I bought 9 Rip-It Atomic Pom energy drinks at Walgreens last night. They were on "last chance" sale for a $1.09 each. The sale is a mixed blessing — on one hand it's nice to get one of my favorite energy drinks cheep, on the other hand they're cheap because I won't be able to get them anymore.

I just talked to another nurse who works with my primary care nurse and was told that I should wait until tomorrow to see if it gets worse and confirm that it isn't just some other sort of eye irritation. If it turns out to be conjunctivitis they'll send in a script to Walgreens. I won't actually need an appointment at all.

Further evidence that I look a lot older than I am: a new pharmacist at Walgreens heard my year of birth as 1954. Furthermore, they didn't find anything odd about that.

I saw my endocrinologist last night. My testosterone levels are a bit too high, however my estrogen levels are high as well. She thinks that another delivery system for the estrogen will help better. She wanted to give me a cream that absorbs through the skin, but my insurance won't cover it. Instead I will be getting injectable estrogen. I'm going to have to learn how to give myself shots. I need to find a pharmacy that carries the prescription, as Walgreens does not. I'll still be talking my estradiol until I meet with a nurse to instruct me on how to give myself the shots.

After she got off work, purpleglitter met me at the house_of_clocks. From there we went to Walgreens and noticed a smoky smell. Then we noticed the smoky smell was coming from the smoke that was coming from the trashcan by the entrance. Someone had apparently thrown some sort of ignited tobacco product in the trashcan, which is just plain stupid as the Walgreens trashcans are equipped with a disposal unit on top of them specifically for ignited tobacco products. I stuck my hand in the can to try to put it out as purpleglitter squawked at me that I'd set my clothes on fire. Very shortly after I took my hand out the smoldering turned into sizable flames.

A couple Walgreens employees attempted to douse the flame with water, however they simply lessened its magnitude. Within a few minutes, the fire department arrived and put the fire out properly. No damage to anything but the trashcan, which is trashed.

----

Upon arriving back at purpleglitter's apartment, I decided to make us pizza in the oven. The heating element of the oven fell down while the pizza was cooking and started burning the cheese. This produced much smoke but no real flame. We had to open the doors and air out the apartment. Luckily the oven suffered no real damage and the heating element can be easily reattached.

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Later in the evening, the toaster decided to completely burn our bagels. I would probably not mention the occurrence otherwise, but it seemed to top off the evening of burning.

A couple days ago, I bought razors at Walgreens. The lines up front were long, so they opened up the cosmetics register, and I checked out there. While I was fumbling through my pockets looking for my ten, I didn't notice that I was dropping a couple ones. The woman behind the register saw them after I walked off, and picked them up. When she saw me checking out at the front register today, she ran up to me and gave me the money I had dropped. I'm known around Arlington. People recognise me and consider me part of the community. That amazes me, because at one point in my life I would have thought I'd never be part of a community. I thought I was the eternal outcast. I'm still every bit as strange and every bit as queer and every bit as crazy, but something indefinable has changed over the years. Something I would have never expected. I'm part of where I am.

Spent the better part of today trying to find mazzycat. When I arrived at home, I found that the food I had left for her last night was uneaten. That worried me a bit, but I thought that maybe there was something she didn't like about the food. I went upstairs and could not find her. i looked everywhere and could not find her. I moved my bed into the center of my room just in case I couldn't see her under it from the side, and I could not find her. I remember that the door to the back stairwell was for some reason open when I was leaving last night, which is odd. I had shut it and didn't think mazzycat had slipped through. electricube noticed my searching, and offered to help. We went down the stairs and searched the basement, and could not find her. At this point I was convinced that she had gotten out of the house. We searched the area around the house_of_clocks for some time, singing the food song, and could not find her. I called purpleglitter and she rushed over to help out. purpleglitter and I scowered the house again and searched around the neighborhood again to no avail. I reported mazzycat missing and ordered prints of her at Walgreens to use on fliers. Per purpleglitter's suggestion, I left the back door open, so that if she was hiding in the basement she could get back in. When the prints were finally done, I picked them up and brought them home. Upon my arrival back at home, who was at the top of the front stairs? mazzycat!! She had dirty paws from hiding in the basement, but she was okay!! I was so excited to see her. It was such a bad and stressful day, but I have my mazzycat back, and that is good.

Just got back from Walgreens. In the back isle I saw a man take something of the shelf and plant it directly into his jacket pocket. Not too stealthy. If he doesn't want to get caught he'd better improve his skills and think about how he's going to pull it off beforehand.

A couple days ago, I was at Mass Convenience. Behind the counter I saw a display of flavoured cigars for 50¢ each. I purchased the last chocolate one they had and put it in my pocketbook. This morning I was feeling quite panicky and twitchy, so I lit it up outside Walgreens. I know tobacco is bad, but I've found that it calms me down better and quicker than ativan or klonopin ever did. I smoke only occasionally, in fact it's been about two months since I had my last puff. I don't want to and can't afford to become addicted, but sometimes tobacco is a useful substance to self-medicate with and other times it's just nice to have a relaxing smoke.

electricube and I met in Porter Square yesterday at noon ready for our trip to Cauldron Farms. We were both hungry, so electricube treated me to an Indian food buffet lunch before we left. I enjoyed it very much and felt ready for the trip.

When we got to Fitchburg there was no one waiting at the station. We waited for about 20 minutes, then electricube went to a nearby internet café to look up Raven's number while I waited at the station in case someone from the Farm arrived. Shortly after she left to get online I started having trouble walking. At first it felt like I was trying to get up a very steep hill even though I was on level ground. Soon I couldn't maintain my balance, so I sat on the ground. Luckily I was at a transit station and sitting there didn't look particularly out of place.

The spell didn't last too long and I was up to walking again by the time electricube got back with the bad news: Raven had canceled via e-mail shortly after we had started our journey. So no reading. A waste of money and a day.

It was two hours before the next train to Boston, so we decided to tool around town. We really wanted to find a coffee house, but were unable to. We did run into a cool queer kid who explained to us just how little there was actually to do in Fitchburg. I though with a small state university that they might have at least an okay coffee house, but I guess not. We did have fun talking to him and before we knew it, it was time to head back.

On the train back I had another "spell". More intense and twichy than the one in Fitchburg. This time I lost consciousness for what electricube tells me was five or ten minutes. Nobody usually pays notice to this things as long as one stays off the ground and doesn't make a good deal of noise. As I remained relatively quite in my seat throughout the episode, I was not hassled.

I did end up going to the ground shortly after we arrived at Porter Square, but again I was on a transit platform, so it didn't look particularly out of place.

electricube insisted on seeing me home, but didn't end up staying for very long.

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Once home I tried to get my computer patched to avoid the worm that I heard was going around yesterday. Unfortunately I still don't know if it is properly patched. It has intractable adware on and I need to reinstall the operating system. I'm very very tempted to install Linux instead of XP, because I'm so pissed off with Microsoft's policy of leaving gaping security holes in their products and then charging for products that attempt to fix those holes. I've already given up on Internet Explorer, maybe it's time to ditch them completely. I would miss Photoshop. That is the only thing stopping me.

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Today I woke up quite disorientated. My behind-elbow and behind-knee were really bothering me. I was a bit stumbly. But I'm not going to let my "spells" dictate my life, so I left the house anyway. I headed over to Walgreens, and almost made it to the door before I went to the ground in the parking lot. Again, as with these things, it was not a catastrophic fall as I knew I was about to go down. I ended up on all fours twitching because I wasn't able to properly orchestrate my decent. Quickly several people came by asking if I was "okay". I told them that I was, that this happens all the time, but they were insistent on "helping" me. They even called the emergency services. Oh joy!

The police arrived first. I told the officer that I was fine, that this happens all the time. He said that I should get checked out at the hospital anyway. I replied that they checked me out last week for the same thing and said it was nothing. That going again would be a waste of time. He seemed stunned by that statement, but I didn't really care. The firefighters and the paramedics arrived in quick secession, each again trying to convince me to go to the emergency room. I refused and signed their little thing saying I was refusing treatment.

Soon after they left, I went into Walgreens. I ended up on the floor in the back isle. Apparently "customers were worried", so management called the emergency services. I left before they could arrive.

I'm at purpleglitter's now. Still a bit dizzy but feeling better. Ready for more adventures.

Walgreens may be running afoul of community decency standards by selling this.

( Read more... )

I have becoming more and more unstable over the past few weeks. The problems seem to have peeked on monday. I had a particularly difficult time in therapy. My therapist tried to convince me to go the psych emergency room. I didn't go, because I very much don't want to end up in the hospital. My current therapist is very good about not forcing me to do things like that. I was quite out of it when I left therapy.

On my way home, I ended up on the ground in the middle of an Arlington side street, drenched in sweat. Several people saw me there and offered to call someone for me, I told them not to, that everything was fine. I told them I knew what was going on (I actually don't) and not to call anyone. I really didn't want to end up at the hospital.

Later in the evening I went to Walgreens to pick up some catfood. I ended up on the floor of one of the isles. I was able to get up and out with little harassment, but I went down again in the parking lot. It was very difficult to see. Everything was extremely blurry and I was again drenched in sweat. I spent 20 to 30 minutes in the parking lot feebly telling passersby not to call anyone. Luckily everyone respected that, and left me be. Eventually one of the people living in the apartment downstairs from mine found me and walked me home. I decided it was best not to venture out again that night.

I've had many "spells" today and yesterday, but nothing like Monday night. I've managed to stay off the ground. I don't know if the problem is related to psych issues or something else. It's something that I've dealt with for years. The problem waxes and wanes, but never goes away completely. Usually the spells are minor, and don't cause me to end up on the ground, but occasionally they'll be large enough to send me down. I usually (but not always) am able to avoid physical injury when this happens, because I can feel a very major one coming and can move myself to the ground before I actually fall.

All that does not help my headspace problems, which as I said, have been getting worse the past several weeks. I've been having many suicidal and self injury ideations. Simple ideations does not spell intent. While I may think about those things, I have not been motivated by those ideations enough to actually attempt something along those lines. The frequency of the ideations is, however, a barometer of my mental stability. I've been getting caught in more loops, and feeling generally doomed and hopeless. I have been attempting to hide these issues, as I was doing so well and I don't want to be seen as sliding backwards. I don't want people to worry about me going back to my old habits. I've worked hard to stop my SI, ED, and suicide attempts. I do not want to travel that road again, and I don't want others to worry that I will.

i eat too much
mostly too much junk food
i'm still gaining weight
i eat because it makes me feel better
i'm addicted to junk food
i've got to stop
but it's so hard with walgreens next door
i just ate an entire tube of pringles
i haven't been purging however
just bingeing
i guess that's progress
now to cut out the bingeing without going anorexic
which is a definite risk with me
i need to set times that i can eat
and only eat at those times
regular meals may be the answer
i will eat when i wake up in the morning
at noon
and once in the evening
three meals
sounds pretty normal
sounds pretty doable
i have already eaten my first two meals today
so all i have left is dinner
i will allow myself a healthy snack too
but it must be healthy
no junk food
i think i can do this
i think i have the willpower
i know i've failed at these sorts of plans before
but all i can do is keep trying
and have faith that i'll eventually succeed
so here goes nothing...

i need to lose weight
all this smoking pot isn't helping
i'm binge eating
but i'm not purging
i guess that is better than binging and purging
but it is still an issue

i still don't have a scale, so i don't know how much i weigh
but i'm guessing 230lbs
maybe more
i don't know
i keep gaining

the biggest step is cutting out junk food
i've said this before
if i just cut out junk food, my weight would probably at least level off.
i need to swear off junk food
bye bye chips
bye bye candy
i'll be healthier
i shouldn't be eating all the junk food i do, even if weight wasn't an issue
the problem is walgreens is right next door
it's so easy to just pop in there and get a bag of chips or some candy
and it's especially tempting because there is always something on sale
and a sale is an excuse
i'm saving money aren't i?

i need to get myself under control
i need to control at least one thing in my life
and weight seems like a good target
i just have to beware slipping back into eating disorder territory
i don't want to start purging again
i don't want to be as thin as i was
i'm thinking around 160lbs was where i liked my weight
130lbs (where i got to) was way too low
however, that means i need to lose around 70lbs
that's a lot of weight
i think i can do it
i think i can do it in a healthy way
but i have to get motivated
take things slow
but it is time to take the first step:
no more junk food

i fell down again
after a talk with george
stressing paying the rent on time
i'm afraid he's going to evict us if things don't shape up
and i don't know how things are going to shape up
i just froze in front of walgreens
luckily mutehalo was there to shoo people away
so i didn't get taken to the hospital
i'm afraid if this keeps up i won't be able to leave the house alone
i refuse to live like that
trapped
everything is collapsing
i'm going to get drunk tonight
i spent the rest of the money i have until the 2nd on some alcohol
stupid, i know
but right now i'm in a space that i don't care
i'm accused of being self-destructive
might as well prove them right
fuck it all

I've become less obsessed about passing than I used to be. I, however, am still mindful of it. But I'll go a day without shaving and still go to Walgreens. Or I'll head out without makeup when I know my face is red with razorburn. I don't care as much. However, when I'm in a place I expect to be a social situation, I am still very obsessed with passing. Also, in front of my therapist.

With a few friends, I'm often able to sit and talk to them while I shave. It's a habit I picked up on the psych ward. I had to be watched shaving. I was horrified at first to have someone watch me at, what for me is a very personal moment. It's a moment I have to confront the fact that my body is incorrect. It's a moment that I must face myself. Watch myself do this. Now I let people in that space. I'm very conscious of them being there, I can't not be. I only feel comfortable shaving in front of people I trust a lot. People I'm fully sure see me for who I am, and not for my body. However, shaving is such an intimate experience, that it feels it extremely powerful to be able to share it.