#psycho stuff

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My strategy of "aah it'll be fine I'll do my things and this will pass" for dealing with post-covid exhaustion resulted in a big crash of 24h bed&pain, a mother of migraines and several desperate crying sessions. So I decided to call in a reinforcement of professionals.

The WHO has a brochure on self-management of post-covid - rehabilitation which gave me a scale of exhaustion and phases of increasing activity. (I'll link to it later)

A cognitive-behavioral therapist (me, it was myself) made a daily planner/diary in spreadsheet form with the categories well-being (morning, midday, evening), activities done and how exhausting were they (scale 1-10) and a field for nice/happy things and things I'm thankful for (I'm third wave, duh)

My dad came to clean my kitchen and it is gleaming now and that makes me feel so good. Also we had a good talk about our sensory issues of the week (a bucket in the courtyard on which raindrops fall making it go boing in an unpleasant frequency and skin is dry and itches but bodylotion makes it greasy and clammy for a while) and the current state of the construction sites around us.

Feeling hopeful that it will be okay in a while and that I can get back to walking for more than a few hundred meters a day.

By accident there is a poll here now and this clusterfuck lets me neither delete it nor post without putting something, so tell me

Thai for lunch

Pasta for lunch

Voting ended onJan 20, 2023

[kamisartvonkunst]

Another little update about me and Art even though not many may care since it has been a long time lol

Before I left I talked about not making art my future work goal....and only keeping it as a hobby. 

Well I was just afraid. Art had nothing to do with it. It was me and my trauma who were afraid to go back. I realized that I can’t work for something just so others are happy with me. There will be people who will try to talk me out of it but fuck them honestly. This has been my dream for almost 10 years and I am almost 22 years old. I never stopped having that dream. Everything else is just not able to make ME happy. ME! This is MY life.

And I was controlled by fear that others might dislike my stuff....or aren’t happy with it...somebody will like it, idk who, but there will be ONE person at least.

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trans* Fachliteratur und so, für Psychotherapie und angrenzende Bereiche

Eine kleine Sammlung von Sachen, die ich kenne und mag. Über Ergänzungen und Anmerkungen freue ich mich sehr.

Das eine Buch für Psychotherapie und Beratung: Dr. Gisela Wolf, Mari Günther und Kirsten Teren teilen ihr Fachwissen, ihre Forschung und ihre Erfahrung in Psychotherapeutische Arbeit mit trans* Personen (Gisela und Mari machen auch super Fortbildungen).

Die offizielle S3-Leitlinie für Diagnostik, Beratung und Behandlung (Überarbeitung ist für nächstes Jahr geplant, dann mit den neuen ICD Diagnosekriterien und hoffentlich!!1! angepasst an das Selbstbestimmungsgesetz).

Leitfaden trans*Gesundheit vom Bundesverband trans*: Die S3-Leitlinie zusammengefasst und erläutert für "Patient*innen" und alle, die lieber leichter verständliches in nettem Layout lesen wollen (ich).

The Standards of Care for the Health of Transsexual, Transgender, and Gender Nonconforming People of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH): International guidelines, the newest in research, lots of different languages, new version to be expected in spring 2022.

Der BVT hat auf seiner Internetseite viele hilfreiche Broschüren, zum Runterladen oder kostenlos bestellen.

Das Netzwerk Trans*gesundheit macht einen Fachtag, mit Vorträgen, die so gut klingen.

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I can't read German, but it sounds to me like the first hurdle your study would need to clear is whether or not acupressure or qigong make long covid *worse*? (Bc that's a bar many CFS studies don't even get over) Like, this is not in the least a proven cure. "It didn't do anything bad" is as much a positive finding as "it did a little good"

That and how the study group (eight weeks of qigong class twice a week, daily self-apply acupressure, self-help book and phone calls with a doctor every two weeks) compares to the control group (self-help book and phone calls with a doctor every two weeks, they get the qigong classes later). The study is conducted by the university hospital, from what I understood it is a pretty solid rct and I'm happy they do research on "alternative" (not sure what a good term in English would be) treatments for CFS. Could be that just the added exertion of being asked to perform acupressure every day can worsen symptoms, for sure.

My scientifically trained, patient and compassionate adult parts are okay with participating and just seeing what happens. I also know that there is no known "cure" for long covid for now and the best guess is to pace and hope it'll get better with time. But then there's also that side in me that wants me to believe that I am solely responsible for everything, by just putting in the hard work and being perfect I can get better all while screaming with frustration and fear. I'm getting used to this new way of functioning and living, not being able to do what I used to do, and finding new coping mechanisms. It is hard and scary. I know a lot of my inner workings and what is going on and why, I know what's helping. Still I am glad I can go back to my therapist for some session to get support in this.

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Having a lie down to recuperate from the exhaustion of breakfast. This illness weakened my defenses and stripped me of my coping mechanisms so I get a horrible little depression on top. When people tell me to "take the opportunity to splash out and indulge myself" I can only think of having the choice between fighting to feed myself and finding the ten minutes a day when I can actually get nice food for me, or "indulging" in restriction and dark punishing thoughts. Which takes a lot less energy. Fun times.

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Still at work, listening to a talk on rehab of post- and long-covid patients. Rapid cycling between dread, rage, grief and a hope- and spiteful "let's do this, I can treat them when they come (or if one of my clients develops long-covid)."

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Truly the best thing about working independently as a therapist in my own office is that I can do whatever the fuck I want with my ?gender? expression, my queerness, my radical leftist politics. It is not only never politely ignored or remarked upon with borderline offensive acceptance. I feel seen in it, I can work with it, I can create an environment for my clients with it and I think that is praxis.

[id: gif of a paint roll wet with bright pink paint that rolls on a white wall, painting it pink. End id]

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Boys and men are diverse with respect to their race, ethnicity, culture, migration status, age, socioeconomic status, ability status, sexual orientation, gender identity, and religious affiliation. Each of these social identities contributes uniquely and in intersecting ways to shape how men experience and perform their masculinities, which in turn contribute to relational, psychological, and behavioral health outcomes in both positive and negative ways.

The APA published guidelines on how to psychology with boys and men and my inner psy-student is grinning with glee, because in this men (TM) are the group that is spoken about, instead of men being the norm and women and everything else being the groups that were different and thus spoken about. (also the cute dudes on the title are not white and the first sentences say “intersectional!”)