• mood: migraine
• listening: cars going down the street sometimes

wow, it has been nearly a month since I wrote in this thing. granted, it's been a month full of things to do. obviously, Christmas came and went, as did New Year's. I've had my daughter most of the time for a variety of reasons; things just happened to work out that way. we have also been trying to make more of an effort to go into town and see people from time to time.

I've had some weird stuff go on with me medically because of course I have. on December 28th, I treated myself to a new piercing: a dermal anchor about a centimeter and change towards my ear from my existing dermal anchor, so that they're positioned the same way a surface bar anti-eyebrow would be. I always wanted one of those, ever since seeing one on an older, cooler punk girl in my hometown's scene called Valerie. Valerie is gone now, may her soul rest. when I was old enough to take myself in for a piercing, I asked for one, but could only afford the apprentice that day; he said he would charge me less to do a dermal anchor, so I got one of those instead. then I got my most proximal dermal anchor in 2021, from a piercer here in Indiana who was old and spoke like Billy Bob Thornton's character in Deliverance. I didn't really want just the one, but I settled. finally, this year, I decided I wanted what I had always wanted originally.

for the first few days, it healed terrifically. in fact, it healed so terrifically that I was driving back from a lunch break on the 3rd thinking about how easy healing it had been. five minutes later, I parked the vehicle, opened the door, and *BAM* walked directly the entire fuck into it exactly where my new piercing was.

it's fine now, but goddamn. I could not believe my luck.

then on the 7th, I went in for ingrown toenail surgery. the entire procedure was traumatic and painful. I don't really want to go into details. the long and short was that, despite trying to tell the podiatrist that I did, in fact, still have feeling in one of the digits, I was ignored and felt the whole thing without working anesthetic. it was one of the more disturbing things I've gone through, and it's not even the first time that local anesthetic didn't work on me (thanks, EDS). the first time it happened to me, I was undergoing a tooth extraction. one of the wisdom teeth was impacted and needed sawed in half before removal; this so happened to be when the anesthetic started wearing off. the problem is that it's hard to scream or speak when you have fingers in your mouth, and I in general am the kind of person whose nervous system defaults to "flight/freeze" when experiencing acute trauma. I just... don't really scream when I'm suffering. I save it up and blog about it later.

this latest procedure, I think, was way more disturbing to me and traumatic than the tooth extraction was. I had mentally accepted that it would be painful and disturbing, because I physically didn't have an opportunity to say anything or withdraw consent. conversely, on the 7th, I attempted to say something, but was shot down and told that there was no way my toe, which had been injected with lidocaine about 45 minutes previously, had regained feeling already. there's nothing quite like telling someone that they're about to hurt you, and then getting told "No, I'm not" right before they invariably hurt you, that really reminds you just how small and voiceless you are. and that's what's been fucking me up the most.

the whole thing has totally screwed with my mental health, not to mention actually recovering from the procedure. for some reason, too, on account of being a member of a silly species with dumb monkey brains, when I am faced with feeling horrible on the inside, it's almost like I lean into it and do things that make it substantially worse. I have recently, for that reason, had to add Facebook.com to my "Strict" restrictions list on my browser extension, despite the fact that I hate Facebook with a passion. it's a worthless platform that shows only things that make you feel bad. and yet here I've been for the past couple of weeks, checking it because I just don't know how to perk myself up very well when things are down.

that's not entirely true. I have been trying. I started macro tracking again and holding myself accountable to eat actual meals and sweets in moderation. I bought myself pants that fit--I'm "curvy petite", which I quite like the sound of, thanks, Pants Marketers--and an eyeliner pen with a stamp shaped like a wing. And I'm back on here, aren't I? I've also taken up knitting armwarmers and am going to make my first proper pair of socks when my sock yarn comes in the mail soon. oh, and I've been writing a lot on my Substack lately.

hopefully soon I'll get gumption enough to do the things I want to do with this site. for example, I want to put a lookbook on here for outfits and specific pieces I've knit, with relevant links to Ravelry.

it's been getting better. and it was never that bad to begin with. things have been much, much worse. I do have some post-traumatic growth. sometimes, when I am suffering, I remember that it's incredible that I've made it this far to even still be suffering at all. that hasn't always been a guarantee.