Vegetarianism

I'm exploring vegetarianism. I have made at least half my meals vegetarian meals now. I don't see me giving up all meat, I will want to eat some chicken and turkey especially given my issues with anemia and lack of B vitamins. Veganism is too severe, I do better with eggs and some dairy. 

 Years ago I had to give up red meat to keep the kidney stones away. One Arby's roast beef sandwich or hamburger will make mean kidney stones, extreme back pain and throwing up. That's how bad beef reacts with my body. I've eaten one pork chop in a year, even my Thanksgiving turkey, I had to be careful with. The vegetarian days seem to be dropping the blood sugar by 20 points, this is unexpected. This morning's blood sugar was even on the low side at 84. For years especially with PCOS I was indoctrinated on the high protein/low carb model. Keto would kill me. So much meat and Paleo looked like a kidney stone nightmare to me years ago. More cooking is required, that part is not always easy to get used to. I did have more money for food via Covid Stimulus money, so that helped the vegetarian train along.

Analyzing Good and Bad Therapy

The above statement has a little generalizing to it, but there's good warnings there as well. Some therapists are good, some are bad and some are middling. I really needed a therapist a few years ago but was priced out of the running. Mental health care is far harder to come by in America. So when I couldn't afford therapists anymore,  I went into a peer group for around 5 years, I volunteered with them too. Sadly the good directors of the group moved away and while some of us tried to keep it going, it did end at a certain point. This group was a positive part of my life and gave me the strength to change things to begin with.

I still am interested in therapy now but with huge bills like our impending taxes and the price of food having doubled around here, it's still been put off. Part of me thinks, "What will the therapists do?" They can't fix the world. CPTSD/PTSD is a bad mixture with Covid. One thing that worries me about people is everyone has to act like everything is okay. I feel repressed everywhere. Like sometimes I want to talk about how crazy everything has become but there's no one to do this with. The Midwest is full of stiff upper lip types, where not everyone blends in with this. The world is burning but suck it up!

 Many friends have their own problems. People who have to go slog at some essential job probably envy someone on disability who can never leave the house. It's sad but outside of my husband, I am talking more to strangers online about life, than any friends. People are withdrawing, from depression and the rest. How many are becoming homeless or can't pay their bills?  I expect everything to collapse. Does this shock anyone here? At this point I do. I suppose it's on a slower slog then I dreamed. They will grind us down. One year of Covid, everyone's depressed, Two years of Covid? Who knows if we will have minds left. 

Therapy is really expensive. Even someone insured like me, has to come up with 70-100 dollars a session. The state run therapy place were I live is so overwhelmed unless you are ending up hospitalized or hallucinating on a daily basis, they don't have the resources to help. When I was younger therapy was far more accessible. Even in Chicago during the 1990s, I only had to pay a small fee based on a sliding fee scale. Mental health care was more widely available.

Pre-Covid, I felt like I had finally gotten a handle on my life long depression, leaving Christianity definitely helped with this.  Life was looking bright despite my health problems. The anxiety stuff is still a problem and worsened after Covid, but never has returned to the levels it was pre-no contact. It was ironic, that the year I finally was getting a grip on what could be called happiness, everything kind of fell apart. It's not good to get old and think well my life didn't turn out.

We even got a better car where we could finally take some day trips after years of being so limited with an older van I didn't dare take out of the county but Covid ended those plans. While I still didn't have any close local friends outside of my online ones, and so many friendships ended based on ACON recovery, deconversion and politics, I had cobbled together a life of sorts. I was involved with my community and groups that made me happy, this included a yearly art class, visits to a local art museum, local events from parades to shows,  zine conferences, stamp club and auctions, politics and protests, visits to the park book clubs, the gym, and most importantly of all my Unitarian Universalist fellowship. I still had my disabilities to deal with but with my husband, I was trying to make our life as rich and full as possible on very little money and with my limitations to deal with. 

I enjoy what I can in here, but the misery quotient for everyone now is so high, it's changed the world in some really bad ways. America had a serious enough mental health crisis going before all this. One thing that helps me with Covid, is telling myself, "You didn't choose this". I'm not sure what to think now. It's easier to deal to deal with the philosophy "Shit happens on this decaying rock" then "God has a plan" because then I would be crying over God wanting to drink more of my tears. Buddhist "acceptance" works far better for sanity than "God's punishing me yet again!"

Covid in general has not been good for anyone's mental health. How many people are cracking up? I joked to my husband maybe I am protected in the way that so much bad stuff has happened how does this compare? Singles and other are under the solitary confinement gun. Middle class people have seen careers, small businesses and dreams destroyed. Some people have lost loved ones, I know several people who had a family member or friend die of Covid.

I personally know poverty and impending homelessness are very bad for mental health. How many are in that boat? Some friends have withdrawn and gone quiet. I've gone more inward too. With CFS, I could sleep the day away easy though in my case I have to get up to stay alive and mobile. Medically life is on a required regiment. However sleep remains a nice escape especially in winter. I'm always exhausted enough to fall asleep whenever I want. Unlike some disabled insomniacs from pain, pain doesn't keep me awake. Then there's substance abuse. I suspect those problems have to be skyrocketing too.  In my case, I can't drink due to allergies, haven't touched the stuff in 30 years however that has to be getting worse as people seek an escape from the worry and trauma.

When I was in therapy on and off, some therapists found my life story to be an unusual one. I have definitely talked about some crazy stuff on this blog, but I shared enough of life with sociopaths and narcissists, that there were times, I did surprise the therapists.

Once one of them told me, "I just can't take it!" That was weird, where one's life was so messed up, a therapist was ready to chuck it in. At last three told me I had the most severe emotional abuse of any child they heard of. No broken bones or "Child called It" stuff, but my long time readers on this blog probably can guess at what freaked them out.  Contrary to my haters, I never got diagnosed with any personality disorders, my diagnoses centered around severe anxiety disorders. There was some time my hormonal disorders were added into the diagnostic fray. I connected with some therapists better than others. Some loved me almost like some my favorite professors, but some didn't like me either.

For some my weight was a major issue they couldn't see beyond. One therapist did think due to my fast weight gain history that I had a pituitary tumor or other medical problem and even had me talk to a psychiatrist about it. One thing complicating things, was because my weight was so severe and 50 more pounds could take me into immobility, anti-depressants were not as much of an option as they were for others. I had seen thin people turned easily into 300 pound people from antidepressants. One friend was even an ex-model who became fat for many years though she was able to later lose weight. A doctor warned me I was on so many physical meds, that I could be tipped over into problems just from being on too many medications. I know my complex medical problems were not easy for therapists to deal with.

In one online discussion group I am in we were talking about therapists. There was one therapist I hadn't thought about in years. These memories came up to me and I was talking about it with that group. She is the therapist I had back around 1999/2000 after escaping Chicago. We had strong rapport so much so we discussed befriending each other once my therapy was over, but I think she made the decision this would cross boundaries so we never did, though we would smile and say hello in my then small rural town.

She told me about Aspergers and I read books about it and she thought it described my problems and this was later backed up by two other therapists and a psychologist, so on that score she did improve my life quite a bit. However one thing she did do that led me on a 14 year journey to nowhere, is she sold "Christianity" to me as the answer for my problems. She was an evangelical working in a secular therapy office. She meant well, she was a kind person who meant no ill intent, and what would she say to me today if I had her before me telling me how the Christianity turned out? Chances are that she is no longer with us, as she was well into her 60s when I saw her 20 years ago.

I remember her giving me a book on Jesus to read, wish I remembered the title, and her telling me the Unitarian Universalist church was a spiritual dead end and that they taught "false things". My new rural town was a hundred miles from the closest UU church at that time.  

I am in the position now, if I am able to afford a therapist, that I would have to be clear to the counseling office, no Christians and no conservatives, this may offend a few people, but with the depth of religious issues and others, I would only offend most Christians except the most liberal ones. It's a boundary I would have to establish. 

 Even Catholic therapists can be a problem. One was offended when I spoke of leaving the Catholic church. Another one who was my husband's main therapist in a secular office and where we had joint counseling years ago, tried to convert him to Catholicism. The conservative Republicanism didn't help either. His office was plastered in pictures of the Virgin Mary. We live in a very conservative area, and our old town was even more conservative, so some may be shocked given that the view of most therapists is that the majority are liberals. Many here are very Christian, and two counseling offices in my area advertise themselves as "Christian counseling" centers. In fact if you are destitute and can't afford counseling, and don't qualify for the state run counseling center to take you, you will be referred to a local Christian college to their free student counselors. 

This therapist who led me to Christianity also while she admitted my abuse was some of the most severe she ever had heard, and diagnosed me with PTSD too, also gave me the message to reconcile and "forgive" abusers too. Obviously I would go down a ill-fated forgiveness journey that just opened the door to more abuses. Therapists who taught this weren't trying to harm us though harm was done from it. They were taught in their counseling classes to "improve relationships".

One thing you hear all over the place out there, is that too many therapists are failing ex-scapegoats or those who have faced narcissistic abuse, or even trauma in general. The therapeutic themes of reconciliation or that focus on "reuniting families" a la John Bradshaw were in vogue during most of my years in therapy from the last 90s into the mid 2000s. I hope things have changed for the better especially as ACONs are concerned. However in talking with people online, it seems ACONs are still facing some difficulties in therapist offices. Some have problems being believed, some therapists don't seem to understand how NPD works in family systems. We definitely need more therapists out there trained in how scapegoating works, and how to deal with abuse victims. Soon to be ex-scapegoats who are trying to escape the narcissistic pit, need a lot of support.

The misdirection into reconciliation, forgiveness and the Christian religion did not serve me well. I have the feeling it's probably done a lot of harm to others. If I was to look for a therapist now, how would I find one that knows enough about trauma/abuse, extreme health problems, a fundie past, religious trauma and won't try to push Christianity down my throat? How many offices will I offend saying NO CHRISTIANS? Some would find it a strange request.

One of the best therapists I had, was a young secular one, in 2011 or so, who I could only afford for two sessions, who announced to me, "You are trying your best". She taught the art of self compassion. That helped clear my head and actually was a positive moment for my life. After years of judgment and being told, "you are not enough", that therapist paved the way for me to know I was enough. 

Class issues can be a big thing when it comes to therapy. I definitely hope more therapists are being taught about class consciousness or what life is truly like for the poor or low income when they see more impoverished clients. Some class factors can impact therapy. I live in a very conservative region of the country where we do have some "bootstrap" types in the counseling office. They can do more damage than good.

If you offer clients advice where it takes money to get things done where said money does not exist, than that is a dead end. I also hope things have changed for the better too, as I am an older person and some of my experiences took place in the 1990s. I don't want anyone to forgo therapy just to be cautious of the quality and outlook of their therapist. I don't know if this is true anymore but I encountered some therapists who were influenced by New Age teachings, and affirmations to make things come true too. I think we should let people know what to expect in therapists, so they know the dangers out there and pitfalls.

Finding a "woke" therapist may not be easy. I know in my case, the ones who understand poverty and injustice and admitted they existed, were definitely easier to deal with. There is privilege in telling people to "be positive" and then their dreams will come true. Some have more serious problems to be dealt with and "inner work" definitely is an asset but having a therapist that understands systemic effects is important. People need to be given practical tools and coping mechanisms that deal with life as it is, not given fantasy or religious based answers to problems. Some therapists excelled at this of course.

Reality based therapists or ones who focused on coping mechanisms helped me the most. Here too I think of Christianity where there is privilege in telling people "God has a plan" and that their lives will "work out for the best". Christianity failed for me because it simply provided no guidance for my real life and why bad things happened. It's explanations simply didn't work in the real world. As one guy online I talked to said, "Chinese slaves on the railroad were definitely anxious and depressed." I met many people who had lives so much on the hard setting, where nothing worked out, that the religious descriptions of reality simply failed.

One thing that mentally helped me was jumping off the blame and shame train. The narcissists taught me to blame myself for everything bad that happened. Sadly religion backed this up too, insisting I pray all the time for "good" things to happen, and that if bad things happened, it was due to my lack of faith or spiritual errors. Learning other philosophies and coping mechanisms to deal with the "bad stuff" that happened helped me a lot. I am glad I deconverted prior to Covid happening.

American self-help culture has influenced therapy too. The self help world often taught that everything was under the control of the individual. What has Covid taught us but how much is beyond our control? The best therapists also analyze what needs are not being met. There's times I think the mental health world is full of people who simply need friends and someone to care about and love them. I have a loving husband but the world is full of many Eleanor Rigbys. "All the lonely people"..... Even before Covid, while I and my husband have plenty of online and faraway friends, I told him, we have to become less isolated we need to make local friends too. Covid increasing social isolation and disconnection definitely is not going to help people's mental health. Loneliness prior to Covid was an epidemic. What's going to happen now? I'm starting to feel funny from the isolation as a bookworm Aspie so what about the extroverts of the world?

I am not a therapist just a lay person making remarks on my experience, mental health is a complicated area, I can't claim to know everything about but these were just some ideas I wanted to explore. I do think Covid is massively impacting mental health and the therapists very much have their work cut out for them. Anyone who is a consumer of mental health resources, needs to be mindful of what kind of therapists are out there and some of the pitfalls. We definitely need more access to mental health care in the United States.

Do Narcissistic Families Get a New Scapegoat When You are Gone?

A new book on recovery from scapegoating I found on Amazon: I'm going to order this one.

 When the scapegoat leaves a highly narcissistic family does the family designate a new scapegoat?

Makes you wonder, do they chose a new scapegoat? Don't go back! I am no contact with the whole bunch so have no idea if mine did. I am gone and it doesn't matter what they do anymore. I feel sorry already for whoever it is. I am the only one who managed to break away.

Even doing geneaology I looked for other escapees, one side of the family was definitely messed up with affairs and real grandpa sowing his wild oats far and wide. Maybe when some scapegoats leave, their families fracture apart.  When you pull the "everyone's trashcan for negativity" thread out, maybe it crumbles apart. If you have the guts to leave and stay gone for years and years,  others will notice: "Hey she's gone, if I don't go to Christmas dinner or blow off that wedding, whose going to care, Scapegoat Sue has done far far worse by disappearing!" They may find the courage to do slow fades and low contact themselves.

After all you already pulled a disappearing act and that doors been opened. The scapegoat has already committed the supposed ultimate evil by going poof so what they do will pale in comparison. This can give others permission to fade from the family. Spouses that don't like the main narcissists or are competing narcissists will withdraw as well. People today live far away, what will people mean who live hundreds of miles away after 25 years?  There are no positive memories of "family" to keep the motivation up to remain in contact.

The others may be cowards and did what they were told, but rule by fear only goes so far. The narcissist will get old and that alone will remove the youthful energy it takes keep things going.  Some families probably do fracture apart after the scapegoat leaves. I'm not sure if they pick a new one or not. If mine happened to, I hope the new scapegoat finds the courage to escape. 

From my Sketchbook

 

Birds

 

I have a better camera now, so hoping to take more photos, this was a recent one. 

Unfriending Conservative People without Empathy

This guy called me Debbie Downer the other day. I unfriended him. He is a libertarian from my old town. People in my old rural town are nuts. The place has a Q believer for a mayor and on the Facebook boards they talked about how two of the city council members were at Trump's insurrection, I don't know if they were in the Capitol building or not. It's a damn good thing I never moved back there. The place has gone insane. 

This guy was an atheist but still into the conservative movement. He is rich and flies airplanes and goes to Europe.  I know a lot of people judge me for not being perky and a lot of NTs hate Aspies for not being happy acting enough. I even said you expect me to smile and be positive as the world burns and they have destroyed our lives. He doesn't recognize his own privilege. I am sick of people judging me for not being happy enough or even talking about injustice in general. He was mad at me for talking about all the homelessness that's going to happen from Covid. If I am a Debbie Downer I was made this way.

I have been thinking about the kind of people out there who think everything's all right jack, even during a pandemic. It's kind of messed up. Many of them are upper class boomers. If you noticed all those Capitol protesters had cash for 80,000 trucks, their endless flags and trips to Washington DC. So many good jobs lost due to their traitorship.

 I don't mind fellow UUs trying to be cheerful and doing some volunteer work, I mean people like that make you happier, and don't insist on patroling your emotions. But these conservative types, this one actually posted against the minimum wage. They are so petty lest someone get a dollar above them, even as they rake it, they glory in a world view where they can be in the highest position while spitting down on those below. I guess that describes the entire Republican party. 

This particular guy didn't like Trump, but he embraced all the Charles Murray crap and gave people lectures on one Facebook board about "bettering" themselves, still thinking it was 1980 and a college degree automatically opened the door to the middle class. These are the types who will tell you things like "Go feel sorry for yourself, blame everything on external conditions!" Which is kind of funny given that they will go on about how everyone is victims while doing everything to destroy our lives. This one at least wore masks but most of his compatriots spread pandemic.

He summed up our conversation with:

"As to me, I've got a meeting with another potential capitalistic partner. Excelsior!" 

All the small minds only care about their money and privilege. The world can burn but if their cable and tablet work they don't give a damn. Those homeless people down the street can suck it according to types like this, they didn't "improve" themselves. 

I'm still cleaning the slate this many years in. I don't buy that unity talk about allowing people with different views in anymore. I don't expect friends to be carbon copies, but some people do have shitty values, and I don't want them in my life anymore. I realized many of these people match the anti-values of my so called family.

I responded:

"So who are you to judge whose refusing to "improve their lot" in life? Oh I forget that bottom ledger is supposed to count for everything. Silly me. Save the speeches for those who still "believe". Wonder what our old rural town's poverty rate is now? 50 percent? [It was 37 percent just a few years ago]

What is the rate now of sociopathy in America? If this place folds, the lost altruism did it. A society can't survive when everyone's just out for themselves. I pay attention now to what values the people I surround myself with have, if they suck or they don't have any, I am done. People of the corrupt system have nothing to offer me.

Republicans have more psychopathic traits

The Fat Hatred of the Lipedema World and Whitney Wants Weight Loss Surgery

2014 study on the hardships of high stage Lipedema. I may have even participated in this one but know I did others--I was diagnosed in 2014.

Where are the size acceptance people are when it comes to the Lipedema world? I seem to be the lone voice. Did all the other supersized stage 4s give up and walk away from these Lipedema groups on Facebook? If they did, I don't blame them. It's weird the world is burning and Covid is spreading but people stick to the "thin is in" religion even though the gyms are all closed and our activities have all been curtailed.

I try to ignore the Lipedema boards but do read to find out the few decent medical facts.  More caution is needed. I have noticed a large one has become worse than Weight Watchers with the newly thin although with still puffy legs under their thinness all bragging about their weight loss. This isn't my first time complaining about fat hatred in the Lipedema world, but it's worsening. I need to stay away from these places for my mental health.  On this go around, one snottily wrote, "Weight loss is not impossible with Lipedema!". She looked like a size one or so on top maybe a size 6 or so on the bottom. She wore a bare midriff top too. My settings were changed so the postings aren't visible unless I decide to go over there. Yeah there has to be more of a firm line.

The diets they push have grown more extreme too over the last year. I would post a few disagreements. I do not post to this blog because I want to keep it anonymous, but basically I was ganged up on. The thin at any cost brigade propeled by a society that backs up their hatred of fat people never gave up. Things worsened with more women bragging about giving up every carbohydrate, or eating the Carnivore diet. One woman claimed she only eats only 4 hours a day from 2pm to 6pm, she must not experience hunger pain, making that doable for her intermittent fasting. Another one decided that eating every other day and going completely without food every day in between was her answer. For years, I have been ignored when talking about the degree of hunger I cope with. I have hunger pain now but am pushing lunch back on purpose to spread food out. How bad will these groups be next year, will some have attained Karen Carpenter's level? 

Did size acceptance die? Oh it's still out there, but it's been cast out of the mainstream.  Everyone got fatter, and being fat was painful so now they are pulling out what used to be considered eating disordered behaviors for the anorexic side of things. When your Lipedema boards read like pro-ana boards with people bragging of going days without eating or eating only meat than you start to wonder. Their diets would kill me too. The kidney stones from the Carnivore diet would bring a painful death. This where the majority of the Lipedema world has gone now. To question any of this too, makes you a non-person in those circles, they only care about weight loss success and nothing else. They will definitely shout you down. My marginalization is so complete there, I've never seen anything like it. Maybe I'm too Aspie, to please a group of looks oriented women, or they seem me so much as the "other" because I am "so far gone" but it's disappointing beyond belief. My long time readers know this about me, but sometimes I hate being female, always having to worry about looks or being expected to obey this societal mandate that my body and how it conforms should be the central motive of my life. 

If this was a man's disease, the medical world would looking into the endocrine causes, and why the lymph system failed, or why some of us get fibrosis and lipomas, diets would not be seen as the answer. Because it's women, all the Lipedema boards read like Cathy comics from hell. They focus on fat even though the body is full of fluids. Weight loss is everything. I don't even see anyone talking about infections or pain on there anymore.

How are the newly poor from Covid supposed to afford their special diets? Class issues and Covid barely exists on these boards with the sole focus being weight loss. I am scared about my weight being tied down inside so much due to winter. My parathyroids are going [again] and doctors are doing their usual linear by the numbers stuff and not explaining why I am getting hypercalcimia. My theory now is that the high levels of uric acid and kidney stones could be part of another endocrine problem or issue that is being neglected. 

The doctors all looked burned out. So I am afraid of having another complicated issue happening now. I am supposed to get a PTH test done in March. This may be yet another issue I have to fight for diagnosis on. Hmmm that one doctor back in the 90s thought there were polyendocrine autoimmune issues. The doctors have turned cold, maybe for good reason and have even less empathy. All the fat hating eugenics related to Covid have not helped, since we have been told without hesitation we would be the first on the triage list. It's scary out there.

I don't feel support in the Lipedema world except by a few friends I met online who have it. The punishing words and put downs remain the same. Following my ACON rule of staying away from people who make you feel like garbage, I've withdrawn from the online boards more and more. While I meet a few like-minded women, they've been marginalized same as me, silenced as well.

Only the thin or those pulling out all stops from starvation to 6 hours a day in the gym are considered "worthy" and you can see the ableist pecking order where the smaller lower stages get all the praise. Lipedema puts some women in nursing homes and wheelchairs, and I have a few friends who have died very young I met online, but instead of the seriousness of this condition being dealt with, we are told diets are the answer! It pisses me off. If this illness is supposedly all about fat and diets, how are we going to get real treatment or help? Why do they ignore the pain for so many of us, where doing more makes the fluid come on? It's far more complext in higher stages.  I had to collect urine for kidney tests for 24 hours and noticed I took off 1600 fluid ounces after using my Flexitouch. How is that normal? That's a few pounds of pee! I poured it off into the collection jar. 

A lot of the women seem like normal sized women, who aren't even fat but may be low stage 1s who got a surgeon to give them some liposuction and came on to model their near normal or normal bodies. There's no support there too. Kicking around the fats seems to be a new sport for more budding narcissists now.

A few times I talked about size acceptance and fat liberation but I tell those are rare and refused concepts in the Lipedema world. I was wasting my breath. I'm not sure how to proceed. Maybe I dreamed of acceptance and fitting in, in Lipedema circles. I got banned from one stage 3-4 board because this one admin decided she didn't like me. Some of this was my mistake, asking if it was right for someone to be a member of the board who was trying to sell Shakeology diets to us. Sometimes us Aspies get in trouble with too much truth-telling. Groups don't often like that kind of thing. Ex-scapegoats are warned to be cautious and "pick their battles". Anyone hear anything about Shakeology lately? Another fad diet in the dust bin, sooned to be joined with Keto and Carnivore.

 Reddit is an extreme fat hating world too. If I mention anything weight or obesity related, I get my head ripped off. The default is that you are an overeating pig and deserve what you got. I can tell that horrible show 600lb life has just added to the fat hatred. Dr. Now and his producer son, have not presented super-fat people in a positive light. Are millennials more fat hating now? I'm not sure. There definitely seem to be more fat younger people. I went to the grocery store with my husband, waited in the car and saw a woman who had to be at least 450lbs in her 20s walking in. The pressure to be thin, definitely has grown higher. Her world did not look an easy one.

Pursing the genetic testing has not been easy. I want to know. Doctors don't always care about knowledge for knowledge's sake, and my Covid overwhelmed doctor from his housebound elderly patients, probably doesn't care about getting Peep her free rare obesity genetic tests she found online. I told him about the website, and even asked the company to send me paperwork so I could make it easy for the doctor and have him sign off. They told me, the doctors had to go through the website. Perhaps I can get a specialist to help. I have wanted genetic testing for years. There is another path to use my Ancestry DNA on this one genetics website, but that will cost some money. For years, I have known something is different, my physical attributes go beyond severe obesity, the near deafness, my small mouth, the way I am built, there's a lot of things that point to genetic problems. 

I have failed at weight loss, even keeping it stable, is all I can do on my usual food schedule, and doing Comcast TV exercise. I marched in place for 10 minutes yesterday and walked some in the hall.  Life on Covid house arrest sucks. Whenever I did venture out to walk around trying to avoid people or go anywhere, I was faced with way too many maskless people. Even today this maskless woman sat out our apartment foyer breathing all over the place.  Living like this is getting depressing and it seems like it's never going to end. I will never forgive the people who did this to us. They couldn't shut down some international flights because the richy riches always get their way.

I make sure to walk a little bit once or twice a week but that got harder. The kidney stones are having me transfer to a near vegetarian diet. I still eat a little meat. New vegetarian recipes have become part of my life.  I put 2 chicken sausages in dish of food we ate for two dinners, so had half a chicken sausage at one meal.   Morningstar and Dr. Praeger veggie patties are on the menu.  Oddly more removal of meat dropped my blood sugars somewhat, down by 20 points. [108 this morning]

 I don't expect weight loss from this. It just doesn't happen though for normal people, the calorie deficient would probably take a little off. It's to keep from dying of a kidney stones. The day the fascists attacked the Capitol is the day I got a giant one, with back pain and all. I gave up red meat 5 years ago. So this is lowering of other meat.

Whitney Thore who I still believes has undiagnosed Lipedema is buckling under pressure, and now wants weight loss surgery.  She needs to not waste her platform and to refuse the pressures of our fat hating society. More and more I think her show is meant to prop up the diet industry, instead of challenging it. She should have it out with her producers and turn things around.

All the worse stereotypes about fat people are promoted by her show, knowingly or unknowingly. Fat people are childish, we see Whitney running to her parents for every little thing. Fat people don't deserve romantic relationships the same as others, so we see Whitney cling to Buddy as her sloppy seconds who treats her like garbage, uses her for free rent and refuses to commit. She then had her rumored to be fake relationship, where her now ex-finace Chase cheated on her and had a baby with another woman. Now we see the usual gambit, of the woman still hated even though she exercises all the time, giving in to the diet industry juggernaut! Weight loss surgery as the supposed answer. Hopefully she will back away and this is only a one show venture.

Why doesn't Whitney pursue more answers? She has the cash to go to the weight loss program at Duke University, or another inpatient diet place to get some weight loss on track. She could have doctors figure out what is going on. She could see the ultimate PCOS specialist in the world, maybe they could put her on an androgen blocker like I was which made my weight loss possible down from 700lbs. I was forced off this drug 5-6 years ago due to other medical issues but it could help her.

She could be stabilize at a decent midsized weight if she got medical issues dealt with. She has resources and a platform many others do not.  She has pain, and obviously she can't do everything the thin people do, she's succumbing to the pressure. It's another Carnie Wilson trip: "get weight loss surgery". Whitney should not be talked into the sleeve or the RNY, go for the D and S [duodenal switch], risks and all, at least she won't have the embarrassment of the later regain to come since the metabolism sinks in so many. I hate all weight loss surgery but if I was forced at gun point to do it, I would want the one that works.

Remember that show Ruby? That was another show about a superfat woman, that one focused on weight loss though. She weighed 700lbs and lost a big chunk, I think around 380 or so in her case, but when she stopped losing and had some regain they removed her show off the air. Supposedly she lied about her weight.

Things are getting worse for fat people. I still plan to rejoin NAAFA, though so many bills got in the way for now. It is still on the roster. These weight loss pushing people all they do is make me depressed. Telling people they are pieces of crap doesn't help anyone get healthier. Somehow this is still the way they want to do it with fat people. The abuse out there is getting worse. I can tell. Hell just my moniker fivehundredpoundpeep brings out the haters. They are still sticking to the failed answers of the last 40-50 years.

I feel for the woman who wrote this article last year talking about Lipedema. One thing I notice they never talk about is the pain of Lipedema, everytime I move it hurts and it has taken a toll. It's always with the attitude "fat ass go lose weight --no matter what it takes", "even if you have to go without eating a few days a week". That's basically the message of the majority of Lipedema support groups I've been on! I fear for her if she discovers what some of the Lipedema boards are like. That's going to be a blow. Hatred for obesity has grown so bad, even if you have a rare fat disorder, it doesn't matter, you better be thin or else!

Whitney would be better off to eat three healthy meals a day--get best food she can, portions, lower meat, lots of vegs, exercise a certain number of days a week, food schedule with no free eating inbetween, and let the chips fall where they may and make her size a non issue. Go join NAAFA and raise a middle finger to the diet and weight loss surgery pushers.

Many of the people here don't get that fat people have been told they are "not enough" their entire lives, and blamed and shamed. Doesn't make any of them thin, just fucks them up inside. I like healthy food, exercise, and things like that but the poison, and the drip drip drip of "you suck" wears down on fat people. I've had my fill. Sometimes the internet can be a toxic place. One needs to be careful on here.  That Lipedema board sent me into some more bad feelings, the feeling of "never enough". Sometimes I hate this world, petrified of weight gain by being locked in the house, not able to go anywhere without fearing immediate death because so few here wear masks. We now have an entire year lost.

They all praise the newly thin like they are gods and people like me are no one. This is one sick society. I will be okay and remind myself self-compassion is the answer. I can only do what I can do. I'll do the exercise and go make myself some tofu patties with zucchini for lunch and eat a vegetarian burrito with peppers for dinner and will know all my haters will consider me a liar and that I huffed down a few cakes and pizzas but they never believed me all these years so what does it matter at a certain point? 

And you see that in Whitney. She annoys me as I have written about her possible narcissistic traits but I also realize how she was influenced and the pain they unload on fat people that is never ending.  Since she was a normal sized person for most of her young life, and then skyrocked in weight during college, it messed her up. This is more evidence to me of the possibility of her having Lipedema, remember I'm the woman who was midsized until my early 20s but than had my huge weight gain. It's weird to see her up through college being normal sized.  I hate to see her doing the weight loss surgery thing, she's giving in the fat hating society that's basically abusing her for the sake supposedly of "health". I still say she has Lipedema. It's sad even with all her body positivity stuff, she has never heard of the basics of fat liberation. One can tell she feels like she's "not enough" inside, with her conservative parents that wanted a thin and petite married woman with babies for a daughter, and with a society that denigrates her even as she has achieved a level of fame. She has a group of nice friends hopefully they are real and not just for the show.

Even if she figures out she has Lipedema or got diagnosed with it, she better be careful. That world is making weight loss everything too though Lipedema does more than give you a higher number on a scale. It's still open season on fat people. If anything it's gotten worse in the last 5 years. The Lipedema world has a few decent people like Dr. Stutz but from what I am seeing, it's become abusive, with the shoving of diets down people's throats, that gets worse year by year. Why has the Lipedema world grown so toxic? Why are people even with success and fame, feeling like they are "not enough"? Things shouldn't be this way.