Category: Warrior
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One Tender Step
The thing about writing consistently is that blog posts start showing up in strange places. Like your head. Offline. Which is what happened last night. I fell into a deep, dark depression while trying to go to sleep. Not because something new had happened, but because something finally caught up with me. I had been…
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Noise Into Signal
And then there are bad days. Holy hell. The irony is that the badness is actually part of healing. I feel fine. So I forget. And then I do something that reminds my nervous system that, no, we are not fine yet. Which it communicates clearly. Loudly. Understandably. Because even when there is no pain,…
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Taxing Nerves
I filed my taxes today. Ow. Ow ow ow ow. Not emotionally, surprisingly. Just the normal paperwork migraine of the soul. But also… not as bad as last year? Which is its own strange kind of victory. But the taxes aren’t actually the story. Sunday is. Stay with me for a minute. Saturday was almost…
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A Nervous Truce
This morning was the San Diego neurologist appointment. Which felt oddly like the final boss battle of this whole saga. Or at least the point where someone with a Very Large Brain Map might explain what the hell had been happening. Instead, the appointment started with a question. “What are you hoping for today?” Which…
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Occipital Neuralgia
Occipital Neuralgia is a condition in which the occipital nerves, the nerves that run through the scalp, are injured or inflamed. by Julie G Pilitsis, MD, PhD, FAANSChair, Neuroscience & Experimental Therapeutics Professor, Neurosurgery and Neuroscience & Experimental Therapeutics Albany Medical College Dr. Pilitsis specializes in neuromodulation with research interests in treatments for movement disorders and…
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On My Last Nerve
Nurtec, it turns out, is very new. So new that insurance companies mostly pretend it doesn’t exist. Which means it costs about $250 for eight pills. I declined. Thankfully the gabapentin worked. Not perfectly, but enough. The pain dropped from a seven to nine down to a two to four. Occasionally it would spike back…
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Officially a Nervous Wreck
On Wednesday, February 11th, I slept poorly. Not unusual. Just one of those nights where sleep shows up, but doesn’t quite do the job it was hired for. Later that day a migraine arrived. Also not unusual. So I did what I normally do: took some Tylenol, laid down for a nap, and waited for…
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From Self-Sacrifice to Self-Support
I’ve been thinking about the difference between self pity and self compassion, and how sneaky that difference is when you’re inside it. From the inside, self pity feels justified. Heavy, yes, but justified. It sounds logical. Reasonable. Evidence-based. Look at all the reasons I can’t. Look at how unfair this is. Look at how tired…
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When Is It Time to Flee?
I don’t mean a casual move to another city, I mean actually wrestling with what safety, identity, belonging, and political reality feel like right now. I’m here in California, feeling both grateful and battered. Grateful for the community and relative sanctuary. Battered because it feels like every other week something surfaces that reminds me how…
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Have You Tried Turning It Off and Back On?
When I’m “supposed to” do something but I don’t wanna, I do absolutely nothing instead. Not rest. Not recovery. Not even a deliciously rebellious alternative. Just… nothing. I sit there like a browser tab that’s been open too long, quietly consuming resources while refusing to load. This pattern used to annoy me. I thought it…
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This Is a Love Story
Some days I go to the gym, and it feels meh. Mechanical. Just a place where I lift heavy things and then put them back down again like a very sweaty librarian. Sometimes, though, going to the gym feels like a small, quiet act of love. Not the loud, romantic kind. No grand gestures. No…
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YOU DID IT!! !
After the Storm, Before the Dust Okay. Deep breath again. They’re gone. All three. Three kids, three rounds, three weeks each. Nine weeks of parenting solo in a home that had never been fully theirs before — until now. And now it’s quiet. Really, truly quiet. The kind of quiet that feels like a question:…