I’m trans, so, that’s one thing

More recently, I suffered from some pretty severe sleep deprivation as a result of a bout of insomnia. Hallucinations, micro-blackouts, the world stopped operating in a way I could understand properly. I would never, ever wish that upon my worst enemy and I hope I never experience it again.

Marriage. Don’t get married. I am not kidding. Tie yourself inextricably to someone and discover hell.

I was looking for a spot to watch my brother go by in his first Ironman while he was dieing at the hospital.

Getting downvoted in the Fediverse.

Going with my father to figure out how we would clean up the bathroom my grandfather attempted suicide in as I didn’t think it was something he should do on his own (it was my maternal grandfather but still…). I was right. It made every horror movie look tame. However, it was so terrible that there wasn’t much we could do other than phone crime scene cleanup and stay out of their way while they earned every single penny of their fee.

I met a homeless guy once and we talked. He told me about a time when at the train station there was someone laying on the ground, in the winter, nearly dying in front of a Cash Terminal.

People just stepped over him and were annoyed, while that person nearly died. He told me they had surveillance footage though and many of them where sued for denial of assistance.

The same guy had a huge fresh wound in his face. He was at the train station seeing 4 people attacking a single person. He went to them to see what was going on, had a weird feeling and turned around, someone smashed him in the head.

That was 4:00 in the morning, in the Winter at about 4°C. He woke up at 10:00, nobody helped him, and he nearly died.

He went to the hospital on his own to get stitches. A paramedic gave him his reflecting orange jacket, so that nobody would ever overlook him again…

Also told me how people would shit and piss directly next to where he had to sleep.

Nobody deserves to be homeless. This is so fucking sick.

Not sure, I’d have to say it’s a tie between having my hometown sunk into chaos by the classic tabloid treatment, accidentally contributing to the first human tragedy of someone close to me I’ve had to hear about, witnessing my only friends’ families tear apart by legal forces, assault and stuff at the psych ward, being kidnapped once, and overall people targeting me for various reasons.

Depression and gender dysphoria. It’s not very dramatic nor fast-acting, it just ate away at me for a decade until I was sure I wasn’t gonna survive the next few years.

The fear of death doesn’t go away, it just starts to seem like the least terrible option. And it’s one thing when you get those impulses to do it, but it’s even scarier when you feel calm and levelheaded and still feel you should do it.

Racism. I’ve been called racial slurs for not just my race, but other races. I’ve been profiled by police. I’ve watched my boss not only allow racist remarks made by my coworkers for no reason (eg: working like a hard-R) but laugh along to them. People judge Tarantino’s movies for excessive use of racism but I think they’re the most honest depictions of American culture.

Went under to have my wisdom teeth removed and I swear I was in hell for 5 seconds. All I could see was faded yellow and orange and I was hearing screaming.

Did some volunteering at some old folks homes and a hospice.

The hospice had people who were literally trapped in their own bodies. Bedridden and unable to move their arms, legs or even speak. They communicated yes/no by monotone grunting(two for yes, one for no.

Person was fully conscious and aware. Just unable to act on the outside world.

I was doing some work with an academic center that provided continuing education for the teachers and caretakers at orphanages. We always worked with local administration or charities who would educate the administrators and caretakers on how to maneuver the legal system in their country, while we provided the technical training and education resources. The goal was to get the children trained in a trade skill so they could support themselves when they got out. The areas we were working in were often remote and never in good areas, but the teachers and caretakers usually tried, they just didn’t know what they were doing and needed a little help. But at least they were trying.

By this point I had worked all over latin America, and a handful of countries in Africa. All of these people and cultures were different, but you could tell they tried, and the people in the villages and towns respected, and in many cases helped those that tried. Honestly it was some of the best and most rewarding work I have ever done.

I’m saying all of this because back in 2008 I ended up seeing an opportunity to go to Russia and do the same type work. I thought I’ve never been to Europe or Asia, sure that sounds exciting. Expecting to see the same thing I had seen in 18 other countries by this point. People in rural areas who saw a need and stepped in, now they just need training.

Instead of a rural town or village, we ended up in Kostroma, a city of a quarter million people. We find out from our contact from the Ministry of Education, that children are usually kicked out of orphanages at 14 as they are no longer profitable. At that point we should have immediately started asking questions, alarm bells should have gone off, etc. But it was the first day in a new country, we’re still getting to know our contacts before we start training. So there’s still some cultural unknowns, could be a translation error, any number of things.

While we’re doing our training, the teachers and caretakers were very standoffish, much more than we were expecting, but whatever, we’re the new people. They also have very strict times of when we have to be out of there. Makes sense, end of the work day, you’ve got kids to take care of, we get it.

We stayed too late one night and we found out the reason why the kids could become, “no longer profitable.” Evidently all of the orphanages in the area would sell kids for a night, and when they got too old, people didn’t want them, so they got kicked out. When we found out, obviously the first thing we did was try and report it. But we were told by both our contacts from the Ministry of Education, and the police, that’s just how they do business. If the kids want to eat they have to work.

We broke our contract with the Ministry of Education stating what we witnessed and left. Don’t know if anything has changed, but I’ve not been a fan of Russia ever since.

My brother left my disabeled mother to die in a diaper after a fall, until her leg turned septic from an untreated fracture. He was legally in charge of her and my dementia addled father; put a DNI on her and let her die of a heart attack after sitting in her shit for a week.

Then promised to fly me out to the funeral and ghosted me the same week, leaving my maternal family thinking I skipped the funeral.

Secondhand experience was being a content moderator for Tiktok and witnessing every warcrime, csam or otherwise horrible video spread on the internet for internet points before we had to manually flag it and take it down.

My ex

Kidney stones. Supposedly mine were tiny but it felt like hot nails being dragged across my skin. I was in pain for hours until the doctor gave me some pills so I could relax and piss out the stone (grain of sand). It was such a relief.