Older Brotherly Advice

Disclaimer: Not actually anyone's older brother. This is a sideblog.

[behaviornerdwithahat]

In case anyone finds it helpful because mobility aids are horrifically expensive and inaccessible…

And for those people who have access to mobility devices but might benefit from a second chair they can abuse without risking expensive damage…

Erik Kondo has made a website, Open Source Innovations, that details plans for DIY wheelchairs. These wheelchairs can be made from common materials like wood, plastic, and pvc. They are lightweight and can be custom fit to the user allowing from the same degree of movement you would get from a custom chair. And they are durable and easily repairable. (he has been stress testing his latest design by dropping it down stairs, dropping it out of a car, launching it across a driveway, and throwing it off a deck). Its 12lbs and I think he said its was in the $200 ish range for parts.

He also is working on cheap, open source, accessible designs for beach chairs, off road chairs, motorized attachments (think smart drive), and so on. Plus he skateboards in his wheelchair. Cool dude, helpful info, pass it on.

[sumi-sprite]

It's incredibly sad people have to resort to this, but it's a damn good resource. Use it. Spread awareness. Maybe one day people with physical disabilities won't need DIYs like this. But until then, reblog and share.

[this-is-accessibility]

This is Accessibility!

That's so amazing! It is unfortunate that so many people will need this, but very very cool that it exists

[organizationstationone4all]

OSI HOME- | Open Source Wheelchairs

That other link seems to be broken.

[this-is-accessibility]

Thank you so much for putting the working one!

I will add it to my original reblog as well.

[ID by user paniniwitharugula: a wooden wheelchair made primarily of two-by-fours with a low back, tall wheels, and black seat cushions. The front wheels are hardware caster wheels. end I.D.]

[brotherlysuggestion]

Silly little tip that I discovered while recovering from top surgery:

If any of my little sibs plan on taking any vitamin supplements after a surgery to aid in recovery, I would totally recommend getting one of them as a gummy. Vitamin C is a common one to find in gummy form, but there’s tons of other ones as well, and many of them are vegan!

It’s a bit less cost effective than regular tablets/capsules, and it doesn’t provide any special purpose other than being a little treat for yourself every time you take your vitamins, but having that little pick-me-up every morning has done a lot for me psychologically during the less pleasant parts of recovery!

(Obvious disclaimer to always discuss any vitamin or herbal supplements with your surgeon/care team. Also, vitamin gummies can be likely to include multiple vitamins in one supplement, so read the labels carefully to make sure that you know what you’re getting!)

[onlytiktoks]

[ordinarytalk]

Recovering from autistic burnout as a high-masking adult:

To recover, you literally need to manually learn skills that most people learn as a toddler

You need to learn what makes your body uncomfortable, and what to do to fix it

If you are high-masking, that usually means that you have learned to ignore every distress signal your body sends unless it is a distress signal that a neurotypical person would recognize. People have likely been unintentionally gaslighting you about your lived experience your entire life

If you feel bad or panicked for no reason, stop and try to pay attention to your body. Are you tense? You are likely feeling physical pain somewhere. If you've been gaslit about your pain your entire life, you might not be able to identify it.

Go through a sensory checklist.

SIGHT: Try closing and covering your eyes. If this gives you relief, the lights are probably too bright. You may also need differently-colored lights

SOUND: Cover your ears. Does this give you relief? If so, you may need earplugs or noise canceling headphones. You may also benefit from a neutral or pleasant background noise, like soft music or brown noise.

TOUCH: Are your clothes uncomfortable? Your chair? Your body? Do you feel greasy, like you need a shower? Do you need softer, sensory-friendly clothing?

TASTE: Do you need to brush your teeth or tongue? Would chewing on something help?

SMELL: Is there a strong or unpleasant smell in the room? Do you need to clean or empty a trash can? Would an air purifier help? Would a pleasant smell like a candle help?

INTEROCEPTION: Are you hungry? Thirsty? Tired? How is your posture? Are any of your muscles tight or sore? Scan your body slowly from head to feet, tensing and loosening each group of muscles. Going for a walk or doing a series of quick stretches may help a lot.

Learning how to do this stuff is not intuitive, if you've had an entire lifetime of gaslighting telling you that everything hurting you isn't a big deal and you're being dramatic over nothing.

This takes time, it takes work, it's not intuitive, and it's hard. Most people forget how hard it is, because they learned this as toddlers.

If you want to recover, you need to relearn your whole body. And get over your idea of "normal" and just wear the damn sunglasses and put on the headphones. If people stare, fuck em. You're disabled and they can deal with that.

[tiktoks-i-enjoyed]

[directactionforhope]

The fact that physical therapy is not a frontline treatment for chronic pain is a searing indictment of the global medical field.

[directactionforhope]

Seriously. If you have chronic pain, limits on how much you can walk/move, or both go see a physical therapist.

I have had physical therapy ELIMINATE the following medical and pain problems, solely or in large part:

Lower back pain so severe I could at first not even walk to the bathroom (sciatic)

Foot pain whenever I walked (plantar fasciitis)

Three years of a fucked up ankle that was at times seriously impacting me

Pain when typing (carpal tunnel), at least twice

Widespread nerve damage that caused massive chronic pain and left me housebound for two years

The physical pain/fatigue/other results caused by having to recover from that kind level of pain and inactivity (cough being housebound) for so long

I try not to talk too much about my health on here, for a variety of reasons, but I am being newly reminded of how much the vast majority of people with chronic pain should be referred to physical therapy imho

(ETA: As people pointed out in the notes, a lot of this will not apply or can backfire for chronic pain that is actually caused by autoimmune disorders and connective tissue disorders, esp since most PTs are not trained in connective tissue disorders. This is why I said physical therapy should be a frontline treatment, not the frontline treatment. Other frontline treatments for chronic pain should imo include imaging (as was pointed out in the comments, thank you for that), and a standardized panel of tests for things allergies, autoimmune indicators, vitamins/minerals, and a metabolic panel. If you have undiagnosed chronic pain, and you have not had all of those tests run, I highly recommend that you bug your doctor to do so, using those terms. I also recommend bringing backup to the appointment. Sometimes doctors want to help, but their training is outdated and/or Western medicine is so compartmentalized that they will not know to or will need nagging to run tests associated with other disciplines.

As for "why PT for chronic pain?" - if literally nothing else, because being in that much pain for that long causes a lot of inflammation and makes your body get stuck bracing and moving in ways that ALSO cause chronic pain, so that has to be addressed too.

If you don't have access to physical therapy, there are some really good resources, exercises, and videos online that can at least get you started (but be cautious if you can't get assessed in person), but I'm not qualified to vet or recommend any of those.

But if any of this sounds like it might help you, and you can go to physical therapy, please go to physical therapy, at least to try it and see.

It has been life-changing for me and has (in conjunction with other things) given me huge portions of my quality of life back.

[uneryx]

Op is super right and I want to chime in with an addition:

*preventative* physical therapy should also be normal, accepted and accessible.

I did two years of PT as part of my scoliosis treatment in my early 20. Not because I had mobility issues or pain… but because scoliosis is often a vector for those things later in life.

To this day I use the exercises and methods I learned in PT to ease pain and remain flexible. This was almost 20 years ago but it definitely is something I have benefitted from over those years.

I was very lucky and this kind of anticipatory treatment to enable people with conditions that can cause complications in the future to have control over their body’s health as it degenerates is important.

[enbycarp]

Via The Nutrition Tea on Facebook. Reminders from Shana Minei Spence.

[prince-ashitaka]

Lets create a house where yelling means we’re having fun. When you hear a door slam you know it was accidentally pulled with too much strength, not slammed out of anger. When there is silence, it is Contentment, not another passive aggressive fight. The dog is no longer barking to protect, he simply just wants the cats to play with him. Let’s create a safe, warm environment that makes you feel like you can breathe, not hold your breath. Let’s stomp on the eggshells we use to tip toe on. Together we will make this house into a home. And welcome all with open arms into this kind and loving space.

[brotherlysuggestion]

YOU 🫵 Have you played with your cat today? If you have the time, try taking 10-15 minutes to engage with them. No/minimal distractions. Just cat serotonin.

Cats thrive with 30 mins of play a day, broken up into 2–3 sessions throughout the day. If you’re in a weird space or feel stuck in a loop of doomscrolling, your cat would love to help!

[cripple-punk-dad]

Ok so at this point I've had two people roll up to me in manual wheelchairs, well, one of them was somebody pushing somebody who was nonverbal at the time, but it still counts. They asked me why I had zip ties around my tires.

It's winter where I'm living and we have really bad snow. And the snow plow people are really bad at their jobs probably because there aren't snow plow people who clean sidewalks. As a solution I got to thinking about how I could increase the traction on my wheels. And the most redneck thing I could think of was taking a bunch of zip ties and tying them around my wheels. They last surprisingly long, and work surprisingly well. It's basically the same premise as chains for your tires during the winter.

I chose to space them out pretty evenly so there's about one for every spoke. You could probably do more or less depending on how many you want and how much traction you get but I wouldn't go more than three per spoke. I realize that it's a bit later in the winter, and I probably should have made a post about this sooner, but I came up with it about a week ago. So please share this, even if you're not disabled, because there are tons of people I know who are stuck in their houses because they can't get around in the snow. A pack of zip ties costs about $5, which compared to $200 knobby snow tires is a big save, and if you want to invest you could get colored zip ties.

[fandomshatefatpeople]

Sharing for accessibility

[catgirlwheels]

Oh fuck yes. Thank you all the abled people between op and me this is exactly what I needed to see 💜

[wishuponastarion]

ooh sweet, thanks for the tip

(for anyone using their chair both indoors and outside, highly recommend wheelchair 'slippers'/wheel socks like these so you don't tear up wood/vinyl/linoleum flooring with the zip ties!)

[stormofneurosis]

! This is fucking amazing and I love it!!!

[brotherlysuggestion]

Adding for cane and crutch users (including ambulatory wheelchair users who use these aids at times): They also make ice/snow cane & crutch tips! They retract for when you’re indoors, too.

Some selections from Walmart, Target, & Home Depot. You can likely find them wherever you shop by searching for “ice cane tip”, though!

[amillionmagpies]

This is your periodic reminder that it's possible for multiple people to be right at the same time. It's possible for multiple people to be wrong at the same time.

It's possible for people to be right about some things and wrong about others. It's possible for people to be kind in some situations and cruel in others.

It's possible to be oppressed and an oppressor. It's possible to be abused and an abuser.

It's possible for people to have equally valid needs that fundamentally conflict. It's possible for people to have worldviews that cannot be reconciled.

It's possible to have good intentions and do harm. It's possible to have bad intentions and do good.

People are complicated, the world is complicated, and simplifying everything down to a black and white worldview where some people are Bad (and therefore incapable of being right or kind or good) and some people are Good (and therefore incapable of being wrong or cruel or bad) is only going to cause harm.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled Tumblr.

[violetsandshrikes]

okay so if you need more veggies/fruit, protein or fibre (bc most people do NOT eat enough) in your diet but you struggle to do so, hear me out:

look up recipes (especially snack recipes) that are child/toddler/baby-friendly

i can guarantee there is a woman with a cooking blog out there who has found away to pack a bunch of vegetables into a surprisingly delicious little snack for her kids. this process has never failed me when i feel like i am not eating enough fruits and veggies. my entire flat is eating spinach muffins at the moment, which doesn’t sounding particularly appealing to most people and yet somehow. they’re delicious.

[violetsandshrikes]

putting some of my saved recipes under a read more for people to use as inspiration or a starting point ❤️

Kid Friendly Quinoa Pizza Bites

This healthy, gluten free recipe idea is a kid pleaser!  Quinoa Pizza Bites make a nutritious meal or snack the whole family will love.

Carrot Star Bites - Healthy Little Foodies

Carrot star bites are fantastic for baby-led weaning or as toddler snack. Also great for big kids too - a healthy lunchbox item.

Oatmeal Green Smoothie Muffins

These Green Smoothie Muffins are so easy to make, delicious and kid-approved! Perfectly sweet, soft and packed with healthy greens! Naturall

Carrot Lentil Protein Muffins

These carrot lentil protein muffins are a great kid-friendly snack, filled with sneaky lentils to add healthy protein, fibre and nutrients.

Vegetable Fritters - Healthy Little Foodies

These Vegetable Fritters are perfect for kids of all ages. Packed with veggies for nutrients & eggs and chickpea flour for protein. Gluten f

Curried Lentil Bake - Healthy Little Foodies

This lentil bake is perfect for babies, kids and adults. Made with 4 veggies, lentils, sweet potato and egg. Great for lunch boxes.

Sweet Potato Quinoa Cakes Recipe | Haute & Healthy Living

Quinoa Cakes are an easy way to pack in nutrients! Make in advance for a fun, healthy side or snack during the week! {Gluten Free, Vegan}

[violetsandshrikes]

here’s a few more:

Healthy & Moist Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

Healthy Chocolate Zucchini Muffins are moist, tender, mixed in one bowl, made with whole wheat flour, naturally sweetened with a little mapl

Baked Sweet Potato Zucchini Tots (Paleo + Vegan)

Baked sweet potato zucchini tots made with 3 key ingedients are nut free, vegan and paleo. Healthy baked veggie tots perfect for school lunc

Hidden Veggie Pasta Sauce for Babies and Kids - Baby Led Bliss

This super veggie pasta sauce for babies and toddlers is delicious on top of all kinds of pasta! With over 7 different oven roasted vegetabl

Veggie-Loaded Mini Meatloaves

Flavorful & full of veggies, these mini meatloaves are a great twist on a classic family dinner recipe. Easy to make, perfectly portioned ou

Cottage Cheese Egg Bites - easyfoodflash

Looking for a quick, protein-packed snack or breakfast that’s both delicious and nutritious? These Cottage ... <p class="read-more-container

[avantegarda]

UPDATE: I happened to have all the ingredients for the spinach muffins on this list and made them today, and folks, they're GOOD. They have a very nice mild flavor and don't actually taste like spinach at all

[creature-wizard]

Folks have got to understand that they probably aren't messed up by some Secret Big Trauma that they just can't remember; but rather by a million tiny microtraumas that they do mostly remember but don't even register as traumatic because nobody actually understood that these things would cause trauma, much less stack on each other over the years.

[xpxssxm]

Whether you're carrying one big rock or a big ol' bucket of sand, it's going to weigh on you just as much.

[ramshacklefey]

This is why psychologists have started taking more of an interest in CPTSD in the last 10-15 years. What most people know as PTSD is a response to a single, intensely traumatic event (or even a series of events). However, CPTSD (chronic post-traumatic stress disorder) is caused by living for years in a situation where your nervous system cannot catch a break. Even if nothing huge ever happened to you, you always had to be on guard for a thousand little things that could and did happen.

After years and years of this, your nervous system gets "stuck" in an activated threat response. It never really lets you rest, and if this started when you were a kid, you may not develop a lot of neural pathways that you should have, because your brain was too focused on keeping you safe to bother with little things like "genuine human connection" and "interpersonal attachment."

[naamahdarling]

No lie, Complex PTSD/CPTSD is HUGE.

If you are disabled, if you are queer, if you are chronically ill, if you are the survivor of a toxic but not abusive relationship, if you grew up or lived under the threat of harm but no "actual" harm (or "very little" harm) was done, you may have CPTSD that isn't getting caught because CPTSD looks different from PTSD.

[thenookienostradamus]

At the risk of falling into a trivialization trap, a lot of things you may not perceive as traumatic actually are. I was embarrassed for a long time in both group and individual therapy to say anything in my childhood was traumatic, because I was sitting with people who had suffered horrible physical or sexual abuse. But here are some things that are, in fact, traumatic and - when they occur over a long period - can set you on a course of maladaptive coping for decades if not addressed:

Being told or shown that your emotions are not valid, that you have no safe place to express them

Parents or caregivers oversharing graphic trauma from their past with you

Threats of physical violence, even if not carried out

Being told or shown that affection or approval is contingent on competency or academic success

Prejudice from inside OR outside the family (homophobia, racism, body shame)

Mocking or dismissal of things that are meaningful to you

If you constantly feel unworthy, afraid, ashamed, or even flat and emotionless, it's worth exploring why. And, because you've been so consistently undermined and minimized, you may feel like a fraud for being upset or functioning poorly. You're not a fraud; it's years of conditioning telling you "I should be able to handle this" or "lots of people are worse off than I am so I shouldn't complain." Your conditioned brain is lying to you; you won't be able to open yourself to the joy of trusting relationships with others OR do meaningful things to help those who are worse off until you do the work to melt the block of ice surrounding you. All my love to you, friends.

[lunahorizon]

Pete Walker is a therapist that's been on the cutting edge of this for many years, and he has a website here with plenty of free resources. (Just straight PDFs of parts of his books!)

Also, his books are not that expensive, well-written, and truly helped me process a lot of my trauma. I did a ton of it alone because I couldn't find a therapist for years, and those books (complex ptsd: from surviving to thriving & the tao of fully feeling) really changed the trajectory of my life.

He talks about grieving, about changing our internal dialogue to one that's positive instead of negative, talks about SEVERAL trauma typologies, and more.

As someone who has been diagnosed with the big trauma PTSD but most of their problems were coming from the little stuff that was CONSTANT and made me run on 2000% all day every day, this guy is a lifesaver. I'm so different from how I was before, especially with the help of some in-person therapy. Finding the right person makes all the difference, truly.

You can pick up his books on the website, but if you're looking for resources on this and you have the space and support to be able to do some of your own work (please don't do it completely alone unless you must) check out the sidebar over at pete-walker.com. He made this incredible resource that not everyone knows about and I try to share it where this comes up.

Thank you for informing people about this.

[creature-wizard]

Reblogging for the additional info and resources, and to emphasize that the C does indeed stand for "complex," not "chronic." (Understandable that people would get mixed up, though.)

[typewriter-worries]

there’s this extremely kind soul of a woman on instagram that makes accessible recipes that don’t require standing, chopping, or a stove and she might just have a permanent place in my heart

[peridotglimmer]

She's on YouTube too! For non-Instagram using friends:

I love her, she's great. Her recipes are friendly for both physical and/or intellectual disabilities. And her 5-year-old helps her cook. 🥰

Link to her YouTube channel:

Epicurious Expeditions

Celebrating the intersection of food and culture, travel tales, social commentary, grieving out loud. 🇳🇬/🇺🇸 👰🏽🧒🏽👧🏽👩🏽‍💼⚖️ Paid Collaboration

[absolutegibberishandnumbers]

jokes to make after failure that aren’t self-deprecating:

I’m the best to ever do it

Nobody saw that (best if said loudly)

No one’s ever done it like me

I could be President/they should make me President

Behold, a mere fraction of my power!

The public wants to be me soooooo bad

I’m an expert in (thing you just failed at)

How could this have happened to god’s favorite princess?

Nothing ibuprofen and a glass of water cant fix

I’m being sabotaged

[brotherlysuggestion]

Some additions from my arsenal:

11. “Speed run strats!”

12. “Y’all don’t know my strats/tactics”

13. “I’m built different” (the more emphasis you put on ‘different’, the better)

14. “Okay, this time is the time” upon retrying / “First try!” upon successful completion (Both get funnier with each failure you experience)

15. “I’m so silly” / “I’m just a silly billy” / “I’ve been a silly goose” (Really good replacement for “I’m so stupid/dumb”)

16. “Hold on, I’m cooking” / “Let me cook”

[chandra-telescope]

hope is a skill

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

hope is a weapon you are trained to wield

[chandra-telescope]

favourite additions

[chandra-telescope]

[tenaciouswritingdragon]

You cannot hide this in the tags, bestie. This is too lovely to keep a secret.

[wonderwyrm]

[eregyrn-falls]

It may not be apparent to everyone how to easily find out who wrote the poem in the tags, so: @mumblesplash

(an instant-classic example of a Tumblr thread where so many people add value!)

[pocket-deer-belly]

your parents don't get to decide for you what does and does not count as private information about you that they are allowed access to.

[pocket-deer-belly]

when you're mad at your parents you should be allowed to leave the situation, and you should be allowed to be mad at them. Your parents don't get to control how you feel about them.

[pocket-deer-belly]

it's not normal to feel like you have to hide very basic information about yourself from your parents. it's not normal to feel terrified of expressing that your parents did something wrong, or that you dislike how they treat you.

[pocket-deer-belly]

It’s not normal to set a basic boundary over and over again only to have it breached over and over again. It’s not normal to have parents decide for you that your boundaries are conditional, and allowed to be violated under specific circumstances that you don’t agree to.

[queeranarchism]

& it's not normal for any other adult to have this kind of power over you either. That includes every teacher, every therapist, every coach, every aunt and uncle, every grandparent, every person.