Thursday, March 31, 2016

Having Kids is Too Hard Today: The Child Free Movement

                                                             source

I've gone to read the Brat-free board before. It's not always a pleasant place. Some of these child-free by choice people brag of their ability to go on vacations and do everything their hearts desire but I wonder how many choose to be child-free due to the sheer lack of money. That's one thing if a millennial is never going to be able to afford his own apartment or make money that actually feeds himself, the idea of having children is going to be put on the back shelf. Time magazine makes being child-free look like a choice of wealthy couples who want to lay on the beach, but for many people it is a "choice" coming from economic pressures and poverty.


I was mostly infertile--never had periods unless forced by drugs like birth control or Provera for twenty years. Though oddly when I went on insulin I suddenly started getting periods all the time and the doctors warned me for the first time in twenty years I am fertile, but I am way too sick to get pregnant.  Some of them seemed confused why insulin brought all the periods back. They never told me why. When you are over 45 the chances for a healthy woman to get pregnant are less then 5 percent, but it's something I didn't need looming over my head. Being this old, I am glad I did not pass down being 700lbs and having severe Lipedema/PCOS and other problems to a child. I hit a wall on my adoption search, but my Lipedema had to come from some where. Rare genetic diseases don't pop up out of nowhere. Even in this woman's case, I believe there is definitely going to be one child with a severe weight problem.

Years ago, I was not in any place to have children. Since meeting old classmates, it has boggled my mind how they got their lives so together so quickly having children in most cases in their early 20s. Well they had normal bodies, were allowed to date and did not have insane parents. As I starved and ate ramen noodles and lived out of milk-crates, they were having babies and beginning careers with actual futures. Now they are having grandchildren. I ask myself, "How did they have the money?" I never would have. Most were married and there were secure jobs in the mix even by that age but I went to an upper middle class high school in a traditional mid-sized town. Facebook can suck, they are even planning the 30 year old reunion, but I don't plan to go. I'm definitely the poorest one by far, I weigh 500lbs. There's a classmate in prison for attempted murder so maybe I'm not the absolute lowest on the totem pole but even that one had children and one day will have grandchildren.

The Child-free movement board talk about the "entitled moos" Mothers and obstinate "duhs" or Dads, parenthood seems to be trophy time among many today. Children have become trophies. I saw this among my relatives to the max. Instead of any punks or goths, obedient Eagle scouts and band nerds have predominated in my family. The child-free are sick of the bragging, and the "special rights". I don't blame them. Watching so many people treat children like trophies and like they became something special just because they had sex and bred like millions of others, has gotten especially cloying over these last ten years.



Parenting for some has become about bragging rights. You see this on Facebook where the endless achievements of everyone's children are touted. They are always winning sports awards, getting good grades or doing sell-out plays. I saw one narcissistic ex-wife of a cousin, even post her entire kid's report card. Many of these narcissists deserved drugged out sneering pot-head teens and got kids that look like they came out of a catalog. Children to many are like items on a life resume, get good ones who get good jobs, and good-looking grandchildren:  Instant bragging rights! Life for child-free ACONs like myself can be especially hell on earth as new babies are cooed over and parents congratulated and seen as full adults while you never are.

                                          I can't figure this guy out, is he being sarcastic, for real? Tongue in cheek?

Many child-free people including myself, know what it is like to be told, that you matter less because you did not have children. Some parents directly say this. I was told that I mattered less to my face because I never had breeded, infertility, health problems and others not withstanding.  My brother even admitted I mattered less because I never had children. How was I supposed to pop out babies when I was dying of sepsis and weighed near 700lbs and hadn't had a period since I was 19 years old? Most women with severe PCOS with far better health then me have to dish out tens of thousands of dollars on fertility treatments.  Our too short 9 years of working class stability still would have made having children near impossible as we were buried in medical bills and I couldn't even breath.  Churches back this up too, they bring the already overly congratulated mothers to the front of the room on Mother's day and give them presents. They hold special dinners for them. They tell you "be fruitful and multiply" and that your main worth as a woman is to have children. Non-mothers in this equation don't matter.  The child-free including me are kind of sick of it all. You can see the pain underneath the angry stances on the Child-free boards.

Families themselves have become idolized, the Duggars with their 19 children are a fertility cult held up as examples to emulate. Otherwise what is special about them beyond the ability to breed so much? Not much. All their grown children seem to be following in the parents footsteps. There's a reason that even after the scandals they kept them on TV.

Some of the child-free do seem overly resentful of crying babies and seem to have Republican stances, that anyone who is poor made "bad choices" and should not have children. I have marveled myself though at extremely poor people having gobs of children, knowing the realities of the welfare system. It doesn't pay out that much anymore and how did they take care of them all? It seems being a parent today would be very hard. American society is not set up to take care of children especially ever since men and woman got caught up in the feminist two for one deal. A workaholic society set up for constant competition and endless moving is not setting up a stable crucible for children. The expectations on parents when there is no extended family or "village" to help out are insane.

It seems a lot of people get into parenthood now knowing what it is all about. I had no such illusions. I worked in day care centers, was a teacher, and was even basically an " in loco parentist" being a group home "family teacher" and residential counselor for several years. I knew babies meant hours and hours of no sleep, puking, clean-ups, constant diaper changing and scary illness. Teens [well I had the most crazed versions of them] meant arguments, confrontations, lack of impulse control and other insanity. Motherhood because of the work I did, didn't have this filmy haze over it of Kodak Moments. I knew parenthood took cash and stamina, I simply never had. Even being infertile all those years, I was doubling up on birth control to hedge my bets. I was on a drug that caused severe birth defects too for over 15 years so that made the vigilance even more important.

In the back of mind too, since I was basically raised by a sociopath with the feelings of a rock, I also knew that parenthood would be more problematic for me. My husband says he thinks I would have been a good mother and marvels still at watching me teach some little kids art once which I did at a volunteer gig.  One odd thing about life now is I spent my 20s surrounded literally by children and teens and now I'm one of those old curmudgeons who definitely doesn't understand the "young" world anymore.

Many of the posts on child-free boards, talk about how people find parenthood to be very hard. They talk about how some parents post on the internet that they didn't know what they were getting into. They are in shock and traumatized about how everything is so complicated. I believe some stances about parenting today have made it more difficult. All the helicopter parenting where one must hover over their child ever second, seems exhausting beyond belief. The constant working and lack of time and ability to have a decent home life, makes having children even harder.  The child-free board are right about the  weird worship of "natural child birth" where in reality in the old days many women died of it, and about the hidden physical effects of giving birth. There is a strain of martyrship in "mommyhood" that seems toxic to the max and it's not about taking care of the kids but about showing off. They rant about the bad parents who don't teach children right from wrong, or in respecting others and enable behavior. In a growing narcissistic society, having calm children who are taught to respect others, is growing far more rare.


Some people have children today for the wrong reasons. It seems some have children so they won't be alone and if you get into it, expecting the kid to meet your needs then it is a recipe for disaster. Some say have children so you are not alone and old! Even that isn't always a guarantee since the kids can move away or die before you or even go no contact if you are a rotten parent. I often wondered thought my own narcissistic parents had children because they "were supposed to" but actually did not enjoy children or their demands. We bothered them. They probably would have been happier people child-free. Maybe not. They needed their trophies. Hopefully now with birth control so common, more people who should not have children won't. A lot of the narcissists out there get disappointed because it seems many believe they will have little Mini-Mes. DNA doesn't work that way. Perhaps some of us ACONs who remained child-free missed a bullet, in giving birth to someone who may have matched the rest of the family or had their tendencies. My DNA connection to my own family is dubious, but I had the thought, "What if I had a kid, and it got the personality of my mother?"

So while I am not technically child-free by choice, one can see the themes out there. Many young people are choosing not to have children because this society is not set up properly anymore for the nurturing of children. They are too broke and poor and can barely take care of themselves. Or if rich enough, they are made to work long hours with everything dedicated to the career. They know having children is very hard today. The money, time and stamina are short in supply even for the healthy and able. The relationships and marriages don't last long enough and in the land of throw-away people, things aren't as stable. Our world and society are growing harder, more cold and difficult to survive in. Having children is not as easy at it used to be and the narcissism is making for children to be treated like trophies, badly educated with negative character training where many people who are without children in society simply don't want to deal with them.

I even think of a bible verse when I think of today's child-free movement:

Luke 21:23 But woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck, in those days! for there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people.

The times have come now where people don't want children. Even as the churches idolize families and judge those without children, this is the reality. The growing narcissism of society has made having children much more difficult as well. So wonder there is even such a thing as the child-free movement. 

Monday, March 28, 2016

All the People in my Apartment Building are Internet Addicts



My attention constantly gets divided because the Wi-Fi goes out every second, I plan to buy a cable that is 20 feet so the laptop in the bedroom can get ethereal cable. I'm done with Wi-Fi. You know something is wrong when there's two-three people for every numbers of apartments with a Wi-Fi account.  At 5:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m., my laptop is inaccessible since they are crowding it. Even turning off the Wi-Fi over and over doesn't work. My building has some elderly people who are home all day like me, a few young families, and a few middle-aged codgers like us.  Maybe there are lots of unemployed people now, who are turning to the internet for solace. The slow grind of the economy on it's burning and crashing may be why everyone is turning into Internet addicts, who stay up all night to argue on message boards or play video games and sleep all day.

If I was healthy I'd probably still have blogs, but I'd be going and doing something and living life. Maybe they have no money and are all unemployed and stuck at home. Maybe there's a secret LAN in here or something of gamers eating up every bandwidth in sight. I'm on the sit up computer on cable now but my time on these is limited because when husband gets home, he needs it for work and to write an article.  If you have ideas about how to fix Wi-Fi, I am open to them.

Saturday, March 26, 2016

Obesity Lies Are Destroying Fat People



This one may anger some size acceptance supporters. While I am against discrimination against fat people I never have been a "fat celebrator". Something is very wrong with so many of us Americans growing so fat, and I stand by my conjecture that the truth is being ignored. The obesity lies rule.



Just like in politics where's there is only two non-choices between the Democrat and Republican parties which both advance tyranny and corporate rule, in the obesity world, we have the diet queens and kings, [aka Fat Logic crowd]  who will tell us it is all a choice, while some of the other side gives us HAES, and tells us we need to "accept and love" being fat.  All I know is being fat sucks. Saying being fat sucks breaks the size acceptance code. Yeah I know it does but there is a place called reality.



I never liked being fat and hate it. I mean this is not a secret on this blog. This has nothing to do with thinking I am ugly. It has everything to do with the sheer mechanics of it all. For me it is not a choice. It causes me pain. When I "exercise" and I do have a rule to take a walk everyday, it means pain, and going off in autopilot just to keep moving and functioning.  Being fat has cost me a lot! I'm never going to sing the joys of fat along with Marilyn Wann. Socio-economically Marilyn Wann never had to worry about stretching a little disability check either.  I will never forget the conversation I had on her forum years and years ago when I was at my peak weight and dying, and given the "size acceptance lines" instead of any empathy. These midsized women can walk, can function, they do not live in my world. Saying you hate being fat and admitting these feelings is not kosher in some areas of the size acceptance world.

This doesn't mean I bow at the feet of the diet industrial complex. Their answers don't work either. Their adherence to CICO like a religion disgusts me. CICO is an absolute joke to me. Some may say "Oh you are an outliner" with your rare fat disorder, but I think it's failing everyone.  I am tired of being called a liar and given a fantasy that does not work. They have their "false religious doctrines" too. They have failed me and millions of others. Diets are like mystery jokes to me. They do not work. I believe even trying to diet severely worsened my diabetes in 2014. I have shrinked down my food even more to control my diabetes and it's been cut down financially and still "nothing". Exercise while I have to do it, just bring more pain and fluids to take off.  In the case of insulin-dependent diabetes, there is no free eating, no pig out a thons if you don't want to die. I had to up the insulin 5 units to stay in the 110-120s for fasting blood sugars.

                                       Why are so many people getting so fat and sick? And why is it to be "accepted" and not fought with "answers" that work?

Given this painful life that has been ruined by fat or  in my case, a rare fat disorder and I still want to pursue an official Dercums diagnosis [one main expert on Lipedema says if you are advanced enough in stage IV, it means Dercums] I don't have much patience with what I see the "normalization" of fat in American society. Just like in politics we are given too non-choices, submit to the diet industrial dreams that don't work for most fat people, or stay fat and be told we have to like it, and "accept it"--the promotion of fat. The two work along aside one another. Sometimes I ask why aren't more fat people like me demanding answers? We are suffering and dying younger. Tight faced grins loving our fat isn't working and the diets are failing. Why am I so alone in this? Why do so few people ask the same questions? 

I guess this is why even the Lipedema world seems hung up on diets, diets, diets to lose "non-Lipedema" fat and specialized liposuction to suck the fluids and fat off still focusing on the fat and on the other hand preaching size acceptance.  Supposedly all these diets from Paleo to Vegan are supposed to rescue me from the ravages of severe Lipedema. How about I'm tired of being fat and get these fluids off me and get my body burning food and working the right way? They work to cure other diseases why not this "rare fat disorder"? There's more to this then the fat, there's the pain, the fat tumors, the fluids, the hormonal imbalances. Wake up people!


Fat people are sliding through the cracks. Being this old, I know people are getting fatter and sicker all over the place. Why is there this acceptance of people getting more fat and sicker, and this being seen as a 'good thing' on one side, and the other side just wants to tell us, it's all our fault, you're not eating and exercising the exact right way! They say "Make changes, and you will be thin", and it's not working!" So we stay fat and we get sicker and are judged and told we are "failing" and one side hates us and thinks we are fat and "lazy losers" and the other side says "Smile, be happy to be fat!" , "Be Fat and Be Proud!","You are a beautiful goddess!" where we have to wear a smile for the rest of the world. "I'm the brave, happy fat woman! I'm an inspiration". Honestly,  I'm sick of it all!

                                                  Sure shame sucks, but as her body grows larger and larger doesn't she want more answers?

There's times I am so angry, I don't even know how to explain it dealing with this garbage.  I am tired of being told I have "control" over this body or that it was my choice and on the other hand being told to "suck it up", "this is your lot" and "you must accept it" is crap too. I spent 17 years of my life trying to get diagnosed with my Lipedema and I almost died several times of sepsis, basically at one point watching a leg almost rot off and my stomach and yes there was the taint of the sweet smell of gangrene around it all. I spent my 20s and 30s constantly in the hospital being told this was "my fault". I know some people read this blog thinking I am a crazy woman, but why don't I get in line and join size acceptance and "be happy to be fat" or shut up and go on some diet and "lose weight". Well the diets don't work and aren't working and I'm fighting all the time not to gain and to be able to walk at all and I lost 180lbs years ago which kept me alive but am still super-fat and while I will stand against fat discrimination, I wonder where my heroes are. Why am I the only one out there saying FIX THIS!!!!!!!!!!! instead of ACCEPT IT?

Obesity past a certain point causes health problems, and what I am seeing is the two non-answers united together. As sick as I am, I don't mind when people say things like "no body shame", I don't want to be shamed and blamed anymore but something seems weird with Whitney sitting there wearing that shirt. Obviously she has to know being fat is ruining her life as an dancer. In her case she has PCOS, but maybe some demands for better treatment would serve women with PCOS better then doing the "The Don't Shame Me" Size acceptance dance". She is still at a functional weight but very close to a weight where she could easily tip over into disability. As she ages, her body will be in for some hurt. This is not to put her down but it is reality. We need more reality and truth when it comes to obesity. Authoritarian demands that don't work paired with focusing on the "feelings" as people's bodies break down isn't cutting it. Pushing denial as if fat was a comfortable state to be in, especially in higher weights just betrays people like me.

                                        How many healthy 500lb people do you know? This applies to the midsized but not to people like me.

Fat people have dealt with enough of that, but what about the question, "Why are we growing so fat?" "Why are our bodies growing more huge and the proscribed diets and lifestyles failing?"  Why is the automatic answer to the diet industrial failures-- "put up with our breaking down bodies without demanding real answers?"

 I believe we are being fattened up and while some can argue it's by design, where some would shout "Be quiet you tin-hatters!", it can be mere human malfeasance, stupidity, greed and the outcome of the growing toxins of modern day life. All I know is the push to NORMALIZE fat bothers me especially as people grow larger and sicker, it worries me. It's like we are all going to be squashed to death between the fat celebrators and the fat diet industrial myth makers. There's a lot being ignored in our industrial society except by a few researchers. When I found out years ago they fattened up cattle by giving them antibiotics, I thought what about human beings?

                                           Ever notice size 22 is okay but cross the size 26 Rubicon and there's no more clothes to be bought in stores?

So between the "normalization" and "acceptance"."promotion" of fat and the diet lies, I have felt squashed.  HAES to me meant a death sentence and "acceptance" of a body that almost led to my death by my late 20s. The diet industrial complex has failed me too.

Some questions:

1. Do you think people in the 1950s had to starve, diet, and sweat over every lettuce leaf to be a "normal weight?" They just lived and their body worked. As I have written before, take a look at old pictures of crowds, fat people are rare even "average" people are far smaller and more slight. Do you believe the mind control antics now that tell us the thin are all thin because they diet and exercise and never eat anything "bad" and are all thin because they are more moral and "harder-working" people? Remember while there was weight lifting gyms in the 50s, this was prior to the days of Richard Simmons and Jane Fonda and aerobics clubs. The whole world is getting more fat.  Soon almost our entire population will be fat. Almost half now classify as obese:



2. Have you ever wondered why there are so many fat people now where people in the 300s are "normal"? Back in the old days, even 300 used to be rare. You were told you were on death's door. Now 300 is considered a "small-fat". I remember being 230lbs and being treated like I was a giant and now 230 is "near normal" and barely anyone blinks an eye at it.  Have you ever asked yourself why people are growing so huge and what in the hell is wrong? Remember if you are new to this blog, I am a woman that reached near 700lbs and am now around 500. When I go out in public, I see fat people all over the place, there's still plenty of thin ones, but at least half are "fat" fat. This is unprecendented in human history.



3. Did everyone wake up one day and decide to be lazy? People still have to clean their houses, go to work, walk in large stores and walk to do other things. People had cars in the 1950s and some labor saving devices. Some buy the lie that people of our modern era are lazy and don't want to do anything and that is why everyone has grown fatter. Before I had my massive weight gain, I loved to walk for miles. I never was home. I was ACTIVE.  There is less leisure but more people are working. Much of our fattening working class are forced to work on their feet in factories and other manual labor jobs. I got fat even working at a residential counselor job that required hours on my feet, walking around, shopping, cleaning and driving clients around to various appointments and home visits. One thing I have noticed is even the working class people who work on their feet, sweeping the factory floors or cleaning up houses still are fatter then the thinner upper classes.

4. Do you think I have the right to be angry? That I am being lied to? That fat people should demand real answers instead of nothing but lies and fantasy? I'm not losing weight on less food and I'm in pain today from walking a lot the last two days.  What else am I supposed to do?  There's aspects of the fat acceptance movement I agree with, but as people know here I have spoken out against a lot of the false ideology too. Too much of the size acceptance world with it's "healthy" midsized people, lies to me just as much as the diet mongers who tell me if I eat "the right way" that my body will change into a more normal body. Fat people deserve better and I am sick of it.




Friday, March 25, 2016

Thursday, March 24, 2016

Ways & Means Chair Describes Plans to Cut Social Security



House Ways & Means chairman Kevin Brady (R-TX) describes planned cuts Social Security by raising the retirement age to 70--a 21% benefit cut--implementing means testing to cut additional benefits, and using the chained CPI to further reduce benefits.

You know they want the retirement age at 70 but do you know how hard it is even for a 50 something to get a job? They of course have no plans to make rules when it comes to the job system making work more likely for older people. Oh they'll never remove the cap where the very rich don't even pay into the system. A 21 percent cut means you would see millions of homeless disabled people in the streets. I would be homeless if they cut it by that much. Does anyone wonder why I hate the Republican party and left churches that worshipped at the altar of these guys? Both parties suck but one is sucking worse in my book lately.

 I have told people avoid going on disability if you can do it. There was this one guy I knew who was applying and I didn't think he was disabled at all, and they'd laugh him out of the disability office. I said to him, "Why do you want to go on disability? It means forever poverty. It means you will be poorer then dirt. Our checks are nearly worthless now because they starting cutting cost of living about 10 years ago, and we do not get those increases according to inflation like we used to."  I believe this is going to get worse. If you can work at all, keep your job if it pays more then minimum wage. In my case if I had kept working I would have died.  Everyone who becomes disabled dreams of becoming un-disabled, and even I had those hopes and dreams but the lungs got worse. When I was in my early 30s, I dreamed of getting my body back together.

The housebound times and rest make it impossible. I was in bed for 2 days just from daring to sit up too long from a church conference. It gets scary. I took my walks and just managed to get my sugar down with an insulin increase, but all I do is maintain the status quo, it seems I never can get things "better".  In America where they want happy endings to every problem, being disabled this long can bring a special sort of shame people want to unload on you. The fat thing adds a whole other dimension to it.

I woke up with dread this morning from my lungs getting tight just because the temperature dropped by 25 degrees. My lung medicine fixed this but COPD is a progressive disease. It reminded me of the years where I was always short of breathe and panicking every other second just because I could barely breath.  Sometimes I think these rich Republicans are a bunch of monsters, they make it like disabled people are all living high on the hog and always turn to us first to cut the disability checks. No most disabled people are at barely surviving standards of living.

If they do a 21 percent cut, and I can breath outside that week, I will go and sit in front of the local Republican Congressman's office with a protest sign. This guy is one of the silver spoons in the mouth types who hate the disabled and poor just as much. They'll vote in more money for war and more money to be handed to a plethora of foreign nations. They'll outsource more jobs and then allow full and rampant age and health discrimination so someone like my husband can't get a good working class or middle class job ever. So I don't think much of these guys not at all.

If Trump becomes president, the disabled are going to be in for it. 

Nothing Done


This one made me laugh. Time whizzes by for me. It is a strange thing. People imagine someone who is disabled staring at the wall and bored to tears. Hey taking care of myself, takes as much work as when I had a job for a short time taking care of disabled people at home. Around here they got us buried in so much paperwork, there's something always to be done. I wish I was better at housework. It would be nice to see a gleaming apartment but I get one corner done and I am tired.

Are You Fat Because You Don't Do Enough Housework?

Poverty


Tuesday, March 22, 2016

Third World Guilt-Tripping


Hmm "Falling Down", anyone remember that movie? My husband has lived that tale as far as the job losses went. Of course in that movie, the guy goes nuts and go on a crime spree through Los Angeles. He is disaffected and thrown away by his wife, and society. This is a story that played out millions of times after that movie was aired. Sadly this movie had some bad messages in it, with a divide and conquer message in it. Maybe this is a favorite movie of today's Trump voters. Trump sent the jobs overseas too which they ignore.

Even if our car dies and I have to hitchhike to go anywhere, I will keep the rent paid with two-thirds of my disability check. I'm tired of this feeling of deer in the headlights feeling all the narcissists took advantage of for so long. Maybe we will be able to dig ourselves out again if the car engine only needs a minor repair, but it get's exhausting.  I found out our local shelter is full and also has plenty of bed bugs, and denied two local newly homeless people a place to sleep, but life in America is great isn't it? We are all supposed to be happy as larks to be born in such a wonderful, great and wealthy country? Right? Oh I guess I'm the crazy one.


                              Problems for rich suburbanites but not for a lot of America

Hearing rich people sneer about "first world problems" got on my nerves long ago. I'm sick of those third world guilt trippers, who tell me that I  and others "have it so good" in America.  Most of them go on their expensive church or other vacations worth thousands of dollars alone for the air fare to "serve" various impoverished nations and do so with an air of smugness and treating other human beings like charity projects and pets.

They have been brainwashed by false pastors and other cultural pundits to hate and disdain their own poor countrymen. Otherwise why are the religious ones hobnobbing around the entire globe instead of helping plenty of the poor who live right in their own towns? While I live in a decent apartment, I can't really afford, there's shacks right outside of the local discount store, there's falling down houses with broken windows and trash in the yard on the 'bad" side of the river.  I don't mind some real missionary work but it makes you wonder when every middle class and above church in town goes several thousands of miles overseas instead of helping people right in their own back yard. Am I the only one even seeing these people or seeing that they exist?

 I remember I made this one pastor angry at a local Baptist church I visited, when he told us he went to Jamaica every year with the youth group. I said, "Aren't there enough poor people around here to help?" He was mad. That was a rich church where you heard about all their overseas trips constantly. Another pastor at a reformed church I went to go see a community video at, had endless blown up "vacation photos" of Nicaragua all up and down the hall way from the church sanctuary to the bathrooms. I notice they never go anywhere cold, or boring to go preach the gospel, let's say like Siberia or Iceland, there's always a beach very close by the place and plenty of pineapples to eat.

Many do seem to see third world people as their "pets" and unload "pity" on them like all third world people would even like to live like brainwashed, over-pressurized Americans with their 80 hour work-weeks, gadgets and mind slavery.  In some cases, they patronize them as "noble savages" and who are "closer to the earth" and other New Age nonsense.  Some Americans are very naive about the world thinking that other cultures and societies are run like Western societies.

                                         "Plan for a New American Century democracy"

 Even all the nonsense however about selling "democracy" worldwide with neo-con wars became a joke, as freedom grew in far shorter supply at home.  So even the right wingers were guilty of that garbage! What "democracy?" Is life in America the best? They always tell us that. Maybe it used to be "better". This idea that life in all other countries is total hell compared to this place seems to be a myth they sell us.

Sure there are many bad places, I am not interested in taking a vacation to Haiti, or hanging out in Saudi Arabia, or other nations where there has been war or natural disasters or famine. Cable TV and a CPAP machine aren't going to be possibilities in some nations.  Those are realities of life but there is one weird thing in America where they seem to tell young people here, that America is so superior and like all third world people and "developing" nation people live in shacks. A visit to Google Earth will tell you that is a false hood. I even found African forums where they pictured African cities [not South Africa], and it changed my view of the place. They had cell phones, cafe's and skyscrapers. The American lens of the world is one formed by much propaganda. If one reads enough articles that tell the truth about life in America, when compared to Western nations alone this place is way at the back of the line when it comes to social safety nets and other benefits.

                                                                          The Heritage foundation wants you walking 10 miles to your minimum wage job each way

The globalism of our elites is something that has been infused through out society. There's no more loyalty to their own country. They see the world as their oyster and now you see this among some groups of wealthier people in America. There is a really creepy attitude among the middle class and above of America where poor Americans are told they are "losers" and "failed" in a system that is supposedly "fair" and a "meritocracy"

We are told over and over from right through the left, that the poor in America live far better then the rest of the world and often any complaining poor people in America are shamed, and told to be silent and well, "you don't have it as bad as that other country or the third world."  They have been trained to have no empathy for poor Americans of all races, and because poor Americans may have access to a bit more food and running water,  they tell them they need to shut up even if they live in a dangerous place full of gangs where they risk getting their head shot off just by walking out the door or are unable to get medical care.  The Heritage Foundation which wants more money to go overseas will do articles on how the American poor are spoiled for having refrigerators and microwaves. I guess our poor are supposed to start building fires out in parking lots to cook their beans, and to go shopping every day which costs more money. I lived without a refrigerator for about two months in Chicago and it was NOT fun. With no public transportation in many areas, how are the poor supposed to get all those lauded Republican jobs they can pluck off trees?

These types ignore our worsening ghettos and dying rural areas full of extremely poor people living in shacks. An entire park in my old town was full of homeless people who lived incognito. Even when I have told them I lived in extreme poverty years ago, it's almost like they don't believe it. This is because the poor in America are hidden now.

These are the type of people who rolled their eyes at me when I was in the most severe poverty of my life. I know my fat body brought more prejudice instead of appearing as a woeful thin waif. They told me things like, "You have it better then those in the third world" and one told me "At least you have that package of ramen noodles for lunch, in the third world, an entire family of 4 would have to share that entire package of ramen noodles."  It's always the Poverty Olympics and the American poor always lose because richer Americans have been taught not to have empathy for their own country men.

Political correctness almost demands that the American be self-flagellating and apologetic just for existing and if poor even more so.  Some of this stuff, to be frank is probably about getting Americans to accept their dying economy out of guilt.  The decline of America is hidden and accepted all at the same time while the elites clean out the tills. Endless false guilt over poverty in the world makes for more acceptable and worsening poverty here. The churches outside of a few, are far less interested in helping people in their own back yard and do seminars on "living the best life now" and bringing in people like David Ramsey where expendable income is a given.



I don't see the globalists as a "friend" to third world nations. If anything third world farmers and people are in a lot more trouble when American or other mega-corporations come in with their "terminator seeds" and Monsanto foods.  Nations end up under the yoke of UN NGOs, mega-corporations and Monsanto under the guise of "humanitarian missions". Even on this blog, I have shown articles where it showed in all "developing nations" where they let in American fast food, people started fattening up right away when before they ate and lived like normal. Is that due to laziness? New sloth? Or is there something wrong with the food?

I actually lived with filthy water and having my butt kicked just to go out into my local neighborhood just at the wrong time of the day. Gun shots would ring out from the down the street. People who think American life is a blur of going to the mall, nice corporate jobs and getting their nails done need to get a clue. Life is not like that for many Americans. I think many live in a bubble where they ignore what they see right around them. Maybe that's why so many think the economy is just fine with multitudes of empty store fronts all over the place. This is the same people who do lectures about how life is so tough in the third world and who have shamed me for daring to speak out for better.

Life is getting harder and harder in America. Yesterday while in my Flexitouch, I read this article about some Syrian refugees coming here in New York Times magazine and one thing that stood out, is they were talking about how expensive everything was here and how survival was so tough. They seemed immensely shocked and surprised. Well the American propaganda goes out to the rest of the world where the streets of gold are found to be streets of iron.  The man's son even said in the article he was going to stay in Europe because survival was so hard on the rest of the family in America. Many immigrants are not told how life really is here in America. People are given the fantasy propaganda lies. Life in America has got much harder. While life in Syria is really bad now since the neo-cons never let up on their war-making and got their Plan For a New American Century war, I've met other immigrants personally who came here and saw the American dream was a lie.

My immigrant in-laws died destitute. Life for them probably would have been better if they had stayed put. My MIL became ill young so that ended their chances here. I also met people in Chicago because I lived in a very poor neighborhood full of people just off the boat. One Taxi driver actually said to me direct, "I got gypped, I never expected life here to be so hard, this is the land of false promises." and this was way back in the 1990s. That particular man was from a "third world" island. he told me he regretted coming here.

Things I have heard from immigrants is that:

1. America is violent
2. It is really expensive and one can barely make a living.
3. All Americans do is work and they are not very social and don't enjoy life. One lady I met who came to America from Portugal told me she cried and cried for months because people were so cold in America.

So is life so bad in the third world? I do believe I could have been a happier person born into a third world nation as long it was one where water was available and not at war or famine. There were problems with my upbringing where I was not prepared at all for how the world really worked. Maybe life would have been simpler and my health would have been better not destroyed by toxins and less poisoning by GMOs and with the high degree of stress. Obviously severe obesity is a worse American problem, one simply does not see the degree of obesity that America has in other nations. Even if I still had Lipedema, I probably would have not advanced to such a severe stage.

There would be less autoimmune disease, expectations, pressure and stress in a society that was so competitive which really did not fit my personality. I would be allowed to be a human being and treated as an equal among my other poor peers or even if I was poor and oppressed would have other poor people around me who were in the same boat. [The silencing and isolation of the poor in American society is it's own problem]. I could even still have a family though narcissism and evil is a worldwide problem, depending on the culture I could have been ostracized over. People in third world nations often have more skills to live off the land, hunt and to fish and to take care of themselves. While some suffer like being forced to live in slavery or living in a factory dorm in China, there is usually more community. Many peoples of the world get to enjoy having a culture and a heritage too.

 Sure nations at war, and with extreme violence exist who suffer immensely, but America is not the easiest nation to live in anymore. Some even believe that America is now slipping into a third world status economically.

Don't get me wrong, I believe there were many goods things about America. There was some idea of justice and helping the poor and disabled years ago where they re busy chipping away at it all. Anyone who believes that either is enjoying life in the upper middle class and above or doesn't realize what some of their fellow country-men are suffering. Americans have been so brainwashed by the message that America is the RICHEST nation in the world and the BEST, 'rah-rah' USA jingoism, they haven't even paid attention to how life quality in the "greatest nation in earth has sunk like a rock!

 They have done studies showing that life is happier elsewhere.

"Citizens of poor countries are the happiest in the world. 

Gallup discovered that citizens of the poorest countries were the happiest. The list of the happiest countries was topped by El Salvador, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Trinidad and Tobago. What is the secret of Hispanic happiness?

People were asked five questions, all about the ways they spent the previous day. They were asked whether they felt joy, whether they felt rested, and how often they laughed and smiled. In addition, the researchers asked whether their interviewees felt respected by their peers, as well as whether they learned something new the day before.

According to Gallup, the happiest people were the citizens of El Salvador, Panama and Paraguay. The top ten included 7 countries in Latin America - in addition to the above, Venezuela, Ecuador, Guatemala and Costa Rica. Russia, however, did not even make it to the top one hundred of the happiest countries, occupying one of the lowest spots (along with Iran and Algeria).

The US came 33rd, tied with Chile, China, Sweden and Swaziland. Canada, Netherlands, Ireland and Denmark, meanwhile, all cracked the top 20.
-

Third world nations are happier then USA.

 So the people who do the third world guilt trips on me, well it doesn't work anymore. 


This one was kind of shocking...

Income Inequality Is Worse in America Than in Most of Africa
No less an authority than the CIA World Factbookdeclares that income inequality is more severe in the U.S. than it is nearly everywhere in West Africa, North Africa, and Asia.

Sunday, March 20, 2016

Eighteenth Century Cooking





This looks like fun, even 50 year old cookbooks are a new world, but going back 200-300 years is a whole other ball game. Reading very old cookbooks can quite an interesting on it's own so these guys cooking the recipes for real is kind of neat.

A Good Quote

Got this quote from my seminar yesterday...

"Grace only sticks to imperfections. If you cannot accept your imperfection, you cannot accept grace."--Donald Miller. 

A Harsh Reality of Lipedema



I went to an annual community seminar yesterday, it is a seminar that a local Christian counseling center puts on and they do great workshops on living better, counseling and other issues. They offer scholarships to go for people like me so it is free. I plan to post some information here, that I learned at this conference, but I had to sit up for several hours, and well my body is worrying me. I don't regret going, not at all! However, the pain I endured was so extreme. The Lipo-lymphedema aspect of my illness is just so out of control.

This means the body swells as a WHOLE. 

My legs were compressed and Flexitouch took off much of the leg and stomach fluids at night, but it's like just from sitting up my body wants to break down and put me in immense pain. I am far more free of infections then I used to be, and it doesn't grow bigger and bigger like it once did, but it is a constant battle.

Even my arms and hands bloat and face and the rest of me grows bigger. Well remember I wrote that physical therapists and nurses saw these constant changes which helped get me to the diagnosis in the first place. I am in bed today, I did get up to do my insulin, clean out my lung nebulizer and use it, shower, and put dinner in the crock-pot, and make sandwiches for lunch, and wash some mini-peppers to eat with the sandwiches but I have to make up just for sitting up for more then several hours yesterday and going to this conference. Some walking in a very large church was required too of me down various halls. [Just 6 years ago going to this conference would have been impossible, my walking stamina would have been way too low.] People were good to me for my disabilities and the people moved around certain chairs and benches I sat on more comfortably.

There is something I am realizing about myself.

I have spent years in physical pain, and I have had to learn to suck it up and hide the physical pain so long. I wonder what it has done to my personality. Sometimes I am hoping even as I am enjoying conversations with nice people, that I am doing a good enough job hiding it, but I think they can tell. That's what worries me.

Sometimes when one has spent years and years in physical pain, you go on an autopilot of sorts. Autopilot for me, means I am tuning my body out and there are a lot of days I have to live this way where there is no choice. When I can tell the plane is about to crash and the pilot check out, I have to force myself into bed for the whole day. Sometimes this seems to be happening lately more then I want. It worries me. I was so exhausted I actually slept 12 hours straight without waking up. Those kind of sleep hours are increasing too.

This can be a very hard disease to have in a culture that would judge me for being "lazy" forced to live this way from a rare and hardly understood disease.

Friday, March 18, 2016

Time Passes So Fast


Time does pass fast. I feel like my 30s whizzed by and now my 40s are sliding out of my fingers. My old classmates are grandparents. Most of them got lives. Even the day when I used to be an art teacher and full of hope and excited to move to Chicago seem so far away.

One wants to use and grasp what time they can. I fantasize about things I want to do but they all would require giving up paying rent. There was one winter's day I kept blathering on about seeing New Mexico for the first time. There's times lately where I think throw it to the wind and find somewhere new to go. I miss my days of youth when I could walk in the woods. I wish I had been more adventurous and gone more places.

 If you are young and reading this, don't be an old lady full of regrets like me. Don't let people tell you just work brain dead minimum wage jobs and to have no life. The memories that give me solace, I have noticed are all the art, nature, friends, love, concerts and times in my old town. We know we have to change something to end the 9 year rut. There's only so much time left.  I can't sit here just growing old and want to make something of the few years I got left.

When People Talk to You this Way: Run!




I'm going to include altered actual quotes from various abusers, gaslighters and toxic "ex-friends" I got away from.

This list will also serve me as a reminder when to run away from someone and not waste any more time. As I cleaned out the narcissistic stable, it was a LOT of people. All I know is anyone new coming into my life better not talk to me this way!

1. When people patronize you....RUN!

"It is perfectly good for you to be at the level of understanding you are at"

2. When people tell you that what you tell them is not true and gaslight you on behalf of narcissists....RUN!

"In all honesty I have not seen the negative behavior towards you that you say has happened"

3.When people tell you to move on and discount your feelings....RUN!

"So I don't hold it against them for that. Deal with it, get over it, move on"

"I choose a long time ago to not let it bother me, they are who they are."

4.  When people use God to abuse or talk of deliverance or promised phony miracles....RUN

"Deliverance is for the desperate. Only those desperate enough to do what God tells them to do qualify for this miracles. If you are convinced you are doing what God requires of you then I'm not going to say anything about it. The Bible says work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Fasting and prayer is how we examine ourselves. If you knew me at all, you would know how often I do this."

5. These quotes speaks for themselves...RUN!

"I wish I could lend you my eyes to see yourself from my angle"

"I am real, you are real, just like Velveteen Rabbit"--said to me by suspected catfisher.

6. When someone calls you a bully merely for defending yourself.....Run!

"The Bully always deflects blame"


I've been in for it, as far as some people I have dealt with recently. Please God send me some nice ones! I do know some nice people who don't tell me things like the above.

One thing I do need to change is I am too quiet when people start talking trash to me. I need to stand up quicker and not let things go by while trying to be nice. ACONs can be trained too easily to sit there quiet for nonsense and trying to make nice with cruel and lying people.  Also avoid people who constantly tell you they are busy, they don't have time for you, do not make it for them.




"Thin Wankers"


Double click to enlarge....

Her facebook wall is public and I am NOT a friend. I happened to see this, I think it was Fat Logic and then went to check out her wall and read some of the public posts.

I understand those "Why am I so fat, I hate the world!" days....but sheesh, the day I start staring at thin people hating them for being smaller then me, is the day it'd all be over for me. A 300lb woman is "thin to me".

I'm sure my Facebook wall has embarrassing stuff on it too but this one surprised me.

Peep Goes Grocery Shopping




It's mind boggling how much everything costs now. And the healthier it is, the more it costs. Why is that? Is everything so adulterated that they have to up the price on the food? This time around I did not go to the discount grocery store. Some of the foods are okay at the discount grocery store but the meats and some items are not the same quality and there is less choice. I also was not visiting the Mexican grocery store which I go to usually at least once a month for a full week or two worth of food.  So this was an occasional shopping trip to a regular mainstream suburban store:

Some of the decisions and thoughts going through my mind as I grocery shopped today:

1. I can't afford that cereal it's an extra. The lactase milk will cost me at least 3.49. The decent cereals are all 6.00 dollars a box or more.

2. Three bags of broccoli slaw for 5 dollars? Well I'll take two, five dollars is too much to spend on one item. Those 10 for 10 dollar deals are insane and no help to anyone whose not middle class and above because who has 10 dollars for one item to spend.

3. The bag of mandarin oranges was 5.99, it costs the same as Aldis too, well I have a few left over at home, I better wait.

4. $10.00 dollars for a pound of boneless skinless chicken thighs? What do they think we are millionaires? I bought the non-skinless ones and thought well, I'll just cook them down.

5. Why are onions a dollar each now? Are they insane?

6. While looking at some veggie patties and their ingredients to help husband with his gout..."What on earth is mycroproteins? "Mycroproteins are 41% of this product". If I don't know what it is, I don't feel like eating it! Is it something to do with mushrooms? Who wants to have to check scientific manuals while grocery shopping?  I didn't buy any vegetable patties. They wanted 7.99 for a box of ones with recognizable ingredients and I couldn't afford those.

7. Why is there only one roll of frozen ground turkey in this entire store? Did a legion of housewives battle each other to the death for the cheapest meat in the place for 1.99?

8. Why do recipes call for so many ingredients? Basil, fennel, and all that junk is extra money. I was thinking of a bean soup recipe I had seen from the other day to make with some dry beans I had left over.

9. Hmm I just need an inch piece of that ginger to flavor the dish I am planning.

10. This turkey lunch meat is expensive too, but it tastes far better then that salt-filled stuff I buy at the discount grocery store. Maybe I'll bloat up less.

I ended up buying a bag of carrots, celery, 1 large round turnip to use for a soup, a head of lettuce, a piece of ginger, 2 things of green onions, 2 bags of broccoli slaw, some cheap eggs, some organic eggs, a pound and half of turkey lunch meat, whole wheat bread, chicken thighs, a small piece of beef to cut up for stir fry, a couple other meats, a small piece of pork to do the same, lactase milk, cottage cheese, other chicken,  bean thread noodles, a hunk of real parmesan cheese, a box of spaghetti, a big bag of those little peppers that are red orange and yellow, one green pepper, husband's frozen French fries--I'm allergic to potatoes, European brand butter--it was cheaper then regular, mayonnaise, salad dressing, canned tomatoes, shampoo, toilet paper and detergent. It sent us back over 100 bucks. Grocery shopping isn't easy. I know it is getting harder and harder for people out there. I have to cook a lot, and frozen foods make me feel crummy. The only aisle of the grocery store I go out of the perimeter for is when I bought the spaghetti and canned tomatoes.

Gaslit: A Poem

Thursday, March 17, 2016

This Meme Bugs Me

 
The dumbing down is true. Common core married to the Idiocracy with lots of distraction, it's one reason the plebes are ready to vote for the sociopathic billionaire and his Monsanto loving, mega-corporatist on the other side, isn't much better. They are fattening us up too. I kind of hate this meme because it implies people become "fat" because they are being dumbed down. Like intelligence will make people less "fat"? No, it's the sick society, toxins and "empty food".

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

No More Posts on the "Family"

Watch out Calvin that list of jerks can get kind of long!

It's time to be done. I will still write about narcissism in general among other topics on the blog but there will be no more tales of Queen Spider, Mini-Me and her brainwashed minions who never deviated from her scripts.  I'm walking away for good. I'm done. Filling my brain with some people I haven't even seen in 7-10 years is a bit much.  

While I may write about narcissism in general, I plan to take the blog into other topics, including the obesity topics I have always continued with and cultural ones. Hopefully I can post more artwork too. I'm done writing about the family and my mother. It's time to get them out of my mind. I have thrown my hands up on the whole affair. I am finished with the whole lot.  My comic has references to my life experiences so that will be an exception but I know I have to be done. If anything new crazy happens against my will, I also will share, but the close-out has to be final now. Legally I do not have to talk to or deal with anyone I do not want to. 

No Contact recovery can be thwarted if you let too many flying monkeys into your space. My brother served as a messenger boy for my mother without fail. On that last phone call when he told me my aunt had died, he gave me the whole "get over it" line and "get back in line" spiel. He couldn't admit my mother had done anything wrong, he knows what side his bread is buttered on I guess.  None of them will ever listen. They all believe in and are attached to the whole sick system. Watching my aunt even in death be labeled "rebel" and "black sheep" told me the time to walk was long over due. My grief has been great.  The betrayals have sunk to a new low. I guess you can tell I won't be attending the memorial service. 

I also spent enough time trying to get some of them to "listen". It was impossible.  There was no removing them from the brainwashing of my mother and her fellow narcissists. Some were the most brain dead withholding people on the planet. If any of them see this blog they can have fun one day reading about themselves.  I'm a stranger to so many and most believed the smear campaigns. We are all strangers. No more wasting time on them. No more cards that are ignored to stranger nieces and nephews, no more trying to communicate to blank walls, no more trying.

I have to get my life together and find a better place to be.  I can't fix this dwelling on them anymore. 

Charlie

 I sometimes think the nicest most genuine people are the least liked among the "crowd". I know rejection has hurt me badly. Even with the "fake friends" "rejecting" me it hurt. There's too many hurts. Well there are still some who love me. Charlie Brown was always the sweetest one.

Sunday, March 13, 2016

Anti-Establishment?



This reminds me of the pictures of Bush #1 golfing with Bill Clinton.

Why Hipsters Aren't Liked




The Lonely Poverty




The Lonely Poverty of America's White Working Class

Yeah, I complain a lot about being poor on here. It's not easy.

"The larger context of this isolation and alienation is America’s culture of individualism. It, too, can worsen the despair. Taken to an extreme, self-reliance becomes a cudgel: Those who falter and fail have only themselves to blame. They should have gotten more education. They should have been more prepared. On this score, too, the U.S. deviates from other wealthy nations. America’s frontier spirit of rugged individualism is strong, and it manifests itself differently by race and education level, too. White Americans, for instance, are more likely to see success as the result of individual effort than African Americans are (though not Hispanics). The less educated, particularly less-educated whites, also share this view to a disproportionate degree."

They are right about the isolation and alienation in the American culture of individualism. Get out your bootstraps! As they destroy the job market and options to survive, they have told us at the same time, "It's all your fault!". What a set up! I believe while other races suffer more hideous things, including racism itself, among whites being poor, it can mean more shame especially if we were born into a higher class and sunk down the ladder. The attitudes are different in some minority communities, more people admit the system is broken, they do not see the poor as at fault but the outcome of injustice in society.

"As organized labor in this country has withered, an extreme individualism has stepped in as the alternative—a go-it-alone perspective narrowly focused on getting an education and becoming successful on one’s own merit. This works well for some, but for others—especially the two-thirds of Americans over the age of 25 who don’t have a bachelor’s degree—it often means getting mired in an economy of contract work, low pay, and few, if any, benefits. These prospects suggest that this is an age of diminished expectations for the working class."

I am a huge union supporter. The extreme individualism has lent itself to extreme social Darwinism and all those libertarian types. Yes some unions went corrupt but the working man has been oppressed via the destruction of unions. The contract work is being foisted on the college educated now too.

This is one thing that hasn't hit the notice of the chattering classes. It's impacting the college crowd too. They are downgrading and outsourcing everything. Even the pay for transcription and some online work my husband does has gone down in the last few years. This is the outcome of globalization. There's only contract work, lowering pay and no benefits.

"Yet there is clearly more to the despair of the working class than empty wallets and purses. Patches of the social fabric that once supported them, in good times and bad, have frayed. When asked in national surveys about the people with whom they discussed “important matters” in the past six months, those with just a high-school education or less are likelier to say no one (this percentage has risen over the years for college graduates, too). This trend is troubling, given that social isolation is linked to depression and, in turn, suicide and substance abuse. "

 Often the working class are forced to move often, trying to move up, trying to get decent jobs, or even just to survive.  Moving all the time breaks social ties. Definitely. When you are poor in America, the culture here is one of shame and being hidden away. The poor are hidden away, always at the side of life. Some of us fake it and "pretend" but then you can't really talk about your life in depth with people. You nod and smile as they talk about vacations, shopping and other pursuits. The cultural precepts are that if you are poor, you HIDE IT. My real life does not share the outspokenness on this blog.

The poor especially in white American culture, are trained to hide their distress. Sure you can tell very close friends but even there you can be hurt and told if you end up with any false friends, that your emotions and faults have bought you the poverty to begin with. Poor people are told, "If you only you tried harder", If only you weren't so afraid", If only you made better choices". You are told over and over that you are a "bad" person in various ways. I've heard it all!

We saw this happening to other communities where no prospects for jobs and severe poverty destroyed inner city lives. I remember telling people years ago after my time in the ghetto, that when the USA economy continued it's descent, that family-break-up, gangs, depression, and drug-use would become prevalent everywhere else.

The common factor I saw in my social work travels, was economic hopelessness. It was part of my own life too. They were told to "try harder" too and were the canaries in the coal mine for the coming economic devastation that very few listened to.  The elites have unleashed the dogs of oppression now on the white working class that was more reserved for other groups. Sadly some are lined up thinking a racist sociopathic billionaire will save them! Others don't realize that the politicians are all about lining their pockets, and that both parties support and advocate the globalism that has destroyed the USA economy.

This sort of isolation was common among the people I talked to. Many said their faith was helping them get through their ongoing troubles, yet they rarely or never went to church. Some felt ashamed to be around people because they were out of work. For others, their religious belief was somewhat a source of self-help, rather than a source of community. For example, one of the workers I interviewed said that being out of work for so long had filled him with a constant rage. To calm his mind, every night he would pick up his Bible and read a dozen verses. He had given up on the church and what he described as its superficial ways. “I want to go to hear the Word—I don’t want to go to see what you’re wearing,” says the man, 53 and from Flint, Michigan. The other way he copes is going outside for a smoke.

This article admits that isolation.  I noticed in this article they said many had faith but no longer went to church. That is definitely is my experience. While there is some charity to be had in the church world mostly given to the "OTHER" instead of those within the church body, most of the evangelical world is invested in shaming and oppressing the poor, with their love of Republican politicians who have brainwashed them to believe poor people are failures, and "immoral".

The churches are geared towards the middle class and above and focused on getting tithes for the middle class and above pastors to maintain their lifestyles. I understand the rage of the guy turning to the Bible. Being poor can make you angry, and the longer it lasts the more frustrated you get. The feelings of low self esteem and being called a "loser" can mix into a toxic stew of rage, and despair.  It puts even the most strong Christian to the test. One reason Walter White was so appealing to the masses is because there is a guy who literally got barrels of money but then if Walter White was real, he definitely would be burning in hell. I am glad God's Word has helped him in calming down. There is a lot in the Bible about how the wicked prosper in this world and how oppression of the poor is a given but give the poor hope to press on. If not for my Bible or God, I'd probably be across the street now getting drunk at the bar with my few last dollars or would have given up.

One form of social support that many in the working class are going without is marriage. I’m reminded of another worker I interviewed, a jobless 54-year-old white woman who used to work at a Ford plant. Her husband left her, she says, when the paychecks stopped coming. “Jesus Christ,” she told him once. “I didn’t think that our relationship was based on the amount of money that I brought in.” Unable to pay her mortgage, she lost her home and had to move in, as she puts it, with a “man friend.” She is depressed, unable to sleep at night, and constantly worried about falling into poverty. “I’m a loser,” she says.

Marriage is under extreme stress when you are poor. Many poor people cannot find mates. I have been told to divorce because my husband is so poor, and to get someone who can really support me and who has a stable income. Those messages hurt more then they helped.

Some people will leave people over poverty and seeing no future, hoping to find a mate that will give them a chance at a "better life" I have seen many divorces happen because women were unhappy with men who faced chronic unemployment and/or unemployment. Many men who cannot find secure work, never marry and now this can apply to women as well. I feel sad for this woman above, I have heard these stories over and over. I noticed the "family-first" evangelicals ignore this stuff, they never look at the broken jobs as a causation for the failing families but they are.

"But it’s important to note that there is an economic dimension to these trends, too—as the frequent separations and divorces I saw among the long-term unemployed made plain to me. Those struggling financially are less likely to follow the traditional path of first comes marriage, then comes a baby. And if they do choose to get married, there is little room for unemployment. As the Detroit man who lost his job told me, he and his wife split up “because she’s working, and … I don’t have any money coming in.” They had been fighting over finances even before he lost his job, he points out, but the arguments grew more heated afterward. In a lone-wolf economy, as sociologists Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas have argued, why take a chance on a partner down on his luck when you’re just barely surviving yourself?"

The constant stress over finances never let up even for the closest of married couples.  Men especially face despair and divorce when unemployment comes knocking. This is something influencing society in a very detrimental way.

"For this man and many like him, there is no one to talk to, no one to rely on. “Nowadays, you got people you really can’t trust, man,” he says. “You can’t call everybody your friend.” As the ties that bind them to others have unraveled, the working class has become an ever lonelier crowd."

Many condemn the poor for having made "bad" life choices. There's many forces in society covering up what is really happening with the fake unemployment rates and articles about the economy improving. While our "two-party plutocracy" will talk about those who failed and didn't prepare, the fact of the matter is, they are profiting off the betrayal of the working class. They want the poor alone and silent.