I have a couple folks to talk to, and my best friend had a break in which she could chat with me a bit too. 🙏 Thank you. 💜

I'm still so upset to hear about your marriage, that's just so awful. It's the #1 person you should be able to count on. 😮‍💨

I hope you believe you deserved better than how he treated you. 💜 Because I know that you deserved better.

💚🫂

(I tried texting but usually Sat is a big parental responsibility day for them 💜)

-and I have *zero* idea, among the contacts in my phone, who would/wouldn't be up for a "hey I'm a little suicidal today, would you be free to talk or just vaguely be on a video call together for a while?".

thanks 💜

Hey folks, I'm at an unsettling amount of risk for self-harm today. (Not my usual state, things are very bad.)

Is there anyone that has my number that would be game to talk for a while? I'll warn you now, I'm pretty mopey! But I do need to talk to someone, and my one very close friend isn't around-

I've thought a lot in the past year about doing something like this if/when the time comes--the problem is, I'm not sure where I would go to do it. (As mentioned in my big thread today...) I have one best friend but they've got a family, I don't want to traumatize anyone's kids!, etc.

This story will probably be new to people outside of the ME/CFS community. If so, you should read it.

Then please consider that tens of millions of people in the US deal with this and overlapping/similar illnesses, and maybe ask yourself if you could maybe play a bigger role in helping us.

it's all bad, but the loss of social and professional support bc no one believes you, bc a crummy under-educated and chauvinistic doctor doesn't believe you, is the worst part of it all IMO

just when you need people, they're convinced to disappear

This 🧵 is so devastatingly relatable

If you're chronically ill & feeling alone, maybe give it a read & know you're very not alone in that

If you're not chronically ill, give it a read & [I beg you] do better by the chronically ill people in your community/ies [and/or who've been shunned by same]

I'm holding some hope for you too. 💜 Really rooting for your transplant to go well.

(Sometimes I feel like fellow sick folks are almost the only people I really know how to be around these days. :) There are exceptions of course, though not many. Just to say: your reply was helpful!)

This level of isolation is excruciating, it is crushing even my generally solid and honed skills at being alone.

Plus, I think I'm bad at being alone plus staring down a more-present-than-normal-chance-of death while alone. The combo is not great.

It's funny, I've gone through much of life quasi-alone; even in periods I've been lucky to be surrounded by many medium-close friends/relationships, I haven't had many very close ones. So yeah, I've always thought I was generally good at being alone.

but,

I kinda just feel like I'm riding a subway to the end of the line and that's all there is left for me in life. Exactly how long will the isolated, monotonous subway ride be?, is kind of the only question remaining. And that's a boring fucking question, is what I'm running up against, motivationally

Medically speaking, it is very possible for me to get well, over time, but do I I have the social support to do it? That's the catch.

Being this isolated has negative health effects even on otherwise totally healthy people. It certainly isn't how very sick people recover from being very sick.

I am tired, I do not feel like working on this spreadsheet to precisely nail down my medical burn rate to determine exactly how financially up a creek I am bc I'm not sure it matters anyway. Some days I feel my time would be better spent on end of life planning than trying to stay alive planning. --

I have one person where a whole circle of people should be.

I spend most of my days not really socializing w/ anyone.

Even if I were magically better tomorrow, I don't know where I want to live (where would I go to have friends?), what I want to do for work, what my life goals even are anymore...

--those are *groups* of people, fighting for like, all of humanity.

I'm just one guy, alone, fighting for myself? (And my best friend. She's said she'd be devastated to lose me, and reminds me of it often. So I'm fighting for two people. That's better than one, but it's not a fully-fledged life.)

Some days it just doesn't feel worth it. The odds are not in my favor, being forced to play a team sport nearly solo like this.

Why am I fighting so hard when the chances are so small?

Yeah sure, we make movies about this: teams of rebels fighting evil, seemingly invincible empires, etc. But--

I'm a couple to few months away from running out of money. If my tiny home gets sold soon, I'll have another several months to a year.

But do I think I'll get better enough in a year? To work again, to make new friendships to replace the crater where my social fabric used to be, to find more love?

I have one loving friendship in my life, a best friend. They live in another city.

That's it. That's all I have for "loving relationships that are part of my daily life."

I read about people going through difficult things "surrounded my family and friends" and wonder what that's like.

My life is, and has been for years, extremely bereft of love.

Acquaintances and buddies are something, but sometimes what you need is love, rather close emotional connection.

Most of the friends I had before I got sick are gone. The help I do get these days is largely people I've met since becoming sick, internet buddies kind enough to lend a remote hand. Oh I neglected to add: I do have a second local buddy who stops by to help sometimes! So I see two people in-person.

It is scary, disheartening, and intensely emotionally isolating to be so sick that you can't really get out of the house much other than medical appointments, have only one friend you see IRL, are sicker than your social fabric can support, and know if you got sicker again you'd be 100% screwed.

do I want to know why "Catholic Identity" is trending at place #3 right now, or...no

like it is nice Catholic people/stuff or did JD Vance say some malignant shit yet again

oh goodness yeah, that's extra hard!, the lip-syncing

haha the different hair style trick is always a bit of a chuckle :D

I was about to give up on this show earlier in the season, now I'm glad I stuck it out bc this episode:
- has that impressive acting (I hope there are more flashbacks!)
- takes place entirely in Paris
- has a bit of French to keep my brain on its toes to see if I can catch it all

(If you also like watching that kind of thing, this week's episode of "The Last Thing He Told Me" (on Apple) is a real treat! Unfortunately the other guy in the scene isn't as convincing as a younger version, but the guy playing the younger lawyer grandfather is unreasonably good at this. Just wow.)

oh no 🫠

(to be fair, I didn't really expect anything less 😅)

I have so much admiration for the skill and work it takes to do something like that!