this is not a fairy tale

Ali, female, 27, Oregon. Richard Armitage took over my life and I have zero regrets. At times it can get NSFW in here; be advised.

[solarine]

Cardiac distress symptoms in women

In the wake of Carrie Fisher’s death four days after she suffered a massive heart attack, one thing that was reported by some news outlets was that she had been in “significant distress” on the flight. We don’t know the exact details of this, but in my experience as an EMT, it often means “hysterical woman having a panic attack and thinking she’s dying…*woman dies* …oops, guess she really was dying.” 

It is SO IMPORTANT to remember that many women present in what medicine considers an ‘atypical’ manner for heart attack, but it actually IS typical…for women. Women are more than twice as likely to die from cardiac emergencies, not because our physiology is that much different than men and thus gives us a worse chance at survival (it’s actually better if treated promptly and adequately), but because our symptoms are more likely to go unrecognized or to be dismissed entirely.

Thus, please take a moment to review and pass on this list of cardiac distress symptoms as seen in women: 

Shortness of breath - This is the most common one. If a woman, especially one without prior history of respiratory issues or shortness of breath, seems to be having trouble catching her breath and/or complains of such, pay very close attention. If she continues to feel winded after sitting or laying down, it’s probably time to call for help.

Feeling of impending doom - This can range from a sense of general unease to a full-blown panic attack. This one is extremely important, and is the symptom most commonly disregarded by doctors and hospital staff. If a woman tells you that she feels ‘not quite right,’ or like something terrible is about to happen, or that she’s about to die, LISTEN TO HER FFS. 

Nausea and “indigestion” - Also common. Heart attacks frequently present as a feeling of vague nausea or indigestion, but unlike typical heartburn, antacids and other OTC treatments will not alleviate the symptoms.

Hiccups - Unexplained hiccups, especially if seen with any of the other symptoms listed above, can be indicative of heart muscle that is being acutely or chronically starved of oxygen.  The exact mechanism isn’t known, but it’s thought that the enzymes released by the dying muscle irritate the pericardium and adjacent diaphragm, causing spasms in the healthy muscle. 

Fatigue - This is another commonly seen symptom, and is often overlooked or ignored as just transient tiredness. Many women having a heart attack will complain of feeling “flu-like” symptoms of nausea, sweating, fatigue, and shortness of breath, and they’ll lie down for a nap and never wake up. 

Lightheadedness - A feeling of being lightheaded or about to faint isn’t terribly uncommon in many benign conditions, and many women experience it on a monthly basis. However - be aware when it appears unexpectedly or unexplainedly, and/or with one or more of the other symptoms on this list. 

Sweating (diaphoresis) - Heart attack does funny things to the sympathetic nervous system, which is behind reflexes such as sweating and hiccups. If a lady is experiencing unexplained or excessive sweating, pay attention to anything else that might be going on with her. 

Tingling or numb extremities - A feeling of numbness or “pins and needles” tingling in the extremities can be an important sign that cardiac function is being impaired and those body parts aren’t receiving enough oxygen. 

Peripheral and/or central cyanosis - Often accompanies tingling or numbness, and is considered a later-stage symptom of cardiac distress and heart failure. Finger and toe tips will turn pale or blue first, and lips and gums after that. Important to remember that darker-skinned women may present cyanosis as ashen, grey, or darker purple rather than pale or blue. 

Back pain - Pain between the shoulder blades, in the cervical spine, or even further down in the torso or lumbar region can be a symptom of heart attack. Alone, it isn’t that suspicious, but if it’s unrelenting and presents with any of the other symptoms above, keep a watchful eye on things. 

Classic “crushing” or “tight” chest pain or pressure - Women DO experience this classic pain, too, just not as frequently as men do. This may be due to our higher pain threshold, or differences in blood volume, or maybe we’re just not sure because nobody’s bothered to really study it. Whatever the reason, some women do still experience the crushing or tightening pain, and others may experience less painful pressure or tightness that doesn’t seem to be relieved by anything.

Arm and jaw pain - Another “classic” heart attack symptom, and a bit more common than central chest pain. Unexplained pain in the left arm or shoulder, and on the left side of the neck or jaw, should not be ignored by anyone.

[spillywolf-deactivated20190920]

Do you ever just wanna pull a Luke Skywalker and disappear to an island in the middle of nowhere and dramatically stare at the ocean for awhile

[mysupervengersworld]

[beksboys]

IT CHRISMAS // available on shirts, hoodies, tank tops etc.! ON REDBUBBLE // available as stickers, greeting cards, and prints! WRAPPING PAPER: GLOSS // MATTE // available for your gifts!

it’s a LITTLE EARLY but chrismas dinosaur is going around again already and it was too late last year to do this, so why not!!! merr november chrismas he’s back, this time on clothing

[beksboys]

HELLO SURPRISE!! NOW CHRISTMAS DINO IS AVAILABLE AS UGLY CHRISMAS SWEATER (but please do not say that to his face, he will be upset. tell him he is beautiful chrismas sweater)

available on teepublic!!! version one // version two

[littlebunnysunshine]

[pomegranatebats]

@thebrideofcaliban

[yfipdragonage]

Your Fave is Problematic: All DAI companios

why does your armor look better than mine

why does your hair look better than mine

why do your fucking eyebrows look better than mine

[fire-is-her-water]

Dear Bioware,

Please give me hugging in DA4. I want to be able to offer hugs to friends. I want a [hug them] conversation option to comfort someone who’s upset. I want my companions to hug each other at appropriate moments. I want to see reassuring hands on shoulders and friendly back pats, reaching over to squeeze someone’s hand, or leaning shoulder-to-shoulder in a quiet moment. I know the animations are complicated but dammit I want non-romantic gestures of physical affection.

[gogomrbrown]

“Doggos never die… for a price”

[divaythfyr]

@scuzer

[iironhide-archive-blog]

@melodiouswanderer

[melodiouswanderer]

@myobsessionsandloves @stupidbolts @zacklover24

[sadcowgirl]

me: I wish I wasn’t so anxious all the time

my brain: girl I got you *switches to the depression*

me: uh….

my brain:

[64bitwar]

this is stomp dog it shows up to stomp away sadness

[i-m-snek]

Leliana is here to spread peace and love :D

[yfipdragonage]

your fave is problematic: requisition officer

Says they’ve got something I might be interested in

LIED

[plaguemd-archive]

the concept of a healslut is fucking hilarious to me because have you ever fucking played a healer

have you ever met a healer

healers are almost always the saltiest, angriest people in any given group comp and there is nothing and nobody we hate more than someone that makes us do our goddamn jobs and actually heal we are angry little balls of spite who will stop healing you if you’re being stupid or pissing us off because we hold the key to life and death in our hands and more importantly fuck you

what im saying is if you’re going to try and eroticize the healer/tank dynamic, the healer is not the submissive party here

[pragnificent]

As a healer I want to thank you for this

[kamdjdndknsssnsshs-deactivated2]

Shoutout to people who can’t stand loud noise because of anxiety or sensory issues or chronic migraines and have to deal with people being unnecessarily loud all the time but can’t do or say anything about it because that’s “rude” and “ruining everyone’s good time”

[elodieunderglass]

I feel like people need to know the Great Moose Truths.

Despite people in Canada/New England feeling a strong pride and sense of ownership surrounding moose, Europeans have the exact same moose. English speakers completely fucked up the naming conventions for the animal because we fuck EVERYTHING up. 

The Eurasian elk is the exact same animal as the moose. It is Alces alces. Here is a depiction of a Swedish soldier riding a moose into war in the 1700s.

Figure 1. The Swedish army used moose as cavalry animals at various points in history. I don’t know what the armored boar is all about.

However, the English caused a lot of confusion by originally calling it an “elk.” This comes from the older English word eolc/eolh, which shares roots with elhaz/algiz, which, if you know your runes, is the antler-looking rune ᛉ. 

So the English had moose, they just called them elks. But there haven’t been any moose in the UK since the Bronze Age, so the English just started using the word “elk” to apply to “really big deer” - and they forgot that there was a specific animal they used to call “elk.” 

Today, modern people from the United Kingdom have overwritten their own understanding of “elk” with Elk (USA), which are wapiti (Cervus canadensis). 

This is a wapiti, which everyone calls “elk” now:

Figure 2. The wapiti, or elk  (Cervus canadensis)

“Hmmmmmmm,” British people may be saying right now. “That is a vaguely familiar animal. I feel like that is a STAG. I feel like it needs to be selling me a bottle of whiskey.”

YES. The wapiti is very similar to the UK’s red deer. This is what UK people call a “stag” : 

Figure 3. A stag, or British red deer (Cervus elaphus) - actually slightly less red than the wapiti.

The explanation for this is that the UK colonizers found the wapiti in the USA, but the problem was that red deer were rarely seen by the common people at that time, so they thought they were Unusually Big Deer. And so the colonizing bastards said “Hey, what are these, Nigel?” and Nigel was like “IDK, stags?” and they were like “Yeah but they look really big, don’t they?” and Nigel was like “well, what about calling them big deer, then” and they called them “elk” which at that point had come to mean “big deer” in English. 

Cervus elaphus (name meaning: deer deer) and Cervus canadensis (name meaning: Canadian deer) are very similar animals, and many people muddy the waters by calling Cervus elaphus an “elk.” The word ran all around the world, and American influence meant that it is losing its own definition in its own land. 

Cervus canadensis are also found in Asia, where the subspecies are called wapiti, from the Shawnee word meaning “white rump.” This is to prevent confusion. If you see one in Mongolia, you must properly call it a “Canadian deer, aka ‘white butt,’ from the indigenous North American word” to prevent this kind of confusion.

Figure 4. The global range of Cervus canadensis, the wapiti, or elk. 

Okay. Enough about what happened to the word “elk”. The point is that other European countries have reasonable amounts of moose, which they call elk. The “Eurasian elk” is Alces alces, the moose. 

Figure 5. A Swedish army representative wearing Swedish flags and riding a Swedish moose. ALSO, SOMEHOW, THE MOST CANADIAN THING EVER

So when the English settlers colonized Canada and New England, they continued their long history of fucking the fuck up. But in the middle of this, they saw Eurasian elks, had no idea what they were, and went with the local Algonquin word “moose.” 

They also called the same moose “elk” at the same time, and went into a slight confusion where they tried to differentiate them into “grey moose” and “black moose” and “black elk,” but when the dust settled, the world was left with British-colonizers-turned-Americans applying random names to everything, and winning. Wapiti are now called elk, and now red deer are also kind of elk. Eurasian elk are now moose. Wikipedia attempts to explain the moose fuckups here and the elk fuckups here.

The word “moose” is Algonquin in origin. This is why it doesn’t pluralize like English words do. In English, the plural of “goose” is “geese” and thus many people feel that the plural of “moose” should be “meese.” However, “moose” is not an English word. If you wanted to treat it as one, you could remember that moose are hoofed animals of a specific class, and you could follow the rules already laid down for moose relatives: The English plural of elk is elk. The English plural of deer is deer. The English plural of sheep is sheep. You can call multiple moose “meese” if you want to. But that’s why it is the way it is.

Figure 6. The global range of moose, or Eurasian elk.

So there you have it. Moose are an important, scary and hilarious part of Canadian/New Englander culture, but they aren’t just ours - we share them with Eurasian cultures too.

Figure 7: a Russian moose farmer with a promising crop

Figure 8: Finnish people provide a dark warning. “Hirvikolari” is a specific Finnish word describing a road accident involving a moose. There are many dashcam videos of hirvikolari on the Internet.

And now think about all the amazing Moose News you have access to now! You can now enjoy stories of moose destruction, mayhem and general fuckery SO MUCH MORE when you realize they aren’t about deer:

Figure 9: every line of this story is perfect?

Actually, you know what?

 That’s still the most Canadian thing ever.

[shredsandpatches]

I’M SO CONFUSED

(also, which one of them does Thranduil ride on?)

[skeleton-richard]

@shredsandpatches from how I remember the first Hobbit movie, I think it was a wapti?

[elodieunderglass]

A few people have asked this. Thranduil’s mount is a perfect Irish Elk (or more correctly, Irish Giant Deer), known as Megaloceros giganteus.

It’s a prehistoric giant deer, and not a close relation to the wapiti. (which is why paleontologists hope that we’ll start calling it an Irish Giant Deer instead of Irish Elk. TO PREVENT CONFUSION. IT IS NOT AN ELK!MOOSE OR AN ELK!WAPITI, IT IS A GIANT DEER. AND IT EXISTED.)

Figure 2. HOLY FUCK THE IRISH ELK.

Megaloceros went extinct about… 7000 years ago, and certainly did once coexist with humans.  There is a potential Folklore Ghost in the Irish word segh and the German work Schelch suggesting that Europeans may have kept their word for it, similarly to how the word aurochs is still extant, despite the Giant Fucking Killer Bull now being extinct. Anyway, it was definitely an animal and the prehistoric Europeans, Asians and North Africans who knew it definitely noticed it and thought about it, the same way that we all once knew mammoths. The Lascaux deer with palmate antlers was probably a Megaloceros.

Figure 3. HOLY FUCK THE IRISH ELK. Cave painting from Lascaux depicting a prehistoric deer with palmate antlers. Could be a reindeer, could be Megaloceros. The palms aren’t very reindeerish, though.

The LotR and Hobbit designers made the good decision of using prehistoric European animals as bases for the designs of the “fantasy animals” in the movies. Lots of fantasy designers do this. George RR Martin didn’t invent dire wolves, for example. The oliphants in LotR are based on prehistoric elephants, ditto and the orc’s war rhinos and the dwarves’ war pigs. The “wargs” aren’t actually dire wolves - which would be TOO CUTE AND BEAUTIFUL to be scary - but Dinocrocuta or Pachycrocuta, two kinds of giant prehistoric ancestral hyena.

Figure 4: Holy FUCK Dinocrocuta.

Anyway, it’s a good path to do down, because you can be incredibly lazy with the creature design, and take credit for all the cultural resonance it evokes. There is something about an Irish Giant Deer that just looks RIGHT, like EXTREMELY CORRECT AND PROPER, in a way that a made-up fantasy animal doesn’t always evoke.

Figure 5. Dire wolves weren’t actually that big. Smilodon (the sabertoothed cat) is smaller than a Cave Lion. Megaloceros is definitely big enough to ride, as is the spectacular wooly rhino, which always has my heart. The Aurochs (Bos primigenius) is there, looking fab.

And personally I think prehistoric megafauna are just so cool, and they just RESONATE. We spend all this time and energy inventing elves and aliens, looking to the stars and a fake fantasy past for cousins and creatures. Are there other humans out there that look like a different species but are still weirdly hot, and could we have sex with them? Are there recognizable animals that are like our animals, but with weird knobs and jaws?

But we did used to have them. We once had horse-sized war-pigs, giant wolves, lions the size of horses, elephants that bristled with teeth, armored beasts. We once had Other Human People, The Little People, the Neanderthals, with their own culture - and we totally slept with them. We had strange shamanic connections and early spiritual practices and ritual magic surrounding beasts, beasts that have only left ghosts. Because the world changed.

Figure 5. THE SCENE IN “BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD” WHERE SHE TOUCHES THE AUROCHS. I CRIED. IT FUCKING RESONATED. I MEAN THE AUROCHS IS MORE OF A GIANT PIG BUT IT RESONATED. 

But that’s why Thranduil’s war mount is not a moose (IT’S NOT A FUCKING MOOSE LOOK AT ITS FUCKING FACE) and not an elk (WHAT KIND OF FUCKING ELK HAS PALMATE ANTLERS) but a VERY SPECIAL AND MAJESTIC MEGAFAUNA.

[nonpolar-bear]

[honey-magnolia]

one of the toughest aspects of mental illness is how often your goals fall by the wayside because the only goal you can afford is survival.

[6teeth-deactivated20200318]

oh my god