genderjumper | Recent Entries

Back in March, I started a 90-day course of an SSRI as a response to suspected Long COVID. Before I started it, I developed an ordinal chart for tracking my own "spoons" in categories that seemed important to me. I recorded my ranges under a variety of conditions (lows were mostly based on peak burnout last November, highs were mostly based on hypomanic cycles pre-COVID) and promptly forgot about it.

But I think that's a good thing. I am now 30+ days past the SSRI course and nearly a month out from my trip to NYC. And using this chart helps me focus on where things are significantly better, minutely better, or unchanged, so I can report that to my doctor. Here's a summary of the categories and my recent changes:

Push
How well can I accomplish a short but intensive physical activity, like loading a refrigerator on a dolly?
Shows some of the greatest improvement but not consistency. Still room to grow, but I'm no longer terrified that I couldn't respond to an emergency without a severe and immediate crash.

Endurance
How long can I be physically active without needing rest?
Moderate improvement, plenty of room for more.

Focus
How long can I focus on one project without needing rest?
Surprisingly no movement. "Follow-through requires intention" is still my high and "Minor difficulties with everyday tasks" is still my low.

Executive Function
How well can I make decisions and plan ahead?
Moderate improvement, room for more.

Emotional
How intense and manageable are my feelings?
No real change, but probably the one that least needed improvement. (So grateful for all the work I did on this as an adolescent.)

Transitions
How well do I navigate "transition time", i.e. shifting focus to a new activity, with or without warning?
Slight improvement, with lots of room to grow. (This one has been one of the greatest shocks to my way of life over the past year; I never used to have to think about transition time unless it was toward something unpleasant.)

Recovery (Waves)
If I expend a lot of energy, then rest, can I get some back -- i.e. a "second wave"?
Slight improvement, but was and remains my worst category. (What I do now is starting to look more like pacing, but I think there's a lot to learn and practice -- I don't think the doctor needs to hear it, but I should write about it more.)

Nutrition
Do I still need to eat a lot of protein every 3 hours (with snacks in-between) and what happens if I don't?
Moderate improvement from March, but a world better than ~~last November~~ the past 10+ years thanks to introducing a small but steady source of sugar into my diet. (This one probably warrants some backstory as well.)

Sleep
How sensitive am I to getting less than x number of hours (x varies, from less than 8 to 12; if you think that's annoying, before my 40s I could reliably function on 6 hours of sleep without consequences, and before grad school 4).
From one of my worst categories to my best and the primary reason I sometimes wonder if I'm still hypomanic (even though the timing is all wrong). I will never turn away a 10-12 hour sleep if the chance arises, but it's getting harder to fall asleep yet waking up isn't getting commensurately more difficult.

So I guess I'll be talking to the doctor about focus and transition time, as well as reporting that nutritional and sleep adjustments seem to be helping.

Current Mood: pondering
Current Location: about to eat again
Current Music: Res: How I Do album is stuck in my head and I'm okay with that.

A trans family in my extended community are about to GTFO Austin (lucky them!) and held a sendoff party today. One of my dear ones is also very dear to them, but disabled and geographically isolated from both them and me, so I asked if I could pick her up and drive her down. She gladly accepted.

( On the way down )

On the drive home, I recorded audio of a potential essay called, "How to Break a Resilient Heart" (or something similar) that felt a bit cathartic to get out of my head. It was a mournful how-to written from the perspective of the hurtiest relationship end I've ever experienced, which haunts me 8 years on. I also sang through a couple of albums, playing with my pitch and range.

I haven't felt this creative in a long time.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: No longer I-35
Current Music: Esthero: I Don't Wanna Let You Go

Poking at my resume, I looked up an old blog and was surprised to find it only contained a couple or three dozen entries. I ended up reading the first five entries or so and skimming the rest. And it got me thinking about how my mind used to race and interconnect ideas well enough to dash off 1000-word entries like that. (Not that I was ever much of a blogger... my output was too sporadic and often went far too long.)

I'm not surprised that my "voice" is so different -- the early entries sound so unlike me! But also, I had to ask myself if I keep telling myself and others what a good writer I am simply out of habit. What if that changed after my last illness? Or COVID? Or general disillusionment? As Janet Jackson might say, "What have you done for me lately?"

I think it'll take a few months to answer, but I needed to put the question out there.

Current Mood: pensive
Current Location: headed to the kitchen

As someone who has done a lot of unpaid labor and a lot of virtual events, I appreciate the occasion of a good debrief. My trip to NYC was such a slog that I'm going to need to debrief on multiple fronts, so this is gonna be practice:

( Debrief V0.1 )

Overall, though, I can't help wondering if the era of the road trip is over. Every stage is way harder than it needs to be, and every place I stopped is one mobile outage away from wasting away.

I'm so glad I enjoyed it while I had the chance.

Current Mood: weary
Current Location: Not the road
Current Music: Ask D.J.G.J.

ganked from another conversation:

I mean maybe it just reflects that gender is contextual performance, and in some parts of our lives we were performing for the audience and some parts we're performing for ourselves.

I changed my name around the same time I started openly identifying as genderfluid, and even though I treated them as separate journeys they intermingled a lot. I have no problem referring to that earlier version of myself (to whit: I already refer to that era in the third person like another entity rather than a deadname, per se) as a "boy", but explicitly BOY: he was young and naïve and ignored his genderfuckery and a lot of other phenomena that have since come to define me.

I also think (and I've heard this from several other nonbinary folks of various flavors) there's something fluid about youth that is expected to become rigid and playless (antonym of playful that I just made up but should probably use somehow...) that is not available to "men" and "women". Gender constructs are socially prescribed, and I've often felt that cultures who are more rigid about binary genders are creating the need for third genders, whereas if a culture allowed for a less rigid spectrum some portion of trans folks may just be able to vibe within those broader, more flexible categories.

TL;DR: a culture can have a finite number of genders or it can have rigid gender boundaries, but it cannot have both. I envision this as a giant, flexible tent held up with two poles vs. an estate with two locked mansions and thousands of tiny houses being built on the lawn.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: about to go to the kitchen for lunch

I'm in the school zone.
I'm in the power outage.
I'm in the combination school zone / power outage traffic.

I'm driving home from the laundromat because our washer won't drain properly.
I'm texting my angry partner while driving home.
I'm texting one angry partner while driving the other home from the laundromat because our washer won't drain properly.

I'm in the combination school zone / windstorm / power outage / traffic during a fascist coup / pandemic / climate catastrophe / washer break-down and having a polycule argument.

And now I'm hungry.

Current Mood: stuck
Current Location: 2 blocks from home
Current Music: turned the radio off to focus

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Current Mood: stunned
Current Location: it happened in the kitchen
Current Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgpcEYkj0hQ

I have a weird quandary that has emerged.

( The long version... )

TL:DR: my partner thinks I'm too honest but I'm trying to offer my potential/reneging mentee a sample of exactly who I am and what I have to offer by reflecting on her unspoken assumptions. By email. Is this a bad idea, and if so which part(s)?

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: 'Bout to eat my kale salad and go to bed
Current Music: Lucinda Williams' Magnolia

I had some wins tonight. One silly, one actually really important to me, but I sort of accosted my disabled partner on her way to bed to tell her about them and was really hurt that she wouldn't pause to acknowledge or congratulate me.

I probably have a couple of friends I could pester this late, but that's not really what I need. My friends are always supportive, they're just not always around. My partner is supportive, she just isn't always... present (and it has nothing to do with me when she can't be). But I don't really have extended family any more and the same can be said for community, and I'm so eager to be someplace new and try again...

But I'm also aware that's a lot to put on new people. And a lot to put on myself. And still carries some assumption of stability that may not be within our control.

I've gotten really good at needing very little social support -- not in a way that minimizes myself, just more rooted, durable, and efficient. I wanted a moment to feel excited and not be thinking about how to leverage it into marketing myself.

But I guess it's time to move on and think about how to leverage it into marketing...

*****

As I was writing that last line, she came out and asked for a redo. We're okay. Living with chronic pain is like this sometimes. Learning to be judicious with how much I depend on her has made me a stronger, more sensitive person overall and I wouldn't give that up. She's there when it matters. I just miss having a larger intimate network.

Current Mood: teary
Current Location: about to go watch Legion

Nevermind all my concerns about AI; apparently the problem will solve itself:
https://fixvx.com/lazerwalker/status/1825782926098968958

Current Mood: jubilant

A response to this assessment vis à vis leaders we have personally known.

I had three mentors when I worked in Washington, D.C. They each influenced and inspired me in distinct niches: one professionally, one personally, and one metaphysically, but they all shared similar qualities as leaders (and were, in fact, all directors at the organization). I think what first drew me to them at the time was a casual insightfulness: not only were they learned and perceptive about the shared world in ways that I could not discern at the time, but they were also each very open and diplomatic with their thought processes: you always knew where you stood with them and you always knew why you stood there. I never saw any of them angry or even particularly irritated, just shrewd and prepared. I wanted that kind of poise.

Knowing what I know now, I absolutely believe they were all participatory leaders (which was my result in the Leadership Style Survey) and what I saw then as insight was actually just a honed humility: they knew what they were capable of, they knew what partners and opposition were capable of, and they came to every conversation prepared for both the best and the worst case scenario without being attached to the outcome: they fought for what they thought was best, they listened and negotiated, and they accepted the results. There might have been some compromises along the way, but I don’t think I ever saw them “lose” in those spaces, and indeed I think another way to describe “participatory” leadership is “noncompetitive”, which is a core value we all shared with the organization that employed us. We’re not looking to “win”, we’re trying to help everyone succeed.

Current Location: not Washington, DC
Current Music: the harpsicord hottie finished, time to wind down

I was assigned 500 words on this Public Health framework, and here's what I'm submitting:

1. Monitor health status to identify and solve community health problems:
Until spring of 2023, it was relatively easy to locate several tracks of information on COVID cases: positive tests, hospitalizations, and deaths. But because public health failed to adequately prepare and update the public for the complex realities of a global pandemic in a globalized economy, these measures became less reliable even before they were canceled. Testing, in particular, became less common as employers pressured workers -- and eventually even governments -- to return to work as quickly as possible, leading to drop in testing and decrease in free testing infrastructure. Since the end of the Emergency Declaration (which ostensibly was not the same as declaring an end, but was mischaracterized by media and elected officials), testing must be paid for out of pocket or processed through insurance; the more cumbersome and expensive the process becomes, the less testing that takes place, so it was already unreliable when states stopped reporting positive cases. Hospitalizations and deaths are similarly skewed: we are seeing far more cases of stroke, heart attack, and cancer than happened before 2020, but because the data on Long COVID is slow in coming (and many people don't know about it or take it seriously), the link between these phenomena and COVID are not reported. When, however, we measure "excessive deaths", we can capture broad trends since deaths that are not recorded as COVID may nevertheless be compared to pre-COVID figures; sure enough, only a handful of months since March 2020 have featured a "normal" rate of excessive deaths. This measure, too, has been diluted by measures being compared not against pre-COVID patterns but trends of the past 5 years (which includes COVID's most active years), so that the significance of data is harder to observe. Our only remaining reliable measure of COVID's ebbs and flows comes in wastewater monitoring, although it is more concentrated in urban areas and not widely discussed by media or public officials. All we need is accurate data and an infrastructure to report changes -- as well as the will to educate and possibly even enforce public responses, such as voluntary or mandatory closures for 2-6 weeks at a time -- to resume a reasonable monitoring practice and reduce illness, disabling chronic illness, and likely deaths closer to pre-COVID levels.

2 Diagnose and investigate health problems and health hazards in the community:
Data already exists that indicates cities who held on to COVID restrictions have fared better in public health measures (even as all cities and states and most nations have dropped most or all restrictions) than those who dropped them quickly, but even if we didn't have that data we could point to the same trends in the influenza pandemic of the late 1910s. Since COVID is strictly airborne (a fact that was widely suspected but misrepresented almost from the beginning), investigating health hazards could focus on identifying "superspreader" events and settings and making sure mandatory spaces -- such as schoolrooms, public transportation, and courtrooms -- received HVAC upgrades and sustained maintenance. Further, new buildings and renovations could be mandated to require such upgrades in the future, furthering evidence of their efficacy.

3. Inform, educate, and empower people about health issues:
Politicians don't want to publicly acknowledge their mistakes -- that COVID isn't really over, that masks were a good thing, and that public health was woefully underfunded and understaffed by 2020 -- but we literally just saw a presidential campaign end after the candidate contracted his third case... that we know of. A little humility would go a long way to restore faith in public health, since the misinformed believe it was some sort of politicized hoax and the over-informed can no longer trust public health institutions to have their best interests in mind. A fresh education campaign could clarify the misunderstandings of early guesses and gimmicks and reassert the importance of simple monitoring and protection practices: pay attention to when you're in a crowd or around someone sick and notify others in your life; wear a mask when local COVID rates are on the rise; normalize masking in healthcare environments in perpetuity. I'm not sure people will ever feel informed, educated, and empowered with their own health again unless public health can inform, educate, and empower its own corrections.

I could go on with 4, 5, 7, 8 (especially 8!), 9, and 10, but I've hit my word count...

Current Mood: frustrated
Current Location: dancing in my office throne
Current Music: Skyliner by Charlie Barnet

I've found myself revisiting one of my earliest quirky, reflexive metaphors several times of late, and

flamingsword asked me to explain it. I think I have, at times, called it "The Lifesaver Metaphor", which is more poetic but technically incorrect twice over.

TWO LIFEGUARDS

Two Lifeguards found each other early in life. They had both helped so many people in their brief lives that they saw in one another a shared drive to help others and quickly build a loving relationship out of it. While it wasn't perfect, it often felt too good to be true. "How can another person see me so well?" they each thought.

In celebration of their love, they went on a cruise, but late the first night they both felt overboard. No one on the ship knew they were gone, and since they were the ones who checked on everyone else, who knew how long it would take for someone to notice?

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

Surely my lover will save me, each thought.

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

Almost at the same moment, they spoke:
"We must swim to shore," said one lifeguard. "There are islands all around us, surely we can find land and get help."
"We must stay where we are," said the other lifeguard. "Someone will notice eventually and they will come find us."

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

Surely my lover will save me, each thought.

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

Did they fight? Did they repeat themselves? Did they hurt one another trying to prove something to themselves? Almost certainly.

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

Their thoughts remained in sync: Surely my lover will save me... My lover will save me... My lover can save me...

They looked at each other. There was nothing else to see.

My lover can't save me...

Their parting barely qualified as a goodbye or a break-up, for by this time each was entirely focused on self-preservation.

They didn't look at each other. There was nothing else to say.

One lifeguard swam away. The other lifeguard stayed in place.

And with a little effort, both plans worked: each lifeguard was rescued exactly as hoped. Once they knew the other person was safe, they did not reconnect.

Their lives diverged rapidly.
The lifeguard who swam away continued to find power in action. The lifeguard who stayed continued to find power in staying still. They each helped so many people yet protected themselves a little more than before.

With each passing year, the other lifeguard and the falling overboard and the rescue would take up a smaller space in their memories.

They stopped looking for one another. There was nothing else to see.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: 1999
Current Music: listened to Glass Animals' new album yesterday at bestie's request

This is a good place to think out loud or get input from peers.

Topics that need messy, process-y attention soon:

Navigating a squishy flexible workload so there's enough time for the concrete elements to actually get done.
When and how to refer out a client whose emotional needs are more than I can handle and interfering with care support.
How to seal the deal with squishes: I want these people in my life and/or work and there's no time to hold back.
The Ordinal Chaos Index: some vague but ongoing measure of how chaotic things are on a personal, communal, or population scale.
Time to start closing doors again on people who are not engaging me on social media despite good faith efforts.
I probably also need help translating prospective clients into paychecks, colleagues into mentors/mentees.
Do I bother warning my friends and communities that now is the time to invest in communal support, not to wait for their rugged individualism to catch up? If so, how? If not, how do I let go of the notion I should.
Do I need to be more proactive in sharing my own foibles on social media? If so, who am I sharing them for? If not, why not?
(2a?) Am I becoming a magnet for energy vampires or am I actually helping them? What are my expectations and limitations either way?
My coaching work needs clearer goals, for me and for the clients.

Current Location: Steroid headache
Current Music: Wet Leg: I Don't Wanna Go Out

A dear friend who seemingly drifted out of my life for the better part of a decade has reached out a couple times in recent years. She asked me for a phone call, and today we made it happen. I thought maybe she wanted to talk about future travels or just kind of generally keeping in touch.
But after a quick catch-up, she hit me with the question I didn't know I so desperately needed to be asked:
"So what happens to your life after caregiving?"
The hour that followed was only the beginning, but when I tell you how much I needed this conversation with this person in this way, it should sound like navigating by the stars for the first time or harvesting fruit you didn't know you planted. Our lives were starkly parallel in those days, and in some ways it divided us. I'm not even sure either of us knew what she was seeking from me until her healing leveled up and she thought to schedule this call and ask this question.
I really needed this. And there will be more in the future.
[Wipes away another tear.]

Current Mood: touched
Current Location: Just another phone call
Current Music: Bittersweet by Big Head Todd and the Monsters

A wise person who may or may not be me posted this ontological argument against AI: https://theoriesofcarehome.wordpress.com/2024/05/28/against-generative-ai/.

Current Mood: motivated
Current Location: follow the shoulder pain
Current Music: Janet jackson's Rhythm Nation and Janet albums have been stuck in my head

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Current Mood: flirty
Current Location: fresh out of bed

For the past few years, holidays and birthdays have undergone a transformation for me. It's hard to safely gather; when money's tight it's hard to save up the money to do something special; and when your relationship with time is changing it can be hard to find inspiration. Even before the pandemic, it was hard to match the holidays of my youth or the community feel of polycules past, but if you'd seen me then I was fucking miserable. How many Chrismases in a row did I sleep through after staying up until 4 trying to get everyone else's presents perfect? Not really out of joy, mind you, just out of a sense of obligation. I was trying to pour my affection out for a lot of people but I didn't have the organizational skills (or energy reserves) to do justice for most.

When my best friend emeritus and I talked last week, she confessed disappointment that I hadn't put much effort into her past couple of birthdays or holidays. But I'm slowly coming to terms with gift-giving not really being my thing right now. I'm not sure I've ever been as good at it as I thought, and these days I'm comfortable putting as little effort as I can justify (and with so much going on, it becomes a lot).

But I don't want to be solipsistic about it.

Today is going to be my nesting partner's birthday, but her father is in the hospital and our plans are waylaid. I'm not sure either of us has the initiative to dream up something bigger than a custard run.

But here's the thing: if we go on that custard run, we'll blast great music, we'll laugh and hold hands, and we'll feel so fucking loved by the little things that the custard won't matter. This is someone who has sewn her wild oats and experienced a wide range of affections and she draws comfort from acts of service now. It matters to her a lot more that I show up for her every day and there's no one I'd rather be stuck in an apocalypse with. I want to do more, but if I put a lot of time and energy into some big gesture or gift, what other quality time would I be sacrificing? What other responsibilities might I ignore or forget?

I can't explain all this to emeritus. She's learning to value herself (perhaps for the first time) and I honor that for her, but I also can't really tell her about all the heavy stuff going on in my life (and she never bothers to ask).

I kinda want to do a Facebook post for my partner's birthday, but I don't want it to detract from everything else we have going on (and there's no guarantee she'd even see it this month). I'm mostly going to focus on showing up.

Current Mood: calm
Current Location: Taking a break from Whiplash. That movie is intense.
Current Music: Taking a break from Whiplash. That music is intense.

I've never had a consistent best friend for more than a few years at a time.

( Backstory )

So we finally talked last night, and it was interesting how many of the same words and possibilities we were considering: her therapist asked if she wanted to de-escalate and she said no, but she also acknowledged some baggage with the term "best friend" and elaborated on just how easy it is for her to receive neutral statements as pressure. I told her that the chaos in the air tells me we're only going to have a harder time connecting away from text, and that my efforts to document my mental health cycles are intended to allow people to choose their level of engagement based on predictable dynamics, but I'm not sure she groks how literal I mean these things. I fluently shift between hyper-abstract and hyper-literal communication and it never occurs to me that someone might not be keeping up.

(Echos of Foucault, who must be read slowly because he writes theory in deliberately obtuse ways to foster caution and discourage misunderstanding; my unique style of communication intimidates many because they think it's formal or hyper-cerebral, but it's when I let my guard down and attempt to be casual with people I trust that the other person gets devastated by some offhand observation delivered without tact because I constantly process heavy stuff and fail to anticipate how triggering it can be for friends.)

It was a mutual conversation, but the agenda centered her worries and needs and left little room for mine. B tapped out after 90 minutes, literally starting to lose her voice as I rushed a couple of clarifying questions. I have a few action steps to hopefully nurture things, but I'm in no hurry to lean on her or be casual with my enthusiasm (which managed to trigger this latest explosion because I wanted to say I loved a book but didn't pay attention to punctuation or tone).

My enthusiasm may be the purest and most innocent part of myself. (I credit it to my best friend from 8th-9th grade, who taught me to love learning and be shameless in doing so. I last saw him in 2015, just before he moved back to Europe and a couple of years before I closed a lot of social doors because the people on the other sides rarely checked on me.) In person or over the phone, there's never any doubt that my clumsiness comes from excitement, but its impossible to adequately convey over text. The reflexivity continues.

Current Mood: pensive
Current Location: alone on a metaphorical beach
Current Music: my partner's 80s punk

I'm not sure there's much to do for an eclipse other than stand around in awe, notice how the subtleties of the partial already change the animals and the shadows, etc. We've got intermittent clouds here today, so it's a bit more of a game and excitement, wondering how much we'll get to see and when (supposed to have totality in about 20 minutes.

I'm increasingly sensitive to another shift around me. My reading of time or chaos (are they even distinct?) leads me to believe we're within 6 months of a major shift, maybe less, but of course those things don't happen all at once. The eclipse may just be a coincidence, or maybe it'll affect some decision-makers... One can only hope.

Current Mood: alert
Current Location: running in and out every door for the best view
Current Music: Wet Leg is stuck in my head

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Gender Jumper

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Gender Jumper

Recent Entries

Ordinal Spoon Scale Assessment

Kind Acts of Randomness

Am I Still a Good (Process) Writer?

Draft Debrief

Playless is the Antonym of Playful that I just made up

Meme+Poem=PoEme? Me-ome? Me-oesy? Poes-eme? ...

Sexting Is Not an Infinite Resource

Weird quandary gets weirder...

Togetherness Is for Celebration

Whew, crisis averted!

Homework Again: Leadership Styles

Three Examples of how Public Health Is Currently Failing to Meet Essential Public Health Services

The Lifeguard Analogy

Reminder to Myself

Not me over here crying?!

What do Generative AI and the Social Sciences have in common? Quite a lot, it turns out...

Nostalgia Dreams

Griswolding Is a Verb for a Reason

Friendship Tides

Eclipse Blessings or Something