For the last week I’ve been from one consultation to another, my supportive rehab team keep repeating the same things “have you spoken to someone kelly” “should we refer you?” “Healthy minds are great”.
I actually feel I’m doing alright, under the circumstances, I think I’m doing fanfeckintastic in actual fact.
In all this I’ve found it really hard that with every new consultation I’m given a chart, a GAD chart (I think that’s the term?), where it asks about my mental health and my stability I guess. It asks questions that to me in this situation seem daft, yes I am sleeping more, no I no longer can do what I once loved, so yes my ratings do look shite when you are doing a comparable to my physical health against my mental health, but no cocker, I’m not going to be leaping off the civic centre anytime soon.
I have become emotional, but I’m tired and being overloaded with medications and information. And surely its ok to flit from feeling that the glass is half full, to thinking it’s a sodding pile of sand? to be angry when you do go out and Karen is giving you the ‘look’, I was fine till you stared love, till I almost tripped over your cocker spaniel and had a coughing fit. Yes my mobility is shit, but so are your shoes so sod off and leave me be! Is it fine to say ‘I’m fine’ when I wanna say ‘oh feck off will you’. And it’s fine to just be alright, right?
I’ve been determined in the last 12 hours to find somewhere I can spew my guts and be met with humour, there are hundreds of websites and forums for men’s mental health with with comedy and humour, but what about us ladies? I feel better when I can laugh at the crap times, I don’t want sympathy I want someone to laugh with me through the shit, so what about us?
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Gingernotwhinger
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LOL Ah Gingernotwhinger you made me laugh this morning! Thank you! 🤣🤣🤣I can relate to 'the look'. Speak your bloody mind is my thought! Besides you'd be helping the poor woman realise she needs better shoes!
Don’t get me wrong, I have an AMAZINGLY supportive husband who does listen (albeit whilst looking at sky sport over my shoulder!). He does listen, but I don’t want to be stroked like I’m a crazed, angry Jack Russell.
He tells me he understands, but after the third bout of thrush, does his middle bit look like road kill? And no my big knickers aren’t sexy, but this aggravated cough means I could pee a little, and have you tried to wear a panty liner in a thong? no sweet and dear husband you have not, nor have you ended up with one sticking, to not only the gusset of your kecks, your trousers and your right arse cheek all in one go, there’s no pleasure in this my love!
I see him wince at some of my dramatic use of the English language, but I need somewhere anonymously to vent, laugh and be laughed at and not burden my bestie x
That made me laugh out loud. A rare it’s these days. You have to laugh at ourself and others sometimes. Bodily functions are often something we hide but here in the safe space it is ok to vent and to laugh because let’s be honest if we didn’t we would sit in a puddle of wee and snot and that definitely is not a good look. You are hilarious and have an acerbic wit that I find hilarious. I have well gone past the panty pad now and am on the full blown hammocks 😂😂
I told you,as I was told - vent away, and someone will be here to help you laugh your troubles away. This lot are a bloody bad influence, I’ve been corrupted by this lot, I’ll tell ya 😂 x
Oh GNW! You are so in the right place here! Not only will your amazing sense of humour get you through the tough times, but we can join in and have a laugh with you. Laughter is the best medicine as they say and some banter on here during the past few years has had me guffawing out loud with tears in my eyes. 😂 Post what you like when you like and we’ll pile in! Perhaps you could help me invent some thong-friendly panty-liners and spare me the embarrassment of it working its way down my trouser leg and sticking to my killer heel whilst walking in to room to deliver a high profile sales pitch to a large room of people...😱🤪 🤣 👠 Xx
😂😂, maybe the sales pitch could have been on the duel function of panty liners/ heel protection?
Confession *So when you sent that with GNW I had a real stupid moment, I forgot my name here so googled it as I couldn’t think what the acronym could possibly be (maybe I’m not really as down with the kids as I thought? ) I found it could be Guns N Wa**ers 😂 I was confused but then realised- I blame the pain meds x
Indeed! I think we’ve hit on something there! We can protect beautiful wooden floors by wrapping our killer heels in non-thong style panty liners! I think the prospective client would just give me the contract anyway just to get me out of the room with my weird foot attire! 🤣 well that’s got me chuckling along with you googling the initials! Xx
How about we rock up waving a “Women of Autoimmunity” banner (thanks to @282523) with the panty-liners already stuck to our heels? They are bound to let us in! 🤣
Hi Ginger. You’re not alone. Sometimes I inappropriately provide humor during serious situations. Healthy defense mechanism. My sister sent me this dish towel as a gift. She didn’t know purple butterflies are the lupus mascot. Gave me a good laugh! Hope it gives you a chuckle and the profanity doesn’t get me censored. ❤️xx
I need this towel in my life! I wish I could say I only sometimes provide humour in serious situations, with no filter or shame I’ve been the bane of my Mr Bouquet mother all my life. The more difficult the situation the worse I seem to be. We waited years after my gramps (he loved me like no one ever could, my best friend and biggest cheerleader who loved I was strong and a massive gobshite) died, when my gran passed we decided to scatter their ashes together in their favourite place. The whole family gathered ( the days when we could!) the pre-prepared mixture of both my grandparents who raised me were opened and scattered at sea, with a sweet prayer from all gathered to say a final farewell, only for a gust of wind to pick it up and throw them in my direction and for me to shout out “Jesus Christ -I’ve my gran on my eye lashed and my gramps stuck to my retinas” 😳
😂🤣😂🤣 Omg..... I’ve been there. Then comes silence and the stares and you’re like whaaaaaaaat...... ? Too funny. But like the towel says.... F- em. It also took me a while to figure out that no one is really paying attention to you as much as we’d like to think.
I’d never hurt anyone (intentionally) and I’ve got to a stage in life where I don’t care what people think, those who love me embrace my ways. I did feel bad recently I went to a physio appointment, it was for my back so I didn’t give my clothing choice a thought, I’d come straight from work in a pencil skirt. The young physio (who looked like he may never have had a girlfriend and reddened when talking) asked me to lie down and said I was to tell him when I felt uncomfortable. He proceeded to lift my leg and as soon as he did I stoped him and shouted“that’s enough”. He was really concerned and asked if I was in pain, when I explained that I was unsure if he was about to split my skirt and my arse would fall out or if he would see my vagina. He ended the session and the week after I was given a new physiotherapist 🙄
My husband says he can see when something is just going to come out of my mouth in appropriate, the expression on my face a dead give away and some kind of reflex where I’ve an inability to keep it inside me! 😇it’s an affliction x
At times, I often think I’m on “the spectrum” shall we say. My mom often says I would tell her things as a child that most would keep to themselves. I still do it but with some remnant of frontal lobe coordination and adult editing. I once caught some grief for speaking up for some colleagues who were kept long over duty hours.... cap is 24 hrs and they were going on 36 hrs (physicians 24 hr call shifts). I knew I should’ve kept my mouth shut but I couldn’t and then after catching grief, I straight up asked the boss man if I was catching crap because I’m female 😳. I didn’t think a male would get that much push back. I can’t help myself but pipe up even if it’s to my own detriment. I. Do. It. All. The. Time. Makes me a brutally honest comedian most of the time.
This is me! I can’t back down, if I see something wrong I speak up, I’ll jump in and try to defuse a situation and put myself in ridiculous situations where I “could have come a cropper” as my owd granny B would say. I say things that I know others couldn’t get away with because it’s wrapped up in a shit sandwich with a side order of a smile and a laugh.
My boss, line manager and head of our department (and great friend after 10years)has given up on trying to keep me in order after I ordered eyelashes for his fancy car and constantly ask “is it because I’m ginger” when he doesn’t agree with everything I say or adds to my workload. Now in zoom meetings when he can see I’m getting bored and restless and he knows the mayhem is bubbling sends me texts warning me of my upcoming conduct in not so nice terms. I’m saving them all for a tribunal if this lupus shit gets bad, at least I may have some money in my bank 😂
I am pleased I am not the only one. My Father was a b****** . I had to scatter his ashes and his sister and sister in law who I had not seen since I was five turned up. I tipped up the urn and the gust of wind sent the whole lot over me like a dust cloud. My face was covered it was in my hair, my eyes my mouth. I was spitting and swearing and flicking my hair like a mad woman. My friend who had a very weak stomach and was pregnant started throwing up over the gravestones. The two aunts had the most horrified faces I have ever seen. When I had stopped jumping up and down I looked and them and started laughing. They announced that I was disgusting and turned to go. I tried to apologise but slipped on my friends sick and ended up spreadeagled on someone’s grave. That is the last time I saw them...good move. I drove home with my friend telling me that I stunk and gagging with her head out of the window. We later found out she was pregnant. Thanks for bringing out that memory it made me giggle all over again xxx
Honestly I was so wound up that day. A funeral car full of his relatives that I had not seen since I was 5. I asked the driver if I could sit in front with him. He turned to look at me and I was taken aback, he had no teeth. He said don’t you like them then? I said no. He grinned a big wide gummy smile and as we pulled away on a snowy February morning he pumped cold air into the back of the funeral car. I giggled all the way to the church. Their cries of driver it’s cold in here made tears run down my face and I really had to clench my pelvic muscles hard not to wee myself. At the church, my poor friend who had been in the back with them said omg it was bloody freezing. I tried to tell her but couldn’t for laughing. I got so much sympathy as everyone thought I was hysterical with grief. Next came the service. My wonderful Vicar Roy who I loved dearly was determined not to say one nice word about the heathen in the coffin in front of him. His barbed comments about sins of the flesh and repentance were almost spat out which again made me snort. As his family took the coffin out they dropped it, at which point I ran for the car as I was now laughing very hard. The gummy driver let me in. He said this is my first day I am not sure I am cut out for this. Suddenly I was overcome with sadness. My Father was gone. I would never have a good relationship with him. I started to cry, mascara running down my face. The driver pulled out a very grubby hanky and offered it to me. My friend had my bag so I took it . He leaned over and whispered in my ear I suppose a s*** is out of the question? 😳. Shock stopped my tears as I processed what he had said. He grinned and said now that stopped you crying didn’t it? I started to laugh so hard I rocked back and forth trying not to lose control of my bladder. People passing were making comments like bless her she is heartbroken. Honestly that man made a horrible, stressful day better. He excelled himself by overtaking the hearse on the way to the crematorium as I needed the loo. Honestly a very true story. Xxx
Absolutely priceless CP! 😂😂😂 I’m snorting with laughter and reaching for my Tena Ladies! The driver was completely perfect for the job and made an awful day so much better for you. Gallows humour spot on! 👍👏🤪🤗😘🤗
Yes it really was. My poor friend. First she was frozen, then angry at the driver then I made her sick when I had a face full of ashes when she came with me to scatter them. She said the next time some f***** dies you are on your own 😂😂😂
Sadly not. I knew her when she was a social work assistant and helped her when she was training. When she became a Manager she told me she had nothing in common with me and found my grief at not being able to have children depressing. I helped her out and dropped her quickly. People disappoint you sometimes but I had some wonderful years of friendship which I will never regret xxx
Oh that’s just sad...sometimes friendships come to a natural end and wear out as our lives take different paths. As you say, some lovely years of friendship to look back on and one hell of an hilarious story to post on here for your fellow lupies amusement! It’s kept me chuckling all afternoon! Hope you’re doing ok with your knee atm CP? 😘🤗😘
Yes it shocked me to my core to be honest, we were inseparable but she changed. People tell me she was always that way but I did not see it and I am glad that I didn’t. I made a cake today so my leg is having some nasty spasms but the good news is that I only have one area of scabby cellulitis left and I started my counselling today. So hopefully soon I will be far more balanced mentally and physically..I can but hope lol . Thank you for asking, you are so lovely xxx
What a lovely wham bam piece of writing this is to wake up to! I love your humour it’s very close indeed to mine.
I feel this should be adapted/ shortened a little to turn it into a poem for the Oxford Poems for Breakfast ones I receive in my email inbox daily. Anyone can submit them for possible publication apparently. A friend subscribed me (it’s a free resource).
They are usually sweet and haunting but I need a proper sprinkle of dark humour with my liquidised breakfast these days so please do keep your posts coming - they are 100% my cuppa. 🥰
Ps and if we can’t take over the Oxford Poetry Library then maybe we can collaborate as women of autoimmunity to create an anthology of Spike Milligan- type wickedness?! I’m certainly game!
So have my responses been model. But with Cecily Parsley on such brilliant form I feel a night oot with the WoAI is becoming more than essential. You honestly have made my day. I tried to post on a gastroparesis forum about my day and got all these ghastly replies about how there are always others worse off and if I don’t like potatoes in anything more I must just think of those who are starving or peg fed. Ugh did I join a forum with a newly diagnosed condition to be offered digital samplers with nauseating words “think positive” as my support???
I’m now imagining stabbing one of them with a giant embroidery needle - or hiring someone to locate and stitch their orifices up with sweet little positives 😈💩😈 🌸🤮
I’m a textiles and fashion teacher with 25 year of martial arts behind me, feck me I’m centre stage here, it’s my time to shine- I’ve all the equipment and experience-I’m your gal! Like a child just reply “you’re boring” to every post and get some pleasure from being banned! Xx
You’re so not boring and I’m onto it with the new puke positivity gang. Will send you them forthwith - by foggy brain telepathy - in voodoo doll form for you to torture with alacrity. Out with a darning tools or one of those embroidery sewing machines cos cheating is cool in this context too 🏴☠️☠️🏴☠️☠️🏴☠️
I’d honestly go for absolute honesty on every reply to them on that forum, say what you think in great detail until they revoke your membership to the forum, it’s the nearest thing you could get to a rock and roll lifestyle, it’s the lupus equivalent to chucking your telly through a window! Do it, I double dare you, come join the lupy revolution xx
Nah - in the interests of brutal honestly - which I’m pretty sh*t hot at already - I’m not a lupy!! This is why I read your post when it flagged up on my HU feed!
A vascular dr tried to suggest I had lupus today but I handed it back saying no thanks Sjögren’s is big enough plus I’m antibody positive for scleroderma. He did look hard at me and say “there’s no such thing as just with Sjögren’s we are learning - it’s an equally serious disease to lupus and RA”. Hurrah so you’ve only finally clocked this mate?!!! After the cat has long bolted I’d say. He always blows me off so I thought I’d blow him off today just because I can - as i also learned that he needs me more than I need him. I carry an uber rare scleroderma antibody now so I’m taking no more 💩
So if I’m still in your gang it will be for a Sjogy Revolution which, in my own dryly humourous experience, requires even bigger girl Pants! Because, unlike the much more established lupy rev, no one can even pronounce or spell it and if one more piece of online info tells me to “Show Grins” they will get a dry vagina in their face with a slap full of grinning dental carries. So I’m up for a Sjögi rev while you lupies do the backing vocals 🙄😈🏴☠️☠️🏴☠️😎
Lol if it’s a brand of undies then it’s more uncomfy than any you can imagine and it only comes as an all body drysuit with sandpaper corset and built in spikes too! X
Just remember, we don’t need a Telly, “The revolution will not be televised” (for those of you old enough to remember or who live in Portland OR aka Riot Central)💪🏽✌🏾✊🏻😹
Omg really? Honestly those sort of people make me sick. Pain, distress, anger is all relative. How dare they make you feel bad gggrr. I cannot sew but I would sit on them for you to do it. They would not be so positive with me bearing down on them lol. I went to a Mindfulness Course once..omg it works for some but not for me. I had one eye open the whole time. It was so precious and so polite. When Neil came to pick me up he said you look constipated. My smile was all teeth and no eyes which made me look deranged. I tried but at the end of each session you had to say what you were grateful for. I said I am grateful this is over.....dead silence I was the only one laughing. The trainer told me that I needed to take it seriously 🙄Life is too short. I think people need to laugh more xx
Ditto. I needed this today. It has cheered me up no end. I have been such a miserable bitch with my torn tendons. Today I am smiling and giggling hoorah!!! Xxx
This is how wonderful you are. You’ve made me laugh out loud at least six times today. Best bits include ashes and vomiting and the taxi guy plus constipated after mindfulness had tears I don’t usually possess streaming down my cheeks. And as for bearing down - you are a total gem!! 🤗😂🤗
Oh thank you. I had my first counselling session today because this past year I feel the joy has been sucked right out of me but tonight I have giggled and felt lighter than I have in a long time. We are all good for one another lovely. No guilt tripping, no mealy mouthed reproaches just pure support and fun . Xxx
Can I just say I am in full agreement. When I was taking my Health Education class for Public Health I did my teaching presentation on Laughter therapy. No joke. Did you know that 5 minutes of good belly laughing gives the equivalent cardio as a 15min workout? (Now it doesn’t work you major muscle groups, that’s another thing…) but I even had to contend with arsehole naysayers in that class. But, I’m a card carrying scientist 👩🏻🔬 and I brought my peer-reviewed research to prove it.
So, forget about the arseholes. Life is much to short! Laugh on!🥳🤣🤣🤣
How wonderful DC. Laughter Therapy sounds like my sort of exercise. I can even do it with my gammy leg what a bonus!!! I once attended a seminar whereby the trainer was so serious and miserable I found everything funny. He had us all close our eyes holding our fingers out and doing the “ ommmhh” thing. Omg the giggles started in my stomach, constricted my throat, made my eyes run. I tried coughing, blowing my nose as mascara ran down my face in black rivers. He opened one eye and scowled at me and that was it, doubled over I snorted and belly laughed. It is contagious laughter, soon It had infected the room. The trainer walked out..oops. The biggest joke was that this seminar was for managing caseload stress in social work. When I went to work the next day, my manager was not happy with me but my colleagues said it was the best stress Buster watching me try to control myself. Job done 😂🤣 xxx
Absolutely, you get lost in the sadness and relentlessness of chronic ill health don’t you? But disability is hilarious if it is you that is laughing. In the gentle exercise class I went to before lockdown a very young very fit trainer decided to take the group ( known to the kids as the old fart and crimps ) to the gym for a session. We were like kids in a sweet shop. One lady who had had a stroke with no use of her one arm wanted to get on the arm press machine. Like me she was quite buxom. She said push me so I did. The state of her stuck like a sardine in this machine laughing really hard complaining she was going to wet herself. Some of the men decided to intervene and try to prise her out. The trainer was panicking like mad. We all had the best time because we helped one another and because we roared with laughter. Strangely they never took us back 🤔 xxx
Okay here’s today’s poem for breakfast from the Oxford Poetry library. Your prose post made me laugh - this poem just made me squirm as a newly diagnosed person with autoimmune gastroparesis. My hands are too weak and numb and my spirit too potentially angry some of the time to be allowed anywhere near a sharp knife. It’s a good example of what we find in our inbox when trying to surface - your post won hands down for me!
“Poems for Breakfast: Tuesday
Welcome to your morning dose of poetry. Make a poem the first thing you read in the morning - not the headlines!
cutting greens by Lucille Clifton
“curling them around
i hold their bodies in obscene embrace
thinking of everything but kinship.
collards and kale
strain against each strange other
away from my kissmaking hand and
the iron bedpot.
the pot is black,
the cutting board is black,
my hand,
and just for a minute
the greens roll black under the knife,
and the kitchen twists dark on its spine
and I taste in my natural appetite
the bond of live things everywhere.”
Enjoying Poems for Breakfast? Help us keep them going by donating to Oxford Poetry Library here. Even just £1 a month can help us cover our costs for sending these mailouts.
Got a suggestion for a poem? Email it to us at oxfordpoetrylibrary@gmail.com
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I love your post & it made me smile. Sometimes I get so sick of people asking me how I am when there is no change yet to report, feel like saying " Well if you'd really like the long version of both the mental & physical Bollocks sit down & I'll make a flask of tea as well as a pot" so tend to go for the stock answer of " Oh battling on" Always wondered if when I used to fill in those GAD forms (when tried CBT) there was a crisis crew in the next room so if your scores were high they'd swoop in & carry you off in a straight jacket to the nearest mental hospital 😆
You are right though somehow there is a sense of humour ( or sense of the ridiculous) that can sustain us. I used to be a nurse working on respiratory & renal wards and guess what I've got ..... Kidney problems & Bronchiectasis. Cue a Monty Python sketch !
Let’s start a revolution! My very first post was last week when I described how I feel or have felt.
I described this in one of my dramatic but very censored ways, with each ailment being an instrument and how the whole orchestra as playing, it went on but the lovely DuranieGirl sent “the who darned orchestra!”. I loved this, people got it, but I really think I should make t-shirts that simply say “the whole fecking orchestra” or something similar. Maybe when people ask how we are we can just flash the t-shirt?
However I’m a proper gormless cow, so I’d probably end up flashing Grant and Phil (yes those are the name for my Lalas ladies! ☺️) x
😹😹😹 OMG thank u so much for this post Ginger 🤗 hilarious!! Just the right medicine for me today.If you're not an English teacher then u should be in my opinion!!
I use "colourful" language too..I think it's coz in my early years I trained as a mental health nurse (years ago) n I worked in a big old psychiatric hospital..I lived there too in the nurses home.think it's given me a warped sense of humour..but I do love a good belly laugh n I've had plenty of those today!! 😹😹
Am enjoying the replies too but for some reason my "like" button isn't working still 🤷
A healthy sense of humour is essential for our wellbeing both physically n mentally..after all it's the exact polar opposite of crying n we probably all do plenty of that!!
I think I might have rumbled who you are though... Sarah Millican..I'm right ain't I? 😹😉🌈😽😽Xx
I am having trouble liking too Kat. It made me laugh as I was typing. Honestly People are either horrified or don’t believe me. My poor friend who was frozen half to death wanted to punch him when I told her what he said. She was raving how dare he but she had a wonderful Dad who she loved dearly whereas my relationship with my alcoholic Father was different. That toothless man made the day easier for me and for that I will always be grateful. I have vivid memories of the pained faces on my aunts and uncles as they complained about the blast of cold air and the vicars face as we raced past the hearse will live in my memories forever. It was priceless xxx
Very true Kat. I was snorting badly when my lovely vicar said that new chap seems a bit strange. Now he was a fabulous person who gave the best Cwtches much to his wife’s disapproval. As he had a fag behind the piano he used to say I was a man before I became a Vicar. The church was full every Sunday. He buried my Nan when I was 20, my Mam when I was 26 and my Father when I was 29. He married Neil and I when I was 36. I miss him dreadfully, a true Christian and a fabulous sense of humour. He came to visit my Nan when she was not well and didn’t get offended when she scowled and said I don’t know why you are here I ‘m chapel not all that hairy toity rubbish. Also when he came to give my lovely Mam the last rights my dog Crockett was humping his arm. He carried on regardless, winking at me and saying Reg does that too ( his little Jack Russell Terrier). I was so honoured to know him xxx
The English department would hate that you think this! The big boring elitist DO NOT find me funny, not even a likkle bit funny as my 2 year old grandaughter says!
The replies are amazing, so much so that as I sat behind my desk and my students were busy I had a sneaky read on my phone, I had to switch them off as I read CecilyParsley funeral post and started to laugh, suppressing it in my silent room of studious youngsters, this started a cough and I ended up trumping! I tried to cover this with louder, dramatic coughing and the movement of my chair but I’m pretty sure they heard me like a bloody trumpet! 😳
Kids r trained to recognise a fart..it's part of growing up ain't it?!? 😹After I trained as a psychie nurse I specialised in drug dependency in the community. I was invited to do a talk to secondary school kids. I was very reluctant but my boss at the time insisted that it would be good for raising drug awareness!! 🙄🤔
When I rocked up I was taken not to a classroom but to the hall..there was a stage n everything..teachers or some other education bods were asking where I'd like to present the session..in my mind I'm screaming nowhere. I don't even wanna do this!!!
So my table's set up n in come the students..I dunno..three classes or something..there seemed to be hundreds of em!! 😱
So starting off very shakily I introduced myself..ok understand here that my role is to raise awareness so I have to get some awareness across to these teenage kids. Nervousness made me crack a couple of jokes..that got them warmed up I think..they were VERY interested..so much so that when I was nearing the end n said any questions loads of hands shot up!! 😹
My boss had also advised that I take our 'drug case' ..this was a case with samples of all the drugs with a glass top..like if u pinned a butterfly collection in a cabinet..that kinda thing. Needless to say those kids knew what drugs were by the end of the session?!! Job done!! 🌈😽😽Xx
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Occupational health 
fed up lupy
WHO IS MENTAL 
Lupus/Sjogrens or not ...
