Cyanide Snacks

main: @cirgaydian-rhythm | this is where I put all my rants, vents, and bitter posts (with the occasional humor and not-so-bad post)

[trans-masked]

Every article about Ray Muscat breaks my heart. They only mention he’s transgender in headlines when it others him and makes readers less sympathetic but when trans friendly news sites talk about the case they talk about it how his trans girlfriend and literal murderer was suffering from mental health issues and they held a fucking zumbathon in her honor? His family’s go fund me barely raised half its goal where’s the grief for him why should we have to grieve them equally. You can’t even blame him being overshadowed by conservatives focusing on his murderer being trans because all the articles ive seen just call her “woman” or “girlfriend” and don’t mention she’s trans until the body of the article. Trans men can’t even be centered in death

[trans-masked]

Family of Ruby, Bishop Taverner raise funds for LGBTQ charity after murder-suicide

Just two months ago, Karen lost her son Bishop Taverner and daughter Ruby Taverner to a murder suicide. Her daughter identified as transgend

This article in particular makes me seethe. The family of Ray Muscats murderer held a fucking zumbathon to raise money in her honor and never once mentions him by name or that he was also transgender. There’s no mourning for him, no celebration of him, no anger at a trans man’s life being stolen.

[thegenderienvy]

There is a growing trend of transgender people being systemically misgendered in news coverage and I do not see people raising the alarm about it NEARLY enough. Same thing happened the the streamer Girlalala after she was murdered

[trans-masked]

The article above is actually about his murderer and doesn't mention him by name or that he's trans at all! It's about the dance parade they threw for her after she committed murder-suicide in order to raise awareness about trans mental health. Despite one of the victims being a trans man, no one bothered to even say his name. No one cared about his suffering. All the spotlight is on the murderer and how *she* felt.

[disco-pony]

She gets the same exonerative tense as cops do: "Lost in a murder-suicide" leaving the ambiguity that maybe a fourth person killed all three. In fact, the specific way that article frames it - Naming Bisop and Ruby as "Lost" and then not naming the third person - would be following guidelines for how to talk about the *VICTIMS* of a family annihilation - Naming the victims but not the perpetrator. So a casual reader could assume that Ray was the unnamed person who killed the Taverners.

Trans Day Of Remebrance memorialised her next to her victim, in direct defiance of all guidance on how to talk about family annihilators- which is what she is, she murdered both her brother (Bishop Taverner) and her boyfriend (Ray Muscat).

TDOR has NEVER tried to memorialise every trans person who had died by suicide in the year, but they chose to memorialise a family annihilator, and to tell anyone who complained about this that it wasn't a big deal, that it was a hard decision but that they thought they had made the right choice - And then their followers jumped down the throats of the people who were complaining because, obviously, only theyfab transandrocunts would feel awful at seeing a murderer getting the "🕯💔🙏🏻🕊" treatment, next to her victim.

We need to be allowed to grieve Ray Muscat, without being told to wring our hands for his killer too.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

US Book ban on LGBTQIA books

The Nationwide Book Ban Bill Moves to the House: How to Take Action Now

The nationwide book ban bill, HR 7661, has progressed out of committee and into the House. Here's what you need to know to take action.

At least hit the shiny repost button if you're going to do nothing else. This should not stand.

Stop the bill dead in its tracks. LGBTQIA people have a right to be represented in books.

[wolverineheight]

hey controversial opinion but clean water should be fucking free and people should never be allowed to make money off of it because its fucking needed to live

[stardustedknuckles]

I dislike how clumsy it is to share Twitter threads but here is a portion from a guy I follow (for his trans porn and monster fucking content at that) echoing a sentiment that aces, traumatized people, people with low libido, etc. can fully relate to. The rest is here and it’s absolutely worth the read.

[mastreworld]

“Sex isn’t special” 

Thank you! I’ve always been fascinated by how sexuality is viewed in such a dramatic, over-criticized way when it’s just another one of those things we do in life, no different from eating, sleeping or playing.

[everything-you-feel-is-real]

This is also why sex workers don’t appreciate being pathologized for having sex for no other reason than ‘hell yeah money’ or ‘sure, beats an office job’.

[doberbutts]

I’m pretty uninterested in dinosaurs. They’ve never really been my thing, for several reasons. But I dated a guy for a while that was autistic, and his special interest was dinosaurs, and we did a fairly large number of dinosaur themed dates for the duration of our relationship together.

To be frank, I couldn’t really care less if I tried about dinosaurs. But I still went on those dates with him because he wanted to, just like he did dog shows with me because *I* wanted to. And you know what? I even had fun on those dates. Not because I enjoyed the actual activities we were doing, but because I got to see him passionate and unrestrained about his love of something. And so as he infodumped at me about whatever fossil he was admiring, or excitedly showed me the latest piece in his collection, or waxed poetic [or angrily ranted] about the animated depiction of dinosaurs on whatever movie we’d turned on… I can’t tell you that I really enjoyed the act, but I *did* enjoy the light in his eyes and the smile on his face as I nodded along and tried to follow whatever he was talking about.

It was fun. I liked going out with him. It was a nice thing that we did together.

Anyway, I’m not ace or aro, but I figure it’s probably pretty close to that.

[bitteralmonds]

I agree with the sentiment of "sex doesn't always have to be about orgasms/mutual pleasure." However you and your partner(s) have agreed to go about having sex is your own business, and as long as everyone involved is on the same page and consenting, you shouldn't be made to feel ashamed about it.

HOWEVER, and this is the point of contention I have with this: for some people, sex IS special, and they also shouldn't be made to feel ashamed about it!

Sex means different things to different people. For some people, sex is a means to an end, a favor for a partner, a distraction, a self-soothing activity, etc, and that's valid! And for some people, sex is an intimate act they only want to share with a loved one who enthusiastically enjoys sharing it with them, too, and that's also valid! But here's the thing: the people who fall firmly into the latter group? Are not going to be comfortable having sex with someone in the former, whether that placement is temporary or permanent. This isn't making a judgement call on the former group - it's pointing out that two people can love each other and still have valid personal stances that are entirely incompatible.

This is why it's so, SO important to me that it's made clear that everyone involved needs to know and understand where the other participant(s) are at.

I'm allo, but I have a low libido. Along with various other issues, I'm not always up for having an orgasm. My partner is demi and has a very high libido, but falls VERY firmly in the camp of "if we're not both getting off, then what's the point?" While I do consider sex a special, intimate act, I also don't necessarily need to get off in order to share sexual intimacy with my partner - but my partner does. We've talked frankly about this, because I would be more than happy to help my partner get off because a) they have better orgasms with me than alone, and b) it would still be a fun, enjoyable activity for me.

But sharing sexual intimacy without us both getting off triggers something awful in my partner's brain. Neither of us has any idea why, but it's not something my partner can just "get over." They can't just turn that part of their brain off, and I'm not going to fucking lie to them and fake an orgasm just so I can help them get off. That's not the sex they've consented to, and if they discovered that I did that, it would absolutely wreck them and they'd never be able to trust me again (and it would be perfectly fucking valid!).

And that's even with knowing that I was still having fun and enjoying myself. I'm aware that my partner is a sensitive soul when it comes to this, but I cannot imagine they're the only person out there who'd feel the same (or even worse) in the same situation. And if I'd done that like it was a chore? If I wasn't even enjoying it? Holy shit, dude! That's fucking awful! Not only would they not be able to trust me, but they'd feel so fucking dirty for having had sex with somebody who didn't actually want or even enjoy the act, but lied and went through with it just because they wanted it.

That is an AWFUL, HORRIBLE, FUCKING DISGUSTING THING TO DO TO A SEXUAL PARTNER. Do not fucking LIE to your partner(s). If you feel like you have to lie to them to keep them, that's not healthy for EITHER of you. NOBODY should have to lie and compromise their own values in order to be in a relationship.

But let me be clear here: it's perfectly fine and valid if you have casual views towards sex, but you absolutely must be sure that everybody else involved knows this. If your partner is asking for sex, and you're happy to help but don't feel like getting off yourself? Say, "Sure, but I'm not up for an orgasm right now, is that okay?" or something to that effect. Some people are perfectly okay with that, as long as they know beforehand where you're at. But yeah, some people are gonna say, "No, I don't want it if you're not gonna get off, too," and you know what? You have to respect that! Because the only sex they will consent to is sex where you're both aiming to get off.

And let me also be clear that this isn't as simple as some idiotic "ace vs allo" argument. Not all allo people are horny for sex all the time, and not all ace people are ambivalent towards/repulsed by sex. For the record? "Asexual" just means "feels no sexual attraction," not "has no libido." Plenty of ace people experience arousal and enjoy getting off, they just have no particular sex-driven desire to do so with another person. Not all of them, obviously; some ace people really do have no libido, but one does not necessitate the other. Oh? What's that? "But if you have no libido, you can't be allo!" FALSE. I don't really want to go off on any more of a tangent than I have already, but suffice to say: humans are complicated, and human sexuality even more so.

All I'm trying to say here is that regardless of how you view sex, you CANNOT lie to your partner(s) about your feelings, and you CANNOT vilify somebody for not wanting to have sex with somebody who does not want to have sex with them in the way the first person wants to. Having casual/ambivalent views towards sex is not a bad/evil/immoral thing, but LYING about it to a sexual partner? That's pretty fucking bad.

And lastly: outside of reproduction, sex is at the top of the "if it's not fun, don't do it" list. If you get ZERO enjoyment out of it, not even the enjoyment of doing something nice for your partner(s), then don't do it. (Also, why are you even with them if you don't even like doing nice things for them?) (This ofc doesn't really apply to sex workers who need to do it for the money - like, I wish we lived in a world where all sex workers were in the biz because they enjoyed it on some level, but we don't, and that's a whole other situation entirely that I'm not gonna get into.)

[marcchagallthebride-deactivated]

i literally don’t care if straight women experiment w their female friends or whatever like why is that an issue that anyone gives a shit about. first off a woman who feels compelled to experiment w gay sex is almost certainly not straight. but second off even if they are i don’t fucking care bc what people do w their own bodies in their own free time is their own business & not mine, yours, or anyone else’s. you don’t need a laminated wlw card to make out or have sex w a woman like some of u seem to have straight up forgotten that confused & questioning people exist & that it’s ok for them to have fun & mess around on the way to discovering their sexuality, it doesn’t have to be an experience that’s defined by struggling & suffering.

[bitteralmonds]

yo, this is fine, but women who're just experimenting need to be up-front about that, y'know? Like, granted, idk if it's actually that big of an issue, but it falls under the greater umbrella of "be up-front with (potential) sexual partners." If you're just experimenting, then say so. If you just want a fling, then say so. If you want (or have) multiple partners, then say so. It's an honesty thing. And like I said, I have no idea how much of this is an actual real problem and how much of it is just biphobia in disguise, but I do know that at least when I was in high school in the early 00's, the threat of being used as an experiment was prevalent enough that most wlw I knew were very guarded about who they would date. At the time, it did present itself as very simple biphobia, but as I've gotten older, I've realized that the problem isn't the label - it's the lack of communication. Regardless of the configurations of the people involved, it's important to communicate what you're interested in getting from the relationship. Some people are a-ok with being somebody's experiment or sexual yoda, as long as they know that's what they're getting into. Other people aren't, and it's not fair to put them in that position. Bottom line: experimenting is fine! as long as you're clear that that's what you're doing.

[gahdamnpunk]

Some places don’t even name the charity like you’re just donating to the corporation’s tax writeoff. You’re better off giving that money to a homeless person on the street who needs it more..

[bitteralmonds]

I don’t mean to sound like a corporate shill here, but it’s shit like that that makes me happy about how Target is going about this. They recently rolled out “Target Circle,” which is their hub for community involvement, basically - it’s connected to any target.com account (free), and all you need is a connected phone number in order to participate (it works better/faster with the Target app, but it’s made to be accessible to people without smartphones). The (relatively) progressive part of all of this is:

a) NONE of this is at any extra cost to the customer - in fact, it SAVES you money for participating. How? Target’s app includes (what was formerly known as) Cartwheel, which is Target’s “e-coupon” dealie, which can save you anywhere from 5% to 75% (tho mostly 5-20%) on specific products, and by using it more and more, it will also offer you “exclusive” discounts on things you buy often or have bought once before, and since their rebranding Cartwheel to Circle, you can also earn cash back for signing up to Circle, which you can apply to anything or let it build up!

b) YOU GET TO CHOOSE WHERE YOUR MONEY GOES. See, all the money marked for donation comes directly from the money you spend at Target anyway, and YOUR contribution goes where YOU and YOUR COMMUNITY have voted for it to go for the designated time period. This means that not only can you change where you want your money to go next month, but they’re also able to target (lol) smaller, community-specific charities! My Circle page lists charities specific not just to my state, but my county - I’m not just donating to the Boy’s and Girl’s club at large, I’m donating to the Boy’s and Girl’s club down the street.

I’m not saying that Target is objectively progressive, but they are, by comparison, more progressive than most other large corporations. And Circle’s not just their first move like this, either - they’ve always donated proceeds to various charities. I’ve worked for them for several years now and I don’t remember even once getting an annoying “would you like to donate $x to [charity]?” pop-up. Last year, if you went to their Pride Month page, there was a big banner about how a portion of the proceeds go to the Trevor Project.

I may hate my job and some of my coworkers, and yeah, we still have to deal with corporate fuckery that shouldn’t be a fucking thing, but overall? More companies should follow Target’s example. Because there is nothing ethical about taking credit for somebody else’s donation and reaping the benefits.

[scretladyspider]

[scretladyspider]

Don’t come at me about the Bible and homosexuality if you’re using it to justify your homophobia. I will demolish you.

[itsabear]

Also, for some cultures including early Christianity, sodomite could very well have ment someone gravely inhospitable, as the sin of Sodom was inhospitality and not anal sex.

[scretladyspider]

I wanted to talk about that too but I was running out of tweets I could put on a singular thread 😅 thank you so much for this addition!

[no-slice-of-serendipity]

@louithescribe

[quacketeer]

I’m reblogging this partially because it’s frickin awesome, and partially for future reference, cus yeah the evangelical community is really scary to be in as part of the LGBTQA community

[scretladyspider]

People keep asking for the links on the thread, so, here’s a link to the thread.

[inkypainter15]

Whoa this is one of the BEST things I’ve ever seen!! And I learned a lot from it which I can tell my LGBTQ+ friends so that they can also destroy someone with this knowledge! Thank you so much for making a stand!

[ninjakasuga]

This was some hella good stuff here. I knew there was corruption with Bible verses and such but wow this was supremely informative!

[woodelf68]

I’ve reblogged this before, but I always feel like someone might need to see this.

[doctorbluesmanreturns]

I don’t hate the concept of ebooks per se but what bothers me is how our society is shifting from actually owning entertainment in tangible forms like books and CDs and DVDs and game discs, to having to download everything so basically we’ll get to the point where everything is intangible and all of our property can be taken away by a website crash.

[fannish-snailien-deactivated202]

#yeah this is mostly the problem#and stuff like. ebooks that can only be read on one companys app#music that can only be streamed from one place and doesnt let you actually download the files#stuff like that#like sometimes its like you cant tangibly have anything even your own digital file#idk where i was going with this but yeah its capitalism (via @ouidamforeman)

[bitteralmonds]

This is why I'm against DRMs. The issue doesn't lie in the medium itself, it lies in how capitalism controls that medium. I ran into a post about how an ebook company is going under, so they're force-deleting their programs off of people's devices. Sure, they're refunding these people their money, but what the fuck? "I'm taking my toys and going home" is a supremely juvenile reaction. This sort of thing is especially baffling when you consider just how much we humans, as a species, LOVE preserving shit. Yes, it gets to the point of ridiculousness sometimes, but we've always been keen on preserving things from the past, whether that's through stories or traditions or relics or whatever. We love that shit! The digital age hasn't changed this - we came up with ways to transfer video tape to more stable forms, we're constantly preserving the physical in the digital, we have websites dedicated to preserving web pages of yore, AO3 even encourages preservation with the ability to "orphan" works and download things! The ability to save and preserve and retrieve again is just so human that the idea of allowing a singular company to control and revoke access to their product so rigorously even after it's in the consumer's hands is just....alien. It's inhuman! It's cold and mechanical, and in the end, it's completely fruitless because we don't make goddamn Space Orcs posts for nothing - we're Human and if we want something badly enough, we're gonna do it. You can't make a DRM strong enough to stop human ingenuity. You just can't.

[thundergrace]

[knightmlm]

okay but like shoutout to all the effeminate gay trans men out there. trans mlm are allowed to be effeminate without being seen as “straight girls”. if cis gays are allowed to be effeminate, so are trans gays. you’re not any less of a man or any less of a gay man for being so. 

transmeds/terfs/truscum don’t touch this post, it’s not for you.

[bitteralmonds]

I agree 100% with this (because I’m a very effeminate gay trans man and it took me forever to get comfortable with it, especially since I’ll never pass), but I got distracted by the idiots in the comments who can't fucking understand the difference between "a trans person who has medically transitioned, supports medical transition, and/or believes medical transition services should be universally accessible" and "people who believe medical intervention is necessary for transness"

because the commonality with all three of those in the DNI is gatekeeping and policing other people’s queerness.

like...what you do for yourself and what you feel is right for yourself is 100% valid and you should be able to pursue that! But you don’t fucking get to dictate what other people do for themselves. Goddamn.

[gahdamnpunk]

They ain’t lie 🤷🏾‍♀️🤷🏾‍♀️

[thehighpriestofreverseracism]

The article

[millennial-review-deactivated20]

[cirgaydian-rhythm]

The Contact

Pillowfort.io: cykotyks

Twitter: cykotyks

AO3: Bombay

I’m not jumping ship quite yet. Pillowfort still has a long way to go before it’s able to be a decent replacement for tumblr, but in the event that I am flagged/muted/purged, I am contactable in other ways, for anybody who cares.

[bitteralmonds]

idek if anybody actually follows this sideblog of mine, but hey, feel free to follow elsewhere.

[grungegoths]

Literally.Who the fuck cares about which label out of bisexual,pansexual,polysexual etc are legit and which ones are “made up” like yall really have way too much free time on your hands to beat around this useless topic lmfao.Why are yall SO bothered if someone is calling themselves pansexual or polysexual instead of bi if they arent putting down one label in favor of the other??Why are yall soo adamant in bullying others into identifying with an orientation they arent comfortable with just to please your narrow views on gender and sexuality???Dont yall realize that if people considered pan,poly,bi labels the same they wouldnt have identified as bisexual only???

Day by day more and more human rights of lgbtqa people are being taken away by facist governments which are being elected all over the world at the speed of light but PLEASE act like making fun of 19 year olds for identifying as pansexual instead of bisexual makes you braver than the US marines when thats literally what assholes have been doing since the label was officially introduced .

“Stop inventing new labels when you just mean bisexual” buddy i got a news for you, literally ALL labels are invented by the human language.Get off your high horse

[bitteralmonds]

Hey, linguistically speaking, we create new words when the current set of words we have available aren't adequate. In that same vein, words change their definitions over time based on how they're used and understood. This is what it means to say "language evolves." It changes and grows in order to serve the linguistic needs of whatever culture or subculture that's using it. "Pansexual" came about likely because, yes, "bisexual" was understood to adhere to a western gender binary. Just because people now use "bisexual" to include genders outside the binary doesn't mean that everyone feels that it's an adequate descriptor of their sexuality. "Pansexual" and "polysexual" came into use because "bisexual" wasn't precise or accurate enough for everybody - for the same reason we have words like "azure" and "cerulean" instead of just "blue" and "light blue." They mean different things, and just because the nuance may not matter to you, personally, that does not mean that it doesn't matter to anybody. And it costs you nothing to accept and respect the use of these "new" labels. BTW, "pansexual" was first recorded in use in 1926, deriving from a 1917 word, pansexualism, though it had a completely different meaning (it was used to describe the idea that sex instinct encompassed both the mental and the physical). Similarly, "bisexual" used to mean "hermaphroditic," and didn't mean "attracted to men and women" until 1914. They're not that new, but neither of them are that old, either. You know what words are relatively new that we accept and use frequently? Spyware (2000), mainframe (1964), lycra (1955), velcro (1958), spandex (1959), internet (1984), website (1994), surfer (1955), podcast (2004), online (1950), malware (1997), zipper (1925), scientology (1951). And this isn't even counting words like "bling" and "bromance" and "yolo," which are all in the Oxford English Dictionary. We make up new words because we need different words to describe concepts that are distinctly different from one another, because the human mind is a funny thing: it hates synonyms. It knows that if two words exist to describe the same thing, then there must be different connotations between them. (Don't believe me? Just try saying "Woodchuck Day.")

[parentless-suggestions]

I just came across a quote. “I’ve heard that if your child hates you, that indicates you’re doing a good job.” No it doesn’t indicate you’re doing a good job. It’s hard to love someone who is manipulative, abusive, and downright evil. Children do not hate parents for being good parents. Children do not hate parents for protecting them and loving them.

[bitteralmonds]

It's one thing to have a small child claim they hate you because you've denied them something - that's just part of the process. Young children perceive only the Now as Good or Bad, and if you, in that moment, have denied them something Good, then by their definition, you are Bad. But that's the case of small children running into boundaries you're establishing for them. It's an entirely different thing to have an older child, teen, or grown adult consider their parent(s) an unpleasant, undesirable, negative part of their life, to the point where they can and will say, at any point, that they dislike or even hate them. A child should not have to grow up in an environment where the major guardian and authority of their life is considered more bad than good. It's entirely possible to set boundaries and instill good habits in your children without making them fear or hate you. It's absolutely disgusting how often Legitimately Bad Parenting is claimed to be "good parenting." If your kid hates you, fears you, lies to you, hides things from you...then news flash: you're failing as a parent. End of story.

[geekandmisandry]

Radical idea: Doctors should give fat patients the same amount of care and thought they would give to thin patients.

[fight-the-infrastructure]

wait is this an actual problem?

[geekandmisandry]

Yup.

[arctic-hands]

Oh yeah.

[geekandmisandry]

And like… It’s deadly. Fat people die while doctors ignore actual problems and suggest weight loss instead.

[arctic-hands]

And were forced to live in pain.

“Your arthritis hurts your knees? Well, the only advice I can give you is that you should lose some weight to take the pressure off your legs.”

“It…hurts…to…move”

[fatbottomedgal]

Another side to this is the fatness eclipses all other problems, even outside the actual appointment. I was sent a bill for $300 because a general check up was billed for a reason not covered by my insurance. I scheduled the appointment because I had such horrible foot pain that I could barely walk at times. I was referred to a specialist, and ultimately treated for plantar fasciitis and a heel spur.

But my doctor billed the insurance company as me coming in for “obesity”, so I got a bill for what the insurance wouldn’t cover.

Now there’s two problems with this. First of all, did he think that I woke up that morning, suddenly notice I was wearing size 20 jeans, and immediately run to the doctor for an explanation????? Secondly….my insurance won’t cover anything related to obesity, apparently. So if this asshat doctor decides that *all* of my health problems are because I’m fat, I’m fucked.

[geekandmisandry]

So by this doctor’s logic thin people have NEVER had heel spurs? Like, apparently it’s a fat person ONLY thing.

[theleafriday]

I went in to ask my doctor to switch my antidepressants because I’m having awful side effects. Instead she suggested exercise and liposuction. During this visit she also admitted to lying to me about why she put me on metformin (a pill that regulates insulin production, if I’m not mistaken). She said it was because my pancreas could use the assistance but then admitted that it was because she thought maybe it’d make me lose weight by killing my appetite or making me poo constantly. Needless to say, none of this helped with the depression :/

[angel-ani]

Seriously DeAunna?? Fuck that doctor.

I recently lost 150 lbs, going from ~300 to ~150. No one ever took my joint pain or my depression seriously. Now that I’m skinny, and guess what ALL OF MY PROBLEMS ARE WORSE my parents are freaking out because suddenly?? I’m sick???? Like, no bitch, I been sick, you just never treated my illnesses.

[theleafriday]

That sounds about right. Like, the only way for them to take us seriously is for us to lose weight??? But that shouldn’t be the case???

[marissacre]

My doctor lectured me about my weight because of back pain I’d suddenly had. She laughed and said at my weight, of course my back and hips hurt. Keep in mind, I was in the middle of a Diet Bet and had lost 40 pounds in the previous six months. I was still very overweight, but I was clearly working on it. (Even if I hadn’t, I still deserved health care!)

So I asked her what I should do because walking over 3 miles makes my sciatica flare up and I literally can’t walk the next day. Her suggestion? Starve myself. Literally. “Get used to being hungry. It’ll be hard at first, but it’s the only way for someone your size.” Never saw her again.

[geekandmisandry]

Fuck these doctors. I was told that my arthritis would be fine if I lost weight. Nup. It was actually the worst when I was at my thinnest, because… You know, I was starving.

I had to take 4 hour showers a day to warm my aching bones.

Doctors have recently suggested I cut calories, not listening to me when I say I am STARVING. I’m sick and unable to eat, the fuck is cutting my already unhealthily low calorie intake going to do other than kill me faster?

[vaspider]

I am going to have to find a new obgyn bc the one I’m going to now keeps bringing up my weight every 5m like … no, really, how many times do I have to tell you that I *do just fine* with anaesthesia and that I’ve been knocked out many times for surgery and testing and they do it to me all the time for my celiac biopsies and for having my teeth worked on so can we move on to scheduling my procedure please?

And that’s not counting the doctor who literally refused to perform tests on me for upwards of 2 years that would have found the TUMOR IN MY SPINE because he had already diagnosed me as You Fat, You Have Fat Problems, Only Problem Is Fat.

Like, no, dude, ACTUALLY I have a tumor in my spine and an autoimmune disease which you said you suspected but decided not to run the tests bc you decided I was a drug seeking fatty.

I should have sued his ass.

[crowslunasidhe]

I saw a rheumatologist, he told me to lose weight to help with the pain. Here’s the advice he gave me on HOW to lose weight: 1) Write down EVERYTHING I eat. 2) count calories and try to lower my calorie intake. 3) weigh myself once a week. 4) increase exercise output. (I already walk like 2 miles a day or more depending on the school quarter)

With my obsessive personality that is just going to lead to me developing an eating disorder. I mean I’ve already thought in the past about starving myself to lose weight. My parents constantly blame all my health problems on my weight. An eating disorder would be fucking inevitable.

I’m not following that rheumy’s advice though. No eating disorder for this person.

[vaspider]

Nnnngh. Good on you for not taking that advice and knowing yourself better than your doctor. <3 

[donnettemartinique]

Doctors should absolutely take complaints seriously, however, I do have to play Devil’s advocate. Being in health care, one thing we learn is that being overweight makes conditions worse. It takes a toll on the body. That doesn’t mean you should starve yourself and be malnourished, it just means that obesity and a lot of medical issues make each other worse.

Keeping a food journal and counting calories while increasing activity is absolutely the best way to lose weight. That doesn’t mean eat nothing and exercise all day. It means find your BMR and base your daily intake on that. Then find an exercise that you can tolerate and do that for an hour a day. You will feel a little hungry at first, and that’s okay. It’s normal. But it gets better and you should see results.

And I’m not saying any of this to be an insensitive douche, I had a total thyroidectomy and I’m struggling to maintain my own weight, but I do see some dangerous misinformation here.

So now that I’ve played devil’s advocate, I highly encourage you to be your own! If something is wrong, push to be taken seriously. I’m not saying being skinny fixes everything, but being at a healthy weight can help, and stop things from further worsening. Find a doctor that works for you!!!

[geekandmisandry]

Keeping a food journal and counting calories is also a very effective way to wind up with an eating disorder Bethany, you shouldn’t be in the health industry if you play devil’s advocate like this.

[yourgaygeekthings-deactivated20]

She literally is trying to help, she even explained the science behind it. Obviously some people are not going to get below a certain weight, but they can try and maintain a healthy (ier) one. I know multiple people that struggle with weight issues, and yes they do get told that because they are over weight that is the problem, which is wrong. The doctor should always check that it isn’t something else, but that does not negate the fact that losing even a little weight greatly lowers the risk of many medical issues. Depending on ones height and sex they have a weight index that they should fit into, obviously people with a genetic disposition to being over weight are measured differently. While most of the doctor’s mentioned here seem like total cunts, there is a lot of doctor’s who legitimately want to help. The sentiment I know more than my doctor can only go so far, as they are trained medical professionals. They unfortunately are human and are prone to mistakes and bias, though. In the end do whatever you want, but (hopefully) most doctor’s actually want to help.

[geekandmisandry]

“She literally is trying to help”, by what? Telling us things we have known since we were 9 and that lead to eating disorders? Thanks for the help.

[pom-seedss]

I’m just going to say this now.

I’m fat. I’m unhealthy.

Fuck my value being tied to my weight. Fuck my value being tied to my health.

I have a spinal cord injury and despite years of physiotherapy it is not, and at this point will never, get better. I cannot “pick an activity that I can do and do it for an hour a day!” It’s not realistic. 

I also suffered from doctor-enduced eating and exercise disorders, so it is really easy for me to slip in to pushing myself beyond my limits with literally no fuel that my body needs. So playing Devil’s Advocate is actually only helping the Devil  harm me further.

Because I did that.

I ate healthfully, I exercised for moderate amounts. When I didn’t lose weight despite this, my doctors didn’t believe that I was doing that. They thought that since I wasn’t losing any fat, I must be lying to them.

Because I was fat, I must not know how to exercise properly. Or how to cook a good meal.

I was a multi-sport athelete before my injury, before my chronic illnesses, before I hit a hard wall on my limitations. So I KNOW how to ramp up exercise slowly, I KNOW what post-exercise pain feels like and I am directly telling them that the pain I am experiencing is NOT that kind of pain. Because I know what that feels like in my body and that’s NOT the response I was getting from my body.

I am trained in cooking, I know how to make delicious and healthful meals but the problem wasn’t being solved by that.

I would crash, two or three weeks out, I would always break down and my body wouldn’t work. I would get leg cramps for days, I would tweak my back and I would be bed bound for almost a month as a result.

But my doctors didn’t believe me. Because the Devil’s Advocate advice up there, thinking that it would solve my problems or stop me from gaining more weight.

But it didn’t work. The doctors didn’t believe me. So I started eating less and less. I started working out more and more. 

Because they said it must help, right? If it wasn’t working then I just wasn’t doing “enough”, right? Because if I was actually doing what they said I would be losing weight and feeling so much better, so I just must not be doing exactly what they mean.

And I spiraled until my period stopped. I spiraled until I didn’t have enough energy to do ANYTHING. My muscle mass has never been lower, thanks to Devil’s Advocate advice. My body has never been weaker or more malnourished as when my doctors thought I was lying because the Devil’s Advocate advice didn’t do what they said it should.

I literally broke my body, my right leg completely seized up, would not take ANY weight without blinding levels of pain and my rib cage was falling in on itself. My spine was on fucking fire and I couldn’t breathe properly. 

It took six months of bedrest to recover from that and my ribcage is STILL not right and my legs STILL seize up and I can NOT push my body passed to its limits at all without breaking myself.

Oh. And when I go to the doctor for all of this? When I explain the nuance of my situation, when I explain in detail my history?

You know what I get in return?

The same Devil’s Advocate advice seen here. Every. Single. Time.

The sub-in doctor was SO concerned about my weight that they tried to pull me off my anti-depressants which keep me from spiraling into suicidal episodes because these pills cause weight gain.

I’d rather be fat and not suicidal all the time than skinny and suicidal, I have tried many medications and this one is the only one that was working for me. I told them that flat out and they still tried to take it away from me because it caused weight gain.

So fuck off Devil’s Advocates.

Maybe, just maybe, if you are going in to the medical field you should focus less on advocating on behalf of the Devil and focus more on being a Patient’s Advocate.

There are too few Patient Advocates. The Devil has enough advocates causing harm. Be a Patient Advocate and fucking listen to what the people in pain are telling you about how they have been harmed by the Devil’s Advocates, eh?

[chaos-legion]

1) back problems have nothing to do with overweight! Went to a back specialist a while ago and he laughed so hard when I asked him this and then told me in the funniest voice “no that’s not the case because my body knows how to carry itself with bothering my back with his buisness” so yeah weirdest appointment ever

2) counting calories is not the automatic way to delevop an eating disorder. And i think “Devils’s Advocate” was just trying to explain that yes, some people are overweight because they eat the wrong things and can fix that by counting calories and stuff. I count myself to that group of people. So I got myself an app that helps you to make counting calories quick but also helps you track your water intake, exercise, nutritions and more. But most important it literally tells you “that isn’t healthy eat more” when your intake of calories sink under a certain amount (1.000 - 1.200 i guess). And I think that’s the right way to do it? Like eating healthy, the right amount and doing exercise are nothing bad? You just need to find the right measurement like in every aspect of life.

Of course it’s shitty and plain out dangerous when doctors don’t listen to you because you’re fat but why does tumblr habe the urge to jump at someone’s throat who was just trying to shed some light on the other side?

[thecrazygeek-rant]

The reason we jump down their throars is because we’ve invariably tried what they suggest and it’s either not worked or harmed us more.

Every time I made a post ranting about GPs who tell me to ‘just lose weight’ when I’ve gone in about e.g. endometriosis, arthritis, my spinal injury.. I’ve invariably received several comments from people telling me how my weight (I take a UK size 20. I don’t know my weight) could be the problem. Then I get told to eat less, exercise more…

..even after posts where I explain I’m disabled and also still suffering from nearly dying of anorexia when I was 17, to the point of never eating more than 1000 calories a day even now at age 41.

Then they say I’m lying. Just like the doctors do. Because nobody could possibly eat as little as I do yet be the size I am.

So every time somebody goes ‘just count calories’ or similar it’s not just that it’s a big ED trigger but for me at least it’s totally invalidating everything we’ve just said while reinforcing the ‘oh you lazy liar’ comments we’ve likely had from all the doctors.

Hence why the anger.

If you are a nice person and WANT to post helpful comments on posts like these then thank you but confine them to advice on how we can dialogue with medical professionals or get them to finally understand that their job is to diagnose and treat medical problems…not to say “eat less, go jogging and fuck off ” to every overweight person out there who has anything wrong with them.

Because THAT is help we need.

[fatphobiabusters]

Do people not get that just because you didn’t intend for your comment to be rude doesn’t mean it wasn’t? That just because you meant for your comment to be helpful doesn’t mean it is?

- Mod Bella 

[paniniville]

sorry for reblogging a long post; sorry for adding to it and making it longer

but I have PCOS. among other things, it makes me gain weight easily and not lose it. most noticeably in my belly area; i have been mistaken for pregnant many times and that is an awkward conversation to have because i have no idea what to say to fake a pregnancy for someone’s pride. anyhow, i recently went to a free clinic (no insurance) to figure out what’s been caused me debilitating foot pain for weeks now.

while i did find out a potential cause – unrelated to my weight, thankfully – i also brought up treatment for my PCOS. what he told me? work on getting a better job, with insurance, and get gastric bypass surgery

at a free clinic because i have no insurance

it’s something i’ve considered before, but the lasting health issues and overall drop in quality of life turned me off long before the price did. i told him as much and he was Very Confused and asked me what i planned to do for my weight, then

so i told him: get me (back) on byetta, so i can get down to a weight where i might have the energy to exercise. i’ve been dieting since i was 11, and, while i don’t have an eating disorder because of it, i hoard food. i know what i need to do to lose weight, i just need you to get me the tools.

i told him my history with diets; how i’d lose 10~14 pounds in the first two weeks, then plateau, and i’d be miserable and not lose weight until i gave up and went back to my usual eating habits, which are actually unhealthy in the opposite direction of what society thinks someone my size eats. I eat one, maybe two meals a day, and never very much. but i told him that if i was going to diet and be miserable and still not lose weight, i might as well just eat what i want, be a little happier, and not lose weight, because it equaled out the same in the end.

he shut the fuck up fast; i don’t think he’s used to having a fatty tell him that we fucking know what to do. he probably expected me to roll over and do as he says. skinny people, especially doctors, don’t seem to understand how difficult losing weight actually is. it isn’t “just count calories, eat right, and exercise”

bitch we’ve been told that since puberty hit and the pounds started piling on. you think we haven’t tried it? and tried it again, when the first time failed? and again, and again, and again? driven ourselves to illness and suicidal ideation?

we know. fuck you, we know. it’s not like you say “hey, you need to lose weight” and we just look down at our pot bellies and thunder thighs and arm wings and go “holy shit, i’m fat???” like we’ve never noticed it before.

we. fucking. know. now stop acting like we just need discipline. we need sound medical advice for everything under the fat, you entitled fuckwad. we’re more than just adipose.

[bitteralmonds]

yo, I'm a fairly skinny person, but I've got fat friends and have heard all kinds of horror stories. Fatphobic doctors suck ass. Yes, extra weight can exacerbate problems, but the key word here is exacerbate - it does not, in and of itself, create problems (outside of maybe a handful of conditions). In fact, it is more likely that excess weight is a symptom of something else. It's absolutely absurd that doctors so commonly dismiss patient concerns because of their weight. I'm not fat, but I have knee problems. Yes, extra weight would probably hurt them more, but that doesn't mean that the knee problems aren't there. If I were fat, the idea of "just lose weight" wouldn't address the actual problem, and in fact could make it worse - if I wasn't made fully aware of the issue with my knees, I wouldn't be able to take the extra caution I need to to make sure they don't slip on me. "Just lose weight" is NOT adequate medical advice for ANY condition. Please don't be afraid to stand up for yourself to your doctor. If their first suggestion is weight loss, challenge them. Ask them how they think that will help. Ask them what they'd say if a skinny person came in with the same problem, tell them that skinny people DO have similar problems. Bring in your own research, show them other people's blogs - if you think your doctor is wrong, SAY SOMETHING. Make them explain themselves. Make them show their work. If they get pissy that you're doubting them, request a new doctor that isn't an egotistical pissbaby. You DESERVE proper healthcare and you DESERVE to be taken seriously. On the other side of this, I'd just also like to say: don't use "I can't lose weight" as an excuse to not eat healthy. It doesn't matter if you lose weight or not, because eating balanced meals helps in other ways, and there are plenty of conditions that are caused by nutritional imbalances. This is flat advice I'd give to ANYONE, regardless of weight. I know people are often limited in what they're able to access and/or consume at any given moment, and I will always advocate eating something unhealthy over not eating at all, because eating is Good. Your body needs fuel. If you're prone to overeating, just make sure you're getting a good balance of fruit and veggies. The only thing a food diary should be used for is to understand your eating habits in what you eat, not how much you eat, unless you yourself have decided to use it as a way to lose weight in a healthy, controlled way. But basically, fatphobic, weight-prioritizing doctors are scum. "Lose weight" should never be Plan A for anything.

[memehumor]

All Your Fault, Ya Dumb Millennial