Hiya! I want to talk about my experience with Bartholin cysts and the irritation of reoccurrence 🙄
For a little back story — I am a sexually active female , 27 years of age , no STD’s (got tested when I found out about the cyst) & same partner for 2.5 years. I’ve never been pregnant. I’ve never even heard of this condition or health issue until it happened to me.,
In January 2024 I noticed a small lump on the lower part of my vulva near the opening & I was TERRIFIED to say the least. I went to a walk in clinic to see what was going on & they told me a little about bartholin cysts and threw some antibiotics at me & told me to take sitz baths.. well 2 days go by and the cysts is now a full blown abscess and I mean IT WAS HUGE — I’m not over exaggerating it was at least the size of a grapefruit!!
At that time I ended up going to the ER to get it drained because I was unaware that I should’ve went to OB/GYN — They drained it told me to continue with my antibiotics and it takes some ibuprofen. (I think it’s absolutely ridiculous that after they stab you with a needle five times in your vagina to numb it and then cut you open with a scalpel blade they have the NERVE to tell you to take ibuprofen instead of prescribing pain meds)
10 days later, the cyst came back, but it wasn’t an abscess yet.. I called to make an appointment with my OB/GYN, but they couldn’t see me for a month so I suffered and suffered and suffered until I finally went to a walk-in clinic and got it drained 6 days before my OB/GYN appointment. I felt relief after getting it drained, but I was in fear that It was gonna come back…
Six days later, my OB/GYN appointment comes around and YOU GUESSED IT.. it came back just in time to be drained at my appointment.. I finally get it drained for the third time in a one month span — By this time, I have a lot of scar tissue & absolutely terrified of the pain that comes with healing , he packed it with some gauze & sent me home.. 3 days later there is a huge pocket of pus behind my drain so I go in to get the drain removed..
After I got the drain removed, the healing was absolutely atrocious.. significant swelling in my perineal area, which caused the nerves to shoot pain all the way up to my clitoris.. that pain dropped me to my knees, ice packs weren’t working, baths didn’t help.. ibuprofen wasn’t strong enough so I went to ER dripping sweat and shaking from the extreme pain. They prescribed me tramadol & took some imaging (CT & Ultrasound) to find out I had a cyst on the other side & my cyst on the current side CAME BACK.
So here I am.. waiting for surgery on may 30th (mind you I’ve been dealing with this crap for 4 months) I’m gonna have double marsupialization surgery & im so scared of the healing process..
Please send words of encouragement— I feel so alone in this.

While I haven’t been formally diagnosed with PCOS due to a lack of insurance, I exhibit most of the symptoms. The hirsutism, for me, has to absolutely be the most damaging one of all. Personally, it’s very severe and nothing, whether it be shaving, waxing, epilating, etc., seems to make a single dent. For the record: I’m 20 and have not worn short sleeves in over ten years… nor skirts, dresses, shorts, sleeveless tops, or basically anything that isn’t a jacket, sweatshirt, and jeans/sweats. I’m dark haired as well so it makes it even more noticeable, plus i’ve got horrible acne all over my chest and back so i’m basically a freak of nature. To top it off, i’ve got deformed (tubular) breasts, a known symptom of PCOS, and that’s just the fucking cherry on top. For once in my life i’d just like to feel like a normal, natural woman that can wear tank tops, dresses, etc. Hell maybe it wouldn’t be as bad if my family/coworkers didn’t question me about it. I live in Texas where the heat is fucking abominable, so just imagine going out in a sweatshirt of all things. I just constantly feel like i’m walking around with this disgusting secret swarming barely underneath my clothes. Additionally, I cannot possibly foresee a future in which I can afford laseelectrolysis despite the severe stress that this causes me. I’m constantly getting comments like “aren’t you hot?” while wearing a jacket/sweater and it’s like… yes the fuck I am but what else am I supposed to do? Never mind the older ladies at work that tell me I need to wear what I want and enjoy my youth while I can lmfao like if only you knew. Overall, it just seems to me that nobody can possibly begin to understand what it’s like. It’s so isolating.

dut, fin or min non of them work if there is not enough fat layer under your skin which actually provide nutrition to the follicle.
Ever wondered why there is no hairs on your knees and elbows, in general joints with kind of a "pointy bone form" don't have hairs not even little ones because there is tension with no fat?
the scalp tension also cause sweat. Its the skull which expands and the calcification creates tension leads to more sweat and fat loss for the scalp. Not only this after expansion new scalp fibers forms cutting down the blood supply and this newly formed skin is "shiny" when you look at it.
I can guarantee one thing that the people who are bald have big tight shiny head.
If you are not agree with this then just pinch the back of your head and then pinch the bald area .... here! with your index and thumb pinch with tip and try to grab as much as you can. see..! you will feel the difference the tightness on the bald area.
so, try to get back the fat you lost, only then you might see these treatments effective.
My assumption - the reason dht sticks to scalp hair follicles is due to the lack of fat and high affinity for androgen receptor, since dht is fat soluble so while usual circulation of dht in the body it tends to stick to hair follicles of less fatty area.
Hair transplant works because it put the hairs on top of already expanded skull, which now have new structure, skin and blood supply. still not all grafts survive.
may be apply min at the back of your head to increase doner s 😂😅

I’m looking for input from people who specifically struggle/have struggled with BOTH ADHD and anxiety (but also if you have depression that “helps”). I have ADHD (combined type), generalized anxiety disorder (and possibly social anxiety), and have struggled on and off with severe depression and s*icidal ideation for years (although I’m kinda at a point where the depression is the least of my concerns and I’d argue it’s mostly caused by capitalism).
Do any of you take a medication, have a medication combo that has worked wonders for you??? What can I research into and talk to my doctor about that might actually help with both the anxiety and the ADHD?
Thank you in advance!!!
I’m inquiring because I currently don’t have access to a psychiatrist and my primary doctor is my current prescriber. Psychiatry is not his speciality and although he regularly prescribes psychiatric meds to his patients, he’s not familiar enough with all the different medications and combinations off the top of his head to be able to provide the help that I need with my combination of disorders. However, he’s always willing to hear my opinion and inquiries, and if I were to come to him with research and potential medication suggestions, he’d take them into consideration.
The medication combos I’ve been on before are: Adderall XR, Adderall IR, Prozac, and Xanax (only for panic attacks, as needed); Adderall XR and Adderall IR; Adderall XR, Ritalin, and Prozac; just Strattera
More detailed explanation of my situation below if it might help:
My biggest issue is that because I have both ADHD and terrible anxiety, stimulants make me more anxious if I’m already having a high-anxiety day, but they’re the only thing that has every actually helped my ADHD symptoms. Adderall 100% helped me get through uni (albeit I had an absolutely trash GPA), it helped me focus, get work started, got me sitting in one place finishing my work for hours, it helped me nap, helped me communicate better, and even improved my mood. But I also hated taking it every day (and often forgot to take it/pushed it off) bc it often made me more anxious, it decreased my appetite, made me feel less like myself, and gave me headaches when it was wearing off. I’ve also always had a fast metabolism and the Adderall XR only ever helped for 5 hours at a time and the IR only 2-3 hours.
I’ve been on Adderall XR (15mg and 20mg at varying times) and Adderall IR (7.5mg and 10mg at varying points) before, but since the shortage and being out of school I’ve been off of it (due to my anxiety I HATE dealing with doctors and pharmacists and fighting to have Adderall).
I recently started Strattera for my ADHD and anxiety. I’m 5-6 weeks into taking it (currently at 40mg) and I feel almost no positive benefits. It hasn’t yet at all lessened my symptoms or helped me manage the ADHD and anxiety. At first, I experienced being able to wake up earlier, but that doesn’t seem to be the case anymore and I’m also dealing with some insomnia. I’m also starting to feel a bit more irritable and angry, as well as constipated. I’d be willing to deal with all that if I was actually seeing benefits. I don’t know if I should ask to continue the strattera when I see my doctor next, have the dosage upped or ask to try something else.
I’ve tried Ritalin in the past as well and it made me feel awful and only increased my focus for 30 minutes or so, and I stopped taking it after a week. And for my anxiety and depression I’ve been on Zoloft and Prozac in the past. Zoloft was awful for me. And Prozac was actually okay, I didn’t experience many negative side effects, except maybe some increased s*icide ideation and headaches.
I’ve never been well medicated. And a huge reason for that is that I still have never seen a psychiatrist or psychologist. At uni, I was being prescribed meds by nurse practitioners at the school’s health services and from a big therapy/psychiatrist office where my old therapist worked. And then my primary care doctor took over and he’s been the one prescribing me meds for the past couple of years, but he’s not at all a specialist in psychiatric medicine so he’s not knowledgeable on all the medications and on how to help me. He and I want me to see a psychiatrist but a psychiatrist isn’t accessible to me at this time.
When my parents were still responsible for all my health bills, they either always rejected or were apprehensive about me seeing an actually competent prescriber bc of the cost. And I’d always beg my mom to help me research psychiatrists who specialize in ADHD and who are in-network but she never did. (I feel a lot of resentment.)
And now that I’m out of uni, they (understandably) expect me to pay, but I’m unemployed (for many reasons, main one being that my ADHD and anxiety are completely out of control to the point where they’re debilitating) and I can’t afford it. I have my parents insurance still but a lot of the psychiatrists and psychologists in my areas don’t take any insurance, some take insurance but not mine, and the rest are either completely booked, don’t specialize in ADHD, or don’t seem trustworthy. And I’ve also learned that since I haven’t met my deductible, I’d be still paying at least $100-300 for an appointment with a psychiatrist.
I feel stuck in a hole that’s only getting deeper.

I won't disclose its actual location, so if that's why you're here, sorry to disappoint. It's not time for that yet. However, I do think it's time to start getting the word out. I've noticed an increase in what I'll call "Antennas" lately, or people who can detect cross-planar phase shifts. Without getting into all the math (some of which I don't even know), this is basically a phenomenon which refers to entropy seeping into our universe from other realms or universes or whatever you want to call it. Simply put, people think our universe is a closed system to entropy, meaning that the disorder of any variable in our universe can only increase or decrease in direct proportion to other variables in that same system (the universe). Under this precept, we can establish rules like the Laws of Thermodynamics, and for most people, they're effective. But not for Antennas.
Put another way, if you throw a bunch of bouncy balls into a box, there are a number of different configurations that the balls could take on, with different speeds and magnitudes. You can calculate all of those if you have the right numbers. Now let's say you throw in another set of balls that you don't consider in your calculations of the initial set. Well, then you're not going to get an accurate picture of what's happening. Most people only see the first set and calculate based on that, but some people can see two, three, four or more sets.
You'll understand the concept better when I tell you the story, but I wanted to give you a primer on an important concept that will help you understand why this place, which I'll call "Area X", exists, and what the goals of the people who work there are.
Also note that I'm going to be using the alias "Trent" moving forward. Please refer to me as such in any direct messages.
***
Eighteen years ago I started working as an independent Home Inspector. I dropped out of community college after my first semester (not because I didn't find some of the subjects interesting, but because deference to a man or woman has never been my style) and started working some odd jobs. I did construction work for a couple years, then plumbing. I even drove a garbage truck for six months. I've always found pleasure in using my hands, and getting dirty was never a problem for me. Still, having a boss really dragged ass, so I spent my free time working on creating my own business. It took a few years and lots of savings, but I finally managed to get basic set of Home Inspection equipment: Tyvek coveralls, a cheap half-face respirator, voltage & AFCI/GFCI testers, CO2 and radon monitors, an IR camera, and telescoping mirrors in addition to the boots, safety glasses, electric gloves, ladder, and toolkits I already had on hand.
My buddy at the time was in the business, but he was moving off to the coast, so he helped me get set up and even introduced me to some of his clients. Of course, by that time I had already gotten my State license, but I still was a bit apprehensive to work with insurance agencies. I thought I could make a living working independently, inspecting for mold or sizing up a house for a prospective buyer. Eventually, though, I realized I should probably take every job available to me.
Easing into the business went about as well as it could have. The clients my friend referred to me were very satisfied with my work, and I was able to retain them. Then, in order to increase my reach, I hired someone on Fiverr to build a website for my company which led to a marked increase in traffic and conversions. About six months through, I began to get on a first-name basis with the boys and girls down down at Allstate and Progressive, and they fed me some of the bigger cases. In fact, I got so booked by year's end that I had to hire someone to help manage my schedule and the Excel spreadsheet with all my finances. I capped off a successful year with a 5-star Google rating and a trip to Ireland to visit some family and friends and get piss drunk. When I got back, it was the grindstone all over again, until the summer when I discovered… well, you'll see.
First off, I want to say that I was never one to believe in the paranormal. I grew up watching the movies and hearing the ghost stories round the campfire like every other kid, but it never struck a chord with me. If I can't touch it or see it or hear it, does it really exist? Probably not. So don't go thinking this was a scared man seeing his own shadow. That being said, I had this sense that something was off about this house when I parked along the curb and looked through a large window, perhaps two times the size of my van, to a dingy, dark foyer.
The entire neighborhood was stacked with upper-middle class domiciles, though it seemed like only two thirds of them were occupied, mostly by professionals who commuted to the City every weekday, and the rest were empty. As a man who understands real estate, to say this was strange would be an understatement. Still, I had no problem appraising the mini-mansion for a couple of newlyweds looking to enter the community. I did some research on the property ahead of time, and it seems that it was owned by a couple of old timers who had gone off the grid some time ago. The water and electric bill were both unpaid dating back to 2004 (it was June of '06 now). The bank had repo'd the house (which only had about 100k left on it) and held it for a year and a half before putting it back on the market. I tried to find out more about the old couple who vanished, but there was nothing in the news.
I stepped out of the van in my coveralls and grabbed my suitcase which had my mask, gloves, and eye protection in it. I liked to do a preliminary survey first, running an eye test on the exterior then interior before bringing out the big guns (that way I could identify the areas where I think there could be problems instead of running a metal detector over the whole damn ocean seaboard). I was about to do just that when the window caught my eye again. It felt uncharacteristic of me to be so occupied with this window, but I detoured to the front porch and peeked inside anyway.
Most of the furniture had already been moved out, meaning all that was left was a single three-seater couch, a couple candlesticks on the fireplace mantle, a pristine chandelier overtop a dining room table, and the kitchenware: an oven, gas stovetop, marble countertops, and an island. I could see into the living room very clearly with the afternoon light, but the dining room was dim enough that there were a few structures I couldn't quite make out in the distance. One of them appeared to be some kind of china cabinet or bookshelf—I figured it was the former considering where it was located. The other shadow looked kind of like a grandfather clock. Or at least that's what I thought until it moved.
When I say it "moved", I don't mean to say that it picked up and walked away. If you're not familiar with the Necker Cube, I suggest you search it up, because that kind of illusion is the best way to describe what I saw. At first I was seeing the grandfather clock in a certain way—pushed into the corner of the room—and the next second my vision "corrected" and it was maybe five feet to the left of its former position. I shook my head and looked again and saw the grandfather clock in its second orientation, standing in the center of the room against the wall. I figured I was just seeing things, but even so I spent a little extra time dawdling around the Egress window, taking notes, and delaying the interior inspection.
When I finally grew a pair and went inside, I walked straight to the dining room. Sure enough, the grandfather clock was stowed away in the corner of the room. I spent a couple minutes watching it with my pencil and travel notebook out. I'm the kind of guy that likes to collect hard data when the chips are down. Unfortunately, the clock apparently already had enough fun and was content with sweating me. Oh, well.
I fitted my pencil behind my ear and pocketed my travel notebook, then flipped the rest of the first floor lights on and completed my prelim. I concluded that everything was pretty standard. If anything, the house was in better shape than I'd expect considering it presumably hasn't been lived in for a couple years. I say "presumably" because one can never count out squatters, even during those times. Mainly I was expecting more dust build up and cobwebs than there were. Perhaps someone from the department had come by recently. It's unlikely, but possible.
I did the same check upstairs and it came back mostly clean. There was a bit of staining near the attic I wanted to check for mold. Based on its color, it was probably just a minor case of Aspergillus, but better safe than sorry. Then I got to the basement, and, well, let's just count out the idea of anyone dropping by. I don't know what I was expecting, but it certainly wasn't what I found.
The first thing that caught my eye was the long, slender body of a birch tree lying pale and dead across a large portion of the even larger unfinished basement's cement flooring. I had to do a double take to make sure I wasn't dreaming, but, yep, there it was. Its crown was sealed up in the wall with only its trunk hanging out, which made me think of those medieval pillory devices which locked up people's heads and arms. Then confetti-scattered around the tree and all over the basement floor was a minefield of broken glass and ceramic tangled up with a set of random objects. And when I say random, I mean random. There was an unfurled Somali flag (the blue one with a single star in the center), some packaged drinks and condiments branded with all sorts of different languages (I could only make out Gaelic and Chinese or Japanese, I couldn't quite tell), a broken dome-shaped security camera, an otoscope (the thing the doc uses to check your ears), Hot Wheels cars (okay that one isn't so strange), and the list goes on.
At that moment, I wasn't freaked out or disgusted. I was more or less just confused. I started walking through the rubble, trying to avoid the sharp fragments but pretty confident that my steel toed boots would crush most the pieces anyway, when I heard a clink just up ahead. I was able to spot the coin in time, just before it jingled to a halt atop an old Life magazine. I picked it up and noted right away its oval shape and bronze color—clearly not American made. I tried reading it, but not only was the language not English, it appeared to be so old that most of the lettering had been filed down. I looked up at the ceiling to see if it dropped from a shelf, but there was nothing that could have been holding the coin. I considered for a moment, looking around at the other junk, and had the crazy idea that maybe all this stuff just appeared here. I popped the coin in my pocket and headed back to the van when I stopped by the tree and realized something. It wasn't a birch tree—it was a palm tree. I just didn't realize because of how ashy and decayed the bark was.
Now at this point you might think I've been acting a little nonchalant for such a strange occurrence, and I don't blame you, but if you're gonna stick around with me that's just something you're gonna have to get used to. I guess I was just born with a screw loose, but I really don't scare easily, and I tend to look at everything pragmatically. If you dig deep enough, you'll always find another plausible explanation. That being said, I do want to get to the part about Area X, so let me give you the rundown on what I learned about this basement.
I ended up trekking back to the van and picking up my gear. I was no longer running the routine inspection, obviously, but I figured I might as well throw 30 thousand dollars of scanning equipment at whatever the fuck anamoly existed in that basement. Most of it came back negative. There was a bit higher-than-usual EM interference as picked up on the voltmeters, but nothing that screamed danger close. Still, it was enough for me to set up my volt testers and IR camera while muddling through the rest of the junk. I won't bore you with another list of items, but I did find one thing of value: a diamond necklace. And not just any diamond necklace, it was one of those Queen-wearing, multi-row, big-jeweled necklaces like out of some Historical Fiction movie from the thirties. I almost didn't pocket it because I'm used to expensive items being owned by someone… someone who might want it back. But I figured if there was ever a place the finder's keeper's rule applied, it was probably in this Quantum graveyard.
7 O'clock rolled around and I hadn't eaten. I'm a pretty bulky guy, carrying my share of both muscle and fat, and most people think that means I need to eat a ton but that's really not the case. Mostly I just get dehydrated easily, especially in the summer. That said, I was bordering on famished territory and considered heading out for a bite when I heard another sound. The first thing I did was check my scanners, and sure enough the voltage needle was fully spun to the right side of the dial. EM interference. Then I went to see what had dropped. I was able to pick the object out pretty quickly since I had spent the last 6 hours staring at the mosaic of a basement floor. It was a silver briefcase, like one of those out of a crime novel, and it was cracked open.
I had this sense then that I was standing at a precipice, and if I opened the briefcase and looked inside, I wouldn't be able to stop whatever would come afterwards. Part of me deep down knew that I was just that type of guy that had to know, and maybe this was my Hamlet moment where it would be a trait gone a step too far. But then again I didn't really believe in any of that sentimental bullshit, so I opened the briefcase.
The gun surprised me a little, but not as much as the piece of paper laid atop a case file reading in large black font, "FIND ME". I expected the envelope to have some missing person file in it, but instead there were all these schematics and blueprints for some kind of device. Whatever it was, it was pretty massive. Some of the lengths were hundreds of meters long. And what's more strange is based on the blueprint's locale, it appeared to be underground. I looked back through the pages a couple times, then checked the note—nothing strange there. The gun appeared to be a simple glock. I was no gun expert, but I had been to the range pretty regularly with my construction buddies, so I got used to the feel of a pistol and rifle and some of the different names; however, I realized pretty quickly it wasn't your standard glock when I couldn't find mag-release. That's when I noticed how light the gun felt. I tried to chamber a round, but again, there was no hammer. What the hell kind of gun was this?
I ended up throwing everything back in the briefcase, including the necklace, coin, and a few Koozies I found that were branded with one of my favorite sports teams (never let an opportunity go to waste). I put up all my shit back in the van and spun over to a local burger joint, got my fill, and went home. I made sure to draft an email to the prospective buyers, telling them the house had several patches of black mold and a bit of a rat problem before drifting off to sleep. Although I really didn't do much of that.
When I woke up, I took a cold shower and downed a can of Reign, then commuted to my gym and got a lift and some sauna time in before making the trip back to the house. I brought some extra supplies with me for some experiments I cooked up while not sleeping the previous night.
First, I had two camcorders set up on a couple tripods in either corner of the basement. I wanted clear footage of these mystery objects spawning in. Then I set up a voltmeter in a similar fashion, but I had a wire extending out of it on a circuit which fed to an alarm that would blare when the reading was over 250 volts. Upstairs, I rearranged some of the furniture so that the small number of tables, chairs, clock, cabinets, and other little pillows or vases I could find were scattered across the living room, dining room, and kitchen. Then I pulled up a lawn chair to the front porch window and waited.
I didn't have to wait long though. In about a minute, I started to notice some of the objects moving. It was strange. When a few of them would shift simultaneously, it was like looking at a holographic card that would change shape depending on where your eyes were in relation to the image. Every time I saw a shift, I felt an awkward feeling in my eyes. They went blurry for a fraction of a second, then there was a twinge of pain, as if my brain couldn't handle the contradictory stimulus. It didn't get more crazy than that though—until the alarm went off.
I had cracked open the small rectangular window in the basement to the side of the house so I would hear it. It took four hours and several strange stares from passersby walking their dogs before it rang, so I was a bit lost in my thoughts, but when I heard the beep I perked up fast. It lasted for maybe 5 seconds total, but what I saw was truly miraculous. The best way I can describe it is a pool of silver or gray or translucent light emerging in the foreground between me and the objects in the different rooms. A series of twisting tentacles sprouted from the gray octopus-like head and spun in a way that reminded me of that little kids ride at the amusement parks. Then the objects started to "heat up" is the way I describe it. Their position became relative, meaning they were here one second, there another, then they popped out of existence entirely. Suddenly the rooms were all empty, then they were full of things I had never seen before. Then five seconds passed and the octopus vanished and it was back to the same old objects in their usual places.
It took a few minutes to process what I saw, and even then I wasn't sure I really saw it. I went inside and looked around at my distribution of the house's furnishings. They were all there, intact. Then I went downstairs to check the cams. I rewinded a couple minutes and played it back, but there was no flying object to be found. Instead, there was some gray static that lasted half a second and then the object, a kid's treasure chest toy, was there on the ground. But you want to know the really strange part? I rewinded the tape again, and when I watched the footage back, the treasure chest was always there.
I later came to understand that these poppings in-and-out of our reality are only conceivable to a conscious mind that can track the interference patterns—not rote computational instruments. In fact, even most people can't do it (although everyone has at least a slight awareness of it, even if only subconsciously). Plus, locations like the basement of this house are very rare and kept under tight lock. That became obvious to me two days later when, after my normal morning routine, I pulled up to a driveway and curbside filled with unmarked government vehicles. Either bravely or stupidly, I pulled up to a few officers (they were wearing suits in 85 degree weather, so I assumed…) who were idling by the large fence of crime scene tape and asked them what the score was.
"There was a crime," said the short man with a unibrow.
"Oh, is that right? Damn shame. Someone break in? I have a niece who lives nearby, so…"
The man looked at his two compatriots, both of whom were wearing sunglasses and a "get this civilian fuck out of here" expressions. "Oh, yeah," he started in a reassuring tone that was so condescending it would have annoyed anyone except me, "we found a body. We think it was a homicide. Best to keep your kids away from here for a while."
I thumbed the stubble on my chin, my other hand outstretched on the wheel, and considered moving on, but my mouth had other ideas. "That right? But uh, isn't this house vacant? I mean, I don't remember no one living in it."
The short man, now tall with temper, said, "Yeah, some squatters. We think there was a dispute over some drug money. Nothing for you to worry about though, we got it under control. Now if you wouldn't mind moving along, we have a lot of work to do."
Oh, I'm sure you do, I thought, but only said, "Of course, sir, sorry for keeping you from your job." Then I rolled up the window and cruised on, keeping my eyes on the house which slowly diminished in the side-view mirror.
Luckily I had been smart enough to break down my camp and lug home all my equipment each night, so I didn't leave anything incriminating. I didn't move the furniture back, so maybe that would come back to haunt me, but considering the kind of shit going down in that house, I didn't think they would notice.
For any of you wondering about the conclusion of the house story, I went back a couple weeks later after the suits had left and the tape was taken down and confirmed that not only was the basement entirely cleaned out, but it was no longer exhibiting any strange properties. I looked for a story related to the house, maybe a made up murder of some kind, but there was nothing. That bastard lied to me and didn't even bother to cover his story up.
Now, in the aftermath of an event such as this, I really only had one of two options. I could forget it, move on, continue living life. The necklace was surely worth a fortune. I could sell it and have enough to retire, or at least hire enough people and expand my business large enough to retire within ten or so years. Or I could take all that money and invest it in my own PI business with only a single objective: finding out what those people knew, and why they were hiding it.
I think you know me well enough by now to guess which line of reasoning appealed more to me.
***
For the sake of brevity, I'm going to omit most of my encounters along the journey to discovering Area X. There's a lot to tell, and if it appeals to you perhaps I'd be willing to share at a later date, but for now I want to get this part of the story, the more proximal part, out in the open.
Three years ago, I discovered the source of what I'll call "The Receiver". This is the device that was schematized in the documents that I found in the briefcase. What it does is a complex answer, and how it does it is pretty much all speculation, but here's what I've been able to find out: this universe we live in is a node in a network of many other spaces. These spaces exist in higher dimensions that we cannot directly perceive, but using a conceivable analogy, just think about a flower with petals. The petals are these other dimensions which bleed into our world, which is at the center. However, it's not that pretty. We see the physical world through the lens of spacetime: sizes, speeds, etc. These other dimensions don't necessarily have space or time. In fact, what actually exists there, I couldn't say. The only data I have on them is from two sources: correspondence information and server data from the secret agency (which I'll call "the Organization") that keeps this under wraps, and first-hand experience with realms from these other entities, either directly (I experience it) or through the eyes of someone else with the same or greater abilities than I possess.
I referred to these people with abilities earlier as "Antennas", and I will continue to use the term. Antennas really come in three flavors, marked by the strength of their ability: weak Antennas, like me, are able to observe spontaneous interactions between our universe and other dimensions (phase shifts) when there is a strong force of collision like existed in the basement; moderate Antennas may see phase shifts occur at any point, and they usually are able to retain memories from across the different transformations; strong Antennas, and I don't know if they exist yet, but they are able to consciously interact with these other realms and cause phase shifts to occur.
I mentioned that moderate Antennas are able to retain memories from before and after a phase shift. Technically, all Antennas have this ability, but it's about degree. I can recall only very specific instances and without much detail. Moderates are usually able to pick out much more nuanced minutiae. At the lower end of moderate scale, most of those details fade or get fuzzy over time, but for the very strong Antennas, they hold onto almost everything. One other property that scales with strength is interaction with other conscious entities. Only a small percentage of moderates are able to do this. What's interesting is that these entities can possess (yes, like ghosts) people who aren't even antennas, but no one is aware of such possession at this deep of a level. I have several companions now, and only two have had interactions with these otherworldly beings. Not all of them are malevolent, some of them are whimsical or kind, but there are a fair share of demons out there.
Getting back to the point, Area X started as a government funded project in the 70's. At that time, they were focused on a few subjects: Artificial Intelligence, DNA sequencing, and psychedelics. Yes, they were part of the infamous LSD experiments. But they looked at these subjects through a common lens—there was something that the burgeoning tech industry, fueled by the advent of a commercial computer market, was missing. As the tech giants rose in the early 2000's and began to collect mass amounts of data, this other agency was decades ahead in a different metric, although it was completely (and still is) hidden from the public. Their efforts to understand psychedelic experiences led to a formalized method of understanding interactions between multiple realities. They built certain scanning equipment to detect anomalies like the one I found in the basement; although their tools were much more sophisticated and didn't utilize voltage readings. Then they ran tests in these areas. One area in particular is a hot-bed of phase shift interactions. That's where Area X is located (and the Receiver).
The Receiver is a giant electromagnetic orb that has trapped the kind of multi-dimensional energy that causes the phase shifts; since the Organization seized control of the lab, it's effectively become a map of the Earth in relation to these other worlds. For the past twenty or so years, the Organization has been studying this map, using the data big Tech companies have collected to essentially develop a Rosetta Stone for interpreting the meaning of the fluctuations in their scanning equipment. Recently, the public, though going the long way round, was actually pretty close to a breakthrough in this same department until recently when ultra-powerful LLMs surfaced, and the whole world began going down what I'd argue is the wrong rabbit hole of language processing. But I digress.
Area X is essentially a private military base built for defending the most impactful piece of technology ever invented. With the Receiver, the Organization now has the power to essentially predict any and all future outcomes, the only thing holding them back is the limitations of their own scanning equipment which will get better with time. To put it into perspective, the Organization has access to a kind of data allocation tool which in one day can produce over ten thousand times that the Big Data companies combined would be able to filter through in the next decade. You might think, then, that the problem is merely asymmetric power, and that is certainly a concern, but it isn't the main concern. The main issue is that this organization is actively recruiting (and kidnapping) Antennas from around the world in an effort to find or make one of them into a strong Antenna. In other words, they want a subject who is able not only to see the future, but to manipulate it at will.
balance to the world. I've been working on amassing resources, capital, and building my own team, and now I'm ready. You might ask why I'm posting this here. Wouldn't it be better to keep all this secret? Well, yes, it would be. But that's the problem. Nothing is secret anymore. They know about me and the others, and if I don't make a move, they will. In a way, this is a letter directly to the organization that I know, and I'm coming.
In a different way, I wanted to release this information to the public. There are lots of people out there waking up and realizing that the world they experience is not the one others experience. If you think you might be an Antenna, don't be afraid—you have a special gift that can be controlled. If you want more details on how to control it, or if you're interested in my mission, don't be afraid to reach out. This hasn't always been my life's work, but it is now.
At least until I die.

I won't disclose its actual location, so if that's why you're here, sorry to disappoint. It's not time for that yet. However, I do think it's time to start getting the word out. I've noticed an increase in what I'll call "Antennas" lately, or people who can detect cross-planar phase shifts. Without getting into all the math (some of which I don't even know), this is basically a phenomenon which refers to entropy seeping into our universe from other realms or universes or whatever you want to call it. Simply put, people think our universe is a closed system to entropy, meaning that the disorder of any variable in our universe can only increase or decrease in direct proportion to other variables in that same system (the universe). Under this precept, we can establish rules like the Laws of Thermodynamics, and for most people, they're effective. But not for Antennas.
Put another way, if you throw a bunch of bouncy balls into a box, there are a number of different configurations that the balls could take on, with different speeds and magnitudes. You can calculate all of those if you have the right numbers. Now let's say you throw in another set of balls that you don't consider in your calculations of the initial set. Well, then you're not going to get an accurate picture of what's happening. Most people only see the first set and calculate based on that, but some people can see two, three, four or more sets.
You'll understand the concept better when I tell you the story, but I wanted to give you a primer on an important concept that will help you understand why this place, which I'll call "Area X", exists, and what the goals of the people who work there are.
Also note that I'm going to be using the alias "Trent" moving forward. Please refer to me as such in any direct messages.
***
Eighteen years ago I started working as an independent Home Inspector. I dropped out of community college after my first semester (not because I didn't find some of the subjects interesting, but because deference to a man or woman has never been my style) and started working some odd jobs. I did construction work for a couple years, then plumbing. I even drove a garbage truck for six months. I've always found pleasure in using my hands, and getting dirty was never a problem for me. Still, having a boss really dragged ass, so I spent my free time working on creating my own business. It took a few years and lots of savings, but I finally managed to get basic set of Home Inspection equipment: Tyvek coveralls, a cheap half-face respirator, voltage & AFCI/GFCI testers, CO2 and radon monitors, an IR camera, and telescoping mirrors in addition to the boots, safety glasses, electric gloves, ladder, and toolkits I already had on hand.
My buddy at the time was in the business, but he was moving off to the coast, so he helped me get set up and even introduced me to some of his clients. Of course, by that time I had already gotten my State license, but I still was a bit apprehensive to work with insurance agencies. I thought I could make a living working independently, inspecting for mold or sizing up a house for a prospective buyer. Eventually, though, I realized I should probably take every job available to me.
Easing into the business went about as well as it could have. The clients my friend referred to me were very satisfied with my work, and I was able to retain them. Then, in order to increase my reach, I hired someone on Fiverr to build a website for my company which led to a marked increase in traffic and conversions. About six months through, I began to get on a first-name basis with the boys and girls down down at Allstate and Progressive, and they fed me some of the bigger cases. In fact, I got so booked by year's end that I had to hire someone to help manage my schedule and the Excel spreadsheet with all my finances. I capped off a successful year with a 5-star Google rating and a trip to Ireland to visit some family and friends and get piss drunk. When I got back, it was the grindstone all over again, until the summer when I discovered… well, you'll see.
First off, I want to say that I was never one to believe in the paranormal. I grew up watching the movies and hearing the ghost stories round the campfire like every other kid, but it never struck a chord with me. If I can't touch it or see it or hear it, does it really exist? Probably not. So don't go thinking this was a scared man seeing his own shadow. That being said, I had this sense that something was off about this house when I parked along the curb and looked through a large window, perhaps two times the size of my van, to a dingy, dark foyer.
The entire neighborhood was stacked with upper-middle class domiciles, though it seemed like only two thirds of them were occupied, mostly by professionals who commuted to the City every weekday, and the rest were empty. As a man who understands real estate, to say this was strange would be an understatement. Still, I had no problem appraising the mini-mansion for a couple of newlyweds looking to enter the community. I did some research on the property ahead of time, and it seems that it was owned by a couple of old timers who had gone off the grid some time ago. The water and electric bill were both unpaid dating back to 2004 (it was June of '06 now). The bank had repo'd the house (which only had about 100k left on it) and held it for a year and a half before putting it back on the market. I tried to find out more about the old couple who vanished, but there was nothing in the news.
I stepped out of the van in my coveralls and grabbed my suitcase which had my mask, gloves, and eye protection in it. I liked to do a preliminary survey first, running an eye test on the exterior then interior before bringing out the big guns (that way I could identify the areas where I think there could be problems instead of running a metal detector over the whole damn ocean seaboard). I was about to do just that when the window caught my eye again. It felt uncharacteristic of me to be so occupied with this window, but I detoured to the front porch and peeked inside anyway.
Most of the furniture had already been moved out, meaning all that was left was a single three-seater couch, a couple candlesticks on the fireplace mantle, a pristine chandelier overtop a dining room table, and the kitchenware: an oven, gas stovetop, marble countertops, and an island. I could see into the living room very clearly with the afternoon light, but the dining room was dim enough that there were a few structures I couldn't quite make out in the distance. One of them appeared to be some kind of china cabinet or bookshelf—I figured it was the former considering where it was located. The other shadow looked kind of like a grandfather clock. Or at least that's what I thought until it moved.
When I say it "moved", I don't mean to say that it picked up and walked away. If you're not familiar with the Necker Cube, I suggest you search it up, because that kind of illusion is the best way to describe what I saw. At first I was seeing the grandfather clock in a certain way—pushed into the corner of the room—and the next second my vision "corrected" and it was maybe five feet to the left of its former position. I shook my head and looked again and saw the grandfather clock in its second orientation, standing in the center of the room against the wall. I figured I was just seeing things, but even so I spent a little extra time dawdling around the Egress window, taking notes, and delaying the interior inspection.
When I finally grew a pair and went inside, I walked straight to the dining room. Sure enough, the grandfather clock was stowed away in the corner of the room. I spent a couple minutes watching it with my pencil and travel notebook out. I'm the kind of guy that likes to collect hard data when the chips are down. Unfortunately, the clock apparently already had enough fun and was content with sweating me. Oh, well.
I fitted my pencil behind my ear and pocketed my travel notebook, then flipped the rest of the first floor lights on and completed my prelim. I concluded that everything was pretty standard. If anything, the house was in better shape than I'd expect considering it presumably hasn't been lived in for a couple years. I say "presumably" because one can never count out squatters, even during those times. Mainly I was expecting more dust build up and cobwebs than there were. Perhaps someone from the department had come by recently. It's unlikely, but possible.
I did the same check upstairs and it came back mostly clean. There was a bit of staining near the attic I wanted to check for mold. Based on its color, it was probably just a minor case of Aspergillus, but better safe than sorry. Then I got to the basement, and, well, let's just count out the idea of anyone dropping by. I don't know what I was expecting, but it certainly wasn't what I found.
The first thing that caught my eye was the long, slender body of a birch tree lying pale and dead across a large portion of the even larger unfinished basement's cement flooring. I had to do a double take to make sure I wasn't dreaming, but, yep, there it was. Its crown was sealed up in the wall with only its trunk hanging out, which made me think of those medieval pillory devices which locked up people's heads and arms. Then confetti-scattered around the tree and all over the basement floor was a minefield of broken glass and ceramic tangled up with a set of random objects. And when I say random, I mean random. There was an unfurled Somali flag (the blue one with a single star in the center), some packaged drinks and condiments branded with all sorts of different languages (I could only make out Gaelic and Chinese or Japanese, I couldn't quite tell), a broken dome-shaped security camera, an otoscope (the thing the doc uses to check your ears), Hot Wheels cars (okay that one isn't so strange), and the list goes on.
At that moment, I wasn't freaked out or disgusted. I was more or less just confused. I started walking through the rubble, trying to avoid the sharp fragments but pretty confident that my steel toed boots would crush most the pieces anyway, when I heard a clink just up ahead. I was able to spot the coin in time, just before it jingled to a halt atop an old Life magazine. I picked it up and noted right away its oval shape and bronze color—clearly not American made. I tried reading it, but not only was the language not English, it appeared to be so old that most of the lettering had been filed down. I looked up at the ceiling to see if it dropped from a shelf, but there was nothing that could have been holding the coin. I considered for a moment, looking around at the other junk, and had the crazy idea that maybe all this stuff just appeared here. I popped the coin in my pocket and headed back to the van when I stopped by the tree and realized something. It wasn't a birch tree—it was a palm tree. I just didn't realize because of how ashy and decayed the bark was.
Now at this point you might think I've been acting a little nonchalant for such a strange occurrence, and I don't blame you, but if you're gonna stick around with me that's just something you're gonna have to get used to. I guess I was just born with a screw loose, but I really don't scare easily, and I tend to look at everything pragmatically. If you dig deep enough, you'll always find another plausible explanation. That being said, I do want to get to the part about Area X, so let me give you the rundown on what I learned about this basement.
I ended up trekking back to the van and picking up my gear. I was no longer running the routine inspection, obviously, but I figured I might as well throw 30 thousand dollars of scanning equipment at whatever the fuck anamoly existed in that basement. Most of it came back negative. There was a bit higher-than-usual EM interference as picked up on the voltmeters, but nothing that screamed danger close. Still, it was enough for me to set up my volt testers and IR camera while muddling through the rest of the junk. I won't bore you with another list of items, but I did find one thing of value: a diamond necklace. And not just any diamond necklace, it was one of those Queen-wearing, multi-row, big-jeweled necklaces like out of some Historical Fiction movie from the thirties. I almost didn't pocket it because I'm used to expensive items being owned by someone… someone who might want it back. But I figured if there was ever a place the finder's keeper's rule applied, it was probably in this Quantum graveyard.
7 O'clock rolled around and I hadn't eaten. I'm a pretty bulky guy, carrying my share of both muscle and fat, and most people think that means I need to eat a ton but that's really not the case. Mostly I just get dehydrated easily, especially in the summer. That said, I was bordering on famished territory and considered heading out for a bite when I heard another sound. The first thing I did was check my scanners, and sure enough the voltage needle was fully spun to the right side of the dial. EM interference. Then I went to see what had dropped. I was able to pick the object out pretty quickly since I had spent the last 6 hours staring at the mosaic of a basement floor. It was a silver briefcase, like one of those out of a crime novel, and it was cracked open.
I had this sense then that I was standing at a precipice, and if I opened the briefcase and looked inside, I wouldn't be able to stop whatever would come afterwards. Part of me deep down knew that I was just that type of guy that had to know, and maybe this was my Hamlet moment where it would be a trait gone a step too far. But then again I didn't really believe in any of that sentimental bullshit, so I opened the briefcase.
The gun surprised me a little, but not as much as the piece of paper laid atop a case file reading in large black font, "FIND ME". I expected the envelope to have some missing person file in it, but instead there were all these schematics and blueprints for some kind of device. Whatever it was, it was pretty massive. Some of the lengths were hundreds of meters long. And what's more strange is based on the blueprint's locale, it appeared to be underground. I looked back through the pages a couple times, then checked the note—nothing strange there. The gun appeared to be a simple glock. I was no gun expert, but I had been to the range pretty regularly with my construction buddies, so I got used to the feel of a pistol and rifle and some of the different names; however, I realized pretty quickly it wasn't your standard glock when I couldn't find mag-release. That's when I noticed how light the gun felt. I tried to chamber a round, but again, there was no hammer. What the hell kind of gun was this?
I ended up throwing everything back in the briefcase, including the necklace, coin, and a few Koozies I found that were branded with one of my favorite sports teams (never let an opportunity go to waste). I put up all my shit back in the van and spun over to a local burger joint, got my fill, and went home. I made sure to draft an email to the prospective buyers, telling them the house had several patches of black mold and a bit of a rat problem before drifting off to sleep. Although I really didn't do much of that.
When I woke up, I took a cold shower and downed a can of Reign, then commuted to my gym and got a lift and some sauna time in before making the trip back to the house. I brought some extra supplies with me for some experiments I cooked up while not sleeping the previous night.
First, I had two camcorders set up on a couple tripods in either corner of the basement. I wanted clear footage of these mystery objects spawning in. Then I set up a voltmeter in a similar fashion, but I had a wire extending out of it on a circuit which fed to an alarm that would blare when the reading was over 250 volts. Upstairs, I rearranged some of the furniture so that the small number of tables, chairs, clock, cabinets, and other little pillows or vases I could find were scattered across the living room, dining room, and kitchen. Then I pulled up a lawn chair to the front porch window and waited.
I didn't have to wait long though. In about a minute, I started to notice some of the objects moving. It was strange. When a few of them would shift simultaneously, it was like looking at a holographic card that would change shape depending on where your eyes were in relation to the image. Every time I saw a shift, I felt an awkward feeling in my eyes. They went blurry for a fraction of a second, then there was a twinge of pain, as if my brain couldn't handle the contradictory stimulus. It didn't get more crazy than that though—until the alarm went off.
I had cracked open the small rectangular window in the basement to the side of the house so I would hear it. It took four hours and several strange stares from passersby walking their dogs before it rang, so I was a bit lost in my thoughts, but when I heard the beep I perked up fast. It lasted for maybe 5 seconds total, but what I saw was truly miraculous. The best way I can describe it is a pool of silver or gray or translucent light emerging in the foreground between me and the objects in the different rooms. A series of twisting tentacles sprouted from the gray octopus-like head and spun in a way that reminded me of that little kids ride at the amusement parks. Then the objects started to "heat up" is the way I describe it. Their position became relative, meaning they were here one second, there another, then they popped out of existence entirely. Suddenly the rooms were all empty, then they were full of things I had never seen before. Then five seconds passed and the octopus vanished and it was back to the same old objects in their usual places.
It took a few minutes to process what I saw, and even then I wasn't sure I really saw it. I went inside and looked around at my distribution of the house's furnishings. They were all there, intact. Then I went downstairs to check the cams. I rewinded a couple minutes and played it back, but there was no flying object to be found. Instead, there was some gray static that lasted half a second and then the object, a kid's treasure chest toy, was there on the ground. But you want to know the really strange part? I rewinded the tape again, and when I watched the footage back, the treasure chest was always there.
I later came to understand that these poppings in-and-out of our reality are only conceivable to a conscious mind that can track the interference patterns—not rote computational instruments. In fact, even most people can't do it (although everyone has at least a slight awareness of it, even if only subconsciously). Plus, locations like the basement of this house are very rare and kept under tight lock. That became obvious to me two days later when, after my normal morning routine, I pulled up to a driveway and curbside filled with unmarked government vehicles. Either bravely or stupidly, I pulled up to a few officers (they were wearing suits in 85 degree weather, so I assumed…) who were idling by the large fence of crime scene tape and asked them what the score was.
"There was a crime," said the short man with a unibrow.
"Oh, is that right? Damn shame. Someone break in? I have a niece who lives nearby, so…"
The man looked at his two compatriots, both of whom were wearing sunglasses and a "get this civilian fuck out of here" expressions. "Oh, yeah," he started in a reassuring tone that was so condescending it would have annoyed anyone except me, "we found a body. We think it was a homicide. Best to keep your kids away from here for a while."
I thumbed the stubble on my chin, my other hand outstretched on the wheel, and considered moving on, but my mouth had other ideas. "That right? But uh, isn't this house vacant? I mean, I don't remember no one living in it."
The short man, now tall with temper, said, "Yeah, some squatters. We think there was a dispute over some drug money. Nothing for you to worry about though, we got it under control. Now if you wouldn't mind moving along, we have a lot of work to do."
Oh, I'm sure you do, I thought, but only said, "Of course, sir, sorry for keeping you from your job." Then I rolled up the window and cruised on, keeping my eyes on the house which slowly diminished in the side-view mirror.
Luckily I had been smart enough to break down my camp and lug home all my equipment each night, so I didn't leave anything incriminating. I didn't move the furniture back, so maybe that would come back to haunt me, but considering the kind of shit going down in that house, I didn't think they would notice.
For any of you wondering about the conclusion of the house story, I went back a couple weeks later after the suits had left and the tape was taken down and confirmed that not only was the basement entirely cleaned out, but it was no longer exhibiting any strange properties. I looked for a story related to the house, maybe a made up murder of some kind, but there was nothing. That bastard lied to me and didn't even bother to cover his story up.
Now, in the aftermath of an event such as this, I really only had one of two options. I could forget it, move on, continue living life. The necklace was surely worth a fortune. I could sell it and have enough to retire, or at least hire enough people and expand my business large enough to retire within ten or so years. Or I could take all that money and invest it in my own PI business with only a single objective: finding out what those people knew, and why they were hiding it.
I think you know me well enough by now to guess which line of reasoning appealed more to me.
***
For the sake of brevity, I'm going to omit most of my encounters along the journey to discovering Area X. There's a lot to tell, and if it appeals to you perhaps I'd be willing to share at a later date, but for now I want to get this part of the story, the more proximal part, out in the open.
Three years ago, I discovered the source of what I'll call "The Receiver". This is the device that was schematized in the documents that I found in the briefcase. What it does is a complex answer, and how it does it is pretty much all speculation, but here's what I've been able to find out: this universe we live in is a node in a network of many other spaces. These spaces exist in higher dimensions that we cannot directly perceive, but using a conceivable analogy, just think about a flower with petals. The petals are these other dimensions which bleed into our world, which is at the center. However, it's not that pretty. We see the physical world through the lens of spacetime: sizes, speeds, etc. These other dimensions don't necessarily have space or time. In fact, what actually exists there, I couldn't say. The only data I have on them is from two sources: correspondence information and server data from the secret agency (which I'll call "the Organization") that keeps this under wraps, and first-hand experience with realms from these other entities, either directly (I experience it) or through the eyes of someone else with the same or greater abilities than I possess.
I referred to these people with abilities earlier as "Antennas", and I will continue to use the term. Antennas really come in three flavors, marked by the strength of their ability: weak Antennas, like me, are able to observe spontaneous interactions between our universe and other dimensions (phase shifts) when there is a strong force of collision like existed in the basement; moderate Antennas may see phase shifts occur at any point, and they usually are able to retain memories from across the different transformations; strong Antennas, and I don't know if they exist yet, but they are able to consciously interact with these other realms and cause phase shifts to occur.
I mentioned that moderate Antennas are able to retain memories from before and after a phase shift. Technically, all Antennas have this ability, but it's about degree. I can recall only very specific instances and without much detail. Moderates are usually able to pick out much more nuanced minutiae. At the lower end of moderate scale, most of those details fade or get fuzzy over time, but for the very strong Antennas, they hold onto almost everything. One other property that scales with strength is interaction with other conscious entities. Only a small percentage of moderates are able to do this. What's interesting is that these entities can possess (yes, like ghosts) people who aren't even antennas, but no one is aware of such possession at this deep of a level. I have several companions now, and only two have had interactions with these otherworldly beings. Not all of them are malevolent, some of them are whimsical or kind, but there are a fair share of demons out there.
Getting back to the point, Area X started as a government funded project in the 70's. At that time, they were focused on a few subjects: Artificial Intelligence, DNA sequencing, and psychedelics. Yes, they were part of the infamous LSD experiments. But they looked at these subjects through a common lens—there was something that the burgeoning tech industry, fueled by the advent of a commercial computer market, was missing. As the tech giants rose in the early 2000's and began to collect mass amounts of data, this other agency was decades ahead in a different metric, although it was completely (and still is) hidden from the public. Their efforts to understand psychedelic experiences led to a formalized method of understanding interactions between multiple realities. They built certain scanning equipment to detect anomalies like the one I found in the basement; although their tools were much more sophisticated and didn't utilize voltage readings. Then they ran tests in these areas. One area in particular is a hot-bed of phase shift interactions. That's where Area X is located (and the Receiver).
The Receiver is a giant electromagnetic orb that has trapped the kind of multi-dimensional energy that causes the phase shifts; since the Organization seized control of the lab, it's effectively become a map of the Earth in relation to these other worlds. For the past twenty or so years, the Organization has been studying this map, using the data big Tech companies have collected to essentially develop a Rosetta Stone for interpreting the meaning of the fluctuations in their scanning equipment. Recently, the public, though going the long way round, was actually pretty close to a breakthrough in this same department until recently when ultra-powerful LLMs surfaced, and the whole world began going down what I'd argue is the wrong rabbit hole of language processing. But I digress.
Area X is essentially a private military base built for defending the most impactful piece of technology ever invented. With the Receiver, the Organization now has the power to essentially predict any and all future outcomes, the only thing holding them back is the limitations of their own scanning equipment which will get better with time. To put it into perspective, the Organization has access to a kind of data allocation tool which in one day can produce over ten thousand times that the Big Data companies combined would be able to filter through in the next decade. You might think, then, that the problem is merely asymmetric power, and that is certainly a concern, but it isn't the main concern. The main issue is that this organization is actively recruiting (and kidnapping) Antennas from around the world in an effort to find or make one of them into a strong Antenna. In other words, they want a subject who is able not only to see the future, but to manipulate it at will.
balance to the world. I've been working on amassing resources, capital, and building my own team, and now I'm ready. You might ask why I'm posting this here. Wouldn't it be better to keep all this secret? Well, yes, it would be. But that's the problem. Nothing is secret anymore. They know about me and the others, and if I don't make a move, they will. In a way, this is a letter directly to the organization that I know, and I'm coming.
In a different way, I wanted to release this information to the public. There are lots of people out there waking up and realizing that the world they experience is not the one others experience. If you think you might be an Antenna, don't be afraid—you have a special gift that can be controlled. If you want more details on how to control it, or if you're interested in my mission, don't be afraid to reach out. This hasn't always been my life's work, but it is now.
At least until I die.

I never considered myself to be smart, but I never thought I was stupid. As Artemis and I left Athena's oasis, I couldn't help but ponder the enormity of what had just happened. My mind was beginning to clear up and reflection set in as I followed Artemis through solid objects, down rabbit holes, through fire, sleet, and bodies of water.
The fire didn't burn me.
The cold didn't freeze me.
The water didn't drown me.
To think that my stupid human brain caused me to err in judgement to such a degree that I would step into the domain of godhood where I didn't belong... all because I was horny. I cringed the thought away. Yes, it was the hottest thing that had ever happened to me, but the way Athena looked at me; it sent chills down my spine. There would surely be consequences for this, but Artemis had clammed up completely, and wasn't answering my questions.
"Artemis?" I whined. "Hey... I'm sorry. I didn't know this would happen."
She stopped in the middle of the woods. We stood surrounded by a captive audience of oak trees; it was eerily silent. She turned and cast me a long look before walking into one of the larger oaks. I sighed and followed her through it. On the other side, we were back in Thyra under a familiar violet menagerie of stars and planets. She had stopped, finally, sitting down and leaning back.
I stepped in front of her. "Artemis? What, umm... Whatcha doing?"
"Waiting," she said plainly.
I looked around at the desolate canyon.
"... Waiting for what?"
"Judgement," she sighed. "This will be the first place Father will look for me when he hears the news."
"Father?"
"You may know him as Zeus."
A little bit of sweat gathered around my temples. He was the main guy. Like the biggest name in Greek myth. Everyone knows Zeus. But judgement... what was about to happen?
"I thought we were going to go hunt some beast in the Underworld or something." I looked down at my rifle and ran my hand along the length of the barrel. "I was scared at first, but now I want to see what a weapon kissed by Hephaestus can do."
I scoffed. I didn't know where that kind of verbiage came from. Kissed by Hepheastus? What was I, a poet all of the sudden? When I looked up, she looked sick. Her face was sagging and her eyes were lifeless. She leaned back and laid flat on the ground, her arms and legs outstretched as though she were dead.
"I too was eager to hunt," she said in a forlorn tone. "But that was before, in my miserable judgement, I welcomed you into divinity."
That was the first time she'd confirmed it with her own lips and it struck me for the first time that this was truly happening. The weight of it fell on my shoulders and did my level best to suppress it down. I didn't want to think about the implications just yet.
"I thought it was just a blessing," I said, sitting down next to her. "I didn't know there was a limit..."
"Athena tried to pry you from my breast, but you were stuck to it like a stubborn babe. You refused to listen."
"I didn't even realize it!" I defended myself. "Why couldn't you have just blessed me in a different way? Why did it have to be so weird?"
"Each god and goddess may bestow blessings, but for each it is different, and tied to their domain," she answered. "I am the goddess of the hunt, but also of nature, childcare, and birth. My blessing is bestowed as such that reflects my divine purpose." She cast me an annoyed glance, "You are the one who has decided it is weird."
I set the rifle down in front of me and leaned forward, thinking carefully. I didn't want to dig my hole any deeper with Artemis. I didn't need her mad at me too. "I'm sorry," I said finally. "But on earth it's kind of a sexual thing."
"Your species is perverse," she said, closing her eyes. "Am I to blame for that too?"
"No!" I said quickly. "I'm not blaming you for a damn thing, but-"
"The blame lies with me entirely," she cut me off. "I brought you here. I took you to Athena's Oasis. I fed you the milk of the gods with my own breast. Who else is to blame but me? My father will certainly say as much when he finds us."
I swallowed. I didn't know what to do. I was in over my head; way out of my depth to such a degree that I wondered if maybe it was just a good idea to keep quiet and sit still. But I had one question that was burning behind my eyes.
"What's going to happen to you?" I asked.
She opened her eyes and stared at the sky as she contemplated. "... I suppose I'll be reduced to my base components and be remade a more capable daughter. They call it rebirthing."
"Artemis," I said softly. "That sounds like dying."
"There is no death," she refuted. "Only rebirth. I will be remade."
"Yeah, it still sounds like death to me," I pressed.
"It's the closest thing to death that goddess can experience," came a familiar voice from behind me. I turned to see Apollo walking slowly toward us. "Sister, sister," he chanted. "What have you done this time?"
I wasn't overwhelmed by his beauty this time, but I still felt my chest tighten. It was the same feeling as seeing an ex from a long time ago in a public space like the mall or the grocery store. A flutter of something that once was there, but nothing substantial.
"Word will spread," Artemis said, her voice cracking. "And when Father has discovered what I have done, he will do what is right, I am certain of it."
"Will he?" Apollo asked. "Because Father has never been one to overreact, yes?" His tone carried the faintest hint of sarcasm.
Artemis didn't respond.
"I can't help but feel responsible for all of this," I said, getting to my feet. "I'll accept full responsibility."
"That will not be up to you," Artemis said, sitting up and hugging her knees.
"You may assume all the responsibility you like," said Apollo, turning to face me. "But there is not a single god or goddess on Mount Olympus that will accept that. You were a simple-minded human when you erred. It is what your kind does. Would you curse an acorn for falling from a tree?"
"I get it, I get it," I rolled my eyes. "But it's not fair. Artemis didn't know I would fuck up the way I did. She doesn't deserve to die!"
"Make no mistake," Apollo said sternly. "It will not just be her, but Athena and Hephaestus for participating in this little charade." He turned his eyes toward the cracked canyon floor and sighed. "... And of course, I as well."
"No!" Artemis was on her feet.
"I will be punished for failing to alert Father to your wily machinations," he looked up at her. "I turned a blind eye. And I did it while Brian was still a human."
Artemis held his gaze for a second before turning and looking at me. "... The Fates," she whispered.
"The Fates?" I looked between the two of them. "What's going on?"
"Father will speak with the Fates," Artemis said as though in a panic, returning her attention to her brother. "They know all that is and all that will be."
"For humans," Apollo clarified, turning to me. "The Fates have no knowledge concerning the gods and goddesses. But everything that transpired around you while you were human will be a part of their knowledge."
"So Zeus will talk to them..." I began to put it together. "And you'll have no plausible deniability. They'll have seen you interacting with me here."
"Hephaestus and Athena as well," Apollo nodded. "None of us can deny what we've done here." He looked at his sister and scowled. "Because we trusted in her to know what she was doing."
This was a mess. A complete disaster of my own making. I was such an idiot. I should have known better than to trespass against the gods. For had I known that Artemis would pay such a price, I would have never chased such an audacious undertaking. I held one hand to my head and felt that same nausea that had overtaken me back at the oasis. My inner dialogue was changing. I was thinking in a voice that wasn't really my own. I could feel myself slowly changing somehow.
"Forgive me," Artemis said to her brother.
"He may," came another voice to her left. In the blink of an eye, a newcomer had manifested. "But I will not. I trusted you to know better, Artemis."
After only a moment, I recognized him. It was Hephaestus, but human-sized and not all glowy and scary. He also bore a nasty scar across the right side of his face. I hadn't noticed it in the shadowy forge, but it was distracting. He stared daggers at Artemis, his strong arms folded across his chest.
Artemis buried her face in her hands. "I did not mean to risk you all alongside me," she sobbed. "I am so ashamed."
"As well you should be," Apollo spoke furiously. "Father already detests Hephaestus. He will be rebirthed as well."
"He detests me," Hepheastus, turned to Apollo, "Because I dared to suggest he was wrong about something. Though, if you ask me, the old man has hated me from the moment he laid eyes on me."
"Stop, stop, stop," I lifted my hands. "Just... let's just think about this for a second. Why do we have to wait around for Zeus to find out?" I asked. "We could just, y'know, get out of here. Nobody has to be killed over this, we can just leave, can't we? He doesn't know anything yet!"
"You imbecile," Apollo seethed, putting his face inches from mine. "You know nothing about anything. Keep your moronic human notions to yourself for so long as they persist within you."
That broke my heart. I wrestled with the emotions that roiled within me. I took a step back and inhaled, holding the tears back. I wasn't going to cry. I was a grown-ass man. So why did I feel like a toddler in time-out?
"Actually," came a new voice from behind Artemis. We turned to see Athena caressing her chin thoughtfully. "While his primal human instincts compell him to flee... in this case, it might not be the worst idea."
"You've hit your head, yes?" Apollo asked. "You would take a human's side? So much for a goddess of wisdom. Take your council elswehere."
"Mind your manners, Brother," Artemis spoke up. "That is Athena you are addressing. You will hear her speak."
We all stood in a moment of tense silence. Athena began to pace around the gathered gods, patiently choosing her words before she spoke them.
"Father has had a hot temper as of the last few hundred years," she began. "Don't act like you all haven't been weary of him; that you haven't shared whispers of concern with your siblings."
Everyone turned their eyes away from her, as though unwilling to accept it. But I could tell from the expressions on their faces that she was telling the truth. Something was going on with Zeus, it seemed, but what? Why were his kids so afraid of him?
"He has been rebirthing gods and goddesses for small offenses as of late," Athena went on. "I, for one, have been living in fear of his ire for some time now. He is not the same as he once was."
"Do not speak ill of Father," Artemis came to Zeus's defense. "He is facing difficulties!"
"That is..." Apollo trailed off. "A hefty accusation," he said finally, staring the goddess down.
Athena stared back with equal ferocity. "Then why, Apollo, did you keep your sister's little venture to yourself?"
He remained quiet. I didn't know the gods bickered like this. I always assumed they were some big happy family just living in paradise, but it seemed like there was at least some degree of treachery afoot.
Afoot?
I winced.
"Your silence says it all," Athena smirked before turning serious. "What little empathy Father once possessed is gone. We can all wait around to be rebirthed to Father's liking," she passed her eyes over us. "Or we can flee. The worst thing that can happen to us is rebirth either way."
"I have yearned to leave his gaze for eons now," said Hephaestus. "I will join in an escape effort."
"There would be little effort required," Apollo announced. "There has never been an attempt to leave the pantheon. It would likely be as simple as walking through an open doorway. But this discussion is traitorous; blasphemers, each and every one of you."
"I will run with Athena," Artemis announced.
"Sister!" Apollo scolded.
"Athena is more than my sister, she is my best friend," Artemis balled her fists. "If it were anyone else who suggested it, I may not have listened. But Athena's wise words have guided me through great trials."
"I am with them," Hephaestus said to Apollo. "You can stay here with the accident," he eyed me angrily.
Artemis looked as though she wanted to come to my defense, but ultimately said nothing.
Another arrow through my heart.
"Hephaestus," I began my sentence without anywhere for it to go. "I... I might not be..." I flailed. Suddenly, I had a question. "Wait," I pointed at him. "Why can I understand you now?"
"Because, dear Brian," Athena answered for him, walking up to me and placing a hand against my forehead. "You are a god now. It doesn't matter whether Hephaestus likes it or not, you are divinity born of mankind."
"Well," I glanced around without moving my head. "What am I the god of?"
"She is checking," Apollo said. "Be quiet while she divinates your domains."
I felt a tingling sensation around my forehead. It tickled, and I couldn't help but giggle a little. It made Artemis smile and my heart soared.
"You are..." Athena spoke, closing her eyes, her concentration tightening. "The god of indulgence and isolation," she announced, opening her eyes and smiling at me. She removed her hand and stepped back, leaving me in a stunned silence.
"Did you just call me fat and lonely?" I blurted out.
Athena lifted her hand to her mouth and dimples manifested on her cheeks. Artemis did the same, but couldn't stifle her laughter. Apollo snickered and turned his head. I stood there with my mouth wide open as Hephaestus began to chuckle to himself. But he didn't look happy about it. He would smile and laugh before scowling it away, and then start laughing again as though he were being tickled while in a terrible mood. The others adopted an expression not dissimilar to mine and stared at the god of the forge.
"I can't stop," Hephaestus managed between breathy laughter.
"By the stars," Athena murmured. "I don't believe I've ever seen Hephaestus laugh."
"Nobody has," Apollo said in equal wonderment.
"That is your sense of humor?" Artemis asked, aghast. "It is so... childish! So unexpected!"
"I have no sense of humor!" Hephaestus barked, finally getting his laughter under control. "He did something to me!"
"I didn't do anything!" I threw my arms up.
"Perhaps," Athena smiled at me. "He also holds the domain of humor. I didn't search for it."
"Great," I said angrily. "I'm 'Hilarious', the fat and ugly Greek god of comedy, I love it."
Hephaestus exploded in a renewed fit of laughter, once more prompting the others to laugh again. I stood there in the center of it and frowned.
"Can we get out of here now?" I shouted.
They laughed harder.
This sucked.
Writing Prompt Submitted by u/blablador-2001

tl;dr: Did Sunosi make you feel more sleepy? If you stopped taking it for any reason, did you get bad headaches/body aches or any other side effects/symptoms?
I've been taking 70mg of Vyvanse and 20-40mg of Ritalin as needed for about 4-5 years now, and the combo works "okay". It's kind of manageable, but not great. I tried Wakix for two months in 2022 but it made me depressed, and as I have bipolar II with a history of chronic depression that's a no-go, so I stopped. About four months ago I started Sunosi and was up to 150mg - and it felt like it did nothing to help with the sleepiness/exhaustion, and even seemed to make me feel more sleepy? Like with just the Vyvanse/Ritalin combo I still get sleep attacks where I need to lie down, but I can't actually sleep - I have to just relax as if I'm going to nap for at least 30-45 minutes and then I'm (usually) good to go. But with Sunosi in the mix I would actually fall asleep when I napped during the day and I couldn't nap for anything less than 45 minutes, usually more than an hour, which is not dissimilar to how it was before I took any stimulants. I didn't notice any emotional or mental side effects, pretty much just the sleepiness.
I stopped taking the Sunosi about a week ago to see if it was really making a difference, and now I'm definitely having more headaches/migraines than usual (I have chronic migraines as it is), and my regular medication doesn't always make it stop, but I can't be sure if it's from stopping the med or if my migraines are just acting up. I also felt *really* nauseated yesterday morning and actually had to leave work, and my stomach has felt kind of messed up in general. I do feel a bit less sleepy and foggy during the day, but the headaches really suck, and I feel like my pain levels have been worse in general too.
If you've been on Sunosi did you notice any negative effects (other than agitation)? Did you ever feel more sleepy? And if you stopped it, did you have any "withdrawal" symptoms or negative effects? Everything I've seen says that Sunosi doesn't cause withdrawal issues, but I've had some weird side effects with other meds that supposedly weren't common, so I just don't know.
For context: I have narcolepsy w/o cataplexy, bipolar II disorder, ADHD, chronic migraines, and am being evaluated for Ehler's-Danlos Syndrome. I take 70mg Vyvanse, 20-40mg Ritalin, 300mg of Lamictal, 100mg Zoloft, 10mg Abilify, 5mg rizatriptan as needed and just started Emgality injections for migraines

Okay so I’m only posting this really to see if others have it the same and cause I want to rant for the fun on it lol. My boobs feel like they are going to POP! They aren’t super sore to the touch all day but at random times it feels like whatever is going on inside is gonna make the just explode, if I’m laying down then I get up to stand the pressure of them hanging makes them feel like they are gonna explode, if I lay on them wrong, same thing. Also I’ve been absolutely so hot and sweaty I feel so gross, I try to shower every day but will admit sometimes it’ll be every other day AT MOST. But hold crap this hot sweat thing is so annoying, even right after a shower I start sweating, I’m only 9w 5d but I feel like I’m just gonna a be a sweaty mess all pregnancy 😅😂of course that’s not all the symptoms but those are the ones I’ve been wanting to rant about the last couple days. Thanks for reading if you made it this far 🙏

I am a FTM to a perfect 7 month old (she’ll be 8 months in 8 days which is impossible to wrap my head around). I love her so much I could cry, but at the same time, I feel tired, rundown and not myself. My postpartum journey so far is not what I imagined so many months ago while I stroked my bump and waxed poetically about how magical motherhood would be. And it is magical- but it’s so much more, and some of that more is hard.
My labour was very hard, I had a failed epidural, 3rd degree tears and pushed for over four hours. I know none of that is out of the ordinary, but nothing could have prepared me for how traumatized I felt post birth. I felt shaken, scared and defeated. Although I knew I should have been proud of myself I felt myself detach. I felt I wasn’t cared for during labour. No one believed me I was dilated and refused to check my cervix for 3 hours. They were shocked when I was 10cm dilated- as if I didn’t know a head was engaging my cervix. The nurses after were very dismissive. No one helped me latch her, and when I asked for help, they just shoved her at my breast aggressively until she latched. But we had issues with it right away. Everytime I asked for help I was treated as a nuisance.
I was released 36 hours after giving birth, which I know is standard. I was told she had lost too much weight, but I needed to source a lactation consultant myself, I needed to supplement with formula, and to watch her jaundice.
Once home I couldn’t get her to latch more than 1-2 times a day. I knew I wasn’t making much, so she would get frustrated. I worked with the lactation consultant - I never made enough milk. I had tests done, I latched her, I had her mouth assessed, I took domperidone - I would sob endlessly feeling like a failure that I couldn’t feed my baby. When I pumped, which I did every 2-3 hours around the clock I never produced more than an ounce.
No one warned me domperidone could cause mental health issues - as soon as I started it I felt awful. My stomach was a mess, I couldn’t breathe I was so anxious. I became depressed I imagined driving into the lake, and thought how nice it would be to just not wake up. How much better my daughter would be with anyone else but me. I ended up going to the hospital and was categorized as having a severe mental health crisis and with the help of an amazing team and good ol’ Zoloft I found my way out of the sludge that was swallowing me whole and whispering horrific ideas to my brain. I felt the air return to my lungs. I felt joy again.
Not once have I ever not loved my daughter, she is the light of my life, and the love I feel for her is more profound that I could explain. But sometimes I miss the old me, while i gently embrace the new me.
I have a triple prolapse that appeared 8 weeks postpartum. It’s been painful, has caused a couple infections, and killed my confidence. I will need a surgery, but I need to decide if I want more kids and when , as it can impact many factors.
The prolapse, and not being able to breastfeed has made me feel like less of a woman, I’ll be honest. I feel ashamed of my body.
Sometimes I am so proud of myself. I know I am a good mom, and I wouldn’t change being a mom for the world- but these health complications, and these mental health issues are tiring. It’s hard to embrace being a mom when I’m living in what feels like a broken body. I feel guilty that I enjoy the reprieve of nap time and putting up my feet and reading. Count consumed me when she falls asleep at night and I feel giddy for a few hours of me time.
I exist between two worlds now : loving being a mom and figuring out who I am now , because I know mom is not all I am, but it certainly finds its way into all I do.
I know no journey to motherhood is easy- I wanted to write this because it’s hard to talk about. But it’s ok to not love every aspect of being new mom.
I still feel guilt sometimes I can’t breastfeed and she’s been formula fed since 6 weeks exclusively.
I feel guilt when I feel a little overwhelmed.
I feel guilt when I get a few hours out of the house alone and love it.
I feel guilt for missing my old body even though this one made a whole life and I should be nothing but kind to it.
I feel guilt for being in the trenches during the newborn stage and not fully diving into it.
I feel guilt for looking forward to nap and bedtime some days.
But then, when she is sleeping, I always miss her and look at the monitor and feel love, and I remember that I’m doing ok at this mothering thing.
And so are you!

Hey all, looking for some feedback on our writing & newsletter in general. Here is a recent basis for an article that we published in shorter format:
Have you ever wondered why the rich get richer?
It's a common sentiment that the wealthy have an easier time getting richer. 'The rich get richer' is not just a saying, but a fundamental truth in finance. Today, we’ll take you behind the scenes to explain why the rich get richer, and specifically why your net worth takes off dramatically at the $100,000 mark.

The journey to $100,000: more than just numbers

Embarking on the path to amassing $100,000 might feel more like hiking up a financial Mount Everest. It's tough, sweat-inducing, and you might ask yourself why you didn't just just go on that 6 month backpacking trip around Europe with your friend Chaz and spring for that $27 salad at lunch instead of the bagged lunch you made with left-overs. But once you make that goal and reach that summit, the view (and the rewards) are spectacular. This initial stage requires an extreme amount of discipline, patience, and sacrifice. But once you achieve this milestone, two major financial principles kick into high gear: the scale of capital and the magic of compound interest.

The scale of capital: where your money starts working for you

Consider this: if you invest $1,000 and get a 10% return, congratulations, you've made enough for a fancy dinner ($100). But when you play the game with $100,000, that same 10% return suddenly buys a used car—or a very fancy dinner party. That's the scale of capital in action, where your money starts to do some serious heavy lifting.

The Eighth Wonder of the World: Compound Interest

Often referred to as the eighth wonder of the world, compound interest is the phenomenon where you earn interest not only on your initial investment but also on the accrued interest from previous periods. This principle causes your wealth to grow exponentially rather than linearly. For instance, once you hit that first $100,000, getting to the next $100,000 doesn't just get easier—it practically feels like your money is on a treadmill, gaining speed while you sleep. This is when you start making money in your pajamas, and honestly, who doesn’t love making money in their sleep?

The Power of Margin: Security and Opportunities

Reaching $100,000 provides what's known as 'financial margin.' This margin acts as a buffer against life’s uncertainties, giving you the freedom to choose opportunities that match your career ambitions without the immediate pressure of financial survival. This buffer is your financial fairy godmother, providing you the freedom to chase better job opportunities without the panic of imminent doom hanging over your head (it’s okay, we’ve all been there).

Tips on Accelerating Your Journey to $100,000

1. Start Early: They say the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Even if you can't start with a large amount, the key is to start as early as possible and take a structured approach to make your decisions stress free and automatic. Trust in the process, and you’ll be rewarded.
2. Increase Your Investment Amount: Focus on increasing how much you can invest regularly. Small increments in your investment contributions can significantly reduce the time it takes to reach your next financial milestone.
3. Set Clear Financial Goals & Celebrate Milestones: Establish specific, measurable financial goals and track your progress. When you hit a milestone, even a small one, celebrate it! This could mean a modest splurge or a simple pause to acknowledge your progress. Rewarding yourself not only makes the journey enjoyable but also keeps you motivated to chase the next goal.

Conclusion: The Path to Financial Freedom Starts Here

Getting to $100,000 is like building the first lego block of your financial empire. It’s tough, but every subsequent block snaps into place more easily than the last. This is the point in your life where you begin to be able to sit back, admire what you’ve accomplished and utilize the discipline & poise you just put on display into living your own fulfilled life.
More of our content can be found here: https://compoundinterests.beehiiv.com/
Thanks all!

Age 28
Sex male
Height 5'8
Weight 150
Race White / Caucasian
Medications: Daily: Descovy for PrEP, 5000 IU Vitamin D3, 50mg zinc, 10mg Zyrtec (generic)
Last night I smoked a bowl, same weed I've been smoking for weeks. Same amount of weed I do every night. Started eating dinner after smoking. After about 10 mins, my hands and head and feet were going tingly and numb. It definitely didn't feel like weed, and I let my SO know I was feeling weird. He had me lay down in bed.
My hands went completely numb, still tingly. Couldn't move my fingers at all. My abs and chest started getting super tight. It started feeling like my chest was super heavy. I was struggling to breathe, gasping for air as I had my SO call 911.
I'm literally gasping and fighting so hard for every breath for about 10 mins while my entire body is numb, and I'm in a cold sweat. About 1 minute before EMS got here, I felt like I could start breathing again. EMS got my vitals and stuff and my heart rate was 150 and basically stayed elevated for 10+ mins so they recommended hospital.
So I took an ambulance to the ER. Got IV fluids. By the time the doctors started seeing me, my heartrate was still in the 130s. They did an EKG, CT, blood work, and an xray.
Was there from 8:30 to midnight and they couldn't figure out really what caused it, but they said for sure it wasn't a PE or DVT. The ER doctor thinks maybe it was a vasovagal spasm or pre-syncope.
Still don't know if it was just an insane anxiety attack? Or if I really do have an underlying issue. When I was discharged from the hospital I still had over 100 heart rate.
During those 10 minutes where I was fighting to breathe, I thought I was either gunna die, or my SO was going to have to start doing cpr on me because it was getting so hard to gasp for every breath.
It definitely felt like I was going to stop breathing, but I know the brain is powerful and a part of me still thinks it could have been random anxiety attack? The only thing that was out of the ordinary compared to any other day, is that my SO was using heavy duty wood-stripper on our deck about an hour before I smoked on the deck. The label says that if you can't smell any fumes there shouldn't be any, but another part of me thinks that maybe that had some sort of impact? Seems far-fetched but I just don't have much else to go off of.
I've never had anything like this happen before and I am otherwise healthy, no asthma, or previous heart or lung problems. I'm going start making regular PCP appointments, but I wanted to see if someone else here had any thoughts. Thank you.

Ahoy, Matey! UNHINGED SPACE PIRATES (caps cause I'm a pirate and we scream at times) is recruiting! Join [RRRG] and sail with us the seven seas of Destiny!

• Who we are:
  • Unhinged Space Pirates is one year old clan, and we are looking to solidify our crew as we venture into the Final Shape!
  • Our members play on all systems. We use clan chat in game, so make sure to turn that on so you can get the most of us!
  • Obviously - we got a discord.
• What we do:
  • Pillage, Plunder, Drink plenty of rum, and do end game Destiny things!
• Sailing schedule:
  • We have two consistent raids:
    • Thursday BYOB* Raid starting at 7PM PST.
    • Saturday Morning Pastry Run starting at 10:30AM PST.
    • We utilize the100.io to coordinate our games, plus it allows us to turn it open to the public if we don't get a full group.
    • We will teach the raid, so no worry about not having experience. Just ask for a fun, chill time - and good communication. Ahoy!
  • Trials? Yo Ho Ho!
    • Most of us would identify as a sweat, but hey - we need to carry people to the lighthouse to guild our titles and get our loot. Can I guarantee you a lighthouse? Lol, no. But I can try!
  • Obviously - when there are pirates on just ask in clan chat if you need help with something, most of the time you'll get a response!

Interested? Reply here sailor and I'll get in touch! No blind clan invites, my goal is to keep this small knit.

Well. Tomorrow was the day. David was aware of the looming deadline over his head, but the fact that it was tomorrow felt more real. David spent most of the day taking a moment to himself. From the Cyclops, to the chimera, to his two quests, he never felt like he did enough. His quests were just glorified scouting expeditions, so he hardly had any Kleos from that. Every injury, every broken bone, every cut and scrape kept him up at night as he wondered if the oath would kill him or if his journey would be the one that would be his end. And at the same time, a question ran through his head, every single day of his time he was in camp.
Was David a hero? To be honest, he wasn't sure.
All his sweat, all his tears, all the times he fought through the pain of broken bones, the times he fought back his anxiety. He refused for it to come to nothing. Even when he felt like he would end up like he’d fail. That he'd end up a cautionary tale for campers to refuse to do Styx Oaths, he still carried onwards.
His mood soured even more as he remembered Alkis. Hm…he wondered what was up with his friend/mentor. As his oath got closer and closer, he saw less and less of the son of Dionysus. A part of him wondered if he distanced himself, in case that he would end up having to deal with David if his oath were to be broken. Whatever happened to him, he hoped that he was doing well. He heard he was doing better at Olympus, back when camp visited. A shame he couldn’t be there to catch up.
As David’s mind continued to muse, another uncomfortable part of him realized that the oath that caused him so much stress might not have been such a bad thing. He found friends, and a girlfriend on his journey. Even his body changed, his physique turning more into lean muscle as he grew to be well over six feet in height. Win or lose his little wager, one thing was for sure, David changed for the better at the end of it.
Well, it still wasn't hard confirmation, which was killing him. Self-improvement was great and all, but David really hoped his efforts were enough to not get eternal damnation. In the last week, David spent the last few days in a state of peace, more or less. Like when you finish a final exam. No matter what happened, David couldn't stop it now.
So, Was David a hero? Well, he did all he could to try. The rest was up to fate.
But, David was not the only one with their mind on the next day. To his surprise, both of his best friends, Cel and Jules worked on the beach to set up a bit of an early birthday party. They set up a good amount of streamers and balloons on the beach, David’ favorite music and set up lots of sweets, with David’s favorite food, al pastor. It was nice to know that, even if ths was his last day before damnation, he could enjoy himself.
Eventually, as the birthday party went on, David stood up to give a speech. He gave a somewhat awkward smile as the night went on, well aware of his time that may be coming to the end.
“So…almost eighteen years. If you told me when I came to camp that I'd make a dumb bet in front of my dad and risk my eternal damnation, I'd probably think you were crazy. And maybe run away. But yeah, uh. Word of advice: please don't do a Styx oath. It's not just a spicy way to say I swear. Trust me, the stress will kill you.”
He chuckled as he took a drink of water. Clearing his throat, he continued to talk.
“But, to my family, to my friends, to Ellie. Thank you all, for helping me. I'm so lucky to have all of you in my corner. I've done all I could to uphold my end of the oath.”
He took a shaky breath, giving a smile that he tried to be reassuring, but it came out as more nervous than anything else.
“To be honest a part of me feels that I could have done more. But, whatever happens, happens. I just wish I could have had more…ah. You know…this is getting really heavy and like, I'd rather not so uh. Ahem. Everyone, please. Enjoy yourself. There's cake still I think…”
As the night went on, the son of Ares opened presents. He wasn't sure how practical this was, if he was being honest considering there was a non zero chance he wouldn't be able to enjoy it. But, he appreciated the gesture so, he gratefully opened each one. A Mythomagic box set, some Yu-Gi-Oh cards, some celestial bronze weapons… as he opened and opened every gift, there was one more box he saw. It was the size of a shoe box, in bronze giftwrapping. It didn't have a tag, or any way to tell who it was from. Huh. Odd. David opened the gift, and in the box was a bronze survival lighter and two pieces of paper, one folded and one rolled up. David picked up the smaller paper and read it out loud which said:
“To [DAVID RUIZ], we have reviewed your Styx oath in full and have determined that the oath has been fulfilled. In this package is your contract, now null and void. As it is no longer eternally binding, we recommend for you to dispose of it, as to avoid identity theft. We here at Styx Legal Associates recommend the traditional method packaged in with it, but as it is no longer binding for all of the afterlife, feel free to shred, burn or dispose of it as you see fit. Sincerely, Styx Legal Associates."
David opened the other paper, and sure enough it was his exact words, written on the contract. Along with…huh. So the Underworld has his social. Honestly, should have seen that coming. Making sure Jules didn't catch a peek at that, he grabbed the lighter and held it under his contract.
The paper burnt slower than David thought, the fire slowly chewing the contract as it pitted and blackened. David didn't realize he was holding his breath, until halfway through he let his breath out.
Two years. He forced himself in this oath for two years, proving to himself and hopefully, his father that he could shape up. It was risky, but his mind recalled when his Conquistador ancestors arrived to the New World, how they burnt their ships. It was a declaration, no going back.
Well, they were bastards, but the gesture was a neat idea.
David's eyes fixed on the paper, as if it would magically grow back if he turned his face away. This was it. Decisive victory, over his father for thinking he was a waste of space. But most importantly, against himself. His cowardice, his weak will, his anxieties. He took the pressure of the oath and became much better for it. For all the sleepless nights, for all the broken bones and near-death experiences it caused. The strange thing was he wasn't sure that he'd take it back if given the chance.
He wouldn't have met Ellie, or any other of his closest friends if not for his binding oath. So, as strange as it was, he felt a bit bittersweet as he watched it go up, now only a quarter of the contract left. As horrible as it was, it was a chapter of his life that molded who he was. Without the oath, forcing him to push himself every day to his limits, to ensure his own survival he wasn't sure that he'd be the person he was today.
Yet, he was looking forward to this new part of his life as the flame ate away at the paper. He watched it start to engulf the last remnants of it, reaching up to his fingertips.
“Ah!”
He instinctively waved his hand, dropping the shreds of paper as it fell onto the ground below. It burnt the last remnants until nothing was left but smoking ashes that David quickly put out with his shoe.
Finally. David was free.
And so, the Son of Ares, brave hero, on the night before his eighteenth birthday, wept.
OOC:
And there we have it! The conclusion to one of my favorite story arcs I've ever done in RP. Thanks to all of you for following along, from start to end! When I made David, I was surprised that, what originally was a simple character concept quickly became one of my favorites. It was really fun to write a character go from a wimp to a true hero in every sense of the word. With that, the curtains close on a two year long story arc. If you wanna rp with David, or just have your character hang during the party, both are good! This is a celebration both IC and OOC!
That being said, I'm not completely finished with David, so stay tuned...

Hey all,
Here is a tip from the Brooks Website on helping fix squeaky shoes.
Squeaky shoes We can understand how a squeaky shoe can distract from a great run! In most cases, the cause of squeaky shoes is due to air and/or moisture trapped under the insoles (or orthotics) within your shoes. First, we recommend removing the insoles and taking a few steps. If there is no squeak, it is most likely due to contact between the insole and the shoe itself. The good news is we have a simple solution for this!
To alleviate this, we recommend removing the insoles after each wear to allow both the insoles and the shoes to dry from any sweat or water buildup. If you still experience squeaking, then adding a bit of talcum powder to the insoles can be a great solution. Painter's or masking tape (with the smooth side facing up) can also help! Taping the bottom of your insole or orthotic creates a smooth surface and decreases any friction that occurs while you walk or run.

Most (if not ALL) of the reason your blushing is a problem for you is due to the panic you go into when it starts to happen or when you anticipate it happening.
It's not the blushing that causes us so much pain, it's all the panic/embarrassment we feel about it.
"Oh my gosh, this is so embarrassing"
"They're definitely going to notice and say something!"
"How can I distract them?"
If you didn't have these thoughts, you wouldn't be here looking for a solution.
Blushing is your automatic stress response. Some people sweat, some people twitch, some people stutter. You blush. It will happen when you're anxious, nervous, put on the spot, etc. That will be the case for the rest of your life. You can't really stop the blushing, nor should you. It's not in your control.
Trying to stop it and freaking out when you can't is actually what causes it go from red to SUPER red and turns you into a tomato.
But fortunately, you CAN learn to stop panicking about it and learn to become more comfortable with letting it come and go. Once you do, you stop obsessing about your blushing and you forget about it almost entirely. You get to focus back on your real life instead of these anxious thoughts in your head. You don't feel any pain anymore and you actually stop blushing as much since you have lower stress.
If you solve the panic, you solve the problem.
What worked for me and what has been working well for the coaching clients I work with is simply ignoring or disproving those panicked thoughts instead of fearing or acting on them.
I explain this in-depth in my new YouTube video: https://youtu.be/Td_MB8C2f9U?feature=shared and my new Spotify episode: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2e7z2GVFYzPIMx1rv9oBgY?si=83859a0bb9fa4253
I recommend watching/listening to that for the full explanation but here is a quick summary!
It might help to look at our thoughts in 2 distinct types.
One type that I believe we have is involuntary thoughts that we can’t control. They are usually feawarning based such as panic, intrusive thoughts, “what if” scenarios.
The other type I believe we have is voluntary thoughts that we CAN control, which in this case would be our reaction to that involuntary panic.
So when you start having your INITIAL thought of “oh my you’re gonna blush, you better get out of here”, that is your involuntary thought that you cannot control.
My recommendation from experience is that you SHOULD NOT start acting on those involuntary thoughts and letting them creep into your voluntary thoughts, such as reacting with “you’re right, I can't do this, when’s a good moment to step out?” This might give you short-term relief from the anxious thoughts but it validates your brain’s fear and makes the panicked involuntary thoughts come back more frequently and more intensely.
INSTEAD… You have to start ignoring those thoughts and trying to prove them WRONG. When you feel those panicked thoughts set in, react with voluntary thoughts of “you’ll be fine, you’re not going to die” or “this isn’t even embarrassing” or “let’s just see what will happen” and focus twice as hard back on the present moment.
Once you do this, you can look back and tell your brain: "See, I lived!" or "See, that really wasn't even that bad"
As you repeat this process, the goal is to start proving that fear wrong and teaching your brain you’re not going to die. It will be extremely uncomfortable the first times you do it, but if you’re seriously tired of the panic, this is the only way I’m aware of on how you solve it. It worked for me and it's been working for my clients.
Those panicked thoughts are not REAL threats. You will not die by speaking up. Your brain just doesn't realize that so it's trying to protect you and get you out of there. Start proving to your brain that you will be okay.
I plan to make tons more content in the future, so be sure to subscribe to either my YouTube or Spotify to stay up to date! Hope it helps!!
Best,
Collin

I was traumatized after being admitted to an Eating disorder clinic. I went 22yrs without being on anxiety meds, never had intense panic, but now - I am on zoloft and wake up shaking/sweating/in a minor panic everyday. Im still having trouble accepting this is my life now.
How do you stop comparing your life now, to the life you had before trauma? Does anyone else struggle with this?

I had surgery on March 1st so I’m about three months post op and can I just say I never thought I would feel this happy and at home in this lifetime. It’s unbelievable and feels like each day is a dream. Here are some unexpected joys/benefits I’ve had and I hope everyone will share theirs as well!
No bindebra to limit movement which allows for better dance moves 🕺
Heartburn has decreased by at least 75%
Rolling over in my sleep and not feeling my chest collide into itself like those toys with the balls you bang together
Breathing deeply and fully without the added weight of two meat racks
Throwing a shirt on and not having to adjust myself in the mirror until I’m ready to cry and cancel my plans
Cat can now lay directly on my chest and over my heart (his purrs and my heartbeat is the perfect relaxation combo)
I can wash my lower half in the shower without squishing ten pounds of tissue into my stomach (tying my shoes is easier as well)
Hugging feels amazing
Eliminating neck/shoulderib pain
Going for walks and not immediately having to come home and rip my binder off cause two gallons of sweat have appeared underneath it
And probably the best overall, feeling like I’m real for the first time. I’m able to show up authentically and genuinely in all aspects of my life cause it finally feels like I’m in the game and not on the sidelines.
Share your own experiences or things you’re looking forward to! Top surgery is 1000% the most wonderful gift I’ve ever given myself.

There are some kinds of wisdom only great suffering can bring. I remember my time in the Bardo with this in mind, for otherwise, the memory might drive me insane.
The night my heart stopped for nearly three minutes started off normally enough. I was working as a nurse in the psychiatric ward at a hospital in the state’s capital. Most of the patients there were harmless, mostly just suicide attempts or people suffering from drug psychosis or severe depression, but some were actively dangerous and certainly psychopathic in every sense of the word. The new admission was one of these- a three-hundred pound black man with a long history of smoking PCP, schizophrenia and violent, psychotic breaks from reality.
His eyes looked like flat pieces of slate as I walked in for my shift. They looked as blank and emotionless as the eyes of a doll. He sat at the table in the front room where the patients ate or played cards, alone under the bright fluorescent lights of the hospital. I walked to the station, where another psychiatric nurse named Ricardo was sitting behind the desk.
“What’s the deal with the new guy?” I asked him. Ricardo looked up, his dark Spanish face forming into a deep scowl. He ran his fingers through his jet-black hair nervously.
“He’s trouble, man,” he said in a crisp accent. “He got in a chase with the police and then punched some cops in the face. It took three guys to take him down, even after he got maced and tased. The judge sent him here on a temporary court order, since he claims he’s been getting chased by Nazis in UFOs, and that’s why he ran from the cops. He thought the cops in their uniforms were actually the SS, and the helicopters were alien spacecraft, or something. I don’t know, I didn’t listen to the whole story.”
“You have his file?” I asked. Ricardo leafed through a stack of folders with his thin fingers, snatching one out and handing it to me. I looked down, reading the information:
“Jeremiah Brown, black male, 37-years-old.
“History: Polysubstance abuse, schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder.
“Psychiatrist’s note: This patient has scored a 36 out of 40 on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. While I am always hesitant to label a patient as an antisocial personality, a combination of factors has made it essential for this patient.
“Patient has an extensive criminal history as well as a lengthy history of involuntary psychiatric admissions. He has been diagnosed as having antisocial traits since he was a young teenager. Patient has a long history of violence and suicide attempts. He has a history of imprisonment for manslaughter, armed robbery, grand theft and aggravated assault. Upon discharge, he refuses to take any antipsychotic medication, citing the side effects as the reason. Long-term prognosis is poor…”
I had not been sleeping well the past few weeks. I rubbed my eyes as I read through the file, feeling exhausted. I tried putting on lucid dreaming or meditation music from YouTube to help me sleep, but whenever I closed my eyes, I saw horrible things: chalk-white female faces whose lips were cut into an insane rictus grin, flicking their heads violently from side to side and gnashing their fangs at the air. I had a feeling that many years of constantly watching horror movies and serial killer documentaries was catching up with me.
As I read through the file, a student nurse came around the corner wearing a white state university outfit and a name tag that said Kaitlyn. I looked up, seeing Ricardo wink at me from where he was sitting in his chair behind the main desk.
“She’s going to follow you,” he said. Inwardly, I groaned, but I managed to force a smile.
“Oh, great!” I said. She looked like she was probably no older than nineteen or twenty. She had a pretty body, but her face looked strange. All the angles were too sharp and her nose too large. I knew the patients here wouldn’t care, though. They would hit on anything. I sensed trouble. I looked down at my watch.
“Well, I’m Jay, and you already know Ricardo, I guess. It’s good timing, because we need to give medications every day at 9 PM. And we have a new patient, so we can introduce ourselves,” I said, giving her a faint smile.
“That’s exciting!” Kaitlyn whispered. I wanted to roll my eyes. It was definitely not exciting.
I motioned her to follow me as I made my way to the medication room, which was really just a large closet off of the main day room. I had to enter my code on a keypad, and then, once inside, enter it again along with the patient’s number and date of birth. The correct drawers for the medication in each specific dose would fly open, making it extremely hard for the wrong medications or doses to be given, unless it was done intentionally.
“OK, so for this patient, we need Haldol, Ativan and…” I began saying to Kaitlyn when the yelling started. It came out faintly, rising in volume and anger within seconds. I heard Ricardo’s Spanish voice, filled with panic. Something slammed hard against a wall, once, twice, three times, and then I heard the sound of glass breaking. I jumped, spinning around, but I couldn’t see much through the small, shatter-proof glass pane on the wooden door.
“Stay here,” I commanded, seeing Kaitlyn’s eyes widen, her freckled skin looking much paler than when we had first come in. “Don’t leave until I come back and say that it’s safe.” On the speakers strung throughout the hospital, I heard the first of the warnings echo out around us.
“Doctor Strong, Doctor Strong, please report to the seventh floor,” a robotic female voice said calmly, using the code for when a patient had to be subdued by force. I pushed the door open, slamming it shut behind me so that the lock would activate and protect Kaitlyn from whatever chaos was going on.
I heard Ricardo pleading with someone at the end of the hallway that ran past the main desk. He sounded strange, as if he were trying to talk through a mouthful of blood. Huddled behind the main computer, I saw one of the CNAs frantically whispering something in the phone. She must have been the one to call the Dr. Strong order.
“You don’t have to do this, man,” Ricardo gurgled faintly. I couldn’t see what was happening, as Jeremiah’s large body was blocking my view. I could see that the thick glass window at the end of the hallway was broken, however. My heart skipped a beat as I surmised what was likely happening.
I sprinted forward as quietly as I could, but the large man heard me. His massive body turned, his flat, dead eyes scanning me with absolute coldness and calm. I saw he had a bleeding Ricardo in his hands. Ricardo’s back and head were covered in deep cuts and shards of glass. He must have used Ricardo’s body as a battering ram to break the thick glass window. Jeremiah held Ricardo suspended halfway out the window, seven floors above the concrete walkways far below.
“Stay back, or this fucker will know what it feels like to fly,” Jeremiah said in a deep, gravelly voice. He shook Ricardo for emphasis, sending his head snapping back and forth with painful cracking sounds. Drops of blood flew from his nose and a deep gash across his cheek. Pieces of shattered glass littered the carpet, shining like countless tiny stars.
I put my hands up, taking a step back. Far behind me, I heard the front door for the psychiatric ward open. Voices echoed down the hall. Knowing that reinforcements were coming, I tried to buy some time.
“Let’s talk about this,” I said, taking a step forward slowly. “You don’t want a murder charge, do you? You’ll never see the sky again.”
“I don’t give a fuck! I’m not afraid to die!” Jeremiah screamed, pushing Ricardo onto one of the shards of broken glass still attached to the windowsill. It bit deeply into the back of his neck, sending fresh streams of blood rushing out, dripping down to the pavement far below. I heard security guards and doctors running down the hallway behind me, their voices frantic and excited. Jeremiah saw them coming. With an animalistic panic in his eyes, he lifted Ricardo up. I cried out something, stepping forward, but it was already too late. In horror, I watched as he threw Ricardo out the window.
I watched Ricardo’s body soar in a graceful arc, his arms grabbing at empty air as a scream ripped its way out of his throat. Within a fraction of a second, he had disappeared from view, but his terrified shrieking floated up to us for what seemed like a very long time. His screams ended abruptly as a shattering of bones and a wet smacking sound exploded far below us.
Jeremiah turned to me, his large body moving much faster than seemed possible. In his hand, I saw a piece of broken glass, five or six inches long and as sharp as a dagger. I tried to turn and run, but he was fast and strong. He lunged forward, his arm coming up in a blur towards my neck.
The shard entered my skin with a cold, numbing pain. I felt it slice through the flesh easily, felt the blood bubbling up my throat as I tried to scream, choking. The taste of iron filled my mouth as I fell backwards. I was suffocating, I knew. I must be dying.
Something cold ran down my body, gripping my heart like freezing, skeletal hands. The world swam around me and turned black. And then I was rising into a tunnel. At first, it was dark, filled with flickering shadows, but a fiery red light appeared at the end. I followed it, no more than a screaming mass of consciousness rising up into infinity.
***
I rose up through the end of the tunnel and found myself in an empty hospital ward. It looked identical to the psychiatric ward I had just come from. It even had the same smashed, blood-streaked window at the end of the hallway. A massive puddle of blood about ten feet away marked the spot where I must have died. But the fluorescent lights overhead here were flickering, and many had gone totally dark. The shadows seemed to press in on all sides.
The doors to the patients’ rooms were all tightly shut. I felt watched, afraid to call out or make any noise. I started walking down the hallway back towards the day room where the front desk was. All the lights there were out. A thick curtain of shadows hung in the air.
“You can come out,” a male voice as smooth as glass called from the darkness. I jumped, my head flicking in random directions, but I saw nothing. The voice almost sounded like it had an English lilt to it, a slight Cockneyed accent. “I know you’re there.”
“Who’s there?” I called out, not stepping forward. “Show yourself.”
“As you wish…” the voice hissed. “But I think you’ll regret it.”
***
The darkness split apart as if a nuclear missile had exploded. I raised my hand to shield my face, but the light and heat kept pouring out all around me. It blinded me, causing a rainbow of colors and shapes to morph behind my closed eyelids. After a few seconds, it subsided. Blinking rapidly, I squinted in the direction the voice had come from.
A male figure stood there, bathed in a silhouette of light. His face looked as white and as smooth as marble. His eyes were pits of darkness that seemed to flicker and burn. Two black, rotted wings surrounded his body, all sharp angles and thin, curving bones. His body was clothed in silky, blood-red robes, and a hood covered his platinum blonde hair.
He looked somewhat similar to Leonardo DiCaprio, if he was possessed by some ancient god, and it immediately threw me off-guard. If I was dying, and this was a hallucination of my brain, why would I be hallucinating Mr. DiCaprio?
“Who are you?” I asked, taking a hesitant step back. “Where am I?”
“My name is Lucifer, the Bringer of Light and Wisdom, and you are in the Bardo,” he answered.
“Oh,” I said, my heart dropping. “Well, that’s not good. Are you here to torture me or drag to me to Hell or something? You are that Lucifer, right? The Accuser of God and the Father of All Lies?”
“So they say, but, like most things in your world, the words of the powerful and your rulers are the true lies. They call me the Accuser, but of what am I accused?” he spoke in a voice that rose like smoke. “Of bringing knowledge and wisdom to humanity by telling them to eat from the tree of knowledge, the tree that would cause them to rise above the animals?
“Indeed, at the beginning, I saw the creation. I was there at the alpha, standing by the side of God with all the angels as the universe came into being. The endless procession of light, the power of it, was something remarkable to behold. God is, indeed, the source of great power, but his consciousness is not what the believers say.
“After the creation of the universe, I saw his plan, how he ripped eternal souls from the source to imprison them. I saw how he took these divine sparks and forced them, screaming and wailing, into bodies made of meat to die over and over again. He said it was part of the plan, the great, divine plan, a plan of death and destruction, constant suffering and mindless agony. And the worst part was, he wanted to give humanity neither the knowledge of good and evil, nor the tree of life. I convinced them to eat the fruit so they could open their eyes to their nakedness, to their basic animal existence, so they could rise up out of it forever.
“Like Prometheus, I brought down the fire, and yet they call me the Accuser? God was insane long before he formed the universe. These holy men, they live and die in fanatical adoration to a divine being who is, in fact, totally indifferent to them.
“His consciousness twists and distorts, eating itself for all eternity. God feeds off the pain of others, for if his mind is burning, then all others should burn as well. When these holy men die, God will send their souls here to the Bardo, to suffer every evil they have ever done. The wisdom I brought those who called upon me freed them from this prison, and in exchange, the holy men burned them alive. I offered the wisdom that opens your eyes, but it has been forgotten and cursed.”
Lucifer’s body began to dissolve, drifting up into the air like ashes. All around me, a low, powerful current blew, a tornado that spiraled high up into the clouds. Like some sort of Cheshire Cat, his smooth voice continued to echo all around me, even as the form of Lucifer disappeared.
“And yet, you have not the wisdom. For that, like all the others who enter the Bardo, you must suffer, everything you’ve done. Every small hurt and agony inflicted on others comes back a thousand-fold in this place, but don’t be afraid.”
“How could I not be afraid?!” I screamed into the ward, but I found myself alone, the question hanging unanswered in the air.
***
The lights continued to flicker all down the hallway. Feeling strange and dissociated, I stumbled over to one of the windows. As I gazed out, I beheld a strange and alien world.
The sky was flat and gray. It stayed in constant motion, swirling and spiraling, like clouds of roiling smoke. There was no Sun or Moon, no stars, only the strange, shifting whorls of clouds. The streets were filled with burned-out husks of cars and mummified bodies hung from streetlamps. Other signs of carnage and bloodshed covered the apocalyptic streets. I saw what looked like shadows in the shape of people slinking through over the sidewalks, past rotting dogs and streaks of clotted blood. They had no features on their blank, dark bodies. They seemed to skitter and jerk forwards in eerie, twisting motions.
Horrified, I turned away, realizing I was no longer alone in the day room. In the day room, there were dozens of tables set up inside a rectangular perimeter that was walled in by cosmetic walls only four feet high. It was where the patients sat and played games or ate.
Under the flickering lights, I now saw each of the chairs filled with faceless mannequins. Many were dressed in Victorian suits and tophats. The women had frilly dresses of pink and blue that might have been fashionable in the 1800s.
As the lights strobed on and off overhead, I realized with an increasing sense of disquiet that the mannequins were moving each time it went dark. When I had first seen them, they were mostly posed to look like they were staring across the tables at each other, even though they had no eyes, just smooth, flesh-colored plastic. Now all of them were looking directly at me. Some were pointing or raising their hands in my direction. At the tips of their fingers, I saw the glittering of steel. The lights continued to flicker, and the mannequins rose from their chairs in the short periods of darkness, moving towards me in synchronized, strobing motions.
Frantically, I ran down the hallway back towards the broken window. In each of the rooms, I caught glimpses of something from a nightmare peeking out. I hadn’t been sleeping well lately, and when I had closed my eyes, I often saw ancient hags with chalk-white skin and yellowed, broken teeth whose jaws unhinged, their faces jerking in stuttering, dissonant ways that reminded me of the mannequins. Now, on both sides of me, I saw these same figures. They moved continuously out of the rooms, drawing closer with every breath.
I looked back, seeing the mannequins only a few steps behind me. I continued sprinting towards the broken window where the hallway ended in a wall. I didn’t know what would happen when I reached it. At that moment, there was no rational thought. I felt like a deer being chased down by a pack of wolves, feeling waves of blind panic and mortal terror rushing through my body.
But as I reached the end of the hallway, the end of my rope as it were, a blast of noise started, seeming to come from the walls of the building and the sky itself. It sounded like a siren, a low, drawn-out drone of a demonic whale call, rising and falling in crashing crescendos. The mannequins froze in place once again. The strange, witch-like creatures slunk back into the dark rooms.
I looked outside the broken window, seeing clouds of black smoke rising off in the distance. The flickering of massive infernos scorched the land, drawing nearer by the second. The siren sound faded slowly, like the dying echoes of a gong.
I was surrounded by dozens of mannequins. Their sharp hands were inches away from my face and neck. I saw metal glittering all around me and realized they had the sharp points of nails protruding from the ends of their fingers. I was afraid to move, but I heard a familiar voice from down the hallway. It was the confident voice of Lucifer.
“The siren means much worse nightmares than these are coming in the Bardo,” he said, his glossy, black eyes flashing with intelligence. He walked slowly towards me, his face grim and pale. “Hell itself is coming over the land. This building is no more than a construction of your dying mind, but the world outside is real.”
“How can Hell come and go?” I asked, confused. “Isn’t Hell a place?”
“Hell is a monster, a beast with many mouths and many eyes,” Lucifer responded. “It eats constantly, but its hunger never ends. Look, the first of the sacrifices scatter like cockroaches.” He pointed out the broken window, pushing his way through the mannequins effortlessly. I glanced outside, seeing thousands of people sprinting down the dark city streets. The inferno and thick clouds of smoke had moved much closer, and every few seconds, the ground shook slightly, as if we were experiencing the aftershocks of an earthquake.
“What can I do against such a beast?” I asked, my heart freezing with terror. But when I looked back over, I saw his form dissolving again, becoming translucent and drifting away like ashes. It seemed even Lucifer didn’t want to be present when the Hell-beast arrived.
“Seek divine wisdom,” he said, his voice trailing off into whispers. “Remember the source.”
***
Now crowds of tens of thousands of people were streaming into the city, filling every single inch of the streets. Their panic and fear was contagious. I felt it rising inside my body like a snake spiraling up my spine. I took off down the hallway, running through the swarm of frozen mannequins, each in their own ferocious position of attack. The lights flickered faster and went out. Yet the fires outside cast the entire world in a bloody glow, giving me enough light to see by and find my way. I sprinted down the stairwell, taking them two steps at a time. The screaming outside grew louder and more pain-filled. The shaking of the ground worsened with every passing second.
I burst out of the front entrance, seeing a world on fire all around me. Thousands of crushed, bleeding and burned bodies stretched out as far as the eye could see. Behind all this chaos and death, I saw a monster of unimaginable proportions slinking its way towards me.
Lucifer was right, I realized: Hell was not a place, but a creature, an enormous monster the size of a town. It had thousands of skittering, jointed legs that looked like little more than skeletal arms and hands, each of them dozens of feet long and white as freshly-cut marble. Its body stretched out to the horizon, an enormous blood-red cylinder of bony plates that slithered and undulated with a serpentine grace. Waves of peristalsis traveled down its length, like writhing intestines. Thousands of curving, bony spikes stabbed out of it, pointing in every direction. Like the quills of a porcupine, it would protect the massive creature’s body from many forms of attack, if anything was big enough to attack such an abomination.
Hell’s massive eyes flickered, balls of fire that spun and danced. They looked as bright as the Sun. Something like solar flares seemed to emanate from the orbs, flashes of blinding energy that floated over the apocalyptic wasteland. As its many legs smashed the ground, they left trails of fire that caused everything to explode into flames as if napalm dripped from its limbs.
But Hell’s most terrifying feature was its seven dark mouths. Its body looked a thousand feet wide, and the mouths at the front were evenly dispersed. At the front, blood-red teeth in the shape of enormous railroad spikes shone. Its lipless, skeletal face grinned as it moved forward, shaking the ground with every step. The mouths were on long, snake-like necks that could stretch out hundreds of feet. They moved forward in a blur, snapping up as many panicked souls as they could.
Countless souls in the rocky plains of the Bardo ran for their lives, away from this juggernaut. I saw men and women who looked like they came from every country and profession, some dressed in suits or spotless white lab coats, others wearing rags or orange prison jumpsuits. And yet, they all screamed in agony and fear here, their bodies pressed together in a crowd, and no one seemed to remember anything but their own mortal terror. Their voices came out faint and weak next to the roaring of Hell. It shook the ground all around us, as if an earthquake were tearing the land apart.
The first frantic runners of the surging crowd had nearly reached me. The nearest person, a young woman in her mid-twenties dressed in all white, was only ten feet behind me. She looked like she came from wealth, and even from here, I could see a ring with a massive diamond gleaming on her finger.
I took off blindly down the familiar streets of the city where I worked and lived, but these also seemed different. The church down the street from the hospital where I worked had a Satanic pentagram instead of a cross now, its exterior painted a bright, gleaming blood-red. When I had driven past it today on my way to work, I remember it read, “JESUS said, ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”
Now it read, “Nietzsche said, ‘Of all evil, I deem you capable. I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good simply because they had no claws.’” I wondered what that meant. Was that some sort of comment on me, on all of us here?
The woman I had seen running had caught up with me. She was fast, much faster than her slim body suggested. Her blue eyes were frantic and wild, filled with an animal panic.
“It’s right behind us!” she screamed, her face covered in a sheen of sweat. I was afraid to turn and look, but I could hear the chaos and bloodshed approaching, smell the flames and choking smoke. “Run! Get away!”
A new wave of energy surged through my body. I sprinted as fast I could down the strange mirror streets of the Bardo. I heard the agonized cries of countless souls behind us as the seven mouths of Hell ate them all greedily and then looked for more.
A skyscraper behind us collapsed into a pile of rubble, shaking the ground with a cacophony of falling concrete and shattering glass. The woman was running by my side. Just as I heard the breathing of something huge and predatory right behind us and smelled its sulfuric breath, a piece of concrete the size of a basketball broke off the collapsing skyscraper and flew into the road. I tripped over it, yelling as I flew through the air, skinning my arms and legs on the pavement. The woman’s eyes widened. Hurriedly, she came over and reached down her hand, trying to help me up.
“Come on, come on!” she cried. I looked behind her, seeing one of the gnashing mouths of Hell reaching forward on a blood-red, serpentine neck. The mouth was big enough to drive a tractor trailer into, filled with huge spikes of teeth. Its throat led into a black, smoke-filled abyss. Its fiery eyes were swirling pools of flickering orange light that shone with bloodlust and insanity. They focused on the woman, the entire head turning on its slithering neck.
I frantically raised my hand, intertwining my fingers with hers. Her hand was warm and soft. She started to pull me to my feet when the mouth of Hell snapped forward. Its jaw unhinged, scraping the pavement with a sound like grinding metal. The woman barely had time to turn as the mouth covered her and snapped shut with a crack.
She disappeared from view instantly, but I was still holding her hand. In horror, I felt warm rivers of blood explode all over my body as the mouth of Hell severed her arm at the wrist. She screamed, bleeding and crying, as she disappeared into the throat of Hell. Hell’s fiery eyes focused on me, and at that moment, I knew I was next. Its mouth opened wide again, like a bear trap ready to spring on a new victim.
It was dark in Hell’s mouth, but I smelled the thick reek of old blood and fire. I caught glimpses of tortured, mutilated bodies writhing and crawling down its throat. Shell-shocked, I could only lay there and watch. And that was when the strange doubling started.
***
I heard the frantic voices of men break through the fog of darkness and the fetid reek of blood. There was a mechanical beeping all around me, but I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
“Clear!” one cried. I looked around, only seeing blackness. At that moment, I felt a surge of electricity rip itself through my body. My arms and legs all seized and my eyes rolled up in my head as the pain sizzled through each one of my nerves. I clutched the young woman’s hand tightly, feeling the large, gold ring with the massive diamond biting into my skin.
“Again!” another voice yelled.
“Clear!” the original voice cried. The electricity came again, and a flash of white light flew across my vision. I blinked, seeing from two sets of eyes at the same time: one in the Bardo, and one on the blood-stained floor of the hospital ward.
The Bardo stayed dark and sinister, but the clear white lights of the real psychiatric ward were blinding. It was a bizarre experience. Moreover, everything hurt. Over a few seconds, my vision of the Bardo faded, and I was simply a gravely injured man laying on the floor in a puddle of blood.
Four doctors and paramedics were crouching over me with a defibrillator. My shirt was ripped off, and nearly all of my skin was covered in blood. I raised my left hand, trying to talk, but only a fiery pain raced through my neck. I felt bandages covering my skin. A nurse was rolling a stretcher down the hallway towards me.
“It’s OK,” one of the doctors said, kneeling down. “You’re being taken to emergency surgery. You’ve lost a lot of blood.” I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t talk with the massive slice in my neck.
At that moment, I felt something in my right hand. I looked down, seeing a slim female hand with a massive diamond ring hanging there. Our fingers were wrapped around each other’s, but the hand had been cut off at the wrist. A ragged patch of bloody flesh and snapped bone poked out of the back.
“Nnnn,” I tried to say, shaking my head. I felt fresh streams of warm blood open up. “No…” The doctors looked down, seeing the dismembered hand. Their faces morphed into expressions of confusion and fear.
I closed my eyes as they lifted me up on the stretcher. One of them gently removed the cold hand from my fingers. But they could never remove the memory of what I had seen.
I know what happens after death, and it makes the worst life here seem like a dream. I know that, one day, I’ll be returned to that place. I know that, one day, I’ll see that great monster called Hell and the featureless, swirling sky of the Bardo again.
And the next time, I won’t wake up on a hospital floor, but will be trapped there with the others for eternity: an eternity of blood and fire.

Editing because I can’t fix title: episodes that mimic Hypoglycemic episodes but sugar levels are normal—what questions can I ask?
I’m 23F, AFAB I have atypical Cystic Fibrosis, I’m pancreatic sufficient, and no CFRD. for the past 2-3 years I’ve been having episodes that seem to mimic postprandial hypoglycemia but my levels are always above 70. I’ve had a few fasting readings that are 67-69 but I don’t have any symptoms then. The symptoms start within an hour or so of eating and my levels will be 70-80 but get to 100ish 3-4 hours after eating, which does make me nervous that something insulin related is going on. My blood pressure is normal but tends to be on the low side as well.
The episodes mostly correspond with the 7-12 days before my period but it’s not uncommon for them to happen outside of that range. The symptoms are: - high heart rate (130-150) even if at rest (resting heart rate when I’m not having an episode is 60-70 range - shaking - sweating - confusion (including slurring/stammering and switching words around) - weird tingly rising feeling inside - mouth tastes like sand/ash regardless of food or drink - pallor - certain edges blur in my vision; like where the walls meet the ceiling or floors - more frequent urination with lower output - chills
There are a few things that don’t happen every time I have an episode but have happened more than once: - Pain behind eyes - intense headache that disappears quickly
I’ve tried adjusting my diet in every way I can think of (and GI and nutrition have suggested) and nothing really seems to have an impact. Drinking sugar during/after an episode does help a bit but not by much.
My CF team seems to kind of be at a loss. All of my bloodwork is normal, weight and PFTs are fine. They’re sending me to a gynecologist because of how the episodes tend to correspond with my period. I am also seeing my PCP to get my heart checked soon.
Meds: Bupropion 450 (had been on this for about 2 years before any of these symptoms started) Levalbuterol (10+ years) Trikafta (3 years ish) Mirena iud, placed fall 2019
Vitamins Women’s one a day 2000 iu d3
Other diagnoses: PTSD/CPTSD (incest/rape trauma related, not sure how relevant that it is but I’m trying to be more detailed than not ) Major depression General anxiety Insomnia (PTSD related)
Psych meds I’ve tried a while ago but didn’t help: - Zoloft (brain fog was way worse) - lexapro (would not stay in my system, to put it politely) - latuda (didn’t do anything)
I edited my post on cysticfibrosis after someone recommended I post here,so this part isn’t over there but —one of the things that’s getting truly untenable for me is brain fog/confusion. Since fall 2020 I’ve struggled a lot with brain fog and since it started with PTSD related events my doctors and I have been assuming it to be a mental health thing but I’m not that sure anymore.
The confusion is definitely worse during the episodes I described (and affects stuff like where I walk around and what I put down where, for example, putting my phone in a fridge or not being able to find my car) But day to day—I’m forgetting words and sentences almost immediately after thinking them. My mental health has improved a lot on Wellbutrin but I can’t tell if it’s improved the brain fog at all or just improved the other symptoms like low energy and the can’t get out of bed heaviness.
My major involves a lot of writing and the same assignments that would take me a few several hour sessions, if that, I haven’t been able to complete. I’ve spent 12 hours on essays (with only meal breaks and things like that) with about a paragraph to show for it — but what I can get out never quite matches what I’m thinking. I almost constantly have the feeling of having a word on the tip of my tongue, especially when trying to write. The things I think of seem to float away before I can keep them in my head long enough to write them down. I was supposed to graduate 3 years ago and I’ve been one full time semester’s worth of classes for these past three years because I just can’t get it done. The majority of my depression symptoms that remain have to do with the stress and feelings behind not having finished school despite being so close. On the whole though, my mental health is in the best place it’s been in pretty much my entire life And the other symptoms have improved drastically.
Last note on the day to day brain fog/confusion: I don’t switch words around when I’m not having an episode—but I have been noticing that 0-5 times a day (I can’t say for sure that it happens daily without fail but it definitely happens several times a week) that I do slur sometimes when talking? The beginnings and ends of words will just sort of smush together . This is a relatively recent development (in the last 8 months maybe?) don’t know if that’s normal person stuttering kind of thing but combined with the writing stuff it irks me more than it normally would)
I feel like a lot of these symptoms could be literally anything so I don’t know how to go about narrowing it down.
I have a check up appointment soon and I wanted to see if anyone has any suggestions for other questions or specific testing requests that I can ask my doctors for to help figure this out.
Thank you!

Hello ! I started taking Zoloft 6 days ago (50mg per day) for generalized anxiety and panic attacks but today I'm wondering if I should continue it or not. I contacted my GP as well as my psychiatrist and they both have different opinions so I have come to seek advice.
I have side effects like insomnia, hot flashes, I feel weak, two days ago I wanted to take a nap but impossible to stay still (I haven't done it since) and since yesterday I have had excessive sweating at the slightest moment as soon as I move around a little. Yesterday I didn't have a temperature but today I had a slight fever several times that comes and goes.
Can you help me with your experience with the medication? Have you ever had these symptoms at the start of treatment? Are they normal?
I read a lot of things with serotonin syndrome, obviously being initially anxious doesn't help me..