Less Sex, More Meat

During my research into Adrenal Fatigue, I came across the website of Dr. L Wilson, and what I believe must be the most ridiculous argument against a vegetarian or vegan diet.

I can't advocate for or against these diets because I'm still searching for my own answers, but I think most meat eaters and their vegetarian counterparts would agree that this doctor's lack of research is not the biggest flaw in his articles.

According to Dr. Wilson, (sic) some women develop a strange craving for male semen [...] This may sound odd, but it is quite common, especially among semi-vegetarian and vegetarian women.  They want frequent sex without condoms because they feel better when they absorb more male sexual fluid.

So basically, these vegetarian women (for some reason it doesn't extend to men) are so meat deficient that they try to get their fill with cum. 

But wait, it gets better.


The problem is these women literally wear out their husbands and boyfriends, wanting sex daily or every other day in most cases.  It is not about enjoying the orgasms and some women don’t even have orgasms and don’t care.  It is the fluid they want.  This can be very hard on marriages and other man-woman relationships.

If the man in their life cannot satisfy their new craving, some are tempted to go outside the marriage or relationship for sex.  This, of course, is extremely disruptive to their primary relationship, especially if the partner finds out, it spreads disease fast, and it puts the woman in physical danger although she may not realize it.

Ladies, if you don't eat meat, you will fuck-up your relationships by becoming sperm-hungry adulteress.   I guess we can surmise from this that it's okay for men to be vegetarians then?

One solution is simply more sex.  However, the craving easily becomes an addiction if one chooses this route.  Then it is even harder to control  A better solution is less sex, more love and more red meat.  This will help preserve the marriage or relationship, since for almost all men, sex once a week is plenty, and once a month is fine, too.  Sex with ejaculation is quite depleting for men.

So if you have too much sex, you're at risk of becoming addicted to semen.  You're way better off with less sex and more meat!

On a side note, I'd like to ask the men out there if what this doctor says is true: do almost all men feel that once a week and even once a month is plenty as far as sex goes?

What kind of science do you have to back up this claim, Dr. Wilson?

(sic) I am not sure why eating red meat is so helpful, but it is.  

 

 The only thing that works besides more sex seem to be that these women must eat red meat such as lamb, wild game or perhaps some beef several times weekly.  Only then does the craving seem to subside.  Sadly, many do not like red meat, but this is needed.  Taking a powerful digestive aid such as GB-3 from Endomet labs may help to digest meat.  

Don't fuck, eat chuck.  (sorry, I couldn't resist).

Anyway, if it's that important to eat all that meat, why do you need to take digestive aids to do so?

In a more thorough article entitled Sexual Fluid Craving, Dr. Wilson goes on to describe the condition more thoroughly:

Sexual fluid craving is a condition in which a person has feelings of depression, fatigue and even despair that are relieved when their body absorbs just a little sexual fluid, usually from a man.  It can be absorbed in the vagina, by mouth, or just rubbed on the skin.  This unusual condition is most common in women, and affects millions of young women, as well as some young men.

The vegetarian diet could also be the downfall of society:

The main effect of sexual fluid craving is a highly disruptive one on teen chastity, on marriages, on genital health, and perhaps other aspects of society.  It tends to cause the society to condone pre-marital sex, more divorce, homosexuality, abortion, the use of dangerous drugs such as birth control pills, and perhaps has other effects, as well.

 

[...] it causes millions of very young women, ages 15 to 25, for example (why so young?), to want to have a boyfriend and “play house”.  This is a euphemism for having frequent sex together, usually without a condom so they can get the fluid they want.  To prevent pregnancies without condoms, the young women are often on birth control pills or patches, which are horrible for their health.  Some of the young ladies end up getting abortions, which is also hard on them, but is a common part of the fluid craving ‘lifestyle’.

It's a lifestyle.

Sexual fluid craving may help explain why those who wish to destroy a society often rape the women and even the men, as it is an effective and fast way to cause sexual fluid craving.  This, in turn, disrupts the marriages, corrupts the young, encourages abortions and so on.  It also leads to more lying, cheating on one’s mate, and “stealing” fluid from others, which is a type of vampire-like behavior.  It also makes women much more aggressive, in some cases, and may result in more homosexuality.

 

This craving can bring out a selfish quality that can become exaggerated.  A person craving sexual fluid, for example, may go outside her marriage to obtain male fluid, even though she may not even enjoy the sex.  She simply wants or feels she must have the sexual fluid.  She may also take chances of obtaining sexually-transmitted or venereal diseases, and may infect her partner with them, all to get more fluid.

All to get more fluid...

One of the causes of sexual fluid addiction, according to Dr. Wilson, is a possible entity attachment.


Weakening of the body due to too much sex as a result of sexual fluid craving often opens the body to entity attachment.  Many do not believe in this, but it has been written about extensively.  It has been mentioned [ ] as a possible cause or contributor to sexual fluid craving.  However, it is also a possible consequence of the condition, as well.  When this happens, which is hard to identify for a person, the condition often gets worse because the discarnate entities often encourage the behavior.

It appears that in some cases, after a woman is raped, for example, souls that float around freely and are sometimes called entities or discarnate souls, get inside the body.  They can get into a woman’s body, where they might irritate the vaginal area or do other things that cause or contribute to sexual fluid craving.

This is a difficult subject to discuss rationally, as some people don’t believe in discarnate souls or entities.  However, they are real, and a Google search will reveal many books about them.  In fact, both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible mention them a number of times. 

The bible, ya don't say...

Another cause of sexual fluid addiction is having too many orgasms.  Too much sex or too much masturbation in a woman or man can deplete sexual fluid and can cause or worsen sexual fluid craving. 

Sigh.

Did you know that sexual fluid addiction explains homosexual behaviours?

Sex fluid craving affects some, and perhaps many male and female homosexuals.  In fact, sexual fluid craving can help one understand some homosexual behaviors when one realizes that they may be attempts to absorb more male sexual fluid.  This includes such things as smearing the fluid on one’s body or the body of one’s partner or mate.  One can absorb the fluid through the skin, in the anus, in the mouth, swallowing it, and a very effective way is to rub it in one’s eyes and ears, and on other delicate parts of the body.

As one follows the program, the entire homosexual lifestyle may begin to seem odd or strange.  I do not understand why this is so, but it can be confusing for homosexual men, in particular.  Clients report that this causes feelings of extreme loneliness, depression and anxiety.  However, once a person works through this, by staying with their nutritional balancing program, which might take a few weeks to a few months, then life becomes much easier and much happier.  Often, homosexual desires are gone and the sexual craving is also gone, or much reduced.

What else?

Christian young women who do not want to have sex before marriage are still affected by sexual fluid craving.  However, they seem to be able to put up with the condition without too much trouble in many cases (aw well that's good).  Becoming a Christian seems to help with the feelings of depression and fatigue that give rise to the craving.

[...] the so-called women’s liberation movement unfortunately can make sexual craving a far worse problem that breaks up relationships that otherwise are going well.  It also fosters selfishness among women, guilt in some cases, and causes more sexually transmitted disease, which is already a terrible epidemic.

Vampirism.  One of the worst outcomes is that it turns otherwise fine young and older women into selfish nutritional vampires who basically crave and steal seminal fluid any way they can, at times, with no regard for their own dignity, for love, or for the well-being of their partners or mates. 
Like all addictions, if left unchecked it can ruins people’s lives, ruin families and children, and has repercussions for the entire social fabric of society.  The reason for this is that the family unit and stable man-woman relationships are the basis for a stable, and happy society.  This is the truth, even if modern psychologists disagree. 

It's the fucking truth.

So now that we know about this horrible disease, how can we get help?

Well, following the prescribed nutritional balancing program is one important step, according to the doctor, and it is especially (sic) VERY IMPORTANT IS TO AVOID ALL FRUIT, although I do not know why this is so.

He doesn't know why, but do it anyway.

To wrap up, sexual fluid addiction can be caused by: lack of meat in the diet, discarnate entities, women's liberation; can cause homosexuality, adultery, semen robbery, wreckage of families and societies, promiscuity and all the accompanying issues (STDs, abortions, rape, etc.); and can be cured by having less sex (leave the poor men alone!), eating all the meat, no fruit, and becoming a Christian.

I hope you enjoyed my review of Dr. Wilson's article.  If you aren't yet convinced that meat = good, I give you the following from the vegetarian diet section of the doctor's website:

 IS THERE ANYTHING POSITIVE FOR ANIMALS REGARDING EATING MEAT? (sic)


Yes.  When animals spend time around human beings, even penned up in cages the way chickens and cattle often are, they advance spiritually.  This is the truth.  The same is true of owning pet animals, too.

Bam.

Notes:

all italicized text is citation from the following sources:

http://www.drlwilson.com/articles/SEXUAL%20CRAVING.htm
http://www.drlwilson.com/articles/VEGETABLEDIETS.htm

all emphasis in bold and/or underlined text is my own

I am not advocating any particular diet choice, all dietary info is that of Dr. L. Wilson

I realize I am being a bitch by 'poking fun' at someone's beliefs, but I'm using the excuse that the source was asking for it by publishing his beliefs as facts.

I apologize for the over-use of memes - I've been reading buzzfeed too much.

<3 M

You Are My Candy Girl

I'm severely addicted to the white stuff - and it ain't crack - it's sugar, baby.

For as long as I can remember, I've used food as a comfort.  It was innocent enough - mum always tried to make me feel better with something sweet when I was down... and my mum was a professional baker!  I think most people find this to be true.  Trouble is, I became severely depressed, and the only comfort I knew was food.

It became a problem when my weight went up and despite a lot of effort, I still had the strong compulsion to satisfy my inner pain with food.  And I developed an eating disorder.

I didn't realize I was trying to stuff the hole that was inside me.

After participating in an intensive DBT group, I had new skills to use: I learned the healthier ways to tolerate distress - the ones that don't do any damage the way drugs, alcohol, over-eating, over-shopping, gambling, and promiscuity do.  So I thought I was okay.

But I still had this problem with food and could not figure it out.

I then participated in an eating disorder group, which helped tremendously by emphasizing meals 2-3 hours apart all day long so that you don't get hungry - hunger in a binge eater is like setting yourself up to fail.  It also emphasized that we do not stigmatize any food as being "bad" food.

I improved. But I still had the problem. I still used food for comfort.  And it wasn't salad either, it was always sugary carbohydrates in some form or another: cookies, cakes, ice-cream, chocolate, breads, etc.

Not only could I not figure out why it was so hard for me, but I also became complacent - it was so normal to me to eat these kinds of foods when I was feeling bad (and I felt bad a hell of a lot) that I didn't think about it - The compulsion was too strong and when I ate the food, I went numb, and then I felt better for a bit.

Of course, health is really important to me, and I'm always trying to make sure I eat well.  I gave up animal products, processed foods, gmo foods, etc. in this pursuit.  But no matter what, I eventually reached for the sugary treat when things got bad enough.

I didn't know I was that depressed.  I thought I got depressed sometimes, but looking back, I think I was just trying to cope - and sugar helped me.  It also made things so much worse.

And now I'm sure that the reason I don't reach for a healthier method of tolerance or comfort is because I've never tried anything that has worked as fast and as well as the food.  Sex works well too, but food is easier to come by.

Last year, when I got into the Nutritarian diet (Joel Fhurman), I learned that when you eat any processed foods, it makes it harder to follow the diet - he strongly suggests refraining completely for best results.  And I pretty much did just that.  Then one day, Brian's daughter came to visit and I thought it would be nice to make some banana bread.  So I found a really healthy recipe and made a loaf.  And I ate a piece. And after that, despite being perfectly content and satisfied without that stuff for months, I felt so strongly pulled to have more... and I did.

And after that, my healthy diet went downhill.

Trying to get myself back on track felt impossible - it seemed that no matter how much I wanted to be healthy, the compulsion to eat the sugary carbs was even stronger.

As I finished off my third? (I don't even remember how many) honey bun, feeling disgustingly sick and full but still needing to finish it, I realized that this was an addiction.

And I don't mean that I'm addicted to food - I'm sure that may be possible, but we sorta need it to live.  I mean addicted to sugar.

I know an addictive behaviour - I've had it with cigarettes and still struggle.  Why I never realized I had the same relationship with sugar as I did with cigarettes, I don't know, but my guess is that it was such a part of my life - right from childhood, that I'd no reason to suspect.  Everyone eats. Everyone needs to eat.  Therefore I just had an eating problem, not an addiction.

The reason I suspected it was sugar and not something else?  I needed sweet things, the sweeter the better - those were what I went for, those are the foods I couldn't stop eating, those were the foods I craved obsessively.

So when Brian came home, I had a talk with home and told him my discovery.  He agreed and said he'd help me in any way he can.

Then, after doing some reading on the topic, I decided to cut out the sugar completely and for good.  This meant any sugar, even honey and maple syrup.  And I had to closely monitor my starchy food intake as that is the type of food I have the problem with.  Starch converts to sugar and ends up having the same effect.

I learned a lot about sugar, and why it is so addictive.  It reacts in the brain the way drugs do.  It's process directly through the liver, like any other toxin.

I learned that Queen Elizabeth was so addicted to sugar that her teeth turned black.

I learned so much that I can't even begin to explain it here and so I'll share some important links/information in future posts on the subject.

The day after I had my realization, I obstained from sugar of any sort.  I didn't even eat bread for the first week... I made Brian hide his bread from me.  I didn't drink coffee because I usually liked it with copious amounts of sugar.

Let me tell you, that first week was horrible!  In all the times I've tried to quit smoking, I have never gone though withdrawals anywhere close to what I went through with the sugar.  If I wasn't addicted to sugar, why would I go through such a bad withdrawal?

My skin wouldn't stop crawling; I was sweating; I couldn't stop clenching my jaw; I was nauseous; I was miserable, moody, depressed, and tired - completely void of energy (even more so than usual and that's saying a lot); and oh my god was I hungry!  All the time.  That deep hunger pain you get when you're just starving - well I had that almost constantly.  I was still eating, but it didn't matter. I later learned this was the body trying to regulate itself since it's been so accustomed to regular doses of sugar my entire life.

During that first week, I felt like I didn't know what to do with myself - like something big was missing inside me and that I would not know how to live without the sugar - not because of the cravings, but because I felt like I was walking around with a giant gaping hole right in the center of me and I just couldn't comprehend feeling that way for, I believed, the rest of my life.

I'd been filling that hole with sugar.  I didn't know any other way.  And now the hole was no longer being filled, and I had to deal with that, I had to deal with how that felt.

I want to touch on that more, but in another post.

I don't remember all my withdrawal symptoms, but I remember what happened after just a few days of no-sugar: food started to taste sweeter.  Just natural food, like vegetables, so much sweeter and more delicious. Everything tasted better in a way that quitting smoking could not even compare to.

Don came over with coffee and so I decided to try it without sugar anyway... the coffee tasted almost as sweet as it did when I was drinking it with a crap-load of sugar!  I thought this was amazing.

I also plan to make a post about the effects of going off of sugar, so look for that one if you're curious.

In the meantime, here's a list of behaviours that someone with an addiction portrays (taken from various sources), all of which are true of myself when it comes to sugar:

• Inability to limit use of a substance or activity
• A craving or compulsion to use the substance or activity.
• Recurrent use escalates to achieve the desired effect, indicating tolerance.
• Attempts to stop usage produces symptoms of withdrawal
• Becoming preoccupied with the addiction, spending a lot of time on planning, engaging in, and recovering from the addictive behavior 
• Secretiveness
• Lying to hide the addiction
• A pattern of avoiding and binging
• The person takes the substance and cannot stop - in many cases, at least one serious attempt was made to give up, but unsuccessfully.
• Addiction continues despite health problem awareness - the individual continues taking the substance regularly, even though they have developed illnesses linked to it.
• An addicted person commonly feels they need their drug to deal with their problems.
• Obsession - an addicted person may spend more and more time and energy focusing on ways of getting hold of their substance, and in some cases how to use it.
• in many cases the addict may take their substance alone, and even in secret.
• A significant number of people who are addicted to a substance are in denial. They are not aware (or refuse to acknowledge) that they have a problem.
• Excess consumption
• Dropping hobbies and activities - as the addiction progresses the individual may stop doing things he/she used to enjoy a lot.
• Having stashes - the addicted individual may have small stocks of their substance hidden away in different parts of the house or car; often in unlikely places.
• Taking an initial large dose. For example, the individual may gulp drinks down in order to get drunk and then feel good.
• Relationship problems
• Feel guilty or ashamed.
• Have friends or family members who are worried about your addiction
• Need to partake in the substance in order to relax or feel better.
• Regularly consume more than you intended to.

It's been over three weeks since I've had any sugar.  I don't regret it.  In fact, I feel so much better.  But I'm going to have to be diligent about it for the rest of my life because it is so easy to stray, as I've learned.

<3 M

 

Hoppy Bunny Day!

Look what the Easter Bunny hid for me!

I will eat your nose.

Derp.

 

C'est fini

<3 M

Cooking Lessons From Mum

I've recently decided to properly learn how to cook: I've asked my mother to give me lessons on the classics and techniques used by professional chefs.  It should be an interesting experience - my mother is the scariest food critic I know!

My mother is a real chef.  She has the natural talent and before she got sick, she cooked up a storm, day after day, year after year, impressing everyone who tasted her food.

At one point she decided to go to school to become a professional.  I was really young at the time (around 8 I think) so I don't remember much, but I do know she was really happy, maybe happier than she'd been in a long time as she has suffered severe depression all of her life.  And as far as I know, she was getting all A's too!

This is a great example of someone pursuing their passion.  My mother loved to cook for people - she loved making them happy through delicious food.  This was her gift.  Now she was taking that passion and making a career out of it.

The sad part of this story is that she left school before finishing to go take care of her dying mother.  She could have said no, but that is not my mother.  She didn't go back to school after her mother died - I don't know if it was because of money or another reason, but I do know she regretted it.

She certainly didn't stop cooking, though.  And she tried her hand at catering for some time.

Then she started to get sick and eventually was not able to cook like she once did.  Now she is in a wheelchair, mind you, even in her wheelchair she can cook circles around most people, but any dream of being a professional chef is no longer in her realm of possibilities.

My mother and I are very different in our attitudes of life:  she is more on the pessimistic side of things while I am of the belief that anything is possible and 'if there's a will, there's a way.'

With the right attitude and outlook on life, a person stuck in a wheelchair can definitely be a professional chef.  It just takes imagination and determination, and confidence, of course.  I'm not saying anyone can do it: everyone has different circumstances to contend with in their lives and I can easily see why my mother hasn't adopted my way of thinking on the subject - she has had one hell of a hard life and when you're doing battle with countless blocks and disabilities, both mental and physical, it can be impossible to see any opportunity for a brighter future.  And it is sad.

Recently I've been watching the show 'Masterchef US' and in the third season there is a woman who is completely blind.  Not only did she get into the competition, but she excelled and has made it to the finals.  Imagine, blind, running around the kitchen with sharp knives, steaming pots preparing and excelling at delicate and professional dishes.  Very inspirational.

I'm coming to believe that success in these times comes from thinking way outside the box and throwing convention to the curb.  If there's a true desire, there is a way to work around the circumstances to make it happen.  There is no problem that does not have a solution.

Where there's a will, there's a way.





<3 M

I Have Good Noms.

Two posts in one day?  Yeah. I didn't talk about any of the stuff I meant to in my previous entry.  Free-flow writing is like that, you never know where it's going to take you, and apparently my psyche needed to bitch about other things.

Anyway, on Monday, Brian met me after work and we went to Zum Linzer on Main for the Kinky Restaurant Crawl (it's the Kinky Restaurant Crawl only because all the people who come are kinksters, we do not wear latex and dog collars at the restaurants).

I've heard a lot about this place because a friend of ours (Ravenshire Fetish) is one of the cooks there. It's German cuisine -  If you've ever heard of the Black Forest Inn, well this place is even better and the prices are extremely fair  for what you get.

So a few good friends made it out and it was a fun night, which I really really needed cause as I've been saying, I've been living under a rock for quite a while.

I ordered the Schnitzel Cordon Bleu, which is ham and cheese wrapped in a pork schnitzel, with home fries (that are cooked in bacon fat O_O) and veggies.  It also comes with soup or salad to start as well as a basket of rye bread.  The Schnitzel Cordon Bleu sounds disgusting to me, but it tasted like heaven and I will definitely be getting that again some day.  The portions were huge and the meal was only thirteen dollars.  I usually hate pea soup and am not a big soup person in general but for some reason I felt like soup so I got the pea soup instead of the salad as my starter and it was fricken delicious!  Plus I had a Stiegl with my meal and I think that's one of my new favourite beers.

The service was really friendly, patient, and overall good.  The dining room was quaint, laid back, cozy.  And my entire bill was only twenty-one dollars (before tip).  Before going, I expected to be paying no less than thirty dollars for my meal but I was pleasantly mistaken.

Everyone decided to go out for ice-cream for dessert up to the Marble Slab Creamery on Upper James, but I went home instead cause I'm really poor this month.  I've never been there but from the sounds of it, I really really want to go.  Ice-cream = Good.

And because I somehow always manage to surround myself with geeks (I love it), what came out of the night was a spin-off group where we take turns hosting movie night where we watch corny, cheesy, horrible sci-fi movies.  Our first movie will be Barbarella.  There'd better be a lot of boobs.

Tuesday was the Hamilton Writers meeting.  That was good.  Of course since the meetings are held at Chesters - Beers of the World, I had to order a Stiegl, just to make sure it was still as yummy as it was the night before :-p  And yes, it was.

The majority of us are gearing up for NaNoWriMo, which is now only four days away.  As has been my tradition for three years now, I wait till the week before to fully decide I will participate and then wait still until it is just days away to consider what I might write about.  My first year was exciting - I had no clue whatsoever about what I was going to write about - nothing.  I still managed to make it past 50, 000 words but it taught me that I need to have at least some idea or plan before beginning so that it wouldn't be so hard to come up with things to write.  Not to mention the fact that the more planning that goes into it, the better chance of the piece being publishable with some work.  Mine was/is publishable with A LOT of work.

My second year I actually had an idea and did a very minute amount of planning.  It made the process much easier and I was able to soar past 50,000 words before the thirty day dead line.  The writing was/is good but it is unfinished.  I decided after the contest ended to take a short break from writing since I'd been writing like a mad-woman for thirty days straight and it's always good to replenish your creative juices and whatnot.  The problem is, I never picked it back up.

This, my third year, I have an inkling of what I'm going to write about.  It was a last minute idea that I will divulge to you later.  If I'm smart, I will do some planning for it because this is something I would actually want to publish eventually.  Should be interesting.

Among the things I've learned from participating in NaNoWriMo is a particular block I seem to have.  I'd love to figure out how to get around it:  the problem is, the writing I like to do most is very much like the writing I do when I make a blog entry - it is free-flowing, personal, and very much my voice, my personality.  But when I sit down to write something (other than a blog or journal), I can't seem to write this way.  I think a big part of the block is the expectation that whatever it is I've decided to write has to be a certain way or follow certain literary rules or be like the rest of the similar works. So I either end up stuck or I end up writing in a style that does not work because it is so "fake".. the voice is... lacking whatever it is that makes prose sound "true." It's hard to explain.  Others may like the writing I've done like this, but if I don't like it, it's not satisfying. 

Anyway, any advice would be appreciated.

My good friend Mel is getting handfasted this Saturday and I'm her witness.  This will be my first handfasting so it should be interesting.  I was invited to one around this time last year but a [insert horrible curse words and insulting adjectives] taxi driver made me miss it.

Then I'm off to Brian's for Sunday and Monday where we will be carving pumpkins and other Halloweeny goodness.  I miss him (and Drew) and wish they didn't live so far away :-( poop.

Though I will admit absence really does make the heart (and other body parts) grow fonder.



<3 M

Always The Wanna, Never The Be

Take one down, pass it around...

Another winter, another series of complaints cleverly disguised as blog entries by yours truly.  I do include other tidbits and can sometimes be insightful, so maybe it's not a complete waste of time.

Complaint of the day: so fucking drained of energy.  It's likely something I can fix if I really try, but the fact that I'm too tired to do so is the evil, viscous circle.

One thing I have learned though, no matter what may be ailing you, you will more often than not feel better if you have a glass of water.  I'm serious.  And this especially goes for lack of energy.  I think I need to go get myself some water now...

So it has been a little over one month since I quit smoking and for the last two days I have had inklings of regret.  I still don't want to smoke, in the bigger picture, but my god do I sometimes I want to smoke.  It's purely psychological and I'm pretty logical about it but what scares me is when I'm emotional: when I am extremely emotionally disregulated, most of my logic goes right out the door and my mind craves things it knows will give me immediate gratification... it wants me to soothe myself and tends to want to fall back on unhealthy, quick fixes... from over-eating, drinking, taking pills, being promiscuous, cutting, living in bed, etc. etc. and now one of those things is having a cigarette.

Cigarettes are an old friend.  We shared a sixteen year friendship, actually.  That's a long time to be addicted to something.  But as unhealthy a friend as they were, if I'm in enough distress, I have little to stop me from saying 'fuck it.'  And that scares me.  But at least I know no matter what happens, logic is never gone forever and will kick my ass if I give into the temptation.

It's funny, a cigarette does not do a thing for me chemically (I don't physically crave it anymore, that has passed) but psychologically it is an old comfort, it is a whole "this is who I am, this is part of my persona" thing, as weird as that sounds.  But I will be strong. 

I have quit five times before this and for some reason, this particular time feels extremely different than the other times.  I feel like I have a lot more control over it this time.  I dunno why. Maybe it's just that I have a lot more skills to use. 

I'm not enjoying the need to eat so much, it's never been a thing before, but I know that's temporary and it's much more worth gaining some weight that will likely come back off than smoking and all the health shit that comes along with it.  I mean, I was in the emergency room with asthma attacks... I think gaining few pounds is forgivable if it means staying out of the ER lol.

That's enough about smoking, I need something to eat :-p

Brian slept over on Friday night which was awesomeness.  One of my favourite things in the world is waking up with him there, waking up to him giving me a sweet kiss and holding me.  It's the perfect way to wake up and I really wish I could wake up that way everyday.  *Sigh* Desire is suffering... grumble grumble.

Anyhew, on Saturday he took me to Thai Memory for dinner.  It's a really nice place next to the Sky Dragon Center on King William.  The food is the best Thai I've ever had, the prices are good, and it's so serene - there's a big pond/fountain thing that I particularly love.  They're pretty cool there: if you pay with cash they take 5% off your bill and if you bring your own tupperware to bring home your leftovers, they take off another 5%.  Awesomeness.  I had a red curry chicken dish with coconut rice (mmmmm) and Brian had the Pad Thai (he has had many many Pad Thais in his time and he claims this was the best one yet).  We were unfortunately too full for dessert, which would have been ginger ice cream.

After that we walked over to the Citadel on Rebecca to go see a play that our friend was in: it was called "Suburban Motel" by George F. Walker (directed by Tyler Brent).  It consisted of two small plays: Risk Everything and Criminal Genius.

"Risk Everything" was definitely THE better play (not that the other one wasn't good), the acting was amazing and I'm looking forward to seeing more, and yes, Tara Smith (Hot-T from the Petit Fours) did steal the show ;-)

After that awesomeness we went over to Gallaghers for a friend's birthday gathering.  It is VERY hard to socialize when the music is so loud you can't hear the person next to you screaming in your ear.  It's a shame because I really like the atmosphere there.  Oh well.

Today is Sunday blah-ness time.  Had a two hour nap today, couldn't help it.

Tomorrow is the restaurant crawl and Tuesday is Hamilton Writers, so I'm sure I'll have more to write about.  Project Un-Isolate Marylin is well underway, but not easy :-s

P.S. I love you.








<3 M

Random

I'm at Brian's place right now: he's gone to take D to her mum's for the weekend and then doing all kinds of other stuff.  I'm staying home and making him a speshul dinner :-)

Our three-month-aversary was on Wednesday... it feels like a hell of a lot longer than that, but in the good way.  I'm still 'getting used to' this whole being in a relationship thing - it's a completely new experience for me.  I've been in, what you could call, relationships before, but none of them were actual relationships.  Needless to say, I'm a very happy girl, life is grand.

Well, mostly.  I seem to be having a hell of a time with the pain thing.  There's my usual pain, and then there's the pain I've been having for the past few months or so.  It seems to be easing up somewhat, but let's just say this masochist is in need of a safeword O_O

Most other areas of my life are improving: I'm seeing a lot of the fruit of my past labours and can see it wasn't all for naught.

Like I said, I'm still getting used to being in a relationship.  He lives all the way across the city and is a full time dad, so working out my scheduling and transportation has been an issue.  I need to figure out how to fit everything in, fit in seeing my friends, my family, that sort of thing.  I wish I drove sometimes.

 I am, what they would call, a Borderline in recovery.  What that means is, I still have all the same emotional disregulations and hyper-sensitivities, and whatnot, but I have the skills with which to cope.  This is quite the miracle, for anyone with BPD knows the hell your life becomes with this disorder.  If I keep up on the skills, I should be okay.

I am also, it would seem, a rapidly recovering body-hater.  I have been struggling with body image issues for years, even when I believed logically that there is no reason to feel down about my body, the filters of society and everything I've always been told to believe/think have won out.  The influence is too strong.  Most everything we're told and shown regarding our body size, shape, etc. is bullshit, but how are we to know the difference if that's all (or the majority) of what we've experienced through media and society?

I did a few things, sort of theraputic-type exercises in hopes of changing my stubborn beliefs about my body.  Some of these seemed to have an effect.  Then I attended an eating disorders group where I was taught the science behind weight gain/loss, etc.  It was a life-changing experience.  Why was this information not out there in our society?  It was so eye-opening, I'd never heard these things before.  I felt lied to, and regretful that I had not known these things before it was too late.

Among all the things I learned, one of them was acceptance.  After knowing what I now knew, I had no choice but to accept things as they were, accept myself the way I was, right now.

It sounds depressing for someone who hates their body and has spend most of her life trying to, or stressing out about, losing weight.  Waiting for life until I was the right weight.  Putting things off until I was 'done my diet.'   Not wearing what I really wanted to wear because 'when I lose weight, it will be too big and I don't want to waste money.'  And when the struggle to achieve the impossible inevitably failed, again and again (no wonder we end up hating ourselves) the cycle just continues, getting worse and worse.

 Well, it was depressing.  Incredibly.  But then some things started happening.  I would go shopping and look at all the clothing I wanted to wear, knowing I could buy it now and not have to wait for a later date that would never come.  This was fun, relieving, and very empowering.  If I accepted myself at the size I was at right now, I could stop waiting to live.  Finally.  Sounds dramatic, I know, but it kinda is.

After a while, I noticed I was not getting down about my body nearly as much as before.  This was happening less and less.  I noticed that I had stopped obsessing.  This was a huge deal, like a ton of weight lifted off my shoulders. 

Many other things happened.  I began to notice an increase in confidence.  So did others.  And it's so true what they say - once you start to believe you are beautiful, so will others.

I still have some major issues, but like I said, it's a work in progress like everything else. I'm just very proud to be able to add that on to my list of ginormous life accomplishments.  Most of the things I've been working on endlessly for the past decade and seemingly getting nowhere with have been shifting in big ways in the past year or two.

One of my biggest issues in therapy, oddly enough, was problem solving my inability to follow any sort of routine or schedule.  To do anything productive on a consistent basis.  Much of this had to do with the fact that I've been out of school and work for so long and haven't had to be very responsible and the fact that I have very black/white - all/nothing thinking. 

It seemed like I would never be able to do it, I would never be able to control my life!  I am very easily overwhelmed.  But in the past, I'd say, six months or so, I have been slowly, by trial and error, getting somewhere with this problem.  It is very slow progress, but it is a very big thing to tackle and I am doing it!

Of course there are other areas in which I'm making headway... I just don't give up.  So like I said, life is grand. 

I still have plenty of problems to deal with, but they are a hell of a lot easier to face when many of the other ones are under control.

I better go start dinner n' stuff now... this chair is killing my back :-/



Love M

Fridge Shame

Here is a photo of the inside of my fridge taken moments ago without touching anything.  You can tell I'm not lying by how filthy it is in there.  Sunny's last blog post is what prompted this little sharing experience and I'm thinking it would be nice if someone else out there who is reading this might like to do the same on their blog... and so on.

I don't think anyone could possibly have a dirtier fridge than I do, seriously o_O


<3 M

Ohio Dairy Farm Brutality

http://www.mfablog.org/2010/05/new-mfa-investigation-ohio-dairy-farm-brutality.html

No one likes hearing the truth, but if you're going to ignore it then what does that make you?




Love M

Baby Got Back

K I feel like writing so here we go.

On the subject of FAT...

 I am.  duh.  I was a chubby little girl until I hit puberty, at which point I naturally thinned out.  To tell you the truth, I didn't really notice: as far as I know, I thought I was the same size the whole time (chubby or even fat, even when I was not).  So anyway, I thinned out and was pretty damn hot (looking back, of course you never realize it at the time - don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone?).  I still thought I was fat though, not huge but definitely "big boned," which is why dieting was always in the back of my mind, always always always.  Looking back I can't beleive how sick that was, that I thought I was fat when I was so not: I was damn fine and healthy too.  Nonetheless, I remember putting a picture I'd cut out of a magazine on the fridge of a super skinny model - inspiration to lose weight, I said.

So then what happened?  Well, first of all, at some point along the way ( think I was either thirteen or fifteen but can't remember at the moment) I "discovered" emotional eating.  Well I didn't know that's what it was at the time, but I discovered it nonetheless.  Luckily it wasn't something I did too often and it didn't effect my weight too much, probably because I was still somewhat active and healthy.  It's no coincidence that this discovery of emotional eating came around the same time as I was becoming unknowingly depressed.  I won't go into what was going on and why that added to the depression but just that it was something I was unaware of, I just thought I was weird and super sensitive (I am both those things, but I was also depressed lol).

What's weird about being depressed in my house is that every single person in my family has some mental disorder or another (usually various) but no one said anything to me about possibly being depressed, nothing.  Not sure why, but I've always been a bit bitter about that.  Back to the topic.

Now, when I was somewhere in my mid teens I fell disgustingly deep in love with a good friend of mine.  This caused me a lot of turmoil and inevitably ended in heartbreak for me.  How badly was I hurt?  Let's just say I only just got over it a few years ago, and I am currently twenty-eight.  I got so depressed (still didn't know I had depression btw) that I eventually left my job and school (on the same day) and slowly but surely began shutting the world out, becoming a hermit, pretty much.

And this is where that wonderful thing called emotional eating came in handy.  I embraced that coping mechanism, consciously knowing that I would probably gain weight and not caring (because what's the point in looking and feeling good if you don't see any hope for the future?).  With the mixture of inactivity and emotional eating, I, of course, did start gaining and I still didn't care.  I'm sure I cared on some level but at the time I was too depressed to care.  That's how hopeless I felt.

I eventually got to the point where I started to suspect there might be something wrong going on and made an appointment with the doctor.  This is when I found out that I did indeed have depression.  They diagnosed me with bipolar (because I would go into deep deep depression and then mania) and anxiety and gave me some pills.

By this time I had a full-out eating disorder and was discovering that even though I didn't want to gain weight anymore, it was starting to become out of my control (that's the best way I can put it I think).  And I was still depressed. And I didn't know how to get control of my eating again, I just thought I was weak and pathetic.  I kept gaining weight.

Then, in my early twenties I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and osteoarthritis.  No wonder physical activity was so hard, I thought I was just lazy.  Try and lose weight when you're severely depressed, have an eating disorder, and have physical disabilities.  Right, sounds fun eh? 

So I became double the size I used to be - the size of two of me.  And trying to lose weight the whole time by dieting dieting dieting and trying to exercise.  The dieting wasn't so hard as the exercise, for obvious reasons, but the mental turmoil one goes through when struggling with body image issues is a sickness I wish upon no one - yoyo dieting, all diets that are extremely unhealthy, for years.  None of them worked.  Diets don't work.  I knew that, I knew it had to be a permanent lifestyle change, but by then I was so deep into the cycle of punishing myself for failing by starving myself, then inevitably binging out of starvation and comfort.  I now understand that this becomes a mental disorder that only gets worse.

And so I kept trying and the harder I tried, the more weight I gained.  I know that doesn't make any sense, but if you're in such a sick cycle it just keeps making you sicker and making things more distorted and eating away at your self-worth and that forbidden comfort food becomes no different than a drug addiction.  The only difference is that you have to eat, which makes it harder to avoid.

And that's why I'm fat.  Mind you, I don't think being fat is necessarily bad - we all have some amount of fat on our bodies, it's just when you have too much that it can take a toll on your health.  If I were able to lose weight (let's hope so!) I wouldn't want to be skinny, I'd want to be pleasantly plump, as they say.  That's just me.

There are many judgments about fat people, and I can understand why: it's a simple scientific formula - burn more calories than you consume and lose weight.  Unfortunately, when an eating disorder develops, when there's severe depression going on, when physical activity is limited, this simple formula is moot.  Don't tell a fat person to just stop eating because you never know if they're like me and get anxiety attacks just walking into the kitchen because they don't want to have to eat but know they need to.

Ultimately I'm not trying to make excuses for myself because that does no one any good, I'm just explaining how I got where I am and why I'm here.

Some days I feel absolutely disgusting, nothing but a blob of grossness that no one would ever want to look at.  In fact I've stayed in many times because I thought no one should have to look at me.  Sick, no?  Some days I actually feel kinda hot, like yes I'm fat but I'm still damn sexy bitches ;o)  Both of those are true depending on who's looking.  So what others think doesn't really matter.  There are plenty of men who love fat chicks, it turns their crank, but at the end of the day, it's me whose opinion matters and I'm not comfortable being as fat as I am.  This goes for aesthetics as well (and especially) health.

While it's true that you can be relatively healthy and fat, there are still things going on inside your body that are not good - things have to work harder because of the extra weight and that puts stress on important processes, resulting in adverse health effects.  Thinking about what my body is going through makes me sad, I want to be healthy.

I was at a level weight for a few years, but in the past year I have gained a lot more weight (yes, another severe heart break by a man I love) and this has accelerated my distorted thinking about eating and my body and all of that good stuff.  But some really good stuff has happened in that time as well:  I finally started seeing a therapist (I know, after being depressed most of my life you'd think I'd have gotten one sooner, but that's a whole other story of woe) and she is fucking awesome.  I've been in a DBT group (Dialectic Behavioural Therapy) as well, which has helped me so much.  And in about two weeks, I will be starting in an eating disorder program at the hospital.

If this doesn't help me, I don't know what will.  I recently went to an information seminar for getting gastric bypass surgery, determined that this was my only hope, I fully intended on going for it.  But after the information session, there was no way, I was really disappointed at finding out what it's really like and that the only thing getting that surgery does is help you lose a bunch of weight really quickly (the way you would on a fad diet) and you have to change your lifestyle by eating right and exercising anyway, the same way you would without the surgery.  There is no difference, well, except for all the serious health risks and permanent sacrifices, etc.  I could get the same results going on a shake diet for a few months and then dieting and exercising - I think I've already tried that lol.

Just learning DBT skills in the past six or so months has already helped me immensely with how I deal with food.  I'm hopeful that the next six months, plus my therapy, plus the next year in an eating disorder group will be just what I need to get healthy.  I'm tired of everything being about my weight.  Just the fact that I would never tell anyone the number on the scale tells me how shameful it makes me feel, cause as some of you know, I'm not the most private person, I tell all! lol  I would like to think, after being rejected by a man, that it's because of my horrible personality and not because I'm fat :op  There is some truth to wanting that, trust me.

I've learned a lot through the  years of being in a fat body...

I've learned the importance of not judging someone by their looks.  I've learned that it's still okay (socially acceptable) to say hateful things to or about a fat person, to discriminate against them for how they look.  I've learned that the media is disgusting.  I've learned that people can eat well and exercise and still be fat.  I've learned that they should stop making polyester/nylon clothing for plus size women because it's the most unflattering, worst possible fabric for anyone with curves, lumps, or bumps.  Oh, and I've also recently learned that there are ingredients in most of the food we buy, such as high fructose corn syrup and MSG that actually effect the body in a way that negates the scientific formula of natural weight loss (calories consumed/calories burned) - it is really sad to find this out because there are some people who try so hard to lose weight and they are unknowingly consuming these additives, not knowing it is likely making their struggle pointless.  I've learned a lot more, but I think I'm about done writing for now.

There was no real point in writing this, I just felt like talking about it so thanks for indulging.

P.S. Fat people need love too please :o)


Love M

Slightly Hung Over

What I've learned so far in 2010...

Dieting creates eating disorders and in the long run they destroy your body and make you fatter than you ever were in the first place.  It is far better to eat healthy, balanced, and consistently and lose weight slowly.  Diets teach you nothing.  They're the holy grail for people who feel out of control and grasp onto the idea that once they do 'so and so' diet, everything in their life will be okay again.  Thank gods I now know this and am finally getting sane again after years of driving myself crazy.  The other big key peice of knowledge - one day at a time.  So yay I'm losing weight!  Woot!

There is nothing wrong with letting people earn your trust - in fact, it probably should be earned rather than given right away to any Joe Blow one comes across.  This may sound like common sense to most of you, but for me, that's hard to accept: I could never understand why I shouldn't trust everyone right away unless they give me a reason not to, and even then, I'd give them a few more chances.  Now I know (hopefully) that opening myself up that much to just anyone makes it so much easier for them to hurt me.  I guess there's such a thing as trusting too much too soon... who knew?

The world is made up of distractions, like static or distortion on top of what's worth living for.  Most of us get caught up in the distractions, it's almost impossible not to because they're everywhere and they come in so many different forms: mindless entertainment, drama, sensationalism, love, hate, sex, fear, money, and on and on and on.  Then sometimes the distraction stops for a moment or two and we feel right again, like we remember what the point of living is or what makes it worth it to each of us and we promise ourselves to not forget again, but we always do.  I guess the goal would be to remember more often, and to practice living in that state of mind as much as we can.

Relationships are hard.  I'm not sure why, but I think it has a lot to do with fear and dishonesty.  People have fear and are dishonest because of it.  We're each afraid of different things and we're each dishonest in our own way, but I think without the fear, the dishonesty would stop and relationships could start to be a more peaceful endeavour.   Some of us are afraid to open ourselves up, some of us are afraid to get too close to someone else, some of us are afraid we're not worthy of love, some of us are afraid we'll be found out for the horrible person we (think) we are, some of us are afraid of being trapped,some of us are afraid of being abandoned, some of us are afraid without knowing why, and it goes on and on.  So we're dishonest.  We lie with our words, our actions, our intentions... we lie by omitting the truth or by not saying or doing what we know is the honest thing to do or say.  We lie by denying our feelings.  Even if we're not dishonest people, we are dishonest without even realizing it.  It sucks, but it's the truth and it's what makes it so hard to have relationships with each other.  Perhaps if we were all less afraid of things that are usually unfounded we would all be less lonely or alone.  And definitely, if we were all less afraid, we would all stop hurting each other so fucking much.  It really does take thick skin to put yourself out there into the world of dating. 

I've learned a lot more than these things of course, but I'm tired so you're gonna have to come back when I feel like sharing more of my wisdom ;o)



Love M

Tastes Like Vegetable

Right, so for the past twenty seven years I've been asking people to try to tell me what various kinds of seafood tastes like, since I've never tried any due to a deathly allergy (see last blog post). I've asked people to compare it to other foods, texture, flavour, anything, and never has anyone been able to do it. So I decided that I'd write my interpretation of the different seafoods I try along the way. You never know, maybe there are others out there who have had the same allergy and just want to know what they're missing.

Last night was my first ever in my life seafood tasting experience, courtesy of Don:



Shrimp. The kind in the freezer that's already boiled. I reluctantly took one and held it for a while until I was sure it wasn't going to kill me. Then a sniff or two. Then a lil' lick. Then a nibble. Then a proper bite. "Hmmm... it tastes like.... a vegetable of some sort!" My first impression of shrimp is that it tastes quite like some sweet vegetable, a cross between a snow pea and celery or something like that, but very light. The texture was different, this is the hardest part to explain: it was on the verge of being crunchy but it wasn't, and it was on the verge of being rubbery, but it wasn't. If I had closed my eyes and eaten it without knowing what it was, there's no doubt I would have said some sort of vegetable because of both the flavour and the texture. Verdict - s'not bad.

Then I ate some that had been cooked in garlic butter. This was a completely different story: the texture was different, more chewy like meat is. The vegetable-y taste was quite a bit less and the shrimp took on some of the garlic butter taste (which is, of course, delicious). My verdict on the cooked version? I like. It made me want to try it done in lots of different ways - all those dishes in the Chinese food take out menu (95% of the menu really) I want to try.

As predicted by the allergy specialist, I had no adverse reactions at all to the shrimp. So now I know for sure. Weird. Two things I'm excited to try are lobster and scallops because I've always thought they looked so yummy. Weird how something that I've never tasted in my life can look yummy - what does yummy look like?


Love M

Holy Fuck Nuts!

All my life I've had a deadly allergy to all seafood and fish, therefore, in the twenty seven years I've been on this earth, I've never tried any type seafood or fish - nothing.

When I was a kid I was allergic to all nuts, but it wasn't a deathly allergy.  Eventually I was able to eat almonds, and then eventually I was able to eat all nuts - the allergy went away.

So, logically it made sense to me that if my nut allergy could go away, perhaps my seafood allergy could as well.  I didn't have high hopes for it though, because I figured if an allergy is strong enough to kill you, it's around to stay.

After too many years of procrastinating, I set up an appointment with an allergy specialist to see what was what.  I just got home from that appointment and here's what happened:

He asked me a bunch of weird questions, then pricked both my arms with various pricky thingies.  After a few minutes, my left arm started to get itchy and red bumps where I got pricked.  My right arm had no reaction.

Then he told me that my left arm was fish (like halibut, sole, trout, etc.) and my right arm was shellfish (shrimp, lobster, crab, etc.).  He also told me that I was never allergic to shellfish in the first place, EVAR.  Just the regular fish.  He said I can eat all the shellfish I want and not have a problem (and always could).

That's fucked!

I've never, in twenty seven years, tasted any type of seafood.  I have NO idea what it tastes like.  I've asked people to try to explain it to me so many times but they never could.  It's been hard not being able to eat something that most other people eat all the time - missing out on something like that sucks.

I'm kind of pissed off that I was misinformed for all these years, but I guess mistakes happen.  Anyway, this feels really weird to me, the fact that I could eat some shrimp right now, that I can do that O_O

I feel like a virgin about to be deflowered! LOL - srsly!  What the hell do I try first?  How do you cook this stuff?  Eeeee!

On another allergy note, since I was a kid I've had an allergic reaction to dark chicken.  Just dark chicken, never white chicken.  When I eat dark chicken, my throat and mouth get really itchy and swell up - it's uncomfortable but not deadly.  My parents thought I was making it up to get out of eating my food, but I sure as hell wasn't.

The only thing that made sense to me is that dark meat has way more fat in it than white meat, so perhaps it's something in the aminos or whatever it's all called.

The allergy specialist confirmed that there is no such thing as an allergy to just dark meat and not white meat.  So now I'm extremely confused because there's no doubt about it, I'm allergic to dark chicken!  Maybe it's just another weird fact about the oddity that is Marylin.

Stay tuned for my take on what it's like to try all the different shellfish for the first time - I'm excited!  What do you think I should try first?

Yay!



Love M

Hey Obama! This Is The Real Pandemic

Well I just posted about this on Buttercup, but it pissed me off too much not to blog about.

• In a study of 4th-grade girls, 90% were on some type of diet.

This is what I know: 4th grade girls are about nine years old; they are generally prepubescent; they have A CRAP TON of growing left to do (women don't stop growing till late in their teens), and in order to properly develop, you need proper nutrition.

Just touching on the physical part of this, diets are about rules and restriction, usually excluding one kind of food or another or trying to eat a lower number of calories and/or fat. What do you think this would do to a child's growth? Kids need all kinds of food and plenty of it - they need their carbs, their fats, their proteins, their vitamins and minerals and yes, even their ice cream cones. Their bodies need it, so I am afraid to even ponder the repercussions of this sad statistic.
If you think I'm nuts and it's perfectly fine for a child to diet, then check this stat:

• In 1992, the National Institutes of Health held investigatory hearings and concluded that diets do not work and may even be dangerous to one's health.

Now let's move onto the psychological implications. These girls are dieting for a reason, the reason could be that their parents put her on this diet, or maybe she's just copying what her mother does (as kids tend to do), maybe she feels fat, ugly, not up to par with whatever ideal nine year old girls look up to today (I shudder to think). Whatever the case, some of these children are not happy with their bodies and some will end up being unhappy with their bodies if they stay on this track. I don't know about you, but when I was a wee girl I didn't really think about my body in any terms besides 'this is my body and it does stuff.' I never looked at it, or parts of it, and felt a need to change it. For most healthy children, I think that's the case - we have no reason to start comparing shapes and sizes as long as we can run and jump and skip and enjoy being nine.

These poor girls don't stand a chance. I'm sorry, but how healthy can a child's self-esteem be if they are dieting? It's a hard, long road ahead for a girl who has the misfortune of being uncomfortable in her own skin before she's even had a chance to fill it out.

What this says about our society is literally deafening because people sure aren't hearing a damn thing. Kids should be busy being kids and not worrying about diets. Considering how mentally trying the diet game is (and if you've been there you know what I'm talking about), imagine what it does to a nine year old girl.

Alright, so who's going to fork up the money to pay for all the therapy these children will need when they get older?

1.2% of people in America with H1N1 have died.

18-20% (roughly) of people with eating disorders die. Where's the state of emergency for this pandemic? Srsly.


Love M

About Stuff And Things

I was just telling my friend earlier that blogging has pretty much become one of my coping tools. That's a pretty cool thing: before blogs/online journals/forums/what-have-you existed, this level of sharing didn't exist to us. There was no way (as far as I know) to write a journal entry and let the world read it (or at least the few wonderful people who subscribe to me).

Some people think that doing so is stupid. Whatever floats your boat, but I've found blogging to be not only cathartic, but probably the most effective tool I have to get through a time of distress.

Anyway, so many blog these days, there must be something to it...

So! I got Akoha in the mail!!!



(Yes that is my address, and yes I do want you to send me mail... friendly mail, that is!)

Anyway, I'm very excited. sunnybananas told me about Akoha Cards and I finally decided to get them. As far as I'm aware, it's an interactive game where the point is to pay-it-forward and the more you do, the more points you get.

These puppies come at a time when I'm feeling the need to be more generous, so I think they'll probably help push me into that frame of mind. Yay!

My only concern is finding people who will 'play' the game. If I use one of the cards on someone, I give them the card and they are supposed to go online and enter the code to indicate it was given to them and they have to pay-it-forward to someone else, and on it goes. The problem is I don't know many people who would be into actually doing that: putting in the code and then paying-it-forward. I dunno, it's probably cause most of the people I know are male... I think gals seems to be more open to this kind of thing.

Sooo now I'm just figuring out where to start :o)

Oooh, shiney new deck:



Don't mind me, I haven't gotten anything good in the mail in a loooong time - I was hurting!


In other news, my first attempt at guacamole was seemingly successful - I thought that shit was complicated to make. Nope.



My next new attempt in the kitchen will be, I believe, biscotti. I don't know why, I just have this compulsion to make biscotti *shrugs*


shrinkingalice asked something on Twitter about wands today. Got me reminiscing... brought out the wand I made a few years back (that's really how long it's been since I've used it) and after admiring the awesomeness of it, realized I'd grown out of most of these sorts of tools.

Anyway, I told her that wands are used (in a nutshell) to direct energy. To which she replied "so does it make the energy more powerful than just pointing with your hand or something?"

No. No it does not, lol. And if that is the case, than why do people use them? It's not just the wand, but a plethora of other such tools that every new Witch feels he/she must have.

That's pretty normal. Paganism, in it's huge growth spurt over the years, has gotten quite complex in its many paths and traditions: to try and learn them all would take a lifetime, and each one (some more than others) is so intricate and complex in its many beliefs, rituals, pantheons, and special tools or sacred objects it is quite mind-blowing.

Don't get me wrong, I love that. When you're first starting to learn you just absorb all the information you can. You buy books and (especially books for beginners) these books tell you what tools you will need and (hopefully) what those tools are for.

You certainly don't need any of them, but acquiring them does no harm either. You love your cool witchy stuff - who doesn't? I wanted all the tools too: I slowly acquired many, most of them second hand or made myself (like that wand).

If you're not just a show-off, a lot of these tools have uses and that's the main point of having them: the wand aids in directing energy. It represents air. Using a wand to direct energy does not make it more powerful, but it can greatly aid in the visualization necessary to direct said energy. Knowing this, many tools can be a great thing for the those starting to learn and practice.

I reached a point in my path where the 'stuff' involved in this way of spiritual practice started to turn me off. I would step back and look around me and see the Pagans showing off their stuff, selling their stuff, buying more stuff, stuff, stuff, stuff.

I'm sorry, but there comes a point when enough is enough and so much stuff gets distracting and in the way of the actual spirituality of it all.

So I say, tools: very cool, especially good for learning how to work with energy, but not at all necessary.

We have a Pagan Pride Festival here every autumn that I used to attend. But I started to notice that most of the actual festival was people selling their wares! So much vital stuff was missing that goes to the root of what Paganism is about. Very depressing. I don't go to the festival anymore.

Anyway, I guess I'm trying to say that material things should really be in moderation lest they become more important than your spirituality.

I'm probably going to catch a lot of flack for saying this, but the Pagan community has come off way to 'religiousy' for my liking. I grew up Catholic and left organized religion for very good reasons. By no means do I wish to be part of another. That's why I never called myself Wiccan - Wicca is a religion, a Pagan religion, but a religion nonetheless.

I think I'm now rambling and likely lost my point somewhere along the way.

Hmmm I'll close this rant by saying: you already have everything you need to practice spirituality and to be connected. You always will. Everything else is just extra.



My wand is full of awesome.


What other random topic can I go on about...

Oh! This.



Is art.

And this...



is an artist.

And I...

have art envy.



Love Marylin.

Earthlings

Watch this.

Because if you can't, you have no right to eat meat.


-Love Marylin.

A Flu By Any Other Name

You know it's the "end of the world" when pigs fly.

The World Health Organization has declared ‘a public health emergency of international concern,’ defined by them as ‘an occurrence or imminent threat of illness or health conditions caused by bioterrorism, epidemic or pandemic disease, or highly fatal infectious agents or toxins that pose serious risk to a significant number of people.’

Known to you and I as Swine Flu.

Now they're having us call it H1N1 because people weren't buying pork due to fear of becoming infected.

But it's too late to erase the damage that the name 'Swine Flu' has begun to inflict on the pork industry: the name 'Swine Flu' has become too common, too catchy, for H1N1 to replace it.

The US agriculture secretary has only just initiated the name change. Could they not have foreseen that a "pandemic" called 'Swine Flu' would cause issues for the pork industry? Of course they did. Now they're saying, "oops, ok, call it this now" but they know they've already planted the seed.

And if they wanted to make it clear that this flu isn't pig-related, why are some farms being quarantined?

So what motivations could there possibly be for putting the pork industry at risk?

Well, for those of you who don't know, the Rockerfeller funded, Monsanto, has been trying to get a patent on the pig. Yep. They want to officially own the species, this is the future.

This would mean big money for Monsanto, with which the US government has many connections, which equals big profit for members of government, thus motivation to destroy the pork industry.

In comes Monsanto to save the day. Now their attempts to patent the pig are what saves the industry, rather than destroys it.

Why would the government allow anyone to become ill or die though? The government wouldn't do that.

Well this isn't the first time they've tried to instill fear into people to achieve their own ends - they love their fear tactics.

So many possibilities... how easy would it be to pin this on terrorists? It's a perfect plan all around. More fear of terrorists means more war. The war is a cash cow as well as a great way to keep citizens under control by making them afraid and then coming in to "save the day."

Well that's not all ladies and gentlemen: don't forget about the pharmaceutical companies ginormous profit from the cure for this horrible, deadly swine flu. And if I know people, I know that most of them are going to be jumping on that vaccine bandwagon, the same way they line up every flu season for their annual flu shot.

Which wouldn't be so bad if the vaccine, Tamiflu, didn't have horrific effects - please watch this video and for the love of god, do not take Tamiflu! Especially anyone under the age of 19.

I'm not even going to go into why they would want to give the public such a dangerous drug, the information I'm talking about is already over-whelming to those who haven't done their research (or didn't know there was ever a reason to).

Listen, if I die from swine flu, then you can take the damn vaccine and say "I told you so."

This was written in a hurry because I wanted to get it out there (I didn't have to do any research before realizing the connections and it was making me too sick to my stomach to not say anything) and I'm sure it's not the only piece talking about these same issues. So forgive me for not providing more research to back all this up. I urge anyone reading this to add to it by leaving more information, links, etc. in the comments.

If you think I'm a nut-job, please prove me wrong and research for yourself, the more you research, the better.

I'd like to build on this, so again, if I've missed important facts (which I'm sure I did) or you think some other points should be made, leave a comment.

-Love Marylin