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maniacwatchestheworld · 1 year

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The bottom 10 Two-Face/Harvey Dent looks

So I gathered together my sister (@steeltypeloverbecca) and my ex (who doesn't really use social media), and we ranked every Two-Face/Harvey Dent Look that I could be bothered to get my hands on from best to worst. In total we ranked over 200 Looks (general character designs and outfits). We agreed upon where to rank things between us via our emotions, hearts, and feelings. Here are the bottom 10 that we agreed upon.

Trigger/Content warning: Entries on this list discuss/contain images of racism, bugs, death, and body horror (moreso than is typical for Two-Face).

10: Lex Luthor Looking Looks

This place is less for an actual Look, but rather a trend that makes us a little... Displeased... When it comes to how Harvey Dent should look, we tended to agree that he should be handsome before he gets disfigured, and to have a normal build. He's a lawyer. It doesn't make a ton of sense for him to look like a shit brickhouse. But you know who is built like a brick shithouse of a man? Lex Luthor. You know. Because his enemy is Superman. So here's a question: Why did we keep coming across Harveys that look like Lex Luthor? If I can shave Harvey Dent in my head and he looks like Lex Luthor, something has gone wrong with how you draw him. Also the Joker/Lex Luthor fusion goes here because my ex and sister hated everything about that existing! We discussed Lex Luthor more than we would have liked while ranking these. And for that, it makes it onto the list!

9: Looks that make us sad because we don't get more

Technically speaking we gave this slot to the vampire look, but it was for the same reasons as the other two looks pictured here. It was merely the one out of the three to hurt us the most. These are here at the 9th lowest Look placing because these are the Looks that tease us, but alas! We don't get to see the actual concept played out fully! They are hiding things from us that we want to see! I don't think we ever get to see what Harvey looks like under those bandages in Beware the Batman. And shadows are keeping us from seeing what Jessica's scars look like as well! But the most disappointing. Vampire Two-Face. Hell yeah, I want to see Two-Face as a vampire! That idea is rad as hell! But as far as I can tell, when it comes to vampire Harvey, we have this cover and that's it! Give me vampire Two-Face, dammit! That idea is so cool! How dare they tease us like this, but not give it to us! D': You wound me DC. WOUND ME! Give me Vampire!Two-Face, dammit!

8: "Siamese" twin cat Look from Batman vs the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Now here's the thing. There is actually a lot of good in this design! This Look is from Batman vs. the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I haven't seen the film myself, but apparently at some point in the film, Batman's rogues gallery get doused in some chemical that mutates them into human/animal hybrids. As a design, this is a lot more interesting than what they went with in the comics (where he turned into a baboon). Making Two-Face into a conjoined cat is actually a pretty interesting design and they executed it pretty well. You can't tell me that this isn't incredibly interesting to look at! However there's one big issue with it that made all of us pause when looking at it... Is this racist...? Because the concept seems to be "Siamese twin" "Siamese cats." A fun pun sure, but is calling conjoined twins "Siamese twins" racist...? Is this design racist? After we discussed it a little, we ultimately decided that this was worthy of F tier simply because no Look should make you question if it is racist or not. The fact that we have to question it for being racist at all makes it worthy of F tier. So just know, that while this is an interesting look that is executed pretty well, we still had to rank it lowly. Also we aren't too fond of looks where he grows a second face that much either.

7: One-Face Look

No. No. No no no. We can all agree that this is pretty bad, right? Just like... All of this is stupid and bad, right? Why make Two-Face basically the Hulk? This goes against everything that we like about him and makes him interesting as a character. Why does he decide that this is something to warrant him calling himself 'One-Face'? This doesn't really seem like much of a life-altering event and didn't change the status quo for the character at all. Just... Why did they do this? Why? WHY? WHYYYYYYY!!!??? We can all agree that we hate this.

6: Bug Two-Face

Eh. Decent enough idea, but you know. Gross. Bugs. Also we don't like seeing our boy in pain and suffering, and he looks like he's suffering. So no thank you.

5: Aaron Eckheart from The Dark Knight movie

It's a shame that this iteration of Two-Face has to be so low on this list. Honestly Aaron Eckheart is a cutie and generally speaking makes for a great Harvey. But that CG is just... Not very good... And time has certainly done the Look no favors! Also that burnt suit, while not bad, just doesn't offer anything new or very interesting to the table. You can barely tell it's burnt in the poster Look, and other versions of the burnt suit Look (namely the video game versions, but special mention needs to go to the burnt trench coat) have taken this concept and done it better. Also his burned half looks like Mars Attacks, a film which very much emotionally scarred me as a child. So for that we gave it an F.

4: Two-Face turning into an eldrich abomination

So... Tentacles... That's certainly a thing about this Look... But yeah... It's gross and once again, our boi looks like he's in a lot of pain, but is unable to move and is helpless to do anything about it. We don't like to see our boi in pain, so we hate it.

3: This abomination...

For the record, I am all for a female version of Two-Face! Have you seen Gilda Dent as Two-Face? She is absolutely radiant and I love her. We like her so much, that she ended up becoming our defacto line for dividing Looks that are merely good and Looks that are great! She almost won best jumpsuit! In fact, if it wasn't for there being a split jumpsuit look, she would have taken it! But this female Two-Face is no Gilda. I do like the purple hair and how her disfiguration looks. I also have a soft spot for the spikes. They're camp and funny and I like that. But it's just... Everything else that I hate... She's just so... Needlessly naked and sexy... Like, this offends me, it's so bad. Why can we see her bare ass? What's with that half a blazer she's wearing? Just... Why? I hate it. I hate everything about this so much.

2: Gotham AD chopped in half and dead look

So this is apparently a Look from a series called, "Gotham A.D." Two-Face being chopped in half and dead is the image that came up on the Two-Face disambiguation page that lists all of the versions of him on the DC wikia. He's just dead. And apparently the Joker killed him. The outfit isn't bad, and maybe we would have actually given it an honest ranking if he weren't just fucking dead! Our boi is dead and we're sad about that. Terrible look. F tier.

1: Donald Trump looking Harvey Dent

Why...? Just... Why!!!??? Why would you do this to our boy!??? What has Two-Face or Harvey Dent ever done to warrant being compared to Donald Trump!!!??? Why would you do this to our boi!!!??? Believe it or not, but this is not the first time they've drawn Harvey in a way that makes him look like a US president, but just... WHY????? I hated all of those instances too, but this one is the absolute worst. I hate it. Thanks. Please kill this Look and never ever ever let it return. PLEASE! This just hurts me on every level. I hate it.

#two-face #harvey dent #two face #batman #racism #bugs #death #body horror #dcu #dc comics

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moon-kissed-witch · 3 years

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Will you tell the Dr Phil story?

Due to the nature of this show, I'm sure you can assume that this involves a messy situation. In this case it involved mental illness. I'm going to do my best to avoid being graphic about it, which the show didn't because they care about shock value, but I see no reason for excessive descriptions of gore.

Okay so the episode was about an internet "celebrity." I knew her. Like she lived in the same area as me, and even though I never saw her in person I had her on both Facebook and Snapchat, we had friends, blah blah blah.

The reason she was on the show was because she was popular for showing and talking about her self harm. At first it was just positivity, like "Hey, this is my body, I don't have to hide it or be ashamed of it just because I have scars." And that was cool and positive. But it blew up and the attention that came with it enabled her problem and made it so, so much worse.

Not only did she start talking more and more graphically about her issues, but she began doing live streams with open, gaping wounds, drinking vodka straight from the bottle every ten minutes, talking about how many stitches she had at the moment, and just completely changing the narrative around the subject. She wasn't being praised for accepting herself, she was being praised for publicly destroying herself. The worse she got, the more fans she had telling her they loved her. It would make anyone worse, not just her. Positive social re-enforcement is a hell of a thing to fight when humans are by nature social creatures.

So, here's where I come in. Like I said, I sort of knew her. I talked to her a few times, but the few times I did talk to her were alarming to say the least. When I mentioned that I also had struggled with self harm, she immediately asked me to show her my scars. Which, as someone who spent a lot of time in inpatient wards, it can be validating to see other people who struggle with the same visible problem you do. (I had a roommate who I'm still friends with who asked to touch my scars and I let her, it never felt violating or uncomfortable, it never felt bad, we were just talking about what we'd been through)

The thing here is that the conversation sounded like a competition. Every time. She talked a lot about how many times she was in the hospital and what she did and how her mom was a nurse so she gave her stitches and mopped up her blood. I don't want to say it sounded like bragging exactly, but I will say that she definitely sounded like an addict, which she was, but not one that was looking to recover.

(She's doing much better now and I'm very proud of her. When people are addicted to anything, whether that's a behavioral addiction or a chemical one, it radically alters their behavior and I don't think it's fair to judge her character as a person based on this. But regardless, it wasn't healthy for anyone involved.)

Now, this wasn't mentioned on the show because it wasn't deemed relevant, but one time I was in the cardiac unit because of a suicide attempt and the first thing she did was tell me that what I did wouldn't actually kill me. Which, regardless of if it's true (in this case it wasn't. I won't list methods of suicide but the damage done was serious enough to land me sedated on a ventilator, in the operating room, and then the icu. It was a literal near death experience, bright light and out of body and all that bullshit. So yeah I'm still bitter about that comment but moving on), is never acceptable to say to someone who attempted suicide. Ever.

So at that point, I was furious and just done. Personally, that is. I decided I would no longer interact with someone who was going to seemingly minimize the pain I was in and the harm I was causing to myself. She was still online doing her thing.

Eventually there was an online petition to get her removed from social media, which didn't happen but it did get enough controversial attention to land her on the show. I ended up talking to the woman who started the petition about my experience with her personally, as well as my concern for her because of how clearly she was spiraling and how she was being cheered on for it. She thought it was significant enough to ask me if someone from the show could contact me and I said yes. I told them the whole thing but they only chose to relay part of it, which is fine. It wasn't about me, it was about her and her health.

After the show her online presence diminished significantly, which is probably for the better, but she said that the show only brought on bullying and was bad for her health. I have mixed feelings on my involvement. I don't like that she was bullied and publicly humiliated, and that I indirectly contributed to that. It also gave me insight as to how the people on this show are treated, because I could tell by her reactions that none of this was what she'd anticipated. But if it did help her recover in any way, then that's positive. I'm not close enough to her to know, but I do feel bad about how horribly she was bullied following her appearance.

Edit: PLEASE do not look for this if you are triggered my images of scars or self harm. Half the videos that are suggested aren't even the episode, but videos of people's own, potentially very triggering, scars and sometimes cuts. Addictive behaviors are often extremely competitive in the mind of addicts, even recovered ones. Part of that can be due to personality but part of it is that we live in a society where if you're not the sickest, people are under the impression that you don't need help. This is not true. Please keep yourself safe.

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scripttorture · 4 years

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I came across your Torture in Fiction tab where you reviewed a Doctor Who episode and mentioned your love of the show so I'm going to mention exactly what I'm writing. It's basically a Bill/Heather story after they leave together and I'd like to accurately take into account the type of consequences (short term and long termr) of the entire turned into a cyberman ordeal. So any input would be highly appreciated.

Anon, I think I love you. Lesbian romance in the stars with one of my favourite characters, you are too kind.

Let’s start at the beginning.

For those unfamiliar with Doctor Who, the Cybermen are a recurring foe. The idea behind them is that they are people, cybernetically enhanced people with all the ‘unnecessary’ bits removed. Like the ability to feel pain or hope or love. The ultimate aim of the Cybermen is to make everyone else like them. They believe that not having emotional connections makes them superior.

And in one of Bill’s stories she gets turned into a prototype Cyberman. Except due to some unique circumstances the programming doesn’t quite take. Bill is left with a Cyberman body but her thoughts, personality and ability to feel are intact.

Through more unique circumstances (which depending on your interpretation may include Bill dying and being resurrected-) Heather restores her body as it was pre-Cybermen.

We’re never told exactly what happens to Bill. But it’s clear from the context that the procedure is painful and not consensual.

We do see Bill for a few days afterwards. She struggles to accept that she’s a Cyberman and doesn’t seem to know how to process what she’s been through. She seems more or less OK, but given the short time frame we see her for it’s difficult to say if this is a bad portrayal or not. For some people it takes a while for things to sink in and for symptoms to become apparent.

Going forward I’m going to assume that’s the case for Bill.

I’m going to make a couple of other assumptions because there isn’t anything in reality which lines up that well with the Cybermen.

There is not anything that can really 'take away' all emotions. Some drugs can result in emotional blunting as a side effect, but less intense emotion is not the same thing as no emotion. The intense, invasive surgical procedures that are implied to make a Cyberman are completely fictional, and probably wouldn't be survivable in reality.

It's a scenario that you'd expect to be traumatic: an extremely painful, invasive act that re-structures the entire body and is done without consent. Given the particular circumstances in Bill's story, it's tempting to compare it to non-consensual medical procedures.

As a black, lesbian woman who is aware of both modern politics and history it wouldn’t be unreasonable to assume Bill can make the same comparisons I have. Black women have been subjected to forced sterilisation and used for medical experimentation within living memory (see The Immortal Life of Henreitta Lacks for a discussion of unethical experimentation in the recent past).

Heather is less likely to be aware of this history and these issues.

As I said there isn't anything that lines up exactly; I keep thinking of forced sterilisation, though this often doesn’t cause lasting physical pain. It also brought to mind some of the… less ethical ‘treatments’ and ‘experiments’ in recent history.

We’ll assume that Bill has a realistic memory of what happened, that the experience was traumatising and that she isn’t in physical pain.

I’d also make the argument that turning someone into a Cyberman could be considered torture in the legal sense. It’s done by a group that effectively controls territory, to people who are under their power. It causes suffering and in Bill’s case it is arguably done to punish the Doctor.

You’ve read the blog before so you probably know the drill when it comes to the common long-term symptoms of torture. Here’s the Masterpost should anyone else want to have a look. I’ll get back to symptoms in a moment.

In the short term I think that it’s likely Bill would experience something similar to modern survivors of ‘clean’ tortures.

‘Clean torture’ is a term Rejali uses to describe techniques that don’t often leave obvious external marks. These are no less dangerous then other methods; people can still be seriously injured, disabled or die because of clean torture techniques.

But the lack of obvious marks makes it harder to prove a person was tortured. And when the public perception of torture is that it always leaves scars many survivors find they’re dismissed, belittled and denied services.

People don’t believe they were tortured. Because we are taught that torture ‘must’ leave marks.

And Bill has just come out of the Cyber-conversion process unscarred. In a world where most people believe that turning back once you’ve been made a Cyberman is impossible.

This is likely to be a factor if she tries to get professional help as well as in everyday interactions.

Bill herself might assume that her symptoms are overblown or somehow put on; that they’re not warranted because her body has been perfectly restored.

When it comes to more long term symptoms, the right choice will always depend on the characters and the story you want to tell.

Personally I wouldn’t want to give Bill suicidal tendencies or an addiction because I feel like those are symptoms that could shift the story away from the central relationship. I think they’re symptoms that usually demand more focus and that can make balancing them with the central story more difficult.

I usually suggest that authors try to include memory problems in a realistic way and I think they’d be an especially good fit here. (The Masterpost summarising the most common forms of memory problems survivors have is here).

Essentially I think that you could use memory problems to highlight how Bill’s time as a Cyberman has affected her mind. So much of our identity and self-image is rooted in our memories. Finding flaws in them, especially around important things, can shake our sense of self.

And that ties in to the way Cybermen are consistently used in Doctor Who to denote the loss of self. All of the common memory problems could be used to raise these philosophical questions and tie Bill’s symptoms more firmly to the plot.

Insomnia is a symptom I always find a little difficult because it has so many knock on effects.

The worsening of reaction times, alertness, coordination, combined with the pain and shakes and occasional visual hallucination or micro-sleep means that insomnia isn’t a symptom I’d recommend for a character like a superhero. If you want the character to consistently win fights then it’s not a good pick.

Similarly the long term effects on creativity, reasoning, concentration, emotional processing and learning mean it’s a bad pick if the character is supposed to be an inventive genius.

One of the nice (but underutilised) things about Doctor Who is that the way the stories are typically structured means that not every character has to be exceptional at everything. Bill’s strengths were not superhuman physical combat or exceptional genius (even though she was incredibly intelligent); they were compassion and her ability to form fast, strong friendships with just about anyone she meets.

Insomnia could fit your story but I think it depends on what you want the characters to do on a regular basis.

Chronic pain could be a good fit.

The conversion process radically changed Bill’s body, a change that she more or less refused to accept was real during the story. In those circumstances physical pain can be an interesting addition: it simultaneously acts as a reminder of what Bill suffered and ties her to her restored body now.

And since chronic pain in torture survivors can be psychological, or a combination of psychological and physical, there’s no reason why Bill’s body couldn’t be perfectly healed while experiencing chronic pain.

This is also a symptom that characters can be more proactive about. She can try things and find solutions much more quickly then she might be able to for something like depression. Stretches, exercise, mobility aids, organisation, painkillers and forward planning can all be helpful. And early success could help you to show the character feeling more empowered, reclaiming her body.

I’m not sure if difficulty relating to others would be a good pick, considering Bill’s canonical strengths. However social isolation could be interesting as an obstacle to gradually overcome.

Going beyond the usual symptoms- Have you read any of the Doctor Who comics? Because I keep thinking of The Flood, which was a Cyberman story with the Eighth Doctor.

It had a rather wonderful Cyberman design and had the Cybermen attempting to persuade large numbers of people to volunteer for Cyber conversion. They did it by chemically manipulating the emotions of an entire city; making feelings unbearably intense and then offering the conversion process as a solution.

Bill kept her feelings but she would have known she was supposed to lose them. And she’d go from that to having incredibly intense feelings. Because she’d have developed trauma symptoms.

She might be tempted to view her symptoms as the ‘natural’ consequence of regaining full capacity for emotion, rather then due to trauma. Latching on to a physical, rather then psychological, difference.

I’d also consider whether all of this changes Bill’s relationship with her own body. Relief at getting it back might be accompanied by a heightened awareness of changes, even natural ones.

I think if I was writing this I’d be tempted to add in little details, triggers or self-soothing behaviours tied to her body.

The Cyberman chest unit for that design looks heavy. Does compression around her chest make her panic? Do rubber gloves feel horrible? Does the sensation of something going over her face, like the ‘mask’ on these Cybermen, prompt intrusive memories?

The ‘handles’ on the head were supposed to suppress emotion in this version. Could Bill reassure herself that they’re gone by touching her own hair? Do short sleeves feel ‘better’, because she can feel the sun, wind or rain against her skin? Does she wear her earrings more often, because the weight of them and the way they move is comforting?

Good luck with your story. I hope this helps. :)

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#writing advice #tw torture #tw medical abuse #tw suicide mention #doctor who #sci fi ask #writing victims #writing recovery #choosing symptoms #clean torture #insomnia #memory problems #chronic pain

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aikainkauna · 6 years

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Fatigued? In pain all the time? The little-known illness that is far more common than we’ve previously thought, especially among geeks.

This is going to be a bit long, but it's so incredibly important, and so very much not just a personal issue that I hope you will read it (and hopefully, also share it). I'm choosing to speak about this now because this is an insanely unknown, disabling and yet seemingly a fairly common illness, and I want more people to know about it, especially as it affects geeks--geeky women in particular. I’ll talk about my own variant briefly at the beginning, but don’t stop reading there, thinking this is just a personal post--there are lists of symptoms and resources at the end that I urge you all to look at, because they are *frighteningly* common.

I and the doctors have finally found out I've got Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

Which means there is one, or there are several, genetic mutations in my body messing up the build of my collagen, collagen being the glue that holds your body together and which is found practically in all your tissues. So, technically, anything that can go wrong with your body might do *exactly* that, because that b0rked collagen is everywhere. This is why I've always been not only hypermobile (being good at yoga and able to bite my toenails and tie myself into knots while sitting down), but easily fatigued and have had trouble simply sitting, let alone standing or walking, because my muscles have to strain like crazy all the time to compensate for my connective tissues being too wobbly. (Every time I've participated in guided meditation, the exhortation to "sit up with your back straight, your body as relaxed as possible" has always been absurd to me, because I can't hold myself upright if I don't tense my muscles. Try it: lightly tense all the muscles in your body for a bit, and see how long you can hold that, and you will know what staying upright is like for someone with EDS). It's been said that having it is like the body having to do strength training with weights all the time, except, unlike on a normal person, the muscles never get to rest and recuperate fully (except during sleep, and even then perhaps not completely; to make it even more fun, sleep disorders are a common manifestation in EDS). I sprain things all the time--I do my back in even in my sleep, and get trapped nerves/sciatica just from walking; winter clothes, let alone bags, are exhausting for me to carry even for short distances. For me, lifting a coffee cup, due to the laxity of my connective tissues, requires the same amount of muscular exertion as it requires for a healthy person to lift a full pint. Et cetera. Plus all the other weird ailments, which I'll get to in a bit.

But the main reason I'm telling you all this is that you really, really, *really* ought to read up on EDS. The whole world does. But especially if you, or someone you know, suffer(s) from chronic fatigue and muscular pain and are bendy--*because it looks like this is actually the illness behind many (not all, but many) fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome cases.* I repeat, *this is now assumed to be the most common cause of fibromyalgia and CFS.*

And then there's all the other EDS-induced stuff, all freakishly common among geeks. Here’s a list of some of the most typical symptoms:

-Bendy? "Double-jointed?" Good at yoga (even without practice)?

-Gut problems/IBS? Leaky gut?

-Serious fatigue, unrefreshing sleep, body feels like it's made of lead? And is it unexplained by other conditions (such as a dicky thyroid or anemia)?

-Sleep problems, anxiety/panic attacks/PTSD, autism spectrum, AD(H)D?

-Bad PMS and awful reactions to the Pill and other progesterone preparations, health crashes after pregnancies, dysmenorrhea with godawful cramps (like you're giving birth to a demon baby every month), endometriosis, fibroids, pelvic pain and other gynaecological issues?

-Allergies by the bucketful? Multiple chemical insensitivities?

-Weird heart thumpages, blood pressure issues, fainting when standing up?

-Early-onset problems with eyesight?

-Can't go numb from anaesthetic, and/or are hard to put under for surgery (this is great fun)?

-Feel pain more intensely than other people (developing needle-phobia from horrid experiences when having blood drawn or being put on an IV drip)? Are all dentist trips and having gynaecological exams (even sex and wanking at times!) a nightmare?

-Or, as a bonus, has the weird pain response made you kinky or just crazily responsive to acupressure/acupuncture? Or just caresses?

-Have you got weird and/or excessive scar tissue formation? Keloids from piercings? Have your wounds healed badly; after surgeries, have your stitches torn spontaneously?

-Got hernias, squashed-up internal organs, including a heavy/tilted uterus, breathing problems like your lungs are squashed (but asthma inhalers don't seem to help much)?

-Weird bruises, and you have no idea where they came from? Excessive bleeding (including bleeding buckets during periods)? Varicose veins at a young age?

-Flat feet? Funny little round, soft bumps (piezogenic papules) on your ankles? Need sturdy shoes with high tops and arch support? Find it difficult or impossible to walk in high heels, due to wobbly ankles and/or the muscular strain it puts on the whole body?

-Constant sprains, muscle pulls/tears, dislocations, subluxations (=partial dislocations; just something going 'crunch', like when the bones of your hand or your vertebrae seem all scrunched up together and you need to pull them open), trapped nerves, monster headaches? Growing pains? Pressure in the skull?

-Just. Hurt. Everywhere?

-Weird adverse reactions to medications that are way worse than ordinary side effects, completely intolerable and/or causing permanent damage, even life-threatening situations?

-Even queerness/gender-atypicality (I am not joking; it goes with the neuropsychiatric profile)?

Guess what, they're all related to this exact damn thing! And just how common are they in fandom, among geeks?! Right? Weirded out yet? And this is *far* from being an exhaustive list, because again, this is a multisystem disease which can technically affect pretty much all your body parts and their functions. But if you said "yes" to several, take a deep breath and keep reading. Or if not, hell, keep on reading anyway, because it's likely you know someone with this thing--it could be as common as 5%-10% of the whole human population.

Even if you are born with this rubbish, people go undiagnosed for decades (I only got diagnosed at 38, and I’ve been sick ever since childhood!) and since it mostly affects women (although guys *can* be affected), it's ignored and/or psychiatrisised by doctors. And since the female body is a chaotic body horror movie anyway, many have just thought it's normal to always have little sprains and crunches everywhere all the time, and that the fatigue just has a merely neurological basis. That it's just depression or a part of having been born with XX chromosomes. But it isn’t.

And another main reason that it goes undiagnosed is the persistent myth that EDS *always* has to involve extremely stretchy skin and extreme hypermobility, which is categorically *not* the case for everybody. Even the sodding Wikipedia article (misleadingly) only uses photos of *extreme* hypermobility and skin stretchiness, of the usual circus performer contortionism EDS has traditionally been associated with but which is NOT WHAT YOU NEED TO HAVE TO HAVE EDS, I repeat, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE A RUBBER PERSON TO HAVE EDS; you only have to be bendy and exhausted and ill. There are some people with it who are even *stiff.*

Thousands, hundreds of thousands of people remain undiagnosed even if EDS/hypermobility-related illness seriously messes up their daily lives--it can be debilitating. So, please, do yourself and your friends a favour and spread the word, and check out these links.

When to suspect EDS (blog discussion, also linking geekiness to this thing):

http://ohtwist.com/when-else-to-suspect-ehlers-danlos-syndrome

An overview on when to suspect, by a specialist (Dr. Bravo, PDF format):

http://ohtwist.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/DrBravoWhenToSuspect.pdf

Good brochure:

https://www.chronicpainpartners.com/brochure/

Another overview from the same site:

https://www.chronicpainpartners.com/what-is-eds/

Hypermobile EDS diagnostic criteria, with pictures showing how the bendiness level is scored (see how many you or your friend can do):

http://edsresearch.weebly.com/the-brighton-score-and-the-beighton-score.html

Good infosite:

https://www.edhs.info/understanding-eds-h

Pictures of a woman with typical hypermobile EDS, which is far more common than the actual contortionist stuff, and thus goes unnoticed:

https://mastcellblog.wordpress.com/journey/edsphotos/

A good overview of the problems hypermobility can cause by a specialist doctor who knows what up. This made me pretty much scream at the screen because I have one of those exact types of insanely painful mini-hernias that some doctors don't believe are there because they are almost impossible to see with normal imaging, but which my gyn saw during laparoscopy (PDF format):

https://www.dynainc.org/docs/hypermobility.pdf

Why hormones, progesterone in general (contraceptives, pregnancy, PMS) screw up the hypermobile body and may cause serious damage:

http://hypermobility.org/help-advice/hormones-hypermobility/

The official site of the biggest, worldwide EDS/hypermobility organisation:

https://www.ehlers-danlos.com/

UK support, including a toolkit for GPs on how to handle EDS:

https://www.ehlers-danlos.org/

Finnish EDS association:

https://www.ehlers-danlos.fi/

More info in Finnish, but this also has an embedded video clip (old but neat and short) from US telly (in English) to illustrate a family living with the disease:

https://eds-group.vuodatus.net/lue/2018/01/mista-voin-loytaa-tietoa-ehlers-danlosin-syndroomasta

(Hey, where have I seen eerie, elongated moves by a tall, bony guy before?! Yes, there are variants, like with the related illness, Marfan Syndrome, where people basically Look Like Cesare.)

And last but not least, the brilliant Dr. Sharon Meglathery's RCCX theory, which ties up all those illnesses I and others have noticed clustering around sensitive/artistic/neuroatypical/queer/geeky/triggered by everything folks, such as hypermobile EDS, fibromyalgia, endometriosis, allergies, IBS, sleep issues, stress hormone (adrenaline, cortisol) issues, CFS/ME, oh, you *know* the type when you read it. It's like a list of the usual Tumblr issues, for crying out loud--she might as well have called the PTSD-prone psychiatric profile that underlines these specific gene weirdnesses as "Triggered By Everything." Only it explains the links to the severe physical illnesses as well, and how and why they relate to stress hormone overload and why, thanks to problems with progesterone and cortisol metabolism, the physical illness stuff screws geeky women over more often than it does geeky men. And you owe it to yourself to read it.

https://www.rccxandillness.com/

I don't often say this, but reblog to save a life. These are geek illnesses, *our* illnesses. There are forms of this stuff that are lethal (causing stroke and heart attacks and organs going boom out of the blue at a young age), and the amount of suffering it can cause is ridiculous--I would have lived my life in a drastically different way, and would have never got so ill from the wrong medications and life choices, had I known I had EDS. (Just don't call me a "spoonie;" I'm not a fan of that thing--I'll explain later. Call yourself whatever you like; however, I'm still a ridiculous arctic chicken just as I've always been.) But there are still thousands of people out there who have all these symptoms and yet have never heard of this stuff, and for whom this knowledge can be life-changing, so *please,* spread the word.

Thank you.

#disability #ehlers danlos #ehlers danlos syndrome #chronic fatigue syndrome #fibromyalgia #autism #i really don't often make posts about my illnesses but the fact that this is so undiagnosed makes me MAD #and even if you don't normally reblog my rambles this is *important*#if a geek on my level--who's researched her illnesses and nutrition etc. like crazy #for the past twenty years for which I've had fatigue/hormonal issues might i add #only finds out this late... it's insane #and yes. yes. connie was hypermobile #it's a toss between marfan or vascular EDS in his case *hysterical disbelieving laughter*#i wish he'd leave me alone but nope...#i mean it about the potential lethality too #my mum's mum died at 29 from her aortic valve going boom and orphaned my mum as a toddler :(#and they couldn't treat it then (in the 50s) even if they knew she had a heart murmur #i have to wait 6-12 months to get to the genetic tests to see if i have that variant:/#but at least i'm going to have a heart ultrasound before xmas this year to check #still it's not fun to feel like a ticking time bomb #but please do read at least some of these/reblog bc this is common but 95% go undiagnosed

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happilyfindingthebeautyinli-blog · 7 years

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Intuitive Eating Challenge Day 4. Reflecting on my journey

w. . So today was actually reasonably better at intuitive eating! Yay! I ate when hungry, and didn't overeat. Maybe I ate a little past fullness at lunch but nothing major. Only day 4 and I can feel a difference.

Something major that I'm working on with this IE world is LETTING GO and NOT JUDGING foods. It's this quest to find foods neutral that I think will be incredible liberating.

One thing asked in today's podcast is: If you were a man, would you do things differently (food-wise)? And the truth is that I would definitely be less preoccupied with my weight. Maybe I would eat the same, but the "mental allowance" is super important.

So, now onto the highlight of my day today.

I had a session with both my therapist and my psychiatrist.

With my therapist: We talked about everything I've been learning about body positivity, HAES, IE, etc. It helped so much to explain everything out loud to someone. One of the things that we both concluded was that restriction is definitely the cause of my binges. I also told her how I've been reflecting a lot about my relationship with food and my body growing up and what external factors influenced it. Some examples are:

1. My mom and her "tomorrow I start a diet so let me eat everything today" mentality. This is one of the big ones that affects my binges. Also her eating emotionally. i.e. I'm sad, let me eat chocolate mentality.

2. My family. My aunts constantly dieting. Me feeling like the ugly/fat cousin. My aunt Morella saying bad things about my body.

3. Guys in my life (brother, cousin, friends) and the way they speak about woman. The "omg you hooked up with a fat girl", or "wow she gained/ lost weight; now she's so ugly/hot", etc. That made me feel like my body wasn't beautiful in some way and that guys would mock me.

4. Society in general. The crazy unattainable ideal of Venezuelan woman to look a certain way in the name of "beauty".

It was a great session, and I could see how much she agreed with everything I have learned. One thing that was very true that we talked about is the idea of your "set point" weight. I've observed it with my body so much. If I try to lose weight, I might lose like 3 kilos, and with all of my binges I max gained like 3 kilos, so my weight fluctuates like 12 pounds in between. That means I'm at my set point weight, and my body will always try to come back to this. That's why body acceptance is sooo important. Yes, maybe I want to be a little smaller, but this is the body I'm supposed to be at, and you know what? It's great!!!

Then, with my psychiatrist (who put me off Olanzapine today yay! Note: in the back of my mind I was like yayy, no more weight gain drug, I'll lose weight now, but then I was like NO brain stop!) I talked about what I thought was the origin of my episode. SO here goes:

I've always in general been very hard with myself, academically, with exercise and food choices, etc. But nothing mattered because I was the "smart" girl.

Once I got to college my "intellectual self-esteem" went down, because I started comparing myself to people who were founding companies, that knew how to code and had apps in the app store, etc.

Sophomore year I was trying to do everything. Get an internship, TA cs15, do well in my classes, party in Buxton, etc etc etc

Internship rejections and CS 32 happened!!! Omg I don't know why but feeling like a shitty programmer just crushed my intellectual self-esteem. Bad.

I dropped CS32, went to Punta Cana, got an internship at Facebook, started dating Aqil. Everything was great!

Aqil started with his commitment issues behaviors... That really affected my self-esteem as well. Why does he not want to talk about me with his family? Why does he not want to meet my family? WHY THE FUCK did I say yes to an "open" relationship (although we weren't "officially" dating) thing during the summer when I knew how much I liked him? Why did I tell myself it was OK when I knew I just wanted a regular boyfriend that said he loved me? Yeap, a lot of things there were wrong... But oh well, I was happy. First time I was physical with someone, first time I (think) I actually was "in love". Co-dependence with Aqil calls all summer definitely bad too.

Existential Valentina ft. existential Aqil ft. existential Valentin ft. Existential Samanee ft existential Andy etc etc etc conversations during the whole summer that made me doubt so many things, and made me feel like I wasn't pursuing my "passion" and therefore I was settling and doing something wrong

Fucking Sunnyvale. #iHateTheSuburbs

Fucking birth control pills #NeverAgain

The decision of whether or not to return to Facebook, and how it was affected by the beginning of my depression

My intellectual and my body self-esteem IN THE FLOOR when I returned to college

And well, then come the terrible months of depression, body dysmorphia, self-harm, suicidal thoughts that followed (I'll describe then in detail someday in another post when I feel like it)... They. Were. Not. Easy.

So hey, I cured my chemical imbalance that made me depressed with the right treatment. I'm working with my therapist on my binges . I still struggle with body image of course, but I'm getting better every day :)

Wow, venting and writing things out really helps!! I'm so proud of myself

Part of my body I love today: The little scars I have on my left arm from when I self-harmed that remind me I'm a bad-ass for overcoming my depression!!

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