Special Torture (or how to grin and bear it)

Category Archives: pain

What I mean when I say…

August 16, 2025 | ADHD, ASC, autism, DysAuDHD, dyscalculia, dyslexia, education, life, mental health, mindfulness, neurodivergence, pain, Uncategorized | Permalink

The 10 of Swords from Tarot of the Mystical Moments by Catrin Welz-Stein The title of this essay comes from Annie Kotowicz’s short and sweet memoir, What I Mean When I Say I’m Autistic. Consider this a set of CliffNotes to my experience of neurodivergence and related subjects.  In each section, I will share the […]

Neurotypical Failure

July 15, 2025 | ADHD, ASC, autism, DysAuDHD, dyscalculia, dyslexia, education, health, life, mental health, neurodivergence, pain, school, selfcare, Uncategorized | Permalink

The Moon from Mystical Moments Tarot by Catrin Welz-Stein For most of my life, I’ve felt like a failure. A rather fair-to-middling one, I grant you—I did have loads of privilege and a cussed determination to fall back on—but a failure nonetheless.  Let’s get right to it. I started struggling—and failing—young. My entire academic life […]

The Good and the Bad.

November 13, 2012 | exercise, health, infertility, life, pain | Permalink

Lots has happened recently. First, I have been remiss in not mentioning that my back pain is, for the first time in almost two years, completely under control. I have been having more pain free days then not. This is HUGE. And yet… I think I expected this to have more of an impact on […]

At least you have….

September 27, 2012 | health, infertility, life, pain | Permalink

…Your Health… The sundry adults in my life must have used that phrase a lot when I was a kid, because whenever things are all fucked up and can’t seem to get much worse, my brain stupidly and automatically says to me, “Well, at least you have your health”. Seriously. I say that to myself […]

UT-OUCH

September 8, 2012 | health, life, pain | Permalink

I guess we should count our lucky stars that the stupid amount of sex we need to have in order to try to get me knocked up does not result in urinary track infection every month… Yes, we should be thankful, but that’s hard to remember when I am peeing white lightening. Stupid e-coli. Stupid […]

Migraine Mondays

August 27, 2012 | health, life, pain | Permalink

I wake up with migraines on Monday mornings more often then on any other day of the week. What the hell? Talk about adding insult to injury. I have had 5 migraines this past week, which I hope is only related to that fact that this was the first 7 days of my menstrual cycle. Hormones be damned. […]

Home Practice

August 14, 2012 | exercise, health, life, pain | Permalink

I hate doing yoga or any other exercise at home. Just deplore it. I have tired all manner of activity – yoga, free weights, PT, aerobics, boot camp style workouts, stuff with that stupid exercise ball, DVDs, streaming video, worksheets, check lists, free flow workouts from my own imagination. Doesn’t matter what it is, I would rather eat glass than do it. I have a litany of half hearted procrastinations  – I don’t have enough time. I […]

It all started with yoga…

August 11, 2012 | exercise, health, life, pain | Permalink

For most of my life I have been lazy and out of shape. It’s just my thing. Also, I have a genetic condition that affects my lungs’ ability to oxygenate my blood. Again, just sort of my thing. I can only assume that the whole lack of oxygen situation probably played a pretty big roll in the not wanting to run around business, but for most […]

In Other News

August 2, 2012 | health, life, pain | Permalink

I got my second Botox treatment yesterday. For migraine management, not anything cosmetic. It still seems strange to me that anyone would use the root ‘tox’ in a drug name. I think we can assume that was not accidental.  Happily, I don’t mind be reminded of the fact that I have Botulism toxin under the skin of my face, neck, […]