scraps for the Junk Drawer

[evil_whimsey]

I just felt compelled to share this tumblr thread with the most excellent character development prompt. Remember back when we were all playing the Trope Subversion game? Hahahaha, no really I love this.

https://bendingsignpost.tumblr.com/post/189833020285/meganwhalenturner-roachpatrol

Comments

[pandoraculpa]

That is pretty great! Sorry, I've got a head full of dumpster fires and garbage today (par for the course), so I can't really cobble together much more to say than that. Hopefully I'll find more words by the weekend. And I'm still trying to write! So thank you for reigniting that spark; I'm gonna keep breathing gently on it, and try to keep it alive.

Ugh. I would really like to pluck my brain out tonight. One very stupid thing that they never tell you about menopause is how it fucks your head over. I can barely stand my own company this week.

[evil_whimsey]

omg dude, I'm so with you on that, hang in there.

The menopause thing is fucking bullshit, and I'm building up a massive resentment toward that little quirk in our whole society that led to nobody ever *talking* about the condition except to make fun of hot flashes. Like nobody told me about the horrible goddamn brain fog, or how emotionally it would be like a bad trip back through the precipitous mood swings of age 13 (christ I hated age 13), boosted by all the existential despair you can muster in middle age (which let me tell you, is a fucking *bunch*).

And the hot flashes aren't any kinda damn picnic, either. I know what it's like to be a Balrog now, I 100% sympathize with that creature, and fully understand its rage. Lost all patience with the shit back in September, started taking Estroven every day. After a couple weeks it did a real good job, but then I noticed it's definitely been less effective recently. So today I got a doc appt for next Tues, and I fully intend to go in there and throw myself at her, like, "Dude I don't care what we do about this, but we have got to do something aggressive about this, bc I can't fucking handle the inside of my head anymore. Please just keep me from being a multimillion-dollar lawsuit waiting to happen."

Uh. Yeah. Sorry about the rant. I just really, really feel you.

But hey! If you're struggling with wrangling words into order (cos christ knows I am), I have shedloads of low-stress easy-peasy writing warmups we could try. Mostly they involve making lists of things, and you'd be amazed at how therapeutic that can be. I could even set them up as posts here in the Hollow, and we could tackle them as a Party In The Comments!

[pandoraculpa]

Someone (rather late into the start of this whole process) once said that going through menopause is like being dragged backwards through puberty. I didn't get it at the time, but lord, I do now. I had always been one of the lucky ones without bad cramps, without bad mood swings; periods used to barely blip on my radar but for their mess and inconvenience. Now though, it's awful. Dreadful downturns in my mood, and that fog (oh god, that fog), and last time (TMI alert, sorry) I bled it was after 6 weeks of nothing, and then I thought my uterus was trying to fall out wholesale. Horrible. The hot flashes I'd actually been having for over a year, but thankfully they aren't too severe (KNOCK WOOD) and I'd assumed it was something else. Can't imagine what that must be like to experience that out in Nevada though, where the temperatures are already insane.

Never thought about any hormone treatments, but that's also probably because I'm without insurance again, and not even on my blood pressure meds, which stresses me out more than I can tell you. That's the current mess I'm trying to sort out, because No.

And Comment Party sounds fun. I will likely be an absolute idiot throughout, because I seem to be a walking disaster lately, but it will be good to try nonetheless. Any diversion is welcome right now, because I'm incapable of doing it for myself it seems. I'd say 95% of my brain function is going to maintaining the ability to keep pushing onward. It's really fucking hard right now.

[evil_whimsey]

"Being dragged backwards through puberty", shit that's really good. But oh jeez, the no-insurance mess sucks, you've got all my sympathies on that.

For what it's worth, I found the Estroven at my local grocery store vitamin section, and also at CVS. It's basically a soy isolate (which some research says only works in a certain percentage of the population, but whatever), plus Black Cohosh, and some vitamins and other herbs.

And I dunno how any of that might interact with your BP situation, but it might be worth chatting up a pharmacy tech. Alternatively, the Sprouts stores out here (less pricey and less pretentious version of Whole Foods) has a big selection of menopause symptom supplements. Which at the very least, might get you some relief. I've also been loading up on B and D supplements, and my favorite, this absolutely magical Magnesium shit that I wish to hell I'd known about 10 years ago:
https://shop.sprouts.com/product/21925/natural-vitality-raspberry-lemon-calm-0-12-oz

It's an excellent antidote to the stress and anxiety, and I stumbled over it totally by chance, looking for electrolyte supplements to put in my water bottle. I highly recommend giving it a go.

As to the Comments Party, let me chip away at that. I'll dig up several different kinds of prompts out of the collection, and we'll see what we like. We can be idiots together, it'll be fun!