Christmas Murder: A Family Tradition (Trigger Warning)

I wanted to write something cheery, about how good I am doing. I really am doing well. I am going to a friend’s for Christmas, and while i am not religious and they are, they respect this and its about communing and being together, unlike most of the other invites I have had. The things to give people and kitties is in a stack taller than my tree, with some bits on the couch since I just ran out of room. I am still fighting the endless battle of finding a caregiver agency that doesn’t remove the caregivers I get along with, because we get along but I am not grasping by a single thread and falling down a cavern of despair and fear. I am still okay.

I wanted to write about the Iraq war being over, and how apathetic I feel about this and the whys. The too little too lateness, the fact that just because we decided oh hey we’re done doesn’t negate the consequences, the disabled veterans who are now going to be struggling. I wanted to. I only have one article’s worth of energy tonight, and the others may happen later but this article demands my attention. You see I just had a serious flash back because I was skimming the news and I ran into my first murdered child holiday story this year. I had managed to dance around them for a lot longer than normal.

I am not certain if the effect on me was so much stronger than normal because I am doing well and my brain could focus, because the snow outside in the second obnoxiously white blizzard has me aching and everything already felt a bit raw, or if it is because I got a package from my mother today and it contained not only presents that she clearly put thought into and that I liked but some Xrays of my neck when it was broken the one time this hit as an adult. Not snapped but cracks in the bones show up. In my gift box. That this is the only abjectly weird thing in there actually impresses me, but with Grandma changing her number to get around the call block, texting daily despite my lack of reply (even telling her to stop fails), or any other confluence of events this link which comes with a serious PTSD warning made my brain go off into the dark spaces.

My mind whirled through every holiday where I expected to die. That means twenty five years of expecting to die. My wedding, with my sister and her lovely poison muffins which were so very nasty no one even pretended interest, every beating, each time my mother just went to bed, each time I was afraid because I just wasn’t ever good enough for these MONSTERS. My family. My serial killer father. My molester older brother who still whines about how I didn’t let him abuse me. My older sister who decided that its my fault she threatened my life, technically kidnapped me and crashed the car. These WONDERFUL (that is sarcasm) people? Each time they threatened me was right there.

The time my father murdered me for Thanksgiving was right there. The reasons I began to question religion. Right there. In the name of holiday statistics, people die. The part that really hit me was, this will be amplified in a year because of all of the people too blatantly stupid to use their critical thinking skills. The world really does end 12-21-2012 because of all of the people who will murder in the name of apocalypse. We see this with every cult, every Harold Camping, and every other failed prediction. Every single one has huge points of logic, like the Mayan calendars not being prophetic, but people still buy in to this garbage. Same as with their gods. There are reasons to question faith always and by refusing to do so, they demean their religious choices.

I am totally okay with people believing in whatever, so long as it isn’t just because they were told this is their option and never considered asking why. I am okay with people believing in the end of the world as long as its not an excuse for murder. Someday the sun is going to explode and incinerate people. In a billion more years. This is a scientific fact. So someday there will be an apocalypse. In that eventuality we can always hope that there will be a single child launched in a space ship to a distant habitable planet with a yellow sun, and he shall rise up to become Superman. Until then, every year, ever holiday, and every fauxpocalypse people get murdered because someone just needed an excuse.

I do not believe in crimes of passion. I do believe in self defense. If someone dies because they tried to hurt me, that’s cool. Means a threat is eliminated. It means that I will also be horrified to feel blood on my hands again. I will question everything in my life. I will cry. I will scream. I will thrash against it. I will also have survived. Too often in these Holiday Murder stories there is a component of pity offered for the murderer. Just as there is in any murder of the disabled or elderly. It is as if by putting Christmas lights on the murderer they become somehow pitiable more so this time of year. That woman murdered her child and her father. There does not need to be a why. She killed herself. Obviously there was some sort of problem. Its not okay to use that problem as an excuse for why she murdered the child.

It isn’t okay either for people to presume that the Autistic person at their holiday gathering who is withdrawing out of a desperate need to escape sensory overload just needs to stop ruining the holiday gathering, because of course a melt down is so much FUN for us Autists. We really want to be in so much agony that all we can do is scream and cry. Every autistic person who melts down, I fear will die. I fear it.

I see the traditional tree, the gleaming ornaments, and I feel fear. The gothmas tree being black and decked out with my own brand of decoration isn’t just because Black Trees are prettiest to me, and silvery black ornaments look cool on them. It is because I wanted decorations that didn’t leave me with vague sensations of fear. So I modified my tree to suit my needs. The need to not wonder in the slightly stuck in PTSD mode by the omnipresent holiday if mommy or daddy is going to love me this year. If I am the only one who hears rape in the song “Baby it’s cold outside”, if I am so evil because I think hitting is bad. I regress I suppose to the small child who was hungry, desperate, my entire childhood was one big act of desperation, and wondering if I am expendable enough and which of the adults in my life, and as I got older my siblings, was going to be the one to kill me.

My mother was the only one who never said “I will kill you” with words. She still said it with her actions. Choosing my step father over me. She loved him more than me, and warehousing me was more convenient than murder. I got lucky. If they’d thought about it and figured out that at that point no one would’ve even noticed if I was missing, I think I would be dead. My mother may not have had the stomach for it but the rapist she married surely did.

In this moment I recognize why I have eschewed the holidays even with friends for the most part. The family traditions my family has end badly. They end in bloodshed, violence and tears. I cannot stop crying as I write this because I know each keystroke is another child somewhere in this world who is living as I did, or dying as I thought I would. My choice to believe in Santa was a conscious one. I always knew he was fictional but I wanted to believe in the goodness that he represented. I wanted to believe that there was someone somewhere who brought pleasant things. I wanted to not spend my holidays afraid for my life, or any other day. That is what the holidays are to so many people, and myself.

The holidays mean family and togetherness. Family and togetherness mean being tied up in a closet, lying awake at night waiting for one of the adults to get mad and demand the ritual beating. I mean literally the ritualized holiday beating. You knew it would come, the question was not a matter of that but if you would survive. Then you had to endure pretending nothing was wrong while making offerings to the parents, and hoping they were good enough. In my case there were offerings to the people around me for a lot longer. This is why I only buy Christmas gifts for people I want to. There is no obligation now, to survival by having managed a nice enough present. I reclaimed gift giving into something of joy.

Yet I cannot reclaim that little girl, who suffered. I cannot give her grandfather back his last moments and make them pain free, horror free. I cannot give voice to every child who is being abused in some way right now. The amount of violence and hatred that spirals up during the holidays, isn’t because of alcohol. That is an excuse that enables domestic and other forms of violence. It is because we all take time off to be together. This means the victims have no out of the house refuge from their abusers, and a smart abuser uses this to their advantage.

There is no excuse for the Family Traditions I have. There is no excuse at all. I look over to my Gothmas lanterns, my tree, and it still makes me happy, its a creative outlet after all. Nonstandard tree means a lot of customization. I look back in time and remember praying I wouldn’t drop the ornaments as we pretended to be a happy family, praying I didn’t bunch them wrong, praying I did the tinsel right. Praying that this year, God wouldn’t tell my father that I was evil. Praying that this year my mother would let me come home and that I would feel like I belonged. Praying that when people showed up to visit, or claimed to, they either would show up and if they did would not act in a way that hurt me. Praying.

I only miss prayer when I have no power to at least reach out to someone and gift them with my understanding, with the knowledge they are not alone in their suffering.

With the article I linked, I cannot overlook the clear premeditation. The gun she obtained without record of obtaining it. The sending her husband away. Did she just love him more or was it less? It was one or the other. The fact she chose the basement, which would’ve muffled the sounds.

This is the holiday season. Readers, if you are feeling depressed, please remember you can always write me. I may not write back immediately but I will try to. you don’t have to be alone. YOu can also find your local crisis line, and anonymously vent.

If you are an autist, advocate for your need for quiet. Even if it means locking yourself in the bathroom for an hour, take the time you NEED to get away from the overload.

If you are alone, volunteer at a homeless shelter. Go help the people who have less than you do, because you can.

If none of that applies, or if all of it does, make a new holiday tradition this year. Do something to either reclaim your holiday from similar circumstance or to share love and joy in new ways. WHile the holidays are arbitrary the need for human companionship, comfort, and to celebrate is not. These are important things and should be done without violence or fear.

You aren’t alone, I am with you and you are with me by the simple act of living. We are alive, and that means you are my new family. Happy Holidays if you celebrate them, and if not, stay warm this winter, enjoy the light displays with their pagan roots and remember the primal need for companionship winter brings out is normal.

The Allure of Jesus Christ (Trigger Warning)

I understand a part of Christianity that has eluded me for some time. The revelation came in the most sacred place in my house. On the potty. Toilets are wonderful for epiphanies. It’s as if letting out all of the shit and piss inside you gives you room for grand ideas or understanding. The tone of this paragraph alone should let you all know I am not quite up to my usual standard of gleaming joy despite all the depraved nonesense in the world at the moment. I think that’s okay.

I am sad over Rose again, and another friend of mine was attacked in her home. She called me and the police, and as the attacker, who most likely is the rare stranger rapist as her neighborhood which is the nicer one in her home town, has had a rapist murderer gallivanting about lately… well as he comes for her she calls me and asks me how to seriously injure him without killing him.

The beast was unleashed. It worried me, frankly because I wanted to have her kill him. I did not do so, at least unless she didn’t follow my directions correctly but the intent to kill was not there and the police are sure he will be fine. Potentially paralysed but a walker to the throat vs him raping and killing a friend? He deserves what he gets.

Yet, I entered a two hour period of extreme darkness. I don’t like feeling that way and I haven’t for years. Not even dealing with Him, aka ex stalker scary ahh, did that. I got dark, I got depressed but not on the edge where for a few hours I fantasized about ways to kill a man with a walker anally. Lets just say my mind has it’s dim corners and some that are pitch black and the lights went out. I am fine again. M the friend of awesomeness helped me sort it out but there I was, in my dark space.

The dark space isn’t anger, it’s fear, terror, and a certain helplessness. I cannot change that Rose was most likely murdered by her greedy and ungrateful children. I cannot change that a man broke into a friend’s home and attacked her. I can however say I protected one, and i could not protect Rose. I wish I could.

So my revelation is this, I had the thought, ‘If I could protect every innocent person, deserving person, and purge the world of people like Him, Steve, and the latest jackass that came to my attention I would die the most horrible death imaginable.’

So this is the allure of Christianity. It is that supposedly someone did just that. Except of course it is clear to me that their sacrifice failed. If Christ indeed existed. Since men wrote the book, about a man, and… it’s all… lies. I understand that the moral of Christianity is not the one they intend. They intend that we should all want this, to die for others and to all be great people. It just didn’t work out that way.

I still would die for my friends, family, and most everyone in the world if it was the only way to make things better. It isn’t so I am obviously not going to go and get boiled and skinned alive or something. Martrying hasn’t worked for millennia.

The thing is… I did protect my friend. I couldn’t reach for the phone and save her but I empowered her with my knowledge of how to seriously injure and or kill people, and quickly enough that she defended herself. A seriously disabled person took out the rapist murderer, not one of the able bodied rich whining bitches who had mace, tasers and food. A person spat upon by society.

I know my darkness has a purpose, because I have given it one. It’s there to remind me why I don’t want kids, who I could be easily without choosing consciously to live, and it is there to remind me of why I hate my mother. She and my father worked hard to twist me up into a piece of garbage. I chose to be something more than feces that marrs the brilliance humanity has to offer.

So I am stressed. I am sad. I am also moving forward. My paratransit interview is imminent, which means I get to take rides from strangers. I am working furiously on this music, but my sorrow is impeding the joy that the music should hold.

I also am being cuddled by Ebay cats. Sylvani has a thing for the bathroom. I think the accessibility and familiarity of a toilet, as she was I found out, allowed to go into the bathroom at the shelter has helped her to feel safer there. So she will at least come to me in there if nothing else, and there is plenty of other stuff.

Despite my frustrations, also made worse by a few weeks of severe insomnia, I managed an hour of sleeping uninterrupted. Since Sylvani accidentally cut my hand with her claws, I “punished” her by forcing her to be petted until she purred and fell asleep curled up in bed with her. I wanted to make sure she knew a little yelp of pain wasn’t the end of the world here, because her reaction was utter terror. The round eyes and the look that Sprite used to get when we would take out the trash, someone has hurt this cat over little things. She needed to know she was safe. Heck as I type about her she is now on my couch bathing and giving me this post nap look of contentment. The nap was hours ago.

Sprite and Syl are working very hard to make me happy, it’s working most of the time. I haven’t felt this sad in two weeks, and it’s not as sad as the previous sad and yet I am still triggered. Yet I am enjoying waking up to a cat who sleeps in my arms and looks like a stuffed animal, snores, drools, and chews her tail in her sleep. Sprite isn’t enthusiastic about sharing the bed with the kitten yet but she never got to where Nymph was allowed, she merely understood that sickness meant she had to do what Ny needed.

I am wondering what it will take for me to have that same sense of relief and release for Rose, that pure moment when I know it’s okay. I am obviously not converted to Christianity by my poopiphany. I just have a bit of comprehension about why people find it approachable. It’s a bit romantic along the lines of other things that are romanticised and creepy. Dying for your sins, before you are born. If I could believe reality worked with such things, then I would be full of joy at the thought, I would hold no ill will. Neither would anyone else. It’s that utopia thing that makes my brain scream and rage, because it makes no sense.

I know this was blathery and babbly, that’s a side effect of my having had a moment where I could have gone down the dark road. I just need to sleep it off. Or write a story where someone gets murdered by a zombie in a power chair.

Euthanasia (Trigger Warning)

I am not pro Euthanasia. I think it should be illegal for humans and pets to be discarded willy nilly. Euthanasia however has a special place when it comes to the suffering of animals, and if humans ever value minorities and the disabled, humans. Yes, I am well aware that cats and dogs are put to sleep for being unwanted and unloved, and that is a part of this conversation I am having with myself. You see, today it became clear to me that if Nymph is here Monday with her dull eyes, her silent meows because she just can’t take the pain caused by making a real meow and if she no longer purrs at all, I will take her in. We will reassess Wednesday if she is still here Monday and is okay enough that this is in her best interest.

Even considering this step is not in MY best interest. I realize part of what is in the house and what is under that ice, from my discussion with myself about fragility. Under the ice is the feelings I locked away after killing my dog, to protect my sister. In as little detail as possible for my sake, it was not humane but he had taken a three year old girl by the throat and so I did what I had to do. I can go into more detail but why? Even thinking of that hurts me. Especially the reasoning and the fact that we had raised this dog from a puppy, and I still cannot fathom why he attacked my sister.

In the house are the feelings related to every lost pet, every lost self, every moment of agony that I cannot quite accept was real. All the things I talk about, and there are more things that I am not sure really happened on the surface but I know deep down these “things never happen here” happened to me. More evidence that the crimes we westerners associate with third world countries happen here, and to the supposed preferred female archetype too.

I think a bit of my issue here is the location of my vet’s office. The first time we went in I had a serious flashback, I could still talk and was aware it wasn’t real but I spent most of the time seeing two worlds, and I think I may have “stumbled across” the location of the murder my father comitted. I am not able to explore that memory fully, it’s still distorted and my brain won’t process it when I try. The only way to force it is dangerous for me, so I won’t do it. I already know EMDR and also just going to the place where I was triggered? Very bad.

Still, back to the choice at hand. Nymph is dying a horrible and painful death. I decided that when the pain is there and she has no her left, if her body won’t stop going I will stop it. This time it will not be in my backyard. This time it won’t be an animal lost to a toddler left alone in a swimming pool that thought the kitten should swim, this time it won’t be an animal spreading disease because he was dumped instead of taken to the vet, though loving people did treat his expensive illnesses and then he left and returned to me like a ghost, this time I don’t have to watch her suffer for months on end because I and my cat don’t merit medical treatment. This time, she still ends up dying. The screaming in the house is me, screaming because how can I watch someone I love die? Agian? Humans, animals, even flowers before I understood them as others do, at least enough that seeing them cut doesn’t hurt me but it still can make me sad (though I worked as a florist so flower genocide haunts me at times) This is what is in the house.

Under the ice is my self hatred. I don’t talk about that very often because I don’t actually have a lot of self hatred and it tends to be fleeting. I am not a bad person despite being forced to do things that hurt my soul. There are sounds I never will forget, there are screams of pain mine and theirs that I can’t escape, so I put them away under ice and the house. There is no one or the other and that is a bit scary but the cracks are memoriy itself. They are a different form of rememberance, perhaps more violent or more gentle than the flashes that twist me into knots, I don’t know.

For Nymph this choice came down to a single thought, do I want her to stay for me? No, I want her to just die so she stops hurting. I want her to go, even though that pains me to want, because I love her. That’s when I knew that if she needs help letting go, then yes I can choose death over more painful death. Sometimes cats who are sick hold on to a point where no medication eases their pain, we’re on the edge of that already. I lived two years without pain medication and suffered. I won’t let her go days or weeks that way. I love her.

The second thought on this was, is it wrong? I thought I would say yes to myself, but the answer, though complex and a struggle to get out of my head? No, it is not wrong to let her go. It is wrong to make her suffer because I am afraid of feeling guilty. There is no way for me to escape the guilt at this time. No matter which choice I make, I will feel guilt.

Moments of guilt, is this soon enough, did I wait too long? What if I act too quickly? What if Sprite never forgives me? What if Nymph haunts me? what if? What if? I had to stop that sort of thinking and put it into terms for myself. If I were in a world where there wasn’t any morphine, an I couldn’t take pain medications would I have continued to let myself live? No. Ny doesn’t have as many options as I do, so I will help her. There is no cure for this disease, and Sprite, her share in this is also leading to yes.

I never wanted to have to make this choice again, but at least this time it wasn’t the choice of the giant dog vs my sister. It wasn’t life or death, just death and death.

Sprite is trying to keep Nymph happy. Yet she has hidden from her a lot more today. Sprite is crying for her. She woke me from my nap because Nymph was making that silent scream face, Sprite asked me to help her and all I could do was hold them both. Nymph has yet to leave Sprite’s side for the last day except for when Sprite goes somewhere Ny no longer can follow.

The purring thing is also misleading, which is why I am worried I may miss the cue, but I speak cat far more fluently than I do human, even typing this is harder for me than glancing at my cats and having an entire conversation. My self doubt is a part of grief and any time you choose death, even when it is one death over another, there is guilt. I feel guilty for Rose, because I feel her death though inevitable as she was alive (which I had to change from is to was) was preventable at this point in time. I feel the degradation she and I faced from the carer agency we shared, as well as the doctors we saw played a part and I am angry.

Nymph does not have that. I wish her vet was my doctor infact because he has treated us all with greater kindness and he hid nothing from me. He did ask me once if that was okay because he didn’t want to make it worse and I told him the truth, upfront hurts less than me trying to guess between the lines of discussion.

So back to Cat’s purring. Sorry this is so jumpy, my brain is not letting me flow as much because this is an active thought process not my more common secondary rehashing of ideas. I think the difference shows as those tend to be a bit more orderly. Screw order! Cats purr from pain, happiness, fear, and all sorts of emotions. Most often love and comfort. Cats purr to heal. The fact is, each purr feels different and when I touch Ny and she starts to purr, it is still love and comfort purr. Her pain purr is a ragged gaspy purr, it is a sad purr that doesn’t feel soothing. Still, those big golden eyes of hers are greying over, and I can smell her scent changing. That bothers me. Being super smell sensitive I liked her scent before. It was like ice cream. Sprite smells like sugar cookies.

The effect of her purr starting to change has not happened yet, which is how I know she will still be there in the morning. I sort of hope she and Sprite share my feet again, each one wrapped around them because that was a gentle way to wake up but I also keep waking Nymph when I cannot tell if she is alive. This happens a lot more each day. I have told her if she just wants to let go she should but I don’t think she can yet.

So Sprite is holding her. She has washed her every day, tucking her up against her side. She curls around her and Nymph wraps herself up closely and just closes her eyes and I know, if she no longer can rest that way I will do what is right, even if it is not what I want and in other situations I find this sort of thing abhorrent. This sort of pain and incurable disease, this sort of suffering is what Euthanasia was actually meant for. Is it murder? I honestly think in this case, especially since I can and WILL ask Nymph, as I have once already, no. Will it hurt and will I doubt that sense of no? Absolutely.

Some of the things Nymph has told me in the last few months we have shared:
1. You taste good, can I have milk on your hand again?
2. I want up! Can I get up too? I promise to not bite Sprite more?
3. Oh, it’s bouncy! (Twice, once for my stomach and once for my waterbed, she proceeded to jump up and down on both for the next hour)
4. Bug! Bug! I’ll get it! I can do it! Rawr! Aww… bug got… bug! (She then squished it under her paw, it was a spider.) Bug stopped moving.(She licked it, made a face) Bug is gross!
5. Soft, warm. I like this. (insert purring that out purred sprite as she stuck her head against my back and curled up next to me the firsttime) Okay I sleep here. (Sprite sleeps there, she wasn’t thrilled about that)
6. I love you.
7. Play? Here’s toy! Yeah!
8. I like hands. Yeah, put your hand on my head. See. I like this.
9. My tail is stuck again! Why doesn’t her tail get stuck?
10. I’m a big girl, just like Sprite.

Nymph has made me and Sprite very happy. That first moment when I met her, I was so surprised by her. I had begun to fear that I would never find a cat that was as cool, amazing, intelligent, or unique as Sprite. My two fae match their name sakes in ways. Nymph with her long thin legs, her adult size tail which is already longer than Sprite’s tail, and her big eyes and ears. She looks like she belongs in a fantasy novel to me, the cat companion to the heroine, her own stylized beauty perfect for such things. Of course Sprite was in the Golden Compass so her beauty with it’s delicate ethereal quality was already immortalized for all to see.

I still find myself imagining what Nymph would be like all grown up, and I regret knowing she wouldn’t ever be much larger than Sprite. Sprite is actually just a tiny bit bigger than Nymph, lengthwise. Ny was taller, and when they sat eating it was Ny’s tail that reached the second shelf down, that’s about a foot. Her tail stretches past her front paws and she has enough tail for two. Right now she has it wrapped all the way around her like a portable hug.

She doesn’t play today, because it hurts. Last night she hunted her last bug, and went for the string toy for a few moments, before the pain stopped her. She tried so hard to hide it but you cannot hide such things.

The part of this that is harder is when I cannot keep my tears on the inside, she still tries to make me happy. I know she knows she is dying. Sprite even told me so. When I asked her why she wasn’t sitting with Nymph, “I don’t want to see her die.” That was what she said. “It makes me sad. Make her better.”

I have come to a realization from this however, about heart break. Hearts do not break, they shatter. They are glass flowers that grow on the vines of our souls, and when we feel healed it is because it is a new spring time with in our minds and hearts. It is because we have regrown a part of us. That is why we are never the same, that is why at times we miss things and feel those shards of glass, they are there beneath the Heart Tree, evidence of the lives we have lived and the chapters that we have written. These shards can cut us but they also hold things of beauty. So though my heart has burst with sorrow, it held more joy than any heart I had before.

I am going to start looking for a new feline on my birthday. I don’t think I will want to. I however must take care of Sprite, and Sprite can handle a month of being alone before she starts to get depressed. I want to find a new companion by her birthday. I also know from experience with her that a month is how long she tends to openly mourn. Therefore, though I will never actually stop mourning, I will do what is best for Sprite.

I know I don’t stop mourning, I just don’t cry as much and remember the happy little moments like when Nymph decided the best place to sleep was in my miniature roses, and I woke up to find her coated in petals. Or when she then brought me a rose the next morning, having decided Roses are really great to pounce AND tasty. She took most of the actual roses, leaving the buds and laid them all around me. Sprite being allergic to roses had no reactions so she did not take part. When I can remember those moments and smile without tears, then I am once more living.

I haven’t managed to do that for Snowball, the kitten my brother drowned. Though as an adult I realize, A could’ve drowned as easily as he was without adult supervision. I am grateful he did not, and I know he has never forgiven his error. I think I have, I just don’t forgive my anger at him, he was three. My mother? Not forgiven for that. She should have been watching him.

I haven’t managed to do that for Sweet Thomas Feline, diagnosed with FIV, feline aids, he turned out to be misdiagnosed and was going to be euthanised. My step father dumped him on the mountain. Tom was found by a classmate, though with no color and this predating microchipping, she had no idea he was my best friend. In fact this classmate was kind to me about my horrible sadness. She was the first person to tell me it was okay to cry and to see that tears tend to mean bleeding for me. She wasn’t a friend but she wasn’t cruel. When Tom returned and I called the tag to find out who had had him, she and her parents allowed me to keep him. They didn’t ask for money but were glad that their cat who disappeared was my dead cat and that he loved someone so much he would walk for six months to return to them. Tom didn’t die with me, instead he chose to not move with me one last time, he was old and hurting and there was a lady, I thought she was ancient but likely not, she gave him a home indoors with REAL TUNA. I have yet to remember his face in the window the last time I saw him as he watched me walk away, the window was open, but he stayed inside and yet he was sad to see me go. He may still be alive, though I doubt that. With her his medical needs were taken care of and he was safe from cars, dogs, storms, and so on. In fact Tom became the father of several generations of cat in a town and is essentially their patriarch. Tom is why I believe in steralization. Someday I will tell you how I obtained this cat, who was a champion apple head blue point siamese. It was an adventure.

There are Philip and Lily, Minerva, Backlash, Fox Meowder (yes after the XFiles character Fox Mulder) and so many more. There were each of the kittens that didn’t make it, and there was Colores’ last litter, who died because their mother did too. She may have turned up in my biology class actually, on my dissection table. I did not dissect the cat that looked like my missing cat, I could not. I failed the class over it. I have no regrets. My biology teacher showed us pornography, home made, because that’s of course human reproduction. The school never ordered cats. My cat wasn;t the only one that looked like a missing pet.

Still, as an adult I have been able to protect my cats, I have been able to fulfill their needs. With Nymph I had to ask for help, and with Sprite once before too but I can do that. In fact if I had not learned to ask for help for them, I would not be here today because I learned to ask for me too. In a life of regrets about how my animals were treated because I could not care for them, there are no regrets about the treatment of my cats as an adult.

I also have seen another cat suffering with medications to keep him alive, feeding tubes, and I have had the horror of this cat asking me to kill him. “Just let me die”. I have seen the light lost in his eyes for almost two years now. This cat, is six pounds. His body was meant to be twenty pounds. I think of him when I see that same look of agony in Ny’s eyes. I regret being unable to save him from years of agony. Is it wrong to save Nymph weeks or months? Days? My heart answers, no, because that is love.

Another lesson in love that I am learning.

Lesson the First: Love is not pain, as I learned before.
Lesson the Second: Love means doing what is best for someone you love, even when you aren’t sure you can live with it later, because if this is truly an act of love then it is selfish to not meet the need no matter how sad it makes you. This is why people can break up and still love one another. This is why a mother can go hungry for her children. This is why sometimes you have to say no. It may make you unhappy to do so, but if it is what is right then do it out of love.

Of course that lesson isn’t learned yet and it is one which others claim in defense of horrific acts. In those cases that isn’t love. In this one, deciding that she should not have to writhe in agony and scream for weeks? That is an act of love. It is another piece of the happiness I have given her.

This picture was taken just as I finished this piece. Essay/Decision making process. Now you know how I decide even what to eat. Intensive mental exploration.

This picture is a symbol of love.

Hush my sweet, sleep so sweet, true is love and true are you.

Suicide: Recovering or Relapse? (Trigger Warning)

I wrote about what it means to actually be suicidal before, and I haven’t really touched on this topic since. Part of that was dealing with the depression. I want to talk about the recovery process and I also want you reader, to be aware that this can be triggering for people to read, or even think of. I also am not claiming to be recovered fully but I am recovered enough that I am no longer constantly looking at the things I own as weapons that could kill me.

Gender

I am a woman. I have never had doubts that I was female… or have I? There is a period in my life I do not talk about often, when I wanted to be a boy. I tried to cut off my breasts, I shaved my head, I desperately wanted to stop being female. I do identify as a female but, it was terrifying because the world hates women. This was one of the steps that lead me to know that persons who are born transgendered, inter-gender, or even without a gender (links to Norrie and Clair Lewis) are born that way.

This period helped me to deal with my struggle when I realized I am bisexual. I actually have a stronger preference for women than men. I often joke that this is because women taste better, to lighten the mood if I am outed. I live mostly in the closet, because my community is in accessible and I am fearful. Also, because of my mother’s reaction the first time I told her. She told me I was instantly a whore. I was slut shamed, I was told I was a liar, and I went with it because I had no recourse.

I admire anyone who lives with their sexual identity and gender identity in the open when it does not match up with the lie of Gender Binary. I have many friends who are between the two pegs that privilege reigns with in. I admire the strenght it takes just to be yourself when there is little to no protection for you in this world and your gender or lack there of makes you a target. That must be beyond terrifying.

I just did my census form, and there were only two check boxes. I secretly hope that those who do not identify as female or male make their own box. This of course may cause issues later but, the fact is, if you don’t fit in the little box then make your own!

This post is in honor of the 11th Annual Transgendered Remembrance day. This link is to a blog called Deeply Problematic, a blog with a series of other links about today and this issue and this link is to the memorial.

I find it striking how many of our brothers and sisters did not have a photo. Something about that strikes me. The lack of photo mirrors a lack of acceptance.

I light a candle and the candle is for each loss we know of, and the many we do not. I light a candle so that no one forgets your murder.

When Life is a Trigger Warning (Trigger Warning)

I wrote over 7000 words and WordPress ate it. I’ll try again later. I am really really not okay with this turn of events.

“Happy” Anniversary (Trigger Warning)

Yes, that says “Happy”. I am not sure this anniversary will ever be happy. I chose today to teach a class. I am trying to wind my brain down from the horrors that are the sound of fireworks. I spent the entire day in my room being cranky with myself. I got over that fairly early actually and enjoyed a mental vent session by reading a site called http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com . Eight hours later I am feeling almost normal and great for a stressful PTSD triggering day. This was the first fourth of July where I did not get sick from the smoke.

I am still feeling like the world is made of sand paper against my skin, but, I can control my snarkiness now. It’s in my head, and that has always been the case. I like to think that even Spock from Star Trek actually thought vindictive things up. “Vulcan Blood. I’ll show you McCoy!” If not, well, I am definately not a Vulcan or a Half Breed so it doesn’t matter. I am just human. That has been the theme for the week. I am just human. I am not Super Cripple, Amazing Woman, or even Functional. Just human. In preparing for the class I am to teach in nine hours, I realized I chose this day on purpose.

This is where I pause, and hide the triggering things, so you have to click a link today to get to the rest of the juicy details.

Sharing the Dream

I have a dream. It started small, with the idea of teaching other women with disabilities how to get their doctor to adapt to their needs, to make certain that they have proper medical care and it grew. A part of this is the rumor that in California there are accessible facilities for medical care. This access should be for all women and men with disabilities as well as those who are aging. A second portion is a discussion I recently spent two weeks taking part in. The third part is my own experience and the frustration that is omnipresent with my current medical needs.

I am sharing this dream with you for two reasons. The first is that I want your input. I am not an expert on all disabilities and I want to make this dream a reality. The other is that this will be my platform when I make my run for Ms Wheelchair USA. So, here it is, my dream.

I want to create not just an accessible doctor’s office but an accessible facility that has several purposes. First and foremost I want an accessible mammogram, one where you do not have to call, beg, and push to get access but where it is expected that you will need access. This will be furthered by a program to teach you how to adapt to your bodily changes and limitations while being able to fulfill the self exam for breast health. If you cannot adapt, either due to paralysis or other limitations then I want to offer the option of having a doctor or nurse perform your exam for you. Breast cancer risk does not magically vanish the minute you are suddenly disabled. It often goes up!

This goes further, I want accessible exam tables and facilities to offer every woman regardless of function and mobility a pap smear. I have an annual cancer scare, something tries to trick us into thinking it is cancer yearly. This year’s cancer scare surrounds my pap and it’s abnormal results and other tests that scream, “You might have cancer!” I am more worried about the high table, embarrassing lack of hospital gowns that actually fit, and my physical issues hampering the test than the actual possibility of cancer. I am loathing the idea of half climbing half being shoved up on that table, half naked and without any chance at privacy because I need help at times to even move my hips. There are accessible tables. Other forms of accesibility will be needed. I want to hear from any persons of short stature, what are the needs you face in the doctor’s office that are not being met? Even the most accessible table for a tall person will fail you, so please tell me what you need so that you are not excluded from my dream.

I want accessible facilities for rape victims with either severe injuries due to the actual rape or a previous disability. Writing these words has me panting with fear, but, how many women could be protected with evidence that is not obtained? There is enough of a violation with in rape itself, but being violated and treated like you do not matter after is a crime as well. This alone could be my platform focus, this alone could impact the lives of countless women. Accessible rape kit access with proper training for those taking the kit is a must. this is the part of my dream that is frightening, this is the part of my dream that feels the most out of reach. I must reach this goal however, for every victim and survivor that exists now or may exist.

I also want a center for adaptation. The Center for Adaptation would include a kitchen, a bathroom, and other areas that the once-abled take for granted. I still have not managed to cook a meal without harming myself in years, but a place where I had the safety to learn without being in danger of literally killing myself would help. This adaptation center must include potential assistive devices so that before the money is spent by the individual they know if the device will work. I wasted so much money on items that I cannot even use. Everyone does. Most persons with disabilities or freshly disabled persons have a very limited income, therefore this is a key component to creating universal access. Imagine learning how to cook around your limited energy, ability, and strength? Imagine learning how to clean again, and imagine too learning other things such as crafts, or finding ways to adapt so that you can create art? Dream with me and see it, a place of learning for all levels of ability.

Not just learning but socialization. I want people of all ability levels to commune together. There need to be varying support groups, socialization groups, and even a place to coordinate activities for the single individual and the couples. There needs to be a safe place to discuss sex with in ability, there needs to be a safe place where intersetion occurs. If you are gay, bisexual, a lesbian, or a transgendered person with a disability you deserve this just as much as someone who does not overlap two subgroups with in the realm of minority. The able bodied need to be welcomed here too, so that they can learn, assist, and so that there is a lack of segregation.

There needs too, to be a place to work with Service Animals. This facet will have to have answers to questions about the legalities of service animals in the given area, certification challenges, and training suggestions. Although it will not be a place to get a service dog, there needs to be a place where safe support can be found easily. Safe support that can come and help you advocate, safe support that teaches you to self advocate, and safe support for the process of accepting your animal partner.

Less medicalization of life needs to happen, and the focus on that aspect is a place to find good fashion, perhaps this could even become the funding source for my facility. The fashion needs to be adaptable to the wheelchair users needs, most likely this will require custom tailoring. The clothing needs to be affordable but also fashionable. Persons who have disabilities cover all age groups and the institutionalization of clothing is unacceptable. The clothing must also be in a broad range of sizes. Just as wheelchairs need to fit everyone from the small child up to the very large adults, the clothing must as well. Giving a place to access good, quality, stylish clothing for men and women with varying abilities will be a huge part of this, simply out of my own desires. I desire affordable clothing that works with my ability. I do not want to trip over skirts that are too long, I do not want to have my sleeves caught in my wheels if I use a manual chair, and I am presuming this is a universal frustration.

There need to be classes as well to train those with degenerative conditions to adapt, or those with compound disabilities to adapt. Perhaps the adaptation center is a new spin on the idea of an accessible home to learn in, yet, the focus on this portion includes teaching skills you might not have. What brought this to mind is my own degeneration. I lost my ability to walk and my sight is endangered. What adaptation can I have if I cannot see to drive my chair? I must learn and there needs to be a safe place for this. There needs to be a place where it is safe to feel the fear, the hope, and a place where there is hope. There is too little hope for the disabled demographic in this world.

A part of preventative care is dentistry, though I have yet to find a dentist who can work with my limitations. There needs to be a facility for dental care. I have a cavity I cannot get tended due to my combination of allergies and inability to bend backwards in their chairs. This cannot be. This is discrimination, yet to stamp out discrimination there needs to be action. If the facility cannot have a dentist, then it needs to have an office where accessible vision and dental care is listed, where referrals can be given, and it needs to be a place where there is acceptance that every body has a different need.

Disaster Safety is also a concern. During the disasters that hit the world, such as Hurricane Katrina, the disabled are often left behind. Their families may stay so that their loved ones do not die alone, and therefore these devalued people are murdered. It is murder to leave someone behind because it might be hard to deal with their wheelchair. A part of this facility needs to house a program that teaches people how to advocate, adapt, and prepare for emergencies. This program also needs to teach FEMA and other rescue organizations how to rescue the disabled. We are people, we deserve life, and being abandoned because of a wheelchair or cognitive disability is murder. It can be helped, it can be changed.

A lot of the focus here is on prevention and adaptation. My focus is not to cure disability, to wipe it out. That is impossible and I have gained from my own limitations. I cannot imagine a world without Autism as being beautiful, for without it I would not exist. Therefore the focus needs to be on preventative medicine, there needs to be a focus with in the facility on adaptive medicine, and there needs to be a focus on demedicalizing the bodies that have limitations. There needs to be a personalization of existence. I exist beyond my disabilities, though they are a part of me. We need to foster acceptance of self, of difference, and we need to offer a safe harbor for all people with all abilities to commune.

A lot of people are unable to work, are fighting for government assistance, and are dying without durable medical equipment. I want to offer rentals, loaners, and at times even the purchase of needed medical equipment such as CPAP machines, wheelchairs, and walkers. These are just examples. There would be a qualification process, and yet the freedom I felt that first time I sat in a manual chair and had more than three hours of coherent function haunts me. I have nightmares of being trapped without my chair now, I have nightmares that others feel that same terror. Those nightmares are realities. This program could use older equipment that was donated, purchased equipment, and could perhaps eventually include low interest/zero interest loans with minimal payments to allow people to obtain equipment. This could help those with a copay and a minuscule income to make ends meet. This could help someone who is choosing between homelessness and a wheelchair to get the chair and keep their home.

A second facet on employment is access to workforce training. There are already facilities yet at times access is denied based on a lack of visible potential, so, I want to coordinate with them to try and educate and prepare those who want to work but are being told they aren’t worth the training. An entire segment of this facility needs to be coordination with existing organizations to get people what they need, to get people connected with the programs that exist. A lot of people who ask me for help do so because they cannot find programs that fit their needs, even when they exist. A hub in the network could make their impact broader, while in a way delegating some of my dream over to their offices. I know one facility cannot possibly do it all.

This is my dream, this is also why I was so quiet this past week. I was dreaming, trying to put into a coherent idea what is needed. This facility will need funding but the insured can be charged. I do not see this as a fee free environment but money should not cause a person to not be able to participate. If a person can pay, or if their insurance can allow coverage then they should pay. Much of what is offered should be covered under Medicaid/Medicare and other insurances without issue. The rest could be funded via donations and grants. I have no idea what I would call this facility yet, but, that is not the most important focus at this time. Branding must come after a plan for action is laid out.

Share the dream. Share what you see as a need. Please feel free to pass links to this post around, I want to offer a taste of freedom to a set of people that anyone can join, to the only equal opportunity minority. If we band together, we can change the world and create universal access. This plan is flawed, this dream is imperfect yet it is merely a start.

Hidden Abuse Take Two (Trigger Warning)

Abuse is something that is running rampant in our society. I think the “right” to abuse is not just reinforced in some religions, but it is reinforced in other ways. The media often shows women getting hit as punishment, or if male and females are both under assault, the woman gets hurt worse, and it is the man’s duty to avenge her. There are very few deviations from this formula. I am writing a deviation, at least I hope so, for my own novel. I realized that I am exploring what it is to be a survivor in my writing.

I am not going to give the plot away by much, but, there is an exploration of rape, incest, and the confrontation of an abuser in my story. That is a big portion of it’s core. This is a core part of what has made me who I am. I have confronted every abuser in my life, and although it is extremely painful and has ended badly in most circumstance, I was able to show them that I know what they are.

Through this exploration of what abuse is, and my constant thoughts and warnings I have come to see that the media lies. Abuse isn’t just when you are beaten bloody. That is the most obvious abuse. That is the abuse that comes in at the end of a very long escalation. Abuse starts small.

My first abusive boyfriend actually helped me find my name. At times I feel weird answering to Kat, because he was the first to call me that. The spelling and intention is different yet the association sometimes pops up. The abuse with him was the smallest. It started over food. I have huge food issues, and have had for most of my life. He would start out with our food order. I would order something meaty and he’d look at me and say, “That will make your cholesterol high. Don’t you want a salad?” If I refused to order the salad, at first he would just shrug, but then the comments started to escalate, “Well, if you want to be a fat pig for the rest of your life fine…”

I nearly died when I started to give in. I didn’t see this as abuse. It was not as bad as what I had dealt with before, so how could it be abuse? I didn’t understand. He then began to accuse me of things, little things that made no sense to me. “You are one of the Illuminati, You are the destroyer of worlds.” I thought he’d been reading way too many comic books. He hated them but read them to try and make me feel better about him, in some ways that worked at first.

This was one of my longest relationships, I was hiding my relationship from my family per his order. After all they would surely judge me for dating a person of a different ethnicity. Before you ask, no he was not black. I have been blessed to know only gentle men of color. No single ethnic group holds the buy out on violence. Most of my abusers are men of my own color, white.

I began to miss out on time with my friends. He then started pressuring me for sex. I had decided a long time ago I want to have sex with the man I marry. For some reason this was not the same in my mind with women, I could explore them but men were too dangerous and in my mind hated pleasure with promiscuous women. I was warned that if I did not have sex with him, the world would end.

The night we broke up he hit me. I do not remember much, I had a flash back to one of the worst beatings of my life. I also reacted, I don’t remember it but when I came back to reality I had been hitting him with a frying pan. My face hurt, and he snarled at me, “I am going to rape you, kill you, and then I will have your soul forever.” Those words haunt me. He meant them. He wanted to steal my soul, because in his eyes I had too much personal power.

I called 911, he was arrested, and some of the things I found out about him were frightening. He had lied about his name, he had lied about a lot of things. He was a known serial rapist, and had killed more than one person. He went to jail, and although he is out now my fear of him is very small. I doubt he will try to find me. If he does, I know how to protect myself, and I will call the police.

Looking back, I see many warning signs of abuse. I thought these were normal for social interactions however. Any time you are not allowed to share a relationship, it is a warning sign of abuse. If you are not able to meet their friends or family, that is another sign of abuse. It is a bit harder to feel that these are significant with internet dating, but they are in the majority of cases. If you must stop seeing your friends, it is a warning sign of abuse. If you say no, and he takes that as yes? Get out of there.

There are more signs to abuse, but my brain is trying to flash back now, so I need to stop writing this piece. Abuse is not as hidden as it thinks it is. As a survivor of abuse I have dealt with varying layers, finding each time my brain accepts it as normal, until I finally found my way out of the cycle of abuse. It takes years, it takes practice. If anything hurts you, even if it might not feel wrong it is abuse.

Bad News

I am sick of advertisements for the news. So often it is a disgusting advertisement that often triggers me. At five in the afternoon they are showing the gore of a dead body, when children are more likely to see it. I can understand to an extent showing some of the gore in life, but, it is gratuitous. It is overly done. It is painful and wrong.

These news stations do not take into account the more sensitive viewers, those with PTSD, or those who need to shelter themselves. Half the time when I try, I cannot make it five minutes into a news program because of the unnecessary gore. Gore is not necessary to give an impactful report. I can give a speech and I can direct my audience into a specific state of emotion with the power of my words. They used to warn you before showing graphic imagery.

I remember it clearly, the news woman with the strange hair and deep voice said, “This next report is rather graphic, if you are sensitive or if there are children in the room we recommend that you turn the station or leave the room for the next five minutes.” Then, they would wait about thirty seconds and usually my mother would send me away, though I often peaked around the corners, and would find myself upset by the very thing she meant to protect me from.

Now they try to slam you with the grotesque, with the horrors of the world. I understand censorship is wrong but warning people isn’t censorship. Do we need to see every dead body? Do we need to see the blood and guts? Isn’t it awful enough to have heard about it? They forget too, the survivors of crime. Often when a crime is reported the victim or the survivors of the victim have yet to tell everyone and in some cases they have yet to even find out. Now there is no shelter or protection from the cruelty of the reports, they do not get the benefit of waiting.

The excuse for this disgusting behavior? Accurate reporting. Most reports are baised, do not actually touch on real issues, and they do not have much effect. If accurate reporting was used, then, there would be no need to try and submerge the viewer in a horror movie, one that is more horrid because it is real.

This rant came from a report showing evidence in an unsolved murder on TV. The police do not have the benefit of using that tidbit of information, now it is public knowlege and adds to the burden with false confessions and misleading rumors. This murder is one that effects me. I knew the victims, we grew up together. I am hoping it is solved someday but, I am not sure I would want to see the news report. Too much information .