Pneumonia blood in nose

Hello everyone, I am 50M, lately I have been going through an interesting life bump. Just a little background about me. I am a single father of three children. I grew up in an abusive household. My dad would physically abuse my mom and also beat my siblings and me. I have four younger siblings, three of them being girls. I was the oldest and would try to take the beatings for them. My oldest just was locked up on various charges and his ex is living with me because my son was abusing her. I actually posted about it, ill leave a link in case anyone wants to read it.
I do not like my father, I still have a relationship with my mom because I do love her dearly even though I partially blame her. A week an a half ago while my daughters were out at disney land, I got a surprise visit from my family. I opened the door to see my brother and sisters in front. I of course asked them if everything was okay and if mom was okay. I was told by my brother that I will have to take a deep breath and that I wasn't gonna like this. It was hard to see past them but I was able to see my mother getting outta the car with a man and my first thought was "oh boy" but it quickly turned to 'a long and violent " fuck". I swear to god I couldn't believe it, She was walking arm to arm with my fucking father.
I looked at my siblings with the expression of " what the fuck is this?" I told them to come inside and I stepped outside to confirm what I was seeing. I didn't say a word verbally but im sure the my facial expression spoke for me. I turned around and went back inside, i do not know what I was gonna say but I had to give me some time to process it. I closed the door behind me, leaving my parents outside. Admitttalty as AHOLE move. I asked my siblings about what was going on, we kinda had a sibling meeting. Everyone was kinda caught off guard as well by it as they were in a similar situation as me. I let my parents in after a few quick minutes.
We all sat down in the living room and we waited for the meeting to start. My mother started it off by thanking all of us for being here ( like if i was invited) and that she thinks its time that we forgave our father. I am not completely sure what she said after words but she was speaking for him and I angrily asked her if he cant speak for himself, If he lost his sharp tongue. My father was about to speak but mom raised her hand a bit signaling to stay quiet. She told us " your father wants to reconcile with you guys and wants to build something with you guys. That he came to her flowers in hand asking for forgiveness." there was a lot more but im going to be honest. I blanked it all out. I sorta snapped at her and told her that she was out of her mind. To come into my house arm and arm with the fucking animal I spent my childhood defending every single one of you from. To come in here and to tell me to just forgive him, be buddies, be father and son. To ask my siblings to do the same. My sisters were trying to get me to water down a bit but I told them to say something as well, this was the same monster that made them hide in their rooms growing up. They just sat down and stayed mute.
That she of all people should loathe this man, for the shit he did to her, for the shit he did to us. At this point I was ranting and looking at my siblings for help or for them to say something. They just looked at me. I turned to my father and told him to speak, not one word from him has been muttered. When he spoke, it was like the speech from the lich ( adventure time) that's how it felt for me. " After all this time, you remain the same man, unable to move past and find forgiveness in your heart. You are the same man as me and yet you look at me with such hate." He continued to utter garbage at me, not once did he apologize to me or my siblings, not once that he talk to me like an equal. He started to "remind me (us)" about all the things he did for us, the family. I scoffed at him. I Told him that him breaking my nose, and making me put down our dog because he was barking to loud over your show was really doing it for the betterment of the family. Like burning my sisters clothes because you thought they were too revealing. Or perhaps beating mother with a broom stick until it broke was for the betterment of the family.
My mom was trying to stop me from continuing on but I told her to keep her mouth shut, that this was between the animal and me. I told him the only reason you decided to come back from the grave was because his was dying, alone, with nobody by his side and the only people he ever had was his family. After all these years, he only now decide to come and ask for our forgiveness. To not only come to us like a coward hiding behind our mothers weaponized emotional incompetence. That he finally realized how pathetic his existence has been.
My siblings stayed quiet but only nooded at me when I turned to look at them. I refuse to accept his bullshit reconciliation plan. That he was more than welcomed to die alone. In some cold and empty room. I told my mother that the same faith would follow her if she decided to continue her association with him. She has had my support, my blood and tears for as long as I have been alive for. I told her If she wants to throw that away for this animal than she can walk out my fucking house with him.
My siblings have my back on this, they are not forgiving him. I love my mother with all my heart but I will die on this hill if i have to. AITA?
Edit: I have apologized to my mother, and to each one of my siblings since. My mother and I haven't really spoken since. My siblings all said that the reason they stayed quiet was because they were gonna decide after I made my decision. If I forgave him than they would to. That they didn't say anything because I was speaking for them. I am not sure what the fuck my mother was thinking.

I have been on Mounjaro and then Zepbound since Aug 2022. I lost 50 lbs 22% of my body weight. I was in maintenance mode on 10mg. In Feb 2024, I got really sick with the flu and pneumonia and was off for almost 4 weeks. I took 3 rounds of antibiotics and a burst dose of prednisone. Then went back on to 10mg. Since then it is like the medication has completely stopped working for me. Over two months I gained 10 lbs despite keeping my calories and diet the same. The food noise and cravings are there with no satiety. I moved up a dose. I do Pilates 3x week and walk and exercise 3-4x week. Nothing! My doctor is an Osteopath and said she can feel the inflammation returning to my tissue. All my aches and pains are back. It’s so alarming. Anyone else experience this? My doctor suggested taking a hiatus to let my receptors and body reset but Im terrified of the inflammation and weight gain. I was insulin resistant with an A1C of 5.4 when I started. Down to 4.8 after weight loss. Now at 5.0. My blood inflammation markers are normal but my body just hurts.

I (30M) had a (s)texting based affair with a co-worker that my wife (31F) discovered about a month ago. I deeply regret what I did. I signed us up for marriage counseling. I installed our cell phone providers parental app on my phone giving her full access to essentially anything I do. I have answered her questions and begged her for forgiveness and to stay with me. We have an 8 year old and 1 year old.
When she found out, as I was holding our 1 year old, she walked up and punched me as hard she could right in my nose/mouth. Broken nose, blood pouring down my face, front teeth shifted out of place. I put her up in a $500 hotel room for Mother’s Day last weekend to give her some time away, and she thanked me by reaching out to my parents and telling them that I har been having an affair with a coworker. Oh, and she told them that I use marijuana (I make well over 6 figures, fully employed, own a home, 2 cars, all in my name as she is a SAHM w/ no income. I like to indulge in the evenings before bed and relax. I hand my business, I don’t see a problem with this. Better yet, my wife also doesn’t have a problem with it- she simply told them in an effort to diminish my reputation or perception of me. (Which was great, prior to last weekend.)
Today, I left work at 11am after a 2 hour conversation with my boss about having to leave work too often to help my wife with some type of issue. My wife rented a u haul as we are picking up a dryer from my sister and brother in law 20 minutes away. She can’t do things like this alone; so she demands I leave the office to help her (abusing the flexibility I used to enjoy with my boss, which is gone now.) Naturally, we get in a huge fight because she had originally told me she only told my parents that I smoked weed. However today, she told me she exposed my texting affair to them as we pulling up to their home to pickup a couch as well. So we started to argue. I have always had no issues with emotional stability, am a naturally happy and optimistic person, and come from a loving family. (She does not) Sure, I get angry and sometimes yell- but I’ve never physically harmed her intentionally tried to cause damage or inflict pain on her life in any way. I love her and of course at times get upset with her, but I process this as any normal person might.
I shut down, stopped talking and tried to walk away from the situation to deescalate. She folllows, screaming insults, and is becoming increasingly frustrated that I’m not responding to her. In an effort to gain leverage over me and force me to her will, she decides to threaten me with the thing that motivated me to come and make this post seeking help.
When she found the texts, she had screenshotted them and sent them to her phone. Today, she pulls out her phone and said I am going to send these screenshots to your boss and your entire team. (Normal for everyone’s direct contact info to be public knowledge in my line of work.)
At this point; I started to lose it and said something to the effect of you’re threatening every aspect of my life because you want me to be forced to endure you berate me and humiliate me to everyone around us.
Reddit.
If what I did warrants this type of treatment- then please tell me. So be it. I can live with that. What I can’t live with (or is starting to feel like it) is feeling that I’m being emotionally abused and tortured with her justifying it because of my selfish and poor decision.

39 (age)/120 lbs (weight)/5 feet (height)/ non smokeno drugs or alcohol/no previous medical condition/area of concern: brain
Five months ago, I had a cranial facial release procedure done by a certified practitioner. This is a balloon treatment where the doctor inserts a finger cot balloon into your nose and inflated it with a blood pressure bulb. In my case, she put the balloon in both my upper nasal cavities. She inflated the balloon so much that the pain was a 9/10, and I felt cracking in my face and head. It felt like being punched in the face and having my brain squeezed at the same time.
I immediately felt dizzy and disoriented with increased brain fog. I went to the ER the next day and they ran a CT with contract, which came back clear.
I followed up with my primary care doctor, who sent me to a neurologist for further testing, and those results are below.
Since this incident, I’ve been dealing with 24/7 cognitive issues - memory lapses (almost feels like the brain zaps one would get coming off an SSRI, which I’m not on), involuntary muscle movements while awake, disorientation, difficulty reading, slight vertigo, feeling off and out of it. No headache or pain - all cognitive.
My doctors aren’t sure what to do besides physical therapy and time. My question is: since I received this injury from excessive force/pressure in my nasal cavities vs typical concussion from blunt force, is my brain affected in a different way that a typical concussion? I’m wondering if my recovery prognosis is worse due to the way I recover the injury. Any truth to that since I’ve been struggling many months with no improvement in symptoms? Any therapies or treatments to help me heal are appreciated.
MRI Non-specific punctuate focus of T2 FLAIR hyperintensity within the right frontal subcortical white matter. This may be from sequela migrainous vasculopathy or gliosis from other remote assault.
QEEG (eyes closed, awake) Shows slow delta waves in the frontal lobes

I have autism, so I suck at recognising and explaining symptoms. But effexor, my first antidepressant, has been good overall. It basically cured my depression and anxiety.
But I was perhaps a little overstimulated. And it gave me very fast heart rate and high blood pressure that gave me migraines and nose bleeds etc. My sister tried it and couldn't stay on it at all. Zoloft works great for them, so my family doctor wants me to try that as well.
But I had the best year of my life in terms of mental health on 150 effexor and 30 mirtazapine. I only had problems when a new doctor started upping them to 225/45, and then lowered it in the space of a month.
So now I'm currently down to 37.5 effexor and off mirtazapine after being on 150 effexor and 30 mirtazapine at the start of the month. This is the only way for me to start zoloft, so I thought that I might as well get it over with as I don't want to be on a low dose for months.
But I'm really wondering why I'm even switching from "California rocket fuel" to plain old Zoloft when I was doing just fine for the past year. My summer is probably going to be ruined by the switch, and there's no guarantee that zoloft even works.
I can't tell whether the benefits outweigh the side effects or if I'd be better on zoloft since my sister is doing well on it. And I'm not sure which might be better for potential inattentive ADHD.
So, are side effects alone worth switching medications? Or the fact that I still had some bit of sadness while on Effexor. But who knows if those symptoms are just something I'll have to always put up with because of autism or ADHD.

This isn't a book request per se, I'm more thinking out loud about how much I relate to MFCs who are open to romance and do want to get together with the MMC.
In HR, in alien romances, in paranormal stories, I'm all into the MFC who is ready to go for her arranged husband/fated mate/monster boyfriend.
This is just me but I don't enjoy "MMC woos/convinces/works to win the MFC "storylines (save for rejection/betrayal stories)*.
No need to convince me, pal, I'm already hot to trott. In fact, maybe I need to convince YOU so that you match my enthusiasm for this forced marriage/fated mating/monster match.
Some of my favourite stories have an open and emotionally forward MFC who shows interest without shame or fear and is excited by the prospect of a partner.
*Sidenote: I get quite anxious about (non-dark romance) storylines where the MFC repeatedly says "No" to the MMC's attentions and he continues with his "wooing". It reminds me of IRL pestering by people who were unwilling to understand a simple No or Not Interested and kept asking me out or trying to romance me. Nope.
I especially love an eager MFC in a sci-fi/paranormal storyline and I will probably DNF if the MFC keeps rejecting the MMC until the end. I get bored and exhausted by those storylines.
Some of my favourite unabashedly romantic sap MFCs!
{Her Bridegroom Bought and Paid For by Alice Coldbreath} - Aimee is chill with buying her husband with her father's money because she thinks he's honourable and righteous. Is disappointed when her initial assessment is proven wrong.
{Craving In His Blood by Zoey Draven} - Millie is funny-looking and interesting, too bad the winged alien vampire lord will reject her in favour of his political marriage. Or will he?
{Nickel's Story by Cate C Wells} - Story wants Nickel, despite his idiot hangups but showing him her boobs doesn't seem to be working. It just makes him angry, then sad, then angry again.
{Luxuria by Collete Rhodes} - This monster hunter cannot possibly want an arranged wedding to the Shade King. Don't look in her sketchbook though. It's NSFW. (This book is not a favourite but it fits the bill)
{War Priest by Anne Aguirre} - Cat shifter wants big Bear Shifter warrior monk (Who doesn't!). Surely he won't leave his religious order so he can lick her mouth?!?
{Seized by Heather Fox} - Human woman who is ecstatic about being on a planet with big jungle-dwelling aliens and cannot WAIT for her fated mate to come along. He's taking his sweet time believing she's real.
This whole series is excellent and I cannot recommend it enough.
Other MFCs who are DTF (Down To Fall In Love)
{Heat for Hire by VK Ludwig}
{The Temptation of a Highlander by Elisa Braden}
{The Alien's Challenge by Ella Maven}
{In Safe Hands by Katie Ruggle} but also {Gone Too Deep by Katie Ruggle}
Last Note: I wanted to use the term Eager Beaver in this post but I thought it was too on the nose. Or beaver.

Vitamin d toxicity
Hello, I had a vit d deficiency of level 6 in March 2023
I went to a doctor and requested the right dose of vit d as my deficiency was severe and I was constantly shaking and felt like I would die. The doctor prescribed me 1 injection of 6L arachitol twice a week for 4 weeks.
Then also take 8 supplements of 60k iu vitamin d
I started taking it and by the end of the injections, 1 month had passed and I developed debilitating vertigo
I went back to her and she told me continue taking vitamin d supplements and quit my job and go relax in Another country. I quit my job as I was very worried about my health at this point and the doctor scared me into it. I had a very good wfh job.
I took 4 supplements as instructed but all my bones started to hurt and I was having severe heart palpitations, night sweats and shivers at the same time. I also developed s in my neck, shoulder, above ankle and below wrist, all on he right side of my body as it's the side I took all the injections.
I googled about the dosage worrying about my symptoms and it suggested Vit d toxicity so I got the levels checked and it indeed was 109 toxicity.
So I stopped supplements and restricted calcium and decided to check it next month.
But the next month it was 127 toxicity.
Anything above 100 is toxicity as per the reports.
I developed severe body pain and my upper back cramped straight for 2 weeks and I couldn't move my upper body.
My uric acid levels were Normal, calcium was in range cause I kept avoiding it.
I went to a doctor and I was suggested to walk 1 hour a day and avoid calcium and vit d
I did so but my vertigo remained and I developed tingling and numbness all over my body and burning near all my joints and my entire head tingling and numbing.
I got several infections of the ears nose and eyes due to extreme dehydration from the overdose. I had dry mouth to the point the tongue used to stick to the roof of my mouth and dry eyes and no tear formation as well as no nasal wetness, to the point nose was scabbing.
I got an x-ray and it showed straighting if the cervical spine as well.
The ENT I visited just treated me with multiple antibiotics and loaded me up on anti vertigo medicines. Which still didn't stop my vertigo
I visited a neuro and they suggested an mri "only to calm me down" cause I was over reacting and it was a brain mri and it showed a c5-c6 annular fissure and nerve indentation.
I was advised to wear a collar which I did from sept to January 2024.
My vit d was now at 36 and finally low enough but none of my swellings subsided. I haven't been able to walk properly since months or do ANYTHING as even chewing triggers the swellings.
Vertigo is mild now but still persists.
Doctors are very dismissive of everything I say and will not provide any solution for the awellings
I've been to physiotherapy as suggested by them and do exercises but my swellings only get worse by even doing the minimum
January I visited an orthopaedic again and he told me to stay home for a year and ignore myself and that I would be fine. It makes me want to off myself that they don't provide any solutions.
My family never cared about me and thinks Im over reacting but I can't look down or move, I can't draw and pursue my hobbies cause it's making my neck swell up to the point I can barely d have difficulty swallowing because of the swelling. I am severely depressed..
Ive gained weight too and they have been body shaming me. I am 5'3, I used to be petite and I think in my 40s-early 50s in kg, I am 64-66 kgs now and doctors have said it's fine but ik I'm overweight by a few kgs. I'm meant to be 57 and everyone blames my weight but I literally can't walk more than 400 steps without debilitating pain, I have walked despite the horrible pain 4000 steps a day minimum it causes a visual issue where everything around me starts moving backwards... Idk what it is but I think it's like vertigo, atleast that's what I assume. Same when I work out..
Ive been doing back pain yoga for 20 mins everyday.
It has also effected my eye sight, I had 0.5-0. 7 vision in both eyes since I was in 5th grade and it never increased and before the overdose this is what is was. But I got it checked last sep and it is now, 1.75 in each eye and I have double vision if I look at a certain angle.. And the muscles around my right eye hurt.. My eyes take time to line up together as well and focus.. I have blurry vision often..
I did some research and online via reddit it suggested that Vit d depletes vit k2 and magnesium and may help break down calcium if they're in the wrong places.
I ate blueberries for the first time in April 2024 and my neck swelling seemed less and I really thought it may all go away cause they're rich In k2 and mag.
I did all the blood tests suggested by a doctor and all of them came back normal, including arthritis tests and bone density tests.
I also requested more mris as my back and neck still hurt massively and I found out I have c4-c6 protrusions and L5-S1 bulge.. I am at a loss on what to do with myself.
I showed the ortho all the reports and requested supplements for k2 and mag and was provided a 30 day prescription for calcimax k2. I was suggested to only walk for the disc issues..
I have been taking it and the first 3 days the swellings seemed down and I experienced much less pain but it's the 5th day and my swellings are back full fledged and it's painful enough to have a panic attack..
All my teeth also hurt when I bite down..I think they've lost density and loss minerals.. I feel like I'm losing my life and I'm not able to do anything about it.
I am at a loss and I don't know what to do, I did approach a lawyer to sue the doctor and I have been told I cannot lose in court if I do file and then the lawyer dipped and he also wants 15% and I don't have the funds cause I've been unemployed for a year
I've been working since I was 16 cause my lifes always been hell and I've had a nail fungus issue since the past 14 years and I haven't lived normally as I can't dip my hands in water as it lifts the nails off the nail bed and it's extremely painful.
Idk what to do anymore and I can't keep being strong and keep getting through this and I feel trapped.. If any one at all, a doctor or medical professional can comment on this and assist me I would really really appreciate it.

Vitamin d toxicity
Hello, I had a vit d deficiency of level 6 in March 2023
I went to a doctor and requested the right dose of vit d as my deficiency was severe and I was constantly shaking and felt like I would die. The doctor prescribed me 1 injection of 6L arachitol twice a week for 4 weeks.
Then also take 8 supplements of 60k iu vitamin d
I started taking it and by the end of the injections, 1 month had passed and I developed debilitating vertigo
I went back to her and she told me continue taking vitamin d supplements and quit my job and go relax in Another country. I quit my job as I was very worried about my health at this point and the doctor scared me into it. I had a very good wfh job.
I took 4 supplements as instructed but all my bones started to hurt and I was having severe heart palpitations, night sweats and shivers at the same time. I also developed s in my neck, shoulder, above ankle and below wrist, all on he right side of my body as it's the side I took all the injections.
I googled about the dosage worrying about my symptoms and it suggested Vit d toxicity so I got the levels checked and it indeed was 109 toxicity.
So I stopped supplements and restricted calcium and decided to check it next month.
But the next month it was 127 toxicity.
Anything above 100 is toxicity as per the reports.
I developed severe body pain and my upper back cramped straight for 2 weeks and I couldn't move my upper body.
My uric acid levels were Normal, calcium was in range cause I kept avoiding it.
I went to a doctor and I was suggested to walk 1 hour a day and avoid calcium and vit d
I did so but my vertigo remained and I developed tingling and numbness all over my body and burning near all my joints and my entire head tingling and numbing.
I got several infections of the ears nose and eyes due to extreme dehydration from the overdose. I had dry mouth to the point the tongue used to stick to the roof of my mouth and dry eyes and no tear formation as well as no nasal wetness, to the point nose was scabbing.
I got an x-ray and it showed straighting if the cervical spine as well.
The ENT I visited just treated me with multiple antibiotics and loaded me up on anti vertigo medicines. Which still didn't stop my vertigo
I visited a neuro and they suggested an mri "only to calm me down" cause I was over reacting and it was a brain mri and it showed a c5-c6 annular fissure and nerve indentation.
I was advised to wear a collar which I did from sept to January 2024.
My vit d was now at 36 and finally low enough but none of my swellings subsided. I haven't been able to walk properly since months or do ANYTHING as even chewing triggers the swellings.
Vertigo is mild now but still persists.
Doctors are very dismissive of everything I say and will not provide any solution for the awellings
I've been to physiotherapy as suggested by them and do exercises but my swellings only get worse by even doing the minimum
January I visited an orthopaedic again and he told me to stay home for a year and ignore myself and that I would be fine. It makes me want to off myself that they don't provide any solutions.
My family never cared about me and thinks Im over reacting but I can't look down or move, I can't draw and pursue my hobbies cause it's making my neck swell up to the point I can barely d have difficulty swallowing because of the swelling. I am severely depressed..
Ive gained weight too and they have been body shaming me. I am 5'3, I used to be petite and I think in my 40s-early 50s in kg, I am 64-66 kgs now and doctors have said it's fine but ik I'm overweight by a few kgs. I'm meant to be 57 and everyone blames my weight but I literally can't walk more than 400 steps without debilitating pain, I have walked despite the horrible pain 4000 steps a day minimum it causes a visual issue where everything around me starts moving backwards... Idk what it is but I think it's like vertigo, atleast that's what I assume. Same when I work out..
Ive been doing back pain yoga for 20 mins everyday.
It has also effected my eye sight, I had 0.5-0. 7 vision in both eyes since I was in 5th grade and it never increased and before the overdose this is what is was. But I got it checked last sep and it is now, 1.75 in each eye and I have double vision if I look at a certain angle.. And the muscles around my right eye hurt.. My eyes take time to line up together as well and focus.. I have blurry vision often..
I did some research and online via reddit it suggested that Vit d depletes vit k2 and magnesium and may help break down calcium if they're in the wrong places.
I ate blueberries for the first time in April 2024 and my neck swelling seemed less and I really thought it may all go away cause they're rich In k2 and mag.
I did all the blood tests suggested by a doctor and all of them came back normal, including arthritis tests and bone density tests.
I also requested more mris as my back and neck still hurt massively and I found out I have c4-c6 protrusions and L5-S1 bulge.. I am at a loss on what to do with myself.
I showed the ortho all the reports and requested supplements for k2 and mag and was provided a 30 day prescription for calcimax k2. I was suggested to only walk for the disc issues..
I have been taking it and the first 3 days the swellings seemed down and I experienced much less pain but it's the 5th day and my swellings are back full fledged and it's painful enough to have a panic attack..
All my teeth also hurt when I bite down..I think they've lost density and loss minerals.. I feel like I'm losing my life and I'm not able to do anything about it.
I am at a loss and I don't know what to do, I did approach a lawyer to sue the doctor and I have been told I cannot lose in court if I do file and then the lawyer dipped and he also wants 15% and I don't have the funds cause I've been unemployed for a year
I've been working since I was 16 cause my lifes always been hell and I've had a nail fungus issue since the past 14 years and I haven't lived normally as I can't dip my hands in water as it lifts the nails off the nail bed and it's extremely painful.
Idk what to do anymore and I can't keep being strong and keep getting through this and I feel trapped.. If any one at all, a doctor or medical professional can comment on this and assist me I would really really appreciate it.

Vitamin d toxicity
Hello, I had a vit d deficiency of level 6 in March 2023
I went to a doctor and requested the right dose of vit d as my deficiency was severe and I was constantly shaking and felt like I would die. The doctor prescribed me 1 injection of 6L arachitol twice a week for 4 weeks.
Then also take 8 supplements of 60k iu vitamin d
I started taking it and by the end of the injections, 1 month had passed and I developed debilitating vertigo
I went back to her and she told me continue taking vitamin d supplements and quit my job and go relax in Another country. I quit my job as I was very worried about my health at this point and the doctor scared me into it. I had a very good wfh job.
I took 4 supplements as instructed but all my bones started to hurt and I was having severe heart palpitations, night sweats and shivers at the same time. I also developed s in my neck, shoulder, above ankle and below wrist, all on he right side of my body as it's the side I took all the injections.
I googled about the dosage worrying about my symptoms and it suggested Vit d toxicity so I got the levels checked and it indeed was 109 toxicity.
So I stopped supplements and restricted calcium and decided to check it next month.
But the next month it was 127 toxicity.
Anything above 100 is toxicity as per the reports.
I developed severe body pain and my upper back cramped straight for 2 weeks and I couldn't move my upper body.
My uric acid levels were Normal, calcium was in range cause I kept avoiding it.
I went to a doctor and I was suggested to walk 1 hour a day and avoid calcium and vit d
I did so but my vertigo remained and I developed tingling and numbness all over my body and burning near all my joints and my entire head tingling and numbing.
I got several infections of the ears nose and eyes due to extreme dehydration from the overdose. The ENT I visited just treated me with multiple antibiotics and loaded me up on anti vertigo medicines. Which still didn't stop my vertigo
I visited a neuro and they suggested an mri "only to calm me down" cause I was over reacting and it was a brain mri and it showed a c5-c6 annular fissure and nerve indentation.
I was advised to wear a collar which I did from sept to January 2024.
My vit d was now at 36 and finally low enough but none of my swellings subsided. I haven't been able to walk properly since months or do ANYTHING as even chewing triggers the swellings.
Vertigo is mild now but still persists.
Doctors are very dismissive of everything I say and will not provide any solution for the awellings
I've been to physiotherapy as suggested by them and do exercises but my swellings only get worse by even doing the minimum
January I visited an orthopaedic again and he told me to stay home for a year and ignore myself and that I would be fine. It makes me want to off myself that they don't provide any solutions.
My family never cared about me and thinks Im over reacting but I can't look down or move, I can't draw and pursue my hobbies cause it's making my neck swell up to the point I can barely d have difficulty swallowing because of the swelling. I am severely depressed..
Ive gained weight too and they have been body shaming me. I am 5'3, I used to be petite and I think in my 40s-early 50s in kg, I am 64-66 kgs now and doctors have said it's fine but ik I'm overweight by a few kgs. I'm meant to be 57 and everyone blames my weight but I literally can't walk more than 400 steps without debilitating pain, I have walked despite the horrible pain 4000 steps a day minimum it causes a visual issue where everything around me starts moving backwards... Idk what it is but I think it's like vertigo, atleast that's what I assume. Same when I work out..
Ive been doing back pain yoga for 20 mins everyday.
It has also effected my eye sight, I had 0.5-0. 7 vision in both eyes since I was in 5th grade and it never increased and before the overdose this is what is was. But I got it checked last sep and it is now, 1.75 in each eye and I have double vision if I look at a certain angle.. And the muscles around my right eye hurt.. My eyes take time to line up together as well and focus.. I have blurry vision often..
I did some research and online via reddit it suggested that Vit d depletes vit k2 and magnesium and may help break down calcium if they're in the wrong places.
I ate blueberries for the first time in April 2024 and my neck swelling seemed less and I really thought it may all go away cause they're rich In k2 and mag.
I did all the blood tests suggested by a doctor and all of them came back normal, including arthritis tests and bone density tests.
I also requested more mris as my back and neck still hurt massively and I found out I have c4-c6 protrusions and L5-S1 bulge.. I am at a loss on what to do with myself.
I showed the ortho all the reports and requested supplements for k2 and mag and was provided a 30 day prescription for calcimax k2. I was suggested to only walk for the disc issues..
I have been taking it and the first 3 days the swellings seemed down and I experienced much less pain but it's the 5th day and my swellings are back full fledged and it's painful enough to have a panic attack..
I am at a loss and I don't know what to do, I did approach a lawyer to sue the doctor and I have been told I cannot lose in court if I do file and then the lawyer dipped and he also wants 15% and I don't have the funds cause I've been unemployed for a year
I've been working since I was 16 cause my lifes always been hell and I've had a nail fungus issue since the past 14 years and I haven't lived normally as I can't dip my hands in water as it lifts the nails off the nail bed and it's extremely painful.
Idk what to do anymore and I can't keep being strong and keep getting through this and I feel trapped.. If any one at all, a doctor or medical professional can comment on this and assist me I would really really appreciate it.

Vitamin d toxicity
Hello, I had a vit d deficiency of level 6 in March 2023
I went to a doctor and requested the right dose of vit d as my deficiency was severe and I was constantly shaking and felt like I would die. The doctor prescribed me 1 injection of 6L arachitol twice a week for 4 weeks.
Then also take 8 supplements of 60k iu vitamin d
I started taking it and by the end of the injections, 1 month had passed and I developed debilitating vertigo
I went back to her and she told me continue taking vitamin d supplements and quit my job and go relax in Another country. I quit my job as I was very worried about my health at this point and the doctor scared me into it. I had a very good wfh job.
I took 4 supplements as instructed but all my bones started to hurt and I was having severe heart palpitations, night sweats and shivers at the same time. I also developed s in my neck, shoulder, above ankle and below wrist, all on he right side of my body as it's the side I took all the injections.
I googled about the dosage worrying about my symptoms and it suggested Vit d toxicity so I got the levels checked and it indeed was 109 toxicity.
So I stopped supplements and restricted calcium and decided to check it next month.
But the next month it was 127 toxicity.
Anything above 100 is toxicity as per the reports.
I developed severe body pain and my upper back cramped straight for 2 weeks and I couldn't move my upper body.
My uric acid levels were Normal, calcium was in range cause I kept avoiding it.
I went to a doctor and I was suggested to walk 1 hour a day and avoid calcium and vit d
I did so but my vertigo remained and I developed tingling and numbness all over my body and burning near all my joints and my entire head tingling and numbing.
I got several infections of the ears nose and eyes due to extreme dehydration from the overdose. I had dry mouth to the point the tongue used to stick to the roof of my mouth and dry eyes and no tear formation as well as no nasal wetness, to the point nose was scabbing.
I got an x-ray and it showed straighting if the cervical spine as well.
The ENT I visited just treated me with multiple antibiotics and loaded me up on anti vertigo medicines. Which still didn't stop my vertigo
I visited a neuro and they suggested an mri "only to calm me down" cause I was over reacting and it was a brain mri and it showed a c5-c6 annular fissure and nerve indentation.
I was advised to wear a collar which I did from sept to January 2024.
My vit d was now at 36 and finally low enough but none of my swellings subsided. I haven't been able to walk properly since months or do ANYTHING as even chewing triggers the swellings.
Vertigo is mild now but still persists.
Doctors are very dismissive of everything I say and will not provide any solution for the awellings
I've been to physiotherapy as suggested by them and do exercises but my swellings only get worse by even doing the minimum
January I visited an orthopaedic again and he told me to stay home for a year and ignore myself and that I would be fine. It makes me want to off myself that they don't provide any solutions.
My family never cared about me and thinks Im over reacting but I can't look down or move, I can't draw and pursue my hobbies cause it's making my neck swell up to the point I can barely d have difficulty swallowing because of the swelling. I am severely depressed..
Ive gained weight too and they have been body shaming me. I am 5'3, I used to be petite and I think in my 40s-early 50s in kg, I am 64-66 kgs now and doctors have said it's fine but ik I'm overweight by a few kgs. I'm meant to be 57 and everyone blames my weight but I literally can't walk more than 400 steps without debilitating pain, I have walked despite the horrible pain 4000 steps a day minimum it causes a visual issue where everything around me starts moving backwards... Idk what it is but I think it's like vertigo, atleast that's what I assume. Same when I work out..
Ive been doing back pain yoga for 20 mins everyday.
It has also effected my eye sight, I had 0.5-0. 7 vision in both eyes since I was in 5th grade and it never increased and before the overdose this is what is was. But I got it checked last sep and it is now, 1.75 in each eye and I have double vision if I look at a certain angle.. And the muscles around my right eye hurt.. My eyes take time to line up together as well and focus.. I have blurry vision often..
I did some research and online via reddit it suggested that Vit d depletes vit k2 and magnesium and may help break down calcium if they're in the wrong places.
I ate blueberries for the first time in April 2024 and my neck swelling seemed less and I really thought it may all go away cause they're rich In k2 and mag.
I did all the blood tests suggested by a doctor and all of them came back normal, including arthritis tests and bone density tests.
I also requested more mris as my back and neck still hurt massively and I found out I have c4-c6 protrusions and L5-S1 bulge.. I am at a loss on what to do with myself.
I showed the ortho all the reports and requested supplements for k2 and mag and was provided a 30 day prescription for calcimax k2. I was suggested to only walk for the disc issues..
I have been taking it and the first 3 days the swellings seemed down and I experienced much less pain but it's the 5th day and my swellings are back full fledged and it's painful enough to have a panic attack..
All my teeth also hurt when I bite down..I think they've lost density and loss minerals.. I feel like I'm losing my life and I'm not able to do anything about it.
I am at a loss and I don't know what to do, I did approach a lawyer to sue the doctor and I have been told I cannot lose in court if I do file and then the lawyer dipped and he also wants 15% and I don't have the funds cause I've been unemployed for a year
I've been working since I was 16 cause my lifes always been hell and I've had a nail fungus issue since the past 14 years and I haven't lived normally as I can't dip my hands in water as it lifts the nails off the nail bed and it's extremely painful.
Idk what to do anymore and I can't keep being strong and keep getting through this and I feel trapped.. If any one at all, a doctor or medical professional can comment on this and assist me I would really really appreciate it.

https://preview.redd.it/eet42gjsxf0d1.png?width=168&format=png&auto=webp&s=61046f3db1a6381345bdf06736d1a5571d22675f
So I know most of you are going to shrug this off as a "Conservative, boomer comedy" and that's fine bc you have your opinions, and I have mine mk?
My dad has a DailyWire subscription because of course he does and wanted to watch this with me. I agreed and sat through the first two episodes with him. The first episode is about a no-nonsense wood-shop teacher at an incresingly "liberal" school. On his way into the school, he meets the new "JEDI (Justice Equality Diversity and Inclusion) officer" At this point I roll my eyes and think what it's going to be about. The JEDI confronts him and eventually tells him to look out. Birchum arrives at the school and is about to start teaching the kids when the JEDI comes in again to say to him that he's banned his safety video and tells him "No blood on the bandsaw". He then plays a safety video called "Blood on the bandsaw" Which my dad howls at and I let a little air out my nose at. Typical gag stuff. The kids complain and stuff and Birchum tells them to meet at his house the next day to work on his deck. The JEDI films this and reports it to the principal who then calls for a tribunal thing to fire Birchum(idk lol). The JEDI asks the students to witness and most of the students complain a little but then say how they're interested in wood working now, which the JEDI silences.
Anyways, he only gets a few day's suspension and the episode ends. At this point I'm like "Ok it couldn't hurt to watch another episode."
The second episode, titled "Thank You For Your Meal Service", is about Birchum and his old platoon from his time in the Navy getting together to try and eat as much food as possible on Veteran's day, taking advantage of the discounts and freebies. They meet Gunderson, basically the Army version of Birchum, and his old platoon, basically the Army version of Birchum's. The two butt heads and both want to try and eat/drink more than the other before the day's done. They fight for a while before ending the day at a pub which only has one more table available. The pair wage a food war at the nearby buffet where Birchum stages an ambush on Gunderson and his platoon, defeating them. Birchum offers to share the table with Gunderson and they get to celebrate Veteran's day together. End of episode.
That's all I've watched so far, and I can honestly say I wouldn't mind watching more of it. There is more that I haven't mentioned bc I don't want to type an essay but if you want go check it out for yourself! And ask questions if you can't!

Hello, I got Otitis from Pneumonia back in March saw a doctor got antibiotics at that time. After a month my ears was not getting better saw another doctor she said it it Otitis and takes 6 weeks to 6 months to clear up. it's been a month now and my hearing is getting worse even spit up a little blood last week. Do I need to see a doctor or, do i give it time to clear up on it's own? Thanks.

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.

The world was a boozy whirl of lights and sounds. Images, broken and fragmented, came and went. Voices, laughter, screaming. The ground pitched like the deck of a tempest-tossed ship, and he felt heavy, as though the ground were pulling him to it. C’mere, Dommy. He fell, lay on the pavement, and pushed himself up again, staggering like a drunk on his way home. His head spun, his body ached, and things seemed blurry, like half-formed images glimpsed underwater.
It was the light blue hour before dawn and Dom was…somewhere. He should have recognized the stores and street signs around him, but he didn’t. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and a sense of confusion gripped him so strongly that he was beginning to panic. Where was he? What happened?
The world spun away again and the next thing he knew, he was lying in a heap of garbage bags, used needles, and rubbish. He came awake with a jerk and sat up so fast that a bolt of pain jammed into his skull. He winced and pressed his hand to his forehead. He felt hot, clammy.
Something was seriously wrong.
Somehow he got to his feet again and started walking. The sun was up now and the streets were filled with people. They all sneered in disgust as he passed, and he wrapped his arms around his chest like a baby comforting itself. He was getting cold. His muscles were sore. Tears streamed down his face and he wanted to cry.
Going on instinct alone, Dom made his way back home and climbed the steps to his apartment. Exhaustion swept over him and he sagged against the door as he dug in his pocket for the keys. They shook in his hand and he had to focus really hard to get the key into the lock.
Inside, he collapsed onto the couch and his eyelids instantly drooped. He was so weary that he couldn’t lift his head, couldn’t form a single coherent thought. Dom felt himself starting to sink, and snapped his eyes open with a start. Something in his soul told him that if he slept, he would die.
He couldn’t help it, though. He was falling, tumbling, hands reaching up from hell to grab him. His eyes fluttered closed again and the world started to go dark, his heart slamming in fear. He tried to fight, but the pull of darkness was too strong, too alluring. Why was he fighting? Why not just…give up? Hadn’t he thought of killing himself before? Didn’t he hate his life and himself? What was there to fight for? A wife? Kids? A community that loved and respected him? Shit, affordable groceries?
No.
There was nothing.
He had nothing and was nothing.
A sense of peace blossomed from the darkness, and suddenly death didn’t seem so scary. In fact, it was warm…inviting.
It was life that was cold and hateful. Not death.
Death accepted you no matter who you were. It didn’t reject you…it didn’t ignore you. If you sought it, you would find it, and if you embraced it, it would embrace you.
With that thought in mind, Dom gave up.
And died.
***
Bruce Kenner, captain of the 5th Albany precinct, sat behind his desk on the morning of June 28 and lazily leafed through a stack of files as he sipped from a mug of coffee. A roughly built man with a dark goatee and graying blonde hair, he looked more like a small town southern sheriff than a low level public works functionary. In fact, he tended to act like it too. He liked to hunt, fish, and drink beer on his off time. Albany wasn’t a big city, but it was big enough that you never got a fucking break. Run here, run there, arrest this asshole, investigate that asshole. By the time Friday rolled around, he was so ready for the peace and tranquility of a fishing trip he could taste it.
Already this Monday morning, he was looking forward to another one.
Over the weekend, three kids went missing in the Pine Hills and Washington Park area, bringing the total for that summer up to eight. All were teenagers, all were troubled. Most were boys, but two were girls.
Troubled kids run away all the time. They might be gone a few days, sulking at a friend’s house over something their father or mother did, but they’d eventually come home. None of these kids had come back yet and from what he knew, a few of them weren’t the runaway types. They were shits at school and caused problems, but they had no reason to up and leave. Hell, Bruce himself raised hell as a kid, but he always found his way back home, even if he spent the previous night dying in a field from Mad Dogg 20/20 poisoning.
One or two kids going missing…okay, it happens. Eight? Over a span of four weeks?
Yeah, something was wrong here.
But what?
There was nothing on any of these kids. No one saw them, no one knew anything - one minute they were here, the next they weren’t. What could he or anyone else do with that?. The public broke cops’ balls all the time, but if you don’t have evidence, you don’t have evidence. What do you want? Door to door searches? Roadblocks? Dogs and helicopters? Yeah, then when you actually do it, they cry fascism. Guess I’ll just use my Spidey Senses.
Bruce wished he had spidey senses. He wanted to find these kids as much as anyone, and he was starting to get pissed off that he couldn’t. He took another sip from his mug and read on. The latest kids to go missing were three boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen.
They were all white, all thin (except for one). If there was a serial killer in town - and Bruce hoped to fuck there wasn’t - he had a type. What, black kids aren’t good enough to kill, cannibalize, and wear like a skin suit? They should charge him with a hate crime for discrimination.
That way he’d actually stay locked up.
The door opened and Vanessa Rodregiez, his deputy, came in. A tall, shapely Hispanic woman with dark eyes and a mouth poised always on the edge of a smile, she wore her black hair in a ponytail that would look stern and severe on anyone else, but on her, looked childlike. She was twenty-seven and had been on the force for three years, but you could be forgiven for thinking her much younger. “Bright and early, I see,” she said with a grin.
Bruce grumbled.
Vanessa held down the fort during the graveyard shift, acting to the night as he acted to the day. She was young and full of energy, which clashed with Bruce, who was old and just wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, Bruce loved her like a kid sister…an annoying kid sister he wanted to throat punch sometimes.
“You missed all the fun last night,” she said and parked her butt on the edge of Bruce’s desk. He glared at her, but she ignored him.
“Good,” he said. Then: “What happened?”
“Big fight outside of Club Vlad,” she said. “It looked like a WorldStar video.”
For a moment, Bruce was lost. “Club what?”
“Club Vlad,” Vanessa said. “Where the Fuze Box used to be.”
Ah, right. The Fuze Box was an Albany landmark, a night club for punks…or goths…or someone. Certainly not for Bruce Kenner. It was small, dingy, and always had people in black waiting outside. On Friday and Saturday nights, it blasted strange music with lyrics about fighting The Man. Kids had been fighting the Man since before Bruce was even born and they hadn’t beaten him yet. Kudos to them for still trying.
Last year, The Fuze Box closed down and someone else bought it. It reopened last month and looked more or less the same: Posers, shitty music, and spiked hair. So much spiked hair. “Place is still a pain in the ass,” Bruce said.
“Yep,” Vanessa chirped. “It doesn’t know what it wants to be now. One minute they play nightcore, the next EDM. It’s all over the place.”
Bruce raised a quizzical brow.
“Not that I’ve ever been there in my free time,” Vanessa said in a tone that suggested she had,
Bruce gave a judgemental hum.
“Anyway,” Vanessa went on, “you see we have some new missing persons?”
Sighing, Bruce sat back in his chair. “Yeah. I did.”
“People are starting to ask questions,” Vanessa warned.
That brought a terse smile to Bruce’s weathered face. “Maybe they’ll solve it then.”
“Ha, fat chance,” Vanessa said. She got up and stretched. “Anyway, I’m bushed. Here’s my…” she trailed off and looked at her empty hands. “Damn, where’s my report? I just had it?” She turned in a confused circle as if she might be able to spot her report making a break for it. “Huh,” she said. She left the office and came back a moment later holding a folder. “Found it,” she grinned.
Bruce just looked at her.
“Um…here it is.”
He didn’t take it.
Her smile faltered. She carefully sat it on top of the files Bruce was looking at.
And his hands.
“I’ll just leave that right here.” She patted it for good measure.
“Thank you,” Bruce said.
“Okay. Night.”
“Goodnight,” Bruce said as she left through a shaft of morning sunlight. Alone, Bruce sat her report aside and went back to the missing kids. This case was giving him a headache and it wasn’t even nine. With a deep sigh, he slumped back in his chair and drummed his fingers on the armrests.
Was it Saturday yet?
He could really use a fishing trip.
***
Dom came awake in the cold purple twilight with a shocked gasp like a man coming up seconds before drowning. His eyes strained from his sweaty face and his mouth hung slack, twisted in a gruesome parody of The Scream. His mind was muddled, murky - he didn’t know where he was or even who he was, but he knew this,.
He couldn’t breathe.
He opened and closed his mouth like a fish, but his lungs did not fill with air. A great, unseen weight seemed to bear down on his chest, and panic gripped him. He tried to move, but his arms refused to heed his brain’s command. The weight seemed heavier, all over, crushing him like a bug. Confusion filled him and he started to pant.
Without warning, his bowels and bladder loosened, and horrible wetness filled his pants. He tried to sit up, but his body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. His chest rose and fell with the frantic labor of his breath, but his lungs remained inert. A cry of fear bubbled up inside of him, but escaped his mouth only as a breathy groan.
A bust of adrenaline shot through him and he tried to stand, but succeeded only in falling off the couch instead, landing face first against the cold tile floor. He felt his nose crunch, but the pain was muted.
Dom thought he lost consciousness after that, but wasn’t sure. His next memory was of shivering so violently that his teeth clacked together. A phantom chill - perhaps from the floor - had settled into his bones, and was colder than he had ever been in his life, colder even than the time he fell into a snowbank and got lost when he was two. Shudders racked his body, and though he tried to turn over, he was too fucking heavy. It was like every muscle in his body had turned to dead weight. Fragmented thoughts swirled in his head, faint colors in the dark, but he couldn’t put any of them together.
With great effort, he managed to push himself slightly up, but a wave of lightheadedness crashed over him and he lowered his head once more. He stopped trying and simply lay there. Shortly, his eyes began to burn and he realized that he wasn’t blinking. Jesus Christ, he wasn’t blinking.
For some strange reason, that brought a fresh bout of panic. He started to hyperventilate, but his lungs still wouldn’t work. He wasn’t blinking…he wasn’t breathing…what was happening to him?
A whimper burst from his throat and he started to cry.
He must have cried himself to sleep, because he woke sometime later to the most intense headache he’d ever had. It felt like something was eating his brain from the inside out. He was sore all over, and could feel his muscles twitching, as though a thousand living things were burrowing through his body. A cramp shot down his right leg, and the toes of his left foot curled involuntarily. Slowly, his jaw clenched closed, and the muscles in his neck began to strain…then to burn. His panic turned to terror, and Dom wiggled across the floor like a worm, his limbs screaming in red agony and his brain filling with heat. He somehow wound up on his right side, and his arms curled slowly up to his chest, crossing at the wrists like a mummy. He tried to pull them apart, but the slightest movement sent waves of excruciating pain cutting through his body. His knees began to draw up to his stomach, and his fingers clenched tightly.
Cramps and spasms attacked every muscle in his body. He screamed through his teeth and shook, resembling a man in the electric chair as 40,000 volts of justice coursed through him. The pain grew gradually, getting worse and worse as minutes ticked by like hours. Higher, higher, higher - he clenched his eyes closed and shrieked as it became unbearable. Disjointed thoughts flashed through his mind - prayers, threats, curses, Jesus fucking…FUCK.
What was happening? God, what was happening to him? Was it fentanyl? He’d seen videos of people high on fentanyl, and they leaned in weird positions. He didn’t do drugs but maybe he ingested it somehow.
His panic may have returned if all of his muscles hadn’t picked that moment to contract as one. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his jaw unclenched just enough for him to utter a high. Agonized scream that echoed through his empty apartment like thunder.
A human being can only take so much before giving out. When the pain reached a crescendo, and Dom mercifully sank into consciousness once more. The sun rose and cascaded through the apartment’s sole window, falling over his huddled form. Slowly, it tracked across the sky before setting again. As the last rays disappeared behind the horizon, Dom’s eyes opened. The pain of the night before was blessedly gone, replaced by a feeling of numbness - the cool ash after the hot fire. His thoughts were slow and thick like molasses, but he could actually think again. Nightmare memories flooded back to him, but he wasn’t sure they were real. He was lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his chest as if for warmth, and his teeth lightly chattered against the icy chill. He was so cold that he didn’t want to move, but he couldn’t stay here forever. He needed help. He needed…
A shower.
Yeah, a hot shower. That would warm him up.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly sat up, ready for a burst of pain.
But none came.
He did, however, feel heavy. Getting to his feet, he stumbled and nearly fell, catching himself against the counter. His limbs had no feeling. It’s like they weren’t even there. Head hung, Dom tried to catch his breath, but it felt like he wasn’t breathing at all. His eyelids drooped closed and he felt like he was going to fall down. Summoning all the might he could, he shuffled into the bathroom with the stiff gait of an old man. He snapped the light on, and cold, white brilliance filled the space, blinding him.
Leaning heavily against the sink, he gripped the cold porcelain. Suddenly, he was afraid of looking into the mirror. He was sure that whatever reflection he saw, it would be of something else, something monstrous.
Dom lifted his head and faced the glass.
His heart shrank.
The man in the mirror was him but different. His skin was white as milk, lacking all color whatsoever save for the ugly purple patch on the left side. IResembling a giant bruise, it started at the temple and extended down to the slope of his neck, disappearing beneath his T-shirt. He gingerly lifted the shirt, and moaned when he saw that his entire left side was discolored, the purple edged with a puffy shade of pink. His sallow skin clung tight to his ribcage, and his hip bones stuck out so much it looked painful. Back in the mirror, his cheeks were sunken, hollow, and his eyes were a hazy, dishwater gray. His skull seemed bigger, his hair longer. Dom wanted to whip his head away from the phantom before him, to never see it again, but he was transfixed.
There was no way that thing was -
Dom looked away, cutting that thought off before it could finish.
A shower.
He needed a shower.
Slowly, stiffly, Dom undressed, peeling off his shirt and his soiled pants. He dropped them in a heap on the floor and stepped under the spray. He could feel the water pounding against him, but it provided no heat. It was neither hot nor cold. It was simply there.
Dom pressed his head to the slick shower wall and stood there for a long time. He was spent, tired, and fried - he had no more emotions left to give. He got out after a little while, dried off, and put on a clean pair of shorts. He settled into bed and lay there with his hands folded over his chest and his eyes open. They felt gritty, dry. His stomach felt bloated, gassy. He was drowsy now, the weight of the past two days (or was it two weeks?) coming down on him all at once. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
He was still asleep - but aware - when the knocking on his door started the next morning. Time was funny in this state of being, fast and jerky but also slow and echoing. Keys rattled the knob turned. The landlord came in with a cop. They saw him on the bed, laid out like a corpse for a viewing, and the cop radioed in a code 35. Soon, cops were all around him, making noise and touching things. He had the vague sense of discomfort and embarrassment at the intrusion. A baling man in a suit stood over him, a cop who looked like a redneck beside him. “He didn’t die here,” the medical examiner said.
The cop looked at him questioningly. Dom caught the name KENNER on his name tag.
“See this?” the M.E. said and gestured to Dom’s face. “That’s livor mortis. When you die, your blood pools at the lowest point. If you’re on your left side, for example, it pools on the left.”
Kenner looked at Dom and then back to the M.E. “Someone moved him?”
“Looks like it,” the M.E. said.
“When did he die?”
The M.E. examined Dom as though he were nothing more than a side of beef. “At a glance? Three days. I won’t have a better answer until I open him up.”
Dom was still awake when they put him into a body bag and zipped it up. He felt a stirring of fear beneath the cold numbness, but he was too tired to worry about it now.
Later, he thought.
He would panic later.
For now, Dom slept.

Rose Glass directs a pulp movie with veins, a non-random term, fantasy, the ditch is immediately framed which evokes Lou's dark past and the place where his father hides his crimes, with a camera movement we first go into the depth of the ditch which then flow into the starry sky thus playing between low and high, descent and ascent, it is no coincidence that a shooting star is shown from the sky which symbolizes the beginning of the story but also the dreams and desires of Lou and Jackie. Through an alternating montage, the loneliness of both protagonists is shown until their meeting. Lou is a lesbian girl who runs a gym, she hates her father who is involved in illegal weapons trafficking, her mother has disappeared and the only reason she doesn't leave her hometown is because she wants to try to protect her sister Bet. Jackie also has a traumatic family past, she was adopted and dreams of becoming a bodybuilder, a dream not supported by her family. The film is therefore a suburban story, the chemistry between Lou and Jackie works and Rose Glass does not portray its characters as positive. The dynamic is beautiful where Jackie asks Lou to leave together, why Lou has never moved from her city and the following scene shows the two girls are having lunch together with Beth and the latter's boyfriend, J.J. The direction makes it clear that the reason why Lou doesn't move is Bet, wanting to protect her from J.J. who beats her up, in fact Beth is always shown with bruises and wounds, all of which will then also be made explicit both in gestures and words. The love between Lou and Jackie is sincere, the film shows their intimacy, however Lou's family situation will degenerate, involving the two girls and despite the mutual affection of the protagonists, the narrative shows mistakes, Lou still invites Jackie to take steroids to try to make her win the bodybuilder competition and subsequently she will carry out controversial acts and Jackie herself will be guilty of crimes. The competition sequence of the bodybuilder competition is well done, games of focus, the lights that start to move, the depth of field is removed, the suit to sensorially alter the dynamics and Rose Glass is noticeable that it comes from the genre, it has no hesitations in showing surreal touches and moments as he had already done for Saint Maud. The staging is good, there are single shots almost reminiscent of cosmic horror, the dark sky at night is very visible and there is a strong use of the color red which also appears in small details from scene to scene. The red clearly evokes blood, there is no shortage of direct shots totally surrounded by the color red but also moments of almost horror-like violence. The film begins at night just like Jackie's journey, the moments in the car, of movement, are at night and therefore shrouded in darkness as is the story of the two girls, the return from Las Vegas is emblematic, where the race for bodybuilders, where the horizon is totally black. In the finale, the car journey will instead be at dawn to mark the new beginning. The above-mentioned play of perspective between high and low is very present in the film, the shots from above also symbolize the various references to the film's destiny and the shots from below, especially on Jackie, are clues to what will happen, the showing the Gulliver cartoon on television which is a very strong signal for what will happen. In fact, you can also read the film as a sort of birth of anti-heroines, perhaps some will turn up their noses, but personally I appreciate when you dare even in these terms. Yes, it is a film that wants to tell a lot, the relationship between Lou and Jackie, Lou's family dynamic with his sister and father, Jacke's broken dream and not everything is fully centered, even in Saint Maud for example some references to the protagonist's past they were a little fast, just as some moments could have been better managed, for example there is a reaction from Lou's father that is a little too comical. However, the core of the film is spot on, the direction is good as is the narration between Lou and Jackie who are the fulcrum of the film, the final scene with flashes of black comedy that seals the birth of the two anti-heroines, both in fact they fulfill each other's narrative arc, where their actions and reactions, even when excessive and controversial, are well motivated

Hi all,
Symptoms for last two years: + Dry nasal inflammation internally. No infection. + Incredibly stiff shoulders and neck.
29M, 180cm, 88kg, living in EU, IBS and reflux sufferer since 14, moved into a new apartment in July 2022 and a couple of months later I started to have nasal inflammation (no infection, no runny nose or no mucus just nose getting blocked like concrete) and breathing problems through nose gave me tens of other physical anxiety symptoms which last year ended up in 9 months of antidepressants and psychotherapy. Since I moved in, I have observed silverfish around the apartment from time to time and since they are an indication of dust and dust mites, my focus was always on fixing probable dust mite issue. Although if mites existed I believe they would've been already eliminated because of the stuff I tried.
Stuff I tried:

• Examinations by ENT and family doctor
• Stop consuming milk products or at least lactose most of the time.
• To reduce dust mite and silverfish population, lowering the humidity, lowering the heat, and getting rid of dust/papers/cereals in the apartment.
• Administrating Avamys spray for months (Fluticasone furoate)
• Administrating Nasonex spray for months (Mometasone furoate monohydrate)
• Administrating Flonase spray for months (Fluticasone propionate)
• 240mg Pseudoedepherine tablets (can't use them anymore due to triggering physical anxiety symptoms)
• Crebros antihistamine tablets (Levocetirizine dihydrochloride)
• Loratin antihistamine tablets (Loratadine)
• Neti Pot (Water + Salt + Xylitol)
• Saline sprays (Water + Salt)
• Nasal Inhilator (Ocalyptus + Menthol)
• Moistruzer nose spray (Natural oils)
• Allergodil antihistamine nose spray (azelastine)
• Air Dehumidifier
• Air Humidifier
• Air Purifier
• Keeping windows open for days
• Vacuuming floors and furnitures daily with HEPA filtered self-cleaning robot, 800W HEPA Filtered floor Vacuum, HEPA Filtered Cordless FlooHand Vacuum, and Mattress Cleaner emitting UV light.
• Xylometazoline spray (This becomes a last resort if I can't sleep at night, but I can live without using for months)
• Nasal strips (Using at nights, they somewhat saved me from dependency on Xylometazoline)
• Massage Gun in case if the nasal issues are the result of constant muscle tension instead of vice-versa.

Tests conducted:

• Blood allergy test for common allergens (which came out negative for everything)
• Nasal endoscopy by ENT (Some dryness was found, but no polyps, no deviation, no infection)
• At home Sleep Apnea Test by sleep clinic with and without CPAP (No apnea or blood oxygen issue was found, but intermediate hypopnea was found probably due to nasal inflammation)
• Nasal breathing test, which showed improvement in breathing through nose when Xylometazoline is administrated which indicated to my doctor the Xylometazoline dependency, but quitting the spray for months doesn't show any improvement. Go to QuitAfrin and you will see no one had issues after quitting the spray for at most two weeks.

Things I did not try yet but I will be looking into this year:

• VivAer or any surgical procedure
• CT Scan (Tomograhpy) on sinuses
• Seeing an allergist on July 2024.
• Mold test
• Test to see what chemicals are used for wall paints. (Happened to another Redditor)
• Lose weight (I was 65 kg in 2020, last year ended up almost 100kg due to antidepressant but I already started having health issues when I went over 80 kg in 2021.)
• Wheat-free diet, keto diet and other anti-inflammatory diets.
• Wet fasting, dry fasting, daily intermittent fasting.
• Acupunture, spa, sensory deprivation tank, massage, exercise/cardio/lifting at gym, yoga to reduce anxiety and also sauna (one Redditor fixed his issue permanently by going to sauna only two times)
• Kimchi powder

I'm open for all recommendations or possible diagnoses. American friends, please don't tell me to move out, here healthcare is free not moving out.
Thank you

I was always a good looking guy.
Good eyes, jawline, abs, things of that nature.
However, I've also always been helplessly awkward around women for whatever reason.
After a lot of thinking and many times during family dinners my dad drunkly demanded me to bang a woman already, I decided to grudgingly install Tinder.
I already had some exprience with texting women online, so it was the same usual crap that made me not want to install tinder in the first place:
1)I text a girl.
2)she takes hours to reply because she wants to seem like she's so cool and busy and because she frankly doesn't give a fuck about me.
3)I do the same.
4)I say some silly jokes so she likes me like I'm some fucking clown.
5)I then ask to meet up.
6)she ghosts me.
7)on to the next girl.
This frustrating pattern went on with 3 girls until I finally texted a girl who i thought was nicer.
This girl, Casey, actually seemed to be interested. She said I'm funny, and handsome and that she'd love to meet up.
I was very intimacy deprived, so that was enough to completely turn off any sort of rationale I had.
Looking back, I should've been wiser.
She proposed to meet at a park that was suspiciously right next to my house.
She knew where I lived.
Again, I was too horny to notice this.
We meet up and start talking. As we talk, even my extremely thirsty ass notices... It's just *too* easy. She laughs at every dumb joke I make. She compliments me a lot. She's the one to initiate touch... Almost like... I'm where she wants me to me and she wants me to stay there... The more we talk, the more I notice her laugh seems... forced. Again, like she's just using it to lure me in. At one point, even my horny ass began feeling uncomfortable and it started getting late. I hugged her and said goodbye. I was then stopped. I felt a sharp, burning sudden pain in my arm. I sighed and turned around cautiously, knowing it'll be an unpleasant sight. Turns out, it wasn't an unpleasant sight. It was much worse than that. Her hand was now covered in blood as her nails dug deeper and deeper into my forearm. I gasped and tried to release myself, only for her grip to strengthen. My eyes then traveled from her hand to her face. Her face was contorted in horror; her lips were pursed tightly and her forehead was scrunched, her eyes were wide and her pupils were so dilated that they were almost completely black. Her bottom lip trembled and a stray tear rolled down her cheek.
"u-um... why are you sca-"
She cuts me off
"Please," she whispered, her voice trembled as she forced out the words, "Don't go. I don't want to do this."
"Do what...?" I cautiously ask
"...please just come with me. p-please..." she answers, her voice very shaken.
I barely knew this woman. She showed a ton of red flags and this just escalated significantly. Although it created much guilt in me, I decided to run away.
"COME BACK, PLEASE!!!" She screamed, her voice became so hoarse from her desperate screaming it hurt to hear her...
Eventually, I arrive back home.
I think to myself "Finally some peac-" I feel some liquid drip on my nose from the ceiling. I turn on the light and look up. My eyes widen. I swiftly run to bathroom and vomit for what seems like hours from the grotesque sight I've just witnessed. I return to the room and stare at Casey's corpse. It was such a grotesque sight that I won't even attempt to describe it, as I think there's such a thing as "too much". But to give you some idea of what happened to her, let's just say... she had very beautiful and clear skin... I wonder where it went...
I kept staring at her body as it hung lifelessly from the ceiling. I then remembered something she said at the start of the date... "I would panic if you didn't come hehe..."

For many, Guerlain’s Habit Rouge represents a high watermark in perfumery. Since its original release in 1965, the composition has been beloved by gentlemen (and ladies) across the world. It is also a well known favourite of many of the most well regarded perfume historians and reviewers out there and, because of that, one could well argue that there is precious little further useful opinion that can be added to the existing cannon (and they may well be right!).
Still, Jean-Paul Guerlain’s multi-faceted composition has been no stranger to a remix over the years and, since Delphine Jelk took over from Thierry Wasser as in-house perfumer at the historic French house, she has managed to deliver a staggering three new takes on the fragrance in as many years. What better opportunity could there be, therefore, to undertake both a reappraisal of the original release and, in doing so, compare it to some of the new kids on the block? Note: I have not sampled the first of Jelk’s flankers, 2022’s Habit Rouge L'Instinct but, given the almost unanimous negativity surrounding it, it’s not high on my hit list! We’ll be looking at Rouge Prive and the Parfum today.
Habit Rouge EDT (1965)
The concept behind Habit Rouge (or ‘Red Coat’, if translated in to English from its native language) was to create a perfume that brought to mind the jackets worn by the landed gentry when they went hunting. In the UK, we’re no stranger to this nefarious practice - our own fox hunting aristocrats also wore red coats and, despite now being banned, the idea of chasing helpless creatures to their deaths is still a subject of debate in our national politics (with right wing politicians often promising to offer a ‘free vote’ to MPs on the issue to energise their base).
As an animal lover myself, this is perhaps the only element of Habit Rouge I find somewhat jarring. There is nothing within this perfume which brings to mind sport, adrenaline, blood, or violence. I find it somewhat curious, consequently, that Guerlain sought to relate it to hunting. The only thing wearers of Habit Rouge were likely to be chasing on its release were sexual partners!
That statement isn’t made wholly in jest either. Habit Rouge is a gentleman’s fragrance, but it carries within its structure not only aspects of formality and traditional masculinity, but also sensuality and sensitivity. It is, as such, a fragrance well suited to old fashioned romantics. Indeed, if it didn’t have these traits, I’d argue that it wouldn’t have survived for the almost 60 years that it has. When you think about it, it’s almost incredible that, despite how radically concepts of masculinity have changed over the years, Habit Rouge has still been a regular seller for Guerlain, with devotees now spanning across 5 generations.
Created to be the younger brother to the company’s 1925 release, Shalimar it, like its sibling, contains a citrus top note, which descends into a floral heart, before culminating in a vanillic leather and amber base. Habit Rouge is not simply a three card trick, however, and its complete run of notes can be summarised as follows (as per Basenotes):
Top Notes: bergamot, lemon, rosewood, basil, pimento
Heart Notes: sandalwood, carnation, patchouli, cedar, rose, cinnamon
Base Notes: vanilla, amber, moss, leather, benzoin, labdanum, olibanum
When it comes to the head of the perfume, the real star of the show is the bergamot, which radiates wonderfully off the skin when first sprayed. Whilst it is effervescent, though, it is also a powdery affair. In fact, it can most accurately be described as being akin to orange sherbet - fizzing whilst maintaining a chalkiness. It is warm and reassuring as opposed to enthusiastic. It also maintains a cologne like structure, however, by incorporating herbal and spicy notes through the use of basil and rosewood.
This accord is then joined to a rose and carnation-dominant middle phase, through which the powdered facets of the fragrance continue to run, and through which the fragrance begins to show its romantic side.
Finally, the dry down of the fragrance provides a semi-sweet backdrop with the vanilla taking the edge away from the traditionally masculine moss and leather accords and combining with the rest of the ingredients to produce a soft, light amber.
It is not hard to see, in this context, why Habit Rouge has continued to be successful over the years - it, essentially, captures hearts and minds because it resonates with the personality of its wearer in a way that other traditional masculine fragrances can sometimes struggle to do (as they were often, like their owners of the period, more buttoned up).
Habit Rouge - Rouge Prive (2023)
That doesn’t mean that the EdT of Habit Rouge smells like it was composed yesterday, however. It just means that it has aged like a fine wine as opposed to being the perfume equivalent of a kipper tie. In fact, if it were any item of clothing, I’d compare it to a 1960s slim lapelled suit - of its time, but still stylish today.
Still, as the years have gone by, the term ‘legibility’ has become more and more important in the perfume industry, and there now seems to be a distinct trend towards the creation of perfumes whose formulas are more streamlined than Habit Rouge. Or to put it another way, perfumers are being encouraged to reduce the number of notes in a perfume’s composition, with the aim of producing a more direct product. For lovers of vintage fragrances, legibility can be an anathema but, personally, I have no issue with the principle behind the concept. Nor it appears, does Delphine Jelk. Enter Habit Rouge Rouge Prive.
Top Notes:Bergamot, Ginger
Middle Notes: Orange Blossom, Iris
Base Notes: Leather, Patchouli, Vanilla
As can be seen from the notes list, Rouge Prive maintains the structure of Habit Rouge (bergamot, floral, vanillic leather), but switches out or culls a number of the traditional accords that were contained within the original. Gone are the cologne-esque elements. Gone too are the powdery rose and carnation. The leather, meanwhile, has been amped up and modernised - more akin to Tom Ford’s Tuscan Leather than Knize 10. Whisper it quietly, but it also seems that Jelk has snuck an oud accord in to the base too.
Given the number of changes, you could be forgiven for thinking that Rouge Prive would end up smelling completely different to the EdT, but fans of the OG need not worry - this is still unmistakably Habit Rouge. To paraphrase Persolaise (my favourite reviewer of perfumes), it’s like the whole perfume has simply been redrawn with clean bold lines. The bergamot continues to shimmer and, in spite of the florals being listed as Orange Blossom and Iris, the ultimate accord generated is still interpreted by my nose as being a rose. It is very much a rouge perfume as opposed to an orange or purple one (which is, incidentally, roughly what you get if you combine an iris hue and orange on a colour wheel…).
Where Rouge Prive differs to the EdT is in its brute strength. The leather note really does have a serious kick to it and, given that, the perfume is pulled from the bottom up, as opposed to the top diffusing off the skin to reveal the heart.
Whilst I’ve always found the EdT to perform quite well, the longevity of the Prive is genuinely outstanding, again due to the material in the base. Pleasingly though, the dry down still does maintain the powdered amber facets contained within the original. It’s a superb flanker that updates Habit Rouge without necessarily ripping up the original composition.
Habit Rouge Parfum (2024)
Not to rest on their laurels, Guerlain have now revisited Habit Rouge again in 2024, introducing a parfum version to go alongside new stablemates Vetiver Parfum and L’Homme Ideal Parfum.
I’ll say in advance that I’m a little sceptical of the allure of parfums myself, as I often find that the actual performance difference between fragrance concentrations can be completely counter-intuitive (I have EdTs that vastly out-perform EDPs and Parfums, both in terms of silage and longevity). In addition, given that Rouge Prive was already quite beastly, the necessity for a parfum to be made only a year later seems curious to me.
Parking those views for the moment though, the theme across these three new releases appears to be alcohol. In the case of Habit Rouge, the drink of choice is listed as rum, although there seems to be confusion in that regard, with Jelk being quoted in the marketing as saying:
For Habit Rouge Le Parfum, I Created a leathery vanilla liqueur with plenty of bold bourbon-inspired intensity
Perhaps Guerlain are suggesting that the perfume has been matured in bourbon casks? Hmm. In any event, the notes list for this one is as follows:
Bergamot, Vanilla, Rum, Patchouli
Well, I did say perfumers were streamlining their notes list, didn’t I!
What’s most striking to me about the Parfum is, firstly, how base heavy it is (we’re talking sub-woofer level) but, secondly, how patchouli dominant it is - there’s a definite chocolate element in that respect, but my nose also detects something slightly medicinal, smoked, and perhaps even burnt (think coffee beans). When combined with the vanilla, the result is a perfume that very much lies within the domain of the gourmand.
This is somewhat a blessing and a curse - if you’re not a particular fan of the EdT or Prive’s floral elements, you’re likely to get along a lot better with the Parfum. At the same time though, I’d argue that the floral heart of Habit Rouge is, to a large extent, key to its DNA, and vastly reducing the components that make this element ‘sing’ lead to a very different fragrance profile.
My second critique is that the perfume, generally, feels less balanced than Rouge Prive. I have no issue with the concept of a Habit Rouge that focuses on patchouli - readers of my previous pieces will know that I’m a huge fan of the note - I just wished that, on a technical level, the Parfum still maintained a decent top end. As it is, the whole thing sits very deep against the skin, with any radiance from the bergamot being buried by the heavier materials. This ultimately leads to a fragrance that, rather than being a sparkling rouge, comes across as a heavy-set chocolate and beige. Because of that, I can’t decide whether or not I’ve truly fallen for the Parfum.
That being said, you honestly couldn’t go wrong with any one of these three and I’ve no doubt they’ll appeal to different elements of the fragrance market. I look forward to Jelk’s next flanker in 2025, even if these variations are becoming a little bit akin to Marge Simpson’s Chanel jacket…!

This weekend, we were shocked by the sudden death of my 68-year-old father (68M). He was found with blood in his lungs at the hospital. The initial autopsy revealed no signs of usual causes. His major organs were otherwise normal, yet the exact cause of death is still undetermined. We're now waiting for additional blood work, which might take up to three months. Additionally, the funeral home is also conducting their own autopsy, which we hope will provide further clarity.
Incident Details: Just before he collapsed in the bathroom at home, my father appeared unusually pale and made noises as if in distress, then slowly slumped to the side, bleeding from his nose. Unfortunately, despite prompt emergency response, he could not be revived.
Background: My father had no significant health issues, was put on prostate medications, and did not smoke. He worked over 40 years at an automobile engine plant, which might have exposed him to various toxins.
Questions: Could his occupational exposure be a contributing factor to his sudden condition? Has anyone encountered similar situations, or does anyone have hypotheses on what might have occurred? Any shared experiences or insights would be greatly appreciated as we navigate this challenging time.

Hi, I have being suffering from aniexty last couple of months not really hit me hard until 2 weeks ago, I was told by a ooh gp about heart failure which I didn’t know I had ( for context I was in a coma in 2020 for covid, pneumonia and sepsis) which caused it and wasn’t mentioned since then untill the ooh GP told me even tho had echo since then and been fine, anyways last 2 weeks been really bad with chest pains and other problems(had a sickness bug for 4 days aswel) , been docs 3 they checked my lungs and heart over and was fine and hospital once because of it,my minds been in overdrive, they did a quick ecg on me which they said was fine and also bloods which came back fine, been put down to anxiety from the first time they saw me 2 weeks ago, last few days got unbearable, numbness in body, not eating, tension in back of my head, last 2 weeks been constantly using oximeter and my heart rate at night time drops to 50-55 (was diagnosed bradycardia 14 years ago which I didn’t remember also) I’m way overweight and not very active either so this worries me somewhat (I am trying to exercise more and eat healthier) but I’m on day 4 of Sertraline 50mg what are people experiences, since taking them my heart rates dropped to around 45-47 is this normal? Also been a emotional wreck last 3 days everything’s setting me off crying all time could this be a side effect? Any advice on how to cope right now because this experience is bad, and I know 99% of people in here would have had worse experiences and longer than me and I have the upmost respect for you guys.