queenofcacti

[queenofcacti]

[nerd alert]

Since platinuming the Vietnamese tree on Duolingo, I have moved on to the French tree (though I am still restoring broken platinum topics on the Viet tree). French is bizarro. Also, it has not given me as much "I" language as I would like, so that I can include snips of nonsensical je blah blah blah in my self-talk/typing. Alas, I've only done the first like 4 topics or some shit.

But also I am extremely amused by the familial names and how they're all basically the same word with like 1-2 letters changed. Big lulz, guys.

ALSO ALSO I got accepted into a ladinokomunita group on fb and I am very excited to read all the Ladino

[queenofcacti]

[queenofcacti]

"Bovarysme is a term derived from Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary. It denotes a tendency toward escapist daydreaming in which the dreamer imagines himself or herself to be a hero or heroine in a romance, whilst ignoring the everyday realities of the situation."

Words

#gustave flaubert #madame bovary #bovarysme #bovarism #french literature #classic literature

[queenofcacti]

Mood.

[queenofcacti]

kaf·fee·klatsch

Also: coffee klatsch, coffee klatch

an informal social gathering at which coffee is served.

talking or gossip at an informal gathering where coffee is served.

#word of the day

[queenofcacti]

I don’t know how to read these animals. Are they happy? Are they bored? Are they depressed? Do they feel rejected when I don’t play with them? Are they hungry, thirsty, feeling unwell? It is terrifying to be home alone with them for too long, because I’m terrified I’m doing something wrong and I don’t know it. I regret agreeing to adopt them, and falling in love with them, because it is terrifying.

#pet rats #fancy rats #pet ownership #anxiety

[queenofcacti]

stomach parasite 

[queenofcacti]

I know M&Ms all taste the same but I’m still eating all the blue and green ones first

#m&ms #happy colors #blue m&ms #green m&ms

[queenofcacti]

I learned that I wouldn’t need to pry the permission to be who I was out of the hands of anyone else—I needed to give myself permission to expand into the space where I wanted to be, and that people who didn’t like it could move on. The people who loved me with my personality, my quirks, my boundaries, and my scars, wouldn’t make me defend my decision to take up that space or be who I am.

yes, I am quoting myself from something I wrote

#identity #gender identity #boundaries #taking up space

[queenofcacti]

When I’m feeling really sad, I clean and minimize my presence in the main spaces of the apartment

[queenofcacti]

Ты...

Ты ничто! - You are nothing! A very mean thing to say to anybody.

Ты ничего! - You are alright! A flirty thing to say.

Ты - нечто! - You are something! You are special! A pretty good thing to say.

[queenofcacti]

There’s a theory that early Europeans started saying “brown one” or “honey-eater” instead of “bear” to avoid summoning them, and similarly my friend has started calling Alexa “the faceless woman” because saying her true name awakens her from her slumber

English has an avoidance register used in the presence of certain respected animals, which sounds fancy until you realize it’s spelling out w-a-l-k and t-r-e-a-t in front of the dog.

Mx. Leah Velleman on twitter

[queenofcacti]

Internet, you wound me. Not that there’s anything wrong with this, but also daammnn iiit.

[queenofcacti]

Gentle reminder/self-affirmation

Friends who choose to pursue sexual gratification instead of hanging out with you sometimes are not undervaluing you, they are simply needing something you’re not offering. And there’s nothing wrong with that, nothing “less than” about it either. If you crave a pickle and someone offers you a cucumber, even if you like both of these options, you’re not going to sate your craving with the cucumber.

#asexual problems #ace problems #self-affirmation #gentle reminder #sometimes your friends just need to get laid and that's ok

[queenofcacti]

chocolate espresso banana jam + gelatin ideas

chocolate espresso banana jam

- mashed and boiled banana - semisweet chocolate, melted - instant espresso - creamy peanut butter ?? - pectin

as a gelatin (light to dark):

- boiled, mashed, strained banana - creamy peanut butter + water (1/2 cup + 1 cup per jell-o jigglers recipe) - prepared espresso - finely chopped semisweet chocolate

pb&j jigglers (for peanut butter): https://www.myfoodandfamily.com/recipe/182788/pbj-jell-o-jigglers

raspberry chocolate gelatin (for chocolate gelatin): https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchen/raspberry-chocolate-gelatin-recipe-2042837

banana jam: https://thesaltedpepper.com/wprm_print/11758

[queenofcacti]

Diabetes Awareness Month Blog-A-Day 2: Share your BG or CGM Data

Since this prompt is more image based than writing based, I decided to share my bullet journal spreads that I use partly or wholly to track diabetes metrics: The first is my quarterly spread, where I log my daily habits, which includes my fasting and bedtime blood sugars. I don’t often test my blood sugar outside of those two times, unless I’m having a noticeable low or feel drowsy and/or have eaten something I don’t know how to bolus for. I have lows (69 mg/dL or lower), my target range (70-126 mg/dL), an acceptable range (127-160 mg/dL), above target (161-185 mg/dL) and high (186 mg/dL and higher) color-coded for easy review. I also keep track of my daily carb intake and any changes to my infusion sets (the orange lightning bolts), reservoirs (the meandros-ish spiral symbols), and batteries (the AAs), and whenever I upload my pump data to Medtronic’s CareLink portal (the up arrow). I also use the bottom boxes to track monthly averages, which allows me to roughly estimate my HbA1C based on the fasting and bedtime blood sugar numbers for any three months at a time.

I’ve experimented with plenty of ways over the years to track my blood sugars—something you’re supposed to do when you’re on MDI (multiple daily injections), including tracking your carbs, but that’s basically obsolete now for a lot of people with insulin pumps and CGMs (continuous glucose monitors)—from writing down every test, every carb, every dose, and every time to the minute that each of these things happened, to writing nothing down at all. Too much micromanagement is exhausting, and I have a tendency to “go big or go home,” which leaves me feeling overwhelmed and frustrated. Before I started bullet journaling, I just let my pump record my sugars and doses and carbs, but then that was the far opposite extreme: I didn’t have enough information, and so I wasn’t in enough control.

In 2018 I started recording my blood sugars in my bullet journal, but it wasn’t really until this year that I came up with the beauty in the picture here: All my stats in one eight-page spread, color-coded and standardized and easy to eyeball and thus easy to use. I haven’t had to worry about skimming pages to find out when I changed my site last, or to look at my fasting and bedtime sugar trends to determine whether anything needs to be tweaked or added or avoided. I’ve already decided I’ll continue to use this quarterly spread to track these vital measurements, though next year I may add an additional set of pages for tracking additional tests between getting out of and back into bed.

The second spread I wanted to share is my inventory tracker for my diabetes supplies and my changelog for basal and bolus rate adjustments. You can tell this is from before the pandemic, since there’s no point in keeping anything in my backpack anymore. I don’t keep up with this page as diligently as I should, but practice makes perfect… maybe next year I’ll have that one fully integrated in my routine.

For anyone who has to keep a paper diary, or who just wants to!, you should consider starting a bullet journal. It’s organizational, artistic (if you want it to be—it can be monochromatic and utilitarian if that’s what you like; it can also be full of colorful markers and stickers and stamps!), and even meditative, and can be used for just tracking your diabetes, or your entire life. Personally, I live out of my journal; some people have one just for work, or one just for life—the beauty of it is how free-form it is. I feel like it’s been instrumental in my diabetes management. (If you’re more of a digital record keeper, there are apps for this for tablets and smartphones that people swear by, too!)

#diabetes awareness month #diabetes awareness #type 1 diabetes

[queenofcacti]

Diabetes Awareness Month Blog-A-Day 1: Diagnosis story

I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at age 22. I was just finishing up my first semester as a senior at my university, but I had been experiencing strange issues for the last few months—since at least summer break, if not that whole year. I had lost a significant amount of weight since that January (which I had attributed to stopping birth control, and there still may be some truth to that); I was becoming disoriented when I got drunk; I was excruciatingly thirsty and hungry all the time, chugging gallons of orange juice like nobody’s business; I was going to the water fountain and the bathroom so often it was cutting into my time spent in my classes; I was having brutal middle-of-the-night leg cramps; and I developed dry sores at the corners of my lips and uncomfortable dry skin in general.

One major event that convinced me I needed to see the doctor was when I couldn’t complete an oral exam for my Spanish class because I was blanking on and stumbling over my words. This was unusual for me, and my professor at the time knew it. She stopped me mid-bumble and said she was giving me an A, explaining that it was because she knew I was capable, but that I was clearly in distress, or something was otherwise wrong with me, and she urged me to seek help for whatever it was. I had also become disoriented celebrating my birthday party that semester and had popped all the blood vessels under one of my eyes from a resulting fall (which was also a major red flag about my health), so this professor was clearly seeing this pattern that I don’t think I would have seen myself. (And bless her for being so compassionate!)

I chalked that exam snafu up to having been hungover and the vocabulary being hard (ironically I believe it was medical vocabulary – inyecciones and such), and the drinking incidents to, well, drinking, and so the urgency that took me to the Urgent Care where I was diagnosed was little more than chronic inconvenience. My mom took me and my brother there when we came home for Christmas break, essentially just a check-up. She was in the other room with my brother when the medical assistant who did my blood work came back in and told me I had diabetes.

Honestly, most of that experience is a blur. I know my blood sugar at diagnosis was 555, and I know the medical assistant who announced my diagnosis said something to the effect of, “She doesn’t look that sick.” I know my mom and my brother came into the room with me while the staff at the UC tried to explain what this meant and how things would have to change for me, but I was in information overload. (I am extremely thankful they were there, because I don’t think I retained any of that information myself.) They told us we could go get something to eat and then come back for them to get me insulin pens and teach me how to use them. In hindsight maybe they should have gotten us squared away with the insulin part before unleashing me on food… alas.

I remember being frustrated that I was diagnosed on December 16, because I thought it would have been better on the 15th, but the 16th that year was a Friday and the 15th being a Thursday I would not have liked that either. It’s possible I chose that aspect of the day I was diagnosed to be annoyed by, instead of the actual diagnosis itself or the way it was handled. I was referred to an endocrinologist there in M-burg and later back at the university, but I learned most of my diabetes management from Dr. Google. That said, I am grateful that it did not result in a hospital visit of any kind, and despite that rough first year after diagnosis I have done a decent job managing my diabetes with little outside help. That 555 is still the highest my blood sugar has ever been in the nearly 9 years that I’ve dealt with T1.

#diabetes awareness month #diabetes awareness #type 1 diabetes