Me: [in a flare] Hey, do you think you could just like calm down? A little?
My Body: [derisive singing begins] Oompa Loompa Doompety Dee now you are asking too much from me Oompa Loompa Doompety Die how about eczema on your eye!
Me: Ok good talk
Please cancel my appointments. I will be extracting my skeleton so I can fight it, gladiator style. Its insolence can no longer be tolerated.
Actually you know what, just put my consciousness into a robot and let me fight my entire fleshsack. I'm not letting the soft tissue off the hook for its many unrepentant crimes.
I am no longer explaining my chronic illnesses. I'm only ominously referencing them like I'm a fantasy realm NPC dropping plot hooks:
- I am besieged by the affliction
- The ritual was successful, but it has drained me. I need time to recuperate.
- I can't do that, because of The Curse
- Dark forces are conspiring within me. I must conserve my strength to battle them.
- Unseen foes assault me. I cannot strike back with blows, but I can lessen their influence by consuming certain alchemical rites.
What you have to understand about being chronically ill, is that I can do all the things that verifiably help me mediate my symptoms, and still I am inevitably going to wake up some days to my body beating me with sledgehammers.
The Best Case Scenario is just that the sledgehammers get smaller & it uses them less often. But the sledgehammers will always return.
It is the nature of chronic disorders to endure. This is why chronically ill folks have to be so cautious about our spoons. The sledgehammers keep breaking them and we only get so many.
Reblogged
Emotional regulation requires energy!! When you're physically tired, emotional regulation is simply physiologically harder to achieve.
So if you've used all your physical spoons and you start crying because you dropped a pen, remember it's because your cells literally don't have enough ATP to coordinate the neurological processes that control your emotions. Give yourself grace and rest and probably a snack.
Also remember that symptoms like racing thoughts, sensory integration issues, chronic pain, and many more all require extra energy.
When your brain is racing through impossible scenarios, it is expending energy. When your brain is constantly processing pain signals, it is expending energy. When your brain can't ignore the hum of the florescent lights, it is expending energy to process that auditory signal.
Neurodivergent, mentally ill, and/or chronically ill people hit their limits sooner, because our brains constantly have to expend extra energy.
Emotional regulation requires energy!! When you're physically tired, emotional regulation is simply physiologically harder to achieve.
So if you've used all your physical spoons and you start crying because you dropped a pen, remember it's because your cells literally don't have enough ATP to coordinate the neurological processes that control your emotions. Give yourself grace and rest and probably a snack.
Reblogged
A big part of being chronically ill is gaslighting yourself about how bad your symptoms are then getting surprised when you go into a flare and remember that they actually are That Bad™
I got glutened the other day. I literally only took one bite before realizing that the meal I was assured was gluten free, was very much not.
And first I had a screaming crying meltdown because I just got poisoned, and then immediately afterwards the gaslighting began.
"I only took one bite. It probably won't even trigger a flare. I just overreacted. I'm just a faker"
But my Intestines determined THAT WAS A LIE
I have had this disease for so long. I've known wheat is a trigger for so long. But still. When I get poisoned, despite my every attempt to avoid it, My Brain is still like "what if you're just faking though? What if you're just being Too Dramatic?"
Well guess what, Me, you're not!
You have a debilitating, chronic disease! You experience horrific symptoms when it's triggered. You're not being dramatic.
So if you're like me, and you needed to hear that today too. Here's your reminder that you're chronically ill. It is that bad. You're not being dramatic and you're allowed to complain about it
Imagine going to a restaurant and after eating, finding out they put arsenic in your food.
Maybe enough to kill you. Maybe just enough to make you very sick. Imagine if it wasn't illegal. You were just expected to know that there's some inherent risk of arsenic poisoning if you eat at a restaurant and if you want to be really sure you're safe, you should only eat at home.
This is exactly what it's like to navigate restaurants with food allergies or other medical dietary restrictions.
Restaurants will advertise "Absolutely No Arsenic! Arsenic Safe Option!" Adding in fine print *some risk of arsenic, eat at your own risk
And if you get poisoned people will shrug and shake their heads like "Well you just shouldn't've eaten there. You knew you were taking a risk!"
Anyways I got poisoned tonight after meticulously verifying that an advertised gluten free entree was actually gluten free. It was not.
Me: Hey, so, could everything that's wrong with me just not all flare up at once?
My various Chronic Illnesses: Wow, we can't even believe you would criticize our collective bargaining efforts like this. For shame.
Me: ok, I'm sorry, so what are your demands? Drink more water? Rest more? Eat something?
My various Chronic Illnesses: No, no, no nothing like that. We just want you to suffer.