It's the Sunglasses

grown-ass adult | amateur actor, theatre teacher, and director | I post primarily about my students, my performing adventures, and my husband but also fandoms like Star Trek TOS/TNG, Dropout, and whatever my interest of the month is | icon by @acadieum | I believe Black Lives Matter, trans women are women, trans men are men, queer has been reclaimed, and aro/ace, nonbinary, and pansexual people belong in the LGBT+ community - and I’m not interested in arguing any of that :)

[sandersstudies]

Hello Internet Friends.

Rather a serious post for my goofy blog. I know I don’t have to justify my absence to anyone, but I want to put this out there. My husband, who appears in the bio of my blog, in my icon, and in many of my most popular posts, is currently in the hospital.

We have spent about sixteen scary hours between two hospitals today, and his doctors have concluded he has a lemon-sized tumor in his brain and are planning to operate this Friday. We will not have more information until then but are trying to remain optimistic.

My queue is still full and you may see sporadic posting from me in the next few days, but expect a halt on message replies and asks for the time being.

Much love to my internetters.

[sandersstudies]

Hey guys, that was August 7th. A few weeks later we found out it’s cancer.

It’s October 11th. I have not posted about it until now. There are still people in our real life who we have to tell.

We’re cheerful. We’re in love. We’re also very scared, but his care team has been beyond excellent and we are now in contact with professionals at a university medical center a couple cities away.

This is my husband who so many people have loved just via my silly posts about him, and I promise if you could meet him in person you’d love him even more.

Just continue to keep us in your thoughts and prayers. My queue is still full and I still have things to say sometimes.

[sandersstudies]

It’s November 27th. Husband is in radiation and chemotherapy until Christmas Eve. He’s having some fatigue and hair loss but otherwise trucking along. I will update again after the holiday season.

I continue to be so grateful for everybody thinking of us and also happy that I’ve had the chance to share a tiny bit of knowledge about brain cancers, which are relatively rare and therefore aren’t usually privy to the awareness campaigns that find research for more common cancers, like Breast Cancer.

[sandersstudies]

It’s December 23rd. Today is husband’s LAST DAY of radiation! He continues oral medication and monitoring into the new year, but his most recent MRI looks GOOD and a more specialized MRI next month will give us more info. Thank you all again for your support and curiosity 💖

[sandersstudies]

It’s January 20th. Husband starts a new round of chemotherapy soon but he had another MRI today and there has been no new growth during or after his radiation. He’s not looking forward to the side effects of his new medication but it’s better than more surgery. Love you guys!

[sandersstudies]

Hey guys. It’s August again.

Today my family and friends are throwing a “cranniversary” to celebrate the anniversary of my husband’s (first) craniotomy and a year of battling cancer. I hope to add some pictures later today.

I’ve had so many kind people in my inbox asking for an update and while I don’t always have the bandwidth to reply I want you all to know he’s out here fighting the good fight! He’s experienced complications of infection, regrowth, and blood clots that unfortunately are risks of cancer and its treatment, but he is currently in “good” health minus the side effects of chemotherapy.

His tumor is unique and his case has been shared with the NIH as well as many of the top brain oncologists in the US, but so far his three surgeries, six hospital stays, chemotherapy, and radiation have kept the cancer at bay and he has a chance to be declared in remission in the next six months. His treatment team is considered one of the best in the nation.

I have also had the opportunity to meet a lot of people whose lives and families have been impacted by brain cancer, including people who have passed, people who are still fighting alongside my husband, and people who have been in remission for years or decades. I’ve also learned a lot about cancer, medicine, disability, and the brain from my own experiences and their shared ones.

Thank you for your kindness, internetters, here’s to another year fighting!

[sandersstudies]

August 2024 — August 2025

[sandersstudies]

Hello my lovely friends. Welcome to 2026. Thank you for coming so far.

My husband has been off chemotherapy and other cancer treatments for two months, and there is currently no sign of his tumor returning (significant because between surgeries and without treatment, the tumor returned the its original size in two months).

He is still recovering from a long period of treatment which leaves the body fatigued, and from the damage to his brain, which luckily is minor and only resulted in minor effect to memory and some small isolated tremors.

We are continuing to follow up with his oncologist — his brain will be heavily monitored for the rest of his life, and he will remain on anti-seizure and anti-clot medication long-term as well, as those were risks that surfaced during treatment. But he is mostly back to his normal life, working full-time and GMing TTRPGs.

Thank you to everyone who chose kindness a hundred times over the past year. Here’s a picture of us imitating penguins.

[monstersinthecosmos]

This is a really good thread.

[glompcat]

#people want to treat their own bad behavior as if it was as inevitable as the weather #and then when the people they're assholes to are like 'actually fuck you' and stand up for themselves #they get all pearl clutchy about how they have a ~right to express themselves~ and how other people ~just can't handle the truth~ #toddlers (via @shesgonnachangetheworld)

[sandersstudies]

Grew up in a one-story house and currently live in a one-story (plus basement) house so I feel alarmed when I go to a house that has stairs. Even if it’s normal size I’m like what is this a mansion.

[quantummoonjune]

no context game changer

[sandersstudies]

When I arrive home I sing a little song to my cats that goes

“Everyone was good/everyone was niceness and politeness

Everyone was sweet/everyone was oh so very kindness.”

And my husband disapproves of the song on the grounds that 1) I have not confirmed if everyone was actually good, niceness, politeness, and kindness in our absence 2) if I wanted to confirm it, the cats would not understand English well enough to confirm or deny 3) even if my cats understood the question, they may not understand human standards for moral values and social conventions and 4) even if my cats completely comprehended the question they are cats and would very likely lie to my face.

[gravitywhatgravity]

caldwell tanner is so clearly made for game changer its crazy that they've only had him on the show for art. my man is out here winking at the camera, cheating in games for points, slamming himself on the floor for prompts, doing little bits with the cast in the phone booth.......I love his art but let my boy be on a podium for realsies😭🙏

[homunculus-argument]

One interesting element of being a part of a conversation consisting of multiple ADHD people is the backtracking. At some point you realise you're all talking about granny oil wrestling or trying to remember what lobster blood is made of, and you all just go "wait, how the fuck did we get here?" and then you all start retracing your steps to figure out what you had been talking about before, and how it led to this one, until you get back to how you jumped from normal conversations to how one would logistically arrange an ostrich brothel.

[sandersstudies]

The actors at the youth theatre I work for get one free “silly rehearsal” as a reward for a great opening weekend. For this year’s show, High School Musical, they completely reconstructed the plot for the silly rehearsal to follow these beats:

Troy and Chad were going through a breakup, which made Chad especially sensitive to Troy’s “betrayal” of joining the school musical

Gabriella was auditioning with Troy only as an excuse to hang out with Kelsi, who she had a crush on.

Jack Scott became “Jackie Scott” who talked in girlypop girlboss language and made out with Chad Danforth in the final sequence.

Zeke Baylor was replaced with Ghostface and was interested in murder rather than baking

The line “I’m coming clean, I play the cello” became “I’m coming out… I’m gay!”

Ryan and Sharpay’s roles were exactly the same but the actors (who are actually siblings) swapped roles.

The director’s seven-year-old randomly became part of several sequences in various roles.

[sandersstudies]

Usually I don’t post photos of the kids… I feel like this one is sufficiently anonymous 😂

[shaftking]

“Media can be factually made with a child/family audience in mind” and “media for children/family audiences can be well made and engaging pieces of art” and “if you are an adult you should have a more diverse media diet than what exists to target an audience of primary middle and grade schoolers” and “it’s okay to watch a cartoon as an adult and enjoy it” can coexist.

[butch-tradwife]

For everyone who ‘used to love reading’ but now hasn’t finished a book in years, you CAN get it back. Genuinely start bringing a book (preferably short and either fiction or a non fiction topic you already really enjoy) everywhere you go and when you have 5-20 mins waiting for the bus or at the doctors office or mechanic or whatever, get out your book and read it! You don’t have to finish it quickly or even read it often but it is so good for your brain and fun to get into the habit of reading more (and replacing being on your phone for those moments). Source: I read 0 books in 2023 and I’ve read 12 in the first 4 months of 2026

[miseducatedmelanicmuse]

[teaboot]

On of the less intuitive things about love, I've found, of any kind, is the importance of needing things.

I didn't realize it until recently, but I've always seen love as something requiring sacrifice, selflessness, patience, and generosity- to ask for nothing is to be the best person I can be, small and quiet and never in the way, always happy and helpful, self-sufficient and present when desired.

It's only as an adult, now, that I'm beginning to see the selfishness of wanting nothing.

I cut my friend's hair in my kitchen the other day. They wanted a trim and I had the skills, so I offered, and was genuinely excited when they stopped hesitating over "bothering me" and took me up on it. It was a peaceful afternoon, and we had tea and chatted for an hour or more.

My brother and I shared popcorn at the movies a while ago. When I came time to pay, I pulled my card out like a wild western sheriff and slapped it on the machine before he could fight me for it first. The satisfaction was delightful.

Someone called me crying on the phone the other day. Kept apologizing for disturbing me at work, talking about how they were bothering me on my lunch break. I was telling the truth when I told them that really, I was flattered and honored and relieved, knowing that if they were hurting I would know, that I didn't have to worry in silence. It felt good to hear them slowly come down, and to know that they knew it would be better soon, and to hear them laugh wetly on the other end. We're getting together for a visit next week.

It's hard to need things, if you've trained yourself not to. It's hard to want things, when you don't know how to want anymore. Trusting people is difficult, and so is relying on them, but I don't know where I'd be without the people who rely on me.

I've heard a lot of people say, "Nobody will love you unless you love yourself". I've had a lot of thoughts about it. It's not right, but it's not wrong, either, I think.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... I've always taken that to mean, "You will not be lovable until you develop a positive view of yourself as a person".

Now, I think it's sort of inside-out.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... because nobody can show their love to you in a way that you can accept until you treat yourself kindly, and learn what you need, and what you want, and how to ask for it, and then give that vulnerability away.

Love, for me, is someone I ask for a ride to the airport. Whether they end up doing this or not is irrelevant.

It's not needy, or selfish, or taking up energy. It's giving the gift of being wanted, and needed, and thought of. It's giving someone the security of being part of someone's life.

[i-am-a-fish]

"enjoy it while it lasts" (undercuts itself, needlessly doomerish, foreboding)

"enjoy it!" (straight to the point, actually encourages enjoying it)

[i-am-a-fish]

"enjoy last it'll it" (what)

[sandersstudies]

The actors at the youth theatre I work for get one free “silly rehearsal” as a reward for a great opening weekend. For this year’s show, High School Musical, they completely reconstructed the plot for the silly rehearsal to follow these beats:

Troy and Chad were going through a breakup, which made Chad especially sensitive to Troy’s “betrayal” of joining the school musical

Gabriella was auditioning with Troy only as an excuse to hang out with Kelsi, who she had a crush on.

Jack Scott became “Jackie Scott” who talked in girlypop girlboss language and made out with Chad Danforth in the final sequence.

Zeke Baylor was replaced with Ghostface and was interested in murder rather than baking

The line “I’m coming clean, I play the cello” became “I’m coming out… I’m gay!”

Ryan and Sharpay’s roles were exactly the same but the actors (who are actually siblings) swapped roles.

The director’s seven-year-old randomly became part of several sequences in various roles.

[omtai]

there is nothing lemon squeezy about any of this

[birdplushie]

often you will see things online where you just have to be like "what a strange thing to say" or "i don't think that's true :)" to yourself and try to move on or you will lose your mind

[thememedaddy]