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ms-demeanor · 3 months

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IDK that I've ever put it in one post before, but here's the transplant speedrun.

1 - Valentines day 2021, he's admitted to the hospital. We take a pre-hospital selfie then I shave his head and he shaves his beard because he doesn't want to deal with hair at the hospital. Me and his mom drop him off; at that point you can only visit someone as they are actually dying and we're told that he's going to stay in the hospital until he gets a transplant or he dies, and if he's rejected as a transplant recipient he'll receive palliative care in this hospital.

2 - First week of March, they allow patients to have one screened visitor; this is our first visit - I take photos in the hospital to show his mom because at this point he has a pump in his shoulder and it is difficult for him to move his arms to use his phone. He has also been confined to a bed since the week he arrived because he's on the ECMO machine, so he can't walk or move around, though they stand him up every once in a while. At one point one of the ecmo tubes pulls out of his femoral artery, which is Not! Great! He also needed a blood transfusion about every two days at that point, which worried the doctors because it increased his likelihood of rejecting. But he had been approved for transplant at that point!

The first thing he said to me on this visit was "look, I have abs" and then he showed me his abs because it turns out when you're really really dying of heart failure your body begins to eat itself.

3 - Now That's What I Call Jaundice (cardiac cirrhosis is liver failure as a result of heart failure and it's pretty much the big giant neon flashing sign of heart failure that says "hey you're fucking dying" so if you've got heart failure and your bilirubin number is off or the whites of your eyes are yellow please kick up a gigantic stink until they check your liver; large bastard's GP, who is my doctor, who I hate, saw his bloodwork with a very high bilirubin number a month before he was diagnosed with cardiac cirrhosis and wrote it off as a testing fluke fuck that guy)

4 - Don't let the sad face fool you, he's acting pathetic so that his mom will stop yelling about the fact that I'm bringing him cookies. He's allowed to have cookies. At that point he weighed 98kg and was outsourcing his heartbeat, he was allowed to eat whatever he wanted. (have i mentioned that I was moving us from Vegas to LA at this time? I was bringing him cookies because I'd baked hundreds of peanut butter cookies and other cookies to use up the flour, sugar, and peanut butter in the vegas house)

5 - Mid-march, he's got a match! He called me when I was in Vegas filling up the truck with another load and I drove right back and to the hospital. Once he went in for surgery I drove to his mom's house and crashed, then woke up and drove to our storage unit and unpacked the truck while I waited to hear from the doctors. I was unloading a bookcase when I got the call. (There wasn't any point in waiting alone in the hospital for sixteen hours; either he was going to make it or he wasn't and someone was going to have to unload the truck at some point. People have been weird about this, like I should have been sitting at his side all the time, but there was a two-hour daily limit for most visits and look i have sat in a waiting room while this dude had a thirteen hour surgery i do not need a repeat of that experience without the soothing balm of nicotine getting me through it; so unloading a truck it was)

6 - Two days after surgery and kind of mad about it. His chest hurt a lot (obviously) but, like, a lot a lot because they'd had to open him up for the bypass just two years earlier.

7 - First walk outside of his room after transplant in early April; he needed a LOT of PT because of how much muscle he'd lost. He lost sixty pounds in the hospital before the surgery, and only gained back about twenty while he was in there.

8 - A visit from the tiny doggo

9 - I come to visit and I've got a new phone with a portrait mode so he steals it and takes stupid pictures for a few minutes. Dude is bored and restless; this is in late april and he's feeling well enough to be moody. ETA: There is a jar of pickles in front of him because he'd been fluid limited for a long time and his salt levels were off and when he got to the hospital they were like "you need electrolytes and a lot of salt" and he was like "sweetheart can you please please please bring me delicious salty things" so I was bringing him jars of pickled mushrooms and garlic stuffed olives and just a huge number of pickles that he kept trying to share with the nurses. "Alli brought the mushrooms again; would you like a pickled mushroom? I have fancy toothpicks to share them with!"

10 - He comes home for the first time in early May; he ends up getting readmitted two more times because of complications before finally being released in early July. ETA: The second time he got readmitted it was for something that he wasn't at all worried about but that they needed to monitor for a couple weeks so he was *SO BORED* and actually feeling pretty okay; so at one point when I was leaving the parking garage at 8pm my car wouldn't start, I did some troubleshooting with the manual and the internet and didn't figure it out, so I called him and he tried to troubleshoot over the phone and got frustrated and was begging his nurses to let him come out to the parking structure to work on my car (they refused) - I ended up getting a tow and fixing it when I replaced the battery terminals.

Photos are all posted with his permission.

Also I dyed my hair purple between photos one and two because it's his favorite color. I also bought a blue dress, red tights, and yellow shoes to wear to visit him because he always teases me for wearing so much black.

I just love him a lot. It was a hard couple years there, but things are getting better.

#tw medical

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habitbslouis · 2 years

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#sorry in advance because i'm sure i'll be annoying i guess? lol #me today was like #hospital at 7. work at 8. literally did not have a single moment of free time. done with work at 6. uni at 6:30. home by 9.#studying for my art history exam till 11:30. it's freezing and i'm sad because i saved up for months to buy tickets for me and my sister #to louis' show and then #my dad had this absolutely horrible situation #like something really really shitty #and my ma tried to help with a little money she had left and it was taken from her #and of course my family is my top priority so i gave them all the money i had #and the tickets sold out also #and i've been heartbroken and stressed for my dad! like it's absolutely horrible #but i've also been very stressed for myself and i just wanted to see louis i've been waiting years #and i would never ever regret helping my parents out #and it's not their fault it's someone else's fault #but i'm mad and upset about it and just very very :(#fucking louis tomlinson i'm not seeing him it i saved my money for months to see that angel and maybe just not be depressed for a while and #it all just went away in seconds #because some idiot woke up one day and decided to be an absolute asshole and make it everyone's problem #i feel bad for my parents they literally felt so bad taking my money because they knew from day 1 it was my louis money #i obviously made them take it #it's just so shitty life is very shitty at the moment and i don't have the energy #i don't wanna sleep because when i wake up louis will be here and i don't wanna keep facing that i won't go #even worse i can't even do anything because after work i have my art history mid and i can afford a bad grade #anyways #i hope from the bottom of my heart that life is treating you people well i love you #also am i old i used to be able to pull an all nighter to study now i'm just knackered and fell asleep on my textbook at least 3 times #befkre i decided i wasn't actually making any progress

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dinanikto · 3 months

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Spoilers: Episode 4 of the Walten Files

I think people misunderstood Felix as a character?

I've seen so many fans WISHING that Felix would actually die?? Like, "if I was Jack, I would beat the shit out of Felix" or "Felix, do a flip".

I thought it was shown pretty well that he is not in the right state of mind.

Before reading this, please, gather all of your compassion and sympathy, and listen to what I'm about to say with a clear mind.

Let's speak chronologically:

1) Felix and Jack meet in college and decide to create animatronic-based restaurant. They are teens/young adults in the year 1958-1964 (not truly canon, but close to). According to Martin, they're very close, they love and trust each other.

2) Jack meets Rosemary, they start dating. She creates designs for Bon and other characters.

Felix is, presumably, left alone to himself, as he doesn't have anyone else.

3) They graduate and contact CyberFun Tech.

Felix meets and marries Linda, while Jack and Rosemary have their first kid.

4) october 30th, 1964.

Linda notes Felix's heavy drinking and his poor self image. She's stressed and scared.

Felix is close with the Walten family. Jack and Rose get two more kids, and they all call him uncle!

And yet, he doesn't feel welcome. He uses alcohol as a coping mechanism. "He drinks for the sole purpose of drinking!"

Please note, the year is 1964!! Even nowadays not many people can get help and cure their addictions. Not many people believe that they can, or that they deserve it.

5) december 25th, 1970.

Krankens and Waltens are so close they spend Christmas together. And yet, Felix is burdened with something.

Jack and Rose are lovey dovey, Felix and Linda are not. Waltens have three kids that love their parents deeply, Krankens do not. Jack is happy, and Felix is not.

He's still using alcohol to calm himself down.

He can't control himself anymore.

Linda tries to talk to him, but Felix doesn't respond. Or rather, it's how Linda frames it.

"He feels bad about it, but doesn't try to change."

Honestly? Sounds like he tries to communicate, but his depression isn't letting him do it well. Again, it's 1970, and I don't think anyone has ever truly tried to help him.

He's a man. Why can't he man up? Jack is doing fine, why can't you, Felix?

Or why won't you just tell everyone how you feel? It's not like men have been bottling their emotions for decades now, right?

6) april 1974.

The Bon's Burgers is about to be open in a few weeks.

Felix and Linda have a fight (verbal). He hurts her feelings.

Jack asks Felix to pick up kids from a school party. Felix says no at first, but Jack won't listen.

Eventually, Felix says yes.

7) morning of may 2nd, 1974.

Linda leaves Felix. Only thing left after her is a note.

No talking, no nothing. His wife of 10+ years left him.

Have you ever gone through a breakup? A breakup with your spouse? Were you in an intoxicated state of mind when your wife left you? Were you depressed when seemingly everyone have left you?

Wait, right, he has Waltens. So of course he's gonna get those kids home, that's the only thing left for him! Everyone are asking him of it.

7) evening of may 2nd, 1974.

The car crash happens.

8) may 3rd, 1974.

He's awfully drunk. He's depressed. He got almost killed. He tried to kill himself twice. He has no one to talk about this with.

He has killed two children. Children that he loved.

Jack is going to hate him. And he does! Jack DOES want to kill him, Felix knows it even before speaking to him.

Note that he's not afraid of Rosemary.

9) may 3-6th, 1974.

He hides. He doesn't sleep for three days, and gets hallucinations.

He's scared. But the fact he actually faced Waltens is surprising. He's trying to fix things as best as he can.

10) may 6th, 1974

He lies. What else can he do?

Jack disappears. Susan disappears. Rosemary and Charles disappear. Brian and Ashley disappear.

And THIS is noway near his fault.

Bon's Burgers close. He has no money, several murder cases. Everybody is dead.

_____________________________________________

And after all of this, people don't find Felix even a little bit likeable? But support an agressive, irrational Jack, who was blind to his brother's struggling and pain? Who was the only person to not notice Felix's drinking problem?!? I'm confused.

I feel like Felix almost constantly. The mentally ill guy with no support system, that has no one to talk to. Never the one to get any help, even when having a "family".

And it's not like he thinks that he deserves love and attention. He never goes searching for Linda. He tries to end his life multiple times. He's masking as a nice corporate guy, while suffering internally.

He suffers more than anybody else in the series. And why? What did he do? Did anyone teach him how to deal with these situations?

In conclusion: don't hate people. Never ever wish the worst for them, especially publicly.

And if you associate yourself with Kranken? Try to get help. Again, and again, and again. We live in a scary, but wonderful world. Your life is worth living, you deserve to be happy. Don't give up.

#muting this post. please dm me if you have any questions #twf #the walten files #twf felix #my thingies

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hellyeahsickaf · 4 months

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Abled people don't fucking get it.

You don't get to imply I'm living some kind of "forever vacation". It's perpetual pain. If you see me doing something I enjoy, it's not because it's what I'd rather be doing than being "productive". I fucking miss the gym but things like video games are just a much more accessible activity these days. I'm not "lounging", I don't get a break from the pain just that sometimes I'm able to take my mind off of it

Unemployment isn't some kind of break or excuse to not participate in society (capitalism is garbage but being disabled=/=unemployed for the hell of it). For reasons, I fell behind in school, bad. But I got myself a diploma equivalent and finally felt I'd chosen the line of work I wanted. I had connections, opportunities. I had fibro and some fatigue (unknowingly CFS as that was manageable) but I was getting PT and managing it as best I could. All I needed was to take courses and I was ready for that even with the difficulty of my then undiagnosed ADHD.

And then I got sick, really sick. Worst mono infection my doctor had ever seen due to medical neglect, Shoutout to those shitty CVS minute clinics. It made my ME/CFS so much worse, I was stuck in bed all the time before getting put on Adderall for my then newly diagnosed ADHD. Then I thought the fatigue was finally healing and a side effect of Adderall was a huge crash and wave of fatigue. No it turns out when it wore off I just felt the fatigue again lmfao

I was told I'd be better within 6 months. Okay so I can opt for the Spring semester, no big deal. 8 months go by, a year, a year and a half. I waited and waited. Hoping that "when I get better" I could be caught up with everyone else I knew my age. That was over 7 years ago. Do people think I wanted that all taken from me? To get progressively worse and worse?

Do they think loss of agency is something I enjoy? Needing help, being unable to drive, to enjoy my old hobbies, cook for myself regularly? I've been accused of enjoying this and not wanting to get better as if this hasn't put my head in very dark places. Sometimes I feel like I see a way out of this and it isn't recovery. They don't get it. I don't enjoy being heavily medicated but I know I need to be. I don't enjoy having things purchased for me because I want more financial independence. I don't enjoy feeling like a leech, actually.

It's not a vacation, it's hell. You can go on about how much more exhausted you are because you work or whatever but the thing is I don't need a job to feel what you feel after working. I feel like I worked a 12 hour shift after taking a shower on some days, no exaggeration. You can't compare your able bodied exhaustion to the effects of a chronic illness that fucks you up without you needing to work a full time job. This is my full time job and it wasn't the one I was hoping for exactly

#chronic pain #disability #chronic illness #fibromyalgia #cfs #chronic fаtiguе ѕуndrоmе #actually disabled #spoonie #me/cfs #cfs/me #long covid

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the-orange-tabby-cat · 2 months

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Wednesday

joel miller x fem!reader

Summary of the fic: For the last 5 years, every Wednesday you watched a handsome man walk by your street with a lilac bouquet in hands. Except he doesn't stroll on your street this Wednesday, he shows up at your grief support group. 🐾

read on AO3 | masterlist | previous chapter Warnings: No outbreak AU, Grief and its implications, Reader lost her mom, Reader's mom has a name (but no physical description), Group therapy, Grief support group, Parent grief, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Slow Build, Fluff, No use of y/n Word count of the chapter: 3,7k

A/N: For the longest time I've thought "What if Joel lost Sarah anyway?" and this became the answer to this question. I have no clue about how big this series will be, but I do know I want to explore grief and loss with these two in the most delicate way possible. Hope you enjoy it 🐾

I. LILAC

Coffee. Sketchbook. Balcony. Five years of waking up early on Wednesdays, grabbing a cup of coffee, and sitting near the railings to wait for him. Like a clock, at 8 am sharp he appears by the street corner with a lilac bouquet under his arm.

His strong profile will be the only thing in your vision for a few minutes as he walks by. You drew it so many times that you could do it with your eyes closed. The man will walk by at a steady pace without looking around (brows deeply furrowed in a “don’t fuck with me” kind of sign), focused on his way down the street.

Tall, dark hair and a patchy beard with a square jaw… He is dreamy, but also out of reach. Where is he going? Why the lilacs? Are they for a woman, his wife maybe? Every Wednesday at 8 am, never a minute late, both he and you.

As you took a sip of your coffee, you glanced over the watch marking 7:58 am, he would be here any minute. You prepared the table in expectancy, what outfit would he be wearing today? You hoped for the green shirt, but the blue one wouldn’t be as bad.

7:59 am. His hair is a little overgrown now, but you like the way his curls frame his face. The broadness of his shoulders and how tall he looks next to the other pedestrians. You aren’t sure of the color of his eyes from afar, maybe green or brown.

8:01 am and no signal of him. This is a first. Maybe you mistook the day of the week, check your phone, and… No, Wednesday still. You squirm in your seat, impatiently looking for him. 8:07 am, he never got so late. Should you keep waiting? You don’t even know his name.

At 8:30 am you give up. A wave of melancholy fills the air. Oh god, be for fucking real, are you really sad because a strange man and his stupid lilacs didn’t walk down your street?

“Don’t forget: 9 am at the gate”, you reread your grandpa's text.

You couldn’t be able to forget it, but deep down wish you could avoid it. Cemeteries aren’t your thing, the constant reminder of the death surrounding you. However, they are Grandpa’s way of dealing with it and who are you to judge?

The sketchbook is opened at the last page you drew, with the man staring in front of him fully angered. How did you end up with over 200+ drawings of a man you never met? The doctor said finding a hobby would help and so you did: drawing. “You see what no one else sees”, your mom used to say and you decided to take a test. Too bad your eyes landed on a strange man walking down the street, holding on tightly to a lilac bouquet. Even worse he had been doing the same path for five years right in front of your balcony. The only things in your sketchbook are his face, his hands, and the bouquet. This is your third one since you kept running out of pages.

As you put the sketchbook away, your mind drifted away to your mother’s (possible) commentary. “Don’t be silly, he will come by later, I’m sure something happened” and she, most likely, would be right. She was always right. 8:50 am and with your chest tightened from “talking” to her inside your mind, your feet landed at the cemetery’s gate.

“No flowers? Really? Who raised you, pigs?”, your grandpa said narrowing his eyes at you.

He, of course, was an impeccable mess in his hat, black coat, thin-framed glasses that gave him a Bond villainesque look. In his rugged hands a white rose bouquet, carefully made and held by.

“If I remember right, and I do remember it, we are talking about the same woman who said that flowers are for the living, not the dead.” He rolled his eyes in response but in good fun. “Why the flowers then?”

“My biggest mistake was to raise a woman a little too avant-garde, wasn’t it? C’mon, we don’t have the whole day,” he deep sighed while showing you the way.

You knew the path, but your feet seemed to avoid getting there, that’s why you followed Grandpa’s steps in the hope of not turning around and leave. It was a little ritualistic if you were honest: Grandpa would have some kind of gift in his hands that he would leave at the tombstone, and you would pretend to do not care as you deeply cared about it. She wasn’t there anymore, she hadn’t been for a long time.

Behind his glasses, you could see a lost man driven by grief. His hands shaking as he cleaned her name at the tombstone, the gaze avoiding yours. He would always wear black on cemetery days, as if the time never passed and it was the first visit yet.

“Want to go first?” He asked, you sighed in response. “Don’t know why I still ask.”

“It’s… Fine. You know she was a Buddhist, right? She believed in reincarnation. I feel a little silly talking to her,” you confessed while chewing the lip corners.

“Oh, trust me: I knew her the same amount as you, maybe even more. She was my daughter, for fuck’s sake.” Startled, you looked at him in shock at the rare occasion he would curse. Shit. “I’m not here because of her beliefs or lifestyle. Do you quote her inside your head? Because I do too, I too remember every small detail of her. I’m here because it’s how I tell myself she isn’t fully gone. So sorry if I’m too old-fashioned and feel like talking a few words at my daughter's tombstone with my grandaughter who, honestly? Could show a little more love towards her right now. I want to talk with her like we used to at the kitchen table on Sundays, I want to bring her flowers just like I did on her birthday and there is no Buddha, Allah, or a flying horse that can stop me. Now, can you open your fucking mouth and say something nice to your mom about your week?”

Silence took the space for a second before you simply replied with, “Better?”

“Yes, a lot. Thank you for asking, now go on, please.” He adjusted his hat and cleared his throat. You hummed, getting a little courage to look directly at the tombstone.

“Hum. I got a new couch last week, a velvety green one. A little too sexy, if I might, but you would probably say I need something sexy to attract someone even sexier. Am I rambling?” You asked, raising your eyes from the stone, but he made a motion for you to continue it. “Let me think, oh, the cat hunted a pigeon. It was somewhat disgusting because of the amount of feathers in my apartment…”

“Did the pigeon survive?” He asked, in his eyes with a slight curiosity.

“Yes, but by a thread. It was her cat, a little savage just like her!”

The conversation went on easily after it. Grandpa had found some old notebooks of your mom, including one with a cake recipe he would later send to you. You wouldn’t tell him, it did feel better not because you were speaking to her, but because you could watch him relax in his uptight perpetual state. In the blink of an eye, your mind wandered to the strange man and if he ever relaxed like that.

Grief is a strange thing. It took a little encouragement from your therapist and the need to move on, but you had started to go to weekly meetings of a grief support group at the local church (the only thing that made you enter that space). The first months were awkward, you went but avoided it at the same time. Slowly, it grew on you. Five years of not missing a single Wednesday, even on vacation.

Your grandpa tried once, but it just wasn’t for him. He didn’t want to move on or find a meaning for it, he needed to feel his grief as second skin. You needed it to stop suffocating you, to scream and shout about that weight in the hope of someone taking it from your back.

This Wednesday wasn’t any different. You entered the church's back door with some cookies in hand, even if you were well aware that most people couldn’t eat as they exposed their pain, it was more of a sweet gesture than a necessity. The white walls and the cross in front of you completed the scenario.

“Cookies? You never eat anything,” Henry questioned while taking a bite. His dark eyes staring suspiciously at you.

“My grandpa found an old cookie recipe from my mom. How does it taste?” You replied as you watched him bite. You couldn’t bear to try it first, too anxious about it.

“Your mom was definitely a writer, not a chef. Taste like an old sock.” His face contorted as he spat out the cookie. Well, you tried something new.

“Yeah, no wonder I survived out of Lucky Charms and BTLs.” Henry laughed as you let go of your shoulder’s tension a bit.

The grief support group had grown and shrunk over the years. Sometimes people would feel good enough to leave the support, those were the lucky ones: grief was a period of their life, not an everyday thing. In other cases, they would get too depressed and leave before making some actual change in their being. You, unfortunately, were addicted to bond with the pain part of it.

Well, you and them. Henry was the first you met, totally wrecked after losing his little brother, Sam, to leukemia. He almost left college due to the weight of grief but kept it together, you even went to his graduation a few years back.

Tess came later. First, her kid died and then, in a stroke of bad luck, she found out she had a terminal disease that would, eventually, kill her. She wasn’t there to deal with the death of others, but her own. She was slowly dying and it was scary as shit. Not that you would know it from the outside, she had more strength (both physically and mentally) than most.

Frank was the group leader, conducting the discussion and creating the safe spaces. Everything you had said while hugging him, no matter how bad, never came back to hunt you. Which was odd on its own, but even odder considering his grumpy husband, Bill, was the exact opposite. Everything you did said in Bill’s direction came back to hunt you right after it came out of your mouth.

People come and go, but you stay there. Grabbing your regular place at the circle, putting the name tag on your shirt, and drinking some water just in case you cry. Except today you have someone new seated across you.

His strong nose and patchy beard hint someone you do know. His square jaw tensed up, brows deeply furrowed in a “don’t talk to me, I want to go home” that you could draw with eyes closed. The name tag reads “Joel”. You were right, his eyes are brown.

It feels weird to look at him without a pen and paper in hand, but it feels just right to see his features up close. Tess brings him coffee - black, you noticed - and gives him an eye silently saying “Don’t fuck it up”.

The meeting starts, Frank asks who is there for the first time. Joel and a woman, Hannah, raise their hands.

“It’s tradition to introduce ourselves at our first meeting. You don’t need to tell the details of why you are here or who you are, just simple information that people can distinguish you from the rest of the group.” Frank explains to a tired Joel, who sighs in response while Hannah overshares who she is.

Of course he doesn’t want to be there. Nobody wants to. You wish you could leave every time you cross the door, but know that the moment the meeting starts to develop you will want to continue in that deep state of pouring your heart out.

“I’m Joel, my friend Tess convinced me to come. That’s it.” He simply states, loud and straight. You catch Frank laughing.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to push you a little on it. Why did you accept to come here?” Joel furrows even deeper at the provocation.

“I didn’t. She trapped me.” Tess raises her very blonde eyebrows at him, who snaps. “You did trap me. Call me saying it was an emergency, I go to your house expecting the worst and you lock me inside there until the time to come here after I said I wouldn’t go to a grief support group.”

“See? He is an asshole, he needs this.” She answers Frank, making sure he gets her points. Your mom was right, something had happened to him.

“So, Joel, why are you here still?” Frank subtly asks.

“I beg your pardon?” Joel’s eyes are softer now, getting caught off guard. He doesn’t have any argument for it.

“Yes Joel, why are you still here? I’m not trapping you in this char, nobody is holding you down.” Tess retorts her mouth in his direction, that scoffs and looks around the room. When his eyes look into yours, you smile coyly unable to retain yourself.

“Sir, please continue.” Accepting defeat, Joel crosses his arms around his chest, fully ignoring Tess's triumphant smile.

“You are free to leave at any point, no need to tell us why. But I guarantee that if you stay, you might learn we aren’t that bad.” Frank nods in his direction, gaining a hard sigh. “Let’s start. Before every meeting, we say out loud the names of those who have gone to allow ourselves to think about them without shame, remorse, or guilt. You know the drill, Henry?”

“Sam,” Henry says firmly.

“Abigail,” you speak loudly.

Another silly little gesture, but you do allow yourself to think about her after it. Every single time. It’s almost as if the weight of her, the one that you carry around all day and pretend isn’t there suffocating you, comes to sit by you, not on you.

“Teresa,” Tess points at her.

“Sarah,” Joel almost murmurs looking at the ground. His hands are fidgeting, his mind in another place.

You have been there, you know how strange it is to say it for the first time out loud after a while, sounds forbidden and partly awkward. You aren’t supposed to say it to strangers, it’s sacred just for you, and yet, here you are saying it to whoever wants to share this pain with you.

You wonder if Sarah liked lilac flowers.

Some people speak about how they dealt with grief during the week until Frank asks you how the cemetery visit went. The group knows that meeting your grandpa there gives you a chill up the spine.

“I think I forget that he is allowed to grieve as he needs. I know all these little parts of her, how she lived her life. I’m quick to fight because she isn’t here to defend herself. I’m not even sure she would like for me to defend the memory of who she is… Sorry, was. Of who she was.” You swallow dryly, trying to ignore the miswording. “He bought her flowers. She always said that flowers were for the living, not the dead, and yet, he bought her a bouquet. I got frustrated, felt like he was trying to put her in a box of who he wanted her to be.

“He put me in my place quickly, even said fuck.” Henry makes some noise in surprise, you nod agreeing. “Exactly, it dawned on me: the flowers are for him, not for her. Just like his grief and how he needs to express it is only for himself, not for me to judge. I think he misses her more than he tells me. If I could go back in time, I would have implored him to cremate her and stop this nonsense of going to her grave, checking her tombstone, giving her damn flowers.”

“Maybe the flowers are his way of saying out loud that he cares too. She was his daughter before being your mother.” Joel speaks out loud, getting your full attention. His arms are still crossed, but now his eyes are lost in thought, almost as if he didn’t want you to hear it.

“Maybe. I just wish he allowed himself to stop pretending she is still here. I want to think of her without feeling guilty that she isn’t. He is too busy missing her to notice that I’m missing him.” You answer locking eyes with Joel, who chews the corners of his mouth, once again deep in thought.

“Maybe he doesn’t know how to do it, need help.” His voice soft, just like his eyes.

“Maybe.” You give in, feeling that Joel isn’t speaking about your grandpa. You swallow as you remember the lilacs.

The meeting runs smoothly. The group finishes by drinking coffee before parting ways. Frank is chatting by the corner with Joel, who is running a hand by the nape of his neck. Curiosity gets the best of you and, before you can stop, you question Tess.

“Who is Sarah?”

“A million-dollar question, huh?” She teases as she sips her sugary coffee. Henry looks between you two, waiting for a response. “You both haven’t heard from me, I’ll deny til death that I’ve ever said it. His daughter, she died a few years back. He hasn’t been the same since. That motherfucker goes to her grave every fucking Wednesday.”

“He visits her every Wednesday?” The number of drawings of Joel walking down your street early in the morning with a lilac bouquet makes more sense. His face, his fast speed, how he ignored everyone that walked by, how he never noticed you at your balcony.

“Yes, she died on a Wednesday, he relives that event every week since.”

Frank walks in your direction, Joel right behind him looking everywhere, except your face. If he only knew how much you have looked at his face before.

“I recall you haven’t been a mentor yet, right?” Frank starts and you nod, curious about where he is going. “Amazing! You’ll have your first newbie. Joel, you’re in good hands.”

He leaves before you can say anything, whether yes or no. Fuck. Joel is confused as well, still looking like he would rather leave. You open your mouth and go grab your phone.

“Sooooo… How was your first meeting?” Flipping through your phone until find your own number isn’t a good move to show that you are smart, trustful and worthy but right now you only want to avoid his brown eyes.

“Pass.” You blink at him. “I won’t keep chit-chatting. Cut to the chase.”

“Oh damn, I thought you had softened a little with time.” He fights the urge to roll his eyes and you smirk at him, reading him like a book. “I’ll give you my number in case you need someone to talk to. And yes, you can call me anytime you want to. And no, I won’t get your number. You come to me or I won’t come to you.”

That entertains him a little. It was the first rule of your mentor, she made sure you would look for her and not the other way so you could understand when and what triggered you. Joel just nods as he saves your contact.

“When did you first contact your mentor?” He questions, sounding genuine in his curiosity.

“Diet Coke, couldn’t drink.” The furrowed brows are back, so you continue. “My mom would mostly only drink Diet Coke, after she passed away I would buy canes just to open and hear the sizzling. Couldn’t drink otherwise would vomit from stress. It was really hot and I craved one, made that call and drank it.”

“And you drank the whole thing?” His soft eyes are back and you feel a little foolish for thinking that he could have green eyes, not when the dark brown suits him so much.

“Yes and vomited right away. Still, it was worth the shot.” You smile and for a fraction of time, he smiles too.

He doesn’t call right after and neither shows up at the grief support group. You still draw him, but from memory, the last time you watched as he strolled your street it was three months ago. Something about his grief seems too personal and you feel awkward invading that space, instead, every Wednesday at 8 am you find another thing to do. It isn’t as easy as it sounds, ignoring his handsome profile and the lilacs on his hands, but you allow his privacy.

The only reminder of your favorite habit is the sketchbook at the table and the fresh lilacs decorating your balcony.

Time goes by slowly and too fast, the weight of your mom still at your back as the life surrounding you goes on its course. You almost forget about him until a Wednesday morning, 8 am sharp, your phone chimes and you pick up at the first beep.

“I can’t eat pancakes. I hate pancakes, but she loved it.” He softly says and you stop everything to listen.

“You made from scratch or store-bought?” You phrased it like it is an important question. He hums back on the phone.

“Store-bought, don’t know how to make the batch. She straight up bought only the mix.”

“Would you eat with her, despite not liking it?” Your hand slides the paper, creating his silhouette line after line.

“Yes.” He simply answered, as if it was the most common question in the world.

“What are you waiting for? Take a bite.”

And he does. The chewing sound from the other side fills the phone, your hand keeps drawing him in his overgrown hair, almost as if you could see the scene right before your eyes.

“So, was it worthed?” You ask looking at the draw as he finishes his plate.

“Still taste disgusting.” He soft replies after a second, you snort and he laughs. The sound is the most delicious thing you’ve ever heard. next chapter

#joel miller #tlou fanfiction #joel miller fic #joel miller x original character #joel miller x reader #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x you #pedro pascal #pedro pascal fic #pedro pascal fanfic #the last of us #the last of us hbo #wednesday series

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emotboyswag · 1 year

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The conversation of when is too late to medically transition is coming round again, which it does periodically, but I have never really resonated with the phrase "it's only too late when you're dead" before. But now I realise it is so incredibly true. It fucking sucks to wait, seeing everyone around you start medically transitioning sooner and faster than you is so disheartening. I came out at 11 and tried to start hormones, I've been on the NHS waiting list for years and I desperately tried to convince my transphobic parents, I tried to get a job to pay for it etc. So it wasn't for lack of trying that things happened as they happened and I didn't start hormones until I was 18.

For 7 years I watched everyone around me transition and it felt like I was running out of time. Whenever the conversation came around about when was too late to transition I always thought to myself "its too late for me". Still these days I feel like I'm running out of time for top surgery. I have been binding ever day for 7/8 years and I'm kinda coming to the end of my rope with it, every day it's just a little harder to bind, which is devastating. I don't know what I'll do when I can't bind anymore but for me at the moment surgery is prohibitively expensive and I'm not in a safe environment to get it. I'm looking into alternatives like trans tape (but I do have a larger chest).

ANYWAY I do understand when ur in the moment of waiting that it feels like you are running out of time, my life didn't even feel like it started until I was on testosterone. A few months in after seeing some changes and finally being convinced it was real and not just hand sanitiser I finally took my first breath tbh and I have not looked back since. But before starting it was just a waiting game and I thought I'd be too old for there to be any differences which is silly really because people start in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond.

Its only too late to transition when you're dead also applies to coming out. Not everyone "always knew" not everyone had the language or ability to express themselves at 3 years old, not everyone understood or thought about gender aged 3. People come out as kids and teens and young adults but people also come out at every stage of life.

I don't admire Caitlyn Jenner by any means but she was 65 when she came out

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jul/16/we-really-are-trailblazers-coming-out-as-trans-in-later-life

Article about people transitioning later in life ^

It really is only too late when you're dead

#trans #transgender #transsexual #ftm #mtf #enby #nb #nonbinary #lgbt #gay #t4t #hrt #testosterone #hrt testosterone #estrogen #hrt estrogen #trans man #trans woman #coming out #bestposts

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jmdbjk · 5 months

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Looking back and forward.

2023 was one for the books.

It is Thursday, Dec. 7 where I am... Friday, Dec. 8 in Korea.

It is the last Friday for Namjoon, Taehyung, Jimin and Jungkook to be civilians. This is their last weekend to spend in their homes, at the company to work, running along the river, doing boxing workouts, ordering delivery food, loving on their dogs, doing the things they've been doing the last over ten years. It will be about 100 days until they get time off and can maybe spend some time back at home.

They are tying up loose ends, getting their shit together, preparing to put their lives on hold.

They will return to us in mid-June 2025.

I've watched their last group live several times after the english subs were up. There were a lot of things I saw and I have a lot of mixed emotions about it all.

None of us know these men, we are observers and all we know is what they choose to show us. Unfortunately, they can't control every single thing and people and the media insist on prying and publishing images and things about them that lead to unconfirmed rumors and misinformation.

In the approximately 38 minutes they shared with us, they conveyed that they are getting ready to go, they seemed in positive spirits. They conveyed that they were still working on things for us (except Jungkook).

They said there was A LOT of content coming, so much... they've NEVER ever reassured us like this before.

They asked fans to NOT show up at the induction site out of respect for the other men and their families also entering the military those days. They explicitly said "we are their face and to do them proud."

During this live, I saw Tae being the fantastically funny guy that he is. Tae was alight with excitement. He was anxious to learn from his fellow soldiers. He is a flower waiting to bloom. And seeing his friendship with Jimin maturing, flourishing, same age friends forever was wonderful.

And Namjoon trying to keep up with the crazy shenanigans of the maknae line. Trying to be the voice of reason: "it'll go by quick, we've left a lot of content. Jin will be back soon. We'll all get strong." But there seemed to be a bit of push and pull between he and Jimin... it was interesting. But he was lighthearted, positive, going into with an open mind. Get in, get out, get back to work.

Jimin, Jimin, Jimin... There was a bit of resignation wrapped up in Jimin's positivity. He wouldn't agree that it would go by fast and he didn't want to show himself with the buzz cut. I wanted to reach through the screen and hold his hand and reassure him we'd be here waiting and that we know it's hard to leave everything right now to do this. This man lives to do work on his passion. He's already had to stop once. Now he has to do it again. I think he is going into his MS kicking and screaming because he does not want to leave his youth behind. It is unfinished.

He said he had been sick. He coughed, sneezed and sniffled the entire live. I hope all of these symptoms have disappeared by Monday/Tuesday. I remember his friend Sungwoon had to delay his enlistment date because he tested positive for covid. Please don't let that happen to any of our four.

During this last group live, I saw a Jungkook that I'd never seen before. His vibe was so in tune to Jimin. I know he's been that way since... 2017? 2018? But this was so in your face I was dumbfounded. Jungkook constantly soothing Jiminie. The things they probably talked about while they were in Japan a few weeks ago, man, to be a fly on the wall.

ALL of those lives he did this past year flashed through my head, how unhinged he was the first few months, falling asleep drunk with the candle, calling out stalkers. ALL those times WE said he was missing Jimin because he was begging him to come eat chicken and drink beer, or come do a boxing workout, or better yet, "let me come over and we can shower together..." No... I meant to say: he can go over to Jimin's and wash up and do a live together. Yes, that's what he said. Beggged him. Tried to use Army as leverage. And all we got was Jimin saying he "can handle it" and "you know how my personality is"...

Jungkook watching all that Jimin content... something happened, some decision was made early in the year. Jungkook embraced it and ran with it.

And to know they are going into the service together, it still has me astonished but it all makes sense now. Y'all... they knew they were going to do this wayyyyyy back, not just in August or September when they applied. Jungkook said back in February (before someone lit a fire under his butt in March to start working on music) that he had to take care of his body for the next year. This has been the plan and Jungkook said "no worries, I got this."

2023 was A LOT.

Jimin, Face: the melodies poured out (as they seem to be free-flowing from him at any given moment) but he had to pry those lyrics out of himself. Jimin achieved a #1 BBHot100. And yes, it appears there were not just one, but TWO of those blasted cakes. I didn't know much about PDogg before Jimin's documentary but now I know how much he supported Jimin during this process.

Yoongi, D-Day: I got to see Yoongi in real life. That weekend flew by for me. One of the best weekends ever. As soon as the concert was over I said out loud, I need to see all seven on that stage. His concert tour filled a void for us. We needed that so bad after last year's gut-wrenching news that there would be no tour. And now he's fulfilling his social service. Let him serve quietly with dignity.

Hobi, Military: after tearfully sending him off, what we hear now is he's cracking the whip, though ever-so empathetically (not to be confused with emphatically) over those new enlistees every day. I need to see his boom chakalaka marching drills. Jimin said when he visited Hobi, he wasn't greeted with his ebullient "Jaman!" but more of a lowkey "oh, you're here."

Jungkook, his solo songs and album: Jungkookie chose to go the route of choosing songs that resonated with him. Over the course of years, Kookie has always shared songs with us. We used to love his song recs and his covers of very poignant songs. He KILLED those songs with his vocals. He did what HE wanted to do. And look how well he did with it, also a #1 BBHot100.

Taehyung, Layover: again, Taehyung did what he wanted to do. Not on his album, but Taehyung singing along with Karen Carpenter was never on my bingo card, ever! (a clip on his Instagram stories where he was singing along to "Close to You")

RM, we kept wondering: why isn't he enlisted yet? Someone had to wrangle the maknae. Not that he ever did that this past year. He cut himself over his left eye and had to get stitches... that's gonna leave a scar. Good thing there are 40 bajillion plastic surgeons in Seoul...

Jin is coming. The Head of Ministry of the Military making the decision that no celeb will be doing anything special, instead they will serve just like regular civilians. Sergeant Kim Seokjin will become civilian Jin of BTS on June 12, 2024.

Their constant looking forward to 2025

Skipping over 2024 for the moment...

BTS has to evolve. They must evolve. They are not going to be a 30 something year old K-pop boy band. Some groups might be stuck but BTS will not stay stagnant, they never have. They have to step forward out of that niche and they have been trying to do that incrementally for a while now. They’ve taken us in baby steps already through chapter 2, and Joon said the REAL chapter 2 will begin when they are back from fulfilling their service.

What will they be like? Will they reinvent themselves? Perhaps, but not overnight. I don’t see any sort of extreme makeover for BTS once they come back together. I do see them addressing more mature topics (as we’ve seen), I do hope we see songwriting from all members.

They don't need to abandon their Korean-ness in order to accomplish this. There is nothing stopping them from being a mainstream artist who just happens to be from Korea and who release songs that are in Korean.

I think the accomplishments that Jungkook achieved will continue to pull BTS out of the K-pop realm and into the main stream Pop music realm. They worked that western market. They got pushback, especially western industry institutions: Billboard and the Grammys. And they learned.

Progress is slow but progress nevertheless. They will cross over to general pop one way or the other. They are not going to stay in the kpop box in the future. Straddle both at the same time. They can do it.

For 2024:

I think comeback/HYYH 10th anniversary reboot is already in the works and has been.

I think PDogg will be working on the songs over the next year. I think they have recorded all this year.

I think when Jin and Hobi get back, they might record their parts. I also am pretty sure we'll see a full-bodied solo effort from Jin and more from Hobi. I think we'll get a ramp up to his discharge with some Hope on the Street content that he recorded before he enlisted.

I think we'll slowly see wheels start turning to get the machine going again much sooner than we imagined.

I think what we see next year will all be primed to pre-promote and whip up the excitement for 2025.

I just feel strongly that Bang PD would NOT have mentioned that specific thing and we would not be hearing the members constantly saying 2025. And especially saying 2025 is not that far in the future and that they are looking forward to the incredible synergy the group will have when they get back together. They've got a lot of work done already. They know already.

They said there is A LOT coming to us.

In about two weeks BTS: Beyond the Star docu-series will begin.

We know we're getting some sort of Jimin and Jungkook traveling content, whether a series or not...I'm leaning toward it being a multi-episode series. Camping? Drinking? Breweries? Beaches? Boating or sailing or both but separate? Fishing? Snow sports? They said it was fun.

We will see activity around all the solo album anniversaries. We still have an RM documentary, a Taehyung documentary and a Jungkook documentary. I bet the latter two will come out towards the end of 2024.

We might have Tae acting, we know he'll be in an IU MV soon.

About aging bangtan ...

Remember when we said this is Bangtan in 20 years?

I joke about it but seriously they are aware that things will be different as they evolve and age as people and as artists.

There are new groups debuting all the time and BTS is aging out of a certain demographic (as they should).

Yoongi saying "cruise with BTS" would be the best case scenario for their future.

I would love to be on that cruise if it ever happens.

#bts chapter 2 #bts military service #jimin #jungkook #namjoon #j-hope #jin #taehyung #yoongi #jikook #instagram is going to be soooo quiet without daily updates from @rkive and @thv #no more tiktok dance challenges #this was a long ass ramble but i had a lot of thinking fragments #purge purge purge #the most beautiful moment in life is yet to come

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