts: Bees: *BUZZ, BUZZ!* Venus Fly Traps: The ones here on the mountain spit grenades at you.

Now you find yourself on the base of the mountain, and it's time to start climbing it. It would be easy if it weren't for those beehives spread out among the trees on the path. They send out bees off and on to try and sting you. If they feel a little overwhelming, you can dig into the ground to escape bees as they will leave soon after.

Achievement Unlocked: A Buzzing Concern

-----

Level 55: Into Crash Air

Crates: 184

Time Trial

Sapphire: 1:50.00

Gold: 1:45.00

Platinum: 1:40.00

Spikes to Save: 5

Helping Partner: Rouge

You continue on from the halfway point of the mountain, but soon the paths run out. They only way to get higher is to ride on top of those Cortex hot air balloons that are floating about. They are quite bouncy to jump on, but don't get too unfocused as you might miss them and fall to your death. About hallway through is a death route path of floating balloons to get to the 2nd gem in this level, the Green gem. At the end of this path is a platform to take you back to the original path so you can move on. The level ends on the huge balloon above the mountain top, which is shown to be a water-filled caldera.

Achievement Unlocked: 99 Crash Mugs

-----

*Crash and Rouge find themselves inside the water-filled caldera in the terrarium on a large platform..*

Rouge: "Hmm? Why did we warp here, Crash?"

Crash: "Probably whoever Cortex has sent next after us."

Ripper Roo reveals himself behind his desk on a nearby stone.  "Why, Crash, do you see as such a simple henchman?"

Crash: "Well, Ripper Roo, it's not like you are very smart. You go crazy with explosives, quite literally."

Ripper Roo: "Perhaps so, but Cortex loves that unpredictability." *He grabs his cane.*

Rouge: "I'm confused. What does he do?"

Crash: "He tries to blow me up with Nitro and TNT crates."

Ripper Roo: "I just love the smell of nitroglycerin. Besides, I'm not crazy anymore. See, no straightjacket." *He shows his free arms.*

Crash screams as he notices something falling from the air.

Ripper Roo: "What?" *A TNT counting down falls in his hands. 3... 2... 1... BOOM!*

Rouge: "Oh, my! Is he okay?"

Crash: "He's had worse, but watch out. He's dangerous."

Ripper Roo starts losing his posh accent as he goes crazy. "Oh, dangerous does not begin to describe me!" *He does his demented laugh as he bounces on his cane to the main platform.*

Boss: Ripper Roo

Ripper Roo seems to regress to his old tricks by hopping around on his cane, setting TNTs behind him that count down from 9. Try to find the area he misses as they explode. When it hits him, it will throw off his protective clothes, showing his yellow hair. Then he will go crazy with his cane, setting Nitros everywhere. Find the avoid spot before he blows them up with a jump. This will stun him, letting you attack him and take out some health. Do this 2 more times to defeat him.

Achievement Unlocked: ♪ He Bounces Like Crazy! ♫

*Ripper Roo collapses and is transported away. Rouge flies Crash out to their friends below. They leave the terrarium.*

Death Head's / Space Egg's Bridge

Eggman: "Why did you make Ripper Roo do that? I know it makes him crazy, but still!"

Cortex: "Eh, I was quickening the inevitable. To be honest, Ripper Roo isn't my best henchman.

Eggman mutters: "I'm starting to regret this."

*Just then, Pinstripe comes in from the elevator.*

Pinstripe: "Yo, Cortex, is it-a my time yet? My gun is itching for-a shootin'."

Cortex: "Yes, Pinstripe, it's your turn. Transport! Take him away."

Pinstripe: "I shall do my best to make them Swiss cheese!" *He is transported to the next Terrarium.*

Next Time: "I won't say nuthen about the 1930's Terrarium-" *Is shot.*

#Isakthedragon's fanfiction #A Dragon Sized Adventure #ADSA #ADSA: Chapter 36

[ecotone99]

[MF] Death finds a way

The intercom buzzed. “Mr Death, Mrs Ofrenda is here,” said Miss Coffins, in her usual, slightly monotonic voice. “Shall I send her in?” Mr Death was intent on staring at the endless black outside his windows. He never tired of the view—and how could he? What was there not to like? Nothing. Almost reluctantly, he looked away from the window and back onto his desk, where one of his many appointment diaries lay open.

“Mrs Ofrenda… Ofrenda, Ofrenda…” he murmured to himself, frowning pensively at the diary. “Ah, of course! Mrs Olivia Ofrenda,” he said, pushing a button on the intercom. “Yes, Miss Coffins, please do send her in.”

“Very well, sir.”

The intercom croaked as Miss Coffins cut the communication off. A handful of seconds later, she opened the door to Mr Death’s study and barely made an appearance as she let Mrs Ofrenda in.

“Ah, Mrs Ofrenda,” Mr Death began, stretching his arms wide open as he went to welcome her. “I cannot overstate what a pleasure it is to—”

“Cut the courtesy,” the old relic snapped at him. “I know I’m dead.”

“Of course you do, Mrs Ofrenda. You’re such a remarkable woman,” he went on unperturbed. “But that is hardly a reason why I should not treat you with the respect you deserve.”

“I thought I told you to knock it off,” she reiterated. “Having to spend eternity with you is bad enough as it is without having to bear with the façade too.” She quickly glanced around, still holding on to her walking cane. “Frankly, I wasn’t even expecting that there would be anything after death.”

“There isn’t,” Mr Death grinned. “People don’t usually go much anywhere else after they come here.”

“Alright, after life, then,” she clarified without concealing her annoyance a tiny bit. “I didn’t think death, of all people, would be picky.”

“I have my quirks,” he conceded. He looked her up and down. She was elegantly dressed, and wore sober makeup, not unlike many other dead old ladies. She was short, a little plump, and very, very grumpy. People reacted to him in all sorts of ways, and belligerent ones like Mrs Ofrenda were not uncommon. “In any case,” Mr Death continued, “I am hoping it was a pleasant surprise to find something on the other side, so to speak.”

“Pleasant? Ha! That’s a laugh! A creepy, old, fake house, with nobody but talking skeletons to keep me company. Very pleasant indeed. Who’s the stunner at the typewriter? Your wife?”

Mr Death laughed. “You’re a most amusing woman, Mrs Ofrenda. You see, I meant no flattery when I said you are remarkable. I meet all manner of people—I meet all people—and yet those who show no fear of me whatsoever, like you, are quite rare.”

“There’s no point in fearing death after it catches you,” she said as she plopped down in the nearby armchair. “I mean, what are you going to do? Kill me? Again?” She scoffed. “If pointless conversation is all you expect to scare me with, I should warn you—I was married for nearly fifty years.”

Mr Death sat down, right in front of her. He crossed a leg and rested his temple on his left hand. “I never did kill you,” he said, matter-of-factly. “In fact, I never killed anyone. I merely sit and wait—sooner or later, everything and everyone tends to come to me.”

“On their own accord?” she asked, feigning interested surprise.

“Sometimes. However, I do have a network of trusted suppliers, shall we say. Mr Ageing— whom I take it you’ve already had the pleasure to meet, though not in person—is one of them. I owe your presence here to him.”

“That’s precisely why I was hoping, more than thinking, that there would be nothing beyond the grave. I’ve had to endure a failing body that grew sicker and more tired every day for nearly twenty years. I lost my health, my independence, control over my bladder and my dignity with it, and I really didn’t think that death would be worse than all of that. Then I met you.”

Mr Death burst in a loud laugh. “I see that Mr Ageing has spared your wittiness, Mrs Ofrenda. Though you will concede that, thanks to me, you no longer suffer from whatever ailments Mr Ageing may have caused you.”

Mrs Ofrenda indicated her own body with a rather theatrical gesture. “Does this look like the body of a top model to you?”

“No,” he said flatly. “I would know—I’ve got several of those in the room over there.”

“That’s just creepy.”

“Why, thank you. Then again, whatever would you do with a top model’s body in here?”

“Whatever do you do with several of them!”

“I collect them, along with many, many, many others. Far many more than you can imagine, Mrs Ofrenda, and actually, it’s not just bodies that I am interested in.”

“I really do not care to know about your hobbies.”

“Perhaps you would care for a cup of tea, though.” He got up and reached the intercom, ignoring Mrs Ofrenda’s umpteenth withering joke. “Miss Coffins, would you please bring us tea? Thank you.” He cut off the communication without waiting for a reply, and went back to his armchair.

“I said I don’t want any tea,” Mrs Ofrenda reiterated.

“I insist. I figure you will appreciate a final chance to indulge in a pleasure of the living before you go through that door.”

“I’m not going through any door,” she laughed defiantly.

“That, I am afraid, is a wish I cannot accommodate,” he replied with a pinch of fake regret.

“That wasn’t a wish—it was a statement. I may be dead, but I don’t have to indulge your sick whims. You certainly can’t make me, and if you think you can persuade me—well, let’s just say you’re gonna kill a lot of time trying.”

“I already did kill time,” he smirked. “I’d be glad to show you his case, if you weren’t so adamant about not wanting to follow me to the Collectables room.”

Miss Coffin entered pushing a trolley with a tea set and a fuming teapot. She stopped by Mr Death, and started pouring the beverage into the cups.

“I’m looking forward to you drinking that,” Mrs Ofrenda said to Mr Death. “Then I won’t be the only one in the room who gets her pants wet after having a cup too many.” She took the cup Miss Coffins was silently handing her and carefully inspected its contents.

Mr Death ignored the joke. He took a sip, then began:”About taking your place in the Collectables room—”

“Forget it,” she said interrupting him. “I already told you, you can’t force me.”

“Oh, but I don’t need to.”

“Say what you wish, you can’t make me do it.”

After a gesture of Mr Death, Miss Coffins bent over to listen to what he whispered into her ear. She then left and went into the Collectables room.

“Tell me, Mrs Ofrenda,” Mr Death said nonchalantly. “How long has it been since you lost your dear Jeremy?”

Mrs Ofrenda became as pale as a sheet.

“It must have been some fifty, fifty-five years, isn’t that right?” he continued. Mrs Ofrenda seemed to have finally lost all her quick-wittedness. “Such an unspeakable tragedy,” Mr Death said shaking his head. “A child so young, and your first one, too. Your first and only one. I cannot blame you if you did not want any others after what happened to him.”

She didn’t seem to be paying much attention to Mr Death anymore. Her gaze was focused on the door to the Collectables, as though she knew full well what to expect to see. Actually, it was more as though she was hoping she knew. She had finally dropped that defiantly sarcastic mask she had been wearing the entire time, revealing the face of a deeply hurt mother who was now hoping for the impossible to happen.

As the door creaked open, Mr Death turned towards it. Suddenly, Mrs Ofrenda stood up.

“Ah,” said Mr Death, in an almost fatherly tone. “Here’s our little man.”

“Mommy!” the child screamed as he let go of Miss Coffins’ skeletal hand and ran towards Mrs Ofrenda. As he hugged her tight, she seemed to be at a loss for words. She hugged back, tentatively, as though she was still trying to establish whether this was real or not.

She hugged tighter. She sobbed uncontrollably while the child told her just how much she’d missed her, how lonely and dark it had been in there, and begged her not to leave him ever again.

Mr Death smirked, pleased with himself. Mrs Ofrenda wasn’t the first one to refuse to take her place in his collection, but unlike what they all thought, he could make them do it. Death finds a way, he thought gloatingly.

As for Mrs Ofrenda, it really looked as though Mr Death, Miss Coffins, or the entire place just weren’t there anymore. There was her, and there was Jeremy.

“I am afraid there are no cases that can accommodate both of you,” Mr Death said, leading them to the Collectables room, “but I took the liberty of assigning you neighbouring cases, and of course you’re most welcome to walk there together.”

Mrs Ofrenda nodded absently, with a dazed smile painted on her face.

“Take your time,” Mr Death added, with an unnaturally large grin. Mrs Ofrenda wasn’t really listening, but Mr Death’s humour was, and had always been, for himself. He didn’t need the recognition of others to enjoy his own cleverness.

“Of course, my dear,” she said lovingly, holding the child’s hand. “I promise I’ll never leave you again. Mommy is so sorry. But now we’re going to be together forever, I promise, and you’ll never have to be alone again…”

Her words faded slowly out, as they disappeared into the darkness of the Collectables room.

“Ah!” Mr Death said to the silent Miss Coffin, loudly clapping his hands together. “Isn’t that heartwarming? And then they say that I break families apart…”

(Original post on my blog here )

submitted by /u/JoeDerivative [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/30JTqmI

#Blogger #Story

[nyxcharliechaos]

Christmas Carol Parody

Ok so here’s a little story parody of a Christmas carol i wrote with my oc’s for fun it wasn’t read by a friend so I’m sorry if my grammar’s bad I tried anyways if you want to give constructive criticism go ahead it’s greatly appreciated IDK about posting full stories to this site so if you have anything to say about that uhh go ahead anyways I hope you can find some enjoyment out of this. also sorry the endings a bit rushed I wasn’t sure what to do with it.

“Merry Christmas!” shouted the carollers outside, after a double take the carollers appeared to be Ricin’s classmates from his drama class, this only served to make his mood even worse “Bah Humbug” Ricin said realizing just how obvious of a quote that was, *KNOCK KNOCK* they must be here to spread ‘Christmas cheer’ ,Ricin was sure one of his siblings would answer, the door knocked again wanting them to leave but not have to talk to them the hybrid called for one of his siblings “Cyanide, Botox, Arsenic, Mercury!” none replied a third knock  “damn it” Ricin gritted his teeth as he opened the door almost immediately started to sing “we wish you a merry Christmas we wish….” the lyrics annoying him more and more  “ FUCK OFF!” Ricin shouted as he slammed the door in his classmates faces returning to his room with the coke he had grabbed  “this was not worth having to hear those assholes” looking out his window he saw they were still there,  “great”.

“You ok Nyx?” Courage asked pulling out a spare handkerchief from his vest pocket  “yeah yeah I’m fine...huh guess stopping here was a dumb idea” Nyx replied and the group just shrugged, Ricin scoffed at them  “Chaos’ fault for getting their face to close to the door...what idiots” Ricin decided to just try and enjoy his drink.

Hours later Ricin was getting ready for bed switching his day clothes for PJ’s, as he put on a pair of pyjamas with nuclear symbols on them on he heard an odd noise followed by the sight of his usual poison apple tee floating in the air a voice booming  “ok you scrooge you know how this game works you’ll be visited by 3 spirits to try and make you less of an asshole” Ricin only reacted with confusion  “what?” he asked the spirit in confusion  “well judging by the look of your room you’re a theater kind so I thought you knew how this whole christmas carol thing goes, or are you just that much of a scrooge?” the spirit asked back, Ricin blinked twice before replying  “well in the actual story isn’t it usually someone the scrooge knows that warns them?” “oh yeah no not when it’s these spirits...yeah sorry you’ve got the back ups” the spirit explained “ok seriously heed my warning though” and with that, the stranger left.

Ricin while taking this seriously knew the story well enough to know he can still get some sleep...or at least that’s what he thought “greetings lil’ toxin time to see your past” the face of confusion and shock wasn’t what this new spirit had been expecting,  “hmm oh I’m Jack Holidayz now seeing as this is a pretty old story” Holidayz that name was so familiar but Ricin couldn’t put his finger on why not that he had time to figure out why before being dragged out his window and affected by some sort. “Welcome to your childhood are you ready to see why you hate this holiday so much” before Ricin could even reply  “oh wait I almost forgot” with a boop to the nose Ricin was changed into an animal form looking like a bird snake same as him though something seeming off most likely due to his phantom heritage. In the window of Ricin’s old house was a young him, his mom was gone as per usual, no dad, his siblings that aren’t out fighting, and there was him a scowl on his face just wanting this damn holiday to end. A silence grew between Ricin and Jack  “is this how it always was? Lonely with fights?” Ricin turned his head and nodded  “ok i’m not supposed to show you others past but I’ll make an exception” Ricin once again confused opened his mouth to question the spirit but before he could he got his answer  “I think seeing some others past so you can see how they reacted different to their negative experiences, maybe that can help you rethink this” and they were off again. “Welcome to Courage's past” Ricin had to do a double take  “that mutt from my class, the one that always hangs with that weird hybrid Xzim?”  ‘mhm’ hummed Jack, looking in the window Ricin saw the scruffy mutt looking surprisingly less scruffy then he did at current day, Courage looked at the tree curled up covered in blankets on a pillow fort,  “his dad’s always extremely busy on Christmas to this day this is how most of his Christmas’ look like...it’s an improvement from before his adoption sure but it’s hard to get much worse than no holidays and being thrown against a wall” Jack was taking very bluntly and his tone reflected that but the look in his eyes showed sorrow and empathy for the mutt  ‘ahem’”next up” stopping at another house in the trailer park the two looked into the window again  “you know Lucy from your theater class” Ricin nodded  “this is her cousin she’s in one of the local street gangs I think” that last bit surprised Ricin who’s eyes widened  “oh that has nothing to do with this I’m just saying, anyways you see she did have a decent Christmas probably the best out of the few I’m showing you” Ricin noticed that the girls mom didn’t appear to be anywhere  “her mom’s neglectful but that’s for the best in this situation since her moms also homophobic ,not the best situation for a lesbian, however she also wasn’t aloud to see her other family” Ricin became increasingly more concerned but before he could ask he was whisked away to the last stop. “And here we have Frankies” Ricin immediately noticed that they weren’t in Arcania anymore this neighbourhood was to white even for December all the houses looked the same white and light blue, Ricin be lying if he said it didn’t creep him out at least a little, moving his head back to the window he saw Frankie much younger and with what looked like a buzz cut and a scowl across their face, they were almost unrecognizable from the long haired happy green mamba Ricin had seen at the school, at first Ricin couldn’t tell what was so off but then Jack simply said “Their parents are christian extremist, a non-binary bisexual with some sort of mental health you can see the problem” it was then Ricin took notice of the crosses located every where and who he assumed was Frankie’s father reading the holy bible, he knows not all christians are that bad but the use of the word extremist gave him an immediate understanding of why. 

“so that’s why they runaway” Ricin whispered under his breath, everyone knew Frankie was a runaway so was Addison but know one really knew why other than their friends.

Ricin turned to see himself in front of Nyx’s mansion with a new spirit in front of him, the spirit ran up to him and grabbed his had jumping up and down as she shook it and him  “I’m Candy Holidayz ,are you ready to see how those three are treating this Christmas despite those” Ricin face said it all, Candy pulled him up to his feet which cause him to realize he had returned to his normal form, no time to figure that out though looking in he saw the three along with Nyx, Gene, and a student he recognized as she often spent time with Lucy’s cousin but he didn’t know her name, and last was Addi the other runaway, the teens were joyfully singing Christmas songs, the two sat quietly until the song was over  “So who else is ready for Black Christmas, Krampus, and candy cane cult” Nyx asked to cheers from their friends “Why are they watching horror movies and some cheesy slasher from the eighties?” Ricin questioned  “Everyone has their way of celebrating not all of them even celebrate Christmas but they’re all having fun and making the best of the situation sure not everyone can do that but if you have the option to then go for it” Ricin went quite in thought, it took him a minute to realize he was at Taylor’s house looking in he saw the sporty gator his best friend having tons of fun, he thought about how she had invited him to hangout so he wouldn’t be alone this Christmas and how he had gotten her a gift but in the end decided against it. “Do you have anything to say?” he questioned the spirit...no response.

Rather suddenly he saw he was back in his room but something seemed off he looked and saw the picture of him and Taylor at a sports game of some sort Taylor had insisted he joined her to go to wasn’t there nor was any proof of their friendship,  “Shit” Ricin said under his breath “Is this what’ll happen if I don’t improve?” ‘Yep” a familiar voice said, Ricin turned around to see the third spirit “ASH?!” Ricin yelled in bewilderment, “you’re the I guess spirit of Christmas future” “Yeah? Who did you expect?” seeing Ricin’s face Ash continued a bit more annoyed ”I’ve mentioned multiple times in class my parents are the spirits of Halloween and Christmas and the last name Holidayz should have been a dead giveaway” Ricin felt rather dumb now for not realizing that sooner “So if I don’t improve I won’t have a friend anymore” the thought of losing his only friend almost physically hurt,  “Yes, though admittedly my siblings and I may not have been who you needed to see, you don’t have much reason to hate the holiday but you already hate everyone and act like an ass” Ricin looked as if he was about to punch Ash in the face” ...ok my point is our visit was to tell you you need to be more positive I understand not everyone can but you have an opportunity like my sister told you earlier so go take it” Ricin in a rare moment took this to heart “Thank you” “Now before I leave” Ash’s smile became creepy and sinister as they grabbed Ricin and threw him out the window, falling head first.

Ricin woke up screaming, funny he didn’t remember falling asleep regardless he called Taylor and asked if he could hangout or if have a sleepover.

“Wait so why did we do that?” Ash asked their siblings, the two stared at each other before shrugging “Well” standing up Ash yelled “MERRY CHRISTMAS”.

#oc #ocs #writing #a christmas carol #parody #or inspiration #take your pick #christmas

[dorothyd89]

That Time I Worked For the Sugar Industry&hellip;

Hey, I was young. I didn’t know any better!

And the money was good. So, how could I turn it down? As a high school kid, you make money any way you can, even if it’s something you’re not thrilled about.

And that’s how I ended up spending two summers with my older brother Jack working for Coca-Cola, which I talked about on Steve’s Instagram:

That’s right, your boy Steve – a guy who once wrote an article explaining why Sugar is Worse than Jar Jar Binks – used to work for the enemy!

For two summers, my brother and I would wake up at 5AM, put on the sweet Coke polo shirts pictured above, hop into our Coca-Cola cars (old station wagons with Coca-Cola logos on the side), and stock shelves full of Coke products for 50-60+ hours a week on Cape Cod.

Now, hopefully you know that the above “enemy” comment is in jest.

If you happen to be currently employed by Coca-Cola or a company that sells products or services that are unhealthy, I don’t mean to pick on you or your employer…kind of. After all, Coca-Cola is a company that aims to make a profit by selling products that are delicious. I get it. Give me an ice-cold Mexican Coke made with real sugar in a glass bottle on a hot day, and it’s heaven. I also know they donate lots of money to charity, employ thousands, and do plenty of good things, and blah blah blah.

Okay! Now that that’s out of the way…

Twelve years after working indirectly for Big Sugar and seven years after starting Nerd Fitness, I now know just how detrimental sugar can be to our health, and it brings me to the point of today’s article!

We know sugar is bad for us (right? I hope?), but I wasn’t aware just how insidious this stuff has become in society and until I learned the history behind sugar’s rise in our day-to-day lives – and the rise in our obesity rates.

The History of Sugar

The history of sugar is both fascinating and pretty messed up. For starters, in the 1960’s the sugar industry actually paid scientists to downplay the connection between sugar and heart disease and instead promote saturated fat as the culprit.

Screw facts and data; there’s money to be made!

This is how we ended up with hilariously depressing ads like the one below from the 1970’s, touting sugar as a great path to weight loss and healthy living:

If you know anything about sugar, you can’t help but look at that ad and start laughing. “Use sugar to help you BUILD willpower? And NOT overeat.” Seriously!?

Fortunately, these days we’re MUCH better off and way smarter, and silly tricks like that can’t work anymore.

Right?

Wrong! As pointed out in “The Case Against Sugar” by Gary Taubes: “Academic researchers in 2015 were doing the bidding of Coca-Cola by taking its money to fund a Global Energy Balance Network and ‘shift blame for obesity away from bad diets, and instead only focus on not enough exercise.’”

We know here at NF that you can’t outrun your fork (it’s one of our Rules of the Rebellion), and you can’t out-train a bad diet, so telling people to ONLY focus on exercising more without worrying about what you put in your bodies is horrible advice.

Luckily, this group was shut down amidst widespread scrutiny and pressure by the public!

Also, pesky things like “facts” and “experimentation” kept getting in the way.

With all of the information coming out about how unhealthy soda can be in recent years, soda sales have steadily dropped to 30 year lows. This is AWESOME news, but don’t expect Coke and Pepsi to go quietly into the night.

Like any animal or company that’s been cornered or attacked, they’re adapting and fighting to stay relevant.

Thus, the strategy they’ve adopted is marketing “healthy” soda alternatives to find another pathway to connect their sugar water with our bloodstreams.

If you’ve picked up a Vitamin Water, a Naked Juice: Green Machine, or a Smoothie King fruit smoothie lately, and patted yourself on the back for making the healthy choice, your head is in the right place…but your blood sugar level will say otherwise!

These beverages, despite everything you’re told on their labels and what they advertise, are as bad for you (or worse) than drinking a soda:

20 oz Vitaminwater Power-C: 120 calories and 31 grams of sugar

20 oz Smoothie King “Pure Recharge” Mango Strawberry: 210 calories and 50g of sugar

20 oz Naked Juice Green Machine (100% real juice, no sugar added): 270 calories and 53 grams of sugar

At least when you drink a soda you know you’re making an unhealthy choice!

Shame on these other companies for convincing you their products are pure and healthy when they often have as much or more sugar as a can of Coke.

If you’re currently pissed off that you’ve been dutifully chugging Vitaminwater for the past few months instead of soda, assuming it’s healthier, I don’t blame you! The marketing and packaging leave you no choice BUT to assume it’s healthy and good for you.

What’s as funny as it is depressing is that even Coca-Cola executives themselves know their “healthy” marketing of these beverages is horseshit.

In 2015, when taken to court over the unsubstantiated health claims of Vitaminwater, Coca-Cola actually used the following defense (seriously): “No consumer could reasonably be misled into thinking Vitaminwater was a healthy beverage.”

I read that quote and my eyeballs almost fell out of my head. Are you furious yet? I am. Let’s fix it.

How to Not Let Sugar Run Your Life

I get it. Sugar is awesome. It’s delicious and makes us happy…temporarily.

It also makes us fat.

And holy **** is it addicting. It targets the pleasure centers in our brains, and is more available now than it has ever been in the history of our species. Unfortunately, our lizard brains have not adapted to its widespread availability instead of scarcity, which means our bodies can’t say “no” or “just a little.” This means we can ACTUALLY get hooked on the stuff. There are even studies that claim sugar can be as addicting as cocaine.

So the solution is simple: do more cocaine, less sugar!

Hahahaha, kidding. I’m not a doctor, and I don’t currently have pants on as I type this, but my advice would be to probably avoid both sugar and cocaine as much as possible.

Unfortunately, avoiding sugar is more than just giving up soda (though that’s a DAMN good start!). Other problems arise because sugar is in EVERYTHING and often hidden.

Why can’t we just tell the truth, people?

We talk a lot about a nefarious shadow organization making us fatter and lazier in our monthly story-driven adventure, Rising Heroes.

I thought it would be fun to create a dragon to slay. However, when you read that stuff above about:

scientists being paid off

calorie sugar bombs being marketed as healthy

companies claiming “there’s no way anybody could consider these drinks healthy,”

It’s like there really is a conglomeration of bad guys aiming to make us unhealthy.

Here’s how you can fight back. Follow these 4 quick rules to keep sugar from ruining your life:

1) Whenever possible, minimize liquid calories. This includes frappucinos and sodas, but also “real fruit smoothies” and “healthy” Naked Juice drinks, Gatorade, and even things like apple juice, orange juice, grape juice, cranberry juice, etc. Every once in a while? Sure. Just make it a rare treat (“treat yo’ self!”) – you’ll actually enjoy it more and be healthier!

I personally prescribe to the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy because I have the willpower and restraint of a 5-year kid in a candy store. I don’t keep sugary beverages in my house so I’m not tempted and have to waste willpower trying not to drink them.

I’ve found that drinking sparkling water like LaCroix can really help me THINK I’m drinking soda, and provide me with the same level of happiness and fizzy satisfaction – without the sugar.

To answer your next question: here’s a whole article on “Is Diet Soda bad for me?” High five!

Still here? Good. Here’s a picture of a puppy:

Okay, back to business.

2) Don’t trust the front of the label, and learn to recognize sugar’s aliases. A label is required to list ingredients by amount, so by adding multiple types of sugar with weird names, a company can get away with moving sugar down the list.

Look for the following names: Agave nectar, Brown sugar, Cane crystals, Cane sugar, Corn sweetener, Corn syrup, Crystalline fructose, Dextrose, Evaporated cane juice, Organic evaporated cane juice, Fructose, Fruit juice concentrate, Glucose, High-fructose corn syrup, Honey, Invert sugar, Lactose, Maltose, Malt syrup, Molasses, Raw sugar, Sucrose, Sugar Syrup.

If you only look at two numbers on the back of a box, look at grams of sugar and total calories. You want minimal sugar and fewer calories. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Do the best you can!

Oh, and if a product says “no sugar added” on the front of it, you can bet your life savings on it having a RIDICULOUS amount of sugar.

Note: please don’t bet your life savings on this.

3) Be skeptical, because sugar is in practically everything. When in doubt, eat things with fewer ingredients. We consume 130 pounds of sugar per year on average (holy crap), which means the white stuff in in way more foods than we realize. Not just candy and soda, but practically everything.

Nature Valley Granola Bars? Plenty of sugar. In fact, most “protein bars” have tons of sugar. And, until outraged customers complained, “Nature Valley” Granola Bars were made with high fructose corn syrup. Mmmm, nature.

Pasta sauce? Should just be tomatoes right? Nope. Add in heaping tablespoons of high fructose corn syrup too and you’re getting closer.

Wheat bread? That’s gotta be healthy, right? Check the ingredients. I bet one of the top 5 is “high fructose corn syrup” too.

Hell, look at what’s advertised as a “balanced breakfast” these days on TV! Cereal and skim milk, fruit, a glass of orange juice, and toast. Or, in other words: sugar and sugar water, sugar, sugar water, and pile-o-carbs.

4) Track your sugar intake, and minimize it over time. As I cover in “Star Wars Explains Why We’re Fat,” everybody has a different amount of “gimme gimme gimme” in our brains that craves instant gratification.

This means we all have different abilities to get addicted to things, including sugar. Some people can eat sugar (or have one drink, or try drugs) and not get hooked, while others struggle with addiction instantly – once is enough to get hooked for life.

This comic explains human behavior and addiction quite well…with dinosaurs.

If you are somebody who is actually hooked on sugar, start by tracking your sugar intake each day (actually look up the sugar content of everything you consume!), and see how many grams you’re eating every day. Don’t worry about total numbers, just focus on eating less sugar than the day before. Repeat.

Michael Pollan, author of the Omnivore’s Dilemma said it succinctly: “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.” Eat real food (meat, vegetables, unprocessed stuff), keep your calorie total down, and stick to mostly plants along with healthy protein. Done!

We’ll continue digging into this battle against Big Sugar, shadow organizations, and false advertising in future posts. It’s amazing how heavily the deck is stacked against us when we try to be healthy, and how tough it is to find the actual truth!

I have no problem with sugar and people making choices that don’t line up with their health goals occasionally.

What really grinds my gears is when sugar is snuck into products and falsely marketed as healthy. We’re going to fight, and it starts by educating ourselves on how much sugar we’re actually eating.

Over the next week, your mission is to read the labels on the food and beverages you’re consuming. Specifically keep an eye on how many grams of sugar you’re consuming. Then over the next few weeks, try to drop that amount down by 10% each week. And then let me know how you did!

I want to hear from you: did you find this post useful? Hit reply and let me know if this article is actually gonna help you start to remove more sugar from your life!

-Steve

PS: We’ve recently overhauled our monthly story-driven experience, Rising Heroes. We’ll be opening doors for it next Monday, a few weeks later than normal – if you were waiting to get in, sorry for the delay. I promise it’ll be worth it – we’ve unrolled some big updates! 🙂

PPS: If you want to learn about the history of sugar and a contrarian viewpoint to “calories in, calories out no matter what they are,” check out Taube’s book “The Case Against Sugar.” It’s thought provoking and entertaining.

###

photo credit: Julien.Belli: Always Coca-Cola, wuestenigel: Macro of Decoration Crystals

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[johnclapperne]

That Time I Worked For the Sugar Industry…

Hey, I was young. I didn’t know any better!

And the money was good. So, how could I turn it down? As a high school kid, you make money any way you can, even if it’s something you’re not thrilled about.

And that’s how I ended up spending two summers with my older brother Jack working for Coca-Cola, which I talked about on Steve’s Instagram:

That’s right, your boy Steve – a guy who once wrote an article explaining why Sugar is Worse than Jar Jar Binks – used to work for the enemy!

For two summers, my brother and I would wake up at 5AM, put on the sweet Coke polo shirts pictured above, hop into our Coca-Cola cars (old station wagons with Coca-Cola logos on the side), and stock shelves full of Coke products for 50-60+ hours a week on Cape Cod.

Now, hopefully you know that the above “enemy” comment is in jest.

If you happen to be currently employed by Coca-Cola or a company that sells products or services that are unhealthy, I don’t mean to pick on you or your employer…kind of. After all, Coca-Cola is a company that aims to make a profit by selling products that are delicious. I get it. Give me an ice-cold Mexican Coke made with real sugar in a glass bottle on a hot day, and it’s heaven. I also know they donate lots of money to charity, employ thousands, and do plenty of good things, and blah blah blah.

Okay! Now that that’s out of the way…

Twelve years after working indirectly for Big Sugar and seven years after starting Nerd Fitness, I now know just how detrimental sugar can be to our health, and it brings me to the point of today’s article!

We know sugar is bad for us (right? I hope?), but I wasn’t aware just how insidious this stuff has become in society and until I learned the history behind sugar’s rise in our day-to-day lives – and the rise in our obesity rates.

The History of Sugar

The history of sugar is both fascinating and pretty messed up. For starters, in the 1960’s the sugar industry actually paid scientists to downplay the connection between sugar and heart disease and instead promote saturated fat as the culprit.

Screw facts and data; there’s money to be made!

This is how we ended up with hilariously depressing ads like the one below from the 1970’s, touting sugar as a great path to weight loss and healthy living:

If you know anything about sugar, you can’t help but look at that ad and start laughing. “Use sugar to help you BUILD willpower? And NOT overeat.” Seriously!?

Fortunately, these days we’re MUCH better off and way smarter, and silly tricks like that can’t work anymore.

Right?

Wrong! As pointed out in “The Case Against Sugar” by Gary Taubes: “Academic researchers in 2015 were doing the bidding of Coca-Cola by taking its money to fund a Global Energy Balance Network and ‘shift blame for obesity away from bad diets, and instead only focus on not enough exercise.’”

We know here at NF that you can’t outrun your fork (it’s one of our Rules of the Rebellion), and you can’t out-train a bad diet, so telling people to ONLY focus on exercising more without worrying about what you put in your bodies is horrible advice.

Luckily, this group was shut down amidst widespread scrutiny and pressure by the public!

Also, pesky things like “facts” and “experimentation” kept getting in the way.

With all of the information coming out about how unhealthy soda can be in recent years, soda sales have steadily dropped to 30 year lows. This is AWESOME news, but don’t expect Coke and Pepsi to go quietly into the night.

Like any animal or company that’s been cornered or attacked, they’re adapting and fighting to stay relevant.

Thus, the strategy they’ve adopted is marketing “healthy” soda alternatives to find another pathway to connect their sugar water with our bloodstreams.

If you’ve picked up a Vitamin Water, a Naked Juice: Green Machine, or a Smoothie King fruit smoothie lately, and patted yourself on the back for making the healthy choice, your head is in the right place…but your blood sugar level will say otherwise!

These beverages, despite everything you’re told on their labels and what they advertise, are as bad for you (or worse) than drinking a soda:

20 oz Vitaminwater Power-C: 120 calories and 31 grams of sugar

20 oz Smoothie King “Pure Recharge” Mango Strawberry: 210 calories and 50g of sugar

20 oz Naked Juice Green Machine (100% real juice, no sugar added): 270 calories and 53 grams of sugar

At least when you drink a soda you know you’re making an unhealthy choice!

Shame on these other companies for convincing you their products are pure and healthy when they often have as much or more sugar as a can of Coke.

If you’re currently pissed off that you’ve been dutifully chugging Vitaminwater for the past few months instead of soda, assuming it’s healthier, I don’t blame you! The marketing and packaging leave you no choice BUT to assume it’s healthy and good for you.

What’s as funny as it is depressing is that even Coca-Cola executives themselves know their “healthy” marketing of these beverages is horseshit.

In 2015, when taken to court over the unsubstantiated health claims of Vitaminwater, Coca-Cola actually used the following defense (seriously): “No consumer could reasonably be misled into thinking Vitaminwater was a healthy beverage.”

I read that quote and my eyeballs almost fell out of my head. Are you furious yet? I am. Let’s fix it.

How to Not Let Sugar Run Your Life

I get it. Sugar is awesome. It’s delicious and makes us happy…temporarily.

It also makes us fat.

And holy **** is it addicting. It targets the pleasure centers in our brains, and is more available now than it has ever been in the history of our species. Unfortunately, our lizard brains have not adapted to its widespread availability instead of scarcity, which means our bodies can’t say “no” or “just a little.” This means we can ACTUALLY get hooked on the stuff. There are even studies that claim sugar can be as addicting as cocaine.

So the solution is simple: do more cocaine, less sugar!

Hahahaha, kidding. I’m not a doctor, and I don’t currently have pants on as I type this, but my advice would be to probably avoid both sugar and cocaine as much as possible.

Unfortunately, avoiding sugar is more than just giving up soda (though that’s a DAMN good start!). Other problems arise because sugar is in EVERYTHING and often hidden.

Why can’t we just tell the truth, people?

We talk a lot about a nefarious shadow organization making us fatter and lazier in our monthly story-driven adventure, Rising Heroes.

I thought it would be fun to create a dragon to slay. However, when you read that stuff above about:

scientists being paid off

calorie sugar bombs being marketed as healthy

companies claiming “there’s no way anybody could consider these drinks healthy,”

It’s like there really is a conglomeration of bad guys aiming to make us unhealthy.

Here’s how you can fight back. Follow these 4 quick rules to keep sugar from ruining your life:

1) Whenever possible, minimize liquid calories. This includes frappucinos and sodas, but also “real fruit smoothies” and “healthy” Naked Juice drinks, Gatorade, and even things like apple juice, orange juice, grape juice, cranberry juice, etc. Every once in a while? Sure. Just make it a rare treat (“treat yo’ self!”) – you’ll actually enjoy it more and be healthier!

I personally prescribe to the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy because I have the willpower and restraint of a 5-year kid in a candy store. I don’t keep sugary beverages in my house so I’m not tempted and have to waste willpower trying not to drink them.

I’ve found that drinking sparkling water like LaCroix can really help me THINK I’m drinking soda, and provide me with the same level of happiness and fizzy satisfaction – without the sugar.

To answer your next question: here’s a whole article on “Is Diet Soda bad for me?” High five!

Still here? Good. Here’s a picture of a puppy:

Okay, back to business.

2) Don’t trust the front of the label, and learn to recognize sugar’s aliases. A label is required to list ingredients by amount, so by adding multiple types of sugar with weird names, a company can get away with moving sugar down the list.

Look for the following names: Agave nectar, Brown sugar, Cane crystals, Cane sugar, Corn sweetener, Corn syrup, Crystalline fructose, Dextrose, Evaporated cane juice, Organic evaporated cane juice, Fructose, Fruit juice concentrate, Glucose, High-fructose corn syrup, Honey, Invert sugar, Lactose, Maltose, Malt syrup, Molasses, Raw sugar, Sucrose, Sugar Syrup.

If you only look at two numbers on the back of a box, look at grams of sugar and total calories. You want minimal sugar and fewer calories. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Do the best you can!

Oh, and if a product says “no sugar added” on the front of it, you can bet your life savings on it having a RIDICULOUS amount of sugar.

Note: please don’t bet your life savings on this.

3) Be skeptical, because sugar is in practically everything. When in doubt, eat things with fewer ingredients. We consume 130 pounds of sugar per year on average (holy crap), which means the white stuff in in way more foods than we realize. Not just candy and soda, but practically everything.

Nature Valley Granola Bars? Plenty of sugar. In fact, most “protein bars” have tons of sugar. And, until outraged customers complained, “Nature Valley” Granola Bars were made with high fructose corn syrup. Mmmm, nature.

Pasta sauce? Should just be tomatoes right? Nope. Add in heaping tablespoons of high fructose corn syrup too and you’re getting closer.

Wheat bread? That’s gotta be healthy, right? Check the ingredients. I bet one of the top 5 is “high fructose corn syrup” too.

Hell, look at what’s advertised as a “balanced breakfast” these days on TV! Cereal and skim milk, fruit, a glass of orange juice, and toast. Or, in other words: sugar and sugar water, sugar, sugar water, and pile-o-carbs.

4) Track your sugar intake, and minimize it over time. As I cover in “Star Wars Explains Why We’re Fat,” everybody has a different amount of “gimme gimme gimme” in our brains that craves instant gratification.

This means we all have different abilities to get addicted to things, including sugar. Some people can eat sugar (or have one drink, or try drugs) and not get hooked, while others struggle with addiction instantly – once is enough to get hooked for life.

This comic explains human behavior and addiction quite well…with dinosaurs.

If you are somebody who is actually hooked on sugar, start by tracking your sugar intake each day (actually look up the sugar content of everything you consume!), and see how many grams you’re eating every day. Don’t worry about total numbers, just focus on eating less sugar than the day before. Repeat.

Michael Pollan, author of the Omnivore’s Dilemma said it succinctly: “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.” Eat real food (meat, vegetables, unprocessed stuff), keep your calorie total down, and stick to mostly plants along with healthy protein. Done!

We’ll continue digging into this battle against Big Sugar, shadow organizations, and false advertising in future posts. It’s amazing how heavily the deck is stacked against us when we try to be healthy, and how tough it is to find the actual truth!

I have no problem with sugar and people making choices that don’t line up with their health goals occasionally.

What really grinds my gears is when sugar is snuck into products and falsely marketed as healthy. We’re going to fight, and it starts by educating ourselves on how much sugar we’re actually eating.

Over the next week, your mission is to read the labels on the food and beverages you’re consuming. Specifically keep an eye on how many grams of sugar you’re consuming. Then over the next few weeks, try to drop that amount down by 10% each week. And then let me know how you did!

I want to hear from you: did you find this post useful? Hit reply and let me know if this article is actually gonna help you start to remove more sugar from your life!

-Steve

PS: We’ve recently overhauled our monthly story-driven experience, Rising Heroes. We’ll be opening doors for it next Monday, a few weeks later than normal – if you were waiting to get in, sorry for the delay. I promise it’ll be worth it – we’ve unrolled some big updates!

PPS: If you want to learn about the history of sugar and a contrarian viewpoint to “calories in, calories out no matter what they are,” check out Taube’s book “The Case Against Sugar.” It’s thought provoking and entertaining.

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photo credit: Julien.Belli: Always Coca-Cola, wuestenigel: Macro of Decoration Crystals

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#That Time I Worked For the Sugar Industry…