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@autumnalakika
when u exit hyperfocus mode and ur immediately hit with every status effect ever
Oh fuck I gotta pee. Wait wait, I can’t stand up I’m gonna fall over. Shit I haven’t eaten in like 23 hours. Damn I’m thirsty, maybe I should— fuck why am I nauseous? Oh, I didn’t eat, right. It’s WHAT time? 3AM? Do I even have time to eat? Shit, I forgot to take my meds earlier. Or did I? Damnit. Why is my head pounding, oh, right, haven’t eaten and I’m dehydrated… fuck I still gotta pee
Time to feed unprofessional managers what they’ve been dishing out for far too long.
Couple things here, for when you do this to people:
1. if you get the “answer my call” text, NEVER ANSWER THE CALL.
They are calling you because they want to have the conversation verbally, and be able to lie later about what they said or didn’t say. Force them to continue via text or email- force them to continue the conversation in writing or not at all.
2. “Lack of 2 weeks notice is unprofessional!” or the other version, “Not providing notice is illegal!”
No it isn’t. Neither is true.
And in the US, all states except Montana are “at will” employment (though you may hear an employer refer to it as “right to work” to make it sound better, it’s the same thing). Sure, at-will employment means they can fire you without cause, BUT! It also means that you are not legally required to give a reason for quitting, or to give notice of any kind.
Is it polite to give notice when you can? Sure. Do bosses expect it? Absolutely. But that does not make you legally required to provide it.
3. The only thing I would change in the worker’s interaction here was their response when initially asked to come in.
Employee: “Hey Mark. Sorry I’m unable to cover the shift tonight because I’m studying for my exam tomorrow.”
Don’t give a reason for your lack of availability. It may be tempting to. You may feel rude if you don’t.
DON’T DO IT.
You do not owe your boss any information about what you do off the clock, and any reason you give will only ever be used against you.
Boss: “Hey I need you to cover Jasper’s shift tonight.”
Employee: “Sorry, I’m not available.”
And leave it at that.
Do not elaborate.
Do not offer additional information.
When you boss asks you to elaborate, because they will, be polite but firm. “With respect, that’s personal. I’m sorry, but I’m unavailable to cover this shift/work late/come in early/etc.”
Be a broken record- you’re unavailable. That’s the only information they need to know, and it’s the only information they have a LEGAL RIGHT to know.
Please stop giving your bosses information they don’t need to know and don’t get to have, because they’re only going to try and use it to fuck you over later.
The worst part of human adulthood is being your own zookeeper
Like... i have to make sure my meals are nutritionally balanced... i have to make sure that the space i occupy is big enough, and interesting enough, and provide enrichment to make up for the lack of novelty... i have to make sure i get exercise... i'm not qualified for this
Why would you abandon this in the tags?
i dont mean to sound like a doomer but personally i find it simultaneously interesting and terrifying to think of how the internet will evolve over the next 20 years. in the last 10 years alone it has gone from one of the most unifying and free spaces for the average person to an active tool of corporate and government surveillance. this platform that was once a safe haven for many people to speak freely is now an ad-ridden temporal booby trap that can go off at any time. the internet has been thoroughly decimated by the presence of venture capitalism, and i am concurrently saddened to watch this happen in real time, and curious to see what will eventually replace it as the go-to counterculture platform
Free Trauma and Dissociation Books
This is the link to Google Drive folder containing these books. There is a list below of what is in the folder. Please consider reblogging so these resources are available.
Disclaimer: I have not read all of these to completion. I have not researched all the authors. Please do your own research if you have concerns.
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson
The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk MD
Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker
Complex PTSD Recovery Workbook by Kimberly Callis
Complex PTSD Workbook by Arielle Schwartz
Coping with Trauma-Related Dissociation by Suzette Boon, Kathy Steele, Onno van der Hart
EMDR Toolbox: Theory and Treatment of Complex PTSD and Dissociation by James Knipe
Emotional Incest Syndrome: What to Do When a Parent’s Love Rules Your Life by Patricia Love, Jo Robinson
Got Parts? An Insider’s Guide to Managing Life Successfully with Dissociative Identity Disorder by ATW
The Haunted Self by Onno Hart
Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Internal Self Alienation by Janina Fisher
In an Unspoken Voice How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness by Peter A. Levine
Life After Trauma: A Workbook for Healing by Dena Rosenbloom, Mary Beth Williams, Barbara E. Watkins
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook: A Guide to Healing, Recovery, and Growth by Glenn R. Schiraldi
The PTSD Workbook: Simple, Effective Techniques for Overcoming Traumatic Stress Symptoms by Mary Beth Williams, Soili Poijula
Rebuilding Shattered Lives: Treating Complex PTSD and Dissociative Disorders by James A. Chu
Running on Empty: Overcome Your Childhood Emotional Neglect by Jonice Webb, Christine Musello
Stoning Demons Book 1: Childhood Trauma is a Primer for Complex PTSD by Kimberly Callis
Stoning Demons Book 3: Physical Health and Complex PTSD by Kimberly Callis
The Stranger in the Mirror by Marlene Steinberg
Toxic Parents by Susan Forward, Craig Buck
Trauma and Recovery by Judith L. Herman
Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy by Pat Ogden
Waking the Tiger Healing Trauma by Peter A. Levine
People love to talk about whether or not disabled people can work
but if you can work just fine and your disability is destroying your ability to have a life outside of work (because work takes all your energy and more)
Dead silence. Nobody cares.
File this under, oh you can be active for 4 hours? You can work part-time. Um no, I have to get ready for work (30 min) get to work (15 min) get home from work (15 min) feed myself all day (30 min) maintain myself, my home and my life (15 min, yeah right), which leaves 15 min for work and absolutely nothing else.
This is so accurate, back after I’d relapsed I wanted to try and go in for one class at school so I could still stay in contact with the education system. I let slip during a meeting that I managed to drag myself to that I could manage about 4 hours of activity a week, which the teacher sprang on to mean I was being lazy for just trying to get to 1 hour class. Never matter that it was 30 minutes travel, that I would have to get washed and dressed, that I would probably still need to recover for 3 days from it.
Far too often abled people see the things they do easily as “non activities”, they don’t realise that for many disabled people these things have to be carefully planned and measured, and sometimes they simply can’t be done.
reblog bc the non activities thing seems really important words
I get X number of pain-free steps per day right now, which means that, for large conventions (like SDCC), I need to be in a mobility device. I had someone ask if I used up my steps every day before transferring to the scooter, and look surprised and a little horrified when I said “no, I save them so I can go to the bathroom unassisted.” Like, they had never considered that walking is involved in peeing.
Reblogging for the important point that the term “activity” may mean something very different and much broader for a disabled person with a chronic pain or fatigue related condition compared to its meaning for a non disabled person. If you’re tired enough, simply sitting up in a chair rather than lying in bed is an activity that drains energy otherwise usable for other things. A thing I knew from other people with pain and fatigue related conditions, but worth reinforcing for followers who didnt know or had forgotten.
How do any of you earn things?
We don’t, it’s almost like disability puts us at risk of poverty or something.
you know, I think a lot of problems people face would be solved if they were involved in a healthy community. so many people don’t have strong friends (or any at all), aren’t around multi generations (there is so much value in helping children grow and getting wisdom from elders), don’t have a support system of likeminded individuals, etc etc and you’re just out here basically alone struggling to fend for yourself without the protection and ability to rest on your community. no big families, no religious community, no nothing.
it’s crazy that you can live surrounded by hundreds or even thousands of people and yet be so disconnected from them all. to not know your neighbors names, to go out every day and not see the same face twice unless they work at the grocery store you shop. community is vital to humans. integral! join a club or two or three. meet people, befriend them, embrace the social side of your genetic makeup that has gone ignored for so long, much to the dwindling of your well-being. and when I say community, I mean community. not just having a few friends but like a community. we are not meant to be alone like this.
“The prince just fell in love with Cinderella because of her looks!”
Wrong. Okay, picture this–
So there’s the prince, okay? He’s like, smack dab in the center of the ballroom, and he is like, horrifically aware that this whole ball thing is a result of his dad falling into a panic about the royal lineage or whatever and he’s stuck listening to highborn girl after highborn girl, all lined up, introducing themselves like, “Oh yeah my family’s been a longtime supporter of the crown, and I think you’re cute, *cough* I’ve been told I have child-bearing hips *cough* Who said that? Anyway–” and Princey boy is just smiling through it, he has been the center of attention for entirely too long, he misses his emotional support horse, and is just internally like “Someone please kill me now.” And then… he sees her–This isn’t a love at first sight thing, this is a ‘what the hell is going on over there’ thing, because this girl has not gotten into the Debutante line for a solid 45 minutes.
She’s just at the hors d’oeuvres table going HAM on the prosciutto-wrapped asparagus, and like, she’s polite about it, she’s happy to move aside for other people grabbing punch and canapes (and she’s really so sweet with the wait staff, it’s kind of cute because they’re like… definitely not used to being acknowledged) but it’s like, “Damn girl, did you not eat today?” and then the prince is kind of stuck with the uncomfortable thought of ‘how many girls starved themselves to fit into a corset for this.’ And then the Prince realizes he’s missed the past 4 Debutante introductions because he’s watching Mystery girl hork down crab rangoons. So he’s like, “Excuse me” and manages to break free from the never-ending parade of girls who will hop on his dick for status.
And as he’s approaching Mystery Girl, it’s kind of hitting him that something’s not quite natural about her. Not fake, but not quite real. But at the same time this whole evening’s been just a whole circus of people acting fake as hell, so like, someone seeming a little off doesn’t seem bad, necessarily. And he sidles up to her like, “Hi,” and she’s like, “Oh–hey, have you tried the tapenade?” and she points to one of the plates, and at this point, he could hit her with the “You don’t know who I am, do you?” deal or the “Very funny, I see your play” deal, but at this point it occurs to him that, no, he hasn’t had anything to eat throughout this whole damn ball, partially because of being stuck in the debutante parade, partially because of nerves, and there’s something so disarming about the question that he grabs a crostini and she still seems so food-focused that it doesn’t seem possible that this is a play. So they both grab little plates and ditch the party.
She pretty much clears her plate in under two minutes and then has half of his plate, he’s cool with it, mostly he’s just absolutely fascinated listening to her.
See here’s the thing about Cinderella:
1. She doesn’t know he’s the prince. Like yeah, he’s been at the center of the room, but she’s kind of spent half the party eagerly looking around everywhere she’s allowed to go (”Have you seen rose garden? Have you seen the solarium??” further confirmation that she doesn’t know who she’s talking to) and the other half stuffing her face with food.
2. She assumes she’s never going to see anyone here tonight again, and no one recognizes her, so she has no filter.
So she’s just talking about whatever with this guy. He seems cool. She talks about her friends, who are rats. She makes little outfits for them. Sometimes they bring her little gifts. She is already the coolest person the prince has ever met because of this. She pretty much offhandedly talks about whatever is fucked up about the kingdom that would take his advisors two hours of hemming and hawing and watering down to address. She just says it like it’s nothing, just funky little things she’s observed, and again, she’s not aware that he’s the prince, but it’s still pretty damn bold to bring up at a literal royal ball.
She… seems to have the majority of graces that lots of girls from Respectable Families™ have, but there’s something strange about it, something simultaneously broken and hardened, like the way you can see where ice has thawed and re-frozen. Also the way she talks about her family, and the way she avoids talking about her family– is raising several red flags, not in the “Oh this is another person trying to take advantage of me” sense, but in the “Oh fuck, something’s gone really wrong and you need help” sense and also lowkey a ‘damn is she even getting fed?’ sense. But he can’t say, ‘Hey, that’s not fucking normal for people to say that to you or treat you that way. We need to get you out of there,’ without sounding crazy himself, so for now, he’s just going to chill, make sure she’s comfortable, and keep enjoying the evening. She’s somehow befriended like 4 of the waitstaff so they’re willing to cover for them while they disappear for a little bit, and they get plenty of time to talk, but eventually it hits her that she hasn’t danced yet and she’s like “Come on! I bet we can make the prince jealous!” and he just bursts out laughing at that like “hell yeah, let’s make the prince jealous. He’s a real asshole.” Like clearly she’s having a good time, so who is he to make it weird? So they head back to the ballroom and they dance. And our girl, Mystery Girl, Cinderella, while they’re dancing, becomes acutely aware that everyone is staring. That doesn’t seem quite right. Like, yeah she’s hot, she knows she’s hot, but at least a good third of the party should still be focused on the prince, right? Where is that guy, anyway?
Oh.
Oh wait.
Oh shit.
And Princey Boy actually picks up on her realization and they whisper argue for like 3 minutes. “Why didn’t you tell me?! Now I feel like a goddamn idiot!” “I dunno it was nice being treated like a normal person” “Well me treating you like a normal person makes me a goddamn felon or something did you consider that?!” “Hey–Hey–it’s cool–you’re cool–I think you’re amazing, and if anyone says shit about you, I can shut it down.” “Well I don’t like that! That’s fucked up!” “I agree. It is fucked up, but I believe in you, and I think you should have a chance, and I’m here to back you up. I know power is fucked up right now. I know. But are you cool with working with me to change that?” And our girl Cindy pauses on that for a couple seconds, because.. she’s just spent hours with this guy and like.. she knows he’s a good guy, she knows he means well, so she’s like, “I don’t know how long I can actually work with you.” and the prince is like “Look, I know your home situation is complicated right now, but I really think we can–”
And then the bell starts ringing.
It’s midnight.
And then she takes off in a panic, and our prince just met the coolest person ever, and like, he’s pretty sure whatever situation they’re headed back to is fucked up, and all he’s got going to find her is a shoe. A shoe.
the only way this works for me is if he also has prosopagnosia, aka facial blindness. in any version of this story, it’s just ludicrous to think that he can’t even string together a physical description of her. but this was total gold. i want to see a cinderella who horks down crab rangoons and has no filter lol
Ah yeah prosopagnosia, a reasonable explanation, however that lends to the other plot hole that there were countless others at the ball who could have recognized our girl Cinderella, including her Stepmother and Stepsisters. If the evil Stepfam recognized her, it would be all over.
Thankfully the Fairy Godmother thought of something for that.
So picture Cindy, she’s in the garden under the hazel tree where her mother was buried, she’s just gotten the kickass dress, she’s doing the skirt twirlies, she’s checking herself out in the reflection of the garden fountain, and all of a sudden this horrible realization falls on her and she whirls over to look at her Fairy Godmother like, “WAIT. If my stepmother recognizes me, I’m dead. I’m so dead.”
And Fairy Godmother is just like, “Oh pffft kiddo don’t sweat it. There’s a memory charm stitched into the dress.”
“Memory charm?”
“Oh yeah. Fae standard. There’s already illusion spells on the dress so no one’s gonna recognize you, and like… once the dress and the carriage and everything disappear at midnight, pretty much the only space you’ll occupy in people’s brains is like… they’ll basically remember you as a cloud of white noise. A talking cloud of white noise–they’ll remember what you say, but not the sound of your voice.”
“I don’t know what white noise is.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Wait–” Cindy perks up, “Everything’s going to disappear at midnight?”
“Yep. Everything,” The fairy godmother is smacking her wand against her palm, trying to figure out how much juice is still in it.
And then this ripple passes over Cinderella’s face. “Even the slippers?”
“The slippers?” The fairy godmother glances up.
“I just…” Cinderella fidgets with her dress a little, “I really like them. They’re so pretty and there’s… I’ve never seen anything like them in my life. I wouldn’t sell them or anything, and I know It would be much harder to hide the dress so I figured I couldn’t keep it… but… I just hoped I might have something so I’d know this night wasn’t a dream. Just something to take out from time to time and look at…” She seems to catch herself and straighten up a little. “But I understand. You’ve already done so much, I should be thankful for–”
And Fairy Godmother is massaging her temples like “Urrrghhhh oh god you’re making the face–Okay. OKAY. I’m bending like 15 rules for this but…” she snaps her fingers and the slippers on Cinderella’s feel just a little heavier, “There you go. The shoes are physical and permanent. But hey–HEY–keep track of them. This means the memory and illusion charms don’t work on them. These are going to be the only recognizable things about you from this night. You got it?”
And Cindy nods.
“I mean it! After this it’s going to be months before I can muster up enough magic to turn into a starling murmuration and peck your stepfamily’s eyes out. So I can’t protect you before then.”
“…w-what about pecking out eyes–?”
“Okay! Ball time! Go kiddo, go! Go! Go! Get in the carriage! Go!”
1. Excellent.
2. As an adult, I just feel like that fairy should have been able to provide more substantial help then the ticket to the ball + accessories. Like maybe money and a ticket out of town at an earlier point?
It took the fairy godmother a very long time to first come into existence as a fairy (From the hazel tree Cinderella’s father planted) and then it took her even longer to become a fairy godmother because the other fairy godmothers had to keep explaining to her, “No we don’t kill people.”
“What are you talking about. We’re fairies. We kill people all the time.”
“Yes, other fairies do that, but we don’t.”
“But what if they suck, though?”
“Fairy Godmothering isn’t about curses and punishment.”
“I think we should be able to kill people.”
*sigh* “Erlking help me…”
“The Erlking would kill these clowns!”
So keep in mind that Fairy Godmother is wearing the Fairy equivalent of an ankle monitor when she’s finally able to help Cindy.
“What are you talking
about. We’re fairies. We kill
people all the time.”
Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.
I don’t think I’ve seen a single Cinderella rewrite on this website that didn’t have fairy godmother as down for murder and honestly I fucking love that, let the sweet magic grandma be as unhinged as possible.
while I’m at it, i may as well post my “how kinky people look at sex reveals how autistic people experience the world better than anything else I have seen” post.
A majority of people in the world appear to view sensation like this: there are some feelings that are Good, and some that are Bad. Pain, of course, is Bad, fundamentally Worse than other sensations, like pressure or touch.
Some people are autistic. They spend their entire lives comparing being touched in ways they hate to being in pain, because people refuse to understand any other way. The world is hard to live in for them, because the feelings that hurt them are not categorized as Bad, and therefore what is torturous is not understood as torture.
Kink really unnerves a lot of people because it upends a lot of assumptions about how brains feel things. How can you want to experience something in the Bad category?
But I think kink better understands and allows for the actual complexity and reality of how brains feel things.
It’s actually more like this: There are very few, if any, actually inherently Bad stimuli. Instead, everything has a threshold at which it is unpleasant, even unbearable, and a threshold at which it is neutral or even good. Those are not necessarily opposite ends of the spectrum and can in fact overlap in weird ways. The intensity of a stimulus, or how much it pushes the limits of your processing, is not necessarily the same as “how much” stimulus, either.
Everyone is different in where their thresholds lie. There is a ton of diversity. This is…okay.
Furthermore, your thresholds are not fixed. You can adjust them a lot based on circumstances, such as how predictable the stimulus is, how much control you have over it, how much control you have over the rest of your environment, the amount of things you’re simultaneously processing, and so on.
In other words, if you experience something in an environment that is controlled, planned, and has low levels of unpredictability and extraneous stimuli, in a way that is curated to your ability to process it, that can cause a dramatic shift in whether you experience that thing as pleasurable or horrible.
Sometimes, people engage in otherwise unpleasant things in a controlled and agreed-to manner so those unpleasant things can become…good. Autistic people try to make their worlds as predictable, controlled and planned as possible so they can process “everyday” things with less pain. (And sometimes they do the first thing too.)
Honestly? I think what has convinced me most of this idea is seeing things people who are “anti-kink” say.
I see posts written by people who believe that doing a thing categorized as Bad in a sexual context is inherently going to cause harm, regardless of consent. The implication, though, in singling out “kink,” is that there is a “normal, natural” form of sex that is not “inherently harmful,” that lacks the characteristics that make pain, for example, harmful.
These people are regarding “normal” sexual activities, certain forms of touch or stimulation, to be inherently “safer” and less hurtful.
But to an autistic person, a touch may feel much worse than pain, no matter how gentle it appears to be. To an autistic person, many “vanilla” and innocuous acts might feel unbearable. But they don’t get treated with suspicion, because the people for whom they are Bad are not Normal.
When you are autistic, agency over your own perception is one of the biggest things you have to fight for in order to heal and be healthy. “This hurts me because *i* say it hurts me” is…basic. Because people don’t believe you when your hurts are non-normative.
“This feels good because *I* say it feels good” seems like it’s just the other side of the coin.
“So I hear you want to free Britney, and I just want to tell you, um, welcome to the disability revolution. We are so glad you’re here! Do you think it’s wild that she couldn’t remove her IUD? Well, it is still currently completely legal to sterilize women with disabilities. Under law. Do you think it’s bananas that Britney couldn’t even see her children? Well, it’s not uncommon at all. In fact, mothers with disabilities face removal rates up to 40 to 80 percent. ‘I can’t believe she couldn’t even see her own boyfriend?’ This happens all the time. It is very common for families of people with disabilities to control their relationships for them. That’s why many people with disabilities can’t actually marry. Because they can lose their benefits and their healthcare. It’s also completely legal to electroshock children, um, if they have have a disability. So, yes. Free Britney. But let’s also free everybody else. And let’s follow the lead of the disability rights movement, who has been shouting and fighting against these injustices for decades.”
Wait what’s a buildings fire evacuation plan if you aren’t supposed to use the elevator to get down
You go down the stairwell/fire escape. Is that weird?
But what if you have a walker or a wheelchair??
in america at least, in this situation, there isnt one. either your loved ones or the firemen can get you out using the emergency fire escapes or stairs, or you die
That’s fucking horrific, thank you
“fun” little story:
last summer my friend who is an amazingly talented artist and i were in this super tall building, and she’s in a wheelchair and i’m pushing her around the room. it’s an art exhibit and some of her art was chosen to be showcased there and so it’s all fine and dandy until suddenly an alarm starts going off
a FIRE ALARM
everyone starts running for the stairs and my friend just looks at me with this forlorn look on her face
“i can’t go down the stairs”
but i’m a stubborn bitch “i’ll carry you”
“what about my chair? it’s too expensive for me to be able to get another one if i can’t get this one back”
“i’ll carry that too”
and i did. we went to the stairs (by then most people from our floor were gone) and i lifted her up in a fireman’s carry over my shoulder and then lifted her chair up and used the ridiculous amount of adrenaline that was coursing through my veins to make it down approximately 20 half-flights of stairs until we met some people exiting lower floors, one of which who kindly took the chair. I changed positions so i was holding my friend bridal-style which was, somehow, easier and the person who took her wheelchair (with her permission to handle it of course) accompanied me to the ground floor and then out the doors
basically there is no real protocol for people who can’t use the stairs in an emergency. it’s up to the people with them, if anyone, to help them or the person to somehow make it down the stairs alone, unassisted
thank fuck that it was just a faulty alarm system, because if i was unable to carry her down those stairs and the building was on fucking fire???? then i don’t know what would have happened to her, but i don’t think it would have been very good.
it’s fucking ridiculous and ableist to the absolute max.
I use a cane. When I did a day-long fire safety training at my northeast American university (UMass Amherst), I asked that exact same question: “what am I supposed to do if the fire alarm goes off and I’m in my lab on the twelfth floor?”
the fire marshal hemmed and hawed for a while and then said to take the elevator- you’re supposed to leave it free for the fire department to use and they want able-bodied people out fast not waiting for elevators. if the fire alarm has just gone off the building probably hasn’t suffered enough structural damage to make using the elevator dangerous, and modern elevator wells are heavily reinforced. many large and high-trafficked buildings on my campus have fire rated elevators that link in with the fire alarm system so they won’t let you off on a floor with a possible fire.
if the elevator isn’t working, wait in the stairwell and call the fire department to let them know where you are. modern stairwells are also heavily reinforced- it might not be pleasant but modern building code usually requires fire-resistant stairwell doors in office and big residential buildings, also to help firefighters get in and out safely. older buildings’ stairwells may or may not be retrofitted with fire-resistant doors but a stairwell is generally the safest place to wait if you can’t get out.
what happened to your friend was horrible, and i’m very glad you were there to help her out, but you can absolutely use the elevator to evacuate if it’s not shut down. those don’t-use-the-elevator rules are for abled people.
This is GOOD TO KNOW. why do they not tell people this??
Okay, firefighter here. If you are not physically able to use the stairs, and the elevator is NOT compromised, use the elevator. But you MUST be ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN that the elevator is NOT compromised before you get into it, because there is always the chance that once you get into it, you may not exit it. Power could go out. The elevator may actually BE compromised and you just couldn’t tell from where you were until you were in there, and it suddenly shuts down on you. Something else could happen.
Understand that once you enter the elevator, you could POTENTIALLY be taking your life into your hands there.
It is NOT LIKELY, to be perfectly honest. It’s only in a pretty catastrophic scenario - think the Twin Towers, USA, on September 11th - that the elevators will be compromised and out of service. But there is a NOT ZERO PERCENT CHANCE and you need to understand that and accept it.
As for leaving the elevators free for the firefighters, okay, here’s the deal. Unless your nearest fire station is literally right next door? Your first on scene fire truck is NOT likely to be there on scene and needing that elevator before you get to the ground. It takes us TIME to find the address, gear up, and drive to the building. Then we need to hoof it into where the elevators even ARE, so YOU HAVE TIME to use the elevator to get down to the ground floor… BUT ONLY IF THERE’S NOT A RUSH ON THE ELEVATOR! And THAT is WHY we don’t tell people this shit. That’s WHY we tell people to NEVER USE THE ELEVATOR… because every self-entitled asshole will use it because they don’t feel like walking, and then put YOU in danger by delaying the elevator’s arrival to you.
IF, however, the elevator IS compromised, or you just can’t get it to come for you, or whatever, and you either don’t have anyone with you who has the adrenaline fueled BALLS to be able to toss you over their shoulder and hoof it down the stairs with you - because, let’s face it, that is RARE AS FUCK, then HERE IS WHAT YOU DO:
You call 911 and tell the call taker that you are in the building that has a fire alarm going off, and you are not able to evacuate because of a physical disability, and you tell them what floor you are on, and EXACTLY what stairwell you are waiting at. And the very FIRST thing that the firefighters are going to do once they arrive, if it is, indeed, a REAL emergency, and not a false alarm, is come get your ass and bring you down. Whether that means carrying you down the stairs, or whether that means locking out the elevators so that no one else can override them and coming to get you themselves, they WILL come get you FIRST THING if it is a real event. And if it is a false alarm? You will probably be the first person who is not involved with the building to know, because the call-taker is going to stay on the line with you until you are under someone’s care and out of danger, or until the scene has been sorted out as real or false, and you are out of danger that way.
These are pretty standard operations in the fire service throughout the United States. There may be some minor variations based on specific municipalities, but, for the most part, this is pretty typical: LIFE BEFORE PROPERTY. So, as long as SOMEONE knows where you are - hence why you call 911 - Firefighters will come get you. You are NOT alone, and you have NOT been abandoned. I PROMISE. It’s like, our whole reason for doing the shit we do: to save lives and to break shit. Sometimes, we get lucky enough to do both at the same time.
High rise fires suck ass, and I always hated them. But the very FIRST thing I asked anytime we got one was if we had “any entrapments” - which is what we call anyone who could not self-evacuate for ANY reason. We ain’t leaving you behind. And yes, your friend who doesn’t have the stamina to carry you down can stay with you, too. Because I would never ask that of someone, honestly.
Also, just a little FYI… MOST fire alarms are false alarms. Not to make anyone complacent or anything, but, yeah. Most of them are either system malfunctions, someone accidentally hit a pull station, or someone burned popcorn in a break room. So don’t let a fire alarm freak you out until you need it to - by smelling or seeing smoke or flames.
I know it’s got 100k notes but I haven’t seen this and even though I would 100% attempt to haul any one of you down a dozen flights of stairs, I know enough of my followers are disabled in more ways than one and ought to know this
There was once a fire alarm in the hotel I was in and I literally called the front desk to ask if it was real because I use a wheelchair most of the time and I could climb down that many steps to save my life but I’m not fucking doing it for a drill. It was neither, someone had pranked the alarm.
This may just be my experience as an autistic person, but the kids I’ve nannied whose parent’s complain of ‘bad awful in cooperative selfish autistic behavior’ are… Not like that? At all?
Like, for example, I cared for a kid for a while who was nonverbal and didn’t like being touched. Around six years old? Their parent said that they were fussy and had a strict schedule, and that they had problems getting them to eat. Their last few nannies had quit out of frustration.
So, I showed up. And for the first little while, it was awkward. The kid didn’t know me, I didn’t know them, you know how it is. And for the first… Day and a half, maybe? I fucked up a few times.
I changed their diaper and they screamed at me. I put the TV off and they threw things. Not fun, but regular upset kid stuff.
Next time, I figured, hell, I wouldn’t like being manhandled and ordered around either. Who likes being physically lifted out of whatever it is they’re doing and having their pants yanked off? Fucking few, that’s who.
Next time, I go, ‘hey, kiddo. You need a new diaper?’ and check. ‘I’m gonna go grab a new one and get you clean, okay?’ ‘Wanna find a spot to lay down?’ ‘Alright, almost done. Awesome job, thanks buddy’.
I learned stuff about them. They liked a heads up before I did anything disruptive. They didn’t mind that I rattled of about nothing all day. They didn’t like grass or plastic touching their back. They were okay with carpets and towels. They liked pictionary, and the color yellow, and fish crackers, and painting. They didn’t look me in the face (which was never an issue- I hate that too, it fucking sucks) but I never had reason to believe that they were ignoring me.
Once I learned what I was doing wrong, everything was fine. Did they magically “”“become normal”“” and start talking and laughing and hugging? No, but we had fun and had a good time and found a compromise between what I was comfortable with and what they were comfortable with. (For the record, I didn’t magically sailor-moon transform into a socially adept individual, either. In case anyone was wondering.)
I don’t like eye contact. It’s distracting and painful and stresses me out.
They didn’t like eye contact either.
Is eye contact necessary to communication? No. So we just didn’t do it.
Was there ever a situation where I HAD to force them to drop everything and lay down on the lawn? No. So the thirty second warning came into play, and nobody died.
“But they never talked!”
No, they didn’t. And they didn’t know ASL, and they didn’t like being touched.
So you know what happened?
My third day in, they tugged on my shirt. ‘Hey monkey, what’s up?’ I asked. And they tugged me towards the kitchen. ‘oh, cool. You hungry?’. They raised their hands in an ‘up’ gesture. ‘you want up? Cool.’ and I lifted them up. They pointed to the fridge. I opened it. They grabbed a juice box out of the top shelf, and pushed the door closed again. ‘oh sweet, grape is the best. You are an individual of refined taste.’ I put them down and they went back to their room to play Legos.
“But they didn’t say please or thank you!” “But you should be teaching them communication skills!” “But!” Lalalalala.
1. The entire interaction was entirely considerate and polite. I was never made uncomfortable. I was made aware of the problem so that I could help them solve it. There was no mess, no tears, no bruises, no shouting.
2. Did my brain collapse into a thousand million fragments of shattered diamond dust out of sheer incomprehension? No? Then their communication skills were fine. Goal realized, solution found, objective complete. They found the most simple and painless way to communicate the situation and then did it.
Kids are not stupid. AUTISTIC kids are not stupid.
I’m willing to bet real cash money that the real reason the last few nannies had quit had a million times more to do with their own ability to cope, not the kid’s.
To this day, that was the most relaxed and enjoyable job I’ve ever had.
And I know I don’t speak for everyone. All kids are different. All adults are different. But in my time and experience, pretty much 95% of all my difficulties with children come from ME not being understanding enough. Every single “problem child” I’ve worked with turned out to be a pretty cool person once I started figuring out how to put my ego aside and let them set the pace.
Again, not speaking universally, here. I’m just saying. Sometimes social rules are bullshit, you know? People are people
The thing about why so many parents think their neurodivergent children are a handful and a half is that they cannot wrap their heads around the fact that their child has needs and boundaries that conflict with what they want their child to do and be like.
hmmhmmhmm maybe chronically ill and pained people “overdo” it and end up hurting themselves so much because they are starved of the feeling of success. because they are constantly being reminded of all the ways they are failing by the able bodied people around them, so when they succeed at something they want to keep!!! doing!!! more!!!!
and then we do more and guess what??? those same able bodied people praise us for succeeding and doing So Much. And it feels so good. like someone is FINALLY recognizing our efforts. so we push ourselves into a flare to keep that feeling alive, and those people quickly turn from viewing us as Inspirational (ew) to lazy. and we are left to deal with not only the physical pain, but the emotional toll of trying harder than everyone around us and STILL being seen as a slacker.
YESSS
When you dismiss accessibility like it doesn’t matter,
It’s like you’re saying disabled people don’t matter.
When you leave the only disabled bathroom stall out of order for too long,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people have nowhere to go to the bathroom.
When you don’t make a cut in the sidewalk curb,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t use the sidewalk, and can’t approach the buildings.
When you don’t have lifts on public transit,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t use the bus, the train, the taxi.
When you leave the elevator out of order, or when there is no elevator present,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t get to the second floor.
When you don’t have a ramp in front of your building,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t get inside.
When you don’t have an automatic door, or the automatic door is broken or not hooked up,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t get into the building or into the next room.
When you don’t make lower counters (and by extension, sinks, stoves, and other appliances), and having the materials on lower counters, an option,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t use the counters or the materials on them.
When you don’t have the books in braille or as audio books available,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t use the books.
When you don’t include the option of captions on television, on online videos, or at the movies,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t use that media.
When you don’t make trigger warnings and content warnings,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people may become very distressed or even suffer a panic attack, anxiety attack, or otherwise violent flashback due to sensitive media (not limited to online).
When you don’t make your curriculum inclusive and understandable to all different types of learners,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t follow along, understand, complete, achieve, and pass the assignments and the class.
When you don’t have games in gym class that can involve the disabled students in any way,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t participate, and by extension, that it doesn’t matter that they are being excluded and that their grade may even be suffering.
Because, you see,
When you dismiss accessibility like it doesn’t matter,
It’s like you’re saying it doesn’t matter that disabled people can’t access it,
It’s like you’re saying disabled people don’t matter.
have i ever told y’all the story about how a snake knew I was trans years before I did
okay so
my 7th grade social studies/8th grade science teacher (he did both classes. Somehow…) had a snake lovingly named Hisser. Hisser would occasionally be taken out to crawl and he was held by kids and when there were fire alarms Hisser was taken along, usually to his chagrin.
This was one of those days where we had in class work time and most of us were just chilling and so Mr. A got Hisser out and started passing him around.
Every girl student that he came to, he would immediately snuggle up to, wrap around their arms, and get cozy. With boy students, he would just sort of sit in the coiled lump that he’d been handed in. This was true with just about every single student, and Mr. A said that Hisser likes girls a lot better than guys and this has been thoroughly proven by Hisser’s attitude.
Then Hisser was handed to me. He was a loveable cold scaley rope as you would expect, but he didn’t coil around my arms. He didn’t get cozy. He just sat there. And Mr. Anderson said, “Huh. That’s weird. He usually likes girls.”
I passed the snake to my friend and surely enough, Hisser wrapped around her arms and got cozy.
I came out as a trans guy about 7-8 years later, and just recently realized that Hisser was right about me not being a girl all along.
I’ve also decided that whenever anyone asks me “Why I think I’m a boy,” which is my LEAST favorite question ever, I’ll just tell them that a snake told me a long time ago.
World Heritage Post
[Image Descriptions: A tweet from Alice Wong saying: "The delights of being disabled: I found out the BiPap machine I use at night and day (both models) are RECALLED (US only). Due to disintegrating foam inside!! That people...who need respiratory support...are breathing in." A retweet from Erik Ekins (QueerlyAutistic) saying: "The fact that people are finding this out through Twitter, about the machines that literally help/enable them to breathe."]
SIGNAL BOOST for anyone who needs to see this:
Here's a link to the recall page:
Sleep and respiratory care updates
Current as of June 14, 2021. Tweets are from June 15 and June 16, this reblog is on the 18th.
Also, the tweet says "recalled (U.S. Only)" but the article says "recall notification (U.S. only) / field safety notice (International Markets)", so I'm guessing it's not that only machines sold in the U.S. have this problem, just that the terminology of the required warning varies country to country. This is probably worth looking at even if you're outside the U.S.
pls stop acting like being chronically ill/disabled is just a lack of effort to be healthy. stop telling chronically ill people they could be healthy if they tried harder, if they thought more positively, if we just believed we can get better we totally would!, if we got out of the house, ate this or that, did yoga, if we drank more water… stop. it’s likely nobody asked for your opinion, we know more about our illness than you do and if there was a way for us to get better we’d be the ones knowing about it.
