(no subject)
Aug. 7th, 2014 05:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwydion* "So what are voter ID laws even for?:"
* "A million people being monitored on US terror database:"
* "Ancient Priest's Tomb Painting Discovered Near Great Pyramid at Giza:" http://www.livescience.com/46806-tomb-painting-discovered-near-great-pyramid.html
* "Fighting Back Against Anti-Transgender Talking Points:" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/fighting-back-against-ant_b_5633450.html
* "Tyra Hunter: Plus 19:" http://www.transgriot.blogspot.com/2014/08/tyra-hunter-plus-19.html
* "Everyone I know is brokenhearted.:" http://zenarchery.com/2014/08/everyone-i-know-is-brokenhearted/
* Where was I all evening? Doing slow, time consuming things off line, necessary, but no fun.
* I spent about 45 minutes behind/next to a schizophrenic woman in line. I kept thinking how exhausting her life might be. She was chanting the same word the whole time with very few breaks, which in itself must be tiring. I think it was some sort of warding against the voices, as her brief periods of rest from it always ended with her arguing with them. She looked so tired and sad. When it got to be her turn, the decisions and communications involved with the transaction were too much for her and she stalled there. It was heart breaking to watch and there was no way to help her. I have no meds or social services to offer her, and it wasn't a situation where anyone could help her. The person on the other side of the counter was being very patient and kind, which is as far as I could see was the best that could be done. They detoured the rest of us around her in the end, and when I left, she was still stuck there, unable to choose or to properly communicate what she needed, the other lady patiently answering questions and trying to help her figure out what to do. I just kept thinking how exhausting and isolating that must be.
Healthy people dramatically underestimate how exhausting, time consuming, and isolating some disabilities are. I know with things like chronic pain, the assumption is often, one can push through it, not understanding that the energy must come from somewhere and that this is a siege, not a skirmish. There is a difference between that month your leg was broken and decades of constant literally crippling pain. I think something similar happens with mental illness. Depression is clearly fucking exhausting. Watching the lady today, I kept thinking about how hard it is to concentrate with people talking at you. It must take a huge amount of effort to her to do even the most basic things, and how much easier it likely would be to curl up in a ball and give up. I wish we were the sort of country that believed in treating the brain as an organ and believed in helping people instead of ignoring them and abandoning them to their illness. I wish we were the sort of country that took care of the sick instead of punishing them.
* "A million people being monitored on US terror database:"
* "Ancient Priest's Tomb Painting Discovered Near Great Pyramid at Giza:" http://www.livescience.com/46806-tomb-painting-discovered-near-great-pyramid.html
* "Fighting Back Against Anti-Transgender Talking Points:" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/fighting-back-against-ant_b_5633450.html
* "Tyra Hunter: Plus 19:" http://www.transgriot.blogspot.com/2014/08/tyra-hunter-plus-19.html
* "Everyone I know is brokenhearted.:" http://zenarchery.com/2014/08/everyone-i-know-is-brokenhearted/
* Where was I all evening? Doing slow, time consuming things off line, necessary, but no fun.
* I spent about 45 minutes behind/next to a schizophrenic woman in line. I kept thinking how exhausting her life might be. She was chanting the same word the whole time with very few breaks, which in itself must be tiring. I think it was some sort of warding against the voices, as her brief periods of rest from it always ended with her arguing with them. She looked so tired and sad. When it got to be her turn, the decisions and communications involved with the transaction were too much for her and she stalled there. It was heart breaking to watch and there was no way to help her. I have no meds or social services to offer her, and it wasn't a situation where anyone could help her. The person on the other side of the counter was being very patient and kind, which is as far as I could see was the best that could be done. They detoured the rest of us around her in the end, and when I left, she was still stuck there, unable to choose or to properly communicate what she needed, the other lady patiently answering questions and trying to help her figure out what to do. I just kept thinking how exhausting and isolating that must be.
Healthy people dramatically underestimate how exhausting, time consuming, and isolating some disabilities are. I know with things like chronic pain, the assumption is often, one can push through it, not understanding that the energy must come from somewhere and that this is a siege, not a skirmish. There is a difference between that month your leg was broken and decades of constant literally crippling pain. I think something similar happens with mental illness. Depression is clearly fucking exhausting. Watching the lady today, I kept thinking about how hard it is to concentrate with people talking at you. It must take a huge amount of effort to her to do even the most basic things, and how much easier it likely would be to curl up in a ball and give up. I wish we were the sort of country that believed in treating the brain as an organ and believed in helping people instead of ignoring them and abandoning them to their illness. I wish we were the sort of country that took care of the sick instead of punishing them.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2014-08-07 06:17 pm (UTC)I'm not feeling strong enough these days to Witness, but I'm not sure what to do instead...