Torture and strife and everything nice

hi! my pronouns are he/him adult | gay | aroace | disabled astronomy major by night, train wreck by day

[weirdstrangeandawful]

About me!

[heads up, this post is outdated and terribly formatted]

Hi! I'm Laertes. I've been here a while, but introductions are hard. This blog is mostly a whump prompt blog and a home for my novel A Good Man's Heart, but I will often put other stuff in it like art and fibre arts. I am also disabled and it impacts every part of my life so that will show up here very often. If you are not a bot or fundraiser, please send me asks -- I'd love to chat! Especially about my novel and my OCs.

I have a post about this blog's boundaries here

A little about me I guess. I'm aroace, gay, disabled, and not American. I am an adult although I don't feel comfortable putting my actual age publicly on the internet (if that's a deal-breaker for you I respect that but I won't be changing this). I'm currently pursuing a degree in astronomy and I work in software engineering.

I enjoy exploring darker whump themes such as domestic violence, major trauma (especially painful or unsuccessful recoveries), and addiction although my prompts will contain a huge variety of things. I also love to research and write historical (especially military) whump no later than World War I (although it's mostly Canadian and British because, well, I'm Canadian).

(If you don’t know what whump is check out my post on the subject)

Please do check out what I've finished of my novel! I've never shared my writing before so I'm very proud of it!

A Good Man's Heart Table of Contents

Some notes on accessibility:

This blog is not terribly screen-reader friendly -- I do my best to add descriptions in alt text but what I end up posting usually takes all my effort to do so. A Good Man's Heart contains scene break embellishments in the text (similar to *** in printed books) which are just described as 'embellishment' so as not to break the flow too much. You can see the above-linked table of contents for a description of the embellishment (under the cut and under the cover image)

My tag system is a mess and I have yet to make a coherent one and corresponding post. The ones I stick by the most are: #whump+#whump prompt, #weird strange and awful art, and #disability

I post trigger warnings at the top of my whump posts (as well as some others) and I tag for as much as I can with just the term (no tw, cw, etc before or after). Do not hesitate to send me an ask or a message if you would like me to trigger warn a certain topic. I cannot commit to always tagging my disability related posts properly since I am often posting those when I am barely functional but I do my best.

I will tag symptoms like seizures or paralysis as trigger warnings. I understand some people feel this clogs the tag but I personally need these to be filterable so they are getting tagged for when I’m not engaging with whump. No whump post will be tagged without also using the #whump tag so block that one if you feel it’s taking up search space.

If there are any accessibility improvements, please let me know! I may not always be able to accommodate because of my own accessibility needs but I do want to hear about what your needs are!

Also! @obfuscated-abstract is my sideblog which I use to summarise and post medical documentation on disabilities which would require someone outside of academia to pay for. Feel free to check it out and send in any papers you need access to.

[houndmother]

you cant defend the right to change sex without the right to abortion and the right to use drugs and quite frankly the right to suicide and the right to tattoos and piercings and body modifications. you believe in bodily autonomy or you dont.

dont lose your voice by choking on your bigotry.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

I'm getting concerned about my kidneys again... I've been having abdominal pain, unbearable muscle cramps, and significantly worse nausea in the past few days and now my pee is cloudy but I have no UTI symptoms. These are definitely symptoms of lithium toxicity too but I'm on half my previous dose which was just barely in the therapeutic range. I'm kinda freaked out to be honest.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

Oh and I'm really hoping the lower back pain that popped up today is just referred abdominal pain or muscle pain from my body adjusting to the new footplate angle/height.

Something feels weird though.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

I'm getting concerned about my kidneys again... I've been having abdominal pain, unbearable muscle cramps, and significantly worse nausea in the past few days and now my pee is cloudy but I have no UTI symptoms. These are definitely symptoms of lithium toxicity too but I'm on half my previous dose which was just barely in the therapeutic range. I'm kinda freaked out to be honest.

[kedreeva]

It looks like just pinpricks of lights flicking off and on. It's some of the hundreds to thousands of fireflies in my yard, after years of fostering their environment.

It's come a long way since I moved in. It used to be that I could stand in the yard during firefly season and count 30+ seconds before seeing a flash. It's still not at the level I remember seeing in local areas a couple decades ago, when fields would practically glow with how many fireflies lit the air above them. But it's not nothing. And maybe my yard doesn't make a huge difference on its own, but when you multiply it by hundreds, by thousands, by millions... it adds up.

Did you know it takes years, multiple, for firefly larvae to mature into beetles? You won't see immediate, drastic effects if you start trying to help them. But when you believe in the long game, you'll see it improve over time. I don't have to wait 30 seconds to see the glow of a firefly in my yard anymore. In fact I can't count seconds anymore. There's always a light on.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

Hot water outage AGAIN tonight, what the hell! Luckily only a few hours but I hate having to clean the toilet and sink after they turn it back on and fill the pipes with brown sludge.

[thewhumpyprintingpress]

Tie-Breaker Round!

There was a tie for the theme of our seventh anthology, so it's time for a tie-breaker!

The choices are:

Environmental whump (examples: extreme weather, hypo and hyperthermia, cave ins, building collapses, natural disasters, etc.)

Water (examples: drowning, dehydration, lost at sea, waterboarding, sea monsters, mer people, etc.)

Yes, there could be some overlap between the two choices, but they are distinct enough to be separate themes So choose wisely!

Vote for your favorite theme!

Environmental Whump

Water

Remaining time: 6 days 3 hours

[weirdstrangeandawful]

FOOTREST REPLACED!!!!!!!!!!!

I know this probably looks like the most boring photo but my last footrest was tilted back 21° meaning my ankles were permanently flexed 21° (which is near most people's maximum range of motion). This one can go nearly flat!!! I do need to lower it a little though.

I also got new brakes under warranty to replace my faulty ones but they came out with new brakes in the meantime so I got an upgrade and they have springs! Not sure how I feel about the springs but I think I like them.

[natequarter]

not only are most people completely unaware of the devastation of indigenous languages in the americas, most people are completely unaware of the devastation of indigenous languages in europe. never mind occitan, they don't know about basque! it's wild! bleak! existentially horrifying!!!

[natequarter]

the last few centuries of french history involved, amongst other things, a concerted effort to establish "french" as a legitimate country and cultural identity, and crucially as a language, which sounds like an absurd statement if you know nothing about the languages of france. french is a language, yes; it exists and existed in the late eighteenth century. but it was limited primarily to the north of france and was certainly not spoken or even understood across the country. other languages within france were banned and french was enforced following the french revolution and even to this day other languages indigenous to france have very little legal protection and are not recognised as official languages.

that's just one country in europe. one. and many people straight up have no idea about any of this!

[natequarter]

did you know france has celtic languages? breton is the only celtic language spoken outside of the british isles. did you know france has germanic languages? alsatian, for example, is spoken in the east of france, unsurprisingly in alsace. it's not even the only french germanic language. did you know france has a number of languages and dialects known as langues d'oïl closely related to french? norman and picard, for example, are spoken in the north of france. did you know that france has gallo-romance languages? franco-provençal (which has a number of dialects) is spoken in the east of france, as well as parts of switzerland and italy. did you know that france has a language most closely related to catalan, the langues d'oc? occitan is spoken in the south of france and has a rich literary history. did you know france is home to basque, or rather euskara, a language isolate which predates indo-european languages? romani dialects! corsican! so much more than just french! there are even extinct jewish dialects of occitan! extinct langues d'oïl like angevin! so much linguistic diversity and all anyone talks about is french.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

My life is ruled by alkali metals

[weirdstrangeandawful]

I’m not paralysed and able to be upright without passing out but I can’t walk? Something is wrong with my legs. If I try and bear weight on them even slightly bent the muscles just seize up and I collapse. What the hell is this?!

[identifying-wheelchairs-in-posts]

Happy disability pride month!

This site has certainly shifted when it comes to disability rep over the last 4 years so please don't forget about wheelchair users, paraplegics, quadriplegics, class 3 Powerchair users, hoist users and any other severely disabled wheelchair users during your celebrations!

🖤💚💙🤍💛❤️🖤

[weirdstrangeandawful]

I got a prescription for AFOs, referral to a neuromuscular specialist clinic, and the contact information of the neurologist I lost touch with. Overall a successful appointment despite my GP’s goal still being to not need my wheelchair because I’m ‘so young’.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

The bus I’m on has the heating off and all the windows cracked open and I’m FREEZING. It’s 14° out.

[richardburbagehateblog]

"All drugs are drugs" = a surprisingly radical position that will upset people right across the political spectrum

This means:

If you draw a hard line between "drug" and "medicine" based on current legality where you live (or any other criteria) you've gone wrong somewhere,

If you think legality and/or prescription status tells you all you need about a substance's capacity to do massive harm to someone's body, mind or well-being you've gone wrong somewhere,

If you think legality and/or prescription status tells you all you need about a substance's capacity to contribute meaningfully to someone's healing, function or happiness you've gone wrong somewhere,

If you think certain substances should be excluded from informed consent (either withheld or forcibly administered) you've gone wrong somewhere.

[weirdstrangeandawful]

I have an appointment with my GP in less than 12 hours to talk about the fact that I can't keep my body where it should be in my wheelchair and am dealing with pressure injuries and moisture lesions again. I am 99% sure she'll tell me she has no idea what to do about that.

On top of that, she's American and is still figuring out the local healthcare system so it's not like she'll even be able to point me to someone helpful. I just can't keep doing this and have decided to do what an abled person would do.

My one hope is that I might get a prescription for AFOs because that will at least give me people to talk to and have been something that have been brought up by every pedorthist since normal orthotics became insufficient (which is like 10 years ago now). I don't know how compatible that is with wheelchair use but given that I'm having the same problems sitting as I am standing I think it might help?

[bunjywunjy]

going in search of fireflies again don't wait up

[bunjywunjy]

found theeeem