This comment thread just keeps getting worse.
I just... can't. I should have known better than to try and engage, or to continue to engage right now, when this medication change has stripped me of my spoons. I spent today so flat, struggling to maintain even "potter around house with no tasks to achieve" levels of functionality, and it's taken that thread and Anthony's final few comments to bring me to tears. I'm five days through my medication change, and it's only going to get harder from here.
I'm exhausted. Trying to argue WHY one should be treated as a full human being is exhausting at the best of times, and trying to argue it while dealing with the illness that has people arguing against you is more draining than I can convey. This is as sick as I get when I'm still arguing online... when it gets worse, I simply vanish.
This thread, and the support for Anthony's attitude on other threads, leaves me with absolutely no conviction that those rights will be advocated for while I'm away. It is a fundamental fact of the fight for disability rights that those of us who are directly affected cannot always fight for ourselves. When this is the truth, when others refuse to fight for us, and when those who claim to have our best interests at heart fight against us and refuse to acknowledge this, what hope is there of ever achieving any of the things we need?
But hey. Perhaps Anthony is right and my position that non-neurotypical people retain full human rights regardless of the severity of our conditions is just "an example of diseased thinking".
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Well....
11 hours ago
19 comments:
There's just no reasoning with unreasonable people like that, and it will wreck your supply of spoons for no good reason.
Here's what I do when I feel things are getting a bit much for me:
I call or email my friends and tell them I'm not going to be around for a few days, I surround myself with paints and a book that always makes me feel calm and I just go 'off radar' for as long as it takes until I feel like talking again. Disceplining myself to go to bed at the same time every night also helps.
I have a friend who has bi-polar disorder and I have seen for myself what happens when she has to change her medication, so while I wouldn't have the audacity to say I 'understand' I do empathise.
Hope you feel better soon ((HUG)).
He is not right. He is a douchebag. Anything other than your convictions on this matter is diseased thinking and is in itself utterly inhumane.
Maybe you could contact the people who run Echidne and flag the issue with them?
Bugger me. I am amazed at your fortitude and persistence with that wanker, hexy, and more amazed at how determined a blogger on feminist sites just refuses to get some very simple facts. Christ on toast, how he keeps crying "How was I privileged! I, like, had to WATCH!!!!" is going to piss me off for weeks.
Gaina: Thanks for the concern, it's appreciated. I think I may have reached the point where I just have to ban myself from the bits of the blogosphere that can upset me until I start feeling better. The medication change is actually going far better than expected, but it's still not fun.
Garbo: Echidne's already commented on the thread, indicating that she doesn't have a problem with Anthony's words. I honestly don't understand why he's a co-blogger on a blog that promotes itself as feminist, but hey. Not my blog, not my choice. It would be a shame if I had to stop reading there. I like Echidne and Suzie's posts.
Ideologicallyimpure: Heh. Great summary. And thank you... I have an annoying habit of presuming most people can be reasoned with. It can be draining.
He's acting like a fucking abusive, nasty piece of shit. (Tried to reword, but there's really no other way of saying that.)
*hugs*, if you want them.
If the situation is destructive to our health, then extract yourself from it - as I see you've done already. I am so pissed off how he kept insisting that he had it oh so bad and non-privileged because his healthy self had to take care of someone so sick. Yes, it can be draining to care for someone who needs more than the care you can give, but really...
He just doesn't get it. Nor will he. Don't take it upon yourself to educate him, as he clearly is not interested in educating himself - only in educating others about how much of a burden the mentally ill are.
Sounds like you need to focus on fighting through the med change rather than on jerks on the internet. I wish you strength to deal with it all.
Urgh. I wouldn't even dare to step in there, tbh - the tone of the whole discussion is too exclusive, too othering, too set up to automatically invalidate my voice. Props to you for representing, tho...
Part of me thinks it was, to at least some extent, grasshopper who set him off by being too absolutist in hir position, but then i would have said exactly the same as hir a few years ago. It's a huge and messy and difficult area, and one i've clashed with even other disability bloggers on. I think i agree with pretty much everything you said, tho...
I've simply been too busy to devote anywhere remotely near the amount of time to the "blogosphere" i feel i need to to keep up with it over the last few months. Hopefully i will have a bit of time to return to it soon, tho. Maybe then i'll try to tackle this one (although it's exhausting to me at the best of times)...
Hi there Hexy. I left a comment in support. I'm sorry you had to (are having to go through) pain because of that thread. I wish I had more of substance to say but there it is.
I'm so sorry, hexy. That thread is seriously... wow... awful. {{{hugs}}} (if you want them). For the record, there are the occasional few who will take up the argument. Angus seems to be in for the long haul, and I'll consider reappearing. But I wanted to say again: you're astonishingly brave and determined. Inspirational, truly. Be gentle with yourself...
Thanks, all. I see you lot and everyone else who has commented opposing him is now being dismissed as my "groupies", while one gentleman who commented saying he agreed with Anthony has been praised... despite his reason for agreement being that he benefited from inpatient care he would nominate as preferable whilst not in crisis, which is something the "not agreeing with Anthony" people were advocating. Sigh.
I left a final comment saying that the commenters in question weren't all friends of mine, but despite the offensive and inaccurate accusations he's throwing around (mentaally ill people who advocate full rights for ourselves are now responsible for the levels of mentally ill people in gaol, apparently!) I won't be engaging in discussing there any more. Braynz can't handle it at the moment.
It's exceptionally upsetting to see him throwing people with extreme paranoia around like some kind of pawn... hello? Sitting right here trying to talk to you. Explained that in first few posts.
Anyway, I appreciate all of your comments here. I may well be offline for a few days, my own paranoia is sneaking in to levels where I may need to limit my communication... and my reasons to feel threatened. Still, medication change is going far, far better than expected, and all symptoms are thus far at levels where I'm still safe.
<3
Hi hexy!
I just wanted to come in and thank you so much for advocating over at that thread.
I wanted to jump in myself, but right now I'm at a place where I know I would just break down. You are amazing and I really appreciate your efforts. So thank you. (Also, I'm totally going to follow your blog now. So hi :) )
Well done - you did amazingly well in difficult circumstances.
I hope you're feeling OK. Take care.
Thank you.
He just keeps getting more vicious and more vile! It's astounding.
He's also jumped seamlessly from "mentally ill people who are a danger to themselves or others need to be hospitalised" (which I agree with) to "mentally ill people who can't demonstrate they are rational enough to function 100% in society should be hospitalised", and doesn't seem to have noticed that he's done so. Yet he wonders why so many of us have objected to his stance on non-consensual treatment.
Yes, I made the mistake of reading over there again this morning. It made me want to cry again.
Yeah wow that thread was horrible. What an asshole. I am really sorry that this has fucked with you and all, and that that guy is such an asshole and unwilling to even think about checking his privilege. I really hope your medication change goes as smoothly as possible.
That thread really got under my skin and upset me too, tho in his opinion I probably fall into his category of "mentally ill but still able to reason"/"not the most severe" cuz I don't have delusions or paranoia and cuz my only "un-reality" (I don't know how to say this) is stuff like depersonalization/derealization/losing time if that even counts...but I identify with a lot of that, like having a bunch of diagnoses that can't all be true and being institutionalized against my will. I have also been told advocating for myself etc. is basically fucked up, selfish, not something I have the expertise for, etc. I get stuff like this also because I am not very compliant with treatment that is basically bullshit and does nothing for me, you know? I've also been blamed and shamed really harshly for having any kind of mental illness/mental dx at all. But I'm sure we all get that.
The person this really affected in our household tho...was my completely neurotypical girlfriend. She def got upset (she said it brought stuff up for her, about me and us)...she started crying and called Anthony an asshole. I think she is planning to jump into the comments section...maybe.
I don't think I wanna jump in there but I might blog about this.
Please drop me a link if you do. I'm sorry to hear about what you've gone through.
I get all dissociated sometimes. It's a nasty feeling. And yes, you're absolutely right that you should not feel forced to be compliant with treatments that aren't right for you.
Sure, will do! I was more trying to rant than be all "poor me" tho, LOL. You are sweet.
Eh, rant or otherwise, it's still a nasty symptom to deal with!
Hexy, I just saw this. I hadn't seen the post in question, I had a quick look and my, oh my! Like others here, I commend your strength.
Do you read Shakesville? If not, you might have missed this post, which is a great post AND includes a much more rational and supportive comment thread.
(Ok, I haven't read all of that thread, either, but the parts I *have* read were much better, and Liss put up an editor's note with the post making it clear that she would close down comments either if the post author asked her to, or if Liss herself thought things were getting out of hand. The thread is not closed.)
Thanks, Jo. To be honest, I've been in a pretty fragile state the last few days, and have been second-guessing myself a lot. The positive feedback on this post has been really helpful.
I did read that post on Shakesville, and it really moved me. I haven't read the full comment thread, though, as it seems to have grown quite a bit since I read the post. Liss puts so much work into keeping her blog as safe as possible for as many people as possible. The only time I feel unsupported and excluded at Shakesville is when the topic turns to sex work.
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